the other way, it was very difficult to get to that conclusion. what we were trying to do and why it's so important, nsa goes overseas and sees really nasty source code very always tried to do was say that if you can do this in real time, and only share them ,- the malicious source code you could stop a lot of problems to witness have them all. so a lot of them. that collapsed around misguided toions of what they believed the nsa is going to monitor private networks.

>> [inaudible] >> go figure. level of the attacks only get worse to will only get worse. i fear that they will be able to pull off a significant attack that has real financial consequences. if you just take the public information by private security companies, we know that nationstates have been on our critical infrastructure truth they are waiting to cost-effective capabilities in case of a conflict. we have a penetrative it. we know they were successful. we know they were successful on getting into our financial networks, large financial institutions, not once, but twice.

is somebody at some point is going to decide to flip the switch. when they do, we will have a significant economic, catastrophic event. actuallys we are just fat guys. that is a losing equation from always. i fear it would take something like that to get most members of congress to understand the real threat. that i will say stop the nsa spying on you. because they don't silently. -- because they don't spy on you. we are finally seeing how sophisticated these gosar. it was an international state capability.

it went to others. now it's medical records, financial records. sony, maybe because it's the entertainment business, but the psycheis on the public is i want to be a movie producer . those guys like a lot of money. my fear is that if we don't fit here,ill, i think you are i'm not sure what it was a good idea. again, i fear if we don't start getting on the defend ourselves side of the trouble. parts we're out of time. thank you for doing this. we are out of time. i want to thank you for doing this.

in a form commentary january. >> daunting. thank you. thank you everybody. >> we will have more on the senate intelligence committee cia report this sunday on newsmakers with our guest john yoo. memos,e several providing legal justification for the cia called enhanced interrogation techniques. on can watch the interview sunday at seneca a.m. and 6:00 p.m. eastern on c-span. here are some of the programs will hunt us we can on the network is taking it in a c-span q&a, political reporters share

stories about being on the campaign trail with mitch mcconnell. can-span2, saturday night come on the teeth afterwards, political fundraiser and hate who is on the money in politics and how it has grown and changed. eastern,hic are p.m. shane harris on the military's cyberspace to wage war. and on american history tv on the family, saturday at 2:00 on how ronald reagan's career as an actor and his folks person for general electric helped cohen's communication skills. sunday at it a clock on the presidency, former president harrison shows lift of his 1983 interview with former president vietnam, watergate, and his resignation. complete television schedule at c-span.org and let us know if you are wanting to

call us the following number. e-mail us at the following address. treat -- fleet universities in conversation, like us on twitter. x former attorney general, alberto ellis discusses new book on immigration policy and recorded in this week cia interrogations. this is one hour. >> "a conservative and compassionate approach to immigration reform" is the title of his new book, former attorney general alberto gonzales and david strange. judge gonzales, we'll get to the book in just a second, but i want to ask a couple of questions very quickly about the cia and the interrogation and what has been going on here in washington. sir, what was your role in

when it came to approving or knowing about the interrogation techniques used. guest: sure. i'm not sure these are the kind of questions that can be discussed very quickly, as you said in your introduction. i could talk about them. happy to talk him -- without them. i was on the council in 2002 when discussions about enhanced techniques began. george tenet, who is the cia director, felt strongly that he had information about pending attacks. they needed to find a way to gather information consistent with the law. so he asked members of the national security council, with this predicament that he was in, and presented the option of enhanced techniques. of course, that began a dialogue between the department

of justice and the cia, in terms of what those techniques would look like, and based upon the needs of the cia in determining whether or not it could be done in a way consistent with the law. of course, as the white house counsel sat in on these meetings and sat in on the discussions. at the end of the day, it is up to the department of justice to make a decision whether or not it is something that can be done consistent with our loss. obviously, i provide input. but at the end of the day, the attorney general has the say and what can be done consistent with the law. i have been asked questions about what was the president's involvement. well, i can say that at the beginning of these discussions -- president bush's chief of staff -- what to the president know about these discussions.

obviously, the president of united states is filled with information every day, every minute. we felt that the president needed to know that we were in discussions about enhanced interrogation techniques. i recall a conversation with president bush fairly early, informing him that the discussions were ongoing and assuring him that we would be focused on ensuring that the techniques for effective. obviously, that would come from the cia. and also that the techniques were lawful, and that comes from the department of justice. and that was very, very important for president bush. they had to be effective and lawful. i can say that subsequent to that conversation, aand the ensuing months and years, i was privy to conversations with the

president where, it was clear to me, that the present had been advised -- may have been briefed -- on the specific of the techniques. i do not know for certain, but clearly there were conversations about the techniques that the president was aware of. as you read his book -- "decision points" -- there a particular conversations in that it was clear that president bush knew there was enhanced interrogation techniques. again i do not know the level of , specificity the information was provided to him, but he understood what was going on. again, the program moved forward with a clear directive that they be lawful. that they be effective. of course, it was very important for the agency and the white house that key congressional leaders be informed -- have knowledge of what the agency was doing.

and those briefings occurred, as well. so we moved forward. again, with a clear understanding that they were effective and would be useful in protecting america and be consistent with the rule of law. the lawyers worked very hard to ensure they provided a framework with safeguards to ensure that the techniques were consistent with both our domestic and international obligations. host: what you think of john brennan's press conference and the release of the interrogation report? guest: well, i do not see all of john brennan's press conference. perhaps i can respond to specific questions about it. it is a tough situation to be in, to be head of an agency and -- and defend or explain the actions of agency for an -- four events that occurred before your watch -- that comes with the territory. i felt some degree of empathy

for john brennan in that respect. my sense is is that what he did is that he said the agency was charged with a mission to gather information and protect america, and that is what they did. i think he supports his work at his agency, as do i, quite frankly. he admitted that in certain instances, the agency -- agents went beyond the guidance provided by the department of justice. and that was unfortunate and should not have happened. and there should be accountability. i think that, in some of these cases, if not most of the cases, there was some accountability put in place. it is a tough chapter and i think that one of the lessons that one might gather from this is that, you know, in a time of war, there is extreme pressure. people sometimes do things that they wouldn't otherwise do. and it is very, very important to understand that even though you may give strong guidance

about what is lawful and can be done, sometimes people go beyond that guidance. when that happens, i think it is appropriate to understand what happened. that there be accountability, and that we do things that we can to ensure that it doesn't happen again. but, again, i have heard people say never again. it is easy to say that now, but when you are in the heat of battle -- when there are threats tremendous against our interests as a country -- it is tough. i think we never need to lose sight of that fact. host: judge gonzales, your book opens with a forward that says -- there is something for everyone in this book to hate. how -- how does a conservative compassionate approach immigration reform? guest: well, i think that we understand that this is a very

complicated issue. it impacts families. it impacts on our security it impacts our foreign?policy. it impacts our economy. it is the very essence of who we are as a country, as a nation of immigrants. we have so many diverse implications at stake here that are implicated by any kind of policy passed by congress and signed into law by the president. it is inescapable that you have to compromise. people will gain, but they will also have to give on certain issues and certain points. that is the basis of the comment that there are things that, you know, everyone has a stake in this discussion. and everyone will have to compromise, from my perspective. quiet frankly, sometimes it is hard to compromise. we have to compromise on something you think is

important -- you are going to hit that. but sometimes you will have to make compromises for the common good. in order to be successful, it is absolutely necessary, in my judgment. i think everybody at the table has a stake in immigration policy going forward -- coming to that table with an understanding -- i can't get everything i want. that is just the nature of this exercise. host: besides being a numbers game, you're right there are substantial consequences related to millions of undocumented immigrants living within the u.s. and the possible negative consequences of having a basic, -- pervasive undocumented , community are many. some of the more tangible issues include fostering disrespect for the rule of law, an economy that is floundering or stagnant. and the potential for security breaches by terrorists. given that, judge gonzales, wwhat are two changes you would make -- if you could -- to the

immigration laws of the united states? guest: well, i do think that we have some serious issues, with respect to security in a post-9/11 world. i think if you want to get conservative support for any kind of immigration policy, there has to be greater efforts with respect to securing our border. clearly, we are much more secure today than we were, say, a decade ago because we have put in place additional resources. we are using new technology. we have additional border agents along our southern border. so we have made progress, but it is very important that we have a secure southern border. the world, i am afraid to say we are not i think in some ways, it is a much more dangerous world than it was pre-9/11.

