[House Hearing, 118 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
MONEY IS POLICY, PART II: ANALYZING SELECT
STATE DEPARTMENT GRANT AWARDS
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HEARING
BEFORE THE
SUBCOMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND
ACCOUNTABILITY
OF THE
COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS
U.S. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED EIGHTEENTH CONGRESS
SECOND SESSION
__________
September 19, 2024
__________
Serial No. 118-132
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Printed for the use of the Committee on Foreign Affairs
[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Available: http://www.foreignaffairs.house.gov/, http://docs.house.gov,
or http://www.govinfo.gov
__________
U.S. GOVERNMENT PUBLISHING OFFICE
63-341 PDF WASHINGTON : 2026
=======================================================================
COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS
MICHAEL T. McCAUL, Texas, Chairman
CHRISTOPHER H. SMITH, New Jersey GREGORY MEEKS, New York, Ranking
JOE WILSON, South Carolina Member
SCOTT PERRY, Pennsylvania BRAD SHERMAN, California
DARRELL ISSA, California GERALD E. CONNOLLY, Virginia
ANN WAGNER, Missouri WILLIAM KEATING, Massachusetts
BRIAN MAST, Florida AMI BERA, California
TIM BURCHETT, Tennessee JOAQUIN CASTRO, Texas
MARK E. GREEN, Tennessee DINA TITUS, Nevada
ANDY BARR, Kentucky TED LIEU, California
RONNY JACKSON, Texas SUSAN WILD, Pennsylvania
YOUNG KIM, California DEAN PHILLIPS, Minnesota
MARIA ELVIRA SALAZAR, Florida COLIN ALLRED, Texas
BILL HUIZENGA, Michigan ANDY KIM, New Jersey
AUMUA AMATA COLEMAN RADEWAGEN, SARA JACOBS, California
American Samoa KATHY MANNING, North Carolina
FRENCH HILL, Arkansas SHEILA CHERFILUS-McCORMICK,
WARREN DAVIDSON, Ohio Florida
JIM BAIRD, Indiana GREG STANTON, Arizona
MICHAEL WALTZ, Florida MADELEINE DEAN, Pennsylvania
THOMAS KEAN, JR., New Jersey JARED MOSKOWITZ, Florida
MICHAEL LAWLER, New York JONATHAN JACKSON, Illinois
CORY MILLS, Florida SYDNEY KAMLAGER-DOVE, California
RICH McCORMICK, Georgia JIM COSTA, California
NATHANIEL MORAN, Texas JASON CROW, Colorado
JOHN JAMES, Michigan KWEISI MFUME, Maryland
KEITH SELF, Texas BRAD SCHNEIDER, Illinois
RYAN K. ZINKE, Montana
JAMES C. MOYLAN, Guam
Brendan Shields, Majority Staff Director
Sajit Gandhi, Minority Staff Director
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SUBCOMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND ACCOUNTABILITY
BRIAN MAST, Florida, Chairman
SCOTT PERRY, Pennsylvania JASON CROW, Colorado, Ranking
DARRELL ISSA, California Member
TIM BURCHETT, Tennessee DINA TITUS, Nevada
FRENCH HILL, AR COLIN ALLRED, Texas
MIKE WALTZ, Florida ANDY KIM, New Jersey
CORY MILLS, Florida SHELIA CHERFILUS-MCCORMICK,
Florida
MADELEINE DEAN, Pennsylvania
NATHANIEL MORAN, Texas
C O N T E N T S
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REPRESENTATIVES
Page
Opening Statement of Subcommittee Chairman Brian Mast............ 1
Opening Statement of Subcommittee Ranking Member Jason Crow...... 3
WITNESSES
Statement of Hon. Julieta Valls Noyes, Assistant Secretary,
Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration, U.S. Department
of State....................................................... 5
Prepared Statement............................................. 7
Statement of Hon. Cindy Dyer, Ambassador-At-Large, Office to
Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons, U.S. Department of
State.......................................................... 14
Prepared Statement............................................. 16
Statement of Hon. Rashad Hussain, Ambassador-At-Large, Office of
International Religious Freedom, U.S. Department of State...... 21
Prepared Statement............................................. 23
APPENDIX
Hearing Notice................................................... 56
Hearing Minutes.................................................. 58
Hearing Attendance............................................... 59
Materials for the record
Letters to Rep. McCaul from Naz Durakoglu Assistant Secretary
Bureau of Legislative Affairs.................................. 60
Public Law 114-281 submitted by Rep. Crow........................ 85
Questions for the record
Questions to Rashad Hussain submitted by Rep. Mast............... 100
Questions to Julieta Valls Noyes submitted by Rep.Mast........... 109
Questions to Julieta Valls Noyes submitted by Rep. Issa.......... 116
Questions to Julieta Valls Noyes submitted by Rep. McCormick..... 118
MONEY IS POLICY, PART II: ANALYZING SELECT STATE DEPARTMENT GRANT
AWARDS
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Thursday, September 19, 2024
House of Representatives,
Subcommittee on Oversight and Accountability,
Committee on Foreign Affairs,
Washington, DC.
The committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10:02 a.m., in
room 2200, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Brian Mast
(chairman of the subcommittee) presiding.
Mr. Mast. All right. Let's let the Subcommittee of
Oversight and Accountability come to order. The purpose of this
hearing is to examine the Foreign Assistance Grants process
within the Department of State's Bureau of Population, Refugees
and Migration and the Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking
in Persons and the Office of International Religious Freedom. I
am now going to recognize myself for an opening statement, and
then I am going to recognize Ranking Member Crow for an opening
statement, and then we will introduce you all. We would love to
hear from you all each for about 5 minutes, as well.
OPENING STATEMENT OF CHAIRMAN BRIAN MAST
So this is our second hearing on Foreign Assistance Grants
fittingly titled Money is Policy, and that is the reality.
Money talks, and it shapes our foreign policy. When we send
foreign aid abroad, No. 1, it all comes from the American
taxpayer; No. 2, it is usually not Uncle Sam doing the heavy
lifting. We are outsourcing that job to external organizations,
trusting them to get the mission done in line with America's
foreign policy goals and objectives, at least that is what we
are led to believe and that is what we hope happens in many
circumstances. But something starkly different happens when
that theory is put into practice in too many cases. When the
State Department cuts a check to an NGO abroad, whether it is
Humanists International or the Red Cross or some other group,
what those entities then do on the ground effectively becomes
U.S. policy paid for by the U.S. taxpayer. They are meant to be
implementing U.S. taxpayer policy with the dollars that are
given to them by State Department.
Today, we are going to look at both good and bad grants.
Unfortunately, because of the way these grants are structured,
it seems that, in many cases, from my observation, State
Department may not have a clue what its implementing partners
are doing or State Department doesn't care what its partners
are pushing in terms of ideological agendas abroad that a large
portion of the American people would not be supportive or our
Constitution or the State Department knows what is happening
and may be ignoring what is happening because they actually
support it, even though they may know it is wrong. All three of
those are problematic situations if any of them are occurring.
Let's kick things off with something that I have spoke
about in length: atheism grant in Nepal. For years, the State
Department has swore up and down that Humanists International
was not promoting atheist networks, expanding atheism, or
promoting atheism in Nepal. This has gone on for years with a
back and forth between this committee and the State Department.
Deputy Secretary of State for Management and Resources, Richard
Verma, came here to this subcommittee, forcefully declared
without hesitation State Department was not funding the
promotion of atheism in Nepal. But just a month later, that
office called me personally to reverse course and, in my
opinion, they realized that the ruse was up, that they weren't
going to get away with the lies that were being told to us any
further. So they had to start digging themselves out of this
hole, and they discovered that Humanists International had not
actually been straightforward with them. That raises a whole
mess of new questions that have yet to be answered properly,
and I will have more to say about that later.
Another issue uncovered by this committee's majority
concerns illegal immigration policies in places like Mexico.
One grant, for instance, went to a group that literally
violated the terms of its grant agreement by coaching migrants
on how to evade U.S. law. Let me say this in a more plain way:
Under Border Czar Kamala Harris, the Biden-Harris
administration gave out grants to coach illegals on how to
evade U.S. law, on how to get around border patrol, so they
could come here and have their lodging, food, health care,
other things, paid for by the American taxpayer. That is real.
That is something that happened under this administration.
In that circumstance, the State Department tried to
stonewall this committee about this grant, as well, just like
they did with the atheism in Nepal grant. First, the State
Department denied that there was any cause for concern. Then
they dug in a little bit more. The State Department backtracked
and admitted there was a problem at a certain point. The State
Department did not just provide inaccurate information to this
committee, the State Department lied to us. We must remember
that these are public hearings, and their public hearings in
the People's House, which means that if you are lying to us,
you are lying to the American people from whom you actually get
every single dollar which you may spread around the globe.
These people work for you.
So I am going to go back to what I said earlier again. Is
the State Department going to claim at some point that they did
not know what was being done? Is the State Department going to
say that they didn't care what was being done, or is the State
Department going to tell us that they knew about it, they knew
it was wrong, but they encouraged it to go on anyways because
people in the State Department were in support of these radical
ideas? No matter which way it goes, it is unacceptable. This is
just the tip of the iceberg.
I would say this; I believe this personally: if we had a
diplomat abroad or a dollar of foreign aid going anywhere or a
kernel of aid somewhere, it should be to make America win. What
we have instead is, in too many cases, the State Department
fighting to make the world Godless, which is what grants to
expand atheism do, or coaching migrants on how to enter our
southern border illegally, evading U.S. law.
Let me switch gears for 1 second here in the negative time
I have remaining because I have already gone over. The Office
to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons, also known as
JTIP. JTIP seems to be doing a damn good job of picking solid
projects and following up on them in my opinion. We have
examined this office, as well. Their work, which targets child
trafficking and scam centers, has been a success. They have
been transparent throughout this committee. I look forward to
hearing more about the success on how JTIP is performing its
due diligence to monitor and evaluate the outcomes of the
programs that they put in place, and I hope that other parts of
State Department can learn lessons both in how to communicate
with this committee, these subcommittees, and how to conduct
proper oversight of the programs that they are implementing.
And with that, I will recognize Ranking Member Crow for any
opening remarks that he may have.
OPENING STATEMENT OF RANKING MEMBER JASON CROW
Mr. Crow. Thank you, Chairman Mast. I am going to start by
thanking our witnesses for being here today and for your
dedicated public service on behalf of the American people. On
this subcommittee, we have a unique opportunity to explore a
variety of disparate topics within the jurisdiction of the
Foreign Affairs Committee, and we play a unique role in
publicly laying out what is working properly as we work to
advance our diplomatic and development objectives and what is
not. That is always legitimate oversight. That, in my opinion,
is our job, and that is productive oversight.
The topic of today's hearing is one that has the potential
to fit into that category. It is a chance to have a productive
conversation on how to approve the U.S. foreign assistance
process and highlight for the American people what robust
foreign assistance means for our interests in an area of
widespread instability and renewed Great Power Competition. It
is a chance to talk about what is working, what is not, and to
dispel information about what foreign assistance is and what it
is not.
We held a hearing on this topic in June with a private
panel. We had what I believe was, at times, a helpful and
productive conversation. We heard legitimate suggestions about
how to make our foreign assistance more transparent, and we
heard about how such assistance advances our national
interests. But we also heard unsubstantiated claims of
widespread mismanagement and minimal oversight in the misguided
narrative that our assistance goes to promoting particular
ideologies or belief systems over others.
So I want to begin today in similar fashion that I did at
the opening of our committee hearing in June by reiterating a
few key facts and expressing my hopes for today's hearing. Key
fact number 1: Our foreign assistance programs go through a
rigorous process to justify their creation by competitive
bidding to find the best implementers for the job, and then
they undergo ongoing monitoring and mechanisms to recoup
American investment should any kind of waste, fraud, or abuse
occur.
Key fact 2: Our U.S. foreign assistance programs do advance
our values and interests, many of which have been made explicit
by Congress. They do not, by law, push domestic political
agendas that they have one belief system or one political party
over another. Multiple witnesses have testified to our
committee that the Department and its partners clearly
understand and take seriously these obligations. They
proactively train and take other steps to preempt any
violations of the Establishment Clause of the Constitution or
any other elements of U.S. law.
