Transcripts For CSPAN3 FBI Director Christopher Wray Testifies On National Security Threats 20240712

Acting deputy Homeland Security secretary Ken Cuccinelli and the head of the National Counterterrorism center. The fbi director said at the hearing that the fbi has not seen widespread voter fraud. Wisconsin senator ron johnson chaired this two hour, 40 minute hearing. Good morning. This hearing will come to order. I want to first welcome and thank our witnesses, christopher wray, the director of the federal bureau of investigation, christopher miller, the director of the National Counterterrorism center, and kenneth cuccinelli, the senior official performing the duties of the deputy secretary. This is our annual threat hearing. When i take a look at all of the threats that this committee has considered and all of the threats facing this nation, i think its pretty interesting, you know, how many hearings weve held on so many of these things. Before i proceed, i guess i would ask for unanimous consent to have my written Opening Statement be entered in the recor record. If you consider these threats, cyberattacks and these cyberattacks, ramsonware, intellectual property threat, the hundreds of billions of dollars of Economic Loss due to intellectual property theft, potential cyberattacks and threats against our Critical Infrastructure, Drug Trafficking, and the overdose crisis. Gangs like ms13, emp threats, the use of drone, human trafficking, Election Security, and school and other Mass Shootings. These are issues, these are threats that this committee has not only held hearings on but passed some pretty significant pieces of legislation. One hearing we had talking about school shootings. We had parents come in from parkland, florida, to describe, you know, hopefully what could be some Commonsense Solutions to help prevent or minimize the destruction from some of these Mass Shootings. And so as we consider all of these things and will be considering these today in our hearing, i do want to raise the troubling aspect of whats happening currently in the streets of america. As serious as all of these threats are, i have a growing fear that whats happening on the streets of america actually represent a greater threat for a longterm democracy. As senator peters pointed out yesterday and will point out again today, the Mass Shootings over the last couple of years certainly have instead of being perpetrated by islamic terror, theres a growing percentage, a majority, now perpetrated by White Supremacists. As acting secretary wolf said yesterday, the whats happening in terms of Mass Shootings over the last couple of years is completely different about versus whats happened in the last four months. And i just want to cite a study, this was established by u. S. Crisis project, it was a joint effort by the Armed Conflict location and event data project at princeton university. They take a look at whats happening in the streets. They analyzed and they provided data on the last three months of demonstrations. What they found is there have been more than 10,600 total. They also went back in july of 2019 and said on average, for at least for july, there were 1,400 demonstrations in 2019. So you take a look at that, you say, well, a normal level of demonstrations every month is about over three months would be 4,200. So this year, weve had 10,600 or an excess number of 6,400. They also analyzed whos protesting who recollects are the demonstrators. About 7,750 of those protests have been linked to black lives matter in all 50 states and the d. C. Now what they found is of the 10,600, about 95 were peaceful. In other words, 5 turned violent and turned into some kind of riot. The peaceful ones were about peaceful in 2,040 locations. But the 5 that turned into being a riot, property destruction, loss of life, occurred in 220 locations. It was minimal. Its only 5 turned violent. That represents 570 riots that occurred in this nation over the last few months that they studied. Almost 570. And weve seen loss of life. Weve seen destruction of property. In my own state in wisconsin, kenosha, the protests turned into property destruction. Dozens of businesses burned down, the downtown all boarded up. And of course the final night of those riots, two people lost their life as well. So now weve seen in louisville last night, where two Police Officers were shot and our thoughts and prayers go out to them and their families for a speedy and full recovery. Why did that first of all, why were those people protesting . Why did that turn into a riot . They were protesting because they didnt agree with our system of justice. Where a grand jury take a look at all of the evidence and brought forward an indictment, but it wasnt the indictment or enough indictments that they wanted. So rather than accepting our judicial system that has served this nation well for as long as weve been a nation, these individuals turned to rioting and turned to destruction. So what i would like to do right now and ask the Senate Recording Studio to play a short video of a supposedly peaceful protest following president trumps acceptance speech at the white house. [ shouting ] move the [ muted ] back. Breonna taylor back up, please. Watch out, bro. I got you. Fortunately senator paul, his wife and their guests were not harmed. But they were scared, you know, unbelievably and they had every right to be frightened by how they were accosted and how they were threatened. That is not a peaceful protest. And, you know, the fact of the matter is, when you take a look at these statistics from the center, they didnt even they found the study found there were no riots in seattles c. H. O. P. Or chaz. Im not sure of the statistics. But, once again, 570 peaceful protests turned into rioting, turned into property destruction and loss of life. And, by the way, i can see the point that the Mass Shootings are a majority of those come from White Supremacists. Those people i denounce White Supremacists. Those 7,750 demonstrations, the 570 that turned into riots, those are not being perpetrated by White Supremacists. Those are being perpetrated by people with leftist ideology, that are perpetrating the ie yachti rioting that we cannot allow in this country. And another point is even a peaceful protests that continue to linger day after day after day as happened in kenosha where the downtown was boarded up. Even if it doesnt result in direct property loss or loss of life, those types of protests can turn into sieges that deny other americans their institutional rig constitutional right to operate a business or allow themselves to provide for themselves and their families. So this is a serious issue. We cant slough it off. Ill point out the number again, 570 that turned into riots, into property destruction and loss of life. Those are the facts. I dont like it. Of all of the threats this nation faces right now, this current one gives me the greatest cause for concern right now. Hopefully we can have a great discussion of all of the threats but, again, i want to highlight how serious the current threats of whats happening in our streets today, what happened in louisville last night, what a serious threat that poses and what side of the political spectrum are those protests springing from. Senator peters . Thank you, mr. Chairman. And thank you to each of our witnesses for being here today. While our committee has no shortage of serious and consequential issues to tackle our annual threats hearing is one of the most important opportunities that we have to discuss how we can better safeguard our nation. We continue to face a number of security threats both old and new. And over the past year since we last held this hearing, unfortunately, that list has only continued to grow. Not only do we continue to face critical threats from foreign and domestic terrorism, cyberattacks and efforts by Foreign Governments to sow chaos within our country, were dealing with a once in a lifetime pandemic that has taken the lives of over 200,000 americans. This Public Health disaster has exposed security risks embedded in the tools that we use every single day to connect us with the world. As we have moved more of our daily lives online because of coronavirus, bad actors have exploited the technological weaknesses to attack the platform that is we use for Remote School and work. Adversaries are working to infiltrate private companies and Government Agencies who are part of the critical race to find a vaccine. Both foreign and domestic doctors have seized on misinformation and disinformation chipping away at the very fabric of our democracy and sowing discord and mistrust in the institution that is we rely on everyday to keep us safe. The scorch of White Supremacists violence is a longstanding issue but is the greatest threat to American Safety and security. Im alarmed that this administration continues to downplay this threat and the root causes driving these ideologies. We cannot be shortsighted when it comes to protecting our National Security. As threats continue to develop and to evolve our National Security agencies, must be willing to adapt. We count on dhs, the National Counterterrorism center, and the fbi to Work Together and to provide a unified effort to defend the homeland. As we discussed at yesterdays hearing, im concerned that the dhs has suffered because of a lack of qualified, consistent and stable leadership at the agencys home. And while im disappointed the department does not believe the acting secretary can testify alongside his counterparts from the fbi and the national counterism center, im looking forward to testimony from all three of the officials here today. Many americans will never know the names of the thousands of personnel that work tirelessly behind the scenes at each of your agencies to keep our country safe. But were all counting on you and your teams to address the known threats to our safety. Anticipate the emerging as well as the unknown dangers our communities are going to face in the weeks, the months, years, and decades ahead. Im grateful for each of you for joining us here today. I look forward to hearing from you about the threats that america currently faces, what your departments are doing to address each of these threats, and how this committee and your agencies can continue to Work Together to protect our National Security. Thank you. Thank you, senator peters. I think our witnesses will hear that repeatedly. I think we truly do appreciate your service to this nation and certainly the service and sacrifice of the men and women that work in each of your departments and agencies. But it is the tradition of this committee to swear in witnesses. If youll all stand and raise your right hand. Do you swear that the system you will give before this committee will be the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth so help you god . I do. Thank you. Please be seated. Our first witness is christopher wray. Director wray is the director of the fbi. He was sworn in as the eighth fbi director. Director wray . Good morning, chairman johnson, Ranking Member peters, members of the committee, im honored to be here today on behalf of the men and women of the fbi to discuss our nations top threats from the fbis perspective and what were doing to counter those threats. I know we all share a lot of the same concerns about topics ranging from international and domestic terrorism, to cybersecurity to the violence in our streets and particularly this year, to the threat of foreign influence in our elections, just to name a few. I look forward to updating you on these and other important topics this morning. But i would like to begin by covering a few items that have been particularly top of mind for us at the fbi over the past few weeks. First, terrorism remains the fbis top priority, though, the nature of that threat has evolved significantly since 9 11, we are ever vigilant in our efforts to prevent attacks by International Terrorist groups like al qaeda and isis, those groups pose a threat not just to americans overseas but also here at home. Most notably by those we call home grown violent extremists, lone actors inspired by foreign terrorists, selfradicalized online and motivated to attack soft targets with readily available weapons. Were also working around the clock to prevent attacks by domestic terrorists who are inspired by one or more extremists ideologies to commit violent acts. In recent years, weve been laserfocused on threats posted by racially or ethically motivated violent extremists and they too are often radicalized online and move quickly to carry out their violent plans. As with any terrorism case, were focused on disruption, making arrests before a criminal can act. Just this year alone, through the hard work and dedication of countless men and women both at the fbi and across our partner agencies, weve successfully thwart thwarted terrorist attacks in kansas city, cleveland, oklahoma city, boston, phoenix and other locations. In recently months weve witnessed protests in various places around the country and many members of congress have raised a variety of questions about those protests and although the majority of protestors have been peaceful, we have opened investigations on individuals involved in critical activity at these protests. Some of whom adhere to violent extremist agendas designed to sow discord and upheaval. Let me be clear, we do not investigate groups or individuals based on ideology or on the exercise of First Amendment protected activity alone. When the ideology leads someone to commit criminal acts and pursue violence, the fbi will not hesitate to take appropriate action. Thats why weve been working closely with our federal, state and local partners to ensure the safety of our citizens, including the safety of those exercising their First Amendment right peacefully. We in Law Enforcement must keep our communities safe and secure while safeguarding our citizens Constitutional Rights and civil liberties. And as ive said before, one need not and must not come at the expense of the other. We also remain focused on other threats. In less than two months, americans will exercise one of their most cherished rights to vote in a free and fair election. Americans must have confidence in our Voting System and our election infrastructure. And thats why the security of our elections is and will continue to be one of our highest priorities. We are not going to tolerate foreign interference in our elections. And were working closely with our federal, state and local partners as well as the private sector to share information, bolster security and identity and disrupt any threats. Just recently, for example, we share threat indicators with facebook and twitter that allowed them to take down fake accounts as part of a Russian Disinformation Campaign before those accounts could develop some kind of broader following. Turning to the cyber arena, were focused on an increasingly diverse array of threats from our cyber adversaries, from statesponsored chinese intrusions to intrusions by russia, iran, north korea, sophisticated cyber criminals seeking to exploit technical vulnerabilities for personal profit. Last week i announced the fbis strategy leveraging the unique expertise and authorities to impose risks and consequences on our cyber adversaries. Were focusing on results on impact. That means were working to enable our partners operations as well as our own. So, for example, the fbi and nsa recently joined to expose highly sophisticated Russian Military intelligence malware providing the private sector and other government partners the indicators they need to disrupt that tool. And just last week, our investigations enabled a coordinated mix of disruption actions against five different iranian hacking groups, three of which worked for the iranian government, including criminal charges by doj, treasury sanctions and si sa and fbi alerts enabling potential victims to protect themselves. We also face the increasingly blended threat of state sponsored economic espionage facilitated by cyber intrusions. In july based on the fbis investigative work, carrying out a Global Computer Intrusion Campaign targeting hundreds of victims, including Companies Developing covid19 vaccines, Testing Technology and treatments. With that kind of behavior, china continues to undercut their own claims of being a trusted and effective partner in the international community. Last week, we unsealed charges against five chinese hackers who were targeting victims around the world from their safe haven in china. With our partners, we arrested two of their coconspirators in malaysia and seized or took down hundreds of the hackers accounts, servers and domains. Now, ive touched on only a handful of the important threats we face and only lightly at that, and of course there are many significant others. As the threats evolve in scale, impact, complexity and agility, were relying on our deep well of expertise, intelligence and partnerships. I am committed to ensuring that the bureau does great work while adhering to our core tenants of fidelity, bravery and integrity. In these challenging times, i remind my folks that weve got to keep calm and tackle hard, remaining faithful to our core values and best traditions while making sure that were always doing the right thing in the right way. Thank you. Id be happy to take your questions. Thank you, director wray. Our next witness is the honorable christopher miller. Mr. Miller was sworn in as the 7th director of the National Counterterrorism center in august of 2020. Prior to his confirmation, he served as the Deputy Assistant secretary of defense for special operations in combatting terrorism. Mr. Miller previously served as a special assistant to the president and senior director of counterterrorism and transNational Threats at the National Security counsel. He served in the army and joint special operations. Mr. Miller. Chairman johnson, Ranking Member peters and distinguished members of the committee, it is with deep humility that i appear before you today to present our views in the state of our war against islamic jihadist terrorist groups and other extremists that mean us harm. I represent an enormously president talented and committed group that is on duty 24 7 365 to protect our citizens from terrorist attack. Before i begin my prepared remarks, i want to publicly thank the department of justice for their tireless pursuit to bringing the beetles to justice in pardoner inship with our friends in the united kingdom. The beetles were isis leaders involved in the killing of americans. We are hopeful the families receive some degree of closure. This is a reminder to our enemies that we never forget and will pursue justice to the ends of the earth. 