Transcripts For CSPAN3 Key Capitol Hill Hearings 20160308

Surprise i found that theres obviously evidence out there that it exists, that women do have a different effect in leadership and gender inequality has an affect on a variety of state Security Issues and im sure some of you are nodding your head because im idiot and i should have known that. It was surprising to me who was a cobra pilot, im just like the guys. Theres nothing i cant do that they can do. Kind of took some of this emotion or the not emotional but more as a marine what i felt like touchy feely stuff out of the equation. As it turns out, i was wrong back then and im learning more every time. Right now what ive been looking at for a number of years is the impact of gender inequality not necessarily on face value, on its face, but the impact of gender inequality on domestic terrorism as an enabling condition. And terrorism, obviously, is very relevant right now and has been for the last 15 years, more so than it was earlier. And we still dont fully understand the factors that cause it, what brings it about, what enables it to continue. We look at it from a supply side generally. Sometimes a demand side. A lot of our programs and policies that are set to counterterrorism are set up from the supply side angle. Ill talk a little bit about that. But what i like to do at the end is bring it back full circle and talk about why an integrated military is uniquely suited to addressing the enabling conditions that go into domestic terrorism, specifically in this instance, gender inequality. So i talked a little bit about my initial findings back in my earlier years of looking at this. Mary caprioli is informative, as well. They have done some great stuff. It caused me to become less skeptical and more open to what i found later through work of a classmate in the naval academy, his nonprofit. I dont know if youve made of n ru international. He made it his life work to go combat terrorism through education and combatting poverty in three specific regions in africa. They started including women as counterterrorism agents of a form to counter radicalization and terrorism, but theyre doing it on a very low grade level. And then i started learning about sisters against violent extremism and state has some, as well, that talk about using women to counter violence extremism and theyre seeing some success. I wanted to learn more. I found that academically theres very little support one way or the other of gender inequality in domestic terrorism threats. Theres some out there. If you expand in the direction of terrorism you can see where the lines get drawn. But its far from clear. So i started looking at it and interestingly enough i found that so far and im still going through the research in my dissertation. This is what my dissertation is on. But my initial quantitate results are showing a strong, significant support for the idea that women in the political sphere, the greater the impact or the greater the allowance to have an impact in political sphere, the lower the rate of domestic terrorism in that country. Which is surprising. I actually didnt really expect to see that clear of a result early on and it makes me all the more excited to take it down the next road which is the second half of this. I mentioned how a lot of our counter disterrorism programs rely on supply dynamics. They want to get at the source. What creates terrorists. How do we get women involved to stop would be terrorists from being radicalized . And i think in some ways were looking at that all wrong because the supply side will always exist. We will always as women and men in this world see grievances, see people take those grievances down a path of violence. I dont know if we can ever stop terrorists from being born. We can create conditions that keep them from developing. And keep radicalization from growing. I dont know if any of you are familiar with mark teslers work from the late 1990s, he did fascinating work on the role of feminist norms and values or the acceptance among both men and women and the impacts of those on conflict. And on the use of violence conflict or the preference for violence conflict. He specifically looked at the arab israeli conflict and found that in a number of states in the middle east, north africa, both men and women who had more feminist attitudes or thought women should have equal rights were less supportive of the use of violence and less supportive of the military force and were more interested in finding alternative means to conflict resolution. I found that fascinating. It has some ways reflected my experience as a marine and i hope it in the future it will reflect my research into domestic terrorism. But the role of norms and outcomes in a society that is more open to equal opportunity for men and women under the inclusion of women at every level with the Peace Process and throughout the securities sphere, that society has more options at its disposal for conflict resolution. Ky mentioned populous buyin. Enabling conditions of a society that to foster or to help prevent terrorism, well, chief among those in my mind and in a lot of the research im finding is that an acceptance of violence plays a big role in that. So by including women at a descriptive level, we also can start to affect the way cultures accept traditionally feminist norms and values such as less aggression, more peaceful conflict resolution even though we all know especially as female marines were not all very nurturing and were not all universally pacific in our nature. In fact, part of me is laughing right now. But those things become more accepted culturally on a wider scale as the idea that women are worthy of respect and are worthy of inclusion at the highest levels and bring something to the table as that becomes more accepted. To tie that into how an integrated military can better address a domestic terrorism threat, i have a little story from something that happened last summer. I have a 5yearold son and two older daughters, and we were at a picnic. I heard a friend of mine who has the son the same age. His son ran up and was crying about something and he turned to his son and said stop crying like a little girl. Cut it out right now. And it took me a minute and i didnt say anything right then and i thought that moment over and over again a million times but as his son and my son age, which one will be more open to different outcomes and to different methods of conflict resolution . Clearly theres a lot more to that. Its a very simplified version of that story but thats an idea of how a cultural change within the military can also impact our ability to deal with other cultures and to relate to them in a coin or peacekeeping environment, those factors become downright critical to success. An integrated military with women included at all levels and that affords respect to women at all levels will be a lot more accepting of traditionally feminine characteristics, whether all or not all women have those characteristics and will accept different options and outcomes more. Thats in a nutshell and i look forward to your questions. All right. Thank you. As we open up the question and answer period again, just remind everyone that were still on broadcast television, so when you wait for the microphone from one of the interns, state your first name and your affiliation. So questions from the audience, please. Do you see one over here . Oh, im sorry. Dr. Cat fisher. Hello. Thank you. Im dr. Kathy fisher. I work at ft. Bragg. Thank you all for your comments and presentations there. Theyre very helpful. I have one that came from the first panel but also came up in terms of what a lot of you spoke to. My interests and kind of question and concern is this round between masculinity and femininity and how it plays in both within the military context and outside of it. Im wondering in terms of the Peace Process, negotiations or military combat units how we dont inadvertently essentialize consumed notions of gender in the name of equality. You hear those both in terms of how questions are phrased, how explanations are made based on a natural that just is. So if how we can kind of deal with that and again i think its not exclusive to the military realm by any means but perhaps more pronounced in a specific particular kind of way. If you could speak to that i would appreciate it. Thank you. Yeah. I can. I know jeannette can as well because we both spent a lot of time thinking and writing about this. This is i think one of the reasons that both of us got into the course of research we did is because in both of our personal lives where we were both the only women in our unit, like the first squadron to do the job that we did as cobra pilots, we very much had this idea of dont look at me as a woman. Im just another pilot. Treat me just like another pilot and thats the same. Thats the way it is. But then on the flip side we get out and we get really emerged in this research and we find more and more evidence that, well, a lot of these things that are culturally associated with women whether its nurturing or motherhood or thinking about Security Issues that are more than just physical state killing security or what are really important for lasting peace and lasting security. How do we really shape this tension where it is . I think the biggest thing that integrating women does is that it opens it up for individual worth and individuals to be looked at for what they bring to the table rather than necessarily assuming a lot of these whether you want to call them essentialized or culturally constructed notions of masculinity and femininity and where it is very true that each of us brings very unique perspectives to whatever our profession happens to be based on how were socialized and whether thats were socialized as a woman, were socialized based on our religion or based on our race. So we all kind of i think carry a lot of cultural socialization. I think sue and ellen both spoke very well to how that actually makes forces stronger and how you need to think more diverse because of it. I think within of the things that sbre gaiting women does here, in whatever form that takes, and i think whatever an individual you know, however that individual chooses to wrestle with her, like, own masculinity and femininity issues, and i know we can both speak to that on a personal level, but what it does is it opens the door for individual worth and individual expectations and also then individual exceptionally. One of the thing working with female rebel groups in latin america is that the presence of women in these fighting roles enpoumerred other women outside of the fighting roles. Its a very women fighting is a very overt break to what those gender roles are. If you look at the most sort of black and white essentialization of men and women is that men are the protectors and women need to be protected. Thats i think, like, the big duality there. So when women take on that role of being the protector and do it very overtly, its a very visual, very obvious break in that norm. And what it then does is frequently just open the door for women who felt constrained by other norms to say, no, i can be a politician. I dont have to accept this. I can take responsibility for my own physical security, for my own economic security, for my own stake in what happens to my family. So however that plays out, i think thats where this integration has its biggest effect in the longterm roles of this counterinsurgency environments where women are becoming more and more active. I got the gist of the question and i agree with her question but sometimes i have a hard time hearing sometimes so i think i got most of what you said. If im missing something, let me know. Its mostly this ear. So i do want to add one thing. I think its not just whether or not women specifically have the qualifications or the characteristics that make them uniquely women at the aggregate sense. Ky and i try to make yourself just the cobra pilot, not the woman. So theres such a wide variety among people, but i think the more important thing that comes from integration within the u. S. Military and internationally at every level is that youre just bringing more choices to the table. As worthy of respect, as worthy of consideration, youre opening up that box to more options. And as the u. S. Military because of our ubiquitousness and because of how much attention is put on us in many parts of the world and our presence, we have the unique opportunity by integrating to make cultural statements as well to other countries that suffer. And thats huge. Thats something that weve seen in small bits in iraq and afghanistan, and i think has some fantastic potential. Does that answer the question . Yeah, thank you. If i can also weve done a really good job, i think, of explaining the value of moving away from that essentialism. Its obvious in the way you framed your question, i think. But weve also seen really fascinating cases of the essentialized roles women are expected to play being extremely empowering on their own. Right . Weve seen women as mothers be very politically active, participating in conflict in ways that we dont expect that are not traditional but theyre doing that by mobilizing that essential identity, that sort of prescribed role. And so, i think one of the things that i sort of wrestle with in my own work is also not diminishing what those essential roles can do for us even as were trying to move away from them, even as were trying to accept their let me say this a different way. Recognizing the potential for value without being limited. Maybe is a better way of what im trying to get at. Theres really interesting ways in which the essentialism has worked for women. The role the coalition played in the case i was giving earlier in Northern Ireland, a number of the women who participated were participating very vocally and overtly as mothers and as women acting within their traditional roles in their community, but the legacy that it left behind, whats really fascinating is that all of these traditionally very maledominated Political Parties recognized that there was a womens vote, that there was the capacity there and so they began bringing women into their own Party Leadership and getting them elected into roles following that. So even this sort of empowerment that came from working within those essentialized roles initially enabled a sort of break from them more broadly in the generation of Political Leadership that followed. So i think theyre also alternative views to how we frame that tension, i think. Can i add one thing to that, too . Reminded me of Something Else as well. If youre envisioning, lets say, the u. S. Military in Northern Ireland helping to broker any kind of Peace Agreement but lets talk about how we view like, if you send infantry unit over there to do Peace Keeping work over there and they dont have respect for womens roles and womens values and what women might bring to the table but you have an organization like Northern Irelands Women Coalition and women primarily acting as mothers as activists as well, the amount of respect that will be accorded to those women and the amount of attention they will receive will be very different depending on the norms accepted and the levels of respect accepted within the unit thats over there. Thats part of how an integrated military can play such a huge role in this. Thank you. Another question . Over here again. Good morning. My question has to deal with the best way to implement integration of women in a traditional society. So should it be the holistic approach where we focus on education and have women teach their children so when they grow up, ten, 20 years down the road its more of a generational approach where theyll be more liberal and open or more should it be transformative occupation approach where we take over a country and we basically say now we say you need to have this certain amount of women inside your government . Which way do you think would be the best way to do it . So what ive seen evidencewise it so it sort of depends this is a question where its very good to have a lot of dialogue of participants and practitioners because it comes down to measuring outcomes. And the evidence would point to the first case being the best way to do it, to education and socialization so that you learn and it becomes more organic so that as norms become more accepted, as more liberal norms with regards to gender roles and tolerance roles become more accepted, you create a society which women are viewed more as equals. However the way that metrics are typically measured is that we say things like, well, okay, this becomes a success when we have 30 of parliament being women. And so, theres a few problems to that. One is that its a very artificial measure. As you sort of set an arbitrary number, when this happens then we have enough. The second is that you dont necessarily get i hate using this word but its a lack of a better word the right women in the job. If you were just to go out and say, i need 30 women to do this and you pick 30 women at random, theres really no guarantee that youre getting women with the skill set, the desire, the experience to perform the job well. What also then frequently ends up happening is you get a lot of cooptation by Political Party elites. This was a big problem you actually saw in kuwait with the introduction of a quota system. We want to open this experience to women. We bought into this literature that having women matters. But what you did is then you had the Political Parties saying, you, you, you, you and you are going to represent us and you just represent us and theyre not representing their own experiences or any sort of kind of sort of bottom up organic desires. Theyre just perpetuating the status quo that had been ruling because you become puppets. So the evidence points to really this i think the case of rwanda is one that speaks to this very well as to really the power of organic change. And that you had a situation in rwanda where because of the horrific genocide, all that was really left was women. You numberswise you didnt have a lot of men left to be political activists, to even run the military in the post genocide. So you had women having to take on those roles and they had to figure it out because there was really no there wasnt this sort of structure put in that, oh, we need this amount of women in here. But as a result, you see their children who are the generation that are coming up now and becoming the leaders that they learned from observation, they have learned from what sort of education the these women felt were important to impart that it becomes organic. Now it doesnt become we have women in for the sake of women in. We have individuals who have seen what women had to do and seen what sort of security concerns need to be in play and fully internalize that. And thats whats become a more security and stabilizing force. The other thing it does is that having pure gender quotas, this whole notion of respect and the norms that are brought in within a unit. There are i think as many males who can speak for the benefits of respecting womens rights and respecting autonomy and individually as women can and thats largely in part to socialization and that the really the gender comes down to being able to respect individual and putting more options on the table. And seeing there are more ways that women can act than just this essentialized version. But unfortunately whenever we go and do anything as a military in particular, you need results. And you need to come back with these sort of metrics that you hit wickets a, b and c and now we measure them and this is perpetually going to be a problem when you have to have actionable goal. You have to say we did one, two and three and this is good enough and its stable now because there are x percent of the women are in the parliament. We had x amount of women in this negotiation. We hit the u. N. Resolution obligations. We hit what we set out as our counterinsurgency obligations but it doesnt ensure anything is going to happen the next time. Either theres elections or the next generation is actually being taught to internalize any sort of actual integration and expanse of opportunities. I was going to say, we can see all pretty well obviously with the u. S. Military with millennial generation coming in and taking over some of the more lower level to mid level leadership positions and their attitudes towards dont ask, dont tell and their attitudes towards gender integration are by and large different from the Senior Leadership views. Its been interesting to see. But its an example of how organic change is good but at the same time you need a little push to remind those in charge that there is a push that there is Something Else going on out there that they might not see. I would also say that social change has to come from within. We have goals and we have measures and policies to promote the kinds of change that we want, but we dont always respond the way people want us to. The changes were hoping for are not always the change we get unless weve talked about this language of buyin a lot. And the case of rwanda is a really interesting one because the change that was forced upon the existing population in rwanda by virtue of the genocide was not a positive one. It was not something that the survivors certainly would have chosen or would have sought but as a result we do have this really amazing exemplar of number of seats for women in the legislature. But that didnt necessarily correlate with a or reflect a change in the existing social expectations. Right . What were seeing is, yes, rwanda has this fantastic number of women in the legislature, and yet, at the same time rwanda has a president that has consistently sought and taken and reappropriated more and more powers for himself at the expense of any potential change or empowerment that being a part of a Legislature Might otherwise have conferred on this generation of women who played these first time very public, very official roles. And so, what it means to have that change truly taking effect and to be long lasting is really has to be driven from within and it doesnt always happen the way we want or hope that it will. Thank you. Another question . Well, i have one. So my question is about the role of women, in particular, mothers in counterradicalization and deradicalization issues. By way of context last june 2015, we had over 40 alumni from the middle east, southern europe, africa and southeast asia, and one of the topics in the conference was on radicalization, in particular how that point of radicalization with foreign fighters leaving countries of those that were there to go fight with the Islamic State or daesh. And in discussions it came out that in particular from muslim countries that the role of the mother more so than any other Family Member influenced either the radicalization or the counterradicalization of both young men and young women Family Members. So in your own research, have you seen something similar . If so, are there ways that the United States and our partner nations can leverage that role in positive ways . Yes. Absolutely ive seen it. The mother schools that save has been developing have shown some levels of success and those basically brought in communitylevel leaders and brought in women and taught them how to recognize the signs of growing radicalization in their families and what to do if they notice and found it. Its still very small. But theyve had some success. The women preventing extremist Violence Program has done similar work. Theyve involved women as mothers interacting with local Police Forces or local Security Forces to recognize the signs of growing radicalization and extremism. I think the small successes are encouraging. I think we have yet to figure out how to harness that on the wide aggregate scale. Thats where im looking with my research. Because its obviously going to vary by culture in huge ways. Women in Northern Ireland will by and large probably be find accesses easier or gathering together and discussing and meeting and becoming activists is easier there than in other countries. And we can all think of a few. So it varies culture to culture but there is definitely an association there, we just need to figure out how to capitalize on that. So you can come to i. S. A. And read my paper. On a panel about this. So i did a little work for this paper looking at the radicalization of immigrant communities and really the role that the mother plays there and like, so i looked like micro level familial gender roles and was finding that there wasnt much there. But something i found that hasnt been addressed i dont think very well in all of these antiradicalization programs, especially when you see kids who live in the west, you see this big in britain and france who are leaving and going to daesh, thats where i think a lot of this work is really coming from. What i found and its right now still very rough corellary data and i dont have a really robust data set. One of the reasons i want to go to i. S. A. Is to try to make it better is that in communities where children saw their mothers targeted because of their cultural and because of that religious beliefs, so where there was a lot of essentially very antiislamic sentiment especially towards women because women are much more identifiable as muslims than men do in western cultures, you saw a very high instance of radicalization of their children and that it became almost this reverse protective mechanism where children grow up expecting like their mother to take care of them and becomes this natural bond that you grow up and your mother is the first person to really care for you, really take care of you. Well, what happens when the culture into which youre supposed to come to get a better life, you know, like they were sold this idea as immigrants that were moving to the west because its going to be better, and now you see that cultural particularly targeting your mother, the person that is supposed to be your protector, your caretaker, your sort of world, when that person and that identity becomes targeted, there becomes almost this knee jerk radicalization response. And this is i think a radicalization dynamic that hasnt really been looked at very much, but needs to be addressed i think on a larger scale when we talk about what is integration. Is it really just gender integration or are we talking about increased tolerance . There is a lot of evidence that increased gender tolerance will also lead to cultural tolerance and religious tolerance. But that are we really having the wrong response in this goes back to the idea what breeds radicalization . Is radicalization really a response to being othered so much that you dont feel like you have any other recourse to air your grievances. The supply side. But i think this idea the role of mothers and especially when mothers are threatened it hits at the very much supply side and demand side. Youre creating an environment where children tend to feel helpless but they have this other option. And i think some of these radicalized groups have done really well at marketing themselves. Theyre great at recruiting. They are really good at reaching these children who feel very isolated. So looking at that role of how i think not just the role of mothers as these schools as jeannette is saying, how to prevent radicalization and spot radicalization but as larger, as we think about as the west, what are we doing to assimilate familial units so that facilitation can happen, so women have the power and the ability to spot and prevent radicalization as opposed to their targeting being the catalyst for it. I thought of Something Else, too. This keeps happening. And on the same note youre talking about u. S. Military coming in and recognizing the signs or recognizing communication from women in different societies about the signs of growing radicalization and military that can understand the roles of women in those societies is better equipped to relate to that, as well. But also, if we dont do a better job as a country and internationally of harnessing the role of women in more traditional societies, terrorist groups are doing that and they do it fairly well. Theyll come into an area and pull all the women and say this is your duty as a mother to teach your son, push your son in this direction, send your son in this direction. If we dont offer a different narrative or at least some version of that out there, then weve lost part of the battle. Thank you. Other questions from the audience . Right here in front. Thank you. Im jen taylor. Im one of the external guests. I work as a consultant to d. O. D. With a clearing. I just wanted to pick up on the thread that you were putting out there related to mothers being in the protectivism and how do you think the migration waves were seeing throughout europe now might impact in the decades to come . And are there any intervention points to prevent the near term to prevent sort of the trajectory Going Forward . So, i think thats the milliondollar question, and i wish i was an anthropologist now to be able to trace that. So i think theres a theres a few factors. One is that we dont have i think a really good harness on how big the migration, both the migration and the refugee problem, are. Because i think they are two very different issues that sometimes get sort of conflated together when were just like, oh, theres middle easterners heading to the europe or heading to the u. S. Before. And we need to separate them out. Theres the migratory group that very intentionally is saying we want to go work somewhere we want to go live in europe to have better opportunities for x, y or z because whether its themselves or their families, they feel that theres a better the whole sort of American Dream narrative or western dream narrative that youre going to come and have better opportunities and better education and its going to be a better life. So thats one set. Then on the other side you have the refugee and the Asylum Seekers who because of the perpetual conflicts that have been going on really honestly have nowhere else to go. Its not that they necessarily want to leave syria or want to leave iraq, theres just physically no place. They dont have a home any longer. Its been gone. So i think we need to look at those two separate issues. And i think one is with the migration side it really just comes from this is sort of a different conversation about immigration and actually accepting that immigration makes people stronger and may bring different skills and different trades and those are important. But on what i think your question is more getting at, this refugee and asylum crisis. Its building and building and building to the capacity where host countries arent going to be able to handle it. So what i think and whether those these people dont necessarily want to leave their home. They