6 U.S.C. § 349 — Office of Strategy, Policy, and Plans

(a) In general: This section establishes an Office of Strategy, Policy, and Plans within the Department. (b) Head of Office: The Office is led by an Under Secretary for Strategy, Policy, and Plans, who serves as the Secretary's principal policy advisor. The President appoints this Under Secretary, with the advice and consent of the Senate. (c) Functions: The Under Secretary must: (1) lead, conduct, and coordinate Department-wide policy development, implementation, and strategic planning; (2) develop and coordinate policies to promote quality, consistency, and integration across Department programs, components, offices, and activities; (3) develop and coordinate the Department's strategic plans and long-term goals using risk-based analysis, including consulting with the Secretary on the required quadrennial homeland security review under section 347; (4) manage Department leadership councils and give them analytics and support; (5) manage the Department's international coordination and engagement; (6) review and, as appropriate, incorporate outside stakeholder feedback into Department policy; and (7) carry out other duties the Secretary assigns. (d) Deputy Under Secretary: (1) The Secretary may establish a Deputy Under Secretary position within the Office to support the Under Secretary, and appoint a career employee to it. (2) No such Deputy Under Secretary position, or any substantially similar position, may be established in the Office except this one — unless the Secretary first gets authorization from Congress. (3) Definitions: "career employee" has the meaning in section 2105 of title 5, but excludes a political appointee; "political appointee" means an employee whose position is excepted from the competitive service because of its confidential, policy-determining, policy-making, or policy-advocating character. (e) Coordination by Department components: To stay consistent with Department policy priorities, the head of each Department component must coordinate with the Office when establishing or modifying that component's own policies or strategic planning guidance. (f) Homeland Security statistics and joint analysis: (1) The Under Secretary must: (A) set standards of reliability and validity for statistical data the Department collects and analyzes; (B) receive statistical data on Department operations from the heads of all Department components; (C) conduct or oversee analysis and reporting of that data as required by law or directed by the Secretary; and (D) ensure the accuracy of metrics and statistical data given to Congress. (2) Responsibility for maintaining all immigration statistics from U.S. Customs and Border Protection, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and United States Citizenship and Immigration Services transfers to the Under Secretary. This includes information like that in the "Yearbook of Immigration Statistics," such as region-by-region statistics on applications and petitions filed and denied, the reasons for denial, and breakdowns by category and application type. (g) Assistant Secretary: (1) The Office also includes an Assistant Secretary, who helps the Secretary with the duties in paragraph (2) and the responsibilities in paragraph (3). Unlike the usual rule in section 113(a)(1), this Assistant Secretary is appointed by the President without Senate confirmation. (2) At the Secretary's direction, this Assistant Secretary is responsible for policy formulation on matters relating to economic security and trade, as they relate to the Department's mission and operations. (3) In addition, at the Secretary's direction, this Assistant Secretary may: (A) oversee coordination of supply chain policy, and assessments and reports to Congress on critical economic security domains; (B) coordinate with stakeholders in other federal agencies and nongovernmental entities with trade and economic security interests; and (C) perform other duties the Secretary or the Under Secretary assigns. (4) Definitions: "critical economic security domain" means any infrastructure, industry, technology, or intellectual property essential to U.S. economic security; "economic security" has the meaning given in section 474(c)(2). (h) Limitation: Nothing in this section overrides or otherwise affects the requirements in section 468.