[House Hearing, 115 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY APPROPRIATIONS FOR 2018
_______________________________________________________________________
HEARINGS
BEFORE A
SUBCOMMITTEE OF THE
COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED FIFTEENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
_________
SUBCOMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY
JOHN R. CARTER, Texas, Chairman
JOHN ABNEY CULBERSON, Texas
CHARLES J. FLEISCHMANN, Tennessee
ANDY HARRIS, Maryland
STEVEN M. PALAZZO, Mississippi
DAN NEWHOUSE, Washington
SCOTT TAYLOR, Virginia
LUCILLE ROYBAL-ALLARD, California
HENRY CUELLAR, Texas
DAVID E. PRICE, North Carolina
C.A.DUTCHRUPPERSBERGER,Maryland
NOTE: Under committee rules, Mr. Frelinghuysen, as chairman of the
full committee, and Mrs. Lowey, as ranking minority member of the full
committee, are authorized to sit as members of all subcommittees.
Valerie Baldwin, Kris Mallard, Laura Cylke,
and Christopher Romig
Subcommittee Staff
____________
PART 2
DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY
Page
Coast Guard Requirements, Priorities, and Future Acquistion Plans.....1
United States Department of Homeland Security........................73
Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Border Protection...........207
[GRAPHIC(S) NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
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Printed for the use of the Committee on Appropriations
__________
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
27-050 WASHINGTON : 2017
COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS
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RODNEY P. FRELINGHUYSEN, New Jersey, Chairman
HAROLD ROGERS, Kentucky\1\
ROBERT B. ADERHOLT, Alabama
KAY GRANGER, Texas
MICHAEL K. SIMPSON, Idaho
JOHN ABNEY CULBERSON, Texas
JOHN R. CARTER, Texas
KEN CALVERT, California
TOM COLE, Oklahoma
MARIO DIAZ-BALART, Florida
CHARLES W. DENT, Pennsylvania
TOM GRAVES, Georgia
KEVIN YODER, Kansas
STEVE WOMACK, Arkansas
JEFF FORTENBERRY, Nebraska
THOMAS J. ROONEY, Florida
CHARLES J. FLEISCHMANN, Tennessee
JAIME HERRERA BEUTLER, Washington
DAVID P. JOYCE, Ohio
DAVID G. VALADAO, California
ANDY HARRIS, Maryland
MARTHA ROBY, Alabama
MARK E. AMODEI, Nevada
CHRIS STEWART, Utah
DAVID YOUNG, Iowa
EVAN H. JENKINS, West Virginia
STEVEN M. PALAZZO, Mississippi
DAN NEWHOUSE, Washington
JOHN R. MOOLENAAR, Michigan
SCOTT TAYLOR, Virginia
----------
\1\}Chairman Emeritus
NITA M. LOWEY, New York
MARCY KAPTUR, Ohio
PETER J. VISCLOSKY, Indiana
JOSE E. SERRANO, New York
ROSA L. DeLAURO, Connecticut
DAVID E. PRICE, North Carolina
LUCILLE ROYBAL-ALLARD, California
SANFORD D. BISHOP, Jr., Georgia
BARBARA LEE, California
BETTY McCOLLUM, Minnesota
TIM RYAN, Ohio
C.A.DUTCHRUPPERSBERGER,Maryland
DEBBIE WASSERMAN SCHULTZ, Florida
HENRY CUELLAR, Texas
CHELLIE PINGREE, Maine
MIKE QUIGLEY, Illinois
DEREK KILMER, Washington
MATT CARTWRIGHT, Pennsylvania
GRACE MENG, New York
MARK POCAN, Wisconsin
KATHERINE M. CLARK, Massachusetts
PETE AGUILAR, California
Nancy Fox, Clerk and Staff Director
(ii)
DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY APPROPRIATIONS FOR 2018
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Thursday, May 18, 2017.
COAST GUARD REQUIREMENTS, PRIORITIES, AND FUTURE ACQUISITION PLANS
WITNESS
ADMIRAL PAUL F. ZUKUNFT, COMMANDANT, U.S. COAST GUARD
Opening Statements
Mr. Carter [presiding]. Good morning. Subcommittee will
come to order. I see that some of our colleagues have a hard
time getting up in the morning.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Do we get an award for the ones who came
in?
Mr. Carter. Absolutely. Special red star by your name. You
get to brag. Maybe even a gold--from Baltimore, yes--got up and
drove here.
Welcome, to everybody. We are really glad to have you.
Admiral, we are pleased to have you.
Here comes brother Cuellar. Sure some others will be here.
Others will be coming in soon, and I am glad that we have got
everybody here.
Admiral Zukunft, we are getting started on another year. We
are really grateful that you are here this morning to talk to
us about what is going on with the Coast Guard.
As you are aware, we are all aware that we don't have our--
have the budget out yet, but we are--because we are on a kind
of a crammed up schedule to get things done on next year's
budget--next year's appropriations bills, we thought you cluing
us in about the needs, we will be able to have a memory of that
as we get--when we get our budget and then we will come back to
it and talk about it.
The Coast Guard has a complex mission requiring significant
resources including vessels, aircraft, and especially
personnel. With responsibilities ranging from securing the
Nation's borders, safeguarding maritime commerce, and ensuring
environmental stewardship of the U.S. ports and waterways, to
interdicting drug trafficking and illegal immigration, and
combating transnational crime, these challenges are diverse and
require a force that is robust, agile, and well-equipped.
Congress provided substantial funding in the fiscal year
2017 omnibus appropriations to improve readiness, recapitalize
vessels and aircraft, modernize shore facilities, and recruit
and retain a quality force. The committee is eager to hear from
you on how you intend to sustain these efforts along with your
priorities and concerns. I am especially interested in your
plans to recapitalize the Coast Guard's aging fleet and vessels
and aircraft.
With the funding Congress provided in fiscal year 2017 the
Coast Guard now has four vessel modernization programs
underway. The NSC and FRC programs are well established. I
would like to hear the Coast Guard's plans for the polar
icebreaker and the offshore patrol cutter, as well as plans for
addressing the remaining vessels in your fleet, many of which
are past their useful life.
In addition, in your recent State of the Coast Guard
address you stated a bigger force is needed. I look forward to
hearing from you on what is driving the staffing requirements
and on strategies to fund this growth, especially in light of
the recapitalization efforts that the Coast Guard will need to
continue to address in the future budget submissions.
Although the fiscal year 2018 budget isn't expected until
next week, unmet needs will remain. The subcommittee will face
tough decisions to ensure critical priority programs are
adequately funded and that all funding appropriated is, in
fact, executable. Your testimony today will help guide this
committee in making those tough decisions.
After we receive your budget, I look forward to a candid
discussion about unmet needs that were not addressed.
Admiral, every agency is operating in a constrained
resource environment. However, I believe few can match the
Coast Guard's consistently excellent performance recruiting and
maintaining a quality force, sustaining operations with aging
assets, recapitalizing for the future, and taking care of Coast
Guard families. This is no easy task.
I commend the leadership and the Coast Guard men and women
who serve this Nation so very ably.
And I also want to take this opportunity to commend
Commander JoAnn Burdian as she completes her assignment as the
Coast Guard's liaison to the House of Representatives. I have
dealt with many liaison officers from our military services as
chairman of this subcommittee and a member of the Defense
Appropriations Subcommittee, and I can tell you that Commander
Burdian is one of the best. An ardent, responsible, and
trustworthy advocate, she has been invaluable--an invaluable
asset to the staff and the force multiplier for the Coast
Guard.
I and my staff will miss her and wish her well in her next
assignment, where I know she will continue to serve the Nation
and the Coast Guard with distinction.
Before I turn to the admiral for his statement, the text of
which will be included in the record, I first want to recognize
my distinguished ranking member, Ms. Roybal-Allard, for any
remarks she may wish to make.
Ms. Roybal-Allard. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Welcome, Admiral, to this morning's hearing.
The Coast Guard has a critical set of missions that we must
properly support. That is why I was pleased we were able to
provide funding above the fiscal year 2017 request for the
Coast Guard, including $233 million above the request for the
acquisition, construction, and improvements account, which
funds the recapitalization of the Coast Guard air and marine
assets; and $92 million above the request for operating
expenses.
As was mentioned, we don't currently have any detail on
what is included in the fiscal year 2018 budget request for the
Coast Guard. However, with this administration's focus on
border security we have seen in the ``skinny budget'' the other
DHS programs are cut.
With the forthcoming 2018 request in mind, we need to know
how the Coast Guard is operating and what resources are needed
to support your important missions, especially for personnel
and operations.
I also would like to thank JoAnn Burdian for her hard work
with the Appropriations Committee on behalf of the Coast Guard
and the American people and wish her well on her next
assignment. She will be with us for a little while longer, but
this is probably our last opportunity to publicly recognize her
service.
Thank you again for joining us this morning, Admiral, and I
look forward to our discussion.
Mr. Carter. Admiral, before you begin I want to recognize
your lovely wife here today with us. I have had the pleasure of
being at your home and also traveling with you, and I know that
she is the wind beneath your wings. So we are very proud to
have her here today.
You may proceed.
Admiral Zukunft. Good morning, Chairman Carter and Ranking
Member Roybal-Allard. And first of all, thank you for calling
out the many accomplishments of JoAnn Burdian. And I will stay;
she will leave. But we have many great Coastees, and certainly
many that will be able to fill her place.
I also want to thank the distinguished members of this
subcommittee and thank you for the opportunity to speak with
you today. And especially I thank you for your support of the
United States Coast Guard. In particular, I appreciate your
advocacy for the fiscal year 2017 consolidated appropriation as
it funds key readiness and modernization initiatives and better
positions us to address today's evolving challenges.
I ask that my written statement be entered into the record.
Mr. Carter. It will be.
Admiral Zukunft. The Coast Guard is first and foremost an
armed service that advances national security objectives in
ways that no other armed service can. It begins with our
authorities that include over 60 bilateral agreements to
enforce rule of law in the territorial seas and on the high
seas around the world, and many foreign nations depend on the
United States Coast Guard to be their maritime law enforcement
against transnational criminal organizations.
Applying these authorities, in 2016 we removed a record 201
metric tons of cocaine and we brought 585 smugglers--these are
transnational criminals--to justice here in the United States,
where our prosecution rate is 100 percent. It is less than 10
percent in their nations of origin.
And today our greatest challenge in this campaign is really
one of platforms and people. And we must maintain our current
pace in recapitalizing the Coast Guard fleet while advancing
shore-based unmanned aerial systems to enhance our surveillance
capacity.
So in 2016 we awarded a contract to complete the buildout
of our fleet of 58 fast response cutters, all at an affordable
price, and Bollinger Shipyards delivered the most recent four
with zero discrepancies. And we awarded the acquisition of the
first nine offshore patrol cutters to Eastern Shipbuilding
Group, the down payment for a program of record of 25 of these
very capable platforms that meet our requirements--and again,
at an affordable price.
And we are cutting steel today at Huntington Ingalls
Shipyard on the ninth national security cutter. We have also
stood up an integrated program office with the Navy and awarded
industry studies to commence the buildout of a fleet of three
heavy and three medium icebreakers--all meaningful steps to
keep our Nation on an accelerated path to deliver the first
heavy icebreaker in 2023.
And we also received our fourth consecutive clean financial
audit opinion and have minimized acquisition cost growth and
timeline slippages.
The Coast Guard is the only armed service that has been
funded below the Budget Control Act floor in our annualized
operations and maintenance appropriation. Going forward, we
will need 5 percent annual growth in our operations and
maintenance accounts and at least $2 billion for major
acquisitions to operate and maintain our assets and preserve
our acquisition programs.
And I am working to rebuild our long-overlooked inland
fleet of 35 inland construction tenders with an average age of
52 years. Now is the critical time in sustaining our inland
rivers system and overall maritime transportation system that
contribute $4.5 trillion of commerce on an annual basis. This
fleet is essential to our economic and our national security.
And finally, we need to grow the Coast Guard and with
respect to our most critical asset: our people. Over the next 5
years we need to restore the 1,100 reserve billets that were
taken out of circulation as we faced difficult budget
priorities, and we need to bring on another 5,000 active duty
members into our service over the next 5 years while sustaining
our more than 8,500 civil servants.
This is the direction that the world's best coast guard--
our United States Coast Guard--must steer into the future.
And so on that note, I sincerely thank the unwavering
support of this subcommittee to address our most pressing
needs. With the continued support of the administration and
Congress, the Coast Guard will remain semper paratus--always
ready.
Thank you for the opportunity to testify today, and I look
forward to your questions.
[The information follows:]
T7050A.001
T7050A.002
T7050A.003
T7050A.004
T7050A.005
RECAPITALIZATION OF THE COAST GUARD
Mr. Carter. I thank you, Admiral.
We are--keep a time clock, but we are going to loosely keep
the time clock. We are here to get information today.
I want to start off with something you just mentioned that
I have been looking at and thinking about. You state the
recapitalization of the Coast Guard is the highest priority.
However, many vessels that you operate have reached or
surpassed their projected service life--the inland cutter fleet
in particular, which you just mentioned.
This is so vital to the $4.5 trillion of economic activity
that occur on our Nation's waterways, and they are in desperate
need of replacement. Only 10 of the 35 cutters are under 50
years old, and one that was commissioned in 1944. We don't even
want to think of how old that is.
The magnitude of this recapitalization and modernization
effort will require tradeoffs annually. Beyond the major
programs like the NSC, the FRC, the OPC, and the polar
icebreaker, does the Coast Guard have a viable plan to address
the requirements of this vital but aged fleet, and what
strategic risk are you taking as a consequence of focusing the
recapitalization program on the NSC, FRC, and OPC, and the
icebreaker?
Admiral Zukunft. Chairman, thank you for that question.
And this is not a new need, a new requirement. This is one
that has lingered over time as we looked at other programs,
other major acquisitions, and we did not want to put those
acquisition programs at risk.
But eventually you have to air out your dirty laundry. And
this is the time to do that. This provides full disclosure of
what our unmet requirements are.
As we build out the national security cutter, actually the
ninth national security cutter will cost less than the sixth.
As we look at keeping a hot product line going and then
realizing economies of scale, the cost of those are coming
down.
The fast response cutters are now coming out with zero
discrepancies. So with mature product lines we are driving down
costs and then holding requirements steady.
We have already reached out to the Army Corps of Engineers
in looking for a commercial off-the-shelf design for an N-1
tender that can be modified depending on where it is going to
be operating but would have the same engines, basically the
same design, and can be built for roughly about $25 million a
copy in a commercial shipyard here in the United States, which
would also stimulate job growth, as well.
When you actually go down to the waterfront and you go on
this--the Coast Guard cutter Smilax, which is, in fact, 73
years old, the first thing you notice are there are no women
assigned to it because these ships were not designed for mixed-
gender crews back in the 1940s. We have done a lot of lead and
asbestos mitigation to make sure that these are still safe to,
you know--are habitable, and if they are not we take them out
of service.
But at the end of the day, I mean, this is what maintains
our infrastructure, our inland waterway system. And through
that waterway that connects the deep-water ports are over $4.5
trillion of commerce each and every year.
The heartland of the United State are maritime states in
the true sense--Kentucky, Tennessee, Ohio, Illinois, and so on
down the upper Mississippi River, lower Mississippi River. When
you look at the latticework of waterways that we have and what
the--what burden that takes off our other highways, it really
is what I would call geographic envy to any other Nation that
looks at our geography, but again, maintained by this fledgling
fleet of 35 ships. The time to replace them have arrived.
Mr. Carter. One other quick question: In your State of the
Coast Guard address you stated that emerging global threats
warranted an increase in the NSC program from eight to nine
ships. There is no question the national security cutter is a
tremendous asset, performing well above expectations. It is,
however, one of the many tools in the toolkit that the Coast
Guard needs to successfully execute its complex and diverse
missions.
Funding a capital ship like the NSC is expensive. As you
know, we will be faced with a budget decision to include
production funding for a 10th NSC in the fiscal year 2018
budget. Will adding more NSCs and reducing or foregoing other
recapitalization efforts like the OPC, FRC, and inland cutters
better serve the Coast Guard?
Admiral, let me ask you today, as I will ask the secretary
next week, does the Coast Guard need more national security
cutters to execute its 11 statutory missions? Will the 10th
cutter endanger other priority recapitalization programs like
the offshore patrol cutter, the fast response cutter, or the
polar icebreaker? Please be specific.
Admiral Zukunft. Thank you, Chairman. And I have gone on
record in the past when we laid out our program of record for
eight national security cutters, with our biggest concern being
any additional growth, what risk that would impinge upon the
buildout of the offshore patrol cutter.
What we received was topline relief to build a ninth
national security cutter with long lead-time materials. In
fact, that ship is under construction right now.
Will we put that ship to use? Absolutely. In fact, today
one of our national security cutters, the Hamilton--she is
still in her first year of service--will be returning to port
with 17 metric tons of cocaine. In fact, there are 27 metric
tons of cocaine on Coast Guard cutters today.
So when we looked at what our requirements were for our
entire fleet, our full program of record, we didn't have global
refugee flows, we did not have trafficking activity, we weren't
addressing the nine-dash line, and we weren't addressing
potential conflict with North Korea. So the world has changed
at a much more accelerated pace since we built out this program
of record.
But I will be specific. The offshore patrol cutter is our
number one priority in recapitalizing our legacy fleet of
today.
A 10th national security cutter, yes, if that is funded
upon the top line will I put it to use? Absolutely.
But we need to look at what the follow on, the out-year
costs are, as well--not just the initial acquisition but, as I
mentioned earlier, it is our annualized operating and
maintenance funding. That needs to be built into this
algorithm, as well--not just acquisition, but the sustainment
piece of that, as well.
