cis's processes and adjudicating benefits and looking at employment verification issues. i want to give you a flavor of who gao is as an agency and sort of range of work we've done, more specifically on border security around immigration issues. for today's discussion i want to focus my remarks on two or three key reports that relate to some of the issues and topics that are raised in mpi's report. . .

and i think that it is relevant. is to give you a kind of sense of what were some of the trends and data that we saw in the population of aliens. so those are the two key reports that i will focus on, and to let me turn first to our work on the secured communities program. as you're all probably aware, the security community program is one of i.c.e. programs for identifying potential removable aliens who are arrested by state or local law enforcement agencies. under the program when an individual is arrested by the state or local enforcement agency, the individuals fingerprints are taken taken and automatically checked against federal fingerprint databases to include dhs' fingerprint system. if there's a match i.c.e.

conducts additional checks and determines whether not to request that the law enforcement agency hold the individual so that i.c.e. can take custody for further enforcement action. so as i get into my remarks now on some of the trends and data i'll present i just want to provide one or two definitions for terms and contexts. for our report a criminal alien is a noncitizen in the united states who may be present on a lawful basis, or not, who has been convicted of a crime. and it's important to note a criminal alien lawfully in the u.s. may be removable, depending on the nature of the particular offense for which the alien was convicted. so going to talk about a couple of sets of data that we present in our report. so the first set of data i want to talk about his trends that we looked at in terms of isis enforcement actions under the security committees program. we looked at removals of aliens identified by the security

committee programs while relative to all i.c.e. removal during the time period of our study. what we found was the security committees program account for an increased in% of all i.c.e. removals during the period that we looked at which was fiscal year 2009, the first six months of fiscal year 2012. and so we found, for example, that secured communities was responsible for 20% approximate 400,000 aliens that i.c.e. removed in fiscal year 2011 up from approximately 4% of the aliens that i.c.e. removed in fy 2000. would also look at some data on the security communities program in terms of the type of offense that aliens were identified by the program had. what we found was the majority of aliens who were removed and identified by the security communities program have been convicted of a criminal offense.

again during the time period that we are looking at, which is october 2008 through march 2012, about 70 forced -- said for% of aliens removed identified by the security program had been convicted of a criminal offense. that is either the offense that led to their identification under secured communities within a record of the conviction for a previous offense. 21% of aliens removed do not have a criminal conviction known to i.c.e. prior to the removal that were identified as one of than once other removal priorities such as aliens were fugitives all who we entered the u.s. illegally after reentry. excuse me, after removal. the remaining 5% also did not have a known criminal conviction prior to the removal but they were nonetheless removable because for example, they entered the country without inspection only had violated the terms of admission. to for the breakdown these data we found that 27% of the aliens who were removed by i.c.e. after

being identified by secure communities were convicted of level one offenses, 17% were convicted of level two offenses, and '30s % were convicted of level three offenses. so level one includes aliens convicted of aggravated felonies are basically two or more felonies. level two includes aliens convicted of any felony, or three or more what are generally referred to as misdemeanors. level two includes aliens who were convicted of offenses are punishable by less than one year. so in addition to those dated, the 26% of aliens who were removed by i.c.e. after being identified by the secure communities program that had no confirmed criminal conviction, 18% were prior removals overturned, 5% were introduced without inspectioinspectio inspection or they work visa violators and the other 3% were

i.c.e. fugitives. that just gives you some sense of the data and trends that was looking specifically at removals under the secure communities program during the time frame that we studied. in addition we also look at variation across the fiscal years in proportion to aliens removed according to the criminal level under the secure communities program. so, for example, we found that there was a decrease in the proportion of convicted level three offenders removed from about 40% of total removals in fiscal year 2009, the 26% during the first half of fiscal year 2012. we found there was some change among level two offenders as well. and part of what i.c.e. attributed to the changes were that i.c.e. that continue to prioritize its resources to focus on the identification and removal of aliens convicted of felonies and also that i.c.e.

did have some redefinition of its criminal defense levels between fiscal year 2010 and 2011. so in closing on this report we did not make any recommendations to dhs having to do with the data or trends that we reported, but we did make recommendations to the department related to how it was managing its contracting process for updating or modernizing its systems use as part of the secure communities program. we also made a recommendation related to dhs developing a workforce plan related to using resources under the program. and dhs concurred with those recommendations and is acting on them. so let me now briefly turned to a report week issued an 2011 on criminal alien statistics. these data were last updated through fiscal year 2010, but i think they provide some useful information for the discussion today on the numbers of an

incarcerated criminal aliens and the types of offenses for which they were arrested or convicted. so let me get into some of the trends that are identified in our report. first we found the number of criminal aliens in incarcerated in federal prison increased about 7% from 51,000 in fiscal year 2005, to about 55,000 in fiscal year 2010. and for context, the criminal alien population of the total of the federal, total federal inmate population has remained relatively constant since 2001 at about 25-27%. we also used as part of our study a random sample of 1000 criminal aliens and made some estimates based on the sample. and so, for example, we estimated that criminal aliens had an average of seven arrests, about 65% were arrested at least

once. for an immigration offense and for about 50% were arrested at least once for a drug offense. immigration, drugs and traffic violations accounted for about half of arrest offenses, and about 90% of the criminal aliens sentenced in federal court in fiscal year 2009 were convicted of immigration and/or drug related offenses. so there's more data in that report should anybody be interested. i won't get into all of the data now for the sake of time, but that report is available on our website. the last report very quickly if i can, george, just go your attention to but i won't make remarks on today's, 2012 gao issued a report looking at data on border patrol enforcement efforts, specifically along the border. while our data did not include removals which are part of fbi's report has been released today, we did look at other data on

border patrol enforcement efforts, including data on elite entries, apprehensions, recidivist rates and someone. and so i would commend that report to you as well should you then interest in some of the other, or some different data on order patrol enforcement efforts along the southwest border. so again, thank you, george and mark, for inviting me. >> okay, thank you very much for that. i hope everybody has a copy -- had coffee this way because i know we're getting a variety of numbers but we decided we would make this a research bill because there really is a lot of information that is pertinent to an issue that is very important in the public policy discussion. and we're going to continue on that, on the trajectory with mark, although his work takes a slightly different angle of vision. mark, let me turn the microphone over to you.

>> thanks also to mark and to randy as well for bringing me here today. i work as an enforcement role at the american immigration council. we are a nonpartisan organization whose mission is to shape a more rational immigration policy. and as part of that work i do work on deportation and detention as mpi does as well. i'd like to do three things in my brief time. wanted to emphasize the importance of this paper and india's work over the last couple of years in helping to understand modern use immigration enforcement. secondly given this data that's been put out to look into the future and forecast some of the coming debates policy and legislators, and 30 to briefly describe the paper on immigration detention, that mpi has asked me and my co-author robert at the university of maryland to write, which coblentz our work on deportation. so first, this is a very valuable paper. and it's part of a series of

valuable papers that mpi has done over the last couple of years that examine the enforcement system that congress has funded and particularly in this paper phs prioritization of that funding. under different administrations. but it's worth noting the key driver here is congressional funding. as mpi's 2013 report rise passion which adores and others put out, the u.s. spends more on immigration enforcement than all other law enforcement agencies combined. that $18 billion the cbp and i.c.e. in fiscal year 2014. so this administration has been trying to walk a tightrope in between choosing between top and humane enforcement, as mark set out in an earlier paper this year. but at these funding levels in the administration would have to walk a tightrope in choosing

between those sometimes competing goals. so let me summarize a little bit about what this data and this paper tells us about the policy. first, one of the important things that marks paper brings out is how the obama administration has shifted its priorities to border enforcement from interior enforcement, and moreover, from this data how they're very different systems and the processes they use and the individuals involved. at the border the processes are generally nonjudicial removes out of course. at the interior their general in court removals. at the border, removals are rising, generally of non-criminals are criminals only for immigration crimes. oser abrogated soon after entry. at the interior there's a shrinking share of removal. they are mostly of individuals of criminal convictions. they are mostly apprehended after some time in the united states, over one year.

