Transcripts For CSPAN3 Global Terror Threats 20180213

Id like to call this hearing on world live throats order and id like to welcome our distinguished witnesses today, director of National Intelligence dan coats, director of the Central Intelligence agency mike pompeo, director of defense Intelligence Agency general robert ashley, director of the federal bureau of investigation chris wray, director of the National Security agency Admiral Mike Rogers and the director of the geo spacial Intelligence Agency robert cardale. Weve got a long day in front of us and i thinkal of you for being here. I now how forward you look to this one occasion on an annual basis. Since 1995, this committees met in open forum to discuss the security threats facing the United States of america. This has never been nor will it ever be a comfortable conversation to have. The threats this country face are complex, evolving, and without easy answers. They exist in multiple domains. Theyre asymmetrical and conventional. They can be launched from across the ocean or planned in our homeland. None of less, this conversation serves a vital purpose and its essential that it takes place in the Public Square with as much detail and candor as is possible. In my view, that is the true value and Public Service of this hearing. It provides the American People with insight that they just dont normally get. Those insights are about the spectrum of threats were up against as a nation, but importantly, those insights are also about the work that the Intelligence Community does to push back on those threats. This is work that both time are both time and labor intensive. It can be frustrating, heartbreaking and dangerous. Its often thankless, but because of the tireless dedication and patriotism of men and women who make up our Intelligence Community, it gets done on behalf of the American People every single day. To this point, i encourage all the witnesses this morning to not only address the threats to our nation, but to talk about what their organizations are doing to help secure this country and to the degree they can, in an unclassified setting. Director coats, your testimony for the record ties together the expertise, capabilities, and wisdom of the entire Intelligence Community. I encourage everyone to familiarize themselves with its content. Its lengthy and its detailed and its a testament to the broad range of talents our ic brings to the table. Its also a compelling reminder of high this country invests so substantallily in his intelligence apparatus. Director pompeo, when we held this hearing last year i asked you to share your ideas on the Korean Peninsula. Im going to ask you again for your instates on the state of Koreas Nuclear program and whats going on with their political leadership. Perhaps you can help us deliver eight between a genuine effort to remembering son kyle with north korea and driving a wedge between south korea and seoul. General, the work never seems to end four our department. I would value your thoughts on the battlefield. Last week we had u. S. Advisers and kurdish allies come under fire in eastern syria. This prompted a strike that killed dozen of proregime forces. In afghanistan a string of attacks in cab bull left 150 dead last month suggesting that after 16 years of war, the insurgency is nowhere near fold gd and the government remains hard pressed to supply the protection for its own people. I would ask your insight on where progress is being made and where its not. Admiral rogers, cyber is the most challenge threat vector this country faces. Its also the most concerning given how many aspects of our daily lives in the United States can be disrupted by a wellplanned, wellexecuted cyberattack. Id appreciate your assessment of how well were doing when it comes to protecting the nations most critical Computer Networks from the system of our military to the networks thaen sure the Nations Energy supply. They are all essential to a functioning functionality of a modern america. And i fear that theyre increasingly vulnerable to state and nonstate actors. Director ray, im keenly interested in hearing your assessment of the threat posed by the spread of Foreign Technology in the United States. This committee has worked diligently to sound the alarm bells when it comes to the counterintelligence and Information Security risks that come prepackaged with the goods and services of certain overseas vendors. The focus of my concern today is china and specifically Chinese Telecomthat are widely understood to have extraordinary ties to the Chinese Government. I home youll share your thoughts on this and i also ask you to provide your insights into how foreign commercial investment and acquisitions are jeopardizing the nations most sensitive technologies. Lastly, id like to spend a moment on the counterintelligence threat to our National Academic research and laboratory construct. Whats the scale of the problem and whats the fbi doing to fight it . And finally, director car dilla, weve come to associate nga with the modernization of the Intelligence Community. The adversaries of this country are investing in innovating faster and with fewer constraints than we are. The threats we face are multidimensional, decentralized and goble. Ng sanction playing a central role and pushing the envelope with new ways of tackling problems like having more data than you can feasibly analyze. As we move closer to Machine Learning, and eventually Artificial Intelligence. The computer learning and vision work at nga will be a bridge to help us get there. I look forward to your thoughts on whats next at nga and how the Intelligence Community as a whole can make better use of innovation and technologies to advance intelligence disciplines that have not changed much in the past 60 years. Our adversaries arent going to wait for us to catch up. Ill close there because we have a lot to get to, but i want to thank you and more importantly i want to thank those who are not here with you. Those who carry out the lions s share of the work on behalf of the American People, the Intelligence Community, the foctio folks you represent are important to this to this commit tie and we cant do our work without the work they perform. Before turning to the distinguished advice chairman, i would like to say we will reconvene at 2 30 this afternoon in a closed session to hear from the same witnesses in a classified setting. I would ask members to please reserve anything that remotely gets into a classified question for the afternoon session. With that, advice chairman. Thank you, mr. Chairman. And let me also welcome all of you here and echo the chairmans comments. Thank you all for your service. And we hope you will convey back to all the brave men and women who work for you that this committee will always have your back. I think this open hearing comes at an extraordinarily important time. Our nations intelligence agencies stand at the forefront of our definition against continuing threats from terrorist groups, extremists ideology, rogue regimes, nuclear p proliferation, and regional instagt. We all know and weve discussed this, weve also seen the rise of nation whos view themselves as least as competitors if not as adversaries of the United States. Theyve began to use utilize new asa metric weapons to undercut our institution rrss to steal our most sensitive intellectual property. Let me start with russia. Certain questions remain with respect to the true extent of the russian interference in the 2016 elections and well work through these, continue to work through these in a bipartisan way on this committee. However, i think youll find a broad bipartisan consensus on this committee on a number of critical issues. First, that russia engaged in a coordinated attack to undermine our democracy. Second, that effort included targeting of state and local elections electoral activities in 21 states. Third, the russian effort in a new area utilized our social media platforms to push and spread misinformation at an unprecedented scale. Now, weve had more than a year to get our act together and address the threat posed by russia and implement a strategy to deter further attacks. But i believe, unfortunately, we still dont have a comprehensive plan. Two weeks ago director pompeo publicly stated that he has had every expectation that russia will try influence our upcoming elections. Secretary of state tillerson just last week said that were already seeing russian efforts to med he widle in the 2018 ele. But i believe were no better prepared that he we were in 2016. This threat did not begin in 2016 and it certainly didnt end with the election. What we are seeing is a continuous assault by russia to target and undermine our Democratic Institutions and theyre going to keep coming at us. Despite all this, the president inconveniently continues to deny the threat posed by russia. He didnt increase sanctions on russia when he had a chance do so. He hasnt even tweeted a single concern. This threat, i believe, demands a whole of government response and that response needs to start with leadership at the top. At the same time, other threats to our institutions come from right here at home. There have been some aided and abetted by Russian Internet bots and trolls who have attacked the basic integrity of the fbi and the justice department. This is a dangerous trend. This campaign of innuendo and misinformation should alarm all of us regardless of our partisan affiliation. In addition to this ongoing threat from russia, im concerned that china has developed an all of society, not just all of government, but all of Society Approach to gain access to our sensitive technologies and intellectual property. Im paying a great deal of attention to the rise of chinas tech secretary tore. In particular im worried about the close relationship between the Chinese Government and Chinese Technology firms, particularly in the area of commercialization of our Surveillance Technology and efforts to shape tell mun occasion equipment markets. I want to ensure that the ic is tracking the direction that kmoo chinas tech giants are heading and especially to the extent which they are beholden to the Chinese Government. In recent years weve seen major technologies firms whose rise is attributed in part to the u. S. Technology and ip. These companies now represent some of the leading Market Players globally. Most americans have not heard of all of these companies, but as they enter western economic markets, we want to ensure that they play by the rules. We need to make sure that this is not a new way for china to gain access to sensitive technology. Now there are a number of other concerns i hope to raise both in the hearing this morning and in the closed hearing this afternoon, let me just briefly mention two. First, how is the ic poised to track foreign influence that relies on social media and misinformation . Just last week the chairman and i had a good meeting with our uk parliamentary colleagues investigating this issue. Russian trolls and bots continue to push device civil content both in the United States and against all our allies in europe, not only the uk, but as weve talked before, france, germany, netherlands, and weve also heard recent indications of russian activities in mexico. The ic needs to stay on top of this issue and im worried that we dont have a clear line of assignments. Let me also raise another issue. I believe we need to do more to reform the broken security clearance system which gao recently placed on its list of highrisk Government Programs in need of reform. Weve seen close to 700,000 folks now waiting in line, folks that need to serve our country will in government or in the private sector who have just been waiting way too long to get their security clearances. Its obviously hampering your recruitment and retention and its costing us millions of dollars in inefficiency. Again, thank you to all of you for your service. Please convey our best wishes to the men and women who work with you and i look forward to our hearing. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Thank you, advivice chairman. Im going to recognize director coates and he is the only one who will give an official testimony. All members of the panel are open for questions. I will recognize our members by order of seniority for up to five minutes. With that, director coates, the floor is yours. Mr. Chairman, thank you. I raspy voice. Ive been fighting through some of the crud thats going around that several of us have endured. I may have to clear my throat a few times, which i apologize for. But it strikes me listening to your opening remarks and the vice chairmans opening remarks that excuse me that we have continued to have a very interactive presence with this committee. The issues that you and the vice chairman have raised and that others will raise are issues we talk about continuously with you and we want to continue to work with you carefully on both sides of the aisle as we go forward looking at what the Intelligence Community can provide for this committee and the issues we find in common. Vice chairman warner, members of the committee, we thank you for the opportunity to be with you here today. There have been some changes on the panel since we were here last year. This will be admiral rogers last visit before this committee on the threat assessment issue. He deeply regrets not having to come before you in the future years as hes enjoyed this process very much. Considering status so he can come back. We have two new members, director ray and general ashley, who have been looking forward to this day, im sure, with great anticipation. So i say all that because what youre looking at here is a team. A team that works together in terms of how we provide the American People and our congress and policymakers with the intelligence that they need. So its an honor for us to be here, and i think this team reflects the hard work the Intelligence Community in their testimonies and their answers to questions today. Before i begin the sobering portion of my remark, let me take a moment to acknowledge a positive development for our Intelligence Community and express our thanks to members of this committee for their support in the renewing of the authorities, the recent 702 authorization. This is, as we have told you, our more important legislative issue because it is our most important collection issue against foreign terrorists. And we appreciate the work the committee has done and others have done, particularly this team has done in reaching that goal. As you will hear during these remarks, we face a complex, volatile, and challenging threat environment. The risk of interstate conflict is higher than any time since the end of the cold war. All the more alarming because of the growing development in use of weapons of mass destruction by state and nonstate actors. Our adversaries as well as the other maligned actors are using cyber and other instruments of power to shape societies and markets, International Rules and institutions, and International Hot spots to their advantage. We have entered a period that can best be described as a race for technological superiority. Against our adversaries who seek to sew division in the United States and weaken u. S. Leadership. And nonstate actors, including terrorists and criminal groups, are exploiting weak state capacity in africa, the middle east, asia, and latin america, causing instability and violence, both within states and among states. In the interest of saving time for your questions, i will not cover every topic in my opening remarks. I think thatll be a relief to the committee. We are submitting a written statement, however, for the record with additional details. Let me turn to global threats. Id like to start with the cyber threat, which is one of my greatest concerns and top priorities. Frankly, the United States is under attack, under attack by entities that are using cyber to penetrate