What happens when a federal agency must answer to over 100 different congressional committees and subcommittees? Duplication, contradiction, inefficiency—and more duplication. That has been the fate of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) since its creation in 2002 following 9/11.
Congress created the DHS from 22 different agencies or parts of agencies that each had very different core charges. Despite the merger into the DHS, all of these agencies kept their old congressional committees of jurisdiction and oversight.
As a result, the DHS has been hindered by the demands of burdensome and ever-increasing congressional oversight. As of this year, over 100 committees, subcommittees, and congressional groups maintain jurisdiction over the DHS, and the department spends much of its valuable time and resources responding to them. The fact that different committees often provide different, and sometimes conflicting, direction only exacerbates the situation.
Problematic congressional oversight of the DHS is not recognized by only a select few; a multitude of organizations and agency affiliates see the stagnating and harmful implications of the issue. Former DHS Secretaries Tom Ridge, Michael Chertoff, and Janet Napolitano, together with dozens of other homeland security experts, declared in a full-page Wall Street Journal ad that the labyrinth of oversight committees ultimately leads to paralysis, making our country more vulnerable to the threats that the DHS is intended to combat. Current DHS Secretary Jeh Johnson stated in late 2014 that being forced to contend with such heavy oversight distracts the agency and “detracts” from its ability to complete its mission.
To ensure both strong oversight and departmental efficiency, the structure of DHS oversight should be modeled after that of the Department of Defense. Responsibility and jurisdiction should fall under only six committees, three in the Senate and three in the House: the Homeland Security Committees, the Permanent Select Committees on Intelligence, and the Appropriations Committees. The Senate and House Committees on Homeland Security would be the primary hubs of oversight and should each be made up of seven subcommittees to accommodate the different entities within the DHS.
Power politics should no longer be an excuse for Congress to give the DHS conflicting messages and waste its limited resources on a byzantine oversight system.
Jennifer Guthrie is currently a member of the Young Leaders Program at The Heritage Foundation. For more information on interning at Heritage, please click here.
