can you imagine any reason they would not want to do that? >> from a consumer standpoint, i would imagine that every driver of a toyota that may have an issue regarding sudden unintended acceleration would like to have this feature on their car. speaking, just speaking as a consumer, toyota's decision making in terms of how they implement it is an ongoing question. but to answer your question, sir, i believe it ll be a positive move for safety and for their own driving public. >> i look forward to hearing mr. lentz's explanation for why it won't be available in all toyos. beuse i don't see a reason to make it all available. make it available in all the toyotas. but we'll get his response to that. thank you mr. chairman. >> thank you. thank you, mr. strickland. toyota relies on two primary justifications for its assertion that electronics plays no role in sudden unintended acceleration. we've already discussed one of the shortcomings, one of the justifications, the work, the engineering firm exponent has done for toyota and the problems with that. the other justification toyota relies on is the premarket testing that toyota's own engineers do before manufacturing vehicles for sale to the public. our committee staff conducted a transcribed interview and two engineers in japan and asked them multiple qstions about the testing calls. we learnedhis premarket testing has significant limitations. toyota only conducts this test during the design phase of the vehicles. as one of the toyota engineers we interviewed told the committee, quote, once, quote, mass production is initiated then that means the design is completed so we don't conduct anything additional, end quote. so mr. schickland, is this premarket testing strike you as adequate to identify the cause of unintended acceleration? >> there's two components that nhtsa is concerned about. it's compliance. before a vehicle is put into the stream of commerce it has to be compliant with all the federal motor vehicle safety standards. that's one set of issues that has to be taken care of. the second part after the vehicle's on the road, we worry about any defects expost. >> i understand what you're saying but now we're talking about before. but this is before mass production. let me go on. toyota engineers also told us that toyota does not perform these design phase tests on a large number of vehicles and as a result it samples may not be representative enough toest for the risk of a rare event such as a sudden, unintended acceleration. some of the tests toyota relied on for its claim that the electronic system had undergone, quote, extensi testing, unquote, involves sample sizes of just one or t vehicles. so, mr. strickland, does toyota's approach strike you as adequate >> the approach, every manufacture has a different approach. the only thing we're concern the about is what happens on the road. >> no, i understand, but you said there was a premarket phase that you required. is the test of one or two cars in the design phase, in your view, sufficient? >> i would have to compare that withther mafactures' testing protocols and i don't have that offhand. but i will definitely get back to you on the record about it. >> sudden unintended acceleration occurs rarely and intermittentill he -- i asked you that. one or two vehicles. further more we learned fail safe mechanisms in toyota vehicles are designed to detect single point, single event faults. in other words, fault that's occur in isolation and effect only one vehicle component. toyota's testing of critical components of the electronic throttle control system reflects th focus in that they do not test for multiple event or multiple component faults. numerous academics and independent eerts told committee staff that rare multiple event faults could play a role in sudden unintended acceleration. it seems to me that toyota should try to identify all potential faults, not just the most frequent ones, and develop tests to prevent them. so, mr. strickland, do you agree toyota should take a comprehensive approach to test forotential causes of sudden unintended acceleration? >> they should take a comprehensive approach. nhtsa's work with nasa will be a multiple fault causation study which takes into account possible intervening ents which could cause this. that is our study. that is our approach. and we would have the expectation from our finding that's if we do find vehicle defect that that will be part of our vee pons to toyotaf that's the case. but nhtsa's approach is a multi causal analysis in how we can replicate that fault. >> based on the discretion of of toyota's premarket testing you've heard today, do you believe toyota's premarket testing provides a sufficient basis to conclude that there are no potential electronic causes of sudden unintended acceleration? >> i don't think you can use a premarket analysis as a determinative factor that there is no problem. i think you have to not only do premarket testing, but you have to do long-term, you know, i guess long-term studies of how your vehicle reacts in the real world as a number of manufacturers do. so i don't think that nhtsa would say a premarket test validates a lock term answer of the possility of there being a failure. >> well i'm concerned about the premarket testing itself, and it seems toyota's is not an adequate subs tutd for thorough testing needed to identify potential defects after manufacturing is complete, and it's time for toyota to stop making public assurances about the infallibility of their electronic systems when they don't have comprehensive testing to back it up. thank you, mr. chairman. >> thank you. mr. schi in response to some of the questions from mr. burgess and chairman waxman, a couple questions. first one is a lter dated february 22nd, 2010, sent to secretary lahood by myself and mr. waxman. and on page four, sub part b asks that nhtsa reopen its investigation of p.e., that's preliminary examination 0421 which had 37 consumer complaints on sudden, unintended accelerations in the camry, 2002, 2003 camry, solara and lexus. we've yet to have a response. are you going to reopen that investigation as requested? >> the universe of test vehicles assumes these, all of these parts that you asked for, so in terms of a defect investigation that's part of the nasa study that's ongoin that will have done in the -- by the end of the summer. so to answer -- the short answer to your question is we are re-evaluating all this work in light of the nasa study. in addition to, that's going to be included in the nas study but we'll definitely get back to you on the record in direct response to sub part b. >> well, in looking at that and in response to mr. waxman's questions, you said thibrake override system is a huge sift issue. why wouldn't nhtsa require toyota then to have the brake override system in 2002 and 2003 lexus es300s, the toyota camera and the toyota camera solera from 2002, 2003 since we had 37 consumer complaints and we've asked that it be reinvestigated? why wouldn't you require the brake override system be put in all vehicles or toyota models of vehicles that had this sudden unexplained acceleration. >> it is still an ongoing investigation, mr. stupak. if it is found that that is part of that, w would ask for a remedy and that brake override could be a mandated part of that remedy. because it is an investigation, it is ongoing, which is inclusive and the key to the in as that study we are not in position to -- >> well. >> -- make that demand at this time. >> if toyota is putting it in some of the vehicles now, be in all vehicles in 2011, then by putting it i certain vehicles now, is that admission, then, that you have a defect in those models and that's why you've got to put in this brake override? >> that isn't admission, you can ask mr. lens those questions. but from nhtsa's perspective, we can only force mantdtory recall if there is a defect we can prove in court and we haven't been able to do that yet. but the fact that toyota feels they need to install this in some vehicles may be indicative of what they feel would be a proper solution until they can come to their own answs. >> all right. i guess i'll save those questions forr. lentz. let me ask you the other document i put before you. it's ded 5/2/2007, it's a memorandum from scott yawn, this is on the smith vehicle that mr. burgess had asked about. in the last paragraph, first line it says discoloration rust and surface damage to brake rotors is visible through all four wheel ap tours. if you go on the next page, second paragraph, lower part of that paragraph, it indicates a brake components exhibit wear and damage inconsisten with normal operation and inconsistent with the indicated vehicle mileage. then they have a number of photographs which show the damage, showing brake temperature shows the brakes being applied while the vehicle is moving at speed. so the smith vehie, maybe every time you turn the key you don't find a sudden unintended acceleration, obviously there is damage there outside the normal wear and tr on a vehicle of this age s that correct? >> yes, sir, that's correct. >> and you've never found any vehicles that's been considered to have sua, sudden unintended acceleration, you haven't been able to turn the keys, you said you had 20 models and you haven't found thi sudden intented acceleration? >> we haven't had an event where the engineer turnedn the car, was able to recommeplicate the because of something outside the parameters of a floor mat entrapment issue. >> and we don't know when that occurs, that's why we give it this name, sudden unintended acceleration. >> we have to categorize all those events. there could be multiple causes for that. that's the reason we're having our long-term investigation for the national academy of sciences and having nasapecifically look at toyota's electronic throttle control system for the study that we're hoping to finish at the end of the summer. >> my time is up. mr. burgess for questions? >> thank you, mr. chairman. on the -- mr. strickland, on the order of the brake override that now receiving so much attention, you mentioned, i think, that installing it, the brake override in toyotas would be a positive move, is that correctly state your feelings? >> yes, sir, i think that would be a very positive move. >> what other manufactures have installed a brake override system on their cars? >> there are several manufactes that have brake override systems. >> are there some that don't. >> that are some that don't. >> why is that not a requirement if you think it would be a good move for toyota would it be a good move for other manufacturers? >> we have brake override has tremendous promise which is the reason we're taking our preliminary research for possible rule making in firms of dealing with this issue, i guess across the rest of the fleet, that's going to be part of a study and part of the one of the answers will be possible long-term solutions, either from the national academyf sciences, which may include. >> rough numbers, what percentage of the fleet has the brake override right now? >> that i'm not surement i'll have to get back to you on the record for that. >> why isn'tt more widely used? what are the barriers to the implementation? >> there's different systems in terms of how the brake and the accelerator work in terms of their software configuration, their mechanical linkages. i'm sure every manufacturer has different strategies in manufacturing and construction which may lead to different decisions. >> if you're thinking about rule making, then presumably you're looking at cars with electronic throttle control would have a requirement for a brake override system. so that if the brake is applied, the throttle, the default is for the throttle to stop action. >> yes, sir, we're absolutely looking at that. >> so if that's good for toyota, then it's good for x-% of the fleet that does not have the brake override system. >> the safety of the entire fleet, not one manufacturer. >> when we had the other hearing, and i don't have the information in front of me today, but it was a list rated, a numerical list of complaints received by the -- your agency about cars, and toyota showed up on the list, but they were, i don't remember, 1617, 18 on the list. that means there were 16 other car manufacture where the cars had more complaints. than toyota. and yet here we are involved in a series of hearings over toyota. have you looked at the cars in the complaints that scored higher than toyota or worse than toyota, if you will, on that list? and are we -- are we actively pursuing the complaints that came into nhtsa for those vehicles as well? >> nhtsa looks across all manufacturers in terms of how the focus on toyota, there was clearly an anomaly in the acceleration events during the period that we're talking about, which is the reason why nhtsa has opened, you know, up until this point we had, i believe we opened eight investigations into thisssue prior to the santy crash. so we he taken a look -- we've et treated toyota as we would any manufacturer. yes, there are other manufacturers with similar complaints, more complaints. we look at them just as vigorously as we do toyota. it's just that in terms of the actual profile and in terms of trend analysis, toyota in this area did have a higher tendency toward the later years of the camry after 2002. >> and was that all related to control? >> yes, sir. let me ask you this. let's talk about nasa for a minute before i run out of time. you referred to the research plan. has -- have you submitted a research plan to -- for nasa's ? >> we will be meeting with nasa next week. they have required a humge amout of work for the toyota source code. there were issues to overcome. there are a tremendous amount of documents nasa had to receive in addition to our automotive experts working with nasa. so our hope is to have a test plan done fairly soon and hopefully once we get that finalized we'll submit it to the volpe center for peer review. we have not finished yet. >> so you will submit this analysis also for evaluation from the committee when . on the nasa review is for it to be completed by the end of august? >> that is our hope. >> you don't have a plan yet, but we're going to get one. is that correct? >> yes. you will get that. >> what if we get to the end o august and we haven't gotten there? >> well, we have a timeline and a goal to make sure we have results, but the primary objective is to make sure we get it right. there are issues that may take more time. we'll update the committee about the issues as they arise. our hope is to be done by the end of the summer. >> do you have enough funding to do what you need to do? we have not done a budget this year and won't do appropriations until late in the year. can you pay for the things you need to do to get this information? >> at the time we are properly resourced now. if there are any resource issues that confront us, we'll come back and inform the congress. >> let the record show nhtsa is awash in cash and needs no more money. i think that's what he said. [ laughter ] >> thank you for the implication. >> any questions? >> administrator strickland, one thing i'm curious about is the work that your agency is doing looking at other types of analysis that are being done by manufacturers in other parts of the world