19 years ago after the shock of alaeque das devastated attacks, our nation set out to accomplish three objectives. One, harden our borders, two, go overseas to destroy the safe havens and sanctuaries of al quaeda and its associated groups, and three, address the drivers of instability that created al quaeda by supporting likeminded partners in their efforts to combat islamist extremism. Due to the enormous dedication, self lesser vis a Selfless Service of americans and likeminded foreign partners, we have been remarkably successful in accomplishing the first two objectives. I sense that we are on the verge, if providence is kind, of transitioning from a u. S. Led partnerenabled campaign to an era where local and regional partners take the lead and we provide them niche support to fill gaps in their security, intelligence, informational and legal architectures. I must be clear and not histrionic. Our enemies will successfully attack us again as their adaptation and innovation is driven by a profound hatred for what we represent. This is our terrorists dilemma and their strategic advantage. They only need to be successful once while our defenses must be successful all the time from preventing a cataclysmic attack. But our enemies have profoundly underestimated the resilience of the American People time and again. I wonder if the 9 11 al quaeda leaders regretted their decision to attack us. Im confident the survivors must. They saw it as soft, spoiled and morally unanchored. They are now either dead, imprisoned or in hiding awaiting death or capture. Their ideology is debunked in overwhelming majority of the islamic world. No one today misjudging our resolve and commitment to protecting the security of our citizens in using all available instruments of National Power against those that bring war and violence to our shores. However, as we have experienced in the past, purveyors of extremism will periodically amass the resources required to attack us. My principle concern is their potential acquisition and use of weapons of mass destruction. If history is an accurate guide, weapons developed are ultimately used. I do know that the American People can withstand anything they throw at us. In the use of wmd by a terrorist group would make our successful pursuit of the 9 11 attackers pail in comparison. Those that underestimate the fortitude, grit and resolve of the American People do so at their peril and any such attack would guarantee their elimination. Isis which originally formed as al quaeda in iraq is in crisis. Its caliphate is destroyed and its ideology is exposed as a brutal, perverse and horrifying abomination. The world recognizes that a positive and magnificent faith was hijacked by a handful of corrupt selfish opportunityists. Isiss territorial defeat in syria and iraq has forced the group to return to its insurgent roots and increase reliance on Global Networks to project a narrative of strength. With superb partners from the 86member coalition that defeated isis in the middle east, we continue our efforts to render isis permanently ef impotent. Even as we combat these enemies, we face new ones, including increasingly aggressive groups aligned with iran and domestic extremist motivated by a variety of ideologies. I am hopeful that in the coming year or two, we will be successful in destroying the remnants of al quaedas leadership and continue the attrition of isis, guaranteeing this does not become a multigenerational war. For the past 19 years, i have been involved in this struggle at all levels from the moonscape of southern afghanistan in 2001 to baghdad in 2003 to senior policy and strategic leadership in washington, d. C. And international as the ct strategist and advisory maker. The only sacrosanct lesson ive learned is that we must maintain pressure on these groups to preclude them from establishes safe haven. We must continue to be chastened by our relaxing of this constant pressure in 2011, which allowed for the creation of the largest most successful terrorist insurgency in iraq and syria. Its a testament to the sacrifice of a generation that we are now at a place where terrorism isnt the National Security priority but rather another issue of concern. But we must not overcorrect or disinvest before we solidify our gains and make them enduring. We face new crisis and challenges. We have sacrificed greatly. But as wars near their end, victory requires continued commitment and focus. This is what we owe to the next generation, that we saw it through and we ended it on our terms. I thank you for this bodys uncompromising support and partnership. I rest easier knowing that your support will continue as we maintain pressure on al quaeda and isis in these final battles. I look forward to your questions. Thank you director miller. Our final witness is the honorable cuccinelli. He previously served as the acting director of u. S. Citizenship and Immigration Services and served athe attorney general of the commonwealth of virginia where he led the states fight against human trafficking. Mr. Cuccinelli. Good morning chairman johnson, Ranking Member peters and distinguished members of the committee. Thank you for the opportunity to testify today. Im here to discuss the myriad of threats facing the American People and our homeland n. 2020, the men and women of the department of Homeland Security have carried out their protective mission with professional excellence as our nation faces unprecedented and dynamic challenges. From the pandemic to riots to natural disasters, Trump Administration has ensured that our personnel have the vital support and the resources they need to address evolving threats while continuing to fulfill our enduring nofail missions. Dhs has a clear mandate from president trump. At all times in all decisions in all dangers to keep the safety and prosperity of the American People as our first priority. Today, i will briefly comment on three National Threats that deserve specific attention, the civil unrest, domestic terrorism, and Transnational Criminal Organizations. When we talk about domestic terrorism, were talking about threats or acts of violence carried out against people or Critical Infrastructure in the u. S. To advance an ideological agenda or coerce policy or social change. These are generally conducted by americans and not linked to foreign terrorist organizations. Americans have the right to believe whatever they want. But there is no right to carry out act of violence to further those beliefs. That is when we move from protected speech to domestic terrorism. When the civil unrest by violent anarchists drag on for months in portland, oregon, and local leadership refuse to cooperate with law enforce. The department of Homeland Security defended the courthouse without hesitation. Despite being pelted with ieds, molotov cocktails, fireworks, metal pipes, hammers and more, our federal officers were resolute, sustaining more than 340 injuries in the course of their duties. Lawlessness has festered in too many of our communities. From chicago to seattle, minneapolis to new york, even lancaster, pennsylvania, and kenosha, wisconsin. The department will always uphold the right to peacefully protest, but there is no constitutional right to loot, to burn or to assault others. President trump has made it clear that we cannot and will not allow acts of violence, intimidation or chaos to prevail in american streets. And the department of Homeland Security is proud to participate in implementing such policies. On the Transnational Criminal Organization front, tcos as we frequently call them, and beyond illegal immigration at our borders, were also contending with the most deadly organizations in the western hemisphere, the mexican drug cartels. To put it in context, the power of these Transnational Criminal Organizations is so great that it is a destabilizing force to many governments in our hemisphere. Their attempts at drug smuggling and human trafficking, not to mention their regular brutal and violent tactics must be addressed. Last year in america, we lost 71,000 americans to drug overdoses. They happened in every one of your states and every one of your communities. And i know all of you are familiar and touched by those tragedies familiar with and touched by those tragedies. Consistently the majority of these deadly drugs and opioids are produced and smuggled by criminal organizations across our southern border. Working daily to decrease the flow of illegal drugs, dhs has seized 4 Million Pounds of hard drugs. Its worth noting that were on track to seize drugs at roughly twice the rate of the previous eight years. So, in these four years, weve seized about as many drugs as have been seized in the previous eight of the hard drugs. Were talking about fentanyl, meth, that level of drug seizures. Transnational criminal organizations and their allies are not content profiting off the destruction of lives through the drug trade. Theyre also destroying lives through human trafficking. The brandnew 330 miles of border wall on highimpact sectors pushes human traffickers and drug smugglers to locations where were best equipped to catch them, ports of entry. It makes their transnational efforts much harder and makes america safer. That is another reason this administrations delivery on the promise to build the wall and the system that goes with it is so very important. Finally while i address Election Security at length in my written testimony, i do want to reiterate that our goal at dhs, our fundamental goal, is to ensure that American Voters decide american elections. As we sit here in september of 2020, that seems an important point worth reiterating. Finally, we do need legislative help from congress in at least two areas. There are many we Work Together in, but there are two i would like to highlight. We need greater authority, or some authority, to designate transnational organized crime at a level below a foreign terrorist organization, but giving us authorities above the level of mere criminal law. We will not prosecute our way out of the tco problem. We also need the authority to address the drone threat in an appropriate manner. We cant study the problem forever. We do have some authorities provided by congress, but we need to be able to bring them down and have the money, the appropriations, to purchase the equipment to allow us to do that. This problem is wellstudied. The danger is understood. And we are frankly behind the curve in being equipmented ped address it. I would note in my view, especially at airports and the border are sensitive sites. The threats facing our homeland are vast and varied. Our men and women are embracing their duty to safeguard the American People. Thank you. Im now happy to answer your questions. Thank you, mr. Cuccinelli. Unfortunately, democrat leader schumer is obstructing the workings of the senate. So, we are bound by some Arcane Senate rule that because of his lack of consent, his obstruction, our hearing has to have a hard stop two hours after the convening the senate for business. So, again, unfortunately were going to have to im going to have to limit the amount of time of questioning to fiveminute rounds to make sure that every senator gets a chance to ask a question. And i will keep people closely to that five minutes. So, youll hear me interject if youre running over five minutes. Ill also ask the witnesses to be looking at their clocks as well and not ramble on past the fiveminute time. I want to make sure every member gets a chance to ask questions. For the time being, ill defer my questionsing, but i will for sure get it in even if a member doesnt get to ask questions toward the tail end of the hearing. But ill defer to senator peters right now. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Toks each of our witnesses for being here today. Director wray, im going to start with you and talk about election integrity, which you raised in your opening comments. Its important for us to put this in perspective that we know people are voting in states today all across the country. In michigan, today is the day you can go to your clerk and vote. And were going to have well over 2 million ballots are being mailed out starting today for absentee voters. You said last week at the house hearing that, quote, the steady drum beat of information, end of quote, is your number one concern for the election. You noted that the threat can lead to a, quote again, a lack of confidence in the American Voters and citizens and the validity of their vote, end of quote. So, given the covid19 pandemic, were seeing many more people vote by mail. As i mentioned, unprecedented numbers of absentee ballots have been asked for in the state of michigan. So, i want to dispel some of this drum beat of misinformation that were hearing out there. My question is very direct. Is voting my mail secure . Well, senator, i think what i would say is this. We take all electionrelated threats seriously, whether its voter fraud, voter suppression, whether its inperson, whether its by mail. And our role is to investigate the threat actors. Now, we have not seen historically any kind of coordinated National Voter fraud effort in a national election, whether its by mail or by otherwise. We have seen voter fraud at the local level from time to time. So, my comment should in no way be construed as minimizing how seriously we take our responsibility to investigate such incidents or the potential impact those things could have at the local level. So, its on our radar, certainly to change a federal election outcome by mounting that kind of fraud at scale would be a major challenge for an adversary. But people should make no mistake, were vigilant as to the threat. And watching it carefully because were in uncharted new territory. And i think as far as risk assessments of any states processes or systems, i would defer to mr. Cuccinelli. Your answer is clear. You have not seen any widespread fraud by mail. Its something the fbi watches continuously to make sure thats not happening. Thats something we investigate seriously, aggressively. So, the next question is, you know, effective interagency coordination is going to be very important. You mentioned mr. Cuccinelli with dhs says were all on this to make sure our votes are counted and its fair and free election. So, the question is what does that interagency cooperation look like and whos in charge . Of all of you that are involved in Election Security, who is in charge . Is it the white house . Is it fbi . Is it cyber con is another entity . Who should we look to as being in charge . Ill start and maybe mr. Cuccinelli wants to chime in as well. We all have different aspects of the problem. We have command posts where people from different agencies are stationed on that