to build any sorts of things. but we want it to build good things. if order to figure out what a good thung is, we need that political, idea poj and to those who are either unskrounsed or on the fence wanting to be convinced but not having heard the story that justifies the changing test or interpretation of the ambiguous doctrine, in a way that, protects this. i think kevin is exactly right, that the agency and the discovery that's they've done and told a good. >> so we're happy to take

questions from the back cue. we're using the microphone in the back of the room. and again, general rules. if one can identify ones self, we get cracking. >> steve wu again. i wanted to thank you for your thought-provoking paper. one of the things i've been thinking about is generally the transition from physical to digital and how the law doesn't seem to have caught up. and the example that i give is in the 1990s when i was really first thinking about the internet and i was trying to do, quote unquote, computer law, i saw some of the cases having to do with insurance coverage for the loss of some kind of data center. and a claim was put in by the insured to seek compensation for

not only the loss of the hardware but also the loss of the data. of course policies weren't very sophisticated at that time but the courts said you can cover for the loss of the hardware but data intangible and not covered by the eyes of the policy and in the eyes of the court, this data have no worth. and i'm saying to myself, it's all about the data. i think you're seeing the same kind of thing with this transition from reading physical papers to reading people's e-mails. it's all about the data. that might be something to think about in terms of further refining your draft. the other this evening i would give you a little bit of a practicer's data point, which is what you're writing about has real difference in part because for the first time last week in a contract negotiation, which i'm trying to help negotiate an agreement for an internet-based

service, a customer of the service wanted to impose a term on us saying that if we, my client, becomes aware of government surveillance that, we have an obligation to notify the customer. i mean mass surveillance, completely -- mass surveillance, that my customer -- i have an -- basically take on the nsa. and i applaud the opposing counsel for coming up with the idea and jumping on the issue of top call importance, on the other hand it was quite a burden on my client. yet you're seeing something straight out of the news go into a contract negotiations and so what, you know, if this program didn't exist, my client wouldn't

be incurring these expenses. >> so i agree with you totally about the data versus hardware question. i was just at a conference in toronto where one of my nell fel owe -- fellow attendees had lost her laptop, she had it stolen and she was talking about how she had a chapter of her book and she just lost it. we were talking about the fact that there should be a repository. you're like just give me my data back and i won't file charges on the computer. >> on the first part about the law, it's a truism. the law isn't fast enough to keep up with the technology. technology is changing much faster than our dock tren can keep up. luckily in a lot of ways, on a

lot of these eissues, we have ready metaphors like cyberspace, that help us grapple with these things. in the issues of the e.c.p.a., it protects our data in the cloud. and we've been arguing for years and i think it's a strong argument that the data we store in the cloud should be treated the same way as the data we store at home in our personal file cabinets. even with a ready metaphor, it's taken many, many years. we're lucky we have a bevy of physical metaphors and simply the idea of millions of people sitting there reading everyone's

e-mail, that we have some pretty strong arguments by analogy to make. what freaks me out is when the technology gets so weird that ready physical analogy -- there are no ready physical analogies. we can barely keep up with the easy issues and i consider this to be actually one of the fairly easy issues, when things get really, really weird such that there's no ready analogy to the physical world, that's when not only is the law not keeping up, it's falling far, far, far, far behind. >> i'll just make one point on the contract negotiation. we sent out a program where they go to the providers and ask for information and then the back bone program that we tackle throughout the whole paper that they're just getting information off the wires. it's hard for providers to know that information taken off the

back bone is being taken off. so you won't get that notice that the program is even happening given to the provider but what i think that we're moving toward is a world where they're in contracts it is you have to secure our data as to the point where it cannot be picked up the wire in any readable format. that's something we're not necessarily looking at where there is a huge problem with authorized access and how much information governments are requesting for companies but also them going around companies and getting information off the back bone and what you should do to make sure this can't happen anymore. >> on the first point, the physical digital, the first part answers the second. you said on the one hand data has enormous value but securing date kra is costly.

it it may not warrant canaries for everyone but what a fantastic legal rule that work at least from my perspective. but the fact that data does create all this value but also creates risks to the companies but also to the users whose date kra is being safeguarded i think actually does cancel itself out to some extent and argue it's okay to impose renl obligations of privacy and security on private entities and it shows how this is not just a government problem or a government versus citizens problem. the intermediaries are an important part of the puzzle. on the metaphors, we can call it a robot here, we can call it an agent, we can call it a device. we can call it the cloud, which sounds very airy and puffy. we can also call it the vault or the data locker. compare icloud to drop box and the various senses that con

oates about security. and my overriding point today is that the choice of those matters and the choice is important and the choice is natural and weep should make those choices consciously, not because we've been using the met for before but because the met for helps to us capture the human and legal and social values at stake and that we cannot let our metaphors get in the way of our values. woody? >> hi. stanford university's cumberland school of law. i loved this paper and i especially loved, amy, your take on the reasonable expectations of privacy and you said it should be chucked and i agree with you. we can't decide what privacy means, if it means anything. on that point i actually would

like to pick up on what neal said, which is it's important to create a story and it's important to create a narrative. i actually think that you may have the beginnings of a very interesting narrative that i haven't seen played out yet. and i wonder if you could draw upon that a little more. so one of the big problems with privacy is we don't know what it means and can you define it seven different ways. but one of the ways is the right to control information and this idea of control. but that doesn't work when we're talking about surveillance because you've already lost control the moment you hit send. so we say, okay, that doesn't account for surveillance because surveillance isn't an issue about controlling information. it's picked up along the way, you know, there's control lost, then your information is traveling along, then the privacy harm happens. but the talking about the metaphor of the nfl, which i

really loved and it was very intuitive to me, i wonder if the story that you're creating here is that the harm from surveillance actually occurs when control is gained by another. so not loss of control but rather an others gaining of control, because that's really what enables the harm here and it allows us to talk about privacy harms in a certain kind of way, a way in which neal has described in some of his work about one of the true harms in surveillance is pourer disparities and one of the ways in which the power disparities is created is when an other, a third party, gains control of information. i wonder what i think about that if that's maybe a way you can flesh out this theory a little more to put some scaffolding around it. >> do you want to start? >> yes to all of that. clearly one of the overall themes in the paper when we step through at least the

interception, the statuary analysis and the fourth amendment seizure analysis is that actually in some ways the robots are irrelevant. the real moment for, you know, when an interception occurred or when a seizure occurred was when the government gained control of a copy of your communication such that you no longer had the ability to decide how it was disposed of and it was taken out of the regular transmission path and someone other than the intended recipient gained control of those bits. the met for that you mentioned was an interception in football. the ball is intercepted. the moment that happened, other team has gained possession. it may be that he fumbled it, takes a knee, gets a touchdown. but whatever happened after that moment is irrelevant to the fact

that it was intercepted. this does also reflect a theme that you see in work like neal's or and we're moving away from discussions of privacy and moving more toward discussion of pow and how data and access to data and imbalances in access to our controlled data effectuate power relationships. in a way this goes back to my cocktail party version of my answer to the question of why should i care about surveillance? i don't care if, like, the nsa has a copy of the recipe that my grandma isn't me or whatever. and my answer to that question is always, well, it's not about you, you narcissist. it has nothing to do with you individually or whether you feel creeped out or violated.

it has to do with maintaining the conditions for a democratic stat society. and if we live in a society where those already with power also have the power to look at our private communications to see if tles ago that might threaten their power, that's much bigger than a privacy question be and about whether you feel personally violated, which frankly i don't care that much about. that's going to come back to haunt me. >> so just to bolster everything that i agree with that kevin just said, we spent a long time -- oh, the computer went black. we spent a long time looking at the diagram that used to be behind me and trying to figure out when the privacy harm occurred and what the privacy harm was. there was a very long discuss, i think, about harm, that we tried to work in and we're going to try to continue to work into this paper and eventually we came up with it occurs at the

point the communication is originally diverted. it doesn't matter what happens in the box. if they discard it, regardless of whether they keep it they now have the decision to make the robot has the decision to make about what to do. they have put it into the robot and now the control has been taken away from the person. so the moment it has been diverted off of the path that it was intended to go on, a harm has occurred no matter what. >> i think this is a great point and agree with everything kevin and amie said. if the robots are irrelevant, if they are to the story then maybe they should fall out. even though i love the title -- >> irrelevant to the search analysis. >> they're certainly rell vent to getting the pay before the conference and i'm glad they did because we get to hang out with them and argue about this stuff, but i wonder -- >> i will say there's another pypo in the paper that raises

the same issues but indisputably involves a robot one that amie mentioned but dogs, we mention i had as self-driving cars. imagine them driving around the neighborhood -- >> i mixed metaphor. >> driving around the neighborhood doing heat sensing on the houses to try to detect marijuana grow operations like the supreme court found doing that type of scanning is a search of the house and i think that metaphor which is a different hypo from the nsahypo but raises different issues that the robots respect necessarily irdevelop haven irrelevant but at least it's timely. >> all agents and that's the real power of the paper. woody's question, it's the agency theory and that is a story. and i think it's a really powerful one and ties in nicely with, you know, newt tralt -- neutral -- existing neutral

rules. on the nfl metaphor, i like it but i like sports and i like football. and, you know, but we have to be careful. it might work for the interception part but we can't let fourth amendment law be sidetracked by the nfl, right, because if there's -- i'm english, but if there's defensive -- >> call it american football. >> american football, right. as opposed to real football. the -- if there is encroachment by eight defensive lineman before the snap, there's an interception, but the play is called back when it's declined afterwards by the offensive team which is complicated but the point is we can't let the nfl-ness and the coolness of the metaphor imprison our -- it's useful for the point they use it in the paper but then we need to need to stop sean day no more nfl because we're doing privacy law and civil liberty laws and democratic society law not football law.

