Transcripts For CSPAN Key Capitol Hill Hearings 20140410 : c

we never have to walk alone. there is a contemporary song that describes this powerful truth. part of the chorus, song as one looking back over the road of life, says, scars and struggle on the way, but the joy of our hearts can say, never once did we ever walk alone. never once did you leave us on our own. you are faithful, god. you are faithful. as we walked through this valley as a family, as a community, and as a nation, let us each one choose not to walk the journey alone. embrace the healing, comfort, and strength that god offers you. embrace your faith community and allow them to care for you. embrace your family and friends and draw strength from their presence, and in our context, embrace your battle buddy's, your leadership, your brothers and sisters in arms who never choose to walk alone. to the families, i forever reiterate, you are part of our army family. we love you. we are standing with you. you'll never walk alone. theadies, please rise for benediction and remain standing for the roll call, the rendering of honors to the fallen with three rifle volleys and the playing of "taps." >> god, as we bring this ceremony to a close, we find strength in the fact that your love and support is never closed time of need. in the days ahead, we pray that you may lift our hearts, restore our joy of life and of living, and grant us the wisdom to resurrect our purpose and discover new meaning from the ashes of these dark days. bless us with a spirit that can forgive. shine upon us the divine light that is true, good, noble, and pure so that we may heal and be healers in this time of great sadness. in your holy name, we pray, amen. >> the roll call is an army tradition. sergeants major routinely called the units roll after battle to account for all soldiers under the command. --aff sergeant grafted sergeant first class ferguson. sergeant first class daniel ferguson. sergeant first class daniel michael ferguson. specialist wilson. >> here. >> private first class rose. >> here. >> staff sergeant lazan ey-rodriguwez. staff sergeant laza ney-rodriguez. staff sergeant lazaney -rodriquez. specialist scott. >> here. >> sergeant owens. sergeant timothy owens. owef sergeant timothy wayne ns. fired] ♪ ♪ ♪ [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2013] >> if you continue to send people here who have no real-world experience, no real hardship, no difficulty, no successes in life outside of politics, you are going to continue to get the same result. that is why i think we need a constitutional convention that will put term limits. once you put term limits on, you eliminate a lot of careers that go on here. the other thing that will open up a lot more seats for a lot more people who actually have real world experience to be competitive in terms of coming up here -- that is only one part of what you can do to fix the government. you are not going to fix it in washington today. i am literally convinced of that. i will have spent 16 years in congress, and i continue to be disappointed everyday at the lack of foresight, at the lack of judgment, at the lack of long-term thinking, and the lack of critical decision-making that occurs in congress. on his career,rn politics, and reasons for his retirement from the senate, sunday night at 8:00 on c-span's "q&a." on the one-year anniversary of the boston marathon bombings, the house homeland security committee held a hearing with testimony from the law enforcement officials who first responded to and investigated the attacks. this is an hour and 45 minutes. >> the committee is meeting today to examine the bombings in boston on april 15th, 2013. today there will be a memorial in my home state of texas for the shooting that took place last week. before we continue this proceeding, i would like to take a moment of silence to recognize the victims of this norfolk attack -- horrific attack. i now recognize myself for an opening statement. this is a powerful and emotional day for the witnesses and for me. it is a time to remember the anniversary of the boston marathon bombings. it is a time to remember the victims. i personally remember walking down boylston street with boston police commissioner edward davis who is with us here today. i remember him pointing out to me the trash cans where the bombs went off, injuring 260 innocent people and killing three, including an eight-year-old boy, in cold blood. in the middle of the chaos, we also witnessed exceptional bravery. acts ofor the heroic the first responders and boston citizens who ran towards danger instead of away, many more could have died. after the attack, the marathoners tying their shoes hundreds immemorial out of respect and dedication. i also remember the watertown police chief who is with us here fory as well, and thank you being here -- i remember him taking me and congressman keating on a tour of their once quiet neighborhood and seeing the aftermath of the gunfight to take down two of the biggest terrorists since 9/11. what happened after that is what heroes are made of. threw everything he had at these officers, including pipe bombs, rounds of ammunition, and it pressure cooker ied. the boston bomber was finally subdued after the horrific acts and efforts of our local law enforcement who are with us today, as well. so well-known is that had it not been for the efforts of commissioner ed davis and those of the watertown police force, our nation could have been further terrorized. these terrorists had six more bombs in their car, and they were on their way to times square. heroiceren't for these acts of bravery, new york city could have been hit again. we will hear from these brave individuals today for the first during thiscongress committee through its oversight responsibilities conducted a thorough investigation into what happened and what went wrong. we found that several flags and warnings were missed. was ond that tamerlan the raider of the fbi and somehow dropped off. we found that he traveled to dagestan, knowing for its chechen terrorists. this is precisely what a russian letter warned our intelligence community and fbi about. he came back even more radicalized. we also found that unfortunately customs, fbi, and the intelligence community somehow missed it. arrogantly, some u.s. officials said it wouldn't have made a difference. it would not have made a difference if they had known about his overseas travels. we now know that, checking his public social media would have shown indicators such as jihadist video postings. seen escalating behavior, as well. it likely would have been clear that he was becoming more and more of a threat to his community, which takes me to my rid state and local police have a strong role in counterterrorism. they know the streets better than anybody, and they know the local threats to rid the boston pd should have given more should have been given more information throughout the entire process. they must know terror threats in their own backyards. this process, in my judgment, has to change. this, twort to do weeks ago our committee issued our report about the boston marathon bombings. over the course of the year, we held two hearings, added numerous briefings and engagements, traveled to boston multiple times, had a bipartisan staff delegation traveled to moscow. i personally went to boston and bosco with mr. keating and spoke with officials on the ground. i want to thank the democrats for their participation in the investigation and the report. i am pleased that their input was reflected in the final report. based on the lessons learned, we issued our recommendations to fix some of the systemic problems that led to tamerlan ts arnaev falling off our radar. small way,hink, in a the recommendations we made in this report can make a difference in preventing the tragedy we saw in boston from occurring again in the homeland. i'm pleased to know and to hear and report that both the fbi and dhs are already constructively implementing the recommendations of this committee's report, and i commend them for that. let us hope that such a tragic event like this never happens again. with that, i would now like to in thise the heroes hearing, in this committee room here today, the watertown officers who are with us here today who were directly involved takenerlan's takedown, off the streets once and for all. sergeant john mcclellan, officer joseph relevant -- reynolds, officermagill colen, michael comic, and of course, chief gevo. gentlemen, would you please stand and be recognized? [applause] the chair now recognizes the acting ranking member, miss sanchez. >> i think the chairman for holding today's hearing, and i also extend my condolences to the families of the four people killed during last week's shooting at fort hood. additional prayers are with the people injured during that shooting. the firstto recognize responder community and medical personnel for their incredible response to the shooting. today, the joint terrorism task force does not consider the shooting an act of terrorism. however, the investigation is ongoing. i am going to read into the record comments from our ranking member, mr. thompson. incidents like last week's shooting and last year's model -- marathon bombing, we are reminded of the importance of our first responders. i commend the service of our witnesses, former commissioner chief, the sergeants, and i think professor leonard for recognizing their courageous efforts in his research. resilience and response are two of the reasons why almost a year areahe boston metropolitan -- why almost a year from ago, the boston metropolitan area remains strong. wish mayor walsh, president of the boston athletic association, and all the runners and volunteers participating in the 118th boston marathon well as the race commences on the 21st of april of this year. even though boston is standing strong, it would be a disservice to the community not to take a look back. there are still unanswered rnaevions about the tsa rudders. we owe it to doug people of boston -- to the people of boston and the people of america that officials do a thorough review of that situation. last april, the inspectors general of the intelligence community, departments of homeland security and justice and the central intelligence agency announced a joint investigation into whether intelligence was properly intributed and acted upon the months and years before the bombing at the boston marathon. i find it rather unfortunate that the review was delayed because of the senseless 16-day government shutdown in october of 2013. partisan