to make sure the glue, the connective tissue is there. As far as foreign influence, foreign influence here domestically, investigating that is the fbis lead as well as investigating cyber intrusions into election infrastructure. But dhs takes the lead nerin te of protecting infrastructure and mitigation. In response to that, you mentioned cyber con to the extent theres offensive cyber so, theres not necessarily one entity in charge. You take your you have your different lanes to run in. You cooperate but theres not one person as is true frankly with counterterrorism. Okay. We all Work Together and all take the lead and Work Together. I appreciate it. In the limited time i have, just the final question because you mentioned foreign misinformation. Give us advice. How can American Voters recognize an attempt by a Foreign Government to influence their opinion and vote . Its important i know behind the scenes youre working. Weve got the different agencies working. But how do we let the American Voter know this is a Disinformation Campaign thats perpetrated by a Foreign Government . How should they recognize that . I think its a challenge as your question alludes to. I would say when it comes to information about their vote itself, where to vote, when to vote, hours of the polling places, information about the po results, things like that, its important americans get that information from their official, state or local election website as opposed to relying on something that might be on social media, for example. As far as getting their news, which might shift or influence their views more broadly, i would encourage people to be critical thinkers and to get their news from a variety of sources and make up their own mind and be skeptical, discerning electorate, which is what i think is the best defense against maligned foreign influences with disinformation. Im out of time. Thank you. Senator lankford. Gentlemen, thank you very much for the work, and please thank the folks that work around you that we dont get a chance to meet in this pleasant setting, when we get a chance to gather every time together. Tell them thank you because they do a lot of work behind the scenes. Director wray, i want to ask you about some of the violence thats happened across the country in the past several months. Weve had hundreds and hundreds of peaceful protests on Racial Injustice around the country that we are grateful as a country we have that option to be able to have that peaceful protests. And people are allowed to be able to speak out and point issues out. But some of them have turned very violent. And some of your testimony in the house, it seemed that you were trending to try to connect some groups. Have you been able to identify groups or entities behind the scenes that seem to be organizing nationally to be to foment violence in some of these events . Or are you seeing these spontaneous events or small groups that are unconnected with others . So, senator, i appreciate the question and i appreciate the opportunity to try to be as clear as i can because this is an important topic. I think the first thing, big picture, is that as the chairman referenced in his opening comments, when you look across the country, youve got three broad categories. Youve got the peaceful protesters. Thats maybe the biggest number of people. Then youve got the second category, which is what i would describe as criminal opportunists, engaged in looting, lowlevel vandalism, et cetera. Then youve got a third group. While it might numerically be the smallest, its by far and away the most dangerous and most serious and the one we might have to go after most aggressively, which is the people who are clearly violating federal law, ieds, moll taf cocktails, targeting of Law Enforcement, arsons of government facilities and businesses sh et cetera. Who those people are, thats our priority. Thats our focus. Varies their motivation, what drives them from day to day, city to city. However, we have certainly seen a number of violent anarchist extremists participating in that mix. Ive gotten a lot of questions from a lot of people about antifa, for example. So, let me try to be as clear as i can about that. Antifa is a real thing. It is not a fiction. We have seen organized tactical activity at both the local and regional level. We have seen antifa adherence coalescing and working together in what i would describe as small groups and notes. All of this i said last week. But some of it got more clearly conveyed than others. We have a number of predicated investigations into some anarchist violent extremists who operate some who operate through these nodes and subscribe to or selfidentify with anarchist extremism including antifa. And we will not hesitate, will not hesitate, to aggressively investigate that kind of activity. So, were going to be looking at and we have been looking at their funding, their tactics, their tlogistics, their supply chain. Were going to pursue all available charges. There are also, in addition to that group, there are what i would describe as more militia types. And weve had plenty of those and weve got a number of investigations into those as well. But i think trying to put a lot of these things into nice neat clean buckets is a bit of a challenge because one of the things that we see more and more in the counterterrorism space is people who assemble together in some kind of mishmash a bunch of different ideologies. We sometimes refer to it as its almost like a salad bar of ideologies, a little bit of this, a little bit of that. And what they are really about is the violence. We are not going to stand for the violence. Nor should you. The American People are engaged in thoo. Peaceful protest is encouraged and allowed in our country. Violence is not on that. You and i have spoken several times about oklahomas specific issues and the mcgurt decision from the Supreme Court last yore and the significant change that is for the fbi and oklahoma. We are grateful for your engagement and i continue to be able to ask your engagement for Law Enforcement there in oklahoma as we deal with that and were grateful for that. Before we run out of time and ive only got a few seconds and i apologize for that. Its the issue of china. Director obrien has made the comment that theres a rise in china trying to be able to engage in our election this year and identified that as one of our greatest threats. Can you briefly comment on that and what youre seeing right now . Is it just influence or is it in actual Cyber Attacks in the system . Thanks senator. Im just i look at International Terrorism specifically, not really familiar with the can anyone else comment on that briefly . Sure, briefly. You know, each of the two areas you mentioned, china is a major threat. Theyre a rising power. And they have every intention of trying to rival and surpass us as a nation. And they have stolen our intellectual property at a level director wray said last week was a greatest transfer of wealth in the history of the world. Its the chinese stealing intellectual property from americans. And for purposes of for their strategic purposes, military intelligence and their economy, we also face them trying to exercise influence via money and their Media Enterprises much more overtly than most other countries are even able to. And last and absolutely not least in this country is their massive trade with us, which can be a positive, of course, for both sides. Its also used as a lever of influence. Thank you. Senator lankford, we were just informed that senator schumer invoked the rule today so we do not have a hard stop. You have another minute and 15 seconds if you would like to do that. And senators can tack on another two minutes now or we can do that later. Thank you. Well have 7minute rounds. Great. I appreciate that. Let me do my last minute and 15 seconds. I want to drill down this issue about china trying to malign influence for the election. When director obrien made that comment, were all very aware of how theyre trying to engage in our election. But his comment seems to be that china is being more aggressive behind the scenes this time than russia was. We also know that iran is trying to be able to influence our elections. Didnt know if theres any clarity any of you could bring to that. Obviously hes not sitting at the table today, but if there are any other comments about that. I would just note that the way china acts in that arena is different than russia and iran. In part because they have so many more levers. Iran and russia dont have the trade with us that china has. They dont have the relationships at every level of government that china has. And they dont have the connections to our economy and so forth. So, they dont have the levers that china has available to them. Weve seen through this year, covid was an excellent example as we roll into the election season, where theyve got ambassadors in other countries, theyve got their foreign minister. Theyre taking on false narratives aimed at the United States very overtly and then spreading them through their Media Outlets in ways that our other opoepts dont have available to them. So, its a very unique attack. Thank you. Senator peters, would you like to take your two minutes now . Just so everybody knows, im in quarantine so i wont be voting. I will definitely defer my questions until the very end. Senator peters, do you want to go . Yeah, if i could, ill take a quick two minutes. Quick question to continue with director wray. Director wray, online extremist conspiracy theories have kind of jumped out of obscure web forms and fortunately now are prominently featured on traditional social media. Even more concerning, theyre manifesting themselves in real world incidents of violence. So, my question to you, mr. Wray, is there a risk that foreign actors will try to leverage some americans belief in some of these conspiracy theories that are floating around quite widely . And will they use that to engineer some violent confrontations . How concerned should we be about that . Certain think there are two strands that youre alluding to there that were concerned about. One is the sheer impact of social media on the threats that we face, right . So, in the terrorism context, we say that terrorism today moves at the speed of social media. And thats really across all the different terrorist threats. Then separately you have this effect also facilitated by social media where foreign adversaries willi identify trends, divisive issues, in some cases conspiracy theories that they will then in effect piggyback on and amplify and push to suit their own policy goals and propaganda. And we see that across a range of adversaries. Russia, of course, but also china, also iran. And so its a real concern. Now, whether or not the second trend will ultimately manifest itself in terms of violence, hard to say. But certainly there is an effort to sow upheaval and discord. And as weve seen around the country, discord and upheaval can lead to dangerous violent criminal activity that well have go after very aggressively. This is something the fbi is very focused on, i would hope. Yes. Thank you. Senator haasen. Thank you, mr. Chair and Ranking Member peters for this hearing. Thank you to your witnesses for being here today, and please thank all the women and men with whom you serve for their excellent work keeping us safe. This hearing is about threats to the homeland. Before we begin, we must acknowledge a new and dangerous threat to our country and our constitution. The president of the United States refusal to promise a peaceful transfer of power if he loses the election. Today i call on every person who has sworn an oath to uphold the constitution, including my fellow senators, to condemn the president s remarks and to recommit to ensuring a peaceful transfer of power, whatever the outcome of this election. Some of the members of this committee from both parties have already done so, and i appreciate their words. I hope that the rest of the committee will speak out as well. Now, to director wray, at last years threats to the homeland hearing, we discussed the growing threat of ran some wear attacks to our communities. Over the past six months, theres been a further uptick on rans ransomware attacks. There has been a spate of ran some ware attacks on our schools as districts have migrated to online learning. Our communities do not have the resources to effectively counter a wide range of Cyber Threats on their own, including ransomware. I appreciated your discussion on Cyber Threats. Can you drill down a bit more on what the fbi is doing to protect state and local governments and other attacks to deter malicious adversaries. I appreciate the question and recall our exchange from last year. Certainly ransomware is a concerning part of the cyber threat we face. And the threat of ransomware against state and local governments is particularly high. There are a variety of reasons why actors target municipalities, hospitals, police forces, et cetera. Right. We one of the things that we have done recently is through our National Cyber Investigative Joint Task force. We have brought together the whole of government effort to focus across multiple agencies, Intelligence Community and Law Enforcement on the most damaging ransomware variants. And some of that is through investigative activity disruptions. Some of that is through outreach and engagement where we work closely with sisa at dhs to help educate those entities on how to better harden and protect their infrastructure. Because certainly having good cyber hygiene back ups, et cetera, is one of the best defenses against ransomware. We are seeing something that concerns me in particular a growing trend to see ransomware actors essentially sharing ransomware across different activity. That means some of the most sophisticated forms of ransomware are potentially available to less sophisticated actors. Its a version of cyber crime as a service, which is deeply troubling and increases the risk. Were also seeing a greater trend of ransomware actors essentially piecemeal pushing out the information. In other words, rather than just locking it up and encrypting it and holding it ransom, theyre releasing little bits of time as a way of increasing. The pressure. Thank you. I appreciate that very much. I look forward to working with you on that. Director wray, i also wanted to touch on another issue. I was pleased to see tuesdays announcement about operation disruptor, an effort to stop Drug Trafficking on the dark web. This operation resulted in the seizure of fentanyl and dozens of firearms as well as the arrests of 179 people. Needless to say this was a significant operation. I appreciate the work of the federal agents who carried it out. Last week i wrote a letter to you and the attorney general asking for more information about efforts to combat Drug Trafficking on the dark web. Senator feinstein joined the letter as well. We requested a reply by october 15th. Can you commit to that date which is still three weeks away . I will get you a response as promptly as possible. Not having had a chance to read the letter yet, i dont know how involved a response would need. Right. But certainly we appreciate your focus on the issue. And j code, which is the essential wi essentially the operation that weve stood up that spins off these things Like Operation disruptor, is i think, a really exciting effective tool, a coordinated interagency tool, not just the fbi, to disrupt and dismantle dark net marketplaces which is a really particularly important part of the opioid problem were facing. Absolutely. So, i thank you. And i would look forward to further conversation about what Additional Resources congress could provide to help bole administer those efforts. Im going to move on to one last question if thats all right. To director miller and director wray. Last december a member of the saudi military in the United States on a Training Mission killed three people and injured eight in pensacola, florida. Al quaedas yemeni affiliate claimed the attack. Director miller and director wray, do you feel confident with the adequacy of screening done by the u. S. On Foreign Military training in the country. And how would you assess the vulnerabilities of the Exchange Program . Thank you, senator. Obviously of great concern. Thanks for the question. Adaptive innovative enemy that means us great harm, they found a loophole. The loopholes been closed. Im confident in the department of defenses efforts to recognize the security protocols and screening need to work. But they found a loophole and they exploited it. Thank you. And director wray. I do think the department of defense has taken important strides to address the vulnerability there. Of course