prompt_front: You are given two reports by the government agency.



Question: Write a one-page summary of the report 1.



Report 2: With the passage of the NDAA in December 2016, PLCY is to be led by an Under Secretary for Strategy, Policy, and Plans, who is appointed by the President with advice and consent of the Senate  The Under Secretary is to report directly to the Secretary of Homeland Security  Prior to the NDAA, the office was headed by an assistant secretary  Since the passage of the act, the undersecretary position has been vacant, and as of June 5, 2018, the President had not nominated an individual to fill the position  According to PLCY officials, elevating the head of the office to an undersecretary was important because it equalizes PLCY with other DHS management offices and DHS headquarters components  The NDAA further authorizes, but does not require, the Secretary to establish a position of deputy undersecretary within PLCY  If the position is established, the NDAA provides that the Secretary may appoint a career employee to the position (i e , not a political appointee)  In March 2018, the Secretary named a Deputy Under Secretary, who has been performing the duties of the Deputy Under Secretary and the Under Secretary since then  As shown in figure 1, PLCY is divided into five sub- offices, each with a different focus area  As of June 5, 2018, the top position in these sub-offices was an assistant secretary and two of the five positions were vacant  As of June 5, 2018, 6 of PLCY’s 12 deputy assistant secretary positions were vacant or filled by acting staff temporarily performing the duties in the absence of permanent staff placement  The NDAA codified many of the functions and responsibilities that PLCY had been carrying out prior to the act’s enactment and, with a few exceptions as discussed later in this report, were largely consistent with the duties the office was already pursuing  According to the act and PLCY officials, one of the office’s fundamental responsibilities is to lead, conduct, and coordinate departmentwide policy development and implementation, and strategic planning  According to PLCY officials, there are four categories of policy and strategy efforts that PLCY leads, conducts, or coordinates: Statutory responsibilities: among others, the Homeland Security Act, as amended by the NDAA, includes such responsibilities as establishing standards of validity and reliability for statistical data collected by the department, conducting or overseeing analysis and reporting of such data, and maintaining all immigration statistical information of U S  Customs and Border Protection, U S  Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and U S  Citizenship and Immigration Services; the Immigration and Nationality Act includes such responsibilities as providing for a system for collection and dissemination to Congress and the public of information useful in evaluating the social, economic, environmental, and demographic impact of immigration laws, and reporting annually on trends in lawful immigration flows, naturalizations, and enforcement actions, Representing DHS in interagency efforts: coordinating or representing departmental policy and strategy positions for larger interagency efforts (e g , interagency policy committees convened by the White House), Secretary’s priorities: leading or coordinating efforts that correspond to the Secretary of Homeland Security’s priorities (e g , certain immigration or law-enforcement related issues), and Self-initiated activities: opportunities to better harmonize policy and strategy or create additional efficiencies given PLCY’s ability to see across the department  For example, PLCY officials said that DHS observed an increase in e-commerce and small businesses shipping items via carriers other than the U S  Postal Service, thus exploiting a gap in DHS monitoring, which covers the U S  Postal Service and other traditional shipping entities  PLCY officials noted that DHS’s interest in addressing e-commerce issues occurred just before opioids and other controlled substances were being mailed through small businesses and the U S  Postal Service  As a result, PLCY developed an e-commerce strategy for, among other things, the shipping of illegal items and how to provide information to U S  Customs and Border Protection before parcels are shipped to the United States from abroad  In accordance with the NDAA, as PLCY leads, conducts, and coordinates policy and strategy, it is to do so in a manner that promotes and ensures quality, consistency, and integration across DHS and applies risk-based analysis and planning to departmentwide strategic planning efforts  The NDAA further provides that all component heads are to coordinate with PLCY when establishing or modifying policies or strategic planning guidance to ensure consistency with DHS’s policy priorities  In addition to the roles PLCY plays that are directly related to leading, conducting, and coordinating policy and strategy, the office is responsible for select operational functions  For example, PLCY is charged with operating the REAL ID and Visa Waiver Programs  The NDAA also conferred responsibilities to PLCY that had not been responsibilities of the DHS Office of Policy prior to the NDAA’s enactment  Among other things, the NDAA charged PLCY with responsibility for establishing standards of reliability and validity for statistical data collected and analyzed by the department, and ensuring the accuracy of metrics and statistical data provided to Congress  In conferring this responsibility, the act also transferred to PLCY the maintenance of all immigration statistical information of the U S  Customs and Border Protection, U S  Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and U S  Citizenship and Immigration Services  PLCY has established five performance goals: build departmental policy-making capacity, coordination, and foster the Unity of Effort, mature the office as a mission-oriented, component-focused organization that is responsive to DHS leadership, effectively engage and leverage stakeholders, enhance productivity and effectiveness of policy personnel through appropriate alignment of knowledge, skills, and abilities, and accountability, transparency, and leadership  PLCY officials stated that the office established the performance goals in fiscal year 2015 and they were still in effect as of fiscal year 2018  As previously discussed, DHS has eight operational components  DHS also has six support components  Although each one has a distinct role to play in helping to secure the homeland, there are operational and support functions that cut across mission areas  For example, nearly every operational component has, as part of its security operations, a need for screening, vetting, and credentialing procedures and risk- targeting mechanisms  Likewise, nearly all operational components have some form of international engagement, deploying staff abroad to help secure the homeland before threats reach U S  borders  Finally, as shown in figure 2, different aspects of broad mission areas fall under the purview of more than one DHS operational component  PLCY is responsible for coordinating three key DHS strategic efforts: the QHSR, the DHS Strategic Plan, and the Resource Planning Guidance  The QHSR is a comprehensive examination of the homeland security strategy of the nation that is to occur every 4 years and include recommendations regarding the long-term strategy and priorities for homeland security of the nation and guidance on the programs, assets, capabilities, budget, policies, and authorities of DHS  The QHSR is to be conducted in consultation with the heads of other federal agencies, key DHS officials (including the Under Secretary, PLCY), and key officials from other relevant governmental and nongovernmental entities  The DHS Strategic Plan describes how DHS can accomplish the missions it identifies in the QHSR report, identifies high-priority mission areas within DHS, and lays the foundation for DHS to accomplish its Unity of Effort Initiative as well as various cross-agency priority goals in the strategic plan, such as cybersecurity  The Resource Planning Guidance describes DHS’s annual resource allocation process in order to execute the missions and goals of the QHSR and DHS Strategic Plan  The Resource Planning Guidance contains guidance over a 5-year period and informs several forward- looking reports to Congress, including the annual fiscal year Congressional Budget Justification as well as the Future Years Homeland Security Program Report  Although PLCY has effectively carried out key coordination functions at the senior level related to strategy, PLCY’s ability to lead and coordinate policy have been limited due to ambiguous roles and responsibilities and a lack of predictable, accountable, and repeatable procedures  According to our analysis and interviews with operational components, PLCY’s efforts to lead and coordinate departmentwide and crosscutting strategies—a key organizational objective—have been effective in providing opportunities for all relevant stakeholders to learn about and contribute to departmentwide or crosscutting strategy development  In this role, PLCY routinely serves as the executive agent for the Deputies Management Action Group and the Senior Leaders Council, which involve analytical and coordination support  PLCY also provides support for deputy- and principal-level decision making  For example, the Strategy and Policy Executive Steering Committee (S&P ESC) meetings have been used to discuss components’ implementation plans for crosscutting strategies, PLCY’s requests for information from components for an upcoming strategy, and updates on departmentwide strategic planning initiatives  According to PLCY and operational component officials, PLCY also provides leadership for the Resource Planning Guidance and Winter Studies, both of which help inform departmentwide resource decision- making  For example, officials from one operational component stated that PLCY’s leadership of the Resource Planning Guidance is a helpful practice for coordination and collaboration on departmentwide or crosscutting strategies  The officials stated that PLCY reaches out to ensure that the component is covering the Secretary’s priorities and this helps the component to ensure that its budget includes them  Furthermore, PLCY develops and coordinates policy options and opinions for the Secretary to present at the National Security Council and other White House-level meetings  For example, PLCY officials told us that, in light of allegations of Russian involvement in using poisonous nerve agents on two civilians in Great Britain, PLCY coordinated the collection of information to develop a policy recommendation for the Secretary to present at a National Security Council meeting  PLCY has encountered challenges leading and coordinating efforts to develop, update, or harmonize policy—also a key organizational objective—because it does not have clearly-defined roles, responsibilities, and mechanisms to implement these responsibilities in a predictable, repeatable, and accountable way  Standards for Internal Control in the Federal Government states that management should establish an organizational structure, assign responsibility, and delegate authority to achieve the entity’s objectives  As such, an organization’s management should develop an organizational structure with an understanding of the overall responsibilities and assign these responsibilities to discrete units to enable the organization to operate in an efficient and effective manner  An organization’s management should also implement control activities through policies  It is important that an organization’s management document and define policies and communicate those policies and procedures to personnel, so they can implement control activities for their assigned responsibilities  In addition, leading collaboration practices we have identified in our prior work include defining and articulating a common outcome, clarifying roles and responsibilities, and establishing mutually-reinforcing or joint strategies to enhance and sustain collaboration, such as the work that PLCY and the components need to do together to ensure that departmentwide and crosscutting policy is effective for all relevant parties  According to PLCY officials, in general, PLCY is responsible for leading the development of a policy when it crosses multiple components or if there is a national implication, including White House interest in the policy  However, PLCY officials acknowledged that this practice does not always make them the lead and there are no established criteria that define the circumstances under which PLCY (or another organizational unit) should lead development of policies that cut across organizational boundaries  PLCY officials said the lead entity for a policy is often announced in an email from the Secretary’s office, on a case-by-case basis  According to PLCY officials, once components have been assigned responsibility for a policy, they have generally tended to retain it, and PLCY may not have oversight for crosscutting policies that are maintained by operational components  Therefore, there is no established, coordinated system of oversight to periodically monitor the need for policy harmonization, revision, or rescission  In the absence of clear roles and responsibilities, and processes and procedures to support them, PLCY and officials in 5 of the 8 components have encountered challenges in coordinating with each other  Although PLCY and most component officials we interviewed described overall positive experiences in coordinating with each other, we identified multiple instances of (1) confusion about which parties should lead and engage in policy efforts, (2) not engaging components at the right times, (3) incompatible expectations around timelines, and (4) uncertainty about PLCY’s role and the extent to which it can and should identify and drive policy in support of a more cohesive DHS  Confusion about who should lead and engage  Officials from one operational component told us that they were tasked with leading a departmentwide policy development effort they believed was outside their area of responsibility and expertise  Officials in another operational component stated that components sometimes end up coordinating among themselves, but that policy development could be more effective and efficient if PLCY took the role of convener and facilitator to ensure the departmentwide perspective is present and all relevant stakeholders participate  Officials from a third component stated that they spent significant time and resources to develop a policy directly related to their component’s mission  As the component got ready to implement the policy, PLCY became aware of it and asked the component to stop working on the policy, so PLCY could develop a departmentwide policy  According to component officials, while they were supportive of a departmentwide policy, PLCY’s timing delayed implementation of the policy the component had developed and wasted the resources it had invested  Moreover, officials from four operational components told us that sometimes counselors from outside PLCY, such as the Secretary’s office, have led policy efforts that seem like they should be PLCY’s responsibility, which created more confusion about what PLCY’s ongoing role should be  PLCY officials agreed that, at times, it has been challenging to define PLCY’s role relative to counselors for the Secretary, and acknowledged that clear guidance to define who is leading which types of policy development and coordination would be helpful  Not engaging components at the right times  Officials from 5 of 8 operational components told us that they had not always been engaged at the right times by PLCY in departmentwide or crosscutting policies that affected their missions  For example, officials from an operational component described a crosscutting policy that had significant implications for some of its key operational resources, but the component was not made aware of the policy until it was about to be presented at the White House  Officials from another component stated that they learned of a new policy after it was in place and had to find significant training and software resources to implement it even though they viewed the policy as unnecessary for their mission  PLCY officials stated that, while they intend to identify all components that should be involved in a policy, there are times when PLCY is unaware a component is developing a policy that affects other components  PLCY officials said they will involve other components when PLCY becomes aware that a component is developing such a policy  PLCY officials stated that it would be helpful to have a process and procedures for cross-component coordination on policies to help guide engagement regardless of who is developing the policy  Incompatible expectations around timelines  Officials at 4 of 8 operational components stated that short timelines from PLCY to provide input and feedback can prevent PLCY from obtaining thoughtful and complete information from components  For example, officials from one component stated that PLCY asked them to perform an analysis that would inform major, departmental decision-making and quickly provide the analysis  Component officials told us that they did not understand why PLCY needed the analysis on such an accelerated timeline, which seemed inappropriate given the level of importance and purpose of the analysis  Officials from another component told us that PLCY had not always provided enough time to provide thoughtful feedback; therefore, component officials were not sure if PLCY really wanted their feedback  Officials from a third component stated that sometimes PLCY did not provide sufficient time for thoughtful input or feedback that had cleared the component’s legal review, so component officials elected to miss PLCY’s deadline and provide late feedback  PLCY officials told us that, frequently, timelines are not within their control, a situation that some component officials also noted during our interviews with them  However, PLCY officials agreed that a documented, predictable, and repeatable process and procedures for policies may help ensure PLCY provides sufficient comment time when in its control and may provide a basis to help negotiate timelines with DHS leadership in other situations  PLCY officials stated that, even with a documented process and procedures, there would still be circumstances when short timelines are unavoidable  Uncertainty about PLCY’s role in driving policy harmonization  Policy officials at 6 of 8 operational components told us that they were unsure or not aware of PLCY’s role in harmonizing policy across the department, and stated a desire for PLCY to be more involved in harmonizing or enhancing departmentwide and crosscutting policy or for greater clarity about PLCY’s responsibility to play this role  As previously discussed, PLCY’s policy and strategy efforts fall into four categories—statutory responsibilities, interagency efforts, Secretary’s priorities, and self- initiated activities; these activities include efforts to better harmonize policies and strategies  According to PLCY officials, the category with the lowest priority is self-initiated activities
