Christopher Shays: “I rise in support of H.R. 1955, the Violent Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism Prevention Act, which I refer to as…”

“I rise in support of H.R. 1955, the Violent Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism Prevention Act, which I refer to as the Harman-Reichert bill. I appreciate that they have worked so well together on a bipartisan basis. I like the fact that this legislation creates a 10-member national commission, modeled after the 9/11 Commission, to study violent radicalization and ideologically based terrorism in these United States. Before September 11 we had the Hart-Rudman Commission, the Bremer Commission, the Gilmore Commission. They all told us the same basic point, that we have a terrorist threat and we need to recognize that threat, that we need a strategy to deal with this threat, and that we need to reorganize our government to implement the strategy. Then came September 11, and we did wake up somewhat. We reorganized our government and created the Department of Homeland Security. We passed the PATRIOT Act. We reorganized our intelligence agencies and created a Director of Intelligence. And we are reforming the FISA law, but this is still an issue we are working with. The 9/11 Commission did something very courageous. They didn't say we are confronting terrorism; they said we are confronting Islamist terrorists who would do us harm.”