NATIONAL SECURITY MEMORANDUM
The revitalization of our nationwide safety and international coverage establishments is important to advancing America’s safety, prosperity, and values, accelerating our home renewal, and delivering outcomes for all People.
Our nationwide safety and international coverage establishments are made up of exceptional professionals and patriots whose service and sacrifice are too usually taken with no consideration and whose experience has too usually been sidelined or demeaned. For too lengthy, we now have requested our public servants to do extra in an more and more sophisticated and aggressive world, with fewer monetary sources and fewer help. Their expertise, integrity, and professionalism have been severely examined. We’ve got fallen brief in making certain that our nationwide safety workforce displays and attracts on the richness and variety of the nation it represents. And we now have failed to make sure that our public servants have the required instruments, coaching, and help to totally notice their potential.
At house and all over the world, we face challenges that require us to lean ahead, not shrink again. Assembly these challenges would require an unprecedented mobilization of public service, a sharpening of our priorities and instruments of statecraft, and a renewed compact between People and their Authorities. This memorandum outlines my Administration’s dedication to revitalizing our nationwide safety and international coverage workforce and establishments, and the renewal of the dedication of our establishments to the American public.
Part 1. Core Rules. The next rules will information this endeavor and ought to be expressed as priorities by the implementing steering of every govt division and company (company):
(a) Integrity. The integrity and judgment of diplomats, civil servants, Intelligence Group professionals, navy personnel, protection officers, growth consultants, and all professionals who advance the nationwide curiosity are crucial to knowledgeable, sound decision-making, and rigorous coverage implementation. Their oath is to the Structure of the United States, and so they have the duty and obligation to serve the general public curiosity by providing their professional views and judgments with out regard to the political preferences of my Administration, the Congress, or curiosity teams, and with out concern of reprisal or retribution.
(b) Transparency. In a democracy, the general public deserves as a lot transparency as attainable concerning the work of our nationwide safety establishments, in step with legit wants to guard sources and strategies and delicate international relationships. The revitalization of our nationwide safety and international coverage workforce requires a recommitment to the best requirements of transparency.
(c) Range, Fairness, Inclusion, and Accessibility. Our establishments mirror the American public they signify, each at house and all over the world. It’s the coverage of my Administration to prioritize range, fairness, inclusion, and accessibility as a nationwide safety crucial, with the intention to guarantee crucial views and skills are represented within the nationwide safety workforce.
(d) Modernization. Too many ofAmerica’s international coverage and nationwide safety establishments have misplaced, or are vulnerable to shedding, their technological edge. To achieve a aggressive world, we should shut mission-critical data and expertise gaps, compete in and win the race for expertise, equip our workforce with cutting-edge expertise and agile, versatile, and adaptive organizational buildings, and set up incentives and rewards for innovation throughout the Authorities.
(e) Service. To deal with challenges that Authorities can’t remedy by itself, it’s crucial that we harness the concepts, views, and contributions of companions, together with State and native governments, universities and schools, the personal sector, and civil society. And simply as our nationwide safety establishments should serve the American public, so should we search methods to permit extra People to have interaction in public service all through their careers.
(f) Accountability. Revitalizing our nationwide safety and international coverage establishments will take time and extraordinary effort. I anticipate govt departments and companies (companies) to revive the integrity and independence of inspectors common and to work carefully and cooperatively with the Congress to make sure it will possibly train its important oversight position.
Sec. 2. Coverage on Strengthening the Nationwide Safety Workforce. Strengthening the nationwide safety workforce will likely be crucial to carrying out my Administration’s international coverage targets. This contains efforts to increase the pathways to recruit and rent new workers from all segments of our society, retain and help present workers and their households, enhance skilled growth with the intention to shut mission-critical gaps, recruit and retain technical and different specialised expertise, and take away obstacles that inhibit People from serving their nation.
Sec. 3. Interagency Working Group on the Nationwide Safety Workforce.
(a) There shall be an Interagency Working Group on the Nationwide Safety Workforce (Working Group), to be chaired by the Principal Deputy Nationwide Safety Advisor. The Deputy Director for Administration of the Workplace of Administration and Funds (OMB), the Deputy Director of the Workplace of Personnel Administration (OPM), and the Deputy Director of the Workplace of Science and Know-how Coverage (OSTP) for Nationwide Safety shall function Vice Chairs.
(b) The Working Group shall encompass the Chair, the Vice Chairs, and the heads of the next companies or their designees, and such different govt department companies because the President might designate:
(i) the Division of State;
(ii) the Division of the Treasury;
(iii) the Division of Protection;
(iv) the Division of Justice;
(v) the Division of Commerce;
(vi) the Division of Power;
(vii) the Division of Homeland Safety;
(viii) the Workplace of the Director of Nationwide Intelligence;
(ix) the Federal Bureau of Investigation;
(x) the US Company for Worldwide Growth;
(xi) the Central Intelligence Company; and
(xii) the Division of Veterans Affairs.
