Senate Follows Lead on DHS Restrictions

The Senate has passed an appropriations bill for the Department of Homeland Security (HR-5441) that like the House-passed version continues a ban on contracting-out of immigration information officers, contact representatives, or investigative assistants in the Citizenship and Immigration Services bureau. The Senate bill also restricts the amount of money that would be available for the new DHS personnel system, MaxHR, which has been the subject of two adverse court rulings. The House version would provide $29.7 million for continued development of the system, the same as the current fiscal year, while the Senate would provide $35 million. In both cases, the measure cites the ongoing litigation as the reason for not providing the $42 million requested by the White House. The Bush administration said it “strongly opposes any effort to reduce or eliminate funding for MaxHR” and that it also opposes limiting contracting-out.