george washington university. he's also a 2004. truman scholar distinction shared by the speaker who is among the first class of scholars in 1977. national editor for "vanity fair." john hughes reporter for bloomberg news and national press club board member. senior business ed qtr at aviation week magazine. undersecretary for the national protection programs to electorate and guest for the speaker. skipping over the podium we have andrew snyder says the editor and chairman of the press club's speakers' committee. skipping the speaker for the moment sean bullard national press club board member and

president. the speaker's committee member who led the organization of today's event. acting tsa administrator and a guest of the speaker. linda jeneane and member of the speaker's committee and washington editor at crimber magazine. she's also helped put together this evening. chris chambers journalism professor george tenacity and commentator for russia today also a member of the press club. the director of communications for the holes corporation and former homeland security corporation. in the current homeland security spokesman a guest of the speaker press secretary clark stevens. [applause] our guest today has spoken before up the national press club although her title has changed since she was the last guest three years ago she's handling many issues during her time as governor of arizona.

immigration and border security. today she will be talking about aviation security and terrorist threats. janet napolitano runs a massive federal agency that is still new by washington standards. persius seven federal organizations under her leadership. rahm $60 billion in her annual budget and is responsible for about a quarter of a billion employees. and those employees jobs are about as drivers of any federal agency in putting the coast guard, the federal emergency management agency, u.s. secret service, u.s. immigration customs enforcement, a u.s. citizen immigration services, u.s. customs and border protection and transportation security administration or tsa. what the purchasing mobile radios for federal law enforcement officials working in the borr region, search and rescue helicopters for the coast guard or body scanners to discourage a mother would be donner from boarding a plane bound for the u.s., today's guest is vital to securing the nation from the threats we face

the it terrorism or catastrophic suaturppes please welcome today's national press club guest the third secretary of the department of land securities janet napolitano [applause] >> thank you. good afternoon. it's a pleasure to be back at the national press club with a different job. some of the same issues but some additional one sells well. as was mentioned in the introduction. very briefly before i turn to the act will topic today, which is aviation security and the ever-changing threat environment and which we live, let me briefly describe our department. it is an amalgam of 22 agencies. it was formed in the week of

9/11 but there are aspects of the federal government the word square away or pieced together in different departments that should be under one roof. i'm often asked how one can manage such a large and diverse organization, and we have done -- i was going to give [inaudible] for just a minute. [laughter] we have done a quadrennial review which is basically a really good plan for the department. the first woman ever since it is such a yondah department and we have boiled ourselves down to five major mission areas. one is the counterterrorism

mission. the reason for the founding and the primary thread that runs through almost every area of the department. the second is securing the border of the united states, be they land borders, the day at sea or in the air. the third is the enforcement of the nation immigration law and to do that smartly and effectively even as we advocate for reform of those laws. the fourth this protection of cyberspace, and i think we are probably the first department or major department of the federal government to identify cyberspace's a separate and discreet mention area deserving of our protection. and then the fifth is the ability to prepare and advance for and then not respond quickly to any type of emergency that might occur, and beat tornadoes,

floods, ice storms, forest fires, hurricanes, tsunami, we see all of that and by way of further new wants we are not first responders perce but what we do is we work with responders to make sure they are ready to respond and then come in when their resources are overwhelmed. so, viewed that way through that prism you can see why the department makes sense and how it all comes together. but the topic i wanted to talk with you about today was the issue of the threat to aviation and we are doing both domestically and internationally with respect to aviation security. now we know that al qaeda and al

qaeda related groups continue to believe that taking down a commercial airliner for two with a nice a commercial airliner would be a great leap forward in their terrorist view of the world. we also know they are a very smart and determined adversary. and so they are very familiar with the steps we have already taken in the country and indeed the world in the week of what happened on 9/11. so our task is not only to respond but to think ahead not just reactive but pro-active in dealing with that continuing threat of aviation security in a world where aviation is a key engine of the economy both

domestically and internationally and it is a key engine for true to the tourism and families who live in different places of the world or different states within the united states to be able to get together. you can't imagine a world quite frankly without a safe and secure aviation system. so our job is to focus on that and what we need to do to keep it safe and secure and to give you a sense of scale because the sound system complexity to the issue every week there are some 2500 commercial flights carrying half a million people that come into the united states just from europe, just from europe and we have 2.2 billion passengers who fly every year and 10 million business people, students, visitors, board and international flight down to the united states each week.

