▶ 0:03:28Committee on Homeland Security will come to order.
▶ 0:03:33Chair made it clear. Committee in recess at any point. I'd also like to welcome the newest member of the committee, Mr. Matt Vaneps. Happy to have you here. You all can sit down for now, please. [clears throat] Purpose of today's hearing is to better understand the worldwide threats facing us today. Under the rules of the house, the chairman is responsible for maintaining order and preserving decorum in the committee room. I expect audience members to be respectful of witnesses, members, and the public.
▶ 0:04:04The issues we are debating are important ones that members feel deeply about. While vigorous disagreement is part of the legislative process, members are reminded that we must adhere to established standards of decorum in debate. It is a violation of House rules and the rules of this committee to engage in personalities regarding other members or to question the motives of a colleague. It is also a clear violation of the rules of the house to make statements that might be personally offensive to the president or the vice president of the United States.
▶ 0:04:30Remarks of that type are not permitted by the rules and are keep not in keeping with the best traditions of our committee. The chair will enforce these rules of decorum at all times and urge all members to be mindful of their remarks. I now recognize myself for an opening statement. Good morning. Welcome to the Committee on Homeland Security's annual hearing on worldwide threats. Our witnesses today are Homeland Security Secretary Christy Gnome, National Counterterrorism Center Director Joe Kent, and Federal Bureau of Investigation Operations Director Michael Glacin.
▶ 0:05:01Appreciate your willingness to testify and address the threats America face every day at home and abroad. I want to recognize that this is an annual hearing on the one committee ex and one the committee expects to hold in September 2026 surrounding the 25th anniversary of September 11th terrorist This year we made a numerous accommodations considering the record-long Democrat shutdown and your busy schedules.
▶ 0:05:23But we expect 2026 to include the Homeland [clears throat] Security Secretary, the NCTC director and is in the past the director of the The Department of Homeland Security and this committee were created following the attacks on September 11th and bestowed with the responsibility to secure the homeland from threats and keep Americans safe. The work your agencies do each day furthers that mission and this committee will always be strong partner in those efforts. I want to commend all three of you.
▶ 0:05:49The border is secure, the flow of drugs is slowing, and violent criminals are being taken off the streets. America is once again a symbol of global strength. However, I'm sure you'll agree it is not time to take a break. It is time for action. We cannot succeed in our collective homeland security mission without working together, collaborating, and striving for better. The threats we faced are persistent and ever changing. The days of strictly kinetic strikes are over.
▶ 0:06:18The battlefield is not the same as it was on the Western Front in 1914, nor Pacific Theater in 1941, and not even the Middle East in 2000s. In 2025, we fight our adversaries in cyerspace. We counter radicalization on the internet and in chat rooms. We resist communist China propaganda. We prepare for newfound biological threats. And we combat the flow of transnational criminals across our borders. This is why this hearing is so important. Congress must hear from the executive.
▶ 0:06:48Oversight is not unfair and asking questions is not unwarranted. We must ensure the people's representatives are informed. In less than one year, the Trump administration has delivered historic results in securing our borders and dismantling transnational criminal The commitment to restoring and maintaining a state of law and order has resulted in illegal border crossings falling to their lowest level in decades. Compared to last year, nationwide border encounters have plummeted nearly 80%.
▶ 0:07:15This is a testament to the administration's enforcement of law and deterrence of further uncontrolled illegal More and more both nation state and rogue actors are turning to cyerspace to conduct nefarious operations against the United States and its interests. Just a few weeks ago, we saw first mainly the first mainly autonomous artificial intelligence conducted cyber attack. The the AI threat is no longer something out of farway science fiction movie.
▶ 0:07:42Technology improves every day and so does our adversaries understanding of how to use it. We must be prepared. We must work together with our state and local partners as well as the private sector to share information to better identify and mitigate attacks. We must remain vigilant in the face of threats posed by Russia, China, and Iran. And we must harden critical infrastructure.
▶ 0:08:04The United States is entering an unprecedented period of hosting major international events, including 2026 FIFA World Cup, the 2028 Olympic and Parolympic Games in Los Angeles, and nationwide celebrations marking the nation's 250th anniversary.
▶ 0:08:18These mass gatherings will test the nation's ability to secure large crowds, safeguard foreign delegations, and maintain operational community continuity amid evolving threats from nation state adversaries, foreign terrorist groups, transnational criminal organizations, and loan actors. Trump administration is employing a whole of government approach to ensure these events are safe and secure. However, host cities and law enforcement shouldn't significant shoulder significant burdens in planning and resourcing.
▶ 0:08:47Persistent challenges include coordination shortfalls, intelligence sharing gaps, and jurisdictional limitations, particularly at ancillary venues such as athlete housing, training facilities, hotels, and fan zones. All of this is on the backdrop of the upcoming 25th anniversary of the horrific terrorist attacks of September 11th that took the lives of thousands across New York, DC, and Pennsylvania. It is why I sought this chairmanship and what guides me every day in this work. We all share the same goal. Keep Americans safe. regardless of the threat.
▶ 0:09:18I look forward to the witness's testimony today and I hope we can work together to ensure we achieve this common goal. I now recognize the ranking member, the gentleman from Mississippi, Mr. Thompson, for his opening statement.
▶ 0:09:29Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. And before I start, let me welcome Mr. Van Els uh to the committee. Uh Mr. Chairman, uh, thank you for getting the Secretary of Homeland Security and National Counterterrorism Center director here today. Your predecessor couldn't seem to get that done, and I appreciate your commitment to holding this hearing.
▶ 0:09:54Each day, we've had more examples of Republicans abdicating their constitutional oversight responsibilities. Fortunately, unlike other chairs in this body, it appears that a if you are serious about this committee work being done, and I compliment you for that.
▶ 0:10:13As I look at the witness's table though, uh I can't help but notice that FBI director Cash Patel isn't here with Secretary Gnome and Director Kent. I'd also say that uh we have just been uh Secretary Nolan's uh testimony.
▶ 0:10:35I've been on the committee since its inception and I've never had uh the rules violated where we couldn't get testimony so members of the committee could look at it until today. Today's hearing is supposed to be one of the most important exercises of this committee's oversight jurisdiction.
▶ 0:10:55Each year we hear from the Secretary of Homeland Security, the director of National Counterterrorism Center, and the director of the Federal Bureau Investigation, who is nowhere to be seen today. Maybe Director Patel is too busy spending taxpayers dollars flying to his girlfriend's concert on the FBI's jet to answer questions from Congress.
▶ 0:11:22Maybe the FBI director isn't here because he's afraid of scrutiny from Democrats who want to know what the FBI is doing to keep America safe. Or maybe Director Patel knows that the Trump administration itself is a threat to homeland security and want [snorts] to hide from public accountability.
▶ 0:11:43On the other hand, Director Kent is here, which is a good because we have questions for him about NCTC's work, [snorts] as well as his comments about the January 6 insurrectionists he called, and I quote, political prisoners," unquote, who deserve to be pardoned.
▶ 0:12:06Some of the people he defended, however, are back in jail for crimes like plotting to murder FBI agents and possession of child It's scary that these unserious people are in charge of keeping America safe from terrorism.
▶ 0:12:27But what's even scarier is that they work for an unserious and unhinged president who spends most of the days designing monuments to himself and finding new ways to hide the Epstein files. All of this puts America and its lives who people who live here at risk every day. Now, Secretary Gnome, everyone knows you love the spotlight.
▶ 0:12:57We've seen your commercials, but what you haven't provided to the committee, despite our many requests, are the questionable contracts that you've awarded to your friends to film you on the 2028 campaign trail. Unfortunately, this is nothing new.
▶ 0:13:18In their one big ugly bill, congressional Republicans gave you a blank check, Secretary Terry Nome, and you have wasted no time spending it on yourself. Instead of deploying Homeland Security grants to protect churches and synagogues from terrorism, you handed your friends a $220 million contract so they could follow you around the country with a camera.
▶ 0:13:48Instead of fully funding the DHS agency that protects our hospitals, schools, and electrical systems from cyber attacks, you spent $200 million to buy yourself new private jets. And instead of paying your way like the rest of us, you're living rentree in a taxpayer owned property that is supposed to be reserved for military leaders.
▶ 0:14:17Every penny that you spend on yourself represents the blood, sweat, and tears of hardworking Americans who expect their tax dollars to be spent on homeland security, not promoting you and your interests. Apparently, you haven't noticed that regular people are suffering under President Trump's affordability crisis. Or maybe you, like him, thinks it's a hoax.
▶ 0:14:46and just don't care. Either way, such corrupt behavior hurts Homeland Security. But it's not just the corrupt behavior, Secretary Herin known that hurts Homeland Security. It's also your blatant disregard for the law. You cut programs and withheld congressionally appropriated money to prevent terrorist attacks and prepare for natural disaster.
▶ 0:15:14You eviscerated the Office of Civil Rights and Civil Liberties, which was supposed to keep DHS from violating Americans constitutional rights. Within your own department, you illegally fired employees and retaliated against whistleblowers who reported wrongdoings at DHS.
▶ 0:15:34And during a shutdown, when frontline employees were working without a paycheck, your press shop never stopped using its social media accounts to push out racist and xenophobic post. Throughout your tenure, you diverted resources from critical homeland security agencies and programs to carry out an extreme immigration agenda.
▶ 0:16:02You illegally you illegally ordered people deported to El Salvador despite a federal court order and Department of Justice council instructing you to not do so. You illegally ignored a federal court order and shipped people off to South Sudan without due process.
▶ 0:16:24You are illegally blocking members of Congress from conducting oversight of ICE detention facilities, even though federal law demands that we have access. In the process of carrying out this extreme agenda, at your direction, DHS has terrorized, beaten, and detained hundreds, if not thousands of American citizens.
▶ 0:16:51At your direction, DHS has illegally detained and deported American citizens, including US citizen children with cancer. At your direction, DHS has illegally gassed, pepper sprayed, and put [clears throat] their knees on the necks of Americans, including military veterans and clergy.
▶ 0:17:15At your direction, DHS has illegally tackled, beat up, and humiliated United States citizens, including senior citizens. At your direction, DHS has illegally tased, maced, punched, and even shot Americans. Black and brown Americans in particular have been racially profiled, detained, and locked up and sometime with tragic consequences.
▶ 0:17:46It's just one awful incident. a pregnant US citizen was reportedly thrown to the ground, kicked and left in handcuffs for hours after immigration officers did not believe that she was an American. She later lost the baby. You cannot enforce the law by breaking the law, Secretary Gnome. That's not how justice works.
▶ 0:18:16It's not right and it's unamerican. And when Congress tries to carry out its constitutional oversight responsibilities to question you about your department actions, you hide, often with the help of congressional Republicans. Never in the history of the committee has a Secretary of Homeland Security hidden from congressional oversight like you and [snorts] your department have, Secretary Gnome.
▶ 0:18:45Our oversight letters to you go unanswered. You owe us by extending the millions of Americans who sent us to Congress as their representatives a response to over a dozen letters. Your predecessor came before this committee regularly under administrations of both parties.
▶ 0:19:10But under President Trump, you and other department officials have rarely shown their faces at committee hearings. In the first year of President Biden's term, his administration made 28 appearances before this committee. 28 under President Trump, DHS officials have appeared only to only three hearings before this committee. Just three.
▶ 0:19:38You, Secretary Gnome, have appeared before this committee just twice. That's fewer appearances than your predecessor, Secretary [snorts and clears throat] Alejandro Mayorus, who Republicans lambasted for not coming before the committee more often. It's interesting how my colleagues on the other side are now. Secretary Gnome, I'll give you one thing.
▶ 0:20:04You showed up today rather than throwing a civil servant under the bus like director Patel did. But you have systematically dismantled the Department of Homeland Security, put your own interests above the Department and violated the law. You are making America less safe.
▶ 0:20:24So rather than sitting here and wasting your time and ours more with more corruption, lies and lawlessness, I call on you to resign. Do a real service to the country and just resign. That is if President Trump doesn't fire you first. I yield back. Gil mess back. [clears throat] Other members of the committee are reminded that opening statements may be submitted for the record.
▶ 0:20:54I'm pleased to have a highly distinguished panel of witnesses before us today. Pursuant to committee rule 8C, I ask that the witnesses please rise and raise their right hand. Do you solemnly swear that testimony will give before the committee on homeland security of the United States of House of Representatives will be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth to help you God. Thank you. Please be seated. Let the record reflect that the witnesses have all answered in the affirmative.
▶ 0:21:23I would likely I would like to now formally introduce our witnesses. First is Miss Christy Gnome. She is the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security. Secretary Gnome previously served as governor of South Dakota and was a member of this distinguished Second is Mr. Joe Kent. He currently serves as director of national counters and uh center with office of director of national intelligence. Mr. Kent served in the US Army completing 11 combat tours and a stint with the Central Intelligence Agency.
▶ 0:21:53Third is is Mr. Michael Glene. He is operations director for the National Security Branch of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Mr. Glin has served in National Security for more than two decades, including as director of FBI's terrorist screening center and assistant director to the National Security Branch. Prior to joining M the bureau, Mr. Kusheen served in the US Marine Corps. I thank all the witnesses for being here today. I now recognize Secretary Gnome for five minutes to summarize her opening
▶ 0:22:23Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you, Ranking Member, for holding this hearing today and inviting me to be a part of it. I'm looking forward to discussing the worldwide threats that this country faces and the work that President Trump and his administration does each and every day to make America safe again. I'm very privileged and honored today to have my family with me. I'd like to introduce them to you. and deportations.
▶ 0:22:46Disruptions of congressional business is a violation of law is a criminal offense under federal law.
▶ 0:22:52Audience members are advised to take their seats and maintain order.
▶ 0:22:56The chairman may now ask Capitol police to remove and arrest the persons creating the disturbance. your community. Secretary may continue.
▶ 0:23:20I'll [clears throat] I'll continue.
▶ 0:23:22Today with me I have my husband Brian who's with me and also two of my children. My oldest daughter Cassidy and her husband Kyle are sitting here in the front row. And then my middle child Kennedy and her husband Tanner and that was my grandbaby Noah that was crying a little bit during the ranking members comments. I don't think she agreed with
▶ 0:23:41I don't have my son with me or three of my grandchildren. Uh but I'm very blessed that I have a wonderful family who is here and loves this country and is grateful to the work that we get to do as a family each and every day. We also have the blessing of having some angel families with us as well. Uh they are here in the audience and I'm so grateful for them for being willing to come here and be strong.
▶ 0:24:01It's hard to lose someone that you dearly love to um illegal criminal activity uh to people who never should have been in our country to begin with and to lose those loved ones to drug overdoses that get perpetuated by the terrorist organizations that filter them into our country that President Trump works so hard to stop. So, I'm grateful that they're here and that they are telling their story. Under President Biden, he closed the office in the Department of Homeland Security that serviced these families. He closed it because he didn't want them to speak.
▶ 0:24:30He didn't want them to have support or services. And President Trump reopened the Voic's office so that they can get services so they can hear about the cases of the individuals who killed their family members and they can get the kind of help that they need to get through the tragic grief that they've experienced. So I want to thank them for being here and continue to pray for them. I want to thank you for the opportunity to be in front of you today to discuss the wide range of threats that the Department of Homeland Security is working on to protect us from here at home and also around the world.
▶ 0:25:00Just two weeks ago, the day before Thanksgiving, a terrorist shot two of our National Guardsmen in Washington DC, killing Sarah Beckmrum dead and Staff Sergeant Andrew Wolf is still fighting for his life. Fortunately, we've had some really good news about Andrew recently, and he had the opportunity to stand up and is a miracle, and we're so grateful for his family for being so strong. We continue to lift him up and pray he has a full recovery.
▶ 0:25:25The terrorist who shot them was an Afghan national who entered the United States under Operation Allies Welcome. The same week, we arrested another Afghan national who came in under the same program. He was planning to carry out a bombing in Fort Worth, Texas. And just last week, just miles away in Washington DC, we arrested another Afghan national who also came in under Operation Allies Welcome.
▶ 0:25:48That individual provided support to the Islamic State of Iraq and ISIS K and weapons to his father who was a commander of a militia group in Afghanistan. Those are only a handful of the challenges that we face and the threats that the Department of Homeland Security stands against every single day. Under President Trump's leadership, DHS is securing our borders. We're restoring the rule of law, and we're protecting the homeland.
▶ 0:26:13DHS is eradicating transnational organized crime, and the stopping of deadly drugs from continuing to be funneled into our communities. We're ending illegal immigration, returning sanity back to our immigration system, and we're defending against cyber attacks against our critical infrastructure. We have sent a strong message to criminal illegal aliens that we will find you. we will arrest you and we will deport you.
▶ 0:26:38Our message has resonated to over 1.5 million illegal aliens who have gone home on their own voluntarily. At the same time, we as a country are still dealing with the mistakes, the errors, and the willful disregard of the last administration. For four years, the Biden administration allowed millions of people to come into our country illegally. Millions more in our country were exploited and were brought in under parole programs without even basic vetting.
▶ 0:27:05As a result, we've seen terrorist attacks and heinous crimes committed against American children and families by criminal illegal aliens and violent perpetuators who should have never been allowed into this country in the first place. transnational organized crime groups including Mexico's Sinaloa, New Generation Deliscoco, and other drug cartels. They cause chaos and they harm American interests.
▶ 0:27:29Our critical infrastructure faces a perilous landscape largely driven by the impact of cyber attacks, from bad actors and cyber criminals. American citizens are increasingly under a threat from assassination attempts, intimidation tactics, and violence perpetuated by our adversaries, radical Islamic extremists and domestic extremists. These bad actors seek to undermine our public trust. They instill fear in Americans. They destabilize the institutions that safeguard our national security.
▶ 0:27:59The United States is preparing to host several major public events in 2026, most notably the FIFA World Cup and the celebration of the 250th anniversary of our Declaration of Independence. These large-scale events will be potential targets for a range of bad actors, and they come with an increased level of risk. DHS is using every tool and authority we have to ensure the safety of US citizens and our visitors can enjoy next year's events.
▶ 0:28:25Radicalized domestic violent extremists and lone actors are a concern and intentional targeting and murderous attacks on ICE agents in Texas, parishioners in Michigan, and two National Guardsmen here in Washington DC are just some of the acts of the disp despicable examples that unfortunately are becoming too common. These threats underscore a clear need for security strategies that counter both large-scale and individualized attacks.
▶ 0:28:53We will remain alert in our mission to protect this country. We will protect our citizens. And as we enter into a historic year, America will be on the world stage. Our economy faces challenges from anti-competitive and illicit foreign economic practices that hurt the prosperity of all Americans. Those include economic espionage, intellectual property theft, and customs fraud. Illicit front companies often abuse the visa system to acquire sensitive US equipment, information, and technology.
