S 2519 Reported in Senate – NCCIC Act

On the last real day of Senate activity before the current recess the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee ordered the publishing of their report on S 2519, the National Cybersecurity and Communications Integration Center Act of 2014. As I reported in my original blog posting on this bill this bill was ordered reported the day after its introduction by HSGAC Chair Carper (D,DE).

There was one amendment made to the bill during the markup hearing (.PDF Download link) on June 25^th; an amendment by Sen. Johnson (R,WI). That amendment {§3(b)} clarifies that the legislation does not provide an new authority for the Secretary of Homeland Security to “promulgate regulations or set standards relating to the cybersecurity of private sector critical infrastructure”.

Writing and publishing a committee report in just 30 days (for a non-appropriations bill) is pretty quick in the Senate. That combined with insuring that the report was ordered printed before the recess probably indicates that at least Sen. Carper expects this bill to come to the floor of the Senate early after the return of the Senate in September. We will just have to wait and see if Sen. Reid (D,NV) shares that intention.