Janet Napolitano Quotations

With these newly forming areas, it's too soon to predict what they will be in the long run, ... I think areas like Pinal County are very fluid.

Each and every one of the security measures we implement serves an important goal: providing safe and efficient air travel for the millions of people who rely on our aviation system every day.

Nonetheless, to the extent that terrorists have come into our country or suspected or known terrorists have entered our country across a border, it's been across the Canadian border. There are real issues there.

Well, you know, I think in conversations with members of the Senate and others, they all recognize that the issue of immigration is important. It's important to our nation, it's important to our public safety, it's important to our security, it's important to our economic well-being moving forward. And it's not something that's going to go away.

What we're doing is making sure that we have a safe and secure border region from San Diego all the way to Brownsville. And that means manpower, it means technology, it means infrastructure, it means interior enforcement. All, you know, kind of layered in appropriate ways, and making sure, like I said before, the border is safe and secure.

All images generated by imaging technology are viewed in a walled-off location not visible to the public. The officer assisting the passenger never sees the image, and the officer viewing the image never interacts with the passenger. The imaging technology that we use cannot store, export, print or transmit images.

I'm angry that the private sector, which is supposed to be in charge of running gasoline into the Valley, doesn't have its act together to deal with a critical situation, so now the public sector has to step in.

We are on the lookout for criminal and terrorist activity but we do not - nor will we ever - monitor ideology or political beliefs. We take seriously our responsibility to protect the civil rights and liberties of the American people, including subjecting our activities to rigorous oversight from numerous internal and external sources.

Let me be very clear: We monitor the risks of violent extremism taking root here in the United States. We don't have the luxury of focusing our efforts on one group; we must protect the country from terrorism whether foreign or homegrown, and regardless of the ideology that motivates its violence.

The last thing the Department of Homeland Security is about is infringing on anybody's constitutionally protected rights.

Well, you know, the violence is mostly in Mexico itself, at least the violence that people are worried about. And so we want to make sure that violence does not spill over into our communities that are along the border.

One of the most striking elements of today's threat picture is that plots to attack America increasingly involve American residents and citizens.

Such a system would be very, very expensive and laborious to have, given the kinds of border we have. Scientists and engineers aren't even sure they have the technology to make it work

It is fair to say there are individuals in the United States who ascribe to al-Qaeda-type beliefs.

I believe that Streamline should be part of our toolbox of things that we use at the border. And there needs to be a variety of things that we use at the border to get the most effective enforcement strategy. And so really it's a resource issue more than anything else.

We have at least 125 communities in Arizona at risk from wildfire, not because of review processes or litigation delays but because of a lack of federal funding on the ground to actually begin the projects.

As part of our layered approach, we have expedited the deployment of new Advanced Imaging Technology (AIT) units to help detect concealed metallic and non-metallic threats on passengers. These machines are now in use at airports nationwide, and the vast majority of travelers say they prefer this technology to alternative screening measures.

The United States and Arizona are both losing jobs to offshore locations.

I believe we have to move, eventually in our country, toward a system of public financing that really works for candidates running for federal office. I will support that as president.

It's all about who gets to work and making sure they're legally present in our country. And to do that nationally E-verify becomes a key component. It certainly needs to available, effective and as inexpensive as possible and that employer needs to use it as a tool. Some of the arguments that are made about how it works or does not work don't carry much water with me. I've already used it for several years. It works.

It drove home, personally, the value of early detection and education and intervention.

It would be unwise to say the least, irresponsible of us at the TSA, at the Homeland Security Department not to evolve our technology to match the changing threat environment that we inhabit.

I've appointed a task force to take a fresh look at the color-code system and whether we should retain it, change it or scrap it.

I have long been a proponent of a guest-worker program between the United States and Mexico, and in particular I have proposed that Arizona would be an ideal location for a pilot project.

But my view is that you need a system at the border. You need some fencing but you need technology. You need boots on the ground. And then you need to have interior enforcement of our nation's immigration laws inside the country. And that means dealing with the employers who still consistently hire illegal labor.

And we ask the American people to play an important part of our layered defense. We ask for cooperation, patience and a commitment to vigilance in the face of a determined enemy.

Now, a lot of what we are doing right now, quite frankly, is because of what happened on Christmas. Many of the things were kind of in the works. We were already planning, for example, the purchase and deployment of advanced imaging technology. You call them body scanners. We call them AITs (Advanced Imaging Technologies).

