want to repeal to the misbehaving party that this investigation is under way because they are likely to abscond or hide assets or destroy evidence or whatever. do you want some form of ex parte process like a warrant provides where the civil agency could say, look, these are extraordinary circumstances, this is why we need access ex parte to this information and try to convince the judge of that? mr. salzburg: we are not asking for that authority. senator whitehouse: why did you use that example? mr. salzburg: i suppose i florida stated the previous content -- >> all of this later in our program and c-span.org. the u.s. house gaveling in for one-minute speeches. legislative business at 3:00 p.m. eastern. the chair will be offered by our chaplain, father con roy. chaplain conroy: lettuce pray.

almighty god of the universe we give you thanks for giving us another day. we thank you that you give us a share in your creative work, having endowed each with unique and important talents. on this day, we ask your blessing upon the -- on the men and women of the people's house who have been entrusted with the care of this great nation's people. because of the great blessings you have bestowed on our nation, may we embrace the opportunity to build a better world beyond our borders as well. bless all those who work in the nation's capital, may their work be appreciated by the american people, for their faithfulness and service to our nation is truly edifying. may all that they do this day be for your greater honor and glory, amen.

the speaker pro tempore: the the chair has examined the journal of the last day's proceedings and announces to the house his approval thereof. pursuant to clause 1 of rule 1, the journal stands approved. the pledge of allegiance will be led by the gentleman from nebraska, mr. ashford. mr. ashford: i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under god, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. the speaker pro tempore: the chair will entertain requests for one minute speeches. for what purpose does the gentleman from pennsylvania seek recognition? >> ask unanimous consent to address the house for one minute. revise and extend my remarks. the speaker pro tempore: without objection, the gentleman is recognized for one minute. >> thank you, mr. speaker. over the last few years i met with thousands of families of those with mental illness. mr. murphy: their number one concern is how the current system shuts them out. debbie and chazz lost their son to suicide in 2002.

although chucky sought counseling from his college and showed signs of depression, his parents knew nothing about his struggle. the federal education and rights and privacy act also known as federal republica kept chucky's parents in the dark. they aren't alone. each day millions of families experience the same tragic frustration. schools will be sure to lee mind you when the tuition check arrives, but because federal republica when it comes to your child's mental health you receive a call too late. this suicide prevention month congress can fix this problem to helping families in mental crisis act helps doctors provide crucial information to a known caregiver to save their life and protect their right to treatment. i urge my colleagues to support h.r. 2646. thank you. i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. for what purpose does the gentleman from maryland rise? mr. hoyer: mr. speaker, i ask unanimous consent to speak for one minute and revise and extend my remarks. the speaker pro tempore: without objection, the gentleman is recognized for one minute. mr. hoyer: speaker harris, we have only seven legislative days

left until another unnecessary, costly, and entirely preventable government shut down. we need to negotiate an agreement tree place the sequester with a responsible alternative. and because republicans have refused to start these negotiations, i have talked to mrs. lowey, the ranking member of the appropriations committee, i talked to mr. van hollen, the ranking member of the budget committee, and i have talked to mr. mccarthy but we have had no discussions how to keep the government opened just eight legislative days from now. if the government were to shut down, as it did in 2013, it would cost our economy billions of dollars. and put our national security at risk. hundreds of thousands of public service workers would be furloughed and millions of people would be cut off from critical programs and services. many republicans are urging their leadership not to risk a

shut down. representative dent of pennsylvania said i don't think we need to do a replay of 2013. it would be an enormous tactical and strategy bunder -- strategy blunder. indiana senator dan coates, conservative republican, called the shutdown a failed tactic for political purposes that is not going to succeed. i urge my republican colleagues to stop threatening a shut down. not all of them but some of them, and instead take action to keep the government opened as we work to reach an agreement on a bunt that replaces the -- budget that replaces the see quers enand funds our nation's priorities responsibly. i yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back. for what purpose does the gentleman from texas seek recognition? mr. smith: i ask unanimous consent to address the house for one minute. revise and extend. the speaker pro tempore: without objection, the gentleman is recognized for one minute. mr. smith: mr. speaker, this week i am circulating a letter to my house colleagues that asks

the senate to drop the 60-vote requirement for consideration of the iran deal. the american people sent us to congress to represent their interest and take actions that benefit our great country. that time and time again we hear from our constituents that congress isn't listening or is incapable of performing its basic responsibilities as a legislature. our request to eliminate the filibuster for some votes simply underscores that in a democracy the majority should decide. it is time to send a strong signal to this administration that it can no longer disregard the will of the american people and their representatives in congress. i urge my colleagues to sign this letter that asks for a majority vote on the iran deal in the senate. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. for what purpose does the gentleman from nebraska seek recognition? >> i ask unanimous consent to address the house for one

minute. >> without objection, the gentleman is recognized for one minute. >> mr. speaker, today we face another government shut down. another government shut down that threatens our economy. and what is this potential shut down about? it's about congress trying to dictate to women in my community which health care provider they can and cannot see to give care. mr. ashford: let me set the record straight. planned parenthood of the heartland provides vital preventive care to women in my community. last year planned parenthood of the heartland served nearly 10,000 patients. they conducted over 4,000 cervical and breast cancer screenings, and over 13,000 tests for sexually transmitted infections. they provided prenatal care, pregnancy testing, and other preventive health services. they are an active supporter of the national campaign to prevent teen and unplanned pregnancy. and they even have licensed adoption professionals on site

to help women navigate the steps of adoption. i am a strong believer that education regarding women's health prevents abortions. we must come together and work in the spirit of bipartisanship to avoid this government shut down. thank you. the speaker pro tempore: for what purpose does the gentleman from texas seek recognition? >> mr. speaker, i ask unanimous consent to address the house for one minute. revise and extend my remarks. the speaker pro tempore: without objection, the gentleman is recognized for one minute. coptic mr. speaker, christians, the largest religious minority in egypt and largest christian community in the middle east are constantly persecuted. in 2011 a boy went to school like he did every day. like most coptic christians in egypt had a cross tattooed on his wrist as a sign of his christian faith. when he got to school, his arabic language teacher asked him to cover the tattoo. instead, he pulled a cross from underneath his shirt and left it

hanging around his neck. the teacher became enraged. he choked iman and asked his classmates what are you going to do with him? then his classmates beat him to death. to silence his faith. iman was murdered because he was a christian. religious freedom is a basic sacred universal human right. alexander hamilton said in 1775, the sacred rights of mankind are written as with a sunbeam in the whole volume of human nature by the hand ofdy vinity itself and can never be erased or object second degree murder by mortal power. that's just the way it is. the speaker pro tempore: for what purpose does the gentleman from michigan seek recognition? >> mr. speaker, i seek unanimous consent to address the house for one minute. the speaker pro tempore: without objection, the gentleman is recognized for one minute. mr. kildee: thank you, mr. speaker. well, there are only seven days, legislative days until the g.o.p. shuts down this government again.

i have been back home. i don't know about you, but what i have heard is the american people do not want to see another government shut down. they don't want to see planned parenthood defunded. taking away a central health care for women across the country. but what they want to see is us work together. they want to see both parties work together to keep the government opened for sure but to go beyond that. to make sure that families can save to own a home. that they can send their kids to college. that they can have something setaside for retirement. it's not just enough to keep the government opened. that ought to be a given. but we ought to take up the priorities of the mesh people -- american people. unfortunately what we see is that in an attempt to get something that a minority of this body wants, they are going to hold up the entirety of the government, shut down the government, over one issue. that's not responsible. that's not what the american people sent us here to do. house democrats are ready to work together. we'll compromise.

let's negotiate. let's have discussion. let's talk to one another. come up with a budget that we can work together on that we can present to the american people and get back to the business the people sent us here to do. with that i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back. for what purpose does the gentleman from texas seek recognition? mr. burgess: i rise ask unanimous consent to address the house for one minute. revise and extend my remarks. the speaker pro tempore: without objection, the gentleman is recognized for one minute. mr. burgess: thank you, mr. speaker. i rise today to encourage support in promoting the national manufacturing day, an annual event that's recognized on friday, october 2. during the time that the manufacturing sector is under a number of challenges, manufacturing day aims to revitalize the image of manufacturing and to bring awareness of this sector's many contributions to the economy and to the united states competitiveness. as the chairman of the subcommittee on commerce, manufacturing, and trade, i intend to support this day of recognition on october 2 in my district. i encourage my colleagues to do the same in their districts.

manufacturing day also serves as an opportunity for manufacturers across the country to highlight their work. manufacturing is an imperative for the future of the united states' economy and encourages the growth of american innovation, a skill that must continue to be fostered in this generation and those generations yet to come. i yield back my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yield back. for what purpose does the gentleman from hawaii seek recognition? mr. takai: i ask unanimous consent to address the house for one minute. the speaker pro tempore: without objection, the gentleman is recognized for one minute. aloha, mr. speaker. i rise today to discuss the need to come together, put aside partisan politics, and pass the budget. more than seven in 10 americans are saying they would prefer a budget agreement to prevent the government from shutting down.

i was elected to congress and came here promising my constituents no more government shutdown downs, no more federal furloughs, and no more sequestration. i ask the leadership of both parties put forward a bipartisan, long-term dugget solution to help prevent a government shut down. we need to focus on what matters. growing our economy. upgrading our aging infrastructure, and helping ensure that our citizens are able to obtain the american dream. we cannot waste anymore time on political gridlock. and it is not fair to hijack our nation's budget bill. let's come together, let's get to work. let's answer the call of our constituents and let's pass the budget. thank you, mr. speaker. i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back. for what purpose does the gentlelady from california seek recognition? >> i ask unanimous consent to address the house for one minute. revise and extend my remarks. the speaker pro tempore: without objection, the gentlelady is recognized for one minute. mrs. capps: mr. speaker, i rise oday to recognize september as

children's cardiomyopathy awareness month. it is a chronic disease of the heart muscle that increases the risk of sudden cardiac arrest. a condition that claims proximately 295,000 lives in the united states every year. it's also the leading cause of death among school children. that's one reason why i introduced the safe play act, which would improve the health and safety of student athletes, including those diagnosed with cardiomyopathy. we know that when sudden cardiac arrest hits, quick intervention saves lives, and that's why the safe play act includes provisions to teach students across the country lifesaving skills of c.p.r. and how to use a.e.d.s. as we recognize children's cardiomyopathy awareness month, i want to invite my colleagues and their staff to the second annual a.e.d. hunt on the hill

taking place tomorrow at 4:00 p.m. in the afternoon. there you can learn more about cardiomyopathy, now a.e.d.s save lives, and how the safe play act can help. together we can make a difference. i yield back. . the speaker pro tempore: the gentlelady yields back the balance of her time. for what purpose does the gentlelady from north carolina seek recognition? without objection, the gentlelady is recognized for ne minute. ms. adams: thank you, mr. speaker. once again republicans are threatening to shut down our government. instead of passing a sensible funding bill or a long term transportation bill that will create jobs, republicans have chosen to put jobs at risk. they've chosen to weaken security at our airports, chosen to close our national parks. pretty much they've chosen to serve their -- not to serve their constituents back home. and for what reason?

because they're so determined to regulate women's bodies and block women's rights to access preventive and life saving health care that they'd rather throw americans under the bus. last year alone in my state of north carolina, planned parenthood served who are than 31,000 patients, providing s and pap smears and cancer screenings. conscious -- contraceptive services and s.t.d. testing. why would we want to deny women, many who are low income, of these necessary health benefits? women's access to health care has always been important to me and that's why i'm a consistent advocate for the work that planned parenthood does. more importantly, i refuse to put jobs and our country's safety at risk over partisan grandstanding. only seven days left, it's time we do what we were sent here to do and end this senseless shutdown talk. mr. speaker, i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlelady yields back the balance of her time. for what purpose does the gentleman from texas seek recognition? the gentleman is recognized for

ne minute. >> mr. speaker, i rise today to urge my republican colleagues to please, don't shut down the government. mr. veasey: let's work together. let's put politics aside and do what's best for the american people. by the end of this month, we are expected to negotiate a responsible budget agreement but threats from the right wing extremists are taking us off course once again. i recently wrote an op ed challenging republicans' threats to women's health care coverage as i refuse to stand on the sidelines when our country's daughters, sisters and mothers are under attack. instead of once again holding women's health care hostage in order to pass a biased agenda, we need to come together to pass a responsible, bipartisan budget to address our nation's most pressing problems. residents in the dallas-fort worth area are concerned about getting some congestion off of our freeways and doing things like making sure that the american public has good well-paying jobs and protecting

our businesses. we want to pass a balance and responsible budget that averts another government shutdown. we can not -- we cannot expect a repeat of the same mistakes and think that it's going to yield different results. the american people are counting on us to do what's right, jobs, education, and fixing our country's crumbling infrastructure. i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman's time has expired. the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. for what purpose does the gentlelady from michigan seek recognition? the gentlelady, without objection, is recognized for one minute. mrs. lawrence: thank you, mr. chair. i stand before you today outraged and disappointed. once again petty partisan politics is threatening to derail government funding and shut down critical services to hardworking, deserving americans. later today, i'll be hosting a forum with the media, talking

about how women are treated and misrepresented in the media. here we have an issue that has a direct impact on women being used as a pawn to shut down our government. the only group that is portrayed more negatively, and we all hear it, is our own congress. we must act now to change how we are portrayed and how americans view us. we must work together and stop another wasteful and harmful government shutdown. we are better than this, congress, my colleagues, let's work together and keep our government working. thank you. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlelady yields back the balance of her time. the chair lays before the house a communication. the clerk: the honorable the speaker, house of representatives, sir. pursuant to the permission granted in clause 2-h of rule 2 of the rules of the u.s. house of representatives, the clerk received the following message

from the secretary of the senate on september 16, 2015, at 9:23 a.m. that the senate passed senate 2036. signed, sincerely, karen l. haas. the speaker pro tempore: pursuant to clause 12-a of rule 1, the their declares the house in recess until approximately

there is an ongoing investigation looking into allegations concerning the processing of intelligence information by the intelligence director. because the allegations are currently under investigation, it would be premature and inappropriate for me to discuss this matter. what i will say is i welcome the d.o.d.-i.g.'s oversight. once the investigation is complete, based upon the findings, you can be assured that i will take appropriate actions.

again, i cannot speak to the specifics of the allegations, however, i would like to take this opportunity to provide some clarity with respect to how we use intelligence products in the critical work that we do. because of the nature of our mission we do have and rely on a robust intelligence enterprise to support the command. there are over 1,200 seasoned intelligence professionals that make up that enterprise. and they do exceptional work. as a commander i greatly value and seek their input and insights. i use the assessments that they provide me together with the inputs that i receive from a variety of sources that include my commanders on the ground, who i talk to almost every single day, and i consider this broad range of inputs when making my decisions. there's been a lot of speculation in the media about allegations made to the dodig and one in particular i believe should be addressed and corrected for the record. some have expressed concerns

that reports are sent directly to the president. this is not accurate. as the office of the director of national intelligence put out to the media last week, and i quote, none of the combatant commands are permitted to engage directly in the president's daily brief process. rather, reports are produced by the combatant commands and funnel through the d.i.a. to ensure that all substantive deliberations and final contributions are appropriately coordinated. end of quote. again, i cannot comment on a specific allegation. we will need to wait for the dodig to complete its investigation. but i did want to provide this dditional clarification. [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2015] >> that's today's senate armed services hearing on isis. you can see the sfwire event online or later. >> our road to the white house coverage of the presidential candidates continues saturday morning. with a new hampshire democratic party convention. live from manchester.

speakers include five presidential candidates, former secretary of state hillary clinton, vermont senator bernie sanders, former governor of rhode island, lincoln chafee, former maryland governor, martin o'malley, and harvard professor. saturday at 9:30 a.m. eastern on c-span, c-span radio and c-span.org. c-span's campaign 2016. taking you on the road to the white house. >> this sunday night on q&a, "the washington post" national political reporter on the 2016 presidential campaign and the similarities between donald trump and 1992 presidential candidate and businessman ross perot. >> the themes are really overlapping and i think perot, he has a distinct personality that's different from trump, the celebrity factor was not there with perot in the same way it drives trump and attracts people to trump. you see people, they throw themselves at trump for his autograph, a picture. there's a power with trump's personality that perot didn't have.

but being outside of washington, being out of the -- outside of the republican party, the republican party's relationship with trump has been rocky this year. i broke the story that trump was called a couple months ago and told to tone it down on immigration. he said, we'll see. he did not tone it down. now he's signed the pledge but who nose what that's worth -- knows what that's worth? it's a political document. we could see what happened with perot happen with trump. he keeps talking about wanting to be treated fairly. trump is unpredictable and he could easily run as an independent, regardless of this pledge. >> sunday night at 8:00 eastern and pacific on c-span's q&a. >> we want to welcome back to our table jerry connolly. we wer , member ofd connolly the foreign affairs committee. let us start with the first page of "the new york times." the headline, president obama considering talks with putin on syrian crisis.

should he start talking to vladimir putin about syria decker -- about syria? guest: absolutely. burden ofre i put the the so-called cold war on president obama's shoulders right i think what prudent -- putin is engaged in is reprehensible. host: what does the unit is -- the united states do? theconflict has dominated report -- the obama administration. needs to look at a little bit of history with respect to russia and the former soviet union and syria. syria is the oldest client state in the middle east for the soviet union and now russia. the relationship goes back decades.

assad's father cemented that relationship, so the prime military supplier of nuclear technology, supplier of training and equipping of the military in syria was the soviet union and now russia. it was no coincidence, for putinle, that prudent -- and russia negotiated an them to remove chemical weapons which were the former this -- soviet union and russia. relationshipd, old . they are not going to give up easily on that. problem we have got is even in military,he syrian they are kind of crumbling. assad'ss -- a solid -- position in syria continues to

erode. think qiagen -- putin has some motivation in trying to rescue the situation before death collapse or host: so the united states is training rebels were trying to fight a sod -- assad. what is this doing to long-term relationship between the united states and russia? there is really nothing new with the united states and russia being on opposite sides of conflict, and in fact even using them as surrogate opportunities to try to thrust and perry with each other. this is a very different situation -- difficult situation. the russians are replacing equipment. that is not a new thing. i'm not sure it is going to be saw'sient to solidify a

assad's crumbling base. half the population is now on the move. they are refugees are they are displaced in the country. it is an unprecedented situation. and i think the other thing we need to remember is the united the ability of the united states to control outcomes in syria is extremely limited. is soutin has discovered are russia's opportunities for control. to control what happens on the ground is pretty limited. it is not like president obama has liberally ignored a situation and if only he had paid attention we could have had a different set of outcomes. am -- i have been a student of the region for a long time. host: i want to show our viewers

a graphic in "the new york times." it takes up an entire page. each of these dots represents a person killed in the syrian war since its beginning. that is two hundred thousand people. approximately 29,000 have died in shootings and mass killing rate 27,000 died in mortar and rocket attacks. 18,000 have been killed in air attacks. 8800 died after being kidnapped, detained, or tortured. others died after being exposed chemicals. 670 medical workers have been killed. 565 have been killed by starvation, dehydration, or lack of medical care. syrians are leaving in mass. aid groups are criticizing the united states for not taking on more. guest: you mean refugees jacket -- you mean refugees? host: yes.

guest: the immediate haven for refugees ought to be the region itself. the gulf states need to step up to this challenge. and we need to do our fair share, as do europeans. but that also involve careful screening. given the complexity of the situation within syria and just outside of syria, the work we need to be doing is accepting the last thing- we need to be doing is accepting folks were part of the problem. having said that, there is a humanitarian crisis that we have to help, and most certainly we can do more. host: front page of the paper today saying hungry -- hungary stopow erected a fence to migrants who are trying to get to germany and other countries. germany has no call for an emergency european meeting.

you agree with this move to try to keep these people who are trying to escape in the area? hungarian officials are saying is they have made it out of syria to turkey, they are safe. there is no reason for them to hungary. to guest: i would hope that the europeans can come up with a unified, humane approach to this crisis. people are risking life and limb. the image of a young baby facedown on a beach, whose parents were trying to flee -- the violence you just recounted, i think ought to be a very sober reminder are all of us of the nature of this crisis. we are talking about fellow human beings. parochial aside concerns, religious concerns.