Key fact 3: U.S. foreign assistance helps us advance human
rights, reduce stability caused by lack of necessities, and
create environments that are permissive for U.S. engagement and
economic growth. It demonstrates that, when there are global
challenges to democracy, to human rights, or to the
humanitarian needs of people around the world, that the U.S.,
not our adversaries, takes the lead.
So that leads me to my goal for this hearing: that we can
discuss with the officials responsible for overseeing these
programs in their respective bureaus and offices how we can do
all these things better, how we can be more transparent, how we
can be more efficient, how we can be more effective. That is
legitimate oversight. I think we can have that discussion and,
hopefully, we can keep it on the rails.
But I also want to be really clear that these claims of
lying and misleading, there is simply no evidence to support
that. The Department has repeatedly come to us in good faith
time and time again. There have been corrections that have been
made. There have been additional followups, there's been
additional oversight. That is the natural process. But at no
time has there been bad faith or lying and misleading, and I
will correct the record whenever those assertions are made.
So with that, I appreciate the witnesses for coming in, and
I yield back, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Mast. Thank you, Ranking Member Crow. Pleased to have
you all as witnesses today on this and a number of important
topics. First of all, we are going to have Hon. Valls Noyes.
Thank you for being here today. She is the Assistant Secretary
for the Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration. Next is
Hon. Dyer. She is the Ambassador-at-Large for the Office to
Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons. And, last, we have
Hon. Hussain, who is the Ambassador-at-Large for the Office of
International Religious Freedom.
Thank you for being here today. Your full statement will be
made a part of the record. I will ask you to keep your spoken
remarks to 5 minutes in order to allow time for members to ask
their questions. And I now recognize Assistant Secretary Valls
Noyes.
STATEMENT OF HON. VALLS NOYES
Ms. Noyes. Good morning, Chair Mast, Ranking Member Crow,
and distinguished members of the subcommittee. I am pleased to
be here today to talk with you about how the Bureau of
Population, Refugees, and Migration, or PRM, implements the
Department of State's grants and award management process. PRM
is responsible for leading U.S. humanitarian diplomacy. We are
the steward of policies and programs that sustain humanitarian
responses to unprecedented levels of forced displacement
globally. This includes assistance for refugees, stateless
persons, conflict victims, and the most vulnerable migrants. We
also manage the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program.
As the title of this hearing is Money is Policy, I would
like to note at the outset that PRM prioritizes our funding
decisions strategically. Then we carefully monitor our programs
worldwide to ensure that they meet our policy objectives. We
use a variety of tools, including traveling, to evaluate the
effectiveness of crisis responses firsthand. As the PRM
assistant secretary, I personally take part in these monitoring
trips, and it is an honor to see in person how humanitarian
assistance so generously provided by the Congress and the
American taxpayer is saving lives around the world.
In March, for example, I traveled to Ethiopia and Chad to
witness the response to the Sudan displacement crisis, the
worst humanitarian crisis in the world. There, PRM is providing
critical life-saving assistance, including food, water,
sanitation facilities, shelter, medical services, and
protection to Sudanese fleeing the conflict. I spoke to
refugees who shared stories of their harrowing journeys to
Chad, fleeing unspeakable horrors in Darfur. Women and children
arrive at the U.N. Refugee Agency site on Chad's border with
literally nothing but the clothes on their backs. The human
toll is unimaginable.
I also meet regularly with the donor community and with
humanitarian actors to coordinate our work. We constantly seek
new approaches to address growing gaps between the dire needs
and humanitarian responses.
As authorized by the Migration and Refugee Assistance Act,
PRM administers and monitors U.S. contributions to
international organizations and funds cooperative agreements
with non-government organizations, or NGO's. PRM also
coordinates closely with USAID on assistance to displace
populations, addressing issues related to food security,
integration, and other programming.
To implement our NGO programs globally, PRM openly competes
assistance award opportunities through publicly advertised
notices in accordance with Federal regulations and Department
of State policy. My written testimony provides further details,
but I will give you a high-level summary of the process. First,
we conduct a technical review to determine partners'
eligibility. Next, a merit review panel evaluates their
submissions. PRM conducts due diligence, including a risk
assessment, and then we create a plan to monitor any risks
identified. Once these processes are complete, I review and
approve, as assistant secretary, PRM awards.
And it is important to note that the majority of PRM
funding to NGOs is awarded through cooperative agreements. Such
agreements enable greater programmatic oversight and more
active collaboration with our partners to implement their
projects.
Monitoring is, of course, mandatory for all Department
assistance awards. As part of PRM's comprehensive monitoring
and evaluation activities, PRM program and grants officers and
our teams based in the field conduct site visits and monitoring
meetings.
Let me give you some examples of what this looks like in
practice in our hemisphere. PRM's humanitarian coordinators
based in Mexico make monitoring trips to examine the work in
our partners in person and to assess program performance at
least twice a month. In addition, as of the end of August, PRM
staff based in D.C. had made five monitoring trips to Mexico
this year.
During Fiscal Year 2023, our Ecuador-based team conducted
32 monitoring trips to the eight countries that they cover in
South America. On their recent trip to Brazil, refugee
coordinators travel to five cities to visit each PRM partner
and to meet with local government and military officials. In
addition to our own field monitoring, PRM supports and
accompanies Members of Congress and staff delegations
conducting congressional oversight efforts on their trips.
So, in closing, I would like to emphasize my personal
commitment and that of PRM to act as responsible stewards of
migration and refugee assistance resources generously provided
by Congress. This is critical to show American taxpayers that
their hard-earned tax dollars effectively meet the humanitarian
needs of millions of people around the world affected by
conflict, displacement, and statelessness. And as the daughter
of refugees myself, this is my way of paying forward what this
generous, great country did for my family.
I thank the members of this subcommittee for the
opportunity to discuss PRM's lifesaving work done through our
grants and other awards, and I look forward to your questions.
Thank you.
[The Statement of Ms. Noyes follows:]
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Mast. Thank you, ma'am. Now recognize Hon. Dyer for her
opening statement.
STATEMENT OF HON. CINDY DYER
Ms. Dyer. Chairman Mast, Ranking Member Crow, and
distinguished members of the subcommittee, thank you for the
opportunity to appear before you today to discuss the work of
the Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons, or the
TIP office.
Before discussing our international programs, I want to
take a step back to explain the broader work of our office and
how that work guides our grants portfolio. One of the core
mandates of our office is producing the annual Trafficking in
Persons report, or TIP report, which assesses the anti-
trafficking efforts of 188 countries and territories. The TIP
report also serves to highlight how human trafficking is linked
to broader national security challenges from state-sponsored
forced labor in the People's Republic of China, Cuba, and the
Democratic People's Republic of Korea, to online scam
operations that have defrauded Americans out of billions of
dollars. The TIP report is central to our grant-making. Our
international programs are directly linked to recommendations
in the report, which focus on the three Ps of anti-trafficking:
prosecuting traffickers, protecting victims, and preventing
this crime. And these three Ps are made possible with a fourth
P of partnership.
Our annual foreign assistance appropriation of nearly $76
million is divided into three primary programming streams. The
first is our Child Protection Compact (CPC) Partnerships
program, to which Congress has appropriated $12.5 million.
These are multi-year bilateral partnerships with other
governments to combat child sex trafficking and forced child
labor. We have successfully concluded CPCs in Ghana, the
Philippines, and Jamaica, and have four currently underway in
Peru, Colombia, Mongolia, and Cote d'Ivoire, and we just
launched our newest CPC with Romania earlier this week.
The second stream is our bilateral and regional program
portfolio, which represents $48.5 million. These are multi-year
projects in specific countries or regions.
The final stream is our Program to End Modern Slavery, or
PEMS, program to which Congress has allocated $25 million. This
program helps understand trafficking challenges through
cutting-edge resource which is then used to target programming,
making it more efficient and effective.
All of our programs are selected through a rigorous review
process and in full accordance with relevant procurement
regulations and processes. And we notify Congress before
obligating funds for all of our grants and regularly brief
Authorizing and Appropriations Committee staff on ongoing or
upcoming programs.
Each year, we issue about 37 new awards. We currently have
118 active awards, all of which are listed on our public
website. Nearly three-quarters of our implementing partners are
nonprofit organizations. The rest of our implementing partners
are international organizations, including the U.N. Office on
Drugs and Crime and the International Labor Organization. We
seek to always be responsible stewards of taxpayer funds, and,
of course, we want our programs to be as successful as
possible.
After a project is awarded, we work closely with the
implementing partner to ensure it stays on track based on
established performance indicators. Our program officers
regularly conduct site visits. Our office also requires
implementers to fund an external evaluation of their own
project.
As a result, we have a very strong track record. We take
our fiduciary responsibility to the American people extremely
seriously, and we want to ensure every single dollar we spend
has the greatest impact possible to protect victims, prosecute
traffickers, and prevent this abhorrent crime.
I am incredibly proud of the work our office does to combat
human trafficking and protect vulnerable children, women, and
men around the world from exploitation and abuse and to advance
American interests and values. And I am grateful for Congress's
strong bipartisan focus on this issue and support for our work.
Thank you.
[The Statement of Ms. Dyer follows:]
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Mast. Thank you, ma'am. I now recognize Hon. Hussain
for his opening statement.
STATEMENT OF HON. RASHAD HUSSAIN
Mr. Hussain. Thank you. Good morning, Chairman Mast,
Ranking Member Crow, Representative Issa, Representative Dean,
and distinguished members of the subcommittee. I have had the
honor to serve as U.S. Ambassador-at-Large for International
Religious Freedom since 2022, continuing our country's proud
tradition of working on a bipartisan basis to protect religious
freedom for everyone everywhere.
During my prior time in government, I led an effort to
protect Christians and other religious minorities living in
Muslim-majority countries, resulting in the landmark Marrakesh
Declaration in 2016. This work followed our efforts on the
important effort to counter blasphemy laws that are often used
to target religious minorities.
I have also worked closely with past U.S. envoys and
current U.S. Ambassador Deborah Lipstadt and Second Gentleman
Doug Emhoff on countering antisemitism around the world,
including by taking delegations of Imams to the Holocaust sites
to combat Holocaust denial. I am proud that these efforts were
recognized in the endorsements of a number of individuals and
groups, including my predecessor Sam Brownback, my predecessor
David Saperstein, the American Jewish Committee, the Anti-
Defamation League, Christian Solidarity Worldwide, American
Baptist Churches, Open Doors USA, and the president of the
National Council of Churches. We continue to work on a
bipartisan basis with these individuals and organizations and
others, including In Defense of Christians where I will be
delivering remarks at their annual reception tonight.
The Office of International Religious Freedom's mandate was
established by the International Religious Freedom Act of 1998,
which passed by an overwhelming bipartisan majority. And our
policies and general processes have remained consistent across
the past five administrations. The thrust of our work falls in
three broad categories: exposing, countering, and preventing
religious freedom violations.
First, our work to expose religious freedom violations is
focused on our international report that documents religious
freedom violations in every country in the world. These reports
are read by governments and civil society around the world. In
April, in an indictment of two individuals for opening and
operating an illegal overseas police station used to target
Falun Gong practitioners and other members of the Chinese
community on U.S. soil, the DOJ specifically cited the 2021
International Religious Freedom China report, noting that the
Chinese Communist Party maintains an extralegal part-run
security apparatus to eliminate the Falun Gong movement.
Second, our work to counter religious freedom violations is
focused on using our diplomatic and program tools to assist
people who have been or are at risk of being persecuted for
their beliefs and, third, efforts to prevent persecution focus
on addressing the abuse of laws, such as blasphemy laws, and
policies that foster environments where discrimination,
harassment, and violence take place. We work on individual
cases of oppression, and we are never off the clock, often
getting notified in the late hours of the night of individuals
who have been arrested or wrongly detained and realizing that
every minute that we wait to jump into action can cost someone
his or her life.
