[House Hearing, 118 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
FORCE MULTIPLIERS: EXAMINING THE NEED
FOR ADDITIONAL RESOURCES TO DISRUPT
TRANSNATIONAL CRIME AT THE BORDER
AND BEYOND
=======================================================================
HEARING
BEFORE THE
SUBCOMMITTEE ON NATIONAL SECURITY,
THE BORDER, AND FOREIGN AFFAIRS
of the
COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT
AND ACCOUNTABILITY
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED EIGHTEENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
MARCH 8, 2023
__________
Serial No. 118-5
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Oversight and Accountability
Available on: govinfo.gov
oversight.house.gov or
docs.house.gov
_________
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
51-472 PDF WASHINGTON : 2023
COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND ACCOUNTABILITY
JAMES COMER, Kentucky, Chairman
Jim Jordan, Ohio Jamie Raskin, Maryland, Ranking
Mike Turner, Ohio Minority Member
Paul Gosar, Arizona Eleanor Holmes Norton, District of
Virginia Foxx, North Carolina Columbia
Glenn Grothman, Wisconsin Stephen F. Lynch, Massachusetts
Gary Palmer, Alabama Gerald E. Connolly, Virginia
Clay Higgins, Louisiana Raja Krishnamoorthi, Illinois
Pete Sessions, Texas Ro Khanna, California
Andy Biggs, Arizona Kweisi Mfume, Maryland
Nancy Mace, South Carolina Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, New York
Jake LaTurner, Kansas Katie Porter, California
Pat Fallon, Texas Cori Bush, Missouri
Byron Donalds, Florida Shontel Brown, Ohio
Kelly Armstrong, North Dakota Jimmy Gomez, California
Scott Perry, Pennsylvania Melanie Stansbury, New Mexico
William Timmons, South Carolina Robert Garcia, California
Tim Burchett, Tennessee Maxwell Frost, Florida
Marjorie Taylor Greene, Georgia Becca Balint, Vermont
Lisa McClain, Michigan Summer Lee, Pennsylvania
Lauren Boebert, Colorado Greg Casar, Texas
Russell Fry, South Carolina Jasmine Crockett, Texas
Anna Paulina Luna, Florida Dan Goldman, New York
Chuck Edwards, North Carolina Jared Moskowitz, Florida
Nick Langworthy, New York
Eric Burlison, Missouri
Mark Marin, Staff Director
Jessica Donlon, Deputy Staff Director and General Counsel
Kaity Wolfe, Senior Professional Staff Member
Grayson Westmoreland, Senior Professional Staff Member
Jake Gilluly, Professional Staff Member
Mallory Cogar, Deputy Director of Operations and Chief Clerk
Contact Number: 202-225-5074
Julie Tagen, Minority Staff Director
Contact Number: 202-225-5051
------
Subcommittee on National Security, the Border, and Foreign Affairs
Glenn Grothman, Wisconsin, Chairman
Paul Gosar, Arizona Robert Garcia, California, Ranking
Virginia Foxx, North Carolina Minority Member
Clay Higgins, Louisiana Stephen F. Lynch, Massachusetts
Pete Sessions, Texas Dan Goldman, New York
Andy Biggs, Arizona Jared Moskowitz, Florida
Nancy Mace, South Carolina Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, New York
Jake LaTurner, Kansas Katie Porter, California
Pat Fallon, Texas Cori Bush, Missouri
Kelly Armstrong, North Dakota Maxwell Frost, Florida
Scott Perry, Pennsylvania
C O N T E N T S
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Page
Hearing held on March 8, 2023.................................... 1
Witnesses
Mr. Anthony Salisbury, Deputy Executive Associate Director,
Homeland
Security Investigations, U.S. Immigration and Customs
Enforcement
Oral Statement................................................... 5
Ms. Diane Sabatino, Deputy Executive Assistant Commissioner,
Office of Field Operations, U.S. Customs and Border Patrol
Oral Statement................................................... 6
Opening statements and the prepared statements for the witnesses
are available in the U.S. House of Representatives Repository
at: docs.house.gov.
Index of Documents
----------
* Article, Fox News, ``Brutal Killing of California Family a
`Clear Message' from The Cartel''; submitted by Rep. Gosar.
* Witness Testimony from May 22, 2019 Committee on Oversight
and Reform hearing, ACLU; submitted by Rep. Ocasio-Cortez.
* Article, The Washington Post, ``Amazon Met With ICE Officials
Over Facial-Recognition System That Could Identify
Immigrants''; submitted by Rep. Ocasio-Cortez.
The documents listed above are available at: docs.house.gov.
FORCE MULTIPLIERS: EXAMINING THE NEED
FOR ADDITIONAL RESOURCES TO DISRUPT
TRANSNATIONAL CRIME AT THE BORDER
AND BEYOND
----------
Wednesday, March 8, 2023
House of Representatives
Committee on Oversight and Accountability
Subcommittee on National Security,
the Border, and Foreign Affairs
Washington, D.C.
The Committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10 a.m., in room
2247, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Glenn Grothman
(Chairman of the Subcommittee) presiding.
Present: Representatives Grothman, Comer, Gosar, Higgins,
Sessions, Biggs, Mace, LaTurner, Fallon, Armstrong, Garcia,
Lynch, Goldman, Ocasio-Cortez, Frost, Crockett, and Porter.
Mr. Grothman. The Subcommittee will come to order. Everyone
welcome.
Without objection, the Chair may declare a recess at any
time.
I am going to recognize myself for the purpose of making an
opening statement.
Good morning, and welcome to the Subcommittee on National
Security, the Border, and Foreign Affairs, our first hearing of
118th Congress, so a little bit of history here today. I want
to thank all our Members who are here today as we continue to
conduct our oversight of the Nation's southern border. Today we
are examining the technology being used by the Department of
Homeland Security to disrupt transnational criminal
organizations and protect our border, focusing today on our
ports of entry. I want to thank our witnesses for being here
today to testify on behalf of the Department.
In 2022, U.S. Customs and Border Protection seized 656,000
pounds of illegal drugs, including 155,000 pounds of marijuana
and 175,000 pounds of methamphetamine. CBP also seized 14,700
pounds of illicit fentanyl. The lethal dose of that fentanyl is
only 2 milligrams or the amount that fits on the tip of a
pencil. This means CBP seized enough of the drug to kill 3.3
billion people. Unfortunately, the Centers for Disease Control
and Prevention reported in the 12-month period ending January
2022--so, that is a year old, we are going to get bigger
numbers sadly soon--more than 107,000 Americans died due to
drug overdose with at least 70 percent of those resulting from
fentanyl trafficked across our southern border. Make no
mistake, we have a crisis at our southern border and in our
communities with this many people dying, which is why we chose
this topic for the first hearing the Subcommittee is going to
have.
We are going to have an opportunity to examine the
technology and resources that work to keep our Nation safe at
the border points of entry. And between points of entry, we
have both the Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Homeland
Security Investigations, and CBP's Office of Field Operations
are both here to combat transnational criminal activity, and I
am pleased to see they are both represented here today.
Emerging technologies, such as illicit substance detection
devices, facial recognition technology, or something as simple
as canine units, help protect the U.S. from threats coming into
our country. In particular, I would like to highlight the work
of CBP's canine units. CBP's canine program works to detect
explosives, controlled substances, large amounts of currency
which may be heading south, and even illegal agricultural
products. The work of these canines and the use of other force
multiplier technologies and resources allow our agents to
perform their jobs in a safer and more efficient manner. When I
visited the border and points of entry, I am consistently told
by CBP officers that the canine units are one of the most
valuable resources in their disposal. We are going to learn a
little bit more about them today.
Finally, I am interested in hearing more from the witnesses
regarding about their experience utilizing force multiplier
technology. There have been reports that some of these
resources are not used effectively because of personnel issues.
Identifying patterns in which resources are not used
effectively or properly is also important for this Subcommittee
to examine as we work to identify policy gaps. A hundred and
seven thousand deaths is too much.
I am increasingly concerned regarding reports that as
record-breaking numbers of migrants cross our border, CBP
officers and Border Patrol agents are spending more time
processing paperwork for release or parole than actually
patrolling and protecting our borders. We must also keep in
mind that any given technology is only effective as the
manpower available to respond. A sensor doesn't make an arrest
or prosecute a case. It takes good quality law enforcement
personnel.
Today, I intend to explore these issues to examine where
reforms can be tailored to provide the maximum return on
investment. After this hearing, I hope we will be able to
identify the most vital technologies and resources utilized at
the border and at points of entry that allow border agents to
be successful. I also hope we can examine the need for the
efficient use of personnel and resources to protect our
national security from those wishing to impose harm to our
country. Thank you again to each of our witnesses for
participating today, and I look forward to your testimony.
Now I would like to recognize my Ranking Member Garcia for
the purpose of making his opening statement.
Mr. Garcia. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and I also
look forward to working with you and the entire Subcommittee on
an incredibly important topic to our country. I also want to
thank our witnesses for being here this morning. I think we can
all agree that all of us here care about a safe and secure
border. We all care about stopping human trafficking. We all
care about the fentanyl crisis, prosecuting traffickers, and
using every tool available to us to shut down cartels. I also
hope that we care about the humanity of migrants who are
crossing the border, oftentimes out of desperation or out of
suffering in their home countries.
We look forward to having a Customs and Border Protection
team here, of course. They are also going to be demonstrating,
I believe, some canine animal security techniques, which we
look forward to seeing. And I want to thank Mr. Sabatino and
Director Salisbury for being here today and for your service to
our country. Thank you very much.
Now, in November 2021, President Biden and congressional
Democrats passed an infrastructure bill, I believe with the
support of only a few Republicans, that included $430 million
to expand Customs and Border Protection for facilities and to
improve screening capabilities at our ports of entry. In the
2023 appropriations package, I believe also with the support of
just some Republicans, Democrats also provided another $130
million to Customs and Border Patrol to hire additional workers
at our ports of entry and to invest in more innovative and
efficient technologies to speed up our border entries. I want
to mention this, because I think it is important to remind
folks that we are all here committed to national security and,
of course, to border security.
I also hope that this hearing helps us better understand
the technologies that we use to disrupt cartels, secure our
ports, and facilitate commerce. We look forward to learning how
Congress can help provide and deploy resources effectively to
make our country safer and, of course, is a goal that, of
course, the Biden Administration shares. I am also particularly
interested in this issue because I represent the Port of Long
Beach and our seaports in California. The Port of Long Beach is
the second largest container port in the United s, combined
with the Port of Los Angeles, our sister port. They earn $5
billion a year in custom revenues to aid in our economy across
the country.
Our ports also impact 2.6 million jobs throughout the U.S.
and are linked directly to work force development across the
Nation. So, it is a very important issue for us as well in
California. We all know that ports are important engine of
commerce for this country. We oftentimes talk about what is
happening at the southern border, but we also know that ports
are an important part of the work that you all do, and so, we
thank you for that work.
Now, it is the Federal Government's job to foster commerce
and ensure that goods drive our national economy safely and
quickly. Throughout our experience, particularly with the
pandemic, we have seen how bottlenecks actually impact the
economy very dramatically. So, we want to strive between not
only security, but also commerce, and how we find that balance
is really important. It is really critical that we strive to
screen all vehicles and cargo for dangerous drugs, contraband
and threats and do so efficiently. And that includes our ports
of entry, and that includes our ports across America.
Now, we know that Mexico is our second largest trading
partner with billions of dollars in goods and services and
hundreds of thousands of people that come into our country
every single day between our two countries. One study found
actually that a 10-minute reduction in wait times for each
commercial vehicle at the border could generate hundreds of
millions of dollars of additional revenue each year for the
American economy, with benefits extending to non-border states
as well.
Now I know some people like to fantasize about sealing the
border, or shutting down our asylum system, or invading Mexico,
as I believe our full Committee Chairman actually mentioned on
Fox News last night, but we know that those are not reasonable.
They are not feasible, and they are not smart. We should be
making every effort to streamline our border crossing process.