Report 2:  Effective beginning March 2016, VA issued a contract modification that eliminated the requirement that community providers must submit medical documentation as a condition of receiving payment for their claims  Data from one TPA showed a reduction in non-clean claims following the implementation of this contract modification  For example, starting in April 2016, after this modification was executed, almost 100 percent of claims submitted to TriWest were classified as clean claims, as opposed to 49 percent of claims submitted in March 2016  However, when the modification first went into effect in March 2016, TriWest and Health Net officials stated that they processed a large amount of claims from community providers that had previously been pended or denied because they lacked medical documentation and, in turn, submitted a large number of invoices to VA for reimbursement  As previously discussed, to help address the increased number of TPA invoices, VA issued lump-sum payments to the TPAs during this time period  Modification of timely filing requirement  In February and May 2018, VA issued waivers that gave TPAs the authority to allow providers to resubmit rejected or denied claims more than 180 days after the end of the episode of care if the original claims were submitted timely—that is, within 180 days of the end of the episode of care  VA officials stated that the waivers were intended to reduce the number of rejected and denied claims by giving community providers the ability to resubmit previously rejected or denied claims for which the date of service occurred more than 180 days ago  VA’s waivers were implemented as follows: In February 2018, VA issued a waiver that allowed community providers to resubmit certain claims rejected or denied for specific reasons when the provider or TPA could verify that the provider made an effort to submit the claim prior to the claims submission deadline  In May 2018, VA issued a second waiver that removed the 180 day timeliness requirement for all Choice Program claims  The waiver also provided instructions to the TPAs on informing providers that they may resubmit claims rejected or denied for specific reasons and how the TPAs are to process the resubmitted claims  In regards to the first waiver, TPA officials stated that the processing of those resubmitted claims adversely affected the timeliness of the TPAs’ payments to community providers because the waiver resulted in a large influx of older claims  As the second waiver was in the process of being implemented by the two TPAs at the time we conducted our work, we were unable to determine if the second waiver affected the TPAs’ provider payment timeliness  Changes to authorization of care requirement  VA issued a contract modification in January 2017 to expand the time period for which authorizations for community providers to provide care to veterans under the Choice Program are valid  In addition, in May 2017, VA expanded the scope of the services covered by authorizations, allowing them to encompass an overall course of treatment, rather than a specific service or set of services  According to VA officials, the changes VA made related to the authorization of care requirement were also intended to reduce the need for secondary authorization requests (SAR)  Community providers request SARs when veterans need health care services that exceed the period or scope of the original authorizations  Community providers are required to submit SARs to their TPA, which, in turn, submits the SARs to the authorizing VA medical facility for review and approval  Both Health Net and TriWest officials told us that since VA changed the time frame and scope of authorizations, the number of SARs has decreased  Despite efforts to decrease the number of SARs, payment delays or claim denials are likely to continue if SARs are needed  We found that VA is not ensuring that VA medical facilities are reviewing and approving SARs within required time frames  VA policy states that VA medical facilities are to review and make SAR approval decisions within 5 business days of receipt  However, officials from one of the TPAs and 7 of the 15 providers we interviewed stated that VA medical facilities are not reviewing and approving SARs in a timely manner  According to TriWest officials, as of May 2018, VA medical facilities in their regions were taking an average of 11 days to review and make approval decisions on SARs, with four facilities taking over 30 days for this process  According to an official from VA’s Office of Community Care, VA does not currently collect reliable national data to track the extent of nonadherence to the VA policy to review and make SAR approval decisions within 5 business days  The official told us that instead, VA relies on employees assigned to each Veterans Integrated Service Network to monitor data on VA medical facilities’ timeliness in making these SAR approval decisions  If a VA medical facility is found not to be in adherence with the SAR policy, the official told us that staff assigned to the Veterans Integrated Service Network attempt to identify the reasons for nonadherence, and perform certain corrective actions, including providing education to the facility  Despite these actions, the official told us that there are still VA medical facilities not in adherence with VA’s SAR approval policy  According to a VA official, VA is in the process of piloting software for managing authorizations that will allow VA to better track SAR approval time frames across VA medical facilities in the future  However, even after this planned software is implemented, if VA does not use the data to monitor and assess SAR approval decision time frames VA will be unable to ensure that all VA medical facilities are adhering to the policy  Standards for internal control in the Federal Government state that management should establish and operate monitoring activities to evaluate whether a specific function or process is operating effectively and take corrective actions as necessary  Furthermore, monitoring such data will allow VA to identify and take actions as needed to address any identified challenges VA medical facilities are encountering in meeting the required approval decision time frames  Without monitoring data to ensure that all VA medical facilities are adhering to the SAR approval time frames as outlined in VA policy, community providers may delay care until the SARs are approved or provide care without SAR approval  This in turn increases the likelihood that the community providers’ claims will be denied  Further, continued nonadherence to VA’s SAR policy raises concerns about VA’s ability to ensure timely approval of SARs when VA medical facilities assume more responsibilities for ensuring veterans’ access to care under the forthcoming Veterans Community Care Program  We found that VA and its TPAs have taken steps to educate community providers in order to help prevent claims processing issues that have contributed to the length of time TPAs have taken to pay these providers  Despite these efforts, 9 of the 15 providers we interviewed reported poor customer service when attempting to resolve claims payment issues  While VA’s contracts with the TPAs do not include requirements for educating and training providers on the Choice Program, both TPAs have taken steps to educate community providers on how to successfully submit claims under the Choice Program  Specifically, TriWest and Health Net officials told us that they have taken various steps to educate community providers on submitting claims correctly, including sending monthly newsletters, emails, and faxes to communicate changes to the Choice Program; updating their websites with claims processing information; and holding meetings with some providers monthly or quarterly to resolve claims processing issues  Officials from both TPAs also told us that they provided one-on-one training to some providers on the claims submission process to help reduce errors when submitting claims  In addition, VA’s RFP for the Veterans Community Care Program contracts includes requirements to provide an annual training program curriculum and an initial on-boarding and ongoing outreach and education program for community providers, which includes training on the claims submission and payment processes and TPA points of contact  VA and the TPAs have also made efforts to help providers resolve claims processing issues and outstanding payments  For example, VA launched its “top 20 provider initiative” in January 2018 to work directly with community providers with high dollar amounts of unpaid claims and resolve ongoing claims payment issues  This initiative included creating rapid response teams to work with community providers to settle unpaid claim balances within 90 days and working with both TPAs to increase the number of clean claims paid in less than 30 days  In addition, VA has developed webinars on VA’s community care programs and—in conjunction with trade organizations and health care systems—has delivered provider education on filing claims properly  TriWest officials stated that it has educated the customer service staff at its claims processing sub-contractor, who field community provider calls regarding claims processing issues, to help ensure that the staff are familiar with Choice Program changes and can effectively assist community providers and resolve claims processing issues  Internal TriWest data show that providers’ average wait time to speak to a customer service representative about claims processing issues decreased from as high as 18 minutes in 2016 to as low as 2 5 minutes in 2018  Health Net officials were unable to provide data, but stated that since the fourth quarter of 2017, Health Net has decreased the time it takes for a community provider to speak with a customer service representative by adding additional staff and extending the hours in which providers can call with questions  In addition, Health Net officials stated that they have required customer service staff to undergo additional training related to resolving claims processing issues  Despite these efforts, 7 of the 10 providers that participate in the Health Net network and 2 of the 7 providers that participate in the TriWest network we interviewed between April and June 2018 told us that when they contact the TPAs’ customer service staff to address claim processing questions, such as how to resolve claim rejections or denials, they experience lengthy hold times, sometimes exceeding one hour  In addition, 7 of the 15 providers we spoke with told us they typically reach employees who are unable to answer their questions  According to these providers, this experience frustrated them, as they often did not understand why a claim had been denied or rejected, and they required assistance correcting the claim so it could be resubmitted  One community provider stated that their common practice to resolve questions or concerns was to call customer service enough times until they received the same answer twice from a TPA representative  In addition, 5 of the 10 Health Net providers we interviewed stated that they have significant outstanding claim balances owed to them  One of these providers—who reported over $3 million in outstanding claims—stressed the importance of being able to effectively resolve claims issues with TPA customer service staff, as the administrative burden of following up on outstanding claim balances takes time away from caring for patients  The issues concerning customer service wait times and TPA staff inability to resolve some claims processing issues reported by community providers appear to be inconsistent with VA contractual requirements  VA’s current Choice Program contracts require the TPAs to establish a customer call center to respond to calls from veterans and non-VA providers  The contract requires specified levels of service for telephone inquiries at the call center  For example, VA requires TPA representatives to answer customer service calls within an average speed of 30 seconds or less and requires 85 percent of all inquiries to be fully and completely answered during the initial telephone call  However, VA officials explained that VA does not enforce the contractual requirement for responding to calls from community providers  Furthermore, according to these officials, VA allows the TPAs to prioritize calls from veterans  Officials from VA’s Office of General Counsel, Procurement Law Group, confirmed that this requirement does apply to the TPAs’ handling of calls from community providers  Because VA does not enforce the customer service requirement for providers, VA has not collected data on or monitored the TPAs’ compliance with these requirements for providers’ calls  As previously stated, standards for internal control in the Federal Government state that management should establish and operate monitoring activities to evaluate whether a specific function or process is operating effectively and take corrective actions as necessary  Without collecting data and monitoring customer service requirements for provider calls, VA does not have information on the extent to which community providers face challenges when contacting the TPAs about claims payment issues that could contribute to the amount of time it takes to successfully file claims and receive reimbursement for services under the Choice Program  This, in turn, poses a risk to the Choice Program to the extent that community providers who face these challenges decide not to serve veterans under the Choice Program  Looking forward, VA has included customer service requirements in its RFP for the Veterans Community Care Program contracts, and VA officials have told us that these requirements are applicable to provider calls  For example, the RFP includes a requirement for its future TPAs to establish and maintain call centers to address inquiries from community providers and has established customer service performance metrics to monitor call center performance  Monitoring data on provider calls under the contracts will be important as Veterans Community Care Program TPAs will continue to be responsible for building provider networks, processing claims, and resolving claims processing issues  The Choice Program relies on community providers to deliver care to eligible veterans when VA is unable to provide timely and accessible care at its own facilities  Although VA has taken steps to improve the timeliness of TPA claim payments to providers, VA is not collecting data or monitoring compliance with two Choice Program requirements, and this could adversely affect the timeliness with which community providers are paid under the Choice Program  First, VA does not have complete data allowing it to effectively monitor adherence with its policy for VA medical facilities to review SARs within 5 days of receipt, which impacts its ability to meet the requirement  To the extent that VA medical facilities delay these reviews and approvals, community providers may have to delay care or deliver care that is not authorized, which in turn increases the likelihood that the providers’ claims will be denied and the providers