. If the speaker says that is what he will do, i will take his word for it. Is your bandage gone for good . Is this a sign you are Getting Better . Uh, we are working on my beauty. For a change. I have these on, tomorrow we will try other things. I can see out of my right eye, but not very well. I have to be patient. I appreciate your interest but this is the best i can do. Senator what project . [indiscernible] with the judge in texas has said is that it has not passed. He never ever said, that anything the president did was unconstitutional. I am sorry what . I do not know what is popular, i just know it is the right thing to do in my mind, and to the right thing to do is to make sure that we do not run up another increase the debt by 7. 5 billion. We want to continue moving forward, improving the economy of this country. Did you hear from boehner that he would bring the bill of . They say, who says, when boehner wants to talk to me, i will talk to him. We will share a conversation. Until then, we are where we are. Remember, we are hours away from being totally shut down. Unless there is an agreement there is no way we can get that done. There is no way. Procedurally, there is no way unless there is an agreement to get it done. We are waiting to hear from the speaker to make sure that the government security, protecting our homeland, is funded. Thank you. Did you speak to senator boehner today . We have berg is everett joining us Burgess Everett with us. Walk us through the day. Senator mcconnell has offered a deal for the democrats. If the democrats will cooperate and allow a quick low, senator mcconnell it seems that there is a change in the way things are going. It looked like it was going toward a shutdown. He says it no deal, unless a boehner says he will pass that same bill. Right now, we are at a stalemate. There has a been some movement, but we do not have a sense of what the house appetite is for this. Right now, there is no resolution. This has been absorbing the congresss energy for more than a month. You really do get whiplash as this goes back and forth. Right and at the house has said that they have done their work, because they passed the bill tying immigration and the president s policy to the funding bill. They are trying to find a way out, he is adamant that there is not going to be a shutdown. He is working actively to find a way out. I am not her that we have a good sense of what the houses appetite is for this, but the early returns have not been encouraging. How about the politics between House Republicans . It is a conservative group, compared to the senate group. They want to take a hard line on this. They think that they are right to be overwriting the president s actions on immigration, particularly the 2014 product sheltering of millions of immigrants from deportation. They were able to pass that bill, the senate was not able to. They do not understand why the senate could not do it. So they are more to do a clean bill like mcconnell has said. They want to take this to the brink. They think the Public Relations piece of it is on their side. On the other side of the capital, mcconnells is to show that he is responsible and a good steward of the senate, and that is why he is holding a little to the democrats. And the politics are weird for the democrats to, because it is something that they have been asking for for weeks. Mcconnell, give as a clean bill. Now they have it, but they will not go for it until they get an extra step of assurance from senator boehner. If you had to guess who would blink . We have not discussed the other option, which would be shortterm funding and continuing the fight for another month or two. At that would be everybody blinking, but only partially. I still think that is the most likely option, right now. Something that the dhs secretary doesnt want. Nobody wants it, but it is slightly better than a shutdown. There are some conservative saying that if the funding lapses over the weekend republicans will emerge stronger and the democrats will cave. I have an ive not seen any indication that that could happen. At politico. Com, senator mcconnell is offering a think you for your time today. Veterans Affairs SecretaryBob Mcdonnell apologized again for the second time, veterans Affairs Secretary offered for effort telling a veteran last month that he is been a special forces, when he had not. He addressed an audience in front of the a headquarters va headquarters. He said that he made the air error while trying to connect with a veteran. Good afternoon, thank you for calming coming. As you know, while i was in los angeles, engaging and a homeless man engaging with a homeless man, asked where he had served in the military. He responded that he had served in special forces, and in an attempt to connect without bettering veteran, i incorrectly stated that i too had been in special forces. That was wrong, and i have no excuse. I have Great Respect for those who have served our nation in the special forces and they and all veterans deserve the care and benefits that the va serves and what they have earned. You can look at more on our website. Unless a funding deal is reached, the department of Homeland Security will be partially shut down by next week. We will talk more with henry cuellar. And a later conversation about the recent evacuation of the u. S. And the sea in Yemen Embassy in yemen. That is part of our spotlight on magazine series. And you can access the washington journal on twitter and online. Secretary of state john kerry made it to appearances on capitol hill today. The Senate Appropriations committee this morning and a Foreign Relations committee this afternoon. He testified about the Russia Ukraine conflict. Nuclear talks with iran and the current threat of isis. They also talked about the israeli Prime Ministers visiting next week. The current chairman, is bob corker of tennessee. The committee will