i remember my first trip to mexico when i was attorney general i visited my counterparts in mexico -- and we had some very candid discussions about the challenge that exist with respect to mexico and immigration coming into america. they were very, very candid and saying that the nightmare scenario was someone like al qaeda coming across our southern border and committing another 9/11 scale attack. they knew what the repercussions would be -- that the united states would shut the border off. and that would devastate the economy. so, they were really worried about border security. they were really worried about threats to the united states coming from the southern border. my reaction was -- if they are that worried about it, maybe we should be worried about it as well. i think focusing on the border is very important. with the economy, i do think that we need to have an immigration policy that understands it complements -- that actually promotes commerce within the united states.

and we need to understand that immigrants are very important part of our workforce. i think that legal immigration can improve our economy, can result in increased jobs -- which will make jobs more available for citizens here in this country. so i think there needs to be more of a focus. our immigration policy should be more focused on our economy. driven by our economic needs. for example, we should have additional visas for skilled workers, additional visas for unskilled workers where those , needs arise. in today's economy and today situations, i think that is what it should be going forward. host: what about a pathway to citizenship? guest: it is becoming extremely politicized, and one of the main issues that has made it

difficult to achieve any kind of legislation to make any kind of progress on this issue. the truth of the matter is -- many of the people who come into this country do not come tto this country to obtain citizenship. they come to this country to -- to pursue a better life for themselves and their families and their children. so becoming a citizen is not a primary objective. and, obviously, if the united states were to say we are going to make everyone a citizen, i think these immigrants would say, yes, great. we would like that. but that is not why they come here. for me, that would be a secondary objective, in terms of if people have been here a while, if they do not have a criminal record, if they pay their taxes -- then i would have no objection to citizenship in the long run. provided, however, that they were not be able to obtain citizenship in front of those people have been waiting patiently outside our borders

and have followed the law. i think it would be unfair to them and send a terribly wrong signal if we provided citizenship to these folks who came to this country unlawfully. if we provided citizenship in advance of those who follow the rules, i think that would be a tremendous mistake. host: in one chapter, you and your co-author write -- the american people may resist the changes necessary, but leaders must ccommit to long-term thinking and explain why our efforts with mexico are good for america. additionally, our political leadership will have to be tactful when dealing with mexico. our southern neighbor is a sovereign nation and rightfully proud of its heritage and nationality. -- a matter institutional

reform by outsiders will most certainly fall on deaf ears. anything you want to add to that? explain? guest: i am not sure i have anything else to add. as i said earlier people come , into this country -- migrate into this country because they are in pursuit of a better life -- better economic conditions and better opportunities. if, in fact, that was the situation in mexico, we would have a lot of unlawful immigration. and so -- but we try to be realistic in our assessment of what can be done. politically, we have to be careful -- for example, spending resources dollars in , mexico. many american citizens would rightly say why are we doing that, we have our own problems here in the united states. we need to focus on those problems. so we have to deal with that. and, of course, as you just read -- mexico is a proud country and has a long history

of not resentment, but a great deal of pride in their own country. they would only -- there would only be so much we could do. but we have a great deal of cooperation today. i think we need to build on that and see what we can do to help our economy, tto share resources, to share intelligence -- which is already ongoing today. there are things we can do, but i think more, white frankly, perhaps needs to be done. i think mexican authorities -- if you ask them -- they have an understanding that there are some institutional improvements that should be made -- in terms of their legal system, criminal justice system. there are things that, i think, would help improve conditions in mexico. and i think we have some progressive leaders forward , thinking in mexico that are working on these kind of issues, and certainly when i was in government, these are things we worked on. i am assuming and i hope that

those efforts are continuing today. host: who is your co-author? guest: david strange is a good friend of mine. he is from texas. he is an immigration expert. i am not an immigration experts, in terms of knowing the technical aspects of the immigration act. i felt it important to have someone join me on this project who had that level of expertise. so david has that expertise. he is an immigration expert. he is, coincidentally, taking a leave of absence from his practice in texas and is now a student at georgetown -- pursuing a national security law degree -- so i have enjoyed working with david and he has provided the appropriate level of expertise on this issue. which when you talk about immigration, you're talking to a lot of immigration experts around the country who no the immigration act well better than , i do. i felt it important to have

someone like david on board on this effort. i think we have a fair product. i think it is balanced. and hopefully it will stimulate some discussion and make some progress encumbrance of -- comprehensive legislation going forward. host: 202 is the area code. 202-748-8001 for republicans. 202-748-8000 for democrats. 202-748-8002 for independents. former attorney general alberto gonzales is our guest. he served as attorney general from 2005-2007. prior to that, white house counsel. prior to that, secretary of state in texas, general counsel to governor bush in texas, and currently the dean of belmont school of law in nashville, tennessee. from where he joins us. eric in hagerstown, maryland. the republican line. your first up. go ahead with your question or comment. caller: i just want to say the new immigration law is -- i

don't see how you are saying they have to pass a background check and all that. they have already broken the law by coming into this country illegally. as a native american citizen if , i break a lot, i go to jail. they are going to be awarded with citizenship. it is a slap in the face of everyone who has gone through the process properly. i don't see how it is fair or remotely for to anybody last to sit and wait. these people, because they break our law and already have established income, they get a chance before everybody else. host: judge gonzales. guest: of course, anybody in this country who breaks the law suffers a consequence for it. often times it is paying a fine. sometimes it is going to jail. so a proposal would require that they pay some type of penalty for the fact that they did come into this country unlawfully. i do not know why we are giving them any sort of preference in that situation.

-- than anyone else who breaks the law -- again, they would be required to pay a penalty, pay back taxes. and my preference would be that they not be afforded citizenship before anyone else who got in the line and follow -- followed the rules. so i don't see how this could be called amnesty because many people say that, well, this is amnesty. but amnesty is sort of blanket forgiveness by a sovereign government to a group of individuals. and that would include granting a pardon. granting a partisan active forgiveness without a penalty. -- granting a pardon is an act of forgiveness without a penalty. that is not what we are proposing here. and i think people who keep who say that proposals like this one are nothing but amnesty in reality, that is not what we are proposing at all. host: from fiscal years 2002 2009, alberto gonzales writes, many millions of immigrants gain citizenship.

