The Border Challenge: An Insider's Guide to Stopping Drugs at America's Borders by
This book presents an insider's view of the federal government's dual mission to stop the flow of illegal drugs across our borders and to prevent streams of drug money from financing drug cartels, insurgents, and terrorists. Andrews focuses on current challenges facing federal drug enforcement agencies, how our strategies for enforcement have been redirected since 9/11, and why we require different strategies along our northern and southern borders and our ports of entry. This guide's aim is to provide an operational view of drug enforcement to policymakers, law enforcement officials, think tanks examining drug interdiction issues, and military officials who assist federal law enforcement efforts. The Border Challenge will also be of interest to students of international development and social change and the next generation of criminal justice and law enforcement officials.
Import Trade and U. S. Customs and Border Protection: Policies and Challenges by
International trade is a critical component of the U.S. economy, with U.S. merchandise imports and exports amounting to $2.2 trillion and $1.5 trillion in 2011, respectively. The efficient flow of legally traded goods in and out of the United States is thus a vital element of the country's economic security. U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), within the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), is the primary agency charged with ensuring the smooth flow of trade through U.S. ports of entry. CBP's policies with regard to U.S. imports are designed to: facilitate the smooth flow of imported cargo through U.S. ports of entry; enforce trade and customs laws designed to protect U.S. consumers and business and to collect customs revenue; and enforce import security laws designed to prevent weapons of mass destruction, illegal drugs, and other contraband from entering the U.S. - a complex and difficult mission. This book describes and analyzes import policy and CBP's role in the U.S. import process, with a focus on the legislative history of customs laws;'trusted trader'programs to improve enforcement of intellectual property and trade remedy laws, to strengthen cargo scanning practices, and/or to promote modernization of customs data systems.
Border Security and Who Is Responsible for It by
This book explores U.S. border security and the role of the key agencies and their missions. The U.S. Border Patrol (USBP) has a long and storied history as our nation's first line of defense against unauthorized migration. Today, the USBP's primary mission is to detect and prevent the entry of terrorists, weapons of mass destruction, and illegal aliens into the country, and to interdict drug smugglers and other criminals along the border. In the wake of the tragedy of September 11th 2001, the U.S. Congress decided that enhancing the security of the U.S. borders was a vitally important component of preventing future terrorist attacks. After the massive reorganization of federal agencies precipitated by the creation of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), there are now four main federal agencies charged with securing the U.S. borders: the Bureau of Customs and Border Protection (CBP), the Bureau of Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the U.S. Coast Guard, and the Transportation Security Administration (TSA). This book serves as a primer on the key federal agencies charged with border security and describing each agency's role. This book consists of public documents which have been located, gathered, combined, reformatted, and enhanced with a subject index, selectively edited and bound to provide easy access.
Open Borders: In Defense of Free Movement by
Border control continues to be a highly contested and politically charged subject around the world. This collection of essays challenges reactionary nationalism by making the positive case for the benefits of free movement for countries on both ends of the exchange. Open Borders counters the knee-jerk reaction to build walls and close borders by arguing that there is not a moral, legal, philosophical, or economic case for limiting the movement of human beings at borders. The volume brings together essays by theorists in anthropology, geography, international relations, and other fields who argue for open borders with writings by activists who are working to make safe passage a reality on the ground. It puts forward a clear, concise, and convincing case for a world without movement restrictions at borders.The essays in the first part of the volume make a theoretical case for free movement by analyzing philosophical, legal, and moral arguments for opening borders. In doing so, they articulate a sustained critique of the dominant idea that states should favor the rights of their own citizens over the rights of all human beings. The second part sketches out the current situation in the European Union, in states that have erected border walls, in states that have adopted a policy of inclusion such as Germany and Uganda, and elsewhere in the world to demonstrate the consequences of the current regime of movement restrictions at borders. The third part creates a dialogue between theorists and activists, examining the work of Calais Migrant Solidarity, No Borders Morocco, activists in sanctuary cities, and others who contest border restrictions on the ground.