want to be back there. They have roots that they want to return to and so i think what this the bigger question needs to be is, what is the role of the International Community in ensuring that you have a fruitful, lasting negotiated settlement in places like syria or that you are able to put in programs to address the radicalization issues that are going on in iraq right now, to ensure that it doesnt become worse and so that how do you get them, you know how do you get the Islamic State to the table . How do you get in africa, how do you get boko haram to come to the table . How do you negotiate these things because i think thats the first question. If that can happen and this brings in, i think, Something Else that mandi can speak to a little bit better, but ensuring the role of these Asylum Seekers in that negotiation process, this was a i was able to see the transcripts of a meeting with a bunch of syrian women who are now in turkey and these were all very they were universityeducated women. They all had professional jobs in syria before they were forced to leave because they just didnt they had no place to live or no place to work anymore. And they were talking about why these negotiation have failed and one of them finally brought up, she was like, nobody will talk to us. Nobody will include us. Like, we were economists and bankers and University Professors and paliamentarians. We have skills but theyre so focussed on who is actually fighting that theyre not reaching out to people who have, as mandi mentioned, this expertise in this set. And so, i think figuring that problem out is going to help prevent this from becoming because youre seeing the refugee population becoming a radicalization problem as well now because really they have nowhere else to go. And its the way and again, i think this goes to how good a lot of these radical groups are at actually their propaganda and their recruitment ability is theyre saying well, well offer you a solution, well offer you a place when we win. And thats something that theyre doing that no other side is doing. No other side is saying, well, if you come join us, well ensure that you have a socioeconomic role when this conflict is over. And unfortunately, what the u. S. And other International Militaries have been doing is theyve been so focused on having the right side militarily win that theyve neglected to really engage with who the Key Stakeholders should be when the conflict has terminated. All right. Good. Thank you. Questions, anyone . All right. [ inaudible ] right up here in front. Please. Doesnt seem to be any. Hi. Ambassador jones, deborah jones, ive spent 33 years in the middle east but i think you hit something in your question thats really important and it gets back first of all, too, before i start on this. I just want to ask, did anyone read deborah tanners Washington Post editorial on women in leadership and the essential conflict there because we like our leaders to be forceful, strong and occasionally angry. We like our women to be gentle, selfdeprecating and not really too angry. We like our mothers. I mean, we all have mothers and we love our mothers, most of us. But i was going to say about and that leads me into what i was going to say about the middle east, though, and anyone who spent any amount of time here and i think ambassador holt would agree with this and who spent a lot of time in the houses and the homes and that has been the advantage of being a female officer in the Foreign Services that we spent a lot of time in the homes with these families, as well, knows that the question is not necessarily female power. Its spheres of influence. In the home, they are tremendously powerful, and they make all of the decisions. And in fact, often jokingly refer to the men with the donkeys who work and bring home all of the money and the women make all the decisions. But i think more importantly what we have to realize in these disrupted cultures and in libya, for example, where i most recently served, the only sphere where the government did not intrude was inside the home. That was the only sphere where there was order, where there was food, where there was comfort but also, where the shame factor or the family honor factor is so important and the downside of that, of course, is the womens independence, you know, because womens honor is so important to the honor of the family that that leads to the other problems that you have. Across the middle east, you have differences and we can talk later about kuwait because i was the ambassador of kuwait, as well. I think of all the countries kuwaiti women are the most independent and most out there and make their choices and whatever, but nonetheless, in all these societies, the home still remains the center of gravity for everything. So now with the refugee flows, youve created all kinds of free electrons and thats really dangerous because these women come, they cant establish that same center of gravity for these families, for these kids and that is something i think we really need to focus on a lot and not just teaching them how to they know when their kids are misbehaving, a lot of times and we need to get them creator centers again within their cultural norms that help them to keep an eye on and keep tabs on all these free electrons because i agree with you about the young women, as well. Theyre next generation. They dont know how to cook like their mothers do. If you ask them who theyre still going home. They were still going home and now theyre disrupted and were not plugging into that, as well and its really a tough, tough situation, but it is an important one. Im glad it came up. Im glad you raised that question. Thank you. Go ahead. Im going to say one more thing on that, as well. The other thing about the refugee crisis that were not really talking about that would be interesting to hear about is how much of an impact, if any, external cultures are having on the refugees as they go. Like, that would be a fascinating topic and that could teach us a lot about how we could use the military, use different countrys militaries to face some of the problems we have in the world today and were not talking about that, and were not hearing about it and the level of influence will vary greatly depending on the towns, regions that were talking about but thats something that i wish we had discussed more. Any other panelists want to comment . All right. Well, i dont think we have any other questions so lets join in a round of applause for our panelists. So dr. Bale will close us out with our remarks and if i could have the panelists from the Early Morning session kind of make their way up because we have a parting gift for you after your remarks. Parting gift. A token of our appreciation. You can come slowly because i have to make a few comments first. Just to recap, first of all, i want to thank all of the panelists and all of the participants who came. I found it incredibly enlightening and some of you may not realize what you learned from this and youll find out later when youre in some tough jobs, youll say, wow, i really needed that insight. I think it is essential that we all assess the experiences weve had, particularly the last 15 or 20 years, understand those, but also chart a path to the future. And intellectually our own military likes to forget the lessons of fill in the blank, vietnam or the last decade of war before were even out of it and we havent even grasped the way ahead. So i think even understanding what weve done is important, but the way ahead is crucial unless somehow were going to emerge into a very Peaceful World where everyone is kind of happily living together and the challenges of the regular warfare and radicalization are gone. Im afraid were want going to live in that world. It would be great, but we might as well prepare for the world that were in. In the world of sisa our goal is to take everybody out of the comfort zone and give them the tools, the ability to succeed and meet the expectations we have even if you dont think you can when you first come here. Right, fellow . International fellows . Right . Youve achieved more than you ever thought possible and i think our comments about expectations are huge and the power of diverse teams and diverse perspectives. Its important to step back, whether its a gender question or some other question. What are the diverse perspectives that were missing that could give us different approaches or more Creative Solutions to the problem . Because, frankly, in some cases what weve been doing hasnt necessarily achieved the resounding successes that we keep claiming weve had. So this is an important way to think about it whether, again, its gender, religion, generation, ethnicity, subcultural groups, tribes, you name it. How do we include those in a constructive way to move forward as we build the approaches that are going to endure forever . We talked about expectations matter. Thats a key thing. How do leaders set the expectations . How do they set the organizations up for success . And then how do they recognize within their organizations the official standards and the informal standards . Sometimes theyre different. How do they then root those out as they go forward . In the discussion of standards which we kind of got to a little bit, but could go much deeper, from my experience we always talked about the sanders limiting, but we never looked at the aspects in the case of women where they may have been superior. For example, i remember a subject back in the day when i was lieutenant that it came out and suggested that women had superior handeye coordination and dexterity and would make better tank gunners than men. Oh, man. We didnt like that because it kind of fit against that. Well, of course, then as you do your force design, one option was we could have an automatic loader in the tank in which case Upper Body Strength wasnt that important. The other one was oh, no. We cant have an auto loader. Thats too soviet union. The technology is great, but instead you had this justification based on Upper Body Strength rather than the key element in the tank i would submit was the actual ability to put steel on target. So did i get a better loader or better gunner . Oi probably wanted a better gunner but it was interesting even there how what we call standards we sometimes have very selective approaches. And think about that, step outside of your own bias. This is an important way to think about some of these issues. The next organizational cultures. We are all part of them and whether its a Service Culture or a Community Culture or a branch culture and then leaders may try to change those organizations, but ultimately, there can be spoilers at the subordinate level and some day ill figure out why do the folks that could come out to the panel that at the last minute they were told they couldnt travel. Is this another example that, yes, theyre supportive at the policy level and the senior level, but below that theres some missing element and how do you as leaders identify that follow through to make sure that your campaign will succeed, and this is all your responsibility. Im reminded of this regard in andrew jay goodpastor. He was superintendent of west point. Sue remembered him and ellen came in out of retirement and was a retired fourstar general and was supreme allied commander and came out of retire am as a threestar general, to take them through trying times and one was a cheating scandal and a question of professionalization post a regular warfare, imagine that, and the second was the integration of women in an allvolunteer force. General goodpastor, by their account, took his senior staff aside and in a session said i expect you to welcome, and im paraphrasing because i wasnt there. I expect you to ensure that the women have an environment that welcomes them. If not, ill be happy to shake your hand as you leave and go out the door and leave the organization. So from the top, he set not a flamboyant leadership climate, but a clear one on what the expectations were of the leaders to make this happen. Having seen the other side, it didnt happen all of the way down. Weve come a long way. Theres some serious challenges, but the leaders set the tone and set the expectations and also have to understand that the subordinate leaders have to be fully supportive. Whatever your transformation is. This is a question of organizational change in leadership that i think this is just a great example. The other one flies in the face of the question. Were really in a system with the American Military built on the notion of interchangeable parts and it emerges in the world war i army and how can we treat our soldiers and in large case all of our Service Members interchangeably, you know . You are all interchangeable parts, if you will, once you graduate from this war college experience. Well, shame on us. In our ability today why dont we treat you as talented individuals of significance, find the skills that each individual has and that will be a task for someones dissertation when we get the ph. D Program Going and think about how do we harness our talent beyond the interchangeable parts and thats the industrial approach to war. Can we have something beyond that as we go forward, but how do we see the individual significance of each of us and each of our subordinates . So a couple of pieces about irregular warfare because thats kind of my world. I grew up in the world of traditional warfare and the idea was the german town and all those people would be gone and so the battlefield was inherently clean. We just destroy the enemy and we preserve our forces and everyone else and all those people that live in west germany would be somewhere in the rear. My experience over time, however is thats not the battlefield that really exists, whether it was in iraq during the first gulf war or whether it was in beautiful bosnia or kosovo or macedonia or iraq again or afghanistan, that theres people that live in this world. The people that we want in our doctrine to kind of ignore so we can focus on our enemy armed forces, when in fact, the world of irregular warfare by our doctrine is about this struggle for power and legitimacy and influence among relevant populations. Those populations may be that the host countrys population, and it may be our own domestic population. How do we think about our own legitimacy and our inability in American History to prosecute longterm irregular warfare campaigns because ultimately we lose domestic legitimacy over time and our tie to the citizenry is really an important aspect. The second is ambassador jones comment about spheres of influence. In American History, the argument that won the day why women needed education was that women were part of a separate sphere and the sphere was the protection of the family and the education of the next generation and so ultimately that moved forward whereas much more radical views of women incorporation into this new fabric of American History and the constitution really didnt happen. Abigail adams ultimately will be the wife of adams and in march 1776 writes a letter to her husband, remember the ladies and shes envisioning, i believe, something much more politically inclusive, but over time women do have a huge dimension in irregular warfare, whether its in the recruitment or counter recruitment, whether its in the domestic piece and whether its the spies and whether its combatants or part of the Peace Process. So again, if we come from a traditional background, well leave some of that out and we lose those dimensions. So ultimately, i would suggest that what we see as conventional warfare and a phased approach to warfare where we have the conflict phase and the postconflict phase and iraq and afghanistan should lead us to suggest that maybe thats a false choice. Why is it that the level was higher in the postconflict phase in both iraq and afghanistan . Shouldnt that alone need to rethink that we need to rethink the fundamental assumptions about what happens in what phase . The other one is the postconflict activities are supposed to happen simultaneously with the conflict phase. How do you do that, if you havent incorporated women into that . I dont know, another great thesis topic. Again, think about the logic we have has been built up on a very conventional approach that may be out of tune with the contemporary security environment and what are the implications then if your doctrinal approach is inconsistent with the reality that youre in. Tonight on cspan d3, the hd of washington, d. C. Transit service talks about service in the metropolitan area. Then Jason Fuhrman speaks to lawmakers about the u. S. Economic outlook. The head of u. S. Custom and Border Protection, testifies about the budget request for 2017. Since november 2015, Paul Wiedefeld has been in charge of washington, d. C. Transit system known as metro. At the National President club, he spoke abo he spoke about improving service and safety for passengers. This is just under an hour. A fatality during a spoke related incident, derailment, a drop in ridership and other worrisome event might be what keeps our guest, mr. Wiedefeld up at night. Work with vendors to develop a Smart Phone App surely make the days more exciting for the new general manager and ceo of the washington metro pol. He was the ceo of baltimore washington airport. He is credited with leading growth as the busiest passenger airport of the three airports in the metro washington region. Now his attention is on the countrys busiest subway system and a bus system. 40 years after the first metro railcar ferries residents to work and to sites, todays riders experience unpredictable time and must budget more time to reach their destination. Ontime performance which measures how evenly spaced the trains are is below target particularly since the opening of the silver line. Track work, outside of rush hour hobbles the system. Maintenance systems including broken elevators and escalators creates stress for passengers, especially those on crutches or in wheelchairs. Mr. Wiedefeld rides the metro to work and has witnessed the frustration and extra time added when the escalator isnt working or the annoyance when the announcements are garbled. In addition to safety and maintenance issues, he will usher through usher metro through a krcritical period. Contract negotiations are scheduled this summer. Please welcome Washington Area Metro Transit Agency general manager and ceo Paul Wiedefeld. [ applause ] thank you for joining u ining u. You have been in office three months. There are issues facing the nations second busiest transportation system. How are you going to tackle and actually solve the problems facing metro . Thats all . Thats it. Very good. Easy question. If i could before starting there, i did want to introduce my Board Members that are here. They are so important. Michael goldman, mort downy. And i would like to introduce the first person i met at metro, my station manager, miss odo m. My first day on the job, i got to meet her. Shes a good worker. Rephrase the question. Im wondering your observations and your plan. You have been in office three months. Theres a lot of problems that faces metro. The things i started talking about, broken escalators and elevators. Funding issues and problems with incidents that have led to deaths in the past on metro. How are you going to tackle them and solve them . First thing i did on coming on board in November November 30th is i spent the whole month of december basically reaching out to stakeholders to understand the issues better. Meaning stakeholders everything from my line employees all the way up to leaders of the business, elected officials and the riders to give me a feel for that. At the same time, we started in december and in january in particular we had a number of outside consultants come in to help us get arms around some of these issues. And then my own assessment based on my experiences in different positions. And i really got a good flavor during the blizzard when i got a good sense of operationally some of the things we were dealing with. My priorities have been around safety, social liability and fiscal management in order. Just today, we started to roll out some of the specific initiatives were doing on those three areas. I will get into them further. But it starts with me and getting the entire organization to understand those priorities. To start to organize, to deal with these issues in an efficient way. And to get particularly the line people, the operators, the station managers, the mechanics to understand what were up against and get their support and to work from that end up with our supervisors and superintendents. Because thats a lot of where the issues get determined, particularly from a customers perspective. Focusing on that at the same time im focusing on the overall management level, the team as well. Thats how we are starting the process. I can get into specifics as im sure you have other questions about specific issues. Lets address the first one that comes to mind. You had an op ed laying some of the stuff out. Riders have seen people come before with promises. The promises sometimes take years or never get done. How is this going to happen . How fast is this going to happen . You know, my approach is, again, starting really nuts and bolts and not so much some of the larger things that we tried to frame in the past. To me when i look at particularly the service liability for instance, you know, its fairly simple. Its the cars. Its the vehicles. And then obviously midway and a. M. And p. M. Its the track and its the operations. The operators, station managers. We have set up three teams with champions on each one of those. We meet weekly on what theyre doing, what the plan is and what we are doing to achieve it. What i found in each one of the categories to be frank, its probably its much worse than i expected and maybe even publically we have been talking about. So we have to clearly go right at those issues. We have issues, for instance, in the cars a lot of the debate and the discussion over time has been about parts. Thats only one part of it. Its everything from how we move the cars in the yard. Its everything from how were efficiently programming work, using our employees most efficiently. I have a whole team just working on that issue. On the track issue, same thing. When you look at our truck issue and the work that we have been doing, you know, when you start to peel it away, we have 30 very sharp curves in the system. So thats got to be our first priority. That leads to a lot of our issues. Its not only just fixing what we see but its thinking much more holistically about what we do. So for instance, on the track work, we have a lot of fasteners we have to replace. They are aged and broken and whatever they are doing. What i found i went out with my head engineer and ceo on the rail side. When i went out there and looked in the tunnel and met some of the workers that were doing the work, you know, whats the root cause . Why are these things breaking down . Moisture. Its the wear and tear. Theres a drainage system not working. So its not just go out and fix the fastener. No. Lets come at this together at one time. We have a lot of equipment left over that was left sitting there. We actually sell a lot of our parts, leftover steel and stuff. Its sitting there. To me, its money sitting there. We have to get that out of there quickly. When we have a contractor following up behind us. Eventually, a contractor does take it. Yet we moved it two or three times. It doesnt make sense. The way im getting at these things is again not coming out with a fiveyear plan. We have those things in place. Its really again the nuts and bolts of where we can start to make changes that will impact the customer, you know, in the immediate term. Longer term i was going to follow up. You said something, which is rare to hear somebody in charge saying Something Like that. You are telling us that the problems are actually worse than we may think they are. In terms of the way they have been presented and the way theyve been framed, i think maybe its just the way that i look at them. How i would plan to solve how i plan to solve them, its probably different than they have been planned before. From that perspective they are not from my estimation, they havent been framed correctly in the public dialogue with the board. So thats what i intend to do. The hard truth. The idea you need to know what they are before you can fix them and try to cover. Right. I interrupted you. The mentioned the fiveyear plan, 5 billion plan. It seems riders have raeheard at this. They never see. They dont have that, what has happened. How are you going to show riders that there are improvements coming and make sure they notice them . Again, i think thats an area where we havent done a good job in framing that out. To be frank, i have asked for that exact thing. Where are we on basically where we have to catch up with work that was that we had put off over time. And then where are we then on what we call state of good repairs. Once you get it to a certain stage, how do you maintain it . So im going to come out with basically what that is. Where we are. Here is what we said we were going to do. Here is where we are. Thats where im starting from. We have a backlog of work. What is it . Then once we get through that backlog, whats the plan Going Forward . We have to be very clear to people what that is. And then we have to think strategically about how we address it. So i get into thinking about we have an effort under way to do that. Lets define it for people so they can understand it. But more importantly, lets think strategically how we address it. In my estimation, we have tried to make everyone happy. We have made everyone not happy. With some of the approaches we have taken. I think when you look at other systems around the country, you have to make hard decisions. But i think there is a discussion that needs to be had is what can we get, how much quicker can we get it if we have a little bit of pain here . Do we get things quicker . One thing i hear constantly is i wont use the Weekend Service because its so inconsistent. c maybe its time to look at how were doing the Weekend Service. Is there other things we can do . Same with some of the midday. We do midday work. We come upon a problem. It rolls into the peak period. Im doing a total assessment of what were doing, how were doing that. That will be part of that Going Forward strategy. So its not just something that theres a fiveyear plan out there. But its specifically talking about this is what i need to do to get us back up to this state and at that point here is what you will see Going Forward. This is going to be trackable for the public . We will see in two months we will have this done, one year, we can judge you . Yes. We started on our website today a customer report accounting system, basically. I have laid out almost 50 items that were starting to work on that some of these we have been since ive been on board, some before i got on board. But a lot of them that were just start doing now. So thats going to be something that we some of the things will be updated weekly, monthly at a minimum. Things will come and go. I only want to put things on there that im comfortable saying, yes, i know what were doing and this is the schedule were going to do it on. Then lets judge ourselves against that. There will be issues with schedules. I get that. But i think its important for us to be both transpoiarent and turn up the accountability. You mentioned fiscal management. Theres only a finite amount of money that you have. When you are trying to fix things, where does that come out . If you are talking about you want to maybe improve the 20 minutes to wait on a sunday for a train, that has to come out of somewhere else. How do you find that money . In the first foremost is safety. I mean, thats the first priority. So we have to do that. We have to bring to get at some of the core issues, we have to bring just the basics up. So thats going to be the next priority. And then we go out from there. Anything that we touch, you know, it gets very expensive very quickly, particularly if were in the im speaking rail. Theres another side of the equation with bus and metro access. On the rail side, just given the physical limitations of a twotrack system, any time we touch it, it gets expensive in terms of just getting out there, the ability to get out there and then the challenges we face with a 40yearold system that in some cases was not it was not kept up. Interesting. The plan talked about safety. Theres a couple issues there. One is obviously the safety when you are on the train from no derailment or things like that. Were also raising concerns about stabbings or shootings or rapes that have happened, Sexual Harassment that have happened on the metro. Whats the plan there . Are you going to boost the number of officers on the trains . The personal security, personal safety issue. You know, knew marits a very s system. If you look in most communities, its a safe number. That Means Nothing to the person or to the community when they see one of these tragic events or drastic events that occurs. So what we have done, i worked with the chief of police. Basically, we have gone back and stepped back. What is it that question do differently than what we have done in the past . One of the first things i noticed with the security is it tends to be almost invisible at times because of the uniforms. They blend into the crowd. We have an event where anything that occurs, its hard to see who is in charge. Thats one of the things for instance that minor thing we are doing. We are getting more people. We have a class that comes out in april. Another comes out in september for more people. We have realigned our resources to basically free up some things that our uniform Police Officers were doing to put them out into the field. Ive made very clear to the chief that i want these officers on the platforms, popping in the cars, popping out. Again, its as much giving people the sense and the reassurance that its under control. The same way for our bus operators, same issue. We have issues, serious safety issues with some of our bus routes at different times of the day. We created a Night Watch Program in effect where we are having our officers come up to buses, stop, greet the operator, make sure everything is all right. Were doing that with our Central Control system where were touching in with the bus operators. Because again, its not just rail but clearly rail is one of the biggest ones for us. But even when we do all that, its a much larger issue as we all know. Community issue. One of the things that we have reached out to is the schools. We want to go out and meet particularly with the students. Were going to bring not only the police but bring some of the operators and station managers like that