▶ 0:15:28Chair Lee: The committee will come to order. This is the senate committee on energy and natural resources hearing on research security risks posed by foreign nationals from countries of risk working at the department of energy's national laboratories and necessary mitigation steps. I will give my five minute opening statement in a moment, and I will give it to ranking member heinrich for his opening statement.
▶ 0:15:55Chair Lee: Then I will introduce witnesses and give them an opportunity to give their five minute opening statements. The U.S. department of energy oversees 17 national labs. These labs have been instrumental in shaping america's technological and military competitive edge.
▶ 0:16:16Chair Lee: When the manhattan -- from the manhattan project to cutting edge research, d.o.e.'s national labs have strengthened our national security, but for those very same reasons, they have become a prime target for espionage. Secretary chris wright at his confirmation hearing a few weeks ago said we must protect and accelerate the work of d.o.e.
▶ 0:16:46Chair Lee: Labs to secure america's competitive advantage and security. I could not agree more, and that is precisely why we are here today at this hearing, to explore ways which we can secure american technology for the benefit of our economic and national security. For years, the chinese communist party has worked to infiltrate our national labs, targeting top scientists and siphoning off american research to feel china's military ambitions.
▶ 0:17:16Chair Lee: Through programs like the thousand talents program, the ccp systematically recruited elite scientists, nationals like the people's republic of china, who were trained in the worked with american funding to develop american funding. Then the ccp lured them back to china. It's a deliberate strategy to leverage U.S.
▶ 0:17:45Chair Lee: Taxpayer-funded expertise to the benefit of the chinese military. And, tragically, we are starting to see the consequences. Former d.o.e. Researchers are helping china develop cyber that hypersonic missiles, warheads, and advanced summaries, weapons designed to out match and deter the united states. Make no mistake, beijing is actively exploiting weak security protocols. Academic collaboration loopholes, and U.S.
▶ 0:18:14Chair Lee: Grant programs to advance its nuclear capability, all on american taxpayers' dime. During his first term, mother president trump cracked down on ccp recruitment programs and assure accountability at the d.o.e. For those approved research working on d.o.e.
▶ 0:18:41Chair Lee: Programs, making it clear our national labs would not be used to strengthen the chinese military. But president biden listen to those restrictions, and the door is once again -- loosened those restrictions, and the doors once again opened to the ccp, which compels its citizens by law to disclose information that they might have that can benefit china's strategic goals. That is unacceptable to e united states.
▶ 0:19:10Chair Lee: Congress and this administration must act immediately to close the gaps, tighten security, and ensure that american research stays in american hands. I'm looking forward to understand how the department of energy and the biden administration allowed foreign adversaries to infiltrate our most sensitive research institutions and ensure ways that this will not happen again.
▶ 0:19:33Chair Lee: If we fail to protect our scientific leadership, our intellectual property, and our national secrets, we don't just lose our competitive advantage, we hand it directly to our greatest geopolitical rivals. So I look forward, needless to say, to hearing from our witnesses today and learning more about this emerging problem . Now, we will turn to senator heinrich for his opening statement.
▶ 0:20:02Sen. Heinrich: Thank you, chairman lee, and thank you to our expert panel of witnesses for coming to speak with us today. As ranking member of the senate energy and national member of the senate select committee on intelligence, counterintelligence is a matter I believe we should all take very seriously. But first, I want to discuss another counterintelligence risk.
▶ 0:20:30Sen. Heinrich: Last week, the trump administration laid out 1800 -- laid off 1800 d.o.e. Employees. Many of our top experts essential to our economic and national security, which is critical and emerging technologies and nuclear safety were let go.
▶ 0:20:47Sen. Heinrich: These employees had top security clearances, were dismissed without following legal protocol to end those clearances, and the trump administration is now trying to read a verse course and reinstate some of these employees, but you have to ask, why would they want to go back after being treated this way? Our best experts had lost trust in the U.S. government. President trump is doing exactly what our adversaries want. They aren't losing their best effort, we are.
▶ 0:21:18Sen. Heinrich: This is a national security threat that will have lasting impact on our country for decades to come. I sent a letter to the president, urging the administration to halt these mass firings, and I would encourage my colleagues to do the same. Turning back to the research securities at our d.o.e. National labs, this is a serious issue.
▶ 0:21:38Sen. Heinrich: We want to avoid telegraphing to our adversaries details on the research our labs are doing, and what security protocols our national labs take to protect it. We don't want to give our adversaries the blueprint of any vulnerability. This is what we've always discussed this issue in a classified setting, and quite frankly, I'm disappointed to read some of the witness testimony to which we cannot appropriately respond in this open venue.
▶ 0:22:06Sen. Heinrich: But we are here today, so let's do our best to take care without we have this discussion in a public setting. Additionally, as no one on this panel is currently at d.o.e. Or any of the national labs, I think it is important that we be briefed by d.o.e. And its office of intelligence and counterintelligence about how it is implementing recently passed legislation before using this hearing or any hearing as an input this for future legislation.
▶ 0:22:34Sen. Heinrich: Most people think about the department of energy for his manhattan project beginnings or work advancing energy technologies, but d.o.e. Does much more than just nuclear weapons and energy. The department is also the largest supporter of physical science, scientific research in the federal government. Conducting research and developing technologies across a range of fields from artificial intelligence to vaccine the -- vaccine development to astrophysics.
▶ 0:23:03Sen. Heinrich: The united states has been able to accomplish razors and space exploration, supercomputing, and the human genome project because of the work of the national laboratories bid we have been able to accomplish so much and be the first to do it in part because of the counterintelligence capabilities we possess that have kept our research safe and secure.
▶ 0:23:25Sen. Heinrich: The fact that d.o.e.'s counterintelligence office is under the umbrella of the intelligence community is a critical asset critical aspect we must leverage. The threat of foreign espionage is increasingly becoming more complex and dangerous. We need to adapt.
▶ 0:23:46Sen. Heinrich: When scientists or students from other countries want to come in and partake in our world-class research, we must take a serious look at the security risks involved, especially individuals from countries we've deemed a national security concern. On the one hand, we must recognize and embrace that much of america's science and technology expertise come from abroad. Immigrants founded or cofounded nearly half of top startups in the U.S., and international students earn 60% of computer science doctorates.
▶ 0:24:17Sen. Heinrich: Between 1901 and 2023, immigrants have been awarded 36% of the nobel prizes won by americans in chemistry, medicine, and physics. The department of energy would not exist without the contributions of in re gaither may and -- henrico and hans, two immigrants necessary to the manhattan project.
▶ 0:24:46Sen. Heinrich: We must make sure we can be a home to the breast -- the best and brightest around the world, striking a balance between international cooperation and science and technology and our national security is not easy. In the c.h.I.p.s. And science act and more recently in the fiscal year 2025 intelligence authorization act, we authorized bipartisan and balanced research security improvements for the d.o.e., that strengthen their capabilities in this space.
▶ 0:25:11Sen. Heinrich: I look forward to hearing about how congress can best support d.o.e.'s effort in safeguarding our research for the safeguarding the country. However, as we all know, not all threats come from foreign entities. Thorough background checks are required before any individual has aspects -- access to sensitive information.
▶ 0:25:34Sen. Heinrich: We see multiple instances of staffers from the department of government efficiency to not a department, or doge gain access to information fear we've seen staff access to federal payment systems at the treasury department as well as try to access personal details of americans at the social security administration.
▶ 0:25:58Sen. Heinrich: The head of d.o.e.'s office of intelligence even had to remind staff that doge employees could not have access without a clearance. All of this is concerning. Along with my colleagues on the senate select committee on intelligence, I said they letter to the white house, demanding answers regarding doge operations and their seemingly unfettered access to sensitive information.
▶ 0:26:25Sen. Heinrich: These are unprecedented risks to our national security, and it is paramount that we address them immediately. With that, chairman, I yield back.
▶ 0:26:35Chair Lee: Thank you, senator heinrich. It's important to remember that the president under article two is vested with the executive powder, and the president has the authority, constitutionally and statutorily, to decide who can see what in his administration, and when he designates someone has access to a, they do have access to that. I want to thank our witnesses today. Let me introduce each of them quickly, and then we will turn to each of you. For your opening statement.
▶ 0:27:06Chair Lee: First, we have Mr. paul dabbar, the cofounder of bohr quantum technology, former under secretary of defense on the department of energy under the trump administration. As undersecretary, Mr. dabbar managed the laboratory complex at the department of energy. Next we have miss anna puglisi. Ms.
▶ 0:27:29Chair Lee: Puglisi is a fellow at the hoover institute of public policy think tank at stanford university. Ms. puglisi has testified extensively on the topic we are discussing today, so I look forward to hearing your thoughts as well could finally, Dr. geri richmond is the former under secretary for science and innovation at the department of energy and under the biden administration. Dr. richmond currently serves as the presidential chair in science and is a professor of chemistry at the university of oregon.
▶ 0:28:01Chair Lee: Thanks to all three of you for your willingness to be here in front of the committee. We will now turn to Mr. dabbar for your opening statement, then to Ms. puglisi, in order of introductions, and then Dr. richmond.
