Security Expert Warns of Gaps in Homeland Defenses

Former CIA operative Charles Faddis provides U.S. News & World Report with six potential domestic targets that he says are particularly vulnerable to a catastrophic terrorist attack:

• Military bases
• Rail and metro systems
• Chemical plants
• Liquid Natural Gas
• Dams
• Bio labs

Now a private consultant and author of Willful Neglect: The Dangerous Illusion of Homeland Security, Faddis says an attack on passenger rail is his worse fear. While Faddis acknowledges that DHS is correct that we can't protect everything, authorities shouldn't use that slogan as a way to dismiss all criticism of the status quo.

We need to do a better job securing the places that have a potential to produce mass casualties. That should be a priority. Is that going to stop terrorists from driving a truck bomb into a McDonald's? No. But it should stop them from driving that truck bomb into a chemical plant and killing thousands.

The System Didn't Work, But The Passengers Did

Open borders advocate Janet Napolitano, the hapless Homeland Security Secretary, has back-pedaled on her claim that the system worked. Instead (probably after an attitude adjustment from White House spin doctors), she now says the system failed miserably:

Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano conceded Monday that the aviation security system failed when a young man on a watch list with a U.S. visa in his pocket and a powerful explosive hidden on his body was allowed to board a flight from Amsterdam to Detroit.

The Obama administration has ordered investigations into the two areas of aviation security — how travelers are placed on watch lists and how passengers are screened — as critics questioned how the 23-year-old Nigerian man charged in the airliner attack was allowed to board the Dec. 25 flight.

A day after saying the system worked, Napolitano backtracked, saying her words had been taken out of context.

Here's the perhaps soon-to-be-former DHS secretary doing damage control on the Today show:

Last year, Ed Rendell, the governor of Pennsylvania, famously said (and then retracted) that Napolitano would be perfect for the job "because for that job, you have to have no life. Janet has no family. Perfect. She can devote, literally, 19-20 hours a day to it." It appears, however, that the governor was incorrect.

ABC: Feds Leaked How-To Manual For Getting Past Airport Screeners

Please don't let this shake your faith in those in charge of security procedures at America's airport checkpoints:

In a massive security breach, the Transportation Security Agency (TSA) inadvertently posted online its entire airport screening procedures manual, including some of the most closely guarded secrets regarding special rules for diplomats and CIA and law enforcement officers.

The most sensitive parts of the 93-page Standard Operation Procedures were apparently redacted in a way that computer savvy individuals easily overcame.

The document shows sample CIA, Congressional and law enforcement credentials which experts say would make it easy for terrorists to duplicate.

The improperly redacted areas describe that only 20 percent of checked bags are to be hand searched for explosives and reveals in detail the limitations of x-ray screening machines.

"This is an appalling and astounding breach of security that terrorists could easily exploit," said Clark Kent Ervin, the former inspector general at the Department of Homeland Security. "The TSA should immediately convene an internal investigation and discipline those responsible."

Just in time for the holiday travel season. And this is the same government that, by the way, wants to take over the medical delivery system, including gaining control of individual medical records. Wired.com has more on the TSA security breach.

DHS Chief Warns Of Terrorist Sympathizers

Open borders advocate Janet Napolitano is suddenly worried about man-caused disasters:

Al-Qaeda followers are inside the United States and would like to attack targets here and in other countries, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said Wednesday night.

The secretary's comments were her bluntest assessment yet of terror threats within the country, and they came one day after President Obama, in announcing his decision to send 30,000 additional U.S. troops to Afghanistan, warned that extremists have been "sent here from the border region of Afghanistan and Pakistan to commit more acts of terror."

..."The fact is that home-based terrorism is here. And like violent extremism abroad, it is now part of the threat picture that we must confront," Napolitano said. "Individuals sympathetic to al-Qaeda and its affiliates, as well as those inspired by their ideology, are present in the U.S., and would like to attack the homeland or plot overseas attacks against our interests abroad."

Napolitano has also conceded that DHS will flunk a 2012 deadline for scanning incoming ship cargo for nukes.

