[Senate Hearing 117-321]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]





                                                        S. Hrg. 117-321

 
 NOMINATIONS OF MATTHEW AXELROD, ALANNA MCCARGO, JAMES ARTHUR JEMISON 
                           II, AND MARK COLON

=======================================================================

                                HEARING

                               before the

                              COMMITTEE ON
                   BANKING,HOUSING,AND URBAN AFFAIRS
                          UNITED STATES SENATE

                    ONE HUNDRED SEVENTEENTH CONGRESS

                             FIRST SESSION

                                   ON

                            NOMINATIONS OF:

       MATTHEW AXELROD, TO BE AN ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF COMMERCE

                               __________

     ALANNA MCCARGO, TO BE PRESIDENT, GOVERNMENT NATIONAL MORTGAGE 
        ASSOCIATION, DEPARTMENT OF HOUSING AND URBAN DEVELOPMENT

                               __________

 JAMES ARTHUR JEMISON II, TO BE AN ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF HOUSING AND 
                           URBAN DEVELOPMENT

                               __________

     MARK COLON, TO BE AN ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF HOUSING AND URBAN 
                              DEVELOPMENT

                               __________

                            OCTOBER 7, 2021

                               __________

  Printed for the use of the Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban 
                                Affairs
                                
                                
                                
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             U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE 
 48-180PDF           WASHINGTON : 2022   
 
 
 
 
 


            COMMITTEE ON BANKING, HOUSING, AND URBAN AFFAIRS

                     SHERROD BROWN, Ohio, Chairman

JACK REED, Rhode Island              PATRICK J. TOOMEY, Pennsylvania
ROBERT MENENDEZ, New Jersey          RICHARD C. SHELBY, Alabama
JON TESTER, Montana                  MIKE CRAPO, Idaho
MARK R. WARNER, Virginia             TIM SCOTT, South Carolina
ELIZABETH WARREN, Massachusetts      MIKE ROUNDS, South Dakota
CHRIS VAN HOLLEN, Maryland           THOM TILLIS, North Carolina
CATHERINE CORTEZ MASTO, Nevada       JOHN KENNEDY, Louisiana
TINA SMITH, Minnesota                BILL HAGERTY, Tennessee
KYRSTEN SINEMA, Arizona              CYNTHIA LUMMIS, Wyoming
JON OSSOFF, Georgia                  JERRY MORAN, Kansas
RAPHAEL WARNOCK, Georgia             KEVIN CRAMER, North Dakota
                                     STEVE DAINES, Montana

                     Laura Swanson, Staff Director

                 Brad Grantz, Republican Staff Director

                       Elisha Tuku, Chief Counsel

                        Mohammad Aslami, Counsel

                 Dan Sullivan, Republican Chief Counsel

                 John Crews, Republican Policy Director

                      Cameron Ricker, Chief Clerk

                      Shelvin Simmons, IT Director

                    Charles J. Moffat, Hearing Clerk

                                  (ii)


                            C O N T E N T S

                              ----------                              

                       THURSDAY, OCTOBER 7, 2021

                                                                   Page

Opening statement of Chairman Brown..............................     1
        Prepared statement.......................................    28

Opening statements, comments, or prepared statements of:
    Senator Toomey...............................................     3
        Prepared statement.......................................    29

                                NOMINEES

Matthew Axelrod, to be an Assistant Secretary of Commerce........     5
    Prepared statement...........................................    30
    Biographical sketch of nominee...............................    32
    Responses to written questions of:
        Chairman Brown...........................................    79
        Senator Toomey...........................................    80
        Senator Menendez.........................................    83
Alanna McCargo, to be President, Government National Mortgage 
  Association, Department of Housing and Urban Development.......     7
    Prepared statement...........................................    45
    Biographical sketch of nominee...............................    47
    Responses to written questions of:
        Chairman Brown...........................................    84
        Senator Toomey...........................................    85
        Senator Shelby...........................................    91
        Senator Tillis...........................................    92
        Senator Moran............................................    94
James Arthur Jemison II, to be an Assistant Secretary of Housing 
  and Urban Development..........................................     8
    Prepared statement...........................................    58
    Biographical sketch of nominee...............................    59
    Responses to written questions of:
        Chairman Brown...........................................    95
        Senator Toomey...........................................    96
        Senator Reed.............................................   103
        Senator Sinema...........................................   104
        Senator Shelby...........................................   105
        Senator Rounds...........................................   107
        Senator Tillis...........................................   109
        Senator Kennedy..........................................   111
        Senator Moran............................................   111
Mark Colon, to be an Assistant Secretary of Housing and Urban 
  Development....................................................    10
    Prepared statement...........................................    67
    Biographical sketch of nominee...............................    69
    Responses to written questions of:
        Chairman Brown...........................................   113
        Senator Toomey...........................................   114
        Senator Menendez.........................................   120

                                 (iii)


 NOMINATIONS OF MATTHEW AXELROD, ALANNA MCCARGO, JAMES ARTHUR JEMISON 
                           II, AND MARK COLON

                              ----------                              


                       THURSDAY, OCTOBER 7, 2021

                                       U.S. Senate,
          Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs,
                                                    Washington, DC.
    The Committee met at 10:02 a.m., via Webex and in room 538, 
Dirksen Senate Office Building, Hon. Sherrod Brown, Chairman of 
the Committee, presiding.

          OPENING STATEMENT OF CHAIRMAN SHERROD BROWN

    Chairman Brown. The Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, 
and Urban Affairs will come to order. Thank you all for joining 
us.
    Today's hearing is in a hybrid format. Our witnesses are in 
person. Members have the option to appear both in person or 
virtually. For those joining remotely, the reminders we give 
every hearing, there will be a slight delay before you are 
displayed on the screen. To minimize background noise please 
click the mute button until it is your turn to speak. You know 
of the 30 seconds on the clock. Technology issue, we will move 
to the next Member if there is a problem.
    Speaking order will be as usual, that is by seniority of 
the Members who have checked in before the gavel came down, 
either in person or virtually, and then by seniority of Members 
arriving later, and we alternate, as you know, from Democrat, 
Republican, Democrat, Republican.
    First, before addressing the four of you--and again, thank 
you for your willingness to serve--I would like to say a word 
about our Committee and our tolerance for character 
assassinations.
    Until yesterday, I thought we all recognized that 
McCarthyism has no place in our democratic society. Any 
American citizen who fled communist repression, whether FDIC 
Chair Jelena McWilliams or OCC nominee Saule Omarova, should be 
lauded for her courage and her conviction. Anyone who hears 
Professor Omarova's story of life in the Soviet Union, her 
family's banishment to Siberia, and other stories will 
understand how offensive the attacks on her character are.
    I have faith that my colleagues, on both sides of the 
aisle, will reject these modern-day ``red scare'' tactics.
    The Committee meets today to consider the nominations of 
Matthew Axelrod to be Assistant Secretary for Export 
Enforcement at the Department of Commerce; Alanna McCargo to be 
President for the Government National Mortgage Association, 
Ginnie Mae; James Arthur Jemison II to be Assistant Secretary 
for Public and Indian Housing at HUD; and Mark Colon to be 
Assistant Secretary for Community Planning and Development at 
HUD. Thank you again, all four of you, for joining us and for 
your willingness to serve our country. We congratulate you and 
we welcome their families and friends.
    If confirmed, the nominees before us today would play a 
significant role in protecting U.S. national security 
interests, expanding housing opportunities for millions of 
Americans, and supporting families searching for a safe and 
affordable place to live, all important functions of this 
Committee, the Senate, and this country's Government.
    As Assistant Secretary for Export Enforcement, Mr. Axelrod 
would be responsible for leading a division within the Commerce 
Department's Bureau of Industry and Security that detects, 
investigates, and deters illegal behavior.
    As President of the Government National Mortgage 
Association, or Ginnie Mae, Ms. McCargo would play a 
significant role in expanding funding for mortgages and making 
home ownership a reality for millions of Americans across the 
country, including in my State of Ohio, of course.
    As the Assistant Secretary for Public and Indian Housing, 
Mr. Jemison would be responsible for leading an office 
dedicated to ensuring vulnerable families across the country 
have a decent place to call home.
    And, finally, as Assistant Secretary for Community Planning 
and Development, Mr. Colon would be responsible for leading an 
office working to support communities in all our States.
    All four nominees appearing here today are highly 
qualified. Mr. Axelrod has a distinguished record of service as 
a Government prosecutor, currently detailed to the Office of 
the White House Counsel from the Department of Justice. Before 
that, Mr. Axelrod served in several roles at DOJ, working to 
protect our national security and working on criminal 
prosecutions. Welcome, Mr. Axelrod, to the Committee.
    Alanna McCargo currently serves as Senior Advisor for 
Housing Finance at HUD. Prior to joining the Biden 
administration, she served as Vice President for the Housing 
Finance Policy Center at the Urban Institute, where she focused 
on reducing the racial home ownership gap and making housing 
more affordable. She has 10 years' experience at Fannie Mae, 
including during the last financial crisis. We are glad to have 
you here today, Ms. McCargo.
    Mr. Jemison currently serves as the Principal Deputy 
Assistant Secretary for the Office of Community Planning and 
Development at HUD. Prior to joining the Biden administration, 
he held numerous positions for the city of Detroit, most 
recently leading the city's development agenda.
    He has also served the public in Massachusetts and the 
District of Columbia, all working on issues related to creating 
vibrant, growing, affordable communities. Welcome, Mr. Jemison. 
We are glad to have you here today.
    Our fourth nominee today is Mark Colon. He serves as the 
President of the Office of Housing Preservation at New York 
State Homes and Community Renewal. In various roles at that 
agency, Mr. Colon has served the people of New York, working to 
build and protect affordable housing, and helping families, 
especially families recover from Superstorm Sandy. Welcome, Mr. 
Colon.
    We are grateful to the nominees for appearing here today, 
and for their willingness to serve the American people. I look 
forward to your testimonies.
    Senator Toomey.

         OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR PATRICK J. TOOMEY

    Senator Toomey. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, thank you. Since 
you brought up the issue that you described as ``red scare'' 
tactics, let me respond.
    What is shocking to me is the notion that a person 
nominated for a very high position in our Government should not 
be accountable for the things they have advocated for, in 
writing, themselves. Every one of my criticisms of Ms. Omarova 
are rooted directly in things that she has said and written, 
mostly quite recently, and which she has characterized herself 
as radical ideas. I agree that they are radical, and they are 
dangerous, and they would be enormously harmful to our economy, 
and that is exactly what I pointed out in my comments on the 
Senate floor.
    I also pointed out that some of the most wonderful, loyal, 
and greatest Americans that I have ever met are Americans who 
happened to have been born and raised behind the Iron Curtain 
and came to this country. That fact of her background has no 
bearing whatsoever on my judgment about how profoundly 
misguided the policies she has advocated are, and it is 
perfectly appropriate for us to examine those policies.
    As for this morning's hearing, I want to welcome to our 
nominees.
    Mr. Axelrod has been nominated to serve as Assistant 
Secretary for Export Enforcement in the Commerce Department's 
Bureau of Industry and Security, or BIS. BIS, of course, 
determines which U.S. goods are too sensitive to be shipped 
abroad. In the face of China's drive for dominance in key tech 
sectors, BIS's mission today is as important as ever.
    But export controls are only as good as their enforcement. 
Mr. Axelrod would have the important job of overseeing that 
enforcement. I expect him, and I look forward to him giving his 
own answers to questions from this Committee, including 
questions for the record, and I mention that because some BIS 
nominees have not done that in the recent past.
    Today's other nominees would, if confirmed, fill key 
leadership positions at HUD. In response to COVID, Congress 
appropriated billions of dollars for HUD programs, in addition 
to the billions we normally provide for them. In March, the 
Democrats' partisan spending bill sent billions more to HUD. 
Now Democrats are trying to use their reckless tax-and-spend 
reconciliation bill to provide more than $300 billion, in 
addition, to HUD. And unfortunately, based on their records, I 
am not certain that all of today's nominees are well-suited to 
be good stewards of these taxpayer dollars.
    Ms. McCargo has been nominated to serve as the President of 
Ginnie Mae. After the 2008 financial crisis, she was 
responsible at Fannie Mae for implementing the Home Affordable 
Modification Program, or HAMP, which was intended to help 
borrowers avoid foreclosure. HAMP was beset with challenges. A 
special inspector general found that a significant share of 
borrowers in HAMP, people who had already defaulted because 
they could not afford their initial mortgage, received loan 
modifications then defaulted again, and GAO found 
inconsistencies in how loan servicers interfaced with 
borrowers, which GAO claimed could lead to inequitable 
treatment.
    Fast forward to today. Ginnie Mae recently rolled out a 
proposal to help borrowers by transitioning them from COVID-
related mortgage forbearance into loan modifications for up to 
40 years. Ms. McCargo has endorsed this idea. If confirmed, Ms. 
McCargo will need to be vigilant to ensure the challenges that 
HAMP faced do not reappear for borrowers, and taxpayers, with 
this latest taxpayer-backed plan to subsidize certain people's 
mortgages.
    Mr. Jemison has been nominated to serve as the Assistant 
Secretary responsible for public housing and Indian housing. 
For almost 7 years, he worked on housing issues for Detroit, a 
city so chronically mismanaged that it had to file for 
bankruptcy in 2013. Mr. Jemison contributed to the leadership 
of Detroit, and that leadership often failed to revitalize 
blighted homes and neighborhoods on time and as promised. 
Amazingly, city officials admitted that they set aggressive 
construction timelines without any data to support them.
    Mr. Jemison's track record in Detroit is concerning because 
Democrats and the White House want to spend $80 billion more on 
public housing in this reckless spending bill that they are 
contemplating. If confirmed, Mr. Jemison would lead HUD's 
public housing office, which would be directly responsible for 
this enormous amount of money.
    Our last nominee today, Mr. Colon, has a particularly 
concerning record. He has had senior management roles at New 
York housing agencies that have been rife with problems, from 
project delays to ignoring ever-increasing tenant complaints, 
according to independent auditors. These failures, which 
occurred under Mr. Colon's watch, give me little confidence 
that he would be a good steward of taxpayer dollars at HUD.
    But there is something even more troubling about Mr. 
Colon's record is his history of using Twitter to engage in 
vitriolic and profane attacks on his political opponents. Over 
the years, he has repeatedly mocked and attacked, by name, our 
Senate colleagues. He has ridiculed Senator Manchin. He 
referred to Senator Collins and other Republicans as 
``clowns.'' Senator Graham he referred to as ``Senator 
Snagglepuss'' and ``Senator Shameless,'' Senator Rubio as 
``Senator Jellyfish,'' Senator Paul as spineless, Senator 
McConnell as ``MassacreMitch'' and ``Moscow Mitch.''
    He has endorsed the slanderous claim that Republican 
Senators, including Members of this Committee, were ``Russian 
stooges'' for having traveled to Russia there on a CODEL. And 
he has gone on profanity-laced tirades about President Trump. 
This is just a small selection.
    Unfortunately, we do not know the full extent of Mr. 
Colon's statements because he has deleted some of them, shortly 
before being nominated. I asked him to try to recover his 
deleted tweets from Twitter, but he refused to comply with this 
very reasonable request. And, of course, it makes you wonder--
what does he have to hide?
    The statements we do have from Mr. Colon are more than 
sufficient to demonstrate that he lacks the judgment and 
temperament to serve in a senior leadership position at HUD. 
Frankly, I am shocked and disappointed that the Biden 
administration did not withdraw his nomination months ago after 
these statements were uncovered.
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Chairman Brown. Thank you, Senator Toomey. Will each of you 
rise and raise your right hand.
    Do you swear or affirm that the testimony you are about to 
give is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?
    Ms. McCargo. I do.
    Mr. Axelrod. I do.
    Mr. Jemison. I do.
    Mr. Colon. I do.
    Chairman Brown. Do you agree to appear and testify before 
any duly constituted Committee of the U.S. Senate?
    Ms. McCargo. I do.
    Mr. Axelrod. I do.
    Mr. Jemison. I do.
    Mr. Colon. I do.
    Chairman Brown. Thank you.
    Mr. Axelrod, and all of you, if you feel free, certainly in 
your testimony to introduce family members or friends, whether 
they are sitting behind you or you want to call them out if 
they are watching at home. Presumably they are watching from 
home.
    Mr. Axelrod, please begin.

 TESTIMONY OF MATTHEW AXELROD, TO BE AN ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF 
                            COMMERCE

    Mr. Axelrod. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Chairman Brown, 
Ranking Member Toomey, and distinguished Members of the 
Committee, I am honored to be here today as President Biden's 
nominee to become the Assistant Secretary for Export 
Enforcement at the Department of Commerce. I want to thank the 
President and Secretary Raimondo for my nomination to this 
important enforcement and national security position at this 
critical time.
    I also want to thank my family, both those in the hearing 
room with me today--my wife, Jami, and daughter, Sophie, who is 
missing her high school American Government class but getting a 
firsthand look here today--as well as those watching intently 
on their computer screens at home in Massachusetts and 
Florida--Sophie's older sister, Emily, my parents, Carl and 
Andrea Axelrod, and my in-laws, Jon and Margie Sussman. No one 
does these jobs alone. It is only through my family's 
collective love, support, and belief in the importance of 
Government service that I am able to appear before you today as 
a Presidential nominee.
    In recent years, the export enforcement work of the 
Department of Commerce has become an increasingly pivotal 
component of our country's national security efforts. It is 
essential that our adversaries do not have access to dual-use 
goods and technologies that they can put to malign purposes 
like terrorism, WMD proliferation, and human rights abuses. If 
confirmed, I believe that my deep criminal and national 
security enforcement experience will allow me to effectively 
lead the dedicated agents and analysts of BIS in meeting this 
national security imperative.
    As a career Federal prosecutor in Miami, I was part of one 
of the Nation's busiest U.S. Attorney Offices. Given Miami's 
role in international commerce, both licit and illicit, our 
work often had international dimensions. My cases included ones 
against the two founders and highest-ranking members of the 
Cali Cartel and against a husband-and-wife team who were spying 
for the Cuban Intelligence Service. In all my cases as a 
prosecutor, both those with international angles and those that 
were purely domestic, I worked alongside Federal law 
enforcement agents. I was, and remain, in awe of all they do to 
help keep the American people safe.
    After 6 years in Miami, I became a career detailee to DOJ 
headquarters here in Washington, where I worked as a Senior 
Counsel to the Assistant Attorney General for the Criminal 
Division and then as an Associate Deputy Attorney General, 
responsible for overseeing the criminal enforcement work of the 
Department. I also later served as the Principal Associate 
Deputy Attorney General, where I worked with the Department's 
senior leaders on the most significant national security and 
criminal enforcement matters at the Department.
    During my time at Main Justice, I also worked closely with 
the career prosecutors in the National Security Division, with 
Federal law enforcement agencies, and with interagency partners 
to protect the country's national security. I am confident that 
the relationships I formed, and the knowledge I gained about 
the importance of bringing a whole-of-Government approach to 
combat national security threats will serve me well, if 
confirmed.
    While I come from an enforcement background, that is not 
the entirety of my professional experience. I spent much of the 
past 4 years in an international law firm, where my work took 
me around the globe, from Europe to Asia to Africa. No matter 
where I was in the world, people wanted to hear about United 
States enforcement mechanisms; it was our enforcement regimes 
they wanted to make sure they did not run afoul of. That 
experience gave me an important perspective on how best to 
maximize the impact of our export enforcement work. We must 
impose significant penalties against those who break the law 
while at the same time incentivizing companies to play by the 
rules. That way, we not only punish export violators, but also 
deter those violations from occurring in the first place.
    I mentioned that my daughter, Sophie, is missing her high 
school Government class to be here today. Back when I was in 
high school, my classmates and I were consistently told that 
``from those to whom much has been given, much will be 
expected.'' I am filled with gratitude beyond measure for what 
I have been given over the years, by my family, my friends, and 
my professional colleagues. I know that means that much will 
continue to be expected of me in return. If confirmed, it would 
be my great honor to endeavor to fulfill those expectations as 
the Assistant Secretary for Export Enforcement.
    Thank you again for considering my nomination, and I look 
forward to your questions.
    Chairman Brown. Thank you, Mr. Axelrod.
    Ms. McCargo, you are recognized for 5 minutes. Thank you.

   TESTIMONY OF ALANNA MCCARGO, TO BE PRESIDENT, GOVERNMENT 
NATIONAL MORTGAGE ASSOCIATION, DEPARTMENT OF HOUSING AND URBAN 
                          DEVELOPMENT

    Ms. McCargo. Thank you, Chairman Brown, Ranking Member 
Toomey, and Members of the Committee. It is an honor to appear 
before you as you consider my nomination to serve as the next 
President of the Government National Mortgage Association, or 
Ginnie Mae.
    I am grateful to President Biden for nominating me and 
thank Secretary Fudge for her leadership and vision for the 
Department of Housing and Urban Development and in trusting me 
to lead Ginnie Mae. The historic significance of being the 
first woman nominated to this role since Ginnie Mae was created 
in 1968 is a distinct honor.
    My husband, Jay McCargo, and my daughter, Alexandra, are 
here with me today. I thank them for being a loving source of 
inspiration, encouragement, and support. I want to thank my 
family members and friends watching virtually, and acknowledge 
my mother, Veronica Malveaux Brown, who has been my wise and 
faithful guide through life. I would also like to especially 
thank my amazing sons, Gerrad and Jay-Jay.
    Nearly 20 years ago, I came to Washington, DC, to work on 
affordable housing programs at Fannie Mae. I spent a decade 
there, including the years of the Global Financial Crisis in 
2008, which led to a U.S. housing market meltdown that 
ultimately left tens of millions of people without homes and 
with lost wealth.
    Those years became an inflection point for me. I learned 
how fragile the system is that supported housing and home 
ownership in America and how quickly things could change. I saw 
the devastating effects that rippled across neighborhoods and 
households. It was heart-wrenching to see so many people in 
financial distress and despair and disheartening to find that 
many who were losing their homes to foreclosure and eviction 
during that time looked like me and my children.
    That experience changed my perspective and helped sharpen 
my purpose. Stable, affordable, and accessible housing has 
since been at the core of my professional work in the private 
sector, in the nonprofit policy research work I led at the 
Urban Institute, and now in my public sector work with the 
Biden-Harris administration at HUD.
    My career in housing finance and passion for the field of 
affordable housing is driven by my own lived experience. I 
understand how powerful asset building and access to credit and 
financing are to personal financial security. Property and home 
ownership have been vital to my own family for generations, and 
I recognize that my personal story is often not typical for a 
Black family.
    My mother grew up on a farm that my grandfather owned in a 
small town near Opelousas, Louisiana, where she picked cotton 
and canned and farmed vegetables. Our family roots of property 
ownership are deep and have created a value system through 
generations of Black farm and landowners in my lineage. My 
father was an immigrant from Jamaica who came to New York and 
became a U.S. citizen as a child and joined the Navy after high 
school.
    In 1969, just 1 year after the Fair Housing Act was passed 
and racial discrimination in housing became illegal, my parents 
purchased a four-unit home in a highly segregated area of the 
Bronx for $30,000 with some savings and a small VA mortgage 
loan. We lived in one of the apartments and rented out the 
others. My parents later bought a home in New York State, in 
the suburbs, in search of better schools and a safer 
neighborhood, and kept the house in the Bronx as a source of 
extra rental income.
    My parents built a strong foundation for our family through 
home ownership. They were able to pass those benefits on to me 
and my siblings in the form of college tuition payments, 
helping us avoid student loan debt. They helped me with a gift 
to purchase my first home, which I was able to finance with a 
low-down-payment FHA mortgage.
    Far too many people do not get the opportunity to plant 
seeds of ownership because housing is grossly unaffordable, it 
is impossible to save, or they lack resources or do not have 
parents who can help them get started. Government mortgage 
programs help enable home ownership opportunity.
    Ginnie Mae's guaranty enables the work of key Government 
housing programs that play an essential role in housing 
America's veterans, low- and moderate-income households, urban, 
rural, and tribal communities, and helps expand access to 
affordable home ownership and rental for the historically and 
systematically underserved. In 2020, more than 70 percent of 
all people served by Ginnie Mae securities were first-time 
homebuyers.
    Ginnie Mae has remained stable and reliable while quietly 
supporting affordable rental and home ownership for millions of 
people. If confirmed, I will be a faithful steward of Ginnie 
Mae, ensuring the program stays focused on its critical 
mission, keeps pace with a rapidly changing market, attracts 
global capital into America's housing finance system, and 
protects American taxpayers.
    I look forward to leading an incredibly dedicated team of 
public servants at Ginnie Mae and to working with this 
Committee, Secretary Fudge, and housing stakeholders across the 
globe to ensure stability, liquidity, affordability, and equity 
in our housing finance system.
    Thank you for the opportunity to testify today. I look 
forward to your questions.
    Chairman Brown. Thank you, Ms. McCargo.
    Mr. Jemison, you are recognized for 5 minutes. Welcome.

