Inspector general finds litany of failures within Homeland Security under Biden-Harris

Under the Biden-Harris administration, a litany of failures have been identified at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

Multiple Office of Inspector General audits found a range of failures at DHS and its subagencies, from vetting, to screening to releasing foreign nationals who Republicans say pose a national security threat. Its secretary, Alejandro Mayorkas, was impeached in February by House Republicans for dereliction of duty, including the failures the OIG identified.

Congress established DHS through the Homeland Security Act of 2022 to consolidate federal agency resources to better protect Americans from terrorist threats and disasters after the 9/11 terrorist attacks.

The Homeland Security Act “requires DHS to provide situational awareness and a common operating picture for the entire federal government,” and for state, local, and tribal governments, related to terrorist acts, natural disasters, or man-made disasters.

“Recent incidents and disasters highlighted the need for situational awareness throughout the Homeland Security Enterprise,” the OIG says, which is why it audited DHS to determine if it was sharing “actionable information on emerging threats with its external partners.”

The OIG found that it wasn’t and DHS partners “did not always use DHS technology to obtain emerging threat information.”

This is after members of Congress called on DHS to issue a National Terrorism Advisory System Bulletin, which it hasn’t done since May 2023. The NTAS was “designed to communicate information about terrorist threats by providing timely, detailed information to the American public.” When asked why it still hasn’t issued one, DHS did not respond.

Congress has allocated billions of dollars for DHS technology to enable agents to identify and share emerging threat information and maintain “real-time situational awareness.” The audit found that DHS partners “did not always use this technology to obtain threat information,” were not always aware of technology modernization or training efforts, DHS didn’t conduct outreach to support partners and didn’t “always share information with partners in a timely manner. As a result, “DHS cannot always effectively share emerging threat information with partners, which may limit … response to emerging threats against the homeland,” the report found.

This was the latest among many DHS issues the OIG identified.

One OIG report found that individuals on the terrorist watchlist were being released into the country because of DHS’ U.S. Custom and Border Protections’ “ineffective practices and processes for resolving inconclusive matches with the Terrorist Watchlist led to multiple mistakes.”

This is as the greatest number of known or suspected terrorists have been apprehended under the Biden-Harris administration. With more than 2 million gotaways, those who illegally entered and evaded capture, law enforcement officials have expressed concerns about not knowing how many terrorists are in the country.

Another OIG report found that DHS didn’t properly vet Afghanistan nationals admitted into the US., including those who were deemed “a risk to national security.”

In another report, the OIG found that CBP and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement were not detaining or removing inadmissibles flying into country, raising national security alarms. Another report found that roughly 200,000 deportation cases were dismissed because DHS failed to file paperwork.

In another, the OIG found that CBP and U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services vetting of asylum seekers was inadequate, they weren’t fully screening or vetting noncitizens applying for admission into the U.S. and still released them.

Despite this, President Joe Biden just announced via executive order that he was expanding refugee application status to citizens and residents of multiple countries on multiple continents worldwide.

In addition to DHS’ failed screening and vetting process, another OIG redacted report found that DHS “does not have assurance that all migrants can be located once they are released into the United States.”

Once released, for those who were provided housing, in one period of time evaluated, the OIG found that ICE wasted millions of taxpayer money on hotels not to house them.

When it comes to “unaccompanied alien children” (UACs) under the federal government’s care, DHS transfers them to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Office of Refugee Resettlement, HHS ORR.

The OIG for years has identified problems with this program. The OIG found that UACs were being sent to live with unvetted sponsors, background checks weren’t being performed on sponsors, children were being released to alleged gang members and human traffickers, ORR had lost track of roughly 100,000 children, and UACs were being used for child labor. It also found that ICE was “incapable of monitoring unaccompanied minors released into U.S.,” expressing alarm because “missing children are 'considered at higher risk for trafficking, exploitation, or forced labor.'”

Information about abuse and neglect that whistleblowers brought forward was so serious that U.S. Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-IA, filed criminal complaints this year and introduced legislation to address the concerns, which Senate Democrats blocked.