interests to impose rules on other folks, and to cut the deals like president obama did with president xi to restrain us, to restrain them, it will also restrain us. that's in our interest. >> i would ask our panelists to help us keep within our five minutes. we've got a number of people that want to ask questions. if we can both ways. the chair now recognizes mr. farenthold for five minutes. >> thank you, mr. chairman. mr. amey, you mentioned there's no penalty for overclassification. what would you suggest that we do? obviously, you would want some penalty for self-serving classification. what other areas would you -- what would you suggest as a potential punishment, or do you just make it illegal with no punishment? >> well, i think that's -- there has to be some punishment. we can debate what the punishment will be. there has to be some kind of civil, criminal or administrative punishment that happens. currently things are marked and

at least with classification, there is at least a better process. i mean a lot of what we've also been concerned with is this you know, in the old days it was fouo with the controlled unclassified information, the cui out there is that anybody that thinks something can be stamped cui, they put a stamp and all of a sudden that has dissemination control on it and it can't be shared and there's questions on, wait a second, if people can't learn about it, how can we foia it. we have to figure out what the punishment will be. it has to be administrative. i'm sure the other panelists have ideas, as well. there has to be something. >> so let's talk a little bit. this committee has had pretty good success with the ig community where within each agency, there's an independent inspector general that does investigations. we've had success with chief information chief technology officers under fatara.

is there a model in which we create within all agencies a classification office, or are we better offsetting up something outside the agency certainly on longer term move something within the national archives where there's a method for declassification. we'll start with you, mr. blanton, and let anybody else weigh in. > excellent, excellent question. all i can do is point back to some of the lessons off history. which are the times when we've had real success in forcing unneeded secrets out of the system was when congress took action with the nazi war crimes, records bill, with the jfk assassination records bill. it set up blue ribbon panels outside and inside. >> part of our problem here in congress is we can do a lot of things. we need to your suggestions on what specifically to do. i understand that that's probably more in-depth we can get in the 2 1/2 minutes i have left.

let me let anybody else. mr. leonard, do you want to weigh in? >> yes, sir. i'm a big advocate of the ig's involvement in these types of issues. having been external to agencies when i was at isu, obviously part of the federal government but yet an outsider, i was very much limited to what i could do when dealing with cia or even the department of defense or what have you. igs don't experience those limitations to the same extent. plus i have the dual reporting responsibilities in both the executive and legislative branch >> so your suggestion might be expand the responsibility to the igs? >> absolutely. there was the 2010 reducing overclassification act which assigned specific responsibilities to the ig. i believe those types of things can be given the proper training, igs could be very effective in this area. >> yes, mr. aftergood. >> one hopeful sign in current classification policy is the growth in classification challenges from within the system.

the current executive order allows people who have access to classified information to challenge its classification status and to say that you know, wait a minute, this shouldn't be classified. in the most recent year, the number of internal classification challenges reached a record high of more than 900. and of those challenges, more than 40% were granted. that is a trend that i think could be built on. if the system can be made more and more self-correcting where people inside the system themselves are finding errors and helping to adjust them -- >> one final question before i'm completely out of time. this committee and other committees often get classified information in requests in response to our requests for information as part of our oversight responsibilities. do you think it would be appropriate to create a

mechanism for congress once we've read that and said this is crazy. this doesn't need to be classified? do you think congress should have the ability to declassify material? does anybody think we shouldn't? >> i believe congress should, in fact, some committees by virtue of rules have empowered themselves with that option. but to my none have never been acknowledged. it's a dicey issue to co-equal branches of government. >> you look like you wanted to weigh in. >> in the final cui rule, that's one of the things we fought for. orally there was only allowed to be a challenge internally. we fought it could be externally or internally. the same process should be applied to classified information, as well. >> thank you. my time has expired. >> i thank the gentleman. >> the chair now recognizes miss watson coleman for five minutes. >> thank you, mr. chairman.

thank you to each of you for raising what i think is an important complex list of issues actually. and i recognize that we need to to be talking about security first. we need to balance. we need to accountability and fairness. so this is a huge area with so many people interacting. and many cases there's disagreement among agencies and within agencies. and a lot has to be done here. i wanted to ask a series of questions, and so i hope you will answer them as succinctly as possible, recognizing you're only going to give me sort of the top lines. i want to start with you mr. blanton. you testified about the recommendations of the moynihan commission more than 20 years ago. i want to have a reaction from you as to why you think congress has not moved to fix this classification system. >> i'm no expert on congress. i assume that you could give them far more sophisticated answer than i could. i think steve aftergood testified at one of the congressional hearings in 1989 -- 1998, when senator moynihan,

helms was alive. they were in many powerful positions and even they didn't push through their recommendations. my own sense is there wasn't enough of a notion of crisis. and we've got a crisis today i think in the classification system. >> i think that you're quite accurate on that that we may be in a situation right now where we are in an unprecedented environment. mr. aftergood, would you like to comment to that? >> you know, the moynihan commission report itself included an appendix of previous studies from previous decades that had also not solved the problem. here we are 20 years later looking back at the moynihan commission. it may be that the recommendation didn't quite capture the issue properly. it seems to me that a law on secrecy is a means to an end. it's not the end. i would think about what is the end that you really want and then go for that. and the end that you really want is greater congressional control over what is or is not classified. focus on that, go for that.

if there are particular areas particular topical areas that need classification, declassification, mandate their declassification. >> so probably and the end result should be the kinds of things that i sort of mentioned when i opened up. the issue of security and balance and fairness and accountability and now we get there. mr. blanton again, you talked about a possible reform that could be made by statute. one of those would be to implement a life cycle of secrets. would you talk to me a little bit about what that is? >> in the most straightforward version, it was in the freedom of information amendments. it's like a 25-year sunset for deliberative process. the reality of our classification system, one of the reasons it's entering crisis, we've got a tsunami of electronic records. the volume is, we're talking d

pedi bytes of information. we're not going to be able to do page by page review which is what our declass system currently consists. >> we have to build in automatic relations for entire categories of records without review. and that i think is going to be the only way to deal with those electronic records. life cycle is a summary term to say we've got to put sunsets on the secrets. you've got to have better decisions on the front end that build in the sunsets and then automatic release. otherwise, we're sunk. >> i believe it was your testimony that i read where you said in this age of technology we can take care of those things that are sensitive in nature. personal information that could be deleted automatically if it's programmed to do so? >> yes, ma'am. that's the big holdup in releasing state department cables. they say they have got to look at every single cable to make sure there's no social security number or phone number there.

i can't think of anything that is more automated than searching for that number. >> i want to ask two questions here. number one is, is it currently a situation where each agency is responsible for classifying its information? even though that information might be shared with other agencies and involve other agencies? and lastly, anybody can respond to this. is there a proposal where this sort of classification consideration would go into a sort of multidisciplined entity where those things could be vetted under standards and circumstances and then sort of move in a way that agencies can sort of agree on the ground levels and would reduce the amount of classification? >> that entity exists. it was recommended by moynihan. the congress and president -- it's called the national declassification center but the reality is, it doesn't have the power, maybe the will to override those agencies so you get a constant equity referral where the agencies all get a bite at the apple. and one of the recommendations

in my testimony is, empower that center. make the decisions. do a sunset. if something's older than 25 years, that center should be able to review it. >> that empowerment require our legislative, my last, i'm sorry. does that require our legislative action to reconfigure this and empower in a different way? >> yes, ma'am, absolutely. >> thank you, mr. chairman. >> thank the gentle lady. the chair recognizes mr. desantis for five minutes. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i appreciate the testimony and the invitation for congress to be involved in this. but i want to just start at the beginning. i just ask everybody does everyone agree that at some level, the executive does have inherent authority under article 2 as part of the executive power to maintain secrecy of information related to the national security? mr. leonard? >> absolutely. >> yes.

