Center of Excellence

Chris Strohm,
CONGRESS DAILY
Senate Democrats and a handful of Republicans joined forces last week to pass a massive homeland security bill, moving one step closer toward a showdown with the Bush administration over a controversial provision that would give federal airport screeners collective bargaining rights.
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Chris Strohm,
NATIONAL JOURNAL’S TECHNOLOGY DAILY
Members of the House Homeland Security Committee last Wednesday demanded clarification from the Bush administration regarding exactly how states and cities can use a new $1 billion grant program to improve their emergency communications capabilities.
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Heather Greenfield,
NATIONAL JOURNAL’S TECHNOLOGY DAILY
TYSONS CORNER, Va. — Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff on Thursday outlined the transition to improved technology to check people and cargo entering the country.
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Jonathan Marino,
The Homeland Security Department’s technology goals extend beyond ensuring that first responders’ equipment is up to date and compatible, an agency official said Thursday.
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Jon Fox,
GLOBAL SECURITY NEWSWRITER The Homeland Security Department is scheduled to decide last week whether to formally begin testing next-generation radiation detectors at a sea cargo terminal in New York City.
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Jonathan Marino,
The Coast Guard announced last Wednesday that it has terminated a shipbuilding deal with two high-profile defense contractors, and will exercise more control over acquisitions for its $24 billion Deepwater fleet modernization project.
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Jonathan Marino,
The Democratically-led Congress may be headed for a showdown with the White House over whistleblower protection legislation that easily passed in the House last week.
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Chris Strohm,
CONGRESS DAILY
A key House Republican appropriator suggested Thursday that the Homeland Security Department’s fiscal 2008 budget might not need to be increased, and could possibly be decreased, if billions of dollars for domestic homeland security programs are included in the emergency supplemental spending bill for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
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Daniel Pulliam,
Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff’s decision last week to boost the authority of the agency’s chief information officer is winning praise from observers of the federal information technology scene, although some called it overdue and inadequate.
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Jonathan Marino,
A bill recently introduced in the Senate would transfer agriculture inspection duties from the Homeland Security Department to the Agriculture Department, where they originally resided.
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Chris Strohm,
CONGRESS DAILY
Democrats are using their newfound political muscle to advance a handful of homeland security policies that they were unable to push through while in the minority, even if it means risking partisan warfare with the White House and their GOP counterparts.
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Jonathan Marino,
The Homeland Security Department faces major challenges tracking whether foreign visitors leave the United States, witnesses told members of the House Homeland Security Committee at a hearing Tuesday.
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Jonathan Marino,
The Homeland Security Department’s grants process remains mired in bureaucracy, slowing the delivery of money and hindering security, witnesses told lawmakers at a hearing last Wednesday.
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Fawn Johnson,
CONGRESS DAILY
Illinois Democratic Sen. Barack Obama and Reps. Luis Gutierrez and Jan Schakowsky unveiled legislation last Wednesday that would prevent the Homeland Security Department’s Office of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services from almost doubling citizenship application fees.
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Jonathan Marino,
Coast Guard officials said Thursday they want to hire more personnel to prevent potential lapses in contract management similar to those that have been exposed in the Deepwater fleet modernization project.
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Winter Casey,
NATIONAL JOURNAL’S TECHNOLOGY DAILY
The Homeland Security Department’s research and development program is making progress but is still in need of improvement, a key lawmaker on the House Science and Technology Committee said Thursday.
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Chris Strohm,
CONGRESS DAILY
The Senate voted 69-26 Friday morning to cut off debate on the bill that would implement unfulfilled recommendations of the 9/11 Commission, but continuing disputes over how to dispose of amendments forced senators to put off a final vote until Tuesday.
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Jonathen Marino,
A new rule issued this week further restricts where senior Homeland Security officials can lobby for the first year after they leave the department. In a rule posted in the Federal Register, the Office of Government Ethics announced that it will prohibit Senior Executive Service and non-General Schedule employees who earn 86.5 percent or more of Executive Schedule II pay ($145,320 or more for 2007) at DHS from lobbying anywhere within the department for 12 months after they leave their jobs.
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Shane Harris,
NATIONAL JOURNAL
Defense Secretary Robert Gates is considering a plan to curtail the Pentagon’s clandestine spying activities, which were expanded by his predecessor, Donald Rumsfeld, after the 9/11 attacks.
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Peter Cohn,
CONGRESS DAILY
There is a lot of good news for “red” districts in the supplemental war spending bill Democrats unveiled Thursday, not to mention billions in added funding for politically sacrosanct veterans’ health programs, military readiness and housing for troops returning from overseas.
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