-- my pento write fell out and i lost the chapter -- it was a change to the to the visa system, so that people cannot overstay their visas. what kind of changes would you like made to that? guest: well, here is the issue we have. i think the numbers very. i think experts will disagree about this -- 30%, 50% came to this country lawfully under a valid visa. what happens is they are in this country, their visa expires, and they don't want to go home. so they stay in this country in an unlawful status. so, this is a very difficult issue because what it requires is that it requires there to be better communication between universities and the government, between employers and the government.

it requires, i think, better interaction between the u.s. government and the home countries. so that we can identify -- we have a better idea and better track -- of people who are here on visas and when those pieces -- visas are set to expire. perhaps make them sort of permanent immiscible status, so that if they do overstay their visas, there is no chance that they can come back into this country once we find them. no chance whatsoever that they can become a u.s. citizen. so what we have to do is explore ways to really discourage visa over stayers. because that is a significant part of our problem. let me just also mentioned that the fact that such a large percentage of people who are here unlawfully came here through a valid visa means there is limited utility in border security. the fact that people talk about a 2000 mile fence -- that may be fine for preventing some people from coming across, but it is not going to do a thing

with respect to visa over stayers. it is a very important discussion, in terms of making progress in solving the high numbers of people that are here in this country in an unlawful status. host: wayne is in harrisburg, pennsylvania. democrats line. go ahead. caller: i would like to ask a question. president bush, the cia, and barack obama -- as a citizen, i wouldn't care what they did to make sure that the american people are safe. and on immigration -- when you have two professional people that know what they're talking about, they will never come to a decision. so what i say is let the illegals, illegal. i don't care how many of them there are.

i don't care if they taking people's jobs or what ever. so let them come in. that is all i have to say. at viewpoint. i'd have to disagree with that. every nation has the authority -- and there is no question under international law -- hhas the authority to determine who is within the country. i think that is perfectly appropriate, particularly when you're talking about how can impact policy your economy. policy w immigration can, quite frankly, affect your security position. so, again, i respectfully disagree with the caller's viewpoint. i think that if anyone is in the country, they should be here with in a lawful status -- it is a nationalized to

this end, whatever. i think one positive offshoot once you are at here in a lawful status, i have problem at that point with a drivers license, having certain benefits. but for me, it is much easier to recognize this notion that entitled to certain benefits if they are, in fact, in some sort of lawful status. would have that you someone not with a lawful status walk into a government a drivers secure license -- to me, that does not square with the american way. i think it is important to have with one in this country some sort of llawful status. caller: it is not the lives is something we have wrestled with for 20 years.

the laws to extend beyond our borders. explain to me se how it works in this country? guest: i have a hard time understanding your comment. i think your question was you have a hard time understanding how he is still imprisoned in this country. quite frankly, i'm not knowledgeable of the specifics. host: let's move on to john in des moines, iowa. the republican line. caller: thank you so much. i look forward to c-span every morning. he earlier was talking about international law, but my question comes back to -- sshould it ever have happened a high-ranking military officer or a high-ranking cia

were to be ghanistan captured, and have to endure these enhanced interrogation techniques -- would you recognize that as being lawful would that be okay? guest: of course, the big -- ference that many people i am hopeful and i think this be the case -- that our people were not have engaged in war crimes. they were not have beheaded people and kill innocent citizens. from my perspective, that would be the main difference. more nk it would give us moral authority to complain to raise objections about the treatment of our citizens. so from my perspective, that would be one very important of our nce -- in terms legal position, moral position respect to ns with al qaeda, for example, raising objections to the way that

i -- someone was treated. in your book te that of the 11 million undocumented immigrants in the united states -- we support placing those who are eligible and without a criminal record into temporary they pay a us after fine and back taxes. oppose their becoming eligible for permanent lawful if they learn english and american civics and pay taxes. a couple of executive orders that the president has signed couple of amers a years ago, then the recent one -- hhis executive action pretty does that, doesn't it? guest: it does, but of course, part of the challenge or part of the problem of executive action is that it is temporary.

it can be undone by the president, of course, and can be undone by the next president. and they can be undone by the congress. and my concern with what obama has done -- this most recent action -- is came following an election, which i think the american people sent a very strong signal aabout what they wanted to see -- the level of cooperation they wanted to see president and the congress, which is not been very good and i think we all understand it and agree with that. so rather than allowing the new congressional leadership to them an h this -- ggive opportunity -- the president comes out immediately and says i'm going to do this through executive action.

think k the timing -- i from that perspective, it was a mistake. the repercussions of taking think ive action -- i many people believe that the up ber of children coming from central america was notions, in part, that here in america we do not take our immigration laws into effect. for that reason, i think it is also mistake. finally, i think the action is shortsighted. shortsighted from the perspective of democratic lawmakers. because at some point, we are going to have a republican wield ent who is going to the executive pen. may wield the pan on

or policy that democratic lawmakers believe is a very important idea. more about h immigration policy. who should get to decide what is our immigration policy? should it be solely the president? or should it be beginning with and signing a law? very important dialogue -- a very important discussion. from my perspective, i think we are much better off if our upon ration policy, based a comprehensive bill passed by the congress and signed into law by the president of united states. host: barbara is in chicago. hi, barbara. please go ahead with your question or comment. caller: i am interested in 2 subjects --

host: barbara, i'm going to put you on hold. barbara, do you know the rules? you have to turn the volume down on your tv. someone is going to come on and talk to. nash is on from charleston, south carolina. caller: good morning and think of it taking my call. how are you doing? host: nash, pplease go ahead. are leaving le their country to come here and they children, so that way can become citizens -- isn't the way of becoming -- i

think, as an immigrant, everyone has the right to immigrate. and everyone should be free to come to america. host: what was your process to immigrating to the u.s.? the process that you went through. went through due process. i went to my wife. host: through the family process. thank you, sir. any response to that? guest: i'm not sure i understand all this comment. you are re born here, an american citizen. i think that is a good policy. if the majority of people don't like it, i think we can move forward and change the constitution. i'm not sure i understood his question.

host: i think he was just making a comment that he was going to the process, aand that every country has a right to protect its own borders. guest: no question about that. that is one of the aspects of as i a sovereign nation, said earlier, to determine who is within a country's border. we do have a process, and that is why i do believe it is important that whatever we do who are here s unlawfully, we do not disadvantage those who are waiting in line who are following the rules. this notion of instant citizenship, i think it is not the american way. on the other hand, i think we need to be realistic about the fact that we cannot deport 11 million people. we talked about this during the bush and ministration. i remember having a a group of n with experts in deciding whether or not that would be realistic. government does other functions. this is not something the government would be capable of

doing. even if we were successful, it would devastate certain industries -- farming, construction -- and i do not think that is the right way to go. way is to approach -- determine who, in fact, can contribute to our economy. those kind of folks -- and in this community -- they are not a danger to our country. if you put them in some sort of temporary legal status, i think right way to go. posted barbara, chicago, go ahead. it is interesting that mister gonzalez is interested in law. if he is so interested, he has absolutely violated the american way and the law. since he wishes to punish anyone who has broken the law, patiently the parade. he is one of the most evil enablers of this whole torture

business that is now being widely exposed. host: judge gonzales. respect the i caller's opinion. i worked with a team of dedicated lawyers in the white house, at the department of justice, at the cia, and other working hard to provide a framework so that we do not violate the law. was there a way to collect information that would be consistent with our laws. and the lawyers provided a framework. the agency not decided -- would make a decision whether or not to move forward with that framework. we know now that the agency, in some cases, exceeded the requirements and guidance given the department of justice. and there have been and should be consequences with respect to that. am i saying that the bush

administration was perfect? no. it was not perfect. we have imperfections today with the way that president obama carries forth on the war on terror. this is a tough business, and you are dealing with a brutal, ruthless enemy -- you know -- you have to take strong measures. and those measures should the ys be consistent with judgment of lawyers, with the constitution, and with the law. but sometimes you make mistakes, and that is the very nature of that. i think the cia director, john brennan, acknowledged that yesterday. host: i'm going to read "a ething from your book -- conservative and compassionate approach to immigration reform" has he republican party hurt itself among hispanics because of the harsh way some have spoken about immigration reform. guest: well, i believe that is true.