>> yes, but because there's an article one that says congress makes the rules to govern the military armed forces and national security. so it's both. >> well, it's both but i think hamilton in when he -- there was a debate whether you should even have a single executive. they had revolted against george iii. some proposed a council and one of hamilton's main arguments for why you need a single executive was for secrecy particularly with regards to national security. there's got to be -- is there any place, i guess, that congress can't go into that, or could congress basically legislate as far as it wants in your judgment? >> can legislate as far as it wants, the power of the purse. separate the power of the purse from the power of the sword. that's key. >> i think absolutely. so the congress could abolish cia if they wanted to.

there's no requirement you have that. we do have intelligence agencies. we do that. could congress pass a statute saying declassify as much sensitive stuff as we want. would there be any constitutional concern with doing that. >> none and congress has done so with the nazi war criminals which exposed the files of nazis the cia recruited and brought to the united states. it worked. >> when did they do that? >> 1998 and 1999. >> i guess my points is if congress wanted to start declassifying things that are germane and right right now with our government's conducting sensitive operations, you say that, would it still be okay even though it could jeopardize lives? >> it would still be okay. my bet is this congress and committee would act pretty judiciously on that. you're not julian assange. >> i get it. >> i have a lot of confidence in your judgment. >> well, but there's certain constitutional prerogatives we obviously have the power to legislate, of course, the purse, the executive has -- the executive power means something. there's certain things so what

i'm trying to figure out is, are there certain -- i think we all agree, some of this stuff is ridiculous. and there's an incentive to just simply cake on more -- some of the stuff isn't even classified it's being protected. at the same time i think it's important to recognize there is a legitimate reason. i think when you overclassify, i think it actually undermines the core reason of why you want to do it. let me just get you, mr. amey, down on the end. >> i totally agree. i believe there's constitutional protection for secrecy but at the same time, as tom said in his statement, you have to get to point number three. that is don't trust it. eventually we have to get down to a point whether it's through the challenge process or through briefings that congress gets on questioning what the executive branch is doing. >> you look at some of these things, some of these agencies. the anti-trust division at the department of justice. the bureau of prisons has somebody who's an original classification authority. you know, mr. leonard, how did

it get to be that point? is that really necessary in those instances? >> it's an example perhaps of when i was in my position at isu, one of the things i had to do was to deal with requests for agencies to get original classification authority. and quite frankly, one of the issues that i had to contend with is it was one of convenience more than anything else. and there were a number of instances where there were agencies or even small activities looking for original classification authority that had to push back because they were looking to really accomplish something that probably can have and should have been accomplished through legislation if there was really a legitimate reason to withhold information from public disclosure. >> how do you analyze because some of this stuff it's just the agencies are embarrassed. they don't want to do it.

it's clearly not credible. but sometimes when you're trying to get information from foia or congress, you are diverting the executive from kind of their core mission to actually do good. we're the first ones to criticize the government when they screw up or not competent and so how do you do this in a way that's not going to impose too many costs? for example, if we're going to always review every ten years some of the stuff, you know, that is going to create some cost. how would you recommend we strike that balance? is that a valid concern? >> very much so is. one way, as mr. blanton referred to, was to consolidate authority and responsibility and not spread it so far and wide within the government. and to give -- i'll give you a perfect example. when i was in the department of defense, i could write a memo and cia information, the cia trusted me to properly class

-- classify information. they didn't want to look at it. if i came back 20 years later and wanted to work at the national declassification center and looked at my same memorial -- memo, they wouldn't allow me to declassify it because i didn't get a paycheck from cia. that type of redundancy can be beaten out of the system and would result in significant cost savings. >> i yield back. >> thank the gentleman. chair now recognizes miss kelly for five minutes. >> thank you, mr. chair. and thank you for holding today's hearing on this important topic. i believe that secrecy is a serious problem that is widespread in the federal government that it goes beyond classified information. for instance, there's a category of pseudo classification that has exploded over the last 15 years, controlled unclassified information. there may be as many as 100 designations in use but the label sensitive but unclassified is one of the worst offenders. first i want to get a sense of the extent of this problem, the

information security oversight office annually reports how many classifications, decisions, agencies make. however, there's not a corresponding section how many decisions were made to designate materials as controlled and unclassified information. mr. leonard, you previously served as a direct isu. are agencies required to track how many materials they designate as controlled and classified information? >> i'll defer to one of my copanelists because i've been away since they assumed that responsibility and have not followed that closely. >> i would say that there has been significant progress compared to where we were ten years ago. it used to be that anybody could mark any document anything. you could say this is for official use only. and that would restrict its access.

now under the executive order on controlled unclassified information, there is what's called a cui registry. only those markings that have been approved and validated can be used. and there are many things, of course, we want to protect. we want to protect tax returns. we want to protect privacy information. all those kinds of things have been validated. and only those markings that are on the cui registry are supposed to be used. is that system working perfectly? are people bending the rules? i don't know the answer to that question. i think it just went into force very recently. and we're still waiting to see how it's working but i think the policy has improved substantially over the past decade. >> would you estimate that more information is designated as cui than is classified? >> i don't know the answer to that. i don't think we know the answer to it. agencies are going to be required to report how much information is marked. they did boil the over 100 categories down to 20. however, there are 80 sub

categories. so at that point, you still end up with a real patchwork of designations and markings that can be placed on documentation. the big thing with it also is there's going to be better training. you know, isu is doing a very good job. i have to applaud them. they reached out to our community and worked with us on the rules, as it went through the process. they really did work with the agencies to try to get it. but i don't think they realized how big that this had expanded within agencies. there was a lot of foot dragging by federal agencies, as well. so as mr. aftergood said, it was only in effect i think as of mid-november something like that. so that the point, we're going to have to wait and see and full implementation of the cui regulation isn't expected to be completed until 2017, '18, '19. at that point it's going to take a very long time to probably get answers but it needs the proper oversight from this committee. >> you called it a gray area because i was going to ask you what do you think the potential for abuse is. >> and we've already seen some

abuses. in my written testimony, i provide two examples. one was an ig report in which there were examples involving tsa. also, the bizarre case of robert maclean in which something was marked sbu, was actually the original cii. at that point something was marked sbu, i think four years after he released it even though it didn't have marking or designation but they retroactively marked that information as sbu. there are problems in the system and it is prone to abuse. so we do have to watch it. the nice thing with the cui rule is that there is a misuse provision. that may it be something that could be borrowed upon for the classification system and we should look at since it's already in regulation and also the challenge procedure but again, challenges go back to the agency. and then i think you have a right to dispute resolution. so it's a little murky due to the fact you're, in essence,

going back to fox guarding the henhouse that may have originally marked. there are concerns with that. >> mr. blanton, i want to give you a opportunity for comment. >> i agree. >> i yield back the balance of my time. >> the chair is now going to recognize himself for five minutes. i want to go back to something that came up a little while ago. that is the number of classifications. over the last five years, some 400 million. and yet, only a little over 2300 in the same five-year period have been challenged. and those numbers it can be debated a little bit here and there. whatever it is, 2300 out of 400 million is virtually no challenges whatsoever. and just real quickly, just from a sentence or two, why so few challenges? mr. leonard, i'll start with you. >> mostly one of culture. you know it, when i was in the pentagon, when i had reports in

my in box, if i had an unclassified report and top secret report, which one would i read first? the top secret one. even though it the unclassified may be more substantive. sometimes sheer culture. people get inured to it and just expect nothing else. >> mrs. aftergood. >> in many cases, employees are not aware of the challenge provision that enables them to make this challenge. and that's one simple step that can be taken to say, look, as soon as you sign your nondisclosure agreement, you sign i'm aware that i can challenge a classification marking i believe is improper. i would also mention that i think your hundreds of millions figure is including original and derivative classifications. the number of original classifications or entirely new secrets has been on a steady downward trajectory. >> i don't want to get into the number right now. mr. blanton, why so few challenges?

