, which is responsible for infrastructure protection and cybersecurity. my role was created in 2005 and formalized in legislation in implementing recommendations from the 9/11 commission act of 2011. as chair, i am responsible for overseeing the intelligent enterprise and performing a few key functions. first, leveragings bring -- the expertise of the members in support of the department's mission.

i recently received for fiscal year 2013 might budget. i am working on crafting might response and my input to the secretary. i where another hat in addition to under secretary for intelligence. i am also the department information sharing executive. as you know, the portfolios are closely related. the review process allows me to identify capability gaps. for example, the budget request currently on the hill, i put an initiative in there to put additional personnel in immigration services to assist them in reviewing the voluminous antic -- immigration data.

after be standardized policies and practices, i want to highlight a couple of those. the first is our collective effort to standardize and improve our intelligence reports. after much discussion and examination of the burying processes, we developed a approach for transitioning from an enterprise process which will streamline the review and clarence process while still comply with all laws. -- and clearance processes while still complying with all walls. -- with all laws.

we have created as a counter intelligence working group. some are representatives of the first-ever component. this group is going to report back to us on plans for a new department. another area where we have developed an enterprise approaches production management. as congresswoman spear asked, we were frequently asked about redundancy in the department. it is hard to have too much visitation because they are so distinct. in the area of threats, we definitely need to coordinate. we produced our first program of analysis in 2010 which laid out 17 key intelligence questions. the first one was drafted by

i.n.a. the second one is intended to be a true enterprise document developed collaborative late from the beginning and articulating a who is trying to produce what from the full range of departments in homeland security. finally, a couple of examples on collaborative focus on intelligence issues. without going into details, we could teams together to focus on things like apprehension of specific groups along the border arriving without documentation to try to figure out why and how they arrived at the border. we have a very successful working group that focused on capabilities and gaps and discovering tunnels under the southwest border. we also put together a team in cooperation with our enter agency partners as a way of ensuring that we and our state

and local partners had the most protective measures. the hsic and dhs work together and are getting better at working together. we take it to the next level and work closely with our interagency parties. finally, if you forgive my analogy, homeland security is a team sport and i am proud to be here with my teammates to answer your questions. >> thank you, undersecretary wagner, for your testimony. our next witness is rear admiral en of the united states coastguard. he has held the post of acting assistant commandant for marine safety, security, and stewardship. as an admiral in the coast guard, he served as special assistant to the president and

senior director for better security on the national security staff. he was first commander of the coast guard deployable operations group. he is a graduate of the united states coast guard academy with aged bachelor of science degree in mathematical -- with a bachelor of science degree in mathematical sciences. i also understand you may have a little interest in how the coast guard lacrosse program is doing this year. you are recognized to summarize your testimony for five minutes. >> good afternoon, chairman. thank you for the opportunity to provide testimony of the coast guard intelligent enterprise and how we were closely with the vhs homeland security intelligence council partners.

i am we admiral thomas atkin. in the, dodd for criminal investigation and intelligence. -- i am the assistant commandant for intelligence and criminal investigation. no other department has a jurisdiction likes our coast guard which allows us to test the maritime domain in every manner. we protect those on the sea, we protect america, and we protect the sea itself. the coast guard's persistence presence allows us to fill a unique in each within the intelligence committee. as a member of the armed forces, we are at the intersection between homeland security and

national defence. as a federal law enforcement agency, because god is also positioned between these two import -- the coast guard is also a position between these two important groups. we collect and report intelligence that not only supports our mission, but supports the national security objectives. in august 2010, eight 180 foot carrier crossed the pacific with migrants.nkan the coast guard enabled tactical commanders to closely monitor the case, prepare contingency plans, and position response forces. this vessel was of particular concern because the smugglers

include members of the -- of a terrorist group. we monitor the vessel, especially as it approached u.s. territory. we leveraged our capabilities with our law enforcement counterparts. we may boarding team is aware of the positions and the responses they might encounter. we assessed the potential threat posed by the crew and passengers. at any time, this could have turned into a major search and rescue case where a significant interdiction is dead. the vessel was intercepted by the canadian forces. we provided effective, timely, and usable intelligence to make sure we were ready to take action. this example highlights our maritime expertise and allows us to leave our law enforcement to identify potential threats and to work towards a positive solution to protect our nation.

the coast guard screens ships, crews, and passengers. in 2010, we screened more than 21 to 57,000 -- 257,000 ships. we use real-time data base checks that allow us to identify suspected entities. our collaboration has been so successful that earlier this year we moved much of our screening effort to the national targeting center to better integrate our agents with personnel performing their duties. any info on persons found with possible terrorist links are shared with the department of justice and the intelligence community. i have only scratched the surface describing the broad capabilities endeavors relationships that define the

coast guard intelligence enterprise. our experiences result from our unique status is with law- enforcement agencies, a federal regulator, and the national intelligence committee member. our enterprise bring something different to the table. we have made great strides in our collaboration under the leadership of secretary wagner. we understand that we are strongest when standing together. we are working to make significant progress and align our capabilities with the strongest purpose. thank you for inviting me here to discuss the coast guard intelligence enterprise. i look forward to your questions. >> process, rather admiral, for your testimony. our next witness is mr. daniel johnson. mr. johnson began as an assistant administrator for

intelligence earlier this year. prior to that, he served in the united states air force. with 26 years' experience at the air force intelligence, surveillance, and recalls its -- and recognizance efforts, he is a seasoned staff officer. he also worked at the pentagon on the joint chiefs of staff as deputy director for joint requirements. that must be quite a business card when you have something like that. in that role, he provided intelligence support to the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff as secretary of defense. mr. johnson graduated from the air war college at maxwell air force base in alabama. he received a master of public administration from the university of oklahoma, a bachelor's degree in public administration from eastern connecticut state university.

mr. johnson, you're recognized to summarize your testimony. thank you. >> ranking member spears, mr. chairman, thank you for allowing me to testify today. since coming on board this january i have had the opportunity to work closely with undersecretary wagner and my colleagues at the united states coastguard, immigration and customs enforcement. as the assistant administrator for intelligence for the gsa, i oversee three primary missions. in the case with a warning, predictive analysis, and response. the gsa office of intelligence can receive, assessed, and disseminate intelligence information for transportation security purposes that helps protect the 1.7 million passengers per day the u.s.

civil aviation, the 47,000 miles of highway, the 147 million maritime passengers per year, the 29 million passengers per day to use mass transit, the 1.6 million tons per year travel by freight rail, and the over 2.5 million miles of natural gas and liquid pipeline. in my role, i am often asked what keeps me up at night. the answer is a global threat with a regional focus coming primarily from al qaeda and its affiliate groups. they are a threat to transportation security. they continue to threaten u.s. interests abroad. in particular, a group that is fixated on aviation as a means to inspire fear and economically cripple the united states western efforts -- western answers.

we rappers the october 2010 cargo blocked -- cargo block. in light of the successful assault bin laden roll out, we continue to track and monitor existing gestation threats from al qaeda. -- existing transportation threats from al qaeda. stakeholders include the passengers out there today, fuel operations, a key infrastructure operators. in order to do this, we must work clothes with the haleh security council -- must work closely with the homeland security council. of the past six months i have

reached out to be intelligence and law-enforcement communities. along with reaching out externally and leveraging existing analysis being done by partners, the government coordination councils, fusion centers, private trade associations, and national joint terrorism task forces. under the leadership of undersecretary wagner, we have worked closely with vhs in professional development and training. within my office we have created a development at that ranges from new hires to seasons analyst. on the ground floor, we're beefing up our intelligence section. we work closely with dhs on policies and procedures.

within tsa, -- thank you for this opportunity to address the subcommittee. i am happy to answer any questions. >> thank you, mr. johnson. i am grateful for your testimony. our next witness is the assistant director of intelligence for the united states intelligence and customs enforcement. his public service includes 20 years experience, most recently as deputy undersecretary for operations in the office of intelligence and analysis. he has also served as the director for human smuggling and trafficking center. special agent in charge of the field office. before that time, he worked with

the immigration and naturalization service as deputy assistant commissioner for investigations, director of anti smuggling, and assistant director for investigations and special agents. he also holds a bachelor's degree in political science from california state university at long beach. you are now recognized to summarize your testimony. thank you. >> thank you, mr. chairman. distinguished members of the subcommittee, on behalf of secretary napolitano i would like to thank you for the opportunity to discuss efforts in support of the dhs intelligence enterprise. i offer a unique perspective because i have had the honor of serving in a leadership role in both i.n.a. and i.c.e. we do this to intelligence production and that through law

enforcement investigations focusing on terrorism, human smuggling, humans factoring, financial crime, weapons proliferation, drug-smuggling, and other activities. we had the most extensive investigative authority. we a people assigned in over 200 u.s. cities and in 48 countries around the world. ice is a vital contributor to the intelligence enterprise and a voracious consumer of its products and services. the ice intelligence program is structured along three major lines. we have field based intelligence teams that support our field offices directly. we also have intelligence liaisons' which we have placed with enter agency partners in the intelligence community.

this combined approach allows us to have people who will help serve and make sure we have the right information going to be right people at the right time. in your opening statement, undersecretary wagner provided an extensive overview. i would like to focus on how collaboration within the enterprise is projecting from ours perspective. the homeland security council, as previously mentioned, stars as an excellent venue to coordinate on a large, strategic initiatives as well as making sure we are working on common threats. for example, ice has advanced important initiatives in the coordination of counter-tunnel investigations and operations. we'll work our collaborative capabilities to determine and identify illicit smuggling

pathways, bringing people and goods into the u.s. illegally. ice facilitates a bi-directional and vote flow between our external partners, both domestic and overseas. is plays a critical role in support of the national intelligence committee as well. ice is the leading producer of homeland security reports, which provide valuable intelligence reporting from ice operations. we disseminate those externally to our partners. in the year 2011, ice as accounted for 58% of the department's production of h.i.r.s their value by customers as high value or major significance.

