Transcripts For CSPAN Susan Rice Denis McDonough Others On National Security 20240713

Feels a little bit like a family reunion, but this is more than a reunion. It is more than an average think tank conference. We all have an urgent task before us, to be ready to advance the Progressive National security and Foreign Policy agenda on day one of a new presidency, should we be so lucky in november. It is obvious there will be a lot of repair work to restore americas leadership in the world after donald trump. The last couple weeks have shown what danger might lie ahead. It will be no small task to fix from the has broken, erosion of our National Security institutions, to our credibility around the world, to the rampant corruption across our Foreign Policy. But today is not really about trump, and it is not about returning to the status quo. We need to be ambitious about an agenda that advances our interest and reflects our progressive values, and that unifies the American People across generations around a positive vision for our role in the world. In doing so, it will be important we revisit some of our perceptions stop some of our ambitions. This wont happen unless we are ready. Today kicks off a Cap Initiative to build a 100 day plan for National Security. Our goal today is to have a substantive and exchange for ideas in advancing a progressive vision across a number of areas, including ending the wars, managing our complex relationship with china, tackling Climate Change, rebalancing defense and diplomacy, and many more. We are thinking about executive action to major policy initiatives to building human capital. There are Big Questions for our community to take on. How do we responsibility we responsibly end wars . How do we ensure america can compete with china without ending up in a cold war . How do we address human rights while acknowledging steps necessary to ensure the rights of americans at home . How do we put diplomacy front and center in american foreignpolicy after years of atrophy and militarization . High for set the Bar International action on Climate Change . Todays discussions will certainly not cover the full waterfront of issues we collectively need to take on, but it is important to start somewhere. Most importantly, cap cannot do this alone. This effort complements a lot of work underway across the progressive community. I want to acknowledge our closest Partner Organizations here today, including National Security action, third war, Foreign Policy for america, truman project, and human rights first. We hope this conference will generate ideas for all efforts across the community. I am grateful for how strong and collaborative it is, even when we have a range of viewpoints. One thing is certain, there is a lot of passion in this room, and i am excited for cap to be part of it. I want to give you a few logistical notes. You will be divided into binary sessions and breakouts. This is the morning session. We will have a keynote conversation with ambassador smith after the breakouts. Given the venue capacity constraints, we tried to allocate Breakout Sessions based on receiving availability. Your badge contains the schedule for the day, as well as directions for which rooms you will be in. Room will be on the record and open to the press. Breakout sessions will be off the record and not for tweeting or according. Or quoting. Your hashtag information is on your badge. I would like to welcome to the stage max hoffman, our associate director at the center for american progress. He will introduce the first panel of the day. [applause] max good morning, everyone. Thank you so much for being here today. It is essentially impossible to reflect on our topic for the day, the critical first 100 days of a Progressive Administration, without a nod to the frenetic and productive first three months of Franklin Roosevelts first term, which gave us the concept itself. Fdr assumed office with one in four americans out of work, the nations banks shuttered. The International System was in tatters, torn apart by economic depression, crippling war debt and trade wars. By the time roosevelt took his oath, hitler was chancellor of germany, mussolini firmly ensconced in italy, japan had begun its expansionist path and a crisis in neighboring cuba, often forgotten, augured a new new and potentially costly u. S. Intervention. Roosevelt and his aides responded with persistent experimentation. Above all, the president insisted, try something. It is in that spirit that we are here today. To assess the critical problems and priorities we hope will create a new Progressive Administration a year from now. Many daunting challenges are clearly visible already and will be discussed in the Breakout Sessions. There will almost certainly be unpleasant surprises in the months to come. Most of us share the sense our system is badly frayed. We cant ask Kerry Hopkins what their secret was in 1933, but we have the next best thing. Along with our moderator, our three speakers were integral to the last time a progressive president took office. In 2009, amid financial crisis and two wars. Share theirm to thoughts on this critical first 100 days and the balancing act that will confront the next president. Michele flournoy is