Homeland Security Committee chair, mike mccaul, and Homeland Security secretary john kelly. This ran about 40 minutes. Good morning. Welcome to the first Capitol Hill National security forum. Todays panels and discussion also bring together policymakers affiliated with both parties to reestablish the importance of bipartisan thinking in washington when it comes to National Security and foreignpolicy. Know the United States is constantly under threat from adversaries abroad. A desperate dictate your in north korea continues to defy the International Community by firing off Ballistic Missiles and brutalizing civilians, including americans. And now possibly preparing another provocative nuclear test. A bloody civil war rages in syria, having already taken the lives of almost a half Million People and displacing millions more. Mr. Mccaul china is militarizing islands and threatening its neighbors. And russias fomenting instability through cyberattacks and military incouragence. A tyrannical regime in tehran funds and Arms International terrorists. And isis and likeminded groups continue to spread an ideology based on death and destruction. Each day becomes clear and clearer that the challenges we face are becoming more complex. As a result, the urgency behind working together becomes greater and greater. If were going to be successful in protecting the American People, we must confront the most pressing issues with policies that tran send partisan politics. Transcend partisan politics. Terrorists do not check their party affiliation. National security must run through the center of the aisle. And todays forum will give us a chance to lead by example. We will hear from our current United Nations ambassador, nikki haley, former secretary of state, madeleine albright, former c. I. A. Director, john brennan, and two former secretaries of Homeland Security, Michael Chertoff and jay johnson, and many others. Jae johnson, and many others. Throughout the day well debate the strength of our military, cybersecurity, the role of nate, of nato, and the renewal of the transatlantic alliance, the expansion of democracy and human rights, and other important topics. Well also have a chance to discuss how the executive and legislative branches of government can work in unison to carry out a coherent National Security strategy. We can all be proud of the party we belong to. The partisanship must end at the waters edge. We are americans first. And that is what this forum is all about. Id like to introduce our first guest. Good friend of mine, the secretary of Homeland Security, john kelly. If there is anyone who understands why we must Work Together to defeat common threats, its our current secretary of Homeland Security. Secretary kelly has dedicated his entire career to the safety and security of the American People. As a marine, he served in leadership positions in europe, iraq, the pentagon, and as a four star general in charge of the United States southern command. In his role he oversaw the United States military operations, contingency planning, and Security Cooperation through central and south america as well as the caribbean. Since he was selected by President Trump to lead d. H. S. , he has made it clear that Border Security, counterterrorism, and cybersecurity must be Top Priorities in keeping our homeland safe. Hes also been very supportive of our committees efforts to pass the first ever reauthorization of the department of Homeland Security since its creation. Landmark legislation that we intend to pass on the floor of the house next week. Finally, secretary kelly has been a great advocate for the dedicated men and women of d. H. S. Who wake up each day and carry out the mission of safeguarding the American People , our homeland, our values, with honor and integrity. Ladies and gentlemen, please join me in welcoming secretary kelly. [applause] mr. Mccaul thank you, mr. Secretary, for being here at this conference. Let me commend you again for the job you have done and the morale of the department. I know the first couple weeks on the job you went down to the border. I can tell you when i have been down there the morale of the Border Patrol has gone up exponentially. Thats really throughout the entire department. I know you have been on the job for about five months. I want to dive into the hot issue of the day and that is were in the season of ramadan. As this article makes clear, fatality has already more than tripled last years ramadan season. As i look at the every day of ramadan, we have had multiple attacks, both in iraq, afghanistan, europe, and just yesterday in flint, michigan, we had an attack in the homeland against a Police Officer in an airport. Can you sort of comment on that, and what is the department doing to prevent this . Secretary kelly thanks for the additional comments, chairman, appreciate it. To the issue of the morale and the organization, i just have to say up front that i have talked to, at this point, hundreds of members of the work force whether they were Law Enforcement here in washington. I have never once received any individual feedback other than i love my job. I love what im doing. I think im making a difference to protect the country. It doesnt matter if its done on the 110 degree border or in somewhere in the United States. The point is they all love what they do. They think they are making a difference. But the overall morale, the reason its so they havent been given much credit for that over the last whatever. Were looking to give them the credit. Cover their backs and make sure they have the tools to carry out the