those numbers give you a sense of scale so not only do we need to deal with threats as they emerge we think in anticipation of future threats and the things we do have to be things that enable the system to continue to work. now a lot of what we are doing right now quite frankly is because of what happened on christmas. many of the things are kind of in the works. we were already planning for the example the deployment of imaging technology called body scanners, we call them ait. but i think christmas put a very stark reminder in people's minds about the fact that aviation continues to be the target of threats and that the new kind of threats don't necessarily

involve a large scale conspiracies that took months if not years to prepare but deeply individuals carrying nothing that are metals that can be picked up in a magnetometer, powder or liquid or gel that could be detonated in an airplane. putting those materials and harder to find a location, making greater use of individuals who don't fit what we think of as a terrorist proposal. they may have no derogatory information at any file for example. we are seeing the use of women in the recruitment of women for this kind of missions, which is also a change. so it is an ever evolving world

we deal with the indian ever evolving threat situation. so what have we done since what happened on christmas? and let me be very precise what happened of christmas. on the day before, abumutallab got on a plane in lagos nigeria and was screened there and then transferred to amsterdam. the amsterdam airport, where he was again, screamed. he did not appear on any screen and watch list the would be available overseas and he got on the plane bound of course for detroit on which he was unsuccessful in detonating a load of what is called petn which is a powder for of explosive material. so the president's response to

that -- we did an immediate review of what went wrong. what went wrong to enable abumutallab to get on this planet possibly killed not just himself but individuals from 17 other countries? what went wrong was twofold. a bomb was he wasn't on the white watchlist. there was information but because of some practices in the watch listing community, he didn't make it on to what is called the selectee list or the no-fly list of the two lists that are pushed abroad before someone boards the plane. not only have organizations like the and ctc and the fbi addressed that and fixed the dish you but we are also pushing a lot more information overseas so that individuals at foreign airports, even though they are not u.s. employees perce, but the have the opportunity to have

the benefit of that intelligence then of course the second thing that happened this because he was not on the watch list, he wasn't given a secondary inspection and of course because he wasn't carrying something metallic it didn't get picked up with standard screening equipment. so what does that mean and how were we addressing this at the tsa and the department of homeland security? i already mentioned the watch list issue which is primarily in the hands of the in ctc and the fbi. but we have done some things, too. for a sample, pushing more overseas. we have domestically in the airports that are under our supervision, our direct

supervision deployed more different types of equipment and mechanisms designed to give greater granularity of securities if you get through one you might not get through the next for the next. by the way we don't do the same thing at every airport. so when you ask the question how come this happen to me at this airport but not this airport that's because it is designed to be unpredictable. why is that? because those who seek to a attack needham predictability. but we have added more behavior detection officers. we've added more k-9 teams. we've added more explosive triste detection for passengers where durham is wanted to see if there is an explosive trees and of course we have been deploying the advanced imaging technology machines into more and more

airports and by the end of next year if you will be a thousand plus machines that were actually installed in airports from the country. by the week, the people who actually go through them and have gone through them like them and the more they are used and the more quite frankly we by and other countries by the better the technology gets. in addition, we have formed a kind of innovative and new partnership with the department of energy and the department of energy of course was in the national labs and in the national labs presides some of the best scientific minds of the country. and we have asked them to help us design the 21st century checkpoint, is what do we need to do now but what we need to be thinking of that would take us beyond even the kind of advanced screening we can do today.

so that work is all under way domestically. but perhaps the greatest area of reform has been internationally because one of the things the was so clear on christmas was that the aviation system is global and if you get into the system you potentially have access to airports around the world to read and so we immediately after christmas i think within a week or so after christmas i sent the deputy secretary of the department of homeland security and assistant secretary and others and we put them on a plane and they went around the world in 12 days meeting with ministers of the like, ministers of interior, secretaries, transportation ministers, to begin talking about what we need to do internationally to make sure the global aviation system remains safe and secure.