as people who have a value system that says a human being comes first, let's respond to this crisis. i would hope that this would be the response of european leadership. hungary is a small country. their resources are somewhat limited. but they are part of the eu, they are part of nato. i would hope that upon reflection the prime minister would join with his colleagues in europe to a more in-depth that addresses the humanitarian crisis. host: our guest is congressman gerald connolly gerald connolly, democrat of virginia. let's talk about domestic issues. anthony is up first in st. paul, minnesota. democrat. caller: good morning. host: good morning. this with thee on

foreign intimacy policy is that we need to start -- what i keep hearing, and don't cut me off, but the united states seems to have this issue with the arabs or persians, whoever, over in the middle east. enough totupid believe everyone will shoot off a bomb. but we all have to understand that nation means mutual destruction. we give a lot of money to israel and we don't get anything back. thathole argument has been it is their land and they will give it back. we should demand something for what we give, that is basically it. thank you very much. i heard that as an opinion, i am not sure i can comment on it opinion. host: what would you say to him in that we are not risk -- we are not demanding something in return in the aid we give to egypt and other countries in that area? guest: the united states and

israel have had a deep and abiding relationship. they are a strong ally. i think that is going to continue. i think israel remains an island of stability in a sea of instability in the region. and i think that relationship matters now more than ever given what we are witnessing with these neighboring states. that is not a relationship i think we should abandon. as to the question of, do we demand an up of israel, it is a very complex relationship. there is give and take. we receive as well as give. i don't think it is as simple as the caller presented at all. it is a very valuable and important relationship. critical right now in terms of stability. host: are you -- but they are against us nuclear agreement. guest: the government of israel. clarificationat

that you just made, you voted for approval? guest: i think the prime minister of israel and his ambassador here in washington is dead wrong. their solution would guarantee their fears would be realized. the only way to roll back the nuclear capability of iran right now is as agreement. prime minister netanyahu is not has offered an alternative. people as it -- people i respect, like senator joe lieberman, has said say we just cannot sell it. let's go back to the negotiating table and come up with a better idea. furthermore, to me, it is specious logic is not delusional to believe that the united

states having taken the lead in these negotiations could say to ,is leadership partners in iran we have changed our mind about our own agreement. we are going to announce it. come back to the table and the tough new negotiations. either the way, we reserve apparently the really -- the right to resort -- were not sent to. it would erode u.s. credibility. none of those negotiating partners, including germany, france, the u.k., russia, and china, let alone iran, would agree to come back to the table. and the very sanctions regime we are concerned about would collapse. we need to enforce the sanctions , which they have not. furthermore, the agreement rolled back existing capability for the first time. uranium has to be transported

out of the country. 3.67%,el of enrichment, nowhere near it. plutonium actually has to be .ismantled in perpetuity inspections regimes, at the snap of a finger, with the exception of undisclosed sites. what that means is, if somebody says i don't know what is going on over there. maybe nothing. we have to look at it. that has a delay, but it is a delay to review it among our partners, and iran only has three days, not 24, to comply. not to appeal, they have to comply. i think it is a pretty robust regime. so do a lot of back's diplomats, so do a lot of republicans who cannot vote on the deal, like former secretary of state colin

powell. they see this for what it is worth, which is a guarantor of a nonnuclear iran. and an avoidance of the adoption of military insurrection. we will go to michigan, iraq, an independent. caller: good morning. guest: good morning. caller: sir, why don't they use the word atomic, it's that is calling it nuclear? you are dealing with the atomic energy it is an atomic bomb. i think you folks in washington need to look at more pictures of the disaster that we put down on hiroshima and nagasaki with the disintegration of people's skin and bones. you are still paying for it. it caused disaster. bomb, and youc need to look at more pictures

and realize how much we have been spending to apologize for what we did, and we said never again. never again means never again. how many nuclear physicist are there out there who can tell you what enrichment looks like, or what the ingredients are? who are these people who are being trained in the united states for what to look for, showing that we have an atomic arsenal and we have stuff sticking out of the ground? thank you. have a nice day. god bless america. guest: thank you. with respect to who are these , one of these is the secretary of energy to his the -- who is a nuclear physicist. he was very valuable in making sure the technical details what -- were met. z and wesecretary moni

are so blessed to have him serving our country. that was a huge asset. if you prefer the word atomics, that is fine. you can call it atomic. i think it does not matter whether you use atomic or nuclear. it is what we want to avoid. we do not want an atomic arms, nuclear armed iran, capable of having and deploying an atomic weapon. that is the goal. i was proud support the agreement, and as i said, i understand that reasonable people might come to other perspectives about what they might find, but i have yet to hear a single critic offer anything like a tenable alternative. you need an alternative if you want to vote no. host: we go to new hampshire, mark, and atkinson, new

hampshire, a republican. caller: good morning. guest: how are things up in new hampshire? nice and cool this morning. not bad. what happens if this deal falls apart in iran? second of all, you say israel is our ally, but you forget in 1950 they tried to start a war between us and egypt. 67. they tried it to blow up our uss liberty. they were trying to start a war between us and egypt. i will leave you with that thought. guest: i think you meant in 1956, the suez crisis. yes, look, we have our , but weces with israel agree on a lot more than we disagree. obviously the obama administration has been pushing the netanyahu government, the

current government of israel, to be more forthcoming about settlements, more forthcoming about a two state solution, more forthcoming about engaging with the palestinians to achieve that. we also have been prodding the who unfortunately pulled back at the last moment in terms of sitting down and having real negotiation with the state of israel. that is a challenge as well. no relationship is without problems. every family has its differences. sometimes they are pretty severe. that does not mean we are not family and that does not mean we do not share a lot more in common than not. i think that characterizes the relationship we have. host: jorge is next in albuquerque, new mexico, democrat. good morning. caller: good morning. i just wanted to point out the fact that the syrians, and really all people, have only two options.

fight or flight. int is why i thank god here america we have the second amendment, the right to bear arms, so we can protect ourselves and our property. thank you. guest: i don't know. i don't think the lack of weapons, because of the lack of a second amendment in syria is the problem. i think quite the opposite, there are too many weapons floating around. i agree with you, the options are pretty limited. fight or flight. that is the tragedy of syria today or it but what caused that? the lack of any political base. the lack of these people to express himself openly. the lack of free expression with respect to the ballot box to elect a government of their choosing. havethat happens, when you percent a long. of time and authoritarian s,ctatorship under the assad that always breeds extremism. that is that we are witnessing

in syria today and it is destroying the country as we know it. host: los angeles, eddie, an independent. good morning. caller: good morning. i have a couple questions to ask. one is about the israeli thing. they received the largest amount of our foreign money, but they are also the largest contributor to our government. it is like a kickback. you speak of the humanitarian thing, what is going on in syria , but they did not have a problem about blowing the both of with the libyans coming over. tell me the difference of that? is it race, or what? as a been on, -- as a vietnam vet, with what they did to the uss liberty, i can't see them being an ally. could you explain that please? the liberty thing occurred in the midst of a war.

accidents happen. .ook at for example ourselves friendlye killed with fire because we called in a bomb strike and got the wrong coordinates. that is the official version of what happened, and obviously people can draw their own conclusions. with respect to aid to israel, we do provide a lot of military aid to israel. over the years we have provided economic stability funds as well. investment in technology and in self-defense for israel? importantnk is a very investments.

technology that we have used has protected israeli citizens and communities from rocket attacks from the gaza or from other parts of the region. it has worked. it is technology that actually has a lot of promise in terms of self-defense technology. street.it is a two-way i think we benefit from it, and clearly the israelis do as well. it is a relationship that is not without problems, but it is a relationship that i think we need to undergird. host: "washington times" front page this morning, iran and north korea cooperation.

what is your reaction to that? concerned about this going forward? guest: all the more reason why we need a robust inspections regime, and we need a robust nuclear rollback agreement, which is precisely what has been negotiated. a disagreements that will go forward. i think it is precisely what is needed to make sure that that kind of thing is known and prevented from having any material effect on iran's nuclear capability. proliferation proliferates in secrecy. the whole point of this agreement is to put a lot of sunshine into what is going on in iran so that that kind of secret development can no longer occur. going to see on the agenda when the chinese president comes to washington

later this month? guest: there is a cannot play of issues -- there is a panoply of issues. intellectual property protection, chinese hacking into including the breach of 22 million federal and retirees. all that has to be addressed. it cannot be annoyed -- ignored. there are human rights issues in china that have to be addressed. there is provocative action by china in the pacific basin that relationshipss with south korea, the philippines, vietnam. of buildingactivity

up atolls and coral reefs to become military bases and airstrips, it is a very alarming thing. way to resolve international, territorial disputes, and that behavior is extremely bothersome. i think it is unsettling in the region. it is an opportunity to talk and ,o exchange i hope candid views and to try to get some commitments out of china. there are also air is bank of -- areas of bank -- cooperation. china is one of our partners and had adhered to agreements and been helpful more often than not in this project -- process. we also need china to help deter the north korean issue we were

talking about a few minutes ago. the only relationship a have is with china. it is frayed, there is a lot of difficulty right now. china is the one place we can go to to try to get some helpful morevention to just her extreme behavior by north korea to be try to get them more cooperative in terms of international norms. host: another common ground appears to be climate change, "the wall street journal" this morning with the headline that president obama and the chinese president are advancing a climate deal. go to richard, an independent. caller: hello there. how are you doing? guest: good. caller: what you were just speaking of is of great importance to me, but what i actually called about is these refugees. when you see them, there are children and women. i don't see a lot of old people.

people 20's, 30's, 40's that are actually in good shape. very good shape. why wouldn't they want to go to baghdad? or to jordan? to join forces against this, rather than run away and leave ?heir country behind i can't relate to that. that it would be better for them to try to get rid of their problems rather than run away from the problems. eventually down the road this will cause political and other hardships when these countries taken large quantities of these people. host: do you have any thoughts? , i think most human aings want a better lives -- better life for themselves and

their families. i don't think they want to be engaged in military conflict or hostilities. they don't want to sign up for that. certainly going to another country, like iraq, is not a particularly viable option. there is no clear signal they would be welcome. they have their own violence and civil conflict. why would you go from the fire back to the frying pan, if you will. i think they are seeking a modicum of safety, ease, and opportunity, and they are fleeing a source of violence that is life-threatening to them and their families. that is a very understandable human reaction. the numbers we are talking about, greta listed the deaths, but the refugee numbers are enormous. syrians, maybe as much as half the population, has

fled from the violence. that tells you a lot. not an easy alternatives within syria. we are trying to create one, i am not sure that is going to be successful, because the radicalization of the conflict has proceeded at a pace. we have seen that in other parts of the world as well. withutions often start very noble, visionary, all touristic sentiments, but then cynicism sets in in terms of who and otherhe conflict agendas come into play. we have seen that time and again, and we certainly have seen that in syria. i'm not surprised that most of the people fleeing the violence don't want to go back into the violence. they wants to get away from it and try to protect their families.

and tragically, they are looking for opportunities and alternatives that can protect them. i think that is a very understandable human reaction, and i don't think that is an outrageous goal or desire on the part of those refugees. we'll go to john in beaverton, oregon. democrat caller. good morning. caller: good morning. guest: hi. caller: next thursday you are going to have an immigrant visitor to congress, and i'm just wondering, do you believe that congress is going to be able to listen and really listen of careupon his message for the poor, care for the environment? peace. for do you think they are really going to be listening to him, or do you think it is going to become a media event? ensuretizens how can we

that congress, senators, and so on hear the message and work towards that message? guest: what a great question. certainly i think congress will listen. the second part of the question is, and act upon. that is a different matter. unfortunately our politics are so polarized that people will hear what they want to hear. what theytake away are predisposed to take away. certain talking about aspects of catholic doctrine, that will fall on certain parts of the hall and the country. and if he is talking about the other doctrines of the church that you cited, that will be heard by others.

the famous expression, who am i to judge. well, he is pope. if he is not supposed to judge, then who is you are -- who are you or i to judge? not everyone is comfortable with that. it -- his encyclical, the first one he has written, was devoted to climate change and the environment. i made some people uncomfortable, but that is very much part of catholic teaching. i think it is very significant but that is the topic you chose -- but that is the topic he chose for a teaching document. he has an intriguing figure. i think a breath of fresh air on the international scene, a very human person with a human touch. i am very much looking forward to seeing him, greeting him, and

listening to him. journalhe wall street those quote says it is one hot ticket. if you can get into see the pope -- do you have a ticket? have one ticket, and my wife made it quite clear that that ticket is going to her. i have another ticket for the stand up to greet him. we are actually going to go through a number of firsts. be reaching out to catholic parishes in my district to see if some of those folks would like to avail themselves of this very limited number of tickets. host: you yourself are catholic. guest: i am. host: how important is this to you? your wife made a close -- made it clear. guest: i was 10 when john kennedy ran for president. headlines atr the the time saying, can a catholic

me president? ,n other words, our loyalties our patriotism, was under question. that was so offensive to me as a young boy. so i am somebody who really is quite aware of a large part of american history that discriminated against us as we were suspect. we were a foreign religion. we are a mainstream religion with the largest and nomination in the united states. i think that question has been put to rest. but to have the pope, for the first time ever, address a joint session of congress, in many ways says a lot about the maturation of american democracy. about diversity, about immigration. i'm just so excited that this historic figure can play that role as the very first to do so. and that my country has come to grips with putting aside the

suspicions of the past. we will move on to harry in dallas, pennsylvania. republican. good morning. caller: congressman, i would like to thank you for your support of the iran deal, i think that was the proper thing to do. guest: thank you. caller: the idea that ashton carter went over to israel and give them 1.8 elaine dollars in military aid on top of the tenant half- [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2015] >> the u.s. house gaveling back in now for work on 12 bills, including one directing t.s.a. to direct airport security. live to the house now on c-span. record votes on postpone questions will be taken later today. for what purpose does the gentleman from texas seek recognition? mr. smith: i move the house suspend the rules and concur in the senate amendment h.r. 23. clrk clerk h.r. 23 an act to re-authorize the national windstorm impact reduction program and for other purposes.

senate amendment. the speaker pro tempore: pursuant to the rule the gentleman from texas plrks smith, and the gentleman from new york, mr. tonko, each will control 20 minutes. the chair recognizes the gentleman from texas. mr. smith: i ask unanimous consent that members have five legislative days to include extraneous material. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. mr. smith: i yield myself such time as i recognize. h.r. 23, the national win storm impact reduction act re-authorization of 2015 re-authorizes the activities of the national windstorm impact reduction program through fiscal year 2017. representative randy neugebauer, has championed this program for over a decade. in the 113th congress, he and representative wilson's bipartisan efforts helped move this legislation through the science committee and to pass the house. because of their past work we were able to bring this bill to the house floor on january 7,

the second day of business in this congress. the bill overwhelming passed the house 381-39. today, we consider the senate amendment to h.r. 23. thanks to the leadership of my colleague on the other side of the capitol, senator thune, an amended version of h.r. 23 passed the committee in june. it then passed the senate by unanimous consent in july. the install windstorm impact reduction program supports federal research and development efforts to help mitigate the loss of life and property due to wind-related hazards. millions of americans live in areas vulnerable to hurricanes and wind storms. they reported over 100 deaths and 900 injuries due to tornadoes and other wind storms. in texas, we are all too familiar with the harm the strong wind can cause. according to the national oakic and atmospheric storm prediction

enter, 128 tornadoes and 1,366 windstorms were reported just in texas in the last two years. the effects of these disasters can be felt for a long time. initially established in 2004, the national windstorm impact reduction program supports activities to improve our understanding of windstorms and their impacts and helps to develop and encourage the implementation of cost effective mitigation measures. h.r. 23 establishes the national institute of standards and technology as the lead agency for the program. the bill improves coordination of interagency activities and fiscally responsible manner and expands transparency for how much money is being spent on windstorm research at the four participating agencies, the national institutes of standards and technology, the national science foundation, the national oakic and atmospheric administration and fema and authorizes $21.4 million for the

interagency research. the amendment provides flexibility on windstorm impact reduction when it provides recommendations in its report and also ensures that noft easters are included in the definition of windstorms. i thank representative neugebauer for his continued efforts in support of this prame program. i encourage my colleagues to support this bill. and i reserve. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman reserves the balance of his time. the gentleman from new york. mr. tonko: i yield myself such time as i may consume. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized. mr. tonko: i rise in support of h.r. 23, legislation that authorizes -- re-authorizes the national windstorm impact reduction program. americans face significant exposure to windstorms and saw it in 2012 when superstorm sandy devastated the northeast.

it was responsible for over 200 deaths and caused over $70 billion in damage. according to the national weather service from 2005 to 2014, thousands of americans lost their lives from the impacts of windstorms, along with the loss of life, windstorms cause many billions of dollars in property and crop damage during that time. when windstorms occur, we must work to save lives and reduce the amount of property and crop damage that the windstorm or other natural disaster causes. we already are investigate -- investing significant resources after a windstorm but should be investing more in preparedness. fema's program has demonstrated that every dollar invested in mitigation activities saves $3 to $4 in recovery costs. this is largely a mitigation

program. the bill re-authorizes the nooa andirects n.s.f., fema to improve our understanding of windstorms and their impacts and develop cost-effective mitigation measures. this program has the potential to lessen the loss of life and economic damage of windstorms by supporting research and helping to translate that research into more effective building codes and mitigation programs. but this program needs robust investment to achieve that result. unfortunately, this bill includes a lower total authorization level than was authorized for this program in fiscal year 2008. we have the responsibility, i believe, to assist our constituents after a natural disaster occurs. but we also have the responsibility to properly support mitigation programs that could reduce the loss of life and property damage caused by the next natural disaster.

nevertheless, this is an important program that needs re-authorization and i today support its passage. i want to thank the members of the science, space and technology committee, including chair smith, ranking member johnson and representative naug bower for their hard work on neugebauer for their important work on this bill. it is nice to see my colleagues here in the house of representatives and over in the senate working in a bipartisan bicameral manner to bring this bill to the floor today. i urge my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to support this bill. and i reserve. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman reserves the balance of his time. the gentleman from texas. mr. smith: i would like to thank the gentleman from new york, mr. tonko, for his comments and supporting this piece of legislation. i now would like to yield as much time as he may consume to the gentleman from texas, and i

want to thank him for sponsoring this piece of legislation and look forward to its passage today and being enacted into law as well. i yield to the gentleman from texas. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from texas is recognized. mr. neugebauer: i thank the chairman and the chairman for his support in this effort as well. i rise in support for my bill, the national windstorm impact reduction act. i want to thank chairman smith and thank senator john thune of the senate committee on commerce and science and transportation who helped this bill through the senate. there are 1,300 recorded tornadoes every year causing deaths and injuries. these storms cost about $400 million in damage each year, but particularly in a bad year like 2011, wind damage from tornadoes and thunderstorms cost more than $28 billion. this is a natural -- natural and

national disaster. when a family loses their home, they have to rebuild their lives. and we can help these families and help save their lives and save their property through the important research that's going on at many universities around the country, including texas tech university. with those families in mind, i introduced this program which helps saves lives and reduce injuries and lessens damage from windstorms. this was mentioned by my colleague from new york, we have found that $1 investments can result in $4 in savings in a disaster response. not only are we investing dollars to make america safer but also saving the taxpayers in the long run. upon passage of this bill, will move to the president's desk to be signed into law and important to get this bill passed as

quickly as we can. windstorms can cause a lot of damage and cause the loss of life. and the more we understand about the dynamics of these windstorms and understanding how they interface with building materials, the safer and better structures that we are able to build and ultimately and in many cases save lives. a lot of important research is going on and what i like about this particular piece of legislation is it brings accountability in making sure we are investing the dollars in the places where we are getting the most bang for the buck for the american taxpayers. t only looking for the taxpayers but the men and women that are affected by these windstorms. i encourage my colleagues to support this legislation and i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from new york. mr. tonko: i have no further request for time. mr. smith: we have no further

speakers. mr. tonko: i'm prepared to close, mr. speaker. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from new york. mr. tonko: we must help our constituents prepare for and mitigate the impacts of windstorms that threaten lives and property. this bill re-authorizes a program that would do just that and i urge its adoption. with that, i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. the gentleman from texas. mr. smith: i have no other requests from members to speak on this legislation. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. the question is will the house suspend the rules and concur in the senate amendment h.r. 23. those in favor say aye. those opposed, no. in the opinion of the chair, 2/3 being in the affirmative, the rules are suspended and the motion to reconsider is laid on the table.

