she is testifying here and has done so before, and i think that i speak for everyone on the committee that she has also been responsive with questions in between the testimony. this is the oversight of the department of homeland security. and the women and men in the department keep america safe. much attention has been focused on incidents prior to president obama's attendance in the recent summit in cartegena, colombia. i have spoken a number of times with secret service director sullivan about this, that we met with privately yesterday for about an hour. we have been on the phone half a dozen or a dozen times.

i have known the director from the time he was an agent. i knew him when president bush appointed him as director of the secret service. president obama reappointed him. i know he shares my view that the alleged conduct was unacceptable. i think he he's doing all he can to ensure a timely and thorough investigation, accountability for behavior that failed to meet the standards he expects and the standards that the american president in american people deserve. he has taken action on 12 agents that have been involved in this misconduct. last week, i raise my bipartisan briefing. the judiciary committee staff with the secret service and the department of homeland security office and inspector general.

i asked the director to ensure he is available to this committee as the investigation continues. he assured me that he will be. he will make sure that we know exactly when they finish the investigation and everything they found. now, i have no doubt you are treating this situation with equal seriousness. in my conversations with you, you have worked a great deal with the director during this time. nobody wants to see the president security compromised. nobody wants the american people interest. i point out to the director that we have, obviously, have to protect the president of united states. and with we are going to be protecting the republican nominee, governor romney. i can't think of anything, aside from the personal tragedy,

anything -- that would look worse to the rest rest of the world that if something happened to either president obama or governor romney. i think everyone here would agree with that. you told us that your first appearance as secretary, you focus on using limited federal law enforcement resources in a smart and equitable matter. also, immigration laws and john morton following through, implementation and the likes of his prosecutorial discretion policies as a positive step forward. this new policy is affecting everything more individuals. it provides a major relief to those opposing improvements. you understand by your commitment and focus. mr. moran was in vermont. we discussed that then, too.

i think you are doing the best you can. the efforts of congress are taking up meaningful and comprehensive immigration reform. i supported president bush's immigration reform, and i still would like to see that. even though it has very little impact on my state. but it does have impact on the rest of the country. as we hold this hearing today, this dream court is hearing arguments on the constitutionality of an arizona immigration enforcement law. the constitution of the u.s. has the power to establish a rule of naturalization. naturally, immigration policy is a proper subject we should act upon. they shouldn't be left to hodgepodge of conflicting state laws. i hope we can get back to where we can do good, strong, comprehensive, bipartisan immigration policy.

in 2010, we passed an emergency appropriations major to provide $600 million in security enhancements. we have reportedly made significant strides. i understand the leader will -- illegal border crossings have declined. since monitoring our borders, i take special notice that you're working with canadian officials on the border of -- the border initiative on our shared northern border. i am impressed with that. it is very rare that someone's parochial in any one of these committees, but in vermont, many people are enjoying all that vermont has to offer, and when i was a youngster, you thought of

going to another state as easy. we took that for granted. i hope that we can work on that to keep it -- protect our security, to keep our borders open as possible. i'm pleased that the senate program is among your recommendations. jobs and competitiveness. we work with that a lot. i look forward to working with the reauthorization of these programs. senator grassley and i have been working to get this and other expiring visa programs reauthorized by bipartisan measure. we will continue to work with you and to strengthen and improve the program. i have raised issues creating procedures with technology and i have questions about these policies. and how they will impact the privacy and health of america.

the technology and the most resourceful use of resources. the is the issue of the tsa. i want to make sure that in national security, we protect our rights and civil liberties. i want to commend the women and men who work for the agency's. i have met so many of them. all different kinds of them. i know they work very, very hard. they care about her country. vermont is working hard to adjudicate. [inaudible] in the vermont service center. all are states will expand the workforce, the vermont service center, but i am constantly impressed with the men and women who work there.

senator grassley, senator kyl, did you wish to make an opening statement? >> know, mr. chairman, we want to hear from the secretary and then we will have questions. but thank you. >> secretary, it is you are -- it is open to you. then we will go to seven minute rounds of -- rotating from side to side, secretary napolitano, please go ahead. >> thank you, chairman leahy and members of the committee. i'm pleased to be with you today. i think the committee for your support of the department over these past two years, and indeed, since the department was founded more than nine years ago. before i begin, i want to address the allegations and misconduct by secret service agents in colombia. the allegations are inexcusable, and we take them very seriously. since the allegations have surfaced, i have been in close

touch with director sullivan. the director took immediate action to renew the agents involved, and a full and thorough investigation is underway to determine exactly what transpired and actions we need to take to ensure that this kind of conduct does not happen again. director sullivan has the president and my confidence as this investigation proceeds. the investigation will be complete and thorough, and we will leave no stone unturned. thus far, the investigation has indicated 12 secret service personnel. eight individuals are now separated from the agency. the secret service is moving to permanently revoke the security clearance of another, and three of the employees involved have been cleared of serious misconduct, but will face appropriate administrative action. at this time, therefore, all 12 secret service personnel identified in the investigation

have either faced personal action or have been cleared of serious his conduct. let me be clear. we will not allow the actions of a few to tarnish the proud legacy of the secret service. an agency that has served in her mess presidents and whose men and women execute their mission with great rationalism and honor and integrity every single day. i have nothing but respect for these men and women. many who put their own lives at risk for the president and many other public leaders. we expect all dhs employees in the secret service and throughout the department to hear to the highest professional and ethical standards, and we will continue to update the committee as the investigation proceeds, and more information becomes available. let me now move to the department's progress since 9/11. ten years after the terrorist attacks of september 11, america is stronger and more secure

today thanks to the support of the congress, the work of the men and women of the dhs, our federal state, local partners who work across the homeland security enterprise. as i said, many times, homeland security begins with home town security. as part of our commitment to strengthen home town security, we have worked to get information, tools, and resources out of washington d.c. and into the hands of state and local officials and first responders. this has led to significant advances. for example, we have made great progress in improving our domestic capabilities to detect and prevent terrorist attacks against our people, our communities, and are critical infrastructure. we have increased our ability to analyze and distribute threat information at all levels through fusion centers, the nationwide suspicious activity reporting initiative, a national terrorism advisory system, and other means.

we have invested in training for local law enforcement and first responders in order to increase expertise and capacity at the local level. we supported preparedness and response across the country to approximately $35 billion in homeland security grants since 2002. and we have proposed important adjustments were grim programs for fiscal year 2013, to continue to develop, sustain and leverage these capabilities. our experience over the past several years has made us smarter about the terrorist that we faced face and how best to deal with them. we have learned that an engaged, vigilant public is essential to prevent terrorism, is why we continue to expand -- if you see something, say something campaign nationally. we have also expanded our risk-based intelligence driven security efforts across the

transportation sector, the global supply chain, and critical in the structure. by sharing and leveraging information with our many partners, we can make better informed decisions about how to best mitigate risk. over the past several years, we also have deployed unprecedented levels of personnel, technology and resources to protect our nation's borders. these efforts, too, have achieved significant results, including historical decreases in illegal immigration as measured by total apprehensions and increases in seizures of drugs, weapons, cash, and other contraband. illegal immigration attempts are at their lowest levels since 1971. while violent crime in u.s. border communities has remained flat or has fallen over the past decade. we have also focused on smart and effective enforcement of immigration laws, while streamlining and facilitating the legal immigration process. lester, i.c.e. removed record

numbers of illegal aliens from the country, 90% who felt within the priority categories of criminal aliens and repeat law violators, recent border entrants and immigration fugitives. we have focused on identifying and sanctioning employers to hire workers not authoress work in the united states. we have made important reforms in our immigration detention system, so that every individual in custody is traded in treated in a fair, safe, humane manner consistent with i.c.e. standards. we have worked to reduce democratic insufficiencies and visa programs, streamline entrepreneurs that wish to bring business to the united states, and improved systems for immigration benefits and services. in the critical area of cybersecurity, we also continue to leave untrimmed lead the federal government's efforts to secure government networks while working with industry, state, and local government to secure

critical infrastructure and information systems. we are deploying the latest tools across the federal government to protect critical civilian systems, while sharing timely and actionable security information with public and private private sector partners to help them protect their own operations. with these partners, we are also protecting the systems and networks that support the financial services industry, electric power industry, and the telecommunications industry, to name just a few. we stand ready to work with the congress to pass legislation that will further enhance our ability to combat threat in the united states of cyberdomain. specifically, we support legislation that would, among other things, establish baseline performance standards for the nation's critical core infrastructure. remove barriers for information sharing between government and industry, so that we can quickly respond to indicate cyberthreats or intrusions.

ensure robust privacy oversight to ensure that voluntarily shared information does not infringe on individual privacy and civil liberties, including criminal penalties for misuse. and provide dhs with a hiring flexibility to attract and retain the cybersecurity professionals we need to execute our complex and challenging mission. mr. chairman, threats against our nation, whether from terrorists, terminals, or cyberadversaries, continue to evolve. dhs has continued to evolve as well. i look forward to working with you and members of the committee to build on the progress we have achieved across these and many other mission areas. we remain ever vigilant to threats, as we continue to promote the free movement of goods and people, essential to our economy. and to protect our essential rights and liberties. thank you, mr. chairman. >> thank you.

of course, we will put your post statement in the record. we did one ask you some questions. >> all americans are concerned about the safety of our president, if it could have been jeopardized by this kind of behavior. just as i concerned about any of the protect these, i mentioned governor romney, but there are several others. >> with the misconduct we have heard about, we have heard about the pose of security. >> mr. chairman, that was my first question to director sullivan. the answer is, no. there is no risk to the president. based on the information supplied to me by the director.