they are substantial in the intelligence world. the successful of our reporting is a commitment not only to the people producing them, but also a commitment to show that ice is committed to making sure we are putting out our most valuable information so others can use it to strengthen national security efforts. ice also has a leadership role in the e.t.t.f. this is an inner agency entity that sits in the office of intelligence analysis that work to ensure that dhs leadership maintains situational awareness on rapidly evolving terrorist threats. we do this through the enabling of counter-terrorism threat coordination and by producing sensitive intelligence assessments. is's a participation also helps our needs. we are able to glean information held by other intelligence

components and share that with our special agents on the ground to or working around the country to combat terrorist threats. ice also plays an important role in the information sharing with our federal, state, local, and international law enforcement orders. we do this primarily to the law- enforcement information sharing initiative. since its inception, we have entered into eight law- enforcement information sharing agreements on behalf of the department of homeland security. this is an agreement recently signed with the international justice and public safety network. this is an important point. this will enable us to share lawrmation with 7085,000 enforcement officers around the country. this is something i am very

proud of. this will help the boots on the ground in the state and local community. the importance of integrating intelligence into our investigations and operations cannot be overstated. since 2006, dhs has leveraged task forces which combined federal, state, tribal, and local law enforcement intelligence and law enforcement resources to synchronize efforts to combat existing threats. ice intelligence provides strategic and operational support. we are working with i.n.a. to increase overall support on the borders. ice serves an important role in coordinating intelligence functions. we serve as the primary conduit for the d.h.s. intelligence from

ice. in a rapidly changing environment, however, we cannot be complicit with our successes. we are moving forward by increasing our strategic intelligence. >> mr. chaparro, i am very focused on your testimony. i appreciate it. i would ask you to sum it up very quickly. we need to get to miss mitchell. we would do our votes and get back as quickly as we can. can you give us your concluding the go absolutely. >> if we take great advantage of the services provided by our partners. we utilize information. i look forward to answering any questions the committee members may have for me. >> thank you. we would like to identify our final witness, mrs. susan mitchell, the deputy assistant commissioner for the opposite

intelligence. i hope you will allow me to -- allow me the privilege of not sharing the same introduction as i did before. let's get right to your testimony. >> good afternoon, chairman. it is a privilege and honor to appear before you with my colleagues and to discuss c.b.t. intelligence efforts and evolution. with all the 60,000 employees, cbp is the largest employer -- enforcement operation in the nation. we protect the united states from terrorists, drug smugglers, agricultural disease, among other threats all while fostering our economic security and competitiveness. cbp provides a layered defense

along 7,000 miles of land border and 95,000 miles of shoreline in partnership with the u.s. coast guard. we protect and deterred the -- detect and deter the movement of foreign terrorists. i would give you two examples of our efforts on this much -- on this front. cbp officers prevented the entry into the united states the so- called "millennium bomber." there were transforming explosive materials. it was identified by a behavioral analysis detection and the vehicle he was driving. more recently, on may 3, 2010, cbt worked with jfk airport to apprehend the times square bomber as he was attempting to

flee the u.s. on a flight to the middle east. much earlier, and it really is he changed drastically from his normal means of traveling with his family versus the documents detailing this trip -- which traveling alone and failing to return. we were the first to identify him as a certain level of concern and fully document his travel and his admission interview. after the attempted bombing, we provided to it -- provided the fbi with the phone number from the person who sold the car to the actual suspect. we provided the fbi with his name, picture, and address. we then posted him in our

system. sure enough, he hit are targeting system when he attempted to flee the country. we worked closely with our d h s partners and our local partners at jfk airport to stop that departure as he had already boarded the flight. in this case, every second mattered and highlighted the need for real time targeting and cooperation between federal, state, and local partners. in the interest of time, i would discuss more when you get back. i just wanted to get on our office of intelligence and operations was established in 2007, merging the former offices of anti-terrorism intelligence as well as components of the field operations, border patrol, and infotechnology. we are the coordinating facilitator that integrates and

leverage is all of our diverse intelligence capabilities into a single, cohesive intelligence enterprise. extendedt the agency's zone of security to the use of a multilayered approach to address our borders, consisting of collecting advanced traveler and target information, enhanced law-enforcement technical collection capabilities, and information sharing relationships with federal, state, and local agencies. i will talk about targeting when you get back. >> thank you timely for summarizing your testimony in that fashion. if we had a series of three votes on the floor. the subcommittee will stand in recess for five minutes following the last vote in the series.

>> the committee will come to order. i thank you for your patience and your testimony. at this point in time, what i would like to do is to begin the questioning. i hope we can do five minutes for each of us and then, at the conclusion, if we have remaining questions as well because there is an awful lot of material to

go through. to begin the questioning -- undersecretary wagner, i am very grateful for you being here and for the role you have undertaken in an agency in which there has been a great deal of, not just collaboration, but, of course, a role in which a number of agencies have been put together in an effort for us to effectively respond to the multiple challenges. that is difficult in any point in time. when you're talking about sharing intelligence across the agencies, i think we have done -- in the we have made a great deal of progress in terms of breaking through some of the old stove piping as well as some of the agency tendencies to what to hold onto their role in their information. i am greg will for the progress that has been made, but we are again a very active world again

information flows. one of the challenges that each of us has is the prioritization. some elements of our infrastructure are defended against attack. others, not quite so much. if we are always worried about the ability of terrorist to adapt to what we have to do as well. we are also quite aware that there were 12 homegrown inspired jihadist terrorist just in the last year. 10 attacks and 10 plots by american citizens who were permanent residents of the united states. they were included in that. by comparison, over seven years since the 911 attacks, there were only an average of two such plots per year. we are in a period of enhanced concern. you discussed the homeland

security threat task force, which is being brought to bear against specific incidents or national security investigations. i really would like to know what role but -- what role that group is playing now in light of the information that we purportedly received from overseas with specific threats against some of our infrastructure. >> thank you, mr. chairman. the name sometimes causes some confusion because it sounds like another. they really do different things. the dhs threat task force was created by my principal deputy in the wake of heavy cases.

it was created largely as a way to pull together all the different pieces of information that were in the department at all the expertise in the department to make sure the department leadership was up to speed on the rapidly evolving threats. we have expanded the mission a little bit to be the focal point of falling emerging threats to the homeland and making sure we have pulled all the right strings, touched all the right data sets, reached out to our partners at the fbi to make sure that we are all up to speed and are doing what we need to do and everyone is on the same page. it is staffed by a mixture of our main component people. it is currently headed by someone from ice. recently, we were the focal point for dealing with the

information flowing from the exploitation of materials captured during a raid. we appreciate the fact that we got people from the components to help us deal with that. we are using it to be our focal point for revealing that information at determining whether we need to request more. we need to get information out to our state and local people. >> do you believe you have the capacity to make some discretionary calls and to be able distinguished from all along that trove of information and that there is a capacity to communicate that dell appropriately to the local level? >> absolutely. i have rarely seen such a good interagency effort on this. we have seven people

participating to are linguists. they are helping with the translating. there are people from all over the community participating on that. we pull together a group to pull together -- we pull together a group to work on the issues. it has been going relatively smoothly considering the volume of information. we have been working jointly with the fbi to put out most of the information that we get put out. we have put out probably about 12 classification levels. based on this information and in combination with information that is still coming in to our intelligence channels. >> my time has expired. i will turn to ranking member speirs. >> thank you, mr. chairman. thank you to all of you for your

testimony. you really are the unsung heroes who do this work. you go unnoticed, but make sure our country is safe. let me start by asking you, the house is suddenly considering a $1 billion cut to bthe dhs budget. how will this affect your intelligence functions? >> i will start by saying that i think my office has fare reasonably well. we are appreciative of what we received from the appropriators. i will defer to the others on any issues they may have. >> thank you. my understanding is that our budget faired fairly well as well. if we are not anticipating any

major cuts at this time. major cuts would have a significant negative impact on our ability to collect and report information. >> the same period from the gsa perspective, we are doing really well. >> from the ice perspective, i think we are doing well. i would want to make sure there are a couple of critical pieces that are in there. one is we had an and utilization for our southwest border. it was supplemental. the work we're doing on the southwest border is critical. we would not want to see that falter. so far we are good. hopefully we can keep it that way. thank you. >> our intelligence capability also paired well. there was a small pop up for are targeting capability. one of the things you heard today is the cbp targeting capabilities reduce support all

of our partnering agencies. >> if i could add one thing. it does not specifically an intelligence issue, but we are concerned about cuts to the grants because the grant program is a source of a lot of funding for state and local partners. while that is not specifically in my benefit, we are obviously benefit -- we're obviously interested in them retrieving enough funding to be active participants in the homeland security enterprise. >> where any of your agency's involved in examining the bin laden drove? all of you had a role in reviewing the materials? ok. this is a diagram of this entity that you are part of. undersecretary wagner is in the

middle. it is somewhat confusing because there are straight lines and then there are dotted lines. it is difficult to bring 22 agencies together in a group that had been independent and have everyone work well together. i am sure there are many challenges, some of which you may know what to discuss in public. as you move to a doubt, i want to know whether or not there are still areas that we should be aware of in terms of assisting you in unifying as a single agency. >> one of the areas that we, i think, still struggle with as a department is integrating our information systems. we came from a bunch of different places and we have a lot of different legacy systems. the department has a great deal of data -- travel data,

all intion data -- it is very different stovepipes. we are working very diligently with the components and with the department's chief information officer to work through how to do a better job internally, ensuring we have appropriate access to our data and we are not having to redo pontians multiple times, check individuals multiple times against multiple databases. we have a way to go before we get to that goal. that is something we are still working on. i would offer anyone else the opportunity to come if they are interested. >> i agree with undersecretary wagner. was the biggest challenges we face is the vast volume of data we have to sift through.

having the data tools and the connectivity to be able to look at tsa our intelligence community data and to be able to do that in an integrated fashion is a challenge that we all face day today. -- day-to-day. >> there's a tremendous amount of collaboration that has to occur and you need the tools out there. there are documents we have to go through every day. there are tools out there that could help us put them together into an analytical pocket at the end of the day. that could be very helpful. >> in the assets of time, i will concur with my colleagues. >> ok. the only one point of light to have is we need the ability to go from the backside to the plus side. >> thank you. i yelled back. >> thank you, ranking member

speier. at this time of like to recognize the gentleman from minnesota. >> thank you for your service to the country. you are the unsung heroes. you're the guys that do not get the metals. we appreciate all the things that you'd do. thank you very much for that. my quick question is, admiral, could you tell me what keeps you up at night? where do you see -- what is the main threat to the ability to do your job? >> as you know right now, we do not have an imminent threat in the maritime domain. being the new guy on the block, i am still learning a bit about what the intelligence committee is working on. i think my biggest concern is two-fold. one is safeguarding coast guard

personnel themselves. how do we provide the right force protection? the next piece would be those transnational threats, whether they be from middle -- criminal or terrorist organizations and how they are trying to get into the country and attack the american people. not having a specific threat right now, it is really trying to identify working with the colleagues on how they are coming into the country and have to stop them. >> thank you. i feel your pain when it comes to being the new guy on the block. you kind of alluded to it in your opening testimony, can you expand on it a little bit? >> we had a closed-door session a couple of months ago. it continues to be a threat to aviation followed closely by mass transit a different dress

that are out there -- different threats that are out there. price thank you. >> the short answer is my blackberry keeps me up at night. [laughter] all kidding aside, ice has a wide breadth of things that we cover. it is the violence between drug cartels, it is the pedophiles, it is the transnational criminal organizations that we investigate, it is the threat in cyberworld. there are many things we ought to focus on in order to make sure our citizens are safe. to be honest, i wish it were only terrorism. unfortunately, it is much much more. >> thank you for that. i thank you for being by your blackberry. >> i think for cbp, the biggest

thing we're concerned with is some of the unknowns. we have a good handle on identifying those we know are bad, but making sure our systems at that predictive modeling capability that allows us to pick up on those travel patterns that should be of concern. also, the impact of global security. we are partnering with a lot of foreign governments to ensure they are picking up on that same thought process for targeting as we have here. >> have you felt the at the national committee to be assisting you with that a little bit? is it more of a challenge? >> as they are finding that they themselves are targets as well and we can show some success stories in are targeting methodology, they are becoming much more willing partners. >> thank you.