Park Service Bearish on Border Security

Forest Rangers vs. Border Patrol on border enforcement, according to the Washington Times:

In the battle on the U.S.-Mexico border, the fight against illegal immigration often loses out to environmental laws that have blocked construction of parts of the "virtual fence" and that threaten to create places where agents can't easily track illegal immigrants.

Documents obtained by Rep. Rob Bishop and shared with The Washington Times show National Park Service staffers have tried to stop the U.S. Border Patrol from placing some towers associated with the virtual fence, known as the Secure Border Initiative or SBInet, on wilderness lands in parks along the border.

In a remarkably candid letter to members of Congress, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said her department could have to delay pursuits of illegal immigrants while waiting for horses to be brought in so agents don't trample protected lands, and warns that illegal immigrants will increasingly make use of remote, protected areas to avoid being caught.

The documents also show the Interior Department has charged the Homeland Security Department $10 million over the past two years as a "mitigation" penalty to pay for damage to public lands that agencies say has been caused by Border Patrol agents chasing illegal immigrants.

DHS Aims To Implement Biometric Exit System For Foreign Nationals

The Washington Post says DHS has a plan--subject to White House approval--for identifying foreign visitors who fly out of the U.S. by air:

The Department of Homeland Security is finalizing a proposal to collect fingerprints or eye scans from all foreign travelers at U.S. airports as they leave the country, officials said, a costly screening program that airlines have opposed.

The plan, which would take effect within two years, would collect fingerprints at airport security checkpoints, departure gates or terminal kiosks, allowing the government to track when roughly 35 million foreign visitors a year leave the country and who might be overstaying their visas, DHS officials said. The department plans to send the proposal to the White House as soon as next month for review and inclusion in President Obama's next budget.

Some experts and former government officials are skeptical. In a concession to industry, DHS said it probably will drop plans to require airlines to pay for the bulk of the program and is looking to cut costs, which could reach $1 billion to $2 billion over a decade, largely to be paid by taxpayers or foreign travelers. In addition, the program would not operate for now at land borders, where 80 percent of noncitizens enter and leave the country, because fingerprinting travelers there could cost billions more and significantly delay commerce.

High Court Wants Input From Napolitano On Arizona Employment Law

Awkward! DHS Secretary Napolitano may be put on the hot seat by the U.S. Supreme Court, although it's far from clear if she will actually respond to the court's request for information:

A simple query from the Supreme Court is forcing the Obama administration to wrestle with the limits of states’ authority to enforce immigration laws — and also is throwing an uncomfortable spotlight on Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano.

On Monday, the justices asked the Justice Department to provide its views on Arizona’s attempt to force employers to verify the immigration status of potential employees. The law being challenged in the cases was signed by Napolitano in 2007, when she was governor of Arizona.

Napolitano has stated that she believes the law is constitutional, but business groups and immigration reform advocates generally in President Barack Obama’s camp are asking the Supreme Court to strike down the statute.

...A federal appeals court rejected the legal challenges to the Arizona law. The Supreme Court has not said that it will take the case but wants the administration’s view on whether further review is warranted.

Privacy Backers Want Probe of DHS Privacy Officer

Electronic privacy supporters from the left and the right join to demand answers from the federal office headed by Mary Ellen Callahan, Homeland Security's privacy mogul:

Privacy advocates have asked lawmakers to investigate the Department of Homeland Security office in charge of protecting Americans' privacy, saying it has shown "an extraordinary disregard" for its duty.

In a letter sent Friday to the House Homeland Security Committee, 21 organizations and seven people belonging to the Privacy Coalition say the department's chief privacy officer has seen its role as enabling, rather than curbing, government surveillance and intelligence programs.

"The job of Chief Privacy Officer is not to provide public relations for the Department of Homeland Security," stated the coalition letter, whose signers included the American Civil Liberties Union, Gun Owners of America, former congressman Robert L. Barr Jr. (R-Ga.) and libertarians inspired by Rep. Ron Paul (R-Tex.), a former presidential candidate. The Electronic Privacy Information Center, a public interest group in Washington, organized the coalition.