We should make it easier and safer for commerce and immigrants
alike. This goal means bolstering our ability to have actual
lawful immigration and to address the root causes of migration
in regions across the Western Hemisphere. This hearing offers
us an opportunity to understand how we can further the Biden
Administration's work to secure our border and disrupt cartels
by using canines, technology, and other innovations at the
greatest extent possible.
Now, I am an immigrant myself, and so, I am very honored to
be on this Subcommittee. I look forward to talking about the
immigrant experience as we move forward throughout the next few
months and the years ahead. I also think we should make one
thing also very clear that our problems that we have today are
not solved just by border security or a wall. We have to have
an orderly process, have legal pathway to citizenship, a focus
on technology, and certainly ensure that we have immigration
system that is fair and humane for all. We want to welcome
hardworking immigrants into our communities. We want to ensure
that folks pay taxes, work hard, and have actually a pathway to
citizenship, one that we can all benefit from. We have always
been a Nation of immigrants. We cannot stop people from wanting
to come here to build better life for themselves and their
future.
I look forward to productive opportunity to engage with our
witnesses today. I want to thank you again for your service and
for being here, and, Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
Mr. Grothman. Thank you. First of all, I am pleased to
introduce our two witnesses here today who have a combined 47-
plus years in Federal law enforcement. Anthony Salisbury began
his Federal law enforcement career as a deputy United States
marshal and later joined the former United s Customs Service in
2001. He currently serves as the acting deputy executive
associate director for homeland security investigations and has
extensive experience countering transnational criminal
organizations. And Diane Sabatino began her Federal law
enforcement career in 1998 as an immigration inspector. In July
2020, she was appointed to be the deputy assistant commissioner
of office field operations for the U.S. Customs and Border
Protection, and as deputy assistant commissioner, she oversees
over 25,000 CBP officers at 330 U.S. points of entry.
Now pursuant to Committee Rule 9(a), the witnesses will
please stand and raise their right hands.
Do you solemnly swear or affirm the testimony you are about
to give is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the
truth, so help you God?
[A chorus of ayes.]
Mr. Grothman. Let the record show that the witnesses all
answered in the affirmative.
We appreciate you being here today. Let me remind the
witnesses that we have read your written statements and will
appear in full in the hearing record. Please limit your oral
arguments to five minutes. As a reminder, please press the
button on the microphone in front of you so that I and Members
can hear you. When you begin to speak, the light in front of
you will turn green. After four minutes, the light will turn
yellow. When the red light comes on, your five minutes have
expired.
I recognize Mr. Salisbury to begin his opening statement.
STATEMENT OF ANTHONY SALISBURY, DEPUTY EXECUTIVE ASSOCIATE
DIRECTOR, HOMELAND SECURITY INVESTIGATIONS, U.S. IMMIGRATION
AND CUSTOMS ENFORCEMENT
Mr. Salisbury. Chairman Grothman, Ranking Member Garcia,
and distinguished Members of the Subcommittee on National
Security, the Border, Foreign Affairs, thank you for the
opportunity to appear before you to discuss Homeland Security
Investigations' efforts disrupting and dismantling
transnational criminal organizations. My testimony today will
focus on HSI's efforts to disrupt transnational crime at the
border and beyond. I will also discuss HSI's focus to stop
deadly drugs from making it to the streets of the United s and
its efforts to deny TCOs the illicit proceeds and access to
darknet vendors that fuel their operations.
Criminal organizations in the 21st century do not limit
themselves to a single crime. These organizations have evolved
beyond just narcotic smuggling and are now involved in the
associated crimes of weapons trafficking, human trafficking,
human smuggling, money laundering, and others, all of which HSI
investigates. These criminal organizations also use technology
to disguise their illicit enterprises. To this end, HSI's
investigative efforts must be technologically savvy and broad
in scope to fully identify and dismantle these enterprises.
HSI combats TCOs by using its unique and broad
investigative authorities to enforce over 400 Federal laws to
investigate a myriad of crimes and target TCOs from multiple
investigative angles. This includes attacking TCOs' abilities
to procure U.S. origin firearms and the illicit proceeds that
motivate their crimes. Simply put, HSI attacks the entire
illicit network. HSI is the premier law enforcement agency best
positioned to attack the cartels and TCOs at each phase of the
supply chain to exact maximum damage and have cascading effects
against illicit networks.
HSI's international presence is a key facet of its approach
to counter transnational organized crime. The largest
international investigative presence of all DHS components, HSI
comprises hundreds of HSI special agents strategically assigned
to 93 offices in 56 countries. These efforts enable HSI and its
partners to prevent dangerous narcotics and other illicit goods
from reaching our borders and stop illicit southbound flows of
illegally derived currency and weapons. The effectiveness of
our international counter narcotics efforts is greatly enhanced
by HSI's Transnational Criminal Investigative Unit, or TCIU,
Program. TCIUs are composed of vetted foreign law enforcement
officials and prosecutors who lead some of HSI's most
significant extra territorial investigations and prosecutions
targeting TCOs.
HSI established 12 TCIUs around the world, including in
Mexico, made up of officers and prosecutors from Mexico's
attorney general's office. Mexican cartels operate on an
industrial scale when procuring precursor chemicals from abroad
used in the production of fentanyl and other drugs. One way HSI
is attacking the illicit narcotics supply chain is through
Operation Hydra. HSI's Operation Hydra, an intelligence-based
counter narcotics operation designed to identify the precursor
supply chain of TCOs involved in the production of illicit
drugs, is central to HSI's current counter supply chain
efforts.
Operation Hydra's methodology blends traditional
investigative and analytic techniques with interagency
collaboration, industry partnership, and computer-based
analytic tools to identify, disrupt, and dismantle TCO chemical
supply. In the last two years, Operation Hydra is credited with
seizing or disrupting the delivery of approximately 1 million
kilograms of precursor and dual-use chemicals destined for use
by narcotics production labs in Mexico. Moreover, since
October, HSI seized over 1,200 pill presses and component parts
used to make fentanyl and other drugs as part of HSI's counter
opioid strategy. The interdiction of these shipments plays a
key role in disrupting the TCO's ability to produce a finished
product before it even gets to our borders.
Domestically, HSI's Border Enforcement Security Task
Forces, or BEST, represent one of the Agency's premier tools
for turning border seizures into TCO-toppling investigations.
The primary mission of the BEST is to combat existing and
emerging TCOs by employing the full range of Federal, state,
local, tribal, and international law enforcement resources.
There are currently 86 BESTs, comprised of nearly 1,000 law
enforcement officers and personnel representing more than 200
agencies and national guard units. In addition to the BEST,
each of HSI's 253 offices located in all 50 states and multiple
U.S. territories dedicates assets to combat TCOs. As CBP
deploys new technology at the southwest border ports of entry,
it will likely increase the number of CBP-origin seizures. As a
result, HSI will need additional staffing to support the
investigations and prosecutions of port of entry seizures to
conduct the complex investigations which dismantle TCO threats
to the homeland.
Thank you again for your opportunity to appear before you
and for your continued support of HSI and our enduring efforts
to dismantle transnational criminal organizations throughout
the world. I look forward to your questions.
Mr. Grothman. Thank you. Ms. Sabatino?
STATEMENT OF DIANE SABATINO, DEPUTY EXECUTIVE ASSISTANT
COMMISSIONER, OFFICE OF FIELD OPERATIONS, U.S. CUSTOMS AND
BORDER PROTECTION
Ms. Sabatino. Chairman Grothman, Ranking Member Garcia, and
distinguished Members of the Subcommittee, thank you for the
opportunity to appear today to discuss CBP's efforts to combat
the dynamic threat of transnational criminal organizations and
prevent the entry of dangerous illicit drugs, including
fentanyl, to our Nation's ports of entry. I am proud to
represent the more than 30,000 dedicated frontline personnel of
the Office of Field Operations who work tirelessly every day to
protect our border, our homeland, and our communities. I
appreciate this Committee's focus on force multipliers and the
opportunities to amplify the capabilities of the work force at
our ports of entry, our most valuable and prevalent resource in
the Office of Field Operations.
As you are aware, the reach and influence of transnational
criminal organizations, or TCOs, continues to expand across our
borders. And TCOs have sophisticated and well-funded networks
and continually adjust their criminal operations to circumvent
detection and interdiction by law enforcement. For example,
TCOs continue to produce and smuggle drugs like synthetic
opioids, including fentanyl, that can be concealed and
transported in smaller quantities. And most illicit fentanyl is
synthesized in Mexico, and like other illicit drugs, including
cocaine and methamphetamine, large volumes are encountered and
seized at our southwest border ports of entry. It is brought in
by privately-owned vehicles, concealed within commercial
vehicles, and even on pedestrian travelers. And although much
less frequently now, we also encounter fentanyl and other
synthetic opioids in international mail and express consignment
shipments. nationwide, CBP seizures of fentanyl continue to
increase, and, specifically, the Office of Field Operations
seized nearly 12,000 pounds of fentanyl in Fiscal Year 2022, an
increase of 31 percent over Fiscal Year 2021 and 200 percent
over Fiscal Year 2020. And so far, this fiscal year, we are on
track to surpass last year's total fentanyl seizures by the
middle of spring.
Each and every seizure is absolutely critical. Seizures
remove dangerous drugs from illicit supply chains, deny TCOs
the valuable profits, but also give us critical opportunities
to conduct post-seizure analysis with the ultimate goal of
identifying criminal organizations and illicit supply chains,
and we partner with HSI in support of these investigations and
prosecutions that they pursue. But we certainly don't wait for
illegal drugs to arrive at our ports of entry. We use
aggressive and multi-layered enforcement approach that
leverages advanced information, analytics, intelligence,
sophisticated detection and scientific laboratory capabilities,
and strong partnerships to combat transnational threats while
also facilitating the high volume of lawful travel and trade.
Our National Targeting Center and our local port analytical
units use advance information and law enforcement intelligence
records to identify suspect high-risk shipments, cargo, and
travelers before they reach our borders. And our highly skilled
frontline personnel use their law enforcement expertise,
experience, and all of the available information and technology
to prevent the entry of dangerous drugs and people. All CBP
operational environments have sophisticated detection
technology, including non-intrusive inspection systems,
commonly called NII, that reliably and quickly detect the
presence of suspect illegal narcotics.
And canine operations also provide invaluable detection
capabilities, and our training program maintains the largest
and most diverse law enforcement canine training program in the
country. And CBP was the first law enforcement agency back in
2017 to develop a discipline to detect fentanyl with canine
units. And today all Office of Field Operations concealed human
and narcotic detection canine teams have completed training to
include the odor of fentanyl and fentanyl analogs and are
currently scoping missions to support other countries with
developing this capability.
Beyond detection and interdiction, CBP officers use various
field-testing devices and work with onsite and remote
scientists to also rapidly screen and identify suspected
controlled substances, and our partnerships are absolutely
critical. We work closely with our law enforcement partners,
certainly starting with Homeland Security Investigations, to
share information and collaborate in joint enforcement
operations to identify, target, and disrupt illicit drug
activity. It is this collaborative approach that leads to
investigations, prosecutions, and ultimately the dismantling of
TCO networks and operations. We are going to continue to
prioritize and dedicate resources to counter TCOs and disrupt
the flow of illicit drugs across our borders.
So, thank you for the opportunity to testify today, and I
look forward to your questions.
Ms. Sabatino. And, Chairman, at this time, I have the
privilege of introducing Mr. Thomas Salvati. He is a CBP canine
instructor, and one of our incredibly valuable canine team, CBP
officer, Stephanie Salas, and her partner Villy, and the team
again, one of our most valuable resources in the field in the
interdiction of narcotics deployed to ports of entry across the
country. And like all OFO canine teams, Officer Salas and Villy
are trained in concealed human and narcotics detection,
including fentanyl, and will be providing a brief demonstration
of their skills.
Mr. Salvati. Good afternoon, everybody.
Mr. Grothman. Thank you.
[Demonstration.]
Mr. Salvati. My name is Tom Salvati. I am the canine
trainer for JFK port of entry. We will just give you guys a
small demonstration of what our canines do on a regular basis.