george w. bush had a way of connecting with people. had a way, especially, of connecting with hispanics. of a the former governor message, ate, but the the messenger, and the tone are very important if you want to successfully reach the hispanic community. that doesn't mean you have total agreement with the someone like george bush was able to somehow connect with the hispanic community. some of the rhetoric that are here from the right i think is very unfortunate. you know, absolutely no compassion whatsoever. treating them as the worst of the worst criminals. and that they should be removed immediately, even though that is impossible, in my judgment. so i think the rhetoric has been extremely harsh. we need to tone down the rhetoric, from my perspective. we need to acknowledge that

these are human beings we are talking about. and that's most of them have families. they came into this country to pursue a better life, jjust like our ancestors did. just like the ancestors of these republicans. we need to not lose sight of that. i'm not suggesting that we simply allow people into this country. that we provide instant citizenship. moving forward with comprehensive immigration reform -- we need to understand that we are a nation of laws, but also a nation of immigrants. host: brian is on our independent line. caller: good morning. i hope i can keep on one subject. most americans are prejudice. what we have understood about our government and people is seeing, you you're are using the word 70.

that word -- sovereignty. that word is not being used anymore. we are trillions of dollars in debt. and we have actually decided our mexico, even though great country -- you look at the demographics and where they terms of latitude goes, they could do a lot more than they are doing -- so they need these fine people. two -- get rid of the corruption in the country so they can be a solid, strong country. that we are say dispassionate and some on the so hard lined -- no. you were in charge of our law enforcement in this country. a cruise ship ave industry -- and i have sailed these life and see all fine cruise ships that are flagged from liberia and all

these other countries -- we this is not right. why don't we ship the cruise just one idea -- ship the cruise ship industry over to mexico with our coast guard. host: that is brine in michigan talking about immigration reform. general gonzales. well, i'm not sure i understood all the points he is getting to. i think that we have to try and find ways to help our neighbors. they are our friends, and we them to be helpful to the extent that improvements can occur in mexico. including the corruption that is rampant there. and, of course, we have our own corruption here in this country. think you will have more in cessful economic policies mexico come forward, and that will endure to the benefit of not only mexican citizens, but also here in the united states. host: next car comes from

in martinsburg, west virginia. caller: yes, thank you. have an enhancement law that forces those who committed misdemeanor crimes -- of the more than 3 times -- into felonies. which kerry state -- carry state prison sentences. i understand that all those who come over here ccome over here more than 3 times. are they still subject to the law? can you explain more of the -- the ion between the federal aspect of it. i understand they want to grant them amnesty. but the separation between the doj ral and the state regulations and laws for the border states. guest: well, i disagree with one component of what i think

you are saying -- banning amnesty. i am not sure who is suggesting not aware of any republicans or democrats were to be ting that we ought granting amnesty. there is a clear division between the federal and state responsibilities. and, obviously, if you commit a state crime in texas, you are going to be subject to state criminal laws. different with respect to being in this country unlawfully. that would be, in fact, a federal offense. a state could pass a state law tthat makes it a crime to be in state as an unlawful, undocumented immigrant. i think that would then raise or not stion whether that law would be unconstitutional, as having by the federal law, because the courts have been very clear in saying -- in the area of immigration, that area has been preempted by

federal law. congress has passed a very a very it become comprehensive -- complicated, very comprehensive law. although, there are certain rights that the state can do. obviously, if you go into texas and you murder someone, that is a violation of state law. and you are subject to state prosecution. host: a treat for you, general gonzales. do you think an attorney general should get involved iin the execution of local law enforcement? this is with regard to ferguson. guest: right. i think that is a very interesting question. i have been asked this question, of course, whether or not i would have gone into ferguson. this nk on balance -- on

particular case -- it was probably the right thing to do. general holder was invited tto come into ferguson. i think it would have been appropriate for the attorney general to come to ferguson. the other reason that i think it was appropriate is that you are there to speak to the are on the ops who ground and involved -- perhaps on the periphery -- but no question involved in the investigation to tell the folks that this is important. let's get it right. we want to work with the state and local folks. we're not taking over the you to gation, i want understand that, but we have an obligation to work with the state and local folks. as the attorney general, you can deliver a very powerful message to a community that has a large black population. you can deliver the message that we are going to get this right. are not over here to take over the investigation,

but we are going to work with the state and locals to find out exactly what happened here. where, i think, i disagree with the actions of the attorney general and the specific case didn't see enough acknowledgment -- maybe 9 to the same degree -- the e not in ferguson to same degree -- that's by a far e, their heroes -- as of the concerned -- effort ongoing and developing strong ties between the law enforcement and the community. i think the attorney general should really emphasize that his t in connection with visit to ferguson. tweet into you -- mister gonzales, is immigration policy intended to primarily serve our economic needs, or to be a form of humanitarian aid?

guest: i think both. from my perspective, there are that can be ctives achieved and should drive our immigration policies. i think and i have said on the show -- the economy is, obviously, one. we care about families. i think that is something we care about. you know, reunification. we care about security in a post-9/11 world. that is very, very important. and obviously humanitarian aid, to the extent that people are overseas, that d is appropriate grounds for relief. there are a number of factors, i think, that should be considered. host: donald. north branch, michigan. good morning.

caller: good morning. they seem to be placing all the blame on the latin community, but isn't immigration a worldwide problem? including so-called illegals from russia and czechoslovakia, germany, france. i wonder if he has a breakdown of the presenters from other countries? thank you. you the i cannot give exact breakdown, but the majority of the immigration to this country come to mexico and central america. the caller is absolutely right, from ve immigration issues our northern border, and with respect to immigration from europe and asia. but for magnitude, there is no question that the primary focus our government should be from mexico and central america.

because the number there are so overwhelmingly larger in scale, as opposed to unlawful immigration from other parts of the world. from your book -- we believe it is important to state that not all aspects are broken. in the fiscal year 2010 alone, millions of unlawful immigrations into the u.s.. they include temporary workers, students, diplomats, etc., etc. years 2002 to 2009, over 10 million immigrants obtained lawful resident. 2011, they removed 396 individuals. and in 2012 -- jack is in springfield. hi, jack.

a best way there i could follow -- that the american public might be able to follow the progress on this issue? host: on the immigration issue? caller: just like we're doing the budget. mister gonzales, you work for the justice department right now? guest:, no, no. i used to work for the justice department. i ended in 2007. host: and that color is gone now. what would you recommend to him? guest: there are many organizations that track the facts out there. your local congressman, your local senator can get information. a lack of ot information as to what is going on now.

writing books about immigration, so i don't think about s a question whether or not there is enough information out there about immigration reform and the progress of immigration reform. there is a lot of information out there. internet to go on the and look up some of the organizations. they are all going to be biased. they all have personal agendas, and i understand that. but perhaps the best source is to talk to your congressman or senator. perhaps even state and local officials. host: and tim is in california. go ahead. caller: good morning, mister gonzales. just about 2 months ago, i went to a swearing-in ceremony. 1100 people from 110 different countries. our immigration does work, we just have to enforce it. we have to make congress stop

about getting the votes -- and just follow the policy that we have had in the united states for some time. i'm sick and tired of people when called undocumented they are iillegal. thank you for your time. happened with at the cia -- all these people have never had to fight a war. they have never been shot at. they have no idea what this is like. you did a great job there. guest: well, i appreciate that. terms of the job, the cia operatives -- i wasn't being shot at. to our system process -- it deals with a large number of individuals currently. but obviously, we have something that is wrong. 12 man, ave 11 million, 30 million people here -- 12 million, 13

million people here undocumented -- it is not working perfectly. i'm not suggesting that we can achieve a perfect system, but one an certainly achieve than our ore fair current system. you also write -- the democratic party has heard itself by projecting an image that pays lip service to the rule of law and care about those immigrants who have followed the law and are waiting patiently to come to america. guest: well, i do believe that an image that -- a that iis -- i think more important that -- they are fighting furiously to not see anything happen. i think that is very unfortunate.