then we followed that with a meeting ikao formed in the wake of world war ii to keep global aviation safe. so undersecretary rand beers who is here went to montreal to meet with them and we began a joint initiative where we have been going region by region around the world reaching an international consensus on improved aviation security. better information collection and sharing, better passenger vetting and sharing of information about passengers before they even get to the airport, stronger cooperation on the development and deployment of technologies, new technologies and modernized aviation security standards shared across the world that can

be audited and enforced across the world. we began and spain meeting with the ministers of interior of the european union had reached a very strong consensus the result in what is now called the toledo declaration for spain. we then went to mexico city and have the countries of the western hemisphere from canada, argentina, chile, brazil and others and the resulted in a regional international consensus known as the mexico city declaration. several weeks ago we were in tokyo, japan. i've been at all of these by the way. we're again we forged an international consensus with 20 some odd countries of asia, it directly represented their. that's known as the tokyo declaration. then just this past sunday, monday and tuesday we were in

nigeria with ministers from dozens of countries from africa which resulted again in a strong international consensus now mass the declaration. we will finish up in a few weeks and a meeting focused on the middle east where we will meet at the uae to forge i hope and i think another international consensus of information collection and information sharing, better technology screening at airports themselves and then we will have a global general assembly under the auspices of ikao in september. we will have, basically nine months from zero to a revised global consensus on what we need to do to not only react to the threats we know weeks test but to build capacity to be

proactively dealing with the safety and security of global aviation. in that we need to deal with the capacity and resources not every country has the same kind of resources. we know that. that's part of the discussions moving forward. but i think it is highly sycophant that in all of our discussions with all of the issues involved and possible tensions that could have arisen it is remarkable to me any way that on in this issue the need to have a safe and secure global aviation system that allows people and goods to travel the globe with a free safety and security we can have there has been no resistance or pushback whatsoever were. let me close if i might on the

following to be even with all of this the has gone on, there is no guarantee. there is no guarantee that somewhere somehow someone will manage to successfully destroyed in an airplane or turn that plane again into a weapon as was done on 9/11. we don't live in a world of guarantees. that is just not the environment in which we excess. so i'm not here to say that there is a guaranteed now being provided. what i am here to see is that every step, reasonable and we can conceive of both domestically and internationally is being pursued to make sure that aviation remains safe. and i also year to say if something were to happen we are prepared to respond swiftly, to respond effectively and to

respond strongly. that is our tradition as a country and that is the tradition that we will uphold regardless of any circumstance because this nation is one that is very strong and extraordinarily resilient. with that, let me close my remarks. thank you for having me. i especially want thank brand who's been leading our efforts. i will share with you that when i say that we've been pushing more information overseas that has been a remarkable effort not only to push information overseas that in such fashion that it's based on intel and threat based more precise information so that we no longer have to see if you travel through this country 100% of you

will get screenings which in the aftermath of christmas day was something we had to do so we've been able to turn that system into a more intelligence driven system as well so i would like to thank gail and grand and the many people with the homeland security. when i accepted this position some described it as the ultimate and thankless position. i don't need thanks. the men and women at the department do because they did a great job thank you very much. [applause] >> thank you madame secretary and to the people that have brought questions. i don't know if i've ever seen so many questions at the national press club luncheon. i apologize in advance if they don't all get asked but we are going to do the best we can. first question coming from a member of the audience how can

you insure planes bound for the u.s. are safe when you cannot compel the foreign government said the security regimes the you would want? >> i think part of it is that espeive of u.s. hempulsion's there world from every country on the plans so just because a plan is bound for the u.s. doesn't mean that it is a u.s. plane and as i mentioned before, there were individuals from 17 countries in addition to the united states that were on the flight on christmas day. in addition, we have the ability of the last points of departure for the united states to insist on certain protections particularly at the gates it will ultimately have the ability not to allow planes to be a last point of departure to the united states if security is what he maintained.

so that is the stick that we have not been played and i don't believe it has ever been played but it is among the legal authorities we possess. >> are those the sorts of authorities and contingencies you it to spread to the international summits? >> you know we really haven't had to. i think everybody's recognizes the global aviation system is linked and that the united states is a key part of the linkage for everybody so everybody has a stake in making sure the system remains safe. >> were the most challenging issues for aviation and aircraft manufacturers as it relates to airline security? >> i think manufacturers obviously to make the aircraft themselves as pacelli and has possible as tough as possible to be able to have a catastrophic

incident to particularly catastrophic incident while the plan is in the air. but from a scientific and engineering standpoint that is an extraordinarily difficult issue given for of vast array of different kinds of material that could be used in the interior of a plan. so that is why it is important we have good information, intelligence sharing, passenger vetting and different screening mechanisms used at airports to give us this greatest likelihood that no one like abumutallab can board the plane. >> how does the department of homeland security default security standards either for international or domestic flights, ports, land borders and such a way to not unduly restrict trade? >> this is -- our job is and our function always has to be

