[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 38, Number 30 (Monday, July 29, 2002)]
[Pages 1258-1261]
[Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

<R04>
Remarks on Proposed Legislation To Establish the Department of Homeland 
Security

July 26, 2002

    The President. Thank you all for coming. Welcome to the White House. 
Good morning.
    Audience members. Good morning.
    The President. I appreciate so very much being joined here by 
firefighters and police officers and emergency personnel, public 
officials at the local level, the State level--I know we've got some 
Governors here. And I want to thank you all for coming.
    We're on the cusp of doing something right for America. And I 
appreciate the members of my Cabinet who are here. I want to thank the 
Secretary of Defense, the Attorney General, the Secretary of 
Transportation, the head of the Office of National Drug Policy. I 
appreciate Kay James being here. I want to thank Tom Ridge for his hard 
work.
    But most importantly, I want to thank the Members of Congress who 
got up pretty early after not much sleep--[laughter]--for

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your hard work and your care for our country. I see Senator Lieberman, 
who is really working hard in the Senate to cobble together a homeland 
security bill that will work. I appreciate Senator Nickles being here as 
well; Senator Bennett from Utah. Thank you all for coming.
    I really want to thank Chris Shays and Jim Gibbons for coming, and 
Mac Thornberry as well--the three fine Republican Members, along with 
Steve LaTourette. But I also want to thank Ellen Tauscher from the State 
of California. She's been working really hard to make this bill a 
bipartisan bill, where the American people can see both Republicans and 
Democrats working together to do what's right for the country. I really 
want to thank you all for coming.
    I also want to thank the heads of agencies who are here. Jim Loy, 
who's the Under Secretary for Transportation, Chief Operating Officer of 
the Transportation Security Agency--served our country nobly as the--
running the Coast Guard and has now put on another uniform called a coat 
and tie. [Laughter]
    I want to thank Tom Collins, who does head the Coast Guard, Robert 
Bonner, who runs the Customs. I want to thank Jim Ziglar for running the 
INS. I appreciate again my Governor friends, Rowland, King, and Patton 
for coming up today. And I also want to thank my Mayor, Anthony 
Williams, the Mayor of Washington, DC.
    I want to acknowledge Mike Carona of Orange County, California, 
who's with us, the sheriff. Where are you, Mike? There you are, Mike, 
looking right at you. I appreciate you coming. He represents the local 
officials, what we call in Texas the high sheriffs. He's the fellow who 
recently apprehended the killer of Samantha Runnion there in California. 
I want to congratulate you for your good work, helping make your 
community as safe as possible.
    America, we're in our 10th month on the war on terror. And we've got 
a great deal to show for our efforts. We're making progress. And that's 
important for the American people to know. Our country continues to lead 
a mighty coalition of civilized nations, all joined in facing a common 
threat to humanity.
    This is the first war of the 21st century, and we're making 
progress. We and our allies have uncovered terrorist cells all across 
the world. We're disrupting plots. We're doing a pretty good job of 
seizing their assets and cutting off their money. And we've got them on 
the run. See, these are international killers. That's all they are. And 
we're getting them on the run. So far we've captured over 2,000 of the 
terrorists, and just about that many weren't quite as lucky. But there's 
still a lot of them out there.
    And what you need to know as leaders in your communities is that, no 
matter how long it takes, we're going to run them down, one by one, and 
bring them to justice. And we do so not only to defend freedom and 
civilization, itself; we do so to protect the American people, which is 
our highest calling.
    We defeat the threat abroad, and we're doing a pretty good job here 
at home as well. Congress has passed new laws to help. Congress has 
already acted to help our law enforcement agencies investigate and 
prosecute terrorists. Congress responded quickly after September the 
11th in a fashion that made me proud, and I know that made the American 
people proud.
    We've strengthened our aviation security and tightened our borders. 
We've stockpiled medicines to defend against bioterrorism. We've 
developed new technologies to help first-responders identify and react 
to attacks. We've dramatically improved information-sharing amongst our 
intelligence agencies. Governor Tom Ridge has produced the first 
comprehensive plan in our Nation's history to protect America from 
terrorist attack. It's a good piece of work, and I appreciate you and 
your staff, Tom, for working hard on it.
    We're taking urgent measures against clear vulnerabilities, and now 
we must also prepare our Government and our people for the long-term 
vigilance that the new threats will require. I say ``long-term'' because 
this is a determined enemy we face. This isn't just a one-battle war. 
This is a war that will occupy not only our time, but will occupy the 
time of future Presidents and future Members of the United States 
Congress and future agency heads. The number one priority