so that we can make the connection with these students that its just not its not a power issue. These are this is your mother. This is your grandmother. This is your uncle, so they can relate to try to take that in. So thats one of the things we want to do or we started actually to do that. We have also worked very closely with the district. We have some of their personnel dealing with us on a day to day in our operation center. We have direct communication. We do intel every day. With the police and with the school system. If theres anything going on on social media that we can all watch. We have an excellent closed Circuit Television program on our rail and the stations. The reality is if you do something in the station or platform or at our bus stops, we will see it. We have been any of these things, weve been catching the people. We have been getting them. We want to prevent it. On that note, were in a city with a lot of visible security. Staying on this theme here. A soft target, with no visible security, often times you walk into a metro station and theres one employee, theres one person there. I have riding metro for 11 years. I can tell count on one hand how many times i have seen officers in the tunnel. What is your plan to change that . Its to get more people out there and police differently. Have them proactively going down. A lot of times again, being new, what i would see is Police Officers around the station kiosk. I want them on the platforms, popping into trains. Thats a different policing strategy. So thats where i think it is. Its getting physically getting the Police Officers into the system, deeper into the system. Got you. Back to fiscal management for a second. You had a memo recently that talked about no more travel and purchasing paper clips were on your target list. I dont guessing that paper clip purchases are not going to solve the budget crisis. What is this an effort to do . Its a checkbook effort. Its like you have with your personal checkbook. If you know that you spent you iallocated 500 for food a travel and you burn it quicker than you thought, you have to bring it back. Thats all it is. Its a normal budgeting process that we have to manage the operating budget very tightly. We monitor it constantly. At this point, we just want to say, with the blizzard particularly, with the expenses that we incurred there, we have to make sure were ratcheting it back and thinking about all expenditures. Lets talk about the blizzard for a second. The very bold choice to shut down the system for two, three days there. Can you give us more rational of why you shut down the system when underground, for example, it wasnt snowing . Sure. It gets to the larger issue of if we are serious about safety, then we have to start making decisions based on safety. Across the entire agency, every employee i have met, they basically said thats the first time we have done this because someone understood the safety concerns that they had as operators and people. So that was part of it is just recognition that we cannot ignore the safety implications of a storm like that. If you recall, when we were preparing for that storm, our big concern was not only the snow and trapping vehicles in the snow and in the yards, but the winds. They were calling for 40 mile an hour winds. We have a very very limited backup power. If that power goes out, then we are basically we have people marooned in locations if we kept just the underground open. The other part we wanted to do, which i think was the first time we had done it, we harbored the vehicles in the tunnels. That let us get back up and service quicker. If you go back and look at some of the history of some of the snowstorms here, we had large mechanical issues after trying to go through snow because of the age of the equipment and where the snow gets under the cars and would create other issues for us. We didnt have a that this time. So we had that figured out. Anyway, it was something that i think was the right thing to do from a safety standpoint for our employees and for the customers. The worst thing we could have done is have people out there to get them to think they could travel in a storm like that as we knew it at the time and, b, have to go and rescue them. Then were pulling resources away from basically getting the system up and running. That was the decision. I think it was the right decision to make. Going staying with the safety issue, there are a lot of times you can get into metro system and see a very crowded platform. When you are at the games, the gallery or Something Like that, but also there are issues when it comes to construction inside of the stations where theres only a few feet between falling off the edge. Have you had any plans to try to address that for safety concerns . Passengers trying to walk through stations. In the shortterm, one of the things were doing is basically we created a new class of employees that are going to work on platforms particularly at the busier stations just to deal with the crowding issues like that and also using police to do that. The reality is in some of our stations, the physical limitations are very tight. It gets compounded when you have either a major event or you have some incident on the rail. So theres clearly that. What we have to do is one of the things that particularly for incidents, is we want to get people to understand before they get down into the station or before they go through the into the mess mezzanine. One of the things we are looking at is putting rail information out on the pylons at the street level. We have electric there. Thats one of the things were trying to figure out. Where we can tell people whats going on before they get down there. Thats part of the issue. You get people down there and they are stuck. The other thing that were doing is we have proposed a tap in, tap out. Some of the times people come into a station and theres an issue. They already paid and they figure, im going to stay because i paid. They wait it out. They are frustrated because they paid and they have to they dont get the service they demand. Were looking at a 15minute gl grace period so people dont feel they have to stay. Something is going on. Let me go get out and do another plan without costing them. I have done that myself. I understand that very much. Talk to me about the situations, too. If i walk in and i see theres a 20minute wait, i walk out and pull up my uber app. Lyft, other organizations are causing competition for you. Is there a way to address that . Do you find it complimentary to your system . I look at that let me talk about it at two levels. There are certain things i have no control over. I have no control over the price of fuel. What can i do about that . Thats going to impact this uber, lyft and car sharing, all those ipg things impact us. I want to focus on, let us provide the best service we can within that context. Thats where we should be focusing. Not worrying about some of the things that havei have no contr over. Thats one level. The other level is thinking about those as part of an overall Transportation Plan for region. Theres nothing wrong with that. You know . Its not an either or car or any of that. To me its all part of a system. So we should think of it as a system. Gear towards that. Then are there opportunities to use that . Are there other things we could be doing that are more efficient by tapping into those resources . Not figuring out ways to try to beat them. Its a little different philosophy. In fact, i think i read that was it giant pea pod will deliver groceries. Does metros problem a lot of the issues reflect the larger state of the countrys infrastructure, especially transportation infrastructure . Are we essentially an example of whats going wrong when it comes to transportation funding and structure . A lot of the same trends you see across the country, whether its transit, highway. You name it, you look at any of the Industry Groups and they have a laundry list of needs that havent been the met, have been kicked down the road. At some point they come to come back to haunt us. Look at Manhole Covers blowing up in the air. Theres all kinds of inf infrastructure things that need to be fixed. Thats a National Debate and its regional for us. Speaking of regional, the idea of a dedicated tax has been pushed for a long time with little interest in virginia and maryland. Is there any way you think you will see a dedicated tax for the metro system . I think that the way that i view the system is we are in a region thats competing globally. I mean, thats where we are. The metro is one of the tools to help this region compete globally. And so unless we start to think in those terms, it puts us in a very difficult position to compete. So with what that means is if we fund on a local level, you will think more locally. If you fund in a rengional leve, you think regional. You start to have an understanding of what you are trying to do as a region. From that perspective, i think its important. If you look at the major transit Properties Around the country, i think were the only one that does not have some sort of regional mechanism like that. It provides stability and certainty and budgeting rather than an annual budgeting thing we go through. We Reach Agreement for longerterm agreements. By and large, again, across the country, the reason that you see that is because these are very large, complex, expensive systems to maintain and operate. And unless you have that, it makes it very difficult. In terms relatively terms, metro is young compared to a lot of the other systems out there in the United States and europe. Are there lessons you can learn, for example, from some of the systems in europe that have been operating for a very long time and dont seem to have as many of the issues we face in washington . I think to compare to europe is a little we look at transit in this country differently than other places, both in europe and asia. That comparison is tough. There are lessons to be learned. The smart card is one of those. They did in london, for instance. Theres lots of things that we can learn from them. I think particularly the funding and the Public Policy decisions in both europe and in some of the asian countries, they are not applicable here. I think clearly we can learn from other major systems in the country. My experience has been every one of those systems have their issues. Im sure that if you look deeper, they have very similar issues that they have to go through. We all do because, again, the nature of the beast. But i think if we get at some of the core issues, we can start to solve we should be at a minimum the best Transit System in the u. S. Both in terms of its age, its meaning to the economy, what it means to the nation as the nations Transit System. We should definitely be there for sure. As we reach to meet european and or asian models, thats further down the road. Why arent we the best one in the United States . I think some of it is because we had a new system and focused on the newness and not some of the aging of it. We had a Capital Construction mentality i believe as an agency over the years. We have now moved into obviously with the except ft. Sill vor t r li silver line. You are taking care of the basics. Thats a shift for the agency. This question is from the audience. The questioner wants to know, there are many examples of wonderful Customer Service representatives. But its often operators who abandon trains or their station and theres no one there to help. Does metro have a Customer Service program . I have seen just some fantastic Customer Service from people that have no idea who i am or they dont know i was there. So they by and large do very well. Do they have issues . Yes. Have we brought the line employees into the solutions . No. Thats exactly what i talked about earlier. What im trying to build is at the staff level, particularly at the operation of front line people level, is the pride in the system. I want them i have said this we have a class of new employees that come in every two weeks. Dan, who runs that, is here. The thing i say to all those employees is that what i want you to do is when you go out to watch a game or whatever, if someone asks you where do you work, i want to you say metro and they think, thats cool and you are proud. We have a lot of work do that. I think thats something if you ask someone where they work and they say, under armour, you may have a different view and they may say it a different way. I know we can get there. Its something we did at bwi. If you ask anyone if they say bwi, they are proud about it and you think positive about it. Thats the same goal i have here. It starts with line employees. That means a lot of work with our managers to understand that, to buy into that. It means working with in the construct of our how were operating in terms of unionization, labor, making sure theres rules that we abide by there. We have to make sure that the goal here is to be proud in the system. Can you do that without raising salaries . Thats usually one thing that instills happiness in a work force. Of course, thats always going to be an issue. I think if you treat people with respect, it goes an awful long way is my experience. They get it. I mean, the money is not always going to be there. I think that we have these are great jobs. Theres no doubt about it. The employees have great jobs. More importantly, its building that relationship with the front line employees that were in this together. That woere thinking of you. For instance, when i make a decision on blizzards, im thinking of them, not just i have to try to do this because thats what other people say i should be doing. Its really thinking about them at the same time. Speaking of that, you have had some Big Decisions you have had to make so far. Youve been pretty decisive in your three months as the gm. From the snowstorm to the police expansion, others. How do you approach Decision Making . Is it a group effort . Do you bring everyone together . Is it you saying, we have do this . Right now its heavy handed on my part. I am i just came out with a new organizational structure. I am recruiting for a number of those positions. My experience though eventually is i get a tight team that basically is thinking strategically about the agency all the time, is what i want. And then i manage more of a matrix style, which is i get out and want all of my particularly managers to do that. One of the things that i have found at the agency is quite a bit of silos and a lot of turf issues. So with the new organizational structure, basically tearing that down so the people that work for me directly that are my direct reports and all people under them are at will. And they will understand what that means is that, you know, either they act as a team or they are not on the team. One of the questioners wants to know your personal what has been your worst metro fiasco as a passenger . Actually, one of the worst was it wasnt it was understandable. We had an issue. And it was at union station. I had a breakfast meeting there early. Then i caught the train down. It was kind of interesting because i had a 9 00 back at headquarters. It was on Customer Service. In getting when i was there, there was a number of issues we were dealing with. But i could not find the people that were managing it. I did not get the sense of urgency of what we were dealing with. And so when i got back to the meeting, you know, when i looked at the pages i was getting, we had train delays and there was things going on. That was it. I sort of lost it a little bit. But i think they started to understand that, you know, a, they had been over the years a little dull to the issues, i think. Have i have to bring that into focus that this is not acceptable, that we need to be proactive when things occur and not just think, okay, i have the trains and they are moving back. Its the Customer Experience part of it which i did not see. I was lucky enough to be recognized by a number of customers. I was informing them of what was going on. That was probably one that sticks in my mind is one that got to me a little bit. You want to tell me your best experience to counterweight that . Best . I have had so many theres one gentleman thats a train operator thats just fantastic in providing information. I asked him to come down to the office. We get to meet him. Thats fantastic. I have seen our police do just tremendous work. Unfortunately, we had a terrible incident not too long ago on the tracks with an individual. And it was a friday night. And it was a threehour ordeal. Guess what . No one on that line that was dealing with the issue most of them were not working. They were off. This wasnt how they were planning to spend their friday night. They handled a very complex and tragic incident with just utmost professionalism. In dealing with the situation and also trying to get out to the customers to understand what was going on and rebuild the service. To see that im very thrilled with the passion i see in the people. It needs to be harnessed, it needs to be direct and brought out. But its there. You referenced crime problems a few minutes ago. You seemed to be talking more about transparency with the metro system. Currently, information about the crimes, arrests and prosecution of crimes on metro is not available publically. Will you make it publically available Going Forward . We will make public whatever we have. Its a little bit more complex than just what we control of this. Particularly with youth crime. Theres all kinds of rules that im still learning about in the region. From what we do, we will be as open as we can. If it jeopardizes an investigation or a method were using, were not going to be open about that. Same question about transparency, will you make public the terms of real estate transactions after they are finalized and approved . Other public agencies do this across the country. I see no reason not to. Im getting as many promises as i can from you right now. When will you join other transit agencies with procure awards and the value of the bids on website . I dont see any problem in doing that. You are making the crowd very happy. This questioner wants to know, why does it take so long to replace bloroken escalators. We have seen stories like in dupont circle. And why do they break so often. Let me touch on the why part first. We have a lab where we have the mockups of the he escalators an elevators we have. With escalatorescalators, a lot times from a customer perspective, its broken. Its a breakdown. But the reality is, these are very complex systems that are designed from a safety standpoint. Im not going to tell you what you can do. There are certain things if you do certain things on the escalators, they will stop ou t automatically. It deals with steps and rails and other things. Just in normal usage, it can happen. It shuts down automatically as it is supposed to do. We have station managers have some ability to investigate. But the reality is, you have to make sure its safe. You take a technician out. We try to keep technicians in an Emergency Response condition so they can do that. A lot of times what you see with a stopped escalator is that issue. Theres another set of escalator issues where we have to replace escalators. That gets to be a challenge if you have limited access to a station. Because we have to think about, how do we get people out of there if an emergency occurs . Thats how they have to think about how they stage these things. In terms of rehabilitation of escalators, same issue. We try to maintain them. We replace basics. Every few years, we have to do a rehab on them. Our breakdown rate is in the 90 were performing in the 90 , 92 , 93 . The reality is if an escalator is broken down and it is yours, theyre all broken. If you look at any of our stations, you may be looking at a dozen escalators in that one station that you may as a customer never think about. There are escalators all over. The one you hit is broke. We get it. From the percentage standpoint, they have done a very good job. Were going to continue that. Were going to continue to try to do that better. Continuing with a little bit of transparency and openness part, to my knowledge, metro has not released the number or amount of settlements paid for for injury or death that have occurred in the system. Will you release that information . Do you know offhand how much has metro paid . I dont know that. To commit to that one. I dont know what the legal ram if ramifications are on that one. I have dont want to commit on that. Changing suggee ining subjec. We learned an effort with major phone care years to plug the system with more cell Service Towers antennas fell through. Metro will fund that itself. Why was that decision made and why did it take this long . Sure. I walk in as a tenyear history of this thing. But the reality is, its not a cell phone issue for us. Its a radio issue. We have a major radio system above ground and below ground that basically is used for emergencies and the 700 megahertz system. We have to replace that because the fcc says we have to get on the band we are on. We have a project to replace the radio system above ground, below ground. New radio, new cabling, new anten antenna. As part that was as we are in the tunnels hanging our cable for our radio needs, we basically have struck a deal with the carriers to hang their cable. A few years ago, eight years ago, ten years ago it was flipped. There was a business reason for them do that. That business reason has pretty much dried up. Used to pay by the minute. You dont pay by the minute anymore. Now the other thing is as they try to do it, what they found is its a very complex environment to work in. Basically, you are competing for space to get track space because you are hanging the cables on the walls on tunnel walls. You are moving utilities and or signage on those things. You have do this in a very small window of time or the customer pays in terms of what we can provide. Basically what the arrangement we have now is we have this 350 million project, 125 million or so is in the tunnel portion of it. Of that is a subset that deals with the cell phone portion of it. What we have done is struck a deal where they give us cash and they give us some materials in kind. Were going to be doing it as were doing our radio. It flipped the approach. Do you see that as a safety issue as well . Is it a safety issue for people not to be able to use their phone . Yes. At a minimum, its a perceived safety issue because something happens down there, you want to be able to have access. I get it. Thats very understandable. Yes, we want it from that perspective. The customer would like it to have it for sure. You see it in the stations where we have it. This is not anything unique to metro. This is an issue for any Transit System around the country, particularly the major systems. Its very expensive. It has a major impact on the system when you put these things in. Then you compound it with our system with only a twotrack system, you are talking out one of the tracks to do it. Lets talk about the phone app. The ability for riders to tell how long until a bus is coming, how long until the train is coming or if theres a back load at union station, they know that they should walk to the other side to another train. What efforts are making there to make that Information Available to App Developers . Apparently we had for some reason we werent sharing as much information as we had. We changed that about two or three weeks ago. To be frank, i hadnt gotten down tho that level. When i learned about it, i said thats ridiculous. We should be able to share whatever information we have in terms of train movement. The reality is, we dont have excellent information on that. Its based on maybe a ten, 15yearold technology of how we have been trying to track trains. You can see that on the information displays we have. You might see something that says three minutes. Its measuring where it was in the one gap and its estimating what it will take to get there. It doesnt understand whats happened between here and there. So we have to create a system that does that. We need do that on our own. Were going to that on our own. At the same time, we want to be able to open up as much of the technology to Third Party Developers to do this. One of the things that i have said repeatedly is for us to try to catch up in some of the areas whether social media, in some of the technology areas, for us as an agency to get there is we will always be behind. We just dont have that capability. Its not our core mission. It supports our mission, but its not our core. Why dont we let private sector people, other people, greater people creative people do that. Lets figure out way dozen ths that. We reached out to Greater Washington to help us. Theres a lot of smart people in this area that know more than we will ever know in that area. A lot of these things you talked about today, and your yo safety, fiscal management, relight, those things cost money. Gets to fiscal management. Where are you going to fi ing i money for better technology, fixing elevators, adding security and making safety important . How do do yyou do that . Manage more efficiently. Theres a lot of things we can pick up by managing a little differently than we managed before. Theres definitely efficiencies there. Theres redundancy in what we do and we need to make changes there. We just have to things that are legacy that we just dont need anymore. We have to address all those. That frees up some dollars to work smarter i think in general. We can achieve more. But we need to continue to work with our federal partners and our jurisdictions to basically address those issues and make hard decisions. My job is to give them clear understanding of what were up against and where do you want to chip away at. Does the fda how much does that affect what you are trying to do or does it change what you are trying to do . I welcome oversight. I think we have to make sure its as efficient as possible. We have to make one of my concerns is we tend to be very focused on process and not the product. So one of the things [o8y we di line today is we outlined 732 i think it is literally actions that were taking. Thats more important to me is what physically are we doing to get the system safer and not sort of the compliance part of the issue. Obvio obviously, we have to meet the compliance. We seem to be spending a lot of time and energy on the process versus what are we doing to change the product. So my focus is more on that. I think the obviously as the new Metro Safety Commission gets set up, thats great. Those are things we should have. The more the sooner had a is done in a definitive way, the better. Theres a questioner who wants to know about what can we done about the 3wbad behavior being from noise, food, blocking exit, people put feet up on chairs. Is there an effort to maybe be done with a Courtesy Campaign or is there a culture problem you see with riding trains that needs to be reversed . I dont know. Ive been to movies. Ive been to malls. I experience all kinds of things that a lot of public environments. I think we reflect that no differently than other public environments. So, yes, we can make sure that we try to do that, that we p project a certain decorum that we would like to have in the system. But its a big community. You talked earlier about the stakeholders you visited with, news outlets, civic groups, politicians in the d. C. Area. This questioner wanted to know, you spent ten minutes with the riders advisory counsel. This is a 21member Group Representing the riders in the service area. When do you expect to spend more time with the group . How do you see their influence as representatives during your time . They are right. I did meet with them early when i came on board. Basically, i have to spend time with them. I know that. I basically said that at the time that i need to get back and work with them. I think now where i basically remember, at the beginning two months or so, i was really in the sort of absorbing stage. Trying to take in as much. Now i can talk about more what we are doing so i can get more engaged with groups like that. I look forward to doing it. They offer excellent perspective. Now, they do provide a perspective to the board. Myself but more importantly to the board. Its one of their committees in effect. So thats important for the board to have some direct connection with some of the riders. Thats what that does. Got you. A questioner wants to know the blue line riders have been complaining nonstop since the introduction of the silver line and the rush plus changes that reduce the number of blue line trains. That happened in 2012. Four years later, the riders are crammed on six car trains at 12 minute headway while paying peak fair fares. How do you plan to address this . Sure. Do you want me to talk to martin directly . Nice. The reality is, you know, those decisions were made a dozen years ago by the local governments. They understood that you have a tunnel that or a portion of the system that can handle roughly 26 trains per hour. Decisions were made a decade ago that thats what they would do. We have to again where i need to focus on is making sure that what we put out there operates. That we put it out at the right numbers in the morning and peak and once its out there its reliable. That starts to solve some of the issues. I cant undo the construct of that deal because of the limitations. Thats again something that was settled i think quite a while ago. Its the nature of what we have with a very constrained system at that point. You have had declining ridership for many years. You have some bullet points. You are talking about what you would like to do to change that can increase the number of people using it . Does it have to be wholesale change in how the system operates . I think it definitely has to be we have to get the basics right. Washcog to look at the trends, whats going on. Clearly, you can point to some of the issues that we have. You know, this is a complex region. You hit on some of the things impacting that. I think when we look harder at the numbers, some of the core roots and errors where we have joint development, the numbers are up. Longer haul routes are down. Theres lots of dynamic going on. I reached out to washcog, help us think this through and think about all the other aspects of it, whether its land use, whether its different business and whether you can all those things have to be followed so we can start to think differently about what we provide. We continue to try to provide a system from a 70s and 80s mentality, that were wasting dollars and time. Were almost i wanted to end with a few last questions. Before i ask the final questions, the National Press club is the worlds leading pro professional organization for journalists. We fight free press worldwide. For more information, visit our website at press. Org. Thats press. Org. I would like to remind you about upcoming programs. Tomorrow, jay phasen, will outline the organizations conservative approach. One week from today we will host ken barns and henry lewis gates junior to discuss race in america. That night, the National Press club will welcome home jason rozion, a journalist held hostage. He will be with us that night. I would like to present our guest with the National Press club mug. I would like to remind you not to use this on the metro system to drink out of. Thank you. We have talked earlier about a lot of the issues coming with metro and lot of the issues coming with metro and the bus system and efforts to address those. Recently, d. C. Started running its streetcar after many years and many failed promises of when it would start running. 