A bill that is intended to shore up the nation’s electronic defenses failed to advance in the Senate on Wednesday. That could lead President Obama to sign an executive order on the issue.
A motion to force a vote on the bill fell short of the 60 votes needed to pass, with only 51 senators backing it, The Associated Press reported. The main stumbling block was the role that the Department of Homeland Security and other agencies should play in electronic defense.
“The only other thing that can produce legislation is a major cybersecurity meltdown,” Stewart Baker, a former assistant secretary for policy at the Department of Homeland Security and a partner at the Steptoe & Johnson law firm in Washington, told Bloomberg News.
Senator Charles E. Grassley, Republican of Iowa, said that rushing a vote on the bill was “eerily reminiscent of the conversation we had about Obamacare,” The Hill reported:
Some Republicans opposed the bill last time because the U.S. Chamber of Commerce said it included burdensome regulations on businesses. Grassley said the bill still hasn’t addressed those problems and that the vote was just a way for the Democrats to paint Republicans as obstructionists.
“If we’re truly serious about it, we’ll treat [cybersecurity] with the seriousness it deserves,” Grassley said. “Are we to once again pass a bill so that then the American people can read it?
The Washington Post reported on Wednesday that President Obama signed an executive order last month allowing the military to be more aggressive in thwarting online attacks:
Presidential Policy Directive 20 establishes a broad and strict set of standards to guide the operations of federal agencies in confronting threats in cyberspace, according to several U.S. officials who have seen the classified document and are not authorized to speak on the record.