>> i think the one thing that keeps me up at night the most is having -- is an attack on the homeland in discovering that we have data in the department that was relevant to it. that is why i focus my efforts on making sure we have the procedures in place, make sure we are using every piece of information that we have. i hope to never be in that position. >> i hope you never are as well, ma'am. two years ago, secretary napolitano ask you to coordinate with the dhs in coordination with state and local fusion centers. i am from minnesota. because of an alert that was giving instructions, that is also critical and so could have loaded up the chain of command.

could you update us on the progress? >> i think we have made a great deal of progress in the last few years in building a network of national fusion centers they share information both upward with the national intelligence and law-enforcement communities, and sideways with each other, which is an important regional aspect of this. what we are trying to do -- i.n.a. is leading the efforts of the department -- is to provide information, training, anything we can do to help the fusion centers achieve the ability to analyze their own and so, report on it, and understand what information is value to others so it can be shared. we have intelligence officers in the fusion centers.

we provide training courses in writing, reporting, protecting civil rights and civil liberties. i think we are seeing from most of the fusion centers improved levels of situational awareness. we are focusing on implementing with the department of justice, the reporting initiative. fusion centers are a key element of that. the secretary, as i am sure you are aware, has been promoting this. that is a way for us and the fusion centers and to leverage the american public to be on the lookout for information and behavior that might potentially allow us to detect and disrupt activity. i think we are in a very good

position to use those guys as a first line of defense in detecting and deterring terrorism. >> thank you very much, ma'am. i am over time. i yield back. >> thank you. the chair will now recognize the gentleman from arizona for five minutes of questioning. >> thank you, mr. chairman. under-secretary wagner, we hear a lot about the need to improve the level of information sharing between the various federal agencies, but we do not often hear about how that is done within the individual departments. what are you doing to improve the intelligence collaboration and information sharing within the d.h.s. intelligence enterprise? >> we are doing multiple things. there is not a single silver bullet to solve information

sharing or communication. we start with the homeland security intelligence council that we discussed earlier. we meet regularly on a monthly basis. we have weekly teleconferences to make sure we are on the same page about emerging threats and the other things we're trying to adjust collaborative lead. at the same time, we have multiple daily meetings. there are representatives on the d.h.s. task force becky's everybody up to speed on the emerging and evolving threats. we work together to produce joint products, many of which are shared with our state and local partners. it is multiple interaction across the board. we also work closely on collection requirements as well as on analysis and developing analytical tools.

i cannot even discuss all the interaction there is. we have been trying to significantly improve the cooperation and communication. i think we have made a lot of progress. >> thank you. you said the drug cartels activity having keeping you up sometimes at night. what are we doing for the intelligence standpoint to apprehend and make sure we are not seeing these drug cartels continue to move across our border? >> as we have seen the drug cartel threats and violence in vall, particularly in mexico, i have seen a higher level of emphasis placed on the intelligence community. i would say very candidly that they have been very responsive to our requests for information and support. i know we have wars going on in iraq and afghanistan.

the intelligence committee is stretched very thin. this threat is close to home and it impacts our committees is tremendously. we're doing everything possible from a law enforcement perspective to bring cartel members to justice. also, to make sure information is coming out of our operation. we understand the cartel's structure, where they are operating, how they are communicating -- we are making sure we are passing that information to the intelligence community to help sharpen their focus as well. >> the ability to work with your counterparts on the mexican side -- has that been fruitful? had you been able to blame a lot of information and have a good working relationship with them? >> i have been in this business a long, long time. i think the corporation has never been stronger in all honesty. for example, when a special

agent was murdered in mexico last february, the support we received from the mexican garment as well as u.s. law enforcement was unprecedented. the cooperation was good. you can always build and make it better, but i have never seen it as good as it is today. >> process is very much. mr. chairman, i yield back. >> thank you, mr. quayle. i hope that i may ask one more round of questions myself. the ranking member may have a few questions. ms. wagner, this may seem sort of counter intuitive because we spend a lot of time in the intelligence field trying to develop as much information as we can on emerging threats, which means we develop a lot of information about a lot of things and a lot of people. you're building a sophisticated

network with fusion centers that are touching each and every one of our communities. we have a broad spectrum of agencies better simultaneously participating. within our treasure trove of information, there is information about a lot of people, including american citizens among others. my own state of pennsylvania before i was elected, i was very aware of information developed by one of our entities that was read out into the mainstream to the benefit of a private entity. they take advantage of that intelligence information. what are we doing to assure that the civil liberties and privacy protections are in place so that we access information appropriately, but guard against inappropriate uses of that information? >> thank you for that question.

it is something we focus on a lot. for all of us who are intelligence and nerds, we have intelligence oversight that is embedded in our organization. we have guidelines within which we operate. we find ways of training our people, double checking to make sure we are following the rules, and periodically going to all our reports. this is a new world in which we are operating. we have focused a lot of time, effort, and resources on training the fusion centers to understand the rules regarding privacy, a civil rights, civil liberties, and constitutionally protected activities. we were to make sure every fusion center as a privacy policy in place. we work with them to make sure those are adequate, that

everyone in the fusion centers has been trained on those policies and that they are being followed. we work very closely with civil rights offices to provide training to make sure that they are fully trained on all of the things we have brought up -- >> they take their reach out to their local communities? >> yes, they do i am, that that we are leaning forward and building at the front and along with our engagement at the fusion centers, using all the products we are putting out. >> thank you for that and your work on that. it is vitally important as part of our mission. it is often overlooked. you just on a variety of stains. i have been thinking about a lot of different issues. you just on one area in which

agencies like yours might be the only people that have an opportunity to reach out to be a lifeline to some victims to live a horrible existence. you look at human trafficking and others who have been put down into the system. how are we doing in that battle? >> i think human trafficking is not going anywhere. ice has taken a leadership role in not only rescuing victims, but aggressively going after and prosecuting the horrific criminals that commit these crimes. equally important, we have victim assistance coordinators' in every single one of our field offices to ensure that the victims of human trafficking are able to get the help they need in order to help recover.

similarly, we are working closely with the community organizations, the non- governmental organizations, and we are working both domestically and overseas to combat him and trafficking. >> how about our local police officers and others? you often have local police departments that might make an investigatory stop, because somebody, realize this is an immigration violation, but not necessarily work making an arrest for some particular purpose, but they are looking past signals that may indicate there's something more going on.

the cloakroom. the gentleman from alabama. mr. aderholt: thank you. it is nye honor to present the fiscal year -- it is my honor to present the appropriations bill for the department of homeland security. this bill before us today, perhaps more than any other bill, exemplifies the difficult choices that need to be made in order to address our nation's fiscal crisis. this bill demonstrates how we can fully fund vital security programs while also reducing

spending overall. furthermore this bill does not represent a false choice between fiscal responsibility and security. both are national security priorities and both are vigorously addressed in this bill. i'm under no illusion that everyone here in this chamber will agree with the spending reductions included in this legislation. but now more than ever our government needs fiscal discipline and this bill takes the necessary steps toward that goal. the bottom line, more money and more government do not equal more security. so in this time of skyrocketing debt and persistent threats, we must get our homeland security priorities right. the bill before us today provides $40.6 billion in discretionary funding or almost $3 billion which is 7% below the request and $1.1 billion or almost 3% below the f.y. 2011 level. in addition, the bill also

includes $1 billion in offsets, emergency supplemental funding for fema's disaster relief fund immediately upon enactment. there are no earmarks that are set out in this bill or the accompanying report. the bill places priority on funding our nation's greatest security needs. fully funding all frontline personnel such as border security, c.b.p. officers, i.c.e. officers, coast guard, military personnel and secret service agents and fully funding all intelligence, watch listing and threats targeting functions. in addition the bill provides funding for the administration and the department of homeland security have failed. this bill makes up for nearly $650 million shortfall handed to us by the department through phony, unauthorized fee collections. it is irresponsible for the administration to submit a budget based on an illusion that congress is going to raise taxes or fees under the current economy. this bill also addresses the

inadequate request for disaster relief funding and provides the resources to help our communities recover from natural disasters. like the unprecedented flooding across the mississippi valley, the tornados that devastated my home state of alabama a few weeks ago and of course the horrific tornado that destroyed much of joplin, missouri, just a little over a week ago. however, programs that have been underperforming and failing to execute their budgets or which have repeatedly ignored congressional directives to measure the results are significantly reduced. in short, this bill places a priority on the taxpayers' limited dollars toward the security programs that will have an immediate impact upon our national security and responsibly reduce spending wherever possible. the bill is constructed around three core principles. number one, fiscal discipline. number two, target investments and security operations and disaster relief.

and number three, meaningful, hard-hitting oversight. first, on fiscal discipline, the bill goes further than simply cutting spending. this bill insists upon real reform. reform in how the department justifies its budget, reform on how fema manages first responder grants and reform on how fema, the department and the administration budget for the cost of disaster relief. number two, on security the bill includes nearly $150 million worth of targeted investments above the budget request for security operations. the frontline programs that are among the most critical at keeping our nation secure and these activities that directly counter recent terrorist attacks and address known threats. on disaster relief i have seen firsthand what natural disasters can do over the past few weeks and i can tell you that my constituents in alabama are expecting fema to get it right.

so this bill picks up where where we left off -- up from where we left off and provides an increase of $850 million above the request and within the budget for fema's disaster relief fund to address the known and expected cost of disasters in f.y. 2012. and as we added with unanimously in our full committee markup of the bill last week, we added $1 billion in offset emergency supplemental funding, provided to fema to ensure that disaster relief efforts stay on track this year and well into 2012. and, three, finally, oversight. our subcommittee has a long tradition of insisting upon results for each and every taxpayer dollar that is appropriated. this is a testament to the previous leadership on this subcommittee that was exhibited by our founding chairman of this subcommittee, chairman rogers, and also my predecessor and now

the ranking subcommittee ranking member, mr. price. this bill continues the dedication to frontline security programs and robust oversight by including numerous spend plan requirements. reporting requirements and operational requirements such as border patrol staffing levels and increase to i.c.e. capacity. i know there have been some criticism on the funding level this bill is recommending for fema's first responder grants. let me emphasize that there is more than $13 billion in the pipeline that has not been spent. but fema has yet to establish a credible method for measuring the impact of these grants. so this bill takes bold steps to get fema's fiscal house in order, requiring accountability for every dollar spent, requiring a plan for drawing down the enormous unexpended balances and consolidating

duplicative grant programs. putting priority on high-risk needs, rewarding programs like the emergency management performance grants that actually spend their funds witesly -- wisely and are willing to measure their results. i know how important first responders are to this nation, we see it every day. but we simply cannot keep on throwing money into a clogged pipeline when our debt is soaring out of control. i believe it's our duty to reform these grant programs. mr. chairman, this bill is about putting a priority on limited dollars and robustly supporting the most essential functions. the department of homeland security with all its critical missions is not immune from fiscal discipline. that means the department has to find the most cost effective way to meet its mission requirements. the american people are demanding no less. in closing, let me thank ranking member price, although we have certainly had a turbulent year he has been a statesman and a

true partner as we worked on this vital bill. i sincerely thank him for his input and his contributions that he has made on this bill. in addition, i'd like to thank the distinguished chairman and ranking members of the full committee, chairman rogers and ranking member dicks. as much as we have had to make difficult choices and tradeoffs at subcommittee level, i know that both of these gentlemen have had to make much more difficult decisions dealing with all 12 subcommittee budgets. finally i'd like to take a moment to thank the committee staff for their hard work on this bill. namely stephanie gupta and paul cox on the minority staff. jeff ashford, chris mallard, kathy crenger, rebecca orr, ann marie and bill and ben nicholson who is the clerk of this committee on the majority side.