Porous Borders: Multiracial Migrations and the Law in the U.S. - Mexico Borderlands by
With the railroad's arrival in the late nineteenth century, immigrants of all colors rushed to the U.S.-Mexico borderlands, transforming the region into a booming international hub of economic and human activity. Following the stream of Mexican, Chinese, and African American migration, Julian Lim presents a fresh study of the multiracial intersections of the borderlands, where diverse peoples crossed multiple boundaries in search of new economic opportunities and social relations. However, as these migrants came together in ways that blurred and confounded elite expectations of racial order, both the United States and Mexico resorted to increasingly exclusionary immigration policies in order to make the multiracial populations of the borderlands less visible within the body politic, and to remove them from the boundaries of national identity altogether.Using a variety of English- and Spanish-language primary sources from both sides of the border, Lim reveals how a borderlands region that has traditionally been defined by Mexican-Anglo relations was in fact shaped by a diverse population that came together dynamically through work and play, in the streets and in homes, through war and marriage, and in the very act of crossing the border.
Border Rhetorics: Citizenship and Identity on the US-Mexico Frontier by
Border Rhetorics is a collection of essays that undertakes a wide-ranging examination of the US-Mexico border as it functions in the rhetorical production of civic unity in the United States. A “border” is a powerful and versatile concept, variously invoked as the delineation of geographical territories, as a judicial marker of citizenship, and as an ideological trope for defining inclusion and exclusion. It has implications for both the empowerment and subjugation of any given populace. Both real and imagined, the border separates a zone of physical and symbolic exchange whose geographical, political, economic, and cultural interactions bear profoundly on popular understandings and experiences of citizenship and identity. The border's rhetorical significance is nowhere more apparent, nor its effects more concentrated, than on the frontier between the United States and Mexico. Often understood as an unruly boundary in dire need of containment from the ravages of criminals, illegal aliens, and other undesirable threats to the national body, this geopolitical locus exemplifies how normative constructions of “proper”; border relations reinforce definitions of US citizenship, which in turn can lead to anxiety, unrest, and violence centered around the struggle to define what it means to be a member of a national political community.
A Short Guide to Customs Risk by
The historic growth in world trade, large container ships and information technology have triggered profound changes in international trade. A few years ago, customs officers at the border were meticulously checking goods and documents before releasing a shipment to the trader. A business could be confident that a shipment that had cleared customs complied with all applicable regulations. Today, to reduce congestion and give the trade quick access to their goods, customs have introduced risk management principles and a large number of shipments clear customs automatically. Controls have moved from the border to the trader's premises and it is during site visits that customs officers check the business compliance records. Moving from frontier checks to audit based controls has transferred a high level of responsibility and risk to the trader. It is now the duty of the trader to identify and report any error or irregularity and to keep an impeccable audit trail from initial quotation to receipt of payment. For the business, failing to provide satisfactory compliance records will result in delayed shipments and serious disruption in the supply chain. This will in turn impact on financial performance indicators such as Days in Inventory, Days Sales Outstanding and of course Cash Flow. The business will also have to endure in depth customs audits during which customs officers will inspect each step of the audit trail disrupting day-to-day business operation. Errors uncovered during these audits will yield heavy financial penalties and a customs debt. Ultimately, customs risk will impact on shareholders value. Customs and finance reporting should receive the same level of attention. However, if all companies check carefully their tax returns, only a few check their import or export declarations with the same scrutiny. Managing customs risk is often seen as a cost centre but it is also a source of competitive advantage. A sound customs management can reduce or remov
Border Watch: Cultures of Immigration, Detention and Control by
Questions over immigration and asylum face almost all Western countries. Should only economically useful immigrants be allowed? What should be done with unwanted or'illegal'immigrants? In this bold intervention, Alexandra Hall shows that immigration detention centres offer a window onto society's broader attitudes towards immigrants. Despite periodic media scandals, remarkably little has been written about the everyday workings of this system, or about the people responsible for setting immigration policy. Detention, particularly, is a hidden side of border politics, despite its growing international importance as a tool of control and security. This book also looks at the social life and the relationships between officers and immigrants to explore broad social trends, as well as resistance within the system, and provides rare insights into the treatment of the'other'.