>> it's easier just to classify. and much classification just occurs reflexively. most of those derivative classifications is just keep it going because there's not a thought process on the front end of the first decision. what's cost benefit, what's the real risk, what's the vulnerability. what's that? you've got to educate them at the nondisclosure agreement point, but i would argue -- >> just quickly, it could be career suicide. at this point, we have insider threat investigations that could take place and also whistle blower retaliations. a lot of times it's easier to go along with the process. >> it's not a matter of red tape perhaps poor advertisement. people don't know the perhaps a culture that -- or whatever. but red tape is not the problem. is that correct, all of you would agree with that? >> absolutely. again, a lack of accountability is key, too. >> okay. now, when it comes to obviously

we know there's been a lot of threats to our country, and i'm concerned about the lack of information sharing within our federal government. how serious of a problem is this to each of you? >> i think it was ten around the time of 9/11. it's five now. in other words, there's been significant progress. >> the rest of you, mr. leonard? >> i would tend to agree, but my sense is that there's also been a rollback with respect to some recent rather significant wholesale compromises that have occurred as well, too. >> mr. aftergood, how serious of a problem? >> it's a serious challenge. you know, it's when you classify

you restrict dissemination. so they're the flipside of each other. it's an ongoing problem. >> mr. amey? >> agreed. >> so across the board we still have a serious problem. there may be some improvements but we still have a serious problem with sharing information even when potential threats are hanging in the balance of our country. in the mix of all of that, also it came up earlier is the ability of congress to do our job. how serious is the issue or is it at all an issue where agencies are overclassifying to either complicate or obstruct congressional oversight? >> i'd like to hear from each of you quickly. >> honestly, you're probably in a better position to answer that. i think it's the exception, not the rule. >> okay. i think it varies by agency and i think the intelligence community has the in the sense the worst cultural problem. you got to go into that skiff. you can't bring out notes.

you can't have staff. how are you going to have a serious consideration of real oversight over some of the most important and sensitive and deadly operations of our entire government. >> real quickly. >> inevitably occurs whether intention or not. and again, the lack of accountability makes it ripe for abuse. >> it's why in any oversight or new commission that is going to be paneled here to take a look at classification and the status and secrecy issues is why you have to get out of just the check the box kind of audit of are people following procedures but take a look at some specifics where challenges have been raised and why those things were allowed to be over classified. >> when we do get stuff, it's so redacted it's virtually worthless much of the time. i want to thank the panelists. my time has expired. the chair will now recognize miss maloney for five minutes. >> thank you, mr. chairman and ranking member. mr. blanton, earlier you mentioned the nazi war crimes disclosure act. that happened to have been a

bill that i authored and it took about four years to pass it because the cia was objecting. it opened up the files of nazi germany and japan 50 years after the war. now, every other country had open their files but we were refusing to. and it took congress to pass a bill to open up these files. it's been turned into books. it's been turned into all kinds of helpful information that has helped our defense strategies and how to operate in an environment as they did. but i want to ask you about another way of classifying, which is retroactively classifying. and i join you in saying there was no reason why we shouldn't have declassified that information. but on september 8th of this year, state department undersecretary for management patrick kennedy testified before this committee about a unique

process in the state department used to retro actively classify 2,000 of secretary clinton's e-mails that she turned over to the state department. in other words, they were not classified at the time they were sent or received by her. but then they were reclassified after the fact by staff and the department of the foia office. and patrick kennedy testified that 1,400 of these documents or 70% were retroactively classified because they contained what is known as foreign government information. so my question is, it seems to me that this is a confusing process. foreign government information is not treated like classified information. until it's reviewed for public release. and then all of a sudden, it's classified. seems to me we should have one standard. why have one retroactively?

it makes no sense. how are state department employees supposed to know when to treat information as classified and when not to if the designation might change without warning? >> i read mr. kennedy's testimony with great interest because he asked this committees to create an exemption under the freedom of information act for foreign government information which is a terrible idea. for three reasons. one, it puts tajikistan standards into our freedom of information law. no thank you. lowest secrecy abroad. second reason is if there's harm from release of that foreign government information, it's protected already under your executive order. you can classify it. the third reason is, that's the easy way out. instead of our diplomats actually thinking about how you protect stuff that actually would get us into trouble, they don't want to think about it. i remind you of the weatherhead case when the supreme court over foreign government information got mooted out. turned out the document at issue had already been handed over to

the plaintiff, and the government had no idea. and it wasn't going to damage our relationship with great britain which is where the document came from. so skepticism is in order. >> well, i agree with you. and i truly understand the need to protect truly sensitive diplomatic discussions from public release. but using the classification label to do that makes the classification system even more confusing. and i would argue less effective. and we need to find a better solution. so with that statement, i'd just like to ask all other panelists in my remaining time, do you have any recommendations of how to improve this process? and we could start with you, mr. leonard, and just go right down the line. >> the consistent theme this morning, and i agree with it wholeheartedly, is providing legislative backing to the very system.

in order to ensure uniformity, consistency, and most of all, accountability. and also for to enable to facilitate the congress to be able to fulfill their article one constitutional authorities, as well. >> the government requires a degree of flexibility. and so i would be cautious about you know, strict provisions that remove such flexibility. information that is provided in confidence needs to be protected somehow. if one wants to maintain that working relationship. whether that's classification seems like a heavy handed way to do it. but if the alternative is a blanket foia exemption, then that might not be better. i don't have a good solution for you offhand.

>> when it comes to retroactive classification, we need to study. i'm not aware of anything in-depth in taking a look at the effectives. so i think that would be in offered. >> the fundamental phenomenon on retroactive is being driven by agencies like what mr. leonard said. cia asserting control and no longer allowing the state department to declassify their own information. >> thank you very much. >> thank the gentlelady. the chair recognizes for five minutes. >> i'm so glad we're having this hearing today. i've been looking for the opportunity to talk about something that's very important to me.

about and i'll be very careful not to disclose anything that's classified. about a month ago, i went back down to one of those skiffs that mr. blanton was talking about. can't take notes out. and what i did is i reread the 28 pages. but i brought the redacted version with me. so that i could see in what manner it was redacted. by the way, i'm going to ask you guys a question later so you can get ready with an answer. but one of the things that i would think would help is to know the reason for the redaction. there's certain reasons that might be legitimate and maybe a law that says when you redact large swathes or even small portions, that you have to give the reason. if the reason is to avoid embarrassment or to protect a source or to protect somebody who may not be guilty, their public reputation, just disclose it and then the crime or the infraction could be that you lied about the reason. because that's what i want to get to with these 28 pages and the reason for those redactions. and i think i can disclose my perceived reason for some of these redactions without disclosing anything classified. 20% of the redactions i would say were to protect specific and confidential sources. i would say another 20% were to withhold the names of individuals whose reputations

would be irrevocably ruined whether they were guilty or not. but 60% of those redactions fall into a very troubling category for me. they change the very nature of the document and the way it's impact that it should have had. for instance, and those are some of those are probably to prevent embarrassment. but i feel like after reading that 10, 20, 40 years from now when it's all released, this is going to be a textbook case of how the government overclassified something in an effort to control the narrative. before these pages came out, there was as op-ed in the "usa today" by two of the chairman on the commission that said these are raw, unvetted sources. right? so the redactions in my opinion were made to support that presumption that these were raw unvetted sources because if you remove the redactions you would say no, those might be credible

sources. in fact. and they might in fact be vetted. so that's my concern is that you know, 20 years from now, we'll look back there. you'll see the key words and acronyms and sentences were removed. and with the effect, with the effect of diminishing the impression that you get from reading the unredacted pages which is that saudi arabia and i can say that name now because it's in the redacted pages, has some kind of civil liability or criminal culpability either not because of their citizens but because of their government. acted either in, i would say, acts of omission or comission. either one makes them somewhat culpable. i'm afraid that has been diminished by those redactions and it's been over classified. this is a prime example.

so one of the questions i want to ask is, do you think it's a good idea if we required them to give the reason for the redaction. >> absolutely, sir. the order does require original classifiers to be able to identify and describe the damage to national security. but to my formal statement, i attached an actual e-mail that had been used as count one for a felony indictment of mr. drake who was eventually not prosecuted. but the government claimed it was classified. and in preparing for the trial, the nsa was required to state specifically why they considered that e-mail to be classified. their explanation looked entirely rationale when you read it. but if you compared what they said to the actual document, it was factually incorrect. >> so that he supports the notion that they should be required to disclose. >> absolutely. >> there should be some punitive

ramification for misleading about the reason. mr. aftergood? >> i would like it to be to make the point that the classification system is permissive. it says that information may be classified if it meets certain conditions. and what that means is that the decision to classify is actually a subjective one. somebody thinks that classification is the right move. and because it's subjective, you or i may disagree and say you know, that's a mistake. you're wrong. so providing the reason i think would be helpful but it wouldn't necessarily resolve the disagreement. i just disagree with that reason. instead, i would suggest that in cases of significant interests like the 28 pages like many other cases, there needs to be a procedure where you take the decision away from the original classifier, don't try to make the original classifier admit he was wrong. take the decision away, take it to a third party.

there's a public interesting declassification board. there may need to be a new body and say, does this make sense. i want you to evaluate it as a third party and comeback back to us with a recommendation. >> mr. chairman, i appeal to let the other two answer the question. >> just very briefly. exactly this mechanism exists for mandatory review requests this interagency security classification appeals panel and it's ruled in favor of openness over 70% of the time. just a third time. the simple maneuver of taking the document away from the original agency and putting it in a panel that includes account original agency, you gets a completely different result. >> mr. amey. >> this is also a process with the freedom of information act. there is a process there where just only a few years ago, did they add where they had to list the reasons. in the old days we used to get a letter back with tons of blackens out markings. in the intro they would say we redacted things for b, 3, 4, 5, 6, and 7 and you in to guess what is applies.

now they're required to go through documents subject to the freedom of information act and list right next to each redaction what the redaction what exemption was being cited to justify the reason for that and also then you also have an administrative appeal that we hope we always hope it goes to a different entity inside of the department rather than the person that made that marking and now there's also a process through isu to challenge those determinations and go to an arbitration. it's funny we have a better procedure for that freedom of information act process than the classification process. >> i've seen the documents with the markings. they're somewhat helpful. they classify the stuff they even send to us. they try to not even disclose. but i haven't seen that on the 28 pages. i've just seen op-eds that say there's nothing to see here. by the way, it was released the day before trump named his vice president. which is another thing but at least it was released in part. thank you.

