Cspan3, government officials and scholars discuss the peace building process on the korean peninsula. That gets underway at 10 30 a. M. Eastern. Susan cspans newsmaker this week is representative mike rogers, republican of alabama, a Ranking Member, the seniormost republican on the Homeland Security committee and a Senior Member of the House Armed Services committee, which puts him at the nexus of many big issues we are talking about this week. His district is home to fort benning, Anniston Army depot and Maxwell Gunter air force base. We are going to start with military related issues, congressman, let me turn you over to our two reporters scott wong of the hill and Anna Giaritelli of the washington examiner. Scott, you are up first. Scott congressman, thank you for being here today. We have learned President Trump approved military strikes against iran in retaliation for downing a u. S. Military drone. He called that strike off 10 minutes before it was scheduled to happen. We know that gop leaders, including Kevin Mccarthy, have said there should be a measured response to the downing of the drone. What is your own position on this issue . Do you agree with gop leaders that we need to see retaliation, and what might that look like . Rep. Rogers there absolutely has to be some response to that provocative, unprovoked act. But it does need to be measured, and i think thats what the president is trying to decide, whether it needs to be a kinetic strike, like was being planned, or something in the way of other diplomatic approaches to put pressure on them. But i dont know what his thinking is right now. I think he is going to take some response. Make some response. Scott do you believe some members of congress have said the president , before he takes any sort of action, should come before congress and request an authorization for military use of force . You sound like you are opposed to that. Do you believe the president now has the authority to launch military attacks against iran . Rep. Rogers correct, i think he does. He did take the time to consult with congress yesterday. He had the leaders of both chambers over as well as members of the Armed Services committee, the Foreign Affairs committee, and others to talk to him about what he should do. So he did consult with congress as he was trying to decide what action to take. But when you have a country like iran shoot down an american drone in international airspace, i dont think we need to have three months of argument in congress to decide what needs to be done. We have him as a commanderinchief to make decisions like this, and it does not matter if it is a democrat or a republican. I felt the same way about barack obama when he was president. If we are going to get into a longterm war, it is a different story, but he needs to take action, i think, in a quick manner, whether it is sanctions or kinetic attacks, he needs to make that call. There has to be a response. Otherwise, you will see countries like north korea, china, and russia will be much more provocative in their actions toward us because they know we are paralyzed and unable to respond. Scott the other big story out of the pentagon this week was pat shanahan, the acting defense secretary, taking himself out of the running and out of the confirmation process to become the Permanent Defense secretary. President trump has selected mark esper, the secretary of the army, to replace him as acting defense secretary. Do you have concerns that we are now seven months of having an acting defense secretary, trump will have to find a new nominee to head up the pentagon, especially at this time of increased activity in the persian gulf and with north korea . Plus, you have thousands of migrants showing up on the southern border. Do you have concerns about the fact that we have no permanent senateconfirmed defense secretary . Rep. Rogers i do. I was concerned before this change that secretary shanahan was in an acting role. This is the Largest Organization on the planet. They need a confirmed secretary leading it. I am also very disappointed that secretary shanahan is resigning. He was a topnotch secretary, very competent, doing a great job and i think it is awful that he has had to pull back to protect his family from what he was going through. Secretary as per secretary esper is going to be great. I hope the senate will confirm him soon, but we dont need to have these acting secretaries in charge of these large organizations. It is not helpful at all. Anna as the Ranking Member on the house Homeland Security committee, i want to talk to you. You have been to the border plenty. The media is not allowed in Border Patrol stations, so they have not been able to see the overcrowding or the conditions. This week, one congresswoman compared them to concentration camps. What have you seen on the ground in the last few months when you have been down to the border . Rep. Rogers it is a crisis. It is a humanitarian crisis, and it is not manufactured. It is real and getting worse. The fact is over the last three months we have had over 100,000 migrants coming across our border. In march, it was 104,000, in april it was 109,000, you can see the trendlines. This is not going to get better. We are not equipped to deal with this huge volume of migrants, and there is a different set of migrants. In the recent past, we have dealt with single males, typically from mexico. Now we have many women and children, and we are not set up to handle them. I am disappointed that yall are able to get in and see these processing facilities. Rcbp is set up to hold a maximum of 4000 individuals in these facilities, and we have over 20,000 right now. We cant let this go on. Some folks on the democrat side may not like President Trump or his policies, but this is not about President Trump and his policies. This is a humanitarian crisis. These women and children and men need to have housing and health care while we try to determine who is appropriate for allowing into our country, or who needs to be sent back, but they need to have a place to stay while they are here. They come across from Central America through mexico, and by the time they get here, most of them are in very poor health. This cant just be ignored. I am hopeful that soon the democrats will allow my authorization bill to appropriate 4. 