i understand why this is frustrating. i do. it is also the case that these policies that i am referring to about my inability to discuss ongoing investigations and certainly internal deliberations related to ongoing investigations are policies that have not only been in place for many years multiple administrations and both parties, but, in fact, these policies were strengthened under the last administration and that my predecessor was faulted in a fairly scathing inspector general's report for not following. >> you have an obligation to call it out.

this oversight hearing with fbi director, christopher wray, taking a brief break here is appearing before the senate judiciary committee. live coverage here on c-span3. >> the committee will resume.

>> thank you, mr. chairman. all i can say is, it's good to have you back. director wray, you testified that no court has held that the fourth amendment applies 2702 searches, but in 2019, the second circuit explained that 702 inquiries, "does have important fourth amendment implications" and remanded the case for further review. i know that you testified that you have put in place various protections and accountability features to prevent the misuse or abuse of 702, but my understanding is that prior to your putting in place these kinds of protections, there was something in the order of 2 million u.s. citizen inquiries under 702, and that has gone

down to 700. that is still a lot of queries. my colleague, chris , asked, why do you have these protocols in place, and courts have said you are doing a good job with regard to abuse of 702, but what can prevent another administration from removing these protocols? in fact, i know that during the trump years, that his administration, they interpreted the words derived from in a very broad way, so i do think there are number of us who are concerned about another administration not having -- not paying as much attention to abuses as you have testified, and even now, i also have some concerns relating to the u.s. citizen inquiries under 702, but let me turn to another matter. you did note that there is a

heightened environment for foreign terrorism. in your testimony, though, you noted that the top domestic tourism threat we face continues to be from racially motivated violent extremists and antigovernment or anti- authority violent extremists. can you explain how the tech companies, and a lot of this are people that have been radicalized online. can you explain how the tech companies could be better partners in rooting out domestic violent extremism? >> some of this goes to the exchanges that we have already had about the encryption issue, and when individuals we have found, historically, moved to discussing truly operational, actual violent activity. they tend to move to encrypted

platforms, which, if those encrypted platforms are not designed in a way to be responsive to a warrant, that activity, just like the child exploitation we talked about earlier, would be beyond reach, so we need companies to work with us on that. that is one. second, the companies have their own terms of service and actions that they can take on their own platforms, or actions that they could take to help reduce abuse. but, most important, i think, on social media platforms, we need people who are on those platforms, who are americans, who see threats of violence -- again, that's what this is about, threats of violence, to alert law enforcement if they see it. >> certainly, we can do that, but as you said, with the reporting of hate crimes, these are all very underreported, and i think there are concerns about , possibly, limiting the

liability protections under section 230. would that be another way to get these platforms to pay attention to content on their platforms? >> without weighing in on specific legislative proposals, i would say that these are gigantic companies now, with all kinds of activity, some very positive, some very negative, that happens on their platforms, and just like any industry, it makes sense to me that they should take responsibility for what happens on their platforms. their duties, unlike ours, unlike this committees, their duties are to maximize profit for the shareholders. there is nothing wrong with that being their duty, but that is a very different responsibility then all of us have to protect the american people. >> it does sound as though we need to make some changes to section 230, liability protections, and i think we

need to go there. let me turn to another important issue. sex trafficking remains a problem in hawaii. in hawaii, sex trafficking disproportionately affects the native hawaiian per -- community. they represent 67% of trafficking victims, and 37% of child trafficking cases in hawaii, and earlier this year, the fbi launched operation not forgotten to help solve cases of missing and murdered indigenous people. i think that is a really important step for the fbi to take, and prior to that, you also have in place operation cross-country, a 13 year program highlighting some of these issues. can you tell us a bit more about what these programs do and what you hope to accomplish? >> these programs are designed

to both rescue victims of human trafficking, and to take down the predators, who engage in the human trafficking. and, we take a very victim centered, victim focused approach, so in addition to rescuing the victims and arresting the predators, our victim services personnel try to engage with the victims to connect them to social services and things like that, and we recognize it's a long road of recovery for them, even after they are rescued from the trafficking itself, and we are trying to help get them on the right path that way. part of the reason things like operation cross-country are combined the way they are is to raise awareness for victims and witnesses, and deterrence for predators. >> i know that operation cross- country resulted in the finding of some six missing children in

hawaii. i have asked you this before, regarding focusing on native hawaiian women and girls that are trafficked, and is operation not forgotten in hawaii? >> is it in hawaii? i think operation not forgotten , if i recall the name correctly, there are very specific operations in hawaii at our honolulu field office, and they do some great work in the human trafficking space. i'm proud of the work they've done for your community, your citizens, your constituents of the state of hawaii. >> thank you. i appreciate the effort. i'm glad that some of my colleagues have asked about what more we can do regarding the uprise in anti-semitism in our country, especially on college campuses. thank you for whatever you can do to assist in that regard. thank you mr. chairman. >> thank you, senator hirono. senator holly.

