Thanks clarke and the Aspen Institute have having me back. Lucky to have the Homeland Security jeh johnson. Not going through his bio. You have it in your pamphlet. The two things that struck me as the most interesting preparing for this. It is difficult to know where to start in an interview with the secretary. He has Legal Council at the pentagon was involved in the most important issues that the Obama Administration inherited from the Bush Administration and many of you know he was responsible for helping resend dont ask dont tell he was the last legal word on every drone strike outside of the main seeders of war at the pentagon, he was in charge of the fraught issue of figuring out how to shutdown guantanamo bay, and the list goes on and on. With that background, it does make you realize why you were the guy for dhs which is another institution with a lot of problems when you inherited it. I want to ask you given that background you went from the pentagon and offense on the war on terror to homeland where you are almost purely playing defense. So one, i want you to start out telling us what are the lessons you learned dealing with all of those issues at the pentagon . And what issues did you have going from the pentagon to dhs . Tell us a little bit about that transition. Big question. First of all, lesson impression. 1819 months into the job i worked with terrific people. I hope everyone here met the terrific new dhs team. So you are correct. Part of what i did at the legal egal counsel at the department of defense was to sign off on a lot of our Counterterrorism Operations legally, and i took that very seriously. I looked at each one of them very carefully, and that was on offense. Weve taken the fight to the enemy overseas. Homeland security, by its nature, is defending our borders, defending our aviation, defending maritime ports defending cybersecurity. It would seem as if were on defense, and there are, in fact, ways in which we can be on offense. And so i am pushing our people very aggressively on a lot of different things. For example, preclearance capability, Aviation Security, i want to see us build more Aviation Security on the front end of a flight coming from overseas into the United States. I want to see us build a customs capability on the front end of a lastpointofdeparture airport, so that we have more information, and we screen people, and we know what we know about them before they get on the flights bound for the u. S. And there are a lot of airports out overseas that have indicated an interest in working with us on that. I want to build more of that. Cybersecurity, which i suspect well get into, we are on an accelerated timetable that i have set down to build our additional capabilities to block more intrusions in the federal, civilian dot gov world, and to enhance our continuous diagnostics and mitigation practices. I want to see us get to 100 percent of the federal civilian dot gov world by the end of the year. And were on an aggressive mission to make our Department Function most efficiently. Thats something that russ our undersecretary for management, and i are doing. He is a retired Business Executive from johnson and johnson. And so weve got a lot of initiatives out there. And i, in many respects, believe that part of my job is, frankly being on offense to stay one step ahead of a lot of the threats that we know we face. You have talked about what you call the new normal, right . Tell us what the new normal is and what is the new normal in the context of the threat from isis . Well, over the last 14 years, since 911, were seen core al qaeda, as everybody knows, aqap, the Al Qaedaaffiliated elements of al shabab, which, while i was at dod, we were focused on in our counterterrorism efforts. We have done a lot to degrade core al qaeda, through our good efforts. We have done a lot to degrade aqap and al shabab through our good efforts. The global terrorist threat now, as everybody knows, and as jim talked about last night, has evolved, and it has evolved in a very significant way from those groups to more groups, isil being the most prominent example, obviously, and it has evolved from terroristdirected terrorist attacks to terroristinspired attacks. I disagree a little bit with jim last night, in that i think that the distinction between terroristdirected and terroristinspired is a significant one that the American People need to understand to understand why we are where we are in our efforts. And so if you catalog the terrorist attacks and attempted attacks in this country and in europe, for example, they almost fit neatly into one of two boxes, the terroristdirected attacks, with an operative who has been recruited, trained, directed overseas and exported to someplace else to commit a terrorist attack, to terroristinspired attacks, which very often, most often involve a homegrown or even homeborn threat, and the individual has never even come face to face with a member of isil or aq, but is inspired, through the very effective use of social media, to commit an attack or attempt to commit a smallscale attack. And i think the American People need to understand how we have evolved to this new phase, because it does involve a whole of government approach, it does involve a lot of domesticbased efforts, in addition to the good work of the fbi and in addition to taking the fight to the enemy overseas. And so were doing a lot of things in dhs. We have enhanced our federal protective Service Presence in a lot of federal buildings around the country. Theres a presence right outside here that i dont think was here last year. Thats in addition to the three wild bears that were at my three wild bears that were at my we have enhanced our Aviation Security overseas at