hearing will come to order good morning and welcome to the subcommittee fiscal year two thousand and ten budget hearing for the department of homeland security's office of intelligence and analysis that is a mouthful let me first take the opportunity to acknowledge the wise decision made by secretary janet napolitano was this week to shut down the national applications office and its related program under her leadership d h s s recognized what a number of us have advocated for the last two years that this program offered neither a desire capability for state local and tribal law enforcement nor adequate protection for privacy civil rights and civil liberties and with that good start i am delighted to welcome the acting under secretary johnson to the subcommittee and also to acknowledge that sitting behind him in the front row is tom fine in who was former counsel to the majority of the subcommittee who has fled us to s and in reverse i'd like to recognize michael blynde a who was formerly at the h s who has fled you to join the subcommittee as counsel so i'm not sure what all the implications of this are but i think it's a net plus for both sides mr johnson your distinguished record of more than thirty years as a state law enforcement official gives you special insight into our subcommittees focus on improving accurate actionable and timely sharing of homeland security information with state local and tribal partners your written testimony is excellent i just commended you personally and heard from you that you wrote most of it personally it is exceptionally good and i also told that to your secretary when i spoke to on the phone yesterday it clarifies a role for the office of intelligence and analysis that i personally completely agree with one that p information from the federal intelligence community d h s s intelligence component state and local law enforcement and fusion centers combining it to create products that provide regional and national assessments of threats to the homeland in a after all must connect the dots so that cops on the be america's first preventers can get the information they need in a form they can use in order that they will know what to look for and what to do this is what we've been saying up here for years and years we believe and i think you would agree that our first preventers are most attuned to the local communities and will have the best chance far better than a bureaucrat in washington or a politician in congress to know if something looks suspicious and if they have the right intelligence products they will be best positioned to do something about it thankfully because of your law enforcement experience i believe you understand this and so the question we always have to answer is how can i in a make our homeland safer i think a good part of that answer is to develop products and distribution message to give law enforcement better information let me highlight two issues though before i am yield the floor to the ranking  member that i also think we have to consider one is and you mentioned this in your testimony and that is the over use of outside contractors i was surprised to learn recently from one of those contractors and i'm certainly not implying they don't render good service but that i think as much as fifty percent of the analysis done and i in a is contracted out i don't think that's a good idea at all it's expensive and it will not get us to where we need to go which is to have this  hyper sensitivity to the needs of local law enforcement so i know you're addressing this i'd like you to to expand on this in your in your comments second is the need always to respect civil rights and civil liberties  the dissolution of n a o your efforts to hire a privacy officer and your requirement that i in a personal undergo privacy and civil liberties training are very good initiatives they are however merely first steps and so  i hope you will amplify again on how privacy and civil liberties will always be part of the procedures and protocols of your office we hope and expect that you will engage with us in candid dialogue and in information sharing over the next months this is not an adversary relationship it is a partnership and i really believe that mr johnson that your skill sets will make a finally in to  the the intelligence function that many of us who voted for the homeland department in the first place intended and i commend you again for your  participation in this and for your excellent testimony and now yield to the ranking member mr mccaul for any opening remarks that he has thank you madam chair and let me be the first to congratulate you on your recent victory  of gotcha we want to work together with you you have a unique background set of skills for this job i think it's going to greatly enhance d h s s position with respect to local law enforcement and let me also say  that since the house appropriations committee has already reported out the homeland security appropriations legislation for f y two thousand and ten it's important we use our time here today to talk about how the house appropriations committee is funding for the analysis and operations account will affect the department's mission although the i know the budget numbers are classified we should be able to get a general sense of whether or not the appropriators are providing adequate resources and funding necessary to fulfill it critical mission and let me just say i know that the the amount that came out of the appropriations committee was roughly eleven point eight million dollars short what the president requested and i think that's that's going to be an issue that i'll be focusing on at this hearing a particular significance is the funding allocated for the fusion centers and support for them that we can all agree that they play a critical role in facilitating information sharing at all levels of government we need to ensure that these centers are receiving all that they need to to work effectively we must remember