we are a nation of laws, and i believe in a rule of law is. i know how important that is. come to the ple to country and not suffer any consequences -- to me, i think that is a little disrespectful. that is not the america that i know. that is not the america that i worked to serve at the state level, at the federal level. we are a nation of laws, and there should be result or accountability for those who do not follow the law. host: and we are going to close with the street -- who would you like to see -- tweet -- who you like to see win the presidency in 2016? guest: wwell, it will not surprise anyone -- i hope a republican wins. host: what about jeb bush?

guest: well, i think jeb bush would make a great president. just say this -- i think we need someone to be president actually been an executive -- who has made executive decisions. because being a president is not on-the-job training. it is probably the most difficult job in the world. it is about making decisions. and i think it is important to have someone who has a track record of making decisions, and being accountable for those decisions. that would be the number 1 criteria that i would impose in deciding who i can picture working in the oval office. host: alberto gonzales. here is the cover >> tomorrow on washington journal, reverend al sharpton talks about grand jury decisions

pursue my recharges in the cases of michael brown and eric garner. then larry pratt talks about gun rights. bring you the justice for all march in washington, organized by civil rights, labor, and church groups. 11:30 a.m.e live at next, edward snowden talking about government surveillance medicaid oh cato institute conference. then representative mike rogers. then a discussion of reining in surveillance programs. "q&a" political

reporters share stories of being on the campaign trail with senator mitch mcconnell. >> this started right after what he saw happen in the primary for rand paul. rand paul beat mcconnell's handpicked guy. he realized, i have to recalibrate everything i know about republican politics in my home state. he started to build this very sophisticated infrastructure, knowing this would be the most difficult race in the campaign. >> they had watched the obama campaign in 2008 and 2012. they watched harry reid's reelection in 2010. would go that this from a 2008 race where he beat democrat roos lunsford, a very tough race.

he was going to have the most thorough campaign ever -- >> [indiscernible] alexei he probably got there. >> sunday night at 8 p.m. eastern and pacific on c-span's "q&a." our 10thrk anniversary, we are going to air one program from each year at 7:00 and 10:00 eastern. viadward snowden spoke videoconference. he has been charged with violating the espionage act for leaking government documents. he is currently living in russia, where he has sought asylum. to protects how privacy on the internet. this is an hour. well, while we arranged for

him to be heard as well as to had us, obviously, we have a year of disclosures that ignited a pretty fierce debate. the obvious question is, for someone who has paid an -- was it,ry price to what extent do you feel satisfied with what you have seen and how it is unfolding? been proposed, nothing yet has passed. we've seen a presidential directive. do you view, are you satisfied with the reaction you have had? >> first of all, i want to confirm, can everyone hear me? >> yay!

>> yes. hello. >> great. okay. thanks. apologize there. i am broadly satisfied with what's happened in the last year. we have seen an extraordinary change in public awareness. we have seen an increased openness. i would say innovative spirit in government, not by choice, but by necessity. i believe we had bob lits speaking earlier, which was great. he mentioned they'll be more transparent in the future because they recognize these policies of over classification, over secrecy, are not helpful and, in fact, are damaging. damaging. i think we should really scrutinize the value not just of the government's, shall we say, improvement, and not just the encouraging moves we're seeing around the world in the court systems. a number of panelists have spoken about the beneficial things we're seeing in the united states court system. the first federal court system, or the first open federal courts review programs found they're unlikely -- they're likely unconstitutional. the european court justices

struck down the european version of sort of a smith v. maryland. said the directive is unallowable, a fundamental vile rights. we've seen the united nations issue reports that mass surveillance is not permissible under any circumstances. a is necessarily contradiction of our fundamental values and" hernt violation of rights. we see a lot of things like that. but beyond that we see the real change that's happening is actually occurring outside of court, outside of congress, outside of the executive agencies entirely and this is happening through things like technology companies. let me actually make sure that i've -- i can see these right. what we've seen are things on the technological side, sort of in the fabric of the internet, where immediately upon the public awareness of the

problem, technologists, academics, engineers around the world all came together and went, this is a serious concern. and how do we address this? how do we solve these problems? how do we make sure we don't have to deal with this in the future? we see that individuals as well are taking action, taking steps o try to retrieve their rights that have been sort of unnecessarily taken out of their hands, out of their domain. this is done by a canadian group. they don't really have a dog in the fight. they got a representative sample of internet users around the world and they found that 60% had sort of heard of the revelations of last year. of those 60%, 39% of those had taken active steps to improve the security of their privacy of communications online. and it was interesting how the media interpreted this. because they said, well, this is a minority. people must not care that much. nobody is really making changes.

but when you're actually doing of ath on what 39% of 60% the world's global internet users is, that's 702 million people around the world who are now safer today than they were just a year and a half ago. and this is i think really where we begin to see the framework of how we can move forward in the absence of political reform, in the absence of legal reform, and this is good. because what we've seen politically around the world hroughout the development in history is that politics is about power. when you have people in great power positions, when you have super states, they will not cede any sort of authority that they've claimed back to the public, back to civil society, unless they are afraid of a more undercutting nive. and this is really what is setting us up to really have a

sort of renaissance of security and of liberty in the way we associate, the way we speak, the way reresearch online. it's critical. when we think about reforms, we think about the challenges, these are big picture problems, but at the same time these are only the things happening within the united states. and the policies of the national security agency and central intelligence agency and the f.b.i., as bad as they've been in regard to respecting the foundations of our rights, they are good relative to many governments around the world. so we have to think about not just how to protect the rights of americans, but protect the rights of individuals around the world who live under regimes who are much less liberal and much more authoritarian. the only way we can do that is to ensure that there are international standards that are well agreed upon as to what behavior is proper and improper. we have court mechanisms that can enforce these and, ultimately, fundamentally, we

can enforce these through technology on the basis of all of this i would say i'm tremendously satisfied. >> julia? >> well, hello. it is great to meet you, because you did a great job of marketing my book for me. i was already half way through writing it when your revelations came out, and i benefited greatly from that, so thank you. also, i want to say one other thing. i don't know if anyone has seen "citizen ford" but in case you were not convinced that edward snowden was graves, appearing robe is really a brave move in a documentary film, so if you haven't seen it, there is a bathrobe scene. at any rate -- >> entirely unflattering. >> you know, everyone makes their own choice about that. we could have a bathrobe up or down vote, you know. so, you know, i'm a huge fan of encryption and i try to use as much encryption as possible.