Today in America, we are trying to prepare students for a high tech world of constant change, but we are doing so by putting them through a school system designed in the early 20th Century that has not seen substantial change in 30 years.

So not only do we need to deal with threats as they emerge, we have to be thinking in anticipation of future threats, and the things we do have to be things that enable the system to continue to work.

Public schools were designed as the great equalizers of our society - the place where all children could have access to educational opportunities to make something of themselves in adulthood.

If American schooling is inadequate now, just imagine how much more obsolete it will be when today's kindergarten students graduate from high school in just 12 years.

Smart businesses do not look at labor costs alone anymore. They do look at market access, transportation, telecommunications infrastructure and the education and skill level of the workforce, the development of capital and the regulatory market.

You can't imagine a world, quite frankly, without a safe and secure aviation system. And so our job is to really focus on that, and what we need to do to keep it safe and secure.

We have received 500 calls from people, saying 'What the heck is going on with gas?'

Several of them are inside doing their homework,

She said basically, 'Thank you for not leaving me. Thank you for not rushing the tower. They would have killed me,'

to combat the growing devastation caused by the crimes associated with illegal immigration.

I agree with them. What the heck is going on with gas?

Our school facilities must be repaired, and our teachers need to be trained and treated as artisans of a noble profession.

Reduction of Highway Patrol presence should always be a last resort, and should not be undertaken without an exhaustive review, in consultation with the Governor's Office, of all available alternatives,

Sue Clark-Johnson has been a wonderful addition to Arizona and to Phoenix. I wish her the very best of luck, and we will sorely miss her,

It doesn't make sense that Arizona's prices should suddenly jump up higher than California's, ... Arizonans deserve real answers.

It doesn't make any sense to me to start on the interior of the forest if you haven't first protected around the areas where the communities are.

I think I had pretty clearly telegraphed that I was going to be proclaiming (approval of all ballot measures) before I went to Mexico. Anybody could have read those tea leaves.

We must prepare young people for a brain-centered economy whose one constant is rapid change. The predominant classroom model a single teacher lecturing to 20, 30, or even more students reflects the production-line model of the Industrial Age, not the technological demands of our Information Age.

We have an obligation to enforce the border, ... it's important for the people of this state to understand, your voices are being heard in Washington, D.C.

Today's children need more years of education than we are offering. And they need more daily hours of instruction than we are providing. They are ready to learn long before kindergarten, and on the other end of the spectrum, all of them must have access to advanced education for years after they graduate from high school.

We constantly need to go back, look at what we have, think of scenarios where there's no power, no water,

We just kept waiting and waiting and waiting but never did see a sense of urgency from Washington.

We've probably gotten 500 calls from people saying what the heck is going on with gas, and I gotta say I agree with you, ... What the heck is going on with gas?

Both federal governments let us down - there doesn't seem to be any sense of urgency,

The rule of law has become victim, and the people who are experiencing it the most are those communities along the border, ... It is a very, very big problem for us.

Right now we are not on a plane list for the next couple of days so that gives us the opportunity to focus on the people who are here,

Definitely some work needs to be done, and it's pretty astounding,

This is a step in the right direction, but we really need more resources.

This confirms what parents have been telling us for years now. Parents want voluntary full-day kindergarten because it works. Parents want strong classroom teachers for the same reason: because it works. No surprises here.

They have a great facility there, well prepared, and we'll keep dividing between Phoenix and Tucson as they come in,

They (FEMA officials) just don't have their act together, ... They didn't know where their evacuees are; they didn't know how many each state had. Those are basic questions. You need competence at the top to manage these large-scale disasters.

As we move deeper into the 21st Century, the need for a quality public school system will become more of an economic issue and more of a civil rights issue. Because, as our economy relies more on brains and less on brawn, the only way everyone can secure all the blessings of liberty is to receive a quality education.

It's not partisan, ... I don't think education can be a partisan issue if we're going to be successful. Partisan politics in this country can get things stuck. It needs to be what can we do for the next generation of kids. And what do they need.

For Arizonans, there's a particular connection because it was the U.S.S. Arizona and so on December 7, we have a lot of commemorations on the day of the attack, and it's a big part of Arizona life,

It's a very detailed and very complex operation,

I'm not going to play that game. I focus on my own issues. We've been able to very commonsensical.

The great thing about this town hall format is that it allows us to hear what's on the minds of Americans. Tonight, it was clear - voters have quite a few questions about the direction in which the current administration is headed.