The Homeland Security Act (FEMA)

September 11, 2001, will forever be remembered as a day of tragedy for the United States as an act of terrorism killed roughly 3,000 people at the World Trade Center, and 200 at the Pentagon. Terrorists hijacked four separate aircraft that day, two planes were crashed into the north and south tower of the World Trade Center in New York, one was crashed into the Pentagon in Virginia, and the last one crashed into a field where it was believed that passengers disrupted the hijackers, causing the aircraft to crash before reaching its target. Both towers eventually fell, and this attack brought about the beginning of many changes for the United States, that had a ripple effect onto other nations. On September 20th, Bush called for an emergency joint session of the US Congress where he announced the creation of the Department of Homeland Security (MacFarlane, P. J., 2017). Along with this new department came the development of several measures that were implemented to prevent future attacks. Although the terrorist attacks of 9/11 were devastating and caused turmoil and unrest for the United States, even to present day, there were some positive outcomes to be had from this event.

According to Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), there are many factors that will affect the direction of emergency management in the coming years. These can be classified as global challenges, global opportunities, national challenges, national opportunities, professional challenges, and professional opportunities. Global Challenges include some issues like global climate change, increasing population and population density, increasing resource scarcities, rising income inequality, and increasing risk aversion. Global Opportunities has to do with increased scientific understanding of the hazards and societal responses, as well as revolutionary technologies. National Challenges involves increasing urbanization and hazard exposure, interdependencies in infrastructure, continued emphasis on growth, rising costs of disaster recovery, increasing population diversity, terrorist threats, low priority of emergency management, legal liability, and intergovernmental tensions. Due to these factors that will affect the direction of emergency management in the coming years, there is need for us at emergency management division to adjust operational plans to meet these challenges and especially changes emanating from constant changes expected in technology and other threats we face.

On September 11th, 2001 the future of the United States changed forever. With almost 3,000 people dying from a terrorist attack that spanned the Eastern U.S., new tactics had to be created to prevent an event like this from ever happening again. Forty-five days after the attack, the USA Patriot Act was passed (Source 5). While only some Americans approved of it, the act was created to protect from terrorism across the country.

Throughout its history, FEMA has had two main missions. First, FEMA’s mission is to enhance the federal government 's capacity to deal with and survive foreign attacks. The main types of foreign attacks that FEMA is tasked to respond to relate to terrorist attacks and nuclear war. The second mission of FEMA is to assist state and local authori¬ties to respond to man-made and natural disasters that are to enormous for the local and state resources to respond to efficiently. While national security focuses more on civil defense, state and local authorities are more focused on natural disasters such as hurricanes, storms, floods and potential nuclear power accidents. These divergent focuses really presents FEMA with huge challenges since federal security authorities’ main objective is quite different from state or local authorities’ focus. Considering that FEMA designed the Federal Response Plan, the agency has the challenge of balancing these interests while working on its two key missions.

One topic that is in the cross fire on debates all the time is the federal policy on disaster relief, and disaster preparedness. The federal government has programs put into place to help the victims of natural disasters, such as hurricanes and tornados. Some of these disaster relief programs are The Robert T. Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act (the Stafford Act), Department of Homeland Security (DHS), and The Red Cross. These programs have many policies in place, but some feel that there is still a lot of work that needs to be done to improve these policies.

After the terrorist attack September 11, 2001, the United States government increased their investments in security. Many innocent lives were lost because of that incident, which worried the United States of America about self-defense or Homeland Security. Homeland Security was signed to become a law by the President George W. Bush in November 2002. Their main priority was to secure the country from the threats such as international terrorism. The Department of Homeland security had to focus on five goals such as prevent terrorism, enhance security, secure the borders, enforce immigration laws, safeguard, and cyberspace. In order to achieve these goals a lot of work was needed.

September 11. 2001 was a major turning point in American History, and its political and social impact can still be felt today. The tragic event shook the entire country on the civilian and federal level. Before 9/11 many did not think that a plan of terrorism such as that of Osama Bin Laden's would be able to come to fruition because they had great trust in American security. The destruction came as a wakeup call to the federal government and American citizens themselves. National Security became the first thing people thought of when they traveled, and civilians looked to the government for reassurance that they were safe. The federal government's plan of action was to pass a series of acts that would go on to create the Department of Homeland Security and Transportation Security Association. Along with the creation of more strict security measures came the question of "who is a terrorist?" within the country. The formation of the DHS, TSA, and increase of Islamophobia are some examples of the lasting effects that 9/11 had on the country.