i think that you're right that there is a renaissance of encryption programs going on. but i am concerned about an arms race. so if i, a citizen, am trying to beat huge agencies trying to defeat my encryption and i'm trying to keep one step ahead of them, i feel this is something where i'm under funded. right? i'm concerned that i'm not going to win that. i think we have some evidence, actually, that the arms race is escalating. i would point to one thing that really disturbs me which is we've seen a lot more spy tactics that involve spoofing, we saw the d.e.a. spoofing a facebook page. we saw the f.b.i. spoofing an associated press article. we saw the n.s.a. spoofing a linked-in page. we've seen commercial hacking companies spoofing adobe updates. and so i would like to hear what you have to say about, can

we win this race in a world where we might not be able to trust the contents that we see n front of us? are we going to enter a world we can't authenticate anything we see online? >> this is a real challenge. computer security is a field rapidly expanding i think much more so than almost any other academic discipline. it is a fertile field. computers are so fundamentally insecure today it is impossible to rely on them and trust them fully. many reasons i was successful is i did not have to rely on any particular computer or communication. this is not a world we want. this is the reason we're having the debate and people are fighting in countries around the world to push back against

this kind of evasiveness, this kind of truth in policies, also the state of play in terms of our security around the world. now, there are a number of business interests that have been referenced by some of the other panelists. the representative from the aclu, matt greene, john hopkins professor, and many others who referenced the fact that there are commercial incentives today to find vulnerabilities, weaknesses in our system. and rather than work to fix those, rather than work to systems, they actually leave those open. they will sell them to the highest bidder and use those to enable the exact kind of masquerade attacks, spoofing attacks, phishing attacks you are describing. more concerningly, we see agencies of government, for example, the national security agency, which has secured the name, actually using this same paradigm to weaken our own

infrastructure. we've seen them go to bodies and spy on them and look for vulnerabilities and rather than fix those standards, rather than correct those flaws, they leave them in to try to exploit them and in other cases look at where they can introduce them to make them less secure overall in certain vulnerabilities where they did not exist before so they could exploit them and gain access. we can understand the intentions for why they might want to seek to do this. it would give them access in novel places, places previously denied, but at the same time the same vulnerabilities can be used against the american , american people, allies and other citizens around the world. but also google has had a pretty big presence here. it's not just about google. it is about every american service around the world and product. if we're creating phones that have inherent insecurities,

we're creating flaws in our standards and protocols that every interoperable system relies upon, we're weakening the basis of our modern economy, because america relies more on the internet for productivity, for trade, for economic gain and comparative advantage than any other nation earth and, yes, it may give us some sort of comparative advantage in spying on china, once they discover it, they'll be able to use the same thing against us and even if not them, even if it's latin america, russia, france, and they begin to do the same thing, we quickly learn that being able to spy on other country, particularly based on how we restrict the uses of the product of intelligence, for example, the american government is very fond of saying recently that we don't give economic secrets to

out e companies, we find that the benefit of having secrets on other countries is worth less than the benefit they dwayne from knowing ours because we put more into research and development efforts than other countries do comparatively. we put more into education and research than other countries do. we put more in military spending than other countries do. so if everyone is insecure at an equal level we don't benefit because we have the best spy agency. we actually lose because we are more reliant on security than everyone else. >> edward, you alluded to and julia was alluding to also the spoofing and the sort of suite of malware tools collectively referred to as quantum. one of the stories that flow from your disclosures that i found most troubling was

related to that and the idea of a system apparently called turbine that is delivering these in an automated way, to think of it very crudely, an a.i. for hacking that lives on the internet backbone and pushes out malware to thousands and potentially hundreds of thousands of target computers, categories of target computers and the goal is to eventually be able to sort of automatically compromise millions of computers around the world. that was -- i was surprised at sort of how little -- i don't know if anyone here is aware of turbine, i guess this is not a representative audience but i don't know how many people heard that before. it seems like of all of this sort of stunning stuff, people have heard a fair amount about the telephony program and maybe something about prism but a lot of the other stuff, i guess i'm surprised that it hasn't gone as much -- hasn't gotten as much attention as the earlier disclosures. -- what ing what the

have you thought deserved a few more stories and hasn't gotten that much attention and what bothers you most? >> right. this could go on for days as opposed to the short time we have here but really what you're touching on is a fundamental problem that we discussed earlier. we've got a few representatives in congress trying to protect and promote the interests of millions of americans, but the classification authorities who provide the clearances, offices like the d.n.i., say their staff can't be cleared. this is problematic because people in d.n.i., people at c.i.a., at the n.s.a., say i wish i had this and that. i'd want a private secretary, too. they don't represent millions of people. they represent small agencies. the same dynamic happens with

the press. we have a few editors, a few reporters who are not grounded. they don't have a background in technology. they don't have ph.d's in computer science. they don't know what stories matter and which don't. in technical reporting, in main stream news at the "new york times," "the washington post," it's incredibly a modern thing. this hasn't happened before. so one of the reasons we don't see the media real keen on stories that are of critical importance, is because they don't realize they are of critical importance. and because of this, we're increasingly reliant on the technical community to kind of do this for us and represent us. now, this is increasing the dangers over time i believe because what we see is an increasingly disempowered citizen class and even in politics, because they have no idea what is going on that matters and an increasing empowerment of people who have sort of an elite, technological diversity. i think this is dangerous over

time because you will see a concentration of power around the small groups, small individuals, who can increasingly impact society in greater and greater ways. i, personally, am an example of this. i'm not the world's expert in technology but because i was where i was, because i saw massive crimes against the constitution happening on an unprecedented scale, and i had the technological skills and capability to do something about it, i was able to change the conversation in a way, make some small contribution to the public that has really had an outside impact. we do not want our government to rely on this model because that relies on the actions of the individuals. this is inherently dangerous. back to the basic question, stories that have been overlooked, one of the very significant stories is the fact that all of this information we're collecting in bulk, bulk collection, the government's

euphemism for mass surveillance, the unreasonable seizure that is forbidden by the fourth amendment, these programs, mass collection, the 215's and what not, the n.s.a. and so forth assert this is okay because they apply what is called minimalization. they say if we see you're a u.s. citizen we'll remove your name and replace it with a pseudonym. we will take measures like this and say an analyst can't target the u.s. citizen though we can target and read all of your information. we can't look at you. we have to look at who you're talking to. that kind of thing. but this is not done when we're sharing this with overseas allies in many cases. there was a story that was run i believe last year, late last year, that showed that we were sharing unminimized information

that included information on u.s. political figures, on judges, on officials across the spectrum, private industry, private businesses, private individuals, their private records were being shared en masse with israel. this did not get a lot of play in the mainstream press in the u.s. in the "new york times," the public et idiosyncrasyor lator investigated this and -- the public editor later investigated and said why. this is a story of public importance. there wasn't a really satisfactory answer. one of the editors previously worked for the "l.a. times" and also sat on this story. we also saw a story last year in "the huffington post" that found that the national security agency documents reflected that they were intercepting, collecting, and planning to use information on individuals' pornography habits to discredit them in their communities and in public on

the basis of the political views they held. now, these individuals were islamists. their politics were considered radical. so we can understand why this sort of interest would be there. but it also said these individuals were not suspected to be associated with violence. these were not actually terrorists. these were people who on the basis of secret judgments made by a secret agency with no public oversight and with no authorizing legislation had decided that a certain brand of political viewpoints would authorize the intrusive monitoring collection and eventual disbursement of your private records related to your sexual activities. this is a fundamental thing. we have to ask ourselves, why do we allow this in the first place? okay. maybe mistakes were made.

