Hearing of the House Homeland Security Committee - Examining DHS's Misplaced Focus on Climate Change

Hearing

"Today's hearing title mischaracterizes the Department of Homeland Security's programs that
address security risks linked to climate change as climate politics and a misplaced focus. These
Department programs and activities provide resources to address other national priorities, such as
preparedness for and responses to natural disasters.

After living through the effects of Hurricane Katrina on the Gulf Coast--not to mention recent
flooding in Texas and Oklahoma - I find it confusing that the Majority would see a "misplaced focus"
in DHS efforts on hazard mapping and risk analysis to support the National Flood Insurance
Program, producing physical measures to avoid or reduce damage associated with natural disasters;
Assessing the safety and security of critical infrastructure; and conducting workshops requested by
state, local, and tribal leaders, intended to build their preparation and response capacities.

In addition to the relevance of the Department's core disaster preparation and mitigation efforts as a
response to climate-change trends, an even-handed treatment of DHS responses to climate change
would also acknowledge assessments produced by and for the U.S. Intelligence Community over
the past decade. These studies have provided ample evidence that trends in global climate act as
what the 2014 Quadrennial Homeland Security Review describes as "threat multipliers…
aggravat[ing] stressors abroad that can enable terrorist activity and violence, such as poverty,
environmental degradation, and social tensions."

For example, as the U.S. Institute of Peace has found that the threats we face today from the
extremist group Boko Haram first emerged and expanded during a period coinciding with major
droughts in and around Northern Nigeria. Two months ago, the Chairman of this Committee stated
that the Obama Administration, particularly the Department of Homeland Security, is placing more
emphasis on climate change than on countering violent extremism.

Despite the Chairman's unwarranted criticism of DHS valuable initiatives related to climate change,
I, too, have concerns about the Department of Homeland Security's approach to countering violent
extremism. I have asked the Chairman to hold hearings on the Department's approach to
countering violent extremism and to receive testimony from the DHS countering violent extremism
coordinator. I have also expressed the need to receive testimony on this topic to the Department of
Homeland Security. However, rather than provide testimony, the Department has chosen to have a
briefing in our Committee's classified space.

Unfortunately, to date, this Committee has not received testimony, in an open setting, from the
Department on what it is doing in that space. Consequently, the Department has not adequately
afforded the members of the Committee with the opportunity to hear what it is doing on Countering
Violent Extremism. With the surge in domestic terrorist activity, such as what was carried out in
Charleston, South Carolina, on June 17 and the continuing threat from international terrorist groups
such as ISIL, it is important and well past time this Committee receives testimony from DHS, not
outside entities, on CVE.

The Department can and must manage in ways that develop robust, versatile, and adaptable
activities and capabilities to address the full spectrum of threats - from both man-made and natural
disasters - to the American people and homeland.

In doing so, DHS leaders work to find ways for the Department to make the fullest contribution to the
whole-of-government response to climate-change phenomena, employing programs and systems
also used to respond to drug trafficking, threats to transportation, and threats to infrastructure
generally. Similarly, we can find ways to counter violent extremism that robs Americans' lives,
whether originating at home or abroad, sharpening the same kind of smart and flexible
management."

Source