News21 fellows at Columbia – ten 2006 graduates of its Graduate School of Journalism and one from Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government – have spent months, in teams and alone, following the Department of Homeland Security. We’ve used new, computer-assisted reporting techniques to assess information in federal databases and we’ve used old-fashioned reporting techniques to interview dozens of current and former DHS officials, industry executives, academics, advocates, lobbyists and individuals affected by homeland security issues. We’ve investigated the department’s management and the operations of many subsidiary agencies, and we’ve scrutinized private-sector companies that are selling homeland security services to the government. What we found was always interesting and frequently unique.
Over the past six months, News21 interviewed several people who have closely followed developments at DHS. All agreed that the department has much work left to reach its goals of securing the United States against terrorist attacks. Watch five of these experts share their thoughts about the department and homeland security in general.
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