▶ 0:28:15Mr. Dabbar: Chairman lee, ranking member heinrich, it is going to be in front of this committee yet again. I'm seeing many friends here. America leads the world in discovery and innovation. No one else comes close. One can see that in the nobel prizes, that was referenced in the introduction, and examples include nuclear power, generation of fusion, ai, quantum, solar, electric vehicles, gene editing, chemistry of all types, and much
▶ 0:28:45Mr. Dabbar: Of that was spearheaded at the d.o.e. National labs, but our top adversary, china, let's tremendous pressure in appropriating that and then manufacturing it. Examples include nuclear powers stolen from westinghouse, lithium-ion battery, the battery at pyd stolen from m.I.t.
▶ 0:29:10Mr. Dabbar: Patents, electric vehicle, gpu's, semiconductors, and they are trying to steal the future of quantum and fusion. Let me put this into historical context. When I took over the role of undersecretary, I discover that we had significant stealing of technology at the lab. Not only that, but our policy allowed our own researchers to legally be employed by a communist china at the same time as working at our national labs.
▶ 0:29:41Mr. Dabbar: After finding this out and going through the five stages of grief,, that n.a.y.e. It is an acronym standing for her again volunteer yourself, and -- n.a.v.y.
▶ 0:30:03Mr. Dabbar: It is an acronym standing for never again volunteer yourself good we restricted interactions with china and extended communist china fundraising from researchers who got d.o.e. Funding. All of these felt like bringing back common sense. However, after the last several years, we've allowed the list to increase. Infrastructure active funding was given to communist controlled entities in violation of the act.
▶ 0:30:33Mr. Dabbar: As disclosed in the report at the homeland security committee, to communist chinese nationals who were employed stolen inventions in violation of U.S. law and took them to china for commercialization. They effectively created spy sales by recruiting new members, and they tried to recruit senior lab and former political officials. I wrote about that in "the wall street journal," and I submitted that as testimony. We must also a member that all p.r. -- p.r.c.
▶ 0:31:02Mr. Dabbar: Citizens are required by the chinese national security office to hand over all information when directed by the chinese state. In addition, d.o.e. Has restarted engagement with communist china in sharing energy technologies. They have been proactively meeting with the communist government to reestablish transfer of american invention to china.
▶ 0:31:29Mr. Dabbar: And what was interesting was that this effort was never publicly identified by d.o.e., but many were able to find that a local chinese newspapers, and those officials in communist china were hailing china as the appropriation.
▶ 0:31:50Mr. Dabbar: I do believe that there are plenty of people who think of this as important to share with communist china, for various different reasons, but I expect that the majority of american people do not want us to turn over our technologies to our adversaries, and I venture to say that this is the view of this full committee. New control is needed for science and security, and I know secretary wright is focused on that. While the current d.o.e. Borders on the d.o.e.
▶ 0:32:17Mr. Dabbar: Website provide a framework to secure counterintelligence, they provide too much flexibility and discretion for interpretation by political, career, and lab employees. I recommend a new d.o.e.
▶ 0:32:31Mr. Dabbar: Team roll out significant and tighter controls, such as requiring labs under secretaries to be sole authorizer with no ability to delegate authority for all countries at risk, while labs are meeting, and also create a list of the waivers that can be found by the committee for its oversight.
▶ 0:32:57Mr. Dabbar: The senate should consider legislation, mandating security policies that require administrative policies. In the senate should consider extending the lab ban on adversary nation nationals from the three nsa labs to all the labs.
▶ 0:33:26Mr. Dabbar: America is the world's greatest superpower in both technology and energy. As we invent the future, we should reengage on strong policies to protect our leadership.
▶ 0:33:39Chair Lee: Thank you, Mr. dabbar. Ms. puglisi.
▶ 0:33:43Ms. Puglisi: Thank you, chairman lee, ranking member heinrich, distinguished members of the committee and staff. Thank you for the opportunity to participate in today's hearing. It's an honor to be alone aside -- alongside distinguished members of the panel. I previously served as the national counter intelligence officer. I will discuss research community and strategy.
▶ 0:34:14Ms. Puglisi: Lastly, I will offer some lessons learned that include this is a U.S. problem, not just a department of energy problem. China's government has explicit efforts to exploit. While this must be addressed and counter, these rights of persons of chinese ethnicity in the U.S. must be protected. Finally, we can't protect what we don't have. We have to invest in the future. U.S.
▶ 0:34:38Ms. Puglisi: Science and technology research and especially the department of energy is innovation. Creating a climate to safeguard plans that change. Many in the research community's sees this as benefits. Because of this, it is important to discuss benefits of collaboration broadly, as they are not sustained across the different stakeholders.
▶ 0:35:01Ms. Puglisi: An individual researcher can benefit from a specific collaboration because it brings in additional resources, access to data, or equipment, but it might not be to the benefit of the U.S. government and national security or the U.S. taxpayer. While china is not the only country that targets the department of energy labs, china's policy to target or a deliberate strategy to save time and money.
▶ 0:35:28Ms. Puglisi: China uses nontraditional collectors, basically the expert scientists, business, instruments, to acquire technology and technological know-how. Our current system is not designed to combat this client of threat. -- this kind of threat. Current mitigation tools are tactical and narrow by design, with the assumption that the action -- the actor fully participate in a laws based, rules-based system.
▶ 0:35:56Ms. Puglisi: They are basically designed for traditional counterintelligence threats that focus on intelligence officers and legal activity. The protection in this and as a result, some of the individual programs that have been put in place by agencies, such as nfs, are a good start, however, in my written testimony, I provide subfactors for consideration in determining access to the lab.
▶ 0:36:24Ms. Puglisi: But reviewing individual factors can help them about what we really need is a more comprehensive mitigation strategy. Piecemeal solutions will not have the desired outcome. I cover these three suggestions in more detail in my written testimony come about briefly, I support the following elements that will make up a national level program. First, is establishing a national center for open-source information. This will provide detailed information at scale for our institutions and help make informed decisions.
▶ 0:36:54Ms. Puglisi: Second would be to create collaboration. It is important to establish an accepted framework of protections and make those clear , the standards, norms, expectations to researchers, staff, scientists, and students. And those who agree to those parameters, putting forth collaboration. Finally, investing in the future.
▶ 0:37:19Ms. Puglisi: The investments we make oro not make today will impact our future competitiveness tomorrow. In conclusion, it is important to remember that china takes a holistic approach. Civilian and military, private and public. It has such deep invocations for the d.o.e. Complex because it impact the basis of entry for chinese students and U.S. labs.
▶ 0:37:47Ms. Puglisi: Chinese laws, which include the ability to compel citizens to share information, regardless of who owns it, also complicates the individual -- ability for individuals to act independently. We must take a comprehensive strategy. Extreme positions such as closing our eyes or closing our doors only benefit china. We either discredit all the efforts to address the problem or we deprive ourselves of contributions of foreign-born students or scientists. China is not a neutral actor.
▶ 0:38:18Ms. Puglisi: Why does this matter? Because china intimidates and silences critics. This has only grown in the past few years, and it places individuals in untenable situations. We do our colleagues and students a disservice by not highlighting it. Continuing to discuss this issue, it should make us uncomfortable, which is to challenge assumptions and established norms, however, we as a nation have to have these conversations if we are going to protect them from others.
▶ 0:38:48Ms. Puglisi: Thank you.
▶ 0:38:48Chair Lee: Thank you. Ms. richmond.
▶ 0:38:53Dr. Richmond: Thank you very much, chairman lee, ranking member heinrich, and distinguished members of the committee. Thank you for the opportunity to testify before the committee on the important subject of protecting the integrity of U.S. research and enterprises.
▶ 0:39:10Dr. Richmond: As a lifelong scientist, working in science for 50 years now, and a researcher and also a devoted educator, I understand the critical importance of talking about this topic for maintaining the nation pose a competitive edge of science and technology and ensuring that our research efforts remain secure and beneficial to the american public. And may I add in these 50 years, I have seen dramatic changes in how we can interact with countries like china.
▶ 0:39:39Dr. Richmond: I seen the change, the threats become even stronger, and they are as much concern to me as they were when I was under. Discovery and technological innovation is one of the reasons why we are able to attract the best and the brightest in the world. According to a 2024 report from the national science foundation, foreign-born workers make up 19% of the overall workforce that senator heinrich pointed out, and 60% of the doctoral level in computer and mathematics.
▶ 0:40:15Dr. Richmond: Were born outside this country. We have an innovative society that is a key driver of our system. At the same time, I realized, as we have at the department of energy while I was there, the action that plays unacceptable risk. During my tenure on the national science board, under president trump and recently as undersecretary in the department of energy under biden, I saw firsthand the growing threats to the growing leadership in science and technology.
▶ 0:40:45Dr. Richmond: As this committee well knows, U.S. enterprise would not function without, but we also cannot afford to have things stolen from us, properties stolen by us, by material -- mysterious acts that threaten our national security. We must strike a cheerful balance if we are to protect national security interests without siphoning innovation that has long been our nation pose the greatest threat.
▶ 0:41:10Dr. Richmond: During my time as undersecretary, doe and other laboratories work diligently by aggression only -- by aggressively strengthening rigorous training. For example, d.o.e. Developed the scientist technology risk matrix and it continues to be updated.