that said, both the border and interior enforcement involve difficult policy choices, and some in that little human impact. at the border you have border crosses that are turning to join family, particularly reflected in reinstatement of a prior removal order. you may have asylum-seekers they are seeking to join films, particularly this year we've seen that from central america. they are process generally through expedited removal. so border enforcement still has impact inside the border. and removals are these summary out of course processes has attracted criticism for due process concerns. and my organization, the council has been one of the organizations that is raise those issues. secondly, in the interior, most of criminal convictions. the majority are not serious convictions. it is a higher percentage than is at the border but it is not a majority. moreover, many of deep u.s.

ties, even more so today than a decade ago. the pew hispanic trust has put out information this year that shows that of the 11 million unauthorized, the median time to spend in the country is now 13 years. only 15% have been here less than five years. 38%, a million about live with u.s. immigrant children so even with the shifting of these priorities to effectuate a more humane enforcement policy, there is inevitable human impact. now, these priorities are not new. and as mark said so, dhs along with a legacy ins has always focused on these priorities. in the 2011 morton memo priorities are in many -- many ways a logical extension of the priorities that the commissioner affection but at her time at the ins. but one possibility that is

raised by this date is that with such high funding levels, it may be getting harder practically to have such robust enforcement's without raising difficult choices. without deporting the harder cases, for lack of a better word. and notably as well, among these priorities, the least of the priorities is increasingly occupying more of dhs' resources. let me explain what i mean by that. john morton's memo prioritize public safety threats as number one, understand what. and within that he prioritized serious violent criminals over minor criminals. as this paper shows, most of the convicted of a crime by the not violent or not serious criminals. an increasing percentage our immigration convictions. secondly, the morton memo prioritize immigration obstructionist and with that he

prioritized for public safety threats as well as those with a prior deportation order. but we are seeing increasing numbers of reinstatement or answer the dhs make serious efforts to effectuate these priorities and within them the highest of their priorities. in practice they are increasingly deporting the least of the worst, so to speak. so these priorities will inevitably have human impact and inevitably drop all the scrutiny. now that said, i think these priorities are likely to remain through the obama administration and very likely into the next, particularly because it's getting harder for i.c.e. to accomplish interior removals for two main reasons. one is the impact of the immigration courts being underfunded. these enforcement funding increases have not been accompanied by commensurate court funding increases.

so the our record-breaking court backlog. average case now takes over a year an and a half to be procesd in immigration court. for removal numbers to stay steady year over year, if that was the goal, it would be almost practically impossible to do that without accomplishing more removals out of course. simply because they are quicker. tthrough nonjudicial removals it's possible to up in someone in fy 14 and remove them in fy '14 in a way that is not very likely in court. secondly, the impact of local noncompliance with i.c.e. enforcement is making it much harder for i.c.e. to accomplish interior removal in the same way. city counties and states across the nation are adopting noncompliance policy. rather remarkably. we are refusing to now turn over any person with a criminal charge to i.c.e. not even minor criminals, any criminal charge. this is now 250 counties across

the u.s. i.c.e. could respond to this by conducting raids in the same localities that have expressed this noncompliance. that might engender further opposition to the logical process. so for those reasons it's likely that the state of affairs mark described will remain over the next couple of years with enforcement shifted to the border. with the major exception of, depending on if the administration choose to provide some affirmative administered relief this fall which remains to be seen. so the further questions looking forward, one may be is congress getting what it wants as it finds enforcement and just dhs prioritizes its allocation of that funding? or put another way, as the picture becomes more clear to reports such as marx today, and apis work over the last couple of years, will the american public agree with the political branches decisions?

congress and the executive branch? after these two decades since 1996, very robust enforcement at high funding levels is becoming harder for dhs to draw a bright line between removing those with the least claims to stay in the united states, where the legal, equitable or moral, and exercising discretion over the most. as mark's is in the report from dhs lacks the capacity to precisely fine-tuned enforcement. but any law enforcement agency decide -- size would lack the capacity. as we look ahead, there's an unavoidable impact on those inside the border. the enforcement net remains wide and in some cases becomes whiter. but we have an unauthorized population with deeper ties. we have studies, academic studies that are showing programs such as security communities have little impact on u.s. crying. albeit impact on lawful

migration but little impact on u.s. crying. and boosting local political opposition to increased enforcement. so one of the questions is, is that if congressional funding remains constant at these levels, i think one is are there any policy choices that this administration or future one could make without impacting residents inside the united states? many have a vote. or another way of putting it is that the flat point going forward for change may be congress. the administration's decision to shift enforcement to the border may deflect some of that political criticism, but perhaps not all of it. and more broadly still, one of the question is as we look forward, with the political dynamics of immigration enforcement change as the political dynamics surrounding criminal justice have changed over the last years? for decades without a political consensus that has supported tough on crime policies.

recently that has changed. in a bipartisan way. we are senator cory booker and senator rand paul introducing bills on sentencing reform. we have a bipartisan house judiciary task force on over criminal session chaired by representative sensenbrenner. in the immigration ground there has not been the same sustained widespread opposition to harsh consequences for noncitizen minor criminals as there has been an a criminal justice world. but we see around the country that jurisdictions many with high immigrant populations are starting to fight with the trade-offs of expand immigration enforcement and starting to register opposition to the political process. now, i think one question is whether that local opposition will register at the federal level, and particularly in the appropriations process which may be fundamentally the main driver of the policies that this data

describes. and they didn't shifting resources to the border where enforcement is less visible in communities may deflect some of that criticism. it may not be that the same local opposition emerging at the local level in certain cities rises up to the federal level of communities registering their opposition in the appropriations process but that maybe with a last point is. last i thought i would mention a couple of words about detention that india has asked me to write. editing this is with robert who is a political scientist at university of maryland and director of the law and society program. it complements in the eyes work on deportation with data on detention, which is a substantial part of i.c.e.'s interior budget, $2 billion under provides similar granulated that allows us to

violate i.c.e.'s choices regarding detention. we gained this information through freedom of information act responses regarding i.c.e.'s new risk assessment tool. this is a computerized tool that evaluates life and public safety risk, whether to retain -- became another kind one using and 2013, with several hundred samples in baltimore. so using this data we can evaluate through -- who i.c.e. decides who to detain or not. we can see i.c.e.'s recommendations as to flight risk and public safety. we can see collective criminal history and a really groundbreaking fashion we can see personal history. this data records family time from when someone has a u.s. citizen spouse or child. whether someone has a stable address, whether someone has work authorization. it allows us to provide greater detail to tell some of the stories and even further detail i think and complement what mark has done.

for example, of those with criminal convictions, are the more stable and fat? even if they might have lesser claim to stay in the united states because they committed a crime during the time you're. did have a greater claim in another sense because of their long-standing family? and it will sell something also about the utility of mandatory detention laws because it will give us an one's own evaluation of the risks of people it a rest even though subject to mandatory detention. without i'd like to think doors and mark ayn rand again for having me here, and headed back to doris spent okay, thanks very much, mark. that was not purposeful but somewhat of a teaser for things to come. so will be continued of course be working on these kinds of issues and this work that mark is doing should be particularly interesting. we turn to q&a now and i'm going

come since we're streaming and recording i want to be sure that you wait until the mic comes to you. but when it does come to you, please give us her name and affiliation and ask your question. so i'm ready for hands. over here. >> and. [inaudible] spent some of the slides you put up did not appear to be in the report itself, and i'm just wondering if those will all be available, for example, on ndis website for reference purposes? and the other question that i have basically is is it anyway of knowing in terms of immigration offenses for deportation how many of those involve such things as alien smuggling as opposed to simply being in violation of

immigration law? >> i think we will post the powerpoint on the website so yes to your first question. a shortage to second question is also yes. that data is, i mean, that level of detail is in my data center i don't have the exact numbers in my head, but i can tell you that the overwhelming majority of immigration crimes are of illegal entry and illegal reentry. i got member if it's on the order of 85%, 90%, 95% but it's somewhere in that range. and the other, the other crimes that are included in the immigration crime category our document fraud and there's a smuggling offense in there, but the great majority of them are entry and reentry. so crossing the border. spent i saw a hand in the back.

yes. >> item from the southeast asian resource action center. the majority of people deported in our communities are originally refugees, cambodia, laos and vietnam, and a green card holders, usually to get in trouble with the law when they are teenagers or young adults. i'm wondering in any of the data center looking at including from the foia request, can you look at the impact of these enforcement regime on green card holders, maybe even those who originally entered as refugees? and in general, long time residents with legal status. >> so, we would not be able to see if it entered as refugees or not. i do, we do they feel on the data that is self-reported green card holder. ice asks people what your status and people and they have a green card. that's how it gets recorded.

