since lochner. a majority rule or a state legislature, can it take away your life and liberty without due process? i think it is a wonderful decision. >> this week on c-span's landmark cases, we look at lochner v. new york. bakery owner joseph lochner violated the law and was fined $50. refusing to pay, he took his case to the supreme court. find out why lochner is known as one of the most controversial decisions in supreme court history. randy barnett, a professor of constitutional law and author of the book "restoring the lost constitution" and the political science professor at texas state s hostsity paul ken

"landmark cases." director james comey testified before no bright a committee.h this is about two hours and 45 minutes. >> good morning. the judiciary committee will come to order. >> welcome, director komi.

we are happy to have you here with us today. commend your distinguished service and i am confident you will continue to serve honorably. today, the fbi continues to face the effects of one of the worst national security leaks in our nation wash history by edward snowden two years ago. was aa freedom act bipartisan law that ended a controversial national security program. you provided transparency of the american intelligence gathering. the act in chores that federal law appropriately respects civil liberties, while providing the and meet ourls national security responsibilities. comey to thank director and the men and women of the

fbi, for working closely with the members of this committee to ensure the passage of the freedom act. events of the past year have deeply violated the world's moral compass with scenes of theaginable brutality at hands of isis. in particular, the appalling and targeting of anyone refuse to abide by isis's isis stated goals to establish a global caliphate has resulted in the shedding of innocent blood by the most revolting method. as a radical islamic terrorist organization, isis mandates conformity to an ideology which admits no dissent. as americans with a strong history of protecting religious liberty, we stand in total opposition to isis. america is not immune to isis up again. american teenagers have been radicalized part by isis inserted social media efforts promoting milk that's the

-- promoting the killing of fellow americans. just this past week director only direct the forefront protecting our country from those who recently bought the car. i'm interested today about hearing more of the efforts to combat isis. over three years ago diplomatic mission to benghazi was attacked terrorists. americans, including our ambassador, was killed. as of today, only one subject put on trial. i'm interested in hearing about the investigation. separately, it was revealed that former secretary of state hillary clinton used a private e-mail server to conduct her official business while serving as secretary of the.

-- secretary of state. classified information was contained within her private e-mail. the matter has been referred to the justice department. apparent lack of transparency related to the use of a private server to conduct the nation's diplomatic business is troubling, it raises significant questions. a homebrew setup may afford a foreign intelligence service day today elected official. on the technology front, the issue known as going dark has been a concern of the fbi for years. encryption technology is exciting and can effectively secure private communication. over 15 years ago, i led

congressional efforts to ensure encryption technology. this enabled the u.s. encryption market to thrive and produce a legitimate encryption technologies for legitimate actors, rather than see the ead overseas. however, it is true this technology can also be used by those who wish to do us harm. the adoption of new communications technologies i those intending to harm the american people is outpacing the law enforcement's capabilities to access those communications in legitimate criminal and terrorist investigations. in light of the administration's recent announcement that it is not currently seeking a legislative solution to its going dark challenges, i am interested to hear your perspective on whether the administration's newly announced

approach to work in an ad hoc fashion is an adequate solution. violent crimes appears to be on the rise across the country. particularly, around our major metropolitan centers. it is disconcerting to watch the games of the past decade unravel in an explosion of community violence. we have witnessed several incidents in the past year that have led to increased community tension with law enforcement. this tension will hopefully be resolved through improved communication, accountability, policing practices, and other initiatives. i hope to hear the fbi's perspective. the officers and the citizens they serve to coexist in a safe and respectful environment. i appreciate your efforts to keep us safe and the heroic actions consistently performed

by the men and women of the fbi. i look forward to hearing your answers on all of this today, as well as on our other issues. at this time, i pleased to recognize the ranking member of the committee, the gentleman from michigan, mr. connors for his opening statement. connors: thank you, chairman. good morning director comey. for this second appearance before the house judiciary committee. since taking office on september fbi's mission is a complex undertaking to protect the united states from terrorism , to enforce our criminal laws, nation's lawhe enforcement community.

seems, is this mission think nearly all of the discussion we will have today can be distilled into one word, trust. trust in the executive branch to respect and secure our privacy and our civil liberties. fbi as anhe institution. saving local agencies that police our communities. think weespects, i agree on this point. for example, you have spoken truthslly about the hard we must keep in mind when we discuss race and policing. in particularly, when we discuss use of force by police officers. i am told that he require all new agencies to study the fbi

interaction with dr. martin luther king junior. and to visit his memorial. keepalso advised that you on your desk a copy of robert kennedy's approval of j edgar request to place a wiretap on dr. king. these are powerful reminders of a troubling and not too distant history. it is not difficult to draw a line from that era to recent events in ferguson, baltimore, new york, and cleveland. builds why your work to trust between police and our communities is so important. effort morehat apparent than in your call for better data on the use of force

by police. although the fbi is the national statistics, crime that data is reported voluntarily and inconsistently. you have been honest in your assessment that official statistics in this area are so incomplete as to be embarrassing and ridiculous. we need a better understanding of what drives the police's use of force. we cannot study the problem without reliable data. press you to continue to your state and local partners for consistent and accurate reporting through the national incident-based reporting system. trust ine must rebuild certain state and law enforcement units, we will look to your testimony today to

reassure us about a number of programs and activities at the fbi. public this year, the noticed a small plane flying in a tight pattern directly over the site of unrest in west baltimore. from other parts of the country, including my own district in detroit, raised questions about the presence of similar aircraft's. confirmed thence existence of its aerial surveillance program. on june 3, 15 members of this committee wrote you to ask for more information about this program. your team provided our staff with the briefing soon thereafter. still has many questions about aerial

surveillance and you said that there is a great deal of misinformation about this program. i would like you to use your testimony and presence here today to explain, from your perspective, how this program works and why we should trust the bureau to operate it. we would, i think benefit from a full or description of encryption and what you have called the going dark problem. over the past year, you have called for a congressional mandate to give the fbi special access to otherwise encrypted data. i have a difficult time understanding this proposal. every technical expert who has spoken on this issue has concluded it is technically impossible to provide this access

without also compromising our security against bad actors. even if it were technically feasible, it would cost our technology sector perhaps, billions of dollars to implement the scheme. and perhaps ilion's more from loss of business overseas where the united states government surveillance programs have already taken a toll on the industry. and even if it were technically feasible and easy to implement, a new rule for united states would not succeed in keeping that actors are amusing unbreakable encryption. which is open source, free, and from companiese

based overseas. we had this debate in 1999. only by allowing the use of , not onlyryption an domestically, but internationally as well, can we hope to make the internet a safe and secure environment. i agree with that sentiment and you have made similar public statements. i hope you can help us to whatcile that view with you you call special access. because rigorous oversight is necessary for public trust, i hope that he will commit today to full compliance with the

the inspector general of the department of justice is to have timely access to every document he requires to carry out his duties. noncompliance has real consequences. this committee waited until february of this year to receive a report about the f.b.i.'s use of section 215 orders from 2007-2009. the public waited until may for the unclassified version. in the middle of a national debate on government surveillance, we waited six years for critical information. this delay is unacceptable. i understand that there are other interpretations of the law. congress will soon clarify the

the matter, likely it overwhelmingly bipartisan fashion. but in the meantime, director comey, i hope that the bureau will step away from its litigating position and give the office of the inspector general the access it requires and deserves. your job is a complex and demanding one, director. we appreciate you being here today and i look forward to your testimony. i thank the chairman and yield back. >> thank you, mr. conyers. without objection all other members' opening statements will be made a part of the record. we welcome our distinguished witness today. if you will please rise, we will begin by squaring you win. do you swear the testimony you are about to give shall be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you god? >> i do.

>> thank you. let the record reflect the witness has responded in the affirmative. on september 4, 2013, director comey was sworn in as the seventh director of the f.b.i. he began his career as an assistant united states attorney for both the southern district of new york and the eastern district of virginia. after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, director comey returned to new york to become the united states attorney for the southern district of you ne new york. in 2003, he was appointed deputy attorney general under united states attorney general john ashcroft. director comey is a graduate of the college of william & mary and the university of chicago law school. we welcome you again today to your second appearance before the house committee. your written statement will be entered into the record in its entirety and we ask you to summarize your testimony in five minutes. with that we welcome you again to the committee. >> thank you chairman. it's good to be back before you and the members of the committee for my second annual oversight hearing.

i expect to be back for eight more during my 10 year term, which is look forward to very much. what i thought i would do is just explain to the committee, in very short form, how we at the fbi think about ourselves and a couple of the things that are prominent in our work today. i think the fbi can best be described in a single sentence. we are a national security and law enforcement organization that uses, collects, and shares intelligence in everything that we do. that sentence captures us in two different ways. first the first half of that sentence, we are a national security and law enforcement organization. there is great strength for the american people and having our criminal responsibilities and our national security responsibilities in the same place. perhaps no more better example is the strength gained from that combination than the rule of law as the spine of the

fbi. it is a great thing i think, for this country that the people responsible for counterintelligence, counterterrorism, and the criminal work all have as part of their being, the rule of law and the bill of rights. the second half of that sentence, we use, collect, and share intelligence in everything that we do, is the description of what i think we've always been but what we've tried to get so much better at since 9/11. that is being thoughtful about what we know, what we need to know, and who needs to know what we know. so we can all be more effective in protecting this country. i want to start with national security. the threat posed to us from isil's crowd sourcing of terrorism using social media is a significant feature of our work. it was an especially taxing threat the f.b.i. dealt with earlier this summer when all over the country in hundreds of investigations we were trying to evaluate where people are from consuming isil's poison to

acting on it. through the internet is the so-called islamic state has been pushing a twin-prong message to troubled souls all over the world and all over our country. the first prong is come to the so-called caliphate and live a life of glory and if you can't calm, the second prong says, killed. kill where you are. kill anyone. if you can kill people in uniform, military or law enforcement, best of all. that message has gone out since the summer of 2014 aggressively in a very sophisticated way to thousands of consumers on twitter. and twitter works to sell books or movies or magazines. it works to crowd source terrorism. and so in every state we have investigations trying to understand where people are on the path from consuming to acting. and this is a very different paradigm from the traditional al qaeda paradigm because this is not about national landmarks and sophisticated, long surveilled events. this is about trying to motivate murder anywhere, by

anyone. unfortunately, it is a message that resonates with troubled souls seeking meaning. earlier this summer especially in may, june, and july, we were faced with the prospect of a lot of people acting out on this inspiration or direction from isil. thanks to great work by the men and women of the fbi, and our partners in state, local, and federal law enforcement, we disrupted a whole lot of efforts to murder innocent people in the united states. that work, though, continues, and it is made particularly difficult by an issue both you and mr. conyers touched upon. our mission is to find needles in a nationwide hay stack and we have hundreds of investigations aimed at doing that in all 50 states. but increasingly what isil does is move the real live ones who might be willing to kill on their behalf off of twitter to a mobile messaging app that is end-to-end encrypted. at that moment the needle we may have found becomes invisible to us even with court orders. which is how the f.b.i. does its business.