▶ 0:29:22Economic security is national security because a country that cannot feed itself, can't fuel itself, and cannot provide for itself cannot possibly defend itself. Under President Trump's leadership, we will continue to protect American interests and bolster American economic power and technological innovation to further growth and prosperity. The American people depend on the Department of Homeland Security to remain vigilant, agile, and responsive. We will never yield.
▶ 0:29:51We will never waver, and we will never back down. Thank you for the privilege to be with you today, Mr. Chairman, and I look forward to your continued support of the work that we do. I yield back.
▶ 0:30:00Thank you, Secretary Gnome. I now recognize Director Kent for five minutes to summarize his opening statement.
▶ 0:30:08Thank you very much, uh, Mr. Chairman, ranking members, and all the members of the House. I appreciate the opportunity to appear before you and discuss the threats posed to our nation. Despite the progress that we've made so far in the Trump administration, the threat posed by terrorists of all brands remains very high right now. We've made significant progress under President Trump's leadership.
▶ 0:30:28We have the jihadis of ISIS and al-Qaeda on the run in Iraq and Syria thanks to the decisive action and the strikes that we've taken there recently since President Trump took office in January. However, we have a persistent threat from the individuals that were allowed into this country by the previous administration. The number one threat that we have right now, in my view, is the fact that we don't know who came into our country in the last four years of Biden's open borders.
▶ 0:30:56What we have identified is alarming and I want to share that with you today. We just recently put out a warning warning of the heightened risk of terrorist attacks uh posed to the homeland by terrorists pretty much of all stripes, but in particular from ISIS and from al-Qaeda. NCTC has been crunching the numbers and going through the sheer volume of known and suspected terrorists that are in the country that came in under the Biden administration.
▶ 0:31:20So far, NCTC has identified around 18,000 known and suspected terrorists that the Biden administration let come into our country. These are individuals who under normal circumstances would never be allowed to enter our country because of their ties to jihadi groups like ISIS and al-Qaeda.
▶ 0:31:38Yet, the Biden administration not only let them into the country and in many cases facilitated their entry into the country, just like the entry of the Afghan terrorists who committed the terrorist attack here just before Thanksgiving, killing one of our National Guard members and wounding another. That Afghan was brought into the country as a group of over 100,000 Afghans who were brought here during the disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan.
▶ 0:32:04These individuals, despite what has been reported, were not vetted properly to come into the United States. The individual terrorist who committed the attack uh in DC, he was vetted to serve as a soldier in Afghanistan. The Biden administration essentially used his tactical level vetting as a ruse to bring him here and to bring him into our communities. And we've seen the tragic results of that. Now, that Afghan, that attacker, that terrorist is just one of 88,000.
▶ 0:32:32We've identified 2,000 of that group of 88,000 who have ties to terrorist organizations. We're working right now handinand with DHS and with the FBI to run down this 2,000, the Afghans who came here under Allies Welcome who have ties to terrorist organizations. And additionally, the other 16,000 individuals with ties to terrorist organizations that Biden let into our country. That is probably the top terrorist threat that we face right now. And that doesn't include the individuals who came here illegally through the open border.
▶ 0:33:02That number alarmingly remains unknown at this time. We're trying to figure out who those individuals are as well. Also adding to this elevated threat, we have ISIS and al-Qaeda that have found sanctuary in places like Afghanistan and Syria due to the transitional nature of those governments and also again in Iraq and some of the the hinterlands of Iraq.
▶ 0:33:23And these terrorists are able to communicate and spread their propaganda and a lot of their knowhow thanks to the proliferation of encrypted apps and also due to just the internet at large. The new terrorist tactic that we're seeing more and more is moving away from very deliberate cellular attacks that we can infiltrate easily while they communicate into an inspirational methodology where you have key members putting out media and putting out how-to guides to reach out and to touch individuals inside the United States.
▶ 0:33:52We recently disrupted one of those attacks just before uh Halloween thanks to the work of the FBI with support from really the entire US intelligence community in the joint terrorism task uh task force model in Michigan. That plot touched multiple states and had ties to ISIS inside Iraq and Syria. Another issue that we are addressing right now thanks to the decisive leadership of President Trump is the scourge of fentanyl gang and cartel violence.
▶ 0:34:19Under President Trump's leadership, we've designated these cartels and gangs as terrorist organizations. And we've done that rightfully so. These individuals, these terrorists have killed hundreds of thousands of Americans, as these angel families will tell you firsthand. What President Trump has done by designating them as terrorists has allowed us to turn the tools of the intelligence community against them and predominantly watch list them as terrorists to prevent them from ever coming into America in the first place.
▶ 0:34:48To date, we've added about 35,000 of these narco terrorists to our terrorist watch list. And we've stopped just just around 6,000 of these terrorists from ever entering our country from setting foot inside of America so they can no longer kill Americans with impunity. These are just some of the issues that we're covering 247 365 at the National Counterterrorism Center and I look forward to discussing more with you all today. Thank you.
▶ 0:35:11Thank you, Director Kent. And now recognize Director Kasheen for five minutes to summarize his opening Morning, Chairman Garbberino, Ranking Member Thompson, and members of the committee. I'm operations director Michael Glass Shane. I oversee the FBI's national security divisions. I am honored to be here with you representing the people of the United the FBI who tackle the complex and grave threats we face with perseverance, professionalism, and integrity.
▶ 0:35:38Our nation faces serious and evolving threats ranging from international terrorists to hostile foreign intelligence operatives. From sophisticated cyber attacks to internet facilitated sexual exploitation of children, from violent gangs and criminal organizations to public corruption and corporate fraud. Keeping pace with these threats is a significant challenge.
▶ 0:36:00Our adversaries take advantage of the internet, social media, and emerging technologies like artificial intelligence to influence the American people, facilitate act illegal activities, and recruit followers. Even as 2026 marks the 25th anniversary of the 911 attacks, terrorism remains a persistent but evolving threat.
▶ 0:36:26Over the past several years, the FBI has identified a particularly concerning uptick and a radicalization of young people. Radicalization of domestic terrorist most often occurs online. Social media and encryption have increased the speed and accessibility of the violent extremist content. International terrorists continue to pose one of the greatest, most immediate threats to the homeland.
▶ 0:36:51some international terrorists and people located and radicalized to violence primarily inside the United States who are not receiving individualized direction from foreign terrorist organizations or FTO's but are inspired to commit violence by FTOS such as ISIS and al Qaeda. Iran continues to plot attacks against former government officials in retaliation for the January 2020th death of Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps or IRGC commander Kasim Salmani.
▶ 0:37:23Iran also continues to provide support to its proxies and terrorist organizations throughout the world such as Lebanese China, Russia, Iran, North Korea, and criminal ransomware continue to be the top cyber threats facing the United States. And there's no clear line where cyber criminal activity ends and nation state activity begins.
▶ 0:37:47Critical infrastructure remains a highly attractive target for cyber criminals and nation state actors due to the potential to cause widespread financial damage, and risk to our national security. The United States faces foreign intelligence threats as nations such as the People's Republic of China, Russia, and Iran become more aggressive and capable than ever.
▶ 0:38:14The PRC has deliberately created an environment that abuses global interconnectedness and encourages intellectual property acquisition using human intelligence officers, corrupt corporate insiders, foreign direct investment, and cyber Russia continues to seek and acquire US technologies to help rebuild its defense industrial base, relying on complex procurement networks to evade US export controls and sanctions.
▶ 0:38:43The United States faces many many criminal threats including violent crime, financial and healthcare fraud, transnational and regional organized criminal enterprises, crimes against children and human trafficking, violent threats against public, election officials, personnel, and public Currently, the FBI task forces are staffed with over 9,000 federal, state, local, tribal, and territorial partners.
▶ 0:39:10Many of these task forces are focused on cartels, violent crime, drug trafficking, child exploitation, and human trafficking across our nation's communities. The FBI has and continues to establish strong capabilities to assess the threats, share intelligence, and leverage key technologies. We recruit the best to serve as special agents, intelligence analysts, and professional staff.
▶ 0:39:37Our [snorts] leadership team views change and transformation as a positive tool for keeping the FBI focused on the gravest threats facing our nation. Over the past few months, we we started the process to to relocate hundreds of positions from the National Capital Region out to field offices across the country.
▶ 0:39:55This enhancement to to field resources increases our investigative capacity across our 56 field offices and enhances the FBI's commitment to addressing violent crime, gangs, drugs, counter intelligence, and terrorism threats. Our fellow citizens look to us to protect the homeland from these threats. And every day, the men and women of the FBI continue to meet and exceed these expectations. I'm proud to represent them in testimony today. And I welcome your questions.
▶ 0:40:25Thank you, Director Koseen. My understanding is a witness may have to leave early today. While I want to be clear, the committee did not agree to a hard stop. All witnesses are here voluntarily and are free to go. If witness does leave, the hearing will continue with the remaining witnesses. Members will be recognized by order of seniority for their five minutes of question. We want to get through as many members as possible.
▶ 0:40:45So, even though I have been lenient before with the five minutes, I'm directing members and witnesses that uh we're going to strictly enforce the fiveminute rule I now recognize myself for five minutes of questions. Secretary Nome, I I appreciate you being here today and you've been on the job less than a year and you this is the second time appearing before the committee, which I think is is the norm.
▶ 0:41:10Uh, and I do really appreciate you being here and I know you have a very important job to do. You oversee a lot of different uh, sub agencies. Um, so I know you can't always be here in person. Um, and with that I as a as a committee, we still want to uh, work with the administration and conduct our oversight.
▶ 0:41:28So, I'm I'm asking you if you can commit to making sure that in the future um if if the we want to have a hearing, you'll be able to supply maybe a deputy secretary or somebody to come spec specifically uh talk about that issues talk about.
▶ 0:41:42Yes, Mr. Chairman,
▶ 0:41:43I really appreciate that communication and uh I think collaboration between the administration and uh Congress is is key. Um, Secretary No, I also want to ask you in September department, the department under FEMA proposed new allocations for counterterrorism grant funding um, which cut dollars to New York by 80% because of a new formula. Um, considering New York is a constant consistently a top terror target, this was surprising.
▶ 0:42:11We're grateful President Trump restored this uh, this grant funding. Uh, and pursuance of the present direction, has the department increased the uh, the allocation to New Yes, President Trump did. I would say that when we look at the Homeland Security grants and how they're allocated, uh the formula focuses on where we see the threats today and where those communities are that need the resources. I would also um inform the committee and uh you, Mr.
▶ 0:42:38Chairman, that New York City at the time of the allocation still had over $440 million in reserve that was available to them to utilize. So the intention of these grants is that communities and cities would use the dollars to build up the security measures that they need to do for a long-term impact and that the same amount of dollars aren't necessary every single year. You need to meet the threats where they are in the country at the time the grant dollars are available.
▶ 0:43:03So thank you to all of you for your work on getting us dollars that we can give to grants to help secure our local communities and states. But when we're looking at cities that have hundreds of millions of dollars in reserves, we recognize that giving them hundreds of dollars of millions more um may not be appropriate considering all of the threats that we have. But President Trump has sent more resources to New York City. We'll continue to meet the [clears throat] threats headon because that is our mission is to make sure that we're looking at every single threat that we have.
▶ 0:43:32The formula that we have considered and have put in place recognizes what came over the border where we see the infiltration going, which communities are impacted, and what we need to do to harden our systems.
▶ 0:43:43I appreciate that, Secretary, and I appreciate the work you're doing with the president. I appreciate his uh his decision to send that increased money to New York. Um I have a question since this is about worldwide threats, can you would discuss what DHS's most significant concerns are today for the
▶ 0:44:00I [clears throat] would say, Mr. chairman. Uh what keeps me up at night is that we don't necessarily know all of the people that are in this country who they are and what their intentions are. Um we think up to 15 to 20 million people came in under the Biden administration on the invasion over the southern border. They were not vetted. Uh they were allowed to pour in.
▶ 0:44:19um our parole programs, our asylum programs, our visa programs were all exploited and the integrity was demolished under Joe Biden and the leadership at the Department [clears throat] of Homeland Security and frankly the entire department was neglected. Um in fact, I believe the secretary was told at times uh not to do certain things by the Biden administration to facilitate this invasion. Uh so what keeps me up at night is the individuals that are in this country that wish to do us harm.
▶ 0:44:45And that is why we are so aggressive at making sure that we're going out and uh doing investigative work, finding those violent criminals, finding those people who shouldn't be in this country to begin with and those that want to go after and to harm our American citizens.
▶ 0:44:59Thank you, Secretary Director Kusheen. Um during as you heard and as you've said during the next few years, the United States will host more major events than ever before. This brings obvious concern security concerns including counter drones um which which we just passed some new authorities in the NDA yesterday. How is the FBI preparing for counter drone threats during mass gathering events? Chairman, thank you for that question.
▶ 0:45:25Um you know, counter UAS, the passage of the of the legislation yesterday is a game changer for us. um how we're preparing for that going forward. We have we just stood up a [clears throat] counter UAS school down in Huntsville, Alabama, where we will federal officials, state, locals as as well to assist with with that preparation and implementation of using counter counter UAS uh technology.
▶ 0:45:53Prior to this passage, it was only the FBI andor DHS that can provide that assistance. Now that this passage of authority, it will allow us to have a a greater h handling of the threat to to a mass event.
▶ 0:46:06Thank you very much. Uh I yield back. I now recognize the ranking member for five minutes of questions.
▶ 0:46:11Thank you very much. Uh Mr. Chairman, uh Mr. Glaststein, will you tell me um organizations that pose on the domestic side? uh two of the organizations number one number two threat to the homeland at this point.
▶ 0:46:35Can you please clarify organizations
▶ 0:46:38uh any domestic terrorist organization that poses a threat to the homeland as we speak?
▶ 0:46:46I'd say the first one you know President Trump had just announced executive order domestic terrorist organization Antifa. That's our our primary concern right All right. That's what President Trump did. What does the FBI say?
▶ 0:47:02We share the same view. When you look at the data right now, you look at the domestic terrorist threat that we're facing right now. What I see from my position is that's the most immediate violent threat that we're facing on the domestic side.
▶ 0:47:17So, where is Antifa headquartered? what we're doing right now with the
▶ 0:47:25Where in the United States does Antifa If it's a terrorist organization and you've identified it as number one,
▶ 0:47:36we are building out the infrastructure right now.
▶ 0:47:40So what does that mean? You I'm just We trying to get the information. You say Antifa is a terrorist organization. Tell us as a committee, how did you come to that? Where they where do they exist? How many members do they have in the United States as of right now?
▶ 0:48:00Well, that's very fluid. It's it's ongoing for us to understand that the same no different than al-Qaeda and
▶ 0:48:06No, no, I don't want you ask one question, sir.
▶ 0:48:09I just want you to tell us if you said Antifa is the number one domestic terrorist organization uh operating in the United States. I just need to know where they are, how many people. I don't want a name. I don't want anything like that. Just how many people have you identified with the FBI uh that Antifa is made of?
▶ 0:48:35Well, the investigations are active.
▶ 0:48:39Sir, you wouldn't come to this committee and say something you can't prove. I know. I know you wouldn't do that, but you did. Uh, Madam Secretary, you and the gentleman from CT NCTC uh reference the unfortunate accident that occurred with the National Guardsman being killed.
▶ 0:49:04You think that was an unfortunate
▶ 0:49:06I mean,
▶ 0:49:07it was a terrorist.
▶ 0:49:08Wait, wait, look. I'll get it straight. Then you can
▶ 0:49:10He shot our National Guardsman in the head. Look, Mr. Chairman, will you direct the witness to allow me to ask my It was an unfortunate situation, but you blamed it solely on Joe Biden. I want you to know who approved the asylum uh application for this same person.
▶ 0:49:35Mr. Thompson, this individual that came into the country.
▶ 0:49:38Now, I I want to know who approved. Congressman Thompson, I want you to understand when this individual came into the country under
▶ 0:49:46I'm not going to let you evacuation of Afghanistan under Operation Allies welcome thoroughly vetted by the Biden administration at that point in a time allowed into our country and then was never followed up. I want to remind everybody Congress reclaim my time.
▶ 0:50:01We follow the law and every asylum is supposed to have a check-in every single year and the Biden administration failed to do that. We they vetted this individual, allowed them into our country and did not do
▶ 0:50:12the witness will allow the gentleman to ask his question.
▶ 0:50:14Yes or no? Who who approved the asylum
▶ 0:50:17The application on the asylum was thoroughly filled out by information that was gathered by the Biden
▶ 0:50:23So the Biden administration approved the
▶ 0:50:27The asylum application was put into place under the rules established by the Biden administration.
▶ 0:50:32Reclaiming my time. Uh, I don't want to charge file perjury charges against you, but I'm of the opinion that the Trump administration DHS, your DHS approved the asylum application.
▶ 0:50:48The asylum application moved forward under all of the information and vetting processes that were put in place under the Biden administration, which is when vetting happened. And that's what President Trump has changed
▶ 0:50:59under President Trump's administration. my time again
▶ 0:51:01when when
▶ 0:51:02it's obvious you don't want to answer the question. Mr. Kent, do you want a shot at it?
▶ 0:51:08The individual was vetted to serve as a soldier in Afghanistan and that vetting standard was used by the Biden administration as a ruse to bring him here. Had we followed the standard operating [clears throat] procedures for special immigrant visas, that individual and none of the allies welcome people would have come to America. That's on Joe B.
▶ 0:51:27Gentleman's expired. That was the
▶ 0:51:30Point of order, Mr. Chairman, that was a murder that took place in DC. It was not an unfortunate incident and those comments are ethan disrespectful.
▶ 0:51:41Who is that?
▶ 0:51:42I expect better from the the
▶ 0:51:44It's not a valid It's not a valid point of order. Uh I now recognize gentleman from Texas, the former chairman, Mr. McCall for 5 minutes.
▶ 0:51:51Mr. Chairman, Madam Secretary, great to see you. Um this hearing reminds me of the novel A Tale of Two Cities. Um, they see it, the Dems see it as the worst of times, but I see it really as the best of times. And what do I mean by that? Under the Biden administration, 15 to 20 million illegal aliens, unvetted, as you indicated, came into this country. Um, what I think most disturbing is Director Kent's testimony.
▶ 0:52:2218,000 known or suspected terrorists got into this country under the Biden That's why we impeached my Orcus. I was one of the managers. He told his Border Patrol, you don't have to pay attention to federal law when it says shall detain aggravated felons. He disregarded federal law and says, you know what, may detain. It's discretionary. And guess what? We have thousands of aggravated felons now, or if not millions in this country today.