We do this work whenever and wherever it is needed. Last
year, we worked extensively with the Shenzhen Holy Reformed
Church, or the Mayflower Church, to protect its members' right
to freedom of religion or belief in the face of relentless
pressure from the Chinese Communist Party, even after they fled
China. On April 7th, I was thrilled to welcome members of this
church to the United States, where they celebrated Easter at a
Texas church in safety.
Most recently, my office supported the long-negotiated
September 5 Nicaraguan political prisoner release. The 135
political prisoners included approximately 60 survivors of
religious persecution, including 13 individuals from this group
who were affiliated with the Texas-based evangelical
organization Mountain Gateway. And we continue other
substantial efforts to protect people of all faiths in places
such as Burma, Bangladesh, Pakistan, India, Nigeria, and Saudi
Arabia.
In recent years, our programs have focused on countering
discrimination and abuses targeting members of faith
communities around the world, including religious persecution
in the Middle East, Asia, Africa, Europe, and the Western
Hemisphere. We have worked closely with other offices across
the Department to address the dangerous rise in antisemitism;
to counter genocides and crimes against humanity impacting
members of religious minority populations, including Yezidi,
Christians, Rohingya, and Uyghurs, and to combat hatred
directed at particular religious communities.
Additionally, our programming support activities such as
documenting abuses against members of vulnerable communities;
promoting greater mutual respect and tolerance for all in a
society; promoting accountability for perpetrators and justice
for victims of religious freedom abuses; providing legal
assistance and other tangible support to individuals who have
been tortured, arrested, or detained on account of their
beliefs.
In light of the Establishment Clause of the First
Amendment, the State Department does not fund any programs with
the aim of promoting or advancing specific religious ideologies
or beliefs. Religious-freedom programs provide tools and
support to those facing persecution, abuses, harassment,
discrimination, and violence on account of their religion,
beliefs, or non-beliefs.
IRFs single largest program, by far, is a global emergency
fund, which began in 2011. And, since 2020, this fund has
helped more than 4,000 individuals in every region of the world
and across every religious background escape abuse, harassment,
jail, and even death on account of their beliefs.
I thank the members of the Subcommittee for the opportunity
to discuss this critical work.
[The Statement of Mr. Hussain follows:]
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Mr. Mast. Thank you, sir. Appreciate your testimony. We are
now going to recognize members for about 5 minutes to ask
questions, and we hope to have honest and prompt response from
you all.
I am going to begin by yielding time to Representative Issa
to begin the questioning, and we will go side by side.
Mr. Issa. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Madam Secretary, you
have had a distinguished career, your career in foreign
service. But your department is responsible for giving us
knowingly false information, and I want to just go over it
quickly.
As the committee did its oversight over the PRM's
assistance, we were told and I would ask that she be given
copies of this and I will ask that it all be placed in the
record, and I will quote. This was in January 2023 and, again,
in December 2023. PRM has not funded and does not fund legal
representation or counseling related to immigration
proceedings. Again, later in December, from the government of
Mexico, PRM does not fund legal representation or counseling
related to U.S. immigration proceedings and legal assistance
provided to those in Mexico is solely for the Mexican legal
processes.
At this moment, under the rules of U.S. 18, Title 1001, is
that a true statement, either of those?
Ms. Noyes. Congressman, PRM funds----
Mr. Issa. Ma'am, that is a yes or a no; it really is. Are
those true statements?
Ms. Noyes. Yes.
Mr. Issa. Okay. If you would please give her a copy of
this. Are you aware of this packet that was used throughout
2023?
Ms. Noyes. Yes.
Mr. Issa. Does it limit to legal activities in Mexico, or
does it on pages 9, 10, and 11 clearly advise people on how to
get asylum in the U.S.?
Ms. Noyes. This packet of information, Congressman, was not
funded by PRM. It was funded by the U.N. Refugee----
Mr. Issa. Was this organization at this time under funding
from the United States?
Ms. Noyes. The organization was. This packet was not----
Mr. Issa. Okay. So one of the problems with the title I
mentioned to you is that it makes it a crime to use tricks or
mislead. Were you aware of this activity under other funds when
you were funding this organization?
Ms. Noyes. Congressman, this slide deck and these briefings
were begun before I was confirmed as assistant----
Mr. Issa. Ma'am, they were going on during these days of
those statements. Right in the middle of it, the packet says
May 2023 was the revision. I am going to go back to the
original question because I think it is the most important
question for you today as a Senate-confirmed officer: were you
aware of this packet?
Ms. Noyes. I became aware of the packet when we were
producing documents for the Congress in response to their
request. I----
Mr. Issa. And what disciplinary actions or other activities
do you envision when Congress has been told something in
writing that is untrue and then you discover this?
Ms. Noyes. Congressman, again, I repeat, this packet was
not funded by PRM. We became aware of it when----
Mr. Issa. Ma'am, I am going to make something very clear to
you. The intent of Congress is not to use the fungibility of
money to give an organization that goes out with the people
that you are funding and those people and that organization do
something inconsistent with what you tell Congress and what
your mandate is. Money is fungible. As long as you give to this
organization, which I understand you are still funding around
the world, and they have a dual purpose and they used that dual
purpose to do something that Congress clearly doesn't want.
Nowhere in this deck--we will call it U.N. funded for a moment
just to humor you. Nowhere in this deck does it suggest that
you can seek refuge in Mexico, which, under international law,
you have not only a right to but an obligation to. Isn't it
true under international law that every refugee in Mexico, if
they are not Mexican, is, by definition, eligible to seek
refuge there and Mexico is at least one of the countries before
the United States.
So at a time in which every individual handed this had
traveled into Mexico, a country that would have required visas
and/or a claim of asylum to let them in, they were allowed in
only because your organizations, along perhaps with the United
Nations, was, in fact, funding their trip to the United States?
In other words, you were part of conduiting people to
circumvent international law. Every one of those people,
Haitian, Chinese, whatever, you are so proud of helping had a
right and Mexico had an obligation. We circumvented that at
Federal taxpayers' expense so they could come to the United
States where we were spending $150 billion in support of this.
Chairman, I have no further questions. I yield back.
Mr. Mast. Thank you, Mr. Issa. And we will do further
rounds if you feel as though you have more questions on it. I
now recognize Ranking Member Crow.
Mr. Crow. Thank you, Chairman. Well, I had a line of
questioning, but I feel really compelled to correct the record
here because this last line of questioning was inaccurate and
misleading in so many ways.
First of all, this organization, I think people deserve to
know that this organization that was the subject of the last
round of questioning, HIAS, was actually founded in the wake of
the Holocaust. After the Holocaust, the purpose of this
organization was founded to help Jewish folks in Europe escape
the pogroms of the Soviet Union and actually help bring them to
safety after the Holocaust. That is No. 1. No. 2, at no time
has the U.S. funded the specific programs that were at issue
here, and there is a very big difference between funding an
organization and then specific lines of effort. No. 3, the
information itself about navigating the Mexican immigration
system actually is available on--wait for it--the CBP website
of the United States. That is publicly available information on
a Customs and Border Protection website. And then the last
thing is I just find it very disingenuous, frankly, when my
colleagues will question somebody or come after a witness based
on transcribed interview testimony and transcripts that they
have literally refused over and over again to make public,
taking an interview of a witness and then refusing our requests
to make that public so that the public can actually see the
full context and the full meaning of what happened in those
interviews, instead cherry-picking certain parts to attack a
witness. So I just wanted to level set that.
And then, Ms. Noyes, would love to give you a minute or two
of time to actually address the issues since you didn't really
have that opportunity to do so just now.
Ms. Noyes. Well, thank you, Congressman. And I appreciate
that, and I do want to reiterate the U.S. Government did not
fund the production of these slides. The U.S. Government did
fund activities and programs in Mexico to inform immigrants
within Mexico of the ability to seek asylum. And, in fact, the
Mexican asylum agency has grown by 500 percent. Mexico is now
one of the top asylum-receiving countries in the world with
over a 140,000 applicants. And all of that has happened as a
result of the assistance that has been appropriated by the
Congress for PRM and has been very successful. Thank you.
Mr. Crow. Okay. Any other comments from any of the other
witnesses on this? Okay. And just to be really clear, since my
colleague referenced a component of U.S. law about knowingly
making false or misleading statements to the U.S. Government,
you have at no time made false or misleading statements to the
U.S. Government.
Ms. Noyes. That is correct.
Mr. Crow. All right. Thank you. I do think it is important,
actually, this organization that has such an important history,
can you just tell folks a little bit about it and what this
organization does?
Ms. Noyes. Well, I wouldn't want to speak for HIAS, but
they are an important implementing partner for the United
States. We have programs with them in several countries around
the world. They are also one of the ten resettlement agencies
that help in the resettlement of refugees arriving legally in
the United States after fleeing persecution and substantial
vetting and processing overseas.
They conduct programs on issues like preventing gender-
based violence, providing support for medical services and
other types of activities. They are a humanitarian agency, as
you said, Congressman, founded in response to the pogroms in
Russia initially to help Jewish refugees but then they have
expanded their activities to support refugees and vulnerable
people around the world.
Mr. Crow. And did this organization, in fact, do so, help
Jewish refugees escape persecution?
Ms. Noyes. Indeed. I mean, I can't speak for them. I don't
know their entire history, but it is a long and distinguished
history.
Mr. Crow. Okay. Thank you. I yield back.
Mr. Mast. Thank you, Ranking Member Crow. I am going to
wait until round two to ask questions, and I yield my time to
Representative Issa.
Mr. Issa. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I guess sometimes you
have to respond to the correcting of the record by correcting
the record. In May, the Department told Chairman McCaul that
the deck was used at PRM-funded legal orientation sessions, the
sessions provided by HIAS. So we funded the sessions in which
they used the deck. Would you like to correct the record that
we didn't fund it? If you fund the meeting and they use the
deck, why is it and how is it that you can say you are telling
us without trickery or any kind of misleading that this wasn't
funded or at least enabled by the U.S. Government, ma'am?
Ms. Noyes. Again, Congressman, we did not fund the
production of the deck, but it is accurate that the deck was
used in briefings where we were also informing migrants about
the ability to seek asylum in Mexico.
Mr. Issa. Ma'am, it is wonderful that you can--you are a
great diplomat because diplomats tell people to go to hell and
make them pack and look forward to the trip, I guess, because
there is no truth in what you just said. It is extremely clear
that if a group, I don't care who printed it or handed it out,
a group you were funding and funding waters and transportation
and everything else, to bring to an event, host the event under
the color of the United States of America, not the United
Nations, and then you say, well, we didn't fund it, they got
the money fungibly from somewhere else. Ma'am, there is not one
American that would believe that.
And, by the way, to look at an organization and say, well,
in the past, it had a great history. No question at all. My
general counsel and one of my best friends was a refusenik that
this organization probably helped his family get out. That's
not what this organization is doing today, and it is not what
you are paying for. If you fund them and your people see them
handing out this deck and pages 9, 10, and 11 are clearly--not
one bit of this document helps them stay in Mexico or implies
they should. It makes it very clear that, in fact, this is how
you circumvent law by what you say to get into the United
States. That is just the truth.
I appreciate Ranking Member Crow wanting to correct the
record, but the record is the U.S. Government paid for sessions
in which, knowingly, this was used. And you still stand behind
the statements made to this committee that you do not do it and
you were making those statements while people were handing this
out at U.S. Government paid-for events; is that correct?
Ms. Noyes. [Speaking off-mic.]
Mr. Issa. Okay. So why is it that you, I am going to ask
you just one more time because maybe Mr. Crow will see the
light, why is it you think that that is not somehow using funds
if you bring people in and say, here, go ahead and use this
deck that tells them how to get to America and then you tell us
that you don't in any way facilitate it.
Ms. Noyes. [Speaking off-mic.]
Mr. Mast. Please turn your microphone on.
Ms. Noyes. Sorry about that. We didn't fund the production
of the slide deck. It was created in order to provide
information to migrants who were participating in the Remain in
Mexico program, the migration protection protocols. PRM stopped
funding for HIAS in Mexico in 2023. We do no funding for the
agency.