So, a lot of times our dogs are cross-designated, so it will be
all different environments, but we are very successful in mail
facility. So, in just a minute, a mail operation for the day.
So, whenever there is a lineup, this particular box here
has the odor of fentanyl in it. There are about 35 grams of
pure fentanyl. You will see the dog come in. Officer Salas will
walk in here. Villy is a pedestrian dog, stray dog, so she will
come in and search everybody in here and then the box when she
sees the box.
So, this will be the box here. I hope you guys can see, and
it is in a metal concealment with the fentanyl in the metal
concealment there, so it is all contained. I will get Officer
Salas.
[Audio malfunction in the hearing room.] We train on a
regular basis
[Audio malfunction in the hearing room.]
Ms. Salas.
[Audio malfunction in the hearing room.]
Mr. Salvati.
[Audio malfunction in the hearing room.]
Mr. Grothman. I would just like to ask you one question
just so the Committee knows, and I want you to comment on it.
One of the times when I was down on the border and one of the
reasons I wanted you to bring the dogs in here is we saw a dog
sniff out fentanyl that was in a gas tank. And I thought it was
incredibly impressive given, you know, if you have a gas tank,
that is, you know, it smells like gas, it is such a strong
thing, you wouldn't be able to think you could detect anything.
But I wonder if you could just comment a little on the
capability of a dog sniffing out something even when you put it
in something like a gas tank full of gasoline. We would figure
there is no way in the world anybody would be able to detect
that if you hit it there. Could you kind of comment on how
people try to----
Mr. Salvati. The canines know
[Audio malfunction in the hearing room.]
Mr. Grothman. OK. Thank you very much. I appreciate you
guys stopping in and very impressive. Caution the rest of the
Members of the panel, it is not always this fun. OK. Thank you.
OK. And I will now recognize myself for five minutes for
questions. First of all, for Mr. Salisbury.
We know that tens of thousands of Americans are dying every
year from fentanyl, the vast majority of which is coming from
the cartels across the southern border. Can you describe how
transnational criminal organizations have adapted in recent
years to exploit vulnerabilities in our border strategy and
what HSI is doing through its investigations and prosecutions
to stay a step ahead and make some traction in actually
disrupting their activities?
Mr. Salisbury. Thank you for the question. So, when we talk
about transnational criminal organizations, they constantly
evolve. They constantly try to exploit the vulnerabilities they
identify. And so, HSI as the second largest Federal law
enforcement agency in the U.S. Government charged with
addressing the TCO threat coming across our border, obviously
we try to develop the partnerships.
A couple of things that we do. First of all, as we try to
push these crimes further away from the U.S. border, we try to
develop relationships downrange with foreign governments. As we
do that, we try to develop the TCIUs. HSI's ultimate goal is to
push these crimes further and further away from the U.S. border
and our communities. So, that requires the robust relationships
overseas working with the Department and the host nations that
I described in my opening statement.
Additionally, we look to identify the money flows and the
gaps that the cartels utilize to come across the border. So, we
use that ability from our legacy customs days in Treasury and
our legacy immigration days to identify how these cartels will
attack the vulnerabilities that I identified. Money, certainly,
as you see cartels today, there is a shift toward cyber. There
is a shift toward cryptocurrency. They are certainly trying to
hide and invent new ways to smuggle goods into this country.
Every day is different. Every day we identify new means and
methods, and that is our job to identify and dismantle these
cartels through a plethora of means. We have task forces on the
border, and we exercise all our authorities to attack the
cartels at every angle from money, merchandise, and people.
Mr. Grothman. OK. Thank you. Ms. Sabatino, this question is
for you. How are canine units integrated into overall security
apparatus and points of entry, and what role do they play in
the larger context of border security?
Ms. Sabatino. Thank you for the question, Chairman. Our
canine assets are one of a number of tools that we employ at
our ports of entry to interdict narcotics, an absolutely
critical tool. Certainly, you know, in the deployment of that,
we are looking at risk associated with, you know, data that we
have, the number of seizures and by environment to where we are
seeing the volume coming through. They are integrated in teams.
They rove in pre-primary operations, they rove in our cargo
operations, and, again, work special operations with our CBP
officers.
Mr. Grothman. OK. For either one of you, how will a
combination of enhancing technological resources and other
force multipliers work to disrupt cross-border crime and start
to get the crisis we see at our southern border, where the
cartels are running rampant and bringing in daily narcotics,
under control?
Ms. Sabatino. I will start. CBP is currently fostering a
whole-of-government approach to combating the flow of fentanyl,
and our efforts start certainly with our primary DHS partner,
Homeland Security Investigations. But we are also working
closely with DEA, the Department of Justice, DOD, the
intelligence community, to name a few, to increase efforts to
commercially disrupt the fentanyl supply chains themselves. I
mentioned earlier leveraging through our National Targeting
Center advanced information in our port analytical units, and
sharing and collaborating with our partners, and making sure
that we all have visibility on the information, on the threat
of the narcotics coming through. Sorry, sir.
Mr. Grothman. No, go ahead.
Ms. Sabatino. OK. But we are also designating a single
point of contact within the National Targeting Center to enable
a holistic approach to planning to tackle the fentanyl threats,
operationalizing all things fentanyl through one cell in our
organization, and partnering also with the industry to ensure
that they are aware of what the illicit supply chains are, how
their lawful supply chains can be corrupted or compromised by
transnational criminal organizations. And we are also aligning
our expansion and enhancement of NII technology at our ports of
entry, and certainly appreciate the investments that Congress
has made in supporting our Non-Intrusive Inspection Technology
Program with significant deployments across the southwest
border over the next two-and-half years.
Mr. Grothman. OK. Could you give me exactly what your plans
are? Are there plans to expand the canine units, and how many
do you have now, and how many do you think you are going to end
up with, say, two years from now under current plan?
Ms. Sabatino. Our last increase in canine teams was in
2019. We currently have 712 positions allocated, and that
includes 59 supervisory level positions. Actively on board, we
have 488 canine teams that are deployed to our ports of entry
and 114 expected to complete training and be deployed this
year. That will leave us with about 51 vacancies, and our goal
is to fill those vacancies in the upcoming Fiscal Year and to
complete training by the end of this Fiscal Year to beginning
of the next fiscal year.
Mr. Grothman. OK. I will cutoff my questions now at five
minutes. I just do want to make one comment. It was stated that
we have to find a way for people to get here legally or become
citizens legally. Last year, we had over a million people sworn
in as new citizens. That was the most we have had since 2006,
so it is not like nobody can figure out how to get here
legally. There are a million people here coming in legally.
OK. Now I recognize my Ranking Member, Mr. Garcia, for his
five minutes. Mr. Garcia.
Mr. Garcia. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I want to again
thank our witnesses for your service and for your testimony,
and I just want to begin by just establishing some facts. I
know we are going to have a lot of great questions here from
the Committee. Director Salisbury and Commissioner Sabatino,
thank you both. I know you are both a professional career,
national security--career servants, public servants, and I just
want to thank you for that service.
I know it has also been mentioned by some on this
Committee, so I want to clear it up. Have either of you ever
received an order to stand down directly from the White House
or stop enforcing the laws that you are tasked to enforce?
Ms. Sabatino. No.
Mr. Salisbury. No, not for HSI, sir.
Mr. Garcia. Thank you very much to both of you. I say that
because of course you have heard this claim over and over
again, that somehow the border is open, that we are not
enforcing our laws, and that we are directing our career law
enforcement officials to not follow our laws at the border.
I want to return to a point that was raised in the opening
remarks. I know millions of American jobs, workers, and
families, as we know, rely on the commerce that flows in and
out of our borders every single day and at our ports of entry,
especially at our southern ports of entries. In 2021, American
goods and services traded with Mexico totaled more than $725
billion, making Mexico our second largest trading partner. And
in that same year, American exports of goods and services to
Mexico supported an estimated 1.1 million jobs in our country.
So, we obviously need to be smart about how we manage our ports
of entry, how we achieve security. And we also have to ensure
that our inspections are done quickly and efficiently.
Now, given the jobs and, of course, the commerce that is at
stake with Mexico and our other partners, efficient ports of
entry should, of course, be a bipartisan issue. Playing
politics at the border have devastating effects on the American
people and our economy, and we have seen that recently. We
probably just remember just recently when Governor Greg Abbott
from Texas ordered state troopers to conduct unnecessary
examinations of commercial vehicles coming from Mexico. That
obviously was a political stunt. That action alone cost us $9
billion in GDP here in the U.S., and those are the types of
stunts at the border that do not work and certainly are causing
harm to our relationship, not just with Mexico, but also with
all of our trading partners.
I want to thank you both for your work and particularly
want to focus especially on how important it is to process our
ports of entry efficiently and to ensure that they are secure.
I want to start with Commissioner Sabatino. Can you just
briefly explain how processing effective screening at our ports
of entry not only makes us safer, but promotes commerce in our
American economy?
Ms. Sabatino. Thank you for the question, Ranking Member.
Certainly, and we strive to utilize technology and innovation
to streamline our operations at ports of entry and have
undertaken significant efforts to automate as many processes as
possible. It is really important for us to give our CBP
officers, our agriculture specialists, all our frontline
personnel, the tools that they need to effectively do their
job. In order to do that, we need to remove administrative
burdens from them, and by doing that, we go paperless, we go
automated, we go touchless in our environment.
So, technologies such as non-intrusive technology, force
multipliers like canines, but also using facial biometric
comparison technology in our passenger environments, the
implementation, that goes across air, land, and sea. You know,
in our land border environment, the modernization of truck
manifest, again receiving advanced data in advance of the
arrival of cargo shipments that, you know, we see in the air
and maritime environment, that was much more automated
previously with the deployment of the truck manifest
deployment.
Mr. Garcia. And, Commissioner, also on that point, can you
also talk about sea ports of entry?
Ms. Sabatino. Yes.
Mr. Garcia. Because I think oftentimes, we spend a lot of
time talking about the southern border, which is obviously very
important, but our sea ports are an incredible part of our
national economy. And could you also mention our sea ports of
entry and what is happening there?
Ms. Sabatino. The most significant percentage of volume in
terms of value of imports comes through our maritime ports of
entry, again, and it cuts across all of our environments, in
automating, going paperless, leveraging opportunities for
submission of paperwork. The Vessel Entrance and Clearance
Program is one of them where we are deploying a resource in the
automated commercial environment to allow a carrier to submit
electronically data that we used to require paper packages for,
saving a million hours for CBP and countless hours for the
trade as well as gas, you know, resources and expenditure. So,
we look at efficiencies in terms of removing administrative
burdens, again, giving our officers and frontline personnel the
opportunity to do what they do best.
Mr. Garcia. Thank you, Commissioner. I think to your point,
I think it is important to note that there is so much commerce,
in fact, a larger impact to our economy what is happening
through our seaports as ports of entry, which we rarely focus
on, which is an incredibly important piece of our national
economy. So, I want to thank you for the technology you are
putting in place. I hope that this Committee and the full
Committee can also focus on the bigger picture of what is
happening at our ports of entry, and including seaports as part
of that conversation is really critical. So, thank you, and,
Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
Mr. Grothman. Thank you. I will next call on Congressman
Gosar from Arizona.
Mr. Gosar. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Just last week, four
Americans crossed the border in Northern Mexico for a medical
procedure. All four of them were shot at and kidnapped. Two of
them died. The White House made sure to let us know that
``these sorts of attacks are unacceptable.'' Well, that is just
great, but if these attacks are really unacceptable, we should
have a protocol in place to avoid them. We can't stop American
citizens from making decisions to cross the border into Mexico,
but what we can do is to keep the violence down in Mexico out
of the United States. We have a name for that kind of protocol.
It is called ``border security.''
As long as you don't have a real southern border with a
real wall, and real-enough agents, and the right technology
necessary to properly police it, we might as well call what
just happened down in Northern Mexico a domestic terror
incident. Until America has real, distinct, and adequately
defended borders that clearly signal to both citizens and
foreigners where our Nation ends and the unrestricted cartel-
dominated war zone begins, the Mexico cartels problem is our
cartel problem. And every drop of American blood, every sex
trafficking victim, every fentanyl overdose is on the Biden
Administration's hands until they get serious about border
security, close the gaps, and use every available means to
protect Americans from the hell coming across our southern
border.