looking into the problem of evaluating electronic throttle control systems. are you aware of any of the work being done by the european manufacturers in terms of education and training to analyze potential problems with those systems? >> i am not, but i am certain that my staff is. more than happy to have them come and speak to you and your staff and get back to you on any questions regarding the differences in approaches between the european union, the japanese or any other manufacturer. >> i would be happy do that and would encurrently your staff as part of its work on the investigation of the specific problem to look at what's happening with those other manufacturers, what lessons they have learned and what their safety record is on the issue of sudden, unintended acceleration after the programs have been implemented. >> absolutely. >> one of the other questions wanted to ask you about is througut this process, toyota hasepresented to the committee that it retained exponent to conduct an independent investigation of the underlying causes related to these problems with sudden unintended acceleration. you have bn here when we've talked about that. >> yes, sir. >> they have made similar representations to you. >> that's correct. >> now the company they retained to do that analysis, exponent, do you know about them and what they do? >> i am fairly familiar with the company and its prior name and the issues that it's worked on over the years. >> its prior name being failure analysis associates? >> that's correct. >> are you aware of any instance where failure analysis associates or exponent has been retained to do ap independent analys on behalf of a consumer who was injured in a defective automobile? my recollection of exponent or failure analysis probably goes back to 1993. so thas the window that i have knowledge of. i am not aware of them doing work for a victim o consumer of a product. >> that's all the questions i have. >> that concludes the questions for this witness. administrator, thank you. for the record, i would like to enter into the record the two documents i presented to the administrator on questns of february 22, 2010, a letter from chairman waxman and myselfo secretary la hood and the memorandum dated may 7, 2007 concerning the smith vehicle. without objection they will be entered into the record. thank you for being here. >> thank you very much, mr. chairman. >> thank you for being here. you're on our second panel. we have james e.lintz, president and chief operating officer of toyota motor sales usa incorporated. it is theolicy of this subcommittee to take all testimony under oath. please b advised that you have the right under the rules of the house to be advise bid couns during your testimony. do you wish to be represent bid counsel? >> yes. ted hester is behind me. >> you may consult with him at the appropriate time. >> thank you. >> please raise youright hand and take the oath. >> do you swear or affirm the testimony you're about to give to be the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth in the matter pending before this committee? >> do >> i do. >> the witness is now under oath. if you would like to begin with an opening statement, five minutes. if you have a longer statement we'll submit it for the record. >> thank you, chairman stu pack, members of the submmittee. thank you for inviting me here today. i am theresident and chief operating officer of toyota motor sales usa. i'm honored to return here to represent the 30,000 americansi thousands more from those who bring great dedication and spirit to their jobs each and every day. three weeks ago i said toyota is committed to strengthening focus on safety and quality assurance, in communicating effectively with customers and regulators. in subsequent hearings four of my senior colleagues from the u.s. and japan including our president akio toyoda also prejudiced to improve responsiveness on safety issues. there is substantial progress in monitoring the commitments. we are taking major steps to become a more responsive safety focused organization, listening closely to our customers responding more likely to their concerns and those of our regulators and taking actions to ensure they are among the industry leaders in safety. mr. toyoda has made improving quality assurance his priority. our company is mobilized to ensure that toyota vehicles are safe and reliable for our customers. not only when they are first sold and leased but as they are on the road for years to come. under his personal leadership we have undertaken a top to bottom review of our quality assurance process in all aspects of global operations. toyota has appointed a new cef quality officer for north america. a u.s. executive with more tn three decades of manufacturing expertise to act as the voice of the customer in this region. north americnow has a greater say on recalls and other safety issues that affec vehicles sold in the united states. in fact, the chief quality officer has a direct line to mr. toyoda when it comes to ensuring our customers' safety. these changes are having a real impact as reflected in the speed and decisiveness of our response last month when consumer reports identified a potential software issue with the vehicle stability control in the 2010 lexus gx-460. in addition, our smart evaluation process has significantly improved the speed of our response to customer reports of unintended acceleration. start stands for swift market response team. the field technicians can be deployed anywhere to investigate customer reports of uniended acceleration on site. under the new evaluation process the company has completed more than 600 on site vehicle inspections. technicians have completed an additional 1400 inspections. these inspections are giving us a better understanding about the reasons for unintended acceleration complaints. none of these investigations found that our electronic throttle control system with intelligence washe cause. we are now making an extraordinary effort to service recalled vehicles and equip new cars and trucks with more advanced safetyechnologies including the star safety system, brake override and improved event data recorders or edrs that will read both preand post crash data. our dealers completed nearly 3.5 million recall remedies. that'sore than 70% of the sticky pedal modifications and we'll continue to reach out to the affected owners to make sure they bring vehicles to their dealers' attention. we are grateful to customers for the way they are standing by toyota. consistent with our pledge to congress, we now have 150 edr readout units in north america and delivered ten edr readers to nhtsa so they can conduct their own data retrieval during their investigation. toyota is well on its way to being the first to feature brake override technology as standard equipment on all vehicles sold in the united across our product line-up by the end of 2010. we are also taking the extraordinaire step of retro-fitting brake overrides on several existing models involved in the recalls as an additional measure of confidence for customers. toyota remains confidence that our et csi system isn't the cause ofintendinteed acceleration. they are designed so real world uncommanded acceleration cannot occur. we test our vehicles extensively to make sure that the failsafes and redundancies work. nonetheless, we're making a major scientific effort to further validate the safety of our vehicles by opening up our technology to an unprecedeed level of independent review by respected safety, quality and engineering experts. the engineering and scientic consulting firm exponent has already completed more than 11,000 hours of testing and the analysis of the etcsi system and its evaluation is ongoing. i have been advised by secretary slater that the quality advisory panel he chairs will invite a rigorous peer review of the process as part of its assessment of exponent's findings. it will be one of the topics of discussion when the panel meets with mr. toyoda next week in japan. as mr. toyoda told secretary la hood, we are pleased to cooperate with nhtsa and with the engineers from nasa in their independent evaluation of the system. we also cooperate with the national academy of sciences on their evaluation of toyota and lexus vehicles as they study the industry-wide issue of automotive safety. membs of the committee, at toyota we are committed to doing more than just correcting mistakes from the past. we're learning from them and making major steps to avoid them in the future. i'd like to quote the words of mike getz, a toyota team member for 22 years from georgetown kentucky. in one team on all levels a book which means what it is to work at our plant in kentucky. it's written by the team members of the georgetown plant. mike writes, toyota makes mistakes, but we are expected to take ownership to prevent reoccurrence and learn from them. we just don't say that. we do that. that's been the toyota way for 70 years. for the future, by acting swiftly on safety issues when they arise we are determined to set a new standard for quality customer care for vehicles. our goal is to lead the way for our industry. thank you very much. m happy to answer any of your questions. >> thank you. thank you again for being here. let me start -- i asked mr. strickland, so let me ask you this question. you testified that the mats and sticky pedal accounted for 16% of the sudden unintended acceleration and that's 84% of them we have no answer for. are we any closer to finding out what about the other 84% of the sudden unintended acceleration, what's the cause of it? >> i think it depends on the datase that u're looking at. in the case of nhtsa's database, it's lumped together as speed corol. so it includes not only events of sudden unintended acceleration, but it inclus any other type of surge or hesitation event. so when we spoke last, i'm confident of three things -- that the sticky pedal is being repaired. we're already almost 70% repaired. >> correc >> i'm confident we'll be under control on the mats -- >> but even if you do 100% mats, 100% sticky pedal we have 84% -- and these were numbers from last time. 2,262 sudden axlcceleration reports. 19 deaths in the united states. the 84% of the 2262. so even if you did a 100% mats, 100% sticky pedals we have 84% we have no answer for. you tell us you have 11,000 hours that exponent has done. what did they conclude? what did the tests show? we he no reports. they won't give us any. what was 11,000 hours of testing on? electronics? computer? micro processers? we don't know because exponent give us the answers. >> quite a number of questions there. first off, in terms of surges and hesitations, the possibility of pedal misapplication, even though we are going to do these two mechanical fixes, those are going to exist. they can still be reported to nhtsa as speed controls. that's part of the 84% number. in terms of exponent and the scope of the work they provided the committee back around the time i testified. >> an interim report. >> veryih$jz a small rtion of what they are testing. i believe yesterday ty provided a second report to you all with more information, but they are testing not only vehicle electronics. they are testing emi. they are testing everything that could possibly create unintended acceleration. >> i guess i would agree with you. you come and say we're doing everything and exponent has this open-ended ability to do what needs to be done. you testified there was 11,000 hours. what exponent says -- and all we have is february -- is it's important to note at this stage of our work we neither claim to have looked at all issues nor to have opined on the cause of incidence of unintended acceleration reported. we agree further wk needs to be performed before we reach such opinions. when we asked we received to reports. just saying, work is under way. is this in some engineer's head? no one writes down what they are doing for 1,100 hours? how do you pay them. we have the payment schedule. $485 for this person or that person. ho in the heck do you know if you're getting anything for your money? >> well, you know, i am convinced that in the end when we see the final report and it will be made public it will be peer reviewed and secretary slater is also going to review what's taking place. i'm confident we'll see an independent report. >> when will we see a final report? >> i don't have an exact te. >> we're looking for the end of august. >> i don't think they have committed to me a given date. but i will tell you in the case of exponent, you're right. i have listened to the comments of the past that they were reporting through product liability attorneys. that changed this week exponent is now reporting to steve st. anglo and all of the work will report thrgh steve. i know we have a conference call as we do every week with the steve, being he's from the manufacturing side he's going to demand we have a work process with exponent going forward. as soon as we have that, you will have that. >> okay. your counsel has indicated that expont's contract didn't change at all. will this be a new change or will it be reduced to writing about how they are going to get this to your safety? >> a letter has gone to exponent from steve -- >> when youet a chance will you get it to the committe can we see the document? >> it was submitted with our written statement. >> let me ask you one last question. is there going to be a recall tomorrow on the lexus ls vehicles? >> i don't know for certain the timing. >> but there is going to be a recall on steering problem? >> yes. it is because of the experience in japan. the steering component that creates this is standard in japan on lss. >> it is a computer-driven steering issue. >> it is. >> have we had complaints in this country about steering? >> we have not. now that japan has had the issue we are combing through our files to see if they haved with anything. it's on roughly 50% of the lss in the united states. it's not standard like it is in japa >> about 3800 vehicles? >> 2500 that have been sold and 1400 in dealer stock or on the way to us that could be impacted. >> mr. burgess, questions? >> thank you. mr. lentz, thanks for being with us this afternoon. chairman stupak's openg statent made a lot of reference to polling. would you care to respond to some of the statements made in the opening statement by the chairman of the subcommittee? >> we have the polling company and i cannot recall their name now. they have done polls for us for three ars. >> nnett's strategy? >> yes. they have done pol for the last three years. they have probably done at least two dozen polls in the past. the poll that's in question was done soon after my testimony. it was done soon after the expose ran about unintended acceleration there were questions about dr. gilbert and abc. there were a lot of other questions of the things measured as well. yes, we did research polling about the work done by dr. gilbert. >> if it's not proprietary can you give us an idea of the polling sample size? >> i believe it was around 1,000. i may not be exact. it was 980, 990. >> and you would have no reason to publically state the fact you're doing a poll. typically a company would not publicize that it's polling because it might influence the poll. >> correct. >> you did this in response to the