Separately, the aforementioned Mary Ellen Callahan reached an agreement with the EU "on a set of common principles that unite our approaches to protecting personal data when exchanging information for law enforcement and security purposes." According to Callahan, the next step is "a binding international EU-U.S. agreement based on these common principles to facilitate further cooperation while ensuring the availability of full protection for our citizens."

Homeland Security Can't Trace Visa Holdovers

Even the New York Times, despite its absolutist open-borders philosophy, thinks this is bad:

Eight years after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks and despite repeated mandates from Congress, the United States still has no reliable system for verifying that foreign visitors have left the country.

New concern was focused on that security loophole last week, when Hosam Maher Husein Smadi, a 19-year-old Jordanian who had overstayed his tourist visa, was accused in court of plotting to blow up a Dallas skyscraper.

Last year alone, 2.9 million foreign visitors on temporary visas like Mr. Smadi’s checked in to the country but never officially checked out, immigration officials said. While officials say they have no way to confirm it, they suspect that several hundred thousand of them overstayed their visas.

Over all, the officials said, about 40 percent of the estimated 11 million illegal immigrants in the United States came on legal visas and overstayed.

Mr. Smadi’s case has brought renewed calls from both parties in Congress for Department of Homeland Security officials to complete a universal electronic exit monitoring system.

DHS also has problems closer to home--the vulnerability of its own website to a cyberattack:

The Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) public-facing websites present a highly accessible point of entry and attack to its information resources, according to an Office of Inspector General report released last Thursday.

The report titled Vulnerabilities Highlight the Need for More Effective Web Security Management evaluated nine of DHS’ most frequently visited public-facing websites to determine whether DHS has implemented effective security controls and practices, examining the implementation of DHS’ required configuration settings and patch management practices.

The report was heavily redacted in order not to divulge details that could help would be malicious intruders.

Sheriff Joe: Deputies Will Still Make Illegal Immigration Busts

Despite the new 287(g) program, "America's Sheriff" is not backing down from enforcing immigration law in Maricopa County. Since the feds (and their friends in the ACLU and elsewhere) appear intent on watering down border enforcement, expect more investigations and lawsuits thrown in the sheriff's path.

Department of Homeland Security officials have signed new agreements authorizing nearly 70 state and local law enforcement agencies, including a contentious Arizona sheriff, to help arrest and deport illegal immigrants charged with violent or criminal acts.

Under the new agreements, Sheriff Joe Arpaio of Maricopa County, Ariz., who has come under fire for his immigration sweeps, will continue to work with federal authorities when illegal immigrants are booked into his jail. But Sheriff Arpaio's office will not be given the power to arrest such people, as it previously had, federal officials said.

As the new agreements were announced, Sheriff Arpaio launched a crime and immigration sweep Friday in northwestern metro Phoenix, according to the Associated Press.

The sheriff told the AP that he can still arrest immigrants under a state smuggling law and a federal law that gives all local police agencies more limited power to detain suspected illegal immigrants.

"It doesn't bother me, because we are going to do the same thing," Sheriff Arpaio said. "I am the elected sheriff. I don't take orders from the federal government."

Writing at NationalReviewOnline, immigration scholar Heather MacDonald observes that..

Though this tightening of 287(g) authority comes under the Obama administration, the Bush administration was no fan of the statute, either, and resisted allowing sheriff’s deputies to enforce immigration law on the streets against gangbangers. The trend is clear. When amnesty finally rolls around, among those millions of illegals allowed to jump the queue ahead of people who intend to be legal immigrants will be hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of criminals whose residency in the U.S. has been carefully protected to guarantee their ability to take advantage of the inevitable amnesty.

New Video: Recognizing Terrorism Warning Signs

With Department of Homeland Security funding, the Denver-based Center for Empowered Living and Learning (The CELL) produced this new video called "Recognizing the 8 Signs of Terrorism." The video aims to educate Colorado citizens (and citizens everywhere) on their responsibility to recognize and report signs of terrorist activity to law enforcement. The film is narrated by former Denver Broncos quarterback John Elway and Denver television news anchor Kim Christiansen.