so that's the challenge we face called going dark in real, living color. we are trying to interdict, trying to stop, trying to understand people on the cusp of acts of violence and increasingly a tool that the american people count on us to use is less and less effective. i don't know exactly what to do about that, frankly. but i think my job given the responsibility have is to tell people there's a problem and we need to talk about it. so i look forward to a conversation about it with you. our law enforcement responsibilities, the second thing i want to touch very briefly obviously we do public corruption work. we protect children. we fight fraud. we do a lot of work with our partners around the country to address violent crime. something very disturbing is happening in this country right now in law enforcement and in violent crime. i imagine two lines. one being us and law enforcement and the other being communities we serve and protect , especially communities of color. those two lines over the last year or so have been arcing away from each other and that continues. each incident that involves

police misconduct or perceived misconduct bends one line away. each time an officer is killed or attacked in the line of duty bends the other line farther away. and in the midst of the arcing away from each other, maybe because they're arcing away from each other, we are seeing a dramatic spike in violent crime especially homicide in cities all across the country. in communities of color especially, especially young men are dying at a rate that dwarfs what we've seen in recent history. it's happening all over the country and it's happening all in the last 10 months. so a lot of us in law enforcement are talking and trying to understand what is happening in this country. what explains the map we see. what explains the calendar. why is it happening all over the country? why is it happening this year? i don't know the answer to that. i as i said like a lot of people in law enforcement are struggling with it. we simply must focus on this. because all lives matter. this is not a problem america

should drive around. we should stair at it. as we stare at it we should all work for ways to bend those lines back toward each other because we need each other. we need each other to make sure our communities are safe. we have achieved in 2014 historically low violent crime in this country. we cannot let that slip away from us. i am grateful for the hard work of the men and women of the f.b.i. on these challenges. i'm especially grateful for our partners in law enforcement around the country who help us address those. as you know, the f.b.i. doesn't have a lot of fancy stuff. we have people. and we have great people thank goodness, who are americans who care deeply about protecting all of their fellow citizens. i am honored to be in this job where i get to watch what they do and help them. i look forward to your questions. >> thank you, director comey. we'll now proceed under the five-minute rule with questions for the director and i'll begin by recognizing myself. since the passage of the "usa

, a law that struck a balance between privesy and national security, is the fbi experiencing any difficulty in complying with the new law? >> we have not, mr. chairman. we haven't yet gotten to the place where the system that -- the alternate system for telephone metadata has been built, but so far we have not seen adverse impact. >> you're getting very close to that i think the date when the metadata collection will be completely turned off. >> yes. end of next month i believe. >> even with a decade's worth of information on iraqi refugees didn't we still encounter cases of domestic terrorism conducted by those admitted as refugees with significantly less information on potential syrian refugees isn't it true that you , can't ensure the iraqi experience is not going to be replayed? >> thank you, mr. chairman. yes, you're correct that we did discover in people who had come in as refugees from iraq a number of people who were of serious concern including two that were charged when we found their

fingerprints on improvised explosive devices from iraq and there is no doubt that was the product of a less than excellent vetting that had been done on iraqi refugees. there's good news and bad news. the good news is we have improved dramatically our ability as an inter-agency. all parts of the u.s. government to query and check people. the bad news is, our ability to touch data, with respect to who come from syria, we may be limited. >> much less than we'd have access to when we were in iraq. >> i think that is fair. >> and had extensive networking aboutcess to information iraqi citizens that simply does not in any way compared to the lack of information we have today about syrian nationals who refugee status

in the united states. >> i think that is a fair generality. the data we had available to us from iraq, from a decade of our folks of being there, encountering people is richer than the data that we have from syria. >> the director of the national security agency has said that former secretary of state clinton's private e-mail server would be a sought after target for a foreign intelligence agency. do you also believe that a foreign intelligence agency particularly an adversary's could benefit from acquiring and exploiting sensitive and classified information of a top level u.s. government official? >> mr. chairman, i respectfully say that is one i am not going to comment on. as you know, the f.b.i. is working on a referral given to us by inspectors general in connection with former secretary clinton's use of a private e-mail server. as you also know about the fbi, we don't talk about the

investigations while we are doing them. this is one i'm following very closely and get briefed on regularly. i'm confident we have the people and the resources to do it in the way i believe we do all of our work which is promptly, professionally, independently. i don't want to do anything that would compromise my ability to do it that way. >> well how about answering my generic question not directed at any specifics of that case, but rather, the question of whether you believe that if foreign intelligence agency, y'sticularly an adversar could benefit from acquiring and , exploiting sensitive and classified information of a top level u.s. government official? >> thank you, mr. chairman. i hope you'll understand why i don't think it is appropriate for me to answer that. i want to preserve my ability to oversee this investigation in a way that is both in reality independent and fair and is perceived that way. i believe the bureau is three things. we are competent, independent, and honest. and i want to make sure the american people have confidence that that's where we're doing our business. if i start answering questions

like yours, which is a reasonable question i worry that , i could infringe upon that. >> you've said encryption represents the going dark problem in high definition. earlier this month you testified in front of the senate homeland security and government affairs committee that the obama administration has decided to no longer seek a legislative remedy to address enforcement faces with encryption and going dark. what has changed, and do you agree with the concerns that i and the ranking member have expressed about some of the proposals that have proo previously been made with regard to addressing this problem? >> what the administration has decided, mr. chairman, is that it is not going to seek a legislative remedy now. then, we can continue the conversations we are having with the private sector, with their

our allies around the world, and with the state and local law enforcement. i think that makes good sense. i don't think we are yet to a place where we know exactly how we would fix this legislatively. this is a hard problem. two sets of values we all care about, safety and security on the internet, i am a big fan of strong encryption for the reasons you said. it helps us fight cyber security. it helps us protect all the .atters most dear to us andave to wrestle with it we continue to do that. we are having very good conversations about all the dimensions i just said. we will continue to do that, i hope. >> i just came from a meeting with bill gates who indicated that the progress being made in quantum computing is dramatic and that computers of that high

be able towill soon crack any kind of encryption that anyone has. that i found to be very interesting information. i have both good and bad reviews of that because obviously, that can be seriously abuse and of lawthe privacy abiding citizens. it will be a source of solving your problem when you encounter sncrypted materials by material from people who are suspected enemies of the united states. do you have any comments or the currentout state of quantum computing. nothing that would be useful to you. i only have eight years left on

my term. i have a hard time imagining a police officer in uric city having access to quantum computing. >> i know reference the ranking member for his questions. >> thank you, mr. chairman. welcome again, mr. director comey. you observed that the "the washington post" and "the guardian" are becoming the lead source of information about violent encounters between police and civilians. called the state of fbi statistics on these accounts embarrassing and ridiculous. that you have had some

time to reflect on them, do you stand by this comment? >> i do, mr. conyers. i think it's embarrassing for those of us in government who care deeply about these issues, especially the use of force by law enforcement, that we can't have an informed discussion because we don't have the data. people have data about who went or how manyast week books were sold, or how many cases of the flu walked into an emergency room. and i cannot tell you how many people were shot by police in the united states last month, last year, or anything about the demographics. that is a very bad place to be. >> what is the fbi have trouble collecting this information? >> the big challenge, mr. conyers, is it requires cooperation from 18,000 law enforcement organizations around the country. we are a big, diverse country of many different size

organizations in the law enforcement space. we've never all sat together and said, let's change the way we do this. i am optimistic. >> you're working on the problem. >> very hard. the good news is chiefs and sheriffs get it and want to be we as a country can have informed conversations. what i've been asking for resonates with them. i'm going to speak to them again at a huge conference in chicago next week. i am optimistic. >> i hope so. your written testimony takes a rather dim view of the so-called going dark problem. you want private companies to understand the public safety and national security risks that result from malicious factors. of their encrypted products and services. in the past, you have balanced

comments like these with an honest assessment of the benefits of strong encryption. i want you to take some time to do that here. why is encryption important to the internet economy, to the cyber security, and in many cases, to our personal security? >> encryption is vital to our personal security because all of our lives are now online. i like people locking their cars when they go into a store. i like people to lock their homes so people cannot break in and steal what matters to them. now what matters to us as people and as companies, and as a country, our online. it should be secured in a way people cannot steal our innovation, identities, information about our children. so encryption is a very good thing and the f.b.i. has long said that. the challenge we face is we never live in a world with locks

that couldn't be open on a judge's order. now we face that world where all of our lives will be covered right strong encryption so judge 's orders under the fourth amendment will be unable to be compiled with that and there are significant costs to that. that's what i meant by the conflict of the values, public safety on the internet, and that is what makes it a really hard problem. >> thank you. over the summer we receive reports that a single engine cessna operated by the fbi and mounted with surveillance equipment had flown multiple times over metro detroit, including two lengthy flights over dearborn, where many citizens feel reason to distrust the fbi because of their religious or ethnic background. you have been forthcoming to my staff about some of the details of this program.

can you give the public a similar overview here? >> sure. i'd be happy to, mr. conyers. when we investigate criminals or spies, or terrorists, a key tool is surveillance. we follow them a lot in cars. we follow them on foot. there are plenty of circumstances where both of those options don't work. and so since the wright brothers we have used airplanes to follow people in our investigations. if a spy comes out to meet somebody and it is an area where we cannot park cars, we will get a small plane up to get eyes on that meet with their contact. so it is a feature and i hope this does not shock the american people. i think i should be in trouble with them if we are not doing this. we use planes in our predicated investigations to conduct surveillance of people under investigation. we do not use planes for mass surveillance. so the good folks in michigan who saw the plane in the air, a lot of them had a chance to meet with my sac of their and explain

to them. look, this is what we do in criminal cases. it should make sense if we understand how to use it in individual cases. we have a small number of airplanes. actually wish we had more that we use to follow people where it is hard to follow on foot or in a car. >> thank you for your response to my questions. >> thank you. the chair recognized the gentleman from virginia mr. forbes for five minutes. >> thank you. thank you not just for being here but for your service. i also want to thank your staff for the dedication they put into serving the country. we appreciate your being here. if my friend were here he'd also commend you for your selection of william & mary as an under graduate and i will tell you if we couldn't convince you to go to the university of virginia law school chicago was probably a good second choice. but i have a question as i listen to the ranking member today talk about trust and he talked about the symbols that you have on your desk regarding police brutality and efforts by law enforcement.

you mentioned it was important to have reality and perception, both of those, when you look at that trust. tell me the symbols, if you would. tell me the symbols on your desk or in your office that would give me comfort in knowing that there was also a perception that he were equally looking at organized groups that were coming into areas like ferguson to firm that unrest. especially groups that were outside those communities and especially those groups who might be impacting violence against law enforcement. as you mentioned, there are two curves. not just one. >> thank you. first of all, to make sure the record is clear. , is i have on my desk to me a message of the importance of restraint and oversight within the government.