i believe this bill reflects our best efforts to address our nation's most urgent needs, security and fiscal discipline. i urge my colleagues to support this measure and i reserve the balance of my time. the chair: the gentleman from alabama reserves the balance of his time. for what purpose does the gentleman from north carolina rise? mr. price: mr. chairman, i yield myself such time as i might utilize. i'm pleased that we're considering the fiscal year 2012 department of homeland security appropriations bill in a timely fashion and under an open rule. chairman alder --ed aer holet -- aderholt has been a true professional in the drafter of this bill and certainly want to share in his commendation of all of our staff on both sides of the aisle. for the second year in a row, overall funding for the department of homeland security

will drop. it is below the president's request and returns the funding to the 2009 level which is concerning to many people, including myself. this allocation has required chairman aderholt to make some tough decisions. he's been able to retain adequate funding for the front line employees of the department of homeland security to continue to conduct critical operations along our borders, to protect our nation's airports and sea ports and to respond to the waves of natural disasters that our country has experienced this spring. the same, however, is not true, unfortunately, of homeland security grant programs, which are cut radically. providing a total of $1 billion for allstate and local grants or 65% breaux the presidents a request and providing $350 million for firefighter assistance grants. that's almost 50% below an

already reduced request. breaks faiths with the states and localities that depend on us as partners to secure our communities. these cuts will be especially harmful as our states and municipalities are being forced to slash their own programs. for example, according to the association of firefighters, 650 fewer fire irets will be on the job if these cuts in this bill are enacted. i can't see any defensible argument for cuts of this magnitude. cuts on cuts already made in the fiscal year 2011 appropriations. they will do great damage to local preparedness, to emergency response in our communities and to the recovering economy. these grant programs equip our state and local partners to be ready for a daster so they can mitigate its impact and respond effectively. while this bill rightly seeks to help states and localities remr. after a disaster strikes,

it decimates the -- that exposes our community to greater risk and potentially raises the cost of disasters when they occur. and we shouldn't ignore the cost of layoffs on our economic recovery. this bill recommends other sdrastic reductions. for example, cutting -- drastic reductions. for example, cutting research in half. they would have aviation security and explosive detection devices and two cutting edge near-term research projects, but other critical research under way, including research on cybersecurity, disaster resiliencey, the detection of chemical and biological threats, this research simply wouldn't be funded in 2012, if ever. the bill also greatly reduces

funds for information technology needs and construction activities. it includes no funding for the new d.h.s. headquarters that's already under construction, and the related lease consolidation efforts. we've been told repeatedly by the administration that deferring these investments will ultimately affect front line operations and cost us more money in the future and i believe that they are absolutely correct. now, i recognize that the administration budget left chairman aderholt some holes to fill, but the real problem here is the bill's allocation in the budget resolution. that's thanks to a commeetly unrealistic spending -- completely unrealistic spending cap set forth by the administration. we're seeing the results of that deeply flawed plan. we can't fund our dual responsibility to respond to

all hazards. the majority further exacerbated the inquatses by adding $850 million in disaster relief beyond the president's request due to flooding. now, contrary to bipartisan tradition, the additional spending was not designated as an emergency for budget purposes. and as a result, these disaster funds come out of the hide of first responder funding. we gave the majority two chances to correct this flaw by designating the funding increase, that is the increase beyond the president's request as an emergency. once in last week's appropriation committee markup and yesterday in the rules committee. unfortunately the majority refused and passed up the opportunity to get us to a point where both parties might be able to support this bill. i want to close by reiterating

my appreciation for the chairman's efforts, for the staff's efforts to work with us on many, many issues in this bill, and for their valiant efforts to sustain our front line federal homeland security operations. but the bill does fall short of our obligations in critical aspects. the inadequate allocation makes it difficult to repair this bill. but i and other members will be offering amendments to move it in a positive direction. mr. chairman, i reserve the balance of my time. the chair: the gentleman from north carolina reserves the balance of his time. for what purpose does the gentleman from alabama, the subcommittee chairman, rise? mr. aderholt: i yield two minutes to the gentleman from pennsylvania. the chair: the gentleman from pennsylvania is recognized for two minutes. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i'd like to engage in a colloquy about some of the anti-terrorism standards. the committee on energy and commerce has voted by more than 2/3 to favorably report to the house a bill to extend

authorization for it through fiscal 2017. mr. murphy: it contains authorizations for appropriations for the full seven years and that provision conforms to the majority leader's cut-go protocols. i understand the need to fund the chemical plants for five years. we need to get the job done on this manner, mr. aderholt. mr. aderholt: i'll be glad to. i want to thank them on the expedited basis this year. we do hope and expect that cfat will be under regular order prior to the start of the new fiscal year. however, it was important that we included funding for the 2012 appropriation bill for cfats and we do not want that line item to appear to be in conflict with the sunset date of october 4, 2011. i look forward to a long-term authorization extension so that

these chemical facilities and the people who work in them can have a long-range certainty with respect to anti-terrorism plans and investments. we look forward to a good authorizing bill becoming law and time to guide our final 2012 agreements on the cfats' funding. mr. murphy: i thank the chairman for his support and yield back the balance of my time. the chair: the gentleman yields back. the gentleman from alabama. mr. aderholt: i reserve. the chair: the gentleman reserves the balance of his time. for what purpose does the gentleman from north carolina rise? mr. rogers: mr. chairman, i'm pleased to yield three minutes to the ranking member of our full committee, the distinguished gentleman from washington, mr. dicks. the chair: the gentleman from washington, the ranking member of the committee on appropriations, is recognized for three men's. mr. dicks: mr. -- the chair: the ranking member of the committee on appropriations, is recognized for three minutes. mr. dicks: i want to thank the chairman and the ranking member for their work on this bill and for the committee staff that's

worked long days and many late nights to produce the bill for consideration today. i'd like to commend the majority's effort to accommodate many of the concerns from members on the democratic side. i'd also like to thank chairman rogers and aderholt of bringing this bill to the floor through regular order and working with us to bring it to the floor with a rule that allows members to offer their amendments. at the outset i want to state for the record that the allocation for this bill is too low. it is about $1.1 billion below the f.y. 2012 enacted level and -- f.y. 2011 enacted level. it would represent the second straight year of a declining homeland security budget. some parts of this bill are very good. and i commend the chairman for providing adequate funding for the front line employees of the department of homeland security to continue to conduct critical operations along our borders, protect our airports and sea ports and to respond to the series of natural disasters we

have experienced this spring. however, some serious gaps remain. my colleague, mr. price, has already described in great detail the dangerous reductions in our support for the nation's first responders. also slashed in this bill is the budget for research and development activities at the department. the bill approved by the full committee provides less than $400 million for the science and technology directates research and development operation account, a cut of more than 40%. at this level for 2012 s&t has informed us that many critical research efforts already under way on cybersecurity, disaster resiliencey and detection of chemical and biological threats would be halted. america's technological edge is one of our great assets, and in the fight against terrorism i believe it would be a mistake to retreat from the aggressive pursuit of new solutions. i also want to bring my

colleagues' attention to another disturbing precedent-setting provision of this bill. it would require the president to send a budget amendment for additional disaster relief funding three months before the balance of available fund reaches $800 million and would require these additional funds to be fully offset from discretionary budget accounts. certainly democrats as well as republicans would like to see less reliance on supplemental appropriations to fund known disaster relief needs. but when disasters strike, victims need help, and they need help quickly. we should not risk delaying disaster relief because of partisan battles over proposed assets, nor should we create a mechanism that would tie up the relief process because a disaster did not do us the courtesy of providing three months' notice. during our consideration of the bill, we have the opportunity to address these and other serious flaws and i am hopeful we will be able to do so.

thank you, mr. chairman, and i yield back the balance of my time. the chair: the time of the gentleman has expired. for what purpose does the gentleman from alabama rise? mr. aderholt: i would like to yield five minutes to the distinguished chairman of the full appropriations committee, mr. rogers of kentucky. the chair: the chairman of the appropriations committee, the gentleman from kentucky, mr. rogers, is recognized for five minutes. mr. rogers: i thank the chairman and thank chairman aderholt for the time. more importantly, thank him for the great work that he has done in perfecting this bill and bringing it to the floor, along with the accolades that have already been said about the staff and the other members of the subcommittee. so, mr. speaker -- mr. chairman, i, of course, rise in support of this bill. when i became chairman of this committee, i promised to return to regular order open rules and the completion of as many

appropriation bills as possible prior to the august recess. and i intend to stick by that promise, and i appreciate the cooperation of my ranking member, mr. dicks, who has been very, very helpful in this process already. i look forward to an open amendment process, lively debate over the next several months. i also vow, mr. chairman, we would cut spending wherever possible to help balance our budgets. the appropriations committee is dedicated to the careful stewardship of taxpayer dollars, and you'll see that in each of these bills, these 12 bills that we put out this year, that that will be a hallmark, careful stewardship of money. we then make the most of our very limited resources in our limited government, and that includes the department of homeland security.

we begin this year with the homeland security appropriations bill because we can all agree that our national security is number one priority. every day our citizens worry about constant terrorist threats, the security of our air and seaports and the defense of our rail systems. but we also face the very real dangers of uncontrolled spending and skyrocketing debt. americans deserve to live and work in a country that will protect not only their physical safety but also their economic livelihood. the bill maintains the ability to keep our americans safe while also reining in the out-of-control deficit spending, providing $40.6 billion in total nonemergency

funding for the various programs within d.h.s. this is a decrease of $1.1 billion below last year's level. it funds the critical front line personnel, operations and programs needed to uphold the highest levels of national security. within this bill we bolstered our immigration and border security efforts, funded the maritime and security activities of the coast guard and boosted security efforts to address air cargo threats. the bill also addresses the president's overtly inadequate request for known disaster relief costs. it can be nearly impossible, in fact it is impossible, to plan for acts of god. but over the past few weeks mother nature has wreaked havoc across our midwest and south and other parts of the country.