>> thank the gentleman. the chair now recognizes mr. connolly for five minutes. >> thank you, mr. chairman and thank you all for participating. i guess i'd like to explore a little bit what happens when two agencies disagree about something being classified at all? and there is -- this is not a hypothetical. in a recent investigation of e-mails, we had multiple examples where the state department said one thing. and the intelligence community said another. specifically example really quite i think quite striking. a 20 11 e-mail was marked

clearly important but not classified. the state department considered the e-mail unclassified and anyone reading the e-mail would assume it was not classified. but after the e-mail was sent, the intelligence community, nonetheless, claimed it was classified. in september last year the state department sent a letter to senator corker explaining the intelligence committee was wrong. the letter from the state department stated that the suggestion that the e-mail should have been treated as classified was, and i quote, "surprising and in the department's view incorrect." so what is a poor boy to do? is it classified or isn't it?

>> there are appeals process in the system but they are sum bersome and time consuming. tom blanton referred to the interagency classification appeals panel. i used to serve as executive director for that. interestingly enough, last year, for the last full year of numbers available, for appeals that came to that panel, which consists of executive branch representative from various agencies. 95% of the time, the determination made by the agency that owned the information was overridden, at least in part or in whole. 95% of the time, since 1995. >> but in this case, mr. leonard, the originating agency didn't want it to be classified. >> i think the short answer to your question is that each agency has classification authority over its own information. and in the dispute you're referring to, i think the intelligence community

considered that the information at issue was its information even though it was in the state department documents. >> and the state department -- >> said no it isn't. >> the state department took direct issue with that, saying we understand that's what you think but that's not how we got the information. >> yeah. >> we could even add another layer. let's hypothetically say we invite the fbi, a nonpolitical organization, to come and look to see if there were violations of our secrecy laws. well, how is it supposed to determine whether a violation occurred when the two major agencies or entities looking at classification have different views about the nature of the document, the sourcing of the document, and what it should be classified as? >> part of the problem for the federal bureau of investigation is it's part of the intelligence community, so it leans one way on the question.

the real answer to your question, is it classified or unclassified, the answer is both. that's the reality of our classification system. i showed you documents here that are both classified and unclassified, simultaneously because different people or different agencies rer sometimes the same reviewer came to a different conclusion. >> i know, but there's a certain kafka-esque quality to it. i was a staffer for the senate foreign relations committee, and we were careful about classified material and how it was stored and make sure it's never on your desk, as are executive branch employees. if i have one branch saying that, give it to your grandmother, it's unclassified. the other is saying don't you dare. it's classified. what's my liability as an employee? i'm trying to be diligent. what is it? and my exposing myself by leaving it on my desk? for example. >> the executive order on classification includes provisions for resolving disputes about implementation of the order.

ultimately, those disputes can be directed to the attorney general. and you know -- >> but that's not how it works practically. >> it's not. >> listen, i was in the private sector and i was the head of all of this for a private sector entity. we went around, checking to make sure nobody was sloppy. and we're not going to go to the attorney general. you have a ding on your mark because i saw that document on your desk. well, in good faith, you're counting on the state department judgment that it was not classified. it was no issue. and i'm deciding, as the security chief, that i don't care. the intelligence community is what i listen to and they say it is. it puts people at risk, and frankly, i'm glad it can could be arbitrated at some point and i'm glad the attorney general can ultimately adjudicate, but we're talking about thousands of documents, thousands of judgment calls, i think you mentioned it was subjective.

but disputes between agencies are a real dilemma for people trying in good faith to comply with the law. >> you are absolutely correct. and the arbitration is really a technicality. the reality is that these kinds of disputes drive the issue to the lowest common denominator. they result when there's doubt. they end up adopting the view that is classified. >> thank you. and the executive order says when there's doubt, it should not be classified. exactly the opposite happens. my answer to your question, send it to your grandmother. i have an opinion from mr. leonard when he was head of the information security oversight office. he said if the national security archive got a version of the document under legal authority, declassified with somebody with the power to do that, you can take it to the bank. you can keep it on your website, even if somebody else at the energy department or defense source says that's classified. wrong, sent it to your grandmother. >> thank the gentleman.

now recognize mr. grothman for five minutes. >> sure. first question i have, and this is really for anybody who wants to answer it, in the stuff we have here, we're told the government spends $16 billion on classification activities. and $100 billion over ten years. which is a stunning amount of money. if it's $100 billion over ten years it must be going up like a rocket. i assume it means $5 million ten years ago and $16 million today. does anyone care to comment on if that's a good investment of funds and how do you spend that amount of money? it seems like a phenomenal amount of money. think it's accurate? >> that's a difficult thing to evaluate. lets put it this way, i spend many a year in the defense department.

and i had to deal with the consequences of major failures, major compromises, espionage cases and things along those lines. and what the challenge is is that whether rightfully or not, the mentality is zero tolerance for those types of things. how many espionage cases are you willing to endure. how many major releases or unauthorized releases are you ready to endure? the mind set is zero tolerance, and as a result, there is -- tends to be a lack of risk management. when you have a lack of risk management, you end up paying premium dollars. >> do you think the numbers are accurate, though? $16 billion? >> at least accurate from the point of view they show consistent trends from year to

year. >> okay. we have a new isoo director, mark bradley. does anyone want to give us their opinion? is that a good pick and what goes into making a good pick? >> you know, it was never going to be an openness advocate who led the isoo. but i think he is a good pick because he has a broad understanding of the problems of secrecy. he was an aide to the late senator moynahan. and is well attuned to the understanding of the problems that the secrecy system suffers from. as a former intelligence officer and as a doj lawyer, has a degree of credibility with the national security agencies that others might have trouble matching. >> okay. go ahead. >> just the proof's in the pudding.

we look forward to meeting with mr. bradley, as soon as he's on the job. you can look at the information security oversight office's previous directors and you can see those folks made some real differences in the security system in a more rational direction. i can hope for that trend to continue. >> certainly, we hope that they reach back out to our community. that's one of the nice things with all the gentlemen that mr. blanton just mentioned is they have been very open. there has been a dialogue back and fort, and they know that there is a burden on secrecy but then on openness and have provided the proper weight test to that. that has been, i think, beneficial to the system. >> okay. there was an inspector general report in 2013 that said that 33% of the dia employees didn't understand their role. and even more outrageous in that report, they said 80% of the documents reviewed were

misclassified. i guess first of all, i should ask how many different classifications are there because it seems like you could almost throw darts at a dart board and do better than that. could you comment on that and as to why that happens. >> comment on it, do you think things are better than three years ago? or maybe it was a flawed report. >> i would suspect it's not a flawed report. i think based on my experience for over 40 years, that's rather typical. it's a reflection of as much as we spend tax dollars to investigate people, to establish secure i.t. systems and things along those lines, we do not spend a comparable amount of money in terms of trying to train people in the basics. one of my concerns is that we make -- we make a distinction between original classification and derivative classification.

my experience has been when people are deriving it classified information, they're doing it on gut instinct more than anything else. >> any other comments? by the way, unless i'm doing the arithmetic wrong and i did it twice, on the cost of this thing, for that, you could hire 200,000 people at $80,000 a year. that's how much we're spending. 200,000 people. i understand some of that may make more than $80,000 a year, but my goodness. >> thank the gentleman. the chair recognizes mr. lynch for five minutes. >> thank you, mr. chairman. first of all, i want to thank the panelists for helping us, helping us think about this, and how we might approach the problem.