I think it is worth getting to the bottom at how exactly
the Biden Administration has gotten soft on the border and how
their policies have emboldened the cartel-style-like executions
occurring across this country. Yes, Americans deserve to know
why the border crisis isn't just at the border anymore. It is
coming to your town, even Mayberry.
I would like to submit for the record January 19, 2023,
article from Fox News entitled, ``Brutal Killing of a
California Family a Clear Message From the Cartel. Sheriff
Warns: `They Were Targeted'.''
Mr. Grothman. Without objection, so ordered.
Mr. Gosar. For both witnesses, do the illegal aliens you
encounter have connections to the cartels?
Mr. Salisbury. So, from HSI's perspective, we identify all
types of cartel activity. As you stated, the cartels' reach is
far and wide into the United States. So, as we --
Mr. Gosar. Nobody crosses without the cartels, right?
Mr. Salisbury. So, what we do know is that the cartels will
hold the pathways into the country, for sure.
Mr. Gosar. So, there is a connection. Ma'am?
Ms. Sabatino. I think to say that we absolutely have seen
the exploitation of migrants coming up into the U.S. through
the southern border, vulnerable to the transnational criminal
organizations. I think distinct from in between the ports of
entry, at the ports of entry, I can't say definitively that the
TCOs are involved in every single arrival to our ports of entry
because there are more commercial means to get there.
Mr. Gosar. Got you. So, 6 million illegal aliens have
entered the U.S. during the Biden Administration. Compare that
to 647,000 illegal alien encounters in President Trump's last
Fiscal Year in office. How has the surge of illegal aliens
affected your jobs, to be kind of concise, please?
Ms. Sabatino. Certainly, at ports of entry we have looked
for ways to streamline and be as efficient as possible because
at ports, again, the admissibility processing of individuals is
just one part of the operation.
Mr. Gosar. So, it is more of a secretarial duty than there
is actual enforcement, right?
Ms. Sabatino. With respect to, I am sorry?
Mr. Gosar. Processing. You are to facilitate processing.
Ms. Sabatino. No, I am talking about, like, the legitimate
travel and trade of individuals is also a significant
responsibility of ours, but the processing of individuals
includes interviews by our CBP officers at the front line to
identify and further identify threats to the U.S.
Mr. Salisbury. So, from HSI's perspective, the more goods,
the more people coming across, our criminal investigations are
on a razor's edge. So, we have to identify the needle in that
proverbial haystack to try to find razor focus criminal
investigation. So, as more people come across the border, same
as more goods, it gives the cartels more ability to hide. It
gives these illicit networks more ability to hide. So, we do
need to increase our efforts to basically sort through the
extra volume of both personnel and/or if a merchandise flow
increases as well. So yes, it would increase what HSI needs to
look at in order to find the razor focused criminal
investigations and criminal activity.
Mr. Gosar. In Fiscal Year 2022, CBP seized 656,000 pounds
of illegal drugs to include 14,700 pounds of fentanyl, the
majority by weight, at ports of entry. Now they are actually
adding atrazine, you know, making it a drug that cannot be used
with narcan to reverse it. Are you seeing that activity from
the cartels in regards to increasing illegal transport?
Ms. Sabatino. I would have to get back to you, sir, on that
specific narcotic. I don't have information on that right now.
Mr. Gosar. It is a horse sedative that doesn't allow Narcan
to actually work when somebody overdoses.
Ms. Sabatino. Understood. We will take that for followup.
Mr. Salisbury. We certainly heard some intelligence and
some source information. To answer your question more broadly,
the cartels will adjust, adapt. As I said in my opening, you
know, it was HSI's very successful operations attacking the
precursors. As we attack the precursors, we see the cartel
shift to try to get different analogs that will get them what
they need to make their final product. So, it is a constant
shifting game of cat and mouse, so they will shift the analogs
and the precursors needed as HSI attacks those routes and other
precursors.
Mr. Grothman. Thank you. Mr. Goldman from New York.
Mr. Goldman. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I am very happy to
hear that my colleague from Arizona is concerned about domestic
terrorism. Unfortunately, his colleagues in the majority on the
Homeland Security Committee last week rejected an amendment by
the Democrats to add domestic terrorism to the oversight plan,
so hopefully, Mr. Gosar can speak to his colleagues about that.
The fentanyl crisis is real, and it has been growing for a
long time. It has affected just about every community around
the country. But it is disingenuous and counterproductive for
the majority to try to mislead the public by making this a
partisan issue as they did last week when they brought a
witness in front of the Homeland Security Committee to bash
President Biden's response at the border because her sons had
tragically died from fentanyl. Unfortunately, for them and for
her, the children were killed in July 2020, during the Trump
presidency. So, I hope that we can start to move past the
partisanship and address this real problem that we have. And I
lean on my 10 years of experience as a Federal prosecutor where
I worked very closely with all sorts of law enforcement,
including both of your agencies, and I thank you very much for
all of your work.
It is clear that the Mexican cartels and other
transnational criminal organizations have expanded their power
and criminal activity in recent years and have certainly preyed
on the opioid crisis. Director Salisbury, can you talk a little
bit about how the Mexican cartels have evolved over the last 10
years or so?
Mr. Salisbury. Yes, I can. So, as you see, the cartels will
look at anything and any mechanism they can to make money,
mostly off narcotics. So, we have actually seen this history
lesson before when we see methamphetamine. Traditionally, when
I first started law enforcement in the late 90's,
methamphetamine was predominantly manufactured in the United
States. We saw the Mexican cartels basically take over the
stronghold of it, bring in precursors from China, India. And
they basically took over the manufacturing process and pumped
it into the United States at such massive amounts that it
basically stopped the domestic supply of methamphetamine.
So, the cartels now have this cheap option with fentanyl,
very profitable, same thing. They are basically reinventing
what they did in the past. They are getting in the precursors.
They are bringing in the ability to manufacture this and use
their routes into the United States to pump this across the
border. So, the cartels are always looking for new lanes,
avenues to exploit and they see dollar signs with fentanyl. It
is cheap to make. The precursors are currently available from
China, and as they pump it in, they are going to be licking
their lips on how much money they are going to make.
It is important to know, as we talk to our foreign
partners, right now it is predominantly a U.S. issue. A lot of
our other partners in Europe haven't quite seen the issue. So,
we do have a chance here to kind of stop the spread of fentanyl
from around the world as we deal with the opioid epidemic on
our own soil.
Mr. Goldman. You mentioned in your opening statement, I
believe, that guns travel south over the border from the United
States to Mexico, to the cartels, while the fentanyl travels
north. Are we essentially exporting our guns from the United
States to Mexico in return for them sending fentanyl?
Mr. Salisbury. So, what I can tell you in regards to
weapons trafficking, it is a major priority for HSI. HSI does
recognize that the United States is a source country for
weapons, with criminal organizations sending weapons southbound
not only to Mexico. We see it going to the Caribbean, South
America, and to Europe, so we certainly see the weapon flows
getting into the hands of the criminals. It is a major priority
for HSI to stop this illicit southbound flow of weapons to
getting in the hands to fuel the violence. Without the weapons,
the cartels don't have as much teeth. They can't scare. They
can't intimidate. They can't kill. So, weapons are a key
component of any criminal organization, and certainly weapons
from the United States, which is a key priority for HSI and our
partners at CBP, to stop the illegal southbound flow of
weapons.
Mr. Goldman. You had mentioned some of the international
partners. I am curious how you view the cooperation that you
have gotten from the Mexican Government over the past several
years?
Mr. Salisbury. So, I was previously assigned to Mexico in
2010 to about 2012-2013, and also now. So again, through our
international operations office, we do have foreign-vetted
units. The Mexicans have provided that through the embassy. We
have cooperation. It ebbs and flows with higher-level political
issues that arise, but at our level, working relationship, we
do share joint investigative binational investigations with our
vetted unit with Mexico.
Mr. Goldman. And then my last question is, can you describe
a little bit the additional capacity and authorities that you
have received from the Biden Administration to attack the
cartels and fentanyl crisis over the past couple of years?
Mr. Salisbury. So, in order to attack the TCOs, we have
most of the authorities we already need. HSI is a new agency
under the Department Homeland Security at 20 years old, but we
come from Customs, legacy Customs. Our authorities are old,
going back to the creation of the United States of America. So,
we have authorities. The biggest authority that we are still
looking for and there is ongoing discussions is right now, of
all the cross-border crimes we investigate, Title 21 is gifted
to us in a limited agreement through DOJ. So, Title 21 is the
narcotics charges for the United States, so right now we don't
have that standalone authority. There are ongoing conversations
both at senior department and within Congress on getting us
Title 21 authority.
Outside of that, you know, personnel is always the issue.
There is a lot of cross-border crimes. We can get spread thin,
but the men and women of HSI are out there every day working
with our partners to pursue these cross-border crimes.
Mr. Goldman. Thank you very much. I yield back, Mr.
Chairman.
Mr. Grothman. Mr. Higgins from Louisiana.
Mr. Higgins. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I thank our witnesses
for being here today.
Commissioner Sabatino, could you step through, for the
record, your chain of command above, ma'am, beginning with
President Biden and Secretary Mayorkas and coming down through
your chain of command? Can you identify the chain of command
above you?
Ms. Sabatino. Yes, certainly beginning with the President
down to Secretary Mayorkas, to our Acting Commissioner Troy
Miller, to my direct leadership, which is Executive Assistant
Commissioner Pete Flores.
Mr. Higgins. So, you are two positions and chain of command
removed from Secretary Mayorkas? Just to clarify for the record
based on what you just said.
Ms. Sabatino. At least two removed, and that essentially is
our chain of command, yes.
Mr. Higgins. Is there more?
Ms. Sabatino. No.
Mr. Higgins. So, you are two positions and a chain of
command removed from Secretary Mayorkas? I am just asking for
clarification.
Ms. Sabatino. Yes.
Mr. Higgins. OK. Ma'am, thank you for your service. As a
Thin Blue Line brother, I very much appreciate the work that
you do to help secure our Nation. In the course of your
command, did you have ongoing conversations, communications,
emails, maybe text messages, with your chain of command up,
obviously?
Ms. Sabatino. I would say my primary communications with
Executive Assistant Commissioner Flores, on occasion I will be
acting for him and engage with the acting commissioner.
Mr. Higgins. OK. Thank you for that clarification. Do you
have direct communications by telephone or email, texts with
Secretary Mayorkas?
Ms. Sabatino. I don't recall having direct communication
with him one-on-one. Certainly, I have participated in meetings
where he has been present.
Mr. Higgins. When you said, ``participated in meetings,''
would those be in-person or virtual?
Ms. Sabatino. I believe they have all been virtual.
Mr. Higgins. They have been virtual. Again, thank you for
that clarification. So, you do recall interactions with
Secretary Mayorkas, directly in virtual communications, and
yourself and at your level of chain across DHS will be present,
how many people will be on it, commonly, in a virtual
communication with Secretary Mayorkas who is leading the
meeting?
Ms. Sabatino. Yes, I think that could range from five to
six, seven people to large groups.
Mr. Higgins. There you go. Just give us a picture there.
So, you have had, during the course of your service, over the
last couple of years, would you say a handful of direct
communications wherein Secretary Mayorkas was leading that
meeting?
Ms. Sabatino. At least a handful.
Mr. Higgins. At least a handful. And they were all virtual,
ma'am?
Ms. Sabatino. I believe so, yes.
Mr. Higgins. OK. Thank you for that. That is interesting.
Madam, regarding vessels and vehicles screened at the ports of
entry, I have observed operations many, many times in my trips
to the border, and I am always impressed by the professionalism
and the focus of the men and women that work in long shifts.
Many of them will work in doubles. They work in two eight-hour
shifts. Is this common under your chain that you have your men
and women working in two eight-hour shifts?