sensitive to several things. one is the safety and security mandate. one is the protection of privacy and civil liberties. this is a great concern as you add layers of protection world so one of the things we do is we have a chief privacy officer and civil rights and civil liberties bureau within our department and they were gone and help us even as we are to the wpm changes in policies, equipment standards requirements and the light. at the outset rather been issuing so xin at the end. then we have the sometimes competing demands of the illegal trade and commerce versus port security be a planned port, seaport or airports.

and there we work with the private-sector flexible than the aviation environment. i have met now with the association that represents airports both domestically that i met when i was in abuja that represents international airports and we have also met extensively with the u.s. carriers who through their associations and the international flag carriers because they have to be part of the solution. they have issues of cost and passengers throughput. we all have issues like that. nobody enjoys waiting in line. at least i have not met anyone who has volunteered to me they like the line at the airport. so, we know that and those things have to be thought through and accommodated to the greatest extent possible even as

you are adding new or different types of security regiments and putting them in place. and quite frankly the technology can also be of assistance because as i suggested before, as we employ the new generation of technologies, they get better, they get faster, they are more efficient and passengers no more how to deal with them. remember the first five, some of you will, when the magnetometers were first installed in airports? raise your hand if you remember. thank you. many at the same arguments were made regarding the slow people down, they were invasion of privacy etc. and it turns out no the are an object of a better way to protect the airline environment. the new generation, the explosive trace detection models

are the next generation and our object of the better. are they won hundred%? no. as i said in my concluding remarks, nothing in this environment is 100%. is about to actively better, safer? absolutely. .. all positives through something

called at that and something secure flight. these are initiatives underway being implemented that will assist us in keeping that number down. the other thing we are working on, and it is a work in progress is a quicker, more efficient, redress system. in other words, if you still coming in now, if you're silly false-positive coming to keep getting pulled aside regardless of what airport you are at because your name and your dob or whatever matches and that occurs, there has to be a way to be able to clear the list. we call that redress. i think our redress system right now is not where we wanted to be from a consumer standpoint. so over the next month and year,

we will be working to make adding more efficient system as well. >> also, for a time i implementation, when will implement a trusted traveler program that the tsa has been telling for years? >> as soon as we can. [laughter] >> related, how goes for the certain timeline for import a new full-time administrator? >> as soon as we can. [laughter] look, as you know, the president has not -- he's nominated to people, but they have not completed the confirmation process. and i'm going to embarrass her right out, but it has been my fortunate as the secretary to have that the act and had to tca

who knows this business, no these issues and has been able to run this department and keep me advised of what is done on an absolutely classy level. we have civil service and the government will do a wonderful job even if the president decides on who the next nominee will be. then of course many issues of people in the advance and on c-span would like to know about. this is about the nuclear summit that is taking place in washington this week. how well they execute or carry out the spirit of this summit by tying border enforcement like immigration to the smuggling of potential bomb materials on this siddhartha from smugglers or gangsters could be heard to bring in fiscal material? >> well, you know, let's switch of aviation to land borders because the question really goes to that.

although, in the united states has immense land borders north and south with lots of force eventually, lots of lanes of highway. and, remember that in addition to security issues, as i said before, we also betrayed, the comments come the tourism issues that needs to be taken into account. mexico by way of example is the number one or two trading partner for 23 states in the united states. that porter have to work. traffic needs to be looked to flow. the issue becomes how do you keep out contraband like the products? how do you keep out illegal immigration? and then, at another end of this but i am, as were actual nuclear fissile type materials, while they are on that, we deploy

scanning technology, both land and sea, and and are designed to detect that material. but there again, we don't want to be until something is actually at the physical border of the united states to pick up something. and that's what are important, to get everything by saying this is about in the layers begin with good information gathering, good intelligence analysis and sharing. good ways of picking things up as they go through the supply chain, if i can use that phrase. i'm getting actually to the physical border, be a land or sea in the united states. so we have responsibilities in all of those areas. and as you might imagine, our country is unique in the amount of order land border in particular that it needs to

protect. >> more questions on the land border. recently, arizona, rancher rod krantz was killed by someone who is in this country illegally. what does that say about our current order security needs on mental american ranchers and landowners seek an increase in federal activities along arizona's southern border since quiet tonight well, as you mentioned in the intro, i'm a former governor of arizona, the former attorney general in the former u.s. attorney general for arizona. i know that area very well. i did not know rob chris personally, but i know other ranchers from that area who knew him as a longtime ranching family in arizona. in fact, spent an hour on the phone a week and a half ago with a number of ranchers from that part of arizona, which is near douglas, for those of you that know the state.