>> i noticed with interest in your written testimony, that you said, and i'm quoting you now, the fbi uses all tools available at its disposal to combat domestic terrorism, which now, apparently, includes the crime of being catholic. let's talk a little bit about the fbi's egregious targeting of catholic americans. you have repeatedly been asked about the memo generated by the richmond field office, we now know in collaboration with multiple other field offices about recruiting sources in catholic churches. you have repeatedly said that no human sources were approached. this is due on july 12 in the house. you were asked directly by jim jordan, do you think that priests ought to be approached to get information on parishioners? you said, no, sir. you went on to say, we do not recruit open or operate human sources. we do not report on religious organizations. you went on to say, this product, meaning the richmond

memo, has not resulted in any investigative action, but now we know that in fact, fbi agents did approach a priest and a choir director to ask them to inform on parishioners. so, were you lied to when you gave this testimony or were you lying to congress? 's buy >> neither. your question conflates two different things. that is the intelligence product itself, which the richmond field office created. it was written by analysts in richmond, reviewed by people in richmond, and captioned richmond field office product. separately from that, there was an investigation of a specific individual, who was amassing molotov cocktails and posting about killing people, and it does not surprise me that there were people who knew that subject in that investigation,

that is the guy building the molotov cocktails and trying to kill people, that people talked to the witnesses who knew that person, and i think the product , which cites that investigation, is actually pretty transparent about exactly what i just said. >> i don't think so at all. the only reason we know this is a whistleblower has come forward and told the house under oath that the fbi went and interviewed priests and choir directors in the richmond area. the house goes on to say that the fbi has repeatedly refused to disclose this information. the only reason we know it is because a whistleblower came forward, just like the only reason we know about this memo is because a whistleblower came forward with it. how many other parishes around the country have priests or choir directors been approached? by the way, are catholic wires breeding grounds for domestic terrorism? is this your latest theory? how many other parishes have fbi agents approaching priests and choir directors to ask about parishioners? >> look, senator, we do not and

will not conduct investigations based on anybody's exercise of the constitutional -- >> you have done so and your memo explicitly asks for it! your memo labels traditional catholics as racially and ethnically motivated violent extremist in need of investigation. you have a list of churches, a list in the memo. you have repeatedly said, we don't target churches. we don't list churches. they are listed in the memo, so how many other parishes have you gone to to talk to choir directors, for heaven sake? >> no, i don't know the answer to that question, but i can tell you that we don't investigate people for their exercising of constitutionally protected religious expression. a particular intelligence product that is, as soon as i saw it, i was aghast. i had it withdrawn. >> you were a gas? oh, really, what to be done about it? did you fire the people that

wrote it? have you fired anybody involved? >> senator, if you will give me a chance -- >> that the yes or no. have you fired anyone involved in the writing of that outrageous memo, about which you have frequently misled the public? >> the individuals involved -- >> have you fired anyone? >> just a minute. they have not engaged any bad faith conduct, and in fact, senator, a number of the individuals involved in writing that product in the richmond office were themselves catholic, so the notion is -- >> oh, it's a get out of jail free card pic. they are immune. we shouldn't ask questions about it. you haven't done a darn thing. you haven't fired anybody. what the house founders, you admonished them. they were admonished, and the respected supervisors were told to engage with the human resources division to ensure that deficiencies were addressed. oh, i feel much better.

they have been sent to bed without food. good heavens, director. this is one of the most outrageous targeting's you have mobilized. you have mobilized against traditional catholics, whatever the heck that means, and you told us you have not fired a single person. it gets worse. your richmond field office, they thought there was nothing wrong with this. the house interviewed the head of the richmond field office. he testified. it's all here in the public report. i refer you to it. page 12, 13, 14. he saw no problem with this. he said he thought it was fine. in fact, we have an internal memo of members of the field office high-fiving one peer reviewer, and i think this is a great product. i really enjoyed the read. do you have a problem with systemic victory against catholics in the fbi? >> no. >> what are you going to do about this?

are you going to fire these people or not? >> those individuals have all been admonished, and if you would let me finish my answer, it is all going into their annual performance reviews, which has direct impact on their compensation, among other things. >> oh, i see. the 60 million american catholics, who now learn that your fbi has recommended that priests be recruiters and informants. your fbi has gone to priests, choir directors, but we are to feel better because you have admonished them for their wrongdoing. >> you, again, are conflating two different things. >> in your testimony, you said categorically, we do not, we do not go to priests and asked them about their parishioners. you didn't say, we haven't, we won't, you said, we don't. as it turns out, you do, and you kept it from the public. you deliberately misled congress about it, and the only reason we know about it is because a whistleblower came forward. >> i fundamentally disagree

with your characterization. >> there are no characterizations of facts, and i resent the fact that you have violated the spirit, of the first amendment, and used your law enforcement agency against catholics in this nation. let me ask you about one of the thing. last time you were here, you had to leave early to take a jet to your vacation in the adirondacks. now, let me ask you this, a whistleblower tells us that you also maintain a home in atlanta, to which you fly on a regular basis. i'm told by this whistleblower from the fbi that you use the fbi jet to make that travel. is that correct? >> all of my travel, personal or work related is required to be done on fbi planes. that is long-standing policy that goes back over a decade. >> i will take that as a yes. the whistleblower says that you regularly require the jet, based in manassas, to be flown to d.c. because wray doesn't

