WEBVTT - DHS 0:00:06.680 --> 0:00:10.920 November two thousand to the Department of Homeland Security became 0:00:10.960 --> 0:00:13.840 an official agency. It would also become the parent to 0:00:13.920 --> 0:00:17.200 agencies like the t s A, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, 0:00:17.400 --> 0:00:21.360 the Coast Guard, FEMA, and the Nuclear Incident Response Team. 0:00:21.440 --> 0:00:23.799 For a brief time, Chad Wolfe was the Secretary of 0:00:23.800 --> 0:00:26.440 Homeland Security. He was also the Under Secretary of Homeland 0:00:26.480 --> 0:00:30.120 Security for Strategy, Policy and Plans. Previously, he was one 0:00:30.160 --> 0:00:32.600 of the original architects of the t s A. It 0:00:32.680 --> 0:00:35.400 was a monumental task, probably at that time, something that 0:00:35.440 --> 0:00:38.479 had never really occurred since the stand up of the 0:00:38.560 --> 0:00:42.000 Department of Defense. This is nine eleven, two decades later. 0:00:42.120 --> 0:00:44.560 I'm Steve Gregory in Los Angeles. On the morning of 0:00:44.640 --> 0:00:46.600 nine eleven, I was working on Capitol Hill in the 0:00:46.640 --> 0:00:50.600 Russell Senate Office Building. Had arrived at work as the 0:00:50.640 --> 0:00:53.559 first plane went into the first Trade center, uh, and 0:00:53.600 --> 0:00:56.560 then saw the second plane on the television go into 0:00:56.600 --> 0:00:59.160 the second one. We were evacuated, along with other members 0:00:59.200 --> 0:01:03.840 of Congress, you know, shortly thereafter. And uh, that's kind 0:01:03.880 --> 0:01:07.119 of how I was introduced to Homeland Security. Had been 0:01:07.120 --> 0:01:09.760 working on really domestic issues prior to that, so it 0:01:09.760 --> 0:01:13.120 hadn't really been in the national security space. But like 0:01:13.200 --> 0:01:16.080 many other people, that that day forever change sort of 0:01:16.120 --> 0:01:19.600 my professional outlook and how I went about doing my 0:01:19.760 --> 0:01:22.880 job and had a profound impact on me. And talk 0:01:22.920 --> 0:01:25.000 a little bit about how you got into the security 0:01:25.000 --> 0:01:27.200 space and and sort of how you started to learn 0:01:27.600 --> 0:01:31.440 about how nine eleven started to affect how we lead 0:01:31.440 --> 0:01:33.800 our daily lives. I stayed on Capitol Hill for a 0:01:33.840 --> 0:01:38.319 few additional months when the Aviation and Transportation Security Act 0:01:38.440 --> 0:01:41.399 was passed by Congress, which actually created at that time 0:01:41.440 --> 0:01:45.440 the Transportation Security Administration, and a few short months later 0:01:45.520 --> 0:01:47.680 had the ability and the opportunity to go to work 0:01:47.920 --> 0:01:52.040 for the Transportation Security Administration in the Bush administration, so 0:01:52.280 --> 0:01:55.560 I had sort of a first hand seat to what 0:01:55.680 --> 0:01:58.680 it was like on building a new agency after such 0:01:58.720 --> 0:02:03.480 a monumental event as nine eleven. Security was at the 0:02:03.520 --> 0:02:07.640 forefront of most Americans thought process at that time, and 0:02:07.720 --> 0:02:10.520 so we went about for the next several years building 0:02:10.760 --> 0:02:13.320 an apparatus that you see, you know, in use today 0:02:13.480 --> 0:02:16.360 at airports all across the country and really had become 0:02:16.400 --> 0:02:20.760 the gold standard for how security is conducted in airports 0:02:20.760 --> 0:02:24.080 all around the world. Um, and so there's probably no 0:02:24.160 --> 0:02:27.720 other aspect of Homeland Security that touches so many daily 0:02:27.800 --> 0:02:31.720 americans lives, like the Transportation Security Administration. If you travel 0:02:31.720 --> 0:02:33.160 and go through an airport, you're going to come in 0:02:33.240 --> 0:02:36.639 contact with an employee of the Department of Homeland Security. 