>> he's the president. you have to be careful about your jokes. thanks for joining me for "inside politics." we'll see you back here tomorrow. wolf starts right now. hello, i'm wolf blitzer. it's 1:00 p.m. here in washington. wherever you're watching from around the world, thank you very much for joining us. memo wars. all eyes on the president as he decides whether to release the democratic counter to the disputed republican memo attacking the fbi. silenced is golden. the president's lawyers reportedly advising him not to speak with the special counsel robert mueller, fearing the special counsel will catch the president in a lie. so what happens now? and wall street roller coaster. the dow taking another wild ride one day after the worst point drop in history. why the trump administration is shrugging off the volatility. let's start, though, with the big question on capitol

hill. will we see the democrats' official response to last week's republican intelligence memo? if we do, what will be taken out, if anything? the president said the memo vindicated him in the russian investigation, but now the democrats' memo has cleared the house. let's go to chief white house correspondent jim acosta. jim, what options does the president have on the democrats' intelligence memo? >> reporter: we should point out our colleague jerry diamond who is reporting this morning, the president is expected to authorize this document, but of course the white house still has four days to make this decision. over the next four days, we're told by our sources that the white house is going to subject this memo to the same scrutiny, the same vetting that was applied to the republican memo last week. now, of course, we should point out just in fairness, the president was telling a lawmaker at the state of the union speech

last week that he wanted to release that memo 100% before he even read it and the clear process was completed here at the white house. it's not going through the same process, obviously, when it comes to that democratic memo. we did hear speaker ryan telling manu raju and other sources that as long as this is scrubbed to protect sources and other methods, that that is okay to the leadership. that would also be the same, i would think, to the white house. but the press secretary, sarah snders, will have a chance to weigh in on this. she has a briefing at 2:30 this afternoon, and the president has a briefing event in the next hour. he'll obviously be asked about this question and some of these other matters such as this conversation that's been going on about whether or not he will actually sit down with the special counsel robert mueller's team. but wolf, i think one thing we have to keep in mind in all of this is that the schiff memo from the ranking member adam

schiff on the house intelligence committee is expected to refute point by point what is said in the nunes memo, so i would have to think that part of the calculation here at the white house, and the president, i think, will be paying very close attention to this, is whether or not he wants to release a memo that goes point by point in refuting what is stated in the nunes memo from the chairman of that intelligence committee, devin nunes. it still makes all of this not a done deal when it comes to the white house and the ultimate decision in all of this. you heard the president yesterday making it very clear that he is very annoyed with the democratic party right now. he feels like they're not working with him on anything, or even applauding him at the state of the union speech. he refers to the democrats being treasonous for not applauding him enough. of course, the white house secretary is saying that the president was only joking when he said that. i suspect that will come up at the briefing as well, wolf. >> i suspect you're absolutely right. we'll see what happens with that

memo and everything else, jim acosta. while the president weighs hi options on the democratic optio option. it chose wrongdoing by democrats. >> did we catch them in the act or what? >> we catch them in the act, they are very embarrassed. they never thought they were going to get caught. so much fun. it's like the great sleuth. zrz columnist for real clear politics, emelica henderson. even the well-known republicans, they're not saying what the president suggested, that the republican memo has been cleared of any wrongdoing. trey fwoud i, verily said that

memo doesn't have anything to do with obstruction of justice, so there's going to be a russian probe even without a dossy. even in the clip talking about him being the great sleuth, even the crowd seemed md -- you wonder if the president is hyping this up in his own peril and then if he releases this other memo, there were some scratching their heads at the thought he would release this memo, because it likely point by point is going to contradict everything the other memo said, contradict adam schiff as well. >> the attorney general thinks the president will release the memo, but he really fears political redactions.

they could reduce the memo. but political redactions because it could help the democrats and hurt the republicans. >> i think what the reporting shows is that democrats did not see a bombshell. it was overhyped and oversold. chris collins. there could be a republican refl because it wasn't touted enough. i think if the white house releases this memo, he needs to tell us what he was talking about, what was taken out or removed, to put it into proper context. but you can see there was a feeling that paul asked about today. this is about fisa abuses.

