[House Hearing, 113 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Printing Office]
MEASURING OUTCOMES TO UNDERSTAND THE STATE OF BORDER SECURITY
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HEARING
before the
SUBCOMMITTEE ON BORDER
AND MARITIME SECURITY
of the
COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED THIRTEENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
MARCH 20, 2013
__________
Serial No. 113-8
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Printed for the use of the Committee on Homeland Security
[GRAPHIC] [TIFF OMITTED]
Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/
__________
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COMMITTEE ON HOMELAND SECURITY
Michael T. McCaul, Texas, Chairman
Lamar Smith, Texas Bennie G. Thompson, Mississippi
Peter T. King, New York Loretta Sanchez, California
Mike Rogers, Alabama Sheila Jackson Lee, Texas
Paul C. Broun, Georgia Yvette D. Clarke, New York
Candice S. Miller, Michigan, Vice Brian Higgins, New York
Chair Cedric L. Richmond, Louisiana
Patrick Meehan, Pennsylvania William R. Keating, Massachusetts
Jeff Duncan, South Carolina Ron Barber, Arizona
Tom Marino, Pennsylvania Dondald M. Payne, Jr., New Jersey
Jason Chaffetz, Utah Beto O'Rourke, Texas
Steven M. Palazzo, Mississippi Tulsi Gabbard, Hawaii
Lou Barletta, Pennsylvania Filemon Vela, Texas
Chris Stewart, Utah Steven A. Horsford, Nevada
Keith J. Rothfus, Pennsylvania Eric Swalwell, California
Richard Hudson, North Carolina
Steve Daines, Montana
Susan W. Brooks, Indiana
Scott Perry, Pennsylvania
Greg Hill, Chief of Staff
Michael Geffroy, Deputy Chief of Staff/Chief Counsel
Michael S. Twinchek, Chief Clerk
I. Lanier Avant, Minority Staff Director
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SUBCOMMITTEE ON BORDER AND MARITIME SECURITY
Candice S. Miller, Michigan, Chairwoman
Jeff Duncan, South Carolina Sheila Jackson Lee, Texas
Tom Marino, Pennsylvania Loretta Sanchez, California
Steven M. Palazzo, Mississippi Beto O'Rourke, Texas
Lou Barletta, Pennsylvania Tulsi Gabbard, Hawaii
Chris Stewart, Utah Bennie G. Thompson, Mississippi
Michael T. McCaul, Texas (Ex (Ex Officio)
Officio)
Paul L. Anstine, Subcommittee Staff Director
Deborah Jordan, Subcommittee Clerk
Alison Northrop, Minority Subcommittee Staff Director
C O N T E N T S
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Page
Statements
The Honorable Candice S. Miller, a Representative in Congress
From the State of Michigan, and Chairwoman, Subcommittee on
Border and Maritime Security................................... 1
The Honorable Sheila Jackson Lee, a Representative in Congress
From the State of Texas, and Ranking Member, Subcommittee on
Border and Maritime Security................................... 3
Witnesses
Mr. Michael J. Fisher, Chief, Border Patrol, Department of
Homeland Security:
Oral Statement................................................. 6
Joint Prepared Statement....................................... 8
Mr. Kevin McAleenan, Acting Assistant Commissioner, Office of
Field Operations, U.S. Customs and Border Protection,
Department of Homeland Security:
Oral Statement................................................. 13
Joint Prepared Statement....................................... 8
Mr. Mark Borkowski, Assistant Commissioner, Office of Technology
Innovation and Acquisition, U.S. Customs and Border Protection,
Department of Homeland Security:
Oral Statement................................................. 15
Joint Prepared Statement....................................... 8
Ms. Veronica Escobar, El Paso County Judge, El Paso, Texas:
Oral Statement................................................. 17
Prepared Statement............................................. 19
Appendix
Materials Submitted by Veronica Escobar.......................... 41
MEASURING OUTCOMES TO UNDERSTAND THE STATE OF BORDER SECURITY
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Wednesday, March 20, 2013
U.S. House of Representatives,
Subcommittee on Border and Maritime Security,
Committee on Homeland Security,
Washington, DC.
The subcommittee met, pursuant to call, at 10:03 a.m., in
Room 311, Cannon House Office Building, Hon. Candice S. Miller
[Chairwoman of the subcommittee] presiding.
Present: Representatives Miller, Barletta, Jackson Lee, and
O'Rourke.
Also present: Representative Barber.
Mrs. Miller. The Committee on Homeland Security, our
Subcommittee on Border and Maritime Security, will come to
order.
The subcommittee is meeting today to examine how to measure
our Nation's border security and our witnesses today are Chief
Michael Fisher, chief of the United States Border Patrol, Kevin
McAleenan, acting assistant commissioner in the Office of Field
Operations at U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Mark
Borkowski, who is the assistant commissioner for the Office of
Technology, Innovation, and Acquisition at the U.S. Customs and
Border Protection, and Judge Veronica Escobar of El Paso County
Texas, and we certainly welcome all of our panel. I will
introduce them a bit more in detail in just a moment.
But how this committee and how this Congress really, this
subcommittee, approaches border security should be based on
answers I think to some very simple questions.
First of all, what does a secure border actually look like?
How do we get there? Then, how do we measure it?
As Chairwoman of the subcommittee, I have made these
questions certainly a focal point of our efforts here in this
Congress. Identifying some of the principal characteristics of
what a secure border looks like was the goal of this
subcommittee's first hearing.
Today, we are going to be examining what is perhaps the
most important piece of border security, and its puzzle so to
speak, and that is how we measure border security outcomes.
In the past, we have based our standing of border security
progress at how much technology or how much personnel we have
along the border or how many linear miles of the border that
were under operational control.
The current conversation focuses on the record, the number
of Border Patrol agents, on how many UAVs we have there, on the
fact that the amount of people that we are catching is low. So
we assume that the border must be secure, and security is
certainly more than resources or low apprehension rates.
Without a way to quantify effectiveness there can be really
no sound basis for determining how secure our borders are, let
alone justification for immigration policy decisions.
I think it is time to change the conversation up a little
bit. In my view I think a better way to the state of border
security is how effective we are at keeping bad people or bad
things out of the country; basically, we need to stop measuring
resources and pivot to a measurement of outcomes.
Our borders, whether that is the Southern Border or the
Northern Border or all of our maritime borders, are very
dynamic places that are constantly changing. Once we have
secured a section of the border, that doesn't mean that it will
be secured forever.
Smugglers are always going to seek out the area of least
resistance and how we address our border security in measuring
that has to reflect that reality also.
At our last hearing, Assistant Commissioner McAleenan said
something that I want to reiterate. He said, ``There is no
single measure that will tell the whole story at the border,''
which I thought was very true. I certainly agree with that,
which is why I am certainly open to a series of measures that
could better inform the security and the vastly different
terrain along the border or at our ports of entry and in the
maritime environment.
Unfortunately, such measures do not exist today. They don't
seem to be ready in the near-term. The Department of Homeland
Security officials have been telling us for quite a few years
that, sort of, the next holistic measure called the Border
Condition Index is on its way and we have yet to see--to have
it make its appearance.
Although I certainly have said that I am willing to look at
better ways, different ways to measure border security, but we
are looking for the Department to deliver on that.
My hope today is that we will get some good answers about
the status of the BCI, what measures it will take into account,
and when it may be ready.
In fact, several Members have asked questions about the
status of the BCI at our last hearing, but again, we were not
able to get answers really from those on the ground.
This is very troubling because if we learned anything from
the failure of SBInet, it was that the operators on the ground
have to be more involved, must be more involved. The ground-
floor stakeholders must be more involved in the development of
border security decisions, I think, in order to prevent any
failure.
Developing a complicated measure without the continual
input of the men and women who are in the field, on the ground,
who will be held to this standard, is not the best way to do
business.
So, if the BCI cannot be ready in 2 years, you know, we
have to question if it is going to be a useful tool.
In 2010, when the administration stopped reporting
operational control information, the GAO warned that--they
said, ``The absence of measures for border security may reduce
oversight and the Department of Homeland Security
accountability.''
Congress and the American people must have a great deal of
confidence that the Nation's border security agencies can deter
or apprehend the overwhelming majority who cross the border
illegally, and possess the ability as well to interdict drugs
and whatever else may be coming across destined for American
cities, that we don't want to be coming into our country.
I think absence of such assurances, we will just have the
same border security and immigration conversations next year
and the following year and the following year thereafter.
In my view, only a robust and agreed-upon way to measure
outcomes can be the basis for that confidence. All of the DHS
components for the nexus to the border have to be held
accountable for success or failure, progress or not.
We need to have a comprehensive strategy to secure the
border and part of that strategy has to be a measurement system
that makes sense.
The Department should be held accountable for outcomes and
certainly not keep telling us that the border is just more
secure than ever because there are a lot of agents or
technology or infrastructure along the border.
Again, we have to be able to have a robust way of measuring
it; something that can be explained, easily explained to the
American people, that we are going in the right direction.
So I certainly look forward to hearing from our
distinguished panel this morning. I think we have a lot of
expertise, fantastic expertise, before the subcommittee here
today, and I we certainly look forward to hearing from them and
at this time, I would yield to the Ranking Member for an
opening statement.
Ms. Jackson Lee. Good morning. I thank the gentlelady from
Michigan for yielding, and I am very pleased with your
leadership and us working together on a very important
component of America's National security, and more importantly,
Madam Chairwoman, asserting of the jurisdictional authority of
Homeland Security and the Border and Maritime Security
Subcommittee as it relates to the question of comprehensive
immigration reform.
We know well that as the debate moves rather swiftly, one
of the issues that has been raised, that will be raised, either
as a constructive component or either in some camps and
categories as one that would distract from comprehensive
immigration reform, it is whether or not we have a secure
border.
Your last hearing, our last hearing, where we asked how the
border was being secured was an important outlay, if you will,
of establishing what is actually happening.
This hearing is important because it is really key to have
how that is measured and the experts that you have here, as I
welcome the witnesses, will be very constructive in our journey
toward making sure that the border security effort is led by
this full committee, Chairman, and Ranking Member, and this
subcommittee that I believe is working with good intentions.
Let me also acknowledge Congressmen Beto O'Rourke for
championing the value of understanding the border and providing
us with insight as relates to the expertise that is in his
Congressional district. So besides the witnesses, we look
forward to welcoming Judge Escobar for that expertise, and we
thank the Congressman for his leadership on that issue.
I am pleased the subcommittee is meeting to examine the
Department of Homeland Security's efforts to use metrics to
quantify border security.
This discussion is particularly timely as Congress
continues to work on legislation to reform our immigration
system; border security will be an integral part of this
discussion.
Also in recent years, Congress has made unprecedented
investments in border security personnel, technology, and
resources to help DHS achieve that goal.
Existing border metrics, while perhaps imperfect, indicate
these investments have paid off. Apprehensions at border
crosses totaled nearly 365,000 Nation-wide in fiscal year 2012,
which is a 78 percent decrease from their peak in fiscal year
2000.
According to the Government Accountability Office, Border
Patrol data shows that the effectiveness rate for eight of the
nine Border Patrol sectors on the Southwest Border improved
from fiscal years 2006 to 2011.
They also found that the recidivism rate across has dropped
to 36 percent in fiscal year 2011, down from 42 percent in
fiscal year 2008.
Certainly, our leadership on the board should be
acknowledged for the work that our law enforcement has done
along with homeland security. It is important to note these
strides, and we thank you for it.
It is important that for Congress to have an accurate
assessment of remaining needs at our borders so we can identify
areas for improvement. But I am encouraged that the trends--
about the trends that we are seeing. But I also want to say
that we want to make sure these trends are being seen in the
light that they should be and that is that you have the
resources that you need or is it combined with the weak
economy. Likely we will hear some of that today.
While metrics are useful to measure our continued progress
towards better-managed borders, I will reiterate my strong
opposition to tying a comprehensive immigration reform to
achieving some arbitrary standard of border security or some
exaggerated standard; meaning that to make the argument that
the border is not secure and won't be for many years to come
and therefore we will not be able to complete comprehensive
immigration reform.
Indeed, we must move forward on parallel tracks reforming
our broken immigration system while continuing to work together
to achieve more secure borders.
I would also caution that no single number or metrics can
tell us whether our borders are secure. Geography and terrain
of our borders are very diverse and the threats can differ from
mile to mile based on highways, mountains, waterways, planes,
and deserts.
Madam Chairwoman, I do want to focus on the area that our
colleague, Mr. Barber, is from, the Arizona desert area, and
the concerns that he has expressed over the last couple of
months in the time that he has been on this committee.
Also metrics that are useful at the ports of entry will
differ from those that are meaningful for between the ports of
entry. Instead I believe DHS should use a range of data points
combined with the stakeholder input to determine the state of
the border and to make decisions about where additional
resources may be necessary.
Today I hope to hear from the operators, Chief Fisher,
Assistant Commissioner McAleenan, about what they believe are
the best metrics to assess the state of our borders.
I am particularly interested in hearing from the CBP about
what metrics are most valuable at the ports of entry, which is
something we hear less about compared to challenges between the
ports of entry.
Further, I want to hear about how Mr. Borkowski uses
information from the operators both in developing Border
Condition Index and making border security technology
acquisition decisions.
Last, and arguably most importantly, I would like to hear
from Judge Escobar on how border cities' and communities' input
and needs could be included in these decisions.
I thank the witnesses for joining us and look forward to a
productive discussion.
Finally, in conclusion, I am aware of the GAO report, which
I will make more comments on as I go forward, and the metrics
request that was made by Congressman Thompson and also Mr.
Barber, and as the Ranking Member, I will look forward to
analyzing that report and probing it more closely.
Finally, Madam Chairwoman, I will look to posing some
questions regarding the utilization of drones on the border and
will look forward to some in-depth responses to that inquiry.
This is an important hearing. I thank the witnesses and
look forward to a productive discussion.
I yield back to the gentlelady.
Mrs. Miller. I thank the gentlelady, and I am prepared to
accept a UC request if the gentlelady would like to offer one
for Mr. Barber to sit in on our hearing. He said he had to run
a quick errand and be right back.
Ms. Jackson Lee. I do. I ask unanimous consent that Mr.
Barber, as a Member of the full committee who is not a Member
of the subcommittee, have permission to sit and to inquire
through questioning on this committee and at this hearing.
Mrs. Miller. Without objection.
Ms. Jackson Lee. Thank you.
Mrs. Miller. Other Members of the committee are reminded
that opening statements might be submitted for the record and
again, we are pleased to have four very, very distinguished
witnesses before our panel here today.
Michael Fisher was named chief of the United States Border
Patrol in May 2012. Chief started his duty along the Southwest
Border in 1987 in Douglas, Arizona. He has also served as the
deputy chief patrol agent in the Detroit sector and as an
assistant chief patrol agent in Tucson.
Mr. Kevin McAleenan is the acting assistant commissioner at
the U.S. Customs and Border Protection where he is responsible
for overseeing CBP's antiterrorism, immigration, anti-
smuggling, trade compliance, and agricultural protection
operations at the Nation's 331 ports of entry.
Welcome both of them back.
Mark Borkowski became the assistant commissioner at the
Office of Technology, Innovation, and Acquisition at the U.S.
Customs and Border Protection in July 2010.
In this role, he is responsible for ensuring technology
efforts are properly focused on mission and well-integrated
across CBP. Prior to his appointment as the assistant
commissioner, Mr. Borkowski was the executive director of the
Secure Border Initiative, SBInet.