virtually every major action that takes place in the United States. From u. S. Businesses to the federal government to state and local governments, the United States is threatened by Cyber Attacks every day. While russia, china, iran, and north korea pose the greatest cyber threats, other nation states, terrorist organizations, Transnational Criminal Organizations, and evermore technically capable groups and individuals use Cyber Operations to achieve strategic and malign obje objectives. Some of these actors, including russia, are likely to pursue even more aggressive Cyber Attacks with the intent of degrading our Democratic Values and weakening our alliances. Persistent and disruptive Cyber Operations will continue against the United States and our european allies using elections as opportunities to undermine democracy, sew discord, and undermine our values. Chinese Cyber Espionage and cyber attack capabilities will continue to support chinas National Security and economic priorities. Iran will try to penetrate u. S. And allied networks for espionage and lay the groundwork for future Cyber Attacks. And north korea will continue to use Cyber Operations to raise funds, launch attacks, and gather intelligence against the United States. Terrorists will use the internet to raise funds and promote their maligned messages. Criminals will exploit cyber tools to finance their operations. My next topic for you is weapons of mass destruction, the wmd. Overall, state efforts to modernize, develop, or acquire wmd, their delivery systems, or the underlying technologies constitute a major threat to the United States and our allies. North korea will be the most volatile and confrontational wmd threat in the coming year. In addition to its Ballistic Missile tests and growing number of Nuclear Warheads for these missiles, north korea will continue its long standing chemical and biological warfare programs also. Russia will remain the most capable wmd power and is expanding its Nuclear Weapon capabilities. China will continue to expand its weapons of mass destruction options and diversify its nuclear arsenal. Irans implementation of the joint comprehensive plan of action has extended the time it would take to develop a Nuclear Weapon from several months to about a year, provided iran continues to adhere to the deals major provisions. Pakistan is developing new types of Nuclear Weapons, including shortrange tactical weapons. And state and nonstate actors, including the Syrian Regime and isis, the remnants of isis in syria, continue to possess and in some cases have used chemical weapons in syria and iraq, and we continue to be concerned about some of these actors pursuit of biological weapons. Turning now to terrorism. The terrorism threat is pronounced and spans the sectarian spectrum from isis and al qaeda to Lebanese Hezbollah and other affiliated terrorist organizations as well as the statesponsored activities of iran. U. S. Based homegrown violent extremists, including inspired and selfradicalized individuals, represent the primary and most difficult to detect sunni terrorism threat in the United States. Isis claimed to having a functioning caliphate that governs populations is all but thwarted. However, isis remains a threat and will likely focus on regrouping in iraq and syria, particularly in ungoverned portions of those countries, enhancing its global presence, championing its cause, Planning International attacks, and encouraging members and sympathizers to attack their home countries. Meanwhile, al qaeda almost certainly will remain a major actor in global terrorism as it continues to prioritize a longterm approach and the organization remains intent on attacking the United States and u. S. Interests abroad. Now, moving on, as if we dont have enough threats here on earth, we need to look to the heavens, threats in space. The Global Expansion of the space industry will extend spaceenabled capabilities and Situational Awareness to nation state and commercial space actors in the coming years. Russia and china will continue to expand their spacebased reconnaissance, communications and Navigation Systems in terms of numbers of satellites, breadth of capability, and applications for use. And both russia and chinese counterspace weapons will mature over the next few years as each country pursues antisatellite weapons as a means to reduce u. S. And allied military effectiveness and perceptions of u. S. Military advantage in space. The final functional topic is transnational organized crime, which poses a growing threat to u. S. And allied interests. These criminal groups will supply the dominant share of illicit drugs fueling record mortality rates among our population. They will continue to traffic in human life. They will deplete National Resources and siphon money from governments and the global economy. Id like now to briefly go around the world on regional topics, starting with east asia. You know, if you went out and hired a private plane and launched from los angeles and went around the world and stopped at every hot spot in this world, you would make multiple dozens of stops. Thats the kind of threat that we face. But let me start with east asia. North korea continues to pose an evermore increasing threat to the United States and its interests. Pyongyang has repeatedly stated it does not intend to negotiate its Nuclear Weapons and missiles away because the regime views Nuclear Weapons are critical to its security. Kim also probably sees Nuclear Icbms as leverage to achieve his longterm stroo teategic ambiti end seouls alliance with washington and eventually dominate the peninsula. In the wake of its icbm tests it last year, we expect to see north korea press ahead with additional missile tests this year, and its foreign minister has threatened an Atmospheric Nuclear test over the pacific. Pyongyang is committed to fielding a longrange Nuclear Armed missile capable of posing a direct threat to the United States. And modest improvements in north koreas conventional capabilities will continue to pose an ever greater threat to south korea, japan, as well as u. S. Targets in those countries. China will increasingly seek to expand its regional influence and shape events globally. It will take a firm stance on its claims to the East China Sea and south china sea. Its relations with taiwan and its Regional Economic engagement. China also intends to use its one belt, one Road Initiative to increase its reach to geostrategic locations across eurasia, africa, and the pacific. From east asia, we head to south asia. In afghanistan, kabul continues to bear the brunt of the talibanled insurgency as demonstrated by recent attacks in the city. Afghan National Security forces face unsteady performance, but with Coalition Support probably will maintain control of most major population centers. Complicating the afghanistan situation, however, is our assessment that pakistanbased militant groups continue to take advantage of their safe haven to conduct attacks in india, in afghanistan, including u. S. Interests therein. Pakistani military leaders continue to walk a delicate line. Ongoing operations against the taliban and associated groups probably reflect the desire to appear more proactive and responsive to our requests for more actions against these groups. However, the actions taken thus far do not reflect a significant escalation of pressure against these groups and are unlikely to have a lasting effect. In the last month, the administration has designed excuse me, designated eight militants affiliated with the taliban, haqqani network, and other pakistani militant groups, and we assess that pakistan will maintain ties to these militants while restricting counterterrorism cooperation with the United States. Next is russia, where president putin will continue to rely on assertive foreign policies to shape outcomes beyond russias borders. Putin will resort to more authoritarian tactics to maintain control amid challenges to his rule. With respect to russian influence effort, let me be clear. The russians utilize this tool because its relatively cheap, its low risk, it offers what they perceive as plausible deniability, and its proven to be effective at sowing division. We expect russia to continue using propaganda, social media, false personas, sympathetic spokesmen, and other means to influence to try to build on its wide range of operations and exacerbate social and political fissures in the United States. There should be no doubt that russia perceived that its past efforts as successful and views the 2018 midterm elections as a potential target for russian influence operations. From russia, ill turn to the middle east and north africa. This region will be characterized by political turmoil, economic fragility, and civil and proxy wars in the coming year. Iran will remain the most prominent state sponsor of terrorism and an adversary in the middle east, especially in iraq, syria, and yemen. Iran will seek to expand its regional influence and will exploit the fight against isis to solidify partnerships and translate battlefield gains into Political Security and economic agreements. We also assess that iran will continue to develop military capabilities that threaten u. S. Forces and u. S. Allies in the region. For example, iran has the largest Ballistic Missile force in the middle east. The Islamic Revolutionary guard corps, navy, and its unsafe and unprofessional interactions pose a risk to u. S. Naval and allied Naval Operations in the persian gulf. And Lebanese Hezbollah, with the support of iran, has deployed thousands of fighters to syria and provides direction to other militant and terrorist groups all fomenting regional instability. Irans provocative and assertive behavior, as we saw most recently this past weekend in northern israel, increases the potential for escalation. Turkey will seek to thwart kurdish ambitions in the middle east and the ongoing turkish incursion into Northern Syria is complicating ongoing counterisis activities in the region and increases the risk to u. S. Forces located in the area. Syria will face unrest and fighting through 2018, even as damascus recaptures urban areas and violence decreases in some areas. Iraq is likely to face a lengthy period of political turmoil and conflict. The social and political challenges that gave rise to isis remain, and iran has exploited those challenges to deepen its influence in iraqs military and security elements and diplomatic and political arms. The war in yemen between the iranianbacked ho Iranianbacked Houthis and Saudi Coalition is likely to worsen. 70 of the population are in need of assistance. The situation in yemen is emblematic of a far larger problem. The number of people displaced by conflict around the world is the highest that its been since the end of world war ii. Turning to europe, where i want to draw your attention to two Significant Developments that are likely to continue to impact european politics and Foreign Policy in the coming year. Let me state first, the Continent Center of gravity appears to be shifting to france, where president macron has taken a more assertive role in addressing european and global challenges. Results of the recent german election, i think, enforce that assessment. Second, recent efforts by some governments in central and Eastern Europe to undermine Judicial Independence and parliamentary oversight and increase government control over public media are weakening the rules of law. These steps could further democratic decline. There are many more topics i could discuss. I havent even gotten to the western hemisphere or africa, but i would like to close with the discussion of one additional threat. This one internal and somewhat personal. Im concerned that our increasing fractious political process, particularly with respect to federal spending, is threatening our ability to properly defend our nation, both in the short term and especially in the long term. The failure to address our longterm fiscal situation has increased the National Debt to over 20 trillion and growing. This situation is unsustainable, as i think we all know, and represents a dire threat to our economic and National Security. Former chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, mike mullen, first identified the National Debt as the greatest threat to our National Security. Since then, hes been joined by numerous respected National Security leaders in both parties, including former secretaries of state Madeline Albright and henry kissinger, as well as bob gates and leon panetta and our current defense secretary jim mattis agrees with this assessment. Many of you know i have spent a lot of time in my last term in the Senate Working on this issue and unfortunately the problem continues to grow. So i would urge all of us to recognize the need to address this challenge and to take action as soon as possible before a fiscal crisis occurs that truly undermines our ability to ensure our National Security. With that, i and the rest of the panel are happy to take your questions. We appreciate the opportunity to be with you today. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Thank you very much for that very thorough overview of the world and whats at play. Ill recognize members based upon seniority for up to five minutes. Chair recognizes himself. Admiral rogers, according to the statement for the record, the Intelligence Community assesses that most detected chinese Cyber Operations against the United States private industry are focused on clear defense contractors or i. T. And Communications Firms whose products and Services Support government and private Sector Networks nationwide. Rate the Intelligence Communitys performance when it comes to notifying clear defense contractors and other sensitive private sector actors about malicious cyber activities on their networks. So, first, in all honesty, youre asking me to rate a function for which i dont have responsibility or daytoday execution. Ill give you an opinion, but its not informed by daytoday experience. I try to work very aggressively, because as you have outlined, this is a tremendous concern for us as a department. Clearly, i think we are not where we need to be. The challenge, i think, is weve got multiple areas of knowledge and insight across the federal government within the private sector, and how do we bring this together and integrate a team with some realtime flow back and forth. That is not where we are today. Thats where weve got to get to. In your estimation, are we doing enough to warn the private sector of the threat thats out there . I think we are informing them as we become aware of it, but one of my concerns is were only going to see one slice of this picture. Im also interested from the private sectors perspective. Tell us what you are seeing. If we can bring these two together, well have such a broader perspective and much more indepth knowledge of whats happening. I think thats part of this. Its not just, hey, one side these to do a better job. Not trying to say its two sided, but its our ability to bring this together as a team. Given youve seen the difficulty, especially this committee and the Intelligence Community has that communicating with Tech Companies about a way forward that is in commonality, are you concerned at how this is going to become an increasingly challenging landscape for both congress and for the Intelligence Community working as we see new tech firms emerge every day . Yes, i am, because quite frankly i wonder how bad does this have to get before we realize we have to do some things fundamentally differently. I would argue if you look at the internet of things, the security levels within those components, folks, this is going to if we think the problem is a challenge now, we just wait, its going to get much, much worse, exponentially from a security perspective. Director pompeo, the ic assesses that north korea is likely to press ahead with more tests in 2018, missile