the speaker pro tempore: for what purpose does the gentleman from new york seek recognition? >> i move that the house suspend the rules and concur in the senate amendment to h.r. 720. the speaker pro tempore: the clerk will report the title of the bill. the clerk: an act to improve intergovernmental planning for and communication during security incidents at domestic airports and for other purposes. the speaker pro tempore: pursuant to the rule, the gentleman from new york, mr. katko, and the gentleman from mississippi, mr. thompson each will control 20 minutes. the chair recognizes the gentleman from new york. mr. katko: i ask unanimous consent that all members have five legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and include material on the bill under consideration. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. mr. katko: i yield myself such time as i may consume. i rise today in strong support security 0, the

airport act of 2015. this legislation is a product of a strong bipartisan effort stemming from the fatal shooting at los angeles airport on november 1, 2013. on that day, hernandez was shot and killed by an active shooter, becoming the first employee to be killed in the line of duty. two other security officers and a passenger were injured during the attack. in the wake of that attack, congressman richard hudson was serving as the chairman of the homeland security subcommittee n transportation security. and enhanced the state of airport security across the uents. one of my first acts as chairman of the subcommittee in the 114th congress was to work with mr.

hudson and reintroduce this important legislation and pleased to see it through final passage today. this bill builds on important steps taken by t.s.a. in airports across the country and developed with input from public and private sector partners. the legislation makes important strides in enhancing the level of preparedness of our nation's transportation systems and responding and mitigating security incidents such as active shooters and terror attacks. for example, it requires t.s.a. to verify that airports and high risk surface transportation hubs have plans in place to effectively train for and respond to security incidents when they occur. further, it will ensure that emergency communications equipment is regularly tested and emergency first responders are able to communicate with each other and the public during a major security incident. the legislation also directs t.s.a. to seek ways which

funding in agreements for law enforcement can be increased to provide better support to the critical layer of security they provide. developing this preparedness will go a long way in improving the response to threats of public safety and work to overcome the challenges experienced by law enforcement, emergency first responders, t.s.a. and the public during the l.a.x. shooting. last week, the need for efficient and effective communication was highlighted during a stabbing and shooting incident at union station here in washington, d.c., in which law enforcement from multiple agencies responded to mitigate the situation. we must ensure that our front-line employees and first responders are equipped with the necessary tools and training to respond to these types of incidents in order to protect themselves and the general public. i wish to extend sincere thanks to congressman hudson for his work on the legislation and chairman of the full committee, mr. mccaul, for his support. i would like to thank ranking

member thompson, ranking member rice and co-sponsors in getting this legislation across the finish line and extend gratitude to our colleagues in the senate and chairman thune and ranking member nelson in moving it through the senate. i urge all my colleagues to support the bill and i reserve the balance of my time. . the gentleman from mississippi. >> i rise in strong support of the senate amendment, airport security act of 2015. mr. thompson: and yield myself such time as i may consume. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized. mr. thompson: thank you, mr. speaker. mr. speaker, i rise in strong support of the senate amendment to h.r. 720, a bill that i'm pleased to co-sponsor. the november, 2013, shooting at the los angeles international airport resulted in the death of transportation security gerardo hernandez.

this brought into focus the heroism of those who serve on the front lines of aviation security, transportation security officers. unarmed and exposed, transportation security officers perform the often thankless task of screem screening 1. million -- screening 1.8 million passengers each day, although they have limited workspace protections and are charged with great responsibility. in march of 2014, i traveled with my committee's subcommittee on transportation o conduct a site visit and oversight hearing at los angeles international airport to explore what lessons could be learned from the tragic events of the shooting. through this valuable oversight work, we learned that there were much to be done to address gaps and vulnerabilities within airports. we found that vital equipment such as panic buttons at the

checkpoints were not in working order. we also found that there were other factors that could be bolstered to aid during active shooter situations. such as interoperable communications, so that every emergency responder would have access to realtime information. the legislation under consideration today is a product of a bipartisan effort to remedy many of the deficiencies identified following the shooting. before yielding back i'd like to once again give my condolences to the family of officer hernandez and remind members that under current law t.s.o.'s families do not receive death benefits. currently transportation security officers do not meet the definition for a public safety officer and as a result the families of t.s.o.'s who are killed in the line of duty such as the harunanimous dezz family are not entitled --

hernandez family are not entitled to funds from the public safety officers benefit program. last congress, representative brownley introduced legislation that would grant transportation security officers the benefits of other law enforcement officers that are killed in the line of duty. and plans to re-introduce that legislation honoring our fallen t.s.a. officers act today. i hope my colleagues will join me in supporting this forthcoming legislation so that the families of the men and women on the front lines of protecting our aviation sector are properly compensated if tragedy strikes. with that, mr. speaker, i urge support for the senate amendment to h.r. 720 and reserve the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman reserves the balance of his time. the gentleman from new york. mr. katko: mr. speaker, i yield as much time as he may consume to the distinguished gentleman from north carolina, mr. hudson.

the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from north carolina is recognized. mr. hudson: thank you, mr. speaker. i rise in strong support of h.r. 720, the gerardo hernandez airport security act of 2015. as former chairman of the committee of homeland security subcommittee on transportation security, i introduced this bipartisan bill in the 113th congress to improve the state of preparedness at our nation's airports and in response to the shool -- in response to the shooting at los angeles international airport in november of 2013. i'd like to thank ranking member thompson for working with me in a bipartisan way. we traveled together for the field hearing and the tour of the site. and i think the work that he does in a bipartisan way on this committee is a true testament to what the american people expect us to do here, which is to work together and put the people's business first . it was a pleasure working with the ranking member. i also want to thank chairman mccaul for his strong leadership on this committee. he also worked very closely with me on this legislation and traveled with us that day into

los angeles. so without his support, this would not have been possible. that event which tragedyly took the life of transportation security officer gerardo hernandez and wounded three other people served as an unfortunate wake-up call to the gaps in our security and the relative ease with which someone could wreak havoc on one of our nation's airports. after months and months of careful review and hard work, including the site visit i mentioned to l.a.x., subcommittee found that while state, federal, local law enforcement response to the l.a.x. shooting could be described as nothing but heroic, and was swiftly executed, there was room for improvement in the coordinated response and communication in critical moments after the major security incident. that's where this important bipartisan bill stemmed from. and i know as chairman of the subcommittee, mr. katko has taken our work from last congress, built upon it, he's done the hard work to make sure that it reached the finish line. i take my hat off to chairman

katko for showing great leadership and the kind of fortitude and determination necessary to advance this legislation. to finally get it to the senate and to have the president sign it into law. serving as chairman of the committee is no easy task. but it's one that mr. katko has ac selled at. he's not a-- excelled at. he's not afraid to ask tough questions, he holds folks ktsable and he's worked diligently to improve aviation security in this nation. the bottom line is, while t.s.a.'s taken positive measures to update emergency response protocols since the l.a.x. incident, this bill will help to solidify these changes and ensure our airports are fully prepared to respond to future security incidents and potential acts of terrorism. this bill will provide for more extensive collaboration and coordination between airports, law enforcement, first responders and t.s.a., which will result in safer airports across the country. it's a necessary step toward countering the threats facing

our nation's airports without placing an undue burden on airport operators, law enforcement and the taxpayers. the shooting at l.a.x. was a tragedy that will never be forgotten by those affected and those of us who are committed to protecting the traveling public. my thoughts today and my prayers continue to be with the family of officer harunanimous dezz. i hope they're watch -- hernandez. i hope they're watching today and they're proud of the work of this congress. i want to thank again chairman katko for his work to keep the traveling public safe and applaud his him for stepping up on such an -- him for stepping up on such an important issue and making sure this legislation reaches the president's desk. i urge my colleagues to honor the memory of security officer hernandez and support this legislation. with that, mr. speaker, i yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from mississippi. mr. thompson: mr. speaker, i have no further requests for time and i'll reserve and i am prepared to close. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from new york. mr. katko: mr. speaker, i have no more speakers and if the

gentleman from mississippi has no more speakers, i'm prepared to close once he does. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from mississippi. mr. thompson: thank you, mr. speaker. mr. speaker, in closing, i'd like to thank subcommittee chairman katko and ranking member rice for their efforts on this legislation. through our votes today we are honoring the life of officer hernandez and ensuring that transportation security officers, airport workers and members of the flying public are more safe and secure. with that, mr. speaker, i once again urge my colleagues to support the senate amendment to this bill, as well as honoring our fallen t.s.a. officers act and yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. the gentleman from new york. mr. katko: mr. speaker, i yield myself such time as i may consume. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized. mr. katko: mr. speaker, i once again urge my colleagues to support h.r. 720. the tragic event that unfolded at l.a.x. in november of 2013 was a stark reminder that much

remains to be done in securing america's transit hubs. particularly the nonster ilor nonsecure areas of --ster -- nonsterile or nonsecure areas. we must ensure that airport communities are prepared to respond swiftly to any major security incidents that threaten the safety of the traveling public. in remembrance of t.s.o. officer hernandez, i urge my colleagues to pass this important legislation. before i close, mr. speaker, i do want to recognize and echo the sentiments of my colleague, mr. hudson, with respect to the gentleman from mississippi, mr. thompson. he set a tone of bipartisanship in the committee and because of that, in the committee itself, on homeland security, as well as the subcommittee, much good work is being done and many bills are being passed. i appreciate and acknowledge the bipartisanship because it's important, it's an art that's all too lost in this congress sometimes and we're doing well with it in our committee. with that i yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. the question is, will the house suspend the rules and concur in

the senate amendment to h.r. 720. those in favor say aye. those opposed, no. in the opinion of the chair, 2/3 of those voting having responded in the affirmative, the rules are suspended, the senate amendment is agreed to and, without objection, the motion to reconsider is laid on the table.

the speaker pro tempore: for what purpose does the gentleman from california seek recognition? >> mr. speaker, i move to suspend the rules and pass h.r. 487. the speaker pro tempore: the clerk will report the title of the bill. the clerk: union calendar number 189, h.r. 487, a bill to allow the miami tribe of oklahoma to lease or transfer certain lands. the speaker pro tempore: pursuant to the rule, the gentleman from california, mr. mcclintock, and the gentlewoman from michigan, mrs. dingell, each will control 20 minutes. the chair recognizes the gentleman from california. mr. mcclintock: thank you, mr. speaker. i ask unanimous consent that all members may have five legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous materials on the bill under consideration. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. mr. mcclintock: mr. speaker, i yield myself such time as i may consume. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized. mr. mcclintock: mr. speaker,

h.r. 487 is a noncontroversial one-page bill that would exempt lands held in fee by the miami tribe of oklahoma from the limitations imposed by the indian nonintercourse act. according to the tribe, these limitations may hinder economic development. specifically, h.r. 487 would allow the tribe to lease, sell, convey, warrant or transfer all or any portion of interest in any real property not held in trust for the tribe. the bill also states that the legislation does not authorize the tribe to lease, sell, convey, warrant or otherwise transfer all or any portion of any interest in any real property that is held in trust. in accordance with the expressed wishes of the tribe's leadership, congressman mullin who represents the tribe in the house sponsored h.r. 487, the department of interior supports the bill, which passed the natural resource committee by unanimous consent earlier this year, i want to commend my colleague from oklahoma for his

hard work and i urge my colleagues to pass the bill. i reserve the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman reserves the balance of his time. the gentlewoman from michigan. mrs. dingell: mr. speaker, i yield myself such time as i may consume. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlewoman is recognized. mrs. dingell: thank you, mr. speaker. for the recognition. h.r. 487 will allow the miami tribe of oklahoma to effectively manage their nontrust lands by providing relief from the indian nonintercourse act. the indian nonintercourse act was intended to protect indian tribes by preventing the loss of their lands except by treaty. historically, the act has generally not interfered with the tribe's ability to buy, sell or lease land that it owns in -- owns. but uncertainties raised by the act can be a hindrance when considering purchase agreements from outside parties. therefore, relief from the act is at times necessary for a tribe to successfully manage their lands and to sell fee

parcels that are determined to be in excess of the tribe's needs or were purchased for investment purposes. h.r. 487 would simply allow the miami tribe to convey all the land that the tribe holds in fee simple without further federal approval to facilitate those future transactions. i agree with the goals of this legislation and ask my colleagues to support it. mr. speaker, i reserve the balance of my time. . the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from california. mr. mcclintock: i'm pleased to yield to the author of this measure, the gentleman from oklahoma. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized. mr. mullin: thank you, mr. chairman and thank you for allowing us to bring this to the floor. this is one of those bills that unfornlt requires congress to act and several tribes before us obtained legislation like this

from congress to authorize or sell or mortgage specific lands. lands we are talking about isn't needed anymore. it's outside of the trust. but in order for the tribes such as the miami and other tribes that are out there, to effectively manage their lands, congress is required to act as my daughter has climbed up beside me and it's her birthday. i thank chairman bishop and young and i urge the support for the passage of this bill and i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. the gentlewoman from michigan. mrs. dingell: i thank mr. mullin for his leadership and wish his daughter happy birthday and i urge all members to support h.r. 487 and i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. the gentleman from california. mr. mcclintock: i urge adoption of the measure and i yield bark. the speaker pro tempore: the question is will the house suspend the rules and the bill

h.r. 487. those in favor say aye. those opposed, no. in the opinion of the chair 2/3 being in the affirmative, the rules are suspended, the bill is passed and without objection. the bill is laid on the table. mr. mcclintock: i move to suspend the rules and pass h.r. 959 as amended. the clerk: h.r. 959, a bill to authorize the secretary of the interior to conduct a special resource study of the medgar evers house located in jackson, mississippi, and for other purposes. the speaker pro tempore: pursuant to the rule the gentleman from california, mr. mcclintock and the gentlewoman from michigan, each will be recognized for 20 minutes. mr. mcclintock: i ask unanimous consent that all members have five legislative days to include remarks on the bill under consideration. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. mr. mcclintock: i yield myself such time as i may consume. h.r. 959 authorizes a special

resource study to be conducted by the department of the interior on the home of the late civil rights activist medgar evers. this is to determine the national significance of the home and feasibility of designating the site as a unit of the national park service. the national park service doesn't have any objections to this bill and it was reported out of the natural resources committee by unanimous consent. once the results of the study are available, congress would have to create a new unit of the national park service. and i reserve. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman reserves the balance of his time. the the gentlewoman from michigan. mrs. dingell: i yield myself such time as i my consume. i thank the speaker for his recognition. years ago, on un12, 1963, medgar evers, a native of mississippi and the first field officer in that state for the national association for the advancement of colored people which is the naacp was shot in

the driveway of his home in jackson, mississippi. this horrific event occurred hours after president kennedy made a speech in support of civil rights. this was a critical moment in the modern civil rights movement as it moved towards the march on the washington march for jobs and freedom. evers was a world war ii veteran, fighting in the battle of normandy and returned home to find his path to the voting booth blocked at gunpoint. he fought to integrate the mississippi law school and assisted james meredith to enroll as an undergrauth. he was an activist, an organizer, a loving father, a husband and timely a martyr. he is a true american hero whose

time came too soon, yet his name and what he stood for continues to inspire so many. it is time that his service and loss be properly recognized by our nation. h.r. 959, the medgar evers house study act would authorize the secretary of the interior to conduct a special resource study of the medgar evers house in jackson, mississippi, for potential inclusion in the national park system. we estimate that this study will st approximately $200,000 to $300,000. funding would need to be allocated from the set amount of funding that congress properties for all special resource studies. i want to thank my friend and colleague, congressman thompson of mississippi for his very hard work on this legislation. and his leadership on this critical issue. the medgar evers house is a

piece of american history that must be preserved, which is why this legislation is so important. i urge my colleagues to support the adoption of h.r. 959. and reserve the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlelady reserves. the gentleman from california. mr. mcclintock: i reserve. mrs. dingell: i yield to mr. thompson as much time as he may consume. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized. mr. thompson: thank you very much plrks speaker. and i thank the gentlewoman from michigan for yielding me the necessary time. mr. speaker, i rise today to urge our colleagues to support h.r. 959, the medgar evers house study act. medgar evers was born in a small town of decatur, mississippi, in 1925. medgar would go on to serve in our country's army in france and germany during world war ii. after his military service,

medgar attended a state university college where he would meet his future wife. after graduating, he devoted his life to seek justice and equality for all americans of the as field secretary for the naacp in mississippi, mr. evers led successful voting registration efforts throughout the state. he applied for admission to the university of mississippi law school in an unsuccessful effort to desegregate the university. medgar courageously led investigations into the deaths after his al imprisonment on erroneous charges stemming from his efforts to integrate the university of southern mississippi. on june 12, 1963, as he returned home from a planning meeting, medgar was shot in the back in the driveway of his home while

his family was inside the house. he died at a local hospital less than an hour later. one week after his death, he was buried with full military honors at arlington national cemetery. today, the medgar evers house has been preserved as a museum by two colleagues. the home has been refurbished to appear as it did at the time of his death. it contains an exhibit regarding his family, career, death and his legacy. the home has hosted scores of visitors including many members of congress, who participated in the faith and politics pilgrimage throughout the south. my bill, h.r. 959, the medgar fers house study act authorizes a special resource study by the secretary of the interior on the home in which he lived and medgar evers died and was

assassinated located in jackson, mississippi. the study will determine the national significance of evers' home and determine the feasibility of designating the site as a unit of the national park system. mr. speaker, medgar evers was a civil rights giant. he dedicated his life to bringing down the pillars that maintained jim crow in mississippi. the heroic life he lived and the remarkable legacy that he left are unquestioned. today's bill will further cement the role that he played in advancing civil and human rights in our nation. with that, i urge you and my colleagues to join me in supporting h.r. 959. and i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from california. mr. mcclintock: i'm ready to close when the gentlelady from

michigan is. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlelady from michigan. mrs. dingell: i urge all members to support h.r. 959 and yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlelady yields back. the gentleman from california. mr. mcclintock: medgar evers was a patriot and a civil rights leader who gave his life to realize the full promise of the american declaration of independence. his memory is revered by every american who lived through those years. it is for us to preserve his memory with the many generation of americans to follow who will have to look to history to know him. this bill is a step towards recognizing the debt our nation owes him and ensure that future generations can draw inspiration from his patriotism, his courage and sacrifice that he made in the cause of freedom. i yield back. the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. will the house suspend the rules and pass the bill h.r. 959.

those in favor say aye. those opposed, no. in the opinion of the chair, 2/3 being in the affirmative, the rules are suspended and the bill is passed and without objection, the the motion to reconsider is laid on the table. for what purpose does the gentleman from california seek recognition? mr. mcclintock: i move to suspend the rules and pass h.r. 1214 as amended. the clerk: h.r. 1214, a bill to amend the small tracts act to expand the authority of the secretary of agriculture to sell or exchange small parcels of national forest system land to enhance the management of the national forest system, to resolve minor encroachments and for other purposes. the speaker pro tempore: pursuant to the rule, the gentleman from california and the gentleman from michigan each will control 20 minutes. mr. mcclintock: i ask unanimous consent that all members may have five legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous materials on the bill under consideration. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. mr. mcclintock: h.r. 1214 would

amend the small tracts act to allow for the small isolated federally owned parcels outside of the main body of the national forests and parcels encumbered with special uses. the management of these parcels takes considerable resources away from the core mission of the forest service. proceeds from the sale of these parcels would be depositted into a fund and may be used for deferred maintenance, acquisition of lands or recreational access or reimburse the forest service for administrative costs. the u.s. forest service has a challenging mission. enabling it to develop a more manageable land base is simply good government, which is why this bill has broad-waste based support. i thank chairman conaway in his assistance and include in the record our exchange of letters. and i reserve.