Veronica Escobar was sworn in as El Paso County Judge on
January 1, 2011. She works on issues related to health care,
border policy, government consolidation, nature tourism,
economic development. In her role as judge, she has been active
in addressing issues important in border communities.
Judge, in my area, we call you the county executive. That
is our term in Michigan for what you do there.
But we welcome all of you here and certainly the witnesses'
full written statements will appear in the record.
The Chairwoman now recognizes Chief Fisher for his
testimony, and thanks again for appearing once again before
this subcommittee, Chief.
STATEMENT OF MICHAEL J. FISHER, CHIEF, BORDER PATROL,
DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY
Chief Fisher. Chairwoman Miller, thank you for the
opportunity.
Ranking Member Jackson Lee, Congressman O'Rourke,
Congressman Barletta, it is an honor to appear before you today
to discuss the state of border security and the role that the
Border Patrol agents and our mission support employees play to
secure the border along with our strategic partners.
I believe the committee has it right in terms of
characterizing the border as a non-static state and framing the
discussion around the state of border security.
As we have discussed in the past, the border fluctuates
with ever-present and dynamic threats along the continuum of
potential vulnerabilities at a point in time.
A condition that sets in motion risk mitigation as well as
risk management responses primarily utilizing advanced
information, operational and technological integration, and
rapid response applied both at the strategic and the tactical
level, all the while, recognizing the interdependency of
intelligence, interdiction, and investigative capabilities.
As stated in my previous remarks before this committee, I
believe the state of border security is one in which we reduce
the likelihood of attack to the Nation, one that provides
safety and security to the citizens against the dangerous
people seeking entry into the United States.
Given this framework, the question becomes how should we
measure this, not just how we can measure this; an important
distinction in my opinion.
In order to explain how we might show sustained progress
over time in this mission space, I want to frame my brief
remarks against our strategic plan. I will start with our
classified environment, which is nothing less than the
prevention of terrorists and terrorist weapons from entering
the United States.
I propose that I would prefer this committee on the
potential corridor threats to the homeland and describe to you
our integrated risk mitigation approach.
In a classified setting, I would share how we are
prioritizing threats and how we are refining situational
awareness. If amendable, we would also include outcome measures
for your insights towards our progress.
In the unclassified environment, our focus for this hearing
on managing risk and disrupting and degrading transnational
criminal organizations. Outcome measures to assess our progress
in this area would include the following.
First, analysis of unique subjects, which helps us
determine the number of people who have entered between the
ports of entry and were subsequently apprehended.
Distinguishing unique subjects and as a subset of
apprehensions is important because it informs our understanding
of patterns and rates of flow toward and into the United
States. It also allows us to measure illegal activity at in
between the ports of entry.
The second outcome measure would be recidivism, which
separates the number of people arrested at least two times from
those who are arrested only once.
Third, the average apprehension-per-recidivist rate
provides us with the ability to analyze the flow and
corresponding trends to distinguish between those that only
enter two times from those with multiple entries in a given
area over a period of time.
This is important in assessing the threat. Moreover, as a
measure, it informs our decisions to redeploy resources to
high-risk areas as well as applying the appropriate
consequences in order to reduce a further entry while
disrupting criminal smuggling networks culminating and reduce
flow rates.
Fourth, as we have discussed in the past, affective rates
in corridors characterized by significant illegal cross-border
activity is equally important. We need to be aware of those who
make illegal entry and track as best we can the outcome.
Now we are learning and getting better at knowing how many
people entered, and of that number, how many did we apprehend
or turn back. This, in essence, is the effectiveness ratio; an
informed assessment governed by our best efforts of integrating
technology along with our agent judgment and experience not
predicated on certitude.
Fifth, and final, post-apprehension analysis. For instance,
how many individuals do we arrest with criminal records and
what does the trend line suggest? How many individuals have
outstanding arrest warrants? Were they previously removed from
the United States, and if so, under what circumstances? Were
they arrested while smuggling illegal contraband?
These are just a few examples of outcome measures that I
would offer this committee. To balance our judgments regarding
the state of border security, outside entities at that track
similar measures may be used.
For instance, the FBI's uniform crime reports, established
to meet the needs for reliable, uniform crime statistics for
the Nation, perhaps may be useful. Today, data from these
reports and the analysis are provided by nearly 17,000 law
enforcement agencies across United States.
In conclusion, I want to thank the committee for leading
this important effort to get the outcome measures right. I look
forward to questions. Thank you.
[The joint prepared statement of Chief Fisher, Mr.
McAleenan, and Mr. Borkowski follows:]
Joint Prepared Statement of Michael J. Fisher, Kevin McAleenan, and
Mark Borkowski
March 20, 2013
Chairwoman Miller, Ranking Member Jackson Lee, and distinguished
Members of the subcommittee, it is an honor to appear before you today
to discuss the role of U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) in
securing America's borders, a role that we share with our Federal,
State, local, Tribal, and international partners.
We are here today to discuss measurements of border security. Some
have suggested that it can be measured in terms of linear miles of
``operational control,'' a tactical term once used by the Border Patrol
to allocate resources among sectors and stations along the border. We
do not use this term as a measure of border security because the
reality is that the condition of the border cannot be described by a
single objective measure. It is not a measure of crime, because even
the safest communities in America have some crime. It is not merely a
measure of resources, because even the heaviest concentration of
fencing, all-weather roads, 24-hour lighting, surveillance systems, and
Border Patrol agents cannot seal the border completely.
For border communities, important barometers for success are
security and facilitation of travel and trade. A secure border means
living free from fear in their towns and cities. It means an
environment where businesses can conduct cross-border trade and
flourish. For other American communities, it means enjoying the
benefits of a well-managed border that facilitates the flow of
legitimate trade and travel. Our efforts, combined with those of our
international, Federal, State, local, and Tribal partners, have
transformed the border and assist in continuing to keep our citizens
safe, our country defendable from an attack, and promote economic
prosperity.
For CBP, securing our borders means first having the visibility to
see what is happening on our borders, and second, having the capacity
to respond to what we see. We get visibility through the use of border
surveillance technology, personnel, and air and marine assets. Our
ability to respond is also supported by a mix of resources including
personnel, tactical infrastructure, and air and marine assets.
unprecedented resources at our borders
Thanks to your support, the border is more secure than ever before.
Since its inception, DHS has dedicated historic levels of personnel,
technology, and infrastructure in support of our border security
efforts. Resource levels, when considered with other factors, remain
essential aspects in helping to assess the security of our borders.
Law Enforcement Personnel
Currently, the Border Patrol is staffed at a higher level than at
any time in its 88-year history. The number of Border Patrol agents
(BPAs) has doubled, from approximately 10,000 in 2004 to more than
21,000 agents today. Along the Southwest Border, DHS has increased the
number of law enforcement on the ground from approximately 9,100 BPAs
in 2001 to nearly 18,500 today. At our Northern Border, the force of
500 agents that we sustained 10 years ago has grown to more than 2,200.
Law enforcement capabilities at the ports of entry (POEs) have also
been reinforced. To support our evolving, more complex mission since
September 11, 2001, the number of CBP officers (CBPOs) ensuring the
secure flow of people and goods into the Nation has increased from
17,279 customs and immigration inspectors in 2003, to more than 21,000
CBPOs and 2,400 agriculture specialists today. These front-line
employees facilitated $2.3 trillion in trade in fiscal year 2012, and
welcomed a record 98 million air travelers, a 12 percent increase since
fiscal year 2009, further illustrating the critical role we play not
only with border security, but with economic security and continued
growth.
Infrastructure and Technology
In addition to increasing our workforce, DHS has also made
unprecedented investments in border security infrastructure and
technology. Technology is the primary driver of all land, maritime, and
air domain awareness--and this will become only more apparent as CBP
faces future threats. Technology assets such as integrated fixed
towers, mobile surveillance units, and thermal imaging systems act as
force multipliers increasing agent awareness, efficiency, and
capability to respond to potential threats. As we continue to deploy
border surveillance technology, particularly along the Southwest
Border, these investments allow CBP the flexibility to shift more BPAs
from detection duties to interdiction and resolution of illegal
activities on our borders.
At our POEs, CBP has aggressively deployed Non-Intrusive Inspection
(NII) and Radiation Portal Monitor (RPM) technology to identify
contraband and weapons of mass effect. Prior to September 11, 2001,
only 64 large-scale NII systems, and not a single RPM, were deployed to
our country's borders. Today CBP has 310 NII systems and 1,460 RPMs
deployed. The result of this investment in resources is the capacity
for CBP to scan 99 percent of all containerized cargo at seaports and
100 percent of passenger and cargo vehicles at land borders for
radiological and nuclear materials upon arrival in the United States.
The implementation of the Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative
(WHTI) involved a substantial technology investment in the land border
environment; this investment continues to provide both facilitation and
security benefits. For example, today, more than 19 million individuals
have obtained Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) technology-enabled
secure travel documents. These documents are more secure as they can be
verified electronically in real time back to the issuing authority, to
establish identity and citizenship; they also reduce the average
vehicle processing time by 20 percent.
An outcome of the increased use of RFID-enabled secure travel
documents is CBP's capability to increase the National law enforcement
query rate, including the terrorist watch list, to more than 98
percent. By comparison, in 2005, CBP performed law enforcement queries
in the land border environment for only 5 percent of travelers. In
terms of facilitation, CBP has also capitalized upon these notable
improvements to establish active lane management at land border ports;
this process is analogous to the management of toll booths on a
highway. Through active lane management, CBP can adjust lane
designations as traffic conditions warrant to better accommodate
trusted travelers and travelers with RFID-enabled documents.
CBP continues to optimize the initial investment in the land border
by leveraging new technologies and process improvements across all
environments. Since 2009, a variety of mobile, fixed, and tactical
hybrid license plate readers (LPR) solutions have been deployed to 40
major Southern Border outbound crossings and 19 Border Patrol
checkpoints. These capabilities have greatly enhanced CBP's corporate
ability to gather intelligence and target suspected violators by
linking drivers, passengers, and vehicles across the core mission areas
of in-bound, checkpoint, and out-bound. In the pedestrian environment,
automated gates coupled with self-directed traveler kiosks now provide
document information, query results, and biometric verification in
advance of a pedestrian's arrival to CBPOs.
CBP not only supports security efforts along the nearly 7,000 miles
of land borders, but also supplements efforts to secure the Nation's
95,000 miles of coastal shoreline. CBP has more than 268 aircraft,
including 10 Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS), and 293 patrol and
interdiction vessels that provide critical aerial and maritime
surveillance and operational assistance to personnel on the ground. Our
UAS capabilities now cover the Southwest Border all the way from
California to Texas, providing critical aerial surveillance assistance
to personnel on the ground. Our UAS flew more than 5,700 hours in 2012,
the most in the program's history. Over the last 8 years, CBP
transformed a border air wing composed largely of light observational
aircraft into a modern air and maritime fleet capable of a broad range
of detection, surveillance, and interdiction capabilities. This fleet
is extending CBP's detection and interdiction capabilities, extending
our border security zones, and offering greater opportunity to stop
threats prior to reaching the Nation's shores. Further synthesizing the
technology, CBP's Air and Marine Operations Center (AMOC) integrates
the surveillance capabilities of its Federal and international partners
to provide domain awareness for the approaches to American borders, at
the borders, and within the interior of the United States.
CBP is also looking to the future by working closely with the DHS
Science & Technology Directorate to identify and develop technology to
improve our surveillance and detection capabilities in our ports and
along our maritime and land borders. This includes investments in
tunnel detection tactical communication upgrades, and tunnel activity
monitoring technology, low-flying aircraft detection and tracking
systems, maritime data integration/data fusion capabilities at AMOC,
cargo supply chain security, and border surveillance tools tailored to
Southern and Northern Borders, including unattended ground sensors/
tripwires, upgrades for mobile Surveillance Systems, camera poles, and
wide-area surveillance.
indicators of success
This deployment of resources has, by every traditional measure, led
to unprecedented success. In fiscal year 2012, Border Patrol
apprehension activity remained at historic lows with apprehensions in
California, Arizona, and New Mexico continuing a downward trend. In
fiscal year 2012, the Border Patrol recorded 364,768 apprehensions
Nation-wide. In fiscal year 2012 apprehensions were 78 percent below
their peak in 2000, and down 50 percent from fiscal year 2008. An
increase in apprehensions was noted in south Texas, specifically of
individuals from Central American countries, including El Salvador,
Guatemala, and Honduras. However, significant border-wide investments
in additional enforcement resources and enhanced operational tactics
and strategy have enabled CBP to address the increased activity. Today,
there are more than 6,000 BPAs in South Texas, an increase of more than
80 percent since 2004.
At POEs in fiscal year 2012, CBPOs arrested nearly 7,900 people
wanted for serious crimes, including murder, rape, assault, and
robbery. CBPOs also stopped nearly 145,000 inadmissible aliens from
entering the United States through POEs. Outcomes resulting from the
efforts of the CBP National Targeting Center and Immigration Advisory
Program, include the prevention of 4,199 high-risk travelers, who would
have been found inadmissible from boarding flights destined for the
United States, an increase of 32 percent compared to fiscal year 2011.
We see increasing success in our seizures as well. From fiscal year
2009 to 2012, CBP seized 71 percent more currency, 39 percent more
drugs, and 189 percent more weapons along the Southwest Border as
compared to fiscal year 2006 to 2008. Nation-wide, CBP officers and
agents seized more than 4.2 million pounds of narcotics and more than
$100 million in unreported currency through targeted enforcement
operations. On the agricultural front, from fiscal year 2003 to fiscal
year 2012, CBP interceptions of reportable plant pests in the cargo
environment increased more than 48 percent to 48,559 in fiscal year
2012. In addition to protecting our Nation's ecosystems and associated
native plants and animals, these efforts are important to protecting
our Nation's economy as scientists estimate that the economic impacts
from invasive species exceed $1 billion annually in the United States.
Another indicator of the success of our combined law enforcement
efforts is reduced crime rates along the Southwest Border. According to
2010 FBI crime reports, violent crimes in Southwest Border States have
dropped by an average of 40 percent in the last 2 decades. More
specifically, all crime in the 7 counties that comprise the South Texas
area is down 10 percent from 2009 to 2011. Between 2000 and 2011, four
cities along the Southwest Border--San Diego, McAllen, El Paso, and
Tucson--experienced population growth, while also seeing significant
decreases in violent crime.
These border communities have also seen a dramatic boost to their
economies in recent years. In fiscal year 2012, more than $176 billion
in goods entered through the Laredo and El Paso, Texas POEs as compared
to $160 billion in fiscal year 2011. Additionally, the import value of
goods entering the United States through Texas land ports has increased
by 55 percent between fiscal year 2009 and fiscal year 2012. In Laredo
alone, imported goods increased in value by 68 percent. Arizona is also
a significant source for the flow of trade. In both fiscal year 2011
and fiscal year 2012, $20 billion entered through Arizona POEs.
Communities along the Southwest Border are among the most desirable
places to live in the Nation. Forbes ranked Tucson the No. 1 city in
its April 2012 ``Best Cities to Buy a Home Right Now'' and in February,
2012, the Tucson Association of Realtors reported that the total number
of home sales was up 16 percent from the same month the previous year.
Tucson also joins Las Cruces, New Mexico on Forbes' list of ``25 Best
Places to Retire.'' These Southwest Border communities are also safe.