theres also Important Role for the saudi government to play. And theyve been cooperative at durc different times on this issue. But theyre an incredibly important partner if were going to prevent Something Like happened in pensacola again. Thank you. I appreciate all of your work very much. Director miller, as a New Hampshire senator, i thank you for everything you have done to bring the killer of james foley to justice. Thank you, senator. Senator romney. Thank you, mr. Chairman, and thank you for each of the panelists for the work that you do. Deeply appreciate the work of the men and women who work in your respective organizations that are working every day to keep us safe. Director wray, with regards to foreign Cyber Threats and theft, i think we can agree that best defense is a good offense. China, russia, iran are only going to stop attacking us in a cyber way if theyre hurt more than we are. I guess the question is do you believe our offensive Cyber Efforts are as effective as they should be . And if not, what should we be adding . So, certainly i agree with you that an important part of fighting back against our foreign adversaries in the cyber realm is offense as well as defense. Thats a big part of this new strategy, fbi strategy that i rolled out, which is the idea that i obliquely referenced in my Opening Statement, about focusing on results and maximizing impact. Sometimes the way to maximize impact is through Law Enforcement action that we would take. Sometimes its through sanctions. But sometimes its through offensive cyber operations. And we are very focused on making sure that intelligence and information that we develop through our invaes guy tif work is shared with your partners to enable their operations offensively. So, through our National Cyber Investigative Joint Task force were much more effective in partnering with the el advantre and dod agencies on that. Obviously its a growing area and were getting more sophisticated all the time. And youll ner find an fbi director that would welcome more tools. I think youre right to raise the issue. Thank you, sir. Director miller, i appreciate your cleareyed unvarnished update on where we are. With regards to weapons of mass destruction, do other nation states recognize just how severe a threat it would be for a weapon of mass destruction to fall in the hands of a nonstate actor and to be used against us or anyone else for that matter . Do they recognize that . And are they taking sufficient actions to secure their Nuclear Capabilities . Thanks, senator, for that question. I can say definitively with our partners that they take it seriously. I cant dispute the fact that they provide such weapons. Obviously if something if a nation state was so unsophisticated to do Something Like that, i feel strongly that it would probably result in just catastrophic effects on them. Its what were seeing really is they recognize our terrorist enemies recognize that that is the one thing they havent been able to use against us. We have targeted again and again and will continue to prioritize any terrorist groups that are trying to acquire those types of weapon systems. Thank you. Director wray and m mr. Cuccinelli, i think we have watched with dismay as what have begun as peaceful protests turn violent, where heavily masked, apparently organized individuals come in and do destruction and in some cases cause death. It seems, in many respects, that were not as effective as we would like to be in preventing or stopping people of that nature. Sometimes we wonder whether we need more police on the front lines. Do we need National Guard . Do we need heavier equipment . Other times its like, no, no, that will only encourage the violence to occur. Given your experience so far, what are we doing wrong . What should we be doing better to prevent what began as peaceful protests from being, if you will, kidnapped by these small groups of whether its antifa or other violent groups of anarchists . How can we shut them down as violence begins to occur in a way that were not doing now . Do you want to go first . Ill start and then turn it over to mr. Cuccinelli. I think at a big picture level, if you look across the country, the places that have been most effective in countering the kind of violence and dangerous criminal activity that youre describing, preventing those bad actors from hijacking otherwise peaceful protests has been quick, prompt robust partnerships between federal, state and local Law Enforcement. Where all the partners have worked together quickly, all on the same page, all with the same mission all aligned, its usually been nipped in the bud which has allowed both peaceful protests to continue, but has also prevented dangerous violence from really fomenting and spreading. Yeah, senator, i would add that first of all i would double down on the directors comment about the necessity of state, local and federal cooperation. Where you see ready smooth cooperation at the professional level were not talking about mayors and city councils. Were talking about when they dont interfere with their polices ability to interact with those of us at doj and dhs. Thats where you see success. And i would say in terms of tactics, its a peace through strength approach. It isnt that we want to engage in the battles. Its that we want to deter them and allow the peaceful protesting to go on peacefully. And the way that has succeeded in the country over the last several months is where there is sufficient responsible Law Enforcement in place, violence is deterred and peaceful protesting can continue. I would just note this is overwhelmingly or largely in the hands of state and local authorities. We have limitations on our federal jurisdictional authority, more so at dhs than doj, we all respect our legal boundaries of authority. That leaves many people sometimes to be frustrated about why we not be doing more in city x. Well, take portland. We have federal facilities were protecting the people there, but theres no jurisdiction on the part of Homeland Security to Police Portland in the way their police do, even though their police wont cooperate with our officers and the result is greater violence. Thank you. Mr. Cuccinelli, real quick you sent a video of a press conference with the chief of police of chicago. If you could describe that. The video the chairman is referring to is the july 20th press conference by superintendent brown who is the police chief in chicago. And youll recall when he had 49 officers injured during what amounted to an attack on a Christopher Columbus statue in that city. And that press conference, the first 14 minutes, is, in my view, the most clear and simple description, and he shows it to you. He just doesnt tell you. He shows you the video footage of the transformation of what clearly starts out as what looks like any other peaceful protest in any other city, literally marching down the street, Police Protection in front and back, and then it takes a left turn into the park. They use drone footage, showing people changing into the black clothing, show you people dropping bags worth of weapons to be used against the police, the transformation of the pvc pipes to hold the banner and pulling those apart and using those as weapons, the use of umbrellas. And its it is truly one of the clearest examples and best explained that ive seen anywhere since these protests turned violent have happened this summer. Its the july 20th press conference by superintendent brown of chicago. And i would urge anyone interested in this subject to pull it up on youtube and watch it. Thank you, mr. Cuccinelli. It certainly shows that in this case it wasnt spontaneous violence. This was well organized. Clearly planned ahead, yes. And it was violent. Senator rosen. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Thanks to the Ranking Member. Thank you to all of you for being here today and the important work that you and your teams do and the analysis that you are all engaging in. Earlier this month, we know americans learned from drafts of the 2020 dhs threat assessment that White Supremacists present the greatest Terror Threat to our nation. The earliest draft refers to white supremacist extremists and i quote, presenting the most lethal threat, unquote, whereas later drafts of the report softened the language on the white supremacist threat. Mr. Cuccinelli, i was alarmed to see a whistleblower complaint alleging that you personally ordered him to, quote, modify the section on White Supremacy in a matter that made a threat appear less severe to ensure they matched up with the Public Comments by president trump. And i ended that quote. Mr. Cuccinelli, do you agree with fbi director wray that the top threat we face stems from racially and ethnically motivated violent extremists . I certainly think that the lethality analysis that you cited is correct. Its been the position of the department of Homeland Security for some time. It has not been changed, despite the implications of your question. And so, why change. And we dont to believe that is true and it isnt a belief. Its just looking at the data. When White Supremacists act as terrorists, more people per incident are killed. That is a higher lethality. Thats what were referring to. So, why the change between the earlier and most recent drafts to soften the language if you believe that thats true . We have not softened the language and youll see when the final report is out that the what youre describing is still in our homeland threat assessment. So, your concerns in that regard i can put to rest. Well, why did you order mr. Murphy, then, to down play the threat . Oh, i absolutely did not do that. That did not happen. So, you dont have the metrics that you personally used to assess the intelligence products . Would you provide those that you would say that theyre good or bad, how you assess the threats and to be sure not down playing . Well, the metric used with respect to the subject you and i were just talking about was the number of deaths. Its a ratio, deaths per incident. Because that ratio is highest among Domestic Violence extremists, White Supremacists terrorists, as opposed to other types we face, that leads to the conclusion, mathematically, that they have the highest lethality, at least in recent years. I look forward to working with you and your team in trying to down work on stopping those threats, to eliminate those threats and keep our community safer. But i do have another question for you while i have you here. I am disturbed i guess thats a mild way to put it disturbed by the allegations weve all heard about forced hysterectomies taking place in an i. C. E. Facility in georgia. These are assaults on womenss bodies. Have you gone to facility in georgia and who was with with you . I would agree with you that those are shocking allegations and as a result i immediately dispatched a team from outside of i. C. E. Including a doctor from the coast guard, attorney, and one member of my staff whos retired army nurse as well to review the records of that facility. And im happy to report that at this stage, the Inspector General is still doing a more in depth review, but at this stage, the documentation indicates that there were over the course of four years, two hysterectomies performed on two women. And that is confirmed by the nearby medical facilities where those procedures take place. They came to the same numerical conclusion that we did. But as i said, the Inspector General is continuing to investigate that. And i should also that one of the lawyers that filed the complaint last friday was reported by the ap as indicating that they hasnt talked to anyone who had a hysterectomy but they wanted the department to investigate. That is not a legitimate basis to bring complaint. You didnt answer the question. Did you go down to georgia yourself . No, i didnt go with that team. I dispatched that team to go literally within a day or two of the allegations. So, you havent been there for yourself . Thats all im asking . I have not been to that facility. Thank you. I would like to move on to director miller. Talk a little bit about iran quickly in the time we have left. In your testimony, you noted that iran has an ability to employ and support terrorism within the United States. You also stated that hezbollah has extended its reach into the United States in recent years. As recently as 2018, two iranians were arrested in the u. S. For surveilling iranian activists and jewish groups and passing the information back to iran. So, can you please outline for us the threat to the homeland from iran and its terrorist proxy hezbollah . Yes, thank you senator for that great question and of great concern. As we saul know, iran is the greatest state sponsor of terror in the world and continues to plot against america all the time, as almost as if its part of their strategic calculus. And greatly concerned by their continued ambition as well as aggressiveness. And its something that, of course, all three of us at this table look at probably several times a day. And our men and women are on point on this but absolutely of concern. But at this point, you know, a lot of times the iranian bark is louder than the bite, and we want to keep it that way. But its still, obviously, one of our principle threats. Well, thank you. I look forward to working with you to find out what congress can do to improve interagency collaboration to keep irans bark worse than its bite particularly when it comes to the effects. Thank you mr. Chairman. I yield back. Thank you senator rosen. Senator scott. Thank you chairman johnson for hosting us today. I want to thank each of our witnesses here today for what you do. I want to particularly thank director wray forparticularly tk director wray for his efforts and i had a great trip to the tip center. Its a Wonderful Group of people that are working hard to make sure with a lot of tips, how to figure out how to make sure things get directed down to the right person. I also want to thank director wray for the efforts after the pensacola shooting to keep us informed and try to figure out how we make sure Something Like that does not happen again. I want to thank the fbi for their hard work. Its disgusting what has been going on with Law Enforcement and how it is been treated. The insults they are taking. The things that are thrown at them. Its disgusting. It reminds me of what happened to people that were coming back from vietnam. They were treated disgustingly. You are not the ones who chose to go. He chose to defend the freedom of this country and they followed orders that they were given. Last week, i did a resolution on the center floor supporting the men and women of Law Enforcement. It shocked me that members of the Democratic Party decided to block it. I just cannot imagine that just a simple resolution to support the members of Law Enforcement would not get supported by everybody in this country, especially by the u. S. Senate. What are you all doing how does it impact the morality of the Law Enforcement when you see how badly Law Enforcement is treated and what are you all doing to make sure that the members of Law Enforcement that you work with and others are safe . Senator, i appreciate both your comments about the fbi and even more your concern about the women and women of Law Enforcement around this country. I will say that this is personal for me and personal for us at the fbi. All of the state local Law Enforcement department as we were talking about, have members on our task forces and we work with them every day. I will tell you that the rate of violence, including lethal, felonious lethal violence against Law Enforcement is up significantly this year from last year. When i say it is personal, i mean that in a different sense as well. It is what i started doing when i became director. I was going to call in every time an officer was killed in the line of duty. Shot and killed i was going to call the chief or sheriff myself. My staff gives me a picture of the dead officer with the description of the family. We call the chief and sheriff and we have a conversation. I express my condolences and i will tell you that i have to make way too many of those calls. In fact, in late august and Early September of this year, and in about 1 15day period, i had to make seven of those calls, that is basically one every other day. Each one of those officers was a son, a daughter, a mother, a father. A beloved family member. Community members and all they do is get out and tried to serve the public and sometimes i scratch my head at why more people cannot appreciate how special it is for somebody to be willing to get up every morning and put his life on the land on the line or her life on the line for complete stranger. To do it once