i had the pleasure of working with walter jones on the 28 pages. it took us 15 years to get that information out there. which is far too long. it was interesting because as we were asking for disclosure and declassification, the administration was pushing back and saying no, this is too sensitive. we had some of the agencies saying, no, it's methods and sources. then finally, when it was eventually declassified, they flipped. they flipped and said, well, there's nothing here. the information is not valid. and they took a totally different tack. we're now struggling with the dea and fbi in regard to classified -- excuse me, confidential informants. so we have learned from the office of the inspector general for the dea that we have 18,000, they have 18,000 confidential informants out there.

that are under contract, being paid by the dea. and last year, we spent $237 million paying confidential informants, and congress knows zero about that. they don't know about the crimes they have been committed. they don't know the way they're operating. dea headquarters isn't independently involved. this is all operated at the field level. so that -- and that's just the dea. from our conversations with the fbi, i believe that the numbers are double. probably about 500 million that the fbi is paying to confidential informants. probably double the number, probably in the area of 30,000 or 40,000 informants. confidential informants. that's totally out of our purview. i'm wondering, you have all hit on this, you know, with the interagency panel reviewing

classifications, is there some way to super charge that, that process? because it is painstakingly slow, and it doesn't work in the timeframe in which the information would be useful to us. mr. leonard, i know that you said that the last time somebody took a good swing at this was during the clinton administration, in your remarks. your earlier comments. is there some way we can get this interagency declassification review panel resourced and equipped to give congress, and i have seen -- i have seen my colleagues across the aisle tear their hair out when they couldn't get information. i have been in the same position. is there some way we can formalize this process to get the information in a timely

manner? >> one way i would suggest would be to make provisions to allow appeals directly to that panel under certain circumstances. right now, requesters have to go to the individual agency. if they get turned down in whole or part, they have to appeal to the same agency. it's only after that process that they can go to the interagency panel. even that panel then has its own coordination of things which can be problematic, which is easier to address, but the individual agency time delays can be problematic. also, for purpose of congress, congress does have the public interest declassification board that they can refer to. and that is another avenue that quite frankly i never believe is utilized enough. but that's another avenue. >> yeah. to expedite it, you know, maybe we just have to figure this out legislatively, to introduce an expedited process where the information we believe is so

critical and i guess i'm just thinking, is there a way to get the judiciary involved here so they would review -- i don't want to create a political question that the courts can't rule on, but we're being stonewalled in wide areas of public interest, and i feel like it's hampering congress' ability to do its job. >> one of the things is the interagency panel is actually exercising on behalf of the president. it's exercising his article ii authority, and the public interest declassification board, ultimately, they just make recommendations to the president who makes the final decision. >> you have something you want to add? >> yes, sir, you mentioned sources and methods. i think it goes right to your informants problem and one of the big drivers of classification, which is under the current statutory system, anything that is a source of method can be claimed to be withheld, whether or not its release would actually harm a

security value or get a source killed. i think congress can take very simple action, both in the intelligence field and the law enforcement field to say sources and methods is not a burka. it should only cover the things that would do damage. get something killed, ruin an investigation. right now, that identifiable harm standard, which is now in the freedom of information statute, it doesn't apply in this informants and sources method. it needs to apply. congress has to take that action. >> and that recommendation was in the moynahan commission report, and it hasn't been acted now in almost 20 years. so it may be time for congress to enter that world. >> yeah. i know that attorney general reno issued some guidelines, but they're not being followed. i actually have legislation. i don't even want to know who the informants are. i just want to know how many are out there, what they're being paid and what crimes if any they have committed while being a part of this government program. we had a difficult time getting

that through. but that's all i have, mr. chairman. thank you for your indulgence. i yield back the balance of my time. >> the chair now recognizes mr. duncan for five minutes. >> thank you very much, mr. chairman. first of all, i want to say that i want to go on record as saying i agree with mr. grothman in saying i'm astounded by the amount of spending that's being done on this, this $16 billion estimate and over $100 billion in the last ten years. i think we lose sight up here of how much a billion dollars actually is. but having said that, i had two other meetings so i unfortunately didn't get to hear your testimony. i apologize if you have gone into some of this earlier. but mr. blanton, in skimming over some of this testimony, i was fascinated by your report about the moynahan commission and that we went through all of

this 20 years ago, basically. and also, i think the thing that impressed me the most was, i mean, there seems to be general agreement here today that there is a real problem of overclassification. but i saw where mr. mcdaniel, who was president reagan's national security adviser, said that only 10% of what's being classified probably really needed to be classified. is that correct? and why do you think -- you mentioned there that this was a tremendously bipartisan commission, had jesse helms and daniel patrick moynahan. and obviously, you're disappointed that not -- very little was done with that, those recommendations. why do you think that was? and do you think we should take another look at that? what -- just go into that a little bit for me. >> i think in the testimony i quoted mr. mcdaniel, who the moynahan commission quoted and

said based on my experience with a few million pages of classified documents, he's right, especially about the historical materials. i think an estimates that's closer to reality for current material, the material on terrorists and isis, the best estimate came from the republican head of the 9/11 commission, tom kean. he said 75% of what i read about al qaeda and osama bin laden that was classified shouldn't have been, and we would have been safer as a country. so i think the range is in there. the 75% to 90%. it's a bureaucratic problem. bill knows it better than anybody. steve aftergood has been studies it, pogo. every incentive is to classify. there's almost no disincentive.

there are no penalties. there has to be, i think, this is the main reason why congress needs to take action. because y'all can change the minds of the bureaucracy and how it actually works. you can change the laws and their hearts and minds will follow. >> i actually believe that the executive branch in general agencies in particular actually want the ambiguity because the ambiguity gives them almost unlimited discretion. in dealing with issues. and yes, it results in dumb things, but it's the ultimate trump card to pull out whether you're dealing with the courts, whether you're dealing with congressional oversight or whatever. nobody wants to be the one who compromised truly sensitive information. so there tends to be this over deferential to any assertion,

and that's what it is, a simple assertion. it cannot be demonstrated that truly should be classified. >> well, there's so many other things i would like to add or comment on, but mr. amey, i'm assuming -- this committee has requested through the years a great deal of classified material. and do you think that agencies are classifying some material or a lot of material that really doesn't need to be classified? just to void or get around congressional effective congressional oversight? >> yes, but it's hard to know at what level. i don't know what i don't know. that's unfortunately when something shows up and it's a blackened out page and marked classified, and then a foia exemption attached to it, it's hard to know. sometimes we get documents released to us, and at that point, you can do the comparison. that can allow you to ask some questions. unfortunately, with the amount of classification we have, its very difficult to put your finger on it, the experts that have taken a look at it, the 75% to 90%, but the culture. i think that's it. even after 9/11 with the 9/11

commission, you have a culture to the default setting is err on the side of caution. >> i have run out of time, but i will say this. we're going to have to, it seems to me, go to much more of a carrot and stick approach on all of this, and incentivize good behavior and penalize bad behavior in this area. and at any rate, thank you very much. >> thank the gentleman. the chair now recognizes mr. lujan grisham for five minutes. >> thank you, mr. chairman. and hearing some of the comments at the tail end, you may have to repeat some of that because representing my district and of course new mexico, we're home to world-class national security defense operating labs and related defense. both private and public sector institutions and businesses. and i understand unequivocally the need for being very clear that sensitive, classified security aspects related to

information, that we have to be very clear about protecting the integrity of those systems and that information. having this committee work on furthering our effort at transparency and recognizing that across agencies that we don't have an effective handle of that, who's determining and what parameters apply and what circumstances before, during, and after information is being shared in a variety of what i would call sort of post and presecurity issues. i also worry about unintended consequences. and being a long-standing bureaucrat, i can argue either way that having ambiguity is -- can be a protective mechanism to not change anything, because you fear those unintended

consequences and your own accountability, particularly here where national security is at stake. right? there's no incentive to be a little bit -- to talk about being less risk averse when we need better transparency in order to inform ourselves in a way that's productive so we can do policy making and you can increase the way in which we address national security issues. both in the congress, both in the bureaucracy, and defense and secure the nation. but i also know that it's very frustrating not to have clear direction so that you can make recommendations and include reforms. it's both. and so to provide those leaders with better guidance, help me with some very specific ideas about balancing our efforts, the need for transparency and the clear issue that we have, which is also protecting classified, secure information and the national security interests of this country, because my constituents are going to say, and they're right, be very careful about unintended

consequences here. once it's out of the box, it's out. anyone. >> i think one way to understand the issue is that classification is treated as a security function. understandably. the people who are making the classification decisions are asking about the security consequences of disclosure. that's fine. that makes perfect sense. the problem is that security is not the only consideration. because classifying has implications from oversight, it has implications for public understanding, for diplomacy, for technological development. it can have all kinds of implications. to ask the security officer to weigh the public interest or weigh the diplomatic effects is totally unrealistic, i think. what that -- where that takes me is that in areas of significant interest by congress or the