In fact, Business Insider published a list of the top 25 most dangerous
cities in America, and again, none of them is located along the
Southwest Border. In fact, El Paso was named the second safest city in
America in 2009 and the safest in 2010 and 2011. This is in dramatic
contrast to Ciudad Juarez, just across the border, which is often
considered one of the most dangerous cities in the Western Hemisphere.
The successes of a secure border are also reflected in key National
economic measures. In 2011, secure international travel resulted in
overseas travelers spending $153 billion in the United States--an
average of $4,300 each--resulting in a $43 billion travel and tourism
trade surplus. In addition, a more secure global supply chain resulted
in import values growing by 5 percent and reaching $2.3 trillion in
fiscal year 2012 and is expected to exceed previous records in the air,
land, and sea environments this year. CBP collects tens of billions of
dollars in duties, providing a significant source of revenue for our
Nation's treasury. These efforts compliment the strategies implemented
by the President's National Export Initiative (NEI) which resulted in
the resurgence of American manufacturers, who have added nearly 500,000
jobs since January 2010, the strongest period of job growth since 1989.
Additionally, other efforts to boost trade and exports are producing
results. In 2011, United States exports have reached record levels,
totaling more than $2.1 trillion, 33.5 percent above the level of
exports in 2009. United States exports supported nearly 9.7 million
American jobs in 2011, a 1.2 million increase in the jobs supported by
exports since 2009. Further, over the first 2 years of the NEI, the
Department of Commerce had recruited more than 25,000 foreign buyers to
United States trade shows, resulting in about 1.7 billion in export
sales. The administration's National Travel and Tourism Strategy calls
for 100 million international visitors a year by the end of 2021,
bringing more than $250 billion in estimated spending.
protecting america from afar: secure borders expanded
Although enforcement statistics and economic indicators point to
increased security and an improved quality of life, many of these
outcomes are a result of CBP's intelligence-based framework to direct
its considerable resources toward a dynamic and evolving threat. CBP
gathers and analyzes this intelligence and data to inform operational
planning and effective execution.
CBP's programs and initiatives reflect DHS's ever-increasing effort
to extend its security efforts outward. This ensures that our POEs are
not the last line of defense, but one of many.
Securing Travel
On a typical day, CBP welcomes nearly a million travelers at our
air, land, and sea POEs. The volume of international air travelers
increased by 12 percent from 2009 to 2012 and is projected to increase
4 to 5 percent each year for the next 5 years. CBP continues to address
the security elements of its mission while meeting the challenge of
increasing volumes of travel in air, land, and sea environments, by
assessing the risk of passengers from the earliest, and furthest,
possible point, and at each point in the travel continuum.
As a result of advance travel information, CBP has the opportunity
to assess passenger risk long before a traveler arrives at a POE.
Before an individual travels to the United States, CBP has the
opportunity to assess their risk via the Electronic System for Travel
Authorization for those traveling under the Visa Waiver Program, or as
part of the inter-agency collaborative effort to adjudicate and
continuously vet visas, which are issued by the Department of State.
CBP has additional opportunities to assess a traveler's risk when they
purchase their ticket and/or make a reservation, and when they check-
in.
Before an international flight departs for the United States from
the foreign point of origin, commercial airlines transmit passenger and
crew manifest information to CBP. CBP's National Targeting Center then
reviews traveler information to identify travelers who would be
determined inadmissible upon arrival. As part of its Pre-Departure and
Immigration Advisory/Joint Security Programs, CBP coordinates with the
carriers to prevent such travelers from boarding flights bound for the
United States. From fiscal year 2010 through fiscal year 2012 CBP
prevented 8,984 high-risk travelers from boarding as a result of these
programs.
Additionally, CBP's work on business innovations and enhanced
partnerships with private industry helped lead to the expansion of
Trusted Traveler Programs like Global Entry. More than 1.7 million
people, including more than 414,000 new members this fiscal year, have
enrolled in Trusted Traveler Programs, which allow expedited clearance
for pre-approved, low-risk air travelers upon arrival in the United
States. When comparing 2011 and 2012, CBP processed 500,000 more
passengers using Global Entry and there were 689,000 more kiosk uses in
2012.
These efforts not only allow CBP to mitigate risk before a
potential threat arrives at a POE, but they also make the travel
process more efficient and economical by creating savings for the
Federal Government and the private sector by preventing inadmissible
travelers from traveling to the United States.
Securing Trade and the Supply Chain
In fiscal year 2012, CBP processed 25.3 million cargo containers
through the Nation's POEs, an increase of 4 percent from 2011, with a
trade value of $2.3 trillion. The United States is the world's largest
importer and exporter of goods and services. To address increasing
travel volumes, CBP assesses the risk of cargo bound for the United
States, whether by air, land, or sea, at the earliest point of transit.
Receiving advanced shipment information allows CBP to assess the
risk of cargo before it reaches a POE. Since 2009, the Importer
Security Filing (ISF) and the Additional Carrier Requirements
regulation have required importers to supply CBP with an
electronically-filed ISF consisting of advance data elements 24 hours
prior to lading for cargo shipments that will be arriving into the
United States by vessel. These regulations increase CBP's ability to
assess the scope and accuracy of information gathered on goods,
conveyances, and entities involved in the shipment of cargo to the
United States via vessel.
Since 2010, CBP has implemented the Air Cargo Advance Screening
(ACAS) pilot, which enables CBP and the Transportation Security
Administration (TSA) to receive advance security filing cargo data and
help identify cargo shipments inbound to the United States via the air
environment that may be high-risk and require additional physical
screening. Identifying high-risk shipments as early as possible in the
air cargo supply chain provides CBP and TSA an opportunity to conduct a
comprehensive review of cargo data while facilitating the movement of
legitimate trade into the United States. Benefits to ACAS pilot
participants include: Efficiencies by automating the identification of
high-risk cargo for enhanced screening before it is consolidated and
loaded on aircraft and reduction in paper processes related to cargo
screening requirements which may increase carrier efficiency.
CBP also has a presence at foreign ports to add another layer of
security to cargo bound for the United States. The Container Security
Initiative (CSI) launched in 2002 by the former U.S. Customs, places
CBPOs on the ground at foreign ports to perform pre-screening of
containers before they placed on a United States-bound vessel. The CSI
program has matured since its inception in 2002, through increased
partnership with host country counterparts and advances in targeting
and technology, allowing CBP to decrease the number of CBPOs on the
ground at CSI ports, while maintaining security outcomes. CBP still
screens more than 80 percent of cargo destined for the United States
prior to lading on a vessel.
Securing the Source and Transit Zones
The effort to push out America's borders is also reflected by CBP's
efforts to interdict narcotics and other contraband long before it
reaches the United States. Since 1988, CBP Office of Air and Marine
(OAM) and the former U.S. Customs Service, has provided Detection and
Monitoring capabilities for the Source and Transit Zone mission. The
CBP OAM P-3 Orion Long Range Tracker (LRT) and the Airborne Early
Warning (AEW) aircraft have provided air and maritime surveillance,
detecting suspect smugglers that use a variety of conveyances.
Transnational Criminal Organizations (TCOs) smuggle various contraband
towards the United States Borders and Arrival Zones. The CBP P-3
aircraft have been instrumental in reducing the flow of contraband from
reaching the Arrival Zones, by detecting the suspect aircraft and
vessels while still thousands of miles away from America's border. In
fiscal year 2012, P-3 crews were involved in the seizure of 117,103
pounds of cocaine and 12,824 pounds of marijuana. In the first quarter
of 2013, P-3 crews have been involved in the seizure of 33,690 pounds
of cocaine and 88 pounds of marijuana. Providing direction to
interdiction assets and personnel to intercept suspects long before
reaching the United States, the CBP P-3 aircraft and crew provide an
added layer of security, by stopping criminal activity before reaching
our shores.
evaluating the state of the border
DHS uses a number of indicators and outcomes to evaluate security
efforts at our borders, including factors described above such as
resource deployment, crime rates in border communities, and
apprehensions. However, while enforcement statistics and economic
indicators point to increased security and an improved quality of life,
no single metric can conclusively define the state of border security.
Any individual metric can only capture one element of border security
and none captures the true state of security along our borders. Rather
than focus on any particular metric, our focus is on the enhancement of
our capabilities, ensuring that we have tools that will lead to a high
probability of interdiction in high-activity areas along our Southwest
Border.
conclusion
Over the past 4 years, this administration has undertaken an
unprecedented effort to secure our border and transform our Nation's
immigration enforcement systems into one that focuses on public safety,
National security, and on the integrity of the immigration system. DHS
has deployed historic levels of personnel, technology, and
infrastructure to the Southwest Border to reduce the flow of illicit
drugs, cash, and weapons and to expedite legal trade and travel through
trusted traveler and trader initiatives.
CBP has made significant progress in securing the border with the
support of Congress through a multi-layered approach using a variety of
tools at our disposal. CBP will continue to work with DHS and our
Federal, State, local, Tribal, and international partners, to
strengthen border security and infrastructure. We must remain vigilant
and focus on building our approach to position CBP's greatest
capabilities in place to combat the greatest risks that exist today, to
be prepared for emerging threats, and to continue to build a
sophisticated approach tailored to meet the challenges of securing a
21st Century border. At the same time, the Secretary has made it clear
that Congress can help by passing a common-sense immigration reform
bill that will allow CBP to focus its resources on the most serious
criminal actors threatening our borders.
Chairwoman Miller, Ranking Member Jackson Lee, and distinguished
Members of the subcommittee, thank you for this opportunity to testify
about the work of CBP and our efforts in securing our borders. We look
forward to answering your questions.
Mrs. Miller. Thanks very much, Chief.
The Chairwoman now recognizes Mr. McAleenan for his
testimony, and again, welcome back to the committee.
STATEMENT OF KEVIN MC ALEENAN, ACTING ASSISTANT COMMISSIONER,
OFFICE OF CUSTOMS AND FIELD OPERATIONS, U.S. CUSTOMS AND BORDER
PROTECTION, DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY
Mr. McAleenan. Good to be back. Good morning, Madam
Chairwoman, Ranking Member Jackson Lee, distinguished Members
of the subcommittee. I appreciate this committee's continued
leadership on these issues and look forward to our discussion
this morning.
CBP remains committed to increasing the effectiveness of
our operations and programs and we welcome this discussion.
We define a secure border at our Nation's port of entry as
a well-managed border where mission risks are effectively
identified and addressed while legitimate trade and travel are
expedited.
Every day we carry out our mission to protect the people
and the economy of the United States by preventing dangerous
people and goods from entering the country while expediting
legitimate trade and travel that is a lifeblood of our economy.
Traffic at our 330 ports of entry is diverse and varied. It
differs by environment--air, land, and sea; type of traffic,
whether traveler, conveyance, or cargo; and mode of
transportation--commercial or general aviation, personally-
owned vehicle, truck, rail, and containerized package or bulk
cargo. All of these present different challenges and different
threat profiles and different processing time expectations.
As a result, as you noted, Madam Chairwoman, we don't have
a single number or target level by which CBP's Office of Field
Operations can measure the full scope of our security or
facilitation efforts, but there are a number of important
indicators that we do use to address and refine our operations.
These metrics are both qualitative and quantitative. They
include effectiveness and efficiency, and are assessed at the
National, regional, port, and programmatic levels.
We use these key indicators to assess our performance and
evaluate trends and developments over time. I think we can come
to a mission and environment-specific understanding of what
those measures are and the best way to capture and discuss
them.
We start with the volume of travelers and goods. That is
the backdrop against which we measure our performance. Last
year, CBP welcomed 350 million passengers and travelers and
processed over 25 million cargo containers and over 100 million
air cargo shipments with a trade value of $2.3 trillion.
We continue to see increases in all of our environments at
both traveler and trade and anticipate continued growth.
It is important to note that the vast majority of this
traffic, an estimated 99.5 percent of land passengers and 90.6
percent of air travelers, is in compliance with all laws and
regulations.
Our goal is to identify and interdict those few travelers
and shipments that may present a risk, while facilitating the
vast majority. This presents a complex, multifaceted risk-
sorting problem that we work very hard to address every day. We
are working to find and stop those proverbial needles in the
haystacks while the haystacks are actually in motion.
Using a number of increasingly-refined tools and
techniques, we are improving our ability to do this and
focusing our finite resources on those people and goods that
present the highest potential risk.
In addition to refining our risk-based and layered approach
to security, we have worked to extend our borders outward to
interject threats before they reach the United States at the
earliest possible point in the supply chain in the travel
cycle.
DHS, in cooperation with our interagency and foreign
partners, now screens people and goods earlier in the process
before boarding passengers or loading cargo onto planes or
vessels destined for the United States.
Since 2009, CBP has expanded its pre-departure screening
efforts and now checks all air travelers against Government
databases on all flights arriving to or departing from the
United States prior to boarding.
In addition, all in-bound maritime cargo manifests are
screened before they are laden vessels with almost 85 percent
of high-risk shipments being examined or addressed before
arrival at a U.S. seaport.
We are tracking improvements in our capabilities, resulting
in enforcement benefits across each of our other critical
missions, as well, from our enhanced capacity to identifying
and interdicting inadmissible persons to our ability to detect
and interdict smaller and better-concealed contraband to our
trade enforcement and agriculture protection efforts.
I would welcome the opportunity to discuss any of these
mission areas in greater detail.
In addition to improving our ability to identify and
mitigate potentially high-risk trade and travel, CBP remains
focused on identifying ways to facilitate the growing volume of
people and goods entering the United States.
We have seen marked facilitation improvements to the
development of a series of transformative initiatives that
increases speed of our processing including the expansion of
trusted traveler and trader programs, the elimination of paper
forms, and the increased use of technology in our process.
We will continue to aggressively pursue these strategies
which will both increase security and streamline the process
for people and goods crossing the border.
The state of border security continues to improve at our
ports of entry. We have made tremendous progress and are well-
postured against terrorist threats having pushed our security
measures beyond our immediate borders.
We have focused our agricultural protection efforts against
the highest-risk, pest, and diseases and are maintaining
historic levels of interceptions of products and pests, and we
are pursuing a robust strategy to optimize our current business
processes.
In short, we have maintained and increased our mission
effectiveness while facing increasing demands from growing
passenger and trade volume and we continue to seek ways to
improve.
Chairman Miller, Ranking Member Jackson Lee, and Members of
the subcommittee, thank you for this opportunity to testify. I
look forward to taking your questions.
Mrs. Miller. Thank the gentleman.
The Chairwoman now recognizes Mr. Borkowski for his
testimony and welcomes him back to the committee as well.
STATEMENT OF MARK BORKOWSKI, ASSISTANT COMMISSIONER, OFFICE OF
TECHNOLOGY INNOVATION AND ACQUISITION, U.S. CUSTOMS AND BORDER
PROTECTION, DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY
Mr. Borkowski. Thank you, Chairwoman Miller, Ranking Member
Jackson Lee, and distinguished Members of the committee. It is
a pleasure to be here and talk about this what is frankly an
extremely challenging topic.
I think it is important because we have talked a little bit
about how the Border Patrol measures, what the Border Patrol
does, and that is important, and we need to continue to do
that.
Assistant Commissioner McAleenan just talked a great deal
about how he knows whether he is doing well or poorly and it is
important that we do that, but in some of the discussions and
even here, we have asked--but holistically, how are we doing?
