Transcripts For CSPAN Key Capitol Hill Hearings 20140325

They wont have employersponsored Health Insurance which, by the way, has zero tax consequences to the employee. They have no tax consequences, but under obamacare, every american is forced to buy a product whether they want it or not, even if they cant necessarily afford it, so then people now under obamacare have to go and buy a product that the government dictates to them that they have to buy at a price that government dictates that they have to peso either they get Health Insurance with no tax consequence or pay so they get Health Insurance with no tax consequence or with money they already paid taxes on, so now theyre going to get double hurt under obamacare. So the president wins, the American People lose, thats our choice. The president wins, the American People lose. Financially, freedom new york this case, the most important case, religious liberty, thats not acceptable under our constitutional guarantee of liberty. The magna carta taught king john that no man is above the law, especially the king, because thats who you have to worry about. No man is to be above the law, including the president of the United States he cant just change a law with the stroke of a pen or with a telephone call. He is not allowed to, under our system of justice, but he also is not within his power to deny anyone their real jougs liberty rights. Mr. Gohmert the gentlelady makes a great point. But unfortunately, or fortunately, depending on your point of view, the founders created so much in the way of checks and balances to prevent the government from abusing the power the gentlelady points out, but if the congress will not protect its own powers as we have not, the senate has been very protective of the president s executive orders that usurped our power, they have gladly handed over power and i was shocked to hear in this very room, as the president spoke from this podium a standing ovation from most of the people on this side of the aisle when the president in effect says if you dont change the law, i will. And they stand and applaud a president who says, in effect, im going going to usurp even more of the legislative power given to congress under article i than ive already taken. Its stag toring hear that applauded and its also stag toring me to see the senate as a body in effect protecting the president s usurpation of our power. Thats one check, one balance mrs. Bachmann i was here in the chamber with the gentleman, i saw and observed exactly what you said that our colleagues across the aisle stood up and applauded. That is a constitutional crisis. As we are having this discussion today, we are in the midst of a constitutional crisis. With a president who is eyre gating to himself who is air ating to himself pow who is arrogating to himself powers that are not his, taking power away from people as far as freedom of speech and religious free tom. With all due respect to our colleagues across the aisle, theyre applauding becoming dinosaurs because when the president of the United States decides hell also be congress and he will write the laws, thank you very much, i dont need your help, thank you very much. Why in the world would anybody in this body who has an election certificate applaud that they get to become a dinosaur, theyre no longer relevant. We might as well dispense with the cost of elections and go home and revert to what king george wanted in the first place, a government with one person calling all the shots. Thats not our form of government. Mr. Gohmert i was shocked that one of the justices asked the question, basically, how can or does a corporation exercise religious freedom . This justice knows that the Justice Department has indicted corporations, charging criminal intent, intent to violate the w, and yet she cannot figure out how a corporation could have intent to violate the law but could not have intent to have religious religiously held beliefs. That was a bit staggering to me to hear that question. How can a corporation exercise religious beliefs . Mrs. Bachmann and she fails to understand that the federal government again is practicing censorship in that the sfrovet the one forcing its vision of morality and religious belief on every american. Again, thats government enforced coerce i speech and morality and religious expression. Thats also contained in that remarkable premise of the Supreme Court justice. Mr. Gohmert it is remarkable. Again, the justice, if i heard her correctly, just advocated well, just drop the insurance. Drop the insurance. This company is providing great insurance, as the gentlelady pointed out, and that point was not her point was not made because time is so limited, know paul clement knows, but that is such a huge benefit to the employee, there was discussion by the Supreme Court about, you know, benefits to employee. Well, you know, you can raise their salaries and make up the difference, when actually you may have to raise that salary an extra third in order to cover the cost that is pretax to the employee. So the employee is getting hammered when they just, as this justice appeared to callus oy callously advocate, play pay the drop the insurance, pay the penalty, Congress Said penalty, they said penalty and tax, take your pick, but either way they were advocating harming the employee mrs. Bachmann 16,000 employees of one company. Mr. Gohmert harming 16,000 employees. With an unconstitutional act. Mrs. Bachmann and isnt it true if the gentleman recalls that while this Supreme Court justice was advocating in a flippant way, drop Health Insurance coverage for over 16,000 employees, doesnt that seem doesnt that Supreme Court justice enjoy federal employee Health Insurance and isnt that same Supreme Court justice protected from not going into obamacare . It seems to me that our president is not in obamacare, nor are the Supreme Court justices in obamacare. It seems to me that theres a shield of protection for them. Its good enough for the American People to suffer under obamacare but i dont believe that our president or the Supreme Court justices have to be in obamacare. Mr. Gohmert that is my recollection. Some of us were pushing for and asking our leadership, why dont we do an amendment that will make sure the Supreme Court has to be under obamacare. I really think that would have been the more appropriate thing to do. In fact, i still think its the proacht thing to do and since of course its hard to know since congress was not given a chance to see what the Supreme Court was doing, who was asking what questions, but it sure seems like that since they feel so strongly about obamacare, that they really should have the chance to experience it firsthand. And just find out how wonderful it is. Mrs. Bachmann i would like to share my experience with it. As members of congress we were forced to go into obamacare, the only exchange we were allowed to go in was the one here in washington, d. C. , its called a Small Business link. But the only Small Business is congress. The government. Were the ones put in. And just for the record, my own individual premium increased for the same number of people in our family that we would have to cover, our premium was scheduled to increase times four. So we would have had to increase our premium by four times and our deductible was quadrupled. That also went up four times. So there was no Affordable Care act in our family. Its an extremely inaed for unaffordable Health Insurance act. I would be curious to know if the Supreme Court justices would voluntarily put themselves in obamacare so they, too, could know the pleasure of what it is to pay four times more for the same Health Insurance than my family paid last year. Mr. Gohmert one of the one of the justices pointed out, apparently, appeared to point out that an agency is the one that establish sod many of these things so the question arises, since an agency can say, your insurance policy must provide this medicine this medicine, not his medicine, this medicine, does that agency apparently, have we given unelected bureaucrats the power to determine what your religious beliefs, firmly held, include because under obama care cair, an agency says, your religious rights must yield to our unelected bureaucratic decision that this medication must be included, therefore, your First Amendment rights, yield to our unelected bureaucratic rights to decide what your religious rights have to include and what they dont. It is incredible when you think about it. Mrs. Bachmann that is government enforced coercion of religious beliefs. Thats one thing under the rule of law that has been a pillar of american exceptionalism, the fact that under the rule of law, theres certainty for the American People. If you look at the declaration of independence and the constitution you knew with certainty when you woke up tomorrow morning that your religious liberties were intact. Now, apparently today, the gentleman was in the chamber, and heard that according to least one Supreme Court justice, in her opinion, they arent so much certain anymore. It is not only the election of the court, but at the election of the unnamed bureaucrats who the side, today well have these killer drugs that we mandate, tomorrow what drugs will they take off the list . Will i not get lifesaving drugs that i would need to get . Will i not get lifesaving treatments i thought i was going to get . Will the bureaucrats decide that only politically connected best friends of the administration get certain surgical procedures . Or get to see the best doctors . We dont know. Because apparently, the Supreme Court has decided that the bureaucracy must be fully imbued with all powers. But that means again that the president and his Administration Wins their religious liberty and the right to force their religious views down the throats of the American People but while the president wins, the American People lose, and they lose under the protections of the constitution. Its unlike anything we have ever seen before in the history of the United States of america. It is a seminal day in washington, d. C. And its why the American People better wake up really quick and watch whats happening because we are living in a country we no longer recognize. Because it is being rewritten by unelected bureaucrats, it is rewritten by Supreme Court justices who apparently think that the amendments in the constitution are optional rather than mandatory. Mr. Gohmert god bless justice antonin scalia, clarence thomas, i didnt hear Justice Thomas ask questions, he normally doesnt. Its extraordinary if you spend time with Justice Thomas, you find out rather quickly how really brileant he. Is he didnt need affirmative action to get him into yale law school. Or harvard as we was accepted to but at the time thought was too conservative. But Justice Scalia took on the governments position, the governments attorney stood up d basically said, if a corporation is forprofit, no matter how religiously convicted the holders of that are, they have no right to religious beliefs. Scalia took him on and said theres never been a case where we said if youre a Forprofit Corporation, you had there has never been a case that you dont have religious freedom. The speaker pro tempore the gentlemans time has expire. Mr. Gohmert thank you, mr. Speaker. The speaker pro tempore the chair lays before the house the following enrolled bill. The clerk h. R. 3771, an act to accelerate the income tax benefits for charitable Cash Contributions for the relief of victims of typhoon haiyan in the philippines. The speaker pro tempore under the speakers announced policy the nuary 3, 2013, gentlewoman from california, ms. Speier, is recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader. Ms. Speier mr. Speaker, i thank you for the opportunity to address the house tonight on what is called the defense logistics agency, something probably not many people have heard about. Well, the d. L. A. Is like a big Hardware Store in the department of defense. And about 30 years ago we heard horrific stories about wasteful spending, taxpayer dollars being spent, 436 being spent on a hammer, 7,600 on Coffee Makers and 640 for toilet seats. And we all thought, well, its been taken care of. Well, not so fast. Im showing you right now what is a plumbing elbow. At the local Hardware Store i, this elbow sells store, this elbow sells for 1. 