Norton has Praise for President's Actions and Questions for Federal Agencies

Following Terror Attempt, Norton has Praise for President's Actions and Questions for Federal Agencies

December 28, 2009

Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC), who sits on the Homeland Security Committee and is a member of its Subcommittee on Transportation Security and Infrastructure, praised the Northwest Airlines crew and passengers "who saved the day" when an alleged terrorist tried to set off an explosive, but the Congresswoman said that several government agencies need to explain why they appeared not to have been nearly as alert in preventing the terrorism attempt. Norton, who represents the nation's capital, a likely high profile terrorist target, said that there will be many questions to be answered at the hearing that Homeland Security Committee Chairman Bennie Thompson has already announced on how Umar Abdul-Mutallab escaped official notice.

Norton praised President Obama for "without hesitation taking the right steps in ordering investigations of the watch lists and of airport detection equipment." Norton said that controversial whole-body equipment is not used at most airports here but is available in Amsterdam, where the terrorist suspect embarked for Detroit. Norton said she does not know why this equipment reportedly is not used on passengers coming to the U.S. inasmuch as every nation has a right to screen passengers pursuant to its own laws. However, the Congresswoman said, "the president was right in doing the investigations first rather than setting off panic by ordering the many unproven, make-work steps that continued for years after 9/11." Norton is sponsor of H.R. 3555, the Open Society with Security bill, now making its way through the House.

Norton said that she was particularly puzzled and troubled that no red flags went up after the suspect's own father, a prominent banker, and a presumably reliable source, notified embassy officials of his son's terrorist and Yemen connections and of his disappearance. "This father did the right thing in taking an unusually courageous and difficult step." Norton said, "In contrast, most of the information for these lists is far more hearsay or circumstantial." The Congresswoman recalled many hearings on the ineffectiveness of the terrorist watch list in the years after 9/11 and said it is time to revisit the lists and especially list procedures that duly note such reports but do not throw up red flags.