public, there needs to be an additional venue where this original security classification decision can be reconsidered in the light of broader issues. what is the public interest? what is the need for oversight? what are the undesirable unintended consequences of continuing to classify? don't ask the poor security officer to make this complicated assessment. take it somewhere else and re-evaluate it in light of the big picture. >> anyone else? that is in and of itself sort of a balance and a chance for a re-review as a lawyer and what i would fashion in an appellate aspect. again, making those decisions and then creating the parameters for asking for that guidance is

also a set of reforms that can also have unintended consequences. are there specifics in that regard, and the concept, i think, is one i'm very interested in. getting to the concept, are there ways to include the agencies in terms of their recommendations about what those parameters would look like? without having them protected on interest. that's the other problem. in a way that doesn't get you, then, to that appellate level, which gets us right back where we started. >> right. we really need more experimentation in this area than what we've had. i think one model is the ice cap model, the interagency panel that's been discussed. there may be others. you would want the voice of security represented, of course, but it would not be the only voice. so you would want diversity and diversity of opinion and perspective brought to bear. you would also want to define who could elevate the issue.

a congressional committee, maybe just a member of congress. you know, who else could ask for this kind of review and under what circumstances. these are all questions that could be hashed out. i don't think the answers are obvious. they might not become obvious until they're tried in practice. >> well, mr. chairman, thank you very much for giving me this extra time, and thank you very much for weighing in on what i think is a really critical issue for us to deal with. so thank you. >> thank the gentle lady. the chair now recognizes mr. amash for five minutes. >> i yield my time to the gentleman from kentucky, mr. massie. >> i have tons of stuff i want to discuss. we try to get three things in in the last five minutes. the first two fall under the category of there's good news but. okay, there's good news in terms of the intelligence budget, right? because the 9/11 commission recommended that at least the aggregate number be disclosed. so it is disclosed.

and the executive branch, actually in this case, does a better job than the legislative branch. they disclose their request for the budget. but the situation we had last week is you had 435 members of congress probably less than 80 knew what was in the budget, but they all voted for it. they can find out what's in it two years from now. like the 2015 number, i can tell you, it's on the website. but we still don't disclose the top line number, aggregate number for intelligence appropriations until a year after it's been voted on. so that's the good news is that it's disclosed. the bad news is most of congress is voting on it to see what's in it. they can go down to -- like my colleague and i from michigan did, and see what's in it. that's the good news, but some of this is just lack of attention on our part.

another good news but. mr. desantis capably and appropriately pointed out the executive branch has to have secrets to conduct its diplomacy, et cetera, et cetera. then mr. blanton, you talked about how you could use the power of the purse. there is one department that does effectively use the power of the purse for oversight. and that's the intelligence committee. they don't give the intelligence community a tranche of money and say, okay, you have no strings attached and we don't want to know anything until next year. they're continuously -- that money is contingent upon certain things and also when certain things happen, they have to be reported back to that committee. the judiciary committee would do well to follow that example. you could -- the judiciary could fence money and say we will give you part of it but you're not getting the rest until we get this answer. so to the theoretical point of can you get this information from the executive branch or can you not based on the constitution and article i versus article ii, the answer is what you provided, mr. blanton. the key is in the power of the

purse. and you can always get that information. so that's the good news is that you can get the information and the intel committee does it. the bad news is doj doesn't do it. the other bad news is the intel committee controls this information very tightly and it's hard for a rank and file member to access that. it's basically 20 questions and a skiff. and without staff walking out. that's the bad news. now, and if i have time, i'll let you comment on that, but here's the third thing i want to talk about. i think it falls within this committee hearing today. and this question is for mr. aftergood. the federation of american scientists keeps a bootleg copy of all the congressional research service reports. is that correct? >> not all of them. >> well, the ones that you can obtain? >> yes. >> okay. this is -- the congressional research service, for those who don't know about it, is is enormous wonderful resource

available to congress, and they have all the historical context for the reasons of things. they prepare these wonderful reports. but they're confidential to congress. and the irony here is i could disclose them to a constituent, but the crs has no clearing-house for this. a greater irony is on a weekend, i go to your website to find out what the congressional research service has prepared. how ridiculous is that? so i would like your comment on that, mr. aftergood. >> um, you know, there's been a lot of talk lately about fake news and how it's corrupting our public discourse and so forth. to me, i think of crs reports as kind of the antidote and opposite of fake news. >> we get a lot of fake information in congress from

various sources. >> i mean, you know, we all need to be critical consumers. but i think the crs product on the whole are extremely informative. they're balanced. they aim to educate. if you read them, you're going to get smarter than you are. and so i'm not -- you know, i'm not -- >> that's not hard to do for a congressman. >> or for a citizen. i don't have too big a chip on my shoulder about doing this. i'm not -- you know, i would just as soon congress do it the right way. i think you have a product that you can be proud of. and you should be making it available to the public. until that happens, i hope to be able to continue doing it through the federation. >> i hope you do, too, because i need access to that on weekends. thank you very much. >> i would only suggest it's the end of the year. you might want to contribute to steve's web page. >> i thank the gentleman, and i also want to extend a sincere thanks to each of our witnesses for appearing before us here today. if there's no further business, without objection, the committee stands adjourned.

tonight on american history tv, programs on great attacks in the civil war including

longstreet's attack, the battles of the wilderness and spotsylvania courthouse in virginia. this week on c-span, tonight at 8:00, jerry greenfield, co-founder of ben and jerry's ice cream talks about creative and responsible business practices. >> the idea that we couldn't sell enough ice cream in the summer in vermont to stay in business, that forced us to look for other markets. >> wednesday night, former vice president dick cheney and former defense secretary leon panetta on the future of the defense department under president-elect donald trump. >> the challenges are very great. i think we have unfortunately over the course of the last many years, done serious damage to our capabilities to be able to meet those threats. >> living in that period, there are a lot of flash points. a new administration is going to have to look at that kind of

world. obviously, define policy that we need in order to deal with that, but then develop the defense policy to confront that kind of work. >> thursday at 8:00 p.m. eastern, a look at the career of vice president elect mike pence. >> amidst the shifting sands of contemporary culture and law, we have stood without apology for the sanctity of life, importance of marriage and freedom of religion. >> on friday night beginning at 8:00, farewell speeches and tributes to several outgoing senators, including harry reid, barbara boxer, kelly ayotte and dan coates. this week in primetime on c-span. sunday january 1st, "indepartme"i "indepth" will feature barack obama. our panel includes april ryan,

white house correspondent for american urban radio networks and author of "the presidency in black and white, my upclose view of three presidents and race in america." eddie glaude author of "democracy in black." and associate editor of the "the washington post" david maraniss, author of "barack obama, the story." no labels co-chair and joe lieberman on centrist candidacies in the wake of the election. after that, congressmen and senators talk about the first 100 days of donald trump's white house and what ways the legislative branch can work with the administration. the women's basketball

association and no labels vice chair lisa borders. good afternoon, everybody. are we in our seats? no, we're not. good afternoon, everybody. thank you. it's a privilege to be with all of you. i think we are all getting to our seats. while we are doing that, have we not had a terrific morning? have we not had a terrific morning? so let me welcome you to our lunch session. i have the privilege of leading the wnba, and that is a group of professional women athletes. and i often remind them that there are two international languages, music and sports. we have the benefit of playing

sports, but what we have to recognize on a regular basis is that our teams can't win unless everyone is engaged. basketball is a team sport. i would submit to you that democracy is also a team endeavor. so we are delighted that you are here with us today to have these conversations about where we're going as a nation, and you have been willing to step forth, engage, participate yourself and bring others along with you. is my assumption correct? are you sure? are you going to bring another person to this movement? you're going to listen, learn today and lead by example? i'm going to make you all stop eating in mant and really listen to me. so without further ado, we are delighted to have you here

today. we have an opportunity truly to listen to some exceptional colleagues, to hear what they have to say, synthesize, internalize what they have to say and bring that back to our communities and spheres of influence. so without further ado, i would like to bring my teammate andy berski to start our program. give him a warm welcome, if you would. good afternoon. it's great to be here and tremendously exciting to see the progress no labels made over the last five years. testament to that is your presence here with us today. center to our efforts is to create a durable center core of bipartisan action that can work

thr through compromise that supports the no labels national strategic agenda and growth. i want to talk briefly about the two sharpest tools in our tool kit. the problem solvers caucus and our super pac. the problem solvers caucus has been meeting for several years. up until now, it's been an opportunity for our congressional leaders to build trust, to get to know each other and to lay a course for forward progress. what is most exciting to me, they are ready and we are ready to see them take on the tougher challenges, the big issues and create a durable block that can be an enabler of positive legislation in the upcoming congress. the second big tool, if you read your "wall street journal" this morning was announced the $50

million super pac that will provide the kind of air cover that will enable our congressional leaders to make the tough decisions. and for that matter, to take out those who don't. we owe an enormous debt of gratitude to nelson peltz who has provided guidance, leadership and great commitment to this effort. nelson is an icon of american business, a preeminent financier and business leader. without further ado, nelson peltz. >> thank you, andy. thank you all for being with us today. i know that i'm really excited.