demonstrating the need for sufficient disaster relief funding. i'm proud that we have added $1 billion to the disaster relief fund while completing offsetting this increase by taking unused funding from the department of energy. we've significantly reduced or eliminated ineffective and wasteful programs while requiring reforms in underperforming programs through heightened oversight to get the most out of each and every tax dollar. this includes long overdue reform on the state and local grant program under the federal emergency management agency which has been plagued by inefficiency. these grants often remain in federal coffers for years to come. right now, as you heard, there's a backlog of more than $13

billion in unspent grant funds. why should we pack a clogged pipe, as chairman aderholt has said, at a time when we are strapped for money as we are? this bill reduces funding for that program by $2.1 billion, changing the structure and requiring increased measurement and reporting and getting the money out of the pipeline and into the hands of our first responders and our local communities and states. this bill does not include funding for additional advanced inspection technology body scanners -- the chair: the gentleman's time has expired. mr. aderholt: i yield the gentleman an additional 30 seconds. mr. rogers: or other staff, it prohibits funding to transfer, lease or assist in the transfer of guantanamo detainees to or within the u.s. and in

accordance with the house rules there are no earmarks in this bill. the misleading budget request from the president for d.h.s. included undefined and unspecified administrative savings and relied on $650 million of revenue from fees congress has not approved. this bill follows both the spirit and the letter of the law , that we must make real budget cuts. the chair: the gentleman's time has expired. mr. aderholt: i yield the gentleman an additional 15 seconds. mr. rogers: i yield back. the chair: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. for what purpose does the gentleman from north carolina rise? mr. price: mr. chairman, i yield three minutes to one of our fine subcommittee members from california, ms. roybal-allard. the chair: the gentlewoman from california, ms. roybal-allard, is recognized for three minutes. ms. roybal-allard: mr. speaker, i rise in strong opposition to this bill which irresponsibly slashes over $1 billion from programs that protect and support the ability of our local

police, firefighters and emergency medical personnel to quickly and adequately respond to a disaster or a terrorist attack. the destructive flooding across the mississippi basin and the devastating tornados in alabama and missouri have demonstrated the need for a rapid and effective response to save lives. this is true of other parts of our country like my home city of los angeles, which is vulnerable to fires and earthquakes and is one of the top 10 targets for a terrorist attack. my police departments, firefighters and first responders have said that the cuts in this bill will delay their implementation of a badly needed interoperable communication system which is critical to their emergency coordination efforts. it was the lack of this kind of technology during the 9/11 attacks that contributed to hundreds of deaths.

the cuts in this bill also jeopardize the security of our nation's ports, the port of los angeles-long beach, for example, tells us that the cuts to port security grants would seriously threaten their ability to protect the port and to continue critical security training programs. an attack on this complex alone would have devastating consequences on our economy. fema director testified before our subcommittee that degrading the capabilities of state and local governments would likely magnify the impact of a disaster and ultimately increase the total cost to taxpayers. this bill turns a blind eye to these realities. it is a dangerous bill that weakens our national security and undermines the ability of our first responders to safely meet the dangerous challenges they face every day.

america cannot cut its way to greater security. today's realities require that our first responders and our department of homeland security receive funding with the scale and the severity of the threats america faces. i ask my colleagues to join me in opposing h.r. 2017. i yield back the balance of my time. the chair: the gentlelady yields back the balance of her time. for what purpose does the gentleman from alabama rise? mr. aderholt: i would like to yield two minutes to the gentleman from texas, mr. carter. the chair: the gentleman from texas is recognized for two minutes. mr. carter: thank you, mr. chairman. i rise today in support of fiscal year 2012 department of homeland security appropriations act. this bill cuts $1.1 billion from last year's level and $30 billion from the president's

request while still providing the resources needed to ensure that our borders are safe and secure and our homeland is safe and secure. all frontline defenders including the border patrol, immigration and customs enforcement agents, coast guard, military personnels and secret service agents are fully funded. in fact, this measure substantially increases funding for many of these frontline defenders over the president's budget request while eliminating waste in other areas. it ensures our borders will be secure by providing both c.b.p. and i.c.e. with all necessary resources. it ensures our homeland will be protected from terrorist threats by giving t.s.a. additional funds to conduct air cargo screenings. it ensures that the federal emergency management agency, fema, will have the flexibility and funds needed to respond to disasters, including the floods along the mississippi river value yrk the tornados that have swept the nation and the wildfires that have devastated my home state of texas.

this also includes 169 oversight actions which will force the obama administration to be accountable to the congress and ultimately to the people of the united states. at a time when china owns $1.1 trillion of our publicly held debt, we must make hard choices on spending here in d.c. during these difficult economic times, just like thousands of families across this country do every day. i would like to commend chairman aderholt and ranking member price for their leadership on this critical measure and i urge my colleagues to join in supporting this very important bill and i yield back the balance of my time. the chair: the gentleman from texas yields back. for what purpose does the gentleman from north carolina rise? mr. price: mr. chairman, i'd like to ask to reserve as the chairman has further speakers. the chair: for what purpose does the gentleman from alabama rise? mr. aderholt: i would like to yield two minutes to the gentleman from new jersey, mr. frelinghuysen. the chair: the gentleman from new jersey is recognized for two

minutes. mr. frelinghuysen: i thank the gentleman for yielding. i rise in support of the homeland security's appropriations bill. as a member of the committee from a 9/11 state, i work daily to ensure that our state and nation are prepared to meet any and all potential homeland security threats, whether those threats come from natural events or from activities of violent international extremists. one month after osama bin laden was brought to justice, we cannot ignore the fact that terrorists are plotting and planning at this very moment to harm americans everywhere. they're waiting for us to let down our guard so they can attack our communities and our neighbors. mr. chairman, it remains a dangerous world, we must remain vigilant. however, we must also remember that one of the greatest threats to our national security is our growing $14.3 trillion national debt. we've heard that from our civilian and military leaders. consequently our subcommittee has carefully examined the president's $43.5 billion

request and we've had to make some hard choices and i congratulate chairman aderholt and mr. price for making those choices. in this context i must say for the record i am concerned about the extent of the reductions to fema's state and local grant programs included in the bill. a lot more could be said. i also recognize that we have already made substantial investments in these important areas for over nine years. mr. chairman, i support the chairman's intent to force the department to make tough decisions on spending. it's imperative at a department with over 230,000 employees and dozens of agencies and directorates under its jurisdiction that they make the hard choices. this bill will ensure that the department is accountable for taxpayers' dollars. we've witnessed the infusions of many millions of taxpayer dollars, we've witnessed over

the last nine years. and lastly, as one of the three appropriators that are liaison to the intelligence committee, i note that the bill fully funds the president's requested funding increases for intelligence gathering activities at the department of homeland security. i support the bill and yield back. the chair: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. for what purpose does the gentleman from alabama rise? mr. aderholt: i yield two minutes -- the chair: does the gentleman from north carolina seek recognition? mr. price: mr. chairman, i would ask to continue to reserve. mr. aderholt: i yield two minutes to the gentleman from pennsylvania, mr. dent. the chair: the gentleman from alabama yields two minutes to the gentleman from pennsylvania, mr. dent. mr. dent: thank you, mr. speaker. i rise today in support of h.r. 2017, the homeland security appropriations bill for fiscal year 2012. as we all know we're closing in on the 10th anniversary of the september 11 attacks and this week marks the one-month --

marks one month since the death of osama bin laden. in communities across the country and particularly in alabama, as ably represented by the chairman of the subcommittee, and missouri, are realing from some of the most devastating storms and -- reeling from some of the most devastating storms and tornados in their history. i'm pleased that the bill is the first of the f.y. 2012 appropriations bills to be considered on the floor this afternoon. h.r. 2017, this legislation tackles both fiscal discipline and national security. both of critical importance to the american public. with regard to fiscal responsibility, h.r. 2017 provides $40.6 billion in discretionary funding or almost $3 billion or 7% below the request and $1.1 billion or 3% below the fiscal year 2011 level. as for national security, all of our frontline personnel including border patrol agents, c.b.p. officers, i.c.e. agents

and coast guard military personnel are funded to sustain their forces and meet mission objectives. obviously we wish we could do more in this legislation but i think this is a very important start, we should move this process forward. furthermore, this bill, 2017, does not shy away from oversight to ensure the federal government is a good steward of the american public's tax dollars. for instance, the transportation security administration, t.s.a., will be required to cap their full time screeners and generate plan to improve the integration of screening technology and the deployment of its existing work force. having served on the authorizing committee for six years, i very much appreciate this initiative and pay very close attention to these t.s.a. issues over the years. i do believe that this bill we are considering today is timely and specifically targets our nation's security needs and i know we're going to have a robust debate on some of these amendments that can further enhance this legislation. finally i want to thank chairman aderholt for his hard work and his leadership as well as the minority staff. at this time i yield back the

balance of my time. the chair: the gentleman's time has expired. the gentleman from alabama. mr. aderholt: i'd like to recognize the gentleman from new york, mr. king, for two minutes. the chair: the gentleman from new york, the chairman of the homeland security committee, mr. king, is recognized for two minutes. mr. king: i thank the gentleman from alabama for yielding and let me just say at the outset commend him to for his professionalism and courtesy and also for the effort that he made to preserve to secure the city's program in the homeland security bill. having said that i must oppose the bill in its current form. mr. speaker, mr. chairman, the threat level is the highest in our country since 9/11. that is only increased since the death of osama bin laden. osama bin laden specifically stated, we find in his document, that he wants to attack mass transit, maritime shipping, yet we are reducing mass transit security funding by 50%, we are

reducing our port security funding by 50%. we are reducing overall aid for homeland security grants which was the purpose for which the department was created, we're reducing that by 50%. this, i believe, is putting us at risk. i can speak for instance, for new york. we have five million people, five million passengers every day in our subway system. hundreds of thousands on the commuter lines, yet we're cutting security by 50%. we have 1,000 police officers working on counterterrorism, counting out a federal purpose. doing not what they were doing before september 11 but working entirely on counterterrorism and intelligence. yet their funding will be significantly cut. we have the manhattan security initiative which will provide a camera system of protection in the lower manhattan area and i can go through program after program, every penny, every penny is accounted for. and i would say that, as we go forward, as we look to the future, it's important that

cities and governments have some sense of continuity of where the funding will come from as they put their programs in place, to have a 50% cut this year is going to put us at a severe disadvantage and as we do approach the 10th anniversary of september 11, do we really want to cut our police departments, counterterrorism units, our intelligence units, mass transit security, our port security by 50%? to me this is an invitation to an attack. we cannot put ourselves in that position and because of that, despite my great regard for the chairman, i must owe p

[captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2011] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] >> one of the things in talking to reconstruction folks that they suggested is that it is time that we have a permanent office of stabilization and reconstruction. we sort of reinvent the wheel every time something comes up and if we had an office with

expertise knowing ropes and the vendors, that would make us for efficient and save taxpayer dollars. any observation on that mr. crowley? >> well, there is an office in the state department that that is purpose of doing exactly that. i think ambassador haslak would be better able to comment on it. u.s. aid works closely with that office in situations where these kinds of responses are required. we also have our own office of transition initiatives which is itself built around providing responses to these kinds of situations, but it works hand in hand with scrs which is the state department office tasked with that responsibility. >> would you indulge --

>> the gentleman is recognized for an additional minute. >> i thank the chairman. >> mr. crowley is right. there is an office at the state department that is tasked with what you're thinking about. under the qddr, there are a number of suggestions on how that office can be strengthened to fulfill the role you're recommending. >> ok. again, if you want to get back to the record, that would be great. thank you so much. thank you mr. chairman for your indulgence. >> thank you. we're ready to wrap up the hearings. you're welcome to ask questions if you had some questions, tom? no problem. ok. thank you very much. if there is no further business to come before the committee, we want to thank panel for their testimony and for answering our questions this afternoon.