Border Wars by
The consequences of political fear-mongering and tough talk on immigration in the American Southwest.The Tea Party and its allies celebrate the rogue states of the Southwest as a model for the nation in their go-it-alone posturing and tough immigration-enforcement talk. In Border Wars, dogged investigative journalist Tom Barry documents the costs of that model: lives lost; families torn apart; billions of wasted tax dollars; vigilantes prowling the desert; and fiscal crises in cities, counties, and states. Even worse, he warns, the entire nation risks following their lead. As Barry explains, the lack of coherent federal policy on immigration and drug war conduct and the uncritical embrace of all things in the name of national security has opened doors for opportunists from boardrooms to governor's offices in Texas and Arizona. Corporate-prison magnates eagerly swallow up undocumented immigrants into taxpayer-funded dungeons, border sheriffs and politicians trade on voters'fears of Latinos and “big government,” and pro-business policy institutes and lobbyists battle the public interest. Border Wars offers a stark portrait of the domestic cost of failed federal leadership in the post-9/11 era.
Federal Drug Enforcement: History, Polices, Trends by
The federal government prohibits the manufacturing, distribution, and possession of many intoxicating substances that are solely intended for recreational use (notable exceptions are alcohol and tobacco); however, the federal government also allows for and controls the medical use of many intoxicants. Federal authority to control these substances primarily resides with the Attorney General of the United States. This book discusses domestic drug enforcement. It outlines historic development and major changes in U.S. drug enforcement to help provide an understanding of how and why certain laws and policies were implemented and how these developments and changes shaped current drug enforcement policy. This book also highlights certain non-criminal regulatory requirements of the Controlled Substances Act (CSA).
Firearms Trafficking: U. S. Role in Efforts to Stem the Flow across Mexico's Borders by
Violent crimes committed by drug trafficking organizations in Mexico often involve firearms, and a 2009 Government Accountability Office (GAO) report found that many of these firearms originated in the United States. The Department of Justice's Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) and the Department of Homeland Security's Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) have sought to stem firearms trafficking from the United States to Mexico. This book examines, among other things, the origin of firearms seized in Mexico that have been traced by ATF; the extent to which collaboration among U.S. agencies combating firearms trafficking has improved; and the extent to which the National Southwest Border Counternarcotics Strategy measures progress by U.S. agencies to stem firearms trafficking to Mexico. Furthermore, the book examines the activities undertaken by U.S. agencies to build partner capacity to combat firearms trafficking and the extent to which they considered key factors in selecting the activities; and progress the United States has made in building such capacity.
Privacy: an Overview of Federal Law Governing Wiretapping and Electronic Eavesdropping by
It is a federal crime to wiretap or to use a machine to capture the communications of others without court approval, unless one of the parties has given their prior consent. It is likewise a federal crime to use or disclose any information acquired by illegal wiretapping or electronic eavesdropping. Violations can result in imprisonment for up to five years and fines up to $250,000 (and up to $500,000 for organizations). This book provides an overview of federal law governing wiretapping and electronic eavesdropping and the procedures they establish for law enforcement and foreign intelligence gathering purposes. It also appends citations to state law and contains a bibliography of legal commentary as well as the text of the Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA) and the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA).
Budgeting for Immigration Enforcement: A Path to Better Performance by
Immigration enforcement is carried out by a complex legal and administrative system, operating under frequently changing legislative mandates and policy guidance, with authority and funding spread across several agencies in two executive departments and the courts. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is responsible for conducting immigration enforcement both at the border and in the United States; the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) is responsible for conducting immigration removal procedures and criminal trials and for prosecuting people charged with immigration-related crimes. DOJ confronts at least five technical challenges to modeling its resource needs for immigration enforcement that are specific to the immigration enforcement system. Despite the inherent limitations, budgeting for immigration enforcement can be improved by changing the method for budgeting. Budgeting for Immigration Enforcement addresses how to improve budgeting for the federal immigration enforcement system, specifically focusing on the parts of that system that are operated and funded by the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ). The report recommends that DOJ establish policy-level procedures to plan and coordinate policy planning and implementation to improve performance of the immigration enforcement system. The report also recommends that DOJ and DHS accelerate their design of an integrated capacity to track cases and project immigration enforcement activity. Policy makers and others who are interested in how the nation's immigration enforcement system is organized and operates also will find it useful.