>> michael from the school of law. i'm going to ask you guys to speculate about legal doctrine because especially one of you is a great expert and the others of you are not only experts but inside the beltway. in order to set up droctrinal point, the case, the heat-sensing case is a very funny case because a key point is a reasonable expectation of privacy based on the idea most people don't have heat acceptsers. if they were built into the iphone, that case wouldn't hold that those are reasonable expectations anymore. now, one of the great achievements of your paper which i love is that it puts agency law right at the heart of the surveillance mechanical surveillance problem and, you know, in a sense the elevator pitch for 50% of your paper is we take the action of the agent attribute it to the person and treat them like the person. and that gets us where you and i want to go, so long as there is a reasonable expectation of

privacy as regards the action of the person. the question was asked to speculate about, how -- that's using agency law as a shield. the question i have, can we use agency law as a sword and this goats to something amie was talking about briefly before, which is how can we deal with situations where there is no expectation and that's important because the extent we have this one-way ratchet and supreme court doctrine where technology becomes more common the zone of our reasonable expectation shrinks and sh risks and may be zero, the shield is not enough. it is temporary but we may need the sword. so, you know, given the door has been a little open by jones and by other recent cases, how can we -- is there a way we can use this agency idea to fix things that are party doctrine, bank, whatever and the reason why this question seems to me so hard is that if i wanted tomorrow to open up a privacy bank, that gave you a contract that to the

maximum extent permissible by law protected your rights and therefore gave you more reasonable expectations of privacy, i couldn't actually give you much more than my bank gives me now, because of the world of law and regulation in which banks are enmeshed and which controls what they can offer me. i think the same thing is to a certain extent true in communications and lots of other infrastructure we've built. so it's not enough, i worry, merely to take your idea and try to turn night a sword, we then run up against all these other problem, what do we do? >> what do we do? what do we do? so i have a few thoughts and i'm going to -- just so i -- i don't want to refrain -- rephrase the question. how do we address reasonable expectation of privacy. i'm not seeing the linkage between the agency question and the reasonable expectation rife si question. >> as i understood the paper, right, the agency theory gets its power because if the

principle had done this thing it would have been a violation of our reasonable expectations of privacy. >> uh-huh. >> and if there had been no reasonable expectation of privacy on the part of what the principal did there is no problem with the agent doing the same thing. am i misunderstanding ha. >> no. >> so what about -- the but the problem is reasonable expectations you could say i suppose it is an answer we need to put more life back into reasonable expectation. the trouble is, it's very tough and i mean we're all -- where words have meaning and metaphors work to talk about a ream expectation when it isn't ream. >> there's an interesting -- there are a number of interesting things we could talk about here. on just the general queson of ream expectation, i share your expectation. we have seen alternate pads to way that increases in capacity can strengthen our reasonable expectation of privacy rather thandi mennish in jones for those who respect familiar wit the supreme court held the 28 days of gps tracking of a vehicle on public roads was a

search, did violate a ream expectation of privacy even though that information was exposed to the public. and that shorter-term, you know, or technologically unassisted tracking would not and i feel that -- five of the justices in that case actually held that it was the tracking that was the violation, not the attachment of the device and so that shows that there's a concern on the supreme court and there are five justices that believe on the supreme court that believe even just using technology to aggregate lots of this was that was public could violate your expectation of privacy. and in that way, increases in capacity to surveil us can actually give us pore protection than we had before in a way as a counterbalance to the kyleissue of what was a search no longer a search and the agency questioned, there's i really interesting double-edged sword and we want to address it in the

paper. we didn't have time. we cite a paper by a fellow make tokeson -- toxin. >> tokeson. >> he argued it shouldn't count if a robot reads your e-mail from a fourth amendment perspective in part because he feared if it does count, then that will actually eliminate our expectation of privacy. that is, to the extent we have a lot of robots looking at e-mail to scan it for spam or scan it for viruses or to allow many travel violations or service ads or whatever, if that counts, and we've agreed to that or otherwise have allowed that, that that could mean we have given up our overall expectation of privacy in those communications. i fear that tokeson was killing the fourth amendment to save it. i think that i'm more concerned about the horribles that come from government surveillance than private surveillance and i think there are plenty of

extension interceptions and ways to play with the law that our allowing that kind of behavior does not eliminate a ream expectation of privacy and we have enough cases saying that that i feel pretty comfortable but it's not an easy issue and it gets to the question of the automation rationale which he points to in smith v. maryland where the supreme court said we don't have a privacy expectation in the numbers we dial. and the reason, one of the key reasons they said that was because and i think this goes to age bias around technology as well as anything else they said, well, you know, human telephone operators used to connect our calls and the fact that the phone companies have now automated that prose doesn't change the fact that we've exposed that information to the phone company. we pivot that and use that to our advantage in the paper and say, well, if it's good for the goose it's good for the gander, the fact that the government is out mating this reading doesn't make it any less of an invasion, but it is a valid concern and i

don't think we fully addressed it yet in our paper. >> so i think -- the way -- that's right and i think another way that just to restate this or maybe adding a bit to it that kevin and amie could answer the question is, we agree with you, neil and michael and woody that the real genius of our paper is not the use of the word robots in the title but is the use of the word agent because we talk about the national security agency and that national security agency has agents and some of them are human beings and some of them are software agents, maybe some of them are scary robots too. and those agents follow out the wishes of the principal and it doesn't matter whether those wishes are accomplished through a software agent for or a human agent or scary killer robot agent. what matters is that the -- that the agency is happening and the

will of the principal is being effectuated through one of its arms or legs or agents or instrumentalities and so to get to the way i understand my michael's question he's saying it we live in a world in which people say i don't have any privacy anymore because everything is being tracked, a test under the fourth amendment from the innovation in k.a.t.s. that says we protect an expectation of privacy that people have subjective and also one that society is prepared to accept as objectively reasonable ee normative political inquiry, if there is no subjective expectation anymore, privacy goes away. and there's two ways to fix this, junk the subjective prong entirely which i think we should just do. and when it comes to the -- the objective reasonableness, we should look to lawyers, right, so lawyers are doctors or priests or librarians or account apartments or anybody who has a

professional duty of confidentiality that when you entrust someone with your data, your lawyer, let's say, this might be publicly known information, but they are under a duty as your agent not to disclose under any circumstance, this doesn't matter whether the person asking the question know what is going on. that's the way agency can be used as a sword that it could protect confidences and protect sharing. ironically enough and helpfully enough so that sharing can take place. >> it occurred to me that over the last 200 years there's been a massive erosion in the public's concern with privacy. because if you think about what our founders were trying to do with the bill of rights in protecting our papers in effect and preventing the interception of our mail essentially the

precise cream we get when we sign up for google or hot mail or something like that, lets us sacrifice the privacy of -- you've heard the free ice cream theory, right? >> i didn't get the eye cream. >> okay, sorry. >> i'm sorry. >> there's a little bit of a theme i guess in privacy discussions on articles and stuff, they call it the free ice cream problem that people will accept any crazy terms of use inclu including indemi if i kafgs the service that they're providing and limitation of liable to the amount of their subscription and they will do anything for the free ice cream. that's the saying. that is going around. if people are thinking, okay, i'll click i accept these insane they remembers of use and sacrifice my firstborn and my arm and my leg and that is the reason why this expectation of privacy just kind of

disappeared, then the only people who are terrified are the lawyers, right? because the lawyers are thinking, how do i defend my client in court when the contents of every e-mail that they've ever sent are exposed for consideration? so it's one thing. how do we expose this problem to the general public and inspire them to be outraged in the same way that our founders were outraged, in the same way that the british were outraged when, you know, the castle doctrine originated and how do we manage the problem of the destruction of a person's life during multiyear litigation when you may finally get this critical piece of evidence that was acquired by violating the privacy kicked out of the lawsuit but the person has basically been dragged through the mud in the public eye? >> so we -- i mean, i don't -- i