come to order. Mr. Secretary you have done a lot of traveling around and you have important issues to deal with and we appreciate you coming in to talk about your budget and your testimony today. As you know, the purpose of this hearing is to learn more about the state departments budget request. I know that these become in many cases, a time to talk about Public Policy issues. I know you know that there will be some other issues brought up. We appreciate you answering all of those. One of our Top Priorities is to complete the authorization and it helps the department become more effective within a sustainable budget. Chairman perdue will take on the effort and we met yesterday with Heather Hickam bond, and we had a good meeting to watch that. A lot of us want to make sure that as we are dealing with the many crises that we are dealing with around the world, that the state department is set up in a way to leverage our efforts and to ensure that we are doing on a daily basis everything we can to make sure that we continue our National Interest in so many ways. Obviously the president has set forth a budget. I think all of us understand that is where we are going to be. We know we have some challenges in front of us. And we appreciate you being here. The state department is proposing some increases in foreign aid. There is a difficulty in enforcing that and that is why it is important to have an overseas contingency funding 14 of spending. I think we need to move away from funding oco and get them back on a budget. That is something to the budget process that we will attempt to do this year. I do have four things that i would like to highlight. That is, the state department right now has an overreliance on oco and carryover balances. There is a great concern that those over balances create a lack of discipline in the department. With Strategic Planning efforts, with the diplomacy and for those not being linked up in an appropriate way seem to miss an opportunity that we are aligned properly. We have a massive increase in peacekeeping with the share of funding. And we have a failure to read prior torus reprioritize. It is very difficult to see the resources that are being put forth to do with that. So a look forward to your testimony. I know that there will be a lot of questions, not just about the budget, but other activities that you have been dealing with. We thank you for taking time out to be with us today. And with that i would like to recognize the distinguished Ranking Member, senator menendez. Thank you. I see you have a big binder hopefully it has all the answers that we want to hear. As we meet, it is a challenge it is a challenging time for states of budgets and for the nation. Negotiations are continuing with iran even as it perpetuates the war in syria. I still is expanding its territory and sphere of influence in the middle east and north africa. And a pit and has reneged on his commitments to solve the ukrainian crisis. China is rising, pressing for the political and territorial advantages. Ebola remains a threat in do part to lack of an adequate medical infrastructure and Delivery System so, we have many challenges it in the world. I know that we are trying to meet those challenges. The fact is that World History has taught us that no matter what the threat, dealing from a position of weakness is always a greater provocation them dealing from a position of strength. So i appreciate your total engagement as evidenced by the fact that you have logged 306 travel days, that you have traveled 700,000 miles to 59 countries. I want to take one or two moments to talk about one or two issues as a framework. On iran, i stand second to no one to see my desire of a negotiated solution that rolls back and dismantles the nuclear program. But eight deal that allows iran to continue as a Nuclear Threshold state gives it a relief from sanctions, potentially allows it to go from being a threshold to an actual Nuclear Weapon state is no deal. I am very concerned about the news that is leaking from the negotiations and that this entire deal will hinge on the inspection and verification regimes while leaving iran with a vast majority of its nuclear infrastructure. And we dont know whether they are facts or not, but various reports address it, in a matter of time that it is a far less than anybody would have envisioned. On cuba, i think the deal is onesided. The regime has not changed tactics. In fact, it is wanting its success in the negotiations. Last week the congressional did not include any visits with human rights activist, political dissidents or independent journalists were followed by the arrest of more activists across the island. In havana, Seven Members of the ladies in white were arrested. Several dozen more were arrested for a company in them. Accompanying them. Over 90 activists from the Cuban Patriotic Union were arrested in santa a audio. Another 13 ladies in white were arrested in santa cruz. But that is not all. One of the ladies in white was actually splashed with tar clearly the regime hasnt changed. And if anything, it seems they can do this with impunity notwithstanding our engagement. And finally, on ukraine the most recent diplomatic efforts seem to have only emboldened putin. There havent been hundreds of ceasefire violations and to the city has a fallen under rebel control. Putin and his forces now threaten, which could provide a land bridge to crimea and his intentions are clear. On february 9, the president said that providing lethal defensive weapons is one option being considered. I look forward to hear whether this option is more likely given the failure of it is something that this committee in a bipartisan fashion sent to the president , signed by the president. I held that we will help ukrainians to be able to defend themselves. You know sending them night vision goggles and being able to see the enemy doesnt do much for you if you cannot