like to sit in traffic. is that accurate? >> no, that is not accurate. >> he says that you only pay for the lowest cost commercial trinket for the atlanta d.c. trip, when it costs 20,000 or 30,000 to operate the jet. is that correct? >> the reimbursement that i provide is set by policy, and i follow that policy, which goes back over a decade, and has been chronicled in a gsa report from 2013. >> and you provide all of those records to this committee? >> whatever information is appropriate. absolutely. >> everything we ask for is appropriate. >> we will follow-up with you about providing information. >> senator butler. >> thank you mr. chair, thank you director wray for returning. iso c8. i appreciate you for your service, and those who serve under your leadership for doing the work to protect the country. i have a couple different topics i would like to talk with you

about. one, concerning what it is that your team might be learning and/or seeing post dobbs decision. after 50 years of precedent set by roe v. wade, we got a dobbs decision, where the preliminary data has shown that there is an increase in attacks against medical clinics that provide abortion related healthcare. in my own state of california, this dangerous behavior has reared its head as of late. there were three men involved in conspiring to firebomb a reproductive health clinic. talk to me a little bit, director wray, and share with the american public what the fbi, your agency, has been doing post dobbs decision? what trends are you seeing relative to the threats facing reproductive health clinics?

>> i'm happy to get going on. some things you might expect, some things you might not expect. in the category of things you might expect, certainly, we continue to see violence against a variety of establishments, motivated by views on abortion. you mentioned a few cases in your question, and we pursue those cases on the criminal side through the face act, and in some instances, if there is more of a terrorism angle, we might be pursuing explosives charges through a joint terrorism task force. that part you would probably expect, and that continues at pace. what you might not expect, though, is that of the investigations that have been opened, based on tips and leads an activity that we have seen since the leak of the dobbs decision, is that, actually, we've seen a huge uptick in violence against pro-life

facilities, not just abortion clinics and so forth. we just recently had a case where we had an individual, who had tried to firebomb a pro- life facility in madison, wisconsin. our folks did some great work with dna off of a burrito to apprehend the suspect. and so, we've seen violence on both sides of the issue. the reason i bring that up is because it's important for americans to understand. i don't care, we don't care what side of the abortion issue you are on. you don't get to engage in violence to express your views. that's where we get involved, and that's where the line gets crossed. >> are there -- let me move to a different topic. there has been a lot of conversation and questions asked of you today that you have responded to relative to the inquiries in hate crimes

directed towards the jewish community, directed towards the muslim community, and i too join my colleagues in the concern and appreciate the work of the fbi in those areas, and the last time you were before this committee, i asked you specifically about hate crimes directed towards the lgbtq+ community. there is continued data that continues to illuminate the fact there is increased hate crimes directed towards the aapi community in the country, and it continues to be noted and documented, the rise in hate crimes directed towards black americans in the country. here is my question. what is the work the fbi is doing directed towards hate crimes, generally? what are you doing? what can you do, and what can we do as a congress, as a committee to better equip you to help to increase both the

reporting, as well as the prevention of these crimes, directed and motivated by hate? >> i can speak more to what we can do, and what we are doing. both on the investigative side, we are making a conscious point of trying to work with our law enforcement partners to find the cases, to pursue them, even if federal charges, because of the particularities of what the federal statute requires, even if federal charges are not easily prosecuted, or if state charges are brought. we don't just check out. we at the fbi continue to help local state partners to ensure there is accountability and justice brought through state charges. we have elevated civil rights crimes, including, specifically, hate crimes, as the highest priority within that to a national threat priority over the last couple of years, and that has increased the amount of resources we can

devote to it. in addition, you mentioned reporting and prevention. one of the things we know about hate crimes across the whole spectrum of victims is that they are underreported. and so, one of the things that we are doing, and other public figures could do, is to try to reach out to individual communities, to educate them about hate crimes and where they can go to report it. if they are witness, a victim, they know where to go and what to do about it. we also engage with local law enforcement, because sometimes they don't necessarily recognize what to do with individual fact patterns that might become a hate crime. those are some of the things that we are doing to try to increase the fidelity of the statistics on this, because that helps us identify trends and figure out how to allocate resources and investigative priority. it is investigative. it is support.

it's outreach. it's education, raising awareness. >> last question that i have, director, and thank you for that. since i have been a member of this body, this is the second time that i've gotten the opportunity to talk with you, and each time, each instance, you have raised your concern and heightened awareness about the potential threat of violence directed towards this country from other nationstates. i want to talk a little bit about attacks on our electric grid. particularly, in the past two years, the u.s. has seen a record surge in the number of attacks on the electric grid, physical attacks, including two bombings in my state. san jose cumbest -- california. it left thousands of members without power. i know you know the details, but

director wray, what updates can you share about the fbi's investigation into the recent string of physical attacks on our electric grid? what steps have you taken to improve the data collection relative to protecting our physical infrastructure? >> of course, you are asking about the physical attacks on the electrical grid. there are whole range of cyber attacks as well, but just focusing on the physical attacks, we have seen an increasing number of attacks on substations and things like that. for a variety of motivations. for example, in baltimore, we had a fairly well-known case not that long ago of a couple of individuals, who were attempting to cause chaos. these were racially motivated violent extremists, who wanted to, essentially, causes cascading power failure, attacking five substations in the baltimore area.