Mr. Carter. And I agree with that.
Ms. Roybal-Allard.
Ms. Roybal-Allard. This review will lead to a permanent end
to live tissue training.
Can you tell me how the review will proceed, what will be
examined, and if experts from within our outside of the Coast
Guard will be used?
Admiral Zukunft. Ranking Member, this will in all
likelihood be a contract service, just as the legacy live
tissue training was. And like you, I found that, quite
honestly, abhorrent, in terms of meeting our mission
requirements.
So we will move to a simulation. It may be more expensive,
but for us it will be the right thing to do to prepare our
Coast Guard members who may be deployed to theaters where they
may encounter traumatic injuries.
Ms. Roybal-Allard. Okay. I believe there is some evidence,
however, that it is cheaper to do it this way, so I am hoping
that that will be true.
Admiral Zukunft. Yes, ma'am. And again, I look at this as
the right thing to do.
Ms. Roybal-Allard. Thank you.
CYBER SECURITY
This past week we saw the devastating effects of a
cyberattack involving ransomware across many countries, and the
news has reported that over 100,000 organizations have been
affected in 150 countries. As vital physical infrastructure is
increasingly dependent on the Internet, the potential damage of
these attacks increases significantly.
The Coast Guard is responsible for cybersecurity for one
such piece of infrastructure, and that is, you know, the ports.
What would be the impact of such an attack to the movement of
commerce, and what would be the impact of a delay in operations
mean to commerce if the ports were to shut down even for an
hour or a day?
Admiral Zukunft. Ranking Member, this probably goes back to
2014 when there was a work delay on the West Coast as the
longshoreman workers were revisiting their contract renewal for
5 years. When I went out there I flew over the ports of L.A.
Long Beach and I counted over 70 fully laden container ships
anchored offshore because they could not engage in commerce.
That immediately impacts the Rust Belt, the manufacturing
floors. It affects the stocking in major distributors. We live
in a just-in-time environment. The daily cost is over $1
billion a day, and then the jobs that get added onto that, as
well.
This was a man-made disruption. The very same thing can
happen because about 90-plus percent of our ports are fully
automated. They have taken the human out of the equation, if
you will, so everything from cargo manifests to actually moving
and then forwarding that container, as well.
So industry is turning to the Coast Guard in terms of what
are the, you know, the national standards, if you will, for
cybersecurity.
I am engaged personally with the international maritime
organizations. We just don't look at the United States; we need
to look at the entire international global supply chain, and
then how do we codify and then share best practices
internationally?
And so we find the Coast Guard drawn more and more in in
terms of being, in terms of a sector, maritime--to be, you
know, the oversight, if you will--not a regulatory but, you
know, disseminating best practices in terms of how can we
prevent a cyber intrusion, and then also turning to industry to
report to us so that we know that there has been an intrusion
in case this is a coordinated effort to disrupt our supply
chain.
Ms. Roybal-Allard. And how is the coordination between the
ports and the Coast Guard working with regards to
cybersecurity?
Admiral Zukunft. We have 37 area maritime security
committees at all of our major ports, and within these
committees we have subcommittees that are strictly addressing
cybersecurity. Right now it is not built into the Maritime
Transportation Security Act. That addresses fences and access
but it doesn't address indirect access via the Internet.
So we are working--collaborating with the many port
stakeholders through these area maritime security committees
looking for best practices. I am encouraged by what I have seen
at Long Beach container terminals. They have nearly fully
automated that port facility right down to autonomous vehicles
that move containers--battery-powered, no carbon footprint
whatsoever. But they built cybersecurity into the forefront of
that.
And how do you migrate that best practice for others? There
is a real cost involved in doing this so I think the other
piece of that is, you know, is the cost aspect. The cost of a
disruption would be ruinous to our economy.
Ms. Roybal-Allard. Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Carter. Thank you.
Mr. Fleischmann.
Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you.
Oh, I am sorry.
Mr. Carter. Yes. Let's remember to turn the mikes on.
MARINE INSPECTORS
Mr. Fleischmann. Yes. Thank you. My apologies.
Admiral, again, I want to thank you and the President. I
saw the Coast Guard graduation yesterday. I have had the
privilege of nominating--trying to get some folks in the Coast
Guard Academy. We have a proud tradition in Tennessee of Coast
Guard personnel.
Specifically, I did want to thank Master Chief Shawn
McMahon and Wicheta. They are doing wonderful work in
Chattanooga. They are omnipresent and we thank you for them, as
well, sir.
I have been hearing lately that there is a potential
shortage of Coast Guard marine inspectors. With that in mind,
would you briefly touch on three things, sir: the importance--
the important work that the marine inspectors do to facilitate
commerce, what a lack of marine inspectors will mean to your
inland waterway mission, and what has led to this problem and
what might our subcommittee do to combat it, sir.
Admiral Zukunft. Well, I think the biggest--Congressman,
the biggest challenge to our marine inspection program is
subchapter M, which now brings over 6,000 what had been
uninspected towing vessels under an inspection regime. And this
was brought on by just a spate of casualties.
There are several alternatives that an operator may use.
They may wish to have a Coast Guard inspector or they may want
to have a third party do the inspection on behalf of the Coast
Guard. We call it an alternative compliance program.
I have come to the realization that we need to overhaul our
alternative compliance program and provide more stringent
oversight of these third parties doing inspection work on
behalf of the Coast Guard. We have seen a number of casualties
where third parties did not go to the level of detail that the
United States Coast Guard would in finding safety--flagrant
safety violations, and perhaps maybe that is why an operator
uses a third party and not the Coast Guard, because we will
write them up and make sure they fix it.
So we need to provide better oversight, and at the same
time we may incur, you know, a larger share of this new fleet
of ships that will come under an inspection regime.
The other part is we need to get after shipbuilding here in
the United States, as well. When we look at the status of our
prepositioned fleet, those that would provide sealift during a
campaign, many of these are 20, 25-year-old steamships. In
fact, there are very few licensed engineers that have steamship
qualifications today.
And we only have about 78 prepositioned ships, you know,
and if you look back to World War II the highest casualty rate
was in our merchant marine. So if you think that there will be
no casualties if we find ourselves in a campaign--a
traditional, conventional campaign, whether it is Europe, North
Korea, or the like--there are a lot of submarines out there
that will take these ships out.
So we need to be thinking about what is our ability to
recapitalize our merchant marine fleet. And if we do, that
requires marine inspectors, as well.
We are on the, I would say, the fast lane to being a net
export nation of fossil fuel.
Mr. Fleischmann. Yes.
Admiral Zukunft. And if there were a provision that would
say a certain percentage of those ships have to be U.S.-flagged
ships, whether it is carrying LNG or U.S. crude, that might
spark another increase in the shipbuilding industry.
We have three Jones Act deep draft shipyards in the United
States today. Certainly they would be interested. This would
certainly stimulate economic development with jobs. But, you
know, I don't want to be the ones holding them up because I
don't have enough marine inspectors.
So whether it is uninspected towing vessels, national
security, or international commerce, those are three areas that
I see right now a growth--foreseeable growth requirement for
our marine inspection program.
Mr. Fleischmann. Yes, sir.
Admiral Zukunft. Thank you, sir.
Mr. Fleischmann. Well, thank you, sir.
And I will end by just inviting you next week--I am sorry,
next year is Coast Guard year in Chattanooga. We honor all five
branches and we would like to invite you to Chattanooga on May
the 4th. We have had the commandant of the Marine Corps; we
have had the CNO down. So I will extend that invitation to you,
as head of the great United States Coast Guard, sir.
Admiral Zukunft. Four May. I have the date. Thank you,
Congressman.
Mr. Fleischmann. Yes, sir.
Mr. Carter. Mr. Cuellar.
PRODUCTION SCHEDULE
Mr. Cuellar. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
And I also saw the graduation last night and--yesterday
afternoon, should I say--and very good speech that you gave, so
thank you so much.
I want to follow up on a couple of items that you
mentioned.
First, the offshore patrol cutter project: How is that
coming? I mean, do you feel confident that it will be on--the
production will be on schedule? Any particular things you see
in the way or will they be on schedule?
Admiral Zukunft. Congressman, we are on target and
tracking. And first of all, I have to thank this committee, as
we awarded final design to award the contract back in
September.
We did have to move some money around to make that happen.
The 2017 budget, it puts the long lead-time materials in place.
I have been down to Eastern Shipbuilding Group and they are
ready to cut steel to put that first ship in the water in the
year 2021. So I am very confident that they will deliver a top-
quality product on budget and on time.
ICEBREAKER
Mr. Cuellar. Okay.
On a second subject that you mentioned, the icebreakers, I
just got back on a CODEL to the Arctic Circle. Secretary
Tillerson was there and I asked him a question about the
icebreakers because, as you know, when you have the Russians up
there and other folks you are talking about shipping lanes that
are important, then you are talking about the natural
resources--oil, gas--resources that you have there.
And I think the Russians have over 50 icebreakers. I think
that is what one of the briefings told us there. And I think we
have, what, two or three--one working partially?
Admiral Zukunft. We have two.
Mr. Cuellar. Two. Two, but the second--is the second one
working? There is only one working, or they are both working?
Admiral Zukunft. So the third one is actually deactivated.
Mr. Cuellar. Deactivated. So there are two working built in
the 1970s?
Admiral Zukunft. The oldest was built in the 1970s. The
Healy is--was built around the year 2000, so relatively new
compared to the Polar Star.
Mr. Cuellar. All right. So you mentioned the next one is
coming for us 2023. Could you just expand a little bit on the
icebreakers for the Arctic Circle?
Admiral Zukunft. Thank you, Congressman. So we chartered a
study about 5 years ago to look at, you know, what are the
national requirements for access in the high latitudes. This
was done through a third party and we went back and revisited
it a number of times, and at the end of it the minimum
requirement was three heavy and three medium icebreakers.
If you use the, you know, a carrier--an aircraft carrier as
kind of the model, and if you need an aircraft carrier, say, in
the Pacific, well you really need three to keep one there
permanently. One is in maintenance; one is, you know, ramping
up to get ready; and the other one is deployed for 6 to 8
months at a time. So it takes three to make one, which is how
we got to three and three if we need permanent presence north
and south, or even more so.
Then we started looking at now what has changed in the
Arctic since the study was done. Well, the ice has retreated at
record rates.
About 13 percent of the world's oil reserves and about a
third of the world's gas reserves are in the Arctic right now--
and I say ``reserves'' because it is not profitable right now
to do offshore drilling up there, but out of that about half of
this is in the U.S. EEZ and in our extended continental shelf.
And so we have sovereign interest at stake up there, as well.
We have seen China, for example, with their icebreaker
doing annualized studies in what I would call our extended
continental shelf. Put it in perspective, that area is the size
of the state of Texas. It is enormous.
But we have not ratified the Law of the Sea Convention so
it is treated right now as the global common. So if some point
in the future we ratify the Law of the Sea, we stake our claim,
I would be naive to think that claim would not be challenged by
others who claim they have operated there repeatedly and this
is now global commons, and the next thing we know we see a
Chinese mobile offshore drilling unit going into the, you know,
extended continental shelf to extract what otherwise would be
U.S. oil.
We see Russia--with their 40 right now, but they are still
building their fleet out--prepared to deliver two icebreaking
corvettes that will carry cruise missiles in the year 2020.
We have sat down with the Navy and we created what is
called a cooperative strategy for the 21st century. And we look
at the Arctic. The Navy says, ``Coast Guard, you have got the
Arctic.''
So as we look at, you know, who has, you know, sole
responsibility for exercising sovereignty in the Arctic region,
it is the United States Coast Guard. So that gets us to a point
of why we need national assets--icebreakers--to exert
sovereignty there.
And right now we are trying to do it with a ship that is 40
years old. It is literally on life support, which is why we are
going to accelerate the delivery of this first icebreaker. We
will need another one right behind that so we can deactivate
that. We have put a lot of maintenance money into this old ship
but it is the only heavy icebreaker in our Nation's inventory
today.
Mr. Cuellar. My time is up, but I just want to say I
appreciate the strategy because we don't pay a lot of attention
to the Arctic, but once you get there and you get the briefings
and you understand and you see what the Russians and the
Chinese--I forgot the Chinese, also--and because of the
reserves that we have there and because of the shipping lane
and because of the military bases that the Russians are
building there aggressively, I think it is something that we
need to start looking. I appreciate your leadership on that.
Admiral Zukunft. Thank you, sir.
Mr. Cuellar. Thank you.
Mr. Carter. Admiral, when David was chairman of this
subcommittee we went to Alaska--what would that have been, 6 or
8----
Mr. Price. Probably 9 or 10.
Mr. Carter. Okay, 9 or 10. My wife learned that Coast Guard
needed a icebreaker and she has been bugging me about that
icebreaker ever since. And yesterday when the President
mentioned it in his speech at the graduation she called me in
the middle of another meeting to inform me that the President
said he is going to give them an icebreaker.
You have got the best lobbyist, as far as I am concerned,
in--for me in this committee of anybody in the country.
Mr. Palazzo.
SURVEILLANCE
Mr. Palazzo. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Admiral, it is great to see you again. Really enjoyed
seeing you in Pascagoula, Mississippi for the christening of
the Kimball this past March and look forward to several more
christenings of the national security cutters.
And I just want the thank you and your men and women that
work for you for everything that they do protecting our
maritime security as well as keeping the drugs off the streets
and out of the hands of our children and our communities. That
is an extremely important mission. Thank you for doing that.
My question is $18 million is going into research and
development for a shore-based long-range UAS. Can you tell me a
little bit more about the program and the timeline for
delivery?
Admiral Zukunft. Yes. Thank you, Congressman.
So we have talked a lot about recapitalizing ships, which
are long overdue. But the reason we are having so much success
right now in the transit zone is, one, you know, the
intelligence is really good; and two, the surveillance is good.
But we have not addressed what are we doing to keep pace
with surveillance as we increase our presence on the water, and
then how can you do that more effectively and efficiently? And
so we were a little bit late to the game getting into the land-
based unmanned aerial system.
Within the Department of Homeland Security, within the--
within Customs and Border Protection there is a squadron of
nine Guardian UAVs built by General Atomics. We have Coast
Guard members detailed to CBP to operate these remote systems,
but they are really, you know land border-focused and so we
really haven't addressed the maritime domain, as well.
And so with this $18 million it is really working within
the Department of Homeland Security, so we have a unified
requirement that we can leverage, you know, what DOD is
building. We are not putting Hellfire missiles on these; these
are strictly surveillance platforms. But what can we--what are
the state-of-the-art systems in the maritime that can look
through cloud cover, that can work at extended ranges?
Right now the go-fast activity--I was at Tampa, Florida
talking to our folks at Panama Express, and the go-fasts now
are heading south from Colombia off the coast of Ecuador out of
range right now of our surveillance platforms that are pre-
staged in Comalapa, El Salvador. So they are going beyond where
we can reach, so we are not getting to a point we can't reach
and touch them until they come further north. So they are
gaming our lack of surveillance capabilities.
So the $18 million gets after, you know, the state-of-the-
art sensor packages, the range that would be needed, and the
operating systems to operate these platforms at extended
ranges--not from the United States, but really closer to where
the threat is, miles and miles before those threats arrive in
the United States, to stage those out of places in the
Caribbean or perhaps in the Eastern Pacific to address these
threats that are ultimately destined for the United States.
JONES ACT
Mr. Palazzo. All right. Thank you for that.
You also mentioned earlier--we discussed the Jones Act a
little bit. Can you tell me a little what the Coast Guard's
enforcement role is and perhaps why the Jones Act is extremely
important to keeping the U.S. maritime industry strong?
Admiral Zukunft. Well, absolutely. And, Congressman, I
think as you well know, we only--today we have three Jones Act
deep-water ports in the United States: Philadelphia Shipyard,
Halter Marine in Pascagoula, and then NASSCO Shipyard in San
Diego.
If the Jones Act goes away, all U.S.-flagged ships will be
built overseas and then those shipyards will shut down. Not
only do the shipyards shut down, the expertise goes with it, as
well.
And so what if all those shipyards move to, say, South
Korea? And now what if we find ourselves in a conflict in that
region and we are now dependent for an overseas shipyard in
conflict to deliver ships for the United States?
We didn't do that during World War II. I think we can learn
a lot from history and not make what I would consider
shortsighted calculations that would have strategic
consequences in the long run. Obviously, with that comes our
U.S. mariners, as well.
So for me, you know, it is job creation, it is about
national security, and it is a workforce that we need to have
at the ready if we do find ourselves in a global conflict. I
look around the world today and I am not seeing tranquility
break out anywhere. I would like to see it somewhere, but it is
just not breaking out.
A lot of pressure on our military forces today in terms of
how do we balance diplomacy? If that fails, you know, what are
the military consequences as a result of that?
Jones Act is a big part of that.
Mr. Palazzo. Admiral, thank you.
I yield back.
Mr. Carter. Okay, Mr. Ruppersberger.
Mr. Ruppersberger. First thing, thank you for being here. I
never realized how good the Coast Guard was until I came to
Congress. I remember I was in the Port of Baltimore, and Judge
Carter and I sit on the Defense Preparations and we do the
budget for Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marines. And what you all
do with what you have is just incredible, in my opinion.
I think semper paratus--what does that mean?
Admiral Zukunft. Always ready.
ARCTIC MILITARY PRESENCE AND COMMERCE
Mr. Ruppersberger. Always ready. And if you look at what
your missions are with drug interdiction, working with ports,
you know, doing all the search and rescue, it is just amazing.
