DHS FY 2013 Budget Request Released

Today the Administration released their budget request for FY 2013. This is a high-level document (the DHS portion is only six pages long) describing spending in broad categories. It certainly doesn’t mention CFATS or MTSA or ICS-CERT. But it does provide a broad overview of how the Administration wants to spend our hard earned tax dollars.

The table below shows the discretionary spending numbers from the DHS budget that will primarily affect chemical and cyber security issues. The FY 2012 numbers are estimates for the spending for this year.

Discretionary Spending (in Millions of $)       FY 2011   FY 2012    FY 2013

Discretionary budget authority                         41,885      39,649       39,462

National Protection and Programs Directorate   1,165        1,214         1,217

Transportation Security Administration             5,384        5,425         5,106

United States Coast Guard                                  8,622        8,656         8,319

Of the three the only one that would not see a budget cut under the Obama plan would be NPPD. This is the Directorate that contains both the CFATS and ICS-CERT programs. This does not mean however that either of those programs will necessarily receive an increase in funding. Likewise the TSA funding decrease would not necessarily mean a decrease in the funding for their freight rail security program, nor would the decrease in Coast Guard funding mean that the MTSA program would receive a decrease in funding.

More details about the DHS budget will almost certainly come out in the two budget hearings on Wednesday.