management liquidity risks, redemption risks, potential risks that have to do -- >> thank you. i stand corrected. you sit on fsok. >> that is right. that is fsok's focus at the moment. it's studying these areas. the sec is actively involved in rule making in these areas and that has been the focus recently in fsok. >> thank you. you know what would be really helpful, chair yellen, if i could suggest, if we have a written set of criteria that the industry, those folks that are in this space can look at something on paper to say, you know, if i have these various business practices that revolve around my business model or i manage these sort of assets then i know the probability of me being designated to siffy is very high or low. does that make sense? instead of our focus at fsok is

not look at asset manages of siffys but maybe down the road it would? >> there were a set of criteria that fsok initially issued to indicate firms that it might look at. >> has that been updated, chair? >> i'm not certain if it has. but there was -- there was written -- >> if you don't mind we'll reach out to your staff to see if there's any updated criteria on that. do you also have a set of criteria that deals with an off-ramp, such as if an institution designated as a sify and they go down this path in your eyes, off-ramp for them. do you have that set of criteria? >> we evaluate each of these firms every i think i'vevery si decide if it's no longer appropriate for them to be

des designated? do you have the guidelines? >> we're to the trying to run these businesses. and we're not going to -- i don't think it would be appropriate for us to say you need to do x, y, and z to be dedesignated. these firms understand very well why they've been designated. and they understand what kinds of changes in their business model would change that assessment. >> if i may -- >> you know, these are firms that have decided they want to do this kind of business. and if they change that decision, of course it's possible -- >> here's what i worry about. i don't mean to be rude but i only have over a minute left. here's where i worry about. you probably seen this study that was conducted by holtz eken who is the former director of the nonpartisan cbo. >> yes. >> and when you have pension

fund managers and mu chuld fund managers that are designated as sifys he concludes the long-term rate of return, refirement nest eggs are likely to go down up to 25% if they have to succumb to these dodd frank regulations. so it is my contention that when you have a trucker in bangor or a teacher in maine, the greater teacher in the greatest state in the country, doing their best to put aside $50 or $100 a month to plan for retirement but because of the dodd frank regulations over an industry that poses no systemic risk to the economy, if that happens and these regulations prevail, then these folks have to work longer, will have less money in their nest egg. that's not fair. it is not compassionate. all i'm asking of you is if we as a member of congress, i represent 650,000 of the most honest, hardworking people you can find in this country. i just would like to see what written criteria you have such

that these pension fund managers, asset managers, know how to be dedesignated as a sify. >> none of them have been designated. >> i know. wouldn't it be great if they knew what would cause them to be designate and how they could get out of it? >> fsok is not designated any asset manager. >> and thank you for doing that. but it would be wonderful, we have criteria, so going forward we know what that looks like. >> time of the gentleman has expired. >> thank you. >> i want to thank chair yellen for her testimony today. without objection, all members will have five legislative day to submit questions for the witness to the chair which will be forwarded to the witness for her response. i would ask, chair, that you please respond as promptly as you and your team are able. without objection all members will have five legislative days of which to submit materials to the chair for the record.

we stand adjourned. the u.s. houses a approved a multiyear highway funding bill. on next washington journal associated press reporter joan lowy talks about transportation funding and the legislation. then former world chess champion garry kasparov will discuss u.s.-russian relations and his book. and erica groeshen of the bureau of labor statistics and "wall street journal" reporter on the october employment numbers.

washington journal is live every morning at 7:00 a.m. eastern. you can join the conversation by phone and on facebook and twitter. on friday a forum on ways to improve the health care system and reduce costs. we'll be live with the national institute for health care management foundation starting at 1:00 p.m. eastern here on c-span3. every weekend the c-span networks feature programs on politician, nonfiction books, and american history as the nation commemorates veterans day, saturday starting at 11:00 a.m. eastern american history will be live from the national world war ii museum in new orleans as we look back 70 years to the war's end and its legacy. we'll tour the museum exhibits and take your calls and tweets. starting this week at 10:00 our new program "road to the white