When you are one of the last ones to ask questions a lot of
this has been addressed, but I want to prioritize on the area
of the Arctic again. And I think it is really important that we
deal with this because I think that maybe because it is so far
away or whatever, but we have serious issues because, in my
opinion, more than anything is the Russian aggression. Anything
having to do with Putin we have gotta be concerned. And you
also mentioned the China issue.
And right now I think Putin has 40 active polar icebreakers
in the Arctic while the United States has two, with the Polar
Star being commissioned over 40 years. And there are a lot of
issues we have to deal with there.
Recently the Russians have made a number of aggressive
moves in the region, and that includes dispatching numerous
military brigades, planning a large ship--shipping port in
Siberia's Yamal Peninsula, and also rebuilding old airbases.
U.S. presence--and one--I am sure one of the issues not only
from a dominance point of view but also because of the
resources that are going to be there, as far as oil.
U.S. presence in the Arctic is necessary for more than just
power projection; it is a matter of national security. If
remain unchecked, the Russians will extend their sphere of
influence to over 5 million square miles of Arctic ice and
water.
Now, climate change is melting ice in the Arctic at an
alarming rate, and as a result, more waterways are becoming
navigable. It is essential that the United State be ready to
assist any uptick in Arctic commerce. There is a vast amount of
natural resources which we can extract, including large gas and
oil reserves. And simply put, if our waterways are not cleared,
we cannot capitalize on this resource.
Now, in a GAO report I read that several years ago the
Coast Guard was unable to provide year-round access to the
Arctic in 2011 and 2012 and the Coast Guard could not meet four
of 11 total requests for icebreaking services.
My questions: First, how many medium and heavy polar
cutters do you need to completely manage increasing traffic in
the Arctic?
I got a couple more.
Admiral Zukunft. Yes. Yes, Congressman, you know, in the
current state of affairs right now, you know, the six
icebreakers, three heavy and three medium icebreakers, would
satisfy those requirements. You know, that is based on what the
threat environment is in 2017.
Now, these ships will be in service for 30-plus years. As
we build those, as we have seen with our program of record with
the national security cutter, the offshore patrol cutter, the
world changes.
And so what if the world does change? The advantage you
have when you are building national security cutters and now
you are making these more affordable in the long run, you have
a hot production line, maybe, you know, 10, 12 years from now
the world changes but at least you are producing these at an
affordable price, a predictable price, and on schedule.
There may be a change, but at least as we see the world
right now, you know, the three heavy and three medium would
meet today's requirements based on the threats that we see----
Mr. Ruppersberger. Including the Russian dominance there?
Admiral Zukunft. With the Russian dominance.
We need to look differently, though, at what an icebreaker
does. We need to reserve space, weight, and power if we need to
strap on a cruise ship missile package on it.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Well, that is an issue. That and maybe
intelligence utilities, those type of things. But----
Admiral Zukunft. Right.
Mr. Ruppersberger [continuing]. Let me ask you this: I see
Russia as a serious threat and we have to deal with it. So in
the current icebreaking capabilities, would the Navy be able to
conduct a full-scale defense of Alaska in the event of real
threat to our homeland, based on what we have just talked about
here with Russia?
Admiral Zukunft. I probably won't speculate on what the
Navy, you know, can or cannot do. Obviously we have the
world's----
Mr. Ruppersberger. We need to plan for that.
Admiral Zukunft [continuing]. Best Navy. But our
cooperative strategy, right now we--you know, you don't see the
Arctic addressed, you know, in our national military strategy
as a strategic region, so that is why as I look at where the
other services are operating, where are they not operating?
Which is why I am focused on the Arctic, which is why I am
focused on the Western Hemisphere.
We are a military service, and so we need to double down
where the other services are pulled off to North Korea, Russia,
China, Iran, violent extremism.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Probably many countries, including
Russia, laid claims to portions of the Arctic territory. If
tensions rise does the Coast Guard have the capability to
firmly defend our geopolitical interests?
Admiral Zukunft. Congressman, I would say it is seasonal,
and for the Navy it would be seasonal--seasonal by virtue of
the fact that our fleet of today, our offensive capability can
only access those waters when they are ice-free, and they are
not always ice-free.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Well, it is something I think we really
need to prioritize. I think it is really important. In this
business of politics it is important you listen to your wife,
so I would suggest that this committee and the chairman really
listen to his wife and that we really make this a priority on
where we are going. So----
Admiral Zukunft. Congressman, thank you.
And again, I want to thank this committee because this is
the committee that has really moved this, you know, from the
starting block to down the track. The $150 million that we have
moved out of the 2017 appropriation that you put there gets us
out of the starting block.
Mr. Ruppersberger. The other thing I want to say, too, if
you are a female member of Congress you need to listen to your
husband.
Ms. Roybal-Allard. Who happens to be a Marine. [Laughter.]
Mr. Ruppersberger. I know. I work out with him in the gym
sometimes so I see him.
Mr. Carter. You finished?
Mr. Ruppersberger. Oh, I am finished. Thank you. I yield
back.
Mr. Carter. I definitely ought to listen.
Mr. Taylor.
Mr. Taylor. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
And, Admiral, thank you for being here today. Really
appreciate it, everything that you guys do in your service. And
I know the Coast Guard is a great bang for the buck, if you
will, and certainly in my opinion a fundamental part of our
national security apparatus, and I really appreciate what you
do.
A couple quick things. Actually, I just want to just follow
up one thing on--that Representative Ruppersberger just said
about defending sovereignty in the Arctic. I know that he did
ask in terms of the Coast Guard's capability to do so in the
face of Russian movements, Russian aggression, and stuff like
that.
Can you just repeat that if you will? Do you believe that
the Coast Guard currently has the capability to be able to deal
with that potential threat? And also, is there a strategy in
place now that can actually with the Navy to be able to do it
if you need more backup, if you will?
Admiral Zukunft. I will first talk about the strategy and I
will go back to our cooperative strategy for the 21st century,
which is signed by the CNO, myself, and then the commandant of
the Marine Corps. And so what it does, it looks at what your
inventory is of assets and then it looks at where you employ
those.
And so when you start looking at the Arctic on the surface,
you know, that is where you will find the Coast Guard. Are we
ready to go toe-to-toe with a Russian combatant with a national
security cutter? Our capabilities on the national security
cutter are more defensive than they are offensive, so as
currently equipped, you know, that platform is not ready to
engage in what I would call traditional naval warfare.
The Navy certainly has a fairly robust submarine fleet, and
so if nothing else that would keep an adversary guessing. And
our Navy has operated in the Arctic for some period of time. So
in terms of an offensive capability, it would be less surface
and it would be more subsurface.
But how might this play out? I mean, do we immediately
jump, you know, to armed conflict, or does it begin with the
fact that Russia has already claimed most of the Arctic, you
know, up to and including the North Pole? And now they start
extracting resources, or they move fishing vessels in there,
and we say, ``Well, wait a minute. That is not yours.''
And so initially the conflict or the tensions, as we see in
the nine-dash line and the east South China Sea, it doesn't
quite approach armed conflict; it is something less than, but
if you don't have an ability to exert sovereignty then they are
going to fill that vacuum. So I think that presence piece--it
is not presence, but it is really posturing to say, ``Hey, this
is our sovereign interest. Keep out.''
And so I think that is really the strategic way forward.
Mr. Taylor. Got you. So look at international law first,
maritime law first, and go that route, and then--but backed up
with a presence.
Admiral Zukunft. Yes, sir.
CYBER ATTACKS
Mr. Taylor. If I can switch gears just really quickly on
the cyber, have you guys--have you seen an increase in attacks?
And is there currently--and I have asked this question at a
couple other hearings, as well, too--are there currently data-
sharing on attacks to be able to establish a pattern or
potential attribution to state sponsors, potentially, or
others, and then also for best practices?
So again, are there--are you seeing an uptick in attacks?
Is there a sharing apparatus between agencies and even military
services to be able to find patterns?
Admiral Zukunft. Yes, sir. I would say the--pattern is
persistent.
You know, we operate on the Department of Defense
information network. And in fact, the J-6 for the Joint Chiefs
of Staff is a Coast Guard three-star admiral.
The chairman of the Joint Chiefs brought this individual in
and he says, ``Well, we, military, just operate on the dot-mil
domain. The Coast Guard operates the full spectrum: dot-gov,
dot-com, dot-mil. And so we really need to bring a Coast Guard
three-star who we created to fill this position because we
can't just insulate ourselves within the dot-mil domain.''
We also helped staff the Department of Homeland Security's
NCIC, which does the interagency piece.
And the 2017 budget actually finally provides us the
billeting to establish a program of record, because up until
now we had been a volunteer fire department in cyber, pulling
people off of other primary jobs to do cyber work. So now we
can finally build out a program of record, the professionals
who will be doing cyber full time. Two graduates, two brand new
ensigns that graduated yesterday, they are going straight into
cyber.
We have a shortage of about 209,000 cyber professionals in
the United States today, so to think we can bring these in off
the street, we are going to have to grow it our own. So there
is a human capital piece that goes with this, as well.
And I want to thank this committee for allowing us to go
from a volunteer fire department to a professional service when
it comes to cyber.
Mr. Taylor. I have got more, but I am--I won't hold all the
time.
Thanks, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Carter. Mr. Price.
Mr. Taylor. Thank you, Admiral.
Mr. Price. Admiral, let me welcome you back to the
committee and thank you for helping us schedule this early
morning--I want to briefly ask you about a backward-looking
budget item, which probably left some needs unmet, realizing
that we don't have the figures for the----
Mr. Carter. Turn your mike on.
DISASTER RELIEF
Mr. Price [continuing]. Realizing we don't have the figures
for the coming year. Has to do with Hurricane Matthew, which,
as you know, had a devastating effect on our region. And I know
several Coast Guard units along the east coast from Florida to
Virginia were damaged in the hurricane.
Coast Guard had estimated operational impact--an impact on
the crews who have to work on overtime to be something like $92
million. That was the estimate. Congress did not appropriate
funds for Coast Guard recovery in the December emergency
supplemental, but we did provide $15 million to begin repairs
on facilities in the April omnibus bill.
So can you provide us a status update on the east coast
units' recover? And is it fair to say there is still a $77
million worth of need today?
Admiral Zukunft. Congressman, yes, we still have a $77
million hole. The $15 million from Station Tybee, which is
right outside of Savannah, Georgia; Cape Canaveral; Ponce
Inlet--those were probably the most seriously impacted units
from Hurricane Matthew. Their piers were destroyed. Right now a
lot of these units are operating out of portable trailers. That
is where the $77 million, the brick and mortar to reconstitute
those stations, would go to.
But what the $15 million does do is it at least allows us
to sustain operations as on June 1st we start a whole 'nother
hurricane season all over again. And then we also enter into
what I would consider our peak search and rescue period, as
well. So the $15 million at least keeps us in business, but not
in the ideal state, but as good Coasties we will be semper
paratus.
Mr. Price. I am sure that is true. I also infer from what
you said that this cost estimate remains valid, as to what is
still required.
Admiral Zukunft. Yes, sir.
BORDER SECURITY
Mr. Price. Let me move to an important question of border
security, very much in our discussion and debate these days.
President has asked for additional resources to construct a
physical wall along the southern border, as you well know.
It seems to be a well-kept secret that Congress built 375--
370 miles of pedestrian fencing in the 2007 to 2009 fiscal year
period and 300 additional miles of vehicular fencing. That is
in place today.
And I remember Coast Guard briefings from the period when
that fencing was going online about the impact of migrants and
smugglers who were increasingly prone to come to the U.S. by
sea when their land routes were cut off or were impeded.
So I wonder what kind of data you actually have from those
earlier years on the correlation between enhanced physical
obstruction on the land border and waterborne migrant traffic
numbers. Have you made any projections about what the
operational impact on the Coast Guard would be of this proposed
border wall?
Admiral Zukunft. Thank you, Congressman. If we are looking
at a defense and offense, a wall is certainly a defensive
approach. It is a goal-line defense.
I am the offensive coach, so what does the offensive coach
do is when it comes to illicit goods, human trafficking, in
most--this is moving almost predominantly by sea, eventually
working its way up to the southwest border. I met with
President Santos in Bogota 2 months ago to address the
significant increase in coca cultivation, cocaine production,
all destined for the United States. It takes to the sea.
We have these authorities, and that is the one place where
this commodity is vulnerable is on the water. When it lands in
Central America the corruption, rule of law has really taken
over. And in fact, it facilitates the movement of this
commodity rather than in bulk--you know, 80, 90-pound bales of
cocaine, now you are talking grams--that try to ride along the
legitimate trade between the United States and Mexico, and that
is secreted into the United States.
So once it touches land I almost view that as a, you know,
as a disease--what it does to law enforcement, what it does to
elected officials. If we can stop it at sea we give those
communities, that security environment, a better opportunity to
get a grip on some of this violent crime that is taking place.
So the offensive coach says you need more offensive play
downrange. You have got all the authorities to go right into
their waters and apprehend them, you know, regardless of where
they are at.
All these countries want to see them extradited almost
without exception here to the United States to prosecute. And
before they are prosecuted they will turn evidence and provide
us valuable information on where the next load is coming. So it
feeds that whole intelligence cycle.
So the offensive game is a pretty sound investment. I am
not the defensive coach so I can't really speculate on, you
know, what it takes to stand up that goal-line defense in the
form of a wall.
Mr. Price. But it will be--your defensive capacity, in
terms of the small craft coming into this country, which, of
course, could conceivably increase if the land routes are
further restricted, that defensive capacity will be required.
You are exercising it right now.
Is there any projections about that or any comments about
how it worked last time?
Admiral Zukunft. Yes. So thank you, Congressman. So, yes,
we looked at, you know, that defensive approach, if you will,
we saw with Cuba. This time last year I had between eight and
10 ships, you know, in the Florida Straits because we saw last
year a record movement of Cuban migrants. We have now gone 7
weeks without one Cuban migrant apprehended at sea or even
attempting to flee.
But we realize, you know, as you allude to, it is the
squeeze-the-balloon effect. If you apply pressure, as in a
wall, then, you know, illicit activity will find the path of
least resistance, and that path is the water, which means we
would have to draw down assets to apply that defensive measure
if we saw a change from land to maritime access to our
homeland.
CUBAN MIGRATION
Mr. Price. Do I have any time remaining?
All right. All right. I will move just quickly to this
Cuban matter because that was going to be my next question if
time permitted.
You have cited the statistics already. The interdiction
numbers are down and actually at zero. Is that what you said?
That is what I understand, as well.
Admiral Zukunft. At sea, Congressman, zero.
Mr. Price. Yes, at sea. That is what I mean.
So what does that mean in terms of the deployment of Coast
Guard resources? That offers, of course, a possibility to focus
on other areas, other problems. What are your projections
there?
Admiral Zukunft. What changed in the Florida Straits was
the repeal of the wet foot, dry foot policy.
Mr. Price. That is right.
Admiral Zukunft. And so we have been able to move some of
those ships deeper into the Caribbean, and so now we are seeing
shipments of cocaine that have been leaving Venezuela, the
Guajira Peninsula in Colombia, destined for either Puerto Rico,
the Dominican Republic--from there they go to Puerto Rico, as
well. And so we have seen an uptick in our at-sea interdictions
because we have been able to push those ships, those
resources--fewer of them in the Florida Straits to now look at
some of these other threats.
So I would call it a target-rich environment. So if it is
not migrants, you know, there is plenty to do with all the
other illicit activity in the Caribbean, also in the Eastern
Pacific.
Mr. Price. Thank you.
PROCUREMENT FUNDING STRATEGY
Mr. Carter. Admiral, I want to go back to the icebreaker
for a minute. As we have talked about, the U.S. Navy and the
Coast Guard established this joint program office to managing
the acquisition of this asset, and the bulk of the funding so
far has been with defense appropriations.
However, Defense Committee, in their report accompanying
language in the fiscal year 2017 omnibus, encouraged the Coast
Guard to budget for the--all follow-up requirements. The money
that we got from the defense was the planning money.
Can you tell this committee about the procurement funding
strategy for this program in 2018 and beyond? Do you envision
that we have to chin these $1 billion ships ourselves or are we
going to still be getting shared cost with the big budget of
the defense?
Admiral Zukunft. Chairman, that is a great question and I
have spent a lot of time talking to Sean Stackley, and as we
look at building this first heavy icebreaker he is all onboard,
you know, in standing up this integrated program office for the
first. And we have also been looking at driving the cost of
this first one down to get that cost figure under $1 billion.
We haven't built one of these ships in 40 years. There will be
a front-end investment.
But I cannot go at risk, and the Navy has gotta--if they
are going to a 355-ship Navy they have gotta recapitalize the
Ohio-class submarines, you know, where does the Coast Guard
equities play into there? And so that is a risk I am not
willing to take in the out years.
And I will look to see. You know, we are going to have to
look very hard to make sure that we don't lose this
appropriation. We certainly have the capability, the capacity
within our acquisition program to see this program through. And
in fact, I could not be more proud of our acquisition staff,
who have held requirements steady, growth steady, on-time
deliveries with zero-discrepancy ships being delivered to our
service.
But the funding piece is a huge concern going forward. When
I look at the pressure that is going to be placed on the Navy
with their recapitalization aspirations, this is a program we
would be in a much safer place if we had the appropriation in a
Coast Guard budget versus DOD.
Mr. Carter. But you understand we are talking about a
roughly $40 billion budget here versus a $600 billion budget
there, and $1 billion for us is--means a lot of things have to
go wanting in other areas of homeland security. As you well
know, I have talked to you publicly and privately--I am all in
for the icebreaker program. I definitely want this first
icebreaker to be an example and I don't dispute your three-and-
three idea.