0:02:36.720 --> 0:02:39.840 So it was, you know, for those three or four 0:02:39.960 --> 0:02:43.520 years after nine eleven, it was a crash course on 0:02:43.919 --> 0:02:46.639 how do we protect the country from another terrorist of it? 0:02:46.880 --> 0:02:49.400 Where does one start when you're creating an agency and 0:02:49.400 --> 0:02:51.600 we're not just talking about any agency. We're talking about 0:02:51.639 --> 0:02:54.919 an agency that's supposed to protect the lives and safety 0:02:55.160 --> 0:02:58.520 of American citizens and all citizens. But where does one start? 0:02:58.720 --> 0:03:01.200 Well for us at that time, and again just talking 0:03:01.240 --> 0:03:03.040 about t s A at that moment, we had a 0:03:03.080 --> 0:03:06.959 pretty instructive handbook from Congress. They gave us very specific 0:03:07.000 --> 0:03:11.400 deadlines to meet, whether it was federalizing checkpoints, whether it 0:03:11.480 --> 0:03:16.720 was deploying explosive detection equipment UH and everything in between. 0:03:16.760 --> 0:03:18.720 And so we had a very specific we laid out 0:03:18.720 --> 0:03:20.840 a roadmap on how to get there, and it was 0:03:20.880 --> 0:03:24.280 a monumental task probably at that time, something that had 0:03:24.320 --> 0:03:27.960 never really occurred since the stand up of UH the 0:03:28.000 --> 0:03:31.040 Department of Defense, and so you had to go about 0:03:31.080 --> 0:03:33.720 it smartly. You had to bring in stakeholders. You had 0:03:33.760 --> 0:03:35.320 to bring in those that you were going to regulate. 0:03:35.720 --> 0:03:38.280 As I've often said, homeland security is not just done 0:03:38.320 --> 0:03:41.000 by the department. If you don't have the buy in 0:03:41.240 --> 0:03:44.480 and support of the stakeholders and the other individuals in 0:03:44.520 --> 0:03:47.800 the private sector specifically that are involved, and you're really 0:03:47.800 --> 0:03:51.280 not going to truly have homeland security. And so we 0:03:51.280 --> 0:03:53.400 were conscious to do that from day one, and we 0:03:53.440 --> 0:03:55.680 did that at the Department of Homeland Security, and then 0:03:56.560 --> 0:03:59.240 you know, broadly speaking sorry at t s A, and 0:03:59.280 --> 0:04:02.480 then broadly speak at at DHS when we look at 0:04:02.480 --> 0:04:05.600 a variety of other threats beyond just the aviation sector. 0:04:05.760 --> 0:04:08.040 You know, when you start talking about the t s A. 0:04:08.600 --> 0:04:12.119 I think in the beginning, we as Americans were understanding 0:04:12.120 --> 0:04:14.000 that we were going to have to adhere to all 0:04:14.000 --> 0:04:15.920 of this, and we're going to go through pat downs, 0:04:15.920 --> 0:04:18.000 We're gonna have to limit our our liquids, We're gonna 0:04:18.040 --> 0:04:20.239 have to do all these things. But after a while 0:04:20.360 --> 0:04:23.240 that became sort of cumberson to the everyday person in 0:04:23.240 --> 0:04:25.400 in in the t s A started to become sort 0:04:25.440 --> 0:04:28.400 of the agency everyone grew to hate. Did you see 0:04:28.440 --> 0:04:32.599 that coming I think we all certainly recognize that it 0:04:32.680 --> 0:04:36.320 certainly had the potential. Again, as I indicated, there's probably 0:04:36.320 --> 0:04:39.520 no other agency within the Department of Homeland Security that 0:04:39.520 --> 0:04:42.600 it comes into contact with everyday Americans more than T 0:04:42.880 --> 0:04:44.680 s A. And you just got to think about the 0:04:44.760 --> 0:04:48.960 nature of flying. It's already sort of a stressful situation 0:04:49.400 --> 0:04:53.080 to fly. You add that into security, and you add that, 0:04:53.400 --> 0:04:56.080 you know, a variety of different levels onto that, and 0:04:56.120 --> 0:05:00.080 it just becomes all together that much more cumberson. And 0:05:00.120 --> 0:05:04.200 then you add a workforce that you know, Congress you know, 0:05:04.600 --> 0:05:07.880 only pays them so much and so um, you have 0:05:07.920 --> 0:05:11.240 a workforce that is constantly under stressed some would say, 0:05:11.320 --> 0:05:15.640 is constantly under resource. And you know you're going to 0:05:15.760 --> 0:05:18.599 have some some incidents that the media will love to 0:05:18.640 --> 0:05:22.200 blow out of proportion, will love too, you know, only 0:05:22.320 --> 0:05:24.600 highlight