Detain and Deport: The Chaotic U. S. Immigration Enforcement Regime by
Detention and deportation have become keystones of immigration and border enforcement policies around the world. The United States has built a massive immigration enforcement system that detains and deports more people than any other country. This system is grounded in the assumptions that national borders are territorially fixed and controllable, and that detention and deportation bolster security and deter migration. Nancy Hiemstra's multisited ethnographic research pairs investigation of enforcement practices in the United States with an exploration into conditions migrants face in one country of origin: Ecuador. Detain and Deport's transnational approach reveals how the U.S. immigration enforcement system's chaotic organization and operation distracts from the mismatch between these assumptions and actual outcomes. Hiemstra draws on the experiences of detained and deported migrants, as well as their families and communities in Ecuador, to show convincingly that instead of deterring migrants and improving national security, detention and deportation generate insecurities and forge lasting connections across territorial borders. At the same time, the system's chaos works to curtail rights and maintain detained migrants on a narrow path to deportation. Hiemstra argues that in addition to the racialized ideas of national identity and a fluctuating dependence on immigrant labor that have long propelled U.S. immigration policies, the contemporary emphasis on detention and deportation is fueled by the influence of people and entities that profit from them.
From Deportation to Prison: The Politics of Immigration Enforcement in Post-Civil Rights America by
Winner, 2017 Oliver Cromwell Cox Book AwardA thorough and captivating exploration of how mass incarceration and law and order policies of the past forty years have transformed immigration and border enforcementCriminal prosecutions for immigration offenses have more than doubled over the last two decades, as national debates about immigration and criminal justice reforms became headline topics. What lies behind this unprecedented increase? From Deportation to Prison unpacks how the incarceration of over two million people in the United States gave impetus to a federal immigration initiative—The Criminal Alien Program (CAP)—designed to purge non-citizens from dangerously overcrowded jails and prisons. Drawing on over a decade of ethnographic and archival research, the findings in this book reveal how the Criminal Alien Program quietly set off a punitive turn in immigration enforcement that has fundamentally altered detention, deportation, and criminal prosecutions for immigration offenses.Patrisia Macías-Rojas presents a “street-level” perspective on how this new regime has serious lived implications for the day-to-day actions of Border Patrol agents, local law enforcement, civil and human rights advocates, and for migrants and residents of predominantly Latina/o border communities. Winner, 2017 Oliver Cromwell Cox Book AwardA thorough and captivating exploration of how mass incarceration and law and order policies of the past forty years have transformed immigration and border enforcementCriminal prosecutions for immigration offenses have more than doubled over the last two decades, as national debates about immigration and criminal justice reforms became headline topics. What lies behind this unprecedented increase? From Deportation to Prison unpacks how the incarceration of over two million people in the United States gave impetus to a federal immigration initiative—The Criminal Alien Program (CAP)—designed to purge non-citizens from dangerously overcrowded jails and prisons. Drawing on over a decade of ethnographic and archival research, the findings in this book reveal how the Criminal Alien Program quietly set off a punitive turn in immigration enforcement that has fundamentally altered detention, deportation, and criminal prosecutions for immigration offenses.Patrisia Macías-Rojas presents a “street-level” perspective on how this new regime has serious lived implications for the day-to-day actions of Border Patrol agents, local law enforcement, civil and human rights advocates, and for migrants and residents of predominantly Latina/o border communities.
Immigration Detention Facilities: Costs, Standards, and Issues of Sexual Abuse by
Within the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) uses two different methods to collect and assess data on detention costs; however, these methods do not provide ICE with complete data for managing detention costs across facilities and facility types. This book addresses the extent to which ICE has processes to track costs; standards vary across facility types and the reasons for any differences; and oversight and the results of that oversight vary across facility types. This book also examines what DHS data show about sexual abuse and assault in immigration detention facilities, and how these data are used for detention management; the extent to which DHS has included provisions for addressing sexual abuse and assault in its detention standards; and the extent to which DHS has assessed compliance with these provisions and the results.
Immigration Enforcement: Overstays and Student and Exchange Visitor Program by
Approximately 4 million to 5.5 million unauthorized immigrants in the U.S. entered the country legally on a temporary basis but then overstayed their authorized periods of admission, referred to as overstays. This book examines the extent to which the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) takes action to address overstays and its reported results. Additionally, as of January 2012, more than 850,000 active foreign students were in the U.S. enrolled at over 10,000 U.S. schools. The U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency (ICE) is responsible for managing the Student and Exchange Visitor Program (SEVP) and certifying schools to accept foreign students. This book also examines ICE's fraud prevention and detection procedures for SEVP, and the extent to which ICE has identified and assessed risks and developed policies and procedures to prevent and detect fraud during the initial school certification process and once schools begin accepting foreign students.