▶ 0:52:53That was the worst of times. Let me go the best of times. Most secure border I've seen in my 22 years in Congress. And I've dealt with this for a long time. Coming from Texas, being chairman of this committee, the daily crossings are 95% down from the prior administration. That's the best of Zero catch and release. My very first bill in Congress 22 years ago was to end catch and release.
▶ 0:53:2222 years later, we finally have achieved that goal. That, Madam Secretary, is the best
▶ 0:53:28of times. An all-time record low. America is safer today. I feel so. And when I look at the Venezuelan vessels attacked, president had every right under the constitution, article two, international waters, cartels designated as FTO's coming into our country to spread poison to kill Americans. If that's not self-defense, I don't know what is.
▶ 0:53:55And then finally, Madam Secretary, thank you for taking out the the shadow Iranian oil takers headed from Venezuela to Cuba, getting around our sanctions that Congress passed. I'm finally seeing an administration flexing its muscle in this hemisphere which has been neglected for so many years. So air, land, and sea is your charge. It's the military's charge as well. I see the land secure.
▶ 0:54:23I see the maritime borders getting more secure and I applaud you for that. On the air secure piece, I chair the special events task force. That's FIFA, the Olympics, the 250th anniversary. Drones are the biggest threat as I see it. I see it in Ukraine and its conflict with Russia and I see it across our border and I see it at these events.
▶ 0:54:48if you could uh update me and with the new NDA authorization to allow federal, state, and locals to work together to identify hostile adversary drones and take them down. Can you tell me how that will impact your ability uh Madam Secretary to better secure these special events?
▶ 0:55:08Yes. Thank you, um Congressman McCall, and thank you for your leadership. I understand you're retiring and um I'm sad about that. You've been a statesman. Thank you for serving with such dignity.
▶ 0:55:18Thank you.
▶ 0:55:19The counter drone and drone technology that is out there today, frankly, our authorities haven't kept up with. Uh and so, thank you for that legislation. Thank you for giving us the opportunity to truly defend the homeland. Here at the Department of Homeland Security, we are going to be investing upwards to $ 1.5 billion dollars into drone technology and counter drone technology and mitigation measures that we can deploy not just across different NSC events or largecale events that we're responsible for the security on, but also that we can use to partner with
▶ 0:55:49cities and states for celebrations and different things that they may hold as well. So we have the responsibility at the Department of Homeland Security for FIFA and the 11 cities that will be hosting the matches here in the United States. Also the Olympics, the America 250 celebrations, also other um national security events that happen such as um Marty Gro and other events that uh are going on throughout the country.
▶ 0:56:14So, this program that we will have will not only work within the events that the department is responsible for, but we will be able to sign agreements with states and cities to provide measures that they don't currently have. Uh, and we're working with the FAA as well to get what we need to um be able to operate. And we don't want just to detect, we don't want to just monitor, we need to mitigate, we need to take these drones down. We need
▶ 0:56:38if I could my time's going to expire. There is so much technology out there today, counter drone technology that I've been working to get into Ukraine to protect them from Russian drones that we can deploy at these events. I'd love to visit with you on that at a later date and thank you for your service.
▶ 0:56:54Yeah, thank you.
▶ 0:56:56Gentleman's time's expired. I now recognize a gentleman from California, Mr. Kareah, for five minutes of
▶ 0:57:01Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And uh I agree with my colleague from Texas. It is a tale of two cities. Um, Secretary Gnome, Trump administration, you're going after the worst of the worst criminals, and we agree with you. The problem is 70% of the people you've arrested have no criminal record.
▶ 0:57:22You're going after noncriminal US citizens, and permanent legal Donna Hughes Brown, Irish citizen, green card holder, 48 years in the United States. She also happens to be the mother of a US Marine, sister to a retired Army colonel. She is in ICE detention since July.
▶ 0:57:50She tried to come back from Ireland, arrested, has been there since then. her crime. She wrote two bad checks for less than $80 a decade ago. You arrested her. She's in custody. Her husband, Jim Brown, came to us and told us her story.
▶ 0:58:11Jim told us, "I voted for President Trump because he promised to go after criminals in our community and not people like my wife." If I can, I'd like to play a video for you. Then he also voted for President Trump.
▶ 0:58:39Yes, sir.
▶ 0:58:41Why did you vote for him?
▶ 0:58:42Because I was an idiot. 80% of the evangelical Christian people were lied to. If you really want to know the truth, and that's exactly what happened. They said criminal, you know, and I believe criminals need to be off the street.
▶ 0:58:58I just want to make sure people watching this understand who you are.
▶ 0:59:02My wife and I when we don't work, we're ministers. We help the needy. That's what we do. We And that's that's who they're arresting. It's Now, we've got Mr. Jim Brown before you. He's standing up. Um hopefully you can talk to him a little bit. These people, Donna Hughes Brown, are not the individuals that should be deported.
▶ 0:59:32Another case, Narciso Barco was beaten and arrested by masked agents while working as a landscaper. He's an undocumented immigrant, 30 years in this country, not a traffic ticket. Mr. Barono is also the father of three US Marines. Three Marines. You want to make a movie of people like this?
▶ 1:00:01A man who comes to this country, instills patriotism in his kids, they swear enough to serve and possibly give up their life for this country. We play a video on this as well, please.
▶ 1:00:26asked federal agents were filmed pinning a man to the ground and repeatedly striking him in the head and neck before putting him in an unmarked car. The man in the video has been identified as Narciso Barono and is the father of two active duty Marines and one Marine veteran. The Department of Homeland Security said an illegal alien was arrested by Border Patrol agents after he quote assaulted federal law enforcement, adding that Bronco quote swung a weed whacker directly at an agent's face.
▶ 1:00:52Video shared by DHS and reviewed by CNN shows Bronco running with a weed whacker, but does not show him striking officers.
▶ 1:01:02I also have with us today Alex Baranco behind you a retired Marine. That's his And uh Alex on behalf myself members here I want to thank you for your service to our country and we also thank your brothers for serving our great country. Thank you very much. Got another case George Ree 25year-old native of California my home state.
▶ 1:01:31He's a US citizen army veteran who served in Well, on his way to work, he came to an immigration checkpoint, pulled over, I don't know where officers deployed tear gas on him, broke his car window, pepper spayed him, and dragged him out of his car. [snorts] An American citizen held for 72 hours without any charges.
▶ 1:02:00Wasn't even given the opportunity to shower to that paper.
▶ 1:02:04Gentleman's time's expired. I now recognize gentleman from Mississippi, Mr. G.
▶ 1:02:08Mr. Chairman, I have two articles I'd like to present for the record.
▶ 1:02:17Under President Trump, an agency intended to keep Americans safe has diverted resources from child abuse, trafficking, and terrorism to immigration enforcement. Second is this letter from my Orange County Sheriff Don Barnes essentially talking about all the individuals under Prop 50 referred to ICE
▶ 1:02:422025 year to date 50 of them. ICE never showed up to pick them up without I will entertain I will entertain I will entertain uh UC's at the at the end of the hearing. I will entertain all UC motions at the end of the hearing. We have witnesses. I want to make sure everybody has time. So, if we do this now, we do have a witness has to leave. You're just going to be taking time from other members, but I will entertain you see motions at the end of this hearing. I now recognize a gentleman from Mississippi, Mr. Guess for 5 minutes.
▶ 1:03:09Uh, thank you, Mr. Chairman. Uh, Madam Secretary, it's great to see you again. Uh, thanks for appearing before us again. Uh, I want to echo uh some of the remarks uh of Mr. McCall. U, I want to first thank you. you. I want to thank the men and women who serve under your command uh for the incredible job that you have done over the last 12 months. We have seen that you are active in enforcing the rule of law.
▶ 1:03:35We have seen a border that is as secure in our lifetime as we have ever seen. You mentioned in your opening statement over the last four years we saw somewhere between 15 to 20 million illegal immigrants enter the country. Just looking at monthly statistical data, we know that under the Biden Harris administration that in December of 2024 that there were over 300,000 illegal immigrants who were encountered along the southern border in that month alone.
▶ 1:04:05uh recent statistics by the Department of Homeland Security for October, the most recent statistics we have show that the number of border encounters for October of this year uh under uh your leadership have dropped to 11,000 uh a uh a decrease of 90 over 95%. And so I want to thank you for that. I want to thank you for the work that your men and women have done to protect our borders from illegal narcotics entering the country.
▶ 1:04:35Uh we saw a press release the Coast Guard um sent out this week regarding Operation Pacific Viper. Uh and they mention a specific seizure uh that occurred on December the 2nd by the Coast Guard cutter Monroe in which in a single incident of interdiction that the Coast Guard had the largest maritime interdiction seizure in almost 20 years, seizing 20,000 pounds of cocaine in an individual seizure.
▶ 1:05:04So, I thank you for your aggressive actions and enforcing the law and for the incredible work that you and the men and women under your command are doing. I want to talk about as we talk about threats, I want to talk about threats against law enforcement. Last week, this committee, we had a hearing then the hearing was entitled when badges become targets. And during that hearing, we talked about the threats to law enforcement, specifically federal law enforcement.
▶ 1:05:29and even specifically within federal law enforcement, the threats toward ICE agents, the threats toward you and other members of leadership within DHS. We know that those threats and those incidents of physical attack have escalated dramatically, in some cases over a,000%. And part of the driving force, I believe, behind those threats is what I refer to as rhetoric against law enforcement.
▶ 1:05:55Uh, and I brought this up last week and I want to bring this up again with you and give you a chance uh to briefly address this. Uh, these are just uh roughly 10 of the statements that I was able to easily find online by elected officials, governors, mayors, in many cases members of Congress uh where they were spewing what I believe to be very harmful statements forward toward law enforcement.
▶ 1:06:17Governor Pritsner from uh claimed uh that ICE um is grabbing people off the street and disappearing them, that our country is becoming Nazi Germany. Representative Crockett compared ICE to slave patrols. Representative Garcia referred to ICE as thugs. Representative Ramirez attacked ICE as a terror force, later a terrorist organization and then later in the hearing said, "Let me be clear.
▶ 1:06:43The Department of Homeland Security, you can quote me on that, is the single biggest threat to public safety right now." Representative Tib said ICE is terrorizing our community, turning our country into a fascist police state. Representative Job Paul calls IC called ICE agents deranged and said is inspiring to obstruct immigration enforcement. Governor Walsh smeared ICE agents as modern-day Gustapo.
▶ 1:07:11Chicago Mayor Johnson accused ICE of being secret police and terrorizing our community. Representative Lynch referred to ICE agents as the Gestapo and nondescript thugs. and Representative Frost compared ICE operations to some of the worst horrors and crimes against humanity in history.
▶ 1:07:31And so, Secretary Gnome, I'd like to give you a few moments to one, address these statements and to speak to how these statements place the safety of our men and women of law enforcement at risk.
▶ 1:07:44Thank you, Congressman Guest. I appreciate you giving me the chance to talk about this because I think the words that these elected officials have used to describe our law enforcement officers are horrific, shocking, and unacceptable. Every single American citizen should find the words that they have used to describe these men and women that took an oath to keep us safe um unacceptable and uh needs to be pointed out that we are seeing the consequences of those words every single day by the violent attacks.
▶ 1:08:14Thousand% increase 's expired 8,000% in death
▶ 1:08:18Gentleman's time is gentleman's time expired. I now recognize the gentleman from Michigan, Mr. Tanadar, for 5 minutes of question. Please remember to stick to the five minutes. Thank you, Chairman Garbarino and Ranking Member Thampson for having this hearing today. I know the American people have been demanding answers from this administration on their unlawful actions. So, I hope we are able to get some useful answers from our witnesses today.
▶ 1:08:46Secretary Gnome, this past May, I asked you during a congressional hearing if it was the policy of DHS to follow orders issued by federal courts. You said on the record, and I'm quoting here, we are following all federal orders. End of my code. End of your quote. Secretary [snorts] Gnome, you lied to me under oath that day.
▶ 1:09:11You lied to the American people and you have betrayed the trust placed upon you in your role as Secretary of Homeland Security. You defied federal court orders when you refused to order the deportation flights to El Salvador in March to turn around.
▶ 1:09:29Federal courts have also found your department to have violated federal injections in your continued to send non-citizens on deportation rights with some courts having called your orders unlawful. [snorts] Secretary Gnome, I just have three questions for you.
▶ 1:09:51One, why did you lie under oath by saying DHS was following all federal court orders when they clearly were not?
▶ 1:10:05question two, let me finish my questions. Question two, why did you misled the American people when you said that no American citizens have been arrested or detained by federal immigration agents? And my last question number three, Donald Trump said that your ICE agents haven't gone far enough.
▶ 1:10:28Do you think terrorizing American citizens and assaulting peaceful protesters isn't far enough?
▶ 1:10:37Congressman, the Department of Homeland Security and this administration complies with all federal court orders. We always have and we always will.
▶ 1:10:43Not true.
▶ 1:10:43And we will continue to appeal. And sir, I will even tell you that at the highest court at the Supreme Court, the Department of Homeland Security and our litigation has an over 90% success rate in winning at the highest court in our battle against activist judges across this country. Madam Secretary, judges that we will continue to appeal and then when it gets to the highest court and we get a decision, it is proven that we have been compliant. I will also say madam madam secretary let you want me to answer your questions or not?
▶ 1:11:10I do, but let me uh you haven't been telling us the truth. Uh, look, there have been at least 170 known cases of citizens being arrested or detained by federal immigration agents this year alone. This is the truth. Are you lying to the American people right now by denying these reports?
▶ 1:11:29When we are doing our targeted enforcement operations against criminal illegal aliens, individuals that are in that area may be detained until we verify who they are and then they are released. This has been done for years in every single law enforcement operation that has always happened. We follow the same protocols and we continue to do that. We have never once detained or deported an American citizen. We have not held them and charged them. Uh when we find out to verify their identity, then that is when they are released.
▶ 1:11:59You also asked about ICE agents going far enough. Sir, I will tell you that every single ICE agent, CBP agent, federal law enforcement officer that's out there doing their work every day, none of them will rest until our communities are safe. None of them will rest until ter and our children and our grandchildren can grow.
▶ 1:12:18Let me reclaim my time here, please. Let me recn it is a fact that you ignored federal court orders in March and in May of this year. Do you plan on ignoring more federal orders? We always
▶ 1:12:32I'm sick I'm sick I'm sick of your lies and the American people demand the truth
▶ 1:12:36because you keep saying it doesn't make it true.
▶ 1:12:39I am sick of your lies. The American people are sick of these lies. American people demand truth.
▶ 1:12:45America is very happy that finally they have a president in the White House that gets up every day to keep them safe.
▶ 1:12:51Madam Secretary, your incompetence and your inability to truthfully carry out your duties of Secretary of Homeland Security. If you're not fired, will you
▶ 1:13:01Sir, I will consider you're asking me to resign as an endorsement of my work. Thank you very much.
▶ 1:13:08I yield back my time.
▶ 1:13:10Gentleman yields back his time. I'll remind uh members that they are entitled to ask questions during their uh their time. Um witnesses are entitled to answer those questions. Uh members are entitled to reclaim their time. So let's if we're going to have questions and answers, please allow it. You can reclaim your time if you want, but witnesses are here voluntarily. Please at least give them a chance to answer the questions that you're asking. I now recognize a gentleman from Texas, Mr. Fluger, for 5 minutes of questions.
▶ 1:13:36Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And it's unfortunate that our colleagues on the other side of the aisle for five straight years now have no concern for anything worldwide threats wise. Uh, and I have proven that we're supposed to be talking about worldwide threats, but unfortunately we're talking about homeland threats, threats in our homeland. And director, um, can you just reaffirm the number for us of people that match the terror watch list that are in our country?
▶ 1:13:58There's 18,000 known and suspected terrorists in the country right now that came in under Joe Biden's watch.
▶ 1:14:06That's unbelievable. That's
▶ 1:14:09And that's just what we know of.
▶ 1:14:11Secretary, um despite uh even members on this committee uh that have uh called our law enforcement and ICE and DHS and Border Patrol and and other agents names and slandered them. Uh I support you and I support what you're doing to secure the homeland. Uh the Working Families Tax Act allocated 13.5 billion dollars to the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Justice to reimburse states for the cost of the Biden Harris administration's open border policies.
▶ 1:14:42No state suffered more than Texas. Uh fentanyl, drug and human trafficking, violent crime, stress on local emergency response services substantial damage to my district, to our state, to my constituents, to people that live and work in Texas. And in response, our um state launched operation lonear to secure the border when the Biden administration abdicated their responsibility uh to do that. We built miles of border wall. We uh had other barriers.
▶ 1:15:11We deployed state troopers, national guard to deter uh the invasion that we suffered during this time period, which cost our state over 11 billion. And so, as part of this working families tax, we allocated $13.5 billion to reimburse those states. Last month along with our senators, I led the Republican uh Texas delegation in sending a letter to you and Attorney General Bondi uh highlighting this and requesting that the state of Texas be fully reimbursed and I wanted to get a status on that reimbursement today.
▶ 1:15:39Yes, thank you. And we are we still to this day remain in uh incredibly grateful to the state of Texas for their leadership during that time. That was challenging times um devastating times for what we saw happening down there and Texas stepped up in a way that was absolutely incredible. So yes, those dollars are being formulated and allocated. If you remember, many states deployed their National Guard down there. I was governor of South Dakota at that time and my National Guard was deployed down there as well.
▶ 1:16:03So, uh, reconciling the costs, um, for every single state and looking at that allocation, we're making sure we're doing due diligence to make sure that it's appropriated correctly.
▶ 1:16:13And just to be clear, I want to make sure that that money does come in the form of the reimbursement to Texas.
▶ 1:16:18Uh, that's what we're working with the White House on doing, sir. Okay. Um what when it comes to what uh Director Kent talked about these 18,000 people, can you give us an idea uh of of who these people are, what type of threat they posed to us? We saw it wasn't some accident. This was an assassination and a murder.
▶ 1:16:40Uh it was not an accident. Uh despite my colleagues saying that it was an accident, it was a murder uh and an assassination um of a National Guard uh hero. So what other types of threats uh are you are you uh tracking and and preventing from happening?
▶ 1:16:58Yeah, I would say sir that we we face the typ the terrorists that we've faced for years in ISIS, al-Qaeda, Hamas, um individuals that are here that are radicalized, but also we face the cartels as they've infiltrated our country under the last administration, their proliferation of human trafficking, drugs, and violence going after um trend Araba as well, MS-13.