when things go bad, and that's what they do 0:05:24.720 --> 0:05:27.640 most And so I think over time T s A 0:05:27.839 --> 0:05:30.520 and some sense has been victimized by that. Really the 0:05:30.560 --> 0:05:32.880 only thing that gets publicized a lot of cases is 0:05:33.000 --> 0:05:36.560 you know, things that are perhaps things that they do bad, 0:05:36.880 --> 0:05:39.159 And what doesn't get showcased is all the things that 0:05:39.200 --> 0:05:41.520 they do right each and every day. To keep our 0:05:41.760 --> 0:05:45.760 airways safe and secure. Use air travel safer now today 0:05:45.800 --> 0:05:48.040 because of the t s A. Oh, I would definitely 0:05:48.040 --> 0:05:51.159 say yes from it From an aviation security standpoint. The 0:05:51.320 --> 0:05:54.680 enhancements that t s A has done both at the 0:05:54.760 --> 0:05:58.840 checkpoint but check baggage, general aviation, a variety of different 0:05:59.000 --> 0:06:02.200 things that Essay has done over the last twenty or 0:06:02.240 --> 0:06:06.800 some odd years, I think has certainly increased the security 0:06:07.120 --> 0:06:10.479 of the American people flying not only here domestically, but 0:06:10.520 --> 0:06:16.320 internationally as well. Um just the technology standards detection standards 0:06:16.360 --> 0:06:20.720 alone has increased. Now. Look, our our adversaries are also 0:06:20.760 --> 0:06:23.800 still out there at work, still trying to to figure 0:06:23.839 --> 0:06:27.000 out how they can penetrate that security network that we 0:06:27.120 --> 0:06:31.720 have put in place. But I would say absolutely when 0:06:31.760 --> 0:06:35.560 we just look at the aviation security context and what 0:06:35.600 --> 0:06:38.240 we've done over the last several years, were certainly safer 0:06:38.320 --> 0:06:40.680 today than we were on nine eleven. You spoke a 0:06:40.720 --> 0:06:42.919 little bit about the media blowing things out of proportion 0:06:43.160 --> 0:06:46.880 and talking about how we as a media always fixate 0:06:46.960 --> 0:06:49.160 on the bad tell us some of the good tell 0:06:49.240 --> 0:06:50.960 us some of the things the public doesn't get to 0:06:50.960 --> 0:06:54.720 see on a daily basis. Wow. Uh So it's you know, look, 0:06:54.720 --> 0:06:57.279 when we talk about the Department of Promeland Security, we 0:06:57.360 --> 0:07:00.640 talk about, you know, the largest law enforce an agency, 0:07:01.000 --> 0:07:02.920 not just in the US but in the world. So 0:07:02.960 --> 0:07:05.640 we have over or the department has over seventi five 0:07:05.680 --> 0:07:08.880 thousand law enforcement officers and those are folks. Some of 0:07:08.880 --> 0:07:11.040 those folks are at t s A, some of those 0:07:11.040 --> 0:07:14.200 folks are at the U. S. Border Patrol CBP ICE, 0:07:14.240 --> 0:07:17.600 which is Immigration and Customs Enforcement Coast Guard. And so 0:07:17.720 --> 0:07:21.160 you have a huge network of law enforcement officers that 0:07:21.200 --> 0:07:24.360 are doing their various missions, all very different, but are 0:07:24.400 --> 0:07:26.920 coming together to protect the homeland at the end of 0:07:26.920 --> 0:07:29.239 the day. And a lot of that is not again 0:07:29.280 --> 0:07:32.120 reported on or advertised about how they do that, how 0:07:32.160 --> 0:07:38.040 they are investigating child smuggling rings, child exploitation, human trafficking 0:07:38.400 --> 0:07:43.520 on a daily basis, or how CBP is is you know, uh, 0:07:43.680 --> 0:07:48.400 detecting and seizing immense amounts of drugs and other contraband 0:07:48.480 --> 0:07:50.960 along our borders. And so some of these things I 0:07:51.000 --> 0:07:53.520 think are taken for granted, but it it actually takes 0:07:53.560 --> 0:07:56.120 a lot of hard work, a lot of dedication from 0:07:56.160 --> 0:07:58.640 the men and women of the department to do their 0:07:58.760 --> 0:08:01.040 job every single day. And haven't even talked about our 0:08:01.200 --> 0:08:04.680 Cybersecurity Agency and what those folks do every day to 0:08:04.720 --> 0:08:08.000 try to keep federal network secure and keep the American 0:08:08.000 --> 0:08:10.880 people as safe as can be against cyber intrusions. So 0:08:11.320 --> 0:08:12.680 there's a lot of work that I think a lot 0:08:12.720 --> 0:08:15.360 of people just take for granted. Uh is. You know, 0:08:15.400 --> 0:08:18.080 it's embedded in the security of their lives every day. 0:08:18.160 --> 0:08:20.600 But it's only there because of the hard work of 0:08:20.640 --> 0:08:23.080 the men and women of DHS. You know, some would 0:08:23.120 --> 0:08:25.880 say that if you think about bringing all these agencies 0:08:25.920 --> 0:08:29.040 under one umbrella, because all these agencies obviously existed outside 0:08:29.040 --> 0:08:31.320 of it. You know, Immigration, Customers Enforcement was you know, 0:08:31.400 --> 0:08:33.559 that's that was more of an iteration of what border 0:08:33.600 --> 0:08:36.520 patrol and customs, right, But you've got past Guard, You've 0:08:36.520 --> 0:08:39.079 got all these agencies you spoke about. Critics have said 0:08:39.440 --> 0:08:42.199 there was really no need to to create the Homeland 0:08:42.240 --> 0:08:45.120 Security or the t s A, because, in fact, I 0:08:45.160 --> 0:08:47.160 was talking to military expert the other day they said, 0:08:47.440 --> 0:08:49.599 if we had just adopted the Israeli model, he is 0:08:49.640 --> 0:08:52.120 a Reeli security model, we wouldn't need the t s A, 0:08:52.320 --> 0:08:55.079 And then that the creation of DHS was just more 0:08:55.120 --> 0:08:57.960 bloated government. What would you say to that well. I've 0:08:57.960 --> 0:09:01.400 heard that. I've heard that as well, and I appreciate 0:09:01.600 --> 0:09:04.280 that viewpoint. Particularly when we talk about the Israeli model 0:09:04.320 --> 0:09:07.080 of aviation security. I go back to they have one 0:09:07.280 --> 0:09:11.559 primary airport, ben Gurn International Airport that they have to protect, 0:09:11.559 --> 0:09:13.560 and so they can devote all their resources to that 0:09:13.600 --> 0:09:17.079 one airport. We have over four hundred and fifty airports 0:09:17.080 --> 0:09:19.880 to protect in the United States, and so you're gonna 0:09:19.920 --> 0:09:22.559 need a little different approach. I've also heard about the 0:09:22.600 --> 0:09:25.559 Canadian approach right where you you regulate it instead of 0:09:25.600 --> 0:09:29.040 having it federalized, and I think that's a debate worth having. 0:09:29.200 --> 0:09:31.680 I'm not sure it's the right approach, but I think 0:09:31.679 --> 0:09:33.760 that model is probably going to be a little bit 0:09:33.760 --> 0:09:36.640 closer if you wanted to change the the nature in 0:09:36.679 --> 0:09:39.600 which we do aviation security, a little bit closer to 0:09:39.679 --> 0:09:43.320 having it being more regulated by the federal government and 0:09:43.480 --> 0:09:48.280 actually conducted by private entities versus having it being totally federalized, 0:09:48.320 --> 0:09:51.080 which it is today. Talk about some of the things 0:09:51.200 --> 0:09:54.840 that just absolutely surprised and or shocked you when you 0:09:54.840 --> 0:09:58.000 started to work creating the t s A and starting 0:09:58.040 --> 0:10:00.400 to see security on a global scale, and what was 0:10:00.440 --> 0:10:02.240 going on, what were some of the things that shocked 0:10:02.240 --> 0:10:05.720 you about the creation of this agency. That's a great question, 0:10:05.880 --> 0:10:08.760 I think. You know again, I think it was you 0:10:08.800 --> 0:10:11.000 have to think back to the time period after nine eleven. 0:10:11.080 --> 0:10:13.600 I think everyone was in a very different mindset than 0:10:13.679 --> 0:10:16.640 they are today, and there was an extreme focus on 0:10:16.720 --> 0:10:18.720 are we going to be hit again? Will there be 0:10:18.760 --> 0:10:21.839 another nine eleven? I think over time, what one thing 0:10:21.880 --> 0:10:26.079 that surprised me was how quickly that faded and how quickly. 