The Municipal Security Gap

Executive Summary

Due to the size and global prominence of U.S. cities, many mayors are forging international relationships to advance local economic and cultural interests. As cities’ global profiles rise alongside the spread of international security challenges, municipal governments have become more exposed to evolving risks. U.S. mayors are developing proactive responses to cybersecurity threats, transnational criminal organizations, and engagement with China. However, the traditional federal security system is not structured to address the decentralized nature of these challenges, allowing critical risks to fall through the cracks in local-federal security coordination.

Key Assessments

• International security risks affecting cities are exposing gaps in U.S. policy and governance frameworks. Cities increasingly bear the immediate impacts of emerging international threats, while national-security authority, intelligence, and strategic direction remain primarily federal. Mayors and local law enforcement are taking steps to build international partnerships and manage risks, but they often do so without standardized security frameworks or reliable federal support. This gap reveals two necessities: 1) making subnational security policies a core component of municipal international engagement, and 2) more systematically incorporating cities’ exposure and governance role into national threat assessments and security strategies.
• Threat information often reaches mayors too late and with limited utility. Despite the Intelligence Community’s duty to warn, threat information is shared inconsistently with municipal leaders and often after critical windows for early response have passed. Federal information-sharing mechanisms prioritize law enforcement and operational agencies, leaving elected officials with fragmented, event-driven intelligence that limits proactive coordination and risks damaging public trust when local leaders appear unprepared for emerging threats.
• Federal-local law enforcement partnerships are essential but increasingly strained. Cooperation is critical for addressing transnational crime and drug trafficking in cities, yet expanded federal involvement, particularly in immigration enforcement, has introduced governance tensions that can constrain local decision-making, erode community trust, and politicize joint operations. Mayors remain publicly accountable for local impacts of federally driven actions, often without advance coordination or visibility into federal decision-making.
• Municipal cyber defenses lag behind the scale of growing threats. Cyberattacks against municipal governments are persistent and increasingly sophisticated, yet federal cybersecurity support has not kept pace with the scale of the risk. Federal funding reductions and policy uncertainty have weakened protections for election infrastructure and other critical local systems, leaving cities exposed and with diminished capacity to defend essential public services.
• Structural asymmetries shape U.S.-China subnational engagement. The People’s Republic of China (PRC) has oversight and control over subnational diplomacy, while U.S. cities operate within a decentralized framework that prioritizes local autonomy and offers uneven federal guidance and administrative support. As U.S. cities engage internationally with fewer resources and risk-mitigation tools, they face growing exposure to geopolitical competition. Without clearer federal support and targeted capacity-building, these asymmetries are likely to continue shaping subnational engagement in ways that disadvantage U.S. local governments.
• National leaders should support municipal security governance by institutionalizing nonpartisan pathways for information and resource sharing. Federal agencies can formalize protocols for communicating significant national security threats to mayors, collaborate with trusted third-party organizations to develop guidelines for engagement with China, and adapt existing task force models to provide structured opportunities for city government input without compromising law enforcement independence.
• City leaders should expand municipal security capacity by leveraging local expertise and peer networks. Municipal governments can establish standing security commissions to improve horizontal and vertical coordination and develop risk-mitigation frameworks. These commissions should be supported by advisory councils that incorporate expertise from universities, the private sector, and diaspora groups. A dedicated national security task force within the U.S. Conference of Mayors could pool resources and ideas, such as the sharing of non-sensitive cybersecurity infrastructure templates and governance models among cities.