200 million i believe is the effort. What are your thoughts on the management of the d. C. Streetcar and will you be able to use metro fare passes when they so its all integrated in some form . They are doing a fantastic job running that system. Hes a board member, too. They have done a really hes done a very good job. I know his team has to get that up and running. I think they did the same approach. They are not going to put something out there until they know its safe and reliable. Thats basically what i think you just saw play out there. So thats very good. We will discuss later on the fare issue. Okay. Will it be integrated . Yeah. We will work with them to see what makes the most sense once they decide to start to charge. Okay. I guess for my last question, i will end a little bit early today, you moved from baltimore now here to washington. We have some sports teams that are competing. I would like to get you on the record. Are you now a redskins and nationals fan . As i mentioned to one of my Board Members awhile ago when he asked me that same question, you have a great hockey team and Great Basketball Team down here. I guess i could press you a little more. I also know your wife is sitting right there and shes from Baltimore County so i will be very careful. Thank you. I appreciate that. I would like to thank the National Press club staff including our Journalism Institute staff and Broadcast Center for organizing todays luncheon. If you would like a copy of todays program or to learn more about the National Press club, go to press. Org. Thank you. We are adjourned. [ applause ] the commanders of u. S. Central command, Africa Command and special operations are set to testify on capitol hill. Theyll speak to members of the Senate Armed Services committee about counterterrorism efforts. Thats live at 9 30 a. M. Eastern here on cspan 3. And over on cspan, Homeland Security secretary jeh johnson testifies on the president s 2017 Budget Proposal for dhs which calls for 40 billion in spending. That hearing gets under way at 10 00 a. M. Eastern. I am a history buff. I do enjoy seeing the fabric of our country and how things, just how they work and how theyre made. I love American History tv. Presidency, artifacts, fantastic shows. I had no idea they did history. Thats probably something i would really enjoy. And with American History tv, it gives you that perspective. Im a cspan fan. Jason furman is chair of the White House Council of economic advisors. He was recently on capitol hill to outline the president s annual report on the u. S. Economy. He also took questions from lawmakers about the National Debt, income inequality and federal regulations. This is an hour and 40 minutes. Meeting will come to order. As soon as i turn on my microphone. The committee will come to order. Chairman furman, welcome back. We very much appreciate your willingness to come and speak with us following the economic report of the president. It is important for us to understand what is in this and get your take on it and where we are going. It certainly helps us in terms of our policy making decisions Going Forward. Want to welcome you here and thank you for your participation. Vice chairman teaberry, Ranking Member maloney, thank you for your willingness to continue this longstanding tradition we have that the chairman of the council of economic advisors testifies before the joint committee committee. This year marks the 70th anniversary of the council of economic advisors, and the joint economic committee. Both of which were created to advise our respective branches of government on a wide range of matters affecting the economy. We appreciate this annual opportunity to engage in dialogue and look forward to discussing this years economic report. Much has been learned over the course of this slow growth recovery that were in. These lessons will only continue for the foreseeable future. The current recovery has been slower than priest of previous recoveries and subdued expectations about the economic population and Labor Force Growth have placed additional pressures on federal budget constraints. However, i dont accept the often mentioned assertion that we have entered a new normal of slower Economic Growth. Policy reform seeking to create a better tax system, rein in spending and loosen the regulatory shackles restricting the economy can alter this trajectory by removing some of the structural barriers American Workers and businesses face today. In my opinion, a lot of the problems wed like to solve require us as policy makers to look in the mirror and see how current federal Government Policies are affecting our economy. In his final state of the Union Address this year, president obama stated he wanted to focus on the next five years, the next ten years, and beyond. However, he admitted one of the most important issues that america faces in the coming years, the financial obligations that will come due over those time frames, and particularly in the beyond. That was not mentioned once in his address and how to achieve fiscal sustainability was not among the four questions the president argued that we as a country have to answer. I found this to be a glaring omission, given how our National Debt has risen so sharply over the past seven years from 10. 6 trillion when president Obama Took Office to now over 19 trillion. This accumulation of such staggering levels of debt is nothing short off reckless and the situation will only get worse the longer we wait to address it. According to a recently released report by the nonpartisan congressional budget office, in just ten years spending on mandatory spending programs and interest on the debt will consume nearly 99 of all federal revenues. Clearly this path is unsustainable. So if we dont work now to correct this disturbing trajectory, our ability to pay for essential government functions will be severely constrained, our economy will suffer, and our National Security will be at risk. The ceas report we will discuss today devotes significant attention to inequality as a defining challenge of the 21st century. However, i think it is important to recognize that intergenerational theft is also a form of inequality. A particularly severe one that our children and grandchildren are poised to inherit. Their ability to succeed in our future economy will depend largely on the decisions that we make today. For the American Dream to remain attainable for future generations we must accept the reality of our fiscal situation and act responsibly by addressing it immediately. I look forward to discussing these issues in more depth with chairman furman. I will now turn to Ranking Member maloney for her opening statement. First of all, welcome, dr. Furman. Thank you for calling this hearing, mr. Chairman. Thank you for appearing yet again before us today to answer questions about the current state of the u. S. Economy. I share the overall assessment of the economic report of the president that under the leadership of president obama the nations economy is back on track after what was the worst recession during the since the great depression. We have just completed the best two years of private sector job growth since the 1990s. We have recorded the fastest twoyear drop in the annual average Unemployment Rate in 30 years. The Unemployment Rate has been cut in half. As you can see in this chart, were in the midst of the longest streak of private sector job creation in history, with a record 71 straight months of growth and the creation of 14 million private sector jobs. There are some who look lightly at these achievements claiming that the obama recovery pales in comparison to average quote, average, recoveries, as if the economic meltdown during the last years of the Bush Administration was an average recession. Is the loss of almost nine million american jobs average . Is the loss of homes for nine million americans average . Lets remember, when george bush left the oval office, the economy was in a death spiral. In the final quarter of 2008, gdp shrank at a staggering 8. 2 annual rate. The worst Quarterly Economic performance in more than 50 years. Housing prices were collapsing. U. S. Households lost nearly 13 trillion. Dr. Furman, last year you told us this recession was like an economic heart attack. You said the share of wealth lost in the early days of this recession was almost five times as large as the loss and wealth that triggered the great depression. Thanks to the bold action of president obama, democrats in congress and the Federal Reserve, we have steadily climbed back from this recession. As you can see from this chart, the u. S. Gdp has grown in 24 of the past 26 quarters. Real gdp has grown by over 14 since the start of the Obama Administration. The Auto Industry written off by some as dead has already added nearly 640,000 new jobs since 2009, and it is now exporting more than two Million Units per year. Average housing prices have rebounded to 2007 levels, and Household Wealth is more than 17 trillion higher than before the recession. This recovery has occurred despite efforts by many republicans in congress. First they opposed stimulating the economy. In fact, every single one of them in the house voted against the recovery act. They demanded budget cuts at exactly the time when economic theory says government should increase spending to boost demand. The report notes that the economy faces longterm structural challenges. First of all, the baby boomers are retiring. That alone will decrease Labor Force Participation and slow the growth of gdp. We also face the devastating effects of offshoring of american jobs and job losses due to automation and technical changes. These challenges are not a surprise. They have been on economists radar for years. So what should we do . I agree with your assessment that we need to rebuild the nations crumbling infrastructure, invest in Early Childhood education, implement paid leave, achieve equal pay for equal work, and make college more affordable. I want to close by looking at economic inequality, one of the central issues of our time, and the focus of the first and fourth chapters of the economic report of the president. The u. S. Experience has diverged from other advanced countries. Since 1987, the share of income going to the top 1 in the United States has been greater than every other g7 country. Every single year. We need to recommit ourselves to policies that expand opportunities and narrow inequality. These policies will pay dividends in the future and help us create an economy that is even more robust, an economy where the benefits of growth are shared across the income spectrum. As you note, giving all people a fair shot will strengthen our economy by boosting productivity and accelerating growth. Dr. Furman, thank you once again for appearing before the committee. I am eager to hear your testimony and congratulations on an excellent report. Thank you, Ranking Member maloney. Now we turn to introducing our distinguished witness, chairman furman. He is chairman of the council of economic advisors. Previously he served as a Principal Deputy director at the National Economic council and Senior Vice President of the world bank. He has also been a senior fellow in economic studies and director of the hamilton project at Brookings Institution. Dr. Furman earned his ph. D in economics and master of arts and government from Harvard University and a master in science and economics from the London School of economics. Thank you for joining us. We look forward to hearing from you on your report. Thank you, chairman coates. Vice chairman, Ranking Member and members of the committee. We are excited to be here today to talk about the 70th annual economic report of the president , something that the cea and this committee have had a chance to do many times over the decades. This reports overall Macro Economic theme is that 2015 was a year of continued growth for the u. S. Economy in the face of substantial headwinds from abroad. Ranking member maloney cited a number of the statistics, the strongest job growth in two years of job growth in a decade. The largest decline in the Unemployment Rate in 30 years. The longest streak of private sector job growth on record. The Unemployment Rate has consistently fallen well faster than what anyone would expect, falling to 4. 9 in february 2008 as compared to forecasts which as recently as 2014 had expected it to stay above 5 through 2020. At the same time, the laborforce Participation Rate has been relatively stable over the past year as improving Economic Conditions partially offset the drag on participation from the retirement of the baby boom generation. And perhaps most importantly, over the past six months, nominal Hourly Earnings for private Sector Workers have grown at their fastest pace since the Great Recession although more work remains to be done to boost wages. Our domestic progress is all the more notable in light of the substantial headwinds that the United States faces from the Global Economy. The International Monetary fund estimates the Global Economic growth was 3. 1 in 2015. The slowest since 2009 and continuing a trend of falling below expectations. The United States had the highest growth rate of any major advanced economy, but slowing growth in a number of large emerging markets weighed heavily on the Global Economy in 2015. Weak growth abroad served as a drag on u. S. Exports with exports subtracting 0. 1 Percentage Points in gdp growth in 2015, a substantial shift from the half point exports had been adding to growth in 2013 and 14 and we expect these head winds to continue into the year 2016. Particularly in light of these adverse Global Developments it is important that we work to strengthen domestic growth by boosting productivity and dynamism in the u. S. Economy. It is also important that we work to ensure the benefits of Economic Growth are shared broadly, and to this end, the 2016 economic report of the president lays out the president s agenda for inclusive growth. Despite progress since the Great Recession, the unequal distribution of income, wealth and opportunity remains one of the greatest challenges facing our economy. Its not unique to the United States, but its more severe here than in other countries around the world. Some of the increase weve seen is a natural consequence of competitive markets, the result of differences in productivity as technology evolves. But some of the increase may reflect the rising influence of what economists call economic rents. The income captured by companies and workers beyond what their productivity justifies. The apparent increase in rents in recent decades and their overall increasingly unequal distribution have contributed to overall inequality without boosting productivity providing opportunities to improve both efficiency and equity in the u. S. Economy. The president s agenda includes making competitive markets work better by increasing opportunity and combating the trend of rising unequally divided rents. Competition most effectively promotes Economic Growth when it is open to the widest pool of talent. The president is promoting equality of opportunity by investing in education, supporting children in lowincome families, and ensuring a fair criminal justice system. The president also supports policies to make markets more competitive by reducing Overall Economic rents through promoting more open and competitive markets, balanced intellectual property rules and a smarter approach to occupational licensing and regulation among other policies. Other sections of this years report lay out additional steps we can and should take to ensure a strong domestic economy, including expanding trade, invfting in technology, investing in infrastructure and invfting in children. Id be more than happy to talk about these or any other top particulars that you are interested in. Thank you. Mr. Chairman, thank you very much. I want to apologize for having to leave shortly. The senate has called for four consecutive votes which will take considerable amount of time. Im going to ask my question to you and then turn this over to mr. Teeberry, our vice chairman who will recognize miss maloney as Ranking Member. Then in this somewhat byzantine order of who came first and which chamber you are from and what is your seniority, we will try to do a fair allocation of back and forth. And i have someone here who has studied assiduously and is an expert trust me, with people in and out and back and forth it can get very complicated. Mr. Chairman, i came to office a long time ago. One of the very first critical votes i had to face was the decision as to whether or not we would raise our debt ceiling limit to over 1 trillion. People say, wow, that must have been 100 years ago. No, not quite. That was 1981. Today we are at the 19 trillion mark. Look, lets take the politics out of this. We had three years of balanced budgets at the end of the 1900s before we came into this new millennium. Under both republican control and democrat control, we have seen an ever accelerating plunge into debt. We know that the darth vader of the future economy is lurking out there waiting to collect the bills. We know that from cbo, the projections Going Forward are dramatic relative to the way sdrigs Discretionary Spending shrinks. Cbo said in ten years we will as a current trend be at 99 of our budget will be consumed by mandatory spending and interest coverage. This obviously is unacceptable. We know the baby boom era has been descending upon us. Weve known this for decades. So if we can take the politics out of all this as to who to blame and whos responsible and simply say we now, whether you are a republican, democrat, conservative, liberal or in between, on this spectrum, we have a common challenge that has to be addressed. It has been pushed down the road over and over and over. It is becoming increasingly a hindrance to our economy and ability to grow to provide for our National Security, pave roads, to build infrastructure, to provide for health care, research and you name it. You name the functions that are necessary to be addressed. So i wonder if you would tell us, what is the next president , regardless of who that is, what is the next president and the next congress what do they need to do to finally stand up to this looming crisis to put in place a longterm solution that is feasible in terms of what how we need to govern but will put us on a path to more fiscal responsibility and avoid this coming wall that were going to hit if we dont take action. I may not be able to be here to be hear your final answer on that but wed like it for the record. Id appreciate it if you would address that. Thats my only question. Then ill turn it over. Thank you very much for that question. I think i agree with the premise of almost everything that you said. I think it is important to put this in context. Our deficit was nearly 10 of gdp when the president walked in the door. That as a consequence of a very severe recession. Deficit has come down to 2. 5 of gdp which is below the average of the last 40 years but we know it is going to spike shortly. Right . Absolutely. Thats due to a combination of deficit reduction and also a strengthening economy. The former cbo director recently cowrote a paper in which he argued that the fiscal outlook over the next 25 years is a challenge, but is less of a challenge than it looked a couple years ago, in part because of the steps weve taken, in part because of lower Interest Rates. But more does need to be done. Deficit will rise as the share of gdp, the debt will rise as a share of gdp. Our approach is a balanced approach of measures on the spending side including entitlements and measures on the tax side which are predominantly not about raising rates but about cutting back on tax benefits for high income households, many of which are economically efficient. The last thing i should say is ultimately our goal is to see the debt to gdp ratio on a downward path and stabilized. One can accomplish that both by lowering debt, but also by raising gdp. So steps that strengthen our economy are really important part of how we need to deal with our debt and deficit as well. Thank you. We finished 12 seconds behind my time so i need to pass this on. Again, apologize for having to leave. Hopefully to be back as quickly as i can. Thank you. Thank you, mr. Chairman, i will recognize the Ranking Member, mrs. Maloney, for five minutes. Thank you very much. A major focus of the economic report of the president is widening economic inequality. And your report argues that extreme inequality will be a macroeconomic problem, a drag on productivity and growth. Please explain to even those who arent concerned about the growing gap between the haves and the havenots, why we should be concerned about inequality and why is vast inequality everybodys problem. Thanks for your question. And i think theres a number of reasons. One of the clearest is that if you have inequality of income, youre going to have inequality of opportunity. And if you have inequality of opportunity, theres talent that could be contributing more to our economy but wont get the shot that it should get because lacking educational and other opportunities. So, well miss out on the innovation and creativity we need to push us forward. Okay. As you noted in your testimony, the share of income going to the top 1 in the United States is much higher than in other g7 countries. And why has the experience in the United States been so different from the other g7 countries . All of our economies are facing similar forces in terms of technology and globalization, and those have played a role in rising inequality across the advanced economies. One thing thats happening in the United States, though, is we have made less of an investment in education that would let our workers keep up with the skills that would complement the advances we see in technology or to take advantage of globalization. So, thats one reason why weve seen an increase in inequality. I think also institutional changes matter. The fact that the United States has a minimum wage that is very low by the standards of the g7, has been eroded substantially by inflation has also been a contributing factor to the increase in inequality. Many people understand that expanding Economic Opportunity for women in the workplace and paying them fairly is the right thing to do. Why is it also good for the broader economy . One of the challenges we face in our economy is a demographic challenge that where an increasingly aging society and that has slowed the growth of our labor force. One of the ways to increase the growth of our labor force would be to incorporate both men and women in the workforce and when you take steps like more flexible workplaces, more subsidies for child care, reducing the tax penalty on secondary earners and other measures along those lines, paid leave, all of that helps bring more women into the workforce and helps us overcome some of the demographic challenges we have built into our structure. And people understand that programs like head start and universal prek are an effective tool for helping children succeed in life. What are the economic benefits for allowing all of our children to have this opportunity of prek . Recently Economic Research has been taking advantage of studies that follow children over a very long period of time, after public policies, and they found that highquality preschool, for example, raises future earnings substantially. And raises them more than enough to justify the initial cost of the program. Highquality preschool also, by the way, helps womens Labor Force Participation. So, it helps today the family as a whole and balanced work and family and then it helps the children later on. Thats true of a wide range of interventions, the earned income tax credit, Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program and medicaid all have been shown to have longterm benefits for children in terms of education, earnings, and health. When the United States congress instituted automatic spending cuts in 2013, did it help or hurt the economy . That hurt the economy. It created a fiscal headwind. Well, my time has expired. Thank you. Thank you, Ranking Member. Good afternoon, chairman. Thanks for joining us today. In his letter to Congress Introducing the erp, president obama says, and i quote, i have never been more optimistic about americas future than i am today. However, the chart that i have hopefully on the screen here in a second shows that path growth projections from the administration have not lived up to expectations. Theyve failed. And that now by the administrations own estimates the longterm Growth Potential is meager at best. So, the red is ombs forecast. The solid black line is actual. And the dotted black line is the new projection Going Forward. And then the blue various blue lines are other nonpartisan organizations. You can see the growth gdp growth is between 2 and 2. 5 which is below the historic averages. As you know Business Investment is essential to Economic Growth, job creation and rising living standards. It has slowed dramatically in the last two years. So, you describe an optimistic and a pessimistic view of the future trend in Business Investment within your report. So, are you optimistic or pessimistic . Thank you so much for that question. Of course, im optimistic. And that optimism depends, you know, both on the inherent strengths of the u. S. Economy and also the policy measures that we can take. You know, if you look at the Unemployment Rate and i had shown that chart in my initial presentation that has consistently fallen faster than our forecasts. Interest rates have come in below our forecasts. And the goal of these forecasts is to forecast the budget deficit which has also generally come in at less than what we had expected. So, a number of things have come in ahead of expectations. I think youre right, though, on the Business Investment across all the advanced economies the uk, the eurozone, japan has, you know, has not been, you know, what wed like to see. And i think a lot of that is the consequence of the very deep recession. The bright spot within Business Investment is research and development by private companies is the highest its been as a share of gdp. You mentioned the importance of gdp growth to the chairman, mr. Coates question regarding our debts, our longterm debt. Larry summers who you know recently talked about secular stagnation, his hypothesis, sees low capital investment, slow labor growth and slow Technological Progress as lasting conditions long term. Is secular stagnation the same as the pessimistic view in the erp, or how do you explain it . And do you agree with it . I guess i interpret secular stagnation as a specific economic hypothesis about longterm equilibrium Interest Rates and the like. I think it has a number of problems in its application to the United States. I think it may help us understand places like japan and the eurozone. I dont think it applies to the United States. That being said, i think the impetus that we need to take big, bold steps like invest more in our infrastructure are very much true and we would have a Brighter Future if we did that. Okay. Last question. I got a chart up here. I was disappointed the erp does not address what i believe is the limiting effect on Economic Growth potential from a whole host of the administrations actions and policies like increased spending, debt, failure to reform the tax code and the Regulatory Burden through regulations. For example, on this chart it shows historic and projected Greenhouse Gas emissions including the effects of the president s clean power plant, specifically the paris pledge. These policies and regulations arent even mentioned in the erp, and the administrations apparently turned away from the all of the above Energy Strategy that it was once in favor of as it now closes power plants and shuns natural gas and nuclear power. Weve also seen this administration pour on new financial, labor regulations, environmental regulations. Arent those holding down Economic Growth and arent there massive costs associated with such decline in emissions, for instance, on this chart . And these policies, none of none of them, which i just mentioned, are included in this economic report. Shouldnt the erp discuss the most important issues impacting our economy and explain that some Government Policies might constrain Economic Growth . I you know, to some degree when you dont see something on the report, its just a matter of space and we already imposed 430 pages on you. You mentioned taxes, last year, for example, we had a long discussion about Business Tax Reform and i hope you would find a lot to agree with in that discussion, the importance of lowering our rates and making our International System more competitive. We just didnt repeat it again this year. Its not that its not important, just a matter of space. On regulations i suspect we see it a little bit differently, certainly our analysis on the determinants of investment growth in the economy finds a trajectory of investment growth weve seen is very well explained by a traditional model that doesnt take into account the regulatory changes and the performance in the u. S. Economy is very similar to other economies that have different regulatory trajectories, so i dont think theyre a very important factor in explaining this macrophenomenon. Thank you, my time is expired. Mr. Beyers recognized for five minutes. Thank you, mr. Chairman. The report notes, quote, while the investment has been low the rate of payouts to shareholders by nonfinancial firms in the form of dividends or net share buybacks has been rising, nonfinancial corporations are now returning nearly half the funds that could be used for investment to stockholders. One possible explanation provided by the report is that, quote, the rise in pay as to shareholders may be related to the decline in the startup rate as young firms are more likely to reinvest their cash flow than mature firms. The report also notes the lower investment growth and higher share of funds returned to shareholders suggest firms had more cash than they thought they could profitably reinvest. However, the rise in share buybacks predates current economic circumstances. Senator baldwin among others has pointed to a 1982 s. E. C. Rule that provided for a safe harbor for manipulation liability at the beginning of the explosion of stock buybacks. Prior to 1982 buybacks were a very limited use of corporate profits and buybacks as we know can make earnings reports look better and improve shortterm executive compensation and foster shortterm thinking in the corporate governance. Can you compact comment on the impact of this and other regulatory changes have contributed to the current investment environment and should we be seeking to limit buybacks as a means of promoting private Sector Investment . Uhhuh. So, thank you for your question. Ive certainly seen the hypothesis put forward that that 1982 regulation has played a role in the rise of buybacks. And its certainly the case that buybacks have risen over time. Its not just a recent phenomenon. I havent seen reviewed the research in terms of assessing that link, so i dont have an opinion on that. Id be happy to look into it a little bit more and get back to you. I think, you know, one of the most important questions for us to ask, though, is what can we do to make sure companies have good things to invest in and make sure that we have a really dynamic system in which new businesses are being formed and coming into existence. And if you have a large, Mature Company that doesnt have great investment projects, id rather that money go back to the shareholders and the shareholders can allocate it to some other part of the economy that could be of higher efficiency. So i usually step back and look a little bit less at, you know, where the money is going and a little bit more at whats shaping the Business Decisions and the Business Opportunities in terms of the Real Investment prospects they have. Great. Great. Thank you very much. The erp contains a very interesting discussion of the impact of economic rents as a driver of inequality and i liked your simple definition was economic rents is income by companies and workers beyond that which their productivity justifies. Rent can also be created by market consolidation and regulations which favors specific business or sector of industry over competitors. Can you recommend policy approaches to address the undeserved rents . Sure. One is something that with senators lee and senators klobuchar held a hearing on a few weeks ago which is occupational licensing, the fact that at the state level 25 of occupations you need a license to get that reduces your ability to move between jobs if you are one of the lucky people with a license, it lets you command a premium. Land use restrictions that drive up the cost of living in certain areas also create rents both literally and in the economic sense. Greater degree of competition is important in this regard. But, you know, the other thing id say is some rents are inevitable and its a question of how theyre divided. A higher minimum wage or expanding workers voice including labor unions would fe help make sure when you are dividing the pie it gets divided a little bit more towards the labor end. Thank you. Mr. Chairman, we keep hearing about mandatory spending continuing to increase and at some point in our lifetimes it will be 100 of federal revenues. Do we have a plan to address the longterm thinking about what were going to do to maintain a meaningful discretionary part of our budget . We currently have much lower projected health care both level and growth rates Going Forward than the projections six or seven years ago and thats in part due to the Affordable Care act and in part due to a set of changes that were under way in our Health System and continuing to implement that which is most of the job of our administration is really important. We could also take additional steps modeled on that that bring down the cost of health care, helping to reduce premiums, extend the life of medicare and reducing the pressure on Discretionary Spending that you cited in your question. Thank you, mr. Chairman. I yield back. Mr. Paulson is recognized for five minutes. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Thank you for being here. Following up on the report and, you know, its interesting to me because some of the numbers you cited and that the other side often cites in terms of numbers and the economys back on track, weve had the fastest, weve had the best and weve had records. Heres another number that i think is really critical. The u. S. Bureau of labor statistics announced that for all of 2015 all of last year that we had u. S. Productivity, Labor Productivity rose only 0. 6 percent. So, this is the fifth year in a row where that growth has been below 1 . So, since 19 since the u. S. Started collecting this data, going back all the way to 1947 up until now, theres never, ever been such a poor fiveyear stretch because weve had five years in a row where its been below 1 . So, knowing thats the case, this is really important, the link between increases in Labor Productivity and the average u. S. Standard of living, one example now estimates, for instance, because of the annual increases in Labor Productivity of 3 , if you had 3 , the average standard of living would double in just about 24 years here in the United States. But now if you compare that to the last five years weve had [s with low productivity growth, weve actually changed it where the average standard of living wont be doubled until every 139 years. So, 139 years to double our standard of living. So, these are numbers i think that are behind what many people feel or sense, they feel its the disappearing of the American Dream. And its probably why 72 of the public feels were in a recession right now even though technically were not. So, im not a doctor, but, you know, one of the rules we have in medicine is do no harm. In terms of that question, to what end do you or the administration what thoughts have you given, what analysis have you provided, or do you acknowledge that the cumulative effect of a lot of regulations on small, on medium, on large businesses, has had on a lack of productivity growth and the effect that that is having now on the lower standard of living in the United States . Thank you for your question, and i think youre right to identify productivity as one of the Biggest Challenges our economy faces. An analysis by the San Francisco fed put the date at around 2004 when productivity growth started to slow. Its something weve seen, as ive said, in other context across a range of other countries. The United States and one of the reasons im optimistic about the United States over the last ten years weve had the fastest productivity growth of any of the other g7 economies but weve certainly not had enough, as you said. That places a big role in terms of what future we can expect for wage growth and so i think the most important question is what steps can we take. I would suggest expanding markets abroad through steps like tpp, reforming our business tax system, lowering the rate and reforming the base, investing more in infrastructure, investing more in research and development are and bringing down our deficit to free up, you know, more private capital for investment are five really important steps we could take to increase our productivity growth. I would agree tax reform, expanded trade opportunities and sell more American Goods and services overseas, get the money back home. But what about the Regulatory Environment . I mean, do you acknowledge or do you have you done analysis just on the weight of regulations from a cumulative effect that that has actually had . Its a consistent message that i hear from my employers that i visit with in minnesota all the time. I dont think the i think its very important to get regulations right. And one of our jobs at cea is to participate in the process by which executive Branch Regulations are reviewed, and we take that responsibility very seriously and work hard to get the benefits as high relative to the costs as you possibly can. Often that means doing regulations in a way that is flexible, that uses market mechanisms. I think if you do that, it can be consistent with a stronger economy and strong productivity growth. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Thank you. Congress marnman delaney is recognized for five minutes. Thank you, mr. Chairman. I also want to welcome chairman furman and thank you for your very intelligent report and testimony here today. It also has pretty significant throw weight associated with it, so its a great work product as usual. I was going to ask about economic rents but my friend from virginia already covered that, so i wanted to go back to a point raised by the chairman, the paris accord. Thinking about this debate about Economic Growth as it relates to how we position the country around Climate Change. So, when you think of two postures, one that is more forward leaning as it relates to Climate Change, in other words, setting goals like 50 Clean Electricity by 2030 or various goals that are achievable based on current technology, but aspirational, you know, stretch goals versus not taking these steps, right, and not putting the proper incentives in. How do you think about that as it relates putting aside environmental stewardship, but just as a pure matter of economics, which posture will drive greater Economic Growth for the United States . I think acting as soon as possible to create as predictable a path for the future and one that as you said is achievable but a little bit of a stretch to make sure were challenging ourselves is the thing that makes the most economic sense, especially in a world where most other countries most every other country in the world is doing the same thing, and so some of the progress weve seen in solar energy, in wind, in conserving energy, all of that is helping to make sure jobs are located here in the United States. And when you think about job creation opportunity in carbonintensive industries versus noncarbonintensive industries, what does the data suggest in terms of both what is likely to bring Economic Growth but also this notion and i may be wrong about this. But my sense is that the carbonintensive industries have become much more automated and, therefore, are not actually driving labor and, in fact, theyre net even as they produce the same amount of energy theyre net reducing their Labor Participation in the industries versus the clean energy, green energy, whatever you want to call it, would actually tend to be more labor intensive. Right. Do you have a view on that . Thats my understanding as well, that a lot of the traditional carbonintensive industries are very capital heavy. It is a continuum, though. So, natural gas, for example, has carbon, but it has half as much carbon beginning to end as coal would have and weve had substantial increases in natural Gas Production thats helped create jobs in our country and i think thats a good thing and something that we would welcome and encourage and its also something compatible with how were trying to hit our goals for Climate Change. But then solar and wind and a range of renewables and the set of industries around those, as you said, are very labor intensive. When you think about economic risk or threats to american prosperity, if you will, because as weve seen from the Economic Performance this country has realized across the last seven years particularly relative to our competitors, which this might be one of the greatest periods of time where weve outpaced the rest of the world in terms of how well we recovered from the financial crisis and how well our economy is doing relative to other places and how less dependent we are on other parts of the world so things happening in the developed world are affecting us less than anywhere else. When you think about the threat, mark carney, the chairman of the bank of england gave a speech about a year ago that one of the rinks he saw to Financial Markets was, in fact, Climate Change because there might be a point in time when people actually it may not be when some of the catastrophic effects occur but people come to the view that it will be a reality and theres a dramatic repricing of assets based on that. How do you think about that in terms of risk to our economy if we dont deal with it in a prudent way . You have macro views as to how much Climate Change could hurt our economy . The administration has a social cost of carbon. Its an estimate of how much each ton of carbon costs us economically. Our estimate is about 40 a ton that we use as an input into the rulemaking process. That estimate does not include the uncertainty risks associated with Climate Change and thats a lot what mark carney was talking about in the speech you were referring to, and that might be a larger and more consequential cost than just this. On the other end, the somer you deal with it the cheaper and more efficient it is. If you waited 30 years it would be quite costly to our economy. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Thank you. Senator lee is recognized for five minutes. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Thank you for coming to testify today, and i want to thank you also once again for coming to testify on occupational licensing. Just last month in the Judiciary Committee. Id like to speak with you about innovation and get your thoughts on a piece of your report that focused on the potential job market effects of robots. It seems that we might be nearing a really significant technological inflection point, one that could have profound implications for our economy. Boston dynamics continues to release videos of robots with incredible mobility and coordination while industrial applications involving Machine Learning and analytical algorithms at some level simulate cognition, continue to advance. Some observers have suggested were on the edge of a new wave of innovation and this new wave of innovation might be similar to that which was spurred on by the invention of the internal combustion engine, for example, which effectively led to a really sharp and economically significant decline in the use of horses. First of all, as policymakers, should we be thinking about automation as a discrete issue or is it better thought of as a piece of a larger challenge involving globalization, trade, and a number of other similar factors . Im referring in particular to the challenges facing lowerskilled, lowerincome workers and their jobs. I think thats a great question, and its something that i know i grapple with all the time. I think to some degree thats all one set of issues, but i think automation brings it to the fore in a very direct way. In theory automation shouldnt present any problem at all. Weve had automation for thousands of years and we always find more jobs for people. But in practice that can come at a cost either in terms of inequality if you dont have the skills to benefit from it or some people who get displaced dont find another job and, you know, you might call it transitional or temporary, but that could last for decades. Right. Right. Which is part of why i raised the question here, this one could be different in some ways and i was looking to try to stay ahead of the curve. Now, your report estimates a high likelihood that jobs today paying less than 20 per hour will eventually be automated. There doesnt seem to be a hard timetable right. Or projection. But is that accurate . Thats accurate, and we were drawing on research that was done at oxford in that regard. Mckenzie has also done their own research that reaches similar conclusions to whats presented there. You know, the current administration, of course, supports raising the minimum wage and obviously every policy has tradeoffs. Thats what we try to hash out in these debates and one of the things that we discuss in this committee the economic implications of policies like that one. But if lowpaying jobs are the ones that are most threatened, most potentially threatened by automation, doesnt raising the minimum wage just raise the cost of lowskilled work and incentivize employers to accelerate the process of automating these jobs, the very jobs that were perhaps most concerned about . The evidence that ive seen for moderate increases in the minimum wage phased in over time, similar to the types of proposals that have been put forward in congress, has found that they dont have adverse effects on employment. But certainly if you were to raise the minimum wage to 30 an hour, you know, i would expect you would have a tradeoff. At some point youre going to get there to a tradeoff and perhaps when you factor in the effects of automation, that tradeoff could end up being significant. I think its important its part of an overall strategy that makes sure our workers have more skills and more productivity. Got it. And i want to be clear, im not trying to get you to disavow the president s policies here. I know thats not something thats going to happen, certainly not in this forum and not in your current position. What im asking is if our goal as a society is that an honest days work should earn an honest days wage and machines are going to make it harder, and in some cases perhaps impossible for lowskilled, entrylevel americans to find an honest days work, doesnt the basic design of our social safety net have to perhaps look a lot different than it does today . I think it certainly has implications for how we design our social safety net, and i think thats an important conversation to have. I wouldnt throw out the lessons of the last 50 years, and we have a certain idea of whats worked and whats not. I think minimum wage has worked. I think earned income tax credit has worked. But i think we should be thinking hard about these questions Going Forward as well. Okay. Thank you very much, mr. Furman. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Thank you. Senator klobuchar is recognized for five minutes. Thank you very much, mr. Chairman, and thank you. Sorry that senator coates and i have had a number of votes going on here. I appreciate the words about the improvement of the economy. I think weve all seen that. Our state is down to 3. 8 unemployment, but we also know there are challenges. You raised one, mr. Chairman, about income inequality. We have challenges for workers that are retired and have issues with their pensions. In fact, right behind you there, who i am going to meet with later, sherman lemitainan who is from northern minnesota, spent his whole life, started as a janitor and then a teamster, has issues with his pension because of a decision that is inordinately affecting a lot of states in the midwest that were trying to work on. But another issue up in northern minnesota that i know that youre well aware of is the Current Employment situation with the Iron Ore Mining affected by the overproduction in many countries combined with illegal steel dumping that we know is going on. And ive really appreciated the recent moves of the administration to try to be more aggressive in the enforcement, including adding nearly 40 new inspectors to the ships from the budget money we got last year as well as working on the Enforcement Actions including some new tariffs today. Could you talk about that industry and whats going on and what you think the future is . Yeah. Thank you. And thats this is an issue we do pay a lot of attention to, senator. The backdrop for this is that the substantial global overcapacity in steel, and that steel capacity is 70 outside of oecd economies, much of it in oecd economies, much of it in economies that have made very heavy state investments in supporting their steel industries. This overcapacity has collided with a collapse in worldwide demand for a range of commodities and products, including steel, and the result has been a 35 decline in steel prices in 2015, which is having a Significant Impact on our industry and on your state among others. We have, as you said, taken 149 antidumping and countervailing duty actions, 40 of them in 2015 alone. The highest rate of actions in at least 14 years. That has contributed to the fact that steel imports are down 13 months 13 over the last year. And were going to continue to rigorously enforce our trade laws, including taking advantage of some of the new tools that Congress Gave us with the Customs Enforcement bill that the president signed i believe last week. Its important to understand that it cant that Domestic Trade enforcement is an important part of the answer, but International Coordination is also critical. U. S. Imports represent only 10 of Global Exports and we need to be working together with other countries, both importing countries, who are dealing with many of the same issues our economy is, as well as steel exporting countries like china, to push on their overcapacity. Very good. Well, as i said, its the president s chief of staff came up to northern minnesota. Weve had thousands of layoffs, and it was really helpful to have him there. And im going to ask you more on the in writing some questions about this pension issue. But could you just talk in general about the importance in a volatile economy, youve got on one hand the millennials dealing with the economy and having trouble saving because they dont have that kind of structure in place. Right. That we once had. And then you have some seniors who have retired but things change with their pensions and it makes it very difficult for them. Yeah. Could you talk about just the importance in general of retirement. Retirement security is very important. A lot of people are not prepared for retirement. And Retirement Security is enhanced when youre depending on multiple sources, Social Security, of course, being one, private savings being another, and pensions. Pensions include both defined contribution and defined benefit. Defined benefit have faced a number of challenges in our economy especially in the multiemployer segment and thats an important issue, and the Pension Benefit Guarantee Corporation plays an Important Role in helping to make sure those pensions function as well as they can. Okay. And, you know, this issue with the Central States pension plan, which we can talk about more in the future, is affecting twothirds of the 400,000 participants are going to have their pensions reduced as high as 70 and so its a real big concern in northern minnesota which is the same place where all the layoffs are occurring especially, so thank you. Okay. Thank you. Congressman grothman, recognized for five minutes. Thanks for calling on me, and chairman furman, im honored to have a chance to be in a committee youre testifying before. One of the things i think we can all agree about is the labor Participation Rate is a little bit disappointing. When i get around my district, one of the big complaints employers have they have a hard time finding employees, okay . On the other hand, they also feel that there are major competition for those employees is the government itself because of all the government benefits that you get if you dont work or dont work as hard as you can. You mentioned that the Unemployment Rate has dropped during the Obama Administration which it has, but at the same time the unemployment has dropped s. N. A. P. Enrollment has gone up by 12 million, okay. So, it seems as though were paying people either not to work at all or not to work to their abilities. Could you comment on whether or not you feel all of the benefits out there that are available to you if youre making less money are contributing to the low labor Participation Rate or contributing to people not achieving their full potential. Right. So, thank you for your question. For men between the age of 25 and 54 their Labor Force Participation rate has fallen nearly every year since the 1950s. So, this is a very longstanding phenomenon. For women since the late 1990s. This happened even though we changed our social assistance system to be much less something that youd get regardless of whether or not you were working to something that you pretty much in most cases really requires you to work to get. In fact, many elements of our social assistance im going to take to a certain extent you are talking about earned income tax credit there which requires you to work a little, but as soon as you work more than a little you begin to take it away, but go ahead. I was going to say the evidence on the earned tax credit is it does increase Labor Force Participation because people deciding whether to work or not work, its a several thousand dollar difference, and then, youre right, theres a phasein range and a phaseout range and those could have an effect as well but those appear to be dominated by the large amount of money you get as an additional bonus for working. Im going to disagree with you. But im going to mention another problem we have. Economists have found theres a correlation between stable twoparent households and Better Outcomes for families. Its not difficult to come up with hypotheticals in which people are losing over a single parent could lose over 30,000 a year by getting married. Do you view and im hearing examples of that in my districts, parents saying my son cant get married, we lose the benefits, that sort of thing. Can you think of anything you can do in the remaining time of this administration, any plans for the future that you can suggest for future administrations, to do something about this huge marriage penalty we have right now . Thanks for your thanks for your question. President bush passed meaningful marriage Penalty Relief for many middleclass families which president obama signed into law on a permanent basis. Theres a substantial marriage penalty in the earned income tax credit that was reduced in 2009 that we just made permanent on a bipartisan basis this past december. And then one of the proposals in the president s budget which i alluded to in response to a question from Ranking Member maloney gets at the fact that secondary earners often face higher tax rates in the United States than many other countries and it can discourage them from working and so we have a tax benefit for secondary earners that weve proposed. Will you agree, though, we still have over a 30,000 penalty, say, for a single parent making a couple kids, making 10 to 15 grand a year if they do marry somebody making 40 or 50 grand a year, do you agree with those figures . I think for most middleclass families we dont have a marriage penalty in the tax code anymore because of the steps im not saying the tax code. The earned income tax, the s. N. A. P. Program, the thats higher than i would have put the number at. In part because we have taken a number of steps, but theres certainly more we can do. Okay. Yeah, ill have to get you those figures. Ill give you one more question. Before you talked about the fact that you felt we cut spending too much in whatever, 2011, 2010, it would have been better not to. Okay, so i take you are not a keynesian economist, you believe that deficit spending improves the economy. In the budget that president obama has recently submitted to congress, you also have a larger deficit. It always kind of makes me wonder about you folks. I love all people. But if the time to run a deficit is when the economy is weak as it was in 2010, 2011 and now that weve had such a long period of time of lower employment, though our incomes arent what we want, and youre still running a large deficit, is there ever a time that economists such as yourself would suggest running a surplus . The goal that we have in mind is having the debt on a declining path relative to the size of the economy so that youre shrinking it relative to the economy. Thats not something that under current law we would achieve. Its something that additional steps, including greater spending reduction and reducing tax benefits especially for highincome households would help us achieve. The gentlemans time has expired. Senator casey is recognized for five minutes. Thanks very much, mr. Chairman. Thank you for being here. Thank you. And we have we have a day when folks are voting in the senate were voting, so ill probably have just one question, but i think its a critically important topic. We could spend hours on this one topic. And im glad that you have in your work, in the report, in the work of the administration, focused on what we sometimes call early care and learning. Early care meaning quality, affordable child care, and learning, of course, prekindergarten education. I noted i think theyre both essential. And obviously theres a relationship between the two. I noted on page four of your testimony you said, and i quote, that one of the chapters focuses on, quote, disparities in opportunity that appear at an early age in the longrun benefits of investments in the education, health and wellbeing of children. Then you go on to talk about the gaps in the early early health and cognitive skills of children. And then you conclude by saying, quote, Research Demonstrates that direct investments in children can help close gaps and these important outcomes can have lasting positive effects, unquote. Then you have a chart there about cognitive skills, kindergarten versus fifth grade. Ive been working on this issues for years. And i think the connection between learning and earning is is not only demonstrated, but its something we should bear in mind, that if kids learn more now, meaning when theyre in those early years, they will literally earn more later and frankly were all better off with that investment. So, i guess i wanted to ask you, number one, is just can you walk through some of the benefits that you see maybe purely from an economic or workforce perspective on making those investments in children in the dawn of their life. Yeah, thank you so much for that question and bringing up that issue, because i think thats a really important chapter of the report and a really important example of how we can both promote productivity growth which weve been talking about in this hearing and make sure that that productivity growth is shared more widely. When you do an Economic Analysis of these types of early care programs and Early Education programs, you find that it has two sets of benefits one is actually an immediate benefit because it enables the parents more often than not the mother to work more if she chooses to do so. And it facilitates greater income for that family, which itself is important for a learning environment for that child. And then the second set of benefits, the ones youve talked about, are a robust connection between education as young as 3, 4, 5, and how much you earn at 20, 25, 35 years of age. And when you look at, for example, just the extra tax revenue collected on those future earnings, that is enough to repay a substantial portion, if not all, of the initial cost