Ms. Sabatino. We actually have a pilot currently in place
to limit only to volunteers to work eight-hour overtime shifts
on top of their current tour of duty they are assigned to.
Mr. Higgins. The normal eight-hour shift. So, you do have
men and women under your command working 16 hours a day? My
understanding is they work five days. Is that correct?
Ms. Sabatino. Yes, and that is why I think there is a
discrepancy in that we do have alternate work schedules. Some
normal tours of duty could be 10-hour shifts, they could be 12-
hour shifts, but depending on what the work schedule is and
alternate days off.
Mr. Higgins. Thank you for that clarification. Regarding
vehicles and vessels that are screened, just to clarify for the
American people, my final question, a vehicle coming through a
port of entry is screened with technology, electronic screening
that we won't go into the details of, but it is essentially
viewed with technology by men and women under your command.
That is the initial screening for vehicle, is that correct?
Ms. Sabatino. We currently scan in personal vehicles one
percent to two percent coming across the southwest border. With
the deployment of technology over the next two-and-a-half
years, we expect to increase that to 40 percent.
Mr. Higgins. And of the vehicles and vessels that are
screened with technology, some are pulled aside for secondary
search by actual agents and usually dogs, correct?
Ms. Sabatino. Yes, they could be referred for a variety of
reasons.
Mr. Higgins. And in that secondary search, is that where
you make your drug seizures?
Ms. Sabatino. It could be something that is identified
right on a primary, depending on the concealment, but it also
could be secondary NII screening that could identify anomalies
in a search done in our secondary areas.
Mr. Higgins. And you had stated that the percentage of
secondary screening was what? Let me let you state that.
Ms. Sabatino. So, for passenger vehicles, it is currently
one percent to two percent.
Mr. Higgins. One percent to two percent.
Ms. Sabatino. And for commercial vehicles, it is 15 percent
to 17 percent, with an increase to about 70 percent with the
deployment of new technology.
Mr. Higgins. Thank you. Mr. Chairman my time has expired. I
yield.
Mr. Grothman. Ms. Ocasio-Cortez from New York.
Ms. Ocasio-Cortez. I thank the Chairman for recognizing me.
You know, there is a lot that is currently being unfolded with
the Biden Administration with respect to certain border
policies. And, Ms. Sabatino or Mr. Salisbury, I understand you
both are not in the policymaking aspect of it, so I won't harp
on that element of things. But, Ms. Sabatino, you had raised a
little bit earlier today about some of the technologies that
are currently being deployed at the border and included the
deployment of facial recognition technology. And I will be
candid, this is something that has been of extraordinary
concern to us here in the Committee. What we are seeing in
prior hearings, and we have held quite a few hearings on this,
is the internal and baked-in biases within facial recognition
algorithms in certain technologies.
But let me take a step back. Ms. Sabatino, are you aware of
the Trump Administration's previous policy of metering?
Ms. Sabatino. We refer to queue management to ensure the,
you know, manageable throughput of the flow of traffic at our
ports of entry.
Ms. Ocasio-Cortez. And under the Trump Administration, or,
you know, just in general, that goal was to really, essentially
cap and limit the number of asylees seeking protection under,
you know, inciting these capacity restraints. But rather than
eliminating the practice that clearly violates international
and domestic law, people are free to seek asylum at our border.
I am very concerned that the Biden Administration is moving
this online with the CBP One app. Ms. Sabatino, migrants and
asylum-seekers at the border have to use the app to request
asylum, correct?
Ms. Sabatino. We do see migrants that haven't necessarily
used the app that we will process at ports of entry. But what
the CBP One application does, it puts it in the hands, removing
intermediaries and potentially limiting exploitation by TCOs of
the migrants themselves, but allows for the efficient and
effective processing by CBP officers.
Ms. Ocasio-Cortez. Thank you. Ms. Sabatino, you know, and I
want to cite a little bit about some of the previous work the
Committee has done and introduce witness testimony from the
ACLU during the May 22, 2019, oversight hearing, titled,
``Facial Recognition Technology: Its Impact on Our Civil Rights
and Civil Liberties,'' and that articulates the dangers of the
technology in government use. In this Committee, we have gone
through great lengths to prove that facial comparison and
recognition technology is racially discriminatory. And we have
done this on a bipartisan basis, and we found in 2019 that
Amazon's algorithms misidentified the gender of darker-skinned
women in about 30 percent of their tests.
Ms. Ocasio-Cortez. Additionally, this technology, and I
would also like to submit to the record documentation from The
Washington Post that Amazon had met with ICE officials over its
facial recognition systems that could identify immigrants. And
what we saw therein was that that technology incorrectly
matched the faces of 28 Members of Congress with those of
people who were arrested for crimes elsewhere in the United
States. In the summer, the American Civil Liberties also
conducted that study. And then on top of that, what we are
starting to see now is early reporting from the CBP One app
that migrants from Africa and Haiti are reportedly
demonstrating much more difficulty in using the facial
recognition app deployed by CBP One.
Ms. Ocasio-Cortez. My concern is that while we already have
quite a few folks using the CBP One app, the Administration
seems to be signaling with this proposed rule change that they
are going to try to make that the primary mode of this. And I
am very concerned about the implementation of that exacerbating
through technology racial inequities that already exist in our
system. Once the app is fully implemented, can asylum seekers
who lack a smartphone or internet access and, therefore, cannot
schedule an appointment through CBP One be turned back when
they present themselves at a point of entry should the proposed
rule be enacted?
Ms. Sabatino. I certainly would like the opportunity to
give you a full, comprehensive briefing on our biometric facial
comparison technology because it is the algorithm that we use
that is distinguished from other algorithms. That is high
performing, and we have some very significant statistics and
technical high-match rates with respect to countries of
citizenship.
The issues with the CBP One app that were noted based on
the data and the analysis that we did, it was not the facial
biometric comparison. It was the liveness detection that was
determining is this a real person. And that liveness detection
issue, which has been resolved because now we have limited it
to one individual per unit or group family units, you know,
more specifically, but that certainly was, you know, a capacity
issue with the liveness detection, and that is where the data
errors were coming from. We saw significant decrease in those
data errors once we made it possible for just a primary and a
group to do the liveness detection. It certainly cut down on
the bandwidth for the liveness app.
But in terms of the biometric facial comparison because we
don't track ethnicity, we look at technical match rates based
on countries of citizenship. And certainly, for an example, a
couple of different regions, Middle Eastern countries, 99.6
percent match rates, African countries, 99.5 percent match
rates, North American countries, 98.9 percent technical match
rates, and there are others. But I think looking at the
holistic program that we use, and certainly offer a more
fulsome briefing specifically on the business use cases we
have. And I think, you know, making the distinction, we use the
biometric facial comparison at a time and a place when an
individual is normally expected to present themselves for
identity verification, and we do not conduct surveillance with
the facial biometric technology.
Ms. Ocasio-Cortez. And do you know if----
Mr. Grothman. The gentlewoman's time has expired.
Ms. Ocasio-Cortez. Thank you.
Mr. Grothman. Congressman Biggs from Arizona.
Mr. Biggs. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Ms. Sabatino, when you
talked about the number of canine units that you have, were
those the canine units that are in OFO or the entire CBP?
Ms. Sabatino. These are specific to the Office of Field
Operations.
Mr. Biggs. How many canine units are in CBP, if you know?
Ms. Sabatino. I don't have that number, sir. I can get back
to you on that.
Mr. Biggs. You guys use dogs very effectively. I mean, I
have seen lots of demonstrations been done. In San Ysidro--I
was with the Chair, and we saw the gas. That was fascinating,
but they don't have anywhere near the same number of canine
units in CBP to deal with between ports of entry, do they?
Ms. Sabatino. I would have to defer to my colleagues on the
Border Patrol, sir.
Mr. Biggs. You know it is true. OK. See, density meters,
density readers, you guys have those at the ports of entries,
right?
Ms. Sabatino. We do employ a number of small handheld
technology at----
Mr. Biggs. I have seen them at Mariposa, as well as in San
Ysidro, and as well as in other ports of entry as well. In
other words, you have great equipment at the ports of entry
that are essentially a force multiplier, right?
Ms. Sabatino. Yes, absolutely, we have a number of
equipment.
Mr. Biggs. We don't have those same tools between the ports
of entry because we don't see the same type of border crosser
between the ports of entry, right?
Ms. Sabatino. You know, sir, I can speak to what happens at
the ports of entry.
Mr. Biggs. OK. Very good.
Ms. Sabatino. The technology there.
Mr. Biggs. Very good. Do any of your officers ever provide
parole to those who illegally enter the country through ports
of entry?
Ms. Sabatino. We have certainly----
Mr. Biggs. Three hundred sixty thousand people got paroled
last year. How many came through ports of entry?
Ms. Sabatino. I would have to get the breakdown of that
number. I can share with you certainly the last four months of
encountered that we had.
Mr. Biggs. What is that? How many got paroled?
Ms. Sabatino. Through our programs? I apologize, sir.
Mr. Biggs. While you are looking, I am going to go to Mr.
Salisbury. Mr. Salisbury, HSI is embedded into ICE, correct?
Mr. Salisbury. Yes, we are directed under ICE.
Mr. Biggs. Right. You guys don't remove individuals who
have deportation orders. Is that correct? That is not HSI's
responsibility?
Mr. Salisbury. That is correct. HSI is a criminal
enforcement arm.
Mr. Biggs. Right. So, ICE, when the director said and the
President said we are going to have 100-day moratorium on
deportations even though you have 1.2 million people who had
due process and deportation orders, that would be a countermand
to the law. But you guys didn't receive that because that is
not what you do.
Mr. Salisbury. Homeland Security Investigations is only
focused on----
Mr. Biggs. Yes, you don't do that, so you didn't receive
that order to violate the law. You didn't receive that, right?
Mr. Salisbury. HSI solely proceeds with----
Mr. Biggs. So, you didn't receive that order?
Mr. Salisbury. Correct.
Mr. Biggs. There. It is that simple. Back to you, ma'am,
Ms. Sabatino.
Ms. Sabatino. Apologies, sir. So, for the last four months
in October, we saw 26,505; November, 27,651; December, 30,428;
and January, 28,155.
Mr. Biggs. So, averaging between 26,000 and 30,000 roughly
for the last four months, 360,000 last year. CBP One is going
to provide to four nations ostensibly up to 360,000 additional
parolees through ports of entry. Secretary Mayorkas, who is in
both of your direct chain of command, has testified before
Congress that parole is to be granted on a single individual
case-by-case basis. I have read the law. That is what it says.
The granting 30,000 a month, is that a single, case-by-case
basis?
Ms. Sabatino. Well, I think we do evaluate, and our CBP
officers interview all of these individuals that come across,
and there are certainly----
Mr. Biggs. So, prior to the Biden Administration, there had
never been more than two dozen or so parolees, parole grants in
a year.
Ms. Sabatino. I would have to go back and----
Mr. Biggs. No, I am telling you. That is the fact. That is
the testimony we have had previously, multiple hearings.
Ms. Sabatino. I think depending on the circumstances, there
could certainly be more examples where parole has been
utilized.
Mr. Biggs. More than two dozen in a year?
Ms. Sabatino. Yes.
Mr. Biggs. OK. I would love to see that because our
testimony that we have received repeatedly is that about two
dozen have been kind of the high, normally about 12 to 15, very
individualized basis. This Administration, however, is now
going up to 300,000. That sounds pretty generic to me. That
doesn't sound like an individual case-by-case basis.
So, when we look at force multipliers, if you really want
to get to the force multiplier, and this doesn't go to you, Mr.
Salisbury or maybe even you, Ms. Sabatino, because you guys,
you said you didn't receive these, but I think the parole issue
is a problem. How about enforcing the law, you enforce the law?
That is your best force multiplier. That would include things
like removals of 1.2, now up to about 1.5 million people who
have had due process and removal orders. With that, I yield
back.
Mr. Grothman. Thank you. Mr. Frost of Florida.