won't speak for kevin because he'll yell at me but i get this -- is privacy dead question a lot like people do not care about this anymore? my experience has been less that they don't care than they don't know and they don't understand where their information can and is going. so to the extent that they do, i agree with kevin on his point. i agree with kevin on his point earlier that quit being a narcissist, but also i mean i just -- because you talked about multiyear litigation i had to go through it with my sister because her facebook messages could be subpoenaed. even her private messages and she had no idea which is an interesting place to put somebody through when they think what is public and private and you have to put it in context and this is something dana boyd speaks about a lot. people may give up their privacy but give it up contextually and don't understand there are instances when your information can leave the context in which

you've put it into. so i think there's a lot of psychological pieces that go into that go outside of the law and lawyers are used of thinking it in rigid specific rule-bound instances and not necessarily in the ways that you think about it in your everyday life. >> kevin is exactly right on the nsa question it's all about power but power on the consumer rights question. the reason papers are in the fourth amend not because people were concerned about the government rummaging through their things but to find diaries and letters and to find evidence that could be used to blackmail or punish or haul people before court on charges of treason because it was very much a political liberty and i think that is the -- that sort of the intellectual privacy argument as well but it's an argument that we should care about the fourth amend because we care about a democratic society and i think this might be controversial. it might be wrong but i'll say

it anyway, it's more important to have a demic society than free ice cream. and on the commercial side, it's also a question of power. amie is right. it's a question of limited choices. it's a question of knowledge and information. and what we have elsewhere in the consumer context we regulate it. that might be practically difficult to accomplish but that's the answer and i think that's the story that we need to tell and these are all about stories. >> i just want to know if somebody from microsoft and google are here giving out ice cream? >> i want my ice cream. >> so first of all you two are my favorite country lawyers or at least kevin is. i'm not sure if amie is from the country. she says she is. but so i think that you should use that perspective actually more. i'm going to push back against neil. kevin, you said -- >> no litigator perspective. >> no, you're uniquely situated. you said something at the beginning that struck plea because i couldn't find it in

the piece which is this is all about trying to get these into court and then i looked to see if clapper v. amnesty was mentioned and didn't find it. i think there is a missing part of the project from the litigator's perspective of showing it this is about power the very complex like series of hurdles that you have to overcome to even get to -- >> that's a whole other series of articles. >> but there's still to, you know, there's -- if you're going to frame this as being about power this is like that last piece in all of those other pieces of the ecosystem which i think is a really important part of it. >> thank you. >> hi, i'm kate darling, m.i.t. i'm just here to troll neil because i'm still mad at him for saying that we should treat robots like hammers and screwdrivers two years ago [ laughter ] no, but i basically i completely agree with you, neil, that the

real argument here is agents, right and not robots and that it's intellectually dishonest to use the word robot maybe in this context. i agree with that, but i mean we've talked so much about how people perceive robots as agents and how we have these completely unrealistic expectations from science fiction and it just sounds so different, you know, a robot is reading your e-mail versus your e-mail is being automatically scanned and so if we're talking about getting people that care about privacy and, you know -- i don't know. i'm just trolling basically but if you had to choose between being intellectually honest and actually getting people to care about these issues what, would you pick? [ laughter ] >> so that's directed at me. i mean i want to say like based

on this wick ki period ya entry that i just edited, they are robots. would taking the ro off make people happy? >> when di stop beating the wife is the loaded question you're asking me. i don't think it's intellectually dishonest to call it robot. i want to be clear because that was one of my critiques of kevin and amie's paper. i think using the word agent is better. my concern about using at a tactical level getting robots to get people to care is we may get people to care about the privacy issue but create this problem with robots and solve the privacy issue, yay for me and for woody. and ryan but then we create a huge -- these guys and create a huge robotics problem with the an throwmorphic problems that the panel was talking about

yesterday. i would say also -- when i say that robots are hammers, i say that robots -- metaphors are hammers too and hammers are good and we should just be clear about these are human constructions that are tools, that's all i'm saying. hammers is perhaps a colorful way of expressing it toasters is an even more colorful and literary rooted way of expressing it. that's all. metaphors, tools, software code, law, they're all tools and we just as -- in that respect we're all of us in this room are engineers and we just want to build good things and we argue what good is. and but ultimately that's all we have to realize and there's no mystery to this. it's just hard. but that's why we're here. >> any other thoughts? >> well, thank you all very much. i have two quick announcements. i've been told to make the first, we have t seven for sale. if you want them they have the

wonderful symbol of rosie the roboter. this is the last call to sign up for afternoon car service at the airport. having done that duty i can get to the fun part which is asking you to join me in thanking these wonderful panelist, neil, kevin and amie, a great panel. >> thank you. thank you. [ applause ] >> we'll see you in 15 minutes sharp. on monday the state department hosted an ocean conservation conference with government officials and scientists. the event began with remarks by secretary of state john kerry. >> i want us to walk away from this conference with more than ideas. i want us to walk away from here with a plan, a plan that puts an end to overfishing through new

rules based on the best available science. and may i add one of the things that ted stevens, senator ted stevens of alaska who teamed up with me on the commerce committee in the senate, one of the things we always were fighting was getting more, better science. so that we could convince fishermen and convince countries, governments of the imperative of making decisions. too often we'd hear, well, we don't really see that or we don't really feel that or i'd hear from captains of the bows, when i go out and fish i see plenty of stocks out there. there's no reason to be restricted. we need science and globally could put our heads together and governments together and come up with a budget and the capacity to be able to do what we need to be able to help convince people of the urgency of this. we need a plan that requires fisheries to use gear and techniques that dramatically

reduce the amount of fish and other species caught by accident and discarded. a plan that ends subsidies to i shall fisheries which only serves to promote overfishing and a plan that makes it near impossible for illegally caught fish to actually come to the market anywhere whether you're in boston or beijing or barcelona or brasilia or any other city that doesn't begin with a "b." let's develop a plan that protects more marine habitats and we will have an announcement regarding that, i believe president obama will make such an announcement. today less than 2% of our ocean is considered a marine protected area. where there are some restrictions on human activity in order to prevent contaminating the ecosystem. less than 2% of the entire ocean. there isn't anybody here who doesn't believe we can't do better than that. so let's start by finding a way

to perhaps bring that number up to 10% or more as soon as possible. and let's develop a plan that does more to reduce the flow of plastic and other debris from enter nothing the ocean. everybody has seen that massive array of garbage in the pacific and elsewhere. we need a plan that helps cut down the nutrient pollution that runs off of land and is miles from the shore and that contributes to the dead zones that i mentioned earlier. i learned about that back when i was running for president. now out in iowa and minnesota and mississippi and missouri rivers, and you learn about the flow of these nutrients that go down the mississippi, out into the gulf and we have a great big dead zone as a result. we need to develop a plan that gives us a better understanding of the ascidification effect. there was a regurgitation of carbon dioxide.

have we reached a saturation point? i don't know. i know it's a question that is critical to our capacity to deal with climate change and to maintain the oceans. we ought to be able to know where it's happening. how quickly it's happening. so we can find the best way to slow it down. and we need to push harder, all of us, for u.n. agreement to fight carbon pollution in the first place because the science proves that's the only way we'll have a chance of reducing the impact of climate change which is one of the greatest threats facing not just our ocean but our entire planet. >> watch more of the conference online at c-span.org. so the idea behind 215 and 200 is trying to tell the history of st. louis as a time line or a sort of like era by

era we would miss vitally important things, so instead of trying to do that and failing, we decided what if we just gave snapshots of st. louis history that would give people a glimpse of all the diverse things that have happened here and they could use their imaginations to kind of fill in the rest so we chose 00 people, 50 place, 50 moment, 50 image and 50 objects and tried to choose the most diverse selection we possibly could. we're standing in the 50 object session of the 250 and 250 exhibit right now and this is what most people would call the real history. this is where the object is right in front of you. brewing is such a huge part of st. louis' history. it's an amazing story with lots of different breweries and, of course, the most famous became anheuser-busch when -- the largest in the world. and in the era of anheuser-busch talking about millions of barrels produced each year, you know, we think they're producing

so much beer, this is from an era when things were a little bit simpler and it's fun to show people this object and gauge their response in the days before they had cans or bottle caps they put corks in the top of bottles and somebody had to sit on this thing and do it by hand. you can see it's got foot pedals on the bottom. that's where the operator would push down with his feet to give the cork enough force to go into the bottle and it's got three holes for three different size bottles. >> this weekend the history and literary life of st. louis. the gateway to west on c-span2's book tv and c-span3's american history tv. the nominee to serve as u.s. ambassador to qatar says the u.s. is optimistic about qatar's ability to watch over the guantanamo bay prisoners who were recently released in exchange for sergeant bowe bergdahl. the comment came during a senate

confirmation hearing with the nominees to egypt, iraq and honduras. this is about two hours. our first panel today we have nominees for u.s. to egypt, iraq, and qatar. in egypt on sunday, field marshall cisi was sworn into office. but as we all know, a sustainable democratic transition is about more than elections. i remain concerned about the state of media repression in egypt, intimidation and detention of activists. mass death sentences and the disproportionate use of force by eept services. that said, the people of egypt have taken to the streets to protest successive governments and there's no reason not to expect protests again if the sisi government is unable to deliver on its promises. ultimately my goal is to find a way forward for the u.s./egypt partnership which means maintaining the peace process and a strong defense and counterterrorism partnership. when it comes to assistance,

