Committee Business to Consider: Review of the 9/11 Commission Report

The permanent select committee on intelligence will now come to order. Without objection, the committee may recess at any point. The purpose of today's business meeting is to consider and release the committee's nine eleven commission review final report. I want to particularly thank the co-chairs of the committee's nine eleven task force, Miss Stephannik from New York, Mister Gottheimer from New Jersey. Each of you agreed to personally take on this challenge to review the intelligence posture of our nation in the intervening twenty five years. since the infamous day our nation was attacked in subsequent actions to keep and defend America's commitment to freedom. I also wanna thank committee staff who have worked tirelessly to assist in the drafting of this report with appropriate sensitivity, professionalism, and substantive expertise, as this subject entails. I wanna similarly thank those who have graciously offered to host us here in Shanksville today, including event organizers organizers, memorial staff and security. Each of your involvement has been critical. and very much appreciated. Finally, I want to offer my sincere appreciation to the family, friends and colleagues of the heroes of Flight ninety-three for joining us today. Your loved ones' sacrifice and your own are seared into our memories and our hearts. Before we begin the formal business of this hearing, I want to acknowledge where we are and more importantly who's with us today. We're gathered on sacred ground. Twenty-five years ago, forty passengers and crew members aboard United Flight ninety-three found themselves in circumstances none of us can fully imagine. In a matter of minutes, ordinary Americans were confronted with an extraordinary choice. They learned what was happening elsewhere in our country. They understood what was likely happening aboard their own aircraft, and they acted. Because of these heroes' actions, the terrorists aboard flight ninety-three did not reach their intended target. Their courage saved lives, and their sacrifice became part of the story of September eleventh and part of the story of America. To the family members of those passengers and crew who are here with us today, thank you for allowing us to share this place with you. We know that September eleventh is not simply history to you, it's personal. The people whose names are memorialized here were your husbands and wives, your mothers and fathers, your sons, your daughters, your brothers and sisters and your friends. Nothing this committee says or does can repay what your families gave our country. But we can remember, we can learn. We can do everything within our power to make sure the government of the United States never becomes complacent about the responsibility entrusted to us. That's why we're here. Our committee undertook this review because the twenty-fifth anniversary of September eleventh should be more than a moment of remembrance, it should also be a moment of accountability. The original nine eleven commission identified profound intelligence, policy, structural, and information sharing failures that contributed to our inability to prevent these attacks. Its recommendations fundamentally reshape the intelligence community, leading to the creation of the Director of National Intelligence and the National Counterterrorism Center and significant reforms in information sharing, inter-agency coordination and congressional oversight. Twenty-five years later, we believed Congress had an obligation to ask a straightforward question. Did these reforms work? And then an equally important question, are they enough for the threats America faces today? In many respects, the answer to the first question is yes. The reforms adopted after September eleventh have largely succeeded in their most fundamental purpose helping prevent another terrorist attack of the magnitude of nine eleven on American soil. That's an extraordinary accomplishment. And we should recognize the thousands of intelligence professionals, law enforcement officers, military personnel, diplomats, and others who've quietly contributed to that success over the last quarter century. But the answer to the second question is more complicated. The world of twenty twenty six is not the world of two thousand one. We still face terrorism. We also face increasingly aggression, aggressive nation-state adversaries, sophisticated counter-intelligence operations, cyber-attacks, foreign malign influence, economic warfare, rapidly advancing artificial intelligence, biotechnology, drones, and autonomous systems, and threats to critical infrastructure. Many of these threats don't fit neatly into the bureaucratic boxes our government created decades ago. Our adversaries understand that. They do not organize themselves around our com- committee jurisdictions or uh agency organizational charts, or the lines separating foreign and domestic threats. They organize around our vulnerabilities. And that brings us to perhaps the most important lesson of September eleventh. The nine eleven commission described a failure of imagination. Twenty five years later, we cannot allow ourselves to make that mistake again. The next strategic attack against the United States may not involve hijacked airplanes. It may begin in cyberspace. It may target our power grid or telecommunication systems. Or it may involve artificial intelligence, biological threats, economic coercion, or capabilities we've not yet fully contemplated. As our report concludes, the next nine eleven might not look like nine eleven. but its consequences could be just as grave. That's the purpose of this work. I also wanna recognize that this has been a genuinely bipartisan undertaking. I wanna thank ranking member Jim Himes for his partnership and his commitment to the serious oversight responsibilities of this committee. And I especially wanna thank our two task force co-chairs Elise Stefanik and Josh Gottheimer. They have invested considerable time and effort in this review, examining the reforms that followed September eleventh, evaluating where they succeeded, identifying where gaps remain, and considering how an intelligence community built largely in response to the threats of yesterday must adapt to the threats of tomorrow. The report itself reflects the bipartisan leadership of the Chairman, Ranking Member, and both task force co-chairs. There will be disagreements about particular policies, and there should be. Serious oversight requires serious debate. However, there should be no partisan disagreement about the mission. Protect the American people. Defend their constitutional liberties. And never stop asking whether we're prepared for the threat we have not yet. imagined. Finally, I wanna return to the families here today. Throughout this review we've tried to keep the victims of September eleventh and their families at the center of our work. Our report says that explicitly, at every point in compiling it, we kept the victims and their families in mind and sought to honor their sacrifice. Here at flight ninety-three those words carry a weight that cannot be borne in a hearing room in Washington. Twenty-five years ago the Americans aboard that airplane did not wait for someone else to act. When the moment came, They acted. Our government owes them the same resolve. We should not wait for another catastrophe to expose the vulnerabilities we can see today. We should identify them. We should confront them, and we should act. That's how we honor the forty heroes of Flight ninety-three. That's how we honor all two thousand nine hundred seventy-seven innocent lives taken on September eleventh. It's how we honor the first responders who ran with courage to save their fellow Americans. That's how we fulfill our obligation to the generations of Americans who came after them. May God bless their families, may God bless all those who continue to defend this nation, and may God bless the United States of America. I now recognize the ranking member for his opening statement.