stop them. That is where we are at right now. I want to stay, one very supportive thing in addition to recognizing your most recent comments in ukraine, which i applaud, for the past several years i have complained encouraged pushed in every way i know how the u. S. Needs to direct Additional Resources to form policy priorities in our own hemisphere. And the budget request for Central America focuses on the right priorities and is a very good start. We need to work with these countries and help create opportunities which in our own which are in our own National Security interest. I look for to discussing those interest with you. Thank you senator. We will thank you for being here. I think you know the drill. Your comments will be entered into the record. If you could keep your comments to about five minutes. With that, thank you again. We look for to your testimony. Mr. Chairman, and Ranking Member menendez, my former colleagues and i guess one person that i did not have a chance, senator perdue, welcome to this great committee. I am delighted to be able to to to have a chance to share an important dialogue. I appreciate the comments that both of you have made. I will not pick up on all of it now, because i am confident that during the questions, we will have a chance to dig into most of the things that you have raised. But, i will summarize to try to maximize our time and respect years. I want to just make it clear that since leaving the perch, up there that you set in. As chair. And having spent what, 29 years on this committee, beginning way over here, even further than my friend. I have watched a lot of events unfold in the course of this committee and in the senate. A number of wars, major debates. It is interesting for me to see from now serving as secretary the reality, the degree to which what we choose to do is really important. And how the congress acts, makes just a gigantic difference to the sense of unity of purpose about our country. This is about our country. It really shouldnt be about party. The old saying that you know, foreignpolicy concerns and National Security interests should end at the waters edge. And, what has come home to me more than anything is the degree to which we in the United States are privileged. And sometimes burdened with the responsibility of leading. I mean making things happen stepping and where others dont or wont. And i will say to you that i believe we legitimately, you mean i mean, you may disagree with how we are doing in libya at this moment, or maybe you think something more should be going on in syria, but i cannot think of a time, and i hear this from former colleagues, when we have had to deal with as many explosive transformational moments historically, then now. And i just want to respectfully suggest to all of you, and i will say this at some point and i will talk about it at length and i hope i get the chance to do so, but we ask for 1 . 1 of the federal budget, 1 of the total budget of the United States of america goes into everything that we do abroad. All of our efforts for our citizens for these is, our embassies, counterterrorism, our aid, our assistance, everything, 1 . But i absolutely guarantee you that well more than 50 of the history of the aero will be written off that 1 and off of the things that we do or dont choose to do in terms of foreign affairs. And when you look today at the challenge of isis, when you look at the clash of modern itty modern itty with youth populations and bad governance, corruption, all of the challenges. We have our work cut out for us. Now we are leading in putting together this president did president did unprecedented coalition. I say that because this is the first time in anybodys memory that anybody knows about five air of countries, engaging and proactive military operations in another country, syria, in order to go after a terrorist organization. And we have five at major channels of effort, foreign fighters, humanitarian on counter messaging, on counter financing, on the connecticut. All of this is kinetic. All of which is gear to try and win this, and we will win it. I am confident of that. Providing we all make this right we all make the right choices. We certainly have the tolls. In iraq, we worked diplomatically to implement the president s policy to make certain that we didnt take over that effort before there was a Transitional Government in place. And i am telling you, we spent amazing amounts of time and ours and good diplomacy to help the iraqis to make their own decisions about their leadership. And you know, we worked hard to get all of the chemical weapons out of syria. No small feat, particularly when you consider if we hadnt done that they would be in the hands of faisal isil, today. And america is leading an effort to bring people to the table to keep from providing one Million People from dying in the a bullet outbreak. In ukraine we have worked hard to hold together a complex array of partners in the sanctions. The sanctions have had a profound effect. The ruble is down 50 . Russias economy is predicted to to go into recession this year. There has been a capital flight of 151 billion. You know, they may be able to pursue this short term goal of stirring the waters of ukraine but in the long run, they are writing themselves out of the future. They are falling behind in technology and production and other things. The fact is, on iran, sure, it is controversial. It may have risks. But we are dairy to believe that diplomacy may be able to provide a better alternative to ridding iran of the possibility of a Nuclear Weapon than a war. Or then going first to the threats that lead you to confrontation. So, we are trying. I cant make a prediction what the outcome will be. But we are leading the effort to make that happen, together with p5 plus one partners. In korea we are working with north korea, with the chinese. We are trying to make certain changes it