▶ 0:41:38Dr. Richmond: This matrix addresses the guidance associated with economic and international competitiveness by identifying the risks associated with the topic and resulting level required. D.o.e. Also developed a comprehensive and rigorous approach to economic security through policy, establish new procedures, and created a new office to continue to evolve d.o.e.'s enhanced due diligence, engage with external
▶ 0:42:11Dr. Richmond: Stakeholders, and review agreements involving foreign entities. This includes asked by congress, thank you, and by national security memorandum, both in the trump administration and the biden administration. Together, these measures of helping the department and its partners mitigate risk that malign foreign governments to our system and intellectual property. For most U.S.
▶ 0:42:37Dr. Richmond: Universities, research universities, d.o.e.'s updated policy is a newer paradigm. I saw this on the national science board and I've seen it now. Restrict universities to critical through government and academia, and since I'm back at academia, going back to my home. That is why it as undersecretary at d.o.e., I focused on helping them open scientific collaboration.
▶ 0:43:10Dr. Richmond: I'm proud of the way university administrations have stepped up, including my own at the university of oregon. Security is in the dna and the structure of the national laboratory. It happens historically at our national laboratories and in d.o.e. This is not always been the case at universities. That is why it is so important to work with them.
▶ 0:43:32Dr. Richmond: After measures that have been identified, I have several recommendations that are important to consider pit while I cannot speak to the status of activities from my current capacity, I can assure the committee that regardless of the administration, the department of energy and its national laboratories have the responsibility to protect the scientific integrity of our nation's assets seriously. Thank you for the opportunity to appear before you today on this important issue, and I look forward to the discussion.
▶ 0:44:03Chair Lee: Thank you so much to all of you for your opening statement. We will now proceed to five-minute rounds of questions, alternating between republicans and democrats. I will begin that now. Ms. puglisi, I will start with few, if that is all right. Last week the "new york times" published an article in which you were prominently featured.
▶ 0:44:23Chair Lee: You were featured discussing how the ccp has used illegal threats to intimidate american researchers, including yourself, in an effort to suppress research that exposes its influence operation.
▶ 0:44:40Chair Lee: Now if the ccp is brave enough to do this, to try to pressure and influence american researchers, what does that say about the ability that they have to exert pressure, chinese nationalists from the people's republic of china, working within U.S.
▶ 0:44:58Chair Lee: National labs, especially keeping in mind that those individuals, if they are residents of china, what does that say about their ability to have pressure brought to bear on them, given that they are subject to chinese law that can compel them to cooperate with prn -- p.r.c. Intelligence gathering operations?
▶ 0:45:25Ms. Puglisi: Thank you for that question, senator. I think it highlights a disturbing trend. We talked a lot about the posts come as we move forward with engagement and collaborations, that china would exchange, and laws and norms would become workarounds. Unfortunately, that is not the case.
▶ 0:45:51Ms. Puglisi: So I think, as I made in my opening statement and testimony, the importance of talking about these, of this behavior, and if we ignore the pressures that these scientists and students are under, we do them a disservice, and we do our own society a disservice, but it really highlights as well for us to understand that kind of pressure.
▶ 0:46:21Ms. Puglisi: And that we need to put in place guidelines to those, foster collaborations and also to protect that technology.
▶ 0:46:31Chair Lee: Needless to say, the pressure to be brought to bear on chinese nationals.
▶ 0:46:37Ms. Puglisi: Yes, it is come and I think it highlights the articles about the extralegal behavior, not only for scientists, but on different campuses.
▶ 0:47:05Chair Lee: Mr. dabbar, your testimony said that under the at biden administration, we started engagement with china, to share development in our national labs at least one interest in -- instance in 2023, a national labs scientist went to china where he advises the dean of the school of energy, power, and engineering at the university, who also happens to be an affiliate of the ford influence arm of the chinese communist party on how best to construct an engineering lab for the school. Do you think U.S.
▶ 0:47:31Chair Lee: National labs should be engaged with these efforts with our greatest global adversaries, and should american taxpayers be funding such support that ends with benefiting our adversaries in this way?
▶ 0:47:49Mr. Dabbar: No, senator lee, I don't think we should. They have been very clear that they want to dominate the tax base, as I listed in my testimony, there's a long series of technologies, including in energy, that were invented at the d.o.e. National labs, invented by americans, that were stolen. This is a long track record on this topic, much of which they are selling the world, was invented in america.
▶ 0:48:13Mr. Dabbar: So I think we need to be much more cognizant of this topic, and I think more controls are needed on this, as I mentioned in my testimony.
▶ 0:48:22Chair Lee: That's an expensive proposition, losing valuable research for which we paid dearly, and having it go to our political adversaries is not an ideal outcome. You can have devastating conference quizzes. -- it can have devastating consequences.
▶ 0:48:47Chair Lee: Barring adversarial nations from barring our national laboratories received unanimous support. It was blocked from the national defense authorization act due to opposition from the former chairman of this committee. A provision included a waiver process allowing exceptions when the secretary of energy determined the national or economic security benefits outweighed the risks.
▶ 0:49:14Chair Lee: Now, given the strong bipartisan support, would you -- concerns, would you support limited high-level exceptions?
▶ 0:49:23Mr. Dabbar: I would, senator. Obviously it is a bipartisan topic. The way the current d.o.e. Is written, that was done when I was undersecretary, basically required sign offs to have any chinese interaction. I believe a lot of it was delegated down to lower levels, which basically opened the doors, as far as I could tell from my conversations with d.o.e. I think we need to potentially do exactly as the intelligence committee looked at.
▶ 0:49:54Mr. Dabbar: Instead of authorizing sign-ups, do it the other way, which is the base case is to ban that from adversary nations and to give waivers as required. I think that is a better way, given decades of chinese infiltration and accounts.
▶ 0:50:14Chair Lee: The off and on is dangerous, in other words could I see my time has expired. We will send it over to senator heinrich.
▶ 0:50:23Sen. Heinrich: Thanks, Mr. chairman. Miss richman, you and I have interacted some of our nation's most cherished national labs, places like los alamos. Do you have thoughts on what the current dismissals at d.o.e. And nnsa could mean for our national security in the long-term and in particular for workforce morale?
▶ 0:50:47Dr. Richmond: [inaudible] sorry. Thank you for that question. I agree, and you know, I hope you all know, how committed I was with regards to national security, and the concern of china stealing our most valuable assets.
▶ 0:51:15Dr. Richmond: With these cuts, particularly in the security area, but also having to do with our energy infrastructure, the cuts there, too, give me even greater concern, because they are immediate. Because to be able to work at his essay but also to be able to handle classified information requires a tremendous amount of background checks, polygraphs, they ask all your neighbors, and so, my neighbors are sick of being asked.
▶ 0:51:45Dr. Richmond: [laughter] there are all these things I've done. But the point is that when we make these cuts, even if we say, "come on back," what are the chances that we increase the risk of someone being hired by china to come over and share what they have been doing?
▶ 0:52:08Dr. Richmond: I got a letter not too long ago that was light, for this work, they would pay me 240 thousand dollars. I don't have a mortgage to pay, but there are others that do. I just have to say that these cuts, especially how they will impact the energy infrastructure, I think it is time for us to go to the new administration and to secretary wright and asked, what was the root process to do this, to
▶ 0:52:40Dr. Richmond: Make these cuts? And we do make cuts from our federal employees. Budget priorities, will they develop our budgets, set the priorities, and if you're part of d.o.e. Does not fit into the priorities of the white house and the secretary of energy, then you eliminate those people, but you do it in a processed while you develop this product budget, because the priorities are changing all the time.
▶ 0:53:10Sen. Heinrich: Yeah. One of the things that I think is important to share with folks is probably the leading red flag for someone being a risk, with respect to recruitment, is financial distress. So we just created a whole bunch of people with really important clearances, really important expertise, who are all under financial distress.
▶ 0:53:35Sen. Heinrich: We created a bunch of targets for the ccp, and I think -- I just -- I'm aghast at how un thoughtfully this is all being carried out. Mr. dabbar, good to see you again. I want to ask you to sort of walk us through what currently happens. So we will talk about how the intelligence officers at the labs, the lab directors, and then d.o.e.
▶ 0:54:02Sen. Heinrich: Intelligence coordinates, and then what happens when they don't all line up and agree?
▶ 0:54:08Mr. Dabbar: Yes, senator, so obviously this has been a big focus, this classified report that is out there, that has evaluated the details of that, I think it is safe to say, and they've obviously had some recommendations for that particular topic. In general, what happens is that the intelligence component of d.o.e.
▶ 0:54:32Mr. Dabbar: Has local officers at each of the labs for counterintelligence. They will do the screening of employees, travel, interactions, security clearances, so they do that interaction as part of that intelligence component with the lab complex in general, that works quite well.
▶ 0:54:54Mr. Dabbar: D.o.e.'s intel arm is integrated with that effort, and I think the biggest challenge on this is not the structure of it, but as I was mentioning, who has the approval, right, to allow this interaction to happen. I will give you an example.