0:10:26.440 --> 0:10:31.080 You know, travelers really voice their displeasure with being inconvenienced 0:10:31.120 --> 0:10:34.720 at the airport, and look, I can appreciate that. Um, 0:10:34.760 --> 0:10:36.280 you know, you want to make sure we're all very, 0:10:36.360 --> 0:10:37.760 very busy, and you want to make sure you get 0:10:37.800 --> 0:10:42.160 to your destination as quickly as possible, particularly for business travelers, 0:10:42.160 --> 0:10:44.840 because that's you know, time is money, which I understand. 0:10:44.880 --> 0:10:48.479 But you know, again, after that, after nine eleven, security 0:10:48.600 --> 0:10:51.640 was continues to be a priority for the department, but 0:10:51.920 --> 0:10:55.120 really at that point in time, it was the overriding factor. 0:10:55.640 --> 0:10:57.440 We were doing everything we could to make sure that 0:10:57.480 --> 0:10:59.880 we didn't get hit again, and some would say that 0:11:00.040 --> 0:11:03.720 we overcompensated on the security front and not on the 0:11:03.760 --> 0:11:06.560 facilitation front. So I think That was one thing that 0:11:06.600 --> 0:11:10.199 surprised me pretty quickly after nine eleven was the attention 0:11:10.280 --> 0:11:13.440 span of the American people wanted to make sure that, 0:11:13.600 --> 0:11:15.920 you know, they got to their destination pretty quickly, as 0:11:16.000 --> 0:11:19.480 quickly as possible. I would have thought that the overriding 0:11:20.000 --> 0:11:22.920 concern at that time, particularly in two thousand and two 0:11:23.160 --> 0:11:25.160 two thousand and three, would be to make sure that 0:11:25.200 --> 0:11:27.880 we didn't get hit again and to shore up that 0:11:27.880 --> 0:11:31.720 that aviation security. That's not a criticism, that's just like 0:11:31.760 --> 0:11:34.680 I said, answer your question, it's more of a surprise 0:11:34.720 --> 0:11:37.360 than anything else. I am very curious if you could 0:11:37.360 --> 0:11:40.200 go back and do anything with this over again, what 0:11:40.280 --> 0:11:43.439 would it be. Well, I think there's always there's always 0:11:43.440 --> 0:11:45.720 a number of things that you can do better, whether 0:11:45.760 --> 0:11:49.920 that's from communicating with the American public, whether that's communicating 0:11:49.920 --> 0:11:51.680 with members of Congress. So like, there's a lot of 0:11:51.679 --> 0:11:55.839 criticism both from Congress and the American public because as 0:11:55.840 --> 0:11:58.800 a security agency at that time creating t s A, 0:12:00.000 --> 0:12:02.240 you wanted to communicate, but you didn't want to communicate 0:12:02.240 --> 0:12:04.360 too much, right, You didn't want to show your hand 0:12:04.520 --> 0:12:07.600 your adversaries. You didn't want to detail everything that the 0:12:07.640 --> 0:12:10.520 agency was doing at that time to give them a 0:12:10.600 --> 0:12:12.840 roadmap on how to penetrate you. So there was a 0:12:12.880 --> 0:12:14.920 there was a balance there on how much we could 0:12:14.920 --> 0:12:18.320 communicate versus how much we were actually doing to help 0:12:18.480 --> 0:12:21.960 secure and protect the American people. So as I look back, 0:12:22.000 --> 0:12:24.760 I mean, there's different ways to communicate that, there's different 0:12:24.800 --> 0:12:28.199 ways to to talk to individual stakeholders. I think one 0:12:28.200 --> 0:12:31.720 thing that the agency didn't do extremely well is I 0:12:31.720 --> 0:12:34.600 think they thought, you know, at that time, that security 0:12:34.679 --> 0:12:37.480 was everything. And I'm not sure that we brought in 0:12:37.520 --> 0:12:40.360 the airlines and the airports as quickly as we could have. 0:12:40.760 --> 0:12:43.120 Right at the end of the day, it's it's their airplanes, 0:12:43.160 --> 0:12:46.920 it's their passengers, it's their customers, and we needed to 0:12:46.920 --> 0:12:48.680 do that. We we did that pretty well. We could 0:12:48.679 --> 0:12:50.360 have done that a little bit better to really have 0:12:50.440 --> 0:12:52.839 them be partners. But I think there's always gonna be 0:12:52.840 --> 0:12:55.080 a healthy tension there between the private sector who wants 0:12:55.120 --> 0:12:58.280 to a for profit entity and like the airlines and 0:12:58.320 --> 0:13:02.520 the airports, and an agency that is worried about securing 0:13:03.240 --> 0:13:06.600 UH their infrastructure, um and so there's always gonna be 0:13:06.640 --> 0:13:10.360 that healthy tension. I think sometimes it boiled over into 0:13:10.360 --> 0:13:12.520 the public sphere and and T s A took a 0:13:12.600 --> 0:13:14.400 hit for that, So I think you can always go 0:13:14.440 --> 0:13:17.320 back and have a little bit better relationships and communicate better. 