>> is the secret service coordinating its internal investigation with the department of defense? preparing for the president's arrival? >> mr. chairman, we reported an investigation with the inspector general called we have an existing them away between the secret service and the ig, so they are in effect supervising the investigation, even though it is being done by secret service agents. >> was there any evidence of the president's advance team and being involved in this misconduct? >> i have not been informed of any such evidence. >> we continue to look at this so that we know that the agents are trained as acceptable and what is unacceptable that are there standards that place appropriate conduct for agents on foreign trips and how they may interact with locals when

they are on assignment? are there such standards, and if so, how are they compared? >> there are standards that are conveyed through training and supervision. one of the things we are doing is looking at the standards -- the training, supervision, to see if what if anything needs to be tightened up. again, we don't want this to be repeated. >> is the training given to private or intimate conduct with foreign contacts for security work? >> the training is focused on professionalism, conduct, conduct consistent with moral values and standards, and i think that would include your question. >> well, secretary, i know that when we travel with members of congress -- different countries we go to, we are given different advisories than in some

countries where, for example, we believe all of our community should do your best dismantled -- with u.s. security officers. and so forth. our agents given training and security, particularly regarding a country they might go into? >> that is part of the advanced process, mr. chairman. >> so if it was thought that there was a intelligence threat, in a particular country, they would be vice for that? >> yes. >> my cruiser during the cold war. we had some of the assessments -- some of them are different than what they are today. some of the assessments today are to increase communication gear and electronic gear, which are different -- i assume that is geared, based on today's real

threats? >> yes. how to secure ours communications equipment? >> is this a country -- are they going to be a threat of -- agents of another country? >> the agents are informed as to what the intel is. what specific -- what country specific measures need to be taken. in this instance, is your chairman, there was no intention on the security of the president and no access to any of your information by the people involved. >> like you, i've been in many cases were the secret service is around. always very professional man. i have traveled with several different presidents over the

course of my career. lots of secret service -- again, they were very professional. men and women. when i heard the number of the agents involved in this, i thought, particularly, when i got my first call at home from the director, and my staff looked into it, and the committee looked into the numbers, i found it shocking. do you know, is this the first time the best with that something like this has happened or have you had similar reports of things like this happening in the past? >> mr. chairman, i ask the same question, and over the past two and a half years, the secret service officer professional responsibility has not received any such compliant. that same period, the secret service has provided protection to over 900 foreign trips and

13,000 domestic trips. from that standpoint, there was nothing in the record that suggests that this behavior would have been, and it really was, i think, it was a huge disappointment to the men and women of the secret service to begin with, who pulled very high standards and to feel their own reputations are now dispersed by the actions of a few. >> to the extent of listening to this hearing, i would hope that they would not be distracted from their job protecting governor romney and those who are protecting president obama and all the others. they have to put the job first. you and the director have the job of seeing where we go from here. can you assure us that there will not be -- can you assure us

that it will be made clear to secret service agents that this kind of conduct will not be condoned? >> that a circle, mr. chairman. there are three things that i immediately discussed with the director. one was to make sure that the president security was never at risk. number two was to make sure that we instituted a prompt and thorough investigation into the actual allegations in columbia, and three, what other steps we need to take to make sure that this behavior is not repeated. >> a different matter, we are going to turn to the reauthorization of the violence against women act. the provision would modestly increase the number of -- [inaudible]

sometimes including domestic violence and sexual assault. law enforcement all over the country say they enforce this. does the department of homeland security support this provision of this increase in new visas for the purpose of cooperating in criminal cases? >> absolutely. >> i've run over my time, but we have the question before about the technology used for screening -- i was very concerned about the earlier ones -- the x-ray type machines. in effect, my words, not yours, the strip search of people was very graphic images going through the x-ray machine.

those machines, how much did dhs spent on him? >> mr. chairman, the machines themselves are at the unit cost of approximately 100 30,000 dollars, and i think we can get you the exact number, the expenditure is probably totaling with installation and other things, about a hundred and $30 million. >> i'm told the changes, the replicants and upgrades cost about 12 million? >> i'm not sure they cost that much, part of the contract with the vendor was is the software changed, that the hardware would be able to accept the software. >> what? >> i will verify. >> what companies were awarded contracts to provide this? >> leopardskin and l3 are the

two major vendors. >> i apologize for taking the extra time. please go ahead. >> welcome, madame secretary. i have really enjoyed working with your office. thanks for what you do for a south carolina and the country's security issues as a whole. my experience with secret service is very similar to what senator leahy said. the time i have traveled with senator mccain during the last presidential election, and i was very impressed by the people -- very hard-working, working long hours. just as anytime you have military problems come you don't want to paint brush the 99%. let's start with that baseline. >> just. >> just like in the military, situations and systems failed them, and honestly there is a system failure. the likelihood that this was the first and only time that such behavior occurred, do you think

that that is great or not so great? >> i think that part of our investigation is confirming that this was an aberration, or not -- but i agree with you, senator, the secret service is a marvelous job -- they do a marvelous job. >> the only reason i suggest that we need to look harder is because we are lucky to have found out about this. for lack of a better word, without money, we probably would not have known about this. the point is that you have a good order of working on this problem. do you believe the agents were confused at the time it was wrong? >> they should not have been. >> i don't think it's a lack of training. i don't think that anybody -- >> i think the conduct was unacceptable. it was unprofessional. as i said in my statement, i

think that the people who are most disappointed or the other men and women of the secret service. >> i couldn't agree more. human beings being human beings, we all make mistakes. sometimes organizations can get loose. i've been a military lawyer for 30 years. one of the first things we would advise new commanders -- a new squadron commander, you have a bunch of young people in the military for the first time away from home. go to the barracks when they least expect you to go. show up at three in the morning. word will get out quick that you have to watch what you do in the barracks, because you never know when the commander will show up. .. ..

>> we are looking at this from the aspect as i said earlier,

one with the president security and two discipline for the agents involved in three, what do we need to do to tighten any standards the need to be tightened, so i think you're -- take your suggestions very seriously. >> this is a bipartisan -- mr. sullivan i have never met the man but everybody who knows him seems to have nothing but good things to say about him and we want to get this behind us and not have the problem emerge again. homegrown terrorism, you mention that in your opening statement. would you agree that a bubbly the idea of homegrown terrorism, and attack from within, is greater today than it was navy five years ago, the radicalization? >> i think that's right. i think we have seen -- when i say terrorism continues to evolve that is one of the evolutions we are seeing, radicalization to the point of terrorist violence and we have seen several episodes across the united states in the past several years. >> going to the recent tragedy

in france where you had a john, french citizen muslim who went to i think pakistan to study the madrassas there, came back to france and engaged in horrific acts of terrorism. do you worry about that happening here in the united states? >> one of the things we did in the wake of toulouse was to analyze what happened in that case and were there any early signs, indicators, anything that would give us an early tripwire that somebody in the united states was getting ready to do the same thing? >> i think some of these terrorist organizations are trying to come to our country and recruit within our own. is that a fair statement? >> doesn't really require a visit. can talk to our people into the cyberworld to recruit them to their cause and unfortunately there are some takers and we need to be diligent about that. now immigration has a case

before the supreme court today. each person can make their own mind up about south carolina and arizona and the laws and what they will be doing. president obama's campaign in 2008 promised comprehensive immigration reform in its first year. do you believe there was a real genuine effort to make that happen? >> as someone who spent a lot of hours visiting members of congress on the hill to see if there was any room for negotiation of a comprehensive bill i would say yeah there was a serious effort. >> i i think all of us have a responsibility to deal in a bar partisan way with a national problem. >> we didn't deal in a bipartisan way with health care. one republican this senate voted for the health care bill. we had 60 u.s. senators on the democratic side and a huge majority in the house so i guess my point is that i don't think

there is much of an effort to deliver comprehensive immigration reform in the first year. the president failed the country by not making this a priority and chose health care over immigration and here we are. not to say that my party is blameless. we are not that i want to understand that when we talk about this issue that we remember exactly what happened. 16 democratic senators, large majority and the house. do you remember any bills coming out of the house of representatives dealing with immigration reform? >> i obviously disagree with how you are putting the issue but i think we can both agree that at some point we are going to have to deal with comprehensive immigration reform. >> thank you very much for your service. >> i would just note parenthetically, i sat in on the meetings with former president loesh on immigration reform.

i strongly supported his effort. i said in bipartisan meetings that president obama had with some of the same people who were at the president bush ones and the follow up and i recall him being told, don't bring it up because it's not going to go anywhere. i hope, and i still hope that we will have comprehensive immigration policy. we need it. senator feinstein and then -- senator feinstein. >> thank you very much. madam secretary i am one that thinks you are doing a very good job in an agency that is perhaps too large. i think it's 22 departments and over a couple hundred thousand people. it's a very big job i wanted to concentrate my questioning on three areas. the first is the student visa

and fraud and earlier i joined in a letter with senator schumer on this program, and i am concerned that i.c.e. is not adequately certifying each educational institution a sham school, certified for 30 students, bringing 1555 students in, making $4 million. the head is now being prosecuted. to make a long story short, the united states immigration and customs enforcement known around here as i.c.e., wrote an interesting letter on may 3, 2011 saying this. the students do not have the statutory authority to close

noncompliant schools immediatele the authority to restrict dso access and it goes on to say they have done a risk analysis of the 6487 mp vp certified schools with active records and they have schools sitting in the low, medium or high risk categories. here's the breakdown. low risk, 4794, 74%, medium risk, 1276 schools, excuse me, 20% and then there is high-risk, 417 schools, or 6% of all the schools examined. now here is what they say, many of the noncompliant schools are

already the subject of criminal investigation. forestalling any administrative action to limit access, to issue for my 20. please know that as ctp can begin immediately such assessments and site reviews once cleared to do so. can't they be cleared to do this early on? >> i think -- i think we have to remember, 9/11 hijackers came in on student visas, went to school that taught them how to fly but not to land and nobody thought it was unusual. so i'm really concerned about the schools and we have a good sense of who is coming in of your foreign student visa, where they are attending the school. i've been at this madam secretary for about 12 years and initially everybody ed objected to it. then they began to do it and now i see it easing up.

so i wanted to bring it to your attention. >> i share that concern. the sham school should not be allowed to operate. we have increased our efforts against them. in that particular letter i suspect we are coordinating with the u.s. attorneys offices in the relevant districts and they have asked us to to postpone administrative action until the criminal case was ready to go but i will follow up on that. >> could you take a look at it? >> absolutely. >> okay, the second thing is agriculture enforcement. obviously we have a bias. we have 81,000 farms in california. virtually all of the labor is undocumented. what happens is in harvest season, canning season, i.c.e. comes in. we have got a problem. i've tried for 10 years to get an ag jobs bill through and i can't get it through. the fact of the matter is, if we

want american produce, the labor is generally undocumented and we have to find a solution to this. so i am hopeful, and i know that you are doing aggressive i-9 audits of ag employers. i am very concerned that these are going to decimate on farm and farm dependent jobs. >> yeah, i think the base of the problem is that there is no provision under the current immigration law that enables more agricultural workers to be documented. and so, we have some employers, and we try to pick those who are really knowingly and intentionally violating the law when they have other options. trying to focus on them through the audit process, but the underlying issue goes back to

the immigration law itself. >> senator schumer just murmured to me, most don't have other options. california is a state that can't use the program, the the visitor program so it depends on a large scale rotating, generally undocumented cautery of about 600,000 workers for 81,000 farms if i.c.e. swoops in, farmers can't plant, they can't harvest, they can't canon and this has been happening. i want to bring it to your attention and you know it's a hard problem. if this body won't take action, we are going to put ag out of business. and i'm really concerned about it. so if there is any thoughts you might have, i would very much appreciate them. and the last point i want to

raise with you is another long-standing issue of mine, and it's the visa waiver program and biometric eggs. for many years i've been trying to get data on visa overstays for each country to no avail thus far. last month, dhs assistant secretary informed me that by june of this year, dhs will have a fully operational, by a graphic exit system in place. it's going to provide real-time information on those who exit the united states air force. this new exit system is expected to allow you to calculate overstays for country in may of this year. here's the question. i think this is very important. it's got 50 million people that come in every year.

we don't know whether they leave or not on a visa the visa waiver. is dhs on track to have a fully operational, by the graphic at exit system by june of 2012? >> senator i believe we are. the final plan is in the clearance process with omb, but that is our intent. >> good. will dhs be a will to provide overstay raise for countries by may of 2012? >> we should be a will to provide some of that information, if not all. >> good, thank you. >> what we will do now, we will go to senator grassley and senator kyl. we will go to senator kyl. senator grassley would would han next but -- then we will go to senator schumer.

