Senator shelby is on his way from voting, and the official part of the hearing will begin shortly. I just wanted to go over two things. One, as you all know, today is the hearing on the supplemental request submitted by the administration to cover the unexpected and unanticipated needs of the significant number of unaccompanied children coming to our border. I want those who follow our committee so very closely to know that on tuesday we will be marking up the defense appropriations subcommittee, and we will do a full Committee Markup on the defense bill defense appropriation on thursday. The committee should be alerted that if we can get other things done during the week with appropriate notice following the rules, we will do so. However, we will not do anything until after tuesday afternoon. So we know that monday, tuesday Tuesday Morning will be the subcommittee on defense markup. Well look for also opportunities because there are Unfinished Business at the full committee level, the opportunity perhaps to go to the floor with one or more bills, and, of course, we will have to look where we will go after our hearing on the supplemental for unaccompanied children. Were also keenly aware that there is a need by many members to be able to catch planes this afternoon, which is why with the indulgence and concurrence of everybody, i would like to start my Opening Statement so that we can get to the witnesses for those of you who might haveh t leave. We will be recognizing people in their order of arrival, and well proceed in that direction. So for today the purpose of todays hearing is to examine the president s emergency request for the funding of 3. 7 billion to address the crisis of children from Central America crossing our southwestern border by the thousands. Their situation is extremely dire. The United States of america has an obligation to deal with this emergency. These children are seeking refuge. Theyre seeking refuge from organized crime, despicable gangs, vile human traffickers who are ex employeding and profiting from human misery and desperation primarily in three countries, guatemala, honduras, and el salvador. They are willing to risk their lives in order to get away from the terrible violence. The president s emergency request totals 3. 7 billion for caring for the humanitarian needs of the children, detention and enforcement at the border, identifying their legal status under our rule of law, and robust deterrence in the Childrens Home country by going after and prosecuting the organized crime syndicates, the smugglers, the coyotes, the traffickers. There alsol7 needs to be, and theres a funding request, for a Massive Education Campaign warning Central American families about the dangers and false hopes of the journey. We also need to make sure that we are working with the Central American countries in structuring repatriate. The ambassador tom shannon of the state department, ambassador shannon, an experienced south america hand counselor to john kerry and appointed by secretary kerry to be his point person on all matters related to this crisis at our borders, and then also we will have juan usuna from the executive office of immigration review at the justice department, a witness that particular senator shelby wanted. We had hoped that attorney general holder could have come. We respect, of course, your presence, sir, and welcome it. Secretary holder i mean attorney general holder is traveling, and we hope that as the full senate gains more knowledge about this, we will look forward to hearing fr q attorney general as well. Now, this, the appropriations committee, and particularly my appropriations subcommittee chairs, realized early on that the president s fiscal year 2015 budget request was inadequate to this growing emergency. Our committee had to make some hard choices, and in the bills weve already marked up, we had to make hard choices in the funding related to Homeland Security, Human Services, state department, and justice. Though the budget deal gave us tremendous certainty, the actual budget is quite spartan and, therefore, we did the best we could. Our appropriations job now is to make sure that the resources to deal with this are met. There needs to be food and shelter for children seeking refuge. Border agents and detention facilities need to be available. We want to be able to relieve the overworked and highly stressed Border Patrol agents who are doing a great job at the border, and there needs to be shelters who now have too few beds to care for these many children while we determine their legal status. We need to have Immigration Judges and Legal Services to make sure that we can determine their legal status in a way that meets all requirements of the law, the law that is on the books, and at the same time honor the fact that america isxa country of the rule of law. There also has to be muscular deterrence going after criminals and gangs who so exploit these children and their families, who mislead them, misinform them, and even abuse them as they make this perilous and treacherous journey from Central America. I know there are many like myself who support comprehensive Immigration Reform and there are many views on that, but i caution my colleagues todays not the top todays topic is not about Immigration Reform. It is about meeting this refugee crisis. The best way to make sure the surge of children is temporary is to pass the emergency supplemental making sure we have a deterrent strategy against the smugglers and traffickers and a real effort on the host country or where the Central American countries to also be a source of deterrence. Right now 57,000 unaccompanied children have arrived. We can expect as many as 90,000 by the year. Last week i toured the border with three of the witnesses at this table, secretary burrell, secretary