Rep. Scott Perry (R-Pa.), chairman of the House Oversight and Management Efficiency Subcommittee, called the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) vendor vetting process “bureaucratic in the worst ways, inefficient, inconsistent, and lacking transparency,” at a Feb. 28 hearing. He noted that the Office of Personnel Management establishes contractor employee standards, but DHS is inconsistent in […]
RAND Report Offers Alternative to Amnesty/Deportation Debate
The new RAND Corporation report, Neither Deportation nor Amnesty: An Alternative for the Immigration Debate Building a Bridge Across the Deportation-Amnesty Divide, released Feb. 26, charts a third path between the deportation and amnesty sides of the immigration debate. Author Douglas C. Ligor, senior behavioral and social scientist at RAND Corporation, suggests a statutory approach […]
Homeland Security Hearings to Focus on TSA, Contracting
Two House Homeland Security subcommittees will convene Feb. 27—one focused on the Transportation Security Agency (TSA), the other on doing business with the Department of Homeland Security. The Transportation and Protective Security subcommittee will “examine how TSA engages with the traveling public, through interactions at the checkpoint, customer service contact centers, and social media.” Witnesses […]
Ambassador: Iraq Largely Responsible for Its Own Success
Iraqi Ambassador to the United States Fareed Yasseen discussed progress in Iraq Feb. 22, noting that the entire dynamic in the long-embattled country has dramatically changed from just four short years ago. “The Iraqi army that has now defeated ISIS is not the Iraqi army of 2014; the governance structure of Iraq is different from […]
WH Report Explores ‘Malicious Cyber Activity’
A new report by the Council on Economic Advisers released last week said “malicious cyber activity” took a toll on the economy anywhere between $57 billion and $109 billion in 2016. It also pinpoints China, Iran, North Korea, and Russia as primary nation-state actors among a variety of groups identified in the report identified as […]