lastpointofdeparture airports. We are, with Frank Taylors leadership, enhancing the information sharing with state and local Law Enforcement, which i think is crucial. Garland city is a perfect example of the importance of sharing what we see and what we know with state and local Law Enforcement, so that they have the big picture. We have enhanced our cve engagements domestically, countering violent extremism which i know were going to talk about a little bit more. That is a personal priority of mine. I have personally met with large numbers of Muslim Leaders in this country and communities first of all, i want to appreciate the security details because i am sleeping next to you so when the bears come i am glad you are there. I want to talk about the threat of the differents between the athlete from alqaeda and the threat from ii mean in a sense, directed versus selfmotivated. Isnt the lone wolf or the inspired gunman who is random a better problem to have than alqaeda when the selfdirected threats that plotted spectacular attacks or do you see isis moving in the sim same direction and that is what they will want to do . We are facing the prospect of smallerscale attacks, given how this whole thing is evolving, but we face the prospect of that day to day in a lot of places in this country. As i think jim pointed out, um, abdul aziz was not on our radar, and i would not have considered chattanooga tennessee to be a highrisk area. And so we are facing smallerscale attacks that are harder to detect day to day to day. The alarming longerterm phenomenon we have to be concerned about with isil is any time a terrorist organization with that level of resources in excess of 30,000 fighters, with foreign fighters pouring into syria, and that level of depravity establishing territory, an attempt to establish a caliphate in iraq and syria, so that this very large, dangerous terrorist organization has a place to base, train, send operatives, that is a huge Homeland Security concern to a number of nations. And so that is the longerterm phenomenon that we see, and were very concerned about, which is why were taking the fight to them in addition to the basic Homeland Security concerns that we see day to day. All right. Now lets talk about cve, countering violent extremism. I think the first question i have about that, which you hear from many, many republicans, and is a criticism of the term itself, why do you and the Obama Administration describe this as violent extremism and refuse to use the phrase islamic extremism . What is the distinction that youre trying to get at there . I believe strongly, and i hear this over and over again from Muslim Leaders in this country, that to refer to isil as islamic extremism concedes too much. It dignifies them as occupying some part of the islamic faith, which is about peace. And so when i go into the cve engagements well, tell everyone what youre talking about with the cve engagement. Yeah. Its countering violent extremism here domestically. So youre going around, youre meeting with islamic communities in the United States. Yes. And i did not invent this. This is something that our department, the fbi, and other parts of the federal government have been doing for some time, but ive taken it on as a personal mission. We go to these roundtables, these discussions with groups, anywhere from 50 to 100 people. Ive been to boston, brooklyn, new york, northern virginia, maryland, chicago, columbus, minneapolis, los angeles, houston, and i want to get to every single metropolitan area in this, major metropolitan area in this country that has a significant Muslim Population to talk to Muslim Community leaders about helping us if they see somebody going in the wrong direction. As jim said last night, its almost always the case that there is someone else who knows. And we have seen success stories, where somebody in the community has intervened, and we need to see more of that. And so we go out, we do these things, and its a twoway conversation 10 where people in the community have lots of issues they want to talk to me about. I am responsible for the enforcement of our immigration laws, for example, and things that happen at airports. So they want talk to me about things, and i want to talk to them about helping us help them in our Public SafetyHomeland Security efforts. And the message is its your homeland, too. And i think people hear that message, and i think weve made a lot of progress in building trust, building relationships, and almost always have the local sheriff, the local police chief with me, and local sac of the fbi office, and were building trust. Were getting some pushback. Yeah. There is actually a ccve effort out there, countering our countering violent extremism initiative. And as mike leider phonetic pointed out to me yesterday, thats how you know youre having an impact. And so we are making progress. Id like to see us take our efforts to the next level. We talk a lot about the counter message. The counter message actually does exist but it needs a larger microphone. Counter messaging is not something domestically for the government, but it does exist. Theres some imams that have done some good work. It needs a larger platform. It needs a larger microphone. And so one of the things i want to do in this next phase is engage, frankly, foundations, philanthropies to support this kind of effort here in the United States. We want to engage the hightech sector in helping us with the messaging, but i think cve is fundamental to our efforts. Now at these engagements whether its somaliaamericans in minneapolis, or syrianamericans, or pakistaniamericans, the one thing i hear consistently, irrespective of the socioeconomics of these groups, and theyre not a monolith, is