Mr. Issa. Okay. Last, and the chairman has been very kind
to give me this time, can you give this committee assurance
today that no organization attends U.S. government-funded
events in which these migrants are made available and provide
similar information today?
Ms. Noyes. Congressman, we are fully cognizant of the
requirements in the 2024 Appropriations Act, which stipulates
that. We are in full compliance with that. In fact, I sent
letters to the heads of all international organizations that we
fund to inform them of that stipulation. And so, yes, I can say
unequivocally that such briefings are not happening with U.S.
Government funding.
Mr. Issa. Okay. Since I represent a border district, I have
about 80 miles of the Mexican border east of San Diego. I go to
that constantly. I have led many Members of Congress and
attorneys general and so on to them. I have stood at the fence
and listened to U.S. government-backed NGO's, including
Catholic Charities, talk through the fence and advise people on
what to say as they are irregularly entering the United States.
So I wish I could believe that you enforced your letters, but I
appreciate that you say that you sent letters for that
guidance.
Mr. Chairman, thank you so much. Hopefully, the record of
correcting the record of correcting the record is now complete.
Mr. Mast. Thank you, Mr. Issa. It was an interesting dialog
to me. I understood it to be they had an audience of people and
maybe they didn't tell the audience of people this is what is
in the deck, but, hey, come up here and, by all means, give
this instruction, and you are also getting U.S. dollars for
something different is kind of how I understood that. I will
have my own time for questions, but it does seem above board.
I recognize Ms. Dean for 5 minutes.
Ms. Dean. Well, thank you, Mr. Chairman. And thanks for
that interpretation of this conversation.
Mr. Mast. You are welcome.
Ms. Dean. You know, we have an expression that we often use
here, which is I associate myself with the remarks of the
gentleman who spoke before me. In this case, I am going to say
to you three honorable people leading groups that are trying to
do good work around the world I do not associate myself with
the former line of questioning. I am sorry that we all suffered
through that. I would rather focus on the good work that you
are doing. Surely, we have an oversight responsibility. I am
happy to be a part of that, to make sure that everything that
we fund is executed as well as possible with the purpose it was
intended for. But I do not associate myself with that kind of
tearing down of other people.
Secretary Noyes, in your written testimony, you didn't cite
the example today, but I wanted to give you a chance. In your
written testimony, you highlighted an example from one of your
monitoring trips where a Venezuelan family was able to obtain
asylum in Guatemala with the Bureau of Population, Refugees,
and Migration-funded support. And they successfully have
integrated into the community that they are in and working in
in Guatemala. Could you tell us a little bit about that one?
Ms. Noyes. I am happy to do so, Congresswoman. Venezuela is
facing a mass migration situation. Six-seven million people
have left the country. Ninety-four percent of those people have
actually remained in other countries in the Western Hemisphere.
They are not coming to the United States.
Ms. Dean. Ninety-four percent.
Ms. Noyes. Sixteen out of seventeen. And that is, in very
large measure, because of the types of activities and programs
that PRM is funding. We have, for example, provided funding and
assistance, capacity-building, in Colombia, which now hosts and
has provided legal status for over two million Colombians.
Ecuador, Peru, Brazil are doing the same. Mexico is providing
massive amounts of asylum for people from around the world who
have arrived in Mexico. Costa Rica has provided safe haven for
600,000 Nicaraguans. PRM is very proud on behalf of the
American people to support efforts to support these governments
as they seek to integrate people in our hemisphere. We work
very hard on responsibility sharing with other governments in
our hemisphere.
And, yes, I was delighted to meet that Venezuelan family.
They make candy, and they have settled in Guatemala, and they
are so happy. I similarly met a Venezuelan migrant in Mexico
who settled there and has received asylum there through a
program that PRM funded, and he told me now that his favorite
food is tacos and he is looking for a nice Mexican girl to
settle down and raise a beautiful Mexican family. And there are
stories like that all over our hemisphere as a result of
American taxpayer-funded programs and activities that I think
uphold our values but also our national security in helping to
address the worldwide migration crisis and its consequences
here in our hemisphere.
So thank you for the question.
Ms. Dean. And I want to honor the extraordinary work you
did in Chad and Sudan and just the devastating suffering that
is going on there and the work that you are trying to do there.
With the detail of what you just talked about, this family
with their candy company, what does it look like? Can you paint
the picture? What does the assistance look like to get a family
that kind of placement and thriving, the ability to thrive
within a community? And then what impact does this have on the
U.S. border?
Ms. Noyes. Absolutely. Happy to do so. PRM funds activities
like capacity building for asylum agencies and immigration
services in other countries. We can provide support for data
base systems or, in Colombia, we funded a system to create new
ID cards, like the fraud-proof ID cards, for Venezuelan
migrants in Colombia. We provide protection services to make
sure that people are receiving protection and care to prevent
them from being smuggled or trafficked. We also work very
closely again, through our diplomacy and through our work with
other governments, in the hemisphere on responsibility sharing
to address all of these issues.
So all of this work goes to helping people who have had to
flee their countries because they are fleeing persecution or
war, violence, gangs, the effects of climate change sometimes.
Helping people to settle down and integrate in the country
where they find themselves and to find safety and to start a
new life there, everyone who starts a new life in another
country in our hemisphere is someone who is not coming to our
border, and that helps support our national security, as well
as our humanitarian objectives.
Ms. Dean. I see my time has expired, and I apologize I did
not get a chance to speak with both of you, but I thank you for
your work and I yield back.
Mr. Mast. Thank you, Ms. Dean. The chair now recognizes Mr.
Mills.
Mr. Mills. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you all for being
here today. While I can applaud some of the work that actually
USAID and State Department does, I think that we can identify
the fact that there has been a continuous problem with the
effectiveness, the implementation, and the actual oversight
tracking of the grants and grantees that are actually going out
there. Would we all agree with that? You wouldn't agree with
that? Let me refer you to the 2011 November OIG report that had
to do with Afghanistan USAID grantee and sub-grantee programs
where they actually had found that where 67 hospitals and
schools had been reported, the true findings was what? Three.
Three had been built in that entire establishment, and you are
going to tell me there is no problem with subcommittee or--
sorry--the sub-grantees and grantees when you are talking about
people like Creative Associates, DAI, Chemonics, all the USAID
implementing partners who have actually admitted that they
couldn't track the funding once it went to a sub-grantee?
That's not a problem?
Ms. Noyes. Congressman, I am not familiar with this 2011
report that you are citing.
Mr. Mills. It is actually the USAID OIG report, November
2011. It actually talked about a program called ASI South, the
Afghan Stabilization Initiative South. Are you familiar with
any ASI programs or the ramp-up, the Regional Afghan
Municipality programs, or any of these types of programs?
Ms. Noyes. No, sir. That was 10 years before I joined PRM.
Mr. Mills. Well, I can tell you that nothing has changed
since then. This is short history of grant deficiencies. You
know, the State Department engaged in increasingly complex
acquisitions procurement-needed services and the Department
needs to ensure the contracts for grantees properly shows work
and conducted monitored objectives and have problems giving the
effectiveness of being contained. That was the OIG in 1917.
In 1918, they talked about oversight weaknesses and
mismanagement also increased possibilities that the purpose of
the instruments would not actually be met. That was 2018.
In 2019, they actually talk about the Department entities
domestically and abroad did not consistently and adequately
monitor contract performance, conduct thorough invoice reviews,
or oversee grants in foreign assistance programs. That is 2019.
I can continue to go on and provide this list. 2020, 1921,
1922, 1923, and even as recently as this year when the OIG
reported that whether its resources are used for core
operations or destined for contracts, cooperative agreements or
grants that assist programs, the department's ability to manage
its significant resources efficiently and effectively continues
to remain a challenge for us.
It sounds to me like the OIG continuously, regardless of
whether or not it was 10 years prior to you coming or not, over
the last 10 years that I can show right here, the OIG reports
that you are still having problems tracking utilization of the
funding of sub-grantee money; is that not correct?
Ms. Noyes. Sir, I can tell you that the OIG has pointed to
PRM's processes as a model. I can tell you that the cooperative
agreements that we have with NGO's involve considerable
oversight and monitoring, and I can talk about our strong
collaboration with OIG, with the Office of the Special
Inspector for Afghan Reconstruction. We welcome this oversight.
We would like to collaborate with them. We are always looking
to improve----
Mr. Mills. So you are familiar with SIGAR?
Ms. Noyes. Yes.
Mr. Mills. And you are familiar that SIGAR has reported
time after time the misuse and abuse of funding, American
taxpayers' funding, like things, as an example, the KHPP,
Kandahar Helmand Power Project, that resulted in three-plus
billion dollars----
Mr. Crow. Would the gentleman yield? I have a clarifying
question.
Mr. Mills. Sure.
Mr. Crow. Would the gentleman clarify for me are you
referring to an OIG report done by the U.S. Agency for
International Development (USAID)?
Mr. Mills. And also the State Department OIG reports.
Mr. Crow. So I think it would be helpful, I think these are
melding because you referenced a whole bunch of USAID reports.
Obviously, this is a State Department panel----
Mr. Mills. I understand that, but State Department does
actually provide the oversight for USAID; am I not correct in
this in some way?
Mr. Crow. I understand that. I think it would be helpful
because there is confusion and melding with the questioning. If
you could just clarify for the witnesses what you are talking
about.
Mr. Mills. For the gentleman here, do we not only
appropriate things under the State and foreign ops budget? Does
that include State Department and USAID, and State Department
ultimately has the oversight of----
Mr. Crow. Yes, but they are different OIGs.
Mr. Mills. I understand that. But both OIGs have reported
that there is actually an issue with the grantee and sub-
grantee programs when it comes----
Mr. Crow. Yes. What I'm asking the gentleman to clarify is,
when he is asking questions, if you could just be more----
Mr. Mills. Let's talk about SIGAR----
Mr. Crow. I am not debating the gentleman. I am just asking
the gentleman----
Mr. Mills. I am reclaiming my time. Reclaiming my time.
Mr. Crow [continuing]. Could clarify which OIG----
Mr. Mills. Reclaiming my time.
Mr. Crow [continuing]. They are referring to.
Mr. Mills. Let me ask this question to make it easy: if a
grantee fails to comply with the terms of its grant agreement
or otherwise violates U.S. law, is the grantee suspended from
receiving further U.S. funding?
Ms. Noyes. Yes. And I can give you examples of when we have
done that in PRM.
Mr. Mills. Okay. Can you explain how that process works?
Ms. Noyes. So we have a very robust system of monitoring
and evaluation that includes written reports, performance
reports, financial reports, desk audits, interviews, site
visits as I described in my testimony. And when, in the course
of conducting this oversight, we find that a recipient of U.S.
funding, one of our cooperative agreements, is failing to meet
the benchmarks that we have agreed on, then we have suspended
funding. We did that in----
Mr. Mills. So can you tell me where we are at then--I
appreciate that--with the implements of the atheism grant that
was referred to a suspension? Where is that now?
Mr. Mast. Mr. Mills, let me pause you for a minute. Your
time is expired, but we are about to move into round two----
Mr. Mills. In other words, I just assumed that, since the
vice chair wanted to claim some of the time, which----
Mr. Mast. I am more than happy to, since it goes to our
side, start with you for round two if you want to roll into
this. Would you like to--because you can have 5 minutes now if
you want.
Mr. Mills. No, that is all right.
Mr. Mast. Okay. We are going to roll into round two
of questions. I will begin with myself. We will continue to
go back and forth. I do want to start with something. Under the
title of correcting the record with my ranking member, this was
a letter from Naz Durakoglu referencing the numerous times that
we spoke about the atheism grant. And, by the way, there was an
atheism grant. This is a copy of the atheism grant. It says
promoting and defending religious freedom inclusive of
atheists, humanists, non-practicing, and non-affiliated
individuals. It goes into specifics on it, but you spoke, as
well, Mr. Hussain, about there wasn't anything on atheism.
There is.