but how do we -- i think this follows to a fundamental point. i don't want to be on bob. he came to the forum. he is kind of what we've got. he is doing a hard job. we all know he is trying to do his best. he said something fundamentally concerning in regards to false testimony of james clapper. he said, that the real problem was not that the most senior official in the united states intelligence community committed a crime in front of congress. it doesn't have to be perjury or a willful lie. giving a false statement to congress in itself, providing false testimony, is also a crime under u.s.c. 1001. i believe u.s.c. 18-1001. that false statement is itself a crime. he was not concerned about the crime and he was not concerned out the impact this had on

the public. he was concerned that the question had been asked at all. this kind of paucity of concern for the public's role in the function of american government is a real danger. and i hope that this is, you know, he spoke quickly and that was not a representation of his true intent. the reality is we see this consistently and it becomes increasingly concerning, this incautious language that causes them to lose credibility, causes us to lose faith in the institution of government upon which americans must rely. he said something such as, it is indisputeable that the exposures of last year caused damage. that terrorists changed their communications and we lost reporting as a result of the leaks. but the evidence on the public record shows this ness fact not the case. it is entirely contrary. there is no evidence on record that this has been caused a is

a result of the disclosures made last year. i do believe him when he asserts that, you know, some sources of intelligence have gone dark. me taps we had up are no longer functional but this is part of the process of evidence collection. people change their route of communication all the time. as anyone knows the correlation did not imply -- we also know from the evidence on record there is no reason to suspect causation in the first place and there is actually no evidence for a correlation at all. al qaeda's methods changed in the same week in the same manner in the last year they had in the years past. the only study that had ever shown anything contrary was actually done by a contractor that is funded by the central intelligence agency investment office. and so we need to be careful about these kinds of things and the representations they make. it is entirely in dispute that

damage has been caused at all but the benefits of this are not in dispute. in fact, the director of national intelligence, himself, argues that it is necessarily in the public interest to know about these policies about these processes and the fact ey should not have been done in the first place and the justifications being made to disclose these. how can it be we use the anguage of indisputeable -- we haven't reaped the benefits. the answer is politics and their understanding. this is a community that feels itself under threat but this is unnecessary. if they were more open we wouldn't have these problems in the first place. what happened last year was preventable. it was avoidable in the same way that the torture program, itself, was avoidable. i mean, one of the things that was not well understood in the torture program was that individuals throughout the

central intelligence agency and other factions in the government knew these programs were wrong. on both a moral basis and a legal basis and they raised concerns about it. the second bullet point shows people were concerned about how long it went on for and the third bullet point shows that individuals were actually brought to tears as a result of being confronted with the reality of these programs. others were transferred away. others said, you know, prepare for something that's never been seen previously. this is unprecedented. and what is the response to this? these were within the agency who raised concerns. as this shows it went into official paperwork which is extraordinary at the c.i.a. having worked there the only things that go into official cable traffic are things coordinated on and agreed upon by a number of individuals. the analysts write the report, the officers write the report,

then they send it to their superior and his superior who talks to the round table about it and then it finally goes out. they were questioning not just the legality >> the questions were rejected. the head ofried and the counter terrorism program said these things, these to stop being put in official traffic. they need to stop being put on official record. they need to be buried because such language is not helpful. and i think these are the things we as a society need to think we correct and restructure the incentives to ensure when individuals have these concerns and see clearly occurring tivities

we move to the questions from the audience might give you an opportunity to a comment, to a couple audience since you talked about what you and ded as an illegal at the importance of phepl to correct for that.t for the 702 authority that is aoued or prism and up stream collections are sort of general warrants that involve a single tens of tion exthen overseas at targets the analyst's discretion and

we're basically satisfied with was being used. it it seemed not to be used in abusive way. were comforted looking at the finding of the oard or if you think perhaps they neglected something. is there something you suggest another look at? >> that's a challenging question ecause i personally used the 702 authority in targeting and i elieve the conclusions of the board specifically in regard to the value and productivity of program are we correct and ac. it is an extraordinarily evasive authority. danger because when we saw the response to the 702 report, it was universally to the issue. ny kind of knowledge on the civil liberties issue that is they looked at it in a glib way

way that i used it which as on a target basis. is.re you looked at

individual is is an agent of the foreign government. government.d of the of course they'll say this guy as access to some intelligence value. we'll sign the war ept for. there is no problem whether private ublic or because he can't belie them and hide. there is some argument to be ade that this is not the case with terrorists, but we have also seen that mass surveillance beneficial in the context of terrorism. despite all the mass surveillance, they did not -- collection, 215 and all of this internet collection and all of this stuff with retrospective

search or go through the -mailboxes or go facebook and say, i want to see the contacts and see the pictures. addresso see every i.p. you ever checked in and every device. stop the bottom marathon bombings. n fact they may have could be tributing to causing them. they made us think that they are associated with terrorism despite the fact that we have resources like we a who saw this guy who good job.id not do a the same thing overseas. stop the madrid bombs. mass surveillance has no proven not be cord and should pursued and should not be funded. resources away from things methods and phefpl mechanism that's we know work. and that we know are effective.

a very kindly analogued to the torture case. we know that rapport building interrogations will work and aying basically the interrogator is your advocate against your captors works. intelligence that we got from the program that was gained before we applied torture techniques and yet we did it anyway. e funded it to the tune of millions of dollars. all of these individuals and all them have never been held to account for what are unambiguous crimes. -- she t to let julia has a question of her own. >> want to challenge you on two hings because i have to stand up for journalists. have some do .echnical skills

agree. i just felt like i need to raise journalists. to the that leads me question that i think the that are made about publishing these stories are in the hands of a few people and you yourself might not agree. wonder if going back do you think to yourself maybe i should have sat and sifted through more or fully beforehanding over do you feel that maybe there needs to be wider array of technically capable journalists. wonder if you could -- you designed the optimal system would it land? >> you know, i don't want to go ack and second guess their reporting in hindsight. we can look at the records and ee that harms have been mitigated if harms do exist

they're minimal. there has been no evidence in he public record to show lives lost that occurred. is always the chance that things could have been done better. mistakes -- this was perfect. what i say i was very concerned my own bias. i evaluated all of the stuff because i ming out believed that it was in the public interest to know about these were that capabilities that went too far nd had constitutional implications a not have been -- the government should not have i ssumed for itself these authorities behind closed doors. ecause they were limiting the boundaries. however, you can tell from my manner of speaking, it is an issue i'm passionate about and i recognize that i could be drawing the lines in a radically different way than what would be interest. a public it's for this reason that i work

institutions tic and i demanded that they coordinate with the government government a chance to comment and say this could cause unnecessary harm. react this sentence that's mitigated. to address those concerns and to lines hem to draw the differently. i think by creating that system of checks and balances which was intentionally kind of the process and protections we have own governments, that that was the really the only thing i could have done. because there was no way sitting back when i was where i was sort of operating with only the brain and no debate partners on this, how i ould ensure that we could get the best possible outcome. and i'm not sure that we have the best possible outcome of all words but i think it's pretty clear that the public globally grees that this has a workout relatively well. with audiencetart

questions? > i don't think everybody will be able to join us via tech support but there are actually a number of questions about that. >> i was going to go somewhere it would i think that interesting so i was -- i thought maybe could you address it in a broader way like that should things be done. >> i'm pretty sure we have room as well.he your wish list. that i he first thing would say is they need to stand

in solidarity with the and they need to get on the same page with apple -- i y we're going to believe the reason they have not one this so far is because the benchmarks that have been done n their phones enable show there's a pretty significant performance impact because they problem.iver whatever. but really we need to take a -- the re that goes government. mandate to say what they can and cannot do. is not going to take a they on of leadership really have no place in the selling of actual software. really got to be the

forward.moving point out a counter argument ll's going to be about using exploitation and using actual exploitation and flaws in services and websites and flaws for judges to say i hink, i suspect this is the direction we're going. for the government to say in his particular case we will author rise you to commit the act we'll grant you a warrant to do a sneak and peek

on this house or to kick in the search it. >> i think that's the biggest thing. to end hat we need encryption which google is on its way of doing but many others internet to do this. they need to commit to protect the they'll sort icates that protect their we node to make sure it's not hacked. we they also need to say, if receive a secret order from any government any jurisdiction, we publicly to the highest court of appeal.