0:13:17.360 --> 0:13:19.360 At the end of the day, you're looking back now 0:13:19.440 --> 0:13:23.200 with DHS, T s A, and UH, you know, everything 0:13:23.200 --> 0:13:25.520 like the Patriot Act and all the things that were 0:13:25.559 --> 0:13:29.480 created following nine eleven. Are we safer today than we 0:13:29.480 --> 0:13:33.120 were on? Well, that's a that's a difficult question to answer. 0:13:33.160 --> 0:13:34.800 I think if you you have to when you look 0:13:34.840 --> 0:13:37.200 at are we safer as a country, you have to 0:13:37.240 --> 0:13:40.720 look beyond just T s A and aviation security. You 0:13:40.760 --> 0:13:42.680 have to look at cybersecurity. You have to look at 0:13:42.720 --> 0:13:46.599 border security. You have to look at foreign terrorist organizations 0:13:46.600 --> 0:13:49.280 and their ability to strike the homeland. So there's a 0:13:49.320 --> 0:13:52.640 variety of different threats in scenarios that you have to 0:13:52.679 --> 0:13:55.439 look at. If you're trying to assess is the homeland 0:13:55.520 --> 0:14:00.480 more secure today than it was at nine eleven? Were all? 0:14:00.920 --> 0:14:04.480 I would say probably yes, although I am extremely concerned 0:14:04.480 --> 0:14:08.400 about what I'm seeing today. When we look at border security, 0:14:08.400 --> 0:14:11.640 we look at what's going on in Afghanistan today and 0:14:11.640 --> 0:14:15.160 and creating another safe haven for terrorism because of some 0:14:15.200 --> 0:14:17.840 of the events that have occurred recently. I think all 0:14:17.880 --> 0:14:21.320 of these things give me great pause to say, are 0:14:21.360 --> 0:14:23.960 we safer today than we were two years ago, four 0:14:24.040 --> 0:14:26.880 years ago, or six years ago. I'm not so sure 0:14:26.920 --> 0:14:30.000 at this point in time, when you have over two 0:14:30.040 --> 0:14:34.040 hundred thousand illegal individuals coming across our southern border in 0:14:34.040 --> 0:14:36.800 a given month, when you know you can't bet them all, 0:14:36.840 --> 0:14:39.720 you know you're not apprehending them all. What does that 0:14:39.800 --> 0:14:43.840 say about the sovereignty and and the security of your borders? 0:14:43.880 --> 0:14:45.800 Not a lot in my opinion. And so to have 0:14:45.880 --> 0:14:48.480 an administration say that the border is closed and the 0:14:48.520 --> 0:14:51.600 border is secure when you know that there's criminal elements 0:14:51.600 --> 0:14:54.240 and bad people coming across that border every day, that 0:14:54.320 --> 0:14:57.240 gives me a great pausing concern. Do you have any 0:14:57.280 --> 0:14:59.360 other thoughts you want to share? No, I mean, I 0:14:59.360 --> 0:15:01.480 think you know, we didn't talk a lot about the 0:15:01.480 --> 0:15:03.560 other parts of the department. You know, we talked about 0:15:03.560 --> 0:15:05.800 T s A, which I think is important. Obviously that's 0:15:05.840 --> 0:15:08.720 what occurred on nine eleven, But there's a lot of 0:15:08.720 --> 0:15:14.160 other elements of DHS that go into protecting the homeland, 0:15:14.720 --> 0:15:17.920 go into what how do you do that so that 0:15:18.000 --> 0:15:20.960 the American people can sleep safe at night? And one 0:15:21.000 --> 0:15:24.280 thing that I always focused on It's not just you know, 0:15:24.760 --> 0:15:29.400 how do we protect individuals from foreign terrorist organizations or 0:15:29.400 --> 0:15:32.520 even domestic terrorists. But I think what the Department does 0:15:32.880 --> 0:15:37.400 in many cases is provide economic security to the country. 