that the office of intelligence and analysis as a whole is not provide the resources it needs it will not have the capability to provide adequate support to the fusion centers and countless other programs so important after nine eleven it's also important that this is a first budget to fund the substantial increases in authority resulting from the nine eleven implementation act which is committee passed and  responsibilities of the office of intelligence and analysis and added additional responsibilities to the undersecretary therefore again sufficient funding in my view is needed to help realigned your efforts and your office efforts according to this legal mandate again i'm concerned that the appropriations committee may not have provided enough of the funding necessary to accomplish the goals and what h r once set out for your office and for the department to do so with that i look forward to hearing your testimony and i yield back to the madam chair i thank the gentleman for yielding and now i want to recognize the chairman of the full committee for opening remarks but also to tell him  that when i speak of partnership he has been a terrific partner in this effort to get the department to appreciate the risks of proceeding with the n a o and  i thank you very much mr chairman for your enormous effort and support on this issue and many other issues and i yield to you for opening remarks for five minutes to thank you for holding this hearing on the president's f y two thousand and ten budget request by the office of intelligence and analysis i'd also like to thank acting on the secretary bought johnson for being present to testify before th report about right wing extremism came out we don't want to get caught up in the semantics of a report but we think there was some bedding that that report require that was overlooked and it's that bad again that we had issue with that produced a product that i think would not have been in that same format had to betting  information but we still are looking for whatever personal actions did occur relative to that report fusion center important that it need to have uniformity and connectivity with them a number of us have been in fusion centers all over the country one thing we can say is we've not found one that looks like another and we just hope that's not indicative of a failure to connect the dots between them so we're looking for some direction from the department to help us put that whole situation together because we think it's absolutely important apart from that the committee's loss with tom fine and is you'll gain there's no question about statements made be submitted for the record it is now my pleasure to welcome our witness this morning bart johnson is the acting undersecretary for the office of intelligence and analysis prior to his appointment at the department of homeland security mr johnson served as the director of homeland security and law enforcement at the office of the director of national intelligence his work focused on bridging the intelligence community with state local with federal state local and tribal customers before this mr johnson served as a colonel with the new york state police he possesses over thirty years of law enforcement experience without objection your excellent and lengthy statement will be inserted in the record and i would now now ask you mr johnson to summarize your statement for five minutes thank you very much i just want to start off by thank you madam chair on this recall and mr thompson and the rest of the distinguished committee subcommittee on intelligence it's my pleasure to be here today to speak about the president's two thousand and ten budget as all of you well know i just started for short weeks ago as a principal deputy undersecretary for intelligence and analysis and told such time and under secretary is selected i'll also be the acting undersecretary so basically i'm wearing two hats at this point in time you accurately stated that it's my first time in this c acity but i'm kind of embarrassed to say it's my first time period of testifying before congress so bear with me i was to appear back in april of two thousand and seven to testify about controlling classified information but because of the tragic death of trooper david brinkerhoff trying to apprehend a felon this group into the record and you madam chair spoke to that issue and i want to take the time to appreciate very much the kind comments that were shared with  family because of that very unfortunate tragedy but having said that i am very very honored to be here in this current capacity i've met with and spoke at length with the secretary agree with everything that he's pushing forward which very fortunately is directly in line with everything that you all have been saying for the past several years that i've been operating within for the past twelve years and also agree with one hundred percent i appreciate the comments regarding the more than thirty one years of law enforcement i come from the organization based on pride and tradition rule of law accountability all the things that make a great organization i also come from a world where it's operational so i'm very familiar with those type activities so i hope i bring something to the table the most striking event that occurred to me and many of you were the events of september eleventh were foreign direct foreign  supported foreign born individuals came to this country and let upon us one of the biggest tragedies that we've ever seen i lost two personal friends in those attacks fire fighter samuel and port authority officer pull and i live with that each and every day on that same day superintendent james the man tasked me to build an intelligence operational investigative component within the new york state police and i've been doing nothing since that since that time so i'm very familiar with a lot of the programs that all of us have been building together as we move forward i also had the opportunity to spend