WASHINGTON, Sept. 15 (UPI) -- Senators told the president's pick to head U.S. immigration law enforcement that they are still weighing a plan to re-organize her agency, just two-and-a-half years after it was set up -- and one of them said he doubted she was qualified for the job.
Julie Myers was nominated by President Bush to head Immigration and Customs Enforcement, known as ICE -- the agency charged with hunting down money launderers, sanctions busters and human traffickers, and which is the sole enforcer of immigration laws inside the country. Thursday, she faced a confirmation hearing before the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Government Affairs.
"I'm really concerned about your management experience," Sen. George Voinovich, R-Ohio, told her, pointing out that ICE, with 20,000 employees, was the second-largest investigative agency in the federal government.
"I think that we ought to have a meeting with (Homeland Security Secretary) Mike Chertoff ... to ask him... why he thinks you're qualified for the job.
"Because based on your resume, I don't think you are," Voinovich concluded.
The law establishing the Department of Homeland Security specifies that the head of ICE should have at least five years management experience in law enforcement.
Myers, who has worked as an assistant U.S. attorney in Brooklyn, on money laundering and export control issues at the Departments of Treasury and Commerce, and was chief of staff for Chertoff when he ran the Criminal Division at the Department of Justice, just gets over that bar.
But Voinovich told United Press International after the hearing that he was concerned that -- aside from two years in Brooklyn -- she had spent little more than a year in each of those positions.
"I just wonder how significant those management experiences have been in terms of the length of time that she's been in those positions," he told UPI. "She's had little periods where she's had experience, but so often you really don't get into the depth of managing until you been some place more than a couple of years."
Voinovich is a former mayor and governor.
Myers told Voinovich in the hearing that her experience was very relevant, and "will serve me well."
"During my time in Washington, I've had the ability ... to work with legacy Customs and legacy (Immigration and Naturalization Service) agents in different capacities," Myers said, referring to the two agencies, parts of which were melded together into ICE with the formation of the Department of Homeland Security in March 2003.
"I know what it's like to work side-by-side with a Customs agent trying a case. I also know what it's like supervising a Customs agent," she said.
But Voinovich said she would face the huge problem of the ongoing financial crisis that has gripped the agency since its inception.
A budget shortfall of several hundred million dollars resulted in a hiring freeze and other emergency measures that some ICE field agents say handicapped them.
"You understand that that'll be one of the challenges you face in this job?" Voinovich asked Myers.
"No question," she replied, adding that she had already met with the department's chief financial officer and the acting chief for ICE.
"It will be one my top priorities to focus on," she told him. One of the reasons for the crisis, she said, was that the agency "was still getting up to speed in terms of having top financial management in place."
"To this day," she added, "ICE does not have a permanent chief financial officer. If confirmed, I would make sure to (appoint one) immediately."
But Voinovich said he would seek reassurances from her prospective boss.
"She's gonna work for him," he said of Chertoff after the hearing, "and I'd really like to know why he thinks she's the one who can get the job done ... how successful she is will have lot to do with his success."
Voinovich added that the Hurricane Katrina disaster, which had exposed the weakness of the leadership at the Federal Emergency Management Agency, "highlighted in a dramatic way, the need to have competent people at the top."
He said that he planned for the committee to probe Homeland Security closely -- to "get down into the bowels of the department," as he put it.
Observers noted that Myers -- as a former chief of staff to Chertoff, and as fiancé to his current chief of staff -- had close personal links to Chertoff that would help keep the agency's profile up within the department.
"ICE has always been something of an undervalued asset (within the department)," former Homeland Security Assistant Secretary for Policy Stewart Verdery told UPI.
"Having a leader who has such a close connection to the secretary should be helpful to them in keeping their priorities on the front page of the secretary's agenda."
Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, and her Democratic opposite number, Sen. Joe Lieberman, D.-Conn., raised the issue of merging ICE with the agency that was also founded from the break up of Customs and the Immigration and Naturalization Service. That agency, called Customs and Border Protection, polices the ports of entry to the nation -- inspecting people and goods seeking admittance.
"A lot of individuals and organizations that have taken a look at the Department of Homeland Security have proposed the merger," Collins told the hearing.
She said a report by the department's Inspector General, which the committee commissioned last year, and which would be "released shortly" would "recommend the merger."
"What I have found," she told the hearing, "and the (Inspector General's) report confirms, is that many field employees of the two agencies are very frustrated at what they see as the unnatural separation between the two organizations.
"In addition there have been turf battles, budget fights and a feeling among outside law enforcement that the current organization has not done well."
Myers replied that the department -- as part of the comprehensive review that Chertoff initiated upon taking office -- concluded that the two organizations should remain separate.
"They determined that it was in the best strategic interests of the department for the two agencies to remain separate," she said.
As a result of the review, she added "There would be additional steps taken to improve co-ordination" between the two agencies.
But Lieberman suggested that the review was not the last word.
"This is not necessarily a closed issue within the department ... (or) with members of congress, including myself," he said.
Also appearing at the hearing was Stewart Baker, nominated to be assistant secretary for policy at the department.
He called his role "a daunting prospect," noting that the department was "still inventing itself."
"The job description ought to demand perfection," he said.
Lieberman asked Baker if the staffing level for his office were adequate, given the huge task he would have.
"I don't think there's anyone who's ever taken a job in government who didn't think that they could do a better job with more staff," replied Baker, adding that "no final decisions on staffing had been taken" and that he would "make the case aggressively" for the personnel he needed.