   TESTIMONY OF JAMES ARTHUR JEMISON II, TO BE AN ASSISTANT 
           SECRETARY OF HOUSING AND URBAN DEVELOPMENT

    Mr. Jemison. Good morning. Chairman Brown, Ranking Member 
Toomey, and distinguished Members of the Committee, thank you 
for the opportunity appear before you today as the nominee for 
Assistant Secretary for Public and Indian Housing in the 
Department of Housing and Urban Development. I want to thank 
President Biden for nominating me, and Secretary Fudge for her 
support of my candidacy.
    I also want to thank my family and friends for their love, 
support, and guidance. I am grateful to my father, James, and 
particularly my mother, Beverly, and my sister, Jamileh, who is 
joining me here today, for their guidance and support. Finally, 
I want to thank my wife, Annie. She has been a partner to me, 
our three children, and the family for the last 20 years.
    HUD's Office of Public and Indian Housing funds the 
operation and capital that supports 3.2 million American 
families every night. Public housing is at the center of many 
American neighborhoods, and PIH rental assistance supports many 
American households and landlords. Indian Development Block 
Grant supports many thousands of families and elders in Tribal 
communities every day. I am excited to work with the 
professionals who have maintained and supported these capital 
assets and voucher resources since 1938.
    I have spent the last 25 years working in city planning and 
development, first as part of a team and later leading the 
development and preservation of market-rate and affordable 
housing units as well and the parks, streets, transportation 
facilities, commercial districts, downtowns, and employment 
centers that bring those communities together.
    I have done this by bringing together the feasibility, 
planning, design, permitting and financing concepts--private, 
public, and philanthropic--required to execute these 
strategies. Bringing expertise together with community 
engagement, I have performed this work in downtowns, 
neighborhoods, and small towns.
    Specifically, I have experience in three great American 
cities--Boston, Washington, and Detroit, Michigan--as well as 
the smaller cities and towns of Massachusetts. As part of 
partnerships with developers, community leaders, funders, 
boards, and commissions, my work has resulted in the 
preservation of more than 4,000 affordable units and over 3,500 
new market and affordable housing units, including hundreds of 
public housing units.
    For the last 9 months, I have had the opportunity to lead 
HUD's Community Planning & Development Office as Principal 
Deputy Assistant Secretary. I appreciate the partnership CPD 
staff members and leaders have extended to me.
    However, today I am particularly honored to be nominated to 
be the steward of this institution because I grew up in public 
housing. From 1983 to 1988, I lived at 693 Main Street in 
Amherst Massachusetts. It was a newly built unit, operated by 
the Amherst Housing Authority.
    Amherst is what would be described as an area of high 
opportunity. It is college town surrounded by five colleges and 
farming communities.
    However, this housing opportunity stabilized my family at a 
critical time and made a difference in my life, the difference 
that affordable housing makes for so many Americans every 
night. Making it work for more Americans has been my mission 
ever since I left that unit for college; for a summer 
fellowship program that caused me to be interested in planning 
and development; and later to become a graduate student in City 
Planning. It is also the place that my sister, who is here with 
me today, left to go to medical school.
    I know that well-designed and well-maintained public 
housing and rental assistance can work as part of the American 
safety net. I know this personally because I have lived it. I 
know it professionally because I have had affordable housing at 
the center of every major effort I have been involved in since 
I began my career.
    I have spent my entire career collaborating to create 
better places for every kind of American, where everyone can 
live together. Public housing is central to this mission.
    If confirmed, I will use all of my energy and experience 
working transform public housing, ensure that vouchers 
stabilize households and end homelessness, and support the 
strength of Tribal communities across America.
    Thank you for the opportunity to testify before you today. 
I look forward to your questions.
    Chairman Brown. Thank you, Mr. Jemison.
    Mr. Colon, you are recognized for 5 minutes. Welcome.

   TESTIMONY OF MARK COLON, TO BE AN ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF 
                 HOUSING AND URBAN DEVELOPMENT