Thank you, Chairman Crawford, what a deeply meaningful privilege to be here today at the Flight ninety-three memorial and to have been joined by the remarkable family members of those lost and the first responders to that horrific tragedy. The story of those on Flight ninety-three is one of unimaginable courage and sacrifice. And the American people and members of Congress in particular owe a lifelong debt of gratitude to those heroes. I very much appreciate the leadership of Chairman Crawford as well as Congresswoman Stefanik and Congressman Gottheimer in establishing a task force to look back at the findings of the nine eleven commission the commission identified numerous areas for reform following the attacks and most of those have been implemented, at least in part. But we need to remain vigilant in our oversight of the intelligence community to counterterrorism as well as other missions that have come to the fore. Looking back at the nine eleven commission's report with the benefit of two decades of hindsight the committee developed a number of recommendations and findings. I will support the motion to report the committee's work and I thank the members and staff who contributed to that large effort. From my perspective a couple of themes stand out. First, the commission emphasized the tremendous value of deep subject matter expertise. They warned that this knowledge base takes years to build and cannot easily be replicated or outsourced. Our greatest asset within the IC is our people, and they are by and large tremendously talented and focused on their mission. That rings true to me today because I've been concerned about a brain drain out of the IC, whether through retirements or otherwise. We collectively need to make sure that our cadre of IC professionals is strong, and that they are allowed to do their jobs within the law and without fear uh of retribution. if they say the wrong thing. That culture and talent pool is hard to create and easy to destroy, and we need to remain focused on preserving our single greatest advantage. Second, intelligence sharing and cross-agency integration are key. I was so thrilled to have the new Director of National Intelligence here, uh, to hear us reiterate that point. We can best counter threats when people from across the IC come together and bring diverse perspectives and expertise to attack a problem, as they do with the National Counterterrorism Center. in the world of classified information, stovepipes can and do arise, and one of our core missions should be to break those down and to make sure that information gets where it needs to go to disrupt threats of all kind. Finally, just as the commission identified a failure of imagination that helped leave open the vulnerabilities that allowed nine eleven to occur, we need to be vigilant today. The chairman said it exactly right with a long list of potential threats. The one thing we know for sure is the next war and the next attack will not look like the last war or the last attack. Twenty-five years on, we carry these and other lessons with us in our work to Congress and within the intelligence community. Our job will never be finished, but we can take this occasion on the hallowed ground, on this hallowed ground, to rededicate ourselves to working in a constructive and bipartisan fashion to protect the American people. I appreciate the partnership I have with Chairman Crawford and all the members in the committee to do precisely that. And I yield back.

Thank you. And I recognize the task force chair from the gentleman from New York, Miss Define.

Thank you, Chairman Crawford. As co-chair of the committee's nine eleven bipartisan commission task force, it is truly an honor to be here today at the Flight ninety-three National Memorial, where we remember and honor the heroism of the forty on September eleventh. And I know as you've heard from all of the members on this committee, today was extraordinarily meaningful, and we will take it with us. not only in our service in Congress but for the rest of our lives. Thank you to the family members of those heroes. I also wanna thank the National Park Service, the incredible work that you do to memorialize this hallowed ground, and to maintain it and to teach it to the next generation. We will never forget their sacrifice and the immense courage that the heroes displayed in the face of great evil. Not a day goes by where the events of nine eleven don't touch on some aspect of our daily lives. I want to thank Chairman Crawford for making this report a true priority of this committee and also wanna thank ranking member Jim Hymes for ensuring that we've seen bipartisan leadership. This important twenty-fifth anniversary is deserving of a renewal of efforts, and I'm proud to have co-chaired this with my colleague and close friend, Josh Gottheimer. Today's vote marks the culmin culmination of a year of this committee's review of the nine eleven commission report. While the threats have changed over the last quarter century, our mission in Congress and on this committee have not, keeping the American people safe. Achieving this objective looks a lot different today than it did twenty-five years ago. One of the key themes gleaned from our review of the nine eleven commission report was that we cannot afford another quote, failure of imagination. Our committee attempted with this report to think big picture and address where and how America may be vulnerable today and what we can do to address these security gaps to ensure it never happens again. Of particular importance was our review of emerging technologies, like artificial intelligence, cyber, drones, and influence operations and campaigns. To combat these new lines of attack, our report concludes that we must pursue a whole of government approach. We need to continue to strengthen information sharing and collaboration within the intelligence community community and between all of the federal agencies, but we also need to continue to improve our work with state, local, and tribal partners. To meet the national security challenges of our day, it also requires a unity of effort with our industry partners in the private sector. Expert witnesses before this committee continuously stressed how important it was it is that private companies realize that they must also be on the front lines in this fight, not just the government. Throughout our open hearings and closed door meetings, one thing was very clear, every facet of our society must work in concert to deter threats and keep the American people safe. This report offers a road map to continue to strengthen our national security. We must also teach the next generation of Americans the importance of that day, not only to memorialize the heroes, but to teach them what it means to be a fellow American. The extraordinary actions by these heroes embody every quality that our nation stands for. The heroes of Flight ninety-three prevented further bloodshed and prevented a tragedy from taking place at our nation's capital. I hope that all of the people that joined us today are inspired to live by the same virtues these forty heroes lived by, and that we can come together as a nation and confront the next generation of threats, with the same resolve. With that, I yield back to Chairman Crawford.

Well, I thank the gentlewoman now recognized, uh, Co-chair Congressman Josh Gottheimer from New Jersey for an opening statement.

Thank you so much, Mister Chairman, and thank you for your leadership and for bringing us together, you and the ranking member. Very grateful for for spearheading this. Uh, and I I wanna thank Director Clayton for having spent time with us today. It's a very important role and I I think hearing from us directly is critically important. I wanna thank the Park Service, National Park Service four, all they do every single day for with limited resources and bringing this together, and working so closely with the families and all those who have decided to dedicate their lives to teaching others who are here every single day. So thank you so much to all of you. Um, being here at Flight ninety-three Memorial in Shanksville, it's I think it's impossible for all of us not to feel the weight of these hollow grounds, and impossible not to be moved by the family members and everyone we heard from today who shared their stories. Uh, the brave forty men and women on this field who gave their lives, puts the lives of other Americans, it just, it just really, from a gut-wrenching, heart-wrenching moment, puts it all in perspective. Those who stood up put their, their lives and their families ahead of others, uh, on that morning of September eleventh. I'll never forget those calls that some of my colleagues mentioned that we we listened to today and what I learned from the family members. May God continue to bless and watch over their souls and their loved ones. Because of their grit and heroism right here, an uncountable number of lives were saved that day in our nation's capital. Their loss was hardly in vain though. It led not only to the nine eleven commission and report insur- in two thousand four insur- but it but it also I think left an indelible mark for future generations of Americans. It showed what heroism is really all about. Every American and especially every American young person should have to come here and visit here. And obviously it had a huge impact on our intelligence community to ensure we were better prepared for the threats ahead. But the fight against terror, as the co-chair and ranking member and chairman said, is in static. Our our adversaries and their weapons of war, as part of the global war on terror, are always evolving. We too must evolve and be prepared for any threat. That is why today, after the last year of work, we are formally releasing our bipartisan twenty five year review of the original nine eleven commission report. It represents a comprehensive examination of how the report's initial recommendations and subsequent actions materialized and evolved across the intelligence community, and what new reforms are needed to confront the novel threats facing our nation today. I'm proud to have helped lead this effort with my colleague, Representative Elise Stefanik, and I'm grateful for her partnership, friendship, and leadership. It is the product of months of hard work and hearings. I also want to thank the team, the staff, who did an incredible job in helping us. Some of the Nile and the Commission's most impactful recommendations for reforming the intelligence community are still critical for today's threat landscape. Take, for example, the National Counterterrorism Center. for more than twenty years and it has tracked terrorist groups and warned us about plots before they occurred. It's evolved and strengthened across these years. Similarly, the Director of National Intelligence was established after nine eleven, for a clear reason, to put some of the deep national security expertise to the head of the community, capable of integrating and coordinating between eighteen intelligence agencies, to both prevent stove piping and to advise the President and us on the threats we face. At the same time, the threat landscape has greatly expanded. Over the course of this project, we've heard from national security experts about those emerging challenges, including our adversaries rapidly expanding capabilities in cyber warfare, bioengineering, and artificial intelligence. We can't fear these new threats. We must be prepared for them with the tools and agile organizational structure, and all the best men and women in the IC as possible to overcome them. That is one of the greatest lessons from September eleventh, two thousand one, and from this field in Shanksfield. We learned the hard way what the intelligence community was, in many ways, ill-equipped to combat and warn us against unconventional threats, including enemy that was not a nation-state, but instead a rogue terror group with the ability to gather substantial resources and do great harm to our friends, families and neighbors. Many of the new threats we face today are similarly complex and lurk online. Looking forward, as the original and today's report highlights, we need to ensure that our intelligence agencies are flexible enough to file threats against bureaucracies and offices, without duplicative work and with seamless communication. We're very lucky to have the best and brightest in the community. The key is to maximize their talents and our tools, and to continually recruit the next generation, and never allow bureaucracy or inter-agency bravado to get in the way. If we focus on deep and cutting edge expertise and tools, top-notch talent and training, proactive information sharing, and seamless cross-agency integration, there's nothing that can stop the greatest country that the world has ever known. The next threat will take new imagination. And I do wanna thank some of our colleagues here who served After nine eleven, I just wanna thank you for stepping up and answering the call as well, because we need to hear from you continuously, and and recruit the next generation. We hope this conversation, our recommendations will help ensure that our best days are ahead of us. And as as uh her grandson was one of of uh Nancy's grandsons said, the good guys will continue to win. I believe that. But it will take all of us working together as Americans, not as Democrats or Republicans. So thank you. May God bless the forty souls we honor on this field, the two thousand nine hundred seventy-six Americans who gave their lives that day, and those who have given their lives since, and the serva- including the servicemen and women, and for our our great country, the greatest the world's ever known. Thank you. I yield back.

Gentlemen, yields, and before we open up to member questions, due to the tight schedule, I ask unanimous consent to limit your uh comments to three minutes, without objection. So ordered. That said, now rep uh recognize Vice Chairman Kelly. Any comments?

Uh, just very briefly. This hallowed ground to our National Park Service, to all the s- all the family members who survived those heroes, we can never forget. I hope that this commission report will help us stay vigilant and stay in tune to what the intelligence community and the whole of government has to do to make sure that we prevent this from ever happening again, or at least if we don't, that we've done everything within our power to make sure that everyone is lockstep in doing that. So I thank each of our Democratic and Republican colleagues here for your vigilance in this, and with that I yield back.

Gentleman yields, Mister Lohut.

Um, I have nothing further to add beyond my comments earlier. I do wanna thank our co-chairs, Miss Stephannik and Mister Gottheimer, for the great work they've done in putting together this report.

Gentleman yields, Mister Fitzpatrick.

Yeah, our country has never been more united than we were on September eleventh, and thereafter. Uh, across the board, people treating other ch other people like human beings, mutual respect, mutual love, and the words never again have to mean something. They can't just be words, they have to be filed with action, and that's a responsibility of this committee. I yield back.

Gentleman yields, Mister Scott.

Thank you, Mister Chairman. Uh, I again go back to the day September eleventh I know exactly where I was and I watched the country come together and hold hands together and cry together and pray together. Uh I wanna highlight uh one comment in this report, the over-classification of information has emerged as a potential obstacle to ensuring timely and actual intelligence on various threat streams. Uh reaching state and local uh law enforcement and stakeholders, I again uh continue to be concerned about um the over-classification of information that our state and local law

Gentlemen, yields, Mister Hill.

Thank you, Chairman, and I want to thank Mister Goddard and uh Miss Stephonic for their work on this report. I think it reflects not only the follow-up uh from nine eleven and the attempt to fuse uh intelligence and the and the attempt to avoid a failure of imagination, I think that's been made clear by the National Counterterrorism Center and the results that we've seen from them over the years. But I wanna say I appreciate them moving this discussion forward, uh both in correcting things that were never completed uh following nine eleven like biometric uh admission, uh in tracking in the United States, I don't wanna use the word tracking, I know that's triggering for some people, but people entering the country and exiting the country that we actually know who they are and that they're properly documented. But this committee over the last three years has identified the fact that we do not still share and fuse information between uh the Transportation Safety Administration, the Customs and Border Patrol Administration, uh uh and and have that integrated with the threats that our homeland faces. So I thought that was a very important part of the report. I commend the co-chairs of the task force for that work. And secondly, the forward-looking aspect of what we're confronted with in technology. And all the, where we have the imagination. The question is, do we have the ways and means to tackle that imagination with uh what we uh have as a threat going forward from space and from technology and in cyber. So my congratulations to the task force. I'm very supportive of this report. I'm glad we're marking it up here in historic Shanksville and uh are able to pay a personal, emotional, a connected tribute to the families of the forty.

Chairman Nielsen, Mr. Crenshaw.

Uh, thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you for for all your work on this, uh, co-chairs and chairman. Um, there there's a couple recommendations here I wanna highlight. Uh one is a continues to be a grave concern to me which is the our our issues with the counter-UAS um and our l complete lack of strategy as a country uh working on legislation uh with uh in a bipartisan way with numbers on this committee uh towards that end and I I I can't I can't emphasize enough how important that is, I'm glad it's in this in this report, I I truly believe that um i if if there is a a next big attack, it it will very clearly use uh the the drones and UAS. I'd also wanna highlight how important I think it is, um and and it's also in this report, that that this committee be able to have a greater effect on its own appropriations. Uh and there is no other committee except for maybe HASC, where that issue is is is more important. Um, we spent a lot of time diving into the details of a variety of subjects and um to then lose complete power over how those topics might be funded, um is is not the way people might expect this this place to work. So I'm glad that's in this this report and and great work and I yield back.

I thank the gentleman, I and I just personally wanna thank the gentleman for his service to this country, the sacrifice you've made, and and your contribution to this committee. I appreciate that. uh gentlemen from Pennsylvania, Mr. Perry's Reference.

Have a good night, Morgan.

Thank you, Mister Chairman, and I wanna thank the co-chairs for the effort and the work and the input and the time spent and the sacrifices made getting this report out here. Um also thanking the the Park Service, the family members, law enforcement and everybody everybody that has something to do with the continued commitment to making sure that Americans don't forget that um that this place this stays close to our heart and that those sacrifices by regular people regular Americans on the front lines didn't you know didn't sign up for anything when they bought an airplane ticket, but found themselves in a very dire situation where things could have gone very differently and and it's easier for us to say now um but God bless them and God bless you for your commitment and your continued commitment. That having been said report in particular. I wanna agree with Mister Crenshaw on the appropriations issue. It's long time, it's long overdue that the people that are dealing with this are the ones that are making decisions about how they're funded. Now this game has got to end. Um the only the only other thing I wanna just just echo is what I kinda said before. Whether it's a drone attack or some other imaginative attack, we ju- look, on nine eleven most Americans had no idea who Osama Bin Laden was at that moment. There's been a lot of attacks around the world since and there were a lot of attacks prior to that and they're coming from the same places and we can't stick our heads in the sand and just ignore that and hope it's gonna get better. So I would just encourage us to be imaginative about that and be courageous about that and be direct about that and get after it. Otherwise we're gonna be doing this again in some other town in America and that's gonna be very very sad and we're never gonna forgive ourselves for that.

Gentlemen yields, Doctor Jackson.

Uh, thank you, Mister Chairman, and thank you to our nine eleven first responders, survivors and families here today. As we mark twenty five years since September eleventh, I think it is important that we take a clear-eyed look at what has changed since that terrible day, and where we still need to improve. The nine eleven commission helped drive some of the most consequential reforms to our national security system. We became better at sharing information, coordinating across agencies, and connecting the federal government with state and local partners. Those reforms have saved lives and made our country safer. But the world did not stand still. Our adversaries adapted and threats we face today are different in more important ways from the threat environment we confronted in the years immediately following nine eleven that is one of the central lessons of this review. We cannot assume that the structures we built for one error will automatically work for the next one. We need an intelligence community that can detect emerging and confront them with the whole of government cooperation. And we, as Congress, need to ensure that the IC is well equipped to face these challenges while providing effective oversight to hold these institutions accountable. Security and liberty should not be opposing goals. Americans should never have to choose between being safe or being free. Our national security policies must protect both. At the same time, we also have a responsibility that goes beyond policy. For many Americans, September eleventh is now history rather than a lived experience. A generation has grown up without personally remembering that horrific day. That makes it even more important that we preserve the lessons of what happened, not only the failures that preceded the attacks, but also the extraordinary courage that followed. The passengers and crew of Flight ninety-three, the first responders, the ordinary Americans who ran toward danger, showed us what service and sacrifice looked like. As we consider this report, our job is to honor that sacrifice by learning from the past and preparing responsibly, for the future threat environment. Twenty five years later, that work is not finished. With that, Mr. Chairman, I yield back. Thank you.

The gentleman yields, Miss Wagner.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman, uh for yielding but also for arranging this visit here to Shanksville. Um I wanna thank our co-chairs, uh Representative Stefanek and Gottheimer for their incredible work. Um you know, the National Park Service, the first responders that have spoken with us, the families most of all of the Flight ninety-three heroes, we We honor you, we thank you on this hollow ground. Um, it's been an amazing day. I can't believe it's been twenty-five years. It's unbelievable. And it's difficult for me to properly express my gratitude to the heroes of United Flight ninety-three. In short, I owe them my life. On the morning of September eleventh, I was not only in Washington DC, I was working directly across the street from the United States Capitol. If those passengers and crew members of flight ninety-three hadn't acted, if they hadn't so bravely sacrificed their own lives to bring down that plane, I have zero doubt uh uh that I'd be um I b- I believe that it would have hit the capital. And I would have been one of the hundreds, if not thousands, of killed in that devastation. It is a debt that I will never be able to repay. And I'm truly honored to have been able to meet the family members of those who paid the ultimate price for our nation. Our government and our intelligence agencies knew these terrorist threats existed. The alarms were flashing red. And yet, as the nine eleven commission found, we were not communicating with each other and it cost the lives of over thr- of uh nearly three thousand Americans. The report we are about to vote on today, which I support, shows that the world has changed drastically over the past twenty-five years. However, the alarm is still flashing red. We have the widespread proliferation of low-cost drones, artificial intelligence, cyber warfare, giving terrorists and our adversaries new ways to harm our nation, and our families, and our values, our very way of life. The report we will release today provides Congress, the intelligence community, and the public a road map to keep the American people safe. We must do more. to avoid the mistakes of the past. We owe you all the accountability, the transparency. We must do more to honor the lives that we lost here. I thank you. This has been a humbling and amazing experience, and I yield back.

Gentlemen yields. And gentlemen from Virginia, Mr. Klein.

Thank you, Mister Chairman, and thank you to the family members of the forty first responders in the National Park Service for helping to personalize this beautiful memorial that we visited today. The tour of the Flight ninety-three memorial and our subsequent discussion been the perfect background to highlight the importance of this report. While significant reforms were made in the aftermath of the nine eleven attacks that have allowed our nation to confront threats, from those that aim to destroy our nation and the values we represent, there's no doubt that the threat environment has shifted in the twenty five years since nine eleven. This report is an ess essential step in identifying the threats that exist today and how we can work together uh in unity, to close gaps that exist to keep Americans safe. I wanna thank the co-chairs uh for their bipartisan work on this report. It's in remembering the bravery and sacrifice of those heroes on September eleventh two thousand one that we can identify where we failed where we have succeeded since and where we can improve in the future to ensure that as uh one of the family members said about her grandson uh when he was uh at the site that the good guys continue to win uh we must never forget and we must e commit to educating future generations about the heroism displayed twenty five years ago so I r support this report I thank the Chairman and I yield back.

Gentleman Yields, gentleman from New York, Miss Tinney.

Just wanna say thank thank you again to the chairman, uh thank you to everyone here, the Park Service, uh the heroes, families, everyone who was involved in this, uh the friends of the of the uh Flight ninety-three uh organization, and obviously our two chairs, uh Representative Stephanec, Representative Gottheimer, uh we are, you know, we're at a a point uh where everything my colleagues have said is true. uh this ferocious and evil attack on our country. Uh it was horrific and and stunning for us, the biggest terrorist attack in our nation's history on our own soil against innocent civilians not against uh military uh military installations. And yet we continue uh as a member uh of the New York State Delegation and a life-long member of the State of New York, uh we s- continue to have issues uh with where we do not have

I remember that.

cooperation and interoperability between our law enforcement. whether in in the state of New York, our federal agents, our our intelligence, Okay. and that's why this uh commission report is so important to emphasize that. That would be the first bullet. Uh we have uh influences in uh and and government leaders in my own state of New York, where the worst uh tragedy in history has occurred, and yet we continue to have to fight uh to get information sharing, uh laws passed by uh our state legislature in New York, to prevent our p our uh l our law enforcement from working together. Uh, recently our governor has uh declined and and actually wrote a law, and signed into law a an a a law that would prevent us and our government and our local officials from cooperating with the two eighty seven G program to keep our community safe. But I really commend uh the c the uh the work of the committee uh and the s and the c subcommittee on getting this done. It's really important that we continue uh the implementation of this report and make it better as the threats we face are even worse. And uh I'm really pleased with that and I really just wanted to say I'm I'm just completely grateful that uh we have the families here to know that we are fighting and trying to do everything we can uh to make sure make sure this doesn't happen again on our soil. In light of that, and no American should ever lose a family member, a friend, and no loved one should ever face this kind of evil on our soil. Um and to fail to learn the critical lessons of nine eleven uh would be a tragedy again for all of us. And I really just wanna commend

Hmm.

the heroes of uh Flight ninety-three and for this absolutely incredible memorial. It was just amazing uh to see the confluence of evil uh with the beauty of your

Yeah.

remembrance for these people and their hero heroic saving of so many people, uh in our communities and across the country. And I just wanna say thank you to you and thank you to uh our report uh authors. This is uh this is a great step forward into bringing us closer together in preventing this from happening in the future and I yield.

Gentleman from gentlewoman from New York yields here here. The gentleman from Texas is recognized.

Thank you, I'm a better person for having come today, I I really am, and uh yeah, I remember nine eleven and and how we were in Texas and people weren't smiling. I mean it went on for like a week. And um so my staff was nice enough to write remarks I'm not gonna read. Um They're they're well-meaning, but like we can't A hundred million people have been born in this country since the events of September eleventh. Almost half the country had a never living memory. Uh, the pronouns a on September twelfth were us and we. Cuz this country has never uh been stopped when we're united. We've accomplished everything we've ever set out to do when we're united. Taking on Imperial Japan and Nazi Germany synchronously and crushing the evil. We did it cuz we were united. We were united when we took on the the these terrorists. And you can't get, remember it's September uh uh of not two thousand one? You ninety plus percent of Americans were agreeing on what we should do next. You can't get ninety percent of Americans today to agree the sky's blue uh on a clear day. Uh that was it was really and we live in an evil and uh some there's evil in this world and it's a dangerous world and it's ever shrinking. So I do thank um uh Elise and Josh for this report because You did so many things with specificity about the breaking the silos and strengthening ODNI and the importance of uh analytic expertise the whole society approach, public-private partnerships, uh recognizing new threats, uh counter-intelligence, uh leveraging technology, uh innovative flexibility, and American ingenuity will help tremendously. Uh but we sometimes have to have uncomfortable conversations and there's uh newly emerging prominent political voices that are talking about America deserve nine eleven. And I could not vehemently disagree more with this kind of dangerous

Right. Right.

rhetoric. This country is far from perfect, but doesn't mean we're not great. And as Josh said, and I, you took the words right out of my mouth, the greatest country history is ever known. Here, here, absolutely. It's our greatest calling, not just the people on this committee, but Congress as a whole. to make sure that we protect American lives. Because if you're not safe, then you're not free. And you without life, you're not gonna have a pursuit of liberty or or or you're not gonna have liberty, and you're not gonna have a pursuit of happiness. Uh, and my takeaway here is uh, that we can accomplish anything so long as we stay focused on the correct pronouns, which is us and we. Mr. Chairman, I yield back.

Thank you. Uh, before we go any further, first off, I wanna associate myself with the comments of the colleagues on this committee. This has been a great honor to be here today with all of you. I appreciate it. Before we take up the vote on this commission report, I wanna say a word of thank you to the staff who contributed and worked so hard. Um, we could not run it without you. You guys just do so much. This is the evidence of the contribution that you make day in and day out. Thank you guys so much. It's uh now in order to consider the committee's nine eleven report for public release the question is on agreeing to the public release of this committee's report entitled House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, nine eleven, Commission Review, final report. So uh, many of yous are in favor we'll say aye,

Aye. Aye.

aye, all those opposed, no. The ayes have it and the report's release is agreed to. Pursuant to clause two L of house rule eleven, all members are entitled to not less than two calendar days to file supplemental minority additional or dissenting views in writing. I ask unanimous consent that staff be authorized to make necessary conforming technical and clerical changes to the committee's nine eleven report, without objection so ordered. If there's no further business This committee stands adjourned with my thanks.