disagreements create serious gaps in homeland security oversight, and this is just one example of the myriad of setbacks that the shutdown yielded. another development since last year is attorney general holder's january 13 announcement that the u.s. would be seeking the death penalty against the allegedlyaev, boston marathon a bomber. he was arrested and indicted. confidence ind my his receiving a fair yet aggressive prosecution in the united states district court for the commonwealth of massachusetts. mr. chairman, as a former federal prosecutor, you know attorney general holder's decision to seek the death penalty is a game changer. i'm sure you are familiar with the intricacies involved in a capital case. as i reminded the committee last year, as we fulfill our constitutional oversight responsibilities, we must be careful not to jeopardize a federal prosecution. this applies in both the words that we speak to the public, as well as the publications that stem from this committee. unfortunately, some of the actions that have extended from this committee have not been helpful to the department of justice. on march 25, a majority staff report endorsed by a minority at a minority of the members of this committee was released to the public. less than 48 hours after the arnaev's release, ts defense team filename ocean in the district court citing this report. i reemphasize that as members of congress, especially as members of the homeland security committee, we are held to a heightened standard. we are trusted with both classified and unclassified briefings and meetings with members of the intelligence community. therefore, the words that we speak or publish about alleged transcend the halls of this congress and are not taken lightly by the public. furthermore, this not only applies to events surrounding boston but also to other events with pending investigation. reaching conclusions before facts are known puts the reputation of this committee at peril. a sauce, we must exercise discretion in our questioning, and our statements about events, suspects, and the links to others that may not be in custody. of those limitations, mr. chairman, we can still use our platform to have a productive discussion about the acton marathon bombing and on outstanding matters. for example, we can and should discuss the funding given to the first responder community. last year, at the committee on homeland security's first hearing, former commissioner davis said without grant funding , "the response would have been much less comprehensive than it exercisesithout the supported through the urban area security initiative funding, there would have been more people who died in these attacks." for faster leonard's testimony also indicates that this type of preparedness is what makes first respondents effective. the sergeant is testifying today that local municipal governments are not financially equipped to take on the increasing burden of these catastrophic attacks like boston. we not onlyhat listen to the first responders but that we also take action. not only after last year's hearings, but also hearings throughout several congresses, members have heard about the importance of these grant programs and the success stories involving them. accordingly, i urge members to oppose the administration's proposal to shift focus away from supporting state and local efforts to develop terrorism-related prevention and preparedness capabilities by morphing the homeland security annt program into all-hazards grand prix i'm not convinced that the under funded grants consolidation proposal would provide sufficient support for first responders across america to build and maintain the capabilities necessary to respond as effectively as the first responders in boston and watertown did after the bombings last year. we learned from 9/11 that it is the local responders that are there on the scene. i cannot support any grant reform proposal until i'm convinced it would provide the support necessary to maintain the terrorism preparedness capabilities that we have spent -- has been building now for over a decade. also, i agree with the chairman that we cannot ignore that information sharing between federal, state, and local authorities needs strengthening. since september 11, information sharing silos that the 9/11 commissioners addressed continue to be exposed after tragic events. we need to work together to develop ways to fix that problem as soon as possible. we must also consider the economic costs of terrorism. in response to the events of september 11, congress enacted the terrorism risk insurance act of 2002. that measure increased the availability of terrorism risk insurance to at risk american businesses by guaranteeing that the government would share some of the losses with private insurance should a terrorist attack occur at a building. that act is set to sunset this year. according to the rand corporation, allowing this act to expire would harm our national security. , mr. thompson introduced a bill that would and add somet needed improvements. i urge my colleagues to cosponsor the legislation. even though it has been almost a year since the bombings, there has been some game changing .oments some ships are still anchored. as we continue to seek answers, i remind us to be responsible and to act within our constitutional boundaries. the people of boston are looking for our leadership on this issue , and i yield back the balance of my time and ask that the full statement be put into the record. >> without objection, so ordered. i think the ranking member. i understand legal standards very well. i would do nothing to jeopardize the prosecution. also, as a member of congress, i understand our responsibilities of oversight under the constitution of the united states. as recently quoted in the "boston globe," "this shouldn't be about democrats and republicans. if you cannot put that behind you on an issue like this, then i don't know when you can." i couldn't agree more with that statement. with that, the chair now recognizes the gentleman from massachusetts who has had more impact out of this tragedy than any other member of this committee, mr. keating, to introduce today's witnesses. >> thank you, mr. chairman. by way of introduction, i just want to realize and have us all realize that it is almost a year to the day of april 15 when we were all shocked, not just in massachusetts, but around the country at the news, the lives of four young individuals were taken and hundreds more were injured in the boston marathon. if i could, in this introductory period, i would like us to take a moment to remember and honor the lives of krystle campbell, lindsay collier, 26, richard, 8. martin that boston'subt handling of the marathon attack will serve as a model for cities around the world on how to respond to mass homeland security incidents. for this reason, it is important to look back and analyze the steps taken before, during, and after the tragedy. we are honored today to have before this committee public from boston and watertown whose actions directly impeded further damage and loss of lives during the attack and in the days following. in that regard, all of our witnesses today can provide unique perspectives on the best methods to increase our nation's adaptability, and transparency within the homeland realm.y our first witness, former boston police commissioner edward davis, is currently with the john f. kennedy school of government at harvard university. mr. davis was appointed by another great leader, former boston mayor thomas menino. this role, commissioner davis led the boston police department's response to the boston marathon bombings on april 15. the heroic actions and quit thinking of the men and women under mr. davis's leadership, as well as that of the massachusetts national guard, the boston national guard, medical personnel, and indeed, civilians, led to the survival of 17 critically injured civilians. i have known mr. davis throughout his 34 years of law enforcement, and he served in the lowell police department. he was named superintendent in 1994. he was recognized for reducing the crime rate and lowell quicker than any other superintendent in the united states of america with over 100,000 residents in the city -- in a city of over one hundred thousand residents. commissioner, thank you for your service and your service to the city of boston, the commonwealth, and to the country. it is an honor to have you with us here today. we look forward to your testimony. we also have the chief of police at the watertown police department, mr. edward devoe. the chief sits on the executive board of the massachusetts chief of police association and played a crucial role during the manhunt for dzhokhar tsarnaev. his leadership made national headlines, and when five of his officers found themselves in a battle that involved both gunfire and homemade explosives in a small street of watertown -- chief devoe, we are grateful for you testifying here today. finally, sergeant jeffrey pu gliese is the second-generation officer of a watertown police officer. he was born and raised in watertown. sergeanten promoted to in 1993, he was on the night shift during the early hours of april 19, 2013 when he came to the assistance of his fellow officers. after a grueling exchange of fire, he came within six feet of tamerlan tsarnaev and eventually chased the suspect, tackled him to the ground, leaving him time to rush those hurt on the scene to the hospital. members of this committee had the opportunity to visit the thee and were able to see and thesigns of heroism impressions that the bombs and bullets left throughout that street. sergeant, thank you for your incredible service. and even though i am not introducing him, i want to dutch leonardeant from the university, and the report that professor leonard is going to talk about today has been submitted to the record. without objection, so ordered. >> i yelled back. >> professor leonard, thank you for being here. i guess i am somewhat of an alumni. you produced an excellent report and analysis of the boston bombing and i look forward to reading that and sharing my thoughts with you. thanks much for being here today. the written statements of witnesses will appear in the record. the chair now recognizes commissioner davis for five minutes for an opening statement. >> thank you for inviting me to speak before you today. [inaudible] i'm sorry. came before you last may of commissioner of the boston police department to offer my insights into the information that occurred before and during the events of last