But as I look down the tunnel of time, these are big-ticket
items--as big a ticket items as we would have in the homeland
security budget. We don't know where we are going to be with
this administration. We may get beefed up because we are
obviously part of where this president has a vision.
But let's be practical: This is a big-ticket item so I am
hoping the Navy won't bail out on us. And I didn't like that
language when I saw it. You probably didn't like it either.
Admiral Zukunft. No, sir.
LEASE ALTERNATIVE
Mr. Carter. And back to another subject we have talked
about extensively, but I know it is back on the table: the
medium icebreaker idea, that there is this commercial ship that
has been offered as a possible lease alternative on medium
icebreaker, yet we--I don't think we have been able to see what
this ship can actually do. It was designed as a service vehicle
for offshore platforms and besides to get there, I assume.
The question we have got to ask ourselves is--there are
multiple. I am going to throw a couple of them out at you and
see what you think. A, can it break ice in the Arctic and the
Antarctic? Do we know? Do we not know?
Can it perform law enforcement missions, i.e., boarding
operations being operated by commercial crew? Would it require
major reconfigurations to make it an active part of our fleet?
And could leasing the service help mitigate the risk of
icebreaker acquisition in the Arctic strategy?
These are things I would wonder, I am sure you have looked
at. What do you think?
Admiral Zukunft. Thank you, Chairman.
So over a year ago I sent a team of engineers down to look
at this particular vessel. They provided me a report and so
then I went down, and actually I went out to Seattle to see
this ship, as well.
And among other things, first of all, it has never
completed ice trials. I mean, on paper it is an icebreaker but
it hasn't demonstrated ability to break ice of what we would
require a medium icebreaker to do.
It is not configured to launch and recover boats to do law
enforcement missions. It is not configured to hangar a
helicopter. It is not equipped to do what I would consider
sensitive communications at a classified level to do maritime
domain awareness. And to do that with a civilian crew--perhaps
it can be done, but there are a number of conditions that would
need to be satisfied before we can entertain this.
So we are in a dialogue with this vendor of, ``Here is what
it would take.'' No one has put a price tag on the table, and I
don't know what that price tag is.
And I would not absentmindedly, you know, make a promissory
to engage in this lease option, if you will, and then
pressurize this committee to not only raise money to
recapitalize a fleet but now I have got perhaps an exorbitant
lease rate on a platform that may at best marginally meet our
requirements. An so I need to be a responsible steward in that
regard.
So we will continue to have a dialogue with this vendor and
ideally get to a point where, you know, we need to talk price
here, and not conceptually.
Mr. Carter. I am sorry?
Mr. Ruppersberger. Could you yield for just a second?
Mr. Carter. Yes, I yield.
Mr. Ruppersberger. I would think that if we are going to
move forward and spend the money, all the issues you said this
ship does not have now, we need to move forward with an
intelligence component. We need to look forward with all of the
other issues you are talking about because that could be a--
when you are talking about oil reserves and gas reserves
between Russia and China, that could be a really dangerous
spot, and I think we need to be prepared and not just put money
in--we have gotta be--we have gotta have something like the
Zumwalt. You know what I am talking about? That new ship that
we just----
Admiral Zukunft. I have been on that one, too. Yes, sir.
Mr. Ruppersberger. Thank you for yielding. Yield back.
Mr. Carter. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Ruppersberger.
And, you know, so basically we are still where we were when
we had this conversation last time. We are still looking at it;
there is an avenue of conversation going on, but the positions
are still the same as per that report which I read the previous
time you looked at it. We are pretty well in the same place.
Admiral Zukunft. Yes, Chairman. We have been in the
business for over 70 years. We know what it takes to operate in
this very remote, harsh environment, and this is a unique
design for a single purpose, and so we are more than willing to
sit down with this vendor and have a back-and-forth.
But until we actually start getting into the specifics and
what are some of the costing algorithms involved, I am not
ready to move forward until I have all that information in
front of me. And it would be a breach of trust on my part for
me to then turn to you, sir, and say, ``I am going to need this
lift to lease something. I am not even sure if it is going to
meet our requirements.''
Mr. Carter. I assumed we were still in the same place but I
had to ask because I knew that there still was a conversation
going on.
Admiral Zukunft. We are, sir.
Mr. Carter. Does everybody want to do a second round or--
Okay----
BORDER SECURITY
Ms. Roybal-Allard. Well, first of all, I just want a little
bit of clarification in your response to Mr. Price's question
with regards to the impact of building a wall.
It is my understanding then there is the unintended
consequences, actually, that there will be increased migration
and drug trafficking on the seas. And is the Coast Guard doing
anything in anticipation that that might happen, especially
with the limited funding that you have?
Admiral Zukunft. Ranking Member, we haven't seen that
happen yet, but probably no better insight than when I met with
each of the presidents of the tri-border region of Honduras,
Guatemala, and El Salvador. When you look at the economies,
they are not doing well. When you look at the violent crime,
not doing well. Lot of parents are actually pulling their
children out of school because they are afraid they will be
coopted by a gang, and so what is going to happen this next
generation?
And so what they are telling me is that their only hope is
to get out of their country and they will do whatever means
that it takes. And if a wall stands in their way at some point
in time they will find a way to go around the wall. And so we
have not seen that yet, but that would be a foreseeable
consequence. If you have an impenetrable barrier on the land
border then you go where there isn't a wall, and in all
likelihood that would mean take to the sea.
UNFUNDED PRIORITY LIST
Ms. Roybal-Allard. Okay. In the fiscal year 2017 bill we
were able to provide a small amount of funding, $10 million,
for projects on the Coast Guard's unfunded priority list. And I
imagine this list will likely grow to increase competition for
funding created by the push for increased border security.
Do you expect the unfunded priority list to grow in fiscal
year 2018 and in future years?
Admiral Zukunft. Yes. Thank you, Ranking Member.
So we are doing triage on what I would call our shore
infrastructure. And so when I laid out a way ahead and we talk
about a $2 billion floor, if you will, for major acquisitions,
$300 million of that would be allocated to our short
infrastructure.
What it does, it provides us a more deliberative approach
on our major acquisitions to eat at the $1.5 billion shore
infrastructure backlog that we have right now and do it in a
deliberative way to a point in time where we don't have to look
at an unfunded priority list and triage what our needs are one
year to the next.
But in the meantime, we do owe this committee our unfunded
priority list for 2018. Our folks are hard at it. We have got
our 2017 appropriation, and working that through our
department, through OMB, I put the pressure on our folks
because we need to get that to you on time because you have
done tremendous lifting to work at those unfunded priorities.
And again, I thank you for doing that.
Ms. Roybal-Allard. Okay. So the list will be provided to
us?
Admiral Zukunft. Yes, ma'am.
Ms. Roybal-Allard. Okay, because it is important. Obviously
we are not going to have all the money to be able to address
all of your needs, but I think it is important for us to know
what those needs are and how you are prioritizing.
Mr. Carter. Thank you, Ms. Roybal-Allard.
Ms. Roybal-Allard. Just one more question, okay?
Mr. Carter. Oh, I am sorry.
SOCIAL MEDIA ABUSE
Ms. Roybal-Allard. Because I was greatly disturbed to hear
about the recent Marine Corps photo-sharing scandal in which
the members of the Marines United Group posted explicit
pictures of female Marines without their consent. What is even
more egregious is that according to news reports, this group
was discovered by regular rank and file Marines, not
specialized investigators.
What does the Coast Guard do to monitor social media for
abusive behavior like this?
Admiral Zukunft. So we sent a team of investigators so we,
you know, worked with all the other armed services when this
scandal came out. Relieved to see that we don't have a Coast
Guard Web site of Coast Guard United. And in fact, there were
very minimal involvement of victims, if you will, in this
Marines United Web site.
It is a challenge, just because of the proliferation of the
websites that are out there, but we do have policies in place.
This is harassment in the workplace. This is bullying. And so
there are measures in place to hold people accountable.
I know the commandant of the Marine Corps is looking at
standards of accountability and, you know, this is a
subculture. It is inconsistent with everything that all the
armed services stand for, but there is this subculture.
Ms. Roybal-Allard. Do you have investigators that actively
look for this type of behavior?
Admiral Zukunft. We are right now. So as part of this task
force that was stood up we went out and we scanned the Web
sites. And you have to get creative, you know, in looking, you
know, for search engines and trying to find this. And some of
the--are they on the dark Internet? But we have not seen any
surface.
You know, the other aspect of this subculture, you know, I
put a communique out to the entire workforce that we are a
service of bydoers. You know, we always talk about bystander,
but you do something when you see something wrong.
We have seen tremendous progress in the reduction of sexual
assault in the United States Coast Guard. It was my imperative
to try to drive this out of our service altogether, but our
numbers are down 40 percent over the last year. Not only that,
but more and more members are coming forward with unrestricted
reports, which tells me they know that leadership takes this
serious, we are going to hold those accountable that think that
they can live a double standard, but not in my Coast Guard.
Ms. Roybal-Allard. Thank you.
SMUGGLER PROSECUTION
Mr. Carter. Dr. Harris.
Dr. Harris. Thank you very much, and I am sorry I wasn't--
--
Mr. Carter. Turn your mike on.
Dr. Harris. I think it might be on. Just not close.
Mr. Carter. If it is red it is on.
Dr. Harris. Thank you very much.
Thank you, Admiral, for being here today. A couple of
questions.
First of all, just one observation. I hope that we pay
particular attention to the Bahamas and, you know, that
international trafficking that might occur from the Bahamas
because of their policies, you know, on visas. It seems like it
would be a pretty easy entry route for some people to enter the
United States who aren't here for good means.
Anyway, let me ask about compliance with one of the--some
of the executive orders the President has issued. Executive
order 13773, Enforcing Federal Law with Respect to
Transnational Criminal Organizations and Preventing
International Trafficking--in your testimony you talk about the
interception of--and again, it is the President's
prioritization of saying, ``Look, we are actually going to get
tough with people who attempt to do this.''
But you say that, you know, 588 smugglers were detained but
only 156 were referred for prosecution. You know, we heard--I
believe it was in this subcommittee--from the Border Patrol
under the last administration. You know, you have to carry a
significant amount of drugs with you before you were
prosecuted, which is just striking to me. I mean, we should
have zero tolerance. These are drugs. These are harmful. These
kill Americans.
And so I am curious, if you detained 588 smugglers why are
only 156 referred for prosecution?
Admiral Zukunft. Doctor, I will have to get back to you on
that 156 number because we are looking at nearly 100 percent
prosecution rates.
Dr. Harris. Well, but this is in your written testimony. I
don't understand. This is not, you know, 588 smugglers; 580
detained--this--I--and maybe you--maybe some of your staff can
assist you with this who wrote this for you. Didn't that strike
them as pretty unusual?
You detained 588 people with drugs, I assume, or some
illegal contraband, and you only prosecute 150. I mean, that
bothers me tremendously.
As someone who wants to protect the youth in my district
from illegal substances that the last administration turned
their back on, creating a horrendous, horrific epidemic in this
country, I appreciate you getting back to me on it.
Admiral Zukunft. Okay. As I said earlier, I was in Tampa,
Florida on Monday. We take these detainees there, referred to
the U.S. attorney, 100 percent prosecution. Many of them are
providing information. So there are a lot of folks in the
pipeline.
Dr. Harris. Well, this says ``referred for prosecution.''
Doesn't say ``prosecuted.''
Now, look, I don't understand whether you are being honest
with me or not. You have plain English in your testimony. It
says ``referred for prosecution.'' Doesn't say ``in a
pipeline.''
Admiral Zukunft. Yes, we will get back to you on that, sir,
because I--
[The information follows:]
In 2016 a service-record 201.3 metric tons of cocaine (7.1 percent
of estimated flow) were removed from the western transit zone, 585
smugglers were detained and 156 cases were referred for prosecution.
Of the 585 smugglers detained, 544 were referred for prosecution
(468 referred for US prosecution; 76 referred for partner nation
prosecution). The Department of Justice determined that there was not
enough evidence to prosecute 41 of the 585 smugglers, and there were
released.
Dr. Harris. I hope that under this administration our
border security has zero tolerance. And, Admiral, you are a
part of our border security.
Admiral Zukunft. Well, I am a zero-tolerance kind of guy,
Doctor.
BORDER SECURITY IMPROVEMENTS
Dr. Harris. I hope so. I hope so.
All right. With regard to the immigration enforcement, we
have obviously another executive order, 13767, Border Security
and Immigration Enforcement Improvements, appear to be kind of
directed toward the southern border but I assume that the Coast
Guard looked at the executive order and said, ``Yes, there are
actually things that we can improve in--under this order.''
And again, to reverse the striking--the strikingly--I don't
even know how you would phrase it--the catch-and-release
policies of the last administration, the willingness to turn
their back on defending our border. So I would like to know
what the Coast Guard is doing with regards to that particular
executive order, the enforcement improvements for our border
security.
Admiral Zukunft. Well, Doctor, before this executive order
we had more than doubled our Coast Guard presence in the
transit zone--illicit drugs. We removed a record amount of
cocaine last year and we will probably beat that record again
this year.
So we have repositioned where we have forces.
Now we do that--I don't have more ships than I had the year
before. I have taken them out of other areas to double down
here. In fact, we are the only--you know, we don't see other
aspects of our military operating this domain, so I have taken
that upon myself.
We have not seen any Cuban migrants since a wet foot, dry
foot policy went into effect in January. We have in the last 7
weeks not one Cuban migrant.
The threat vector you alluded to, the Bahamas--so some of
those ships that were between Florida and Cuba, we are now
looking at the threat coming from the Bahamas. Most of what we
are seeing is what I would call human smuggling: Brazilians,
Venezuelans. We are not seeing those special interest aliens
that may be coming to the United States to cause us harm, but
we are looking at that threat, as well.
We have joint task forces created on the Department of
Homeland Security. We have Coast Guard, CBP, Homeland Security
Investigations working hand in glove to look at--most of this
is focused almost exclusively on illegal migration, but to work
not just on the members but what is the network that are moving
these people, as well.
Dr. Harris. Well, thank you. And I appreciate that because,
you know, there are only two ways to get into this country
illegally. They gotta come by land or by sea. And, you know,
you have a huge role in the by sea.
And with regards to getting back to me on the first
question, I understand that you can only catch. Obviously a
prosecutor has to agree to prosecute. And that is what I want
to know.
I want to know if what is--what we heard at our southern
border was that the prosecutors were unwilling to prosecute
low-level drug crimes when they involved violating our borders
to deliver drugs here to kill our people. That is what they do.
Drugs kill our people.
So I understand, but you are the one who is best able to
say, ``Look, we find these people. Somebody downstream isn't
doing what they need to do.'' So I am depending on you to let
me know what is going on there.
Admiral Zukunft. Yes.
Dr. Harris. Thank you.
Admiral Zukunft. So again, there may be a technicality. So
these were cases, versus individuals. So typical smuggling
package is four to five people, and that goes into a case
package.
Dr. Harris. Okay.
Admiral Zukunft. And so we may be, you know, I think in
violent agreement, perhaps, but I need to validate, okay, who
are in these cases, what are the numbers of people. But
typically it is four to five in a go-fast and they typically
plead out. And again, prosecution rate pretty darn high.
Dr. Harris. Good. And that is what I need to go after.
Because again, what we heard from the southern border is that
the prosecution rate wasn't high. Because I think the--when you
seize contraband I think it is probably higher quantities. I
mean, people don't put one little cube of marijuana on a boat.
But if you can get back to me, I would appreciate that.
Thank you. I yield back.
Admiral Zukunft. Yes, sir.
Mr. Carter. Mr. Cuellar.
LEGAL SYSTEM
Mr. Cuellar. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Let me just follow up on my colleague.
This is an issue I have been looking at because I do live
on the border, and I assume this applies to any of the U.S.
attorneys. Brought this to the attention of Chairman Wolf some
time ago because what you have is every U.S. attorney district
will have a different policy.
You, just like Border Patrol, you do your job. You get
them; you present them over to the U.S. attorney's office.
The U.S. attorneys--because Congress, and that means, if I
can just correct my colleague, it is not the past
administration; it is the past administrations, with an S, and
this could continue if we don't add money into the legal
system.
The problem is Congress always puts money into Border
Patrol, the law enforcement, and you create activity because
you arrest people, you put them down the legal system. But if
we don't have the U.S. attorneys, judges, and if you look at
the caseload for the judges on the border, they are about this
high compared to other judges who have a level caseload this
high.
So if we don't add judges, U.S. attorneys, U.S. marshals,
and everybody down the stream, then what they are going to
continue doing is they are going to continue prioritizing the
cases. And I know that because I get frustrated in my area
because, without revealing the amount of drugs where they
either say, ``We are not going to prosecute,'' or, ``We are
going to give it to the local district attorney,'' and the
local district attorney say, ``Hey, we are already loaded up
here,'' then what happens is I joke around that if you are a
bad guy all you have to do is X amount, just be a pound under
and you might be let go because--or sent to the State level
because of the priorities.
So it is all a matter of funding, and if we just keep
putting money on the goal line then all we are going to have is
we are going to have the same problem past administrations--
with an S--and current administration. Unless we seriously put
money on judges--I am talking about the border, the judges, the
U.S. attorneys, the U.S. marshals, and everybody down the
system, we are going to be in the same thing and still be
talking about this for a while.
In my opinion, it is not your fault. It is a matter of
putting money into the legal system, number one.
You also mentioned that the wall is a defense and you do an
offense on the water. I respectfully disagree.
I think if you look at the $18 billion that we spend on
land and ocean, that is a one-yard line, the goal line. And if
you want to play football I would rather play defense not on
the one-yard line, but I would rather play defense on the--
their 20-yard line, which means that, like you mentioned, work
with Central America, work with the Colombians. You know, the
president is here this week, as you know--Colombian president.
