Issue: H.R. 2217 Department of Homeland Security Appropriations Act, 2014. (Making appropriations for the Department of Homeland Security for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2014, and for other purposes.)
Result: Passed in House 245 to 182, 7 not voting. Died in Senate. Republicans scored.
Bill Summary: Makes appropriations for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) for FY2014. Includes (Title II): Appropriations for: (1) U.S. Customs and Border Protection; (2) U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement; (3) the Transportation Security Administration (TSA); (4) the Coast Guard, including funding designated by the Congress for Overseas Contingency Operations/Global War on Terrorism, and funding for the Coast Guard Reserve; and (5) the U.S. Secret Service.
Also includes (Title III): Appropriations for (1) the Office of the Under Secretary for the National Protection and Programs Directorate, including for the Federal Protective Service (FPS) and the Office of Biometric Identity Management; (2) the Office of Health Affairs, including for BioWatch operations; and (3) the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), including for grants for state and local programs (including the Urban Area Security Initiative), firefighter assistance grants, emergency management performance grants, the U.S. Fire Administration, disaster relief, the flood hazard mapping and risk analysis program, the National Flood Insurance Fund, the predisaster mitigation grant program, and the emergency food and shelter program.
Analysis: The September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks provided a convenient pretext for stampeding the 2002 creation of the Department of Homeland Security. Liberals (with Establishment Republican support) had long been working toward nationalizing state and local police powers. The Department of Homeland Security should be regarded as a major steppingstone toward that dangerous goal.
Although other Insiders applauded President George W. Bush for making the proposal, no one should believe that it originated with the figurehead president.
In fact, the Department had been proposed prior to the September 11th attacks in a report by the CFR dominated Hart-Rudman Commission.
The report, entitled “Road Map for National Security,” specifically proposed the creation of a “National Homeland Security Agency.” This agency would have “the responsibility for planning, coordinating, and integrating various U.S. government activities involved in homeland security.”
That national security was not the real reason for establishing the new department can be seen in the federal government’s lack of urgency in tightening border security following September 11 and in the obvious fact that it would take years for the behemoth new department to assimilate its new responsibilities.
During the November 13, 2002 House debate of the Homeland Security Act that would establish the Department, one who objected to the mad rush was Congressman Ron Paul (R-Texas):
“Mr. Speaker, when the process of creating a Department of Homeland Security commenced, Congress was led to believe that the legislation would be a simple reorganization aimed at increasing efficiency, not an attempt to expand federal power. Fiscally conservative members of Congress were even told that the bill would be budget neutral! Yet, when the House of Representatives initially considered creating a Department of Homeland Security, the legislative vehicle almost overnight grew from 32 pages to 282 pages — and the cost had ballooned to at least $3 billion.
“Now we are prepared to vote on a nearly 500-page bill that increases federal expenditures and raises troubling civil liberties questions. Adding insult to injury, this bill was put together late last night and introduced only this morning. Worst of all, the text of the bill has not been made readily available to most members, meaning this Congress is prepared to create a massive new federal agency without even knowing the details. This is a dangerous and irresponsible practice.”
In referring to the history of this deceptive power grab, we mention, as an example, the federal Law Enforcement Assistance Administration created in 1968 and abolished in 1982. The LEAA sought to gain control of state and local law enforcement agencies through federal grants. Later, came the federal civil-rights lawsuits against major city police departments, resulting in consent decrees, amounting to a virtual federal takeover of the local police.
The influential Internationalists behind the civilian disarmament drive also revealed their long-term objectives. The 1958 disarmament classic, World Peace Through World Law, by Establishment Wall Street lawyer Grenville Clark and Harvard law professor Louis B. Sohn (CFR) warned “that even with the complete elimination of all [national] military forces,” local “police forces, supplemented by civilians armed with sporting rifles and fowling pieces, might conceivably constitute a serious threat to a neighboring country….” [Emphasis in original.]
Accordingly, Clark and Sohn recommended extremely rigid controls on all firearms and ammunition possessed by police and private citizens. Clark was a vice president and founder of the United World Federalists and had strongly influenced John J. McCloy at a military training camp in 1915. McCloy, often called the “chairman of the American Establishment,” would advise nine presidents and serve as chairman of the Establishment’s Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) from 1953 to 1970.
The CFR’s creation, the United Nations, (documented in Freedom First Society’s Masters of Deception) would also provide “authority” for the role of the new Department of Homeland Security. This relationship was evident in U.S. “compliance” reports submitted to the UN Security Council’s new Counter-Terrorism Committee.
The debate over H.R. 2217 was another example of how the American people are regularly deceived by the equivalent of a professional wrestling match known as partisan politics. H.R. 2217 would have appropriated $38.9 billion in discretionary spending for the Department of Homeland Security. This was only $34.9 million (less that 0.1 %) below the president’s FY 2014 budget request and yet the White House opposed it as irresponsible.
On the other hand, Republicans boasted that H.R. 2217 was $613.2 million (about 1.8%) below the FY 2013 enacted level. We did not score the House Democrats on this one, because most wanted to spend more.
Unfortunately, we could not find any published objection from members of either party to the unconstitutionality of much of this infant department.
Since this House-passed regular appropriations bill was never considered by the full Senate, FY2014 appropriations for the department were included in two consolidated continuing resolutions and then the $1.1 trillion omnibus spending bill enacted shortly after the start of the second session (1-17-14).
We have assigned (good vote) to the Nays and (bad vote) to the Yeas. (P = voted present; ? = not voting; blank = not listed on roll call.)