when they release their findings, it's going to show that there was. we're going to see what underlying intelligence produced the warrant, rnlt. >> i'm wondering, and i don't know if you know of the of the. there has been pages. i'm wondering if they'll release this redacted memo or the paragraphs that will be redacted, do you know? >> what we're dealing with here is a battle over information in memorandums that is going to continue, and i don't think the politics of the russia probe and how the voters are looking at this in the context of the upcoming elections has

materially changed at all. chairman nunes has said we're going to have more memos regarding more information, and from the republican point of view, more instances of abuse of federal power. i fully expect democrats to find reasons, legitimate or otherwise, as to why the information in the forthcoming memos are not quite accurate. the democrat i pay attention to the most, because of the politics of this, is senator mark warner. he's a ranking democrat on senate intelligence. he is very careful with how critical he is of the investigation and what is happening in the house and the senate. that doesn't mean he's not critical at times, but he was not kbree not impressed with the nunes memo. that was more interesting to me than adam schiff's takedown from the republican point of view. i think republicans would be better off from a political standpoint if they focused on fisa abuse.

there is an article to make, potentially, that the government, for no reason other than this fis ara that there we some a blootd, that will make itself known. the fact that you have some. has added to the politics. >> and you know what's hovering over this skvrgs, or when they watched the state of the union, they sat on their hands. >> they were like death. and unamerican. unamerican. somebody said treasonous.

yeah, i guess, why not? can we call that treason? why not? i mean, they certainly didn't seem to love our country very much. >> so the white house is saying it was tongue-in-cheek, the treasonous comment. he was clearly joking. but he wasn't joking when he said these democrats don't like our country very much and they're unamerican. >> you were seeing him and we were looking at it here, and he seemed to indicate someone in the audience was treasonous. maybe somebody yelled it out, i definitely didn't hear it. we didn't get the blowback as he did on his treasonous comment and said, i was just kidding, that's just my sense of humor. he wasn't joking at all, there was no laughter from the

audience. have you seen another state of the union delivered by a president and they try not to show their disappointments with the president in congress. amy duckworth who lost her legs serving in the u.s. army in iraq responded quote, we don't live in a dictatorship and the an arcy. not to carry the winds of cadet bone spurs and collapse he was told several times he was deferred. >> i can imagine where to find these.

>> it's just outrageous. it degrade our dmers and not. there is a democratic and white house again calling. so when he shouted at then-president barack obama "you lied" during a state of the union address, was he committing treason, was he simply unamerican or does he not love america? >> i think there was a lack of de decorum for how the house is run, but i think that was america, apple pie and baseball and all the rest. if this was a one-off comment by the president, we would all look at it and say, that's interesting, and look at it as a joke. but it's not the first time as the president has viewed respect for him as synonymous with respect for the country. as all americans claim they

would like to see more civility and less uncommon in capitol hill, there is nothing untoward to reflect your issues with him. there is nothing wrong with it, and i think everyone in that chamber knows that, because in the last eight years, they were on the other side of this equation. >> we've seen a lot of opposition addresses. we've seen this unfold. there is a lot happening. wall street struggling to hang on as the markets go for another white knuckle ride. it plummeted 1800 points over the last two trading days, yesterday and friday. the dow swung for more than 500 points down right at the bottom of looking for a deposit trail

territory. this was just -- christine, what's the reaction right now in. >> right now we're just seeing swings all day long. at one point in the day, we saw a huge swing. five minute, something we really have not seen any time in recent history. what i'm looking at right now, i'm looking at fomz right now, and i'm seeing kwibuying. we see inconsistent buying, someone going into the market buying. but to your point, volatility is probably here to stay at this point. that's what i'm hearing from tweeters, investors. we simply had stability for too

long. the market was headed in one direction for way too long and investors have been calling for a correction, which is a 10% drop from the recent peak for quite some time now, and that's what we're seeing. layer on top of that inflation fears and the fact that the fed may raise rates faster than expected, and you have this kind of a fact because investors are expecting people to perhaps come out of stocks and buy those bigger yielding assets in that regard. we'll have to wait and see what happens from here, wolf, but right now. leslie on the floor of the new york stock exchange. thank you very much. jim is here. a tax reporter for the "new york times." was the market due for a correction? >> probably. it's been a great last year for the market, even with corrections in it. the market goes up and go down.