tests. Noting that north koreas foreign minister indicated an Atmospheric Nuclear test over the pacific may be under consideration. Whats the ic assess the regional reaction to this kind of test would be . Senator, thanks for your question. If i may just take one minute to say identify beve been doing t now and i want to express my appreciate to the committee for helping us do the things we need to do. Weve put a lot of effort against this very problem. You all have been incredibly supportive for that. My team thanks you for that. We think a test like that would certainly further unite the region. Having said that, our sense is that we have built a Global Coalition pushing back against kim jongun and his terror regime. With respect to what each particular country might do, id prefer to keep that conversation to closed session this afternoon. Great. Whats the ics assessment of north koreas willingness to employ its expansive conventional military capabilities . Senator, one of the things that director coates referred to n in his opening remarks is kim jongun remains intent not only on staying in power, the thing all dictators prefer to do. Die in their sleep at the peak of their power. But he has this mission that is a longstanding north korean idea of reyuunification. Their can pass it i to upacity umbrella to exert coercive behavior, certainly inside their country, certainly against south korea, but more broadly is something our analysts are continuing to look at. We can see as they ratchet up their nuclear capability, makesimaking a response more difficult, their capacity to do harm in the region as a result of their incredible conventional capabilities alone increases. Probably for general ashley and admiral rogers. According to the statements for the record, the widespread proliferation of Artificial Intelligence is likely to prompt new National Security concerns. Hows the ic accounting for the possibility these new national of these new National Security concerns . Are we seeing indications now that our adversaries are working to harness emerging technologies like Artificial Intelligence, and is the ic looking to maximize the potential of merging technologies in our own processing and analysis of data and intelligence . Sir, if i could take the first shot at that one. As you look at dia and thanks for all the support the committee provides to the defense Intelligence Agency. If you look at our core mission, you look at foreign militaries and the operational environment. This is central to looking at doctrine and what theyre developing. When you think about Artificial Intelligence, our near peer competitors are pursuing us, and its a lot of commercial technology thats available. When you look at the volume and big data and whats available, the ability to digest and pull all that information in, Artificial Intelligence is going to be integral to that. An example of one of the projects were working on, and this is at the opensource level, project maven. Fullmotion video, for example. Youre never going to be able to forward the work force thats going to be able to go through all the material, whether its video, whether its what admiral rogers works in the way of signals intelligence, or whats available on social media. So Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning, which is where we are right now its more Machine Learning than Artificial Intelligence. Were seeing all of our near peer competitors invest in these kinds of technologies because its going to get them to decision cycles faster, allow them to digest information in greater volumes, and have a better situational understanding of whats happening in the battle space and in some cases just whats happening in the strategic environment. So i would agree with general ashley. Id also highlight every organization on this table is faced with a challenge of victims of our own success in some way, the ability to access data and increase levels brings its own set of challenges. Were collectively all attempting to deal with this. When i look at potential adversaries, i see them going through the same set of challenges. When i look at the prc in particular, theres clearly a National Strategy designed to harness the power of Artificial Intelligence to generate strategic outcomes, many along the lines that general ashley highlighted, to generate positive outcomes for them. If you look at their research, you look at how it is affecting the amount of data theyre going after. I can remember five, ten years ago looking at some data concentrations and thinking to myself, this is so large and has such a disparate amount of information in it, boy, it would be really difficult for an opponent potentially to generate knowledge from it. I dont have those kinds of conversations anymore. With the power of Machine Learning, Artificial Intelligence, and big data analytics, data concentrations now increasingly are targets of attraction to a whole host of actors, and you have watched the prc and others engage in activity designed to access these massive data concentrations. If i could followup on that, this is one of those areas thats available in the commercial industry, so you see a lot of investment, academia and others, that are pursuing this. Theres a key piece of this i think worth addressing, which is how do you operationalize it. You go back, and if i could just use a world war ii example, the fact there were planes, radios, and tanks was not unique to the germans in world war ii. They came up with an operational concept that allowed them to leverage that. Peter singer, if anyones ever read wire for war s, is a futurist. We had a panel a couple years ago. If you look at things emerging, the technology and things coming out, what do you see in the way of breakthrough that gives somebody a marked advantage. His comment was its whos able to harness it, whos able to operationalize it and put it to effect. So thats really a key difference. A lot of that technology is going to be available globally. Thank you. If i could just ask your permission here. Nga has probably taken very significant lead on this, given the enormous volume of collection that they take and the inability to process that through the use of humans. Ive asked robert to be prepared to answer that question for you because i think theyre taking some leading efforts that might be helpful. Great. I think its important to note at the front what hasnt changed, quite frankly. The mission, the responsibility, this whole table has is to provide you with decision advantage. Whats changed is the world around us and now within us. So what we used to hold exclusively because we had capabilities that others didnt is now more shared. So as admiral rogers has said, this is something we all lock arms on because it isnt the access thats exclusive anymore. Its the use. Its the concept of operations, as general ashley said. I have the same concerns you do about getting the cooperation we need from these companies. Im rather optimistic about it because i think at the end of the day, we can advance the american economy, we can advance american entrepreneurship, and we can advance our understanding of the world in a way that gets back to that first step, which is decision advantage. Rest assured, processing of data will come up in our closed session with you. Ive got you targeted. Vice chair. Thank you, mr. Chairman. I take with some note the fact that the director started his discussion with cyber. I think its telling in terms of how we view worldwide threats. Let me get one question out on the record. We all know its been over a year since the russian intervention in our 2016 elections. Weve also seen russia intervene in a number of other western democracies. Id like each of you to briefly reconfirm to the American Public that our Intelligence Community understands this threat. Last year those of you who are o on the panel each expressed confidence that russia interfered in the 2016 elections. Id like each of you today to, one, reaffirm that, and also with a simple yes or no, do you agree with director pompeo that we havent seen a significant decrease in the russian activity and we have every expectation i think director coates, youve already alluded to this that theyll continue to intervene in our elections in 2018 and 2020. Ill start with you. Simple yes or no. No change in my view of the 2017 assessment. I support that. And i agree with director pompeos assessment about the likelihood of the 2018 occurrence as well. I participated in that 2017 work. I stood by it then. I stand by it now. I agree with director pompeo. This is not going to change or stop. General ashley . Yes, it is not going to change, nor is it going to stop. Throughout the entire community, we have not seen any evidence of any significant change from last year. I agree with director pompeo. Youve been waiting for that answer. I have. Ive had that one in the pocket for a while, yes, sir. As do i. One area that i think we were a little all caught off guard on, understandably, is how the russians use social media. I realize this is a new area for all of us and there are legitimate issues around American Civil Rights that have been to be balanced, but the fact is i think we have to have an organized plan going forward. This question will be directed at dni coates and director ray, but if others want to weigh in, im because the notion that these companies while maybe located here, operate in cyberspace, and when we have somebody masquerading as mike pompeo but is also boris in st. Petersburg, it doesnt fit neatly into a particular flowchart. Director coates and director ray, who is in charge of addressing the threat posed by foreign nationals or foreign nations in terms of their use and misuse of social media . Theres no single agency, quote, in charge. There are several agencies throughout the federal government that have equities in this, and we are working together to try to integrate that process. It clearly is something that needs to be addressed and addressed as quickly as possible. You and i have had a number of discussions about that. And so we are keen on moving forward in terms of not only identification but relative response and things that we can do to prevent this from happening. We are gaining more, i think, support, i guess is the right word, from the private sector who are beginning to recognize evermore the issues that are faced, the material that comes through their processes. We cannot as a government drek them wh direct them what to do, but we are spending effort we can to work with them to provide answers to this question. Director ray . I would agree with director coates. Its a team effort. One thing thats jumped out at me since being back in government is how much more of a team the Intelligence Community is than the last time i was in this space. I have one of mikes people who sits right, you know, in my inner team and vice versa. Were dealing with each other, you know, every day. Its teamwork within the Intelligence Community and partnership with the private sector, which is i think the other big change ive noticed. A lot more forward leaning engagement with the private sector in terms of trying to share information and raise awareness on their end because at the end of the day, we cant fully police social media. So we have to work with them so that they can police themselves a little bit better as well. Let me say, i think the companies themselves are slow to recognize this threat. I think theyve still got more work to do, but the fact that we dont have clarity in terms of whos in charge means i believe we dont have a full plan. Let me get one last question in quickly on the rise the chairmans alluded to this as well the rise of chinese Tech Companies. I know senator cornyn and senator feinstein have legislation. My fear is these Companies May not have to acquire an American Company before they become pervasive in our market. Again, ill start with director coates and director ray. How do we make sure that we send a signal to the private sector before some of these companies in effect totally invade our market, particularly because so many of them are tied back to the Chinese Government . Well, i think its not only sending the signal and working together, sharing information with the private sector and the public sector. It also, i think, involves almost a whole government issue, in particular legislative with the legislation being looked at in terms of the process. I think we need to go beyond what the current process is in terms of evaluating. We as a community will coordinate our intelligence to provide the policymakers and those that are making these decisions with the best intelligence we can relative to what the situation is. So well we view this as a top priority. Its ongoing, because as i mentioned in my early remarks here, the chinese are pervasive on this. Weve seen it happen throughout both the public and private sector. Weve tried very hard to be more out and about in the private sector in terms of providing what are almost like defensive briefings so that some of the u. S. Telecommunications companies, among other Technology Industry members, kind of can recognize the threats that are coming their way. I think ive been pretty gratified by the response that weve gotten by most companies once were able to try to educate them. I think one of the bigger challenges we face is that because americas the land of innovation, theres a lot of very exciting stuff happening in terms of smaller startup companies. A lot of them are a lot less sophisticated about some of this stuff and trying to make sure were touching those and educating them as well is a continuing challenge. The reality is that the chinese have turned more and more to more creative avenues using nontraditional collectors, which i think we in the Intelligence Community recognize, but i think the private sector is not used to spotting. So a lot of it is trying to educate them about what to be on the lookout for and to have it be more of a dialogue. Senator. Thank you very much. First of all, i want to associate myself with remarks of the vice chairman when he said that this committee will always have your backs. For those of you who have been associated with this committee, z dan, since you used to sit here, and director pompeo, you were in the same operation, you guys have seemed like part of the committee. You know thats the case. We sincerely appreciate that. I would say, however and every one of us here knows what a tough job each of your agencies have. Im speaking for myself and i suspect for most, if not all, of the committee. We have absolute 100 confidence in your ability to in a very neutral, dispassionate fashion deliver to us the facts we need in order to make policy decisions. One of the things that does rear its ugly head occasionally and causes issues and winds up in the media a lot more than it should is when your jobs intersect with domestic political affairs. Mr. Wray, youll probably wind up with this more than anybody else. It gets messy. It gets difficult. I think weve got to recommit ourselves to what were actually doing here to reach the right facts. I would respectfully disagree with my good friend from virginia that were no better prepared to handle the russians onslaught in 18 than we were in 16. When this happened in 16, those of us on this committee, those of you on the panel, and most everyone who works in the ic were not surprised to find out the russians were attempting t meddle in our affairs. I think one of the best hearings weve had this year was the open hearing we had on how they used social media. We saw how disjointed it was, how ineffective it was, how cheap it was for them to do that. But i think after that, with all due respect to my friend from virginia, i think the American People are ready for this. I think that now theyre going to look askance a lot more at the information that is attempted to be passed out through social media. The American People are