Mr. Frost. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I just want to start
with a reality check from my colleagues for people watching
back at home, that the individuals most responsible for
smuggling fentanyl across our borders are not migrants. In
fact, in prior years, American citizens have accounted for more
than 86 percent. The statistics has been thrown around a lot.
It looks like it is not sticking for everybody. Eighty-six
percent of fentanyl tracking convictions at the border have
been U.S. citizens, not foreign nationals, not undocumented
immigrants and not asylum seekers--Americans. And, Dr.
Salisbury, have you seen any evidence that the expansion of
legal pathways for immigration would bring more fentanyl into
this country?
Mr. Salisbury. Current legal pathways or pending?
Mr. Frost. Current legal pathways.
Mr. Salisbury. So, no. HSI looks to identify any and all
pathways that get exploited, so no, we have not----
Mr. Frost. So, the answer is no?
Mr. Salisbury. Correct.
Mr. Frost. OK. Thank you. Thank you. And instead of
shutting down our asylum system, like some folks on this panel
have, you know, suggested and people are suggesting, we have to
strengthen the way that we process most vulnerable populations
seeking help, which is right, at our border.
In 2020, CBP rolled out the CBP One phone app in an attempt
to streamline border processing, and I am just going to kind of
continue on the line that Ms. Ocasio-Cortez was talking about.
The CBP One app has been plagued with racial bias concerns and
other issues that have hindered legitimate applications,
migrants, and asylum seekers. The app also requires migrants to
have a smartphone, to have strong cell service, to have a Wi-Fi
signal, and it has been called by some people the asylum ticket
master because of the high rates of failure and difficulty for
folks to obtain an appointment.
This is something that really concerns me, especially as a
former ACLU staffer, thinking about people's civil rights,
civil liberties, and the ability for people to seek asylum at
the border no matter what the color of their skin is. And like
it was stated before, we are still receiving information,
anecdotes, stories, photos from NGO's at the border that are
saying the darker your skin color is, the more difficult it is
for you to use this app and be processed in a timely matter.
Commissioner Sabatino, what is CBP doing to make the app
more equitable and accessible? I know you said that it has been
handled and it is being worked on, but we are still receiving
these anecdotes. We are still receiving these stories from
NGO's. What are you all doing to remedy this?
Ms. Sabatino. Now certainly looking and evaluating all of
the data that we have available to us, and again, what we saw
with respect to the data errors wasn't related to the biometric
facial matching. It was liveness detection, and it was a
capacity issue. And over the last several weeks, we have made
that enhancement, limiting the number of people required in a
group to do that liveness detection, which has significantly
cut down on those data errors.
You know, with respect to the populations that we are
seeing for the Title 42 exceptions, you know, we can say that
the predominant population has been Venezuelans, followed by
Haitians. We have also seen a significant increase since the
enhancements to the app of family units or groups traveling to
the border. I personally had the opportunity to speak to
several NGO's in South Texas that were highlighting these
challenges that were relayed to us, and again, we are
continually evaluating the performance of the application.
Mr. Frost. Yes. With Title 42 expiring in May, do you know
whether CBP is exploring other technologies or process to
streamline the border process because from what we have heard,
it is moving toward everything being on the app.
Ms. Sabatino. And the goal for us with leveraging the
application, again, this is to limit the data entry and the
administrative burdens on CBP officers and make it a more
streamlined process to ensure that they have the time to do
what they need to do and talk to----
Mr. Frost. And I think it being a streamlined process is
important for everyone, but what we are seeing, again, from
NGO's, the photos or stories we are getting is that it is not
streamlined for people who have darker skin. Commissioner
Sabatino, how is CBP addressing the technological bias against
people with darker skin tones with the CBP One app?
Ms. Sabatino. I think certainly working with our partners
south of the border, directly with the NGO's, as well as, you
know, our partners in the Government of Mexico on ways to
support and streamline and enhance bandwidth, we do see that,
you know, not to say every single individual has a phone, but
it is very prevalent that individuals have access to at least a
smartphone that we have encountered, you know, in the
operations.
Mr. Frost. Thank you.
Ms. Sabatino. But the bandwidth issues do fall in Mexico,
and we are working with them.
Mr. Frost. Thank you. Thank you. I am also concerned about
individual privacy as OFO implements the technology of facial
recognition at airports, corporations, airlines having access
to the data bases. And what we are seeing is that they are not
necessarily complying with restrictions on the retention of
that, of this facial recognition information for commercial
use. Commissioner Sabatino, what steps has CBP taken to ensure
that its external parties don't exploit and misuse traveler
photos and information?
Ms. Sabatino. We have published a number of privacy impact
assessments. We are trying to be as transparent as possible as
to what is done with the data, how is it used, how is it
transferred, how is it stored, and those are publicly available
on the DHS website. But also, as part of a GAO recommendation
going back several years, we do conduct audits, but our
partners don't have access to our data base. Our airline
partners, they simply take a photo, it goes behind the CBP
firewall and is matched to a photo that is in a preexisting
gallery based on the advanced passenger information that we
have. And that photo was templatized. It can't be reverse-
engineered or exploited, but we do audits of our partners to
ensure that they aren't retaining that photo. But there is no
biographic information also attached to those photos, and
certainly offer again a more fulsome briefing on the biometric
comparison program.
Mr. Frost. Thank you. I yield back.
Mr. Grothman. Thank you. Pat Fallon from Texas.
Mr. Fallon. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and congratulations.
[Audio malfunction in the hearing room.]
Ms. Sabatino. Yes.
Mr. Fallon.
[Audio malfunction in the hearing room.]
Mr. Salisbury. Yes.
Mr. Fallon. And I fully agree with
[Audio malfunction in the hearing room.] Thank you. It only
passed 33 to 26. Five Democrats voted for it, all 28
Republicans voted for it, but 26 Democrats didn't agree with
that statement, which is remarkable. That is why we took great
care in crafting it to ensure that it was just pretty much that
statement. And it is a simple one, and I am glad that you both
agree because I do as well. And is it also true, Commissioner
Sabatino, that when migrants transit through Mexico, that the
cartels like to charge, I don't know, for lack of a better
term, maybe a transit fee they are charging these migrants.
Ms. Sabatino. We have absolutely seen instances where the
migrants are being targeted by criminal organizations or moved
by criminal organizations and exploited for money.
Mr. Fallon. And it is a pretty good sum of money, too. It
is in the low thousands?
Ms. Sabatino. The costs range, but we have seen substantial
sums.
Mr. Fallon. And before this Administration, had we ever had
a month where we saw more than 200,000 encounters with migrants
at the border?
Ms. Sabatino. I don't have the information to validate
that, sir.
Mr. Fallon. And fortunately, we did look it up, and it had
never happened before. And yet, we had 10 months in a row under
this Administration where we had 200,000 illegal border
crossings or greater. Which leads me to believe that if you
have that many more folks that are crossing the border
illegally, and the cartels are charging them a tax or a fee,
that is making the cartels stronger than they have ever been
because from what we have ascertained, it is hard to say
exactly, but the narcotic trafficking alone is about $25
billion a year, what the cartels are making, and an additional
$12 billion now with all the illegal migrant taxes that they
are hacking on, which is making them stronger, which is making,
unfortunately, Mexico a de facto narco state.
And then so I, you know, I firmly believe that open borders
and an immoral border for the folks that live north of it and
the folks who live south of it. So, in Fiscal Year 2022 alone,
we had 98 individuals on the Terrorist Screening Data base that
were apprehended at the southern border. Already in Fiscal Year
2023, we have seen 53 folks that were on the same watch list
that have been apprehended. In May 2022, an Iraqi native was
arrested in connection with an alleged plot to assassinate
former President George W. Bush. The man was linked to both
Rasheed Daesh, and he was said to regularly be conducting
surveillance on President Bush's home and offices, and planned
to smuggle terrorists into the United States through the
southern border. This is what happens when you have a very
porous border. This is one of several examples that highlight
the consequence of vulnerabilities that we have at our southern
border.
In March 2022, the commander of USNORTHCOM stated before
the U.S. Senate that, ``Most of the GRU members in the world
are in Mexico at the moment''--those are Russian intelligence
personnel--and they keep a close eye on their opportunities for
influence in the United States. In Fiscal Year 2022, CBP
encountered 36,271 illegal aliens from Russia, which is
startling. Since the beginning of the new fiscal year, there
have been 21,234 Russian illegals encountered by CBP. At the
southwest border specifically, there were over 21,000
encounters with the Russian nationals. Last year and about the
same amount through January already. So, as you know, most
illegals don't carry any documents and records, so it is hard
to ascertain who they are. In most cases, officers must rely on
whatever the alien tells them to include what country they are
from. Finding cracks in that story would require a good
interview, which takes time and resources.
So, for Commissioner Sabatino and Director Salisbury, if a
person that has never been to the United States is arrested
while entering illegally, what is the likelihood that the
records check our officers run will reveal the person's real
identity and provide any criminal background from the other
nations?
Ms. Sabatino. Certainly at ports of entry employing all the
tools that we have, you know, our records checks, our system
verifications are one tool that we use, the highly trained CBP
officers skilled in interview techniques for individuals who
are referred to secondary who don't present documents. But
there are a variety of different types of documents that people
potentially have in their possession that are identity
documents, but aren't necessarily travel documents. But also,
for individuals, again, collaboration and information sharing
with our foreign partners is also absolutely critical for us to
further identify individuals that show up at our ports of
entry. So, it is a myriad of tools that we use, you know,
including our ability to look at technology that they have and
media exploitation as well.
Mr. Fallon. OK.
Mr. Salisbury. The same thing. Sir, with our
investigations, we are aware and leading and working with the
entire U.S. Government on organizations that are and willingly
trying to bring dangerous individuals into United States. So,
our ability to identify them and who they are among the masses
of migrants trying to get in is critically important in HSI. We
do employ technology and relationships in foreign governments,
as well as utilizing biometrics and relationships with the
intelligence community to basically try to identify these
organizations and stop them from bringing anybody for nefarious
purposes in the United States.
Mr. Fallon. OK. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I yield back.
Mr. Grothman. Thank you. Ms. Crockett from Texas.
Ms. Crockett. Thank you so much. I have just got a couple
of questions. No. 1, seemingly my colleagues from the other
side of the aisle have decided that migrants are somehow
synonymous with cartels in the drug trade. Is that something
that you can agree with, that migrants are synonymous with the
cartel in the drug trade? Each of you.
Ms. Sabatino. I will take it first. I think certainly
migrants, the vast majority are potentially vulnerable to
exploitation by cartels.
Mr. Salisbury. I would concur with that. The migrant
community can be exploited by cartels and other nefarious
actors, correct.
Ms. Crockett. Thank you. Additionally, we have heard a lot
of talk about seemingly open borders under President Biden. And
there is almost an insinuation that the cartels are somehow in
cahoots with Democrats, and that is the reason that things
like, you know, more fentanyl is coming across the border. I
would imagine that both of you agree with me that there is no
evidence that there is any agreement with the Administration to
allow for nefarious actors from cartels to get their drugs
across the border, correct?
Ms. Sabatino. I would agree with that.
Mr. Salisbury. I would agree with that also.
Ms. Crockett. OK. Finally, before I move on to Texas, we
talked about the fact that you seemingly have implemented a lot
of different tools in dealing with cartels. And I think one of
the things that my colleagues don't understand is the level of
sophistication that these cartels have. Seemingly they believe
if you get more dogs, then that is going to resolve all the
issues that we have with the drug trade. Would you agree with
me that it is important to employ every single tool that you
can find, including technology, because as you do one thing,
the cartel advances and they change, and they are basically a
moving target at times because this is what criminal
enterprises do?
Ms. Sabatino. I agree that it is a comprehensive whole-of-
government issue: technology, canines, our personnel, which are
our most valuable resource--all critical tools. Certainly
advanced information, partnerships with our other government,
you know, law enforcement partners, as well as international
partnerships, all play a role.
Ms. Crockett. You just mentioned something that really
matters a lot to me. You mentioned international partners. For
some reason, my colleagues on the other side of the aisle
continue to insinuate that immigration is just a U.S. issue.