And that is what we need to do--extend our perimeter
instead of playing on defense. So we appreciate your efforts on
that last point.
The last thing I want you to consider--and I got some
language into the law some years ago and the Coast Guard did a
report--is the only international waterway that you all don't
really spend time on is the Rio Grande. And I understand it is
not--it is what they call--a member of the last Coast Guard, it
is brown waters compared to blue waters, and you prefer blue
waters. I understand that.
And I understand that it is not deep, but you have got
those airboats that are available there. I know the air marine
is doing some work there, but just want to just mention for the
record the only international river that you all don't do any
work on, really spend, is the Rio Grande, just--and it is
international waters, as you know, because it is an
international river.
Closing Remarks
So I do want to say I appreciate your work. I look forward
to working with you on the icebreakers.
When I mentioned to Secretary Tillis he said he was going
to talk to--Tillerson--he was going to talk to the President.
So if he mentioned it at the speech I guess he did do that, or
maybe he listened to somebody's wife. I don't know what--but
either way, I want to be supportive of the committee on the
icebreakers because we just can't forget about the Arctic.
I do appreciate the work that you do, and sometimes your
hands are tied.
And, Mr. Harris, I would be happy to work with you because
I have been looking at this for a long time. And it is
frustrating. It really is frustrating that law enforcement--
that includes you also in the work--you present it over at the
U.S. attorneys, they don't have the resources, and therefore
they make priorities, and I don't like those priorities on
that. But unfortunately, if we don't put the money we are going
to be talking about this for this administration, other
administrations.
But I appreciate the work that you all do.
Admiral Zukunft. Congressman, just on that note, where we
prosecute these drug cases I have taken out of hide a number of
our JAG officers as special assistants to the U.S. attorney so
we can move these cases forward. And I will continue to make
that investment to take some of that burden so these do not
become low-priority cases, and so we do get the prosecution, as
well.
Mr. Cuellar. Yes.
And finally, Mr. Chairman, keep in mind Miami Vice, and,
you know, in the 1980s if you remember the drugs were coming in
through the southern--I mean, that area of the United States.
Some of us in Texas were saying, ``You know, one of these days
it is like a balloon. If you put the pressure here they are
going to come another way.''
Sure enough, years later here we are talking about the
border. And as you know, when you talk about billions of
dollars of drugs coming in, there--we have consumption in the
U.S. and the bad guys are going to--transnational groups are
going to be making money, they are going to find a way. If you
block over here they are going to come another way and it is a
constant, ever-going, you know, strategy that we gotta have. It
is not static. It is ongoing and, again, you all play a very
important role.
Admiral Zukunft. Yes. And just adjacent to your district,
you know, down in South Padre Island huge influx of illegal
poaching by Mexican fishing vessels fishing in U.S. waters. And
a lot of these fish are protected--red snapper, for example.
So a lot of effort being expended by the Coast Guard to
stem this back. Weekly we are, you know, seizing these Pangas,
but they just keep coming and coming.
If you are down in Port Isabel you will see a yard filled
with hundreds of these boats that we are seizing. So right now
it has been a pressure point for us on our border as it
approaches the Rio Grande.
Thank you, sir.
Mr. Carter. Mr. Cuellar has done a lot of very hard work,
and I have also twisted Mr. Culberson's arm. We are getting
more legal resources into this project.
Mr. Taylor.
COUNTERRORISM
Mr. Taylor. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Admiral, real quick can we speak about the antiterrorism
force, MSRT I think it is? Can you just talk to us about--you
know, and let me preface this by saying I was very impressed by
the coordination and collaboration down on the border,
specifically in the San Diego area, of course, with the Coast
Guard and CPV and how that--just using each other's strengths
and weaknesses and leveraging those. I thought it was awesome.
On the antiterrorism force, MSRT, is that something that
you see that is essential for the Coast Guard mission? Is it
absolutely needed?
If so, is it--what are the capabilities currently? Do you
need more funding for it? Can you just talk a little bit about
that, please?
Admiral Zukunft. Yes. Thank you, Congressman.
And as you would well appreciate, you know, these are
actually counterterrorism, not antiterrorism.
Mr. Taylor. Counterterrorism----
Admiral Zukunft. Two teams, one in San Diego, one in
Chesapeake, each team about 200 people strong.
I was just at SOCOM. I met with General Thomas on Monday,
as well, and as you know, SOCOM is lead for, you know weapons
of mass destruction proliferation. You know, they are the go-to
team.
The Coast Guard has over nearly a dozen bilateral
agreements. It covers every flag state of convenience.
We have a national targeting center in Reston, Virginia. We
work with CBP, Coast Guard. So we screen every ship over 300
gross tons on an international voyage--the cargo, the cargo
manifest, where was it packed, who are the people?
And so if there is an anomaly and say, ``Well, wait a
minute. You know, there could be a weapon of mass destruction.
We don't know 100 percent, but there might be one in this
container.''
We have the authority to board that ship anywhere on the
high seas, and if they are not compliant then we have
agreements with Third Fleet to provide vertical lift, so we
come in with a team, we fast-rope in. We take positive control
of that ship. We stop it, and then we go ahead and we do the
search.
We can do everything but what Special Forces can't do. I
can't say that in an unclassified environment.
But it gives us that authority in an ambiguous threat to
stop it before a ship, say, enters the Port of San Diego, a
military port, and now we have got a commercial ship with a
weapon of mass destruction on it.
So we still see a requirement for us to have it. Either
that or we assume away there will be no proliferation of
nuclear material, you know, forever to come. And when I look at
Pakistan, I look at North Korea, I am not ready to make that
assumption, so we need to sustain this capability.
This is not your everyday Coasties. We are open to both
genders, but as you can appreciate, what it takes to get folks
through that level of competency from weapons to agility, the
muscle memory that is required to do these jobs, these are a
one-of-a-kind--we have two of them in the United States Coast
Guard--in the Department of Homeland Security, for that matter,
as well.
Mr. Taylor. Just a quick question, a quick follow up on
that, and certainly not diminishing any capabilities that are
at the level of what they do, and I think it is awesome, you
know, I know that in San Diego specifically, where the Navy
will utilize the Coast Guard and they will work collaboratively
to use some of the law enforcement powers to be able to board
ships, as you very well know, again, is that something that
SOCOM can be a part of, again, or--and also, what is the budget
for the counterterrorism forces currently for----
Admiral Zukunft. Yes. So we have both of those in budget. I
will get back to you on what that exact number is.
The total budget for counterterrorism forces is approximately $51
million; this includes personnel, training, equipment, and operations
costs. MSRT Chesapeake accounts for $24.7 million and MSST San Diego
accounts for $26.3M of the total.
But at the same time, you know, I have advanced
interdiction teams from these elements that are currently
filling a niche over in, you know, in CENTCOM's AOR. That takes
a burden off our soft community, our Navy SEALS as they are
looking at doing other things.
So we do get those requests for forces for a capability,
and these are teams, we call them advanced interdiction teams,
that can provide these platforms serving off Navy ships.
Then what it provides, you know, NAVCENT is the ability of
saying, ``OK, these aren't just Title 10. We could also do
Title 14 law enforcement because we have this unique team that
can switch hit Title 10 and Title 14.''
Mr. Taylor. Excellent.
PORTS
Switching gears really quickly--thank you. Thank you,
Admiral. We have heard about modernizing the fleet of Coast
Guard cutters and might acquire additional mile pier length
beyond your current fleet needs and that you are potentially
looking to cluster your assets and optimize more shore
maintenance activities. Any chance of potentially home-porting
those fleets in the Tidewater area?
Admiral Zukunft. Tidewater has been a great home for us. It
is a great home for our people, too. I mean, they always say it
is a Navy port; well, it is a Coast Guard port, too, as well.
So as we look at building out our fleet of offshore patrol
cutters we will probably have to extend our pier lengths that
we have at our base in Portsmouth. We will probably have to do
some dredging.
But when we look at just not the infrastructure but we also
look at the communities--the health care, the schools, and the
fact that you can do multiple assignments in the same
geographic region and our people like being there--they stay in
the Coast Guard. So Tidewater has always been friendly to the
Coast Guard, and you can count on seeing white ships with red
racing stripes in the Tidewater region for the indefinite
future.
CLOSING REMARKS
Mr. Taylor. Excellent. Well, thanks for your service.
Thanks for your testimony today. Thanks for all of your service
over there. We appreciate you and look forward to working with
you. Thank you.
Admiral Zukunft. Thank you, Congressman.
Mr. Taylor. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Carter. Admiral, we thank you for being here. We went a
little long, but the reality is you guys are kind of the
darling of our world that we live in in this subcommittee and
we are glad to be able to have a conversation with you.
Thank you for your patience. Thank you for the great work
you do. Thank all of the Coasties for us. They are models for
America. I appreciate you.
Admiral Zukunft. Chairman, thank you.
Ranking Member--all the members, and I especially want to
thank those sitting on the back seats over there, just like the
people sitting behind me. A lot of this work doesn't happen
without the support of our staffs, so again, thank you very
much.
Mr. Carter. Yes, sir.
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Wednesday, May 24, 2017.
UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY
WITNESS
HON. JOHN F. KELLY, SECRETARY OF HOMELAND SECURITY
Mr. Carter. All right. Today's hearing is called to order.
Welcome to the subcommittee's first hearing on the
Department of Homeland Security's fiscal year 2018 presidential
budget request.
I would like to extend a special welcome to today's
witness, Secretary John Kelly.
Mr. Secretary, we are very pleased you answered the
President's call to lead DHS. Having someone with your
credentials at the Department will strengthen it and enrich it.
It is good to begin the fiscal year 2018 appropriation cycle.
Despite the late start, I am confident the subcommittee will
produce a bill that supports the Department's mission, balances
competing interests, and is affordable to the American
taxpayers.
Before I dive into the numbers, Mr. Secretary, I have a
couple of pieces of advice. First never lose focus on the
Department's highest priority of keeping the Nation safe and
enforce the law of the United States. With your reputation, I
know you will do that.
Second, stay in touch with me, Ms. Roybal-Allard, and the
subcommittee, and let us know when you need help. Everyone on
this subcommittee wants DHS to be successful meeting its
mission, besides, failure is absolutely unacceptable.
Two, I know I speak for everyone when I promised we will
always listen respectfully to your suggestions and advice, and
we will be reasonable and evenhanded in our responses.
I for one am grateful the President directed you and the
men and women of DHS to focus on the Department's law
enforcement missions.
I am tremendously pleased catch and release is a relic of
the past. And as a result, illegal crossings of the border are
60 percent lower--64 percent lower than in April the same time
last year.
This is proof that the President enforcing the Nation's
immigration laws is a forceful deterrent. I am also satisfied
with the $1.5 billion border security package included in the
fiscal year 2017 omnibus bill. Simply enacting legislation that
supports enhanced border security and interior enforcement
sends a powerful message to human traffickers and drug runners
that business as usual on the border is over. If you break our
Nation's laws and cross the border illegally, you will suffer
the consequences, which is a guaranteed stay in detention.
The fiscal year 2018 request continues the administration's
emphasis on law enforcement, and that is important. The total
discretionary funds requested is $44.06 billion, which is an
increase of $1.66 billion over last year. Items I am pleased to
see you included are the $2.6 billion for border security,
which includes 74 miles of physical barrier along the southwest
border and significant investments in surveillance, technology,
and aviation systems; $4.9 billion for enforcement and removal
operations, including $3.6 billion for 51,379 detention beds,
an increase of 12,055 above the amount provided in fiscal year
2017. Additional funding is proposed to actively enforce the
Nation's immigration laws.
Substantial increases are proposed for additional law
enforcement agents at Border Patrol and Immigration and Customs
Enforcement. Though I support this initiative this subcommittee
will take a hard look at whether it will succeed. As I am sure
you know, attrition in both organizations has outpaced hiring
in the last 2 years, despite congressional increases for
incentive programs. I am not inclined to leave money on the
table if DHS is unable to meet these hiring goals.
For the first time in many years, the United States Secret
Service request meets their requirements.
I have concerns, too. The cyber threat to the Nation's
network and critical infrastructure grows daily, yet, the
budget for cybersecurity has not increased at all from your
current level of funding.
While there is funding for border security, there should
also be corresponding increases for our ports of entry where
the majority of all illicit drugs and currency enter our
country. Physical barriers may stop human trafficking, but they
are not the only means of decreasing illegal drugs and
currency.
Slashing funds for FEMA critical grants and training
programs by $918 million is worrisome and shortsighted,
especially for cities that are targets of terrorism.
Likewise, I am surprised and disappointed that the
administration chose to perpetuate the last administration's
bad habit of proposing fees to increase TSA and using it as an
offset despite knowing it is unlikely to become law.
While balancing all the continuing priorities of DHS is an
understandable challenge, I remain concerned about reliance on
budget gimmicks and cuts to important national security
programs. I hope the fiscal year 2019 request will focus on the
Nation's homeland security priorities and not allow offsets
that this subcommittee doesn't control.
In conclusion, I want to restate my commitment to work with
you, and I also want to take a moment to commend the budget
offices of every DHS component and at DHS headquarters.
Executing under a CR, proposing and advocating for a budget
amendment, and developing a new budget request over a 2-month
period is a monumental undertaking. They deserve our thanks.
I want you to know that I am blessed to have Lucille
Roybal-Allard as my ranking member. She and I don't always
agree 100 percent on the policy, but her balance and helpful
approach engenders collaboration, which means a better bill for
the men and women of DHS. For that, I want to thank her and
recognize her for any remark she wishes to make.
Ms. Roybal-Allard. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Good afternoon, Mr. Secretary, and welcome to your first
appearance before this subcommittee.
There is no doubt that you have a really hard job, and in
my opinion, among the hardest in government.
The Department is still quite young and still maturing in
institutional terms, and it has a large and diverse set of
components and missions.
Some of those missions, as you well know, are extremely
controversial. We will disagree about some policies and
priorities as we did with your predecessor. In some cases, we
will strongly disagree. We do, however, share the common goal
of protecting our country and its values.
My hope is that we will have the same constructive working
relationship with you that we had with Secretary Johnson.
The members of the subcommittee have the common goal of
appropriately resourcing the Department to protect and to serve
our country. This includes supporting the men and women who
make up your Department, the vast majority of whom are fully
dedicated to their work and are performing admirably.
Immigration enforcement will be the biggest challenge that
we will face in working together. I hope you understand that in
my view, the crux of this issue is not simply a matter of
enforcing the law or not. It is the manner in which that
enforcement is done.
It is also a question of the incremental benefit to the
Nation of significant new investments in border security and
immigration enforcement actions and capabilities.
Each additional segment of physical barrier at the border
and each initiative to hire more immigration enforcement
officers comes potentially at the expense of things like State
and local preparedness, cybersecurity, investments in the Coast
Guard fleet, and a multitude of other priorities outside of our
bill.
So it isn't enough to simply ask whether an investment
would improve homeland security. We must also ask what the
incremental benefit is, what the downsides are, and what the
tradeoffs are.
Mr. Secretary, our immigration laws are entirely out of
step with the situation on the ground in this country. On your
watch, I know you see an aggressive enforcement posture as
faithfully carrying out the laws currently on the books, but
you do have discretion.
And right now, that aggressive enforcement is upending the
lives of millions of people, the vast majority of whom are
valuable, contributing members of their communities. The vast
majority of whom are guilty of no criminal acts. The vast
majority of whom have been in this country for many years
working jobs that others are unwilling to do.
For example, I have had growers from California and
representatives from the hotel and restaurant industry tell me
and other Members of Congress about the devastating economic
impact current enforcement policies will have and in some cases
are already having on our State and national economy. These
consequences are also a threat to national security.
The ultimate answer is for Congress to enact comprehensive
immigration reform that lays out a path to legal status and
eventually, if one meets all the criteria for eligibility,
citizenship. Many of us desperately want that to happen.
While it is up to Congress to pass reform legislation, you,
as Secretary of Homeland Security, could play an important role
in helping that to come about.
I also want to encourage you to continue an effort that was
begun by your predecessor that is very important to this
subcommittee. Secretary Johnson made a high priority of
maturing the Department's planning, budgeting, and acquisition
processes, including working with us to establish a common
appropriation structure.
I hope that you will capitalize on his accomplishments by
also making it your priority to further improve and
institutionalize those processes.
We have a lot to discuss this afternoon, and I look forward
to your testimony and your responses to our questions.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Carter. I thank you, Ms. Roybal-Allard.
I now recognize Rodney Frelinghuysen, the chairman of the
full committee.
Mr. Frelinghuysen. Thank you, Chairman Carter, for the
time.
I also want to welcome the Secretary here to the
Appropriations Committee. We look forward to your testimony,
and hearing your frank and candid views on many issues.
All of us up here thank you for your remarkable service, as
a Marine of over 45 years and now as Secretary of Department of
Homeland Security. We appreciate all of that you have done for
our Nation.
Today's hearing is an important part of the oversight
duties of this committee, now that we have formally received
the administration's budget request. The committee will
undertake a thorough analysis of it. We will go through each
and every budget line, question every witness, and demand
credible spending justifications and only then will we make our
own determinations on the best use of tax dollars.
We intend to put forward a complete set of appropriations
bills that adequately fund important programs while working to
reduce and eliminate waste and duplication.
I will work with the ranking member, Mrs. Lowey and
Chairman Carter, and Ms. Roybal-Allard to move rapidly in the
coming weeks and months to complete the fiscal year 2018
appropriations bills.