the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman reserves the balance of his time. the gentlewoman from michigan. mrs. dingell: i yield myself such time as i may consume. i thank the speaker for his recognition. h.r. 1214 amends the small tracts act to provide the forest service with more flexibility to sell or exchange small parcels of national forest land. this increased flexibility will allow the forest service to identify opportunities where the sale or exchange of small parcels of land will increase sufficiency and improve the integrity and health of our national forests. i thank the sponsor of this legislation for working with the forest service to update this bill so it could be supported by both sides of the aisle. i support adoption of h.r. 1214. and with that, iry reserve. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlewoman reserves. the gentleman from california. mr. mcclintock: i yield such time as he may consume to my good friend and nevada neighbor,

congressman amodei. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized. mr. amodei: thank you, mr. speaker and thank you ranking member, and i want to thank the chairman of the whole committee as well as my co-sponsors in this measure, mr. polis from colorado, mr. shimkus from illinois and mr. jones from north carolina. so as not to risk matching the jaws of victory, i will be brief. i would like to say this was my idea but this represents taking care of business that has been knocking around for more than a decade or more. we are not moving the frontier into national forests but to dispose of those lands that have become not attached to the national forests and have no management for land use characteristics with with respect to the managing of the national forests. so therefore, the other thing i want to point out is, it will allow them the ability to

dispose of well into six figures worth of acres potentially in the next few years, as opposed to last year. the resources generated by this will stay with the forest service for use under their various charges as opposed to disappearing into that sometimes black hole in space sometimes referred to as the united states treasury. i urge nationwide bipartisan support and i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. the gentlewoman from from michigan. mrs. dingell: i urge members to support this bill. and i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from california. mr. mcclintock: i i urge adoption of the bill and i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the question is will the house suspend the bills and pass the bill h.r. 1214 as amended. those in favor say aye. those opposed, no. in the opinion of the chair, 2/3 being in the affirmative -- the gentleman from california. mr. mcclintock: i ask for the yeas and nays. the speaker pro tempore: the yeas and nays are requested.

all those in favor of taking the vote will remain standing until counted. a sufficient number having arisen, yeas and nays are ordered. pursuant to clause 8, rule 20, further proceedings on this question will be postponed. for what purpose does the gentleman from california seek recognition? . . the clerk: union calendar number 160, l.r. 1289, a bill to authorize the secretary of the interior to require approximately 44 acres of land in martinez, california, and for other purposes. the speaker pro tempore: pursuant to the rule, each member will control 20 minutes. the chair recognizes the gentleman from california. mr. mcclintock: thank you, mr. speaker. i'd ask unanimous consent that all members have five legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous materials on the bill under consideration. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. mr. mcclintock: i yield myself such time as i may consume. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized. mr. mcclintock: mr. speaker, h.r. 1289 would expand the john muir national historic site by approximately 44 acres.

this expansion may only occur by donation of the land. located in the san francisco bay area in martinez, california, this site preserves the 14-room italian victorian manony john muir lived, as well as a 325-acre tract of native oak woodlands and grasslands owned by the muir family. the additional proposed ac rage in this bill is -- acreage in this bill is directly adjacent to the current site and will allow for better access to trails in this area. this has been donated to the national park service and will not be acquired with any federal dollars. this bill passed out of committee by unanimous consent and the previous version passed the house during the 113th congress. i'd urge my colleagues to vote in favor of the bill and i'll reserve the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman reserves the balance of his time. the gentlewoman from michigan. mrs. dingell: mr. speaker, i yield myself such time as i may consume. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlewoman is recognized. mrs. dingell: thank you, mr. speaker, for the recognition. h.r. 1289 will authorize the national park service to expand the boundary of the john muir

national hiser to -- historical site and acquire by donation 44 acres of land from the muir heritage land trust. the donation will expand the site and help carry on muir's important legacy of conservation and environmental stewardship. john muir's one of our nation's most respected and revered ecoologists. his writers have inspired millions and his activism and advocacy led to the establishment of some of our first and most iconic national parks. from the moment he set foot in yosemite valley, john muir was consumed with its natural wonder and beauty. he became yosemite's most vocal champion. and he didn't -- but he didn't spend his whole life there. from 1890 until his death in 1914, muir lived on a farm not far from san francisco. it was from this corner of the bay area that muir co-founded the sierra club and helped lay the groundwork for a century of

conservation. muir's tireless advocacy led to the creation of yosemite and is a i couldia national parks and his spirit and enduring legacy led to the protection of much more. since he's known by some as the father of our national parks, i know he would be proud of all of our national parks today, especially as we are approaching the00th anniversary of the national park -- the hundredth anniversary of the national park system. my home state of michigan has several beautiful national parks include the sleeping bear dunes, national lake shore, isle royal and the river basin national battlefield. passage of h.r. 1289 will contribute to john muir's legacy and it will help to protect and conserve the place where he found solace and inspiration in his later years. i want to thank the bill's sponsor, my good friend, , presentive mark desaulnier

for his leadership and urge swift passage of to this legislation. with that i reserve the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlewoman reserves the balance of her time. the gentleman from california. mr. mcclintock: i continue to reserve. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman reserves the balance of his time. the gentlewoman from michigan. mrs. dingell: i now yield to the gentleman from michigan. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from california is recognized. mr. desauliner: thank you, mr. speaker. i want to thank the gentlelady for yielding and her kind comments. i also want to say what a pleasure it is to be here on the house floor, to continue to honor and respect a great american and a great californian, his adopted state. today i rise in support of h.r. 1289, the john muir national historic site expansion act. this bipartisan legislation will expand the martinez, california, historic site in my district that celebrates the life and legacy of john muir. muir was a life long conservationist, leading advocate of the national park service and a co-founder of the sierra club. he worked to establish and protect national parks,

including yosemite, saquoia, the grand canyon and mount rainier. the historic site, which includes the home where he where covers 330 acres muir championed the revolutionary idea that wild spaces should be set aside for all americans to enjoy. this bill would add 44 acres of donated land from a nonprofit trust, improving access to the park and its scenic trails, including those of mount wanda, named after muir's eldest daughter. the trail's systems are accessible for hikers and bikers, including critical connections to the 550-mile bay area ridge trail. as muir once said, every american needs beauty as well as bread. places to live in, where nature may heal and cheer and give enough strength to body and soul alike. mr. speaker, i want to thank my

predecessor, congressman george miller, who's been a champion of this bill and introduced it in an earlier session. i'd also like to thank natural resources committee chair bishop, the ranking member grijalva, as well as subcommittee chairman mcclintock, and ranking member tsongas. for their leadership in bringing h.r. 1289 to the floor today. i'm also grateful for the support of 31 of my colleagues from both sides of the aisle who co-sponsored the bill, as well as senators boxer and feinstein for sponsoring this legislation in the senate. i'd also like to thank the john muir land trust for its hard work and dedication to preserving and protecting this valuable park land and shore line in the bay area for future generations. as our nation prepares to celebrate the centennial of the national park service, this legislation will help preserve the trails and lands that surround the long time home of the man known as the father of the national park service. i urge my colleagues to vote

yes on this bipartisan legislation, the john muir national historic site expansion act. thank you, mr. speaker, i yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. the gentleman from california. mr. mcclintock: mr. speaker, i'm ready to close when the gentlelady from michigan is. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlewoman from michigan. mrs. dingell: i urge all member to support this bill and yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. the gentleman from california. mr. mcclintock: mr. speaker, my district comprises the sierra nevada and we are daily reminded of the foresite of pioneers like john muir who worked to set aside these natural assets for, in the words of the original yosemite charter, the public's use, resort and recreation for all time. keeping their memory fresh is an important objective and i would urge adoption of the legislation. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. the question is, will the house suspend the rules and pass the bill h.r. 1289 as amended. those in favor say aye. those opposed, no. in the opinion.

chair, 2/3 of those voting having responded in the affirmative, -- in the opinion of the chair, 2/3 of those voting having responded in the affirmative, the rules is suspends, the bill is passed and without objection the motion to reconsider is laid on the table. for what purpose does the gentleman from california seek recognition? mr. mcclintock: mr. speaker, i move to suspend the rules and pass h.r. 1554. the speaker pro tempore: the clerk will report the title of the bill. the clerk: union calendar number 195, h.r. 1554, a bill to require a land conveyance involving the elkhorn ranch and the white river national forest in the state of colorado and for other purposes. the speaker pro tempore: pursuant to the rule, the gentleman from california and the gentlewoman from michigan each will control 20 minutes. the chair recognizes the gentleman from california. mr. mcclintock: thank you, mr. speaker. i'd ask unanimous consent that all members may have five legislative days to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous materials on the bill under consideration. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. mr. mcclintock: i yield myself such time as i may consume. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized. mr. mcclintock: mr. speaker, h.r. 1554 introduced by my friend, congressman scott tipton of california, would require the u.s. -- colorado, would require the u.s. forest service to convey by patent a small area of land near rifle, colorado, to its rightful

owner. conflicting surveys between federal agencies resulted in the inclusion of this land in the white river national forest, even though it was originally patented in the early 20th century and legally owned by private landowners for decades. these landowners paid property taxes on the acreage and used it for a variety of purposes, including agriculture and grazing. earlier this year, the forest service testified that the bill would, quote, resolve a long standing title issue associated with the property, unquote, and is recommended that the area be, quote, confirmed in the successors in interest to the rorge patentees. the bill is supported by garfield county, colorado, the city of rifle, colorado, and many others. congressman tipton has worked hard to correct this survey discrepancy and return this land to its rightful owner. i'd encourage my colleagues to vote yes on h.r. 1554 and reserve the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman reserves the balance of his time. the gentlewoman from michigan.

mrs. dingell: mr. speaker, i yield myself such time as i may consume. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlewoman is recognized. mrs. dingell: thank you, mr. speaker. h.r. 1554 could will convey 148 acres of land to the partnership. a colorado limited liability partnership and remedy a land dispute between a private landowner and the forest service. in 1947, an administrative error occurred that shifted the boundary between the elkhorn ranch and the white river national forest. this survey placed 148 acres of private land inside the forest boundary without providing consideration to the land holders. since then, the title to the ranch has changed hands several times, but the administrative errors has not been corrected -- error has not been corrected this bill will correct the error and acknowledge the correct boundary of the elkhorn ranch, providing the current owner with a clear and free title. i want to thank my colleagues, congressman polis, congressman tipton, for their good work on

this legislation. the forest service testified and supported this bill and we urge its adoption. i reserve the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlewoman reserves the balance of her time. the gentleman from california. mr. mcclintock: thank you, mr. speaker. i'm pleased to yield what time he may consume to my friend from colorado, mr. tipton, who has worked tirelessly to correct this administrative error. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlewoman from colorado is recognized for such time as he may consume. mr. tipton: thank you, mr. chairman. i'd also like to thank the ranking member for their support on this legislation. h.r. 1554 is a straightforward bill which congressman polis and i introduced to reconfirm the private ownership of 140 acres of land in my congressional district. the lands concerned were patented into two private ownership via the united states land patents, issued in 1914 and 1917 and 1957. but their ownership has come into question by virtue of the 1949 government survey which showed them to be national forest land rather than private

land. long held u.s. law specifically states that a government resurvey cannot take away private property or private property rights. mr. chairman, the forest service and the private landowners of the elkhorn ranch only became aware of the potential title issue in the early 2000's and thereafter the forest service conducted a lengthy and thorough review of the matter. upon completion of the review, both the supervisor and surveyer of the white river national forest concluded that the ownership of the 140 acres should be confirmed in the successors and interest to the original patentees. namely the elkhorn ranch. in reaching this conclusion, the forest service noted that the land has never been managed by the national forest land and deed it's been fenced and occupied with ponds, springs, roads and other private improvements and has been used as private land for ranching and agriculture for the better part of the past 100 years. mr. chairman, this bill is a simple matter of fairness and equity to a private landowner, to honor government land patents that were granted to

the landowner's predecessors 60 to 100 years ago. the bill is supported by both the surveyer and supervisor of the white river national forest, the garfield county surveyer, county commissioner, city of rifle, 20 of colorado's counties, and energy which has the lease on part of the area. in addition at our hearing on h.r. 1554 in june, the administration testified that this bill is a practical and workable way to address the long standing title issue. mr. chairman, that concludes my remarks and i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. the gentlewoman from michigan. mrs. dingell: mr. speaker, i urge all members to support this bill and yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlewoman yields back the balance of her time. the gentleman from california. mr. mcclintock: thank you, mr. speaker. i join the gentlelady in requesting the adoption of this bill and yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. the question is to will the house suspend the rules and pass the bill, h.r. 1554. those in favor say aye. those opposed, no. in the opinion of the chair,

2/3 of those voting having responded in the affirmative, the rules are suspended, the bill is passed and, without objection, the motion to reconsider is laid upon the table. for what purpose does the gentleman from california seek recognition? mr. mcclintock: mr. speaker, i move to suspend the rules and pass h.r. 1949 as amended. the speaker pro tempore: the clerk will report the title of the bill. the clerk: h.r. 1949, a bill to provide for the consideration and submission of site and design proposals for the national liberty memorial improved for establishment and the -- in the district of columbia. the speaker pro tempore: pursuant to the rule, the gentleman from california and the gentlewoman from michigan each will control 20 minutes. the chair recognizes the gentleman from california. mr. mcclintock: i ask members have five legislative days to include extraneous material on the bill under consideration. mr. speaker, h.r. 1949 would transfer the responsibilities regarding the construction of the national liberty memorial that honors the slaves and free men of african descent to the

secretary of agriculture. the proposed site for the memorial is on department of agriculture lands so this change makes sense. either the secretary of the interior or the general services administrator would otherwise be responsible. as a co-sponsor of this bill which passed out of committee by unanimous consent, i ask the colleagues to vote in favor of passage. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlewoman from michigan is recognized. mrs. dingell: the public law authorized the establishment of a fund to create the national liberty memorial dedicated to the honor and sacrifice of more than 5,000 enslaved and free black people who served as sailors or soldiers or provided assistance during the revolutionary war. this is a long overdue memorial which recognizes the early

military role that black people played in securing our nation's freedom. in june, 2014, the general services administration identified the location at the memorial at 14th and independence avenue southwest here in washington, d.c.,. the approved site is on the grounds of the department of agriculture campus. in the interest of eliminating unnecessary bureaucracy through overlapping jurisdictions, h.r. 1949 would make the department of agriculture responsible for the consideration of the site and design proposal,, doing so on behalf of the commission of fine arts and national capitol planning commission. this responsibility would be transferred from the g.s.a. or the department of interior as it was originally written. i want to thank my good friend and colleague, the chairman of the congressional black caucus, congressman butterfield of north carolina, for his years of hard

work and leadership in establishing the national liberty memorial. we are all looking forward to seeing it open some time in the future and will be a fitting tribute to those who sacrificed so much to create this great nation of ours. i ask all of my colleagues to support h.r. 1949, and i reserve the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from california. mr. mcclintock: i'm ready to close when the gentlelady concludes. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlewoman from michigan. mrs. dingell: i yield to mr. butterfield. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized for such time as he may consume. mr. butterfield: thank you for yielding time and thank you for those kind words a moment ago and thank you for your leadership here in the congress. i rise in support of my bill h.r. 1949, the national liberty memorial clarification act of 2015. i was joined by my colleague, congressman mcclintock from

california who serves as the chairman of the committee on natural resources subcommittee on federal lands. i'm grateful that chairman's mcclintock's early and sustained support for this bill and i appreciate he moving it expeditiously to the floor for consideration. the national liberty memorial which i have long supported, seeks to honor the more than 5,000 slaves and free persons of color, who fought for independence during the american revolution. the memorial will ultimately be constructed near the national mall in what is known as area one. pursuant to house joint resolution 120, my resolution that was signed into law by president obama last year. the preferred site location for the memorial is at the department of agriculture where both memorial's private sponsor and usda want it to be

constructed. under current law, the g.s.a., government services administration is charged with, among other things, site and design proposals and their submission to the appropriate planning commissions. however because the preferred site is physically located on property occupied by the department of agriculture, my bill will simply transfer site and design responsibilities to the secretary of agriculture. the memorial's sponsor and usda both believe that the secretary of agriculture is in the best position to move this important memorial project forward. doing so will allow the memorial's sponsor and usda to make progress on a design and construction plan. this simple change, mr. speaker, will eliminate duplication. better use of scarce federal resources and avoid unnecessary delay. seeing this important and significant memorial to fruition

is of great importance to me and great importance to the congressional black caucus and important po the constituents i represent in north carolina and descendants of the brave revolutionary war soldiers who sacrificed so much on behalf of american independence. i urge my colleagues to signal their support for h.r. 1949, similar by voting yes on final passage. and i thank you very much. i yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from california. mr. mcclintock: continue to reserve. the speaker pro tempore: the the gentlewoman from michigan. mrs. dingell: we urge members to support this bill and i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlewoman yields back. the gentleman from california. mr. mcclintock: the national liberty memorial reminds us of a story of patriotism and sacrifice that won the independence of our country and set in motion the last best hope. it is a story from the american

revolution that to this day has not been adequately acknowledged. i'm pleased to commend mr. butterfield for his legislation to have joined as a co-sponsor of it and urge the house its speedy adoption. with that, i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the question is will the house suspend the rules and pass the bill h.r. 1949 as amended. those in favor say aye. those opposed, no. in the opinion of the chair 2/3 being in the affirmative, the rules are suspended. mr. mcclintock: mr. speaker, on that i ask for the yeas and nays. the speaker pro tempore: the yeas and nays are requested. those in favor of taking this vote by the yeas and nays will stand and remain standing until counted. for what purpose does the gentleman from california seek recognition? mr. mcclintock: i move to suspend the rules and pass h.r. 2791. the clerk: union calendar number 193 h.r. 2791 a bill to require

certain federal lands be held in trust by the united states for the benefit of indian tribes and oregon. the speaker pro tempore: pursuant to the rule, the gentleman from california and the gentlewoman from michigan each will be recognized for 20 minutes. mr. mcclintock: i ask members be recognized for have five legislative days to include extraneous material on the bill under consideration. i would like to acknowledge the gentleman from oregon, mr. defazio and mr. walden, for their hard work on this important piece of legislation that will benefit several indian tribes in the state of oregon. h.r. 2791 is a compilation of three standalone bills that were reported out by the natural resources committee and passed by the full house during the 113th congress. and since i have every confidence that mr. defazio will describe the bill in detail, i will reserve.

the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman reserves the balance of his time. the gentlewoman from michigan. mrs. dingell: i yield myself such time as i may consume. thank you, mr. speaker. h.r. 2791 is the culmination of years of work to address the wrongs of the past. the termination area in federal indian policy is one of the darkest chap terse in american history. in oregon, all but one of the tribes lost their recognition. the federal government saw the error of their ways and restored the recognition of the tribes but now left with inadequate land bases. h.r. 2791, the western oregon tribal fairness act will go a long way in helping re-establish long established land bases for the oregon tribes and giving them the ability to effectively manage their land on their own terms. like my colleague, i want to thank my colleagues mr. defazio and mr. walden for listening to

the needs of the oregon tribal people and pushing for this bipartisan legislation. all the sections passed the house by voice vote last congress and i urge my colleagues to do the same now. i reserve. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlelady reserves. the gentleman from california. the gentleman from california reserves. mrs. dingell: i yield to mr. defazio as much time as he may consume. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized. mr. defazio: i thank the gentlelady for the kind words and yielding the time here on the floor and i thank chairman of the federal lands subcommittee and his words of support also. and thank the committee for sending this bill to the floor. the western oregon tribal fairness act is a bipartisan, no cost, commonsense bill that will go a long way toward helping resolve some of the government and its policy shifts have

created for three western oregon tribes. provides fairness for three tribes. the bill contains the text of provisions within h.r. 5701 which passed unanimously last december, but was not enacted into law. for too long, federal policies have unfairly disadvantaged indian tribes in western oregon. after signing many treaties with the tribes, the united states put them on two reservations, established to house potentially more than 60 tribal governments. 1954, congress made things worse. all tribes west of the cascades lost federal recognition when the western oregon termination act became law. scholars called it the termination era. it was terrible, terrible federal indian policy. it was so bad that it was

rebuicked by congress less than 30 years later. in the 1970's, congress began the process of restoring the western oregon tribes to federal recognition, cleaning up the mess that the united states made. i began my congressional career as an orange co-sponsor on legislation to restore one of oregon's terminated tribes. yet today, it remains difficult for these tribes to function as the sovereign nations they are and govern themselves effectively. unlike many tribes, the three tribes are deprived of any land held in trust. unlike any other tribe in the united states, one tribe must function under a legal anomaly with regard to its own forests. the western oregon tribal fairness act makes good on a decades'-old promise to put the forest on an equal footing with

those of other indian tribes nationwide. h.r. 2791 deals only with oregon issues, oregon tribes and oregon constituents. i strongly encourage my colleagues to support the bill and i yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. the gentleman from california. mr. mcclintock: i continue to reserve. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlewoman from michigan. mrs. dingell: i urge all members to join us in supporting this bill and yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlewoman yields back. the gentleman from california. mr. mcclintock: my complete faith in mr. defazio's powers of description was well placed and endorse his remarks and ask for adoption of the measure. yield back. the speaker pro tempore: the question is will the house suspend the rules and pass the bill h.r. 2791. those in favor say aye. those opposed, no. in the opinion of the chair, 2/3 being in the affirmative, the rules are suspended and without objection the bill is passed and the motion to reconsider is laid on the table. mr. mcclintock: i move to suspend the rules and pass s.