So to start, I think we need to kind of reframe that. As I
deal with this question, and I have done a lot of research on
it as you might imagine, I have to constantly remind myself
that this is a bigger problem than even just CBP.
This is a holistic question of what the state of the border
is and CBP is a part of that, is a part of the contribution,
but is not the entire contribution.
I know we have all heard the Secretary for example
emphasize the importance of internal enforcement. So you are
the panel here from Customs and Border Protection, which is
very much focused on the at-the-border contribution to border
security. You just heard about the Border Patrol domain and you
have heard about the Office of Field Operations domain, but
what about--how do you put all that together?
I think, Chairwoman Miller, it goes to something you said
in your statement about how do we simplify this.
Because frankly we are very comfortable with the kinds of
measures that our experts are proposing, but it is very
difficult to use those in this kind of a forum to discuss the
state of border security.
That is actually what has gotten us to some of the
opportunities, the options, the things that we have been
investigating as perhaps ways of depicting that story in a
simpler form, and that is what the BCI is intended to do.
So let me briefly describe the BCI. You probably remember
that we have gone through several iterations of ways of
attempting to explain the state of the border and one of the
more recent ones was apprehensions; the decline in
apprehensions.
We often said and continue to say that the decline in
apprehensions is a good indicator that the border is more
secure. Now when we said that, frankly we said that because as
you might have gathered from some of the things that the chief
said, we look at a lot more than that.
We look at a great deal of data that helps us validate what
those apprehensions mean, but for the simplicity of
presentation to the public, we used the apprehensions as a
surrogate for all of that information. The Secretary asked us
about that at one point because she got criticized, frankly,
for using apprehensions; what about the things that you don't
know?
Well actually, there is a lot more we know but it was that
dilemma of being simple in explanation that was the problem. So
we went back to the Secretary and described the kinds of things
that you just heard from AC McAleenan and from Chief Fisher,
and the Secretary said that is great and I get that, but is
there any way that you can consolidate that into something a
little simpler? Something that stands for all of that without
necessarily being all of that; and that is what the concept of
the Border Condition Index is.
So we have been going and researching datum looking at what
is available, looking--is there some set of--some subset of
this that is an indicator, that is indicative of what all of
the data says?
Although I think there is a perception that we have not
worked with the operators, in fact, we have. We started with
the operators. We have reiterated with the operators, but
partly that reconciliation between what Chief Fisher is doing
in his kind of tactical operational level and at the big
picture message, that takes time. That is one of the
challenges. We had to do that very carefully and very
deliberately.
So that is what the BCI is intended to do. I would be happy
to talk about where we are in that. We have looked at a number
of options, but I would also caution you that it is an
indicator. It is not a perfect number, but it has attempted to
depict what all of this other stuff when you look at it
holistically tells us, and so the question is: What should be
in there? What does that mean it to be holistic? That is what
we are dealing with the BCI.
The only other thing I think I would like to highlight
briefly because I think, Chairwoman Miller, you raised it, and
I just want to make this point. We agree that it is not
appropriate to measure inputs standing alone as measures of
border security. What is an input?
Number of Border Patrol agents, amount of technology, miles
of fence, those are resources we apply to a problem, and we
agree it is not correct to say we have just spent a lot of
money and therefore, we are better. We need to link that to
outcomes, but one of the challenges is that when you design
plans, you design them with an expectation of an outcome.
So what I want to assure you of is that when we talk about
plans for technology or for personnel, we have done that,
advised by, for example, in the case of the Border Patrol, the
Border Patrol's expectation of what that will produce in terms
of an outcome.
So when we measure our progress against for example amount
of technology procured, it is important to measure that, but I
want to assure you that we measure that in the context of the
reason we are doing it is because it is designed to produce an
outcome that the Border Patrol has requested.
So that is kind of our overall thinking. That is what the
BCI is designed to do and I wouldn't throw away measures of
inputs, but I would always remember that those measures--those
inputs were designed to produce an outcome.
I look forward to the committee's questions.
Mrs. Miller. Thank you very much.
The Chairwoman now recognizes Judge Escobar for her
testimony.
STATEMENT OF VERONICA ESCOBAR, EL PASO COUNTY JUDGE, EL PASO,
TEXAS
Judge Escobar. Thank you very much, Chairwoman Miller and
Ranking Member Jackson Lee. I appreciate the opportunity to be
here with all of you this morning.
I am Veronica Escobar, the county judge for El Paso, Texas.
As one of your colleagues and my own Member of Congress has
undoubtedly informed you many times, El Paso is the safest city
of its size in the Nation.
In fact, for the last 3 years in a row, that has been our
ranking and for at least a decade preceding that, we have been
among the top three safest cities of the Nation, and that
predated the walls, the drones, and the quadrupling of Border
Patrol agents.
We are dealing today with this question of how to measure
security because border security was mandated to be achieved
before immigration reform would be enacted.
We were told by our policymakers that our pursuit would be
enforcement first, but it quickly became enforcement only to
the detriment of any thoughtful policy considerations or
reform.
Those of us who have been engaged in this issue have long
said that immigration reform should come first, that
approaching enforcement first or only is a backward way to deal
with the flow of people and goods across our borders.
In 2007, when the Federal Government erected the wall that
scars my community, I took a tour of it with Border Patrol
agents who told me that 85 percent of their apprehensions at
the border were of non-criminal offenders.
That meant only 15 percent or fewer of the apprehensions
made were for criminal aliens. It is important to note that the
definition of criminal aliens is broad and includes people who
do not necessarily represent a security threat to the United
States.
The more important fact is that the 85 percent and even
some of the 15 percent of undocumented crossers are risking
jail time and even their lives to be in this country to find
work, perhaps establish a safer and better life, or reunite
with their families.
In 2008, Border Patrol Chief David Aguilar wrote that, ``90
percent of the illegal aliens we arrest are drawn to this
country for socioeconomic reasons,'' but our Nation has spent
enormous resources trying to secure our borders from these
migrants.
Had we dealt with those crossers at the policy level,
creating for example legal guest-worker programs for migrant
farm workers or more humane family reunification programs,
which are especially relevant for border communities like mine,
then fewer resources would have been needed for security, which
costs taxpayers $18 billion in fiscal year 2012 alone, and more
importantly, those resources could have been aimed at targeting
true threats, the threats described by those seated at this
table.
With this in mind, how do we as a Nation put together
metrics that will define success and security? How do we apply
that to a border where the geography, environments, and
populations are so different as the Ranking Member pointed out
in her opening statements?
Furthermore, if we are to look at what security is, we
should also identify what we know it should not be. It should
not be long, idling wait times at our ports of entry, and it
should not be unnecessary, expensive, ugly fencing that can
easily be defeated with tunnels and ladders.
Since we are talking about metrics today, one of the
metrics El Paso and other communities have asked about for
years now has been staffing statistics at each of our ports of
entry. It is very difficult to fully understand how to address
the lack of personnel at the ports when the statistics about
the specific number of CBP personnel at each port isn't
available to local leaders or even the Members of Congress who
represent us in the District of Columbia.
This secrecy will be problematic if and when communities
like El Paso are allowed to begin reimbursable fee, public/
private partnerships such as those described in S. 178 and its
companion bill, H.R. 1108, the Cross-Border Trade Enhancement
Act of 2013.
I know there are co-sponsors on this committee and even the
Chairman of the committee. I define security by our ability to
protect our vital interests; our port--excuse me--our people,
our economy, and our infrastructure among them.
Security for example should be measured by how quickly we
can move people and goods safely across our ports. Is
international trade that boosts our economy a vital interest of
the United States and therefore an important measure of our
security?
Absolutely. In another vein, security also should be
measured by the transparency that helps us address shortages in
personnel and inadequacies in technology and infrastructure.
Finally, it should be measured by those of us who live in
the communities that bear the brunt of the measures enacted by
Congress and should be based on close collaboration with local
leaders and law enforcement.
I submit to you that once we deal with immigration reform
first, finally, and thoughtfully, a more meaningful and less
complex debate over security and outcomes can easily be
resolved.
Thank you very much for this opportunity. I look forward to
the questions.
[The prepared statement of Judge Escobar follows:]
Prepared Statement of Veronica Escobar
March 20, 2013
Good morning, my name is Veronica Escobar and I am the county judge
of El Paso, Texas. I thank you for the opportunity to be here with you
today to discuss ``Measuring Outcomes to Understand the State of Border
Security.''
As one of your colleagues (and my Congressman from Texas's 16th
Congressional District), Representative Beto O'Rourke has said many
times, El Paso, a border community, is among the safest in the Nation.
In fact, the last 3 years in a row, we've been ranked the safest city
of our size, and have consistently ranked among the top three safest
cities for over a decade. This achievement, just like the safety
enjoyed by other communities along the U.S.-Mexico border, predated the
walls, drones, and quadrupling of Border Patrol personnel. So I
appreciate that I can share with you a local perspective about security
on the border.
We're dealing with this question of how to measure security because
border security was mandated to be achieved before immigration reform
would be enacted. We were told by our policy-makers that our pursuit
would be ``enforcement first,'' but it quickly became ``enforcement
only,'' to the detriment of any thoughtful policy considerations or
reform.
Those of us who have been engaged in this issue have long said that
immigration reform should come first--that approaching enforcement
first (or only) is a backward way to deal with the flow of people and
goods across our borders.
In 2007 when the Federal Government erected the wall that scars my
community, I took a tour of it with Border Patrol agents, who told me
that 85% of apprehensions at the border were of non-criminal offenders.
That meant only 15% or fewer of the apprehensions made were for
``criminal aliens.'' It's important to note that the definition of
``criminal aliens,'' is broad and includes people who do not
necessarily represent a security threat to the United States. The more
important fact is that 85% (and even some of the 15%) of undocumented
crossers are risking jail time and even their lives to be in this
country to find work, perhaps establish a safer and better life, or
reunite with their families. In 2008, Border Patrol Chief David Aguilar
wrote that ``90 percent of the illegal aliens we arrest are drawn to
this country for socio-economic reasons.''\1\
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\1\ Aguilar, David V. Frontline U.S. Customs and Border Protection
Magazine. ``Protecting the Southern Border,'' Spring 2008, p. 10.
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But our Nation has spent enormous resources trying to ``secure''
our borders from these migrants. Had we dealt with those crossers at
the policy level--creating, for example, legal guest worker programs
for migrant farm workers or more humane family reunification programs
(especially relevant for border communities like mine), then fewer
resources would have been needed for security, which cost taxpayers $18
billion in fiscal year 2012 alone. In El Paso, for example, if it were
easier for Mexicans to go back and forth, fewer would try to live here
permanently--with stricter controls, crossers have an incentive to try
to live here rather than risk re-crossing the border.
With this in mind, how do we as a Nation put together metrics that
will define success and security? How do we apply that to a border
where the geography, environments, and populations are so different?
While our Southern Border cities have commonalities among them,
clearly we are not all alike. El Paso is an urban community, a vibrant
county of over 800,000 people with five international ports of entry in
our sector that move people and goods back and forth. We are across
from the massive, sprawling metropolis of Ciudad Juarez. Obviously, we
are unlike rural border towns that are situated across from rural
Mexican communities. But, we all share a common theme: The vast
majority of the people coming across our border want to be a part of
us, not harm us.
And before evaluating metrics for success, how do we even define
``security''? That is a definition that depends on whom you ask. Some
think that security means not allowing a single human being to enter
our country without permission--an impossible standard. Absolute
security can never be achieved. And even if it could, absolute security
is incompatible with a free society. Security may mean something
different to local law enforcement, or to those in the intelligence
community, or to those who are part of a neighborhood watch program.
History has shown us that the Southern Border does not present a
security threat.
If what this country is trying to achieve is having more control
over who comes back and forth across our borders and knowing who those
people are and what they're bringing in, I will repeat that we've
approached the situation in a completely backward way.
It's not too late to revisit that approach even though the question
before everyone now is how to measure border security. The key is to
reform immigration first and then deal with those who are truly a
threat to U.S. National security. We need to stop using precious
resources on those whose purpose in coming to the United States
presents no threat and who can be dealt with through policy changes.
Furthermore, if we are to look at what security is, we should also
identify what we know it should not be: It should not be long idling
wait times at our ports of entry and it should not be unnecessary,
expensive, ugly fencing that can be easily defeated with tunnels and
ladders.
Those border wait times are expected to worsen if we do nothing. I
recently toured some of the maquiladoras in Ciudad Juarez, which
produce the cell phones we use as well as a number of different
products that this Nation's economy and people depend on. Each
maquiladora is expanding and their exports are growing. That means more
commerce moving across El Paso's ports (last year it was worth $80
billion). These job- and economy-growing companies all shared a common
concern and complaint: Long border wait times.
Since we're talking about metrics today, one of the metrics El Paso
and other communities have asked about for years now has been staffing
statistics at each of our ports. It's very difficult to fully
understand how to address the lack of personnel at the ports when the
statistics about the specific number of CBP personnel at each port
isn't available to local leaders or even the Members of Congress who
represent us in the District of Columbia. I understand the need to
secure certain data from the human- and drug-smuggling organizations
that CBP and ICE contend with on a daily basis. However, keeping these
statistics secret from policy makers such as Members of Congress is
excessive and counter-productive.
This secrecy will be problematic if and when communities like El
Paso are allowed to begin reimbursable fee public-private partnerships
such as those described in S. 178 and its companion bill in the house,
H.R. 1108, the Cross-Border Trade Enhancement Act of 2013. The Chairman
of this committee is even a co-sponsor of this legislation. If we as
local partners are encouraged to supplement personnel at our ports but
we aren't allowed to know what current staffing levels are, how will we
know what the supplement should be? These are the types of metrics we
should be focused on.
I define security by our ability to protect our vital interests:
Our people, our economy, and our infrastructure among them. Security,
for example, should be measured by how quickly we can move people
safely across our ports. Is international trade that boosts our
economy, a vital interest of the United States and, therefore an
important measure of our security? Absolutely. In another vein,
security also should be measured by the transparency that helps us
address shortages in personnel and inadequacies in technology and
infrastructure. And finally, it should be measured by those of us who
live in the communities that bear the brunt of the measures enacted by
Congress, and should be based on close collaboration with local leaders
and law enforcement.
I submit to you that once we deal with immigration reform--first,
finally, and thoughtfully--a more meaningful and less complex debate
over security can easily be resolved.
Mrs. Miller. Thank you very much, Judge.
Again, I appreciate all the panel being here.
This hearing really in my mind has been called at a very
critical juncture in the National debate about comprehensive
immigration reform or however we want to categorize it.
I think we have an opportunity as a country to actually get
something done on this very important issue this year perhaps.
You look at the--in the Senate with the ``Gang of Eight''
whatever they are calling themselves. I had an opportunity to
chat a bit with one of the members of that committee, that
group--it is not a committee, but a working group, earlier this
week and felt very optimistic that they were moving along and
we would be seeing some sort of a work product shortly.
I think that has been pretty widely reported as well and
here in the House, we have a similar group, bipartisan, just as
it is in the Senate, working on these critical issues.
But, a component of that and something that is going to be
asked by every member of the House or the Senate that may be
voting on any bill eventually, that comes to the Senate or the
House, will be the same question that the American people are
going to ask; and that is whether or not we have a high degree
of comfort or confidence in whether or not our borders are
secured, so that we, as I say, do not continue to have this
same conversation over and over without some way to measure
that. One of you said--the Secretary asked you to come up with
that this formula because it wasn't--to put it in simple terms
that the American people could understand.