april. i also came to you on behalf of of the boston community, and specifically for people whose voices could no longer be heard the guys of the attacks of these cowards. i ask you to remember the lives of martin, crystal, lou, and m.i.t. police officer sean collier. thaty comments reflect nobody can ever make up for the lives cut senselessly short. asked tuesday will mark the one-year anniversary since two pressure cooker bombs were detonated on anna stork stretch of austin street that leads to one of the most inspirational sites an athlete can view, the finish line of the boston marathon. that one changed in year for the hundreds of victims wanted in the attack. get on abeen altered, daily basis we continue to see and hear the inspirational stories of those victims. of adriana ofhat boston, a professional dancer who returned to the stage last month despite losing part of her left leg during one of the explosions, or jeff, the iconic image of him being wheeled away from the devastation by a good samaritan emblazoned in our minds. he just announced he is engaged in is going to be a new father sin. sister whohards' inspired a team of runners to run on her behalf. or the dozens of nurses and first responders who will be undertaking their first marathon ever next week in honor of the victims whose lives they helped save. there are hundreds more stories i could share with you. i just want to make sure that none of them are lost in time as we continue to examine the events that led to the attacks in the actions that unfolded in the days and weeks after. i also want to speak on behalf of the community, not just boston but the greater community at large. in the year since i have traveled across this great country talking about the lessons learned from this tragedy, i have come to realize the community that relies to be -- that rallied beyond boston strong numbers in the millions. that is how the nation felt after these attacks on our freedom and how the innocents in the paths about the explosion. many questions were raised about who knew what and when and what information was shared. year, the level of interagency cooperation that has occurred between local, state, and federal law enforcement has ensured we have found ourselves answers to the many questions that have been posed. within the first few minutes of hearing about the explosions on boylston street, my first phone call was to my friend and colleague at the fbi. we worked side-by-side through swing week and i considered him a staunch friend and ally. he offered all of the services of the fbi and other agencies to make sure we not only apprehended the terrorist responsible for the crime but also to ensure our interagency collaboration affords all of our agencies the critical information sharing needed for the organizations to operate at peak efficiency. what all of us learned that week in the ensuing 12 months is how the big our community is beyond the partnerships and levels of government. how the law enforcement community is obvious. with me are some of my colleagues from the neighboring police departments. the community where the manhunt came to an and and the committed that found in its neighborhoods never -- under siege never before. police, watertown police, none of our agencies could have enjoyed the success we achieved without the involvement of a much larger community that felt personally victimized by the attacks. that is the community that has been come to and known as boston strong. in the past 12 months, boston strong has been used as a rallying cry for indomitable spirit, a sign of resilience and perseverance. team, thewn baseball red sox, found inspiration from the message to win the world series. it came to personify our unexceptional patriotism and commitments to neighbors helping neighbors. in new england, we do not just gee it is a cliché or hashta on twitter, it was a proclamation that we stand together in the face of unimaginable atrocities to hold fast to our ideals and basic tenets of freedom. boston strong became an exclamation. by a community that wants the world to know that he can rally in the face of adversity and, armed with the necessary information, can work with its government partners to achieve the safe and desired outcome to a horrible and senseless act of violence. our city a few days after the attacks, president obama told the world that boston would run again, and he is right. we run to support the dreams and personal aspirations of everyone who will be lacing up their sneakers to complete the grueling course. we run for the ideals that this kind of event brings our community together to celebrate everything that is great about our city, our state, and our nation. and we run for those who cannot be there this year. officer lou, martin, an sean collier. all of us run together. thank you. >> the chair now recognizes chief to go for an opening statement. >> thank you for the privilege of doing this. i am extremely proud to be here today representing the men and women of the watertown police department. our goal has always been to be the best police department in massachusetts. i had the privilege of meeting you in the committee when you travel to boston and watertown. i thank you in the members to learn about how the watertown police department and community responded to the events of that day. the actionsak about of the watertown police department, i would like to give some background. patriots' day is a special day in boston. it is my favorite weekend of the year. businesses and schools are closed in massachusetts for most people. spectators line the 26 miles of the boston marathon into boston, cheering on the elite runners but also the regular people who run for charities. the boston red sox play at 11 a.m. fans the game, all the walked down to kenmore square and walk the final mile or two of the marathon. you have not lived in boston long if you have not in a spectator or volunteer or runner. with 12 of will run my officers. it will be an emotional day as we run the route and crossed the finish line. the boston marathon will be held in less than two weeks and more people want to be part of it. they want to come together and celebrate those who died and were injured last year. they want to remember officer sean collier of the m.i.t. police department who was ambushed and killed before the two brothers got into watertown. seen what occurred at the finish line of the marathon on april 19. commissioner davis has spoke about that, how well an impressive his department responded that day. i am here today to talk about the events that occurred in watertown on april 19. that seemingly quiet overnight shift suddenly turned into a war zone. for the first time in america, police officers were attacked with guns and bombs on a quiet backstreet of my community. those two brothers were trying to kill my police officers and had plans to kill and injure more innocence. the handful of officers on duty that day acted heroically and defendant watertown without regard for their own personal safety. they displayed courage and bravery lay as they -- and stubbornlythey defended our community. my officers were at their best when they were confronted with these big challenges. their split-second decisions and actions went far beyond their academy training, but i assure you they will not be taught in academies across the country. , but aseen said before police chief i want to state it again -- the actions of my officers saved lives here in boston and new york city. i want to introduce those officers. again, i would like to point out officer joe reynolds, the first officer to confront the two brothers. he had no idea who he was up against. did notgot notified, we know it was related to the boston bombing or sean collier. immediately shot on. john, sitting behind him, was the next officer on the street. he got a round through his windshield and the bullet went right by his ear. they continued to fight on that backstreet of watertown. miguel and mike showed up shortly after that. up, heficer colon showed had trouble getting out of his cruiser to help. you will hear about all of the heroic things he did. during these trying days last april, two individuals attempt to strike fear and take down a city. they attempted to terrorize us all. in the end, they come place nothing. they will never know what it is. when america gets knocked down, we pick ourselves up and get stronger. we will not be intimidated. watertown is stronger, boston is stronger, and in my opinion the entire country is united and stronger. the strength and resilience and even defiance is what made boston strong, and i know if an attack occurs in another city in our country, they will respond in a similar way. the watertown police officers on duty that night stop these evil brothers from leaving with a cadre of weapons to carry out their deadly plan. in the following 18 hours, our entire department of 65 officers was tested and worked around-the-clock the clock to keep our communities safe. unprecedented support from the surrounding police departments and federal agencies as a result -- and as a result the second boston bombing suspect was captured. i want to thank everyone for their patience and support. it truly took an entire community. my chairman, when i begin comments today, i mentioned our goal was to be the best leased apartment in the state, and i'm not sure if we have reached that, but i can tell you one thing -- we may have the best damn police department in the world. i'm happy to answer any questions you may have. chief, for the compelling testimony. and you are right about the best police department in the world. with that, we turn to sergeant for his testimony. morning. thank you for inviting us to speak here this morning. it little background on myself. 