501. the clerk: an act to neighboring corrections to the settlement in the state of new mexico. the speaker pro tempore: pursuant to the rule, the gentleman from california and the gentlewoman from michigan each will control 20 minutes. the chair recognizes the gentleman from california. mr. mcclintock: i ask unanimous consent that members have five legislative days to include extraneous materials on the bill under consideration. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. mr. mcclintock: yield myself such time as i may consume. mr. mcclintock: s. 501 makes a number of small changes to a federal law in packing the navajo's water projects in new mexico. the bill fix hes errors to help expedite the water infrastructure projects. i urge my colleagues to support this noncontroversial bill and i reserve. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlewoman from michigan. mrs. dingell: i yield myself such time as i may consume.

. 501 would make technical technical changes to the gallup water project which was authorized by congress in 2009. the legislation will help provide a reliable water supply to tribal communities on a faster time line and promote economic growth in northwestern new mexico. this legislation has the administration support and has already passed the senate by unanimous consent. i want to thank my friend and colleague, congressman lieu han lujan of co, the -- knew mexico. i fully support s. 501 and urge its adoption by my colleagues and i reserve. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from california. mr. mcclintock: i'm ready to conclude. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlewoman from michigan.

the speaker pro tempore: for what purpose does the gentleman from california seek recognition? mr. mcclintock: move to suspend the rules and pass s. 230. the clerk: senate 230 to provide the conveyance of certain property health corporation located in alaska. the speaker pro tempore: pursuant to the rule the gentleman from california and the gentlewoman from michigan each will control 20 minutes. . mr. mcclintock: mr. speaker, i yield myself such time as i may consume. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized. mr. mcclintock: i'd like to acknowledge the gentleman from alaska, mr. young on indian insular and alaskan native

affairs for his sponsor of the house companion to this bill h.r. 521. this bill was favorably reported from the natural resources committee by unanimous consent in july of this year. the senate version, s. 230, sponsored by senator murkowski, is before us today. the bill directs the secretary of health and human services to convey by warranty deed a 23-acre parcel of federal land under the administration of the indian health service and located in bethel, alaska, to the union calendar union calendar -- to the yukon kuskokwim health services. the ykhc is a nonprofit alaskan native organization which operates a regional hospital on the 23 acres of the federal land conveyed under this bill. in recent years the hospital's had a need to expand and renovate the existing facilities in this location. to secure funding for the hospital expansion, the ykhc must demonstrate sufficient

site control. because the surrounding land is federally owned, this bill is necessary to provide the health corporation the site control necessary to improve its facilities. congress' enacted two similar bills in the last several congresses, and like those, this bill is supported by the entire alaska delegation and by the administration. i again want to commend my lleague from -- to support this bill and i yield back the alance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlewoman from michigan is recognized. mrs. dingell: s. 230, as my colleague has so eloquently stated, will provide for the conveyance to the ykhc located in bethel, alaska, for the purposes of constructing a primary care clinic attached to the existing hospital. this bill is identical to h.r. 521, introduced by our colleague and my very dear and good friend, chairman don

young, which we passed by unanimous consent out of the committee on natural resources. the land transfer is needed so that the ykhc might participate in the indian health service joint venture construction project. access to quality health care is a fundamental part of our trust responsibility to tribal members. and passage of this bill will ensure that the ykhc can meet the current and future needs of its residents. i urge my colleagues to support passage of s. 230 and reserve the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlewoman reserves the balance of her time. the gentleman from california. mr. mcclintock: mr. speaker, we've been pleased to be joined by the entire alaska delegation, and i'm pleased to yield to that legendary force of alaskan nature, mr. young, such time as he may consume. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman is recognized for such time as he may consume. mr. young: i ask unanimous consent to revise and extend. the speaker pro tempore: without objection. mr. young: i do thank the chairman and i do thank the ranking member for their

comments. much has been said about this fine piece of legislation. as was mentioned, it's passed the house twice. the senate finally passed it and now we're dealing with the senate bill. as was mentioned, this gives an opportunity to the ykhc, a native hospital to expand on federal lands. ownership of the land now, there will be no cloud on that title. i do appreciate the comments. i do appreciate the work has been put into this and this is a bill that should have been signed into law a lot sooner. it will be done now and we'll be take and expand this hospital for my alaskan natives. with that i urge passage of this legislation and yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman yields back the balance of his time. the gentlewoman from michigan. mrs. dingell: mr. speaker, before i yield back for the day, i want to thank my colleague, chairman mcclintock, for his collegeality today and his leadership in making this a pleasant afternoon and a bipartisan afternoon and i urge all the members to join me in supporting s. 230 and yield

back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the gentlewoman yields back the balance of her time. the gentleman from california. mr. mcclintock: thank you, mr. speaker. i'd reciprocate those kind words from the gentlewoman from michigan. with that i'd ask adoption of this measure and yield back the balance of my time. the speaker pro tempore: the question is will the house suspend the rules and pass senate 230. those in favor say aye. those opposed, no. in the opinion of the chair, 2/3 having responded in the affirmative, the rules are suspended, the bill is passed, and without objection the motion to reconsider is laid on the table. pursuant to clause 12-a of rule 1, the chair declares the house in recess until approximately

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9:00 p.m. >> the head of the u.s. central command today said only four or five u.s. trained syrian fighters are still on the battlefield fighting isis. he said the u.s. will not reach its goal of training 5,000 syrians to fight isis. his comments came in testimony before the senate armed services committee. senator john mccain chairs the committee and said the u.s. strategy to combat isis is failing. senator mccain: the u.s. strategy to counter islamic

state of iraq and the lament or isil. i want to thank our witnesses, undersecretary wormuth and general austin for appearing before us today and their continued service to our nation. it's been one year, it's been one year since obama spoke to the nation of the threat posed by isil and increased u.s. military operations against us. many of us believe that the goal the president laid out, quote, to degrade and ultimately destroy isil, is right. many of us agree with the military strategy that seeks to empower local forces in iraq and syria to combat isil. with u.s. and coalition training, equipment, assistance and airpower. one year into this campaign it is impour to assert that they're losing and we're winning. stalemate is not success. it is accurate that we have conducted thousands of air strikes against isil, trucks and fighters, bunkers and

buildings. this conjures the illusion of progress but what effect has hat had? they expanded its control in syria. it continues to dominate sunni arab areas in both iraq and syria it maintains control of key cities like mowsmose you will, fallujah and ramadi and efforts to retake those territories of pure -- appeared to have installed entirely. meanwhile, they're expanding globally. it's now operating in afghanistan, yemen, libya and ypt and other radical groups like boko haram in nirgee and l that back has -- and al-shabab in syria. published media reports suggest that the c.i.a.'s estimates of

isil's manpower has remained constant despite u.s. air strikes which suggests that either they were wrong to begin with or that isil is replacing its losses in real time. neither is good. this committee is disturbed by recent whistleblower allegations that officials at central command skewed intelligence assessments to paint and overly positive picture of conditions on the ground. we are currently investigating these allegations which we take with the utmost seriousness. the department of defense should as well and if true, those responsible must be held accountable. ultimately, it's not -- ultimately it's not that we are doing no to counter isil. it's that there's no compelling reason to believe that anything will be rently doing efficient to achieve our objective of degrading and ultimately destroying isil. the united states and our partners do not have the initiative. our enemies do.

they're combatizing to enhance their initiative as they have for the past four years. the situation on the ground has taken yet another dramatic turn to the worse as several recent events made clear. recent published reports state that u.s. officials believe that isil is using mustard gas. and may even been manufacturing these chemical weapons by hemselves. if they are making mustard gas, this is a potential nightmare scenario for our partners in the middle east and for us. the goal was 3,000 fighters in the first year. instead this has trained and equipped 54 fighters some of which were killed or cap purred by al qaeda as soon as they returned to syria.

this has yet to produce any significant effects on the battlefield. to be sure, the fixation is ontributing to this failure. failure to do so has squandered a lot of time, money and worst f all credibility. we need some major changes.

has now vacuum tepped with this committee to continue supporting this program we need some major changes. into this vacuum has now stepped vladimir putin. as in ukraine and elsewhere, he perceives the administration's inaction and caution as weakness and he's taking advantage. according to media reports, putin has deployed strike , , t-90 tanks, howitzer russian marines and housing for up to 1,500 personnel in military bases in western syria. this as an expansion of russian power in the middle east that we have not seen in four decades. and it will allow putin to further prop up assad, fuel his indiscriminant killing machine, play king maker in any transition, undermine u.s. goals, policy and operations and ultimately prolong this horrific conflict. the main beneficiary will be sil. many of us have said from the beginning, from the beginning that the conflict in syria would not be contained and for four years we have seen vidence of that.

the hundreds of thousands dead, the millions of driven displaced people, the use of chemical weapons and the rise of the worst terrorist army in the world. now we are seeing the latest manifestation of this failed policy, the flood of people pouring out of the middle east that has led to the worst refugee crisis in europe since world war ii. the administration has promised to accept 10,000 refugees in the coming year. that's a noble effort. unless we address the cause of the crisis, which is the continued conflict in syria, the refugees will keep coming. isil will grow stronger, the middle east will dissend into further chaos and u.s. national security interests will be put at greater risk. for four years we have been told that there is no military solution to this conflict. as if anyone believes there is. and there are no good options.

if anybody -- as if anybody believes there are, that our influence is limited, as if that has not always been the case. that we will not succeed overnight, as if our problem is one of time, not policy. and that we cannot solve every problem in the middle east, as if that absolves us of our responsibility to make the situation better where we can. this is not a question of our capacity or our capabilities or our options. we have options between doing nothing and evading iraq and syria. many members of this committee suggested such options for years now, and they are still relevant. we need to put an end to assad's ability to use airpower against his people, especially the use of horrific barrel bombs, shoot down planes that drop barrel bombs that slaughter innocent civilians. it's one of the leading killers of innocent civilians.

we need to help establish safe zones inside syria where refugees and displaced people can be secure. we need forward air controllers to add prevision and lethality to our air campaign. we need to make significant changes in order to improve and rapidly expand our training of syrian and iraqi forces. and while no one believes that we need to invade iraq or syria, the fact is we will likely need additional u.s. special forces and military advisors to be successful. i hope our witnesses will not repeat our desired policy goals and a list of tactical achievements and talk about, quote, nine lines of effort. we have heard all of that before. but we have yet to hear a theory of victory. i hope to hear one today. senator reed. senator reed: thank you very much, mr. chairman. secretary wormuth and general austin. this continues the military review to counter isil in iraq and syria and its growth in the

broader middle east, south africa. through the extreme ideological and brutal tactics, including the reported development and use of chemical weapons, isil has gained control over portions of syria and iraq erasing the border between these two countries. this violent extremist group has slaughtered women and girls and carried out attacks on ethnic minorities and broadcast its barbaric acts on social media. to escape the violence of isil, the assad regime and millions have been displaced or fled outside iraq and syria. this has added to the sense of urgency regarding the need to secure -- security in the region. the military campaign against isil remains complex with no easy answers. while the coalition has pushed some out of the area, including the peshmerga the north,

retaking of tikrit by iraqi security forces and along sections of turkey, the self-described islamic state continues to hold key cities. including mosul in iraq. the iraq security forces counteroffenses to take back ramadi has struggled in the last few months. nd basr remains contested. they have stalled in operations near fallujah. and despite the recent setbacks, isil is consolidating controls in the areas in both syria and iraq. the agreement between the united states and turkey, expanding access of land and turkish airbases and creating an isil-free zone on the syrian side of the border is an important step forward. however, the deployments of russia of additional military forces to bases in syria under the guise of assisting and countering isil efforts appears to be an effort by putin to prop up the assad regime, further complicating efforts to

have security in syria. these have raised concerns of whether our efforts against isil is sufficient. a critical issue of the military lines of effort is the progress the u.s. train and equip programs for coalition-backed forces in both iraq and syria. while the u.s.-led air campaign has had an effect in degrading isil, effective local forces that can take full advantage of coalition airpower seized ground from isil and hold it are essential to success. n iraq, operations to take anbar require getting a significant number of sunnis in the forces and equipping them to resist the isil threat. i'm concerned by reports that sunni recruitments have fallen short of its targets and the government of iraq has been slow in delivering equipment to arming sunni forces. syria, the train and equip program has been -- according to public reports, has experienced a variety of setbacks.

we'll be interested in your assessment of this effort. quite interested. and general, i also hope you'll address what you believe might be done to intensify our military operations that counter the isil threat. for example, would you support a more active role for u.s. military personnel in facilitating the engagement of -- with sunni tribes or providing advisors to build institutional capacity or accompanying iraqi security forces on a limitted bases when direct contact with enemy is not anticipated? the isil problem is not geographically bounded by syria and iraq, and indeed, as the chairman pointed out, isil have appeared in yemen, afghanistan, egypt, libya, the horn of africa and elsewhere. general, i'm interested in your assessment of the group's growth in the region and how centcom is contributed to -- contributing to transregional efforts to combat the group. ultimately, the success of the counter isil effort will depend on a number of nonmilitary factors also, including reforms to the prime minister are implemented and result in a iraqi government that is more inclusive and responsive to the concerns of the sunnis, kurds,

religious minorities and other factions in iraq society. whether the international coalition, including states in the region, can counter isil's propaganda, financing and the spread of its extreme ideology and whether a political solution can be found for the crisis in syria. these issues are the primary responsibility of the departments rather than the department of defense. but i assume that our witnesses think they are integral in countering the isil threat. general, i also hope that you will also, to the extent possible, given the ongoing review by the inspector general, address questions involving intelligence assessments with respect to isil. it's important that we wait for the inspector general's investigation before completed before making a judgment, but i have no doubt you will take such allegations as seriously as we do in congress and we take them very seriously. like senator mccain, i hope the -- i expect the committee will be kept apprised and be active in terms of the recommendations. let me thank both witnesses for their testimony this morning. thank you, mr. chairman.

senator mccain: ms. wormuth. ms. wormuth: thank you, chairman mccain and ranking member reed as well as members of the committee. thank you for the opportunity to be here today to give you an update on the military aspects of our counter-isil campaign. it's also a pleasure, as always, to be here with general austin. we work very closely together every day on a range of issues so it's nice to be with him today. as the chairman said it's been over a year since the united states and a coalition of nations began the military campaign against isil. when we began that campaign about a year ago, isil was pushing into kurdish territory in northern iraq and pushing towards baghdad. over the past 12 months, isil has lost territory in both yria and iraq, despite advances it's made in ramadi and pamira. progress has been slow but steady. there are definitely been setbacks in the past year. while not 10 feet tall, isil

remains a thinking enemy that adopts to evolving conditions on the battlefield. our train and equip programs in iraq and syria have faced challenges. in iraq, the pace of our program has moved more slowly than we'd like, and in syria, the stringent vetting criteria we're using at the outset of the program has contributed to smaller numbers than we'd hoped for. as the military campaign continues in both countries, we expect there will continue to be challenges clearing and holding territory. but we've also seen progress in the past year. you're all familiar with the successful operations to take back kurdish territory in iraq to defeat isil in kobani and to more recently to retake tikrit as well as other successful engagements. on the political front, prime prime minister abadi continues to demonstrate the resolve necessary to confront isil and he's striving to manage what is a very difficult political landscape in baghdad. in syria, we've seen some opportunities emerge that we didn't envision a year ago, particularly in the northern

part of the country where syrian kurds working with syrian arabs has successfully pressured isil along the turkish border. over a year ago, the president outlined a whole strategy to degrade and ultimately defeat isil and he emphasized it would be a multiyear campaign. when secretary carter was here in july he outlined the nine lines of effort that comprise our strategy so i won't go over them in detail but i will emphasize that it will take more than the military campaign to be successful. we also need to dry up isil's finances. we need to stop the flow of foreign fighters into iraq and syria, in particular, protect the united states from potential attacks from isil, provide humanitarian assistance in areas that we are taking back from isil and find a way to more effectively counter isil's very successful messaging campaign. as secretary carter said to the committee in july, the administration believes we have the right strategy in place. we're now focused on implementing the strategy as effectively as possible.

this is a very much an interagency effort with ncreasingly better synchronization across all of the departments and agencies that are involved. and in fact, secretary carter and secretary kerry had been meeting together with their senior staffs to monitor and identify issues in the campaign, and they're meeting tomorrow with nctc to focus in particular on foreign fighters. d.o.d., as you know, is responsible for two of the lines of effort inside the strategy. denying isil safe haven and building partner capacity. so i'd like to speak briefly to those areas and general austin will also elaborate. the campaign has degraded isil's capacity, has removed some of the key leaders and engables gains by local forces in iraq and syria. the i.s.f. has regained control of tikrit from isil earlier this year and sunni kurds have taken the key boarder town which severed

their key line of communication and supply and put isil on the defensive and also put more pressure on its strong hold, raqqa in syria. these examples demonstrate how when we have credible ground forces and we support them with our airpower isil can suffer. we're also working hard to build the capacity of our partner forces on the ground. since we began our efforts, we have now trained and equipped more than six brigades and provide training to more than 13,000 iraqi personnel. peshmerga, urdish and we have more in the pipeline. as secretary carter said in july, however, training for the iraqi army has been slowed by a lack of trainees coming into the training sites. over the last several weeks, we've had better participation from iraqi units at the training sites and iraq has actually expanded the pool of units that are eligible for training. some of the units we've trained are now participating more directly in the fight in areas such as ramadi.