I think we are all asking the same question that Secretary
Napolitano asked of all of her staff; how we can put it in
terms that we can understand it and feel good about it, whether
it is--whether the results are good or bad, at least that we
understand what is happening.
The first thing we don't want to do is mislead ourselves
about what is going on at the border, whether it is secure or
not secure. You may have one, you know, one person that has a
very different opinion of--than another of what border security
looks like and whether or not the border is secure.
I would also say this. We--you know, one of the things that
I think we certainly learned from the 9/11 Commission
recommendations that I look at all the time and I have it in my
prism as I ask questions or certainly my service on this
committee is, we had to go from the need-to-know information to
the need-to-share information; and that had to cross all
ground-floor stakeholders that we share information with--
various agencies certainly within the Department of Homeland
Security, that we share with our local law enforcement, you
know, force multipliers throughout the entire chain, et cetera.
This BCI asking for this 2 years ago and we still don't
have it, and, you know, as the Secretary has said, operational
control is an antiquated term, not to be used.
So we are sort of sitting here as a Congress asking the
Department as you are developing this BCI, are you know, let's
not make the same mistakes for instance that were made, many
people have said by SBInet and when we developed that--by not
really getting good input and asking the people in the field
whether or not--you know, what they thought to help them
develop this.
So I know, Mr. Borkowski, you said that you have had good
conversations. I am not sure that--I guess I am not sure that
that is exactly so, that you have had as much conversation as
you have need to or input or suggestions from the people in the
field about that. So I would just say that I guess I would like
to flush that out a bit. Do you think you are asking for
instance, the Chief and Mr. McAleenan and others, the kinds of
questions that you need to, and at what point will you be able
to give us something that we can use as a measure?
Mr. Borkowski. First of all, I don't believe that we
intend, at least at this point, that the BCI would be a tool
for the measurement that you are suggesting. So let's--I need
to start there.
The BCI is part of a set of information that advises us on
where we are and most importantly, what the trends are and that
is what it is designed for.
So it is not our intent, at least not immediately, that it
would be the measure you are talking about. We do think it
would be a very useful tool to show why we believe that the
trend is one way or another and to show the components of that
trend. So that is the first thing.
In terms of interaction with the operators, we have
actually had extensive interaction. Now I would agree with your
statement that we need more and that is part of the issue. That
has to go back and forth until it converges, but in the initial
considerations of what might be included, we have asked the
operators what they had.
So some of the things that AC McAleenan described to you,
some of the things that Chief Fisher described to you, those
are candidate elements underneath of the build-up of the BCI.
After we had some notional constructs--oh, by the way, in
addition to that, we went out to the communities mostly in
Arizona, but to NGOs, law enforcement, ranchers, academics;
asked them what was important to them.
So there was a lot of homework done in what should we
include, not just our own operators, but other stakeholders.
After we had some notional constructs, we fed those back to
this operational community and by the way, to a panel of
academic experts who commented on it and made some suggestions
for changes.
We, as recently as last week, got together with the staffs
in both Chief Fisher and AC McAleenan's office to go through
this again because again, what they are concerned about is the
kinds of things that Chief Fisher described to you are the
kinds of things he is going to continue to use.
What he needs to be comfortable with is whether or not
those things in total reconcile with the kinds of things that
are coming out of the BCI, and we continue to do that. So----
Mrs. Miller. So you met with them last week, you
mentioned--of course you knew that this hearing had been
noticed by then--I am just asking. So you have been meeting
with them on a very regular basis?
Mr. Borkowski. Absolutely.
Mrs. Miller. To get all of their input? Et cetera, et
cetera?
Mr. Borkowski. Absolutely. Now, I would----
Mrs. Miller. You know, I would----
Mr. Borkowski. Sorry.
Mrs. Miller. Excuse me--I am--I don't have that much time.
But the--if we are not to use operational control, and again, I
even said in my opening statement, I am open to the suggestion
that that is an antiquated term and perhaps this is not the
best measurement, and I appreciate--believe me I do--how
complicated it is; a layered approach at the border, how very
complicated it is to get some sort of an accurate measurement,
but we have been told--at least I have been under the--
operating under the assumption for the last several years that
this BCI would be taking the place of operational control, that
it would be something that whether the GAO, et cetera anybody,
any other agency vetting this would be using as a measurement.
Now you are saying that it has never really been intended
to be used as a measurement. So I am just trying to let this
all digest here.
If that is so, I guess I would ask the chief if I could,
you mentioned certainly, you know, as far as the threats you
would want to talk about that in a classified setting. I
appreciate that, of course, but some of the outcomes certainly
can be in an unclassified setting like a hearing like this so
that we can explain to the American people what is going on.
You mentioned--I was taking some notes while you were
talking, Chief--the effectiveness ratio is essentially the
measurement that you are currently utilizing. Do you feel
comfortable that that is a--I guess I am just trying to
understand this--a component of the BCI or what is your thought
about the BCI? Do you agree that it shouldn't be used as a
measurement?
Chief Fisher. Initially, with Mark and as we were
discussing this, as we were developing our strategy and looking
at outcomes 3 years ago, we started understanding how valuable
effectiveness was as a replacement to stand-alone apprehensions
only as we have been maturing process; which gets us to some of
the things--we had offered that up to Mark on some of the
different measures that we were collecting under the--our new
strategic plan.
So in that regard, we have shared with Mark everything that
we collect, whether they are being incorporated or not or the
extent to which one or the other is, I don't know, but we are
still moving down in terms of how we within, as Mark framed,
our domain, right.
So we understand what is happening because it is not just
measures, it helps us at the tactical level deploy and redeploy
resources to those areas where we are now differentiating
between high- and low-risk areas. So it is very valuable to us
independent on whether it gets absorbed into a broader Border
Condition Index.
Mrs. Miller. I appreciate that.
I didn't want to cut you off, Mr. Borkowski, if you have
anything else to add to that.
The reason I am focusing on this obviously--look, we all
understand we are dealing with a constrained fiscal environment
here. At the same time we are asking you, can you tell us
exactly how you are doing?
It is a very difficult question to be asked and to answer
it correctly. I am not trying to gotcha, kind-of thing. But I
am telling you, at this moment in time, where we have an
opportunity to do comprehensive immigration reform, if we just
say well, we can't really--you know, we can't use operational
control and the BCI is not really a good thing and it is not
the correct--it is a component of the important scenario there
and you really don't have a matrix that we can utilize that
could be a component of our failure to pass something that I
think is very important for our country.
So there is a lot of interest and just trying to get a
handle on, you know, we look at some of the lessons learned,
certainly since 9/11 with various kinds of technology that we
have deployed along the border that has not worked particularly
well but has cost a ton of money, and the American people are
going to be making sure their representatives ask these
questions.
Any other comment there?
Mr. Borkowski. I would just say that obviously we have had
the discussion with the chief, and one concept for at least
part of this BCI is to take the effectiveness ratio and somehow
bound it by how confident should we be in that number.
That is the challenge, right? How do you take what is a
very good number, a well-calculated number, and then add to
that some level of confidence you have in it because the
effectiveness ratio also is based on what we know. How do I
augment that with the uncertainty in the knowledge? That is the
kind of thing that the BCI is struggling with.
Mrs. Miller. I appreciate that.
I recognize the Ranking Member for any questions you may
have.
Ms. Jackson Lee. Madam Chairwoman, thank you.
The line of questioning, I think, is enormously important
on a very important policy journey that this country is making.
So gentlemen and lady, this committee is making, I think, a
very sound effort as I work with the Chairwoman on establishing
a bracket of which we can stand on.
I am very glad that the leadership on this committee has
shown an openness to the idea of a policy decision being made
about comprehensive immigration reform.
Speaking for myself, I will say that I embrace it totally
and believe that it is a long-overdue policy and legislative
initiative that should be passed, and I recognize, as the
Chairwoman has indicated and I think we have said it together;
No. 1, this committee should be an intimate part of the border
security aspect, but at the same time, facts are really the oil
to the engine and I would say to the Department you have got to
get in the game. What I am hearing here is not really a
definitive game strategy.
When I say that, this is the second hearing, this is a
hearing based upon an assessment, and I am not getting, I
think, what could be not where you tie yourself to what you
believe you could not tie yourself to, but where you can give
confidence that the trends are leading to the kind of security
that we need.
So let me just cite again the December 2012 Government
Accountability Office report that was drawn through the request
of Ranking Member Thompson and Mr. Barber, which I associate
myself with the request now in this position, and to note that
some of the data indicated that eight of the nine Border Patrol
sectors on the Southwest Border improved from fiscal years 2006
to 2011, and that GAO also found that the recidivism rate
across dropped to 36 percent in fiscal year 2011, down from 42
percent.
So those are some indicia that one can cite, but maybe what
you should indicate as we have put to the side operational
control that the security of the border is a continuum, that it
is a challenge and a responsibility that is on-going, that you
have confidence that the maximum level of ability the border is
secure, but that collaboration with State and local officials
and information gathering is a continuing challenge along with
technology.
Now Members of Congress should be able to understand that
if that is asserted in an affirmative manner. So let me proceed
with my questions to say that at some point, we are going to
have to have DHS work with us more concretely about the
confidence of the security of the border, and I would add to
that I recognize that we have a distinctive topography along
the border.
Mr. Barber needs help. He will speak for himself, but he
has an Arizona desert border that we need to be assured that we
can work with, and I believe we can, but you got to own up to
it. I don't believe that we should hold up comprehensive
immigration reform because as Judge Escobar said, that will
contribute to your being able to do a better job.
Let me raise these questions. I would like to go where the
Chairwoman has gone. I would like to give us the meat and
potatoes that we need.
First of all, I want to ask: Are we using the Z Portal
system? I understand that new technology has been given a lot
of awards, and how is that effectively securing the ports of
entry?
Mr. McAleenan. Thank you, Ranking Member Lee.
Yes, we are using the Z Portal. We, with the support of Mr.
Borkowski's office and our Office of Information Technology, we
have purchased a number of Z Portals and a similar technology
called ZBBs that operate more quickly at a lower level of
radiation and allow us to scan many more vehicles and actually
Z Portal on the Southwest Border we have several bus portals as
well.
This has been a tremendously effective tool for us in
identifying and seizing additional illicit drugs.
Ms. Jackson Lee. My question is: Do you continue to get the
technology as it improves and increases and about how many of
your ports of entry do you know that you are using that Z
Portal?
Mr. McAleenan. We have NII lay down at all of our ports of
entry that take cargo and we use it to inspect that.
Ms. Jackson Lee. Give me how many.
Mr. McAleenan. I can give you the numbers on the ZBBs and Z
Portals in a follow-up if that is okay.
Ms. Jackson Lee. You are continually improving that
technology?
Mr. McAleenan. Absolutely. We use the American Recovery and
Reinvestment Act to purchase a number of very effective systems
that we are applying.
Ms. Jackson Lee. Would you suggest that that is helping
provide security at the border or giving an answer to those who
are trying to hear do we have--I know that is not the newest
technology, but is that part of the security that you are
talking about?
Mr. McAleenan. Our non-intrusive inspection technology is
absolutely a critical tool that we are using to increase
security.
Ms. Jackson Lee. Okay, now I asked this, but I need to hear
it again. So how are you moving up on the ladder of technology
as it relates to that kind of technology? Are you constantly
being able to upgrade it to your satisfaction? Do you believe
the present technology is satisfactory?
Mr. McAleenan. Well, we have been upgrading of the last
several years the Z Portals and the ZBBs that we just talked
about are more efficient because they work faster and they have
a lower energy level that allows us to put more vehicles
through them. So yes, we have been able to benefit from an
improving continual technology.
Ms. Jackson Lee. Mr. Borkowski, let me, because you are the
center point of intellect around this issue and seemingly have
been given the responsibility of sort of holding on to the BCI,
and I assume that you use a lot of analytics to be able to give
it some substance, you heard what I said.
You all have got to rise to the occasion. If we are not
using operational control, then you have got to tell me that
Northern Border, here is how we assess and we can tell you that
we are making progress. The GAO report gave some numbers. I
don't know if under the GAO report it is a weak economy that
saw those numbers go down, and DHS needs to be able to tell us
that.
Secondarily, the border that raises a lot of concern is the
Southern Border, so what are the concrete measures that you
would say could definitively be interpreted to have us in a
continuum of securing the border?
Mr. Borkowski. If you are talking about for example between
the ports of entry, so I won't talk holistically unless you
would like me to, but if you are talking about between the
ports of entry, I think what is important there is whether or
not we have got the capability to deal with the threat that the
chief of the Border Patrol perceives.
So chief of the Border Patrol can measure that not
quantitatively, but in a very disciplined way, and compare that
to the capabilities we have.
If you add to that the information he has about
effectiveness, I think that is a very important metric. So if
you take and you assess whether the Border--chief of the Border
Patrol has the capability he thinks he needs to have to watch a
border and he has a good effectiveness ratio, I would say that
is a pretty good indicator that the border is secure in that
area. That is between the ports of entry.
Ms. Jackson Lee. Well, okay. Let me just stop here. If I
could just, Madam Chairwoman, just get my last two questions
very quickly.
I will take that, and some others may pursue that.
Let me just say to Judge Escobar. In a testimony in the
Senate, one of the witnesses indicated that Dr. Shirk of the
Transborder Institute of the University of San Diego indicated
that what we are seeing in actuality with migrants coming
across is that the enforcement has actually caused more deaths,
400 I think in one of the years that he was speaking of, in our
enforcement process and these are only individuals that are
trying to work.
You somewhat commented on that. I would appreciate it if
you would. I would just throw this very quick question out so
then I can get the answers from the other three gentlemen, but:
Utilization of drones, how much of it and whether you have seen
that have any impact. Let me go to Judge Escobar very quickly,
please, on this idea that migrants--that you have seen deaths
because of the enforcement as opposed to finding an immigration
reform process for that.
Judge Escobar. Thank you very much, Ranking Member. You are
absolutely correct.
What happens when the United States puts up the walls that
we have put up in our Southern Border, it does not stop
necessarily the flow of people who are trying to find work in
our country and also some of the bad folks who are trying to
smuggle drugs and the coyotes who move those people across our
borders.
It just pushes that movement into more treacherous
territory, terrain that is more challenging for these families
trying to reunify with their families or trying to get work. So
if we deal with those people who can be addressed through
policy changes, through reform, it will do what former Border
Patrol Chief Aguilar said, which is de-clutter the environment
for law enforcement.
Ms. Jackson Lee. Thank you very much. I will wait on that
other answer.
Mrs. Miller. We may be able to go to a second round. We
will see how we do.
Ms. Jackson Lee. Thank you.
Mrs. Miller. I would just appreciate the gentlelady's
questioning. I thought one thing she said that was very
significant is when she asked the Department to get in the
game, and I think that is a very good way to put it.
You do not want the Department of Homeland Security to be
the stumbling block to comprehensive immigration reform for
this country and it could happen. So get in the game. I
absolutely would agree with that.
At this time, the Chairwoman would recognize the gentleman
from Pennsylvania, Mr. Barletta.
Mr. Barletta. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman.
Judge Escobar, in your testimony you talk about the need
for reforming our immigration system before we spend enormous
resources trying to secure our borders from migrants who are
looking for a better life specific to El Paso.