>> mr. chairman, thank you. this is the first time that senator feinstein and i seem to have been thinking about exactly the same thing so it may quickly touch on the things she mentioned which were also a concern to me. on student visas it's not just a matter for sham school but the failure of i.c.e. to follow up with students who have overstayed their visas and the poor record of the schools are binding information to i.c.e.. the second on the ag workers, the rags could be reformed. is not just a matter of passing legislation here. regulations were formed toward the end of the bush of administration. they were more workable i'm told. that was then change with the obama administration. if we could work more toward the kind of breaks that existed towards the end of the bush of administration that might be help for some and on the visa overstays and the exit system i was going to ask about that. your budget was denied

$30 million by the appropriations committee because of his frustration with the lack of a plan. we need to get that plan implemented as well as of here. let me go on. >> if i might, cannot can i talk about the visa overstays? one of the things that we have done over the last few years is we have added databases and been able to link them so that the four pieces that are issued is a check against our data, the institutions data and certain nsa data. we have done now the same thing to apply visa overstays and we have looked at and prioritized those that provide any kind of public safety or security risks. and we have now looked at the entire backlog, and i will give you the inventory of what we have found and we are

prioritizing those visa overstays. >> and understand. what is your estimate now of approximately the number of the visa overstayers as a percentage of the total of illegal immigrants in the country today? as opposed to those who have crossed the border illegally? >> well -- >> number is usually around 40%. >> that may be a high number because what we have found is a lot of people with visa overstays had left for gus be so 40% might be too high an estimate? that is a number that is usually given when we complained about lack of security at the border. they say well remember 40% of the people here illegally actually overstayed visas. you think that numbers a little high? >> a little high. >> in either event it's a big problem in and it's fine to prioritize for criminals but that is a small percentage who overstayed visas. >> senator we have made the best use of those i.c.e. resources we

have. >> matted secretary to use me for interrupting but every year i say if you need more resources asked for them. no we have got everything we need and the excuse on moving forward is we don't have enough resources. if you need more resources asked ask asked for them. >> senator, thank you. as you know we are all working under the constraints of the budget control act. that was the deal that was signed but to your point yes anti-senator feinstein's.yes we believe these overstays are a keen interest. >> so do we and we appreciate that. another very parochial but very important point and i know you appreciate that every time i go to the border, the first thing people talk about is not illegal immigration. it's the incredible delays at the ports of entry. we need a lot of things, including more officials at the border on the american side. that is not the total solution to the problem. a lot has to do with an inadequate link up on the mexican side of the border but

at the mariposa point of entry are going eat more agents. that is what they tell us down there. and yet that was not in the budget request. i would just ask you to please either ask agents and this is to facilitate commerce between the two countries. and to make life a little bit easier for people have to cross every day. either asked for it in the budget or find some place where we can get it or make a recommendation as how to move money around to provide for those initial agents. mariposa is about 250. doesn't seem like that many. we ought to be able to find money for that. would you agree to work with us on that? >> we will definitely work on you with a. >> i appreciate that because i know you know the problem. >> very well. >> it's not a partisan problem and we agree we need to solve a. >> we want to facilitate that trade and commerce.

a lot of jobs depend upon a. >> absolutely. six months ago you had written a letter and three months ago about the lack of enforcement of federal detainer's, specifically for example cook county. last night we finally received a response to our letter and it certainly is a good response in terms of pointing out the problem. where i fail to see the responses in what you are doing about it other than writing letters. this letter dated april 24 from nelson peacock and i asked who ported and record because as i said it lays out the problem from i.c.e.'s respective and your prospective very well. cook county is not provided by federal law in detaining officials who have criminal records that you have asked them to detain. for example since it was enacted according to this letter i.c.e. supports more than 432 removable

aliens from cook county's custody who has been charged with crime including serious offenses. cook county has not honored any of these 432 detainer's and they point out a case in particular recently reported in the shot -- "chicago tribune." mr. peacock knows that this probably violates federal law. the only action that i can see taken here is that two letters have been written and cook county has been encouraged to change its policy and has been advised that if it continues this policy, it may result in denial of reimbursement to the state under the program. the federal government has been very aggressive in filing lawsuits against states who are trying to actually do something about illegal immigration but it doesn't look to me like the government is doing that much to enforce the law that currently exist with respect to detainer's. what more do you plan to do with

entities like cook county who are obviously jeopardizing american security in the process? >> i agree. i think cook county's ordinance is terribly misguided. it is a public safety issue. we are evaluating a lot of options right now. you know we always start off trying to work with the local authorities and work things out. we to date have no success with this so we are evaluating all options. >> i hope more than evaluating, you will take some action pretty soon. will you report to us as soon as you have decided what kind of action to take and keep us advise rather than waiting for correspondence from us? >> we will keep the committee staff -- the best way to to do it advice on how it is preceding. >> appreciate that very much. thank you mr. chairman. >> thank you senator kyl. i will also note today is senator kyl's earth day. please don't sing.

>> thank you mr. chairman. i wear senator kyl a happy birthday. your next birthday may be happier than this one. thank you mutually, seriously. senator feinstein and i were just mentioning that a second ago. first, two points of housekeeping. i am not going to ask you any questions on the secret service. i have a lot of faith in your ability to get to the bottom of this. all of us are shocked and terribly troubled by it, but i think the kind of investigation you and your department will do i have a lot of faith in. second, senator feinstein mentioned a student visa issue and i believe she mentioned, i came in the middle of her

testimony unfortunately -- she and i have asked for a gao report which is coming out in about a month and our subcommittee on immigration with your permission will have hearings on that gao report when it comes out. so to let you know about that. okay, have two if two questions here on other issues in your fast jurisdiction. the first relates to passenger advocates. over the past several months there've been increasing numbers of news stories about passenger complaints over tsa's screening procedures and these complaints include for instance a female passenger being told she could not carry her pump on board the plane while the milk bottles were empty. imagine. asking female passengers to submit to repeated inspections their body scanner machines for non-security readings, asking elderly and disabled passengers to remove critical medical quick equipment prior to clearing

security. i like tsa and i think they do a good job. it's a hard job to balance security and commerce but you can now is make it without impeding, without one impeding the other. tsa's original response at the lower levels was to first deny wrongdoing and then issue an apology. in light of these incidences, senator collins and i decided to introduce legislation called the rights act and the rights act would help curb abuses in tsa screening, simply by requiring the tsa ombudsman's office to establish a passenger advocate program to resolve public complaints and the training of tsa officers to resolve frequent passenger complaints and require every category -- big airport. let strike category x. that is a funny category.

a through v. we don't know. anyway every category x airport to have one tsa advocate on duty at all time so times so somebody's face with the choice. they are asked for an intrusive exam and they think that is uncalled for. i don't expect every tsa agent to be schooled in each thing but at kennedy airport, a large airport that handles tens of thousands, someone who is trained who can come over within 10 minutes, no new people, no new koska more the existing employees who knows how to do this and can resolve a sticky situation. it involves the passenger of a choice addicts undergoing examination that they think is intrusive for humiliating. so do you support the creation of passenger advocates at airports and will you work to roll those out at airports without the need for an act of congress? >> absolutely and if i might, just to go through first, as you

no tsa i think is a very good job and it's a very difficult job. every morning i start my morning with a threat reef of what is faced as in terrorism and aviation security still remains the number one threat. so we have taken steps to try to make it last onerous. we have taken those over 75, children under 12 out of the routine line. the breast pump incident you mentioned was not in accord with how we do that and employee received appropriate retraining. we keep trying to do that, but the idea of having crosstrained advocates among our tsa personnel in the category of airports is something we support and tsa is already moving toward that goal. >> that is great news. thank you and it will avoid senator collins and i having to pass legislation which is good.

since legislation moves so quickly these days through the senate. okay, second is a parochial issue but of great importance to western new york. is the niagara air force base, airbase. want to ask about the possibility of constructing a new border patrol station at niagara airbase to replace the existing niagara falls border patrol station. as you know the existing station is insufficient to meet current needs, we all agree to that given all the new security. we have had terrorist cross over the buffalo border. it lacks the capacity needs to accommodate the number of agents housed at the station. does not the space and resources your agents need to do the job. the new station at niagara airbase could comfortably accommodate 50 agents, could be modified to accommodate 75 and also include critical items that the border bertoni's such as administration building for training and an armory and necessary storage space,

ancillary buildings that will house vehicle maintenance and close parking and camels. obviously we have the dogs that the border too. this would be a win for the border patrol in the and the niagara air force base which mission is being can -- retailed. would you support the creation of a new border patrol station at the niagara airbase? >> niagara's very much under consideration senator. the issue is money for construction of a new facility but certainly niagara is under consideration. >> in other words you think it's a good idea to have it there and we have to find the funds for it? >> that is one way to put it, yes or. >> yes, i like the yes part of that answer. thank you. mr. chairman, i am finished. i would yield back. >> thank you mr. chairman. first, a statement i want to give you an update.

first of all i want to put a statement in the record. >> senator i don't know that your microphone is on. >> i am not talking into it. that is a problem. i'm surprised you want to hear me but thank you. [laughter] first and update. about 99% of the time when i write you i don't get a response directly from you. the response comes from affairs and second and more frustrating many times my questions are rarely if ever answered and third, the delays are unacceptable. just last that i received a response from the department about cook county, six months after my initial letter of inquiry and also you just responded to a question we posed at the last oversight hearing which took place last october. that is just to bring you up-to-date, that is not a question and i don't want a response to that. both the chairman and i want to get to the bottom of this secret

service matter and i know the chairman has covered a lot of the issues i want to cover so i'm not owing to go back over that. i thank the chairman for asking those questions. i was briefed by the secret service director, and he responded about the inspector general being involved and i have asked for that involvement. but he said he was already involved before i asked for it, so i complement director sullivan on that. director sullivan has included in the inspector general and the investigation up to this point but i want to know if the inspector general is truly conducting an independent and impartial investigation. i think the same independent investigation is necessary from the inspector general in advance and from the white house to get to the bottom of the story for all of the staff that was in

colombia. you mentioned in previous answers to questions, you mentioned that the ig is supervising the investigation. do you agree that the inspector general should conduct a full scope investigation to determine if this is a cultural problem routinely occurring and additional cities instead of just reviewing what occurred in colombia? question number two, do you have any reason to believe that the inspector general isn't receiving full and complete access to a secret service investigation and three, you referred to previous answers back, as far as we know in the last two and a half years, this has not been a cultural issue. why in just two and a half years and don't you think we have to make sure before two and a half

years that it wasn't a problem as much as not being in the last two and half years? >> senator let me address that. i use that timeframe because you know we are going back now thrall of the records and we have gone back. probably even further at this point. in terms of the ig's involvemene investigation, i'm sure the ig would be willing to answer those questions but we have an moaa, memorandum of agreement with the ig and the secret service that they are in these kinds of cases, whether it's an alleged misconduct, they actually, they being the a.g. supervise the investigation but use the investigatory research is -- resources. that is how we are managing this one and i believe the ig has been with director during the congressional briefings to confirm that point. we expect the ig to be conducting a full investigation.