news mooves in a little bit and we see things like this happen. >> back in 1926, the dow reached its highest ever, 26,616. it's down since then more than 2,000 points? >> as a percent correction, it's well in line with other corrections we've seen in history. it's not anything like a black pun prm, with the way the market rkt. of course, the president had been tapping for months f. it's 24,000 plus right now. is it because of interest rates, fear of inflation? what explains this volatility over the last few days? >> the worry is inflation suddenly reappearing on the

scene. it's been dormant the last few years, since the recession, and now the economy is growing, unemployment is very low, wages are starting to go up, and with the extra boost of spending increase and tax cuts, we might be in a place where finally inflation is coming back, then the feds will tap the brakes, raise interest rates faster, and that's when they lead us to slower grapes and is. >> thanks very much, sir. on top of all of this, the. efforts for a shut drs do rmt. the president's legal team. robert mueller fearing he'll be caught in a lie. we discuss what happens if the president refuses. duncan just protected his family

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lawmakers on capitol hill is in another mad scramble to keep the federal government from running out of money. they have two days to come up with a spending bill to avoid a government shutdown. they're moving another bill through for march 23rd but it's not likely to get through the senate. congressman is joining us from the freedom caucus. congressman, thank you for joining us. >> it's good to be with you, wolf. it seems like we were here just a few weeks ago, but obviously a very important time for america and hoping we get the government funding. >> we might be back march 23rd to try one more time. what happens if it doesn't get through the senate? >> wolf, i just left a meeting to come out here and be with you. where we were talking with some of the cross-sectional leaders within our conference, talking about a budget caps deal.

really, the major impediment for this not to go through the senate would be a number we would agree to what they would call the non-funding side of the government. those numbers have pretty much been in place the last six or seven months. the big holdup has been an agreement on immigration, as you well know. we're hopeful we'll go ahead and attach those numbers to this, fund the military, not hold it hostage and allow it to come back and have a fairly easy bipartisan vote here in the house. that being said, if it comes back just a clean cr, it will not be received well on the house side of the capitol here. >> and that could create a government shutdown. if you're talking about immigration, a sensitive issue, obviously, the clock is clearly ticking on daca and the fate of about 700,000 young immigrants called dreamers. the white house chief of staff, general john kelly, on "today" just told reporters it's unlikely the president would extend the march 5th deadline. the senate is expected to take up the issue next week.

are you in favor -- let me just take your specific point. the president as part of an overall deal says he wants 1.8 million dreamers to be allowed to stay in the united states and eventually have a pathway to citizenship. are you with the president on that one specific point? >> as we look at that particular point, there is support for that if you can get the other programmers, wolf. i don't kn -- programmearameters, wolf. i don't know if you can get to the causal effect of what created the problem in the first place. i can tell you that's a hard issue for some of my members to swallow, but they've been willing to along with the president's four-tier proposal. additionally, i can tell you there is a bipartisan meeting going on right now at high levels in the senate and the house as they're trying to reconcile what we mean by border security, you know, how we're going to address chain

migration. but as you noticed, the applause line in the state of the union when they talk about amnesty for the 1.8 million dreamers didn't really get a big applause line from republicans or democrats, so it's what we attach to that, i think, is going to be the grueling debate on whether we get a bill by march 5th or not. >> you don't necessarily regard that as amnesty, 1.8 million dreamers having, over 10 to 12 years, a path to citizenship, living here in the united states legally? you would support that as part of a broader package, is that right? >> as part of a broader package. even in the goodlap bill, it gives a partial pathway to citizenship. most of my constituents don't have a problem that they become citizens, but a pathway to citizenship. why should they create a new

path to perhaps let them become citizens quicker than those waiting in line? it's those negotiations, wolf, that are probably the thorniest issues we have, yet making sure you address that 1.8 million population is something that i think all of us understand that we have to do, but i think for my constituents, they're just saying, listen, we don't want to have to come back and deal with this again in five or ten years. let's make sure if we do something comprehensively that we protect our borders and up hold the rule of law. >> yesterday the president criticized the democrats in the house, and the senate for that matter, for not standing and clapping during parts of his state of the union address. the white house says he was simply joking when he called democrats treasonous. but he clearly wasn't joking. his face was very serious when he called these democratic colleagues of yours unamerican and said they don't love america. what's your reaction? you know these democrats in the house of representatives.

