he wanted to find stories in the people that were staying here. >> on sunday 2:00 p.m. eastern on american history tv, we tour the largest home in america. the built more estate built by the van der filth family during the gilded age. >> a home more than 33 bedrooms for guest and family, 65 fireplaces, incredible massive staircase, just architectural beauty surrounding the hoemt. >> and visit the late pastor billy graham the retreat the cove. watch cities tour of asheville, north carolina saturday and sunday at 2:00 p.m. american history tv working with cable affiliates as we explore america. >> house subcommittee held a hearing on southern border security. it came following reports of a caravan of central american

migrants traveling through mexico and headed toward the u.s. mexico border. president trump issued a memorandum doing the deployment to assist federal patrol agents. witnesses included the head of the union representing border patrol agents. and public safety. it's about an hour. >> subcommittee on national security come to order. without objection the presiding member of the chair is authorized to declare a recess at this time. over the course of the last two and a half weeks we've heard news cats of foreign nationals headed for the u.s. national border. we are here to discuss the impending arrival which remains a challenge of u.s. border security. the san diego based group pueblo or people without borders has taken credit for organizing the

effort but claim to have aide for refugees, what they are doing now is under mining tt rule of law. for years they have escorted people from central america to mexico encouraging many to continue in the united states to take advantage of asylum laws. this year they drew biggest crowd yet, more than 1,200 people. in some ways their similarity phos what we experienced in 2014 kwh waves of unaccompanied minors and young children screamed across the border. unlike pred sos sore president trump called out the mexican government failure to step up and do their part to accommodate these refugees. for far too long mexico has been derelict in their duty. they have been content to let the caravans pass on through and become our problem. not anymore. coincidentally a few days after they began their march, dsc released monthly apprehension

statistics which showed illegal border crossers. what we saw in response was consistency and conviction of president trump's administration, of course, who campaigned on building a wall, and backs the men brave men and women of law enforcement working hard. took courage to get the guard without manufacturing a humanitarian crisis. as commander of chief the president has every right to make meaningful measures to maintain the integrity of our borders and safe guard our immigration system. we know it can't serve in this in definitely. be been honest about what can be done not only to enhance border security but reduce the magnet going forward. the care a van had the unintended consequence of helping the trump administration identify operational and

vulnerab vulnerabilities. reminds us how porous our borders are with drugs being struggled in daily. also refight resource toss illicit activity in one direction, we may be leaving a gaping hole for gangs to pass through in another. now, there are promising actions that can be taken to get a handle on this. the trump administration should follow the president's first immigrati immigration executive order and properly do the wilbur force act. both the department of homeland security and the department of justice should send asylum officers directly to the border for a rocket docket to immediately hold a rapid fire field hearing and conclude that folks trying to abuse the asylum laws are in fact ineligible and then allowing them to be placed in expedited deportation. what is more, both article ii of the constitution, and the delegated authority given to the president by the congress, to

keep anyone who is not already entered and even override refugee asylum policies when determines it's against our interest. that's in the law now. when you have criminals, gangsters, drug crisis, and the political nature of the mass illegal immigration, this clearly fits that description. and finally congress is part of any effort to tighten immigration statutes muslim it at least the power of the lower courts to block deportation or denial of entry september when there is a prima fascia case being a u.s. citizen. we have a lot of work to do. and i'm grad to introduce or panel of experts. mr. brandon judd is here to speak on behalf of approximately 15,000 border patrol agents in his capacity of the president of the national border patrol council. colonel stephen serves as texas public safety.

we also have the honorable author resident fellow with the center for immigration studies and former immigration judge. and, lastly, we welcome mr. michael bream from the truman center, a national security expert and iraq war veteran. i'd like to add that we did invite the u.s. border patrol to join us here today, and they chose not to send a witness to testify on this important matter. again rgs i'd like to thank all the witnesses who decided to join us here today and look forward to their testimony. finally, i just want to make sure we will be maintaining order in the hearing room. so i thank you and i yield to my ranking member gentleman from massachusetts for his opening statement. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i'd also like to thank and welcome our witnesses today. thank you for helping this committee with your work. on the bill passed last month, there are members on both sides

of the aisle who share a commitment to providing border security and fort personnel with the resources necessary to perform their critical missions on behalf of the american people choik. this agreement which i supported i voted for provides a total of $14 billion for customs and border protection, including $4.4 billion for cvp, customs and border patrol and security operations. and $3.7 billion for u.s. border patrol training, development, assets and other activities. it also makes funding available for the hiring of 351 new border patrol agents and law enforcement officers. and while the agreement was a result of hard fought negotiation, it is not a perfect bill, i believe it does represent a meaningful step towards enhance gs our border security. however, it is impeer tive that the government does these provided by the agreement in a