>> on another matter dealing with cybersecurity, specifically one cybersecurity rapoza would place your department, the lead agency, and overseeing regulations for covered critical infrastructure. i have concerns that this proposal, because it creates a new regulatory bureaucracy, i and i'm also concerned that this new regulatory power given dhs background on overseeing the chemical facilities security, the cfas program. congress gave your department regulatory power over chemical facilities, regulations were issued in 2007. five years later nearly 4200 kim a call facilities have complied with the regulations that your department has yet to approve a single security plan. so far spending half a billion dollars and not getting anything

approve. i've obtained a copy of an internal review by and her secretary by two subordinates that implements the fats. this memorandum is the most candid review of a failed federal government program i have seen. this memoranda details failures on and on presidential level hiring poor people, poor staff morale, management leadership failures, lack of subject matter expertise, union problems and catastrophic failure to ensure personal and professional accountability. the memorandum also states that inspectors lack expert keys to a byways site compliance with cybersecurity requirements. on top of this memorandum, the department has failed to implement outstanding gao recommendations that taken

together, these reports paint an agency that cannot control costs, manage employees and effectively implement admission. if it cost dhs $480 million to effectively regulate zero chemical facilities, can we expect in the cost to the taxpayers of the department to regulate cybersecurity among thousands of private businesses? >> senator let me take those issues, both of them. first, the cfas or chemical facilities. yes, we did a candid internal review because we were not satisfied that we were achieving the results that we need to achieve which is the safety and security of our chemical facilities and their possible security issues with them. we now have a very aggressive corrective plan in place. i would be happy to brief you or your staff on that. we have been approving site-specific plans.

that process is really moving forward with great alacrity. so we have learned a lot from cfas and we are fixing those problems. we have put new people in charge, done all the things one needs to do to make sure that a program moves forward effectively. with respect to cyber, this is an area where our deep concern is that the nation score critical infrastructure on which farmers depend and small business depend, and everyone depends on is very susceptible to attack. the attacks can occur in a variety of ways. we are seeking some means to annie have a sick performance standards by that core critical infrastructure, have real-time information sharing so that we can swiftly moved in to help mitigate and share information if need be, and we are actually asking the congress to give us some hiring authority so it's easier for us to hire people who

are experts in the cyberfield rico as the congress begins to consider this legislation, we hope that the risk posed to the country right now. spain next, senator klobuchar. >> thank you very much mr. chairman and thank you secretary napolitano for being here and the good work that you have done. i share an senator feinstein spews that you have done a good job with a very difficult challenge. and i also wanted to thank you for being here to answer questions about what happened in colombia. in my old job as a prosecutor i had very positive interactions with the secret service and i'm hopeful that the actions of a few won't overshadow all the good work that they do.

but i do want to ask some questions about that because i think it really shook the trust of a lot of people and i think the way you make sure that the actions of a if you don't overshadow the actions of many, good actions and how they sacrifice their lives everyday every day and put them on the line. we clear up what happened and also make sure it doesn't happen again. and that we have a clear and standing up what is going on. i know one of the senators asked about this. there was a "washington post" report recently that talked about the fact that this may have been going on before. in fact this person is not identified but one agent that was not in the matter remarks of course it has happened before. this is not the first time. it really only blew up in this case because the u.s. embassy was alerted. i just wondered if you could comment on that, how you think we need to move forward, and how, to me, this does seem to

create a riff when you are you're in a country like colombia and you have people doing things where they could potentially be bribed and if you could generally comment about that? >> right, again, the actions were unacceptable and they were unacceptable taken by themselves i think every mother of a teenager knows that a common defense is everybody else is doing it so i get to do it. first not everybody else is doing it and second this behavior is not part of the secret service way of doing business. they are very professional but we are going to get to the bottom of this. we are going to make sure standards and training if they need to be tightened up our tightened, and we have moved with great speed to deal in a disciplinary fashion with the 12 agents involved. >> ih don't expect you to reveal things that aren't public that aren't there other instances where people are tried have tried to bribe her but mail agents because they believed or

they had some kind of interaction with prostitutes or someone with some kind of illegal activity? >> senator, i am not aware of any. as i have said before, the office of professional responsibility in the secret service went back 2-1/2 years. that covers 900 foreign trips and 13,000 domestic trips and did not have during that period any type of complaint. that does not obviously include the ig. that is dependent entities but we are looking to see and make sure this was not some kind of systemic problem, and -- there was one agency and one agent that was in the president's hotel? is that correct? also that was just identified? >> i believe that is correct.

>> another question that is completely different incident. and i think every employer has had incidences of people posting things on the internet and pictures of themselves may be in there but. that is within within and. it was in the tent but i never thought we would see it. these are things that happen, and when they happen with law enforcement it seems a step above and i think much more of a security risk. i know that recently one of the secret service agents -- any talk about the secret service rules with their assignments on line or otherwise the secret service policies regarding agents use a facebook and other social media web sites? >> we do have a social media policy and we would be happy to provide you with a copy of that. and yes, to the extent there was

such a posting, unprofessional and on the acceptable. >> very good. i want to ask you a little bit about, we are working hard on cybersecurity initiatives here going forward and can you talk about how homeland security is currently working with state and local law enforcement to prevent and mitigate cyberthreats and discuss the connect campaign in their efforts to educate the public on the role that they have to play in this important thing? >> we have to see something say something campaign, stopping connect is one of our efforts to educate the public about everyone sharing the responsibility who is on the internet. everyone has a responsibility to have good cyberhabits just like when you get in the car you should buckle your seatbelt. it should be reflexive above anything else so we continue to push on that. with respect to our coordination with state and local

governments, we do that quite a bit, senator. we have the nccic in northern virginia. wewe have state and local representatives on the floor. that is our 20 for seven-watt center where cyberis concerned. so we are working with them very extensively on that. >> very good and now turning to our borders. i am chair of the u.s. enter parliamentarian group. they're actually coming to washington next month and i know you have been working on cross-border crime issues but i did want to thank you for an issue that i've been racing for a few years and that is the issue of the canadian daggett screening which is finally been resolved as part of that beyond the border action plan so thank you for working on that. and then i wanted to ask, no senator schumer asked some things about the tsa. again i understand that there is always incidences that need to be resolved in new things, but overall i think they also, like yourself, the very challenging

job and the work they do at least in the minneapolis airport, you just brought in the pre-checked pilot program in our state. do you know how that's been going? >> the preacher pilot program is very popular. this is domestic branch of the kind of trusted traveler programs that we began with the global entry program, internationally so we are expanding that pre-checked program as rapidly as we can. >> very good and then last the joel fact, i call your attention to that, a bipartisan legislation that we have introduced with senator schumer and rubio blunt, mikulski, kirk and lee and i think it's important to move ahead with that. we have appreciated some of the work you've done on tourism and as you know we are working with the state department to improve that these away time but there is also other things we can better contain a sad. we would love to have your help

and support with that bill. >> happy to take a look at it. >> thank you. >> senator cornyn. >> madams secretary, good morning. we can all stipulate you have an extraordinarily challenging job. i want to ask you a question about the dna testing of detainees, and i know you are a former federal prosecutor and attorney general so you know how powerful a tool dna can be in a law enforcement investigation. as a matter fact, to digress a moment we have an important violence against women reauthorization of the bill probably this afternoon or tomorrow and i'm offering a bipartisan amendment that will address the 400,000 estimated untested rape kits that currently are sitting in police lockers and elsewhere, which as we all know, it is a powerful tool to help identify what in

many instances are serial perpetrators of sexual assault. but let me bring you back to 2005. senator kyl and i sponsored the dna fingerprint act during the last reauthorization of the violence against women act. this legislation gave federal law enforcement authority to collect small dna samples from all federal arrestees and detainees, just like we take fingerprints but as issue no more accurate. these dna samples again, as you know, can be checked against the fbi's nationwide dna database codes to determine whether the detainee has committed other crimes, perhaps in other jurisdictions. so far they have assisted law-enforcement officials in more than 169,000 investigations including 10,000 my state of texas so we have seen it to be a

powerful tool. at your 2009 confirmation hearing i asked if you would see to it that the alien deportee dna testing regulations are fully and promptly implemented by the department, and he replied apart freely. dhs will fully comply with the applicable statutory and regulatory framework. nearly three years after the hearing, how do you feel it's going? >> well i think senator we have deported a record number of individuals as you know. i will be happy to go back and look at all of the regulations to make sure we are in compliance, but we have had a very aggressive plan to deport those who should be removed from the country. >> my question is a little more narrow because what we want to do is identify whether these detainees have perhaps committed other crimes and in the course

of those other investigations, not just enforce the immigration laws which is not the complete rationale. would you be willing to, on a voluntary basis, submit to the committee sort of the departments of valuation of how it has complied and handled this requirement of 2005 into the dna fingerprint act? >> i would be happy to supply that. >> that would be very helpful. let me tell you the reason for my concern. of course we know the fbi has used a great deal of taxpayer money and crime lab resources to prepare for hundreds of thousands of dna samples as a result of the passage of this act in 2005. we are told that the fbi is prepared and expected to receive between 120,240,000 samples from

the department of homeland security in the year 2012. today, they report only having received 4000 samples, so i hope you will help us. >> let's get to the bottom of that. >> identified as is very between a number of samples and the number and has abided by the fbi as a result of this because while i am aware that for example in afghanistan and iraq, when their military captured high-value detainees, they to get the final identifiers from them that can be used by law enforcement agencies and the department in the united states when identifying people coming across let's say the southwestern border without the appropriate visas to make sure that they are not coming in to commit acts of terrorism or other violence. >> senator if i might -- >> it strikes me that this dna

evidence and i will be glad to let you answer, this dna information would be vitally important and enormously useful not only in assisting your department in terms of border security and immigration enforcement but also to help law enforcement writ large in terms of identifying people who come into the country and commit the crimes that currently are unsolved. please go at. >> thank you senator and i did not mean to interrupt but we do run illegal immigrants in a variety of databases and i think i should supply you with that information and then i will look physically into the issue with the fbi. >> to my knowledge and i look forward to your report, that is more the nature of fingerprinting and other biometric identifiers and does not -- did not extend to dna testing of detainees until the congress passed the dna fingerprint on 2005.