it is a wire tap order that relates to martin luther king , not about law enforcement police misconduct. that is something we take very seriously. i devoted my whole life to law enforcement. i come from a law enforcement family. one of the things that's prominent in my office is a picture of my grandfather in 1929 is a dangerous felony to jail. detectivether was a who rose up to lead a significant police department. i care an awful lot about making has theorcement confidence of the community, that we conduct ourselves well, but that we protect law enforcement from attacks. i call, this is my phone. whenever a police officer is called in the line of duty call the chief or sheriff of that slain officer to offer the condolences of the f.b.i. i make far too many phone calls. so we care about both making sure law-enforcement ask well, and that we investigate people who farm law enforcement. whether it is sophisticated groups, or individual actors. it is a feature of all the work

we do. >> director, i would just ask that at some point in time, you could submit for the record, the data you have on these outside groups coming into these communities and we have situations like this, who might unrest, andup especially, activity against law enforcement. also, any data you have regarding the impact, or even the number of gang members that might be currently being released by the government who might be here illegally. we asked it is questioned of homeland security, they cannot give us that data. the second question i have for you. you know the opm breach impacted over 22 million current, former, and respective federal employees and contractors. considering these individuals used personal e-mail accounts for their own personal communication and store private information relating to financial transactions, their children, and health care do you think the , breach made these individuals more vulnerable to social engineering tactics used by hackers and what ways could encryption enhance the security of personal

information of those who have had their information compromised during the breach? breach is the omp breapm disastrous. it is a gold mine for foreign intelligence services that would allow them to use that material to conduct very sophisticated social engineering attacks to penetrate people's systems. encryption is very important to protect people's information. i don't think encryption will directly blunt that particular vector. it will allow a nationstate to send an e-mail from my sister from my nephew with an attachment. it is highly likely i will open that e-mail and click on that attachment. i see those as two separate problems. both serious, however. >> thank you. with that, i yield back. >> the chair recognizes the gentleman from california for five minutes. >> thank you, mr. chairman and

director comey for being here again. the national background check system was created as a result of the brady act of 1993 before i was in the congress and it requires that gun sales by licensed gun dealers are subject to background checks that allow transactions to proceed after three days, and less the fbi stops a transaction based on criteria, such as felony record or domestic violence, convictions and the like. under the rule even if the fbi has not completed its check, the dealer has the discretion to complete the sale after three days had passed and the have not received a red light from the fbi. it is my understanding from news reports that the man who shot and killed nine people at the emmanuel methodist african-american episcopal church in charleston, s.c. south carolina on june 17 was

sold the gun by a dealer who waited five days but did not receive a response from the examiner. now the shooter had a drug possession conviction that if it had been found by the examiner would have prevented the gun sale. due in part to the large case load and time constraints placed on the examiner the gun dealer didn't receive the red light that would have prevented this gun sale and possibly prevented this massacre. i have a couple questions. first, what can be done to make sure that we have a timely response and we have the data available to prevent the sale of guns to those who are not eligible to buy them, number one? number two, should the lot require a green might from the fbi to prevent a firearms transfer to those prohibited by law from buying them, instead of the red light system that we have now? do you think we should examine

the amount of time that we give for background checks, beyond three days, if we don't go to an affirmative green light system? >> thank you. with respect to the case of gives roof, the law dealers three days, three business days, to give the fbi an opportunity to conduct the background check. in that circumstance, the gun dealer was notified it was in delayed pending status. at the end of the three days it is still in delayed pending, the gun dealer has the discretion to transfer her to wait. some large gun dealers wait. this gun dealer transferred which was consistent with the law. there were a number of errors in the processing of his that

allowed his drug possession arrest to be missed. the gun was transferred. we have stared very, very hard at that and tried to figure out what we can learn from that. there were some easy fixes to our proses but we're looking at bigger fixes to see whether we can surge resources, whether we can add innovation to make our processing faster. but the other key piece is going to be we must get better records from our state and local partners. so that when our examiners query a data base they have the disposition reported and have to go trackting down. we're having productive conversations with state and local law enforcement who see in the wake of the pain of that tragedy that the importance of giving us those records. that is what we are doing to improve our processing. the policy questions are not for the fbi. we comply with the law. as it stands today, we have three days to get it done. we will do our best to get it done in three days. if congress were to change that we would get it done, obviously. back to encryption, i understand the concerns you have raised here today and in the past. the experts really say, trying to get the back door is a

mistake. if you have the back door, the hackers will get it and china will get it and we will be less safe. that leads me to a question about the use of encryption by the fbi. are you encrypting all of your your agents,l of and personnel, and payroll, and systems? data. we use encryption on a significant amount of data. >> i'd like to follow up with that because i was stunned that the office of personnel did not have that important data encrypted. the federal government should protect itself by encrypting this data. we know that we're being hacked constantly by state actors and the enemies of our country and i'm sure they would love to get data about the f.b.i. i look forward to hearing a

greater details on them. i yield back, mr. chairman. >> recognize the gentleman from california mr. issa for five minutes. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i have so many questions and so little time. i'll try to touch on each and bear with me. on sting rays, i'm going to ask you to tell us now or for the record how you control the access to these products when they're not being used. how you control them when they are being used not just at the fbi but to the extent that you are cooperating with nonfederal agencies around the country that have these devices and, specifically, i'm very concerned that since they're being used at times without warrant almost mostly, and there are at least some allegations they've been used to track policemen's girlfriends or wives' activities and so on that they are too powerful a tool not to have a series of controls.

again, some of this you can answer for the record. on that i'd like a full understanding of federal policy and controls. in the case of encryption i'm only going to ask you, to be a long answer to provide for the record, any and all studies you have to show the value of the encryption and the value of your access or ability to not go dark and if it is classified i'll look at it in the classified section but i'd like to fully understand the value of the studies related to that general direction of the administration. but i'd like to take up for today more, a question on some historic pieces. a few offices away they're dealing with secretary clinton and those, so i won't ask about those today.

i think that is certainly an ongoing investigation as to her use of private e-mail for transmitting what turns out to be sensitive information. in the case long before your tenure, solyndra went bankrupt after accepting half a billion dollars in taxpayer money. at that time, we began an investigation in the oversight committee and were told by the d.o.e. inspector general we could not talk, he could not talk to us because the fbi at that time had an ongoing investigation. it's now four years later and the department, the i.g. did release information but we have not received any indication from the f.b.i. so today i'd like to ask you who at the fbi made decisions not to bring any charges against solyndra executives and what the basis was to find no fault in that loss of $500 million in

-- $500 million, and particularly since there was evidence provided publicly by our committee that there were emergency efforts to get some additional money to have their bankruptcy delayed and that was done by federal employees including a gentleman named jonathan silver. you might remember in may of 2013 the president stood beside the attorney general and declared there would be serious investigation by the doj and fbi into the political targeting done by the irs. months later the president declared there wasn't a smidgeon of corruption related to the i.r.s. director, you know that in fact there was targeting. the evidence is convincing. where you stand on bringing accountability to those involved at all levels to targeting conservatives and pro israel groups by the i.r.s., including but not limited to lois lerner? director comey: thank you,

congressman. with respect to the first two, the sting rays and encryption, we'll get you information on the record, for the record. with respect to solyndra, first of all the f.b.i. doesn't make decisions to prosecute. we investigate, bring the evidence to prosecutors -- >> i appreciate that. but there is either a decision to refer for prosecution or not. and to the extent that there was one, i would like the evidence that it was referred but not prosecuted to the extent that there was a decision not to refer one or more that would be helpful. i appreciate the other part of justice handles the other part and we will have the attorney general here shortly. director comey: we worked the solyndra matter very, very hard and had it reviewed by two different u.s. attorneys offices , one in california, one in new york. they both made the same decision that there was insufficient evidence to bring prosecution. probably limited what i can say about the details because it was a grand jury investigation but that is the upshot of it.

i had a lot of folks working very, very hard. one u.s. attorney's office looked at it. i asked it be brought to a second u.s. attorney's office. my alma mater in new york and they looked at it and decided there was insufficient basis to prosecute criminally. that's where the matter stands. with respect to the irs investigation, i think it is still pending as i sit here so i'm not able to talk about it in any way. >> i just want to close with a very short comment. it was 2010 when we became aware the i.r.s. was targeting conservatives. it is now almost i really would 2016. would comeif the fbi up with a timeline that says an investigation is not ongoing and aggressively pursued if a certain period of time passes and nothing has happened. i would only ask that five years begin to become an amount of time in which the f.b.i. can say

we can't say with a straight , face it is ongoing if it's five years later and nothing has happened. thank you, mr. chairman. >> thank you. chair recognizes the gentleman from tennessee, mr. coen for five minutes. >> thank you, mr. chair. i'm a big fan of yours. at the same time, i would like to ask you a question. i understand you keep a copy of the f.b.i. request to wire tap dr. martin luther king on your desk as a reminder of the f.b.i.'s capacity to do wrong is that correct? >> that is correct. >> i commend you for that. that occurred during j. edgar hoover's tenure as director. as you know, j edgar hoover did some awful, terrible things in his life and as f.b.i. director. tel-proted the coin

program, that harassed civil rights workers, flc people, dr. king in particular, activists and homosexuals. he was abusive. he was the opposite of justice. his efforts to silence dr. king and out homosexuals by the -- it out homosexuals working for the federal government were a stain on the history of the f.b.i. it is reported at one point he had a letter sent to dr. king threatening to expose all kinds of private information selected -- collected surreptitiously. the letter appeared to suggest dr. king should kill himself to save himself from embarrassment. king, there is only one thing left for you to do. you know what it is. you have just 34 days in which to do it. you are done. there is but one way out for you. you better take it before your fill become abnormal, fraudulent self is bared to the nation. this was the head of the f.b.i. treatment of homosexuals was no better. he called them sex deviants and ordered the f.b.i. to identify everyone in the bureau even

suspected of being homosexual in the federal government. there is a documentary done on this on yahoo.com by michael isakoff called "uniquely nasty." i watched it and was shocked. it premiered at the newseum. it is sickening what the f.b.i. did. in 1951, hoover issued a memo to top fbi officials saying each , supervisor will be held personally responsible to underline in green pencil the names of individuals who are alleged to be sex deviants. this was discovered through a foia two years ago. the f.b.i. eventually had more than 260,000 files on gays and lesbians. it is reported in 1952 he outed a young campaign aide and went awol -- and went on a war on him and senator vandenberg a , republican, eventually committed suicide in the senate office because of what they brought out about his son and what they were doing to destroy him. j. edgar hoover was a man that doesn't reflect the good people

of the f.b.i. or reflect what you and the f.b.i. are trying to do today. the f.b.i.'s own website intel-pro program as rightly criticized by congress and the american people for first amendment rights and other reasons. would you agree his name is not appropriate as a reflection to what the fine people at the fbi did today to bring about justice? director comey: i'm sorry, hoover's name? >> i'm saying, does it not reflect the quality that the fbi individuals and the f.b.i. today have in pursuing justice and being fair and not using tactics to attack minorities in this country? director comey: i see. thank you. i'm sorry. the f.b.i. today is vastly different than it was under its first director. in some of the ways you mentioned and lots of other ways. i keep that under the glass of my desk not to dump on hoover. i never knew the man. but to make sure people

understand the danger in falling in love with your own view of things and the danger in the absence of constraints and oversight. i am somebody who believes people should be very skeptical of government power. i'm a nice person. i suppose you should trust me but oversee me and i should be checked and i should be balanced. that is the way you constrained power. it is there to remind me. >> i agree and appreciate that but you agree his name does not reflective of what the fbi stands for and what fbi agents of today believe in and do? director comey: i think that's fair. hoover did a lot of good things for law enforcement in the united states. did a lot of things that through the lens of history we reject as improper. i am no historian, but i imagine a historian would say you have to take the total measure after -- total measure of the person to figure out what is good and bad and i am not equipped to do that. >> thank you sir. i would like to see his name taken off the building.