abc news piece. sit unusual for your company to do polling related to other issues of the day that may relate to your particular industry? >> i think it is. i think the abc news piece was unusual as well. it was a clear attack on the reputation of the company and really cast doubt about the throttle control system. so we felt it was very, very important to our customers, our dealers. >> sir, if you didn't make it public and it was obviously in your best interest not to go public with the information, who did? >> made which public? >> the poll on the ab news piece. >> i don't know the answer to that. >> you did not and your company -- >> not to my knowledge. >>o it was leaked to a usually reliable source. >> possibly, i don't know. at the time we were doing that polling we didn't know how much damage the abc report had done to our reputation and we were contemplating whether or not we would have to do newspaper advertising to explain our side and the results of the polling indicated that consumers didn't know much about what they said and didn't care about it. so we didn't end up doing anything about it. >> you asked your representative to replicate the conditions that professor gilbert gave to us here in committee. was that decision made before you commissioned the poll from the strategy group? >> that actually took place the evening before my testimony. when we found out24ñabc was running that, exponent worked that night to see how many other vehicles they could replicate. that would have been before the polling. >> did you reive information based on the polling? >> some of the advertising in terms of toyota in america has beenun based on some of the polling information, but to my understanding with regard to gilbert & cane, i don't believe we have run anything on that. >> we have had talk about the brake overrides and fixes for the sudden unintended acceleration last fall your company announced it will be introducing a brake override on certain models. will this cover all toyota models that were the subject of unintended sudden acceleration, going back and installing the brake override system? >> not on every vehicle. the first cut to decide where we would put those were really on all vehicles that had the push button start-stop. so camry is an example. we put it across the entire line. same with i.s., e.s. and avalon. we then took a second cut and took a look based at nhtsa's sudden acceleration. what other vehicles might we add for additional consumer confidence? >> why not all models for consumer confidence? >> it's an additional eight million vehicles. in some cases, some of the models, when you look at the nhtsa database actually has a much less than average incident rate of sudden acceleration. it's not the same across all vehicles on the toyota or lexus side. i thi part of it is the tremendous amount of engineering resource and time it takes to do that. >> you're trying to rebuild consumer confidence after a very damaging series of events the past eight months. it seems like it would make sense if that's the way to repair consumer confidence, add the feature and none of the rest of us have to worry. would the brake override system prevent every and all instance and type of sudden unintended acceleration? >> it only work ifs you step on the brake. >> okay. let me ask you this if i could. you've been very indulgent. i want to say at least in my part of the world that your dealerships have done an excellent job opening early, staying late. i have had my own experience with your dealership in lieu wisville. i think they have done well by your company in what was a tough time. ey stepped up, met the challenge and have taken it -- met it head on. so your dealers in the texas area are doing a tremendous job. >> thank you. they understand the value of taking care of customers. thank you. >> mr. chairman, mr. waxman for questions please. >> i'm still confused. as i hear you saying exponent is continuing to do research for you but not for therial lawyers. they will do it for one of your corporate executives. >> i don't think they are mutually exclusive. as it has evolved -- >> so they are still doing research? >> yes. >> you told them to do a comprehensive evaluation, spare no budget, do everything that needs to be done. have they completed their research? >> no. >> when you were here last they had done an interim report. that's all we had at that point. the interim report didn't tell us much, yet you and -- well, others from toyota assured the american people that it is not the whole electronic system that could possibly be the cause of the sudden acceleration. how could you be so sure about that? >> the only way we can be sure and i'more confident today than i was in the past. we know that we do a lot of work ana lot of research before we put the vehicles on the road. i know you will have additional questions on that. today as the smart teams are going out and investigating these -- >> we were told that you were relying on exponent's research and conclusions, but you weren't relying on their conclusions because they still haven't finished the report. >> no. >> so you are relying on what you were told about the work that was being done in japan before the products were put into production. >> yes. >> i raised concerns about that in my opening statement. let's go back to exponent. it's been held out to us that exponent has put this issue to rest. that's why exponent is doing this work. i just can't understand why you're so absolutely certain -- you say you're even more certain now than you were then but you have exponent's report. you will have it peer reviewed. why are you bothering to do it if you're convinced based on the other work you're doing? >> we want to ense the public and our customers that they have the confidence that this has been reviewed independently, scientically, peer reviewed even having secretary slater review the process. >> former secretary slater. >> yes, i'm sorry. >> well, we heard from the head of nhtsa, mr. strickland. he doesn't feel he can rely on what he knows of exponent's work. exponent seems to be working for the lawyers. everything that they have shown us by way of documents gives us no sense that they have come to any conclusion. in fact, we have no sense they are looking at the issue because they don't even have it on the list of things that they are evaluating. if exponent is doing the job you describe in your testimony providing a comprehensive assessment it presumably would undertaking a complicated multi disciplinary investigation involving numerous rounds of testing and analysis. but dr. surey told the staff at any time 10 to 25 people could be working on the toyota project and there is no written communication among these people. there is nothing by way of written notes. science is what we need to have evaluated. so ii!uñ just raise that issue. i still am not satisfied because you're now relying on something other than exponent to give you that certainty. i want to ask you a different question before my time is up. that's this question of the brake override. why are you doing a brake override? what's the purpose? >> to help with added consume confidence on our products. >> is it for safety? >> i thinkor some people it could be safety. i can't speak for all the consumers to say 100% of the consumers will see it -- >> not how they see it. i don't care how they see it. will it make cars safer? >> there are other redundancies within a car today that will make that car stop. today, even at full throttle, full brake pressure -- >> so you don't think there is a safety need for it. >> i believe there is. otherwise we wouldn't be putting it on future models but it adds future -- >> it seems you're saying it will make people feel better. that's consumer confidence. but are you willing to say it's going to make the cars safer. >> i can't say 100% that it necessarily makes cars safer. they're different. it's just like cars. >> it costs around $50 to do this. but you're not doing it for all cars. you're retro-fitting some cars, but not others. why are you made that decision? don't you feel those driving less expensive toyotas should have that sense that they have a brake override that's going to protect them? >> it's not a question of what people pay for tir cars. we started with e four vehicles that had push butto start -- >> are you going to get to the other vehicles? >> we then went to an additional three models that were high on( list. >> are you going to get to all the other vehicles. >> we are not going to get to all the other vehicles going back. >> do you have a brake override in your car sp? >> i drive a hybrid that has the equivalent leapt of it. my son doesn't have it in his and i don't feel that he's not safe. >> what ii, as a toyota owner wanted to spend $50 and get it in my car? >> if it hasn't been developed, it's not developed. >> it's developed enough that you are putting it most toyotas. >> it's unique to every vehicle. >> you will put it in all future toyotas. >> yes. >> each and every vehicle for toyota in the future and you're retro-fitting for some but not all. >> it is unique to every vehicle. the amount of time it would take to do it is just not -- >> with all due respect, i hear you saying you want people to feel good so you tell them exponent said it's not the electronics. i don't believe you can say that. that was past testimony. you're saying people ought to feel good about the brake override but you're not willing to say that's really for safety. i don't see that you are giving us assurances on safety. it seemso me you're working around attitudes. that attitude you want to velop is people should feel good about toyota. i want people t feel good about safety. >> it is an extraordinary effort. i dot know of another manufacturer that's gone back to retro-fit vehicles with any type of safety like this. even to do three million going back on these seven models is an extraordinary evident for any manufacturer. >> my time is -- i don't want to interrupt you. my time is more an expire thank you, mr. chairman, for letting me go over. as you cantell, i'm still not satisfied. thank you. >> mr. christensen for questions. >> thank you, mr. chairman. in a prior hearing i asked a question that all the major decisions were being made in toyota japan. there seemed to be a disconnect between what was happening with toyota made cars in different parts of the world. no communication of what was happening in europe toyota e.u. and toyota u.s. for example. how would hing a special committee on global economy and a chief quaty officer have made a difference in f those offices ested back then. >> the biggest difference is not only did we have a global quality officer but we have an individual who was responsible for recalls in the united states. the world has been divided up into six different regions. europe has a representative. china has a representative. the u.s. has ap representative. they will share in all the information and data that's going on on a global basis. >> that didn't happen before. >> that did not happen before. the decisions were made in japan and communicated to us. now that information will be visible to this individual. this individual will work with one other person in japan to make that decision whether or not there is a recall. if he's not satisfied, steve saint angelo has the ability to go to akio toyoda and discuss the situation. not only do we have input but we can go to the president of the company if we are not satisfied with what the decision is. that's very, very different than before. >> okay. you have the north america quality advisory panel. they are appointed and paid by toyota? >> yes. mr. slater was initial ly suggested by toyota and he basically hand-picked the reprentatives on the committee. >> so other than relying on the high respect that we have for the stewartship and integrity of rodney slater who may not always be -- for any number of reasons, how do we ensure that there is adequate independence in this advisory panel? >> you know, i think you have to look at the results of what happens over the next few years. we are confident that not only mr. slater but the additional members of his panel, they have already spent time with our people. they have already spent time with exponent. they seem to be very, very independe independent. very, very up front and are asking tremendous questions. i think they will add tremendous value to our overall organization. >> my last question, initiatives such as smart happening in the territories and the states, we have a big toyota market in the virgin islands. >> i can't tell you specifically many the virgin islands, our smart team has not been requested to go, but after your comments today i will make sure japan understands if they need technical expertise i know o the engineering side that they cover the caribbean. our smart team does not outside of puerto rico under tms control. >> puerto rico covers the u.s. virgin islands. thank you. >> thank you. >> mr. braley for questions. >> thank you. welcome back. >> thank you. we'll explore in more detail toyota's relationship with exponent. when you appred on september 23, 2010 you submitted a written statement. >> yes. >> on page two you said we asked exponent a world class consulting firm toonduct a comprehensive independent analysis of the electronic throttle control system with an unlimited budget. do you recall making that statement. >> yes, sir. >> at the conclusion i requested a copy of any documents that would verify the nature of the relationship between toyota and exponent. in response to that request we received from your attorneys king and spalding a copy of a document listed as attachment a which we'll put on the screen and whi you have in front of you. this is an agreement dated december 7, 2009, between joel smith at bowman and brook law firm in south carolina with exponent. would you agree with that? >> yes. >> and under the term "subject" it says toyota class actions. do you see that? >> yes. >> a class action is a group of claims against a manufacturer that have been accumulated for theurpose of pursuing relief. did i state that correctly? >> yes. >> and in the first paragraph, it says dear joel and it outlines the scope of services under the agreement. it says our scope of services is anticipated to inclut engineering services related to class actions filed against toyota. do you see that? >> yes. >> you would agree class actions against toyota are separate and distinct from an independent analysis of what's causing this problem? >> i understand that. i can tell you that -- >> let me go on to the rest of this letter. down in paragraph three it says -- and this is an agreement between bowman and brook, a law firm in california and expoept. it says it is our understanding that exponent retention on this project is solely with your organization and the organization that exponent is referring to is the law firm of bowman and brooke. you would agree with that? >> yes. >> it says all charges incurred by expoept on this project and that's the toyota class action project will be the responsibility of bowman & brooke, independt of other parties involved. do you see that? >> yes. >> it's clear when exponent was first retained they entered into an agrment with a law firm in south carolina, not just with toyota