Again, today's hearing is part of a process we followed to
determine the best use of taxpayers' dollars. After all, the
power of the purse lies in this building. It is the
constitutional duty of Congress to make spending decisions on
behalf of the people we represent at home.
Some here on the committee may know that hundreds of
families, almost 700 in New Jersey, and in my congressional
district, lost loved ones on September 11 in those terrorist
attacks.
Although it took years for the Nation to recover from that
attack, the events of that day made us rethink how we protect
the Nation and allowed us to learn from prior mistakes in order
to prepare for and stop the next attack.
Mr. Secretary, I wholeheartedly agree with your recent
assessment that the risk of a terror attack on these United
States in your own words is as threatening today as it was on
that faithful day in September in 2001.
And, unfortunately, this week, we witnessed another
horrific attack on our British allies, and we extend our
greatest sympathy to these young victims and their families.
That is why we must be certain to continue to invest in
critical programs like the Federal Emergency Management
Agency's urban area security initiatives that ensure our
communities, which face the greatest risk, are able to respond
to ever-growing and more complex threats.
The fiscal year 2018 budget request proposes a 25 percent
cut to the Urban Area Security Initiative the (UASI) program.
And I am eager to hear how your Department will continue to
ensure the necessary resilience while absorbing such a large
deduction.
In light of the recent spike of anti-Semitic crimes, which
were directed at hundreds of Jewish schools, and synagogues,
and temples, and community centers in the United States,
including those in my district, we must continue to direct
funding to the UASI nonprofit security grant program, which
provides at risk nonprofit institutions of all faiths, critical
assistance to bolster their physical security.
And lastly, I would like to give a shout out to one of your
most important urban search and rescue teams, including New
Jersey's task force one, which became a federally designated
team this time last year. New Jersey task force one, which was
the first team to respond to the tragedy at the World Trade
Center on 9/11 was activated and responded to also to Hurricane
Matthew in October. These teams are essential to the entire
Nation.
In conclusion, I welcome you.
And I thank the chairman for the time, and I yield back.
Mr. Carter. I thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I now recognize Mrs. Lowey, the ranking member of the full
committee.
Mrs. Lowey. Thank you. And I would like to thank Chairman
Carter and Ranking Member Roybal-Allard for holding this
hearing. And, of course, it is always a pleasure for me to
appear with Chairman Frelinghuysen, who is a distinguished
chair of the full committee.
Secretary Kelly, welcome and thank you for joining us.
The Department of Homeland Security's mission is to secure
our Nation from consistent threat. It is not an easy one. It is
underscored by the tragic attack in Manchester earlier this
week. To keep us safe, different agencies within the Department
of Homeland Security must effectively coordinate and cooperate
while also working closely with other Federal, State, and local
agencies.
The budget request, unfortunately, does not fully reflect
the grave character of the threats we face. In New York and
many other States, preparedness grants are the difference
between being able to prevent, mitigate, respond to, and
recover from acts of terrorism or not.
Secretary Kelly, put simply, your budget proposal would
make communities like those in my district and regions less
safe. The State Homeland Security grant program, which enhances
local law enforcement's ability to prevent and respond to acts
of terrorism, would be reduced by $118 million or over 25
percent, reduced at this time of the absolute need for response
as quickly as possible. That results in a nearly 20 million
reduction for my home State of New York alone.
The Urban Area Security Initiative, which as you know
assists high threat, high density urban areas, arguably the
most vulnerable, would be cut by 26 percent or $156 million.
That is a nearly $45 million cut for New York. Maybe the people
who put this budget together are not really watching the news
that we all were watching just this week.
The emergency food and shelter program is eliminated, as is
the flood hazard mapping and risk analysis program.
State and local jurisdictions cannot effectively plan for
the worst when support from their Federal partner is
inconsistent or insufficient.
In addition to terror threats, we know that the severity
and cost of natural disasters are increasing, and mitigation
efforts can reduce taxpayer support in response to a disaster.
We cannot expect communities to realistically prepare for
natural disasters with proposed cuts of 55 million to the
predisaster mitigation program.
As I said, while negotiating the fiscal year 2017 omnibus,
I cannot support a single cent, let alone 1.6 billion for a
boondoggle of a wall. It is an unjustified request based on a
campaign promise and simply cannot be taken seriously by this
committee.
President Trump's budget request slashing $54 billion from
nondefense investment would decimate the Department of Homeland
Security.
In fact, even existing sequestration level caps are
insufficient and would lead to reduce services that American
families and communities need, including law enforcement and
first responders.
It is time, Mr. Secretary, for a new budget deal to end
sequestration once and for all, in part to prevent disastrous
cuts to critical Homeland Security grant programs.
Now more than ever, this committee must support the
Department's essential and complex mission, but we cannot do
that at the expense of State and local preparedness.
So I look forward to a productive discussion today, and I
thank you for your service to our country.
Mr. Carter. Thank you, Mrs. Lowey.
We are going to stick to a 5-minute rule, probably try to
warn you when you have got 1 minute left, but keep an eye on
the clock.
Mr. Secretary, we are going to allow you to make your
opening statement now. Your statement will be entered into the
record, so you can make it shorter and easier on us.
Opening Statement--Secretary Kelly
Secretary Kelly. Well, Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member Roybal-
Allard, and distinguished members of the subcommittee, it
really is a privilege to be here.
I know you feel the same way I do that a government has no
greater responsibility than the safety and security of its
citizens. A secure homeland is one of prosperity where legal
trade and travel add to the National economy. A secure homeland
is one of freedom where American citizens can go about their
lives without fear. And a secure homeland is one of laws which
we enforce to keep our communities safe.
So it is with great honor and privilege to appear before
you today to discuss the men and women of the Department of
Homeland Security and the critical missions they carry on every
day in service to this Nation.
I believe the President's fiscal year 2018 budget request
for the Department of Homeland Security will make it possible
for us to continue and expand on our ability to protect the
Nation and its people.
We know that threats are out there. We know that our
passenger aviation is an example, our top prize in the eyes of
terrorist organizations around the globe. We know that
transnational criminal organizations are bringing drugs across
our borders both on land and sea in massive numbers at a
devastating rate.
We know that our Nation's cyber systems run a constant
attack. We know that natural disasters devastate American
hometowns. We also know that DHS is up to the job of protecting
the United States against all of these threats and many, many
more.
Just last week, the Coast Guard offloaded more than 18 tons
of cocaine they seized in international waters off the eastern
Pacific ocean. That is roughly the weight of nine cars. And it
is certainly at least as estimated $498 million worth of drugs,
but more importantly, drugs that won't serve to poison our
citizens.
This week, on May 8, and 14, TSA Transportation Security
Administration discovered--between May 8 and 14, discovered 76
firearms in carry-on luggage. In 6 weeks, ICE arrested more
than 1,000 gang members in a nationwide multi-law gang
enforcement operation. The men and women at DHS are making a
difference. They are making our Nation more secure, but we need
a budget that matches our mission.
No more continuing resolutions. We have to be able to plan,
and I think this budget does that.
The President's fiscal year 2018 budget requests 44.1
billion in net discretionary funding for the Homeland Security
Department. It also requests 7.4 billion to finance the cost of
emergencies and major disasters in FEMA's Disaster Relief Fund.
When you are talking about numbers like these, it is easy
to lose sight of what is behind each dollar. When you get right
down to it, behind each and every dollar are hardworking men
and women who have dedicated their lives to protecting the
American people by enforcing the laws that you have passed.
They are taking dangerous criminals off our streets,
keeping terrorists out of the country, and drugs off of our
streets. They are investigating crimes with international
implications. They are making sure passengers get to their
destinations safely. They are responding to devastated
communities in the wake of natural disasters. And they are
patrolling and maintaining our Nation's waterways, waterways
that support $4.5 trillion in economic activity every year.
Every dollar invested in the men and women of DHS and every
dollar invested in the tools, the infrastructure, equipment,
and training they need to get the job done is an investment in
prosperity, freedom, and the rule of law. It is an investment
in the security of the American people.
There is no greater responsibility in a time of no greater
need than now.
I would be remiss if I did not mention the terrorist attack
in Manchester on Monday, as some of you have. Our friends in
the U.K. suffered a terrible loss this week with 22 dead and
dozens others wounded. Our thoughts and prayers are with them.
The U.S. Government is actively working, as you can imagine,
with the British, the FBI, the intelligence community, DHS, and
others to assist their investigation in any way that we can.
Their enemy is our enemy. He is evolving, becoming more
reprehensible, even targeting children. He is much more
sophisticated, adaptive. He is global. And you can bet that
your DHS is working every day to meet these threats.
I appreciate the opportunity to appear here today,
particularly as I can speak about the great men and women of
DHS, the foot soldiers who protect us in the home fight. I
thank you for your continued support of DHS. I remain
continued--committed, rather, to working with Congress in
protecting the American people.
I look forward to answering your questions, sir, ma'am.
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STRATEGIC IMPERATIVES
Mr. Carter. Well, thank you, Secretary Kelly. We appreciate
you being here.
Mr. Secretary, you are one the longest serving cabinet
members in this administration, having been confirmed on the
job on January 20th. Since you have been at DHS, have you
identified strategic imperatives for the department?
Secretary Kelly. Great question, sir.
One of the things I think that came to me right away when
the took the organization--again, I can't speak enough about
the men and women of DHS. They are the most criticized,
maligned organization group of people in the Federal
Government, and I have found them to be honorable men and women
who take their jobs seriously. So that is one discovery.
Another discovery is that there is an awful lot--despite
the fact that Department of Homeland Security is a very
disparate organization, it--there are many places, and Jeh
Johnson really started this unity of effort thing, and I think
it makes a lot of sense.
My number two, and I think I might be the only one with a
number two in the Federal Government right now, Elaine Duke,
who was confirmed a couple of weeks ago and is on the job,
among other rocks that are put into her path is this issue of
how do we take what Jeh Johnson put in place, the unity of
effort initiative, and really accelerate that and find places
where it makes sense to find efficiencies and to try to get
everyone kind of in a tent.
I was shocked to find that throughout the agency there are
a number of paying benefits schemes, that people in the Secret
Service don't get the same--are not on the same pay scale as
the people in INA, and the people that are--ICE don't stand in
the same way from a paying benefits point of view as does, say
CBP. Those are acquisition.
I found that we had two parts of the organization going to
the process of researching and developing, acquiring the same
piece of equipment. You know, this is something that DOD
mostly, almost entirely, because the United States Congress in
1985, they solved that with a gold-wadded nickles kind of
thing.
So, I mean, it does work. So I am looking for those kind of
things to increase the efficiency of the Department.
But there are other aspects that I have learned, to say the
least, and that is the highly politicized nature of what I do,
of what the men and women of this Department do, and also press
reporting.
Now that said, in defense of the press and others, I don't
think we had a particularly good approach to interacting with
the press and, frankly, with the Hill. We have put first-class
people in my liaison section in DHS and in the public affairs
section. We are leaning forward as fast as possible to serve
the needs of the United States Congress, quicker, certainly
quicker, than it was done before. I remember during the process
of being confirmed, almost every Member I talked to said you
are the worst in the Federal Government for responding to
letters or requests or whatever, and that is unacceptable, and
we are changing that.
The same thing with the media. We didn't have a very good
outreach to explain what we are doing. What the media does with
that information, of course, is up to them, but those are the
kind of things, Mr. Chairman, that I found early on and doing
the best I can to address.
DETENTION: CAPACITY
Mr. Carter. Those are a lot of things that this committee
has been concerned about, and we are, I think, pretty much in
agreement that all of those things need to be fixed. So
congratulations. You got a good eye.
Mr. Secretary, the fiscal year 2018 budget proposes $49
billion for enforcement of illegal migration, including 3.6
billion for 51,379 detention beds and custody operations, an
increase of 1 billion dollars and 12,055 detention beds. The
average daily population of detainees has been steadily
dropping since the President signed the executive order on
border security and strengthening enforcement of our
immigration laws.
What methods and policies are DHS proposing to achieve such
a dramatic uptick in detention capacity when the current trend
for adult detention has slowly but steadily decreased over
several months?
Please explain the assumptions used to develop the budget
and whether they are still valid and--well, that is enough.
Secretary Kelly. Mr. Chairman, upfront, I think the actions
that are being taken both on the border and in the interior
will ultimately result in a pretty, pretty quick drop of the
number of beds that we ultimately need. But let me deal with
the border first.
I mean you--I think you mentioned it in your comments.
Somewhere in--very close to 70 percent drop in the number of
illegal--of all--illegal migrants of all types moving up
through that terribly dangerous network through Mexico.
And not just central Americans, but primarily central
Americans have been the travelers on that network, but
individuals from all over the world as far away as Somalia,
Pakistan, North Korea.
So because of what they--they don't understand, and this is
a good thing, what is going on right now in terms of the
enforcement and what we are doing on the border that has caused
them to delay their departure, if you will.
And, by the way, working closely with the Central American
countries, with the Mexican Government, of which I have a very,
very close relationship, telling them what we are doing,
working with them to try to convince their citizens to not pay
a huge amount of money to them to get on that network, which,
again, is very, very dangerous and abusive, to stay at home.
And at the same time, working in another vector to--and,
again, not really my job, but we put some energy behind this,
and that is to help develop economically the Central American
republics, particularly Guatemala, El Salvador, and Honduras,
of which with whom we have great relationships. So that is what
we are doing on the border.
And that has--in messaging, and that has resulted in really
a 70 percent reduction in the movement of migrants. There is a
lot of good news there, but to me, I think the first thing I
think about, again, are the number of people that are not on
that horrible network being abused, killed, in some cases, all
the way up the 1,500 miles or so into the United States.
And, again, I can't emphasize enough the close relationship
we have working relationships at every level with the Mexicans
not to mention the Central American countries.
Interior enforcement is something--and, again, I have only
been in this job 4 months, but interior enforcement, that is to
say developing target packages by ICE, working oftentimes, with
local law enforcement to go after specific ideally--ideally,
specific illegal aliens inside the United States that are also
criminals, developing those packages. There are no sweeps.
There are no drop-ins to churches. We don't do that, or medical
facilities or schools.
But the interior enforcement, to ideally, go after
criminals who are also illegal and put them into the system if
they are not already in the system. And frequently they are,
and they just have dropped out of the system. And we need a
place to hold them. So the interior enforcement has gone up.
And--but ideally, in my mind, over time, we will not need
nearly as many--as many beds, because the legal justice process
that is also in place, much of it belongs, of course, to the
Department of Justice, the legal justice process of immigration
courts and that kind of thing, will return people to their
countries of origin much, much faster than it does today.
I mean, the real--the real sticking point right now in what
we are doing is that DOJ (Department of Justice) and Attorney
General Sessions and his staff are working hard at hiring more
judges so we can process people through and ultimately, the
number of beds we will need will go down, I think, pretty
steeply.
Mr. Carter. Thank you.
Ms. Roybal-Allard.
DETENTION: POLICIES
Ms. Roybal-Allard. Mr. Secretary, it is sometimes forgotten
that ICE detention is, in fact, civil detention and not
criminal detention, and therefore should not be used as a
punishment or as a deterrent.
In fact, the D.C. District Court imposed a preliminary
injunction in 2014 preventing the Department from using
deterrence as a factor in the context of family detention.
I mention this because you indicated a few months ago that
you were considering a policy of separating children and
parents who are apprehended after crossing the border as a way
of deterring future migration.
I believe you subsequently indicated that you will not
institute such a policy, but I wanted to ask you more broadly
about deterrence as a factor in detention.
Do you believe that deterrence is a permissible
consideration when making custody decisions? And does ICE
currently have any formal or informal policies that it be
considered?
Secretary Kelly. Well, the courts have told me I can't do
it, so that is where I am on this topic. The people that we
are--put into detention are people who are--we either consider
to be a flight risk, which many are, or a danger to society. So
those are the two general categories.
Many, many people at--ICE takes into custody that are then
not put into detention but given mon--you know, we put them in
monitoring, sometimes we put ankle bracelets on them, those
kinds of things.
So the ones that go into detention, again, are dangerous
folks, men and women, or they are a flight risk, which,
unfortunately, many of them are. As I think the ranking member
knows, that there is an awful lot of people that kind of just
disappear, you know, that come into the country illegally, that
disappear into our society. We don't know where they are.
Most of them, as you say, as you pointed out, and I think
Mrs. Lowey did as well, they stay under the radar, they don't
commit crimes, and those are ultimately are not the people that
we look for.
But for those two factors are why we need the beds and why
detention is an option for us.
DETENTION: FACILITIES
Ms. Roybal-Allard. Most ICE detainees are housed in
dedicated facilities, but a substantial number are confined in
the same facilities as those charged with criminal acts. ICE
detainees should not be treated like criminals or suspected
criminals. So this underscores the need for strong civil
confinement standards.
And I was alarmed to see that in your budget request, you
intend to weaken ICE detention standards in order to attract
more local jurisdictions as detention providers.
Is the impetus for weakening standards the need for more
detention space to implement the President's executive order on
immigration enforcement?
Secretary Kelly. First of all, the standard--as I have
learned, and as kind of a side comment, I was asked by Jeh
Johnson long before I ever knew I was going to be sitting in
this seat, to participate in a study of ICE facilities
nationwide. And I did that and was a member of that study. I
was in all the discussions, went on trips with him, but I had
to drop off, because when I was--as soon as I was named to this
job, I dropped off of that.
But the point is, I know a fair amount about the conditions
and not only the concerns, not only what the private and law
enforcement people say about detention facilities that ICE
runs, but also what the agenda groups, what advocacy groups
talk about, so I get a sense of both sides of that. That is
very helpful for me to understand the issue.