But you would agree with me that it does take partners being in
communication about what is going on and their help in
enforcing and making sure that some of these people never even
make it to our border, correct?
Ms. Sabatino. Yes, and certainly agree with Director
Salisbury in highlighting, you know, identifying pathways.
Mr. Salisbury. Yes. No, essentially, without our foreign
relationships, our ability to combat TCOs would be very one-
dimensional and domestically based. And certainly, HSI's goal
is to work with the partners, the foreign partners, make them
better and push these crimes and criminal activities further
away from our own borders.
Ms. Crockett. OK. And finally, my colleague from Texas
brought up some Texas things. Let's talk about when we get a
Republican policy on immigration. We have talked about Governor
Abbott, who is a failure on so many accounts in my book, but
let's talk about what happened when he decided that he was
going to employ his enhanced security tactics. I don't know how
many of you remember this. We don't have Fox News on here, but
we do have CNN as well as the Texas Tribune and exactly what
they said about that.
We know that in the midst of the pandemic, we were having
supply chain issues, unfortunately, whatever policy that our
Republican Governor decided to employ. Instead, what it did was
it cost us hundreds of millions of dollars and literally
rotting food. So, my question to you is, I know that you are
not policy wonks, and I applaud you for not having to do the
policy side of things. But right now, what we are dealing with
is one team that is arguing that the borders are somehow open,
seemingly because of Democratic policies, regardless as to
whether or not they specifically said that that is what they
are insinuating. And it is my understanding that you all work
hard every single day, whether there is a Democrat that is in
control or whether there is a Republican.
And so, my question to you, my final question has to do
with Operation Lone Star and Governor Abbott. If we were to
employ similar tactics to what was employed during this time,
do you believe that this would be more helpful or less helpful
to the U.S. American people?
Ms. Sabatino. You know, with respect to ports of entry,
they are economic engines, and it is really important for us to
be able to be effective and efficient in managing the flow of
traffic through our ports of entry. And, you know, solutions,
you know, that result in impeding commerce can be incredibly
challenging for the economy. But we are always working with our
partners to find ways to work together to ensure, you know,
that we are enforcing, you know, the, you know, counter
narcotics, counterterrorism missions, while at the same time
making sure that we are not putting up impediments to that
lawful throughput of travel and trade.
Ms. Crockett. Thank you so much.
Mr. Grothman. Mr. LaTurner of Kansas.
Mr. LaTurner. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Sabatino and Ms.
Salisbury, I appreciate you both taking time to be here, and
thank you for your dedication to securing America's borders and
protecting our communities. This past November, Secretary
Mayorkas told me in a hearing on the Homeland Security
Committee that he believes our southern border is secure. I
have been to the border multiple times, and I can tell you that
the Secretary's claim could not be farther from the truth. Over
1 million illegal immigrants have already crossed our southern
border this fiscal year, and we are only five months in. This
worsening national security and humanitarian crisis is
unsustainable. A country that can't secure its borders is not a
country at all.
Mexican cartels and other criminal organizations are taking
advantage of President Biden's lack of action. Record amounts
of fentanyl is being smuggled across our wide-open border and
into our communities. Roughly 300 Americans are dying every day
of fentanyl overdoses. That is 1 death every 8.5 minutes. This
deadly drug is killing more young adults than car crashes and
suicides. My home state continues to be impacted by the
fentanyl epidemic. Over the past few years, Kansas has seen a
73-percent increase in fentanyl-related overdoses, one of the
highest increases in America.
Earlier this year in January, a 15-year-old freshman at
Lansing High School named Nicholas Cruz Burris acquired what he
thought was a Percocet pill from a drug dealer soliciting him
over Snapchat. The next morning, his mother, Rhonda, went to
wake him for school, only to find him dead in his bed. This is
a picture of Nicholas, 15 years old, and this is happening to
young people all across this country. The time for action was
yesterday. Our Federal Government is failing at a core
constitutional duty, enforcing commonplace border security, and
safeguarding our citizens. We can and must do better, and
families like that of Nicholas Burris demand it of us.
Mr. Sabatino, would you agree that the vast majority of
fentanyl coming into this country is being made by precursor
chemicals primarily from China, manufactured by drug cartels in
Mexico, and then smuggled into the United States both through
and in between ports of entry?
Ms. Sabatino. That is what we see with about 84 percent
interdicted at ports of entry.
Mr. LaTurner. Fentanyl has sadly become the leading cause
of death for Americans between the ages of 18 and 45. Last
year, Customs and Border Patrol seized approximately 14,700
pounds of fentanyl. The DEA considers just two milligrams of
fentanyl to be potentially a lethal dose. So, the work of your
Agency has likely prevented millions of deaths. I commend you
for your collective efforts, but as we have seen, despite the
valiant work of CBP, the drug is still flowing into our
country. Of the force multipliers that CBP's disposal, is there
one you find most effective at combating fentanyl explicitly?
Ms. Sabatino. Again, we have to leverage-integrated tools,
but our partnerships and the collaborative approaches to
identifying these illicit supply chains is critical. We can't
wait for these things to come to our ports of entry. We are not
going to seize our way out, you know, of interdicting
narcotics. We have to develop those partnerships. And again,
going back to the great partnership we have with Homeland
Security Investigations, and, again, establishing a cell to
focus on all things fentanyl is a priority for us.
Mr. LaTurner. Mr. Salisbury, can you please elaborate upon
how Homeland Security Investigations acts in concert with Joint
Terrorism Task Force factions within the DOJ and FBI?
Mr. Salisbury. Yes, thank you for that question. So, HSI is
the largest investigative arm of the Department of Homeland
Security partners with the FBI and the JTTF, the Joint
Terrorism Task Force. We are currently, next to the FBI, the
largest participating member on the JTTF of criminal
investigators. So, we supply information. We utilize our
authorities in support of national security investigations with
the JTTF, working in concert every day with DOJ and the other
partnerships on the JTTF.
Mr. LaTurner. It has been reported that in 2021, 86 percent
of the FBI's Joint Terrorism Task Force disruptions of
terrorist activity were achieved with significant HSI
involvement. Can you describe what significant HSI involvement
means?
Mr. Salisbury. Yes. So, going back to HSI's unique
authorities and investigative skill sets, you may have national
security risks, but it may be not able to be proved. A lot of
national security risks may be involved in counter-
proliferation investigations, export violations, money
laundering, all of which HSI excels at. So, HSI will employ
every investigative priority under its mandate to explore all
these criminal organizations and take them apart for whatever
criminal activities they may be currently proceeding with.
Mr. LaTurner. Again, thank you both for being here. I yield
back, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Grothman. OK. All the way from Massachusetts, Mr.
Lynch.
Mr. Lynch. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Let me congratulate the
Chairman and the Ranking Member for the new responsibilities,
and I want to thank the witnesses for their willing to help the
Committee with its work. Mr. Salisbury and Ms. Sabatino, I,
along with Mr. LaTurner and other Members on this Committee,
have gone to the border many, many times, as well as to
Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, to try to figure out and
better understand the push factors and the influence of cartels
on what is happening on the border because, as you have said,
Ms. Sabatino, you know, we don't want to be confronting this at
our border. We would like to act behind those countries from
which a lot of these migrants are coming from.
In the past, we have had a good cooperative relationship
with those countries--Honduras, Guatemala, El Salvador. Is that
still the case today? I know that in the past we have had a
special task force in the Guatemalan Highlands, which was
somewhat of a less-governed area, and we had a good special
forces team there working in that area on drug interdiction and
keeping tabs on the cartels. Is that still going on, or is
that----
Mr. Salisbury. So, yes HSI maintains great relationships in
all those countries. We certainly look to develop relationships
with the State Department post in host country, and we also
develop vetted units with the foreign law enforcement officials
in order to further our cases. So yes, all those relationships
continue to be robust. They are constantly developing, and we
are constantly looking at better ways to partner with our
foreign partners.
Mr. Lynch. OK.
Ms. Sabatino. I think with respect to CBP, certainly we
support capacity-building efforts in a number of different
countries, including in South and Central America. We also have
deployments of, you know, individuals through our Container
Security Initiative, you know, in key port locations where they
support operations and get to see shipments before they come to
the United States.
Mr. Lynch. Let me followup on that. Commissioner Sabatino,
you previously testified that nearly 14 million cargo
containers arrive at our land ports of entry every year, and
those containers are in addition to the millions of pedestrian
and passenger vehicles that cross into the United States on an
annual basis. Our security at the southern border depends on
the resources that we are willing to dedicate to our ports and
to your men and women. To this end, you know, I, in the past,
have supported the omnibus appropriations bill that was enacted
under the previous administration, providing $6.4 billion for
Customs and Border Patrol security operations. That was a 24-
percent increase from the previous year. So, given the millions
of inspections that CBP generally conducts, it is critical that
they optimize their resources to both facilitate commerce and
bolster border security.
Commissioner, how would additional funding for technology
investments that have been raised earlier in the hearing
increase the number of vehicles that CBP's Office of Field
Operations can scan for drugs or other contraband?
Ms. Sabatino. Thank you for the question. Certainly, our
non-intrusive inspection technology, in 2019, we received $564
million for technology to deploy to the southwest border to
increase scan rates, the mentioned POVs, from 1 percent to 2
percent, to about 40 percent, and commercial vehicles for about
15 percent to 17 percent, to about 70 percent. We greatly
appreciate what was given to us in Fiscal Year 2023: $177
million for ONS, just over $15 million for outbound, $10
million for the development of artificial intelligence and
machine learning, which is also going to be critical.
As the number of scans that we do goes up, we are not going
to be able to staff that with officers--we wouldn't have a
footprint to get everyone in the room to look at those and
adjudicate those scans. So, that is going to be critical work
for us over the next year. We did receive about $45 million for
deployment civil works, the installation of that technology
over the upcoming fiscal year, and another $18 million for the
technology that is going into the Gordie Howe Bridge on the
northern border.
Mr. Lynch. OK. My time has just about expired. Thank you
both for your good work. Thank you for your willingness to come
before the Committee and help us with our work. Thank you. I
yield back.
Mr. Grothman. Thank you. Ms. Mace from South Carolina.
Ms. Mace. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I want to thank you
both for being with us today. And I know you are getting a lot
of different questions from a lot of different angles, and I
appreciate the time and effort you have done to prepare for
this hearing today. You have one of the most important jobs in
the country, both from a national security standpoint and the
integrity of our immigration system.
Every town is a border town. I am from South Carolina, but
two years ago, we had a member of MS-13 gang in Beaufort
County. I don't know what the hell he was doing there. We have
had fentanyl overdoses. We have had law enforcement, you know,
get exposed to that and be hospitalized, and we have seen what
the millions of illegals in the cartels have done coming across
our country and how it has affected every community across the
Nation.
I am interested to hear from both of you today on some of
the tech things that have been mentioned, technology. We had a
hearing early on in this session about the Border Patrol and
technology, and one of the things mentioned was that they have
more needs for technology. But I just wanted to ask both of you
if you could just speak a little more broadly about the
effectiveness of the biometrics technology that you are using.
I would like to hear just a little more about how effective it
is in tracking individuals who may pose a security risk or, you
know, coming through ports of entry.
Mr. Salisbury. Yes. So, obviously technology does play a
key part of what HSI is trying to do. We are looking to find
and identify more leads more efficiently. As we generate
investigations, we generate a large volume of information, some
of it is good, some of it is bad. So, technology, like data
analytics out of our innovation lab, key--they focus agents in
the right areas.
In reference to biometrics, we found biometrics being very
useful, particularly in human smuggling investigations, where,
again, the smuggling organizations are focused on bringing in
illicit actors, nefarious individuals into the United States.
So, partnering with the intelligence community and the
Department of Defense, yes, biometrics has been a key part.
Ms. Mace. One quick question on that because I only have
five minutes.
Mr. Salisbury. Yes.
Ms. Mace. But are the biometrics, are they used both on
legal citizens coming across the ports of entry and those who
are crossing over illegally? Is it both?
Mr. Salisbury. So, from HSI's perspective, we use it on a
razor focus. If it is focused toward a criminal investigation,
so it could be both, depending on the nature and the makeup of
the criminal organization we are looking at.
Ms. Sabatino. Certainly, since the implementation of our
biometrics facial comparison program, starting back in 2016, we
have encountered over 1,700 imposters. Primarily it was about
just over 1,600 of those who were identified at our southwest
border ports of entry. So, we have facial biometrics deployed
in our air environment, our maritime environment, cruise
passenger, and our pedestrian land border environment. A focus
of ours over the next year is going to be to get the right
technology in place to incorporate that. The program has
simplified arrival into the vehicle environment in our land
border, challenged by finding technology that can capture
usable images that we can use for the facial biometric matching
program. So, it really is removing an administrative burden,
and a part of the streamlined process, you know, at our ports
of entry, take officers away from those administrative burdens.
You know, give them the tools that they need and let them do
what they do best, which is to talk to people to determine
intent, and interview people.
Ms. Mace. And then what are each of your Agencies doing and
working on the security and privacy of biometric data that is
collected? What sort of steps are taken to protect that
information and data?
Ms. Sabatino. And certainly, going back to the
implementation of U.S. visit back in 2004, we have been taking
fingerprints and photographs of in-scope, you know, foreign
nationals dating back to that time certainly with the advantage
of facial biometrics. And it really goes back to the 2002
legislation that was passed, requiring us to biometrically
confirm the entry and exit of individuals coming in and out of
the United States at our ports of entry.
It has been a long endeavor in that. We received that
mission in 2013, testing multiple modalities, iris,
fingerprints, and photos, and we landed with photos because
everyone knows how to take a picture. Everyone knows how to
take a selfie. It is not intimidating. And it is the most
streamlined process for us to do without creating major
disruptions in the infrastructure investments for outbound air
passenger.
Ms. Mace. And I have got 30 seconds left, and either of you
can answer this speed round, but what is next? What do you need
from Congress to do more, better, faster, more efficiently?
Ms. Sabatino. I think certainly the opportunity to brief on
the full biometrics program, the technology, the continued
support that we have for the non-intrusive inspection
technology, also looking to make investments in intelligence
resources for intel research specialists who can operationalize
information, put the jigsaw puzzle of intel together to provide
to our analytical units at our ports to target, you know, more
effectively.
Mr. Salisbury. Certainly, as we increase our investigative
capabilities and our technology capabilities, it is going to
require more agents to back that up, so technology is great. It
allows agents to be focused. But we do need to followup with
that in order to make criminal investigations. So, technology
will never replace the men and women actually pursuing what the
technology uncovers, so we will inevitably need more agents on
the field working these investigations.
Ms. Mace. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I yield back.
Mr. Grothman. Thank you. Mr. Sessions from Texas.
Mr. Sessions. Mr. Chairman, thank you very much, and my
thanks to both of you for your service, not only to the
country, but your continued diligence to making sure that the
American people have soundness in those that represent us in
key decisionmaking roles.
I think you knew before you came up here that we have two
sides of the story that will be told up here, and there is
certainly a feeling that Republicans accuse Democrats of being
soft on immigration and soft on criminals. I am one of those
that makes that conversation because I believe that what is
happening at our border, what is happening in our cities, what
is happening across this country, supports that viewpoint. We
have people arrested all over the country, thousands of pieces
of fentanyl and other lethal items, and the person, when
arrested, gets out without bail. They just release them. We are
concerned about this.
I would like for you to be able to leave here today knowing
that there are people want and expect you to do your job to
capture these people, to keep them away from America, to send
them back, to use the necessary resources that would include
bio identifications and other markers, pictures that would be
necessary to protecting us. We need this. And I recognize the
Democratic Party, including our President, are completely
against the tools that are necessary to protecting our
children.
I am getting ready to be a grandfather within the year. I
am worried about our children. I am worried about our schools.
I am worried about the places of influence and these drug
cartels that have marketing force all across this country now.
There are people that don't understand that there are people
who get away. Those that got away many times have huge
backpacks on them. I have been to Fort Huachuca. I have watched
just east of there, packs of people coming by. And so, a couple
hours from real-life people who are with the Border Patrol who
had interdicted those people, but they sooner or later caught
them as they got closer to the highway. They found backpacks
full of drugs. There is a reason why they didn't want to be
caught.
So, I would like for you, as you leave today, to recognize
that we up on the Hill have two sides of the story, and yet we
can't get away from the narrative that millions of people are
impacted by drug cartels. Their long reach into communities is
no longer just the largest cities in this country. They are
rural, and they are across many, many, many states. This is a
huge problem, and it won't get better because we are allowing
not just tens of thousands but millions of people to come here.
And we are inviting them by the President of the United States,
by the Secretary of Homeland Security who refuses to even
acknowledge the issue and the problem that we have.
Being from Waco, Texas, it is easy for me to look up and to
see law enforcement that is diligent about catching people,
holding them accountable, judges who will put them in their
proper place. I would like for you to take, in the minute I
have got left, and talk to me about U.S. attorneys across the
border and about your relationship to have put these criminals
in jail and to detain them, either one of you.
Mr. Salisbury. So, the U.S. attorney's offices'
relationship with HSI is critical. Otherwise, we are
investigating, wasting a lot of taxpayer money and energies
without getting prosecutions, so our relationships on our
priorities seem strong across the board. All our criminal
matters that HSI pursues, we have great relationships with DOJ,
high level relationships. Certainly, we have----
Mr. Sessions. And the effectiveness of these U.S.
attorneys?
Mr. Salisbury. So, the effectiveness of the U.S. attorneys
pushing the HSI priorities in the criminal investigations, we
have a great relationship, and those investigations are moving
forward. And over 20,000----
Mr. Sessions. So, you feel successful?
Mr. Salisbury. I feel we need to do more given what we are
doing. We always strive to do more. I think the men and women
of HSI would recognize that we are doing everything we can, and
we want to do more so, yes, sir.
Mr. Sessions. Sure. I have seen throughout my career--my
father was U.S. attorney for the Western District of Texas,
chief judge for the Western District of Texas, an FBI director
for the United States of America. And during that period of
time, he, like you, devoted himself to trying to keep this
country safe. I hope you will leave today, dust each other off,
and thank each other with a pat on the back for your service to
a great Nation. Mr. Chairman, I yield back my time. Thank you
very much.
Mr. Grothman. Thank you very much, Mr. Sessions, and I am
going to call upon Mr. Garcia, if he wants to make a closing
statement.
Mr. Garcia. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. Of course, I
want to thank our witnesses again today, and I want to
highlight something that has been mentioned a few times, and
that is that our ports of entry are really engines of commerce
and are places where our economy is succeeding in the U.S.
because of the work that you are all doing and because of the
commerce that is happening across our ports of entry.
We also know that we want to improve the economy, improve
our ports of entry. We really got to focus also on a safe and
secure process for processing commerce, and I think that is
something that we are all obviously interested in on this
Committee, and clearly both of you are as well. Border security
is also about ensuring that our economy is strong and that we
are also providing an orderly process. It is something that the
Administration is working on and something I know that all of
us are committed to as well.
And, while I should not need to remind everyone, just as an
important reminder for everyone here, but every single
Republican that is a part of this Subcommittee actually voted
against funding for Custom Border Patrol's efforts at the
border just recently. And so, there has been a lot of concern
about the border, a lot of concern about how we are going to
support the work you are all doing, but the Republicans that
have been asking you questions today actually all voted against
that funding.
They voted against $230 million against technology, against
funding to improve operations between our ports of entry. That
happened in the appropriations package just recently. They also
voted against $60 million for more personnel for CBP and $70
million for non-intrusive inspection technology at the ports of
entry that was also part of the appropriations package. They
also voted against $430 million in funding to build out ports
of entry with non-invasive inspection technology to detect
illegal narcotics and fentanyl coming into our country.
So, as we hear a lot about, I am taking on fentanyl and
supporting all of you, every Member of the Subcommittee
actually voted against all of that. That, of course, was in the
Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, so I think it is
important for us to be serious about border security. And House
Democrats are, and I want to thank you again for your
testimony. And, Mr. Chairman, with that, I yield back.
Mr. Grothman. Thank you. I just want to make a few comments
on the comments before we leave today. First of all, I will
emphasize one more time, it has been said part of our problem
is that it is difficult for people to become citizens legally
and that is why we have a problem at the border. I will remind
people that last year we had a million people sworn in as
citizens legally, the highest since 2006. I don't think anybody
could say it is impossible to become a citizen the old-
fashioned legal way. I try not to be a partisan person, but
since President Biden has taken office, we have gone from
having 20,000 to 238,000 people in a month come across our
border, and which some people would say illegally. When you go
up by a factor of more than 11 to 1, it is hard not to be
incredibly critical of the Biden Administration.
I think that is also the reason why we have low morale at
the border, and when people imply that somehow the Border
Patrol are not ordered to do their job, the problem or the
frustration for them, and morale is low, and I have been on the
border seven or eight times, is that when so many Border Patrol
agents are processing people asking for asylum and being let in
here, they don't have time to guard the border. And that is why
I think we have so many people streaming across the border
between points of entry is because the Border Patrol, which
should be guarding those areas, is too busy doing paperwork as
the result of decisions made by the Biden Administration.
I will try to be bipartisan here in my criticisms. I wish
President Trump had appointed Steve Miller to be in charge of
the border policies earlier. I think he made a big mistake in
waiting so long for that to happen. I will also point out that
something has been made of it. Most of the fentanyl is found at
points of entry. I think one of the reasons, and the Border
Patrol will tell you this as well, one of the reasons they get
more fentanyl at the points of entry is because they aren't
catching it, hardly at all, between the points of entry because
they are busy doing paperwork. And if they had enough people to
guard the other areas, they would get a lot more fentanyl there
as well. I think further evidence of where this Administration
stands, and I think Representative Biggs did a good job
pointing this out, not a halt, entire halt, but way less
deportations than we have had in the past, which shows where
the heart of the Biden Administration is.
I also point out that, you know, it is considered an insult
to interpose the cartels with immigrants coming here. The vast
majority of immigrants who come here off our southwestern
border are having to pay the cartels to come here. So, in
addition to other problems resulting from too many people
crossing the southern border, we are enriching the cartels.
Every time you are down there, they tell me, a Mexican 5,000
bucks, somebody from India 20,000 bucks, but the cartels are
getting very enriched with the current policy.
I would like to thank you guys for bringing in the dogs.
Obviously, I am a fan of dogs. That is one of the reasons we
had these hearings, and hopefully the publicity we got for dogs
will result in more dogs being available for you and other
agencies in the upcoming budget and perhaps earlier. I mean,
one of the things that frustrates me about this, I guess
108,000 people are dying every year of illegal drug overdoses.
I don't think this Administration, or this Congress has done
enough. I mean, it is just a number, it is just a statistic,
but it is such a huge statistic. I don't think the average
American realizes, you know, how great that is.
My talking point is, it is twice the number of people who
died in the Vietnam War over 12 years, every year. And if that
many people were being died in murders, man, they would be
screaming for doubling the police forces of this country,
screaming for more people in prison, but instead, there seems
to be a total lack of urgency when so many young people are
dying of these illegal drug overdoses. And I hope that in the
future Congress and state legislators don't let their dislike
for putting more people in corrections stand in the way of
stopping this huge amount of death that we are having from the
illegal drugs.
Something has been said about our relations with countries
in Central America. I think, well, first of all, if you go to
the border, your Border Patrol will tell people that the people
coming here are not necessarily coming here out of desperation.
Whether they look at the fact they all seem to have cellphones,
or the clothes they are wearing, or insofar as they find out
what their occupations are, the Border Patrol will tell you,
this is not poor people coming out of desperation. It is just
that things are best in America. And I think the best thing we
can do for other countries is educate them on freedom, value of
the free market, and that prosperity does not come from a big
government. And I think, unfortunately, too many other
countries around the world haven't got the message.
But in any event, thank you for being here. You did a
wonderful job. We will check you off at an A, and we are done.
Thanks.
[Whereupon, at 11:57 a.m., the Subcommittee was adjourned.]
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