really the those are obvious best steps that they can do that are relatively well efforted. actually let me ask ecause you've talked about technical solutions and seems like in the background of this s -- that while you may be optimistic on the whole for the privacy you don't seem -- we have a question from sara harvard on twitter. about hr-4681.s don't know whether you looked at the authorization but talking aspects.t legalizing in case you haven't stud heed specifically. let me broaden that and say is at e legislation you looked that you feel is helpful or moving the ball in the right way or we have certain folks like

a lot ofeler who while legislative freedom act believed that it locked in it was the programs trying to reform. this is paul rand's reason for not voting for that bill. a quick take on the legislative developments? let me respond. that you got the section 309 hing which apparently some could read to be providing a ladies and gentlemen lative halo and congressional recognition. that only authority exists on an old piece of paper. whatever youcan do want overseas, don't sweat it. if it's not happening over fine. it's you want. whatever

communications goes to outside our borders and then they bounce back and come back to us. ns a has used this authority do an something that information about americans and says they did not did not need to be reported. there is no congressional because it's not provided through legislature. have again mr. lit from the dni who has said on the hope everybody makes a historical footnote of this that there was no providing intent in that. so if we were to have any faith we have to tutions assume this will be accepted and be his statements will accepted and relied on.

it restricts the activities. we've got a lot of reforms out there which are a ood idea and make small steps, ut we don't have anything that really solves the problem. we're looking at baby steps. this is fine. we've got to start somewhere and momentum build some but we really need to -- if i can suggest something radical or a minute of the we need to think broadly about the kind of society and kind of gary intees want ocess protections we to enjoy in regard to our rights and our access to courts and in to our ability to challenge evidence that's not us in court inst but gathered for use against us agencies through some kind of means. e have to have some way to provide for grievances which today does not exist. we actually take a bigger ake back and go, all right, we

intelligence agencies but where were they born? they were born in times of total a. in world wars would verbally be demobili demobilized. everybody understands this never happens. ut particularly in the context of state security agencies, right, do we really need them? are they the product of developingsocieties, government and civilization replaced by our methods of law enforcement. when we talked about reference vladimir putin, do we need

nsa and secret court to say, putin.oing to wire tap i don't think we need a special ethod to provide for targeted wire taps and efforts rehated to investigation. outside that's thinking the box. >> i'm just kind of thinking out loud because i wasn't expecting question. but you know why not? law ve probably the most enforcement funding of any justnment around the world as we had the greatest military funding. tangs around ferguson and sting rays around new york places collecting

all our movement and license are and easy passes that tracking communications on maps nd providing retrospective searching where police departments can go where was last year.rch of that is intelligence power when thingsice are capable of that other countries -- spy of we s aren't capable need to start asking questions is unique to lity our spy agencies that cannot be through legislation. miss talked about the moose of the capability. along the lines -- it doesn't as though we've gone -- revelations in there you've disclosed but doesn't seem like we have seen real hoover level trying to

drive martin luther king to targeting peaceful protestors, stuff that not just sort of -- disturbing because of the scale of what they're collecting but the way being used and anti-democratic way. it that you -- do you think that that in fact there are uses should be worried about in addition to the collection or more that you're prospectively architecture is so fierce some. misused t's not being now the damage if it were to be misused would be greater. arguments i would worked at nsaf, i cia. guests mentioned we have very little insight as and we hey're operating

don't have any effective level of even at the d.n. i.into how to manage this. eyond that, let me argue by anecdote and provide data points. ust two days ago, a report was released that the central intelligence agency tortured at death.ne man to he died after being interest concrete hained to a floor without pants apparently and froze to death. 29 other more individuals disappeared. c.i.a. and i can tell you nothing happened without people making note about picking up the phone and coordinating. disappear from a secret government torture program without any records. know what happened to them. maybe they ran away and disappeared off into the forest are living a happy life now. we can hope for that but the more sinister.

when we look at the probability -- i should say the much more is sinister. rehydration we had physicians come out say these are not medical procedures. yet we were using them for what had said increased -- it the ancillary benefit of increasing compliance. if you think these things are related to trying to get someone to commit suicide but to actually torturing them death i would have to question your moral campus. in a u personally but general way. beyond that when we talk about talk about scope and domestic abuses let me provide another data plan. the "wall street journal" who i worked with, but they reported a story very recently using und that we were sort of the sting ray type signals hat ingest any

that emanate over certain waive engths that means your cell phones and the wireless cards on your lap tops. kinds of certain smart cards and things like that. probably mart cards can't be from up in the air and they correlate these. we simply do reverse correlate it with the user name that you log into account or google play account and we know who owns that phone. then correlate this really briefly with going, all got a plane that is eurbgting over this level and it hears at this point in the transit. ou got enough points you triangulate location. his is actually compressible data. it's very small amounts of data create a them to

movement ive index of not just the target but data set carrying a who is phone. okay, this has to be exceptional authorities. maybe they're only used in certain ways. it come from in the first place? what is the ground for using d.o. j.operating this programdom mescalely in the united states which is the case today. story the 's the "wall street journal" broke. when we look at where it came rom, we see that it was actually broken in story by the intercepts earlier this year of called shenanigans. imagine who can't chose that name. this is a program putting the rays on the phone and called the dirt box. and using on a phone these things in yemen to target the drone program.

they try to figser out where this phone is and then they it. that's ng at what this program was developed for. t was an extraordinary authority that was used overseas terrorists andst then we saw within a span of few public thout any awareness and any authorizing being tion and now it's operated in the united states on common criminals that are not threatening the existence of our society. be just identified without the involvement of the public in some way. previously oned these programs are not briefed to all members of congress. the coded k about programs, these black programs, strikes, drone strikes, we're relying on a very small group of people. the gang of d eight. even when we expand this to the community, the

incentives are entirely wrong publicm to represent the interest. because everyone sitting on the of theee, even opponents agency receive twice as much in campaign donations from contractors from people who are nsa ing business with the and cia as any member of congress. incentive to y approve the programs and aintain their own chairs and their own seats as to hold the people who are asking for them account rizing them to for it. we need to think about how we can fix these structures provide for mechanisms that future.vent this >> maybe this is just sort of yes or no. the mirror universe where snowden evil average

who doesn't disclose things want to help one political party and not the could evil snowden target someone -- do you think your evil counterpart can get away with that? >> absolutely. i mean, it's no secret here we sitting -- i don't know, nsa still 014 and the says when asked in public under he ressional oaths what did get referring to me and they still don't know. f they're auditing is so poor that after a year and a half after investigation and god powers and ny man how many forensic professionals can't find in they out what happened with an individual who was not trying to cover his tracks, what's going have an when they individual in a position of privilege who is trying to stay abuse the adar and system and who is trying to use ort of these incredible authorities and exceptional

powers for the benefit of their ves, their class, group, their own interests? today there is no protection and that's an incredibly dangerous, incredibly concerning problem. they haven't provided an answer for it. >> i think we time for one last question. honestly there are so many people who want to know about your personal life, so i'm going to combine them into one question, which is do you expect the u.s.? o i think you've said yes you like wine. you don't drink wine. i like to know why you were the name citizen thor and -- you mentioned you're working on a tool that in journalists in dangerous areas and i wonder us on that. update it is my goal to return to the

united states. unfortunately, there are no provisions in the charges that aren't doubled against me. that provides challenges. i am working with the government to find out if we can do this in a manner that serves the public good. unfortunately, everything we have heard blessed are they want to use media scare everybody in the world out of ever saying that the public as a fit of the -- seat atvernment the table of government. it is becoming clear and the united states that i should never have had to do this in the first place. so we will see. drinkcond thing was, do i ? no, i have never been drunk. it is not a religious thing or an ideological thing, i do not like the way it tastes. citizen