the cofounder and former ceo of the center for new american security. She was under secretary of defense for policy from 2009 to colead president obamas transition team. Dennis mcdonagh, senior principal of the markle foundation. Denis oversaw the Strategic Communications in the first year of president obamas term before serving as assistant to the president and Principal Deputy National Security advisor from 2010 to 2013, when he assumed the role of white house chief of staff, where he served for the remainder of the term. Ambassador susan rice, distinguished visiting research fellow. Ambassador rice has been integral to two president ial transitions, serving president clinton and serving on the National Security council from 1993 to 1997. Ambassador rice served as president obamas un ambassador, before she became National Security adviser in 2013, where she too remained by the end of the term. Here experience from this remarkable career are captured her recent book tough love, which is well worth a read. Join me in welcoming this distinguished group of public servants. [applause] welcome to our first opening panel. Im excited to welcome you here. I have worked closely with everyone on the stage. They are tremendous policymakers and human beings. Thank you for joining us today. You all served on the front end of administrations. Some of you served all eight years of an administration. You have seen the full arc of Foreign Policy under a progressive president. The first 100 days is usually a very hectic time for presidencies. Campaigns get focused before they enter the west wing. As you reflect on your time in the first 100 days of a presidency, what would be your practical recommendations for how we should all be thinking about planning for that. I realize the 100 day contracts is somewhat arbitrary, but they are useful in terms of creating momentum and ideas at the beginning of the presidency. I ask you to reflect on that. Mr. Nough is mcdonough it is great to see so many familiar faces. It is an honor to be up here with michele and susan. Three things. It is all about the people and the ability to execute on campaign promises, which is the name of the game. You have to have people in place. If you are waiting to think about people until the first 100 days, it is too late, which is why it is so important for work you are doing focusing on the transition, the work people like the partnership for Public Service are working on interestingand also ideas out there, including trying to aggregate a new tech book so that we are able to shorten the distance between Silicon Valley and washington in terms of getting tech talent into the government. One is people. Two is recognizing it is going to be hard. Max said this is what we do as democrats or progressives. Republicans screw stuff up, and we have to fix it. Wilson, you with can start with roosevelt, you can go to truman, who built institutions that won the cold war, kennedy restored american standing and hope and optimism in institutions. President carter, who again restored hope in the institutions, and president clinton, who brought us out of the depths of real economic malaise into being able to capitalize on the fall of the soviet union and ultimately president obama stopping us from falling into a Great Depression as we came out of the deepest recession since the Great Depression. It is hard. Our ideas, our people, our commitment are the best ones. That has been proven over time. The fact that you are rolling up your sleeves today to get those ideas and people ready means it will be less hard, but still really hard. Not 3, but it is hard to overstate the damage that has been done to our alliances, to our standing in the world, and while we are basically standing still, china and others are not. Make maximum use of the time now to ensure when the bell rings on those 100 days, that we make maximum use of that period. It is great to see so many friends and colleagues in the audience. Good morning to everyone. I agree with denis that personnel is key, the most critical thing to have right by the end of the first 100 days, which means starting to think about personnel before there is a transition, utilizing it to maximum effect. The transition is incredibly short. It will go by in a nanosecond. There are lots of nuts and bolts practical planning that needs to be done. Personnel, number one. Two, i suggest only a handful of early critical policy initiatives. I think you can get sucked into a morass and fail to execute adequately if youve got a huge menu of things you are trying to do all at once at the outset. Four or five big things, domestic and international, that you aim to prioritize, makes better sense. Tactical things like the budget. Practical things like the budget. The Prior Administration will leave behind a budget that is garbage, that bears no resemblance to your priorities, but having an early sense to what you want to use the money for is absolutely key. Basic things also, like knowing what the calendar is coming up, what are the events, the meetings, things you absolutely have to confront, not only in the first 100 days, but the first six months, and being prepared to hit the ground running for each of those things. Thinking carefully