So people have to decide. Do they want to have the security? Do they want to continue to plug the gap [in border security] that GAO has identified and recognize that there will be some costs to doing that? Or do we want to make sure that business isn't hampered and that people can move back and forth readily, and recognize that, if we don't put some barriers in place, we're going to wind up with dangerous people coming into the country?

Even the kinds of ingredients you can find in your own kitchen can be used to make bombs. So the problem is with the people and not with the tools.

There really is no vacation from the world in which we live.

Al Qaeda is very media-savvy and very focused on what goes on in the global media.

I have not heard a report of thousands of people in the convention center who don't have food and water.

You don't bargain with terrorists. You don't appease terrorists. And anybody who believes that this is about something we've done has to ask themselves why it is, on September 11, 2001, before we were in Afghanistan, before we were in Iraq, he committed a dastardly attack killing over 3,000 people. I mean, this is not a matter of negotiation; it's a matter of victory.

We don't really have the ability to enforce the law with respect to illegal work in this country in a way that's truly effective...We haven't been able to require every employer to enter a system in which they check the work status of their employees and determine whether they're legal, and without that, we don't really have the ability to enforce the law with respect to illegal work in this country in a way that's truly effective. And that would be the single greatest additional weapon we could use if we're serious about tackling this problem.