is extraordinary, but to do that for a living every day. Then when you pack on top of that the impact of covid on the Law Enforcement, i think there are close to 90 line for cement officers around this country who die as a result of covid. When you put all of those things together they are out there protecting the public, so they are more at risk. It breaks my heart. Thank you. Doctor miller. How doesnt make you feel when you see how badly Law Enforcement is being treated right now. And what are you doing to make sure people are safe . My father was a career Law Enforcement officer. In my current capacity and focused on International Terrorism, but as a citizen and as a son and father who didnt dedicated his career, i am also incredibly humbled by the commitment and selfless servant of Law Enforcement of men and women. Senator, dhs Law Enforcement officers we take your question very seriously. And its certainly something that we talk about in the leadership, is maintain that morale. Theyre doing something as the director described, that no one else in america is asked to do. No one else in this country we are asked to get up every morning, to put on a gun with the possibility of them using it to stand between us and evil. There is no real sign that evil is going away. We are going to keep meeting these folks, and i think back to George Washingtons description of veterans. You are ability to recruit your next round of troops, i am paraphrasing of course, is going to be heavily dependent on how they see your treatment of the last round of troops. The veterans, of course, for him coming out of the revolutionary war. The same is true for our Police Officers. They deserve our respect in a way that very few other people in our society do. What we have found is that while the public discussion can be very rough and tumble, i will describe it, they respond very positively when they see leadership in their Department Going out and affirmatively defending them and taking the position you just described. I know they appreciate it when they see you doing it. I know they appreciate it when they see is doing, it because they tell us. That it really matters a lot that you all in this body pay them the respect they are due. I am sorry the resolution played out the way it did. I am a shocked as you are, just based on the subject matter, but it is very important that you all use your leadership to encourage Law Enforcement all across the country. Thank you big for reaching out. We had 51 members of Law Enforcement who died in the line of duty in my years as governor. I wanted all their funerals. You get to meet their families. Big almost all of them seem to have young kids, and your heart goes out to them. Thank you for what you are doing. Big anybody you come into contact with with regard to Law Enforcement know how much we appreciate them. Senator paul . I would like to begin by wishing a speedy recovery to the two Police Officers and louisville who were shot yesterday in the line of duty. I joined senator scott and others and saying we have to appreciate our police more generally. They are protecting us from the vandals, the marauders, the arsonists in our cities and it is not just the democrat proposition of defunding the police that threatens us, it is also the idea that if we dont appreciate our police, we wont have more volunteering to become policemen in the next generation. It is imperative that we do show our appreciation for these people who are risking their lives to keep us safe. My wife and i know about this personally, as you saw from the video going into this. We were attacked by a mob in d. C. , just a few weeks ago. For those of you who doubt that the mob had violent intent, immediately after we were safely into the hotel, or somewhat safe in our hotel, one of the Police Officers was assaulted and received stitches in his face. What bothered me is, i commend them for their heroism. I actually believed they saved our lives. For the person who assaulted the policeman was out of state. He was released on his own recognizance. I tweeted out somewhat snorkel, if you are looking if you might look in kenosha. But i do think we have to investigate these people and we have to put more blame or blame. As we need to find out who is financing. Them if you are from out of state and attack someone from d. C. , i would think that the fbi or federal authorities should investigate. How did he get there . Who is paying for it . I can tell you that black lives matter is supporting these folks, and that we should not shy away from attributing blame where blame goes. When we were attacked, the head of black lives matter had this to say. She said we could see the fear in their faces and that is how we want them to live. Their goal is terrorism. They are admitting. If you look at their exchanges online and social media, they are saying their goal is to terrorize public officials, and really anybody. Many of the people in the restaurants are being terrorized are not public officials, but their goal is terror. Whether or not that equates to something that you can legally investigate, i do not know, but we should know that. We should let Corporate America know that. Corporate americas giving millions of dollars to something they perceive as an anti racist group. In reality, it is a group that is funding terror and funding terrorists to go from city to city. I dont think probably anyone can comment directly on the Police Officer that was assaulted that was protecting my wife and i, but i guess in general, director wray, the Police Officer being attacked by someone out of state, do you think that can fall under the purview that the fbi, the fbi investigating cases like this where people from out of state or doing something you think would be a local crime to be investigated, but if they are from out of state, is there a federal angle to an investigation . Senator, first let me say i appreciate your sympathy and appreciation to that officer, and we are pleased that the offender was charged. Obviously, the release is concerning. I would say that when it comes to interstate travel, there are sometimes federal charges that we could bring. There are federal rioting charges that we have started trying to use around the country where we can. There are a variety of interstate calmest commerce type books that we are looking we are aggressively looking for the same kinds of things that you are pointing to. Funding, supply chains, Networks Communications with others in different parts of the country. Certainly, the interstate travelers are off and some of the most serious offenders. I know in portland, for example, there were a couple of individuals that i could think of off the top of my head who were coming from a different state hug. They were in one case threatening to blow up a building, another case attempting to attack a building and charges were brought in both of those instances. Wherever we could find a tool or a legally available weapon to go after those people, we are going to use it, because while there are certainly a large number or even a majority of people out there who are protesting peacefully, it does not take very many big, as you experienced, you and your wife that really shocking video that was played. It does not take very many people to suddenly cause very serious harm. I think the frustration is that there is one guy on the internet who has been arrested 26 times and there has got to be some sort of cumulative nature to that many crimes and weve got to be at some point able to hold them. I do think really arresting is a good idea. If i were in portland i would arrest them on every night, the ones that are committing infractions. Its not life in prison, but you should get 24 hours in a cell and a hearing the next day and be booked. But weve got to do something. I think the lack of doing anything is encouraging more of this. The people who were in the mob that attacked us, within 20 minutes, people were isolating their faces and saying here is a picture of him in louisville. Here is a picture of him in memphis. Heres a picture of him in portland. There is some connection and it costs money to travel places. There were dozens staying in hotels near the white house that average over 500 dollars a night. I think it is important that we look at it. Im very concerned about free speech and not going after groups for speech. I sympathize with some of the reforms. I had an act called the Breonna Taylor acted to get rid of no knock rates. Many Police Officers actually agree that the no knock rates may be necessary. But at the same time, if the trail leads to black lives matters, there is an Important Service to the corporations who think they are giving money to a peaceful protest, or to a peaceful antiracial group. Need to be aware if theyre being flown around. There is an important call to not having more money flood into a group, if that is what is happening. Well i would say is we should not be afraid of allegations that this is just a peaceful group, so we cannot touch them. We do need to trace the money from people who are committing crimes. If it is coming from an organization that may have multi purposes and say they have a First Amendment right. They dont have a right to fund mayhem. I hope it will be pursuit. Feel free to respond to that or. Not thank you, senator. Two quick points. One, i could not agree more on the repeat offender aspect of it, and one of the things we are doing in portland and other places is trying to work with our state and local partners to essentially identify who is going in and out of the state local system. Either because it is getting released on bail door otherwise. We prioritize those individuals to see if there is some federal charge, because often that can result in detention and more stiff sentences. Then on the funding peace following the money is kind of our bread and butter. It is something we are looking at, as i said, including, which i think goes to a little bit to your last point including situations where somebody might be misrepresenting what it is they are fundraising for, right . Certain crowd sourcing or activities where somebody contributes thinking theyre giving for something that is a First Amendment activity, but in fact it may be used for Something Else that is much more pernicious. We are looking at that as well. One final comment. The people who are being heard the worst and people who are living in these communities said the people who say i want to help people into the port sections of chicago, the poor sections of d. C. Need to realize when you burned down the last pharmacy, when you burned down the last mcdonalds or walmart, that it hurts the people who live there. Many of these businesses will not get. Back that cannot be emphasized enough from a humanitarian point of view. We have got to end the violence, because your hurting the very people you think you are trying to help. Thank you. Thank you, senator paul. I appreciate your comments and i really am sorry that you and your wife had to endure that kind of abuse. Senator portman . Thank, you mister chairman. As we have seen today, our annual discussion about the threats to the homeland big is full of threat. It is a busy time for all of you. I want to start by thanking the men and women who work for you. I hope you will pass along our respect and support for them. We rely on them, as senator paul has just indicated. To keep us all safe, to keep our communities safe. At the state and local level, but also the people who you represent here today doug. Weve got a lot of threats during the president ial election, we had foreign actors trying to intervene in our election again. That is a threat. We are experiencing these protests in the wake of the tragic death of george floyd, Breonna Taylor. Other events as i have repeated many times, of course i support peoples right to protest peacefully. It is protected by our constitution. I also support Police Reform. It was discussed earlier that some things have been blocked around here. We actually had a Police Reform bill that was common sense. We had a lot of provisions on a bipartisan basis. It was blocked even for consideration by the other side. I think that is cynical. I think we should have had that debate and discussion. We should have passed something, including some ideas that senator paul just talked about. Ive got to tell you, the riots big and particularly the damage to our communities. The arson, looting, the desecration of property. When i say our communities, often these are communities of color. Nothing upsets me more then seeing entrepreneurs in one of these communities, like the African American guy in ohio or the hispanic woman i have seen in other news broadcasts who say, i spent my life building this business and now it has been destroyed. Of course, the harm to individuals lead, to citizens, and particularly the violence against federal state and local officers. Doctor wray said it was heartbreaking. I think it is a good way to put it. These people are doing their job. By the way, they get paid very little compared to what a lot of people are getting paid around this place. Or frankly even some of the demonstrators who are assaulting them. Taking out their frustrations on these guys. Its not fair. Its not acceptable. I want to express my condolences for dave underwood. He was one of yours. Dhs protective Service Officer who was killed while trying to protect the courthouse in oakland california. Big 300 injuries, over 300 injuries have been sustained in portland. Of course we wish all these officers a speedy recovery, including getting their sight and hearing back. It was just discussed that two officers were shot last night. These two officers, of course we wish them a speedy recovery, but to their families, and you talk about trying to recruit people into this business. Wow . I wonder what their families think about that. I was with a family recently, two weeks ago in ohio, in a visitation for an officer, and he is one of your guys, officer scorn of itch was working with the fbi and working with state and local Law Enforcement. On a Violent Crime task force. Operation legend. He was gunned down in his car by three teenagers. Unprovoked. Just gunned down in his car. His family was incredible. Look what they were so courageous and response to this. N ththey were so committed to te notion that jimmy died and service to his country doing exactly what he wanted to do in life. God bless them. Its like talking to the families of our military who have fallen into this violence must stop. This too is a threat to our homeland. We have talked today, as dr. Mueller said, the terrorist groups are kind of isis and others continue on the attack. That is a threat. We cannot forget. We cannot take our eye off the ball. It is confirmed in this committee decider cyberattacks are on the rise. We did a permanent subcommittee investigation recently about this issue, and i think you should know secretary cuccinelli, i am very concerned with the implementation of some of our federal agencies are just not doing. It they are not protecting themselves, which means theyre not protecting the taxpayers or the government. Weve got to Work Together to put the fire walls in place more effectively. So many other im going to ask about three specific threats quickly. The first of which is these transnational terror groups that are shipping poison into our communities. They keep doing it. It has increased. I am pleased that 4 Million Pounds of hard drugs have been recently apprehended. Crystal meth, heroin, cocaine and so on. I do believe that the ultimate answer to this issue lies on the demand side. We spent over five billion dollars of additional federal money just over the last few years on prevention, on treatment, services, longer term recovery, and weve got to keep that. Up unfortunately, we have seen a reversal during the covid period in the last several months on Overdose Deaths after finally getting to the point where we were making progress on that. 20 reduction in ohio in 2018. After three decades of increases. Now we are going the other way. Weve got to deal with the supply side as well, because when it flows into this country, it is poison, it is cheaper, it is more accessible. I want to focus just for one second on fentanyl. We know it mostly comes from china by mail. The stock act, you all worked with us on that legislation. We got it passed. It is supposed to keep the stuff from coming in from china. How do you think it is working . I know on either side of the panel weve got a lot of experience with the stock act. How is it working from a few fbi point of view . They have started aggressively pursuing small package inspections at a level that we have not done before. That has proven fruitful. Of course our adversaries adjust they tend to be adjusting by going through mexico. That is their path of adjustment, that we are observing. We are going to keep up the pressure in that space. If for no other reason, its like my comments earlier about driving people into the ports of entry. If we could minimize their opportunity points, we can focus our efforts, all of us together on those avenues of approach that we know they are using, and we do need the help of this body to continue that effort. I know that the commitment is there. I know especially on this sort of particular issue, senator, you have been very strong for a long time. We very much appreciate that it vhs. Lets keep the stock act in place and it is not coming by mail from mexico, its coming overland, although some are both. The stock act helped there as well. I know im getting close im going over my time. Chairman, can you give me a chance quickly to ask about the two other threats. And we will get back to you, director wray if thats okay. When is safeguarding our research and i love what you said about the greatest transfer of wealth in the history of the world. Who have systematically targeted our research. It is a threat to the homeland. It really is. I guess what i would say is with this new legislation that came out of this committee, the chairman marked it up, it is going to the floor in the census as part of a proposal by senator mcconnell, safeguarding American Innovation act. With that help you, directory to do your job. You say every ten hours in a china related investigation. This is you know provides a new criminal fraud charge under title 18. That give you the tools to be able to protect homeland from this threat . Senator, i very much appreciate the legislation. We do think it will help. I want to underscore some of the points that you have made. From our perspective, and i have said this repeatedly and publicly since pretty early in my tenders. There is no adversary that presents a broader and more comprehensive threat to our democratic ideas, or innovation, our Economic Security then the government of china. We are up about 1300 percent in terms of economic espionage investigations. Tied back to china over the past decade. 