▶ 0:55:14Mr. Dabbar: I have been told that many times in lab employee can actually do a recommendation and potentially come I've heard, even a sign off, on people coming to visit a lab. So if there is a p.r.c. Citizen who is employed at the lab, he could recommend another p.r.c. Group coming from china to enter the lab. And lab. And if .
▶ 0:55:36Mr. Dabbar: And if the authorities at the lab, sometimes these things are happening at a higher rate than maybe some people at headquarters my like. So just, who has authority in the signoff and the interaction of that? I think that is the core, practical issue that probably deserves to be raised to a more senior level than has, I believe, been delegated.
▶ 0:56:00Sen. Heinrich: If you have specific examples of that, I would appreciate if you would share them with this committee.
▶ 0:56:06Chair Lee: Senator cotton.
▶ 0:56:08Sen. Cotton: Thank you, Mr. chairman. My work on the intelligence committee for the last few years and now as chairman, I could tell you this issue is of critical concern. Our national labs are where we develop some of the top security capabilities -- top capabilities of the world, but they lack security measures. Is not just me, as members of the intelligence committee. Five members are on this committee.
▶ 0:56:33Sen. Cotton: There's a reason we passed legislation last year unanimously that would have stopped scientists from scientist and russia and even iran and north korea and cuba from being in our labs. Mr. dabbar, do you know how many chinese and russian scientists were in our labs in the last fiscal year?
▶ 0:56:51Mr. Dabbar: If I've seen your past testimony, I think the number is around 8000.
▶ 0:57:00Sen. Cotton: 8000 out of a total of how many, did you know? Total foreign visitors.
▶ 0:57:03Mr. Dabbar: I'm not certain about that.
▶ 0:57:06Sen. Cotton: 40,000, so every one in five in an american lab is chinese or russian. Do you know how many american scientists get to go to equivalent sites in china and russia? Do you know?
▶ 0:57:20Mr. Dabbar: I think it is less. [laughter]
▶ 0:57:23Sen. Cotton: If I put the over under at zero point five, would you bet the over or under?
▶ 0:57:28Mr. Dabbar: Maybe even under.
▶ 0:57:31Sen. Cotton: Ms. puglisi, how many american scientists get to go to the equivalent sites in china?
▶ 0:57:37Ms. Puglisi: Senator, I currently don't have that number, but I think it is a point that may be for this committee and others is it is reciprocity. -- it is not reciprocity. True collaboration comes from transparency reciprocity.
▶ 0:57:54Sen. Cotton: I cannot bring
▶ 0:58:00Sen. Cotton: I cannot br agree more. Miss richman, there is zero reciprocity on this issue. Why would we allow chinese and russian scientists in our national labs, to say nothing of iranian and cuban and north korean when they don't allow our scientists there. We told the directors of these labs for a long time and the intelligence committee that if they do not get a hold of this problem, than the congress will solve it for them.
▶ 0:58:28Sen. Cotton: And the legislation that we introduced and passed the intelligence community last year, though he did not get passed into law, will be brought back up this year, and I'm going to champion that on this committee in the intelligence committee, because we have to put an end to this threat. There are a lot of great people working at the department of energy, to include our labs and at the departments of intelligence and counterintelligence, where the very best of our small intelligence offices around the government, but too many people have this open science mindset,
▶ 0:59:00Sen. Cotton: This naive ideological commitment that we have to allow these former adversary scientists into our labs no matter what the risk. Mr. dabbar, who has the final word on allowing a foreign visitors to visit his or her lab?
▶ 0:59:15Mr. Dabbar: So, the order is flexible on who has the authority. Previously, when we instituted it, when I was under secretary, it was required to be at my level, and we were able to squash a lot of the thousand talents program's. We found many, many people working for china, including on joint nuclear weapons work. That is a pretty stunning comment I just gave, that we found that one of the labs.
▶ 0:59:46Mr. Dabbar: I believe, I was told and when of my last conversations with d.o.e. Recently is a lab has been delegated down to an individual lab level.
▶ 0:59:54Sen. Cotton: And sec. Haaland: we have great people -- and, again, we have great people working at these labs, but the great people tend to come from a scientific background, correct? They are not coming from the intelligence community, not from law enforcement. If a foreign national is excluded from one lack of a sea therefore excluded from every other lab?
▶ 1:00:15Mr. Dabbar: I'm not certain how it is currently being done.
▶ 1:00:19Sen. Cotton: I think the answer is no. If one says no, this guy from russia is too dangerous a risk, he cannot be here, he can turn around and try to go to one of the other labs as well. It it fair to say sometimes there is a little bit of competition between these labs for money or prestige or talent?
▶ 1:00:37Mr. Dabbar: Senator, one of my many times of uncovering things with intelligence, counter intelligence at the labs, we found that a chinese national who had been hired at one of the d.o.e. Labs, then they used that to shift to nist in colorado and use of the impromptu or having been hired at a d.o.e.
▶ 1:01:01Mr. Dabbar: National lab to join an imported effort at nist, and as soon as we found that out, we had to reach out to commerce quickly and point out that we are sorry that this person had got in that role, and basically we allowed them to end up at another lab.
▶ 1:01:19Sen. Cotton: Thank you. I want to thank the chairman for having this hearing. This is not something we discussed much in a public setting. We've examined it closely for years on the intelligence committee, but it is a grave national security threat. It is a threat to our prosperity as well. So many of these technologies end up getting commercialized. To be clear, what we are talking about here, again, is foreign nationals.
▶ 1:01:44Sen. Cotton: There's been a lot of testimony, a lot of statements from members and the witnesses about the history throughout american life of foreign-born nationalized scientists. We are not talking about that. We are not talking about somebody who has raised their hand and taken the oath of affirmation to become a citizen or even a legal permanent resident, we are talking about foreign nationals coming to our lab. It is a grave threat come and we cannot allow it to continue.
▶ 1:02:13Chair Lee: Thank you. Senator wyden.
▶ 1:02:19Sen. Wyden: Thank you you, Mr. chairman. I'm glad to welcome back Dr. geri richmond come a long time and also a longtime university of oregon duck. We welcome. Go ducks. If I might ask you about what we learned at d.o.e. In the northwest here recently, there were abrupt and significant workforce reductions, those who give our electric grid reliable.
▶ 1:02:50Sen. Wyden: My take is that this raises national security issues, it raises issues for our economy could what are the implications of something like that?
▶ 1:02:58Dr. Richmond: Thank you, senator wyden. It is good to be here with you, too. In terms of our power, energy infrastructure, and particularly the cuts, as well as the 1800 people that were just cut off at the department of energy, with no clear understanding of the procedure or why, it really is going to, I believe, that it is
▶ 1:03:29Dr. Richmond: Going to not only compromise the safety of our grid, but it will also drive up energy costs. These are, again, my personal opinions, having served as the undersecretary those years, but I think it also is sowing confusion and chaos among the federal workers. Because of what they are learning about things in the news, and I can't confirm what is in the news, either, but the point is, that it is leading to a lot of confusion.
▶ 1:04:01Dr. Richmond: For example, at bpa, there were a number of employees that were cut. For a pacific northwest or like you, that is chilling.
▶ 1:04:12Sen. Wyden: Let me see if I can get in the couple of other questions and will quickly. . When you went through the process of getting your security clearance, did you have to disclose all of your foreign financial conflicts of interest and contact with government officials?
▶ 1:04:26Dr. Richmond: Yes. In fact, because I have worked with several different countries, over two dozen developing countries in particular, I had to list all the countries I had been to, whether they had paid for my travel support, which most of them did not, whether I had any kind of a conflict of interest with them or any type of financial support from them, continuing. What all of my finances are, with regards to all of the investments that we have. We had to declare all of those. We had to be clear at general counsel. . I had to give a polygraph test.
▶ 1:04:58Sen. Wyden: I think I got the drift. If a U.S. government official has significant business dealings with the government of china or failed to disclose all of these contacts with chinese government officials, could that derailed her access to sensitive department of energy secrets or classified information?
▶ 1:05:13Dr. Richmond: Yes, and in fact, what happens in the laboratory, during my time, we had both the eye in and also the lab meters talking about when there is a concern about someone being in the laboratory could what they go through is, who has got to come on-site site, what is their background, what kind of access would be controlled if they did come on-site? And this is for visitors also.
▶ 1:05:45Dr. Richmond: And what projects can they work on, and what partnerships do they have? If there is a disagreement between those two entities in the laboratory, then he gets sent out to me. I did not have any concerning was they came up to me, and the laboratory said this much.
▶ 1:05:57Sen. Wyden: Thank you, Dr. richmond. Colleagues, I'm asking you questions for several reasons, and one of them is, according to public report industry, elon musk is running doge while remaining tesla's largest shareholder, and according to that public reporting, tesla makes one million cars a year at its factory in shanghai on land owned by the chinese government.
▶ 1:06:23Sen. Wyden: Finally, according to public reporting, tesla's contract allows the chinese government to revoke tesla's lease on the land at any time, if it determines doing so is in the public interest. On this committee, every one of us works for the american public interest, and given that as our highest priority, I intend, colleagues, to come back and asked more questions about this in the days ahead. Thank you, Mr. chairman.
▶ 1:06:49Chair Lee: Thank you, senator wyden. Senator mccormick.