how you do outreach to friends and partners and allies. The sequence of initial phone calls, of meetings, of travel by the president sends important messages, and you want to be extremely deliberate about that, especially now, given how much damage has been done to these relationships. It is critical to be intentional. We only have one president at a time. The Trump Administration violated that flagrantly during the transition to detrimental to honorbut we need it, because it is the only way our government can function responsibly. And finally i say, in stark contrast to what the incoming Trump Administration did, it is important to spend time with your predecessors, and to get the briefings that you need. You may not agree with them. They may not be as forthcoming, but spending time with your counterpart to understand where things are and where the landmines lay is vitally important. As we know from our experience at the end of the Obama Administration, in the entirety of the National Security apparatus, the only meetings that occurred of any substance between counterparts were between me and National Security advisor michael flynn. Not the state, not the other critical agencies. You can imagine the kind of deficit that leaves an incoming administration. Let me add my thanks for convening us all. Thank you. I agree with everything that has been said. Surprise. On the people point, one of the things that establishes us his we want to National Security cadre that looks like america. You have to put in work to make sure it becomes a reality. Now is the time to do that work. I want to give a shout out to an Organization Called Leadership Council for women in national literallywhich is looking for qualified midlevel and senior women so when the next president says i want a diverse National Security cadre, they are actually qualified women and hopefully people of color ready to be considered for the top jobs in the National Security country. Security cadre. We have to make sure we live our values when we govern. Now is the time to build intellectual capital on the policies we want to use to govern. You cant wait until the transition time. It is way too short. This is what we should be doing in terms of think tanks and others to start developing, a prioritized agenda for the most important areas where we want to signal change, that we are changing direction. One of my favorites is the notion of, if we are worried about strategic competition, why arent we investing here at home in drivers of american competitiveness . The s p agenda, the research and development, smart immigration policy, those are all issues that transcend the domestic Foreign Policy divide. What does the agenda look like . That is a primary area. How do we send a reassuring signals to allies, that this is a new era. The last thing i will note is, agenda,et that early we have to be cognizant, coming from being in the get your you have to arms around this quickly and you inheriting potential crises. You need to get a quick sense of what comes down the pipe, what explodes in the early part of my watch. How do we make sure we are positioned . Those are some specifics to add to the great frameworks laid out. From a diplomatic perspective, you talked about having the first two or three bi g plays. Unyou are an incoming ambassador we wont make you do it twice, dont worry. Why not . [laughter] from a diplomatic perspective, picking up on the allies, what would you think are the biggest moves we need to make in the first 100 days . I dont think we should underestimate the difficulty of restoring these relationships and renewing them. That is not easy. People are frustrated. They have lost trust, they are impatient. The depth of their disaffection with the United States is deep and real, and will take, in my judgment, the work of more than a single new administration over eight years to restore and repair. Being reminded how deep that damage is, and how much patience, state work, humility that to restore it is critically important. Allies, vitally important. How do we go about that . Certainly the european allies need extraordinary reassurance. So does canada. Asian allies. We have traditionally thought of these groups of alliances as distinct, the asian allies, north atlantic allies. With trump making everything extremely transactional and bullying, we not only have to try to repair in the most practical sense the damage, but we have to think about how we view our alliances anew. If we could envision a renewal of our vows to nato. [laughter] or, you know, you stand up and reconnect. Go back to the altar and apologize for your transgressions. [laughter] ms. Rice i think we need something almost akin to that in diplomatic terms, but we need to toreasingly look at ways knit together our asian and north atlantic partnerships not only on the security front but politically, diplomatically, and that is where i suggest some real rebuilding. I would suggest for two reasons that a new president seriously considering sending as ambassadors to the critical european partners, career ambassadors. That is a typical, but what that would do apart from a very steady and apolitical hand is send a critical message to a deeply beleaguered Foreign Service and Career