and early indications are they're performing well in combat missions. as you know they face a difficult fight ahead and strong leadership of these forces is going to be essential. our forces on the ground at l-assad airbase are advising in anbar province to train the trainer type of assistance with the iraqi security forces. and in terms of equipping these sunni tribal fighters, we recently delivered a battalion's worth of equipment to iraqi officials working with us on those two airbases to dwibt the equipment to fighters. we're also now overseeing the the government of iraq's equipment to these sunni tribal fighters from these bases. so through these kinds of efforts we now have more than 4,000 sunni tribal fighters in anbar province. we're also still in the early stages of our train and equip program in syria. this effort, i think it's important to highlight, is just one element of what we're

trying to do in the larger campaign in syria which includes an increasing number of air strikes as well as supporting partner forces on the ground, like the syrian kurds, the y.p.g., sunni arabs and other local forces to try to put pressure on isil in northeastern syria. these efforts have substantially rolled isil back in this area, and have had significant impacts on isil's freedom of movement and supply lines. as of september 15, our train and equip program, the specific program we have, we're now currently training more than 100 fighters and we have additional recruits in the pipeline. this number is definitely smaller than we'd hope for in part, because as the chairman and others noted, we put our trainees through a very rigorous screening process to meet standards that are appropriately laid out in u.s. law. we closely aligned all of our efforts in all of these areas with our 62-country coalition and as an example of how we're doing that, turkey's recent decision to provide us access

to bases has enabled us to expand the fight and is strengthening the cohesion of our efforts in syria. before turning to general austin, i want to address russia's involvement in syria. we're closely tracking russia's recent efforts to deploy additional military equipment and personnel to syria and we're in close touch to our partners and allies with these developments. both russia and iran have continued to support politically and militaryaryly the assad regime which has systematicically murdered its own people. and helped create the conditions. what we need in syria urgently is a political solution to the conflicts through a transition away from assad. and any actions that empower the regime to escalate the conflict are unwelcomed and would be destabilizing and counterproductive. this is clearly a very difficult challenge that we face. we're not going to solve it quickly, but we have the right components in place to advance our objectives and we're dynamically adjusting our campaign to a rapidly changing

battlefield. achieving a lasting defeat against isil is going to require a continued commitment, strong leadership from us and the global coalition as well as commitment and sacrifice from local forces in iraq and syria. thank you. general austin: good morning, chairman mccain, senator reed and distinguished members of the committee. i want to thank you for this opportunity to appear here today to provide a current update on a progress achieved over the past year in support of the ongoing campaign to counter isil or da'ish in iraq and syria. i'm pleased to appear here this morning alongside christine wormuth. ms. work muth is widely respected throughout the department of defense and we're most grateful to her for her continued and strong support of our efforts at centcom. i'll join christine in making a few brief opening comments and then we're prepared to answer your questions. before providing a brief update

on a counter-isil campaign, i did want to quickly address an important issue. as the chairman mentioned, there is an ongoing d.o.d. i.g. investigation looking into allegations of the concerning of the processing of information by centcom intelligence director. because they are currently under investigation, it would be premature and inappropriate for me to discuss this matter. what i will say is i welcome the d.o.d. i.g.'s oversight and once the investigation is complete, based upon the findings, you can be assured that i will take appropriate actions. again, i cannot speak to the specifics of the allegations. however, i would like to take this opportunity to provide some clarity with respect to how we use intelligence products and the critical work that we do. because of the nature of our mission at centcom, we do have and rely on a robust intelligence enterprise to support the command. there are over 1,200 seasoned intelligence professionals that

make up that enterprise, and they do exceptional work. and as the commander, i greatly value and seek their input and insights. i use the assessments that they provide me together with the inputs that i receive from a variety of sources that include my commanders on the ground who i talk to almost every single day, and i consider this broad range of inputs when making my decisions. you know, there's been a lot of speculation in the media about the allegations made to the d.o.d. i.g. and one in particular i believe should be addressed and corrected for the record. some have expressed concern that centcom intelligence reports were sent directly to the president. this is not accurate. as the office of the director of national intelligence put ut to the media last week, and i quote, none of the combatant commands are permitted to engage directly in the president's daily brief process. rather, reports are produced by the combatant commands and funneled through the d.i.a. to

ensure that all substantive deliberations and final contributions are appropriately coordinated, end of quote. again, i cannot comment on a specific allegations. we will need to wait for the d.o.d. i.g. to complete its investigation, but did i want to provide this additional clarification. ladies and gentlemen, with respect to the ongoing operations in iraq and syria today, despite some slow movement at the tactical level, we continue to make progress across the battle space in support of the broader u.s. government strategy to degrade nd ultimately defeat isil. key to the enduring success of the military campaign is sustained pressure on isil, both from the air and on the ground. and the approach that we adopted relies on indigenous forces to create and sustain this pressure while also curbing the flow of foreign fighters and cutting off the ability to rearm itself. in recent months, iraq's security forces have experienced some setbacks and this is to be expected in the early stages of a fight as

complex as this one. but overall, coalition air strikes and our advise and assist in building partner capacity efforts, the iraqis continue to make progress. in northern iraq, the kurdish ershmerger have performed well and the kurdish arabs in northeast syria are achieving substantial effects. in fact over the past several months they've retaken more than 17,000 square kilometers from terrain from the enemy and the effects they have achieved served to create significant opportunities that if pursued could prove devastating for the enemy. the intent of the military campaign is to degrade and ultimately defeat the enemy through our own actions and by enabling and supporting the efforts of our coalition partners and the indigenous forces in iraq and syria. again, progress is being made and this is evidence by what we see happening in the air and on the ground in both countries. i would also point out that the

progress reflects in large part the many contributions made by our coalition partners. the 60-plus nation coalition represents the strength of this campaign and we main grateful for their strong support. success in this campaign will require the continued support of our coalition partners along with support of other elements of the u.s. government and the international community. more importantly, it will require that the iraqis do what s necessary to address their political challenges, and national reconciliation is absolutely essential to the success in the counter-isil campaign. we said at the outset that military campaign to counter isil would take time and it will take time. and we should expect there will be occasional setbacks along the way, particularly in the early stages. we also need to keep in mind that we are supporting and enabling this effort, and our partners, not us, are in the lead. it is taking a bit longer to get things done but it must be this way if we are to achieve lasting and positive effects.

fortunately, amiss the many challenges that exist in iraq and syria, we find opportunities and we remain confident that our actions in pursuit of these opportunities will continue to produce positive results in the coming days. mr. chairman, senator reed, members of the committee, i want to thank you, once again, for the strong support that you show to our service members, our civilians and their families. they are truly exceptional, and they are making important and lasting contributions to the overall effort. again, we appreciate your support and i look forward to answering your questions. senator mccain: well, thank you, general austin and ms. wormuth. i've been a member of this committee for nearly 30 years and i never heard testimony like this. never. general austin, on september 9, one week ago, chairman dempsey , the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, said that the fight against isil is practically stalemated

with no, quote, dramatic gains on either side. so obviously you and the outgoing chairman of the joint chiefs of staff have a very different view of what the situation is. and so with all this progress that you're citing -- and how long do you think it's going to take for us to defeat isil and to restore stability in iraq and syria? general austin: sir, it will take years. if i may -- senator mccain: years. ok. general austin: if i may comment on the chairman's comments. as i spoke to the chairman yesterday, and we did talk about this issue. when i went back and took a look at what he said, he also said, isil's future is increasingly dim as more nations join the anti-isil effort. although it is practically stalemated with no dramatic gains on either side, isil will move at the speed of its governance, not at the speed of

its military capability. and i agree with the chairman, sir, on the issue of there haven't been any dramatic gains on either side. senator mccain: dramatic. that's different than from, quote, tactically stalemated, please, general. that's what chairman dempsey and chairman dunford said. exactly the same thing. so there's clearly a disconnect between your view and that of our outgoing and incoming chairman of the joint chiefs of staff. really in your view, everything should remain as it is. for example, do you think we should have a no-fly zone in syria? general austin: that's a policy decision. senator mccain: would you recommend a no-fly zone in syria? general austin: i would not recommend it at this point, sir. senator mccain: not at this point. four years later. would you recommend setting up a buffer zone in syria where hese refugees might come and

be protected from the attacks and slaughter of bashar assad? general austin: it would take a ground support to support the refugees. senator mccain: would you support a buffer zone which would protect these people who are being barrel bombed and slaughtered by bashar assad? general austin: i would not recommend it at this point in time. senator mccain: we won't be able to shoot down bashar assad's aircraft as they barrel bomb and slaughter innocent men, women and children, is that correct? we don't have the capability to protect them? general austin: we clearly have capability, yes, sir, we do. senator mccain: but you would not recommend such action? general austin: i would not recommend a buffer zone at this point, sir. senator mccain: i see. so basically, general, what you're telling us is everything's fine as we see hundreds of thousands of refugees leave and flood europe, as we're seeing now 250,000 syrians slaughtered, as you see more and more iranian

control of the shiia militia that are only ones that are really doing the fighting, besides the peshmerga. as i say, i have never seen a hearing that is as divorced from the reality of every outside expert and what you are saying. does the massive flow of refugees from syria have any effect on what you think we should be doing in syria? general austin: sir, i want to be clear that i believe that this is a horrible tragedy and this is a thing that the entire international community is going to have to continue to ork together on. and so there's always -- we would hope that as as these refugees continue to be disadvantaged that we see more countries oining in to assist.

senator mccain: so you would not support a policy that would help these refugees that are being slaughtered by bashar assad with his barrel bombs? general austin: sir, it's always in our best interest to protect civilians. again, i would not recommend a buffer zone at this point in time. senator mccain: so everything is really going well? general austin: no, sir, that's not -- senator mccain: well, if things are not going well and if we've had, quote, setbacks and the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff say it's basically stalemated and you think everything is going well pursuing the strategy and tactics on the ground that we are, general austin, i respectfully disagree. i respectfully, fundamentally disagree. this is an abject failure. the refugees are the result of it. this is a result of leaving iraq and you were there at the meeting when maliki told senator graham and i if the others agreed he would agree to

keep a residual force there. and we never gave him the forces that we wanted to leave behind, which set and train the departure of u.s. completely from iraq and set the table for the catastrophe that we are seeing. this is, as i see, i have not attended a hearing that is so grossly distorted as the view of a terrible and tragic situation as i've seen from the witnesses. and by the way, senator graham and i predicted every single thing that is happening now. and i predict unless we do something different it will remain, as general dempsey said, stalemated. which means tragedy. senator reed. senator reed: well, thank you very much, mr. chairman. both madam secretary and general austin, about a year ago or more there was real concern that essentially baghdad could fall to isil.

that they were virtually unstoppable. at this point, your assessment of the security, at least for baghdad, has that been improved? general austin: sir, it has been greatly improved. enator reed: and going forward now, one of the fundamental issues is, and i think it's related to the comments both you and general dempsey made, who is -- who will have the advantage going forward in terms of the use of time, isil or iraqi forces supported by the united tates? what's your view on that? general austin: sir, i think clearly it's the iraqi forces supported by not only the united states but the 60-plus nation coalition. senator reed: now, one of the things that has been suggested but not only suggested but recommended strongly to the iraqi government is they create a national guard unit, sunni

units as well as others but formally aligned with the government and that legislation is bogged down in their parliament, is that accurate? general austin: that's correct, sir. senator reed: so we are -- we could do more essentially if the iraqis were willing to make some changes in terms of their policies. for example, we could at least contemplate the use of advises with these national guard -- iraqi national guard units to be brokers in terms of distributing equipment as well as tactical advice, is that something that's possible if we get cooperation? general austin: it's clearly possible, yes, sir. senator reed: is that something you would consider? general austin: yes, sir, it is. senator reed: one of the actors, too, and this is a constant source of inquiry is that in fact recently the iraqi parliament, i think, rendered a scathing report about prime

minister maliki's leadership or lack of leadership effectively sort of suggesting that whatever he said couldn't be trusted, is that your estimate of his role leading up to this crisis, in fact, over many years? general austin: sir, what we saw from the former prime minister was increasingly sectarian behavior and a number of bad decisions that led to the atrophy of his security forces. senator reed: and in fact, according to this report, as i've seen in the media, they attributed mostly of the blame of the disintegration of the security forces at maliki's doorstep, no one else's, is that at least accurate for the feeling in iraq? general austin: i'd say it's primarily his responsibility, and those he appointed in key leader positions enabled that as well. senator reed: in terms of your campaign plan, the sense i have s that you have tried to

exploit the area where we have the most interest against isil and that's iraq while maintaining as much pressure as possible in syria. is that the general outline of the campaign plan so that we would expect and frankly i agree, i don't think anyone's seen the progress they'd like to see but the first progress would essentially be in iraq and then lead to isil in syria, is that accurate? general austin: it is, sir. in iraq there is a government for us to work with essentially. -- initially. there were some forces for us to begin to work with. and, of course, we had access to things that could -- that could enable us to get our -- to get the work done. our shaping operations in syria enabled our work in iraq and are still enabling it. and as we get increasing resources, we're able to increase the tempo in syria and

so i think we'll have greater effects going forward. senator reed: and just finally, any general comments, because one of the recent developments is the fact that turkey now is allowing operations. they seem to be much more cooperative in an operationally sense. what do you expect in the next, say, six months that will translate to on the ground? general austin: i think it will translate to a lot more pressure on key areas in syria, sir, like the city of raka, which has long been an isil strong hold. and so because of that access, we'll have the ability to increase the pace and focus on key places in syria. senator reed: thank you, hairman.

senator fischer: thank you, mr. chairman. when secretary carter was here in july he testified there were only about 60 syrian fighters that had been trained in our train and equip program and easserted. we heard reports about attacks on those individuals when they were reasserted back in syria. can you tell us how many trained fighters remains? general austin: it's a small number. the ones that are in the fight is -- we're talking four or ive. senator fischer: a "new york times" report on september 6 indicated that among the lessons learned from that experience was hat these fighters should be returned to syria in larger numbers than the 60.

obviously larger than the four or five that are there. o you agree with that? general austin: i agree with that, senator. whenever that's possible, it is in our best interest to make sure that we have an element that can protect itself and also can go in and combine efforts with other elements that are on the ground. senator fischer: how do you plan to achieve that? how are you going to increase the number of fighters when we're looking at the really tough security screening processes that are in place now, how are we going to achieve that? and how long will that take? and you mentioned earlier about ncreasing resources. i took that to mean increasing the number of fighters that you would place in syria and the effect they would have. so what's the time period we're looking at here? how are you going to do it? because i don't think it's been at all successful yet. general austin: and i certainly gree with you.

this -- the new syrian force program has gotten off to a slow start. but i think it's important to remember that this element is designed to be a complement to all the other things that we're doing. so we're going to use and we are using every tool that we have available to us in our inventory. our strategy is, our approach is to utilize indigenous forces to complement our work from the air on the ground. as we -- senator fischer: if i could interrupt you on that point, and i'd like to get back to your answer. when you say to complement the work on the ground with air strikes, did i hear -- did i ust hear you say that? general austin: the -- they have to work in tandem. senator fischer: so if they're going to work in tandem, there is a new article out today, are we going to change strategy? i think it's in "foreign policy

today," it says the united states is drawing up a new plan that will send these trained fighters into syria that are going to help direct air strikes. is that report correct? general austin: i would just say that, ma'am, we'll continue to look at the best ways to -- the best means to employ these forces as we go forward. we'll capitalize on lessons learned. and, again, it is really about the full complement of indigenous forces that we have available to work with. as we mentioned earlier, the y.p.g., or the syrian kurds and some arabs have done tremendous work in northeast syria and they have pushed isil back from the border. there are currently somewhere 40 kilometers or so north of isil's capital city of raqqa and they'll continue to pressure isis. so the new syrian force is added to that effort.

senator fischer: so with the fighters we're training and equipping, is it still the goal to have about 12,000 of them there, is that still the goal? what's the expectation, then, or them? general austin: well, we certainly won't at the pace we're going won't reach the goal that we had initially established for ourselves. but the overall goal is to make sure we have enough mass to be able to get work done on the ground. and whether it's y.p.g. elements or other elements they're able to help us, we can still achieve and are achieving the same effects. it's not aspirational. we are actually doing it today. senator fischer: and is the strategy changing for the work on the ground you're asking -- you're asking for these fighters? general austin: we're looking at

the best means to employ them and we will do, ma'am, what you would expect us to do and make adjustments as opportunities present themselves. senator fischer: thank you, sir. senator mccain, just to fol -- senator mccain: just to follow up, there's an article, it says anxious to avoid another damaging setback for the training effort the white house and pentagon are looking at attaching small number of fighters in northern syria tone sure the rebels are better protected on the battlefield by more numerous troops. can you confirm or deny that that option is being looked at? ms. wormuth: senator, we are reviewing the way forward. senator mccain: i'm asking if that option is being considered? ms. wormuth: we are looking at a range of options and -- senator mccain: i'm not going to -- i'm asking you a direct question. is the pentagon looking at that option, yes or no? ms. wormuth: we are looking at that option as well as others. senator mccain: thank you very much. senator nelson. senator nelson: general, it's my

understanding that general dempsey recently said if the u.s. really seize control of the campaign against isis we could speed up isil's defeat but that it would come at a great cost to our service members and that another group with another name and ideology would just be back n a couple of years. isn't that what you understand general dempsey to have said and that you have reaffirmed that ere today? general austin: yes, sir, it is. i think it's important that the people in the country and in the region take ownership and work to put in place lasting solutions. and if we don't do that we will be back in another two or three years. senator nelson: and because of that campaign against isis, it must be won by our coalition

partners and the iraqis, not just us. general austin: that's correct, sir. senator nelson: would you care to read that statement again for clarity in your response to the chairman's question that general dempsey had said in its full context? eneral austin: yes, sir. what the chairman said is isil's future is increasingly dim as more nations join the anti-isil ffort. he further stated that although the fight right now is tactically stalemated with no dramatic gains on either side, iraq will move at the speed of its governance and not at the speed of its military apability.

senator nelson: mr. chairman, i have the transcript here in front of the committee. i would like to reinsert this transmit of general dempsey with your permission. senator mccain: absolutely. and along with that we will include the assessments by senator keane, general petraeus, the architect of the surge and all of those who observed this debacle. senator nelson: of course. general, give us your assessment that russia is building up the military base and sending soldiers and weapons into syria to prop up assad. under, i might say, the guise of fighting isis. general austin: sir, we're

witnessing a buildup of forces in syria by russia. as you know, they have been there all along but they are increasing their footprint. what they stated is that they want to focus on helping to counter isil, as i understand t. that's left to be seen. as you know russia is not very transparent so we really don't know what their true intentions are. but the introduction of potential introduction of additional capability and operations, utilizing that capability could increase the friction in that battle space significantly. senator nelson: general, the senate defense authorization ill calls for 30% reduction in headquarter staff across the

department of defense starting with a 7.5% cut in fiscal year 2016. what impact will that have on your ability to conduct operations and what is centcom, if you want to submit for the record, planning to do to make hat cut? general austin: sir, if you take a look what's going on -- and from pakistan to afghanistan to yemen to iraq and syria and to increase tensions in other places throughout the region, it's clear that we have a very active region. and so in order to manage the things that we need to manage and work with our partner nations in the region, we need an appropriate staff to be able to do that. i fully understand and appreciate the pressure that the departments -- the department is

under in terms of the reduction of the top line on the budget, and so we have to do what we can do and need to do to tighten our belts. i appreciate that. but it makes it increasingly difficult to get things done. senator nelson: thank you, general. senator ayotte: i want to thank both of you for being here today and for your service, i want to follow up and ask about, general, i believe you testified about the effectiveness of the syrian kurds right now in syria n pushing back isil. what are we doing to support the syrian kurds as they are effectively pushing back isil on

he ground? general austin: we are providing them a tremendous amount of air support which is what they wanted most. as you will recall, ma'am, this is the element -- a portion of this element where the folks that hung on at kobani valiantly. there was question if they could survive and continue on. they increased their size and activity and they made a significant difference in the northeast part of the country. and so what they asked from us over time is sustained airpower, sustained strikes and they have benefited from those strikes. because of their aggressiveness, they made a tremendous difference in the northeast. senator ayotte: so just to be clear, they haven't asked for rms? and how does turkey -- how is turkey acting on the ground here in terms of obviously -- first,

i want to know what have the syrian kurds asked for that we haven't given them? i understand air support. how do you view turkey's role in all of this? because as i see it these four or five u.s.trained fighters, let's not kid ourselves, it's a joke. if they're the only force on the ground doing something, what more can we do to help them? general austin: up to this point they have not asked us for arms, but it doesn't mean that they on't, ma'am. i think -- and, of course, you know, as we go forward, there are things that we can do to continue to help as they try to get supplies into northeastern yria, work with the kurds in northern iraq to help make sure that we have lines of communication that facilitate that. and we're doing that. they will also need to partner with syrian arabs in the area, and they're doing that and we are working with syrian arabs,

developing relationships as ell. and so i think it's the combination of all of these forces that are going to make a difference going forward. and, again, we expect our footprint with the new syrian forces to grow over time. senator ayotte: sir, can you help me with turkey, what role that turkey is playing that we would like them to play? general austin: senator, turkey has recently come onboard and given us access to their bases which is a tremendous capability. it shortens the legs that our fighter pilots will have to fly. it allows us to be more responsive, and they also are flying strikes in our formations and focused on elements, isil lements in syria thus far.