house rewind" takes a look at past presidential campaigns through archival footage. this sunday we'll feature ronald reagan's 1979 presidential campaign announcement. and on c-span saturday night at 8:30, the effect of legalized marijuana and colorado and other states around the country. and sunday especiallying at 6:30, our "road to the white house" coverage continues with former maryland governor and democratic presidential candidate martin o'malley who will speak at the town hall meeting at the university of new hampshire in durham. and saturday afternoon on c-span 2's books tv starting at 4:00 eastern it's boston book festival featuring nonfiction author presentations including jessica stern on the terrorist group isis. joe klein and his book "charlie mike" about two iraq and afghanistan war veterans who used their military discipline and values to help others. and james wood and his book "the nearest thing to life, on the connections between fictional writing and life."

and sunday night at 11:00, a book discussion with former first lady of massachusetts, ann romney on her book "in this together" about her journey with multiple sclerosis. get our weekend schedule at c-span.org. the sec they of homeland security jeh johnson spoke object his department's efforts to improve the u.s. immigration process. he was joined by the director of citizenship and immigration services, leon rodriguez at an immigration conference on thursday. this is an hour and 45 minutes. >> it is my pleasure to introduce our up buds man who brings 20 years of cross sector experience in the field of immigration law. as an ins trial attorney, as a private practitioner, as the executive director of a national faith-based organization, and with this in-depth experience

she makes sure that our work product is not only thoughtful but well thought out. she encourages us to think outside the box, to be innovative in our product and in our approach. we are very lucky to have maria odom as our om bunds man. she helps us meet our mission with efficiency and empathy. with that i would like to introduce you tou maria odom, citizenship and immigration services ombudsman. >> thank you, stacey shore. thank you. it's very kind of you. i am very proud to serve as your ombudsman. good morning. it's great to be here. it's our fifth conference. can you believe it? feels like it was just yesterday when my predecessor launched this great initiative and i'm very proud that our office continues to host this conference. i'm glad that we continue to hold it here at the national archives surrounded by the

beauty and the complexity of our nation's history. so i pleased to welcome you. i am pleased to welcome our staff as well who i will introduce in a minute. i am pleased to introduce our friends from ucis as well and arc vis for hosting us again and for his incredible staff. they help us every year with the logistics and execution of this conference. thank you, those of you helping us live stream today and are helping us throughout the day. it's been a momentous year for immigration. i think one which warrants a special morning discussion on the implementation of the president's 2014 directive to reform our nation's broken immigration system through a series of executive actions. you will hear shortly from our secretary of homeland security jeh johnson and also from ucis director rodriguez as well as other department leaders who have been instrumental in

carrying out this very ambitious task. i know that they're looking forward to some of your questions, too. in the meantime, allow me to share a bit about the important business of the ombudsman's office. as citizenship and ver services ombudsman i lead an independent office at dhs which is charged with problem solving. i am extremely proud to be part of a team that works hard each day to do right by those who do not see and experience our immigration services at its best. for those of you who are new to our office we do two things. we assist individuals and employers in resolving their problems with ucis and we review the agency's policies and procedures as we identify problem areas and work with them to propose solutions to resolve them. i'm often asked what does an

ombudsman do. i'll borrow a very simple but very on point definition. he said, ombudsman are useful people when it comes to make mistakes -- to making mistakes right. if you complain to an organization and they don't sort things out then an ombudsman might be able to help. they are the people to whom you can turn for help when all else has failed. our work would not be possible but for the professionalism, integrity and grit of our ombudsman staff. they embrace problem solving, they embrace our mission, and they welcome open dialogue with all of you. i'd like for all the folks in the ombudsman office who are in the audience to please stand. some of them are outside working. thank you for your service. i'm very honored to work with all of you.

