House excluding these cabinet secretaries as well as the state department which is now without a leader, of course, Rex Tillerson not yet confirmed, what do we know about how theyre trying to fix this situation and their close connection with the attorney general senator sessions who is up for conffirmation and apparently working behind the scenes on all of this. Reporter whats notable here, house judiciary aides, not the actual bosses, not the members of congress in the House Judiciary Committee but their aides were a party to this effort to try to draft the executive order that was announced thats now controversial not only because of the poll at this policy itself but the way it was communicated, jaime meatis, john kelly and Rex Tillerson had no yld this was coming, had no details, only the wide concept until it was announced. We see him walking up to the podium. Quickly Pete Williams the firing of the acting attorney general. Pete im going to interrupt you for a moment. Immigration laws and keep our citizens safe by keeping Foreign Terrorists out of our country. Id like to clarify that the most recent executive order does, what it does and does not mean. This is not a travel ban. This is a temporary pause that allows us to better review the existing refugee and visa vetting system. Over the next 30 days we will analyze and assess the strengths and the weaknesses of our current immigration system which is the most generous in the world. We will then provide our foreign partners with 60 days to cooperate with our National Security requirements. This way we can ensure the system is doing what it is designed to do, which is protect the American People. This analysis is long overdue and strongly supported by the departments career intelligence officials. Acting undersecretary for dhs intelligence analysis david glaw will speak to that in detail more shortly. Furthermore this is not, i repeat not a ban on muslims. The mission is to safeguard the American People, our homeland, our values and religious liberty is one of our most fundamental and treasured values. It is important to understand that there are terrorists and other bad actors who are seeking to infiltrate our homeland every single day. The seven countries named in the executive order are skdesignate by congress and the Obama Administration as requiring additional security when making decisions about who comes into our homeland. As my predecessor secretary johnson liked to say its easier to play defense on the 50 yard line than 1 yard line. Preventing terrorists from entering our country we can stop terrorist atakts on the homeland. I will not gamble with american lives. These orders are a matter of National Security. It is my sworn responsibility as the secretary of Homeland Security to protect and defend the American People and i have directed departmental leadership to implement the president s executive orders professionally, germanely and accordance to law. Cvp began taking steps thats customs and border protection, immediately began taking steps to be in compliance. We are and will remain in compliance with judicial orders. We have also been working with our partners at the departments of defense, justice and state. We are committed to ensuring that all individuals affected by the eos including those affected by the court orders are being provided all rights afforded under our laws. We are and will continue to enforce President Trumps executive orders humanely and with professionalism. Our job is to protect the homeland, these executive help do that. Im happy to have my colleagues answer any questions, clarify any positions that may be confusing, and we have with us today acting commissioner of cvp, acting commissioner of i. C. E. And my intelligence or the departments intelligence chief. So with that. Good afternoon, kevin mc mc mcelwane, customs an border protection. As we heard former general kelly speaking out for the first time as Homeland Security secretary. There is reporting that he was general kelly was on the plane from miami back to the d. C. Area being briefed about this executive order when they looked up at the tv and saw the president was signing it. So there was no prior consultation of any meaningful sort. Pete williams you cover homeland and justice and its been pretty tumultuous. He is clearly falling on the line lets listen in as the head of i. C. E. Is speaking. We had calls with stakeholders, air carriers and airports starting a few hours after receiving the order so they would understand how to operate. We also overnight on friday and saturday worked through a process to be able to wave travelers that were in transit, or had sensitive cases that should be considered for a waiver in the National Interest as the executive order calls for. To put this in context in the first 72 hours of the order, 1 million travelers came through our borders via air. Out of those travelers, 500,000 of them were foreign nationals. The people affected by this order we denied boarding to 721 travelers that had visas from the affected countries, but we actually processed for waivers 1,060 lawful permanent residents of the United States as well as an additional 75 waivers granted to immigrant visa and nonimmigrant visa holders. To make sure everyone understands how the process is working today, lawful permanent residents and special immigrant visa holders are allowed to board their flights foreign and will be proelse issed for a waiver upon arrival. Again weve done that over 1,000 times so far in this three days of implementation. Secondly, immigrant visa holders and nonimmigrant visa holders that are covered will be denied boarding before