Congressman Linder supports passage of the 9/11 Recommendations Implementation Act

Washington, D.C. (Oct. 8) - Congressman John Linder (R-GA) gave the following floor statement on the rule for H.R. 10, the "9/11 Recommendations Implementation Act." H.R. 10 was approved by the U.S. House of Representatives by a vote of 282-134.

   Congressman Linder's floor statement on H.R. 10 is as follows:

   "Three years have passed since a beautiful September day was shattered by terrorists who despised the thought of a nation that allows its people the freedom to live and worship as they choose. I agree with President George W. Bush that 'the terrorists are offended not merely by our policies - they are offended by our existence as free nations.'

   "Since that day, our nation has fought this war on multiple fronts: diplomatic, financial, investigative, homeland security, humanitarian, and militarily. We have also committed to improving our intelligence operations. 

   "After the House and Senate passed the Intelligence Authorization bill last Congress, the President signed the bill into law - establishing the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks on the United States. Its goal was to prepare a complete account of the events surrounding the September 11th attacks. Recently, the commission submitted recommendations to Congress citing the need for reforms of our intelligence and homeland security systems.

   "I am pleased that this bi-partisan group was able to come to a thorough conclusion on what went wrong prior to September 11th and what must be done to ensure that those heinous acts never occur again.

   "Proactive steps have already been taken. During the month of August, when Congress traditionally recesses to conduct work in the respective districts across the country, Members were called back to participate in no less than 20 committee hearings on the Commission's report. I joined my colleagues in a hearing of the House Select Committee on Homeland Security, where we were able to listen to the testimony of Commission Chairman Tom Kean and Vice Chairman Lee Hamilton.

   "President Bush has outlined a strategy for sweeping reform of our security and intelligence operations in his continuing efforts to keep our nation safe from those who wish to do harm to our citizens. Today, the House continues its efforts to move forward to make the substantive changes that will inevitably help better protect the citizens of this country. The House is committed to doing everything in its power to enact a plan that reflects the full scope of the Commission's intelligence and homeland security recommendations.

   "This wide-ranging bill reforms and integrates our intelligence capacity by establishing a National Intelligence Director to serve as the head of the intelligence community, a National Intelligence Council, and an Intelligence Community Information Technology Officer to assist in the implementation of an integrated information technology network.

   "This bill focuses on effective information sharing, because we know that - prior to September 11th - the sharing of intelligence in the federal government was inadequate. This bill ensures the sharing of - and access to - information within our intelligence community with a particular emphasis placed on detection, prevention and the disruption of potential of terrorist attacks.

   "H.R. 10 focuses on terrorism prevention by authorizing federal officials to target "lone wolf" terrorists, targeting money laundering and terrorist financing, and enhancing airline security through improved passenger pre-screening and training all federal law enforcement officers with in-flight counter-terrorism procedures.

   "This bill effectively restructures the government by strengthening the Federal Bureau of Investigation through recruitment and retention, streamlining our nation's current security clearance procedures by eliminating duplicative processes, and finally improving efficiency by expediting the processes that direct resources to first responders where they are most needed.

   "In addition, in response to the Commission's detailed report on problems such as border security, information sharing, and immigration enforcement, this comprehensive bill tackles these challenging issues and enhances the reforms that have been put in place since September 11th.

   "Mr. Speaker, this is a fair and balanced rule for a bill that is critical to improving our current security and intelligence operations. I urge support for the rule and for the underlying measure, and I reserve the balance of my time."