of these programs. Im not suggesting that we take that into account, you know, in budgetary treatment of them, but in evaluating, you know, whether or not its a good idea to undertake those programs, thats certainly relevant. I know there are a number of studies that show the return on investment, which is really extraordinary, sometimes its you spend a buck on highquality early learning, you get back multiples of that. Sometimes into the teens. Yep. So, its its significant. I will, in the interests of time, because i have to run, but ill yield back 1 07. Thank you appreciate it. Mr. Hanna is recognized for five minutes. Thank you, chairman. I want to say that i couldnt agree more with senator casey. The arne duncan strong start for children act, past secretaries ive supported that and pleased to be the lead of that in the house and every possible matrix suggests that universal prek or as near as we can get to it is one of the best investments a society can make. But on another matter, the you talked about corporate inversions that are high Corporate Tax rate visavis other countries. And you mentioned you believe its an issue. How would you correct it . Because one of the its kind of the issues been demagogued i think by both sides in ways that arent helpful. You know, certainly i have my opinion about it. But what would you like to see happen, doctor . Sure. I think theres a good way to address it and theres an even better way to address it. The good way to address it would be to take a simple step of banning the practice of merging with a smaller Foreign Company and changing your tax domicile overseas and thus claiming the set of benefits associated with being an overseas corporation. Thats a step we could take today, and it would reduce inversions. The even better way to deal with it would be to do that at the same time that we make it more attractive to investment in the United States by reforming our business tax system, lowering the tax base ultimately one isnt effective if you dont do the other . I think we could do i think it would be the change the inversions are happening so quickly that i dont think we can afford to wait. And if its going to take a long time to reform the tax code as a whole, then i would just deal with the inversions issue by itself. I think that would be the economically prudent thing to do. The even better thing would be to reform the business tax system as a whole to make it more attractive to be here at the same time that youre making it harder to invert. Ultimately, i mean, were talking about larger businesses being cooped by smaller ones. Exactly. But you also cant stop the reverse, and the idea of building an environment that makes it fundamentally attractive to be here, which chairman brady supports i think, is really what we should be considering. And the fact that we have the highest Corporate Tax rates, or among them in the world, is a fundamental problem when you look at pfizer and Johnson Controls and others and apple and the conversation that ensues. I want to ask you, though, about something that im disappointed. Im afraid that were not going to be addressing this year, and that is the transpacific partnership. And id like to give you an opportunity to talk about it in any way youd like without, you know without rendering an opinion if you dont want to, but the idea that were not taking up this conversation is deeply disturbing to me regardless of where it goes. So yeah, thanks for that. As i said in my opening statement, one of the challenges facing the u. S. Economy is that its hard to export, increase your exports to a world where growth in the rest of the world is slower. In that environment one of the steps we could take that could help make it easier for us would be to reduce or eliminate 18,000 taxes that our exporters face when they try to export to abroad, the tariffs that these 11 other countries in the tpp have. One study found not just that there would be substantial benefits from doing tpp, it also found that if you wait a year to do it, you lose 94 billion. You lose more than 600 or 700 per household in our economy. So, i think its not just important to do, its important to do it as expeditiously as possible. You hear the conversations on the street that unions are against it, but i find that very much people are uninformed or misinformed. What do you say to those people, doctor . I say the United States is a very open economy. Its very easy for other countries to sell here. What were trying to do is break down the barriers that our Companies Face to countries around the world. We also have very high standards in our country, labor, environment. This would ensure that other countries are raising their standards and put us in a better position to compete on a level Playing Field. So, that the net is a big benefit. The net is a big benefit for workers. A big benefit for productivity. A big benefit for our economy. How come we cant get the message out . It doesnt seem to be getting any traction. Its something weve been trying to communicate and make it tangible, this is about cutting taxes on american exporters and american exporters support higherpaid jobs. Thank you, doctor, my time has expired. [ inaudible ] my understanding that congressman byers has some questions. Chairman furman, on this committee, weve often focused on the lost economic gap between a perceived or a titular 4 growth rate, versus the 1 , 2 , 2. 5 we have. We look past over our lifetimes we have higher raters of growth. But i keep reading in various newspapers and magazines, absent some dramatic disruptive new technology, the manufacturing revolution, the i. T. Revolution that were destined to longterm growth rates between 1 and 2 . Your perspective . Growth rates are a function of two things. One, how much is labor growing, and the second is how much is productivity growing. Labor is growing more slowly than in the past for demographic reasons. If you look during the 1980s, for example, and you look at the growth of the population between age 25 to 54, this is the group of people most likely to be working, that was 2. 3 annually. Now the growth in the population in that age bracket is negative 0. 1percent annually. This is a pure demographic factor. Not working, not working. Its just who is alive in that age range. So the baby boom helped propel our growth forward. Thats turning into a retirement boom, and for that reason the labor component of growth is lower today and is going to be lower in the future. The second component of growth is productivity. And theres a big debate that you alluded to within the economics profession about what the outlook for productivity growth is. I think no one really knows, and it depends on what inventions people have in the future and if i knew what inventions people would have in the future id go out and invent them myself and probably not be before your committee today. I think theres a lot of reason to think we have a lot of potential. Theres a lot of exciting Technological Developments in our economy, a lot of questions about how to apply them and make sure were using them as well as possible. But i certainly would feel better if we were investing more in research, infrastructure, trade, business tax, you know, all the different steps that we should be taking. Lower deficit, all different steps. Thank you very much. One more question. Chinas lost about 800 billion in currency reserves over the last 12 months. What are your views on the drivers of this capital outflow . Do you expect them to continue . And how about chinas reserve adequacy . And really, whats its impact on our economy . Thats certainly a really important question. And china has, you know, suffered from not always communicating its policies as clearly and as transparently as we would like to see them do and as the market would like to see them do. And one consequence when you dont have transparent marketoriented policies that are communicated clearly is that you can see various abrupt changes in Financial Markets, so i think thats part of what is going on with china. China still has very substantial reserves. They have i think more than enough wherewithal to deal with the economic challenges that they face. The question is are they going to, you know, make sure that theyre doing the right reforms, the right transparent policies, communicating them in the right way such that they are taking advantage of those resources to address the challenges they have. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, i yield back. Thank you. Congressman grothman. Kind of going a little different than the way congressman hanna went here. I know there are countries around the world that want to get the kids as soon as possible in the loving arms [ inaudible ] away from their parents. In your report you emphasize that the head start is a good way to improve improve economic success in children. Your own hhs has found that head start has little or no impact in the long run across 22 different measures and that actually 3yearolds who attended head start were doing worse in math than their peers. I know that the Brookings Institution were you affiliated with the Brookings Institution . Yes. Came up with their own conclusions that head start wasnt up to snuff. Given these studies that show that maybe head start wasnt that great and maybe its best to leave the kids with their parents, and head start is for poorer kids, not kids across the board. Why do you keep pushing the day care stuff to get the kids away from their parents . In the report we review several dozen studies conducted over of programs over a few decades, and, you know, any given study is going to have a different finding. We show that in broad terms they consistently find positive results. A number of these studies were authored by a nobelprize Winning Economist jim heckman from the university of chicago who happens to be a republican as well. Thats not relevant for evaluating his research, but i think this is a widely accepted finding in the economics profession. Certainly highquality is important. You dont want to just do you know, you want to Pay Attention to the quality of what youre doing, not just anything. Youre familiar with the brookings deal, too, right . Yeah. I think it was brookings. There are studies out there, hhs, brookings, that it doesnt work out that well. Ill give you one more question. I am alarmed by the growing income gap in this country and one of the things that i think contributed to it was the quantitative easing by the Federal Reserve which as far as i can see is pushing money to almost the most obscenely wealthy americans and kind of feeling youre going to grow the economy that way. I realize you dont have direct control over the fed, but could you comment do you think it was a mistake in trying to juice the economy for the fed in essence to financially benefit some of the wealthiest or i guess wealthiest americans . I guess their idea was they thought it would trickle down, but do you think that was a mistake . Is there a moral problem with that . Wouldnt you have thought it would have been better off if wed had kind of base the currency at least give more money to the working stiff . I dont comment on policy actions at the Federal Reserve. We think its better for them to undertake those independently. But Congress Granted the Federal Reserve a dual mandate in terms of employment and inflation. And i think, you know, any steps they take consistent with that mandate are, you know, ones that i would agree are in the best interests of our country. So, you agree with am i wrong in thinking that quantitative easing in so far as it gives an immediate benefit to somebody, gives an immediate benefit to the big wall street banks . Theres a large economic literature on the sources of inequality, and i dont think any major Economic Research thinks that Monetary Policy one way or the other is an important part of the explanation for changes in inequality. Okay. Thank you for the additional time, mr. Chairman. Congressman teaberry. Thank you, chairman. Thank you, chairman furman, for being here today and your sincerity on this difficult pocket. I want to associate myself with what senator lee said. I worked at mcdonalds my first job and i was really excited about six months in when i got a minimum wage increase. I got an increase in my pay which wasnt very much, but the impact, good for me, wasnt so good on that guy the two guys that got hired after me, because they lost their jobs. And i think thats what senator lee was talking about. But let me give you a better example of what i was thinking about when he was talking. My next job in high school was pumping gas at a gas station. Im dating myself here. You cant get anyone to pump gas anymore at a gas station. You do it yourself. And i remember the owner, a small businessman, telling us, most of us in high school and college, that the biggest cost driver his business was us and so we better perform. And i didnt have many skills in high school, but i learned how to pump gas. Well, today that job is gone. And many Service Areas we find in our economy, employers trying to figure out ways to reduce cost. And one of the few areas through technology that they can reduce cost impacts those High School Kids that dont have those skills that they have yet to learn. And we have in our state of ohio, its reflected really in many other states, more and more individuals with a lack of skills not being able to find those service jobs that once were plentiful when i was a kid. In urban areas its even more where we have meaningful regulations, sometimes they have just the opposite effect, which i think is senator lees point of trying to allow for those who have the skill set, maybe that i had when i was 16 and hadnt yet developed are being left behind. If you think youre dating yourself on your first job, wait till i tell you what my first job was. I see senator peters has arrived. Senator, just in the knick of time. Well youre on. Thank you. You havent been to a Committee Meeting in a long time where you walk in, sit down and the chairman says youre on. I need to do this more often. Thank you for that. Senator furman thank you for being here to talk about Economic Issues and considering the future. Longterm structural changes that seem to be occurring in our economy that i think will pose some potentially significant challenges for us in the decades ahead. I enjoyed reading the economic report, job creation, dynamism, et cetera. One issue thats addressed in here and i think youve done some studies related to it as well deals with the pace of technological change and the impact its having on the job market. I think i heard is some of that as i walked in here today. Its always been i would like your reflections and thoughts. It has always been that folks have always feared that technology would destroy jobs but its never materialized. Technology has destroyed jobs. It has. Its created more jobs, they tend to be better, higher paying jobs and a lot of routine jobs have been replaced with ones that require Higher Education and skill training. It seems as if a lot of folks think we may be getting to an inflection point, that technology is advancing to the point where those higher skill jobs can even be done with technology, that physicians, for example, when you look at watson and the medical breakthroughs that are being done with watson that can diagnose disease, perhaps, better than most physicians can do it. We know radiologists, there are machines that can do the job probably better than a lot of radiologists can from that technology. That we may be getting to the point especially with Artificial Intelligence that can radically transform the job market. A recent study i was looking at that thought that the matter of the next decade or two, 50 of the job classifications in the country could probably be done better with some sort of technology that than a human can do it. Thats disturbing but its a challenge. What are your thoughts on that and if, indeed, thats something we need to be concerned about, what sort of policies should we be thinking about right now . Thank you for that. I think that bears a lot of thought. I dont think its particularly a partisan issue. I dont think we have all the answers. I think its something we should all be grappling with together. I think one hypothesis you stated is right. For thousands of years, weve invented new machines. Theyve replaced things people used to do. Most of what people did in the 19th century, theyre not doing today. Were much better off as a country for it. The problem is when that happens abruptly and youre not prepared for it. The consequence of that can be one of two things. One is inequality. And the 50 figure, if you break it down by income, its higher than that if your income is lower and its well lower than 50 if your income is higher. And if you see a lot of lowerwaged jobs replaced, thats reducing demand for those types of workers. That lowers their wages and raises inequality. One bad side effect is inequality. The second is i certainly believe that over time, if you lose a job, youll be able to find another job and, hopefully, a better job. If a lot of people lose a job at once, though, that process can be long and painful. And we dont always make it as easy as we should. What we should be doing in this regard is make sure people have more skills to take advantage of so theyre comp pleming the innovations and benefitting more from them. Make sure we have a labor market thats better from moving people from job to job. The president s proposed a Wage Insurance Program that would help get people back on their feet by insuring them against some of the wage loss associated with a job as they move into a new job. And theres probably a lot more than that that we need to do as well that we need to keep thinking about. Thats the challenge with the training as well, as Technology Particularly with Artificial Intelligence and the promise of that is. Theres significant challenges, but it may be difficult to train folks as well in that area. These are not things im worrying about happening in the next year or five years or, perhaps, ten. But at least from some of my reading, its something we should be very concerned about, looking beyond that. For example, ive done a lot of work with Autonomous Vehicles. You talked about Autonomous Vehicles. Something were passionate about in detroit. Incredible applications and most importantly will save tens of thousands of lives with the types of technology that will make cars safer, eventually leading to Autonomous Vehicles. They can have great promise for the economy. We should talk a little bit about what you see happening with Autonomous Vehicles, transforming the economy and some of the investments necessary with the federal government to make that happen . I think thats an important question. Autonomous vehicles, everyone is interested in them. American car makers, japanese automakers and the like. Its really important to make sure that a lot of that is happening here. State regulations that allow experimentational testing. We let cars with drivers on the road. Thats already quite dangerous. Its often safer to let these cars on the road. And to make sure youre not letting your fears get in the way of being able to undertake that type of experimentation. Basic research that, you know, we fund here in washington is is an important compliment to the more applied research thats under taken by the companies me more applied research thats under taken by the companieemen more applied research thats under taken by the companiement more applied research thats under taken by the companieemen more applied research thats under taken by the companies that are doing that investment in an infrastructure that supports both Autonomous Vehicles as well as, for example, electric cars and other types. There can often be a chicken and egg problem. If theyre not there, the infrastructure wont be there, if the infrastructures not there, they wont be there. The government can help with the chicken and egg solution. I think theres a number of different steps we are thinking about and need to keep thinking about. Great. Thank you so much. Appreciate it. Chairman, thank you so much. I want to follow up with one last thing while we have you here. If you could take yourself out of youre current job and youre back at brookings or teaching at harvard and i came to you and said, you know, we talked about this runaway spending related to the population, the bulge that existed, the baby boom generation. Weve done a number of things to address that. Weve had sequestration, tax revenue increase that raised income taxes on the highest category. Economic growth will help us address that problem. We still have the impact of this bulge of baby boom, affecting Social Security and medicare. You know the numbers and so forth. If we were able to summon the will to bring together bipartisan, bi cameraal executive branch working together i dont know why this is doing this. Maybe my time is up. But what would you recommend in terms of what we do now or what the next administration, next congress should be thinking about in terms of addressing the challenge of the longterm problem that we have here . And doing it in a way to preserve the programs to theyre not at risk, health care entitles will be available to them so they dont have that concern, what would you recommend if that will was there, if they say we want to go forward, particularly given what weve already done but now what we clearly know we need to do and do it in a way that isnt disruptive to the economy or retirement abilities and capabilities. If i wasnt in the government and it was a year for now i would say look back at president obamas last budget. It had lots of great ideas. Setting the reimbursement rates rather than setting them the way we do now, which often results in rates set too high. On drugs, using the same way to purchase drugs, as we do for people in medicaid. Reforming the benefit structure in medicare so that theres more cost sharing in areas like part b, home health, reduce the ability of medigap to blunt that cost saving and have more incomerelated premiums. I would think both private and public in terms of health, socalled cadillac tax, sponsored insurance is one of the most important steps that we have to slow the growth of private health care that results in additional revenue, based on an idea thats widely support bid both democratic and republican economists. More broadly, i would say that you want to think of tax benefits, tax preferences, those are termed tax expenditures and my predecessors who served under president regular sben president bush have all said we should be looking at those because theyre also on autopilot. Theyre not an efficient way of accomplishing goals and not a particularly fairway either. I would bring that into it and curb those tax expenditures for highincome households like the incentives we have for health, housing and pensions. I hope we can get to that point without getting there by crisis in 1983 when Social Security was about ready to go belly up. President reagan reached out to then speaker of the house tip oneill. They secured about 33, 35 years of solvency for Social Security. It has been done, it can be done. You have to have the pistol at the temple of the politician in order to get it done. Often times when youre doing it in crisis form rather than laying out and doing it in a logical way, which doesnt end up making mistakes and putting people at risk. I appreciate you giving us that template. Hopefully, we can get to that point without having to get to a crisis. Appreciate you coming in and being with us today and your continuing availability to the congress. Working together is the only way to solve this we make appreciate you doing that. Well keep the record open for five business days. And that would be for you also, if you so desire. With that, the hearing, thanks again to you, is adjourned. You. El know sal joins us to d disdus campaign 2016 and the prospect of the first woman to be u. S. President. And at 8 30 a. M. Eastern, author crystal wright joins us to talk about her book con job sanctuary cities and racial division. Be sure to watch tuesday live at 7 00 a. M. Eastern. Join the discussion. A week before the allimportant florida primary, the start of the winner take all primaries for the republicans. Joining us from tampa is ed okeefe from the Washington Post. His story today, front page, looking at the marco Rubio Campaign. As your piece points out, the Rubio Campaign has failed to deal with the fundamentals of campaigning. How so . El well, in so many different ways as we heard from candidates, this campaign seems to just sort of be skimming the surface in the various states since iowa and South Carolina probably more than new hampshire. Quick visits in and out, very little attention paid to cultivating any kind of a ground game and making sure that volunteers are out doing the fundamentals of politicking. Anticipate over and over again, we were hearing from people in some of the states that have voted in the last few weeks that if only the senator had put in a little more time, a little more effort, if only his people had sent a few more staffers for the ground game, he may have prev l prevailed. Senator jim inhofe said he was on the verge of something but ted cruz is spending more time there. We heard it in kansas as well. Ted cruz and donald trump were at the exact same location. If he had been there, goodness knows how good he could have done. And ditto in tennessee, placed third. Despite the support of the governor and the state senior sart lamar alexander, also who was convinced that rubio had a game plan for tennessee and ultimately he did not. Were hearing it now in florida where i am today. Hes struggling to put together some kind of a ground game that would help him win next week and surpass dnd trump in the winnertakeall contest here. It is a mustwin state for senator rubio, having won only the minnesota caucuses and over the week, the puerto rico primary. But the Trump Campaign in a word is scathing. Thats right, its a full blown attack ad. You can put it in the dictionary or encyclopedia as an example of what exactly attack ads can be. This one goes after rubio on sort of his greatest hits, the greatest hit, the greatest scandals of his political tenure. Questions about a home purchase he made years ago as a state lawmaker. Questions about money he was spending on a Republican Party charge dard here in florida where he was speaker. There was a building issue that was later sorted out but led to years of bad headlines for him. Why he was putting personal expenses on a charge card that was meant only for party business. And then the fact that he is, by all means, the least attentive senator, the one who shows up the least in the last year or so to vote. A laundry list of things that rubio will be faulted for. It looks somewhat similar, but is more ominous in tone than the attack ads that the Bush Campaign and its superpac has been running against senator rubio. This is a candidate who has flaws who would be easily picked apart in these kind of televisions ads and sure enough thats exactly what donald trump is doing, airing right now in florida, rubios home state. Ened cokeefe, where is jeb bush at the moment . The latest guidance i have on his people is he has nothing to announce just yet. Not only is that notable, because these two had a sort of professional personal relationship through the years, not necessarily as close as once believed, but sort of a mentor mentee or, you know, colleague to colleague kind of relationship. A Mutual Understanding and appreciation for what they were doing. The fact that bush doesnt want to get involved suggests to me two things. A, he doesnt think it will necessarily help rubio in an environment dominated by trump, who is so expertly picked apart bush and basically destroyed his chances. And b, it suggests that bush doesnt think rubio can win so why bother. The reason i think that is if you talk to bushs closest soshts, some of his top donors across the country and here in florida, they say i dont want to waste my time, i dont want to waste my money on an effort that may ultimately come up fruitless because he cant surpass trump. Finally you point, all of these failures have all but doomed senator rubios chances of securing the gop nomination. Can you elaborate . El with, you know, if you look at the delegate maps right now, trump has such a wide lead. Only a little more than a third of the delegates have rolled out. He trails trump and he trails cruz badly. With contests in michigan and idaho where hes not expected to do well, according to a recent poll, hes tanking in michigan, meaning hell get robbed of delegates yet again. It becomes harder and harder for him mathematically to get the delegates needed to win the nominati nomination. Remember the magic number in republican circles is 1,237. By no means is anyone near that, and frankly ted cruz had such a good Night Saturday that he caught up almost with donald trump. Nine in the next ten days or so, he may pull just about even with trump. Its becoming harder for rubio who continues to insist if you were to get it to some kind of a floor fight in cleveland with the debate in july, he could ultimately prevail. But its harder and harder to make that argument when so far at least hes only gone 220 in the 20 states that have voted. This is the headline. Senator rubio on the ropes after a string of letdowns, the reporting of ed okeefe whos joining us from tampa florida. Its also Available Online at Washington Post. Com. Thank you for being with us. Anytime, take care. There are primaries tuesday in michigan and mississippi, with a little less than 300 delegates at stake between democrats and republicans. Well bring you the results to those contests and speeches with the candidates beginning live at 8 00 p. M. Eastern on cspan. Youll have a chance to share your thoughts by phone, facebook and twitter. Im a teacher. The most important thing to me right now is education. Im looking at the candidates very closely for their programs in education. Im not happy in the last 15 years or so with all the poor standards and the common core thats been happening and so i would like to see that changed around. Im going to vote for either Bernie Sanders or hillary clinton. Im happy with both of those choices and interested to see what their education plans would actually turn out to be. Ive decided im voting for ted cruz for the candidacy because hes a constitutional scholar, hes eloquent and he is principled, consistently out of all of the candidates so far. The head of u. S. Customs and Border Protection recently spoke on capitol hill about the budget request nor 2017. It costs for 14 billion in spending,en increase of 107 million. The commission was also asked about Drug Trafficking, unaccompanied minors a the the u. S. Southern border and the implementation of visa waiver restrictions. This is just under two hours. Im going to call the hearing to order. Today we call gil kerlikowske. Fiscal year 2017 budget for customs and Border Protection is 13. 