so you understand i know the issue and i would very much welcome your response to me and the committee so we can help get to the bottom of it. mr. chairman i will yield back my remaining time. thank you. >> thank you mr. chairman. welcome secretary napolitano. just one question on the secret service episode. what opportunities does this behavior create for compromise of the president security? for instance, the prostitutes had connections with colombian criminal networks for foreign intelligence services? i am not saying that it did, but it seems like it's the kind of behavior that would render an agent vulnerable to blackmail and influence if criminal

networks and intelligence services were aware of it and that would have the potential to compromise the president security. >> senator we are still completing the entire investigation and there are still interviews to be conducted, but i think we have a plan to keep the committee briefed on what we find and whether there could on a future bases basis be that kind of rift. and i testified earlier that the first question i'd pose to the director was, was there any breach to the president security and the answer was no. >> but there was a risk of breach along those lines of those connections existed, correct? >> there may be a risk and that is why this behavior cannot be tolerated. >> let me switch to cyberand let me thank you for your energetic work and persistence on this issue as we in congress try to pass the legislation that we

need. there are a for a few different approaches that are being looked at here. let me ask you this. if we were to pass a bill that failed to protect american critical infrastructure in private hands like our electric grid, our financial processing systems, communications networks and so forth, and indeed it said bill even failed to define critical infrastructure or provide a process for defining critical infrastructure so we actually knew what it was and what it wasn't, how well would that build have met the threat that you see us facing in this realm? >> well it would lead us to a big gap given the kinds of attacks we already see. that is why we think the core critical infrastructure should have basic performance sanders to me. that is why we think a bill needs by real-time information

sharing and and in it and incentivize that information sharing. those are the kinds of things that really should go into a conference of cyberbill. >> and, would you be able to say that the national security needs of the united states had been met by a bill that did not include any protection for our critical infrastructure? >> senator i would say based on what we know now and the risks that we already see now in the kinds of attacks that we are already seeing now, the failure to address court critical infrastructure would be a significant gap in legislation. >> thank you. my last question on this same subject, but switching from the national security and public safety side of cyberattack to the intellectual property and economic competitiveness side of our cybervulnerability.

i said about two years ago that i felt we were on the losing and of the biggest transfer of wealth in the history of humankind through theft and piracy because of the attacks on our industrial base and art technological base from overseas for the purpose of industrial espionage and stealing intellectual property. since then general alexander uses virtually the same language. issuing a report that uses virtually the same language, mike mcconnell has used virtually the same language. this is a very big deal for us from the point of view of economic competitiveness and you have been an attorney general and in fact we were attorney general together by the u.s. attorney and in fact we were u.s. attorneys together. you have had a lot of experience with law enforcement also as

governor and in your role as secretary of homeland security. i do not yet believe that we are resourced adequately in law enforcement to address that aspect of our cyberliability, and i hear from companies in all sorts of industries that, when they can get for instance via the ipod smack attention, they are very impressed with the capabilities that are involved but it is very rare they would turn over a case of intellectual property theft. >> bf be i would say no, we don't have the staff. we don't have the resources. as much as this part upon prisoners grown at the -- so i would like to ask that you participate in the discussions that we are going to be having

around the cybersecurity legislation about how we should better organize our cyberresources. both criminal and civil because a lot of it is done through civil law and a lot of the cleanup on the net of cricket web sites can be done through civil proceedings but it's a law-enforcement function because we are getting rid of very bad actors on the net who are attacking american businesses and the american economy. that was a little bit more of a speech than a question but what i would like to do is based on your experience, ask you to participate in that discussion. i don't know if we need the equivalent of a cyberdtf or a different way of organizing law-enforcement activity or the organized crime strike force that we set up many years ago. there are variety of different structures but i don't think the private sector is getting the support he needs from law

enforcement because of its lack of resource and there's an awful lot of money going out the door. we are standing by one of the biggest robberies in history and i would love to have your support in pursuing that concern. >> senator, first of all i agree with your statement of the scope of the problem. it is severe. it is endemic and it is a transfer of wealth, as you put it. we work with the fbi, secret service and i.c.e. all have cybersecurity and two criminal cases in that area as well as some other so i would be happy to participate. i think in the context of looking at the protection of the country and cyber, how we organize our law-enforcement resources to make sure pretty or the fbi has what it needs to handle some of this work is a good question and i would be happy to participate. >> thank you. mad him secretary, senators and

both from both sides of the aisle had to come and a lot during this hearing because most of us have three different committee meetings going on. you don't get that luxury and i do want to applaud you one for keeping your answers as brief and to the point and i might say as accurate as you have, which is typical of your appearance and i appreciate that. i'm going to have to leave. i would just note that senator leahy will go next and i will turn the gavel over to senator coons. i am doing this so that we are trying to keep similar hairlines. [laughter] sorry about that but senator coons has worked very very hard on the subject. i've asked him to take over the chair and we will go to senator leahy next we do appreciate what

you said and i would add, think i can speak for senator grassley and others, we will want to keep in touch with you and the director of the secret service as this goes on, not just on what has happened now, but what has happened in the future -- what will happen in the future. ..

in march of this year, john colin who i believe is your principal deputy coordinator for counterterrorism testified before a house subcommittee that the department should have a biometric exit system designed and ready to go come at least ready to roll out and announce and describe something within the next few weeks, in the coming weeks. your written testimony today i believe you said a biometric exit system should be ready for deployment and use within four years. how confident are you about that time frame? >> what we are planning an senator, the actual plan is in final clearance at omb, so it should be out shortly. but given our ability now to do enhanced by a graphic exit, immediately moving and apply not and then we will move and use that as a platform for adding on

the biometric. but the plan is done from our standpoint. we are just working through the nuts and bolts at omb. >> why did it take so long to get it deployed? just development of the technology? in other words, the fact that it takes four years to get it going, is that -- >> well, it is the scope of the issue. we have so many ways that people connect to the united states. were very different from other countries in that regard. and other resources. >> but kind of an impact do you think this will have fun piece up over stage once again it deployed? >> i think it will help us although we have already used are enhanced by a graphic to go backwards and identified over stage and to prioritize those that we want i.c.e. to focus on finding and removing.

>> can you give us specific brief thumbnail sketch on how the system will work? >> i would prefer to do that in a classified setting, senator. we would be a what to do that, yes. >> understood, understood. a different topic, last year john morton director of u.s. immigration and customs enforcement issued a couple of memoranda that between this and that certain priorities that would gather in the use and the exercise of prosecutorial discretion within i.c.e. within that memorandum, they were a number of considerations outlined and mirroring to a very significant degree the same factors that were outlined in the dream that come the same version of the dream act that

the senate refused to pass a couple years ago where they didn't get the necessary number of votes to pass. among those that there is the agents were instructed to consider in exercising prosecutorial discussion included the alien like the presence in the united states commotion near the factor in section three, b1 any of the dream act, circumstances of the alien's arrival in the united states, particularly if that happened anytime an alien with alien with a young child. which nears for can be found in three b-1 b. they factor in the dream act. the aliens pursuit of education at the united states with particular consideration given to those who have graduated from u.s. high school was successful pursuit or pursuing college or advanced degrees at a legitimate institution of prior education of the united states. that of course mere section three b-1 e. of the dream that. the alien sage but reticular

consideration given for minors nearing section three b-1 a-alpha victory that. marion session five a1 b2 of the dream act. so given the prosecutorial discussion standards which match up somewhat closely to the same that there's no point in the dream act and given the fact the dream act is not passed into law, what assurances can you give us or what assurances can you give to my constituents when they suggest perhaps there may be an effort underway to back door the same fact various and regulatory channels that couldn't be passed through congress. >> senator, let me begin by saying having worked in this field for decades now, we strongly need overall reform and we strongly support the dream act at a legislative enactment.

you're afraid of philip i of four or five votes to get cloture here and was passed by the house. that being said, we have the capacity or only jurisdiction to do this to administratively close the case. that doesn't give a person involved in a kind of a green card or anything of that sort. this simply means the case is effectively suspended and they can remain in the united states. it's very different from the dream act, which would allow an actual pathway to citizenship and that's one of the things we should be doing is really focusing on our enforcement resources and the risks to the public safety of the united states and those who meet the standards of the dream act, if they really meet the standards are not. >> said the overlap is going through that all in your response to that is essentially

that these are two different layers of analysis. one in the dream act would be focusing on a pathway toward citizenship. this is focused on how to allocate scarce prosecutorial a month for six resources. >> i think that's an accurate statement. >> and you're not and you're not concerned are convinced these could spill over into something larger? >> we are in the process of looking on all of the cases on the immigration docket to see which if any should be administratively closed. those that meet the criteria you just anger at those who would consider for administrative closure. >> finally, is there any chance of my lifetime will see if passengers before boarding the plane don't have to remove shuster for according to tsa? >> senator, we're looking at everything from what is the threat and what is the risk and

we have our delay changes for passengers over the age of 75 and children at the age of 12 or except for a random basis and lewis have to had to have some unpredictability, they can expurgated the lives without shoes being taken off. from a technology standpoint come the technology still does not exist it allows us to easily identify nonmetallic matter and choose or in liquid, which is why we are doing some of the things we are doing and it's based on the intelligence we have about the terrorist threats we face. >> i see my time is expired. thank you. >> senator franken. >> thank you, mr. chairman. adam secretary, this week the house of representatives is considering several cybersecurity proposals, but this morning i want to talk with you about the cybersecurity proposals that are shared in the

senate. because while there has been a lot of talk about privacy and civil liberties, implications of the house proposals and rightly so, few people are attacking about the two bills here in the senate. the fact is as they are currently drafted, both of the cybersecurity proposals here in the senate to send very serious threat to our privacy and civil liberties. both bills allow companies to near unfettered ability to monitor the e-mails and files of their customers. both bills may allow companies to share that information directly with the military. both bills generally allow the federal government to freely share that information with law enforcement in both bills

immunize companies against grossly negligent and knowing violations of the few privacy protections that apply to this process. in doing all of this, both of these bills sweep aside decades privacy laws, many of which vote in many cases with chairman leahy at their home. i'm talking about the wiretap act, the stored communications act and the pen register statute. now i've been working together with senator durbin, with the sponsors of cybersecurity act of 2012 may have been working with us in good faith and i sincerely hope that we can fix these problems before the bill even gets to the floor. but i think it's really important to let everyone know that we have real civil liberties problems, not just in the house, but also here in the senate bills.

i am saying all of this deal, not an secretary because the administration cybersecurity proposals from last may does not have many of these problems. it is in several ways more perspective of our privacy than either proposal here in the senate. i want to use the remaining time i have here to tease out those differences and frankly just make the case that we should pay attention to what the administration and its proposals. first of all men and secretary of the mansion, both cybersecurity act and the secure i.t. act would allow the military to be the initial recipient of the private company, but it's my understanding is the official position of this administration that a civilian, not a military entity should always be the initial recipient of cybersecurity data from the air.

can you explain why this is the administration's position? >> the administration mirrors how we have actually organized ourselves in the absence of cyberlegislation. the way we organize ourselves is that dod has responsibility for military networks, but dhs has responsibility for civilian and for the intersection with the private sector. we both use the technology resources that the nsa, but we use them under different authorities and with more restrictions, particularly on the privacy side venue it in an international military sort of contacts. so the position that we have is to make sure that the statute mirrors that actually is happening on the ground. >> thank you. sack him and secretary, both of the bills in the senate give

private companies for new authority who freely monitor the communication files on their systems, many of which would be private. these bills creating a sweeping authority despite existing provisions in the wiretap act that allow companies to perform monitoring to protect their systems. the administration's proposal does not contain a broad new authority. can you tell us why it does not? >> what we are looking for in part of the protection of critical infrastructure is for the code. we are looking for the fact that the attack, the methodology used, decoder signatures that are employed so we can check and see whether that's being done elsewhere and also mitigate with other companies about the attack. so we're not looking at content.

we're looking at the house. >> great comic thank you. why does the administration -- let me back up. third, the administration proposal only allows the federal cybersecurity senator to share the information it receives from private company with law enforcement authorities that the information constitutes actual evidence of a crime. one of the senate bills allows this building information received by the federal government to law enforcement if it quote appears to relate to the crime. what is the administration have a heightened standard for disclosure is too to law enforcement? was this done to protect civil liberties?