34 years at officer the watertown police department. >> can the clerks help with the microphones at the witness table? >> is that better? are it. haveround on myself, i been a police officer 34 years in the town of watertown. prior to that i served in the u.s. army from 1974 until 1978, military police assigned to the earl in brigade in berlin, germany. what happened that night, i finished my work shift what i heard a radio broadcast that officers from my agency were following an alleged carjacked vehicle. i knew the current shift had for patrol officers and a patrol supervisor on the street that night. i thought i would head out to assist the officers in the event it became a pursuit or foot pursuit or any assistance was needed. area, i route to the heard another broadcast that the officers were now taking gunfire from the occupants of the alleged carjacked vehicle and requesting assistance. when i arrived on the scene, i heard gunfire aimed at my vehicle and in moments i heard an explosion. i advanced to the area where the other officers were taking cover and returning gunfire. the suspects were eventually taken into custody. i'm not really at liberty to go into my new details of the incident. still the suspects is awaiting trial. but i will endeavor to answer any questions you may have. i would like to make note that in today's ever-changing environment of violence, local municipal governments are not financially equipped to take on the ever-increasing burden of such hostile actions. in closing i would like to say all of the officers in the watertown police department, those officers who were there that night, their ordinary guys put in an extraordinary situation and performed extraordinarily well. once again, thank you for inviting me to speak at this hearing. >> thank you, sergeant. he for your acts of heroism, taking down the biggest terror since 9/11. we now recognize professor leonard. >> thank you, mr. chairman. thank you for inviting me to testify. my thanks to congressman keating for his tireless work that has brought the boston marathon issues to our attention. i'm honored to appear today with three genuine heroes of that week. commissioner ed davis, chief gelese, and sergeant pu and the five watertown police officers who gave such a great account of themselves when they were the best police force in the world. each of them will tell you he is not a hero. but i feel very strongly today, and i think we all know, we are in the company of heroes. leonard, the professor and codirector of the program of crisis leadership at the kennedy school of government at harvard. for the last year, we have been doing research on the boston marathon bombing, supported in part by the international center for sport security. this was a team effort from the beginning, and all of my colleagues were huge contributors to this. one of my co-authors, christine, is with us today. my views i am preventing are own, not those of harvard university or any other organization. our work was done in honor of those who lost their lives or suffered egregious -- suffered grievous injuries. we focused on the issues of command and coordination. we are examining issues, as the committee has, of three event intelligence. about why was boston strong was released last week. localers to the descriptions already referenced, boston strong, of the resilience shown by first responders and survivors and the community during that week. my first message to the committee is about the first responder part of boston strong. .ncident command works the national incident management system that this committee mandated in the homeland security act of 2002, section 502, part five is starting to work. responders, first worked without effective multiagency doctrines of how to combine and incident management. too many times we watched while vitally needed communities -- vitallyly needed -- were notems effectively deployed. boston strong is a good illustration of what can be achieved. we believe the response in boston over that course of that week is as good as one could have reasonably hoped. so why were people and organizations able to be so effective? we found three answers. first, because senior commanders, including at davis ux, were able to come together and form a joint command structure. that was not a result of chance. it was joint planning and exercises involving numerous agencies over many years in the planning for and production of fixed events. some of it funded through grants from the homeland security department. third, other communities can do this, too. any community can engage in joint planning and execution for any major fixed event. good daysr dues on builds the infrastructures of interagency familiarity, respect, and trust, and has an immediate payoff. if a bad day ever comes, as it did in boston, that structure is literally a lifesaver. our research suggests several areas where further work needs to be done, but if we had to choose just one thing to improve, would be to add at the tactical level micro-command, the ability for people to quickly come together in an organized way. that would be in parallel to the announcement -- national incident command system of macro command that allows the senior people to come together at the strategic level. my second message to the committee is about the community part of resistance to terrorism. it is again on display this year as my daughter and the chief and thousands of others trained to run in this year's marathon. boston strong encompasses what everyone did and does to stand tall and proud in the face of two murderous thugs with terrorist intense. boston strong is not a form of or naïveté.rogance it is a form of pride and defiance and resilience. terrorist, in the end, are few and weak. he could never defeat us. but we could voluntarily surrender to them. and we must not. if wecower in fear, abandon our commitment to a free and open society, we do our work for them. we cannot defend the american way of life as these five officers did that night by surrendering. protect, uphold, and defend. boston strong affirms the oath of office. austin strong says we will defend the american way of life by continuing to participate in it. the community part of boston strong is a good place to start in thinking about what resilience actually looks like. thank you, and i look forward to your questions. >> thank you, professor. on me just say we all felt that day that we were all citizens of boston. the way boston and the people responded with the resilience and strength was truly inspiring i think to the nation. i am wearing my boston strong pin to show my support and solidarity as well stop the chair now recognizes himself for five minutes. commissioner davis, welcome back. been almost a year since we have come up on the anniversary. they say that a man's true character is tested in a ti me of crisis, and your character really shine. you're a true leader. you were a calling influence for the nation, comforting influence very --nation, and a and in a very dangerous time of crisis i cannot think of a better man at a better time than you, sir. >> that's very kind of you. i had a great team, mr. chairman. >> we had so much respect for your service and dedication, and you will be remembered for a very long time. you and i have talked quite a bit since that tragic day. your response efforts were her brought an end to these terrorists who were on their way to time square. i don't want this to be a "gotcha" such as size, but i was think of something like this happens, we can always analyze and determine what we can do better to make sure this never happens again. can you tell me personally from your background and experience from this event and your long enforcement -- law-enforcement background, what are the real lessons learned from the boston bombing? >> mr. chairman, i would like to commend you for the work you have done, congressman keating, and all the members of the committee that have reviewed this. i have taken a good long look at the report that came out, and i think that the recommendations that are broken down into four categories in the report are really the best steps to take to deal with any shortcomings that were identified. there is nothing in there that cannot be accomplished simply. those recommendations will cause a more comprehensive and effective system to protect our nation to be put in place, and i think that those should be followed. >> i appreciate that. i think that -- and as i said in my opening statement, i'm pleased to see the fbi has begun to implement these recommendations, along with the department of homeland security. that oversight is at its best. thank you again for your service, sir. chief, you and i talked about the tragic event that day, but also the acts of heroism on behalf of you and your officers. in taking down one of the biggest terror threat since 9/11. , may beas interested surprised to find out is once he was taken down, you are not even quite sure who this person was. and that after-the-fact learned that he was indeed the boston bomber. can you tell me -- we talked about this, hindsight is always 20/20, boat would it make sense to include -- but what it make sense to include local police department when something like this happens, when a terrorist attack occurs, after the event occurs to bring in the local police departments in the area for briefings and for participation with the joint terrorism task force? >> thank you, mr. chairman. yes, i do thin k so. department,5 man all the big cities have that, but what are town represents most police departments across the country with limited resources. it does not make sense for us to have somebody at the jt tf on iraq full-time basis. -- on a full-time basis. but when something like this happens, we need to have access to that and be brought into it, updated, and play a role. i think some of the recommendations you are making in your report touched on that. we needed to have a seat right away. there were obstacles we had to do before we could. i think there can be improvement , and your committee is helping make that happen. your insight on that. i think that is a potential future recommendation, that local police departments be brought into these crisis situations to possibly identify a suspect before rather than after-the-fact. i just want to commend you and the sergeant and all of the behind you,e four for one of the biggest acts of heroism. you are correct, for eight and half minutes, you are the best police department in the world, and i would say you are still a great police department. >> thank you. >> my time is expired. i now recognize the ranking member, mrs. sanchez. >> thank you, mr. chairman. following the september 11 attacks, the department of homeland security develop the national incident management oftem to improve the ability first responders to coordinate multijurisdictional response efforts. how have federal grants enabled organizations to implement them, and would reductions to or changes to the structure of our federal homeland security grant , what the administration is adjusting his weeklong -- ishing together suggesting is that we clump everything together, do you feel that approach is correct? would it harm you if we did it that way? etc., etc. fromcan tell you experience that the programs as they are set up have been very effective. our ability to coordinate with with other agencies, our