smart people. They realize theres people attempting to manipulate them, both domestically and foreign. And i agree with everybody on the panel that this is going to go on. This is the way the russians have done business. This is no surprise to us. We saw it even more so than we got it in france and germany in the past year. So i think the American People are much more prepared than what they were before. Dan, thank you for that analysis of syria. I doubt it made it any clearer for me or the American People. Its a rubiks cube thats very difficult and after this weekend got even more complicated. I think that were going to have to keep an eye on that. I agree with you, cyber certainly is something thats right at the top. The Financial Condition of this country is of critical importance to us. I want to close and ask a specific question to four of you regarding korea. I think thats the most existential threat we face. I think its something thats at our doorstep. A year ago when we talked about this, it was then, this is now. The movement of north korea has not slowed down. In fact, if anything, i think all of us would agree that its probably picked up and its at our doorstep. This is going to have to be dealt with in the very, very near future. Weve talked about trying to engage in conversations and what conditions would be, et cetera. I think were still in the process of refining that, but thats moving. We all watched over the last week the smile campaign that north korea has inflicted on the south Korean People. The south Korean People seem to be charmed by it to some degree. Some of them seem to be captivated by it. From my point of view, i think its nothing more than a stall by the North Koreans to further develop what theyre trying to do, and i suspect in my judgment, we need to be very, very cautious of this. Director coates, pompeo, rogers, and ashley, id like to hear your view of this supposed turn in the last couple weeks by the North Koreans. Well, this is an existential threat, potentially to the United States but also to north korea. Kim jongun views this as any kind of kinetic attack or effort to force him to give up his Nuclear Weapons is an existential threat to his nation and to his leadership in particular. As you know, its a very hard topic given their secrecy and so forth. We know its a oneman decision. We have processes in place here in the United States to have multiple engagements with various agencies in terms of our policymaking and relative to the decision that the president ultimately makes. That does not appear to be the case in north korea. The provocative nature and instability that kim has demonstrated potentially is a significant threat to the United States. I agree with you that a decision time is becoming ever closer in terms of how we respond to this. Our goal is a peaceful settlement. Were using maximum pressure on north korea in various ways, which can be described by my colleagues here. Most of that in closed session. We have to face the fact that this is an existential potentially existential problem for the United States. Wise words. Director pompeo. The last part of your question about this past now almost week at the olympics, we should all the American People should all remember that kim yojong is the head of the agitation and propaganda department. No change there. Admiral rogers . I would just say if kju thinks he can splinter the relationship between ourselves and the south koreans, he is sadly mistaken. And finally, Lieutenant General ashley. No change to his strategic calculus. As a matter of fact, under the kj regime, youve seen an effort of readiness, very different from his father. You have a millionman army. 70 of it is south of pyongyang. They train in a very deliberate fashion. His strategic calculus is not changing, and we should not be misled by the events around the olympics. Thank you so much. My time is up. Senator feinstein. Thanks very much. I want to associate myself with some of the comments of the senator. We just had a secure briefing last week, and i think it was difficult and harsh. I harken back to the words of the secretary of state. One, that we do not seek regime change. Two, we are not seeking the accelerated reunion of the peninsula. And finally, that we will not bring u. S. Forces north of the demilitarized zone. If the Korean Peninsula is reunified. Let me ask you, mr. Pompeo, because you were you just spoke with some certainty. Does kim jongun really understand and believe that our goals are not regime change or regime collapse . Senator feinstein, i cant give you any certainty about what kim jongun actually subjectively believes. Very difficult intelligence problem anywhere in the world, most especially difficult there. And i have expressed this before. We do remain concerned. Our analysts remain concerned that kim jongun is not hearing the full story. That is, that those around him arent providing nuance, arent suggesting to him the tenuous nature of his position, both internationally and domestically. The breach with china, the deep connections between the United States and the republic of korea, we are not at all certain that the leaders around him are sharing that information in a way that is accurate, complete, and full. In a recent Washington Post oned, victor cha warned of the dangers of a preventive United States military strike against north korea. He cautioned that such a strike would not halt north Koreas Nuclear Weapons Program and could spark an uncontrolled conflict in the region that could kill hundreds of thousands of americans. He is not the only one. A number of experts on the area have said that. And he argued to continue to press for multilateral sanctions at the u. N. To provide japan and south korea, advance weapons training, some intel, and some other things. Has the Intelligence Community assessed how the north korean regime would react to a preventive United States attack . We have. I would prefer to share that with you in closed session this afternoon. Would you do that this afternoon . Absolutely, senator. We have written about various forms of actions, what we analyze, the certainty and uncertainty we have around that analysis, as well as what we think happens in the event that the United States decides not to do that and continues to allow kim jongun to develop his Nuclear Weapons arsenal. Have you explored what it would take to bring them to the table . We have. Id prefer to share that with you in closed session. Yes, maam. Thank you. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Thank you, senator feinstein. Senator rubio. Thank you. Thank you, all, for being here. I also echo the same words everyone else has shared with you about the esteem we have for all of our agencies and the important work they do. I think this has already been touched upon. I do believe that russia, Vladimir Putin in particular, efforts around the world are very important, but the Biggest Issue of our time, in my view, and i think the view of most members of this committee and i would guess most members of this panel, is china and the risk they pose. Im not sure in the 240someodd year history of this nation weve ever faced an adversary to have this scale, scope, and capacity. Its my personal view and shared by many people that they are carrying out a wellorchestrated, wellexecuted, very patient, longterm strategy to replace the United States as the most powerful and influential nation on earth. You see that reflected in this repeated use of this Term Community of common destiny, which basically means a retreat from western values of democracy and freedom and openness towards some other model that benefits them and their pursuit of this appears to be every element of their national power. Military, commercial, trade, economics, information and media. The tools they use are everything from hacking to companies and Critical Infrastructure and defense contractors. Everybody you can imagine to using our immigration system against us, to even our universities. Thats where i wanted to begin. This week i well, let me ask this. Is it your view that the United States today as a government is prepared for the scale, scope, and magnitude of the challenge presented by this plan that chinas carrying out . We have full awareness of what the chinese are attempting to do on a global basis. Theres no question that what you have just articulated is whats happening with china. Theyre doing it in a very smart way. Theyre doing it in a very effective way. Theyre looking beyond their own region. I think they have its clear that they have a longterm strategic objective to become a world power. And they are executing throughout the whole of government ways in which they can accomplish that. We have intensive studies going on throughout the Intelligence Community relative to a to z on what china is doing. General mattis has asked us for that. Others have asked us to provide that. Senator warner called me last week. We had a discussion on that. I assured him that we are pulling all of our elements of intelligence gathering together to provide a very, very deep dive into what china is doing now and what their plans are for the future and how it would impact on the United States. The just to kind of highlight the different ways and untraditional ways in which theyre pursuing this plan, director wray, what is the counterintelligence risk posed to u. S. National security from chinese students, particularly those in advanced programs in the sciences and mathematics . I think in this setting, i would just say that the use of nontraditional collectors, especially in the academic setting, whether its professors, scientists, students, we see in almost every field office that the fbi has around the country, not just in major cities, small ones as well, basically every discipline, and i think the level of naivety on the part of the academic sector about this creates its own issues. Theyre exploiting the very open research and Development Environment we have, which we all revere, but theyre taking advantage of it. So one of the things were trying to do is view the china threat as not just a whole of government threat but a whole of Society Threat on their end, and i think its going to take a whole of Society Response by us. Its not just the Intelligence Community, but its raising awareness within our academic sector, within our private sector as part of the defense. In that vein, last week i wrote a letter to five Higher Education institutions in florida about the confucius institutes. Its my view theyre complicit in these efforts to influence Public Opinion and teach half truths to show chinese policy and government in the most favorite light. Do you share concerns about that as a tool and as a way to exploit the sort of naive view among some in the Academic Circles about what the purpose of these institutes could be . We do share concerns about the confucius institutes. Weve been watching that development for a while. Its just one of many tools that they take advantage of. We have seen some decrease recently in their own enthusiasm and commitment to that particular program, but it is something that were watching and in certain instances have developed appropriate investigative steps. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Vice chairman warner highlighted in his Opening Statement the importance of an Effective Security clearance process. So ive got a question for you, director wray. With the fbi aware of allegations related to rob porter and domestic abuse, and if so, was the white house informed this could affect his security clearance . When were they informed, and who at the white house was informed . Well, senator, theres a limit to what i can say about the content of any particular Background Investigation for a variety of reasons that im sure you can appreciate. I would say that the Background Investigation process involves a fairly elaborate set of standards, guidelines, protocols, agreetments, et cetera, that have been in place for 20plus years. Im quite koconfident in this particular instance, the fbi followed those protocols. So was the white house told this could affect his security clearance . I cant get into the content what were they informed . What i can tell you is that the fbi submitted a partial report on the investigation in question in march and then a completed Background Investigation in late july that soon thereafter we received requests for followup inquiry, and we did the followup and provided that information in november and we administratively closed the file in january. Then earlier this month, we received some additional information, and we passed that on as well. Okay. Let me turn now to the two recent arbitrary and inconsistent decisions that affect the politicizing of the classification system. The first was the public release of the nunes memo. The second involved the report that the congress required on russian oligarchs, the relationship with president putin and indications of corruption. In that case, the secretary of the treasury released nothing other than a list of rich russians taken from public sources. My question, and any of you can respond, did any of you take a position on either of these two arbitrary classification decisions, and did any of you have any communications with the white house about either of those classification matters . Ill start. The answer is no. No. I raised concerns on this issue with the dni. No. The cia was not asked to review the classification of those documents. Not on the second. The oligarch treasury document, we did have interaction about the memo from chairman nunes. Is there anything you can say that protects sources and methods in an open session with respect to that matter . Well, i would just say as we said publicly that we had grave concerns about that memos release. Okay. On encryption, director wray, as you know, this isnt a surprise because i indicated i would ask you about this. You have essentially indicated that companies should be making their products with back doors in order to allow you all to do your job. And we all want you to protect americans, and at the same time, sometimes theres these policies that make us less safe and give up our liberties. Thats what i think we get with what you all are advocating, which is weak encryption. Now, this is a pretty technical area, as you and i have talked about. Theres a field known as cryptography. I dont pretend to be an expert on it. But i think there is a clear consensus among experts in the field an expert. I have asked you for a list of the experts that you have consulted. I havent been able to get it. Can you give me a date when we will be told who are these people who are advising you to pursue this route because i dont know of anybody respected in the field who is advising it is a good idea to adopt your position to weaken strong encryption. So can i get that list . I would be happy to talk more about this topic this afternoon. My position is not that we should weaken encryption. My position is we should be working together, government and private sector to find a solution that balances both concerns. Im on the program for working together. I just think we need to be driven by objective facts and the position you all are taking is out of synch with what the experts are saying. I want to know who you all are consulting with. Well talk about that this afternoon. Thanks, mr. Chairman. Senator collins. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Director pompeo, last week New York Times published a report that alleged that u. S. Intelligence officials had paid 100,000 to a russian source for phony secrets, including potentially compromising information about the president , and information on certain tools allegedly stolen from the nsa. First, is it accurate that the cia has categorically denied the assertions in this story, and second, if so, what would be the motivations of a russian who pedalled this story to New York Times and other western Media Outlets . Is this part of the Russian Campaign to undermine faith and western democracies . Senator collins, thanks for the question. Reporting on this matter has been atroecious, ridiculous, inaccurate. In our view the people that were swindled were james rise enand rosenberg, authors of the two pieces. Indeed it is our view the same two people that were proffering phony information to the United States government proffered that same phony information to these two reporters. The Central Intelligence agency did not provide any resources, no money to these two individuals who proffered u. S. Government information directly or indirectly at any time, and the information we were working to try and retrieve was information we believed might well have been stolen from the u. S. Government. It was unrelated to the idea of compromise that appears in each of the two articles. Thank you. Director wray, the president repeatedly raised concerns about current and former fbi leaders and has alleged corruption and political bias in the performance of Law Enforcement and National Security missions. I want to give you the opportunity today to respond to those criticisms. What is your reaction . Nosenator, my experience has validated all my prior experiences with the fbi and that it is the finest group of professionals and Public Servants i could hope to work for. And every day many, many, many times a day im confronted with unbelievable examples of integrity and professionalism and grit. You know, there are 37,000 people in the fbi that do unbelievable things all around the world. Although you would never know it from watching the news, we have more than two investigations. And most of them do a lot to keep americans safe. Thank you. Thats one of the reasons i wanted to give you an opportunity to respond. Director coats, weve had a lot of discussion about russian attempts which are ongoing to influence elections and western democracies, to undermine nato, and to try to destroy institutions in our country and elsewhere. This is an election year. It is frustrating we havent passed legislation to help states strengthen their security of their Voting Systems. Putting that issue aside, theres also going to be an election this year in latvia, one of our nato allies. What is your assessment of whether or not the russians are actively engaged in influencing that election and how concerned is the Intelligence Community they might be successful producing a government subject to russias Foreign Policy objectives. Not only are we concerned, the nations of nato are concerned. I returned not long ago from a meeting in brussels with the intelligence arm of nato. All 29 nations, the topic was dressed primarily on russian elections, trying to undermine Democratic Values. At the end of that the new director of the organization asked for show of hands or any verbal response from any representatives of the 29 nations if they thought that russia had not interfered with their processes or had the potential to do so. Not one person raised their hand. He said do i understand that we are unanimous in assessing what the russians are trying to do to undermine our elections and undermine our coordination wlt United States and relationships with each other to undermine the basic principles of sharing with European Countries everything thats accomplished through nato. Do i understand that no one has an objection to you all see this for what it is . Dead silent. He said i take silence to be consent. I think that says that this is pervasive, that the russians have a strategy that goes well beyond whats happening in the United States, even though while they have historically tried to do these kinds of things, clearly in 2016, they upped their game. They took advantage of social media. Theyre doing that not only in the United States, theyre doing it throughout europe and elsewhere. I think that sends a strong signal that any elections coming up, you need to assume there might be interference in that, particularly from the russians and maybe other malign actors, and steps need to be taken to work with state and local officials because many elections will be state and local. Governorships, even members of certain houses of representation within the states themselves. So it clearly is an issue that is whole of government, whole of and i would say this, the more, and we agreed with this at brussels, i tried to make that point while i was there, the more transparency we can provide to the American People, to people of nations that see this threat coming, the better off we will be. Obviously we have to take other measures. And we need to inform the American Public that this is real, that this is going to be happening, and resilience needed for us to stand up and say were not going to allow some russian to tell us how to vote and how to run our country. I think there needs to be a national cry for that. Thank you. Thank you, chairman. Director wray, the fbi is accused of political bias recently against the president by the president himself. In fact, he said the fbis reputation is, quote, in tatters. Do you think the fbis reputation is in any way in tatters, and are you confident in the independence of your agency . Senator, theres no shortage of opinions about our agency just like every other agency up here and just like the congress. I can only speak from my experience. Youre doing better than the congress. And my experience has been that every office i go to, every division i go to what patriots, people who could do anything else with their careers but have chosen to work for the fbi because they believe in serving others. And the feedback i get from our state and local Law Enforcement partners, from foreign partners, from folks we worked with in the private sector in the community, office after office after office has been very, very gratifying and reassuring to me. And im a big believer in the idea that the fbi speaks through its work, through its cases, through the victims it protects. And i encourage our folks not to get too hung up on what i consider to be noise on tv and social media. So you havent seen any evidence of some sort of inherent political bias in the agency . No. How do statements like that impact morale of rank and file agents, are they able to shake that off . Well, we have 37,000 people. Theyre all individuals. They all think in their own way, but i guess i would say our people are very mission focused, theyre accustomed to the fact that we do some of the hardest things there are to do for a living, and i like to think our folks are pretty sturdy. I think of a woman i met just the other day, an agent in the miami office who had a bad accident, 12 stitches in her face, and the next day, boom, back at work. I think about folks in the San Juan Office i visited recently. You want to talk about people going through a real storm, they do it and theyre out in the community. I can tell you the Community Values what they do on the island. Thank you. An oped by former intelligence analysts, one of the worst cases of pollittization of intelligence in modern american history, end quote. You said you had concerns about the memo. I know you cant get into the gritty details of that, but can you say in your view whether or not one of the concerns is that it may have selectively cherry picked information without presenting the entire fact pattern that led up to the fisa warrant application . Well, senator, i would just repeat what we said at the time which is that we had then and continue to have now grave concerns about the accuracy of the memorandum because of omissions. We provided thousands of documents that were very sensitive and lots and lots of briefings, and it is very hard for anybody to distill that down to three and a half pages. Director pompeo, have you seen russian activity in the lead up to the 2018 election cycle . Yes. Senator, i paused on that, trying to make sure i stay on the unclassified side. We are seeing russian activity and intentions to have impact on the next election cycle. Director coats . Yes, we have. Anyone else . Admiral rogers . Yes, i think this would be a good topic for this afternoon. According to news reports, there are dozens of white house staff with only interim security clearance still, to include Jared Kushner until last week, to include white house staff secretary rob porter, who i would assume would have regularly reviewed classified documents as part of his job. Director coats, if someone is flagged by the fbi with areas of concern in their Background Investigations into white house staff with incident rterim clea should they still have access to classified materials . Let me first speak in general relative to temporary classifications. Clearly with the new administration in particular were trying to fill a lot of new slots and the classification process and security clearance process has been mentioned. Im only speaking with regard to folks who may have had issues raised as opposed to just being in the matter of course going through the long process. Well, im not in position, and we can talk about this in the classified session, but im not in position to discuss what individual situations are for specified individuals. I might just say that i think sometimes it is necessary to have some type of preliminary clearance in order to fill a slot, but i have publicly stated if thats the case, access has to be limited in terms of the kinds of information they can be in a position to receive or not receive so i think thats something that we have to do as part of our security clearance review. The process is broken. It needs to be reformed. As senator warner has previously said, its not evolution, it is revolution. We have 700,000 backups, so we have situations where we need people in places but they dont yet have that. Your specific question i think might take up in the classified session. Chairman, i am over my time. Thank you, director coats. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Director coats, director pompeo, admiral rogers, i think you all talked about evidence that the russians would intend to do things to be active in our elections. Really seems to me two divisions of activity. One is information thats put on the record, misleading, false, trying to develop that level. The other even more sinister might be the level of dealing with the election system itself, the voting day system, registration system, and those two clearly the voting day system, the one we need to have the most concerns about that Critical Infrastructure. This committee has been working toward both those goals of trying to shore up Critical Infrastructure on election day as well as alert people to and decide what might be done about misinformation on the other side of the ledger. Voting begins in march. Thats next month. If were going to have any impact on securing that Voting System itself, it would seem to me we need to be acting quickly. I think the great part of the strength of the system is the diversity of the system, different not only state to state but from elected jurisdictions within the states, thats a strength, not a weakness in my view, but what are some of the things we can do to be more helpful to local Election Officials and encourage them to share information when they think their systems are being attacked, getting more information than we have. There was a lot of criticism in the last cycle that we knew that some election systems were being attacked and didnt tell them they were being attacked and so the three of you in any order, lets just do the order i started with, director coats, director pompeo, admiral rogers. Any thoughts you have on what we can do to protect the Critical Infrastructure of the election system and how quickly we need to act if we intend to do that this year. Well, the Intelligence Community, all elements of it are aware. We want to provide, collect and provide as much information as we can so we can give the warnings and alerts, so we can share information back and forth with local and state and election processes with the federal government. Department of homeland security, department of fbi, obviously were involved, given these are domestic issues, but we look to every piece of intelligence we can gather to provide the warnings. It is an effort i think the government needs to put together at the state and local level and work with those individuals who are engaged in the election process. In terms of security of their machines, cyber plays a major role here so i think it is clearly an area where federal government, foreign collection on potential threats of interference, warnings, and processes in terms of how to put in place security and secure that to ensure the American People that their vote is sanctioned and well and not manipulated in any way whatsoever. Director pompeo . I was referring to the former, first part of your question, not truly to the latter, things we have seen russia doing to date are mostly focused on information types of warfare, like senator warren spoke about earlier. With regard to the cias role, we have two missions. One, identify the source of the information, make those here domestically aware of it to do things they need to do, fbi or dhs so they have that information. We are working diligently among many threat factors to do that. Second thing, we can talk more about this this afternoon, we have capabilities offensively to raise costs for those that dare challenge United States elections. And after admiral rogers, director, i may want to come to you and see on the same sharing information, any impediment to sharing that with local officials or reasons we dont want to do that. Senator, the only thing i would add, and one of the things we find in that role, many network and system operators dont understand their own structures and systems. One of the things i think is part of this, how do we help those local, federal, state entities understand the network structure, potential vulnerabilities. It is part of how we work through the process. Director wray . Senator, thats one of the areas that theres been discussion about whether were doing better. This is one of the areas i think we are doing better. We together at the fbi, together with dhs recently, for example, scheduled meetings with various election, state Election Officials. Normally the barrier would be classification concerns, whether somebody had clearances. We were able to put together briefings appropriately tailored with nondisclosure agreements with the officials. There are ways if people are creative and forward leaning to educate the state Election Officials which is of course where elections are run in this country. Hopefully well be creative and forward leaning and want to keep track of what were doing there. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Senator king. Thank you, mr. Chairman. First statement i want to make is more in sorrow than anger. I will get to the anger part in a minute. The sorrow part is that director coats in response to a question from senator collins, you gave an eloquent factual statement of the activities of the russians and the fact that theyre continuing around the world and that theyre a continuing threat to this country. All of you have agreed to that. If only the president would say that. I understand the president s sensitivity about whether his campaign was in connection with the russians, and thats a separate question, but theres no question we have before us the entire Intelligence Community that the russians interfered in the election in 2016, theyre continuing to do it, and theyre a real imminent threat to elections in a matter of eight or nine months. My problem is i talked to people in main that say the whole thing is a witchhunt and hoax because the president told me. I just wish you all could persuade the president as a matter of National Security to separate these two issues, the collusion issue is here, unresolved, we get to the bottom of that. But theres no doubt as you all have testified today. We cannot confront this threat which is a serious one with a whole of government response when the leader of the government continues to deny it exists. Now, let me get to the anger part. The anger part involves Cyber Attacks. You have all testified that we are subject to repeated Cyber Attacks. Theyre occurring right now in our infrastructure all over this country. I am sick and tired of going to these hearings which i have been going to for five years where everybody talks about Cyber Attacks, and our country still does not have a policy or a doctrine or a strategy for dealing with them. And this is not a criticism of the current administration, i am an equal opportunity critic, the Prior Administration didnt do it either. Admiral rogers, until we have some deterrent capacity, were going to continue to be attacked. Isnt that true . Yes, sir. We have to change the current dynamic. We are on the wrong end of that cost equation. Trying to fight a global battle with our hands tied behind our back. Director coats, you have a stunning statement, they will work to use Cyber Operations to achieve strategic objectives unless they face repercussions for their operations. Right now there are none. Is that not the case . There are no repercussions. We have no doctrine of deterrence. How are we going to get them to stop doing this if all we do is patch our software and try to defend ourselves . Those are relevant questions, and i think everyone not only at this table but in every agency of government understands the threat that we have here and the impact already being made through cyber threats. Our role as Intelligence Community is to provide all of the information we can as to what is happening so our policy makers can take that, including congress, and shape how we are responding to this and deal with this in a whole of government way. It just never seems to happen. Director pompeo, you understand this issue, do you not . Were not going to be able to defend from Cyber Attacks by being defensive, we have to have a doctrine of deterrence. If they strike us in cyber, theyll be struck back in some way. I agree. Though i cant say much in this setting, i argue your statement we have done nothing does not reflect the responses that frankly some of us at this table have engaged in and United States government engaged in before and after this, both during and before this administration. Deterrence doesnt work unless the other side knows it. The doomsday machine in dr. Strangelove didnt work because the russians hadnt told us about it. It is true. Important the adversary know it, not important the whole world knows it. And the adversary knows it in your view . I prefer to save that for another forum. I believe this country needs a clear doctrine, what is a cyber attack, what is act of war, what will be the response and consequences. Senator, i agree with you. We collectively, it is a complicated problem. Including us by the way. I do too. Sat as member of house of representatives, i take responsibility not having solved that too. Theres a lot to do. We need a u. S. Government strategy and clear authorities to go achieve that strategy. I appreciate it. I just dont want to go home to maine when theres serious cyber attack, say we knew it was a problem, had four committees of jurisdiction and couldnt work it out. Yes, sir. Thats not going to fly. Yes, sir. Senator, i might just add that we dont want to learn this lesson the hard way. 911 took place because we were not coordinating our efforts. We are now coordinating efforts but didnt have the right defense in place. Our job is to get that right information to policy makers and get on with it because it is just common sense. If someone is attacking you and theres no retribution or response, it is going to incentivize more contacts. Right now, there are a lot of blank checks of things we need to do. Thank you. Senator langford. Director coats, you and i talked last year about this issue that senator king was bringing up about cyber doctrine and a point person on who that would be and defined person to give options to congress and the president to say if it is needed and warranted, this is the person, this is the entity that would make the recommendations and allow the president to make decisions on what the proper response is. Has that been completed, is there a point person to give recommendations on cyber attack to the president . That has not yet been completed. Of course, your understanding of the standup of Cyber Command and new director replacing admiral rogers, the decision relative to whether there would be separation between functions that are now nsa and cyber has yet to be made. General mattis is contemplating what the next best step is. They have involved the Intelligence Community in terms of making decisions in that role, but we at this point cannot point to one sort of cyber czar but various agencies throughout the federal government taking this very, very seriously, and there are individuals that we continue to meet on a regular basis. We have a coordination effort for all of the cyber that comes in so we dont stovepipe like before 9 11. Things are under way, but in terms of putting a finalized this is how were going to do it together is still in process. Senator langford, with respect to responses to that, these are title x dod authorities, so there is a person responsible. Secretary mattis has that responsibility to advise the president on appropriateness of responses in all theaters of conflict with adversaries. Thank you. I want to bring up the issue of rising threat of whats happening south of the border in mexico. Homicide rate went up 27 last year, had 64,000 americans that died from overdose of drugs, preponderance came from or through mexico. We have a very rapidly rising threat it appears to me. What i am interested in from you all on National Security level and what youre seeing, what are we facing, whats changing now in mexico versus ten years ago mexico and our relationship and threats coming from there . I would defer to director wray relative to what his agency is doing. Clearly we have a continuing problem and the Mexican Government has a problem relative to gangs and organizations. There are high profile arrests lately. We have taken down some labs. Mexico is cooperating and they themselves will admit it is almost overwhelming, their army has been participating, almost overwhelming to control the situation south of the border. We have our own issues on boarder protection as well as consumption in the United States. Director wray. In many ways were seeing more of the same. One of the things that changed, i think that was the heart of the question, i think one of the things we are watching in particular is more black market fentanyl being shipped to Transnational Criminal Organizations and theyre taking advantage of pricing advantages and thats being then delivered in large quantities to our streets. Certainly the mexico relationship is from Law Enforcement perspective and from domestic security perspective, one of the most important. The fbi lead that office and mexico is the largest in the world, pretty sure about that, or pretty close to it if not. Thats a reflection of how much activity there is. Let me ask you specific oklahoma questions and also a national question. There was an individual that was picked up in weatherford, oklahoma a few weeks ago by the fbi. His fingerprints were identified from a terror Training Camp in afghanistan. He had been in the country for multiple years. And what im trying to be able to determine is the coordination of information to local Law Enforcement and from data thats gathered from some of the work thats happening overseas in afghanistan and such, how are the two being married together that we can identify individuals that are a threat to our nation based on their participation in a terror Training Camp overseas, now coming to the american shores. Well, certainly we have become better at looking at bio metric information from overseas and marrying it up with potential threat subjects here in the u. S. As well as in some of our allies. The individual in question of course turned out to have his fingerprints on information from the al for uk camp. Lot of people went through those camps. While the civilized world, Intelligence Community, Law Enforcement, military, our allies around the world made a major dent on those people, were kidding ourselves if we think a lot of them arent still out there. It is a reminder to stay on the balls of our feet. Senator, if i could, one additional point. You asked what has changed in mexico. What has also transpired last couple years, you had five principal cartels, talked about a few captures, those five cartels have devolved into 20, and part of that outgrowth, youve seen increase in the level of violence. Thank you. On behalf of people of West Virginia, i want to thank you for the job you do keeping us safe. Professionalism and we have confidence in what youre doing, hope to support even farther. Thank you. The people do appreciate it. And we appreciate the service youre giving. Director coats, i think you and i both were in the senate at the same time when mike mullen, admiral mullen said the greatest threat we face. I was on armed services, you were on intelligence at the time, we were trying to find out what the greatest threat the United States faces. I was thinking of another country, russia, china, whatever. He didnt hesitate and said the greatest threat is the debt of our nation. I think you reiterated that in opening remarks. You didnt mention the debt in the worldwide assessment as a threat to the nation. I didnt know if there was a thought process behind that because you made a tremendous effort to put that in your Opening Statement. I appreciate that. But tell me what your thought process there was. My thought process is i am getting a little out of my lane in terms of what im supposed to do, but i felt that you think it is a threat, it is not in this assessment. It is something that Congress Needs to deal with, and i didnt want to come back and preach at you. But i thought at the very end, in fact just yesterday, look, i think i have a responsibility to raise this issue because it does effect the military significantly, it effects the Intelligence Community, which is tied to the military in terms of intelligence. It is going to have a serious effect on us. You sit on both sides of the aisle. Only thing that seems to be bipartisan, spending money. Both sides agree on spending money without any accountability. Im glad to hear your remarks on that. If i could indulge witnesses, i share concerns about whats killing more americans than any of the threats discussed that we have today, and it is with drugs. My state of West Virginia has been hit harder than any state. More deaths per capita than any state. Ravaging communities and homes, my schools, the families, it is unbelievable what we are going through. I think in a nutshell i would be asking all of you all are responsible to do everything you can to keep us safe and youve done a tremendous job as far as foreign attack and things of that sort. Director wray, i appreciate what the fbi does. They have a strong presence in West Virginia and were very appreciative of that. What type of efforts from each of your agencies have you spent as far as drugs and fighting the drug infestation, highest on the priority list, one of the greatest dangers, or part of the overall scheme of things. Just speaking for the Intelligence Community, it is a high priority for us. We mentioned it in the threat assessment. We are collectors of foreign sources at transnational organizations, et cetera. Whether coming from overseas, afghanistan, colombia, what it is, how it is going, and of course it is a whole of government because once it penetrates the United States, we then use our domestic agencies. As far as the fbi, youre on the front line, youre here on the home land. What do you think, what can we do to help . I think on the good news side in a country thats often very divided, this is one issue as far as i can tell where everybody agrees about what a major threat it is. It covers communities from north to south, red to blue, from rich to poor, from urban to rural. I think it has thats the good news. Bad news, it has grown to a point theres no one agency or one approach thats going to solve the problem. So were doing our part. Some of the things were able to do, focusing particularly on gate keepers. A lot of it is coming through medical professionals and pharmacies, so were using Intelligence Driven operations there, various michiginitiative. We are partnering with foreign counter parts, working with dea, state and local Law Enforcement, et cetera. Were also trying to do things to raise awareness. We did a video with dea called chasing the dragon kind of been shown in schools around the country. But this is a multidisciplinary problem. My time is short. If i can ask this question, whoever wants to answer this one. Based on what we know, and the way we distribute money for foreign aid to different countries, knowing a lot of countries we distribute aid to is basically allowing, permitting this type of scourge coming to the country in the form of drugs, have you all thought and considered to make recommendations we hold them hostage if you will or liable to money theyre receiving from the United States for the best of intentions, but the best of intentions is the fight of drugs coming to our country, we know it is coming from china, afghanistan, iraq, wherever it is coming from, mexico and all the south american countries, we should hold that. I mean, ive never seen, theres a whole generation in West Virginia. I have 10,000 jobs i cant fill. United states has 3 million jobs we cant fill. Most of it is around drugs. This is what were asking for. This is going to be all hands on deck. I dont know if anybody wants to do you all have that as high priority . Does anyone believe we should withhold foreign aid to countries that basically have a list of drugs coming to our country . Senator, ill answer this. I think the United States should use every tool, whether foreign aid or other tools. Money talks. To get these. Thats exactly right, to get nations it is coming from to put it as priority for their country. Some dont have the capacity to fix it. It is a problem bigger than their nation, but we ought to be unafraid to use the leverage that comes with our generosity from the american taxpayer to ensure these countries are doing everything they can to prevent drugs coming from their country to ours. Thank you. I appreciate it. As you know, we provide efforts within countries to help them eradicate, hasnt been totally successful, but thats one way we use some of that aid, if directly contributed to ratification of drugs. Thank you. Thank you for your appearance and thanks to the men and women you represent and the work they do for our country. Mr. Wray, are you aware of a gentleman by the name of ol oleg daraposka. I heard the name. Fair to call him a putin linked russian obviously ee gashin oligarch . I will leave that. Sent a letter to london based lawyer, who represents him, and asked if Christopher Steele was employed directly or indirectly by him at the time he was running the socalled steele dossier. Do you know if Christopher Steele worked for him . Thats not something i can answer. Could we discuss it in classified setting . There might be more we can say there. Thank you. Maybe well hear back from the lawyer in london as well to give us a straight answer. Jim comey testified before the committee in open setting last summer and referred to the steele dossier as seunverified. Does that remain to be verified. We can talk more on that this afternoon. I want to talk about Chinese Telecom companies. Senator rubio talked about threat of rising china and threat of con fush us centers. And Telecom Companies pose to our country. Thats why