they board their aircraft and referred to the department of state for further process. Another question that has come up whether dual nationals are treated differently. Travelers will be assessed at our border based on the passport they present, not any dual national status, so if youre a citizen of the United Kingdom you present your United Kingdom passport and the executive order does not apply to you upon arrival. I want to talk about refugees, the executive order calls for refugees that were ready to travel, where it would cause undue hardship, that they should be considered for waivers. We have done that in concert with our department of state colleagues, 872 refugees will be arriving this week and well be processing them for waivers through the end of the week and thats fully coordinated. As secretary kelly noted, we are responding immediately to any court orders. We did so quickly on friday with the Eastern District of new york order and those parties that were affected by that order were proelse issed for a waiver and admitted into the United States. Lastly, i just want to tell you to increase communications and provide Additional Information to travelers, we are updating on our website, cvp. Gov, it will be there as you login a statement about the implementation, faqs, giving information to traveler answer other stakeholders and link for specific questions affecting individual traveler answer a phone number to call, all of that will be on our website, thank you. Good morning, im thomas holmen, the acting director for i. C. E. It was a great honor to be contacted in the last couple of days and asked to step up in this capacity as acting director. My plans to retire were put on hold and i did so because i chose to serve my country once again. For those who dont know me ive been in Immigration Enforcement business for 33 years. I started on u. S. Border patrol and office of investigations Homeland Security investigations for over 20 years and climbed the ranks there, and now im on enforcement move operations on the back end, arrest and detaining and removing aliens so i certainly know the immigration life cycle and how to enforce immigration laws. I chose to come back and act in this capacity because of my concern for the communities and the safety of our communities. Various crimes that walk out of the jurisdictions without any cooperation with i. C. E. , so theyre back in the communities, back in our communities, and that causes my officers to once again go out in the community, knock on the door to arrest somebody they should have arrested in county jail. Im here to excute a mission within a framework provided me, that framework has changed on the executive orders of President Trump and the men and women of i. C. E. Will execute them perfectly and theyre here to serve as an organization. Thank you very much. Thank you, im david glawy, undersecretary acting for intelience. I want to echo secretary delis remarks, the National Security of the United States is utmost priority. This is the fundamental responsibility of our government to protect the National Homeland from nefarious actors trying to come inbound to the United States. What this is is an action for to us take a temporary pause and look at how we collect intelligence and run that against databases to identify the nefarious actors. Im taking a look how Law Enforcement, the Intelligence Community, the department of defense, our federal, state, local Law Enforcement organizations share information and how we run those data not just against refugee populations but anyone trying to come inbound into the United States to identify the sophisticated networks that are trying potentially trying to come inbound. Were trying to break down those barriers to share information, to continue our automated screening processes and vetting process to make sure that we once again to identify those nefarious actors, nefarious networking outside the United States that may be potentially trying to threaten the United States. Again this is a pause to take a look at how we collect data and how we exploit it against National Security threats. Thank you. You have time for a couple questions . One, two, three . Come on up. Probably best to be in front of the microphone so who is first . Great, thanks, julia with reuters. Two quick questions. First to the acting. I. C. E. Director. Is i. C. E. Planning on growing detention space for people at south of the border and extending the time in which they are he . Also on cvp would you mention u spoke to people about the order within 72 hours, would it have been easier if you had any guidance before this order came out, could confusion have been avoided . On the first question, yes. We got to secure our borders, those arrested entering into the United States we need to detain those people so were in the process of identifying additional detention capacity. As far as increase the length of stay, we like to do just the opposite. Wed like to keep them in custody as little as possible, make sure they get their due process and once they get that order from a judge, execute that order. Kevin before you step up, let me kind of frame it a little bit. We did know the e. O. Was coming. We had people involved in the general drafting of it. You know, clearly it was, this whole approach was part of what then candidate trump talked about for a year or two. So we knew all that was coming. As i said, we had high levels of government lawyers from across the inner agency to include Homeland Security that were involved in the drafting of it, so we knew it was coming. It wasnt a surprise it was coming, and then we implemented it. So go