▶ 1:17:20uh those individuals are still a very real clear danger every day on the streets and we encounter them, arrest them and deport them and bring them to justice each and every day. Beyond that, sir, you even have gangs in cities that are localized that are terrorist organizations. The Latin Kings in Chicago are absolutely terrorists to their communities and we work every day to make sure that we're protecting those communities. So, I could not prioritize one over another because they're all killers. They're all killers and they all are destroying families each and every day.
▶ 1:17:50For both you and Director Kent, do terrorist organizations around the world such as ISIS, al-Qaeda, uh, and others still have an intent, uh, to attack America, to attack our homeland, to utilize every method?
▶ 1:18:01Absolutely. Our intelligence and our information that we deal with every single day is addressing those threats on our streets here in the United States. Uh, Director Kent, can you give us an idea of what those uh tactics, techniques, and procedures could be that we're that we are uh need to stay alert
▶ 1:18:18Honestly, the uh attacks of October 7th, the decentralized and just barbaric nature of that is the new terrorist uh playbook. They're not looking necessarily for a spectacular attack like we had on 911, but targets of opportunity like we tragically saw with the terrorist attack in Washington DC. these smaller cells or even individual operatives taking action. That's what has us very concerned combined with just the sheer volume.
▶ 1:18:40My time is expired. Secretary, thank you for your commitment to reimburse Texas. I yield back.
▶ 1:18:45Gentleman's times expired. I now recognize the gentleman from Rhode Island, Miss Magaziner for five minutes
▶ 1:18:50Madam Secretary, how many United States military veterans have you deported?
▶ 1:18:56Uh, sir, we have not deported US citizens or military veterans.
▶ 1:19:01I don't believe you've served in the military. I haven't either, but I think you and I can agree that as Americans, we owe everything to those who have served our country in uniform, particularly those who have served in combat. Do you agree with that,
▶ 1:19:13sir? I believe that people that are in this United States that are citizens have legal status here. Those
▶ 1:19:18Madam Secretary, we are joined on Zoom by a gentleman named Sejun Park. He is a United States Army combat veteran who was shot twice while serving our country in Panama in 1989. Like many veterans, he struggled with PTSD and substance abuse after his service. He was arrested in the 1990s for some minor drug offenses. Nothing serious. He never hurt anyone besides himself. And he's been clean and sober for 14 years. He is a combat veteran, a Purple Heart recipient.
▶ 1:19:48He has sacrificed more for this country than most people ever have. Earlier this year, you deported him to Korea, a country he hasn't lived in since he was 7 years old. Will you join me in thanking Mr. Park for his service to our
▶ 1:20:04Sir, I'm grateful for every single person that has served our country and follows our laws.
▶ 1:20:08Can you please tell Mr. Park why you
▶ 1:20:10Every one of them needs to be enforced.
▶ 1:20:12But you understand that many veterans struggle with PTSD. Many drug uh veterans struggle with with substance abuse challenges. Uh this man took two bullets for our country. Will you you have broad authority, by the way, as secretary to issue humanitarian parole to to do deferred action. Will you commit to at least looking at Mr. Park's case to see if you can help him find a pathway back to this country that he sacrificed so much for?
▶ 1:20:36I will absolutely look at his case. But I want you to remember that
▶ 1:20:40Madam Secretary, the man behind you, please stand up, sir.
▶ 1:20:43His name is Jim Brown from Troy,
▶ 1:20:46He is a Navy combat veteran who served our country in the Gulf War. He's married to a woman named Donna who came to our country legally from Ireland when she was 11 years old. She has lived here for 48 years. Because of you, Jim's wife, Donna, has been in prison for the last four months. She did not come here illegally, and she has never committed any crime other than writing two bad checks totaling $80 ago.
▶ 1:21:15She is currently in prison and facing deportation. Miss Gnome, will you thank Mr. Brown for his service to our
▶ 1:21:23Thank you, Mr. Brown, for your service to our country. Now, what possible explanation can there be for locking up his wife for 4 months when she has committed no crime other than writing a couple of bad checks for $80?
▶ 1:21:36Sir, it is not my prerogative, my latitude, or my job to pick and choose which laws in this country get in.
▶ 1:21:42You have broad discretion as the secretary. You can you can issue parole. You can do all kinds of things, but you're choosing not to. Will you commit again to just reviewing Donna's case and reuniting this combat veteran with his beloved wife who also loves this
▶ 1:21:58I will review the case.
▶ 1:21:59Now, Madam Secretary, you've already heard the story of Lance Corporal Alejandro Barono, uh the United States Marine veteran who is behind you, who also has two brothers who are United States Marines. Will you thank Lance Corporal Barono for his service?
▶ 1:22:15Thank you for your service. His father, Narc Bronco, is a landscaper in California who has lived peacefully in our country for 30 years and has no criminal record. Last spring, while he was mowing the lawn at an IHOP, ICE agents tackled him in the street and imprisoned him for weeks. A peaceful, hardworking man who raised three sons to be United States Marines. We need men of that character in this country. Again, as secretary, you have broad discretion.
▶ 1:22:46Will you consider Lance Corporal Bronco's father for parole in place to stay in our country owing to the fact that he has contributed to our country by raising three United States Marines?
▶ 1:22:58This is an opportunity to remind everybody that every person that's in this country illegally has an opportunity to voluntarily go home and come back the right way.
▶ 1:23:08Three, he raised three United States Marines facilitate that. He has been living here peacefully doing his job for 30 years. You have discretion. You are choosing not to use it. Madam Secretary, you promised America that you would go after the worst of the worst. But these people are not the worst of the worst. A Purple Heart recipient, a military spouse, the father of three Marines. And it's not just veterans and military families you are locking up and deporting children with cancer, mothers with babies in the NICU. United States citizens.
▶ 1:23:38You do. There are many problems with your leadership, but the biggest problem is this. You don't seem to know how to tell the difference between the good guys and the bad guys. Go after the bad guys. Go after the terrorists. Do not go after veterans, Marines, children. Gentleman's timed back. Time's expired. I now recognize a gentle lady from Georgia, Miss Green, for five minutes of questions.
▶ 1:24:02Thank you. The previously Democratc controlled administration allowed over 13 million border crossers from over 170 countries and territories to break our laws, invade our country, rape our women and children, and murder our own people. They set all-time records for the highest number of illegal aliens ever encountered in a single day at 14,500.
▶ 1:24:25in a single month at 370 thousand and in a single year at three million not including the known gotaways. Thanks to Secretary Gnome and the hard work of Tom Hman and all the brave men and women at DHS, our new Republican controlled admin has produced the safest and most secure border our country has ever seen. Thank you very much for that.
▶ 1:24:50For the seventh consecutive month, US Border Patrol released zero illegal aliens into the United States. Daily average apprehensions at the southern border are 95% lower than the daily average under the last administration. 10 months under Trump has seen less apprehensions than one month under Biden.
▶ 1:25:12Since January 21 through the end of November, there have been 117,15 total enforcement encounters along the southwest border, which is nearly 40% less than the monthly average during the Biden administration. Meanwhile, there has been an 8,000 increase in death threats against ICE law enforcement.
▶ 1:25:38Secretary Gnome, back in July, the department put out a press release titled Worst of the Worst: Criminal Proceedings Begin in a case of transgender illegal alien accused of rape, child rape,
▶ 1:25:55not just rape, child rape of a 14-year-old boy in a in a sanctuary New York City bathroom. I wanted to highlight this case because it encapsulates so many different violent policies of Democrats.
▶ 1:26:09This this was an increase in trans violence with their embrace of gender ideology and egregious catch and release policy implemented under the last four years and sanctuary cities that harbor criminal illegal alien monsters that have raped and murdered many Americans. Can you discuss further what you're facing in these sanctuary cities and the illegal alien monsters that have been released into American communities under the Biden
▶ 1:26:37Yeah, unfortunately, Congresswoman, we arrest individuals like that every day because they're so prevalent on our streets because of what happened under the Biden administration. Every day we're able to go out and encounter and bring to justice individuals who are raping our children, murdering our mothers, our grandmothers, our families are devastated by them.
▶ 1:26:58And I'm shocked at the Democrats constant defense of these individual criminals over the American citizen that is out there just trying to live their lives, put food on the table, and live the American dream. And what we do at the Department of Homeland Security by making sure that we're out enforcing the law every day is making sure that those families get a chance to do that. So, I'm so grateful for them. The 8,000% increase in death threats is real.
▶ 1:27:24These ICE agents and CBP officers that are out on our streets doing God's work um live in these communities. They live there. Um these are their families and their neighbors that they're protecting and they get up every day and do that job because they believe in their mission. uh they take an oath and they um are honorable men and women who are serving with greatness during a challenging time when activists and radicals attack them and put their lives in danger.
▶ 1:27:51I think it's shameful to see the defense of individuals who break our laws. We are a nation of laws. If we are not a nation of laws, we're no nation at all. And that is what we are doing every day is following those. If you guys don't like the law, go change it. That's your job. You don't complain. I was raised by a dad who said, "We don't complain about things. We fix them. Well, go fix them. If you don't like the law, quit belly aching. Quit hitting and attacking our ICE officers. Quit going out and protesting and screaming vile things at them. Quit calling them names. We wouldn't let our children do that.
▶ 1:28:20Go do something that actually matters by having an honest debate and changing the law. That's your jobs. You all should be fired in my
▶ 1:28:27I agree. Thank you so much for that, Secretary Gnome. Uh back in 2021, I was one of only 16 members who voted against the Allies Act of 2021, which increased the number of special immigrant visas for Afghan nationals and loosen vetting requirements for eligibility. This brought in over 76,000 Afghans.
▶ 1:28:48Director Kent, what actions are being taken to identify and remove any of the 100,000 Afghan nationals admitted under the Biden admin who may have ties to terrorism like the one who shot two National Guard members tragically killing Sarah Beckm here in Washington
▶ 1:29:06Gentle, I'm sorry, gentle lady's time is expired, but can
▶ 1:29:09can he just answer?
▶ 1:29:10No, we're keeping everything quick to the five minutes. I'm I'm sorry, but uh gentleman from New York is now recognized Mr. Goldman for 5 minutes. Secretary Gnome, let's talk about the law. Do you agree that asylum is a lawful pathway to immigrate to this country? Yes or no?
▶ 1:29:26There's an asylum program. Yes. In
▶ 1:29:28All right. So, immigrants then with ongoing asylum applications are legally in this country. Correct.
▶ 1:29:35Excuse me. I'm sorry. Your question was
▶ 1:29:37immigrants with ongoing asylum applications are legally in this country. There are individuals in this country that have applications that
▶ 1:29:47and they are legally here because it's a lawful pathway, right?
▶ 1:29:50It's a lawful path pathway.
▶ 1:29:51Okay. So, if your department then deports anyone with an ongoing asylum application, you are violating the law.
▶ 1:30:01Joe Biden left us with
▶ 1:30:03I'm not asking about Joe Biden. I'm asking you a specific question. If your department deports anyone with an ongoing asylum application,
▶ 1:30:12you are violating the law. Is that
▶ 1:30:15It was greatly violated when they
▶ 1:30:17I'm asking you to come asylum application.
▶ 1:30:21Why are you filibustering? Why can't you answer the question? It's a simple
▶ 1:30:25If your departmentary deports anyone with an ongoing asylum application,
▶ 1:30:32you are violating the law. Isn't that correct? the asylum program was broken under the last
▶ 1:30:36Mr. Chairman. I will reclaim my time. She's not answering the question and but the obvious answer is that yes, if you follow a lawful pathway, asylum is a lawful pathway. If you have an open asylum case, you are here lawfully. But the problem that we are seeing around the country is that you are not following the law. Don't tell us to change the law. If you don't like the asylum system, you change the asylum law.
▶ 1:31:06Bring it to us. We'll work with you. I think it needs to be changed. But you can't just decide that you're not going to follow the law and asylum is a law and deport people who have ongoing applications. Unfortunately, that is exactly what's happening. It's happening across the street from my office right in New York City.
▶ 1:31:28Numerous thousands of people who have come to court appearances have left them with open asylum applications have been and then they've been shipped off and many deported. In September, one applicant was ripped away from his wife and small children after such a court appearance. And then this happened to his wife. Please play the video.
▶ 1:31:56No, it's not. It's not this one.
▶ 1:32:01All right. It's not this video. I I Here it is.
▶ 1:32:08Oh, come on, MAN.
▶ 1:32:14NOW, after this incident, your department issued a statement that said, "The officer's conduct in this video is unacceptable and beneath the men and women of ICE. Our ICE law enforcement are held to the highest professional standards and this officer is being relieved of current duties as we conduct a full investigation. 3 days later, you reinstated that officer and you put him back on duty.
▶ 1:32:39I sent you a letter and asked you what investigation was done and why was he reinstated. You did not answer that letter. So, I'm going to give you an opportunity right here to explain to me that if that officer's conduct was quote beneath the men and women of ICE unquote, why did you reinstate him?
▶ 1:32:59Sir, that investigation was completed. I can give you that investigation and the information that you would like. Um, this is
▶ 1:33:07Well, I I wrote you two months ago. Why haven't you given it to me yet?
▶ 1:33:10I'm actually surprised that that you haven't gotten it. I'm going to ask my staff about that. Well, you shouldn't be surprised because generally speaking, hundreds and hundreds if not thousands of your letters.
▶ 1:33:18Now, the other problem that we are seeing all over the country for years is that your officers are wearing masks, are dressed in plain clothes, often going around without identification.
▶ 1:33:28All of our officers are identified.
▶ 1:33:30I'm not asking a question.
▶ 1:33:32I introduced the No Secret Police Act to stop this and we now have 113 co-sponsors so that they will not be masked and that they will identify themselves. Now you say all of them are identifying themselves. That is not the case because last month in New York City again an uh the NYPD officers were injured by your masked plain clothed ICE officers after they were called from 911 by 911 as residents witnessed your
▶ 1:34:02officers pulling individuals out of their vehicles and chasing them down the street. I also asked you what happened there. How were the NYPD officers injured by your officers and you didn't respond? What's the answer,
▶ 1:34:16sir? Our individual offici time has expired.
▶ 1:34:21I yield back.
▶ 1:34:22I recognize gentleman from Texas, Mr. Gonzalez. Five minutes.
▶ 1:34:26Thank you, Chairman. Thank you, Secretary Gnome. Thank you, Director Kent and Director Glen, for your patriotism, your your service to our country. Thank you to the families for allowing uh everyone to serve. We're grateful for that. Democrats like to show uh clip after clip. I represent a district that's half of the southern border. Our lives was turn were turned upside down under Joe Biden and now we have our lives back due to President Trump and due to the policies that y'all are executing. So, thank you. I I have one question, but I'm going to try to if there's time.
▶ 1:34:56I think it'd be important for the American people to get an update on the role Coast Guard played in the Venezuela oil tanker seizure. But first, I'd like to thank once again thank you for being here. And so I'd like to first thank you SISA. Thank you for keeping our nation's critical infrastructure safe. Your you are nation's uh cyber first responders. Thank you to the Coast Guard during during our Texas floods. You showed up. Coast Guard showed up. You save lives. Thank you to the Coast Guard for all the work that they've done in Giadam South.
▶ 1:35:25They've been the tip of the spear in the in the Southcom AO for a long time. Their work often goes un unnoticed. Thank you, HSI, for leading these anti-gang task force. They work. They're going out there. You're apprehending murderers. You're apprehending sexual sexual offenders. You're doing it in a local, state, federal way. They're working. Thank you for that. Thank you, ICE. Thank you for keeping us safe by deporting all these people.
▶ 1:35:50I really appreciate the the the innovative idea of DHS owning its own airplanes. It's ridiculous that we had to to to essentially uh contract out in order to to have these repatriation flights. That is a gamecher. Thank you for that. Thank youro for adding bed space. This is exactly how we continue to deport uh the the millions of cu convicted criminal aliens that are in this country. Thank you NCTC for for keeping us safe. You're exactly right.
▶ 1:36:18We thank you for for vetting for going out and finally doing the role of vetting vetting these people. you and I served it served uh overseas. Many of us did. Uh and we know oftentimes it was more dangerous at the chow hall than outside the outside the wire, right? So, thank you for that vetting. Uh thank you Border Patrol for ending catch and release. Uh thank you TSA for keeping us safe during uh during uh uh the all our travel and then also looking into any future vulnerabilities. Thank you Secret Service.
▶ 1:36:48Thank you for not only keeping our leaders safe, but a lot of people don't realize Secret Service is key to school safety. I think that's just so important. That brings us all together. I wanted to say thank I want to use the bulk of my time to just thank you because we don't do that enough here. It's always fingerpointing. It's always somebody else's fault. Please go back to your agencies and thank the men and women that are serving every day and and and helping to keep this country safe.
▶ 1:37:13Uh with that, I'd like to give you a little time to talk about the Venezuelan situation and and what the Coast Guard is doing.
▶ 1:37:20Uh the operation that was conducted yesterday morning was a Coast Guard operation. It was in partnership with the Department of War and the Department of Justice, the FBI as well. And it was a successful um operation directed by the president to ensure that we're pushing back on a regime that is systematically covering and flooding our country with deadly drugs and killing our next generation of Americans.
▶ 1:37:42Just the drugs that the Coast Guard has been able to interdict on the waters um since that President Trump has been in office has been enough lethal doses of cocaine to kill 177 million Americans. That's twothirds of our country that has been saved by blowing up by going after and bringing to justice these individuals that are out at sea and those individuals that are funding it with a shadow fleet of sanctioned oil that should never be sold to benefit their profits and their pockets to kill Americans. Thank you for that update.
▶ 1:38:12Uh for many of us that served in uniform often times it was overseas, it was in uh it was in uh the Middle East or it was in Asia or was in Europe and and I think those those AOS are very important. But for too long president after president after president. Our backyard has been left wide open and we are completely shocked why all these terrorists are in our country and all these people are unvetted. All this chaos is happening when in our own backyard was unsafe.
▶ 1:38:39So, thank you again for one, I know you traveled, you met with heads of state, uh, El Salvador, Mexico, a couple that come to mind, but, uh, I just want to thank you and and for for making our backyard a priority and ultimately to keep Americans safe. Texans, Texans are more safe today than we were a year ago. And a lot of that is due to President Trump and due to the leadership that I'm seeing right here of executing those policies. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. With that, chairman, I yield back.
▶ 1:39:09Gentleman yields back. I now recognize the gentle lady from Illinois, Miss Ramirez, for five minutes of questions.