you are one dedicated bunch. and i'm very proud to work alongside all of you. but the but we don't do this work alone. every day we work and they work with dedicated ucis officers here in washington, d.c. and also around the country who share in our goal of pr vovidin high quality immigration services. i'd like to recognize our ucsis colleagues in the room. please stand. i know you're there. we know you're here. thank you for all of your hard work. associate director of ucis, public engagement and customer services director, i got all that backwards, welcome and thank you for your support and for your commitment to the work that you all do. ombudsman work is hard work and it's often done quietly and very effectively. sometimes even without recognition. and while we need steadfast

advocates for much needed comprehensive immigration reform we also need to keep our commitment to improving the delivery of services in the immigration system that we have today. this is critical. it is critical in part because we have seen a sharp increase in the number of request for our systems made to our office over the past year. it has more than doubled since i was appointed to this position in 2012. there is still a lot of work to do. why is our case work important? because cases not only represent a family, an employer, an individual seeking benefits or relief, but they also signal to new or continuing systemic issues that require the agency's attention. for example, recently our office noticed a spike in the number of applications for change of status to that of student. delays prevented some of these applicants from starting classes, from accepting campus

employment, some even faced losing teaching and research positions and fellowships. given the good number of cases coming to our office showing a trend, we contacted ucis and they worked to resolve these delayed cases. more importantly, they immediately started working on addressing the operational costs for the delays. in some cases our office intervenes to address a clear error or quality issue in the actual adjudication of a case. that includes monitoring the use of templated request for evidence and other notices. we do that to ensure that customers receive adequate notice of evidentiary deficiencies in their filings and an adequate opportunity to address them. other cases that we've seen this year involved individuals facing delays in renewing their employment authorization documents. while the vast majority of

employment authorization applications are adjudicated by icis within the required 90 days statutory time frame, every year, especially in the summer, thousands of individuals encounter processing delays in renewing their work permits. similarly, over the past year we received requests for case assistance from applicants seeking to renew their deferred action under the deferred action for childhood arrivals program. while some had timely filed their applications they face delays in renewing their documents and also accompanying work permits. so we continue to try to understand the operational constraints that prevent timely adjudication of employment authorize shaigs documents as well as applications. and we encouraged the agency to be true to the posted processing times and to recognize the negative impact of a lapse in having a valid employment authorization document. it impacts individual,

employers, families. on the humanitarian side next month our office will issue formal recommendations addressing trends, our case work has uncovered relating to special immigrant juvenile policies and procedures. we also continue to advance our mission through public engagement on issues that matter most to those who come to ucis for immigration benefits. this year we participated in over 100 stakeholder engagements in 20 different states and we continued our teleconference program hosting important conversations, some with ucis on important topics including provisional waivers, many revisions we've seen lately to ucis forms and longstanding problems in the employment programs. but though we are an office charge with focusing our on problems, sometimes that makes us unpopular, we we recognize ucis' many successes and efforts to modernize our immigration

system and to implement the president's executive actions. i don't want to steal director rodriguez' bragging rights later. i'm sure he will talk about some of the good work they are doing at ucis but i'd like to congratulate him on the agency's guidance and the lauchlg of two very important humanitarian programs. the haitian family reunification program and the in country refugee parole program for central american miners. and i also commend the agency for its planning and preparation to implement the president's executive action initiatives. before i close i'd like to share that in addition to my role as citizenship and immigration services ombudsman i have the privilege of serving as the chair of the dhs blue campaign. the blue campaign is the unified voice of the department to combat human trafficking. the campaign was created on the idea that we are at our best only when we are all working together to fight the crime of modern day slavery.

this year the blue campaign celebrates its fifth anniversary. that's five years of raising public awareness of human trafficking. five years of working with our government and private sector partners. five years of training law enforcement both here at dhs and also around the country. and five years of working and coordinating department policy to support investigations and, more importantly, stabilize and provide relief for victims of this terrible crime. i am grateful to secretary johnson for his support of our office and for his leadership. i also wish to thank deputy secretary for his relentless commitment to the immigration work of this department. i'd like to again thank my staff for putting together an incredible and ambitious agenda today and i'd like to thank our panelists for what i'm sure will be a day of great conversations and, again, all of yoursing once again, for joining us for this fifth conference. thank you.

