During a House Homeland Security Committee hearing prior to the congressional recess, Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-CA) spoke about cyber threats that the United States faces.
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NewsTranscript
00:00I thank the chairman and excited to begin this new Congress again with the chairman.
00:07It's not a great place to be in the minority, but if you have a chairman like Mr. Garbarino
00:13on your subcommittee, it's a great place to get things done.
00:17And that's our mission here, is to get things done for the good of our constituents and
00:23the security of the people and companies we represent.
00:27This first hearing is focused on a bipartisan priority, identifying opportunities to improve
00:32implementation of the Cyber Incident Reporting for Critical Infrastructure Act, CIRSEA, and
00:37the need to harmonize cyber regulations.
00:40Before I begin, though, I did want to take a moment to recognize and express my condolences
00:44to the family, friends, and constituents of Congressman Sylvester Turner, who passed away
00:50last week.
00:52He was a member of this subcommittee and his passion for cybersecurity, whether it was
00:57as the mayor of one of America's largest cities in Houston, that was clear, also as a member
01:05of Congress serving on a committee that works on that, and it was clear during his first
01:11two full committee hearings last month, and we'll miss his contributions that he made
01:15and would have made to this subcommittee.
01:19Referring to the subject of today's hearing, I agree that compliance costs can outweigh
01:22the security benefit of regulations when compliance with duplicative regulations cuts into investment
01:30and security.
01:31We should not be imposing regulations for the sake of imposing regulations.
01:36Security should be designed to achieve outcomes that are proven to reduce risk and improve
01:42resilience and security.
01:45To that end, I am pleased to support CERCEA because it addressed a concrete security gap
01:50and will improve the government's ability to detect and disrupt malicious cyber activity.
01:55It also put in place a framework that ensures covered entities would not need to report
02:00the same cyber incidents multiple times to multiple regulators.
02:05If a hacker gets into a bank or energy company, we want them to focus on eradicating the threat
02:10as quickly as possible, not huddling the lawyers and compliance experts.
02:15It should be fixing the problem and reestablishing their services.
02:20I'm troubled that the proposed rule does not incorporate the feedback that the private
02:24sector provided during the RFI process.
02:27Congress put CISA in charge of the cyber incident reporting rule because it has a record of
02:31working collaboratively with the private sector, and our intent was that CISA would engage
02:36the private sector to develop a workable rule.
02:39Together with Ranking Member Thompson and my colleague, Congresswoman Clark, I submitted
02:43comments on the proposed rule, urging CISA to more carefully scope the entities, incidents,
02:48and information that must be reported.
02:49I've also called on CISA to establish an ex parte process to facilitate ongoing engagements
02:56with the private sector.
02:58With the fall 2025 deadline for issuing a final rule looming, I urge CISA to work quickly
03:05to reengage with the private sector and refine the scope of this rule.
03:09There are also three key pieces of cybersecurity legislation that I urge this committee to
03:13pass as quickly as possible.
03:15First, we must authorize the Joint Cyber Defense Collaborative, CISA's operational and collaboration
03:21hub.
03:22Formal authorization of the JCDC will provide much needed transparency regarding who can
03:27be a member and the activities JCDC takes on.
03:30We passed this in a bipartisan manner last Congress with support of the chairman of the
03:35whole committee.
03:36I hope that authorization this Congress will restore trust among JCDC participants and
03:42focus JCDC on the activities most likely to drive security benefits.
03:47Relatedly, the Cyber Information Sharing Act of 2015 is set to expire at the end of September.
03:54The bill is the foundational collaboration between the government and the private sector
04:00and it must be reauthorized.
04:02As it relates to CISA and some of the firings that we've seen there, I want to make sure
04:06that we get rid of waste, fraud, and abuse.
04:09The government should be efficient and not waste your money.
04:12That is a priority of mine.
04:13It's a priority of most of my colleagues.
04:16However, we must be especially careful when any cut goes to public safety, national security,
04:23or cybersecurity because we know that we are more vulnerable than ever to a cyber attack
04:29and we want to make sure that we have the best folks on guard working hand-in-hand with
04:34the private sector to make sure we're best protected.
04:37Finally, state and local cybersecurity grant programs will expire on September 30.
04:41The grant program has helped state and local governments across the country improve their
04:45ability to defend against and become resilient to sophisticated cyber attacks from our adversaries
04:50and other criminals.
04:51Again, I thank my colleagues for their commitment to moving the ball forward on cybersecurity
04:55and I look forward to working with each of you and our witnesses to do that.
04:59Mr. Chairman, again, I'm looking forward to this Congress and what we can do together
05:03and this is an appropriate way to kick off this subcommittee and I yield back.