41. But the taxpayers of this country spent 80 to a defense contractor who charged us that much money for this elbow. How about a box of washers . At the local Hardware Store we as individuals would pay omething like 1. 22. 1. 22 for this box of washers. What did the taxpayers of this country pay a defense contractor for a box of washers . How about 196. 50. So, that issue that was around some 30 years ago is still with us today and its time for the house of representatives and for the Armed Services committee to hold hearings on why it is that the defense logistics agency, our Hardware Store that is responsible for putting together good pricing on spare parts, is being overturned and overlooked by defense contractors within the Department Deaf fence who would rather go outside within the Department Deaf fence who would rather go outside and pay 100 , 200 more. Well, we are going to play a game tonight on cspan called the price is wrong and see what were talking about here. Now, if for one minute you think that were talking about small potatoes, were not talking about small potatoes. Were talking about a lot of money. The Defense Department has so many excess spare parts that they have disposed of, thats right, thrown away, 15 billion in excess parts and materials. In just the last three years. And theres about 96 billion worth of spare parts inventory right now in the defense Hardware Agencys coughers. So why would we coffers. So why would we ever go outside the internal Hardware Store to buy parts . Well, some argue that its faster or its cheaper to go outside. Well, the audits have repealed instances when the military had enough of certain parts that would last 100 years and theyre still going outside of the defense logistics agency. I mean, thats the equivalent of having spare parts that include horseshoes for a calvary, because thats 100 years of spare parts, if we were looking back in time today. So, the likelihood of these parts being used completely over 100 years, not so likely. Now, you might say, well, maybe this is difficult for the Defense Department to figure out where their spare parts are and how much they are. And how much they cost. Well, thats not correct. In fact, the department of defense has the resources and the databases to check the accuracies of these prices. The auditor found these overcharges by using the department of defenses own database. So this is no more than a click on a mouse to find out, one, whether the part is in stock, and, two, how much it costs. Well, lets start this game. First game were going to play is called flip flop. Its a game where the numbers are scrambled. And im going to start with the in this picture here. This is what it looks like. Its a little larger than a quarter. Its a ramp gate Roller Assembly. Its used for chinook helicopters. You can buy this at a local Hardware Store for 3. 50. But because this is the military and we want the very best quality, then the d. L. A. Sells this part for 7. 71. So the question is, what did the army pay for this Gate Assembly . Well, did they pay 7. 71 . Nope, they didnt pay that. 77. 10 . Ay nope, they didnt pay that either. Did they pay 771 for this Little Assembly part . Nope. For this ramp gate roller 678. 61. Y, they paid 1, now, thats obscene. And that shouldnt be happening in the department of defense or anywhere in the federal government. The taxpayers should not be ripped off in that manner. In the price is wrong, taxpayer always lose because the Defense Department consistently pays too much and defense contractors consistently win. All right, so were going to play the next game which is thats too much. See what happens again when the military thinks that they can get something faster and cheaper by not going to the defense logistics agency, our inhouse Hardware Store. This is a bearing sleeve. All right. Lets see what we paid for this. Did we pay 6 . Thats what it would cost at our local defense Hardware Store. Nope. We didnt pay 6. Was 86 too much to spend for that bearing sleeve . Nope. 86 wasnt too much. How about 286 . Was that too much to pay . Nope, that wasnt too much to pay either. Bearing ,286 for a sleeve that costs 6 at the Defense Departments logistic agency. So, thats what were dealing with here. A ripoff of the taxpayers. The truth of the matter is, for this bearing sleeve that we just bought one of here this evening, well, the Defense Department didnt buy just one. They bought 573 of these bearing sleeves, not for 6,. Ot for 86, but for 2,286 and let me do the math for you. Ats 1. 3 million in overpayments for just these 573 bearing sleeves. All right. Next were going to talk about a spur gear for the chinook helicopter. This is what it looks like. Its this tiny little thing, its smaller than a quarter. In this is what is used chinook helicopters. We have lots of them in the d. L. A. But again, they didnt want to go to the d. L. A. , to our Hardware Store to actually purchase this. They wld have paid 12. 51 if they had gone to the Hardware Store within the department. Nope. They didnt want to do that. So was 125 too much to pay for that spur gear . No. That wasnt too much. In fact, they were willing to pay 644 for this little rubberized spur gear. It was 34 times the fair and reasonable price. So, again, why are we doing Something Like this . Why are we allowing the taxpayer dollars to be flushed down the toilet by not paying what is the normal price for these spare parts . The last part is a flush store ring. Look at this. This is a pen next to it, so you can see this is a pretty small part. Its smaller than a pen. The contracting officer would have used to sign off on the price. So the d. L. A. Sells this part for 8. 37. Did we pay 83. 37 for this product . No, we didnt pay 83. 70, that wasnt too much. Hat we did pay though was 248. 46. For this flush ring. 34 times the fair and reasonable price. For that price you could go to dinner, a movie and rent a hotel room. Which brings me, i guess, to our last game. Its the showcase showdown. On the price is wrong. Much like the price is right, we have this final showcase. And were going to compare two packages. And guess which one costs more. The first showcase is a tworamp gate Roller Assembly. This is the very first thing that we showed you earlier. Here it is. This is the item that cost 7. 71. Do we buy tion is, a hich costs more as package . Two ramp gate roller assemblies or a trip to paris, france . It includes air fair, four nights in a fourstar hotel for two adults. So which one do we think costs more . Well, youve probably figured out that we in fact paid more for the ramp gate Roller Assembly times two than you would have paid for a trip to paris, france. 57. 22 for aid 3,3 these two parts while the trip 681. Aris is only 2, so, what are we doing here . How many more studies have to be done for us to make a serious attempt to clean up the spare parts issue in the department of defense . Very recently, in fact a it just came out in february of this year, the Inspector General for the department of defense put out this following report. Entitled air force Life Cycle Management center could not identify actual cost of f119 engine spare parts purchased from pratt and whitney. I mean, can it get me in any more embarrassing than that . That not only are we spending extraordinary sums of money on spare parts and not using the internal Hardware Agency that we have, but in an Inspector Generals report the air force cant even figure out how much it paid for the initial spare parts. So i would close, mr. Speaker, by saying that we have a lot to do. The army overpaid boeing 13 million recently. But the pentagon only recovered 2. 6 million. It included paying twice the fair and reasonable price for kits, overpaid 16,000 for structural support that should have only cost about 1,300. So, all right, we overpaid, they overcharged, what happens next . Well, after the i. G. Exposed the ripoff that had occurred, what did we do . Was that defense contractor kicked out . No, im sorry to say that what happened was the air force gave this contractor a new contract to oversee the supply chain contract. Thats like giving the fox a contract to guard the chicken house. I dont like playing this game any more than i think the taxpayers do, and it is not a game. It is truly a disaster. And its one that we as members of the house of representatives have to clean up. So i will continue to make the public aware of these kinds of overpayments until we fix the system. Stay tuned for the next show, the price is wrong. I yield back. The speaker pro tempore the gentlewoman yields back. For what purpose does the gentlewoman from california seek recognition . Ms. Speier mr. Speaker, id like to make a motion that we adjourn. The speaker pro tempore the question is on the motion to adjourn. Those in favor say aye. Those opposed, no. The ayes have it. The motion is adopted. Accordingly, the house stands adjourned until minimum wage, try to talk about the need for daycare centers, embracing ideas on both sides of the aisle. The media have not been interested in that. They wanted to ask me about petty personal finances. You need somebody else. So i want to give you that ack. Well have to focus on use it. Then i will offer to resign from the house sometime before the end of june. Et that be a total payment for the anger and hostility we feel toward each other. Lets not try to get even with each other. Republicans, please dont feel you need to get somebody else because of john to youer. Democrats, please dont feel that you need to get somebody on the other side because of me. We ought to be more mature than that. Lets restore to this rightful the priorities of whats good for this country. And lets all Work Together to try to achieve them. The nation has important business and it cant afford these distractions. And thats why i offer to resign. Ive enjoyed these years in ongress. I am grateful for all of you who have taught me