the investigation is still ongoing as to the identification of the murderer or murderers. we are working, by the way, closely with mexican law enforcement on this, which is a growing trend with us. working very closely with mexican law enforcement, which we need to do. not just in this area, but along the u.s.-mexico border. we had prior to rod krantz's murder put a lot of additional resources and to the southwest border, particularly arizona because there was so much activity there. we had increased the number of border enforcement teams geared we increased the number of mobile radar teams here we increased the number of checkpoints. i could go with a list, but everything was increased. nonetheless, this outrageous crime occurred. so, number one, working in every law enforcement investigatory

tool of our command, identify the perpetrators, bring the perpetrators to justice. as the number two, working to see what, if any, additional resources would be helpful, not just in arizona, but other parts of the border as well. i think the visit by the president of mexico next month is a very important visit because he has engaged in a real -- an effort that deserves our applause come but more important than our plus, our absolute cooperation and commitment within. and that is to really go after these big drug cartels that are cause for much of the violence along the border and break them up. they've been there for a long time. they been for as long as i've been in arizona, which was many, many years. and it's time for our security,

and mexico, both countries have a stake in is that they were broken up. >> following non-mac, looking at the texas border, who was running it these days and what does that today about homeland security? >> juarez is right across the bridge from el paso, texas. it has been the site of literally thousands of hamas sites, drug-related over the last several years. and when i say thousands, i mean i think -- i may not know the exact number, but i think last year was something north of 6000 homicides drug-related or 550 of whom were law-enforcement officers, right? right over our border. and so, this is something that is intensely important, both to mexico and the president of mexico, resident calderon has been investing major resources in restoring the rule of law and

the state of chihuahua. and we are working with mexico on that and we are working on our side of the border to assist in things like inspect and southbound vehicles for arms or bulk cash that transient the border to go back to the cartels. for the first time, for example, respecting all rail traffic that is going south into mexico. that hasn't been done before, looking for the tip of contraband, you know, the drugs come north, the arms and cash goes south. so we have a role to play both in presenting preventing the drugs from coming in, but try to keep dams in the bowl cash from going south to the cartels and we're working on that as well. >> as the search for the alleged perpetrators continue in the krantz case, without as as a backdrop, earlier this week the arizona house of representatives asked a bill that increases the power of local police to stop question and detain people they

suspect may be illegal immigrants. are such powers necessary? is it a good thing for state to be so in front of the federal government on immigration policies? given your experience as arizona ag and knowledge of the legislature, based on what you know of the law, is it constitutional? >> on all levels of the law. it is -- i think the kind of law that evidences why the congress needs to take up integration reform because immigration reform it to look at increased enforcement tools. it needs to look at the issue of flows of workers, now and in the future. it needs to look at how we deal with those already in the country illegally. and without that kind of commitment by the congress to really deal with it, i think we're going to see more and more states take up the issue of

immigration and the danger we run is having a patchwork of laws. and in this area and i say this as a armors date ag and a former state governor. while i do not believe the federal government has exclusive power, where immigration enforcement is concerned, the kind of wholesale turnover that i believe distract arizona log represent really in my view it doesn't strike the right balance that we need. but quite frankly, and so we can move forward on immigration reform, i know the president is very committed to this. he's asked a number of us in the cabinet to be working on it, which we have been. we look forward to when congress does take up this important subject. >> out of that don't come into

play when you hear folks were frustrated with immigration policies that, just build a wall between the u.s. and mexico? >> well, i think i was the originator we show me a 15-foot wall masha ua 16-foot ladder. and just holding a wall doesn't reflect a first of all the reality of the border. and mean, it's a physical place. and it is thousands of miles long, across some of the most rugged terrain you can imagine. so to build and maintain a law with the notion that you don't do anything else admit that in another other than immigration policy is neither wise nor affect his. you've got to have a system. he's got to have a system down there that includes boots on the ground, that has to include technology and fencing and infrastructure as part of an overall system. but again, you also have to deal

with the demand for the illegal labor. that means you have to have the tools to go after employers who continue to employ illegal labor intentionally, knowingly exploiting that market. one of the things that means reform in an immigration bill is that the law governing employers and the sanctions for employers that continue to hire a legally are not strong enough and they need to be reformed to match economic reality. so while reform is some something that is complex, it is also something that is so very, very necessary in the day and age. >> there've been several examples on them is, showing a rise in self radicalized or homegrown terrorism. individuals who may be younger and inexperienced compared to foreign terrorist, buttercup divided either radical islam.