i'm going to reintroduce that bill. i would hope as i mentioned the last time we have a new building sometime in the future named for somebody like you. director comey: i appreciate that. >> or congressman edwards or attorney general kennedy. i yield back the balance of my time. >> thank you, gentlemen. recognize the gentleman from iowa mr. king for five minutes. >> thank you, mr. chairman. director comey, thanks for coming to testify. i just would comment that i appreciate your response when you used the reference the lens of history. that was a different set of values that applies today than back in those days. but i'm looking at our values today and watching as there is a fairly strong push here for sentencing reform in the united states. and i've watched as the president or the administration at least has directed that thousands be released on to the streets before they serve their terms. and that we've seen that some of them have been charged with homicide and found guilty. i think that number is around 121 or so.

i thought i saw the number 36,007 felons released and a subsequent number. i'm actually blurred by the parade of releases we've seen and now i see a, what appears to be a group of legislators that believe we can save tax dollars by releasing more on to the streets. are you aware of any studies that would help quantify the impact of these releases in terms of either prospective crimes that are likely to be committed or perhaps even quantifying it in terms of the dollar value that's suffered in great, huge, chopping chunks like crime victims? director comey: i'm not aware of any studies on that. it's not that i would be. that's sort of a policy question but i'm not aware of any. >> they are very hard to find. i've searched a long way back. i'm going from memory. it occurs to me that in 1992 there was a justice department study that did quantify numerically the cost of crime. but do you have any studies that show statistically whether there

would be more crime or less crime that would take place because of the early releases? director comey: i am not aware of any studies on that. >> what would be your professional estimate? would we have more crime or less crime? director comey: i know we face as a country a significant challenge with recidivism. high reoffend rate among people released. my whole career is dedicated to the proposition that law enforcement contributes to a drop in crime. it's not entirely responsible for the historic drop in crime we have seen over my lifetime but it a big part of it so that -- but it is a big part of it so that is the way i think about it. >> mandatory sentencing statistically shows to have had a positive impact on reducing the crime in the streets of america? director comey: i think so. mandatory minimums have been an important part of my work as a prosecutor. reasonable people can discuss whether it should be at this level or this level but some mandatory sentence, some fixed prospect of punishment is very, very valuable in incapacitating people and developing cooperaters.

>> and sometime back i sat down with a very impressive chief of police in one of our major cities who remarked to me about the very high homicide rate in the inner city of his city and his response was that the black-on-black homicide rate in that city was roughly 98% of the homicides that took place. i don't know that we discussed these kinds of statistics. i would be hopeful we could find a way to do this and alleviate this situation that we have. we have gone into a void on this for politically correct reasons, but are you aware of any data that would reflect what i've represented to you? director comey: i think there is a lot of data collected by criminologists and others on the demographics of homicide victims and perpetrators. i can't cite it off the top of my head but i know smart people have done that work. >> and that 98% number wouldn't be shocking to you?

director comey: i don't think it would shock me in particular neighborhoods that are heavily concentrated with people of a certain demographic background but i don't know the number off the top of my head. >> is there a planned parenthood investigation currently taking place in the f.b.i.? director comey: i'm not able to answer that question because i don't know enough. i know there have been letters written to the department of justice about it. i'll have to get back to you on that one because i don't know the status of matters within the fbi on that sitting here this morning. >> has anyone from the administration, to your knowledge, ever sought to influence you or any subordinates on whether to investigate a crime? director comey: never. >> specifically nonplanned parenthood would be included in that? director comey: that would be included. >> that would be consistent with your independent and honest

characteristics of the fbi. you're implementing the "usa today" freedom act now. -- the usa freedom act now. do you have access to more or less information than you had before the usa freedom act was passed? director comey: it really hasn't changed because we're still under the old telephone metadata system. as i said to the chairman i think the new one kicks in at the end of november, so currently our world is , unchanged. >> okay. you expect more or less? director comey: i expect more actually. >> it'll be interesting to follow up on if i had another minute. i'll yield back. >> the gentleman does not have another minute but the chair will recognize the gentle woman from california for five minutes. >> director comey, i want to discuss with you a series of very troubling federal investigations against chinese-american scientists who are treated as spies and have their lives turned upside down only to have the charges dropped. most recently, we have a case of an american citizen and well respected professor who was

chair of the physics department at temple university. he led a normal and peaceful life as a scientist, professor, and researcher with two daughters and wife in quiet pennsylvania neighborhood. he had no criminal record, no history of violence. just an average american in academia. one day at the break of dawn , about a dozen armed f.b.i. agents stormed into his house with their guns drawn. he was handcuffed in his own home and his two young daughters and wife in pajamaas and directed out of the house at gun point. the state in charge wire fraud. ,however, in the interrogation it was clear he was accused of , being a spy for china. his life has been turned upside down. he lost his title as chair of the physics department. his reputation was irrevocably damaged. his wife endures emotional trauma as does his whole family and himself. after all of this, the charges against dr. xi were dropped.

my understanding of cases of wire fraud is that generally people aren't even handcuffed let alone arrested or paraded in front of their family and neighborhood as criminals at gun point. rather, they've been given an opportunity to self surrender and if someone is being investigated for wire fraud they are usually informed about such an investigation by target letter. but we know that professor xi is not alone. sheri chen was also recently arrested, a u.s. citizen, employee of the national weather service in ohio. she was arrested at her place of work, led in handcuffs past her co-workers to a federal courthouse 40 miles away, where she was told she would face 25 years in prison and $1 million in fines. several months later, all the charges were dropped without any explanation. this is reminiscent of course of dr. wen ho lee, another u.s.

citizen whose life was ruined when he was accused of being a spy for china only to have 58 of the 59 charges dropped. let's not forget that during world war ii, 120,000 japanese americans lost everything they had and were imprisoned in desolate camps because they were accused of being spies for japan. 3/4 of them were u.s. citizens. 70 years later, not a single case of espionage was proven. i am particularly concerned about this because there is a stereotype that asian americans are perpetual foreigners no matter how long they've lived in this country. my question to you is, is this common practice to have a dozen armed f.b.i. agents arrest someone for wire fraud, someone who is not a flight risk and poses no harm to law enforcement? or is there a presumption of guilt when it comes to chinese americans because they are viewed as spies for china? director comey: thank you,

congresswoman. at the outset, the challenge i'm going to answer -- the challenge to me is i can't talk about the facts of something that is of an investigation, including ones that are pending. i guess i can say this. first of all, we operate with no presumption that anyone is guilty or any stereotype on any particular person. we are a fact-based organization. we are required to gather facts and through a prosecutor present them to a judge to make a showing of probable cause before we can get a warrant to arrest anybody. a whole lot of people in this country are arrested on wire fraud charges. i've been involved in many cases where people are handcuffed and arrested from wire fraud is a very serious felony. the particulars of the case i wouldn't talk about but i cannot connect the dots in the manner that you have and that is probably all i can say about individual matters. >> we understand the threat of economic espionage is real and we don't take it lightly. however, we want to make sure in

all cases there is due process and otherwise innocent americans do not become suspicious simply because the person taking those actions has an ethnic surname. yet in the case of professor xi his investigation came out of , the blue. he had no idea he was being investigated. primarily because he did nothing wrong, as evidenced by the dropped charges. do you know how many chinese americans are being surveyed? director comey: i do not. >> i will personally follow up with you on this issue to figure out what is happening in cases like professor xi's and how we can make sure no other american regardless of their origin or , background, endures this kind of egregious humiliation and shame. with that, i yield back. >> the chair thanks the gentle woman and recognizes the gentleman from texas for five minutes. >> thank you for being here. i don't think i ever told you

but back in the july, august timeframe of 2007 i was talking with a powerful democratic senator and we agreed you had a great reputation for justice, honorable man that would potentially be a good attorney general. it ended up being mccasy but you were discussed very favorably by both sides of the aisle. we appreciate your work. i want to touch on something my friend steve cain brought up. -- steve king brought up. i know there is a lot of talk about how we need to have reform and people being released from prison, but as someone who has worked with the system, i've prosecuted, been a judge, been court appointed to defend, and isn't it true that some people

that actually plead to nonviolent offenses, do so as part of a plea agreement where the prosecutor drops a gun charge or some charge of violence in order to get a plea in the case and a lesser sentence? haven't you seen that happen? director comey: i've seen that happen. >> so that's why for someone like me, who is a former judge who saw those kind of plea agreements take place, even though i was in the state side, it's shocking to see people come from the outside and say this wasn't a fair sentence without really considering what could have been prosecuted, what could have been pursued, and what was a transaction, an agreement between a prosecutor and defense attorney that the judge considered all the circumstances and came down on the side of the agreement. well, i want to touch on something else you'd said about

-- with iraq refugees, you had a database apparently of figure prints from ied's evidence that had been obtained , from iraq. did i understand that correctly? director comey: yes, sir. >> now, with regard to the masses of syrian refugees i'm not aware of a lot of ied's that we've gotten, evidence from which you could get fingerprints. is there such a database? director comey: i think that's right. there may be some. and a variety of other intelligence sources that may help us try and understand who people are but the point i was trying to make is we had a whole lot more information about iraq because our soldiers had been there and run into people and collected information. >> right. and that goes to a concern of mine. i'm not the biggest fan of the u.n., but they had data i pulled from their website this morning that says, starting off, that more than 43 million people

worldwide are now forcibly displaced as a result of the conflict and persecution and goes on to say that children constitute about 41% of the world's refugees. and, about half of all refugees are women. to it was very disturbing pull this from the u.n. website in september that says of the 381,000 arrivals that came across the mediterranean sea , that 15% were children, 13% were women, and 72% were men. along withke that saying james clapper that this provides a prime opportunity for islamic state groups to attack western targets , he said a disaster of biblical

proportions. then you take statements that have been made by isis leaders themselves that they have been able to place more than 4000 warriors in with the refugees. has that spike concern in the fbi along with what you testified before about isis having people in every state? director comey: it is a risk that we are focused on and trying to do anything we can to mitigate. fingerprint database or good identification, how can you be sure that anyone is who they say they are if we don't have fingerprints to go against. when i watched people exchange identification information and decide to use the other ones. is there a good way to avoid ?hat

director comey: the only thing we can query is information we have. if they have never been a ripple in the pond, then there will be no record and it will be challenging. >> the gentleman from illinois, mr. gutierrez. >> thank you, mr. chairman, and welcome, director. i'm going to have a conversation about one area, and that is about god. -- about guns. 40-50hometown, there are shootings in a weekend. that is a whole classroom of kids. so, i know that you have a relationship with making sure we check who can and cannot -- it seems that

whatever we do in chicago -- first, our laws and in weekend. it used to be pretty strong. inn i first got elected 1986, to give you a batch and you get a gun. badge orot to take the the gun. i figured chicago police could do those things. here we have a majority in the congress of the united states who is really unwilling to take up the challenge. they're coming from indiana and mississippi and all over. they wind up in chicago. i guess, if you could just tell of how toe your ideas lie or people at a local level help curb gun violence. what things can we do to help

curb legislation? the fbi business is not policymaking but enforcement of the law, so we spend a lot of time on enforcement. felon,llegal for a someone convicted of domestic violence. i have devoted a lot of my career as a prosecutor to impose because the challenge we face in a lot of cities is the bad guy thinks it is just another piece of clothing. that leads to a lot more shootings based on people bumping into each other, frankly. our mission is to send a strong message of deterrence that you ought not to have that gun. that will make that corner safer. it requires tremendous effort by the law enforcement community.