things and een patient with me. Horris greely had a quote that president truman used to like. Fame is a vapor, popularity an accident. Riches take wings, those who cheer today may curse tomorrow. Only one thing endures. Character. Im not a bitter man. Im not going to be. Im a lucky man. God has given me the privilege of serving this, the greatest institution on earth, for a great many years. And im grateful to the people of my district in texas, im grateful to you, my colleagues, all of you. D bless this institution god bless the United States. [applause] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2014] find more highlights from 35 years of house floor coverage on our facebook pages. Cspan, createsed by americas Cable Companies 35 years ago and brought to you today as a Public Service by your local cable or satellite provider. You have ever heard of fracking . Hydraulic fracturing . Fracturing. Of what . You, congress, ordered the Environmental Protection agency to look into dangers posed to Drinking Water sources due to hydraulic fracturing. What was expected to be completed in 2014, the e. P. A. Announced it was delaying studies until 2016. Can we really wait that long, congress . Weve announced the winners of this years cspan student cam video competition. On whats the most important Issue Congress should address this year. Watch the top 21 winning videos, starting next tuesday, april 1, and every week day throughout the month, at 6 50 a. M. Eastern on cspan. And see all the winning documentaries online at studentcam. Org. Earlier today the u. S. Supreme court heard oral arguments in the case of sebelius v. Hobby lobby and conastoga woods. A combined case dealing with whether forprofit companies comply with the Affordable Care act. Coming up next, some reaction following todays Supreme Court case from attorneys, litigants and others. This is about 10 minutes. Our family started hobby lobby built on our faith and together as a family. Weve kept that tradition for more than 40 years and we want to continue to live out our faith and the way we do business. The choice of the government has forced on us is unfair and not in keeping with the history of our great nation founded on religious freedom. We believe that americans dont lose their religious freedoms when they open a family business. We were encouraged by todays arguments. We are thankful that the Supreme Court took our case and we prayerfully await the justices decision. Thank you. Since my family first opened our business in my dads garage 50 years ago, we sought to glorify god. Not only in the quality and craftsmanship in our product, but in the principles that inspire our lives every day. We believe in hard work, good citizenship and the dignity of our customers and our employees who are all created in gods image. We never thought wed see a day when the government would tell our company how to run our business. When the government would force us to be explicit to the potential destruction of human life. But sadly that day has come. Rather than sacrifice our obedience to god, my family, the green family, and many others have chosen to take a stand to defense life and freedom against government coercion. We didnt choose this fight. Our families would have been happy to just continue providing good jobs and Generous Health care benefits. But the government forced our hand. We hope and pray that the Supreme Court will uphold the religious freedoms of all americans to seek the glorified god, even as they go about making a living. Thank you. Where can you draw the line then . If i can just say, were obviously gratified that the court heard these cases, accepted both of them. We think it was important for them to understand the religious observations of both the greens and the hobby lobby case and the hahn and conestoga case. We think that the court took these cases seriously, took them under consideration. We do think that there are real concerns when the government comes in and takes a position that even a kosher deli that was told that it would have to be open on a saturday, that they would have no basis to even get into court and make that claim. That is a very, very difficult argument to sustain. The nature of their argument would also say that forprofit Medical Clinic would have no ability to raise a conscious objection and only if congress provides the conscious objection would they be in a position to do that. Those are the arguments that were presented to the court today. Obviously we covered a great deal of territory. If there are a couple of questions id be happy to take them. What about the argument inaudible] i think the court really got to that issue by saying that theres really no case on either side that says either that Forprofit Corporations definitely have religious exercise and theres no case that says that they definitely dont. But i think what the arguments explored is that the ramifications of saying that a Forprofit Corporation under no circumstances can even get into court to raise a free exercise claim, if just its just untenable. The solicitor general even seemed to concede that if were a exree exercise claim that discriminated against a religion, a corporation would have the basis to bring that claim. I dont understand why if a corporation has the ability to vindicate that claim they wouldnt have the ability to vindicate the claims at issue here. What did you say to justices comments that the law isnt forcing anyone to provide health care or agree with it, companies are given the option to not provide health care at all. The options that are provided for a statute like hobby lobby is the option to either pay a 475 million per year fine or to pay a 26 million per year fine or comply with the governments mandate. And the point is not that any of these companies are asking for something, some special treatment. The point is that Congress Passed a statute that youve heard so much about that provides every person in this country a right to be treated on the basis of their person and not on the basis of their religion, not to be discriminated on the basis of their religion. And if the government puts a substantial burden on a persons religious exercise and they cannot support that with a compelling interest, then the persons claim is supposed to be vindicated. And the fundamental problem with the Governments Program here is that an agency has provided this accommodation or this exemption for a subset of the employers protected by the mandate and a subset of the persons protected by riffa. When Congress Passes a statute that provides protection to every person in the country, its not for an Administrative Agency to provide a protection only for a chosen few. [inaudible] the only sense i have from the question cans is that the court took this case very seriously as it does every one of its cases. Were gratified we had the opportunity to present our case to the court and we await eagerly their decision. Thank you very much. My name is Marsha Greenberger and i am copresident of the National Womens law center. We filed a friend of the court grief on behalf of almost 70 organizations speaking for the women whose health and whose futures are at stake with respect to their access to contraceptive coverage. The Supreme Court has said in the past, and i want to read this quote, being able to decide when or whether to have whose womens ability to participate equally in our economic and social life, access to Birth Control has mproved womens status and overall Financial Security and i will add as well as their health and the health of their children. Its use is nearly universal. And its benefits are extraordinary. What was at issue in this case is whether when the government determines that Preventive Health care that is essential for women must be provided to hem can be overridden by any Forprofit Corporation that decides to do so would be objectionable to the corporation. My organization, the National Womens law center, heard from someone who was not heard from in the Supreme Court. And that was actually a woman who was an employee of hobby lobby itself. And she spoke and i can read from her words specifically about the importance of contraception to her and to her family and she said that it would allow a woman to lead and. He said a responsible life and it is the ability of women to be responsible and to protect their own health that is at stake in this case today. Thank you very much. Im the president of poor choice america. I want to say one simple thing. What the court heard today, what the court heard today is that it was to find for the plaintiffs in this case, it would be the first time the court of this country had proactively extinguished the rights of any americans, this is about all women, all womens health, all womens freedoms, we are the 99 , we will not have our rights extinguished, r bodies are not our bosses business. Thank you. Cecil riched rismeds, the president of planned parenthood and the planned parenthood arks fund. Im proud to be here on behalf of our three million parents we see for health care. What we saw today was the importance of having women on the Supreme Court and it was so proud to be there as a woman who cares about womens health, to have the justices talk about the fact that whats at stake in this case is whether millions of women and their right to preventive care, including Birth Control, is trumped by the handful of c. E. O. s who have their own personal opinions about Birth Control. It was a wonderful day, i think, for women and i really believe that this court understood that women have the right to make their own decisions about their health care and their Birth Control and its not their boss decision. Thanks. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2014] weve been showing you reaction to todays Supreme Court case, sebelius v. Hobby lobby, dealing with mandated contraceptive coverage in the health care law. A programming reminder, even though cameras are not allowed in the court chambers, justices will release recordings of todays oral argument on friday. Well have those recordings for you friday night starting at 8 00 eastern right here on cspan. Earlier today, House Intelligence Committee leaders, mike rogers and ruppersberger, held a press conference to announce their Bipartisan Legislation to improve the foreign Intelligence Surveillance act. That legislation would end the governments collection of telephone metta data under the act. This is about an hour. About nine months of intense negotiation to come to a conclusion so we could move forward on an issue that certainly has been contentious, often misunderstood, to move forward on something that we think protects america and i want to talk just briefly about this program. Passionately believe that this Program Saved american lives. Believe it was legal. It was overseen. It was passed by congress. Now, the review committees that got to section 215, no one found any illegal activities or misuse. So we know that the program served its purpose, was legal and had the proper level of oversight. Now, it did create discomfort with americans. And we knew one thing when we walked into this negotiation, that if we were going to continue the ability to protect americans against Foreign Terrorists making efforts to call into the United States, we a program that accomplished that. And lets begin by how regot there, is that after 9 11 they found that one of the gaps in our ability to protect the United States against an attack like 9 11 was the fact that we had no ability to find when the safe house in yemen phoned in to the United States, to one of the hijackers, that ended up flying into the pentagon that day, they had no ability to track that. There were seven such calls. Thats a gap. So, what the community decided to do in conjunction with congress was find a way to fill that gap. Again, we believe that it was both legal and constitutional and overseen at the appropriate levels. And all of the reviews, and i mean all of the reviews, from the i. G. To congressional reviews to the president ial review panels, no one found misuse of that program. Again, americans need to buy into this. And if were going to continue to be able to track terrorists calling into the United States, we thought we should try to do, over the last nine months we tried to do, what kind of a program we could put together that would allow us to maintain the program and reaffirm the confidence that americans have. So we think weve done that. We think that we have found the way to end the governments bulk collection of telephone metadata and still provide a mechanism to protect the United States and track those terrorists who are calling in to the United States to commit acts of terror. So, weve met with all the stakeholders, as ive said, nine months, met with industry folks, privacy folks. We have spent long hours talking to each other on the committee. Trying to find the right way forward. Talking to the Government Agencies responsible for keeping americans safe. And i do believe now that we have found that compromise that we can move forward. Just a couple highlights of the under at we will ban section 215 is the use of fisa to collect bulk electronic communication records, email, metadata and internet metada tark the use of fisa to collect bulk sensitive records, library records, firearm sales records, tax records, etc. And we can go into more detail in the questions period. But that is a primary concern of both the average americans who were concerned about the Government Holding large quantities of phone metadata. Again, no content, no names. But just the metadata. We think again weve found a way to do that. And we can explain it later. I want to allow my Ranking Member to have make a few comments. This is a significant step, an important step. We think the white house is now moving toward our position on this. Weve been sharing texts with them for the last few weeks. We think this is an important step for them. For a bipartisan solution in moving forward so that we can get on to other important matters in the tense business and with that im going to turn it over to the Ranking Member for his comments. Thank you, mr. Chairman. First thing, i did want to acknowledge the leadership of the chairman. We have been working on these issues to protect our country for at least the last nine months and both the chairman and i, along with our other members of the committee, have had to negotiate, weve had to discuss issues and come to an agreement so we can have a bipartisan bill. First, i do want to acknowledge my two members that are here today. Langevin, congressman langevin has been working on cyberissues as long as hes been a member. And i want to thank him for his input. I also want to thank congresswoman sule for her input and i do want to acknowledge congressman thompson and congressman schiff who both have worked closely with me in attempting to get our issues together and then we came together with the chairman. Basically what were doing is were listening to the American People. But we also know that our committee has the responsibility to protect the American People from terrorist attack. We cannot let 9 11 happen again. And we know we would have had the information that the 215 would have given us, that we might have been able to stop the 9 11 attack because we did not know at that time that the terrorist was in san diego, the United States of america, plotting this attack. With that said, what we basically are doing is, number one, ending bulk collection. The government will no longer with our new bill be able to have the metadata. Now, the metadata was not content but there was a perception issue. The public for whatever reason, and theres been a lot of information out there and a lot of issues, the public were concerned that the n. S. A. Or the government was maintaining the information. All it was was recording the duration of a call. We had to deal with the perception. We had to get the confidence of the American People. The people who work at the n. S. A. Every day get up in the morning and they feel very strongly that theyre doing the right thing. Theyre not breaking any laws. Theres not one incident in the 215 program, not one incident that anything was illegal or anything was basically done wrong. Notwithstanding that, we decide we felt strongly that we were going to do something to make a difference and that were going to change the bill. As the chairman said, the phone companies now who have this data already, that we will be taking a warrant, the f. B. I. Will be taking a warrant, giving it to the phone companies and then we will they will have to pass what they call the reasonable ar tick labble suspicion. If theres a terrorist at a safe house in yemen and that terrorist, known terrorist to us, calls the United States, then that would be the r. A. S. Test that we would need in order to get the warrant to the phone company get the information. Whats more important and whats so important in our country, which makes our country so strong, checks and balances, is the court will be involved in the process. In the preprocess they will be involved with overseeing the procedures that we use. In the post, though, the courts will evaluate every individual case, the r. A. S. Test, as it occurs. And that just doesnt happen now. So, we have, again, to reiterate. We have the f. B. I. Going to the providers, gathering this information. We have to pass the r. A. S. Test at that point and then the courts will oversee that post. And that will be done very quickly also. We also want to deal with some other issues. Those issues will be transparency. We think its very important that the public know how important and what the mission is of our intelligence communities and how they work with our military to save our country from terrorist attacks. So im going to stop now and, mr. Chairman, you want to take over . Well open this up to any questions we have, i think from cbs. What are you saying to people who say there are no safeguards if the courts are involved after the fact . Well, theres two things. So, with this you actually get two bites of the apple. You have a Program Review so that you have to have a court authorization for the program itself and all its guidelines and its standards. And then they have to have a prompt review of each of the numbers. And we do that for exijent circumstances. These things happened in realtime. You have to react in realtime. Hat the court will do is review each individual selecter, so theyre going to approve the program, approve what qualifies as a reasonable suspicion on a foreign number, this is important, coming into the United States and then they will take that information within a short time and make sure it meets the standard. If it doesnt, we require a purge of all of that information. So you really get two levels of judicial coverage on this particular search and again were talking about foreign numbers calling into the United States. What happens if the court in the postreview says that wasnt snok then all that information is purged and then theyll do a review of how they got to that position. But all that have information is required under the law to be purnled from the system purged from the system. Theres no incentive for the nib to start this process for the f. B. I. To start this process knowing if in fact they dont pass the r. A. S. Test it will be expunged. Were waisting everyones time. There will be a test and that test is again the r. A. S. Test. Heres another important part of this. Theyre not getting anyones names in this. Still. So that number would come in, it only gets phone numbers. No names, no addresses. Just phone numbers. And so it still has to meet that r. A. S. Test. Subsequent to that, if they want to go and find those numbers, the n. S. A. Has to turn it over to the f. B. I. For them to get their appropriate Legal Standard to find out who even owns that particular phone number. So the big change here is at one time the program would send all of this information, put it in a lock box or an evidence safe keeping room, americans felt uncomfortable with that. So this is the alternative that now you only do it by the number, that they find overseas, to plug it in and all the information the n. S. A. Would get at that point is the information associated with that individual selective. So thats a major difference when it comes to bulk collection. I think thats where most people had their anxiety and it wasnt about there was this abuse, therefore we have to change the program. It was, we think there could be in the future abuse. Thats really what were trying to do here. Is alleviate that concern that there could be abuse in the future of these programs. Lets talk about what intelligence is. Tense is getting information intelligence is getting information that in the future can be used as a Building Block to get enough information for more tests such as probable cause or that type of standard. The intelligence is the best defense against terrorism but its just getting initial information and building beyond. That thats why you have the r. A. S. Test. Just a quick clarification. Before the collection occurs, does the court have to approve the individual selecter that the n. S. A. Or the f. B. I. Is seeking . Secondly, if what youre trying is data collection, [inaudible] first of all, we need the program to function. This is a Critical Program for saving lives of americans. This is a Critical Program to catch Foreign Terrorists calling into the United States. Thats why we have the program. We believe that the other bills that are out there dont meet that standard of still being able to protect americans through intelligence gathering so we can find out whos planning attacks that lives or resides or is staying in the United States of america. Approve the program and set the standards for r. A. S. And then when the selector, that means 5551212, we get that number from afghanistan, pakistan or yemen or fill in the blank of 20someother countries and that number comes in and tell you why its a terrorist, the judge would say heres the requirements you have to meet in order to even submit the number. They can begin collect in realtime and the court must promptly review to make sure it meets the standards of the court. If it doesnt, all