a year and a half as the director of homeland security law enforcement with the o t and i where i got to see and witness the fin work and the bravery of the members many members of the intelligence community and i also saw how those two worlds collided on september eleventh which clearly illustrated the need to get the right information to the right people at the right time in my new role as a principal deputy deputy i often often reflect upon the fine work of charlie allen and general use and what they set into motion and i'm going to build upon that i'm going to learn from them i've been meeting with them  already and nobody can illustrate to me the importance of getting information to the first line officers who's a maryland state trooper that stops on a september ninth there are the people there the front lines that really need to operational e and really see the information and that's what all of you have been saying since that tragic event so what do we have right now we have seventy fusion centers and there's a baseline capability that's being built they need to be enhanced they need to be mature and like the secretary has stated it's her role to counterterrorism leverage those fusion centers in connecting the dots and making sure that we're empowering the people that need to be empowered with the information that they need so what am i going to do i'm going to work with the state and local solicit their thoughts before i do anything like i've been doing over the past two weeks i'm going embrace and fully support the fusion centers are going to move more assets to the field i'm look going to look at to professionalize which they already are a professional federal workforce and become less reliant on the contractors that we're already reliant on or in a poll information integrate information translate where we quired information and really put an operational spin into the hands of the people that need it the most i understand the rule of law i've testified in a court of law i know how to play by the rules and needs to do that so in a work with the a c l u and finally with all of your support and i appreciate the very kind comments and the partnership that is illustrated and you have my assurance that i'll be transparent i'll get back to you on issues and i need to you know get back to you on and i will work full of it with you and thank you for your support the chairman just said wow and i think that is a sentiment we all share for so you're you're rookie performance mr johnson that's an a plus exactly on time and consistent with much more lengthy testimony though that super i know for the moment you are the acting under secretary but i would say that not only i but a number of us on this committee want to remove that word acting from your title as soon as we possibly can and it's something i've urged the secretary to do and hopefully that will be another one of her wise decisions in the near future and you are not permitted to comment on that because you cannot turn this down i i just want to give you a chance to elaborate on something you didn't mention in your oral testimony and that is the fact that the f y two thousand and ten budget provides for the conversion of over one hundred contractors into federal positions i stated my concern about the over use  federal contractors both because it's expensive and because they don't provide the same skill sets in terms of they the understanding of needs of of state local and tribal entities that i think the employees do so i want you to elaborate on that and also like you to talk about the i tag g the inner agency threat assessment coordination group which has been the tool although not as we would like to incorporate state local and tribal people in the preparation and intelligence products that they at the federal level so could you address those two issues in four minutes please oftentimes there are tractors for very specific reasons not to run the organization not to have governmental people defer their decision making process to those contractors so what we're going to try to do by sure you that we will have a plan and we work very very gainfully and proactively aggressively to try to make that flip and then use that as a start it's not an endpoint we need to continue to work forward in that regard  regarding the i tag g i'm very familiar with the inner agency threat assessment coordination group i sat on the other side of the table from the d h s s employees and i sat alongside with kerry sleeper the former director of the vermont state police and we clearly illustrated to the department of homeland security why the needs and requirements and the thought process of state local and tribal and the private sector needs to be born into the production process the writing of the reports and basically the so what factor and that's not to criticize the expertise of the intelligence community they write for a different customer and we are the customer so you can't have a better integrator i think sitting at this table now now bringing that experience to the hall so you have somebody i e inside so i have been working with those details i know those details i recruited those  the and i'm going to continue to do that i work very closely with director mike leiter i respect him and i know him and i've committed to working with him also i actually hosted my first i tag g advisory committee meeting and we spoke about a lot of the things that we need to refine refocus on and really then develop a plan to implement them i think they've done a good job no i don't believe they are but it's not for lack of trying so i'm go things number one we share your assessment about mike leiter we think the n c d c is a critically important manatee i now recall that some of that function was supposed to be in the homeland security department and  and the n c d c is is what's going to make this whole function work best i think one of the things we may want to do soon is take a little road trip to see