0:15:37.440 --> 0:15:39.600 And what do I mean by that, right It it's 0:15:39.880 --> 0:15:41.240 you know, if we talk about t s A, it's 0:15:41.320 --> 0:15:44.120 keeping that aviation system up and running, because if that 0:15:44.200 --> 0:15:46.880 industry goes down, the economy is going to take a 0:15:46.920 --> 0:15:50.520 significant hit if airlines can't fly. You know, the same 0:15:50.520 --> 0:15:53.760 thing goes with the Coast Guard. Of all the goods 0:15:53.840 --> 0:15:55.720 that you you know that we see on the on 0:15:55.760 --> 0:15:59.320 the shelves of Target and Walmart come through our ports, 0:15:59.600 --> 0:16:02.200 and you know, the United States Coast Guard provides security 0:16:02.200 --> 0:16:06.000 in those ports and waterways. You know, cybersecurity and what 0:16:06.200 --> 0:16:10.280 our our SISSA agency does, you know, protecting federal networks. 0:16:10.320 --> 0:16:12.640 You know, when a pipeline goes down or or any 0:16:12.680 --> 0:16:15.400 of these other cyber attacks, it has a significant impact 0:16:16.160 --> 0:16:18.600 on the country as a whole. So a lot of 0:16:18.600 --> 0:16:21.040 what DHS does each and every day is to make 0:16:21.080 --> 0:16:24.120 sure that you know, we are in the best position 0:16:24.120 --> 0:16:27.200 to keep this economy roaring and going, because at the 0:16:27.280 --> 0:16:29.880 end of the day, that's the security that's the sort 0:16:29.920 --> 0:16:34.280 of the might behind the United States is our economy 0:16:34.360 --> 0:16:36.800 and obviously the security that we provide not only here 0:16:36.840 --> 0:16:39.520 in the US but around the world. I think over 0:16:39.560 --> 0:16:41.680 the last few years, there's always been this talk about 0:16:42.040 --> 0:16:45.040 whether you know, how strong is our intelligence infrastructure and 0:16:45.040 --> 0:16:47.440 how does that play into the homeland security. Well, it 0:16:47.440 --> 0:16:51.240 plays in significantly a lot of the information that we 0:16:51.320 --> 0:16:54.520 acted on, right, So, you know, when you look at DHS, 0:16:54.800 --> 0:16:57.880 there's a lot of different threats that come in, a 0:16:57.880 --> 0:17:00.600 lot of different scenarios that that the Apartment could be 0:17:00.640 --> 0:17:03.720 acting on. But like any other department, there's limited resources. 0:17:04.160 --> 0:17:07.840 So you focus those resources on the on the most 0:17:08.359 --> 0:17:11.320 you know, logical threats out there, and we rely on 0:17:11.359 --> 0:17:15.480 our intelligence community to provide that information to us. Uh, 0:17:15.520 --> 0:17:18.280 there's a great amount of information that they collect overseas 0:17:18.320 --> 0:17:22.200 that goes into that decision making process, and so we 0:17:22.280 --> 0:17:24.760 are completely you know, the department, I would say, is 0:17:24.960 --> 0:17:28.199 you know, really really reliant on on a lot of 0:17:28.240 --> 0:17:31.600 the intel collection that different parts of the intel community 0:17:31.680 --> 0:17:34.359 provide to the Department so that we can make informed 0:17:34.359 --> 0:17:37.720 decisions that we can say, look, we we believe that 0:17:37.760 --> 0:17:41.080 the foreign terrorist threat is more you know, severe and 0:17:41.119 --> 0:17:43.719 dire today than it was. I'm not you know, this 0:17:43.800 --> 0:17:47.320 is just an example, but we we base that assessment 0:17:47.480 --> 0:17:50.160 off of information that we're getting from the intelligence community. 0:17:50.280 --> 0:17:54.320 So the Department gets fed from the IC, the intelligence community, 0:17:54.640 --> 0:17:59.399 and then we make educated assessments based off of that information. 