Welcome to order. Without objection the chair is authorized to declare a recess at any time. We welcome everyone to the subcommittees hearing. Ill begin by recognizing myself for an opening statement. Wed like to welcome our witness today, the honorable christopher wray, director of the federal bureau of investigation. Director wray has served in this role of august since 2017, overseeing an agency of over 35,000 people. Including special agents, intelligence analysts, language specialists, scientists, and Information Technology specialists. The 24 budget request for fbi salaries and expenses is 11. 3 billion. With 6. 7 billion of that amount to about 60 . Thats designated as defense spending. Thats a 6 increase above the fiscal 23 elected level for salaries and expenses. The fbi budget request includes 196 million in program increases and 409 million adjustments too base representing the substantial increase cost of continuing the fbis current activities. The Largest Program increases requested art for fbi cyber investigative an increase of 6. 3 million. Followed by an increase of 53 million for the and a lab support. With federal debt surpassing 31 trillion dollars, its imperative that this committee ensure that every dollar provided to the agencies are spent efficiently and appropriately. Director wray, we welcome you to the subcommittee. Thank you for giving us this amount of time with you, we look forward to the opportunity to discuss with you today the major cost drivers and threats challenging the fbi. Such as the crisis at our southern border. And other challenges, such as the erosion of public trust in that bureau. Perhaps unfairly, faith in the fbi seems to be at an alltime low. Like it or not, many believe the fbi sometimes employees unnecessarily aggressive tactics. Those doesnt, hold itself to the same standards holes to the subjects of itsmi2 pursuit of these efforts and many, sadly, have given their lives and service to our nation. Americans need the fbi to remain focused on its mission, and do all it can to stay above the political fray. I hope to learn more about the fbis efforts to combat transnational organized crime and the introduction of synthetic opioids to the u. S. Markets. Including fentanyl and fentanyl and along. I also want to hear about the fbis efforts to combat the wide range of illegal activities along our southern border. Mr. Wray, once again, we appreciate you being here to answer our questions and your hard work on behalf of the American People. Let me now recognize Ranking Member cartwright for any remarks he may have. Thank, you chairman rodgers. I would like to join you in welcoming our witness, fbi director wray. To the subcommittee again. We all know the fbi dust just enormous amount of work to help protect the American People. To that end, fbi employs 37,000 people and 56 field offices. 350 resident agencies, special facilities and Analytical Centers across the country, as well as over 60 legal attache offices in 80 countries around the world. The fbi works to investigate and disrupt crime. Everything from violent gang networks, cybercriminals, white collar crime, human trafficking, and domestic and international terrorism. Since russias brutal and unprovoked aggression, its invasion of ukraine last year, the fbi has also worked successfully to disrupt criminal, cyber, and hostile intelligence activities from russia that in danger ukraine, our partners, and american citizens. This has included investigating and supporting the indictments of individuals and corporate entities engaging in sanctions of asian, export control violations and other crimes as well as identifying hundreds of millions of dollars in yachts, airplanes, and luxury homes belonging to russian ogallala oligarchs, leading to warrants for their seizure. As chairman of the subcommittee in the last congress, i am proud of our work to provide Additional Resources for the fbi, including for its ukraine related work. And for various other efforts to protect the American People. But biden administrations of requesting funding for further fbi enhancements in fiscal year 2024, including investments to combat Violent Crime and cybercrime, and to enhance the fbis Counter Intelligence and counterterrorism capabilities. At the same time, i must continue to express my very strong opposition to the house majorities plan, as included and legislation that barely passed the house last night and on partisan lines, to implement drastic cuts in discretionary spending. These proposed cuts would translate to the equivalent for the fbi of losing 11,000 positions. Our a third of its workforce. Greatly damaging the fbis ability to protect our American People and keep our community safe. Director wray, i look forward to discussing these issues and hearing more from you about the fbis fiscal year 2024 budget request. And i thank you for being here. Mister chairman, i yield back. Our witnesses time, and will follow up, should we have additional questions. The rector wray, you are recognized for an opening statement, without objection, your written statement will be entered into the record. I will ask that you try to keep your statement up to five minutes or so, so we can have additional time for questions. You are recognized, sir. Thank you. Good afternoon, chairman rogers, Ranking Member cartwright, members of the subcommittee. There is no question that todays threats are more sophisticated and move more quickly than ever before. And to stay ahead of them, we have requested important enhanced mints to our budget that will allow us to tackle the wide range of threats we face. I look forward to discussing those with you today. Let me start as you did, mister chairman, with cyber. Todays Cyber Threats are