isil is trying to hijack my religion. We cant let them do that. And so if you call it islamic anything, we are dignifying this terrorist organization with occupying a part of the islamic faith, which muslims in this country i know push back very strongly on. So if i went into these communities calling it islamic extremism, id get nowhere. But arent we, as a isnt the government denying the fundamental religious component of this kind of extremism by not using the word islamic . Isil your analysts, i assume, in the government are trained to understand the religious dimensions of this kind of violence. To some people it sounds like political correctness, and that were missing an important component of whats going on if we dont describe this if we dont understand the religious component. I could not disagree more. Isil would like us it is called the islamic state. And many people believe that they do not deserve to be called islamic or a state. Yeah. Isil, i think, would like to be referred to as islamic extremism, because it, therefore, concedes that what they are saying and what they are doing occupies legitimately some form of islam, which is about peace. And so here domestically i think its critical that in order to build our relationship and build our level of cooperation with the Islamic Community here we have to say to them, look, we understand that what this depraved terrorist organization is doing is no part of your religion. Some people believe that what were witnessing in the middle east, though, is a civil war within islam. That sounds like its not your view at all. Look, i think isil believes that what it is doing is driven by their religion. The muslims that i know and that i have spent a lot of time with in this country believe just the opposite, and so its important to remember that islam is one of the most one 12 of the largest religions in the world, and this band of terrorists and criminals does not represent what the overwhelming majority of muslims in this country believe islam is all about. Let me ask you about violent extremism in general, and whether we overstate the threat from jihadism in the United States. We had two very, very tragic events recently, one in chattanooga and one in charleston, of course. The New York Times recently reported on some very interesting findings from the new America Foundation that show that since 911 there have been more attacks by violent extremists who were white supremists than people who were islamic extremists, which i think challenges a lot of the assumptions, especially at a conference like this. How does dhs grapple with homegrown extremism that, according to the times and according to some of this reporting recently, local Law Enforcement is actually more concerned about than anything coming from the middle east . Local Law Enforcement should be concerned about mass shootings, rampages, multivictim acts of violence. A lot of our grant making in dhs, we put out over 2 billion in grants to state and local Law Enforcement, goes to readiness, First Responder equipment, active Shooter Training that can be useful in a variety of different mass casualty situations. A lot of the First Responder equipment that was used at the boston marathon, for example, was funded by our department, but a lot of that same equipment could be just as effective, and is just as useful in any mass shooting event irrespective of the motive. You know, my mission, our mission at dhs is largely protecting our borders, land, sea, and air. Chief fisher is here. Hes our chief of the u. S. Border patrol, but given how the threat has evolved, we also have to Pay Attention to the effectiveness of terrorist groups ability not just to send an operative physically into this country, but to send a message into this country through social media, through the internet, and that is a mission that both dhs and Law Enforcement must undertake and must be mindful of. 13 but should the should the u. S. Government be spending more resources on tracking, identifying white supremist groups that, or as much should we be spending more resources on that than we are right now if i believe that if the numbers show that actually more americans have been killed since 911 from that sort of threat, rather than jihadism. Look, i believe that we do spend and we do invest considerable resources in tracking violent white supremist groups, violent domesticbased groups that have an extremist purpose, and we do so very effectively. And we have to. We have to be mindful of that. The cornerstone of our departments mission is counterterrorism, you know, and it has evolved to a place where we have to be mindful of the overseas terrorist organizationinspired attack here by a homegrown terrorist here. Thats part of our mission. It is, and this goes to the point of your question. Given how its evolving, it is moving more closely to the purely domesticbased act of terrorism. Yeah. So theres a mission there for both dhs and Law Enforcement, obviously. You were talking about isis and controlling territory in the middle east. The 911 report one of its core recommendations was never, ever should the United States let a group like al qaeda, or one of its affiliates, or group like isis, which obviously didnt know about at the time, gain territory. Never let it build a state. Thats when it has the resources and capabilities to launch a more spectacular attack against us. You were at the pentagon when we drew down the troops in iraq. Ray odierno said this week that we could 14 have prevented the rise of isis if we had left more troops in iraq. Do you believe that the Obama Administration could have prevented the rise of isis . Well, i dont i dont really have i dont like to engage in second guessing. I fully sup