continued u.s. aid must be based on the totality of our shared interests and this now includes the egyptian government taking steps toward a sustainable position. that is not only my view but a legal requirement of the 2014 omnibus appropriations act. so that said i look forward to hearing from ambassador beecroft on his views. in iraq, while political leaders are deal making, the people are not benefitting from their country's increased oil output and the conflict continues to surge in western iraq as a spillover from syria has enabled the islamic state in syria to take hold. clearly we must continue to support iraqi security forces. syria's questions remain unanswered. i'm concerned about them using barrel bombs. their questions remain unanswered. iraq's role in syria, iranian shia militias and iranian influence in iraq and the

commitment of the iraqi government to protect the residents of camp liberty until we can conclude a resettlement so ambassador jones, i look forward to your perspective and analysis. qatar presents another set of issues. i know that there are many who have questions about the context of the negotiations, the qatari government role in the talks and the status of the taliban detainees but their mul multifaceted strategic importance goes far beyond role in the bowe bergdahl/taliban deal. i hope this dot not denigrate into a debate and leaving us with no ambassador on the ground to enforce the terps of the agreement. this is not the time to debate those terps. it is time to confirm an ambassador who will enforce them. i look forward to hearing from you with what you see as your role in qatar broadly as well as

on this issue. if confirmed, i'm monitoring this commitment and i want to make it clear that congress will play an active oversight role on this issue. that said, i look forward to hearing from the nominee on the many facets of qatar's importance. with that, let me turned to senator corker for his remarks. >> thank you, mr. chairman, and thanks to all three of you for your desire to serve in this way. we obviously have three very qualified nominees and going to very, very important places, and i think to a lesser degree in qatar but certainly to a degree there are two issues that overwhelmingly will affect the service of both ambassador jones and beecroft and that is the black hole that we have right now in syria and i know that both of you have already experienced that in the countries in which you are serving right now and the fact that we have never really put in place any kind of policy or

strategy or even laid out what our objectives are clearly, and that's obviously having a very destabilizing effect on iraq and jordan where both of you have been. we also have a situation where there's just no regional strategy. you know, the administration, unfortunately, continues to hide behind, you know, classified briefings and those kind of things, and is unable to lay out a coherent strategy for the region, and so again all three of you enter places where that has created significant difficulties and again i thank you for your desire to serve. egypt since 2011, there's been no stabilization there. the country is really no better off relative to many of the issues that we care about than it was. i do have hope, maybe greater hopes than our chairman just mentioned, for egypt going

forward and i know they are a very important relationship for our country. iraq, we're continuing to read daily the devolution that's taking place there. you feel it on the ground, the lack of -- the lack of involvement that we have had in helping shape things on the ground is very, very apparent and i know we'll talk about that during q & q and in qatar because of our inability or lack of desire or just whatever in taking a lead relative to the syria -- syrian opposition, qatar obviously has taken a role that has been unhealthy. i understand that may be tapering back some now but that's a very important relationship. so i look forward to our questions and answers. i want to thank you each of you again for the lives you have led that have made you so qualified for the positions that you are ascending to, and i thank you for being here today. >> thank you, senator corker. let me again welcome our first panel of nominees all decorated career foreign service officers. none is a stranger to the

demanding consuming critical assignments both domestically and abroad and thank them and their families for their past service and their willingness to serve again in very challenging roles. let me introduce them. robert steven beecroft to be ambassador to egypt, and stuart e. jones to be ambassador iraq, and dana shell smith to be ambassador for qatar. he is a career foreign service officer, the rank of minister counsel and currently serves as ambassador of the u.s. embassy in baghdad. stuart e. jones is no stranger to demanding assignments in the most pressing areas in the united states as a career foreign service officer. he's currently serving as our ambassador in amman, jordan. and in our embassy in egypt. dana shell smith is truly a global diplomat. served throughout the world in her capacity as a public affairs officer. she too is a career foreign

service officer. s rank of minister counselor currently serves as senior adviser to the undersecretary for public diplomacy and public affairs. so let me thank you. let me join senator corker this thanking all for your service both past and moving forward in the future. we have a large audience than we normally have for nominees so i assume there may be some family members or friends. if they are here with you, we would urge you to induce them to the committee when you have your time to testify. we understand and appreciate that families are a big part of the sacrifice and the service and we honor their willingness to have you be willing to serve our country as they themselves face sacrifices as a result of it. your full statements will be included in the record without objection, so we ask you to summarize your openings in about five minutes or so so we can enter into a dialogue with you and with that, we'll start off

with you, ambassador beecroft and ambassador jones and then move to ms. smith. >> thank you very much. chairman menendez, ranking member corker, other members of the committee. i'm honored to appear to you as the president's nominee as the u.s. ambassador to the arab republic of egypt. i'm deeply grateful to president obama and secretary kerry for their support and confidence and if confirmed, i look forward to working closely with you and other members of congress to advance the interests of the united states. i'm also pleased to share this hearing with my colleagues. mr. jones and miss smith. i look forward to working closely with them on the many issues facing the united states in the middle east. mr. chairman, i've spent much of my career working in the middle east, including assignments in syria and saudi arabia and as ambassador to jordan and iraq. my experience has made me acutely aware of egypt's importance inside and outside the region.

as the most populous arab country egypt represents a quarter of the world. egypt is the third largest market for u.s. goods and services in the middle east, and the united states is the second largest source of foreign direct investment in egypt. approximately 8% of global maritime commerce flows through the suez canal every year and a total of 420 u.s. flagged vessels including over 8 au.s. military vessels moved over 1.9 billion tons of cargo through the suez in 2013. and i cannot stress enough the importance of egypt's upholding of its peace treaty with israel. which has delivered over 35 years of stability to the region. after repeated conflicts beginning in 19489, the two countries have not seen war since 1973. conditions in egypt thus have implications for the security of israel and our allies in the arab world and beyond. increased instability in egypt

would not only open space for violent extremist strongholds but also encourage migrant threat and threaten global commerce with an ensuing ripple effect on international economies. for these reasons and more we have crucial interests in egypt, preserving regional peace and stability with israel and all of egypt's neighbors. countering the weapons trafficking and creating economic prosperity and increased opportunities for foreign investment, and building inclusive democratic institutions and civil societies that undermine the conditions for violent extremism. and form the bedrock of prosperous economic growth. as president obama said in his may 28 address at west point, support for human rights and democracy goes beyond idealism. it is a matter of national security. while views on how to advance us may differ, there is agreement that egypt's success is a pluralistic democratic state that remains vital to the united states.

if confirmed, i commit to work with congress to help achieve this goal. and promote a constructive u.s./egypt partnership that furthers our interest the. i want to commend the american personnel, local staff at our u.s. mission who have been carrying out courageous and difficult work during a tumultuous time. the mission has remained actively engaged with egyptian officials and civil society. 12 cabinet level agencies at the mission are advancing our national security objectives, protecting the welfare of american citizens and business and pursuing our work with the government and people with egypt. if confirmed as ambassador i look forward to joining in their efforts. it is the distinct honor to have been nominated by president obama and to serve as u.s. ambassador to egypt and i thank you for the opportunity to testify before you today. chairman menendez and ranking member corker, i look forward to answering any questions you or members of the committee may have. thank you very much. >> ambassador jones. >> thank you, mr. chairman. ranking member corker, members

of the senate foreign relations committee. i'm deeply honored today to appear as president obama's nominee to be the united states ambassador to the republic of iraq. i'm grateful to the president and to the secretary for their confidence in me. if confirmed, i will work closely with you to advance u.s. goals in iraq. i look forward to building on the excellent work of my predecessor and friend, ambassador steve beecroft who is, of course, with us today and i'm delighted to share this panel with dana smith. a valued colleague of many years. with your permission, mr. chairman, i would like to induce introduce my daughter, dorothy jones, a rising sophomore at duke university. she through up from atlanta to be with me here today, my wife and barbara and sons are thaddeus and woody are in amman. i'm grateful that my family has been game for every new posting. mr. chairman, i'm both humbled and thrilled to the vunts to serve as chief of mission at the

american embassy baghdad. one of our largest and most diplomat exmissions. i've served in iraq twice as you mentioned and as director for iraq affairs on the national security counsel. these jobs have helped me to prepare for the complexity and challenges of the assignment ahead. we are all familiar with the history of iraq's past decade. it is impossible to serve in iraq without recalling and honoring the sacrifice and achievement of our u.s. servicemen and women and civilians. more than 4,000 lost their lives there. but they also put an end to the oppression and regional threat of the saddam hussein regime. today we are all committed to help build a new iraq, secure in its borders with strong democratic institutions where all can benefit from its abundant resources. iraq has indeed made important

