April 24: The current (FY25) budget of the U.S. Marshals Service’s court security program is $750.2 million, or nearly $50 million less than what the judiciary requested.

With that in mind, and as an illustration, we’ve put together a list of what programs we believe could be better funded if the budgetary gap were to be filled. The judiciary is expected to come out with its FY26 request soon.

April 25 update: here are their numbers.

I. U.S. Marshals Service personnel
— Increased funding to hire and train deputy U.S. Marshals (DUSMs) for increased protective duty for Supreme Court justices and their homes/families
— Increased funding to hire and train new DUSMs to staff threat-based protective details (i.e., 24/7 coverage when needed) of lower court judges given the heightened threat environment of late
— Increased funding to hire and train new DUSMs in the Office of Protective Intelligence to expand USMS’s capability to investigate threats and inappropriate communications directed at judges and courthouses

II. Program funds
— Enhancement of the USMS program charged with removing personally identifiable information from the Internet, i.e., a combination of more staff hires and more outreach to judges who have yet to sign up with one of the vendors (IronWall and DeleteMe) since the program is opt-in
— Enhanced coordination between the Judicial Security Division’s Judicial Threat Operations Center (p. 27) and state and local law enforcement on new threats to judges, including home pizza deliveries
— Funding to support the new Judicial Security and Independence Task Force

III. Home intrusion detection systems (HIDS) improvements
— Audit of the current HIDS system to encourage 100% participation (Sept. 2024 rate was 72%) — e.g., identity all the judges who aren’t participating, conduct interviews with a certain percentage of them and based on that develop materials to encourage signups
— Funding to cover the anticipated additional sign-ups to HIDS

IV. Training
— Funding to work with the Federal Judicial Center to develop new training programs for judges on how they can better keep themselves and their families safe
—Funding to send DUSMs to each circuit’s annual conference to conduct in-person training (for the conferences that have biennial conferences, they can do the trainings remotely)

Members of the House and Senate Appropriations Committees (119th Congress): LINK