5 billion in supplemental funding to help deal with this. When President Trump was talking about wanting to get money for the border barrier, the Democrat Party kept saying, well, we dont need barriers, they dont work. What we need is money for health care, transportation, housing. Well, thats all this appropriations bill is, 4. 5 billion to provide that kind of assistance to the border. When i hear members of the Democrat Party talking about our Processing Centers being similar to concentration camps, first of all i am terribly offended because these are nothing close to concentration camps. Weve got Border Patrol agents buying toys with their own personal money, diapers and food with their own personal money, trying to take care of these families. If they really think the conditions are deplorable, then bring a bill to the floor to get the Border Patrol and health and Human Services the money they need to take care of these people. Anna there is an appropriations bill making progress in the senate, and now House Democrats are working on their supplemental bill. It has been said to be too controversial to gain republican support. What say you . You have your own subliminal you have your own supplemental bill. Is there something that could be passed before the august recess . Rep. Rogers i was disappointed to learn this morning the democrats had decided not to bring their supplemental bill to the floor this week. We had learned there would be a bill on the floor next week. I have not seen it, so i do not know what was in it, good or bad. We want to be helpful in assisting with this crisis at the border, so as long as they dont put poison pills in the bill that would somehow impede the president s parallel effort to secure the border, we are going to be fine with it. If they try to do that, obviously we are going to have a problem, but this needs to be dealt with on its face. It is a humanitarian crisis. We need to deal with it without putting extraneous issues in it or dealing with extraneous issues as a part of it. I am hoping that is their intent, because as you may or may not know, hhs is about out of money. By the end of this month, they will be out of money, and cbp is going to be out of money by august 1. There is not a lot of time for us to continue to bicker about this. We need to put solutions on the table. I have offered a solution. They need to bring something to the floor. So far, they have refused to vote on my bill 15 different times. I am sure people are wondering what this country might do to better stem the flow of migrants from southern countries. What are your thoughts on that, helping to mitigate some of the situations causing people to leave in the first place . Rep. Rogers well, congressman doug collins of georgia has offered legislation to close some of the loopholes and encourage people to come through, particularly bring in children. I would like to see those bills brought to the floor for a vote so we would not be inviting these groups. But the president took an excellent to step, putting pressure on mexico to stop the flow into our borders. The Central American countries coming to our country have to come through mexico, and mexico was just letting them come across the country. I think President Trump getting them to secure the southern border is already bringing relief for us. But they will have to help the other countries, stop other people from coming here unless they go through the proper procedures that we invite. And for us to fix our own immigration laws. Susan let me just follow up. People are fleeing desperate situations, and i wonder if through economic aid, more diplomacy, or other methods that are in the country that can help stem some of these situations that are causing people to flee, it is there any role in the United States for stopping the root causes . Rep. Rogers you talk about people fleeing for their safety, lets say you flee honduras and you get into mexico, and mexico says, you are welcome to stay here, you are safe once you are in mexico. They are coming to america because they want economic opportunity, and i dont blame them, but the fact is we cant just take everybody that wants a better economic circumstance in their life. We do have a role, and i think we can be better in those countries as far as their personal security, but that does not mean that everybody worried about their circumstance and their country can come into this country. We cant take everybody. Susan we are at the halfway point. Next question. Scott President Trump made a pledge this week saying that he plans to arrest millions of undocumented immigrants. The question now is, do you see that as a plausible strategy, and where would you put millions of people if you had detained them . Would they be deported, put in facilities in the United States . Do you have any explanation here . Rep. Rogers my understanding is he is talking about people who have overstayed their visas that we know no longer have legal status to be here, and removing them from the country. We would not have to