will not be paid  Second, VA requires the TPAs to establish a customer call center to respond to calls from veterans and non-VA providers  However, VA does not enforce the contractual requirement for responding to calls from community providers and allows the TPAs to prioritize calls from veterans  Consequently, VA is not collecting data, monitoring, or enforcing compliance with its contractual requirements for the TPAs to provide timely customer service to providers  As a result, VA does not have information on the extent to which community providers face challenges when contacting the TPAs about claims payment issues, which could contribute to the amount of time it takes to receive reimbursement for services  To the extent that these issues make community providers less willing to continue participating in the Choice Program and the forthcoming Veterans Community Care Program, they pose a risk to VA’s ability to successfully implement these programs and ensure veterans’ timely access to care  We are making the following two recommendations to VA: Once VA’s new software for managing authorizations has been fully implemented, the Undersecretary for Health should monitor data on SAR approval decision time frames to ensure VA medical facilities are in adherence with VA policy, assess the reasons for nonadherence with the policy, and take corrective actions as necessary  (Recommendation 1) The Undersecretary for Health should collect data and monitor compliance with the Choice Program contractual requirements pertaining to customer service for community providers, and take corrective actions as necessary  (Recommendation 2) We provided a draft of this report to VA for review and comment  In its written comments, reproduced in appendix I, VA concurred with our two recommendations and said it is taking steps to address them  For example, VA plans to implement software in spring 2019 that will automate the SAR process and allow for streamlined reporting and monitoring of SAR timeliness to ensure ongoing compliance  Additionally, VA has included provider customer service performance requirements and metrics in its Veterans Community Care Program RFP, and will require future contractors to provide a monthly report to VA on their call center operations and will implement quarterly provider satisfaction surveys  We are sending copies of this report to the Secretary of Veterans Affairs, the Under Secretary for Health, appropriate congressional committees, and other interested parties  This report is also available at no charge on the GAO Web site at http://www gao gov  If you or your staff have any questions about this report, please contact Sharon M  Silas at (202) 512-7114 or silass@gao gov  Contact points for our Offices of Congressional Relations and Public Affairs are on the last page of this report  GAO staff who made major contributions to this report are listed in appendix II  In addition to the contact named above, Marcia A  Mann (Assistant Director), Michael Zose (Analyst-in-Charge), and Kate Tussey made major contributions to this report  Also contributing were Krister Friday, Jacquelyn Hamilton, and Vikki Porter 

ground_truth: The National Popular Vote (NPV) initiative proposes an agreement among the states, an interstate compact that would effectively achieve direct popular election of the President and Vice President without a constitutional amendment. It relies on the Constitution's grant of authority to the states in Article II, Section 1 to appoint presidential electors "in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct.... " Any state that joins the NPV compact pledges that if the compact comes into effect, its legislature will award all the state's electoral votes to the presidential ticket that wins the most popular votes nationwide, regardless of who wins in that particular state. The compact would, however, come into effect only if its success has been assured; that is, only if states controlling a majority of electoral votes (270 or more) join the compact. By early May 2019, 14 states and the District of Columbia had joined the compact. After early momentum—eight states and the District of Columbia joined the NPV Compact between 2007 and 2011—the pace of state accessions slowed through 2018. Since then, four additional states joined, bringing the total number of electoral votes controlled by NPV member states to 189. During the same period, legislation to join the compact had been introduced during the current session in at least one chamber of the legislature in 14 additional states that control an additional 150 electors. The NPV initiative emerged following the presidential election of 2000, in which one ticket gained an electoral vote majority, winning the presidency, but received fewer popular votes than its opponents. NPV grew out of subsequent discussions among scholars and activists about how to avoid similar outcomes in the future and to achieve direct popular election. Proponents of NPV assert that it would guarantee the presidential candidates who win the most popular votes nationwide will always win the presidency; that it would end the inequities of the general ticket/winner-take-all system of awarding electoral votes; and that candidates would extend their focus beyond winning the "battleground states," campaigning more widely and devoting greater attention to issues of concern to other parts of the country. They further assert that NPV would accomplish this while avoiding the exacting standards set for the proposal and ratification of constitutional amendments. Opponents argue that NPV would undermine the authority of states under the Constitution and the Founders' intention that presidential elections should be both national and federal contests; that it is an admitted "end run" around the Constitution that would circumvent the amendment process; and that it might actually lead to more disputed presidential elections characterized by politically contentious state recounts. The NPV has also been debated on legal grounds. Some observers maintain that it must be approved by Congress, because it is an interstate compact that would affect key provisions of constitutional presidential election procedures. NPV Inc., the organization managing the initiative's advocacy campaign, responds that congressional approval is not necessary because NPV concerns the appointment of electors, a subject that falls within state constitutional authority, and that the Supreme Court has previously rejected arguments that similar compacts would impair the rights of nonmember states. Other critics claim that NPV might violate the Voting Rights Act by diluting minority voter influence and avoiding the recently invalidated preclearance requirement for election procedure changes in covered jurisdictions. In response, NPV Inc. has asserted that the compact is "entirely consistent with the goal of the Voting Rights Act." This report monitors the NPV's progress in the states and will identify and analyze further developments as warranted.

prompt_front: You are given two reports by the government agency.



Question: Write a one-page summary of the report 2.

Report 1: Since its founding in 2006, the National Popular Vote (NPV) initiative has promoted an agreement among the states, an interstate compact that would effectively establish direct popular election of the President and Vice President without a constitutional amendment, while retaining the structure of the electoral college system  The United States is unique among "presidential" republics by providing an indirect election to choose its chief executive  The President and Vice President of the United States are selected not by registered voters, but by the electoral college, electors appointed in the states "in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct     " Alexander Hamilton, who was "present at the creation" of the Constitution in 1787, commented favorably on the electoral college system in The Federalist : The mode of appointment of the Chief Magistrate of the United States is almost the only part of the system, of any consequence, which has escaped without severe censure, or which has received the slightest mark of approbation from its opponents     I venture somewhat further, and hesitate not to affirm that if the manner of it be not perfect, it is at least excellent  It unites in an eminent degree all the advantages the union of which was to be wished for  Notwithstanding Hamilton's endorsement, the first proposal to change the electoral college system by constitutional amendment was introduced as early as 1800, and since that time more than 700 proposals to reform or eliminate the college have been introduced in Congress  Reform advocates have long focused on the fact that it does not provide for direct democratic election, that less-populous states are afforded an arithmetical advantage due to the assignment of two electors to each state, regardless of population, and that the winner-take-all system makes it possible for candidates to win an electoral college majority and the presidency, while gaining fewer votes than their principal opponents in the popular election  Between 1949 and 1979, Congress considered amendments to reform the electoral college, or replace it with direct popular election, in committee and on the floor of both chambers  Proposed amendments must, however, meet the requirements of the Constitution's Article V, which calls for two-thirds approval by both houses of Congress, and ratification by three-fourths of the states; to date, no electoral college reform proposal has met these requirements  Proponents of the National Popular Vote initiative contend that their plan will achieve direct popular election while circumventing the requirements of Article V, and will guarantee that the popular vote winners will always be elected President and Vice President  The fundamentals of the electoral college system were established by Article II, Section 1 of the U S  Constitution, and subsequently revised by the Twelfth Amendment  The Constitution's minimal provisions have been complemented over the past two centuries by a range of federal and state laws, political party procedures, and enduring political traditions, leading to the system as it exists today  The salient features of the contemporary system are detailed below  The electors are collectively known as the electoral college; although this phrase does not appear in the Constitution, it gained currency in the early days of the republic, and was recognized in federal law in 1845  The electoral college has no continuing existence; its sole purpose is to elect the President and Vice President  Each state is allocated a number of electors equal to the combined total of its U S  Senate and House of Representatives delegations  The District of Columbia is also allocated three electors  At present, the total is 538, reflecting the combined size of the Senate (100 Members), the House (435 Members), and the District of Columbia electors  Any person may serve as an elector, except Senators and Representatives, or any other person holding an office of "trust or profit" under the United States  Article II, Section 1 of the Constitution empowers the states to "appoint [electors], in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct     " This grant of authority provides the constitutional basis claimed for the NPV initiative  In practice, all states currently provide for popular election of their electoral college delegations  Candidates for the office of elector are nominated by political parties and other groups on the presidential ballot in each state  In most cases, the candidates for the office of elector are nominated by the state party committee or the party's statewide convention  The winning presidential nominees must gain a national majority of 270 or more electoral votes, out of the 538 total, in order to be elected  If no ticket of candidates attains a majority, then the House of Representatives elects the President, and the Senate the Vice President, in a procedure known as contingent election  Candidates for the office of elector are selected by their respective political parties  They are expected to vote for the presidential and vice presidential candidates to whom they are pledged  Some states seek to require them to so vote by law or other means, but most constitutional scholars hold that the electors remain free agents under the Constitution, and that they may vote for any person they choose  On rare occasions, an elector will vote for a different candidate, or abstain from casting a vote for any candidate; he or she is known as a "faithless elector " The goal of presidential campaigns under the existing system is to win by carrying states that collectively cast a majority of electoral votes  Political parties and presidential campaigns tend to focus on states that are closely contested (widely referred to as "battleground" states), or that have large delegations of electoral votes, or both  Winning a majority of the more populous and/or battleground states is considered crucial to obtaining the necessary electoral vote majority  In 48 states and the District of Columbia, the presidential/vice presidential ticket winning the most popular votes (a plurality or more) in that state is awarded all its electoral votes  That is to say, the winning party's entire ticket of electors is elected  This is referred to as the "winner-take-all" or "general ticket" system  Presidential Election Day is set by law for Tuesday after the first Monday in November every fourth year succeeding the election of President and Vice President  On Presidential Election Day, voters cast one vote for the candidates they support  They are, however, actually voting for the state political party "ticket" of electors supporting those presidential and vice presidential candidates  Presidential electors assemble on the first Monday after the second Wednesday in December following the general election  They meet in their respective states, not collectively, and cast separate votes by ballot for the President and Vice President  After the electors vote, the results are sent by the states to Congress and various other federal authorities  On January 6 of the year following a presidential election, Congress meets in a joint session to count the electoral votes and make a formal declaration of which candidates have been elected President and Vice President  A range of factors contributed to the emergence of the National Popular Vote initiative in the first decade of the 21 st century  A major source was frustration by reform advocates after three decades of failed attempts to secure congressional approval for a direct popular election amendment  A more immediate spur was the contentious and disputed presidential election of 2000, which is regarded as having been a major factor contributing to the development of the NPV proposal  One of the factors cited for the emergence of the NPV initiative has been the exacting requirements set by the Constitution for amendments, in this case, a direct popular election constitutional amendment  As noted previously, approval by two-thirds of Members present and voting is required in both houses when Congress proposes an amendment, followed by ratification by three-fourths of the states, 38 at present, usually within a seven-year period specified by Congress  Between 1948 and 1979, Congress debated electoral college reform at length; throughout this time, hundreds of reform proposals were introduced in both chambers  They generally centered on one of two courses: "end it" by eliminating the entire electoral college system and establishing direct popular election, or "mend it" by reforming its more controversial provisions  Between 1948 and 1979, proposed amendments were the subject of hearings in the Senate and House Judiciary Committees on 17 different occasions, while electoral college reform was debated in the Senate on five occasions and twice in the House during this period  Proposals were approved by the necessary two-thirds majority twice in the Senate and once in the House, but never in the same Congress  Following the 1979 defeat of a direct popular election amendment on the Senate floor, and the retirement or defeat of prominent congressional advocates, the question of electoral college reform largely disappeared from public attention and Congress's legislative agenda  Although Senators and Representatives continued to introduce reform proposals, few received action beyond routine committee referral, and in time, the number of measures introduced dropped to zero  Even after the presidential elections of 2000 and 2016, in which the winner of the electoral vote won fewer popular votes than his opponent (a so-called "misfire") , there was little evidence that Congress was prepared to consider an electoral college reform amendment  Proposals to replace the electoral college system with direct popular election continued to be introduced, but in dwindling numbers as the years passed  No proposal for direct popular election was introduced in the 113 th Congress  By comparison, 41 direct popular election or electoral college reform amendments were proposed in the 95 th Congress (1977-1978)  Following the 2016 election, however, four