now, secretary johnson has challenged us here at dhs to bring together our talents, our rich experience and department's resources into one whole of dhs effort. now, his vision for unity of effort is reflected in how we have worked together to resbond to the president's directive to do what we can to fix our broken immigration system. i am very honored to work under his leadership. please join me in welcoming secretary jeh johnson. >> thank you. thank you, maria, for all the terrific work that you do as our ombudsman. thank you, ladies and gentlemen, for being here today. i recall addressing this conference last year and welcomed the opportunity to come

back here. let me provide a few thoughts about where we are, particularly with the implementation of our executive actions. let me begin with something that i said at westminster college in missouri in september. i was honored to give the 56th annual green foundation lecture at westminster college in missouri, in fulton, missouri. the most famous green foundation lecture at westminster was given by winston churchill in 1946. the famous iron curtain speech. in 1954 former president harry truman went to westminster and gave a green foundation lecture. his lecture given during

mcor think error, the red scare, was about what hysteria does to us. i decided in my green lecture to use that as the basis for my own remarks. at westminster in september i said, all of us in public office, those who aspire to public office, and who command a microphone hold the public calm, responsible dialogue and decision making, not over heated, over simplistic rhetoric and proposals of superficial appeal, in a democracy the former leads to smart and sustainable policy. the latter can lead to fear, hate, suspicion, prejudice, and government overreach. this is especially true in matters of homeland security and

it is especially true in matters of immigration policy. at that speech i commented that i know this both as the secretary of homeland security and in a very personal way from the experience of my own grandfather. i talked about testimony that my grandfather gave before congress in 1949 to the committee on unamerican activities of the u.s. house of representatives. the lawyers here will appreciate this. this is the q and a. question, are you now or ever have been a member of the communist party? johnson, i am not now and never

have been a member of the communist party. mr. chairman, i have been asked by this committee to state my views as an educator regarding the loyalty of american negros. in one sense it is like asking if tennesseans are presbyterians or foreign born citizen or american women are persons with freckles are loyal. where there has been resentment, this is in the year 1949 -- where there has been resentment, it has been not against the form of government but against those who misinterpret or seek to abuse the purpose and power of government and cherished freedoms. all of you here know that around immigration policy there is a lot of emotion and a lot of misinformation. i like to note a poll taken by pew research two years ago that

asked the following question in its survey. two years ago. just your best guess, compared with ten years ago do you think the number of immigrants entering the u.s. illegally today is higher, lower, or about the same? a majority surveyed, or 55%, said that they thought two years ago the number was higher than it was ten years before then. when, in fact, as i think all of you know the opposite is true. the high of apprehensions on our southern border was 1.6 million in fy 2000. in fy 2013 that number had dropped to 414,000. in fy '14 the number was 479,000. the spike in the rio grand valley of the children and families. this past year, fy '15, the number has dropped to 331,000,

which with the exception of one year is the lowest number of apprehensions we've seen on our southern border since 1972. notwithstanding these lower numbers there is more we can do on border security as a sovereign nation, we must protect our borders from illegal migration. but as all of you know, building more walls is not the answer. more technology, risk-based strategy, not more walls is the answer. one of the pieces of advice i got last summer when we were in the midst of the crisis on the southern border was from the u.s. conference of catholic bishops that you have to offer people an alternative way, hope, you can't put a padlock on a burning building. so we have established in-country processing in central america so that parents here can petition to have their children

come to the united states. we'd like to see wider use of this program. in terms of building a wall, one of the best commentaries i've ever heard from a border security expert was and is, if you think someone is motivated enough to leave their home in central america, travel north across the complete distance of mexico and climb a 10,000 foot mountain, are they really going to be deterred by a ten-footwall? or as janet napolitano used to say, show me a ten-footwall and i'll show you an even will-foot ladder. so more technology is the answer, not more walls. there are 700 miles of some form of fence across the southwest border now built pursuant to the secure fence act of 2006. longer-term we need to invest in root causes. the poverty and violence in central america must be

addressed, which is why this administration under president obama has requested $1 billion for guatemala, el salvador, and honduras in aid and investment in those three countries. today i want to review with you the progress the homeland security is making on our executive actions announced a year ago. congress has not acted awed r as all of you know on comprehensive immigration reform. we are distap poiappointed by t. the senate passed a bill in 2013 but the house has failed to act. so the president and i have acted on our own within our existing legal authority to do what we can do fix the broken immigration system. overall the president's policy are new policies, are smart, common sense uses of the resources we have to focus on threats to public safety, felons not families, quality of our