worry about a place to keep them. The concern i have is where is the manpower going to come from . We are already shifting people away from other dhs agencies to help the customs and Border Protection personnel do their jobs, and ice is already understaffed, so my concern is where they come from. I like what he is talking about, because i have called for years for these folks that we know are here illegally that overstayed their visas, and we know where they are, and nobody has been removing them. I like that idea. I just dont know where the personnel to do it would come from. Scott switching gears, you have been a proponent of First Responders in rural parts of america. Last week we saw jon stewart, the tv host, come to capitol hill and plead with members of congress, implore them and shamed them to try to get congress to act on reauthorizing the 9 11 fund for First Responders who served during that time and responded to that emergency. Mitch mcconnell has indicated there was nothing to worry about, but obviously there is urgency with money running out by the end of the year. Do you believe this fund should be reauthorized, and do you see this happening by the end of the year deadline . Rep. Rogers i do. I think jon stewart was doing showboating in that visit. What i found disappointing was he was testifying before a subcommittee in a full Committee Chamber and made a big issue about all the empty chairs and members not caring when there was only two members of the subcommittee that were not present, and i think he knew that. I think he was just showboating. The fact is, i think this is going to be reauthorized by the end of the year. He may want it to be done sooner than that, but we have our own timetables of getting things done. We are not going to run out of money by the end of the year, and i think this will be fine. Anna back to the supplemental, the customs and Border Protections Parent Agency has not explained how they will break down some of the funding. Some of it would go to different projects, those sorts of things, but in terms of the nine Border Patrol sectors that make up the southern border, i just came back from eagle pass, texas, and when i kept hearing was the union was saying the money was not there in the sector to move on. It was in the headquarters in washington, d. C. What do you know about customs and Border Protections plan to, once they do get supplemental funding, how do they go about spending it . Rep. Rogers i have not heard the concern you just described. The money in the supplemental bill i had introduced, we do see where it goes. There is no secret about it. We have been clear about who gets the money. I assure you that once by bill is adopted, we will make sure the money is pushed out. It will not be staying in washington. Scott let me switch to some 2020 politics, if i could. This week, judge roy moore, who lost the senate race in alabama two years ago, announced he would be giving it another shot and running for the senate in 2020. He obviously has come under enormous fire for a Sexual Misconduct controversy and scandal. Mitch mcconnell and the president himself have said that if judge moore is the nominee, he could cost republicans that seat in a very red state, your state, alabama, once again, and hand that seat to democrats for another six years. Do you share the same concerns about judge moore, and that he would hand democrats that seat . Rep. Rogers it is possible. I think it is not likely. That was a unique situation in that special election in december. Regardless of who are nominee will be this time, we are going to have a spirited primary, and i personally do not think roy moore will be our nominee, but whoever our nominee is will prevail in november because you will have the full complement of Republican Voters turning out to vote, because he did have such a problem, half of the Republican Voters would not turn out and vote for him. The democrats nationwide made an enormous effort in alabama to make sure they turn out for doug jones was at the same level Hillary Clinton had in the president ial election. This is going to be a completely different playing field, and whoever the republican nominee is going to be will be successful next year, but i dont think it is going to be roy moore. Susan does that mean you dont welcome his reentry . Rep. Rogers i do not. Scott who do you think will be the strongest nominee on the republican side . Rep. Rogers we have four people running now. We have bradley byrne, tommy tuberville, and we have a state representative, mooney, that is running. I think three of those four, any of them would be a strong nominee in the general election. I really could not pick right now who the front runner is, but any of those would be strong. Scott and your senior senator from alabama has been actively trying to recruit Jeff Sessions to run for his old seat. Any thoughts about Jeff Sessions jumping into that race . Rep. Rogers i love Jeff Sessions. He is one of my favorite people on the planet, but i think he has moved on and has no interest going back to the senate. He is enjoying private life and being with his family. Susan you have been a chief supporter of the creation of a space force. Would you give the audience your rationale of why this is the right direction for our military defense to move in . Rep. Rogers we have become heavily reliant on satellites in our daily lives, whether you are doing banking transactions or using your smart phones or watching tv. We have become very reliant on satellites, and most people do not realize that. The truth is the military has as well. We use them for command and control of our nuclear weapons, for the gps system for positioning