more pervasive, with a wiser variety of victims in carrying the potential for greater damage than ever before. You take china a key part of the Chinese Governments multipronged strategy to lie, cheat, and to steal they are way to surpassing assess the global superpower its fiber. The scale of but chinese Cyber Threats is unparalleled. It got a bigger Hacking Program than any other major nation combined. And have stolen more of our personal and corporate data that all other nations, big or small, combined. To give you a sense of what were up against, if each one of the fbis cyber agents and intel analysts focused exclusively on the china threat, on nothing but china, chinese hackers will still outnumber fbi cyber personnel by at least 50 21. But of course, china is not the only challenge in cyberspace, not even close. Who are investigating over 100 different ransomware variants, each variant with scores of victims, as well as a host of other novel threats posed by both cybercriminals and nation state actors. In addition to china, countries like russia, iran, and north korea. It is getting more and more challenging to discern where that nationstate threat and and the cyber state criminal threat begins. Recently, weve seen cyberattacks targeting the Critical Infrastructure and services that ordinary americans rely on every day. Im talking about places like hospitals, schools, 911 call centers, and the fbi has got investigations into destructive attacks like these all over the country, in communities large and small. Which is why in this years budget request, you will see our need for 192 more cyber positions and a little over 63 million. We will put those Critical Resources towards ensuring the fbi remains the worlds premier cyber investigative agency. By taking the fight to our adversaries, through joint sequenced operations and rapid information sharing with the private sector, by building our model cyber squad, speech tackling multiple threats in more field offices, placing investigators, analysts, and other key professionals close to the victims that need us, and by providing our workforce with critical cutting edge training. Our opponents in this space are relentless. And we need your help to ensure weve got the resources to keep responding in time. Switching gears, almost every week, im speaking with chiefs and sheriffs all over the country to discuss the threats that we are fighting together. I can tell you, in those discussions, the number one issue is always the same. Which is Violent Crime. Last year, working with our state and local partners through our hundreds of fbi led Violent Crime task forces, we arrested more than 20,000 violent criminals. Thats an average of 55 bad guys taken off the streets per day, every day. Support of our fy budget requests, we are requesting an increase to build on our efforts to request the combat the violent rising crime attack on communities over the country. A big part of that will also go towards our investigation of crimes against children and human trafficking. Every year, the fbi and our partners identify and locate thousands of victims, of Child Exploitation and human trafficking. The enhancement weve requested will allow us to add even more personal to that vital effort. Finally, ive described the threat of gangs and cartels moving fentanyl and other deadly substances across the border and into communities all over this country as a threats of epidemic proportion. We are now suing investigations against Transnational Organization critical groups and also 56 fbi field offices and have more than 300 and, close to 400 now, active investigations into Cartel Leadership. On top of, that were leveraging International Partnerships through our legal attache offices to investigations and gather and share intelligence. We are actively participating in six hosted Strike Forces along the border. And although we are not the agency tasked with physical security of our borders, we are committed to doing our part to work with our partners to tackle these very real and very serious threats. As part of, that weve asked for 53 million in part to keep pace with the seven fold increase in dna samples for individuals crossing the border. That we are testing on behalf of dhs. Over the past couple of years, weve provided critical dna testing support to 223 investigations, including more than 100 sectional Sexual Assault and a dozen homicides, based on matches from dna samples collected at the border by customs and border protection. We expect that volume to increase as Border Crossings increase, and we need your support to continue to process those samples, which, so often, provide the missing piece of the puzzle to solve serious Violent Crimes that might otherwise go unsolved if we are not able to process those Border Crossing dna samples. I barely scratched the surface of threats and depth of the threats the American People look to us to protect them from. Its staggering. And i am proud to be here today, representing close to 38,000 men and women of the fbi who work tirelessly and selflessly to meet that challenge every day. Thank you for your support of our men and women in helping us carry out that mission, and i am happy to answer any questions that you have. Thank you, director. We will not proceed under the five minute rule, with questions for the witness. I will begin by recognizing myself. The Opioid Epidemic continues to ravage communities in my home state of kentucky and of course, across the country. As you highlighted in your testimony, the fbi is doing extraordinary work. Disrupting opioid Trafficking Networks on the dark net. What are some of the most significant actions the fbi is currently taking to curb the deadly Opioid Epidemic plaguing the