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CNN Live Today

President Bush Prepares Speech on Homeland Security

Aired June 06, 2002 - 14:16   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
LEON HARRIS, CNN ANCHOR: In the meantime, let's check in with our Jeanne Meserve in Washington, who's got something for us now -- a preview of this speech that President Bush is going to make tonight about this big change in homeland security -- Jeanne.

JEANNE MESERVE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Leon, we understand that President Bush is expected to practice at this hour for this major primetime speech he's giving tonight to announce this major restructuring of government.

The intent, of course, is to bring some coherence to a homeland security structure which has been criticized as being inefficient and ineffective since September 11th.

This will create one massive Department of Homeland Security to be headed up by a cabinet level official. And within this department, there will be four divisions. Let me talk a little bit about what those will be.

The first will cover border and transportation security. This will merge the functions of the Coast Guards, the Customs Service, Immigration and Naturalization Service, the Boarder Patrol and some smaller agencies. It will insure that all aspects of border patrol, including the issuance of visas, are informed by a central information sharing clearinghouse.

Now, the second division would handle emergency preparedness and response. FEMA would be the big player here. It would be administering the grants to firefighters, police and emergency personnel that are currently dispersed across several departments of government, and this would be the department that would integrate the federal interagency response plans to a single government-wide plan, and to insure that all response personnel have the equipment and capabilities they need to respond.

Now, the third division would be chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear countermeasures. This is fairly self- explanatory here. These people would prepare and respond to the full range of terrorist threats involving weapons of mass destruction.

And the last division is some people feel the most key. This would be information analysis and infrastructure protection. This is the division that would take the intelligence from agencies like the CIA, the FBI, the NSA, the INS, the DEA, the DOE, Customs, DOT, everywhere within the government. It would pull it all together, analyze it, fuse this information, and hopefully have a handle on the threats facing the country.

Now, this is being compared by some people to the National Security Act of 1947. That consolidated the military departments into the Department of Defense and gave it a civilian head. It created the CIA. It created the NSA. A major restructuring.

Many homeland security experts with whom I have spoken today are very enthusiastic about what the president has put on the table. It is much broader and much more comprehensive than they expected it would be, and reaction from the Hill thus far has been positive as well.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. RICHARD GEPHARDT (D-MO), MINORITY LEADER: I'm really pleased at what I've heard in the last few hours, that the administration is apparently tonight going to announce, a new, and I hope it will be bipartisan, homeland defense plan.

I'm told there is an effort to setup a new Department of Homeland Defense, a cabinet agency with operational and budget authority, and that's precisely what I think should be done.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

MESERVE: I talked to one state homeland security official today, who thought this plan was dead on arrival on Capitol Hill because it would threaten the interests of so many members of Congress. There also are questions from some quarters about agency and department heads, how they will react to this. I am told by an official at the Department of Homeland Security, however, that they have all signed off and that there will be various cabinet level officials fanning out tonight to talk about this proposal, in support of this proposal, after the president's speech.

Tom Ridge will be the one in charge of spearheading any congressional action on this particular measure. They hope Congress will act before the end of this session.

Back to you, Leon.

HARRIS: Interesting, Jeanne.

Any idea, to gauge right now, I know it's a bit jumping the gun a little bit here, but any idea what the reaction is going to be like amongst the other branches, say for instance the Coast Guard, between the army? Did you see that they basically are going to have another line of responsibility that, you know, that hasn't been set in stone before.

MESERVE: From what I know of the situation so far, of this plan being outlined, it will not impact the Department of Defense in any significant way. That remains a stand-alone agency. There will be, continue to be, a White House Office of Homeland Defense. This is the job that Tom Ridge has been holding. It will coordinate between this new department and the Department of Defense, and the FBI and the CIA and the various agencies that will still stand alone and still have a part to play within homeland security.

But, as I said, people in the Department of Homeland Security today are saying that everybody in the cabinet is onboard -- they will be supporting what the president is proposing tonight.

HARRIS: All right. So, it'll soon be Secretary Ridge then.

MESERVE: Well, we don't know. We don't actually know where he's going to go. Will he stay in his present job? Will he move to this department? We don't know.

HARRIS: OK, very good. Jeanne Meserve, that's lots of work you've been doing all day. Appreciate that. Jeanne Meserve in Washington.

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