any time since the blackened by friends, relatives or coworkers due to some obvious changes in behavior. what actions is dhs taking to educate the american public to increase their awareness of the threat reason i buy homegrown terrorists of any origin in hopes of identifying them before they attacked? >> this is a change that i have seen even in my 14 or 15 months as the secretary of homeland security. and that is the increase in the number of u.s. edison, who themselves are radicalized when they travel to the fata or yemen or vienna camp, learned the trade craft of a terrorist and then return. and, or learn much of it just simply by the internet among other things.

this is something that we are focused on right now in working with local law enforcement. in other words, you know, there are 800,000 some odd pairs of eyes and ears out there around the country, known as law enforcement. what to look for, what are the markers from when somebody is moving from first amendment activity, plain old angry rhetoric, which we have had is the country since we began, to actually planning a violent act. it means being able to share a threat of information to mainstream. for example, if there's a threat that someone is winning to build bombs or a type that requires the purchase of abnormal marts of hydrogen peroxide, then

making sure that police and others are watching to know how to get information about whether someone making abnormally large purchases of hydrogen peroxide. it is that exchange of threats and threat information that really i think as we move forward will give us, as a country, the architecture that will enable it to minimize the risk and the threats will actually materialize into reality. so we begin right now and are working very closely with local law enforcement on how do we deal with the homegrown threat? >> in early february, dennis berthold lawmakers that al qaeda and its affiliates have made it a high priority to make attack within the next six months. recent citizens awareness of domestic versus international terrorism can help make attack. what is dhs doing on this front?

>> well, you think we informed. verity mentioned particularly with state or local law enforcement making sure that intel that is spread around the beltway also makes it out of the beltway, the fusion centers and other places around the united states where it can be employed on the ground. and the other thing is to make sure that people are prepared for emergencies of whatever type, that they know what to do, where to go, how to reunify the family happens to be split up with an event were to occur. it could be terrorist related event. it could be a natural event. but the plain fact of the matter is that preparation and knowledge are ways to make sure that, as a people, as communities, as a country resilience, that we respond with strength and resiliency.

and that way you minimize living in fear. we should live in fear. we should do with the fact that we are in an ever changing threat environment. we deal with it, react and we also are practically dealing with it and were able to respond should something happen. >> early forecast by accuweather and other organizations discussed at the shares hurricane season will be unusually severe. what steps is dhs through fema taking to prepare for this? >> you are just trying to cheer me up with your questions, aren't you? [laughter] we've gone from nuclear to -- >> we have dennis quaid hear on tuesday, the actor, and was a very different summit. maybe you want to do a job switch. >> we already through fema are working with communities around the country on hurricane

preparation. and it's a number of things. its grants to localities for their own mitigation. it is making sure that warehouse says already, and murray's are stocked, portable water is read the, equipment is prepared, exercises have been done, all of the rest. we have fortunately, as the fema administrator, craig q. gates, who was the emergency manager director in florida for a number of years and really knows the hurricane business inside and out. and so, he's leading our preparation efforts they are. and if i might suggest, would be a very good speaker for this. >> taking her point in going away from the discussions of disasters and catastrophes in terrorism and homeland security threat, something that may be easy for you to address.

there's a vacancy on the supreme court coming up. [laughter] >> really? >> and given your background as a former arizona attorney general and governor with the legislative executive and legal systems experience, who do you think would be a good nominee? >> whomever the president appoints will be an excellent nominee and he has many good choices. >> switching back, this week with a nuclear summit in d.c. -- [laughter] you'll like this one. her military trucks in the street and a bicycle is actually accidentally killed, which leads to this question or questions strike in the right balance between security and freedom as we protect public events. the >> yet, i think there's still some review of that action with the national guard truck, but it

was a terrible thing and my sympathies to the family of the individual who was killed. in terms of the question presented, which is always striking the right balance, i think as i mentioned before, we build those issues into our analysis and our development at the outset, before we even are doing major programmatic change. we want to be thinking those things through. that being said, the balance is not always so obvious. and sometimes you're in the middle of implementing something and you realize you don't have it quite right and you have to make adjustments and you have to be flexible and agile enough to do that. i mean, the goal is to protect america while we protect american values. and american values include freedom, right? so, it is something that we work on constantly good we adjust for it constantly.

