DHS’s New Years Resolution: A Budget

Tomas O’Keefe, Consultant, Market Intelligence

When Congress voted last year to give appropriations to federal agencies, there was one glaring omission: the Department of Homeland Security. Due to furor over executive actions on immigration taken by President Obama, Congress passed a Continuing Resolution for DHS until the end of February, so expect conversations on the Hill to be geared toward how to fund the Department while attempting to address the President’s executive action; this could affect two departmental components in particular, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS).

In Continuous Diagnostics and Mitigation (CDM) news, DHS and its General Service Administration counterparts have released Task Orders 2C & 2D to cover an array of federal departments and we’re still waiting on word of awards to follow from Task Orders 2A and 2B. We’ll likely see some work on the additional phases of the CDM efforts as the year progresses as well, with more information to follow in the coming months.

Additionally, last week in one of his final actions before leaving Congress, Senator Tom Coburn of Oklahoma released a report summarizing his time as Ranking Member of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee; this report highlights many of the deficiencies and problems in the way DHS has been funded — and has spent that money— over the past 12 years. The findings in this report can be useful for COTS vendors looking for opportunities where your products can help address DHS’s shortcomings.

To learn more about sales opportunities within DHS, make sure to register today for my Market Intelligence Webinar on Tuesday, January 20^th. I’ll be covering some hot topics including: the impact of political negotiations and how they could affect the work done by DHS (including ICE and USCIS), a detailed review of the CDM roadmap, and challenges the Department is facing with a special emphasis on where industry support is needed. Click here to register.