Immigration Reform: Issues, Congressional Action and Past Efforts by
Immigration reform is a key issue for the 113th Congress. The Senate has passed the Border Security, Economic Opportunity, and Immigration Modernization Act, a comprehensive immigration reform bill that includes provisions on border security, interior enforcement, employment eligibility verification and worksite enforcement, legalization of unauthorized aliens, immigrant visas, nonimmigrant visas, and humanitarian admissions. This book discusses these and other immigration-related issues that have received legislative action or are of significant congressional interest in the 113th Congress.
Just Immigration: American Policy in Christian Perspective by
Few issues are as complex and controversial as immigration in the United States. The only thing anyone seems to agree on is that the system is broken. Mark Amstutz offers a succinct overview and assessment of current immigration policy and argues for an approach to the complex immigration debate that is solidly grounded in Christian political thought. After analyzing key laws and institutions in the US immigration system, Amstutz examines how Catholics, evangelicals, and main-line Protestants have used Scripture to address social and political issues, including immigration. He critiques the ways in which many Christians have approached immigration reform and offers concrete suggestions on how Christian groups can offer a more credible political engagement with this urgent policy issue.
Understanding Immigration: Issues and Challenges in an Era of Mass Population Movement by
Undergraduate-level textbook introducing students to the factors which define immigration politics in the United States and Europe.Based on the dual premise that nations need to learn from how immigration issues are handled in other modern democracies, and that adaptation to a new era of refugee and emigration movements is critical to a stable world, Marilyn Hoskin systematically compares the immigration policies of the United States, Britain, Germany, and France as prime examples of the challenges faced in the twenty-first century. Because immigration is a complex phenomenon, Understanding Immigration provides students with a multidisciplinary framework based on the thesis that a nation's geography, history, economy, and political system define its immigration policy. In the process, it is possible to weigh the influence of such factors as isolation, colonialism, labor imbalances, and tolerance of fringe parties and groups in determining how governments ultimately respond to both routine immigration requests and the more dramatic surges witnessed in both Europe and the United States since 2013.Marilyn Hoskin is Professor Emerita of Political Science at the University of New Hampshire and the author of New Immigrants and Democratic Society: Minority Integration in Western Democracies.
In the Name of the Children: An FBI Agents Relentless Pursuit of the Nation's Worst Predators by
The voice that narrates In the Name of the Children: An F.B.I. Agent's Relentless Pursuit of the Nation's Worst Predators, which Rinek wrote with the journalist Marilee Strong, sounds warm and humane, qualities missing from much crime writing. Their book is a professional job, filled with illuminating details about the day-to-day operations of the bureau.'—New York Times Book Review FBI Special Agent Jeff Rinek had a gift for getting child predators to confess. All he had to do was share a piece of his soul... In the Name of the Children gives an unflinching look at what it's like to fight a never-ending battle against an enemy far more insidious than terrorists: the predators, lurking amongst us, who seek to harm our children. During his 30-year career with the FBI, Jeff Rinek worked hundreds of investigations involving crimes against children: from stranger abduction to serial homicide to ritualized sexual abuse. Those who do this kind of work are required to plumb the depths of human depravity, to see things no one should ever have to see—and once seen can never forget. There is no more important—or more brutal—job in law enforcement, and few have been more successful than Rinek at solving these sort of cases. Most famously, Rinek got Cary Stayner to confess to all four of the killings known as the Yosemite Park Murders, an accomplishment made more extraordinary by the fact that the FBI nearly pinned the crimes on the wrong suspects. Rinek's recounting of the confession and what he learned about Stayner provides perhaps the most revelatory look ever inside the psyche of a serial killer and a privileged glimpse into the art of interrogation. In the Name of the Children takes readers into the trenches of real-time investigations where every second counts and any wrong decision or overlooked fact can have tragic repercussions. Rinek offers an insider's perspective of the actual case agents and street detectives who are the boots on the ground in this war at home. By placing us inside the heart and mind of a rigorously honest and remarkably self-reflective investigator, we will see with our own eyes what it takes—and what it costs—to try to keep our children safe and to bring to justice those who prey on society's most vulnerable victims. With each chapter dedicated to a real case he worked, In the Name of the Children also explores the evolution of Rinek as a Special Agent—whose unorthodox, empathy-based approach to interviewing suspects made him extraordinarily successful in obtaining confessions—and the toll it took to have such intimate contact with child molesters and murderers. Beyond exploring the devastating impact of these unthinkable crimes on the victims and their families, this book offers an unprecedented look at how investigators and their loved ones cope while living in the specter of so much suffering.
