[Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents Volume 38, Number 48 (Monday, December 2, 2002)]
[Pages 2090-2092]
[Online from the Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]

<R04>
Remarks on Signing the Homeland Security Act of 2002

November 25, 2002

    Thanks for coming. Thanks for the warm welcome, and welcome to the 
White House.
    Today we are taking historic action to defend the United States and 
protect our citizens against the dangers of a new era. With my 
signature, this act of Congress will create a new Department of Homeland 
Security, ensuring that our efforts to defend this country are 
comprehensive and united.
    The new Department will analyze threats, will guard our borders and 
airports, protect our critical infrastructure, and coordinate the 
response of our Nation to future emergencies. The Department of Homeland 
Security will focus the full resources of the American Government on the 
safety of the American people. This essential reform was carefully 
considered by Congress and enacted with strong bipartisan majorities.
    I want to thank Tom Ridge, the Homeland Security Adviser, for his 
hard work on this initiative. I want to thank all the members of my 
Cabinet who are here for their work. I want to thank the Members of 
Congress who are with us today, particularly those Members of Congress 
who were essential to the passage, many of whom stand up here on the 
stage with me. One Member not with us is our mutual friend from Texas, 
Phil Gramm. I appreciate his hard work. I thank the work of Senator Fred 
Thompson and Senator Joe Lieberman. I appreciate Zell Miller and Don 
Nickles' hard work as well. We've got a lot of Members from the House 
here, and I want to thank you all for coming. I particularly want to pay 
homage to Dick Armey, who shepherded the bill to the floor of the House 
of Representatives. I'll miss him. I'm not so sure everybody will. 
[Laughter] But I appreciate your time here. I thank Tom DeLay for making 
sure the bill got passed. I thank Rob Portman for his hard work. And I 
want to thank Ellen Tauscher as well for her leadership on this issue.
    I appreciate Kay James of the Office of Personnel Management, who 
worked so hard to make sure this effort was understood by everybody in 
our Government. And I want to thank the other administration officials 
who are here, many of whom are going to be responsible for seeing to it 
this new Department functions well.
    I want to thank all the local and State officials who are here with 
us today--I see Governors and county judges, mayors--for coming. My own 
mayor, the Mayor of Washington, DC, I appreciate you coming, Mr. Mayor. 
I want to thank the local and State law enforcement officials who are 
here, the chiefs of police and fire chiefs who are with us today. I see 
the chief of my city now is here as well. Thank you, Mr. Chief, for 
coming.
    I want to thank the union representatives who are here. We look 
forward to working with you to make sure that your people are treated 
fairly in this new Department. I want to thank the Federal workers who 
are here. You're charged with being on the front line of protecting 
America. I understand your job. We look forward to working with you to 
make sure you get your job done. I want to thank the President's 
Homeland Security Advisory Council as well, and thank you all for 
coming.
    From the morning of September the 11th, 2001, to this hour, America 
has been engaged in an unprecedented effort to defend our freedom and 
our security. We're fighting a war against terror with all our 
resources, and we're determined to win.
    With the help of many nations, with the help of 90 nations, we're 
tracking terrorist activity; we're freezing terrorist finances; we're 
disrupting terrorist plots; we're shutting down terrorist camps; we're 
on the hunt one person at a time. Many terrorists are now being 
interrogated. Many terrorists have been killed. We've liberated a 
country.
    We recognize our greatest security is found in the relentless 
pursuit of these coldblooded killers. Yet, because terrorists are 
targeting America, the front of the new war is here in America. Our life 
changed and changed in dramatic fashion on September the 11th, 2001.
    In the last 14 months, every level of our Government has taken steps 
to be better prepared against a terrorist attack. We understand the 
nature of the enemy. We understand they hate us because of what we love. 
We're doing everything we can to enhance security at our airports and 
powerplants and