>> senator, i don't know the reasons for the different and the language between those two things. i think we both are getting at his use of information for a non-law-enforcement purpose would not be immunized or would not be permitted. but it has to follow-up with you and by the difference between the two phrases. >> okay comic thank you. let's do that. i'm a. how much he thank you come in and secretary. i do want to say that i agree with my colleagues who say that we need to do something about cybersecurity. i just think we need to get the legislation rights such that the bill does not unnecessarily sacrifice civil liberties and i thank you so much for your service and for being here and for your answers. thank you. >> thank you, senator franken. senator sessions.

>> thank you, mr. chairman. her meteoric rise to the chairmanship. senator franken. >> mine was actually -- [laughter] >> that's neither here nor there appeared for the purposes of the unit where the secretary and i don't think we should squabble over that. >> were glad to have both of you senators here. madam chairman, this is homeland security a big operation. as the third-largest in our government. >> is third-largest. over 200,000 people. i got to say it was uneasy about the bill. as i recall the democrats said we should consolidate and president bush said no and then he finally said yes and then we passed it without a whole lot of

consideration in my view. we have a whole lot of agents. coast guard, secret service, tsa, ulcers of agencies with different histories, cultures and so forth. i know the challenge is hard. i just truly believe -- i don't think completely together. do you agree they're still cultural and not your craddick efficiencies that could be obtained if focused on today? >> senator, we operated under the caption one dhs then we continue to excavate differences and systems and cultures than protocols and procedures. there's been a lot of accomplished over the past 10 years with my predecessors and over the last three plus years

that would have been secretary. but given the size and scope of the merger that is underway, it does take time. the department of defense took a most accounts 40 years to really become 30 years at the apartment. my goal is to substantially beat that record. >> well i think so. every dollar the taxpayers send us, they need and have a right to ask that wisely spent in the fat duplication, and mismanagement in competition within departments and it just needs to be confronted and strong leadership. i'll just read it out. i suggest you focus on that. senator pilate believe raised the question in their refusal to honor detainer is placed on prisoners which i find cook county's policy at least is unacceptable. you have written letters about it. i hope you will follow through on it.

they are i believe on track to obtain their secure communities, money and program through 2013 with alabama who has been sued or the administration for trying to have laws that help america enforce its immigration laws, not block the enforcement of immigration law. it has had its secure communities stopped, not continue for counties that have asked for it. can you tell us where you stand on not? and when can alabama expect they would be able to have their secure fundings? >> well, as they share with senator kyl, i believe the cook county ordinance is unwise, overbroad paper evaluating all options there. we've been trying to work with

the county to see if there is a resolution. with respect to alabama, given the litigation and what was then joined and not enjoined, what we did was simply to stop expansion of secure communities to the final. i think we've covered now 75% of foreign-born populations with the final quarter. but our plan is to complete implementation of secure communities nationwide by the end of 2013. >> that would include alabama? >> i would include alabama. >> that's a problem for me in the appeal filed some written questions to make sure we are clear about where that's heading. i'm uneasy about it. this seems to me the state was targeted as their love was not popular with the department -- but the president, whereas

they've not taken to date any firm action against cook county, which clearly endangers the people of cook county in the country. with regard to the visa access program, this is a plan that was designed and required by law in 1996. i have observed it and seen that since i've been in the senate. the difficulty that has occurred. we have the visa waiver plant open working. the entry program up and working. i do not believe it is that difficult to implement an exit program. i said that when the bush administration was in office and i'll say it again. i think the government accountability office, gao validate that and i hope we can make some progress on it.

first, you indicated earlier that you have a biographic plan that has some capability. but is it not true that biometric fingerprint, dna and other such system clearly being the most logical from my perspective that a fingerprint that a fingerprint that a fingerprint the system up and working otherwise someone could walk out with a card that has their the system up and working otherwise someone could walk out with a card that has their name on it in their biographical data, but there be no way to verify the person holding that card is the person actually exiting. >> senator, let me offer to have our staff come and brief you personally. it is enhanced biographic. it is not simply a card. elementary get briefed on that. but the biometric, and the issue

is going to be, whether the congress wants to appropriate the money for whatever marchioness left after the enhanced biographic. our workout plan and plan to use the enhanced biographic as a platform for that isn't clear if the wilshire that issue as well. the mac i had a long come year or more enhanced discussion with on this is secretary rich and it went on months and months and months. i insisted the only system that really works based on your experience as a federal and state prosecutor as i've had that same experience. if the fingerprints in every police officers fio. if the fingerprint that's taken somewhere in the united states and becomes a fugitive in the

fingerprint is the basic thesis fugitives. so when he left after refusing to commit, he left one bit of advice. he said we should have a biographic system should be the fingerprint. and not to his successors. i do believe that is the system that works. that was there any plan not to have that? >> now, what we are planning to go in phases. first is the biographic which we're a long way towards implementing right now. use that as a platform for the biometric. >> in my view, it should've been the biometric aleman should've been working on that we would've had that done a lot sooner than

four years and otherwise when you indicate your not going to work out for people who overstate, you're basically saying we don't intend to take any effort to enforce an entry exit system that allows countries that are approved for visa waiver or anything to have been unfair, unlimited entry to the united states. >> senator, we have gone back and looked at these overstays and mocked and stacked them according to biographic information we have about the overstays and turning that information to transcend into prioritize enforcement options the network is already underway. the problem for the logistical -- the reason there's no biometric system is it is not easy. the lanes in the pores have

always been designed for entry. the architecture has never really been designed for exit. but that is an issue. and then cost and manpower are issues. >> may be a briefing from your stuff would be helpful to me. >> be happy to provide that. >> thank you, mr. chairman. >> thank you, senator sessions. senator blumenthal. >> thank you sunder blumenthal for your software service and steadfast and effective work on behalf of our national security and words earlier on behalf of the secret service. i think all of the share your view that they do cover to use your word, it in marvelous job. i want to follow-up on the line of questioning by senator graham began in terms of looking for the kinds of systems, and maybe analogizing the secret service to the military that are used in

that context. i wonder if you given any thought to additional steps that can be taken to safeguard again, but also monitor the kinds of abuses that obviously occurred or electively occurred here. >> we are intent, senator i'm doing it her examination. how we do it now and we need to do to improve to make sure this never happens again. so all of those kinds of options around the table. >> thank you. switching to a different subject, i was recently approached by a couple -- same-sex couple who were married under law and one of them is a citizen of the united states. the other is not.

and i wrote to you and i want to thank you for your assistance in connection with their application for a green card to be held in advance. you're probably semiarid the problems that arise under the circumstances. eventually we need a solution like the uniting families in america at that can provide some longer-term solution to this problem. but i wonder whether we can establish a policy of not supporting or another is holding green card for same-sex couples, one of whom is here, the other is seeking a green card. >> senator, the legal advice we have been given is that unless and until the law is overturned by the court and i'm talking as

to goma, which the department digest is a search would be done and we cannot unilaterally give green cards based on that. but we have done would be a same-sex couples if they fall within the other criteria of a priority memo, prosecutorial memo, datafile says to intercede with removal and some of the other actions. >> i'm a strong supporter as either members of this committee ever appealing delma, which would provide a comprehensive solution. i've been approached by other similar couples who have enormous contributions to make to this country and whose families are every bit deserving of the kind of recognition that

we accord to heterosexual couples. and so i hope i can work with you on this area are a solution in the meantime that will enable his couples to continue to be families here as we need and they deserve. thank you. >> yes, absolutely. >> thank you, madam secretary. thank you, mr. chairman. >> thank you on the senator. >> and secretary commit thank you. i've been trying to juggle schedules. thank you for your service. am i to ask a few questions about dream that, which you and i talked about from time to time. yesterday senator schumer and my tattoo at s.b. 1070, controversial arizona last and i talked to the senate arizona who qualified for the dream act, but also would be targets of the arizona love. that is beyond reasonable suspicion there and documented. they have stated it publicly all of them are either attending

college or graduate said arizona state university with degrees in engineering as an example. you are asked by a bipartisan group of senators to suspend deportations of >> students and in response to the president has suggested a new policy. under this policy as i understand a high priority to deport those who committed various crimes or a threat to the public while there is a low priority to deport individuals have been in the united states since childhood like those who are eligible for the dream act. last night we received a date statistics i requested on deportations that dhs is conducting your policy. there's currently more than 300,000 pending deportation cases that these i.c.e. 219,054, approximately 16,544 cases, 7.5% of been identified as eligible for mr. to closure. but these cases 2722 by 1.2% of

been closed. please explain the difference between 7.5% of deportation cases eligible to be closed in the 1.2% actually closed. when the respect to rise as the review progress is that when you expected to be complete? >> i think the difference is primarily attributable to time. you know, we have been doing this case-by-case review. we just started the pilots right after christmas and we move now to go across the country since then. so part of it is that as we offered illustrative exposure, often times the recipient will ask for time to think about it. so i think i will catch up and i think we will be closed with the case review by the end of the calendar year and then we will see what the numbers show.