constitutional amendments introduced late in the 114 th Congress proposed eliminating the electoral college and replacing it with direct election  To date in the 116 th Congress, three amendments to establish direct popular election by constitutional amendment have been introduced, but no action beyond committee referral has been taken on them  Until recently, survey research findings showed public support for presidential election reform through direct popular election by sizable margins  As early as 1967, the Gallup Poll reported that 58% of respondents supported direct election, compared with 22% who favored retaining the electoral college  More recently, Gallup's 2013 survey recorded that 63% of respondents favored an amendment providing for direct election, while 29% favored retention of the electoral college  Following the 2016 election, however, overall support for direct election was measured at 49% in favor to 47% opposed  It is arguable that the change in public attitudes was influenced by the 2016 election results, in which the Republican nominees won the election with a majority of electoral votes, but fewer popular votes than their Democratic opponents  For instance, Gallup reported a shift to greater support for the electoral college system by respondents who identified themselves as "Republican" or "Lean Republican " Conversely, already high levels of support for direct popular election among respondents who identified themselves as "Democratic" or "Lean Democratic" rose still further in the post-2016 election Gallup Poll  To date, CRS has identified one survey that was specifically designed to measure public commitment to the NPV initiative  A March 27, 2019, Politico/Morning Consult poll posed relevant questions on the presidential election process and the NPV compact  The first question, which presented a general outline of the existing electoral college system and the generic alternative of direct popular election, reported that respondents preferred direct election by 50% to 34% for retaining the electoral college, and 16% reporting "Don't know/No opinion " The next question explained the proposed NPV compact and asked respondents' preference for NPV or the electoral college method  Although the level of support for NPV was lower than that measured for generic direct popular election, a plurality of respondents to this question favored the "National Popular Vote Interstate Compact" by a plurality of 43% in favor, to 33% opposed and 23% who reported "Don't know/No opinion " The disputed presidential election of 2000 was arguably a catalyst for new thinking on electoral college reform   Following a closely contested campaign, Republican candidates George W  Bush and Richard Cheney were elected over Democratic nominees Al Gore Jr  and Joseph Lieberman following a bitter dispute over election results in Florida tha t was ultimately decided by the Supreme Court   The high court's decision left Bush and Cheney with a narrow plurality in Florida of 537 popular votes and a similarly narrow electoral college majority of 30 states with 271 electoral votes, while their Democratic opponents took 20 states and the District of Columbia with 266 electoral votes (one District of Columbia elector cast a blank ballot in protest against the outcome)   It was the first election since 1888 in which the candidates elected uncontestably won fewer popular votes than their principal opponents : the Gore / Lieberman Democratic ticket gained 50,992,335 popular votes to 50,455,156 for Bush / Cheney  The se election results generated considerable discontent with the system  Some critics argued for a constitutional amendment, but the 107 th Congress faced a heavy legislative workload throughout this period, which initially included enactment of President George W  Bush's legislative program and was later expanded to urgent responses to the terrorist attacks of September 1 1, 2001   Rather than focus on the lengthy process associated with consideration of a constitutional amendment, Congress focused on legislati ve remedies  The Help America Vote Act of 2002, passed in response to the numerous irregularities in voting systems and procedures revealed by the 2000 election, mandated election administration reforms and v oting system technology enhancements (funded in part by federal grants to the states) intended to ensure accurate and timely voting and vote tabulation in future elections  In 2016, the presidential election was again won by nominees who gained a majority of electoral votes but fewer popular votes than their major party opponents  Although proposals to amend the Constitution to provide direct popular election were introduced in response to this occurrence late in the 114 th Congress , and again in the 115 th Congress, the 2016 results did not result in the degree of c ontroversy a nd activism that followed the electoral college "misfire " of 2000  T he following factor may have contributed to this situation : i n 2000, a shift in Florida's electoral votes from Bush/Cheney to Gore/Lieberman would have changed the election result; by comparison, in 2016, a shift in the state with the closest vote margin, Michigan , would not have altered the election  While the 2000 election's "misfire" did not result in consideration of a constitutional amendment, it did prompt considerable study and investigation into new approaches to electoral reform among scholars of the presidential election process and political activists  Law professors Robert W  Bennett of Northwestern University, Vikram Amar of the University of California-Davis, and Akhil Amar of Yale University School of Law are generally credited as the intellectual godparents of the concept that ultimately evolved into the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact, which relies on the Constitution's broad grant of power to each state to "appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct [emphasis added], a Number of Electors, equal to the whole Number of Senators and Representatives to which the State may be entitled in the Congress " Project FairVote, an issue advocacy group self-described as a nonprofit, nonpartisan "501(c)(4)" organization, appears to have been an incubator of the NPV concept  FairVote has supported NPV for "over a decade," and was an early supporter of National Popular Vote Inc , the plan's official advocacy group; moreover, longtime FairVote board members Robert Richie and the late Representative John B  Anderson were early supporters of the National Popular Vote initiative and contributors to its manifesto, Every Vote Equal   As noted previously, the NPV initiative was the ultimate result of the various studies and proposals offered following the presidential election of 2000  The NPV initiative seeks to establish direct popular election of the President and Vice President through an interstate compact, rather than by constitutional amendment  Ideally, under the compact's provisions, legislatures of the 50 states and the District of Columbia would pass legislation binding the signatories to appoint presidential electors committed to the presidential/vice presidential ticket that gained the most votes nationwide   If all 50 states and the District of Columbia were compact members, this would deliver a unanimous electoral college decision for the candidates winning a plurality of the popular vote  Specifically, the plan calls for an agreement among the states, an interstate compact effected through state legislation, in which the legislature in each of the participating states agrees to appoint electors pledged to the candidates who won the nationwide popular vote   State election authorities would count and certify the popular vote in each state, which would be aggregated and certified as the "nationwide popular vote " The participating state legislatures would then choose the slate of electors pledged to the "nationwide popular vote winner," notwithstanding the results within their particular state s   To ensure success, the initiative would come into effect only if states whose total electoral votes equal or exceed the constitutional majority of 270 were to approve the plan  If the nationwide popular vote were effectively tied, the states would be released from their commitment under the compact, and could choose electors who represented the presidential ticket that gained the most votes in each particular state  One novel NPV provision would enable the presidential candidate who won the national popular vote to fill any vacancies in the electoral college with electors of his or her own choice  States would retain the right to withdraw from the compact, but if a state chose to withdraw within six months of the end of a presidential term, the withdrawal would not be effective until after the succeeding President and Vice President had been elected  The NPV advocacy effort is managed by National Popular Vote Inc , a "501(c)(4)" nonprofit corporation established in California in 2006 by Barry Fadem, an attorney specializing in initiative and referendum law, and John R  Koza, Ph D , an automated systems scientist and entrepreneur  As a 501(c)(4) entity, it is permitted to engage in political activity in furtherance of its goal, without forfeiting its tax-exempt status, so long as this is not its primary activity  NPV states on its website that its "specific purpose is to study, analyze and educate the public regarding its proposal to implement a nationwide popular election of the President of the United States " Dr  Koza serves as chairman of NPV Inc , and Mr  Fadem serves as president  NPV's advisory board includes former Senators and Representatives of both major political parties  In 2006, National Popular Vote Inc  published a detailed handbook, Every Vote Equal: A State-Based Plan for Electing the President by National Popular Vote   This publication, in its fourth edition at the time of this writing, provides a detailed account of various issues related to the NPV initiative, including the electoral college, earlier reform efforts, interstate compacts, the text of the proposed compact, a strategy for advancing the initiative, and a 340-page section addressing "myths about the National Popular Vote Compact " National Popular Vote Inc  maintains an office in Mountain View, CA  Supporters in various state legislatures began to introduce measures to adopt the interstate compact shortly after NPV's inaugural press conference on February 23, 2006  The NPV Compact has been introduced at various sessions in the legislatures of all 50 states and the Council of the District of Columbia, which performs the functions of a state legislature in the nation's capital, and has received some form of active consideration in 38 states and the D C  Council  Among other activities, NPV maintains a regular communications program of email newsletters announcing activities and soliciting readers to petition governors and state legislators to support the compact  At the time of this writing, NPV claims that 3,112 state legislators have either sponsored or cast a recorded vote in their respective legislatures for the compact  NPV also claims endorsements from legislators and endorsements by the New York Times , Los Angeles Times , Chicago Sun-Times , Minneapolis Star Tribune , Boston Globe , Miami Herald , and other newspapers  NPV also advocates use of the citizen initiative process where available to enact state adherence to the compact; it asserts that when Article II, Section 1, clause 2 grants authority to the states to appoint "in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct," the authority extends to the states' entire lawmaking process, which in some states includes the proposal and passage of legislation and constitutional amendments through citizen initiative  The citizen initiative approach to the interstate compact, however, has yet to be used at the time of this writing  At the time of this writing, in May 2019, the following 14 states and the District of Columbia have adopted the National Popular Vote Compact  Collectively, they are assigned a total of 189 electoral votes  The National Popular Vote Interstate Compact has been introduced since its inception in all 50 states and the District of Columbia  States that have adopted NPV at the time of this writing are listed in chronological order, by year of adoption, as follows: Hawaii (4 electoral votes), 2008; Illinois (20 electoral votes), 2008; Maryland (10 electoral votes), 2008; New Jersey (14 electoral votes), 2008; Washington (12 electoral votes), 2009; Massachusetts (11 electoral votes), 2010; District of Columbia (3 electoral votes), 2010; Vermont (3 electoral votes), 2011; California (55 electoral votes), 2011; Rhode Island (4 electoral votes), 2013; New York (29 electoral votes), 2014; Connecticut (7 electoral votes), 2018; Colorado (9 electoral votes), 2019; Delaware (3 electoral votes), 2019; and New Mexico (5 electoral votes), 2019  After initial momentum in 2008, when four states joined the compact in one year, NPV made slower progress toward its goal of approval by states accounting for 270 electoral votes  Highlights were California's approval in 2011, which added 55 electoral votes to the tally, and New York's accession to the compact in 2014  Beginning with Connecticut's approval in 2018, followed in 2019 by Colorado, Delaware, and New Mexico, 24 additional electoral votes were added to the NVP count, bringing the total to 189, 70% of the 270 votes needed for NPV to go into effect  By early May 2019, legislation to join the NPV had been introduced in the current session of at least one chamber of the legislature in 14 states that controlled a combined total of 150 electoral votes  As of April 17, the compact had been approved in Nevada by the Assembly (lower chamber of the legislature) and in Oregon by the Senate  Accession by these two states would raise the NPV member total to 202 electoral votes  Conversely, proposals to rescind approval of the NPV Interstate Compact have been introduced in the legislatures of Connecticut, Hawaii, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, and Washington, to date; none has been approved  Some observers note that, despite NPV's assertion of bipartisan support, all the jurisdictions that have joined the compact to date could be identified as "leaning" Democratic or "solid" Democratic in their support of the Democratic Party, as classified by a recent Gallup survey  For instance, 11 of the 14, including California, Delaware, the District of Columbia, Hawaii, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New Mexico, Rhode Island, and Vermont, were found by Gallup to be among the "most solidly Democratic states in 2017 " Alluding to this fact, one commentator observed that [a]ll the states to have joined so far are very blue  Until some purple states and red states sign on, the compact has little in the way of territory to conquer     The seven states where President Obama won [in 2012] by the widest margins, along with D C , have joined  So have three others—New Jersey, Illinois and Washington—where Obama won by at least 15 percentage points  But none below that threshold have done so  The 2016 presidential election results in Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, and New Mexico, the most recent adherents to the NPV compact, arguably confirm this observation—the Democratic candidates won the popular vote in all four states, by margins of between 4 9% in Colorado to 13 7% in Connecticut  On the other hand, several states where the NPV remained under active consideration in 2019—Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Kansas, North Carolina, Ohio, and South Carolina—were carried by the Republican presidential ticket in 2016  As the NPV campaign developed momentum in the states, particularly between 2008 and 2011, defenders of the existing arrangements and the electoral college announced measures to promote retention of the electoral college system  In October 2011, the Heritage Foundation, a conservative public policy institute, released a report opposing the NPV compact  That same month, Roll Call reported that the State Government Leadership Foundation, a project of the Republican State Leadership Committee, would begin a campaign to defend the electoral college and counter recent NPV gains  Further activity, however, does not appear to have been undertaken by these groups by the time of this writing  Arguments in support of and opposed to the National Popular Vote proposal resemble those advanced in favor of and against direct popular election of the President  The central issue turns on the question of the asserted simplicity and democratic attractiveness of the direct election idea as compared to a more complex array of factors cited by supporters of the electoral college system  Proponents of the NPV initiative arguably share the philosophical criticism voiced by proponents of direct popular election, who maintain that the electoral college system is intrinsically undemocratic—it provides for "indirect" election of the President and Vice President  This, they assert, is an 18 th century anachronism, dating from a time when communications were poor, the literacy rate was much lower, and the nation had yet to develop the durable, sophisticated, and