it's not confirmed but we wouldn't expect that that number will be underreported if you would expect perhaps it's overreported them not underreported but we found surprisingly a green card holders in the data set. it was on the order of around 5000 a year out of around three or 400,000 removals a year. again, i apologize i don't have the exact numbers in my head but happy to fall u up with both the guilt and gives exact percentages, but it was a surprisingly, i was expecting to find a little bit bigger number than we found. and legally the reason that green card holders would be deportable is if they've committed a removable offense. and we did find that the people identified as green card holders have been, it was a very high correlation had been convicted of crimes that look like they would have been removable offenses. so we didn't find -- in the data

we did find evidence of green card holders being deported without being convicted of a crime. >> in our detention data set there's not is not a checkbox that mentions whether they were refugees. there is an assessment of special vulnerabilities, whether they're at risk of persecution. and there is not a checkbox for lpr status in that risk assessment, whether they should be is another question but there is not. there is a checkbox for work authorization, which may be related, although not exactly the same as green card status. >> okay. other hands? in the front. >> thank you. probably for both of you. one of the things you have looked at, there's been an increase, surprising increase of

nationals from caribbean countries, jamaica, dominican republic and on and on. is there any specific reason for the? the other thing is i wonder if you been able to correlate i.c.e. decanters with removals? and that's my part of the world you are doing right now. >> i didn't notice that trend. an intimate something we could look at their kids that something jumped out at me in looking coming spending a lot of time looking at these data, but it could certainly be there. you know, what comes out clearly in our data is within the interior that people convicted of a crime are a rising share of those interior removals. so i don't like that could've been part of the driver. i didn't really find another

interior trend that was obvious to me. and we unfortunately don't have container did in our data set but that is something we would be interested in looking at. >> let me just say one other thing, and you know, the i.c.e. eid data set in one of the other things were frustrated by in this data set -- enforcement integrated database, the main i.c.e. removal database, isn't designed to really track exactly a people flow into the system. so there's an arrest program listed, but a lot of those arrests are by the criminal alien program which is the biggest part of i.c.e.'s removal operation. and you can't see whether somebody came into the system because they were identified through secure committees are whether they were identified through one of caps prison-based

screening programs where the screen people post sentencing while they are incarcerated, on whether it's a captain because cap has task force is also. so you can't, the data don't give you clear information about sort of, that level of detail about and come including for example, whether a detainee was issued. >> at the american immigration council we're doing some research and found that actually gets at some of those questions mark answered, by which program someone came into the system whether it is caps or secure communities and that's something we're looking to do in the next several months. >> besides those causes you

think it's a to b. to read they are put in pretty, did you find any triggers probably in the past or any patterns in which we could start identifying some of these cases? and i was also going to ask you in regard to the border removals, are they also proportional to immigration patterns? is to anything we can identify five years ago -- is there anything we could identify five years ago that would be useful to understand them? >> i'm glad you asked that second question because your mind to something i was supposed to add to my comment and i forgot to, which is that the border removals are not predicted by apprehension. what i mean is that during the period that border removals have increased, apprehensions have been falling. the border patrol and dhs have at purposeful policy of placing a higher share of apprehensions

in formal removal. this is something we talked a lot about in our april report, but border removals are going up while border apprehensions are going down. what's driving that is an increasing share of apprehensions are being formally removed, rather than permitted to voluntarily return it to have in the past. so historically most people apprehended at the border us are put on the boxer put on the plane and sent home with sort of no additional consequences. there's been a systematic effort to instead increasingly formally removed people which makes them an illegal for a visa to come back. in many cases to charge them with illegal entry or illegal reentry which makes them convicted of you as part of potentially subject to jail time in the u.s. so that's been an enforcement strategy and that's really in the biggest driver of increased rentals at the border, then, despite falling apprehension neighbors. in the interior, you know, we

know that most people apprehended in the interior are identified through one of the criminal justice related programs can either through 28070 our secure committees or other programs. the effort of the i.c.e. field offices is to sort of prioritize and been convicted of a crime but also people have previously been deported into a lesser extent people who can't document how long they have been in the u.s. those are going to be the priorities. overall, we know that the unauthorized population in use has fallen by about 1 million since 2007. so the available pool of unauthorized immigrants is going down, which may be part of what's driving the interior numbers down. but the number of people passing through i.c.e.'s filter is going

up because of the implementation of secure committees the i.c.e. has access to larger and larger potential for simple and they're using it fairly selectively, particularly in the last couple of years. is what the data show. >> over here. >> thank you. matter graham from the bipartisan policy center. i've looked at similar data, maybe the same data set and one thing that struck me is that started in fiscal 2007, there substantial number of returns in the data. i think the code is voluntary return witness. on the order of 10%, sometimes more of the removals. so i was wondering, did you all

examine or notice this, and if so, what do you make of it? >> so i think i saw you sneak in late, and what i said before you got your is we exclude all those returns from our analysis. mostly in order to be able to look at a consistent trend. so it only focused on the removal. the reason that returns appear in the data set in 2007 is that prior to 2007 returned were not counted among the i.c.e. removals. i mean, it's not at the start increasing in 2007. it's that they were zero before 2007 and they represent about 10% of all i.c.e. deportations after 2007. that was an accounting rule that decision was made at the end of the bush administration to be can counting those witness returned as i.c.e. removals. so that's been a source of

confusion and, you know, among some the people looking at the data. the only cases that are included in i.c.e.'s data set are as you said, the witness returned. so they give somebody a voluntary return and can't confirm that that person actually deported, they don't get counted. but we decided to only focus on the removals. and i did look a little bit at the returns. the returns as you would've spent on less likely to been convicted of a crime. that's the main thing i can do about the returns is about, i mean, they appear to be consistent with i.c.e.'s discretion rules, that they appear to be the lower priority cases. as you said it's about 10% of the cases, so we were more interested in having the trend over time than complicating the analysis. >> anymore than it already is. >> yeah. >> right there. >> hi.

i'm wondering if the data that you have at your disposal, does it have details on where they come from, which particular region in the country? and whether the analysis takes into account people coming from a particular part of the country, and how then this information is relayed to the region back to the country? thank you. >> we have data about where people came from, what country they came from but only at the national level, not come get it, we have their citizenship and birth countries, and we have data on the board of exit, where they deported through but we don't have data on where they were apprehended, other than by program, by cdp versus i.c.e. -- cbp. for more detailed data about where they came from.

but something we be very interested in is being able to disaggregate within the u.s. about where people are being apprehended. but obviously dhs has that data but we don't have the data. >> i take it is her question is where they originated, which state in mexico, which region and guatemala? is that what you're getting at? >> within mexico or guatemala there might be certain for regions. and if that's the case, how is the dialogue between -- it's not just sending them and hoping that the problem will be resolved. the problem is not going to the but is there a two-way dialogue at the political level to say these are people coming from a specific coastal area are down by area or area where there are drugs or whatever, what sort of policies can you put in place to contain? >> i can tell you that, you

know, with respect to mexico, most people are repatriated to the closest port of entry. there is a program. you choose to become just a program called the mexico interior repatriation program. the new program is called the interior repatriation initiative, which does involve bipartisan -- by national coordination through which certain mexicans are deported by air back to mexico city and then i bus back to their hometown. it's a pretty small share of total removal. item in exactly how many the iri as. it's small. it's in the few thousands, tens of thousands. [inaudible] >> matt has a program where we find job opportunities people that are being repatriated in mexico. we have statistics of the cities that they're going to. and, of course, those troubled

areas are where most of the people are going through. we would be more than happy to post something about on our website. i will try to make sure it is up by tomorrow. i will by monday. >> can i add one thing to the previous point that mark was making about sort of where aliens who identified for removal are removed from? in our report, and again is just focused on the secure commits program which is a small population, but we actually include a map that shows data by state on the arrest locations of aliens who identified for removal to the secure communities program for the time period we studied its of anybody's interested in the data on state-by-state basis, again just as relates to secure communities we do include some of the information in our report as well. i just wanted to add that. >> others? in the front.

