Cspan, the senate on cspan2 when they come back into session. Our next guest is from alexandria. His zachary terwilliger. U. S. Attorney for the Eastern District of virginia. Thank you for joining us. Guest thanks very much for having me. What start by reminding us exactly u. S. Attorney does. Guest i am proud to have 92 collects. There is 93 u. S. Attorneys across the country. We are the chief federal Law Enforcement officers in our respective districts. We have two in the Eastern District of virginia. If you draw a line down the blue ridge mountains, that would be the Eastern District. Of league has the west rest of virginia. Our goal is to service the chief federal Law Enforcement official or our respective areas. That is bringing together our Law Enforcement partners and prosecuting any manner of criminal violation as well as defending the government on the civil side. Host as we look at the coronavirus, how has your job changed since the pandemic and what are your Biggest Challenges right now . Guest ive got an amazing team of about 350 employees across the Eastern District. That number grows exponentially when you include all of our Law Enforcement, investigative, and agency partners. Like much of the country we have moved to a telework model. Essential, but we are part of the National Security apparatus. We are still working. We have a skeleton staff in the office to ensure that every anything that cannot be done remotely, whether related to National Security, whether it involves a Public Safety arrest, we are still moving forward. It is a challenge under the circumstances, but as we have resolve oflt our employees, we are still moving forward. We made significant arrests yesterday involving a darknet drug distributor. We have gone out and made arrests in neighborhoods that were reeling from Violent Crimes and shootings. Beene covid front we have in lockstep with a lot of our partners in helping to get out the message to citizens as well as going after the fraudsters in real time. That is one of the things i am proud of that we have been able to do. Rather than wait for this pandemic to end, we are doing our best, working through it. Host phone numbers on the bottom of the screen for zachary terwilliger. We will take your calls in just a moment. Our guest was appointed u. S. Attorney just about two years ago. He started talking about some of your actions this week. What else can you tell us about crime rate trends during this coronavirus. . It was prior to covid19 pandemic. Those trends very. One of the things we started to see what anecdotal informationable to hear through my contacts as well as what i have read in the media. A real issue with Domestic Violence, which was something a lot of us were worried about. You have individuals under stress at home, not leaving the house. Reddy had a cycle of Domestic Violence going, this is going to exacerbate that. And Indianapolis Police officer lost her life responding to a Domestic Violence call. One of my big concerns was Child Exploitation. You have got a lot of people on the internet 24 7, and one of the things im worried about is an increase in Child Exploitation through child pornography. I think initially you saw a little bit of a decrease in Violent Crime, even in certain hotspots around the country. Now i have had the opportunity to talk to my colleagues yesterday, they are seeing a massive spike in some of those areas. Again, i think it is repeating that it is our men and women in Law Enforcement who are not given the option of staying at home. Debt of gratitude and appreciation for enforcing the rule of law. Guest,alls for our zachary terwilliger. There was a headline that usa today, crime rates plummet among the pandemic but not everyone is safer. Betsy, you are up first from austin, texas. Caller good morning. The boro a supporter of gan project. I would like to ask what the relationship is between the importance of Funding Global Health initiatives and National Security . Host something you could speak to . Guest sure. I must admit, that is not a project i am familiar with. I dont want to comment on the specifics. We are at a heightened vulnerability any time there is a pandemic like this, when it comes to National Security. The good news is, certainly in a post9 11 world have been focused on National Security. When you have more of our work being done in a particularly vulnerable way over the internet, you have got individuals spread very thin. We were not able to come together physically like we normally what to deal with some of these National Security threats. And, just things that were absolutely appropriate but for example, extending the date of our real id requirements. Which was absolutely the right call. Isn Something Like that going to impact National Security. I dont think we can underestimate our vulnerability. I do believe there is a causal relationship there. The fbi andnt that our intelligence apparatus are not only aware of that but are executing every day to keep americans safe. It is incumbent upon all of us to remain in a heightened sense of vigilance. Host this is on the line. Dennis is on the line. Caller i have Great Respect for the Law Enforcement community, doing your job. Could omment who that could apply. Part of the function of people on the front lines is to communicate information to the public. Whothe people who believe, compared the flu to the coronavirus, saying 70,000 deaths occurred for the flu, in the flu the mortality