johnson, and, of course, the ambassador shannon. We saw young children, some as young as 5, 7, 9. They had one instruction, cross the border, turn yourself in, and hope for the best. Border agents who found them find these children dehydrated, malnourished, scared. Many have been abused. They come here relying on smugglers false promises. Smugglers that are part of dangerous gangs and cartels who see women and children like commodities to be able to buy and sell them across the u eaay children leave home based on lies, endure dangerous journeys and the threat of being trafficked along the way. President obama has come before us to ask for designated funds to meet the emergency. I believe this is an emergency designation. The budget control act defines an emergency as spending for the prevention or mitigation or response to loss of life or property or a threat to National Security that is sud, urgent, unforeseen, and temporary. I agree with the president and i believe that this situation is an emergency. Our first goal must be to protect the safety and health of the children and make sure we have the resources to do it. Our second goal is to make sure that their legal status is determined under the law that we have so that then their future can be legally determined. Third, there must be a muscular deterrent strategy to discourage families from sending their children with smugglers who profit from them out of profit. We look forward to listening to our witnesses and i look forward to working with our colleagues in order to be able to move the president s supplemental. I also want to note that though were hearing from government witnesses today, weve opened up the hearing procedures for any nonprofit that wishes to submit testimony to the committee. Weve already heard from 13 of them, and those records will be opened for the next two weeks. The president s urgent supplemental also included 615 million to prevent and fight wildfires. Were not going to go into that today. Today the subject of thousands of children at our doorstep will take the committees attention. So we look forward to moving the hearing along and dealing with this supplemental. I now turn to my vice chairman, senator shelby, for his remarks. Thank you. Thank you, madam chair. Madam chair, at this time id like to request that my full statement be inserted in the record. Without objection, so ordered. Why are we here today . Were here because our nations immigration system is broken. Were here because the Obama Administration as well as previous administrations have failed to secure our borders and has ignored our existing Immigration Laws for a long time. Is it anything new . Over the years weve spent billions of dollars on immigration enforcement, but to no avail. Currently we have millions of illegal immigrants6s in our nation, the result of president obamas failure, i believe, to enforce the Immigration Law currently on the books has been predictable, and thats one of the reasons were here this afternoon. Now were being asked by president obama to approve a 3. 7 billion request to resolve the Current Crisis at our border. There are several questions that i think need to be answered. What exactly is the 3. 7 billion going to address . Will this request be the end . Or will it be the beginning of many new requests by the administration for emergency funding . And while the president is seeking billions for the admission, detention, and care of illegal children and adults, only, yes, only 45. 4 million its my understanding is requested for the department of justi justices adjudication and immigration proceedings. This fact is very troubling to me. Estimates suggest that the expense for hhs is more than 15,000 for every minor in u. S. Custody, 15,000. For hhs alone, the president requests an additional 1. 8 billion with no firm policy to stem the influx and no way to pay for it. I personally have no confidence that pouring billions ofo dolls into our current immigration system will solve the crisis. I think we have to get serious about enforcing our current laws and protecting our border if were ever to get different results. In 2011h hhs took custody of 6,560 unaccompanied children coming into this country illegally. Today that number has skyrocketed. Last october roughly 52,000 children unaccompanied have entered the United States. Customs and Border Protection estimates that as many as 150,000 children may attempt to cross the border in 2015. If we continue to double down on the same failed immigration policies, where does that take us in 2016, 17, and beyond . I look forward to working with the chairperson here to ensure that we do not reward illegal immigration. I believe that we must start with actually securing our border which we have never done, enforcing our nations Immigration Laws, which we dont do, and definitively saying no to people who come here illegally. Thank you, madam chairman. Senator shelby. Were now going to turn to our witnesses. Rather than go through lengthy introductions, im going to just suggest that secretary burwell start, secretary johnson, ambassador shannon, and then mr. Osani, youqe be the wrapup fro justice. Secretary burwell, we will just go right on in the interests of time. Chairwoman mikulski, Ranking Member shelby and members of the committee, i thank you for the opportunity to discuss these issues. The influx ever children is an urgent humanitarian situation that calls for a robust humanitarian response. It is a complex evolving situation for which there are no easy answers. It is a situation we are taking very seriously across the administration recognizing our dual purpose of taking care of these children while we also enforce the law. As a nation of laws, we must acknowledge that many of the children crossing our borders do not have a legal basis to