>> i am from safe foundation. a couple of questions. one is the term reinstatement and if you could explain that, what is. and the second one is, those mentioned there some counties which refused to cooperate, i don't know, nowadays they don't use the term ins, so i.c.e., and what the reasons could be. and 30 come you didn't focus on the prison conditions without the immigrant population held by i.c.e. and what was the reason for that? >> so i'll try to answer those and then if others want to also add their answers. so i reinstatement is a noncitizen who has been previously formally removed,

who's been subject to removal order because a judge ordered them removed or because they were apprehended at the board and formally removed. if there subsequently apprehended again within the united states, then dhs can reinstate the removal order, turn it back on and formally remove them again without any opportunity to appear before a judge, or to petition for relief to make a case that if equities that would allow them to stay in the united states. in terms of why some communities are opting out of secure communities, this has been sort of a long story. when secure communities was first rolled out it was% as a voluntary program that i negotiated agreements with states to include them in it. later, i.c.e. decided that they did need to have an agreement from some localities because the heart of secure communities is communication between i.c.e.

and, between dhs and the department of justice to share federal information, and then when dhs determines that the removable immigrant has been arrested, the local i.c.e. field office can request that the arresting agency holds the person for i.c.e. to pick them up. some communities don't want to participate in that because, i guess there are two main reasons. one reason is there are concerns they don't get reimbursed to hold people, so there's fiscal, you know, it costs money for local jurisdictions to hold people for i.c.e. but i think the more fundamental reason is that there are concerns that the program is being used to hold and to deport people who aren't public safety risks. and so this has an impact on the local immigrant communities. it trains relations -- strains. so law-enforcement officers to want to do community policing has a hard time with immigrant

communities that they're deporting members of those communities who may not be viewed as a priority. so i think those are sort of the two main concerns is the cost and impact on communities, and concerns that the program is not fine-tuned to only focus on high priority cases. and then, i don't know them to others want to add and i can say something about detention also. >> i would say your request -- with question regarding detention retention. gao has issued two reports related to immigration detention standards issue. were issued our report last year about how i.c.e. addresses sexual abuse and assault in immigration detention facility. last week we issued a report looking at how i.c.e. manages detention facility costs and

standards. and so those reports are available on our website. i'm happy to discuss findings if anyone has any questions, but we have done some work looking at issues related to standard in immigration detention faciliti facilities. >> and we have a report also at the american immigration council. i think mark summarized it very well. >> hi. i'm brenda. in terms of removal of mexicans, you've mentioned the iri, also the repatriations who are the closest port of entry and there's a so-so data, the aliens transferred program. i was wondering what they did look into recidivism rates and whether there is a link in between recidivism on these three different ways of removing mexicans? thank you.

>> so we don't do that in this report. i mean, that's something that cbp has been looking, you know, systematically at. so cbp through its consequence delivery system tax recidivism rates just at the border, not people are apprehendapprehend ed in the u.s., within the u.s. and is able to describe recidivism for people who are voluntary return, people who are formally removed after appearing before a judge or through reinstatement or expedited removal, and also looking at tasha i guess also at back when they had the interior repatriation rate. and they found, and also people who face criminal charges. i mean, generally what they found is that people are formally removed have lower recidivism rates that people are voluntary return. people who face criminal charges

have lower recidivism rates that people are just a formal removal. i do think they've published any of those data, but some of the state have been published. i know there's a congressional research service report that came out in 2013 that i did my work at the crs that has some of those, the day that cbp made available at the time. it doesn't appear in the data to have disappeared to reduce recidivism rates. it's a little confusing to look at it because it's always combined with some other removal strategy. but i think that it is somewhat controversial partly because of that reason and also because the human cost can be pretty high because people get deported back to a committee with the don't have the connection and so it's a controversial program. >> so for purpose of

understanding, describe that? >> that is the alien transfer exit program and that's a program, so normally mixing, unauthorized mexicans or removal of mexicans are deported back to the closest port of entry to under atep their intentionally put on a bus it's a people apprehended in arizona may be deported through taxes or through arizona. the effort is to disrupt the smuggling networks and to make it more difficult for people to reenter. because typically people are deported back to the closest port of entry may reconnect with the smuggler who help them enter coverage is generally they be able to attempt reentry were easily than somebody who's deported far away. so that's what atep is designed to do. it's an expensive program to send people to different parts of the country and immigrant rights groups have argued i think convincingly that it really creates difficult circumstances for people who may be deported, to hide that fact

to high crime communities and they may lose their documents and/or not have money when they arrived, and so there's some real vulnerabilities that result from atep. so it's a controversial program i think for that reason. spent in the front. >> thank you. i have to question. the first one for marc rosenblum. just wanted to drill down a little bit more on your final paragraph in your executive summary to any proposed changes to the enforcement priorities would result in a modest reduction in overall removals. would that make any difference if the administration extended the priorities and prosecutorial discretion guidance to cbp? >> yes. i mean, some modest is not a very precise word. i think it's not hard to describe a scenario where you could see removals go down by 10 or 15% or maybe close to 20% to some of the center as we described your but certainly cbp

has, as we described in our last report there's been a sea change in cbp does enforcement just over the last less than 10 years from mostly voluntary returns to overwhelmingly formal removals. i mean, if what you are talk of specific is removing formal removals, you could reduce that substantially if he decided to go back to an era where you'll voluntary return most people. which may or may not be governed by, which you may i may not choose to try to enforcement priorities. but having said that, the data do suggest that the great majority of people that cbp apprehends, they apprehend within three days and especially within two weeks of entry. so people apprehended within two weeks of entry are going to be viewed as a top enforcement priority, then, that's most of what cbp does.

>> thank you very much. the second question is for mark and for doors. market, when you were saying that congressional spending and appropriation is a primary driver of the deportation system and doris, i was one if you could comment on that given your years as former ins commissioner, whether or not the actual congressional appropriations really has made the exercise of prosecutorial discretion much more limited, and i want to kind of push one premise here in that. i want us to question whether, you know, a certain amount of congressional spending necessary means that that has to be 400,000 removals per year. because that answer within the way the administration has pursued the removals, but at the same time internally we know that many are trying to push for qualitative removal as opposed to quantitative removals and is

wanting if you could speak to that a little more? >> is definitely a debate and it's definitely a discussion, both externally and i think within the executive branch. you know, and executive, in any agency that gets money from congress as a certain degree of electability and how that spending takes place, but that is very, i mean, you know as an agency when the congress is trying to give you money generally for carrying out a mission, and when it is very specifically targeted. and it's really, you are at your peril win, with appropriators, having the discussions that go on between appropriators and administrators, and administered accidentally from what it is

that congress intends. now, it is certainly true that dhs has interpreted the funding for detention and deportation as quantitative. that's also because it's been very clear that that's what the appropriator asking for. so i don't think that, i mean, i think that the executive branch has some good advice in particular, last you the deportation numbers fell to think about 382000, something like that. now this year they are back up to some 430,000. so there certainly is a vast degree of fluctuation which has not caused, you know, a huge problem for the executive branch. but at the same time congress expects that money to be used for detention and deportation, and administrators within i.c.e.

and dhs probably have a little bit of moving room with that but they would not in wholesale fashion ignored what it is that's in that appropriations language, i think. so the funding is a very important driver. >> do you want to let anybody make final comments? >> i will get to that. are there any other final questions from the audience? okay. any final comments anybody would like to make? >> you haven't had enough airtime? >> i have had enough air time. >> we want to thank you all for coming. we do somewhat apologize for the density of this information but not truly because this is really very important research, and the numbers tell us a great deal. and so we are thankful for your

attention. i do want to make an announcement about a future event, which is next tuesday. we have the annual immigration law and policy conference which ndi does in collaboration with center for migration studies in new york and clinic as well as georgetown law center. it's on tuesday at georgetown law center. we have a very, very substantive lineup of panels for this year, very, very good speakers, very topical subject. so the flyer is on your chairs. registration closes on friday so we hope to see you all there next week. and with that let me close this and invite people to come forward with any further conversation if you want to carry on a conversation. thank you very much. [applause] [inaudible conversations]