But I want to go to the record of what Naz Durakoglu sent
us. Let's see. All of the times that we asked about it, April
18, June 8, June 19, October 20, November 9, November 29,
November 30, all in 2023; February 16, August 3, February 22,
March 30 to April 18, 2024; and other hearings that we had
here. And here is the short part of the response that I want to
read: The Department has since learned that the documents
provided by the grantee to the Department and, in turn, the
committee were not, in fact, the version of the slides used in
the relevant training. I will submit this for the record.
The long and the short of this is State Department, Naz,
Secretary Verma all came back to this committee and said, hey,
all those times we testified to you or wrote you letters about
atheism and that not happening, turns out we were dead wrong
and, in fact, the slides actually show they were doing this
and, you know, we are telling you that we didn't get the full
slide deck from them. So I hope that, as the ranking member
said, he would correct the record. He will take that as that is
the correction of the record by State Department. They did
literally over and over and over tell us the wrong thing, lie
to us, whatever you want to call it. That is what happened, and
they acknowledged it.
So it has been revealed that the State Department actively
promoted atheist and humanist groups and their membership in
clear violation of the Establishment Clause. So you stated,
Ambassador Hussain, you began in 2022. What month of 2022?
Mr. Hussain. [Speaking off-mic.]
Mr. Mills. Okay. How many people report to you?
Mr. Hussain. Approximately 40.
Mr. Mills. Approximately 40. And did you know that this was
a violation of the Establishment Clause, or when did you learn
of that?
Mr. Hussain. So the program that you have cited,
Congressman, was a program that I believe was approved in 2020
internally, and you cited the title of the program. It is a
program----
Mr. Mills. I believe in 1921.
Mr. Hussain. The internal process by which it was created
and that it went out in 2021.
Mr. Mills. Did you know it was a violation of the
Establishment Clause?
Mr. Hussain. No.
Mr. Mills. When did you learn about it?
Mr. Hussain. I learned about the program when I came
onboard. I believe it was finalized with the internal
department 2020. It started in 2021. I came in. The focus of
our----
Mr. Mills. You learned about it in 1922 when you came
onboard, and you didn't jump out and say this is a violation of
the Establishment Clause?
Mr. Hussain. The program, as you read correctly, the title
is a Program to Defend Religious Freedom of People Around the
World, inclusive of atheists and humanists. So it is a----
Mr. Mills. Did you ever detect any problems with this--in
2022, when you learned about it, at any point were you like I
am not sure if this aboveboard, let me at least dig into this a
little more? Did that occur at all?
Mr. Hussain. Actually, Congressman, we have had back and
forth with the committee, and we take our responsibility to be
responsive to oversight very seriously, so there has been a
number of letters that have gone back and forth. There is a
request to produce documents regarding the NOFO, and we
responded to each one of those requests. Then there was a
request about documents as a part of the grant as it is being
implemented----
Mr. Mills. I just want to let you know I am happy to let
you speak because I am going to take as many rounds as this
takes. I don't care if we go to round 20 to get through this,
but I am going to have a number of questions. So by all means,
speak as long as you want because, actually, right now, you are
digging a hole for yourself----
Mr. Hussain. Actually, I appreciate the opportunity to get
to the bottom of it, as well, sir, because, as we found out
more information, and we found the slide, which the committee
requested slides, we immediately went to the implementing
partner and asked for those documents, as well. And as soon as
they received it, I believe it was on April 17th, we notified--
you mentioned the call that you received on April 19th--as soon
as we could and then recommend the matter to the Office of
Inspector General.
I take very seriously----
Mr. Mills. Do you think that is the first time that there
was a correspondence in that way, like, hey, there is concerns,
let's make sure that, you know, you get us the appropriate
slides? Would you say that, to your knowledge, that is the
first time----
Mr. Hussain. Well, we have quarterly correspondence with
our implementing partners. We have written materials that come
in, performance evaluations, financial reports. So we are in a
rigorous process of checking in as per our requirements by law
to check in with our implementing partners, and we have done
that, including through site visits.
As we learned more information about the questions that the
committee requested, we have tried our best to provide that
information to the committee. And as someone that works on a
day-to-day basis on literally saving the lives of people that
are suffering around the world, Christians that are being
persecuted for blasphemy and apostasy. I mentioned, for
example, the recent political prisoners that came from
Nicaragua, those that we welcomed from China, individuals that
have sentenced to death for leaving their faith, for example.
Our focus on a day-to-day basis is to make sure that we are
engaging in diplomatic work, that we are also overseeing the
many, many programs that we have around the world. We take
every single penny seriously.
And so when there was a suggestion to me when I came into
this role that perhaps there is promotion of atheism, my
initial reaction was it is completely against the law to
promote atheism, I do not accept that, or to promote any
religious faith in this job. As a person of faith myself, I
take very seriously the importance of protecting the religious
freedom of all people around the world and the International
Religious Act of 1998 requires us to protect the religious
freedom of all, including people that don't have any particular
belief.
And so my understanding of the grant when I came in is that
it was designed to protect the right of individuals not to
follow any particular faith. That is something that has been
championed by Representative Chris Smith, who has been a
tremendous supporter of our efforts and our religious freedom
work around the world. He has said himself that he will support
the right of individuals to not belong to any particular faith
community, and the IRF Act itself says that the freedom of
thought, conscience, and religion is understood to protect
theistic and non-theistic beliefs and the right not to profess
or practice any religion.
So I actually think there is more that we agree on than it
might seem. I think we all agree in this room that is our
responsibility to protect the religious freedom of all people
around the world. That could extend to protecting the rights of
people not to believe, and we all believe that promoting any
particular religious fact using taxpayer dollars is wrong and
it is wrong to promote atheism, it is wrong to promote any
particular religious faith using American tax dollars, period,
full stop. And that is my belief, and that is how we have tried
to execute the work of our office. And if there are times when
there is a grantee that has done something that causes concern
or has done something otherwise, then it is my responsibility
and our responsibility as an office to come to you and to say
we have discovered something that may not be in line with that
mandate and that responsibility, and it is our responsibility
to then report that to the Office of Inspector General. They
have a number of responses that they are able to execute
themselves, including going back and retrieving the money if it
was ever used in an improper way.
So, Congressman, I just want to say I share concerns that
you have, and I do not want to see a single penny of U.S.
taxpayer dollar used to promote any particular religious faith
or atheism.
Mr. Mills. So you have gone well over my time. Like I said,
I am happy to let you speak and expound. We are in rounds of 5
minutes. I do have to go to my counterpart, Ranking Member
Crow. I am going to put something up for you to reflect on
while he is asking you questions or other people questions just
so you can read it and digest it and be prepared to answer.
Could you put that up a minute?
And what is it specifically says, this is State Department
speaking to Humanists International, the atheist group, and
what it specifically says: Our in-person meeting, December 2022
meeting with redacted team leader from State Department and
redacted program officer from State Department and person from
Humanists International is when I was first instructed to
revise the language in all official grant documents to, quote,
neutralize the language in all materials that were submitted to
State Department, the ones that we would be able to see,
neutralize the language for the stuff that we would be able to
see. Know the changes to language did not impact the activities
that we were doing, that were carried out. The activities
remained the same, we just changed the language of what we
reported to State Department. I was instructed by State
Department to exclude and/or remove such language from official
grant documents. I was not instructed to exclude or remove the
language from the program documents, the actual materials that
people were given. No changes to program activities were
requested by State Department.
I am not going to ask you any questions on it. Stare at it,
look at it, read it, reflect on it, think about it. I am going
to go to my colleague, and then I am going to hammer you on it.
You are recognized for 5 minutes.
Mr. Crow. Thank you, Mr. Hussain. You were, I think, in my
view, very clear in your prior assertation here about our
policy and how you manage the office and that is aligned with
how Congress has dictated that this be done. But should we just
run through it in a more succinct way? Your office does not
promote atheism or any other belief set; is that correct?
Mr. Hussain. That is correct, Congressman.
Mr. Crow. Your job is not to promote but to protect
people's rights to believe or non-believe as they see fit,
correct?
Mr. Hussain. That is our responsibility, and that is what
has been done by my predecessors on a bipartisan basis, as
well.
Mr. Crow. And, under law, atheism is a non-belief set that
would fall under law as one of those beliefs or non-beliefs
that are protected.
Mr. Hussain. Yes. And, specifically, in 2016, the
amendments to the IRF Act clarified that atheism or non-belief
is to be protected under the International Religious Freedom
Act.
Mr. Crow. This is the Frank R. Wolf International Religious
Freedom Act, and it was passed in 2016 and enacted in law in
2017; is that correct?
Mr. Hussain. That is right.
Mr. Crow. And specifically amended to include non-belief or
atheism as a protected belief or non-belief set.
Mr. Hussain. Yes. Just to clarify further, it was already
required in the 1998 act but just made it that much more clear.
Mr. Crow. More clear, yes. I would like to enter the Frank
R. Wolf International Religious Freedom Act into the record.
Mr. Mast. Without objection.
Mr. Crow. This is the one that you had mentioned was
actually a Republican-led effort by Mr. Smith.
Mr. Hussain. That is right. And we continue to work with
Representative Smith. Congressman Wolf is someone that we have
worked very closely with. He has been a commissioner on the
International Religious Freedom Commission and enjoy our
cooperation with him, as well.
Mr. Crow. Okay. And the way you tailor things, it is my
understanding that your office will tailor your programming
approaches to meet the needs of specific places in the world.
In someplace, it might be Christians. In another place, it
might be those of Jewish faith or Muslims or Hindus or non-
believers. Different places have different concerns and
different threats to individuals that you are working to help
defend; is that correct?
Mr. Mast. If you have a moment to yield, I would love to
give you a clarifying point on our argument. Whenever you--I
don't want to interrupt your train----
Mr. Crow. If the gentleman could just answer the question,
then it would be great----
Mr. Hussain. That is right. And I will say that, as someone
who has experienced previously in my career doing work in
Muslim-majority countries specifically and work on the
protection of Christian minorities, countering antisemitism,
and protection of other religious minorities, that has been a
specific interest that I brought into this position, as well.
And so we take our responsibility very seriously to protect
people of all faiths everywhere all around the world.
Mr. Crow. And then you do oversight, so in instances where
you have a grantee or there is a program that you are
supporting that is not aligned with our standards or violate
any of our laws or standards, you fix that.
Mr. Hussain. Absolutely.
Mr. Crow. In the case of this particular grant that some of
my colleagues were referencing, you all provided, it is our
understanding, my understanding that you all provided the
materials you had available. That is what you believed was
being used, and it was drawn to your attention that other
things were being used. You then provided that. You disclosed
it, and you dealt with it.
Mr. Hussain. That is correct.
Mr. Crow. Okay. Thank you.
Mr. Mast. The clarifying point was simply nobody disputes
that atheism is included in the IRFA. It is about whether they
wrote a grant to promote atheism specifically. That is the
point of contention. Just in case you want it, here is a time
line. We did start reaching out to them back in 1922 about 15
times before they actually did get back to us.
Mr. Crow. I appreciate that, and I certainly understand
that issue. You know, there is the broader assertions. I think,
along with some of the specific allegations against you all,
there is just this implication about overall policy that I
wanted to clarify, as well as the specific issues about, you
know, knowingly misleading the committee or Congress, which I
just see no evidence of. In the regular course of oversight,
things are identified, things are fixed. You just can't fund
programs without occasionally finding things.
And I agree with that. I agree with my colleagues on this
that, if there is an issue that violates something, fix it,
right? We should not be promoting any one belief set or non-
belief set; and, certainly, in this case, it was identified and
it was fixed.
Mr. Hussain. And I want to fix it more than anyone else if
there is an issue because I spend 99 point, you know, some
percentage of my time fighting for the rights of people of
faith around the world. Yes, there are atheist communities
around the world, and we protect their rights, as well.
But any insinuation that the office is set up to protect or
promote atheism is misrepresentative of the fact that the vast,
vast majority of the work that we do is helping people that are
in dire straits, people of faith that I mentioned in my opening
statement and in some of our exchange here, and that is a
responsibility that we take very seriously.