0:17:59.480 --> 0:18:02.760 So it's absolutely critical that the information that they pick 0:18:02.840 --> 0:18:06.320 up that's relevant to protecting the homeland gets shared with 0:18:06.359 --> 0:18:09.480 the Department UM so that we can make informed decisions, 0:18:09.520 --> 0:18:12.560 we can make resource allocation decisions to go about and 0:18:12.800 --> 0:18:16.000 doing our job every day. Talk about baggage screening because 0:18:16.000 --> 0:18:19.480 that that is become a huge part of security. This 0:18:19.680 --> 0:18:22.119 is something that you know, the entire airports had to 0:18:22.119 --> 0:18:25.720 be reconfigured to accommodate all of this bag screening. Talk 0:18:25.760 --> 0:18:28.240 about how that came into play. Well, I think it's 0:18:28.240 --> 0:18:30.320 a great question, and I think you have to think about, 0:18:30.760 --> 0:18:32.439 you know, the Department of a lot of people think 0:18:32.480 --> 0:18:34.679 about Homeland Security and they think about the Department. You 0:18:34.680 --> 0:18:38.200 think about you know, Border Patrol, you think about Coast Guard, 0:18:38.240 --> 0:18:40.600 you think a lot of different agencies. A lot of those, 0:18:41.040 --> 0:18:44.240 you know, we're pulled from other departments to create the 0:18:44.240 --> 0:18:46.880 Department of Homeland Security. T SA was unique and that 0:18:46.960 --> 0:18:49.160 it was created out of whole cloth. Right. It didn't 0:18:49.160 --> 0:18:53.120 exist prior to other than an office or two within 0:18:53.200 --> 0:18:56.960 the Federal Aviation Administration that did some civil aviation stuff, 0:18:56.960 --> 0:19:00.200 but nothing to the extent that we see today at 0:19:00.200 --> 0:19:03.919 t s A. And but again, Congress was very explicit 0:19:03.960 --> 0:19:07.720 in the Aviation and Transportation Security Act ats A and 0:19:07.800 --> 0:19:11.639 gave the department very specific deadlines to meet UH. And 0:19:11.720 --> 0:19:15.400 that started with making sure that we federalized every checkpoint. 0:19:16.240 --> 0:19:18.760 And what does that mean. You know, prior to nine eleven, 0:19:18.880 --> 0:19:21.040 it was you know, it was contracted out by the 0:19:21.080 --> 0:19:23.720 airlines and airports, and so you had a couple of 0:19:24.480 --> 0:19:27.160 you know, private contractors there at a at a checkpoint 0:19:27.400 --> 0:19:31.000 doing some you know, magnetometer work, and that was about it. 0:19:31.160 --> 0:19:33.240 And so all the infrastructure that you see at a 0:19:33.320 --> 0:19:35.320 checkpoint when you arrived there to get on a plane, 0:19:35.800 --> 0:19:38.560 it didn't exist prior to nine eleven. And Congress gave 0:19:38.680 --> 0:19:41.520 us a year or so to get that out UH 0:19:41.600 --> 0:19:47.119 and into into play. And so that meant hiring fifty screeners, 0:19:47.160 --> 0:19:49.679 making sure they were trained, making sure they were resourced 0:19:50.320 --> 0:19:53.280 is a significant hurdle. The next year, you know, making 0:19:53.320 --> 0:19:56.160 sure that we had explosive detection system, So every bag 0:19:56.720 --> 0:19:59.240 that goes into the hole of an aircraft is screened 0:19:59.280 --> 0:20:03.080 for explode SIPs, matching those bags with passengers that get 0:20:03.119 --> 0:20:04.960 on the airplane, which you didn't have to do prior 0:20:05.040 --> 0:20:07.199 to nine eleven. So all these different things that I 0:20:07.200 --> 0:20:08.920 think a lot of people take for granted over the 0:20:09.000 --> 0:20:11.920 last twenty years, it just occur because of the security 0:20:11.960 --> 0:20:14.480 system that we have been put in place didn't occur 0:20:14.600 --> 0:20:17.680 prior to nine eleven. And within a two year period, 0:20:18.320 --> 0:20:20.440 the folks at t s A and all the screeners 0:20:20.440 --> 0:20:22.560 and all the officers that were hired and are very 0:20:22.720 --> 0:20:26.359 rapid fashion, you know, got to work and created not 0:20:26.440 --> 0:20:28.639 only an agency. You're standing up an agency in the 0:20:28.640 --> 0:20:31.959 infrastructure of that agency, but you're also standing up the 0:20:31.960 --> 0:20:35.560 security apparatus, which is largely still intact that we see today. 0:20:35.600 --> 0:20:39.040 I mean, there's been improvements of technology over time, but 0:20:39.119 --> 0:20:41.639 a lot of that infrastructure still exists today. And just 0:20:41.720 --> 0:20:44.600 let me you know, mentioned the technology again. Prior to 0:20:44.680 --> 0:20:47.359 nine eleven, it was non existent. It was an X 0:20:47.440 --> 0:20:49.919 ray machine and a magnetometer, which was very very basic. 0:20:50.040 --> 0:20:52.480