our troops, guiding our missiles and uavs. There are a whole host of things we use satellites for, and it is very entrenched in every one of our services. Our adversaries have recognized that as well, china and russia in particular, and they have put a significant amount of defense spending into developing capabilities to take out our defense satellites. We cannot allow that to continue. At present, 90 of our space professionals who run and operate these systems are in the air force. The air force is culturally indoctrinated towards air dominance. Space is just one of 11 other missions that they have not been applying the appropriate amount of resources to. We felt like and this debate started about 18 years ago with the rumsfeld commission, that we were going to have to separate the space professionals into their own organization where they have a culture that makes space dominance the Number One Mission. Space is now a warfighting domain. Also, properly resource it so the budgets cannot be robbed. One of the things we have seen over the last couple of decades is the air force pulling money out of Space Programs to fund bombers and fighter jets and tankers, because they are not an air dominance organization. We want to make sure we have an organization that comes to work knowing that the Number One Mission is space dominance, that the professionals will be promoted based on merit in space. They have an educational system that promotes space dominance. And we will properly budget to make sure we regain our dominance in space, because now we have allowed both china and russia to have become our peers. That is not an acceptable option for us. The two things we try to make sure of in the Armed Services that is always the case is that it is a fair fight and on someone elses homeland. We have gotten into a situation where russia and china will have a fair fight with us in space. That is not acceptable. The space force will allow us to regain the dominant position and maintain it into the future. Susan a quick followup, there are many visions being proposed in the capital city. Under your scenario, with the space force be your own separate command and have a member of the joint chiefs . Rep. Rogers yes, and that is true under the senate and house version. We will have a separate service that remains in the department of the air force, but it is a separate service. In the department of the navy, you have the navy and marine corps. We are going to have, in the department of the air force, the air force and the space corps. It is going to be a separate service in the department. One day, maybe 20 years from now, it may spin off into its own department, but we dont think it is necessary right now. It is important right now to separate those professionals into their own service so we can properly resource them and see them be able to advance our interest in space to regain a dominant position. But the chief of staff of the space force will also have a seat at the joint chiefs. Susan final questions from either of you . Anna with the supplemental expected to pass through the house and senate at some point, we have already passed one supplemental after the government shutdown, where do we go from here if lawmakers cant come together and deal with what republicans say are the causes, asylum laws and other policies . Is that why President Trump is taking action by going after folks who have been ordered deported . They were not granted asylum but are still in the country. How can the Trump Administration take it into its own hands . Rep. Rogers i think you are exactly right. Thats where we have to go next. First we have to take care of the crisis with the appropriation bill. I am hopeful that will happen in the next week or so, and hopefully before hhs runs out of money. The next thing we have to do is have this debate on what to do with our immigration laws. Hopefully President Trumps actions will spur that debate. Scott one final question, both the gop leaders Kevin Mccarthy and Steve Scalise backed a pay raise for lawmakers on capitol hill. What is your position on the pay raise for lawmakers . Rep. Rogers i think colas are appropriate for all federal employees, and members of congress are federal employees. I have always believed the law that says every time a federal employee gets a pay raise, members of congress will too, and i think we should go back to that practice. Susan congressman, we covered a lot of topics. Thank you very much for being our guest this week. Rep. Rogers glad to be with you. Susan anna, you referenced in your question your reporting from the border. I would like to start there. , you mentionedre before we started taping, that you go down there once a month. What are you seeing that the public does not know or members of Congress Might not know if the debate needs to happen . Anna i have seen Border Patrol agents coming up to me and speaking to me when they should not, but saying, our hands are tied, and we are doing all sorts of jobs, and it is the sector management working with headquarters in d. C. , and agents are saying not enough is being done. Not enough white tents are going up and other actions being taken. And that is because sometimes customs and Border Protection has worried that if you put up more outdoor, temporary facilities, it will incentivize more people to come. There is this disconnect between agents and management, and i think a lot of the times, what we see is a child has died in custody, Border Patrol is blasted as a whole, and agents really feel like they are not being represented. They want to do more, but they are not allowed to just go rogue and do their own sort of additional operation. Susan you have the Top Republican on the Homeland Security committee who is surprised to find out that reporters cannot get access to these facilities. Is there Anything Congress can bring to bear on the agency said on the agencies so that they would allow reporters to see what is going on . Anna that would be interesting. I have not been at a Border Patrol facility in a year now, and i think i have been on 12 trips since february. If congress could take some sort of action it is really Border Patrols benefit to have media in there. Therefore, you can have the public able to see. It is not just one Border Patrol station like the one in el paso that was reported to be severely overcrowded. 