the n c d c i have been there on several occasions but to see it and to meet the i tag the folks who are now in place and i take you at your word you're going to add to their number and diversity because i think that will make all of your products better my time is expired and i now yield five minutes to the  and history shows me that too quick i want to have some issues on the budget i offered an amendment to restore the funding the appropriations committee came out with the three hundred forty five point five million dollars number for your divot this division the present request is three hundred fifty seven i had an amendment to restore that to the president's request it was not made in order unfortunately so with the writing on the wall how are you going to  deal with that gap in funding and how is that going to affect your  office first of all i prefer your efforts second of all we will work within the president's president's budget and whatever funding we're provided we had an off site yesterday first off we're going to start to convert contractors who full time governmental employees that should result in cost savings reevaluate you waiting the workforce setting the priorities in the priorities are going to be state local and tribal fusion centers to get people from commander mcnamara's who seating behind me from the l a p d to have them understand you know what the needs and requirements are on a more timely basis so instead of spending a year they're going to be dropped in for a month program will suffer any harm and will continue to move forward and i would just like to add i know this committee as a whole is very very committed to state and local fusion centers at its current situation and there have been some enhancements to it and i very much recognize it and appreciate it and i know that's where it needs to be and i'll continue to do that thank you one other brief issue of the border intelligence efforts that you have in your office and i know there in that department initiate a southwest border surge would triple the number of intelligence analysts working at the southwest border to deal with the growing violence in the region i come from a border state madam chair as well this is a real concern for us can you can you talk a little bit more about those efforts i know you to create a new division and of course you know for a resource standpoint i wish we could give you more of the need can you comment on what you're doing certainly we have the border focus group run by ten sampson i'm very familiar with the no other northern border coming from new york state and all the challenges associated with it somewhat familiar with the southwest border i was there once i plan on going back there again we have the homeland intelligence support team situated at epic i know mr doty he's a real champion at epic for all these efforts assistant secretary ted sexton is very much involved mr bersin i've met with and the one concern that i had was the number of intelligence efforts that are underway and whether or not they're connected to one another through those conversations and interactions i no longer have that concern i and we're going to be connected at the hip to co chair of that effort to make sure that whatever intelligence needs to get into the hands of the state local tribal and really let them know what we what we want why we want it where to send it when they send it what they can expect in return and really develop a more robust feedback mechanism so they know that the information that they're providing is having value to solving the issues that exist thank you note and i want to follow up with you on that specifically in the future with the twenty seconds i what i did at the throughout the as a chairman brought up the report that came out of your office regarding right wing extremists so cherry nepal tano came forward and very candidly admitted that  believe that report could have been much better written and it should have focused on violent extremism violence crime that's where the linkages need to be made the ball was dropped a relates to not following the procedures that were established and people need to be held accountable to that because i believe that's anomaly an anomaly that occurred i believe that we need to do better than that that we had the professional staff and the expertise to do better than that i've been the recipient of many very fine resource cited products and that's where we are in need to go and it's going to be enhanced so what am i doing about it  this afternoon at about one thirty we're going to be meeting on that clearance process to make certain that it has within it the tenets that are necessary without diminishing the outflow of information and the analytical  a that need to take take place without it being influenced to have people in cumbered and be reluctant to produce what they need to produce so it's a balance but i think we're moving in the right direction to get what everybody needs in that regard i look for your leadership on that thank you the gentleman's time is expired i now recognize and miss patrick of arizona for five minutes thank you madam chair mr johnson thank you for your excellent testimony i to represent a border state arizona and my district is largely rural rural law enforcement has seen an increase in human trafficking drug smuggling almost more than they can handle and i just want to know what efforts the fusion centers are making to work with rural law enforcement certainly and so i share story with you i stood up what i thought was the first intelligence center in the country the new york state intelligence center until i shared that conversation with secretary napolitano and she said i beg to differ and the arizona center was the first center so i stand corrected in that regard thank you but arizona has one of the most mature centers in the country as do several locations i know there are a number of them in texas also and what the fusion centers need to do is