efforts over quantity, giving people an opportunity in this country to be held accountable and to be accountable if they been in this country for years and have roots here. in terms of the deferred action for adults program that we announced last november, we are disappointed that this important program is in litigation, in the courts. we are disappointed that the district judge has enjoined the program and the expansion of the docker program that we announced. but we will fight on. we will defend the program. we will defend the case in the courts on appeal. we are anxiously awaiting the decision of the fifth circuit following in the oral argument on july 10th. deferred action aside, we are moving forward with the other

nine of ten executive actions. the most significant of which is our reprioritization of how we use our resources for removal. we're focusing more on felons over families, quality over quantity, as i said, and threats to public safety. the nonpartisan migration policy institute has noted with respect to our new removal priority which we announced last year. these prosecutorial discretion changes which have received significantly less public attention than the deferred action program make it unlikely that unauthorized immigrants who would qualify for doka or dopa will be deported. the overall impact of the new memorandum is to describe dhs enforcement priorities more precisely and more narrowly than was the case under the 2010-2011

guidance. while broadening the circumstances under which dhs personnel should exercise discretion, including reasons department personnel may choose not to deport people who generally fall within the enforcement priorities. overall the new enforcement policies and i can continue to quote, have the potential to subsubstantially transform the u.s. deportation system, particularly within the u.s. interior, end quote. so as all of you here know in fiscal year 2012 i.c.e. removed 409,000 people. fiscal year '13, the number dropped to 368. fiscal year '14, the number went down to 315,000. we're still counting but in fiscal year '15 i anticipate that that number will be significantly less than

$315,000. why is that? well, froiirst of all, simply, there are fewer people on the intake side because of the lower apprehension, fewer total attempts to cross the border illegally that we saw fy '15. second, however, i.c.e. is doing what i told them to do. in terms of reprioritization and the focus on convicted criminals. of those deported in the period march to september 2015, 83% of those deported in that period are in my pruiority one for removal, criminals, criminal gang member, those at the border. at large arrest of those convicted of felonies and misdemeanors is up 22% from last year. bottom line of all of this is fewer deportations but a greater

percentage of those are convicted criminals and threats to public safety. that is the direction we want to go. that the direction the president directed, and that's what we are doing. other reasons for the lower deportation numbers frankly was the politically and legally controversial secure communities program, which we have ended and replaced with the priority enforcement program. as all of you know, under the secure communities program, municipalities, states, counties were enacting limitations on their levels of cooperation with immigration customs enforcement, leading to a number of detainers that were not acted upon, including detainers on people who are convicted criminals and threats to public safety. we are changing that. with our new priority enforcement program we have replaced detainers with requests for notification on a defined list of crimes and removal

priorities. not simply going after people who have been arrested and arrested or convicted of minor offenses. we have received a good reception so far to our priority enforcement program. of the approximately 340 noncooperating jurisdictions that were out there, nearly two-thirds are now working with us on the priority enforcement program. and this is a work in progress. of the 25 largest which account for 83% of previously declined detainers, 15 of those 25 are now working with us again. more will be coming online soon, including big cities. and preliminary indications are that the individuals being transferred under this new program fit within my priority one for removal to an increasing

percentage. we are doing these things for public safety. so in terms of our other executive actions, let me announce and say again as i've said several weeks ago, we have issued a proposed rule to expand eligibility for provisional extreme hardship waivers of the three- and ten-year bars to all persons who statue toirlly qualify for that waiver. a comment period for this change is closed and we are now revi reviewing the 600 comments we received and are preparing to issue the final rule. second, and to encourage broader use of this waiver on october 7th we published new guidance for public comment on the extreme hardship requirement. up until now no clear guidance on what extreme hardship means is out there. for decades, there has been confusion and inconsistent

application. this guidance will provide the needed clarity for this benchmark. the comment period on this guidance is open until november 23rd. we encourage all of you to send us your comments and reaction to this proposed guidance. and help us publicize this guidance once it is final. third, on september 25th, state and dhs made changes to the bisa bull tan to enable certain families to apply for green cards sooner. fourth, we have almost completed guidance to assist the families of those defending our country in the u.s. military, to obtain work permits. on october 15th, we provided public notice of a proposed rule to strengthen the program thatañ provides optional practical training for students in stem fields studying at u.s.