▶ 1:07:01Sen. Mccormick: Thank you. Pittsburgh is the home of the national energy technology laboratory. Many commute across the delaware river to call pennsylvania home. We must ensure that this critical national research, these wonderful assets, are secure from threats.
▶ 1:07:22Sen. Mccormick: So I really do share the concerns raised by so many today about the continued theft of american research and innovation by the chinese communist party. It's a huge national security risk for all the reasons we talked about, but it is also the stated goal to dominate the commanding heights of technology and to use that technological supremacy to undermine america's economic might, its geopolitical position, our very way of life.
▶ 1:07:53Sen. Mccormick: Of that research and technology theft is a well-documented, pico -- key pillar of the ccp strategy. So scientific espionage not only provide a ccp with advantages in economic and environmental technology, it's also cutting american workers in pennsylvania and other places. We are essentially paying for the r&d that china steals, to beat us in the market space. How can american companies compete in that environment? Let me start with you, Ms. puglisi.
▶ 1:08:20Sen. Mccormick: You pointed out because the seep youth -- the ccp does not play by the same rules of science and technology that our often narrow research and security tools are outmatched by chinese efforts to steal american technology and know-how. How can we make the jump from piecemeal solutions, some of which we discussed here, to a national strategy for mitigating these threats?
▶ 1:08:42Ms. Puglisi: Thank you, senator, for that question. I think it is important to highlight first that the reason why what creates this challenge is china takes a hybrid approach, a holistic approach, so often times, we try to separate things out incomplete buckets. So to have a national choice, what we need to do is recognize how different the system is.
▶ 1:09:10Ms. Puglisi: To look at the individuals and the companies we are dealing with, holistically and acknowledge those ties to the chinese government. And in moving forward, have policies that are across both our infrastructure and commerce that recognize that these are supported, that they often times don't have to make a based decisions, but individuals, and we know this, our studies to
▶ 1:09:41Ms. Puglisi: Work in the laboratory for a purpose, and we just have to be much more deliberate about the way we look at people's backgrounds. And to begin with, I think is putting in place very clear guidelines, because our system has been built on trust.
▶ 1:10:00Ms. Puglisi: And I've been in the lab or worked in a lab, and no one wants to believe that their collaborator is stealing their technology or that the student they are supporting is giving out or has some other alternative motives.
▶ 1:10:19Sen. Mccormick: And yet we know they are.
▶ 1:10:21Ms. Puglisi: Yes, unfortunately, this is the case. So I think the point is being very clear, what are those assumptions that we are making? Sometimes we cannot get the yes with some of these collaborations. We have to engage with the research community to really be clear on that.
▶ 1:10:42Sen. Mccormick: I want to move on to one more question if I can. Thank you. Mr. dabbar. Good to see you again. Many research institutions, just following up on this question, including the national labs, are engaging in research collaboration with third parties. Here in the united states and overseas. Those third parties can also be exploited by our adversaries to steal sensitive research, particularly ccp. What policies should d.o.e.
▶ 1:11:10Sen. Mccormick: Put in place to ensure that the research collaborations and joint research projects that may be outside the lab don't create additional security vulnerabilities? What authority directive can congress use to help on that mission?
▶ 1:11:23Mr. Dabbar: So, that certainly happens. Let me give you an example. We do accelerator technology with our european friends, where they ship us some accelerators sometimes, and we shipped them some equipment sometimes. We generate I.p. In some of these very large pieces of equipment that could have dual use points, and sometimes the chinese go under germany, to a lab in germany, to try to appropriate I.p.
▶ 1:11:52Mr. Dabbar: That we invented at one of our national labs. I have specific examples of that. I think any collaborations with our allies, we need to push the ball, awareness of germany, france, and what not, that china is trying to steal stuff, and that if they want to work with us, and we are going to share technology with them, they have to meet the same sort of standards.
▶ 1:12:24Sen. Mccormick: So it is fair to say regardless of how tight our security is in our own labs come if we have research efforts underway that are not equally strong in the security measures, then that's a back door where some of the same challenges of I.p. Fat and so forth can occur.
▶ 1:12:44Mr. Dabbar: Absolutely, senator. Senator risch has been doing on fusion, america is about to break a major balance on fusion in the next four years. There will be some major examples. They are trying to steal it from us and our international collaborations on fusion. So that is something that historically was more open science, and I think very clearly, both domestically as well as international, that needs to be greatly enhanced, since we are about to accomplish quite a bit.
▶ 1:13:15Sen. Mccormick: Thank you.
▶ 1:13:20Chair Lee: Thank you. Senator gallego, you are up next.
▶ 1:13:26Sen. Gallego: Thank you, Mr. chairman timing. And thank you, again, to our witnesses for being here, and our ranking member. National security interests should always be, of course, top of mind. I was proud to be a leader in passing the 2025 ndaa. Among many things, they will enhance vetting and limit the entrance of certain foreign nationals to certain national labs to protect national security.
▶ 1:13:59Sen. Gallego: I also know how important it is to be deliberate in the ways we discuss sensitive operations, especially in open settings. As we do our duty to oversee national labs in this committee, we must not give away information that our adversaries could use against us or actively gather. I have a couple of questions for Dr. richmond. In united states military operations our armed forces work with interpreters to make our operations more secure and successful.
▶ 1:14:28Sen. Gallego: I certainly experience to that in combat with local nationals, as well as foreign nationals. And third-party companies. So, we have talked a lot about the risks of foreign infiltration. Can you expand on the risks of siloing ourselves too much and missing vital and from should from our allies and foreign-born scientists?
▶ 1:14:53Ms. Richmond: Yes, thank you, senator, and thank you for your service also. We cannot closet ourselves. I have to say that for the wall came down in europe I was in east germany and I got to see weeks before the wall came down and I could see what a closeted country looked like. We have to rely on intelligence from other countries too. We have to decide whether we trust it or not.
▶ 1:15:23Ms. Richmond: We have to decide what we are going to do it that. I'm going to go back for your comments now, because we need a coordinated effort across all agencies and universities if we are going to use what intelligence we have in order to move forward. And the armed forces play a critical role in that. As you know, if we did not have that outside information those partners with us, it would be [indiscernible]
▶ 1:15:52Sen. Gallego: Even the siloing of information and sharing of information, from my experience as the past chairman of intel I even had complaints from our five I nations, people that were supposed to have an shared are most intricate and sophisticated intelligence that we still were in such a silo that we cannot share our intel across platforms fast enough for them to use as actual intelligence.
▶ 1:16:20Sen. Gallego: When it comes to sharing with our close five I partners or other intelligence treaty nations do you see that also still being a problem in terms of some of the research that is found in the u.k., for example is not as quickly transferable or is easily shared for us to consume, use, or effectively continue the research on?
▶ 1:16:43Ms. Richmond: I think it is important for us to add to this conversation. This issue of open science. Open science is science that is going to end up in literature. It's going to be published together. That kind of collaboration happens at the laboratory because it is natural to do that. Whether it be feels like I have worked in with lasers in optics, and others too. We have to have that open science.
▶ 1:17:08Ms. Richmond: I fear the discussion of really restricting the labs to even things and personnel, and things that are open science, than my concerns are there. I don't know if that went to your question, but it is a point I feel is really important for this committee, any who are not scientists, to understand what the open science is as opposed to something that is an economic threat to us.
▶ 1:17:30Sen. Gallego: Your testimony includes multiple measures, including a risk matrix to protect research and attack at d.o.e. You concerned any of those measures will be disrupted or dismantled under new agency leadership? Doesn't really understand the goal and intent of that matrix?
▶ 1:17:50Ms. Richmond: As a citizen myself I am concerned, because what we have always found -- and I'm not going to divulge any classified information -- first of all, you do have people from other countries helping us in the intelligence for some of these countries. But the point is that we really have to be able to go forward in a manner that allows us to share the information we need and be able to go forward. I'm not sure if that quite went to your point.
▶ 1:18:21Sen. Gallego: Thank. I yield back.
▶ 1:18:24Chair Lee: Senator risch.
▶ 1:18:32Sen. Risch: I have been 17 years on both foreign relations committee and the intel committee, and we have watched this cancer grow over those years. And it is not going away. It is getting worse and worse. I'm going to start at 50,000 feet. In 1983i traveled in china. I left china thinking, were never going to have to worry about this. They have no plumbing, they have no phones. Have nothing. It smelled. It was terrible.
▶ 1:19:03Sen. Risch: That was in 1983. If you go there today it is like america. It took us over 200 years to get where we are. And it has taken them only a handful of decades. Are they that much smarter than we are? We all know better than that. They still every good idea we have, except for democracy and respect for human rights. So how did that happen?
▶ 1:19:27Sen. Risch: Well, it happened because america is so open and so free pet we just open the floodgates. And today this problem of the people coming into the labs is joined with the question of people that come into the colleges and universities. They are identical problems. The numbers are stunning.
▶ 1:19:51Sen. Risch: Americans have no idea that there are hundreds -- hundreds of thousands of chinese students studying in america. And we have a tiny fraction of that. As tom cotton pointed out, he went and dug out the figures of the thousands of chinese people who visited our labs and zero have visited -- zero americans have visited their labs.
