WASHINGTON – The Department of Homeland Security will go through an internal review to eradicate white supremacy and extremism within its ranks as part of a larger effort to combat extremist ideology in the federal government, officials said Monday.
The task of identifying extremists in the United States, and particularly in government agencies, has been high on President Biden’s agenda since January 6, when a pro-Trump mob stormed the U.S. Capitol. Many of the rioters were members of extremist groups.
“We recognize that domestic violent extremism and the ideology, the extremist ideologies that spit it out are widespread,” said Alejandro N. Mayorkas, Minister of Homeland Security. “We have a responsibility, given our activities, to ensure that this harmful influence does not exist in our department.”
The review comes shortly after the Pentagon completed a 60-day anti-extremism “shutdown” after it was discovered that a number of veterans participated in the Capitol riot. The Biden government is currently considering whether other agencies will conduct similar investigations as part of a wider review launched this year to assess how the federal government is addressing domestic extremist threats.
Monday’s announcement underscores the government’s decision to prioritize fighting domestic extremism after decades of intermittent dismissal of it as a minor threat or reluctance to invest additional resources to combat it. This is also a lynchpin of the approach taken by President Donald J. Trump, who pressured federal authorities to divert resources to counter the anti-fascist movement and left-wing groups, despite law enforcement officials concluding that violence against the rights and the militia plays a bigger role in Serious Threat.
The Homeland Security Review is asking a team of senior officials to determine if extremist ideologies are prevalent in the various agencies, including the Border Guard, Immigration and Customs Service, Intelligence and the Coast Guard. The division works to prevent domestic terrorism threats, enforce immigration, protect the president and respond to national emergencies.
Fighting extremism across government is a tremendous challenge. The military alone has 1.3 million soldiers on active duty. With more than 240,000 employees, Homeland Security is one of the largest law enforcement agencies in the country.
Gil Kerlikowske, who served as Customs and Border Protection commissioner under President Barack Obama, said the internal review would be complicated with many agents communicating on private social media sites or in chat rooms.
“That’s pretty tricky,” he said. “At every level.”
As part of the review, senior officials will set up an internal process for agents who are found to be associated with extremist groups or who hold these beliefs online or on duty, Mayorkas said.
He said he was “aware of the constitutional right to freedom of expression”.
“There is a clear difference between this right and violence to promote extremist ideologies,” Mayorkas said.
He added that the team will develop training and resources for staff and hold listening sessions for officers and agents, similar to the methods used by the Department of Defense this year.
Following his “resignation,” the Pentagon said a task force would be set up to investigate how to better screen recruits and train service personnel who may be targeted by extremist organizations.
The term “resign” is used in the military to refer to any issue the Secretary of Defense deems important enough to be addressed through discussion within the armed forces.
Mr Biden made combating domestic extremism an early priority.
Shortly after taking office, he ordered the director of the National Intelligence Service to work with the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security for a comprehensive assessment of the government’s fight against extremism. The government followed suit last month with an intelligence report to Congress identifying white supremacists and militia groups as the top national security threats.
In a memo to all department staff on Monday, Mayorkas described domestic extremists as “the deadliest and most persistent terrorist threat to our country today.”
The department will also provide guidance to employees in the coming days for reporting “inside threats and other actions related to domestic violent extremists,” the memo said. Mr Biden released a spending proposal this month that included an additional $ 84 million on Customs and Border Protection and ICE to improve the investigation of workers’ complaints, “including those related to white supremacy or ideological and non-ideological Relate beliefs “.
The Department of Homeland Security has come under scrutiny after several episodes of wrongdoing in recent years, including the 2019 revelation that dozens of border guards had joined private Facebook groups and other social media sites displaying obscene images of Hispanic lawmakers and threats against members of Congress contained.
A Coast Guard lieutenant who described himself as a white nationalist was arrested in Maryland that same year for plotting to kill journalists, Democratic politicians, professors, Supreme Court justices, and people he called “leftists in general, according to prosecutors “designated.
Mr Mayorkas declined to say in an interview how many active members of his department had participated in the Capitol riot, citing an ongoing investigation.
Department staff have the right to share their views on immigration policy, Mayorkas said. When a person “communicates anti-immigrant sentiment in a back office, that is one thing that a regulatory address may or may not justify”.
However, if an ICE agent made such a statement during enforcement, it could “compromise the integrity of the department’s work” and warrant another possible action, Mayorkas said.
Mr Kerlikowske said the review could lead to a backlash in the agency.
“I think there is real potential for that,” he said, “if you tell them what to post and what to post.”