>> and [inaudible conversations]

as this even come comes to clotr remind you can watch it again any time later on our website. go to c-span.org. dr. tom frieden, director for the cdc, and dr. anthony fauci, institute vegetable to side for house subcommittee today on the u.s. response to the ebola virus. live coverage gets underway at noon eastern on c-span. we invite your comments on facebook and twitter. here's what president obama had to say yesterday following an urgent to our white house meeting on people with cabinet members. >> is everybody set up rocks obviously the news is been dominated by the diagnosis of a second health care worker in dallas with ebola. and in light of this second case, i thought it was very important for me to bring together our team, including our cdc director, tom frieden, to directly from them in terms of how we're ramping up our efforts

here. obviously, come initially, we want to express concern for the two health workers who have been affected. our nurses and our health care workers are out a vital to the health and well being of our families. they sacrifice for us all the time. not just in this case but in the case of other illnesses that affect us. they are selfless. ..

is diagnosed with ebola we want a rapid response team from the cdc to be on the ground as quickly as possible, hopefully within 24 hours so that they are taking the local hospitals step-by-step through exactly what needs to be done and making sure that all the protocols are used and the use that use of protective equipment is done effectively and disposal of that protective equipment is done properly. the key thing to understand about this disease is that these

protocols -- we know that because they have been used for decades now in ebola cases around the world including those that were treated at emory and in nebraska. if they are done properly, they work and we have to make sure that understandably a certain number of hospitals may not have that experience are walked through that process as carefully as possible and we have to make sure that the rapid response team can do that. in addition, we are reviewing every step of what has happened since mr. duncan was brought into the hospital so we understand where some of the problems may have occurred and during a inventory all of the workers that had contact with mr. duncan including those who engaged in some of the testing

that took place. we are now communicating all of these various licensed hospitals, clinics, first responders around the country and others getting all of the attention that this has received we are going to make sure that that provision of information is constant, ongoing and being updated on a real-time basis. in addition, we are working very closely with the mayor of dallas, governor of texas and others to make sure that in the event of any other cases arise from these health workers that they are properly cared for in a way that is consistent with public safety. i know that people are concerned about the fact that a second health-care worker had traveled. here's what we know about ebola. it is not like the flu. it is not airborne.

the only way that a person can contract ebola is by coming into direct direct direct contract with direct contact with bodily fluids of someone who is showing symptoms. in other words, if they don't have symptoms, they are not contagious. what we are able to do, however, is do what is called contact tracing so that anybody who may have had contact with someone, even if it was incidental contact and they were not showing symptoms, being able to identify who those individuals are and make sure that they are then going to be monitored in a way that allows us to make certain that the disease doesn't spread further and that is currently taking place in an aggressive process conducted by the cdc, hhs and the rest of our teams. i want to use myself as an example so that people have a sense of the science.

i shook hands with, hugged and kissed not doctors but a couple of the nurses at emory because of the valiant work that they did in treating one of the patients. they followed the protocols, they knew what they were doing, and i felt perfectly safe doing so. so this is not a situation in which like the flu the risks of a rapid spread of the disease are eminent. if we do these particles properly, if we follow the steps, if we get the information out, then the likelihood of widespread ebola outbreaks in this country are very, very low. but i think what we've all learned over the last several weeks is that folks here in this country and a lot of non- specialized hospitals and

clinics don't have that much experience dealing with these issues and so we are going to have to put this information as aggressively as possible and that the instructions that i provided to my team. just a couple other points. you know, we are going to be monitoring carefully the health status of the other healthcare workers in dallas, and obviously they are concerned. we understand many of them are scared, and we are going to make sure that we are on the ground 24/mexican to provide them the kind of support coming information and assurances they need to get through this particular challenge. finally, we are going to be continually examining the screening processes at airports and making sure that in the event that we have additional cases that involve the need for transporting those patients to specialized hospitals that those teams are in place and

facilities are in place and we will make sure that on a day-to-day basis we provide the public all of the information they need on any updates about what has happened not just in dallas but what is being done across the country. i will end with this point, we are going to have to make sure that we do not lose sight of the importance of the international response to what is taking place. i am absolutely confident that we can prevent a serious outbreak of the disease here in the united states, but it becomes more difficult to do so if this epidemic of ebola rages out of control. if it does, then it will spread globally in the age of frequent

travel and the kind of constant interactions people have across borders. so it's very important for us to understand the investment that we make in helping liberia, sierra leone deal with this problem is an investment in our own public health. this is not simply charity, although obviously it's important that america take the lead in the humanitarian crisis that's taking place there. it's also publicly the single most important thing that we can do to prevent a more serious ebola outbreak in this country making sure that we get what is a raging epidemic right now in west africa under control. so for that reason last night i had a call with the prime minister of japan to solicit greater support for the international effort. this morning i spoke with the chancellor in germany and france

as well as david cameron, the prime ministers of great britain to make sure that we are coordinating our efforts and that we are putting in a lot more resources that so far the international community has put into the process. so, bottom line in terms of the public, i want people to understand the dangers of you contracting ebola and the danger of a serious outbreak are extraordinarily low, but we are taking this very seriously at the highest levels of government. and we are going to be able to manage this particular situation, but we have to look towards the future and if we are not responding internationally in an effective way and we do not have the kind of preparedness and training in our

public health infrastructure in the united states but just for the celtics future outbreaks so in the meantime i want everybody to be thinking about and praying for the workers that have gotten sick. those are also treated a patient with compassion and care we just want to say thank you to them. we are going to be doing everything we can to make sure that they are properly cared for. thank you very much everybody.an

>> host: can you tell us about today's activities at the whitet house and what his plan to u.s.? specifically w hen it comes to the monitoring ebola in the u.s.? >> guest: what we know is the president canceled a trip toot rhode island and that's because. the president doesn't often cancel trips he did so yesterday and he did so today. exactly what he's going to do o today will become apparent in the next few hours, but it's the kind of underscores the host: president has canceled his travels for the second day in a row.t >> host: from the cabinet did meeting yesterday, what wererect thes and first and foremost committed the cdc director frieden come up in these discussions? >> guest: while, he was in on the call, he was in the meetings and, you know, what kind of came out of it is that the white house is doing a very delicate balance. as you said they are going to be reviewing everything that happens with dallas, but on the

other hand they are trying to assure the public that the risk of a widespread outbreak is very, very low, and the president held himself up as an example saying that when he was in atlanta a few weeks ago, he hugged and kissed the nurses that worked with the ebola patients and felt perfectly safe doing so because they took all of the necessary precautions while treating those patients. so, you know, they talked about the protocols. they talked about the fact that they need to really take lessons learned and go from there. >> host: as far as more pressure on the cdc to handle this matter, did you sense that from the cabinet hearing? >> guest: well, you know, from what the president said, they are sending swat teams out when there are additional cases because there probably will be additional ones. the cdc has been directed to send this to the rapid response team as quickly as possible to help local hospitals go through

protocols and do things in a way that will try to ensure that the disease -- the virus doesn't spread further. >> host: what about the political undertones? there've been calls by some in congress to remove the head of the cdc and some have called for a travel ban. how does the white house take those recommendations? >> guest: well, i think they are focusing right now on the cdc response. yes, speaker governor speaker governor came out yesterday and called for a travel ban and a high profile member called out to do so. but it is growing for that. there has been more and more lawmakers have called for a travel ban. two countries -- there have been some lawmakers have called for the resignation of the cdc director frieden. so, that is definitely growing and will likely do so in the next few days as well. >> host:, events canceled yesterday, today.

has the white house indicated other events might be canceled as well? >> guest: no. as far as we know, the president was supposed to travel to rhode island and give a speech on the economy today and then go to long island in new york to fund raise. those events are canceled. as far as we know, that is all we know right now in terms of events being canceled. yesterday he was supposed to go to new jersey for a democratic fund raiser, and then fly to connecticut for two rallies for connecticut's governor who is embroiled in a very, very tough three election race. that has been postponed because he supposed to go back to connecticut at some point unclear when he will do so. >> host: is there any indication the president might address that president might address the concern directly in the speech to address the republican as far as this matter is concerned is there anything along those lines on the white house? >> guest: we do not know at this point whether he will or he won't created that is something that will definitely be walking very close.