▶ 1:20:21Sen. Risch: I'm familiar with the birthplace of nuclear energy on the planet. I talked to those people all the time. I have never met a person who has set foot in a chinese laboratory. So, this is the problem. We have given away the farm, and I would disagree with Ms. richmond about open science. We should never have given them that, but that ship has sailed. The open science is there. It is all over the internet. It is everyplace.
▶ 1:20:50Sen. Risch: But they have used it to bootstrap themselves up where they are. So, let's change lanes for just a second and talk about who we are dealing with. If a student that comes here, or an engineer that comes here and comes to one of the labs, may have no malign ideas whatsoever. But for a person who lives in a communist, autocratic country, nothing belongs to them. Their property doesn't belong to them. They're thinking doesn't belong to them. Their intellectual knowledge does not belong to them.
▶ 1:21:20Sen. Risch: It belongs to the chinese communist party. Because in those states the state does not exist for the people as it does in a democracy like we have. People exist for the state, and the state always comes ahead of the people. Surveys take these people -- when the students go home they are debriefed by the chinese communist party and every scintilla of information they have been belongs to the chinese communist party.
▶ 1:21:51Sen. Risch: It is two different systems. There is absolutely no question about it. But again, it is really kind of slamming the door on this thing. Ahead preached about this for years, and with all due respect to the scientific community, I cannot get it through their head that this is a national security issue. They say, well, we are all on this planet together. The knowledge we have helps everybody. Welcome yeah, to a degree. If we are fighting polio that is true.
▶ 1:22:20Sen. Risch: Not when we are designing, -- signing four computers. It is not like that at all. And we should not be sharing that information at all. Either way, I get real pushback from the colleges and universities. Why? There are millions of dollars being transferred from china to the colleges and universities. In those colleges and universities get very defensive of the grants they get from the chinese communist party. Anyway, that is where they are.
▶ 1:22:49Sen. Risch: Folks, how do we get the word out to the community and the word out to americans that this is a huge problem? I know we've only got a few minutes start down here and give me your 30-second take on that.
▶ 1:23:01Ms. Puglisi: Thank you, senator. Whole issue of basic science comes up quite a bit, it is important to note the collaborations are very important, and I myself have been a proponent for open science. However what is lost in the conversation is not everything is shared. That is the challenge, because it is happening is that the time and resource-intensive parts of that basic research, often times the data, the know-how, the access to, how do I actually do something?
▶ 1:23:32Ms. Puglisi: And often times what does not work is the kinds of things we really need to focus in on and had a conversation.
▶ 1:23:40Sen. Risch: Ms. richmond, I'm out of time.
▶ 1:23:44Ms. Richmond: Glad to me. I have been through chinese laboratories back in 2010.
▶ 1:23:50Sen. Risch: I've met somebody, finally. I've met one.
▶ 1:23:55Ms. Richmond: The point is --
▶ 1:23:58Sen. Risch: Did you get into the wuhan lab? We are interested. Probably not.
▶ 1:24:03Ms. Richmond: I don't read chinese, so I have no idea what lab I was in. You raise an important point. Your issue about open science is right, but on the other hand collaborations are important too. I believe we need to have a full discussion of this out in the open.
▶ 1:24:23Ms. Richmond: Universities need to -- and faculty and universities need to understand they could be involved in the areas of high performance computing, bioscience, battery science that we have the labs considered to be extraordinarily high risk, so they can understand.
▶ 1:24:36Sen. Risch: You got that exactly right.
▶ 1:24:40Mr. Dabbar: I think this is a big but narrow topic. America is a bright light, recruit people from all around the world who want to work at the doe national labs, and people want to become americans. I think that is good. When I was there we had four lab directors who were naturalized citizens from the u.k. And canada and germany and so on. That is excellent, right? They came here, they became american citizens.
▶ 1:25:09Mr. Dabbar: We are still a small percentage of the world in terms of population in the big scheme of things. I think doing that and all of the other people underneath them, citizens from all over -- china is the biggest topic.
▶ 1:25:21Sen. Risch: Those people can't stay here. You know what happens to their families if they say, we are giving up china and becoming a U.S. citizen. They will start -- I don't know. They do bad, bad things. Time is up. Thank you.
▶ 1:25:36Chair Lee: Senator cortez masto
▶ 1:25:42Sen. Cortez Masto: I appreciate the panel discussion today. It is good to see some of you again. Let me start off with the nevada national security site. Most people don't have it in their backyard. I do. Most people don't grow up next to it. I did. Most people don't have family and friends who work there. I have, and still do. This is an issue that is important for us in nevada and I appreciate the conversation today. But, Dr.
▶ 1:26:11Sen. Cortez Masto: Richmond, we start with you and your testimony. You have lined the chips and science act, the national defense authorization act, research can severely -- research security concerns we have talked about that are getting ready to go into effect.
▶ 1:26:27Sen. Cortez Masto: You mentioned the doe was getting ready to implement section 3112 of the ndaa, which would ban foreign nationals from china, russia, north korea, and iran from accessing the national laboratories operated by the national nuclear security administration. Right? Without secretarial waivers.
▶ 1:26:49Sen. Cortez Masto: Even the enhanced research security measures outlined in the full scio 2025 ndaa, how do you think these new regulations will affect the mission at nevada's national laboratories? Such as the nevada national security site? Which we know is essential for maintaining our nation's nuclear weapons stockpile?
▶ 1:27:08Ms. Richmond: Thank you, senator, for that question. As you may know, director ruby was the one that oversaw when I was in my position, so I don't have all of the depth of knowledge that she would have. But I do think the lab directors had spoken last week and even Dr.
▶ 1:27:35Ms. Richmond: Kimball dell is there and she does oversee lawrence livermore national laboratory. All five directors that were there, three or four of them, they are ready to do it and have accepted it and will have it done by april 15, or what the deadline is. What impact that has I cannot speculate on, but I think they are ready to take it on.
▶ 1:27:59Ms. Richmond: The concern is, though, that they are now going to have to fire, I think, a number of people, I think it was close to 1000 or something like that. And that compromises our security because those people can easily be picked up by our adversaries. So, --
▶ 1:28:15Sen. Cortez Masto: Can I touch on that? That was my next question. We are now implementing legislation to address foreign nationals coming into our labs. But what we are not doing is addressing the workforce necessary. We have had this conversation before about making sure -- stem, making sure our kids are exposed to it.
▶ 1:28:37Sen. Cortez Masto: We want to make sure that they are now stepping into, as they graduate, jobs like we have at the site. What does it say to them that we have just on this wholesale firing of people, particularly in my state people are paying attention. They know what is going on. What does that say to our ability to develop that workforce for the future in these stem courses?
▶ 1:28:59Ms. Richmond: I will put my academic hat on now. People are scared. Students are scared. Parents of students are scared. Spouses are scared. About paying mortgages. All of the energy they have put into this passion they have for signs is now being questioned. It is very personal.
▶ 1:29:18Sen. Cortez Masto: Me touch on one final thing. We have talked about foreign nationals and I agree we have to address it. We have passed legislation to do that. But there are other security challenges we are not talking about. Cyber threats. Where are we talking about cyber threats here? And should we be addressing that is congress as well? Let me open it up to any of the panel members. Talk to me about cyber threats. What should we know that we are not talking about today that is the next step for us to implement when it comes to our national labs?
▶ 1:29:49Sen. Cortez Masto: Ms. puglisi or dabbar?
▶ 1:29:56Ms. Puglisi: That is a very important point and that is why I advocate that we really need a holistic, comprehensive program that looks across the board. And also both external and internal, to understand, ok, who is sharing what with whom? I just want to pull the thread on the collaborations. That is an important point and why we need to demand that reciprocity and transparency. It cannot be a one-way street, right?
▶ 1:30:25Ms. Puglisi: We talked about how the people in our labs, how may people in their labs. These are serious topics. Serious countries do serious things. We need to ensure that there is that reciprocity of annalee people, but information. One of the challenges I think with china is they are clamping down on open science access to their data, access to academic papers. That doesn't demonstrate to me a place that has a serious desire to do true collaborations.
▶ 1:30:56Sen. Cortez Masto: Thank you. I know my time is up.
▶ 1:30:59Mr. Dabbar: Senator, this is a university example but not a lab example. This goes to show you that you need to have strict controls and sometimes things can go wrong. We found a cybersecurity effort funded by doe at a university in which all of the principal investigators were p.r.c. Nationals. Electric did, cybersecurity, funded by doe at a university with p.r.c.
▶ 1:31:28Mr. Dabbar: Nationals developing the software for cybersecurity for the electric grid. We stopped that. As soon as we found out that had been done. I will not go through the details, but it is an example that people were not thinking, ok? At the department, and they were issuing funding of something I think is pretty common sense.
▶ 1:31:56Mr. Dabbar: So, it comebacks -- it comes back to rules and proper oversight so that people down below don't do things that would not pass, kind of, common sense, for I think anyone in this room.
▶ 1:32:09Sen. Cortez Masto: For we don't have the staff to catch it. Thank you.
▶ 1:32:14Chair Lee: Senator king.