of that information must be purged. Let me try to answer the sensenbrenner issue and deal head on with it right now. In my opinion, the sensenbrenner bill and i understand what he is attempting to do, its a good start. But it makes our country less safe. Why . I talked about the example of a known terrorist calling from a safe house in yemen. Under the sensenbrenner bill, in order for us to be able to have the ability to see who that person is calling and get that information, under the sensenbrenner bill, you have to have an ongoing investigation. Thats not an ongoing investigation. Right there, we wouldnt have the ability to see who is calling into the United States because we didnt have an ongoing investigation. What sensenbrenner is attempting to do is getting information for a probable cause, for evidentiary hearings, that type of thing. We are in the intelligence business. We have standards in intelligence. And yet, we understand listening to our constituents who have concern about privacy and we should. We should always be concerned about privacy. What were doing is attempting to get this information so it can move over sometime and get more information if there are bad guys that want to attack us and take it over to the probable cause sensenbrenner side. Are you negotiating [inaudible] what about snowden, is this a victory for him because his claims and concerns were correct . His concerns were not correct. This was a Legal Program that had proper oversight. There were five different places he could have taken his concerns, he chose none of them. 95 of the information he took was related to military, tactical and strategic information that we now believe is in the hands of the russians. A lot of that information benefits the russians and there is information in there that benefits the Chinese Military as well. It is important to put into perspective what he did in this particular case, which is create confusion on a Legal Program. He had no understanding whatsoever of all of the level of protections nor the courtlevel of protections nor the i. G. Inspections are and he has do a complete disservice. It created a misperception about the information. After all of the reviews and there has been plenty, the president is now up to two, there has been no abuses in the program or misuse of the information. The concern always has been, but couldnt there be in the future . We took that to heart and sat down and said we have two goals here, one is to regain the confidence in americans what these programs really are and its really hard to cut through the misinformation, a lot of union corner information and it s to meet it against terrorists communicating in the United States. Why is the potential alleviated by the phone Companies Holding onto the data . There is no requirement on the phone companies in this bill. They have metadata which is their way of collecting information to bill customers. These are called Business Records. And the metadata is the way they have billed. When i was in the f. B. I. , they called them pen registers or track and trace. This has been going on longer as long as the phone has been there. There is no new requirement there. Isnt there a risk that the phone companies abuse this the way the government would abuse this . The phone companies have access to it today, so we didnt change that. And this bill doesnt require that you hold certain pieces of information. It is absolutely nonbinding on any information. These are records that they already have. There is no new information they have toll collect, zero. What were saying is, just like you would do on other criminal matters is you try to go to the company and say we need to see these Business Records based on this r. A. S. Standard. It happens thousands and thousands and thousands of times a day in criminal investigations today in the United States. So theres nothing new about that. How is this different than a National Security letter . Couldnt you accomplish the same thing . The National Security letter is an administrative subpoena in the course of a criminal investigation that could either it could be intelligencerelated but a different Legal Standard on different programs. We didnt touch that program. The program we are dealing with today which has the number one concern today in talking to our colleagues and americans, they didnt have a Comfort Level with metadata evenbulk though we had huge levels of protection. I believe privacy is better protect, but we didnt can change any of that but the way the government collects that information. We didnt change anything at the phone company. Some of the national plead yeah this morning have said that this program will now have the phone companies collecting the data for us. They have that data. Under the f. C. C. Regulations, they have to keep all of these numbers of all of their customers for 18 months. What we are doing is saying, number one, we are passing the r. A. S. Test and looking at each case. That is not the case in the program. We are going to individually court test. They arent doing anything different than they are doing now and we are not forcing them other than the warrant which. Ill pass the r. A. S. Test yes, maam. You had mentioned that you the past industry in five months. What was their reaction to this proposal and are they asking for some kind of compensation for whatever work theyll have to do on their end . How does your proposal differ from what the administration wants to see . Well, again, we provided start with the administration piece first. We have been working on it for nine months. Its within our jurisdiction and responsibility and we believe its important to talk to all of the stakeholders to make sure that this works. We believe from what we read in the paper yesterday, unfortunately thats the way we had to read about their proposal. What we read yesterday, they are coming closer to our position here. E think this is a bipartisan wellthought through hag willed over stakeholder event and still protects the programs and we were encouraged to see they are moving in our direction. We provided them legislative text a couple of weeks ago and read about their proposal in the newspaper. We had a meeting at the white house yesterday where we tried to get parameters and that was helpful. We are going to get there. Hopefully by the end of this week, it will come to an agreement how to move forward. First part of your question . As a democrat i should respond. We have been working with the white house and the white house includes the legislation community. We have had conversations with high levels in the white house. We met yesterday. I believe we are very, very close. The white house understands we need to do something with the issue of holding bulk collection because of the concerns of our constituents. We need to balance to protect our citizens. We know its a dangerous world and terrorists out there every day to try and kill and attack us or our allies and we had to have the balance and we breeve we sought that balance. There are a couple of things we have to work out. But based on the information we provided them and we have vetted everyone. We have vetted the phone companies and communicated with the white house. This should be a team effort. Shouldnt be a republican or democrat. Thats why we are standing here in a bipartisan way. The stakes are too high. I believe the white house could be one issue and to be honest with you and im not sure where that white house is. Might be we had discussions by the way, we have prejudicial also and reviewed the procedures. We had preand post. And we dont have the exact time but once we get the phone number, the courts are going to involved right away, depends how long they will take to get it back. Where mike and i are concerned about the pre, we want a flexible system. If that yemen person is calling over and getting ready to coordinate an attack, we are moving right away. The privacy rights of our country are being protected because the courts are involved all the way through. If we cant pass the r. A. S. Test, its ex punked. Is there compensation for what they are requesting . They arent seeking anything new under the law and we dont provide any language under the law for direct compensation. They like the fact that they are having a warrant and like the fact they are not being forced to hold the information longer than they would under the f. C. C. There has been a lot of negotiation, but we wouldnt be here now. What is one of the reasons for the original n. S. A. Phone collection that they needed to store the metadata longer than 18 months and why is the 18 months sufficient now . In any one of these programs you have to find a balance. Again, i believe the program is legal in overseen and determined by 17 judges 37 times that was constitutional and met all the tests. Thats u. S. District court and Supreme Court. And there are hundreds of a. M. Ate court cases that rea firm the underpinnings of this program. The way it was set up protected Civil Liberties. The five years, we wept back and said at some point you have to be able to find a balance. Preferably, i started out with maybe we ought top keep the program that has been tested and overseen and can protect Civil Liberties. We are beyond that. Now our number one goal has never been b. P. Phone collection but how do we catch these people trying to call into the United States and can we do it in a way that prevents another 9 11. Thats the bottom line. Under the arrangements of what we have, it at least provides us the majority of what we need. Its not everything. We need to understand, when we make changes, you assume a little more risk. I think when i look at everything we have been able to put together, i think the risk is a place we can accept as we move forward and try to fill it in with other programs and other things and our intelligence collection overseas. To answer your question why we need the program to begin with after 9 11, its like finding a needle in the haystack. You need the haystack and thats what the program is all about. And after snowden, there was a lot of mistrust and we have to deal with it. Like an official representing our constituents. I represent the n. S. A. These are some of the most patriotic, smartest people and they go to work every day. And believe me, they are not happy they are being criticized for doing something they didnt do. For the benefit of the whole program, country and get the citizens to understand what intelligence does, we start at number one all bulked out. Thats major and huge. But we are going to go further. We have judicial review on each individual case, thats huge. We want to get into the issue of transparency. Congressman langevin wants to open up some of the issues in the fileso court and maybe six months after the case, the public review, fisa court decisions. We are listening and we need the balance. Cant have security if you dont have privacy and cant have privacy unless you have security. We feel strongly that this seeks the balance. In my opinion, it makes our country less safe because you will never pass the test when we are trying to gain intelligence and have an ongoing information to get information. We cant get there and i could never be a part of that to put our country at risk for another terrorist attack. There are a lot of bad people that want to attack us evidence and its our job to do it to stop it. [inaudible question] we had a productive meeting with our two Senate Colleagues and working with them on a whole host of issues, literally before we walked up to the press Conference Today. You know, we are feeling pretty good, people coming around a solution. No longer can be we be all for it or against it. That is unproductive and it creates an absolute misperception about what isnt exactly happening. The United States government is not listening to cell phones across america and not reading your emails. Unless they have a court order through a domestic Law Enforcement agency to get those. That is a drastic difference from what you mere often talked from politicians and the media. We have to stop all that. Its dangerous to us protecting ourselves in a more complicated and more dangerous world. So through all of that and all of the conversations, we have been able to bring in republicans and democrats on our side and having great discussions with the senate. There are people who are married to their own particular positions. Thats the nature of this beast. The power of the solutions in a bipartisan people that meet the standards that people were concerned about will pass the house and will pass the senate. As i said, the president is not far from our position. And we look forward to putting the final touches on the negotiation to get where we can finally be for something to move through and put this behind us. We have important issues to deal with. I mean this is absolutely critical as we move forward. We are Going Forward in the press Conference Today to send a message to the American People that we have a drastic major change that will not put our country at risk. We also have to educate our respective caucuses and we have far left and far right and going to educate them on what this is and tell them what the balance is. We in the Intelligence Committee know how serious these threats are and they are very serious and we have a lot to do in the area of technology and the area of cyber. Not getting off of where we are on this bill, but look at the target issue, the issues that are out there in the future that we are going to have to do. Educating our caucuses and get the votes to move forward. We are almost there with the white house. We have some things to work out but in the end, we all want the same thing. Following up on that, though, is there a time line in which you are hoping to finish this, by the election, by the summer . Its going to take on a natural rhythm. We have other shugs to deal with and just in conversations with members, some members want to look at this and try to make a decision about where they want to be and they wanted to find a balance. Our instructions, when we sat down, and said we are going to work this thing out, said, lets find a balance. It was a long path. Other National Security bills will be on the floor and other issues from energy and commerce that will have to deal with these issues. Its important to put it on the table and say thats what we are working for and build a coalition and get it done. We arent going to say a time line. We dont know. More people that understand what we have done and what it looks like, the more support we are going to get moving forward. Let me get these folks in here. You say that russia has access to the snowden documents, which documents and whats your evidence for that . As i said, there is a great defense report, Damage Assessment report, that details all of the information, a that we believe he has and the fact that at least by those analysts believe that that information, some or all, would be in the hands of the Russian Intelligence Services today. The question is not he is under the influence of Russian Intelligence Services today, the question is when did that start, that seems to be the debate. That means that that information, which is deadly to our military army, navy, air force, marines, some of whom are in combat zones today and some of the information that was stolen, definitely could lead to the death of soldiers on the u. S. Battlefield. Its serious. And i think the media got confused that they got everything he had. That is not true, they didnt get hardly anything that he stole. The vast majority of what he stole had nothing to do with any of the issues we are talking about today. I forget what the number is today, 97 , 9 , youll related to military, strategic and tactical issues. Terrorists, especially al qaeda can change their mechanism on how to communicate and those terrorists and al qaeda specialists that we were on and watches where they were going its very serious. Snowden took an oath and turned his back. I would love russia to send him back here. There ant say hes and i know the russians and im sure the russians have gotten all of this information. The assessment of the report is grave National Security damage, which is the highest indicator that you can have. On terrorism, can you tell us where we stand on the hearing next week, what you are trying to accomplish and if asked, will you let other Committee Members participate . I have no interest allowing any members of other committees. This is the regular course of the Intelligence Committee to do its work and follow up on investigations. This would be the third testimony in front of the committee to try and find the answers on benghazi. I believe a public hearing given the controversy and swirl after his two classified testimonies throughout the course of the investigation was important. And so i think hopefully this will shed some light and allow him to answer the questions that we know many people have about what he knew and when he knew it. And i have every full faith that he is going to be truthful in his testimony and wim allow us to continue all aspects of the investigation to come to a conclusion. Who asked for those talking points anyhow . [laughter] next question. Test with pass the the american public. Looking back, do you feel that the program should have been designed as you are proposing now as in the first place so when snowden revealed this it isnt [inaudible] some of the loudest protests on these issues today never read the classified reports that were made available to them. We have an awesome responsibility and every member on this committee knows it and understand it. We talk about it ourselves. Its a burden and privilege to be down there to access the most sensitive things our u. S. Government does and a huge responsibility. We believe all of that was accomplished. Even though its not on the committee was made available for them to get questions on it. Those on other committees that would have jurisdiction were provided updates, most of which did not take advantage of reading those reports. What i get so offended about in this whole process, those members who say the Intelligence Committee has run amuck, many members of this house did not do their basic constitutional function of learning the true operational programs. And thats treat strong talk, but i believe, because we find ourselves where we are. It was authorized by congress and then reviewed by congress. All of their operations were sent up to committees, to the appropriate committee. The expanded members were invited to come down and take part of how it worked. This was not there is no abuse here. No illegality, no unconstitution yalt. I think that the first issue is that we are the best coach in the world. Mike and i travel to hot spots all over the world and one of the ronchese is because our forefathers made a system of check and balances. We are the type of people that this could be better. What has happened here as a result of noticeden and turn a negative into a positive, we have a debate that has been going on and that debate is dealing with privacy versus security and thats a good debate to have. But we have to do what is right and get to the facts. And i think right now because of the perception issue, absolutely no illegality whatsoever but perhaps of the perception issue, we want to do better we want the constituents to know they are not violating any privacy rights. I might not always agree with aclu, but i appreciate the fact that they are raising these ssues. Look at Homeland Security and asal result of what happened in 9 11. Congress reacted right away. There were some very smart people and lawyers that reviewed and the program, the minute it was passed by the Supreme Court, our checks and balances and our system of governing. Because of the fact that we in this free country we can debate and make those issues. If we can make it better and our constituents can feel safe for privacy and the fact we are protected against terrorist attacks, we will continue to do that. Thats why we are the best country in the world. To say there is no debate on this program is wrong. We had plenty of debates in our committee, Senate Committees and other jurisdiction committees. There were debate on these programs. And i supported it when it was classified and i support it today. I think thats important. Some people disagreed and didnt like it but at the end of the day, the consensus was Important Program and fills an important gap and have a tremendous amount of oversight. If the i. R. S. Had this kind of oversight we would all be getting refund checks. Thats why those of us who believe in Civil Liberties and our constitutional obligation believe it passed all the test required including the judicial review. A, technology has changed when it started and the way we investigate overseas, incredibly since i have been on the committee the last 10 years. Thats an unfair premise to what is a conclusion here today that candidly we are changing the Program Based on a perception, not a reality, which is why we have classified information in the first place. We have to put ourselves in a policy that protects america. We found it in this program. Some people disagree. What about all these other programs that were exposed in ing s of the n. S. A. Leak encryption . There doesnt seem to be any concern in congress. A lot of what has been out there is wrong. Great example, the last goaround when the n. S. A. Contractor got up and said n. S. A. Is stealing Economic Data for the purposes of espionage is wrong and we didnt do it. It happened at the time when americans were trying to negotiate with europe over a transatlantic trade agreement. And i tell you, there is a lot of intelligence officials today who will have to go back and every new revelation, knowing he is under the influence of russian intelligence will have to scrutinize it 10 times more than we did. People kill take it as gospel. Its not. When it came out that the United States spied on 80 million french citizens phone calls in a period of a month and how terrible, awful and disgusting and the french screamed blood murder. To find out, that wasnt the truth. That was information that the french Intelligence Services gafere to the United States based on their collection protecting their troops in combat area. Thats a big difference than the United States spying on french citizens, which it doesnt do. So the frustration for us is now, i would be exceptionally careful about what you hear coming out of that whole information broker system created by the n. S. A. Contractor, because we dont know, was it under the influence of the russians. If you look at what the russians are doing in the ukraine today, we better shake ourselves out of this a little bit. They have aggressive campaigns and using Intelligence Officers and special forces officers to run up and down and create huge problems in that particular country. We see the same thing in georgia. Amassing troops and heavy equipment. They are playing for real. So this notion that we are going to have this discussion in our coffee shop without any understanding of what is happening on the ground and what the Russian Intelligence Services are doing around the world is irresponsible. There are more russian intelligence agents in the United States today than at the height of the cold yawar. And the other issue, too, what snowden was able to steal from his country, 90 military, the russians now have that information and understand what our sources and methodsr what our strategies are and dont you think they arent using it and it is a sensitive matter to the whole world and what is appening with putin. If this bill is perception more than reality as you said, what do you do to counteract this perception, monitoring, unrelated to deals in china, deals in europe . And you have been talking about what snowden took. Is there a fear do you have any idea how much more is going to come out . Next year at least. Just the sheer volume that was provided to the media is huge. There are null outlets created for the sole purpose of releasing that information. I suspect that youll see a tremendous amount of that being released. Talking about the perception in this country. Im talking about the perception in other countries . One of these is dealing our Business Community was dealing with in europe. And dont fool yourselves, the french passed a measure to make it so they dont have to get a court order to get personal data stored on their systems in france. Espionage is a french word. Some notion that the europeans just hast at espionage is wrong and many of those European Countries do use the economics to stateowned companies benefit, which we clearly dont do here. We have to start having an honest dialogue and start having an honest dialogue about what is happening. Europeans spy on the United States of america. Sorry, every single day. What we are trying to do is make sure that we get a balance in the discussion. We have gone to the European Union to balance that discussion so that you can really argue on the same set of data points. To me, thats really important. Lets talk about where we are today, we are talking about unions of america. Since world war i, almost every count in this world has some form of intelligence. What we are doing here, we are starting to lead by example, we are showing the rest of the world that we are making changes based on the perception of our constituents that have concerns about privacy. We have more checks and balances of what we do in intelligence than any other country. You just heard about the french. We have two committees. We have justice, Inspector General, we have the courts. Thats a lot. I used to be a former investigative prosecutor and you had to have probable cause to get a search warrant. Dealing with the United States first. And then we are going to lead by example what we are doing here today. On the previous question, do you see any need for reforms for programs in section 702, such aspirin . You know, those programs are under different authority. We oversee them. We have lots of conversations about what they are. And that is an overseasbased program. And i dont believe you want to bring that in to some domestic discussion. That is a very program with a very different set of authorities which is heavily overseen by the committee. Im not sure we ought to try to mix the two. This is the program that caused the angst. That bulk collection of metadata. We believe its a pretty big agreement here today that says we found a bipartisan way to end the government collecting in bulk that metadata and found a new way to protect the United States. There is a separate matter. Ere is someone many hightech c. E. O. s lobbying in washington having concerns about it. You are saying the main problems is it as it is sne i dont believe that foreign collection on foreign soil is something that we need to change. It is really important that when we have some 26 countries with ungoverned space and al qaeda is spreading in the way that they are, which means we have more threat streams than ever before and the russians use their Intelligence Services and special forces in ways that are really dangerous to liberty, democracy and freedom, including by the way, the gentleman we met who for the sole purposes of living on a farm, the russians separated from the rest of georgia, he was 85 years old and a gun put in his stomach saying dont talk to anybody on the other side of the fence. That is the berlin wall in the middle of farm country. This threat is real and the intensity of it is growing. We met a guy in the ukraine who had his face cut and he was put in a position of they nailed with a nail gun, nailed his hands up on the wall for the sole purpose of getting him to confess on videotape that the americans were the ones who gave money to spur the riots in the city of kiev. Americans, women seemed to have missed the boat here that this guy is up to absolutely no good. Those programs that allow us to understand what is happening, i think we would be foolish and irresponsible if we disrupted them for any political purpose. I encourage all the members to come down and understand the scope of these programs so i think the misinformation thats being provided out there to whip up the frenzy of americans to think that every phone call is listened to and every email is read, is not true and not happening, is dangerous to our National Security. Lets talk about our ongoing process. It is more in the realm of the president of the United States dealing with the allies and leadership in different countries. If one of our allies is talking to iran and we can get the information and its against our best interest, the United States of america is our number one priority. Believe me, there are countries out there that would love to find a way if they have been able to listen to our president or policy people. So this is an ongoing process, but we want to maintain it especially with our allies. I want to make sure we do what we can do to find out what russia, iran and these countries are doing. But again, i know the president has conversations with leps of other countries of how we are going to work through this process. When you look back 10 years from now and what we are doing in the area of cyber and technology, we are going to be the pioneers and have a long way as Technology Keeps evolving through the process, too. This is the beginning stage and trying to get it right. Just the last point. One of the big differences in 215, somebody asked this question, do you do it pre have to get the court to approve every single number prior to get the number or after where you have Program Review . You create a new standard under the legality of saying that a foreign terrorist will have a different Legal Standard than a u. S. Citizen and i think this is really nuts and ought to deal with this head on. Et me give you an example. I left some bad guys out there in chicago, but coming back. If i was prosecuting, we would have gotten them. You have this other standard. In the criminal law today, im going after a crime committed by a u. S. Citizen, i get a subpoena and go down to the fope company and say give me these records on this subpoena, never even gone to the court. What they are saying is some terrorist who is calling into the United States, we want you to have the higher standard, we want you to go to the court to get that number approved before getting that information. You have created two different standards, one for Foreign Terrorists and one for u. S. Citizens. Let me give you a great example. If youre its against the law, section 18, title 18, section 1821, to take dentures across state lines that are unlicensed, dentures. What were saying, the groups that were arguing for this, we are saying it is more important or you to worry about herbie the unlicensed dentist who is taking dentures across state lines and we are going to have a low standard to that and High Standard for za hirey to aughter three 3,000 americans. We came to the geement on 215 that you have a Program Review and then an afterreview of each select tore versus what most people want to shut the program down. I think its wrong to have a better standard for a terrorist living overseas than a u. S. Citizen who may be engaged in criminal activity in the United States. We shouldnt go there. Wrong way to go. This bill answers that question, takes us to the next place and i do believe and we have handouts with great stuff in this bill that i think will make americans feel comfortable, regain their confidence and encourage our Intelligence Services to go out there and do their best which is to stop bad guys from killing americans and protect our ational security issues. When the order is issued is that administrative order or courtapproved order . Its an administrative. So the f. B. I. . Yes. And secondly, does the phone company turn over not just that twohub ut the connection and if so who does that . Is that the phone company . They would request 5551211 and that information would come to the n. S. A. Based on court review and review after that to make sure it met the r. A. S. Test. How many would that, over the course of a year . Each individual case. If theres more information, it could be an actual conspiracy. They are going to do their investigation and make a determination they need more, they will have to come back and o the rast test again. Its two hops. In the beginning, its the two hops, but again, getting intelligence, this is where i have a problem with sensenbrenner, in the ongoing investigation, we wouldnt get any of that. You get the two hops and after you do the investigation to move forward, you need to pass the r. A. S. Test to get more information. Based on your field investigation with the f. B. I. , you might want to go to the court and use the foundation of the intelligence to get to the improbable cause. No content. This is really important. There is no content in this collection, zero. Its only that metadata. No name, no address. And if they want content later, there is no recording, that doesnt happen. They have to take that information, and have to again rate the case in order to go out and determine who it was if they could build probable cause to get content. Those are pretty solid protections. We are concerned, we already from precourt on the process and procedure, but there are those who