ability andrain on the nims system game it out on table tops and in real-life situations, when we were dealing with sports victories and things like that in boston, that money all comes from our homeland security grants and funding. the other thing that we have is the equipment that is necessary to respond to something like this. before the program,our equipment was antiquated and not up to the task. when we were called to service that day, we had exactly what we needed to go in and clear the neighborhoods and do the work that had to be done in watertown to catch these guys. so i think the program as it exists works very well. >> chief? >> i would agree with the commissioners comments. in watertown, we don't get as much funding as boston would, nor should we. the watertown communities are 50 communities surrounding boston. >> in my area i have two uasi recipients, but they work through the local police departments to make sure that everybody is buying things to use together. have a swat situation, you have the right things. that the way you are seeing it? >> exactly right, it makes no sense for what are town to buy squat equipment or vehicles, but we can partner with the towns and cities to team up. it does not make sense for me to have a swat team, but it makes all the sense of the world for us to have a 40 man swat team for all of those communities to have a rapid response team, and have the vehicle and attack equipment to respond. watertown was able to participate with our law enforcement, along with boston and state police and national guard, and be able to protect our own community for those grants when a long way. the training that goes on, you can never prepare for what happened in watertown, but trading makes for police , professionals, training, training, training. we need to do that to be up to perform when we are challenged like we were in watertown. >> i think my police department's are very concerned about all of this being lumped .nto one line item whenever we consolidate programs into one line item, we generally also reduce at the same time the amounts of money available. so it makes it difficult. thank you, gentlemen. theso have a concern about harvard white paper on the boston marathon bombing, identifying communication to the public as an incredibly important issue, particularly in light of this 24-hour cycle, everybody trying to put something on, all the rumors that go, all the things that fly, and then get repeated and repeated and america gets scared or is incensed or whatever goes on. social media. you know, things we have become an face everyday. but for jurisdiction that for a jurisdiction in a crisis can be difficult. can you tell me -- what have you done? what did you learn from that experience? have you set up different protocols about how you share information, what you say to the community and the public? what are the lessons we can learn from that? >> we had a significant presence on social media prior to the event. you cannot have an event and twitter or facebook account. you have to understand how that works. in the years before the april 15 bombing, we used twitter and facebook to get information out. we don't even do press releases anymore. we just posted on social media and the press monitors it. what's good about that is not only do we speak one way, not only can we send information out to the public and the media, but a dialogue exists on social media. we are able to understand how people are react in you and thinking what we are saying and whether we are getting the real message across. ofs a very effective means getting information out to people quickly, effect only, and a crisis. cell phone usage. the cell phones shut down at the marathon because of overuse. >> we saw that on 9/11 also. towe were able to revert social media and get messages out to people who were trying to find loved ones after the event. where toelling them go, what to do. it's an effective means of communicating with people and speaking back and forth, the dialogue is very critical. >> i also like to hear from the chiefs, if you will indulge me. then i have another follow-up question. >> i think the boston police department did an incredible job about getting the news out and reliable information. was so much misinformation when the media came in and they relied on the boston police department to get it straight. to notify residents at 2:00 a.m. to shelter in place and we had a communication system where we could encourage people to shelter in place, notify their neighbors, and that worked as well. boston really assisted us as the manhunt went on to make sure residents in greater boston were getting the right information through social media. >> do you think that other agencies, other pleased departments are as advanced as you are, commissioner? not even using traditional media but putting our press releases out? >> there are very few departments who do that and it's the coming more of a realization among the major city chiefs that this is something to invest time in. >> thank you, mr. chair. >> i want to associate my remarks with respect to the response training. responders had emergency response training exercise that was funded with homeland security grant dollars and i know that made a big difference in the saving lives that fateful day. >> there's no question. >> the chair now recognizes the gentleman from new york, mr. king. >> at the outside tom a thank you for the outstanding work you've done on this report, the time and effort you've put into it that represents the very best of what a committee should be doing especially when we have such a topic like this that can inflame emotions and there can be distortions. the fact that the two of you work so well together is a tribute to both of you. i'm proud to be on the committee with you. commissioner davis, police chief aveau, fdny thinks you from the assistance you've given over the years. when we are talking about what we've done -- i'm not just here to give tribute to you. i have great admiration of you. confidence you project is absolutely essential. in addition, within moments of the bombing happening, you were able to put everything in the play securing the site, ambulances, everything that had to be done was done. this waso idea that going to happen and they are involved in a gunfight for their lives. how much effort is put into training every year? you have to have as many contingencies as possible and i guess hope for the best. when that happens it can be put into good use. on in theraining goes course of a year? do you put in to try to provide for contingencies? >> we try to train as much as we can all the time. some of the best training we got in the regional training is working with boston. championship or razor back toions, even going the democratic national convention in a number of years back, we always work with them. we train all the time. our units train with austin and the state police trying to do that. sports team practices and practices to get it right on game day, that's what we need to do. we need to train, train, train. dollars are limited. we tried to put it the right ways, the money that we do get federally and with ed davis possibly leadership we've done a great job in the greater boston area working together to have that work under the unified command of everyone doing at that particular day. that was based on all the training we had done with the cities and towns around boston, with boston. >> we put a mumbai-style attack together and we used u.s. money to fund a couple days of training. we took over different venues in the city and played out what would happen if there were multiple attacks on the city. that was the first time we had engaged the medical people into the training. was called operation urban shield and it was very effective because a got the medical people lined up with us and when we went to the hospital's and had to take over some of the emergency room is because there were potential suspect there, because we had done training with them beforehand it went much more smoothly. that same year we had done homeland security training that came in through dhs. two huge trainings in addition to a continual process of training for our swat teams that happens routinely. gone over thedy issue of information not being shared before the event and it has been discussed and is being addressed. coming from new york, i was struck by the fact that when joe money was being interrogated, no one talked about it but they did not know that they were the only two involved. could have been others on the way to new york yet new york was not told about it in commissioner kelly learned about it two or three days later. he asked why i did not tell him but i did not know anything about it other than the fbi said something. going towards the future, what is the protocol if you find a possible additional attack being planned? should the department be notified? calexico have been anyone along the atlantic coast. that may bethink holding this information to closely in the interests of besecution or having justice the only thing that we think ,bout, in addition to justice there is the issue of public safety. our system is so focused on a close hold and maintaining on the evidence for the prosecution that it is certainly the right thing to do, but i think that singular focus must be tempered with the overall safety and security of the community. >> there could have been another attack being planned in new york, philadelphia, trenton. >> and a stand the commissioners concern. the committee,on i went to watertown to find out exactly what happened and not only did i have a minute by minute reefing but he stood in the pouring rain for an hour which was above and beyond the call of duty. maybe you can get line of duty disability for that. thank you for coming. thank all of you for coming. >> the chair recognizes the gentleman from massachusetts. >> i would like to asking animus consent to clarify for the record congressman sanchez's statement that it was joe carson federal- tsarnaev in custody. i wondered the motivations of the attack, how i came to be, how it could be prevented in the future. because of that, it took me to russia twice to try and get information to see if there was a link between the north caucuses region, chechnya, if there was any connection for the motivations of this. i the course of doing that, learned that authorities here in the u.s., the fbi and later the cia were given detailed information about tamierlan. frustrationter some with our own federal agencies in that regard. concern aboutl information sharing across the board and there is an obvious multiplier benefit in sharing information and the testimony before the committee, we were told there is roughly 800,000 local police that could be utilized in this effort and there's about 14,000 fbi agents. one of the sensitivities behind the lack of information sharing is a concern that as you spread information among sources that there could be leaks. there is that in addition. right now,your job people's lives are in danger and you already hold very sensitive weremation that if it released, in your own community, people to be in danger. could you comment on how you maintain that confidentiality i thinky and how there's a greater risk in not sharing that information with local police authority? 