we are doing a lot of that though including in chicago where your characterization is exactly right. >> can you tell us what kinds of things we are doing in chicago? your agency and the federal government to help the people of the city. director comey: we are trying to focus on some of the predators who are focusing on this violence. we do taskforces, we do drug task forces and as i said, we operate on an ad hoc basis to try to lock up repeat offenders. >> as i've look at the challenge of gun violence in the city of chicago and i see that there is -- if we took a map of the city of chicago and we put little stars where people had been

murdered due to gun violence, do you see it as -- is it the whole city of chicago? i am not that worried about my grandson walking in the park -- i am worried but not that worried as i would be in other neighborhoods. what other dimensions relate to gun violence? director comey: i know the city of chicago pretty well having gone to law school there. the story of chicago is much like other cities. it is localized. the violence is heavier concentrated. in chicago, primarily south and west. it is the groups of, primarily young men who are carrying firearms when they are

prohibited by law from carrying them on the streets and that inevitably leads to the most -- what would have been a fist fight when you were a kid, today is a shoot out. what we are doing in law enforcement is to change the behavior. they are good at cost-benefit analysis. the idea is to force a cost-benefit liability. that is how we hope to change behaviors. >> 15 more seconds. there is a group of us in the hispanic congressional caucus and the african-american members, we would like to have a roundtable discussion with you, a conversation from different parts of the united states. in a less formal setting such as this. you might give us some of your thoughts or input.

would you agree to that? director comey: i would be happy to. >> the chair recognizes the gentleman from texas. >> i want to talk about several subjects and see how many i can get in in five minutes. the idea that under current law, if e-mail is stored in the cloud, government does not need a warrant to obtain that e-mail. is that your understanding of the law? director comey: you probably know best. after 180 days. we still operate under a warrant. that is our policy. that is the law. if it is older than 180 days -- >> it is after 180 days. before, or during, you have to have a warrant.

other government agencies still have the ability to seize that e-mail without a warrant. because the law does not require that they get a warrant. director comey: they would need some sort of legal practice. >> they would need some other court document from a magistrate. i am sure that you are aware that myself and others have filed legislation to require any government agency to obtain a warrant if e-mails are over six months old and stored in the cloud. next subject.

702. let's talk about obtaining backdoor information on some different companies such as google or yahoo! or whoever. does the fbi request that backdoor device be put into a cell phone? director comey: i do not know what you mean by backdoor device. >> the fbi could obtain the information in the cell phone without a warrant and you could ask the maker of the phone for example to install a device in the phone to obtain that information. director comey: no, we would need a court order for the device or online to take content or put an implant in a phone. we would need a title iii order. >> my question is -- does the

fbi request manufacturers to put a device in the phone itself to obtain that backdoor information? to have it available? director comey: no. when we collect information, it is pursuant -- we are talking about the content of a person's communication, we do it through a court order. we don't go through the person who made the device. >> when you talk about court order, are you talking about a warrant? director comey: a search warrant or an order from a federal judge if we are looking to intercept communications as they are moving. >> i think the fourth amendment applies to that type of procedure. you are saying that the fbi complies with the law, the fourth amendment, on obtaining that information. director comey: yes, the fourth amendment is sort of the spine of the fbi.

>> i am glad to here that. let us talk about surveillance with the use of drones and fixed wing aircraft. specifically, targeted surveillance with the use of a drone. does the fbi obtain a warrant to do that? director comey: any kind of aircraft, we do not. if what we are doing, which is what we use them for, to follow someone. the drones, we do not. we have a small number of unmanned aircraft. we operate drones within line of sight.

when we are talking about surveilling someone come we are talking about an airplane with a human being in it. we do not get a warrant for that. the law does not require that. >> the difference being -- i am not talking about circumstances, but any circumstances -- saying the fourth amendment does not apply to the drones. the faa makes those decisions. director comey: to follow someone on foot or in a plane, we do not have to go to a court to get permission. >> should the fbi make the rules regarding fourth amendment? director comey: the fbi does not make any laws. congress makes the laws. the courts interpret them.

>> the faa may make the regulations on what you can do with a drone. i think that congress ought to awaken and determine what the reasonable expectation ought to be with the use of drones. do you have an opinion on that? director comey: i don't think i have a view or a preference. the fbi, we are maniacs on wanting to follow the law. if congress changed the law, we would follow it. >> the chair recognizes the gentleman from georgia for five minutes. >> thank you mr. chairman. director comey. you mentioned how isil and other terrorist organizations field potential recruits in social media and private messaging platforms.

could you detail the issues that law enforcement is facing due to the encryption. director comey: the isil challenge illustrates the problem we call going dark. isil increasingly uses this when they find someone who i call a live one, someone who they might be able to motivate into acts of violence in the united states. they move them from twitter. to a mobile messaging app that is end to end encrypted. if we get a court order from a judge and intercept the communication, we cannot read it. their communications become invisible to us even with a court order. that is the challenge. we think that in all kinds of criminal cases as well but it is very well illustrated by the isil challenge. >> in other words, a

foreign-based person, a foreign person operating from a foreign location using social networks such as twitter can identify a potential target for radicalization or someone who is already radicalized but who is reaching out to this foreign-based person. and then they can take it to another site where their communications are encrypted. because they are encrypted, then law enforcement, whether or not it has a warrant, cannot discover what they are talking about even though the foreign-based person is a isil member. director comey: that is correct and we have to have a court order but the court order would be useless. >> the practical impact of that is what?

director comey: that we cannot know what somebody who is planning on an act of violence against a police officer, member of the military, or civilian is up to her and when they will -- it up to and when they will act. it is darkness. they go dark to us in a way that is really important in those matters. >> ok. you mentioned about traditional crimes, domestic crimes and how encryption hurts your ability to get at domestic criminal activity. can you talk about how in a case of hot pursuit or exigent circumstances, this adversely affects our ability to keep

americans safe? director comey: there is a lot of different ways it impacts. i believe the going to problem overwhelmingly affects state and local law enforcement. people talk about it like it is an intelligence question but it is almost entirely a law enforcement question. to give you an example. if they recover a cell phone at a scene where someone has been murdered or kidnapped, they cannot open the device even with a court order to figure out who that person was communicating with before they disappeared. we also are increasingly encountering where drug gangs or carjacking gangs are communicating using apps, text apps that are encrypted and with a court order we cannot read them. it is becoming increasingly -- the logic of it is that it will affect all of our work at some point.

hundreds of pieces will be affected by it. it is all of our lives -- they are becoming part of the digital world. when that is covered by strong encryption, judges will not be able to order access in serious criminal cases are national security cases. that is the future we are going towards. maybe that is where we want to be but we ought to talk about it as we are going to that place. >> thank you for your responses. >> i recognize the gentleman from utah for five minutes. >> thank you for being here. the fbi has had to change through the course of time since my grandfather who was a career fbi agent served. great admiration for the agency and what you in particular are doing. i want to go back to cyber.

can you articulate the size, scope, and investment you have in personnel dollars to address the cyber threat that is going to continue in perpetuity. director comey: i probably cannot give you exact numbers sitting here but we have, the cyber division headquarters that does nothing but cyber related work. and a cyber task force in everystate's fbi field office. that does not capture it because all of the threats we are responsible for -- everyone has to be cyber analysts or cyber agents in a way. i can give you specifics on how many hundreds or thousands of people are assigned to this work but it is even broader. >> what is it that you cannot do -- is there another department or agency that is doing something that the fbi could not do? director comey: in a cyber realm? that is a good question. >> thank you.

director comey: i cannot think of it sitting here. we work with our partners, nsa in particular, in fighting the cyber threat that comes from overseas. the bureau cannot reach out in that way. >> let me ask you in the context of the united states secret service. i was surprised to learn that two thirds of the agents that they have, two thirds of their time is spent on investigations in cyber. it begs the question to me -- why do we have such a small group of people doing that which the fbi has a much bigger resource, infrastructure, and expertise in doing. as we look at restructuring this service, and getting more focused on the protective mission, why not combine the two? director comey: such a good question, i misunderstood. one of the things i have been trying to do is drive us closer together to the secret service.

they have expertise in the financial related intrusions and credit cards scams. they have spent years developing that expertise so i do not want to duplicate that. i would like us to combine our task forces. there ought to be one. they do great work and i want to make sure we do not duplicate and i want to do joint training with them. we cannot do enough for state and local law enforcement to help them deal with digital crimes. >> in terms of the personnel that you have associated with that, how would that work? are there other agencies?

director comey: there are people at hsi within the department of homeland security that are doing cyber related crime work. there is a lot of state and local law enforcement that are doing it and they are part of our task forces. >> can you shed any more light on the fbi's next generation cyber initiative? director comey: without eating up your time, our strategy, my strategy for where we will take the fbi in the next 3-5 years. it involves deploying our people in a different way, better training and equipment, focusing ourselves on the threat we are

best able to address. >> when you have an fbi -- you have personnel that will focus their entire career on just cyber. director comey: correct. >> thank you for the time. i yield back. >> we recognize mr. deutsch. >> thank you for being with us today. i represent broward county and palm beach county. we are experiencing an epidemic. broward county is the epicenter of this crisis. the broward county sheriff's office has stated that in january 2014, they analyzed a single flakka case. this year, they have reported analyzing 100 cases per month. these cases are also flooding the county system. 12 cases per day. it has contributed to the death of 45 people in the past year in broward county. it has also started to spread

northward. in 2014, there were 35 missions involving this in the crime lab. in 2015, there have been 42. people are using this and are experiencing hallucinations and violent outbursts. it is extremely cheap. five dollars. it can be easily purchased online from china. the low cost of the drug and easy access is causing the trouble. it is extremely difficult for law enforcement to prosecute. the primary problem is that the composition cannot be pinpointed as illegal because the drugs are constantly changing their composition. as soon as the synthetic drug is listed as illegal, they change it slightly.

they are now making it into gummy bears. the ones containing this drug are individually wrapped. dealers are using them to hook young people. if you could target the effort to crack down on this epidemic of synthetic drugs, and speak to the challenges that you face in cracking down on these sorts of cases. director comey: thank you congressman. the synthetic drug is a serious problem that i hear about all over the country. dea has the lead on the federal level but we are participating through our drug task forces to try to do something about that scourge. it is appearing in gas stations,

or little markets where kids can walk up and buy these things not knowing exactly what they are buying. it will wreck their life. >> the current law permits them to be treated as -- if they are proved to be similar to controlled drugs. to avoid being listed as a controlled substance. what steps can lawmakers take to help in your efforts? director comey: honestly, i do not know. in talking with mr. rosenberg, they are keenly focused on their problem. every time they schedule one of these, it comes in from china slightly different so it is not scheduled anymore. they are chasing it with a -- >> i would invite representatives of your task force and the dea to come to south florida.