directly and the subject of the agreeme was to investigate class action claims against toyota. we heard from administrator strickland and he put this in perspective when he said there is preparation for litigation and there is sentific analysis skising of a detailed analysis of the cause of a problem and c eliminating it. you would agree there is a distinction? >> i don't know that for certain. >> let's look at it. we also received an attachment d, a summary of what exponent had been paid by toyota over the years andt says that between 2000 and 2008 toyota paid exponent about 11 million dollars for consulting services and during the period between 2004 and 2009 it was 9.1 million dollars. there is a statement here. exponent belies the result of the search provides a reasonable gross revenues from toyota but they know if the agreement doesn't refer to toyota by ne it may show up in the revenues. it's clear that toyota paid a substantial amount of money to exponent. my question is how can you claim that exponent was retained by toyota to conduct an independent investigation when this agreement we have been provided with makes it clear that they were retained by the defense law firm and it was for contested litigation which is in no way considered an independent analysis. >> that is how the relationship began. but as this has evolved -- >> well, as of this week before you came here you testified that they were reporting through product liability attorneys that it changed this week. >> correct. >> we also asked questions from toyota and received responses. i want those put up on the screen. question and request number 15. it says the overall amount exponent billed for workelated to toyota since e exponent was retained in 2009 the answer the committee received was exponent bied $3,330,552.36. so you indicated in your written statement today that exponent has already completed more than 11,000 hours of testing and analysis. that means that at 11,000 hours that they are billing about $302 an hour for this incredible amount of work that they have done on the project. >> i don't know. i don't know what the specific contract is. all i can say is i understand the perception that this is not a transparent process. >> you have provided in your written statement today with the letter to mr. sabai who you have indicated will be communicating directly with mr. saint angelo and when toyota's counsel talked to committee sff yesterday they said the letter to exponent that you provided with your attachment does not change exponent's contractual relationship with bowman & brooke. >> not yet. >> is it your understanding that it will. >> i don't know that for a fact. >> will you commit to the committee today that if it does you will provide us with any documents that change the relationship between exponent an bowman & brooke or toyota and any of its various entities related to the project that we have been talking about during the two hearings? >> absolutely. >> i see my time is expired. i will yield. >> thank you. we wanted to go another round of questions but we have four votes on the floor, plus the committee mark-up on the bill on the nhtsa bill at 2:00. we're going to cut it short. before i go, i wanted to get in questions about the polling but i can do that in writing. i'll follow these up but last time you were here in february i asked you about a lot of discussions about the event data recorders. >> yes. >> we received no information yet other than you provided some. but i had asked, mr. rush and others asked specifically about the november 27, 2009 accident involving a 2010 camry in auburn, new york. i asked about decemr 26, 2009 accident in south lake, texas, involving a 2008 toyota avalon. i asked about jeff pepski of minnesota, 2007 lexus es 350 about their black box record. i also asked and questioned you on the february 20th, 2010 washington post article on the camry's 2005. in fact, three fatal accidents in the course of 2005. camry is not subject to any sudden unintended acceleration though the thr fatal accidts did. we are looking for information on the black box recorders. i will follow up in writing. that and other questions i have. >> i apologize if we haven't submitted that to you. i can tell you that the black box recorders, we have lived up to our commitment that we have 150 of the deces, the data retrieval devices in the marketplace. i can also tell you -- >> correct. we want to know what they say. >> yeah. i can tell you they will be made commercially available by about september of 2011 to make it much more readily available for police across the united states. >> and consumers i hope. >> consumers will have access. >> that will be part of the bill today. we'll follow up. quickly, sir. >> before you close, i would ask that the response from king and spalding that we received are w all the relevant attachments and the e-mail we had on the screen dated wednesday, may 19 with be included. >> no problem as long as we have redactions on some of the names. that would be the only thing i have to insist upon. other than that, i have no objection. do you have any objection as long as we redact the names? >> i have a question for the chairman why we would redact names provided in response to an official request. >> that's the policy if they are not subject to it the names of those enginrs by exponent, their names don't need to be in the public record. >> the only exception i would request, mr. chairman, is there are people -- mr. sabai is listed as the first person in the interest. he's been the subject of the discussion at the hearing and there is no question based on the letter that the witness has provided that his name be left. >> correct. without objection. so that will be included with the redactions of professional engineers notubject to or signing that letter. that concludes -- >> mr. chairman, just one observation since everyone else has gone over. >> a right. >> you're going to a mark-up. i am no longer on the subcommittee, but you're going to mark up legislation but we haven't finished our work here that is supposed to influence legislation being marked up this afternoon. there are huge hole that is need to be filled with the need to get this done -- >> the legislation we are marking up doesn't just include the subject of this hearing. there are also others. there have been hearings o the legislation that witnesses have testified. i know you're not on the subcommittee. >> we do this time and again. i'm reclaiming my time. >> you don't have any time. >> we did it with clean water and we are doing it this afternoon. it seem it is committee should take things in a methodical way and not be doing things in a haphazard arrangement that seems to be so prevalent in the committee. thank you. i will yield back. >> you will have a chance to voice those objections when it comes to full committee. as you know when it goes to the subcommittee level it must come to the full committee. you will have a chance then. that concludes all questioning. i want to thank our witnesses for coming today and your testimony. the committee rules provide members have ten days to submit questions for the record. i ask that the contents be entered into the record provided that the staff may redact as it relates to privacy concerns. the documents will be entered in the records. let me acknowledge two key staff rsons, alan tindale and karen christensen of the republican staff. both women are expecting a chi soon. we appreciate their work on this hearing and previous hearings for the committee and our subcommittee. we wish them well in the coming days and weeks ahead as they transition from work exhaustion to childbirth exhaustion. that will conclude our hearing. this meeting is adjourned. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2010] >> the senate cleared a hurdle on the financial speculation bill. we get reaction from president obama. >> mexican president calderon visited the capitol today to address a joint meeting of congress. he talks about illegal drug trafficking and heirs and his recent immigration law which he says he strongly disagrees with. later, the swearing in of the newest member of the house of representatives. the democrat won a special election tuesday to replace jack murtha who died earlier this year. on tomorrow morning, we will get an update on its financial regulations bill which passed the senate. after that, newt gingrich on his new book. also, jonathan alter talks about his book on the first year of the obama administration. "washington journal" to morning at 7:00 eastern. in a discussion on national security focusing on the u.s. presence in the world ocean. we will hear from to navy officials. it is hosted by the center for ocean law and policy. our live coverage starts at 10:00 a.m. eastern. >> this weekend, a boston radio talk-show host michael graham's defense the two-party -- tea party movement. by the entire weekend schedule at booktv.org. >> the senate passed the financial regulations bill 59-39 thursday night. president obama spoke about the legislation at the white house before the vote. good afternoon, everybody. i want to say a few words about the vote on financial reform in the senate today. i've said many times that the recession we're emerging from was primarily caused by a lack of responsibility and accountability from wall street to washington. it's part of the reason our economy nearly collapsed. it's what led to countless home foreclosures, the failure of community banks and small businesses, and a cascade of job losses that have left millions of americans out of work. and that's why i made passage of wall street reform one of my top priorities as president - so that a crisis like this does not happen again. over the last year, the financial industry has repeatedly tried to end this reform with hordes of lobbyists and millions of dollars in ads. and when they couldn't kill it, they tried to water it down with special interest loopholes and carve-outs aimed at undermining real change. today, i think it's fair to say that these efforts have failed. today, democrats and a handful of republicans in the senate have voted to break the filibuster and allow a final debate and vote on financial reform -- reform that will protect consumers, protect our economy, and hold wall street accountable. i want to thank senator chris dodd and majority leader reid for their leadership on this legislation, as well as all the senators who put partisan posturing aside in allowing a vote on this important reform. and i want to thank every american who kept the pressure on washington to change a system that worked better for banks on wall street than it did for families on main street. now, we've still got some work to do. soon we're going to have a final vote in the senate, and then the house and the senate will have to iron out the differences between the two bills. and there's no doubt that during that time, the financial industry and their lobbyists will keep on fighting. but i will ensure that we arrive at a final product that is both effective and responsible - one that holds wall street to high standards of accountability and secures financial stability, while preserving the strength and crucial functions of a financial industry that is central to our prosperity and our ability to innovate and compete in a global economy. our goal is not to punish the banks, but to protect the larger economy and the american people from the kind of upheavals that we've seen in the past few years. and today's action was a major step forward in achieving that goal. because of wall street reform, we'll soon have in place the strongest consumer protections in history. if you've ever applied for a credit card, a student loan, or a mortgage, you know the feeling of signing your name to pages of barely understandable fine print. it's a big step for most families, but one that's often filled with unnecessary confusion and apprehension. as a result, many americans are simply duped into hidden fees and loans they just can't afford by companies that know exactly what they're doing. those days will soon end. from now on, every consumer will be empowered with the clear and concise information that you need to make financial decisions that are best for you. this bill will crack down on predatory practices and unscrupulous mortgage lenders. it will enforce the new credit card law we passed banning unfair rate hikes, and ensure that folks aren't unwittingly caught by overdraft fees when they sign up for a checking account. it will give students who take out college loans information and make sure lenders don't cheat the system. and it will ensure that every american receives a free credit score if they are denied a loan or insurance because of that score. because of financial reform, the american people will never again be asked to foot the bill for wall street's mistakes. there will be no more taxpayer- funded bailouts -- period. if a large financial institution should ever fail, we will have the tools to wind it down without endangering the broader economy. and there will be new rules to prevent financial institutions from becoming "too big to fail" in the first place, so that we don't have another aig. because of reform, the kinds of complex, backroom deals that helped trigger the financial crisis will finally be brought to the light of day. and from now on, shareholders will have greater say on the pay of ceos and other executives, so that they can reward success instead of failure, and help change the perverse incentives that encouraged so much reckless risk-taking in the first place. so, in short, wall street reform will bring greater security to folks on main street -- to families who are looking to buy their first car or their first home, to taxpayers who shouldn't have to pay for somebody else's irresponsibility, to small businesses and community banks who play by the rules, and to shareholders and investors who want to see their companies grow and thrive. but let me stress that this is not a zero-sum game where wall street loses and main street wins. as we've learned, in today's economy, we're all connected. when the economy prospers, we all win. when the financial sector operates under sound rules of the road to ensure fairness and stability, we all win. every american has an interest in a healthy financial sector. but for that reason, it's also imperative that those in wall street boardrooms and on trading floors be held accountable for the decisions that they make. for behind every dollar traded or leveraged on wall street, there is a family looking to buy a house, pay for an education, open a business, or save for retirement. and the reform i sign will not stifle the power of the free market -- it will simply bring predictable, responsible, sensible rules into the marketplace. unless your business model is based on bilking your customers and skirting the law, you should have nothing to fear from this legislation. as we continue to emerge from this recession, this reform is one important step that will strengthen our economy. and despite the ups and downs associated with a recovery, that economy is getting stronger by the day. it's an economy that's growing again. last month, we added jobs -- the fourth straight month of job growth and the largest increase in four years. and we're working closely