when i first met nancy jacobson years and years ago, i met with her out of frustration because i, like all of you, didn't like the way things were going. and here we are. at a new major turning point in america. we've got a new president, new congress and new labels has really come together. as andy talked about this super pac has really put some bite behind our bark, and i think that we all know there's a lot of capital on the left and a lot of capital on the right, and we are going to be the capital in the middle to bring everyone together. i thank you, and andy peter may, louis bacon, all others who had an important hand here. without further ado, i want to

introduce other two co-chairs, joe lieberman and jon huntsman. jon is a two-term governor in utah. our china hand, very important going forward. joe served the state of connecticut 26 years in the senate. as i like to think of him, as a real independent. he was no labels before we ever thought of this place. and so without further ado, let me bring them both out. ♪ it's a beautiful day >> that's such an auspicious song "beautiful day" by u2. that's the song i had when i ran for governor. 2004. auspicious because we won that election. it was pretty good. following nelson peltz and and andy bursky, what a special moment.

people like that, when they take this effort seriously, you know what we're doing is of serious purpose and intent. all of new this room don't waste your time. you want to be part of something purposeful going in a direction toward a destiny that's going to be good for this country. i'm delighted to be here with joe lieberman, my co-chair, rabbi, big brother. there she is. let me just remind you of a couple of things is so significant about why we're here today. number one, it's a new center of gravity emerging in american politics. now it's by virtue of how things played out not over one administration but over many administrations, and it's brought us to where we are today. it's called unclaimed real estate. it's center right, it's center

left, it's where the deals get done. it's where business is transacted. we are here to plant our flag in that real estate. make no mistake about what we are doing. this is where we are. it's a claim to this real estate. number two, no labels is leading the effort. i don't know of another organization or undertaking quite like what nancy and her team have put together. it is prepared, it's organized, it's got the energy to make things happen with respect to this new political real estate. number three. this new political real estate, this new center of gravity is represented by an emerging problem-solvers caucus who had a couple of years of, let's say, pretrial exercise. some of them are here, working

together, burnishing up their ability to do things cross boundary. i'm here to tell you, they've got the resolve to build and to play a significant role as the problem solvers caucus on capitol hill. the go-to group that could change the balance of power on these very important issues, whether it's tax reform, infrastructure, immigration or health care. number four and finally, we couldn't be doing any of this without defensive mechanisms in place. make no mistake about it. this is where we have not adequately built the right systems. that is protecting the center lane in primaries with an unprecedented new super pac. we talked about it and we talked about it. we've thrown some numbers out there. members of the media are starting to report on those numbers. i'm here to tell you if we can bring all of this together, claiming center right, center left, this new real estate down the center lane where deals are done and problems are solved, if

we can keep our problem-solvers caucus on capitol hill alive and well, organized and focused on the mission, and if we can build these defensive mechanisms, folks, we will be an organization to be reckoned with. and then the amount of good we can do for the american people for the good taxpayer, for the folks who make everything else happen, i think will be very consequential and important longer term. thank you for being here. it's a great privilege to serve as co-chair of no labels. i can't begin to thank you enough for what you're doing in your own individual ways. i'd like to turn this microphone over to my great friend joe lieberman. thank you. >> thank you, jon. thanks, ladies and gentlemen. great honor really to be co-chair of no labels with jon huntsman and better to be his friend. i want to take my text for my brief remarks this noon from a

holiday card i got from my former colleague in the senate tom carper of delaware. on the card he quoted this african proverb, "if you want to go fast, go alone. if you want to go far, go together." and i think that proverb really sums up what no labels has been about and what we are doing here today. there has to be a new center in american politics where people with good intentions, even if they have different ideas, can work together to get things done for our country. because if we don't have a center in american politics, we don't really have a functioning democracy. we just have a never-ending battle of factions trying to impose their narrow views on one

another. and that, too often in recent years, is exactly what it's felt like in america. it feels like we're coming apart it feels like we're coming apart when we should be coming together to solve our problems. but here's the hopeful fact beneath all the partisan slashing back and forth. at the level of the american people, we are not really as divided as a lot of people would suggest. if you look at the polling, the majority of people in america are in the center right to center left. they're not at the extremes. but in washington, it doesn't feel that way. it feels like that majority has been squeezed out by the

extremes. so what i'm saying is we have the numbers. what we need is the will and the organization to put those numbers and the common sense that comes with them back into our government. and that really is what no labels has been about and why this day is such a moment of great opportunity. it's a different day. it's a beautiful day. and it's a different day. why? because we've got leaders in congress and no labels supporters across the country, from across the country, stepping up like never before. we've got the problem-solvers caucus working together. we've got the political action committee ready to help those who are problem-solvers and fight those who are extremists

and who are not. i can tell you having been there at the moment a member of congress faces a big decision about a vote, and he or she feels that what's in the best interest of their constituents in our country is what they want to vote for, but the party leadership, our interest groups are telling them to vote the other way, too often that's what they do. at that moment, we want them to know that the problem-solvers caucuses with them and in a very real and tangible way, the super pac that we're forming will be with them at their backs the next time they run for office. there's another reason why this is a moment of real opportunity for no labels. in the last election, whether you supported hillary clinton as i did or donald trump, the

election of donald trump is a disruptive event for a political system that has needed to be disrupted. it opens the door to enormous change. and if president trump wants to really carry that change forward, he can't listen to the people in the republican party who say let's just shove it down their throats, and he won't benefit and won't be able to get anything done if the voices in the democratic party there are calling for resistance, obstruction at all cost prevail. he needs a group from congress from both parties to come together to work with him to take america forward. so i would say that today marks a new and exciting chapter in the history of no labels. we have a lot to build on, but we've got a lot of great things we can do for the country. to go back to the african

proverb, we can and must go far, but we can only do it if we go together. thank you very much. [ applause ] [ applause ] >> ladies and gentlemen please welcome from the great state of texas, former senator kay bailey hutchinson. ♪

>> well, thank you, everyone and welcome. i think this is a very exciting opportunity for our country to reboot as joe lieberman just said. it's been disrupted and so now let's go forward in a positive way. and i think this panel today is an example of the diversity, geographically in our country, in the party diversity as well. and our task is to talk about what to expect in the first hundred days.

raise your hand if you would like to predict what will happen in the next hundred days after watching this campaign of the last year and a half. kind of hard to predict right now. but that's what this group of experts who are sitting in congress today can enlighten us on what can the president-elect actually do without congress? what can he do maybe with the consultation of congress, work with congress to do, and then what can he not do at all without a congressional way forward? so with that, let me introduce this panel. first to my left is my friend and former colleague roy blunt, senator who has just re-elected from missouri. senator steve daines -- i guess i should say party affiliation. roy blunt is a republican. senator steve daines from montana also a republican.