this is an issue that dominates the headlines. it affects young people and as you point out, the moment someone takes this, one of these synthetic drugs, which is so readily available in florida and elsewhere, it changes and often ruins their lives. i am grateful for your focus on it. i hope we have the chance to do something in south florida. >> i now recognize mr. marino for five minutes. >> it is good to see you. i too am a maniac for the rule of law. most of my career has been in

law enforcement and i still consider myself a law enforcement guy. my family has been in law enforcement for a long time so i appreciate your comments concerning oversight and rule of law. that is needed very much today. even more so today. i do want to emphasize the fact that i have worked with all agencies, state, local, and federal and 99.9% of our agents out there are top-notch. i trust them watching my back at any time. with that, you have already effectively answered two questions that i had so as a result, i yield back the remainder of my time and best of luck. director comey: great to see you. >> i now recognize miss bass. >> i would like to talk about the recent operation cross traffic fbi nationwide effort to crack down on child sex

trafficking. the fbi's october 13 release about the operation states, operation cross-country, a nationwide law enforcement action focused on underage victims of prostitution has concluded with the recovery of 149 sexually exploited children and the arrest of pimps and other individuals. i would like to commend the agency for correctly referring to the children as victims. a child under the age of consent should never be referred to as a prostitute. this release refers to other individuals. i was wondering who those individuals were. i have a concern that while it is appropriate to focus on the pimps, it is also very much a to focus on the child molesters who some people would call john's. i would like to know if that is who you were referring to.

director comey: that is what i think that is referring to. >> thank you. the release also says that the children were recovered. i wondered, what does that mean? director comey: as part of operation cross-country, the folks i call the angels of the fbi, victims specialists, are deeply involved in the operation to make sure those kids get either reunited with their families, or so many of them come from foster care, if they get in a healthier placement, a lot of them need medical attention right away. that's what is meant by that, to get that child to a place where they are cared for either by their biological family or a foster family. >> in addition to medical attention, they certainly need therapy.

i think it is important, if you would lift up, you were saying that the other individuals were referring to the child molesters. i think it is important that we call it correctly. in addition, i would like to know, if the fbi tracks the number of children in foster care. we know that a large percentage of these kids are in foster care, but there's not a lot of documentation. do you have documentation? director comey: i think we do. i think our intelligence analysts have done some good work on that front. i'm a foster parent, so they know it is a passion of mine. i think we could equip you with at least some of our thinking on it. >> i would like to follow-up with your office and get that data. i would also like to commend you for your innocence lost task

force and i'd like to know if there's more we can be going to assist your efforts. i work in the los angeles area and you have been in the leadership of bringing different sectors of law enforcement together to understand this problem and address it. director comey: i appreciate your interest in it. i will ask my staff to think about ways in which we might get more help. >> thank you. i yield back my time. >> thank you, mr. chair. mr. director, great to have you here. i have questions about the refugee program and its impact on idaho. there is concern that the actors are gaining admission alongside bona fide refugees. i'm an advocate of refugee programs. but there's a lot of misconceptions out there and a lot of real fear about the people that are coming into the united states.

this congress has an obligation to address those concerns and ensure the process is working correctly. numerous times over the past year, including yesterday, both the fbi assistant director and yourself have testified about the flaws and limitations in the vetting of syrian refugees. on october 8, you testified that you were concerned about certain gaps in the data available to the fbi and you testified that the fbi can only query what has been previously tested, which is obvious. you address this issue before. can you please explain to this committee the security gaps that exist for the purposes of conducting full and effective background checks of foreign nationals who claim to have fled the conflict zone of syria and are seeking to resettle as refugees? director comey: certainly.

we learned some good lessons from less than excellent screening of iraqi refugees eight years ago or so. some folks we let in were serious actors that we had to lock up after we figured out who they were. we have gotten much better as an intelligence community at joining our efforts and checking our databases. if we have a record, it will surface. the bad news is, with iraqi refugees, we had an opportunity for many more encounters between folks in iraq and our soldiers. we had fingerprints, iris scans, forensics of different kinds. the challenge we face with syria is that we don't have that data. even though we have gotten better, we certainly will have less overall. as i said earlier, someone only other as a result of our searches if we have some record on them.

>> the lack of intelligence available on the ground in syria is rendering our traditional database biometric checks obsolete? director comey: i wouldn't agree obsolete, but i would say we have a less robust data set then we had with iraq. >> so the fbi has repeatedly contrasted the united states ability to collect intelligence on the ground with its ability to do so in syria. what can the fbi due to adapt security checks for refugees originating from failed states with no available intelligence? director comey: that's a hard one. what we can do is just make sure that whatever is available figures into our review. the underlying problem is, how do you generate intelligence in failed states? >> are you currently working to try to fix this problem?

director comey: certainly. everyone is focused on trying to mitigate this risk by finding additional sources of information. >> recognizing that isis and syria, that there is a risk that bad actors may attempt to take advantage of this administration's commitment to bring at least 10,000 refugees into the united states, can you estimate the manpower and resources that will need to be diverted from other programs to address this threat? director comey: i'm not able to do that sitting here. >> how can i ensure my constituents that the people that may come to idaho are safe, that they are not terrorists, that the people in my community are going to be safe?

director comey: on behalf of the fbi, we will work day and night to make sure that if there's information available at somebody, we have evaluated it. >> the problem is that we don't have the information on most of these people. director comey: so i can't offer anybody absolute assurance that there is risk associated with this. >> thank you very much. i yield back my time. >> i now recognize ms. delaunay for five minutes. >> thank you, mr. chair, and thank you director coming. as acting ag, you demonstrated a commitment to the fourth amendment and protecting americans' privacy. you've mentioned in your original testimony and in other comments that the rule of law and the fourth amendment is the spine of the fbi. i appreciate that commitment. i would like to ask about the fbi's use of aircraft. the fbi deployed aircraft over ferguson last year in response to requests from local law enforcement? director comey: yes.

>> does the fbi respond to these types of requests frequently? director comey: thanks goodness there aren't the kind of turmoil and pain in communities frequently, but we have local law enforcement ask for help in getting a look at a developing situation. we've done it in baltimore and ferguson as i recall. >> what criteria has to be met for the fbi to send aerial resources to assist local law enforcement? director comey: it is made at a fairly high level in the fbi. i think at the special agent charge level at least, the commander of the field office. it has to go through a variety of checks. >> what are the criteria you use to make that decision? director comey: it has to be part of a open investigation of hours or part of open assistance to law enforcement. we can get you the particulars.

the bureau has a policy for everything. there's a series of steps to make sure it is part of an open case of hours or a legitimate open assistance to law enforcement matter. >> thank you. your staff also acknowledged that the fbi routinely uses aviation assets in support of predicated investigations targeting specific individuals, and when requested an appropriate, in support of state and local law enforcement. why is it so important to stress this distinction when it appears it is more generalized? director comey: i'm sorry? >> the distinction that you have in this, the feedback from your staff that you use aviation assets in support of predicated investigations targeting specific individuals, when in these cases of local law enforcement, it seems to be more generalized.

director comey: i think we are just trying to explain how we use it. we don't fly planes around america, looking down to figure out if somebody might do something wrong. the overwhelming use of aircraft is part of an investigation to follow a spy, terrorist, or criminal. if there is tremendous turbulence in a community, it is useful to everybody to have a view of what is going on. where are the fires, where our people gathering? sometimes, the best view of that is above. >> do you feel that warrants are necessary when targeting specific individuals, especially when you have aircraft equipped with high resolution cameras? director comey: i don't think so. i meant what i said about the fourth amendment. we are not collecting the content of communication or

engaging in anything besides following somebody. we've done it since the wright brothers with planes and we do it in cars, we do it on foot, and the law is pretty clear that you don't need a warrant. >> now that there are technology changes, even the most recent case of florida versus riley in 1989, there's been a lot of changes in technology. it is not just what you might see with the human eye anymore. are there other types of technologies and do you think standards should be in place? director comey: i suppose if you were putting technology on an fbi aircraft that had fourth amendment implications, that it was reaching someone's communications or looking within a dwelling, it would have fourth amendment implications. but that is not what we use the aircraft for. >> what led to the decision to seek court orders when aircraft are equipped with stingray technology?

director comey: we have one aircraft that we can put stingray technology on. i suppose we could mount it on others if we had a court order. the whole department of justice does this. if we are operating a simulator, it has fourth amendment implications. we will get a warrant on that. >> do you feel like you are required by law to do that? director comey: i think we made that move before it was even a divide among opinions in the court. some courts have said you need it. some not. we went nationwide with a requirement for warrants. there's been no national decision on that. we think given that some courts are requiring it, we do it across the country.

>> good morning, director comey. do you remember mr. collins' questions about renaming the fbi headquarters building? director comey: yes. >> i appreciate your response, that we have to look at things through the lens of history. i want to ask about a few other historical figures and see if there are any other buildings named after some of these folks. former senator robert byrd of west virginia was a member of the kkk. he was a recruiter for the kkk. he held leadership positions with the kkk. the state capital in west virginia is named after senator byrd. the united states courthouse and federal building in west virginia is named after senator

byrd. the federal correctional institution in hazelton, west virginia is named after senator byrd. do you know of any fbi buildings named after senator byrd? director comey: i don't know whether we have folks -- i don't know, sitting here. >> former democrat president woodrow wilson resegregation the entire government, including the armed forces, held a showing of the movie "birth of a nation" at the white house and went so far as to praise it despite calls to ban it. "birth of a nation" was used as a recruiting tool for the ku klux klan. there are a number of buildings in this country named after president wilson. do you know of any buildings that the fbi occupies or predominantly owns that are

named after president wilson? director comey: i don't. >> former president lyndon baines johnson was fond of using the n-word, used it in the white house, used it while he was senate majority leader, and in many other public settings. many federal buildings are named after him. are there any fbi buildings named after president johnson? director comey: i don't know. >> lastly, president truman wrote to his soon-to-be wife the following words, "i think one man is just as good as another, so long as he's not a n word or a china and." again, many buildings named after president truman. any fbi buildings named after president truman? director comey: i don't know, sir. >> democrat senator richard

russell was also a member of the ku klux klan and there is a senate building named after senator russell. i assume there are to your knowledge no fbi buildings named after senator russell. director comey: i don't know. i don't think so. >> my last statement would be that perhaps congress should clean up its own act in naming buildings for it asks the fbi to try to rename buildings. i yield back my time. >> i thank the gentleman and now recognize mr. cellini for five minutes. >> thank you, mr. chairman. thank you, director comey, for your service and for coming before the committee today. thank you also to the extraordinary men and women who serve the bureau. many of us express our sincere concern and condolences following the recent mass

shooting in rosenberg, oregon where nine innocent men and women lost their lives. as more americans lose their lives to senseless gun violence, this congress has failed to act. with this in mind, i'd like to draw on your experience to find solutions to this growing epidemic and help us find the guts to take action. first, i want to draw your attention to the shooting at the emmanuel church in south carolina. following the shooting, you ordered the fbi to conduct an internal review of policies and procedures surrounding background checks for weapons purchases. did that review a car and what were the findings? director comey: the review did occur. i asked my folks to do a 30-day

examination. it confirmed the facts as i understood them. no new facts with respect to dylann roof's purchase. it highlighted areas for improvement. internal, it highlighted that maybe we can search resources and technology to try and reduce the number of gun sales that are held in the delayed pending status longer than three days. that work is underway. secondly, to get better and more timely records from state and local law enforcement about the disposition of arrests so that our examiners have good records to make a judgment on. >> as you well know, the current law requires that if a request of purchase for firearm is made, the fbi has three days to respond. if no response is provided, the gun dealer is able to sell the weapon.

