From the U.S. Government Accountability Office, www.gao.gov Transcript for: Countering Violent Extremism Description: Violent extremism in the United States: what is the federal government doing about it, and have these efforts made us safer? Related GAO Work: GAO-17-300: Countering Violent Extremism: Actions Needed to Define Strategy and Assess Progress of Federal Efforts Released: April 2017 [ Background Music ] [ Narrator: ] Welcome to GAO's Watchdog Report, your source for news and information from the U.S. Government Accountability Office. It's April 2017. Acts of violent extremism have been happening in the United States for years, driven by political, religious, and other ideologies. A team led by Diana Maurer, a director in GAO's Homeland Security and Justice team, recently looked at the federal government's efforts to counter violent extremism. Sarah Kaczmarek sat down with Diana to talk about what they found. [ Sarah Kaczmarek: ] There's a lot to unpack in your report. Could you start us off with just how is countering violent extremism different than counterterrorism? [ Diana Maurer: ] Unfortunately, a lot of people use both of those terms to mean the same thing. Counterterrorism involves the intelligence and law enforcement efforts to identify these people after they've started taking steps towards committing terrorist acts. Countering violent extremism are efforts to prevent someone from becoming a terrorist in the first place. [ Sarah Kaczmarek: ] So, Diana, how is the government trying to counter violent extremism in the first place, and what are their objectives? [ Diana Maurer: ] In the overall federal strategy, there are -- there are three different pillars. The first is what they call community outreach, which is helping local communities know what to look for, the second is research and training, which is investing resources and the gaining of better understanding of why people become terrorists in the first place. The third is what's termed, capacity building, which is enabling local communities to have the resources to be able to address the problems and to deal with people before they become terrorists. [ Sarah Kaczmarek: ] Would you say we're safer today because of these efforts? [ Diana Maurer: ] Unfortunately, no one knows whether these efforts make us any safer now than we were in 2011. And the big reason why no one knows is because the federal government has yet to come up with clear measures of success. All the different functions and activities that the Department of Homeland Security, the Department of Justice, are carrying out, are done without any yardstick of knowing whether they're making progress towards achieving their goals. [ Sarah Kaczmarek: ] Does your report have any data on acts of violent extremism? [ Diana Maurer: ] One of the things that our report has done is we've looked at a number of attacks committed by violent extremists here within the U.S. since 9/11. We identified a total of 85 attacks that, unfortunately, led to 225 deaths. About half those deaths were from right-wing violent extremists. The other half were from radical Islamist violent extremists. [ Sarah Kaczmarek: ] Let's go back to the tactics the government is using to counter violent extremism. What has the government done, and what is the government planning to do? [ Diana Maurer: ] These activities are being carried out by a variety of departments and agencies. Many of them are being done by the Department of Justice, as you would imagine, because they have the law enforcement lead within the federal government. They're doing things like working with U.S. attorneys' offices around the nation to do outreach with local communities. The Department of Homeland Security also has some programs and activities. For instance, they've started issuing grant programs to help local communities and organizations within local communities do a better job of countering violent extremism. But other agencies have also been involved, as well, including some you may not think of right away, such as the Department of Education and the Department of Health and Human Services. They're involved in more general programs to help with the overall well-being of individuals within the society, and that can be important in helping counter violent extremism. The country faces a variety of violent extremist threats, and needs to have a strategy and approach that recognizes that unfortunate reality. [ Sarah Kaczmarek: ] Are there any First Amendment concerns here with what the government is doing? [ Diana Maurer: ] The First Amendment definitely comes into play when you're talking about people who are American citizens and within the United States. People have a First Amendment right to express their views. Even if those views are things that most people would find repugnant, or violent, or extreme. So the federal government definitely has to balance that. People have a First Amendment right to post things on social media. At the same time, the federal government needs to be in a position to keep their eyes and ears open to potential threats, and, more fundamentally, on the countering violent extremism front, have a way of articulating a message that counters the hate, that counters the misinformation that is being put out there by terrorist groups. And that's a big part of what CVE is about, is countering those messages. [ Sarah Kaczmarek: ] Finally, given this need for balance, what do you see as the bottom line of this report? [ Diana Maurer: ] The federal government is undertaking a number of activities since 2011, all designed to help get us in a better position to know, how do you make it less likely that people are going to become terrorists? Department of Justice and the Department of Homeland Security have been implementing about 4 dozen or so different activities, about half of those were completed. That's the good news. The bad news is, we don't know if we're any better off today than we were in 2011. And that's because the federal government does not have a comprehensive strategy to guide these efforts, and does not have measures to determine whether or not these efforts are being successful. [ Background Music ] [ Narrator: ] To learn more, visit gao.gov, and be sure to tune in to the next episode of GAO's Watchdog Report, for more from the congressional watchdog, the U.S. Government Accountability Office.