▶ 1:32:16Sen. King: Thank you, Mr. chairman. The focus today has been on national security. As it should be. That is one of our jobs. On the other hand there is an opportunity cost of excluding talent that could be important in furthering our own interests, in terms of technological development. Ms. richmond, talk to me about that.
▶ 1:32:39Sen. King: It seems to me what we need to do is find a path between total exclusion and not being cognizant of national security risks. But not exclude people who can make a significant contribution to our national welfare. You see what I'm trying to find?
▶ 1:33:00Ms. Richmond: Senator king, thank you for that question. There are so many examples of where chinese citizens have made -- I would be happy to give the committee many examples, especially chinese researchers, who continue to contribute in our laboratories and universities. It is a balance, and particularly for our universities we have, while I was undersecretary we started the art has office, which is the search for technology and economic security.
▶ 1:33:30Ms. Richmond: That is basically to make sure we don't have things happen like happened in your administration, which would check everyone that is going in for a grant. The foia that goes out, it is checked to make sure it is very clear we are going to ask this information when you apply for a grant. Then when the selections are made look for who the pi's are. What about the topic? The security for some topics.
▶ 1:33:58Sen. King: But universities don't have the security clearance apparatus that the national labs have. I believe there may be more risks, frankly, on the university level than there is at the national labs, because the national labs, you have counterintelligence, department of energy, and those kinds of examinations.
▶ 1:34:18Ms. Richmond: That is why we are working with them and sharing the risk matrix with them. As well as on a video call recently to talk about what they need to do and proposals with their pis to give them guidance on --
▶ 1:34:31Sen. King: Mr. dabbar, how do you think we should strike this balance?
▶ 1:34:35Mr. Dabbar: So, one of the orders we also implemented was banning giving money to university researchers if they were also taking money under 1000 talents program. We had found out that during the previous administration that they had allowed that. So, literally a researchers could -- a researcher could be getting money from the chinese government as well as the doe. We also spent a lot of time with university residents.
▶ 1:35:05Mr. Dabbar: They had a lot of worry about that and at the end of the day they reached a conclusion that the federal government can decide what to do with its money. That is a simple kind of conclusion, but one of the big thanks they found as a part of our pushing on this topic was they found out they had researchers who were spending significant times in communist china and basically taking their research and nothing to do with doe, and they didn't even know it was happening.
▶ 1:35:33Mr. Dabbar: I found out at stanford, for example, there was a professor that was supposedly full-time that spent nine months a year in china. The university didn't even realize it was going on, even though they were paying that professor. I think awareness with the university system, that they need to address their own problems, but I do think additional controls around how the federal government money is given to principal investigators --
▶ 1:35:59Sen. King: Let's go back to the national labs. If there is a total ban, no chinese researchers whatsoever. Is that a good policy or would that cost us some good scientific breakthroughs that would otherwise be useful? I'm trying to find the right line between national security and opportunity cost of brilliant researchers from anywhere in the world.
▶ 1:36:29Mr. Dabbar: I think, senator, given that there has been literally a whole generation of successful efforts by communist china in stealing stuff -- the los alamos club, and then 1000 talents -- they keep coming at us.
▶ 1:36:45Mr. Dabbar: I think the better way of doing it is this proposed legislation from the intel community that was referenced, which is a band with chinese nationals at the national labs, which are at the highest level of the united states, with the ability of the department to do away with them. There is flexibility.
▶ 1:37:02Sen. King: So the default would be, no?
▶ 1:37:05Mr. Dabbar: The default would be no, which was the intelligence committee's unanimous vote. With the ability of the department to grant waivers. So, there is still flexibility in the idea, but, once again, I think the doe national labs are at the top of the security worries.
▶ 1:37:24Sen. King: I understand. Quick follow-up question. Who is chinese? There are a lot of chinese-americans. They swerved into this? What is the definition?
▶ 1:37:35Mr. Dabbar: The way the orders are written, it is citizens.
▶ 1:37:39Sen. King: Chinese citizens? Ok. So a chinese american who has been here a couple of generations will not be included?
▶ 1:37:46Mr. Dabbar: Citizens is the way that the order is currently written.
▶ 1:37:50Sen. King: Thank you.
▶ 1:37:51Mr. Dabbar: Four russians. We had an iranian trying to get hired, an iranian citizen, and we had concerns on the type of technology and we decided not to let them in.
▶ 1:38:04Sen. King: Thank you, Mr. chairman. >> I have taken the gavel while senator lee goes to vote. Let me follow up on that. I don't know the particulars of it, by the way, I have been elsewhere, so I asks -- if I ask something that is a repeat, I apologize.
▶ 1:38:24Sen. King: It was two folks who apparently were american citizens, but who were passing information to the chinese communist party that were recently arrested from the dod. I want to say it is out in san diego. I am a little vague on this, but suffice it to say this occurred. The friction is on chinese citizens -- restriction is on chinese citizens -- and, by the way, I am irish-american, right?
▶ 1:38:55Sen. King: I'm not saying we have this prohibition on chinese-americans. I'm trying to understand this interface where the -- where there has been a infusion of citizens who may pose a security risk we want fairness, we want to capitalize on incredible human talent, but we don't want to be someone's sucker. These naturalized citizens, how we do that is a follow-up to what senator king asked. In terms of establishing security. Would you like to go?
▶ 1:39:24Ms. Puglisi: I think that is a really good question. So, we have, just to put data out there, of the chinese citizenship at graduation, after they have been here for five years, 80 8% state and after 10 years 81% have stayed. A lot of them are going to stay. The question is, which ones are the ones that we need to be concerned about?
▶ 1:39:47Ms. Puglisi: I think we have done working with the universities and nsf, and certainly, paul, with you administration working on this too, is department of energy in 2019 and 2021, you have everyone who wants money has to put down all of their connections, ok? With regards to money and visits, financial support, all of that has to be there if you are going to get doe money.
▶ 1:40:17Ms. Puglisi: I have been in a skiff where I have been talking to our intelligence people about someone that causes them concern. Those people are also working with our vetting, our test group, in order to figure out who those people are, because a university pi said, if you don't disclose and we find out that something is wrong, you are out of here.
▶ 1:40:40Sen. Cassidy: Let me ask you this. I once read about how the chinese missile program began because there was a chinese-american who was doing fabulous work, but because of a security issue was not given clearance to continue, and he just wanted an outlet for his intellect, so he returned to communist china and helped develop their program.
▶ 1:41:07Sen. Cassidy: So I guess that brings to mind, is there a way to discern between those people who are more loyal to china and those who are more loyal to the united states, but if we shut off opportunity they will go where they have opportunity?
▶ 1:41:22Ms. Richmond: That is exact but we have been talking about here. The concern about all of the cuts happening in the department of energy. 300 employees at nsaid. Those people have an incredible knowledge, scientific background. If they are upset, shall I say, they may decide to do that.
▶ 1:41:43Sen. Cassidy: People have got to eat, so they've got to have a job.
▶ 1:41:46Ms. Richmond: Have to pay the mortgage. You can take that contract, that letter I got recently that said $40,000 for an hours worth of work in china, we will pay all of your expenses. For somebody that is angry at the government --
▶ 1:42:00Sen. Cassidy: That is not my fundamental question, though. I'm going back to this person in the 1940's or 1950's who was really seeking opportunity. So, is there a way to discern between those who might be a security risk and those who are -- you know, they may leave, but they are going to leave because of opportunity or some other circumstances, because they are a security risk?
▶ 1:42:26Ms. Richmond: In the case of people, again, we go through with our test program and the risk matrix at the laboratories. We go through as much information as they will give us with regards to when they are employed at the university -- excuse me, employed in the government, to find out.
▶ 1:42:43Sen. Cassidy: This would apply to people of multiple nationalities. I think I heard you mention, there are talented people coming to the united states for graduate school. From the world over, right?
▶ 1:42:54Ms. Richmond: Yes, but you don't have to only worry about someone who has a chinese background. American scientists have decided they needed the money, so they went over to china.
▶ 1:43:05Sen. Cassidy: I'm a little suspicious about some of the canadians.
▶ 1:43:09Ms. Richmond: I think it is ours-americans we need to worry about. [laughter]
▶ 1:43:13Sen. Cassidy: You don't have to worry about irish-americans for much. Senator hickenlooper.
▶ 1:43:19Sen. Hickenlooper: Think all of you for being here. I appreciate this. I grew up in a time back in the 1960's lawyer at the height of the cold war there was a continuing cartoon series in mad magazine where it was spy versus spy. There were constantly doing tricks with each other in a comical competition.
▶ 1:43:45Sen. Hickenlooper: We are way beyond that, and I think, you know, when I was getting -- I got a masters in environmental science and had a number of foreign students within our program. It was embryonic in the sense of how much they added from their educational system to things we did not emphasize or did not understand as well, and vice versa. I got a great appreciation for that. I taught field geology for a year down in costa rica.
▶ 1:44:14Sen. Hickenlooper: While I was still a graduate student and saw that culture and got those exchanges. It is incredibly powerful. Look at the number of our largest companies that have been started by immigrants. The amazing innovations and breakthroughs that have come from people who came to this country because they wanted to live in a free country, to be honest. That magnet is still powerful. I want to ask each of you, are we doing enough? Is the current system sufficient to protect our classified research from foreign espionage?