and so they are adding value. what we asked them to do, as well, is continue to tighten up or abate the flow of foreign fighters and lethal ack sell rance coming across the -- accellerance coming across the order. senator ayotte: what role is iran playing in this, and also their support for hezbollah, what role is hezbollah playing in terms of supporting the assad regime? general austin: well, we know that iran has been -- has been instrumental in providing support to syria throughout. and we see increasingly that they would like to provide -- they want to provide more support. what that will mean in the future i don't know, but they are active in syria. senator ayotte: so perhaps if they had more cash and money, they would like to provide more support to the assad regime? general austin: that would be --

my assumption would be that would be the case. senator ayotte: i wanted to also ask our issues with these trained fighters. are we going to provide, if they're under attack, i guess we got four or five of them, but if we're able to get more of them trained what are we going to do to support them or protect hem? general austin: we will protect -- provide air support and i.s.r. to overwatch and air support to protect them. with the first class we put in, we've done that already. so we are committed to doing that going forward. senator ayotte: thank you. senator mccain: senator mccaskill. senator mccaskill: i'm worried, like the rest of my colleagues, and there have been a number of questions from my colleagues, about the train and equip mission. there are good news and bad news about america's military. the good news is you give them a job they'll figure out a way and get it done.

sometimes you give them a job and they're not willing to say t's not going to work. at what point in time, general austin, do you envision us admitting that while all good intentions and on paper all of the work was done but the job of finding willing fighters that can be screened appropriately when you have the vast majority who feel victimized by the current situation in syria are running for the exits? at what point in time -- and what is the discussion ongoing about the $600 million you're requesting for next year? that seems very unrealistic to e in terms of a request. if at this juncture we successfully completed five to six, and i believe you said the last information you had, ms.

wormuth, more than 100. what is the number? ms. wormuth: senator mccaskill it's between 100 and 120 basically. senator mccaskill: so we're counting on our fingers and toes when we envisioned 5,400 by the end of the year. i'm just worried that this is one of those instances where the good news about our military is dominating. we can do this. we can do this. and the practical reality of this strategy aren't being fully embraced. general austin: thank you, senator. you know, i absolutely agree with you. we have the finest troops in the world. and they will figure out a way to get the job done one way or the other. and again, what our special operations forces have done in orthern syria is they didn't

ait for the new syrian force program or train and equip program to fully develop. at the very outset, they began to engage elements like the y.p.g. and enable those elements, and they are making a difference on the battlefield. and there are tens of thousands of the y.p.g. out there. they're right now fighting isil. so because the syria train and equip program is slower getting started than we'd like for it to be, it doesn't mean we're not creating effects on the battlefield. senator mccaskill: i want to make sure, general austin, i know they feel strongly about the surge and there are a lot of incredible american heroes that were part of that surge, but the other part of the surge we don't talk about as frequently is we paid a lot of people. we paid a lot of people to help us during the surge. is this money that we're setting aside for train and equip, would it be better off in direct compensation to some of that

.p.g. force? ms. wormuth: senator mccaskill, can i address this a little bit? as general austin said, we're reviewing the program and we're looking at a range of options. our train and equip program is part of a broader effort that we're prosecuting with the y.p.g., with the syrian arab coalition and so on, and we're looking at how to have our train and equip program effectively enable those other efforts and i think as we go forward and look at what our options are, we absolutely want to look at the resources we requested for the next year and how that fits in. but the forces we are training, while right now a small in number and leerily are not going to reach the numbers we had planned for, are nevertheless getting terrific training and very good equipment and as such will be able to really be force multipliers of those other groups on the ground that has been very effective, line the

syrian arab coalition. senator mccaskill: if we get to the end of the year with us bragging about the difference between 100 and 120, it's time for a new plan. and i do not mean to be bragging . -- ms. wormuth: and i do not mean to be bragging. it's not as wig as we thought it would be. senator mccaskill: i know there's pressure on analysts to change the the nor of their -- tenor of their report. it's a serious allegation. i want to say at the end of this investigation when you can discuss it, i want to put on the record that i for one will be watching very carefully for any potential retaliation against any of the men and women that

came forward with allegations. it's incredibly important that whistleblowers be protected. depending on what the investigation finds, i understand that maybe there are other factors i'm not aware of. but i want to put on the record that i will be playing close attention to how these whistleblowers are treated in the aftermath of this investigation. general austin: i share your concern, senator. you have my -- i will assure you that we will do everything within our power to ensure that the whistleblowers remain protected and there is no retaliation. this is absolutely important. and again, you know, we need oversight by organizations like the i.g. and so we welcome that. and we're going to cooperate fully and we'll make sure we abide by the spirit of this investigation. enator mccaskill: thank you.

>> thank you, chairman mccain. i think the grim nature of your remarks are justified. was wormuth, how long has it been since we've had this train and equip program in effect? ms. wormuth:y started the actual training earlier this spring. we started the program in december when we got authority from congress. >> you have to say we started in december. that's when it was authorized, and funding was provided. and we have to acknowledge, this is a total failure. senator sessions: it's just a failure. i wish it weren't so but that's the fact. so it's time, way pastime, to react to that failure. i just would say the whole idea that we've got to wait for the locals to take ownership and to take the lead and do this kind of activity without any leadership support sufficient

from the united states or our allies is also a failure. they're not able to organize well. mosul has fallen. there's divisions within iraq that make it very difficult. soy just wish it weren't so but i'm afraid that's the reality we are dealing with. we now have, i believe, the u.n. says, four million refugees, seven million displaced persons. it's obvious to me that this is a humanitarian catastrophe. we need to deal with it in an honest way and the most effective and honest way is to keep people as close to home as possible. if they can't stay in their homes because of violence and war, then they ought to be kept as close to home as possible. i talked to a senior european official recently, he told me that this refugee crisis is the greatest threat to europe since

world war ii. and i don't see any plan to make it any better. general austin, we've got to consider creating safe zones within syria. i understand there are some places in syria now that refugees can stay. and we're going to have to keep, we can't have millions and millions of people walking into europe. it's hardly worth discussing. but i am really worried about this. and wish that we could -- we had already done much better. by being so slow to act initially this is what resulted. now the situation is far more than it should be in my opinion. general austin, i do tend to agree with you that a defeat of isil is not the end of the problems in the middle east. 've got extremism that witnesses told us may be going

on for 50 years. would you agree with that? general austin: i absolutely agree with that senator sessions thrk there'll be another -- agree with that. senator sessions: there'll be another crisis. we need a strategy, an understood strategy, bipartisan, with our allies around the world, to confront this long-term, multidecade threat to the western democratic order. and to try to help protect people in the middle east from this disaster. so i want to ask you, do we have a strategy of that kind that our allies in the united states and congress and republicans and democrats understand and agree on? ms. wormuth: we have a strategy to defeat isil ultimately in the middle east, it's largely in the middle east but obviously spreading to other areas.

there are other dynamics in the middle east obviously that are part of this. there's a broader sunni-shia sectarian conflict that's gone on for decades. there's the fact that many of the, excuse me, governments in that region are not very representative and have internal policies that don't give much freedom too their people, so that's part of what's creating problems in the middle east as well and a big part of our relationships with these countries is talking to them about the importance of more democratic approaches. senator sessions: well said in one sense, how however, does that -- however, does that mean we don't support the king of jordan? just asking rhetorically, ok. we've got to have a more realistic policy than that. in the book ding on order he hit the part about

the containment strategy that maintained western unity against the communist totalitarians. it went on for 50 years almost. ended up ultimately successful. this was the way it was expressed. soviet expansion, according to kinnon, was real and inherent. the conflict was inherent in the two idea ols. -- ideologies. it's income pat tart, totalitarian communism and constitutional democracy. he said, but it could be, quote, contained by an adroit and diligent application of counterforce at a series of constantly shifting geographical and political points. close quote. and i don't sense we have any such strategy and i'm sorry we don't. i think also that radical islam, sharia law, an essential

component is incompatible with constitutional democracy. we need to work better. thank you, mr. chairman. >> thank you both for being here. senator sessionest's -- session's comments about containment is a good segue. ms. wormuth, why do you believe that four years into this conflict that russia is deploying terrell and increased ship -- is deploying materiel and increased shipments and setting up shop in syria in a way they haven't over the last four years? ms. wormuth: russia has been a supporter they have assad regime and putin has spoken more publicly about the role russia has played to date. part of what may be happen, part of putin's calculus may be that assad regime has been under greater threat in the last several months as isil has advanced in places like padmar

or palmyra. so putin may be nervous about the stability of the assad regime and trying to shore it up. >> given that, how do we assess the possibility that the assad regime may fall? ms. wormuth: at this point, the assessments i have read are that the regime still has considerable strength in terms of military forces, it's still the most powerful military force on the ground and the support it receives from iran and russia remains significant. so there have certainly been battlefield losses that are concerning, but -- and we are looking at obviously how to deal work we are planning and thinking about the potential for a significant retrenchment. but i think the assessment right now is the regime is not in mminent danger of falling.

senator shaheen: are we concerned that they'll threaten our coalition aircraft? general austin: if they're trying to operate in the same space, senator, that possibility is clearly there. senator shaheen: and how are we thinking about responding to that? general austin: well -- senator shaheen: for other of you. ms. wormuth: we are still in the early stages of what russia is doing. but at the diplomatic level we are making clear that deployments to shore up the regime and draw out the conflict are counterproductive and destabilizing and if this is about russia joining the fight against isil we expect the kinds of military they deploy to be consistent with that. senator shaheen: how are we making that clear to russia? ms. wormuth: secretary kerry

speaks to his counterpart very relationly and has been making that point clear and on the military side, i'm sure general austin can elaborate on this, if in fact it gets to a point where we see russian aircraft operating in that area, we would, i imagine, need to set up some sort of mechanism to continue our counterisil campaign there. senator shaheen: general austin? general austin: we know how to do that, senator. my utmost concern is protection of my -- of our troops. and we're going to make sure we have the ability to protect ourselves at all times. and you know, there are on occasion syrian aircraft that are flying in, you know, spaces that are not too distant from where we're operating but we're able to make sure that number one, we maintain vigilance and number two, we keep the battle

space -- we work in the battle space in such a way that we avoid conflict, avoid encounters if at all possible. senator shaheen: so i appreciate that that has been our policy to date. given the total failure of our ability to influence the outcome of the syrian civil war, are we assessing whether we should take a different response with respect to assad? and engaging with the syrian troops? ms. wormuth: i think we continue to believe that what would be the best solution is to get a political transition and get assad out of the government while retaining the governance structure so you don't have a situation of chaos on the ground. russia, with its relationship with the regime, could potentially contribute to

helping find that solution. that would be a valuable contribution from russia. senator shaheen: it would be but there's no incentive at this point for russia to do that. what's the incentive. ms. wormuth: they want more than anything a more stable syria and they are quite fearful of isil as well. i mean, they have many, many chechens in russia. they are just as concerned about foreign fighter flows from isil as we are. i think russia does have an interest in having a more stable syria and a construct i way for them to engage would be to work with us and other countries who would like to see a transition there to try to come up with a diplomatic way to make that transition happen. senator shaheen: i certainly think that would be a positive outcome, but it's not clear to me that we've seen any action in the last 4 1/2 years to suggest

that russia is going to play a more positive role. thank you. >> thank you, mr. chairman. general austin, thank you for your service. in both syria and in iraq we that are iduals clearly part of the conversation, i'm curious in terms of numbers right now, this one a -- would be a question for either of you, do we have an update on the total number of individuals who are displaced between syria and iraq that you can share with us this morning? ms. wormuth: i believe, senator, it's around four million. it's a very large number. there are more than a million. ms. wormuth: -- >> that would be from syria. ms. wormuth: i thought it was from both syria and iraq.

there are hundreds of thousands in jordan, the neighboring countries are already hosting very large you were ins of refugees, lebanon, jordan, and turkey. >> could you just check and see if the numbers you are providing are up to date? i'm curious about the number of individuals displaced in syria and the number of individuals displaced in iraq but still perhaps in iraq. ms. wormuth: we can get you that >> general, the reason for my question is that it would appear this is a significant number. senator rounds: our desire not to do more harm than good in what we provide yet at the same time one of our expectations is that we're doing ongoing air operations throughout the area. we don't want to get into areas where we're going to cause more damage. yet, right now, you're challenged because you don't

have the forward air observers that would make it more efficient than what you've got today. can you share with us a little bit about what you're doing to try to improve that situation and how you would like to see that handled? general austin: sir, we routinely use all of our intelligence surveillance and reconnaissance assets, u.a.v.'s and manned aircraft, to make sure that we are understand what's going on on the ground before we employ weapons. and we are diligent in our efforts there, not overly cautious to the point where we -- where we're not able to take advantage of opportunities to engage the enemy, but we're very, very mindful of, you know, the possibility of committing civilian casualties. senator round: but we're not

using any of our own forward air observers at all? we don't have any forward air observers on the ground at all? general austin: that's correct. our jtacs are operating in the command center. it allows them to have visibility over what's going on in the target area but also enables them to gain visibility of where the friendly troops are. this is one of the biggest challenges we encounter throughout this battle stage. in a lot of cases, the folks we're trying to help don't have a good handle on where their people are. and that slows down the -- our ability to engage. senator rounds: currently when you're training individuals in iraq and those who want to fight back in syria, we understand, and i think -- i don't think there's anybody out here disagreing with the fact that we're not on schedule for getting the number we want to have trained, that is a fair

assessment in terms of the number of individuals we want to have trained that are both iraq iowa -- iraqi initials and syrian nationals? general austin: sorry, struggling with my sign here. you're right, sir. we would like to see a lot more forces available to be trained and we're encouraging the government of iraq to recruit those forces, bring them on board so we can get them in training centers. what we discovered, not discovered, we knew this going on, those forces that have been trained by us are doing pretty well on the battlefield. senator rounds: fair to say, though, general, one of the problems we've got particularly with syrian fighters is our ability to actually discern which ones we can use and which ones we're not using based on our review of their background and what they intend to do, if they want to go in and fight assad, eliminating them from being part of our team? fair to say at this point? general austin: that's correct,

we're focusing on countering isil. senator rounds: thank you. thank you, mr. chairman. >> thank you mr. chairman. both of you testified that a very strict vetting process has resulted in far fewer fighters for us to train. does this mean we're turning away thousands of potential fighters? ms. wormuth: senator, i would say two things. one, because the authority we have focuses our program on fighting isil, there are a number of individuals who might like to receive training from the united states or equipment, for that matter, but they want to fight the regime and that's not the focus of our program. and then the other way the standards affect the recruiting pool is obviously we want to make sure that we have confidence in the people we bring in to our program and that we can give them equipment and trust them to use that appropriately, trust them to fight on the battlefield in way

-- in a way that's consistent with the laws of armed conflict. in many cases, people who might be interested in volunteering don't meet those standards or are younger than -- are under the age of 18, for example, or who are otherwise not medically qualified. >> so is one of the assessments that you're doing is to review whether or not we're being unrealistic regarding the kinds of factors we want you to take into consideration before you train a particular individual, is that one of the areas you are looking to which may require congressional action? ms. wormuth: we are looking at our recruiting and screening process all the time. even before the first class was reinserted we were looking at how to speed up our recruiting process and speed up the screening process. we are looking at the kinds of criteria that we have in place

but i think our view is that right now, our criteria are very consistent with the requirements that congress gai us and if we were to loosen them, for example, i think we would absolutely have to come back to you all and ask for -- senator hirono: that's my question are you seriously asking us to re-evaluate the criteria congress established. i know we're talking a lot about what's going on on the ground but a concern is also, and you mentioned this in your testimony, that you're looking for more effective ways to ounter isil's very effective messaging campaign. there are concerns about isil's ability to motivate lone wolves who will take action without ever having direct contact with isil. so taking action in our country as well as elsewhere. so what are some of the effective ways you are countering isil's messaging

strategy? ms. wormuth: we are taking some step it is that are effective but need to do more. part of what -- we have been working, for example, closely with a number of countries in the coalition to identify communicators inside those communities who have credibility with muslim populations and who will be able to lay out a compelling reasons why isil's theology is completely bankrupt. we have been working with governments to counter violent extremism, we have been working to get our messages out about military successes that we have more effectively. but a lot of it is working with the private, sort of the private sector and civil society to try to get the right kinds of messengers to speak to these kinds of groups. it's a very challenging part of our effort and i think we need to do more there. senator hirono: i agree with

that. i think the lone wolf phenomenon, and the problem is one we don't have a very good handle on. general, i think you mentioned you thought there were signs that iran would like to be more active in supporting syria and possibly that -- because of the agreement and they were getting their hands on more money as the sanctions get lifted, you said you saw some signs of that. that iran would like to do more system of what are these signs that you are referring to? because we know that iran is already supporting syria. so -- are you expecting that they're going to put billions more into their support of assad? general austin: they are already supporting sir ark you're exactly right. as things become more die nam i think in syria -- more dynamic in syria and the regime is increasingly challenged, it's my

assessment that iran will want to continue to try to shore them up in a greater way. senator hirono: it's not as though our country will stand by idly as iran proceeds with that kind of program, correct? we're not going to just sit there. ms. wormuth: certainly not. we are very focused on countering iran's maligned activities. we have sanctions of our own that are in place to try to block arms, for example, going to countries. we have interdicted or worked with folks in the coalition to interdict weapons going from iraq to the sue fees, for example, and we -- to the sufis, and we would continue to try to use those kinds of tools to limit iran's ability to support the syria -- the syrians. senator hirono: thank you. >> thank you, mr. chairman, for

calling this important hearing. thank you, secretary wormuth and general austin for taking the time to answer these questions. it's deeply appreciated. it's been one year since president obama announced to the world that the united states would undertake a strategy to degrade and defeat isis. in order to return some semblance of stability to iraq and create an environment that could lead to a negotiated end to the civil war in syria. it was my belief that president obama's overall goal and strategy he outlined to achieve that goal may have been beset from the outset by some flawed assumptions of some contradictions and perhaps an excessive reliance on political forecasting in a region of the world that is anything but easy to predict. senator lee: this, compounded by a string of recent events, is why i think it may be time for us to reassess the way the united states views this

conflict and chooses to respond to it. and i think we need to start by making clear-eyed threat assessments and prioritizing u.s. national security interests. general austin, what's your assessment of the most significant threats that the conflict in syria and in iraq pose to the security of u.s. citizens and our freedoms? in other words, at the end of the day, what needs to be accomplished for the u.s. government to fulfill, perform its constitutional duty to protect the people of the united tates and our interests? general austin: thank you, senator. this is a transnational threat. if left unchecked, it will continue to expand and to try to take up occupied territory and govern it.

