A better solution for DHS
Recommendations
Regarding “Overhaul DHS,” (A19, Sept. 14): The Houston Chronicle is right to call for a closer look at the Department of Homeland Security. But the better solution is not to break up DHS or create new Cabinet departments.
On Sept. 9, the Atlantic Council released the first comprehensive study of DHS since 2004, with input from 100 top homeland and national security experts, including five former secretaries and acting secretaries of Homeland Security under Presidents Bush, Obama and Trump. We recommended DHS needs to focus more on fighting COVID-19, which hit Texas hard; dealing with the effects on critical infrastructure of climate change or extreme weather like Hurricanes Hanna and Laura; and protecting American democracy against threats from Russia, China and Iran. And none of DHS’s current missions are going away.
DHS should lead the defense of the nation against non-military threats. DHS should update its approach to the private sector and fix DHS’s management problems. But our experts strongly recommend no reorganization for at least a year. Moving boxes on an organization chart will not solve DHS’s problems.
The problem with oversight of DHS isn’t that DHS is too large or diffuse. The problem is that more than 90 congressional committees or subcommittees oversee some part of DHS. Streamlining congressional oversight of homeland security has been recommended by Democratic, Republican and nonpartisan experts. It’s the last recommendation of the 9/11 Commission that hasn’t been implemented. Thomas Warrick, former Department of Homeland Security’s deputy assistant secretary for counterterrorism policy, Washington, D.C.
Unnecessary expense
Today my husband’s application for ballot by mail arrived. There is just one problem. He has been deceased for more than five years. After his death, when absentee ballots continued to arrive, I returned them to the Harris County Clerk’s Office, apprising them of his death. The ballots stopped briefly, but now my husband is back on their lists. What an unnecessary expense and an opportunity or temptation for voter fraud if the county is blanketed with unrequested applications for absentee ballots. Elizabeth Meredith, Houston
I want to thank you for the time and real research on candidates for 2020. I rely on your excellent background work on each person and their viewpoints. Good journalism is vital for a well-informed public. Second, thanks so much for the puzzle books! Third, Alison Cook dining at Whataburger and eating Ritz crackers … OMG, it is 2020! Nancy Bohnstedt, Cypress