remain in this country. We must acknowledge that we are talking about children, many of them young children, who are escaping unthinkable violence and living in conditions that are difficult for many of us to imagine. Often times they are preyed on my smugglers who have made it their business to bring unaccompanied children across the borders. I had the opportunity to meet a few of these children last week as the chairwoman mentioned. We visited a customs and Border Patrol station along with a temporary shelter at an air force base in texas. And we met the remarkable americans who are caring for these children and supporting this mission in other important ways. Some of the folks work for cbp, fema, and hhs. Others are grantees and Community Members all going above and beyond. The children had heartbreaking stories to share. A teenaged girl told us how she had fled heres home when her une had been murdered in front of his house. Sadly, this story is not an anomaly. Many of these children are escaping violence and threats by gangs, and they and their families are being preyed upon by smugglers. A situation of this magnitude calls on all of us to work across government to enforce the law and to care for these children in a manner that honors our values. Federal law says that hhs role is to feed, shelter, and provide medical care for unaccompanied children until were able to place them in a safe and suitable setting with Family Members or a sponsor while they await immigration proceedings. As the number of children has grown, our resources have been stretched thin. In fiscal year 2011 an estimated 65,000 unaccompanied children came into our care. This increased to 13,600 in 2012 and almost 25,000 in 2013. As of july 6th, over 50,000 children have been apprehended and placed in our care in fy 14. To associated challenges, hhs put together a twoprong strategy for our part. One is first to drive down the length of time that children remain in shelters. The other is to expand our shelter capacity. When it comes to time that children are in our care, weve made significance progress. Since 2011, when it took 75 days, we reduced that time to 35 and are continuing to try and make progress so we move even more quickly. On permanent shelter capacity, we have added about 1700 beds since january. And weve also opened temporary shelters with three military bases across the country. While temporary solutions were necessary in the short term, makeshift solutions do not make longterm fiscal sense. Temporary shelters cost more than the permanent shelters. As we move forward, the reality is that we dont have enough beds and we dont have sufficient resources to continue to add beds to ensure that the children are not staying in the Holding Facilities at the border. That is why the president has made the request that we are discussing today. And we believe this investment will allow our department to bring on the additional capacity that we need. The gravity of this situation calls for a robust and compassionate approach that reaches across government and empowers us to enforce the law. Thank you, and i welcome your questions. Secretary johnson. Thank you madam chair, vice chair, senator shelby. Thank you for hearing us today. You have my prepared statement. Let me just summarize it with some less formal observations about this request. First of all, i believe we can and we will stem this recent tide of illegal migration into the Rio Grande Valley sector. The request that we have made for 3. 7 billion supplemental is, indeed, a lot of money for the taxpayer. I think senator shelby asked the right question. What will it address . What am i being asked to pay for . And from my perspective, this request has the right focus on deterrence, added detention and removal. And removal more quickly than we have done in the past. From my perspective, the supplemental seeks 1. 1 billion for immigration and customs enforcement. 879 million of which goes to adding detention capacity for adults who bring their children. Family units as we refer to them. Weve already begun the process of building an increased detention capacity for family units at artesia, new mexico, where im going tomorrow. We need the ability to build additional family unit capacity. 109 million goes to i. C. E. For work with the three Central American countries from which this migration is coming to expand their own resources. With respect to the customs and Border Protection agency, 433 million is requested, 364 million of which is for added Border Patrol agents overtime and the like. For their capacity. As doj will point out, thats a 64 million request, 45 million of which goes to more judge teams and to an increased caseload of 55 to 75,000 cases a year. The Deputy Attorney general and i have already agreed that with this added capacity, the recent influx should be the priority. The state department is seeking 300 million. 295 million of which is for repatriation and reintegration into society. Members of this committee, doing nothing is not an option. At our current burn rate, within the department of Homeland Security, ic. E. Will run out of money in midaugust. Given the added transportation cost, given the added enforcement cost, customs and Border Patrol will run out of money by midseptember at the current burn rate, given the situation we face. The one additional point id like to add is the transfer authority that weve requested within the department of Homeland Security and between hhs and dhs, in our view is critical based upon the possibility of evolving circumstances. Id like to also point out that were not starting from standing still. Weve already done a number of things to address the recent influx. We have, with respect to the Adult Population that is part of this recent migration, already dramatically reduced the expedit