wise fashion. in the interests of national security, policies designed to secure our borders against the threat of terrorism, criminal networks cannot be based on misinformation or derived from arbitrary presidential treats. rather it is dependent on policies developed through bipt crit stism and grounded entirely in fact. to this end, they must also be undertaken in a manner that avoids due humanization and a ford's respect to nation of immigrants. also adheres to 1951 geneva convention relating to the status of refugees. in view of all these considerations it's important to review president trump to order deployment up to 4,000 personnel to the u.s. mexican border. clearly this decision is not

unprecedented. both president george bush and obama previously in advocated title 32 authority to temporarily deploy thousands of national guard units to the southwest border to provide technical, logistical and administrative support to the u.s. border patrol. it is not worthry while the u.s. border patrol exceeded one million apprehensions in 2006, in over 430 am prehengss in 2010, u.s. reports that in 2017, the agency recorded, quote, lowest level of illegal cross border migration on record as measured by apprehensions. and encounters at u.s. ports of entry, close quote. the approximate 310,000 arrests for illegal border crossings reported for 2017 represents the lowest annual apprehension figure since 1971.

46 years ago. in articulating his plan to employ national guard units, the president has stated, quote, we are looking for them from 2,000 to 4,000, and will probably keep them or a large portion of them until such time as we get the wall, close quote. given that congress has not authorizinged for the entirety of the president's border wall and absent further clarification of the president's tweet, the deployment of our national guard units to the southwest border appears to be indefinitely at point and largely undefined in terms of scope and cost. according to the independent government accountability office, the collective costs of the two previous national guard border operations under president bush and president obama exceed td $1.35 billion. it's important, i think for congress to learn which

priorities or programs the military will need to reduce in order to reprogram the necessary funding to pay for this border operation. in order for this community to examine the merits of the president's action, today ranking member cummings and i join ranking members from the home land security armed services judd committees in requesting documents from the department of defense. and the department of homeland security. pertaining to the rational behind the announcement of deploying national guard troops to the border, as well as specific activities durations and costs associated with this operation. this includes any memoranda of understanding the administration has negotiated with relevant states, and the national guard bureau. along these lines, it would have been helpful for us to hear from the department of defense and department of homeland secured witnesses at today's hearing as we continue to conduct oversight over our border security policies and seek to identify common sense steps that we can

take to better secure our borders in a balanced and sustainable way. so thank you, mr. chairman, i look forward to discussing these issues with our witnesses. and i yield back the balance of our time. >> gentleman yields back. i'm pleased to introduce our witnesses. we have mr. brandon judd president of the national border council, art arthur, center for immigration studies, and mr. michael breen, president c eefrmt o of the truman center. as you can see there is an empty chair for the uninvited witness. miss carla provost should she choose to attend the hearing. welcome to you all. rules, if you can please stand and raise your right hand.

do you solemnly swear that the testimony you shall give you is the truth whole truth ago nothing but the truth so help you god. please be seated. all witnesses answered in the affirmative. please five minutes. as reminder clock in front of you shows remaining time during opening statement. light will turn yellow. red when time is up 0. please welcome to press the button before speaking. and with that we'll recognize mr. judd for five minutes. >> chairman, ranking member lynch and distinguished members of the subcommittee, i would like to thank you for the opportunity to testify today. i want to discuss with you the issues of border security and the magnets that draw people across our border ill leely. this includes but is not limited to the catch and release program. man power, and thes use of agents. the catch and release policy is a term that was coined by border patrol agents many years ago.

it refers to persons arrested for crossing the border illegally and subsequently released into the united states on their own recognizance and prior to having their deportation proceedings adjudicated by an immigration judge. under this program, most individuals are released with the promise to appear before a judge at a later date that is to be determined. due to extensive backlog of cases data is usually at least two years from the time of release. but it might as well be ten, 15, or 20 years. because the vast majority of these individuals never appear before a judge as ordered. instead, they disappear in the shadows of society. on january 25th, 2017, president trump signed the border security and immigration improvement executive order. its intent was to implement new policies designed to stem illegal immigration. in support, dhs secretary john kelly issued implementation directions by memoranda to all

corresponding department heads stating catch and release policy shall end immediately. notwithstanding the clear guidance, catch and release policies have not ended. in november of 2017, the field office droekt ors for both texas i.c.e. offices stating in part i have directed my staff to not have family housing units that are not frc eligible, field relocation center, my position may change subsequent to discussions with hq, but for now ero san antonio position is we will not process unless we september custody. as transfer of cases is not automatic. by processing illegal border crossers with wnta we consciously continue the catch and release program and sent a clear message to criminal cartels that we are not serious