universities. on may 26th we finalized a new rule that allowed spouses of highly skilled h1b workers to apply for visa. we're working on a regulation now and guidance to support high-skilled businesses and workers by enabling these businesses to hire and retain talented foreign workers while providing these workers with increased flexibility to advance with current employers or seek new opportunities elsewhere. additionally we are working on a regulation to enhance opportunities for foreign inventors, researchers, and entrepreneurs wishing to conduct research and create jobs in the u.s. we're promoting and increasing citizen access to citizenship under the leadership of director rodriguez, who will speak next, during the week of september 14-21 we launched citizenship week and constitution day and

ucis in that one week naturalized 40,000 people. and we are now permitting payment by credit card of the naturalization fee. we continue to assess a partial fee waiver of a naturalization fee. an idea championed by a number of organizations represented here today. in terms of our deferred action program, as i mentioned earlier, the dopa program is enjoined but we are defending the case on appeal, along with the enhancements and enlargements of the doka program. we are defending the case on appeal. we will continue to fight for this program. to those who say we did not have the authority to create the dopa program, without a change in law, i say, well, then, you should change the law. we must account for these people. we must encourage them to be

accountable. they are not going away. we are not going to deport a population of people the size of new york city and chicago put together in anybody's administration. there are sound and good law enforcement reasons why we should encourage deferred action. it is also in my judgment simply the right thing to do. it should be no second class people in this country. the most striking thing about this population is something like over half of them have been here for ten years. they live among us. we know them. they work among us. they study among us. there was a documentary on a couple weeks ago on pbs, "front line" and immigration reform. i suspect a lot of people here saw it. i'm proud that two of the people in that documentary, esther and

david, now work for me as immigration and legal advisers. esther had a couple of bit parts in the documentary. one of the -- i had to watch it twris befo twice before i noticed esther sitting behind senator edward kennedy at the end of the documentary. it was kind of hard to recognize her. it was eight years ago. hair was a little darker then. but it was the speech in which senator kennedy announced the end of the effort then at immigration reform. and he said then in 2007, and i quote, this is a message of hope, hope for those of you who recognize the need for immigration reform and deferred action. it is now clear we are not going

to complete our work on immigration reform. this is enormously disappointing for congress and for the country, but we will be back and we will prevail. the american people sent us here to act on our most urgent problems and they will not accept inaction. i have seen this happen time and again, america always finds a way to solve its problems, expand its frontiers, and move closer to its ideals. it is not always easy but it is the american way. in that vein, let me tell you something that my grandfather who

voting rights act of 1965, and all the other things that have occurred since that time. he died a second class citizen in a intrastation in louisville, kentucky, in october 1956. this is what he said about the african-american's plight in the south in september 1956. very much in line with what senator kentucky had to say in 2007. it is variously expected that negro southerners as a result of their limited status in the racial system would be bitter or hostile or patient or

indifferent. bitterness grows out of hopelessness and there is no sense of hopelessness in this situation. however, uncomfortable and menacing and humiliating it may be at times, faith in the ultimate strength of the democratic philosophy and code of the nation as a whole has always been stronger than the impulse to despair. so to those of you who champion immigration reform, fixing our system, and caring for those immigrants who are in this country seeking a better way, i say that the road is long. it can be bumpy. but in the end, we always do the right thing. we always get there. the arc of history is long. so for those of you who work with maria, who want to build a better system and build a better

life here for immigrants, i say keep at it and don't give up. and don't lose hope. thank you all very much. >> thank you. thank you will appreciate it. >> i'm sorry i can't stay and take questions. i do have to get back to my palatial headquarters uptown in nebraska avenue. thank you all. and have a good conference. >> thank you. >> leon, are you ready? leo nrk rodriguez, director of ucis is a colleague who joined us here at dhs over a year ago. and he probably feels about ten years in experience to him at this point. he assumed an incredible challenge but also i think amazing opportunity to lead ucis in executing the president's