2000 plus active investigations tied back to the government of china, by far the greatest chunk of our intelligence portfolio. China sees itself on the issues that you are raising in terms of research as engaged in an international we have this reverse phenomenon where you have a pipeline of u. S. Technology, property and Research Back to china for their nationalist purposes, essentially misappropriating u. S. Tax player dialers in the process. I appreciate the leader ship youve shown in the legislation and otherwise on this topic. We are trying to tackle through investigations. I think we have had about talent plan arrest a month almost the. Syria covers almost every region of the country. We are very concerned about chinas military civil fusion policy, where essentially they overtly focused on channeling even what appeared to be civilian Research Intellectual Property in advance to their military aims. As one illustration of that, certain members of this committee may know that we have now recently started discovering pla researchers in the country who were concealing their ties back to the pla. That is a real concern as well. This is a major issue and it is our highest Counter Intelligence priority for a reason, because it will shape what this country is like in 25 or 30 years. My time has expired. I appreciate your indulgence, mister chairman. Let me just say this. Your personal commitment that this is very much appreciated. It was not always so at the fbi. Did you know when we had our hearing after a year long investigation, it was shocking what we learned . The fbi to their credit testified and said basically we have been asleep at the switch on this for a while. Two decades. We need to increase what we are doing in terms of prosecution and investigations, and boy they have. Doj and fbi have really stepped up. Unfortunately, it is absolutely necessary. A question about the nonprofit security Grant Program. I will follow up with you about that in writing. We think its working. Weve got good experience back home with groups that are not just getting funding but they are getting your expertise. They are getting the best practices. You are getting the professional help as to how to protect themselves. These are synagogues, churches, mosques, pushing back against the domestic terrorism and threats including islamic extremist and white supremacist. We know we have a new program you are looking at two followup. With that, thank you gentlemen, very much and mister chairman for your indulgence. Say i want to say the legislation he referred to as Bipartisan Legislation hand i coauthored. I want to second anne it with respect to the good work the fbi is doing in support of our efforts. This legislation should be before the senate. We should have the opportunity to see this signed into law. Well said. Well said. Thank you. I want to look i want to say to our witnesses, thank you for being here. Thank you for the work that you do. Thank you very much for the work for the people you lead to do for all of us every single day. I just want to take a minute to ask you about kentucky. My sister lives and win chester, kentucky. This is personal for our family. No one has been charged in the connection with Breonna Taylors death and we need to know why. Breonna Taylor Family need to know why. We all need to remember the words of Breonna Taylors mother from earlier this summer. Here are her words. This is so much bigger than her, but we cannot get justice with violence. It does not make sense. It does not help her. It does not help. It does not help us. She was on to say it does not help the world that we live in. We cannot fight violence with violence. Words of Breonna Taylors mom. To her words, just yesterday of our former Vice President joe biden. He said, violence is never and can never be the answer. Violence is never, never the answer. And as we seek the whole truth in the death of Breonna Taylor, we must not silly her memory by perpetrating the same violence that took her from her family. Meanwhile, i wouldnt ask all of us to pray for the Police Officers who were shot last night in louisville as we pray for breonna. And especially for her mom. I want to turn to the domestic terrorism if i can. This would be a question for our director wray. Director wray, tragically in recent years we have seen an increase and targeted violence. Anne perpetrated in this country, as you know better than anybody. In order to address this we need to address the symptoms and reconnaissance of the problem. I worked with the security secretary to ensure that the department had the needed resources to adjust the root causes of violence and extremism. Director wray, two questions, if you will. Why are we seeing such a rise and racially and ethnically motivated extremism in violence in this country in recent years . Why . Senator, i appreciate your concerns and i share many of those concerns. Something that we all struggle to get our arms around. I think one important part of that phenomenon, which i have referred to earlier is the rule of social media. As they said, terrorism today moves at the speed of social media. In effect, what you have is a phenomenon where disaffected, angry, hateful people yeah who are maybe separated geographically, and many are largely lone actors, are now able to essentially spin each other up by being virtually connected in a way that they could not before. The more of that that occurs through encrypted messaging platforms and places like that as well, the more that i think we can expect to see unfortunately, and tragically. The person, the angry person who wants to lash out who is living at home in moms basement. Maybe before it was all by himself. Now he is talking to similarly situated people all over the country and indeed all over the world, and is more likely to get encouraged and galvanized and to take hateful and a warrant ideas and turn them into dangerous and all too often lethal violence. Thank you very much. My sister and i grew up in virginia. I remember taking a school trip with my whole seventh grade class. We went to richmond. We had the opportunity to meet the governor of virginia when we were like 12 years old. It was an amazing experience that will never forget. A couple of years ago, there was a demonstration. There was violence in richmond, virginia. We had people there that were folks from the ku klux klan. People who were instigating racial violence. Death occurred. Our president was asked to comment. He said there are good people on both sides. I would suggest that words like that from our president encouraged racial extremists to act out. Yeah not to just to be vocal, but actually to increase violence. That is something that needs to stop. How is the fbi working to ensure that when you come back here before this committee next year, the threat from domestic extremist is reduced and how can we be helpful in that regard . Senator, i think a few things. How are we working . I have asked all of our joint Terrorism Task forces, which means that we were able to leverage not just fbi personal, but essentially for 4500 investigators around the country, to make sure they are focusing on domestic terrorism, in addition to International Terrorism. They were already doing that, but one of the things that we did just recently was to elevate racially motivated violent extremism to the same National Threat priority as isis and homegrown violent extremists, folks who are inspired by foreign terrorist organizations. We also created a domestic terrorism hate crimes fusion cell, which brings together the expertise of both domestic terrorism, investigators and analysts with our hate crimes investigators and analysts. That is designed to make sure that we are getting the synergies that are necessary there, and weve already made significant progress there. The first time i can think of, we were able to proactively disrupt an attack using a hate crime charge involving the attempt to attack a synagogue in colorado. Certainly we need agents, analysts, we need that a analytic tools and we are going to need a solution to end encryption problems that plagues Law Enforcement in an increasingly big constant basis. So there are a number of things that we would intentionally turn to congress for help their. Mister chairman, i have one last question. Can you indulge me for two more minutes . Okay. Mr. Ray, can you give us examples of what russia, china and iran have been doing to spread misinformation out of the election . How does the bureau work to combat this misinformation . I would refer you to the show dnis Public Statement that is the unclassified version of what the Intelligence Community says from our foreign adversaries with respect to election interference. It goes through a description of china, russia and iran. All three countries are highly sophisticated actors with different capabilities pursuing different means. In the case of the russians and the iranians, with the use of online tools, for example. You have heard about the use social media. We are seeing online journals. Fake placement of stories. Things like that. Use of proxies by the russians, for example. The chinese, as i mentioned before, in many ways, it is our greatest Counter Intelligence threat to this country. There are malign foreign influence efforts are different from the russians. But much broader and wider in terms of their reach to not just federal officials, but state and local officials. They use economic levers very heavily. We are mostly concerned about subversive undeclared coercive or criminal means. There are obviously a lot of overt laws that occurs in those countries, but those are the means that we are most concerned about. Of the three countries, which poses the biggest threat to the upcoming election, versus the longer term . Which of the three countries, russian, china and iran, which poses the biggest threat to the sanctity of this upcoming election . I dont think i could really rank them. All three are ones that we are very concerned about. Indifferent ways. It is not really an apple to apple comparison. Certainly, as i have said before, the russians are engaging, and as the odni statement are engaged in the range of measures, that also the chinese have recently been expanding their influence efforts. It is why after the midterm elections, we, with the Foreign Influence Task force that i created early in my tenure, we broadened and significantly added resources to that task force, not just to russia but to china and iran as well, because those countries are very much looking for different ways to take a page out of the malign foreign influence playbook that they have seen elsewhere. Thank you so much. Thanks for all the witnesses and mr. Chairman, thank you for your generosity with your time. Senator, thank you and other witnesses for being. Here let me pick up on something that you testified to earlier. You talked about evidence of an organized, tactical activity by some groups as part of the recent rioting and violence looting that we have seen across the country. And louisville of course, last night, we saw egregious acts of violence to Police Officers shot. I have seen this in my own state. Weve had nine Police Officers. Nine shot in st. Louis in that city alone since june. Just since the month of june. There appears to be some footage that is circulating on the internet from louisville last night, that that shows a parked uhaul waiting for a crowd in which it looks like it contains signs that says things like, abolish the police along with shields and perhaps other paraphernalia that could be used for violence. I understand the fbis going to insist in investigating the shootings that happen in louisville, but i want to ask you, will you be investigating coordination between extremist elements in the violence that we have seen across the country . I appreciate the question, senator. As you anticipate in it, we are very focused on what we would call the most dangerous actors, which tend to be the ones who are most coordinated, and therefore potentially able to cause the most harm and damage. We are looking in a number of places without reference to any specific investigation, we are aggressively investigating funding streams, tactics, logistics, travel, networks, that kind of thing. What we are finding is that in a lot of the activity because, it is organized at what i would call more of a tactical level than a strategic level. Organized more locally and regionally, in small groups or nodes, then in a more structured, hierarchical way across the country. In no way does that diminish how serious and dangerous it is. We do not view how a nationally organized something is for a proxy for how dangerous it is. We are aggressively investigating all the kinds of things that you would expect us to be investigating in pretty much every state in the country right now. These local and regional notes using social media as a means to communicate with each other as they plan their activities . They are, but let me just add a finer point on that. We see a lot of communication on social media in what i would call sort of more benign ways. But a lot of the communication with each other, that is the more telltale order revealing, it is happening locally. Sometimes through encrypted channels that they think will cause them to be able to hide from Law Enforcement. In some cases, they are able to hide from Law Enforcement, which is a real frustrate we are taking steps to make sure we can break through some of those barriers and try to uncover some of the stronger evidence of what we are seeing, reports across the country. Thank you for your attention to this. I certainly hope you continue to devote every resource that you can to these investigations, to the potential coordination here, and especially for violence that is being directed against Law Enforcement. Whether it is in st. Louis, louisville, seattle, portland, wherever. It does not matter. Law enforcement, when they are under attack and what appears to be in some instances, again, coordinated actions across state lines, that i think deserves your attention and i am glad you are giving attention to that. Let me switch gears and ask you a little bit about chinese espionage and covid. In may of this year, you released a public warning to organizations researching covid19 with an eye towards a vaccine, warning about a possible chinese espionage activity related to the pharmaceutical research, Health Research and ultimately vaccine development. Can you give us a sense here . Our chinese hackers still