we are expecting senator joe manchin a senator democrat from west virginia, he's running late. if he gets here, he'll be on the chair at the end. congressman ami bera, democrat from california. congressman kurt schrader, democrat from oregon. and congressman peter welch, a democrat from vermont. and we are being moderated today by ryan clancy who is one of the chief strategists for no labels. i think he's going to start us off, let everybody say what they think the lay of the land is then be ready to ask the questions that you would like to answer or make the statements, brief statements with a question to follow, as well. >> thank you very much, senator. i want to start with senator

blunt and daines. i think for anybody that's been following the news, we have a sense of what's on the docket in the first 100 days, tax reform, infrastructure, some other things. i think what's more interesting to people is not only what is going to get done, but how. is the republican party, does it see an opening with your senate democrat colleagues to get something done together? we'd love to hear your perspective and conversations you have with senator schumer and other folks on the other side what you think you could work on on the first 100 days. >> i want to say first, i thought senator lieberman's observation about the importance of the disruptive event, and disruption not a bad thing. in fact, i've got a good friend who has an investment group he

calls the disrupt-offs. it's an important thing in an economy to keep it vital. i do think there is a synergy available here that would not be available under other circumstances. i think the new president makes us think about different ways to look at things because he's got to look at things in different ways. i would think on the senate side, a lot of the first hundred days will be the personnel business that we're involved in, that the house isn't involved in, trying to get move forward with appropriate speed to get a government in place, very possibly we'll have a supreme court nomination to deal with in that hundred days. we will probably pass two different budgets. we have an opportunity to pass a budget in january that frankly gives us a vehicle to do something to move forward with health care, and then we'll pass the budget for the budget year that begins next september or next october 1 after that. that's about all we'll be able to get done in the first hundred days. when you think about the

inclusiveness of that, that's going to be a big moment. what do you think? >> i do. i come from a state, montana, if you think about no labels, we are a state that's notorious ticket-splitting state. we elect democrats, we elect republicans. in fact, i was the first republican elected to this u.s. senate seat in 101 years. in fact, i say about my home state, we're a little bit of john denver, a little bit of merl haggard. i love to backpack with my wife. we have the environment and we need jobs. that's the merle haggard side. i'm also a chemical engineer. i'm trained to solve problems. i think this last election governor huntsman and senator lieberman alluded to was less

about ideology. president trump's message was pragmatic, staying focused on american jobs, energy security, about the need to secure and save social security, medicare, and the need to responsibly manage the fiscal house here in washington in achieving a balanced budget. so i hope we can stay focused on these bigger picture issues. this town suffers from attention deficit disorder. i think the question about the first 100 days very important as roy mentioned. the presidential appointees will consume a lot of our time, at least in the senate. we've got to think beyond 100 days. the issues we face in this

nation are going to take longer than 100 days to solve. more in terms of five and ten year horizons. >> sure. okay. question for the congressman. because you face a different set of challenges in the house. there are certainly elements the democrat party who do not want to see democrats work under any circumstances with the new president. where do you see the opportunity where you can work with the new president and your colleagues here in the senate? >> i'll start. peter welch. the first thing is not the where, it's the whether. republicans have a major decision to make and so do the democrats. there is a tendency when one party gets power to overreach. my hope is that the republicans won't do that. paul ryan is going to have his work cut out for him, even though he continues to have a majority because he's going to have a wing in that party that is going to push him too far. and if he makes the decision to try to get some bipartisan progress he'll work with democrats willing to work with him, that is going to be a huge advantage for us to get practical things done.

the second, the challenge for the democrats is do we fight for failure or do we put out an affirmative agenda that we're advocating on all these topics we know need to be addressed? s and that remains to be seen. the democratic party is in some turmoil now. we are now a bicoastal party. we have white hispanic, working class americans. we have soul searching to do. we don't have the answers credible to a lot of people we think we represent. the bottom line here is a big decision by mr. ryan, will he work to get things done and be willing to get votes from democrats in order to accomplish

that? something john boehner did at the high point of the last congress. and will democrats be smart enough to know that we don't need to be criticizing trump. he's going to do well or he's not. that's going to be on the basis of what he does, not on the basis of what we accuse him of having failed on. so big decision for us, are we going to have a constructive agenda going forward? >> congressman schrader, any thoughts where that space is to be constructed? >> if i play off what peter just shared, we're on the democratic side going to experience what the republicans experienced in 2008 we are going to get a radical tea party equivalent that will clamor for just straight opposition, oppose, oppose, oppose. speaker ryan is going to have a lot of say in whether he wants to invite democrats to be part of the solution. president-elect trump is going to have some say based on what he chooses to focus on. i think we all know just for politics, the affordable care

act, politically they have to do some kind of symbol quick repeal of that. but then beyond that, if the president-elect focuses in on deportations and some of the social issues, i think it's going to be very difficult for democrats to come to the table. if the president-elect sets the agenda on infrastructure and tax reform, it does create and the speaker on our side allows us to be part of that conversation, i actually think it sets a different tone. because we're going to, those of us that are willing to thing it's better for us to be sitting at the table and participating in these conversations as opposed to yelling at the door, we're going to feel some heat as much as republicans did eight years ago. >> congressman? >> there are things the president is going to do without us, a lot of executive orders that the current president has put in play. you're going to see rescinded or

modified, whether it's overtime rules, carpet rules, what have you. we'll have little to say over that. you may have a bigger say over that. actually, your input might be very interesting because you made a lot of business decisions based on what you thought was going to happen, and this could change radically. on the actual party side as mentioned, there will be a reconciliation bill that only takes 51 votes in the senate. probably coming out early, primarily dealing with health care. then that's the only reconciliation bill allowed this year. after that, every vote in the senate will take 60 votes. to my colleague's point on the house side, there's at least 40 maybe more freedom caucus members that are not interested in governing. they're interested in ideology. anathema to no labels. democrats cross the aisle at

some peril to themselves. name of the game is leadership, reward lock step behavior and punish people that actually will step out for the greater good of the country. it's a problem. it's a discussion i know this group has had. the super pac announcement earlier will hopefully be a sign that some of us that are willing to step up for the good of the country are not left behind. i think there's a lot of great bills. the appropriations bills will hopefully become more bipartisan as a result of that. that committee has had a history working bipartisanly. i'm on energy and commerce. we've got a great new chairman, great ranking member. there will be bipartisan opportunities there. i think there is an opportunity with this relatively blank sheet of paper we have out there, whether it's the president, the congress, house, senate, democrat, republican, for no labels to step in with common sense broad appeal items that

senator daines outlined, that we could do quite a bit of work on. i think it's exciting new time. >> congressman schrader talked about the critical threshold in the senate. there are some things that can be moved to reconciliation with only 50 votes. there's limits on what can be moved. you can't create new programs. most things require 60. senator manchin, that would mean you're looking at seven or eight democrats that need to come over for most big things to get done. you're on the leadership team with senator schumer. what are the conversations you're having about where you work together early next year? >> on the leadership team, i'm taking up one side trying to bring it back to the middle. chuck asked me to do that and i was pleased to be able to do that. i look at all of this.

this is a big change. this is a big change in our country right now. with every change comes opportunity. i'm looking at the opportunity to get something done. i really am. i'm so pleased with all my colleagues here. i think everybody here knows that i'll do whatever i can to help my country. no labels will play a tremendous part whether we'll be successful the next two or three years. you'll find that quickly which way we're going to go. the 60 rule, that was senator bird, my predecessor. i didn't vote for the nuclear option. i thought it would destroy the functions and purpose of the senate. i was one of the few democrats that wouldn't go along with that. i understand where my republican friends are right now. fine, you've given us this we'll use it when we can. that makes sense. i understand that. with that being said, we have to be careful how we go down this road. if we do use the nuclear option

and it's -- i'll give you a perfect example. if we have a supreme court nominee and the one thing we were able to talk harry out of is doing a nuclear option on the supreme court, but say some of my democrat friends hunker down and say no, no, and hell no. i can understand they are going to say wait a minute. we've got a pretty good person here. what are we going to do? those types of things i'm hoping we can avoid that before we get to it and get in this dysfunction we've been in. i can tell you speaking from the moderate centrist democrats, some of us work more conservative than others, from that wing of the party, we are looking at everything we can to work with president-elect trump to make it successful, to make it work. if we disagree, we're going to disagree in a respectful way, but also have input and i would say that if we're thrown the aca from the beginning, affordable care act, i would hope my colleagues would say fine, we're going to repair this with this. it would be much easier. if you say we're going to do this and take a two or three-year period to work out

the differences, there's going to be people on my side of the aisle that said you had six years right now and 60 votes to rebuild it and you've not begin us any alternative. let's work together constructively. i think it needs to be repaired. i'm the first to tell you that, but i think is there a pathway forward if we work together if we don't, we are taking hard votes and back into the stalemate. only thing i would recommend to the president-elect is this, i've said this many times, get your financial house in order. as a previous governor, when i went into governorship, i went immediately to wall street to find out what they thought of the state of west virginia. i asked standard and poor's and moody's.

60 members of the senate and a majority of the house can support and i would envision taking those things off the table starting almost immediately. there is a provision i sponsored in the house when i was still in the house, the 26 -- where you can stay on your parents insurance until you were 26. i was the only person that filed that bill.