about following through with the president's or secretary's orders. criminal cartels continue to exploit our policies, specifically catch and release. they force large groups of people across the border illegally in dangerous locations instead of through ports of entry, a controlled environment. in effort to create gaps in our coverage by creating gaps they are higher contraband such as opioids criminal aliens persons from special interest country and other narcotics without detection, apprehension or seizure. by continuing policies like catch and release we are putting nntd people into the hands of criminal enterprises. single biggest challenge to securing our border is man power. as currently 2,000 agents below our congressional mandated floor of 21, 370 agents. current currently three challenges we

face, retention, recruitment and the use of agents. the national border patrol council also views the reenstatement as a top priority and one that will significantly improve our urgent retention crisis. i want to be clear about this. until we address these issues, we will not be table to secure t ---be able toll secure our border. along with this, limited resources is important piece of the security puzzle. "washington post" recently published an article highlighting gross miss management of the border patrol workforce in the mc-cal enborder patrol station. a little more than 700 agents are assigned to the station and when annual sick leave and days off duty are calculated tlrks are approximately 400 agents that show up to work on any given day. of those 400 agents on duty, only around 50 are deployed to the border. that's unacceptable. this is well below par for a station that controls

approximately 60 miles of the border and is the busiest station in the country. the federal government's decision to devote only 12% of the workforce to perform the duties ease they were hired to perform is lost on me. but for the sake of border security, this entirely unjustifiable. if you are angry about this, you should be. protect tg our borders is paramount to ensuring homeland security, economic pros expert and national sovereignty. it is my hope that the members of this committee recognize this and exercise their oversight responsibility to hold border patrol management accountable. i want to thank you for this opportunity to testify. and i look forward to answering any of your questions. >> thank you. colonel, you are up. >> chairman, distinguished members, you have my written testimony, so i'll not go into anything that i discussed in there. but four things i with like to mention. first, obviously the texas mexico border is unsecure. because of that, it is the

consequence of that is a public safety and national security threat. not just texas but to every community in the united states. and ranking member you noted some of those things in your comments along that. everyone is concerned about the impact of criminal organizations or communities. and we all recognize that. we are concerned about meth amphetamine. if you have a drug problem, you have cartel program. if you have unsecured program, you have ms 13 problem in new york you have a border problem. so clearly must vulnerability we face for public safety standpoint. from texas standpoint we recognize it's a solemn response of the federal government to secure the border. but when it doesn't happen it effects our community. and governor abbott and state legislature in texas is not going to do it. and what they have done is direct support to the u.s. border patrol. not to compete.

but complement. and that includes marine implements, i have over 1,000 troopers engaged in border security activities. we have 13 aircraft, including nine helicopter and airplanes dedicated full time to border security. we have 13 tactical boats. we have 32 texas rangers established to public corruption but to work on occasion. prior to we had to work on assault on federal officers that they weren't handled at the federal level they are now. but those are the types of things that are important to texans. and as texas goes, so goes the nation. we recognize that also that not only is it responsibility of the federal government. it can be done. this is not wreck ket science. and mr. judd mentioned a few of those things that are clearly would choik enhance or secure

the border without question. some of those things is people. technology. infrastructure. and the equipment they need and resources they need. and no question they could do it if they had that. but because they don't have it, the department of public safety, the state of texas, and governor abbott, dedicating resources and time and energy to it be able to complement what they are doing in border patrol. we will say this, though, we do appreciate the texas national guard in texas. they do a great job. in fact, we've had them involved in border security operations from the beginning. we'll continue to do it. and thankfully recently been able to plus up. they bring with them not just the uh 72, but also resources we can use in terms of observation, and i can defer to mr. judd and how important those things are to it be able to deny cartel access to those key areas. and i've out lived my time. so i'll stop for right now and move on. >> thank you, chairman. >> thank you.

>> chair now recognizes mr. author for five minutes. >> thank you, mr. chairman. the gentleman from massachusetts mr. lynch and subcommittee thank you for your testimony. >> make sure your mic is on. >> i should know that, shouldn't i. >> thank you. >> the caravan organized by immigrants rights group in middle of march 2018 had grown more to 1,000 people by the end of the month. this was eighth year but most noticeable because of large number of participants. this caravan little noticed issue on the southwest border and that is sharp increase in the number of alien reversing downward trend that had begun in 2016. from 66,000 until october 2016, number theally lens were seeking entry without proper documents along the southwest border had dropped to 15,000,780 by 2017.

slowly increase by the spring and winter before declining into the mid 30,000s. march 2018, with congress having debated amnesty for doca applicants those numbers sky rocketed to 50,000 aliens. if that continues that would be 600,000ally lens in the year. this increase in the car van brought into focus some crucial loop holes and flaws in u.s. immigration law. first is credible fear. in 1996, congress amended the immigration law to expedite the removal of aliens coming in without visas or entering illegally. these amendments however included a provision to avoid removal by asserting a credible fear of persecution a log them to apply for asylum.