9 billion. Age increase of 686 million above fiscal year 2016. Unfortunately gimmicks in the Department Wide budget have created a 2 billion gap that requires this subcommittee to make hard choices. Therefore, the increase may not be affordable as its evaluated by the totality of this budget. And we discussed this between the two of us yesterday. Commissioner, as you know, i discussed this with you. Were really concerned about the hiring problems that have to be fixed. The budget request funds for 23861 officers, which include 2,000 officers funded in 2014. Commissioner, taking four years to hire 2,000 officers is way too long. I know you plan to send a request to authorize asking them to pass legislation increasing the number of cbp officers. Knowing that wait times dont deserve cbp because cbp isnt likely to have these officers on board for years. 2014. Look where we are now. Likewise, the Border Patrol is losing more agents than it can hire. Currently, cbp is below the mandated floor. The budget takes advantage of this by increasing the mandate. Unfortunately, the reduction isnt supported by any analysis proving that Border Security wont be compromised as a result. Commissioner, as you understand the important National Security role these agents play, but we are concerned that cbp isnt able to sustain the existing workforce, let alone the mandated floor leaves of the agents. These are urgent problems, which must be fixed. Now, well have to discuss how you plan to correct this. This request also includes a Contingency Fund for potential surge in unaccompanied children. We look forward to an update of the current estimates of the 98 uac. Other increases include 55 million for tactical communications, 47 million for vehicles, 26 million for aerostats and relocatable towers and many other smaller increases. I look forward to working with you over the next few weeks to determine the priority of these programs. The request proposes a realignment for appropriation structures to be more mission focused. While i know it is challenging, it is an effort that i have supported for several years. I want to commend you and your team for making the effort. Lastly, commissioner, sovereign nations control and manage their borders. And sustain the integrity of their immigration systems. These objectives are your duty and i expect nothing less from you and from the men and women of cbp. Now, let me turn to my distinguished Ranking Member miss roybalallard for remarks she wishes to make. Thank you. Good morning, commissioner, and welcome. The request for u. S. Customs and Border Protection in fiscal year 2017. About half of that increase say tributable to the proposed transfer of the office of bio metric Identity Management from mpd to cpc. You have served as commissioner now for nearly two years and cbp has made Good Progress in a number of areas under your leadership and id like to highlight some of those. This includes the establishment of the Task Force West for the southern border. The assumption of criminal and Investigative Authority for allegations of misconduct and use of force incidents involving cbp personnel. The expansion of the Preclearance Program which helps address threats before they reach our borders. A new use of force policy and the establishment of a use of force center of excellence. Business transformation efforts that are reducing weight times for passengers and expediting the flow of commerce. Good progress toward a more rigorous technologically based methodology for determining Situational Awareness at the border. A more risk based approach to Border Security. And enhanced capacity to target highrisk individuals and cargo, including a new counternetwork program focused on disrupting transnational criminal organizations. So i think there is a lot that you can be proud of, even if there are still significant challenges that still remain. One of those challenges has been the struggle to hire new agents that officers and manage attrition, particularly Border Patrol agents. As a result, the number of Border Patrol agents and cbp officers are significantly below the target levels as the chairman mentioned. Humanely managing the influx of unaccompanied children and families fleeing violence in the northern triangle. I look forward to a productive conversation on these and other issues. Once again, i appreciate your joining us. Thank you. All right. Commissioner, well hear from you and what your comments are. We all have copies of what you submitted to us. Of course theyll be narrated for the record. You may proceed. Good. Chairman carter, Ranking Member roybalallard and members of the subcommittee, good morning. During this past year, i certainly had the firsthand opportunity to travel not only throughout the country and visit with thousands of our personnel, but also to meet with our International Partners in customs and Border Protection, particularly in south america, mexico and canada. These are countries we share common goals with and strengthening both our countrys security but also our Economic Growth. I highlight this because with all of our responsibilities to protect the United States from the entry of dangerous people and materials, we also have to facilitate the flow of lawful International Travel and commerce. And these goals are the same for many other countries. While im reminded of the diversity of our operational environments, the complexity of our mission and the commitment of our dedicated personnel. And thanks to the Critical Resources that this committee has given to cbp, weve not only enhanced border operations, weve also laid the foundation for the changes that will increase cbp to be more operationally agile, effective, and efficient. Many of these changes are focused on improving the hiring and retention of frontline personnel. I think weve made forward progress and i look forward to working with the committee on this. Our budget request of 13. 9 billion reflect some of the progress that we made and supports our continued investments in personnel and technology and initiatives that are going to strengthen our security and streamline our business process. Detecting and preventing travel to the United States by a foreign terrorist fighter is our highest priority. We recently made additional enhancements to the Electronic System for travel authorization. We started immediately enforcing the restrictions in accordance with the visa waiver improvement, and terrorist travel prevention act of 2015, and we cancelled 17,000 travel approvals immediately. Were expanding preclearance operations. Id like to express my thanks to the subcommittee for the statutory changes that significantly improve the reimbursement mechanism to fund cbps preclearance operations. Its a critical capability for detecting and addressing threats long before they ever arrive at our borders. Furthermore, with the funding provided by the committee and the consolidated appropriations act of 2016, were initiating Counter Network operations at our National Targeting Center. This capability enhances our comprehensive understanding of emerging threats not only for foreign fighters but also for drugs and human trafficking. And it advances our ability to disrupt the networks from that targeting center many of you have visited. Along the southwest border, we monitor and respond. To the flow of unaccompanied children and families. The numbers declined from their spike in 14 but we did see an increase in the numbers this past fall and we remain concerned about seasonal increases later this year and in fiscal year 2017. The budget request 12. 5 million increase in resources for cbp to provide for safety and security of children and families who are temporarily in our custody. In addition to a Contingency Fund of up to 23 million to support up to 75,000 children to ensure that we can respond to that potential surge. Along with all of the border environments, our land, air and sea, continued investments in technology, surveillance technology, other Operational Assets really increase our Situational Awareness. The cornerstone of our approach to identify, disrupt and interdict illegal activities is key. Recapitalizing some of the most essential equipment that was mentioned, radios and vehicles, increasing our ability to respond quickly and to keep our frontline officers and agents safe. We continue to improve the secure and efficient movement of people and goods through the ports of entry. Thats a function critical to our economic competitiveness. The budget request enables us to continue frontline hiring efforts, incorporate new technologies into our travel and trade processes including biometric exit and expand our Public Private partnerships key components of our efforts to optimize resources, ease the flow of low risk lawful trade and travel, and free agents and officers to focus on high risk cargo and high risk people. In all our operations across the globe, we continue to instill the highest levels of transparency and accountability. This past year, we implemented new use of force policies. We continued to test camera technologies to find solutions that can meet the wide variety of operational terrains and climates where our agents and officers work. Thank you for the opportunity to testify. Thank you for your support. Im happy to answer your questions. Thank you, commissioner. Before we begin with the questioning, i want to recognize how the chairman of the preep Appropriations Committee for a statement that he wishes to make. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Commissioner kerlikowske, gil, good to see you again, thank you for being here to discuss your budget for cbp. I greatly enjoyed our association and working together in your earlier chapter of your life when you were director of the office of National Drug control policy, the drug czar, and of course your experience back home. And the police of that wonderful city. In the drug czar role, you graciously took time away from your busy schedule to visit my appalachian district to learn more about our challenges facing Prescription Drug abuse. So you bring a unique perspective i think to your job as at cbp. As the Prescription Drug epidemic has exploded onto the national scene. Now giving way to heroin. Controlling the influx of this dangerous drug and the violence it fuels in our border communities and elsewhere around the country is a top priority for you and for us. So i look forward to hearing about your efforts to reduce the supply of opioids in the country. Over 60,000 employees. Cbp is one of the Worlds Largest Law Enforcement agencies, if not the largest. Youre tasked with protecting the United States through a number of Critical Missions including preventing the illegal entry of terrorists, weapons, narcotics from the air, sea and land. On a typical day, im told, cbp welcomes nearly 1 million visitors. Screens more than 67,000 cargo containers. Arrests more than 1,100 individuals and seizes nearly 6 tons of illegal drugs. Thats a days work. Youre busy to say the least. Before going into the merits of your budget request, id like to express my sincere gratitude to the men and women under your charge including yourself who serve our great nation. Many of whom put themselves in harms way on a daily basis to keep the homeland safe and secure. Your fiscal 17 budget request, 13. 9 billion, which constitutes an increase of 687 million above the current level, i want to commend you on the improvement youve made to the visa security program, although i did have some concerns with the gaps that still remain. I also look forward to the expansion of the Preclearance Program which will push our borders further and further out. Your appearance here today and our testimony on this issue reminds me of this subcommittee in 2003, when we ushered it into existence and i became the first chairman of this subcommittee, and have followed fairly closely since the activities of the department. And its a tough, tough job. Mr. Chairman, youre trying to meld together some 22 federal agencies. I think theres 16 different unions. And like 20 different pay scales. So the work continues. And weve got our work to do as well. But youre on the front line. Theres many positive things in your budget request. Im disappointed with the efforts to ratchet down Border Security and enforcement of our immigration laws. For example, the budget proposed a reduction of 300 Border Patrol agents, decreasing the statutory floor to 21,070. At a time when drug cartels from mexico and elsewhere are flooding our communities. Urban and rural alike with heroin. Weve never seen the like. And yet the budget proposes we cut back on the people fighting that surge and that scourge in our country. Others in the administration have rightfully labeled the abuse of opioids as a national epidemic. I cite the director of the center for disease control, who says that Overdose Deaths heroin and prescription pills, are taking more lives than car wrecks in the country. He calls it a national epidemic. And yet we hear from the administration well lets cut back on trying to fight it. Well, dont be surprised if things are different when we get through with your budget in that regard. We lose 100 americans every day to addiction abuse. And yet youve proposed to reduce our first line of defense against the entry of these dangerous deadly drugs without the benefit of any supporting analysis that Border Patrols mission wont be compromised. As i mentioned, youve been in my district. Youve seen firsthand how these drugs are destroying Rural Communities in appalachia. Of course, youve been all over the country and you see the same. While you and i agree that reducing demand through treatment and education is critical, we mustnt lose sight of the fact that enforcement remains a critical prong of our wholistic strategy on this scourge. Stakes are high. We must do everything in our power to combat this scourge. I look forward to continuing to work with you to provide the resources that you need to do just that. Another crisis being caused by the drug cartels is the massive influx of unaccompanied alien children and families at our southern border. Weve seen a surge in drug cartel and Gang Violence across central and south america. Fueled by the production and trafficking of drugs. These thugs and murderers are wreaking havoc on millions of people. Forcing many to flee to other countries including the u. S. Recently, theres been an unprecedented spike in unaccompanied minors crossing our southern border. In the first four months of fiscal 16, Border Patrol has apprehended 20,000 unaccompanied alien children. Thats double the number that were apprehended in the same time frame last year. Unfortunately, this humanitarian crisis does not appear to be subsiding any time soon. The reality of which is reflected in your budget submission. Youve requested resources to support a revised baseline of 75,000 unaccompanied child apprehensions as well as a Contingency Fund should that number be exceeded. Our committee will analyze this request and my hope is we can provide the necessary resources for cbp to handle the influx of these children at our borders. In addition, virtually half of the 5. 2 increase in your budget request comes from the transfer of 305 million for the office of biometric Identity Management which, as you know, like fees, requires authorization from other committees. Unfortunately, the president has sent us a budget, after budget, after budget, that requests large increases in funding and offsets them by using budget gimmicks like increasing taxes and fees that he knows are dead on arrival here on the hill. Finally, id be remiss if i didnt mention president obamas executive order on immigration. As you know, this still remains one of the most divisive issues in congress and in the country indeed at large. The president s unilateral action demonstrates he has no intention of working with congress or respecting our constitutional authority. Unfortunately, you and your agency are caught in the middle of this fight. And it has made passing an annual appropriations bill for department of Homeland Security incredibly difficult. It also makes it impossible to move forward on any meaningful Immigration Reform while the president remains in office. So mr. Commissioner, thank you for being here today. Thank you for your service to your country. We thank you for leading this agency. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Im gonna start off with the questioning here and the flag i raised as i was talking to you, staffing is something that you were concerned about, im concerned about, and i want us to discuss it. Hiring. Well talk first about the Border Patrol and afterwards about aviation hiring. I understand the Border Patrol is currently 1,268 agents below the mandated personnel floor of 21,370. A floor thats not new. Its been around for a while. So the under execution of agents is not due to hiring up to a new level as it is with the customs officers but sustaining the existing workforce. Im going to have a series of questions. Well pause for some of those, then well move on. What are you doing to address the exit of agents from the Border Patrol 1234 while we have been hiring cbp officers, we have consistently lost Border Patrol agents over the last year. To ensure that stations are manned to the suggested and needed levels, do you foresee a need to reinstate a hardship designation for certain stations or create other incentives to help prevent the attrition of agents, with the reduction of overall numbers, do you anticipate and need to reexamine and restructure how the Border Patrol man stations and Forward Operating bases . I share very much the concern weve discussed on this hiring issue. And for the Border Patrol to be in a downward spiral, which means that we are not able to hire as fast as attrition is very concerning. Ive talked with your staff also about the number of programs that we put in place particularly to speed up the process. So in these new hiring hubs, we can get people through in 160 days until at times well over a year. Thats important. The close cooperation with the department of defense as people leave the department of defense and the active duty military to be able to hire them into the Border Patrol or into customs and Border Protection is particularly important. Working with congress on additional pay for some of the very difficult locations that they work on hardship reimbursement would be particularly helpful. Along with things that weve discussed around the age issues. When we talk about the Border Patrol, you know, we realize that their salaries were cut anywhere from 3,000 to 5,000. As a result of the auo, the additional overtime money. But weve now transitioned to the Border Patrol pay reform act. You should be very happy to know that 96 of the Border Patrol agents who have now opted into the number of hours that they would work have opted into the maximum number. So instead of a 40hour workweek, they will work a 50hour workweek for the additional money, which they are clearly deserving of. Actually results in us getting more boots on the ground. The 17 requests calls for reduction of 300 in the overall strength of the Border Patrol. However, we understand that many stations along the southern border are facing staffing setbacks for a variety of reasons. Theres no Empirical Data to inform how many agents we need. How do you justify a reduction in manning when cbp cannot articulate a validated requirement for the number of Border Patrol agents, combined with the Technology Requirements to surveil the border . When will we see validated requirements and resourcing models similar to the model used by the office of Field Operations . I dont think theres anything thats more frustrating to the heads of the to the executives of the Border Patrol or myself or certainly the secretary on not being able to have a set of metrics that actually said how many Border Patrol agents do you actually need. It has been unbelievably difficult and complex and its as complex as when we tried to decide how many Police Officers we needed in seattle versus how many Police Officers were needed in a city like washington, d. C. But were closer. Were much closer now to developing that set of metrics that would be helpful. As you know, the offset in the reduction of the 300 personnel would be to fund radios, improvements in the radio system. The vast majority of which would go to the Border Patrol and to their vehicles. Many of which now are reaching a lifespan that makes them not as serviceable as they should be. Theres nothing more frustrating than having an agent who cant go out to do patrol because the radio is not operable or because the vehicle. So were looking at using those funds for that. Commissioner, while we have long discussed the hiring of customs officers and Border Patrol agents, im equally as concerned with the vacancy for area interdiction agents. By your own numbers, cbp is 12 below the goal. For air interdiction agents, 93 below the goal of 775 agents. How can we officially use our air assets if we dont have enough pilots to fly the aircraft . Its my understanding Corpus Christi is only manned to fly two, maybe three missions at a time. Yet we have six p3s and three uass stationed at the facility. Do we hire more agents or do we retire the aircraft . Are vacancies impacting air operations . Further i hear pilots coming out of the military who have been flying combat missions overseas are failing the cbp polygraph. What is cbp doing to address hiring and polygraph issues . How do we address air crew vacancies for the p3s who are mostly former navy when the navy is no longer training p3 air crews . So one of the difficulties in hiring for air and marine is its a very competitive environment. One of my last flights, the first officer had been a pilot for us in san diego and was now flying for delta. And so we know and weve seen this huge increase in both domestic passenger travel and also International Travel by air. So were in a competitive environment. One of the difficulties has been, though, this requirement that a pilot coming out of the military must also undergo the same level of scrutiny or screening that someone hiring from outside will go through. Quite frankly, they come with a top secret clearance if theyre a pilot in the military. I dont see any reason why we cant continue to work with the office of Personnel Management and others to bring them on board much more quickly without going through as many hoops as we would go through for others. The last thing i mention is amongst all those different job descriptions in air and marine, we have i think four different pay scales, and we are interested in working toward the same Law Enforcement pay system that the fbi and the marshals and dea have. Which is Law Enforcement availability pay, leap pay, which provides an additional 25 of their salary for the extra hours that they would normally work. And we kind of like to level that Playing Field for all of them. So well continue to keep working on that. But of course i think you know too our push has been to hire with the appropriated money the additional customs and Border Protection officers, plus to stop the bleeding in the Border Patrol. Commissioner, i would like to go back to the whole issue of Border Security and the fact that we dont have enough Border Patrol manpower there. We also hear a lot about the fact that, you know, we have to secure our border and when i go back home, i hear a lot anxiety about that because the impression is that our borders are fairly open and that theyre unprotected. In practical terms, how does cbp define its Border Security mission . And what are the measures by which we should be judging cbps performance . We look very much, particularly with the Border Patrol, between the ports of entry. We look very much at the security that the Border Patrol do they have operational awareness or what wed call Situational Awareness. Do they know the number of people that may be attempting and the particular areas that theyre coming across . They also have the information and the liaison with their state and city and county partners all along the border. We know many of those border cities from el paso to san diego to tucson have some of the lowest crime rates of any of the large cities in the country. So understanding and recognizing that there are also places where we use our unmanned aircraft. There are also places that are so desolate and so rugged and so difficult that were not seeing people attempt in any way, shape or form to cross or enter the border illegally. Well, if theyre not using those locations, we need to take those finite Border Patrol resources and allow them and put them into places where we do have greater numbers. But, you know, as a police chief, i was always held accountable for managing our people, responding quickly, making sure that were trained and have the equipment they needed, but i was never held accountable for a crimefree city whether it was buffalo or seattle. There will always be gaps and we will work very hard to make sure those gaps are narrowed. Id like to go now to an issue that we discussed during last years hearing. Thats the treatment of unaccompanied mexican children who cross the border, which is different from those children that are coming from central america. Last july, gao released a report on the treatment of unaccompanied children in dhs custody. Which made a number of recommendations pertinent to mexican children. Gao found that cbp personnel were not appropriately following the requirements of the trafficking victims protection reauthorization act. For instance, cbp forms lacked specific indicators and questions agent officers should use to assess whether a child has credible fear of returning to mexico, could be at risk of being trafficked if returned, or was capable of making an independent decision to voluntarily return. The report found that cbp personnel did not document the basis for the decisions they made relative to these factors. Goa found that cbp repatriated 95 of unaccompanied mexican children it apprehended between 2009 and 2014. Including 93 of mexican children under the age of 14. Even though cbps 2009 memorandum on the treatment of unaccompanied children states that children under 14 are generally presumed to be unable to make an independent decision. I saw that the department recently signed new repatriation agreements with mexico. To what extent were those agreements in response to the gao report . And what specific changes to repatriations do they entail . As a result of the questions and the discussion last year, and also as a result of the gao, we did a new series of training for the Border Patrol, to make sure that those questions are appropriately asked and that the responses are appropriately recorded for that decision involving mexican children. The same time, within the last month, assistant secretary bursen and director sal dania from i. C. E. Were in, i believe, arizona, to sign new repatiation agreements with mexico, to make sure that there was close coordination with the government of mexico upon returning someone, so that they wouldnt be returned at night, they wouldnt be returned in an environment that may be considered hostile or dangerous, and that their property, whatever property they crossed the border with, would be also returned with them. So i think the progress and the training and progress in the additional repatriation agreement with mexico is helpful. As you know, the vast majority of the unaccompanied children that we are apprehending are coming from the three Central American countries and really not mexico right now. I see that my time is up. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Chairman rogers. Mr. Commissioner, you and i have been working many times together over the years to curtail Drug Trafficking and abuse. Ive said many times and ive heard you say it many times that there is no one answer to the problem. That it does take enforcement, treatment and education. Holistic approach. The president s budget rightly puts Prescription Drug and heroin abuse in the forefront, but largely focuses on treatment and the demand side of the equation. If we want to see any further success in treating victims of abuse and educating the public about the danger thats present, i think weve got to be sure enforcement on the front end is emphasized and, in fact, ironclad. Your agencys charged with protecting the borders and youve got the primary role to play in all of this. Dea says heroin seizures in the u. S. Have increased in each of the last five years, nearly doubling from 2010 to 2014. Your Agency Reports seizing over 9,600 ounces of heroin during fiscal year 14 and yet your budget would reduce the number of agents patrolling our borders by some 300. How can you justify taking boots off the ground in spite of this huge increase in heroin interest in heroin introduction . Mr. Chairman, i go back to a couple things. One is on the heroin issue, the majority of any heroin that we seize is not between the ports of entry, its smuggled through the ports of entry. Whether its in san ysidro or el paso, or whether its at jfk airport, heroin seizures almost predominantly are through a port of entry and either carried in a concealed part of the vehicle or carried by an individual. We dont get much heroin seized by the Border Patrol coming through. I think just because theres a lot of risks to the smugglers and the difficulty of trying to smuggle it through. But when i look at when i look at the number of Border Patrol agents that we are already down and i look at offsetting, being able to provide additional radio equipment and additional vehicles as a result of using some of that money or the majority of that money to the Border Patrol, i think its a decision that will help. We know that technology is better for their safety and its also better to get them out to be able to patrol. Changing subjects. Okay. The Visa Waiver Program permits citizens of 38 Different Countries to travel to the u. S. Either for business or tourism purposes up to 90 days without a visa. In return, those 38 countries must permit u. S. Citizens to remain in their countries for a similar length of time. Since its inception in 1986, that program has evolved into a comprehensive Security Partnership with many of americas closest allies. The department administers the Visa Waiver Program in consultation with the state department. They utilize a riskbased multilayered approach to detect and prevent terrorists, serious criminals and other bad actors from traveling to this country. With the advent of the terrorist era that were in now, the congress deemed it impossible to live with that kind of a free Border Program with 38 countries in the world for fear of terrorist infiltration undetected. So we passed the Visa Waiver Program improvement and terrorist travel prevention act of 2015. Which established new eligibility requirements for travel under the Visa Waiver Program to include travel restrictions. They dont bar a person from coming to the u. S. Point blank but they do require that the traveler obtain a u. S. Visa which then gives us the chance to investigate the background of the person. So in december, that law was passed. Can you outline for us the Program Changes concerning aliens from these countries, how soon youll be able to implement the changes if theyre not already there . Secretary johnson several months before the passage of this, authorized additional series of questions to be put into the esta. This system in which we would record information with more detail and more specificity. For instance, more specificity when it comes to the location that a person would be staying. Additional Contact Information such as cell phone and email, those types of pieces, and then when the law was passed, particularly the fact of dual citizenship with the four countries that were outlined, we canceled 17,000 travel approval requests that were already had already been basically approved. As you know, the esta system lasts. You can use it within a twoyear window. One thing that isnt always recognized with this system, though, is that a person is continually vetted. Those names are run against databases every 24 hours. So if you applied and you werent going to travel for another eight or nine or ten months, every single day your name would be run against a series of databases because we dont want you suddenly to say, now im going to go ahead and use the esta, its already been approved, im gonna get on a plane, and we say, wait, in the last 48 or 72 hours, some information of a derogatory nature came up and needs to be worked on. We work closely with the department of state. I testified recently of two hearings on this issue. I think the fact we were able to cancel the 17,000 visas or estas and require those individuals then go back to an embassy or a consulate and get a waiver, and we will continue including standing up at the National Targeting Center along with the state Department Personnel sitting right next to us, a terrorist Prevention Group that will look at this much more in depth, on a 24hour basis. Are you staffed to handle this workload . In the budget, we requested an additional 40 personnel to go to the targeting center. I would think frankly if theres a real jewel in the crown and in cbp, when it comes to prevention, i would say our National Targeting Centers for cargo and passenger anticipation of things that could be dangerous, or people that could be dangerous, and i know a number of members and staff have visited it, and i would encourage them to see that 24 7 operation. But as for the additional people, including working in a network division, to work on human smuggling and drug smuggling is a good prevention technique. The legislation also required Program Countries to validate passports, report lost or stolen passports, use interpol screening and start Passenger Information Exchange agreements. Can you tell us what the requirements are and how they would be put in place . Ngets they must check that foreign passport against interpols lost and stolen passport database. They must do that. The requirement with visa waiver i think is not often talked about but is really quite helpful is the fact that it will bring these countries who are likeminded who want to prevent terrorism and want to prevent smuggling. It brings us together in a better information sharing environment. We have in cbp a permanent liaison to interpol. We have two permanent liaisons to europoll policing. And we have at our immigration Assistance Program a number of cbp personnel at airports where they dont do enforcement on foreign territory but work closely with their foreign counterparts. I think thats part of the benefit frankly of the Visa Waiver Program, it brings us together to all assess risk and realize that were all in the same boat. The legislation directed you to terminate Program Countries for failure to comply with certain agreements. Do you foresee the termination of any countries from the program . Im not familiar with that. I know secretary johnson, in counsel with secretary kerry and also the director of the office of national intelligence, just added three additional countries to that, to the original four that congress passed. And so that increases our workload, but it also improves our Risk Assessment and our safety and security. Thank you, mr. Commissioner, for your service. Thank you. Mr. Price . Thank you, mr. Chairman. Welcome, commissioner, glad to see you here again. Thanks. I want to pick up where the Ranking Member left off on the question of Border Security, how you conceive of that Going Forward in terms of the mix of elements that would go to make up the kind of Situational Awareness and Border Security youre talking about. I understand this is a mix of personnel infrastructure and technology that were talking about here. I share the concern thats been expressed repeatedly this morning about the shortfall in personnel that this budget would apparently leave us with. Something like 700 custom officials, 1,300 Border Patrol agents. My own view, i think its widely shared, is in the long term, true and effective Border Security isnt going to be achieved, even with all the money we might throw at it, without comprehensive Immigration Reform. And since its been brought up here this morning, i think maybe a little reality check is in order. The president , in fact, pushed very hard in cooperation with the congress for years for comprehensive Immigration Reform. He worked effectively at it and successfully with the senate. The Senate Passed a bipartisan Immigration Reform bill. But then the house never took it up. Thats the problem. Thats the problem is comprehensive Immigration Reform. And it was only after months, indeed years, of that kind of stonewalling that the president did take executive action. It was limited action, it is very well reasoned and legally sound action, i believe. To exercise a degree of prosecutorial respect to those we initiate Immigration Enforcement on. Then the republicans take that executive action as a new excuse not to act. So frustratingly, we fall short, far short of the comprehensive Immigration Reform that might deal with this larger issue. So we return to Border Security. And that, that issue, too, has become inflamed in recent months. Thanks, largely to the president ial campaign. People with little or no Immigration Enforcement or policy experience, including some highprofile president ial candidates have said once again, we can simply build a fence. We can seal the southern border. And one actually says we can send the bill to mexico. Now when i was chairman of this committee, the fence loomed very large. And we appropriated on this subcommittee for hundreds of miles of pedestrian and vehicle fence. We attempted with mixed success, i have to say. To exercise some measure of cost benefit analysis with these various segments of the fence. But we built it there was a huge political push on at the time to build that fence. Well, now its back. Now the fence is back. And im going to give you a chance to comment explicitly on this. What does a secure border look like . And do we need more fence . It does mean that when we have that situational or operational awareness and we know whats coming and where our gaps are, that thats particularly helpful. And the fence that has been built, i think its approximately 600 miles of different types of fencing, including tactical fencing, very high fencing, double and triple fencing in some locations and some to prevent a vehicle. The Border Patrol uses that type of technique and those types of fence technologies in order to move people that may be attempting to come across, into different locations where they can have more resources. We also clearance recognize that anyone who has traveled and spent time on the border, as i think every one of the members here has, that there are lots of locations in which fencing and walls would not be able to be built. Would not work and would not be able to withstand, and even with the fencing that we have, we spend considerable resources repairing and keeping that fencing in line. So you know, we think its the combination of all of the other things that we do, tactical aerostats, patrols, infrared, fixed towers, ground sensors, on and on. That make for a more secure border. Would it be your judgment that the budget you submitted gets that balance right . In terms of the mix of elements Going Forward . Are there major gaps, major omissions that you would look to be addressed in later years . I think the budget that we submitted is a very realistic budget. I think that i would be very happy as im sure every member of the committee would be, if we could hire and get the number of Border Patrol agents and customs and Border Protection officers fully trained and on the job. That right now, that is, that is the number one priority, because regardless of all the technology, this is still a very laborintensive and peopleoriented kind of business, whether its at a port of entry or between the ports of entry. But i think weve submitted a realistic budget that will help us get there. And quite frankly, the committee has been very supportive of a number of initiatives in the past. And i think thats why weve made progress. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Mr. Stewart . Thank you, mr. Chairman, commissioner, thank you for many years of service. And to your peers as well. Law enforcement, all around the country, its a difficult time to be in Law Enforcement. And i want you to know that many of us support you and the efforts youre trying to undertake. Im going to ask you a couple questions. I dont think youll be able to answer them, id be surprised if you can. Id kind of like to explore, do we know what we dont know . Do we have a good feel for some of these things, for example i appreciate and i want to follow up on the chairmans conversation about the Visa Waiver Program. Youve indicated Something Like 17,000 who have been denied or revoked to date on the esta program. Do we have any idea of those 17,000 . Is that 90 of those who we maybe should have identified . Is it 50 . Do you have a sense of how successful that is . The 17,000 are the dual citizens with the four countries. Thats very easy to identify. I would tell you that looking, it is a mix of people, is there somebody in that mix that probably might not have or should not have gotten that . I think thats very possible. But also, its people who fled iran during the overthrow of the shah in 1979, that have been, havent been to iran in 40 years, and but still have dual citizenship. And they were canceled. So you know, it was a broad brush, widely supported by congress and the president. Thats a relatively easy thing to do. Identify those who have the dual citizenship of those targeted countries. Im guessing you identified most of those people. Wouldnt you say . We identified them through the fact that they already, we knew in the system that they were dual citizens. Much harder to identify those, that the visa waiver legislation required us to identify. Those who had traveled to some of these countries in question. Do you have a sense for how successful weve been in identifying those people . And let me elaborate and then ill allow you to answer. Thats a much harder thing to do, and we need partners in order to do that. They may be traveling from europe. That we would be unaware of that travel, were it not for our European Partners or counterparts that have made us aware of that. And the department of Homeland Security, the director really was pretty firm on several countries france, belgium, germany, italy, greece, gave them a february 1 deadline to fix what he called crucial loopholes. Can you give us an update in how our partners are doing in providing us this information . We would be unaware of it without their input. And they hadnt done a good job of that previously. Have they gotten better at giving us that information . Visa waiver results in a lot of partnerships that including the exchange of information. So one, the relationship particularly after the attacks in paris, continues to get strengthened about the necessity of exchanging and sharing information. You are exactly correct when you talk about how difficult it is to detect people because of broken travel. We rely on another partner in another government to perhaps tell us about that. Also, people do selfdeclare. About having travelled to one of the countries. And then lastly, when you enter the United States and the passport is gone by through the customs and Border Protection officers, just as we did during the ebola screening, we do come across people that have traveled to one of those countries. I think 2011 was the cutoff date that you put in place. Commissioner, being short on time, let me ask you, the department of Homeland Security asks these identified partners to gave them a february 1 deadline to close the loopholes. Would you say theyve done that effectively . I would say theyre much better. But i couldnt answer for every one of them and id be happy to provide that information to you and your staff. I wish you would. Some of them are more effective than others. Let me ask very quickly, one of the things we identified and one of the things that many of us recognized that we had to expand our capabilities and that was to using social media to identify someone who may be entering our country and posing a threat. San bernardino there were indications and im not talking about radicalization. Im talking about those who are radicalized, trying to enter a country. If we use social media as a tool, we would raise red flags and say this person, is someone we should look more closely. But previous to that, we hadnt done a good job. I dont think it was a policy to use that tool. Can you update, how is that being implemented to use social media to identify those individuals who may be a threat as theyre trying to enter the country. Sure. The social media checks would apply through dhs, to i. C. E. , et cetera. And secretary johnson has stood up a task force within dhs to look at expanding and moving forward on the ability to research and use information and social media. That applies to dhswide, not just for cvp. Do you know when that task force is supposed to give their report . I believe general taylor from intelligence and analysis is in charge as the chair of that task force. I dont know the date. Well find out and follow up with that. Thank you. Mr. Quayle . Thank you, mr. Chairman. Commissioner, thank you. I believe you said earlier this might be your last hearing, and i just want to say thank you so much for all the many years of service. I appreciate it. And also appreciate your moderate approach to this. Im from the border. Laredo is 96 , most hispanic city percentage wise in the country. I think people know my policies. I like to see a moderate approach. We dont want to see open borders. We believe that if somebody has been put in detention, they ought to be treated fairly. But that we should have detention, have some sort of deterrent. At the same time, we think that the Immigration Reform, sensible Immigration Reform, we think the wall is a 14th century solution to a 21st century problem that we have. So we like to see the moderation there. Because we want to see order at the border. Dont want to get political, but the folks that i represent on the border, wouldnt give me 95, 90 of the vote every time i run, i assume they support my policies. Which is pretty much what you do also, a moderate approach. One of the things weve talked about lately is to extend our border beyond the u. S. mexico border. A couple of years ago, we, i think we put about 80, 85 million to help mexico secure the southern border with guatemala. I saw some figures that over a period of time, they deported more people than Border Patrol did over the same amount of time. So just 80 million did a lot to help mexico for us to extend our border. We were in costa rica, the cuban, a totally different issue. The costa ricans were telling us in december that the people who are coming in trying to get into the u. S. , they had people from ghana, somalia, nepal, and literally name the country, and they were there. My question to you in extending the border out besides the u. S. Mexico border. What else can we do to help the mexicans and our Central American folks to help us secure our border . The more we stop outside the u. S. Border, the better it is for us. So if you want to address biometric equipment, training, we can do that, i know youre doing that, but what can we do to step this up . Congressman, i think the government of mexico has done a really admirable job, particularly in the last year plus on increasing and improving their border. Cvp and other components of dhs have a number of advisers and technical assistants both in places like tapachula and other locations, but also within mexico city. We visited the Training Center for those personnel. We visited the detention facility. I visited it particularly. They have made marked progress in, in, in the work that theyve done. And i think we couldnt be more pleased with the government of mexico as a partner in this. So well continue to look at can we assist in biometric identification process, other types of things. But i think the last thing and probably the most important in all of this, would be that if those three Central American countries, honduras and el salvador and guatemala had better safety, better security, a better educational system for people, and better hope for the people that live in those countries, they wouldnt be fleeing and making an incredibly dangerous journey to the United States. I sat on the floor with a father and his 4yearold daughter not that long ago. He said you know we had several murders down the street. He said the last thing i need to do is to leave my wife with one of our other children and for myself and my daughter to flee. This is in el salvador to flee and try to get to the United States where his mother, where his mother lives. But he said, i cant, i cant raise her in that environment. If those countries are more stable, i think people dont want to pick up and leave and come here. Well, i hope you work with the state department, because as you know, mr. Chairman, and members of the committee, we added 750 million working with kay ranger, for the central america, the northern triangles, hopefully youre all a part of that process. The more we extend our security out instead of playing defense on the oneyard line, but extend it to the 20 yard line, the better it is. So there was 750 million that hopefully yall will work with the state department. Thank you so much for your time and effort. It would be helpful to have an ambassador, too, in mexico. I glea i agree, i think Roberto Jacobson should be the ambassador, its unfair that shes been delayed for something that has nothing to do with it, its very unfair. Thanks for your service. Im going to follow up with what the chairman of the full committee asked about a little bit. Which is the role of your organization now, in controlling drug traffic. I think there was testimony last year that your department doesnt have a zero tolerance policy. That people found crossing the border with marijuana, or other drugs, actually, theres no zero tolerance, you actually dont refer for prosecution, everyone who intends to enter our country and poison our youth. So ive got to ask you, why . I dont know of any policy like that. I know that people are apprehended with drugs, whether its small amounts that theyre carrying for some personal use, or whether its multiton or multikilo loads, all of those, to my knowledge, would be referred to the u. S. Attorney. And it would not be up to customs and Border Protection to make a decision for the department of justice as to whether or not prosecution would be accepted. And frankly, if i did find out that we did have a policy where we were making those decisions. Rather than where they belong with the department of justice, i would reverse that policy very quickly. You were head of the office of National Drug control policy. Would you be disappointed with the department of justice, if in fact they had set minimum amounts of marijuana to be brought into this country before they would be prosecuted . I would tell you that it seems like it would be a waste of time for your agents. Your agents go, track them down, find the drugs, they think they did a great job and turn it over to the doj, and the doj looks the other way. And says were too busy. I would tell you, i understand depending on the United States attorneys offices along the border from texas to california, that the number one client for prosecutions is customs and Border Protection. We keep them busy with everything possible. I think there are clearly going to be cases that theyre not going to and these are questions that are answered by them but i think there are clearly cases that given the finite resources that they have, theyre not going to be able to accept for prosecution, either because of prosecutorial merit or because theyve set some guideline. But i would tell you that we make those referrals all the time. And were happy to make sure they have everything. Ive assigned attorneys in our office to be crossdesignated as assistant United States attorneys just to help out in those areas so they can have additional prosecutors and if we need to assign more attorneys to do that, to help them out, then thats what well have to do. Thank you very much. I was a little disappointed, back in 2009 i guess, you know the administration decided and i think you agreed, to stop using the term war on drugs. And honestly, i think if you look at the heroin epidemic we have now, its exactly the result of the leadership of the country, saying that we no longer have a war on drugs. Just my personal opinion. Rhetorical question. Let me go onto the Visa Waiver Program. I just have a question about this. Because as you know, part of the controversy is this decision was made to on on a casebycase basis, permit waivers for people from Business People from iraq or iran who are conducting business, i believe those are the two casebycase. Can you tell us since that program was put in place, how many, since it was case by case who makes those casebycase decisions . The process, if there was a request, and to my knowledge, theres never been a request, theres not even a pending request it for anyone to use that example. But we would use the unit or the group that we stood up in the National Targeting Center to review those. Theyre a series of questions that a person would have to answer if in fact for example it was a business case. We know there that there are waivers already in existence, general waivers in the law for government officials and for military. But there would be a whole series of questions. And we would have to validate through that system. But right now, i dont know of a single theres not a single pending request or even one thats been made. Irans objection seems to be much ado about nothing . I dont know if its merely too early in the process for some of these additional requests. But i do know that no request has been made. One final point and it would be pretty brief. It has to do with the integrated fixed towers contracts. These were supposed to be important parts of our first line of defense and yet the first tower you know was, the certification was delayed. Now theres no is there money in the budget for the rest of these towers . Are they going to proceed on time . There is money and they are proceeding on time. The Border Patrol, whats required under the contract, and rightly so, to certify that these expensive pieces of technology are actually operational and are helpful. And i think as many members of the committee know, the attempt to build a virtual wall resulted in pretty significance investments in taxpayer dollars in some technology that did not prove to be useful to the agents on the grouped that actually needed it. As i understand it the Border Patrol has certified that the integrated fixed tower is a useful, helpful tool that expands their visibility on the border. Thank you very much. Yield back. Doctor, as youll recall, i mentioned the pretty strong rumor, at least on the texas border, the 200pound rule of marijuana. I didnt get a response from the attorney general when i asked about that. Mr. Young . Thank you, mr. Chairman. Commissioner, welcome. Nice to see you, thanks for what you do. I want to talk about a little about custom and Border Protection uses of unmanned aerial systems. I had gone down to the border last year, early last year and noticed things, uavs and aerostats. Can you talk a little bit about where those are being used, how theyre being used and are you seeing a drop in border activity . Because it seems to me like many times this can simply be a real deterrent by seeing these intimidating blimps or drones up in the sky. And can you just reassure us or talk about the relationship between using the uass and in conjunction with your agents. And is one meant to supplement the other . Youre not phasing out agents with the use of uass are you . Can you talk a little bit about this . Theyre all designed to enhance and even in my earlier statement, the fact that its still a labor intensive job. It still requires boots on the ground but it can be greatly enhanced with technology. So i think the tactical or the tethered aerostats are particularly helpful. With the camera systems that are in them. Do you know about how many aerostats we have now . I think were at five and we put another one in mcallen area, so were now moving to six aerostats. They are fairly expensive to operate because we use contractors to operate them. But frankly, i dont want to take a Border Patrol agent off the road. And then have them operate the mechanics of the tactical aerostat. So i think they are helpful. Ill be down in mcallen next week for my 12th or 13th trip. And the agents down there feel that theyre a definite deterrent and visible. I kind of thought that even if we had some extras without the equipment we ought to just put them up in the air. And see how that works. Kind of like when we park a police car with nobody in it. And see if people slow down. Or the inflatable tanks they used in world war ii. On the road. But well have to see if they take up my idea. Thank you for that. Last year, i asked you about guidance given to cpv personnel to keep administrations policies in mind and if these priorities supersede the law. Last month the House Judiciary Committee heard testimony from a cpb agent that undocumented immigrants are no longer given a notice to appear order and are released without any means of tracking their whereabouts. Are i have serious concerns about this, and i know some of my colleagues do as well. Are agents being directed to ignore the law . Or is this coming from within their own decisionmaking . Or are they given guidance on ignoring the law on this . They shouldnt be releasing anyone and the Border Patrol shouldnt be issuing the notices to appear without going through and without having i. C. E. , immigrations and Customs Enforcement. So we dont need to be in that. I think everyone is very familiar with policies in the past called catch and release, in which people were not documented, reports were not as well written, people werent questioned. Theres no one thats apprehended today that isnt, unless theyre under the age of 14, that isnt fingerprinted and photographed, that isnt debriefed about how did you get here. Was there a smuggler involved . Who did you pay . How much did it cost . All of that information. But we dont need and dont want and i would not stand by if the Border Patrol was releasing people without going through all the formalities that are required. Did this concern you when this Border Patrol agent gave this testimony before the Judiciary Committee about this . The concern i have is quite often the Border Patrol council, which is the union, is probably not the most knowledgeable organization about whats actually going on. I think unlike, you know, when i had Police Officers in seattle, they would follow the law. Then theres room within the law to actually do things. And if they werent happy with doing that, its kind of like well, if you really dont want to follow the directions that your superiors, including the president of the United States and the commissioner of customs and Border Protection, then you really do need to look for another job. Theres some serious concerns out there that the law is not being enforced. Last year when saldana was here, she gave a statement saying their goals and principles and priorities should take precedence even over the law. So thats very concerning to myself and many others. On this panel. And just throughout america. Wondering why if its not happening, the law is not being enforced. Its a very serious thing. I urge you to keep an eye on that, please. Thanks. Thank you. All right. I think well start a second round. First, going back to something one of my colleagues brought up. I think mr. Harris, the integrated fixed towers, the reality is that the first certification of one of these towers, was last friday. Isnt that correct . So its a very, very current event. Yes. And on those towers, heres the question, the texans would like to know. When will your budget install towers in texas . What will you use in texas, if not the integrated fixed towers . So i think that part of the delay with the integrated fixed towers was the fact that the contract was protested. And as we know, when a contract is protested, it take as long a long time then to overcome that, but that fixed tower in arizona is up and working. And we know the additional aerostat in texas is very helpful and if there are other locations, including those within texas, within which the fixed tower would make a difference, then i would like to move forward with that. I couldnt be more specific but im happy to get back to you on that. Its not it wouldnt be the first time that weve looked around and seen resources going to arizona that we really needed in texas. So i think im required to ask that question. I got the message. Okay. We understand that the department is exploring an outcomebased approach to metrics that would measure the effectiveness or of our Border Security. How is cpb working with the secretary on this initiative and how will it change the current cpb metrics which are more inputbased instead of outcomebased. What does the preliminary data suggest for Border Security between and at points of entries