you will have five days to submit questions or statements to the record. if there is no further business to come forward for the committee, we're adjourned. thank you. >> yesterday the house began work on the annual spending bill for the department of homeland security. here is some of the debate on that bill. >> contact information including twitter addresses, district maps and committee assignments and information on the white house. supreme court justices and governors. order online at

c-span.org/shop. it i fi pr for the department of homeland security. this bill before us today, perhaps more than any other bill, exemplifies the difficult choices that need to be made in order to address our nation's fiscal crisis. this bill demonstrates how we can fully fund vital security programs while also reducing spending overall. furthermore this bill does not represent a false choice between fiscal responsibility and security. both are national security priorities and both are vigorously addressed in this bill. i'm under no illusion that everyone here in this chamber will agree with the spending

reductions included in this legislation. but now more than ever our government needs fiscal discipline and this bill takes the necessary steps toward that goal. the bottom line, more money and more government do not equal more security. so in this time of skyrocketing debt and persistent threats, we must get our homeland security priorities right. the bill before us today provides $40.6 billion in discretionary funding or almost $3 billion which is 7% below the request and $1.1 billion or almost 3% below the f.y. 2011 level. in addition, the bill also includes $1 billion in offsets, emergency supplemental funding for fema's disaster relief fund immediately upon enactment. there are no earmarks that are set out in this bill or the accompanying report. the bill places priority on funding our nation's greatest security needs. fully funding all frontline

personnel such as border security, c.b.p. officers, i.c.e. officers, coast guard, military personnel and secret service agents and fully funding all intelligence, watch listing and threats targeting functions. in addition the bill provides funding for the administration and the department of homeland security have failed. this bill makes up for nearly $650 million shortfall handed to us by the department through phony, unauthorized fee collections. it is irresponsible for the administration to submit a budget based on an illusion that congress is going to raise taxes or fees under the current economy. this bill also addresses the inadequate request for disaster relief funding and provides the resources to help our communities recover from natural disasters. like the unprecedented flooding across the mississippi valley, the tornados that devastated my home state of alabama a few weeks ago and of course the horrific tornado that destroyed much of joplin, missouri, just a

little over a week ago. however, programs that have been underperforming and failing to execute their budgets or which have repeatedly ignored congressional directives to measure the results are significantly reduced. in short, this bill places a priority on the taxpayers' limited dollars toward the security programs that will have an immediate impact upon our national security and responsibly reduce spending wherever possible. the bill is constructed around three core principles. number one, fiscal discipline. number two, target investments and security operations and disaster relief. and number three, meaningful, hard-hitting oversight. first, on fiscal discipline, the bill goes further than simply cutting spending. this bill insists upon real reform. reform in how the department justifies its budget, reform on how fema manages first responder

grants and reform on how fema, the department and the administration budget for the cost of disaster relief. number two, on security the bill includes nearly $150 million worth of targeted investments above the budget request for security operations. the frontline programs that are among the most critical at keeping our nation secure and these activities that directly counter recent terrorist attacks and address known threats. on disaster relief i have seen firsthand what natural disasters can do over the past few weeks and i can tell you that my constituents in alabama are expecting fema to get it right. so this bill picks up where where we left off -- up from where we left off and provides an increase of $850 million above the request and within the budget for fema's disaster relief fund to address the known and expected cost of disasters in f.y. 2012.

and as we added with unanimously in our full committee markup of the bill last week, we added $1 billion in offset emergency supplemental funding, provided to fema to ensure that disaster relief efforts stay on track this year and well into 2012. and, three, finally, oversight. our subcommittee has a long tradition of insisting upon results for each and every taxpayer dollar that is appropriated. this is a testament to the previous leadership on this subcommittee that was exhibited by our founding chairman of this subcommittee, chairman rogers, and also my predecessor and now the ranking subcommittee ranking member, mr. price. this bill continues the dedication to frontline security programs and robust oversight by including numerous spend plan requirements. reporting requirements and operational requirements such as border patrol staffing levels

and increase to i.c.e. capacity. i know there have been some criticism on the funding level this bill is recommending for fema's first responder grants. let me emphasize that there is more than $13 billion in the pipeline that has not been spent. but fema has yet to establish a credible method for measuring the impact of these grants. so this bill takes bold steps to get fema's fiscal house in order, requiring accountability for every dollar spent, requiring a plan for drawing down the enormous unexpended balances and consolidating duplicative grant programs. putting priority on high-risk needs, rewarding programs like the emergency management performance grants that actually spend their funds witesly -- wisely and are willing to measure their results. i know how important first responders are to this nation,

we see it every day. but we simply cannot keep on throwing money into a clogged pipeline when our debt is soaring out of control. i believe it's our duty to reform these grant programs. mr. chairman, this bill is about putting a priority on limited dollars and robustly supporting the most essential functions. the department of homeland security with all its critical missions is not immune from fiscal discipline. that means the department has to find the most cost effective way to meet its mission requirements. the american people are demanding no less. in closing, let me thank ranking member price, although we have certainly had a turbulent year he has been a statesman and a true partner as we worked on this vital bill. i sincerely thank him for his input and his contributions that he has made on this bill. in addition, i'd like to thank the distinguished chairman and ranking members of the full committee, chairman rogers and ranking member dicks. as much as we have had to make

difficult choices and tradeoffs at subcommittee level, i know that both of these gentlemen have had to make much more difficult decisions dealing with all 12 subcommittee budgets. finally i'd like to take a moment to thank the committee staff for their hard work on this bill. namely stephanie gupta and paul cox on the minority staff. jeff ashford, chris mallard, kathy crenger, rebecca orr, ann marie and bill and ben nicholson who is the clerk of this committee on the majority side. i believe this bill reflects our best efforts to address our nation's most urgent needs, security and fiscal discipline. i urge my colleagues to support this measure and i reserve the balance of my time.

the chair: the gentleman from alabama reserves the balance of his time. for what purpose does the gentleman from north carolina rise? mr. price: mr. chairman, i yield myself such time as i might utilize. i'm pleased that we're considering the fiscal year 2012 department of homeland security appropriations bill in a timely fashion and under an open rule. chairman alder --ed aer holet -- aderholt has been a true professional in the drafter of this bill and certainly want to share in his commendation of all of our staff on both sides of the aisle. for the second year in a row, overall funding for the department of homeland security will drop. it is below the president's request and returns the funding to the 2009 level which is concerning to many people, including myself. this allocation has required chairman aderholt to make some tough decisions. he's been able to retain

adequate funding for the front line employees of the department of homeland security to continue to conduct critical operations along our borders, to protect our nation's airports and sea ports and to respond to the waves of natural disasters that our country has experienced this spring. the same, however, is not true, unfortunately, of homeland security grant programs, which are cut radically. providing a total of $1 billion for allstate and local grants or 65% breaux the presidents a request and providing $350 million for firefighter assistance grants. that's almost 50% below an already reduced request. breaks faiths with the states and localities that depend on us as partners to secure our communities. these cuts will be especially harmful as our states and municipalities are being forced to slash their own programs. for example, according to the

association of firefighters, 650 fewer fire irets will be on the job if these cuts in this bill are enacted. i can't see any defensible argument for cuts of this magnitude. cuts on cuts already made in the fiscal year 2011 appropriations. they will do great damage to local preparedness, to emergency response in our communities and to the recovering economy. these grant programs equip our state and local partners to be ready for a daster so they can mitigate its impact and respond effectively. while this bill rightly seeks to help states and localities remr. after a disaster strikes, it decimates the -- that exposes our community to greater risk and potentially raises the cost of disasters when they occur. and we shouldn't ignore the

cost of layoffs on our economic recovery. this bill recommends other sdrastic reductions. for example, cutting -- drastic reductions. for example, cutting research in half. they would have aviation security and explosive detection devices and two cutting edge near-term research projects, but other critical research under way, including research on cybersecurity, disaster resiliencey, the detection of chemical and biological threats, this research simply wouldn't be funded in 2012, if ever. the bill also greatly reduces funds for information technology needs and construction activities. it includes no funding for the new d.h.s. headquarters that's already under construction, and the related lease consolidation efforts. we've been told repeatedly by the administration that deferring these investments will ultimately affect front

line operations and cost us more money in the future and i believe that they are absolutely correct. now, i recognize that the administration budget left chairman aderholt some holes to fill, but the real problem here is the bill's allocation in the budget resolution. that's thanks to a commeetly unrealistic spending -- completely unrealistic spending cap set forth by the administration. we're seeing the results of that deeply flawed plan. we can't fund our dual responsibility to respond to all hazards. the majority further exacerbated the inquatses by adding $850 million in disaster relief beyond the president's request due to flooding. now, contrary to bipartisan

tradition, the additional spending was not designated as an emergency for budget purposes. and as a result, these disaster funds come out of the hide of first responder funding. we gave the majority two chances to correct this flaw by designating the funding increase, that is the increase beyond the president's request as an emergency. once in last week's appropriation committee markup and yesterday in the rules committee. unfortunately the majority refused and passed up the opportunity to get us to a point where both parties might be able to support this bill. i want to close by reiterating my appreciation for the chairman's efforts, for the staff's efforts to work with us on many, many issues in this bill, and for their valiant efforts to sustain our front line federal homeland security operations. but the bill does fall short of our obligations in critical

aspects. the inadequate allocation makes it difficult to repair this bill. but i and other members will be offering amendments to move it in a positive direction. mr. chairman, i reserve the balance of my time. the chair: the gentleman from north carolina reserves the balance of his time. for what purpose does the gentleman from alabama, the subcommittee chairman, rise? mr. aderholt: i yield two minutes to the gentleman from pennsylvania. the chair: the gentleman from pennsylvania is recognized for two minutes. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i'd like to engage in a colloquy about some of the anti-terrorism standards. the committee on energy and commerce has voted by more than 2/3 to favorably report to the house a bill to extend authorization for it through fiscal 2017. mr. murphy: it contains authorizations for appropriations for the full seven years and that provision conforms to the majority leader's cut-go protocols. i understand the need to fund

the chemical plants for five years. we need to get the job done on this manner, mr. aderholt. mr. aderholt: i'll be glad to. i want to thank them on the expedited basis this year. we do hope and expect that cfat will be under regular order prior to the start of the new fiscal year. however, it was important that we included funding for the 2012 appropriation bill for cfats and we do not want that line item to appear to be in conflict with the sunset date of october 4, 2011. i look forward to a long-term authorization extension so that these chemical facilities and the people who work in them can have a long-range certainty with respect to anti-terrorism plans and investments. we look forward to a good authorizing bill becoming law and time to guide our final 2012 agreements on the cfats'

funding. mr. murphy: i thank the chairman for his support and yield back the balance of my time. the chair: the gentleman yields back. the gentleman from alabama. mr. aderholt: i reserve. the chair: the gentleman reserves the balance of his time. for what purpose does the gentleman from north carolina rise? mr. rogers: mr. chairman, i'm pleased to yield three minutes to the ranking member of our full committee, the distinguished gentleman from washington, mr. dicks. the chair: the gentleman from washington, the ranking member of the committee on appropriations, is recognized for three men's. mr. dicks: mr. -- the chair: the ranking member of the committee on appropriations, is recognized for three minutes. mr. dicks: i want to thank the chairman and the ranking member for their work on this bill and for the committee staff that's worked long days and many late nights to produce the bill for consideration today. i'd like to commend the majority's effort to accommodate many of the concerns from members on the democratic side. i'd also like to thank chairman rogers and aderholt of bringing this bill to the floor through regular order and working with

us to bring it to the floor with a rule that allows members to offer their amendments. at the outset i want to state for the record that the allocation for this bill is too low. it is about $1.1 billion below the f.y. 2012 enacted level and -- f.y. 2011 enacted level. it would represent the second straight year of a declining homeland security budget. some parts of this bill are very good. and i commend the chairman for providing adequate funding for the front line employees of the department of homeland security to continue to conduct critical operations along our borders, protect our airports and sea ports and to respond to the series of natural disasters we have experienced this spring. however, some serious gaps remain. my colleague, mr. price, has already described in great detail the dangerous reductions in our support for the nation's first responders. also slashed in this bill is the budget for research and development activities at the department.