trying to steal Research Related to a covid19 vaccine . What is the latest . Certainly, as you referenced, we are seeing a very aggressive activity by the chinese, and in some cases, by others to target our covid related research, whether it is vaccines, treatments, Testing Technology, etc, and sometimes you can almost without being too descriptive in an open setting, we can almost see like a news report from some Company Research or research institution. It is announcing or revealing some progress, because of course, a lot of this is getting discussed in the media. Then almost within days, we will see cyber targeting that ties back to chinese actors focusing on those institutions. That is why we, working with dhs, thought it was so important to put out information. We are also engaging as the fbi does all the time, directly with targeted organizations and victims, institutional victims, to help them better protect themselves. But the chinese cyber threat is a major concern and something that we are prioritizing through our National Cyber Investigative Joint Task force with which brings together Intelligence Community and Law Enforcement assets together to try to take a whole grim government response to this. Give me a sense of what youre seeing in terms of the hacking activity and espionage activity. Its a directed towards any product as your sense, or do you get any sense that hackers or other agents of the Chinese Government are trying to disrupt the research itself, and interfere with the development of either the collection of data or a vaccine . Im trying to think of the best way to summarize what we are seeing. I guess what i would say is, it is clearly targeting the former, that is targeting information about progress in much the same way in the playbook we are seeing from chinese hackers across other kinds of industries, and research and innovation. Rather than innovate themselves, they are trying to essentially jump to the front of the line by stealing information from others. Well, thank you again for your work on this and your continued attention to what is obviously a vital National Security interests of this nation. Final question, as i go, what about connection to the Chinese Government . We have talked about chinese hackers and chinese espionage. Have you seen connections to the beijing government itself to these efforts . Of course, what you are raising their is a very important question of attribution and the standards that the Intelligence Community uses for attribution, are different than say, the private sector my ears. But as i sometimes say, nothing says attribution like an indictment. As you know, we have brought some significant indictments against chinese hackers that do tie back to the emphasis, specifically on a number of occasions, and these are targeting not just American Companies but American Research institutions but also similar institutions among some of our closest allies, and targeting pii identifiable information of americans. Chinese hackers have essentially stolen the pii of about half the Adult Population of the United States. That is a shocking number. Thank you for your work on, this thank you mister chairman. Senator halle. Thank, you mister chairman. I appreciate the gentlemen joining us today and for your support. Here as a senator from a border state, i know it is critical that the government tackle threats against the homeland and along our nations borders. I remain committed to working every day in a bipartisan fashion to secure arizonas border and keep arizona safe and make sure the migrants are treated fairly. A key part of this overall effort is attacking the challenge of our nation ports of entry. My first question is for mr. Cuccinelli. Arizona ports of entry are among the busiest in the nation and the goods and people flowing through them play critical roles in both arizona and the nations economy. Cpp employees work hard every day to facilitate the flow of trade and travel but our nation continues to struggle with significant amounts of illicit drugs entering our nation through airports. With a month yet to go in fiscal year c. P. B. Is reporting that 2020, they have already seized more marijuana, methamphetamine and fentanyl at ports of entry than they did in 2019. So i strongly believe that technology is part of the answer here, which is why i worked with senator cornyn to introduce an act to improve dhs technology planning. I want your take on this challenge. What actions does the dhs need to take now on our ports of entry to better respond to the ongoing threat this flow of drugs represents . Zeroing in on your question and the ports of entry, the most Important Program running is the non intrusive inspection effort. As i mentioned earlier, one of the advantages of the expanded security along the border, including the building of the border wall, is that we are funneling more traffic from between ports of entry in two ports of entry. That means that we are able to confront these threats on our terms and on our turf. It is not mean they are not dangerous or there are not a lot of them, but as we have had Great Success in the last four years in seizing hard drugs, the ones that do the most harm in the most communities in your state and every state, of course, we have seen Great Success in that area. As i said in my opening remarks. But we will do better still, as we expand the availability of non intrusive inspection ability. You mentioned how busy the ports in arizona are. You are absolutely correct. One of the beauties of this particular technology, and i know it is part of why you support adding technology to the suite of problem solving tools, is that it increases the efficiency of the port itself and operates in such a way that does not require as much man power or time to accomplish the same security goals. That is the very definition of increasing efficiency, so we are also using, nearby, not in arizona yet, but hopefully to come soon, more autonomy surveillance around ports of entry to provide greater Situational Awareness and security, not just to our employees, but everybody coming through those ports of entry as well. I look forward to expanding those efforts in the future, and your help and cooperation in support of that is much appreciated. Thank you. For my next question, i would like to ask both mr. Cuccinelli and director wray to weigh in. Behind his drugs are Transnational Criminal Organizations. They launder their profits. Recent media reports indicate that tcos have been able to use major Banking Institutions for Money Laundering purposes. What additional steps the dhs and the fbi need to take together and separately to cut off their access to Money Laundering . Senator, i will start and turn it over to director wray. As i mentioned up front, one of the areas we believe that you all in congress could be most helpful to us in this particular battle with these most evil people in the western hemisphere, our to provide us some tools that allow designation somewhere below a foreign terrorist organization, because of the sweeping capture of much of society, because of how these organizations are interconnected with Mexican Society so thoroughly. But above the level of near prosecution of one person at a time. It allows us to attack the organizations at a strategic level, and bring them down to help mexico regain control of its own country and protect hours at the same time. That is an area we would be very happy to partner with you on. It is definitely an area where there is potential for improvement. One of the key areas you touch on is money. Mr. Mueller talked about they believe on some holy war. The folks in the tea ceos, they are not out there for what they think of as god, or maybe the do, but its for money and if we could get at the money and start to cut off their ability to gain the benefits of their evil produce in the case of drugs and trafficking in the case of humans, we are going to really be able to start to put a major dent in their operations and their threat to both mexico and to the United States. I would agree with what mr. Cuccinelli just said. I would just add that we have found over 112 years of fbi that whatever kind of enterprise that we are talking about in this case, the transactional criminal organizations, if you want to dismantle the enterprise, and you have to go after the money as well. In effect, the money becomes their infrastructure. The value of global crime ranges between one to two trillion annually. About 300 billion dollars are attributed to u. S. Based to see owes, best trends Transnational Criminal Organizations. They have to figure out a way to cut off their access to money, that is ultimately going to be one of the most critical parts of making sure that the strategy is not just effective, but enjoying. Thank you, director wray, and thank you mr. Cuccinelli. Mister chair, i do have further questions, but in the interest of my time expiring, i will submit them for mr. Cuccinelli and for directorate, and i will yield back the balance of my time. Thank, you mister chairman. I appreciate it, senator. Let me begin first by saying that of all the listed threats that i began hearing, i think i mentioned border security, we probably have done a good job of covering most. But i did not put a stopwatch on this. I think it is also true it kind of confirms what i ended up with, talking about which i believe is our current greatest threat to our democracy, and that literally is the rioting, yen are key, the fact that the adherence to the rule of law is actually a question in this country today. I think probably there is more time devoted during this hearing, more questions asked and more answers given in terms of what we are seeing right now. So, i appreciate it. I want to ask mr. Cuccinelli as a former attorney general, one of the things im highly concerned about, again, just the lack of adherence to the rule of law and the rejection of it, as we saw in the protests in louisville yesterday, because people did not agree with what happened in the grand jury. One thing that disturbs me is the Movement Toward anti bail laws, the fact that we actually have people donating to organizations that will pay bail so that we in effect have we saw the border catch and release, now we have catch and release in our cities. Can you just speak to the officer who was assaulted that was protected protecting him, the officer who was assaulted, the person who assaulted him he was charged and then released. Im not sure if you will ever be found. Mr. Cuccinelli, can you speak to my concern about this Movement Toward anti bail laws and individuals that bail people out of jail and bring them right back on the street the next night . Senator, that is a major concern. It does invoke state and local authority to a significant degree not, necessarily in d. C. Where congress can have a say. Washington, d. C. Where congress can have a say. Senator paul touched on this earlier. We see this almost recycling o see this almost recycling of criminals because they walk out and so many jurisdictions. Whether its new york, or portland, the notion that antibail legislation is somehow a reform. That improves the criminal Justice System it honestly escapes me. Mind you, thats coming from someone who has been a 25 year advocate for criminal Justice Reform including what was passed by the congress and president trump. Less than two years ago, thats a perspective that i come to this from, including my time is an attorney general. This is not an issue we face in virginia, because we didnt have localities, nor do we have at the state level, this sort of treatment of bail as a punishment. As opposed to a safety mechanism and a part of the justice process, which is what were seeing in other parts of the country. I would just note also, senator portman made comments that i wanted to dovetail off that are similar to yours mister chairman, one of the most disturbing aspects of this summer of violence, has been the overt encouragement of many who are in government positions of leadership. Whether its the speaker of the house, attacking Law Enforcement using phrases like storm troopers to describe federal Law Enforcement doing their job properly. There wasnt even question about a part of them not doing the job right. These are people doing the job she as a member of congress has cast for them. Or if its may or wheeler in portland, whos encouraging violence. And we see this rife across large swath of our political arena. I appreciate senator carpers comments, referencing Breonna Taylors mothers comments, i think those were extremely appropriate and helpful. We appreciate them from hearing them leadership in this country. Its so much of the Political Leadership in the country, has encouraged this violence. Its been a shocking aspect to the last four months that i find as a former attorney general, and in my current role of the department of Homeland Security. Just shocking, and is really contrary to the ideals and values of this country. Its a surprise no one when we put forward this greater leniency thats whats happening. Thats what anti obey old laws are certainly would have been some people contribute to and putting back on the street. There is greatly leading to greater lawlessness, it should come as no surprise. Senator carper, are there things that we should do . Do we need to strengthen penalties . Do we potentially need to create new crimes . I ask director wray, i know they had spoken about whether serious about charging people with sedition. But what can we do to gain control over our cities . Almost 570 of these peaceful protest turned to riots, violence, and death. This is completely unacceptable, we need to get control of the situation. What do we need to do to get control the situation . Certainly mister chairman, you touched on one issue its hard enough to make sure that men and women of Law Enforcement can do what they need to do to arrest people the first time. Without having to go back out and rearrested same person over and over again. And senator paul touched upon that in his comments as well. As i said i think in in response to what are your colleagues questions. When Law Enforcement all the Work Together, state and local, which we do all the time around this country and do it promptly. Thats when were able to see the best results everyone trying to look for what they can best contribute to the phenomenon. In your home state, while there was significant damage in a city in a short period of time, comparatively quickly, to other parts of the country. Different parts of Law Enforcement all banded to gather work hand in hand and managed to bring law and order much more quickly by comparison so while theyre and catcher tragic damage there, of course some fatalities and injuries. It couldve been a heck of a lot worse i, think that illustrates how Important Partnership is, to dealing with this particular problem. Thank you director wray senator portman ill ask you again, i appreciate you stay behind as a backup, do you have any more questions . I have a few more myself. Let me just if i could follow up on a bit on one, thank you mister chairman. I told the chairman earlier i thought it was the last speaker when i questioned last time. I went a little long. Because i was the only one of the room, in this new Virtual World we had others. I apologize to my colleagues for taking more time. The third threat i did want to talk about was this domestic terrorism fret. Sometimes its White Supremacists, antisemitic as example hateful attacks that are sometimes sometimes its exam is islamic extremist, this is something again that the department will focus on more mr. Cuccinelli will understand they recently released the implementation plan. And this committee again has been very active on a particular part of the response, which are these nonprofit security Grant Programs. It basically is a theme a Grant Program that goes out, usually to a faithbased organization, a synagogue, a church, a mosque. But all nonprofits are eligible and its for security and has mint. And now can be used thanks to dhs for our security but a lot of it is just about getting the expertise. Make sure that these organizations know where to place the cameras, how do you ensure that things are locked and you can help them by just doing a walk through. 32 organizations in ohio, have received a combined total of 2. 