Panel II of the House Government Reform Committee - Recommendations of the 911 Commission

Federal News Service

August 3, 2004 Tuesday

HEADLINE: PANEL II OF A HEARING OF THE HOUSE GOVERNMENT REFORM COMMITTEE
SUBJECT: RECOMMENDATIONS OF THE 9/11 COMMISSION
CHAIRED BY: REPRESENTATIVE TOM DAVIS (R-VA)
WITNESSES: SALLY REGENHARD, FAMILY MEMBER OF 9/11 VICTIM; BEVERLY ECKERT, FAMILY MEMBER OF 9/11 VICTIM; ROBIN WIENER, FAMILY MEMBER OF 9/11 VICTIM
LOCATION: 2154 RAYBURN HOUSE OFFICE BUILDING, WASHINGTON, D.C.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT

REP. DAVIS: Thank you, gentlemen. At this time the chair would recognize Chris Van Hollen.

REP. VAN HOLLEN: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

We've covered a lot of territory today, and I just want to take my time to first thank you for your powerful and eloquent testimony and thank you for dedicating yourselves to doing everything in your power to prevent another 9/11 and to prevent other families from suffering the terrible loss that you have. My colleague, Mr. Tierney, talked about the potential timetable in the Congress, and I just want to underscore that point and also add that the parts of the reform that deal with Congressional oversight can be done even more quickly in the sense they don't even require any interaction with the executive branch. We can do that on our own. It affects only the Congress. It does not necessarily require getting any testimony or input from the Congressional-excuse me-from the executive branch, and yet I predict that will be one of the most difficult pieces to put in place, even though it is totally under control and it's our own house. So I ask you, as you monitor the situation to make sure you hold Congress's feet to its fire, not just with respect to the recommendations that deal with the executive branch but our own house as well.

I think you know better than anybody that you were the driving force behind the creation of the 9/11 Commission. There are many people that did not want to see a Commission established, and if it hadn't been for your voices, we wouldn't have the Commission, we wouldn't have the recommendations that we've heard today from the Commission and from all of you, and I think the same may well be true, unfortunately, with respect to the recommendations of the Commission. Without your continued driving force behind these recommendations, there is a real danger, as I know you recognize from your testimony that many of them will be left by the wayside.

And even today you've heard differences in interpretation about the remarks made by the president yesterday. I'm not going to try and interpret his remarks. I would just ask you in the days ahead, rather than us debating exactly what he meant, to make sure that you work with us to seek clarification, because as Secretary Lehman said, this is not a Chinese menu. These are all parts of a whole, and if you take parts of their recommendation without enacting another part, it really does upset the balance within them. So I thank you for your testimony. If you have anything to add with respect to your plans in putting-maintaining public pressure on the Congress, I welcome them.

MS. WIENER: I thank you for your comments, and I want to assure you that all the families will push you as hard as we're going to push the president and the executive branch. There has already been discussion about how critically important Congressional oversight is and changes in the committee structure is discussed in the Commission's report, and we will be pushing you as well, we promise.

MS. REGENHARD: I'd like to add something-you know, regarding the bills and regarding the process of this legislation. It's being posted on the website and, you know, the family steering committee monitoring it. Certainly things such as immigration reform issues will be one of the types of things that will be looked at and who is really supporting this and who is working against it.

I wanted to say one word about immigration reform. The families of the victims are certainly concerned with illegal immigration. We certainly all-I'm a child of immigrants, myself. I'm a first- generation American. My parents were legal immigrants to this country. So a lot of times when we speak about illegal immigration, there is really a confusion regarding what exactly is said. We are certainly for legal immigration in this country. We support it. It's a country of immigrants; it will continue to be so, to our credit; but it's illegal immigration that has to be monitored, it has to be stopped if we want to remain safe.

MS. ECKERT: I think people forget that we have an incredibly compassionate immigration policy. We do let an enormous number of here legally, and I think we have to keep that in mind. And it's important and there are some programs-you know, sometimes there's talk of amnesty as some kind of solution, but before we consider something like that I think the public needs to know that Ramzi Yousef was a beneficiary-he's the World Trade Center bomber in '93 -- a beneficiary of amnesty. So I think any of these programs have to be dealt with very carefully.

REP. SHAYS: Thank you, Mr. Van Hollen. What we'll do is Mr. Platt has agreed to allow Mr. Lynch to go. I think he's going to catch a plane. So you have the floor next.

BREAK IN TRANSCRIPT