in 2009, 2,000 more. and credible fear were being released from custody. that number increased to 33,283. there were 81,864 incredible fear cases. these are people arrested at the border claimed fear to get into the united states. up to 90% apply are found to have incredible fear. many reasons including low credible fear standard lacks evidentiary burdens to make such a claim. the fact is most of the aliens in the car van should they come to the united states would likely be released to a wait asylum hearing years in the future if they appear at all. this is not the only flaw in immigration laws, however, that renders our borders insecure. reauthorization act ttpra resulted in the release from removal of tens of thousands of minors from countries other than

mexico, or we call them otn, including most were never trafrng trafr trafficked to begin with. their parents to trust those minor's lives to smugglers and undertake the journey to the united states. alien minors apprehended even came with the parents should be released into the interior of the united states. provides greater incentives for illegal entry and more money for the car steels that facilitate such entry. finally, 2018 for special immigrant juvenile visas third incentive and parents to entrust their children to smugglers. the fact is most of the otm alien minors will likely be processed into the united states if they decide to come here. administration has taken steps to stem the recent flow of

illegal aliens, the united states ending catch and release, as we discussed earlier, sending guard troops to the border and establishing a zero tolerance policy for illegal entry prosecutions. each of these efforts, however, will fail to secure the border as long as loop holes and flaws that have i described exist. i want to thank you each of you for your time. and i look forward to your questions. >> thank you. mr. bream, five minutes. >> thank you, chairman, ranking member lynch, distinguished members of the subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity to testify to today. the situation is a drug and immigration policy problem, series of legal problems, humanitarian problem, law enforcement and much else besides. it is not at this time definitively not a military problem. i want to preface my testimony by saying how much i respect service and the sacrifice of border patrol agents, texas safety troopers and other law enforcement areas that safe guard our communities.

my own service was in military, three generation military family. and with respect to border patrol, my dad new hampshire, and so we show our military men hand women a great deal but not frequently enough with law enforcement in their families so thank you for what you both do and represent. ensuring they have the resources they need must be a national priority. and no question secure border is essential. fortunately we have been on the right track. tripled the border patrol since 2001. even as ap he prengss has dropped to just over 300,000 in 2017. large portion of whom were asylum seekers who appeared at border patrol agents. much more important work to be done and critical that we do it. but these numbers report to success story to the nation and

reflect important changes in the hemisphere. what these numbers do not point to, and what we do not in fact face is a true crisis or emergency on the border. we face challenges, of course. but those challenges are best addressed by strengthening the institutions we already have to support safe migration and through foreign policy in latin america, not by using the military. nonetheless, president trump frequently speaks of a need for great wall across 5,000 miles of southern border. initially claimed this would be paid for by the governor of mexico which declined to do so. and also sought from congress which has declined. also 4,000 guards man to the border. in the president's words keep a large portion of them there until such time we build the wall, close quote. great many causes for serious concern, all the more so but does not plan to be decision making process chls decisions likely to negatively impact

readiness for the national guard for active duty force as well do nothing to improve the long run and precious little to help security. these are detailed in my written testimony. but comes down to cost and read rea readiness. if that funding is repurchase posed within the defense, congress should ask about readiness. also a direct readiness cost to national guard. by definition they are clearing brush, maintaining fences, doing things on on the border are not training for their primary mission, which is combat. that impacts our national security as a whole because as an operational reserve the guards integral part of our military team. if we face the actual emergency on the borders those costs and risks would perhaps be incurring but consider the threat that

prompted this very hearing. a car van of central american migrants that presented no security threat has dissipated only a fraction 1,200 travelers well by all indications port of entry and seek asylum. so in short the situation in southern borders is better than it's been in decades but meanwhile the national guard is increasing part of our military. and military faces more challenging environment around the world than it has in decades. ongoing wars in afghanistan, syria and iraq. in west africa, east africa, yemen, ongoing to nato, critical deterrence missions in the persian gulf and korean peninsula where that border has been more dangerous since the last korean war. our military is facing all these challenges just as they are digging out of a series --

serious readiness mattis is testifying down the hall. so there is much we can do and should do to improve the situation on southern border. i hope we do those things. but deploying national guard in this manner right now is not one of those things. thank you p and i look forward to your questions. >> thank you. chair now recognizes himself for five minutes. colonel, when they had the border surge in 2014, was that something that was good or bad for the drug cartels? >> it's aullways good for carte if they can overwhelm. that's what happened in 2014. it overwhelmed. and the threat is more significant. when you are talking about mexican cartels that dominate the lucrative drug and smuggling market and engage in trafficking