my understanding is the fbi continues the review anyway. that information is then conveyed to the gun dealer and if that person is disqualified, what does the fbi do? you now know the sale has occurred, or do you know the sale has occurred, and do you take action? director comey: after the three-day window, the gun is transferred and the examiners discover t disqualifying information -- my recollection is the notice is sent both to local law enforcement and the bureau of alcohol, tobacco, and firearms, so they can retrieve the firearm. >> i'm not sure that is actually the practice. i think the notice may go to atf, but i don't believe it goes to the gun dealer or local law enforcement. i would like to work with you on that.

the second issue is, how do we incentivize, require, encourage local law enforcement to use the system? that background check system is only as good as the information in it. have you done analysis of what states participate, where the deficiencies are, or things we could do to help ensure that more states are providing that disqualifying information, so at the bare minimum we are keeping guns out of the hands of people who shouldn't have them under law? director comey: the mass murder in charleston was an event that i think caused a lot of folks in local law enforcement and state law enforcement to focus on this question. there's a whole lot of conversation going on and we are pushing out training to explain what we need and why we need it in a timely fashion. i don't have suggestions for how congress might help us incentivize that cooperation. i think they are good people,

and when they see the pain of a situation like dylann roof, they want to be better. i will get back to you if i have ideas. >> we can't require participation with the system as the result of a supreme court decision, but we ought to be able to create serious incentives or penalties. as a result of that information not being in the system, people are walking into gun stores and buying guns who would be otherwise disqualified. i look forward to working with you on that. i thank you for the work that you are doing. >> i now recognize the gentleman from georgia, mr. collins. >> thank you, mr. chairman. my father is a georgia state trooper. i appreciate your commitment to law enforcement. some quick questions.

one has to do with an advisory for dealing with credit cards. the new credit cards equipped with microchip technology are still vulnerable to identity theft and the use of pin identification would be a more secure way for consumers. however, within 24 advisories -- 24 hours, that advisory was taken down. it is my understanding canada, australia, many other countries have encouraged the pin authorization because it has a lower fraud rate. in light of that, does the fbi consider pin a more secure form of authentication? director comey: i think the experts would say that pin and chip is more secure. the confusion was, it was a mess

on our part without focusing on the fact that most merchants in the united states don't have the ability to accommodate the pin and chip. the worry is that will cause confusion when our equipment is set up for pin and signature. >> many of the places that i go to, you just swipe, like at the gas station, and many of those have a number for debit cards. i've just broken into using the chip because my new cards have chips. the keypad is right above it. i'm not sure i follow your answer that the technology is not available. the keypad is right there to input a number.

why is the technology not available? director comey: i don't know, and i'm not the world's smartest person on this. what i've been told is it is available in some places, but not widely available in the united states. >> me going to the store and putting my card in. i rarely see one that is just pure swipe with no keypad. the concern came among many that there is also an issue that i pay different fees depending on how i did it. a credit card versus a debit card. could that have been an issue? using the pen typically is a different fee. was that possibly taken into account as the reason for the removal of this?

director comey: i think that could be the reason the equipment is not widely available in the united states. that was not a factor in why we withdrew the public service announcement. my understanding is our worry was we were going to confuse a lot of people. >> i think the concern here is information security and everything else. you are always trying to move toward the more secure atmosphere. that is my concern about moving back. it seemed like we were saying, there is a better way, but we are not going to encourage that. just a question. basically, the distinction in

current law is something we talked about. you said that you use a warrant in all cases. would you say that -- 30 prosecutors all say that requiring law enforcement to obtain a warrant from the court does not prevent law enforcement from doing its job. would you agree with that? director comey: by and large, it's true. it poses unique challenge for some. by and large, judges are available. at a general level, sure. >> some of these agencies, i think from a law enforcement -- this is something they could use, that they could go through normal means.

i think that is the concern that many of us have. the hacking issues with china, we actually traced that and said, confirmed that chinese hackers stole this data? director comey: i have high confidence. i'm not in a position to say that in open forum. >> maybe we can get back in a different forum and discuss that. we can't reward bad behavior. i'm concerned that is what we're doing. >> i now recognize mr. jeffries for five minutes. >> thank you, mr. chair, and director comey. i think you testified earlier today in your belief as to the efficacy of mandatory minimums, correct? director comey: yes. i think i said they were useful in my career as a prosecutor. >> can you elaborate as to whether you still believe that mandatory minimums in light of

the explosion of the united states prison population, particularly relative to every other developed country in the world, is still a relevant law enforcement tool? director comey: i think it is. i'm not in a position by expertise to offer a position of whether it should be 10 years or five years, but i think the certainty of punishment is a useful tool in fighting crime. in the absence of mandatory guidelines, that often comes in the form of mandatory minimum. that is about as far as i have the expertise to go. >> is your view anchored in the fact that many prosecutors have argue that it -- have articulated the position that they don't have the same club by which to solicit cooperation and obtain plea bargains? director comey: in my experience, comparing my experience with the state system, again, that's not a view

on whether it ought to be this or that. i don't have the expertise to offer a view on that. some certainty of punishment is very valuable to elicit cooperation. >> there have been studies that have shown that in crimes that don't have mandatory minimums, the conviction rate at the federal level are higher than those where mandatory minimums do exist. i think that's part of the reason why a diverse group of individuals on the left and right, including the heritage foundation which i believe said there's no evidence that mandatory minimums reduce crime, have questioned their continued need, at least in its current form. can you comment on the explosion of the united states prison population? the war on drugs began in the early 1970's. we have less than 350,000 people incarcerated in america.

currently, that number is in excess of 2.3 million. we've got 5% of the worlds population. 25% of the incarcerated individuals in the world are here in the united states. many of us believe it creates a competitive disadvantage for us going forward. in addition to the damage it does to the social fabric of many communities. can you comment as to the mass incarceration phenomenon in america and what should be done about it from a public safety standpoint? director comey: i struggle with the word mass incarceration because it conveys a sense that people were locked up en masse. every case is a tragedy in my view, but every case is individual. everyone had to be proven guilty. a lot of people are locked up and that is a big problem, but here's the fact. in 2014, america was far safer

than it was when i was born in 1960. i think a big part of that change is due to law enforcement. i'm of the view that yes, we can reform our criminal justice system, but we've got to reform it with an eye towards where we used to be. i would not want to give back to our grandchildren the america we lived in in the 1970's, 1980's, and 1990's. i believe we can be better in a lot of ways. >> i think it is important for us to be thoughtful. i grew up in new york city in the 1980's, in the midst of the crack cocaine epidemic, 2000 homicides in the city. no one wants to return to that. a study concluded that in all 17 states that have cut incarceration rates, they've experienced a decline in crime over the past decades. it seems to me that there is room based on the data for a

real discussion as to how to get the balance correct. i gather you share that view. i appreciate your willingness to continue a dialogue for us to get the benefit of your views. director comey: thank you. >> i yield back. >> can i be recognized for a point of personal privilege? >> without objection. >> i'm a student of history and when i make a mistake, i want to correct it. i was wrong in saying that senator vanderburgh son committed suicide. it was senator hayes. his son was arrested in lafayette park for being gay, but that was mccarthy who was after him. i want to correct the record. thank you. >> i now recognize mr. desantis for five minutes. >> good afternoon, director comey. companies have begun notifying

customers when law enforcement requests data through subpoena or warrant unless there is a nondisclosure requirement, particularly for child pornography investigations, this may be an issue. do you think that could hamper investigations? director comey: i do. it is something i have been hearing more and more about. >> i'm glad to hear you say that. the president has a plan to bring over a lot of people from the civil war in syria, perhaps as many as 100,000. can we vet them, and if not,aree contributing to some of the homegrown terrorism in this country? director comey: thank you for the question. it is a very important issue. we can vet them. we've gotten better at vetting and learned lessons from the vetting of iraqi refugees. you the challenge we face it is,

is, wechallenge we face can only vet against data that's been collected with respect to a person. the information we had for iraq was much richer than we will have for syria. >> so there's a problem here, potentially. i know it's going to fall on you to defend the american people it is something i'm concerned with. there's been talk about reforming. is it your view that people say drug offenses are nonviolent, but when they get into the federal system, trafficking, is it accurate to say they are nonviolent? work, it is the drug trade inherently violent? director comey: i guess each case is different. in my experience, anyone who's part of a trafficking organization is part of an

organization that has violence all through it. whether you are a runner, lookout, or enforcer, you are part of something that is suffocating a community. i have a hard time categorizing drug organizations as nonviolent. >> in terms of the drop in crime that you alluded to, is part of that simply because there have been stiffer sentences and so habitual criminals are off the street? director comey: i believe that was a big part. i believe most experts believe it was a big part of the historic reduction in crime over my career. >> with respect to individual offenses, there's been mishandling of information, does the fbi keep records of all the investigations related to each offense? director comey: i don't know that it is searchable by each offense. if a case was charged, the offenses would be reflected. >> in other words, we know every mishandling of classified

information offense. we can look that up. but we don't know whether the u.s. attorney declined x number of cases pertaining to that? director comey: i think that's correct. i also don't know what our records would reflect if there are a number of violations in a case, whether it would be clear that it was that. >> in terms of handling classified information, there's been stuff in the press about, something needs to be marked classified. is your understanding that the u.s. code, if i were to send classified information over an unsecure system, the fact that it was not marked classified, does that mean i have not committed the offense? director comey: i think i would prefer not to answer, trying to make sure that given we have a matter under investigation that

relates to that topic, that i preserve our ability to be honest, independent, and competent. i worry that i could jeopardize that. >> i think that's an admirable posture. how does, when the president renders a judgment about a case, saying there's no national security damage if certain information has been disclosed, how does that help the investigation? director comey: the three things i said earlier, honest, competent, and independent. we follow the facts, only the facts. >> i have no doubt that that will be how you conduct yourself. i just hope that as you do your work, as it moves on to other aspects of our system, that it's based on the merits of the case and not based on political edict from on high. thank you for your time.