>> well, obviously you have a partisan divide. that's what they call reaching across that center aisle that goes down to where the president was speaking. i think the the ddisappointment the president's part, and i don't want to speak for him, was when he talked about african-american unemployment being the lowest we've had in history, and not to have even bipartisan support for things like that, we understand the controversial issues, but when you have people who have lost loved ones to gang members, not being able to stand up and show support for those, even republicans and democrats should be able to come together and applaud those kinds of lines, and i think that's what the president was dismayed about, you know, in terms of seeing that response. that being said -- >> let me press you, congressman, does that make these democrats unamerican and they don't love america because they weren't applauding? >> obviously, i think no one that puts their name out there

to serve this country is unamerican. to go through what all we have to go through, whether you love us or hate us, and most of that is on the hate side of it, but you make great sacrifices to serve your country. yet at the same time when we saw people up in the gallery where you have law enforcement officers and you have military men and women, you have people who had lost their loved ones. we've got to come together at least on those kind of issues to applaud the president. we can do that, but to say someone is unamerican because of their unwillingness to clap is not something most americans would agree with. >> yep, i think you're totally right on that. congressman mark meadows of north carolina, thank you so much for joining us. >> thank you. it's good to be with you, wolf. >> thank you. the president's legal team now reportedly urging him to refuse an interview with robert mueller, the special counsel.

why they're worried the president might be caught lying under oath. also former white house chief strategist steve bannon was on the verge of defying a subpoena to appear before congress today to answer questions in the russia investigation. i'll speak live with a member of that committee on what happened at the very last minute. ng all f these germans in my tree. i decided to have my dna tested through ancestry dna. the big surprise was we're not german at all. 52% of my dna comes from scotland and ireland. so, i traded in my lederhosen for a kilt. ancestry has many paths to discovering your story. get started for free at ancestry.com.

white house lawyers are reportedly warning the president not to meet with robert mueller's special counsel. they are worried the president might be caught lying under oath. here's what the president said just two weeks ago. >> are you going to talk to mueller? >> i'm looking forward to it, actually. >> you want to. >> there's been no collusion whatsoever. there is no obstruction whatsoever. and i'm looking forward to it.

>> you would do it under oath? >> i would do it under oath, absolutely. >> i want to bring in our cnn legal analyst, former prosecutor laura coates. so laura, what are the actual risks if the president does decide to answer questions from the special counsel and his investigators? >> well, the biggest risk, of course, is perjury, that he may make an inconsistent statement to the fbi even if he's under oath. the second is he may make corroborating statements. the third thing is donald trump, who is pretty much a talker, may introduce new, perhaps damaging information, that will introduce a different leg to this investigation that nobody anticipated. >> one of the rewards on his gre agreeing to answer questions? >> he said, of course, i'll volunteer and talk to you, that's totally fine here. also he may be persuasive and

may be able to correct his own credibility as someone who can tell the truth. or he may be vindicated in some form or fashion. those things may happen, they may not. >> the president said he wants to answer questions. the lawyers are apparently deeply, deeply concerned for a variety of reasons. so what happens next? >> they should be concerned, of course. you know, you have somebody who has had a passive line in depositions and things like this, so there are obviously concerns. what happens if the president is cooperative? if he decides to testify voluntarily, he'll do so. if he doesn't, he'll have a grand jury subpoena issued to him which carries a great deal of weight. and third, if he doesn't do either, he will probably go to the supreme court and probably explain issues 1 and 2 again. ultimately he will have to testify. the longer he will be able to negotiate the terms of this conversation, though, the better he is at having good bargaining power and bargaining chips in

terms of the length and the questions asked. but ultimately robert mueller is running this show. >> he could plead the fifth, say it's a hoax, it's beneath the president, i won't answer the questions and i'll cite the fifth amendment. >> that under lines one of those rewards at saying i have nothing to hide. remember, when you try to cash that check of the fifth amendment, you are all but suggesting to people, as trump said himself during the investigation of one of hillary clinton's aides along with the e-ma e-mail server scandal, if you plead the fifth, it makes you look guilty. it would underline the argument that you are entirely truthful in any claim. >> laura, thank you. a delay right now of chief strategist steve bannon who is under subpoena. he was supposed to start taking questions today from the house intelligence committee, but now the ranking democrat on the committee says the white house

is interfering. let's go to capitol hill. ohio congressman brad winstrup is joining us. he's the republican member of the house committee. glad to have you with us. >> glad to be here, wolf. >> steve bannon is refusing to answer certain questions during the transition, during his time in the administration. during his last appearance that resulted in the subpoena that was issued. so why exactly is bannon's appearance once again now being pushed back a week? >> well, mike conaway, who has been chairing the investigation, as you know, put forward our statement. let's just make it clear that we want to get him back in, we want to get him to be able to answer all the questions that we ask him. as far as the legal wrangling that goes along with that, i'm not a lawyer, but our lawyers will be working on that, and we do want to get him in to get answers to our questions from both sides of the aisle.

