ABSTRACT
Two months after the September 11 attacks, Attorney General John Ashcroft asserted that, “The chief mission of US law enforcement … is to stop another attack and apprehend any accomplices or terrorists before they hit us again. If we can’t bring them to trial, so be it.”1 Thus began the modern era of homeland security. Through all the reorganizations, criticisms, and late night jokes about colored alert levels, Ashcroft’s November 2001 words to Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Director Robert Mueller illustrate the post-9/11 domestic security environment. What a shock this must have been for Director Mueller to hear given his US Attorney background and the Bureau’s culture of evidence collection for prosecution. Ashcroft’s message was clear-the mission of US homeland security was the prevention of additional terrorist attacks at all costs.