Mr. Crow. And if I may, another 30 seconds or so, I just
want to also go into this issues of, you know, bad faith or
knowingly withholding things. At any time, Mr. Hussain, were
you in the possession of this purported slide deck or this
slide deck, not purported but actually does exist, were you
withheld that and did not provide it for any lengthy period of
time to prevent it from coming into the purview of this
committee?
Mr. Hussain. No, sir. I believe that we were in possession
of it on the 17th of April and provided it by the 19th.
Mr. Crow. Okay. Thank you. I yield back.
Mr. Mast. Thank you, Ranking Member Crow. And, FYI, they
provided an inaccurate slide deck and then later provided an
accurate one.
Mr. Crow. But can I clarify that? But they provided what
they had, right? They provided a slide that they had been
given, and it was later clarified that was not the one being
used. So that was actually oversight that worked. Something was
inaccurate by a grantee. They came into possession of the
accurate one. They almost immediately disclosed that to the
committee, and it has sense been fixed. That is my
understanding.
Mr. Mast. Actually, a couple of years after, they told
their implementing partner neutralize your language, don't
neutralize what you are doing with the program, neutralize your
language. We will certainly get into that, and we can have some
more back and forth on that. But bear in mind, this was not
immediately. There were several years of stonewalling. And if
you recall, we did have a hearing where you chastised the staff
members of this committee, I believe it was you, chastised the
staff members of this committee for being in Nepal and actually
going to speak with the people on the ground there. It was only
in speaking in person with the people on the ground there that
oversight was actually being able to be conducted. That is
where they actually, oh, crap, they actually caught us red-
handed, now we need to start turning over stuff. That was after
years----
Mr. Crow. And if I may, Chairman, since you----
Mr. Mast. Please, by all means.
Mr. Crow. I mean, listen, I am not going to get into an
argument here. When you referenced that incident, that was
about spending over $80,000 on a taxpayer-funded trip that I
believe was excessive.
Mr. Mast. But it was a bipartisan CODEL----
Mr. Crow. The charge of bad faith by this department simply
is not supported by the facts. I think that has been made very
clear by the witnesses here, and I will always vigorously
contest any allegation of bad faith as distinguished from valid
legitimate oversight that both the Department and this
committee conducts.
Mr. Mast. So it was a bipartisan staff delegation to
numerous places and them going over there and being on the
ground in Nepal. That is oversight that they conducted, no
doubt about it. But, again, it has been pointed out it was
absolutely bad faith, but we are going to get into that more.
It is now time for--I do have to recognize Mr. Mills. I can't
go to you first because we have two members that haven't been
here for questions yet, but you will be after that, and then in
the next round it comes back to me. So I have used my time.
We will go to--is it Ranking Member Perry or McCormick
that's up next? All right. The chair recognizes Representative
McCormick.
Mr. McCormick. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I'll agree with Ms.
Noyes. You are the assistant secretary of the State Department
Bureau of Population, Refugees, and Migration, commonly known
as PRM. What does the P, or population, in PRM refer to in the
Bureau's title?
Ms. Noyes. It refers to the provision of information and
diplomacy with regard to population policies in international
organizations.
Mr. McCormick. Okay. Does that have anything to do with
abortion?
Ms. Noyes. The U.S. Government does not, PRM does not
support, fund, or in any way provide support for abortion or
abortion services.
Mr. McCormick. Okay. Thank you. Interesting, I was
concerned that when I saw local media content on one of PRM's
partners in Mexico, there was an advertisement that we pulled
down and actually printed out for us that kind of concerned me
a little bit. This entity was called the Hebrew Immigrant Aid
Society. Are you familiar with it? HIAS. Some of my colleagues
mentioned it earlier. It is promoting abortion services for
Mexican migrants or people migrating through Mexico. I can show
you the brochures. As a matter of fact, this is one of them.
This basically tells migrants where to call if they need an
abortion. It is an associated advertisement.
Here is another post when migrants asked if they know their
sexual reproductive rights, referring them to, once again,
abortifacient resources. The Instagram post raised a question
that I must ask: does the PRM fund any sort of abortion
processes in Mexico?
Ms. Noyes. No. I will tell you what we do fund and----
Mr. McCormick. It is Okay. That is all I really want to
know. I understand what you----
Ms. Noyes. The State Department does not fund abortion or
abortion services in Mexico or in any other country. We are in
full compliance with all U.S. laws.
Mr. McCormick. So it does not directly or indirectly
support abortion. I got it. With that said, I have a poster
here. If you look at the one on that side, it basically talks
about different places that we support. PRM. That we fund even.
And that these facilities right here are associated, including
seven which is a place where you get abortions that we support
financially. The PRM does fund, fact, the International
Organization for Migration (IOM). As you can see on the next
poster, it provides various health care centers across Mexico,
and that is the map right there. Then you look at the third
poster, the same health center appears in the Mexican
government's list of abortion providers that we support.
So if the PRM does give money to IOM and IOM funds the
entities in the Mexican government that says they provide
abortions, how does that stay consistent with our message that
we just talked about?
Ms. Noyes. Congressman, again, PRM does not fund abortion
or abortion services in Mexico or anywhere else. Whether there
are other partners or whether there are partners that are doing
so, they are not doing so with U.S. funding. We are in full
compliance with U.S. law on this point.
Mr. McCormick. So if U.S. law is we don't fund it, but we
are funding the IOM and the IOM is funding this center that
does abortions, how do we fix that? Because it is a violation
of law.
Ms. Noyes. We do not fund abortion or abortion services.
What we do fund is maternal and child health, menstrual hygiene
products like tampons and sanitary pads, provision of prenatal
vitamins, care for pregnant women or for complications
following pregnancy, like fistula----
Mr. McCormick. I have seen the same kind of sleight of hand
in the United States, too, where we say, no, we are funding
these abortion centers for the things that they are not doing
for abortions, which sends them all the money they need to do
everything else. It is like I am going to fund the Democratic
Party but only for thing that everybody agrees on. Well, that
means they get to save the money for the things we don't agree
on.
As a matter of fact, the same people that we give funds to
in America that do abortions did a fund raise for the same
party that is feeding it the money. It is a self-licking ice
cream cone. It is illegal. We are a nation of laws. Federal
funds are forbidden to be used for abortions for migrants in
this country or another country, and we are supporting the
organizations that are, in turn, supporting abortion clinics
essentially. This goes back to--it goes back to research
centers in China that are doing gain of function. If we are
funding them, even though we are not supposed to be funding
gain of function and they do it anyways, it is still American
funds used on places for nefarious purposes or at least illegal
at the very best. And I think, if we are having an honest
discussion, I think the money needs to be retracted from these
organizations that are funding things that we are not
specifically funding.
With that, I yield.
Mr. Mast. Thank you, Mr. McCormick. The chair now
recognizes Mr. Perry.
Mr. Perry. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Ms. Noyes, my
understanding--and I am sorry you are on the hot seat here, but
you got a lot of topics apparently people are interested in. My
understanding is that PRM is providing funding for
transportation, shelter, cash, and debit cards, and legal
counseling in Mexico, aiding the flow of migrants to the U.S.
border. Maybe you wouldn't characterize it as aiding, but I
think providing those things does aid their coming to America
through Mexico.
PRM defined a dollar amount ranging from $212 to $486 in
the form of cash and voucher assistance to migrants. Now, when
testifying for the Foreign Affairs transcribed interview, at
the time, I don't think you knew the number of migrants
receiving funds in Mexico or how frequently migrants apply for
CVA. And I am not sure you knew the categories or types of what
spending would be prohibited. Do you know those figures now? Do
you have that?
Ms. Noyes. Congressman, I can tell you that the funding
that PRM provides for non-governmental organizations and for
cash and voucher assistance in Mexico is less than 10 percent
of the total assistance that PRM provides in Mexico. That
funding is directed to about 10 percent of the people who are
seeking asylum in Mexico. We give them very limited amounts of
funding so that they can remain safely in Mexico while awaiting
adjudication of their asylum claims in Mexico.
And I do have a specific figure that I can give you. We
have one NGO partner that provides cash and voucher assistance
in Mexico. It serves 1,845 people and provided $175,000, which
comes to less than $100 per person for the year in Mexico.
Mr. Perry. Okay. I didn't ask for the percentage, but that
is fine. I guess I am supposed to feel good about that. So are
you saying that PRM only provides funding through the NGO or at
the 10-percent level or what have you only to migrants
transiting through Mexico if, if they are remaining in Mexico?
You don't provide any of that funding if they are going to
continue to transit Mexico to the United States?
Ms. Noyes. That is my understanding.
Mr. Perry. That is your understanding. And can we have
that, can this committee request that that documentation
regarding that understanding that you have be provided to us?
Ms. Noyes. We will be happy to followup.
Mr. Perry. Okay. The UNHCR received more funding than any
other organization PRM with funding levels at $46 million. Then
the UNHCR takes that money, and maybe it is a derogatory term
to say funnels, but it distributes those millions of dollars to
other organizations to carry out such services as legal
counseling to asylum seekers and migrants. In 2022, PRM also
funded the U.N. International Organization for Migration, or
IOM, with 30 and a half million for activities in Mexico, which
is an increase of $5 million from 2021.
Do you think--I mean, look, you are dealing with all these
folks in these agencies. Do these millions of dollars provided
by the taxpayers of the United States, do you think they are an
incentive to migrants who--let me ask it, maybe a better way to
ask it this way: that money that is spent through the UNHCR, or
IOM, does it require that migrants be vetted first before that
money is spent on them for legal services or what have you?
Vetting.
Ms. Noyes. Our partners, and this is part of our agreements
with them and the oversight that we conduct with them,
absolutely check on the beneficiaries, figure out who really
needs the assistance, and provide assistance only to those who
really are the most vulnerable. And in Mexico----
Mr. Perry. I am sorry. I am running out of time here.
Everybody is vulnerable when you leave your country and you are
transiting. I think everybody would be vulnerable in Mexico
doing that journey. But I am talking about vetting to come to
the United States of America. Are they vetted prior to this--
that is a lot of money. That is 30 and a half million and 46
million, so 86 and a half million dollars is spent on legal
services, et cetera, for these people transiting Mexico to come
to the United States. Do we require them to be vetted before
they get access to that money in the form of legal services and
other services that they would receive as a result of that
money?
Ms. Noyes. We do not provide that funding in order to help
people go to the United States. On the contrary. That funding
is provided in order to provide assistance to people where they
are. And as I had indicated earlier, it is to buildup the
Mexico asylum agency to provide support for people to remain in
Mexico and seek asylum there. We also provide funding for
assisted voluntary returns for people to return to their
country of origin to cease from those trips----
Mr. Perry. Do you have figures--I appreciate that
narrative. I, for one, don't believe any of it. I think it is
designed to assist and aid people to come to the United States
illegally. That is what it is used for, and I think there is
probably a small percentage that return back to their country.
I also don't believe that anybody is required to be vetted
before receiving the assistance that comes through those
programs. Can you provide any metrics to prove what you just
said?
Ms. Noyes. Certainly. We would be happy to provide
information about the assistance that we have provided to
Mexico's asylum agency, which has grown by 500 percent and has
over 140,000 asylum claims in Mexico for people to remain in
Mexico. We would be very happy to provide further information.
Mr. Perry. So what I am looking for, just so you don't go
back to work and kind of chase your tail----
Mr. Mast. Your time is expired, but you are up for another
round in just a moment, if you would like.
Mr. Perry. I yield.
Mr. Mast. You will be up, I guess, in five to ten, you
know, 10 minutes. So we are moving to another round. Just going
to go back to myself. If we could just make sure to give the
quotes from what State Department told to, quote, neutralize
the language, quote, neutralize the language. Don't neutralize
the program language, neutralize the language of what you are
reporting back to State. And then we wonder why would Humanists
International provide an inaccurate deck of slides to State
Department? Why would they provide, you know, only a small
percentage of the slides instead of the slides that talk about
promoting and expanding atheism in Nepal? Well, because they
were directed by State Department revise the language in all
official grant documents to neutralize the language in all
materials that were submitted to State Department. No changes
to impact the planned activities, no changes to the program
language, no requests there.
So here is my question No. 1: was it you that told them to
neutralize the language?