>> if he fails to show up next week, will he be held in contempt? >> that, again, is something we would have to decide on as a committee. i think that may be part of the conversation, i don't know. again, we'll have to have a family conversation about that down amongst the intelligence committee for sure. >> i want to move on to the dueling memos from your intelligence committee, the republican majority memo that was released last week. now there is a democratic minority memorandum that's over at the white house. the president has another four days to decide whether to release it, what to redact, to eliminate, if anything. what do you think the president is going to do? >> that's from over. we had ours seen by christopher wray and he said everything in ours was fact walg. i think there are some things in

that mow. that's fine. we voted to release ours, we voted to release theirs. they did not want to retheresa. the more we tli to get this into the light, we try to get to the truth. . so we have to play our role and use the tools that we need to provide the truth to the american people and get it out in the best way that we can without compromising national security. >> you've read the ten pages of the democratic memo rebutting serl parts of the republican memo. did you see anything. it could compromise, for example, how the u.s. intelligence committee has sources and methods to gather information? >> i think to some degree. that needs to be put in front of

the experts. it is a rebuttal for sure, but i will tell you it didn't change any of the facts that are within our memo. so, again, let's get everything out on the table. that's our job and i take it very seriously and i want to proceed in a professional manner. i feel like we have stuck to all the rules and gone through the process that the rules allow, and we'll continue to move. >> so just to be precise, congressman, from your perspective, and i assume the respect from the other intelligence rls. >> i wouldn't say that because i think it should be released. >> so if they say things should be redacted, you want it released as is.

>> i don't think it will go as is because i think there will be some things they want to change. >> the ranking democrat on your committee, adam schiff, a man you know, says he's not afraid of redactions for sources and methods for classified information, he's afraid of what he calls political redactions. the white house will decide to redact a sentence here, a paragraph there or whatever because it embarrasses republicans. what about that? >> he should know something about it, because as we know, in the fisa application, there was a tremendous redaction, and that was the fact that the hillary clinton campaign and the democratic national committee paid for that dossier that was part of the fisa application. that to me was one huge redaction, if you will. >> wasn't that included in a footnote that the information came from political activists? >> that's not good, either. i don't believe that should have been in there. you take it out completely, in

your opinion. that was paid for by a political party, by a political campaign. >> devin nunes, the chairman of your committee, trey gowdy, a key member, is the only republican that's gone through all the raw information. just like. >> there was a footnote in the summons, in the surveillance warrant that went to the court which indicated the why not put it all out there? and by the way, the reason there's been only a few people to see it that the point system with the doj. i'm a doctor that came to congress to try to serve our country, but we've been stonewalled this whole year. we tried to issue subpoenas and they've been ignored by the fbi

and the doj. i think there is an opportunity right now for christopher wrai and m -- wray and mr. rosenstein to come forward and say, we have a lot of great people working for us, but this is a great opportunity for them to say, let's air our laundry. let's see if someone did something wrong. let's see if we just need to public setting for this. >> do you agree with trey gowdy who says the dossier has nothing to do with meeting at the trump tower in new york, it has nothing to do with cambridge analytica. it has nothing to do with the papadopoulos meetings in great britain? it doesn't have anything to do with obstruction of justice? so there's going to be a russia probe even without the dossier?

do you agree with trey, gowdy. >> i agree, and what we're talking about with the memo is a sub set, if you will. we're talking about the dossier operates, and you got to think about this court. it's one of the few courts when you're seeking a warrant that the cues does not . >> we know it's a phony if you're withholding evidence. i'm not saying it was done on purpose, but it sure looks like it withheld that important component of who paid for this. >> i want to be precise, i know you got to run. you want robert mueller and his team of investigators to continue this investigation. you disagree with the president that it's all a whitewash, a hoax, that too much taxpayer money has been spent? you believe in robert mueller; is that right? >> i believe in this situation

he should be going ahead with this investigation. i hope it's done fairly, obviously. that remains to be seen. he should be left alone to do his work and hopeful physical we'll get a fair evaluation of what he sees happened in american history. >> thank you, congressman, for joining us. the white house you press briefing room. sarah sand eers will be briefin. the white house has decided that syria will pay the heavy price for any attack. will the trump administration make good on that? we'll discuss that. all the breaking news when we come back. ying dutchman. poetry in motion.