>> host: katie zezima with the "washington post" white house reporter talking about the white house response to ebola. there's a story on the "washington post" website. katie zezima, thank you. >> guest: thank you. >> again, the hearing on ebola set for noon, at a 45 minutes from now. we learned about the meeting -- about the hearing 20 members of congress will attempt to hear from director tom frieden and doctor fauci of the infectious diseases. c-span will have the hearing started with your comments in reaction to the response to ebola beginning at about 11:30, 15 minutes from now and the hearing starting at noon eastern over on c-span. ebola may be addressed by the head of the total aviation administration i go in his response today at the aero club of washington. live coverage coming up on:10 eastern on c-span2. ahead of the house hearing house speaker john boehner released a statement on travel and it says

in part the temporary ban on travel to the united states from countries of the good with the virus is something the president should absolutely consider along with any other appropriate action as the doubt in the security of the air travel systems grow. in a statement from the chair of the house foreign affairs committee ed royce urging secretary of state john kerry to suspend issuance of visas and three ebola affected countries. given the critical need to contain the disease at its source. i was surprised the department of state has not already exercised its authority to suspend the service which is standard procedure in countries experiencing a major security description. this would be a prudent measure, again, from the foreign affairs committee chair ed royce of california. we plan to bring you a pentagon briefing on the -- pentagon briefing response to ebola. that is set for noon eastern here on c-span2. in the meantime, a portion of this morning's washington journal previewing today's congressional hearing on ebola. >> host: joining us now,

suzanne ferrechio, the chief congressional correspondent. good morning. there is a hearing today on the ebola crisis. what are the legislators want to learn? >> guest: i think we are going to see lawmakers do a couple of things. first they want to show that they are getting involved and they are not just sitting back and doing nothing when it looks that the public is becoming increasingly concerned about ebola in the united states. so this is the energy and commerce committee. they will be interviewing people from the cdc about what they are doing to try to control this. and i think what we are going to hear is what we've already heard a lot from the cdc the past few days about the protocols they want to put in place, increased staffing at hospitals where there are ebola patients and additional efforts to keep healthcare workers protected. and i also think you're going to hear a lot of talk about how the virus has passed or is not passed and whether or not there should be a travel ban, whether

or not there should be other methods of quarantining people that come from other entries affected by ebola. all of these will be part of the discussion. you have to go through each lawmaker. they all have questions and they are getting questions from people back in their district calling them up and saying what's going on. just listen to the calls. that's what they are hearing, too. so they want to get these answers from the cdc and other experts to find out what should we be doing here. congress is out of session and won't be back until november 12 through its important for them to look like the congress with a low approval rating they don't want to look like they are just sitting back on their heels and letting all this happening. congress wants to get involved and the hearing is the way to do it. they get the call in the administration, get them in front of them at the table and asking a lot of questions and that's what we are going to hear today. >> host: so that men in the hot seat is tom frieden. >> guest: tom frieden, director of the cdc, he's been there since 200938 he's been

relatively low-key. you don't hear much about the cdc until something like this happen. i think we will hear this again and explained the new protocols that we announced earlier this week to protect healthcare workers and limit or stop the spread of the healthcare workers and treatable patients i think you will hear him talk about regrets about the way the initial case was handled in dallas and about not having the cdc staff on the ground more quickly and in greater numbers. i think you're going to hear him talk about whatever shortcomings they think have happened in the first case versus what they are doing now to deal with the healthcare workers that have been by a ghost and also about these interesting isolation hospitals and places they can treat patients with contagious diseases and specialized units in the united states. one of them is at emory university they worked yesterday to treat her at at the hospital and i think you will hear them talk more about this in the

possibility of using the hospitals more. if there are additional cases diagnosed in the coming days, i think it's going to be a big part of it. you will hear him talk about a travel ban. we've already heard the cdc directors say he's not a big fan of the child and. in fact he thinks it will do some harm. a lot of people disagree. so there's likely to be back and forth with him and lawmakers who disagree about whether or not there should be banned. >> host: we heard from some lawmakers already calling for the ouster. what is the likelihood that you'll hear that today? >> guest: you may hear that. there've been a few people calling for that. it's not a big avalanche of people calling for the resignations. i know pete sessions of texas has called for the resignation. he is a relatively high-ranking official in the house. so, a few others have as well talk about that because they feel like the cdc didn't act quickly enough to begin with.

he will be criticized and people will question what he is doing but i think it's another chance at this point. i don't feel like it's the end of the line to get this under control. of course that could change if in the course of the day we hear about another diagnosis and the healthcare worker that boarded a plane there could be more some lawmakers are expressing about why the cdc didn't take more action to make sure these healthcare workers were not moving around during the period they might be contagious. >> host: that hearing is at noon today featuring cdc director and others. watch it on c-span, listen to it

on c-span radio and for more information, c-span.org. other guests joining to talk about the congressional response in the white house response to the ebola outbreaks in the united states. to 025-85-3881 republican, (202)585-3880, and (202)585-3882 for independence. susan ferrechio is the chief congressional correspondent. the first call from donald, democrats line. go ahead. you're on. >> caller: good morning. i think everybody needs to look at this as a national crisis" making it political. this is a disease that can touch any and all of us and we must work together to put politics aside and work as americans and come together as a whole. the nation needs us to come together together and this is a time that we must come together. we have to stop this foolishness. the second point is, i heard

them talk about the independent of each other and what happened to the waste in the treatment plant for those people that are working in the treatment plants how are they working and is anybody looking at the water treatment plant saying when this comes to we have to look at the water system because it is interdependent. we are looking at that down the road. >> guest: contesting the caller mentioned politics. politics is part of this now. congress is not in session but here we are a couple weeks out from the big midterm election two were three weeks away. it's important for everybody to position themselves. i think the caller is right. politics is certainly being

injected into this by everybody. the president wants to look like he's being authoritative on this and congress, the same. republicans would love to paint democrats as not doing a good enough job handling the crisis being in charge of the administration and the cdc. you will see some of that going on as well. but i think even in this case the politics will take a little bit of a backseat to the urgency that everyone feels in trying to find a way to address something like this quickly. so, that is a great fight the caller made. the person that wrote the airplane also took public transportation to get to the airplane. all these questions it sort of underscores the difficulty with a disease like this and it can spread and exponentially very quickly that is something we will hear it discussed at the

hearing. >> host: antonio next on the dependent line. >> caller: hello. how is it going? earlier the gentleman was putting a ban on the republicans, throwing into the politics. and as mentioned about the secretary-general is was an obvious question what would the general do now and i think the general good and just coordinate a response here but he would also be able to coordinate a response to the public with information. now we have a bunch of people not really knowing what to worry about, just fearing for something that they don't have very much information on. i think that that's where the surgeon general will come in very handy at this moment. and i do have to blame in action and dysfunction in congress which has been brought up by the waiver. just for the person that handles this might be tom frieden.

he's an infectious disease specialist. he got his start trading are closest in the new york city where it was a huge problem he hoped to get it under control. he has vast experience dealing with controlling outbreaks. and i think that's one of the reasons you're not going to see an immediate call for him to step down, not yet. because he probably isn't the best position to figure out a way to get this under control but only here are also in africa which i think the point that he's made repeatedly is the best way to control this here is to stop the outbreak in africa because if you don't do that it's going to spread around the continent and it might be impossible to keep people out of the united states who might be -- who might have caused the disease. the surgeon general it's true we don't have an acting surgeon general. and the surgeon general normally isn't super visible. they are more like coming you're right, a public space is held

for the united states. and it's certainly underscores this idea that there should be some kind of a bar or somebody in charge of this going forward. and i think that you will hear discussions about that as well if this disease becomes a larger issue. >> host: we see the ads about the cuts that the republicans have made and it's featured when it comes to the issues we have seen a reaction from the speaker john boehner that send out a message saying that congress has allocated more money for the disease. who is right on this? >> guest: they are both right and i'm not just trying to be diplomatic. across the board and the government because of an agreement that was bipartisan to reduce the government spending everybody took a cut on that including the cdc. they've got about a

7 billion-dollar budget. they are not underfunded by any means. i think that they have additional money to deal with ebola but the democrats are right that many government agencies lost staffing and lost money including other parts of the government because of this thing that we call the sequester that they are trying to undo right now. they've got additional money to deal with this. i suspect there might be more money coming when congress gets back depending on how this is going. now don't forget that we are also sending the troops to africa to help combat the source about 4,000 troops to read its not as though the government isn't spending money on this. so for the democrats to make that claim, that's probably not true. >> host: bobby on the democrats line. hello.