thankfully, we were able to disrupt that attack. we have also seen people attacking substations for non- ideological reasons, including out in the pacific northwest somewhere, there was a case where an individual was trying to facilitate a robbery, and they wanted to bring down the power grid to, essentially, enhance their ability to conduct a robbery, so there was a financial motive in that instance. we have also had straight out vandalism. there is a lot of different motivations. what they have in common is a targeting of the electric grid, of the substations. we are working more more closely , not just with dhs, the department of energy, and other regulatory partners to try to give them better information, so they can figure out how to better harden their infrastructure. >> thank you. >> senator cotton.

>> director wray, in your written statement, you mentioned anti-semitic texts. you said that the fbi seeks to mitigate them quickly. has there been an increase in anti-semitic attacks since the october 7th atrocity? >> yes. and, what is striking about that is that, it's coming on the heels of what we were already seeing, even before october 7th, as a significant uptick, not just of hate fueled attacks, but specifically, anti- semitic hate fueled attacks as a portion of those. by far and away, the biggest chunk of the tips and leads, which are coming in fast and constantly to us, the biggest chunk, by far, involved threats to the jewish community. we have seen bomb threats to synagogues, threats to attack the jewish community on campuses and other places. we've had multiple arrests. so, it's a real problem, and as

i think i testified recently, what is so jarring about those attacks is that the jewish community in this country is like 2 1/2% of the american public, and yet, they represent something close to 60% of all religiously based hate crimes, and they have the unique distinction of being targeted by sunni terrorists, shiite terrorists, domestic terrorists, inspired terrorists. we are acutely focused on the threats to the jewish community, which very much needs our help. >> thank you, i share your concerns about those threats and the disproportionate nature of the threats. federal civil rights laws do protect jewish people to include criminal provisions, is that right? >> yes. i want to focus on one particularly egregious incident of such anti-semitism.

on thanksgiving day, a pro- palestinian mob showed up at the home of a private citizen in los angeles. he is the president of the israel public affairs committee, and one of the strongest supporters of the israel alliance, and an organization with broad bipartisan support in congress. this mob was there for no other reason than he was jewish. the mob set off smoke bombs with dense, black smoke to make he and his family think the house was on fire. they blared sirens, dumped fake blood and left body bags in his driveway. they vandalized cars parked in the driveway. they distributed flyers around the neighborhood with his photo and a message there would be, no peace for him, as long as they support israel. when a neighbor tried to intervene, one member of the mob attacked them with a matter

-- metal pole. has the fbi made any arrests in these hate crimes in los angeles? >> i don't know if it's part of the same investigation, but i know, for example, post october 7, we have had arrests of individuals in l.a. , specifically, individuals who were threatening the adl, cdl, and a number of leadership. a lot of the cases that we have been advancing post october 7th involved threats that sound very similar to the one you are describing. >> these go beyond threats. they showed up at his home on thanksgiving day and vandalized his home and attacked the neighbor. the organization is known as the people city council of los angeles. they posted videos and photos, along with a message, no peace for these baby killers. free palestine. to be clear, they did not use

the pg version in their social media posts. is the fbi conducting arrests against this mob? or, even investigating? >> as i sit here now, i don't know specifically. we have had so many investigations, as i said earlier, that are focused on threats or more than threats against the jewish community all around the country. let me follow up and see if we can get more information on that specific case. >> i would very much appreciate that. the history of our federal civil rights laws, go back to a time when local authorities refused to protect the civil rights of their people. this is the post-civil war area, where local officials would protect the rights of freed black slaves, but color me very skeptical that notorious democrat george gascon, the prosecuting attorney for the

county of los angeles, will zealously pursue criminal charges against this mob. i would very much appreciate following up with me, personally, to know that the fbi is, at a minimum, investigating this mob and the violent attack on the neighbor. i hope they will do so zealously using some of the main techniques that have been used, for example, the prosecutions of donald trump, or the department of justice has gone so far as to subpoena people who retweeted or liked donald trump's social media posts, or the investigations into the january 6th the writers -- rioters. if these are good enough for those investigations, i think they should be good enough for this investigation as well. again, i don't think that george gascon will zealously pursue. >> will follow up with you directly about this particular matter.

i will tell you, in the meantime, that my instructions are very much along the lines of my comments here today, which are, the jewish community needs us, and we need to be leaning forward. >> thank you for that. as i said, citing those social media accounts, these are not criminal masterminds. this should not be a tough case for anyone to crack. i'm sure that lapd would be happy to investigate and arrest. absent that, i hope that the fbi and department of justice uses the full extent of federal criminal civil rights laws to make sure that this pro-hamas mob faces legal consequences. thank you. >> thank you mr. chairman, and director wray, good to see you again. you know i never fail to mention that georgia is proud of you, and that we love seeing you when you come back home. i hope you will again soon. you and i have spoken before about the dangerous increase in the frequency of crimes

targeting children, young children, who are lured or targeted to share compromising or explicit photos, and blackmailed or bullied or worse on the basis of the content. senator blackburn and senator grassley and i have, together, move legislation through this committee and at helping prevent the sexual abuse of children online. at your field office in atlanta, you recently highlighted sextortion as a particular concern in georgia. the field office says that these schemes have increased by 700% since 2021. can you please provide an update on the fbi's overall efforts to investigate and prevent these crimes targeting children online? >> this is a rapidly emerging threat to the youth of america.