Mr. Hussain. No, sir. And I share your interest in
understanding the proper interpretation----
Mr. Mast. I will let you get to your response. I am glad
you share my interest. We will go back to something I said in
my opening statement: either you didn't know and you should be
pissed off, or you knew and you didn't care or your people knew
and they didn't care and you should be really pissed off, or
you knew and you tried to hide it. Any of those things should
result in being really, really pissed off. Now please respond.
Mr. Hussain. Yes. I share your interest in understanding
the interpretation of the language. Now, I will say very
clearly that, if there is any effort whatsoever to do anything
to use American tax dollars to promote atheism, that is wrong
and that is not something that I associate myself with or----
Mr. Mast. That is the grant. You acknowledge that that was
the grant, right, and Secretary Verma and Durakoglu all came
back and said, yes, this is what was--I mean, we have the
letter here. I submitted it for the record. They came back and
said, yes, this is what the slides were doing, this is what we
were doing. State Department said it.
Mr. Hussain. To answer your question, Congressman,
respectfully, the grant is a grant that is designed to protect
individuals that hold particular religious faiths or it is
inclusive of individuals that don't hold any particular faith.
It is not a grant that is designed to promote atheism. It is
not permitted----
Mr. Mast. Atheists. Promote atheists.
Mr. Hussain. Right. But if we read the entire title----
Mr. Mast. Promote and defend religious freedom inclusive of
atheists. So promote and defend atheists, promote and defend
humanists, promote and defend non-practicing, non-affiliated
individuals. Nobody told you guys you have to write a grant to
promote atheism. Yes, you can go out there and do a number of
different things. Nobody told you, Congress didn't write a law
that said, hey, go out there and write a grant to promote
atheism.
But to my question, again, were you the one that directed
them to neutralize the language that we would be able to read?
Mr. Hussain. No, Congressman. And that is why we did not
write----
Mr. Mast. Who directed them to neutralize the language that
Congress was going to read?
Mr. Hussain. Look, I am----
Mr. Mast. Who directed? Who was that?
Mr. Hussain. The language I see is revised language in all
official grant documents. If you have the rest of the document,
I would be happy--I am just as interested in the whole
document----
Mr. Mast. Who was it? Who is that team lead program
officer?
Mr. Hussain. I do not know who this meeting was with in
December----
Mr. Mast. So this is new information to you that somebody
was directed to neutralize? You are not familiar with this?
Mr. Hussain. Neutralize the language in the official grant
documents. I am more interested in learning what that----
Mr. Mast. That doesn't answer. Is this new information to
you, or did you know this already?
Mr. Hussain. I haven't seen these bullets that are on the
board.
Mr. Mast. Okay. This is directly from Humanists
International. And, by the way, let's take a step back in time.
We have gone back and forth in a lot of different rounds, but I
want to go back to, remember, this grant came about in 2021. It
was awarded. June 22, Congress wrote the first letter
about this saying, hey, we have concerns about this grant, we
were stonewalled. The first correspondence went out from your
office. You were there at the time in 1922 where the
implementing partner expressed concerns to State Department
about our oversight letter. Humanists International said, hey,
what is going on with Congress, you know, they are up our tail,
what is going on with this? And they were told by State
Department we are taking care of this. That was the quote by
State Department, we are taking care of this.
Now, again, fast-forward in time to just a little while and
we know that in December 2022 you guys said neutralize the
language. You said you didn't do it. You said this is new to
you, that you didn't know somebody directed them to neutralize
the language. Should somebody be fired for telling them to
neutralize the language?
Mr. Hussain. Congressman, that is a very serious action. I
would want to know what it means in this context to neutralize
the language. It says all materials in official grant
documents. That is not the same thing as slides. I want to know
exactly what----
Mr. Mast. Don't change the slides that you are delivering,
don't change the program materials, just change what you are
reporting back to us is what it says.
Mr. Hussain. I am interested in knowing how we can
interpret that to mean slides.
Mr. Mast. Let's talk about----
Mr. Hussain. If you have the rest of the document, I would
love to see it. And I am just as interested as you are----
Mr. Mast. We are going to leave this right up-front so you
can look at it, reflect on it, have some more opinions about it
when I get back to you in about 10 minutes after my colleagues
ask some more questions. I am now going to recognize Ranking
Member Crow for 5 minutes.
Mr. Crow. Thank you, Chairman. I am sorry you had to sit
through that, Mr. Hussain. Do you know why you have never seen
this? And that is a rhetorical question. It is because this,
what you were just asked about, is the transcript from a
transcribed interview done by staff of this committee that has
never been released to the public. So you have never seen this.
Mr. Hussain. That is correct.
Mr. Crow. The public has never seen this. And despite
repeated attempts by the minority to get the majority to
release this, they have repeatedly refused to do so. So this
was an interview that was done by the committee of a former
employee of the organization in question, not one of your
employees, not one of the State Department employees. I just
wanted to clarify what it is we are talking about and why you
might be confused about what you are being asked about because
you haven't seen it, nobody outside of this committee has seen
it.
Mr. Mast. Do you want to yield for a clarifying point?
Mr. Crow. Sure.
Mr. Mast. As far as I know, no Democrat representative
showed up to that.
Mr. Crow. Oh, Okay. And just to clarify mine, it wasn't a
transcript, it was written answers. So it actually wasn't an
actual interview, it was written answers submitted but not
released to the public. It is my understanding that this has
not been released by the committee. Is that----
Mr. Mast. It could have been released to your side----
Mr. Crow. Yes, but we have asked for it----
Mr. Mast. I will get you an answer about whether the
broader public----
Mr. Crow. In the meantime, because it is my understanding
that you all have not released it. In any event, you haven't
seen it. And do you know what this language, neutralize, mean?
Is this language you use?
Mr. Hussain. It is designed to protect the religious
freedom of all individuals inclusive of atheists, and there are
organizations that may be humanist that are doing work and
training----
Mr. Crow. My question is different, though. This language,
this neutralization language, do you have any idea what that
means?
Mr. Hussain. No. And I am trying----
Mr. Crow. And is that language you have ever used?
Mr. Hussain. No.
Mr. Crow. That language that you've directed your staff to
ever use?
Mr. Hussain. No, especially not in the context that is
being implied here that neutralize might mean something to do
with allowing promotion of atheism.
Mr. Crow. And context matters a lot, which is why we have
asked for these written answers to be released, because I will
tell you why context matters: because the written answers also
say something interesting. And I don't have one of these big
boards. I wish I did. But the written answers say this: this
same individual said in the written answers that she understood
the obligation, quote, ``to not use funding to promote or
proselytize any religious or non-religious belief over another
but, rather, to promote the inclusive right of religious
freedom, including non-religious, for all.''
Mr. Hussain. That is correct.
Mr. Crow. Specifically clarifying that was their
understanding.
Mr. Hussain. That is correct.
Mr. Crow. That is also is in the written answers, and that
is why context matters. Did you guys get any clarification on
whether or not these written answers have been released?
Mr. Mast. Yes, I do. Not released to the public, and my
understanding is Dem staff received the same offer, did not
want to make these thing public for basically the same reason
that you all asked for the dissent cable in Afghanistan. You
guys didn't want certain names released.
Mr. Crow. Well, names, yes, to protect individuals against
reprisals. But we have repeatedly wanted these, for this reason
actually, because it allows----
Mr. Mast. But that is the----
Mr. Crow. We do have them. There is no doubt about that,
which is actually why I have this quote, why I have this
context, which is important and why I asked the question and
why I think it is important that the public see it and for you
all, frankly, to see it.
Mr. Mast. If you would like their names released now, just
make that request----
Mr. Crow. No, we are talking about something different. I
think it is important in all of these contexts to protect
people's names because we don't want people to be subject to
fear and intimidation or reprisal. But the content, I think, is
important for folks to see.
Ms. Dyer, you are doing a phenomenal job today. In 40
seconds, are there any stories that you would like to tell
because your department does just amazing, amazing work to
combat human trafficking. I would love to just give her a
minute to chime in here.
Ms. Dyer. Well, I appreciate the opportunity to speak and
really just to sort of, like, thank you guys. I really feel
like the successes that we have had in the Trafficking in
Persons office is due to hardworking staff, bipartisan support
from Congress, and really working together in partnership to
both prevent the crime, prosecute the bad guys, and protect the
victims. It is an honor to get to work on this issue. It is an
honor to get to collaborate with all of you and happy to answer
any further questions that you have.
Mr. Crow. Thank you. Chairman, I yield back.
Mr. Mast. You have been very patient. I now recognize
Representative Perry.
Mr. Perry. Thanks, Mr. Chairman. Ms. Noyes, I think, from
my standpoint for this committee, I misspoke. It was 76 and a
half million--I should never do math in public--that I counted
up there. But you said 10 percent essentially, but whether it
is 10 percent or whatever of the 76 and a half million, I would
like to know if you can provide for us how many recipients, how
many of those recipients were actually returned to their
country? How many of the recipients were vetted, how many were
not vetted, prior to receiving the funding? And how many of
these recipients remained in Mexico while they sought their
asylum claim? I think that would at least help illuminate.
I don't want to be unduly critical. I represent, just like
everybody else here, 760,000 people. They get up early in the
morning, they go to work, they are paying their taxes. We are
borrowing money every single time we vote here to pay for all
this stuff. We are borrowing. This is all borrowed money. And,
you know, I can't speak for anybody else's district, but the
district that I represent people can't afford their groceries,
their gasoline, their electricity bills, their daycare bills,
their normal daily needs. And when we are spending that kind of
money, that amount of money, I would say it encourages people
to come to the United States but maybe you are right and maybe
I am wrong. But we should be able, I should be able to tell my
bosses this is where your tax money is being spent, this is how
it is being used, and right now I can't do that. So I
appreciate that.
Mr. Mast. Mr. Perry, can I borrow a moment from you?
Mr. Perry. Absolutely. I yield to the chair.
Mr. Mast. I was frustrated in your last dialog because Ms.
Van Noyse--sorry. Valls Noyes--I didn't mean to say that
incorrectly--had a dialog with Representative Issa in which the
specifics of the dialog, please correct me if I am wrong, were
they were funding a group. That same group was providing
literal materials on how to circumvent U.S. immigration law,
but they were paying the same group to do other things. So it
is not what we were paying them to do. They were using other
moneys to literally give these documents on how to circumvent
U.S. immigration law. We were paying for the other stuff. Yes,
it was done at the same events. Yes, they were invited to the
same audience. Maybe they were at an audience for, I don't
know, receiving information on something, and they were given
that information by this group, happened to be paid by the
U.S., but they were also delivering this.
It was frustrating to me that when you were asking your
questions about whether they are doing different things,
funding these groups and teaching them how to circumvent
immigration law. Do I have a misunderstanding of your dialog
there? Yes, you funded this group that was directing people to
circumvent immigration law. Your claim is that you were not
funding them to do that. They must have got the money from
somewhere else to do that; but, yes, they were doing that at
State Department-sponsored events or where there was an
audience for United States Department of State.
Ms. Noyes. Congressman, although we did not fund the
slides, it is absolutely true that nothing in those slides was
intended to circumvent U.S. immigration law. In fact, it was to
provide correct information about U.S. immigration law, as
opposed to the garbage that smugglers and traffickers put out.
And the information in those slides is all information that is
readily available on multiple U.S. Government websites.
Mr. Mast. If it was such corrective information, why
wouldn't you want to fund that? You were very specific that you
didn't fund that.
Ms. Noyes. Because we only funded that organization to
provide support for asylum procedures in Mexico.
Mr. Mast. And Mr. Issa did speak again very specifically
about where that group was directing people to circumvent U.S.
immigration law, and, yes, you happen to be funding them, as
well. Certainly a frustrating point----
Ms. Noyes. But, Congressman Perry, if I could, I appreciate
your question about who is receiving cash and voucher
assistance in Mexico funded our partners, UNHCR and IOM. I can
tell you that other countries also contribute funding to those
organizations for cash and voucher assistance, so we will need
to do some analysis to figure out how much of that funding came
from American taxpayers versus other taxpayers. But I am very
happy to take the question back, and I appreciate it.
