Still No CFATS Personnel Surety ICR

It has now been 60 days since Under Secretary Beers of the DHS National Programs and Protection Directorate (NPPD) promised Congress that the NPPD would be publishing the new information collection request (ICR) outlining the revised plan for conducting personnel surety background investigations against the national Terrorism Screening Database (TSDB). Needless to say that has not happened.

I doubt that Congress will take action on CFATS during the lame duck session; there are too many really high-priority issues that are on their plate. In January, however, a new Congress will be sitting in Washington and all of the current bills will be erased. An issue that is sure to come up is the reauthorization of the CFATS program. Most of the congressional leaders that Beers has misled over the last two years about the efficacy of the program will still be here. The personnel surety ICR issue will certainly be one of many raised in the reauthorization hearings that will certainly be scheduled in the first couple of months of the 113^th Congress.