    Mr. Colon. Thank you Chairman Brown, Ranking Member Toomey, 
and distinguished Members of the Committee. I am deeply honored 
to appear before you today as the nominee for Assistant 
Secretary of Community Planning and Development at HUD. I would 
like to start by thanking President Biden for his trust and 
confidence in nominating me. I would also like to thank the 
Committee for allowing me this time and for considering my 
nomination.
    I must also thank my family, friends, and colleagues for 
their unwavering support and to recognize my beautiful and 
talented wife, Gina Kim, and my brother-in-law, Reverend Ryan 
Kim, the Senior Pastor of the Korean Presbyterian Church of 
Baltimore, and my cousin, Anthony Salemi [phonetic] recently 
retired from serving 38 years with the U.S. Department of 
Defense, for being here to support me today.
    HUD's Assistant Secretary of CPD oversees many of the 
Department's most critical grant programs. If confirmed, I will 
bring nearly 20 years of relevant public and private sector 
experience to help advance HUD's mission and to support the 
constituents who rely on these programs in your States.
    But I would like to start by explaining my motivation for 
seeking the role. I have experienced, first-hand, the 
debilitating effects that substandard housing and limited 
economic opportunity can have on a family. My own family lost 
our house when I was 12 years old, and we moved into one of the 
few unregulated rentals in our area.
    I was one of four siblings raised by a single mother, in a 
small working-class town in upstate New York. Our family was 
easily among the poorest, and we wound up with five people 
living in an 800-square-foot, two-bedroom apartment.
    After my mom passed away when I was 20, I worked full time 
to put myself through college, first at Westchester Community, 
then at CUNY Hunter College. I later earned a law degree from 
Yale University and spent 6 years working for some of the most 
prestigious private law firms in the world. Ultimately, 
however, I decided that public service was my calling, and I 
have spent the past 13 years overseeing statewide programs for 
New York's combined Housing and Community Development Agencies.
    My life's experience has given me a unique perspective on 
the issues faced by most Americans, whether they are working 
class, economically struggling, or solidly middle class. I 
understand intimately the difference that well-run Government 
programs can make, both as a participant and as a program 
administrator. This motivates me every single day to find ways 
to improve Government programs so that more Americans from 
modest circumstances can access greater opportunities and a 
safe, decent place to call home.
    I also believe that my professional background is uniquely 
aligned with CPD's mission of developing viable communities 
through partnerships focused on expanding opportunity for those 
most in need.
    For instance, I have overseen one of the largest, most 
diverse affordable housing portfolios in the country, with more 
than 450,000 units, stretching from the eastern tip of Long 
Island to the rural North Country, bordering on Canada. I have 
also served as my agency's acting ``disaster recovery'' 
counsel, helping to lead New York's post-Sandy and post-Irene 
recovery efforts by designing policies for the award of 
billions of dollars in Federal, State, and local funding.
    I have also served with nonprofit organizations that 
spearheaded disaster recovery efforts. For instance, after 
Hurricane Maria devastated Puerto Rico in 2015, I helped lead a 
collaborative effort to purchase, import, and distribute, 
island-wide, more than 12,000 solar lanterns equipped with 
emergency radios and phone chargers, nearly all delivered 
within weeks of the hurricane's landfall.
    In short, I have worked with a range of organizations and 
officials of all political persuasions, in every corner of the 
State and beyond. I have compiled a record of providing 
efficient and equitable resources to people in need, where and 
when they need them. And I believe that those Americans most in 
need of these programs would benefit greatly from someone who 
shares their experience, can empathize with their struggles, 
and has a proven track record of getting things done.
    Finally, I recognize the important role that this Committee 
plays in overseeing the Department's work. If confirmed, I 
commit to work in a bipartisan manner and to be responsive to 
the needs every Senator and their constituents, working to 
ensure they have access to affordable housing and every 
opportunity to realize the American dream.
    Thank you once again for your time and this opportunity, 
and I look forward to answering any questions that you may 
have.
    Chairman Brown. Thank you, Mr. Colon. Thank you all.
    As you know, we operate around here in 5-minute blocks of 
time, and I want to ask a question of each of the four of you, 
so be as brief--thorough, certainly, but be as brief as you can 
in answering the questions. And I will ask each of you one 
question.
    Mr. Axelrod, we got a letter signed by former DOJ political 
appointees in Democratic and Republican administrations 
supporting your nomination, as you know. As an assistant U.S. 
attorney you prosecuted two of the founding members of the Cali 
Cartel, that you mentioned.
    How has your previous experience in enforcement and 
national security prepared you for this role?
    Mr. Axelrod. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. You know, export 
enforcement has not had a Senate-confirmed head in over 5 
years, and it has been even longer than that that they have had 
a former Federal prosecutor like me. I believe my past work at 
the intersection of criminal enforcement and national security 
would enable me to lead the agents and analysts of BIS 
effectively and with credibility, and focused clearly on our 
most pressing threats. And I am confident that my established 
relationships within Federal law enforcement, if I were 
confirmed, they would allow me to help build partnership and 
raise the profile of export enforcement, which, in turn, could 
help to increase deterrence and incentivize compliance.
    Chairman Brown. Thank you.
    Ms. McCargo, you saw the effects of the last financial 
crisis first-hand at Ginnie Mae and talked about the personal--
you know, the impact it had on you personally that way. What do 
we need to do, what will you do at Ginnie Mae to make sure we 
do not have any avoidable foreclosures in the future?
    Ms. McCargo. Thank you for the question, Senator Brown. The 
last foreclosure crisis did devastate millions of families, 
and, you know, we are coming out of a pandemic that has 
millions of families still in housing insecure positions, 
currently many of those coming out of forbearance programs that 
were put in place.
    This is something that I know that all of Government has 
been focused on in terms of the interagency housing work groups 
with FHA, VA, USDA, and Indian Housing, working together to put 
strategies in place to help homeowners that are coming out of 
forbearances keep their homes. And Ginnie Mae has been a part 
of that work, and I believe that if confirmed, I would continue 
to work with Ginnie Mae and the teams in the interagency 
working group to ensure that those families find security and 
have a healthy recovery from this crisis.
    Chairman Brown. Thank you.
    Mr. Jemison, you have had extensive experience in housing 
community development programs at the State and local level, 
how important that is in this job. Tell us why investing in 
preserving and improving public housing is so important to you.
    Mr. Jemison. Thank you, Senator, for the chance to answer 
this question. It is essential because so many American lives 
could be stabilized in this way. Preserving and creating new 
affordable housing, as I have shared before, make a huge 
difference in people's lives. We have a chance to revitalize it 
in a way that is going to help us fight the impacts of climate 
change and it can be designed in a way that allows American 
families to really reach their greatest potential.
    So for that reason I think it is absolutely essential to 
invest now, and it has been a part of the practice I have used 
over the last 25 years.
    Chairman Brown. Thank you, Mr. Jemison.
    Mr. Colon, your personal story was moving, I think, to all 
of us. Thank you for that. You have had extensive experience in 
housing and community development, including development of 
affordable housing and helping your community recover from 
Superstorm Sandy.
    You would oversee critical affordable housing community 
development, if confirmed, homelessness and disaster recovery 
programs. Talk about the importance of investing in 
sustainable, affordable housing in communities.
    Mr. Colon. Thank you for the question, Senator. I can talk 
for quite a while on how important the investments are, but to 
get to the quickest answer, in my own personal professional 
experience, these investments work.
    I can give two quick examples. One is rural rental 
assistance program that New York State runs and mimics the 
Federal Section 8 voucher program for USDA Section 515 projects 
in rural areas. We increased the number of those by about 100 a 
couple of years ago, out of 5,000 total, and I can tell you the 
number of messages, emails that we got thanking us for those, 
for doing that and telling us how it changed their lives, one 
woman talked about it allowing her to buy Christmas presents, 
that extra subsidy money.
    So, as I mentioned, these programs work, and they change 
lives, and they are critically important to the constituents, I 
believe, in all of your States.
    Chairman Brown. Thank you, Mr. Colon. Senator Toomey.
    Senator Toomey. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Colon, as part 
of the confirmation process, the Senate, of course, reviews 
nominees' past public statements. As you know, they help 
provide a complete picture of nominees' policy views, judgment, 
and temperament. A nominee should not be able to avoid scrutiny 
by merely clicking a button marked Delete, but unfortunately 
that appears to be what you have tried to do. You deleted 
multiple tweets, including some with profane attacks on 
Republicans.
    Now we recovered some through an Internet archive website, 
but that website is not comprehensive. And so on June 9th, I 
sent you a letter asking you to request that Twitter try to 
recover your deleted tweets. My staff followed up with you, but 
you have refused to comply.
    So, Mr. Colon, my question is, why do you think it is OK to 
ignore a reasonable request for information from the Ranking 
Member of the Committee with jurisdiction over HUD and your 
nomination?
    Mr. Colon. Thank you for the question, Senator. I would 
like to start by stating I am deeply and genuinely sorry for my 
prior personal tweets. To be clear, I began to delete those 
tweets prior to the election and long before my nomination. It 
was an approach that was out of character with everything in my 
professional and personal life.
    But just to be perfectly clear, that is my way of 
explanation. It is not an excuse, Senator. Posting these tweets 
was wrong. I take full responsibility for my actions. I have 
apologized on the record and publicly.
    Senator Toomey. My question is, why did not respond to my 
letter and that request that you retrieve those that were 
deleted?
    Mr. Colon. Thank you, Senator. It is my understanding that 
you may have received a letter last night in response to your 
letter.
    Senator Toomey. Last night? I sent you the letter on June 
9th. You send me a letter--this is the first time hearing of 
it--the night before the hearing. Did you include all the 
tweets that you had deleted?
    Mr. Colon. Thank you for the question, Senator. As I 
mentioned before, I began to delete any personal tweets long 
before my nomination. I have apologized publicly----
    Senator Toomey. Well, it was not terribly long before, 
because some of the tweets are fairly recent. I mean, January 
21st of 2020, you were tweeting about the impeachment. You 
replied to a tweet about Senator Collins saying, ``It really 
seems like we are reliving the eighth grade with these clowns, 
doesn't it?'' and you included a meme of Peewee Herman. Do you 
think Senator Collins is a clown?
    Mr. Colon. Thank you, Senator. No, I do not. I am deeply 
and genuinely sorry for those tweets. They were out of 
character with everything that I----
    Senator Toomey. You say they are out of character but there 
were many that we discovered that were not deleted. Then we 
found some through this archive. You, in October of 2019, 
seemed to agree with the characterization of Americans who 
voted for Donald Trump as ``deplorables''--I would point out 
that almost half of Americans did vote for President Trump, 
half of the voters--and some of them work at HUD.
    Let me bring your attention to one in particular, because 
it suggests a disturbing disregard for the law. On September 
12, 2019, you retweeted a tweet from another Twitter user who 
posed a video and tweeted, quote, ``This hero stopped two 
undocumented immigrants who were passengers in his car from 
being arrested by ICE.'' In response you wrote, and I quote--I 
think we have the tweet here--``This Brian McCormick guy is so 
GD badass to stand his ground against two ICE officers on 
behalf of two others. I am in awe of his resolve, heroic 
resolve, BAMF.''
    All right. This is not profane insults but it suggests that 
you are celebrating a person who is interfering with the 
Federal Government's lawful apprehension of people who entered 
this country illegally. Is that your position?
    Mr. Colon. Thank you, Senator. It is not my position. As I 
mentioned before, I have deleted the tweets, as many as I 
found, long before my nomination. Once this became an issue, 
rather than continue to delete the remainder of those tweets 
and have my motivations be questioned I decided to come here to 
the Committee and----
    Senator Toomey. Let me ask--do you acknowledge that it is 
actually against the law to interfere with a law enforcement 
officer's attempt to perform a lawful arrest?
    Mr. Colon. Thank you, Senator. I would have--I guess I am--
in the general sense I would have to agree.
    Senator Toomey. Right. And it appears in your tweet that 
you were celebrating someone who did exactly that unlawful act. 
So it goes beyond the profane insults. It suggests a disregard 
for the law, at least in this regard, and who knows what the 
content is of those that you have chosen not to provide for us.
    So, Mr. Chairman, I am running out of time. I do want to 
point out I have some concerns about Mr. Jemison's history in 
Detroit, Ms. McCargo's tenure at Fannie Mae. I am going to send 
specific questions for the record to our nominees, and I expect 
that these nominees, not HUD staff, will actually answer the 
questions, unlike some other nominees that have come before 
this Committee.
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Chairman Brown. Senator Menendez from New Jersey is 
recognized for 5 minutes.
    Senator Menendez. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. You know, Mr. 
Chairman, I am glad to see that our colleagues have found the 
Twitter app after years of being unable to find former 
President Trump's inflammatory tweets. I do not know when 
tweets became disqualifying for nominees, because they were 
certainly not a disqualifier for my colleagues on the other 
side of the aisle when I was the Ranking Member of the Senate 
Foreign Relations Committee where I saw a number of nominees 
put forward by the last Administration that would clearly not 
meet my colleague's new and rigorous standard.
    For example, one individual, nominated twice by President 
Trump, retweeted offensive and baseless claims about Republican 
Senators, that I will not repeat here, including promoting 
fringe conspiracy theories about their families. One actually 
disregarded the Committee's request, but Republican Senators 
voted for that person.
    Another one committed IRS fraud and was potentially under 
investigation. I brought that to everybody's attention. 
Republican Senators voted for him. He subsequently was 
indicted.
    So this goes far beyond anything that the nominees before 
us have said, and I do not recall our colleagues speaking up in 
righteous anger, let alone sending letters against the last 
Administration's nominees. So I do not think we should be 
pretending to hold these nominees before us to a different 
standard than those that Republican Senators voted for in the 
last Administration.
    But there is a fundamental difference between those 
nominees and these. These nominees are qualified for their job.
    I have to say Mr. Colon brings years of experience and 
dedication to HUD, if he were to be confirmed. Not only did he 
work on Sandy recovery, which as a New Jerseyan this is very 
important to me, but he currently oversees 450,000 affordable 
housing units. Mr. Colon embodies the type of nominee we would 
like to see more of--highly qualified, experienced, and, by the 
way, representatives of the communities that they serve.
    So I am happy to see he has been nominated to HUD, and I 
would hope the Biden administration follows through with more 
Latino nominations for this and every other agency.
    With that let me turn to my questions. Mr. Colon, we are 
nearly 9 years since Hurricane Sandy, which devastated New 
Jersey and New York and Northeast. What followed after the 
deadly natural disaster was a manmade disaster caused by a maze 
of FEMA, SBA, and HUD programs. After fighting in Congress to 
secure billions in CDBG-DR funding, my constituents used that 
aid to rebuild their homes and follow the rules in good faith.
    Nine years later, HUD is attempting to claw back from New 
Jerseyans the money they used to repair their homes and get 
back on their feet. I think this is absolutely ridiculous.
    So my question to you is, if you are confirmed, will you 
commit to working with my office to provide relief for Sandy 
survivors so that New Jerseyans who tried to follow the rules 
are not faced with unfair clawbacks?
    Mr. Colon. Thank you for the question, Senator. I am always 
open to legitimate solutions that will help families to better 
recover from natural disasters. If confirmed, I would be open 
to further discussing this issue with your office.
    Senator Menendez. OK. Well, I hope that that leads to a 
more conclusive answer. If people followed the rules, as they 
existed at the time, were not told that you were going to get a 
HUD loan and an SBA loan, and that therefore there was 
duplications, but you were not told that at the beginning, it 
is unfair to then subsequently tell them, ``Sorry, you should 
not have done that.'' But you did not tell they you should not 
do that. You don't think that is the way the Government should 
act, do you?
    Mr. Colon. I do not. I am unfamiliar with the specific 
circumstances, Senator.
    Senator Menendez. Take my scenario for truth for the 
moment. Would you think that is an inappropriate scenario?
    Mr. Colon. Inappropriate, I am sure whether it is legal or 
not. I am not sure whether the authority for that determination 
rests with my office or whether Congress would have to address 
it.
    Senator Menendez. Mr. Axelrod, the President, as a 
candidate, promised that he would return the jurisdiction of 
the export licensing of semiautomatic weapons from the Commerce 
Department back to the Department of State, from which 
President Trump took it. And, of course, the President can do 
this by simple regulation without the need for legislative 
approval. Until that happens, the Department is providing no 
information to Congress as to what lethal weapons, including 
sniper rifles, assaults rifles, and others, are being sold to 
what countries or foreign persons, in what quantities, and 
under what conditions.
    Do you support the President's promise to return 
jurisdiction to the Department of State, and until that is 
ultimately implemented will you commit to provide to the 
Committee of jurisdiction over arms sales specific information 
about what weapon sales are being considered for export?
    Mr. Jemison. Thank you, Senator. I do not know enough about 
the policy issue to have a view on--I know you feel very 
strongly about it. On the enforcement side I do not have a view 
on where those authorities should lie. But I will commit to you 
that until they are returned to the munitions that, if 
confirmed, I would make sure that we enforce aggressively. I 
also would commit to you, Senator----
    Senator Menendez. OK. I do not want to hear about 
enforcement. I am asking a simple thing, and, you know, it is 
amazing. I am trying to help you guys, but you are not helping 
yourselves.
    Information--that is all I want. I am not asking you to 
enforce. I want simple information. I chair the Senate Foreign 
Relations Committee. We have jurisdiction over arms sales. All 
I want to know is who the hell you are selling it to, and you 
cannot tell me that? How do you expect me to give you my vote? 
Explain to me.
    Mr. Jemison. Well, Senator, when it comes to information--
and apologies for not getting to that part of my answer more 
quickly--when it comes to information I do believe it is 
important, of course, for committees of jurisdiction to get the 
information they need to fulfill their oversight 
responsibilities, and I will work with you, with the Department 
of Commerce, if confirmed, to make sure you have the 
information necessary to do your job.
    Chairman Brown. Thank you, Senator Menendez. I believe 
Senator Scott and Tillis are not remote. OK. Then Senator 
Tester is recognized for 5 minutes.
    Senator Tester. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to thank 
you and the Ranking Member for holding this hearing.
    I cannot speak for any other State, but have got a notion 
they are in the same boat Montana is. Housing is at a premium. 
There are businesses that cannot expand because of lack of 
workforce housing. There are startups that cannot startup 
because of lack of workforce housing. And the houses that are 
there are really expensive because demand has driven the price 
way up, over the last 18 months.
    So, Ms. McCargo, how will you address barriers, or can you 
address barriers in your position to home ownership, across the 
country but particularly in rural America?
    Ms. McCargo. Thank you for the question, Senator Tester. 
The issues that you are raising in Montana are present all 
across the country. Home ownership--and I said this in my 
opening statements--is grossly unaffordable on a nationwide 
basis. Housing, not only for homeowners but also for renters, 
families are paying incredible amounts and are incredibly cost-
burdened by the cost of their housing.
    This is an issue that, if confirmed, you know, my role in 
sort of being able to effect home price appreciation and the 
things that are happening is limited. But we are going to be 
there. Ginnie Mae is there to support millions of families by 
providing capital, liquidity, and making sure that new rental 
housing projects that are financed and new home ownership 
opportunities that require mortgages have the capital that they 
need, and that is my commitment to being able to ensure that 
that continues.
    Senator Tester. Mr. Jemison, you are going to be head of 
Public and Indian Housing, in Indian country, at least the 
large land-based Tribes that do not have any gaming. I can 
speak for them because those are the ones in Montana, and there 
are other parts of the country too. Poverty is very high.
    I have said this before, but I was wanting to get Booker 
out to Montana so we could compare what urban poverty and rural 
poverty looks like and the challenges that exist both places, 
what is the best way for solutions, and particularly for 
housing. Because as people have pointed out in this panel 
already there are multiple generations living in one house in 
Indian country.
    How will you work to make sure that there is more housing 
availability in Indian country?
    Mr. Jemison. Senator, thank you for the chance to answer 
this question. One of the things I am most excited about doing, 
as part of this job, if confirmed, is going to Indian country 
and engaging in the Nation-to-Nation consultation that our 
President has called for, and through that begin to work on a 
range of the housing issues in Indian country. You know, by way 
of example, there is Section 184 loan guarantee program about 
which there has been a lot of recent discussion, working to get 
title so that people can acquire homes that they want to 
acquire on Indian land.
    Another example, I mean, I have had a chance to get focused 
on many of the best practices and great projects that have come 
out of that Nation-to-Nation Tribal consultation, if I am 
confirmed, one of my first actions is going to be to go and 
begin that discussion, because I think that is the way, in all 
of my work, I have been able to help people develop the housing 
that they need in their community, using the resources 
available through HUD to make it possible.
    Senator Tester. OK. I want to talk a little bit about 
vouchers, and help me understand this, OK? I know some people 
that have some rental units in a town very close to me that 
were approached by a bigger company that says it will rent your 
house for you, and we will get your more money than you could 
ever get renting it, than you could ever get with somebody 
using vouchers.
    Can you explain to me why that would be, number one, and 
number two, what you would do about it? Because, you know, 
vouchers are there to help people pay their rent, but if the 
house is not available because people can make more money 
renting it to people who do not have vouchers it does not get 
us where we need to be. Could you talk about that?
    Mr. Jemison. Thank you, Senator, for the chance to answer 
your question. To make sure I am understanding, a person, who 
you are speaking about, said that they could make more money by 
not renting to voucher holders?
    Senator Tester. That is correct. That is correct, because a 
bigger rental outfit has come in and said, ``Hey, look, you 
know, here is the deal. We can make you more money.''
    Mr. Jemison. So the issue would probably be that fair 
market rents, or FMRs, in that area are lower than market 
rents----
    Senator Tester. Yep.
    Mr. Jemison. ----and that there has maybe been such a rapid 
appreciation based on my understanding of your conversation 
before, such a rapid appreciation----
    Senator Tester. Yep.
    Mr. Jemison. ----in price that the FMRs have not been 
adjusted yet.
    Senator Tester. So I am out of time, but can you tell me 
how we fix it? Is it as simple as you fixing the FMRs, or do we 
have to fix them, or is it something else that we have to do?
    Mr. Jemison. FMRs need to be adjusted so that they better 
reflect the market. There is an annual change system that goes 
through with that, but I think it is something--it sounds like 
we need to move more quickly so that we are more responsive to 
every part of the country in this way.
    Senator Tester. All right. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. 
Chairman and Ranking Member.
    Chairman Brown. Thank you, Senator Tester. Senator Smith, I 
believe, is online from her office. She is recognized for 5 
minutes.
    Senator Smith. Well, good morning, Mr. Chair, Ranking 
Member, and welcome and congratulations to all of our nominees 
today. I am grateful for your willingness to serve our country.
    I am going to direct my questions today to Mr. Jemison. 
Thank you so much, sir, for the great conversation we had 
recently, and I just want to follow up on those conversations.
    So the first question is about life and safety and fire 
issues in public housing. As we discussed, on Wednesday morning 
at 3:56 a.m., in November of 2019, 1 day before Thanksgiving, 
Minneapolis firefighters were dispatched to the Cedar High 
high-rise, which is a 49-year-old high-rise public housing 
building. And when they arrived they found a fire on the 14th 
floor of that building.
    The firefighters went to work. They attacked the fire and 
they called for backup, but tragically, five people were killed 
before firefighters were able to bring the fire under control. 
And according to the fire marshal, if the building had been 
equipped with fire sprinklers, which it was not, those deaths 
would not have occurred.
    So I am committed to making sure that this kind of tragedy 
does not happen again in public housing. HUD estimates that 
there are 185,000 high-rise public housing units in this 
country that do not have fire sprinklers.
    So, Mr. Jemison, if you are confirmed, what will you do to 
make sure that this kind of tragedy does not happen again, and 
where does this problem rank, the problem of sprinklers in 
buildings, or lack of sprinklers in high-rise buildings? Where 
does it rank on your list of priorities to work on in public 
and Indian housing?
    Mr. Jemison. Senator, thank you for the chance to answer 
this question, and I enjoyed our conversation earlier this 
week.
    As I mentioned, one of the things I am most focused and 
interested in is working on Indian housing matters, but first 
and foremost we are part of a system of ownership and property 
management all around the country. So in that respect, we are 
supposed to provide safe, clean, and decent housing. Safe is 
the first part of that phrase. So making sure that life safety 
improvements are part of the--the number one priority in the 
capital rehabilitation of public housing, we share that passion 
together. It has got to be number one. Our housing authority 
leaders are faced often with more than one crisis that they 
have to address, but life safety has got to be the first one.
    So what I think you are going to see me focus on is 
highlighting the critical nature of these improvements and then 
ideally, if there are additional resources available to the 
public housing system it will be faster, and we can even 
accomplish more above and beyond life safety if we have 
additional resources.
    So it is going to be my focus, like yours, on life safety 
improvements as part of the current capital allocations that 
our housing authorities receive.
    Senator Smith. Well, Senator Brown and I and many of us on 
this Committee are working hard to make sure that you do have 
additional resources so that people who are living in public 
housing have a decent place to life and a safe place to life, 
and putting fire sprinklers, in my mind, at the top of that 
list for life safety is urgently important so that the tragedy 
of what happened at the Cedar High Apartments in Minneapolis is 
not duplicated in the 185,000 units around the country that 
also do not have sprinkler systems. So it is crucially 
important to me.
    We just have a minute left, and I wanted to just maybe 
follow up a little bit on Senator Tester's question about the 
significant challenges of housing in Native communities. You 
and I also had a chance to speak about this earlier this week. 
Could you just tell us a little bit more about how you would 
approach your leadership of the Office of Native American 
Programs at HUD and what you will do to familiarize yourselves 
with the unique housing challenges that Native communities 
face, especially on Tribal land?
    Mr. Jemison. Thank you, Senator, for this question. So as I 
mentioned when we talked about this, one of my first actions is 
going to be beginning to engage through the Nation-to-Nation 
consultation process to get an understanding of what--because 
again, each Tribe is different and has different challenges.
    But one challenges I know that you and I have talked about, 
on which you are particularly focused, is the Section 184 loan 
guarantee program, and the hindrance, frankly, that is coming 
out of the Administration of that program historically. I am 
committed to helping you with that, moving our agency and BIA 
together to more quickly clear title.
    Senator Smith. Thank you very much. Thank you, Mr. Chair.
    Chairman Brown. Thank you, Senator Smith. Senator Van 
Hollen is recognized for 5 minutes.
    Senator Van Hollen. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 
Congratulations to all of you on your nominations.
    Mr. Colon, let me start with you, and the question is going 
to relate to using home grants to increase home ownership 
opportunities, because, as you know, we have a big housing 
shortage in the country. But when you look at the HOME 
Investments Partnership Program, since it began in 1992, $36 
billion in home funding that has been spent, $21 billion of 
that has gone to rental housing activities while only $9 
billion has gone to home buyer activities. And I have heard 
from lots of community groups in Maryland, including an 
organization called BUILD--I do not know if you are familiar 
with them--also from Metro IAF, and according to them there is 
just not enough funding from home directed to these home 
ownership purposes.
    There was a program, and a successful one, launched a long 
time ago called the Nehemiah housing program in Brooklyn. It 
was successfully implemented in East Baltimore. Can you 
identify some of the barriers that exist in the current HOME 
program that is essentially preventing it from being used for 
those kinds of, I think, creative and successful housing 
programs?
    Mr. Colon. Thank you, Senator, for the opportunity to 
address this important issue. I share your concern with the 
increasing cost of home ownership and home construction. I know 
that home ownership is an important priority for Secretary 
Fudge.
    In my own experience, HOME has been a critical and very 
effective program for States and communities. However, I 
understand the use of home ownership under HOME has declined 
over time, as well as the statistics that you mentioned.
    If confirmed, I commit to working with Congress to identify 
and address any statutory, and working with my team, to 
identify regulatory issues. I do understand that there are some 
issues with, I believe, the pricing and some flexibility that I 
commit to sitting down with my team, if and when I am 
confirmed, and making those a priority to make sure that HOME 
is more flexible and that we can get those home ownership rates 
up.
    Senator Van Hollen. I appreciate that. You know, we have to 
obviously focus on both sides of the equation. We have to 
increase the supply of homes overall. We also, in my view, need 
to ensure supply of choice vouchers, especially focused on 
families with kids, and give them mobility and wraparound 
services. But just looking at the HOME program, it does seem 
like a disproportionate amount of the funds were used to build 
the rental properties or help with that piece of the equation 
and not enough in terms of providing paths to home ownership 
for lower-income and middle-income families. My understanding 
is there are these impediments, and hopefully we can address 
them in a regulatory manner.
    Ms. McCargo, congratulations on your nomination. I want to 
ask you about increasing access to consumer credit in a safe 
and sound way. In August, Fannie Mae announced that it would 
launch a new feature in its underwriting system that 
incorporates consumers' rent payments in a mortgage credit 
evaluation process. Single family lenders with permission from 
mortgage applicants will be able to automatically identify 
recurring rent payments in the applicant's bank statement data, 
to deliver a more inclusive credit assessment that would also 
comply with safety and soundness requirements.
    I know you worked at the Urban Institute and your research 
focused on reducing racial home ownership gaps, increasing 
housing affordability and reducing barriers to accessing 
credit. I am asking you at Ginnie Mae, whether you would 
consider applying this same expanded, more inclusive credit 
rating approach that Fannie Mae has adopted.
    Ms. McCargo. Senator, thank you for that important 
question. You raised one of the critical barriers to entry into 
home ownership which is access to credit and credit history and 
credit scoring, and that has been part of my past work has 
really focused on the over 25, 30 million Americans that do not 
have a credit score at all. Many of them are renters. Many of 
them have positive rental history. And that is a major barrier 
to being able to get your first home if you do not have a 
credit history.
    So I have studied this issue. I have seen the 
recommendations at Fannie, that the GSEs are putting out around 
rental income as a way to become a homeowner. And I, if 
confirmed, at Ginnie Mae while we do not do direct underwriting 
work, would work with any program that the FHA, VA, Rural 
Housing Service, or Indian country home ownership programs 
would look at to expand access to credit for more Americans, 
and Ginnie Mae would be there to support those programs.
    Senator Van Hollen. I appreciate it. It just seems to me a 
way to move relatively quickly to expand home ownership 
opportunities by addressing the credit issue. Thank you.
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
    Chairman Brown. Thanks, Senator Van Hollen. Senator Tillis 
from North Carolina is recognized for 5 minutes.
    Senator Tillis. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and 
congratulations to the nominees before the Committee.
    Mr. Colon, I think it is true, and I think some people have 
talked about it--I have been watching this from my office--that 
some people want to change the discussion back to maybe some of 
the inappropriate tweets of President Trump. I actually 
publicly criticized some of those tweets, but the American 
people elected him. And now it almost seems like these are not 
things that we should consider for any nominees coming before 
the Committee.
    I was just in a Judiciary Committee hearing this week where 
one of the nominees, 31 years ago, made a statement, and was 
roundly criticized by some of my colleagues on my side of the 
aisle, and I saw that as a statement that this person has twice 
now before me regretted. That was maybe a lapse of judgment.
    But the concern that I have with you, as a nominee, is a 
pattern of behavior, and quite honestly, it is unprecedented in 
my six-and-a-half years being in the Senate.
    We frequently hear that retweets do not equal endorsements. 
What are your thoughts on this?
    Mr. Colon. Senator, thank you for the question. I would 
like to start by saying, again, in connection with those 
tweets, they were wrong and a personal approach that I have 
never--I engaged in for the first and only time in my life.
    Senator Tillis. How about some of your actual quotes, those 
that have to naturally--and if it was not just one but 
multiple, have to really express your thoughts and feelings.
    Mr. Colon. I am sorry, Senator. I did not understand the 
question.
    Senator Tillis. Well, Mr. Colon, how many people will work 
in the organization you are seeking confirmation for?
    Mr. Colon. In HUD, Senator?
    Senator Tillis. Yeah.
    Mr. Colon. Thousands.
    Senator Tillis. Mm-hmm. You know, you would be the 
administrator of many grant programs run by HUD, and they would 
be in blue States, they would be in purple States, they would 
be in red States. You would be in an organization that has 
thousands of people, who probably run across the political 
spectrum.
    So with that in mind, many people who probably voted for 
Trump, probably supported him both times that he ran, can you 
explain to me what the acronym PAB, or PPAB means?
    Mr. Colon. To be honest, Senator, I do not recall, but I 
can tell you that----
    Senator Tillis. Well, we have got a graphic here, if it 
helps.
    Mr. Colon. Thank you, and I just want to say, I appreciate 
your concerns and I understand completely.
    Senator Tillis. But coming in as a manager of this 
organization, again, I have read your letter. I understand you 
are remorseful. But the fact of the matter is the information 
is out there, and what Senator Toomey said earlier, some of it 
is not out there and we have not been able to get it from you. 
We can probably have people go back on WayBack or other 
platforms and find it.
    This is what we know, and this is what you were comfortable 
with saying in what is clearly a public setting. Nobody 
believes when they go on Twitter it is a private setting, 
people sitting around cutting up, like we all do.
    You know, this is a pattern of behavior, and you are 
seeking a management role in an organization where I would have 
to believe people would say that it would be threatening to 
know that their boss has--even if you regret the words, the 
sentiment is the same. Even if the language was cleaner, the 
sentiment is the same. And it would just lead me to believe it 
could create a toxic--how could anybody who has this view, and 
maybe they were on Twitter and said, ``I support Donald 
Trump,'' how could they have any reasonable expectation that 
they would be treated fairly under your management?
    Mr. Colon. I can tell you that, Senator, in 13 years of 
administering some of the largest housing programs in the 
country, working collaboratively across the aisle with both 
Republican and Democratic officials, in rural, suburban, and 
urban regions, I am unaware of a single complaint of 
partisanship or bias or inappropriate behavior against me or my 
office. I understand the concerns you are raising. I could only 
point out that record, and I could only offer my apology and 
commit to you that if confirmed, I can tell you that I am 100 
percent committed to working collaboratively, and as I have my 
entire career, in a bipartisan fashion to address the important 
issues in every State.
    Senator Tillis. Well, Mr. Colon, I just feel like 
statements that you have made about female anchors on 
television, this interaction that I will submit for the record, 
it just really makes me wonder why--you knew this going into 
it--why you even decided to come forward. I think it raises 
questions. There are going to be people in an organization you 
are seeking confirmation for that I believe would have grave 
concerns.
    And to the other nominees, I am going to submit some 
questions for the record. I know that it does not completely 
swim into your lanes on manufactured housing and a couple of 
other issues, affordable housing, but we will get back with you 
all for questions for the record.
    Thank you, Mr. Chair.
    Chairman Brown. Thank you, Senator Tillis.
    Senator Ossoff is recognized for 5 minutes from Georgia, 
from his office.
    Senator Ossoff. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you to the 
panelists. Congratulations on your nominations, and thank you 
for your willingness to serve.
    Mr. Jemison, I would like to engage with you on the 
question of affordable housing. We have an affordable housing 
crisis in Georgia. Just to illustrate that, there is a shortage 
of nearly 200,000 affordable housing units in our State. It is 
a crisis in all of our major metro areas and in rural areas. It 
is a crisis in metro Atlanta. It is a crisis in Savannah. It is 
a crisis in Columbus, in Macon, and Athens.
    What I want to ask you, Mr. Jemison, is, do you agree that 
it is vital that we respond to this crisis by making policy 
that increases the available stock of housing for prospective 
home buyers and renters, and what policies do you believe that 
Congress could implement or the Executive alone could implement 
that will increase housing supply, where a shortage of housing 
in metro Atlanta, across the State of Georgia, is driving this 
crisis?
    Mr. Jemison. Senator, thank you for the chance to answer 
this question. I agree that there needs to be significant 
investment to create additional affordable housing supply. The 
role that housing authorities can play in this is very great. 
There is current discussion, and I do know that the Build Back 
Better proposal includes what would be historic and once-in-a-
generation investments in affordable housing.
    In particular, they would address the shortage of 
affordable housing in all of our communities. The public 
housing section's role in this is to create affordable housing 
that serves the very lowest-income Americans and also through 
vouchers serves a broad range of Americans. We can be part of 
the supply solution if we have the resources to do it.
    The resources proposed in the Build Back Better plan have 
the chance to really help us bring public housing into the 21st 
century and make it the kind of asset that we all know that it 
can be, that it needs to be, to answer the supply questions 
that you are asking.
    Senator Ossoff. Well, thank you, Mr. Jemison.
    Mr. Jemison, I would like to secure a commitment from you 
and Mr. Colon that you will come to the State of Georgia, that 
you will visit, at minimum, the city of Atlanta and the city of 
Savannah and the city of Columbus to meet with local elected 
officials and leaders and my team to help chart a course, a 
strategy, for increasing the availability of affordable housing 
in our State, working with Federal partners.
    Mr. Jemison, can you give me that commitment?
    Mr. Jemison. Senator, I would make that commitment today, 
to come to Georgia and meet with you and elected officials 
hopefully, housing authority leadership as well. Creating a 
strategy with numbers and measurables has been part of my work 
for 25 years, along with community engagement, and I would love 
to bring that personally to visit with you in Georgia.
    Senator Ossoff. Thank you. Mr. Colon, will you head to 
Georgia, if confirmed, to help map out a strategy to make more 
affordable housing available to Georgians?
    Mr. Colon. Thank you, Senator. If confirmed, I would be 
more than glad to come to Georgia and to collaborate with my 
colleague, Arthur, to do as much as possible as we could to 
address the issues in the State of Georgia.
    Senator Ossoff. Thank you.
    Ms. McCargo, in 2007-2008, GSEs played a significant role 
in the development of crises in the housing market and in the 
market for mortgage-backed securities that precipitated the 
financial crisis. What are the most important lessons learned 
from that time that you will apply, if confirmed to this 
position, to ensure that we avoid financial contagion that can 
emanate from the housing market or the MBS market and threaten 
financial stability and the broader economy?
    Ms. McCargo. Thank you very much for that question, 
Senator. There are many lessons learned from the prior crisis, 
and, you know, the current pandemic and the current housing 
crisis that we are in is very different than the last crisis, 
and many safeguards have been put in place. Many new tools are 
now available that were not available during the last crisis. 
Congress has moved quickly to put forbearance in place through 
the CARES Act, which has had a tremendous effect on giving 
ample time for the industry, servicers, and otherwise to 
respond to this and to ensure that borrowers stay in their 
homes, who are able to do so and endure this recovery.
    So I commit to working with you, Senator, if I am 
confirmed, to be the President of Ginnie Mae, to ensure that 
all the loss mitigation options that are in place are 
protective and that we are constantly stewarding and making 
sure that there is safety and soundness in the systems, and the 
underlying risks that exist with Ginnie Mae issuers, that are 
real and important and will be a priority for me.
    Thank you, Senator.
    Senator Ossoff. Thank you, Ms. McCargo. Thank you Mr. 
Chairman.
    Chairman Brown. Thank you, Senator Ossoff. I believe that 
is all the Senators who are online or in person.
    Oh, Senator Cortez Masto is still here. Senator Cortez 
Masto is recognized from her office.
    Senator Cortez Masto. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you 
everyone. Congratulations to the nominees.
    Let me say this, Mr. Jemison. You are going to be very 
busy, if nominated, because I am going to invite you to Nevada 
as well. We have 27 Tribes in the State of Nevada. And let me 
align myself with the questioning from Senators Tester and 
Smith. My goal has been working with our Tribal communities to 
really improve home ownership for Native Americans. And as you 
rightfully touched on, unfortunately, in Nevada, very few home 
loans were made with HUD Section 184 loan guarantee program.
    So I am looking forward to you coming out for that Tribal 
consultation and working with our Tribes and so many others on 
home ownership.
    But let me just put something on your radar as well, which 
is manufactured housing. Native Americans who buy homes on 
reservation land buy manufactured homes. About one-third of new 
homes on Tribal land are manufactured homes, and the Federal 
Reserve research finds that manufactured home loans are much 
more likely to be high-cost loans.
    So, Mr. Jemison, if confirmed, I am hoping that your office 
would help us improve the manufactured home market to lower the 
cost of mortgages for home buyers, especially Native Americans 
purchasing manufactured homes. Can you commit to that?
    Mr. Jemison. Thank you, Senator, for the chance to answer 
the question. Just to make sure that I am hearing you properly, 
the question is, I am definitely interested in meeting the 
right group of people to address the home loan crisis that you 
are talking about. I am not certain that the specific loan 
program that you are talking about is under the control of my 
section.
    But one of the things that I enjoy about my work, and I 
know is true about ONAP, the Office of Native American 
Programs, is that we often convene and bring together the 
people that are required to resolve an issue. So I would be 
very happy to bring together, if it is FHA, if it is my 
colleague, Ms. McCargo, whatever organizations are required to 
be brought together to address this issue, I am going to be 
there to make sure that it happens.
    And I would just further say that I have had some 
experience with manufactured housing and know some of the 
underlying issues there, and as a part of my work at ONAP I am 
excited about being able to address some of them, because they 
are important. They are important to not just Tribes but every 
part of the country and every kind of American.
    But I am particularly excited about working with you on 
this and convening that group of people.
    Senator Cortez Masto. Thank you. And thank you for your 
comments because I could not agree more. I am really kind of 
disappointed, at times, when individuals just work in their 
silos and they do not think outside the box in Federal 
Government and pull partners together. And so that is what I am 
looking for is that collaboration. When you see an issue it may 
not be within your specific jurisdiction, but you reach out to 
others within Federal Government to help find solutions to the 
problems and bring them into the conversation. So thank you for 
that. That is so important.
    Ms. McCargo, let me ask you this. Why is it important that 
the Senate confirm a Ginnie Mae president? I know we have not 
had a Senate-confirmed leader at Ginnie Mae for years.
    Ms. McCargo. Thank you for that question, Senator. Ginnie 
Mae has been without a Senate-confirmed leader since 2017. You 
know, there are a lot of reasons why this is--Ginnie Mae, over 
this period of time, over the last decade, has grown 
tremendously in terms of the assets under management and the 
risks that are present, and there have been great career staff 
that have been there. But without a confirmed leader that is--
really, that the Senate has backed, the United States 
Government guarantee that Ginnie Mae offers is one of the most 
important elements of what Ginnie Mae is and what makes our 
securities, puts them in so much demand across the globe.
    And so having a leader confirmed by the Senate, and backed 
by the Senate, to support the guarantee of the U.S. Government, 
full faith in credit, is absolutely crucial. And I look forward 
to, if confirmed, having the opportunity to demonstrate that 
and show the leadership that Ginnie Mae and the security, the 
stability of the security will have and what that will mean for 
the growth of the agency going forward.
    Senator Cortez Masto. Thank you. I appreciate, again, your 
answers. Let me put another thing on your radar.
    I know in 2018, Ginnie Mae launched a modernization 
campaign called Ginnie Mae 2020. It was a 3-year strategic plan 
to have its data centers running on cutting-edge technology, to 
realign its counterparty risk management framework, to help 
bring in additional financing for mortgage servicing rights, 
and expand its global investor base through outreach and 
education in dozens of countries across the globe.
    If confirmed, would you continue with the Ginnie Mae 2020 
initiative, or would you change it in some way?
    Ms. McCargo. Thank you for that question. The Ginnie Mae 
2020 initiative, you know, by all accounts has been very 
successful. The efforts to modernize the securitization 
platform are crucial. We need to have state-of-the-art 
technology that runs this business. And the counterparty risk 
management work that this team has put in place over the last 5 
years, and even very recently, in the last two to 3 years, is 
critical and has to be second to none.
    And so the stress testing, the work that they are doing to 
make sure that counterparties are safe, these are really 
important innovations, and a lot of the work from the 2020 plan 
is still underway. Much of it has been completed and there is a 
lot more to do.
    So I do commit to you that if confirmed, I would continue 
to work with the team on modernization of the platform and 
ensuring that our risk management is sound.
    Senator Cortez Masto. Thank you. Mr. Chairman, I know I am 
out of time. I will submit the rest of my questions for the 
record. Thank you.
    Chairman Brown. Thank you, Senator Cortez Masto. Thank you 
to the nominees for being here today and providing testimony 
and a productive discussion of the issues. I hope we can work 
together as a Committee to move forward quickly on the 
nominations of these four very qualified nominees.
    For Senators who wish to submit questions, those questions 
are due at the close of business on Wednesday, October 13th. We 
would ask each of the four of you to have your responses back 
to us by noon on Tuesday, October 19th.
    Thank you again for your testimony. With that the hearing 
is adjourned.
    [Whereupon, at 11:26 a.m., the hearing was adjourned.]
    [Prepared statements, biographical sketches of nominees, 
and responses to written questions supplied for the record 
follow:]
              PREPARED STATEMENT OF CHAIRMAN SHERROD BROWN
    First, I would like to say a word about our Committee and our 
tolerance for character assassinations. Until yesterday, I thought we 
all recognized that McCarthyism has no place in our democratic society.
    Any American citizen who fled communist repression--whether FDIC 
Chair Jelena McWilliams or OCC nominee Saule Omarova--should be lauded 
for her courage and her conviction.
    Anyone who hears Professor Omarova's story of life in the Soviet 
Union will understand how offensive the attacks on her character are.
    I have faith that my colleagues, on BOTH sides of the aisle, will 
reject these modern-day ``red scare'' tactics.
    The Committee meets today to consider the nominations of: Matthew 
Axelrod to be Assistant Secretary for Export Enforcement at the 
Department of Commerce; Alanna McCargo to be President for the 
Government National Mortgage Association; James Arthur Jemison II to be 
Assistant Secretary for Public and Indian Housing at HUD; and Mark 
Colon to be Assistant Secretary for Community Planning and Development 
at HUD.
    We congratulate the nominees and thank them for appearing here 
today. We welcome their families and friends in attendance, and 
watching from home. If confirmed, the nominees before us today would 
play a significant role in protecting U.S. national security interests, 
expanding housing opportunities for millions of Americans, and 
supporting families searching for a safe and affordable place to live.
    As Assistant Secretary for Export Enforcement, Mr. Axelrod would be 
responsible for leading a division within the Commerce Department's 
Bureau of Industry and Security that detects, investigates, and deters 
illegal behavior.
    As President of the Government National Mortgage Association, or 
Ginnie Mae, Ms. McCargo would play a significant role in expanding 
funding for mortgages and making home ownership a reality for millions 
of Americans across the country, including in Ohio.
    As the Assistant Secretary for Public and Indian Housing, Mr. 
Jemison would be responsible for leading an office dedicated to 
ensuring vulnerable families across the country have a decent place to 
call home.
    And, finally, as Assistant Secretary for Community Planning and 
Development, Mr. Colon would be responsible for leading an office 
working to support communities in all our States. All four nominees 
appearing here today are highly qualified.
    Mr. Axelrod has a distinguished record of service as a Government 
prosecutor. He is currently detailed to the Office of the White House 
Counsel from the Department of Justice.
    Before that, Mr. Axelrod served in several roles at DOJ, working to 
protect our national security and working on criminal prosecutions.
    Welcome to the Committee, Mr. Axelrod.
    Alanna McCargo currently serves as Senior Advisor for housing 
finance at HUD. Prior to joining the Biden administration, Ms. McCargo 
served as Vice President for the Housing Finance Policy Center at the 
Urban Institute, where she focused on reducing the racial home 
ownership gap and making housing more affordable.
    Ms. McCargo also has 10 years of experience at Fannie Mae, 
including during the last financial crisis.
    We are glad to have you here today, Ms. McCargo.
    Mr. Jemison currently serves as the Principal Deputy Assistant 
Secretary for the Office of Community Planning and Development at HUD. 
Prior to joining the Biden administration, Mr. Jemison held numerous 
positions for the City of Detroit--most recently leading the city's 
development agenda.
    He has also served the public in Massachusetts and the District of 
Columbia, all working on issues related to creating vibrant, growing, 
affordable communities.
    Welcome, Mr. Jemison. We are glad to have you here today.
    Our final nominee today is Mark Colon.
    Mr. Colon currently serves as the President of the Office of 
Housing Preservation at New York State Homes and Community Renewal.
    In various roles at that agency, Mr. Colon has served the people of 
New York, working to build and protect affordable housing, and helping 
families recover from Superstorm Sandy. Welcome, Mr. Colon. We are 
grateful to the nominees for appearing here today, and for their 
willingness to serve the American people in these important roles. I 
look forward to your testimonies.
            PREPARED STATEMENT OF SENATOR PATRICK J. TOOMEY
    Mr. Chairman, thank you. And welcome to our nominees.
    Mr. Axelrod has been nominated to serve as Assistant Secretary for 
Export Enforcement in the Commerce Department's Bureau of Industry and 
Security, or BIS. BIS determines which U.S. goods are too sensitive to 
be shipped abroad.
    In the face of China's drive for dominance in key tech sectors, 
BIS's mission today is as important as ever. But export controls are 
only as good as their enforcement.
    Mr. Axelrod would have the important job of overseeing that 
enforcement. I expect him to give his own answers to questions from 
this Committee, including questions for the record, in a timely and 
transparent manner, which is something BIS nominees have not always 
done.
    Today's other nominees would, if confirmed, fill key leadership 
positions at HUD.
    In response to COVID, Congress appropriated billions of dollars for 
HUD programs, in addition to the billions we normally provide for them. 
In March, the Democrats' partisan spending bill sent billions more to 
HUD.
    Now Democrats are trying to use their reckless tax-and-spending 
reconciliation bill to provide more than $300 billion to HUD. 
Unfortunately, based on their records, I'm concerned that today's 
nominees may be ill-suited to be good stewards of these taxpayer 
dollars.
    Ms. McCargo has been nominated to serve as the President of Ginnie 
Mae. After the 2008 financial crisis, she was responsible at Fannie Mae 
for implementing the Home Affordable Modification Program, or HAMP, 
which was intended to help borrowers avoid foreclosure.
    HAMP was beset with challenges. A special Inspector General found 
that a significant share of borrowers in HAMP--people who had already 
defaulted because they couldn't afford their initial mortgage--received 
loan modifications then defaulted again. And GAO found inconsistencies 
in how loan servicers interfaced with borrowers, which GAO claimed 
could lead to inequitable treatment.
    Fast forward to today. Ginnie Mae recently rolled out a proposal to 
help borrowers by transitioning them from COVID-related mortgage 
forbearance into loan modifications for up to 40 years. Ms. McCargo has 
endorsed this idea.
    If confirmed, Ms. McCargo will need to be vigilant to ensure the 
challenges that HAMP faced do not reappear for borrowers--and 
taxpayers--with this latest taxpayer-backed scheme to subsidize certain 
people's mortgages.
    Mr. Jemison has been nominated to serve as the Assistant Secretary 
responsible for public housing and Indian housing. For almost 7 years, 
he worked on housing issues for Detroit, a city so chronically 
mismanaged that it had to file for bankruptcy in 2013.
    Under Mr. Jemison's leadership, Detroit often failed to revitalize 
blighted homes and neighborhoods on time as promised. Amazingly, city 
officials admitted that they set aggressive construction timelines 
without any data to support them.
    Mr. Jemison's track record in Detroit is concerning because 
Democrats and the White House want to spend $80 billion more on public 
housing in their reckless tax-and-spend reconciliation bill. If 
confirmed, Mr. Jemison, would lead HUD's public housing office, which 
would be responsible for this enormous amount of money.
    Our last nominee today, Mr. Colon, has a particularly concerning 
record. He's had senior management roles at New York housing agencies 
that have been rife with problems--from project delays to ignoring 
ever--increasing tenant complaints--according to independent auditors.
    These failures, which occurred under Mr. Colon's watch, give me no 
confidence that he would be a good steward of taxpayer dollars at HUD. 
However, what's even more troubling about Mr. Colon's record is his 
history of using Twitter to engage in vitriolic and profane attacks on 
his political opponents.
    Over the years, he's repeatedly mocked and attacked--by name--our 
Senate colleagues. He's ridiculed Senator Manchin. He referred to 
Senators Collins and other Republicans as ``clowns.'' Senator Graham as 
``Senator Snagglepuss'' and ``#SenatorShameless,'' Senator Rubio as 
``Senator Jellyfish,'' Senator Paul as spineless, Senator McConnell as 
``MassacreMitch'' and ``Moscow Mitch.''
    He's endorsed the slanderous claim that Republican Senators, 
including Members of this Committee, were ``Russian stooges'' for 
traveling there on a CODEL. And he's gone on profanity-laced tirades 
about President Trump. This is just a small selection.
    Unfortunately, we don't know the full extent of Mr. Colon's 
statements because he deleted some of them before being nominated. I 
asked him to try to recover his deleted tweets from Twitter. But he 
refused to comply with this reasonable request. It makes you wonder, 
what does he have to hide?
    The statements we do have from Mr. Colon are more than sufficient 
to demonstrate that he lacks the judgment and temperament to serve in a 
senior leadership position at HUD. Frankly, I'm shocked and 
disappointed that the Biden administration did not withdraw his 
nomination months ago after his statements were uncovered.
    Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
                                 ______
                                 