the bill approved by the full committee provides less than $400 million for the science and technology directates research and development operation account, a cut of more than 40%. at this level for 2012 s&t has informed us that many critical research efforts already under way on cybersecurity, disaster resiliencey and detection of chemical and biological threats would be halted. america's technological edge is one of our great assets, and in the fight against terrorism i believe it would be a mistake to retreat from the aggressive pursuit of new solutions. i also want to bring my colleagues' attention to another disturbing precedent-setting provision of this bill. it would require the president to send a budget amendment for additional disaster relief funding three months before the balance of available fund reaches $800 million and would require these additional funds to be fully offset from

discretionary budget accounts. certainly democrats as well as republicans would like to see less reliance on supplemental appropriations to fund known disaster relief needs. but when disasters strike, victims need help, and they need help quickly. we should not risk delaying disaster relief because of partisan battles over proposed assets, nor should we create a mechanism that would tie up the relief process because a disaster did not do us the courtesy of providing three months' notice. during our consideration of the bill, we have the opportunity to address these and other serious flaws and i am hopeful we will be able to do so. thank you, mr. chairman, and i yield back the balance of my time. the chair: the time of the gentleman has expired. for what purpose does the gentleman from alabama rise? mr. aderholt: i would like to yield five minutes to the distinguished chairman of the full appropriations committee, mr. rogers of kentucky. the chair: the chairman of the appropriations committee, the gentleman from kentucky, mr.

rogers, is recognized for five minutes. mr. rogers: i thank the chairman and thank chairman aderholt for the time. more importantly, thank him for the great work that he has done in perfecting this bill and bringing it to the floor, along with the accolades that have already been said about the staff and the other members of the subcommittee. so, mr. speaker -- mr. chairman, i, of course, rise in support of this bill. when i became chairman of this committee, i promised to return to regular order open rules and the completion of as many appropriation bills as possible prior to the august recess. and i intend to stick by that promise, and i appreciate the cooperation of my ranking member, mr. dicks, who has been very, very helpful in this process already. i look forward to an open

amendment process, lively debate over the next several months. i also vow, mr. chairman, we would cut spending wherever possible to help balance our budgets. the appropriations committee is dedicated to the careful stewardship of taxpayer dollars, and you'll see that in each of these bills, these 12 bills that we put out this year, that that will be a hallmark, careful stewardship of money. we then make the most of our very limited resources in our limited government, and that includes the department of homeland security. we begin this year with the homeland security appropriations bill because we can all agree that our national security is number one priority. every day our citizens worry about constant terrorist threats, the security of our

air and seaports and the defense of our rail systems. but we also face the very real dangers of uncontrolled spending and skyrocketing debt. americans deserve to live and work in a country that will protect not only their physical safety but also their economic livelihood. the bill maintains the ability to keep our americans safe while also reining in the out-of-control deficit spending, providing $40.6 billion in total nonemergency funding for the various programs within d.h.s. this is a decrease of $1.1 billion below last year's level. it funds the critical front line personnel, operations and programs needed to uphold the highest levels of national security.

within this bill we bolstered our immigration and border security efforts, funded the maritime and security activities of the coast guard and boosted security efforts to address air cargo threats. the bill also addresses the president's overtly inadequate request for known disaster relief costs. it can be nearly impossible, in fact it is impossible, to plan for acts of god. but over the past few weeks mother nature has wreaked havoc across our midwest and south and other parts of the country. demonstrating the need for sufficient disaster relief funding. i'm proud that we have added $1 billion to the disaster relief fund while completing offsetting this increase by taking unused funding from the department of

energy. we've significantly reduced or eliminated ineffective and wasteful programs while requiring reforms in underperforming programs through heightened oversight to get the most out of each and every tax dollar. this includes long overdue reform on the state and local grant program under the federal emergency management agency which has been plagued by inefficiency. these grants often remain in federal coffers for years to come. right now, as you heard, there's a backlog of more than $13 billion in unspent grant funds. why should we pack a clogged pipe, as chairman aderholt has said, at a time when we are strapped for money as we are? this bill reduces funding for that program by $2.1 billion,

changing the structure and requiring increased measurement and reporting and getting the money out of the pipeline and into the hands of our first responders and our local communities and states. this bill does not include funding for additional advanced inspection technology body scanners -- the chair: the gentleman's time has expired. mr. aderholt: i yield the gentleman an additional 30 seconds. mr. rogers: or other staff, it prohibits funding to transfer, lease or assist in the transfer of guantanamo detainees to or within the u.s. and in accordance with the house rules there are no earmarks in this bill. the misleading budget request from the president for d.h.s. included undefined and unspecified administrative savings and relied on $650 million of revenue from fees congress has not approved.

this bill follows both the spirit and the letter of the law , that we must make real budget cuts. the chair: the gentleman's time has expired. mr. aderholt: i yield the gentleman an additional 15 seconds. mr. rogers: i yield back. the chair: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. for what purpose does the gentleman from north carolina rise? mr. price: mr. chairman, i yield three minutes to one of our fine subcommittee members from california, ms. roybal-allard. the chair: the gentlewoman from california, ms. roybal-allard, is recognized for three minutes. ms. roybal-allard: mr. speaker, i rise in strong opposition to this bill which irresponsibly slashes over $1 billion from programs that protect and support the ability of our local police, firefighters and emergency medical personnel to quickly and adequately respond to a disaster or a terrorist attack. the destructive flooding across the mississippi basin and the devastating tornados in alabama and missouri have demonstrated the need for a rapid and

effective response to save lives. this is true of other parts of our country like my home city of los angeles, which is vulnerable to fires and earthquakes and is one of the top 10 targets for a terrorist attack. my police departments, firefighters and first responders have said that the cuts in this bill will delay their implementation of a badly needed interoperable communication system which is critical to their emergency coordination efforts. it was the lack of this kind of technology during the 9/11 attacks that contributed to hundreds of deaths. the cuts in this bill also jeopardize the security of our nation's ports, the port of los angeles-long beach, for example, tells us that the cuts to port security grants would seriously threaten their ability to protect the port and to continue critical security training

programs. an attack on this complex alone would have devastating consequences on our economy. fema director testified before our subcommittee that degrading the capabilities of state and local governments would likely magnify the impact of a disaster and ultimately increase the total cost to taxpayers. this bill turns a blind eye to these realities. it is a dangerous bill that weakens our national security and undermines the ability of our first responders to safely meet the dangerous challenges they face every day. america cannot cut its way to greater security. today's realities require that our first responders and our department of homeland security receive funding with the scale and the severity of the threats america faces. i ask my colleagues to join me

in opposing h.r. 2017. i yield back the balance of my time. the chair: the gentlelady yields back the balance of her time. for what purpose does the gentleman from alabama rise? mr. aderholt: i would like to yield two minutes to the gentleman from texas, mr. carter. the chair: the gentleman from texas is recognized for two minutes. mr. carter: thank you, mr. chairman. i rise today in support of fiscal year 2012 department of homeland security appropriations act. this bill cuts $1.1 billion from last year's level and $30 billion from the president's request while still providing the resources needed to ensure that our borders are safe and secure and our homeland is safe and secure. all frontline defenders including the border patrol, immigration and customs enforcement agents, coast guard, military personnels and secret service agents are fully funded. in fact, this measure substantially increases funding for many of these frontline defenders over the president's

budget request while eliminating waste in other areas. it ensures our borders will be secure by providing both c.b.p. and i.c.e. with all necessary resources. it ensures our homeland will be protected from terrorist threats by giving t.s.a. additional funds to conduct air cargo screenings. it ensures that the federal emergency management agency, fema, will have the flexibility and funds needed to respond to disasters, including the floods along the mississippi river value yrk the tornados that have swept the nation and the wildfires that have devastated my home state of texas. this also includes 169 oversight actions which will force the obama administration to be accountable to the congress and ultimately to the people of the united states. at a time when china owns $1.1 trillion of our publicly held debt, we must make hard choices on spending here in d.c. during these difficult economic times,

just like thousands of families across this country do every day. i would like to commend chairman aderholt and ranking member price for their leadership on this critical measure and i urge my colleagues to join in supporting this very important bill and i yield back the balance of my time. the chair: the gentleman from texas yields back. for what purpose does the gentleman from north carolina rise? mr. price: mr. chairman, i'd like to ask to reserve as the chairman has further speakers. the chair: for what purpose does the gentleman from alabama rise? mr. aderholt: i would like to yield two minutes to the gentleman from new jersey, mr. frelinghuysen. the chair: the gentleman from new jersey is recognized for two minutes. mr. frelinghuysen: i thank the gentleman for yielding. i rise in support of the homeland security's appropriations bill. as a member of the committee from a 9/11 state, i work daily to ensure that our state and nation are prepared to meet any and all potential homeland security threats, whether those threats come from natural events or from activities of violent

international extremists. one month after osama bin laden was brought to justice, we cannot ignore the fact that terrorists are plotting and planning at this very moment to harm americans everywhere. they're waiting for us to let down our guard so they can attack our communities and our neighbors. mr. chairman, it remains a dangerous world, we must remain vigilant. however, we must also remember that one of the greatest threats to our national security is our growing $14.3 trillion national debt. we've heard that from our civilian and military leaders. consequently our subcommittee has carefully examined the president's $43.5 billion request and we've had to make some hard choices and i congratulate chairman aderholt and mr. price for making those choices. in this context i must say for the record i am concerned about the extent of the reductions to fema's state and local grant programs included in the bill.

a lot more could be said. i also recognize that we have already made substantial investments in these important areas for over nine years. mr. chairman, i support the chairman's intent to force the department to make tough decisions on spending. it's imperative at a department with over 230,000 employees and dozens of agencies and directorates under its jurisdiction that they make the hard choices. this bill will ensure that the department is accountable for taxpayers' dollars. we've witnessed the infusions of many millions of taxpayer dollars, we've witnessed over the last nine years. and lastly, as one of the three appropriators that are liaison to the intelligence committee, i note that the bill fully funds the president's requested funding increases for intelligence gathering activities at the department of homeland security. i support the bill and yield back. the chair: the gentleman yields

back the balance of his time. for what purpose does the gentleman from alabama rise? mr. aderholt: i yield two minutes -- the chair: does the gentleman from north carolina seek recognition? mr. price: mr. chairman, i would ask to continue to reserve. mr. aderholt: i yield two minutes to the gentleman from pennsylvania, mr. dent. the chair: the gentleman from alabama yields two minutes to the gentleman from pennsylvania, mr. dent. mr. dent: thank you, mr. speaker. i rise today in support of h.r. 2017, the homeland security appropriations bill for fiscal year 2012. as we all know we're closing in on the 10th anniversary of the september 11 attacks and this week marks the one-month -- marks one month since the death of osama bin laden. in communities across the country and particularly in alabama, as ably represented by the chairman of the subcommittee, and missouri, are realing from some of the most devastating storms and -- reeling from some of the most devastating storms and tornados in their history.