▶ 1:39:15Thank you, chairman.
▶ 1:39:20American citizens have been arrested or detained. Uh we focus on those that are here illegally. Secretary Gnome, you lie and you lie to the American people. I will be including into the record an article by ProPublica from October 16, 2025 entitled, "We found that more than 170 US citizens have been held by immigration agents. They've been kicked." There's nothing smiling about US citizens. I'm sorry. That's very inappropriate. Let me continue.
▶ 1:39:49They've been kicked, dragged, and detained for days. The next one,
▶ 1:39:58the Trump administration has specifically targeted the worst of the worst. The individuals that we are going after are those that are violent criminals, those that are breaking our laws. Do you, Secretary Gnome? Again, you lied to the American people.
▶ 1:40:14I will be including to the article into the record an article by the NBC News from December 7, 2025 entitled, "ICE has arrested nearly 75,000 people with no criminal records." Data shows the co-equal branch of government.
▶ 1:40:38And it is your obligation as a member of the executive branch to honor decisions made by the highest court of the land. Yes or no? Secretary,
▶ 1:40:47we are abiding by all all federal judges orders. Absolutely.
▶ 1:40:50The Justice Department said that when the administration was ordered back in March to stop sending detained migrants to a mega prison in El Salvador, you personally made the final call to continue the flights anyway. Is that correct? and the decisions that are made on deportations, where flights go and when they go are my decision at the Department of Homeland Security. And we'll continue to do the right thing, continue to work and do uh protect Americans no matter what radical judge comes out and tries to stop us.
▶ 1:41:20We'll You lied on the record and you lied to members of this committee. You violated court orders by not turning around deportation flights bound for El Salvador, where we know that hundreds of people under your leadership have reported that they were raped, they were beaten, and they nearly died. And your agents used chemical weapons in Chicago despite court orders from District Court Judge Ellis forbidding their use.
▶ 1:41:50Secretary Gnome, you, Gregory Bavino, and your ICBP and DHS deputized agents have waged an unaccountable, unlawful, unconstitutional war against communities across the nation. Our residents have been surveiled. They've been threatened. They've been tearged. They've been hit with pepper balls. They've been shot. They've been subjected to warrantless arrests and precision immobilization maneuvers. They've been kidnapped and disappeared under your leadership.
▶ 1:42:20So, we have a lot to talk about, but you and your department continue to reject congressional oversight. And you know how I know this? I know this because I requested a meeting with ICE field office director Russell Hut. I requested a meeting with field office director Samuel Olsen. And when you came to Chicago on October 3rd, I publicly and formally requested a meeting with you. So, I'm going to be including a letter I sent on October 3rd requesting a meeting with Secretary Gnome. So, Secretary Nome, I want to ask you again.
▶ 1:42:51Will you commit to meet with me? Yes or no?
▶ 1:42:55Yes, absolutely.
▶ 1:42:56Thank you. Thank you. So, we have a lot to talk about and actually my scheduler has a couple dates that I'll get to you after this meeting. I appreciate that. So, look, I want to be very clear. You have misused resources appropriated by Congress. You've engaged in unethical behavior. You have repeatedly made false and misleading statements to Congress and to the press. And you've undermined the separation of powers and disregarded the role of Congress and the courts.
▶ 1:43:22Bottom line, you lie with impunity, you reject checks and balances, and you ignore Congress and the courts. Your options are limited. Either you're going to resign, Trump's going to fire you, or you will be impeached. I've already called for your resignation. You may remember I handd delivered my request to you back in May and I urge you to reconsider resignation because I've taken the first step towards your impeachment and I've called on the judiciary committee to open an investigation into your lawlessness. Mr.
▶ 1:43:50Chairman, I know that at the end we'll be entering a number of articles into consent, but since I have a few moments, I ask unanimous consent to enter into the record a letter calling the Judiciary Committee to investigate Secretary Gnome's impeachable offenses. Whatever you choose, the American people will have justice, secretary, and you will be held accountable. I'm going to make sure of that every single day. With that, Mr. Chair, I yield back.
▶ 1:44:18Gentle lady yields back. I now recognize a gentleman from Texas, Mr. Latrell, for five minutes of questions.
▶ 1:44:23Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Madam
▶ 1:44:26it's good to see you and thank you again for coming to Texas after the Kurville floods. It was your team was amazing. um their interaction with the leadership um in our state up and down the chain of command was outstanding. Not something I read about. I saw it. So I'm I'm I'm speaking from the truth. Uh so let's talk about worldwide threats if you don't mind. This may go back and forth to Mr. Glen and Mr. Kent.
▶ 1:44:53My questions first and foremost is uh the [clears throat] nefarious actors globally um they're they're kind of everywhere and as we try to protect the motherland um in a cyber space airing land uh something that's come to my attention in the committee we had committee hearing we had earlier undersea cabling and I don't know um if you have if you're a subject matter expert on this I really wasn't until this hearing ing,
▶ 1:45:23but a a large amount of our information flows under the water. Uh something that most people aren't aware of, but I can assure you that the bad actors globally probably Now, it's multi-jurisdictional from what I understand. It's Department of Justice, it's Department of War, and then it's Department of Homeland Security. And they kind of juggle these kind of juggle the effort. Can you give me some insight on the protection mechanism that that Homeland Security has for our undersea cabling?
▶ 1:45:51Um, and do you I I consider this a a very viable threat to specifically for information flow since considering everything that goes back and forth across the water. Can you give me a kind of a high level briefing considering the atmosphere of what we're looking at?
▶ 1:46:10Yes, I can. And I'll try to leave some time for the other individuals, too. But the Department of Homeland Security has 23 different components. Several of them have some responsibility for surveillance and monitoring of those cables and the information that flows through them. So CISA is our cyber security agency which uh looks for bad actors, hunts down those bad actors and then hardens our systems. So where we see a weakness or a vulnerability, they help us do that with the interactions we have with private companies, their communications or other countries.
▶ 1:46:38Uh but then we also have our coast scout coast guard out on the waters each and every day which help us with surveillance activities to see if there's nefarious actors that would be out there jeopardizing those systems. We have INA which is our intelligence and analysis. They are the ones that are helping us with our covert operations.
▶ 1:46:54They're the ones who are coordinating with our intelligence agencies on what we see uh as um hacking attempts or um enemies that would try to endanger those cables or cut them, damage them so that they couldn't be utilized to keep our critical infrastructure going.
▶ 1:47:09FEMA is the agency that's responsible for on our worst day if we needed something or someone to run the government, if there was an attack in this country, FEMA is the agency that would do that and maintains the resources to making sure that that we have an operating government in an emergency disaster situation. I
▶ 1:47:27I know there's redundancy on the cabling system and there's over from what I understand there's over a million miles of cable under underwater. Um I I I want to make sure that we have enough protection in place so the ripple effect is not um catastrophic to the country. Um Mr. Kent, you got something to add. I was going to shift over to Mr. Glacen.
▶ 1:47:51Uh in terms of undersea cabling, no, I I do not.
▶ 1:47:54Okay. Uh Mr. Gene, I have a question for you. So, as far as trafficking, human trafficking, drug trafficking, uh this always this always hurts me to say this, but um Houston, Texas is in my district and it is the worst city in the country for sex trafficking in the country. Um I just cannot believe that. What is the FBI doing amongst other agencies? you just happen to be sitting here in front of me.
▶ 1:48:24And Madam Secretary, you can probably jump in on this, too. Um, enough's enough. I understand the complexities of the worldwide web and how these bastards are doing this, and we can't seem to grab a hold of them. What What What's the answer?
▶ 1:48:44Our HSI investigators specialize in child trafficking and human trafficking. They get up every single day and hunt down those individuals that um victimize our children and partner with nonprofits and other agencies with the FBI to do that. Yes. It's it's shocking to me that Houston is one of
▶ 1:49:02we need to take a better look at this because we're losing. I mean, we're losing so bad.
▶ 1:49:09I don't even know how to define it.
▶ 1:49:10And this has been happening. Um I said this exact same thing to Mr. Mayorus and if I was here before that I'd say the same thing again. is just we have not figured it out.
▶ 1:49:20Mr. Gosh, you got anything for that?
▶ 1:49:22Yeah, I would tell you it's been a priority with this director and you know, so far this year compared to last year, we have 300 plus human traffickers arrested up 15%. Uh
▶ 1:49:31I'm sorry, sir. Mr. Chairman, I yel
▶ 1:49:33I appreciate that. And
▶ 1:49:34I'll catch you after
▶ 1:49:35one of the if one of the following witnesses wants to give him some time to to answer that very important question, they can do that.
▶ 1:49:41Um gentleman yields back. I now recognize a gentleman from New York, Mr. Kennedy, uh for five minutes. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Secretary Gnome, with about a year as DHS Secretary under your belt, there's no shortage of criticisms for me to choose from today. You've deported American citizens, bringing a level of inhumity to this nation's immigration laws that I haven't seen in my lifetime.
▶ 1:50:04You've terrorized communities, including my own in Buffalo, New York, vowing to go after the worst of the worst, but instead detaining women, children, and hardworking individuals in pursuit of the American dream. You've botched a response to one of the most devastating floods we've seen. An extreme weather event along the Guadalupe River that took more than 130 innocent lives, including more than 35 children.
▶ 1:50:28Central Texas waited days for your agency to respond because of the reckless policies you've implemented. Your FEMA lead was missing in action, completely unreachable, as were FEMA's call lines with 84% of calls unanswered on July 7th. Three days after the floods, FEMA personnel, despite your slashing of their ranks, who were ready and willing to help, waited days to spring into action because of your policies.
▶ 1:50:56Disasters do not wait for bureaucracy. Your abysmal performance goes beyond your woeful disaster response. You've also taken a sledgehammer to FEMA's recovery, preparedness, and mitigation missions. You cancel more than $4 billion in building resilient infrastructure in communities funds, a program that helps communities reduce their risk of natural disasters.
▶ 1:51:22You withheld millions in FEMA funds for emergency alerting infrastructure found to be in violation of the Impound Control Act. you. Perhaps most critical to my state of New York, cancelled more than 90% of New York State's Homeland Security Program funding, including $134 million in urban area security initiative funds for New York City's greater metropolitan areas.
▶ 1:51:50You have mismanaged these grants to the point where cities and states, including New York, are suing you to recover counterterrorism funding that's lawfully theirs. and that Congress intended for them to receive. It's a tragedy that we're here today discussing these cuts to counterterrorism and security grant funds for a city that was the main site of the September 11th attacks, the entire reason your department was established in the first place.
▶ 1:52:18As the ranking member of the subcommittee on emergency management, it's my responsibility to show the American public how you've systemically upended FEMA and emergency preparedness as we know it. So, I have a couple of questions. Simple yes or no answer will suffice. Would you agree with the national security officials assessment that the United States has been operating in a heightened threat environment for several years now?
▶ 1:52:45Yes or no? Would you say New York City is susceptible to these kinds of security threats?
▶ 1:52:50Yes. And that's why they should spend with New York City terrorist target in the nation.
▶ 1:52:55Federal government gave them with New York City being their number one I reclaim my time. With New York City being the number one threat this nation, it's unconscionable that you would cut $134 million in urban area security initiative funding for the city of New York. What compelled you to knowingly make our cities less safe with these funding cuts?
▶ 1:53:18What compels you, your mayor, and your governor to release thousands of criminals on the streets rather than to turn them over to ICE? You'd rather release secretary a murderer out. You cut $134 million our detainers. You honor our detainers.
▶ 1:53:32Support the security of New York City in the state of New York. The number one threat in this nation in your own words. Your cuts are blatantly political, callous, and outright dangerous. It's clear you have no interest in countering real threats in the homeland. While high-risk cities and disaster zones wait for help, you've devoted the past 11 months of violent raids, anti- police policies, and non-stop photo ops.
▶ 1:53:59You brought shame to a department that was created after 9/11 in a time of unity to protect our people. Your failure to lead is a direct threat to the homeland security in our nation and you should resign immediately. I yield back.
▶ 1:54:16Gentleman yields back. I now recognize the gentleman from Alabama, Mr. Strong, for five minutes of questions.
▶ 1:54:22Thank you, Mr. Chairman, ranking member and members of this committee. Uh, I thank you too to our witnesses for being here today uh for your work to protect the homeland in an increasingly complex threat environment. My question today focuses specifically on the evolving drone threat. Mr.
▶ 1:54:40uh Glacin, the FBI's National Car uh counter UAS training center at Redstone Arsenal uh is now the center central hub for preparing federal, state, and local partners for drone threats at major events. What makes Redstone Arsenal such an effective location for this mission? And how does uh that setting uh support the scale of training required for World Cup, America 250 and uh the 2028 Olympics?
▶ 1:55:08Thank you for your question, Congressman. Uh what makes Redstone a great partner for us is one the support that we have from Congress. Number two, the space we have there. Uh the FBI's been in Huntsville for for a long time. Uh it Huntsville also houses our special agent bomb technician program where we train bomb technicians EOD professionals across the United States and we model the counter UAS school off of that.
▶ 1:55:34Um so so that proof of concept has been in place and we're mirroring that process to train the counter US operators.
▶ 1:55:40Thank you. I was there for the inaugural graduation. I'm telling you is most impressive. Uh, I can assure you there's no other location in the country that offers the same mix of controlled airspace, testing ranges, partnered uh, agencies and mission infrastructure that the FBI has at Redstone Arsenal. County UAS is um, uh, has the ability in Huntsville to jam, block, drop, intercept, and do forensics.
▶ 1:56:03Uh, as demand for this specialized training grows, what investment should Congress prioritize to ensure long-term stability for this mission at Redstone? I'd say yesterday the legislation in front of uh I think the Senate right now for the NDA for for the authorities that'd be the first step to give us the the ability to lawfully use the counter US authorities.
▶ 1:56:26I think additionally you know is just like uh the computer technology it evolves uh you know with the months and so the counter US technology is going to change so I have the appropriate funding the support to stay up with that technology so we can mitigate the threats that our nation
▶ 1:56:41Thank you. those graduates were from all over the country and it was most impressive. Secretary Gnome, this uh committee has failed to thank you for your faithful service to to America. The southern border is closed. Uh human smugglers, drug traffickers, and illegal aliens that invaded this country from more than 160 different countries are being returned to the country of their origin. Uh fentanyl poisonings are down more than 35%.
▶ 1:57:06Secretary Gnome, thank you for your efforts to keep uh these drugs out of our country in an effort to save a generation of Americans. It's not a Republican issue. It's not a Democratic issue. It's an American issue. And I thank you. Secretary know many of the most advanced counter uh unmanned aerial systems technologies are being uh tested and evaluated in North Alabama.
▶ 1:57:31How is DHS ensuring that those capabilities transition quickly into field use particularly ahead of these major events and what more can Congress do to accelerate the pipeline?
▶ 1:57:42No, we appreciate the authorities that are necessary for us to operate and standing up a drone program and counter drone program is one of the top three priorities of the department this next year to meet the threats that we face every day. Every day our secret service, our coast guard, our border patrol are seeing drones used against them. um criminals using them to surveil them to find out law enforcement operations and to leak them and to um put their lives in danger.
▶ 1:58:08So making sure that we have the ability to operate and to see far into the future and over our operations is important, but we also need the opportunity to take them down when necessary. We've seen the cartels using weaponized drones against each other. We know it's only a matter of time before we see that here on the homeland. We my job is to make sure that we're prepared and that we're equipped and to advocate to you for the authorities that we need to make that happen.
▶ 1:58:32Thank you. With the new counter UAS authorities expected to be enacted as part of the U National Defense Authorization Act, the next challenge is execution. What concrete steps is DHS planning to take uh in the coming months to ensure that these new authorities are fully operational before uh the FIFA World Cup, uh the Olympics and America 250. And I even want to take it even further. You start looking at college football, we've got to take it even further rather than uh they're all large gathering events.
▶ 1:59:02I actually had the secretary of security of the Southeastern Conference uh before Mr. Kennedy and my committee and it was unbelievable on any given weekend 8 to 10 uh football stadiums with greater than 90,000 people there. We must defend the homeront. Uh and I'm sorry that my time has expired, but I thank you for being before this committee today. Gentleman yields. I now recognize gentle lady from New Jersey, Miss McGyver, for five minutes of questions.
▶ 1:59:28Thank you, Mr. Chairman and ranking member for holding this hearing today. The greatest threat to the homeland right now is a Department of Homeland Security that the American people no longer trust. A department actively undermined by its own secretary. This is on you, Secretary Gnome. Today's hearing is supposed to be about worldwide threats. But, Madam Secretary, under your watch, the threat is coming from inside the building.
▶ 1:59:54Because when DHS, the department charged with keeping Americans safe, is caught breaking the law, lying to the American public, systematically dismantling oversight, fueling bigotry, and targeting vulnerable communities. Trust is broken. Let's start with the basics. How can we trust your department with you at the helm? The American people deserve an answer. Even if you've spent the past year dodging accountability like it's your full-time job, we need to talk about oversight.
▶ 2:00:24Oversight is not optional. It is not a courtesy cuz you feel like it. It is not something you entertain only when it's politically convenient to you. Yet time and time again, Secretary Gnome, you have treated congressional oversight as an inconvenience at best and at worst something to be invaded, ignored, or denied altogether.
▶ 2:00:47Republicans on this committee may be willing to hand over their constitutional duty in order to kiss this administration's butt cheeks, but I am not. I will never. My district is not, and the American people sure aren't.
▶ 2:01:02While Republicans turned this hearing into a praise fest for your failed tenure comm community, your failed tenure communities across America, including mine in New Jersey, are made less safe because DHS under your leadership has become unproductive and malicious. All of the thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you that we keep hearing from across the aisle, there's no thank you from me. And we see the truth that you're trying to hide. The truth is you are deeply unqualified for the post you hold.
▶ 2:01:33This is on full display in the way you treat the people in this body, myself included, who have been elected to serve our communities and keep them safe. Representative Graava, Senator Padilla, myself and others whose character, integrity, and bodies were attacked by your department without evidence and without apology.
▶ 2:01:55Far beyond this, far beyond being disrespectful, you have shown a complete disregard for the oversight authority granted to us by law. You have repeatedly shown that you will target whoever you want, whenever you want, without accountability, members of Congress, members of our communities, and even American citizens. As many of my colleagues have continued to point out today, Secretary Gnome, that's not leadership. That's not democracy.
▶ 2:02:25And that is not how this works. Again, this is not just about you. Don't want you to think this is just a pick on you day. This is about the Trump administration that has turned DHS into a political weapon. So, I'll ask you this. Is Trump embarrassed by your tenure, or is this exactly the kind of god-awful leadership he wants at DHS? Yes or no?