(c) The Working Group shall job companies to undertake the next actions:
(i) Set up a particular advisory group together with companies closely reliant on scientific and technological experience to tell suggestions for increasing and creating packages to recruit and retain people with such experience;
(ii) Establish modern proposals to deal with crucial staffing wants, retain skilled personnel, surge expert people during times of disaster or different nationwide demand, and supply extra pathways for People to have interaction in public service inside nationwide safety establishments for choose durations of time;
(iii) Strengthen range and inclusion by intercourse, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, gender identification, veteran standing, incapacity, and financial, regional, and immigrant backgrounds, together with at senior ranges;
(iv) Establish classes discovered and greatest practices from the COVID-19 pandemic and develop agency-specific plans to useful resource and implement modifications that construct extra flexibility and resiliency into the nationwide safety workforce, together with by distant work choices, adoption of safe distant expertise, discount of the over-classification of supplies, and versatile work preparations;
(v) Develop proposals to extra successfully retain, develop, promote, and help nationwide safety workers, equivalent to by expanded exterior and interagency rotational alternatives, assessment of time‑in-class necessities and standards for key assignments, provision of inexpensive little one and household care, and help for these serving abroad and their households, together with these with LGBTQI+ members and with particular wants;
(vi) Assess implementation of safety clearance reforms and reciprocity proposals, extra reforms to eradicate bias, and guarantee environment friendly timelines for completion of safety clearance investigations;
(vii) In session with the Chair of the Equal Employment Alternative Fee, conduct an evaluation of strategies to enhance the flexibility of the nationwide safety workforce to draw and accommodate people who’ve a incapacity as outlined within the ADA Amendments Act of 2008 or a focused incapacity as outlined within the rules implementing Part 501 of the Rehabilitation Act, together with strategies to make extra even handed use of the applying of the nationwide safety exemption to Part 508 of the Rehabilitation Act;
(viii) Overview proposals made by the Nationwide Fee on Navy, Nationwide, and Public Service to modernize veterans’ desire and Veterans Recruitment Appointment, together with their affect on completely different populations of veterans; and
(ix) Develop a proposal to create a nationwide safety schooling consortium consisting of the top of every nationwide safety instructional establishment, as recognized by the top of the division or company below which it’s organized, and exterior consultants as applicable, to determine and implement strategies to enhance nationwide safety schooling by strengthening coordination amongst these establishments on coaching, testing, and analysis of capabilities, expertise, and data wanted to deal with present and rising nationwide safety threats.
(d) Inside 1 12 months of the date of this memorandum, and yearly thereafter, the Working Group shall undergo the President a report on the Working Group’s progress in addressing the objects below subsection (c) of this part. Moreover, the report shall present steering on the crucial expertise wanted to deal with present and rising nationwide safety challenges, in addition to an analysis of progress in recruiting, retaining, and growing crucial expertise within the nationwide safety workforce. Within the interim, the Chair of the Working Group shall present a quarterly progress report back to the Assistant to the President for Nationwide Safety Affairs (APNSA).
Sec. 4. Preliminary Survey of Hiring Authorities.
(a) Inside 180 days of the date of this memorandum, the Vice Chairs of the Working Group established in part 4 of this memorandum shall present a report back to the President on accessible authorities for hiring people into the nationwide safety workforce. The report shall describe:
(i) all such authorities, together with any authorities that exist to recruit people with crucial expertise, together with science, expertise, engineering, and arithmetic experience; financial and monetary experience; crucial language expertise and regional experience; and people with accomplice expertise and experience;
(ii) the usage of such authorities by companies represented within the Working Group, and any impediments to hiring or limitations of such authorities;
(iii) suggestions for learn how to make more practical use of such authorities, figuring out greatest practices to facilitate the hiring of workers with crucial expertise and experience; and
(iv) suggestions for legislative or govt motion, as applicable, to additional improve the recruitment of consultants by all companies represented in the Working Group.
Sec. 5. Coverage on Engagement and Partnerships. No nation alone can remedy the world’s most urgent points. Partnering with different nations to confront shared challenges has thus lengthy been an animating pressure behind United States international coverage, and it is going to be below my Administration as effectively.
Nonetheless, working with different nations is now not sufficient. Technological, social, and geopolitical modifications are combining to increase the ability and affect of non-state and sub-national actors, making their views on a variety of nationwide safety and international coverage points essential and cooperation with them important. A various vary of those actors is required to deal with the urgent issues on our Nation’s agenda. Cities and States have proven they’ll lead on points equivalent to local weather change; trade stands on the reducing fringe of technological growth and is commonly answerable for securing our crucial infrastructure; and social actions advance bigger targets by taking coordinated, grassroots motion. The USA should have interaction with all of those actors to greatest obtain its nationwide safety and international coverage targets.