when i say rapidly emerging, it's not that it's brand-new, as you and i have discussed. it has been emerging for some time, but what's newer is that it is bursting into prominence in the last year and a half. and that, is mostly about then, because of how prevalent it is, but it's also a reflection, a little bit of a good thing, which is growing awareness, and we need more awareness of this. what is the fbi doing? we are aggressively investigating these cases. we just recently had a case, for example, where a very tragic case in michigan, where a young teenager committed suicide because he was, basically, exactly one of these cases. he was, essentially, egged on when he couldn't pay the money, and he was explaining he did not have the money. he was egged on to kill himself, and he did. we pursued, in that case, the wrongdoers, who were all the

way over in nigeria. we worked with our nigerian partners, got the individuals involved arrested, had them extradited back to the u.s. to face trial here, as a way of demonstrating that you are never beyond our reach, and that we are going to pursue these cases to the far corners of the globe. the second thing, and the reason i bring up that case, is that it's very important to raise awareness, because i think a lot of the kids falling victim to this, when they get targeted, they don't think they have a choice. they feel like they are trapped or stuck, and then turn to tragic consequences like suicide, so raising awareness, it's not just raising awareness for parents, but it's raising awareness for teenagers, so they know there is something they can do. in that michigan case, to their great credit, the young man's parents embraced the idea of

using his case, his tragic death , as a way to try to prevent of the kids from falling victim to the same thing. it's really deeply moving that they would try to find some good that they can achieve through the heartbreaking loss of their son. >> thank you, director wray. that is, obviously, a top concern for parents in georgia, and so is the opioid crisis, how it impacts high school students. several news outlets reported recently that multiple students overdosed on fentanyl in one gwinnett county high school, that none of the students knew they were consuming fentanyl. one was reportedly using a vape pen. students in lee county in southwest georgia were hospitalized after using a vape that was reportedly laced, not just with thc, but with

fentanyl. thankfully, all of the students survived. can you layout for my constituents in georgia with the fbi is doing to protect children and adolescents from opioids? increasingly, as we see the inadvertent overdose by students who are either vaping, or perhaps think they are taking some other drug? >> of course, you are rightly flagging that one of the pernicious parts of the prices, the fentanyl scourge that we are dealing with right now, is that it's getting pressed into or incorporated into all sorts of other things. it's bad enough that people are taking it intentionally, because they are addicted, but the people that are unwittingly taking it, whether it's in their prescriptions or something else, is a huge problem. what is the fbi doing? i will start with what i said in my opening. just in the last two years, the fbi has seized enough fentanyl to kill 270 million americans.

that is, essentially, 80% of the american public. that is just our work. we have lots of partners doing great work too in just the last two years. a few other things we are doing, we are targeting the cartels. we have over 300 investigations focused on the cartel leadership , and them as the source of supply. we are focusing on the distribution side here in the u.s. our task forces are focused on those. we are targeting the professionals, in effect, the healthcare profession, pill mills and things like that that are also part of the problem through our prescription drug initiative. we are also targeting the darknet marketplaces, where an awful lot of this stuff is being trafficked. we have a whole thing called g code with lots of other agencies that we lead, that is dismantling marketplaces of

opioids. then, from an awareness perspective, we are doing things like working with the dea to create a movie called chasing the dragon, that was shown in schools, and we have other outreach focused on schools and youth and educators to try to get at it on the demand side too. >> thank you, director wray, and with my remaining time, you have touched on this, but george's jewish community, george's muslim community, both expressing to me their deep anxiety at this moment, the increased level of threat. the explicit threats, the increased perception of threat and fear. can you please provide some reassurance to my jewish and muslim constituents about how seriously the fbi is taking community protection? by the way, thank you to your field office in atlanta, and special agent farley, for the work they have done to help reassure my constituents as

well. >> we are working those cases, both through our joint terrorism task forces, but also, on the criminal side through our civil rights program, as hate crimes. we have both engines, if you will, in the fbi, focused on it. we also have created a domestic terrorism hate crimes fusion cell, which brings together expertise to anticipate where the threats are going. we have opened 60% more hate crimes investigations post october 7th then we had before october 7th, and it was escalating pretty fast before october 7th. we've got all of our field offices, as you mentioned, with farley in atlanta, not just pushing the investigations, but engaging in a lot of outreach to affected communities in their areas. both, to reassure them, as you

say, but also to raise awareness. hey, we are here, if you see something, we want to know about it. there are things we can do to help. >> thank you. senator kennedy. >> thank you, mr. chairman. director, it seems to me that some people should not have power. i don't care how smart they are. i don't care how experienced they are. they just don't have enough maturity or morality or ethics to exercise power. and, i am talking, of course, about your predecessor. you have been a significant