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of this Government and the future Governments will be to protect the 
American people against terrorist attack.
    And so, therefore, I believe it's important, we must create a 
Department of Homeland Security to prepare America for the permanent 
duty--for the permanent duty--of defending the homeland. And these 
Members here today agree with me. We need this Department for one main 
reason: America needs a group of dedicated professionals who wake up 
each morning with the overriding duty of protecting the American people.
    The agencies in this Department will have other duties--no question 
about it--but no higher responsibility. Protecting American citizens 
from harm is the first priority, and it must be the ruling priority of 
all of our Government.
    The Department of Homeland Security will have four primary tasks. It 
will control our borders and prevent terrorists and weapons from 
entering our country. The way I like to put it is, we need to know who's 
coming in and why they're coming in and what they're bringing in with 
them, and whether or not they're leaving when they say they're going to 
leave.
    Secondly, the new Department will work with our incredibly brave and 
dedicated first-responders, many of--the representatives of whom are on 
the stage with me today. We need to be able to respond quickly and 
effectively to emergencies. We need good cooperation between the Federal 
Government, the State governments, and the local governments.
    We bring the best scientists together to develop technologies that 
will detect biological, chemical, and nuclear weapons, and to discover 
drugs and treatments to protect our citizens. We need to harness the 
great genius of the American people to make sure that it's focused on 
the true threat of the 21st century.
    And for the first time, this new Department will merge under one 
roof the capability to identify and assess threats to the homeland, to 
map those threats against vulnerabilities, and then to act to secure 
America. The Department of Homeland Security will draw on the knowledge 
and experience of every sector in America. We'll work in a collaborative 
way with the people who care about America, and that's the American 
leadership and the American people, at all levels of government.
    This administration is working with Congress to forge a bipartisan 
bill, and I want to appreciate the members of both parties for coming 
this morning. I believe we're making good progress. And of course, being 
the modest fellow that I am, I'm willing to recognize a good idea even 
if it comes from Congress. [Laughter] Yet, it's important to understand 
this: I'm not going to accept legislation that limits or weakens the 
President's well-established authorities--authorities to exempt parts of 
Government from Federal labor-management relations statute--when it 
serves our national interest.
    Every President since Jimmy Carter has used this statutory 
authority, and a time of war is the wrong time to weaken the President's 
ability to protect the American people. And as Congress debates the 
issue of how to set up this Department, I'm confident they're going to 
look to me to say, ``Well, is it being done right,'' after they got the 
bill passed. And therefore, it is important that we have the managerial 
flexibility to get the job done right. We can't be--we can't be 
micromanaged. We ought to say, ``Let's make sure authority and 
responsibility are aligned so they can more adequately protect the 
homeland.''
    Now, look, I fully understand the concerns of some of the unions 
here in Washington. Somehow, they believe that this is an attempt by the 
administration to undermine the basic rights of workers. I reject that, 
as strongly as I can state it. I have great respect for the Federal 
employees. I travel the country as one of them, talking about how we 
need to work together to protect the homeland. I think of the times I've 
gone to Coast Guard cutters or gone to ports of authority or gone to our 
labs or seen our first-responders, many of whom happen to be a member of 
the union. Never have I said, ``Show me your card.'' I've always said, 
``Thanks for being a proud American and for working hard for the 
American people.''

[[Page 1261]]

    So the notion of flexibility will in no way undermine the basic 
rights of Federal workers. Workers will retain whistle-blower 
protection, collective bargaining rights, and protection against 
unlawful discrimination. The new Secretary must have the freedom to get 
the right people in the right job at the right time and to hold them 
accountable. He needs the ability to move money and resources quickly in 
response to new threats, without all kinds of bureaucratic rules and 
obstacles. And when we face unprecedented threats, like we're facing, we 
cannot have business as usual.
    I am--I appreciate the work of Senator Lieberman. He's working hard. 
I am concerned, however, the way the committee has passed out the 
homeland security bill. The bill doesn't have enough managerial 
flexibility, as far as I'm concerned. I look forward to working with the 
Senator and the Republican Members to get the bill right, to make sure 
that when we look back at what we've done, we will have left behind a 
legacy, a legacy that will allow future Senators and future Members of 
the House and a future President to say, ``I can better protect the 
homeland, thanks to what was done in the year 2002.''
    It's very interesting that Harry Truman took on the same task. And 
as I understand, it was on this day 55 * years ago that he signed the 
National Security Act of 1947. It was an act that helped win the cold 
war by consolidating the Navy and the Army and the newly independent Air 
Force into what was interestingly called the National Military 
Establishment. [Laughter] It's now known as the Department of Defense. 
[Laughter]
    * White House correction.
    But he thought boldly, and so did the Members of Congress. They 
recognized that after World War II, we were going to enter into a new 
era. And therefore they adjusted the sights of the Federal Government. 
That's what has happened now. History has called us into action. We're 
entering a new era, and we must adjust our sights, and we must respond.
    And I know the Members here, and I know the Members on the floor 
that are working hard. And I'm confident we will respond in a way that 
will make America proud--America proud of our efforts to come together 
but, more importantly, America more secure in the knowledge that we're 
doing everything we can to protect the homeland.
    Thank you all for coming. May God bless your work, and may God bless 
America.

Note: The President spoke at 8:44 a.m. in Presidential Hall in the 
Dwight D. Eisenhower Executive Office Building. In his remarks, he 
referred to Gov. John G. Rowland of Connecticut; Gov. Angus S. King, 
Jr., of Maine; Gov. Paul E. Patton of Kentucky; Michael S. Carona, 
sheriff-coroner, Orange County, CA; and Alejandro Avila, who is accused 
of the July 16 murder of 5-year-old Samantha Runnion in Stanton, CA.