inclusive democratic political system it now enjoys  They maintain that only direct popular election of the President and Vice President is consistent with modern democratic values and practice  Beyond this fundamental challenge, critics cite what they identify as a wide range of technical failings of the electoral college arrangement  Perhaps the most prominent of these is that the electoral college system can result in the election of a President and Vice President who have won the electoral vote, but gained fewer popular votes than their major opponent  This condition results at least in part from the nearly universal reliance on the "winner-take-all" or general ticket system of awarding electoral votes in the states, which is also criticized by NPV advocates  Under the general ticket system, the candidates winning the most popular votes in a state (a plurality is sufficient) are awarded all that state's electors and electoral votes; under these circumstances, a presidential ticket can gain all of a state's electoral votes on even a slim margin of popular votes  Presidents were elected in 1876, 1888, 2000, and 2016 who received fewer popular votes than their major party opponents, while the runner-up in both popular and electoral votes was elected by the House of Representatives when four candidates split the vote in the presidential election of 1824  NPV supporters advocate the compact on the grounds of fairness and respect for the voters' choice  At the core of their arguments, they assert that the process would be simple, national, and democratic; the NPV interstate compact would provide de facto for a single, democratic choice, allowing all the nation's voters to choose the President and Vice President directly, with no intermediaries  The "people's choice," they assert, would win in every election, and every vote would carry the same weight in the election, no matter where in the nation it was cast  No state would be advantaged, nor would any be disadvantaged  According to NPV, the central argument in favor is that the compact "would guarantee the Presidency to the candidate who receives the most popular votes [or at least a plurality] in all 50 states (and the District of Columbia) " According to NPV, there would never again be a presidential election "misfire" or another "wrong winner " Other elements of the electoral college system criticized by NPV advocates (and other electoral college reformers) would arguably disappear or be rendered irrelevant  These include the faithless elector phenomenon, the general ticket system's asserted "disfranchisement" of voters who backed the losing candidates, and various asserted "voting power" advantages attributed to large (populous) states, small states, states with large populations of noncitizens, states with low rates of voter participation, and populous states with concentrations of minority-group voters  In addition, the NPV compact would almost certainly eliminate the need for contingent election of the President and Vice President under the Twelfth Amendment  NPV advocates also assert the compact would provide a practical benefit to states that tend to be noncompetitive in presidential elections and which therefore receive fewer campaign visits by major party candidates  With "every vote equal," NPV maintains that presidential and vice presidential nominees and their organizations would need to spread their presence and resources more evenly as they campaigned for every vote nationwide, rather than concentrate on winning key "battleground" states  They assert that, under the present system candidates have no reason to poll, visit, organize, campaign, or worry about the concerns of voters of states that they cannot possibly win or lose  This means that voters in two thirds of the states are effectively disenfranchised in presidential elections because candidates concentrate their attention on a small handful of "battleground" states  In 2004, candidates concentrated over two-thirds of their money and campaign visits in just five states; over 80% in nine states, and over 99% of their money in just 16 states  For instance, NPV notes that California voters seldom see the presidential or vice presidential nominees or benefit from campaign spending because the Golden State, having voted Democratic since 1988, is considered to be reliably "blue," and Democratic Party candidates are said to take its 55 electoral votes for granted  They also note that Republican candidates make few California appearances, but, NPV asserts, for the opposite reason: why spend time and resources in support of an apparently hopeless cause? Similar arguments made by NPV on the Republican side apply to Texas, a state that has voted for Republican presidential nominees since 1980  In 2016 for instance, NPV claims that no Democratic nominee participated in a general election campaign event in California or Texas, while a Republican nominee appeared in only one campaign event in each of those states  By comparison, according to their calculations, the hotly contested battleground states of Florida, North Carolina, and Pennsylvania received, respectively, 71, 55, and 54 candidate appearances  According to NPV's analysis of campaign appearances, the 2016 major party candidates for President and Vice President appeared at a total of 375 campaign events during the general election campaign, but they visited only 12 states; by NPV's calculation, 38 states and the District of Columbia were bypassed during the campaign  NPV advocates also maintain that the concentration of campaign resources, advertising, and candidate appearances in battleground states depresses turnout in "flyover" states, where candidates make few campaign appearances  The U S  Elections Project report, America Goes to the Polls, 2016 , appears to offer statistics consistent with this assertion, finding that the participation rate of the population eligible to vote in 14 battleground states was 65% in the 2016 presidential election, as opposed to comparable nationwide turnout of 60%  It also reports findings similar to those advanced by NPV: 95% of campaign visits during the 2016 campaign were made in battleground states, as was 99% of "ad spending " The NPV manifesto also cites a Brookings Institution study of the 2004 presidential election in support of its argument, stating, "Because the electoral college has effectively narrowed elections like the last one to a quadrennial contest for the votes of a relatively small number of states, people elsewhere are likely to feel that their votes don't matter " It should be noted, however, that a range of other political, social, cultural, and economic factors may also contribute to the disparity in turnout between battleground and non-battleground states  NPV further suggests that the disparity in participation may ultimately damage the ability to govern on the state and local levels and could have a negative impact on the legitimacy of public institutions: Diminished voter turnout in presidential races in non-battleground states weakens down-ballot candidates, thereby making the state even less competitive in the future  Governance—not just electioneering—is affected by the winner-take-all rule  National Popular Vote opponents oppose the compact on various grounds  Some argue that it is unconstitutional or "anticonstitutional," that is, contrary to the Founders' intentions and the spirit of the nation's fundamental charter  It is also asserted that NPV would solve few of the electoral college system's alleged problem issues and would create some of its own  Finally, some observers note that the NPV compact is an interstate compact as defined in Article I, Section 10, clause 3 of the Constitution, and as such would be subject to congressional approval  This issue is examined in greater detail in a separate section of this report  On the most fundamental philosophical basis, opponents might argue that the NPV compact violates one of the basic principles of majoritarian democracy: it does not require that candidates win a majority of the popular vote in order to gain the presidency  Rather, it would anoint as winner the ticket that gains more popular votes than any other  A majoritarian democracy, it may be argued, should require a majority in order to elect; it may be further noted that the existing system, by comparison, requires a majority in the electoral college  As one commentary noted only the strictest of majoritarians desire a purely majoritarian presidential election system, and those individuals should be deeply troubled by the prospect of plurality presidencies, which the NPVC [sic] expressly countenances  Indeed, the NPVC promises to create more difficulties and "misfires" in its own way than the Electoral College system its proponents so earnestly seek to replace  Further, opponents might ask how the NPV compact would function in the event of a multicandidate election, a phenomenon that recurs from time to time in U S  presidential elections  One commentator posited the following problematic scenario under such circumstances: Under the compact, one can easily imagine a multi-candidate race in which a candidate would win, say, a thirty-four percent plurality of the popular vote nationwide while losing in every state and D C  If all of the states and D C  were signatories to the compact, all the electoral votes in such a hypothetical race would be awarded contrary to the will of voters choosing electors (still not voting directly for President under this plan)  Would the United States accept a President who wasn't the choice of sixty-six percent of those voting, nor even the choice of a single state? The existing electoral college system, NPV skeptics might also assert, is a fundamental element in the federal constitutional arrangements established by the Constitution  Fearing "the tyranny of the majority," the Founders established a system of government that provides checks and balances designed to restrain the majority and secure minority rights  These principles are also embedded in the structure of federal elections: the Senate, the House of Representatives, and the presidency were deliberately provided with different terms of office and different electorates, and the states were given an important role in the federal election process  In particular, through the electoral college the United States elects its national Presidents and Vice Presidents in a state-based federal election  Successful nominees are compelled under this system to present a broad political vision that commands nation-spanning "concurrent majorities" and appeals to the great variety of Americans  As in the case of the Senate, less populous states are accorded a small numerical advantage by assignment of two at-large electors reflecting the Constitution's equal apportionment of Senators to each state regardless of its population  The NPV initiative, they could claim, would discard the Founders' intentions in favor of what they consider to be a flawed "majoritarian" presidency that would ill-serve a continent-spanning and profoundly diverse republic  Another criticism centers on the use of the NPV compact to effect a fundamental change in the presidential election process and a de facto amendment to the Constitution, but without following the procedures set out in Article V  Critics may note that NPV's founders admit their plan is an "end run" around the Constitution  Proponents might counter with the argument that Article V presents too high a hurdle for what they consider a necessary reform of the system  Opponents, however, could respond that the Founders intended the various supermajority requirements in Congress and the states to ensure that successful constitutional amendments enjoy broad national support  The bare majority of electoral votes required to implement NPV, they might note, meets none of these supermajority requirements  As one study critical of the NPV initiative concluded, because the use of an interstate compact "does not conform to the constitutional means of changing the original decisions of the Framers, NPV could not [therefore] be a legitimate innovation " A final argument on this line might be that one "end run" around the amendment process might lead to others, setting a dangerous precedent for similar efforts in the future  Opponents might note that the NPV would eliminate the electoral college system's multiplier effect generated by the winner-take-all or general ticket system used in 48 states and the District of Columbia, which tends to magnify the winning ticket's margin of victory, and is said to confer greater legitimacy to the victors  For instance, in 2016, Republican nominee Donald Trump's clear electoral vote majority of 304 votes (56 5% of the total), compared with Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton's 227 (42 2% of the total) could be said to reinforce and confirm his victory, notwithstanding Clinton's plurality of the popular vote (48 2%), compared with Trump's 46 1%  From a practical standpoint, NPV opponents might argue that the NPV would actually lead to an increase in contested election results and legal challenges in the states, as the political parties maneuver to claim every possible vote  They assert that the existing tabulation of popular votes within each state reduces contested results and recounts  Under NPV, the incentive to gain every vote would arguably lead to far broader disputes and widespread recounts at every level of election administration  As a Heritage Foundation study concluded Under the NPV … any suspicions necessitating a recount in even a single district would be an incentive for a national recount     The prospect of a candidate challenging "every precinct, in every county, in every state of the Union" should be abhorrent to anyone who witnessed the drama, cost, delay, and undue litigation sparked by the Florida recount of 2000  Opponents might also assert that the increased incidence of recounts would be further complicated by wide-ranging disparities in state procedures, potentially leading to prolonged periods of uncertainty following close presidential elections  Critics may also note that the NPV plan contains no "statute of limitations," unlike proposed constitutional amendments, for which Congress typically sets a seven-year ratification period  Where, critics may ask, is a similar time limit that would "sunset" the NPV compact, after which it would expire or return to "square one"? According to its website, NPV was launched on February 23, 2006; if it were a constitutional amendment proposed by Congress, it would have expired on February 23, 2013, since by the end of the customary seven-year deadline it was "ratified" by only eight states and the District of Columbia  By what reasoning, they might ask, should the NPV be exempt from the standards of timeliness and contemporaneity Congress customarily sets for constitutional amendments? Opponents might reject claims that, under NPV, campaign spending and candidate appearances would be spread and scheduled more widely, beyond the current concentration of time and resources in battleground states  They might argue that spreading campaign resources and candidate events in non-battleground states is a questionable argument to justify a fundamental change in the presidential election process  Campaign appearances and spending, they could assert, should not be considered to be a local economic stimulus package, nor are the amounts in question sufficient to make much of a difference in the economic condition of most states  As one critical analysis notes, "    the nation does not hold presidential elections to foster local economic development " Moreover, they might continue, it is equally dubious to assert that nominees will slight the concerns of citizens of the non-battleground states from which they draw their greatest support, or that concentrated campaigning in the battleground states somehow "disenfranchises" voters in others  In the modern era, a small percentage of voters actually attends an in-person presidential or vice presidential candidate appearance  Television (especially broadcast and cable TV news networks), social media, the internet, and newspapers—not the traditional rallies, torchlight parades, and handbills—dominate presidential election campaigns in the 21 st century  In addition to policy issues discussed previously, some observers have also raised questions related to the NPV initiative based on the fact that it is an interstate compact as defined in the Constitution  Others have questioned whether NPV might conflict with some provisions of the Voting Rights Act  The NPV initiative has been described by its supporters variously as a bill, a state-level statute, and an interstate compact  The latter reference necessitates an analysis of whether the initiative complies with the Compact Clause of the Constitution  An interstate compact—under the broadest understanding—is a contract between two or more consenting states  The Supreme Court has further suggested that an interstate compact often requires reciprocal commitments between the governments of two or more states, such that one state's commitment is conditioned on the action of another state and no state can unilaterally repeal its commitment  The