economic and democratic progress. it is now engaged in a fierce battle against isil, islamic state of iraq, and one of the most dangerous groups in the world. monday's coordinated attack on mosul in which isil militants overran parts of the city highlights just how dangerous this group is. we will continue to work with our international partners to try to meet the needs of those who have been displaced and we will look for ways to support the government and the security forces in their -- in their conflict with isil. overall, violence in iraq has reached levels not seen since the height of the u.s. surge in 2007. suicide vests and vehicle bomb attacks are averaging nearly 70 per month since the beginning of this year. the united states has taken important steps to help iraq combat this shared enemy. we've provided urgently needed military equipment and the

iraqis have told us that our equipment and advice are making a critical difference. i would like to thank this panel for making these transfers possible. in addition to military equipment transfers, we've strengthened our information-sharing relationships and are developing programs to improve border security. we've also initiated a high-level dialogue between our senior military leadership and key iraqi military commanders. security assistance however is only one element of our assistance. and it is connected to intense political and economic engagement. the united states has also encouraged iraq to adopt a holistic strategy to isolate isil from the population and to develop a strategy for sustainable security. this strategy will require continued engagement between iraq's political leaders, sunni tribal leaders and others. from a political standpoint,

iraq's successful national election on april 30 was a victory for efforts to strengthen iraq's democratic institutions. while prime minister maliki's coalition won more seats than any other it fell short of the 16 aneeded to form a majority government. government formation is an iraqi owned process and it will be up to iraq's political leaders to form a government that reflects the will of the people as expressed in the april 30th election. despite iraq's political and security challenges its tremendous economic growth over the last decade has been impressive. iraq's economy has averaged 6.5% growth since 2005. it's now producing 2.2 million barrels of oil per day. the united states and iraq have partnered to share best practices on fossil fuel production and exports. we're engaged with the government of iraq on capturing gas for power generation and on political issues related to

hydro carbon revenue management. the government also faces a challenge in its natural resources in distributing the wealth created by its natural resources to its population and to use its oil wealth to promote growth in other sectors. iraq's economic growth offers exciting opportunities for u.s. firms, particularly in key sectors such as infrastructure, development and construction. if confirmed, i look forward to promoting secretary kerry's shared prosperity agenda as ambassador to iraq. mr. chairman, as i've discussed, iraq poses a challenging security environment. if confirmed as ambassador, i will bear responsibility for the safety of all u.s. personnel in iraq, including at embassy baghdad and our consulates erbil in basra. if confirmed, i will work close with our security team on the ground as well as with our diplomatic security professionals back here in washington to ensure that our people are well protected.

this will be my highest priority as well as to protect the safety of american citizens in iraq. since u.s. troops withdrew from iraq in 2011, the embassy and consulates have significantly reduced our staffing. as of june 2014, we have approximately 5,300 staff. just one-third of our 2012 footprint. if confirmed, i will continue to examine staffing levels to ensure that we have the appropriate number of personnel to carry out our mission. our diplomatic efforts are supported by a highly skilled team of individuals at the embassy in iraq, and they represent a wide range of u.s. departments and agencies. this whole of government approach allows us to bring the very best experts our government has to offer and address some of the challenge i've raised with you today. i'd like to thank everyone at the embassy in iraq for their service as well as the leadership back here in washington, including this

committee that makes this level of interagency coordination possible. our continued success in iraq depends on continued collaboration. mr. chairman, members of the committee, thank you again for the opportunity to address you today. i appreciate and value this committee's oversight of our efforts in iraq, and if confirmed, i look forward to welcoming you and your respective staff members to baghdad. your continued engagement on the policy issues that we face in iraq are a vital element in ensuring our success. i would be pleased to respond to any questions you may have. thank you for this opportunity. >> ms. smith. >> representative -- >> will you put your microphone on? >> this is my first time doing this. chairman menendez and ranking member corker, thank you for the opportunity to appear to you today as the

president's nominee to be the u.s. ambassador to the state of qatar. i'm extremely grateful to president obama and to secretary kerry for their confidence in me. if confirmed i look forward to representing the american people and to working with this committee and other interested members of congress to advance u.s. interests in qatar, and it's a privilege to share this panel with stu jones and steve beecroft. to two of our finest ambassadors whose work i have long admired. it's been an honor to serve as a foreign service officer since 1992 and to use my rege national experience and arabic language in a variety of assignments. the foreign service even introduced me to my husband. who is here today. and our two children. well, the foreign service didn't introduce me to them. he is here with our two children and it's exciting them to have them here able to watch our democracy in action. i'm delighted that my aunt and uncle and so many of my friends could be here as well. qatar plays a growing role in the international community with influence that extends well bond its 250,000 sits. we share a productive relationship on key issues ranging from syria and iran. they have been extremely

supportive of our commitment to find a solution to the israel and palistinan conflict. if confirmed i will work to ensure our policies and diplomatic platform advance diplomatic policy and national security in the region more broadly. defense cooperation is a central pillar of our partnership and it's best reflected in qatar's hosting of the sent com headquarters and the combined air operation center and 379th air expeditionary wing at the air base. the renewal in december of 2013 of our defense cooperation agreement is a further testament to our enduring security partnership. if confirmed, i will work to deepen our military ties and expand our regional security cooperation. we have an active and productive dialogue on both counterterrorism and proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. y far has endorsed this and is a founding member of the global counterterrorism forum. these efforts take on increased importance of course. as violent extremists expand their operations in syria and

we're working together to improve the capacity of qatar's counterterrorist financing regime and to disrupt illicit cash flows. the united states is also continuing efforts with qatar to support the moderate opposition in syria. qatar believes as we do assad's murderous regime leaves him no opportunity to rule. and we share the view that the crisis in syria should be resolved through a negotiated political solution. we are working closely with regional partners to maximize the impact of our collective efforts. qatar has also publicly welcomed the joint plan of action reached between iran and the p5 plus 1 on iran's nuclear program. and has made clear its supports u.s.' efforts on this agreement. as you know, qatar played an instrumental role in recovering sergeant bowe bergdahl. their efforts are a testament to our partnership. with regard to the five individuals transferred from guantanamo in connection with sergeant bergdahl's release, the

u.s. last and will continue to coordinate closely with qatar. we are confident that the security measures that have been put in place, including restrictions placed on the activities of the individuals will substantially mitigate any threat that the individuals may pose to our national security. the emir personally provided his assurances to the president and the administration is confident that the qataris have the capacity and will to deliver on the commitments made. but let me be clear. if confirmed, i will work each day to ensure that these commitments are upheld. i will consult regularly with the members of this committee as we move forward on this issue. our thriving commercial relationship with qatar continues to grow, presenting tremendous opportunities for american business. qatar is one of our most important trading partners in the region, importing over $5 billion in u.s. goods in 2013. if confirmed, i will make it my priority to advocate for u.s. companies vigorously. to ensure we continue to seize on the multitude of opportunities offered by the

qatari market. qatar also hosts six branches of u.s. universities. if confirmed, i will work to expand our cultural and educational partnerships to promote enduring ties between our people for the next generation. at a u.s. mission with employees from a variety of u.s. government agencies, my first priority if confirmed would remain at all times protecting the safety and security of the dedicated men and women at our mission, as well as of all americans living, working, and traveling in qatar. chairman menendez, ranking member corker, members of the committee, it has been my privilege and great honor to spend my entire adult life in the service of our country. promoting and defending u.s. interests and values. if confirmed, i welcome your views and insights on qatar and the region. and look forward to your visits to doha. i would be pleased to answer any questions you might have for me today. thank you. >> well, thank you all for your testimony and again welcome to your family and friends. let me start with you, ambassador beecroft, well, let

me ask you, all three of an overarching question. a simple yes or no will do. if confirmed, will you make yourselves available if confirmed to the committee and answer inquiries from the committee while you are in post? >> yes. >> yes, mr. chairman. >> absolutely. >> okay. ambassador beecroft, you know, you are going from one difficult assignment to another one. that's why we have some extraordinary persons like yourself, but speaking for myself as the chairman, let me just say if we are going to continue to see mass death penalty sentences, if we are going to see massive arrests of the young people who in essence created the situation in tahir square that ultimately led to where president sisi can now be

elected, if president sisi believes it is sufficient for his relationship with the united states, then there will be a rude awakening. and i hope that in your role as our ambassador that you'll be able to relay to president sisi that we need a broader agenda to see progress moving forward, not just because that is my view, but the fy-14 appropriations legislation contains certification requirements to release the rest of egypt's fy-14 assistance, including that, quote, a newly elected government of egypt is taking steps to be run or govern democratically. so i'd like to hear from you as you approach this new assignment what is it that you'll be saying

when you go to egypt and how do we make progress to create the political space for the egyptian government to address some of these concerns that by law they must do if we are ultimately going to continue our assistance? >> thank you very much, mr. chairman. i agree with you 100% that we want to have the strongest broadest possible partnership and relationship with egypt and we want an egypt that is stable and secure because it has in respects fundamental human rights democracy and because it builds a prosperous economy. if confirmed, i will engage on all these issues with the egyptian government and work with them to partner and develop the economy, to build human rights, expand those rights, to stop practices such as the mass trials that you've referred to, which we have condemned and to ensure that justice is individualized.