rate is. 1 . That means 70 Million People contracted the flu and one out of 1000 of them perished. People tollion contract coronavirus, the 1 . Ality rate is that is 10 times as many. So 700,000 people would die. That is going to be worse than that and it is important to communicate this because since there are no vaccines, 70 Million People would contract coronavirus, perhaps 150 million, so the deaths would go up to one million americans. I think it is important that we communicate that. Host thanks for calling, dennis. Guest i would prefer that to the very able folks at the Coronavirus Task force. One thing the caller did say that does resonate with me is the need for communication. Thissked me earlier how is impacted our mission . I do think communication from the top regularly we are seeing that obviously the white dose that is what we here. We have daily communication amongst the team to cry to create that to try to create that cohesion. And just doing the Public Service that you are doing at washington journal to allow people to talk and giving folks like me the opportunity to tell others what were doing is incredibly helpful. It demystifies some of what is going on. It lets folks know that Law Enforcement is still open for business. I do believe communication is incredibly important now, as many people are isolated. Benefits ofreat technology is that we can still reach one another, even if it is virtual. As United States attorney, i wanted to ask you about the personal health and safety of police and other Law Enforcement. Here is a headline talking about new york. With police sick, new yorkers are taking crowding into their own hands. We know that the situation in new york and attorney general william barr issued a memo that i wanted to read and get your reaction to. You should now consider the medical risks associated with individuals being remained that into federal custody. Even with the precautions we are taking, each time a new person is added to hl it presents at least some risk to the personnel who operate that facility and to the people incarcerated. It also presents risks to the individual being remanded. Tell us about your take on that. Guest that is one of the issues that is confronting us in the criminal justice arena. The word that comes to mind i have known attorney general bar i think, unflappable. Having somebody with that call is extremely i think a portion you didnt read was something that resonates with me and all of my colleagues in Law Enforcement. Need for this individualized determination. It has got to be an individualized assessment. What i mean is, we cant do two things. If we have individuals positive, introducing them back into the community is going to cause increased issues. As many have talked about, i think there was an oped this morning in the Washington Post to this effect. If you are going to release individuals from a confined setting back out into the public, we need to make sure we are not sending people out there, acting to the public who are positive unknowingly. Cant create, we an increased Public Safety risk. I hope everyone knows, when you are sent to prison or jail or qr in confinement, your health and wellbeing is our responsibility. However, if you are an individual who has been convicted of a Violent Crime or there has been probable cause established, we have to protect the public. We have already seen anecdotally, an increase in strongarm robberies as folks are dealing with the economic consequences of this. We have seen individuals going in and ripping off the that remain open. We have to be very smart and individualized. One of the things im proud to say is, we are looking at each case individually. Vulnerability of a particular inmate is absolutely something, based on this memo, that we take into effect, as is their criminal history, as is the offense for which they have been charged. At all thato look is being done, at least on my end by the u. S. Marshals service to mitigate that harm, both inside institutions and when folks are let out. Is, i thinkto that attending attorney general barr hit the nail on the head because he said, it has got to be individualized. That is what we have to focus on. Look at the individual factors and make a judgment. Host here is that editorial rate sitting ducks behind bars. The virus is raging through jails and prisons. Officials must act. Who doubt a balancing act will be required. No elected officials want to endanger their communities. By the same token, it is he responsible to do nothing as the wheree rages unchecked both prisoners and staff can do little to protect themselves. Dennis is on the line from port st. Lucie, florida. Good morning. Caller good morning. Just a couple of quick questions for you. People obviously on the streets, fewer vehicles on the streets, do you see any trends in crimes that maybe going down . The second is a comment. You mentioned earlier that Law Enforcement is out patrolling our streets and we love our Law Enforcement but you said their presence out in the community is not optional. Our presence in the community is not optional in many places around the country where laws have recently been passed or statutes or governors are basically saying, if you are out on the street, if you leave your home, you are liable to be arrested. Guest sure. As far as trends go, i want to be careful that what i am basing my comments on our anecdotal evidence, which i think is appropriate at this point. I do