with our g20 partners around the world to ensure that growth is balanced and sustained. i also said when i took office that we can't simply rebuild this economy on the same pile of sand -- on maxed-out credit cards or housing bubbles or reckless risk-taking on wall street. we're going to have to build it on a firmer, stronger foundation for economic growth. that's why we invested in renewable energies that currently have the potential of creating new jobs all across america. that's why we're reforming our education system so that our workers can compete on the global stage. that's why we passed health care reform that will lower costs for families and businesses. and that's why we're about to pass financial regulatory reform -- to protect consumers and ensure that we don't have another crisis caused by the irresponsibility of a few. along with the steps we're taking to spur innovation and encourage hiring and rein in our deficits, that is how we will ultimately build an economy that is stronger and more prosperous than it was before. thanks very much, everybody. in >> and house panel looks set auditing standards tomorrow morning. we can hear from officials from the securities and exchange commission and the financial accounting for burda live coverage begins at 10:00 a.m. pit >> and the white house held a state dinner last night for pressing calderon. today the mexican president told congress that the fight against narcotic traffickers can only succeed if the u.s. reduces the demand for illegal drugs. calderon said they must stop the flow of other arms into mexico. >> madam speaker, the president of mexico. the speaker: members of congress, i have the high privilege and distinct honor of excellency, cal cal, the presidentf -- felipe calderon hinojosa, the president of mexico. president calderon thank you. president calderon: thank you very much. madam speaker, mr. vice president, honorable members of congress, and as we say in mexico, amigas, amigos. it's a great honor totand before you today. i would like to thank congress and the american people for this invitation. i want to express my gratitude to all of you here who have supported mexico during very challenging times. i will also tell you the mexican americans and all latinos who work every day for the prosperity of this great nation. xico, a young country but very old nation. our roots go back thousands of years. however this year is especially significant for us. we are celebrating the bicentennial of our independence , 200 years of being proudly. at the time mexico was the first nation to abolish slavery in all ever continental america. -- in all of continental america. and it is exactly 100 years since the mexican revolution, a revolution against oppression, a revolution for justice and democracy. as you can see mexico was founded on the same values and principles as the united states of america. we are very oud of this past, however the mexican people and their government are focused on the future. that is why mexico is a country in a continued process of transformation. we are determineto change, and we are taking the decisions that are going to make mexico a more prosperous democracy. one of the main changes taking place in mexico is our commitment to firmly establish the rule of law. that is why we are deploying the full force of the state to meet organized ime with determination and courage. but let me explain, this fight is not only and not mainly about stopping the drug trade only. it is first and foremost a drive to guarantee the security of mexican families who are in a threat from the abuses of criminals. as i told the mexican people in my inaugural speech, restoring public security will not be easy and will not be quick. it will take time, it will take money, and unfortunately to our deep sorrow it will deep human life as well. this is a battle that has to be fought becaus the future of our families is at stake. but i told them then you can be sure of one thing, this is a battle that united we, the mexican people, will win. we cannot ignore -- we will win, but we cannot ignore the fact that the challenge to our security has roots on both sides of the border. at the end of the day it's high demand for drugs here and in other places. secretary of state clinton has said, we have set our share of the responsibility. we know thathe demand for drugs drives much of this illicit trade. this is a part of our new relationship. we have moved from the suspicious to the past to the cooperations and mutual undetanding of the present. let me take this opportunity to congratulate president obama for his recent initiative to reduce the consumption of drugs. hope for the good of both nations and the entire hemisphere that this succeeds. now let me tell you what mexico is doing to confront another problem. first, we have not hesitated to use all the power of the state, including the federal police and armed forces, in order to support the local governments that are facing the greatest threat from organized crime. this september i measured to restore order. the goal is to provide local governments time and the opportunity to strengthen their security and detailed institutions. second, we are weakening the financial and operational capability of criminal gangs. their operations have led to record seizures of drugs, cash, and weapons from the criminals. we are hitting them and we are hittinghem hard. the federal forces have also arrested many important felons who are now facing mexican justice, and we have extradited a record number of criminals to face justice here in the united states. third, we are rebuilding our institutions and security forces. especially at federal level. we have more than tripled the federal police budget since the beginning of my administration, and multiplied the size of its force. we are recruiting men and women with values who are better trained, better paid, and better equipped. fourth, we are transforming our judicial systemo make it more efficient. we are moving to work open on trials that are the basis of your own judicial system. and fifth, we have set up social programs to prevent young people from turning to crime, including prevention and treatment for adctio. as you can see -- we are doing everything we can to fight this threat and to secure our common future. we are fulfilling our duty as a good neighbor, taking care of business in our side of the border. the u.s. is also helping. congress approved the initiative which we greatly appreciate and our administrations are sharing more information than ever to fight crime. however, there is one issue where mexico needs your cooperation. and that is stopping the flow of assault weapons and other deadly guns across the border. i fully expect, let me be clear on this, i fully respect i admire the american constitution and i uerstand that the purpose of the second amendment is to guarantee good american citizens the ability to defend themselves and their nation. but believe me many of these guns are not going to honest american hands. instead, thousands are ending up in the hands of criminals. just to give you an idea we have ceased 75,000 guns and -- seized 75,000 guns and assault weapons in mexico in the last three years and more than 80% of those we have been able to trace came from the united states. if you look carefully, you will notice that the violence in mexico start to grow a couple years before i took office in 2006. this coincides with the lifting of the assault weapons ban in 2004. one day criminals in mexico, having gained aess to these weapons, decided to challenge the authorities in my country. today these weapons are aimed by the criminals not only at rival gangs but also at mexican civilians and authorities. and with all due respect, if you do not regulate the sale of these weapons in the right way nothing guarantees that criminals here in the united states, with access to the same powerful weapon, will not decide to challenge american authority and civilians. it is true that u.s. gvernment is now carrying out operations against gun strikes, but it is also true that there are more than 7,000 shots along the border with mexico where almost anyone can purchase these powerful weapons. i also fully understand the political sensitivity of this issue. for i will ask congress to help us with respect and to understand how important it is for us that you enforce your laws to stem the supplies of these weapons to criminals and consider reinstating the assault weapons ban. let us, by way legal way that you consider, let us work together to end the illegal trade with threatens mexico and your own people. i have spoken on this issue about security because i know it is a big concern on the american people. however if -- as i say, mexico is a country undergoing deep confirmation and our relationship is about much more than just security. we are turning our economy into one that is competitive and strong. capable of generating the jobs mexico needs. i believe in freedom, i believe in markets, i believe in all those principles that are able to empower economies and provide well-being for the people. we are carrying out a set of structural reforms that has been ignored for decades in mexico. we started, for instance, by reforming the pub lick system and with this we guarantee the retirement of public servants d at the same time we will save 30 points of g.d.p. in our public financing. we passed a tax reform that reduce our dependence on oil and allow us to continue financing our development, keeping our public deficit close to 1% of g.d.p. . we also made -- we also made important changes to the oil sector. this would allow the public company to work more flexible contracts to specialized global companies. and so become more efficient and increase its operational and financial capacity in order toet more oil and natural gas. this will ensure our energy independence and strengthen regional security as well. and finally, we hav increased invtment in infrastructure from three points of g.d.p. to five points of g.d.p. a year, building the roads, ports, airports and energy plans we need to modernize. it is the highest investment level in infrastructure in decades. these changes are making us a more modern country and a stronger partner of the united states. the energy reform, the fiscal reform, the pension reform, the investment in infrastructure among others have all prepared us for a better tomorrow but also allow us to overcome the terrible economic crisis last year. then, mexico's economy experienced its worst contractions in modern times. however, thanks to strong regulations, not one cent from taxpayers went to a single bank in mexico last year. we we also able -- we were also able to quickly implement cyclical measures, such as a temporary work program and increase the credits for small businesses. in this way we were able to save hundredof thousands of mexican jobs. we had to face a series of emergencies, y one of which would have derailed our weak country. we faced the perfect storm last year. besides the crisis, we overcame the second worse struck -- drop in several years. and also the outbreak of the h 1n-1 flu virus. i can tell you that mexico is standing tall a stronger and more determined nation than ever. a nation and a people. a nation -- a nation and a people ready to face the future and take the rightful place in the world. and the future starts now, now that the mexican economys recovering. so far this year mexico has created more than 400,000 new jobs. 400,000 new jobs, which is the highest number ever created in a four-month period in mexico. in the first quarter, the mexican economy grew 4.3%, and we are expecting growth for this year more than 4% in our economy which means among other things more for our people and mo mexicans buying american products. we have made -- we have made structural reform to modernize our economy and we want more. today, our congress is debating stronger antitrust regulations as well as new labor legislation that will provide more opportunities for women and young people. my government is auctioning both wirele frequency in order to increase competitio and coverage in telecom. mexico is on theight track towards development now, and as well as promoting economic progress, we are improving the quality of life of all mexicans on the principle of equal opportunity for all. thanks to opportunidad, mexico was able to reduce the number of people living in extreme poverty from million in 1996 to 14 million in 2006. this program -- this program reaches six million poorest families which mean one in four mexican. equal opportunity means more and better education, and we have provided scholarships to six million children of -- and at the same time we are investing more than ever in free public iversities and today almost 90,000 students graduate as engineers and technicians every year in my country. we want all our young people to havehe chance to study. equal opportunity means access to health services for everyone . we have tripled the popular health insurance and rebuilt or renovated 1,700 public hospitals and clinics in three years. more than one of eight. it this will allow us to rch a goal any nation would be proud of, universal health coverage by 2012, doctor, medicine and treatment. a doctor, medicine a treatment for any mexican that needs it. equal opportunity means more and better education, poverty fighting proams and universal health coverage. by improving opportunities for all, we are giving people one less reason to leave mexico. as you can see, mexico is a country in transformation. this is making us an ever more strategic rtner for the future prosperity of the american people. the world, more global and more interconnected every day. it is also divided into large economic regions. those regions tha maximize their comparative advantages will be the ones that succeed, and we both need to compete with asia and with europe. mexico and the united states are stronger together than they are apart. our economy -- our economic ties have made our economies stronger, and together we can renew our partnship to restore stronger and faster economic growth on both sides of the border. a stronger mexico means a stronger united states. let us not forget mexicans are the second largest foreign buyer of american goods in the world. and a stronger united states, of course, means a stronger mexico. so i invite you to work with mexico and consolidate north america as the most competitive region in the world. i believe in that. let us create more jobs for american workers and more jobs for mexican workers. members of the congress, i'm noa president who likes to see mexicans leave our country searching for opportunities abrd. our mmunities lose our best people. the hardest working, the most dynamic, the leaders of the communities. each migrant will never -- president calderon: i want to say to the -- i want to say to the -- i want to say all those who are working really hard for this great untry as we admire them, we miss them, we are working hard for their rights and we are working really hard for mexico and for the family. today, we are doing the best that we can do in order to reduce migration, to create opportunities and to create jobs for mexicans in our own country where their homes are and their families are as many jobs