to ensure that there is a society and a country and government that the egyptian people buy into, that they see their interests are best represented inside the democratic process and not outside of it and that will lead to fundamental long-term stability. egypt does have promising prospects including economic prospects and has demonstrated at times that it can function as an emerging economy. that can it have real gdp growth in excess of 7%. and we need to build on that and do whatever we can. >> i appreciate that. in addition to those concerns, you talked about the economic questions, and i'm concern by what i read, president sisi's statements, where it sounds like he thinks that greater state intervention in the economy is going to create the opportunities that egyptians need, and i'm not quite sure having just returned from the gulf region that the -- our gulf partners who have

actually been very helpful to the egyptians will have that view. what messaging will we be giving as it relates to how this economy can revive itself and grow? >> thank you very much. it's, of course, very much in our interest to see egypt build its economy, strengthen its economy. it's within our interests to work with the gulf countries you refer to to target assistance as quick as possible and encourage the economic reforms for the economy to progress. i would note that egypt has a number of economic advantages we can build on. it has a relatively well-developed infrastructure, specifically telecommunications, roads, supports. it has access to markets because of its proximity in europe, in asia, in africa. it has labor that should attract investment as well and it has natural resources particularly natural gas that can be developed. so there is the basis for a strong economy. we have to encourage the reforms that will attract investors into

the country and to target the assistance so that it addresses the parts of the economy that need to be addressed, particularly reforms. >> ambassador jones, you know, we had prime minister maliki here last year. it was a difficult meeting. i don't know whether or not he will actually be the prime minister again. i guess by many accounts, he may very well ultimately put the coalition necessary to do that. but as i said to ambassador beecroft as it relates to our relationship with the egyptian government, in this case the iraqis must understand that the use of barrel bombs, that the overflights and transiting of airspace by iran sending troops and military equipment into syr

with impunity and the lives of the people at camp liberty until they are resettled, is going to be parted by what this committee judges as it relates to future arms sales and our future relationship. i'd like to hear from you. we understand the importance. we honor the lives of those who are lost in pursuit of a more democratic iraq from the united states. an enormous national treasure but there has to be some change in the course of events here, including having a government that is more inclusive in which every sunni isn't an enemy of the state. there are many sunnis who want to be part of iraq as a nation but they have to be included as well. can you tell me about what you will be messaging there as it

relates to these issues? >> thank you mr. chairman. let me take your last point, first. which is of course we completely agree that for iraq to succeed, the different political elements, the sectarian groups need to coming to and create a shared vision for their national security. they need to pull together to address the terrorist threat posed by isil. although the news is very bad, i think one positive aspect of this may be that the groups are indeed coming together to address this challenge. at least we're seeing signs of that in the last 24 hours. in regards to the barrel bombs, the use of barrel bombs is completely unacceptable. it's an indiscriminate weapon against civilians. it cannot be tolerated. this is something that my colleague has raised with the

senior levels of the iraqi government. there has been an instruction handed down through the military that barrel bombs will not be used. we've also heard from military contacts that they recognize that instruction. in regards to the overflights, this is an issue that remains a problem. we are concerned that iran is supplying the assad regime with overflights over iraq. this is something that we would like to see the iraqis stop. this is something that we've raised at the most senior levels. i will continue to do that and look for ways to stop this traffic. on the issue of camp liberty, i though this is an issue of particular concern. it's a very important issue. when i was the deputy chief of mission in iraq in 2010 and 2011, we witnessed a terrible attack in which many people were killed and others wounded. i think the steps that we've taken since then have been quite positive, moving the residents

to camp liberty has improved their security. the government of iraq has also responded to our requests and others requests to improve the security around camp liberty. that's encouraging but the solution, of course, is to remove the members from iraq and get them to a safer place. they will not be safe until they are outside of iraq. our government is taking the lead on this. the mission envoy for the second is meeting with representatives of country around the world and asking them to take members. we also now have a team in baghdad to interview members to see working towards receiving a group of those here in the united states. i think this is the best solution we can present. >> two final points so that it's crystal clear. i don't want to here iraq tell us that we need actionable intelligence. when we have it, we will provide

it. never they have a responsibility in doing overflights. that is an excuse that's unacceptable. i agree that the settlement of meks is the ultimate solution. i have urged the state department to consider bringing them to the united states as an example to the rest of the world that we are seeking resettlement to do so. i hold the prime minister responsible for the individuals in the camp. in fairness to my colleague, mr. smith, my time has expired. i will come back to you afterwards. >> i'm sure ms. smith was fine with that. thank you. >> that is correct. >> i may not be from the south but i don't i will be i will be more gentile. >> ambassador joness, you know, i visited ambassador beecroft and have been to iraq many times, today when you're there

unlike jordan where you still are, it feels like a vacant deserted lot relative to our emphasis on it. it feels like we've checked the box and moved on, that we really have lost influence. i think everybody acknowledges that. we just haven't been robust at all levels relative to our efforts there. we had a great conversation yesterday and we talked a little bit about the lack of sofa and the fact that our troops are gone. that's contributed to the lack of influence in a pretty big way. you've had two tours there. i was going to bring this up just to set the record straight. many of us have felt and maybe even after you say what you say, may still feel that one of the reasons that iraq is the way that it is is that we, you know, didn't leave behind some presence and that we actually -- this was actually what the

administration wanted to occur. you have a very different perspective with that. i think it would be good for you to share your thoughts, relative to why we do not have a presence in iraq today. >> thank you, senator. >> we spoke about this yesterday as you is he. my view on this is that -- is that the iraqi people really did not come together and ask us to stay in a way that made it possible for us to stay. it's as simple as that. no major iraqi leaders with the exception of the kurds came forward and invited us to stay. they didn't come forward on television. we needed a status of forces agreement for the security of our troops. the iraqis didn't meet us halfway on that. that's how the negotiation

ended. >> from your perspective and the fact that we have less presence there and less influence is the result of really the iraqi people really not wanting it to be that way. >> yes, sir. >> that's interesting. a very different perspective when i've heard from most but i appreciate you sharing that. i would agree with the chairman we had a very terse meeting with maliki here. i had one on the ground with him just before that. he's obviously had not been a good prime minister. he has not done a good job of reaching out to the sunni population which calls them to be more more receptive to al qaeda efforts. obviously the syrian conflict. i flow was analysis today saying that's really not having an impact on iraq. i believe it's having a major impact on iraq. >> due to our status with ir

iriraq, how do you view your roll there going there now under the circumstances that we have and trying to mitigate some of the problems that problems that exist between the -- especially the shia and sunni. >> yeah. well, i think to be following in the footsteps of steve beecroft. i think he has established very good relations with all the groups in iraq. i think this is a role that we should continue to play. using our good offices to broker solutions to the myriad of problems that face iraq. i think we've made great progress in recent months to try to broker an arrangement to why the regional government and baghdad could resolve their problems and also support a

process of reconciliation between some sunni groups and the government. this is the role that the u.s. has played in iraq in the past ten years. i think we do have significant influence because of our continuing presence in the commercial and petroleum sector as well as continuing presence in the military sector obviously not with groups on the ground. >> ambassador beecroft, we talked a little bit about another topic, a similar topic but for different reasons. our influence of egypt itself. i think people have had really strong believes about what we should be doing relative to egypt and aid. i have felt we should continue the relationship, certainly with some contingencies or conditions. the fact is that we've sort of been on again, off again. people there have perceived us

to be in some way supporting the muslim brotherhood but not the citizens of egypt. you've had some of the gulf countries step in and fill a vacuum when egypt felt we were stepping away. what's your sense of how the leadership of egypt today views the united states and again similar to ambassador joness, how do you expect to be able to step into that situation and exert appropriate influence in shaping the country? >> thank you very much, senator. let me first say that we do have a partnership with egypt. the egyptians are continuing to engage with us. we need to take advantage of that to pursue our own interests. our interests and egyptian interests do happen to overlap considerably, i believe. it's not going to always be the -- we're not always going to agree on matters. again, engaging with them, working with them we can push them in the right direction.

what we want to see in egypt is security and stability that's based on the fundamentals of a sound society such as the kmie and human rights and be as inclusive as possible. i see our assistance as pursuing our interests in egypt. again, i believe that our interests overlap considerably. if confirmed, i will engage with the egyquipgyptian and encourag to go in the direction that's we want them to go to further our interests in the country. >> well, thank you. i appreciate the relationship and conversations that we've had in the past with both of ambassadors and thank you for your willness to serve in this capacity. ms. smith, cutter has played an interesting role in syria because of the lack of policy from our standpoint.

