[Congressional Record Volume 148, Number 30 (Friday, March 15, 2002)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1974-S1976]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

      By Mr. GREGG:
  S. 2020. A bill to establish the Department of National Border 
Security; to the Committee on Governmental Affairs.
  Mr. GREGG. Madam President, I rise today to introduce a piece of 
legislation which tries to address one of the oppressive problems we 
have in confronting the issues of terrorism in our country as we move 
forward; that is, checking our borders and making sure we have control 
over the people who are coming into our country and how they can come 
into our country.
  As a nation, we have traditionally had very open borders, which is 
something in which we take great pride. Unfortunately, people who wish 
to cause us harm, people who wish to kill Americans, people who wish to 
kill Americans by the thousands, and who have stated that their sole 
purpose in life is to kill Americans, have taken advantage of that 
openness. Certainly we saw on September 11 the situation that occurred.
  We have 100,000 miles of coastline, 2,000 miles of land border with 
Mexico, and 4,000 miles of land border with Canada. Last year, we had 
127 million automobiles come across those borders, 11 million trucks, 2 
million railcars, and 1 million commercial airplanes. More than 500 
million people were admitted to the United States last year. You can 
see that our borders are aggressively used.
  There is great international commerce, which there should be, and we 
want to continue that. But one of the problems we have is that the 
agencies responsible for managing our borders have been disoriented, 
dysfunctional, spread about, and uncoordinated. We have seen some 
really horrendous instances of mismanagement. We have also seen 
instances that have occurred as a result of failure of communication. 
We have seen failures that have

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occurred as a result of turf fights between different agencies. We have 
seen agencies which have found their purpose to be unfocused in their 
execution of the protection of the borders.
  The most recent and startling and almost unbelievable example, of 
course, was the delivery of visas to a Florida flight school just this 
week for two people who committed the atrocities in New York. America 
is outraged. Clearly, the President was shocked. All of us were shocked 
that that would happen. That was a total example of an incredible 
breakdown in the systems which are managing our borders; that is, the 
INS.
  What I propose today is to try to get some coherence into this 
effort, to bring together the agencies which are responsible to protect 
our borders, to put them all under one management structure, and to 
create a new Cabinet-level Department, which would be called the 
``Department of National Border Security.''
  Under this Department, we would take the various agencies which have 
responsibility for managing our borders and protecting our Nation and 
put them into this Department so that they would be communicating with 
each other and have a streamlined management and command process--
something which they do not have today.
  Included in this Department would be, for example, the U.S. Customs 
Service, the U.S. Coast Guard, large elements of the Immigration and 
Naturalization Service, including, of course, Border Patrol, and 
elements of the DEA which have responsibility for border security in 
the area of drugs, and the Agriculture Quarantine Inspection Program, 
which obviously controls food that comes into the country.
  The result of putting all these groups together in one management 
structure will be that there will be, hopefully, a coordinated approach 
to managing our borders. It doesn't guarantee it. But it is very clear 
that the system we have today, because of the lack of coordination, 
because of the overlapping authority, because of the turf issues, and 
because of the lack of centralized directional command is not working.

  I happen to be ranking on a committee which has specific jurisdiction 
over funding for the Justice Department and the State Department and 
which has a large percentage of responsibility for our border 
activities, especially the INS. I can tell you from my own experience 
as the ranking member, and formerly as chairman, of that Subcommittee 
on Commerce, Justice, State, and the Judiciary of the Appropriations 
Committee, that unless we get these parties together functioning under 
one umbrella of leadership, we are simply not going to get our borders 
under control.
  Is this the full answer to the problem--the reorganizing of these 
Departments? Absolutely not. There also has to be the intention on the 
part of the parties who are serving these Departments to accomplish the 
goal. There has to be leadership on the part of the administration to 
accomplish the goal of border security and making it more efficient.
  But as a practical matter, without this first step I personally do 
not think we are ever going to get the type of coordination that is 
required in order for leadership in this area to be effective.
  What we have today in this arena is that these various Departments 
are spread across the Government. On top of it, we have each reporting 
to a separate Department Secretary. On top of that, we have the 
Homeland Security Director, of course. Overseeing all of it, we have 
the President. As a result, even though everybody wants to go in the 
same direction, it is like six or seven horses pulling in opposite 
directions. By bringing them all under the same tent, we will have a 
centralized activity.
  We should not, for example, be housing the Customs Service in one 
building, the Border Patrol in another building, the DEA in another 
building, and have them not generally communicating with each other at 
a border crossing point; or have the resources of one agency be in 
surplus at one border crossing point while the resources of another 
agency are strapped at the same crossing point and not having them be 
able to work together to try to more effectively manage those resources 
so that we get the most efficient use out of the people, the parties, 
and the items involved.
  All of that problem which exists today with tremendous 
dysfunctionalism between these various agencies as they try to relate 
to each other, all of that problem is a function of the fact that they 
all report up separate stovepipes, and the only generally coordinating 
event that occurs comes from the President and the new Homeland 
Security Director. But that person, Governor Ridge, has no legislative 
authority and no budget authority. Therefore, as a practical matter, 
other than having the good will of the President behind him, he does 
not have a whole lot of authority.