as we can. and mexico will one day be a country in which our people will find the opportunity that today they look for outside of the country. until then, mexico is determined to assume its responsibilities. for us, migration isot just your problem. we see migration as our problem as well. my government -- my government does not favor the breaking of the rules. i fully respect the rhts of any country to enact and enforce its own laws, but we today -- but what we need today is to fix a broken and insufficient system. we favor -- we favor the establishment of rules th work and work well for all. sohe time hacome for the united states and mexico to work tother on this issue. the time has come to reduce the causes of migration and to turn this into a legal order and secure flow of workers and visitors. we want to provide the mexican people with the opportunities they are looking for. that is our goal. that is our mission as a government, to transform mexi to land of opportunity, to provide to our people with jobs and opportunities to live in peace and to be happy. i want to recognize the hard work and leadership of many of you in the senate and in the house and of presidenobama who are determined to find responsible and objective answers to this issue. i am convinced that a comprehensive immigration reform is also crucial to securing our common border. however, i strongly disagree with the recently adopted law in arizona. . it is a la that not only ignores a reality that cannot be erased by decree, but also introduced a terrible idea using racial profiling as a basis for low performance. i agree with the president to say the new law carries a great amount of grief when core values we all care about are breached. i don't want to deepen the gap between the feeling and emotion between our countries and our people. i believe in communication, i believe in cooperation. we must find together a better way to face and fix this common problem. finally, the well-being of both our people depends not only in our ability to face challenges, but global ones as well. that is the case of climate change, that is the case, for instance, of nonproliferation of nuclear weapons in the world. this is one climate change, one of humanity's more pressing problems. global warming demands the commitment of all nations, both developed and developing countries, that is why mexico was the first developing country to commit to emission reduction targets. we are working hard to make progress in the fight against climate change. because of your global leadership, we will need your support to make the meeting in cancun next november a success. madam speaker, mr. vice president, honorable members of the united states congress, mexico is a country indeed transformation, indeed. we are building the future our people deserve. a future of opportunity, a future of freedom, of equality, of rule of law. a future of security in which families and children can go out to work, study, or play without fear. and most of all future in which our children and their children will see their dream come true. i have come here as your neighbor, as your partner, and as your friend. our two great nations are joined by geaog graph -- geeographer and by history, but more important we are joined by the shared brilliant future. i believe in the future of north america as the strongest, most prosperous region in the world. that is possible. president franklin roosevelt once said that the only limit to our relationization of the world will be our dots of today. let us move forward with a strong and active faith. and i say let us work together with a strong and active faith in order to give our people the few ture days -- future days. thank you very much for your invitation. god bless america. viva, mexico. >> now the newest member of the house of representatives. he won a special collection tuesday to replace congressman jack murtha who died earlier this year . nancy pelosi administered the oath of office youto him. . . will all members please rise? will representative-elect critz please raise his right hand? do you solemnly swear or affirm that you will support and defend the constitution of the united states against all enemies, foreign and domestic, that you will bear truth faith and allegiance to the same, that you take this obligation freely without any mental reservations or purpose of evasioand that you will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which you are about to enter, so help you god? mr. critz: i do. the speaker: congratulations. you are now a member of congress. the speaker pro tempore: the gentleman from pennsylvania, mr. kanjorski, is recognized for one minute. mr. kanjorski: madam speaker,t is my honor to introduce to you and to our colleagues today our newest member of the pennsylvania delegation, mark critz. congressman critz is a dedicated public servant to the people of western pennsylvania. for more than a decade mark has served in many roles for the late jack murtha, including as his district director. as i am sure many of you know, a member's district director knows the ins and outs of the district and he was a great part of the commupet for which he served. he deeply understands the needs of western pennsylvania and comprehends what needs to be done to help him. mark is a proven problem solver and residents of western pennsylvania can clearly see the results of his and jack's efforts throughout their district. their experiences have prepared him well for his job as a member of congress. this is a bittersweet moment for me. jack passed away too soon, i recently said that jack was always there when pennsylvania needed him, andhat he was emblematic of the hardworking pennsylvanians that he represented for so many years. during many of his years in congress, working right next to him and helping jack get the job done was mark. i could think of no better person to take over his seat and continue jack's efforts than mark. it is a true honor to introduce him as the newest congressman from pennsylvania. the speaker: yield. mr. kanjors: madam speaker, i yield to a membe of congress from pennsylvania, joe tts. mr. pitts: madam speaker, the pennsylvania republican delegation's also proud to welcome representative critz to the house. mark, i'm certain you will try to emulate your old boss' record of service to the people of the 12th congressional district. he is missed by the delegation, but we are glad to have a good friend of his representing pennsylvania in the house. i'm certain that your prior service to the 12th district will be invaluable as you serve here in washington. on behalf of the republican delegation, please don't hesitate to contact any of us if we can be of help as you begin your service to the people of pennsylvania. again, welcome to the house of representatives. yield back. mr. critz: thank you, madam speaker. also would like to thank my wife, nancy, my two beautiful children, sadie and joe, my family, mrs. murtha -- my entire family and mrs. murtha for their support. i also want to thank the people of pennsylvania's 12th congressional district who i am honored to are. today i begin your work. this moment is bittersweet for me because i wouldn't be here right now if jack murtha hadn't left us too soon. i thought about the many lessons congressman murtha taught me. he always said to me it's always about the work. it is. and i'm going to work tirelessly every day in congress for the families of concern pennsylvania. the people of western pennsylvania just like so many across the country are struggling right now. the challenges we are facing are unprecedented. my priority is to put western pennsylvanians and families across the country back to work. and i am going to fight every day moving forward to do my part to help create good-paying jobs. good-paying american jobs. i know all of us share this commitment of giving our country back to work and i'm optimistic we can all come together to make this a reality on behalf of all of our constituents. jack murtha spent his life to bring jobs to our community. that was his fight for 36 years and our mmunities are far better becau of it. while nobody can fill his shoes, i now have the extraordinary honor of continuing his fight for jobs and following in his footsteps to congress. i pleverage to my constituents no one will work harder for them than i will. thank you very much. the speaker: under clause 5-d of rule 20 the chair announces to the house that in light of the administration of the oath of office to mr. critz, the whole number of the house is now 432. >> a house panel looks at financial accounting and auditing standards at 4:30. we will hear from officials at the sec and the standards board. live coverage begins at 10:00 from the house financial services subcommittee on capital markets. >> in some ways, every senate class gives you a sense of what the country is thinking at that moment. >> terence samuel looks behind the institution of the u.s. senate, the upper house, sunday. on june 28, supreme court justice nominee elena kagan will testify before the senate judiciary committee. a find all the key moments from previous hearings online at the c-span at a video library. every program since 1987. it is washington, your way. >> defense secretary robert gates told reporters is important for the pentagon to operate more efficiently. he also said the president should be of a military program bill that includes funding for a fighter jet that he called costly and not necessary. the house armed services committee included money for the project yesterday. he is joined by joint chiefs of staff chairman mike mullen. this is a 30-minute news briefing. >> good afternoon. earlier this week, and that the department's senior leadership to establish a plan and process for accomplishing this goal. this will require the party attention of our entire leadership team and include all services, command components and elements of america's defense establishment. at the same time, will be reaching out to the contras, academia, think tanks, and elsewhere for specific and workable proposals on how to change the way this department does business. is support to know that contrary to some of this, it is not about cutting the overall defense budget. there remains my firm belief that during a time of continued conflict, the united states regards the defense budget that grows modestly but steadily in real terms for the long haul. it is a budget proposal currently under consideration with a real growth path. the department will face very difficult choices with regard to sustaining needed military capabilities in the years ahead unless it is able to shift resources away from access management structure or lower priority areas and towards current and future combat capabilities. >> this is about making tough choices and essentially refocusing available resources, not cutting the top line now or in the future. while we continue to take a hard look at all aspects of the department's budget, the focus is on overhead costs and business operations, not poor military functions. my intent would be to protect record budget growth with those elements of the department most central to doing our military mission. i also hope to begin to change the cultural mind-set of this department so that civilian and military employees carry out their jobs within increased sense of care and urgency when it comes to how they spend a vast amount of tax dollars entrusted to us by the american people. finally i should note that the congress has begun the process of acting upon our fiscal year 2011 budget request with the house armed services committee passing its authorization bill yesterday. what do not have all the details, i am very concerned about the initial report. particular, it appears the committee continues to insist that the department at an extra engine to the joint program. in addition, they have rejected the conditions would make it essentiallyun executable. it is one of the department's most important, largest, and costly as acquisition programs. our team has taken aggressive steps to restructure and manage it through this critical phase in development. i am therefore determined to ensure that it remains on track. accordingly, as i have stated repeatedly, should the congress insist on adding funding for costly and unnecessary extra engine work in direct changes that seriously disrupt the program or impose additional aircraft, i would strongly recommend that the president veto such legislation. that we be clear. i believe the defense budget process should no longer be characterized by business as usual within this building or outside of it. when we end dod must make tough decisions to ensure that current and future military combat capabilities can be maintained in signs up -- in times of kicked budget difficulty -- i spent my first two years in this job principally focused on the war's end iraq and afghanistan. i did not expect to have more time to also focus on reforming how the department does business. president obama has given me that time and that opportunity. i intend to spend every day for as long as i remain secretary of defense doing all i can to implement these reforms that are so critical to sustain our military in the years ahead. >> the only thing i would add is the uniform military is fully in support of force secretary gates is headed with respect to this. when i was chief of service, head of the navy a few years ago, we put a great deal of effort into this same kind of approach and the proper stewardship of the taxpayers' dollars was high on absolutely everybody's list. i do not underestimate the challenge that is here, but in being able to get at overhead and shifted to the -- to do so inside that structure we have now is absolutely critical. i also would not underestimate his ability to do this. i have grown up in the budget world having watched him oversee and execute many programs that are now no longer with us. many people said that was not possible. it is possible, and quite frankly, it is needed if we are going to have the resources that we need and apply them where we need them. so i look forward to continuing to support that effort along the lines of the outcomes the secretary has described. >> does the u.s. consider that thinking of -- the sinking of the south korean warship an act of war? >> we certainly support the findings of the korean investigation. we obviously are in close consultation with the koreans. the attack was against one of their ships, and naturally they would have the lead in determining the path forward. they have laid out some past forward, and we will be consulting very closely with them as we move ahead. >> i spoke to my counterpart yesterday and we have been engaged with them since the incident, not just from here but also general sharp. we are all focused on that region'stabilitys that needs to be sustained, and at the same time very focused on supporting our strong ally in the republic of korea. >> did he say whether or not you believe it is in fact an act of war and can you get an -- can you go over some of the options you have? >> basically what we have said is about all there is for us to say. we have accepted the findings and supports the findings of the investigation. the republic of korea has outlined several path forward and we will be