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border crossings. We've deployed detection equipment to look for weapons 
of mass destruction. We've given law enforcement better tools to detect 
and disrupt terrorist cells which might be hiding in our own country.
    And through separate legislation I signed earlier today, we will 
strengthen security at our Nation's 361 seaports, adding port security 
agents, requiring ships to provide more information about the cargo, 
crew, and passengers they carry. And I want to thank the Members of 
Congress for working hard on this important piece of legislation as 
well.
    The Homeland Security Act of 2002 takes the next critical steps in 
defending our country. The continuing threat of terrorism, the threat of 
mass murder on our own soil, will be met with a unified, effective 
response. Dozens of agencies charged with homeland security will now be 
located within one Cabinet Department with the mandate and legal 
authority to protect our people. America will be better able to respond 
to any future attacks, to reduce our vulnerability and, most important, 
prevent the terrorists from taking innocent American lives.
    The Department of Homeland Security will have nearly 170,000 
employees, dedicated professionals who will wake up each morning with 
the overriding duty of protecting their fellow citizens. As Federal 
workers, they have rights, and those rights will be fully protected. And 
I'm grateful that the Congress listened to my concerns and retained the 
authority of the President to put the right people in the right place at 
the right time in the defense of our country.
    I've great confidence in the men and women who will serve in this 
Department and in the man I've asked to lead it. As I prepare to sign 
this bill into law, I am pleased to announce that I will nominate 
Governor Tom Ridge as our Nation's first Secretary of Homeland Security. 
Americans know Tom as an experienced public servant and as the leader of 
our homeland security efforts since last year. Tom accepted that 
assignment in urgent circumstances, resigning as the Governor of 
Pennsylvania to organize the White House Office of Homeland Security and 
to develop a comprehensive strategy to protect the American people. He's 
done a superb job. He's the right man for this new and great 
responsibility.
    We're going to put together a fine team to work with Tom. The 
Secretary of the Navy, Gordon England, will be nominated for the post of 
Deputy Secretary. And Asa Hutchinson of Arkansas, now the Administrator 
of the Drug Enforcement Administration, will be nominated to serve as 
Under Secretary for Border and Transportation Security.
    The Secretary-designate and his team have an immense task ahead of 
them. Setting up the Department of Homeland Security will involve the 
most extensive reorganization of the Federal Government since Harry 
Truman signed the National Security Act. To succeed in their mission, 
leaders of the new Department must change the culture of many diverse 
agencies, directing all of them toward the principal objective of 
protecting the American people. The effort will take time and focus and 
steady resolve. It will also require full support from both the 
administration and the Congress. Adjustments will be needed along the 
way. Yet this is pressing business, and the hard work of building a new 
Department begins today.
    When the Department of Homeland Security is fully operational, it 
will enhance the safety of our people in very practical ways. First, 
this new Department will analyze intelligence information on terror 
threats collected by the CIA, the FBI, the National Security Agency, and 
others. The Department will match this intelligence against the Nation's 
vulnerabilities and work with other agencies and the private sector and 
State and local governments to harden America's defenses against terror.
    Second, the Department will gather and focus all our efforts to face 
the challenge of cyberterrorism and the even worse danger of nuclear, 
chemical, and biological terrorism. This Department will be charged with 
encouraging research on new technologies that can detect these threats 
in time to prevent an attack.
    Third, State and local governments will be able to turn for help and 
information to one Federal domestic security agency, instead of more 
than 20 agencies that currently divide these responsibilities. This will 
help our local

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governments work in concert with the Federal Government for the sake of 
all the people of America.
    Fourth, the new Department will bring together the agencies 
responsible for border, coastline, and transportation security. There 
will be a coordinated effort to safeguard our transportation systems and 
to secure the border so that we're better able to protect our citizens 
and welcome our friends.
    Fifth, the Department will work with State and local officials to 
prepare our response to any future terrorist attack that may come. We 
have found that the first hours and even the first minutes after the 
attack can be crucial in saving lives, and our first-responders need the 
carefully planned and drilled strategies that will make their work 
effective.
    The Department of Homeland Security will also end a great deal of 
duplication and overlapping responsibilities. Our objective is to spend 
less on administrators in offices and more on working agents in the 
field, less on overhead and more on protecting our neighborhoods and 
borders and waters and skies from terrorists.
    With a vast nation to defend, we can neither predict nor prevent 
every conceivable attack. And in a free and open society, no Department 
of Government can completely guarantee our safety against ruthless 
killers who move and plot in shadows. Yet our Government will take every 
possible measure to safeguard our country and our people.
    We're fighting a new kind of war against determined enemies. And 
public servants long into the future will bear the responsibility to 
defend Americans against terror. This administration and this Congress 
have the duty of putting that system into place. We will fulfill that 
duty. With the Homeland Security Act, we're doing everything we can to 
protect America. We're showing the resolve of this great Nation to 
defend our freedom, our security, and our way of life.
    It's now my privilege to sign the Homeland Security Act of 2002.

Note: The President spoke at 1:30 p.m. in the East Room at the White 
House. In his remarks, he referred to District of Columbia Mayor Anthony 
A. Williams and Metropolitan Police Chief Charles H. Ramsey. H.R. 5005, 
approved November 25, was assigned Public Law No. 107-296.