directives on executive action. it's a pleasure to work with leon. it's been a pleasure to watch you run with that incredible charge and watch your staff over the past year preimposed injunction to work to make that happen. and i appreciate ucis' partnership, i appreciate the incredible commitment of your staff who work with the ombudsman daily to help fix problems that sometimes require everyone's attention and i appreciate that we all share the same goal of making the system better. so please join me in welcoming ucis director leon rodriguez. >> good morning, everybody. it's good to see a lot of familiar faces and some new faces. so since i have a little bit of extra time you're going to

indulge me because it means i get to tell a couple of stories. and i'd like to start by talking about how i go to work every morning. i live in montgomery county, maryland, probably a handful of you here do as well. and over probably the last eight or nine months i have made a habit of passing through the corner of university boulevard and new hampshire avenue on my way to work. those of you who know the area well know that to be langley's cross roads. and the reason i go through there is because i realize that in my mind i do what i do for the people of langley's cross roads and people like them all over the united states and all over the world trying to get in to the united states. because if you look at langley's cross roads it is an amazing melting pot of people from all

over the world. you see korean supermarkets, you see salvadorian restaurant, indian restaurant, you see african clothing shops. it's really -- it's a really united nations. what you also see every morning at around the time that i go through is crowds a crowds of people going into the metro, crowds and crowds of people lining up at the bus stops all working to pursue their little piece of the american dream. this morning that route was ill advised. not because it wasn't yet again inspiring to pass through langley's cross roads but rather because the traffic was horrific on the way downtown, via nor on the new hampshire avenue and north capital street. that gave me time to think and time to think is sometimes a

little uncomfortable. and it was uncomfortable because i started thinking about the meeting when i saw all of you last year and that would have been just a few months after i had become director of ucis. maria was kind enough to facilitate my discussion with you. and you asked a number of questions about a number of matters. and what i don't know is how wom well i have done in the past year in resolving the issues that you raised. and that calls to mind really a second thought. i have been in government for most of my life and i have grown through that time to become very interested in the behavior of organizations, whether they are government organizations, whether they are companies, whether they are non-profit organizations. and have grown interested in

what makes organizations act, what makes organizations change, what makes organizations improve. and actually what we do in ucis is very interesting case study in that sort of question. what makes an organization move, improve, and change. we're a very large organization. we're 18,000 people. we have an annual operating budget of approximately $3 billion, if you take into account all the fee accounts. and so we're not necessarily the most easily movable object. i view my job as director to make wise and smart decisions about how the organization moves and changes as it moves forward into the future. and there are a constellation of

inputs that go into how those decisions are made. obviously there are a couple of fix points. one is our basic annual budget. even if we do a fee revision, the basic size of that will be the same. the basic size of our workforce will probably be about the same. so those are our in and of themselves pressure on what we can do and how we can do it. but then there are a number of other forces that act on us to make a change. two of those very important forces are in this room right now. and so as stakeholders of different type, a number of you are immigration lawyers, others are advocates, others play other roles in our system -- thank you. i'm audible, though, right?

>> yes. >> okay. so i'm going to eventually start walking around, then i'm going to walk off with the microphone. so as i hear from you, that, in fact, has a very significant influence in how i make decisions as director. and particularly when i hear something from you not just one time but when i hear things from you one, two, three, four, five, and six times. that starts being a signal that somewhere in that 24-hour day i'm going to have to find an hour to actually do something about that issue that you've raised. that means that we've now hit a certain critical mass. another critical actor is sitting right in front of me, and that is maria odom in the office of the ombudsman. they play i think a very, very critical and very special role. actually i think probably most government organizations should have an institution like this

ombudsman. and that is because they are built in resistors to inertia. so they are -- they have a very special charge. one to facilitate correct outcomes on cases to act on behalf of our customers in case where's the system may not have worked or certainly where those customers are not satisfied with the outcome. and then to also look for opportunities to systemic improvement. they have done so, i think, in a very constructive, very orderly, very thoughtful, very evidence-based way. i'm really grateful to them for playing that relation. i'm also -- being in a relationship with you as icis. i also want to congratulate them on the work that they've done in