people and drug trafficking as well, when you have criminalally ens, when you have these smuggling communities recruit our children, all these things, you know, result in ha serious public safety threat. like i said before, not just texas, what happens texas border happens throughout the nation. so clearly it was a problem. and we saw that. and less border patrol agents were there and involved in detepgs activities and trying in overwhelmed situation trying to deal with uncompanied children and family units and could not put enough people in line. and texas at that point in time decide the leadership in state legislature decided to spend enough resources to send troop tears around 24/7 around the state, maintain surge operations for three and a half years until we can permanently assign troopers down to that area. so from a texas standpoint, they have been paying the bill thus far. and anything you can do to support border patrol, we are all for. if it's national guard right

now, fine. >> but the long-term solutions clearly invest in border patrol. and get right down to t the patrol function, the federal government has never been valued. period. investigative function, yes, but not the patrol function. they don't have the incentive bonuses. they don't have the salary. they don't have the things that recruiting that they can ready recruit and compete with some of the other services federal law. patrol post 9/11 environment is extremely important and unless you invest in it you won't have the type of capability that you need. clearly, again, i've said it a number of occasions, not just here, is that border patrol can do t they don't need texas to help them if they are given the proper resources. and if it's national guard right now, we are all for t anything you can, because we look at it every day matters, every day a community is impacted in texas. every day something goes on that's criminal that's transnational crime that we have to deal with in texas, so anything that we can do and the federal government can do, we

are all for. >> mr. judd, in terms of the cartels and bringing -- because i think we are seeing in tour country a huge problem with fentanyl and some of these opioids, these are street drugs, they are being brought in, a lot of it across the border, a lot of it originates in china. where is the majority of that coming in in terms of are these controlled access points? are they just sneaking past the guards? or parts of the border unsecured? >> no, most everything coming across is coming in between the ports of entry because it's easy. if you go through a controlled environment, you have canine hand letters and have to get past them. what it's easy to do is send them across the border, force them to do, take our resources out of the deal to deal with that, create the gaps, then they cross their products right behind in the gaps that they created. you have to remember, of those

50,000 apprehensions we had in march, only 13,000 was at the ports of entry. 38,000 was between the ports of entry. >> mr. arthur, in terms of asylum, how does it work? i mean, if somebody is living in ha poor country where there is crime, can they just kind of come here and say asylum? or do they have to qualify for certain types of maybe they were persecuted on the base of race or religion or something like that? can you give us how it is supposed to work? >> to give asylum on the united states, race, religion, membership in a particular social group or political opinion. four are easy defined. fifth one membership in a social group is vague in the law and in taep tags. but fortunately attorney general sessions has certified a case what exactly the parameters of

for granting asylum on the basis of being the victim of a criminal activity such as by gangs in a foreign country. >> so i think most of us believe that there is a role for people being persecuted. the united states does want to be a refuge for folks in that situation. but if you are coming in because you want a better job opportunities are here, it using soma more fuss thi some amorphous thing, isn't that ta run around where they should be applying to come here if they aren't any of those bukts you are talking about? >> unfortunately it's worse than that. because the fact is the bad claims takeaway from the good times. takeaway that the judges have to grant asylum to individuals fear of harm in their own countries. once granted asylum by a judge those individuals could then petition to bring their families out of that dangerous situation. but when the system gets clogged up with nonmeritorious claims

the system breaks up and that's what we are seeing now in our immigration courts. >> i'm out of time and i'm going to recognize the ranking number for five minutes. >> thank you, mr. chairman. firstly, i'd like to have entered into the record letter from amnesty. >> without objection. >> as i noted earlier, omnibus appropriation bill we just did allocated $14 billion for border protection. that included a lot for security operations and i believe hiring i think 351 additional border patrol agents. however, that bill did not anticipate moving 4,000 national guard to the border. that's a separate budget that's going to come off d.o. d's account. and last week secretary of defense mattis directed the pentagon comptroller to, quote,

identify available funding to pay for the 4,000 national guard troops to be moved to the border. we still don't have an estimate of how much the operation will cost. but we do know it will divert resources from other military priorities. and chairman mac thorn also a texas native had this to say. if you takeaway money you can't do things, you take money from the defense budget, you can't do some of those things that you are trying to do, like add pilots or repair ships or those other sort of things. so mr. breen, first of all, thank you for your service to your country. we appreciate it. what do you think about pulling money from i think core defense and combat training activities and diverting 2,000 to 4,000 of