improvement. unlike my experience with you, and what i have observed, and unlike your predecessor, you are not egomaniacal, and you are not egocentric, and you are not a self anger and iser. you don't read aloud like your predecessor going, look at me, look at me. i know that is a low bar, but i appreciate it. you talk a lot about 38,000 women and men in the fbi, the vast majority of whom do an extraordinary job, and i agree with that. most of those women and men that you were talking about are in the field offices. i'm not saying there aren't some in the washington office,

but the problems we've had with the fbi over the past decade, you have alluded to them. they have come primarily out of the washington office. i listened carefully to your recitation of your efforts to clean that up, but i think most fair-minded americans still wonder if there has been real accountability. in all cases. that is the spirit in which i will ask you these questions. who made the decision that the fbi would raid mar-a-lago for those documents? >> i'm not sure there is a specific person that made a decision. it was the investigative team that was on that investigation,

working with the prosecutors on the case. >> why didn't you just do a consent to search? and, avoid all of the drama? >> well, let me try it this way. because, obviously, we are talking now about not just an ongoing investigation, that is being led by a special counsel, and an ongoing investigation being led by a special counsel in front of a court, with likely very strong views about what it is i can say publicly, public commentary about cases, but i think in that particular instance, if you look at the affidavit in support of the search warrant, and more importantly, the pleadings that were filed by the prosecutors in the case, they lay out, in a very detailed way, all the efforts that were made to

ensure compliance short of a search, as well as now has been charged, actual obstruction of justice. in my experience, again, speaking more generally now, both as a line prosecutor and the fbi director, when it comes to obtaining classified information, retrieving it, we typically pursue the least intrusive means possible, but if those don't work, and certainly, if there is obstruction of justice, which in this case, was found by the judge, then it is pretty typical to resort to a search warrant. >> of course, as you know as well as i do, that the fbi cannot censor american speech. at one time, i think it was during your tenure, the fbi had 80 fbi agents working with

social media, encouraging social media to take down accounts, and remove "disinformation on election interference." the district court found that the fbi and other agencies, and social media platforms, ask them to remove content in a way that violated the first amendment. and, it went up to the fifth circuit. the fifth circuit limited the injunction, but here's what the fifth circuit said. the fbi, "likely coerced the platforms and the moderating content, and encourage them to do so by affecting changes in their moderation policies." in violation of the first amendment.

the fbi agreed with the plaintiffs that "federal agencies -- agents ran afoul of the first amendment by coercing and significantly encouraging social media platforms to censor disfavored speech. including by threats of adverse government action." like antitrust enforcement and legal reforms. that is serious. is the fifth circuit wrong? >> as you may know, first off, let me just say the opinions, you talked about a whole other executive agencies besides the fbi, and i'm not going to speak about the agencies are going to do. >> you weren't the only one. the white house. homeland security. your folks were there too, all 80 of them. 80 agents.

combing social media every day, calling twitter, calling facebook, take that down. get rid of that account. it wasn't just on election interference. it was on covid vaccines. it was on lockdowns. >> a couple things. i appreciate the opportunity to clarify this. first, on things like covid vaccines and stuff like that, the fbi had no role in telling anybody to take anything down. in fact, as you may know, the fbi was the only agency back at that time, the only agency in the entire intelligence community, to reach the conclusion that the origins of the pandemic were most likely a lab leak in china. we, most certainly, were not encouraging anybody to communicate differently on that. second, even on the topics we did communicate with social media companies about, from

everything i've seen, we in fact, did not, instruct anybody to take that information down. as to the fifth circuit's opinion, as you may also know, we, actually, hotly contested a lot of the findings, and not just the legal conclusions, but the actual factual findings, and the department has sought supreme court review, ask them to vacate the junction. the supreme court not only vacated the junction, but granted search. >> i want to ask you one last question. we had a controversy here in the election about hunter biden's laptop. and, at that time, you had 80 agents interfacing with social media, doing whatever that would be. the fbi had the hunter biden

laptop, december 9th, 2019. the new york post story, which a lot of the social media companies at the suggestion of government, took down. the story came out on 10-14 -2020. why didn't the fbi just say hey, the laptop is real? why didn't you just tell everybody the laptop is real? we are not asking what's on it, but it's real. this isn't fiction. >> as you might imagine, the fbi cannot, especially at a time like that, be talking about an ongoing investigation. second, i would tell you, at least, my understanding is, that both of the fbi folks involved in the conversations and the twitter folks involved in the conversations, both say that the fbi did not direct twitter to suppress --