i'm pleased that the bill is the first of the f.y. 2012 appropriations bills to be considered on the floor this afternoon. h.r. 2017, this legislation tackles both fiscal discipline and national security. both of critical importance to the american public. with regard to fiscal responsibility, h.r. 2017 provides $40.6 billion in discretionary funding or almost $3 billion or 7% below the request and $1.1 billion or 3% below the fiscal year 2011 level. as for national security, all of our frontline personnel including border patrol agents, c.b.p. officers, i.c.e. agents and coast guard military personnel are funded to sustain their forces and meet mission objectives. obviously we wish we could do more in this legislation but i think this is a very important start, we should move this process forward. furthermore, this bill, 2017, does not shy away from oversight to ensure the federal government is a good steward of the

american public's tax dollars. for instance, the transportation security administration, t.s.a., will be required to cap their full time screeners and generate plan to improve the integration of screening technology and the deployment of its existing work force. having served on the authorizing committee for six years, i very much appreciate this initiative and pay very close attention to these t.s.a. issues over the years. i do believe that this bill we are considering today is timely and specifically targets our nation's security needs and i know we're going to have a robust debate on some of these amendments that can further enhance this legislation. finally i want to thank chairman aderholt for his hard work and his leadership as well as the minority staff. at this time i yield back the balance of my time. the chair: the gentleman's time has expired. the gentleman from alabama. mr. aderholt: i'd like to recognize the gentleman from new york, mr. king, for two minutes. the chair: the gentleman from new york, the chairman of the homeland security committee, mr. king, is recognized for two minutes. mr. king: i thank the gentleman from alabama for yielding and

let me just say at the outset commend him to for his professionalism and courtesy and also for the effort that he made to preserve to secure the city's program in the homeland security bill. having said that i must oppose the bill in its current form. mr. speaker, mr. chairman, the threat level is the highest in our country since 9/11. that is only increased since the death of osama bin laden. osama bin laden specifically stated, we find in his document, that he wants to attack mass transit, maritime shipping, yet we are reducing mass transit security funding by 50%, we are reducing our port security funding by 50%. we are reducing overall aid for homeland security grants which was the purpose for which the department was created, we're reducing that by 50%. this, i believe, is putting us at risk. i can speak for instance, for

new york. we have five million people, five million passengers every day in our subway system. hundreds of thousands on the commuter lines, yet we're cutting security by 50%. we have 1,000 police officers working on counterterrorism, counting out a federal purpose. doing not what they were doing before september 11 but working entirely on counterterrorism and intelligence. yet their funding will be significantly cut. we have the manhattan security initiative which will provide a camera system of protection in the lower manhattan area and i can go through program after program, every penny, every penny is accounted for. and i would say that, as we go forward, as we look to the future, it's important that cities and governments have some sense of continuity of where the funding will come from as they put their programs in place, to have a 50% cut this year is going to put us at a severe disadvantage and as we do approach the 10th anniversary of september 11, do we really want to cut our police departments, counterterrorism units, our intelligence units, mass transit

security, our port security by 50%? to me this is an invitation to an attack. we cannot put ourselves in that position and because of that, despite my great regard for the chairman, i must owe >> on today's "washington journal" congresswoman barbara lee. representative nan hayworth on the debt ceiling. and sohini chowdhury. the house republican conference met with president obama at the white house yesterday to discuss u.s. debt and deficit reduction. following their meeting, they spoke to reporters. on tuesday, the u.s. house rejected a bill that would

raise the federal debt limit without cutting spending. >> afternoon, everyone. we had what i think is a very productive meeting with the president today. discussions about jobs and the deficit facing our country. this morning i released a letter signed by 150 economists who agreed that if we're going to get serious about creating jobs in america, we have got to reduce some of then

uncertainty. some of that is caused by the giant debt that is facing our country. we had a very fronk conversation. i thought it was productive. i'm looking for serious conversations about how we reduced the deficit and the debt and get our economy going and our jobs. >> today's meeting gave us an opportunity to express some concerns that we have surrounding the current situations on the economy. a.d.p. issued a report today estimating that private sector job creation amounted to 30,000 new jobs in may woefully short of what we need to see this

economy get back on track and people get back to work. it is really important for us to focus on growth in this economy. as we go through the discussions in trying to get the fiscal house in order surrounding the debt limit, it is very, very important for us to look at growth as part of the fix. we can bring the deficit down to added jobs and also get people back to work. we know that our chairman to have ways and means committee is hard at work putting together a tax reform plan. i asked the president hopefully that he will work with us to do so and to keep out of the discussions surrounding the debt limit and in the biden talks any notion that we're going to increase taxes. it is counterintuitive to believe you increase taxes on those entities you are expecting to create jobs. >> any type of opportunity where the conference got to convey what they are listening to across america? >> the president laid out from

a debt discussion, from the conference he heard about jobs. he heard about unshackling the burden of regulation on the small business to get them working again. from wisconsin to west virginia to members across the way. what i heard from this president, that he wanted to sit down and find real cut cuts now. he said there needed to be entitlement reform. we will work with him to create new jobs and pay off the budget and pay off the debt as well. >> i want to thank president and the speaker for bringing us together today for this important discussion. every generation of america has been proud to pass on a better country to nextgen ration. now there is a question as to whether or not our children and grandchildren are going to have more opportunities. the foundation is that we lay

for them is so important. our tax policies matter. our debt matters. our energy policy matters. whether it was our vote last nights on the debt ceiling or the conversation today with the president about job creation, we are committed to taking the steps necessary to ensure that nextgen ration has more opportunity. >> republicans and democrats are actually having a dialogue this is a good day. what the president heard from republican members of the house is that jobs are jobs number one. that is our job. unfortunately, the greatest impediment we have to jobs today is the lack of confidence in the future. republican house members were able to share with the president that the job creators in our district feel that the regulatory burden, much of it coming from the president's administration creates a lack of confidence in the future.

tax policy that is not competitive. a tax burden that is too high. creates a lack of confidence. last, but not least. a debt burden. the president heard from republican members of the house that we know that the debt burden is going to lead to high taxes which leads to low unemployment. unfortunately, what we did not hear from the president is a specific plan of his to deal with the debt crisis that could actually be scored by the congressional budget office. we hope there is still an opportunity to work on the drivers of this debt that is costing us jobs because republicans know that until we have the confidence that we can solve this debt crisis by dealing with the drivers, entitlement spending, we're not going to get the kind of jobs that the american people want and demand. >> did the president have a

response to that? did he respond your concerns? >> the president admitted that we have got to look at growing this economy. the discussion really focused on the philosophical difference on whether washington should continue to pump money into the economy or we should provide an incentive for entrepreneurs and small businesses to grow. i think the president was well aware and admitted the fact that private sector job creation was not enough. he mentioned a lot of losses were in the public sector. again, our message is to focus on growth in the public sector. the president talked about a need for us to continue to invest from washington's standpoint. a lot of us, that is code for more washington spending. something that we can't afford right now.

[inaudible] >> that's not exactly what i said. that is not exactly what i said. i just said we have got to take on this debt and if we demagogue each other at the leadership lefrl then we are never going to take on our debt. we have a debts crisis coming. we want to deal with this. if we're going to grow jobs and the economy, we have to get our spending and debt under control. if we try demagogue each other's attempts to do that then we are not applying the political leadership we need to get this under control. that is basically what we're saying. i simply explained what our plan is. how it works. it has been misdescribed by the president and many others. we simply described to him what it is that we have been proposing so that he hears from us how our proposal works so that in the future he won't

mischaracterize it. >> what was the point of this meeting today? was it negotiating? public relations? >> clearly an opportunity for our members to communicate directly with the president about our ideas, how to get the economy growing again and how to create jobs and how our idea is to solve the debt problem facing our country. i told the president one more time this is the moment. this is the window of opportunity where we can deal with this on our terms. we can work together and solve this problem. we know what the problems are. let's not kick the can down the road one more time. time to deal with it. thank you, everybody.

>> negotiations over raising the debt limit continue tomorrow when the president meets with the house democratic caucuses a the white house. we'll have full coverage on the c-span networks and c-span.org. today on c-span a subcommittee hearing on the u.s. military withdrawal from iraq and then today's "washington journal" and later, live coverage of the u.s. house and debate on homeland security spending. some events on c-span 2 today to tell you about. at 9:30 a.m. eastern, the house oversight committee holds a hearing on the recovery from last year's gulf oil spill. haley barbour and local officials will testify. also today, former massachusetts governor mitt romney formaly begins his

campaign. live coverage starts at 12:30 eastern on c-span 2 and c-span radio and c-span.org. >> today marks the first time when our legislative branch in its entirety will appear on that medium of communication through which most americans gets their information about what our government and our country does. >> several times today this has been referred to as an historic occasion. whether or not it will be an historic occasion is i think a subject for history. >> this week marks 25 years of televised coverage of the u.s. senate. on the first day in 1986, c-span 2 was carried in 6 million homes. today it is carried in 89 million homes. it is all searchable, shareable

and free. the peabody award winning c-span.org/videolibrary. >> our military forces are scheduled to leave iraq by the end of the year. we'll hear from officials from the state department and the defense department. this is about an hour. >> good afternoon. the meeting will come to order. i want to warn noolings we're probably going to be interrupted by votes here in a relatively short period of time in which time we'll probably be over there for a half-hour to perhaps 40 minutes but we'll come back as quickly as we can. and other members will be

coming in so that they can avoid my opening statement probably. but they will get here. i want to welcome all of my colleagues to this hearing of the subcommittee. this hearing was called to assess the obama administration's iraq policy as we approach the official transition from department of defense to the department of state lead. june 1 will mark approximately six months until all u.s. troops, combat or otherwise are scheduled to leave iraq. as of january 1, 2012 it will fall to the state department to oversea iraq's progress and the implementation and goals of the strategic framework agreement. having just returned from iraq a little over a week ago, i appreciate how critical the work our military and our state department does as we continue to carry out the mission there. in conjunction with the iraqi partners on the ground, they have helped set iraq on the

course to become a stable, secure and democratic country that respects human rights. but as we look with favor upon the hard-won gains, we must remember that we're not there yet. earlier today baghdad suffered a car bomb and roadside bomb wounding 16 people so far. ishe's recent progress is -- iraq's recent progress is as precarious as it is positive. it is too easy to look at where we are today compared with a couple years ago. it is neither time nor unfortunately well-reasoned in a number of areas. our brave men and women have fought tirelessly for eight years to get us to where we are today. thousands of lives have been lost. billions of dollars have been spent. the worst possible outcome for us today would be to withdraw before iraq is ready to stand on its own. there is reason to question

iraq's readiness. in january 2011, u.s. forces, iraqi reported the special inspector general for reconstruction "the u.s. faces the choice of making additional investments to fill essential gaps in iraqi security forces, capabilities or accept the risks that they will fall short of being able to secure iraq from external and internal threats." echoing those concerns, the lieutenant general, the general chief of staff of the iraqi army acknowledged that the iraqi army still depends on u.s. forces for the protection of its air space and borders. in 2010 as the u.s. was ending its combat mission, he stated that if i were asked about the withdrawal, i would say to politicians the u.s. army must stay until the iraqi army is