our national guard men and women to the border? what do you think about the efficacy of that move? >> congressman, that's a dangerous game to start replying. and i think history indicates that all the way back to task force smith in the korean war. the cost to that can be very high when you get yourself into a fight. i agree with great deal of what he had to say in the sense that we do need to invest in these capabilities but i do think there is patrol and other things, but i think there is a great danger when policy makers reach for the military as a band-aid to solve problems in other areas of government. and the military can do so many things. it's been overstretched. sent of defense who knows a few things about being in a fight again is down the hall saying the number one priorities is e lethality. chairman joint of staffs says he has no number two priority. and identified critical readiness needs in terms of the forces ability to go toe to foe can foes like russia and other

modernizing militaries. we have become i think a little too accustomed to think of ourselves as overwhelmingly superior force but we have tied down serious tasks. meanwhile the other high end military has been modernizing and equipping to fight up. so we have to catch up to that. again going back into history, task force smith was about five years at the end of world war ii. doesn't take long. you take the capable land force world ever seen wanting to beat the knit sa five years later puts someone in the field and is routed because the investments weren't continuously made in that combat military. so i think ts dangerous. other thing i would say is it impacts the entire guard. sounds like, only 4,000 guards men. but the guard needs to deploy and fight as brigade combat

team. that's 5,000 soldiers. when you start removing elements of that team for other tasks degrades the ability to train. and national guard has a modernization called national guard 4.0 that calls for those teams to be kept together and so they can deploy a fight to the. so this directly under mines these priorities. >> thank you. and by the way thank you all for your service to our country. thank you all. we have had a chance members of this committee to go down to honduras. went down to guatemala city. el salvador to look at the human trafficking operations going on there that are actually inducing people to come up to the border. we also have had an active role in what's going on in the tri border area where we have hezbollah on the ground, so there are major concerns there. my question is really about the efficiency and efficacy of our funding. is it better to try to divert

money to national guard or, look, i voted for this $14 billion for border patrol enhanced border security. is that a better way to address the challenge ha that we have? or should we try to make it up as we go along using our national guards folks to do a job they necessarily werendidn'n up? >> the investment in border patrol has to be there. but right now you have attrition rate that exceeds hiring rate. so not retaining our border patrol akts. so we do have to have a stop gap. but as far as our national guard, they are being put in situations that is like combat situations. they are in lpop situations sitting in observation posts which they would be required to do in the military in the event that a war was to take place. as a unified officer i work right next to my uniformed national guard counterparts.

and i can tell you they feel that the operations that they are doing -- >> i know my time is running short. all i'm saying is that secretary mattis had other stuff about those folks to be doing rather than being sitting on the border. and i'm just worried about those other priorities that are being ignored. but thank you i appreciate it. i yield back. >> chair now recognizes the gentleman from tennessee for five minutes. >> thank you, mr. chairman. when i was growing up, my grandparents in scott county, tennessee, one of the poorest counties in u.s., they had ten kids and outhouse, and not much more, my dad hitch hiked into knoxville with five in his pocket to go to university. and all ten children end up doing real well but grew up in what was poverty and started with nothing. so i had talked at ceremonies to

have my respect to people that come to this downtownry with nothing except a desire to work and who have made good live ings for themselves. but the american people are the kind es most generous people in the world. and we have allowed far more immigration than any other country over the last 50 years or so than any other country. no other country has come close. but when i google the question of percentage of world population that lives on $10 a day or less, first thing that pops up is from some issue global issues.org says at least 80% of humanity lives on less than $10 a day. almost half the world, over 3 billion people live on less than $2.50 a day. and they have similar articles looic that. we all have tremendous sympathy for all these people who are living in such bitter poverty around the world.

but when you talk about three billion people living with almost nothing, you can understand that we have no telling how many people who would come here tomorrow if they possibly could. so it seems to me that we have to have some sort of legal or at least system of immigration and it has to be enforced. because if we didn't, our whole fractu infra structure, our hospitals, we couldn't handle such a rapid in flux as we might have over the next three or four years if we just simply opened our borders, or didn't enfrs oorce immigration laws. and i heard -- i'm now in my 30th year in the congress. every year since i've been here i've heard this figure 11 million immigrants. i believe it has to be at least two or three times that many that are here living here

illegally because i'm not near a border, but every place in the country is overrun it seems to me with illegal immigrants. i just wonder, it's not being mean or cruel, or harsh, to say that we have to have some of these immigration laws and they have to be enforced. we have to do it, it seems to me, unless we want to almost destroy this country economically. mr. judd, what do you think would happen if we simply -- if we did away with border patrol and basically didn't just had no borders, open borders? >> well, just from my experience of people that cross the border illegally now, i think we would have mass in fluxes of people coming across the border. but that's just from my experience. i with like to say that i wish that my colleague from management were here to testify as well, because they could specifically tell you what we would, you know, why we are

allocating resources where we are allocating them. and if we were allocating them properly, maybe we wouldn't need the national guard but we'll never know that because we didn't do it. >> well, it seems to me that we have to have stronger enforcement of our immigration laws for many, many reasons. and i think almost all of us probably everybody at this table believes in legal immigration and continuing to allow many, many people to immigrant here legally. but we just have a problem that when you are forced to do something about. colonel, do you want to say anything, or mr. author. >> i'll gladly pitch in a couple of comments. first, we had a good relationship with u.s. border patrol. i think that's important that we state that. and leadership has worked very well with us along the border. this is seemless operation. unified command is about.