You argue that if it were easier for Mexicans to go back
and forth that they would be less likely to want to live here
permanently.
However, many of the 11 million illegal immigrants came in
through our international airports, whether it is El Paso
International Airport or Philadelphia International Airport in
my home State, I believe anywhere where there is an
international airport you are a border State.
In my home city in Hazleton, Pennsylvania, it is estimated
that 10 percent of our population is there illegally. We are
2,000 miles away from the nearest Southern Border.
Judge, are you aware that 40 percent of the people who
enter the country illegally didn't sneak across the border, but
entered legally and overstayed their visa?
Judge Escobar. Yes, sir, I am. I--the perspective that I
bring to you and that I am trying to share with you this
morning is the perspective of a Southern Border community that
has ports of entry.
You are absolutely correct in that visa overstays need to
be tracked, and in fact, that is where some of the threats are
coming from, which actually goes to my point that if we enact
immigration reform that deals with people who want easier
access along my Southern Border to come in and visit family or
to reunify with family or to work in construction jobs that
American companies give them or to work in agriculture, which
are jobs given to them by American farmers. If there is a
mechanism and there is a mechanism through policy to address
those individuals then it becomes easier--I would submit--it
becomes easier to track those visa overstays because we are
utilizing resources to deal with a smaller population of
immigrants.
Mr. Barletta. You know, the question is, you had stated
that 90 percent just come for work, they are not involved in
any criminal activity. How do you separate salt from sugar? How
do you separate--how do the men and women who are protecting
our borders separate the 90 percent from the 10 percent who
will do us harm?
In 1986, Congress promised the American people that if they
gave amnesty to 1.5 million illegal aliens--turned out to be 3
million; it doubled as soon as we waived the carrot of American
citizenship--that they would give amnesty--this would be a one-
time deal--we would secure our borders and we would never deal
with this again.
Now here we are years later, 11 million estimated which I
believe will be more again because we are now doing the exact
same thing. History has taught us nothing. What makes the
promise of this Congress, the Gang of Eight in the House or the
Senate or the President--what makes--what makes this promise to
the American people any different than the one in 1986?
Judge Escobar. You know, I think the challenge for Congress
is when it puts the decisions off over the years then and you
are not dealing with them on an annual basis, then you are
going to end up in situations like we are in today in this
Nation when we are having to deal with 11 million people who,
as the saying, the cliche goes, are living in the shadows. So
it should not be a one-time fix.
Policy and reform should be on-going. You can't just do it
every 20 years. Immigration, the flow of people, the reasons
why they come across, the reasons why businesses want certain
types of workers, that is going to change year after year after
year.
So I would encourage the Congress not to think of this as a
one-time fix that we are never going to have to address going
into the future, but instead, as an on-going long-term
challenge that, as the Ranking Member described it or maybe it
was the Chairwoman, as a journey that the Congress is going to
need to address every year through its budgets and through
policy reform.
Mr. Barletta. You know, also, you talk about the need for
reforming our guest-worker program. As you remember, 1993 World
Trade Center bomber, Mahmud Abouhalima, overstayed a tourist
visa and was in the country illegally. He received amnesty in
1986 by falsely claiming to be a seasonal agricultural worker
even though he was a cabdriver.
You argue that most migrant workers pose no threat, but one
of these agricultural workers was actually an Islamic terrorist
who perpetrated one of the deadliest attacks in American
history.
If you could prevent just one terrorist from being granted
legal status, wouldn't you agree that it is worth the wait?
Judge Escobar. I think one of the things that is difficult
is to define security because security may mean something very
different for you than it does for me.
You may be talking about absolute security saying that if
we want to be secure, then we have to somehow someway maybe
seal the borders or do everything possible to achieve absolute
security.
That is not an achievable goal. It is not possible to have
absolute security.
Mr. Barletta. But my question is if you could stop one
terrorist----
Judge Escobar. Well, the answer is, of course.
Mr. Barletta. Okay.
Judge Escobar. But--I am sorry.
Mr. Barletta. You also testified that history has shown
that the Southern Border does not present a security threat. If
most of the illegal immigrants who are sneaking across our land
borders or ports or overstaying their visas are just looking
for work, then I would argue with you that they do present a
threat.
They present a threat to the millions, millions of
Americans who are out of work and looking for a job. Our
immigration laws are meant for two reasons; protect the
American worker and to protect our National security.
How can you support policies to allow businesses to hire
cheap labor at the expense of our Nation's workers, American
workers, when your own town of El Paso has a higher
unemployment rate than the National average?
Judge Escobar. I would submit to you that if those workers
were given legalized status, they would be adding to the tax
base and they would be contributing to our economy in a way----
Mr. Barletta. Well, there was just a study that proves that
that is not true. That if we grant amnesty to the 11 million
illegal aliens, the Heritage Foundation completed a study that
it will cost us $2.6 trillion over the next 20 years.
This is after all the tax revenue is realized. This is a
time when we are trying to balance our budget. We are trying to
find more money for the men and women who protect us, but by
granting amnesty, this plan of pathway to citizenship will
actually cost us $2.6 trillion after taxes.
Judge Escobar. Well, I have read studies to the contrary
and so, really when you talk to economists, they are a great
guide for some of our most challenging policy decisions.
Economists generally will agree that adding those folks into
our country in a way that they can make contributions, it
certainly does contribute to our economy.
Mr. Barletta. Could you identify any of those economists?
Judge Escobar. You know, I am sorry, I apologize. I did not
bring the list with me. I would be happy to forward studies and
names through my Member of Congress who serves on this
committee.
Mr. Barletta. I trust the Heritage Foundation. Thank you.
Mrs. Miller. Thank the gentleman very much.
At this time, the Chairman recognizes Mr. O'Rourke, from
Texas.
Mr. O'Rourke. Thank you.
I want to commend the Chairwoman for her focus on this
question of how we define border security, and as she said
earlier, I think it is one of the most important questions that
we as a subcommittee, a full committee, a Congress, and a
country answer because--you know, the fate of comprehensive
immigration reform hinges on this. I think the fate of
communities like El Paso, other border communities, and our
National economy depend on our ability to answer this in a
thoughtful, intelligent, rational way.
So I appreciate her leadership and I also want to thank her
and Ranking Member Jackson Lee for giving us the opportunity to
hear from our county judge who is able to bring her experience
and perspective to bear on an issue that I would argue
disproportionately affects her constituents in the community of
which she presides over as county judge.
Judge Escobar, I wanted to ask you a question about an
opportunity that might become available in the near future.
Chairman McCaul of the full committee, Congressman Cuellar,
and others including on the Senate side, Senator Cornyn are
introducing legislation that will allow communities like ours
to partner with the Federal Government to provide necessary
resources to speed the flow of this legitimate trade that
Acting Commissioner McAleenan talked about--the 99.5 percent of
the flow coming through our ports of entry that is completely
legitimate that has the appropriate documentation.
What do you as an El Pasoan, as a county judge, as somebody
who might ask one of the poorest communities in the country to
pony up additional resources to speed this flow, what do you
need to know before you can advocate for this kind of
partnership and ask your constituents to dig in a little deeper
to help us solve this problem?
Judge Escobar. Well, thank you very much Representative
O'Rourke, and I appreciate that you are one of the co-sponsors
of that bill, a bill that could help communities like El Paso
provide adequate resources to easing that flow back and forth.
The challenge as I briefly mentioned in my comments this
morning is that if we don't have the metrics, we are talking
about metrics today, if we don't have the specific number of
personnel shortages at the ports of entry--so if we don't have
the statistics that tell us how many individuals, how many CBP
officers are at the ports, how many lanes are closed due to
personnel shortages.
If we don't know that and we are asked or we are saying
that we are willing to put up money and participate in this
partnership, we cannot know nor can we guarantee to the public
and the local property taxpayer that it is actually going to
plug those holes and to address those gaps.
So that is a critical component of the metrics I would
argue that you all should demand from your agencies.
Mr. O'Rourke. Let me ask, Acting Commissioner McAleenan,
there is this a very legitimate concern that we not supplant
Federal resources that should be obligated to border
communities like ours, and instead, if we are going to
contribute, it is a supplement to what you are already doing.
Without your willingness to share that data that the judge
and others in our community are asking for, how can we make
that informed decision and ask our citizens to contribute in
this way?
Mr. McAleenan. Thank you, Congressman. I think it is a
reasonable point and a couple thoughts in response. First, if
we had this legislation and we were able to enter into those
public/private partnerships that were deemed to be in the
economic interest of the local communities, that would be a
partnership situation where there would be commitments to
increase service levels based on that augmentation. So I would
make that commitment very clearly right now.
In terms of the overall availability of data on exact
staffing and specific ports of entry, that is something that we
are working towards with our workload staffing model. That is
something we intend to deliver and have a robust conversation
about with this committee and with the Congress more broadly
this year.
I think that will help us share data about where we are and
where we think we need to be, and would really provide a good
foundation for pursuing legislation like you have offered or
other agreements of the similar type.
Mr. O'Rourke. But when--I want to make sure I understand
your answer. We can expect to have that specific staffing
information and the larger set of data that you are talking
about this year?
Mr. McAleenan. That is CBP's intent and my understanding it
is the administration's effort.
Mr. O'Rourke. Okay. I appreciate that. Then in the brief
time I have left, the judge brought up an important point I
think that you know, the prevailing wisdom right now is that
prior to comprehensive immigration reform, we need to secure
the borders.
You and Acting Commissioner McAleenan have said our borders
have never been more secure and the judge is saying after
comprehensive immigration reform I think we can look forward to
even greater security because of your ability to focus on your
top priorities in terms of threats and those are of course
terrorists, people who want to do our country harm, the weapons
that they might be trying to bring across to do that.
Can you respond to that and talk about how that might allow
you to free up resources or better prioritize the resources
that you have right now? Chief Fisher. Sorry.
Chief Fisher. Certainly, Congressman. I just--a point of
clarification from my perspective. I generally don't like to--
or broadly characterize the border in its entirety one way or
the other, right. So I can tell you at any point in time that
there are areas along the border that are of higher risk, more
activity level, problematic, higher rates of assaults against
my Border Patrol agents, and there are other areas to the
contrary.
That is part of this risk assessment piece. I will also
state that when we are talking broadly about threats, generally
folks outside of the organization look at the individuals and
the groups of individuals that come into this country after we
know a lot about them.
But what I would ask to also take into consideration is the
Border Patrol agent who last night perhaps in an area in the
Nogales area in the mountains, or perhaps the Border Patrol
agent who is working south of the Otay Mountain, or another
Border Patrol agent who was working the river last night.
Each one of those agents in various different circumstances
is being approached by individuals; many times those agents are
alone. Sometimes it is a group of two; sometimes it is a group
of 10. Those Border Patrol agents do not know who those people
are, nor do they know what those individuals intend to do once
they are encountered by the Border Patrol agent.
Therein lies what we qualify as a risky situation. All
right? Not everywhere. What we do find out and post arrest
based on biometrics and bio graphics, we then try to set who
these people are, what they intend to do. Then there is a whole
series of consequences. There is a whole series of dispositions
that would fall either in the administrative or in the criminal
context.
But what generally happens; people then take a look at an
overarching population of people that we apprehend, it may be a
3-month period, it may be a year period, and then try to
qualify the risk that we are trying to define after that risk
has been adjudicated.
So it is really important that we frame that. It is not
all-or-nothing proposition when it comes to security. It is
graduated based a lot more on what we do and what we don't know
and it is our continued ability to learn to get better to be
able to provide those Border Patrol agents in those scenarios
that I just described with advanced information, the right
training, the right equipment, the integrated operational
approaches like our strategy is going to do along with our
ability to rapidly get into areas so that it puts them in a
better position to reduce risk for themselves and for the
citizens in which we serve.
Mr. O'Rourke. I am out of time, but I would like in the
future perhaps directly from you or in writing, a direct
response to the proposition made by the county judge that with
CIR you can better prioritize resources and look forward to
even better security along our border than we have today.
So, thank you and thank you, Chairwoman.
Mrs. Miller. Thank the gentleman.
The Chairwoman now recognizes the gentleman from Arizona,
Mr. Barber.
Mr. Barber. Thank you very much for letting me sit in on
this hearing. I am not a Member of this subcommittee, but this
hearing is very important to me, and I appreciate the
opportunity to be here to meet the witnesses and to ask some
questions.
First of all, I want to thank the witnesses for coming
today. Some very, I think, helpful testimony.
You know, the men and women of the Border Patrol who I work
with a great deal face incredible dangers every single day and
you put your finger on it, Chief Fisher, when you talked about
the incidents: Rockings, rip crews that are trying to steal
drugs from other smugglers put people in jeopardy. Brian Terry
as you know was killed possibly by a rip crew.
So what they are going through every single day is not
fully appreciated by the American people. Sometimes when I stop
at the checkpoint coming back to Tucson I say as I am leaving,
``Thank you for your service,'' and they look at me with a
startled look on their face like, ``You are thanking me? No one
does that,'' or not enough people do.
So I just want to say up front that what your men and women
do is absolutely amazing, heroic, and very important to our
country's security.
I think that what we need to do is make sure that they have
the resources they need to get the job done. I am very
concerned about sequester. Of the 35 to 40 percent cut in
salaries that the Border Patrol agents will face, with a loss
of furlough, with the loss of overtime and furloughs, we cannot
step back and move backwards from the improvement that we have
made in border security.
If we do, as the Chairwoman has said, many issues relate to
this. The future of comprehensive immigration reform depends on
our continued efforts to secure the border. Whatever that
means, Judge, I agree with you on that.
That is part of the problem. The central question really
is: How do you define border security? We have been talking
about it for decades and more recently in the last 6 years we
have put a lot of billions of dollars of resources into it.
When I talked to ranchers for example and they tell me that
they are unsafe on their land and that they can't go to town
without taking their children with them and that they go to the
clothes-line armed or they go on their land fully-armed to
inspect their water lines, then we are not secure from their
perspective because they are not safe.
If you go to Nogales or Douglas where the build-up is
significant, people feel differently about it. So it is a
matter of where you are and what you are facing. So we have to
come to terms with this definition of border security and we
have to plug the holes that exist.
In my district alone, 50 percent in terms of poundage of
the drugs seized in this country are seized right in my
district; the most porous area of the country. We have to do
better and I know, Chief Fisher, you want to do more and
hopefully we can continue to plug those holes.
But when it comes to measuring border security, the issue
in front of us today, we really are, I think, not doing as good
service to ourselves, to the Department, or to the country when
we cannot have what the people would consider credible and
reliable metrics to define success.
I am alarmed to say the least by the most recent jail
report which was referred to by the Ranking Member that came
out and pointed out that the Border Patrol rolled out last May
a new strategy that didn't have goals, it didn't have metrics,
it didn't have a process for evaluation.
That is not really a plan, is it? Now obviously the
Department has to do something. So I guess I want to go to that
point specifically, Chief Fisher, you know, I have the highest
admiration for what you do and it is good to see you again and
what your men and women do, but we have to give them consistent
ways of measuring success.
So can you ask or can you tell us where we are in the
process of developing those metrics that will fill the big
holes in that plan? Where are we right now? The Department
promised it would be done by November. Could you give us an
update on where we are?
Chief Fisher. Sure can, Congressman. First of all, it is
good to see you again, sir, and thank you for those kind
comments. It certainly gives me great pride to serve those
Border Patrol agents here in Washington, and when I go through
the checkpoints, I do make sure that I think them as well. So
thank you for doing that.