i think they became exacerbated andority of wint oent out on th own. there are reports that they are moving back into a more coordinated effort with us. do you have any sense of their efforts on the ground in syria relative to opposition and are they moving more into the mainstream, if you will, relative to the type of support they are giving? >> thanks very much for that question. yes, we do have sense that we are making progress in terms of coordinati coordination. it's all goal to support the modern opposition in syria and to address the humanitarian disaster. cutter has been incredibly genero generous. they've given $1.2 billion in addressing the humanitarian needs in syria. going forward, what our engagement consists of with the cutters is continuing to find ways to coordinate to work

together in support of the modern opposition obviously with the ultimate goal of being assad not being in charge anymore. >> in order to give you a chance to say then i think you're authorized to respond to, it's my understanding the committee is developing language that allows title 10 training of the opposition on the ground in syria. do you know if the administration supports that or does not support it? >> it's my understanding that the administration does support the 11 language in the ndaa to authorize training and equipment of the moderate opposition. again i'm not in those policy discussions. >> i understand. i just understood you were authorized to say that they supported -- i wanted that on the record. so with that, i will close and thank you. i do want to say to the other committee members that our staff

has been able to go down and read the memorandum agreement that we have between the u.s. and qatar. i wish it was available to all committee members. it's not. it's three pages wrong. my understanding is that it's very remarkable. our staff had no antennas raised in reading it. i thought i would share this again. again, thank you for your service. >> senator kaine. miss smith let me just ask you a question. i was curious about. we had a chance to talk. i forgot to ask you about this. in qatar under the new leadership, have there been any particular changes in direction in the u.s./qatar partnership or relationship that have seemed notable during this time of transformation. is it kind of steady and we're continuing to do -- the relationship is in the same place that it was. have we seen some changes in direction because of that

leadership transition? >> if i'm confirmed h i would love to be given more response when i'm actually there and able to make my own assessment. my understanding is that our relationship continues to be as close and cooperative as it was before. the amir has been in power for just about a year. he is not new to the government. he was working for over a decade before under his father's rule. so while i would say we aren't seeing a change, what we are seeing is continued progress on the areas that we have good and close coordination. i have every expectation that if i am confirmed we will be able to deepen and expand those positive areas where we are working together. >> one of the areas where i know there's been some tension had been in who the qatar is referring -- qatar had been supporting in syria.

that created some tensions. is that changing? are we more in accord with qatar and the government about, you know, what is the right way to have influence to bring in humanitarian issue and ultimately the civil war to an end. >> this is something we're al d always watching closely. i haven't heard from anyone that we're ready to declare that everything is wonderful and perfect. we do feel that we are making progress in our shared understanding of what groups constitute moderate opposition and who is worthy of our support? >> thank you of that. mr. beecroft, you talked a little bit about the economic issues in egypt. you know, it seems like that would be a real test for the new president is how quickly he can try to demonstrate some economic i inl improvement. you and i had a chance to talk about this the other day. could you talk a little bit about the roll that the u.s. can play in

economic transformation and also the roles that the gulf state allies will be able to play. thank you very much. >> as i mentioned earlier in the hearing, egypt does have the fundamentals for a successful economy. it needs to be encouraged to take the steps necessary to build that economy. we have a team that is actively engaged in egyptians and the gulf states to help, again, target assistance to egypt and to encourage the necessary reforms. one of the things that president sisi has called for is investment. investment is key to developing the economy. in order to get an investment, you have to have certain sound fundamentals in place or the investment won't come. among those are, of course, a stable society based on an inclusive democracy that respects and guarantees human rights for all egyptians and provides the security and

stability that encourages people to invest. again, as i mentioned earlier, egypt does benefit from certain advantages that should help it get through these crucial times if it chooses to make the right reforms. among those are an infrastructure that's relatively well welled. as i mentioned telecommunication road and ports. access to markets in asia and in africa. natural resources. particularly natural gas. my understanding is egypt has the third largest reserves of natural gas in africa and -- egypt on making the necessary changes to that investors see the safe and security envie environment and people are making the right economic decisions to attract that investment. we can do that by working with

the gulf state that's are particularly engaged in egypt and stay with egyptegyptians, o course. >> i know there was a question when i walked into the loom room. i know i was most troubled with the situation with journalists. it was the day there was a very prominent set of journalists going on trial. the u.s. embassy in egypt asked if i would do a come one, come all press conference just to show an example of an elected official does have to be afraid to answer questions from hostile press. i got some tough questions because i was used to it because of politics in the united states. have you seen any signs since the presidential election. is there any early evidence but the direction that this government will take with respect to press freedoms or is it too safe to say. >> well, president sisi inaugural address did say that

he wanted to be the president for all egyptians and enjoy all fundamental rights and freedoms. i think what we want to do to the extend that we can take him up on that and encourage him to follow through. obviously we believe in the strongest possible freedom of press. the broadest possible freedoms for the press. it's very, very disturbing and unfortunate that journalists have been detained and charged with crimes in egypt. society cannot function effectively without a democratic without freedom of the press. we need to encourage it and show that having freedom of the press is in the interest of the country and the government and the people. >> thank you ambassador joness. thank you for your service. i was very impressed when i visited last july. i don't have much time so let me

get right to it. what do you think of t. i'd like your current assessment of that. >> thanks. thanks also, senator for your visit to jordan. it was very helpful and positive experience. i think that especially as the government faces this terrorist challenge with with isil, there is a strong incentive and political will to try to unfie t unify the groups. just recently the president has issued a statement encouraging national unit and encouraging participation in unifying the groups against isil. i think there is political will. even before the most recent crisis, the prime minister has reached out to sunni groups. he has brought 6,000 tribal member into the iraqi security forces. he is aiming for an even larger

number. i think there is movement on this. i think the united states should continue to play a roll. >> first mr. chairman. my first question out of the box -- we've been debating here for a second. what is the definitive pronunciation is it qatar. >> in ahei arabic is qatar. >> great. so let me ask you about qatar. have you been briefed on the memorandum of understanding. >> yes, i have. >> will that be provided to congress? >> i believe it's been made available to the chair and the ranking member. >> do you know it f that will be made available to other members as well? >> i don't. i'm sorry. i'm not in those conversations . what can you tell us about how much of the supervision of these individuals will the united

states have the ability to participate in? >> thank you for griving me the opportunity to address this. i know this is very much on people's minds not only in this room. if i am confirmed, this goes to the very top of my list of priorities. we will be working very closely with the qatarie sers. we will be verifying the restrictions that they have put on these individuals an the information that they will be collecting on these individuals but also verifying from our own standpoint. we will be assessing continuously everyday, every morning when i wake up. every night when i go to sleep to reassess whether these people pose any threat whatsoever to our national security. so i can guarantee you that i will be leading a country team representative of our government who will be working on this

tirelessly if i am confirmed. >> can you share with us in a setting what exactly are the expectations of the u.s.'s participation in that effort in terms of providing capabilities. is that something you can share with us in terms of your understanding. >> i think what i can share is that we have a very good and close and productive sharing relationship with qatar. obviously as secretary kerry said, qatar will not only be the one was with eyes on these individuals. i think it's probably best to leave it at that. >> can you give us your investigation or feelings about the capabilities of the cqatar government to carry out this obligation that they've committed to. >> it's my understanding that they have the capacity to do this. that we have a high degree of confidence in their capacity. we also have assessed that they have the will. their amir called and gave the president personally his assurances and commitment to

upholding this agreement. so we are cautiously optimistic that there is the ability to do this. i don't think it would be an effective way to enter into it with blind faith. that is why we will be working hard to constantly verify. >> what is your opinions on the aftermath of the swap and risks that it poses for americans for capturing americans for the purposes of carrying out an exchange similar to this one. >> i'm sorry. that's something i'm not qualified to address. >> are we concerned in the aftermath that americans serving our country whether it's in the embassy or as part of any of our efforts in qatar are now at a increased risk given the

aftermath of this. >> as dip diplomats we are always concerned of our national security both of the people working on our teams or in the countries where we are representing america whether there or back at home. absolutely, safety and security of americans is the number one thing that we care about. >> in that light obviously we are all aware of what happened in benghazi. we understand is that when we send men and women to represent us in the diplomatic core around the world particularly in areas that are more froen terrorist groups, that places particular dangers upon those who serve our country in that realm. give us april assessment of how you view our security in the embassy there and obviously you've talked about what a priority that would be if you could share with us just a little bit about -- to the extent that you can. the process by which that becomes a priority and how do we

ensure the safety of those who will be working underneath you in that facility. >> sure. this is something that every chief admission is concerned about and particularly focused on in light of the events in benghazi. chris stevens was a close friend of mine. it's something that i'm very mindful of. so as we have moved through -- since the events, every embassy has been looked at and looked at again. it is important to look at the security team that you lead as well as any threat that's are posed day in and day out and how that threat level might be changing. it's a constant give and take. it's a constant conversation. i think it's probably best to leave it at that. >> thank you. mr. beecroft quickly about egypt. what would the administration consider to be sufficient measure business egypt in order to meet the conditions for full