i introduced legislation with nor cornyn and rubio to say they cant use T T Companies that use them. Verizon and at t and others have taken the threat seriously. Could you explain what the risk is we face from zte and wall way being used in the United States, especially in public setting, the risk that companies, state governments, local governments might face if they use those products and services . I think probably the simplest way to put it in this setting is that were deeply concerned about risks of allowing any company or entity that is beholden to foreign governments that dont share our values to gain positions of power inside our Telecommunications Networks that provides the capacity to exert pressure or control over our telecommunications infrastructure, provides the capacity to maliciously modify or steal information, provides capacity to conduct undetected espionage. At a 100,000 foot level in this setting, those are the kinds of things that worry us. I will say like you, senator, we have been gratified to date by the response of the large u. S. Telecommunications providers, trying to raise awareness on the issue. I also recognize that Competitive Pressures are building. So it is something we have to be vigilant about and continue as you all are doing to raise awareness. Admiral rogers, would you care to add anything about the threat posed . I agree with director wrays characterization. This is a challenge thats only going to increase, not lessen over time for us. You would suggest to mayors, county judges, University President s, state legislatures to look if they come bearing gifts to them. Look long and hard at Companies Like this. All witnesses i would like to address this question. Raise your hand if you would use products or services from wow way or zte. None of you would. You lead intelligence services, thats something of a biased question. Raise your hand if you recommend private citizens use those products or services. None of you again raising your hand. Thank you for that. Finally, i would like to turn to a question to director pompeo of something in the news the last few hours. Reports that 200 russian mercenaries were killed in eastern syria. Can you confirm or deny the reports . Ill leave to department of defense to talk about what transpired there. I can say this from intelligence perspective, we have seen in multiple instances Foreign Forces using mercenaries in battles that will begin to approach the United States. General, would you like to confirm or deny . If we can take that to closed session, we can layout interesting fabric of what is syria and what transpired we can address that in the afternoon. As a general matter, can i ask is massing and maneuvering forces against a location where u. S. Personnel are present in syria a good way to get yourself killed . I think ill defer that to departments of defense as well. General ashley, would you like to answer that question . Does make you more susceptible. And leave that to the operation operation operational commander. Not a good idea to have a long and fruitful life. Thank you. Senator ericson. I want to echo the comments of colleagues thanking the men and women of your agencies. I am concerned the political attacks against men and women of your agencies may have had an effect on your ability to recruit, retain, and morale of your agencies. So i would like to emphasize the point that we all i think share in making which is we thank the men and women of your agencies for selfless work. They do it on behalf of the American People without any expectation of award or reward, and we cannot thank them enough for keeping us safe. Director wray. Chairman nunez memo had Sensitive Information to a person working on the campaign. According to the white house statement, the president was the one that authorized the memos declassification. Do you believe theres an actual or at least appearance of a conflict of interest when the president is put in charge of declassifying information that could complicate an Ongoing Investigation into his own campaign . Well, senator, as we have been very clear what our view was about disclosure and accuracy of the memo in question, but i do think it is the president s role as commander in chief under the rule that was invoked to object or not to declassification. I think that is the president s responsibility. Regardless of whether theres appearance or actual conflict of interest . I leave it to others to characterize whether theres appearance or conflict of interest, but i think the president was fulfilling his responsibility in that situation. If the president asked you tomorrow to hand over to him additional sensitive fbi information on the investigations into his campaign, would you give it to him . I am not going to discuss the investigation in question with the president , much less provide information from that investigation to him. And if he received that information and wanted to declassify it, would he have the ability to do that from your perspective . Information from the however he received it, perhaps from members of the United States congress. I think legally he would have that ability. And do you believe the president should recuse himself from reviewing and declassifying sensitive material related to this investigation . I think recusal questions i encourage him to talk to white House Counsel about. Has the fbi done legal analysis on these questions . Happily i am no longer in the business of doing legal analysis. I now get to be a client and blame lawyers for things instead of being the lawyer that gets blamed. Have you blamed any lawyers for their analysis of this issue . I have not yet, no. Okay. Is the fbi getting the cooperation it needs from social Media Companies to counter foreign adversary influence on our elections . I think the cooperation has been improving. I think were continuing to work with social Media Companies to see how could raise their awareness so they can share information and vice versa, i think things are moving the right direction but i think a lot of progress to be made. What more do you need from social Media Companies to improve the partnership you would like to have with them to counter the attacks . Well, i think we always like to have more information shared more quickly from their end, but i think from their perspective, it is a dialogue. Theyre looking to get information from us about what it is we see so they can give responsive information. I think were working through the issues. Do you believe that the social Media Companies have enough employees that have appropriate security clearance to make partnerships real . Thats not an issue i have evaluated but happy to take a look at it. Please do, follow up with the committee. Director coats, one of the things makes guarding against foreign intelligence threats on social media so complex is that threat originates overseas and that would be within the jurisdiction of the cia and nsa and then it comes to our shores and then it passes onto the fbi and also the social Media Companies themselves. Im not aware of any written ic strategy on how we would confront the threat to social media. Does such a strategy exist in writing . I would have to get back with you on that. I would be happy to look into it. From my perspective now, a written specific strategy is not in place, but i want to check on that. Please do follow up. Also last year, Congress Passed bipartisan russian sanctions bill, however, the administration has not imposed those sanctions. From an intelligence perspective, what is your assessment how russia interprets the administrations inaction . I dont have information relative to what the russian thinking is in terms of that particular specific reaction. There are other sanctions as you know imposed on russian oligarchs and others through United Nations and other things that have been done. But specifically on your question, i dont have an answer for that. Senator, may i comment . I think we ought to look at that in broader context, how the russians view all of the actions of this administration, not just a particular set of sanctions or absence thereof. So as we have watched the russians respond to this administrations decision to provide defensive weapons in ukraine, to push back against russian efforts in syria, sanctions placed on venezuela were directly in conflict with russian interests. A list of places russians are feeling the pain from this administrations actions are long. But director pompeo, im sure you agree, in order to understand the full scope of effect, it is also important that we analyze each discrete component, including what is the interpretation of this administrations failure to enact sanctions as has been passed and directed by the United States congress in a bipartisan way. Have you done that assessment . In closed session, i will tell you what we know and dont know about that issue. I agree with you, it is important to look at each one in its own place. What we most often see in terms of russian response is to cumulative activities in response to russian activities, how the United States responds to those in a cumulative way. I look forward to the conversation. Yes, maam. Director coats, you alluded to activities of Transnational Criminal Organizations and i am thinking particularly as regards neighbors down south of our border. Recently heard somebody refer to cartels, Transnational Criminal Organizations as commodity agnostic. In other words, theyll traffic in people, drugs and other contraband, all in pursuit of money. Whatever brings in the most dollars. Senator manchin and others alluded to concern and certainly we all share concern about deaths and overdoses caused by drugs in america, much of which comes across our southern borders through ports of entry. This week were going to be considering Border Security measures as part of a larger package the president has proposed while addressing the socalled daca recipients. But do you believe that modernizing or providing enhanced technology and other means to surveil and follow and identify Illegal Drugs coming across ports of entry would be a good thing for us to do . I do. I do think a layered approach is necessary to it is clear that one specific defense put in place is not going to solve the problem. It needs to be a layered interest of not only physical facilities but also border patrol, also how those who arrive and perhaps dissipate waiting for court appearance, tracking them, whole range of things that are going to be needed to stop the flow from coming in. I know it has been alluded to, but let me emphasize my concerns with the demand side. Maybe we have given up. I hope not, in addressing the demand side that provides money and incentive for the cartels to operate, and something that i think deserves full attention and focus of the United States government. Ive heard general kelly in his previous job at dhs talk about that, and i hope we will return to that focus as part of the layered approach, the demand side. It is something i think that is maybe the hardest thing to deal with, perhaps might have the greatest impact. The supply depends on demand, and demand drives the supply, and provides capital in which to take extraordinarily methods that bypass our defenses to get drugs into the United States. On the demand side this is whole of American People process, ptas, it is growing up, got videos of driving and drivers training and horrendous look at crashes and so forth and so on, need to let every student know, need to let what consequences of the drugs are to their lives and future. Need to get parents involved, Parent Teacher associations involved, so whether they pick up their values from church or the neighborhood or whatever, this is a national crisis. All of us here represented or from states staggering through the process of watching young people and others die from drugs more potent than theyve ever been. Let me lay down a couple of markers here in my comments. Then end on the committee on Foreign Investment in the United States. I will join senator rubio and senator king, senator langford and others concern about failure of u. S. Government again to have an all of Government Strategy to deal with the cyber threat. I have no doubt in my mind we have superior capabilities, but theyre stovepiped. I dont think the policy makers are doing a good enough job. I think it is incumbent on us to try to provide policy guidance so you and others in the intelligence communities and National Security apparatus can address this threat in a way that needs to be addressed. Our adversaries dont suffer from our lack of all of government policy. Theyre all over that. China i agree with senator rubio about their strategy. Some of you responded to that. One of the strategies that china and other countries adopted is to avoid some of the review measures in the committee on Foreign Investment in the United States when it comes to direct investment, buying dual use Technology Startup companies and the like, and then using that to gain strategic advantage against the United States. I wonder if maybe director wray, could you address that, and then anybody else in the time permitted, be glad to hear what you have to say about that. Well, senator, i think youre exactly right that reform is relevant to the china threat, although not exclusively china threat. Theres a degree where it currently stands is susceptible to the kind of round pegs only go in round holes thing, and not hard to come up with other shaped pegs to get around the process. The obvious example is joint ventures, but other ways as well. Thats one of the significant problems. Another problem is the amount of time built into the process to do a thorough review, which is too short. Another problem is the inability to share information since other countries oral ice are going through the same thing, to be able to share information so when they go through their own versions of this process, they have the benefit of what was attempted in our country and vice versa. I think in general, we need a more Strategic Perspective on chinas efforts to use acquisitions and other types of Business Ventures as opposed to a tactical looking only within the four corners of one particular transaction. So if i could, the director laid out the bigger issue at the strategic level. For us at cia, we take on tactical. We are ready to penetrate the if you look at supply chain Risk Management, we run the Threat Analysis Center that is hooked into cfius, so we bring the Services Together and look at supply chain Risk Management for ci issues associated with whomever may get a contract and ties back to china and other nations. But you mentioned the fact that every case for cfius comes back and we look at it, we get about three days with it. We could use more time to get a more thorough scrub. Senator reed . I apologize for being late. We had a simultaneous hearing. All morning, gentlemen, weve heard the story of russia influencing our campaigns and indeed in the Current Campaign for the mid terms. So let me say, has the president directed you and your agency to take specific actions to confront and blunt russian influence activities that are ongoing . Were taking a lot of specific efforts to blunt were they directed by the president . Not as specifically directed by the president. Director pompeo, have you received specific president ial direction to take steps to disrupt these activities . Sorry. Im not sure how specific. The president s made very clear, we have an obligation from our perspective from the foreign intelligence perspective, to do everything we can to make sure theres a deep and thorough understanding of every threat, including threats from russia. Has he singled out the russian threat, which appears to be critical to this election coming up . I know there are threats from many different vectors, but have you received a specific i think the president s been very clear that hes asked our agency to cooperate with each