the subcommittee on border maritime and global towner terrorism is meeting today to receive testimony on the border security challenge recent developments and legislative proposals good morning today our first panel consist of a distinguished panel of our colleagues members of congress who have introduced proposals to enhance and respond to america's border security challenge and our second panel will give the subcommittee a chance to hear from the agency representative operate and directs the front lines of our border security operations i look forward to discussing and assessing the staffing and the resources needed to ensure that our homeland is safe and secure thank you all to our witnesses for being here today this is the eleventh border security hearing that this septimus he has held in this congress and we welcome the opportunity to continue our examination of the challenges that we face in securing our borders and implementing real comprehensive reform of the immigration system in developing this rata g to secure our border and reduce illegal immigration we must also create strategies and reforms to holistically address the important commercial humanitarian and environmental issues involved in border security and immigration reform and many of the agents on the front lines of our border have to consider a combination of these issues every single day and it is our responsibility to make sure that they have the adequate training and resources to do that job the hundred tenth congress has increased border security funding by two point four billion dollars between fiscal year two thousand seven and two thousand and eight far surpassing the administration's proposed funding levels so i look forward to hearing how the u s customs and border protection is using this ample and increased funding to enhance our nation's border security i believe that those funds can help address some of the issues that were recently reported for example the u s customs and border protection agency has struggled to retain and recruit qualified officers dol so in recent weeks we have heard of overworked customs officers and reports of poor working conditions for those officers the situation has resulted in a picket at one of our country's major ports of entry in addition a recent report from the government accountability office expressed concerns that many ports of entry have serious security gaps due to low and in adequate staffing levels as well as some infrastructure problems there's no silver bullet or perfect bill that will completely solve all of our nation's border security challenges everything that happens on our nation's borders and at our nation's ports of entry is related to the over arching supply and demand issues that really in my opinion can only be truly pressed by having some comprehensive immigration reform however in terms of the jurisdiction of this subcommittee we must provide comprehensive training and support for our personnel in order to ensure that they are prepared as well as possible to do this if a call job that we task them with we particularly need to retain experienced border patrol agents who can help guide and provide ongoing supervision and training to the large number of new agents who have joined the border patrol in just the last few years and in addition we must continue to invest in equipment and infrastructure that will act as force multipliers for the personnel of our ports of entry and on our borders and once again i thank our witnesses for being here today i would like to this time ask unanimous consent that the gentleman mr carney from pennsylvania be authorized to sit for the purpose of questioning witnesses during the hearing today so be it once again i thank the witnesses and i yield to my ranking member mr souter for his opening statement thank you madam chair securing our nation's borders is one of our most important tasks over the past seven years especially since the creation of the department homeland security a great deal has been done to increase resources and activities along the border in the interior the country has had the opportunity to have a good portion of both borders and seen for myself that despite the huge increases in resources that have been provided of the past few years there is a lot more to be done one area in particular more needs to be done is our national park land located on or near the border i'm also looking forward to discussing c b p efforts to work with the park service to enhance security in those areas particularly in texas related to that i'm concerned with the legislative proposals that was all in limiting border patrol access to forest service areas of the border by declaring illegal transit routes as wilderness or not only would that degree gate the wilderness area it would severely restrict our ability to stop illegal activities we cannot afford to back down or scale back our efforts along the border we need to move forward with getting agents into the field and limiting not limiting their access we need to compete complete fencing projects and find technology that will actually work for the secure border initiative we need to make sure that we eliminate invasive species like greece obtain and salt cedar that block the ability to see the illegal activities and we need to catch and rate we need to maintain the catch a return policy and not revert back to releasing illegally and additionally more needs to be done on our interior enforcement programs especially related to cooperation with state and local law enforcement and reforming our immigration court system there are new issues that we need to be moving forward with rather than granting mass amnesty and repeating the mistakes of the past as important as i believe it is for this calm congress to pass legislation to provide tools and authority to the department of homeland security to gain operational control over the border is better to do no legislation than bad legislation i would like to thank our colleagues in the house who volunteer their time to provide some insight into existing legislative proposals to address border security and interior enforcement challenges i hope this hearing is a first step in moving forward with bipartisan border security legislation to that and that would like to point out several other bills that have been introduced by republican members of the homeland security committee and asked the chair to commit to considering these proposals for the committee move forward with any border security legislation h r twenty nine fifty four secure border first act of two thousand and seven sponsored by ranking member peter king age resolution four ninety nine expressing the sense of the house that u s immigration law should be enforced as sponsored by represent lamar smith a senior member of this committee a thirty nine sixteen to provide for the next generation of border security technologies as sponsored by represent represented michael mccall of this committee h r twenty five sixty one fast and secure travel at the borders act of two thousand and seven is sponsored by represented death of this committee h r thirty four ninety six border patrol and contractor accountability act of two thousand seven sponsor representative jenny brown weight of this committee h r twenty four ninety to conduct a pilot for the mobile biometric identification a maritime environment sponsored by congressman bill iraq us of this committee as is  forty five seventeen the student visa security improvement act i think it's important that we look how to move legislation forward and not get it bottlenecked in the committee i look forward to working with you on this issue and hope that we can get fair consideration to the right of bills discussed here today and others that have been referred to by this committee especially those by committee members one additional issue that i believe the committee urgently needs to consider and i hope is discussed during this hearing is a current plan to end the deployment of the national guard along the southwest border verd operation jump start in july i'm very concerned from visits on the border and talking with the border patrol directly that we will not have the border patrol agents in place to cover the missions and this is the wrong time to open any new  weaknesses along the border when we're in fact trying to brag about what we've done to back down and retreat is this is not time to do that thank you for using the time that you'll back in remaining i thank the gentleman and we have work to have it together i think very well on many of these issues before this and i would just say that i think well you know we have a good sized panel in front of us of our colleagues with bills and if we would have included everybody from this committee in front of us we'd have nobody to ask questions but you know a nice so we'll start with this and we'll see how we get through the rest of the bill to because i know there are quite a few and of course many of those bills really don't stand to the jurisdiction of this committee i mean this committee is really about border security and not about immigration reform visas and other issues of that type but having said that the chair now recognizes the ranking member of the of the full can no the chairman of the full committee the gentleman from mississippi mr challenge for our nation the unique features of our geographically diverse land and maritime borders present a number of issues that cannot be solved with a one size fits all mentality we must recognize that securing our borders requires a multifaceted approach and i'm pleased to be part of this morning's hearing because i believe that the best way to develop effective border security proposals is by going through the legislative process and holding hearings with members engaged in informed discussion everyone here today is united in their desire to address the challenges presented at our borders dedicated borders border security professionals need our support because as service is critical to the security of our borders and the health of our economy that is why this congress appropriated fourteen point eight billion dollars to da as border and immigration enforcement programs and fiscal year two thousand and eight that act funding it included one point two two five beings for border infrastructure and fencing five hundred seven million for additional helicopters and marine addiction units two hundred million dollars to identify and again removal proceedings for incarcerated aliens and funding an additional four thousand five hundred detention beds and three thousand new border patrol agents despite this unprecedented investment in border security more in the mines to be done i have long said that the department needs a comprehensive strategy for border security the commonsense border security solutions thank you mr chairman other members of the subcommittee are reminded that under committee rules opening statements may be submitted for the record and now to our witnesses our first i welcome our first panel of witnesses our first witness representative sylvester reyes is chairman of the house permanent select committee on intelligence and before you will elected to congress he served for twenty six years in the border patrol congressional district of california which includes a portion of the san diego area in addition to serving on the house committees on oversight and government reform veterans affairs and science and technology representative bill break chairs the house immigration reform caucus and our third witness is representative ginny brown weight from the fifth congressional district of florida which is situated along the gulf of mexico congresswoman brown weight is serving her third term in congress sits on the house financial services the homeland security committee and the veterans affairs committee our fourth witness is representative gabrielle giffords from the eighth congressional district of arizona which includes a hundred fourteen mile border with mexico and representative giffords who was elected to the hundred tenth congress she serves on the house armed services the science and technology in the foreign affairs committee and our final witness on our first panel is representative heath shuler from the eleventh congressional district of north carolina representative shuler was elected to the hundred tenth congress and serves on the house small business transportation and infrastructure and natural resources committee welcome to all of you at this point i would ask unanimous consent that the gentle woman from the virgin islands ms kristiansen be authorized to sit for the purpose of questioning witnesses during this hearing so be it ok mr raise your please summarize your  the chairman of your committee mr thompson because he's been to my district to other parts of the border with me and has an appreciation of just how challenging border security issues are as you mentioned before coming to congress i spent twenty six and a half years in the border patrol part of those twenty six and a half years i worked for years  i have dropped that primarily deals with bringing forth the second part of what i think is vitally important we've done quite a bit in between the ports of entry with customs and border protection now i think it's important that we focus on the ports of entry the part that often gets overlooked but also is an important and intricate part of our whole border security  function i also want to commend the committee on homeland security for recognizing this need to ensure that economic security of our nation is taken into account when we work to secure our nation's borders at the beginning of the year as i mentioned chairman thompson held a field hearing in my district in el paso to examine examine the many different challenges that we are facing today at our land ports of entry and the long waiting times being experienced by our constituents after participating in many hearings with border residents and listening to the testimony at the hearing and consulting with my former colleagues and current leadership that  on port challenges we crafted the of the bill h r fifty six sixty two which we titled putting our resources towards security act or for short  act this bill increases the number of customs and border protection officers by five thousand over the next five years which is sufficient to cover the vacancies on both the southern border the northern border and a significant part of airports and seaports but this legislation doesn't just stop there it also takes into account the need for support personnel positions which in my experience has been often overlooked by by congress and it also addresses a very critical shortage in agricultural specialists the ports ports act would provide a thirty percent increase the number of customs and border protection officers across the nation in discussion with customs and border protection personnel this ng increase as i said would fully staff all ports of entry this also what authorized this ports act would also authorize five billion dollars in funding to the general services administration to allow for reconstruction and repair of the nation's land border ports of entry we must look at the current state of our nation's ports of entry and commit i think as a congress to properly fund in terms of staffing and infrastructure our ports in order to provide security for our nation being understaffed and underfunded all these years is simply unacceptable and not good policy in terms of our challenges faced on both security and commerce the current administration has focused up to now there in their attention on him between the ports of entry but this legislation is intended to correct very critical part and the part that we examined in the field hearing in the past with chairman thomas thompson with  challenges that our ports are facing in terms of facility facilitating trade and commerce and the movement of people along our border communities the  in in closing madam chairwoman i appreciate the opportunity to come before your subcommittee i'm willing to answer any questions you might have about this legislation or other efforts  point i will make is that it's critically important that in any legislation that we take into account and consult with customs and border protection and that the homeland security thank you very much thank you  mr certainly are better here in congress for having someone who has direct experience there on many of our land borders so we appreciate you coming before a committee i will remind everybody that without objection the witness statements will all be inserted into the record able to be a child of an immigrant into this country but growing up on the border and so many most of my leisure time south of the border i look at this issue from a different perspective than most people do more looking up at it rather than down at it and i think one of the critical things we need to remember is as we face the challenges of securing our borders we need those resources along our ports of entry san diego is known as a great port city but it's not well known that our southern part of san schuler's issue that if you're going to secure the border you've got to stop the illegal activity that's happening at the border and the sheer numbers of those legal activity and i think just this week we solve the  cartel and the violence that's happening along the border and surprise you but i strongly support the military aid to mexico to address that fight that the people of mexico are having to defend their sovereignty against the drug cartels because that threat is our threat to and we should work together at fighting this threat while it's still on mexican soil before it ends up on u s soil in fact it's already down in san diego with that murders and kidnaps in san diego so that a sideman share we've got to remember though the judge says we cannot stop drug trafficking at the border if we just try to do it all at the border the other activities such as illegal immigration is contributing not just to the problem  of immigration but the fact is that terrorism and the bad guys who want to do us harm are crossing the border specifically to attack the american people to harm hide among those elements that may want to smuggle drugs or just come here for illegal employment and until we reduce the number that all illegal activity along the border will never be able to secure the american neighborhoods in the interior from the threat from overseas until we address that and that's why it becomes essential that we not only have the resources along the border but that we also have a compromise a plan that can be conceived that actually addresses the source of the problem just as we've addressed the fact that we can't stop illegal drug activity just at the border and we have interior enforcement we do have our local law enforcement arresting people who are illegally in possession of drugs we do crack down on the drug dealers in the cities and the homes in america who are active actively pursuing these pursuits we also need to finally do the tough thing when it comes that illegal employment need illegal immigration and let's be frank about it the source of the illegal immigration number one overwhelmingly is illegal employment but it's so much easier for us politically washington to point fingers at the border but not tell our friends stop hiring these people because they are creating the problems that we're seeing along the border and i'm sure i would ask that we just take a look at the fact that we have a very modern bill with mr schuler the just as you use even if occasion the fact is that system has been proven over the years over a decade to work very well in fact that's why members of congress and short of some procedural small percentage of problems if we can't come together with mr schuler's bill where you have forty nine democrats over one hundred republicans let's not go back to the people of america and say we're really willing to secure our borders and our neighborhoods because we don't want to work together which hasn't been upgraded since one nine hundred thirty seven madam chair why in the world has the federal government not upgraded its number one document for employment except for the fact that we don't want the system the work and interior enforcement and i would close just by saying this there was eighty five people plea pleaded guilty in iowa today this week seventy seven of them are going to prison because they use somebody else's cell security number i'd like to know what's happening to the employer and if verification here those seventy seven people would not be going to prison a day they would been turned back and gone home when they should have and that's the kind of thing we ought to be working together with thank you very much madam thank you i thank my colleague from san diego analysis remind him that the system and the social security card really is an end of the jurisdiction of the subcommittee really falls under the jurisdiction of ways and means and i think they've held a recent hearing and i wasn't privy i wasn't there that day so i don't know when over those issues but jurisdiction more to the border not to social security items i would now like to recognize for five minutes or less our representative from florida miss brown we thank you very much chairman sanchez and ranking member souter and members of the committee for allowing these bills to be heard i am pleased to speak on behalf of my bill h r thirty five thirty one and join my colleagues who have taken steps to confront our nation's border security and immigration crisis h r thirty five thirty one the accountability in forcing immigration laws act of two thousand and seven would ensure america's immigration laws are actually upheld it would also serve as a critical deterrent to illegal entry and a valuable border enforcement tool this bill was drafted after in this very room i asked secretary chertoff if he had the authority to deny homeland security funds to same sure he cities or municipalities that took steps to provide sanctuary to illegal immigrants such practices certainly negate any effect of this of our immigration or border security measures we cannot have local leaders refusing to assist in managing the growing lawbreaking population of our nation in response to my question about sanctuary cities secretary chertoff said i don't know that i have the authority to cut off homeland security funds if i disagree with a city's policy on immigration well many think that it's time to give him that authority first this bill clarifies that law enforcement has the inherent authority to investigate apprehend arrest detain and transfer to federal authorities any illegal immigrant apprehended in the course of routine duties the builder evokes twenty five percent of non emergency homeland security funding for same sure he cities within six months of anathemas and gives the secretary of the already to cut up to fifty percent if a city isn't willing to uphold our laws why should the h s provide that city with additional funding besides withholding same sure the city's besides holding sanctuary cities accountable this bill would also make illegal entry into our country a felony in addition to these two fundamental measures h r thirty five thirty one prescribe several other attempts to confront illegal immigration in an effort to improve protection of critical infrastructure of the bill requires annual immigration checks for airport employees and other critical infrastructure site employees as i've mentioned before in the markup of the chemical facilities bill americans deserve to know those who are working on our critical infrastructure sector sectors are here legally and that they are authorized to work and not that they have overstayed their visas and did the majority as did the majority of the nine eleven hijackers second the strain of dealing with illegal aliens while waiting for ice is squeezing law enforcement resources accordingly my bill requires ice to take illegals into custody or pay state or local governments the perdiem rate to detain the aliens until that individual is removed finally to encourage enforcement of immigration laws h r thirty five thirty one includes several provisions to provide financial assistance for an increasing cooperation with state and local law enforcement officials the bill specifically authorizes the state alien assistance an additional one billion dollars a year and authorizes a bonus program for state and local law enforcement agencies for assistance system in enforcing immigration laws under the two eighty seven g program it is time clearly to address the immigration crisis facing our nation and with proposals such as this and congressman shuler's save act along with i just yesterday signed onto representative reyes's bill for additional in forstmann law enforcement along the border it certainly is time that we really get serious about enforcing our nation immigration laws i look forward to discussing all these issues today and welcome the committee's questions thank you madam chair i think the gentleman from florida and as you we know you are a member of this committee so you have a i think  real deep understanding of what many of the issues are so we welcome you before in your testimony i now recognize representative giffords to summarize her statement for five minutes or less welcome thank you madam chair members of the committee i appreciate the opportunity to testify before to such a distinguished group of members and such a distinguished group of panelists as well i proudly represent nine thousand square miles of a southeastern arizona border district i have one hundred  fourteen miles of the two thousand us mexico border my community is directly on the front lines of america's immigration crisis you can imagine immigration is just as polarizing and emotional in my district as it is right here in capitol hill but in southern arizona where we are on the front lines we want members of congress to roll up their sleeves roll up our sleeves get to work tone down the hysterics tone down the rhetoric and fix this broken system along with most of the arizona delegation i support comprehensive immigration reform chairwoman you talked about that mr chairman you talked about that as well it is truly the only way that we're going to solve this very complex problem i know that the topic of today's hearing is solely about border security but i just want to lay that as a framework because if we're going to really solve that problem you know we need to focus on a comprehensive solution my district is unique my district in kin clues the tucson sector the border patrol which is the most porous part of the us mexico border in fiscal year two thousand and seven almost four hundred thousand apprehensions were made by the tucson sector border patrol forty four percent of all the apprehensions along the border happen within my district it's approximately a thousand illegal crossings every day over nine hundred fifty thousand pounds of the two million pounds of marijuana were seized in fiscal year two thousand and seven in the tucson sector the border patrol legal guns violence from mexican drug cartels international criminals as well are making their way through my border ranches through my communities retirement homes all through southern arizona there are a lot proposals out there i'm pleased to join with mr quaoar in h r one thousand nine because pending the criminal immigration courts is important i'm also co sponsors of chairman res southwest regional border authority act h r two thousand and sixty eight which is a very important piece of legislation as well but i work with congressman bilbray to him to introduce h r fifty five fifty two the border security accountability act madam chair you talked about the billions of dollars being put toward border security but we have to ensure that the taxpayers dollars are effectively being spent we need transparency and we need accountability within d h s s we need solid data on the apprehensions detentions and the deportation process being implemented by the agency in a dish and i believe that congress needs members need to have detailed information about the success rates including exact distance apprehensions take place from the border and the release rates for those apprehensions so while we continue to put millions and millions of dollars billions of dollars towards border i think we have to have a thorough assessment of the staffing equipment training and the policies for all of the border security functions as our legislation instructs congress must demand meaningful data from d h s on the effectiveness and the costly investments so i'm working to as well to make sure that my constituents that are taxpayers have an opportunity to evaluate the structures the operations and to provide input into the planning of these processes if we had more input from people on the border i don't believe that the failures we've seen with the supreme secure border initiative would have happened where there was no consultation with the local authorities or with the border patrol right there on  front lines last december a bipartisan group of nine lawmakers from the house and senate joined me as well to study the effectiveness using a g a o study of the checkpoints along the us mexico border because as we build more infrastructure we have to assure taxpayers and residents that the infrastructure is actually working i'm pleased to work closely with chief gilbert and his staff we've had a variety of meetings up and down the border i hope in the question and answer we can get to this because here for example a meeting of note with my ranchers on the front lines about what really happens when you have hundreds of thousands of people moving through your your communities so a lot going on scap funding is something very underfunded we should talk about that as well so just in closing madam chair southern arizona is i think like most americans expect their elected officials to tackle not just the easy problems but the tough problems the fact that immigration has become polarized it's become ugly radioactive is a reason why congress has to move it's become fashionable here capitol hill to talk tough about immigration but when it comes to the larger immigration crisis as a whole it is short sighted to look at and forstmann only solution the fact remains that all of it the border the visas the deportation the citizenship verification the social security the green talk this all is the responsibility of the federal government we can't just wring our hands we have to get to work and if this hundred tenth congress does not move forward and meaningful legislation coming out of your subcommittees i think that this hundred tenth congress will be a failure thank you miss giffords and i would just remind you that i wish we had all those pieces of jurisdiction but the reality is ours is much more limited and i think you're correct when we talk about staffing and accountability and i believe the second panel will give us some of that information we certainly i know we just took a visit to your two of our subcommittees just made a visit to your district recently maybe in the last two weeks and i would just say as someone whose parents are originally from your border area and who has i have family in both sides of that border when i go there and i see what has become of your border your area as opposed to what it was like thirty or forty years ago you know people who live there really have a challenge and we need to do as much as we can so i appreciate your november i have been working since i was first reelected since i was first elected here to do something about the problems that we had in my district drug trafficking from atlanta through charlotte comes right through my district through knoxville tennessee on interstate forty twenty six eighty five so we truly had a tremendous amount of problems an issue with drug trafficking the costs and expenses as it relates to incarceration as it relates to education so i've been news very strongly that my district really wanted to do something about immigration and it was the number one topic  exceeded the issues with the the war in iraq it was the number one topic that was talked about it continues to be the heights of of a lot of the problems and issues that we have in our district and people say why north carolina well it's the number one state  hours talking to border the border patrol since to the border talk about the importance and the issues that that they see not just what happens up here in washington actually talking to the people that are that are doing the job on every day so much and so often we look at it at that ten thousand feet we really need to talk to the individuals who who are participating when they're having to the lack of  space some of the pictures that were taken from some of the border patrol offices the ceiling was falling then they were having to trade out their their guns they didn't have their own equipment the vehicles that they were using they have a trade out some of them are broken down and so awesome in this this subcommittee and the committee as a whole that the amount of authorization money that we hope to be able to get through you know what seems to be a fight with the administration talk about the want to be strong on security when in fact this administration's allowed this influx of illegal immigrants coming to this country since for many years now so i introduced the save act had forty four democrats forty six republicans as original co sponsors now there's two hundred forty three forty three members of the congress and forty four states represented on the  bill most we realize that people are coming here for work and to better their families and i respect that people want to better their lives and to better their families that's been the american way that's and so many people have gone to the right past who have waited their time and gone through the path of citizenship and those are the people in my district who spoke out first at the time that they had stood in line and their country waited in line in order to become an american citizen have the opportunity come here h r forty eight increased border patrol agents by eight thousand border patrol agents provide funding for new technology and infrastructure it doubles the funding for the tunnel task force a special enforcement program to stop human and drug smuggling it creates a blueprint and the there's been so much money spent but it's a blueprint on recruiting new agents incentives retention border the second part obviously doesn't pertain to this committee but i think it's probably the most important thing if you cut off the job magnet you're going to stop the numbers of people who are coming here for jobs even it would be a mandatory our entire staff i don't know if members of congress have gone through you verify i have i got clearance in less than two seconds took less than three minutes to fill out the form online but all federal employees go through you verify some of the you know for every one thousand workers that go through nine hundred forty two instantly have verification by the system successfully contest the dismounts which basically is a primary is when a woman is married her name is changed and then the other obviously we have fifty three who don't contest fifty three that do not contest the and typically the research is found that they don't they are here illegally so we have interior enforcement and i'll leave and i know my time is up but  in my district we had two people who were here illegally tracked picking drugs they were in and clay county north carolina and they were arrested they served their time we call the they call the i say the sheriff calls the ice agents and charlotte so i have two people that are here illegally and they've been trafficking drugs and they said simply when you get a bus load call me will come and out the door they were released and three days or they were arrested again for methamphetamines in our district we've got problems we've got issues and we know what's the cost of protecting our borders by a chair thank you for all your hard work your dedication to all my colleagues all that they have done and trying to protect america making sure our borders are secure and to to everyone involved i thank you mr shuler i thank all of the witnesses for your testimony i'll remind each member that he or she will have five minutes to question the panel and i now recognize myself for questions that i have mr a your bill offers an increase in staffing for customs officers and improvements in infrastructure at ports of entry i think these are needs that have been overlooked in almost every legislative piece that comes forward how important is it to maintain operable infrastructure and proper staffing levels at our nation's ports of entry  communities and that impact our business in our trade and our commerce they also give an example you know past chairman thompson held a field hearing we're running consistently vacancy ratio of customs and border protection inspectors those are the ones that that inspect vehicles coming back from mexico of about thirty to thirty eight percent that  means three three to four out of every ten positions are vacant when we looked at the issue nationally that's pretty consistent nationally so i think it's critical and important that we do the same thing for customs and border protection at the port that we've done for customs and border protection in between the ports of entry let's not forget that a tremendous amount of our economy comes through those ports of entry whether you're talking about the southern border or the northern border a lot of these bills that i have been asked to co sponsor seem to all focus on the southern border and from a national security perspective we have to recognize that our northern border is left pretty much unprotected and untouched even though it's critical for trade and commerce as well i would agree with you on that northern border issue we know that for example the embalmer who came to l a x was apprehended at the northern border or the guy who had tuberculosis was coming through the northern border and we really haven't had any of those issues at the southern border so i think this committee is very cognisant and we've held a couple of hearings up at the northern border because they do need many many resources and it's like a chain where the weakest link is is where if i were terrorist or i were a drug dealer that's where i would you know pop in friends and family on the southern side of his district and crossing that border even though there are twenty eight gates open at one time or whatever it is sometimes can take you two or three hours so i think we really do need to rethink and and try to staff up for that mr schuler beyond the staff increases that you propose for border patrol agents what resources does your bill give to the customs officials and personnel that force increasing the funding for that and then we also in the save act increases more than doubles the amount of northern border patrol agents to our northern border so not only is it focused on the southern border but also increases our northern border as well so most of the most of the focus has been on the infrastructure the tools necessary and apollo program the department of homeland security and the department of defense so they can utilize some of the the tunnel money if you don't really have new resources or new thoughts on how to do weapons of mass destruction those type of terrorists people coming across whatever border may be by the way aside from the border that we have on the north and the south we have an incredible amount of you know we've if you look at the funding that that has been authorized from this committee and we look that we're hoping that that the committee wins out and we get those budgets passed through that we can that we can have the security that when they thank you mr schiller i see that my time is up so i'm going to refer to my ranking member for his five minutes mr souder of indiana thank you madam chairman and first i'd like to point out for the record that all the bills that i read at the beginning in my opening statement from members of this committee have been referred to this committee as has mr schuler's the nine eleven can ition blistered congress blistered congress for having too many committees and no central jurisdiction under republicans we didn't get that done under democrats we didn't get that done it is important that this committee lead and that we should be the first out of the box if there's joint referral some of these things are joint referrals but this committee needs lead because we're the number one homeland security committee also share german rail is concerned about ports of entry i believe that has become a big problem because some of this agent is having to make decisions about commerce in america and how much time it takes because we simply don't have the resources and the infrastructure trucks get held up it's on the north and the south border it isn't true to say that we haven't had terrorists intercept on the south border we're intercepting on both borders and we just had the u s can a parliamentary session and we have one man who owns ambassador bridge who quite frankly has been giving political contributions and both parties held up infrastructure on the north border and it's becoming a particularly at the detroit area in which th is is another question should private companies hold the choke point and then refuse to participate when the federal government needs to have additional this has to be investigated and what's going on in detroit and we've had some problems up in buffalo as well i want to ask congresswoman brown wait i have a problem i just read not not getting into whether people are getting arrested just for being an illegal immigrant but criminal people who committed criminal one hundred forty four as of two weeks ago in my biggest county allen county had been called in and not picked up according to share freeze and noble county a smaller county north forty had been called in and not picked up these are people have been arrested for other things in your bill you address some of this and what i'm wondering is is that some critics say local police it conflicts with the immigrant communities that this is too expensive to do how do you respond to that i'm beginning to think that you have the same problem that i have and many other individuals who who represent citizens in congress have and that is when they when  called they simply don't show up or they wait until there are enough to show up to maybe fill a van this clearly would have local law enforcement working which we can never have enough federal officials we need the cooperation of the local police the sheriff's offices we need to be working hand in hand and many law enforcement officers want to help but they rather in training and that's a cost to a community they want to send them my bill would actually have bonuses for those communities that are willing to step up and help the federal government in forcing illegal immigration i have the same problem and not only that but when i wrote to the department because they closed a detention center in my area which of course forced more people into the local jails i was told don't worry because we have contracts with the local jails and we're paying them the truth of the matter is the local jails had a limited those contracts a long long time ago and i got misinformation but i know my district and so i wrote back and i challenge them and i said i don't know whether you purposely lied to me or you just out of touch or you got wrong information but i'm sorry that there are no contracts in my county to have illegal immigrants congressman to reinforce your statement though if you go to ask the border patrol agents along the border and they and you want to win secure the border and this is where it comes to homeland security they will tell you rather than sending us another border patrol agent we want if it's a choice between an ice agent in your neighborhood rolled down fantasy role they will say send the ice agent because there's where you're addressing the problem that is not being looked at this time and one of our problems here is we need to adequately fund this we need to pass a bills and adequately fund it because right now even local law enforcement people who are asking for the training it doesn't do any good if nobody picks them up and there's no detention center and these are criminal aliens beyond immigration law and mr shuler still increases by one thousand two hundred the veil ability of ice agents for your neighborhood just like what you presented to us for consideration as a committee is your idea of how we can address part of the problem and they all have merit and i applaud you for that  but the question is how can we successfully do it with a department first of all they're rarely requests enough resources to do a job secondly we give them resources to do the job then they either don't do the job already do it in such a reduced a manner that we have to carry it over to the next fiscal year so my my my my concern is is that if it's a matter of resources can we provide the resources to a department as reluctant but when we look at who actually goes through the pipeline and actually get into the field the number is woefully inadequate so i'm concerned well not we can do it as a department even if we what your recommendation would be well i don't think money is the is the total answer but i hope in the in the next administration we start with a secretary of department of homeland security that has experience or a basic understanding of what the challenge is and this is not a knock on on any of the company or the previous secretary but i think that you've got to have a comprehensive understanding of the challenge of border security and interior enforcement as congressman bilbray mentioned i think you've got to pay attention to working in partnership with our two neighbors canada on the northern border and mexico in the southern border i think we've got to get away from demonizing the southern border and ignoring the northern border which are sure put eighty percent of the border patrol agents on the southern border he made a statement that he doubled the number of agents on the northern border well you know doubling the number of agents you go from maybe three hundred to six hundred or seven hundred forty hundred for over three thousand miles of some of the most desolate area on on both borders i think i think there's a fundamental responsibility of working in partnership between the administration and the congress just giving money to an agency without proper oversight and accountability is not the answer you and i chairman at a meeting saw where the contractor that got the virtual fence funding was trying to load up the border patrol with stuff they didn't need overly complicated all they need is a basic  t on the border and they're being given a cadillac or b m w or something else that really is not not the answer i think there has to be a fundamental committee and being part of this committee of course some very close to my law enforcement up and down the state of california and one of the things that we see is that we have a hard time finding new people who qualify past get through the cannon even can enter the academies these police academies we have and what we see is one department stealing from another a lot of lateral transfers what we see in the military is that we've lowered our standards in recruiting and they're also competing for the same type of person who would enter into the border patrol or in my sky marshals or dozens of other law enforcement that we've got going around the country so  how are you seeing that also in texas are you seeing that also when you are looking at your intelligence work and you're talking to law enforcement do you see the same thing i do that how we find really new people to enter into law enforcement is one of the biggest problems we have versus just offering bonuses or what i mean when i see the price being driven up between one local agency to the next because they're offering bonuses to take people from one department  e limitations to being able to shove x number of agents down the throats of any agency because you've got to be careful and maintain a ratio of experience to trainee agents these are some of the most challenging excuse me challenging jobs in law enforcement because they work independently in remote areas but it's a recruitment issue ability of effort like that one solution that we're that we're looking at and and urging them to look at some of these wounded veterans coming out of the iraq and  afghanistan theater who are very capable of doing support jobs that are able to dispatch agents and do the kinds of work that free up  agents to to actually work on the on the line but there are solutions out there it's not it's not rocket science we just need to get somebody that can focus and put together a strategy that that will work its we've got it so this is a huge country this is a time where the economy is shrinking and there ought to be plenty of people out there that would would be interested delegation along with jackson lee and chairman carney to the southwest border very informative very productive thanks so much i also want to congratulate congressman shuler for putting together a bipartisan border security bill that in my opinion will greatly improve both our from my border defenses and interior enforcement which i believe is necessary prerequisite to gaining operational control over the borders discretion is for the entire panel if they wish to answer do you believe that the failure to remove and centers for illegal immigration such as birthright citizenship the promise of jobs in the prospect for amnesty undermine our border security efforts congressman shuler  bill or how obama or clinton has stood on those issues and then the lack there of the this congress to actually promote something to actually have been force months and and security on our borders i think we'll continue to see an increase i mean we're six thousand people crossing our borders every day and i think you'll continue to increase until we put a stop to and i think the more you know the more opportunities that we're the longer we wait the more the increase we're going to have funding along with taking away that attraction of the employer not verifying propre only the status of the person applying for a job those two things i think will go a long long way i support representative schuler's bill i think it's a great great bill we also have a problem because the verification system is about to expire in november that  is currently in this bill so what if if i know that there are some people who like every piece of legislation have objections to it worst case scenario we don't want to be without that verification system congressm and we don't we don't want to continue to give tax deductions to employers who are hiring people legally mr schuler's bill just from now on we're not going to give you a tax deduction which some people have estimated to be forty four billion dollars this is the kind of thing that's got people upset with us not doing something here in washington while we're dedicating watermelon months anyone want to address the issue  with the next question congressman bilbray i want to thank you for your work as chairman of the immigration reform caucus in your stopping illegal immigration given your expertise in this area do you believe that we can have an orderly and  forceable temporary worker guest program several programs in the absence of true border control and the ability to determine whether these those entering our country are leaving when they're supposed to sadly no i strongly support a true temporary worker program especially firaaq but the key is that you've got to stop illegal employment or people are going to come here to pick our strawberries take a look at the fact that dry wall pays more and ships over so it's essential that before we can put together a viable true temporary program work program that is not a a formula for amnesty is the fact is a we can do it but we've got to build it on a foundation of true and forstmann and that was the part of the eighty six bill that was never fulfilled its promise to the american people but we can do this and i look forward to working with both democrats and republicans of having a program so people come here work and go home what they want to do where we'll build a middle class in latin america rather than draining their their brightest and hardest working we're able to cooperate with our neighbors to the north and the south but it means we have to have employer verification and i strongly support mr ray as his upgrade of the social security card which doesn't even come up to the real i d standards that we set for states but that has got to be the foundation if we're going to make a temporary guest worker program work congressman thank you i know my time has expired thank you m it's important that we establish that is a border committee that deals with borders and terrorism that we're allowed to ask questions that we think impact the border such as amnesty and other types of things because clearly policy decisions of the united states impact our ability to control borders and port security i would say to the gentleman that you know we're trying to do it latitude is possible in this however as you know we have done this is our eleventh hearing is an important one i think we i think we agree on that and to the extent possible i really don't want to get bound down in an amnesty discussion quite frankly in this committee where it really doesn't fall under  would like to hear what the panelists have to say about that which we can work we're i'm trying to work towards a bill that would come out of this committee that would hopefully have some of these good ideas embodied in them a to the gentlewoman from california miss lofgren who by the way is a member of the judiciary committee which has many much of the jurisdiction you are talking about i appreciate that i did want to raise the point that the jurisdiction over the formulation of immigration laws is within the jurisdiction of the judiciary committee we have been very careful on the judiciary committee not to wander into the jurisdiction of this subcommittee and i think and i appreciate your reciprocity on that point and in  fact there are very strong views on the immigration subcommittee mr stephen king is the ranking member and sir in a member of mr bill raise immigration caucus so there's no there's no need to worry that  viewpoints will not be adequately expressed in that subcommittee i read i mention this now just because i'm so eager obviously we appreciate our colleagues being here i don't want to ask them a lot of questions i'm so eager to hear from the head of the border patrol who's waiting in the audience and maybe i'm hoping that we can quickly get to him because he obviously wants to talk to but he has a big job to do we don't want to keep him here all day so i think the jews with a great lady from all recognize miss harmon for her five minutes thank you madam chair after the comment of ms lofgren and feel slightly guilty about taking a few minutes but i do think it's important to interact with our colleagues who have come well prepared to discuss border issues in our authorizing important legislation and are taking questions from this committee in my experience and seven terms in congress this is the first time i've been in a hearing where we could ask our own members questions and i applaud you for doing this it showcases the fact that we have a lot of competence in congress sometimes that is overlooked and that on a bipartisan basis people care intensely about tough issues like this so i applaud you for the format of this hearing let me agree with the chairman thompson's opening remarks he said one size does not fit all we need a comprehensive approach it is certainly true that this committee does not have jurisdiction over a comprehensive approach but i happen to support that and i support the legislation that ms lofgren has been pursuing in the judiciary committee and i would hope that the judiciary committee might have a panel of our colleagues who would address some of the issues that members want answers to our colleagues should be active in this kind of format i think it is good for congress to do this let me make a couple of other points as the daughter of immigrants whose parents were the first in their families to go to college i surely understand as i think most members to the value of immigration to our country the point is to encourage immigration that is lawful we want a diverse country we benefit from it and some of the members on the committee and some of the members on the panel are immigrants or the children of immigrants themselves and we value them as members of congress so let's not lose sight of this let's not demagogue this issue let's solve some of the problems around immigration and we need to remind ourselves of that because i think the message all of us want to send is that we welcome diversity in this country and america is a land of immigrants and i hadn't heard that mention this morning  let me also say as many members of said that this is not just the southern border problem and it is not just a northern border problem it is a coastal border problem too and as one who represents a coastal border in california i international airport which my district surrounds l a x has twice been an intended target of attacks by al qaida and it surely is not a good thing to have huge lines of people trying to get into through customs into the airport into los angeles or to have aircraft on the airfield waiting to unload passengers this is just an invitation for disaster so i strongly support what congressman reyes is trying to do which is to get more resources so that problems like this can be addressed let me let me say further though that that when we when we think about  this we need a strategy it is not just that every one trying to cross the border illegally is an equal problem i suggest we need a strategy in this my one question i want to ask that prioritize who we're looking for that prioritizes people who are potential terrorists people who are drug traffickers and otherwise abuse are otherwise abusing other people no one has mentioned that issue and i just like to ask the panel whether you agree that there is a strategy we have to apply here in making certain that we we make our resources and our efforts as effective as possible along our borders congresswoman i think that anybody who's worked at the border will understand when somebody is crossing the border illegally there is no way of really being able to differentiate those who are coming here just for illegal employment or those who are here just carrying a satchel full of drugs which is a major problem the cartels use these eagles as their mules or that satchel it may not be a drugs it may be some kind of weapon of mass destruction that ability to separate these that a tunnel that is dug for you legal immigration is also used for drug smuggling and can be used for terrorism so the problem i understand your threat the challenge but it is tough at the border to separate those if i can that there should be a national strategy of border management you cannot hope to seal the border whether it's coastal  north or south the managing and from my experience if we can manage the border at eighty five percent success i think i think we were able to do exactly what what your  question and that is better prioritize those that would be coming in here to do us harm or bringing in something whether it's narcotics the d or anything else that ultimately would be harmful to  country and that's why we have to cry out for a national strategy that gets us there both in between the ports of entry the ports of entry the airport and the and the sea ports and of course  so that by the time we return from the floor we can get to the second panel but if you know congresswoman harman briefly as i stated earlier over three hundred eighty thousand people were apprehended in the tucson sector the border patrol in one year from october first to about a month ago we had over one hundred eighty thousand people the vast majority eighty percent plus are coming here to work to feed their families if we can take care of the visa situation to pull those people off from crossing through the deserts through the tractor trailers the semis it's going to be a huge dent into this problem i mean to figure out that guest worker program get those people to work legally and safely  return back to their home country it would free up the border patrol free up customs to do the work that they are really supposed to be doing thank you now recognize for five minutes  life before coming here was as a sheriff in seattle thirty three years in law enforcement i know the frustrations and the heartaches and the headaches of trying to recruit people i agree with mr ramos to be a strong recruitment program in place to attract great candidates sheriffs and police chiefs across the country are competing for the same pull as men and women who serve in our armed forces we don't lower our standards to hire drug addicts and criminals into our sheriff's office and i don't know of others that do that and i'm sure that the border patrol does not do that the heart of a servant really is what we're looking for when we when we hire people into law enforcement fields people who want to serve our country and know the dangers   and and law and give you advice on how you might want to secure your home but guess what it's a quick wants and quick is going to get in so we can only do the best that we can and know that some people are going to violate the law i have heard some concerns mr schuler from employers that this save act will create some concerns around litigation against employers would you agree that the inclusion of a good liability protection language in for employers who are required to use government system should be a part of any electronic verification system absolutely that's why when we wrote the bill up so many of the people that we talked to the employers verify totally takes the labial the off the employer once they leave their proper ogram is they go through and they get the match correctly it's a printed out piece of paper where it's actually mailed in or sent in from from the concern from the employer standpoint would you agree to if it is a ploy or is can't verify with that not encourage people to continue to cross the border absolutely without and then not create more illegal immigrants in the united states and  the some sort of a form of amnesty and creating huge a problem for the chief as far as resources and managing those people absolutely not thank you we've as so many people have indicated that the eighty percent and i think it's more than eighty percent of people here come in for work so we have to get off the job night if we cut the job magnet up we're talking about how to secure the borders and all this we have to start with the jobs first so if you're having to deal with only ten percent of the people coming across the border because of jobs coming here for jobs then we don't have to spin the millions and billions of dollars that we're spending and we may not have to spend the amount of time and resources to be able to hire the people that are protect verify system and really is a trying to address the hands it can i jump in for a second i come from arizona the state that now requires one hundred percent participation for a verify we had a hearing last week in the ways and means committee where we had employers coming out from arizona we had a lot of testimony on that  you know this is not the place to get into it but there are some real issues a very fine the state of arizona people are actually required to do it so i just don't i want to be sure that you look at that testimony and i can read a lot and one last question real quick quick here my time is flying by t s ensure that employers will not illegally prescreen workers that's been a concern to you that's been presented well because even under the the mandate would actually be not used as a tool of and someone after a person is hard and they go through the verify system at that point in time they receive a match if they do not receive a confirmation of a match then they can they continue to still be employed and over the time here they actually request just note i appreciate every one of these members being here clearly they care very much about our country have worked hard to put together what might be part of an answer as is mentioned by our colleague from washington there are  some problems it is impossible as he's noted to seal off completely the entire borders of the united states that includes both seacoast a very long land border with canada as well as the southern border so i think it's important as we discuss our this subject it's important the country that we not lead the country to believe that we anybody in any party could accomplish the impossible what we need to do is have  management system that works much better than it does and i want to especially i raise two issues maybe three it first is a matter of priorities i listen to you congressman shuler and we've talked about this before the frustration that your citizens have that you know you've got a meth dealer in the jail and you know where we may have a discussion about whether the bus boy should be deported nobody's arguing that the meth be it was should be deported and you can't get ice to pick them up in the appropriations bill this year the site of the company the bill in december we put together guidance for ice suggesting that there are priorities and you know we don't have limitless resources so the top priority for ice ought to be go into the jails and taking up the people  convicted of serious crimes and booting those guys out i think that's you know that's an area where we all agree and yet we can't make them do that because the easy hit for them is they go round up some nursing mothers in a field it's numbers but we've still got the meth dealers sitting in your jail and maybe being released so i'm interested you know we've already put the priority in the order in i don't know that it's a legislative problem it's an administrative problem in that they're not doing the smart thing and they're also not following the instructions of congress i want to talk about computer systems and maybe i can ask mr reyes you know that the nine eleven hijackers for the most part were not admissible the united states when they came and presented themselves for entry they were not admissible except that the the officer who interviewed them couldn't didn't know that and could not know it because the evidence of their inadmiss ibility was on a piece of microfiche in a bucket in georgia waiting to be poured into a computer system so you know i've been after both ice and d s u s c i s to upgrade and  in your judgment to any of these bills or any of the efforts we've made really move that effort forward i mean you're an expert in this is duran's again you have to you have to go back to making sure we've got the leadership of the h s that fundamentally does two things first recognizes the where they are and secondly where congress wants them to experts that you know this is not rocket science it just takes people that understand the system understand the challenges and are willing to put together a strategy i want to follow up this briefly the comment you made on hiring our returning warriors some who have now disabilities but it doesn't mean that they couldn't monitor computer efforts and do the like a big and pediment i've heard you know better than me to hiring in the border patrol oftentimes these are remote locations this is a hard job even if you're not you know out in the field with the harsh conditions you know it involves we locating to the border community away from family and the like you know we have call centers in iowa for tech companies in california there's no reason why you couldn't have a whole units to do the remote computer stuff would would you suggest that we move in that direction based on your experience to do take some of the load off of the recruitment you and i have discussed many times there is no excuse for the long waiting list of people that are trying to not naturalized might become citizens c i s has to do a better job that is a perfect example of where wounded warriors would fit in perfectly kerry because they would be in the major cities they would be in in major processing centers that would require computer skills that can be talked to to wounded warriors and would facilitate those huge backlogs that the it is not a priority it's not part of the part of the strategy and it's part of what feeds the frustration against the h s my time's expired even though i didn't mean to use it all madam chair thank you you're welcome it's less green on that i recognize mr green for five minutes thank you madam chair i thank the ranking member as well and i thank my colleagues i must confess that i am impressed with the depth and breadth of knowledge that has been shared with us today i do have a copy at that i would like to share and it is that we must be exceedingly careful assuming that we do one hundred percent of what we desire to do we must be exceedingly careful exceedingly so such that we do not create a false sense of security a false sense of security we have to make sure that we don't create in the minds of the public that this fence is going to secure this country we have to understand that the southern border is really the virgin islands and we have to understand that the northern border poses challenges that we are not addressing we cannot create a false sense of security as we construct a fence along the southern border the border with the united states and mexico i am concerned about the lack of a plan that addresses all of the issues associated with border security as opposed to some of the issues associated with border security i think that when we take a piecemeal approach we will get piecemeal results piecemeal results can have unintended consequences and overall plan can  address the consequences that we may not be considering if we seal the border between the united states and mexico that we have some control over greater control we have to ask ourselves how will this impact other points of entry into this country and be prepared to deal with the impact that it will have on other points of entry into the country if we don't prepare ourselves for those other points of entry into the country we will find ourselves again trying to raise rees respond as supposed to having acted timely and i would invite colleagues to respond tersely if you would too to what i have state border pollution problems and everybody kept saying but it won't solve the whole problem to do this and we've been able to make great leaps in the last twenty years of working on pollution an environmental problems at the border by doing what we can where we can when we can and not finding excuses to buy that to walk around or to avoid addressing issues where you can i'm going south next month for a big reason the border is so violent now congressman people are being killed on both sides of the border law enforcement officers in mexico are being slaughtered there are gun fights going on the degree of urgency in washington d c both republican and democrats and i'll tell you i'm taken on my republican colleagues about the fact that i hope they care enough about helping mexico fight this problem and secure their border reclaiming my time because i only have thirty four seconds left i concur with everything that you've said but it does not cause me to conclude that we must not convey a message that this is going to secure the united states of america why we need to and that's that's this is now i'm reclaiming my time and that's what you have to concern yourself with too we're talking about securing the united states of america we're not talking about just the border between the united states and mexico and we don't want to create a false sense of security in doing members who are testifying here today about the importance they place on immigration reform and also strengthening border security which will obviously have to be a part of any immigration reform bill so thank you paso ports of entry what have been the consequences of understaffing at what has so ports of entry and how did you determine the staffing numbers required by the bill additionally as as a floor border patrol sector chief you are clearly in a very unique position to share with us your first experience in securing america's borders looking at the different borders the programs that the administration and as proposed and involved with in proposals in congress what should the next administration's first priority be to get the border security right such as even fencing virtual fencing or work site  enforcement if you could talk to those two and four representatives sure in my role in the house intelligence committee as well as the chairman of the emerging threats subcommittee on this  committee i spent a lot of time being concerned about terrorist smuggling and a nuclear device or weapons grade nuclear material or radiological material according to recent g a o investigation to determine cross border violator would like to be able to bring radioactive materials or other contraband undetected in in the united states by crossing the u s canada border what i want to ask you is does the save act address any of the vulnerabilities that our nation faces along the northern border and do you believe that the northern border is equally susceptible to entry by terrorists and others wishing to to to agricultural specialists and three hundred fifty support positions were included in the legislation the ports legislation as a result of about nine months worth of work and consultation with the h s and my former colleagues to improve not just staffing but the infrastructure system and i might also add consultation with g s a who has a responsibility for that infrastructure third as to what should the next  preferably experience in the issues facing our country and homeland security and has to come up with a national strategy that addresses all of these issues that your committee has been working on and that we've all collectively been expressing our concerns about thank you thank you jim that has ensured the save act forty eight will increase the northern border patrol agents from eight hundred to two thousand i think the most between our northern border that that distance that is obviously can be very very porous because we have enough manpower the reason why most of the border patrol agents increases been to our southern border it's because of the numbers of trafficking that's coming across our southern border so obviously i think we all recognize the importance of being able to protect both our northern and our southern border save act was actually  the floor three of them will take miss jackson least five minutes dismissed this panel go and vote and return thereafter from recess with the second panel this jackson lee for five minutes ma'am chairwoman let me without objection and chairman raise it was one that we joined together on and let me thank you for the leadership on your legislation but let me suggest that we took for example the large majority of the members bills and i will ask pointed questions and then added a component that dealt with outside the jurisdiction of this committee but just say that we handled the security but then handled the benefits with that from a border patrol officers perspective be enough active tool in which to really handle some of the crisis issues at the border which is human trafficking and narcotics as it relates to your legislation that that that we if we took  some of the legislation that is being presented to us today that deals with security but then added the benefits part which is not in the jurisdiction of this committee but gave access to legalization from a border patrol agent since you have that experience of being at the border with that cost four and a half million dollars per mile we have seven after mile that that barrier focus on even if we passed your legislation that provides us the reinforcement at our ports of entry very important i've been to a good number of them enforcement how poorly staffed do you believe our ports of entry are and how much of a crisis do we face not moving forward on your legislation dealing with infrastructure well the lack of staffing is affecting efficiency and morale and our ability to promote trade and commerce through the ports of entry on a national average and it's between thirty and thirty eight percent vacancy congressman brown wait i too would like to pose the question you have a very stiff and they should have because i believe that what you might wind up doing is making six year olds felons teenagers felons and i understand the impact or the thought behind it my question to you would be would you welcome a modification of your legislation if it paralleled again outside of our jurisdiction because what you're talking about you have a component in there that talks about individuals inside the country that relate to ice internal enforcement would you be willing to have a component of a process of documentation for those who are here and then the enactment of representative i believe what you're talking about is amnesty for those who are here m r correct know what i'm talking about is a pathway to legalization but we can get into the you might be opposed amnesty i just want you to answer the specific question i'm not labeling it would want you to commit to that but would you look to a process of legalization and then look to your legislation would say as anyone that didn't get in line certainly is here and status and could be held as a felon i would have to look at the language of it i honestly cannot commit now i would have to look at the language because i can tell you that in not just my district but so many districts what they want is they want to make sure that illegal aliens and as you know right now it is not a felony but rather a misdemeanor they want to make sure that the law is tough so i would have to look at the language i thank you i've never committed to anything without reading the language i appreciate it remember let me just end by thanking the members and simply saying that border security as you've offered today is crucial but we frankly cannot exist with a situation of making hardworking taxpaying individuals felons both securing the border is crucial but we must have another component of comprehensive immigration reform you mr jackson lay also obviously a member of the judiciary committee because she has a lot of knowledge with respect to some of the issues which really don't touch our committee i would like to this time dismiss the panel thank you for your testimony and for your answers to our questions if there are more questions from our members members who weren't able to they'll be submitted in writing the committee stands in recess for about to about fifteen minutes after the last vote for those on the second panel that will be about thirty minutes from now the committee is now back in session and i welcome the second panel of our witnesses our first witness mr thomas when koski was appointed assistant commissioner office of field operations at u s customs and border protection in august of two thousand and seven in that capacity he directs the activities of twenty four thousand employees and oversees programs and operations at field offices ports of entry container security initiative ports and pre clearance stations and our second witness is mr david aguilar who became chief of the u s border patrol on july first two thousand and four before his appointment he was the chief patrol agent of border patrol tucson sector chief aguilar began his border marine in that capacity he's responsible for approximately five hundred fifty pilots two hundred seventy aircraft and two hundred vessels before coming to see b p the general served on active duty with the u s air force for thirty two years without objection we will put the full statement into the record and i'm told that the three of you are going to sort of do a tag team here and we'll start with  states at our borders this important work is primarily done at fishel ports of entry where legal goods and people are emitted into the united states and at the land border between those ports of entry we are responsible for protecting more than five thousand miles of border with thousand nine hundred miles of border with mexico and operating three hundred twenty six ports of entry we station nearly one hundred thousand officers land and sea ports and throughout the world and we deploy over sixteen always a pleasure to be able to testify in front of this committee to continue talking about some of the challenges that we face and especially some of the achievements that we think we have accomplished over the last couple of years since we have ramped up our efforts along our nation's southwest border and of course also on the northern border i would just like to cover a couple of things and then pass it on to my partner here from aaron marine general kostelnik the things that i think are important at this point and that is the following that we are coming up on the eighty fourth birthday of the united states border patrol on the twenty eighth of may next week we're going to celebrate in el paso texas we've come a long way from where the border patrol originated from riding horseback to continue riding horseback  today but using the technology that is out there integrating some of this technology some of which members of this committee saw last week on the ground in tucson that plus the infrastructure that is being built the personnel that is being added the maturation of the organization the added resources in the area of aerial platforms has helped us dramatically one of the things that i think has made a tremendous difference also has been operation jump start which is coming up at the end of mid july on on a draw down but the difference being between now and when operation jump start started i will share some facts with these figures with you when operation jump start started we had about eleven thousand five hundred eighty one border patrol agents on board as of the tenth of this month we have sixteen thousand three hundred twenty one border patrol agents on board we have built over one hundred miles of fence we have built over or just under  hundred miles of vehicle fence in addition to that also today as we speak we have about twelve hundred sixty six border patrol agents going through the united states border patrol academy we are meeting our recruitment challenges we are currently a little below target but not by much and we are heading towards the eighteen thousand three hundred nine thousand border patrol agents that we are shooting for at the end of the calendar year now what does that translate to it translates to a thirty percent reduction in apprehensions thirty nine percent reduction apprehensions of illegal aliens compared to fiscal year zero six it also speaks to fifty percent reduction of alien apprehension year to date compared to last year in addition to that one point eight million pounds of narcotics apprehended last year also so the achievements and the expansion of our efforts are dramatic in fact we have brought a higher level operation of the border have a long ways to go but we are making and gaining ground on the border thanks to the administration this congress and everything that you have given us to work and continue working along our nation's border with that i look forward to any questions that you might have of us and i don't pass it on the general goes back two hundred years to the original customs service here marine is only two half years old in the transition and i think you are realize it was a combination of the legacy border patrol air marine aviation assets and the legacy customs and says working  wide variety of missions we are by far the smallest you know the things we bring to the table are important elements and assets in the in the war on terror in the homeland and the various missions that we support not only do we sector chiefs and border patrol sectors across the northern and southwest borders we support the ports of entry in those areas in the southeast coastal regions as well and run proper missions not only in the coastal regions and approaches to the country in the caribbean the eastern pacific but deployments in south america focus heavily on narcotics activity in the transit zone during the last two years i think we've made tremendous progress in our transition we have been working behind the scenes to fix and fix important aviation assets that we have historically head the p three s ranking members out or you'll know the what a big contributor they are in the transit zone and we did have big issues with cracks in the wing roots these are aircraft more than forty years old we create a service life extension program with your help that has gone very well we're about to turn return most of our aircraft back to operational service this year when our contract for four new wings that's this year s over the next decade we were a wing in retail and keep these aircraft in operational service for the next forty years we're actively recapitalising our air force we're adding new helicopters we had a b c one twenty last year we're adding new a star law enforcement helicopters not only for border security missions but internal missions supporting ice and their investigation activities within the country we just ordered a new army black hawks with their contract which will appear in homeland security at about the two thousand and ten timeframe and taking the existing sixteen blackhawks we have and updating them through a similar service life extension program that would put the p three s two we have a lot of work to go we probably do not have enough aircraft and meet all the expectations and the need but i think our transition has come a very long way last month we opened our large training center at oklahoma city and the members happen to be traveling through will rogers and would like to see a new twenty one million dollar hanger called i think most people in the congress have supported giving more assets in particular more border agents in the last few years up to a total i think you mentioned eighteen thousand three hundred nineteen supervisory positions and to really make a career out of the whole structure so my question to you is really what effect does a large number of relatively new people have on your organization what are you doing either through training or on the job or you know buddy system or supervising to try to make sure that these new recruits are getting the culture and the real aspects of the job that only comes through time and i guess i would also ask you about recruiting and what it looks like and how how many recruits it takes in order to really get one person that's going to be want to be out in s one of the other places we went to recently yes ma'am madam chairwoman the the recruitment efforts that we are currently undergoing right now are in fact challenging but we are meeting those challenges we are meeting the numbers as i said we are a little bit below our our goal but not by much and in fact right now as we speak the entry into the hiring pipeline is actually higher than what we require in order to maintain that pipeline and by that i mean that we have estimated that we require putting people into the er hiring and recruiting pipeline at about rate of about thirty five hundred per week well we're doing at about forty three hundred right now one of the challenges that we face is in fact what you spoke to and that is the actual organizational integrity what we're for the organizational integrity we're taking many many steps to ensure that we do everything that we can in order to ensure the proper ratio the right direction that we take a look at right now is one supervisor to every seven border patrol agents please to say that at this point in time we're right on that because we are we're pretty much on target with that now we have changed the way that we train our people at the academy which i think and most of the chiefs all  cheese believe it or not a better trainee today than we were in the past because of certain adjustments that we have made we have also taken certain efforts plute for example a mentorship program within the united states border patrol didn't exist before well we'll bring annuitants that did well in their careers putting them into the sectors and using them to mentor the supervisors first line supervisors and the agents actually coming into the end of the border patrol as we speak  a new field training officer program that in the past existed but it was not as tight if you will as it is today it has been handed it is been augment it with the mindset that this is a new organization that is growing at a tremendous pace in addition to that we have implemented a post academy program both of those put together are about a three and a half month long program that basically didn't exist to the degree that it exists today so those are some of the things that we're doing besides that supervisory schools journeymen schools ethics training which is very important to us we have even included polygraphing at the hiring and then recruitment and also to ensure that the quality of training that we're getting is at a higher level the one thing we have not done is we have not in any way degraded the training of our people that you are going through united states border patrol academy the the recruitment as i stated remains a challenge one of the areas that we are covering recruitment is diversity is making sure that the united states border patrol to the degree possible ins up is an organization that is reflective of the makeup of this country we're working very hard in that area also bills that my colleagues had have before the congress is to increase even more your brain and can you give us some indication over like the last four years how many new agents you've taken on and what would you say to for example mr shuler who wants to augment another eight thousand people and can you really can you take that pace or do you need time to sort of figure out where you are and where and what you really  need your people for and specially with the fact that we're still trying to get a sense in other things in place well first of all i would offer my appreciation and thanks to congressman shuler and everybody else on the committee here for their interest in making sure that we're getting what we need and i would start there is that what we need at this current time is an opportunity to mature our organization and the reason i say the said that is i started early with operation jump start when operation jump start  had about eleven thousand three hundred twenty one border patrol agents well we're now at sixteen thousand so it's that maturation process is critical but in addition to that in order to make the agents that we have hired over the last couple of years o last little over two years make them more efficient more effective is we need to balance those out with the infrastructure that some of you saw at the in the field last week and the technology that will make them more efficient and more effective so i would urge a little bit of caution in in adding too much of one thing in this case we're talking about border patrol i just before we balance out what the current border patrol needs and that is a balancing out by way of technology infrastructure and maturation that has to occur the court figure proximately thirty eight to forty percent of the united states border patrol as an organization will be at a maturity rate of two years and under by this time next year that's an important figure because when we take a look at the needs of the organization in order to move forward and properly equip those officers that is our focus right now maintaining the organizational integrity of the organization as a whole we cannot skew it too far in any mr solder for his five minutes of questions and i think after we do that we'll probably break to go in both there are two votes on the floor and then rush back i hope in order for the rest of our members to get in some questions chairwoman first i want i want to say that it is for those who don't think it's dramatically changed on the border because we complain and complain about it but it's dramatically changed there's no question that we're trying to accommodate trade the best we can but there are more agents that we fans we have electronic things that we never dreamed of having a few years ago and in my frustrations and others that it isn't sealed and i personally think we haven't done this sort of fast pace which by the way is a high degree congressional funding hasn't followed through nor has it ministration requested adequate funding not the people who are in front of us problem but i think we do need that knowledge what every day we become safer as a country that doesn't mean it's like well when will we be totally safe i don't i don't think we'll ever be totally safe but every day we're becoming safer as a country i think that's important knowledge that i didn't like the way project twenty eight start out looked at the ranch is around laredo and seen the kind of graphs are doing and are we doing anything to cut it down your agents can't see this invasive species has anything been done since the last time we talked about this other than b i want to know are we cutting down again and these are three year project that we have reservations i was just sharing earlier with some of the staff work on that this june we are going to start a four pronged effort in a one point six mile area there in the right in order to basically test which one of those efforts is going to be the best approach not only to immediately cut it down but more importantly to be able to maintain that to stay as low as possible in addition to that we're going to continue with a biological agent which is the the wasp that you mentioned so it's going to be a two fold approach the work that we're taking a look at i don't want sept first project takes off and we determine which one of those or means is the best way to maine to cut and maintain we will start focusing on that in order to expand for the rest of the river have a couple questions for general kostelnik but i want to put this in the record we do studies all the time you have at least two ranches that we saw on different sides they've already tested this and i don't quite understand why past history can't be included expedited tests but you know i'll continue to bring that up general kostelnik there are our request is i want to ask you you probably don't have time to to feel them all but one is you know i've been concerned about tradeoffs that we make and one of the tradeoffs is the number of hours that is going to back up ice now from p has dropped four well five straight years it was it ten thousand and three forty nine before we merged it's down to three thousand seven hundred sixty one now the problem that we have in congress is i'm not necessarily saying that supporting border patrol missions as opposed to ice missions is the way we can go but i don't believe we've had it fully disclosed to us what tradeoffs are being made does this mean that drug investigations aren't occurring does this mean we're not taking down networks does this mean how did it get diverted because your hours are up but your total hours for ice is dramatically dropping and there's two parts of this one is a deterrent part that we need to fund basically fence with the drop back in the checkpoints at the border patrol does but then the investigations so that we can try to stop the flow in that if you can give a brief answer here here and then follow up a second the second thing is is looking to go from long range radar system to g p s tracking of aircraft what will this impact will this have on your division will you not be able to see the planes as well or track it and what power are we working on because we kno to see more planes and boats coming in we have to think what's the next step in addition the current step which gets the cars and greens questions about do we have an overall plan and the third is we've already heard we're having some troubles getting enough border patrol agents yet it appear that we're spending a lot of time training border patrol how to fly when in fact we may be as we drawdown in iraq getting lots of pilots in who are already trained to fly are you looking at spending more time bringing in trained pilots rather than the number of hours that we're spending training pilots right now thanks for not provide more coherent answers on the record for all three of those very good questions i think you'd be pleased with the two scenarios you mentioned the middle one being the more difficult one first a matter of board is true the hours are down probably less than half of what they were at their peak but it's a very sophisticated analysis when you look at that because when you're you know operating air force thirty or forty percent of your total time really isn't mission time anyway it's overhead is training it's test this evaluation it's no flight for a lot of different things so if you look at that story you know we're caught kind of in the middle between a and m we support the border patrol we support internal c b p missions and we support external ice mission but we support them just the same and in credit to both eyes and c b p we've crafted a very careful prioritization method for how we support in fact if you looked at the i support that is it for two thousand and seven you would find  had ice representation here they would say some of their just aren't asking well that that's a problem but it's an ice problem they have to get over because by asking it tells us where the real requirement is so actually if you look at those missions and ice which is the heart of your question they were not supported as a matter part as a sion in the last two years there's only been three or four of those kind of things and prioritization issues over that nation actually come to the headquarter a top and so i think you'll find when you honestly look at the i support it's very good it could be better and clearly there are places the rocks in fact do not ask because we don't have a lot of infrastructure a key places within the country places like atlanta or dallas and we support those activities from the field but as you know many of those ice missions require a water three hour response but i'd be pleased provide our report from last year on the record to give you a sense for that analysis quickly on the long run rate of that's going to be an issue because when we go to a cooperative system within the national we will know who chooses to cooperate will be problematic for those that do not there is no technical solution to this but we continue to work very closely with the f a a to maintain as long as we can until alternative technical means can be made available for the non co operative things to work that issue that's a much bigger problem with a much longer term solution i thank the gentleman with two votes on the floor two minutes left on this vote we're going to go over and vote i hope you gentlemen can stay will probably be back within ten to fifteen minutes and then we'll continue on with the questioning  we're now in recess thank the three of you for your service to our country in your hard work i do have some questions i'm going to hone in on the on one thing chief aguilar because i think it desperately needs clarification i know that none of us can control in advance what each member of a large organization says i mean that's true for members of congress sometimes your colleagues say something and you go how do they really say that and that can happen in any large organization but i was tremendously concerned by the comments made in the rio grande valley border patrol about hurricane evacuation and  for those who did not see the news articles the report was that anyone in evacuating before a hurricane that people would be brought to his to boston points loaded on buses to escape the coming disaster and that according to dan doty the spokesperson for the valley sector anyone who is not a citizen or legal resident would be held he said in specially designed areas in the valley that are made to withstand hurricanes and not evacuated when i got a couple problems with this number one i'm not aware of any structure that would withstand hurricanes and if there are let's build a bunch and we don't have to worry about evacuating anyone i don't think that exists number two a statement like that means that people who are risk of their lives let's say you're here without your papers and you've got three u citizen kids if you know you're going to be picked up and and pulled aside you're likely to risk your life and the lives of your children not to evacuate so really just with that statement out there we're putting the lives of people at risk in the future and i i not just for fun for the earthquake i mean for the hurricane but for fires for natural disasters anywhere where an evacuation is necessary this statement puts people at risk now i understand and i do appreciate the staff briefing that was held for us yesterday that my staff attended i think many others did i understand that there has been a clarifying statement i've got a copy of a clarifying statement that says that the and i'll quote again our primary role in such events will be the safeguarding of life and no one forced control be undertaken that will in any way impede the safety an orderly evacuation but i don't think it's strong enough given the background you're well aware of what happened with the fires in southern california and for whatever reason at a certain point that experience itself is going to chill evacuations in the future so i'm asking you chief aguilar i know that you don't want people to die in a disaster i know i'm i imagine that this is of concern to you can you tell me what further any way impede or interfere with any kind of evacuation or when a new we go to an evacuation mode if anything the united states border patrol in an area south of such as south texas what in fact probably be the largest law enforcement agency engaged and lifesaving and taking care of private property out there and assisting in the evacuation what we have already done is everybody from the secretary myself chief but in regret the valley has very aggressively and very assertively put out that this is that the statements that were unfortunately in the media are not correct that we would not take that posture that was described that in fact our primary duty would be in fact to protect the life and property of the population within the south texas area we would facilitate any kind of evacuation and we would play the same role that the law enforcement community would be playing during that emergent type of situation that messaging will continue to be going out in addition to that i have personally contacted with the exception of congressman  we haven't been able to connect and assure to the congressman for that part of the country what our true plans are and how we would actually respond to that kind of situation i have spoken to senator cornin i am not connected very aggressively going out to clear the record on this to make sure that the community understands that the border patrol has will and will continue to do what is done in the past on so many occasions when the community requires that type of support chief if i could just follow up but i think my time this is just about over but and i appreciate the efforts he's taken but i just would like to suggest we might need to do a little bit more because capsule as you know  in this in a vulnerable population people are here rumors travel like wow and so this statement whether wrong or incorrect is i guarantee you is having an impact in in florida it's having an impact in georgia it's having an impact in california and i think you know there's a time and place for everything i mean it would be you know we're against people who don't pay their child support but we're not going to run run something on the child deadbeats and say well we know we're going to collect before you get on the bus in the scaped the wildfire i mean there's a time in a place for everything and and as you're saying now when it's that kind of emergency the only thing we're looking at is part of the community have now been painted with this kind of a situation and that is just absolutely incorrect and i thank you and i appreciate your for the revs i'd love to work for the with you on and i yield back i thank my colleague from california when try to get a second set of questions and i know you have many more talk to chairman thompson also because i think the last time he was before is he it was that he was going to get that to his real quickly and it's been literally months this is the letter that we're asking about the what is the true number of staff you need that we have for the border customs customs and the infrastructure needs and it's literally since last year that we passed for this letter was getting embarrassed and i'm a big supporter of the all but i know that some of you all done your work but it's still up at the secretary so could you haven't call us call me and be happy to give my personal cell number at the end of the meeting number one number two major general  i appreciate it i think i saw finally we talked about bring the coast guard down to the border and the coast guard is talking about doing some patrol most have been coincidence but right after we made that announcement the laredo sector and i was kidding  together battles on this if they do come to the patrolling to the doing patrol in the rio grande well you know we're we're one of two aviation and maritime elements that provide a lot of assets obviously much older better known and more productive of course it's up to them to determine the missions that they're best trained and equipped for now we support aggressively the border patrol mission and riverine in environment in particular we are gran and as part of our recapitalization plan not only are we recapitalizing our aircraft fleet recapitalizing our maritime fleet as well we put a new generation of safe folks who actually acquired from the u s coast guard into various border patrol sectors this year we just designed and i have acquired a new generation of the air boats for specific used in the riverina farm in shallow water and have a wide variety of large and small boats that we continue to upgrade for border patrol mission from san diego to macallan texas so separately the coast guard to determine whether that's a credible area and a focus and a mission sit for them to be inappropriate for me to comment on that but clearly we partner with the coast guard on many areas and many missions of support but we think you know over time that we will be able to provide organically the maritime assets in the river environment  calling you and the coast guard general to get together so we can talk about doing a joint mission together ok we have to do that in fact in the small boats the kind that would be right in the river and there's already a very wide ranging cooperation said both in the question that mr sauder was talking let me just follow up i got the white paper that i think was in the works for i don't know how many months it was one page and one  i got and it's on the laredo sector the pilot program and i appreciate what you all doing for selecting that area i have a couple questions posed to be five faces the first five faces post of sixteen point one miles according to this but i think you say might be larger it's was we five faces one face per year starting two thousand and eight and if we go at this rate to cover one thousand two hundred fifty miles that might be over one hundred years and i'm sure we're not talking about one hundred years going at this particular base but the cost also does concern me it's three point five million dollars and i keep getting the folks down there in texas all  want to conservation folks and some of the other folks that mr sot also talked to and they're saying they can do this a lot cheaper and this is only three point five million dollars for two point seven miles are you all willing to sit down and we can put some folks to come up here but i don't want you to send me somebody that doesn't have any authority i would love to sit down with you and i love to sit down with mr solder also and bring you some folks and they keep saying they can do this cheaper and faster and i understand that there are certain hoops that you all got to go through but are you all willing to sit down mr unite and chief but i don't want to be with anybody i really would like to meet with the u n or somebody that has some authority so we can talk about some decisions where we can hopefully do this quicker and hopefully we can do this cheaper also to the taxpayers absolutely as a taxpayer at appreciate that opportunity but more importantly for me and my and my our sixteen thousand agents we would jump on that opportunity if there's a faster easier way to do this yes we did get some clarification on the pilot project up there one of the reasons that it'll take four years of oil is what i'm being told is because of the still requirement for us to do an environmental impact statement that still takes that amount of time now that those are some of the additional built in costs that may add up to the three point five million dollar cost of those will take that for the record and i will come back to you with a full delineation of what those costs include to follow up briefly on on the cain because it's pronounced laredo but it's the whole border has some big percentage of it has saltfleet or other invasive species and that that anybody who thinks any fencing can be  seen or any border patrol can see i mean as i've said before as we were right one of your agents came with the dog and there were two people saying right next to your sector jeev and i wouldn't even see a man in the brush now the question is if it's going to take an environmental analysis why can't they analyze some of the areas that have already done this why it is then if it's going to going to take so long to get it cleared can't we clear for a bigger amount so we're not held up and then have to go to the next area with it it seems to me history can get in some two and lastly is a big believer that you can incarcerate a body there should be work release programs why can't some of the work release people cut the cane that the key challenge we've had is how to keep the cane from coming back and  that's been the biggest reason we don't cut it we think that grass will work that but the key thing it then is we have all the stuff along the border we're not going to be able to take a train border patrol agents and and cut all this stuff and anything that might not take a hundred years but we're probably talking ten or fifteen we need some creative ways to accelerate this process but i have i have a few dish until two additional comments and then a couple of questions that  i'm thankful for the p three at one point hardly any of them flying there are a critical part of our structure and we need to continually upgrade and my earlier concerns about ice coverage is because i do believe from talking to people all along that i was alluding to before the hearings start and i want to put this on the record we have a short term opportunity at big bend on a stud lake the national park service has funds they're willing to to work with that they're trying to make decisions they've been meeting because to put border patrol housing on national park land to have a joint operating center at lake i'm a stud requires chaos in political terms it's two different agencies there's funding streams and e j jency we've got a clearance in appropriations i've talked to congressman dicks who's on both appropriations and this committee and works with national parks in particular this is ridiculous that we can't get these kind of things worked out and it's the classic thing that the nine eleven commission bashed us for in the government is that jurisdictional things seem to be slowing us down i hope your you'll look into that and see because it particularly is important to the border patrol because we have huge sectors there one other thing related to texas and the border patrol it is outrageous in the marfa sector that where you have a checkpoint that the state of texas will not lower the speed limit before that checkpoint endangering our border patrol agents and and somewhere here we're going to have to have some accommodation of what national security needs are in relationship to local authority to put national people trying to protect national security at risk and there has to be some way to address the question i want to ask a few questions up border entry because you you've been spared so far the these questions are from the from the standpoint of infrastructure i think this is extremely critical for us but i believe what we need to do is move off the ports of entry it's very very critical that we remodel and renovate the ports of entry they need a very very bad however congressman we also have to look at the roads going into the ports of entry and exit in the ports of entry  we receive additional staffing we can put them to work there's no doubt about that i think there are things from the standpoint that we're not doing that we need to do number one you know we need to be able to staff all