resumption of u.s. mill military aid. >> i'm full with the 2013 appropriations act. i'm not a party to those discussions yet. what i look forward to is going to egypt and contributing to those discussions and considerations. i know this is something the administration is looking at very closely on a daily basis. i'm not that position to answer that question. >> there's been recent reports about sexual assaults during celebrations this week. particularly a video of showing a mob assault a woman and to hear a policeman struggle to save her has been circulating the internet. how would you ensure the egyptian government to ensue the prosecution of sexual assault. how would you work with them to show them that this is a priority in this government. >> the act that you are referring to and others like it are extremely disturbing. we are extremely concerned about those types of incidents. women should have the ability to

go anywhere they want in the country just like a man and they should be full participants in egypt's democratic and social pros e processes. we need to engage with the egyptian government and claim that they are unacceptable. i know that president sisi has made statements that they are unacceptable and he has called on security forces that they need to do everything they need to do to enforce the law. >> thank you. let me -- for the record. i'm just verifying this right now but my understanding is that the memorandum of understanding of qatar is available to leadership as well as members and appropriately clear professional staff members of several committees, including the senate foreign relations committee which would mean that

any member and those professional staff that have been cleared for intelligence briefings would have access to the memos. so all members would be able to read it. >> mr. chairman. i want to thank you you and your willingness to serve. when did you review the memorandum of understanding. >> earlier this week, senator. >> on monday. >> i believe it was monday. >> is your security clearance higher than that of united states senator. >> i can't answer that kwext i don't know what your security clearance is. i think the point of my question is a nominee to be ambassador, i think you should certainly be able to review that but we weren't until apparently late last night. >> i would like to make this commitment to you mr. senator. if i am concerned, i would be delighted to consult with you

and any member of the staff as closely and regularly as you like. >> in your testimony you said we have confident that the security membe members, did you buy any chance see the video of the celebration as those five detainees were welcomed at qatar? >> i didn't see the video. i saw reports about it. >> you should review that. it doesn't look like particularly restrictive environment to me. >> if i'm confirmed we're going to be focused on our national security and we will be looking at not only the directly threatening types of things they could be doing but things that constitute propaganda and that constitute that type of thing. >> because i was not able to take a look at the memorandum of understanding. i will go down and look at it. there were restrictions in terms of public displays for propaganda purposes within that memorandum of understanding?

in other words has qatar already violated that based on your understanding. >> i think the best thing that i can say here is that there will be restrictions on some of the activities of those individuals. i'd be delighted to consult with you again in a different setting. >> okay. ambassador beecroft, how would you assess -- or how would you describe the result that's occurring in iraq now after we have withdrawn all of our combat forces. how is that going? >> well, iraq is facing a very severe challenge from terrorist groups, particularly the islamic state of iraq and the lebont. it has suffered setbacks. if there's a silver lining in this it's that we're seeing iraqis start to pull together in ways they haven't before. overcome sectarian divided. we've seen the kurds in baghdad

start to talk to each other and cooperate on the battlefield. we've seen iraq putting together a conference for sunnis to reconcile with as many sunni groups as possible and engage them in the fight. it's an uphill battle. it's a struggle. we're doing what question to help provide assistance for military equipment and weapons. acommunition and providing training and sharing as much intelligence as we can with them to fight with this battle. >> but just a couple of word assessment of the result. a success. >> on the battlefield. it cannot be considered a success. it's a huge challenge. >> ambassador jones what do you think of pulling out our troops in iraq. >> thank senator.

the government of iraq concerns to face a severe threat from slil which has now penetrated as a result of the syrian civil war. the isil poses a significant threat not only to iraq but to iraq's neighbors. i think the united states has a commitment to support iraq and its security and we will continue to work through the measures that ambassador beecroft just outlined to try to support the iraqi security forces in this challenge that they face. >> now that we've seen fallujia, fall to elements of al qaeda. now that we've seen the iraqi security forces shred their uniforms and go door to door so that they can melt into the

population. do you see any silver linings. >> i think what ambassador beecroft was that the escalation of the threat posed by isil is having an impact in baghdad of throwing the political factions more closely together. i think in the last 72 hours we've seen a series of meetings where the various political elements are coming together and drawing up plans and looking for ways to cooperate for the national security. >> do you expect the iraqi security forces to be able to turn the tide and recapture fallujia. >> you're obvious gloii going t iraq. you said there are 5,300 u.s. personnel in iraq. are they going to be safe. >> that's a good question senator. thank you for your kind words. the compound -- as mentioned

earlier, i was the deputy chief of mission in dbaghdad 2010 to 2011. we've taken extraordinary measures to ensure the safety and protection of our personnel. we will have to be vigilant to maintain those. we can't stay behind the walls. we have to be out. i know ambassador beecroft is out frequently to meet with iraqi contacts in baghdad and other parts the country. we will have to do the best we can to reduce the risks and ensure that we can both do our jobs and stay safe. >> can you tell me of the 5300 personnel are really military forces. are those military personnel? are those state department. >> it's a complicated question. i would love to go into the details in another setting. suffice to say we have a significant number that are state department offersers. we have the marine security

guards. we also have contract guards that are assigned to protect the perimeter. it's a significant number. >> i appreciate that. again, i wish you god's speed and safety and best of luck. i hope the security of yourself and those serving with you in iraq is your top priority. >> thank you. i appreciate that. >> my questions have been largely asked and answered. i won't pursue them. i would just instruct the nominees that will will be -- the record will be open for -- until -- for the next 48 hours. to the extent that questions are submitted to any of you, i'd urge you to respond to them expeditiously so that we can move your nominations before a business committee meeting of the relation -- foreign relations committee. with the gratitude for your willingness to serve this panel, is excused. i would call upon our second

panel today. james nelond, nominated to be the ambassador to honduras. if we could have everyone who is not staying for the rest of the hearing please leave the room and -- all right as we have

everyone every exit. let me for the sake of time, our second panel today is james nelond nominated to be the ambassador to honduras. it comes at a time when honduras is facing a challenge by the humanitarian crisis. the government of honduras is struggling to maintanintain the economic well being of the people. we are addressing how we will handle people coming across the border on their own. just last week president obama

called it an urgent hum apranian situation many crosses over from honduras. also on our panel is jentriy smith. he san expert in am bassy security issues. he is a career member of the foreign services, serving as deputy secretary and is aft isn't director for counter measures at the state department. the u.s. embassy. he served a security officer during two separate tours in cairo. we overwhelm cowelcome both you committee. we appreciate their willingness to join in their service. your full statements will be

included in the record without objection but i ask you to summarize your openings in about five minutes or so so that we can enter into a dialogue with you. with that mr. nelond. you're recognized first, thank you very much mr. chairman. it is an honor to appear before you. the president's nominee as ambassador to honduras. i am deeply grateful to the president and secretary of state in their trust and confidence. after 30 years in the foreign service, i appreciate the privilege and responsibility that it is to be considered to be confirmation as ambassador. i deeply respect the role of the senate in ensuing that the u.s. has a foreign policy that reflects our nation's values, i would like to recognize my wife kristen who is here today and our four children, mory, katie, and leom.

we've been in this from the very beginning. this is their day as much as mine. i have my brother law and many friends. so i thank all of them. i see my son arrived from california. i'm glad to see you. m mr. chairman, the headline don't always tell a positive story. this is a country that faces tremendous challenges. many of them associated with the affects of narcotics trafficking and organized crime. it is a challenge to attack impunity and krupg corruption. i share with many members of congress a concern about the n consequences of slow economic growth, imimpunity, weak institutions and extreme violence in honduras. i share the view that everything is related. impunity and lack of

accountability and transparency remote a weak rule of law culture. they discourage investment and they encourage illegal migration to the united states. we are partners with you in seeking to influence this trajectory in a positive direction. i believe u.s. intervention does and that is in our interest to stay engaged. a honduras with greater transparency and accountability will be more likely to protect human rights. a honduras with a bribae anvibr middle class means viewer migrants trying to cross our borders. a honduras with a stronger interdiction capacity means less drugs arriving in our community. a honduras with strong human

rights protections means enhanced security in our region. the united states is committed to partnering with the government of honduras to promote prosperity, governorance and security. in order to do so, we need willing partners in honduras who have the political will to transform their society. the capacity to seize drugs and the commitment to arrest, prosecute and sentence criminals. they also need to guarantee the human rights of their own citizens. mr. chairman honduras is at at cross roads. we've seen some early signs that they are ready to improve the lives of its citizens. in may for the first time, they extradited a notorious drug trafficker to the united states. an important step toward impunity. the new government has dedicated new resources to better combat,

and they have invited the un to set up an office. there is no doubt the government of honduras still has a very big job ahead. i am fully aware of the serious doubts expressed, including in the u.s. congress, regarding the willingness and abilityhonduras needed steps to improve the human rights situation. if confirmed, i commit to work tirelessly in this area. i've opinion a dep hit chief, i'm currently the deputy civilian commander. i spent the last 30 years in nine foreign postings working to promost democracy and human rightsment enhanced law enforcement. mr. chairman, thank you again for the honor of appearing before this committee today.