The Department of Justice is launching a new program today in partnership with the White House, the Department of Homeland Security, and the National Counterterrorism Center that will train "community leaders" like teachers and social workers to monitor their communities for signs of radicalization. If the trainees think they have observed burgeoning radicalism, they are to report the potentially radicalized person(s) to law enforcement so the government can intervene before any crime has been committed.
In his announcement of the initiative, Attorney General Eric Holder described the program as a way to "be both innovative and aggressive in countering violent extremism and combating those who would sow intolerance, division, and hate" in the homeland. He labeled it an expansion of existent efforts to "to identify threats before they emerge, to disrupt homegrown terrorists, and to apprehend would-be violent extremists." Presumably this is only a stop-gap program until precogs can be developed for war on terror use.
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