But the point is, what I have learned is the ICE detention
standards are well beyond the standards that even the Federal
Bureau of Prisons has in terms of prisoner or detainee in this
case, housing and care.
As we seek to enter into, if you will, rental agreements
with local law enforcement or counties to have access to their
beds, for generally, short periods of time, in order to do
that, we have--we are looking at lowering our standards so that
we can enter into agreements.
But still, the agreements, the detention, conditions of
detention will be much higher than what is accepted--what is
acceptable in either the Federal system or the State system.
So, yes, lowering it so we can have some access, but it is
not lowering it to the point--by no means lowering it to the
point where there is mistreatment or conditions that would--
would not be appropriate from a humanitarian point of view.
DETENTION: FACILITIES STANDARDS
Ms. Roybal-Allard. Okay. I guess the point is that, it
seems to me that all detainees deserve the same level of
protections for whatever amount of time that they spend in
detention.
And so that is what brings my concern about having
different standards in different facilities.
I would also like to point out that the statement
accompanying the fiscal year 2017 omnibus included a directive
that you should interpret as a caution against weakening
detention standards. Specifically, it requires that you submit
a report to the committee 30 days in advance justifying the
rationale for ICE signing or renewing contracts that do not
require adherence to the most recent detention standards.
In addition, it requires a report on the Department's plans
to bring all detention facilities under the newest standards.
In anticipation of that reporting requirement and directive
from Congress, does ICE still plan to pursue a lax set of
standards for local and county jails? And what are the
challenges and obstacles that you see in moving more facilities
under the 2011 detention standards? And should we be relying
less on local and county facilities if they are unable to
commit to detention standards that are appropriate for ICE
detainees?
That is a long list of questions. I am sorry.
Secretary Kelly. It is. No. Again, lowering the standards
doesn't does not result in any way, shape, or form a detainees
being in any way inhumanely treated, but it does give us access
to some of the State and local jails.
Our preference is to put detainees into our ICE facilities.
And generally speaking, the way they operate, they stay--ICE
operates, they stay in those facilities for minimum periods of
time.
Oftentimes, it is just until they go through the relatively
short process until we decide what to do--they decide what to
do with them.
So, again, I go back to it gives us some flexibility. The
standards will not be anything approaching--anything
approaching inhumane with no dignity, and we will obviously,
report to the Congress. And it probably is worthwhile to offer
right now a brief from ICE, maybe a member brief or maybe
recommend a hearing so they can come talk about those things in
detail.
Ms. Roybal-Allard. My time is up. I have some follow-up
questions, but Mr. Chairman, thank you for the generosity on my
time.
Mr. Carter. And I need to inform the committee, it looks
like your time remaining clocks are not working. At least mine
is not. So we are keeping time over here.
Mr. Ruppersberger. I thought that means we can go on
forever.
Mr. Carter. We try to generally inform you of your time.
Mr. Frelinghuysen.
CYBERSECURITY: CYBER ATTACKS
Mr. Frelinghuysen. I am sitting between two Texans,
probably a pretty good place to be.
The term resilient, I sort of mentioned earlier that the
whole issue of, you know, equipment and training. You have an
amazing number of organizations under your umbrella.
Have you done an evaluation as to how resilient they are
when it comes to cyber attacks?
Do you have a system, which has graded your--those under
your purview? We had, of course, as you are aware, the most
massive cyber attack, I think, perhaps the world has ever seen
just within recent weeks.
Have you done--do you have a constant review of the many
systems under your purview?
Secretary Kelly. Yes, sir. The answer to that, the very
short answer is, yes.
And since you bring it up, the reason--I mean, this was a
joint effort, but on the morning that the ransom attack
started, I would say DHS was among the very first people, which
is our job, to recognize that it started. And as it grew, and
it grew fast, DHS, with other aspects of the U.S. Government,
but DHS has the lead in terms of defending our dot-gov, our
government with the exception of and Intel nets, our dot-gov
nets and have tremendous partnerships with all of U.S.
industry, whether they are financial institution--everybody
that wants to play, that want--and a lot of them do play.
So when that Ransomware attack started, I would have to
tell you, went to the sit room, the situation room, we had some
immediate meetings on it. I was proud that everyone, whether it
was NSA (National Security Agency), FBI (Federal Bureau of
Investigation), everybody, was deferring at all times to my
command center that deals 24/7 watching the nets within cyber
defenses. And I was incredibly proud to have them all deferring
to DHS.
So as we saw that runaway event that ultimately infected
huge numbers of systems and computers in Europe and the Middle
East, I mean, everywhere, Asia, hundreds and hundreds and
hundreds of thousands of contaminated systems and individual
computers.
And because of the interagency efforts of the United
States, but to a large degree because of what DHS does in its
cybersecurity mission, I can't tell you, but let me just say
that the number of systems infected in our country were
miniscule.
We defended the country from the biggest cyber onslaught in
history, and we were successful in keeping it out of our
country with the exception of a tiny, tiny, tiny number of
computers.
Mr. Frelinghuysen. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Carter. Thank you, Mr. Frelinghuysen.
Before I go forward, I have just been informed to expect
multiple votes, at 4:15 p.m., which could take up to an hour,
so we are going to have to limit everyone to one question as we
go forward.
Mrs. Lowey.
FEMA GRANTS: PROGRAM CUTS
Mrs. Lowey. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Secretary, I was disappointed by the significant
proposed cuts for FEMA preparedness grant programs. The UASI
program, which helps the most at-risk urban areas such as New
York, prevent and prepare for terrorist attacks would be cut by
26 percent, and the State Homeland Security Grant Program will
be slashed by more than 25 percent.
Overall, the fiscal year 2018 budget proposes a cut of 919
million dollars to FEMA grant programs that really help law
enforcement prevent and respond to terrorism and other
disasters.
To put that in perspective, you would cut vital funds to
protect the top terror targets in the U.S. by 31 percent, which
is equal to roughly half of what you are proposing to build a
wall on the Mexican border that is not needed.
State and local jurisdictions just cannot effectively plan
for, establish, and maintain their preparedness programs when
support from their Federal partner is inconsistent and subject
to major deviations.
Mr. Secretary, could you please share with us the impetus
for proposing such drastic cuts to the grant programs? Is it
based on any sort of analysis that our States, major urban
areas and other jurisdictions are well prepared for terrorist
threats without Federal assistance?
Secretary Kelly. I would offer to you that in the 120 days,
give or take, that I have had this job, I have visited a number
of our largest cities, New York, Chicago, Boston, McAllen,
Texas, a number of places, met with the mayors, met with the
police chiefs. I have been to a couple of very large police and
sheriff, separate organizations that I have met here in D.C. a
couple of months ago, met with them, talked to them a lot.
I met, interacted with the National Governors Association
that was here in D.C., which was almost all of the--I think 48
of the governors. And the point is, the State and local men and
women of law enforcement and the people that we work with, FEMA
(Federal Emergency Management Agency) works with, are very,
very highly capable.
You know, there was a time, I would offer, back before 9/11
that we didn't think too much about it, because terrorism had
not really come to our country, and many of these grants and
initiatives, of course, were put in place after that. As you
might imagine, the men and women of law enforcement, locally
and on the State level with Federal help have risen to the
occasion. There is very, very capable FEMA type people that are
in the States and indeed many cities have them.
I wouldn't say that these funds are not very helpful for
those States and localities, but I would offer that it isn't as
grim as you describe in terms of taking them away. What I mean
is if you take away this money, which does--the budget does
some of that, their efforts against terrorism and against other
aspects of, you know, disasters, will immediately collapse.
So my offer would be that we were looking for money, and we
evaluated a number of different places, obviously, and we took
where we thought we could take from.
But, again, I am absolutely confident that the men and
women out there in the hinder lands of the United States have
risen to the occasion over the last 15 years since 9/11 and are
very, very good at what they do.
Mrs. Lowey. Well, thank you for giving me the opportunity
to ask the question, Mr. Chairman.
But I am really surprised, Mr. Secretary, with great
respect, at your response. There is no question, for example,
in New York City these people are capable, and they are
carrying out all their activities with distinction. But I will
check with them. I haven't heard that they don't need that
money, and that that money isn't essential.
And when--if New York is a target, and it is beyond my
comprehension that you could think it is okay to make those
deep cuts. Thank you.
Secretary Kelly. I didn't say they don't need the money or
they--I just said that we have found places where we think that
the funds are no longer needed in the way that they once were.
Mrs. Lowey. Okay. I will be happy to get back to you. But I
would like that response in writing, and I will check with the
people who are responsible for these programs in New York and
maybe have them document how essential these funds are.
[The information follows:]
T7050A.048
T7050A.049
Mrs. Lowey. Thank you very much.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Carter. Thank you, Mrs. Lowey.
Mr. Culberson.
OPERATION STREAMLINE
Mr. Culberson. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Secretary, I want to thank you for your service to our
country and the Marine Corps and for your prudence, for the
President's prudence in being careful in spending our
constituents' very scarce, hard-earned and very precious tax
dollars. And in particular, I want to thank you and the
President for focusing on restoring the rule of law, which is
one thing that unites us as Americans.
We understand, and this country, really, one of the first
in the world to understand that our liberty lies in law
enforcement. That is a fundamental principle of who we are as
Americans, and we really appreciate you focusing on that.
And I also want to say that Congressman Duncan Hunter, Sr.,
spearheaded the effort to build a wall in the southern
California border, which has been working very successfully,
and Israelis know how effective a wall could be.
It makes sense in large parts of the border, the Pecos
river country out in West Texas may not be as necessary out
there, but a wall make good sense. But above all, we appreciate
your focus on law enforcement.
And existing law is very clear, has been on the books since
1950s, that an individual crossing the southern border is
subject to up to 6 months imprisonment to enter the country
illegally.
On the second offense, they are subject to imprisonment for
up to 2 years. And I wanted to in particular bring your
attention to Judge Alia Moses' very successful effort in the
Del Rio sector. My good friend, Henry Cuellar and I are well
acquainted with her.
Judge Moses and the Border Patrol in the Del Rio sector
with the support of the Department of Justice, they use their
good hearts and their commonsense in a compassionate way to
ensure that existing law is enforced uniformly and fairly.
And as a result before you came into--President Trump came
into office and the promise of enforcement of the law which
resulted in such a precipitous decline in illegal crossings,
Judge Moses as I recall, Henry, would just simply enforcing
existing law, in the Del Rio sector, and they saw the lowest
level of illegal crossings since Border Patrol began keeping
records, as I recall, Henry.
And you and I have worked together closely to support Judge
Moses and her efforts. I want to bring her to your attention,
Mr. Secretary.
The program that she put in place is called Operation
Streamline, and I would encourage you to try to expand that up
and down the border.
As chairman of the Commerce, Justice, Science, and
Appropriation Subcommittee, I will do my part to help ensure
the Department of Justice resources are focused there with
additional prosecutors, personnel, U.S. marshals to make sure
that folks are processed and handled in a way that protects
everyone's due process rights and to ensure that people are
handled expeditiously by immigration judges.
Because you are exactly right, we need to make sure those
immigration judges are there on the border to handle people who
come across and receive that notice to appear, which is, I
believe, Henry, they call those permisso.
Mr. Cuellar. Permisso.
Mr. Culberson. In previous administrations, they got the
notice to appear, they call it permisso. And they were gone,
disappeared, never to show up again.
So simply by enforcing the law, ensuring that people to
show up in front of those immigration judges, or appear before
a judge like Judge Moses up and down the border from
Brownsville to San Diego, you can have a dramatic effect on
protecting our southern border, ensuring the free flow of legal
goods and people entering the country illegally.
Because we all know we need that good relationship with
Mexico to have people cross back and forth legally and freely
with goods and commerce and for workers.
But you have got to start--it begins with law enforcement.
So I wanted to ask you, Mr. Secretary, about Operation
Streamline, if you are familiar with it. And could you speak
about what currently is happening under the Trump
administration in your leadership if an individual is
apprehended on the southern border, and when and how does DHS
decide to give them expedited removal proceedings before a
judge like Judge Moses?
Secretary Kelly. I am not--and I will get smart on
Operation Streamline, and it sounds like I ought to go down to
Del Rio and visit with the Judge----
Mr. Culberson. She is doing a great job.
Secretary Kelly. One of the things, again, I have learned
in this job, this immigration thing is the most complicated--I
mean, if we try to make it any more complex and hard to
understand, we couldn't have done it any better.
But all sorts of categories. Right?
Mr. Culberson. Right.
Secretary Kelly. They will catch someone, say, a Mexican
that comes across on our side of the border wrong,
essentially----
Mr. Culberson. She will give them a week, You know. She is
not like a----
Secretary Kelly. But pretty quick they can say, I don't
want to enter the system, and they can go right back home.
One of the things we found--and, again, an anecdote, but in
talking to a CBP officer, I think the second week I was on the
job, went down to McAllen, Texas, and just walked the dirt and
the train and the river's edge with the real people that
understand the illegal immigration drug movement and all of
that, the CBP officers, great men and women each.
And they said, you know, sir, we will find--we will stop
traffickers, Mexican traffickers, on our side of the border. I
have been here 14 years. I know the names of many of them,
because we will pick them up. They will be with illegal aliens,
the traffickers, coyotes, as they are called, and they will
say--they will opt to just simply go back to Mexico. And then
whether it is 1 month later or 1 year later, they will capture
them again, and they will go back.
So one of the things they started doing is holding them and
starting the process of prosecuting them for human trafficking.
The cost, then--and this is important in terms of reduction
in the numbers that are crossing the border, the cost of going
from, say, El Salvador to the United States, the fare, if you
will, to travel on the network and get into the United States
grew from an astronomical figure to the kind of people, simple
people, peasants, mostly, from the Central American republic,
good people, $4,000, life savings, an incredible amount of
money to them.
Mr. Culberson. Yes, it is hard.
Secretary Kelly. Now it is $12,000 or $15,000. So they
can't afford it. So that is one of the factors in--that simple
thing starting to arrest and prosecute them.
Mr. Culberson. Absolutely.
I want to be sure to mention that also I learned from Judge
Moses that she cannot seize the assets of human smugglers. That
is the law--a change in law we need to make.
Secretary Kelly. Right.
Mr. Culberson. Thank you.
Secretary Kelly. Yes, sir.
Mr. Carter. Mr. Cuellar.
BORDER SECURITY: WALL ALONG SOUTHERN BORDER
Mr. Cuellar. Mr. Chairman, thank you so much for this
opportunity.
Mr. Secretary, I want to say thank you for what you do,
what your men and women do. I appreciate it. I am from Laredo,
Texas. I represent the border. I live there. My family is
there. I breathe the air. I drink the water. So I don't just go
in and visit for a few hours and take off and think that I know
the border better than some of the people that have lived there
all my life.
And I have to say, during my time here, I have seen
Secretaries come and go. We will probably see you come and go
with all respect. My only advice is: Understand the system that
we are in, the executive branch--and sometimes some of us might
disagree with you. I don't think it is correct for you to tell
Members of Congress to shut up. If we disagree--some us might
agree with you more than others, but I am just saying,
otherwise, it is going to be a long term for you if you do
that. I think you did that within 90 days after you got sworn
in.
I want to focus on the wall. I don't support the wall for
several reasons. One, private property rights: In Texas, we
respect private property rights. It is dear to us, number one.
And, number two, the cost: A regular fence will be $6.5
million per mile compared to $1 million of technology. I think
Mr. Taylor, who has been in the military, there is a lot of
technology out there that works very well for the military that
should work very well for us down there. That is number two.
Number three, environmental or the International Water
Commission: Sir, there was a treaty between the U.S. and Mexico
as to where you can put barriers, and that is an issue that we
have to look at.
Number four, overstays: 40 percent of the people that we
have here are overstays. So you can put the most beautiful wall
that you want to, but they are either going to fly in, drive
through a bridge, or come through a boat. The report that came
out, that Homeland released 2 days ago, May 22, talks about
overstays. Over 40 percent of the 11, 12 million are overstays.
In fiscal year, there were 630,000 visitors that failed to
leave the U.S., far exceeding the 415,000 people that came in
across the border. So more overstays than people coming across
or that were intercepted across the U.S.-Mexico border.
What was interesting is, according to Homeland, there were
more Canadians that overstayed than Mexicans. I think your
report said 120,000 Canadians with expired visas are still
believed to be living in the U.S., compared to 47,000 Mexicans
on that. And that is--probably those stats are not correct or
accurate because I think you only looked at plane and boat and
didn't look at land crossings also. And I think the visa stay
should be one.
The other thing, finally, number five, why I don't support
the wall is natural barriers. I think President Trump on April
acknowledged that there are natural barriers to the border. If
I can show you--I support a wall; this is the most beautiful
that wall I support, Lucille, is Big Bend. Have you seen the
Big Bend? I mean, those are walls. If you want to see walls,
those are walls that we have. I don't think you can come in and
put another wall on top of these cliffs that we have, number
one. I think you would agree with me. The second thing is if
you go down to my lower part of the river, the Rio Grande,
which is a natural barrier, doesn't go straight. As you know,
it snakes up and down. And this is my district down there. And
the U.S. side I believe is in the top part. Look at the river
the way it snakes. So, either you follow it--and I have taken a
small low plane with Michael McCaul from Laredo all the way to
Brownsville, going just a few miles an hour, flying over, just
snaking over. And it is going to be very hard to put a fence,
unless you take private property rights that we have.
So all I am asking you is that you work with the local
Border Patrol, work with us, and just say that we can't just
use, you know, the fence. We know what happened to the Berlin
Wall. We know what happened to the Chinese--to the Great Wall
of China. We know what happened to that. And I am just saying
that we just have to be smart on how we secure the border. We
spend $18 billion a year on border security on the 1-yard line
called the U.S. border. But you remember the last time you and
I were together with Chairman Carter and Kay. We were on the
southern border of Mexico, with $80 million that we put there
to help Mexico secure the southern border, $80 million compared
to $18 billion. Did you know that they actually stopped more
people coming across than the whole Border Patrol did?
