The Obama administration yesterday issued a plan for countering violent extremism in the United States that prioritizes terrorism inspired by Al Qaeda and its affiliates and aims to improve cooperation with local communities that may be the target of violent extremists.
The Strategic Implementation Plan for Empowering Local Partners to Prevent Violent Extremism in the United States will be applied to all forms of violent extremism, according to the 21-page document.
The plan describes current and planned activities in three areas related to countering violent extremism: enhancing engagement with local communities; building government and law enforcement expertise; and countering extremist propaganda while promoting the nation’s ideals.
The plan creates department and agency leads for various activities in countering violent extremism, such as naming the Department of Homeland Security as the lead in building a public website on community resilience and countering violent extremism and putting it, with the help of others, in charge of providing regular briefings to Congress, think tanks and the media on domestic radicalization.
Senators Joseph Lieberman (I/D-Conn.) and Susan Collins (R-Maine), the chairman and ranking member, respectively, on the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, said the plan takes “positive steps by announcing actions to accomplish and designating department leads and partners.” However, they said more needs to be done, in particular who is directing the efforts within each department and what they will do and when.
The lawmakers are also “disappointed” that the administration doesn’t call out violent Islamic extremism as the nation’s enemy and that no particular agency has been designated “to coordinate operations and ensure accountability and effectiveness of the national effort to counter violent Islamist extremism at home.”