think you are, there are some benefits with this shutdown. There is a lot of narcotics trafficking that happens in handtohand settings. Folks on the Street Corners selling drugs. I think that has become more difficult, because as the caller mentioned, you will see individuals out on the Street Corner interacting with random members of the community. While that may have seemed commonplace a month ago, that has everybodys suspicions up. We will see a downturn and some of the lower level drug dealing. Obviously, we have seen with our borders not having the level of traffic across our borders that we typically have, i think that is obviously going to change. As i mentioned, it worries me and keeps me up right now is while crimes on the street to be going down, it is crimes going on within the home in terms of Domestic Violence, Child Exploitation, crimes occurring on the dark web, and frankly the fraud. The amount of money that our elected leaders are pushing out to save our country and economy, you know, it has the fraudsters on high alert as well. That is a big concern of mine. It will be interesting to see, as the weather gets warmer and our Violent Crime trends go up as school is out, i will be interested to see, i am hopeful that we dont see the normal seasonal increase in Violent Crime. As far as your point about elected officials and what that means for citizens, i can only give my own experience in the commonwealth of virginia, where we have a shelterinplace order issued by the governor. It was made clear that Virginia State police are not to pull people over and ask where they are going. I think the social distancing, to the extent that is the best way out of this i have to cede that grant to the exports experts when i am aware of his where social distancing has woken down completely. We saw that with the Cherry Blossom festival. They shut that down. We have seen that with some open markets. Personally of issues in the commonwealth of folks have gone around and been stopped to arrested for failing to social distance. What i see is lawenforcement out on the beat, making sure that the citizenry is reassured that they are out there taking all precautions. And also making sure that if social distancing is the chosen method, which it seems to be, making sure that that is being abided by. Host lets go to philadelphia. Well is calling for our guest. Caller good morning. I had a question. Yournk it would probably solution to the economical problem. Will take care of the crime issue that is going on. Is it possible for the federal government to become a major employer of all of the people that have been laid off . What they would have to do is look at everybodys w2 form and then send them out i guess it would be Something Like a payroll check where they would , andout the city, State Government taxes. Just to keep the economy moving. Is that possible . Host is that something you want to touch . Econ 101 let me say this, thank you for calling and in. I think those types of solutions are ones we need to consider. What i mean by that is, as far as the government becoming a major employer that is for others to discuss. Justi am referring to is, a brainstorming about ideas. I appreciate the suggestion and withthat youll follow up your elected leaders as well as others. About think is amazing the american citizenry is we are always tinkerers. Host you mentioned fraud earlier. Dojss more about the hoarding and Price Gouging Task force. Do you after someone . When do you go after someone . Guest it is multifaceted, the fraud right now. Everything from Economic Impact payments, things like that. When it comes to hoarding, one of the things the department has made clear is we are not going to allow individuals to do two things. One is couch these businesses. But two is to hoard them in a manner that is going to impact Public Safety. One of the things we are focused on right now is to make sure there are not warehouses full of equipment needed that people are sitting on. This is war. We need those materials to the front. If you are somebody who, prior to march 26 or late march, you know, stocked up on hand sanitizer, clubs, and toilet paper personally, you dont have to worry about someone knocking down your door. If you or someone attempting to profiteer off of this and is amassing quantities to extort hospitals and others, that is a problem. Today we are going to be sending out 18 letters in the Eastern District of virginia. Western district is going to do the same. Alerting them to equipment on our list and what we are looking out for. To please let us know immediately if they have salespeople who are charging s rates duringiou this time. We are focused on the Major Players who are not increasing costs due to the increasing supply chain. It is more expensive to move goods and there is a premium to be paid, but that is one of those things where you are seeking to increase your margin, not just pass along some of the cost of doing business, that is going to be a problem. Host you mention some of the Law Enforcement actions you have been undertaking during this crisis. Our prosecutions able to move forward effectively . Are judges Holding Trials . What is the status of that part of the process . Guest great question. This is pretty common across the country. Although i dont think it is happening at all in all 94 districts. We are still able to arrest people and make sure the rights are in tact. After one is arrested, you get a righ