House of Representatives Passes Homeland Security
After World War II, the United States found itself involved in a Cold War that presented new challenges to its security-new challenges that required new thinking if our great Nation was to remain secure. President Truman and Congress worked together to perform a major overhaul of the federal government’s defense and intelligence functions, putting into place much of the national security apparatus in existence today. Now, as we approach the one-year mark since September 11, new challenges to our national security again present themselves, and these new challenges once again require new thinking.
On July 26, 2002, I was proud to join with 295 of my colleagues in the House of Representatives in passing the Homeland Security Act (H.R. 5005). This critical legislation would establish a new cabinet-level Department of Homeland Security.
Importantly, H.R. 5005 would not create more layers of bureaucracy or in any way add to the size of government. Quite the opposite, H.R. 5005 would consolidate 22 different federal agencies into one Department, re-organizing and improving the efficiency of the current counter-terrorism functions of the federal government. The President would have unprecedented flexibility in setting personnel policies in the new Department and-recognizing that our enemies do not have to go through an annual appropriations process to determine how best to use their resources-would be allowed to shift up to 2% of the Department’s funding between agencies.
The new Department of Homeland Security (DHS) would consist of four primary areas.
Border and Transportation Security
This division of the DHS-consisting primarily of the Coast Guard, Customs Service, and the new Transportation Security Administration-would provide a long-overdue integration of the federal government’s efforts at controlling access to the Nation’s 7,500 miles of border with Mexico and Canada and 95,000 miles of shoreline. H.R. 5005 would also abolish the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), spinning its immigration enforcement functions off to the DHS, and put the DHS in charge of policy for issuing visas.
Emergency Preparedness and Response
The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) would be the backbone of this division of the DHS, which would also include certain defense and health-related agencies. The division would consolidate and coordinate emergency planning, manage federal grants to local “first responders,” stockpile drugs and vaccines, and take over the federal government’s Nuclear Response Incident Team whenever a terrorist threat occurs.
Science and Technology
This division of the DHS would work to develop countermeasures to the threat of weapons of mass destruction.
Information Analysis and Infrastructure Protection
The failure of intelligence agencies and law enforcement to share vital information that may have shed more light on the terrorist’s planned attacks of September 11 highlights the importance of a single agency in charge of facilitating communication between the CIA, FBI, National Security Administration and other agencies. This division of the DHS would include detainees from these other agencies, would collect and analyze information regarding terrorist operations, would communicate terrorist threats to local law enforcement and the public, and would act proactively to identify vulnerabilities to our Nation’s infrastructure.
The threat of terrorism to our Nation’s security is every bit as real and dangerous today as the threat of communism was during the Truman administration. It requires an equal response. H.R. 5005 is now pending consideration in the Senate. Although final passage of H.R. 5005 cannot guarantee a terrorist attack never again occurs on our soil, it would substantially reduce the chances of such an attack while also improving our ability to respond.
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