and we think about really and every major programmatic development that we do. >> you talk about other speakers at the national press club. earlier this year we have the head of coast heard, who will be here later this spring from his position. with several questions about the coast guard, including, what role do they play as the hs move forward to effectively mitigating threats, see import issues, things like removing hurricanes et cetera. >> actually, the coast guard has an enormous and multifaceted role in a lot of different teams. they have a footprint in assisting abroad and we have them and see been menses around the world. they are responsible for the protection of the nation's poorest and so for example, they

have been working on the implementation of the twix program, which basically are security cards for four walkers who have access to secure areas. they have the responsibility for search and rescue, for the protection of the nation's waterways, for legitimate commerce and obviously whenever there's an emergency or particularly a hurricane type nature, they are usually first on scene. and the most recent example of this, quite frankly, with haiti. they were first on scene in haiti and were on scene for weeks thereafter. , making sure that we could bring in search and rescue teams from around the country, insisting in the bringing in of equipment, other things necessary to get haiti restored or its stability restored in

haiti. in the aftermath of the earthquake and helping in a whole variety of ways. so, the coast guard is a huge asset for the country. and quite frankly, as somebody who grew up in new mexico and was the governor of arizona, i didn't have a lot of experience with the coast guard coming into my position and a secretary. and i must say, they are a total pleasure to work with. it is a total service oriented military branch. >> we also had several questions about cybersecurity in the aftermath of reversing accusations of cybernations actually hacking accounts. we see nonstate actors using the internet as a way to spread message and communicate and actually violent threats against u.s. citizens. what efforts are you doing in that area to sort of better monitor and better, to some of the cybersecurity threat to the

u.s.? >> well, in the wake of the president cyberreview, dhs has lead responsibility unprotect dean of the civil aspects of federal government, the so-called.gov site as well as working with the dirt on their site. the.com, but that board type sites. we are building a cyber-- basically it's a subsection of grants departments. we're actually hiring right now aggressively. we've been given direct hire authority to hire up to 1000 cyberprofessionals to work in this area. we have unified a number of very different cyberasset that were spread around into a facility known as the end cake and we're working very closely with the

white house cyberporn nader and others on how we move forward. there's a lot of work to do in the same area. and i think again as i mentioned at the very beginning of my talk, it's one of the reasons why we identified the protection of cyberspace as a key and separate missionary of the department of homeland security, particularly because so much of the nation's critical infrastructure is controlled by a cybernetwork. we at telecommunication. so the financial institutions or utilities or water. they are controlled by that. we had to constitute for critical structure and because of the cyberwe received the responsibility for the civilian side of things. this is an area this'll be a growth area for the department. >> were almost out of time. but before we ask the last question we of course had to present to you with her traditional, everyone has been waiting for this moment,

national press club mug. >> might have been spared thank you, thank you. [applause] >> in for a final question, think everyone from his audience would have something to say on this one, but would like to hear your story. what's the worst expensive ever had in airports? [laughter] >> well, here's the thing and i hope you won't think less of me, but this is a tough job and is a big job as you can tell from my talk here today. but there are some things that come with it in one of the things is the plane. the plain fact of the matter is, no pun intended, i haven't been in an airport as a passenger for about 15 months. and of course as report as governor. but i will say this, the most recent experience i had that was not worse, but interesting was

thanksgiving, the wednesday before thanksgiving this year because i went out to national reagan airport to work the line and how people get through the magnetometer, get through the screening devices. so i basically wanted to work with our own ps those, see what they're doing, see that the lines were moving, how it was going. and i was very interesting. it gave me a great appreciation of what our tso's two and the care with which they need to do their jobs. i also saw an immense variety of shoes. [laughter] that's it. thank you all very much. [applause] >> thank you. and with that, thank you for attending today's national press club luncheon. this meeting is adjourned. [inaudible