>> you and i had a conversation about work authorization. this is a very basic issue we discuss in this hearing. historically, the interpretation of the department and under previous president george -- president bush in cases where there was deferred action, these individuals were allowed to work, given work authorization. now under the new policy, individuals are offered administrative closure. the department of state a position to individuals whose cases are closed cannot apply for work authorization. it creates a real problem. you say to qualified individuals cannot be deported but they can't work to support themselves and families. many end up in the underground economy which puts them at risk of exploitation and other cuts of the labor market. only a few thousand people affect deportations so far, so i can imagine a slap in a significant impact on employment

in america. i ask you then why we are not at least making certain that if we had deferred action or administrative closure that a person is allowed to work. >> first, just to make sure we have a common understanding of the record we have continued deferred action and do that before cases get into the administrative system. the administrative closure or cases that are ready on the docket and most of which are in the non-detained docket, but a certain number and they detain docket. those are the ones we are going through in addition to evaluating new cases as they come in to see that they meet the priorities we have set. so with respect to the work authorization, we are going back now in light of your concern and the fact that we now have

numbers to look at as opposed to when we started this whole process to see if we should make some adjustments. so i'd be willing to keep you apprised of our efforts in that regard. i thought about your concerns after we spoke and i thought they were serious concerns and we are exploring how best to address them. >> thank you, madam secretary. the president is committed and is cosponsored has made some important decisions to help these students so i hope we can find a way to go further when it comes to giving them an opportunity to work. i asked you about the registration program created after 9/11. arab-americans, muslims, south asian americans face national origin and religious profiling at least that was what was suggested at a recent hearing i hauled in the room two weeks ago. the special registration program

targeted arab and muslim visitors to register with the ins or face deportation. but the time i called to be terminated because they're a serious dose of help combat terrorism. we are tested by terrorism experts concluded special registration wasted homeland security resources and ended up alienating arab-americans and some muslims prefer than 80,000 people in deportation, how many terrorists were special registration? nine. last year to you just terminated registration requirement. because the special registration many face deportation. they provide the individuals who fail to comply that they wouldn't be penalized if their noncompliance is involuntary and unintentional or inexcusable. we ensure the standards for

noncompliance with special registration are going to be applied fairly and generously? >> you say well and i will make sure that i.c.e. reports to me how it's implemented. >> i visited in immigration detention facility in my state, tri-county and deep southern illinois. his detention standards recently. i'm in the process of looking this over. i'm still concerned about conditions i noted. some of them will take deep investigation before i can say with any certainty there up violations that need to be addressed. there was one thing that is very basic but, intentioned and that was lack of access to the telephone. turns out many of these people who are being detained, not charged with a crime had been detained are basically two or 300 miles away from family. they may seem like a small issue but to immigration detainees

it's not. currently these immigration detainees don't have the right to an appointed attorney. approximately 80% go forward without one. no one has access to e-mail unlike federal and many of them have remote facilities since when i visited. they repeatedly raised concerns about the cost upwards of $1 or $2 a minute of their being charged. these are not wealthy people as you can imagine. they're very poor. we tried to use the local funds to see how they would work and they didn't. so they were spotty service and high costs through the large number of jails with which i.c.e. contracts profit by taking exurban appease the phone companies charge detainees, 30% to 60% of phone call charges. my office has been working to come up with a solution. you have reported progress on

this issue? >> not as i sit here, but i will follow. you are right to raise the concern. so let me follow up with our staff cannot be happy to get back to you. >> things were. today. thank you, mr. chairman. >> thank you. adam secretary, ibi plus questions of the oversight hearing today and i appreciate your patience and diligence before the committee today. i was reminded in your opening testimony just how challenging your job is by the fact that you casually reference to the daily fripperies. he supervised the third allergic that is awesome and the challenge in your leadership face of striking an appropriate balance between security, privacy, commerce with the difficult balance about to start by thanking thinking you had known an attorney general and i've always been impressed with their service.

just on the secrecy of a scandal if they might come and there's been some suggestion in the "washington post" that this is actually part of a long-standing pattern of this and i've had the honor of supervising a local law enforcement agency and i know how devastating to morale and even operations such incidents can be, this particular incident is very troubling and i know there is an aggressive and far-reaching investigation underway. but have there been allegations of serious misconduct related to the office of responsibility in the past? backstab but steps specifically have you directed secret service director sullivan to ensure this type of misconduct doesn't occur again? >> to my knowledge, there have been no similar type incidents reported to the office of professional responsibility. i cannot speak to the inspector general is a separate

department, but nonbiased duo pr. what the director is doing is really revealing, going back, talking to other regions, trying to ferret out whether this is ace a stomach problem. as someone who has been the service secretary for three and a half years now. i found the men and women i work with to be extremely professional and the men and women i come into contact with to be professional. but we want to make sure we get to the bottom of this that we chose strongly with those who have committed the misconduct and gave the report that's already been done with quite a lot of speed and that we ferret out with any other problems because the men and women of the secret service don't deserve to

have their reputations besmirched. >> i want to commend you for how it's commended. i went to reassert what i think we share, a conviction that is to be not just this incident, but a far-reaching that can assure the american public this is not somehow an agency with this is routinely tolerate her brother pat is. this is an outlier incident. i also at the outset want to thank you. last time you are before us has to question of customs and border control of the interdiction of counterfeit for allegedly counterfeit materials. you just implemented a new administration policy that allows agents and may seize goods at the border that are believed to be possibly counterfeit to share that information with the rights holders then i think that's a good and strong head of legislation, but even house with the legislation is moving, or by the administration has engraved that change. i want to dedicate most of our time to cybersecurity.

i share senator frank and steve concerns about privacy and how to strike an appropriate balance, but also senator whitehouse can legislate the field, we leave our critical national infrastructure gravely vulnerable and that risk. i note that in your athletic 13 budget, cybersecurity gets nearly 75% increase in funding while the rest of the department overall stays flat. i want to commend your in fact prioritizing delivering appropriate resources. first if i could, we talked about partnerships, fusion centers. u.s. cert is a resource and i wondered how ucc to local resources in one course that community in the national guard as we discussed for delaware and rhode island have for squadrons that i think can and should play a positive role. what sorts of resource constraints we have in terms of

effectively responding to no one for us that community in the first responder community, my concern about cyberthreat is that it will emerge is very broad and a serious threat today. the second critical infrastructure for it will emerge very quickly and required very rapid response. >> a couple of things, senator. obviously i share your concern. working the state and locals around the floor at the 21st seven watch center, but it's helping with training. it is providing lots of information. i think we have provided feith as an actual/shared. cert responded to 106,000 incidents itself. and so, trading, information sharing and across the country locations via centers of excellence, which are helping us refine what we are doing, but

also think ahead. what is the next thing that will happen in the favor where? >> i also am familiar with the program which has had some challenges. i think it has been successful in promoting safe safety at those sites that use dangerous chemicals they really had a significantly underperformed particularly in cybersecurity. i just wanted to encourage contention on the area with the previous question by senator grassley. given the involvement of cyberattack risk towards our nation's critical infrastructure, given the debate provisions, if the word explains arrest the particular strain that dhs has regarding this capability and capacity to administer potential regulations and protect our infrastructure. are you confident that dhs has capacity as opposed to the nsa

or dod required to handle this critical national thread. >> yes and that as you noted the budget increases has been requested. we've had a multiple additions in the same area over the last three years. we already are the department that deals primarily with the private sector and critical infrastructure. those mechanisms with which to do that are already in place. so on the civilian side and on the.com site is aware, dhs already has that systemic detection role. i think general alexander testify to that several times. dod has of course to the .mil environment. the resources that they are. the experiences they are coming meaning that dhs. we have lessons learned no

doubt, but the lessons have been learned. those lessons learned give us greater confidence we cannot minister this properly. >> last they could come, concerns about privacy and bring in the public, senator lee previously asked about future attribute screening technology and its technology is something i'd be happy to get a briefing on about project very, recognizing that a lot of what is going on in the dialogue between the administration and congress, but the cyberthreat is occurring and secure preteens and that a lot of the information but at least i and i think many other senators have received that makes it clear to us just how big of a threat this isn't just how much loss there is here at intellectual property and how much risk there is, most of that information is shared with us. my concern is that this committee legislators on intellectual property theft.

the comparable committee in the house legislative and someone argue overreached on the piracy act. and there was a very proud and unexpectedly strong national response to that vacation motivated citizens deeply concerned that some legitimacy. with right to privacy in the vibrancy of the internet. by real concern here is if we are not sufficiently bring the public along and striking a balance between privacy, security and commerce, we may face a comparable, unexpected national backlash against the effort and given how rarely we legislate on issues i am deeply concerned we not then what is the moment, that we not create a moment of real vulnerability when you work so hard to craft a structure that works, senator frank announced previously about how the administration and its

proposals has sent a stronger job of recognizing a validating privacy concerns. any advice on how we can while recognizing limitations do not feel secure, were effectively engage the public in this dialogue on the balance between liberty? >> we have tried to do it by sharing information with the public through a variety of means. i think when there have been briefings in a classified setting, you have 30 day at the head of the joint chiefs, the head of the nsa, had ideas ei, the second in charge of the dni, second in charge of the doj and myself, all saying the same thing. this is a big risk. it's honest. we need some way to protect the core infrastructure and summit of information sharing. we need to update to streamline some of the statues that exists

now. in terms of privacy, i think that is built into the collins lieberman bill come the bipartisan bill in this chamber, providing for privacy for independent privacy oversight. limitations on how it can be used in the leg. we need to continue to emphasize the differences any other approaches. >> i agree with you. the secure preteens have been successful. they've been hair-raising, at times alarming, but the unified in bride and issued by the administration and ensuring that brief is commendable. i just am concerned when it don't talk in my home state of delaware i don't hear the same level of broadly shared understanding of just how real it just how constant the threat is to intellectual property to the infrastructure and vibrancy of our nation. last question or area would be

immigration. a recent pew report cannot same for the first time in 30 years there are more illegal immigrants returning to mexico from the united states to come here. i think that is in part due to strengthening and the economy there, but also i think the unprecedented action of the administration. to hire more border guards support for more undocumented workers and really bear down and engage the strong, smart effect is border security and enforcement. i wondered if you had any comment on that. >> i do. in fact i looked at the pew study yesterday. but it's talking about long-term migration trends and what it identifies as exactly which he said. the trend now is more migration to mexico than immigration. it attributes at least part of that to the record amount of personnel and technology, infrastructure put on the border in part because it was

bipartisan agreement by the congress to appropriate an additional $600 million to let us do that job. our efforts now are sustaining that in making sure we stay ahead of any search or movement in illegal traffic on that order and keep the border is safe and secure when we can. >> i think you've done a commendable job on the senate support in the public realize my side of the outcome of suntans as not vigorous in our enforcement shares this is the bipartisan affair. i hope to make progress in the enhanced biographic exit program and there is a real dialogue about that. but i am cautiously optimistic that we will find a new common ground on a host of integration issues, whether the dream that i'm a cosponsor with senator durbin, stem immigration reuniting family. last question on in the

response, i think retaining air lift capacity and local national guard state national guard was critical of the state of vermont, represented by the real chairman of this committee as well as my sit in the past when the hurricanes were flooding other issues. i wondered if you had me comment how the president's spending request might affect the ability of state national guard to play an active supportive role in disaster response. >> senator, let me get back to you on not because, are you asking about how our request with respect to confirm in grants over respect first responders? with the national guard? >> this is my national guard capacity within the branch issue. i may have asked a question that's not directly in your -- >> is more appropriately addressed the department of defense. but i will say our entire work with fema has been to be a team

of local and state responders as opposed to the fed's been in charge. i think the teamwork approach has been well received and has worked very effectively. >> i agree. i hear all the time from delaware how grateful they've been for the share training, equipment, grants programs. actually help the volunteer fire company right there annual grant and a memorable all nighter. i just wanted to close by thanking you for strong leadership of the department and the department with significant contribution to the liberty and people of the united states. thank you for your testimony. we will leave it open for members of the committee not able to join us but might like to submit it. this hearing is adjourned. [inaudible conversations]

, [inaudible conversations]

>> where is the national public radio table? you guys are still here? that's good. i couldn't remember where we landed on not.