3 Million Dollars in grants in the fiscal year of 2020. They are using it well in my view, i had a chance to visit with them, one thing we did last year, that i thought was quite effective. We had a conference in ohio, and we had the fbi there director raid they did a great job, and we also had a dhs there, secretary cuccinelli and they did a great job of just explaining what the threat was. Kind of starting down the process of what you do to respond to it. The folks in the room, this was the sikh community, the muslim community, the jewish community, muslim. People really appreciate it, i think thats one thing to think about is the possibility of doing more these around the country. Where you have a conference bring together some of the leadership just of people get a better sense, of what is going on in the real world out there in terms of this threat. And its not a classified environment youre able to provide some very good information. And second, what you do about. It so thats my question to you, what more can we do . I know you have a Grant Program i would like to hear about that. Its the two of you could maybe all three of you speak about this issue that would be great. Just this month the First Tranche of the new grant dollars, i want to say 10 Million Dollars, went out to 29 recipients. And so much of the dhs responsibility is, prevention goes hand in hand of the office there to target for targeted violence. Were doing it some people are familiar with the uk model, this big huge group of people who work for the federal government that goes out to try and interdict terrorism, not in a Law Enforcement fashion, more like an intervention. Before violence occurs, that is a very different model that were taking, we have just started building our first employees for regional directors. To expand partnerships before so we get a whole of america, including with working exactly those nonprofits youre talking about senator. To integrate them into our preventative efforts. Both planning for their resistance to potential assaults, but also for their partnership in intervening when they see people going down a path that may lead them to violence. Thats the approach that were taking in that office, its one of the areas of greatest expansion that youll see over the course of the next year at the department of Homeland Security, as we grow that effort out into communities across the country. And certainly described one way that those contacts can be made more deeply and more quickly, very open to repeating that sort of performance. Thank you i appreciate the commitment to it, i think it does make sense instance or leveraging the federal dollar significantly by having his cooperation. As director mueller knows, and columbus, ohio, i think the first indictment was made several years ago of native islamic terrorist the fbi had worked with, through an informant. We were able to stop a horrific act, what really happened was that the community in columbus, ohio, was cooperating with local state and federal Law Enforcements to be able to find that individual. And to prevent what would have been a terrible loss of life. Thats an example of having those relationships made a big difference, it was at every level of government. I dont know if you have thoughts on this, . I would just add that i think Community Engagement is something thats critical to dealing with what we consider the biggest threat to the homeland, which is this combination of homegrown violent extremists seized and domestic. Typically loan actors, easily radicalized online packing soft targets with readily accessible weapons. Because that such a challenge for Law Enforcement, the one thing that weve seen with the attacks weve thwarted and unfortunately attacks that weve occurred. Almost every time if we if you look back, there were someone along the way a friend, a family member, a coworker, a classmate, what have you. Who knew the person well enough to notice the transformation, from radicalization of whatever kind it was to mobilization. So you often heard the saying, if you see something say something, most of us when we hear that we think the unintended back count backpack and it bust terminal. Of course we want people to call in that happens. We are trying to push out through all of our field offices and ive been to all 56 of them and met with communities i think in every single one. If you see something about somebody we need you to say something. Ive been encouraging by those instances where sometimes but having gristle wrestled with demons, a parent will say, think about how hard that is. My child my 18, 19 year old child is going off the rails and im concerned he might do something. And they call us, its a heck of a lot better situation if for them and for the public if we can do something before that person acts. Thank you. Again thanks for sticking around there and backing me up. I feel a little bad that you have it providing a whole lot of answers, i like to think about the foreign threats that the National Threats known to dress have been reduced but i know thats not the case. I think the main reason is what i stated in my opening, the unrest, the rioting, the lawlessness, the anarchy on the streets of america are just posing and more pressing risk and a greater risk to our overall democracy. I just wanted to give you a quick opportunity here is there anything else you think its important to the American People understand about what youre trying to do to keep this nation stay . Men and women in your agency . Im not offended in the least, i think thats really a testimonial, or a testament to the success weve had in the last 19 years. That it is no longer the principal concern of this committee and others, and thats all right thats what we wanted. We said this was going to be a generational war, we didnt want it to be a multi generational war. I take great solace and the fact that were talking about other things for a change. I just want to highlight in closing, thank you for allowing me the opportunity to make a few comments. We just need to finish this thing and maintain our focus, and not use a cliche take our foot off the gas too soon. And the support of this committee, and the senate, and the congress at large is so important to that. I really thank you for the opportunity to make a few comments. I appreciate the point you made about 2011, out of iraq, way too early which gives rise to isis and the caliphate. All that tear the result from that we have to learn from that type of blunder we have to learn those types of lessons. Finally director wray, this is not on thread i just have to take the opportunity to ask you a lot of questions about your investigation, and the unfortunate and my frustration i appreciate the fact that weve had conversations and since that point in time, the fbi has become more responsible but the fact of the matter is roderick second extension. My stuff continues to not obtain the materials that have to go into the reading room. Which is very inefficient and quite honestly so much a betrayal there the reviewing is not censored its not really classified theres no reason we cant take possession of it. My first question is, really going to ask you to look into that be a little bit more open about the information that i think Congress Certainly deserves. And American People have the right to know what will happen. Can you make that commitment to really take a look at that, make this this kind of information right away available, directly to our community . Yes mister chairman i will certainly drill into it further, and have my staff look and see if theres ways which we can improve the process, the reading room construct that you described as of course a process that we and others in the Intelligence Community use with all committal east for this kind of information. We have searched Additional Resources to your request brought staff from multiple divisions. Were working with other agencies, and a lot of time the information, or at least the parts of the information that makes something classified our other agencies information, and that makes the more complicated. Were going to continue to work as hard as we can in good faith to be responsive it and accommodating, i appreciate your forbearance and the conversations weve had lately. I appreciate that, one particular piece of information that is frustrating my staff, there are our and classified Text Messages of Andrew Mccabe which are now being made available. Would you commit to making those things available to us, delivered to us, and our possession . I would be happy to look into that and have someone to get back to you as quickly as we can as where that stands. Appreciate it. In the department of justice, Inspector General horowitz report, foreman assistant director was quoted as saying the fbi did not have any indication whatsoever as of may 2017, that the russians were running Disinformation Campaign. Because my staff uncovered for classified close footnotes that point so why this is so important, that we make this information available. In those four classified footnotes, we now know the fbi in early october 16 across my hurricane team, actually did obtain information from a steele sub source that quote. He was suspected of being linked to Russian Intelligence Services and rumored to be a former kgb officer. In january 2017, based on steeles reporting was misstated or exaggerated, that it was based on rumors and speculation that the sub source never expected steele to put the primary sub sources statements and reports or present them as facts. That he or she made it steele made it clear to steal that she had no proof to support the statements from her sub source. There was just talk word of mouth hearsay, conversations he had with friends over the be beers, statements made in jest. So again the fbi had indications of possible infiltration of this Deal Organization by Russian Intelligence Services. This was january 2017, any indication of a sub source possibly being kgb officer and october 2016. January 2017, they found confirmation of that and how grossly unreliable this deal was. And yet, the investigation continued, it continued to the point where we set up the special counsel to take a look at this largely based on the steele dossier. So then my question on this, as the current fbi director, do you believe the crossfire hurricane investigations should have proceed it at all . Once the fbi knew that the kgb might have been one of the steele substances . And that, russian disinformation was contained within the steel dossier . Mister chairman first let me say. I will answer a question this way. I think the Inspector Generals report, about the crossfire hurricane investigation, describes conduct that i consider unacceptable, and representative of who the fbi is as an organization and cannot be allowed to be repeated. Ive and to blunted over 40 corrective measures to address those issues. Some of which youre touching on is relevant as well to the ongoing john durham investigation, which which we are fully cooperating even to the point of having agents who are working on it with him. I want to be a little bit careful about how i win on that. Of course as you know, the Justice Department has concluded that the carter page applications at least after that date, should not have been submitted. I believe of course all of this happened before he became fbi director. The doj officials who around at the time have now said they would not have signed those applications. I think to some extent that speaks for itself. For my sampling its pretty obvious that past january 2017, they should have been no further investigation into the Trump Campaign is possible collusion with russia. The information backing that crumbled and simply didnt support it any further. My final question, you said you were an fbi director back then, but you were in march of 2018. In march 2018, the fbi provided briefing to the Senate Intelligence subcommittee on intelligence. And which they briefed that committee that the steele reporting was reliable. Again, we just talked about what the fbi knew and when they knew it as early as october 2000 6 18, certainly the steele dossier was not reliable. My question for you is that happened under your watch. How could that happen . How could the fbi go in and brief over a year later, when they knew the steele dossier was not reliable. And brief the Senate Committee that it was . Mister chairman the issue here raising is one that ive been in close contact with chairman graham about, i will say this. The briefing in question as i understand it was a staff to staff briefing. And it was happening at a time when we were largely in stand down mode because of the special counsel investigation. Obviously im concerned about what ive heard about that briefing, but i probably for right now should just leave it at that. I just want to ask are the members are the employees of the fbi that were part of that briefing that are still employees . Has there been any disciplinary action taken against those individuals . Just saying it was an fbi briefing to staff, fbi briefing converse this is the year after the fact that we knew the steele dossier was not reliable. By describing it as a staff briefing, that is a no way intended to suggest that thats not important. But second, as a disciplinary action, i believe that all of the most Senior Executives involved in the investigation, including in that who participated in that briefing or all gone from the fbi. Some cases people have been fired, other cases people have retired or resigned, all on my watch. As far as disciplinary action beyond that, every individual whos reference and Inspector Generals report, at any level, even in passing. Has been referred to our office of professional responsibility, and our inspecting division for possible disciplinary action. He said to be people who are more at a line level, as far as disciplinary action towards them that has largely been a little bit on a standstill in order to accommodate mr. Durham in his investigation, and his request to certain steps we have to wait on and order to let him complete his investigation which we are of course fully cooperating as the attorney general has said quote publicly on a number of occasions. I appreciate your answer, i think we share the same goal here, we have to restore the credibility of the fbi. The only way to do that is to fbi has to come clean. Has to clean house to a certain extent. The American People need to understand what happened, they need to have assurance that the fbi will take corrective actions, and hopefully put houses in place will this will never happen again. I look forward to working with you, really encourage full cooperation. Expeditious cooperation by the American People. American people should know not years ago. I want to thank all the witnesses for your service, for your sacrifice. As we said by most members of this committee, please convey to the men and women who work with you our appreciation for the service and sacrifice. I need to underscore the point, i truly believe the vast majority of americans are so appreciative of what Law Enforcement does and doesnt every day, dana day out, trying to keep our cities, our states, this country safe. I think it is just an abomination quite honestly, that there is this defund the police movement. That theres so many people attacking Law Enforcement, we need to support Law Enforcement as members how are we going to recruit the fine men and women that put their lives on the line to keep us safe . If we cant keep denigrating, and keep attacking them. I hope that people hearing this hearing today, understand that there is a great deal of support for Law Enforcement. I think thats by and large the vast majority of americans. Again god bless everyone in Law Enforcement, god bless everyone in your departments and agencies. With that the wreckage will remain open for 15 days until up to uber 12th for the submission of statements. Questions for the record, this hearing is adjourned. [indiscernible] weeknights this month, we feature American History tv programs as a preview of whats available every weekend on cspan 3. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg passed away september 18th, at the age of 87 nominated by president bill clinton and confirmed by the u. S. Senate in 1993. Ginsburg was the second woman ever to serve on the nations highest court, following sandra day oconnor. In 2009, Justice Ginsburg gave us a tour of her Office Inside the Supreme Court and talked about what goes on behind the scenes there. Watch tonight, beginning at eight eastern. Enjoy American History tv this week, and every weekend on cspan 3. Postmaster general louis dejoy closed about Postal Service operations and its handling of mailin ballots for the 2020 election. He also talked about the impact on the coronavirus on the Postal Service workforce. This is 45 minutes. Let me first now go to our special guest the postmaster general louis dejoy mr. Dejoy thank you very much for giving us your time today. Thank you david for having me and i want to thank the Economic Club of washington for paying attention to me at this