▶ 2:02:50Ma'am, we've already conducted more oversight visits. No, no, no. It's a yes or no. Yes or no? Okay, Secretary Gnome, this is my time to talk, not your time to talk. I reclaim my time. I reclaim my time. I reclaim my time. I reclaim my
▶ 2:03:09Secretary Gnome, DHS is breaking the law, hiding information from Congress, and shutting out oversight. So, let me ask you, how can the American people trust your department with you at the helm with this kind of behavior?
▶ 2:03:22The American people absolutely trust this department to keep them safe and we are showing that every day by the support we get across the country, the amount of people that we're recruiting to all of our
▶ 2:03:33Thank you, Secretary Gnome. Do you agree that using DHS resources to target members of Congress is an abuse of
▶ 2:03:40Excuse me. Would you say that?
▶ 2:03:41You would have heard me if you stopped talking and listened to my questions. Do you agree that using DHS resources to target members of Congress is an abuse of power?
▶ 2:03:52We are not doing that. We are out there enforcing the law, doing our work, and we are allowing over.
▶ 2:03:56Of course, we're not going to get any with that.
▶ 2:03:59Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
▶ 2:04:01Gentle lady yields back. I now recognize a gentleman from Oklahoma, Mr. McCre, for five [clears throat] minutes of It's no wonder that chaos has become the common place when rudeness is so on display. You know, like it's both sides. We we've created a lack of civility in this country.
▶ 2:04:21Um but it it we're perpetuating in this society what what your administration is trying to correct and that is returning back to the rule of law. What separates us from falling into chaos as a nation where poverty envelops us is when we return to order and a display of respect towards law enforcement. A a display of respect to officials.
▶ 2:04:47I look this custom and you've been a member of Congress of where we talk over people and we don't give secretaries a chance to respond. the height of self-importance that that too many people uh try to employ in this building, not remembering we're all here as public servants to to to serve the people. We lift our hearts up far beyond our fellow countrymen. I'll tell you who says thank you.
▶ 2:05:12It's those whose families that were that were the victim of of assaults and rapes and murders under the auto pin uh period the last four years. They say thank you. Um, those who see the madness of lawlessness, the lack of respect to law enforcement, the heightened element of law enforcement sitting in their vehicles and being targeted, say thank you.
▶ 2:05:34Th those those uh families of law enforcements whose addresses are being put out in public so they can intimidate not only the law enforcement officials but their families to try to put them into a place of fear, say, "Thank you for common sense returning back into this country." if we do not have a a respective authority, a respect of law enforcement. Thank you for allowing arrest to happen when someone spits at law enforcement. Thank you.
▶ 2:06:03FEMA, you were assaulted a minute ago verbally over what you're doing with FEMA. I will tell you, as somebody that comes from a state that has more tornadoes, Oklahoma, than probably any other state, thank you for looking at how we can save money through efficiencies.
▶ 2:06:16Our state would love the opportunity of what this administration is talking about of returning power and decision-making back to states as I've said to you before of a person who sat on a bulldozer watching the madness of trying to comply with EPA regs that are built their way into FEMA and people's homes destroyed and as a state lawmaker pushing timber around on a dozer trying to comply and get um taking the time off from time of exercise as a lawmaker trying to help people and I saw the craziness of federal regulations.
▶ 2:06:44Thank you for looking and not taking your foot off the gas of trying to put more money back into national security from the waste that has happened through endless All right. Now, I'm going to get to a
▶ 2:06:56Can I say something about FEMA?
▶ 2:06:57Absolutely you can. Thank you.
▶ 2:06:59The only grants that weren't funded, the individual ones that you were talking about um mitigation ahead were ones that were weaponized to fund the Green New Deal and for climate change and those were rededucted to true mitigation efforts. FEMA today is deploying resources two times faster on average than in history, which means the dollars are going out twice as fast than they ever have before. And the president, as soon as these disasters are happening, is deploying those resources to Republican and Democrat states.
▶ 2:07:26New Mexico, Texas, Alaska, they're all getting dollars immediately and we're responding immediately to our people. I have to actually leave this hearing early because the FEMA review council is giving their report today on suggestions for changes to FEMA and I thank you for not taking your foot off the gas.
▶ 2:07:42I have to co-chair it, but I will be leaving soon to have to go do that. But those suggestions are Republicans and Democrats coming forward with how FEMA should go forward in the future based on the president's vision for making sure that states get the chance to manage it and that local emergency managers get the chance to go and help their communities in a much more efficient way. take those monies and let's move them to true national security through waste and inefficiencies. Um where we've deployed money for snow movement.
▶ 2:08:10We have deployed money previously to move snow that melts.
▶ 2:08:15Okay. Um I want to just throw this open to you and and uh Director Kent, whoever wants to take this. We have to find a balance between making sure the First Amendment is preserved at all cost, but also protecting law enforcement. the social media heightened of a hearing that the chairman held last week. Great, great hearing. How do we preserve?
▶ 2:08:36What ideas can we continue with to where the online enticement threats causing people to want to in embolden themselves to then go act upon those threats that we see in social media. They they say the magic words. They know it's not going to get get them because they don't do a direct threat, but it's an indirect threat. It's all trying to accomplish the same purpose. How do we preserve the First Amendment? This is a lawmaking exercise and why we hold these hearings, not for show.
▶ 2:09:02How do we come up with with a way to preserve the First Amendment and stop the insanity, these indirect threats that are going after your law enforcement officials?
▶ 2:09:13The I apologize, gentleman's time is expired. I know the secretary has to leave and um I would now recognize a gentle lady from Texas, Miss Johnson, for five minutes of questions. I'm just going to take the position that she was scared of my questions.
▶ 2:09:37Mr. Chairman, if we could stop the clock and after all this clerk will suspend.
▶ 2:09:43we could reset the time, that would be
▶ 2:09:45We'll reset the clock. Gentle lady prepared. I'll take away.
▶ 2:10:37Uh, thank you.
▶ 2:10:38Is recognized.
▶ 2:10:39Yeah. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Um,
▶ 2:10:43you know, I just want to respond to a lot of what, uh, Secretary Gnome has just testified to. Um, and and gentlemen, I I have some comments that I hope you'll take back um to the Secretary and to the department. If there's anything that is clear about what is going on in this country is that the rhetoric and fear that is happening is at an all-time escalated high.
▶ 2:11:11Um, and we're all describing different aspects of it. Fear of law enforcement, fear of citizens, fear of people who are legally in this country because it's the rhetoric that is happening from the very top that is being decimated down level. Um and that is really really dangerous and one of the things that the secretary said was she is restoring the rule of law.
▶ 2:11:35That is absolutely not true because the rule of law is founded on two fundamental principles that if you are going to be subject to a criminal arrest in this country that there is probable cause to do so. You can't just snatch somebody walking into a coffee shop because of the color of their skin. There's no probable cause for that.
▶ 2:12:00And also that you will get due process and that is not happening. And so what is you're seeing is an overwhelming of the American people in this country that the lack of respect and regard for the rule of law by this administration and in particular by the by this secretary is at a level that we have never seen and violates all of the constitutional norms and all
▶ 2:12:31of the principles of legal fairness in this country. And you're seeing that manifest itself in threats to law enforcement and bubbling over because people are frustrated and they are channeling that frustration because the administration is not listening and is only doubling down on the rhetoric.
▶ 2:12:55You know, this notion that I think my highlights my colleagues highlighted that we're only going to pursue serious threats. It's just not true. I visited an ICE facility outside of Dallas and over 70% of them were were classified as the lowest threat level as never having a criminal record at all. But yet they were there because of the color of their skin. They weren't there was not a probable cause.
▶ 2:13:25They're not a threat to this country. They have no criminal history at all. I fully support, as does everyone on this Homeland Security focusing on threats to our national security. We want cyber security. We want terroristic threats from abroad to be stopped. Absolutely.
▶ 2:13:47None of us want a recreation of 9/11, but we also do not want under any level the trampling of our constitutional rights and the legal system of due process. We had I have a poster here to highlight three American citizens that were arrested by ICE who had done nothing wrong. They presented themselves as American citizens but yet were still trampled assault.
▶ 2:14:14One had broken ribs, a brain injury, an older gentleman by being knocked down to the ground after he said, "I'm an American citizen." But yet they did not stop. And that is a huge problem when somebody says, "I'm an American citizen to ICE." And ICE does not stop and continues to assault them and physically berate them and then hold them for days and days on end without a due process hearing. That is a problem. And it is not stopping.
▶ 2:14:43We have brought these concerns to the secretary and to agencies like yourself in these hearings time and time again through multiple letters. We've all written letters that have gone unresponded because this cannot happen in our And the reality of it is in any law enforcement situation and what we have happening out into the public is there are ICE agents and there are border patrol agents that are doing their great job.
▶ 2:15:10They're doing they're doing what they're supposed to do, but they're also bad actors. There are people who are exceeding their authority. The power's gone to their head. The intimidation is outrageous. And there's no effort to rein them in by the FBI. There's no effort to rein them in by the Homeland Security. There's no effort to overcorrect, just like one of my colleagues highlighted, the reinstatement of one that has gone that was inappropriate. And these efforts are breaking down the trust of the American people.
▶ 2:15:38I hope you take these concerns back because they need to be addressed if we're going to address the violence in this country. I yield back.
▶ 2:15:45Gentle lady yields back. I now recognize the gentleman from Arizona, Mr. Kraton.
▶ 2:15:48Thank you, Mr. chairman for holding this committee hearing today. Thank you for the witnesses. Um, Director Kent, you talked about what keeps you up at night. I believe you said we don't know who came into the country in the last four years. And we've cited several times in this hearing that about 15 to 20 million people came into this country under the last administration. And something that you said actually shocked me.
▶ 2:16:15You said that 18,000 known and suspected terrorists entered into the country during the Biden administration. Is that
▶ 2:16:24That's correct.
▶ 2:16:26That's deeply concerning, but I'm really not surprised many of us in this committee said that's exactly what was going to happen. I didn't know that those numbers would be as high as they are. Um, one of the other things that really concerns me about what's going on in this country is we continue to let people into this country that do not want to assimilate to our culture and want to harm Americans. I want to go ahead and play a video.
▶ 2:16:57Law should be above the US Constitution.
▶ 2:16:59Yes. Yes.
▶ 2:16:59Should Sharia law be over the US
▶ 2:17:03Yes. US constitution which is made by people and the Sharia law is made by Allah. So that is to be all the way above that has to be definitely in the land not for the America for the whole world would be above.
▶ 2:17:15So that should be above the US
▶ 2:17:18Do you feel more comfortable living under American law or do you feel more comfortable living under Sharia law? Sharia law.
▶ 2:17:28I'm a Muslim. I prefer Sharia law.
▶ 2:17:31Shar. Yes. You prefer uh Sharia law over American law?
▶ 2:17:36Of course. Yeah.
▶ 2:17:37They always can come with the same This speaker supports death penalty for homosexuals. This speaker supports death penalty for this crime or this crime or that he is homophobic. These are general views that every Muslim actually has. Every Muslim believes in these things. If the law of the land is Islamic, we respect the law of the land.
▶ 2:18:03Well, if it's not Islamic,
▶ 2:18:04if it's not Islamic, then the law of the land and those who make it can go to hell for honestly because Allah says in the Quran in chapter 33:1, he said, "Oh prophet, fear Allah and do not obey the disbelievers and the hypocrites."
▶ 2:18:15You know why they're worried about the border? Watch this clip here that just sent with al-Qaeda. I call upon every Muslim in the infidel criminal and arrogant United States. Doesn't matter if they're Arab, American, or other descent. I'm saying to all of them, revenge, revenge. Do not consult anyone about killing infidel Americans. You should have a lot of determination and a list of your targets should be
▶ 2:18:43Director Kent, what do you think when you see a video like that?
▶ 2:18:47I think we didn't have control of our borders and we we don't know who's come into our country. However, we have uh had around 2.7 million individuals from Muslim countries and Muslim regions who came in under the Biden administration who went through minimal to no vetting whatsoever who probably share values like the folks that you saw on the
▶ 2:19:05Uh, Director Kent, are you aware that when we invite people into this country and they become citizens, they uh swear an oath to defend and support the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America and against all enemies, foreign and domestic. Yes. What do you think?
▶ 2:19:23What do you believe the long-term consequences will be if the United States continues admitting individuals who either openly reject assimilation into American civic culture or who falsely swear an oath to uphold the Constitution despite having no intention of honoring it.
▶ 2:19:38We simply won't have a country anymore as as we know it. I think we can look to Europe and to the UK to see exactly where this leads.
▶ 2:19:45I I agree 100%. Um, Director Ken, are you aware of some of the differences between uh US Constitution and common law interpretations of the Sharia law?
▶ 2:19:56I am broadly. Yeah.
▶ 2:19:58What what are the differences in in your opinion, and I know you're you're not a doctorate on this subject, but between the First Amendment, which guarantees freedom of speech and the press, including the right to criticize religions, religious texts, and public figures without government punishment.
▶ 2:20:15Yeah. Yeah, the freedom of speech I think is huge because you don't have that under Sharia law and you also don't have the assumption of innocence under under Sharia law as we do.
▶ 2:20:23Many interpret interpretations of Sharia, blasphemy, criticism of the Quran or the prophet Muhammad can be a serious offense, sometimes punishable by death. And there are many others um that I don't have time to get to, but I wanted to bring that up today so that Americans understand the differences and why we need to be very careful about who we let into this country. I thank you guys for the work you do.
▶ 2:20:48I thank you for those underneath you working so hard to keep the American citizens and people safe. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield
▶ 2:20:57Gentleman yields back. And I remind if you don't get to questions uh that you want to ask, you can submit them for the record. Uh so we can do that at the end. Um, I now recognize the gentleman from Puerto Rico, Mr. Hernandez, for five minutes of questions.
▶ 2:21:09I have some matters of interest regarding immigration and FEMA. But before that, Mr. Kent, does the Bible say anything about freedom of speech?
▶ 2:21:18Not a biblical scholar.
▶ 2:21:19I don't think it does. And I'm concerned about singling out Muslims and specific religions to talk about how uh their religious dogma conflicts with our laws and constitutions. Uh, I lament that Miss Noom has had to leave early today, but uh, I wanted to talk about the atrocities that uh, their immigr that DHS's immigration enforcement and the pain it is causing in places like my home district of Puerto Rico. Just a few weeks ago, we witnessed ICE shove a pregnant woman.
▶ 2:21:49I cannot imagine as an expecting uh father myself the anxiety that that family must have gone through when they took that person to the hospital and treated her for her injuries. Also a few weeks ago CBP detained Araelis from the streets of Cabo Rojo. They put her on a plane. They sent her to Texas. She was in a detention facility. She was removed from the detainee uh location service and she was not allowed to contact her attorney. Mr.
▶ 2:22:19Reto was a domestic violence victim who was in Puerto Rico with a legal work permit. And I wanted to ask Miss Noom if DHS policies allow CBP agents to detain persons who are legally in the United States. I wanted to ask Miss Noam the legal authority behind the detention of Arasalist. I wanted to ask Miss Noim why she was removed from the detainee location system.
▶ 2:22:48I wanted to ask Miss Noom why Arasalist was not allowed to contact her attorney. Unfortunately, uh I predict that she would not have given us adequate answers based on the answers that she has provided to my colleagues here today. Now, I also wanted to raise a concern with Miss Nolan regarding TSA agents in Puerto Rico.
▶ 2:23:11I witnessed how many TSA agents worked arduously without pay during the government shutdown and how her announcement that they would get $10,000 as a bonus for working without pay during the pandemic actually created it the opposite effect of boosting morale because it was so selective that it excluded apparently most workers. And finally, I wanted to raise the concerns of red and blue mayors from Puerto Rico.
▶ 2:23:36I emphasize red and blue mayors, Republican and Democratic mayors, regarding her recent secret policy regarding transactions or grants for FEMA money that exceed So, to their surprise, they found out that grants and funding assignments exceeding $100,000 would now need to be approved by Secretary Noam.
▶ 2:24:01But there was no transparency regarding that rule and we have no information regarding the application and the enforcement of that rule. And I sent her a letter with 15 other members asking those questions. And I got a letter in response that has no answers to these questions. And I wanted to urge her to reconsider this policy that is delaying aid and reconstruction funds for the people of Puerto Rico which are still suffering 9 years after Hurricane Maria.
▶ 2:24:29and that this is affecting Republicans and Democrats, that reconstruction should not have a party ID, and that instead of fighting the bureaucracy, this has made the bureaucracy worse. But unfortunately, Secretary Noam left early, and we are left expecting these answers. Thank you. And with that, I yield back.
▶ 2:24:50Gentleman yields back. I now recognize a gentleman from Tennessee, Mr. Ogles, for five minutes of questions.
▶ 2:24:55Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you to the witnesses. Uh let's be clear. The United States of America is safer today because of President Trump. United States of America is the dominant predator across all landscapes. Because of President Trump, we have restored our status as the global leader because of President Trump. Hard stop.
▶ 2:25:23Now, when we look at the topic of the hearings, the objectives, there were six bullet points. I'm going to hit the highlights. Examine the full scope of evolving threats facing the United States of America, particularly on readiness at focal uh at the federal, local, and state level. Highlight the significant number two, the significant national security gains achieved by President Donald Trump. Three, review the Trump administration's efforts to res reverse the damage caused by the Biden border crisis.
▶ 2:25:52Four, analyze the scale and scope of cyber threats, which is my area as the chairman of the cyber subcomi subcommittee. Five, discuss the evolving terrorism landscape, including FTO's, uh, HVES and DVE. And six, evaluate emerging unconventional threats. Unfortunately, my colleagues must not have read the memo because that's not what they've talked about. They want to talk about ICE and immigration. So, let's talk about that.
▶ 2:26:21You know, in 1965, we passed the Heart Seller Act. Since that time, we've seen chain migration on a scale that quite frankly, I'm not sure even the progressive liberal authors of that bill could have possibly imagined. In that amount of time, we've seen 60 million migrants come into this country, most of which 90% from third world countries. There are roughly 300,000 Afghans in America, 200,000 of which came under Biden.
▶ 2:26:52Approximately 45% of Afghans are on US food stamps. Afghans under the Biden administration have an unemployment rate double that of Americans. 68% of Afghans are on Medicaid. Let's go overseas. And so if that sounds like political rhetoric, let's look at the facts. Paris, 48% of crimes committed by foreigners, most of which were Muslim. Overall crime has surged since the m the Islam Islamic migrant influx that is from the French interior ministry.