▶ 1:44:48Mr. Dabbar: Senator, I do think a high level of awareness -- because there has been generation after generation of chinese adapting. I would make a broadening point to your question, which is not just classified. The leading renewables lab in the world is in your state. It is not even close. No other country comes close to that.
▶ 1:45:14Mr. Dabbar: So, to pick on a topic, thin-film solar may be the next big tank. We don't want that to be in chin jang, produced by slaves, right? Because they are the wrong religion. I thought we were over that in 1945, but the chinese are doing that. I'm certain they are trying to steal it from your lab.
▶ 1:45:40Sen. Hickenlooper: The nation's lab. Not my lab.
▶ 1:45:43Mr. Dabbar: In your state. I think there is a broadening point. It also includes economic impact technologies as well as classified.
▶ 1:45:54Sen. Hickenlooper: Dr. richmond?
▶ 1:45:55Ms. Richmond: I agree with that. What we're talking about is an evolving situation. We have to have a system together that is adaptable, can quickly move --
▶ 1:46:05Sen. Hickenlooper: Is our system now sufficient is the question. There are things we can do to improve it.
▶ 1:46:11Ms. Richmond: We can always be improved, but I think certainly under my administration we took what we got from the past administration, tightened it up more, and as we go through we are going to have to see how much it is going to behind more. Again, it is not just classified information. It is also the ai and many of the other areas.
▶ 1:46:32Ms. Puglisi: It is more than the classified information. Because it is really, a lot of the technologies of the future, it is ai, it is biotech. I think what is really important is to focus on the behavior. I think that a lot of the new regulations and rules being put in place are a start and are beginning to do that. But I think it is going to take time to implement those. Again, I think we have to take that really holistic look.
▶ 1:47:03Ms. Puglisi: You cannot set and forget, right? The technology is changing. The threat vectors are changing, so it is going to require a constant dialogue.
▶ 1:47:13Sen. Hickenlooper: The magnitude of those vectors has never been greater. We have to maintain that sense of urgency you have all shown. I appreciate that. Several of you have talked about foreigners coming into our universities and being more motivated or adding a great deal to innovation.
▶ 1:47:31Sen. Hickenlooper: I think we have to get back also to, how do we get our kids in this country -- I mean, the reason universities are receiving these foreign students is because we don't have a pipeline that is sufficient to provide the technology and stem kids. We have to get the them in elementary school. You guys connect that problem with this issue about our national security? I will start with the side.
▶ 1:47:59Ms. Puglisi: That is an excellent point. We should start at k-12 and really do things stolen -- things --
▶ 1:48:08Sen. Hickenlooper: K-3.
▶ 1:48:12Ms. Puglisi: That is going to take an effort. We want to make sure we draw from the wide swath of americans from all over the country. So, that starts with support from the undergraduate -- and make people understand what the possible is. And also it is a proficient workforce.
▶ 1:48:32Ms. Richmond: Do you realize that our country has the lowest retention rate for kids that decide they want to be a scientist at 18 and don't end up being a scientist?
▶ 1:48:45Sen. Hickenlooper: Outrageous. I do know that. Outrageous. [inaudible] [laughter] >> thank you so much, Mr. chairman. No, I have said this a bunch of times, but I'm probably a new kid on the block. But I'm not a kid. I've got a lot of white hair. And I have been around and around.
▶ 1:49:18Sen. Hickenlooper: I can tell you simply just this. I truly believe that energy absolutely is the key to just about every single thing that we've got going. That is all there is to it. Now, and if it is that level of key, I have just got to share with you just a couple things real quick.
▶ 1:49:43Sen. Hickenlooper: First of all, we have one of these 17 labs in oregon town, west virginia, and we are really proud of that. And I can tell you that I have just gotten through being the governor of the great state of west virginia for eight years and, to be perfectly honest, we were able to do lots and lots of good stuff. In little west virginia a lot of people told a lot of bad jokes about to tell you the truth along the way, came a diamond in the rough that everybody missed.
▶ 1:50:14Sen. Hickenlooper: And with all of that being said, successes like you can't imagine. And we were early proud of exactly what we did. With that being said, along the way there was a gentleman that I ran into way, way before I ever became governor, and he was a p.r.c. National, and just the most legitimate-speaking gentlemen you could ever be around.
▶ 1:50:43Sen. Hickenlooper: And then all of a sudden, as I became the governor, we found out things that were going on with him in his life and everything that tied right back to his homeland that absolutely astounded us. I mean, absolutely a gentleman that -- a guy that is suspicious of almost everybody a lot of times, but absolute trusting of everybody.
▶ 1:51:14Sen. Hickenlooper: A guy that believed with all in me that this guy was the real deal. A guy that absolutely we trusted in every way. And we were astounded with what we found. That is all there is to it. Now, if energy is what I think is so important, it is off the chart right now. It is off the chart how important energy is. Do you realize if you are a business guy -- that's me -- do you realize that we can't cut our way out of these messes?
▶ 1:51:44Sen. Hickenlooper: We can't. We can mind the store and surely do a lot better, that the end of the day we've got to find a way to grow. And the way to grow absolutely, hands down, is energy. If it is the most important -- and it is -- it truly is. You know, then we have got to be on guard and we have got to do better.
▶ 1:52:10Sen. Hickenlooper: Because the world is trying to absolutely discover or steal our innermost secrets all the time. All the time. With all that being said, I would say to everybody, from the guy that is the white-haired guy , from west virginia that is a business guy, not a politician, I'm a guy that talks to you with common sense and logic I would say, beware. And absolutely we've got to do better.
▶ 1:52:39Sen. Hickenlooper: And these folks right here are the key to us doing better in a lot of ways. So I do have one question. And it just parallels everything I have already said. Because, you see, I really believe that president trump, because I am a real friend with the family. And absolutely I'm trusting of the family.
▶ 1:53:04Sen. Hickenlooper: He is our president, and he is now saying to all of us, look, we've got a problem here. We need to do better. So, let's get at doing better. But my question real fast is just this. And this is to is it Ms. puglisi? Did I get that halfway close?
▶ 1:53:24Yes -- Ms. Puglisi: Yes.
▶ 1:53:26Sen. Justice: My question is this. Given your expertise in counterintelligence and research security can you provide insight into the extent of collaboration between doe national laboratories and the seven sons universities in china, please?
▶ 1:53:42Ms. Puglisi: Thank you very much. I myself have not done empirical research to give you the exact numbers. There has been a number of articles that look at that kind of -- those kinds of collaborations, and for those who are now with seven sons or universities that worked directly with the military, this is very concerning.
▶ 1:54:07Ms. Puglisi: Because china says that it's -- that it will use anything it acquires and apply it to its military. So, those are affiliations and collaborations that we really need to take a closer look at.
▶ 1:54:23Sen. Justice: Thank you so much. I know my time is expired, but I would say this. I will do anything and everything I can to help all of you in every way at any time. We've got to become safer and more protected in my book. Thank you so much.
▶ 1:54:42Chair Lee: I want to thank all of our witnesses for being here today. This has been a great hearing. We are going to keep the record open until the close of business, 6:00 p.m. Tomorrow, february 21, for the sum and -- submitting of written questions. And items included in the hearing record. Before we gavel out I want to correct the record on some things that have been sent today.
▶ 1:55:07Chair Lee: Over the last week has been a lot of, apparently, misleading and poorly-sourced reporting regarding dismissals at the U.S. department of energy. Here are some facts that are often omitted. President trump and the department of energy are committed to making government accountable, efficient, and restoring proper stewardship of the american taxpayer dollar.
▶ 1:55:37Chair Lee: And the previous administration was not a responsible steward of that, and we are paying the price in the form of inflation. In just four years the biden administration expanded the department of energy's federal workforce by more than 20%, adding more than 3000 positions. The last year alone the biden administration increase the size of the department of energy federal workforce with 1000 new federal employees.
▶ 1:56:07Chair Lee: Delivering on president trump's mandate, supported by more than 77 million american voters, the energy department began on thursday dismissing a portion of recently-hired federal employees classified in the federal government as probationary employees. Across the energy department less than 700 probationary employees have been dismissed. These dismissal numbers pale in comparison to the number of total amount of positions the biden administration hired over the last four years.
▶ 1:56:36Chair Lee: They are also less than -- then the total added in the past year. Contrary to many news reports, nuclear weapons production plants and nuclear laboratories are exempt from these dismissals. Those are not part of it. At the energy department's power marketing administration, the pma, fewer than 3% of employees were dismissed and were primarily administrative goals.
▶ 1:57:05Chair Lee: Of the more than 70,000 contractors and federal employees at the national nuclear security administration fewer than 50 employees were dismissed. These employees held primarily administrative and clerical roles. The energy department will continue its critical mission of protecting our national security and nuclear deterrence in the development, modernization, and stewardship of america's atomic weapons enterprise, including the peaceful use of nuclear technology and nonproliferation.
▶ 1:57:40Chair Lee: So, it is important we keep the facts aligned. When people are crying that the sky is falling, and usually is not. That certainly is the case here. In any event I think the witnesses for being hit today. It has been a good and informative discussion. We have laid a good record and I appreciate your help. The hearing stands adjourned. [gavel]