Surveillance in America: Critical Analysi of the FBI, 1920 to the present by
Surveillance in America provides a historical exploration of FBI surveillance practices and policies since 1920 based on recently declassified FBI files. Using the new information available through these documents, Ivan Greenberg sheds light on the activities and beliefs of top FBI officials as they develop and implement surveillance practices. Paying particular attention to the uses of the media, Greenberg provides a thorough reconsideration of the Watergate scandal and the role of W. Mark Felt as “Deep Throat.” He exposes new evidence which suggests that Felt led a faction at the FBI that worked together to bring down President Nixon. The book concludes with an in-depth treatment of surveillance practices since the year 2000. He considers the question of “surveillance as harassment” and looks at the further erosion of privacy. stemming from Obama’s counter-terror policies which extend those of the Bush Administration’s second term. The startling increase in surveillance since the events of September 11th, reveal the extent to which America is losing the battle for civil liberties.
Days of Rage: America's Radical Underground, the FBI, and the Forgotten Age of Revolutionary Violence by
The Weathermen. The Symbionese Liberation Army. The FALN. The Black Liberation Army. The names seem quaint now, when not forgotten altogether. But there was a stretch of time in America, roughly between 1968 and 1975, when there was on average more than one significant terrorist act in this country every week, and the FBI combated these groups and others as nodes in a single revolutionary underground, dedicated to the violent overthrow of the American government. The FBI's response to the leftist revolutionary counterculture has not been treated kindly by history, and it is true that in hindsight many of its efforts seem almost comically ineffectual, if not criminal in themselves. But one aim of Bryan Burrough's book is to temper those easy judgments with an understanding of just how deranged these times were, how charged with menace. Burrough re-creates an atmosphere that seems almost unbelievable just forty years later, conjuring a time of native-born radicals, most of them "nice middle-class kids," smuggling bombs into skyscrapers and detonating them inside the Pentagon and the U.S. Capitol, at a courthouse in Boston, at a Wall Street restaurant packed with lunchtime diners. Radicals who robbed dozens of banks and assassinated policemen in New York, San Francisco, Atlanta. The FBI's fevered response included the formation of a secret task force called Squad 47, dedicated to hunting the groups down and rolling them up. But Squad 47 itself was not overly squeamish about legal niceties, and its efforts ultimately ended in fiasco. Benefiting from the extraordinary number of people from the underground and the FBI who speak about their experiences for the first time, Days of Rage is filled with important revelations and fresh details about the major revolutionaries and their connections and about the FBI and its desperate efforts to make the bombings stop.
Airport and Aviation Security by
In the years preceding the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, the United States lacked a comprehensive national policy and strategy for aviation security. The United States approach to aviation security had largely been shaped by past events such as the bombing of Pan Am flight 103 in December, 1988. This book explores the national aviation security policy established by the President. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has developed a publicly-available national strategy for aviation security that addresses threats to aviation using a risk-based methodology to complement the overarching National infrastructure Protection Plan (NIPP) and seeks to deter and prevent terrorist attacks against aviation, mitigate damage and expedite recovery and minimize the impact of an attack to the aviation system. The strategy seeks to achieve these objectives by engaging domestic and international partners and carrying out specific actions set forth in a series of supporting plans for operational security, surveillance and intelligence, threat response, system recovery, and coordination.
Coast Guard Drug Interdiction and Cutter Procurement by
The Coast Guard provided varying levels of resources for drug interdiction operations in the “transit zone”—the area from South America through the Caribbean Sea and the eastern Pacific Ocean that is used to transport illicit drugs to the United States—during fiscal years 2009 through 2013, and generally did not meet its performance targets for several reasons. One part of the U.S. National Drug Control Strategy is to disrupt the flow of cocaine through the transit zone. This book addresses trends in the Coast Guard's deployment of resources in the transit zone and the extent to which the Coast Guard met its performance targets; and actions taken by the Coast Guard to combat drug smuggling into Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands, and trends in vessel and aircraft deployments.