use of interstate compacts predates the Constitution, as the Articles of Confederation contained a similar Compact Clause that provided a qualified prohibition on states entering into any agreements between them without the consent of Congress  The chaos resulting from the disunity created by the Articles of Confederation prompted the Framers of the Constitution generally to "impose more uniformity" among the states, resulting in a Constitution that wholly prohibits states from entering into any treaties, alliances, and federations  Nonetheless, the Constitution maintained the Articles of Confederation's qualified prohibition on interstate compacts and agreements, allowing states to enter into an interstate compact so long as the participating states seek the consent of Congress  Specifically, the Compact Clause provides that "No State shall, without the Consent of Congress     enter into any Agreement or Compact with another State     " While the historical rationale for Article I's qualified prohibition on interstate compacts is unclear, the Compact Clause generally reflects the view of the Framers that states should be able to work cooperatively together, as well as the concern that unchecked interstate alliances might threaten the harmony of the Union or the authority vested by the Constitution in the federal government  As the Supreme Court noted in Cuyler v  Adams , "By vesting in Congress the power to grant or withhold consent, or to condition consent on the states' compliance with specified conditions, the Framers sought to ensure that Congress would maintain ultimate supervisory power over cooperative state action that might otherwise interfere with the full and free exercise of federal authority " The Compact Clause places no limits on what might be done through an interstate compact other than the requirement of congressional consent  In the early years of government under the Constitution, compacts were used almost exclusively to settle boundary disputes  Beginning with the establishment of the Port of New York Authority in 1921, however, compacts began to be used to address more complex, regional issues requiring intergovernmental cooperation  Some compacts are merely advisory in form, but others may be regulatory, with significant powers granted to multistate commissions  More recently, compacts have addressed such wide-ranging concerns as mental health treatment, law enforcement and crime control, education, driver licensing and enforcement, environmental conservation, energy, nuclear waste control, facilities operations, transportation, economic development, insurance regulation, placement of children and juveniles, disaster assistance, and pollution control  Approximately 200 interstate compacts are in effect today  Accordingly, the central legal issue with respect to the Compact Clause is whether a given interstate compact requires the consent of Congress  While a "literal" reading of the Compact Clause "would require the States to obtain congressional approval before entering into any agreement among themselves, irrespective of form, subject, duration, or interest to the United States [emphasis added]," the Supreme Court has repeatedly rejected such a reading  In 1893, in Virginia v  Tenness e e , Justice Stephen Field, writing for the Court, contended that a broad reading of the Compact Clause would "embrace all forms of stipulation, written or verbal, and relating to all kinds of subjects[,]" requiring congressional consent to agreements "which the United States can have no possible objection or have any interest in interfering with," as well as those that "may tend to increase     the political influence of the contracting states, so as to encroach upon or impair the supremacy of the United States     " Surmising that the Compact Clause could not have been intended to have such a broad reach, Justice Field concluded that the Clause prohibits states from entering into compacts without congressional consent only when the underlying compact is "directed to the formation of any combination tending to the increase of political power in the States, which may encroach upon or interfere with the just supremacy of the United States " The Supreme Court has subsequently reaffirmed Justice Field's "functional view of the Compact Clause," and, accordingly, generally where an agreement does not fall within the scope of the Compact Clause as envisioned by the Court in Virginia v  Tennessee , the agreement "will not be invalidated for lack of congressional consent " Whether the NPV initiative requires congressional consent under the Compact Clause first requires a determination as to whether NPV even constitutes an interstate compact  At times, its supporters have resisted framing the initiative as an interstate compact, arguably out of concern for running afoul of the Compact Clause's provisions  For example, Professor Akhil Amar has argued that because the initiative does not create a "new interstate governmental apparatus," the NPV should not be considered an interstate compact, as NPV compact signatory states are merely exercising power collectively that each state could exercise on its own  It is unclear, however, whether the creation of a new interstate governmental entity formed out of an agreement between two or more states is necessary, as opposed to sufficient, in order to deem an agreement as being an interstate compact subject to the Compact Clause  While the Supreme Court, in Northeast Bancorp , suggested that a "joint organization or body" formed out of an interstate agreement is a "classic indic[ium] of a compact," the Court has never adopted a definition of an interstate compact that solely rests on the existence of an interstate governmental body  Instead, the Court appears to have adopted a broader definition of what an interstate compact can entail  For example, in Virginia v  Tennessee , the Court noted that the words "compacts" and "agreements" are synonymous and "cover all stipulations affecting the conduct or claims of the parties " In other words, when two or more states enter into a stipulated agreement whereby one state agrees to perform an act in consideration for a reciprocal act by the other state(s), that agreement can be considered an interstate compact  This broad definition of a compact appears to encompass the NPV compact, as the initiative requires signatory states to agree mutually to appoint their electors to the winner of the national popular vote  Moreover, NPV binds each assenting state, as no member state can withdraw from it within six months or less of the end of a President's term  Because NPV prohibits states from freely "modify[ing] or repeal[ing] [the agreement] unilaterally" and requires "reciprocation" of mutual obligations, it appears that the initiative can be described as an interstate compact  Assuming the NPV initiative is an interstate compact, the question remains whether it is one that implicates the Compact Clause  The answer to that question primarily depends on whether NPV is "directed to the formation of any combination tending to the increase of political power in the States, which may encroach upon or interfere with the just supremacy of the United States  " In other words, the "test" for whether a particular interstate compact requires congressional consent is centrally concerned with vertical balances of power between the federal government and the states; namely, "whether the Compact enhances state power quoad the National Government " While the NPV arguably increases the political power of the states that have consented to it by ensuring that those states' desired outcome for the presidential election—the awarding of the majority of electoral votes to the presidential candidate supported by the majority of the voting populace—it is unclear how that increase in political power would be at the expense of the power of the federal government  After all, the Constitution provides the federal government with no role in determining the members of the electoral college  One scholar has suggested that the NPV initiative would lead to a vertical alteration of power by eliminating the possibility that the House of Representatives would resolve a presidential election in the absence of an electoral majority for a single candidate because it is premised on a majority of electoral votes going to a single candidate  The House of Representatives, however, has decided only two presidential elections in American history, and whether such an arguably hypothetical and de minimis diminishment of federal power through the NPV would be sufficient to require congressional consent under the Compact Clause is simply unresolved by the relevant case law  While the Supreme Court's case law interpreting the Compact Clause is centrally concerned with vertical federalism concerns (i e , the balance of power between the state and federal governments), the Court has recognized a potential secondary rationale suggested for the Compact Clause: to preserve the horizontal balance of powers among the various states  And horizontal federalism concerns could very well be implicated by the Compact Clause, as the provision appears to have been included in the Constitution out of concern both for the supremacy of the federal government and unity among the various states  Whether the NPV compact threatens the powers of nonconsenting states has been the subject of much debate among academics  Those in support of the initiative have contended that the nonconsenting states do not lose any power as a result of the NPV  According to this line of argumentation, even under the NPV, all states would retain their right to select the electors of their choosing, as nonmember state electors would still be counted in the electoral vote  Others, however, have pointed to the underlying premise of the NPV—to enhance the political power of more populous states in presidential elections—as evidence that the initiative diminishes the power of nonconsenting states  In other words, while non-compacting states would still retain the power to appoint electors, the influence that comes with that power would arguably be diminished because a state's role in the national election would be defined by its percentage of the popular vote and not by its percentage of electors, warranting congressional interest in approving a compact that effectuated such a change in national elections  Ultimately, however, whether the NPV actually threatens the power of nonconsenting states is a debate that remains active within academia but would likely be the source of considerable litigation if the initiative ever became effective  If congressional consent is needed for the NPV, that consent can take various forms  Usually congressional consent to an interstate compact takes the form of a joint resolution or act of Congress specifying its approval of the text of the compact and adding any conditions or provisions it deems necessary, often embodying the compact document  As with most congressional actions, consent to an interstate compact must occur with the approval of both houses and must be signed by the President before it becomes law  Rarely has the President vetoed or threatened to veto consent legislation by Congress  While congressional consent to an interstate compact is most often explicit, consent by Congress may also be implied by subsequent acts of Congress as "[a]n inference clear and satisfactory that Congress     intended to consent" to a compact may be sufficient  Congress may also delegate its power to approve a compact to a federal official so long as an "intelligible principle" against which approval can be measured is apparent  Ultimately, if congressional consent is truly needed for NPV to be effective, the initiative might have difficulty ever being enacted because the approval of both houses of Congress and the President would likely necessitate additional hurdles beyond the already challenging task of amassing support at the state level for the NPV  Beyond the legal issues raised with respect to the Compact Clause, the NPV initiative also potentially raises other broader constitutional concerns, including whether the states can functionally obviate the role of the electoral college through the NPV  Article II of the Constitution establishes that the election of the President should occur indirectly through the election by the electoral college  The choice of an indirect election for the President was a deliberate one by the Framers of the Constitution, because, while noting the importance that the "sense of the people" should influence the choice for President, they found it "equally desirable" for the "immediate election" of the President to be made by a body representative of distinct state interests and removed from the threat of unchecked majoritarianism  The result was that the Constitution established a presidential election process that was "manifestly nonmajoritarian," with the electoral college, a body established to represent the distinct views of each state, as the centerpiece of the election process  The central constitutional issue presented by the NPV, therefore, is whether the states, through an interstate compact, can functionally transform the presidential election system enshrined in the Constitution into a more majoritarian process  Supporters of the NPV argue that the Constitution provides the legal means for states to transform the presidential election system into one where the President is elected based solely on the result of the national popular vote  Specifically, clause 2 of Article II, Section 1 of the Constitution provides the states with the power to "appoint, in such Manner as the Legislature thereof may direct," the electors who represent the state in the electoral college  Facially, the Constitution's primary limitation on the power of a state to select its electors is the final number of electors awarded to each state  While perhaps an argument can be made that the structure, logic, and history of the Constitution place limits on the manner or method in which a state chooses its electors, the text of the Constitution simply does not impose any such limits  Supreme Court case law also supports reading Article II of the Constitution to broadly provide states with wide discretion as to the manner in which its electors are selected  Specifically, in 1892 in McPherson v  Blacker, a unanimous Supreme Court upheld a Michigan law providing for the election by individual congressional district of presidential electors against a challenge that the law violated Article II of the Constitution  In so holding, the Court placed great emphasis on a number of state laws that existed shortly after the ratification that provided a variety of "modes of choosing the electors," including selection by the legislature itself, by a "vote of the people for a general ticket," "by vote of the people in districts," or by some permutation of those methods  Viewing this evidence together with the text of Article II and the historical evidence from the Constitutional Convention led the Court to broadly conclude state legislatures have "conceded plenary power     in the matter of the appointment of electors," allowing the Michigan law to stand  Applying McPherson to the case of the NPV, the argument can and has been made that if the states have plenary power with respect to the manner of how electors are appointed, the power necessarily allows states to select electors in line with the results of the national popular vote  More recently, supporters of the NPV have relied on the Supreme Court's 2015 ruling in Arizona Legislature v  Arizona Independent Redistricting Commission (AIRC) —which held that the State of Arizona had wide discretion under the Elections Clause of the Constitution to select the method by which the state provided for redistricting —to argue that the states retain broad discretion in selecting electors under Article II, which uses similar language to the provision interpreted in AIRC  Others have argued that the structure of the Constitution and historical evidence suggest that the states do not have such vast discretion in appointing electors as to functionally transform the election for President into a national popular referendum  As noted elsewhere in this report, the electoral college was created by the Framers to ensure that states with the least population retained power in the selection of the President, providing a check against domination by the most populous states  The electoral college, being a product of the choices of individual state legislatures, was envisioned by the Framers as a body that would represent the specific interests of a given state, as opposed to the undifferentiated nation at large  Accordingly, it may be argued that allowing the most populous states to collude to ensure that the national popular vote, as opposed to the wishes of an individual state, dictates the results of a state's slate of electors, could arguably be irreconcilable with the Framers' intentions with respect to the electoral college  As such, for those who find the NPV compact constitutionally suspect under Article II, McPherson 's broad pronouncements about the nature of a state's power to appoint electors should be viewed in the context of that particular