9/11, police chiefs around the nation have received secret and top-secret clearances so that they can be involved in the conversation around these issues. the intent of that was to make sure that there was wider distribution, a wider spreading of the type of information that would be helpful to add in watertown and to myself when i was in boston. intent isat the really good and people have recognized that it should be the way that it works but when you are dealing with such large organizations over time, sustaining change is difficult. that elastic band tends to pop back to where it was. besides having good intentions and having good policies, there has to be a constant testing of systems to make sure that they are in fact working and that is where we need some work. >> i would agree. depending on what the intelligences, and needs to get down to our level. they are out on the street and interacting. it's value-added. could be more information they are not aware of that the officers behind me are aware of it we could share information and we have to continue to build that trust and move this forward as an example to get better. ofduring the whole course this, the committee is trying to really have a continual mother what happened before with the initial information, what happened during the attack, afterwards. and i think this committee has done very well to fill in all of those areas. there is an area that i still have questions about. this and learn about particularly the mission or davis could be helpful in this regard. i just wanted to see procedurally what was going on and i think we could do that without jeopardizing anything, frankly, at all. "60 minutes" segment broadcast about the marathon bombing and the f ei response. i learned for the first time in imagesgment that the that ended up being the images of the suspects, those images were available on wednesday. furthermore, i recall on wednesday there was a press conference that was announced i believeal audience, that the boston police station or wherever it was being held. and at the last minute it was canceled. on what theed light nature of the press conference was? do you recall? are there some procedures that took place or some steps to fill in the lank? >> we did have the photographs on wednesday. there was a press conference scheduled but at that point in time, the guy had taken jurisdiction of the case of they were making decisions on when the press conferences would be or not. there was a desire among everyone at the table to be out front on this as often as possible, but that particular juncture, it was a decision made thereere above me that would not be a press conference but that was between the f ei and the justice department people. >> you don't know the reason inind that? or what happened 24 hours before there was another press conference? thank you for being that candid. to me, that goes to show one more time that maybe there should be more information sharing at all times during this because i would have thought whatever was going on during bostonme, frankly the police should have known what was going on. timel just yield back my to the chair and i appreciate that. like the chair recognizes mr. king for the purpose of entering a question into the record. if you could submit the answer this question in writing, it's important on this. you mentioned the idea of micro-command as an issue that needs to be better addressed. what exactly did you mean by that and why is it important? if you could submit an answer to that i would be very thankful. >> the chair recognizes g gentleman from pennsylvania. >> i think each and every one of the distinguished guests for your being here today. in addition to the way you have responded in the past with all of your officers, you are talking about the chief. you're going to run in this next marathon and the idea that it's not just how we responded in the the result to demonstrate to those who want to create terror and our communities that it will not happen. the idea is that the nurses, the officers, and others will run 26 miles in a marathon is quite a commitment. i want to touch on this thing that peter mentioned. i appreciate the professors focus on this. the concept of incident command was really a significant achievement. i know it is something that is preston -- activist but as a former prosecutor i appreciate that while you are responding, chief davis, you were doing two things. or stand foremost, you were responding to make sure those injured were safely evacuated and it was remarkable that within half an hour, this people whose lives could have been lost were in trauma serum -- centers taken care of that you are securing an incredible crime scene. that is the very substance of the information that becomes subsequently the evidence, chain of custody, and other things. prosecution tohe try and protect it. i appreciate the concept of chain of command that there really are a key questions and peter asked one of them. i would be interested in having the two chiefs and professor, if you have a moment. when you were making decisions, and in that chain of command, there were a couple of different kinds of things. there was a distinction between policy decisions and procedural decisions. that is where you get the command structure. those of you who know the receipt jurors about how to secure a crime scene, how to keep a community safe, how to respond and put your officers in but there are also questions. made a determination to release the photographs of the two individuals. you made a determination to shut the city down to secure watertown. courageous, political decision. if you could discuss higher distinguished between the two and how you work with sometimes political officials that may not have the same sort of background and then you were talking about that you focused on this micro-and that was the officers who were responding to the scene . the unit in watertown knows each other but in the small communities, it could be me next reading, everett, somebody. the officers are coming in and they don't work with these guys. how do you create a structure when they are walking in and the structure of being able to reate a response? these are all good lessons learned so if you could talk police chiefs, and professor, if you want to take a moment talk about the issue like roe, it would be helpful for all this -- issues like micro. >> these are very astute and i appreciate you asking these questions. the procedural piece was fairly much laid out through our practicing and with dealing with multiple homicides that occurred day in and day out. we are frequently called to the scene where people have been badly injured, multiple people shot. our first responsibility is to ase lives and get them out quickly as possible and get them the medical attention that they need. that, itkly after happens very fluidly. the crime scene gets locked down. this particular crime scene was complex because there was the distinct possibility that there was a third device. we were not only locking the crime scene down to preserve evidence that preserve the lives of the first responders. everybody left the scene, left the field. left until the bomb squad could go in and do their work but it becomes very methodical at that time. in the 18 minutes it took to clear the victims, very clearly after that, a process was put in clearing and evidence collection. one of the first things that we did was tell our technical people was to start to collect videotaped. it played an important role down the road. decisions,policy leaving the hospital and coming to the command post, he was joined there by governor patrick . our job as police officials, myself, the kernel from the state police, the fbi, was to give the political officials enough information so that they could get information out to the public to calm fears but also make decisions around big political issues, like the closing down of the transit system. advisers.as to be we advised. we told our elected officials exactly what we had and not the time the decision was made to , there were asit series of events that were playing out that gave people the idea that they could very well be a broader conspiracy with other people involved. there were courageous decisions made based on the best information that we had and we provided it to the elected officials and they did their job. is up but maybe you could jump into that. you have an appreciation for both aspects of the policy decision as well as the micro piece. focusing on the most important question here. do not take incident management for granted. it's not an accident. it's incredibly important. what's important about it is it facilitates to mandy and coordination across many agencies. the capabilities we need for issues arehorrible in many agencies and they should be. the issue is how to bring them together effectively in the moment and it's harder than it looks. it is not self-executing and it is not a natural act for those agencies to do it. it has to be practiced in advanced, worked on and developed. there is the political interface with the strategic operational. the governor and the mariner acting with commissioner davis, the chief, and other operational officials to figure out if we will shut down the city, release the photographs, which is a more tactical type of issue but that political issue is enormously important and they are silent on this question of how it should work so that needs more work and that's the macro level of command and coordination. the micro level is when the sergeant brought to the scene because he is naturally part of a system in which there is command, in which the officers know each other and that is in contrast to the dozens of other officers that showed up from many different departments at the same moment or thereafter the gun fight was over and they