  So when you have one Department over here--let's say, Treasury, with 
Customs--and one Department over here--let's say, INS, with the Border 
Patrol, and Justice heading that Department up--you tend to have people 
who are functioning independent of each other, who, although they may 
have the good intentions to communicate with each other, really do not 
and do not work effectively as a result of that. We do not get the best 
responsiveness.
  So it is just logic, it is just good governance, and, for that 
matter, good management--which I recognize maybe is anathema to 
government--that all the people who are responsible for one function of 
the Government, which is protecting our borders, be functioning under 
the same leadership structure and, therefore, reading off of the same 
page. That is what this new Department will create.
  This new Cabinet level Department will set up a structure where 
everybody who is responsible for the border will report to a single 
Cabinet leader and, as a result, will be functioning off the same page 
relative to the way the border is managed. Hopefully, then we will be 
getting the most efficient and effective use of those people who are 
making a genuinely good effort today but a lot of which is involving 
just the spinning of wheels because of the lack of coordination. Then 
we will get coordination into that good effort and, as a result, get 
better border protection.
  This is a thought which is not necessarily original to me. However, 
it is obvious to me. As the ranking member and former chairman of the 
committee which has jurisdiction over a chunk of this area of 
responsibility, it is something I believe we need to do. I believe 
there are other groups who have looked at the border who have agreed 
with this approach.
  The Third Annual Report to the President and the Congress of the 
Advisory Panel to Assess Domestic Response Capabilities for Terrorism 
Involving Weapons of Mass Destruction, which essentially was Governor 
Gilmore's commission, came to the same conclusion: that there had to be 
a better centralization. They did not do it in the terms of forming a 
new Department, but they came to the same substantive conclusion that 
there had to be a better coordination, collection, and organization of 
the information coming into the country and of the tracking of people 
coming into the country.
  The Hart-Rudman Commission, Roadmap to National Security, Imperative 
for Change, which reported on February 15, came to the exact conclusion 
that I am proposing in the bill:

       Steps must be taken to strengthen the three individual 
     organizations themselves.

  They were talking here about Customs, Border Patrol, and the Coast 
Guard.

       We recommend the creation of an independent Homeland 
     Security Agency with responsibility for planning, 
     coordinating, and integrating various U.S. Government 
     activities involving homeland security.

  This does not go completely to that point, but it goes a long way in 
the area of border activity in that it creates a Centralized Border 
Center. They also suggested that that group, which they called the 
Homeland Security Agency, should include the Coast Guard, the Customs, 
the Border Patrol, and it should have Cabinet level operational effect.
  Even the White House has acknowledged there is a lack of coordination 
in this area. It was interesting, in relation to that, Governor Ridge 
made the statement: If you asked me today who is responsible for the 
border, I would say to you, in response, what part of the border? The 
borders remain disturbingly vulnerable to terrorism.

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 There is no direct line of accountability for agencies charged with 
protecting them.
  So I think Governor Ridge clearly sees the problem as I see it, which 
is that we do not have a coordinated central management point for all 
border crossing activity. It makes no sense to have Customs in 
Treasury, INS in Justice and DEA in Justice, and the Coast Guard over 
in Transportation with no coordinated central management point for all 
border crossing activity. When these agencies serve to protect the 
border as their primary responsibility, and with the threat of 
terrorism that we confront today, they should clearly be together 
managing the issue of protecting our border as a coordinated unit under 
a Cabinet level Secretary.
  That is what the legislation which I am introducing today does.
                                 ______