>> guest: >> caller: i have a question. i called c-span a few weeks ago and someone called in and said the united states had invented the ebola virus and i see that the cdc did invent some type of a strain of ebola in 2010. why would you invent a disease and not come up for a cure as well so that if it ever gets spread outside of the laboratory that you would be able to take care of it without having to find a cure for it. that's the question why would you invent a disease? >> guest: thinking about the origins which come from africa monkeys in africa with the disease originated from and then eventually spread to humans.

it's possible the cdc would try to replicate a disease to figure out how to find a vaccine. certainly, there is storage of disease that has been controversial. smallpox and anthrax. there've been cases where the lab workers have been accidentally exposed to the disease and it's been less. so there have been some questions about the handling of the diseases, but i think what they think what they do is try to figure out a way to come up with vaccines, and that's why they have the diseases at the cdc to find a way to stop people from catching them. >> host: you are on. go ahead. >> caller: [inaudible]

>> guest: i have heard of people expressed fears about the outcome of that it's worrisome and that it might be the hardest virus or any virus or anthrax when it was sent to the capital it's always a fear of that to be able to get a hold of the virus and somehow spread it around. it's definitely something that i think people on capitol hill are talking about and thinking about. i don't know what plans they have to stop them from happening but it's definitely something people are talking about. >> host: you talked about the midterm. how much talk and debate issues -- how much of that will become?

>> guest: it's funny how we have what they called this october surprise. something comes along right before an election and is utterly dominates the news and the talk on the campaign trail. this will be part of it i think. and each side will try to use it to their advantage. the republicans, while the obama administration why are they handling this differently and the democrats will say the opposite. it's going to be part of the discussion. there was a poll that came out where two thirds of the respondents said that they were concerned about this. what's going to happen with ebola in our country. whether it will spread here. so, it's dominating the news and therefore it will be talked about on the campaign trail. when people go to vote is that what they are going to be thinking about? i think still the economy is an issue that the voters are going to have on their mind when they going to cast ballots and foreign policies and our actions bear with the islamic terrorist state.

so, those things i think are the one and two dominant issues right now. but it's hard to know how something like this will fit in and we have a few weeks left. the cdc cannot bear steering this in the right direction. no more outbreaks created no more people coming into the country. we have a couple more people. things don't look like they are under control. this won't help the democrats because we have a democrat in the white white house and people naturally blame the president because he is the one in charge. >> host: next from south dakota uri with susan ferrechio of the washington examiner. good morning. you are on. >> caller: yes, good morning. thank you for taking my call. how is it that if something comes to texas [inaudible]

they said he tested his friend in africa and he caught it and when he came over here with his friends and his family and they never got it how is it transmitted and how could that happen? >> guest: i came to understand it by listening to tom frieden explain it. it sounds like it spreads the easiest when the person is quite ill and having vomiting and other problems that spread the disease more easily. if you are just sitting there and you have a fever, you're not bleeding them you're not throwing out, spreading it isn't necessarily going to happen. these nurses caught the disease from handling the matter that

duncan was producing vital she was very sick. that's how are looking at the transmission at this point. as someone with a fever that is into sneezing, coughing or even sneezing which they see isn't necessarily going to spread about not but not having big problems is not going to spread the disease. and i think that is why his family didn't catch it, but the health care workers did catch it. >> host: next call james, democrats line. you are on. >> caller: thank you for taking my call. a little over a month ago when the health care providers that were in africa contracted this i called c-span for the first time and registered my opposition and said why would they bring the people to this country and expose over 300 million human beings to this deadly disease when they could have treated those folks over there. in a situation with mr. duncan

you will never convince me that putting a temperature device at someone's face is face as it is to appease my fears and anger about keeping the door open and allowing these people to come here when every time you do it the exposed breast of the population to death. they don't care anything about your political persuasion. the >> guest: was interesting listening to the callers. some people individually the administration will pose a travel ban if things don't get under control in a sierra leone where the disease is spreading particularly quickly. i don't know what they will do. it's hard to say whether they will succumb to this and stop people from coming to the country. it's very controversial if they do. you heard last night the house

speaker said he wanted the president to consider a travel ban from the three nations in western africa. so it's out there and i think it's possible that it will happen. i'm not 100% sure that it will but hearing the public talk about this it's interesting hearing the polls and things. sometimes that will influence the administration to take action. >> host: as far as the director tom frieden, has president obama indicated confidence in him, concerns about him, what has been said about him? >> guest: he's been particularly neutral about him, which i thought was interesting. he didn't come out and say i have complete confidence. the administration said they thought that the cdc had exhibited some shortcomings at the start of the crisis in dallas and they feel that things need to change. so i think that is suggestive of

the president sending out a warning signal to the cdc. like we don't like how this has gone so far. we are going to watch and see if you can straighten things out. that's the impression i get right now that he is a little bit on probation )-right-paren watching what he's doing and they want to see how things get handled moving forward at this point. >> host: the president canceled events yesterday and today over this concert. do you see the trend continuing? >> guest: it's good because we're that close to an election and the public which could sour on the idea of the commander-in-chief disappearing on the campaign trail to raise money instead of being here in washington dealing with a health crisis the administration can be responsive to that. however if days go by and they seem to be under control again, no more outbreaks, the health

care workers are improving, no more spread among the 125 odd people who are considered most at risk i think we will see them back out there. that's also an important factor for the democrats as we head into november 4. >> host: the chief congressional correspondent we are talking about the congressional and white house response to ebola and taking questions about their efforts. philadelphia pennsylvania republican line. you are up next. >> caller: the own without the department of health has more say-so in what's going on in texas. why is he in europe right now and he should be out there every day getting updates? no one has taken him to task, no one has taken the local department of health. it seems like the media isn't

asking them the questions. the cdc only gives recommendations and it's up to the hospitals and the local department of health to follow them. i think there need to be more people held responsible other than just bartok obama and the cdc. >> guest: two good points there. rick perry the governor of texas is returning to the united states immediately. my belief he has cut short his tour. that is supposed to be his attempts to attempt to burn the issues and foreign policy expertise as he's a potential 2016 republican presidential candidate. he stopped the tour and he's coming back to texas he announced so i think we will be hearing from him soon and i can almostuarantee he will be out in front of the camera talking about this. the second thing that's an important point is who is really responsible for dealing with the ebola crisis and i've heard this repeatedly from officials and non- officials and medical

experts who say this is at the local health departments primarily in charge of this and the texas department of health, the hospital where the patients are being treated, they need to be the first line of defense against this. i pray a lot of people say this and so you have a split right now where does this idea that health department is supposed to be doing more to deal with this come yet people are also wondering while shipping to the cdc be stepping in to control all of it and i think that we are seeing a little bit with its transition right now where the cdc is getting more involved. first they treated the way the other epidemics are leading the local health department take the initiative. that didn't work so now they are going to put their team in so you will have a lot of cooks in the kitchen which could be another problem. but the cdc has kind of taken charge at this point over the

last local health department in texas. >> host: the biocontainment unit and bethesda maryland, omaha and montana were part of the discussions going forward especially about the money to open up more of the containment. >> guest: i think so. one of the questions yesterday i thought one of the more interesting questions during the conference call with exactly are they going to do if they have more patience than isolation units? that is a question they will be facing. so the answer was moving the second health-care worker who was diagnosed early this week to the emory university isolation unit. what are the different capacities at the institution for how many people can be put there? it's a huge question they are

very expensive and they take a while to put together. are we able to handle the widespread? that's one of the problems there is no way to isolate the patients. again i can almost guarantee on capitol hill today. >> host: good morning from pennsylvania, democrats line. >> caller: yes, thank you for taking my call. i want to know how you figured the cdc didn't drop the ball when they tell you that health care workers taking care they were going to watch every day and take their temperatures every day and the woman was allowed to leave the state and get on the plane and they didn't know she was leaving the state and that was a particle to keep her there they were supposed to be watching her every day and if they are lying to you about that they are lying about the way the disease is spread and how you are in contact because they are dressed up like the michelin man

they initially declared that the healthcare worker health-care worker is 75 or so that had direct contact with duncan the original patient and do self-monitoring, take their own temperatures, isolate themselves, make sure that they were not developing symptoms of the disease and of course both still have contact with others and went off on an airplane with a temperature of 99.9 degrees and i think because of that now we hear the cdc say that they are taking a tough stance on this and they are prohibiting travel by any of the 70 or so people they are monitoring right now. so, the cdc has gotten tougher as the days have gone by and this thing has spread a little bit.