feel strongly that you need the preand the post together. Our concern is that it would take too long. You need flexibility in the process. But if it turns out down the road after six months or a year, we can always look at that issue preversus post and make sure we have the correct balance. We have the obligation to protect us. Look at the unsophisticated attacks from the two brother in boston. Thanks everybody. [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2014] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] the senate held a hearing on exporting natural gas. Chairman landrieu discussed what happening in crime yeah and crimea using this. The events in the ukraine have shown russian president putin is intent on using his monopoly on Energy Supplies to pressure our allies in europe to advance his economic and philosophical agenda. Last week, rush being sanctioned is a badge of honor for me and the people i represent. It is only encouraged me to redouble my efforts to increase Domestic Energy production in the United States and make the u. S. A. Global leader in energy exports. America can and should be an Energy Superpower in all aspects of conventional and advanced sources of energy, including new alternative fuels and alternative energy sources. We all know that real competition in real ohm markets drives sufficiency and lowers prices for everyone. The last thing putin and his cronies is competition from the United States of america in the energy race. Have had many rose to fear revolution and this u. S. Energy revolution is one they should keep their eyes on. This was part of a hearing held today. You can see the entire event tonight at 8 00 eastern on cspan 2. U. S. Supreme Court Argument on the contraception mandate. Senate Armed Services Committee Held a hearing today on the command and forces in korea. Sanctions and pressures on north korea are not enough to make the country end its nuclear program. Witnesses discussed chinas military power and the countrys cyber attacks. Minutes. Wo hours, 15 good morning everybody. Today we receive testimony on the posture of u. S. Forces in the asiapacific region. On behalf of the committee i would like to welcome the admiral, commander of u. S. Pacific command and the commander of u. S. Forces, korea nation command and combined forces in korea. The committee appreciates your long years of faithful service and the many sacrifices that you and the families make a part of this nation. We greatly appreciate the servicemen and women, military and civilian, who serve with you in your commands. Please convey to them our admiration and our appreciation for their selfless sacrifice and dedication. Thurmond was eral unable to testify because of the heightened threat. Todays hearing is particularly timely as north korea is again engaged in sabers rattling and dangerous rocket and missile launches, including one a few weeks ago. The regime has so far followed the same destructive policies as its predecessors, pursuing its Nuclear Weapons with careless disregard for the wellbeing of people in the region. Even china, despite its longstanding relationship with north korea, has joined in the nation condemnation of north korean regimes dangerous behavior and has supported new sanctions. We look forward to hearing the generals views on recent developments on the Korean Peninsula and additional steps that might be taken to promote stability and peace. At the time of increasing fiscal austerity within the department of defense, china has announced it is increasing its official military budget for 2014 to almost 1 132 billion which is a 12 increase over last year, making that countrys military spending the second largest in the world after the United States. Chinas pursuit of new military capabilities raises concerns about its intention, particularly in the context of increasing willingness to assert sovereignty in the south china and east china seas. Chinas belligerence and unwillingness to have a code of conduct with its neighbors raises doubts about its representations that china is interested in a peaceful rise. E were dismayed by chinas unilateral declaration of an identification zone last year that did not follow proper consultations with its neighboring countries and that includes the airspace over the islands, which are administered by japan. In addition, chinas lack of regard for the intellectual Property Rights of the United States and other nations is a significant problem for the global commuvente. China is the leading source of counterfeit parts both in military systems and in the commercial sector. In addition, the china appears to have engaged in a Massive Campaign to steal technology and other vital Business Information from american industry and from our government. Chinas apparent willingness to exploit cyber space to conduct corporate espionage and steal proprietary information should drive our government and businesses to come together to advance our own cybersecurity. We also have grave concerns that chinas cyberactivities, particularly those targeting companies could be used to degrade our ability to respond during a contingency. Our committee will soon release a report on cyber activities. The administration continues to rebalance toward the asia pacific to meet these challenges. Substantial realignments of u. S. Military forces in south korea and japan are ongoing as our initiatives to increase presence in southeast asia, especially in singapore and the phillipines. The u. S. Relationship with australia is as strong as ever as evidenced by the continued plans for successive rotations of u. S. Marines to australia. With respect to the planned realignment to u. S. Marines in japan, the governor approved the landfill permit for the replacement facility at the end of last year. Nonetheless, i believe that moving forward with the construction of infrastructure facilities on guam must await the final Environmental Impact statement and the actual record of decision. Once those actions are completed and we have been provided the final master plans, including cost estimates and a time schedule, we would be better able to judge the feasibility of the plans. While i support the restationing of submarines from japan to guam and hawaii, it needs to be done in a fiscally sound manner. We must consider all of these challenges and initiatives in the asia pacific against the backdrop of our current drop. Admiral and general, we would be interested in your assessments of the budget reductions in your ability to meet your mission requirements. Again, we appreciate you joining us this morning and look forward to your testimony on these and other topics. Senator inhofe. Thank you, mr. Chairman, we all know and talked about this the world is getting more dangerous in the pacific. They continue to engage in actions including military exercises, nuclear and missile tests and the development of a rogue mobile missile system. China declares identification zones and makes moves to blockade ships and claim sovereignty over vast tracks of the south china sea. Despite the growing danger, the massive cuts to our National Security budget, making the jobs of the admiral and the general more difficult. While the Chinese Defense budget rose 12 , secretary hagel tells his command americas dominance in the seas, skies and space can no longer be taken granted. First time i have heard that. Diversion of resources from the defense to the president s domestic agenda. Over the last five years and that has consequences in our society, less capable and less dominant forces make it more difficult for our men and women in uniform to handle crises. Less capable u. S. Military makes it more likely that a crisis will erupt. Total retreat from International Engagement to the security at risk. More aggressive adversaries and best capable United States military forces are a recipe for disaster. Dismantling of our National Security over the last five ars has led to the growth in yria and iraq and putins anne xation of the crimea and belligerence in the east. He rebalance to the pacific that the is not true. I have specific questions to ask about that. I look forward to the frank assessment of how the rebalance is perceived in the region and some specific questions about that. Im concerned that the retreating tide of u. S. Leadership and the defense capability will encourage kim aggressive. E more how this grounds airplanes, ties up ships will impact your combat capability. I dont remember a time in my life when i have seen this type of thing happening and i remember when it all started and all started and we dont like to lk about it, back with the 800 billion people talked about entitlements. This was nondefense dissary spending and have been paying for it. Its a crisis we are in. You guys are the right ones to be there to try to meet these crises and i appreciate the fact that you are willing to do that. Thank you, mr. Chairman. Thank you very much, senator inhofe. Admiral. Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today. For two years i had the honor and privilege of leading the exceptional men and women, military and civilians throughout the United States Pacific Command. They are not only skilled professionals dedicated to the defense of our great nation but within the Pacific Command they serve as superb ambassadors and represent the values and strengths that make our nation great. We continue to work to ensure they are well trained, well equipped and well led to meet the challenges we are facing in the 21st century. I thank them and their families for their sacrifices. When i spoke to you last year i highlighted my concern for several issues that could challenge the security environment across the Pacific Command area of responsibility. Those challenges included the potential for significant hadr or how man tar i cant remember assistance disastrous relief. Korea, the continued escalation of complex territorial dispute, growing challenges to our freedom of action in the shared mains of sea, air, space and seibspace, growing transnational threats and the significant challenges associated with chinas emergence as a Global Military and regional power. During the past year we have been witness to all of these challenges and our forces have en very busy defending the peace. We have done our best to remain ready to respond to crises and contingency, although we have assumed greater risk. We have maintained focus on key aspects of the rebalance to the asia pacific, strengthening our alliances and partnerships, improving our posture and presence and developing the concepts and capabilities required by todays and tomorrows security environment and we have done this against the backdrop of continued physical and resource uncertainty and the result ant diminishing readiness and vailability of our joint force i look forward to your questions. Distinguished members of the committee, im honored to testify today as the commander of the United Nations command, combined forces command and the United States forces korea. On behalf of the service members, civilians, contractors and their families who serve our great nation in korea, thank you for your support