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the united states is, quote, gravely alarmed by gas attacks by the syrian regime. the images you're about to see are disturbing. nine people, including three of its volunteers were injured in the attack. it's the six report in the last month alone of chemical weapons being used in syria. retired rear admiral john kirby, the u.s. is gravely alarmed. so what happens next? >> that's the big question. these reports have to be confirmed. from that video, clearly, there was some chemical agent. chemicals being weaponized is

against the law and that is something that the u.n. security council will have to answer. you saw ambassador haley express extreme frustration that they doesn't even get a condemnation statement out of security council because the russians wouldn't allow it to go forward. the other thing that the administration is worried here is is the assad regime trying to fly under the radar here? in other words, sort of gray zone use of chemical weapons? they know they got hit for the use of sarin. will they continue to use gas to stay under that threshold? >> last april u.s. launched tomahawk missiles against a chemical weapons attack that killed dozens of civilians in syria. is the u.s. about to get to that point once again? >> again, i think that's what they're trying to figure out. i don't know.

it was very clear, convincing evidence about the use of sarin. they were effective. we haven't seen sarin gas attacks since then. it's possible that assad could be trying to use chlorine, even though it's against the law, it's harder to detect to try to prevent the united states from retaliating in that way. it would be a mistake for him to try to pursue that, obviously. not just for his own people but the stakes of international response. we'll have to see. >> i want you to stand by. new developments are unfolding, involving north korea right now, nuclear threat from north korea. take a quick break. much more right after this. you do all this research

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vice president mike pence is in aerobe camera ahead of the olympic games, bringing with him a hash stance on north korea. during a stopover, the sproovic president said he did not request a meeting with north korean officials. but at the same time not ruling it out. is the u.s. sending contradictory messages to the north koreans? i want you to stand by. the president is speaking at the white house on immigration. i want our viewers to listen in. >> big group. it's a very talented group of people. boy, thank you very much. we need talent for what we're doing, believe me. we're here to discuss the tremendous threat of ms-13, one of the most violent and vicious gangs anywhere in the world. we really have never seen anything quite like this, the

level of ferocity, the level of violence. i'm honored to be joined by dhs secretary nielsen, top officials in federal law enforcement and our local sheriffs, our great, great sheriffs. we're also joined by congressman peter king. peter, thank you. congressman lee zeldon. lee, good to have you. been working hard on this, i know, you two. martha mcsalle, i hear you're doing well out there. that's what the word is. congresswoman barbara comstock, nice to have you and congressman michael mccall, an expert on the subject and has been a long period of time. it's a tough subject. ms-13 recruits through our broken immigration system, violating our borders and it just comes right through whatever they want to come through, they come through. it's much tougher now since when

we've been there. but we need much better border mechanisms and much better border security. we need the wall. going to get the wall. we don't have the wall. we're never going to solve this problem. i've gone to the top people. many of these people are at table right now, including this group and without the wall it's not going to work. during my state of the union, i called on congress to close the immigration loop holes that have allowed this deadly gang to break so easily into our country. my administration has identified three priorities. we went through and looked very closely, we've identified three priorities for creating a safe, modern and lawful immigration system, securing the border, ending chain migration and canceling the terrible visa lottery. we've been discussing it. we've been talking about it. we're talking about it in congress. we're talking about daca and how we can work that out. i think the democrats don't want to make a deal but we'll find

out. as congress considers immigration reform, it's essential that we listen to the law enforcement professionals in this room today and so i'm going to turn it over to secretary nielsen. we'll begin a discussion. you folks might want to stay for a little while, okay? secretary? >> yes. mr. president, thank you for hosting this round table on ms-13. as you know, it's the first gang dangerous enough to be classified as a trans-national criminal organization. we've talked at length of the devastating destruction and violence it causes in our communities and we're here today to hear from a variety of folks who work every day to combat this. first i would like to say it's my privilege to be here, the men and women of dhs and doj, who make it their job every day to fight this and other violence coming across our borders and also to be joined by members of congress who have shown great leadership. we thank you for that and also for your support. thank you all. in your recently announced framework, as you know,