did not have a natural command structure and we need to work on that. that's what i mean by micro command. we need to remember that this is the most important asset. it's not a natural thing to have happen and it requires work in practice ahead of time. for me, the most important lesson of this whole experience is that any community can do this but not every community has and we need to keep that that. strong and incident management on display shows what can be done the we should not assume that it is now universal. we need to keep working on that. thank you for asking the question. >> it's frustrating as a philadelphia fan do have to realize you get the practice because you have all of those victory parades, patriots and someone else. >> when the series and you can practice, too. -- win the series. [laughter] >> the chair now recognizes mr. payne. davis, chief,r the administration is proposing to consolidate homeland security and the state homeland security grant program into one pool. based on the testimony heard comments ine of the ranking member thompson's statements, quite a few of us are concerned about that prospect. under the proposal, grantees would no longer be required to dedicate 25% of the grant awards to law enforcement and terrorism prevention. do you have concerns about proposed consolidation in reference to those? as it set the program up is working very well. i'm not briefed on the exact idea on the change but if it results in a reduction in overall money, i think it's problematic. >> as congresswoman sanchez stated, sometimes in the consolidation, the amount of the dollars are drowned down as well, consolidated. a great concern to quite a few of us on this committee in through congress because we know how those grant programs have been exceptional especially in an area such as mine. i'm from northern new jersey and i have the port authority, rail, airport. the grant has been phenomenal for us in that area. let's see. chief, would you like to mention or make a statement in reference to that? they're no longer to required to have 25% of the grant to terrorism prevention activities and that is our concern that money could be deviated for reasons other than those. i agree with the commissioner. the current system is working and i think your boss is an example of it working very well and i think it should stay in place. >> basically, i will yield back in the interest of time. >> we certainly appreciate it. the chair now recognizes the gentleman from california. witnessesou to our for being here today. i stand with boston and command you for your work. commissioner, you and i spoke before the hearing and pointed out that it was urban shield training that they had gone .hrough it was also an exercise that you held yourself. i wanted to bring to the witness and the committee's attention that one year later, we still, i whether face terrorists a broad or -- abroad or here, individuals influence by publications they received or on .he web i was disturbed to read and learn in the most recent addition of the al qaeda arabian peninsula publication that there is a picture of a young person sitting in a tram used at san francisco international airport in the english translation with this person sitting there, "for how long will you live in tension? stand up. tools of destruction. some will your bomb. ready for detonation -- assemble your bomb. ready for detonation." use the passengers a day that tramp to connect from our bart system to the airport. -- several passengers a day use that tram to connect to bart. it's good to see you again. the april 15after bombing, inspire magazine had a whole issue dedicated to the tsarnaev brothers. this kind of extremist propaganda on the internet if it is not countered with something does tend to create problems for us. we are talking about this at the kennedy school right now in getting proper information out on the web to really fly in the extremistst these are putting out there as the truth. when you see that kind of a picture in there, when you read about the attacks on the infrastructure, around the outsformers that were there, it's hard to figure out aat is real and what is not threat. we need to do what we can as a nation to stop it from happening. that,missioner, knowing at least in this most recent publication, the san francisco area is the pick did in this al -- the sancation depicted. area is the pick di what do you think they should do about what is provided? haseach police department that responsibility and i'm sure they are looking very closely at this threat. you just need to be vigilant. that's clearly what needs to happen. i'm sure there are a series of touiries on what can be done tighten up the system. that would just make more sense. follow-up on mr. payne's questioning, is your position that you would prefer a grant system through homeland security that is not consolidated? urban shield and other exercises are funded through a specific grant and it could be threatened should consolidation take place. >> it works because it goes right to the city and gets watered down when it goes right to the state. >> the chair recognizes ms. clark from new york. i i think the witnesses -- thank the witnesses for bringing their experience to bear in light of the response of the boston bombings. i was on the security council during the 9/11 event and had jurisdiction in the council over the rebuilding of the fdny. my question goes to how well we have institutionalized nims. question goes to professor leonard. in your report, you mentioned the response agencies should develop procedures and practices to better control self deployment. that is something that we new yorkers are keenly aware of in the 9/11 event. can you provide some best practices for the types of procedures? how do you think self deployment tactics could be warranted to prevent immediate threats of death and destruction? how do we strike that balance? what can we change in the protocol to address that? >> a goes exactly to the issue we were trying to raise in that report. self deployment did happen and there was a lot of dispatched -- officers from other areas were told that they should go. the watertown police department is very organized in its response. deployment is inevitable in some of the circumstances and also it's not necessarily a bad thing. in the presence of self deployment, when you have people different agencies all arriving in sequence, they'll get there at the same moment. what should they do? we don't have good doctrine about that. the senior officials who arrived did that. the chisam commissioner davis and several others and immediately formed a command structure at watertown mall. wheret the tactical level we don't have training. we cannot expect them to know each other but they can develop protocols for how they could combine so that we get something . little more organized the referenced standard is not that they should be like a college drill team and a half time show. maybe we could provide some doctrine so that they could, through training, establish a somewhat more organized response . in watertown, senior police officials on some of those to gett scenes were able things organized but it took a little longer than some might like. experience,om your from your you take experience as to how we can best manage the inclination of law enforcement and first responders ? people are just going to come knowing what it means for their jurisdiction, their people, their town, their families. what should we do to move closer to managing a circumstance like that? has worked. the unified command we had in watertown worked quite well. ed davis and i have known each .ther for about the teen years there was complete trust between us. as other police commissioners showed up, the kernel from the state police and everyone like that, there is a bit of a disconnect when other departments show up from various cities and towns. i think we should go back and look at it. when there is somebody from , if they are the highest-ranking person in that area, they have to have the knowledge and the ability to take control. we do not do it that well now. we need to do a better job of self deployment. we needed those officers that we needed them to work quicker together and better together. like did you want to add anything to that? -- did you want to add anything? >> at is correct that at the micro level the observations are right. more work needs to be done there. afternge that doctrine columbine. the protocol was to secure the area and wait for swat team to arrive. columbine told us we don't have that luxury anymore. an untrained to put together a to go out and address the threat. but we have not done is come to the realization that the contact many.ay comprise how would a structured and who is in charge is part of the nuts and bolts of this. >> thank you. i yield back. the chairman for the committee hearing in the report. didllent work the committee on that. i appreciate you bringing up a moment of silence for the fort hood shooting and south carolina stands with text as just as we stood with boston last year. -- stands with texas. the red sox are my a.l. team. i am a braves fan. time, i do to like the sox. after reading the report, mr. chairman, the term stove piping kept coming back to me. it is glaring today. the report points out that the information was there. if the dots were connected, i remember the testimony from commissioner davis last year. jttf, if your officers were informed and had the ability to do more research, maybe this tragedy would have been prevented. we hear a lot on the committee about lessons learned. i'm tired of just learning the lessons. we have to start complying those lessons. if we do away with the stove a government, agencies like the fbi, components of dhs, admit that they are not a thief demand they cannot control that information and they cannot be everywhere, nor do we month them to be everywhere. if they will rely on the boston police, the watertown police, the elements in my state whether it is the county sheriff or state law enforcement division, if that information can be more readily shared, i believe we could avert more tragedies. i don't want to sit here one or two years from now and have this same conversation. we had all the information. we failed to connect the dots and we fail to let those close to the situation know about the threats. government is large and cumbersome. and true flexibility ability lies is on the ground with those who can ask the questions in the supermarkets, churches, committee clubs, neighborhoods. i will get off that