the question you asked is a lot of questions asked. the nurses were certainly wearing protective gear that there's a question about whether they put the gear on the wrong way or when they took it off it made it easier to we heard the nurses units talk about the lack of protocol and lack of training and oversight and all kinds of various shortages for how they were monitored in terms of dealing with the transmissibility of the virus. the cdc responded yesterday by saying we are putting our own people to monitor every step of the laser that there aren't any more questions or gaps in how people are protected in how the health-care workers are protected. is it, going forward, now we should see this not spread because they are there to make sure that if there were gaps in how people are protected, now they are not going to be because they are going to be there with their experts making sure that

people are putting the gear on properly, taking it off properly in handling the patients properly. >> host: is there a single person at the white house overseeing all of these agencies in responding to this event? >> guest: that would be sylvia mathews burwell that oversees the cdc. she has been a politically quiet. she was on a conference call with reporters yesterday and said very little other than that they were coordinating with homeland security and showing that shoring that the nation was kept safe from the spread of ebola. she pretty much handed over to the cdc director in terms of how they were going to try to control the spread of the disease here. so there has been some call by other officials saying let's create a position to have somebody oversee all of this and there's been some discussion of that. so far we haven't appointed

anybody to the position that that position but that could change. >> host: cleveland ohio. >> caller: i think we need to close our borders. we can't just ban people from west africa because they might go to another country and then take a plane to the united states. we should close our borders and we already had an incident here in ohio so all of us are worried here. they are starting to get the job done so their job done so i'm not going to put them down but i do think we need to close our borders. we can't let anybody over here just like this man came over here in the first place, he went to west africa to visit and then comes back. >> host: are you still there? >> caller: yes. >> host: what is your level of

worry since this has come to your state and city cracks >> caller: you have a lot of people talking in the background and i can't hear you. >> host: are you concerned or actually worried about the possibility of ebola affecting where you live? >> caller: yes i am concerned. >> host: okay, thanks. >> guest: one of the arguments made by the people that we shouldn't close borders impose travel bans is if we do that people might get in that we don't monitor. we are monitoring five airports that are supposedly covering 95% of all passengers that arrived from west africa daily. about 150 people that are being monitored for temperature and other signs of the disease. that is a big argument being made. also the question of closing the border. we've definitely heard people

call for that and increasingly call for that. i don't know if the travel ban could be coming. it's under discussion by a lot of people. it's probably takes unfortunately more cases being diagnosed to put pressure on the administration to do this. they are highly reluctant to do so. the key is controlling and west africa. they say that it's easier to do that by not closing the border and by posing the travel bans. >> host: you might want to read the column in usa today. he reports on immigration and talks about the idea of selling the border as part of a discussion that currently go on about ebola. just to show you the article. the next caller from arkansas. this is charles. >> caller: good morning. one person wrote on the airplane and there were 100 people on the airplane. those 100 people have three friends and all of a sudden you've got 300 people you have

to follow. the cdc said they are going to contact the following and monitor. you've got people on the telephone that -- i can't hear you because in the background you have people talking. but anyway by the time you compound that it could be a p1 people within a day or two and they are going to follow all those people? that doesn't make sense to me. and if you don't want to shut down the borders and you don't want to keep people coming in from africa, there is no way that you can stop this. >> guest: again back to what the cdc director have to see about this yesterday which is that he did not think that the health-care workers should have got on the airplane, she should have stayed off of public transportation. but the possibility of transmission was low and they said that because her fever was below 100.4 which is the temperature where it's really

needed is more transmissible and it's difficult to transmit, not impossible but harder to transmit unless a person is really exhibiting signs of the disease, which this health-care worker was not. so the assurances include the fact that she wasn't showing symptoms of the disease and that means it's very unlikely that those 132 passengers cost anything from her or spread it to others as they know. so why contact all of these? they are giving this to doing this to be extra cautious and to make sure that they are not leaving any stone unturned in terms of trying to control a potential outbreak. but the possibility of it being transmitted or again, extremely low. that's what the cdc is saying. i know people don't always trust it these days but if you think about who caused the disease, it's not people who knew duncan in passing. those 48 people now look as though they aren't going to

catch this. they are past their peak time that he would catch area they are heading towards the second half of the period. the people that caught it or the people that are really handling the disease, you know, who dealt with duncan when he was in the throw of this. there were front-line workers dealing with bodily fluids directly. people sitting on the plane even if you are sitting next to somebody that you're just sitting there and the chances of you catching it according to the cdc is zero. so if you look at it that way, it makes sense that the cdc says we are not particularly worried people caught the disease but she was at the threshold when it could have been dangerous it is the next day or the day after. >> host: the call for the global response, what has been a response in the other countries? >> guest: people are getting involved in this but the u.s. is taking the lead role. we are sending 4,000 troops to africa to get in the front line to help deal with this. everybody has to get involved because europe is worried about

this, people are going to europe and spreading, cases in spain. people are concerned about it. but the u.s. again called to take the lead response and i think that's also been controversial. people talk about whether we should be sending our military to deal with an issue like this. but, the theory is if we can stop stop if they are the cdc director says he feels confident that we can get it under control. it's just a matter of putting good health practices in place. that's difficult to do in africa because it isn't set up the way that the health industry is even closely remotely close to the readings are here. so i think they talk about it in the long term which is a concern because the longer it grows the more desperate. it spreads. people are understandably worried about this. it's definitely a disaster and i think that u.s. involvement has been controversial. >> host: this is kerry on the independence line. go ahead. >> caller: palo.

have you ever heard of the fever that comes out of korea? back in the early '80s three out of five died through this fever and it was transmitted or contracted because the field mice. so this monkey business that you mentioned that comes out of africa in korea, this fever pops up somewhat frequently every few years and the same symptoms they die from. in africa it is a ebola and in korea it is called a fever. but to your point of the protocols if we can't use a word like protocol because it's misleading because there is a

lack of understanding of transmission of the virus -- .. has been around for years, we know that. low, this years it is at a record high. that is why we are seeing it takeover west africa the way it has. i think one of the most interesting things about the disease is the death rate. it seems to fluctuate. in africa it is much higher than here because you do not have the same level of care. right now, the health care worker that was treated first is in stable to good condition now because we were able to treat it from the get-go. handrica, it got out of and it was too hard to treat patients, keep them hydrated, treat them early. i think what the viewer is trying to say is hemorrhagic fever e

>> and this is a time when it's gon to the point where it's been out of control in africa. >> host: up next, this is maxine in florida, independent line. >> caller: yes. i have two concerns. everyone is hollering about the ban on transportation from those countries, and thank goodness we have a president that is thinking things through. there is no nonstop service from those countries to the united states, so they're going through other countries. yes, we can ban them from entering the united states, but what about the people, those citizens of those countries where these people are allowed to travel, where those citizens may have come in contact that could bring that disease to the united states, not necessarily

the citizen from the african country? the other question i have is, there are certain diseases also where people can have the disease themselves and be carriers and never show any symptoms of that particular disease themselves. >> guest: both great points. that's been under discussion, you know, what about if this thing spreads in europe, and then are you going to ban european travelers from coming here? right now someone arrives you can see on a passport where they came from, and that's part of how the customs and border security folks are checking people who aa arrive at these five -- who arrive at these five airports that they've targeted. they can see where they originated from in their travel, even if they stopped over in another country. but the point is what if it just spreads generally because

there's no travel ban in europe, and then the europeans come here, well, that's just part of a fear of a global pandemic, i suppose, and i think that's one reason why the administration so focused on providing resources and troops now in africa to try to help get this under control. the cdc is over there working to try to get it under control this africa. -- in africa. nigeria has already managed to get ebola cases down, and i think people are hoping that in these other countries it will eventually be under control as well. >> host: one more call, and this is daniel, elizabethville, pennsylvania. go ahead. >> caller: hi. i have two questions. first, actually, this is a comment. i had heard that there was 50 billion ebola viruses would fit into a teaspoon.

and how long does the virus last on a surface, like someone sneezing or something like that? and also, if i may, the obama administration sent military people to these affected countries x cuba sent -- and cuba sent 600 doctors. and they've treated 58 million people over the years with medical diplomacy. >> guest: well, hard surfaces are where the virus can survive longest, and it's not that long, it's a matter of hours on a hard surface. so, again, that is definitely something people are thinking about, what if somebody gets on a bus or they, you know, they touch something, door handles, all this stuff is part of the general worry about how the disease could spread here. it's, i don't think it's at that point. i don't in