WASHINGTON, D.C.— House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence Chairman Rick Crawford (AR-01) delivered the following unclassified opening statement at a closed hearing on counterintelligence screening, vetting, and watchlisting.
Nearly a decade ago, President Trump’s first Administration recognized the importance of identity intelligence when he issued National Security Presidential Memoranda 7 and 9.
These memoranda directed federal agencies to integrate threat actor information, break down stovepipes, and ensure comprehensive screening and vetting in furtherance of border security, homeland security, and public safety.
The premise of President Trump’s directive was straightforward: identity resolution, integrated data sharing, and discoverability are prerequisites to national security.
Despite this clear direction, the Intelligence Community’s progress on the counterintelligence category of NSPM 7 is in doubt. That is the reason for our hearing.
The core question before us is whether the United States currently possesses a structured, discoverable, continuously updated body of knowledge about foreign intelligence threat actors.
To the extent that such knowledge exists, we need to know if it is governed by clear, enforceable, and repeatable standards and appropriate information sharing frameworks.
I hope you have good news for us today because since President Trump issued his directives in 2017, the CI threat environment has worsened. Some believe it is worse now than at any time during the Cold War.
I want to speak briefly about the problem our nation faces and communicate some home truths, which I hope you will take back to your leadership.
The reality, we as a government are going to have to face, is that the United States is a contested domain.
The homeland is quite literally overrun with counterintelligence and foreign operational threats and we, as a nation, lack the resources and capabilities to address them.
In short, I don’t think we have a homefield advantage anymore. In fact, I believe we have an easier time detecting Chinese and other threats against our allies than we do within the United States. I also believe many responsible officials are living in denial about what is going on around us.
Technology has quickly transformed the threat environment. Drones are a good example of this. They can be used to collect information, can be used to enable sabotage or they can be used for kinetic attack. We see this threat every day. Public reporting has documented incursions of unidentified drones at classified facilities across the nation and low-cost drone swarms are being used in combat in Europe and the Middle East.
Compounding this, the border crisis introduced a profound and still-unquantified vulnerability.
Estimates suggest that among the millions who entered illegally, hundreds of thousands— including nationals from adversary states—received very little to no scrutiny and whose identities, affiliations, and intentions remain unknown to this day.
Foreign intelligence services exploit precisely this kind of seam. They operate continuously and below criminal thresholds — to steal research, penetrate industry, cultivate insiders across government and the private sector, map critical infrastructure, conduct reconnaissance, and preposition for sabotage.
They move through layered networks of facilitators, shell companies, academic placements, witting and unwitting sources, and real estate acquisitions.
The threat is not a single catastrophic event. It is cumulative erosion of security— each incident appearing isolated while the underlying vulnerability remains systemic.
The United States is hemorrhaging national security information, research, advanced technology, and as a result we are losing our strategic advantage.
Screening, vetting, and watchlisting are not administrative exercises. They are a core component of national security and to maintaining our strategic advantage.
There are too many threats that we aren’t detecting today and we can’t credibly defend our nation if we can’t see threats.
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