we understand in terms why it's important to integrating in terms of air, marine and land operations, special operations groups, all of those things are happening. and some things that we can do is use some of our special agents that target the smuggling infrastructure in some of those areas. i want to give it a clear indication to you and members that we do work very well with our federal partners. and we are very proud to work with them. the u.s. border patrol. brave men and women all risk their lives daily to protect texas and ts rest of this nation. so i want to get thatten ot record. in terms of our concerns is this, simply put, is that if the border is not secured, then you are opening it up to increased drugs, criminalally ens, transnational gangs, some of the things you are already seeing because the border is insecure. and no question it has impact on public safety in texas. anyone will tell you that. this is nonpartisan issue. this is national issue public

safety threat. this is nothing about politics. in terms of where the funding comes from, way above my pay grade, how it happens, how border patrol gets the resources they need to secure between the ports of entry, that's certainly above my pay grade. i'm sure you can figure it out if you wanted to. and believe me, i can assure you from my discussions with members and i have appropriations hearing next week in texas, is they want to find out in terms of where we are staffing federal level so we can back off on the state standpoint. but right now governor made clear we won't back offer. we won't give 1 inch to the cartel to support them. >> i certain will i agree with them. but my time is up. thank you very much. >> gentleman's time is expired. chair recognizes chair from california for five minutes. >> thank you, mr. chairman, and thank you for the witnesses that showed up for showing up. i really appreciate that. i believe it is quite evident that the recent deployment of national guard troops to the southern border is the result of

carefully considered fact based decisions. on april 1, trump trump manufactured crisis on twitter and justified the deployment of national troops after watching fox news describe a caravan of central american migrants who entered the u.s. through so-called catch and release. and ws a lot of his tweets, there is plenty of misinformation to impact. first, he appears to be claiming it is getting more dangerous due to a caravan of largely honduran asylum seekers fleeing violence, mostly women and children and babies. mr. breen, is this also your understanding? >> yeah, my understanding is that the caravan is ocean hally asylum seekers fleeing extremely violence central triangle in central america, yes. >> do you believe this caravan poses national security or military threat? >> i have absolutely no reason to believe that, no. >> and i know i'm asking you to restate some of your points, but

it's for a purpose. president trump also seemed to imply that caravan was coming because of daca. among other conditions, only individuals who have lived here in the u.s. since 2007 would be eligible. mr. breen, with that in mind, would it be possible for any new arrival from the caravan to be equal to daca? >> by definition, flo it would not. >> president trump decision to send troops to the border until 2,000 mile wall to be built is behalf link. mr. breen, is conducting 2,000 border wall most efficient way to improve border security? >> i do not believe so, no. the wall would -- i mean basically every expert looked at this, you can construct a physical fortification at great cost that will take a great period of time. you'll have to use em nentd domain a lot to do that run through private property. major challenges there. and then in the absence of the

kind of patrol colonel is talking about, all you'll have is an expensive wall to get over. to say nothing about as they have been decreasing, at sea has been increasing entire time. so i think there are a lot of other polices you can put the $20 billion or whatever it's going to cost from increasing -- added capacity to courts, better resource toss border patrol, and coast guard, on we go, but no i don't think the wall is effective solution. >> also mattis signed a memo that stated that the national guard will not perform law enforcement activities in iraq with migrants. mr. breen, is that right? and what would the national guard's role consist of and how effective would they be? >> i think that's correct. that definitely the right thing to do. north noting this is title 32 situation, not a title 10 situation. so secretary mattis is not in a position as strange as it may sound to directly issue good

ance to the guard. that falls to the governors. but i definitely think that is the wise es course of action. what ends up happening, of course, is that in theory the national guard will do things like man toir toyers and do other do other tasks so that th border control agents are free to go out. and border patrol already got in some situations 75 f othm% of t not patrolling already. >> so i don't have much time, so one of the things i want to point out and ask because it was justified that the deployment of national guard troops based on catch and release or daca. >> not at all. >> so my point is that it seems that this policy was decides at

a whim to send national guard to the border. i would like to have something fact-based and thought out and done with coordination and understands that there is a real crisis going on on the border. if your justification is the drug cartel's state it. using something that is not correlated with what he is calling a crisis. there is no crisis because of the asylum seekers. it doesn't change policy at all. all you're doing is sending more troops to the border that are going to not produce the result of keeping away people who are going to be catch and release or daca recipients. in closing, asking governor brown to reject the -- deployment of the national guard to our border.