▶ 2:27:21London 40% of sex crimes are committed by foreigners most of which are Muslims. That's the Metropolitan Police Department. Rome 83% of 2024 street robberies by non-EU citizens. All almost all of which were Muslim. Sexual assault 69% Muslim. Italian police reports. Minneapolis here in the homeland. Violent crime in Cedar Riverside. A Somali hub rose 56% 2010 to 2018. Dearbornne, Michigan.
▶ 2:27:50Crime 105% above the national average. Ham track outside of Detroit. 92% of assaults by Muslim immigrants. Drug arrest 85% Muslim immigrants. Now, let's go to Nashville, Tennessee, where a Somali man, a migrant who came in 2015, raped to death a woman on the steps of a I've had enough.
▶ 2:28:21I've said it once and I'll say it again. Deport them all. This is our country. We get to decide who comes in and we get to decide who has to leave. And I say deport them all. 90% that have come into this country are from third world countries, most of which are sucking resources from American citizens, burdening our cities. They do not belong here.
▶ 2:28:53Mr. Kent, I'm chairman of the cyber subcommittee. Let's go into the scope and scale of the cyber threats posed by the CCP. I give you the floor, sir.
▶ 2:29:05CCP is probably one of the more aggressive actors in the cyber space. Um, right now, NCTC is mostly focused on the on the terrorism realm and how terrorist actors are using the proliferation of encrypted devices and just the internet to spread propaganda. Uh, that's probably our our biggest purview in terms of cyber. I would say that the the Chinese government, the CCP is our greatest cyber threat.
▶ 2:29:31It is a full-time job and the resources they throw at this is unbelievable, a major concern. You know, I want to thank the witnesses for being here and I want to thank President Trump. You know, as I as I sit in the skiff and I'm reading the briefings from the CIA and the FBI on the daily attacks to our country and to our infrastructure, I appreciate the president and I appreciate you gentlemen and your service to this country in keeping Americans safe. They have no idea what you do every single day.
▶ 2:30:00God bless you and God bless America. Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
▶ 2:30:04Gentleman yields back. I now recognize the gentle lady from New Jersey, Miss Poe, for five minutes questions.
▶ 2:30:10Thank you, Mr. chairman and to our ranking member. Um yes indeed we've spoken a great deal and learned many things here today. Some of which are still going unanswered. Many questions that all of us still have. And there are vast number of threats that endanger our homeland.
▶ 2:30:30From increasingly sophisticated state sponsored terrorist networks to evolving technologies, our law enforcement agencies are in engaging criminals on a on multiple fronts and facing significant demands every single day. Next year, there will be an increasingly heightened threat environment in my district uh in northern New Jersey as we host the World Cup.
▶ 2:30:59Federal uh counter federal counterterrorism grant funding is absolutely critical in keeping our communities safe against the evolving threat uh uh environment. This is why I have I I have been so deeply disturbed by the decision uh of Secretary Gnome to freeze, delay, and cut billions of dollars in federal counterterrorism grant funds.
▶ 2:31:26In February, her department, DHS, uh froze billions of dollars in counterterrorism grants that had already been awarded to states and cities. This decision left state and local uh public safety organizations unable to access critical funding.
▶ 2:31:47DHS then ignored legal deadlines for releasing this year's installment of the billion dollar for these uh uh pro uh programs. And when DHS finally released this funding, she abruptly and illegally slashed funding to states with Democratic governors like New Jersey.
▶ 2:32:14States and localities have sued in federal court for funding owned owed by the federal government that was appropriated uh for them by Congress. In October, well, I sent a letter to Secretary Gnome, and if she was here, I would be asking this directly to her, signed by all of my Democratic colleagues in New Jerseyy's delegation, demanding that she stop playing politics with federal counterterrorism
▶ 2:32:44funding and immediately restore New Jerseys allocation. Specifically, I'm referring to the 50% cut to New Jersey's allocation of the Homeland Security Grant Program, which includes the urban air security initiative and the state homeland security program. This is the single largest preparation grant program in the federal emergency management uh agency.
▶ 2:33:14New Jersey has relied on these federal grants to respond and prepared against terrorist attack. When she published the notice of funding opportunities for the uh the Homeland Security Grant Program, she stated that her intent to allocate this funding was going to be based on statutory risk assessment and an analysis of relative risk to terrorism faced by the by the 100 most populous
▶ 2:33:44areas in the country. Under this process, New Jersey was preliminarily allocated around $19 million, but DHS final award notification, our state received just $9 The final award notification failed to explain why such drastic cuts were made.
▶ 2:34:11Instead, she simply stated that it was done, quote, per DHS directive. To this day, we have still not received I have not received a response to my letter. And I absolutely cannot understand and is so incredibly disappointed by the fact that this administration continues to try and attempt to walk all over this body.
▶ 2:34:39Congress is article one branch and we demand that we get we've received the respect that is due and that she respond to the questions and that is her responsibility and her job Mr. Chairman I yield back. Thank you.
▶ 2:34:57General lady yields back. I now recognize gentle lady from South Carolina, Miss Biggs for five minutes of
▶ 2:35:03Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you to the witnesses for being here today. I know you have a really difficult job. Um, I want to take a moment just to highlight the fantastic work of the Homeland Security Advisory Council. Uh, I think when I say this, I speak on behalf of our entire entire South Carolina delegation.
▶ 2:35:26When I say that I'm pleased to see South Carolina's own governor, Henry McMaster appointed to chair the HSAC. Since its inception in 2002, the council's mission has been to offer the department real time advice across the whole spectrum of security issues.
▶ 2:35:46And I think this is especially critical for a state like mine in South Carolina where we face everything from severe weather events such as Hurricane Helen uh to major port security and cyber security concerns. But I'll move on and I would like to um direct this statement to director Kent. China is and has been for quite some time the primary great power competitor to the US.
▶ 2:36:16I think we some of my colleagues have already established that today and I think we've identified the the pacing challenge for our national security strategies. Chinese companies have made land acquisitions near sensitive military sites in the US and Chinese researchers have engaged in espionage and intellectual property theft.
▶ 2:36:44Chinese national encounters at our northern and southern borders surged in fiscal year 24 and China remains the primary supplier of precursor chemicals contributing to American overdose deaths.
▶ 2:37:01So my question director is to what extent do you see a nexus between China's destabilizing activities and the terror threat landscape in the United Thank you for the question and that's a very important topic especially in terms of fentanyl and the precursors the Chinese Communist Party provides working directly with the cartels.
▶ 2:37:24of agents of the Chinese Communist Party, uh, some directly affiliated and some indirectly affiliated, that are working with the cartels to continue to change essentially the recipe of the fentanyl because as we designate these different precursors and they kind of fall off the market or become more regulated, these advanced chemists will then come into play and they're the ones that provide the new ingredients, the new ways to manufacture fentanyl that kills American citizens. So this is something that we are we are looking at in particular the relationship between these Chinese actors and the Mexican drug cartels.
▶ 2:37:55Well thank you so much and sir if you have any additional information I'd be happy to hear.
▶ 2:38:01Yes ma'am. Thank thanks for the opportunity. Um I think to your question if our country's destabilized it creates a lot of vulnerabilities for us and whether it be the fentanel is what you're talking about here it could affect our national [clears throat] regarding the fentanel one thing director director Patel recently did is we've recognized the the challenge that fentanel faces the United States and instead of continuing to address the symptom look at the root the problem
▶ 2:38:31he recently went over to China met with his counterparts in MSP and they agreed to put 13 precursor chemicals on export control list. And if we can prevent the chemicals and the precursors coming to the United States or into the, you know, Mexico or anyone that puts together the fentanyl that comes into the United States that can have a greater effect to to reduce that threat to United States.
▶ 2:38:59Well, thank you so much and I appreciate you being here and hope you realize how important uh your work is and I know the district, my third district of South Carolina is counting on you to continue that hard work. I yield back, sir.
▶ 2:39:15Gentle gentle lady yields back. I now recognize gentleman from Virginia, Mr. Walkenshaw, for five minutes of
▶ 2:39:21Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I regret that Secretary Gnome uh tapped out after two hours, but nonetheless, I want to focus on an issue that I think is really important. The misuse of taxpayer funds and the steering of DHS funds to politically connected firms tied to the secretary's office while hiding that activity from the American people.
▶ 2:39:47Secretary Gnome has been criticized by members of her own party and by the Trump administration for being slow and ineffective when Americans actually need her help. Republican Senator Tom Tillis said she was quote slow off the mark in getting disaster aid out the door.
▶ 2:40:08A senior administration official recently told Politico that there was quote some fishy stuff going on with money at DHS and the veto authority she handed to Corey Luwendowski over contracts and grants has delayed lifesaving resources after disasters.
▶ 2:40:30So when it comes to helping disaster victims, she's been slow and But when it came to spending money on her own image and then funneling that money to her friends and her political allies, she moved with remarkable speed.
▶ 2:40:49According to reporting by ProPublica, DHS obligated $220 million for an advertising campaign featuring her in staged phony border imagery and featuring pictures of President Trump's private properties. That money, that taxpayer money was routed through a newly created and secretive Delaware Shell Company.
▶ 2:41:19It was then secretly funneled from that shell company to a firm with direct political and personal ties to her office and her political operation. That firm is called the Strategy Group. This situation has all of the elements of political corruption. First, she invoked emergency authority to bypass competitive bidding.
▶ 2:41:48Second, she concealed the true destination of the money by routing it through a shell company, a red flag in any corruption investigation. Third, the firm that actually did the work that filmed her attempting to herd cattle has documented political and personal ties to the secretary and her senior leadership.
▶ 2:42:13Fourth, her directive requiring personal approval of all contracts over $100,000 concentrated power in the hands of the very people tied to the firm that secretly received the work, her and Mr.
▶ 2:42:31At the exact time this contract was DHS was diverting investigators and resources away from child exploitation, away from child trafficking, away from illegal gun smuggling. Yet somehow she found nearly a4 billion dollars to promote herself and the money flowed to her political allies. A federal contracting law expert quoted in ProPublica summarized it plainly.
▶ 2:43:02It's corrupt is the word. That's what I would have liked to ask the secretary about today. I would have asked if she personally approved the money that flowed to her political and personal allies.
▶ 2:43:17I would have asked if whether when she was governor of South Dakota in 2023 and the same firm got $8.5 million of taxpayer money, whether she steered the money to because an official in her administration said she did. That's what I would have asked her, but she had to leave early. Mr. Glashene, are you familiar with the Proud Boys?
▶ 2:43:46I'm familiar with the name. Yeah. Proud
▶ 2:43:48Okay. Does the FBI still designate the Proud Boys as an extremist organization? They did in 2018 in President Trump's first term.
▶ 2:44:01We are in the process right now of changing our uh categories for domestic terrorists. So, they're no longer designated as an extremist organization. The FBI designated them an extremist organization in 2018. Has that changed?
▶ 2:44:16I'm not aware that they did that.
▶ 2:44:18It's all over the media, sir. Widely [snorts] reported. Can you get back to me on that?
▶ 2:44:21Sure will.
▶ 2:44:22All right. Thank you.
▶ 2:44:25Gentleman yields back. I now recognize gentleman from North Carolina who's not for five minutes of questions.
▶ 2:44:30Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Before I go into my line of questioning, it's worth notice that the previous administration labeled Catholic churches and charities as domestic terrorists, and there was no outrage about that from the other side of the aisle. Uh but regards to today's hearing, threats that currently face the country. We have millions of people in this country right now who will harm the country either with specific intent or by natural effect. There's a refusal to assimilate. There's a disdain for Western values.
▶ 2:44:59There's even a disdain for this country. We've seen it recently uh in this in the uh unfortunate but staggering case that we've become aware of in Minnesota. Somalian groups who have come here to defraud the United States to tune up billions of dollars, submitting fake invoices, at least motivated in part for personal enrichment, and then to fund terrorist groups back home, our adversaries.
▶ 2:45:24And one of the uh the points that I find most disgraceful from the other side of the aisle, they would rather talk about Secretary Gnome rather than these threats that we are trying to combat. And they also say that this is strictly a race issue. That's a disgusting From my experience in law enforcement, there were people from all over the world who exploited the open border policies or weak legal immigration policies to come here.
▶ 2:45:52Whether they were from Eastern Europe, China, Russia, the Middle East, Northern Africa, Pacific Islands, and of course, South America. It's a full world problem that is operating inside of our borders. So, Mr. Kent, let me just start with you. How can we programmatically identify again these threats that arrive at the point of millions of people who are here specifically harming the country? So right now we're in the the triage phase.
▶ 2:46:20We've already identified 18,000 individuals who have ties to known suspected terrorists and terrorist organizations. So we're starting with them, working with DHS and the FBI to locate and deport them. But as you you pointed out, it is a much bigger problem. We've had two to 2.7 million folks from Muslim countries, Muslim regions that have come into the country under Biden with minimum to no vetting.
▶ 2:46:40Well, I asked I asked you the question, how do you vet someone that doesn't come from a functioning country?
▶ 2:46:44Exactly. You you simply can't. That's why prior to the Biden administration, these individuals, even ones who wanted to claim asylum, they had to go to the first safe third country. And it would take 18 months to two years to properly vet them. Biden threw all of that out the We were assured by Secretary Gnome's predecessor that every Afghany refugee who came in under the asylum program uh was thoroughly vetted. Was that true?
▶ 2:47:06That was a lie. Any of those individuals who were vetted, such as the terrorist in DC, they were vetted under a war zone standard to see if they could serve as a soldier or as a guard or a cook or something like that to see if they posed a threat to us tactically in Afghanistan or Iraq, but not to be our neighbors. Two completely different systems of vetting. The Biden administration used the tactical vetting as a ruse to get millions of people into
▶ 2:47:29and then once they were here, we have eyewitness testimony that they were deployed to military bases and then picked up by people who were already in the country, never to be seen again. Is that consistent with with what you've seen in your current position?
▶ 2:47:42Absolutely. We're having a hard time running down where a lot of these individuals are. That's why we haven't been able to locate and deport all them rapidly. What tools can we assist you with in identifying these self-radicalizing circles who are inside the country currently? One thing that I want to be sure that the people who are watching this know is that the shooter who committed the act of terrorism against the two National Guard members, he was radicalized here.
▶ 2:48:06How are we going to identify again the people who are inside of our own borders empowering our enemies to commit harm inside this country? Right now, the Trump administration has essentially gone back to letting us enforce laws, letting us enforce immigration standards and letting us vet people. What I would like to emphasize to this committee and to the American people is that we simply cannot go back and retroactively vet these millions of folks that came in under Joe Biden. We have to locate them and we have to deport them as soon as we possibly can.
▶ 2:48:35Those who want to reapply, they can have the opportunity to reapply. So, in terms of what we need, we just need the longitude to to do our jobs. We're getting that from the Trump administration and we appreciate the support of this committee.
▶ 2:48:46Yep. Mr. Gosin, I want to give you give you a a time to answer. In terms of the types of domestic terror that we currently face inside of our own borders, can you briefly describe that with the remaining minute that I have?
▶ 2:48:57Yeah, and thanks for the opportunity. I want to make very clear the question came up earlier about, you know, designating the privilege. You know, the FBI doesn't designate domestic terror groups. We don't do that.
▶ 2:49:07That wasn't a serious line of questions.
▶ 2:49:09We we investigate people.
▶ 2:49:11Yes. And the common component there is violence. So I'll make that very clear. and so in terms regarding the domestic terrorism threat um you know we have over 1,700 domestic terrorism investigations in the US and with respect to Antifa which is asked earlier we have approximately 70 Antifa investigations. Our arrests with Antifa related subjects are up 171% this year.
▶ 2:49:38Gentleman's time is expired.
▶ 2:49:40Thank you. I now recognize gentleman from Louisiana, Mr. Carter. Five minutes
▶ 2:49:45Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Uh, thank you witnesses for being here. I represent the New Orleans region where we welcome partnership. We do not welcome occupation. We're seeing what we're seeing unfold in our community is not public safety. It's a political stunt wrapped in badges, armored vehicles, and military uniforms. ICE and Border Patrol agents have descended into our community with no transparency and no meaningful coordination with local officials.
▶ 2:50:14The militarized forces who are not trained in our local laws, not trained in community-based deescalation, and do not know our neighborhoods or our people. This is a res a recipe for disaster, and dangerous mistakes. Our communities are not a stage for political theater. If this administration wants to partner, then act like it.
▶ 2:50:40Share the plan, respect local law, and work with us, not around us. Unfortunately, Christy Gnome, our secretary, had to leave in the middle of a very important conversation to go and talk about dismantling FEMA, a discussion we'll have at another time that for the life of me, I simply can't understand why we would want to decentralize the Federal Emergency Management Agency, an agency that
▶ 2:51:11is needed more now than it was needed when it was first created as natural disasters continue to happen more often than ever before in places it's never happened before. But nonetheless, if she were here, but she's not, I'll ask her chair.
▶ 2:51:29Secretary no, I recently stood with local elected leaders from the city of New Orleans and our mayor elect Helena Moreno as they urged DS DHS agents to commit to transparency, due process pro protections, identifiable federal agents, safeguards against discriminatory enforcement and humanitarian protections. I would ask her if she were here, but she isn't.
▶ 2:51:58Ma'am, will you commit your department to uphold these values during the current operation in Louisiana? Apparently, they aren't doing that, but because I know both of you are capable of answering this question and are in fact civil servants that have demonstrated in your career that you do understand transparency, that you do understand the Constitution. So, I'll ask you the question. Do you think this request from our mayor elect in New Orleans is a reasonable one?
▶ 2:52:28Is it reasonable to ask that agents commit to transparency, due process protections, identifiable agents, and safeguards discriminatory enforcements? Yes or no? Do you think that's reasonable? Ask. Yes or no. Is that reasonable?
▶ 2:52:45Sounds reasonable. Yeah.
▶ 2:52:46Thank you. Do you think it's reasonable,
▶ 2:52:48Sounds reasonable.
▶ 2:52:49Thank you. Um, Secretary Gnome, the masked officers you've sent into the streets of New Orleans are attempting to and abduct and detain anyone that think looks like looks like a migrant. I got to ask the question, what does a migrant look like? Do you know what a migrant looks like, Can you define what a migrant looks like to you?
▶ 2:53:18I cannot.
▶ 2:53:19Thank you. Can you tell me what you think a migrant looks like?
▶ 2:53:23These are targeted raids. Can you tell me what they look like? Yeah, you have to stop them. You have to check their
▶ 2:53:28Okay. But can you tell me if you were describing to me as a new $50,000 bonus ICE agent? What does a migrant look like?