Mr. Perry. I apologize for not using your full Valls Noyes,
ma'am.
Ms. Noyes. Noyes is fine. Thanks.
Mr. Perry. Okay. But now, based on that information, and,
look, we get that other countries fund some of this stuff; and
God bless them, that's great. But I am a representative of the
American people, so that is my interest. Is there a prohibition
in the State Department for funding organizations that would--
these people are coming across the border illegally, right?
Unless they are vetted and they have waited for their asylum
claim, they are coming across the border illegally. Is there
anything in State Department documentation that prohibits the
use of those funds to be used to inform or provide care,
comfort, whatever, to people that are crossing the border
illegally?
Ms. Noyes. The 2024 appropriation passed by Congress made
clear to us that the United States may not provide funding to
assist with provision of information about U.S. immigration
proceedings or about legal representation in the United States,
and I have sent letters to all of our partners explicitly
pointing that out to them. So, yes, as a result of the
legislation passed by this Congress, that is the case.
Mr. Perry. All right. Thank you, Ms. Valls Noyes.
Mr. Mast. The chair now recognizes Representative Burchett.
Mr. Burchett. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you all for
being here. I think I came in and introduced myself earlier as
the chairman, but I had the wrong office or the wrong deal. But
it really didn't matter. I take it upon myself to confuse
people on a daily time, so consider yourself one of those.
Ms. Valls Noyes--did I get that right?
Ms. Noyes. Honestly, Noyes, just Noyes is fine.
Mr. Burchett. No, I am going to get it right. If it says
right here, I am going to try to do it because nobody ever gets
my daggone name right and it kind of ticks me off sometimes
How much money does the Bureau of Population, Refugees, and
Migration give in cash and voucher assistance to immigrants?
Ms. Noyes. Congressman, cash and voucher assistance is a
well-proven internationally recognized tool to support
vulnerable people. We provide cash and voucher assistance all
over the world. I was recently in Cote d'Ivoire where our
partners were providing cash assistance to Burkinabe refugees
who had had to flee the fighting there. We provide cash and
voucher assistance to migrants all over the world.
And I will give you a specific example. The 135 Nicaraguan
political prisoners who left that country 2 weeks ago that
Ambassador Hussain was mentioning earlier, we provided them
with $180 each because they needed, you know, when they got out
of Nicaragua, they had nothing. So they arrived in Guatemala.
We got them lodging, we got them food. They got standard-issue
sweatshirts. But we gave them $180 each so that they could buy
underwear, shoes, clothing that was distinct from that----
Mr. Burchett. We just give it to them to spend. This isn't
a got you. You are just educating me.
Ms. Noyes. We give it to them to spend to support their
dignity, to support their specific needs, while we are
processing them for more durable solutions elsewhere. And we
are very grateful to the government of Guatemala for its
support for these political prisoners, people who have fled
unthinkable persecution.
Mr. Burchett. Yes, ma'am.
Ms. Noyes. And they told us, these political prisoners told
us that that cash and voucher assistance--it is $180 each. It
is not much money. They told us it was a gift from heaven.
Mr. Burchett. What if it is used on something that isn't
approved? Is there any way to track that? Is there----
Ms. Noyes. The cash and voucher assistance is given with
clear stipulations about what it can be used for, whether it is
food or medicine. It is also given with stipulations about
where it can be used.
Mr. Burchett. But there is no way to stop it. Say they were
going to go----
Ms. Noyes. In fact, there are ways to stop it. We do very
robust post-distribution monitoring of this assistance----
Mr. Burchett. But the money is already--say they buy
something illegal, go to a liquor store, whatever, buy a bottle
and drink the bottle. There is no way to get that back.
Ms. Noyes. When you find that there have been any
violations of the terms under which they received it, we cut it
off.
Mr. Burchett. How do we know that this money and how do we
ensure that it is not going to Mexican cartels?
Ms. Noyes. We do very robust post-distribution monitoring.
We talk with the people who receive the money. We talk with the
businesses where they are using the funding, to the landlords
that they are paying rent to. We check up on how that funding
is being used. And, again, if there is ever any indication that
this money is flowing to criminal organizations, further
victimizing people who are already persecuted, we cut it off
and take steps. And if criminal investigations are needed, we
cooperate with authorities on how to followup on those.
Mr. Burchett. All right. You used the term robust more than
once, but I still worry that if this money is already expended,
you can't pull it back. Do you ever worry that giving people
money, the State Department is paying some of these people to
enter our country illegally or, even worse, that you are paying
the cartels to engage in human trafficking?
Ms. Noyes. We give them the money so that they can stay
where they are safely and until we can help them find other
solutions, like integration in the countries where they are.
Ninety-four percent of migrants in our hemisphere who have left
their country remain in other countries of our hemisphere. They
are not coming to the United States. And, absolutely, we are
always concerned about protecting people from criminal
organizations. And that is why all of us sitting at this table,
together with our colleagues in the International Narcotics and
Law enforcement Bureau, our colleagues at USAID, we all work
very hard together, coordinate regularly, to try and prevent
those kinds of abuses.
Mr. Burchett. Thank you. I will yield the remainder 12
seconds back to you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Mast. Oh, thank you.
Mr. Burchett. Thank you all for your testimony.
Mr. Mast. Are those quote often done in cash or pre-paid
Visas? What is used more?
Ms. Noyes. It really varies on the context. In Poland, for
example, we provide cash and voucher assistance for Ukrainian
women who are fleeing with small children. They would get bank
accounts set up with funding for them. In Cote d'Ivoire, where
I was a couple of weeks ago, we actually gave out cash because
there are no ATM cards or machines, there are no places where
they can use cash cards. So it really varies on the context.
Mr. Mast. How many countries do you give out cash and
vouchers?
Ms. Noyes. I would have to check on that. We can get back
to you.
Mr. Mast. Roughly. Give me an estimate.
Ms. Noyes. It is a best practice internationally, so I
would say it is probably at least in the dozens.
Mr. Mast. At least in the dozens. Thank you. I appreciate
that. All right. The ranking member and myself have discussed
we are essentially going to wrap up now. He was kind enough to
say I could have essentially another round just to give Ms.
Dyer a little bit of time here because you haven't had,
unfortunately, a great deal of time. But we would love to hear
you just expound a little bit upon some of the grants and
programs that you have been working on and your oversight of
them, as well. And thank you for your patience here.
Ms. Dyer. Thank you for having me. I think there is two
that I would love the opportunity to sort of flag for you. One
of them is our Child Protection Compacts. This is one of our
most impactful and innovative grant programs, and I am
mentioning it because it is so impactful that we have actually
replicated it into a new program. So our Child Protection
Compact program is a partnership with another government, and
that government has to have skin in the game. They have to give
either personnel or staff or a building. So it is an actual
partnership between the U.S. Government and that other
government.
We have successfully created, for example, in the
Philippines a Philippines Internet Crimes Against Children
Center. These are thing that are super sustainable and that
last long after our government money has ended. In Ghana, we
created a shelter for child victims, and this program
successfully removed numerous victims of child sexual
exploitation and child forced labor. And in Jamaica, which is
another example, we successfully created a national referral
mechanism and child-friendly spaces. These are so important
because these are three examples of Child Protection Compacts
that have ended but the good work, thanks to work from Congress
and money from Congress, continues to benefit the community
even after we have gone.
So that is one of the options that I would love to just
sort of highlight and thank you for your partnership on. It was
launched in 2015, and it is congressionally mandated. And it is
one that we continue to operate. And we just signed our newest
Child Protection Compact in Romania, so thank you for the
opportunity to brag on it.
Mr. Mast. Anything about how you oversee those grants?
Ms. Dyer. Yes. We engage in what we consider a really
robust monitoring and evaluation. It is, in fact, integral to
all of our programs, and it begins with the original
application. So the application has to include a results
monitoring plan, and that is actually one of the criteria that
we use about whether or not we are even going to fund that
proposal.
We continue then to assign it. We have a monitoring and
evaluation team in our office that works directly with those
implementers, and we work with them to have common performance
indicators, which then we followup on every single quarter. And
it is funny. I was a prior grantee from the Trafficking in
Persons office, and so it is so interesting to be in a position
now where I am overseeing those grants. I knew the careful
monitoring and cooperation that I had back in--I hate to date
myself--2012 and 2013. And so it is wonderful to kind of bring
it full circle and make sure that we are overseeing these and
being really good stewards of the money.
And I feel like we have done a really good job. We have
even instituted a two-phase application process, which is
something that we don't always have. But it really benefits
both us as the grantor, as well as the grantee. So thank you
for the opportunity to talk about.
Mr. Mast. Thank you very much. And I think bipartisanly we
are working on legislation to make sure that we improve
transparency on these grants, and we look forward to hearing
more from you and working with you on making that better across
the board, across State Department.
In that, I will say I thank each of you for your testimony,
and I thank all of the members, although it is only Ranking
Member Crow and myself at this point, for their questions.
Member of the subcommittee may have some additional questions
for the witnesses, and we will ask you to respond to those in
writing.
I recognize you for any closing statement that you might
have.
Mr. Crow. Thank you, Chairman. Thank you for calling this
hearing today. And I want to just thank the witnesses again for
coming, for being candid, for telling the stories of your
departments and divisions and the hard work of the men and
women that are under your purview who do work that is essential
for human rights, for promotion of fundamental rights around
the world.
And, you know, I think it sometimes gets lost that this
isn't just charity, right? The American people and the American
taxpayer isn't give this just out of charity, although there is
a very real moral reason for us to do this that I support. But
this is also fundamental to our national security. It actually
sets us apart from our adversaries. You know, our adversaries
who are trying to rewrite the rules of the road and undermine
democracy and fundamental rights, you know, autocrats and
strongmen around the world, they are afraid of these efforts
because they realize that if you all are successful in what you
do, you empower people, you protect vulnerable populations, you
give a voice to the voiceless, you allow people to have
fundamental religious freedom however they choose to observe
that, you help stabilize populations, you combat trafficking of
humans. If you are successful in doing what you do, you
undermine their efforts to suppress people, and I think this is
a really important point for people to understand that you are
doing work that is in the interests of the American people that
promotes stability, that promotes security, that promotes
economy, and actually ties directly back to Americans' ability
to have fruitful, positive, fulfilling, and economically viable
lives by making sure that people everywhere are safe and
secure, as well.
So I thank you for those efforts, and I yield back.
Mr. Mast. Thank you, Ranking Member Crow. I appreciate your
testimoneys today, and we will just followup by saying tell us
the truth, tell us the truth promptly about what is taking
place. It is not acceptable to stonewall Congress for a month,
12 months, 24 months. It is not acceptable to go out there, and
the American people are not stupid or naive. Things are not
always more than meets the eye. Sometimes, it is very clear
what something means. When State Department writes to an
implementing partner to neutralize language but don't
neutralize the program activities, the American people aren't
stupid. They can read that, they can read it directly at this
point because it is absolutely public information at this
point, and see, hey, they don't want us to know something, they
don't want us to see exactly what is going on. And they are the
ones that pay all of our salaries. They are the ones that pay
every dollar that you might spread abroad, whether it is to
expand atheism in Nepal or whether it is to give somebody $180
to buy underwear or something else, whether it is a prepaid
debit card or whether it is cash, whether it is somebody
printing out a pamphlet telling them how to circumvent U.S.
immigration law, all those dollars are coming from the American
taxpayer. And our No. 1 responsibility as members of the
People's House, the House of Representatives, is to make sure
that the people of the United States of America are not the
voiceless ones. What we have from the American people is not
charity in any way whatsoever, not in any single sense of the
word. We should be able to ensure that, if any dollar is spent,
we can tell the American people, No. 1, what do the American
people need from those that are getting something from us; what
are they asking for from us because, as the old saying goes,
let's not give them chicken if they are asking for pizza; and
does what we are providing get America what it needs out of
that relationship? Those questions have to be asked constantly,
and we are going to continue to ask those questions as a
committee.
Again, I appreciate your testimoneys, and we look forward
to seeing you all another day. This committee is adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 12 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]
APPENDIX
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