We do have metrics. Matter of fact, unfortunately, part of
my opening statement that I would like to share with you really
labeled just four or five as examples.
When the GAO did that report, they did so--we worked with
Rebecca Gambler and her team--provided an array of metrics and
measures of things that we were looking at as it related to our
new strategy.
Part of their analysis interestingly enough was they went
back about 2006 to 2011, and as you recall, we just recently
over the past year just-released the strategic plan.
Many of those measures over the past 3 years we have been
gathering some of which we have been just analyzing
differently, some of which we created whole new different sets
of data, things like the consequence delivery system, things I
had mentioned earlier; just quickly, the recidivism rate, the
average rate of--the average apprehension per recidivist.
We take a look at unique subjects. We look at deflection
and how that is differentiated between displacement. I would
welcome the opportunity to sit down with you or members of your
staff to go through those in detail, sir.
Mr. Barber. Madam Chairwoman, could I just ask one more
question? I know my time is up.
It is really important that the Department when it devises
these new metrics that are going to be now completed by
November, that the stakeholders are involved in helping you
define what success is.
I am talking about the business people, the residents, the
ranchers, the Border Patrol agents themselves. I talk with
those men and women all the time. They have got incredible
insights about what goes on as you well know because they are
there. The ranchers are on their land every single day.
What process can you tell us about it that will include
input from those vital stakeholders before we actually finalize
and submit these metrics?
Chief Fisher. Well, Congressman, when I am out in the field
and talk with them, the things that are brought to my attention
are, well Chief, can you tell us a little bit about your
ability to see things through broader situational awareness
although they don't use those terms necessarily, but what they
are talking about is our ability for broader situational
awareness.
How can you tell me, either its technology or whether it is
through intelligence or agent deployments, can you tell me what
is happening around my area? Because when my dog barks at
night, my wife is scared.
I understand that perception, right. Each area of the
border, I am glad you brought that uniqueness out, is very
different, right.
So what we are training the organization to do,
understanding the direction where we are going and defining
this risk-based approach versus a resource-based approach
because you are right and Chairwoman Miller really set the
stage.
I can't go to those ranchers and say, ``Hey, you should
be--you should feel safer because we have an integrated fixed
tower 5 miles down the road and I just doubled the size of the
Border Patrol station in Douglas over the last 3 years.''
That doesn't change the fact that the perception, whether
it is real or not, depending upon what the activity is.
Our approach with the field leadership is, to the extent
that we are able to with information, is to explain to them
what we have in terms of information. What we know is happening
there so they understand not just, ``Hey, would you call us
when you see something suspicious?'' We want to be able to tell
them what that is.
The second thing is we want them to know to the extent that
we are able to, what we are doing about it and in some cases it
may be deployments. It may be, hey, we are going to have Border
Patrol agents in the area tonight. You are not going to be able
to necessarily see them because they are going to be working in
these general areas. We want you to call them because they are
going to have the ability to respond if you see them.
Or we are working some technology you may be aware of; I am
out in the East County and the Douglas area and I would be
happy to go into further detail outside of this hearing to do
that.
Mr. Barber. I want to thank the Chairwoman, and I would
repeat what you and the Ranking Member said. Please get in this
game fully. We need it in order to move forward with
comprehensive immigration reform. We will not get there without
your help.
So thank you Madam Chairwoman.
Mrs. Miller. Thank the gentleman, and I thank him for
joining the subcommittee today as well.
At this time, we are going to go to a second round of
questions, but in the interest of time, we will keep it to 5
minutes. With that, I would recognize the Ranking Member.
Ms. Jackson Lee. Thank you so very much.
I am in a meeting interestingly enough with leaders of
commercial airports in the anteroom here and so I wanted to
quickly get some additional inquiry in. But first what I would
like to do is to say that on behalf of all of the Members, we
thank all of the men and women for their service and we thank
Congressman Barber for his initial comment. But this
appreciation of service goes along with inquiry, and Chief
Fisher I think that the detailed presentation that you made to
the question of the Congressman from Arizona is the framework
that myself and the Chairwoman who have committed to working
together. This is a, sort of, inquiry that we are making
together and the framework is one that we are making together.
That detailed, nonclassified response is the kind of
package that we are going to need, if you will, as we move
forward in a parallel structure to have extra tools for you
through comprehensive immigration reform and then of course the
tools that you necessarily need at the distinctive borders.
Let me pose right to Mr. McAleenan quickly, and if I can
get a sequester answer from all three that is just a yes or no.
Chief Fisher, is sequester impacting you negatively,
prospectively?
Chief Fisher. We do have reduced capability as of March 1.
Ms. Jackson Lee. I am sorry?
Chief Fisher. We do have reduced capability as of March 1.
Ms. Jackson Lee. Thank you.
Mr. McAleenan.
Mr. McAleenan. Yes.
Ms. Jackson Lee. Mr. Borkowski, you are obviously, but----
Mr. Borkowski. Yes.
Ms. Jackson Lee. All right.
If I can bring to your attention and for us to get back
together, JFK airport is experiencing through a message to me
from Congresswoman Clarke, we are very concerned and Bush
Intercontinental Airport is of great concern and let me just
give an example of one besides the--and if you could just give
a quick answer--besides the idea of sequester which you have
already said. However, we have Air China possibly bringing in
about $400 million, wanting to leave Bush Intercontinental
Airport at 1:30 a.m. and your staffing and again, this is not a
pointed blame, it is how can we resolve this, is indicating
they have no leverage, staffing, et cetera after 12 a.m.
That is a very difficult challenge and are you familiar
with this quandary that we are in? Can you provide us a report
back? You want to mix that in with your sequester issue? They
will start--this is going to start, I think, in--you are--look
like you are starting some decreases in April, and this is
going to start soon thereafter.
Mr. McAleenan. Quick response now and I would be happy to
follow up in greater detail.
The challenges that you outlined at our major international
gateway airports are certainly present. We have seen tremendous
growth in your environment.
JFK you mentioned, 14 percent over the last 3 years and
about 5 percent so far this year. Houston, we have seen 23
percent over the last 3 years, continued growth this year and
we have got a robust strategy to try to address that with our
existing resources of both our scheduling, our collaboration
with the airports.
Houston you know, you are familiar with our Express
Connect; our one stop----
Ms. Jackson Lee. Right.
Mr. McAleenan [continuing]. Trying to move those passengers
is----
Ms. Jackson Lee. Can I work with you on those specific
issues? I am going to cut you off just because I need to get
these other--this other question in. Can I work with you on
those specific issues?
Mr. McAleenan. We would love to do that.
Ms. Jackson Lee. All right. Thank you.
Let me just ask this question. Tell me the utilization of
drones--what is--how much--that is nonclassified--who uses it
and, Chief, I guess I would go to you and Mr. Borkowski, very
quickly.
Chief Fisher. Yes, it provides us a critical capability in
terms of broadening our situational awareness and adding to the
suite of technology that we and this particular committee have
supported graciously by the way for our ability to secure this
country.
Ms. Jackson Lee. Mr. Borkowski.
Mr. Borkowski. It does two key things for us. No. 1, it can
get to areas that it is very difficult to put ground-based
technology and get up over them and it can move into them as
the Border Patrol needs.
The second thing it provides us is kind of strategic
information. It is one thing to have information that is real-
time, the camera that I am going to ask the Border Patrol go
respond to what this camera sees. The predator also allows us
to get an idea of whether or not things are changing on the
border.
So where we think some things are not happening, we can go
check and confirm that it is not happening or learn that that
has changed and then the Border Patrol can adapt to it. So
those two key things are important to us.
Ms. Jackson Lee. Madam Chairperson, let me thank you very
much for allowing this, and I would just ask on the record that
we possibly have--well, let me just say--and I want to possibly
have that we have a classified briefing on the utilization of
drones because I want to be both consistent with the
Constitution as well as looking at that as a resource that
these gentlemen are using. I really would appreciate--I think
it would be important for this committee to have a classified
briefing on the drone utilization.
Let me thank you all for your testimony. Thank you for the
second capacity to ask questions.
Mrs. Miller. Thank you.
At this time, the Chairwoman recognizes Mr. Barletta, from
Pennsylvania.
Mr. Barletta. Thank you, Madam Chairwoman, and again I
would like to thank you for this important hearing. I believe
it is very important that we educate Members of Congress before
we make public policy that will affect our Nation as some of
the proposals that we are hearing about will.
My question is to Chief Fisher and Mr. McAleenan. You know,
as I mentioned before, we could build fences across the entire
country, north and south. We can protect our coastlines east
and west, but almost half of the people that are in this
country illegally didn't come in that way.
It is important that I keep repeating this because I
believe that it is a missing piece to how we determine whether
our borders are secure.
So I think it is very important for everyone to accept the
fact that visa overstays are just as important as protecting
our borders North and South. A person that sneaks across the
Southern Border into El Paso and takes an American job is no
different than somebody who overstays a visa and takes an
American job.
It is no different if someone crosses the border into
Arizona and plants a bomb somewhere or someone who overstays a
visa and plants a bomb. So I think there is a missing piece to
this when we talk about whether our borders are secure.
So even if Secretary Napolitano would declare that our
borders are secure, I would argue that our borders are not
secure, are not secure until we also deal with the fact that
visa overstays are part of our National security
responsibilities.
So my question to Mr. Fisher and Mr. McAleenan; how do we
fix this? We are talking a lot about how do we protect our
borders and are you coordinating with ICE and how do we--what
are some ideas that we might be able to impose to solve that
problem?
Mr. McAleenan. Thank you, Congressman. It is an important
issue and I think from the Secretary on down, it is an
important focus for the Department of Homeland Security and
certainly for CBP.
We are absolutely coordinating with ICE and with the
Department of State to really address this from the early
origination of the problem from when people are applying for
visas, when people are applying as visa waiver country
travelers to come to the United States, assessing those
applications for risk at our international processing center to
gather with State and ICE who are joining us to look at the
same data with the best intelligence in our advanced
techniques.
So we are starting now much earlier in the process at the
outset. I think the Secretary and others have defined the
security process as critical at each juncture before the visa
is issued, at the port of entry, assessing admissibility,
following up, identifying and following up if there are
overstays and of course, enforcing the laws on employers who
put people to work who are here out of status. I agree we have
to do all of those things.
Mr. Barletta. Do you agree though that that should be
included when we assess whether or not our borders are secure,
that we also include whether or not we can track people in and
out of the country when they overstay their visas?
Mr. McAleenan. I believe it is included, yes.
Mr. Barletta. Thank you.
Mrs. Miller. Thank the gentleman.
I would also, just to mention on this visa overstays
quickly, it is something that this subcommittee has had a lot
of conversations about even during the last Congress and you
are spot on, Mr. Barletta, about the high percentage, in the 40
percentile of everybody who is here illegally came here on a
visa overstays as you mentioned, the 9/11 hijackers, several of
them were here on a visa overstay.
Since the committee really had very focused oversight on
that, the Department of State has focused much more on trying
to develop a robust exit system. We do pretty well getting them
here, but not tracking when they leave and developing a robust
exit system in dealing with what several hundred thousand
backlog of visa overstays.
I am not quite sure where they are at this time, but there
has been quite a bit of progress but the largest room is a room
for improvement. That certainly is true.
With that, the Chairwoman recognizes Mr. Barber.
Mr. Barber. Thank you again, Madam Chairwoman.
Two or three quick questions. I want to go back for a
moment if I could, Chief Fisher, to the question of getting
input before these metrics are finalized.
I think it is critical that it not only be done, but it be
seen to be done and I would really urge you to convene public
meetings where people who live and work along the border and
back from the border can give you their sense of what it would
mean when they say, ``The border is secure.''
Because I think when we measure--when I look at it, I look
at it anecdotally and I look at it empirically. The empirical
data unfortunately is mixed. The GAO report showed that we have
different ways of measuring or using data across the sectors;
that is not helpful, but I do think the credibility of the
metrics will be enhanced dramatically if we can have public
input and it is seen to be done.
So I urge you to really consider that as you go forward.
Specifically now I want to ask a question about tools that can
be useful. I have talked a lot about the area east of Douglas
all the way to the New Mexico line which is wide-open
territory, as you know, to mountains coming in from Mexico.
The drug traffic into those communities across the
ranchland and put people at risk. We have, I think at least for
now, saved the Aerostat Program which was going to be taken
down operated by the Air Force at least through this fiscal
year. Hopefully it will be picked up by DHS next fiscal year.
The Aerostat Program is our blimps basically that both have
a visible deterrent as well as a very important tool for
detecting incursions.
Chief Fisher, you might want to take this under advisement,
but I really think that if we can get another Aerostat, another
blimp over the ranch area that I have talked about east of
Douglas between there and New Mexico, it would have a great
benefit because part of the problem is the cartel is coming
through it the mountains and canyons are hard to see.
So you may want to comment on whether that is feasible or
whether that would be helpful and then the last question has to
do also with increased resources.
The Senate is sending us hopefully a CR that will increase
the budget for CBP. Could you comment on if that passes, and it
is going to be in the range of $250 million, how that could be
used to offset the impact of furloughs and over time?
So I posed a lot of questions to you at once: The
stakeholder issue, the Aerostat, and the CBP increase hopefully
that is coming.
Chief Fisher. To your first comment and question, I would
not disagree with you, Congressman. We will take that--and
matter-of-fact, it is being done in some locations will make
sure that the leadership within your area is involved as well.
To the second, I will tell you briefly, we are always
changing and our requirements for detection capability and
perhaps Mark can talk a little bit broadly as it relates to
whether it is a tethered Aerostat or other similar technology
that is meeting our requirements.
Third, once we settle with the numbers we certainly--the
direction that I have given my staff here at headquarters and
the commanders in the field is basically two principles.
First and foremost, preserve to the extent that we are able
to, our priority mission sets.
Second, make sure that we can reduce, to the extent that we
are able, to the impact on the agents, the employees, and their
families. Within that construct, we intend to do just that,
sir.
Mr. Barber. Thank you very much.
I yield back.
Mrs. Miller. I thank the gentleman.
Let me just say sincerely how much I again appreciate all
of your service to the country and it has been said here
already by other Members, certainly all of us certainly
appreciate, so very, very sincerely the bravery and the heroism
and the courage and the dedication 24/7 by those who are out in
the field and serve our country so very, very well in helping
to secure our border.
Easy for us to sit here in Washington, you are probably
thinking, asking you all of these questions, right, when you
see what is going on in the field and I guess I just make that
comment because I do want you to know that we do think about
that and we see it and we do thank you so much for your
service.
But that being said, I think you can also understand and
you see here that there is an increased focus here about trying
to get to some sort of a measurement because I think many of us
from the profession that we are all involved in, in elective
capacity here see an opportune time in our country, a sort of a
pivotal time, a historic pivot perhaps, to get some sort of
immigration reform done.
Perhaps. Perhaps not, but that conversation will not be
being had with Members of Congress or the American people
without asking this critical question of is the border secure
and how can we measure it and do we, as I said, do we feel
confident that the measurement that we are using, whatever it
is, is something that is--that we can understand--and believe
me, I know that sounds so simplistic.
You are probably thinking, well geez, there is all these
various components in it, but that is a question that we have
to ask ourselves.
Just as you say, how do you define success, right, in
theater or in any kind of engagement and that is a question
that we are trying to get to. So I think we are all very open
on trying to ask the right question and understanding the
components that go into the construct of an answer.