rant. unquestioningly been significant process in the 13 years since 9/11 with the barriers, walls, stove piping prohibiting information sharing. youissioner davis, i know are not in your role as you are this time last year, but from your perspective, could you ?hare naturedirector has done meant this job. he has said and done all the .ight wings it appears as though we're moving in the right direction. the recommendations that this committee has come up with are exactly the way we should be going to make this a more system.nsive if they are not put into code, they are simply that, a recommendation. if congress in its wisdom sees this as a good thing it should be codified. the system has to operate that way. like the rubber band snapping back that we talked about earlier, it makes it impossible to do that. the other thing i want to mention is this is a story of numbers. fbi agents working on terrorism and 6000 local police officers have a we are a force multiplier. this has to be a recognition that if we're going to have -- i've had the ability to work in the u k and other agencies and other countries where there is a system from top to bottom. that should be our model so andyone is working together recognizes this is not my ball. it is everyone's responsibility. >> wasn't that the original purpose of the jttf? >> yes. came 90 yardsi down the field by establishing the jttf. there was some bureaucracy that prevented it from going over the goal line. those recommendations push it over the goal line. alexei said in the stands and watch a lot of football games. stands andt in the watch games. when i see the coach run the ball up the middle over and over and they are only getting a yard, yard and a half. the fans around me are hollering at the coach. why are you running the ball up the middle? sitting here in the stands and looking at the jttf concept than the failures pointed out in this report, i hope the coach reads this. i hope we don't continue running the ball up the middle and getting down to the goal line and not able to get across. 100% gets sussed across the goal .ine -- gets us across i hope they listen to you. i hope they listened to everyone involved. . hope they read the report mr. chairman, you are doing a great job in pointing this out, laying out the roadmap. responsibility and i think we are doing a good job telling the respected agencies where we need to go, laying out the direction but not just laying them out but helping them proceed down the road. thank you for that. god bless you. god bless massachusetts and may god continue to bless america because america was with boston that day. with that, i yield back. >> let me just close by saying having worked with the joint chairs of the task force, they do good work. it works 99% of the time. we have to be at 100%. in this particular case, some things fell through the cracks, but it's our job not to make people feel bad about that but see how we can do better in the future. these one and two mann operations are very difficult to detect and disrupt. that is the new evolution of terrorism, of al qaeda, of radical extremists. as commissioner ed davis said, i want to commend the new fbi comey for bringing a model of cooperation. i have talked about the state and local cooperation. they are a great or small the flyer to an agency that is very resource strapped. the locals know the streets. ony are the eyes and ears the ground. i think it's indicative that one of the first things the director did was to bring police chiefs to the table to renter into a memorandum of understanding. they did not know what was and that on the jttf's needs to change. the emphasis of that, i know his chief of staff is a big state and local fan. this will ultimately make america safer. your recommendation to codify them into law is an excellent idea. coming out all the time but if it is codified and has the full force and effect of law it is even stronger. i commend you for that recommendation as well. the stafft to thank on both sides of the aisle for all the work that they put into this report particularly my staff that has worked day in and out for a year with all of the relevant agencies doing a good job. i want to thank bill keating, my good friend. inking together with you developing this report, traveling to moscow, you and i have been joined at the hip and i think it's very significant. our heart does go out to the boston community. as we approach the anniversary of this bombing, this tragedy, i think it will be a time to heal, anda time to also a time of pride because boston is strong. >> if i could? staff.want to thank the you've been to boston and you have traveled every footstep on the way and i want to thank you .or your personal involvement this is a very and poured into our area, very important going forward. our brave lawk enforcement officers that are here for the work you have done once again. forward, weoving have been working on legislation that we will share with everyone . some of the positions change so you could have someone more open and they could be shared by someone. tong forward it's important get the laws changed so we do not have a report that just sits on the shelf is we cannot afford to have this kind of tragedy. be of our work will important. i turn back and thank the chair. >> let me close by thanking the officers. you are true heroes to me and this committee. thank you for my watertown police patch. i will wear this very proudly. with that, this hearing is adjourned. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2014] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] >> federale debates the budget. president obama speaks at a fort hood ceremony and the one-year anniversary of the boston marathon bombing. coming up on the next "washington journal," a look at the difference between budgets released by house democrats and budget committee chairman paul ryan. our guest is john yarmouth from kentucky, a member of the .ommittee a member of the ways and means committee will be here to talk about the aspects for tax reform in congress. "washington journal" is live every morning at 7:00 a.m. eastern on c-span. you can join the conversation on facebook and twitter. lexi is interviewed in 1942 on the question of integration of baseball. what he says is very interesting. me that he had serious doubts about the integration of baseball. he says what will happen and what they want, they want our fans. we are outgrowing the major leagues in games. we are packing them in. we think they want our fans. if you want to integrate, take all teams. coal black all-star teams into the majors. black all-star teams. maybe they will not only take one or two dead players. integrating professional baseball saturday night at 8:00 p.m. eastern, part of american history tv this weekend on c-span 3. >> the u.s. house is making its way towards completion of debate on the 2015 budget proposal. with erikned from -- wasson from "the hill." guest: they lay out their priorities and certainly the democrats feel they are right in the budget which cuts $5 trillion and does not close any tax loopholes. are eagerpublicans anywhere inrnative the 10 year window. i think you're seeing passionate debate on the floor as this unfolds and this is typical every year. cranks you are writing -- >> you are writing about how this may go. deflectors rise on ryan budget. you write about a few from potential members who plan to vote against the bill and conservative members. who are some of those? guest: they can afford 17 defections. it is a slim margin of error and they really have to line up all so you have some core conservatives who typically vote against. they are very conservative and they don't feel like they owe any certain that. you also have people from last year because they're concerned about cuts. he does not like the privatization plan. he's going to be a no again. on the other hand, you have vulnerable members. said he was undecided and remains so on the last minute. he's very concerned about law enforcement personnel and their benefits. and chris gibson, another very .entrist member from new york basically at this point, we are seeing 13 or so very likely no and another seven or eight in play which means a lot of last-minute whipping to make sure this does not go awry. >> was there this level of uncertainty last year? guest: there might be more because this is an election year. tore are not many changes the ryan plan. one thing that was a concern was the fact that ryan decided to stick with the ryan mary budget level for 2015. level. murray budget it could stall the appropriations process. they will start to cut deeply after next right year. notably sarah palin called it a joke. paul ryan said maybe she was misguided in saying that. it would create some pressure along with the tea party groups to go against the budget. it seems like most conservatives are on board with a lot of faith in paul ryan even if sometimes .hey are more dissatisfied there is just a core group that tends to be very hard-core that they have to worry about than some other people fighting. the georgia delegation are all running against each other for the saxby chambliss senate seat. kingston is definitely going to be no on the budget. >> the republican whip kevin mccarthy tweeted earlier that between our party and bears has never been more clear. can you tell us about some of the behind the scenes lobbying efforts that republican leaders are trying? guest: you have seen them working the floor as the last several days. he's been after that conversation. there are payments on medicare and they are thereby trying to avoid a roll call and this will just be a trick played on the conservative rank and file. they are showing their displeasure. ryan is their hero. he was in deep conversation with kevin mccarthy. the other people out there are really working the floor. eric cantor was in deep conversation. he was undecided about cuts to defense. we have seen a lot of those but we are seeing that they are confident. roskam saying- it's definitely going to pass but come down to the wire. we will be interested in that there. >> we will be keeping a close eye on things on and off the floor. you can read his reporting at the hill.com and also on twitter. thanks for that update. vote on thell republican budget tomorrow. live coverage of the house begins at 9:00 a.m. eastern here on c-span. now, some of today's debate. this our antenna portion begins with budget committee chairman paul ryan. minute portion begins with a to committee chairman paul ryan. chaian

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