>> others were in government. >> i can't speak to others in government. that's part of the point i was trying to make. >> yes, but you are the fbi. you are not part of the white house or homeland security. you were not supposed to be political. you see all of this controversy going on. why did the fbi say, time-out, folks, we are not getting in the middle of this, the laptop is real? >> again, we have to be very careful about what we can say, especially in the middle of an election season, because that is, precisely, some of the problems that led to my predecessors negative finding from the inspector general. >> thank you, senator kennedy. senator booker. >> mr. chairman, i just want to say that senator kennedy is santa claus of spirit, but is the grinch when it comes to stealing my time. but, it's good to see him as always. >> i'm sorry. >> director wray, it's good to see you again. i just want to say, i don't get

to say this often, but having years and years of working with fbi agents in new jersey, i just know that you represent an organization of extraordinarily noble people, who do things on a daily basis to protect us and keep us safe that most americans don't know about. this time of year, especially, just that heroism, i wanted to recognize it at the top. i listened in my office to a lot of the earlier questioning, and i'm really grateful for how much of an emphasis you have been putting on the safety and security of americans to racist and religious hate. it was, literally, hours after the october 7th attacks that i was in israel, and i reached out to my colleagues in the democratic caucus and said, we have to get more money for the nonprofit security grants, and i'm glad that there seems to be bipartisan support for that. i appreciate the comments of a lot of my colleagues, especially tom cotton.

i know him well, and what happened at his house is appalling, but as you said, it's indicative of a lot of the violence and anti-semitism. it is a top form of religious hate and violence that we see. i want to drill down a little bit about the violence that we are seeing, and threats on the muslim community. because, there are a lot of issues with trust when it comes to the fbi and the muslim community. and, having seen when i was mayor of the city of newark, unjust surveillance, and the erosion of a lot of that trust. both law enforcement, in general. i just want to know from you, what are you doing? what steps are you taking to try to be restorative of trust, to make sure at a time of vulnerability, where muslims are being targeted, with hate, and the arab community, in the larger context, what are you doing to build that trust to know that you as an agency can be relied upon for their safety? >> i appreciate your comments and your focus on the issue.

certainly, we, through every one of our field offices, have, as a point of emphasis, community outreach, and within the community outreach, there are specific communities that i make a conscious point of trying to build bridges with. the muslim community and arab american community are a specific part of that. the good news is that it did not take october 7th and the aftermath for us to start doing that. i have been to all 56 field offices twice, each of them, many of them three times, and i have seen with my own two eyes, the relationships that they have built with the muslim and arab american communities in their areas, and so we have continued to double down on that. post october 7th, to make sure we know we are there for them if they experience threats or violence. there have been tips and leads, reports of threats that have come in.

the chairman mentioned the attack against the six-year-old boy in his area. we've had other attacks as well. we are trying to make sure that they know we are there for them. i will tell you, on a personal level, as somebody who was in fbi headquarters on 9/11, i have never forgotten, as a young leader in the justice department at the time, it could not have been more than four days after 9/11, and president bush, in the middle of all the tension that existed at the time, making a conscious point of speaking, i believe it was at a mosque, and making clear that we are at war with terrorism. we are not at war with islam. that really always move me that he took that step at that time, because it would have been the easy thing to do not to do that. >> i'm grateful for that as

well, and grateful for your visits. i believe newark was a three visit place, not a two visit place. >> i think my third visit is imminent. >> that's good to know. the executive order 14110 directed federal law enforcement agencies to produce a report on the use of ai in the criminal justice system and recommend best practices for law enforcement. the report builds on executive report 1474, which included procurement guidelines for advance lon for technologies, including facial recognition, other biometric technology and predictive algorithms. can you provide the committee with an update on the reporting requirements, including an estimate for when we could expect to release the guidance on advanced law enforcement technologies, in light of the fact that the deadline set has passed? >> let me circle back with you on that. i know we have an entire team, people working very closely with the department and others

on this issue. i wasn't aware that there was a deadline that we had missed, so let me see if there is some guardrail in the process. i will make sure we circle back to you on that. >> finally, i have found every interaction i've had with you or your offense -- office really compelling, from sitting in classified briefings to talking to administration officials, and your comments at the top of the hearing were, again, very compelling. i think you heard that this is an issue that is in both parties, a lot of concerns. when mike lee was speaking, he talked about a lot of the violations >> i am concerned. i trust you

but i learned leadership is a difference between time tellers and block builders. everyone knows time and it goes portably. but the best leaders, no matter who the leader is the protection is always there. when we hear some of these egregious mistakes, can you tell us the testimony now that you are confident that what we talked about openly here that those abuses cannot and will not happen going forward. >> i can pledge to you and to this committee that we have put in place new measures to exceed anything that has been in place before. we are focused on a goal of getting to 100% compliance. i can also tell you, i understand, we brought this on ourselves to some extent. i hear that. i understand why

it's there. that is why i point to the court itself and the department itself looking hard at our compliance to post these reforms because these are the same people and the same kinds of documents that have discussed these problems of the past. they are the ones that are seeing 98 comes percent compliant. these are reports we have had since the middle of 2021. it is not just take my word for it, i get that. trust but verify there is a verification piece that has occurred and we think to an extent that there is a desire to cement those reforms for the long run -- >> my comments expired and i will say in conclusion, and you know this in your heart -- clearly the fbi has a very deep history with the black community

in the 50s and 60s before that. the assurance is radical and like the chairman said there are concerns about how do we ensure that our ideals are not violated by law enforcement especially in communities that have seen historic targeting. >> thank you, mr. chairman. thank you for being here. the last few weeks i have been demanding answers on the jeffrey epstein crimes and crimes to get the flight records, i have been trying to get that and i have been stonewalled. i think having transparency around jeffrey epstein's conduct and this massive text trafficking ring that he built is important. of course we have senators who have all mentored our concern with what has