ahead, kevin. Right, our job at the operation level is to take guidance, statute, direct order, from the secretary or emerging threat and respond as quickly and effectively as possible. We go through the process. The system changes we need, the communications in the field, the communication with stakeholders. In this case we had court orders came in when we were implementing the Operational Plan so we had to adjust our efforts a little bit. We worked quickly to implement and i think the process has smoothed out and just to clarify the initial complaint was in two hours of the executive order being received. Reporter with congressional quarterly, two questions whoever wants to take this. Several lawmakers and advocacy groups are saying that some Border Patrol agents ignored court orders and handcuffed passengers and tried to deport some of them. Are you looking into these reports and can you reassure people in fact agents are following the orders . The second question, the president has called the executive order an extreme vetting. Can you explain what exactly is involved in extreme vetting which is over and beyond what already is happening . The first thing id say without question, no member of the Homeland Security team ignored a court order, nor would they ignore a court order. Ive heard these reports. Ive asked people to include members of congress who called me about them and asked them if they could run down some information for me and of course, we dont have any information, but we would not ignore a court order. Okay, the second and ill let you come up, kevin. What exactly is involved . Extreme vetting were looking at various options right now. We, the inner agency, but led by of course Homeland Security. The countries, there are many countries, seven that were dealing with right now, that we have in our view, in my view, dont have the kind of Law Enforcement recordskeeping that kind of thing that can convince us that one of their citizens is who they say they are and what their background might be. Theres various additional things were considering. On the other end when someone comes in and asks for consideration to get a visa, it might be certainly an accounting of what websites they visit, it might be telephone contact information, so that we can see who theyre talking to, but again, all of this is under development but those are the kind of things were looking at. Social media. We have to be convinced that people that come here, theres a reasonable expectation that we dont know who they are, and what theyre coming here for and what their backgrounds are, and right now, there are a number of countries on the planet that dont have that kind of recordskeeping, police work, that kind of thing, and the seven in question right now for the most part fall under that category. So we are developing what additional vetting, extreme vetting might look like and we will certainly work with countries on this. Kevin, do you want to ill just add to the secretarys comments specifically we had a legal team as part of our Operational Action team in place friday night. As soon as the court oshd was received they advised us on the implication, put a complete hold on anyone being removed in connection with the executive order. We then processed the folks for waivers and released them into the United States. General kelly paula reed, cbs news. The first someone to clarify what you said that you knew the executive order was coming. Is that what you said you knew it was going to be signed on friday . There have been some reports first time you found out about it was on the plane and you were upset about it but you knew it was coming. As i said, if we knew it was coming from like two years ago when mr. Trump first started to run for president , certainly didnt learn about it on an airplane. Again, knew it was coming, knew it was signed friday morning. I took a trip down to miami for a couple different reasons, one of which was to visit the people on the front lines of this whole effort, and that is the folks at the miami airport tsa Border Patrol, those kind of people, had some time, as you probably all know i came from before i retired 39 months in Southern Command went there and talked to admiral kirk tid and engaged with him about the partnership that frankly is very strong between Homeland Security and south comm. Im proud to say that developed very closely between myself when i was in command and my good friend jeh johnson and we want to continue that. But no, i didnt learn about it on an airplane. How much guidance were you able to give specifically when it comes to green car holders or people who have visas and work with the u. S. Military. Loft the problems encountered could have been easily foreseeable. I think from our perspective again, people like me are expected and not just because of my military background, we are the, the departments are the implementers of the policy obviously, developed by the white house, approved by the president n collaboration and then sent down to the departments for execution in this case Homeland Security. Now the e. O. To me and this was more or less a collaborative process it fairly clear. When that came down i think i was in my sixth day on the job but i relied on people like the ones that are standing up here and the hundreds back at the headquarters to say okay, we got it, boss, this looks good to us and were off to the races and really, i mean i kept being asked about chaos at the ports of entry, and as i said to many, many members of congress in individual phone calls, our officers who were at the counter so to speak, the only chaos they saw was what was taking place in ot