mission. As far as ramadan goes, first of uptick in violence and activities, done by a very, very small percentage of people who are just corrupted the whole concept of islam as a religion. It is what it is. Were in the middle of it. So they are up there doing what they think their religion and think they are supposed to be doing. In flint, michigan, is an example yesterday completely off the screen an individual who attacked this Police Officer, who will be ok as i understand it, in flint, michigan, we have seen these terrible things that happened in europe. In paris the other day they dodged a huge bullet because the individual ended up roomed the police car, ended up dying before he could do all of what he had planned to do. But what are we doing about it . Its extremely difficult for us to get our arms around. Generally speaking in our wonderful society thats free, open, protects privacy, its very hard to detect someone who is about to do something. Everyone has a right to go on whatever websites they want to go on generally speaking. So the fact that people on websites that happen to be whether they are white supremists, antijewish, or neonazi, or islamic radicalism, until they do something, generally speaking, the best Law Enforcement can do is watch. I dont know how to predict it. We obviously have tremendous Law Enforcement professionals that once they take action, that is to say the extremists take a. Doesnt matter if its an islamic extremist or white supremist, we know what to do, track them down, and hold them accountable. Thats that front piece i think in every conversation i have, particularly with my counterparts overseas, saudi arabia, jordan, canada, and everything in between, its this. How do we prevent it from happening . How do we prevent the next person from taking the next step . What i would like to do is take what little money i have in this regard and give it to what i consider to be the time proven things. Law enforcement from an outreach point of view in communities. Developing relationships with whether they are churches, synagogues, or mosques, so that there is an open line of communication so they know if they see this happening in the home or they see this happening, that is to say the move toward radicalism, they see it happening in the churches, or in the mosques, that they will know to call someone before that young person typically crosses the line. Its a tough nut to crack. Mr. Mccaul a gentleman was kicked out of his mosque for being radical but we didnt know about that in advance. As we are making progress in mosul and raqqa, that is causing a new challenge. While thats a victory in one sense, squeezing the 50,000 foreign fighters converging from 120 different countries, and forcing them to go elsewhere, can you talk about that foreign fighter threat . Particularly i think as i look at it, i think europe is very much in the bullseye. Secretary kelly again, as i talk to my counterparts around the world, asia, middle east, and certainly europe, and now latin america, that is the thing that they fear is the best word here. Fear the most. Large number of foreign fighters as a caliphate is squeezed are returning to europe as an example. Many countries, but europe is the best and worst example. Many cases these individuals left europe, left the European Union under the radar. So countries dont know they have spent the last year or two or three outside of europe. In the caliphate in syria and iraq. Now they are returning under the radar. So theres no indication in many cases that the individual left is now a combat hardened individual and now returning. What we see them returning everywhere. Europe is obvious. Just some theory in a few places in the caribbean, fairly radical individuals, places of worship there. Were seeing individuals leave the caliphate and return to the caribbean. Thats pretty close to home. Think tourism, think cruise ships. We see them go into the philippines, returning to australiaa. Indonesia. On the one hand the good news is the caliphate is being reduced. The advantage is that they planted a flag and said this is ours. Now we know where they are and we can kill them. We have been killing them regularly now for the last couple years and doing Effective Work there at the department of defense and the coalition. Now the more difficult thing is now they are going back as Little Cancer cells back into society. We really have to be very, very careful. Mr. Mccaul t. S. A. A lot of people think all they do is screen at the airports. Thats the face of t. S. A. The other side is preventing bad people and bad things from getting to the United States. Threat oflk about the potential foreign fighters either coming into the United States or the aviation threat thats currently out there. Secretary kelly when i first took the job i like most americans my idea of what t. S. A. Did they made me take my belt off at the airport. I have since learned its unbelievably deeper and broader than that. World Class Laboratory as they test threats against aviation, literally blow up airplanes. And collect the data as to whats within the realm of the possible in terms of some of the threats. We have seen the explosive threats. We have seen their arblete to track ability to track individuals in a number of databases as they move around the globe. In many cases some of them might be in one of our databases that buy as ticket from london to fly to the philippines. Not even coming to the United States. We see that. T. S. A. Sees that. And we can use that information to warn our partners. Not to mention individuals trying to