happened with sex trafficking in light of this, in looking at some of the survivors from the epstein issues there are disturbing allegations that the fbi failed to investigate the sex trafficking allegations. indeed one survivor said that the fbi, even after she brought this forward repeated content about his content that the fbi refused to investigate her claims, even though she said the allegations were there on the sex trafficking and child sexual abuse material. i want to know, what awareness you have of the fbi's failure to investigate these claims? i

want to get you on the record, since numerous survivors have said the fbi have not shown up to help them, what specifically has the fbi done to investigate the claims that epstein and others participated in, produced , and distributed since then. >> first, let me say, i recall very well that you have a specific and long-standing interest not just in child sex exploitation but human trafficking as a cousin of that . we appreciate your focus on it and your support in the importance of that mission. as for the epstein case specifically, it has been a while since i've looked at that. we worked together with prosecutors to bring charges -- >> i realize that.

what we need from you is a complete investigation. why the fbi did not take this on, and then getting to the bottom of what is an enormous sex trafficking ring and listening to the survivors. as i said, i have tried to get the flight logs, which i think is important i think people need to know who were on those planes and how often they were on those planes . people who invest in companies would want to know. as we go through this, should those be made public? they have been heavily redacted. >> it has been a while since i looked at the specific case. we have been increasing year over year both the number of agents focused on these kinds

of cases, the number of victims -- let me offer to get with my team and figure out if there is more information we can provide. >> that would be great. we have never even through the celine maxwell trial we never got to the bottom of this. we have the survivors that say there is so much more they swept it under the rug. that is wrong. you need to write that ron klain wrong. me ask you about the political allegations coming out of. we have seen a heavily redacted search warrant. first page, here you have a page , another imprint, another imprint. attachment fee, all about the subject account and then look

at the rest redaction redacted, fully redacted, fully redacted, fully redacted. that is very helpful when things are so heavily redacted you cannot get the information. tennesseans are very concerned about two tiers of justice and weaponized of the government. what we see from the search warrant, here it is -- let me go to page 2 first. that gives you the subject account. which is trump's account. you're going to see that on page 1 and page 2. the information that is there. they are wanting to get at his twitter account everyone who had access to it and all the information. when you go to page 3, they are

going to subpoena all data and information that is associated with this and anybody that reposted information on this that favored or retweeted post by the account, as well as all tweets that include the username associated, all synced, all contacts, this covers october 2020 to january 2021. are you aware of this? >> i have seen some of the media reporting. but this matter is being led by -- again, this is an ongoing investigation being led by a special counsel and there are all kinds of court restrictions . >> someone approved a search warrant for everybody that was re-tweeting or reposting from the ayatollah account. have

they gone to his account prior to october 7th and looked at that? this is such an invasion of free speech. as we talk with you about social media and what is going on with social media, we are concerned about this. if i liked a tweet from president trump, if anyone on this side of the desk retreated a tweet from president trump, according to this, jack smith could go pull everything affiliated with our twitter account. if anything that came from that, if donald trump showed up an hour speed, is this an infringement of my free speech? >> i certainly understand the concern. >> i hope so. >> i will tell you that this investigation is being led by

special counsel and it is not appropriate for me to comment on that ongoing investigation. it is also under the supervision of a court. >> ongoing investigation is code word for we are stonewalling. we hear this from you all repeatedly and it really is quite frustrating. >> i understand why it is frustrating. that policy about not not commenting on investigations goes back decades, republican and democratic administrations. >> these investigations are not coming to completion. thank you. >> senator blackburn before you leave i want to make a point for the record since i understand you made statements about the jeffrey epstein flight logs. there is a fox reporter in the hallway who asked me about this and i said i had not spoken to you one time about this issue. i think you will back me up on that i did not know this was

even a subject of your amendments if you recall you were first on the list until the two hour rule was invoked. i do not know anything about this request and i would be happy to discuss it with you i have not done any discussion with you to this point. >> mr. chairman i know. i think you are fully aware that i had two amendments one dealing with epstein. i brought it up previously. we have such an issue in this nation with the six traffic and human trafficking rings that have proliferated across this country and it is a damaging the lives of women and girls. we have to step up and help them get to the bottom of what happened with this jeffrey epstein case and it will be an important thing to do. it should be at the top of this committee's to do list as we fight some of this

proliferation of see sam. >> there were 122 minutes filed -- >> 177 brees 177 filed. i did not know that you offer that amendment. i want a point on the record you and i have never personally discussed this? >> we talked briefly on the floor. >> you said you want to offer your amendment. >> and committee i brought up the subject matter of my amendment three weeks prior. i will pull the transcript for you. >> i wish you would >> thank you mr. wray for being with us today and you have some questions in writing coming your way shortly and i hope you can respond promptly. thank you again. l security andl

competition. arizona senator kyrsten sinema chairs the senate commerce, science, and transportation subcommittee hearing. [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations