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THE DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND

SECURITY: PROMOTING RISK-BASED

PRIORITIZATION AND MANAGEMENT

HEARING

BEFORE THE

COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED NINTH CONGRESS

FIRST SESSION

APRIL 13, 2005

Serial No. 109–7

Printed for the use of the Committee on Homeland Security 

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.access.gpo.gov/congress/house
COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY 

CHRISTOPHER COX, California, Chairman 

DON YOUNG, Alaska 

LAMAR S. SMITH, Texas 

CURT WELDON, Pennsylvania, Vice Chairman 

CHRISTOPHER SHAYS, Connecticut 

PETER T. KING, New York 

JOHN LINDER, Georgia 

MARK E. SOUDER, Indiana 

TOM DAVIS, Virginia 

DANIEL E. LUNGREN, California 

JIM GIBBONS, Nevada 

ROB SIMMONS, Connecticut 

MIKE ROGERS, Alabama 

STEVAN PEARCE, New Mexico 

KATHERINE HARRIS, Florida 

BOBBY JINDAL, Louisiana 

DAVE G. REICHERT, Washington 

MICHAEL MCCAUL, Texas 

CHARLIE DENT, Pennsylvania 

BENNIE G. THOMPSON, Mississippi 

LORETTA SANCHEZ, California 

EDWARD J. MARKEY, Massachusetts 

NORMAN D. DICKS, Washington 

JANE HARMAN, California 

PETER A. DEFAZIO, Oregon 

NITA M. LOWEY, New York 

ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of 

Columbia 

ZOE LOFGREN, California 

SHEILA JACKSON-LEE, Texas 

BILL PASCRELL, JR., New Jersey 

DONNA M. CHRISTENSEN, U.S. Virgin Islands 

BOB ETHERIDGE, North Carolina 

JAMES R. LANGEVIN, Rhode Island 

KENDRICK B. MEEK, Florida

(II) 
(III)

C O N T E N T S

Page 

STATEMENTS 

The Honorable Christopher Cox, a Representative in Congress From the 

State of California, and Chairman, Committee on Homeland Security 

Oral Statement ..................................................................................................... 1

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 3

The Honorable Bennie G. Thompson, a Representative in Congress From 

the State of Mississippi, and Ranking Member, Committee on Homeland 

Security ................................................................................................................. 4

The Honorable Donna Christensen, a Delegate in Congress From the U.S. 

Virgin Islands ....................................................................................................... 40

The Honorable Peter A. DeFazio, a Representative in Congress From the 

State of Oregon ..................................................................................................... 29

The Honorable Charles W. Dent, a Representative in Congress From the 

State of Pennsylvania .......................................................................................... 25 

The Honorable Norman D. Dicks, a Representative in Congress From the 

State of Washington ............................................................................................. 23

The Honorable Bob Etheridge, a Representative in Congress From the State 

of North Carolina ................................................................................................. 43

The Honorable Jane Harman, a Representative in Congress From the State 

of California .......................................................................................................... 25

The Honorable Sheila Jackson-Lee, a Representative in Congress From the 

State of Texas, ...................................................................................................... 48

The Honorable John Linder, a Representative in Congress From the State 

of Georgia .............................................................................................................. 34

The Honorable Zoe Lofgren, a Representative in Congress From the State 

of California .......................................................................................................... 50

The Honorable Daniel E. Lungren, a Representative in Congress From the 

State of California ................................................................................................ 38

The Honorable Michael McCaul, a Representative in Congress From the 

State of Texas ....................................................................................................... 44

The Honorable Kendrick B. Meek, a Representative in Congress From the 

State of Florida ..................................................................................................... 46

The Honorable Eleanor Holmes Norton, a Delegate in Congress From the 

District of Columbia ............................................................................................. 32

The Honorable Bill Pascrell, Jr., a Representative in Congress From the 

States of New Jersey ............................................................................................ 37

The Honorable Dave G. Reichert, a Representative in Congress From the 

State of Washington ............................................................................................. 21

The Honorable Mike Rogers, a Representative in Congress From the State 

of Alabama ............................................................................................................ 42

The Honorable Loretta Sanchez, a Representative in Congress From the 

State of California ................................................................................................ 18

The Honorable Christopher Shays, a Representative in Congress From the 

State of Connecticut ............................................................................................. 31

The Honorable Rob Simmons, a Representative in Congress From the State 

of Connecticut ....................................................................................................... 17

The Honoralbe Curt Weldon, a Representative in Congress From the State 

of Pennsylvania .................................................................................................... 27

The Honorable Don Young, a Representative in Congress From the State 

of Alaska 

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 5
Page

IV

WITNESS 

The Honorable Michael Chertoff, Secretary, Department of Homeland 

Security 

Oral Statement ..................................................................................................... 6

Prepared Statement ............................................................................................. 8
(1)

THE DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND 

SECURITY: PROMOTING RISK-BASED 

PRIORITIZATION AND MANAGEMENT 

Wednesday, April 13, 2005

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, 

COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY, 

Washington, DC. 

The committee met, pursuant to call, at 1:37 p.m., in Room 2200, 

Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Christopher Cox [chairman of 

the committee] presiding. 

Present: Representatives Cox, Weldon, Shays, King, Linder, Lungren, Simmons, Rogers, Pearce, Harris, Reichert, McCaul, Dent, 

Thompson, Sanchez, Dicks, Harman, DeFazio, Lowey, Norton, 

Lofgren, Jackson–Lee, Pascrell, Christensen, Etheridge, Langevin, 

and Meek 

Chairman COX. [Presiding.] Welcome. This hearing will come to 

order. Today, the committee will examine the Department of Homeland Security’s use of the principle of risk to prioritize America’s 

counterterrorism strategy. 

We presently have business on the floor of the House of Representatives. We expect three votes to come up in short order. Because I want to honor the time of the Secretary and the time of 

all the members who are here and who will be here after we vote, 

we are going to begin the hearing on time. We will go through 

opening statements and at least get those accomplished before the 

bells ring, and then we will immediately resume the hearing after 

the conclusion of our work on the floor. 

Our sole witness today is the Honorable Michael Chertoff, Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security. 

Mr. Secretary, we welcome you. This is your first appearance before the Homeland Security Committee, and we look forward on 

both sides of the aisle to working with you. 

Using risk management, which is the subject of your testimony 

today and the focus of our hearing, is important because we have, 

while significant resources are devoted to homeland security, limited resources. We also have an extraordinary breadth of targets 

with which to concern ourselves in the country and obviously a 

limit to our capacity to reach all of them. 

Using risk management involves, first, intelligence. We have got 

to examine and rely upon the information that we put together on 

terrorist capabilities and intentions. We have got to conduct threat 

assessments to evaluate the likelihood that a given asset will be 

subject to a terrorist attack. We have got to conduct vulnerability 
2

assessments to identify specific weaknesses in given assets that 

might be exploited by terrorists. And, we have got to assess as well 

the potential consequences such as economic impact and loss of life 

to determine the level of significance of an asset and how much 

protection that asset should receive in comparison to others. 

This kind of risk assessment, both within a particular programmatic area and across Department of Homeland Security responsibilities is a vital management tool. It is one that is new to 

the United States since September 11. As a result of the newness 

of this challenge, it is not yet possible for the Secretary or this Congress to evaluate as well as we would like the degree to which we 

are appropriately aligning our resources to match our nation’s 

greatest risks. 

One example of the work that we have yet to do is the billions 

of dollars that Congress and the Department allocate each year to 

states and local governments to enhance the terrorism preparedness of first responders. Instead of applying specific risks and allocating funds to address them, the system that we presently use 

sometimes does nearly the opposite. 

Congress and the Department allocate tens or even hundreds of 

millions of dollars to each state and to certain local governments 

across the country without the prerequisite analysis of risk, and 

these authorities then occasionally find themselves looking for 

ways to spend the money. The abuses such an approach invites 

have been well publicized, and if not corrected ultimately will undermine our legitimate efforts to prepare our first responders for 

acts of terrorism. 

Unfortunately, the lack of risk-based rigor affects even those 

DHS grant programs that are not formula driven and that are, by 

intention, based on competition among applicants. For example, the 

DHS Inspector General recently found that $67 million in port security grants had been spent on projects of ‘‘marginal homeland security benefit’’ and that awards had been made to private sector 

projects that ‘‘appeared to be for purposes other than security 

against an act of terrorism.’’

The 9/11 Commission rightly recognized the inherent dangers 

from this type of spending, recommending that ‘‘Homeland security 

assistance should be based strictly on an assessment of risks and 

vulnerabilities. Federal homeland security assistance should not remain a program for general revenue sharing,’’ that according to the 

9/11 Commission. 

We, on this committee, and the Select Committee that preceded 

it, have advocated that Federal efforts to prevent, prepare for, and 

respond to terrorist attacks within the United States should be 

based on risk. That is why we introduced the original version of the 

Faster and Smarter Funding for First Responders Act 18 months 

ago. 

This bill, which has been reintroduced in the 109th Congress and 

which Ranking Member Thompson and I have coauthored with the 

support of every one of this committee’s members, would expedite 

the delivery of Federal assistance to those first responders who face 

the greatest risk of terrorist attack. 

This kind of risk-based approach has to be expanded beyond specific grant programs to encompass all of our Federal government’s 
3

activities. Strong leadership and clear congressional direction will 

be required to instill risk-based prioritization in the formulation of 

budgets, into policies and into programs throughout the Department and across the government, and especially to legacy agencies 

that prior to 9/11 did not have to think this way. We cannot have 

20th century programs to respond to 21st century threats. 

That is why, Mr. Secretary, I noted with great interest the 

speech last month that you gave in which you emphasized your intention to bring a risk-based philosophy to the management and 

operations of DHS, and that is why we invited you here today to 

talk about that very topic. 

Not only is such an approach necessary to enhance our national 

security, it is also critical to our long-term economic security. Each 

year, 440 million visitors arrive in the United States by land, sea, 

and air; 7 million cargo containers cross through our ports; and 118 

million vehicles, including 11 million trucks and 2.5 million rail 

cars, cross our borders. 

A layered risk-based security system is the only one that will ensure that our borders and ports of entry remain open and secure 

to accommodate the free flow of legitimate goods and travelers. We 

have got to work to strengthen security in ways that simultaneously improve our security and promote economic growth. 

The purpose of today’s hearing is to start a dialogue with the 

new Secretary to understand how this committee, the Congress, 

and the Department can work together to instill risk-based 

prioritization and management throughout DHS programs and operations. 

I want to thank the Secretary for his testimony today and look 

forward to continuing this crucial dialogue in the weeks and 

months ahead. 

I will now recognize the Ranking Member, Mr. Thompson, for his 

opening statement.

PREPARED STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE CHRISTOPHER COX, A REPRESENTATIVE IN

CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA, AND CHAIRMAN, COMMITTEE ON

HOMELAND SECURITY

Today, this Committee will examine the Department of Homeland Security’s use 

of the principal of risk to prioritize America’s counterterrorism strategy. Our sole 

witness is the Honorable Michael Chertoff, Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). 

Mr. Secretary, we welcome you in your first appearance before the Homeland Security Committee, and we look forward to working with you as you seek to build 

on the progress of the past two years. 

RISK MANAGEMENT BEGINS WITH INTELLIGENCE: 

(1) assessment of what is likely to be subjected to a terrorist attack; 

(2) a vulnerability assessment to identify specific weaknesses in a given asset that 

could be exploited by terrorists; and 

(3) an assessment of consequences, such as economic impact and loss of life, to determine the level of significance of an asset and how much protection that asset 

should receive in comparison to other assets. 

Such risk assessment—both within a particular programmatic area, and across 

DHS programmatic areas—is a vital management tool, and one that is, new to the 

U.S. since September 11th. As a result of the newness of this challenge, it is not 

yet possible for the Secretary or the Congress to evaluate whether we are appropriately aligning our resources to match our Nation’s greatest risks. 

One example of this failure is the billions of dollars DHS allocates each year to 

States and local governments to enhance the terrorism preparedness of first re-
4

sponders. Instead of identifying specific risks and allocating funds to address them, 

DHS—with the complicity, if not outright direction, of the Congress—does exactly 

the opposite. DHS allocates tens or even hundreds of millions of dollars to each 

State and to certain local governments across the country without any analysis of 

risk, and these authorities then look for ways to spend the money. The abuses such 

an approach invites have been well-publicized, and—if not corrected—ultimately 

will undermine our legitimate efforts to prepare our first responders for acts of terrorism. 

Unfortunately, this lack of risk-based rigor affects even those DHS grant programs that are not formula-driven and that are, supposedly, based on competition 

among applicants. For example, the DHS Inspector General recently found that $67 

million in Port Security Grants had been spent on projects of ‘‘marginal’’ homeland 

security benefit, and that awards had been made to private sector projects that ‘‘appeared to be for a purpose other than security against an act of terrorism.’’

The 9/11 Commission rightly recognized the inherent dangers from this type of 

spending pattern, recommending that ‘‘[h]omeland security assistance should be 

based strictly on an assessment of risks and vulnerabilities. . . .[F]ederal homeland 

security assistance should not remain a program for general revenue sharing.’’

I long have advocated that Federal efforts to prevent, prepare for, and respond 

to terrorist attacks within the United States should be based on risk. That is why 

I introduced the original version of the ‘‘Faster and Smarter Funding for First Responders Act’’ 18 months ago. This bill, which Ranking Member Thompson and I 

reintroduced yesterday with the support of this Committee’s Members, would expedite the delivery of Federal assistance to those first responders who face the greatest risk of terrorist attack. 

But such a risk-based approach should be expanded beyond specific grant programs, to encompass all of the Department’s activities. Strong leadership and clear 

Congressional direction will be required to instill risk should be risk-based 

prioritization into the formulation of budgets, policies, and programs throughout 

DHS, and especially its legacy agencies. We cannot have 20th century programs responding to 21st century threats. 

That is why, Mr. Secretary, I noted with great interest the speech last month in 

which you emphasized your intention to bring a risk-based philosophy to the management and operations of DHS. Not only is such an approach necessary to enhance 

our national security, it also is critical to our long-term economic security. 

Each year, 440 million visitors arrive in the United States by land, sea, and air; 

7 million cargo containers cross through our ports; and 118 million vehicles, 11 million trucks, and 2.5 million railcars cross through our borders. A layered, risk-based 

security system is the only system that will ensure that our borders and ports of 

entry remain open and secure to accommodate the free flow of legitimate goods and 

travelers. Indeed, we must work to strengthen security in ways that simultaneously 

improve our efficiency and promote economic growth. 

The purpose of today’s hearing is to start a dialogue with the new Secretary, to 

understand how this Committee, the Congress, and the Department can work together to instill risk-based prioritization and management throughout Department 

of Homeland Security programs and operations. 

I want to thank the Secretary for his testimony today, and look forward to continuing this crucial dialogue in the weeks and months ahead. 

I will now recognize the Ranking Member, Mr. Thompson, for an opening statement.

Mr. THOMPSON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I am pleased to 

welcome Secretary Chertoff to this committee. 

Judge Chertoff, you are well qualified for your position, and I 

look forward to your service. I hope we will see you more before 

this committee, and I know this is your maiden voyage on the Hill. 

I am sure you will remember it for a long time to come. 

Unfortunately, since 9/11, we have had a lot of things with the 

Department that have gone wrong, and you will have an awesome 

responsibility to help us move the Department forward. But I want 

to talk to you a little bit about the past failures to handle risk 

analysis by the Department. 

This hearing is focused on using risk analysis to prioritize and 

manage the Department’s efforts, but in the one area where the 

Department has experience, it is risk analysis, the development of 
5

a database of the nation’s critical infrastructure, the Department 

has failed miserably. 

As my Republican colleague representative, Ernest Istook, told 

USA Today in December, the asset database list is a joke. If the 

Department has been unable to handle risk analysis in the past, 

then what confidence can we have that it will be able to do it in 

the future. And I am sure your leadership will help us in that respect. 

If the Department really wants to prioritize and manage based 

on risk, then should we have some uniform definition of risk? For 

example, I live in Mississippi. Most of my district is along the river, 

and I have a nuclear power plant. Are we planning for risk based 

on that analysis or are we using the same standard? 

Other issues, Mr. Secretary, we talked about missed deadlines. 

You are aware that over 100 congressionally mandated deadlines 

have already been missed by the Department. We have to do better. There is no question about it. Now that we have pretty much 

the jurisdiction as a committee, we are looking for your leadership 

to meet those deadlines, and we will talk about those a little later. 

There are some other issues associated with the Department. 

The whole issue of minority participation from the staffing level is 

absolutely important, from the issue of Hispanic and other minority-serving institutions participating in programs in the Department is absolutely essential. At this point, under the Centers of Excellence Program, for example, there are no minority or Hispanicserving institutions participating. We have to do better. From the 

standpoint of small, disadvantaged and minority business opportunities within the Department, I challenge you to make the Department responsible and adhere to those edicts. 

Again, Mr. Secretary, we welcome you here. I look forward to 

your testimony, and welcome aboard. 

Chairman COX. I thank the gentleman. Let me remind all members that you are entitled to submit written opening remarks for 

the record, and due to our time constraints, I would ask the Ranking Member whether members should go to the floor in response 

to the bells or whether we want to risk getting the Secretary halfway through his opening statement? 

Do you think we should go to temporary recess while we vote on 

the floor? There are seven minutes remaining in this vote. That 

will give members time to make it, and we will return immediately 

and commence with your opening statement. 

Mr. CHERTOFF. Thank you. 

Chairman COX. Thank you, Mr. Secretary. 

We are in temporary recess. 

[Recess.]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE DON YOUNG, A REPRESENTATIVE IN

CONGRESS FROM THE STATE OF ALASKA

Mr. Chairman, thank you for holding today’s hearing on ‘‘Risk-Based’’ funding and 

management. This is an important yet often misunderstood subject. It sounds so 

simple, but it is extremely difficult in practice. 

The basic argument goes something like this: ‘‘The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has limited resources so it must focus its efforts and funding on those 

areas of greatest risk.’’ That sounds good right? Well, only if DHS is really certain 

which areas are at greatest risk, and if DHS is the best agency for addressing that 

risk. Otherwise, we just put all of our eggs into the wrong basket. 
6

Now I would be the first to say that DHS cannot do everything. If it tries to do 

all things, then it will end up doing nothing well. Perhaps the most important ability DHS needs is to understand its own limitations. DHS can then focus on what 

it can do well, delegate other areas to agencies with more expertise, and develop 

new capabilities to address risks for which we are currently unprepared. 

We also need to appreciate a few simple facts. First, terrorism is incredibly difficult to predict. We have a lot of really bright and talented people working on this, 

but the reality is that threat and risk assessments are extremely uncertain. We simply do not know where or when terrorists will attempt to strike next. Second, security requirements have the potential to place a tremendous burden on our economy 

and citizens. We must be very careful not to regulate our economy into a recession 

or undermine our freedom. If we do that then the Bad Guys have won. 

When it comes to terrorism preparedness and first responder funding, all States 

need to have baseline capabilities and a guaranteed minimum level of funding for 

at least three reasons. First, every State could be a target so they at least need to 

have minimum response capabilities. Second, during a catastrophic attack units 

from all across the country will be called upon to help respond or backfill jurisdictions that respond to the attack. And finally, DHS is responsible for assisting States 

respond to all disasters, not just terrorist attacks. 

Thank you again Mr. Chairman for calling this important hearing. Also, I would 

like to thank you for working so closely with me on your first responder bill. I believe we have a better bill because of our efforts, and that it will help ensure our 

Nation is ready for the next attack or major disaster. Thank you.

Chairman COX. The Committee on Homeland Security will again 

come to order. 

Secretary Chertoff, again, welcome. Thank you for indulging us 

during our floor votes. 

Your complete written testimony will be included in the record, 

and you are now recognized for such time as you may consume to 

provide an oral summary of that testimony. 

STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE MICHAEL CHERTOFF, 

SECRETARY, U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY 

Mr. CHERTOFF. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. As you pointed out, 

this is my first outing before this committee. I look forward to a 

long and productive relationship. 

Mr. Chairman, Ranking Member Thompson, I think what I am 

going to do is simply summarize the main points of my statement 

in the interest of time. 

The Department of Homeland Security was created a little bit 

over 2 years ago, and it was created to do more than simply erect 

a big tent under which a lot of different organizations would be collected. 

It was created to put together a dynamic organization that would 

identify a set of missions in furtherance of homeland security, that 

would execute those missions in an integrated and comprehensive 

manner and that would take a reasonable and sensible philosophy 

to dealing with the matter of homeland security. And, 2 years into 

the Department, coming on as the new Secretary, I have the opportunity to engage in what we call a second-stage review of where we 

are headed, where we have come and what course corrections, if 

any, we need to make. 

And we undertake this process of the second-stage review with 

a very keen appreciation for the fine work done by my predecessor, 

Governor Ridge, and his deputies, Gordon England and Jim Loy. 

They put this together in the first instance. They launched the first 

stage, and that has gotten us on the mission, but we have to again 

ask ourselves what adjustments we need to make. 
7

And I think broadly speaking they fall into three categories. First 

of all, we need to make sure that all of our activities are not focused on the process of the component that is performing the function but on the mission that we are trying to achieve. 

We need to be outcome oriented, and the best example I can give 

to people about what I mean by this is, if I have a problem in my 

house, my appliances are not working, and I call the electrician, I 

call the plumber, I call the contractor, and they work for a day and 

then they come to me and they say, ‘‘Well, we have all done exactly 

what we are supposed to do. We followed all of our protocols, but 

the stuff still does not work.’’

I do not consider that a job well done. I consider a job well done 

to be when the appliances work. And that is called being outcome 

or mission oriented. We want the thing to work the way it is supposed to work, and we do not care about how many of the processes 

are checked off along the way. 

So the second-stage review is designed to take a look at our missions, evaluate how far we have come, how far we need to go and 

then talk about how we accomplish the rest of our objectives without regard to the existing structures but with regard to what it is 

we need to get accomplished. 

And the second piece of what I want to briefly mention is how 

we organize ourselves to carry out missions, and this obviously is 

going to be a function of our study of the mission and where we 

are and where we need to be. But I can tell you at this point, 

again, in general terms, it seems to me there are three aspects in 

which we need to be operating as a coordinated, comprehensive department. 

First of all, intelligence. Intelligence is the driver of everything 

we do, and we need to operate under a common picture of the 

threats we are facing. There are two dimensions to that. First of 

all, we are collectors of intelligence, meaning that we have a lot of 

different organizations that interact with the outside world and collect information. We need to make sure that we are capturing all 

that, we are pulling it together and we are fusing it at the top of 

our organization. And so some of what we are going to be looking 

at in this review is how to make that happen and to improve our 

collection, capturing, and fusion of intelligence. 

The second piece of intelligence is operating within a larger intelligence community, as contributors, as disseminators, and as customers. Obviously, we have a new DNI coming on. That is going 

to create an opportunity for us to work with the community as a 

whole to make sure that we are contributing the way we should be 

contributing, that we have the access that we need to have to do 

our job and that we are in a position to disseminate what needs 

to be getting to our Federal, state and local partners. 

We need to also have a comprehensive approach to policy. Again, 

we have policy in a lot of different components, there are very 

smart people there, but we need to have a vision that looks beyond 

the components through the Department. And so elevating and 

standing up a policy organization that is capable of strategic planning and dealing with policy issues is a second matter we are paying close attention to. 
8

And, finally, the issue of operations. We have proud organizations that are part of the Department of Homeland Security that 

have very strong senses of their own missions, but the purpose of 

the Department was to create an organization that could operate 

jointly, and therefore we need to make sure we have an operational 

element, an operations coordinator that is able to coordinate across 

the board so that when we take an item of intelligence and we try 

to translate that into action, we do it in terms of prevention, we 

do it in terms of protection, we do it in terms of response. 

And standing up a comprehensive and robust operations function 

is the third piece of what we have to do in this effort to look at 

the way we are structured and operating. 

Finally, let me touch on philosophy. As the chairman mentioned, 

he was gracious enough to mention early on in his remarks, a few 

weeks ago I spoke at George Washington University and talked 

about risk management as the template for how we do our work, 

and that means that in our handling of grants, in our deployment 

of resources, in our policy making we have to be driven by a disciplined, analytical approach that looks to the issue of measuring 

consequence, measuring vulnerability, and measuring threat. 

And, obviously, there are a lot of subtleties involved in applying 

this general template to the kinds of individual issues that we face. 

But if we are at least clear about what our overall philosophy is, 

I think that is going to go a long way to making sure that we have 

a coherent and sensible and reasonable set of priorities about how 

to deal with homeland security. 

As the chairman has observed, we cannot protect everybody in 

every place, at every time. We have to prioritize, and I think we 

are launching a process through this review of making ourselves 

better at doing that. 

That being said, I look forward very much to working with the 

members of this committee in the weeks and months to come, and 

I am delighted to be here and to answer your questions. 

[The statement of Mr. Chertoff follows:]

PREPARED STATEMENT OF THE HONORABLE MICHAEL CHERTOFF

INTRODUCTION 

Mr. Chairman, Representative Thompson, and Members of the Committee: Thank 

you for the opportunity to address you today, and for your ongoing support of the 

Department of Homeland Security’s efforts to keep America secure and free. 

I am honored and pleased to appear before the Homeland Security Committee. 

This is my first appearance before the Committee, and I look forward to a productive exchange as the Department begins to reassess and readjust priorities and policies in accordance with the changing threat of terrorism over three and a half years 

after the September 11, 2001 attacks. 

For more than two years now, the Department of Homeland Security has led a 

national effort to protect our country and our citizens from all manner of threats. 

It has been an honor to join the dedicated men and women who carry out this task 

daily. Ours is a difficult mission—to prevent another deadly and catastrophic terrorist attack such as the one we experienced on September 11, and if an attack occurs, to respond quickly and prevent further damage. 

The 180,000-plus people of the Department carry out this mission with unflinching resolve and a driving determination that such an attack should never occur on 

American soil again. Realizing that we can make no guarantees, we pursue our mission with a sense of urgency and daily diligence, so that this nation can respond 

and recover quickly, should an incident or attack occur. 
9

Since its establishment just over two years ago, DHS has made great strides in 

its efforts to unify the defense of our homeland. We have continued to integrate 22 

distinct agencies and bureaus, each with its own employees, mission and culture. 

But our security requires even greater coordination and effort throughout the Department, across all levels of government, and throughout our nation to create synergy and new capabilities. It requires an unwillingness to accept complacency as 

part of anything we do; rather, we know we must apply all effort to tear down stovepipes and coordinate key intelligence, policy, and operational issues across DHS and 

the government. 

SECOND STAGE REVIEW 

I have therefore initiated a comprehensive review of the organization, operations 

and policies of the Department as a whole. This comprehensive review will examine 

what we are doing and what we need to do without regard to component structures 

and programmatic categories. 

We want to understand better what’s working and what isn’t. We will be evaluating every element of our working mission and making sure that the Department 

is best organized to meet the threats—both current and future—that face our nation. 

Old categories, old jurisdictions, old turf will not define our objectives or the measure of our achievements because bureaucratic structures and categories exist to 

serve our mission, not to drive it. 

Deputy Secretary Michael Jackson has been charged with overseeing this process. 

The goal of the review is to help me make informed decisions as I lead the Department. Deputy Secretary Jackson has selected a team of Department officials to look 

at a number of critical cross-cutting issues and determine how departmental resources and programs can be most effectively applied to achieve our security goals. 

I have asked them to get back to me by Memorial Day with the bulk of their recommendations. I intend to study and act on their recommendations. 

What will the review cover? Take an issue such as maritime cargo security, which 

cuts across several departmental components. Customs and Border Protection, Coast 

Guard, Science and Technology, Information Analysis and Infrastructure Protection, 

and the Transportation Security Administration each address aspects of this overall 

mission. Each might perform its element well, but we must go further to ensure 

that each is performing seamlessly and in coordination with the others, that we 

eliminate any duplication of effort, and that we reap the full strength of our wide 

spectrum of capabilities. 

Of course, in executing the initial phase of putting the Department together and 

integrating the different components into a working structure, my predecessor and 

the men and women of Homeland Security did a tremendous job. They should be 

commended. 

Now, as we enter into the second phase of the Department’s life, we must also 

take a fresh, creative look at the Department itself—including its organization, its 

operations, and its policies. We are not yet fully integrated and our entities are still 

not always coordinated with each other. Now the challenge is to take the advantage 

of two years’ experience and evaluate the Department to see if there are potential 

structural and operational changes that will improve and enhance our capabilities 

to protect and safeguard this nation. 

CROSS-CUTTING FUNCTIONS AND INTEGRATION 

On the most basic level, we need to take a step back and focus on the fundamental question: Why was the Department of Homeland Security created? It was 

not created merely to bring together different agencies under a single tent. It was 

created to enable these agencies to secure the homeland through joint, coordinated 

action. Our challenge is to realize that goal to the greatest extent possible. 

Let me tell you about three areas where I plan to focus our efforts to achieve that 

goal. First, we need to operate under a common picture of the threats that we are 

facing. Second, we need to respond actively to these threats with the appropriate 

policies. Third, we need to execute our various component operations in a unified 

manner so that when we assess the intelligence and we have decided upon the proper policies, we can carry out our mission in a way that is coordinated across the 

board. 

My intent is to integrate each of these three areas-intelligence, policy, and operations—across the Department, so that each is directed from the most senior level 

of the Department. 

Let me turn to intelligence. Intelligence plays a pivotal role in mapping our mission. When the Department was created, 22 separate and distinct entities were 
10

woven together, a number of which had components focused on intelligence-gathering and analysis. One of my top priorities is to make sure that these various intelligence components function as a cohesive unit, and that our information and analysis is coordinated across the Department so that DHS, as a full member, can enhance its contribution to the Intelligence Community. 

First, we must organize and combine all intelligence within DHS. To do this effectively, we must ensure that our own intelligence components are interoperable. The 

Department has already made progress in this area. For example, the Homeland Security Operations Center was stood up to help the Department develop a common 

operating picture and facilitate information sharing. 

We must make sure that we are gathering all relevant information from the field, 

communicating with each other, and approaching analysis with a mission-oriented 

focus. We must ask, for example, whether those who evaluate the border from the 

Customs and Border Protection perspective are learning from analysts in the U.S. 

Coast Guard. They each look at border security, but from different vantage points. 

Only if they are working together can they fill in key gaps, paint a realistic picture, 

and evaluate all of the different pieces of information and intelligence that they are 

each gathering. We have to maximize the fact that all of these components now 

exist under the same umbrella. 

Second, we must make sure that information is being disseminated both up and 

down the ranks of the Department. Strong and effective coordination does not just 

mean that our analysts at DHS headquarters are working together. We need to fuse 

and exploit all the information that we learn across the country, so that when a 

Border Patrol agent in Texas learns of a new alien smuggling method, that information is fed up to our intelligence analysts, incorporated where appropriate into our 

strategy to combat smuggling, and disseminated across the Department to others 

focused on the same problem. We must build a culture in which the disparate pieces 

of information are being transmitted to our analysts so that they, who have the benefit of the fuller picture, can properly analyze all of our information and inform our 

decision-making. 

The converse must be true when our intelligence analysts learn of new 

vulnerabilities that terrorists are trying to exploit. That same agent in Texas needs 

to know, on a timely basis, of the threat and what he should be looking out for. 

We have a great many talented individuals at the Department. Some gather and 

analyze intelligence. Others learn critical information as they are in the field performing their jobs. The opportunities are endless. DHS needs to bring all of these 

nuggets of information together and disseminate them appropriately. We need to 

have the structure and the correct systems and technologies in place to take full 

advantage of them. 

Third, our focus must extend beyond the Department itself. We must review and 

make use of intelligence coming from the Intelligence Community and we must play 

an active role in providing intelligence information to the Intelligence Community. 

As the WMD Commission made clear in its report two weeks ago, sharing information across the Federal Government is critical if we are to succeed. To that end, I 

am committed to making sure that our law enforcement and intelligence partners 

across the Federal Government have appropriate access to the Department’s information and analysis, to the maximum extent possible under the law, while protecting the privacy rights and civil liberties of Americans. By the same token, we 

must sit as full partners at the table with full access to others in the Intelligence 

Community. We must work in concert with the Intelligence Community. I will work 

closely with the Director of National Intelligence, whose job it will be to make sure 

that the Intelligence Community is well-coordinated and mission-focused. 

In addition, intelligence and information from other Federal agencies is critical to 

our efforts to secure the homeland. The development of the terrorism information 

sharing environment, as called for under the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism 

Prevention Act, will connect the resources (people, systems, databases, and information) of Federal, State, and local governments, and the private sector allowing users 

to share information and improve collaboration. 

Finally, we must inform and communicate with our State, local, tribal entities, 

and private sector partners. As I observed just last week during TOPOFF, when it 

comes to securing the nation, we must ensure that these entities are well-equipped 

both to react to crisis and to prevent it. As part of this effort, we must improve our 

ability to operationalize intelligence. As information comes in, we need to make sure 

it is getting out to the right people and in a way that they can use to strengthen 

their efforts and contribute effectively to ours. Intelligence in a vacuum is meaningless. We need to explain how our outside partners can counter that threat and what 

we need them to do to watch out for it. 
11

Now, let me address policy development. Development and coordination of policy 

are major responsibilities of this Department. The Department has the central mission of securing the homeland, but there are many different aspects of that mission 

with numerous contributors. Large elements of DHS include traditional operational 

functions in which we deploy personnel, equipment, planes, ships and vehicles. But 

other elements principally involve planning and rule making, and networking with 

State, local, and tribal entities, and private parties. All of these must serve and promote our homeland security imperatives. 

Therefore, we need to further enhance our capability to think through broad and 

over-arching issues like border security, emergency preparedness, transportation security, and cargo security, with a Department-wide perspective, rather than just 

through the lenses of one particular component. We need to develop our policies by 

first looking at our missions and asking the comprehensive, result-oriented questions, rather than by looking to one particular entity that has the lead in driving 

an issue to conclusion. 

Accordingly, I believe that we should pull together the vast expertise and the 

varying perspectives already at the Department as we work toward integrating our 

many cross-cutting functions. For this reason, one of the areas that we are closely 

studying in the Second Stage Review is the advisability of creating a departmentwide, substantial policy office. This office will also be a very important focal point 

for coordinating DHS’s policy work with other Federal, State, local, and tribal entities. 

Finally, let me discuss operational coordination. Just as with intelligence and policy, we need to find new ways to increase our operational coordination. Diverse operational components were woven together when Congress stood up the Department, 

each with its own history and identity. As I have become acquainted with these various components, I have quickly learned that there is a great deal of talent within 

them. Each entity has its own unique focus, but often they address the same mission from differing perspectives. But we cannot function as a cohesive unit, unless 

each operational component works together in combination to promote common missions. 

This means that our operations must be driven by mission-oriented plans. It can 

no longer be the case that different components tackle different problems each in 

its own way and then later look to see if the pieces fit together. Whether it is preventing a potential act of terrorism, emergency preparedness, border protection, or 

countering a particular threat, we must first define the mission and second deploy 

all the tools within the Department to effectively execute each operation. 

The Department has already begun this process. To take but one example, on the 

Arizona border, we have a cross-cutting initiative to protect the border, integrating 

intelligence gathering, border enforcement, and monitoring. It encompasses the efforts of several of our agencies, including Customs and Border Protection, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Science and Technology, the Coast Guard, and Information Analysis and Infrastructure Protection. Each plays an integral role. The 

operations themselves involve patrolling the border, generating information, and 

using it to take enforcement actions. The genius of the Department of Homeland 

Security is that we have the capability within one department to do all of these 

things. But we need to carry out joint operational activities and have a joint perspective on a routine basis, not only when we stand up a special project. 

Operations are also the mechanisms by which we respond to crisis. We cannot 

wait for a crisis, however, to learn, for example, whether TSA has the capability to 

communicate effectively and coordinate with FEMA. Nor can we learn in crisis that 

both are conducting the same operations or sending different messages to the private sector. The Department has made significant progress in this area. For example, it developed the National Response Plan to more effectively map out how to 

handle crisis situations. Now is the time to organize around missions rather than 

old bureaucracies, work through all of these potential disconnects in our systems, 

and operate as one unified Department. 

But integrating ourselves cohesively is not enough. 

RISK-BASED APPROACH 

I have been saying, and you will continue to hear me say, that we need to adopt 

a risk-based approach in both our operations and our philosophy. America is dynamic. Our strength as Americans is the sum of every generation that has ever been 

born in or immigrated to this great land. Our wealth and livelihoods are advanced 

by the inspired ideas and innovation of our own people. We prosper through the vast 

opportunities that exist to interact with the global economic community. 
12

Risk management is fundamental to managing the threat, while retaining our 

quality of life and living in freedom. Risk management must guide our decisionmaking as we examine how we can best organize to prevent, respond and recover 

from an attack. We need to be realistic in our prioritization. We must assess the 

full spectrum of threats and vulnerabilities. 

We all live with a certain amount of risk. That means that we tolerate that something bad can happen; we adjust our lives based on probability; and we take reasonable precautions. 

So, too, we must manage risk at the homeland security level. That means developing plans and allocating resources in a way that balances security and freedom 

when calculating risks and implementing protections. 

The most effective way, I believe, to apply this risk-based approach is by using 

the trio of threat, vulnerability, and consequence as a general model for assessing 

risk and deciding on the protective measures we undertake. 

Here I inject a note of caution because the media and the public often focus principally on threats. Threats are important, but they should not be automatic instigators of action. A terrorist attack on the two-lane bridge down the street from my 

house is bad but has a relatively low consequence compared, to an attack on a major 

metropolitan multi-lane bridge. At the other end of the spectrum, even a remote 

threat to detonate a nuclear bomb is a high-level priority because of the catastrophic 

effect. 

Each threat must be weighed, therefore, along with consequence and 

vulnerabilities. 

As consequence increases, we respond according to the nature and credibility of 

the threat and any existing state of vulnerabilities. 

Our strategy is, in essence, to manage risk in terms of these three variables—

threat, vulnerability, consequence. We seek to prioritize according to these variables. . .to fashion a series of preventive and protective steps that increase security 

at multiple levels. 

We must examine the mission and work of all elements of DHS through this template of consequence, vulnerability and threat. Have we fully defined our missions? 

How far have we gone in carrying them out? What more needs to be done? 

The Department is already working with State, local, and private sector partners 

to further refine the Interim National Preparedness Goal to aid the targeting of resources to where the risk is greatest. There is much that we are doing. DHS agencies, for example, have provided unprecedented level of funding and resources since 

9/11 to State, local and private sector partners to protect and prepare America’s 

communities and individual citizens. We continue to improve the ways for first responders across the nation to be better equipped, better trained and more capable 

of communicating across the public safety community. But we must bring even 

greater focus and discipline to our preparedness mission. We need to take a very 

substantive look at how we align our preparedness activities and functions. We need 

to look at how best to configure our organizations, operations, programs and policies 

so that we can think strategically about preparedness. 

What should drive our intelligence, policies, operations, and preparedness plans 

and the way we are organized is the strategic matrix of threat, vulnerability and 

consequence. And so, we’ll be looking at everything through that prism and adjusting structure, operations and policies to execute this strategy. 

CONCLUSION 

Two years ago, Congress and the President took on the enormous undertaking of 

creating a new Department whose central mission would be to secure the homeland. 

Under Secretary Ridge’s leadership, the entities that now comprise the Department 

of Homeland Security unified under this overarching goal. As I have become acquainted with the many talented people of the Department, I am impressed by all 

that they have accomplished thus far. But there is no time to pat ourselves on the 

back. We must now take it to the next level. 

We must move in an expeditious and innovative manner to carry out our important mission. On September 11, 2001, we learned that the homeland is not immune 

from attack and that we must do everything within our means to keep our great 

nation safe. The Congress responded by constructing a Department dedicated to this 

mission. Together, our job is to make sure that the Department accomplishes that 

mission. As the Department initiates our second stage review, organizes around 

missions, eliminates duplications, and adopts a risk-based approach, we must identify our cross-cutting functions and ensure that we are thinking innovatively how 

to best exploit our intelligence capabilities, develop policy functions, execute our 

operational tasks, and implement our long-range preparedness planning. 
13

I thank the Congress for its support, which has been critical in bringing us to this 

point. I am grateful to be here today to talk about the work we are doing to make 

America a safer home for us, for our children and generations to come. Thank you 

for inviting me to appear before you today. I look forward to answering your questions.

Chairman COX. Thank you very much. 

And let me take this opportunity to tell you how personally 

pleased I am that President Bush asked you to do this job. I know 

that he has selected the right person for the most important task 

of management and organization in the Federal government at this 

time. 

We have a high degree of confidence in your ability to do this, 

and the second-stage review that you are going through right now 

is, in my view, a very important first step to making sure that we 

benefit from all that we have learned since 9/11 and all that we 

have learned since Congress mandated the creation of what is now 

the second largest cabinet department in terms of authorized 

spending. 

You and I have spoken in other venues, and as you mentioned, 

you delivered a speech expressly on this topic about how we might 

bring more disciplined approaches to risk management, to the 

choices that we make—policy makers here in Congress—and the 

decisions you make as the manager of that Department when it 

comes to setting priorities, to determining which threats we are 

going to protect against, and where we are going to place our 

money across America and around the world. 

One of the things that has struck me for some time is that, because of the newness of this task, we are not yet accustomed to 

making tradeoffs of any kind, so that if someone points out that 

terrorists might do this, or that this many people would die if terrorists were to choose this site or this method of attack, there 

seems to be a reflexive response to go after that, the, if you will, 

‘‘seize the pants’’ approach to risk management. 

Congress, in my view, is much more guilty of this than is the Department, because we are in the job of earmarking things sometimes, and we just indulge our collective priorities in this way. We 

need to discipline ourselves in Congress, and we need to help you 

as we authorize and send you money to maintain discipline in the 

Department. 

Forty thousand Americans, innocent Americans are going to die 

this year here at home, in the continental United States in car accidents. This is a risk that we knowingly take. It is a cost that we 

knowingly bear. The Federal government will spend this year 

about $600 million to mitigate that risk on highway safety programs, but it has taken us a century to internalize this risk management approach with the automobile. 

We know that the best way to reduce that risk to zero would be 

to stop driving or stop being passengers in cars or stop using crosswalks. We do not do that because life has to proceed, and there are 

tradeoffs involved. 

There are tradeoffs also involved, as we put our economy on the 

block, send a lot of its resources to preparations for terrorist attack, 

towards intelligence to warn us of terrorist attack, and so on. We 

have to find the right balance. We need to find which terrorist 

threats are the most consequential, which are the most likely, and 
14

where are our greatest vulnerabilities, and in a much more systematic fashion put that all together. 

As you conduct this second-stage review, what are the opportunities that you see for doing this within the Department? What are 

the big picture approaches that you are going to take to head in 

that direction? And then what, in terms of specific resources that 

you might need to accomplish this task, do you want assistance 

from Congress on in order to help move us in that direction? 

Mr. CHERTOFF. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman, for asking me 

that question, because I think it really goes to the heart of what 

we are trying to do here. 

I think we have a couple of opportunities, broadly speaking. First 

of all, we are going to undertake the process of looking at our objectives in terms of these three issues: consequence, vulnerability, and 

threat. 

For example, take the issue of cargo. Cargo security is the issue 

that falls within the responsibility of a number of components of 

the Department, but what I am interested in seeing is if we look 

across the board at how we deal with the issue of cargo security 

and efficient movement of cargo, which are two important goals, I 

want to look at it across the board, and I want to look at it without 

thinking about what the components have responsibility for. I want 

to see it in terms of the outcome of a secure but efficient cargo 

transmission system. Where are we doing a good job in promoting 

that, where are we not doing a good job and then plugging the 

gaps. 

And we are going to apply that template across the board to 

things like how do we keep bad people out of the country, how do 

we better service people who want to come into the country and become productive members of America by getting citizenship? How 

do we deal with the issue of airline security in a way that properly 

focuses on the priority risks in a way that allows people to enjoy 

air travel without having it become so cumbersome and difficult 

that they actually choose other forms of transportation? So this is 

the approach we want to take across the board in terms of what 

we are doing. 

In terms of how we actually analytically start to measure these 

things, one of the questions I have asked is how do other parts of 

the government, what kind of analytical tools do they use in measuring risk, what does the private sector use in measuring risk? 

People do this all the time. As you point out, each of us does this 

in our own life when we decide whether we want to get in a car 

and go to the movies, and we trade off the risk of getting into an 

accident against the benefit of the movie. 

But, actually, government and private industry do this all the 

time too, and they have a variety of tools for doing so. So as we 

are developing and refining our analytical tools, I am asking people 

to be looking at other departments and get expertise from their experience. The EPA has certain analytical tools they use, DOD has 

certain tools and practices they use, and try to, again, use the benefit of all of this experience to help us sharpen our own ability. 

And I think we are—one example of this is the preparedness 

goals which we issued, I think, in the last couple of weeks are an 

effort to start to really identify capabilities that responders need in 
15

a variety of different scenarios so that we can then start to be quite 

specific about what kind of equipment should they be looking for, 

what kind of training should they be needing, and that would be 

the kind of tool one could use, again, bearing in mind potential consequences and vulnerabilities and threats so that when we advise 

people about what to do and we talk to government entities about 

the kinds of steps they ought to take, we can do it with a very specific and disciplined approach. 

How can Congress help? I think it may emerge, and of course we 

are still waiting for the results the recommendations that I hear 

that there are some structural changes that would be efficient, that 

might help us comprehensively operate the Department more readily and at the same time might flatten some of the bureaucratic 

structures, so that we would have the benefit of both coordination 

and yet a more nimble ability to manage. And I think as we develop this review and get a better sense of what we need to do, we 

may be asking Congress for some assistance in that regard. 

Chairman COX. Thank you. My time has expired. 

The gentleman from Mississippi, Mr. Thompson, is recognized. 

Mr. THOMPSON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Appreciate your testimony, Mr. Secretary. You have indicated 

that you have undertaken this second-stage review in a number of 

things, but let me call a situation to your attention that causes concern for a lot of us. 

You had three directors at TSA in 3 years. You have no head of 

the Border and Transportation Security Directorate. You are missing the entire leadership of the Infrastructure Analysis and Infrastructure Protection Directorate, you have no Cybersecurity Director and you are about to lose your Chief Information Officer, your 

Director of Citizenship and Information Services, and your head of 

ICE. 

That is a significant challenge for you, and I would just like to 

hear how you propose to close that gap and give us some confidence 

that we can get some people who will stay on the job long enough 

to finish it. 

Mr. CHERTOFF. Well, of course it is a concern to me to make sure 

we have a good leadership structure in the Department, and it is 

not unusual after people serve a number of years in office for people to move on. In some cases, we have had more rapid turnover 

than in other cases. 

I can say, for example, with respect to infrastructure protection, 

I think the President announced last week his intention to appoint 

someone to that position who has been a very significant member 

of the Department, Bob Stephan, so that is a position that we are 

moving to fill. I now have a Deputy in place, there has been a General Counsel nominated, and with respect to a number of these 

other positions, we are moving rapidly, working to find the right 

person for the job. 

I mean, there is an opportunity here as well to draw creative energy and fresh perspective to the job that we have not had. And 

so while it is, in some sense, a burden to fill the turnover, there 

is an opportunity we intend to exploit to get very good people into 

the Department to bring a lot of energy and creativity to the task 

we have to do. 
16

Mr. THOMPSON. One other question, and I would hope that my 

comments earlier about diversity as you select the leadership in 

homeland security, that it is one of the considerations that you 

would look at. I think it is important that diversity is taken into 

consideration. 

With respect to the infrastructure protection and national infrastructure risk analysis, we have information that there is an inordinate amount of contractors and detailees in the Department and 

not enough people who are actually employees of the Department 

of Homeland Security. If that is the case, how do you propose to 

consolidate this Department so that those individuals become employees of the Department of Homeland Security? 

Mr. CHERTOFF. Well, as I sit here, I cannot tell you that I have 

a clear picture in my mind of where we have a lot of contractors. 

I know traditionally it is not uncommon, particularly in standing 

up a department and trying to get people with the skill set in, to 

have contractors. But I would like our Department to develop an 

internal structure for career development that would make, first of 

all, a very attractive place to work and to recruit and also build 

within the Department a spirit of opportunity for advancement and 

for education and for improvement that would, again inspire our 

workforce to do a good job. 

I mean, one of the things that interests me in terms of building 

a single department is developing within the career path for people 

who work in the Department an advantage in cross pollination, 

moving out of their particular agency and perhaps working at a 

joint coordinating function or a department-level function, much 

the same reason the military does to some extent. They encourage 

their officers to spend some time in a joint planning or operations 

function as a career development element, and that has the benefit 

of giving people a little bit of a perspective of other parts of the Department. 

So one of the things I am looking forward to doing is working 

with the employees to see if there are ways we can use the career 

advancement process to bind us together as a unitary organism. 

Mr. THOMPSON. Last question, Mr. Secretary: We have had some 

security breaches with the staff at companies like ChoicePoint, 

Lexus Nexus. Have you directed your department to look at that 

as a potential risk for us to be concerned about? 

Mr. CHERTOFF. Well, of course, as you may know, Secret Service 

obviously has an investigative responsibility and shares it with the 

FBI in this particular area. The area of identity theft is a very serious area that we are concerned about from a number of different 

standpoints. I mean, obviously, from a cybersecurity standpoint, we 

are concerned about hackers. That is one kind of threat. 

My understanding, at least in the ChoicePoint, is it was not so 

much a hacker as it was their internal decision to sell some of their 

product to somebody who turned out to be different than who they 

expected. And whether that is something that is corrected investigatively or in some regulatory reform, I do not know that I am 

prepared to say at this point. 

But I do agree that the issue of identity theft and identity use 

is not something we are very carefully focused on in terms of a 

whole range of issues that we consider in the Department, includ-
17

ing things like screening for identity, and that brings us to the 

issue of biometrics, which of course is one way to deal with this 

kind of problem. 

Mr. THOMPSON. Thank you. 

Chairman COX. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

I would advise members that under our committee rules, members will be recognized for questions in order of seniority present 

at the time of the fall of the gavel. For members who arrive later, 

they will be recognized in order of appearance. 

The Chair now recognizes the gentleman from Connecticut, Mr. 

Simmons. 

Mr. SIMMONS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Thank you, Mr. Secretary, for your testimony. I was very pleased 

to see in your testimony that you laid out three priority areas—intelligence, policy and operations—and spent much of your testimony dealing with the area of intelligence. 

It is my honor to be now serving as the chairman of the Intelligence Subcommittee with my colleague from California, and I believe that the fundamental obligation of the Department of Homeland Security is to protect our homeland, to protect our citizens and 

our people from attack and the greatest investment that we can 

make is in intelligence so that we can detect, deter, defend, disrupt 

or mitigate any such attacks and that while we must prepare, as 

we have in the TOPOFF exercise, for a failure of that system, that 

it is most important to put our money up-front and put it into intelligence. 

In saying that, I am aware of the fact that the 9/11 Commission 

report and the recent Robb report have laid out serious failures of 

the U.S. intelligence community. I am aware of the fact that your 

organization is relying, in many respects, on information collected 

by that intelligence community, that that intelligence community 

has relied on secret systems of collection, which do not necessarily 

lend themselves to domestic activities here in the United States, 

because we value our civil liberties, we value our civil rights, our 

Fourth Amendment rights to privacy. 

And so my question to you would be to what extent have you 

looked at open sources of intelligence to feed your information analysis system? To what extent do you believe the intelligence community is actually sharing information with you? And I can tell you 

as a former CIO, there is a culture against sharing, we all know 

that, that is the way it goes. To what extent are your requirements 

being given priority in the intelligence cycle, by the intelligence 

community? And, finally, do you feel that the Department of Homeland Security is sitting at the table? In other words, do you have 

a representative, for example, on the President’s Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board or other similar boards at this point in 

time. 

Mr. CHERTOFF. Congressman, I am delighted to answer those 

questions, and I think I have tried to keep track. If I miss one, 

come back and remind me. 

Taking them in turn, I think you have put your finger on something very important when you talk about open source intelligence. 

My observation has been oftentimes people think of intelligence as 

by definition something that is only done with spies or super secret 
18

satellites. And in fact intelligence is often the accumulation of individual facts which may be right out in the open. 

One of the things I am doing internally at the Department, and 

we have talked to the intelligence people about, is recognizing the 

importance of the thousands of interactions that occur at the border, on airplanes, and through ICE every day that yield important 

information. 

In fact, hypothetically, we find that people with a particular connection to a terrorist group that turn up on our watch lists are 

seeking to cross the border in a lot of different places at the same 

time. An individual officer might not necessarily see the significance of a single interaction, but if we can collect all that and we 

can bring it up, that is going to tell us something very important. 

So we are going to work very hard, and this is one of my priorities, to strengthen internally our collection system to develop a 

system which I think is similar to what the Bureau is putting into 

effect of making sure we are getting good reporting in the field that 

we can then bring up and fuse together in order to maximize what 

we do internally through what is either open source of just kind of 

fairly routine intelligence collection. 

Second, we need to be able to contribute that to the intelligence 

community because that is sitting at the table. I think generally 

my experience with organizations is your value as a partner is directly proportional to your contribution as a partner. So we need 

to complete this function so we can contribute. 

But at the same time, as you point out, we need to be full partners at the table, because we have a need for intelligence and a use 

for intelligence that no other department of the government has, 

because we have to take it and apply it directly to homeland security functions: how we handle our border, how we adjust our internal investigations with respect to people who are coming in illegally, how we structure ourselves in terms of what we prioritize for 

protection purposes. 

So we need to force from that large pool of information that the 

community has those items that are of interest to us. And I have 

spoken to others in the community about the importance of doing 

that. We obviously have—the President has nominated Ambassador Negroponte as DNI. I am very hopeful that the restructuring 

of the intelligence community and the addition of Ambassador 

Negroponte and General Hayden, if they are confirmed, will be a 

great opportunity for us to participate in the community at large. 

Finally, with respect to the issue of requirements, I certainly 

have made an effort in my 2 months here to make it very clear that 

our requirements ought to be treated significantly in terms of gathering information, and so far, again, in the brief time I have been 

here, I have seen a positive response from the intelligence community. But it is certainly something that I will be paying a good deal 

of attention to and will be insistent upon because we need it to do 

our job. 

Chairman COX. The gentleman’s time is expired. 

The gentlelady from California, Ms. Sanchez? 

Ms. SANCHEZ. Thank you, Chairman Cox. 

And thank you, Mr. Secretary, for being before us today, and 

good luck. 
19

Mr. CHERTOFF. Thank you. 

Ms. SANCHEZ. As you know, one of the challenges of securing 

critical infrastructure is that the majority of it is owned by private 

companies. And in addition to making incentives for them, I think 

that we probably have to set a minimum set of standards, or at 

least that is what I have heard from private companies, some sort 

of standard so that all the companies in a sector are doing the 

same thing or meeting the standards that we have. 

And while numerous DHS agencies like the Coast Guard and 

TSA and Customs and Border Protection have regulatory authority, 

the Infrastructure Protection Division does not. Do you believe that 

it should have so that if we need industries to comply with standards that we set that they should have that? And if so, is that able 

to do regulatory work at this point? 

Mr. CHERTOFF. Well, I think that obviously, as you point out, 

there are an array of things we can do to get private business to 

do what needs to be done for security and, again, balancing that 

with respect to the need to actually carry out their jobs. I mean, 

I think we always have to be mindful of the fact that we do not—

I can guarantee perfect security at the port, for example, if I shut 

the port down. That would be self-defeating. 

So I think the first thing is to make sure that the private sector 

understands that we have an identity of interest here. I mean, people who put a big investment in their business do not want to see 

it go up in smoke or do not want to see themselves losing customers because there is a problem. 

So the first thing we have got to do is we have got to educate 

them to that. We have got to give them standards and best practices that will enable them to make their choices wisely about how 

in fact they do protect themselves. We have to use market-based 

incentives when we can, including working with the insurance community. 

I can tell you from the Y2K experience we had a few years ago 

that we can get the private sector to be quite sensitive to the need 

to secure things if we work with the insurance community and we 

work with the marketplace to building incentives. 

Now, there are going to be some instances where that is not 

going to be enough, and I know, for example, in the area of chemical plants, the President has indicated that if we could not get 

what we need in terms of security using these various kinds of 

market-based incentives and best practices, that we would look to 

the possibility of some kind of regulation in order to make sure we 

get to where we need to get. 

So I think these are all tools we have to have available to us. 

The idea is to try to work with the interest of the private sector, 

which I think is identical to ours, where we can. 

Ms. SANCHEZ. I understand that, Mr. Secretary. I am just telling 

you that when I have spoken to private sector companies, their big 

pitch is, ‘‘Look, we would like to, it is going to cost money, we need 

a set of standards, we need to know what you think should do in 

conjunction, obviously, planning with them.’’ But, more importantly, they are concerned that their competitors will not be required to do the same thing that they would like to do but will cost 

money. So, again, the question is, can this agency take on the re-
20

sponsibility of being a regulatory agency if that is what we deem 

in the Congress, in conjunction with the administration? 

Mr. CHERTOFF. Well, we certainly do have some regulatory authorities, and as I indicated in the area of the chemical plants, 

there are obviously some times when you need to regulate in order 

to prevent people from free riding, basically, and relying on others 

to enhance security and not doing it themselves. But, as I said, we 

want to be judicious about it. 

I think there is a lot we can do. We clearly have to set good 

standards, and we have to let people know what works and what 

does not work, and that is part of what we are trying to do right 

now. 

Ms. SANCHEZ. I had a second question because I sent you a letter 

with respect to the TIP grant and it looks to me like you are eliminating existing port, rail and transit security grants under the 

Urban Area Security Initiative and putting them all together. 

On March 9, before the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee, you testified that you thought in general 

every type of transportation presents its own issues, and I agree 

with that statement, and that is why I feel it is unwise, and I sent 

you a letter signed by some of the members of this committee, for 

the Department—I think it is unwise for the Department to force 

all of the transportation sectors to compete against one another for 

that funding. 

I am also concerned that the program will not work without a 

completed national threat assessment, national infrastructure protection plan and national asset database to help us all decide how 

to prioritize funding. And of course the budget only has $600 million. It is nowhere close to meeting the needs. 

Could you comment on that? 

Mr. CHERTOFF. Sure. I mean, clearly—well, let me begin by saying, I think, in general, the idea of allowing a broader category of 

infrastructure to be measured makes sense in terms of risk management. It is true that they present peculiar issues and different 

issues, but at the end of the day there are certain commonalities 

that we have to be concerned about, going back to what we originally talked about: consequence, vulnerability and threat. 

And in allocating money and in taking account of these three 

characteristics, you know it is going to differ depending on where 

you are in the country. In some parts of the country, rail service 

is a huge part of what moves people back and forth. In other parts 

of the country, it is less significant in terms of its impact on population. Likewise, the way air or bridges are configured and how 

they would be measured from an infrastructure protection standpoint might differ. 

So the ability to look at all of them together I think makes sense 

if we are going to be risk-based. But you are also correct that we 

then have to be pretty specific about the kinds of characteristics we 

are going to look at. And I think we are moving down that path, 

although we are not there yet. 

We have, I think, each year that we have been involved with 

grants gotten more refined about the kinds of things we look at 

that enter into our formula for grant making. We are developing 

better and more refined tools for analyzing consequences, what the 
21

relative significance of consequences are, what the vulnerabilities 

are and what the threats are, so that these common principles, I 

think, as we get more information, we get more sophisticated analytical tools will in fact be the way in which we operate an infrastructure protection program in the most intelligent way possible. 

Ms. SANCHEZ. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

I guess I would just say it is difficult for me to know which is 

more risky, ports or rail, transit or buses, and I do not think anybody here can answer that. And we have been waiting a long time 

to get some more information on the infrastructure protection plan 

and its assessment through threat-based threats and vulnerability. 

And I think the chairman talked quite a bit about this. And I am 

hoping that you will spearhead that and get that done for us so we 

can do our job up here. 

Mr. CHERTOFF. I will. 

Chairman COX. The gentlelady’s time has expired. 

The gentleman from Washington, Mr. Reichert? 

Mr. REICHERT. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Good to see you again, sir. 

Mr. CHERTOFF. Good to see you. 

Mr. REICHERT. Just a couple of quick things. First of all, I think 

we need to pause for just a second and as I was reading through 

the first page of your comments, ‘‘Ours is a difficult mission to prevent another deadly, catastrophic terrorist attack.’’ Stop and think 

about that. 

I mean, our world has changed tremendously. You have only 

been in this job 2 months. This is your mission: Protect the country, the United States of America. You have 180,000 employees to 

do that with. Not only is it your mission to protect this country 

from another attack, but then you also have a mission to assure 

that we can respond and recover quickly to the huge task ahead 

of you. I hope that we can help you in your task, as you mentioned 

earlier in some of your comments. 

I agree intelligence really is where we need to focus our efforts 

and our attention. Intelligence is where we will be able to assess 

risk, gather intelligence, analyze intelligence, investigate those 

leads that intelligence offers us, and once we have assessed risk 

then we can allow and understand—we can allow our resources to 

be placed in those areas where those risks are identified. 

We do that every day in the sheriff’s office. As you know, I used 

to work for the sheriff’s office in Seattle and you assess risks and 

have to analyze where to put your resources every day. One of the 

things that really is important, though, as you go through that 

whole exercise and process of gathering intelligence, analyzing intelligence and assessing risk, and then assigning resources, is accountability. 

And my question is, as the money is allocated, for example, in 

the State of Washington $234 million have been allocated to the 

State of Washington, $60 million alone to Seattle–Tacoma area in 

the Northwest, only 27 percent of that money has been spent thus 

far. And as we know, as we watch ‘‘60 Minutes’’ and some other 

reports come out, some of those monies are not being spent in a 

wise way. What is your plan for holding not only your people internally accountable to do their job but how do we hold those other 
22

agencies, those local agencies accountable to use the funding that 

has been allocated to them? 

Mr. CHERTOFF. Well, I think this is obviously a very important 

issue for us. We issued in the last couple weeks interim national 

preparedness goals, which basically set forth 10 tasks and I think 

38 capabilities, which cover the range of things we think that state 

and local governments need to be able to be prepared to do in the 

event of any number of scenarios that might occur. In fact, I think 

you got a lot of publicity because in building those capabilities we 

essentially imagined a bunch of scenarios that were pretty grim 

and then used those as ways of identifying the kinds of things you 

would need to be able to do if something like that happened. 

Underneath that one document is a series of templates, and each 

of those capabilities that is really quite specific about what kinds 

of things one needs to be able to do, and they take account of the 

differences between the requirements of a city of New York, let’s 

say, and a rural community. 

For example, in a city we might say you need to be able to get 

hazardous material personnel to a place within a certain period of 

time. In a rural community, it might be a longer period of time. 

And because it is capabilities-based, it is designed to allow state 

and local governments to find different ways to achieve the capability as long as they get there. 

Again, we are not completely through this process yet, but as we 

find this process, this is going to be a great tool for us, not only 

to give guidance but to give accountability. 

If I can just take one minute to talk about our state and local 

partners. I want to be fair to them in this, because sometimes they 

do get an unfair rap. First of all, we have to distinguish between 

monies that are actually spent and money that is obligated. We all 

know as a common sense matter that when a grant is awarded 

what a state and local government is going to do is to go out and 

find the stuff they need that they are going to pay for. They do not 

obviously draw down on the money until they get the material. In 

fact, if they were to spend the money immediately before they got 

the product, we would be criticizing them for being wasteful and 

foolish. 

So I think what is important to look at is what is obligated, and 

I think when I looked at it yesterday, I think approximately 96 percent of the funds that have been granted up through 2004 have 

been obligated, which I think is a very good number. 

Second, even with respect to some of the stories about people in 

small communities buying HazMat trucks or things of that sort, obviously we are always going to find examples of waste or maybe 

misspent resources, but I also want to be fair. Sometimes what we 

have encouraged communities to do is to pool resources. We might 

say to a town, ‘‘Look, you buy something with the understanding 

that it is going to cover the whole region and it is going to be available to everybody.’’

And so when they do that, I think it is a little unfair when the 

press goes out and hunts them and says, ‘‘Well, here is a shining 

new HazMat truck in the town of X,’’ without bothering to tell you 

that X covers really five counties, and that is what the deal is. 
23

So we want to be disciplined with them. We think the preparedness documents are going to help them, but we also want to be fair 

to them. 

Mr. REICHERT. Well, I am glad you touched on the regional issue. 

That was going to be my next question, and that is I think important. 

Just one last comment. Having been a part of a large sheriff’s office, the sheriff of the largest sheriff’s office in the State of Washington and working with the COPS office and the grant process 

there, the COPS office Director, Carl Peed, has a great process in 

place for holding police departments and local agencies accountable. It might be worth taking a look at the process that they already have used for a number of years. 

Mr. CHERTOFF. That is a good suggestion. I will do that. 

Mr. REICHERT. Thank you. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman COX. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

The gentleman from Washington, Mr. Dicks? 

Mr. DICKS. Thank you, Mr. Secretary. I want to welcome you and 

congratulate you on being confirmed by the Senate. 

One of the issues I am concerned about is container security. A 

couple years ago there was a lockout of the long shoremen on the 

west coast of the United States, and within 5 days companies all 

over the country were yelling and screaming about not being able 

to get goods. And so I am worried that we have to take this container security issue seriously. I think in any risk analysis it has 

got to be up there near the top of our concerns. 

Now, recently, 29 Chinese nationals were discovered at the Port 

of Los Angeles. These men lived inside a container filled with machinery parts for 2 weeks, and DHS officials had no idea that migrants were in the container until it arrived in the U.S. This is disturbing but not surprising given the millions of containers arriving 

in the United States without being screened or inspected. 

This event occurred despite the fact that there is a 24-hour rule, 

a national targeting center to assess the risk of a container before 

it is shipped to the U.S. and the fact that we have Customs inspectors stations overseas as part of the CSI Program, including at the 

Port of Hong Kong where the container transited. 

If 29 humans can be smuggled inside a container full of legitimate goods, can we be sure that our current strategy will prevent 

a dirty bomb or worse, a weapon of mass destruction from entering 

our country through one of our west coast ports or the Port of New 

York? And this is one area that—this and port security are areas 

of concern that I have in my region. 

Mr. CHERTOFF. Well, actually, that story bothered me a lot when 

I read it too. And to make it worse, right before I was confirmed 

there was a similar story involving the Port of Los Angeles and so 

I asked a question about this. So needless to say, I was disturbed 

and it is something we are examining and also there are some elements of this that are classified that we can give a classified briefing on later. 

Let me just make a couple points. My understanding is that the 

containers in question at the time that the migrants were discovered were still in the pre-inspection area of the port, meaning they 
24

had not yet come to the part of the port where they would be inspected. So you should not assume that they would not have been 

inspected. They might well have been inspected before they came 

into the rest of the port and were then sent out in the other parts 

of the country. So that does not necessarily mean there is a failure 

of our screening process. It is kind of a geographic issue. 

That does get to your second point, which is container security 

initiatives, can we do more of this overseas, and the answer is that 

is a great example of why we ought to pursue this initiative further. We do it in some ports, we do not do it in every port. Ideally, 

if we could do it in more ports, we could instead of finding the people in the pre-inspection area of whatever port we have in this 

country, we would find them in the port overseas. 

Third, my instruction when I see something like this is, look, we 

have got to go and track back to the shipping company, the container company and find out what is the problem from their end. 

If it is a single failure of security and they can tighten it up, maybe 

we then address that. 

Mr. DICKS. I think there is a role for technology here too. There 

has got to be some way, and we did this at the Port of Tacoma 

many years ago, where we would run these containers through a 

sensor on both sides and if there was something radiological or 

there was something of concern, it could detect it without having 

to inspect it. 

The other thing I think we ought to do is what the military has 

been doing for quite a while now and that is having a sensor and 

a lock on these containers so that, one, we know where the containers are, and, two, we know what is in it and whether it has 

been tampered with. 

Mr. CHERTOFF. Well, I think that is exactly right. We have been 

deploying radiological detectors in land ports and sea ports. That 

is a very important program. As we have indicated, I think today 

we have sent up an 872 notice indicating that we are going to 

stand up a domestic nuclear detection office which is going to be 

an interagency office, the function of which is going to be to move 

further on the technology for detecting radiological devices. 

So absolutely correct. Again, I mean, part of our strategy has to 

be these non-invasive detection devices as well as other technological issues. We are going to look comprehensively at the issue 

of cargo. I think I mentioned that at the outset, but I wanted to 

tell you on this particular issue of the migrants, it annoyed me too. 

I have asked questions. I mean, in fairness, it was in the pre-inspection part of the port, but I think it is a cautionary tale to us 

about what we need to do here. 

Mr. DICKS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman COX. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

Before I recognize Mr. Dent from Pennsylvania, the committee 

inquired of the Department about a week ago, and we are still 

waiting for an answer, whether in this human smuggling incident 

the shipping company was a C–TPAT member, and if so, whether 

it received a lower score and was not inspected for that reason. If 

you could get back to the committee, that would be very much appreciated. 

Mr. CHERTOFF. We will. 
25

Chairman COX. Mr. Dent? 

Mr. DENT. Thanks, Mr. Chairman. 

Good afternoon, Mr. Secretary. You were talking about threat 

vulnerability and consequence or criticality. How do you in the Department go about determining the relative importance of these 

critical infrastructures when you are looking at a nuclear plant 

versus a bridge or some kind of maybe telecommunications infrastructure? How do you go about that? 

Mr. CHERTOFF. That is not the easiest thing in the world to do. 

We have used a variety of different analytical tools to look at the 

question of consequence. You obviously look at possible direct loss 

to human life. You look at economic consequences. What would 

blowing out a particular power grid do to the economy? You might 

look at other kinds of consequences that are indirect consequences 

in terms of illness or things of that sort. 

To some degree, at some level, there is an element of kind of art 

rather than science in making the judgments, but I do think they 

are at least reasonable and I think analytically sound judgments 

that we make. And, again, because we are not just looking at consequences, we are also looking at vulnerability and threat, no one 

issue where there might be a disagreement is going to be necessarily dispositive. I mean, it is going to be a factor but there will 

be a number of factors. So that I think although someone could disagree at the margins, I think, in general, broadly speaking, it is a 

pretty sensible way of making a determination. 

Mr. DENT. More specifically, if you have something that might be 

considered not very vulnerable but of high consequence, maybe like 

a nuclear plant, how do you make those determinations? I mean, 

when you have vulnerability is low but consequence is high, how 

do you balance those? 

Mr. CHERTOFF. There are actually formulas that you can apply 

to that, and without getting into things again which I think are 

maybe somewhat classified, what I will say is I think it is intuitively obvious. Consequence is really a big driver in this in the 

sense that a cataclysmic consequence is one which you pay a lot of 

attention to even if there was comparatively low vulnerability. 

Whereas something, on the contrary, with very little consequence 

you do not care about. Like the footbridge down the road from my 

house I am not going to waste any time on even if it is very vulnerable. So consequence is a big part of that. 

Mr. DENT. Thank you. 

Chairman COX. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

The gentlelady from California, Ms. Harman? 

Ms. HARMAN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And welcome, Mr. Secretary. Count me as a big fan, because I 

think that this notion you have of getting your hands around the 

whole problem and attacking it with a strategy is exactly right. We 

will never succeed with the squeaky wheel theory of homeland security. 

Let me make a couple points. First of all, we are all aware of 

substantial turnover at your department. In that regard, it pleases 

me to see Pam Turner behind you. She is excellent. I hope you are 

staying, Pam. Good. She has been excellent. 
26

As you may know, I served on the Commission on Terrorism, 

which predicted in 2000 a major attack on U.S. soil. I actually 

hosted an event in my district in August of 2001 with the question, 

are we ready? And, clearly in September of 2001, we were not. And 

I would say we are still not ready. The key to getting ready is to 

have a strategy. 

The goal of the Homeland Security Department was not to rearrange the deck chairs but to create one deck, one common, national 

integrated strategy, and I think, if I am hearing you right, that 

your focus on intelligence policy and operations is directed precisely 

to that; am I right? 

Mr. CHERTOFF. That is correct, yes. 

Ms. HARMAN. And I just applaud you for doing that. We cannot 

protect everything equally, and we should not, but this risk analysis applied to everything in some organized way will lead us to 

protect what we must, and, boy, must we protect many things like 

our ports better than we are. 

I represent the communities around the Port of Los Angeles. I 

hope you will visit them soon. There have been two incidents, as 

you point out, where human beings have exited containers at the 

port. In one case, I know, the bill of lading said the contents of that 

container were clothing, and it missed all the screens and just an 

astute crane operator happened to notice people getting out of the 

container and called the police. And, fortunately, we had eyes and 

ears at the port and maybe or maybe not they would have been 

picked up. They were human smuggling rings, they were not terrorist cells, but there were more people in each container than attacked us on 9/11. So it is a very, very serious problem. 

I want to ask you about two things. One of them is not intelligence. I think you have the right fix on intelligence, and if I can 

be helpful, please call on me. But there are two big problems that 

I do not think have been mentioned today, and I just hope they are 

on your screen. One is interoperable communications. Congressman 

Curt Weldon and I have for years been trying to require that Congress keep its promise to make some analog spectrum available for 

interoperable communications by the end of next year. That is a 

tough sell. 

The broadcasting industry opposes us, but, boy, do we need that. 

Just in Los Angeles County alone, the largest county on the planet, 

all we can manage at the moment are bridging technologies, trucks 

that carry frequency integrators on them so that you can plug in 

at the site. That is just not near good enough, not for LA and not 

for the country. So please put that on your screen. 

The other one is our broken threat warning system. I think the 

color-coded approach was a good try but I joked at one point and 

Tom Ridge did find it funny that he sounded more like an interior 

decorator talking about what we could do with yellow than he 

sounded like someone who earned the confidence of the country to 

talk to people and first responders about threats. So I hope you will 

figure this out. 

That is a primary mission of yours, your Department. That is not 

resident in any other department, and I do not think the DNI is 

going to be the threat warner. So I would urge you, as might light 

turns to red, to get on top of that as quickly as possible. 
27

Mr. CHERTOFF. Well, speaking of interior decorating, as you mentioned it, I was trying to figure out what the heck you could do 

with orange in interior decorating. 

[Laughter.] 

I think both those are serious issues. Both of them are things 

which we do have as part of our second-stage review, and I think 

we have to—particularly with respect to the warning system, there 

are a lot of things that are geared to that system. We have to figure out whether we have come to a point where we need to make 

some adjustments with it. We have now a little bit more experience 

about what is useful and what is not useful, and it is a good time 

to take a second look. 

Ms. HARMAN. Thank you. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman COX. The gentlelady’s time has expired. 

The gentleman from Pennsylvania, Mr. Weldon? 

Mr. WELDON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Thank you, Mr. Secretary, for being here. 

Mr. Secretary, if there is some pessimism coming out of this 

hearing today, you have to understand the mindset that comes 

from the members on the committee. I agree with you totally on 

the intelligence aspect of preparing for protection of our homeland, 

but it was the Congress back as far as the summer of 1999 that 

proposed creating a national collaborative center, we called it the 

NOAH, National Operations Analysis Hub, which would have 

brought together all 33 classified systems managed by 16 agencies. 

In November of 1999, the FBI and the CIA said, ‘‘We do not need 

that.’’ It took us until January of 2003 in the State of the Union 

speech for the President to announce the TTIC. The TTIC is exactly what the Congress proposed 4 years earlier. 

The Congress has cried since 1995 to deal with what the 

gentlelady referred to and that is interoperable communications. 

That is when the Public Safety Wireless Advisory Committee came 

out and said, ‘‘We have to set aside 20 megahertz for public safety.’’ 

This is 2005. We still have not done that. And all across the country when you meet with first responders, as you did last week, and 

we thank you for coming to the dinner, their number one problem 

is they cannot talk to each other. 

When I went to the Trade Center in 1993 and talked to the fire 

commissioner, he said the same thing that the fire commissioner 

said in 2001, ‘‘We cannot talk to each other.’’ So the frustration 

here is that the agencies just still are not getting it, and we talked 

to Secretary Ridge about this repeatedly. 

The issue of technology transfer, I happen to serve as vice chairman of both this committee and the Armed Services Committee. It 

is frustrating to me to see us spend billions of dollars on technology 

that the first responder ought to have but for some reason we cannot get it to them. When I was at Loma Prieta Earthquake walking 

with the freeway with the fire chiefs of Oakland and San Francisco, 

they were looking for people in the freeway with dogs. I said, ‘‘Why 

aren’t you using thermal imagers?’’ They said, ‘‘What are thermal 

imagers?’’ That was 12 years ago. 

The Navy had produced that technology 5 or 10 years before 

that. We do not use the technology well, and if you could use and 
28

perhaps establish an enhanced effort to integrate the technology 

transfer between DOD as opposed to reinventing that. We are 

spending a lot of money on UAVs. UAVs are going to become very 

important for homeland security as well as other transmission and 

other related technology. 

In terms of private interface, I would hope that the agency has 

done or would do an assessment of all the stakeholders. I spoke 

this morning to ASIS. ASIS, as you know, has 33,000 members. It 

is the largest private sector representation of the private security 

leaders of our Fortune 1000 companies. They do not have a direct 

relationship yet to the agency. I asked them if they would. They 

said, ‘‘Absolutely.’’

And, Mr. Chairman, they have offered to establish a consulting 

role with this committee to provide the ongoing interface with the 

private sector. 

And when you look at threats like—in my opinion, the number 

one threat to our security from the broad standpoint, which is not 

being addressed, is the threat of an EMP laydown, a terrorist country getting the capability of a low-yield nuclear weapon, launching 

it over our shore, detonating it, and then you basically fry all the 

electronic components and you dumb-down the entire country. We 

are not prepared for that. 

In fact, up until 2 years ago when Congress mandated the establishment of the EMP Commission, the military did not want to 

hear about it. That is a homeland security threat that we have got 

to interface with the private sector on. So I hope you would see 

that as a priority for you. 

And, finally, you referred to the people that are doing the first 

responding, and I appreciate your sensitivity to them, because, as 

you know, 85 percent of them on the fire and EMS side are volunteers, and many of them are not part of government. They are 

parts of 501(c)(3)s; they operate on their own. They have bought 

with their own money, through chicken dinners and tag days, to 

buy their equipment. We need to be sensitive to keep that base in 

place, because if the federal government ever tried to replace that, 

it would bankrupt the nation. 

And simple things like the—and you just came from the Justice 

Department. The Justice Department ruling that says that a firefighter under 18 is really not a firefighter. The federal government 

has never defined what a firefighter is, but all of a sudden after 

25 years of the Public Safety Officer Death Benefit Program, one 

person in DOJ decides that a 17-year-old firefighter is not a volunteer firefighter. Well, that is outrageous. The states determine criteria in line with their local departments. 

And what that is having is a terrible effect across the country 

where the 32,000 fire departments have got to recruit new people. 

And so we have got to address those kinds of concerns to keep 

those people volunteering. 

And I would ask you to be sensitive, as you were when you came 

to the dinner, and gave an outstanding speech, by the way, that 

was very positively received by all the firefighters in attendance, 

to make sure that we are nurturing that group of leaders that will 

in fact be there to protect the nation. Thank you. 
29

Mr. CHERTOFF. Well, taking the last first, because on a personal 

level in the communities I lived in, most of them relied on volunteer firefighters, and I ate my share of chicken dinners and participated in that process, and I think they are the backbone of our response in many, if not most, communities, and we do owe them respect and also we need to attend to their needs and their capabilities. 

I think all the points you make are important points. I know 

with respect to intelligence sharing, which has been a long time 

coming, the President is very committed to making sure that we 

are sharing and we are operating off the same page. There is no 

mistake about that. And he welcomed the most recent report by 

Judge Silberman and Senator Robb’s commission and we have a 

new DNI coming out. So I think we really have—the table is set 

for completing this process of integration. 

Likewise, I agree, I think that we need to work more closely with 

the Department of Defense on getting the benefit of some of those 

technologies, although I would put in a plug for the dogs. You 

know, when all is said and done, the dogs are actually very good 

at a lot of the stuff that they do, including the bomb detection and 

the USAR teams. 

And, if I can just, again, be allowed a little moment of sentimentality, there were stories in 9/11 in the area of the crater of 

dogs that almost broke down because they could not find people 

that were in there that they were trying to find. So I do not want 

to diminish their utility as well. 

Mr. WELDON. As a dog lover, I agree. 

Chairman COX. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

The gentleman from Oregon, Mr. DeFazio? 

Mr. DEFAZIO. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and Mr. Secretary. 

I think that you have got a tough job in ascertaining on a riskbased system where to allocate resources, but I think we would all 

agree there is a continuing high interest with high-risk to aviation. 

So I would like to just focus on that for a couple of minutes. 

Just want to kind of get your vision. As you know, Admiral 

Stone, the third Director of the TSA, is departing in June, and I 

see there are some ongoing problems at the agency, some of which 

I think he was cognizant of and at least as he represented in hearings, trying to deal with. 

One is the overcentralization, bureaucratization of the agency, 

which deprives the local security directors of the flexibility they 

need to hire, fire, train, split shifts, do things like that, which creates certain frustrations with the airports and meeting the needs 

of passengers. So he was very aware of that, kept telling us he was 

going to deal with, it never quite got done, and I would like to hear 

what we hope to do there. 

Secondly, he certainly was a good soldier and did not?well, let’s 

put it this way: He was aware of, as is everybody, the fact that we 

are not investing enough in the technology, as we heard from the 

previous gentleman. We have airports lined up who want to go to 

inline systems, waiting for federal grants that are not available, 

which is in part a failure of the Congress but also the administration. We have not deployed technology that exists for what I consider to be the highest threat, which is bombs. I mean, the Russian 
30

incident is pretty clear and maybe the last maybe wakeup call before something happens. 

And I would just like to know what your vision is. And I particularly have a concern that Michael Jackson, with whom I have dealt 

with over the years with his previous iterations with the government, who went to the private sector and just before he came back 

he gave what has been described to me as a extraordinary speech 

to the Homeland Security Institute saying that there was no way 

to do aviation security except privatize, and I would like to know 

if you intend to push, because very few airports have applied to go 

back to privatized systems but they do want those problems that 

I described fixed with the federal system. 

Mr. CHERTOFF. Well, we do have, as you know, some pilot programs with respect to privatizing, and that is certainly an option 

which the current system lays open for them. And maybe that in 

terms of our doing things we ought to do under the Safety Act, we 

have not been as efficient as we should be, and that is an issue we 

are going to look at. 

I think that there is no question that a key part of the issue of 

dealing with aviation security is technology. The issue of explosives 

is obviously of great concern. Now, that is a little different than the 

9/11 issue, which involved people turning aircraft into weapons, but 

it is of course in itself a serious issue. And there are technologies 

out there that we have to start taking a serious look at in terms 

of whether they can be deployed and how they would operate, and 

that includes backscatter, it includes puffing, and some of these 

things, you know, people have arguments about whether they are 

intrusive or not, and we have to think about how to deal with those 

arguments in ways that take account of legitimate concerns about 

privacy. 

But you are quite right that ultimately our best tool and our advantage in this kind of asymmetrical warfare with terrorists is 

technology. And I think we need to make some decisions about getting new generations of technology out. There also may be in terms 

of financing this kind of new technology some tools we can use in 

terms of alternative ways of financing that would get it out there 

more rapidly than in the conventional method, and we have got to 

look at that as well. 

Mr. DEFAZIO. I would be very interested to follow up on that because Mike and I had talked about that in the past but did not get 

much response from the administration in terms of some ways to 

fund these things up front and get them into the field. 

Mr. CHERTOFF. We are thinking about those things, and we are 

exploring some of those as possibilities, and we will be interested 

in engaging on that subject. 

Mr. DEFAZIO. And one other for all your portable memory units 

who are there behind you writing great notes, a number of firms 

have been certified under the Safety Act for aviation security. As 

I read the act, it is basically they carry a liability insurance and 

that is the limit of their liability. And I have been trying to find 

out what the liability limits have been set at, particularly for 

screening companies since we saw significant problems with 

screening companies pre–9/11. So if I could that get that information? 
31

Mr. CHERTOFF. We will get that. 

Mr. DEFAZIO. Thank you. 

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Chairman COX. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

The gentleman from Connecticut, Mr. Shays? 

Mr. SHAYS. Thank you, Mr. Secretary. I will join with the heartfelt congratulations and prayers as well. You have an awesome responsibility and a great opportunity. 

I wanted to just say to my colleague on the other side of the aisle 

when she talked about being on the commission, there were three 

commissions, the Bremer Commission, Hart-Rudman Commission, 

Gilmore Commission. They all said we need an assessment of the 

terrorist threat—this is before 2001. We needed a strategy to combat that. We needed to assess a threat, a strategy to deal with the 

threat, and we needed to reorganize our government to implement 

the strategy. And all three basically concurred on that except the 

Hart-Rudman Commission went the furthest and said we needed 

a Department of Homeland Security and that is what we have. 

We established the Department of Homeland Security, frankly, 

though, before we really established the strategy and really had an 

assessment of the threat. If I were to ask you now what is our 

strategy, what would it be? 

Mr. CHERTOFF. I would say the first part of the strategy is not 

part of what we do in this Department but what the President has 

done in taking that word of the enemy. I have to say I continue 

to believe that the first layer of defense is a good offense, and that 

means as we eliminate camps, we eliminate labs that the enemy 

has, we kill or capture them, we put them in a position where they 

spend a lot of time worrying about their own safety rather than 

training and recruiting. That is the first piece of a major strategy. 

A second piece of the strategy is working globally with our allies 

all over the world in making the world inhospitable to terrorists. 

And that is, again, a second piece. 

And then of course there is a piece that begins at our own borders, which is complementary and part of the layering approach, 

and that involves having increased capabilities, both at our ports 

of entry and between our ports of entry to protect ourselves from 

bad people and bad stuff getting into the country, our capability inside the country to protect our transportation and our infrastructure, our special effort that we are undertaking now with respect 

to nuclear detection capability, which I think is an area where we 

need almost a mini Manhattan Project in terms of technology as 

well as deployment. 

I think these are all parts of a comprehensive strategy, the idea 

being that we are going to do our best at every level to put them 

on the defensive, take them off the boards, prevent them from coming in, prevent them from shipping their stuff in, protecting our infrastructure and transportation if they do get in, and then if worst 

comes to worst, and we have to prepare for this too, being able to 

respond and mitigate the harm. 

Mr. SHAYS. The last answers please me the most, because it 

seems to me that the Cold War is over, the world is a more dangerous place, that the Cold War strategy of contain, react, and mutually assured destruction went out the window, and that has to 
32

be detect, prevent and it may have to be preemptive and it may 

have to frankly be unilateral. And it seems to me that that is what 

the mainframe work is, and then what you said about the strategy 

taking the word of the enemy, working globally with our allies and 

so on are parts of that. 

I am concerned that we are not doing enough to detect and prevent, and I realize that is part of your responsibility. With the time 

I have left, how can we justify for a minute giving resources to deal 

with the reactive part of the dealing with the consequence of an attack? How can we for a second justify giving to a community resources that they do not need as much as, say, New York City or 

D.C. or even where the Hoover Dam is because, clearly, they need 

to have some. How can we justify that? 

Mr. CHERTOFF. Well, I mean, I think we need to be—and I think 

I have said this before—we need to be driven by risk and that 

means that the resources have to go where they will do the most 

good to prevent, protect and respond based on consequence and 

vulnerability and threat. And that is where we have to put our resources. 

We do not have money to waste, we do not have effort to waste. 

We have to be realistic about the fact that we have a menu of a 

large number of different things we have to protect. Some of them 

are—there are obviously people we have to protect directly, there 

is infrastructure, there are transportation nodes. There is no cookie 

cutter answer to this, but I completely agree with you that we cannot afford to waste money by just making everybody feel good like 

they got a little piece of something. It has got to be driven by essential priorities about what we have to worry about the most. 

Mr. SHAYS. I just wanted to hear you say it again. 

Thank you. 

Chairman COX. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

The gentlelady from the District of Columbia, Ms. Holmes Norton. 

Ms. NORTON. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

And thank you very much for being with us and for your useful 

testimony. I appreciate the distinction you made between obligation 

and spending. 

I would like to ask a question about your own definition of a riskbased approach. As I see it, the two top challenges you face are 

putting Humpty Dumpty together, not again but for the first time. 

It is very difficult. These are melding together agencies that nobody 

ever meant to be together. Were it not for 9/11, they would not be 

together. They still have domestic responsibilities that have nothing to do with you. That is real hard. 

The second one has been of great concern to this committee, and 

that is developing and applying a risk-base analysis. I looked at 

page 10 of your testimony, and I was rather much attracted by the 

way you sent at the notion of ‘‘a trio of threat, vulnerability and 

consequence.’’ I kind of like the notion of giving your example of 

a two-lane bridge down a street from your own house. Hate to see 

that dam but comparing it to an attack on a major multilane 

bridge, this is a touch approach, but what it seems to me does is 

give one an objective standard. Until we get an objective standard, 
33

we are going to have great problems making jurisdiction as vast 

and diverse as those represented at this table. 

Understand why A got more money than B and that this is not 

another of those population-based programs. 

Let me try to apply the notion, the trio notion in your testimony 

to different rather disparate examples since I understand this that 

way. 

One has to do with rail security. I have had a bill for rail security. Very, very concerned. You come from a part of the country 

where you ought to be even more concerned than I am, particularly 

after Madrid. I do not know what the latest figures are. It looks 

like 141 million in the 2005 budget. After 9/11, of course, we 

pumped money into aviation we better had. What I really am trying to get at is whether we are using any risk-based approach, either to budgeting or to other things. 

Compared to air security, I mean it pales beside the number of 

people to get onto subways, buses, light rail every day of the week, 

and I have been flabbergasted by how far behind rail is. It does not 

hardly register here, I am not even talking just money. On the 

screen for approach as far as I have been able to tell, I would like 

to ask about your approach, threat, vulnerability and consequences 

applied, to that way of doing budgeting. That is number one. 

Then let me take a specific example of whether that approach 

even works in the everyday world. We have got now two bills by 

the Chairs of two committees to bring aviation back to the nation’s 

capital. Both chairman have gone at TSA. We even had a briefing, 

it was embarrassing, far from a risk-based analysis. 

This was about a couple of years ago, Judge Chertoff. It was a 

kind of doomsday approach involving the monument and the Capitol. It did not have any analytical sense of risk versus cost and 

commerce and convenience and the rest of the kind of things you 

would expect a market society to do by instincts almost with more 

like a science fiction movie. 

Here now you have what I regard as an override of the Department of Homeland Security, because TSA has taken no action. Both 

of these Chairs now are going to have committees. They both have 

introduced bills that no longer call for a plan. In the FAA bill, 

there was a section that said TSA had to present a plan. There 

having been no plan for 18 months, now they call for opening general aviation. 

They do not have any risk-based analysis, they just know that 

something is wrong with the Department of Homeland Security if 

they make it even look like they do not know how to protect the 

nation’s capital. Understand general aviation was up and running 

in New York City within days, helicopter service, all the rest of it, 

where the great debacle occurred. 

I would just like you to take a stab at your own approach to riskbased analysis, threat vulnerability and consequence and apply it 

to the two examples that I have just presented. 

Mr. CHERTOFF. Well, I think that they do apply, and let me take 

the second one first. We are working, as we speak, on this issue 

of general aviation, because I think actually it demonstrates two 

facets to this risk management concept. One is we have to really 

think hard about what the consequence would be if someone mis-
34

used a general aviation plane in Washington, how vulnerable we 

are at this point given what has been put in place and how real 

the threat is. But, you know, there is another piece to risk management which I think the chairman alluded to earlier which is there 

is also a cost benefit. Because I can completely eliminate risk by 

having no air travel and there will never be a risk of an aviation 

problem. 

And that is clearly not the right answer. And I know that there 

was an understandable tendency on the part of some people right 

after 9/11 to take the attitude that protection overrides everything, 

but I think we understand now that this has got to be a long-term 

strategy, we have got to be structured for a long-term war against 

terror, and that means we cannot destroy our way of life in order 

to save it. 

So whenever we make a risk analysis, we have to also make a 

cost-benefit analysis, and we have to say how much risk are we 

prepared to tolerate, or should we tolerate, in order to make sure 

we have a free flow of commerce, and that is an approach we are 

taking across the board. 

So that I think in the area of general aviation, we are working 

hard now with general aviation to talk about what are precautions 

to put in place to have a plan so that we neither have nothing nor 

bar the door, everything goes like 9/11 never happened. Neither of 

those approaches make sense. What makes sense is an approach 

that opens up the possibility of general aviation but in a way that 

guarantees a reasonable amount of security bearing in mind consequence, vulnerability, and threat. So I think it very much does 

apply. 

Likewise, with rail, we are obviously looking at the issue of rail, 

and we have to consider the consequences of a rail incident, bearing in mind that just a couple months ago in California there was 

a derailment. That was a bad thing, but it was not a catastrophic 

thing. 

Ms. NORTON. And South Carolina? 

Mr. CHERTOFF. And South Carolina too. And then we have to 

build things like a response capability, a security capability in 

terms of sensors on the tracks, things that might anticipate someone driving a car on the tracks. So, again, that is something we are 

working on. We are using exactly the approach I am talking about, 

and I think it is valid across the board and one which I think will 

give results that may not satisfy everybody but will at least be reasonable. 

Ms. NORTON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I appreciate the responses. I am going to be looking—you are new at the Department—to see whether or not in these two areas I see this approach 

being carried out. 

Thank you very much. 

Chairman COX. The gentlelady’s time has expired. 

The gentleman from Georgia, Mr. Linder? 

Mr. LINDER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. Secretary, welcome. Nice to have you here. I just had an 

honest question I ask people all the time: Do you ever think another airplane will fly into a building? 

Mr. CHERTOFF. Do I think it will? I think it is certainly possible. 
35

Mr. LINDER. Do you think the passengers would tolerate that? 

Mr. CHERTOFF. You know, I think it would depend on a lot of circumstances. Are we talking about a large commercial airline, are 

we talking about a private airplane? I think the chances are much 

less now, but I cannot rule it out. 

The one thing I can tell you is that as we take each step to secure the airlines from that kind of a possibility, we have reduced 

the chance measurably. I do not know that we are completely there 

yet, and I certainly would not suggest reversing direction and 

tempting fate. 

Mr. LINDER. I just cannot imagine a flight full of passengers on 

a commercial airliner, allowing some people to take it over without 

going after them themselves, because they know what is going to 

happen. They know what it is all about, and they would rather risk 

dying in an effort to fight than going into a building. And we spend 

$5.5 billion looking for fingernail clippers. It seems that money 

could be spent more wisely worrying about, as you said, there is 

a difference between bad things and catastrophic things. 

Mr. CHERTOFF. I am not sure that—I certainly think that toenail 

clippers are not the thing we are worried about, and I do agree 

what I think someone said earlier. I think we need to be concerned 

about explosives, but I do not think that I would draw the conclusion because I would rely on the passengers that we could stop 

searching people for knives or guns. I mean I think that we want 

to continue to keep those kinds of things off planes. 

Mr. LINDER. It would be a bad thing if an airliner went down and 

200 people died, but it would not be catastrophic. It would be catastrophic if we could find a way to use some of that money to worry 

about the intelligence for the bigger things like the nuclear bombs 

that are radioactive or biological threats. 

And I worry about your department that you inherited. I appreciate your 60-day review, but I worry that you get so bogged down 

in a huge bureaucracy doing really some stupid things that you do 

not have the time to think about the big things. 

Mr. CHERTOFF. Well, actually, I worry about that too, and I do 

not want to keep invoking the review, but I do want to tell you that 

almost every morning I get kind of a briefing as to what is going 

on from an intelligence standpoint, and I sit around with the very 

top people in the Department, and we talk about exactly the kinds 

of things you are talking about. We talk about whether we are 

spending too much time worrying about the kind of risk that is 

comparatively less of a consequence that while serious is not catastrophic and not enough time worrying about other things. And we 

really try to dig into this. 

One of the reasons I do want to see us have a more powerful policy capability is precisely to be able to start to think about these 

things department-wide, to avoid the issue I think you are pointing 

at, which is every component focused on its world and its vision 

without someone standing back and looking at the whole menu. 

And that is really what we have to do, we have to look at the whole 

map. 

Mr. LINDER. I view your challenge as becoming a very sophisticated intelligence organization so that when a threat arrives in 

some location, it may be in Reno or it may be in Hahira, Georgia, 
36

that you can alarm those folks, let them know ahead of time the 

risk, and it is probably not going to be the same risk you might 

face in Phoenix. And I do not know how much percentage of your 

budget is spent on intelligence, do you have an idea on that? 

Mr. CHERTOFF. I cannot tell you—I mean, partly I cannot tell you 

because there are pieces of intelligence that are placed within a lot 

of different—. 

Mr. LINDER. Rob Simmons tells me it is 2.5 percent. 

Mr. CHERTOFF. I am not in a position to dispute that. I know it 

is parceled out in a lot of different areas, frankly, and one of our 

challenges is to unify it and fuse it so we get the benefit of all of 

it. 

Mr. LINDER. The biggest threat that I am worried about is biological. How much of a component in your intelligence community 

that you have is experts in bio threats? 

Mr. CHERTOFF. Well, I mean, we deal with biological threats in 

a number of different ways. In terms of intelligence, of course, we 

get not only whatever intelligence we have within our department, 

but we get what the intelligence community generates. 

But there is a separate piece of this which has to do with preparation and preparedness and response. We have in our Science and 

Technology Directorate scientists and medical people who have expertise. We largely also draw on the expertise of HHS and the Centers for Disease Control in terms of understanding the different 

kinds of biological agents there are. We have a Bio Watch Program 

in a large number of cities in which we have very sensitive sensing 

devices that do monitor for various kinds of biological agents. 

And then we also—and I think this is an important piece of this 

entire approach—is we focus on having a clear set of plans for what 

to do in case of a biological incident. And that requires us to understand the way the agent works, to have access to the appropriate 

antidote and a plan for deploying that antidote and a sense of how 

to do it in a way that is most efficient in terms of getting it out 

and preventing the spread of the agent. 

Mr. LINDER. Just one last question, Mr. Secretary: How did the 

plan work when the Pentagon withheld information for 5 days on 

their anthrax threat? 

Mr. CHERTOFF. Well, you know, we have done, I guess what we 

call, an after-action report. I think the state and locals have too. 

We have talked to all the agencies involved. The Defense Department has changed its protocols. Thankfully, it was not really anthrax, but it was for me, actually, a very useful lesson in terms of 

seeing where we had a deficiency in our response capability and 

where we could correct it. 

You know, I think where I want to go beyond that is I think we 

need to have on the shelf, and I think we are in the process of developing this, we have a lot of good product, an ability with respect 

to any one of the likely agents to understand how the agent works 

and have an ability to think about how to respond, because the response is different depending on the agent. It depends on how contagious it is, it depends on how long it persists in the environment. 

So we jumped on studying this right away. We have embodied 

some immediate lessons that we have now changed, but I think we 

are building on that incident as a way of now going all around the 
37

federal government and making sure that everybody has got their 

protocols and their plans in place for dealing with this kind of situation. 

Mr. LINDER. Thank you, Mr. Secretary. 

Chairman COX. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

Mr. Pascrell from New Jersey? 

Mr. PASCRELL. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. Secretary, you have done a lot of good things in New Jersey 

concerning homeland security, and I would say that under Mr. 

Casperson I would put us as a model in terms of bringing all the 

entities together in New Jersey. 

But that entity cannot do its job unless we share intelligence 

with that entity, and this is not happening—this is not happening. 

I think the 9/11 Commission, Mr. Secretary, got it right, and I 

think you have it right. I will tell you why I think that. You have 

a philosophy which you bring to the job. I never even heard that 

word before in the last 2.5. years. It is not a scary word to me. You 

bring something to the table and not just reacting and responding. 

I think this is important, extremely important. 

And while you say in your opening statement that you cannot 

guarantee, realizing that we can make no guarantees, we cannot 

guarantee but we can minimize our vulnerabilities. We need to be 

primarily dependent on intelligence, and you bring this up. Of 

course, that can mean a lot of things to a lot of people, and I want 

to get into that in a second. 

So before port security, aviation security, train security, border 

security, all the way down the line, philosophy and strategy is very 

important to what we do. And so we have seen a lot of finger pointing over the last 2 years at the CIA and the FBI. Now, we know 

they have made mistakes but they have been driven, if you read 

the 9/11 report, if all of us have read it, you know that that is driven by philosophy and strategy. And if you are not—I am not saying 

you personally—if you are not willing to accept that, then nobody 

is ever held accountable. And that is the situation that we had. 

That is why looking back over that 9/11 Commission report no 

one has been held accountable. Take a look. Unless I missed it in 

the news. So we can line up al the mistakes and we can point fingers at the FBI and the CIA but those entities run on the basis 

of where the President, be it Clinton, Bush or whomever, want to 

go. And let’s not mistake anything about that. 

So intelligence can mean a lot of things if it is supported by a 

strategy, if it is supported by a philosophy and we hone in on an 

enemy. Now, you say who is the enemy, take the war to the enemy. 

The end result of this is saving a lot of money, as you say, because 

we want to know where to spend that money. Say, take the war 

to the enemy. The problem is we do not know who the enemy is. 

We are fighting non-state terror. If it is a state, we know it is easier to get your hands around it. We are not fighting Islam; we are 

fighting extreme fundamentalist, Islamic, radical terrorists. That is 

who we are fighting. 

We have not made that distinction in our policy or in our philosophy. And that is why some members of this body support increasing the profiling. And you know exactly what I am talking about 

in getting at the enemy. 
38

Now, I believe we are at war. I believe that from the bottom of 

my heart and that we are at war with terrorists. But we need to 

preserve the freedoms, and you more than anything else know that 

and you have struck that balance in your entire life. I say that—

I am not patronizing you because I say it because I mean it. 

What is your reaction and response to the issue of profiling, 

keeping in mind Chapter 12 of the 9/11 report about who we should 

be reaching out to? 

Mr. CHERTOFF. Well, let me say this: First of all, before I get to 

that issue, I just want to make it—I am certain to you about the 

fact that the President and everybody who works for him is committed to the idea of intelligence sharing, and I know that the 

President was committed to that before. Judge Silberman and Senator Robb presented the report, and I know that only reinforced it, 

and that has been a very clear mandate. 

I agree with you, Congressman, that we have to be very careful 

about who we are fighting. We are fighting radical Jihadists. The 

vast majority of people who follow the religion of Islam are peaceful 

members of this community and this country, are every bit as good 

Americans as everybody else. And we make a grave mistake if we 

allow the actions of Jihadists to spill over into everybody who is 

practicing Islam—many more than we would do so if we were to 

identify the acts of Timothy McVeigh with people who are Christian or pick someone Jewish who does something wrong. 

So we have to distinguish between—I am deadset against religious profiling for the following at least two reasons—many reasons. First of all, it is counterproductive. It is counterproductive, 

because we do need to reach out to—we will not do well if the 

world walks away with the impression that we are fighting a war 

against religion, because we will do very poorly in the world and 

we will do very poorly with the hearts and minds we need to win. 

Second, I can guarantee you that if we telegraph that we are 

going to look at a particular type of person when they come into 

the country, that Al Qa‘ida will find somebody who does not look 

like that person to come in and carry a bomb. So we would be making a big mistake if we were so obvious and so kind of unsophisticated in what we do. 

And, third, obviously it strikes the fabric of our own country and 

what we believe in terms of our Constitution and our civil liberties 

to single out people based upon their religion. People who have consciously adopted an ideology of hate and war we should pursue 

without quarter. But those who are peaceful, religion should not 

enter into it. 

Mr. PASCRELL. Thank you very much, Mr. Secretary. 

Mr. LUNGREN. [Presiding.] Thank you, Mr. Secretary. Obviously, 

I am not Mr. Cox even though it says that. My name is Dan Lungren. I am a Californian. 

As Secretary Rumsfeld said, I am a retread. I like to think I am 

a returning congressional veteran. That sounds better. I came back 

here because of 9/11. I know you have taken this commitment because of 9/11. 

I guess my first question is because of the need for certainty and 

continuity, is it your intention, if you continue to have the con-
39

fidence of the President, to stay for the rest of his term in this position? 

Mr. CHERTOFF. As long as the President wants me to serve, I will 

serve. 

Mr. LUNGREN. Secondly, with respect to risk assessment, you 

know, we can all talk about the failure to complete that task to this 

point by the Department, but the Congress bears a great deal of 

that burden, as well. My observation is we have not made the 

transformation after 9/11 by recognizing that we need to reorganize 

ourselves and reprioritize with respect to that. 

I would just ask you very simply, you have not been described 

to me as a wallflower in any of your previous experiences. I hope 

that you will—if you think those of us in Congress, in terms of the 

legislation we are presenting or the pressure that we put on your 

department do ignore risk assessment, you will feel emboldened to 

tell us that and to loudly tell us that. 

Mr. CHERTOFF. Well, I will, Congressman. I think I have already 

been pretty blunt, and hopefully, polite, but blunt in saying, you 

know, that I understand this approach of being risk-driven will disappoint some people. What I can hopefully hold out is that we will 

at least present an analytic approach that people will understand 

and respect, even if they disagree with it. 

But you know, this is not an approach that says, ‘‘Let us give everybody a little something to make them happy.’’ It is an approach 

designed to maximize the benefit of what we do to avoid the greatest risk. 

Mr. LUNGREN. As important as it is to get that right, it is also 

important that we be able to articulate it in such a way that members of Congress can go home to their districts and explain why 

they may not be getting the money and why it is necessary, why 

we are national legislators. So not only in terms of the substance, 

but in terms of the ability to articulate, and frankly, we need you 

in the bully pulpit doing that. And I hope you will. 

Let me turn to the question of the Safety Act, because it appears 

to me that the effort of the Congress was to try and stimulate the 

development of technology transfer that you talked about in your 

testimony by setting up a mechanism by which we could have some 

limited protection in terms of liability. 

I come from the legal arena, as do you. We know we have had 

legal reform here in the Congress, and it has been somewhat controversial. Here you have something where the Congress basically 

came together and said it is important for us to do that. And yet, 

if you look objectively at the results of that, I think you would have 

to be—at least I am—disappointed in the number of applications 

for that kind of a review and the assessment completed by your department. 

It seems to me, if we are to look at setting priorities, and you 

have talked about the mechanism of the transfer of technology to 

aid us in that, that that would be one of the top priorities of your 

department. And yet, as I look at what has happened thus far—

maybe it is just because of start-up difficulties, but I do not see 

that as a priority. Would you please comment on that? 

Mr. CHERTOFF. Well, we did, I think, recently change the regulations to try to streamline them, because I think there was a sense 
40

that the original set of regulations may be too onerous. And that 

will hopefully help, in terms of encouraging people to apply. 

But I did—you know, I had the same observation when I came 

onto the job that it seemed we were not getting as much out of that 

program as one would have hoped. And so, you know, that is an 

issue which we are currently looking at as part of this review. I do 

not know whether the regulatory change is enough or whether we 

are being unduly nitpicky in terms of where we are requesting. 

But I do think that is a powerful tool to harness the private sector, in terms of its ingenuity. And I think if we do not make full 

use of it, we are really shortchanging ourselves. 

Mr. LUNGREN. And let me ask you this: Will there be a 

prioritization of the type of applications that are made? That is, if 

you make a risk assessment, and you determine that there are specific areas in which we really need some assistance, would it be 

your thought that the department ought to, in a sense, try and put 

that on the streamlined highway, maybe over something else that 

might be important technically but, in terms of your department’s 

review of the assessment, would not fit the need as readily? 

Mr. CHERTOFF. Well, I would hope we can actually get this to the 

point that it is all pretty streamlined. I think we do want to encourage certain kinds of technology. And there are some other tools 

that even may be more powerful than the Safety Act, which, of 

course, is really a liability-capping act. 

But there are things—you know, we have a version of DARPA 

called HSARPA. And you know, DARPA was a great tool for the 

Defense Department. I want to make sure we are using that tool 

and also that we are—a part of what we need to do is get our procurement system more unified and then connect it up with our research, so we really have kind of a powerful economic engine to 

drive important technological advances. 

Mr. LUNGREN. Thank you very much, Mr. Secretary. My time is 

expired. 

The gentlelady from the Virgin Islands, Ms. Christensen? 

Mrs. CHRISTENSEN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And welcome, Mr. Secretary. I am encouraged like the others by 

your statements, your brief opening remarks, and your responses, 

and especially, of course, knowing that you have come from the 

Third Circuit. 

Mr. CHERTOFF. We are the Virgin Islands—not initiated. 

Mrs. CHRISTENSEN. Mr. Secretary, as you work to change and improve the working culture at the department, I wanted to add another challenge, a basic one, and that is that the department respect this committee’s work and responsibility and be fully forthcoming with the information that we need to work with you, and 

to give you the support you need, and to fulfill the tasks for which 

we are charged. That has not always been the case. 

I want to ask a question, again, around port security. The OIG 

report on Port Security Grants generated a national debate within 

the maritime community and how grant funding ought to be distributed. Some say funding should be distributed solely on risk. 

Others feel that the Maritime Transportation Security Act is a federal mandate as is on all ports, and therefore all ports should receive security funding regardless of risk. 
41

Some of the op-eds that followed criticized the fact the ports in 

the Virgin Islands specifically received grant funding because they 

believe that these ports do have the same risk compared to the 

larger ports, such as New York and Los Angeles. As a member of 

the committee, I do that more financing is needed at all of our 

country’s ports, but I believe that we ignore the smaller ports at 

our peril, as well. 

And while ports in the Virgin Islands may not have as many containers moving through as New York or some of the other ports, 

our ports are host to cruise ships, passengers, anywhere from—

very rarely at 5,000, and maybe as many as 12,000 on any given 

day, second only to Miami. 

So if you feel that homeland security should be risk-based, what 

would be your definition of risk? Because in a maritime environment, I feel it has to go beyond just looking at containers. 

Mr. CHERTOFF. Well, I do not think risk is only containers. I 

think risk is—but I think it is at the end of the day consequence, 

vulnerability and threat. And as I said, I mean, that will not necessarily result in everybody getting something. But I think to put 

it in perspective, it is important to know that our entire effort in 

port security involves a lot of different things. 

And I think there was some confusion about the role that the 

port grants play, in terms of container security. The port grants are 

designed—or were designed, since they are now rolled into the total 

infrastructure program, they were designed to deal with the actual 

security of the port itself. 

But the security of containers, which is a cargo function, is addressed in a lot of additional ways. It is addressed through customs 

and border protection, and the screening and inspection, and the 

security initiative. Coast Guard plays a direct role. There are, depending on where you are, there may be state grants or UASI 

grants that are available also for ports. 

So unfortunately, when you isolate a single program, particularly 

one that is directed at a particular function, you are not, frankly, 

capturing all the resources that are brought to bear. And I think 

the thing I would ask when people evaluate how we do, is they recognize that sometimes we may accomplish a result using a different set of tools. 

And again, you know, we are ultimately capability-and missionoriented. We want to get the job done. We want to keep the bad 

stuff out. If we do it by having Coast Guard do something as opposed to giving a port security grant, if we get to the right result, 

that is good. And that is the kind of philosophy we are going to 

take. 

Mrs. CHRISTENSEN. Well, I appreciate that, and that means that 

perhaps our Coast Guard will be getting some more funding and 

more assets, as well. Because I appreciate your approach that 

brings all of the different components together in a smooth-working, smooth operation. 

You have undertaken a overview, a look at the department with 

an eye to reorganizing it around threat, vulnerability and consequence. We are about to—we are reauthorizing the departments—I surprised this question was not asked before—and we 

may do it before the end of the month. What is your opinion as to 
42

whether we should not extend the current authorization until such 

time as you have completed your assessment, so that we can do 

this—at least take into consideration, as we reauthorize the department, some of the recommendations that you, the Secretary, would 

be coming up with? 

Mr. CHERTOFF. Well, I have to say, I am not—I am sufficiently 

versed in the legislative schedule to know what a normal schedule 

is like. I think it probably would not be a good idea for me to be 

specific about that. I hope, obviously, that whatever is done—I am 

going to try as hard as possible to at least get to you what we can 

in a timely fashion, to have it incorporated in. 

Mrs. CHRISTENSEN. And what is your timeline? 

Mr. CHERTOFF. Well, I am looking to have recommendations—I 

have set a deadline for recommendations, or substantially all the 

recommendations, by the end of May. But there may be some 

things, you know, working with the committee, that if there are 

some things that we can identify ahead of time that might require 

some legislative action, that might be something worth exploring. 

Mr. LUNGREN. The gentlelady’s time has expired. 

We have the Secretary for 29—well, no, 19 more minutes. And 

we have seven people who are in line. So I intend, or the rules are, 

to recognize people for 5 minutes. But if they could possibly do less 

than that, you might allow another member to ask a question. 

Congressman Rogers from Alabama is recognized for 5 minutes—. 

Mr. ROGERS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. LUNGREN. —or such time as he may take of that 5 minutes. 

Mr. ROGERS. I got it. 

Thank you, Mr. Secretary, for being with us. I want to talk about 

first responders. I am of the opinion that currently our organization for training first responders does not meet our nation’s needs. 

And I would like to specifically reference the Gilmore Commission 

Report from December of 2003 which recommended the Department of Homeland Security develop a comprehensive process for establishing training and exercise standards for first responders. And 

I agree with that statement. 

What I would like to know is your thoughts on the current organization of training within DHS and your plans for maybe improving the organization and provision of those training programs. 

Mr. CHERTOFF. I think through our preparedness process, in 

which we have laid down capabilities across the board, which includes response, and then the underlying, supporting template of 

the kinds of functions, you know, that is designed to drive us in 

all layers, including responders, to see, you know, what do they 

have to have the capability to do? What does that mean, in terms 

of the kinds of tasks they have to be able to perform? 

And then that, in our view, and it is not in a final—we do not 

have the final product, but we have kind of created successive cuts 

of this that are more precise. That should be the guidance for what, 

from our standpoint, we need to have first responders capable of 

doing. Not necessarily every community do everything, but every 

community be covered geographically by some capability that can 

perform those functions. 
43

And the idea is to get—you know, use regional support networks 

to make sure we are not simply giving everybody the same thing 

over and over again. 

Mr. ROGERS. Right. 

And the last thing—I would just like to make a comment. Earlier, my colleague from Mississippi talked about his concerns, 

mainly on several senior management positions within your department that are vacant. And I think that is a very real problem, and 

it could have some real management consequences down the road 

if that is not remedied. 

I see the number of vacancies, and are not just people you may 

reference to something similar happening in the military. These 

people have left the department. I think long term, while your idea 

of people being cross-trained is good, we have got to find a way to 

keep that institutional knowledge that we are building for our longterm benefit. 

Mr. CHERTOFF. I agree with that. 

Mr. ROGERS. Thank you. Thank you, very much. 

That is all, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. LUNGREN. Well, the gentleman yields back. 

Mr. Etheridge of North Carolina is recognized for 5 minutes or 

such time as he may consume—. 

Mr. ETHERIDGE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. Secretary, welcome. And you have got an important job and 

a tough one. And today, you have been very candid thus far. 

Over the last several years, I have raised the issue with people 

as they came before this committee about an issue that they say 

is a local level, and that is our public schools. What we saw in Russia and we have seen recently, that can, number one, be a highprofile, and number two, it can send terrible shock waves. 

So when you look at the whole issue of threat vulnerability and—

you may not fit the first two categories, but you know it has got 

huge consequences. And all the other things we may do will slide 

off the sheet when that hits the front page, and it will, when you 

are dealing with people’s children. 

So I hope, as you go through your second stage of your review, 

that this will be an issue that you will pay a lot of attention to, 

how you provide not only just a template to the local levels, but we 

have a plan for assistance. Having been state superintendent of 

schools, I can assure you that should be a higher priority than we 

are paying attention to. 

And I will just leave that where it is. And I will ask that question again when you come back. 

Mr. CHERTOFF. Okay. 

Mr. ETHERIDGE. In the 2001 Hart-Rudman Report, ‘‘Roadmap for 

National Security: Imperative for Change,’’ the authors stated that 

the greatest threat to our country at that point, prior to 9/11, second only to the detonation of a weapon of mass destruction would 

be a failure to manage properly science, technology and education 

for the common good over the next quarter century. 

That being said, the Department of Homeland Security has got 

a tough job. You have got to deal with this stuff, sir, today that 

you see immediately, but at the same time, you have got to balance 

those current trends with long-range planning. 
44

Let me share some statistics with you. Education may not be 

your responsibility, but we should better be paying attention to it. 

And I hope you are meeting with the other secretaries. 

Currently, one-third of all U.S. science and engineering doctorate 

degrees, and 40 percent of the PhDs in computer science go to students who are outside the United States, come here and get an 

education. Some stay; many go home. It is a great plan, but a problem is, if we do not do a better job of training here, we have got 

a challenge. 

So my question is this: How is the department planning to address our nation’s current and future needs for technically and 

mathematically proficient students who we are going to need to 

maintain that cutting edge in science and technology to be able to 

meet the challenges for our homeland security? 

Mr. CHERTOFF. Well, I do think, you know, we have, I think, programs in terms of science and technology that deal with centers of 

excellence. And I think we may also have, or are contemplating 

having, some programs that would try to encourage people to get 

into areas of research and study that have an application to the 

kinds of issues we deal with in homeland security. 

Obviously, the Department of Education is a separate department, but I could not agree more that the long-term advantage we 

have in this war is the advantage of our technology and our 

science. And we cannot afford to lose that competitive advantage. 

Mr. ETHERIDGE. Mr. Secretary, let me encourage you to have 

that meeting. And number two, I know, within your department, 

that you have some of those funds to encourage that. And I would 

hope that you would encourage your folks to spend some time, because I think this is a critical issue. 

Mr. CHERTOFF. I agree. 

Mr. ETHERIDGE. And I think it is not only long term, it is short 

term. We need to pay a lot of attention very quickly. And if you 

will do that, I will appreciate that follow-up—. 

Mr. CHERTOFF. I will. 

Mr. ETHERIDGE. —from that, if you would. 

And I will yield back. 

Mr. LUNGREN. Thank you. 

Mr. McCaul from Texas is recognized for 5 minutes. 

Mr. MCCAUL. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. Secretary, it is an honor to have you here today. It was an 

honor to serve under you in the Justice Department. And you did 

a great job then. I think you are doing a great job today. You have 

a lot of challenges, but I know you are the right man at the right 

time for the Department. So I thank you for that. 

I also applaud the Department’s support for the risk-based funding. I toured the Houston Port Authority with Senator Cornyn last 

week. And it is the largest port in the United States. It is obviously 

a target. And I think the fact my state, and California, and New 

York, are at the low end of the funding, a change would be for the 

better, based on risk. 

I want to focus on—and I know when you were assistant attorney general, you saw this issue coming up quite a bit. In my view, 

the number-one mission is, and should be, in the homeland security 
45

department protecting our border, protecting our citizens from 

threats from outside coming in. 

And we have a situation that I believe is really getting almost 

on an epidemic level, in terms of the number of crossings illegally. 

But my biggest concern has to do with what I am sure you are familiar with, it is called the Catch and Release Program. And it involves people not necessarily from Mexico but countries other than 

Mexico. 

As you saw in your intelligence when you were at the Department—I probably saw some of the same things. And we have the 

Mexican border in our jurisdiction. And it is a real concern of mine. 

The thought of a terrorist crossing with a nuclear or biological capability is truly frightening. 

In the case of the people from other than Mexico, because of the 

repatriation process, as you know, they do not—it takes 2 weeks. 

In many cases, they do not have any space to detain. 

In the McAllen sector in Texas, 90 percent of these people get basically released into the streets with a notice to appear, and then 

they do not show up. You recall Ramsey Yusef, the perpetrator of 

the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, got into this country that 

way. 

So my question, without giving a speech, is simply, what is the 

Department doing on this issue? And how can you make members 

of Congress and the American public feel safer on this issue? 

Mr. CHERTOFF. We are doing two things. 

First of all, we are—they reason, in terms of when we release, 

the decision, there are priorities. And we do pay attention to 

whether we are dealing with somebody who is a special interest 

person. So those people are not released. Likewise, people who 

have criminal issues are not released. 

You know, this is a problem, obviously, that global law enforcement faces, when you release people on bail, you—you know, we 

want everybody to appear, but we certainly prioritize detaining 

those who pose a threat to the community. So that is our template. 

Second, we have actually begun and are vigorously pursuing a 

project of pursuing absconders, people who do not come to appear 

when they are supposed to appear. And actually, our numbers of 

people apprehended have increased since the program has begun. 

That is a very important program, in terms of getting compliance. 

We are trying—for example, we did a repatriation program with 

Mexico. Frankly, if we free up beds for other people, we then have 

more beds for people we cannot move out that quickly. So another 

part of our strategy, again, is to try to cut the time that we are 

holding beds for people who we can deport more readily so we can 

have additional beds for people that we want to hold. 

But it is a serious problem. And at a minimum, what we need 

to do is make sure we are prioritizing and keeping the people we 

really have to be concerned about in custody. 

Mr. MCCAUL. And as you know, I am in favor of the prioritizing 

that issue and making those appropriations for that purpose. I 

think there is no greater issue or threat facing this country. So I 

thank you for being here. 

Mr. CHERTOFF. Thank you. 

Chairman COX. [Presiding.] The gentleman’s time has expired. 
46

The gentleman from Florida, Mr. Meek? 

Mr. MEEK. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Thank you, Mr. Secretary, for being here. 

I wanted to talk a little bit about the grant process and some of 

the nuts and bolts of the Department. But I cannot help but resist 

sharing with you, which you probably already know in your first 

evaluation, as before the hearing, I told you I was from South Florida, which is unique in itself, as it relates to protecting the homeland. I think there is no other place in the country that faces some 

of the issues that we face, not only as it relates to immigration but 

also threat. 

I know you are familiar with the act that was passed by the Congress, which is the Federal Information Security Management Act, 

which, as you know, the Department has received an F 2 years in 

a row, as it relates to securing its own technology and systems. 

And we can talk about protecting the homeland, but if the other 

side, those that are working to infiltrate or to harm us are able to 

hack our computers, we have a serious problem. 

We can have TOPOFF programs throughout the country. They 

can go in and find out exactly where we are weak from the privacy 

of their own home. We have a real issue. And with the Department 

of Homeland Security receiving a threat out of some 24, 25 agencies, and we are supposed to be the leader in securing our information, I think we have a real situation. I think it is very alarming. 

I also would—as you know, there is a GAO report that has been 

written. And the chairman of our subcommittee, and also the 

Ranking Member, and the chairman of the overall committee, we 

are going to be having a hearing tomorrow on this issue. Obviously, 

we are going to be hearing some people—some folks who are in the 

private sector have served on the subcommittee last year that put 

forth a bill. Two fine members of this committee will be introducing 

that same legislation, from what I understand. 

But the Department within, I would like to hear as much as you 

can share at this point of what are some of the steps we have taken 

to protect some of the information, I mean, as simple as patrols on 

the borders, as simple as, you know, some of the main functions 

of the department as it relates to intelligence. 

If someone can—if we are getting an F, and there is other agencies that are getting C’s and B’s, I do not see the improvement. 

And if there is improvement that is ongoing now, we would like to 

hear about it. 

And I have one other small thing that I want to share with you, 

but I would appreciate an answer. 

Mr. CHERTOFF. Well, my understanding is that, even within—I 

do not see any other reaction to an F than disappointment. I mean, 

there is no way you can sugarcoat that or make it seem good. 

I think that, notwithstanding the F, and I think it was an F in 

a prior year thing, there has been some improvement. But there is 

question more generally speaking that, as a department, our IT 

function needs a lot of work. 

I mean, we were—you know, we inherited IT functions from a 

number of different legacy departments. Those have not been fully 

integrated. And bringing somebody onto—it is going to be important to make sure we get that integration process right, not only 
47

to upgrade our ability to defend ourselves but also to make us more 

interoperable. 

I mean, we cannot function in the 21st century without an ability 

to have an integrated computer system. So I think you are right 

to point that out as a significant challenge for us. 

Mr. MEEK. And of course, you know, this is a bipartisan feeling 

here in the Congress. It is not, you know, being in the minority 

side saying, you know, ‘‘What are you doing in the administration?’’

A couple of my colleagues, including the Ranking Member, addressed the issue of attrition and turnover within the Department 

at some of the highest levels. Some of the leadership positions in 

the Department that receive some of the highest security clearance, 

I mean, they are spending 8 months, 6 months in some cases, and 

moving on to the private sector and doing other things. 

And I do not know if it is an issue of pay or attention or it is 

so much work to be done, we are saying we are doing something 

we are not actually doing. And I do not want anything to happen 

under my watch, so I am out of here. That could be one. 

Mr. CHERTOFF. Well, I mean, I think—. 

Mr. MEEK. The other could be—I could see if there were great 

opportunities within the Department, and you saw talent, and you 

say, ‘‘Hey, I need you over here to be able to fill this void,’’ these 

folks are gone. I mean, they are out of there. 

And so we are starting from A, as it relates to the whole training 

issue, and that is what the GAO report was addressing, that the 

issue of training, the issue of retention, the issue of occurring, 

being able to testing of contingency plans, I mean, these are issues 

that are not there. 

Some of those issues are IT issues, but some of them are human 

resource issues. 

Mr. CHERTOFF. Sure. 

Mr. MEEK. And we have to address those. But I know that you 

have limited time. 

Mr. Chairman, one last thing I want to share with the Secretary. 

There was a letter that myself and the Ranking Member sent to 

you as it relates to some of the reporting that the Department has 

to make to the Congress to help us and give us guidance on what 

we are doing good, or what is working and what is not working. 

Mr. Secretary, I would ask, as you do your review, hopefully before the second review, start to hopefully report back to the Congress, which is statutorily mandated that we receive this information. Because it will help us in resolving some of our shortcomings 

in protecting the homeland. 

Mr. CHERTOFF. We are going to—I want to try to improve our responsiveness on these issues. 

I also have to make a plea that we get some relief from too much 

reporting and also some sense of priority. I mean, if we know something is really important, we can move to that first. And you know, 

it is perennially an issue. I mean, sometimes I feel it is the nature 

of an agency, everybody feels they have to touch something before 

it goes out the door. And I want to try to streamline that process. 

But you can help us—that. 

Mr. MEEK. Mr. Chairman, I know I am out of time. Mr. Chairman, I just would like to ask that hopefully you can speak with the 
48

Ranking Member and maybe sharing with the Secretary what is a 

major priority of what we need as it relates to the work that we 

are going to be doing, because I think that will be helpful. 

Some report is better than no report, and I think the Secretary 

has put an offer on the table that is good. 

Chairman COX. Thank you. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

The gentlelady from Texas, Ms. Jackson-Lee? 

Ms. JACKSON-LEE. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. 

Thank you very much, Mr. Secretary. 

I was impressed, first of all, by your focus in your opening statement that seemed to suggest that you, too, believe that one of the 

important aspects of security and the functioning of the homeland 

security is understanding the aspects and facets of the department. 

And your reference to having initiated a comprehensive view of the 

organization, operation and policies, I think, is very positive. 

I think, however, the Congress may have made a mistake. I 

would like to be proven wrong. I am very disturbed at the size, as 

it has become very clear, of the department. It is 180,000 personnel, I am sure all very hard-working. But I have a sense, as this 

review may show us, that we have a problem with one hand not 

knowing what the other hand is doing. 

I would refer back to the Ranking Member’s comments about the 

number of vacancies. And I know that you are just about 2 months 

on the job. I would like to pinpoint really a pointed answer on what 

will be the steps taken, immediate steps taken, so we are looking 

for good people to fill some of those very vital spots, particularly 

in border enforcement and security. 

My next question would be—I can just do all the three of them—

is the dilemma that ICE is in. Before the Judiciary Committee, ICE 

representatives came and said thing such as, ‘‘We do not have uniforms. We do not have badges. In the transition, we are still carrying the same badges and I.D. that we had in our previous position.’’ There was a reprogramming of money, allegedly $500 million. You might comment on whether that has occurred. 

But finally, I would say that I hope that, as you look to the policy—as I see the theme throughout your statement, if there is ever 

a need for policy cooperation, it is in immigration. 

We have failed in immigration. We either spend more time stigmatizing it, labeling it, criticizing it, disregarding it, not wanting 

it. It is here to stay. And I think you need to have a combination 

of the policy part of it on immigration benefits and enforcement. 

I did not hear one statement—and I understand it was a level 

of frustration on these citizens’ part—but I did not hear one statement commenting on the existence of Minutemen on the border of 

the Arizona—on the Arizona border. Comments being made that 

the next state would be Texas. 

I understand citizen frustration. But if we are to have our hands 

around homeland security as Congress indicated, it should be, as 

this department’s establishment suggests that it should be, then 

the frustration of citizens to the extent that Minutemen are on our 

borders and no policy has come from the administration, meaning 

no policy statement has come from the administration to suggest 

that that is intolerable, or that we seek to fix it, or that we will 
49

immediately dispatch numbers of Border Patrol agents possibly 

from other areas, to me is a silence that we cannot tolerate. 

So I would appreciate and look forward with you on these issues. 

I am particularly interested in the border. We have spent a lot of 

time in that area, being from Texas. But I do think that what we 

have on the Arizona border poses a dangerous combination for disaster, for the citizens who mean well and for our Border Patrol 

agents who every day are putting their lives on the line to do the 

best job that they possibly can do. 

I welcome your thoughts, Mr. Secretary, and I thank you for 

staying for all of us, so we are here at the very end. 

Mr. CHERTOFF. I am appreciative of the congresswoman—. 

Chairman COX. Mr. Secretary, I would just alert you that it is 

just a few minutes after 4:30. I understand that you have a hard 

deadline that we have agreed to for you to depart. I want to give 

you the opportunity to do that. 

I also want to let you know we have only one member remaining 

who—. 

Ms. LOFGREN. I will hang in there, but I will talk fast. 

Chairman COX. —if you can stay, we would very much appreciate 

it. 

Mr. CHERTOFF. I will try to deal with each of the three. 

In terms of the vacancies of the senior leadership, again, I mean, 

in some instances, frankly, I think people who are leaving are leaving because they have done a good job and they are being promoted 

or moved to something else. And we do have some very talented 

people who are in the process, I think, of being considered. 

We have already got some positions that are filled or we have 

nominations. And frankly, of course, to the extent where we deal 

with confirmed positions, and this is an issue for the Senate, obviously, you know, it is a long process. And so we want to move as 

quickly as possible. 

As far is ICE is concerned, the reprogramming documentation 

has come up. I think it came up a couple of weeks ago. We believe 

that that will finally at least fix the financial problem that emerged 

when they broke the original INS and Customs apart. 

We need to get that fixed. We are looking hard at the question 

of how we can improve their financial management—they got cut 

short with that—including the possibility of having another component step in to take over that function. And that would be a big 

help. 

Beyond that, I think ICE does a tremendous job. And I need to 

find a way to elevate its profile within the Department and make 

it clear how much—what a valuable contribution ICE does make. 

They have done a tremendous job in dealing with this MS–13 

gang and dealing, obviously, with things like child pornography, 

but also with, you know, human trafficking. I mean, there are 

huge, very high-profile and very important areas of investigation 

that they have a premier role in. And I want to make sure that 

is appreciated and understood. 

Finally, as far as immigration is concerned, I think—I mean, the 

President has it exactly right. He has proposed a temporary worker 

program which would enable us to identify, you know, those people 

who are in this country illegally but with no intent to harm and 
50

pull them into the system in a way that would be regulated and 

controlled, thereby freeing up the resources to focus on people who 

do not want to operate within the system and who are potentially 

a threat. 

At the border, we added over 500 Border Patrol agents. We 

moved them into Arizona as part of our Arizona border control initiative. And that was very successful last year. We hope it will be 

successful again. We have got sensors. We are working on getting 

UAVs stood up over the summer. 

There is no question, I completely agree with you, we have got 

to—this is a big concern of American citizens, rightfully so. We 

have got to put a package together. I think the President’s package 

of having, you know, temporary worker effort but also, you know, 

stepped up and smarter enforcement is exactly the approach that 

we need to take. 

Chairman COX. The gentlelady’s time has expired. 

The gentlelady from California, Ms. Lofgren? 

Ms. LOFGREN. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

And thank you, Mr. Secretary. I will be quick, and I appreciate 

your staying. 

It has been a pleasure to listen to you here today. And I am—

you said much that there is to like here, in an approach that is methodical, and organized, and logical. And frankly, that has not always been presented to us. So I am very eager to work with you 

in the years ahead. 

I would like to—and I very much agree with your emphasis on 

technology. That is the key to our being successful in this mission. 

Just a couple of issues that I wanted to raise, and perhaps you 

can comment on them. 

In terms of technology, I have focused on the issue of immigration functions for several years. The press is reporting that the 

data integration project at the immigration function has been abandoned for budget reasons. I do not know if that is true. If it is true, 

I would like to know and if, whatever the case, what the plans are, 

we are still creating paper records. And obviously you cannot 

search the database if it is a paper record. 

I firmly believe that, unless you have all of the records computerized with a biometric, you are really not going to be able to search 

them. And that gets me to my second question. 

We have never really, so far as I am aware, settled on with probably the assistance of NIST, the appropriate biometric or metrics—

they can be redundant. And we have deployed systems that are 

now incompatible and therefore not fully usable. So I am wondering what you plan to do about that problem. 

Finally, I served last year on the Cybersecurity Subcommittee. 

We have not made progress in implementing the cyber-plan. We 

have had turnover. Congressman Mac Thornberry, who chaired the 

committee last year, and I had a bill which we have reintroduced 

this year for an assistant secretary for cybersecurity so that we can 

get some attention to this area. 

I am sure you read about the NSF funding to avoid what some 

has said a cyber-Pearl Harbor. We all hope to do that. And I am 

wondering if you have a position on that bill yet. 
51

Finally, in terms of science, the HSARPA program is really taking a short-term approach. It is not taking the kind of DARPA 

long-term approach that I had envisioned. And I think, in terms of 

science and technology, we have faced some very huge risks. 

My colleague from North Carolina mentioned the lack of computer, and math, and physics, and science graduates. Half of the 

graduate students are foreign students. Well, no more, because half 

of the universities in America reported that their foreign students 

in graduate departments did not show up because of visa problems. 

So that is also your department. 

We can no longer get scholars into the United States, so the 

international science projects, the big physics, are going to have to 

be located in other countries rather than the United States because 

we cannot get Nobel Prize-winners into the U.S. 

I am wondering if you have a plan for dealing with all of those 

issues. And again, I thank you so much for your approach. And I 

really look forward to working with you. 

Mr. CHERTOFF. Thank you. I think I can touch on all of these. 

I am not quite sure what the report is about us abandoning data 

integration. So it is a little hard for me to answer. I am not 

aware—I mean, clearly, we need to have, and we are moving toward, making available—and I believe we have at the ports of 

entry—an ability to search records to make sure we are getting 

watch lists searched. That obviously is something that is not complete yet, but we have a lot deployed there. 

Likewise, with the issue of a biometric standard, I think I can 

tell you that there is significant progress made toward reaching a 

resolution of this debate about what is the appropriate biometric 

standard. And part of it is a recognition that there are different 

standards for different functions. 

If you take fingerprints, for identification of one-to-one, actually 

one or two prints is enough. But for searching a large database 

against latest prints, which you want to do in case of terrorists, you 

probably need ten. 

Ms. LOFGREN. If I may, I agree with that. But if you have got 

different algorithms on the two fingers versus the ten fingers, you 

cannot use the systems—. 

Mr. CHERTOFF. It depends on what—you see, and you can use 

systems for different things. And in fact, sometimes you do not 

want to have one system, because you are—both the purposes of 

speed and purposes of actual privacy, not everybody needs everything. 

In other words, if I get someone plugged into the system enrolled, I want to search the widest database and make sure they 

are not a terrorist. But once I have locked down that identity, and 

I am comfortable with the person, all I need to know is each time 

the person presents themselves it is the same person. And that 

does not require a full search. It requires a one-to-one. 

So I think we are moving towards resolution in that area. On the 

area of cyber, I do think we have—that is a serious vulnerability. 

As to whether we should, you know, have an assistant secretary or 

particulars of a bill, I do not know that I am in a position to say 

that. But it is something that we have, or are clearly aware of, and 

we are looking at. 
52

Finally, on the issue of visas for foreign students, I mean, I think 

we have already taken some steps, in terms of lengthening the stay 

period. It comes back to the original point. 

Maybe I should close with the original point the chairman made. 

We want to have a balance. We need to keep bad people out. There 

is no question historically dangerous people have abused the student visa system. We have to figure out a way to weed them out, 

but then also welcome the rest of the world. 

I believe, as I think you do, that technology and biometric properly deployed actually is the way to achieve both of those goals. To 

vet people to make sure we are keeping bad people out, but then 

to be able to give them a freer ability to go back and forth so as 

to make this really a friendlier place for the world so we attract 

the leading minds and the leading capabilities. 

Ms. LOFGREN. I totally agree. And it is music to my ears. 

Thank you, Mr. Secretary. 

Chairman COX. Well, it is appropriate that we end this hearing 

on what can sometimes be a dismal topic with music and happiness. 

[Laughter.] 

And I wanted to thank you very much for spending so much time 

with us. Your testimony is very valuable. 

I want to thank the members for their questions. The members 

of the committee may have some additional questions. We will hold 

the hearing record open for an additional 10 days. 

And, Mr. Secretary, we would ask that you respond to any such 

questions in writing. 

Ms. LOFGREN. Thank you very much. 

Chairman COX. Thank you all. 

The hearing is adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 4:43 p.m., the committee was adjourned.]

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