they need to engage with the county sheriffs they need to engage with the smaller law enforcement organizations the federal government can't do everything every time for everybody so they need to rely on the fusion centers to really look at that anomalous behavior that reaches reasonable suspicion that could be criminal in nature and really have a reporting mechanism so it's received that the tactic of the arizona fusion center and it's based on requirements needs awareness and collection processes that formulate in the rule of law and then know where that w it so what we're doing is we're working with the epic paso intelligence center with our dhoti to really be that clearinghouse to receive that information for one stop shopping and then sharing it with the federal law enforcement community and there are dialogues going on which i don't believe i could talk about i apologize in this venue on the other side of the border so it's the lawful passing you know u s person reasonable suspicious information back and forth on the border because you know that it's going to be arizona road trooper or county sheriff is going to start stop an individual with marijuana with human smuggling that's going to have pocket letter of the names of the individuals and the phone numbers and there's going to be investigative leads so that investigative leads need to go to the right person to be looked at the conflict so the best possible solution to come from that information so it's all about awareness and networking and getting everybody on the same page but they they perform a vital role in that regard the fusion centers thank you i appreciate your understanding of that in you know they're going more and more to the back roads to traffic rather than using the highways which causes even more stress on our local law enforcement so i look forward to working with you on that thank you mr johnson thank you mr card patrick we have a vote on a motion to adjourn so what i think we'll do is have one customer for me is the secretary to support her and then other customers and partners are the state local fusion centers which i spoke to and then certainly the component agencies in my current role i wear two hats number one being the  undersecretary with the intelligence community and then equally important is the chief intelligence officer for the department building the intelligence enterprise and each of the component agencies are part of that so i had a meeting on that the other the other day the homeland security intelligence committee during which time there were representatives from t s a c b p ice secret service and all the other component agencies and what i said to them is that as the since the senate has the responsibility to coordinate acted not take over activities not run activities but to try to coordinate it very similar to what the odeon eye is doing with the intelligence community and i think it's a very good thing because it creates efficienc have a general understanding of issues elevating those issues getting the support of the issues whether it be through the six secretaries or venue such as this so what i need to do is just make sure that they get the intelligence support different issues that you're even working with and what i expect from that i expect to have access to their information so then it can be synthesized and translated for the state local and tribal and then share as appropriate with the intelligence community because a lot of information resident within the country does and i know it does has an impact on the activities going on overseas and conversely the information over there is very very relevant to what a is doing and all the other component organizations that you mentioned at us like that speak to that this committee used to continuously receive the weekly unclassified intelligence summaries from t s a highlighting significant security incidents around the country in february we stopped receiving those reports on classified reports who are i think very useful and highlighting real security threats the t s a has to manage and help us make better informed decisions on the need for new technologies like the whole body imaging to defeat these threats which by the way we had a problem with on the floor the other day could you please tell me why these reports stopped coming in to the committee and would you commit to working with us to once again including us on the distribution and and i have heard that also and i understand that and i'm reluctant to say why they stopped on january twenty first could you help us re they're going to resume their thanks yes just please bear with me give me a little little bit of time and we'll work through it will work with your staff to get you the items and issues and topics that are relevant to you but we'll work with you on that thank you mr dan so mr johnson thank you for your testimony in open session it was a wow and we do have the sense i think i can say this on a bipartisan basis that you will be of an able partner with this subcommittee focusing on accomplishing a mist a mission that we share and there will be obviously a lot of work to do in accomplishing the mission fully there is no such thing as one hundred percent protection but i think you will improve the odds by preparing products that are better suited to the questions that local law enforcement asks by including the private sector in the distribution of materials and by bringing your own street grid to to to the game and that is something that i think will will be a a game changer the background that you bring to this and the credibility that you have so again welcome and we will now adjourn the public session session for the public part of this hearing and reconvene shortly after this vote in the house visitor center room three zero one we will have staff off the house floor to lead those like me who never can find their way around that place i'm sure you know already know where it is mr johnson but for the rest of us