case, where the state of Michigan was attempting to appoint its electors based on the votes of an individual district in the state, as opposed to the state as a whole  In contrast to the law at issue in McPherson , with NPV, there appears to be no evidence contemporaneous with the ratification of the Constitution of a state selecting its electors in accordance with the results of the national popular vote  Unlike the State of Michigan in McPherson , an NPV state's electors might not be a product of the views of the state at the time of the election, but instead would reflect national popular sentiment about who should be the President  Moreover, the Supreme Court, in interpreting arguably analogous language from Article I of the Constitution allowing states to regulate the manner of the selection of the Members of the House of Representatives and Senate, concluded that the states cannot exercise their delegated authority in a way that would "effect a fundamental change in the constitutional structure " The question that remains is whether the Court in a future case challenging the NPV compact would interpret the states' authority under Article II to appoint electors to be broad enough to allow the President to be selected as a result of the national popular vote, a question that, given the lack of any precise precedent respecting the constitutionality of the NPV compact under Article II, will likely remain unresolved until such time  Other critics claim the NPV compact might violate Sections 2 and 5 of the Voting Rights Act (VRA)  Writing in Columbia Law Review , David Gringer invokes the voting power theory  He argues that the plan conflicts with Section 2 of the VRA because moving from "a state-based [vote] to a national popular vote dilutes the voting strength of a given state's minority population by reducing its ability [voting power] to influence the outcome of presidential elections " Gringer also asserts that the NPV compact may violate Section 5 of the act  In 2013, however, the U S  Supreme Court invalidated Section 4(b) of the VRA, which contained a formula prescribing which states and jurisdictions with a history of discrimination were required to obtain prior approval or "preclearance" under Section 5 before changing any voting standard, practice, or procedure  Although the Court invalidated only the coverage formula in Section 4, by extension, Section 5 has been rendered currently inoperable  Prior to the Supreme Court ruling, Gringer argued that the NPV compact would qualify as a covered practice under Section 5, and that the legislatures of all the "covered" states would have been required to obtain preclearance before implementing the compact  Responding to this point, National Popular Vote Inc  noted the following: The National Popular Vote bill manifestly would make every person's vote for President equal throughout the United States in an election to fill a single office (the Presidency)  It is entirely consistent with the goal of the Voting Rights Act  There have been court cases under the Voting Rights Act concerning contemplated changes in voting methods for various representative legislative bodies     However, these cases do not bear on elections to fill a single office (i e , the Presidency)  In 2012, the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division specifically declined to challenge California's accession to the NPV compact on VRA grounds  The states' authority to appoint electors by any method their legislatures choose is not absolute  Federal court decisions have struck down state laws concerning appointment of electors that were found to be in violation of the Fourteenth Amendment's guarantee of equal protection: Although Clause 2 (of Article II, Section 1 of the Constitution) seemingly vests complete discretion in the states, certain older cases had recognized a federal interest in protecting the integrity of the process  Thus, the Court upheld the power of Congress to protect the right of all citizens who are entitled to vote to lend aid and support in any legal manner to the election of any legally qualified person as a presidential elector     [I]n Oregon v  Mitchell (42 U S  112 (1970)), the Court upheld the power of Congress to reduce the voting age in presidential elections and to set a thirty-day durational residency period as a qualification for voting in presidential elections  Although the Justices were divided on the reasons, the rationale emerging from this case, considered with Williams v  Rhodes , (393 U S  20 1968)) is that the Fourteenth Amendment limits state discretion in prescribing the manner of selecting electors and that Congress in enforcing the Fourteenth Amendment may override state practices that violate that Amendment and may substitute standards of its own  Critics of the electoral college system have sought direct election of the President and Vice President without success for more than two centuries  The NPV initiative represents a novel effort to achieve this goal by use of an interstate compact that would circumvent the stringent requirements necessary for the proposal and ratification of constitutional amendments  Since its inception in 2006, NPV has achieved a degree of success: 14 states and the District of Columbia, controlling a total of 189 electoral votes, have joined the compact since 2008  Progress has arguably been sporadic, however, notwithstanding active campaigning by National Popular Vote Inc  Over the course of more than a decade, NPV has heretofore failed to develop a sustained momentum toward its stated goal of states controlling 270 electoral votes  The action of three states in joining NPV to date in 2019 marks the most activity in a single year since 2008; it remains to be seen whether this trend will continue  To date, certain Democratic-leaning states have joined the compact  The arguable lack of support in Republican-controlled state legislatures raises questions about further accessions to the compact in the immediate future, particularly given the fact that the GOP controlled both legislative chambers in 30 states following the 2018 elections  To date, while the NPV initiative has generated interest among supporters of direct popular election of the President, it does not appear to have gained widespread awareness among the public at large  The findings of the March 27, 2019, Politico/Morning Consult survey cited earlier in this report arguably suggest that greater public knowledge of NPV might spur popular support for the compact  This might then contribute to further momentum if additional states were to join, particularly populous ones like Florida (29 electoral votes), Georgia (16 electoral votes), and Ohio (18 electoral votes) where the compact was under active consideration in 2019  Under these circumstances, proponents might be energized and encouraged by a sense of progress for the initiative  At the same time, NPV opponents could be expected to coalesce around the issues identified earlier in this report, and renew and increase their efforts in defense of the electoral college system  The activities of both might ultimately bring the NPV initiative to the more immediate attention of Congress 


Report 2:  PLCY officials stated that PLCY makes tradeoffs and rarely chooses to work on self-initiated projects over its other three categories of effort  According to the officials, PLCY’s work on the other three higher-priority categories is sufficient to ensure that the office is effectively leading, conducting, and coordinating strategy and policy across the department  Given its organizational position and strategic priorities, PLCY is uniquely situated to identify opportunities to better harmonize or enhance departmentwide and crosscutting policy, a role that is in line with its strategic priority to build departmental policymaking capacity and foster Unity of Effort  In the absence of clear articulation of the department’s expectations for PLCY in this role, it is difficult for PLCY and DHS leadership to make completely informed and deliberate decisions about the tradeoffs they make across any available resources  In addition to statutory authority that PLCY received in the NDAA, PLCY officials stated that a separate, clear delegation of authority—a mechanism by which the Secretary delegates responsibilities to other organizational units within DHS—is needed to help confront the ambiguous roles it has experienced in the past  PLCY officials stated that past efforts to finalize a delegation of authority have stalled during leadership changes and that the initiative has been a lower priority, in part, due to where PLCY is in its maturation process and DHS is in its evolution into a more cohesive department under the Unity of Effort  As of May 2018, the effort had been revived, but it is not clear whether and when DHS will finalize it  According to a senior official in the Office of the Under Secretary for Management, a delegation of authority is important for PLCY  He described the creation of a delegation of authority as a process that does more than simply delegate the Secretary’s authority  He noted that defining PLCY’s roles and responsibilities in relation to other organizational units presents an opportunity to engage all relevant components and agree on appropriate roles  He said that, earlier in the organizational life of the Office of the Under Secretary for Management, it went through a process like this, which has been vital in it being able to carry out its mission  He said now that PLCY has a deputy undersecretary in place, this is a good time to restart the process to develop the delegation of authority  Until the delegation or a similar process clearly and fully articulates PLCY’s roles and responsibilities, PLCY and the operational components are likely to continue to experience limitations in collaboration on crosscutting and departmentwide policy  PLCY determines its workforce needs through the annual budget process, but systematic identification of workforce demand, capacity gaps, and strategies to address them could help ensure that PLCY’s workforce aligns with its and DHS’s priorities and goals  To determine its workforce needs each year, PLCY officials told us that, as part of the annual budget cycle, they work with PLCY staff and operational components to determine the scope of activities required for each PLCY area of responsibility and the associated staffing needs  PLCY officials said there are three skill sets needed to carry out the office’s responsibilities: policy analysis, social science analysis, and regional affairs analysis  PLCY officials explained that the office’s priorities can change rapidly as events occur and the Secretary’s and administration’s priorities shift  Therefore, according to PLCY officials, their staffing model must be flexible  They said that, rather than a defined system of full-time equivalents with set position types and levels, PLCY officials start with their budget allotment and consider current and potential emerging needs to set position types and levels, which may fluctuate significantly from year to year  In addition, PLCY officials stated that PLCY staff are primarily generalists and, given the versatility in skill sets of their workforce, PLCY has a lot of flexibility to move staff around if there is an emerging need  For example, if there is an emerging law enforcement issue that affects all law enforcement agencies, PLCY may be tasked with developing a policy to ensure the issue is addressed quickly and that the resulting policy is harmonized across the department and with other law enforcement agencies, such as the Department of Justice  While PLCY completes some workforce planning activities as part of its annual budgeting process, PLCY does not systematically address several aspects of the DHS Workforce Planning Guide that may create more efficient operations and greater alignment with DHS priorities  According to the DHS Workforce Planning Guide, workforce planning is a process that ensures the right number of people with the right skills are in the right jobs at the right time for DHS to achieve the mission  This process provides a framework to: align workforce planning to the department’s mission and goals, predict, then assess how evolving missions, new processes, or environmental conditions may impact the way that work will be performed at DHS in the future, identify gaps in capacity, develop and implement strategies and action plans to address capacity and capability gaps, and continuously monitor the effectiveness of action plans and modify, as necessary  The DHS Workforce Planning Guide stipulates that an organization’s management should not only lead and show support during the workforce planning process, but ensure alignment with the strategic direction of the agency  Moreover, Standards for Internal Control in the Federal Government states that management should use quality information to achieve the entity’s objectives  For example, management uses an entity’s operational processes to make informed decisions and evaluate the entity’s performance in achieving key agency objectives  According to PLCY officials, the current staffing paradigm involves shifting the office’s staff when new and urgent issues arise from the Secretary or White House, and adding these unexpected tasks to staff’s existing responsibilities  However, this means that tradeoffs are made, resulting in some priority items taking longer to address or not getting attention at all  PLCY officials stated that they have been caught off-guard at times by changes in demands placed on PLCY and had to scramble to address the new needs  Additionally, PLCY officials said they have a number of vacancies, which hamper the office’s ability to meet certain aspects of its mission  For example, PLCY’s Office of Cyber, Infrastructure, and Resilience was created in 2015  According to PLCY officials, PLCY has had some resources to address cyber issues, however, there has not been funding to staff this office and an assistant secretary has not been appointed to lead it  Therefore, PLCY officials stated that PLCY has not been able to address its responsibilities for infrastructure resilience  Similarly, PLCY has limited capacity for risk analysis  A provision of the NDAA provides that PLCY is to: develop and coordinate strategic plans and long-term goals of the department with risk-based analysis and planning to improve operational mission effectiveness, including consultation with the Secretary regarding the quadrennial homeland security review under section 707 [6 U S C  § 347]  However, PLCY officials acknowledged that their focus on identifying needs for risk analyses and conducting them has been limited, in part, because DHS disbanded the risk management office  Officials from one component told us that they contribute to a report that PLCY coordinates, called Homeland Security National Risk Characteristics, which is prepared as a precursor to the DHS Strategic Plan  PLCY officials stated that, outside of these foundational documents and some risk-based analyses completed as part of specific policy development efforts, PLCY does not have the capacity to complete any additional risk analysis activities  Although PLCY officials said they conduct some analysis of potential demands as a starting point for how to allocate PLCY’s annual staffing budget, these efforts are largely informal and internal and have not resulted in a systematic analysis that provides PLCY and DHS management with the information they need to understand the effects of resource tradeoffs  Also, PLCY officials said they track accomplishments toward PLCY’s strategic priorities as part of a weekly meeting and report, however, officials acknowledged they do not analyze what role workforce decisions have played in achieving or not achieving strategic priorities  Moreover, although PLCY officials stated that they have intermittent, in- person, informal communication about resource use, they have not used the principles outlined in the DHS Workforce Planning Guide to systematically identify and communicate workforce demands, capacity gaps, and strategies to address workforce issues  According to PLCY officials, they have not conducted such analysis, in part, because the Secretary’s office has not requested it of them or the other DHS offices that are funded in the same part of the DHS budget  Regardless of whether the Secretary expects workforce analysis as part of the budgeting process, the DHS Workforce Planning Guide could be used within and outside of the budgeting process to help inform resource decision making throughout the year  PLCY officials stated that at the PLCY Deputy Under Secretary’s initiative, they recently began a review of all relevant statutory authorities, which they will map against the current organizational structure and day- to-day operations  The Deputy Under Secretary plans to use the results of the review to enhance PLCY’s efficiency and effectiveness, and the results could serve as a foundation for a more holistic and systematic analysis of workforce demand, any capacity gaps, and strategies to address them  Employing workforce planning principles—in particular, systematic identification of workforce demand, capacity gaps, and strategies to address them—consistent