                 PREPARED STATEMENT OF MATTHEW AXELROD
                To Be an Assistant Secretary of Commerce
                            October 7, 2021
    Chairman Brown, Ranking Member Toomey, and distinguished Members of 
the Committee, I am honored to be here today as President Biden's 
nominee to become the Assistant Secretary for Export Enforcement at the 
Department of Commerce.
    I want to thank President Biden and Secretary Raimondo for 
nominating me to this important enforcement and national security 
position at this critical time. I also want to thank my family, both 
those in the hearing room with me today--my wife, Jami, and daughter, 
Sophie, who is missing her high school American Government class but 
getting a firsthand look today--as well as those watching intently on 
their computer screens in Massachusetts and Florida--Sophie's older 
sister, Emily, my parents Carl and Andrea Axelrod, and my in-laws Jon 
and Margie Sussman. No one does these jobs alone. It is only through my 
family's collective love, support, and belief in the importance of 
Government service that I am able to appear before you today as a 
Presidential nominee.
    In recent years, the export enforcement work of the Department of 
Commerce has become an increasingly pivotal component of our country's 
national security efforts. It is an essential function that helps 
ensure our adversaries don't have access to dual-use goods and 
technologies that they can put to malign purposes like terrorism, 
weapons-of-mass-destruction proliferation, and human rights abuses. If 
confirmed, I believe that my deep criminal and national security 
enforcement experience will allow me to effectively lead the dedicated 
agents and analysts of BIS in meeting this national security 
imperative.
    As an Assistant United States Attorney in Miami, I was part of one 
of the Nation's busiest U.S. Attorney's Offices. Given Miami's role in 
international commerce, both licit and illicit, our work often had 
international dimensions. My cases included ones against the two 
founders and highest-ranking members of the Cali Cartel and against a 
husband-and-wife team who were spying for the Cuban Intelligence 
Service. In all my cases as a prosecutor, both those with international 
angles and those that were purely domestic, I worked alongside Federal 
law enforcement agents. I was--and remain--in awe of all they do to 
help keep the American people safe.
    After 6 years in Miami, I became a career detailee to Department of 
Justice headquarters in Washington, DC, where I worked as a Senior 
Counsel to the Assistant Attorney General for the Criminal Division and 
then as an Associate Deputy Attorney General, responsible for 
overseeing the criminal enforcement work of the Department. I also 
later served as the Principal Associate Deputy Attorney General, where 
I worked with the Department's senior leaders on the Department's most 
significant national security and criminal enforcement matters. During 
my time at Main Justice, I worked closely with the career prosecutors 
in the National Security Division, with Federal law enforcement 
agencies, and with interagency partners to protect the country's 
national security. I am confident that the relationships I formed, and 
the knowledge I gained about the importance of bringing a whole-of-
Government approach to combat national security threats, will serve me 
well if confirmed.
    While I come from an enforcement background, that's not the 
entirety of my professional experience. I spent much of the past 4 
years in an international law firm, where my work took me around the 
globe, from Europe to Asia to Africa. No matter where I was in the 
world, people wanted to hear about United States enforcement 
mechanisms; it was our enforcement regimes they wanted to make sure 
they did not run afoul of. That experience gave me an important 
perspective on how best to maximize the impact of our export 
enforcement work--we must impose significant penalties against those 
who break the law while at the same time incentivizing companies to 
play by the rules. That way, we not only punish export violators, but 
also deter those violations from occurring in the first place.
    I mentioned that my daughter Sophie is missing her high school 
Government class to be here today. Back when I was in high school, my 
classmates and I were consistently told that ``from those to whom much 
has been given, much will be expected.'' I am filled with gratitude 
beyond measure for what I've been given over the years--by my family, 
my friends, and my professional colleagues. I know that means that much 
will continue to be expected. If confirmed, it would be my great honor 
to work to fulfill those expectations as the Assistant Secretary for 
Export Enforcement.
    Thank you again for considering my nomination, and I look forward 
to your questions.


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                  PREPARED STATEMENT OF ALANNA MCCARGO
 To Be President, Government National Mortgage Association, Department 
                    of Housing and Urban Development
                            October 7, 2021
    Chairman Brown, Ranking Member Toomey, and Members of the 
Committee, it is an honor to appear before you as you consider my 
nomination to serve as the next President of the Government National 
Mortgage Association, or Ginnie Mae.
    I am grateful to President Biden for nominating me and thank 
Secretary Fudge for her leadership and vision for the Department of 
Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and in trusting me to lead Ginnie 
Mae. The historic significance of being the first woman nominated to 
this role since Ginnie Mae was created in 1968 is a distinct honor.
    My husband Jay McCargo and my daughter Alexandra are here with me 
today and I thank them for being a loving source of inspiration, 
encouragement, and support. I want to thank my family members and 
friends watching virtually, and acknowledge my mother, Veronica 
Malveaux Brown, who has been my wise and faithful guide through life. I 
would also like to especially thank my amazing sons, Gerrad and Jay-
Jay.
    Nearly 20 years ago, I came to Washington, DC, to work on 
affordable housing programs at Fannie Mae. I spent a decade there 
including the years of the Global Financial Crisis in 2008 which led to 
a U.S. housing market meltdown that ultimately left tens of millions of 
people without homes and with lost wealth.
    Those years became an inflection point for me. I learned how 
fragile the system that supported housing and home ownership in America 
is and how quickly things could change. I saw the devastating effects 
that rippled across neighborhoods and households. It was heart 
wrenching to see so many people in financial distress and despair and 
disheartening to find that many who were losing their homes to 
foreclosure and eviction during that time looked like me and my 
children.
    That experience changed my perspective and helped sharpen my 
purpose. Stable, affordable, and accessible housing has since been at 
the core of my professional work in the private sector, in the 
nonprofit policy research work I led at the Urban Institute, and now in 
my public sector work with the Biden-Harris administration at HUD.
    My career in housing finance and passion for the field of 
affordable housing is driven by my own lived experience. I understand 
how powerful asset building, and access to credit and financing are to 
personal financial security. Property and home ownership have been 
vital to my own family for generations. And I recognize that my 
personal story is often not typical for a Black family.
    My mother grew up on a farm that my grandfather owned in a small 
town near Opelousas, Louisiana, where she picked cotton and canned and 
farmed vegetables. Our family roots of property ownership are deep and 
have created a value system through generations of Black farm and 
landowners in my lineage. My father was an immigrant from Jamaica who 
came to New York and became a U.S. citizen as a child and joined the 
Navy after high school.
    In 1969, just 1 year after the Fair Housing Act was passed and 
racial discrimination in housing became illegal, my parents purchased a 
4-unit home in a highly segregated area of the Bronx for $30,000 with 
some savings and a small VA mortgage loan. We lived in one of the 
apartments and rented out the others. My parents later bought a home in 
the New York suburbs in search of better schools and a safer 
neighborhood and kept the house in the Bronx as a source of extra 
rental income.
    My parents built a strong foundation for our family through home 
ownership. They were able to pass those benefits on to me and my 
siblings in the form of college tuition payments helping us avoid 
student loan debt. They helped me with a gift to purchase my first 
home, which I was able to finance with a low downpayment FHA mortgage.
    Far too many people do not get the opportunity to plant seeds of 
ownership because housing is grossly unaffordable, it's impossible to 
save, or they lack resources or don't have parents who can help them 
get started. Government mortgage programs help enable home ownership 
opportunity.
    Ginnie Mae's guaranty enables the work of key Government housing 
programs that play an essential role in housing America's veterans, 
low- and moderate-income households, urban, rural, and tribal 
communities and helps expand access to affordable home ownership and 
rental for the historically and systematically underserved. In 2020, 
more than 70 percent of all people served by Ginnie Mae securities were 
first time homebuyers.
    Ginnie Mae has remained stable and reliable while quietly 
supporting affordable rental and home ownership for millions of people. 
If confirmed, I will be a faithful steward of Ginnie Mae, ensuring the 
program stays focused on its critical mission, keeps pace with a 
rapidly changing market, attracts global capital into America's housing 
finance system, and protects American taxpayers.
    I look forward to leading an incredibly dedicated team of public 
servants at Ginnie Mae and to working with this Committee, Secretary 
Fudge, and housing stakeholders across the globe to ensure stability, 
liquidity, affordability, and equity in our housing finance system.
    Thank you for the opportunity to testify today. I look forward to 
your questions.


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             PREPARED STATEMENT OF JAMES ARTHUR JEMISON II
     To Be an Assistant Secretary of Housing and Urban Development
                            October 7, 2021
    Chairman Brown, Ranking Member Toomey, and distinguished Members of 
the Committee, thank you for the opportunity appear before you today as 
the nominee for Assistant Secretary for Public and Indian Housing (PIH) 
in the Department of Housing and Urban Development.
    I want to thank President Biden for nominating me, and Secretary 
Fudge for her support of my candidacy. I also want to thank my family 
and friends for their love, support, and guidance. I am grateful to my 
father James and particularly my mother Beverly and my sister Jamileh 
for their guidance and support. Finally, I want to thank my wife, 
Annie. She has been a partner to me, our three children, and entire 
family for the last 20 years.
    HUD's Office of Public and Indian Housing funds the operation and 
capital that supports 3.2 million American families every night. Public 
housing is at the center of many American neighborhoods and PIH rental 
assistance supports many American households and landlords. Indian 
Development Block Grant supports many thousands of families and elders 
in Tribal Communities every day. I am excited to work with the 
professionals who have maintained these capital assets and voucher 
resources since 1938.
    I have spent the last 25 years working in city planning and 
development first as part of a team, and later leading the development 
and preservation of market-rate and affordable housing units as well 
and the parks, streets, transportation facilities, commercial 
districts, downtowns, and employment centers that bring those 
communities together.
    I have done this by bringing together the feasibility, planning, 
design, permitting and financing concepts (private, public, and 
philanthropic) required to execute these strategies. Bringing expertise 
together with community engagement, I have performed this work in 
downtowns, neighborhoods, and small towns.
    Specifically, I have experience in three great American cities--
Boston, Washington, and Detroit--as well as the smaller cities and 
towns of Massachusetts. As part of partnerships with developers, 
community leaders, funders, boards, and commissions, my work has 
resulted in the preservation of more than 4,000 affordable units and 
3,500 new market and affordable housing units, including hundreds of 
public housing units.
    For the last 9 months, I have had the opportunity to lead HUD's 
Community Planning & Development (CPD) Office as Principal Deputy 
Assistant Secretary. I appreciate the partnership CPD staff members 
have extended to me.
    However, I am particularly honored to be nominated to be the 
steward of this institution because I grew up in public housing. From 
1983 to 1988, I lived at 693 Main Street, Apartment #14, in Amherst 
Massachusetts. It was a newly built unit, operated by the Amherst 
Housing Authority.
    Amherst is what would be described as an area of high opportunity. 
It is college town surrounded by five colleges and farming communities 
where I worked in the summers.
    This housing opportunity stabilized my family and made a difference 
in my life as affordable housing does for so many Americans. Making it 
work for more Americans has been my mission ever since I left that 
apartment for college; later for a summer fellowship program that grew 
my interest in housing; and later for graduate school in City Planning.
    I know that well-designed and well-maintained public housing and 
rental assistance can work as part of the American safety net. I know 
this personally because I have lived it. I know it professionally 
because I have worked to make sure affordable housing is part of every 
development initiative in which I have been involved.
    I have spent my entire career collaborating to create better places 
for every kind of American, where everyone can live together. Public 
housing is central to that mission.
    If confirmed, I will use all of my energy and experience working 
transform the public housing; ensure vouchers stabilize households and 
end homelessness; and support the strength of tribal communities across 
America.
    Thank you for the opportunity to testify before you today. I look 
forward to your questions.


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                    PREPARED STATEMENT OF MARK COLON
     To Be an Assistant Secretary of Housing and Urban Development
                            October 7, 2021
    Thank you Chairman Brown, Ranking Member Toomey, and distinguished 
Members of the Committee.
    I am deeply honored to appear before you today as the nominee for 
Assistant Secretary of Community Planning and Development at the 
Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). I would like to 
start by thanking President Biden for his confidence and trust in 
nominating me. I would also like to thank the Committee Members for 
allowing me this time and for considering my nomination.
    I must also thank my family, friends and colleagues for their 
unwavering support and to recognize my beautiful and talented wife, 
Gina Kim and my brother-in-law, Rev. Ryan Kim, the Senior Pastor of the 
Korean Presbyterian Church of Baltimore, for being here to support me 
today.
    HUD's Assistant Secretary of Community Planning and Development 
oversees many of the Department's most critical grant programs, 
including the Housing Trust Fund, the Community Development Block 
Grant, disaster recovery and mitigation programs and numerous homeless 
prevention programs.
    If confirmed, I will bring nearly 20 years of relevant public and 
private sector experience, to help advance HUD's mission and to support 
the constituents who rely on these programs in your States. But before 
describing that experience, I'd like to start by explaining my 
motivation for seeking the role:
    During my life, I have experienced, first-hand, the debilitating 
effects that substandard housing and limited economic opportunity can 
have on a family. My own family lost our house when I was 12 and we 
moved into one of the few, largely unregulated rentals in our area.
    I was one of four siblings raised by a single mother, in, a small, 
working class town, in upstate New York. Our family was easily among 
the poorest and we wound up with five people living in an 800 sq. ft., 
two-bedroom apartment.
    After my mom passed away when I was 20, I put myself through 
college, working full-time, first at Westchester Community, then at 
Hunter College of the City University of New York.
    I later earned a law degree from Yale University and spent 6 years 
working for some of the most prestigious, private law firms in the 
world. However, ultimately, I decided that public service was my 
calling and I have spent the past 13 years overseeing programs at New 
York State's integrated housing & community development agencies.
    My life's experience has given me a unique perspective on the 
issues faced by most Americans, whether they're working class, 
economically struggling or solidly middle class. I understand 
intimately the difference that well-run Government programs can make, 
both as a participant and as a program administrator. And this 
experience motivates me every day to find ways to improve Government 
programs, so that more Americans from modest circumstances can access 
greater opportunities and a safe, decent place to call home.
    I also believe that my professional background is uniquely aligned 
with CPD's mission of developing viable communities, through 
partnerships among private industry, nonprofit organizations, and all 
levels of Government, focused on expanding opportunity for those most 
in need.
    For instance, I have overseen one of the largest, most diverse 
affordable housing portfolios in the country, with more than 450,000 
units, from the Eastern tip of Long Island to the rural North Country, 
bordering on Canada.
    I have also served as my agency's acting ``disaster recovery'' 
counsel, helping to lead New York's post-Hurricane Sandy and Irene 
housing recovery efforts, by designing policies for the award of 
billions of dollars in Federal, State, and local, publicly and 
privately sourced relief funding.
    I have also served with nonprofit organizations that have 
spearheaded disaster recovery efforts. For instance, after Hurricane 
Maria devastated Puerto Rico, I helped lead a collaborative effort to 
purchase, import and distribute, island-wide, more than 12,000 solar 
lanterns equipped with emergency radios and phone charging capability, 
most within weeks of Hurricane Maria's landfall.
    In short, I have worked with a range of organizations and officials 
of all political persuasions, in every corner of the State, and beyond. 
I have compiled a record of providing efficient and equitable resources 
to people in need, where and when they need them. And I believe that 
those Americans most in need of these programs would benefit greatly 
from someone who shares their experience, can empathize with their 
struggles and has a proven track record of getting things done.
    Finally, I recognize the important role this Committee plays in 
overseeing the Department's work. If confirmed, I commit to work in a 
bipartisan manner and to be responsive to the needs every Senator and 
their constituents, working to ensure they have access to affordable 
housing and every opportunity to realize the American dream.
    Thank you once again for your time and this opportunity and I look 
forward to answering any questions that you may have.

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        RESPONSES TO WRITTEN QUESTIONS OF CHAIRMAN BROWN
                      FROM MATTHEW AXELROD

Q.1. Where have you excelled in past positions in attracting, 
hiring, and promoting people of color in positions in your 
organization? Where might there be room for improvement?
    What specific measures will you use to evaluate the success 
of the Department of Commerce in understanding and addressing 
the needs of Black, Indigenous, and people of color (BIPOC)? 
And, will you work with the Secretary and senior officials to 
keep Congress apprised, as appropriate, on the progress being 
made on these measures?
    What is your plan for creating an inclusive working 
environment for employees within your office?

A.1. If confirmed, I will be deeply committed to attracting, 
hiring, and promoting a diverse workforce and building an 
inclusive workplace culture at the Department of Commerce. I 
have past experience working at intentionally diverse 
organizations and believe that diversity is an essential 
component of strong organizations.
    In 1988, I was one of the founding corps members of City 
Year, a forerunner and eventual inspiration for the AmeriCorps 
national service program, which brought together racially 
diverse teams of young adults to do full-time community service 
in the City of Boston. After college, I deferred admission to 
law school for 2 years to go back to City Year, where I 
supervised a diverse team of young adults in their year of 
full-time community service. It was my job to get this group of 
young adults from different backgrounds and races not only to 
get along, but to perform high-quality community service in a 
Boston elementary school. That experience working closely with 
people of all different socioeconomic, racial, and educational 
backgrounds prepared me well for later jobs doing pro bono 
defense work in the Boston Municipal Court and as a prosecutor 
in Miami.
    My time at City Year also impressed on me the importance of 
assembling and promoting diverse teams, something I worked hard 
to do as the Principal Associate Deputy Attorney General at the 
Department of Justice and then worked hard to do again as a 
Senior Counselor at DOJ at the beginning of this 
Administration. If confirmed, I would similarly work to build a 
diverse organization at Export Enforcement.
    It is particularly important that law enforcement 
organizations be diverse--racially and otherwise. If confirmed, 
I will work with my staff on ways to diversify the workforce, 
including ways to recruit a diverse applicant pool and retain a 
diverse workforce. I will also be intentional about building an 
inclusive atmosphere at work, where people are valued and 
celebrated for their differences. I would be happy to keep you 
and your staff apprised on my efforts and progress in these 
areas.

Q.2. How do you plan to use Export Enforcement's authorities 
and resources to address genocide, human rights violations, and 
oppressive surveillance in China or other authoritarian 
countries?

A.2. I will use all of the enforcement tools at my disposal--
including criminal enforcement options, administrative 
enforcement options, and other administrative actions such as 
denial orders--to protect our national security and to make 
sure that authoritarian countries like China do not have access 
to U.S. technologies that they can put to malign purposes like 
genocide, human rights violations, and oppressive surveillance.
    One of my top priorities, if confirmed, would be to ensure 
that Export Enforcement is deploying its resources in the way 
best positioned to meet the national security threat posed by 
the Chinese Government, especially when it comes to 
technologies that can be used to conduct unauthorized end uses, 
including genocide and other human rights abuses, WMD 
proliferation, military modernization, and terrorism. I would 
also work in partnership with other Federal law enforcement 
agencies and with foreign counterparts so that the efforts of 
the Export Enforcement agents and analysts concerning China are 
amplified and reinforced.
                                ------                                


        RESPONSES TO WRITTEN QUESTIONS OF SENATOR TOOMEY
                      FROM MATTHEW AXELROD

Q.1. Congressional Oversight--Please provide your philosophy on 
how the Office of Export Enforcement at the Department of 
Commerce (Commerce) will approach and respond to Congressional 
information requests (both for documentary information and oral 
testimony), if you are confirmed.

A.1. I deeply respect the oversight role of the Senate Banking, 
Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee and the Congress and take 
the statutory requirements of the Export Control Reform Act 
(ECRA) of 2018 seriously. If confirmed, I intend to sustain a 
strong working relationship with the Committee and Congress, 
whether it is through statutorily required reports, briefings 
on the work of Export Enforcement, or other matters affecting 
businesses and industries in your State. If confirmed, I will 
work diligently to respond to requests for information 
consistent with the constitutional and statutory obligations of 
the executive branch.

Q.2. If confirmed, do you intend to respond to information 
requests differently depending on who is making the 
Congressional information request (whether it's the chair of 
the Congressional Committee, the Ranking Member, or another 
member of Congress)? Please answer ``yes'' or ``no.'' If your 
answer is ``yes,'' please explain.

A.2. I deeply respect the oversight role of the Senate Banking, 
Housing, and Urban Affairs Committee and the Congress and take 
the statutory requirements of the Export Control Reform Act 
(ECRA) of 2018 seriously. If confirmed, I intend to sustain a 
strong relationship with the Committee and the Congress, 
whether it is through statutorily required reports, briefings 
on the work of Export Enforcement, or other matters affecting 
businesses and industries in your State. If confirmed, I will 
work diligently to respond to requests for information 
consistent with the constitutional and statutory obligations of 
the executive branch.
    I understand that information submitted or obtained in 
connection with export license applications is subject to 
Section 1761(h) of ECRA and is provided to the Chair or Ranking 
Member of committees of appropriate jurisdiction.

Q.3. Will you commit that, if confirmed, you will respond in a 
timely manner and fully comply with all information requests 
from me? Please answer ``yes'' or ``no.'' If your answer is 
``no,'' please explain.

A.3. Yes. If confirmed, I commit to responding to any 
information requests from Congress consistent with the 
constitutional and statutory obligations of the executive 
branch.

Q.4. Will you commit that, if confirmed, you will make yourself 
and any other Office of Export Enforcement employee 
expeditiously available to provide oral testimony (including 
but not limited to briefings, hearings, and transcribed 
interviews) to the Committee on any matter within its 
jurisdiction, upon the request of either the Chairman or 
Ranking Member? Please answer ``yes'' or ``no.'' If your answer 
is ``no,'' please explain why.

A.4. Yes. If confirmed, I commit to responding to any requests 
for testimony consistent with the constitutional and statutory 
obligations of the executive branch.

Q.5. China--In enforcing export control policy, Commerce's 
Bureau of Industry and Security's (BIS) mission is important to 
the United States' high-tech competition with China. Do you 
agree that China's technological, military, and economic rise 
poses one of the greatest current challenges to the safety and 
well-being of the United States?

A.5. Yes.

Q.6. Please detail your understanding of the national security 
threat posed by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), including 
your assessment of the CCP's military modernization ambitions, 
intellectual property theft campaign, and coercion targeting 
United States' allies and partners.

A.6. The Chinese Government's unfair and coercive trade 
practices hurt American workers and American businesses. Those 
actions, combined with the Chinese Government's human rights 
abuses, including the genocide in Xinjiang, and other malign 
activities are contrary to our values and interests and those 
of our allies and partners.
    One of my top priorities, if confirmed, would be to ensure 
that Export Enforcement is deploying its resources in the way 
best positioned to meet the national security threat posed by 
the Chinese Government, especially when it comes to 
technologies that can be used to conduct unauthorized end uses, 
including genocide and other human rights abuses, WMD 
proliferation, military modernization, and terrorism. I would 
also work in partnership with other Federal law enforcement 
agencies and with foreign counterparts so that the efforts of 
the Export Enforcement agents and analysts concerning China are 
amplified and reinforced.

Q.7. In 2017, Chinese telecom giant ZTE reached a settlement 
with the U.S. Government after the company was caught illegally 
selling equipment to North Korea and Iran, in violation of U.S. 
export laws. \1\ But ZTE violated that deal and lied to U.S. 
investigators about it. As such in 2018, Commerce banned U.S. 
exports to ZTE as punishment. Later that year however, the 
export ban was removed as part of another settlement. \2\ This 
agreement set a new precedent for monitoring compliance with 
U.S. export laws. U.S. enforcement of this agreement will be 
watched closely by Beijing.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \1\ https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/zte-corporation-agrees-plead-
guilty-and-pay-over-4304-million-violating-us-sanctions-sending
     \2\ https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2018/07/23/2018-
15633/order-terminating-denial-order-issued-on-april-15-2018-against-
zhongxing-telecommunications
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Will you commit to robustly enforcing this agreement to 
ensure ZTE does not violate this settlement, as it did with the 
previous agreement?
    If ZTE is found to breach the terms of the agreement, will 
you commit to enforcing the appropriate penalties?

A.7. If confirmed, I would robustly enforce the superseding 
settlement agreement with ZTE. My understanding, from publicly 
available information, is that ZTE is at present being heavily 
scrutinized by its third-party monitor under the agreement. If 
the monitor uncovers a material violation of the agreement, I 
would enforce aggressively and appropriately, especially given 
the past history of ZTE's noncompliance with settlement terms 
it accepted.

Q.8. End-use checks verifying compliance with Export 
Administration Regulations (EAR) is critical to upholding the 
legitimacy of the U.S. export control regime. Please describe 
how you would approach an end-user who refuses to comply 
properly with BIS enforcement agents and end-use check 
requirements.