In chapter 3, titled “Congress and the Agencies”, we learn of a few of the many laws, processes and agencies that have been created to better prepare the United States for a national emergency. Since the origins of the United States, the President has always been the lead on emergencies that required attention by the federal government, but the legislative and judicial branches of the government have become more and more involved in making sure that it is done constitutionally. One of the main reasons for this is because of the statutes that have been created because of the response to emergencies. These statutes have been separated into three separate categories.

September 11, 2001 sparked many different feelings into the hearts of Americans. People sprang into action to seek revenge and protect America’s precious soils from another deadly attack by reinforcing America’s strength through her government. The men and women of Congress retaliated to the terrorist attacks by drafting and passing the USA PATRIOT Act on October 26, 2001, which stands for “Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism.” The bill was moved through Congress with amazing speed and little hesitation. After the passing, the unsuspecting citizens of America were bombarded with many new rules and regulations that

On September 11, 2001 Muslim terrorists instilled with a hatred of the west attacked the United States in a brutal fashion. Planes were hijacked and flown into the World Trade Center in New York. Over three thousand people were killed and the impregnable nation known as America was know scared and vulnerable. Almost immediately the legislature began drafting an act that would make the war on terror and the fight for homeland security a little easier to fight, this would come to be known as the Patriot Act

In the aftermath of September 11, 2001teerrorist attacks, Congress and President Busch drafted, passed and enacted a number of laws that were focused on improving the nation’s security form terrorist attack and upgrading its ability to search for, identify, and eliminate terrorist threats at homes and international. Two of the most important and far reaching laws to come from the political and legislative action for the fall were the Uniting and Strengthening Americas by Providing Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act of 2001(USA Patriot Act) and the Homeland Security Act of 2002. While the USA Patriot Act and Homeland Security Act of 2002 have formed the backbone of terrorism laws in the United States, they are not without their problems, especially in terms of how far they infringe upon the right, freedom, and liberties of the public.

The Department of Homeland Security has merged twenty-two separate agencies into one unified and integrated department. Funding has nearly reached 9 billion dollars towards the security enhancements of homeland security such as the national borders and transportation systems (Spindlove and Simeson, 2009). Some noticeable department components that make up DHS are the developments of the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), United States Customs and Border Protections (CBP), Unites States Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Additionally, further expanding core mission of homeland security were the effects of hurricane Katrina and its response toward disasters. The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) was enacted in order to prepare the nation for hazardous events, manage federal response and recovery efforts following a national incident. As events have unfolded, homeland security strategies and missions have adapted safeguards and protective measure to ensure a homeland that is safe from

The Department of Homeland Security was established in 2002 because of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. FEMA was integrated into the DHS so that they could ensure there are effective plans in place to quickly resolve catastrophic events. In compliance with one another, they manage at government levels bioterrorism, chemical or radiation emergencies, natural disasters, and disease outbreaks.

On May 12, 1933 after years of struggling to get started, the Federal Emergency Relief Act (FERA) was created. The one who would oversee this program was Harry Hopkins. A key condition of the Federal Emergency Relief Act of 1933 was that for authorization of this program to even begin FERA would need to expire in two years. So, with a very small deadline the FERA decided to set required guidelines and procedures for this act. One of those required guidelines was the administrations had to work with state government by providing federal grants for relief purposes. Those States with grant applications were to provide information on the amount of money that was necessary to meet relief needs in their state. They also had to share the amounts available

After the 2001 September 11th attacks on the world trade center the nations homeland security policies had to be reinforced. The awkwardly titled so as to unite and Strengthening America Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act of 2001 (USA PATRIOT Act, or USAPA) presented a plenty of administrative changes which altogether expanded the reconnaissance and investigative forces of law authorization organizations in the United States. The Act did not, in any case, accommodate the arrangement of balanced governance that generally protects common freedoms despite such enactment. Authoritative recommendations in light of the terrorist assaults of September 11, 2001 were presented not exactly a week after the assaults. President Bush marked the last bill, the USA PATRIOT Act, into law on October 26, 2001. Despite the fact that the Act made critical corrections to more than 15 imperative statutes, it was presented with awesome flurry and went with little verbal confrontation, and without a House, Senate, or meeting report. Therefore, it needs foundation authoritative history that regularly reflectively gives important statutory understanding. The Act was a trade off form of the Anti-Terrorism Act of 2001 (ATA), an expansive authoritative bundle planned to fortify the country 's protection against terrorism. The ATA contained a few procurements incomprehensibly growing the power of law authorization and knowledge organizations to screen private