the blue dhs blue campaign in combating human trafficking, which is something that is near and dear to my heart. so i do that all to really set the stage to say this is a very important interaction which in little strokes and little strokes and little strokes will actually, in fact, eventually has the outcome of modifying the work we do based on the reality of what is happening to immigrants out there every day. now, i want to talk for a little while longer, give you some updates that you will probably be interested in hearing. actually the secretary did a good job of sort of giving you the outline of what i will be discussing in detail. and then i'd really like to open to questions and questions for me are when i open for questions it's questions, comments, concerns, whatever the case

might be. let's dig in first to where we are with respect to executive action. and i want to -- for those of you who don't know her. she's not here today but i just want to introduce you indirectly to an individual by the name of jennifer higgins who actually was supposed to be on your panel this afternoon. she has served since the inception of the executive actions as my senior adviser on the executive actions. she was then and is now dual hatted as the deputy associate director for the refugee asylum and international operations division of ucis. in fact, her role will now be sort of multiplying geometr geometrically because of our increased targets for refugee admissions.

so i just wanted to let you -- let everybody know about her leadership role. unfortunately she's not able to participate in the panel for which she was scheduled today but i'm still hoping that all of you get the opportunity to get to know her. the way i've seen the executive actions, there are basically three key pillars to the executive actions. and they really speak to the three sort of key ways in which our immigration system has been take your pick, broken, damaged, at least susceptible to improvement as the case might be. so the first of those is, as the secretary discussed, the taking the first steps towards some sort of permanent resolution to the condition of undocumented

people in the united states. this is another one of those, you know, we're just talking about how institutions move. there will never be enough public will to remove 11 million people. nobody will want that enough. many people of course don't. and nobody will ever want to spend the kind of resources to do that that that requires. meanwhile, those 11 million people are not just 11 million people. they are husbands, they are sons and daughters, they are sisters and brothers. they are quite typically part of families, part of communities, that, in fact, con ina united states citizens, contain legal permanent residence. and so the impact were we to actually go down that road of 11

million people is not an impact of just those individuals alone. in fact, would have a devastating impact on families, on workplaces, on communities, on institutions of faith. all of which would be terribly, terribly undermined were we to make that decision. and meanwhile at the same time whether we admit it or not, many of these folks are actually contributing quite substantially both economically and in many other ways to our society the most sort of notable, most obvious example is the doka recipients who any time you pick 20 of them to meet you will find young people who are studying, who are working, who are building families. some of them are telling us if you give us a shot, we'll join the armed services so we can

serve our country. a perfect case study of people who in many respects are actually still on the margins of our society saying, not with standing that fact, i'm ready to participate. i'm ready to come in and to make a difference. so we had taken the step of instituting the dopa, drks oka expansion programs. i think everybody has good understanding of where the legal process is with respect to those initiatives. we are now -- i would call attention to this. we are now 3 1/2 months past the oral arguments in the fifth circuit. in circumstances where two out the three judges who heard the case were the same two or three judges who had heard our appeal of the denial of the motion to stay had issued very promptly a

decision. all facts worth noting as we think about where this process stands and what the -- when and how we will have the opportunity to stand up these programs which we believe were not only legal but, more importantly, or as importantly, were good and critical policy to address these issues. but the one thing that i always hasten to remind people when we talk about this, executive action can never have been the end game for immigration advocacy. executive action needed to be understood, deferred action in particular, needed to be understood the best that we could do, given the failure of the political system to act. there is no question that the

political system needs to act. it needed to have acted a long time ago to address this issue and in the given its failure, we took action. the fact is that everything that is going on right now in terms of the legal process, in terms of a lot of the dynamics of our current election further dramatized the fact that our country's leaders, i'm one of them so i have to take this responsibility just as much as everybody else, our country's leaders need to take responsibility as a political system and find a real solution system and find a real solution to this situation. captioning performed by vitac captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2008