So all I am saying, Mr. Secretary, is we want to work with
you. I know it is a very difficult job that you have. Some of
us have been living this for a long time. We want to see
legitimate trade, tourism, not impede that. And we just want to
work with you. So just to conclude--my time is up--some of us
want to work with you, and please take advantage of our
expertise.
Secretary Kelly. I probably am on dangerous ground here. If
I could, Mr. Chairman, could I just make a comment?
Mr. Carter. Yes.
Mr. Cuellar. I am turning on my mic in case I have to
respond.
Secretary Kelly. Two comments really. Since I have been in
this job, everything that the Congressman said about the border
and where to build it and where not to build it, there might be
places where we do it, there might be other places we don't: I
have been saying that since day 1.
Mr. Cuellar. Yes, you have.
Secretary Kelly. What you said about the southern border,
when I was on Active Duty, I helped the Mexicans construct
their southern border strategy, helped them implement it under
the radar quietly, and it has worked very effectively. They
stopped 160,000 illegal migrants last year and returned them to
their countries of origin humanely, great partners.
We stopped more than that last year. But the point is their
southern strategy works.
You have also probably heard me say that our--the 1-yard-
line stand day in and day out doesn't work, that the protection
of the southern border starts 1,500 miles south. I have said
that repeatedly. So everything you said about what we should be
doing and thinking about, I have been saying and thinking about
for 120 days.
CRITICISM OF DHS WORKFORCE
My ``shut up'' comment, the one thing, sir, with all due
respect that is different between certainly my experience in
the U.S. military and my experience now is that the men and
women in the U.S. military, you can throw rocks or criticize--
and God knows we deserve some criticism--senior military
officers, you can criticize the policy of what they are trying
to execute in the world, but the one thing that we never hear
from certainly this institution is criticism of the rank-and-
file men and women that put their lives on the line in the U.S.
military every day. You never hear that.
In this job, all I heard day in and day out, ``Nazis,''
``storm troop tactics,'' prejudice about the men and women, the
foot soldiers, if you will, that stand on our border or inside
our country and protect it. And I would just ask that criticize
me, criticize the Trump policies, but please recognize that my
men and women are doing the same kind of thing day in and day
out as our military men and women are and, in a sense, give
them a break. And that is what the ``shut up'' comment was
about.
Mr. Cuellar. Right. Well, Mr. Chairman, I just need to
respond quickly. Let me just say this: Nobody has attacked the
men and women. I mean, I think they are attacking the policy.
I have been attacked also. I have been called--because you
and I agree on a lot of things, whether you like----
Mr. Carter. I am sorry, Mr. Cuellar.
Mr. Cuellar. I appreciate it.
Mr. Carter. The votes have started. I am going to try to
keep this hearing going. I will stay here. I hope you will have
somebody here to stay with me, and the rest of you go vote.
Come back as soon as you can.
Mr. Cuellar. Four votes, motion to recommit.
Mr. Cuellar. We can come back, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Ruppersberger. That is not going to work. You have four
votes and a motion to recommit.
Mr. Carter. Mr. Fleischmann, we are going to do one more
round of questions and maybe get back to Mr. Price, maybe get
to you.
Mr. Ruppersberger. I doubt you will get to me.
Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Carter. They are now telling me it will be an hour's
worth of votes.
Okay. Mr. Fleischmann.
BORDER SECURITY: LEGAL MOVEMENT OF PEOPLE AND COMMERCE
Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Secretary, let me first start by saying thank you for
your tremendous service to this country in the United States
Marine Corps, for stepping up now and being Secretary at this
most difficult time in our Nation's history. You are a great
American, and I am infinitely grateful for the job that you are
doing, sir.
I will limit my time to one question. Like the rest of the
Federal Government, CPB faces competing funding demands in a
tight budget environment. Much of Congress and the
administration's focus has rightly been on physical
infrastructure, staffing needs, and emerging technologies like
aerial drones.
While I agree these are vital, DHS should not ignore proven
effective technologies that facilitate the safe and efficient
flow of legitimate trade and travel across the border. What is
DHS' plan, sir, to incorporate effective port of entry
technologies into their border security plan?
Secretary Kelly. One of the things Mr. Trump said to me
early on when we discussed what his thoughts were relative to
the Southwest border, he said: You know, Kelly, the one thing
we can't stop--in fact, if anything, if you can speed it up--is
the normal movement of legal people in vehicles and whatnot,
commercial movement, north and south of the border.
On the northern border, the Canadians will say we need to
thin the border, which is we don't have the same issues on the
northern border, but the point is to take every opportunity to
try to thin that southern border.
Longer term plans are to build more capacity at the ports
of entry. I had my science and technology people, who are
phenomenal, I asked them just today--we have good technology
down there now for vehicles to pass through so that we can see
inside them, see if there are people or drugs--what is the next
generation? And then let's skip that one and get to the next
one. So I believe we can speed things up. It is fast now:
Millions of people back and forth every day with not so much as
a slowdown most of the time in their vehicles.
There are certain indicators we look for that would then
put it into secondary. So we look for drugs or people for some
of that. It is an amazing amount of movement north and south,
legal movement, through that border. So we are redoubling our
efforts, sir, to look for ways to get even better at that but,
at the same time, stop more of the illicit movement of not only
drugs, of which it is massive, but also working with the
Mexicans--and we work very closely with the them; I can't
emphasize enough--about how we can move items faster through
the border.
Mr. Fleischmann. Thank you, sir.
And, again, let me reiterate my full support, and I look
forward to working with you, sir.
Mr. Carter. Thank you, Mr. Fleischmann.
Mr. Ruppersberger.
Mr. Ruppersberger. I won't be able to talk. I just want to
say how I respect your career. I was on Defense Appropriations
and ranking on Intel, and I have watched you. And I will tell
you, with you and General Mattis being appointed in the
beginning of this administration, I have been able to sleep
better at night. Now that doesn't mean I am always going to
agree with you. And I would like to meet with you later on the
issue of cybersecurity, port security, a lot of these different
issues that we need to deal with. Thank you.
Secretary Kelly. Yes, sir.
Mr. Carter. Mr. Price.
CENTRAL AMERICAN RELATIONSHIPS
Mr. Price. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Secretary, welcome. I am glad to see you. And I want to
just say that I remember your previous career, our interaction,
in particular, in 2014, in Guatemala, an enlightening
conversation about what the United States' approach in
particular to the triangle countries should be--El Salvador,
Guatemala, and Honduras. The source of so many children,
unaccompanied children, and mothers and so on. And you made it
very, very clear that this was not mainly a challenge for
border security. And you wrote a very well-regarded piece in
the Military Times that had a huge influence I think on this
country's policies toward these countries. And you said just
recently, you can't have these goal-line stands on the 1-foot
line at the official points of entry. You have got to approach
this problem in the countries of origin. So you have been a
major influence on our policy in that regard.
It does however bring us to the wall, to the wall.
Now you wouldn't know it from President Trump's rhetoric,
but there were over 700 miles of fencing already down there. I
know about that because I was chairman of this subcommittee for
many of the years when that fence was constructed. And we
required segment-by-segment analysis. We asked for
environmental impact studies. We asked for comparisons of
fencing versus other kinds of ways of securing the border. We
had a good deal of oversight over that process, and the fence
got built. We also doubled the number of Customs and Border
Patrol agents.
Now President Trump has almost a fixation it seems on this
wall. And I wonder: Is that really compatible with the idea of
a layered defense that you earlier expressed? Particularly, I
wonder what kind of reaction you have to the foreign ops bill.
These countries, these very countries we are talking about: El
Salvador, support, the economic support and development fund,
cut by a third, $65 million down to 45; Guatemala cut by a
third, $112 million down to $77 million; Honduras cut by a
third, $93 million down to $67 million. Where is that coming
from? What does that have to do with the kind of advocacy that
you and others were very powerful in making about the need to
enable those countries to control their gangs, to control their
own security, but also to help their own people with all kinds
of needs that might enable people to stay in those countries?
And then, finally, if we do move forward with this wall, I
expect that we will have more analysis than we have right now.
And I want you to confirm that. You are talking about three
segments. There is not much of a justification as to why that
is the best alternative, how it compares to other alternatives,
what kind of changes might be required, such as the levee
fences we required, the changes in location we required. We
need this kind of congressional interaction if we are going to
move forward with this project.
Secretary Kelly. Sir, on the issue of--I will start with
the Central American countries. Five years ago, when I began my
tour down in Miami, the three countries the northern tier
countries, the Central American republics, were in fact the
most dangerous countries on the planet. They had murder rates
that were astronomical. All of those countries, because of the
help we provided--and the help is some assistance from the
United States' Treasury, so from the United States taxpayer,
but a lot of hands-on work with the U.S. military, United
States Southern Command working with them, helping them get
better. There is a particularly useful program, INL, within the
Department of State working with the police. And still horrific
murder rates, but cut by a third. Where talking about they were
where Colombia was at the beginning of Plan Colombia and
working toward a miracle that is Colombia today.
So the point is the money has been very, very helpful. The
contact has been very, very helpful. One of the things we are
doing is not only messaging through the religious leaders, the
political leaders in Central America, to convince their
citizens not to make that horribly dangerous journey up. We--
the energy behind it has been DHS--have organized a major
conference in Miami, cosponsored with Mexico. We are bringing
in Canada, Costa Rica, Panama, Spain, the EU, most importantly
in the region, Colombia. It will be the President--Vice
President, rather, will spend the first day down, the
prosperity day. The Departments of Treasury and Commerce will
come down. IEDB will come in. The point is to accelerate the
private investment into those countries, and they are ready for
that. And then the second day will be more of a security day
that Homeland Security will run.
So we are, in fact, still--I am still focused on that
country and, of course, that region of the world. And of
course, most of their problems revolve around our drug use in
the United States, the vast majority of the problems, and I
make that point all of the time.
BORDER SECURITY: WALL DIVIDE THE SOUTHERN BORDER
On the wall, where there is physical barrier, it works. I
acknowledge the fact I don't live on the border. But I will
also tell you that, when I visit the border, I talk to--every
trip down there--I talk to the CBP people, the local law
enforcement, the local business community, and the local
mayors, El Paso and other places. So I get down there, and I
talk to them. The number one concern the mayors and whatnot
have is the free flow of commerce. I have already addressed
that.
The police like what we are doing and the partnership they
have with CBP, and CBP has a great partnership with their
Mexican counterparts on the other side.
Where we have physical barrier, it works. Where there are
places that, whether it is environmental reasons why, watershed
reasons, whatever, there are places where it is unlikely we
will ever need a wall. As far as the kind of wall--and you
mentioned the levee system or the levee wall down the Texas.
That is a place where a concrete structure would make sense. As
you know, there is already a concrete wall down there that is
reinforcing the levee system. That is good for the south Texas.
There are other places, frankly, and again, I know I don't live
on the border, but I do talk to people that live on the border
and work this issue of the border, both local law enforcement
and my people, CBP people. And they have told me what they
want. They want a see-through wall, that they can see on the
other side what is going on. And just as importantly to them,
and I hadn't ever thought of this, so the Mexicans can see them
on the other side to understand that the wall, the barrier, is
also backed up with the great men and women of CBP.
So what we are doing right now is looking specifically at
where we think--where CBP and local law enforcement thinks they
need additional physical barrier. And then we are running a
competition right now that I am not involved in, because of
contractual issues and everything else, procurement issues,
running a competition of what physical barrier is the best to
construct along those places, along the border where it makes
sense to put physical barrier. It may be concrete wall in one
place. It may be a bollard type fencing system in another
place. And, frankly, it may be no physical barrier at all in
other places. So we will certainly keep the Congress informed,
sir.
Mr. Carter. Mr. Harris.
Mr. Harris. Absolutely, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Secretary, thank you. Obviously, your reputation is
impeccable. As the chairman said, that is why you are the
longest serving Secretary.
I agree with my colleague from Maryland. I look forward to
working with you.
First of all, look, I agree with the ranking member on a
lot of things. But I disagree with her about not taking the
border wall seriously. You are on the front lines of our war on
drugs right now. The greatest killer of young Americans right
now is heroin, and 90 percent of it crosses our southern
border. And if you, as in your statement, say a border wall
system will deny access to drug- and alien-smuggling
organizations where you plan to build it in this fiscal year's
allocations, I support it, and I take it seriously.
IMMIGRATION ENFORCEMENT: SANCTUARY CITIES
With regard to, just briefly, sanctuary cities, I have got
all kinds of people playing politics with this, local officials
who think that they--pretend that they can write immigration
law. They can't. But they should help the Federal agencies
enforce it. I am glad that a rewrite of 8 U.S.C. 1373 in the
President's proposal.
IMMIGRATION ENFORCEMENT: H-2B VISAS
Finally, just one thing about that that is important to my
district: The omnibus gave you the authority, after
consultation with the Secretary of Labor, to adjust the H-2B
caps and to adjust them where basically to where we would bring
it to a level that would allow the returning workers to not
count on under the caps. I urge you to do it. The businesses in
my district are desperate. The summer season is coming up. We
need it for various industries in my district. I urge you to
expedite that if you can.
And I yield back.
JONES ACT
Mr. Palazzo [presiding]. Mr. Harris yields back.
I am sitting in for the chairman for a minute. I am going
to make my question real quick, and then we are hopefully going
to get to Congressman Taylor.
Mr. Secretary, I believe and I hope you agree that the
Jones Act protects our U.S. shipbuilding capability from being
hollowed out by foreign subsidies and cheap Labor and keeps the
U.S. maritime industry strong. I want to ask you about your
Department's compliance with the statutory prohibition
contained in the Jones Act on foreign ships, crewed by foreign
workers, flying a foreign flag, from transporting merchandise
between points in the U.S.
I was extremely disappointed to see that CBP recently
withdrew a proposal to revoke and modify a number of the letter
rulings concerning the transportation of merchandise on the
Outer Continental Shelf that CBP itself has publicly admitted
are inconsistent with the statute. In essence, CBP was, through
this effort of revoking the old letter ruling, attempting to
get back into compliance with the law, but now has stalled out.
I know you believe in the rule of law. So can you tell us
when CBP will revoke these letter rulings and actually start
enforcing the law?
Secretary Kelly. Congressman, one of the--very early on in
my time in Homeland Security, this issue was briefed to me, and
of course, I didn't have and still do not have a Commissioner
of CBP, but the number two career at the time came in and gave
me a brief rundown on this. And there were three options: kind
of yes, no, and study it.
And I am--generally speaking, when someone comes in and
says we need to study this a little bit more, that in my mind
is a kick-the-can-down-the-road kind of tactic. And I addressed
that with the team. And I said: What is best right now for
America, to make these decisions relative to foreign flag, U.S.
flag?
And they said: The best thing right now is for us to--it is
so complicated and has wide-ranging impacts, the best thing to
do is to do a comprehensive study.
And that is the direction we are in.
Mr. Palazzo. Well, I will be submitting more questions for
the record, but I believe the law is clear on this, and if you
have to choose between a foreign flag or an American flag, you
have to choose America first. And with that--I am done asking
my questions, and I will open it up to Congressman Taylor.
OFF-THE-SHELF TECHNOLOGY: ACQUISITION
Mr. Taylor. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
And thank you, Mr. Secretary, for being here. I appreciate
your service before, and now, of course, I know you have a very
difficult job.
I will just make a couple of statements real quick, and
then I will submit some questions so we can get over there and
vote.
Number one, I want foot stomp on what Dr. Harris said about
the H-2B visas, same thing in our area and many other States as
well too. I have actually had people ask me to ask this
question or at least make a statement on it that there are
labor shortages and people are pretty desperate with these
seasonal operators along the coastal States and then probably
some within as well. That is one thing.
The other thing: I am not sure if you are aware or not, but
the Customs and Border Patrol uniforms and others in the
Department of Homeland Security are actually manufactured in El
Salvador and Honduras, which is incredible to me, obviously, in
facilities with limited security potentially. But we want to
see those productions here for U.S. workers and that textile
industry, obviously, to benefit us and then for national
security as well.
One other thing, one quick question for you: Commercial
off-the-shelf technology, do you face acquisition hurdles in
being able to get commercial off-the-shelf technology that best
benefits you?
Secretary Kelly. I haven't to date. I mean, certainly, my
direction to the Department right now is, before we embark on
any science projects to invent some new technology, let's look
on the shelf first. But so long as we need it, we have the
money, and the acquisition process is adhered to, to the best
of my knowledge, we are not having any problem acquiring things
off the shelf.
CYBER SECURITY: INFORMATION SHARING
Mr. Taylor. One other quick thing now that I have you here,
Mr. Secretary: On the cyber, I know that your command center--
and excellent work, obviously, protecting our homeland. Quick
question on that: Are you sharing between agencies and outside
of DHS's world to establish patterns for potential attribution
to where those attacks are coming from and then best practices?
Is that something that is actively happening? Are we sharing
between agencies?
Secretary Kelly. It is virtually automatic.
Mr. Taylor. It is automatic.
Mr. Carter [presiding]. I am going to cut it off right
there. We have got to go.
Mr. Taylor. Thank you, Mr. Secretary.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Carter. We stretched it way beyond the limit.
Secretary Kelly. I am kind of glad you have to go vote.
Mr. Carter. They are calling for us.
Mr. Secretary, thank you for being there. Thank you for
doing this job. Thank you for being here with us. Sorry we had
to rush, but we have got to go.
We are adjourned.
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