the bills and we do staff the bills during peak times but often oftentimes what happens is that's done over time and we have increased the overtime this year by over a thirty five million dollars to give up port directors the flexibility to deal with these peaking issues but also you've got to be very very careful here because you stop bringing people out people on on on duty for too long so we need that plus up from the standpoint of staffing right now we have  eighteen thousand eight hundred c d p or so on and my target is about twenty thousand so i'm down about eleven hundred now we've made a lot of inroads but we do have attrition rate issues here and when we so we look at the total package here additional positions certainly would assist us but we need to come up with a better way of retaining people we're looking at about a nine percent i believe the new we time an enhancement that was passed by congress and signed into law that's going to be taking effect on july sixth will help us tremendously in retaining our officers our officers will be receiving law enforcement retirement benefits this is something that my thirty three years is one of the most important things that's  hundred five officers strickly to agencies that had that special law enforcement retirement package so the infrastructure piece but we have to think of the technology miss left for five minutes thank you madam chairwoman i know you were here this morning to hear our discussion with the first panel and i had two questions for you either you chief or whoever else can answer  first we know that it's tough to recruit train and retain officers and we had a discussion about taking a new approach with special outreach to our returning our wounded warriors people who might not be in the situation because of their injuries where they could go out and patrol but they would be ready to do computer monitoring and activities of that sort so number one do you think that's viable and so if you do think it's viable how could we help you accomplish it and then question number two i've actually talked to people who have an interest in the agency but if you live in san jose the concept of having to pull up stakes and move to south texas is not necessarily an appealing one and if you were able to do something on a remote basis through computers i mean we've got call centers around all over the world servicing with technology don't need to be on onsite if you're doing that kind of job do you think there's a potential to expand your workforce without the positions mission support positions that are absolutely critical to operations within the border patrol those missions support positions translate to the following behavior mechanics law enforcement communications but actually man cameras and things that nature h r specialists and things that nature within that universe there may be and there probably could be some positions that would lend themselves to that promote off site type of support and we would welcome the opportunity to actually employee and work with our wounded warriors absolutely in fact right now here at the ronald reagan building we are going through that process of trying to engage as many of them as we can we can do better and we need to do better in that area but yes there are in fact probably some positions that would lend themselves to that new technology connecting them to supporting our border patrol operations the  area living in south texas or new mexico i don't mean to be dismissive about it this is a wonderful place is this just absolutely pain and pulling up stakes is hard for people some for the most part and again our for the most part in the border patrol the majority of those positions are probably going wire that they be on site because of the nature of the war but those that could lend themselves to remote site i think we would welcome the opportunity  will do the research of field operations standpoint congresswomen i really embrace his idea and i think we have some more flexibility from standpoint of where our field offices and we're up with cement relocated certainly have we have ports of entry down on the southwest border but as you know we have them we have three hundred twenty six and twenty field offices then scattered throughout throughout the country so i think i have some flexibility there so i want to take that on good if there's anything i can do i'm sure any of the committee members could do assess i'd be eager to do so just one quick follow up question attrition rate now is running at what percent for the c p o as it's eight border patrol what are your priorities in terms of the resources that you need at your ports of entry and to secure our borders from your standpoint and can you give the subcommittee an update on your current staffing levels i don't really want to go to calexico i want to go to san diego so we're looking at a code that just addresses calexico so when a person says i want that code i'll go to calexico we don't get all the refusals that we have now so  that's the challenge i think the challenge that we've had is not having the law enforcement retirement package and now that we have that effect of july sixth we believe that will stop stop slow down the attrition rates last year for example four hundred five officers left customs and border protection and moved on to ice and other organizations that have the door i think we're going to make some some inroads that we have more challenges and i know you've been down to el paso and on the southwest border and it's a tough job it is a very very difficult job as you know and it fits right into the whole issue of infrastructure problem brewing we are heading down a very very dangerous path think about it the chief over here is hiding between the ports of entry what's going to happen then are going to stop coming in and stop smuggling they're going to start coming in through the ports of entry more than they are now they're going to start blitzing the ports of entry and we've had those problems back back really down sanusi drop ports of infrastructure not the paid for that it's inevitable balloon is going to going to go the other direction into into the ports of entry so the below the focus in on on infrastructure is extremely streaming critical for us from the standpoint of staffing i was able to hand out additional overtime to help out our port directors as we enter the summer peak periods but things that staffing scheduling issues and you know being more creative ability to schedule you know we have a whole different workforce now and when i came in thirty three years ago i knew this was my career i had a pension no one has that anymore you only have four once people these kids move on they go on to other organizations and that's good but we've got to be able to have the right package for them to retain i think the the enhanced retirement is a great step forward but we need to look at things more creative scheduling more for tens but in i do that you've got to have the flexibility from the standpoint of staffing because i can't leave those booths empty you know i'm dealing with you know legitimate trade and travel and i'm dealing with the violators and legitimate trade and travel people don't want to wait in line i don't blame them i don't want to wait in line either so i think you know from the standpoint of the infrastructure piece extremely critical  am we've read recent articles about the low morale for example at el paso parts of entry and i think you've talked about how the new package is hopefully going to help with some of that but some of it seems to be the whole issue of over being overworked and you know when you're overworked sometimes things can slip through more easily than not certainly we've seen that the congress can make mistakes when we're pushing things through too fast so you know how do we take care of this overtime problem that so many seem to have to do exceptionally in these ports of land ports where it's not that much six that's a target seven hundred sixty six and they have fifty five fifty five vacancies this is a very very difficult issue for us you know we've got to staff you know we've got a provide the trade community with services i think one of the things that an achievement was attempting to do down in el paso that brought on some of the picketing was looking at some different scheduling with the territory and i personally spoke to the director of field operations jean guy exactly what changes are making a lot of the changes workforce alignment changes and getting the right schedules in place and and i think we able to stream line eliminates some of what is being called free doubles but not all of them and it really comes down to having the right staffing numbers in place to be able to come up with some more of these creative schedul g last question of the day is for the general you have i think three unmanned aerial drones right now do you plan to get any more and do you plan to get any more and is it that you have the three down in the south and you're putting one to the north or can you explain a little bit about what you're doing there and what your future expansion plans if any would be appreciate the opportunity to do that and i left it out of my introductory statement we spent a lot fact we fly which is a predator b it's the same aircraft that the united states air force navy and several other countries around the world fly a single aircraft can do things that none of my manned aircraft can do and in that you know is realize is the charm we currently have four operational aircraft in service today as we speak those are craft are all you know today located in arizona one is a dedicated training as it were currently and have been for the last couple  months actively training our own agents to operate these things and you may or may not realize that most of the operators of these things overseas that are flown overseas are actually flown by contractors and then the military fire them up in a way by the contractors to the takeoff and landing you know we're moving out to fly all these assets for sale to give us maximum flexibility so they will be flown by law enforcement agents we have funds in hand are in the process of finaliz a contract for two additional aircraft have identified tail numbers at the factory and will enter operational service with us this year so by the end of this calendar year u s customs why have six of these aircraft operational one of those is a dedicated training asset will probably be a test asset to support follow on secure border technology developments in yuma and then tucson one aircraft is dedicated northern border aircraft that will deploy in the next month to grand forks north dakota will be hosted out of the air force base where the north dakota national guard actually flies and has pilots to fly predator a models and that will begin the first northern border deployment we have just completed in concert with united states air force and with the u s coast guard a maritime demonstration there is not a developmental maritime radar on it and we're proposing with the coast guard we're having a joint requirements summit this summer in miami and from that if our requirements for varian are aligne think that they will be for really the commandant of the coast guard to speak for themselves we have money in hand in the o and i and budget in a plan to buy an additional system and that aircraft would be the prototype to develop a joint maritime aircraft for us and the u s coast guard to operate simultaneously we have this year moved into flying through the satellite infrastructure realizing that a couple of years ago or a craft were flown a line of si control says we can fly our six aircraft literally anywhere in the world clearly our mission is in the continental united states in the transit zone but we will be able to fly missions anywhere in the country from those remote sites in fact during our maritime demonstration a couple of months ago with a test team and two you avi's deployed to florida dental air force base in the gulf and three or craft remaining is here a vista the test team and i am assets flew the mission in arizona from florida simultaneously with the testing and other air indiction agents in arizona flying the mission in key west florida from arizona these systems can fly thirty five hours they carry e o optics they carry forward looking infrared they carry synthetic aperture radar in the lander and in maritime surveillance radars with a tracking system in the maritime  domain they carry laser designators and they carry all the configuration to fly in the national airspace this is indeed a very unique asset that is going to pay big dividends i was talking to the congressman earlier about you know north dakota why would we go to north dakota and potential concerns the canadians might have north dakota is a good place not because this perhaps is the highest threat area but because of the remote as governor hoeven supports it both of the senator from that state supported talk to the aviators in that state and they're supportive and has wide ranges every mode area with a lot of areas where we really honestly don't know what's going on in north dakota diplomate deployment is an opportunity to learn more what these systems can do they can fly in these remote areas for extended periods of time doing very area risky things for a mandate they offer unique you know local law enforcement age or humanitarian the recall  last year the year before when the people were lost in the mountains in washington state you can put this aircraft with a flare sensor on station for thirty hours looking for something or think about somebody in the water somewhere so this is a tremendous technology push that is kind of been going on behind the scenes and while we're still evolving you know by the end of this year with six operational aircraft and two colocated sites and a full compliment of federal agents to fly these things this will be a very unique as for the border security mission last year for the stand of north dakota we actually partner with the coast guard to take one of our assets box it up and transport it on real time with u thirty two north dakota with the control center the point of that was today we have an agile falcon capability within the department of homeland security that if there wasn't an issue somewhere in the country natural or terrorist related today we could fly one of our aircraft and have these the coast guard c one thirty move a control set and fly overhead missions anywhere in the continental united states same day with thirty hours overhead coverage from this vehicle supporting assets on the ground thinking back to katrina other types in areas this is clearly a capability you would like to have so there's not a lot of talk about it the secretary panetta look these things we had the president out in y last year did like a look at these things i think congressman you've been out there and maybe you have too it's a great opportunity and i would encourage members of this committee to come out to sierra vista or in your next visit to the a mock to observe real time operations a very important as general and my colleague from indiana has one quick question before i gabble this so we all have time pressures here and we perceive how long you've been there this is just two quick yes or no and if you want to submit additional for the record for when aguilar do you have the legal ability now in these tough to where people are having people who don't want to stay there as long or more turnover do you have the ability to pay bonuses using them because that's what i would think the private sector would do also for the ships if you're having trouble getting twelve days then you pay a little bowlers on the twelve days that i don't also know about locations you're looking at going for three days but we need some creative ways to look at this because it's obviously a structural problem and if there are any things that we need to do let us know and i appreciate you gentlemen before us given your testimony and thank you so much  i'm sure they'll be more questions especially from the members who were not able to attend today and will submit those in writing to you and hope that you'll get back to the net quick manner with the answers to that we thank you and