buy a ticket or transport to the United States. They are incredibly capable. This issue of the aviation threat i would just say and i have said many times to the press and in hearings, the threat is real. Its constant. Its relentless. There are multiple cells, not just one group. Across a number of different terrorist organizations. The threats they are developing are incredibly sophisticated. One of the reasons they are orking so hard to make some make them so sophisticated is they so fear t. S. A. T. S. A. Is the 800pound gorilla in the world. It is the standard. Within the department of Homeland Security. And they oftentimes make the decision to go in another direction to knock another airplane down because if they got this very sophisticated device, they dont want to run the risk of having it detected by t. S. A. Just the reputation of t. S. A. And what we do overseas in a couple thousand locations with c. B. P. Personnel, just what we do as established a great defensive line against that kind of threat traveling to the United States. Thats before they even try to get here. The point is that the aviation threat is real. Very, very real. You know, chairman, i came over and briefed congress while i was doing it in mid march, putting a number of final points of departure airports, 10 of them, in the middle east. Because thats where the threat was. Put them on a list to where we would did not want large electronic devices, anything bigger than an eye phone to travel in the passenger compartment that was because the threat was real. It was immediate. And we reacted to it. Since then we have engaged any number of first of all the aircraft industry as well as counterparts, my counterparts around the world, t. S. A. s counterparts around the world, and we have come up with a plan to raise Aviation Security, routine Aviation Security on a much higher level. I have spent experts as recently as last week to malta to interact with the e. U. Ill send more technical experts to brussels next week. We already had engagements in brussels as we started this conversation. We the United States, department of Homeland Security, are driving this effort. I not only believe i know that routine security Aviation Worldwide will be raised to a much higher level. We have a step by step process. Some things we can do within the next, literally, couple weeks. Some things we can do in a little longer term. Couple, three months. Then something maybe a year. Then eventually the fourth step would be as new Technology Comes on, commercially available, well require individuals to bring that on as well. The point is the ball will be raised much, much higher than it is today. And again my focus is departure airports to the United States. That is to say an airplane takes off from that airport and comes directly to the United States. Theres 271 one of them in the world. Right now 10 are restricted in terms of this travel protocol, electronics protocol. My desire is that all airports raise their minimum security to the level that we say it should be. If they do, then the points of departure, they can travel, the passenger can travel. If not, thats their decision. Well simply ask them to not have Large Electronics traveling in the passenger compartments. Mr. Mccaul i have had the threat briefings, classified briefings. As you say the threat is real. Its been the crown jewel of al qaeda since 9 11. We have seen them trying to ring down airplanes. The cartridges they have tried to put on airplanes. Its just a constant evolving threat and they have gotten to leafl of fix where i so level of sophistication where you are taking the right precautions to protect americans. Dont know if it will expand beyond the 10 airports but i know that will be threat based in your judgment. But i commend you for secretary kelly i want to point out, chairman, the 10 airports we put on this status our desire is to take them off. Again theyll be treated exactly the same. They were put on there because of a real threat. It wasnt because of religion or the skin color or the way they live their lives. Those 10 airports were the threat were most threatened. My hope, desire, is that they will come off the protocol by simply doing the kind of things that were talking about here in terms of raising security. Mr. Mccaul if i could quickly back to the radicalization issue. Thats probably the hardest one to stop you dont know who will be radicalizing on the computer in their basement and they emerge and conduct a terrorist attack. I know you are, the private Sector Technology . It seems to me trying to shut down content, then you get into constitutional issues. If the private sector goingles, facebooks, their service in terms and agreements, can require that jihadist material not be placed on the internet. It seems to me that may be worth pursuing. Secretary kelly the industry folks doing a fair amount for us. I think the rules and thinking that they are operating under that frankly our country has been operating under is probably five or 10 years old. This threat has definitely more ofed morphed. Just like child pornography sites that are taken down like that, we need to have a stricter set of rules to look at some of these sites and bring them down. Maybe faster. Know the europeans are particularly in the last five months, what they dealt with whether its pair i. Manchester, running people down whether its paris, manchester, running people down on london bridge, they have stepped back from their thinking as i think we should. Im not arguing against intrusive getting into peoples life. We have a great open society. T