with the DHS Workforce Planning Guide could better position PLCY to use its workforce as effectively as possible under uncertain conditions  Moreover, using the DHS guide would help PLCY to systematically communicate information about any workforce gaps to DHS leadership, so there is transparency about how workforce tradeoffs affect PLCY’s ability to support DHS goals  As discussed earlier, officials from PLCY and DHS operational components praised existing mechanisms to coordinate and communicate at the senior level, especially about strategy  However, component officials identified opportunities for PLCY to better connect at the staff level to identify and respond to emerging policy and strategy needs  Leading practices for collaboration that we have identified in our prior work state that it is important to ensure that all relevant participants have been included in a collaborative effort, and positive working relationships among participants from different agencies or offices can bridge organizational cultures  These relationships build trust and foster communication, which facilitate collaboration  Also, as previously stated, PLCY has mechanisms like the S&P ESC to communicate and coordinate with operational components and other DHS stakeholders at the senior level (e g , Senior Executive Service officials)  However, PLCY does not have a mechanism to effectively engage in routine communication and collaboration at the staff level (e g , program and policy specialists working at operational components to oversee or implement policy and strategy functions)  Specifically, officials with responsibility for policy and strategy at 6 of 8 operational components told us that they did not have regular contact with or know who to contact at PLCY for questions about policies or strategies, or that the reason they knew who to contact was because of existing working relationships, not because of efforts PLCY had undertaken to facilitate such contacts  In addition, some component officials noted that, when they tried to use the PLCY website to coordinate, they found it to be out of date and lacking sufficient information  PLCY officials acknowledged that the website needs improvement  They stated that the office has developed improved content for the website, but does not have the necessary staff to update the website  According to the officials, the needed staff should be hired soon and improved content should be on the website by the end of summer 2018  Although officials at 5 of the 8 operational components we interviewed stated that the quality of PLCY’s coordination and collaboration has improved in the past 2 years or so, component officials offered several suggestions to enhance PLCY’s coordination and collaboration, especially at the staff level  Among these were: conduct routine information sharing meetings with staff-level officials who have policy and strategy responsibilities at each operational component, clearly articulate points of contact, their contact information, and their portfolios at PLCY as well as at other policy and strategy stakeholders, ensure the PLCY website is up-to-date with contact information for PLCY and components that work in strategy and policy areas, and with relevant information about crosscutting strategy and policy initiatives underway, host a forum—such as an annual conference—to bring together policy and strategy officials from PLCY and DHS components to share ideas and make contacts, and prepare a standard briefing for component officials with strategy and policy responsibilities to help ensure that staff at all levels understand what PLCY does, how it works, and opportunities for engagement on emerging policy and strategy needs or identified harmonization opportunities  For example, officials from one component told us that they would like PLCY officials to have in-person meetings with component staff to discuss what PLCY does, who to contact in PLCY, where to find information about policies and strategies, and other relevant information to ensure a smooth working relationship between the component and PLCY  According to PLCY officials, the office recognizes the value of creating mechanisms to connect staff, who work on policy and strategy at all levels in DHS  PLCY officials said they have historically done a better job in coordinating at the senior level, but are interested in expanding opportunities to connect other staff with policy and strategy responsibilities  PLCY officials stated that they are considering creating a working group structure that mirrors existing organizational mechanisms to coordinate at the senior level, but have not taken steps to do so  Routine collaboration among PLCY, operational components, and other DHS offices at the staff level is important to ensure that PLCY is able to carry out its functions under the NDAA, including the effective coordination of policies and strategies  A positive working relationship among these stakeholders can build trust, foster communication, and facilitate collaboration  Such enhanced communication and collaboration across PLCY and among component officials with policy and strategy responsibility could help the department more quickly and completely identify emerging, crosscutting strategy and policy needs and opportunities to enhance policy harmonization  PLCY’s efforts to lead, conduct, and coordinate departmentwide and crosscutting policies have sometimes been hampered by the lack of clearly-defined roles and responsibilities  In addition, PLCY does not have a consistent process and procedures for its strategy development and policymaking efforts  Without a delegation of authority or similar documentation from DHS leadership clearly articulating PLCY’s missions, roles, and responsibilities—along with defined processes and procedures to carry them out in a predictable and repeatable manner—there is continuing risk that confusion and uncertainty about PLCY’s authority, missions, roles, and responsibilities will limit its effectiveness  PLCY employs some workforce planning, but does not systematically apply key principles of the DHS Workforce Planning Guide to help predict workforce demand, and identify any workforce gaps and design strategies to address them  Without this analysis, PLCY faces limitations in ensuring that its workforce is aligned with its and DHS’s priorities and goals  Moreover, the results of this analysis would better position PLCY to communicate to DHS leadership any potential tradeoffs in workforce allocation that would affect PLCY’s ability to meet priorities and goals  PLCY could enhance its use of mechanisms for collaboration and communication with DHS stakeholders at the staff level  Implementation of additional mechanisms at the staff level for regular communication and coordination, including providing up-to-date information to stakeholders about the office, could help PLCY and operational components to better connect in order to identify and address emerging policy and strategy needs  We are making the following four recommendations to DHS: The Secretary of Homeland Security should finalize a delegation of authority or similar document that clearly defines PLCY’s mission, roles, and responsibilities relative to DHS’s operational and support components  (Recommendation 1) The Secretary of Homeland Security should create corresponding processes and procedures to help implement the mission, roles, and responsibilities defined in the delegation of authority or similar document to help ensure predictability, repeatability, and accountability in departmentwide and crosscutting strategy and policy efforts  (Recommendation 2) The Under Secretary for Strategy, Policy, and Plans should use the DHS Workforce Planning Guide to help identify and analyze any gaps in PLCY’s workforce, design strategies to address any gaps, and communicate this information to DHS leadership  (Recommendation 3) The Under Secretary for Strategy, Policy, and Plans should enhance the use of collaboration and communication mechanisms to connect with staff in the components with responsibilities for policy and strategy to better identify and address emerging needs  (Recommendation 4) We provided a draft of this report for review and comment to DHS  DHS provided written comments, which are reproduced in appendix I  DHS also provided technical comments, which we incorporated, as appropriate  DHS concurred with three of our recommendations and described actions planned to address them  DHS did not concur with one recommendation  Specifically, DHS did not concur with our recommendation that PLCY should use the DHS Workforce Planning Guide to help identify and analyze any gaps in PLCY’s workforce, design strategies to address any gaps, and communicate this information to DHS leadership  The letter described a number of actions, including actions that are also described in the report, which PLCY takes to help ensure alignment of its staff with organizational needs  In the letter, PLCY officials pointed to the workforce activities PLCY undertakes as part of the annual budgeting cycle  We acknowledge that the actions described to predict upcoming priorities and resource needs as part of the annual budgeting cycle are in line with the DHS workforce planning principles  However, as we noted, there are opportunities to apply the workforce planning principles outside the annual budgeting cycle to provide greater visibility and awareness of resource tradeoffs to management inside PLCY and in the Secretary’s office  In the letter, PLCY officials made note of the dynamic and changing nature of its operational environment, stating that it often required them to shift resources and priorities on a more frequent or ad hoc basis than many organizations  We acknowledged in the report that PLCY’s operating environment requires it to maintain flexibility in its staffing approach  However, PLCY has a number of important duties, including helping foster Unity of Effort throughout the department and helping to ensure the availability of risk information for departmental decision making, that require longer-term, sustained attention and strategic management  During interviews, PLCY officials acknowledged that striking a balance between these needs has been difficult and at times they have faced significant struggles  The report describes some areas where, during the time we were conducting our work, it was clear that some tasks and functions, such as risk analyses, lacked the resources or focus necessary to ensure they received sustained institutional attention  It is because of PLCY’s dynamic operating environment, coupled with the need for sustained institutional attention to other key responsibilities, that we recommended PLCY undertake workforce planning activities that would help generate better information for PLCY and DHS management to have full visibility and awareness of gaps and resource tradeoffs  Finally, the letter stated that because PLCY is a very small and flat organization, it is able to identify capacity gaps and develop action plans without obtaining all of the data collected through each recommended element, worksheet, form, and template of the model proposed in the DHS Workforce Planning Guide  We acknowledge that it would be counterproductive for PLCY to engage in data collection and analysis that are significantly more elaborate than its planning needs  Nevertheless, we continue to believe that PLCY could use the principles more robustly, outside the annual budgeting process, to help ensure that it identifies and communicates the effect that resource tradeoffs have on its ability to accomplish its multifaceted mission  We are sending copies of this report to the appropriate congressional committees and the Secretary of Homeland Security  In addition, the report is available at no charge on the GAO website at http://www gao gov  If you or your staff have any questions concerning this report, please contact me at (404) 679-1875 or CurrieC@gao gov  Contact points for our Offices of Congressional Relations and Public Affairs may be found on the last page of this report  GAO staff who made significant contributions to this report are listed in Appendix II  In addition to the contact named above, Kathryn Godfrey (Assistant Director), Joseph E  Dewechter (Analyst-in-Charge), Michelle Loutoo Wilson, Ricki Gaber, Dominick Dale, Thomas Lombardi, Ned Malone, David Alexander, Sarah Veale, and Michael Hansen made key contributions to this report 

ground_truth: GAO has designated DHS management as high risk because of challenges in building a cohesive department. PLCY supports cohesiveness by, among other things, coordinating departmentwide policy and strategy. In the past, however, questions have been raised about PLCY's efficacy. In December 2016, the NDAA codified PLCY's organizational structure, roles, and responsibilities. GAO was asked to evaluate PLCY's effectiveness. This report addresses the extent to which (1) DHS established an organizational structure and processes and procedures that position PLCY to be effective, (2) DHS and PLCY have ensured alignment of workforce with priorities, and (3) PLCY has engaged relevant component staff to help identify and respond to emerging needs. GAO analyzed the NDAA, documents describing specific responsibilities, and departmentwide policies and strategies. GAO also interviewed officials in PLCY and all eight operational components. According to our analysis and interviews with operational components, the Department of Homeland Security's (DHS) Office of Strategy, Policy, and Plans' (PLCY) organizational structure and efforts to lead and coordinate departmentwide and crosscutting strategies—a key organizational objective–have been effective. For example, PLCY's coordination efforts for a strategy and policy executive steering committee have been successful, particularly for strategies. However, PLCY has encountered challenges leading and coordinating efforts to develop, update, or harmonize policies that affect multiple DHS components. In large part, these challenges are because DHS does not have clearly-defined roles and responsibilities with accompanying processes and procedures to help PLCY lead and coordinate policy in a predictable, repeatable, and accountable manner. Until PLCY's roles and responsibilities for policy are more clearly defined and corresponding processes and procedures are in place, situations where the lack of clarity hampers PLCY's effectiveness in driving policy are likely to continue. Development of a delegation of authority, which involves reaching agreement about PLCY's roles and responsibilities and clearly documenting them, had been underway. However, it stalled due to changes in department leadership. As of May 2018, the effort had been revived, but it is not clear whether and when DHS will finalize it. PLCY does some workforce planning as part of its annual budgeting process, but does not systematically apply key principles of the DHS Workforce Planning Guide to help ensure that PLCY's workforce aligns with its and DHS's priorities and goals. According to PLCY officials, the nature of its mission requires a flexible staffing approach. As such, a portion of the staff functions as generalists who can be assigned to meet the needs of different situations, including unexpected changing priorities due to an emerging need. However, shifting short-term priorities requires tradeoffs, which may divert attention and resources from longer-term priorities. As of June 5, 2018, PLCY also had a number of vacancies in key leadership positions, which further limited attention to certain priorities. According to PLCY officials, PLCY recently began a review to identify the office's authorities in the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2017 (NDAA) and other statutes, compare these authorities to the current organization and operations, and address any workforce capacity gaps. Employing workforce planning principles—in particular, systematic identification of workforce demand, capacity gaps, and strategies to address them—consistent with the DHS Workforce Planning Guide could better position PLCY to use its workforce as effectively as possible under uncertain conditions and to communicate effectively with DHS leadership about tradeoffs. Officials from PLCY and DHS operational components praised existing mechanisms to coordinate and communicate at the senior level, especially about strategy, but component officials identified opportunities to better connect PLCY and component staff to improve communication flow about emerging policy and strategy needs. Among the ideas offered by component officials to enhance communication and collaboration were holding routine small-group meetings, creating forums for periodic knowledge sharing, and maintaining accurate and up-to-date contact information for all staff-level stakeholders. GAO is making four recommendations. DHS concurred with three recommendations, including that DHS finalize a delegation of authority defining PLCY's roles and responsibilities and develop corresponding processes and procedures. DHS did not concur with a recommendation to apply the DHS Workforce Planning Guide to identify and communicate workforce needs. GAO believes this recommendation is valid as discussed in the report.