As portrayed in this short video, the eight signs of terrorism are:

• surveillance
• elicitation 
• tests of security
• funding
• acquiring supplies
• impersonation
• rehearsal
• deployment

The CELL is home to the world's only multimedia exhibit about the history and causes of terrorism and the best known policies employed to combat such current and future threats to American citizens and people around the world.

Meanwhile, DHS Secretary Napolitano tells Bloomberg News that federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies are tracking terrorists with "al Qaeda leanings" in the U.S.

DHS Says No To Sheriff Joe

They say actions speak louder than words, so it's difficult to take the Homeland Security Department seriously about border enforcement when it decides to decertify Sheriff Arpaio's crackdown on illegal immigration under the 287(g) program:

Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio says he will continue his controversial "crime suppression operations" despite a Department of Homeland Security decision to strip him of authority to arrest suspected illegal immigrants based solely on their immigration status...

“It’s all politics,” says Arpaio, sheriff of Maricopa County.

Arpaio will still have the power to check the immigration status of people booked by his officers, but not the authority to conduct street patrols looking for illegal immigrants.

The Wall Street Journal has more:

Mr. Arpaio was an early participant in a federal immigration program that enlists and trains local police to identify suspected criminal aliens in jails and on the streets. The program, known as 287g, is designed to target drug dealers, gang members and human smugglers.

Since February 2007, Mr. Arpaio has arrested about 30,000 illegal immigrants who were booked into jails in his county. The street-enforcement component, the most contentious portion of the program, resulted in the apprehension of far fewer people suspected of being in the U.S. illegally.

DHS Put New Border Construction Projects On Hold

DHS Secretary Napolitano, who only gave lip service to border security as governor of Arizona, appears to be in over her head even according to AP:

Facing criticism for her handling of federal stimulus money, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said Wednesday that she would not start any new border construction projects while the department reviewed how projects were selected.

Napolitano has faced questions since The Associated Press reported last month that Homeland Security officials did not follow their internal priority lists when choosing which border checkpoints would get money for renovations. Under a process that is secretive and susceptible to political influence, officials planned to spend millions at tiny checkpoints, passing over busier, higher-priority projects.

The criticism peaked Wednesday when a senior Senate Democrat, Byron Dorgan of North Dakota, said that, despite Napolitano's assurances, he felt Homeland Security was treating the economic stimulus plan like a "bottomless pit" of taxpayer money. It was unusually pointed criticism from a member of the president's own party about how the administration is handling economic recovery spending.

At 9/11 Anniversary, DHS Has Big Priorities

On the eve of the eighth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, the Heritage Foundation offers some practical homeland security priorities for Congress to consider for the balance of the current legislative session:

• Scrap the 100% mandates for scanning maritime security and air cargo--the department cannot find a way to meet the mandate in a way that is practical and cost-effective and actually enhances security
• Amend the Stafford Act so that a federal disaster declaration includes only those disasters that truly overwhelm state and local response.
• Reform the homeland security grant structure through the use of cooperative agreements and other reforms.
• Encourage innovative state and local immigration enforcement efforts that do not call for federal intervention.

The Heritage Foundation would probably not recommend spending over $3 billion on a glorified conference room, however:

Washington notables broke ground on the future home of the Department of Homeland Security on Wednesday, symbolically starting construction on the biggest federal building project in the Washington area since the Pentagon 68 years ago.

 The project will bring together more than 15,000 employees now scattered in 35 offices in the region, placing them on a 176-acre campus strewn with historic buildings in a long-neglected corner of Washington, five miles from the Capitol building.

Department leaders hope the $3.4 billion consolidation will help the department fulfill its core mission -- protecting the homeland -- in ways big and small.

 "It will help us hold meetings," Secretary Janet Napolitano said. "It will help us build that culture of 'One DHS.'"