Former Homeland Security Head Napolitano Says Cybersecurity Should Be A Top Priority

When Janet Napolitano took over the Department of Homeland Security in 2009, she inherited a sprawling organization still in its infancy.

Less than a decade old, the agency had a staff of more than 200,000 employees — and they were responsible for some pretty big tasks: securing the nation's borders; responding to natural disasters; fighting terrorism; and managing cybersecurity.

Those challenges were tough then. And some are more difficult now.

Napolitano, who was governor of Arizona prior to taking the Homeland Security post, outlines some of these challenges in her new book How Safe Are We?: Homeland Security Since 9/11, which she co-wrote with Karen Breslau.

Napolitano, who left Homeland Security in 2013 and now heads up the University of California system, talked with NPR's Korva Coleman. Some highlights of the interview follow.

So let's start with the elephant in the room: immigration. President Trump has announced that he wants to close large sections of the southern U.S. border. What do you make of this approach?

Oh, I think it's unnecessary and unwise. First of all, the economic impact would be huge. Mexico is our number two trading partner. There are thousands of trucks and vehicles that go through those ports of entry day in and day out, responsible for hundreds of thousands of jobs within the United States. So just the plain economic impact of that would be immediate — and it would be deep.

And in terms of immigration and immigration enforcement, that is