900 people in a 125 person space. You have about a hundred holding stations on the southern border, all overcrowded. They are not that severe, but some of them are very overcrowded and not sanitary. If the public can see that, it might give congress a little more push to get more funding. Susan congressman rogers expressed his hopes that President Trumps actions will spur congress to have an immigration debate. Congress has been circling around immigration for years now. Is there anything that will move them on this issue . Scott i dont think so, in this election year. Immigration for the president , when he talks about the crisis on the border, thousands showing up, that motivates his conservative base and he can act tough on the immigration issue, so he uses that as a political issue, but that does not bring the two parties any closer together. Democrats, in the same way, have used immigration and the daca issue as a Political Tool or weapon in the past elections. We are starting to see that take shape for the 2020 race as well. Susan and meanwhile, tens of thousands of people keep coming to the border. Anna i am hearing from agents on the ground that it is at 110 right now. Susan last quick question, on iran, the president says he does not need congressional authority. Do the democrats on capitol hill agree with him . Scott no, i think they would like the president to come to congress and make that request, but Republican Leaders are very clear. They believe previous aumfs cover any action by the president on iran. Of course, those were passed in the wake of 9 11 and had a focus on terrorism in the United States, so this is a very different situation. But the white house and the republican allies from capitol hill will argue that the president does have the authority. Susan thats it for our time. Thank you for your questions this week. I view political cartooning as advertising on television. You have about five seconds to capture the viewers attention. You have another five seconds to deliver the point to or sell the product. On television, you are selling the product and political cartoons you are selling the idea. Tonight on q a, Michael Ramirez on his career, his book on political cartoons. My favorite political family and i won my first pulitzer in 1994 on the back of that administration. When you take a caricature of someone coming you are changing the dynamic of their features not only to make them into cartoon but to show the dynamics of their personality as well. 8 00 eastern on cspans q a. , tonight, on after words , the targett book are, a former cia analyst offers her insights into the inner workings of the agency. She is interviewed by House Intelligence Committee member, carson from indiana. While most people know who Osama Bin Laden is, it was another figure you had a connection to in your service. Tell us about your experience tracking him and those around him. I was charged as the analyst with looking at and evaluating whether or not iraq had anything to do with 9 11 and al qaeda. And as an analyst, we had been writing products for policymakers and briefing them and our bottom line was that iraq had nothing to do with 9 11 and al qaeda so there was not a connection there. After that, after the invasion, when i became a targeting toicer, kelly had risen prominence because he had been attacking targets inside iraq. Eventually joined al qaeda and created al qaeda in iraq. My job was to dismantle his network, organization, and later worked and leadership. Watch tonight on book tv on cspan2. Next, the conference on improving Border Management between the u. S. And mexico and the affect on economic competition. You will hear specialists discuss economics in the border region. Speakut an hour, we will more about Border Security and the trade agreement with the u. S. , mexico, and canada. Ok. To the few in the crowd, there are a few more in the hallway that will join us. Thank you for sticking with us for the session. We have one more interesting session. For me, this is a really important one. We have spoken for a lot of the day about how it is that you can move things back and forth mosts the border the efficiently, effectively, and understanding how you can do that what you balance that with security challenges at the border and that is of fundamental importance for border communities and our economies as a whole. However, i do not think that is enough. Not enough for u. S. Border communities or for Mexican Border communities to really have the vibrant communities that we want and the quality of life that people in the Border Regions aspire to. This requires strategies for Economic Development that leverage the unique position of those communities along the border as a way to attract companies to do business in the region. There is a unique Value Proposition there. The combination of the competitive advantages of the two countries sidebyside that makes working and producing in the border region particularly attractive and interesting. E