>> without objection. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i yield back. >> the chair recognizes the gentlemen from georgia. >> thank you very much, mr. chairman. mr. mccraw i believe your department is responsible in texas for maintaining the statewide sex offender registry, is that correct? >> yes. >> this is a little off topic but a great concern of the threat imposed convicted sex offenders who entered the country illegally and those individuals were released from i.c.e. custody without local law enforcement being notified and ensuring that they were placed on the national sex offender registry. i know a lot has been done within i.c.e. and the law enforcement notification system progress is being made. i understand that and deeply

appreciate that, and like wise, concerned that we have a long ways to go with this. it is my understanding that when i.c.e. enforcement and removal operations is scheduled to release an illegal alien required to register on the sex offender list that i.c.e. sends through exchange portal, is that correct? >> yes. >> so when you received this information, what kind of information is provided? what do you get from i.c.e., for example, are you getting criminal histories, country of origin, fingerprints, alias? >> we are getting the information to follow up with state law and requirements so we can get them registered in that

point and time. and with the i.c.e. cio we have done operations with them to capture sex offenders who were criminal aliens and registered. >> are you getting fingerprints? >> yes, sir. i have no reason to know otherwise, if there is anything contra to that, i will get back to you. what i know from now, we are getting all that we need on i.c.e. >> if you would get back to me i would like that. at this point in the process, is it then your department or i.c.e. that has the responsibility to ensure that local law enforcement knows about these individuals? >> we certainly do. we go through process -- once they are registered in the texas registry, we notify a local agency at the point in time. >> so i.c.e. hands the baa tton

you -- >> yes, sir. >> and texas is doing a good job. a lot of states are dropping the ball on that. are you aware of that? >> i'm not aware of other state but i know the government legislature won't stand for anything else other than getting it done correctly. >> local law enforcement is unable to access the doj exchange portal is that -- >> i'm not aware of that. i know they can access the texas sex offender registry. >> so it becomes your responsibility to make sure they get it. they are not able to, as i understand it and i want to make sure. so how can we better fix this whole process and improve the notification, the information sharing spr

sharing process and this type of thing? >> you are looking at different states. some things are laws and some take a more proactive approach and texas the legislation governor have been proactive and concerned about sex trafficking whether it is internationally or domestic by gangs. and they have been proactive in that area. >> i want to thank you for your work with this and i wanted to -- i know it is a little off topic but it is still very much related to the overall topic because we are dealing with this. and i appreciate your expertise and what you do. i look forward to working with you and your department and any of you who are interested in helping find ways to close the gaps and ensure the safety of the american public in this regard and i appreciate your work. >> sex trafficking is a problem.

it clearly. >> i want to thank the witnesses for appearing today. the hearing record is open for two weeks if you want to submit something for the record, if there is nothing else, the subcommittee stands adjourned. we have another first amendment speech and it involves the student protest. it is the vietnam war anden students come to school wearing black arm bands to punish and protest the war. can they be suspended by the

district for the arm bands. this violates the freedom of speech and 7-2 majority opinion and they can't be punished. it is an urgent wish to avoid controversy and it can't be argued that should their constitutional rights or freedom of speech at the schoolhouse gates. >> this one is personal for me. i think i do what i do in part because my parents brought me to philadelphia when i was 11 years old and went to independence hall and that made a tremendous impact on me. but then three years later, four years later i'm in high school and i write an op-ad for the school newspaper that the principal sensors and my teachers stood by me and told me

to read this case which is all about the free speech rights of students. and i read it and it inspired me and changed my life. >> given us this powerful personal story and students have fewer first amendment rights than adults and thomas suggested in a very provocative opinion that as an original matter students have no first amendment rights at all. so who is correct? >> it is true that the supreme court is chipping back on a couple of decisions. greater restrictions upheld on the decor em of student speech and it is offensive. the school becomes the school speech and easier to regulate. i disagree with that. the basic principal that kids

are persons and possessed with free speech rights it is a vital correct principal. >> watch landmark cases. live monday, at 9:00 p.m. eastern on c-span. coming up tonight on c-span 3, prime minister question time and the british house of comments. then a hearing on the fiscal year 2019 budget for the federal office of compliance. after that, the house energy and commerce committee looks at fuel standards and later, a forum on u.s. food safety, policy issues and assistance for low-income families. >> during this week question time. british prime minister theresa may answered questions. recent controversy