and in doing so, it will try to erase international boundaries, t will try to do a number of things that will cause tremendous pain and suffering throughout the region. it will also export terror. in my belief it will export terror to other parts of the world and particularly to places like our homeland. we see the beginnings of this in this lone wolf activity that we talk about. we also see what we're concerned about, individuals who go into iraq and syria and fight as a part of this effort and return, potentially return back to our homeland and bring those skills back with them. so this is -- it is a threat to us. i think the threat will continue to increase. senator lee: the administration's strategy is to create an environment in syria that will be likely to lead to a

negotiated settlement of the civil war and removal of assad from pow for the damascus. in your professional military opinion an given your knowledge of the region what level of pressure would need to be leveraged against mr. assad and his supporters in order for them to capitulate? especially as many -- especially as many minority groups, some opposition -- view some opposition groups as a threat to their survival and how much investment would be needed from the coalition countries in order to provide security and tability in hypothetical post-assad syria? general austin: i think that assad would only be willing, as you have stated, senator, to come to the table to negotiate a

settlement if he feels like he's threatened. and as things continue to develop in the country, you know, we see a number of elements, al nusra and others fighting the regime, isil, their efforts come together and place increasing pressure on assad. he is lose he still has significant capability but he's losing capability every day. now, the wild card is, when countries like iran or potentially russia would -- could possibly move in and shore him up. it could extend things for a bit of time. in a post-assad environment, we have to consider that there are a number of elements there that will continue to be there, will continue to fight. al nusra is one of those elements. if there are remnants of isil there, they'll continue to fight. it will require some sort of stability force to go in and

make sure that whatever the transition government looks like, it has the ability to do its job. senator lee: thank you, general austin. i see my time has expired. senator reed: on behalf of enator mccain, i recognize the senator. >> let me start with a compliment. i was in kuwait, jordan, turkey in late june and early july, i barzani's dent office in, and he said if president obama had not started the bomb, we would not be here today, he meant we the kurd, people. senator kaine: he wanted to extend his thanks. however, everywhere else i

traveled, to baghdad and to the other parts of the region, it seems like there's major problems, the effort to retake ramadi that was begun in mid july is apparently not going that well and in syria, absent some successes in the kurdish area near kobani has been disastrous. i was not an original supporter when senator mccain raised the idea of a no-fly humanitarian zone, but by the time senator king and i went to lebanon in february of 2014 and saw a million refugees already into lebanon, i became converted. when senator mccain pushed the idea of humanitarian zone first, there was only about 750,000 syrian refugees in turkey. now there's 1.8 million and it will be two million soon the number is four million syrians have fled outside the country. there's 7. million internally

displaced syrians in the country and they could easily leaf the country as well. a humanitarian zone in northern syria would be difficult to do but i think the benefit of that compared with four million and then climbing to could be six or seven or eight million refugees, something could be very, very dangerous leaving the country, i think we would have been wise to do it when senator mccain suggested it and i think we would still be wise to do it and from having met with a number of syrian refugees, an awful lot of those who fled the country would go back if they felt there was a place where basic needs would be met and they would be safe. i could encourage -- i would encourage that. that's not your decision to make, i encourage the dministration. general austin, you said the war against isil would go on for years. is that correct? general austin: it is. senator kaine: i don't think go

on for years and the chances of success for isil are dimmed, i don't think those are compatible statements. i don't think those are really ompatible statements. it seems like the isil threat is expanding geographically. we are talking about iraq and syria here, but there is isil presence in libya we are paying attention to. there is isil presence in afghanistan largely disaffected taliban who are moving over and claiming allegiance to isil. boko haram has pledged allegiance to isil. not yet threatening the united states as far as i know. there may be some isil presence in yemen, is that correct? general austin: that is correct, sir. there is. senator kaine: the potential battlefield against isil is expanding. and we are actually maybe engaging in some new activity. my understanding, general austin, you indicated, we have undertaken air strikes to support trained syrians in syria when they have been threatened by al miss a,

correct? nd we are also prepared as a change in policy from early august to undertake air strikes to protect those syrian fighters if they fall under threat and attack by the assad regime? general austin: that's correct, sir. senator kaine: i completely agree with that, but i have to ask what is the legal predicate for the united states undertaking military action against forces of the assad regime? ms. wormuth: senator, our determination is that as you know very well we can defend against isil under the 2001 aumf, and if our forces are attacked by the regime in a particular circumstances, we could -- the president could exercise his article 2 rights under the constitution. senator kaine: if our forces, if the u.s. is attacked -- ms. wormuth: i meant our forces meaning the forces we trained.

senator kaine: i have not seen an interpretation of article 2 ever that would allow the united states to undertake ction under article 2 to protect others' fighters. you can take action under article 2 to protect the u.s. the president doesn't need to ask anybody's permission for that. to undertake action to protect others' fighters, i have never seen an interpretation of article 2 that would do this. the last thing i'll say, there is a lot more criticism i would get into here and a lot of us have, but i worry that congress is criticizing you as if we were editorial writers. we have a lot of opinions. we are acting like fans in the stands. we still have not authorized this war. we still have not authorized this war. i believe it is being carried out in violation of basic legal

principles because congress has not done what congress is supposed to do. we can be fans in the stands and throw all the criticisms we want, but we are in the 14-month of an undeclared war that is based upon a legal justification that is specious in my view. but congress has allowed it to happen. completely giving up their article 1 responsibilities. now that we have been told the war will go on for years, my question is to my colleagues, how long are we going to allow a president to wage an executive war without a congressional authorization? i think we are afraid to touch this. we can criticize this all we want. we'll have many more hearings like this o over the course of a number of years. i'm sure we'll have critical things to say. but if we are not willing to do our constitutional duty, why are we here? we are not fans. we are supposed to be the owners of this team. thank you, mr. chair. senator reed: recognize senator cotton. senator cotton: wars are not won with paper resolutions, they are won with iron resolution. and that is clearly lacking in our strategy right now against the islamic state. general austin, ms. wormuth, thank you for coming.

general austin in particular, for all the the thousands of troopers you represent for your service and their service. i want to speak briefly about the reports that there may have been some efforts to cook the books about our performance in the campaign against the islamic state. i know in your opening statement you acknowledge this. acknowledge the problem. there is ongoing investigations to include with the i.g. but you have an ongoing challenge in our intelligence reporting and the way it affects your operations, as well as the command climate. putting aside the i.g. investigation, could you just tell us what steps you are taking to confront those challenges that you face on a daily basis? general austin: i have recently and continue to emphasize, senator, to all of my subordinates that my expectation is that i get candid and accurate intelligence assessments from my staff. i also emphasize to my entire command as i have in every command that i have had that the welfare of my people is extremely important to me.

and so i care about my people. my expectation is that they have a climate that's conducive to providing for a good healthy sound work environment forum. senator cotton: i would have to say, too, as someone who regularly consumes intelligence community products on the islamic state and our campaign gainst them as a member of this committee and member of the intelligence committee, i was very surprised to hear allegation that is books are being cooked. those products are not painting a very pretty picture how this campaign is going. general austin, i want to move now to events in syria and in particular russia's military buildup, published reports have said in the last couple weeks to include admissions of senior russian officials that russia is sending aircraft there, air defense systems, personnel carriers, main battle tanks

now. in addition to life support systems like modular housing. they are completely designed for a large and continued presence. how many air strikes is the coalition conducting on a daily asis right now in syria? general austin: we are conducting overall about 24 or so air strikes in iraq and syria and about a third are in syria. senator cotton: what efforts if any, do we have under way to deconflict this battle space now that we have hundreds, perhaps thousands of russians running around with air defense systems and battle tanks and ersonnel carriers? general austin: from a military perspective, we continue to look at what the possibilities for encounters are, senator. and we have -- we make sure that we have measures in place to ensure that we don't have an inadvertent encounter with either russian aircraft or syrian aircraft. senator cotton: do our pilots have to have 100% identification there is no

russian on the target before they can strike that target? general austin: the russians to my knowledge have not started operations as of this point. so we have not had to encounter that yet. but clearly these are things that from a tactical perspective that we will continue to work and think through. senator cotton: assad's other main supporter inside syria and iran, and specifically the revolution guard force and qud force, do we need positive identification there are no iranian forces there? general austin: our pilots have to have 100% -- they have to ave certainty, senator, that there are isil targets there to be engaged. as you know we can see what we are shooting at or what we are engaging, this is not an issue. senator cotton: there is a report recently in the media that russia offered in 2012 to

help the west remove assad from power and that the united states declined that offer because we believed that assad would fall of his own accord. is that an accurate report? ms. wormuth: i don't believe that's an accurate report. but that's obviously from several years ago i wasn't in this position at that time. i don't believe it's ccurate. senator cotton: do you believe iran and their proxies can be a partner in the fight against the islamic state in any way in iraq and syria? ms. wormuth: no, not really. i mean we are not cooperating with iran right now in iraq for example. we are deconflicting. as you know well they certainly have a role with some of the shiia militia on the ground, some of the popular mobilization forces. but we are not cooperating and i don't see iran as having a productive role in either iraq or syria. senator cotton: thank you. i agree given the fact there

are militias relying on u.s. airpower and now russian forces in iran to back up their happenless efforts. they aren't going to be a partner in trying to rely on iran to defeat the islamic state is like trying to rely on gasoline to put out a ire. enator reed: on behalf of the chairman, senator king. senator king: thank you, mr. chair. general, i want to touch for a few moments on the intelligence issue. i consider this extremely grave. a grave issue, because if we don't have reliable intelligence as policymakers and if the president doesn't have reliable intelligence, we can't make good policy. his keeps happening. this goes back to the bay of igs, vietnam, the iraq war and

these allegations are extremely serious and i hope you will, i understand we have an i.g. investigation, but as a commanding officer, i would hope that you would just be all over this. i want to ask you a direct question. have you ever ordered, suggested, or hinted to any of the intelligence command that hey should sweeten the intelligence reports in order to portray a more positive view of the success of our efforts in iraq or syria? general austin: absolutely not, senator king. absolutely not. senator king: i just hope you'll stay on this. as you know better than any of us, if you don't have good intelligence, you're not only going into the battle blind, if it's cooked intelligence, you are going into the battle with one hand tied behind your back. i'm extremely concerned about this issue.

this is a question for the record. you used the term progress in your statement a number of times. progress here and progress there. not now but for the record, i would like a very specific list of what you consider progress. where we are succeeding. because generally it doesn't look like that. it looks more like a stalemate and i think, again, we should have this information and i know some of it is in your testimony, but i'd like, if you could, just a one pager on where you think progress has been made. general austin: be happy to provide that, sir. get that to you right away. senator king: from a broad question of policy, this comes off of a lot of the discussion we had, assad and isis are evil twins. isis came into existence in reaction to assad. in retrospect and like senator kaine i was one very reluctant about getting involved, but in retrospect, the longer we left assad there, it has created a

situation both a humanitarian crisis and a situation that has llowed isil -- isil didn't -- allowed al-nusra and isil -- isil didn't even exist when we first started having these hearings. it's allowed them to -- it's given them an enemy and opportunity to make hay with the population. a strategy that ignores assad -- for example, trains -- to go -- trains troops to go into syria to only fight isil but not assad i think -- i think we now need to recognize that's not a logical strategy. part of good strategic thinking is you modify your strategy according to the changed circumstances. the circumstances are, you mentioned he's losing his capabilities every day, i'm sorry, general. i have been hearing that at every hearing since 2013. assad is about to go. he's about to collapse. i know you didn't say that today, but we've got to find a strategy that allows us to move

assad aside in some way working with the russians, if necessary, or the iranians, if necessary, because he's the irritant that's keeping this thing stirred up. finally, in terms of our troops, the fundamental problem seems to me is, we are not going to defeat isis with just airpower, everybody knows that. we are trying to rely on a weak force in iraq and no force in syria. how do we refine this strategy, general, and you know that -- in order to root them out of mosul or iraq or any place else, you have to have troops on the ground. we don't want them to be americans. how do we break through this? clearly the train and equip is too little too late. your thoughts. general austin: we are going to need a greater commitment from the partners that we are enabling, senator. again, if the iraqis make the commitment to put more troops through the train and equip

program, we'll get them trained and equipped and get them into the fight. senator king: are there signs the iraqis are willing to do that? do they want mosul back? general austin: i certainly think so. they want to stabilize anbar, first. and then take on mosul. yes, i believe that. senator king: give me thoughts on the overall strategy here. ms. wormuth: certainly, senator. in terms of getting more iraqis into the fight, they are, as i said, increased -- they are opening the aperture in terms of which units they are putting into our training sites. that's going to help create additional -- senator king: i would like specific numbers for the record. ms. wormuth: certainly. we see them starting to now plan ahead in terms of which units are going into the training pipeline, which again i think indicates a greater sense of urgency on their part. and on the syrian side of the ledger i would say it is

clearly harder to find partners on the ground on the syrian side of the ledger, but one of the things that we didn't envision a year ago was the partnership, if you will, that we have of our airpower with the syrian kurds and the syrian arab coalition that are operating with them. that group on its own won't be enough, but we are continuing to look for opportunities like that even as we review our own train and equip. enator king: i need to rethink a strategy about a safe zone, no-fly zone, some protection from assad's barrel bombs. this is -- i hate it when the chairman's right. he's been talking about this for two years, in retrospect i think he was right. we have allowed this to just -- atrocity to go on too long. it's impacting us. it's impacting the rest of europe. i really think that there should be a rethinking of the nonintervention strategy. not in terms of troops, but in terms of airpower in order to

level the playing field, bring pleasure on assad and the russians so we can get a negotiated agreement because it doesn't seem to be a prospect now. thank you very much. senator reed: on behalf of the chairman, senator. senator tillis: thank you. ms. wormuth, you made in your opening statement, i apologize i had to step out i had a judiciary committee meeting. you made a comment in your opening statement i want to focus time on through a series of questions that i can get briefed. -- brief remarks. you said that isis is not 10 feet tall. the reason i have a concern ith that statement is it's reminiscent of characterizing them as the j.v. team. they are a very serious threat. before i go forward, general austin, i neglected to do what i always do when i see people in uniform. thank you for your service. i know you guys are a part of the solution. but when we say that isis is not 10 feet tall, they are the richest threat group of this

kind in human history. through the seizure of assets for the iraqi national bank, i think they see some $820 million. last week we had a memorial for 9/11. it's estimated that the 9/11 attacks cost about $500,000. through that one asset seizure, f my math is right, that equates to about 1,600 9/11's, having the resources to strike that kind of damage in our homeland, middle east, and europe and other places. i think we need to recognize them as one of the single greatest threats we have today. of course we have russia, north korea, iran. they are at the frontline for people that we have to take seriously. we have to figure out when we are making progress and when we are not. hat leads to my questions. do you feel like year over year, the

last 24, 36 months, whatever time horizon general austin, makes sense to you, does isis control more or less territory or do they have greater or less influence in other areas that are merging as potential strongholds for isis in the future? ore or less? general austin: less in iraq. senator tillis: we know they are expanding elsewhere. we know they are changing jerseys in afghanistan, from al qaeda and other groups, and taliban into isis. we have them operating in other areas. what's the net? more or less? general austin: it would be more. enator tillis: ok. do they have -- if you were to compare their resource, economic resources, over the last 24, 36 months, do they have more or less dollars to support their terrorist operations? general austin: less. we have targeted their resources. they make money, as you know, senator, off things like oil collection.

senator tillis: antiquity ales, kidnappings. general austin: i have said on a number of occasions not only do we have to stop the flow of foreign fighters, but we have to take away this enemy's ability to finance. senator tillis: i'm trying to come up with this concept of a dashboard so when we have the next committee hearing i can ask you the same series of questions and see where the trends are. do they have more or less influence -- they seem to be winning on social media in terms of reaching out to people in the homeland. reaching out to people in europe about six hours ago it was posted some 15-year-old girl murdered her mother in europe. was convicted of murder as a result of being radicalized by some of the social media presence. have we stemmed the tied on their continued expansion of the use of social media to radicalize people internationally in the homeland? ms. wormuth: i think they do have a more effective counter messaging campaign at this point. that's an area we need to work on. senator tillis: it seems like again in terms of trends the ground that they are taking,

the places they are heavily influencing, social media. this is an organization that is trending in the wrong direction gainst the greatest superpower that's ever existed. i want to go back to chemical weapons. do you think that -- there's been reports, all i want to talk about confirmed reports. do you think that their use of chemical weapons have increased over the last 24 months or beginning to see evidence that they are being used in certain areas in syria and iraq? more or less? ms. wormuth: senator, given that they had no apparent use of chemical weapons at the outset, there have been -- some indications. senator tillis: ok. so there are more. the last question i have is how -- i understand that most of the problem has to deal with the fact that iraq has failed to do what they need to do to engage the sunni population.

but they haven't done it. so over the course of the last 24, 36 months has the sunni population been more or less inclined to side with isis where the conflicts are arising in iraq? ms. wormuth: i think we have seen considerable outreach from prime minister abadi. there are now 4,000 sunni tribal fighters in anbar we didn't have six months ago. senator tillis: you feel like we are winning in terms of engaging the hearts and minds of sunni population. general austin: i would agree they are less inclined in iraq to side with isil. they have seen what isil brings to the table and most of the sunnis don't want that going forward. they do want to be included in the government of iraq. senator tillis: i think they should be. if we are going to have long-term strategy that has productive engagement. thank you very much, i'm sorry, ranking member, for going over

time. senator reed: senator king has requested additional question. senator king. senator king: it's not a question, mr. chairman. i want to submit for the record an extraordinary speech by robert gates in 1992 when he was head of the c.i.a. on the danger of politicization of intelligence. it's prescient and brilliant which is not surprising coming from robert gates. i want to submit it for the record. thank you. senator reed: without objection, on behalf of chairman mccain let me thank the witnesses and adjourn the hearing. thank you. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2015] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org]

>> the house of representatives today debated several bills, mostly dealing with transfers of federal lapped with local groups. the house back in a few minutes at 6:30 p.m. eastern time for votes on two of today's bills. and later in the week, debate on legislation that would require federal judges to assess monetary penalties on people who file lawsuits found to be frivolous. also this week, the house is expected to vote on -- or take a vote on legislation that would remove federal funding from planned parenthood. until the house returns in a few minutes, from today's "washington journal," we get a preview of this week's meeting of the federal reserve board. rna columnist for "yahoo finance." what we know leading up to this two-day meeting about what they may decide and who is for raising and who is against? guest: [laughter] well, we know that we have been talking about it what seems like

forever. it is hard to think of any federal reserve act that has ever gotten so much scrutiny. and i think the creston -- question of what we don't know is whether the chairman of the federal reserve actually wants to raise rates or get started with this tightening cycle. and that is really the key thing. you know, there are certain members of the committee have come out and said, yes, it is time. others have said it is too early. it seems like kind of an even split within that committee, and the one person who has not really said what she thinks is jenny gallon, and her vote is most important. so we will find out soon what she thinks they need to do and went. host: what will we find out and how? and what will it mean for the average american consumer? guest: we find out thursday afternoon around 2:00.

the had will put out a statement, followed by a press conference -- the fed will put out a statement, followed by a press conference. that will be where she explains what the fed just to did or didn't do, and then she will take questions from the press. in terms of what it means, probably not much, honestly, at the beginning. not much is going to change. rates, we does raise are talking about a very, very small increase in short-term interest rates. that may have no effect at all on things like mortgage rates and credit card rates and auto loan interest rates, the swords of consumer loads people by because there is not a direct correlation between the short-term rates and the longer-term rates. over time, as though short-term rates go up, back to something that is considered normal, that will filter through to these

consumer loans. but i think the real thing -- this really is not going to affect the real u.s. economy very much, if at all. impact onave some financial markets, and that means the stock market. so if investors get a little bit unnerved by something that the fed does this week, there will probably be a selloff in the stock market. i don't think there is any reason to think it will be a terrible selloff. seewe are probably going to some jumpy behavior in the stock market. host: the "wall street journal" says the fed is trapped by zero. one of the committee members --

is there a risk of that and what that would mean for consumers? guest: yeah, this is a very complicated puzzle for the fed. deflation sounds like a good thing. that is when prices fall. and do a thing, i would be delighted because then i pay less for everything. , that meansfall wages fall. you are most likely to put off purchases of things you don't need right away. and you are always going to be putting off purchases. that is owing to become a problem that is very hard to fix. and also in deflation, debt becomes more inspection of -- expensive overtime. if wages are following and are

mortgage is fixed takes more of your paycheck overtime. we don't have that problem right now. we have very low inflation, which if you are a consumer, that is a good thing. but the risk is that the fed cannot really -- you know -- it doesn't have precise control over the level of inflation, and so that inflation -- let's say 1.5% today might drift back into something that looks like deflation if the fed can't control it. there are a lot of economists who don't agree with the "wall street journal" editorial board. they think the fed has done what they have had to do. nobody -- the fed is in the next ordinary position right now, and even the fed doesn't like being where does because when interest rates are zero, if we have another recession or if they need to do something to similar to the economy, there is nothing they can do in terms of interest rates.

economists are kind of all over the map on this. should the fed have done something differently? shouldn't have gotten off the zero interest rates a lot sooner? it is one of those things that we're ask what is the counterpart, what would have happened if the fed had gone back to normal monetary policy sooner, could that have harm to the economy? a lot going on here. host: by the way, our viewers can read your recent column on this, five things the fed's easy money policies accomplished. [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2015] >> the u.s. house returning in a moment or two following a recess this afternoon. the house today debated several bills mostly dealing with transfers of federal land with local groups. the house back again momentarily for recorded votes on two of those bills. that should be it for legislative business today. later in the week, debate on legislation that would require federal judges t