[applause] >> of the next come discussion is preached peace with the first prize middle-school winner here from "washington journal," this is 40 minutes. >> attachment or for his the most cowinner. leo pfeifer joining us from seattle. a student at middle-school.

welcome. >> high. >> how are you? >> i'm doing well. >> joined by jim schatz of the museum another discussions about the free speech. thank you for joining us, too. >> thank you about pedro. >> wordage get the idea for this? >> i was just thinking about, which amendment influences my daily life the most amazing the shaping of our country and i think it was the first amendment, freedom of speech and freedom of the press. >> specifically had is that impacted your life and ones you choose that make it into a documentary? >> in our daily lives who would be used to communicate to get ideas out there. a documentary just came from. >> so from the time you first got this idea, where did you go -- or did you go to a much

ejected it to help make it a reality? >> i really just sent e-mails out to as many people as they could to get interviews. he'd really be surprised at who will e-mail you back. you just have to be persistent enough. >> give us an example of some of the surprises you how to love the way putting this together. >> interviewing dan mercker from the onion was really lucky i think. i sent an e-mail to the public relations and got an e-mail back a couple days later. they said they could set up an interview. it was really good news so that things like that. >> from the time you start at the time you finish, which learned about free speech in the first amendment you didn't know before? >> i learned how much it influenced our country and our country relies on it and learned about the issues facing, especially from our perception in the modern era.

>> such as clicks what you mean mean by that? >> we are not willing to see all the different viewpoints like we did in past times that were just willing to just plug into whatever we want to watch. >> who have to put this together? did you film and add it yourself? >> yeah, i did it all by myself. it was pretty independent. >> did you get up from school, parents come anything on that line? >> not really. >> jim does, you have heard our winterberry talk about the first amendment and its perception. even had begun each document again, what you like to read about the concept of the first amendment and free speech? ..

>> james duff that you are ceo of newseum. what is that?

>> a wonderfully interactive museum and pennsylvania avenue. on the front of the building is a tablet of the first amendment of the constitution. the newseum is full of artifacts and 86 hits that demonstrate the value of freedoms of the first amendment. real history not only news but of the country this is civic education experience to walk through the newseum me incurred job visitors to experience it. >> host: do you notice early students getting involved? >> we do. i number of school groups visit here every day. we are pleased about that.

it is people of all walks of life and age groups but we are particularly interested to bring in the younger people and school groups to educate about our freedoms and the first amendment. >> host: leo pfeifer, putting the documentary together, what sources did you consider? >> for a topic like this, i talked to as many experts as i could. i went through a lot of c-span footage. >> host: you started with a longer list then a smaller list that ended up? >> most people i interviewed ended up in the documentary. >> host: when you started the project, bet did you

have with the may in mind did it develop? tell us about the process. >> that was interesting. the topic devolved as i talk to people and looking at c-span footage. it was interesting. at i did not have a clear set. >> host: how did you come up with the title "who owns free speech?". >> it just inspired me. it is similar to today. >> host: james duff the issue free-speech faces with politics. >> it is crucial every

american citizen understands the first amendment how we can bruiser and protect it. one interesting story one visitor here was rushed up. walking through the newseum and absorbing it. he said we have free-speech in russia but the difference is that you are free e after you speak for a few publish in the press. it is humorous but also a profound observation. what is important to to us to understand what this why we remain free after recent speak days after we speak

and there are many countries that have of a bill of rights or similar first amendment protections written in but no mechanism to protect and preserve it. we have an independent judiciary. if congress does pass a lot to bridge the freedom of speech we have the judiciary we can go to to challenge the laws of congress. and understanding the free press plays as the documentary reveals reveals, watchdog sober the reveals, watchdog sober the government, it is crucial the public understands the interaction, three branches of government, independent

and free press as a mechanism to preserve our freedom. >> host: con bair shom make no law prohibiting a religion or exercise their of or their rights the people to assemble two petition the government for redress of grievances. good morning on dead democrats line. >> congratulations. number one, is the documentary address citizens united case? second, what about the corollary the first amendment the right to hear people's speech in connection with prosecution

of prisoners in guantanamo or other issues with communication emanating from the middle east on subjects that are not politically popular here so we can hear the speech to understand the point* of view. >> host: did you take on those topics leo pfeifer? >> wish i could have but i do have the eight minute time limit. freedom of the press encompasses so many things. >> host: you reference other points of view and the ability to do so? >> we and joy those freedoms -- freedoms there are limitations to what we

enjoy a and there are restrictions and simply to yell fire in a crowded theater creates a public disruption. and concerns.

if they feel conflict of telling the truth? >> did you tackle that? >> that was what i started out doing. about advertising and that the fact on the news but with the eight minutes documentary ball into what type of media we want. >> host: one viewer asks do you feel free-speech on the internet helps the youth to state informed? also youtube? >> that is interesting because the internet is blending freedom of speech and freedom of the press. it is a good tool that has

helped with different things >> host: the blending of free-speech and free press that deals with organizations like yours? >> we have the brand new exhibit opening this week's on news media and social media the impact on gathering and it is very much a part of ever pretense knell and press and information gathering. we encourage people to come visit how we inc. that into the visitor experience at newseum. >> host: the independent lines. >> caller: congratulations leo pfeifer. i am a journalism major i

did an article on freedom of speech to bulgaria and congratulations on realizing the story develops itself. but with my research i discovered george washington wrote a letter to his troops admonishing them for their profanity that no man of principle would speak in such a way and would lead to help. i find it interesting our first president would say such a thing but then freedom of speech is the first part of the constitution. >> host: do you have a future idea for the journalism as a career?

>> i want to be a filmmaker bet to journalism is interesting. i've learned a lot of recourse of the documentary. >> host: the republicans nine. >> caller: i would like to congratulate the hon gentlemen for his efforts my concern and raised the question how do we deal with the bias of the press that refuses to grant letters to the editor with what is going on in this country? second, if you read the constitution and it says congress show make no law to establish religion but yet we have a supreme court that restricts religious faith.

it tells us when and how and where. essentially supporting mrs. o'hare in the suit against the government, established her religion as a religion of the country. she was atheist. >> host: the ability of the public to respond whether letters to the editor? >> their various means to publish your views and opinions. many of us have written letters to the editor for space limitations editors have chosen not to publish. that could be a function of space availability and a number of letters they

receive as opposed to censorship. but there are various outlets inc widespread problem we could publisher on comments. i don't have a sense we are suffering too much for lack of expression. >> host: texas. good morning. >> caller: i would also like to congratulate mr. leo pfeifer for his prize. but talking about diversity of opinion and appliance.

do you have in your opinion. >> host: the same to other viewpoints how did that change? >> that is what the merged from it. the power is in us. we need to talk to each other and just communique. >> host: when you told your parent and teacher you wanted to enter what was their response? >> i did it last year and 512th place. i did not think i would win anything per car was happy. i worked hard and took all the things that i learned.

you don't necessarily learn just about the issue but you learn from your mistakes. >> host: what did you learn this time? >> i think there learned more about doing interviews and i spent more time writing the questions. >> host: mischa's again good morning. cfius . >> caller. i think it is necessary and constructive but how does that reconcile when people come up with the opinion contrary to backdoor reality? we saw this segment of the postal service saying it is funded by the sale of its products only making

$100,000 but then the caller says it is a little guy which is completely inaccurate. she said it is funded by the sale of its products. many people think. >> host: so the larger topic of free speech and the first amendment? >> how do you reconcile the inaccurate statements that are promoted against the ability to exercise free speech. that should not and have complete the inaccurate statements. >> host: james duff how do you know, what is true? >> uneducated public is the best response.

we cannot prevent people from expressing those views and opinions. the solution is with all sources of information to get the accurate picture. includes a and incorporates the right to speak your views even if not well rooted. for those united states to make those determinations from that point* of view. >> host: the democrat line. >> caller:. >> a one to make a comment from rupiah's color. of the supreme court case where prayer was banned in

public school. before that we always said or its prayer. where i was in school, a poor time was changed to a moment of silent meditation which neutralized the issue of what religion says anybody support but addressed the spiritual need people have put it is not address today. i don't think that decision and established a the is some as a religion. that is my comment. >> host: leo pfeifer answer this. how would you sort through the information and determine if it is true? >> you have to check different sources.

also from credible sources for go live video was from this he spent video library which was helpful. >> host: how much did you determine from each interview would be plugged into the documentary? >> except the footage share went through hours and hours the plane being the segments that i wanted. putting in what you want from the interviews that you do is one of the hardest part spurred behalf to watch and find the right parts. >> host: did you have helped? >> i did not. i a had that myself. but i did get feedback after i had a rough cut. >> i will add he did a

superb job asking the right kinds of questions to solicit a bribe the of responses. also a superb job of gooding and including those in the film. >> host: what other questions? >> the challenges we face under the first amendment today if the media is doing a good job and if you could change anything today in the media, what would it be? >> our next guest on the democrats line. >> caller: the first amendment. >> host: stop listening to the tv. >> caller: one of the most coveted amendments the forefathers gave us why would we want to get rid of

that now? >> host: what makes you think that we want to? >> first amendment and free speech. my concern is i don't want to see that go away. >> host: cardoza the other concerns? >> we do. what is so hard to name with this competitions is that it encourages americans to give thought. it has a increase of civic education. one of the dangers of today of preserving first amendment rights is the alarming statistics we see of the decline of civic education bubbles perk up 12% of high-school seniors are proficient in u.s.

history. i don't see how we can preserve our freedoms and i think this project that leo pfeifer has participated in a substantial and wonderful way, these are encouraging. we here at the newseum will take on that challenge to get involved with civic education to educate people about our history and freedoms and separation of powers in the dormant and the importance of the free and independent press and there will lead to play this >> host: and you discovered free speech is not as free as you were taught? also congratulations. >> i learned free-speech is

there and available but do people want to hear it or what the press tells them? >> host: the independent line. >> caller: first of all, i think because we have said today heterogeneous society not like japan or china we have people coming from all over and they have different ideas of what free-speech is. the supreme court judge said i cannot define pornography but i know it when i see it. we should still have the fcc regulates the internet to on

the homepage so of somebody's sick -- sees something they have paid category license number that this is what they transmit whether retail sales but people are against it because they want to cheat and lie. they could bury easily have transmission coming into your home. only the family shows. >> host: the internet has free-speech the end of regulation she referred to? >> as technology and -- evolves retry to make terminations how to protect young people within the family structure and

materials we don't the is appropriate. there is a balanced to preserving first amendment rights and privileges for people to raise their children in the way they see fit. one of the encouraging things of our system of government is we have the mechanisms in place to make the determinations. we don't always get their right that we have the freedoms to determine the right balance. >> host: our first spot -- first prize winner as part of our c-span's studentcam documentary

contest tall us about your middle school. >> is a great school. >> host: is there a particular teacher you like on this topic? >> my favorite class is geography and social studies learning about how it affects us today says . >> when not as cool weather you doing? >> i like to hang out i snowboard for pro will is a big passion. >> host: chicago, illinois democrat line. >> caller:. >> i by to talk about the consolidation of media. six corporation's own the

mainstream press including cable, television, newspapers from the stories will never get out. because it is not in the best interest for those who sit on the boards to expose the truth about the stories. a couple of examples. one of them, the disaster the fukushima explosion is considered worse than chernobyl but yet to we continue to promote nuclear radiation that some plants are designed just like that one. now there is great serious problems with people living miles and miles away from this site. >> host:o