>> i now recognize -- >> thank you. director, thank you very much. you appeared yesterday in front of the homeland security committee and added a great deal of insight. i would like to not pursue a line of questioning, but hope to have an opportunity to meet with you on something we began discussing yesterday, cyber security and the role it plays as an all most another figure, if you will, in the scheme of terrorism. i am a ranking member of the subcommittee, with my ranking member and chairman, we are looking to be responsible in addressing issues in the criminal justice system, and somewhat overlapping the question of terrorism in this committee, and certainly in homeland security. let me quickly start with a

question that i think i introduced in the record yesterday, no-fly for foreign fighters. we heard testimony that indicated the numbers might be going down. i had notes that there was 250 americans who had left to the foreign fight and may be coming back. we must always be prepared. 9/11, the scenario was one that we had never imagined before. we never imagined an airplane being used as a torpedo. we imagined a hijacking. we lived through that. i know that this is a very serious posture. hopefully, any extra tool that we can give you with respect to refining and defining the list

that you have, to make sure that we have every potential -- every foreign fighter, would that be helpful to you? director comey: yes. we want to make sure the list is comprehensive. >> if we have this legislation to ensure that that list is a vetted and well-updated list, would that be helpful? director comey: i don't know the legislation, but the goal, i share. >> i appreciate that very much. let me move now to the guns. i don't want to put words in

your mouth, but i imagine, and i served as a municipal court judge, and i'd have to say, who are you? dealing with some matters in local government, they were in some tough places. i recognize the dangers that our officers face. we had a horrific tragedy in houston. we just recently lost an officer again in new york. as we do with others who are impacted by guns, the 11-year-old who shot an 8-year-old, and another youngster, three-years old, we never can imagine the ability of our children. i ask you a question, why law enforcement is not our biggest champion, not on gun control, gun safety regulations. not on diminishing the second amendment, but responsibly handling weapons. who would want to lose a four-year-old in a drive-by

shooting in new mexico because someone had a gun? we've introduced legislation, and you might want to comment on this in particular, that gives you an extended period of time on this gun check situation, which was one of the horrible situations in the south carolina nine. the system was doing its work, but since you weren't heard from, they allowed this gentleman to get a gun and kill nine people. we have a number of legislative initiatives. members of congress don't want anything to do with taking away your gun. they want to regulate safety infrastructure. i've introduced legislation to keep guns away from children. in your dealing with law enforcement, the impact guns have, the impact on the work you all do, could you answer that

for me, please? there have been a number of church fires. we keep ignoring it. we had another series before. would you comment on the fbi's work that they are doing? if you take this name down, robby tolan, who was killed on his front porch, a driveway of his home -- excuse me, let me stand corrected. he was wounded and still lives with a bullet in his liver. the disappointing aspect is that it was an officer who mistook him as an african-american male in a stolen car. he was in his mother's car, going home to his house in houston, texas. my question is, what further fbi

investigation can go into this case? i thank you for your indulgence. director comey: thank you, ms. jackson lee. i will look into the last matter. with respect to church fires, we have not ignored them. our agents are investigating a number of incidents around the country. we have not found patterns that connect to our civil rights enforcement work. with respect to guns, people in the fbi care deeply about trying to stop gun violence. what the bureau does not do is get involved in public policy legal questions. our job is to enforce the law. we leave it to the department of justice to make suggestions.

we are passionate about trying to enforce the law against bad guys with guns of all kinds, especially in our cities, where gun violence is increasingly a plague this year. >> the proliferation of guns and dangers law enforcement, does it not? >> but gentlelady's time has expired. director comey: guns in the hands of criminals and danger all of us, including law enforcement. >> thank you. >> i think all of us would agree with that. i'll recognize myself for five minutes. i want to thank you for being here. many people at the committee have recognized your unbiased attitude towards enforcing the law as written. i think that speaks very highly of you. i've been impressed with the cogency and clarity of your testimony this morning. i believe the commitment to independent enforcement of the law is a genuine and sincere conviction on your part.

let me -- the department of justice has investigated past allegations of possible violations, and i know you've touched on this before, so forgive me for rehashing it, possible violations of the partial-birth abortion ban act. in a letter dated august 4, 2015 responding to this committee's request for an investigation of possible violations of the partial-birth abortion ban act by planned parenthood, the department of justice stated that since the inception of the act, the department has invested allegations with facilities that are related to possible violations of that law. is there any current investigation by the fbi related to planned parenthood and the

footage that's been released by the center for medical progress at this time that you know of? director comey: i will get back to you and let you know. as i sit here now, i don't have a strong enough grasp of where that stands. i do know letters were sent to the department of justice. i'll get back to you. >> as far as you know, even apart from the planned parenthood videos, do you know of any partial birth abortion ban investigations by the fbi? director comey: i don't. i believe we have, but i don't know enough to answer that well right here. >> i would appreciate that last part being included in any response you have. there's some of us that think the rule of law applies to these little ones that have so little ability to protect themselves as well. let me shift gears. there's been several questions asked today about gun violence.

i agree with your last answer completely, that we want to do everything we can to keep guns out of the hands of criminals. it is vital for the safety of the public. there are those of us that would ask law enforcement, do we think it would be wise to take guns out of the hands of law enforcement? almost no one would suggest that. we believe, i do, that guns in the hands of properly trained fbi agents is a protection to the public. from my perspective, that would suggest it is not the guns, it is whose hands they are in. it is hard to make a case that if they are a protective measure in the hands of police officers, that they are something that can protect and prevent violence, that they are a good thing, and that all of us from almost every

spectrum of political consideration would suggest that, then the obvious reason becomes that it is indeed not the guns, but whose hands they are in. my question to you is, how do we separate the argument so that we are doing everything we can to prevent those who have lost their second amendment rights, who have demonstrated violence toward society, or an issue with mental illness, how do we deal with that while still leaving intact the right to own and their arms under the second amendment by those who follow the law? director comey: i think that's a question for others, including congress. the fbi's role is such, i think it is very important that not be a debate we participate in. we don't make policy for the american people. the american people tell us what

they think the law should be. we will enforce the law. i think that is critical to us remaining honest, competent, and independent. it is not a conversation i think the fbi should participate in professionally. >> that is a reasonable answer. i hope that we can do that. with that, i'm going to end my question time. do we have -- yes, we do. mr. bishop is not here. oh, i'm sorry. mr. bishop, you're recognized for five minutes. flying under the radar. >> i was here earlier. i apologize for stepping out. i want to thank you and your

entire team, because what you do on a daily basis is something that most of us don't even know about. we can't comprehend. you keep us safe and we are grateful for what you do. on behalf of my family, my constituents, i'm grateful to you and your entire department. wanted to tell you that. i admire your testimony today. thank you for your candor. you've been here forever. i thought maybe i'd ask you about syrian refugees and what we're seeing. my state of michigan is a huge hub for those of middle eastern descent. there is concern about refugees in our country. i'd like to ask you, how do we vet these refugees coming to our country? is there a way to do it that we

can rely upon? my office does a lot of immigration work. we work with those who are attempting to emigrate legally every day and we help them anyway we can to get through the hoops. it is very strange that we now have groups that are coming in the way they are, that really skip all those steps in between. i'm wondering if you could share your experience and what you know about the process. director comey: it's a process i described as good news and bad news. we have gotten much better at organizing ourselves so that we get a complete picture of what we know about somebody. we learned some lessons from iraqi refugees eight years or so ago. we've gotten better. if there's a ripple this person has created in our pond, i'm confident we will see it. the bad news is, we will have

less data with respect to folks coming out of syria then we did with iraq. we don't have the u.s. army presence that would give us biometrics. the risk is that someone who is a blank slate to us will be vetted in a process that is complete but will show no sign of anything because they never crossed our radar. that's why i described it as a process that has gotten better, but we can't tell you is risk-free. >> as time goes on, the process that you are going through will be more apparent to the american people. there are a lot of folks in my state who are very concerned. that level of unknown, of not understanding the process, has caused a little panic across the district. the more we can here, the more we understand what the process is. we remember the iraqi refugees in the state of michigan, especially my area.

i appreciate your ongoing communication. i want to switch gears with you real quick. i've had the pleasure of working with a number of youth-serving organizations and one of those is here today. it is important work they do. i've spoken to some of them about the importance of keeping their kids safe. one of the ways they do that is getting background checks. it ensures so many different ways of fostering a safe environment. it is an issue i feel deeply about. can you talk about the value of including national fbi fingerprint background checks as part of the comprehensive screening of staff and volunteers? there are so many that are right there with our children. we know that the fbi background check is the gold standard of the process.

can you share a little bit about how we can promote that and encourage that? director comey: thank you, congressman. if i remember correctly, we've been doing a pilot program on that topic at our criminal justice information systems of operation, which i believe is the gold standard. anybody who wants to ensure that people in contact with children have been checked out, the best way to do it is working with us. as an exciting new feature that is coming on now, we are building in something called rap back. if you query somebody as a daycare provider, if they are ever again arrested, you will be notified.

that will make a big difference and make the gold standard platinum in a way. i very much agree with your sentiment. >> did you say rap back? director comey: rap back. someone develops a rap sheet, we get back. >> ok. thank you for your time. >> i thank the gentleman. my apologies for missing you the first time. i now recognize mr. ratcliffe for five minutes. >> thank you, mr. chairman. director comey, thanks for being here. i want to ask you a couple cyber security issues. i do want to follow up on a question i asked at the homeland security committee yesterday. we had a brief exchange about the president's decision to take in 10,000 syrian refugees. that is a 500% or 600% increase

over prior years. humanitarian concerns aside, i was troubled with respect to national security. particularly because isis has said it would use, or would try to use, the refugee process to get into the united states. our own databases don't have information on some of these individuals, so there are gaps of intelligence. we had a discussion about that figure of 10,000 yesterday. if you had been the sole decider on that issue, what would you have recommended to the president? director comey: i don't know. i'm pleased to say it's not my job to recommend that to the president. >> i know the fbi is not a policymaking body with respect to that issue, but as you recall, we had a discussion, i asked secretary johnson the same

thing, and he assured me there was an interagency process. i guess what i'm trying to get at, is this a figure the administration presented to you and said, meet the security obligations that come with this, or was this part of a process where there was actually input from folks like you that should be providing input on what that number would be? director comey: i think there was plenty of the input from the fbi and intelligence community on how we thought about the good news and the bad news. i don't recall, don't know if i could say if i did recall, how a number came up. it wouldn't have come from the fbi. >> you understand the concern, that we would hope these decisions were driven by

intelligence, rather than political reasons or pressure from our european allies or other folks around the world. in your written testimony, you said you wanted to get this right. you set the actual crime problem is cyber-based or facilitated. i want to let that sink in for everybody, because it is such an important point for us and for the fbi, and it really speaks to the gravity of an issue that you are facing an element of a cyber security.

what are the major challenges that you face in detecting and prosecuting cybercrime at the fbi? director comey: thank you for that question and thank you for the bringing of that issue and for your leadership there. the question is the folks and the equipment. in reverse order, the bad guys have very sophisticated equipment. we want to make sure we have world-class systems and we have great people to operate them and that is a challenge when we are facing a cyber security industry that will play -- pay a lot of young folks a lot of dough. those are the two big focus is for us. mr. ratcliffe: so the insider threat has been described i at least some as a threat to businesses that operate in cyberspace. we saw the scale of that threat in response to edward snowden. i know the department of justice has asked congress for clarity on the law in this area, for

assistance in prosecuting insiders who access sensitive data that they are not authorized to. i want to give you an opportunity to elaborate on that from your perspective. director comey: it's an important part of the threat, that is absolutely true. i don't know what the department's questions and concerns are about their legislative authority on that front, so i don't think i can offer anything useful there. mr. ratcliffe: ok. well, my time is expired and like everybody else, i want to express my thanks. i had the opportunity to work for you when you were the deputy general, and i have great confidence in you and i am grateful for your continuing service. i am grateful for the fact that you are in the director's chair and the you are making such important questions about security. with that, mr. chairman, i yield back.

mr. chairman: i would like to echo those comments and we are grateful that you are on the job. this will conclude today's hearing. we would like to thank our distinguished witness and thanked the audience for being here and without objection, all members will have five legislative days to submit additional questions for the witenss or additional information for the record. thank you, director comey. meeting adjourned. [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]

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communicators, republican representative from tennessee marsha blackburn vice chair of the energy and commerce committee talks about cyber security and ditea breach legislation. >> as individuals become subjected to the breaches, and many people have, they've come to realize it's not if you have your data breach. it is when is your ditea going to become breached. so having a federal standard and exercising some preemption and setting a period of time, a framework of time that companies have to conduct that information and then to inform consumers and set penalties for enforcement, those are appropriate steps that should be taken. and they're the steps that are covered. and data security legislation that we have worked on at energy a c