A.8. I agree that end-use checks are a critically important 
part of the licensing process. End-users who refuse to comply 
with the Export Control Officers (ECOs) who perform the end-use 
checks or with the end-use requirements themselves must face 
consequences. If confirmed, I would not hesitate to use the 
full range of sanctions at my disposal for such end users, 
including--depending of course on the severity of the 
misconduct--denying them the ability to receive future exports, 
imposing civil penalties, and working with the Department of 
Justice to bring criminal charges.

Q.9. U.S. goods have been exported through third countries for 
eventual use in embargoed States like Iran. Iran has long 
sought to acquire sensitive military and dual-use hardware from 
the United States through the use of front companies and other 
schemes meant to avoid detection. C4ADS, a Washington-based 
think tank, found that ``Gaps in the global export control 
regime and its enforcement enable Iran to procure these items 
and enable Houthi-linked networks to procure critical 
components without going through Iran.'' \3\ If confirmed, what 
steps will you undertake to stop the flow of unauthorized U.S. 
goods to Iran and other terror supporting countries such as 
North Korea and Syria?
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \3\ https://www.wsj.com/articles/irans-armed-drone-prowess-
reshapes-security-in-middle-east-11633530266

A.9. The flow of unauthorized U.S. goods and technologies to 
Iran, North Korea, and Syria is a significant national security 
challenge. If confirmed, I plan to use all available 
enforcement options--including criminal enforcement options, 
administrative enforcement options, and other administrative 
actions such as denial orders--to ensure that our adversaries 
do not have access to U.S. goods and technologies that they can 
put to malign purposes like terrorism, WMD proliferation, and 
human rights abuses. The use of front companies and other 
middlemen is a continuing problem that must be confronted head 
on. If confirmed, I would work to ensure that Export 
Enforcement's resources are properly matched against the most 
pressing national security threats, including Iran, North 
Korea, and Syria, and those middlemen and front companies that 
do their bidding. I would also work in partnership with other 
Federal law enforcement agencies and with foreign counterparts 
so that the efforts of the Export Enforcement agents and 
analysts in this area are amplified and reinforced.
Q.10. Anti-Boycott Compliance--Through the Office of Anti-
Boycott Compliance, BIS leads the enforcement of anti-boycott 
laws to counter malign foreign boycott campaigns. If confirmed, 
do you commit to fully enforcing U.S. anti-boycott laws and to 
discouraging foreign counterparts from participating in the 
boycott of Israel?

A.10. If confirmed, I will ensure that BIS continues to 
aggressively and appropriately enforce the anti-boycott laws 
and continues to work to end unsanctioned boycotts against 
Israel.
Q.11. Answering Questions for the Record--Please describe with 
particularity the process by which you answered these questions 
for the record, including identifying who assisted you in 
answering these questions along with a brief description of 
their assistance.

A.11. I drafted the answers to these questions, with assistance 
from staff of the Commerce Department and the interagency as 
appropriate.
                                ------                                


               RESPONSES TO WRITTEN QUESTIONS OF
             SENATOR MENENDEZ FROM MATTHEW AXELROD

Q.1. Mr. Axelrod, the President, as a candidate, promised that 
he would return the jurisdiction of the export licensing of 
semiautomatic weapons from the Commerce Department back to the 
Department of State, from which the Trump administration took 
it. This the President can do by simple regulation, without the 
need for legislative approval. Until that happens, however, the 
Department is providing no information to the Congress as to 
what lethal weapons, including sniper rifles and assault 
rifles, are being sold to what countries, foreign person, in 
what quantities and under what conditions, if any.
    Do you agree that the President made a campaign promise as 
a candidate to return the export control jurisdiction over 
semiautomatic weapons, including assault rifles and sniper 
rifles, to the Department of State?
    Has a decision been made by the President, personally, 
regarding the fulfillment of his campaign promise? If not, will 
the final decision be put to the President to decide? If not, 
why not, and who made the decision to not put the issue before 
the President?
    Why has the Department of Commerce not alerted the 
Congress, and the SFRC specifically, to pending exports of 
semiautomatic weapons, including assault rifles and sniper 
rifles? Will the Department of Commerce do so? And when?
    How many semiautomatic weapons, including assault rifles 
and sniper rifles, has the Department of Commerce authorized 
for export, to what countries, in what amounts, since the 
export jurisdiction of such weapons was transferred from the 
Department of State?

A.1. I am aware of the commitment made by Joe Biden on this 
issue when he was a candidate for President. I understand and 
respect your concern that export licensing jurisdiction for 
semiautomatic weapons has been moved from the State Department 
to the Commerce Department and the need to ensure appropriate 
oversight over these exports by the relevant committees of 
jurisdiction, including the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
    If confirmed, I will not be responsible for deciding 
whether that licensing jurisdiction remains with the Commerce 
Department. But I very much appreciate your desire to maintain 
oversight in this area, and commit to the following: if 
confirmed, (1) I will work to ensure that you receive licensing 
information concerning the export of semiautomatic weapons, 
including those that have been authorized for export to date, 
consistent with applicable law; (2) I will use all of the 
enforcement tools at my disposal--including criminal 
enforcement options, administrative enforcement options, and 
other administrative actions such as denial orders--in 
partnership with other Federal law enforcement agencies and 
foreign counterparts, to aggressively and appropriately enforce 
against licensing violations related to semiautomatic weapons; 
and (3) I will keep you and your staff apprised of enforcement 
efforts and progress in this area consistent with ECRA. If 
confirmed, I would also be happy to meet with you or your staff 
to discuss this matter further.
                                ------                                


        RESPONSES TO WRITTEN QUESTIONS OF CHAIRMAN BROWN
                      FROM ALANNA MCCARGO

Q.1. Where have you excelled in past positions in attracting, 
hiring, and promoting people of color in positions in your 
organization? Where might there be room for improvement?

A.1. I am proud of my track record of hiring, attracting, 
promoting, and coaching/mentoring people of color, especially 
as a person of color who has worked in leadership ranks in 
different types of organizations. I embrace and believe that 
diversity, inclusion, and equity are critical to an 
organization's success, and this does not only mean diversity 
in race and ethnicity, but also diversity in gender, age, 
organization types and political ideas. Throughout my career in 
financial services sector, I have worked with diverse groups 
effectively. I believe there is always room to do more and do 
better, and if confirmed, I would work to ensure that Ginnie 
Mae embraces a culture of inclusion, and that staff are heard 
and able to contribute their talents to the important work of 
the agency. I would also ensure that Ginnie Mae works not only 
internally but reaches out to other agencies and stakeholders 
for input and collaboration on critical issues to ensure 
perspectives and decisions are not insular. Every organization 
in America, including the Federal Government, has room for 
improvement and it requires intentionality, continuous 
education, and communication to break down organizational 
barriers and create healthy organizational norms that promote a 
diverse and inclusive workplace.

Q.2. What specific measures will you use to evaluate the 
success of the Department of Housing and Urban Development 
(HUD) in understanding and addressing the needs of Black, 
Indigenous, and people of color (BIPOC)? And, will you work 
with the Secretary and senior officials to keep Congress 
apprised, as appropriate, on the progress being made on these 
measures?

A.2. If confirmed, I commit to working with the Secretary and 
HUD team on the equity-related assessments and activities the 
agency has been directed to engage in pursuant to Executive 
orders including the Executive Order On Advancing Racial Equity 
and Support for Underserved Communities Through the Federal 
Government. \1\ If confirmed, I commit to working with 
Secretary Fudge, senior officials and Congress to ensure 
transparency and progress on Ginnie Mae's equity actions and 
intend to fully assess Ginnie Mae's inclusion and equity 
efforts underway, both internal staffing efforts and external 
efforts to ensure diversity with procurement, issuers, and 
investors.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \1\ https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/presidential-actions/
2021/01/20/executive-order-advancing-racial-equity-and-support-for-
underserved-communities-through-the-federal-government/

Q.3. What is your plan for creating an inclusive working 
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
environment for employees within your office?

A.3. If confirmed, I plan do a series of listening sessions 
with Ginnie Mae staff at all levels and quickly devise a shared 
vision and plan that all staff can participate in developing 
and leading. I am eager to listen and learn, and to empower 
employees to bring necessary change and be part of an inclusive 
agenda for moving the agency forward so we can deliver on our 
mission.
                                ------                                


        RESPONSES TO WRITTEN QUESTIONS OF SENATOR TOOMEY
                      FROM ALANNA MCCARGO

Q.1. Congressional Oversight--Please provide your philosophy on 
how Ginnie Mae will approach and respond to Congressional 
information requests (both for documentary information and oral 
testimony), if you are confirmed.

A.1. If I am confirmed, my approach to Congressional inquiries 
will be to act swiftly and transparently in responding. I 
respect the oversight role Congress plays, and I believe it 
helps to ensure continuous improvement for the agency in making 
sure it is meeting its commitments and abiding by the law in 
ways that are just and protect the American taxpayer.

Q.2. If confirmed, do you intend to respond to information 
requests differently depending on who is making the 
Congressional information request (whether it's the chair of 
the Congressional Committee, the Ranking Member, or another 
member of Congress)? Please answer ``yes'' or ``no.'' If your 
answer is ``yes,'' please explain.

A.2. Yes. If confirmed, I will work to ensure HUD responds in a 
timely manner to all to Congressional requests for information, 
consistent with applicable law and regulations.

Q.3. Will you commit that, if confirmed, you will timely 
respond to and fully comply with all information requests from 
me? Please answer ``yes'' or ``no.'' If your answer is ``no,'' 
please explain.

A.3. Yes. If confirmed, I would expect to provide responses to 
requests, with reasonable understanding of the time required to 
produce documentation and consistent with applicable law and 
regulations.

Q.4. Will you commit that, if confirmed, you will make yourself 
and any other Ginnie Mae employee expeditiously available to 
provide oral testimony (including but not limited to briefings, 
hearings, and transcribed interviews) to the Committee on any 
matter within its jurisdiction, upon the request of either the 
Chairman or Ranking Member? Please answer ``yes'' or ``no.'' If 
your answer is ``no,'' please explain why.

A.4. Yes. If confirmed, I would ensure HUD responds to 
Congressional requests for information, consistent with 
applicable law and regulations.

Q.5. Do you believe that Ginnie Mae may assert any privileges 
or other legal justifications to withhold information (whether 
records or oral testimony) from Congress? Please answer ``yes'' 
or ``no.''

A.5. If confirmed, I would prioritize working with Congress and 
would be responsive to all reasonable information requests that 
come to Ginnie Mae. I would defer to the Office of General 
Counsel, which would determine whether Ginnie Mae has an 
applicable privilege or other legal justification for 
withholding information.

Q.6. If you answered ``yes'' to the preceding question, please 
list every such privilege or other legal justification and 
provide the legal basis for why you believe Ginnie Mae may use 
such privilege or legal justification to withhold information 
from Congress.

A.6. As noted above, any determination as to whether HUD has an 
applicable privilege or other justification to withhold 
information from Congress would be made by the Office of 
General Counsel and identified clearly as such at that time.

Q.7. In an effort to be open and transparent with Congress and 
the public, will you commit not to assert any such privilege or 
legal justification against Congress that you listed above?

A.7. I commit to lead Ginnie Mae with full transparency and to 
working with Congress within legal bounds on any reasonable 
requests if I am confirmed.

Q.8. If not, why not? If so, please identify all such 
privileges or legal justifications that you will commit to not 
assert against Congress.

A.8. If confirmed, I will consult with the Office of General 
Counsel to ensure Ginnie Mae responds to Congressional requests 
in a manner consistent with the law and responsive to Congress.

Q.9. Housing Finance Reform--Pursuant to the Presidential 
Memorandum issued March 27, 2019, HUD submitted its Housing 
Finance Reform Plan (Plan) laying out reforms to HUD, including 
the Federal Housing Administration and Ginnie Mae. \1\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \1\ HUD, Housing Finance Reform Plan, (Sept. 2019), available at 
https://www.hud.gov/sites/dfiles/Main/documents/Housing-Finance-Reform-
Plan0919.pdf.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Which of the Plan's recommendations do you agree with?
    Which of the Plan's recommendations do you disagree with?

A.9. I support comprehensive housing finance reform and believe 
it should be inclusive of the entirety of the system when 
Congress takes this issue up in the future. The HUD plans that 
were previously submitted included Ginnie Mae and FHA, which I 
believe to be an important step forward. I appreciated the 
focus on risk mitigation, management and liquidity which I have 
stated publicly as top priorities, and I look forward to 
working with the Ginnie Mae team on and further strengthening 
these efforts, if I am confirmed.

Q.10. Mutual Mortgage Insurance (MMI) Fund--You are currently 
serving as the HUD Secretary's Senior Advisor for housing 
finance. The fiscal year 2020 (FY20) Report on the MMI Fund 
shows that subjecting the FY20 portfolio to the same 
macroeconomic conditions faced during the housing crisis would 
create losses in excess of MMI Fund capital, resulting in a MMI 
Fund capital ratio of -0.63 percent, below the statutory 2 
percent minimum, and requiring a bailout. Would you consider it 
a failure if the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) draws 
funds from the Treasury to cover losses, or put more simply, 
requires a bailout?

A.10. The FHA leadership and risk management teams closely 
monitor and manage the MMI Fund performance, and the Secretary 
has been clear that ensuring adequate capital to endure all 
cycles, including the deep distress created by the pandemic, is 
paramount. Consistent with statements \2\ made during the last 
quarterly report to Congress on the MMIF, I support prudent 
management of the fund and keeping adequate capital reserves to 
weather current and future events that pose risks to it. The 
health of the fund has direct impact on the underlying 
homeowners who tend to be lower income, first time borrowers, 
as well as borrowers of color. It is imperative that FHA manage 
the fund in a way that protects it from losses that would have 
an adverse impact on the most vulnerable existing FHA borrowers 
and future homeowners.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \2\ Secretary Fudge Statement on the State of the FHA Mutual 
Mortgage Insurance Fund https://www.hud.gov/press/press-releases-media-
advisories/hud-no-21-049.

Q.11. Do you think the MMI Fund as of FY20 has sufficient 
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
capital reserves?

A.11. The MMI fund in the FY20 report indicated a healthy 
reserve ratio that was more than three times the 2 percent 
required capital level. There are several assumptions and 
market factors like home price appreciation that must be 
considered and a number of scenarios that could change the 
reserve rate in either direction. A healthy fund is vital to 
the FHA program, and the FHA program is a critical and large 
share of the Ginnie Mae MBS program. If confirmed, I would work 
closely with Secretary Fudge and the FHA Commissioner on risks 
and closely monitor how the fund performs. I hope to also work 
closely with VA and USDA leadership on performance trends and 
risks ensuring those programs remain healthy as well.

Q.12. Do you think it is inappropriate to build a capital 
buffer able to withstand a shock of the kind experienced during 
the 2008 housing crisis?

A.12. I think it is appropriate to closely monitor the fund and 
run numerous scenarios that stress test the fund and ensure 
viability during economic shocks. The 2008 crisis is one such 
experience, as are shocks from natural disasters, pandemics, 
national home price declines, recessionary periods, and so on. 
Knowing how the fund would sustain numerous stress scenarios is 
critical to determining how much buffer is sufficient, and 
something the Secretary and FHA Commissioner should prioritize.

Q.13. Is the statutory 2 percent MMI Fund capital ratio a 
sufficient buffer to protect against taxpayer losses? If not, 
what do you believe is appropriate? If not the 2008 housing 
crisis, what stress level scenario should FHA consider when 
deciding what capital buffer is sufficient?

A.13. The 2 percent minimum requirement is set by Congress and 
represents a floor. I believe the buffer should be continuously 
evaluated by the Secretary and FHA leadership and risk 
management teams based on the many variables and market 
conditions they monitor and the probabilities of significant 
event of default at a given time. Being prepared to weather 
storms, expected or unexpected, is critical for managing the 
FHA insurance program to ensure the program remains a strong 
and credible tool to help homeowners.

Q.14. Do you have plans to impose the same climate stress tests 
and climate change regulatory standards on mortgage backed 
securities (MBS) issued by Ginnie Mae issuers as several Biden 
administration officials have discussed doing for private 
sector market participants?

A.14. The Administration has been focused on the effects of 
climate change, and the FSOC is assessing the financial 
regulatory actions that are needed to address climate change 
related issues our Nation faces in the future. If confirmed, I 
will assess the climate related risks to Ginnie Mae's MBS 
program and work with issuers and other housing finance 
agencies to determine what steps make sense to ensure that risk 
is appropriately understood and disclosed for those who do 
business with Ginnie Mae as that would be prudent and in the 
best interest of taxpayers.

Q.15. Downpayment Assistance--You are currently serving as the 
HUD Secretary's Senior Advisor for housing finance. 12 U.S.C. 
1709(b)(9)(C) prohibits the ``seller or any other person or 
entity that financially benefits from the transaction'' from 
providing funds as part of the downpayment for an FHA-insured 
loan. What does ``financially benefits from the transaction'' 
mean to you as the Secretary's Senior Advisor for housing 
finance?

A.15. In my role as Senior Advisor, I do not interpret the law 
for HUD. Broadly speaking, this language clearly speaks to 
ensuring that nefarious or predatory seller practices that are 
detrimental to the borrower are prohibited in an FHA insured 
transaction.

Q.16. Home Affordable Modification Program (HAMP)--Fannie Mae 
was contracted by the Treasury Department to administer HAMP, 
the Federal Government's flagship loan modification program 
established in response to the 2008 financial crisis. At Fannie 
Mae, you played a role in implementing HAMP. There were many 
problems with the implementation of HAMP. The Office of the 
Special Inspector General for the Troubled Asset Relief Program 
(SIGTARP) discovered that a significant share of borrowers 
redefaulted after receiving HAMP loan modifications, costing 
taxpayers money. \3\ In addition, the Government Accountability 
Office (GAO) reported that while one of the ``stated goals for 
HAMP was to standardize the loan modification process across 
the servicing industry, GAO found inconsistencies in how 
servicers were treating borrowers under HAMP that could lead to 
inequitable treatment of similarly situated borrowers.'' \4\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \3\ SIGTARP, ``Rising Redefaults of HAMP Mortgage Modifications 
Hurt Homeowners, Communities, and Taxpayers'' 3 (July 24, 2013), 
https://www.sigtarp.gov/sites/sigtarp/files/Audit-Reports/Rising-
Redefaults-of-HAMP-Mortgage-Modifications.pdf.
     \4\ GAO, GAO-10-634 ``Further Actions Needed to Fully and 
Equitably Implement Foreclosure Mitigation Programs'' 2 (June 24, 
2010), https://www.gao.gov/assets/gao-10-634.pdf.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    What lessons did you learn from the problems identified 
with the implementation of HAMP? How will you apply those 
lessons at Ginnie Mae?

A.16. I agree there were challenges with implementing a 
Government program of the size, scale, and complexity of HAMP 
during an unprecedented financial institution meltdown and 
overall economic crisis. Millions of Americans lost their homes 
and wealth. I continue to carry lessons and learnings about the 
importance of the mortgage servicing industry in enabling 
sustainable home ownership, and how the overall system benefits 
from a rational set of standards that protect consumers and 
ensure safe and sound financial institution practices. If 
confirmed, I will take many lessons to the work of Ginnie Mae 
and provide leadership informed by my experience managing a 
very complex and large Government program.

Q.17. What steps will you take to ensure that taxpayer dollars 
are better protected at Ginne Mae than they were in the 
implementation of HAMP?

A.17. Protecting taxpayers and creating value and returns to 
the United States treasury is something Ginnie Mae has done in 
all economic cycles and is proud of. If confirmed, I will 
continue to ensure the performance of the Ginnie Mae operation 
and the value of the Ginnie Mae bond continue to create value 
for American taxpayers.

Q.18. How will you ensure that the problems identified with the 
implementation of HAMP will not resurface for HUD borrowers 
entering into loan modifications ultimately backed-up by Ginnie 
Mae?

A.18. If confirmed, I will ensure that the Ginnie Mae team 
monitors the performance and policy choices being made by all 
the underlying agencies who make up Ginnie Mae securities. My 
experience working across agencies and in collaboration with 
key stakeholders will be an asset to ensuring early detection 
of any indications of problems and having tools in place to 
mitigate risks.

Q.19. Do you commit to make protecting taxpayer dollars one of 
your top priorities at Ginnie Mae? If not, please explain why 
protecting taxpayer dollars will not be a top priority for you.

A.19. Yes, if confirmed, it is my top priority to ensure that 
the Ginnie Mae guaranty and security operations remain strong 
and continues to deliver value back to taxpayers by managing an 
efficient budget, investing in Ginnie Mae people and 
technology, prudent risk management, and expanding the agency's 
reach with global investors.

Q.20. Ginnie Mae 40-Year Loan Modifications--Ginnie Mae 
recently announced a new mortgage-backed security (MBS) pool 
type, enabling the securitization of 40-year mortgage 
modifications. And FHA is now proposing a new 40-year loan 
modification option. Do you believe there will be adequate 
investor interest in MBS containing modified loans (for 
borrowers who have previously defaulted) in a rising interest 
rate environment? If yes, please include any reports, evidence, 
or data supporting your view.

A.20. Forty-year loan modification programs have been available 
for Government mortgage programs and at Fannie Mae and Freddie 
Mac for some time. Ginnie Mae has not historically had a 
securitization option for this duration. A 40-year loan 
modification option, while not a first resort, can provide 
additional flexibility for servicers who need to get deeper 
payment reduction to a homeowner to make mortgage payments 
affordable and home ownership sustainable. This is especially 
true for FHA, which has few levers for payment reduction 
modifications if interest rates begin to rise. \5\ The 40-year 
security will be available for any USDA and VA loan 
modification programs before year end and volume is expected to 
be very low initially. If FHA implements a 40-year loan 
modification to bring them in line with what Fannie Mae and 
Freddie Mac already offer and securitize, volumes will 
increase. The GSEs have 40-year modification and performing 
loan MBS but there is very little and infrequent issuance 
activity. The outstanding volume of past issuances amounts to 
$2.3 billion in 2021 YTD and $10 billion since Jan 2019.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \5\ ``Government Loan Modifications: What Happens When Interest 
Rates Rise?'' https://www.urban.org/sites/default/files/publication/
95671/government-loan-modifications-5.pdf.

Q.21. Borrowers entering into 40-year loan modifications may, 
unwittingly, be paying more in interest for their homes on a 
40-year mortgage than they would on a 30-year loan. How will 
you ensure these borrowers are not paying more for their homes 
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
over the course of their modified loans?

A.21. The terms of the mortgage modification agreements are 
negotiated by the mortgage servicer with the borrower. 
Extending term would create longer term interest due by the 
borrower but would also lower monthly payments, increasing 
affordability of the mortgage for the borrower immediately. 
This could be the difference between keeping or losing a home 
and should be discussed and well understood before the borrower 
opts into any loan modification agreement. Ginnie Mae's role is 
not to dictate such terms, but to ensure that the ultimate loan 
modification that is best for the borrower can be sold back 
into a liquid secondary market.

Q.22. A significant share of borrowers redefaulted after 
receiving HAMP loan modifications. Do you anticipate similarly 
high redefault rates for borrowers coming out of COVID-
forbearance status and entering into 40-year loan modifications 
being pooled by Ginnie Mae issuers?

A.22. The foreclosure prevention tools that have been put in 
place by the mortgage agencies in response to COVID have been 
developed with sustainability in mind. My hope is that COVID 
mortgage modifications perform well, especially given the 
sizable equity many households have and the tools that have 
been put in place under this Administration to ensure long term 
affordability. If confirmed, this performance is something I 
would monitor closely and discuss regularly with my leadership 
team.

Q.23. Answering Questions for the Record--Please describe with 
particularity the process by which you answered these questions 
for the record, including identifying who assisted you in 
answering these questions along with a brief description of 
their assistance.

A.23. I have answered all these questions independently and to 
the best of my ability and consulted with a review by relevant 
staff only where necessary to ensure each Senator's question is 
fully addressed with sufficient detail and insight. I have 
answered these questions with the intent to provide you with 
the information you need to be comfortable voting to support my 
nomination to be the next President of Ginnie Mae. Thank you 
for the opportunity to respond.
                                ------                                


        RESPONSES TO WRITTEN QUESTIONS OF SENATOR SHELBY
                      FROM ALANNA MCCARGO

Q.1. The Obama administration created the Home Affordable 
Modification Program (HAMP) to try to help homeowners stay in 
their homes during the financial crisis. Unfortunately, many 
borrowers that obtained loan modifications through HAMP ended 
up redefaulting on their loans. \1\ This result was both bad 
for them and for Federal taxpayers. Fannie Mae implemented HAMP 
on behalf of the Treasury Department, and you worked on that 
implementation at Fannie Mae.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \1\ SIGTARP, ``Rising Redefaults of HAMP Mortgage Modifications 
Hurt Homeowners, Communities, and Taxpayers''.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Do you agree that the HAMP had unacceptably high redefault 
rates for borrowers receiving HAMP loan modifications?

A.1. My work with the mortgage servicing industry and Treasury 
while I was at Fannie Mae involved efforts to mitigate the 
worst outcomes for homeowners from the global financial crisis, 
helping to avoid foreclosures and working with the industry to 
mitigate losses and failures in the system that was broken and 
ill-equipped to deal with the home price declines and 
delinquencies that followed. The goal was helping people stay 
in their homes with sustainable mortgage payments and our job 
at Fannie Mae was to support Treasury in building the 
infrastructure to aid the industry by helping the millions of 
distressed homeowners avoid foreclosure. The level of 
unemployment experienced during that time was high, and many 
borrowers were unable to regain incomes, which led to 
unaffordable mortgages on houses that were no longer worth 
their mortgage debt, and a series of redefaults occurred. I 
don't find any of that acceptable and remain disappointed that 
so many people were not afforded time to get on their feet and 
keep their homes because if they had made it through that 
period, many of them would be experiencing and benefiting from 
what has been a very healthy and appreciating housing market 
since that time.

Q.2. What will you do to make sure that borrowers insured or 
guaranteed by HUD will not redefault in any loan modification 
programs that are being implemented now in response to COVID-
19?

A.2. The Administration and Secretary Fudge made clear from day 
one that helping homeowners keep their homes and recover from 
the pandemic economic crisis was a top priority. HUD's FHA 
insurance program has implemented significant policy 
improvements to its loan modification options with the specific 
goal of avoiding redefaults and creating a sustainable and 
affordable loan modification that will succeed. If confirmed, I 
will work with the FHA team and support the work they have done 
in coordination with other agencies, including the FHFA, to 
align efforts and ensure that the tools available for servicers 
are robust and help homeowners keep their homes whenever 
possible.
                                ------                                


        RESPONSES TO WRITTEN QUESTIONS OF SENATOR TILLIS
                      FROM ALANNA MCCARGO

Q.1. During your tenure at Fannie Mae, you helped to implement 
the Home Affordable Modification Program (HAMP), which was 
created in response to the 2008 financial crisis. According to 
a June 2010 GAO report, there were multiple challenges in 
implementing HAMP. \1\ For example, the report noted that while 
one of the ``stated goals for HAMP was to standardize the loan 
modification process across the servicing industry, GAO found 
inconsistencies in how servicers were treating borrowers under 
HAMP that could lead to inequitable treatment of similarly 
situated borrowers.'' \2\  How will you ensure that any 
problems identified with HAMP will not resurface for HUD 
borrowers entering into loan modifications?
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \1\ https://www.gao.gov/assets/gao-10-634.pdf
     \2\ https://www.gao.gov/assets/gao-10-634.pdf

A.1. The HAMP program that was created to address the 2008 
Global Financial Crisis (GFC) was unprecedented and the 
learnings and findings from the reports and analysis you 
reference have been incredibly insightful for helping 
policymakers, industry, and Government agencies address the 
current crisis and other disaster events that have required 
servicers and policy to help borrowers who are at risk of 
losing their homes. The 2008 GFC exposed several major flaws in 
America's housing finance system and the mortgage servicing 
infrastructure. I have spent significant time studying the GFC 
and I helped create and lead the Mortgage Servicing 
Collaborative \3\ at the Urban Institute which brought together 
a diverse coalition of housing finance industry experts and 
stakeholders to fully understand the challenges faced during 
the 2008 crisis and ensure the system and mortgage servicers 
are more stable and prepared for any future crisis of that 
scale. The pandemic has been a test of the current system, and 
although the COVID-19 economic crisis is very different, the 
policy choices and actions taken by Congress and Government 
agencies demonstrates an understanding from lessons learned in 
the past and is resulting in far better outcomes for homeowners 
and a better coordinated and standard response from industry. 
If confirmed, I would work with the appropriate oversight 
bodies to continuously learn and apply improvements at Ginnie 
Mae that ensure a stable and equitable system.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \3\ ``The Mortgage Servicing Collaborative'', https://
www.urban.org/policy-centers/housing-finance-policy-center/projects/
mortgage-servicing-collaborative.

Q.2. The Obama administration originally estimated that HAMP 
could help between three million and four million homeowners, 
but as of June 30, 2021, only around 1.7 million borrowers 
received HAMP modifications. \4\ Do you believe HAMP succeeded 
in helping families stay in their homes and avoid foreclosure?
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \4\ Dep't of the Treasury, ``Home Affordable Modification Program 
(HAMP) Performance Summary'' (June, 30, 2021), https://
home.treasury.gov/system/files/256/129-HAMP-Modification-Performance-
Summary-Jun2021-v1.0.pdf.

A.2. The unprecedented nature of the 2008 housing crisis called 
for new and untested steps to address the millions of 
homeowners who fell behind on their mortgages and who also saw 
their home values plummet, losing much of their wealth. The 
Making Home Affordable (MHA) program Treasury put in place 
helped millions of people avoid foreclosure, though many still 
did end up losing their homes. The MHA program (which includes 
HAMP) was ultimately responsible for helping transform the 
mortgage servicing sector, standardizing new loan modification 
options to help borrowers avoid foreclosure, refinancing 
millions of homeowners into more affordable housing payments 
through HARP, and modifying over 1.8 million loans in the HAMP 
program (which ended in 2016), millions more modifications in 
Government Sponsored Enterprise and FHA and VA insured 
modification programs. I believe these outcomes are far better 
than what would have happened if nothing had been done. I also 
wish more families could have kept their homes. Those who lost 
their homes were disproportionately lower income households, 
and people of color and they lost a tremendous amount of wealth 
which exacerbates the racial home ownership and wealth gaps. 
The mortgage industry is better prepared for crisis today 
because of what was learned during that period, and while not 
perfect, the infrastructure to withstand massive delinquencies 
and their ripple effects far better in today's system. If 
confirmed, I would bring deep and unique insights from the 2008 
crisis to Ginnie Mae as we address current and future economic 
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
events.

Q.3. HAMP modifications resulted in high redefault rates, 
harming borrowers and delaying eventual foreclosure. Such 
borrowers may have been in a better position had they gone 
through a foreclosure earlier rather modified their mortgages 
and delay a foreclosure. How will you ensure borrowers entering 
into loan modifications now with HUD are not at risk of 
redefault and eventual foreclosure?

A.3. I do not think foreclosure ever puts a borrower in a 
better position, whether it happens early in the process or 
later after attempts to modify or restructure a loan. 
Foreclosure is a bad outcome for a consumer's credit, housing 
and community stability, and wealth. In my opinion, keeping 
people in their homes is usually the best outcome when 
financial distress occurs or helping those who need to leave, 
exit through a normal home sale that they can benefit from. 
However, sometimes foreclosure is the only option remaining, 
and when it must occur, it should be accomplished as 
efficiently and transparently as possible. If confirmed to lead 
Ginnie Mae, I will work with the FHA, VA, and USDA mortgage 
policy teams who create the loan modification policies for 
borrowers and ensure that the risks to Ginnie Mae securities 
backing those modified loans are fully understood and 
mitigated. There is always some probability of default and 
redefault though it is hard to predict, and the agencies have 
better tools and models in place today than in 2008 to provide 
the time for mortgage servicers to work with borrowers to give 
them the best chance at success.

Q.4. The risk of redefault increases as home values fall and 
delaying an eventual foreclosure only reduces the value that 
can be recouped through a foreclosure sale, increasing the 
claim amount paid to Government-insured lenders.
    Do you believe home values will continue rising?
    How will you ensure that taxpayer interests are protected 
if home prices fall?

A.4. Home price fluctuations are very market specific, and home 
prices have been steadily increasing nationwide for some time. 
I follow economic and home price trends and the many indices to 
get a sense of forecasted home values, but I don't make 
predictions or speculate. Right now, homeowners' equity is at 
record highs, standing at over $25 trillion \5\ according to 
the Federal Reserve's Flow of Funds Report. Even if home prices 
fall slightly, the debt-to-equity ratio favors homeowners. If 
confirmed, I will work with the Ginnie Mae team to ensure 
continuous and rigorous risk management continues, and I will 
continue to work to protect taxpayers by delivering value on 
the securities issued by Ginnie Mae and ensuring stability 
through all economic cycles.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \5\ ``September 2021 Housing Finance At a Glance Report'', https:/
/www.urban.org/research/publication/housing-finance-glance-monthly-
chartbook-september-2021.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                ------                                


        RESPONSES TO WRITTEN QUESTIONS OF SENATOR MORAN
                      FROM ALANNA MCCARGO

Q.1. The Home Affordable Modification Program (HAMP) was 
established in response to the impact of the financial crisis 
on homeowners. The Obama Treasury Department tasked Fannie Mae 
with the responsibility of implementing HAMP. You worked at 
Fannie Mae on the implementation of HAMP. HAMP had numerous 
difficulties documented by the Office of the Special Inspector 
General for the Troubled Asset Relief Program (SIGTARP) \1\ and 
the Government Accountability Office (GAO). \2\ These 
difficulties included many borrowers participating in HAMP loan 
modifications ultimately redefaulting, putting taxpayer dollars 
at risk. \3\ As president of Ginnie Mae, you will be running an 
organization which also exposes taxpayer dollars at risk.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \1\ SIGTARP, ``Rising Redefaults of HAMP Mortgage Modifications 
Hurt Homeowners, Communities, and Taxpayers'' 3 (July 24, 2013), 
https://www.sigtarp.gov/sites/sigtarp/files/Audit-Reports/Rising-
Redefaults-of-HAMP-Mortgage-Modifications.pdf. 
    \2\ GAO, GAO-10-634 ``Further Actions Needed to Fully and Equitably 
Implement Foreclosure Mitigation Programs'' 2 (June 24, 2010), https://
www.gao.gov/assets/gao-10-634.pdf.
     \3\ SIGTARP, ``Rising Redefaults of HAMP Mortgage Modifications 
Hurt Homeowners, Communities, and Taxpayers'' 3 (July 24, 2013), 
https://www.sigtarp.gov/sites/sigtarp/files/Audit-Reports/Rising-
Redefaults-of-HAMP-Mortgage-Modifications.pdf.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    What assurances can you provide that decisions made at 
Ginnie Mae will prioritize protecting taxpayer dollars?

A.1. Ginnie Mae's mission since its founding has been to bring 
capital into the housing finance market while minimizing risk 
to taxpayers. The agency has delivered on this mission for over 
50 years. If confirmed, my top priority will be to mitigate 
risks to taxpayers, strengthen Ginnie Mae's securitization 
operations and risk management, and attract global capital that 
continues to expand the value of Ginnie Mae securities to 
investors across the globe in order to ensure our veterans, 
first time homebuyers and lower income households have access 
to affordable mortgage credit.

Q.2. What steps will you take to prevent HAMP's difficulties 
from developing in any programs where Ginnie Mae mortgage-
backed securities include loan modifications?

A.2. While HAMP was a novel program designed to address the 
global financial crisis of 2008, there have since been many new 
and more efficient loss mitigation programs and tools 
implemented and adopted by mortgage servicers that have been 
far more effective in addressing natural disasters and large 
economic loss events, like the pandemic. If confirmed, I will 
work with the Ginnie Mae risk and capital markets teams to 
monitor the loss mitigation and modification activities taking 
place at FHA, VA, and USDA and the impacts that will have on 
Ginnie Mae prepayment speeds and market pricing. I will work 
with the issuer management team to make sure those mortgage 
servicers and issuers of Ginnie Mae MBS are complying with the 
latest policies and manage their performance, liquidity, and 
financial risks.
                                ------                                


        RESPONSES TO WRITTEN QUESTIONS OF CHAIRMAN BROWN
                  FROM JAMES ARTHUR JEMISON II

Q.1. Where have you excelled in past positions in attracting, 
hiring, and promoting people of color in positions in your 
organization? Where might there be room for improvement?

A.1. I would point to the initial staffing of the City of 
Detroit Housing & Revitalization Department (HRD) and 
restaffing of the Planning and Development Department (PDD) as 
examples. In 2014 and 2015, my then Deputy Director Hunter 
Kurtz and I had to restructure the staff of both departments as 
part of the Bankruptcy. (Mr. Kurtz used to work for me in 
Detroit before becoming PIH Assistant Secretary under the 
previous Administration.) I recruited Planning Director Maurice 
Cox (now Planning Director of Chicago, IL) and collaborated him 
in recruiting a diverse staff of planners to lead the City of 
Detroit's Planning Department. While I am certainly proud of 
the diversity of the new staff--in particular the number of 
women leaders--I am equally proud of the retention and 
promotion of staff of color who had served the city for long 
periods without recognition. The planning field and public 
housing field need significant inflows of BIPOC graduates. 
Twenty-five years ago, I was one of those BIPOC students 
entering the field. As a result, in my leadership in prior 
positions have worked with academic departments to recruit 
staff and make sure future generations of my departments have 
diverse leadership and staff.

Q.2. What specific measures will you use to evaluate the 
success of the Department of Housing and Urban Development 
(HUD) in understanding and addressing the needs of Black, 
Indigenous, and people of color (BIPOC)? And, will you work 
with the Secretary and senior officials to keep Congress 
apprised, as appropriate, on the progress being made on these 
measures?

A.2. Throughout my 25-year career, I have focused on using data 
and measurable results and would use similar approaches in my 
work at PIH. Many public housing developments, units occupied 
by voucher holders, and Tribal communities are within 
communities of color or on Tribal land. If confirmed, I will 
make sure PIH is a partner with FHEO and informing fair housing 
oversight and working with PIH stakeholders to fulfill their 
role locally. Reports including data on the preservation, 
rehabilitation and operating results for PIH-related units will 
allow me to highlight specific areas where progress is being 
made or where improvement is needed. If confirmed, I will work 
with the Secretary and other senior officials to keep Congress 
apprised of progress on these issues.

Q.3. What is your plan for creating an inclusive working 
environment for employees within your office?

A.3. Creating an inclusive working environment requires a 
careful process of staff engagement, listening and consensus 
building. It also involves, where possible, using a transparent 
process for the creation of the vision, major decisions, and 
measurement of outcomes. The testimony from my supporting 
letters and track record in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, 
Washington, DC, and Detroit show that I have used these methods 
in my work.
                                ------                                


        RESPONSES TO WRITTEN QUESTIONS OF SENATOR TOOMEY
                  FROM JAMES ARTHUR JEMISON II

Q.1. Congressional Oversight--Please provide your philosophy on 
how HUD's Office of Public and Indian Housing (PIH) will 
approach and respond to Congressional information requests 
(both for documentary information and oral testimony) if you 
are confirmed.

A.1. If confirmed, I would provide responses to requests with 
reasonable understanding of the time required to produce 
documentation.

Q.2. If confirmed, do you intend to respond to information 
requests differently depending on who is making the 
Congressional information request (whether it's the chair of 
the Congressional Committee, the Ranking Member, or another 
member of Congress)? Please answer ``yes'' or ``no.'' If your 
answer is ``yes,'' please explain.

A.2. Yes. If confirmed, I will work to ensure HUD responds in a 
timely manner to all congressional requests for information, 
consistent with applicable law and regulations.

Q.3. If confirmed, I would work to ensure HUD responds in a 
timely way to congressional requests for information, including 
from both Chairs and Ranking Members, consistent with 
applicable law and regulations. Will you commit that, if 
confirmed, you will timely respond to and fully comply with all 
information requests from me? Please answer ``yes'' or ``no.'' 
If your answer is ``no,'' please explain.

A.3. Yes. If confirmed, I would expect to provide responses to 
requests, with reasonable understanding of the time required to 
produce documentation and consistent with applicable law and 
regulations.

Q.4. Will you commit that, if confirmed, you will make yourself 
and any other PIH employee expeditiously available to provide 
oral testimony (including but not limited to briefings, 
hearings, and transcribed interviews) to the Committee on any 
matter within its jurisdiction, upon the request of either the 
Chairman or Ranking Member? Please answer ``yes'' or ``no.'' If 
your answer is ``no,'' please explain why.

A.4. If confirmed, I would seek to respond to such requests 
with reasonable understanding of the time required to prepare 
briefings and make sure appropriate staff are prepared to offer 
substantive responses.

Q.5. Do you believe that PIH may assert any privileges or other 
legal justifications to withhold information (whether records 
or oral testimony) from Congress? Please answer ``yes'' or 
``no.''

A.5. If confirmed, I would consult with the agency's Office of 
General Counsel to ensure HUD responds to Congressional 
requests in a manner that is consistent with appropriate law 
and regulations.

Q.6. If you answered ``yes'' to the preceding question, please 
list every such privilege or other legal justification, and 
provide the legal basis for why you believe PIH may use such 
privilege or legal justification to withhold information from 
Congress.

A.6. N/A.

Q.7. In an effort to be open and transparent with Congress and 
the public, will you commit not to assert any such privilege or 
legal justification against Congress that you listed above? If 
not, why not? If so, please identify all such privileges or 
legal justifications that you will commit to not assert against 
Congress.

A.7. If confirmed, I would work with the Office of General 
Counsel to ensure that I am complying with any and all legal 
requirements.

Q.8. HUD Pilot Projects--In recent years, HUD has started some 
pilot programs to study the effectiveness of Housing Choice 
Vouchers and to try to improve them for beneficiaries. Would 
you be open to additional pilots? If so, what kinds of pilots?

A.8. If confirmed, I would be open to additional pilots in 
consultation with the Secretary.

Q.9. Ensuring That HUD Assistance Is Not for a ``Lifetime''--In 
December 2020, HUD Secretary Marcia Fudge said that ``public 
housing or low income housing should not be a lifetime, it 
should be just a stopping point.'' \1\ What do you intend to do 
during your time as the Assistant Secretary for Public and 
Indian Housing to advance that goal?
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \1\  Errin Haines, `` `I Want To Be Part of Making This Work:' 
Marcia Fudge Talks About How She Plans To Lead HUD'', The 19th (Dec. 
10, 2020), available at https://19thnews.org/2020/12/marcia-fudge-
interview-nomination-department-of-housing-and-urban-development/.

A.9. Programs like Family Self-Sufficiency (FSS) help tenants 
achieve financial and employment goals, including many who 
transition to home ownership. Rental assistance alone is vital 
for those experiencing homelessness or at risk of homelessness, 
but it offers families stability and the ability to pursue 
employment and educational goals and improve their health 
status and wellbeing. If confirmed, I would work with OGC to 
review the limitations on discretion that I have to support 
resources appropriated for this type of program by Congress to 
identify additional ways to support programs like FSS that 
build on rental assistance to help tenants achieve asset 
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
building, employment, and educational goals.

Q.10. Moving to Work--The Moving to Work (MTW) Demonstration 
Program provides public housing agencies (PHAs) with exemptions 
from many existing public housing and voucher rules and grants 
flexibility with how to use Federal funds. Do you support 
expanding the number of eligible jurisdictions to allow more 
communities to experiment with MTW?

A.10. From my experience in the field, I know the value of 
flexibility for public housing authority leaders. I do not 
currently have a position on expanding the MTW program but look 
forward to consulting with PIH staff, stakeholders, and the 
Secretary.

Q.11. Would you consider expanding MTW to allow defined-stay 
tenancy for new tenants (i.e., time limits) in exchange for a 
set rent that will not increase with income?

A.11. I do not currently have a position on expanding the MTW 
program but look forward to consulting PIH staff, stakeholders, 
and the Secretary. I would like to learn more about that 
approach, if confirmed and will work with your office and other 
interested policymakers to ensure that I have the latest 
thinking on this subject.

Q.12. After years of research, the Moving-to-Work Research 
Advisory Committee, comprised of public housing agencies, 
current and former public housing residents, and researchers 
recommended the MTW expansion include work requirements as a 
policy cohort to evaluate (along with general flexibility for 
small/medium PHAs, rent reform, and landlord incentives). Do 
you agree with this committee's recommendations?

A.12. I have not seen the committee's recommendations and so 
cannot respond to them. I do not currently have a position on 
expanding the MTW program but look forward to consulting with 
interested Congressional offices, PIH staff, stakeholders, and 
the Secretary.

Q.13. Despite years spent designing a study for work 
requirements and enough PHAs applying to participate in the 
study, in June 2021, HUD unilaterally decided to cancel this 
study. HUD justified this cancellation by suggesting a need to 
be ``responsive to the economic realities and current needs of 
low-income families.'' \2\ PHAs have expressed disappointment 
in HUD's decision to cancel this important research. HUD's 
justification for cancelling this study does not make sense 
given that any work or volunteer requirements studied by PHAs 
participating in the study would be set years from now. Do you 
agree with HUD's decision to cancel this study? Please explain 
why you agree or disagree with this decision.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \2\  HUD, ``Moving to Work (MTW) Expansion--Work Requirements 
Cohort'' (Rescinded), https://www.hud.gov/program--offices/public--
indian--housing/programs/ph/mtw/expansion/cohort3 (last updated June 
21, 2021).

A.13. Respectfully, I do not know enough about the committee's 
recommendations or the decision to cancel the study. If 
confirmed, I would learn more and meet with the Committee, HUD 
staff, and PHA leaders to understand the future of the MTW, 
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
including its recent expansion.

Q.14. Indian Housing--You have been nominated to lead HUD's 
Office of Public and Indian Housing (PIH). It appears you have 
no experience related to Indian housing. Why should the public 
have confidence that you will be able to effectively administer 
PIH's role in Indian housing affairs?

A.14. If confirmed, I will have the opportunity to work with 
the experienced leadership of the Office of Native American 
Programs which is located in PIH. Success in Indian housing 
requires respect for Tribal sovereignty and Nation-to-Nation 
relationships that the President has called on the Federal 
Government to strengthen across the board. If confirmed, I will 
embody this commitment and exhibit the flexibility and range of 
experience needed to address Tribal communities' housing and 
community development needs. Recent best practice projects from 
Tribal communities range from urban affordable housing in 
Portland, Oregon, to new public housing on islands in the 
Bering Straits. I have a range of experience from big cities to 
small cities and towns. While Tribal communities are unique and 
each one is different, I have the wide array of experience 
required to consult with Tribes on a wide range of issues on 
behalf of the Office of Public and Indian Housing.

Q.15. Public Housing--Public housing is costlier than other 
forms of housing assistance. \3\ And public housing projects 
have long been concentrated areas of poverty and crime. Do you 
agree that public housing is a less effective form of housing 
assistance than tenant-based vouchers that provides families 
freedom to live elsewhere?
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \3\  Gov't Accountability Office, GAO-02-76 ``Characteristics and 
Costs of Federal Housing Programs'' (Jan. 31, 2002), available at 
https://www.gao.gov/assets/gao-02-76.pdf.

A.15. I believe in both vouchers and public housing. I believe 
in both because I have lived in public housing and seen that it 
can be as good as private affordable housing when properly 
managed and supported. Public housing developments represent 
the cornerstone of the affordable housing system. While 
vouchers provide a flexible form of housing assistance, there 
will always be a need for affordable housing units in the 
community. The transformation of affordable housing often seen 
through Choice Neighborhoods and before that HOPE VI shows the 
potential that public housing has as a platform for 
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
revitalizing neighborhoods and entire communities.

Q.16. Public Housing Agencies (PHAs) are routinely found to 
mismanage programs and are plagued by scandals. How will you 
ensure PHAs remain responsible stewards of Federal taxpayer 
dollars?

A.16. If confirmed, achieving the best outcomes for tenants and 
voucher-holders will be at the center of my approach to working 
with PHAs. I will consistently choose the most deliberate and 
appropriate path to obtain improved conditions. I will make 
sure PHAs remain responsible stewards through transparent 
incentive systems for good performance, drawing on resources at 
HUD headquarters and in the field. Where PHAs struggle, we will 
use audits, engagement of PHA leadership, and, where necessary, 
HUD receivership when PHAs are mismanaged.

Q.17. Detroit's History of Project Delays--Detroit has invested 
heavily to revitalize blighted neighborhoods using substantial 
Federal resources. However, one project in particular has 
fallen well behind schedule and lost some of its Federal 
funding. According to news reports, when you served as 
Detroit's Chief of Services and Infrastructure, you reduced 
Federal grants for this project because delays in the 
revitalization of Detroit's Fitzgerald neighborhood raised 
doubts that all the money would be spent in time. \4\ The city 
also set overly ambitious completion timelines. \5\ According 
to one news report, ``Those initial plans were developed 
without any data--officials admitted in interviews with the 
Free Press--to support the notion that so many blighted houses 
could be rehabbed under the original 2-year timeframe.'' \6\ 
You admitted to the press: ``I wish we had been more 
conservative about the timelines.'' \7\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \4\ Joe Guillen, ``Detroit's Showcase Neighborhood Project Falls a 
Year Behind Schedule'', Detroit Free Press (July 6, 2018), available at 
https://www.freep.com/story/news/2018/07/06/detroits-fitzgerald-
neighborhood-remake-full-year-behind-plan/745950002/.
     \5\ Joe Guillen, ``Detroit Neighborhood Redevelopment Project To 
Take 3 Times Longer Than Promised'', Detroit Free Press (Feb. 21, 
2020), available at https://www.freep.com/story/news/investigations/
2020/02/21/detroit-fitzgerald-neighborhood-rehab/4646941002/.
     \6\ Id.
     \7\ Id.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Why did Detroit set overly ambitious project completion 
timelines?

A.17. Fitzgerald was one of approximately 35 housing and 
commercial developments in which I was involved during my time 
in Detroit. Detroit does not have the benefit of a strong 
market and the approach to work there is very different than my 
experience in strong markets of Washington, DC, and the City of 
Boston.
    The Fitzgerald project called for public sector agencies to 
conduct the demolition of approximately 25 vacant houses, 
construction of a new park, the construction of a Greenway and 
significant improvements in alley and roadway systems. The 
project also called for a market-led, phased rehabilitation of 
vacant single-family houses over 5-year period with some City 
funding support.
    The scope controlled by public sector entities took place 
on time. The rehabilitation of the houses which required 
layered financing and market demand moved more slowly.
    Unfortunately, there was not recent market experience for 
the kind of project proposed here, especially relative to 
market demand in a single neighborhood. We had to rely on the 
projections of the developer who won the RFP process. When I 
left the City in January 2021, the project's last phase is 
scheduled for completion by City affiliates in the 2022 
construction season with the final set of home rehabilitations 
to be completed and another set of houses to be sold to a 
neighborhood group in that same period.

Q.18. Why did Detroit set these timelines without any data to 
support them?

A.18. We did use data to support our conclusions. There was not 
very much applicable market data to draw from, however. The 
City was bankrupt just 3 years earlier. It had been a 
generation since there was large scale subdivision development 
in the city. As a result, there was little good indication on 
how quickly houses would be absorbed by the market.
    In approximately the same timeframe, the City of Detroit 
and the Detroit Land Bank Authority launched programs which 
have had significant success in rehabilitation of large numbers 
of houses. Programs such as the City's 0 percent Home Repair 
Loan Program, Bridging Neighborhoods program (BNP) and the 
Detroit Land Bank Authority's (DLBA) Rehabbed & Ready program. 
I was involved with conceiving 0 percent and BNP and 
fundraising capital support for the Rehabbed & Ready program. 
When I left the City in January 2021, these programs were 
approaching completion of 600 0 percent home repairs, 50 BNP 
home swaps and 90 Rehabbed & Ready sales, respectively.\8\  \9\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \8\ Shawn Lewis, ``Leaving Detroit's Delray: A Family Swaps Homes 
for Better Life'', https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/local/
detroit-city/2019/01/27/delray-neighborhood-home-swap/2596281002/.
     \9\ Andrew Ackerman, ``Biden's Neighborhood Revitalization Plan 
Looks to Detroit for Inspiration'', https://www.wsj.com/articles/
bidens-neighborhood-revitalization-plan-looks-to-detroit-for-
inspiration-11621935002.

Q.19. Have you overseen other redevelopment projects whose 
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
completion was similarly delayed?

A.19. Development in Detroit takes longer because it is not as 
strong a market as others in which I have worked. Other large 
and ambitious projects like the private redevelopment of the 
former Herman Kiefer Hospital property also moved slowly.
    While recovery in Detroit is underway, it is a process and 
takes time. It took many years for the current market 
conditions to develop; and it will take time for conditions to 
go in a new direction. I believe we began moving it in the 
right direction during my tenure.

Q.20. The PIH Assistant Secretary is delegated significant 
authority to waive requirements meant to reduce the risk of 
waste, fraud, and abuse in federally funded housing programs. 
Will you commit to not waiving such requirements even if faced 
with pressure to meet unrealistic spending goals?

A.20. I have certainly learned a lot from my 25 years of 
experience in development. I have not waived Federal 
requirements to meet goals before. If confirmed, I would use my 
judgment and avoid waiving requirements to meet spending goals.
    There is evidence of my approach to this kind of challenge. 
When I arrived in Detroit in 2014, the City had never spent its 
funds on a timely basis according to the timeliness test, which 
put the City at risk of fund recapture. Under the leadership of 
Hunter Kurtz and I, from 2016 to 2020 when the test was 
suspended due to COVID-19, we spent our funds on a timely 
basis.

Q.21. HUD has already waived requirements for documenting 
lawful immigration status before awarding housing vouchers made 
available through the American Rescue Plan Act. Are you 
considering additional waivers of such safeguards?

A.21. If confirmed, I will always consult with the Office of 
General Counsel to make sure actions are within the laws and 
regulations that guides our work.

Q.22. Targeting Low- to Moderate-Income Areas--Detroit funded a 
program to provide financial and technical assistance to 
potential and existing small businesses through a Community 
Development Block Grant (CDBG) award. According to news 
reports, however, HUD requested Detroit suspend CDBG spending 
until the city better targeted low- to moderate-income areas. 
\10\ At the time of HUD's request, you stated that you were 
``confident we're going to satisfy HUD's request.'' \11\ 
However, earlier this year, [The City of] Detroit's Office of 
Inspector General found that the program had an array of other 
deficiencies, including ``excessive spending, a lack of 
oversight, weak controls for issuing payments and ultimately 
nearly 77 percent of the businesses the program assisted 
failed.'' \12\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \10\  Candice Williams, ``Feds Review Motor City Match Over 
Documentation, Low-Income Assistance'', Detroit News (June 19, 2019), 
available at https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/local/detroit-city/
2019/06/19/feds-probe-whether-detroits-motor-city-match-program-
misused-funds/1482635001/.
     \11\ Id.
     \12\ Christine Ferretti, ``Duggan's Motor City Match Program Had 
Excessive Spending, Lack of Oversight: Report'', Detroit News (Jan. 4, 
2021), available at https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/local/
detroit-city/2021/01/04/detroit-motor-city-match-program-had-excessive-
spending-report/3776502002/.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Do you think HUD's programs should target low- to moderate-
income areas and families?

A.22. Yes.

Q.23. Under what specific circumstances do you think money made 
available through HUD should not target low- to moderate-income 
areas or families?

A.23. None. The rules governing the targeting of PIH resources 
are different and if confirmed would adhere closely to them 
with the guidance of OGC.

Q.24. Why were you confident HUD's requests would be satisfied?

A.24. I had seen the information and changes to billing 
approach that the HUD Field Office was requesting, and I 
believed that the data existed to meet their requirements.

Q.25. Given that this Detroit program had an array of 
deficiencies, including excessive spending, a lack of 
oversight, and weak controls for issuing payments, why should 
Federal taxpayers have confidence that you will be a good 
steward of their tax dollars at HUD?

A.25. HRD leadership did not run this program; rather, we were 
called in to help correct the identified problems. This was a 
program run by a subrecipient contractor of the city, the 
Detroit Economic Growth Corporation (DEGC/EDC).
    When HUD monitoring identified a problem with way that the 
DEGC/EDC was maintaining its Books and Records, the City of 
Detroit Office of Chief Financial Officer and HRD team leader 
who reported to me performed a forensic audit to identify the 
problems, cited contract violations of the DEGC/EDC, and worked 
with the DEGC/EDC made the Books and Records better conform 
with the requests of the HUD Detroit Field Office staff.
    Due to the work of the City OCFO and HRD staff to resolve 
questions, HUD reinstated the City's ability to contract CDBG 
with DEGC/EDC for the Motor City Match program in May 2020.

Q.26. To what do you attribute the program's high failure rate, 
as 77 percent by businesses receiving assistance through the 
program failed?

A.26. Please see answer above.

Q.27. How will you implement any lessons learned from this 
program to ensure success for families assisted through PIH?

A.27. Some troubled PHAs will require strong intervention from 
HUD PIH and if confirmed, I will use the same approach of 
forensic auditing and if necessary, installing HUD supervision 
to make sure taxpayer dollars are protected.

Q.28. Will you ensure that any provisions in law, regulation, 
or other subregulatory guidance requiring targeting of 
assistance remain in place for families served by PIH programs?

A.28. Yes, I will comply with all statutory and regulatory 
authorities when it comes to such guidance.

Q.29. Answering Questions for the Record--Please describe with 
particularity the process by which you answered these questions 
for the record, including identifying who assisted you in 
answering these questions along with a brief description of 
their assistance.

A.29. I prepared all answers personally. I worked with relevant 
staff to complete them in a manner consistent with HUD and the 
position's responsibilities.
                                ------                                


         RESPONSES TO WRITTEN QUESTIONS OF SENATOR REED
                  FROM JAMES ARTHUR JEMISON II

Q.1. The Family Self-Sufficiency (FSS) program is an important 
employment and savings incentive initiative that I have worked 
over the years to strengthen and expand.
    If confirmed, do you commit to prioritizing FSS as a key 
tool to giving those in public housing the incentives and tools 
to meet their financial goals?

A.1. FSS is a key tool in helping public housing residents, 
voucher holders, and NAHASDA-assisted households achieve their 
financial goals. If confirmed, I will emphasize asset building 
efforts like FSS to support residents.

Q.2. What strategies and ideas do you have for further 
improving access to the FSS program and provide the support 
needed for more public housing agencies to implement it?

A.2. FSS requires local PHA staff leadership to achieve success 
for tenants. Making sure that housing authorities have the 
administrative staff and technical assistance required to work 
with residents will be the key to broader acceptance of the 
program as a part of PHA core programming.

Q.3. Research has shown that the threat to affordable housing 
from flooding and other effects driven by climate change will 
likely triple in the next 30 years, which is why I recently 
introduced legislation (the Green Retrofits Act, S.2361), to 
bolster public-private partnerships to make green upgrades to 
HUD-assisted multifamily homes and create a new program to 
distribute energy efficiency grants and loans. If confirmed, 
how will you work to make public housing stock more resilient 
in the face of climate change? How do we protect our most 
vulnerable populations from future hurricanes, heat waves, and 
cold snaps?

A.3. Public housing authorities receive annual capital 
allocations to address emergency capital needs and otherwise 
maintain their properties. In addition, the Choice 
Neighborhoods program provides significant new capital for 
particularly distressed properties. If confirmed, I will work 
with PHAs to prioritize resilient rehabilitation as part of 
their capital programs. If significant new funds come from 
Congress for capital improvements in public housing, we will 
have an even greater opportunity to make sure rehabilitation 
and new development are resilient to disasters and other 
impacts of climate change.

Q.4. If you are confirmed, can you commit to prioritizing HUD-
VASH and working to ensure that no servicemember is discharged 
into homelessness? What ideas and strategies do you have for 
improving the HUD-VASH program?

A.4. Yes. No veteran who has raised their hand and committed to 
serve the United States should experience homelessness. If 
confirmed, I will prioritize VASH, including Tribal VASH, in my 
work to make sure we improve utilization of VASH through, among 
other methods, more focused engagement between PHAs, Continuums 
of Care, and Tribes, and continuing engagement with the VA and 
DOD.
                                ------                                


        RESPONSES TO WRITTEN QUESTIONS OF SENATOR SINEMA
                  FROM JAMES ARTHUR JEMISON II

Q.1. In 2017, HUD reported finding much higher rates of 
building deficiencies and overcrowding in housing in tribal 
areas than in other U.S. housing. Arizona is home to 22 Native 
American tribes and 20 reservations. These issues continue to 
affect Arizonans who belong to these tribes and live on these 
reservations. If confirmed, how will you ensure that housing 
development projects on tribal land in Arizona are safe and 
affordable? How will you work with tribal leadership and the 
State of Arizona to ensure the efficacy of these projects?

A.1. If confirmed, I will work to make sure that housing 
development projects on tribal land are safe and will work to 
reduce overcrowding. We will do this in coordination with 
Tribes, engaging in meaningful and robust consultation. Tribes' 
needs may vary greatly, but they all want to be able to provide 
housing and other community resources for families. Where 
Tribes request best practices and support in working with 
property owners on safety and overcrowding, our office will 
provide that support.
    If confirmed, I will also focus on helping Tribes meet 
these needs and fully leverage resources available from the 
American Rescue Plan enacted earlier in 2021.
                                ------                                


        RESPONSES TO WRITTEN QUESTIONS OF SENATOR SHELBY
                  FROM JAMES ARTHUR JEMISON II

Q.1. During your time in a senior housing position for the City 
of Detroit, efforts to redevelop certain neighborhoods 
experienced significant delays. According to press reports, on 
one particular project, timelines that you set up were 
``developed without any data'' and were missed. \1\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \1\ Joe Guillen, ``Detroit Neighborhood Redevelopment Project To 
Take 3 Times Longer Than Promised'', Detroit Free Press (Feb. 21, 
2020), available at https://www.freep.com/story/news/investigations/
2020/02/21/detroit-fitzgerald-neighborhood-rehab/4646941002/.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    What was your justification for developing timelines 
without any data to support them?

A.1. We did use data to support our conclusions. There was not 
very much applicable data to draw from, however. The article 
this question cites to refers to the Fitzgerald project. The 
Fitzgerald project was one of approximately 35 housing and 
commercial developments in which I was involved during my time 
in Detroit.
    The Fitzgerald project called for public sector agencies to 
conduct the demolition of approximately 25 vacant houses, the 
construction of a new park, the construction of a greenway and 
significant improvements in alley and roadway systems. The 
project also called for a market-led, phased rehabilitation of 
vacant single-family houses over a 5-year period with some City 
funding support.
    The scope of work controlled by public sector entities took 
place on time. The rehabilitation of the houses, which required 
layered financing and market demand, moved more slowly.
    When I arrived in Detroit from Massachusetts in 2014, the 
City's bankruptcy was being resolved and I was part of a team 
of people whose job it was to help the city recover. This 
required trying new approaches. In a city recovering from 
bankruptcy, there was no data or comparable recent programs in 
which a private, single-family rehabber had delivered 
significant numbers of single-family home rehabilitations 
successfully. As a result, there was no data or benchmark from 
which to measure the proposed pace of rehabilitation. The 
selected developer cited their track record of rehabilitations 
in other city neighborhoods.
    In approximately the same timeframe, the City of Detroit 
and the Detroit Land Bank Authority launched programs which 
have had significant success in rehabilitation of large numbers 
of houses. Programs such as the City's 0 percent Home Repair 
Loan Program, Bridging Neighborhoods program (BNP) and the 
Detroit Land Bank Authority's (DLBA) Rehabbed & Ready program. 
I was involved with conceiving 0 percent and BNP; and was part 
of fundraising capital support for the Rehabbed and Ready 
program. When I left the City in January 2021, these programs 
were approaching completion of nearly 600 0-percent home 
repairs, nearly 50 BNP home swaps and close to 90 Rehabbed and 
Ready sales, respectively. Articles about both these programs 
are referenced below as footnotes.\2\ \3\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \2\ Shawn Lewis, ``Leaving Detroit's Delray: A Family Swaps Homes 
for Better Life'', https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/local/
detroit-city/2019/01/27/delray-neighborhood-home-swap/2596281002/.
     \3\ Andrew Ackerman, ``Biden's Neighborhood Revitalization Plan 
Looks to Detroit for Inspiration'', https://www.wsj.com/articles/
bidens-neighborhood-revitalization-plan-looks-to-detroit-for-
inspiration-11621935002.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Over the last 25 years I've been directly involved in the 
preservation of over 4,000 and development of over 3,500 market 
and affordable units and hundreds of public housing units. I 
have been involved in the permitting and development of over $2 
billion in economic development projects and been part of the 
recovery of two public housing authorities: in Boston under the 
leadership of Sandi Henriquez former Assistant Secretary for 
Public and Indian Housing (PIH); and the Detroit Housing 
Commission with my former Deputy Director in Detroit, Hunter 
Kurtz. Hunter went on to become the Assistant Secretary for 
Public and Indian Housing in the prior Administration.
    I have done my work in recovering cities, working to hasten 
positive change. I hope to bring my energy and reform 
experience, if confirmed, to the Office of Public and Indian 
Housing.

Q.2. If confirmed, what factors will you consider in order to 
ensure taxpayer funds are allocated efficiently at HUD?

A.2. If confirmed, the factors to consider include making sure 
the programs are simple to implement so the full range of local 
approaches can be used. We should also consider the use of 
known programmatic and regulatory channels, such as basing new 
programs on regulatory frameworks like CDBG, for example. This 
process allows efficient deployment of the funds.
    My experience as a practitioner will inform the way in 
which we ensure the efficient deployment of taxpayer funds I 
have already spent 10 months at HUD leading the Office of 
Community Planning and Development. Just since January 2021, 
CPD has issued implementing notices for over $5 billion in 
funds through the HOME-ARP program.
    If confirmed I would bring my field experience to bear in 
headquarters. My experience with the field will also ensure 
that taxpayer funds are allocated efficiently. When I arrived 
in Detroit in 2014, the City had never spent its funds on a 
timely basis according to the CDBG Timeliness Test, putting 
those funds at risk of recapture. From 2016 to 2020, we spent 
our funds on a timely basis. The test was suspended in 2020 due 
to the unprecedented challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic.
    We made these marked improvements to timely expenditures of 
funds by supporting staff focus and close working relationships 
with the field office and technical assistance providers. If 
confirmed, I will bring my extensive reform experience in the 
field and my recent experience at HUD headquarters to bear in 
this new position.
                                ------                                


        RESPONSES TO WRITTEN QUESTIONS OF SENATOR ROUNDS
                  FROM JAMES ARTHUR JEMISON II

Q.1. Mr. Jemison II, could you explain to me how you plan to 
succeed in this position when you have very little direct 
public housing experience and, from what I can tell, no Indian 
housing experience?

A.1. I have extensive experience working with Public Housing 
Authorities to rehabilitate and develop public housing and use 
voucher resources to create more affordable housing. I worked 
at the Boston Housing Authority for Sandi Henriquez who went on 
to become the Assistant Secretary for Public and Indian 
Housing. I also worked with the Detroit Housing Commission 
which was in receivership when I arrived in 2014. In 2015, HUD 
ended receivership based on our work and the Commission was put 
under the control of a locally appointed board. We performed 
that work when Hunter Kurtz the outgoing Assistant Secretary 
and I worked together as the leaders of the Housing & 
Revitalization Department in Detroit.
    Indian housing requires a professional with the flexibility 
and experience to work through Tribal consultation process to 
help Tribes address their housing and community development 
goals. Because Tribes are each unique, they may need the kind 
of housing for urban housing needs that has been developed in 
Portland; or they may need the kind of housing developed in the 
Bering Straits for the Tribes of that region. I have experience 
working in a wide range of environments from big cities to 
small towns and I have shown the flexibility to create success 
working with a wide range of different kinds of people. I'm 
confident I have the range of experience to successfully work 
with Tribes in your State and others.

Q.2. Mr. Jemison, if you are confirmed to this position, the 
Office of Native American Programs (ONAP) will fall under your 
purview. For years ONAP has been a mismanaged, nightmare to 
work with. Can I get your commitment today to work on fixing 
ONAP and making it an effective office for tribes, and entities 
that serve tribes, to work with?

A.2. If confirmed, I would be happy to understand your concerns 
further and would strive to improve the performance of ONAP to 
best serve Tribal Communities.

Q.3. Mr. Jemison, one program that falls under ONAP is the 
Section 184 lending program, of which I'm sure you are 
familiar. There are significant issues with this program 
including:
    Large numbers of loan guarantee endorsements that are 
overdue, sometimes by more than 1 year. For reference, ONAP's 
guidelines require issuance of the Loan Guarantee Certificate 
within 60 days of receipt of the endorsement file.
    There is a huge backlog of unpaid claims, which is reported 
to exceed 250 loans.
    Outdated loan underwriting guidelines that have fallen far 
behind other Federal programs and are causing much higher 
qualification hurdles for Native American borrowers.
    A lack of updating technology to match that of other HUD 
programs, such as FHA.
    Can I get your assurances that if you are confirmed you 
will work to fix all of the aforementioned inadequacies in the 
Section 184 lending program? Specifically, can I get your 
commitment to examine the underwriting process ONAP uses for 
its Section 184 program and look for ways it can be improved to 
match that of other HUD lending programs?

A.3. You have my commitment to work with your office and Tribes 
in your State to improve the performance of the Section 184 
program so that it is a closer match to other HUD lending 
programs.

Q.4. Mr. Jemison, in my State of South Dakota, approximately 9 
percent of our citizens are Native American. My staff and I 
have been working closely with the SD Native Homeownership 
Coalition to improve home ownership opportunities for Native 
people, especially Native American veterans. As I understand 
it, the HUD Section 184 home loan guaranty program is a pretty 
powerful loan program, but it has not lived up to its potential 
over the past decade. In fact, only about 10 percent of Section 
184 loans have gone to borrowers living on Indian reservations, 
where the program is needed most.

A.4. The issues affecting the Section 184 program are primarily 
related to resolution of title issues which rest with both the 
Department of Interior and HUD. If confirmed, I would work to 
resolve the known cases while also creating an improved title 
process. I have some experience with this kind of challenge: in 
2014, the City of Detroit empowered its Land Bank to handle 
complicated title issues en masse to support a stronger home 
ownership market. This was one of the factors that allowed the 
Detroit Land Bank to sell and enable private rehabilitation of 
over 8,000 single family rehabilitations over the last 7 years. 
Each tribe and its title issues will be different but with 
other experience to bring to bear, we can use the Nation-to-
Nation relationship to speed progress.

Q.5. Since this program will be under your jurisdiction, what 
can you do to make certain the Section 184 loan program 
receives the attention it needs to help bring more home 
ownership opportunities to Native people in South Dakota?

A.5. The issues affecting the Section 184 program are primarily 
related to resolution of title issues which rest with both the 
Department of Interior and HUD. If confirmed, I would convene 
the offices across the Departments to resolve the known cases 
while also creating an improved title process. I have some 
experience with this kind of challenge: in 2014, the City of 
Detroit empowered its Land Bank to handle complicated title 
issues en masse to support a stronger home ownership market. 
This was one of the factors that allowed the Detroit Land Bank 
to sell and enable private rehabilitation of over 8,000 single 
family rehabilitations over the last 7 years. Each Tribe and 
its title issues will be different but with other experience to 
bring to bear, we can use the Nation-to-Nation relationship to 
speed progress.

Q.6. Mr. Jemison, it's come to my attention that the current 
relationship and communication, or lack thereof, between ONAP 
leadership and the Native lending community is extremely 
severed. Without the participating lending community, the 
Section 184 program would not exist and therefore the staff 
would not need to exist. I have heard from lenders in my State 
that this is the worst relationship between ONAP and 184 
lenders in 20 years. Can I get a commitment from you to make 
certain that this relationship is mended so the Section 184 
lending program can continue to grow and flourish?

A.6. If confirmed, I will look into these concerns and would 
strive to strengthen ONAP to best serve Tribal Communities.
                                ------                                


        RESPONSES TO WRITTEN QUESTIONS OF SENATOR TILLIS
                  FROM JAMES ARTHUR JEMISON II

Q.1. A [City of Detroit] Detroit Office of Inspect General 
(OIG) report from January 4, 2021, found that a Community 
Development Block Grant (CDBG) program developed by Detroit 
while you were a senior city official awarded grants to 
businesses in the metro-Detroit suburbs and not inside the City 
of Detroit. In addition, Detroit awarded CDBG funds to 
businesses in States as far away as Georgia and California and 
to businesses in foreign countries, like Canada and France. \1\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \1\ City of Detroit OIG, 2019-0018-INV Motor City Match & Motor 
City Re-Store Programs 29 (Jan. 4, 2021), https://detroitmi.gov/sites/
detroitmi.localhost/files/2021-01/OIG%20Case%20No.%202019-0018-
INV%20Motor%20City%20Match.pdf.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Why was it in Detroit's interest to award CDBG funds to 
entities so far removed from the City of Detroit?

A.1. In 2014, the Administration believed that the city needed 
an entrepreneurship program. The field office of HUD in Detroit 
worked closely with the Detroit Economic Growth Corporation 
(DEGC) to design the ``Motor City Match'' program, which is 
partially funded with CDBG dollars. DEGC/EDC operated the Motor 
City Match Program and was responsible for its oversight.
    The program's purpose was to open businesses in Detroit 
neighborhoods and employ Detroit residents. This included 
companies with founders from outside City boundaries if they 
committed to creating jobs for low-income Detroit residents. As 
of January 2021, 64 percent of the new Motor City Match 
businesses had Detroit-based owners, 81 percent were minority-
owned, and 71 percent were women-owned.
    The program was designed to have CDBG funds allocated to 
give entrepreneurs business planning and design advice and 
allow philanthropic funders to support the capital expenses of 
new businesses.
    The City of Detroit Housing & Revitalization Department, 
entered into a subrecipient contract with the DEGC/EDC for 
Economic Development programs in 2015. HRD did not operate 
Motor City Match. That was the responsibility of DEGC/EDC, 
which is separate from the department I led.

Q.2. Did the City of Detroit have sufficient controls to ensure 
that CDBG funds would be appropriately targeted to benefit 
Detroit?

A.2. The City had controls in place for all payments and also 
an office for focus on consistency with grants through an 
Office of Grants Management within the Office of the Chief 
Financial Officer. By the time I left in January 2021, the 
program had had a significant positive impact in Detroit, 
including the opening of over 111 new brick-and-mortar small 
businesses and significant numbers of new pop-up and home-based 
businesses.
    When HUD monitoring identified a problem with way that the 
DEGC/EDC was maintaining its Books and Records, the City of 
Detroit Office of Chief Financial Officer and the HRD team 
whose leader reported to me, performed a forensic audit to 
identify the problems, cited contract violations of the DEGC/
EDC, and worked with the DEGC/EDC to make the Books and Records 
better conform with the requests of the HUD Detroit Field 
Office staff.
    Because of the work of the City OCFO and HRD staff to 
resolve questions from the agency, HUD reinstated the City's 
ability to contract CDBG with DEGC/EDC for the Motor City Match 
program in May 2020.

Q.3. This same [City of Detroit] OIG report uncovered multiple 
problems with this Detroit CDBG program. These problems 
included ``excessive spending, a lack of oversight, weak 
controls for issuing payments and ultimately nearly 77 percent 
of the businesses the program assisted failed.'' \2\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \2\ Christine Ferretti, ``Duggan's Motor City Match Program Had 
Excessive Spending, Lack of Oversight: Report'', Detroit News (Jan. 4, 
2021), available at https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/local/
detroit-city/2021/01/04/detroit-motor-city-match-program-had-excessive-
spending-report/3776502002/.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    How will you ensure that the programs you administer for 
the HUD's Office of Public and Indian Housing (PIH) do not 
experience similar problems?

A.3. HRD leadership did not run this program; rather, they were 
called in to help correct the identified problems. This was a 
program run by a subrecipient contractor of the City, the 
Detroit Economic Growth Corporation (DEGC).
    In my current position at HUD, I take seriously the 
responsibility to ensure taxpayer dollars are protected. If 
confirmed as Assistant Secretary for Public and Indian Housing, 
I will take appropriate action to conduct this oversight.

Q.4. How will you ensure that taxpayer funds administered by 
PIH are not wasted as they were in Detroit?

A.4. If confirmed, I would diligently oversee PIH's annual 
appropriations with the support of extensive expertise and 
personnel dedicated to PHA oversight in the field. The vast 
majority of PIH's funding goes directly to residents for rental 
assistance and resources for capital needs and operations. 
Proper oversight of this vital funding is critical to maximize 
PHAs' ability to serve residents' needs.

Q.5. This same Detroit CDBG program was also the subject of a 
review by HUD due to its poor targeting of low- to moderate-
income areas. In fact, HUD called on Detroit to cease this CDBG 
spending until the city improved this targeting. \3\ At the 
time of HUD's request, you stated that you were ``confident 
we're going to satisfy HUD's request.'' \4\
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \3\ Candice Williams, ``Feds Review Motor City Match Over 
Documentation, Low-Income Assistance'' Detroit News (June 19, 2019), 
available at https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/local/detroit-city/
2019/06/19/feds-probe-whether-detroits-motor-city-match-program-
misused-funds/1482635001/.
     \4\ Id.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Should CDBG dollars be targeted to serve low- to moderate-
income areas?

A.5. This targeting was improved and because of the work of the 
City OCFO and HRD staff to resolve questions, HUD reinstated 
the City's ability to contract CDBG with DEGC/EDC for the Motor 
City Match program in May 2020.
    While this question does not pertain to the scope of the 
Office of Public and Indian Housing, I believe that grantees 
should follow the law and regulation.

Q.6. Should other HUD programs--particularly those administered 
by HUD's Office of Public and Indian Housing (PIH)--also be 
targeted to support low- to moderate-income families?

A.6. PIH programs are critical to low- to moderate-income 
families, providing essential housing assistance. There are 
strict income eligibility requirements for public housing to 
which PHAs must adhere.

Q.7. Do you commit to not remove any oversight controls that 
ensure PIH programs target low- to moderate-income families?

A.7. I do not intend to remove any oversight controls for 
public housing to which PHAs must adhere.
                                ------                                


       RESPONSES TO WRITTEN QUESTIONS OF SENATOR KENNEDY
                  FROM JAMES ARTHUR JEMISON II

Q.1. Risk Rating 2.0--Mr. Jemison, the National Flood Insurance 
Program (NFIP) has undergone significant changes to its rate 
setting methodology (Risk Rating 2.0) that may cause 
policyholders to pay more in monthly premiums, impact housing 
affordability, and, in some instances, constrain the supply of 
housing.
    What will you do to ensure that implementation of these 
changes do not negatively impact the affordability and 
availability of housing?

A.1. This is a question best posed to the Federal Housing 
Administration leadership. It falls outside of both the Office 
of Public and Indian Housing and the Office of Community 
Planning and Development.

Q.2. Will you compel the Federal Emergency Management Agency 
(FEMA) to disclose this data for multifamily properties?

A.2. This is a question best posed to the Federal Housing 
Administration leadership. It falls outside of both the Office 
of Public and Indian Housing and the Office of Community 
Planning and Development.
                                ------                                


        RESPONSES TO WRITTEN QUESTIONS OF SENATOR MORAN
                  FROM JAMES ARTHUR JEMISON II

Q.1. A recent [City of] Detroit Office of Inspector General 
(OIG) report published in January 2021 revealed that one of 
Detroit's Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) programs 
used Federal funds to support many businesses that ultimately 
failed. \1\ In fact, the OIG found that ``ultimately nearly 77 
percent of the businesses the program assisted failed.'' \2\ 
You served as a senior city official in Detroit during the 
period reviewed by the OIG. At HUD, you would administer the 
Office of Public and Indian Housing (PIH), which allocates 
substantial amounts of taxpayer dollars.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \1\ Detroit OIG, 2019-0018-INV Motor City Match & Motor City Re-
Store Programs 29 (Jan. 4, 2021), https://detroitmi.gov/sites/
detroitmi.localhost/files/2021-01/OIG%20Case%20No.%202019-0018-
INV%20Motor%20City%20Match.pdf.
     \2\ Christine Ferretti, ``Duggan's Motor City Match Program Had 
Excessive Spending, Lack of Oversight: Report'', Detroit News (Jan. 4, 
2021), available at https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/local/
detroit-city/2021/01/04/detroit-motor-city-match-program-had-excessive-
spending-report/3776502002/.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
    Given your record of performance in Detroit, how can 
Congress be sure that you will help families supported by HUD 
reach self-sufficiency while protecting taxpayer dollars?

A.1. HRD leadership did not run this program. This was a 
program run by a subrecipient contractor of the city, the 
Detroit Economic Growth Corporation.
    The contention of the City of Detroit OIG referenced above 
is not accurate. Put simply, the failed business percentage 
cited includes businesses that were still receiving technical 
assistance but had yet to open. The eligibility criteria would 
be met when businesses open and hire a low-income Detroiter. 
Many of these businesses were en route to open but were slowed 
by COVID-19.
    When HUD monitoring identified a problem with way that the 
DEGC/EDC was maintaining its Books and Records on the program, 
the City of Detroit Office of Chief Financial Officer and HRD 
team leader who reported to me performed a forensic audit to 
identify the problems, cited subrecipient contract violations 
of the DEGC/EDC , and working with the DEGC/EDC , made the 
Books and Records better conform with the requests of the HUD 
Detroit Field Office staff.
    Because of the work of the City OCFO and HRD staff to 
resolve questions, HUD reinstated the City's ability to 
contract CDBG with DEGC/EDC for the Motor City Match program in 
May 2020.
    As far as my record is concerned, I stand by my record. 
Over the last 25 years I've been directly involved in the 
preservation of 4,000 and development of over 3,500 market and 
affordable units and hundreds of public housing units. I have 
been involved in the permitting and development of over $2B in 
economic development projects and been part of the recovery of 
two public housing authorities in Boston under the leadership 
of Sandi Henriquez former Assistant Secretary for Public and 
Indian Housing (PIH); and the Detroit Housing Commission with 
my former Deputy Director in Detroit, Hunter Kurtz, who went on 
to become the Assistant Secretary for Public and Indian Housing 
in the prior Administration.
    I have done my work in recovering cities, working to hasten 
positive change. I hope to bring my energy and reform 
experience, if confirmed to the Office of Public and Indian 
Housing.
                                ------                                


        RESPONSES TO WRITTEN QUESTIONS OF CHAIRMAN BROWN
                        FROM MARK COLON

Q.1. Where have you excelled in past positions in attracting, 
hiring, and promoting people of color in positions in your 
organization? Where might there be room for improvement?

A.1. I am extremely proud of my record in attracting, hiring, 
and promoting people of color in the State-wide offices that I 
have led over the past 13 years.
    For instance, it is my understanding that I have promoted 
the most diverse class of supervisory personnel in agency 
history, to oversee some of the largest housing programs in the 
country. This includes BIPOC and/or female Directors and 
Assistant Directors of (a) the Nation's third largest Section 8 
Housing Choice Voucher program, (b) the 100,000+ unit Mitchell-
Lama (moderate income) housing portfolio, and (c) NY State's 
Low Income Housing Tax Credit portfolio.
    If confirmed, I am committed to continuing this record and 
attracting, retaining, and promoting a work force at HUD CPD 
that reflects the diversity of our Nation.

Q.2. What specific measures will you use to evaluate the 
success of the Department of Housing and Urban Development 
(HUD) in understanding and addressing the needs of Black, 
Indigenous, and people of color (BIPOC)? And, will you work 
with the Secretary and senior officials to keep Congress 
apprised, as appropriate, on the progress being made on these 
measures?

A.2. I am aware of, and support, President Biden and Secretary 
Fudge's strong commitment to understanding and addressing the 
needs of BIPOC communities and to ensuring racial equity across 
all Federal programs.
    If confirmed, I would first want to understand the 
Secretary's vision for evaluating success in this critical 
area. I would also confer with my team, starting on Day One, in 
order to (a) familiarize myself with those systems already in 
place for evaluating equity, and (b) understand how we might 
work with our partners and facilitate communications with BIPOC 
communities to better identify the most pressing needs and 
collaborate on the most effective remedies.
    I recognize the critical role that Congress plays in 
overseeing the Department's work and, if confirmed, I commit to 
working with the Secretary and senior officials to keep the 
Members apprised of our progress on these matters.

Q.3. What is your plan for creating an inclusive working 
environment for employees within your office?

A.3. I have always believed that good workplace morale and an 
inclusive work environment are critical to providing the best 
possible Government services, as well as to administering the 
most efficient, effective and equitable Government programs.
    If confirmed, my first priority would be to understand 
Secretary Fudge's vision and plan for ensuring an inclusive 
working environment. I would also sit with CPD's Operations and 
Human Resources staff to discuss and evaluate any existing 
plans.
    At its core, though, I have found that an inclusive working 
environment begins with ensuring that all staff believes that 
their efforts are adequately recognized and that their voices 
are heard. I have always done my best to communicate this, as a 
leader, both by my words and by my actions.
                                ------                                


        RESPONSES TO WRITTEN QUESTIONS OF SENATOR TOOMEY
                        FROM MARK COLON

Q.1. Congressional Oversight--Please provide your philosophy on 
how HUD's Office of Community Planning and Development (CPD) 
will approach and respond to Congressional information requests 
(both for documentary information and oral testimony), if you 
are confirmed.

A.1. I recognize the critical role that Congress plays in 
overseeing the Department's work. If confirmed, I would work to 
ensure that CPD is responsive to Congressional information 
requests, in as thorough and efficient manner as possible.

Q.2. If confirmed, do you intend to respond to information 
requests differently depending on who is making the 
Congressional information request (whether it's the chair of 
the Congressional Committee, the Ranking Member, or another 
member of Congress)? Please answer ``yes'' or ``no.'' If your 
answer is ``yes,'' please explain.

A.2. No. If confirmed, I would ensure HUD responds to 
Congressional requests for information, consistent with 
applicable law and regulations.

Q.3. Will you commit that, if confirmed, you will timely 
respond to and fully comply with all information requests from 
me? Please answer ``yes'' or ``no.'' If your answer is ``no,'' 
please explain.

A.3. Yes, if confirmed, I would ensure HUD responds to 
Congressional requests for information, consistent with 
applicable law and regulations.

Q.4. Will you commit that, if confirmed, you will make yourself 
and any other CPD employee expeditiously available to provide 
oral testimony (including but not limited to briefings, 
hearings, and transcribed interviews) to the Committee on any 
matter within its jurisdiction, upon the request of either the 
Chairman or Ranking Member? Please answer ``yes'' or ``no.'' If 
your answer is ``no,'' please explain why.

A.4. Yes, if confirmed, I would ensure HUD responds to 
Congressional requests for information, consistent with 
appropriate law and regulations.

Q.5. Do you believe that CPD may assert any privileges or other 
legal justifications to withhold information (whether records 
or oral testimony) from Congress? Please answer ``yes'' or 
``no.''

A.5. If confirmed, I would confer with HUD's Office of General 
Counsel regarding all matters involving claims of privilege or 
other legal justification.

Q.6. If you answered ``yes'' to the preceding question, please 
list every such privilege or other legal justification and 
provide the legal basis for why you believe CPD may use such 
privilege or legal justification to withhold information from 
Congress.

A.6. N/A.

Q.7. In an effort to be open and transparent with Congress and 
the public, will you commit not to assert any such privilege or 
legal justification against Congress that you listed above? If 
not, why not? If so, please identify all such privileges or 
legal justifications that you will commit to not assert against 
Congress.

A.7. If confirmed, I would confer with HUD's Office of General 
Counsel regarding all matters involving claims of privilege or 
other legal justification.
Q.8. Barriers to Affordable Housing--In January 2021, HUD 
released a report entitled ``Eliminating Regulatory Barriers to 
Affordable Housing: Federal, State, Local, and Tribal 
Opportunities'', which ``identifies many Federal regulations 
and practices that could be revised to eliminate unnecessary 
burdens to providing Americans with affordable, safe, quality 
places to live, including opportunities to make sustainable 
home ownership more achievable.'' \1\ Which of the report's 
recommendations do you agree with?
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \1\ HUD, ``Eliminating Regulatory Barriers to Affordable Housing: 
Federal, State, Local, and Tribal Opportunities'', (Jan. 19, 2021), 
available at https://www.huduser.gov/portal//portal/sites/default/
files/pdf/eliminating-regulatory-barriers-to-affordable-housing.pdf.

A.8. I am encouraged by President Biden and Secretary Fudge's 
commitment to increasing the supply of safe, decent, and 
affordable housing, including both privately owned and rental 
housing. If confirmed, I would want to understand Secretary 
Fudge's vision for the role that HUD and CPD can play in 
encouraging greater production and removing barriers to the 
development of affordable housing. I would also commit to 
familiarizing myself with all the current sources of guidance 
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
on this topic, including the report cited here.

Q.9. Ensuring That HUD Assistance Is Not for a ``Lifetime''--In 
December 2020, HUD Secretary Marcia Fudge said that ``public 
housing or low income housing should not be a lifetime, it 
should be just a stopping point.'' \2\ What do you intend to do 
during your time as the Assistant Secretary for Community 
Planning and Development to advance that goal?
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \2\ Errin Haines, `` `I Want To Be Part of Making This Work:' 
Marcia Fudge Talks About How She Plans To Lead HUD'', The 19th (Dec. 
10, 2020), available at https://19thnews.org/2020/12/marcia-fudge-
interview-nomination-department-of-housing-and-urban-development/.

A.9. I am unaware of the context in which Secretary Fudge may 
have made that remark. If confirmed, I would be reticent to 
forecast any policy initiatives for CPD based on such a brief 
remark, without first fully understanding the Secretary's 
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
intent, as well as the context.

Q.10. Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) Program--Will 
you commit to evaluating whether the CDBG program formula 
allocates too much money to wealthier areas, at the expense of 
funding poorer and more rural areas? If so, will you consider 
implementing CDBG reforms that could address this issue?

A.10. If confirmed, I would first want to understand any 
recently concluded or ongoing studies in this area, as well as 
any empirical findings and the Secretary's thoughts.

Q.11. Will you commit to evaluating whether the CDBG program 
insufficiently prioritizes the building of affordable housing 
because of other allowable uses for CDBG dollars? If so, will 
you consider implementing CDBG reforms that could address this 
issue?

A.11. I would want to defer to the Secretary regarding this 
issue, and, if confirmed, I look forward to discussing this 
further with her.

Q.12. What are appropriate guardrails to enact in HUD's CDBG 
Disaster Recovery program to ensure that disaster relief 
reaches a community swiftly but in a manner that minimizes 
fraud?

A.12. As a former grantee of CDBG Disaster Recovery funding, I 
understand well the risks that come with disaster recovery 
grants--communities must create and administer programs, and 
award funding, all while dealing with the after-effects of a 
major disaster.
    If confirmed, I commit to working with my team, the Office 
of the Inspector General, and the Government Accountability 
Office to protect against waste, fraud, and abuse, while also 
ensuring that all grantees are treated equally and fairly.

Q.13. On December 4, 2019, you tweeted about the response of 
Republican members of Congress to the House impeachment 
hearings against President Trump. You tweeted ``Yes, 
#WellDoneTraitors.'' What did you mean when you wrote 
``#WellDoneTraitors''? At the time did you believe 
Congressional Republicans were traitors?

A.13. No, I did not.
    I am deeply and genuinely sorry for my prior, personal 
tweets. Posting those tweets was wrong and out of character 
with my personal life and my entire professional career. That 
is why I stopped posting, and began to delete, those tweets 
prior to the 2020 election and long before my nomination.
    That is also why I have apologized publicly, on the record, 
and in every meeting that I have had with any Committee Member 
or staff person.
    While I sincerely regret engaging in that type of activity, 
I am also immensely proud of the substantive, bipartisan means 
in which I have addressed housing and economic issues in every 
region of New York State (and beyond) for nearly 20 years. I am 
also immensely proud of my office's record in preserving 
housing affordability for tens of thousands of New Yorkers, in 
every region, regardless of party affiliation and, to my 
knowledge, without a single claim of partisanship against me or 
my office.
    As such, if given the opportunity to serve, I am thoroughly 
committed to working collaboratively and, as I have my entire 
career, on a fully bipartisan basis, in order to address the 
truly pressing issues facing our Nation.

Q.14. On October 16, 2019, another Twitter user tweeted ``I see 
deplorables'' in reference to the 62 million Americans who 
voted for President Trump in 2016. To which you responded, 
``Same . . . ''. Do you view your fellow Americans who voted 
for President Trump in 2016 as deplorables? If not, why did you 
say that you did in the above tweet?

A.14. No, I do not.
    I am deeply and genuinely sorry for my prior, personal 
tweets. Posting those tweets was wrong and out of character 
with my personal life and my entire professional career. That 
is why I stopped posting, and began to delete, those tweets 
prior to the 2020 election and long before my nomination.
    That is also why I have apologized publicly, on the record, 
and in every meeting that I have had with any Committee Member 
or staff person.
    While I sincerely regret engaging in that type of activity, 
I am also immensely proud of the substantive, bipartisan means 
in which I have addressed housing and economic issues in every 
region of New York State (and beyond) for nearly 20 years. I am 
also immensely proud of my office's record in preserving 
housing affordability for tens of thousands of New Yorkers, in 
every region, regardless of party affiliation and, to my 
knowledge, without a single claim of partisanship against me or 
my office.
    As such, if given the opportunity to serve, I am thoroughly 
committed to working collaboratively and, as I have my entire 
career, on a fully bipartisan basis, in order to address the 
truly pressing issues facing our Nation.

Q.15. On November 5, 2019, apparently at 4:00 a.m. on a 
Tuesday, you tweeted: ``Hey, I can assure you that Rand Paul 
has a spine,'' and then you wrote ``Its just too puny & 
insignificant to support any sense of dignity.'' Do you think 
Senator Paul lacks ``any sense of dignity?'' Why did you write 
this about Senator Paul?

A.15. No, I do not.
    I am deeply and genuinely sorry for my prior, personal 
tweets. Posting those tweets was wrong and out of character 
with my personal life and my entire professional career. That 
is why I stopped posting, and began to delete, those tweets 
prior to the 2020 election and long before my nomination.
    That is also why I have apologized publicly, on the record, 
and in every meeting that I have had with any Committee Member 
or staff person.
    While I sincerely regret engaging in that type of activity, 
I am also immensely proud of the substantive, bipartisan means 
in which I have addressed housing and economic issues in every 
region of New York State (and beyond) for nearly 20 years. I am 
also immensely proud of my office's record in preserving 
housing affordability for tens of thousands of New Yorkers, in 
every region, regardless of party affiliation and, to my 
knowledge, without a single claim of partisanship against me or 
my office.
    As such, if given the opportunity to serve, I am thoroughly 
committed to working collaboratively and, as I have my entire 
career, on a fully bipartisan basis, in order to address the 
truly pressing issues facing our Nation.

Q.16. On Friday October 4, 2019, at 9:15 a.m.--working hours 
for most Government workers like yourself--a tweet with a 
picture of Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, Attorney General 
Barr, Vice President Pence, and President Trump asked fellow 
Twitter users ``name this band.'' You responded with ``The Wu 
Tang (Ku Klux) Klan.'' Do you think Secretary of State Pompeo, 
Attorney General Barr, Vice President Pence, and President 
Trump are members of the Ku Klux Klan?

A.16. No.
    I am deeply and genuinely sorry for my prior, personal 
tweets. Posting those tweets was wrong and out of character 
with my personal life and my entire professional career. That 
is why I stopped posting, and began to delete, those tweets 
prior to the 2020 election and long before my nomination.
    That is also why I have apologized publicly, on the record, 
and in every meeting that I have had with any Committee Member 
or staff person.
    While I sincerely regret engaging in that type of activity, 
I am also immensely proud of the substantive, bipartisan means 
in which I have addressed housing and economic issues in every 
region of New York State (and beyond) for nearly 20 years. I am 
also immensely proud of my office's record in preserving 
housing affordability for tens of thousands of New Yorkers, in 
every region, regardless of party affiliation and, to my 
knowledge, without a single claim of partisanship against me or 
my office.
    As such, if given the opportunity to serve, I am thoroughly 
committed to working collaboratively and, as I have my entire 
career, on a fully bipartisan basis, in order to address the 
truly pressing issues facing our Nation.

Q.17. On September 4, 2019, you Tweeted ``Stop trying to scare 
the stupid people, #MoscowMitch. It's not cool.'' Did you think 
Senator McConnell was working with Russia to the detriment of 
the United States? If you did not believe Senator McConnell was 
working with Russia to the detriment of the United States, why 
would you tweet ``#Moscow Mitch''? At any later point, did you 
Tweet did you tweet that you did not actually believe Senator 
McConnell was working for Russia?

A.17. No, I did not.
    I am deeply and genuinely sorry for my prior, personal 
tweets. Posting those tweets was wrong and out of character 
with my personal life and my entire professional career. That 
is why I stopped posting, and began to delete, those tweets 
prior to the 2020 election and long before my nomination.
    That is also why I have apologized publicly, on the record, 
and in every meeting that I have had with any Committee Member 
or staff person.
    While I sincerely regret engaging in that type of activity, 
I am also immensely proud of the substantive, bipartisan means 
in which I have addressed housing and economic issues in every 
region of New York State (and beyond) for nearly 20 years. I am 
also immensely proud of my office's record in preserving 
housing affordability for tens of thousands of New Yorkers, in 
every region, regardless of party affiliation and, to my 
knowledge, without a single claim of partisanship against me or 
my office.
    As such, if given the opportunity to serve, I am thoroughly 
committed to working collaboratively and, as I have my entire 
career, on a fully bipartisan basis, in order to address the 
truly pressing issues facing our Nation.

Q.18. You had the above Twitter exchange with user 
@CrankyBelle. Do you know who the person or entity is behind 
``@CrankyBelle''? Is it an adult? Is it a United States based 
user? Did you receive anything from @CrankyBelle? Do you think 
you exercised good judgment in having this exchange?

A.18. My engagement with Twitter was strictly personal and 
strictly related to tweeting and/or responding to tweets. I 
have never met, nor spoken with, anyone through my Twitter 
account whom I did not already know personally or 
professionally in real life.

Q.19. Based on a review of your Twitter account, including your 
deleted tweets that have been archived by the Wayback Machine, 
it appears that you posted more than a thousand tweets about 
Donald Trump or his family, at seemingly all hours of the day 
and night between March 2019 and January 2021. Many of these 
recent public statements were highly derogatory and 
inflammatory. You also posted dozens of offensive statements 
about members of Congress, particularly those affiliated with 
the Republican Party. All of these tweets were posted while you 
were serving in your current position as President of the 
Office of Housing Preservation at the New York State Homes and 
Community Renewal (HCR). Why did you choose to behave this way, 
in a manner that is highly partisan and derogatory toward these 
Republican officials and their family members, while serving as 
a senior State Government official?

A.19. As noted above, I am deeply and genuinely sorry for my 
prior, personal tweets.
    Posting those tweets was wrong and out of character with my 
personal life and my entire professional career. I have 
apologized publicly, on the record, and in every meeting that I 
have had with any Committee Member or staff person.
    Regretfully, I let myself get caught up in the heat of a 
political back-and-forth, for the first, and only time in my 
life. I have never campaigned for, nor held, any political 
office. Rather, I am a practitioner and a problem-solver. 
That's why I stopped posting, and began to delete, those tweets 
prior to the election and long before my nomination.
    While I sincerely regret engaging in that type of activity, 
I am also immensely proud of the substantive, bipartisan means 
in which I have addressed housing and economic opportunity for 
every New Yorker (and others) for nearly 20 years. I am also 
immensely proud of my office's record in preserving housing 
affordability for tens of thousands of New Yorkers, in every 
region, regardless of party affiliation and, to my knowledge, 
without a single claim of partisanship against me or my office.
    As such, if given the opportunity to serve, I am thoroughly 
committed to working collaboratively and, as I have my entire 
career, on a fully bipartisan basis, in order to address the 
truly pressing issues facing our Nation.

Q.20. On October 14, 2019, in response to a tweet from then-
Presidential candidate Joe Biden, you wrote: ``Fixed it for 
you: Donald Trump is the Devil, only stupider and in human 
form.'' Why did you find it necessary to ``fix'' Joe Biden's 
tweet in this way?

A.20. I am deeply and genuinely sorry for my prior, personal 
tweets. Posting those tweets was wrong and out of character 
with my personal life and my entire professional career. That 
is why I stopped posting, and began to delete, those tweets 
prior to the 2020 election and long before my nomination.
    That is also why I have apologized publicly, on the record, 
and in every meeting that I have had with any Committee Member 
or staff person.
    While I sincerely regret engaging in that type of activity, 
I am also immensely proud of the substantive, bipartisan means 
in which I have addressed housing and economic issues in every 
region of New York State (and beyond) for nearly 20 years. I am 
also immensely proud of my office's record in preserving 
housing affordability for tens of thousands of New Yorkers, in 
every region, regardless of party affiliation and, to my 
knowledge, without a single claim of partisanship against me or 
my office.
    As such, if given the opportunity to serve, I am thoroughly 
committed to working collaboratively and, as I have my entire 
career, on a fully bipartisan basis, in order to address the 
truly pressing issues facing our Nation.

Q.21. Answering Questions for the Record--Please describe with 
particularity the process by which you answered these questions 
for the record, including identifying who assisted you in 
answering these questions along with a brief description of his 
or her assistance.

A.21. I responded to each question myself and then worked with 
counsel and through an interagency process. These answers are 
my own.
                                ------                                


               RESPONSES TO WRITTEN QUESTIONS OF
                SENATOR MENENDEZ FROM MARK COLON

Q.1. It has been 4 years since Puerto Rico was hit by an 
unprecedented natural tragedy, Hurricane Maria. The damage was 
exacerbated by the human-made tragedy of the Trump's 
administration's cruel response.
    According to a HUD Inspector General report, the Trump 
administration successfully delayed and stonewalled Puerto 
Rico's disaster funding by setting unprecedented procedural 
hurdles. No future Administration should be allowed to so 
cruelly and deliberately inflict harm on its citizens.
    The HUD IG report focuses on the interactions between OMB 
and HUD and how OMB imposed new burdensome requirements for 
releasing disaster aid to Puerto Rico. As Assistant Secretary, 
how would you work to standardize the process for releasing 
funds, to ensure that a future Administration cannot 
purposefully delay funds?

A.1. I am well aware of the additional requirements imposed on, 
and delays involved with, Federal disaster recovery funding for 
Puerto Rico, based, in part, on my personal involvement with 
nonprofit Hurricane Maria relief efforts on the Island.
    I am also encouraged that President Biden and Secretary 
Fudge have acted quickly to release long-promised 
reconstruction funding for Puerto Rico, as well as to rescind 
certain additional reporting requirements not imposed on other 
jurisdictions.
    If confirmed, I am committed to ensuring that all disaster 
recovery funds allocated by Congress are made available to all 
communities as quickly, efficiently, and equitably as possible.
    I am also in favor of permanent solutions to providing 
timely disaster recovery assistance. Finally, I understand that 
Congress recently appropriated $5B to HUD related to major 
disasters in 2020 and 2021. This time period includes Puerto 
Rico's most recent, Presidentially declared disaster. Knowing 
this, I commit to making it one of my first priorities to get 
the necessary guidance issued and those funds awarded to the 
most impacted and distressed areas with unmet recovery needs.

Q.2. If confirmed, how will you ensure that Puerto Rican 
citizens are provided the respect and consideration that HUD 
and the U.S. Government should afford to every American 
citizen, regardless of race, political affiliation, or 
location?

A.2. Based on my first-hand observations, I believe that the 
Federal response to Hurricane Maria was inadequate, slow, and 
unacceptable. I believe that it is both a moral and a legal 
imperative to treat all HUD grantees equally and fairly. Our 
fellow citizens of Puerto Rico deserve nothing less.
    Given the size and the scope of the recovery, resilience, 
and mitigation efforts needed in Puerto Rico, if confirmed, I 
commit to working closely and collaboratively with Puerto 
Rico's leaders, civic organizations, and citizens, and to 
having CPD provide clear guidance and adequate oversight and 
technical assistance in order to rapidly and effectively 
facilitate the best possible recovery for Puerto Rico.
    Nine years later, HUD is attempting to clawback from New 
Jerseyans the money they used to repair their homes and get 
back on their feet. The clawbacks that some of my constituents 
are facing is because CDBG GRANT money duplicated a benefit 
with SBA LOAN money. We all know that a loan is very different 
than a grant. I understand that this particular issue was fixed 
for Harvey survivors and future storms, but Sandy survivors 
still have this issue.

Q.3. Can you commit to working with my office to provide relief 
for Sandy survivors so that New Jerseyans who tried to follow 
the rules are not faced with unfair clawbacks?

A.3. I have always been open to legitimate solutions that help 
families to better recover for natural disasters. If confirmed, 
I commit to further discussing this issue with your office, to 
determine whether regulatory relief might be available.
    I also look forward to working with Congress to ensure that 
HUD's role in disaster recovery is complementary of SBA, FEMA, 
and other programs.

Q.4. Hurricane Sandy survivors faced a maze of disaster relief 
between SBA, FEMA, and HUD. And yet, nearly 9 years after the 
storm, some New Jerseyans are facing unfair and costly 
clawbacks of the very disaster relief funds they relied on to 
rebuild their homes. During her confirmation hearing on January 
28th, 2021, Secretary Fudge responded to my question on the 
matter of HUD clawing back Sandy CDBG-DR aid with this 
commitment ``if confirmed it would be one of the early things I 
would take a look at and be happy to work with you.''
    Will you make the same commitment, if confirmed, to work my 
office to find a way for New Jerseyans facing clawbacks to get 
relief?

A.4. If confirmed, it would be one of my first priorities to 
discuss this issue with Secretary Fudge, HUD's Office of 
General Counsel and the CPD team. If confirmed, I also commit 
to working with your office on this important issue.