Female Officers in the Department of Defense and Coast Guard by
Since the end of the Second World War, the role of women in the military has been evolving. Changes to laws and Department of Defense (DOD) policies have either eliminated or clarified restrictions on women serving in the military. A 2011 Military Leadership Diversity Commission reported that women comprise more than 50 percent of the recruiting pool for the officer corps. Public Law 113-291 included a provision for United States Government Accountability Office (GAO) to review the Armed Forces'outreach and recruitment efforts directed at women's representation in the officer corps, among other things. This book evaluates the extent to which accessions of women into the officer corps have increased, and DOD and the Coast Guard have determined resources and funding to increase the accessions of women into the officer corps; and DOD and the Coast Guard have initiatives and an oversight framework to increase the recruitment and accessions of female officers.
Forging the Star: The Official Modern History of the United States Marshals Service by
What do diverse events such as the integration of the University of Mississippi, the federal trials of Teamsters President Jimmy Hoffa, the confrontation at Ruby Ridge, and the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina have in common? The U.S. Marshals were instrumental in all of them. Whether pursuing dangerous felons in each of the 94 judicial districts or extraditing them from other countries; protecting federal judges, prosecutors, and witnesses from threats; transporting and maintaining prisoners and detainees; or administering the sale of assets obtained from criminal activity, the U.S. Marshals Service has adapted and overcome a mountain of barriers since their founding (on September 24, 1789) as the oldest federal law enforcement organization. In Forging the Star, historian David S. Turk lifts the fog around the agency's complex modern period. From the inside, he allows a look within the storied organization. The research and writing of this singular account took over a decade, drawn from fresh primary source material with interviews from active or retired management, deputy U.S. marshals who witnessed major events, and the administrative personnel who supported them. Forging the Star is a comprehensive official history that will answer many questions about this legendary agency.
IRS Collection Cases: Selection Process and Automation Issues by
The Internal Revenue Service's (IRS) collection program largely uses automated processes to categorize and route unpaid tax or unfiled tax return cases for potential selection. The automated Inventory Delivery System (IDS) categorizes and routes cases based on many factors, such as type of tax and amount owed. Outside of IDS, collection managers set goals for closing cases in priority areas, such as delinquent employer payroll taxes and cases involving certain high-wealth taxpayers. IRS's collection program pursues individuals and businesses that failed to fully pay their taxes or file returns. This book describes collection processes and trends in priority areas; and assesses how well controls support the mission, including applying tax laws with integrity and fairness to all. Furthermore, this book describes the ACS process to prioritize and select collection cases and the results of that process for fiscal year 2014; and determines how well the ACS case prioritization and selection process supports the collection program mission and objectives.
National Security and Preparedness: Issues, Developments, and Analyses by
This book examines the national security and preparedness issues, developments and analyses facing the U.S. today. Topics discussed include the nation's air, land, and marine transportation systems that are designed for accessibility and efficiency and which in turn make them vulnerable to terrorist attack; the Transportation Security Admiministration's (TSA) Explosives Detection Canine Program; the Project Bioshield Act and its development, procurement, and use of medical countermeasures against chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear (CBRN) terrorism agents; efforts to address the medical needs of children in a CBRN incident; and additional actions needed to improve security of radiological sources at U.S. medical facilities.
Pinkerton's War: The Civil War's Gteatest Spy and the Birth of the Secret Service by
A thrilling historical account of Allan Pinkerton's pivotal role in the Civil War and the birth of the Secret Service Scottish immigrant Allan Pinkerton is best known for creating the Pinkerton National Detective Agency, which gained renown for solving train robberies in the 1850s and battling the labor movement in the late-nineteenth and early-twentieth centuries. But the central drama of his career, and the focus of this book, was his work as protector of President Abraham Lincoln and head of a network of Union spies (including himself!) who posed as Confederate soldiers and sympathizers in a deadly cat-and-mouse game. As here told in riveting prose by author Jay Bonansinga, Pinkerton's politics and abolitionist sympathies drew the attention of supporters of presidential incumbent Abraham Lincoln—and Pinkerton was hired to act as his bodyguard. Pinkerton was asked to organize the U.S. government's first “Secret Service,” and during the Civil War he managed a network of spies who worked behind confederate lines and tackled espionage at the highest levels in Washington. By war's end, the agency's reputation was so well established that it was often hired by the government to perform many of the same duties today assigned to the Secret Service, the FBI, the CIA, and, most recently, the Department of Homeland Security.
The U. S. Secret Service: Background, Missions and Issues by