This article written by Ambassador R. James Woolsey and Dr. Peter Vincent Pry was originally published by the Washington Times on February 14, 2017. A portion has been re-published with the permission of the Washington Times, and the article in its entirety can be found on their website.
Congress, virtually at the last minute and unnoted by the press, finally passed the Critical Infrastructure Protection Act (CIPA) — arguably the single most important piece of legislation approved by Congress in 2016 — by inserting it into the National Defense Authorization Act.
The bill, long-championed by Rep. Trent Franks, Arizona Republican, and sponsored by Sen. Ron Johnson, Wisconsin Republican, in the Senate, has traveled a long road.
Eight years ago, the Congressional EMP Commission urged Capitol Hill to direct the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to protect the electric grid and other critical infrastructures from a man-made or natural electromagnetic pulse (EMP).
CIPA implements one of the most important recommendations of the EMP Commission to prevent societal mass destruction. It directs the DHS to establish new national planning scenarios focused on protecting and recovering the nation from an EMP catastrophe. All federal, state and local emergency planning, training and resource allocation are based on the DHS national planning scenarios.
Passage of CIPA means that millions of emergency planners and first responders across the nation, including police, firefighters and National Guardsmen, will become part of the solution to the existential threat that is EMP.
Read the rest of the article here.
Read the letter written by Vice Chair of the Board of Governors of the Mackenzie Institute, D. Brian Hay to Senator Tom Carper, Ranking Member of the Senate Homeland Security Committee, requesting to expedite the passage of the CIPA legislation here.