So again, we will leave the hearing record open for 10 days
and if any other Members have any questions of you, we would
ask that you respond in writing, but we appreciate your service
and we look forward to continuing to work with you as we do
secure our Nation's border and move forward to serve the
American people.
Thank you all very, very much.
Subcommittee is now adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 11:43 a.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]
A P P E N D I X
----------
Letter From Veronica Escobar to Chairwoman Miller
March 27, 2013.
The Honorable Candice Miller,
Chairman, Subcommittee on Border and Maritime Security, H2-176 Ford
House Office Building, Washington, DC 20515.
Dear Chairwoman Miller, Thank you for inviting me to testify before
the Border and Maritime Subcommittee on March 20, 2013. I enjoyed
presenting the Members with the perspective of an active border
community, El Paso, Texas. Ensuring safe and effective borders is a
critical issue for our National and economic security.
During the question-and-answer segment of the hearing, Rep.
Barletta asked me to provide him with copies of some of the economic
studies I referenced regarding the tax and economic growth benefits of
an improved immigration system, including a path to citizenship for
those currently residing in our country. I have forwarded those
documents to his office along with all Members of the Subcommittee on
Border and Maritime Security, but I would also like to ask that they be
included with my testimony as part of the hearing record. The documents
are attached.*
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
* Congressional Budget Estimate has been retained in committee
files and is available at www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/
ftpdocs/72xx/doc7208/s2611.pdf. The Economic Benefits of Comprehensive
Immigration Reform by Raul Hinojosa-Ojeda has been retained in
committee files and is available at http://www.cato.org/sites/cato.org/
files/serials/files/cato-journal/2012/1/cj32n1-12.pdf.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Thanks for your leadership on this important topic. I look forward
to working with you and the committee in the future. Please do not
hesitate to contact me if you have any questions or concerns.
Sincerely,
Veronica Escobar,
El Paso County Judge.
______
Article, CQ Weekly
the economics of immigration
By David Harrison, CQ Staff, Nov. 26, 2012--Page 2376.
The immigration debate has a new argument.
For the past few years, those who favor allowing illegal immigrants
a path to legal residence and eventual citizenship have based their
campaign on moral grounds, that it is only fair and humane to bring the
millions of undocumented immigrants out of the shadows, where they
often are mistreated and underpaid.
Those who oppose such a path to legality have countered with a more
politically powerful assertion, that illegal immigrants take jobs from
Americans and, in their millions, threaten to ruin the country and its
economy.
[GRAPHIC(S)] [NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Now, though, at the moment when President Barack Obama's re-
election has highlighted the growing voting power of Hispanic, Asian,
and other foreign-born Americans, pro-immigration groups have begun to
make an economic argument of their own.
What's been mostly lost in the political back and forth in recent
years is the considerable body of evidence that liberalizing
immigration policies would, in fact, improve the U.S. economy. Experts
and academics have run computer models of various legalization
scenarios and found that they would all help brighten the Nation's
economic prospects as it continues to struggle out of a recession.
``Putting these young people to work is good for the economy and
creates jobs, just the opposite of what many people have argued,'' says
Sen. Richard J. Durbin, the Illinois Democrat who is one of the most
outspoken advocates of the DREAM Act, which would grant citizenship to
many illegal immigrants brought to the country as children.
``Bringing these people out of the shadows who are undocumented,''
Durbin says, ``having them pay taxes, having them pay for the
protection of basic laws, these things are good for the economy.''
Most economists agree that a mass legalization program would have a
net positive long-term effect on the economy, and that agreement
includes even Harvard's George J. Borjas, whose studies of immigration
and falling wages have long been cited by those who oppose more liberal
immigration policies.
The macroeconomic effects of an immigration bill, it seems, are not
in question.
The 1986 Simpson-Mazzoli Immigration Reform and Control Act, which
gave a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants who had been in the
country before 1982, had the effect of raising the wages of formerly
undocumented workers by 15.1 percent within 4 or 5 years, according to
one study commissioned by the Labor Department. That, in turn, boosted
consumption and tax revenue.
``The economics is really clear,'' says Jeremy Robbins, director of
the Partnership for a New American Economy, a coalition of mayors and
corporate CEOs that was co-founded by New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg
to seek more liberal immigration policies. ``If you get talented people
here who want to work, the economy is going to grow. We don't have a
zero-sum economy. And the same is true at the low-skilled end.''
That doesn't mean that every American's life would be improved
overnight. As with any significant policy shift, an immigration
overhaul would create winners and losers, at least in the short term.
Academics disagree over the details, in particular the question of
whether the new influx of legal low-skilled labor causes wages for
native-born low-skilled workers to drop.
And that is part of what worries immigration opponents such as
Lamar Smith, the Texas Republican who chairs the House Judiciary
Committee.
``Jobs are scarce and families are worried,'' Smith said at a
hearing last year. ``Seven million people are working in the U.S.
illegally. These jobs should go to legal workers.''
Nevertheless, even some Republicans are starting to probe a new
path on the immigration debate, given the results of this month's
election. Sen. Marco Rubio, the Florida Republican and Cuban-American
who undoubtedly will play an important role on immigration within his
party, noted during a Nov. 15 event at the Newseum in Washington that
illegal immigrants fill a need in the economy that they could just as
easily be filling as legal workers.
``If your economy is demanding 2 million people a year to fill 2
million new jobs at a certain level, but you're only allowing a million
people to come in,'' Rubio said, ``you have a supply-and-demand
problem, and that supply of folks that need a job in Mexico or anywhere
else in the world is going to meet that demand.''
An Uncertain Pathway
When President Ronald Reagan signed the 1986 immigration law, he
set in motion a process that would eventually put 2.7 million formerly
illegal immigrants on the road to citizenship. First, the law granted
them permanent residency visas--known as green cards--which also
allowed them to bring immediate family to the United States. Over time,
many of those green-card holders became naturalized citizens, woven
into the fabric of the country.
[GRAPHIC(S)] [NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Thanks to the law, immigrants were able to bargain for higher
wages, pay taxes, build up their credit histories and apply for loans.
Knowing that they were safe from deportation also made them more likely
to learn English, get an education, buy houses and start businesses.
They eventually settled down to raise thoroughly American children
weaned on sugary cereals and Saturday morning cartoons.
``All around, it generated a burst in consumption as wages
increased, but also in productivity, which is the economist's dream,''
says Raul Hinojosa-Ojeda, a Chicano studies professor at the University
of California, Los Angeles, and an influential pro-immigration voice.
``When you create a wage increase for a lot of people in the economy,
they start spending a lot more. And we are all people that sell to
them, so our economic activity goes up.''
In a paper earlier this year for the free-market Cato Institute,
which backed a more liberalized immigration system, Hinojosa-Ojeda
estimated that a new immigration law similar to the 1986 overhaul would
add $1.5 trillion to the country's gross domestic product--roughly 0.84
percent--over 10 years.
A less-expansive change that would simply create a guest-worker
program, rather than legalize all 11 million undocumented people living
here, would only create $792 billion in added growth, while a mass-
deportation plan would reduce GDP by $2.6 trillion, Hinojosa-Ojeda
found.
Another Cato Institute study in 2009 found similar results.
Restrictionist policies would harm the economy, while legalization
combined with a visa tax assessed on immigrants would add $180 billion
to the economy each year. And a report last month from the Center for
American Progress--which was founded by President Bill Clinton's chief
of staff, John Podesta--reached a similar conclusion when looking at
the DREAM Act, a more narrowly written immigration bill that would only
grant a pathway to citizenship to the roughly 2 million young people
brought to the United States illegally as children. The study estimated
that passing the DREAM Act would generate $329 billion into the economy
by 2030.
Many of those studies point to the 1986 law as evidence.
Cost to Consumers
Higher wages for a large swath of immigrants would also probably
increase prices for consumers, making things like restaurant meals and
lawn care services more expensive.
For instance, today, roughly 70 percent of farm workers are illegal
immigrants, largely because American workers refuse to take farm jobs.
If government policy grants the undocumented workers legal status, they
will eventually look for better jobs in other industries. That means
the farm industry will either have to raise wages and prices or
continue to hire illegal immigrants. Neither of those is a good option.
Hinojosa-Ojeda says that although that may be true in the short
term, over time, newly legalized workers would become more productive,
which would offset the impact of their higher wages so that consumers
would not notice much of a price change.
Other researchers say the economy's need for a large pool of low-
skilled, low-wage workers is the reason why any mass legalization
proposal should include a revamped guest-worker program that would
allow workers more say over their employment and working conditions.
``Because of our border with Mexico, you really have to accommodate
the demand for that type of labor with legal pathways,'' says Pia M.
Orrenius, a senior economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas and
a former adviser to the George W. Bush administration. ``Those can be
set up to work for the benefit of both countries. It's not that
difficult to set up working programs.''
``A lot of people don't want to stay permanently,'' she adds. An
improved temporary-worker program would simply ``reinforce the circular
migration that was there for many decades.''
Needs of the Market
But guest-worker programs have traditionally been one of the
thorniest parts of immigration policy. In 2006-07, when Congress last
debated immigration legislation, labor unions opposed the guest-worker
provision in the bill, saying the program would not be responsive to
the needs of the labor market and would create a class of second-class
workers with no rights and no hope of staying in the country.
[GRAPHIC(S)] [NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
``There has to be a rational, data-based way to determine when
there's a labor shortage,'' says Ana Avendano, the AFL-CIO's
immigration director. ``And when that's determined, employers should
bring in workers to deal with those labor shortages. Those foreign
workers should come in with full rights.''
Avendano says she would favor a government commission that would
use state-of-the-art labor market data to determine where the shortages
are at any given point.
Recent immigration overhauls introduced by two Democrats, Sen.
Robert Menendez of New Jersey and Rep. Luis V. Gutierrez of Illinois,
included such provisions, Avendano says. Senate Majority Leader Harry
Reid, a Nevada Democrat, also has cited the Menendez bill as a possible
starting point for next year's immigration debate. That makes Avendano
optimistic.
Despite its net positive effects overall, legalizing the status of
millions of undocumented immigrants would not benefit everyone equally,
at least not right away. Low-skilled American workers, in particular,
who have been hardest hit by the current downturn, could find
themselves competing with millions of new job applicants.
``The official unemployment rate for native-born Americans without
a high school degree is well over 20 percent, and their underemployment
rate exceeds 32 percent. That's also a third of that entire class of
workers,'' Rep. Elton Gallegly, a California Republican, said during a
hearing last year by the Judiciary subcommittee on immigration that he
chaired.
``And yet at the same time, millions of illegal immigrants hold
jobs,'' added Gallegly, an outspoken critic of loosening immigration
rules. ``Even when low-skilled Americans can find jobs, their wages are
depressed by illegals and other low-skilled immigrants.''
Gallegly and other conservatives often cite the work of Borjas, the
Harvard economist who favors more restrictions on immigration. One of
his most-cited studies found a link between an influx of immigrant
workers and falling wages.
Between 1980 and 2000, Borjas has written, immigrants expanded the
supply of working men by about 11 percent. That brought about a 3.2
percent drop in the wages of the average American worker. The effect
was strongest among high-school dropouts, who saw their wages decline
by 8.9 percent.
Borjas' results have been challenged by other economists, notably
Giovanni Peri at the University of California, Davis. According to
Peri, though immigrant workers may have some small negative impact on
native workers in the short term, they actually lead to higher wages
for Americans over time. That's because immigrants, many of whom do not
speak English well, tend to take different jobs than native-born
workers do. Immigrants will cluster in trades like construction, for
instance, whereas low-skilled Americans will get jobs in manufacturing,
he says.
That means immigrant workers and native-born workers complement
each other rather than compete against each other. In a post for the
Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, Peri provides an example: ``As
young immigrants with low schooling levels take manually intensive
construction jobs, the construction companies that employ them have
opportunities to expand. This increases the demand for construction
supervisors, coordinators, designers and so on. Those are occupations
with greater communication intensity and are typically staffed by U.S.-
born workers who have moved away from manual construction jobs.''
Over time, many of those who would earn legal status would move up
the economic ladder and compete with native-born workers for higher-
skilled jobs, but at that point they would blend into the American
workforce and make it more productive, Orrenius says.
``Is that really a negative? I don't think we should call that a
negative,'' she says. ``That productivity increase is part of economic
growth, and that's something that's desirable. There was a time when
they didn't want women in the labor force because they didn't want them
to compete with men.''
Is There a Cost to Society?
Opponents of legalization contend that legalizing millions of low-
income immigrants would drain social services. Sen. Jeff Sessions of
Alabama, the ranking Republican on the Senate Budget Committee, has
been particularly vocal on this point and has called for changing
welfare rules so that less is spent on benefits to immigrants.
``One of the bedrock legal principles of immigration is that those
coming to America should not be reliant on federal assistance,''
Sessions said in a statement this month. ``That principle has been
steadily eroded.''
During the 2006-07 immigration debate, the Congressional Budget
Office found that the added costs of the legislation, especially its
Medicare and Social Security costs, would outweigh the new tax revenue
generated by the change. CBO reported that the 2006 immigration bill
would have increased mandatory spending by $54 billion between 2007 and
2016, largely because of immigrants' becoming eligible for entitlement
programs. Discretionary spending also would rise by $25 billion from
2007 to 2011, while tax revenues would rise by $66 billion by 2016,
which is not enough to offset the added costs.
But CBO acknowledged that its analysis did not take into account
the possible economic growth that could occur after legalizing so many
undocumented workers. That growth, the agency said, could boost tax
revenues by anywhere from $80 billion to $160 billion between 2007 and
2016, which would compensate for the increased government costs.
There is another reason to believe that the increased use of
entitlement programs would not put a substantial strain on the
Treasury, Orrenius says. That's because any immigration overhaul that
makes it through Congress almost certainly would include more visas for
high-tech workers, a change that has wide bipartisan support.
Those workers are more likely to earn higher wages, which means
they'll contribute more in taxes than the value of the social services
they will receive. ``High-skilled immigration is a big fiscal boon,''
Orrenius says. ``That balances out what is a fiscal cost on the low-
wage, low-education side.''
So if a sweeping immigration overhaul is such a good idea from an
economic point of view, why have advocates been so silent in making
that case until now? The main reason seems to be that it is a nuanced
argument that doesn't play well in bumper stickers.
``The argument for low-skilled immigration is a longer-term
argument,'' says Robbins, of the Partnership for a New American
Economy. ``It's a harder argument to make in a sound-bite context.''
Since the election, however, some Democrats have started relying
more on the economic case. And they have been joined by some
Republicans hoping to strike a deal that could make the GOP more
palatable to Hispanic voters, a fast-growing voting block.
``People that are here, even those who are here illegally, if
they'd like to work, we ought to figure out a way to let them work,''
Sen. Rand Paul, a Kentucky Republican, said on the Fox Business Network
on Nov. 15. ``I think immigrants are an asset, not a liability.''
Any grand bargain on immigration remains a long way off. But if
members of both parties can agree on the macroeconomic merits of an
immigration overhaul, they may find it easier to convince skeptical
colleagues and the public at large.
FOR FURTHER READING: Path to citizenship, p. 2363; Immigration and
employment, 2009 CQ Weekly, p. 2860; Bush-era overhaul effort, 2007
Almanac, p. 15-9; 2006 Almanac, p. 14-3; 1986 overhaul, 1986 Almanac,
p. 61.
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