It’s the coverage of my Administration to advance its nationwide safety and international coverage targets by harnessing the concepts, views, help, and contributions of a various array of companions, equivalent to State and native governments, educational and analysis establishments, the personal sector, non-governmental organizations, and civil society. Particularly, my Administration will emphasize the worth and significance of engagement and partnerships and search to:
(a) extra systematically and strategically incorporate the experience and views of companions into national-level policymaking;
(b) enhance the Federal Authorities’s capability to mobilize and help companions, the place applicable, in order that they can assist the Authorities obtain essential nationwide goals;
(c) facilitate the Federal Authorities’s capability to attract on the expertise, data, and views of potential companions; and
(d) develop instruments and processes, together with by the usage of rising applied sciences, that enable the Authorities to contemplate a range of inputs into coverage and implementation processes and to deepen, deconflict, and make extra strategic use of essential partnerships.
Sec. 6. Organizing the Nationwide Safety Group to Extra Successfully Work with Companions.
(a) There shall be a Nationwide Safety Council (NSC) Directorate on Partnerships and International Engagement, which shall be headed by a Senior Director for Partnerships and International Engagement. This Directorate shall be answerable for coordinating key initiatives associated to how companies have interaction with companions, together with the initiatives outlined on this memorandum.
(b) Inside 30 days of the date of this memorandum, the heads of companies represented on the NSC, in addition to heads of companies showing in an advisory capability, shall designate a senior official to supervise partnership engagement, together with:
(i) taking steps to encourage the inclusion of various accomplice views into company decision-making processes;
(ii) establishing mechanisms to coordinate, prioritize, and deconflict intra-agency accomplice outreach, with the intention to perceive and optimize all of the company’s accomplice interactions; and
(iii) coordinating with the Senior Director for Partnerships and International Engagement on key initiatives associated to how companies have interaction with companions, together with the initiatives outlined on this memorandum.
Sec. 7. Growing the Effectivity and Efficacy of Partnership Engagement.
(a) To exhibit the significance of partnerships and foster efficient relationships between key companions and the Authorities, the heads of companies and the APNSA are every inspired to fulfill with a various, rotating group of companions on no less than a quarterly foundation, as organized by the designated company official. Companions might embrace representatives from State and native governments, educational and analysis establishments, the personal sector, non‑governmental organizations, and civil society.
(b) The APNSA, in coordination with the heads of related companies, shall inside 180 days of the date of this memorandum present a report back to the President that gives suggestions on:
(i) new mechanisms the Federal Authorities might use to acquire the views of companions, with a selected deal with lower-cost and extra inclusive mechanisms, equivalent to on-line surveys, wikis, petitioning techniques, and dialogue boards that enable asynchronous elicitation of recommendation from a broad vary of consultants; and
(ii) methods the Federal Authorities can higher get hold of actionable recommendation in a well timed trend from consultants with present connections to the Authorities.
Sec. 8. Implementing a Overseas Coverage for the Center Class. Our work overseas is — and all the time will likely be — tethered to our wants at house. I’ve dedicated to the American those that my Administration will prioritize insurance policies overseas that assist People to reach the worldwide financial system and be certain that everybody shares within the success of our nation right here at house. To coordinate this effort, I hereby direct that:
(a) Inside 60 days of the date of this memorandum, a gathering of the Deputies Committee shall be held to debate challenges and alternatives for refocusing United States international coverage to fulfill the wants of the American center class;
(b) Inside 30 days of the date of this memorandum, the heads of all companies represented on the NSC, in addition to heads of companies showing in an advisory capability, and the Secretary of Commerce, the Secretary of Labor, the US Commerce Consultant, the Assistant to the President for Financial Coverage, the Chairman of the Council of Financial Advisers, and the Assistant to the President for Home Coverage shall determine a senior official to guide execution of initiatives targeted on benefiting the American center class at every company, and who shall function the company consultant and level of contact for efforts to higher combine international coverage with home goals; and
(c) Businesses shall present a report back to the APNSA inside 90 days of the date of this memorandum summarizing their company’s proposed contribution to a international coverage agenda targeted on benefiting the American center class, and outlining particular actions that every company will absorb furtherance of this agenda.
Sec. 9. Evaluation. Inside 2 years of the date of this memorandum, the APNSA, in coordination with the heads of related companies, shall present to the President a report that assesses my Administration’s progress in implementing the necessities of this memorandum. This report ought to be made public to the utmost extent attainable.
Sec. 10. Basic Provisions. (a) Nothing on this memorandum shall be construed to impair or in any other case have an effect on:
(i) the authority granted by regulation to an govt division or company, or the top thereof; or
(ii) the features of the Director of the Workplace of Administration and Funds regarding budgetary, administrative, or legislative proposals.
(b) This memorandum shall be carried out in step with relevant regulation and topic to the provision of appropriations.
(c) This memorandum is just not meant to, and doesn’t, create any proper or profit, substantive or procedural, enforceable at regulation or in fairness by any get together towards the United States, its departments, companies, or entities, its officers, workers, or brokers, or every other individual
JOSEPH R. BIDEN JR.