▶ 2:53:39You would stop and you would ask them for ID and you you'd be on an intelligence driven operation, which is what these ICE raids are. They're intelligent. If you if you were to say a guy is wearing a red shirt, you would say the guy's wearing a red shirt and a purple baseball hat.
▶ 2:53:52You would be able to give that description. But can you give a description of what a migrant looks like? Can you give a description of what a migrant looks like?
▶ 2:54:00We need to deploy ICE officers to stop people and ask them and they go on
▶ 2:54:04I reclaim my time. You clearly don't want to answer my question and that's unfortunate because the American people want to know these answers. We want to know. I've got a quick video I want to show before my time runs. Please
▶ 2:54:18look at this. This is a stunning video from Louisiana. You hear that woman cry out. She's a 23-year-old running down the street away from the mass agents who are chasing her, repeating that she is a US-born citizen, saying,
▶ 2:54:32"Stop. This is a United States citizen who's running away from ICE agents who when she gets to her house and her husband comes out, they stop the chase. They clearly weren't chasing her for that. They appear to have been doing something nefarious. You know why? We can't tell the difference because they wear mask and they don't identify themselves as agents. That's a problem.
▶ 2:54:55Uh Mr. Gentleman's time's expired. I recognize the gentleman from Tennessee, Mr. Van Eps, for five minutes of
▶ 2:55:02Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Uh thank you to the secretary and gentlemen, thank you for being here today at this critical hearing. Uh I'm honored to be here at my very first hearing as the newest member of Congress. Uh and I've had the privilege to serve this country for over 20 years in uniform first as an active duty US Army helicopter pilot with service with the 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment and currently serving in the Tennessee Army National Guard. And I'm honored to continue the mission from a new post with this distinguished committee. to our witnesses today.
▶ 2:55:33Allow me to begin by expressing my appreciation for the work you all do, for the work your teams do, the work that President Trump and this administration does to ensure the safety and security of our great nation. I have just a couple of questions focused on emerging AI enabled threats.
▶ 2:55:52Adversaries are already using AI to identify exploitable vulnerabilities within systems and networks and generate cyber intrusion plans far faster than traditional cyber tools. Uh m Mr. Glacin, sir, foreign cyber actors are increasingly using AI to refine malware, automate fishing, and sift large volumes of stolen data.
▶ 2:56:15What additional cooperation or coordination between the FBI, DHS, and companies within the private sector would most improve early detection of an a of AI enabled intrusions or if you would just like to comment on this matter generally. No,
▶ 2:56:31I appreciate that opportunity. AI is is a is a continued challenge right now. I think going the relationships we have right now with government private industry are are strong right now with respect to any type of malware ransomware.
▶ 2:56:48I think the 2015 authorization that gives us the authorities that's critical for the future success of that and I think for the ongoing partnerships I mean the key piece here is that relationship with with private sector private industry so I we just could continue to reinforce that. Thank you, sir. Uh, Director Kent, anything further you'd like to add on that from
▶ 2:57:11No, AI is something we're closely monitoring. I mean, the the ability for terrorists to uh breach language barriers and also to inspire people to conduct attacks and then give them AI specific instructions. Something we're monitoring carefully and very concerned
▶ 2:57:23Thank you, sir. Uh, thank you both. I know you both spent your entire careers defending this country and uh greatly appreciate that your service and sacrifice. Mr. Chairman, I yield back. Will the gentleman yield? Mr. Vaneps, can I have your time?
▶ 2:57:39Yes, sir. Uh, Mr. K, I want to talk to you a little bit about what we just had with Mr. Carter. Um, I want to let you finish the answer about what an immigrant looks like. Going back to my question that there really is a wide variety of illegal immigration that has attacked this country.
▶ 2:57:54Just uh just
▶ 2:57:57the gentleman yield to the gentleman.
▶ 2:57:59Yes, sir.
▶ 2:58:00Okay. So, this is the correct time that the gentleman had left. Yes.
▶ 2:58:04Okay. The gentleman's recognized the remainder of time.
▶ 2:58:08If you wanted to finish your answer, I'd be happy to to yield you the time.
▶ 2:58:11Thank you.
▶ 2:58:11He answered. He said he didn't want.
▶ 2:58:12We've had we've had 15 to 20 million illegals come into this country since Joe Biden took office. And so we have to stop individuals and we have to ask them for identification to determine if they are here legally. That's what you're seeing in those ICE raids.
▶ 2:58:26FBI. And in regards to the toll that uh illegal immigration has taken on this country, are you aware, sir, that in the last 25 years, more Americans have died because of drug overdoses than the entire country's military combat
▶ 2:58:44250 years of military casualties is about 10% less than the overall deaths of the last 25 years of drug overdoses. Are you aware of that?
▶ 2:58:55I'm aware of that. And that's why I was glad to see President Trump designate the cartels that bring that poison into the country and kill hundreds of thousands of Americans, designate them as terrorists so we could stop them and aggressively target them.
▶ 2:59:05Does fentanyl discriminate on race?
▶ 2:59:08It does not.
▶ 2:59:09Or does it affect every single person, every single community, every single neighborhood that it enters?
▶ 2:59:14Every single person. Yes, absolutely. I find it quite alarming that we do not have even a even a minuscule percentage of the outrage that we have seen from the other side of the aisle as it relates to the plight that Americans have undergone because of illegal immigration and its harms than we do today when you all are trying to enforce the law from our side of the aisle. Again, I thank you. I hope you'll come back. This is a worthwhile conversation. It's a needed conversation. And uh Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
▶ 2:59:42Gentlemen, yields back to Mr. Vaneps. Do you yield?
▶ 2:59:47Mr. Chairman, [clears throat] I yield.
▶ 2:59:48Gentleman yields. I now recognize. Gentleman from Colorado, Mr. Evans, for five minutes of
▶ 2:59:56Thank you. Uh thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you to the ranking member of course for this important uh conversation today. Thank you for the witnesses for for taking your time uh to come and speak to us about these things. Um, and first I just want to commend everyone that's working uh in the Department of Homeland Security, in law enforcement and border security for all of the work that you've done to keep our country safe, keep our state safe, keep our community safe. I spent 10 years as a police officer uh in the Denver metro area.
▶ 3:00:23Um, I was in the the US Army in the Colorado Army National Guard for 12 years to include a combat deployment overseas to the Middle East as part of the global war on terror. Uh and those experiences uh coupled with what's happening in Colorado have shown me how critically important this hearing is on on global threats uh and things that are happening around the country and around the world because we know the numbers.
▶ 3:00:45We know that every 15 days under the previous administration more Americans lost their lives due to drugs with most of that being fentanyl than were killed in the entirety of the September 11th terrorist attacks. uh somewhere around Americans died under the previous administration as a result of the poison that's coming into our communities from these cartels, these organized criminals, uh these foreign terrorist organizations.
▶ 3:01:11And again, killing more people than al-Qaeda could have ever dreamed of killing on American soil. And I saw it as a cop. I saw it uh as a soldier. Uh, and so I'm incredibly thankful for all of the work that's been done to secure our border and to crush these cartels, these criminals, these terrorist organizations. Um, and and somehow it sounds like, you know, there's been a lot of conversations and a lot of posters about names uh of folks uh from my colleagues on the other side of the aisle. Um, as cops, we all know this. We have uh what we call in cops laying the book of the dead.
▶ 3:01:42All of the bad things that you see as a cop. Uh, and so I don't have a poster up here because I don't want to traumatize the public with the things that I had to see and that my brothers and sisters had to see uh during my 10 years in law enforcement. Uh, but it's the names and faces of some of those 400,000 Americans who died as a result of this poison coming into our community, pedled by cartels and drug dealers and traffickers.
▶ 3:02:04Uh, and it's names uh my uh one of my uh one of the my constituents um that was with me uh here on Capitol Hill earlier this year, Liz Hardy lost a daughter. Brook Hardy to Fentanol. And so I'm going to say those names and I'm going to remind folks that there are 400,000 other names out there of people who were killed by terrorists uh pedalling this poison in our community. Uh in Colorado since 2020, uh Colorado has lost over 7,000 lives.
▶ 3:02:33Uh at times, Colorado has had the second highest overdose rate uh of of teenagers uh in the country. Uh, and so I am absolutely thrilled that we've been able to work together to secure the border and to go target these worst of the worst individuals here. Uh, and so to, uh, Director Kent, uh, can you just talk about how cartels are adapting their drug and human trafficking methods, uh, in response to the new border security and the new focus and emphasis on getting these people out of our community?
▶ 3:03:01And what sort of resources do you need from Congress to continue disrupting? We all know action, reaction. We do something to keep Americans safe. the cartels react to that. What sort of things do you need from Congress so that we can continue to stay one step ahead and not have another 400,000 dead Americans?
▶ 3:03:17It's a great question. Because President Trump and Secretary Gnome decisively secured the border, a lot of the fentanyl smuggling and drug smuggling is moving to the maritime environment on on both coasts, whether that's in the Gulf of America, the Caribbean, or in in the Pacific. So, we're going to need a good deal more ISR, intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance platforms to cover that big and broad space so we can pick up these drug boats and take them off the battlefield.
▶ 3:03:43Thank you so much for that. So, in addition to being a cop and a soldier for a combined 22 years, I am the only Latino from the Colorado delegation uh here in Washington DC, my district, 40% Hispanic. And so, uh, I am a little bit disappointed that the secretary left early because I wanted to make it clear that my Hispanic community also supports getting these drug dealers, these criminals out of our community because the Hispanic community suffers as well.
▶ 3:04:08Um, but I also wanted to talk about, as we used to say in the military and law enforcement, you got to play the hand you're dealt, not the hand you wish you had. And the hand we're dealt right now is somewhere between 35 and 40 42% of the agriculture workforce in the United States are folks who are not here legally.
▶ 3:04:28And so as we're having this conversation around border security and deportations, um I just wanted to uh have a little bit further exploration around how do we make sure that we protect our national security because we know that national security starts with food security. If we can't eat, we can't do any of the other things that we're talking about here today. And so, continuing that conversation around how we strike that appropriate balance to make sure that we are supporting our farmers and so many other industries uh with some of those numbers that I've mentioned.
▶ 3:04:57So, I can see that my time is expired. Yield back to the chairman.
▶ 3:05:00Gentleman yields back and I appreciate the members for being here. I now want to entertain any of those uh unanimous
▶ 3:05:06Mr. Mayor, the gentle lady is
▶ 3:05:08Thank you. I ask unanimous consent to include into the record an article by ProPublica from October 16, 2025 entitled, "We found that more than 170 US citizens have been held by immigration agents.
▶ 3:05:22They've been kicked, dragged, and detained for days." I'd also would like to add an article by NBC News from December 7, 2025 entitled, "ICE has arrested nearly 75,000 people with no criminal records data shows." and the letter that I sent on October 3rd requesting a meeting with Secretary
▶ 3:05:40Without objection,
▶ 3:05:41can I do one more? I'd also ask uh for unanimous consent to enter into the record an article from USA Today, December 2nd [clears throat] titled Trump Pardons Cocaine Kingpin who ruled
▶ 3:05:56Thank you. And last one, I'd like unanimous consent to be entered into the record uh a letter dated today December 11th after uh the conversation with the secretary with dates of availability in order to be able to meet with Secretary
▶ 3:06:11That objection.
▶ 3:06:12Thank you.
▶ 3:06:14Gentlemen yields. Any other Mr.
▶ 3:06:16Chairman? I ask unanimous consent to
▶ 3:06:18gentleman's recognized. Um, you know, we've heard over and over again that Border Patrol would only target uh those people that were in fact dangerous criminals. Uh, we've seen since the time in New Orleans that less than onethird of those have been detained have been criminals. I'd like to submit in the record this article by the AP which demonstrates the statistics that clearly show that these agents aren't in fact going after hardened criminals, but people who look a certain way. Mr.
▶ 3:06:48Chairman, I have one other item that I'd like to also show over and over again DHS would be targeting dangerous criminals. Um, and here's a second article that demonstrates in fact that the people that they're picking up, many of which are in fact US citizens because they look a certain way, the central theme that I'm offering in these unanimous consent articles is you cannot singularly identify a place or person of origin by the way they look. Our constitution protects us from that.
▶ 3:07:18This is a gross miscarriage of justice.
▶ 3:07:22Without objection. Gentleman yields.
▶ 3:07:27I closing.
▶ 3:07:28Gentlemen is recognized.
▶ 3:07:30Uh thank you, Mr. Chairman. Uh Mr. Chairman uh this uh secretary uh abandoned her duty to testify at this committee hearing and refusing to answer our question is unprecedented. No other secretary, even those under threat of impeachment, have just gotten up and walked out of a hearing when nearly half the members haven't even asked questions.
▶ 3:08:02On one level, you can't be surprised because she's failed to answer our letters and other requests for Secretary Gnome did not even want to appear at all today. To add insult to injury, I'm told that when she left, she did not leave the building. She went to the anti room.
▶ 3:08:31Furthermore, to ostensively go to a FEMA council meeting for 1:00. I understand on good information that the FEMA council meeting was cancelled, so there was no need for her to go. She's a liar.
▶ 3:08:55With no respect for congressional oversight, she joined FBI director Cash Patel in telling the US House Committee on Homeland Security to pound sand by getting up and walking out in the middle of the hearing. We were told that she'd be here until 1:00, but she left significantly early.
▶ 3:09:24This is embarrassing display from someone who can't take the heat is disrespectful to the committee and the constitution. The separation of powers. But again, what else can we expect from an administration led by a man who sicked a mob on the Capitol on January Mr.
▶ 3:09:51chairman because the secretary walked out of the hearing. I move that this committee subpoena secretary known back to continue a
▶ 3:10:12Thank the gentleman.
▶ 3:10:14I yield back.
▶ 3:10:15Gentleman yields back. M
▶ 3:10:18Mr. Shamr, I move to table the motion. Gentleman moves the table motion. Uh I thank the gentleman for that motion.
▶ 3:10:42The hearing has uh has ended. Uh I will we will entertain the motion. I I would like to uh excuse the witnesses and thank them uh so they don't have to wait around for the vote. Uh first also thank the Capitol police for being here today and and doing a great job and thank the witnesses for being here today. Uh the hearing was on worldwide threats. I'm sorry we didn't get to focus a lot on that today. As someone who's from New York uh and 25th anniversary 911 is coming up.
▶ 3:11:11Uh I thank you all for the work you're doing to keep us safe and make sure another 911 does not happen. Uh the members of the committee may have some additional Okay, we'll do at the end. All right. The witnesses are And on the motion uh the table, all those in favor say I.
▶ 3:11:36I. I.
▶ 3:11:36All those opposed.
▶ 3:11:39The eyes have it. Mr. Chair,
▶ 3:11:42I guess we're going to have to ask for a recorded vote on that. A recorded vote has been requested. The clerk will prepare the role.
▶ 3:12:51Mr. Chairman, can I just have a point of personal privilege? Ask your question. It's It's an easy one. It's a statement.
▶ 3:12:58It's a It's a point of personal
▶ 3:13:06Yeah, I do. I'll be very brief. And this is bipartisan. I promise you. I I think the fact that the the secretary left prematurely
▶ 3:13:19is not only a disrespect to um to you as
▶ 3:13:24but to the entire body. I think the fact that this secretary at your request and the the the hurdles you had to go through to get her here to leave prematurely for a meeting that was cancelled that really did not hold the weight that she suggested because it never happened.
▶ 3:13:49Somebody turned me off. Um it it's I apologize to you, my friend. You deserve better. Thank you, gentlemen. Um, yield
▶ 3:31:43We're going to have the clerk call the the roll. Mr. McCall Mr. Guest Mr. Guest votes I. Mr. Menz Mr. Fluger Mr. Fluger votes I.
▶ 3:32:12Miss Green Mr. Gonzalez Mr. Mr. Gonzalez votes I. Mr. Latrell Mr. Latrell votes I. Mr. Strong Mr. Strong votes I. Mr. Bkine. Mr. Been votes I. Mr. Crane Mr. Crane votes I. Mr. Ogles I.
▶ 3:32:34Mr. Ogles votes I. Mrs. Biggs.
▶ 3:32:38Mrs. Biggs votes I. Mr. Evans. Mr. McKenzie.
▶ 3:32:45Mr. Not Mr. Fong. Mr. Vanep Epsi.
▶ 3:32:51Mr. Van Eps votes I. Ranking member
▶ 3:32:55Ranking member Thompson votes no. Mr. Swell. Mr. Koreah.
▶ 3:33:01Mr. Koreah votes no. Mr. Tanadar. Mr. Mr. Goldman. Mrs. Ramirez.
▶ 3:33:10Mrs. Ramirez votes no. Mr. Kennedy,
▶ 3:33:14Mr. Kennedy votes no. Mrs. McCyver,
▶ 3:33:17Mrs. McCyver votes no. Miss Johnson.
▶ 3:33:21Miss Johnson votes no. Mr. Hernandez.
▶ 3:33:24Mr. Hernandez votes no. Miss Poe.
▶ 3:33:28Miss Poe votes no. Mr. Walkenshaw. Mr. Walkenshaw votes no. Mr. Carter,
▶ 3:33:35Mr. Carter votes no. Mr. Green of Texas.
▶ 3:33:45How's the How's the chairman recorded?
▶ 3:33:47Chairman has not yet been recorded.
▶ 3:33:49Oh, excuse me. I'm sorry. Are the members uh not recorded that would like to be?
▶ 3:33:55Mr. Tanadar is not recorded.
▶ 3:33:59Mr. Tanadar votes no.
▶ 3:34:35Uh, Mr. Magazer has not been recorded.
▶ 3:34:40Mr. Magaziner votes no.
▶ 3:39:28Mr. Clerk, how's um Mr. F recorded?
▶ 3:39:31Mr. Fong has not yet been recorded.
▶ 3:39:34Mr. Fong votes I.
▶ 3:44:56Mr. Clerk, how's uh Miss Green reported?
▶ 3:44:59Miss Green of Georgia has not yet been
▶ 3:45:06Miss Green votes I.
▶ 3:45:09Mr. Chair, how am I Mr. Clerk? How am I
▶ 3:45:11The chairman has not yet been recorded.
▶ 3:45:13I I vote I report to Tally. Chairman Garberino votes I. Mr. Chairman, on that vote, there were 13 eyes and 12 nos.
▶ 3:45:23Motion table is agreed to. The [clears throat] members of the committee may have some additional questions for the witnesses, and we would ask the witnesses will respond to these in writing. Pursuant to committee rule 7E, the hearing record will be held open for 10 days. Without objection, this committee stands adjourned.