Keeping America safe: Every decision counts

By U.S. Sen. Susan Collins
(R-Maine)
    It has been said that America, in its fight against terrorism, must make the right calls and the correct moves 100 percent of the time. There is no margin for error or misstep. After all, the terrorists only have to succeed once.
    Clearly, as we set up defenses to detect terrorists who have sworn to do us harm,
we carry a heavy burden. That burden is made weightier by the very nature of our democracy, which prides itself on being open, transparent and free.
    For those reasons, I found the recent inadvertent internet posting of a 93-page “aviation security” manual by the Transportation Security Agency (TSA) to be an appalling error of judgment and a terrible blunder.
    The TSA has accepted responsibility for this posting, but it has also downplayed its impact. The agency says the document is old, dated 2008. It says the manual was for supervisors, not for line screeners at airports. It says it immediately removed the document from the Web.
    But given the internet’s unique digital nature, we all know that documents and posting are not easily removed. And, indeed, many copies remain on the World Wide Web, for access by anyone.
    Every single page of the manual is labeled with the warning “sensitive security information”. The TSA also botched an effort to redact significant portions of the document. Instead of eliminating the most sensitive security information, it has been highlighted by the failed redaction attempt.
    I am troubled by this security breach. That is why I questioned witnesses about it during a recent hearing on terrorist travel before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, where I am ranking member.
    I focused in particular on the manual section dealing with official credentials. I noted the section on credentials, which showed the photos of the identification cards and badges used by the CIA, the U.S. Marshals, and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. There are pictures of the actual IDs and of the badges. If we’re trying to make certain that potential terrorists don’t have the ability to falsify documents, then through this manual, we’ve given them a textbook on how to do so. Through this manual, we’ve shown them exactly what documents look like for individuals who are less likely to receive screening.
    Unfortunately, there is no denying the harsh truth: Sensitive information was released. And the manual’s publication on the web cannot be undone.
    Two investigations into this issue – one by the TSA and one by the independent Inspector General’s Office — will answer critical questions about who made the decision to post the manual and how it happened.
    Both investigations are sorely needed. We must use this unfortunate episode as a call to action.
    We can use this mistake to re-energize our efforts to protect our country from terrorist attacks. Indeed, we have done a lot in recent years to increase the safety of our nation.
    Five years ago, our Committee authored the most significant reform of the nation’s intelligence community since the Second World War. As the 9/11 Commission noted, up to 15 of the 19 hijackers might have been caught by border authorities prior to their murderous acts if database information had been linked. Their names would have been flagged, and they would have been arrested. Several of the hijackers’ names were cited in intelligence agency files for their terrorist links.
    Following the attacks, the federal government began to deploy new systems and procedures – all aimed at helping ensure that terrorists would not again slip undetected across our borders. In 2004, Senator Joe Lieberman and I wrote the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act, which expanded and strengthened those initiatives and implemented many of the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission.
    One success: A biometric system for screening foreign citizens seeking entry to this country. The State Department now collects fingerprints of foreign nationals who apply for visas at U.S. Embassies and Consulates overseas and compares them against databases of potential terrorists and immigration violators. Those fingerprints are now checked at U.S. ports of entry by DHS to confirm that the individual arriving in the U.S. is the same individual who was approved for a visa abroad.
    Another important accomplishment: Creation of a consolidated terrorist watch-list based on information from all parts of the Intelligence Community and the FBI. This consolidated list allows individuals to be quickly identified and checked for terrorism connections. The Intelligence Reform Act required that passengers on international flights to the United States and flights within the United States be checked against the terrorist watch list.
    More work remains. The federal government must establish a mechanism to screen mass transit workers, such as those who drive subway trains and buses, against the terrorist watch list. This was required in the 2007 homeland security law. Although 28 months have passed, no regulations have been issued by Department of Homeland Security.
    We must act to put these regulations in place. These employees have many lives in their hands every day, and a simple check against the watch list – like that already required for hazardous materials drivers, ferry captains, and airline pilots – may prevent a needless loss of lives if this mode of transportation were targeted.
    The federal government has done much since 9/11 to prevent terrorists from coming across our borders to do us harm and to prevent terrorists from traveling and working within the United States.
    But any human endeavor is subject to human frailty, as we saw with the TSA security manual breach. Going forward, we must do more to share terrorist watch list information, to put more rigor and critical thinking into our everyday decision-making to and optimize all opportunities to identify potential terrorist threats, without unnecessarily impeding the flow of legitimate travel and trade.