consulting with them very closely going forward. >> it is clearly an act of war, isn't it? >> i think we have said all we want to say on this right now. certainly we are concerned about it and we have supported them. we agree with the conclusions. they are a great friend and ally. we will continue to do that. >> billions have already been spent on providing development and $3 billion more will be needed to get it ramped up. what are your opposition's to this program [unintelligible] its proponents say it will save time and money and increase safety. >> the bush administration opposed this engine. the obama administration opposes it. we have recommended for several years now against funding this engine, considering it a waste of money, and to argue that we should add another $3 billion to what we regard as waste to protect the $1.5 billion that we believe has already been wasted, frankly, i do not track the logic. let me just say, with respect to the proposal for the alternate engine, we think the proposal is based on unrealistic cost estimates. we do believe that the full up costs for us or about $2.9 billion. this department has a long and unhappy experience with overly optimistic contractor estimates. the proposal does provide a fixed price, but not for the engine we need. the proposed engine is based on the design they currently have on the test stand, which we are deeply concerned may not meet the performance needs of the joint strike fighters. in the cost to take the designed to the required performance levels would presumably be paid by taxpayers. the current engine, the alternate engine proposal, is far less mature. the proposed engine is still in development and has about 200 hours of testing, compared to 13,000 for the f-135. even the image or engines would be more expensive during the critical portions of the program. the proposal assumes receiving a guaranteed bonds of over half the engines for three years in order to allow them to catch up. as i said before, only in washington does a proposal where everybody wins get considered competition, where everybody is guaranteed a piece of the action at the end. yes, we are in favor of competition, but my idea of competition is winner takes all, and we do not have that kind of situation here. >> are you concerned the operate -- in the engine may boost operational readiness? >> i have not heard that argument by anybody. >> i have no concern. the services have not express that concern. we have flown with single intrinsic -- historically. >> i want to be clear for the world. you are really not major cuts in the 2012 budget, comparable to your cable 2009 cuts. >> i am talking about ruling out a cut to the top line. >> but you are not ruling out potential more weapons programs. >> know. i think there are some that are still being looked at both by the department and other services, but the principal areas that we are looking at our business operations and overhead. >> what your proposing can be rope-a-dope. >> i know exactly what that means. >> the now anticipate staying here 32011 t see the 2012 budget? >> we will see. >> the expected concrete result of some kind at kandahar later this year, and are you having to reassess the time line and the strategy in kandahar, given the recent violence there and the political difficulties? >> all the efforts with respect to conduct our are already under way. -- with respect to kandahar. general mcchrystal indicated no indications to change the execution plan. the recent violence level which has spiked is quite frankly not unexpected. general mcchrystal has said and general progress and i have said we expect this to be a tough year. in fact, the insurgents have gone back to get their weapons. is that time of year. the alliance will reject violence level will rise and that is not surprise me at all. we have the right strategy and leadership. the issues in kandahar are really focused on this rising tide of security. it is not going to be a d-day kind of option. with our heavy focus on the government's peace as well, that is actually the biggest challenge. governance as the kandahar situation changes over time will be a primary area of focus. >> are you still confident that general odierno is going to be able to meet his withdrawal deadline? >> yes. we clearly are paying close attention to the political developments. i think the completion of the recount in baghdad is clearly a positive development insofar as it reaffirmed the original counts, the legitimacy of the election. we obviously -- you all know this department as well as anybody. we plan for everything. the right now, every expectation is that we will meet the 50,000 as of the first of september. >> can he pushed back on the withdrawals? may was supposed to be a big month for withdrawals and is still slow. we can no longer get there from here. >> i think that he has delayed some withdrawals little bit, in part because of the postponement of the election from january to march. but between now and the 31st of august, as far as i am concerned, general odierno has total flexibility in terms of how he manages the drawdown. if he wants to back in the load it, and trends, can make that work, then i have no problem with that at all. -- if transcom cannot make that work. >> he has brought out a significant number of people with him, and he continues to focus on that. like the secretary said, we are very comfortable we can meet that deadline. >> back to korea. are you concerned that the take away for both north korea and maybe beyond, iran, as that the u.s. is stretched so thin that it is impotent to respond in a meaningful way? >> absolutely not. the trees of the matter is, we have said for a long time that -- the truth of the matter is, our main arms would be the navy and air force. those are not stretched in the same way that the ground forces are. again, the key to remember is that this was an attack on a south korean ship, and the south koreans need to be in the lead in terms of proposing ways forward. >> to get back to your opening statement on overhead, during your speech at the eisenhower library, you referred to the pentagon being too top-heavy on generals and admirals. can you talk a little bit more about that? what options do you have, or what are you considering to winnowed down the number of senior level officers, which has grown while the overall force has shrunk in recent decades? maybe you can comment on what uniform services are likely to think about that. >> first of all, i was very clear at the eisenhower library speech that i was talking about not just generals and admirals, but also senior civilians. i used specific examples of downgrading senior civilian positions as well to lower levels. so this is not a problem that is confined by any means to the uniformed services. some of our combatant commanders are already looking at whether they cannot make some reductions in that area. we will proceed with care on this, but i think we have to figure out a way to try -- and i realize this may be a contradiction in terms -- but to try and make this department more agile. as i said in that speech, where my approval of a guy and a dog going to afghanistan does not have to go through five four- star headquarters. >> the way i certainly took that is that there are no boundaries -- every aspect of what we do needs to be examined to ensure we do not have overhead we cannot afford, that we don't have overhead which is -- we are expending a great deal of resources on at the expense of our people and our system, and that we really have to focus in that regard. i believe the target numbers that the secretary has laid out or not that tough to get to, quite frankly. it is going to take a considerable amount to do it, but i think doing it well, it can be achieved. we do not achieve it at our own peril, in terms of sustaining what we need to fight the two wars we are in and to meet the security challenges we have around the globe. >> while you were examining the different paths the south korean government had presented to you, are any of the american forces in south korea on a high state of alert? >> they are in their normal state of readiness. we are engaged very routinely out there. we have considerable forces that are stationed both on the land and in the air and sea, and the forces are currently aware of what is going on. we have not changed any readiness levels as a result of this, up to this point. >> your busy yesterday in fort carson, worry impressions -- your visit yesterday in fort carson. what are your impressions? >> i met first with about 10 wounded warriors in the war your transition unit and some of their spouses. i spent an hour with the doctors, caseworkers, social workers, and so on. as i told my staff meeting this morning, i did not hear a single complaint about the war your transition unit -- warrior transition unit. several soldiers spoke highly of their rear detachments. we still have work to do in terms of the medical disability boards and the amount of time that takes. there were some vocational training programs that had worked very, very well that had had to be terminated for a lack of funding. i want to see if we cannot get those started again. it was a partnership with a local community college in colorado springs in terms of vocational training for the soldiers. i think that what i heard was reassuring. i will tip my hand a little bit. one of the wounded warrior soldiers gave me a long opinion editorial that he has written that he would like to have somebody published that has his view of the wtu, which is different than what has been discussed before. i came away from that meeting very encouraged. the meeting with the cadre and so on, i think that some of the concerns that were expressed their or the number of soldiers who had a variety of problems that had been assigned to the war your transition units that were not the victims of combat injuries -- the warrior transition units. again, the professionals had very high respect for the soldiers they were trying to treat. they have a pretty robust professional staff in terms of counselors. they had their own psychiatrist associated with the program. they have counselors. they have an occupational therapist, a social worker, and they have a pretty robust staff. they still would like some more, but frankly they have hired about all there are available. i came away encouraged, but also as i do from every one of these sessions, with something of a to do list. >> you tried to keep politics out of defense. what are you going to do to convince the president? >> i obviously did not issue the statement that i did in my testimony on the hill without talking with the president first. so i try not to climb too far out on a limb without knowing no one is back there with a saw. we will have to see at the time the decision has to be made, but he was fully aware that i was going to make that statement, and frankly, i think that if he were not prepared to substantiate that, he probably would have waved me off at the time. >> mr. secretary, as with the ultimate engine, would you recommend a presidential veto if it has anything you do not want? >> as i said, with respect to the carrier, i want change, but i am not crazy. [laughter] >> this is a very important issue. i think i saw someone accrue this out over the next 10 years, but it is $5.2 billion that we did not ask for. that would have to come from somewhere, and typically those get authorized without any money being put behind them. that is one of the things we are trying to get away from. >> can i change the topic to pakistan? it was reported in the pakistan press that it was discussed a timetable for moving in. what is your understanding of whether they are willing to go there? there has been a lot of rhetoric from the administration since the times square incident that perhaps they much the region must do more. what is it they must do more of? >> as far as this visit that general jones and the director took, we need to refer you to them. with respect to my engagement with the general, well over a year ago he indicated that there are plans to execute that mission, but very specifically, the timeline is really up to him. it goes back to what i understand and believe, that he is stretched. he has a military that has lost a lot of soldiers, sacrificed a great deal, and so it makes a lot of sense to me that he does get this time on. this is not a one up kind of thing. as part of an overall campaign plan. what he has told me he would do when i have dealt with him in the past, but it is said he would do in the future, he has always done. >> i would just add to that that he has seven divisions and 140,000 troops in that area, so is a huge effort that pakistan is making. what we have seen here is yet another new phenomenon. the taliban pakistan is not only trying to overthrow the government of islam a bad, but also launched attacks outside of pakistan, and in this case, against us. i think that when the pakistani taliban approached 1.5 years ago, it was a wake-up call for the pakistanis that this group was an existential danger for pakistan itself. we now have a mutual interest in trying to stop this group from carrying out attacks inside pakistan and outside of pakistan, especially in the united states. so i suspect that the main theme of these talks was that how can we intensify our cooperation and deal with this mutual threat that we face? my impression has been that there has been close cooperation since the bomber was arrested. i think it is more about that than any quality of change. >> mr. secretary, the un resolution on iran, is this the kind of thing you have been calling for for months? is it enough, and do you think is really going to change iranian behavior? >> i think first of all, as best i can tell, if the resolution were to be passed in anything like its current form, is actually somewhat stronger than i expected. as i discussed with a lot of our allies, the importance of the resolution is twofold. first, it serves as a reminder of iran's international isolation, that all of the major powers are arrayed against iran's nuclear weapons ambitions. second, and more concretely, it provides a new, legal platform that allows individual countries and organizations such as the eu to take significantly more stringent actions on their own that go way beyond what the un resolution calls for in and of itself. so i think that the resolution has been a fit on two levels. i would just make a final comment. if the resolution did not have an impact in iran, it is not clear to me why the iranians would have or have been making such an extraordinary effort to prevent from being passed. if it were irrelevant, as far as they were concerned, i don't think you'd see them expanding the kind of diplomatic and other kinds of energy to try to prevent its passage. >> is unlikely to change their behavior? >> well, we will see. it is a combination of things. it is the actions of individual countries. over and above that, it is a variety of pressures on iran. by itself, we have seen other resolutions before that have not changed their behavior, but as we go along in this process, i think that they are ratcheting up of what other countries are willing to do on their own, using the resolution as a basis, does have the potential to change behavior. thank you. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2010] >> abc news broke the story that the director of national intelligence at role belair will resign. he spoke earlier. >> thank you for being with us. it what happened? >> what happened is that, according to several administration sources, it has been something of a rocky tenure for the director of national intelligence, retired admiral dennis blair. for the last several weeks, the president has talked about replacing him, and ultimately today they had a conversation about the best way forward. admiral blair said he would offer his resignation, which could come as soon as tomorrow. there are a number of intelligence failures that have been pointed out, having to do with the fort hood shooting and the failed christmas day bomber, having even to do with wiesel shahzad, the failed times where bomber. all these failures -- the failed times square bomber. all these failures have fallen on at all blair, because he is the one that is supposed to be coordinating intelligence and making sure that everyone shares intelligence. it is not always worked out. the senate intelligence committee issued a port -- a report that pointed out 14 intelligence failures that led to a abdul mutallab being able to get on that airplane and almost killing all the passengers on board. it was specifically critical of dennis blair and the director of national intelligence and the national counter-terrorism center, which admiral blair is the supervisor of. ultimately, this was a long time coming. he has lost turf battles when it comes to the cia. he has not emerged as the face of leading the charge on reforming intelligence. it came to a head today. >> one of the issues that was supposed to change after 9/11 was the sharing of information. it was going to be seamless between the agencies and the intelligence community. there was an admission from dennis blair that that still is not happening. why? >> these are 16 entrenched bureaucracies, each of them with their own players and sources and each of them battling within the political world. without question, according to officials, things have gotten better than they were on 9/11, but they are not where they need to be. admiral blair admitted that in a statement he issued earlier this week. things are still not working as he wants them to. so there is going to be a new leader of the national intelligence organization. >> you wrote in your exclusive story that the meeting that took place between the president and dennis blair -- can you imagine what the tenor of the discussion was light between the two? >> i think both president obama and admiral blair are professionals. i do not have more details than i reported. they discussed the best way forward, and ultimately, admiral blair offer to resign as soon as tomorrow, and president obama said he would accept that resignation. i doubt it was a particularly emotional one. these are problems that have been going on for a long time, long before president obama took office. there have been three incidents, only one of them successful, at fort hood, but three instances where there were intelligence failures. that is the reason the director of national intelligence job exists. ultimately, the fact that sharing information was repeatedly the problem with all these failures, this was considered his responsibility. >> you also report that this is something that has been in the works for at least a couple of weeks. >> i have known this was coming for almost three weeks. you do not want to report something prematurely. it is not like president obama made up his mind three weeks ago, but this has been something that obama has been talking about doing with top aides and advisers. he has been interviewing candidates for the job to replace admiral blair, so this is not a snap decision. >> jake tavis is a senior white house correspondent for abc news. dennis blair is resigning possibly as early as tomorrow. thank you for joining us. >> thank you. >> of next, a house panel holds a hearing on toyota's unintended acceleration problems and subsequent recalls. after that, the head of the sec talks about the market dropped two weeks ago. later, president obama on the senate finance regulations bill. tomorrow, the regulation bill that passed the senate. after that, former house speaker newt gingrich, whose new book is "to save america." also, jonathan alter on his book on the first year of the obama administration. that is at 7:00 a.m. eastern. later, a discussion on national security focusing on the u.s. president. the u.s. presence and the world's oceans. live coverage starts at 10:00 eastern. >> on june 28, supreme court justice nominee elena kagan testified before the senate judiciary committee. find all the moments from and in scalea to sonia sotomayor online at the c-span video library. every video since 1987, washington your way. now the house hearing on the toyota automobile recalls. what is is is the head of the nhtsa and the president and ceo of toyota motor sales u.s.a. parts to pack of michigan chairs the committee. this is about two hours, 30 minutes. >> the chairman will be recognized for a five minute opening statement. others will be recognized for a three minute opening statement. i will begin. today's hearing will serve as a progress report on where toyota and the national highway traffic safety administration are in terms of diagnosing and correcting the sudden, unintended acceleration. we will also examine what toyota has done since our february 23 hearing. during that hearing we heard from toyota motor sales president jim lenz and ray lahood, consumer advocates, and from an expert witness, professor david gilbert from southern illinois university about sudden, unintended acceleration in toyota vehicles. unintended acceleration, sua in toyota vehicles. we also heard from rhonda and eddie smith about their experience with this in their lexus. committee members ask many questions. but we were left with more questions than answers. toyota engaged in damage control almost immediately following our hearing by continuing asserting confidence that the extensive testing proves the safety of the electronics systems and attacking those indiduals who disagreed with them. but as chairman waxman noted in his opening, the record doesn't support toyota's statements that it conducted extensive testing. the truth is that we don't know whether the electronics plays a role in sudden, unintended acceleration and toyota doesn't know either. what's disappointing to me is learning that toyota seems to have focused more on discrediting its critics than on resolving the problem. when dr.8n; gilbert testified before this subcommittee in february, he explained that he found a way to induce sudden unintended acceleration in a toyota vehicle without triggering an air code in the vehicle's computer. committee staff have spoken with several academics who described dr. gilbert's experiment as sensible and as a reasonable way unintended acceleration. dr. christian girdis, a professor at stanford university who toyota asked to review dr. gilbert's work told the committee that dr. gilbert's aappropriate a legitimate starting point for a more in-depth inquiry into this problem. unfortunately, toyota appears to have been more interested in messaging than scientific inquiry. after the hearing toyota hired a public relations firm to advise the company on its public's response to lawsuits that it played a role in sudden unintended investigation and know that the pr firm, bsg, conducted a poll to learn more about what toyota could do to repair damage to the company's image among educated consumers known as opinion elites. a psentation by benazen shows that among the key findings from the poll toyota learned the following, debunking cane gilbert's testimony will be critical for restoring confidence among elites and reassuring audiences that electronic throttle control is, in fact, not an issue. that's a document march 5th. we reviewed an updated bsg document showing that the results from another toyota poll to test some aggressive messages for possible use in future public statements or advertising. this poll referred to dr. gilbert's experiments as phony, shoddy science, a hoax and a parlor trick that would never happen in real life. and we have a document on that and bsg summarize the results from this poll march 8th, 2010 suggesting toyota should try to damage dr. gilbert's credibility by accusing him of having "monetary or selfnterested motives." toyota told the committee that the company did not follow i poster's suggestion to attack dr. gilbert but the documents suggest otherwise. on march 8th, a monday, toyota held a press conference and released a report by ex-point criticizing dr. gilbert's work. two days before the press conference, the vice president of toyota's public relations firm noted in an e-mailo a colleague the importance o finishing the poll before this event saying and i'm quoting now "we really, really need to get this done he personally with ee legalities. toyota has a pss conference on monday and need our data to know what to say." that's the document we have right here. at that press conference, before exponent presented its finding toyota spokesman mike michaels dispaged dr. gilbert's work and said it was paid for by an advocate for trial lawyers, end of quote. ex-poepts report on d gilbert's research was a hit job, not solid science. exponent confirmed a key conclusion that dr. gilbert had drawn in his report, but then disparaged dr. gilbert for not testing the likelihood of the faults he identified. even though exponent never did this analysis either. a couple more buzzes there. exponent added new steps. they added new steps and mischaracterized others. all in an attempt to make his outcome seem unlikely and too invent flaws in his analysis. but independent experts have defended dr. gilbert's approach including a stanford university professor who revealed the report at toyota's request and described dr. gilbert's experiment as perfectly reasonable starting point. when i look at toyota's approach i do not understand why the company is attacking dr. gilbert for trying to find a root cause of sudden unintended acceleration. toyota ought to be undertaking a comprehensive review and encouraging automotive experts to come forward with ideas of what could be causing the problem. based on the committee's review of ex-appropriaponent's work, w derned it is not occurring. the committee asked toyota to produce all reports or communications describing the work for toyota related to unintended acceleration or electronic throttle control. we also asked for all contracts, agreements, memorandum or correspondence concerning the ope of$r? ex-preponderance one employees. it appears their only work to date is the interim study and report attacking dr. gilbert's credibility. i find this extremely troubling given the fact that toyota and e exponent have done this. to be fair, toyota has made progress on processingheir recalls. they have completed 80%f the stickyedal recalls. they have completed 30% of their floor mat recalls. they have also made some management changes that we hope will lead to improved safety culture. one of the most significant improvements toyota could make would be to install brake overde technology in all of their vehicles. brake override technology ensures that if both the accelerator and the brake are pressed at the same time, the brake will override t accelerator. toyota told the committee that beginning in 2011, all vehicles will have this feature. but the company is being more selective about which older mode will receive the software upgrade. despite the fact that installing brake override technology on older vehicles would only cost $50 per vehicle, toyota does not plan to offer this option even at the owner's expense to owners of certain models. i look forward to hearing why toyota won't offer brake override to their customers with older vehicles even if the customer pays r it. since our february hearing, nhtsa and toyota appear to have improved their working relationship. nhtsa officials tell us that toyota has shown more willingness to address issues of concern. nhtsa has informed us it has commissioned two studies to study this in vehicles. 9 first is a study to be conducted by nasa scientists who examine toyota's electronic throttle control systems for possible problems assoated with hardwar or software. this report is targeted to be completed by the end of august. the second study will be conducted by a panel of independent scientists selected by the national academy of sciences. the nas study will offer an examination of unintended acceleration and electronic control systems across all automobile manufacturers. this study should be completed by fallf 2011. i'd like to thank both mr. strickland and mr. lentz for their teimony today and ongoing cooperation with the committee's investigation. mr. lentz, we appreciate toyota and its outside counsel ted hester for the company's responsiveness to our several requests for documts and for substantive briefings. i wish i could say we received the same level of cooperation from toyota's consultant, exponent. unfortunately, exponent withheld information from the committee and has even modified responsive documents before producing them to us in direct violation of the committee's instructions. it's ironic the firm toyota hired to conduct an independent investigation has behaved like it hasomething to hide from this committee. i next turn to mr. burgess for an opening statement, please. >> thank you, chairman stupak and as always thank you and chairman waxman for convening this hearing and welcome to our witnesses here today. our first hearing on the toyota problems almost three months ago to the day athat time we had a lot of questions, but not a lot of answers, as to what was causing the sudden unintended acceleration events in toyotas, so today we're here for answers, but it also appears that we will not be getting those. i was hoping this hearing was called because there was some new information that was coming to the floor, but, in fact, we may be having this hearing because we found out that toyota did a poll. now, mr. chairman, if polling is found to be at the level of a hi crime or misdemeanor, this dais would suddenly be irrevocably silent because we'd all go away. we're not going to get those answers today. i'm concerned that we continue to have hearings where we literally go in circles because this is an important issue and it needs to be resolved. needs to be resolved for the safety of toyota's customers and needs to be resolved for the future of the -- of auto sales by that manufacturer. this hearingoes seem premature. toyota has commissioned exponent, an engineering and scientific firm to do a top to bottom review of its cars to figure out the cause of these events. the national highway traffic safety administration has asked for nasa's failure analysis experts to take a look at yota's electronics. as of today, both of those sties are ongoing. that's a good thing. we just don't have answers yet. according to exponent they haven't found the answer to what is causing these events and nasa's work is just getting started. in fact, at the hearing previous ranking member
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