Random Excerpts

CISOMB. The Office of the Citizenship and Immigration Services Ombudsman should be eliminated. The DHS bureaucracy is too large, and the Secretary has too many direct reports. CISOMB’s policy functions can be performed (and sometimes already are) by OIG and GAO. The specialized case work can be moved into USCIS as a special unit, much like the IRS Taxpayer Advocate. This would require a statutory change to Section 452 of the Homeland Security Act of 2002.?°

Personnel. Personnel is one of the biggest concerns for the USAGM and its grantees. Attracting talented staff who will stay and letting go of poorly performing personnel are hurdles. Additionally, whistleblowers have come forward with numerous credible allegations of illegal nepotism and improper hiring practices.*° Past agency leaders have ignored national security procedures when hiring and have failed to adequately vet staff.* Government hiring policies and federal law must be followed, and serious policy changes must be implemented to end these practices.

The above reforms would cost substantially less than the $1,675,060,000 requested for FY 2023.*" Legislation such as the IIJA placed additional funding for new reactor demonstration projects outside of NE. These responsibilities and their associated funds should be moved to NE as appropriate. NE should not simply add or subtract programs, as some programs may help to support NE’s new priorities. The better approach would be to build a new budget and program strategy that accounts for related DOE programs and submit a new budget request reflecting NE’s new priorities.

The OPA further serves as a line of communication between the White House and the President’s political party. This includes both relaying the President’s ambitions to political interests and listening to the needs of political interests. This relationship allows for the exchange of information between the White House and political actors across the country. The OPA should have one director of political affairs who reports either to the Chief of Staff or to a Deputy Chief of Staff. The OPA should also include various deputy directors, each of whom is responsible for a certain geographical region of the country.

managing outside commercial real estate contracting with 376.9 million square feet of space. Obviously, as its prime function, real estate expertise is key to the GSA’s success. However, the GSA is also the government’s purchasing agent, connecting federal purchasers with commercial products and services in the private sector and their personnel management functions. With contractors performing so many functions today, the GSA therefore becomes a de facto part of governmentwide personnel management. The GSA also manages the Presidential Transition Act (PTA) process, which also directly involves the OPM. A recent proposal would have incorporated the OPM and GSA (and OMB). Fortunately, this did not take place in that form, but it would make sense for GSA and OPM leadership and staff to hold regular meetings to work through matters of common interest such as moderating PTA personnel restrictions and the relationships between contract and civil service employees.

Frustrated with these activities by top career executives, the Trump Administration issued Executive Order 13957” to make career professionals in positions that are not normally subject to change as a result of a presidential transition but who discharge significant duties and exercise significant discretion in formulating and implementing executive branch policy and programs an exception to the competitive hiring rules and examinations for career positions under a new Schedule F. It ordered the Director of OPM and agency heads to set procedures to prepare lists of such confidential, policy-determining, policymaking, or policy-advocating positions and prepare procedures to create exceptions from civil service rules when careerists hold such positions, from which they can relocate back to the regular civil service after such service. The order was subsequently reversed by President

• Remove never-needed supply chain restrictions, which give families fewer places to which they can turn. The recent shortage of baby formula, for example, was caused largely by heavily protectionist regulations. Strength and resilience come from openness.

Apprenticeships. The next Administration should return to prior policy and implement an industry-recognized apprenticeship program separate from the Registered Apprenticeship Program (RAP) and explore how best to modernize, streamline, and eliminate duplication in the RAP. For roughly 80 years, the RAP— which requires conforming to government standards and includes federal funding, tax credits, and other federal resources—has dominated apprenticeship programs in the U.S. Organizations across the political spectrum have noted that the overly burdensome requirements of RAPs have contributed to limiting them to legacy trades, failing to meet growing industry demands such as in health care and technology. A 2017 study estimated that the number of occupations commonly filled through apprenticeships could nearly triple (from 27 to 74), that the number of job openings filled through apprenticeships could expand eightfold (to 3.2 million), and that the occupations ripe for apprenticeship expansion could offer 20 percent higher wages than traditional apprenticeship occupations.

The Securities Act of 1933' and the Securities Exchange Act of 1934? reflect nearly nine decades of rushed and haphazard amendments. The securities laws are now extremely complex and do not constitute a coherent, rational regulatory regime. For example, the current SEC has proposed a climate change reporting rule that would quadruple the costs of being a public company.’ This would have a substantial adverse impact on existing companies. Over time, it would also substantially reduce the number of public companies and therefore the number of investing options available to ordinary Americans. The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) should be reducing impediments to capital formation, not radically increasing them.

and large numbers of them have been an enormous resource to the Secretaries of State under which they have served. The secretary must find a way to make clear to career officials that despite prior history and modes of operation, they need not be adversaries of a conservative President, Secretary of State, or the team of political appointees.