of the investigations thats ongoing and do everything we can to ensure we thoroughly understand this potential threat. Director coats, have you received a specific directive to take specific steps to disrupt and understand first and disrupt russian activities directed at our elections in 2018 . I would echo what director pompeo said. We Work Together on this. The agency has full understanding that we are to provide what intelligence is relevant and make sure thats passed on to our policy makers, including the president. Passing on relevant intelligence is not actively disrupting the operations of an opponent, do you agree . No, we pass it on and they make the decisions how to implement it. As the director of intelligence, are you aware of or are leading a interagency or working group that is tasked with countering russian activities, not reporting on it, but countering those activities . Are you aware of any group, since state elections are critical . Were relying on the investigations that are under way. So the answer both with the committee and the hipsy committee and the special counsel. So youre not taking any specific steps based on the intelligence to disrupt russian activities that are occurring at this moment . We take all kinds of step to disrupt russian activities in terms of what theyre trying to do. Ill turn it over to director pompeo let me finish with the rest of the gentlemen. Are you finished, mr. Coats . Yes. Thank you, sir. We have a significant effort, im happy to talk to you about in closed session, and its not just our effort. It is certainly all of ic effort. There may be others participating as well to push back against this threat, and its not just the russians threat. Its iranians and chinese, its a big, broad effort i understand we have mutual threats. But one threat that has been central to our and youve testified to this publicly. The last election there was russian influence on this election. They seemed to be more prepared. They learned their lessons. The question i pose, has the president directed the Intelligence Community in a coordinated effort, not merely to report but to actively stop this activity. And the answer seems to be, were reporting on every threat coming into the United States. Let me get back to, quickly, any of the other panelists have anything to add on this point . For us, i cant say ive been expr explicitly directed to blunt or actively stop. On the other hand, its very clear, generate knowledge and insight, help us understand so we can generate better policy. That direction has been very explicit, in fairness. But ill think, again, you may agree or disagree. Collecting intelligence, then acting on it in a coordinated fashion are two different things. Yes, sir. Id also argue our role as intelligence professionals. Let me just, i have a few moments remaining. We talked about china, cfius, their involvement in trying to buy companies in the United States. What i think has to be pointed out too, they are undertaking a Significant National investment in Artificial Intelligence and quantum computing. That is dwarfing anything that the administration is proposing or suggesting. If Artificial Intelligence has even half of the benefits that its promoters claim, its going to be extraordinarily disruptive. Quantum computing has the capacity to undercut cryptology as we know it, and the experts can correct me if im wrong. Some of the mechanisms that quantum computing can generate could, based on infinite measurements of gravity, detect devices underground and under the water, which for anybody whos a submariner, you have to be wondering. So, where is our National Manhattan program for ai and quantum computing that will match the chinese . Director coats, you seem to be anxious to answer that. I think there are some things that we ought to talk about in classified setting here. Were treading very narrow line here relative to discussing this in an open meeting. I dont want to tread that line, but we do have to recognize that, again, the chinese activity to appropriate our intellectual property is obvious. They are generating their own intellectual property at a rate that could be disruptive and we are not matching them. Again, this manhattan analogy might be a little bit out of date, but when we see the potential effects of a Scientific Development back in the 40s, we spared no expense so we would get it first before our opponents. The chinese seem to be making that type of commitment very publicly. Hundred millions billions of dollars that theyve said publicly, they have a plan and theyre working the plan. And we provide that information to the extent that we can collect that information. But just like the manhattan project, we dont openly share what steps that were taking to address it. I respect that. Thank you. Thank you, sir. Thank you, senator reed. And i hope youll come back to the closed session this an afternoon if you can. I want to turn to were about to wrap up. Everybody can look up. There are no more questions. So you dont have to lose eye contact with us, hoping youre not the guy that theyre going to ask to answer. You can tell who the newbies are, theyve stayed focused on the members the entire times and the ones that have been here before are like this. I want to turn to the vice chairman. Thank you, mr. Chairman. We hope to see you all this afternoon. Robert, we hope to get you some overhead questions to you this afternoon. Echoing what weve all said, appreciate your service. But i think were hearing a lot of commonality as we think about cyber, information, misinformation, and one of the things that have struck me, if you do a rough calculation and add up the costs to russia, in terms of their intervention in america, elections, the dutch elections, where they handcounted all the ballots, the french elections were acknowledged, taking down 30,000 sites. Its less than the cost of one new f35 airplane. Pretty good bang for the buck. I remember a year or so ago, langley looking at some Stealth Technology and the colonel showing him around, bemoaning the fact that the chinese had gotten this on the cheap by stealing a lot of the intellectual property that underlies that technology. And echoing what senator reed said, and again, this is where we all need to put our heads together. We just made a massive additional investment in dod. Were roughly ten up on our spend, versus our adversaries. Not from a criticism standpoint, but where we should be thinking going forward, we should be buying the best 20th century military that money can buy, when we see our adversaries making investments in ai, Machine Learning, quantum computing. We all need to think through this from a general strategic standpoint. I worry that weve got certain lowhanging tr lowhanging fruit, as we think about chinese Tech Companies and how to get cfius right. One of the things weve discussed with you in the past, you look simply at iot connected devices, were going to double the number from ten billion to 20 billion in the next three to five years, but we have no even deminimus federal security requirements for the purchasing of iot devices. Ive talked with general ashley on this. I dont believe there is, across the ioc and dod, prerequisite before we buy connected refrigerators or common consumer goods that there be that patchability or no embedded pass code. So theres a lot of work we can do, but we dont have the luxury of short time. Senator blunt raised questions around Election Security and i know the chairman will make this comment in his closing remarks. I think this committee has done some good bipartisan work on a series of areas that arose out of the russia investigation. Its our hope that on Election Security, we can come forward with a set of recommendations very quickly, because we have primaries coming up as early as march. My hope is that there will be Bipartisan Legislation to start addressing this issue. So thank you, gentlemen. Look forward to our session this afternoon. And with that, ill turn it over to the chairman. Thank you, vice chairman, and admiral rogers, i cant remember whether it was you or somebody else at the table said when we had a closed session about investment. Its not much we spend, its how we deploy the capital that weve devoted to a particular thing. And i think as a general statement, we get much better at the way we deploy capital. And i think we deploy it with a measurement tool today on return thats totally different than it was 10, 20, 30 years ago and i think thats important. This committee has a global mandate. A mandate that i thinks been reflected in the statements and questions of the members of this committee today. Its my hope that the American People got a sense of the breadth of topics this committee deals with on a daily basis and as like so do you. What was unsaid today . What was unsaid is that the special counsel is not the only investigation thats going on in washington. The scope of the special counsels investigation was clearly stated by the dag, when he fired bob mueller. And i think the media has spent some portion of every day trying to portray that the scope of that investigation has changed. The truth is, i dont know. Im not sure that anybody in this room knows. But heres what i do know. I know the senate intel investigation continues. Were hopefully wrapping up some important areas that we have focused on. The vice chairman just alluded to the fact that its our hope and our belief that before the primaries begin, we intend to have an overview of our findings that will be public. We intend to have an open hearing on Election Security. And its the committees intent to make recommendations that will enhance the likelihood that the security of our election process is in place. In addition to that, our review of the ica, the Intel Community assessment, which was done in the december of 16, we have reviewed in great detail. And we hope to report on what we found to support the findings where its appropriate, to be critical, if, in fact, we saw areas that we found came up short. We intend to make that public. Overview to begin with, none of these would be without a declassification process, but we will have a public version that we air as quickly as we can. And the third piece of review of when we learned of russias intrusions into our system, what we did or what we didnt do. And again, with the intent of sharing as much of that with the American Public as we can find through open hearings and through an overview. Lastly, we will continue to work towards conclusions related to any cooperation or collusion by any individual, campaign, or company with efforts to influence the outcome of elections or to create societal chaos in the United States. I want to thank each of you at the table for an unprecedented access to intelligence products, legal documents, and other materials that were needed for us to do our job. We have a very talented group of individuals who have conducted this investigation. The remarks of every individual who has come in before us has commented on their professionalism and the fact that at the end of eight hours, they couldnt tell who was a democrat and who was a republican. So the effort to be bipartisan has not just been public, it is private as well and permeates all the way down through our staff. They couldnt do this in a timely fashion, if it wasnt without the access that each of you have provided us and your agencies. And let me just reiterate again, we understand that this is an unprecedented access to this information. I promised you, when we started a year ago, that the sensitive nature of that material would, in fact, be protected. The vice charirman and i have done everything in our power to do that. We think we have maintained that promise. There have been times where information has found its way out some of recent, where it didnt come from us, but certainly people have portrayed it did. And thats okay, because you know and we know the security measures weve got in place to protect the sensitivity of that material. Weve also protected the sensitivity of the individuals that have been interviewed, voluntarily. The individuals who have come in, what theyve shared with us, to date, we have not released any interview notes. Because thats not very public consumption. We ask people to come in and share with us things that help us understand what happened. Its our responsibility to take that information and to put it into some form that furthers the American Peoples understanding and assurance that we have thoroughly reviewed this. We will continue the promise that we made to each of you, till the conclusion of this investigation, and on. There are no expectations that everything youve shared with us is now a precedent that you have to continue. I hope its not. I have said publicly and criticized for it, that our committee was created to operate in secrecy. I believe thats where we perform our best work, and were giving the opportunity and the need for the American People to have a better understanding, that we should provide that for them in as controlled an atmosphere as we do. Today is an example of that. And we can now move from a public setting to a more private and closed setting to continue to get some clarity on some of the issues that our members need. I want you to understand the takeaway here. The takeaway is, this committee has and will continue to focus on answering the question that was given to this committee from an investigation standpoint what russia did to influence the 2016 elections. There are efforts to expand our efforts. They are not internal. We realize we have to answer for the American People, what did russia do to mess with the 2016 elections. And like many of you, on some of the questions weve asked, we find its multi jurisdictional. Weve got to begin to sort that out for us. Us, the American People. So i thank you for your willingness to be here today. I thank you for the performance of your employees who have worked tirelessly with very little thanks of late, with a lot of criticism, to keep this country safe. And i might say, to keep other countries safe. Because we are very generous when we know that bad things are gonna happen. The committee is appreciative of the relationship that we have. We will continue to work to earn your trust because thats the only way we can perform the type of oversight that we believe the committee is mandated to do. And for the cooperation that each one of you provides us. Were grateful for that. With that, this hearing is adjourned until 2 30. [ background chatter ]. They brought up Nuclear Weapons by north korea and iran but [ indiscernible ] [ background chatter ]. This Senate Intelligence Committee Hearing on global terror threats that cia director, National Intelligence director and nsa director testified. You can watch it again tonight at 10 00 p. M. Eastern on cspan. And later, the Senate Armed Services committee holds a hearing on the defense departments role in protecting democratic elections from Cyber Attacks. Well have live coverage beginning at 2 30 p. M. Eastern. And Steve Mnuchin testifies before the Senate Finance committee on the president s 2019 budget request wednesday at 10 30 a. M. Eastern on cspan3. Cspans history series, landmark cases, returns this month, with a look at 12 new Supreme Court cases. Each week historians and experts join us to discuss the constitutional issues and personal stories behind these significant Supreme Court decisions. Beginning monday february 26, live at 9 00 p. M. Eastern and to help you follow all 12 cases, we have a companion guide written by veteran Supreme Court journalist tony morrow, landmark cases volume 2, to get your copy go to cspan. Org landmark cases. Next, the chair of the House Homeland Security committee Michael Mccall talks about National Security. After that, three republican members from his Committee Talk about u. S. Border and airport security, cyber security, and counterterrorism campaigns around the world