NATA
President James Coyne (right) criticized Senator Bill Nelson's
(D-FL, 2nd picture, right) decision to re-introduce legislation
that would expand existing background-check requirements to
virtually any foreign pilot trained by a U.S. flight school.
The measure is similar to legislation that was approved by the U.S.
Senate last fall.
Currently, only flight training organizations providing
instruction in aircraft weighing 12,500 pounds or more are required
to give notice to the Department of Justice (DOJ) before they may
train a foreign national per the Aviation Transportation Security
Act, signed into law in late 2001. Since passage of this
legislation, NATA has been pressing the DOJ to implement a system
to provide the required notifications. However, the DOJ has
yet to implement this system for students not already qualified in
larger aircraft, effectively preventing U.S.-based businesses from
training many foreign nationals.
The legislation introduced today by Sen. Nelson removes the
12,500 pound threshold, effectively requiring all flight-training
providers to give notification to the DOJ of their intent to train
a foreign national on any aircraft of any size. The only
exception is for existing pilots that already possess an aircraft
type rating.
"NATA and others within the industry have spent countless hours
and resources trying to convince the DOJ to implement the
notification process to no avail," Coyne stated. "It boggles
the mind that, to complicate matters more, Senator Nelson would
remove the weight limitation so that U.S. businesses are prevented
from training foreign students.
"The fact remains that the DOJ has to this point
only accepted and implemented the provisions in law that they deem
important," Coyne stated. "They have ignored the law by not
implementing this approval process and will likely only adhere to
the language removing the weight limitation without taking action
to fully implement the notification process.
"As we have stated in the past, imposing new requirements on the
flight training industry is not the appropriate response to
security concerns about foreign nationals. These issues are
better addressed by immigration controls that apply to all foreign
nationals seeking admission to the United States as students,
regardless of whether a foreigner studies aviation, medicine or
nuclear science.
"NATA will continue to vehemently oppose this legislation as it
will only force flight schools to suffer additional financial
hardships while awaiting activation of a DOJ notification process
that is so far non-existent."