u. S. , and are you keeping pace with the emerging leaders and marketplaces . Well, thank you, mister chairman. As you and i have kids discussed, this is, i, think sometimes hard to come up with a Strong Enough word to capture what a significant crisis this is. Epidemic is the word i keep coming back to. I really think that is accurate. This is an all hands on deck approach. The fbi is trying to do our part, along with other agencies and partners outside of government. I will list several things that we try to tap into what we can uniquely bring to the table. First, we have a Prescription Drug initiative, which testing to our health care program, expertise, where we go after pell pill mills and a lot of professionals who are fueling the crisis, in particular, in the appalachian region, we have significant efforts there against providers who abused their oath and are a part of the problem. Second, through our safe streets task forces all across the country, we target the gangs who are distributing fentanyl and other dangerous drugs all over the country. Third, through our transnational organized crime west programs, we target the cartels, the transnational criminal organizations, that are the supply, the source of supply. Fourth, as he referenced in your question, we have a Significant Initiative called j code, which is the fbi lead but involves 12, i think about 12 agencies, which is focused on disrupting and dismantling dark net traffickers and market places for fentanyl and other synthetic dangerous substances. Weve had a number of major operations, operation dark hunter, for example, not that long ago, which took down what was, at the time, at least, the largest illicit marketplace on the darknet. But we are also doing other things behind just our investigative work. From and awareness raising perspective, we got something called operation protector, which is designed to reach out to schools, both middle schools, high schools, colleges, military service members, wellness centers, things like that, to raise awareness about that problem. It falls on the heels of a similar kind of effort that we did, jointly, with dea called chasing the dragon, which is, again, trying to see what we can do, what we can uniquely contribute to kind of get the problem that multiple levels on the continuum of this really, multiple disciplinary threats. Which, if any of the program increases that you request, would be used to enhance or increase your transnational organized crime efforts, including but jay coat and issued the . Well, a number of so, our Violent Crime peace would be relevant to that problem. Some of our technology pieces would be relevant to that. Really, its across the border, because in some ways, the Opioid Crisis and the organized crime problem that goes with it and its up permeating almost every program that the fbi addresses these days. By all accounts, the fact that the drug cartels occupy places all across our country, not to mention internationally, what are you doing to go after the cartels . So, as i mentioned, we have about 380, i think it is, investigations specifically into Cartel Leadership. Leadership, we are working with our mexican Law Enforcement partners through vetted teams and things like that to go after some of those. There have been some key indictments announced recently. Also, we are trying to cut off sources of funding for the cartels, and also trying to hit their Distribution Network here in the u. S. Those are a few things on the list. The dea director testified this morning before our subcommittee, and to help with the somewhat 2028 people charge from the cartels, and the dea has an ongoing effort, along with how is that Partnership Working . Well, i can tell you, mister chairman, we have a Great Partnership with the epa. In fact, having been in a lot enforcement throughout my career, when you look at the relationship between the fbi and the dea these days compared to what it was like when i was a line prosecutor in atlanta, years and years ago, its nightgowns they. I think a lot of that is just a recognition of how significant the threat is and how much more productive we can all be, working together as a team. We do it on things like assad Strike Forces, for example. And so, its been a very, i think, affective partnership. And i have a lot of respect for the men and women of the dea who are just fantastic partners. What are some of that more troubling criminal enterprises on the dark nets that your agents and analysts are working to defeat . Well, the thing about the dark net that is so challenging is that these marketplaces have become a place where people can come shop for really, every kind of dangerous criminal product or service thats out there. I mean, everything, certainly things like fentanyl, as we already talked about. But also, all the way over to stolen credentials, to log into someones network. Or, you can hire hitmen. Weve even had a w and d type product, if you will, being marketed on the dark nets, so it really is a kind of soup to nuts place of just unbelievably dangerous criminal activity and the key to taking Something Like that down is both technical expertise, which is why we have the cyber piece that is so significant in our budget request, but its also the international piece of it. It is we are most effective, in order to avoid a whackamole effect when we take down one of these marketplaces, we have to work with our foreign partners. For example, we had a very good success against a market called alpha bay, where we worked closely with the dutch, among others, and we timed it so as we took down one market, we knew that bad guys were going to flock to this other market. So, we took down one they fled to the other one, they basically fled r