Mike McCaul

I think it is a shame for an Administration official to make a smart-aleck remark like that when real people are in jeopardy of losing their jobs.

I want to assure Ms. McCarthy not to worry--Americans are not getting that impression.

I agree with Madam Chairwoman. That is certainly good news. That is where the Congress in our oversight working with you actually is a positive experience.

I am glad that after 10 years later, we are making progress on our exit program. When do you plan to have that fully implemented?

Fifteen of the hijackers came from Saudi Arabia. When I look at the Visa Security Program, it does not have 11 of the top 20 high-risk posts included, including Saudi Arabia, which seems sort of interesting to me.

I would hope that we have an opportunity I think to work together on that effort as well in a bipartisan effort in the Harris County delegation.

This committee will be having an authorization bill I believe coming up in the fall.

Finally, I know I have taken more than my time, but I want to ask Mr. Caldwell and the Sheriff, in terms of your recommendations on what needs to be done to ensure that the type of tanker explosion I showed earlier does not occur in the…

I hope that, Mr. Green, you and I and the Ranking Member would like to do this as well, to work on this effort to get more of the funding back.

One-third of our economy is associated with global trade, and that trade comes and goes through our ports.

I think that it really is a model for the Nation, and it was so successful that it moved us up in terms of the port security grants from No. 3 to No. 2 in the Nation.

I look forward to examining the similarities and differences between security measures here in Houston and those in the Port of Boston.

Although much attention is given to aviation security since 9/11, and rightly so, we cannot ignore the very real potential of threats that exist in the maritime sector.

Osama bin Laden's 'war of a thousand cuts' on the U.S. economy has always been a key facet of his strategy.

I will tell you, both Chairman McCaul and I realize that you cannot conduct proper oversight in a vacuum.

I would say if I had to guess what percentage of DHS's budget that they strategically source that they could, I would say it is less than 1 percent.

I think what you are talking about is strategic sourcing, which is how do you leverage that buying power.

The best way to protect American citizens is take a share of the Afghanistan security fund assistance of $12 billion or so and redirect that to homeland security so that we can have the resources that we need.

DHS has way too many of the same people buying the same thing but at different components.

Just yesterday, the Washington Post reported that DHS plans to spend more than $300 million 'on radiation detection equipment that has not been fully tested and may not work.'

With our Nation's record debt approaching $15 trillion, we need this now more than ever before.

As an oversight committee our job is to help reduce the cost of Government.

After expending nearly $1 billion DHS cancelled the program because 'SBInet has had continued and repeated technical problems, cost overruns, and schedule delays.'

The Government Accountability Office (GAO) has identified technology acquisition at DHS as an area of high risk.

So they keep changing the game. When you go to one place, they go somewhere else.