Civil Service , that they count, and we are doing business differently. In the same vein, i think we need an early aggressive initiative to restore capacity and morale to the state department. We should be looking at legislative assistance to bring back many of those who have t not necessarily because they wanted to, but had them to pick up where they left off. That is a complicated thing bureaucratically and it would require legislative relief. It is absolutely essential. We cant repair the damage that has been done to our career foreign and civil service. State, but across the board. Without deliberate urgent steps that enable us to recoup the talent that we could still recoup. A couple other things. In the realm of new initiatives, if you have a handful of things you aim to lay on the table in early days, there are some ripe areas, but the most compelling is in the realm of climate, to go way beyond just recommitting to paris, but having. S. Ledthebox a bold u initiative to take us well beyond where we would be had we adhered to paris, and to try to reclaim and restore the leadership role we once had. To do it not in isolation, but in partnership with key allies and others who are not allies, like china and india, who use the opportunity of our vacation from Climate Change to scramble the table. Finally, we also need to restore certain norms as to how we conduct Foreign Policy and engage the rest of the world. If i were in a position of leadership, i would ban making Foreign Policy by tweet. I dont mean that to be flip or contrary. It is not an appropriate vehicle for substantive statement. It evades the necessary work of consulting with allies and partners and consulting with congress. It is flip, it is short, it doesnt give weight to the decisions of the sort that have to be made. I would restore regular press briefings, not just at the state department, but other agencies and at the white house. We need to, early on, go back to the basics that we have learned in the course of thiS Administration are not mandated, but norms that served our Decision Making process in our leadership role very well, and in the absence of, we are seeing the consequences. Michele, the pentagon. The big behemoth of the pentagon. President trump has politicized the military in hiS Administration. We have reports of low morale, reports that the military has taken an outsized role in planning and decision processes in the pentagon. We are staring down quite a large Defense Budget that, i think, is on an unsustainable trajectory. You had to deal with the intricacies and behemoth that is the pentagon. How would you approach the pentagon transition . The michele the state of military relations inside the pentagon except at the very top is not a good place. It is not very healthy. That goes back to the first thing we talked about, thiS Administration came in and oncame in totally unprepared the civilian front and there was a vacuum in the pentagon for a very long time. Parts of the military institution filled in the vacuum. That has not been rebalanced. S a lot of good ideas, talent, and the value of control oversight and is appropriate in a democracy. Many would welcome the return of a strong civilian partner. Many are uncomfortable having been put in the position they have been put in. Having a strong civilian team come in as you described for the National Security Decision Making process, resetting the internal decisionmaking processes of the pentagon to be civilianled and supported. I think theres a huge opportunity to come in with a Lessons Learned mindset. 11. Ad 20 years since 9 we have been through afghanistan and iraq, the global war on terror. We should have a perspective on what works, what doesnt work. This relates to the budget. Senior military leaders already say they understand the current level of defense spending is not sustainable. Even Mick Mulvaney has signaled that in the second Trump Administration, god forbid, the Defense Budget wouldnt stay at the same level. We have to think about the budget in terms of what is the National Security budget and the Defense Department peace of that piece of that. Sanctions and the military is not an effective Foreign Policy. You cant have one instrument on steroids as much as we would like a Strong Military for deterrence and all that when everybody else is on life support. We have got to think about our budget in National Security terms. How do we continue to invest in smart defense while rebuilding usaid, andepartment, other informational tools. There has been a lot of talk about a national a unified National Security budget. Is that something they should take on . That perspective is the right one. To do unified single budget, even if the administration did that, until you Reform Congress they are going to break it into little pieces and run it through individual committees. What you can do is by mission area. What is the government smart approach to counterterrorism Going Forward . What is the whole of government smart approach to climate and National Security . What is the whole of government smart approach to deal with rising china . We get a lot of distance you need to get by taking a missionbased approach. It raises the question there is always a lot of enthusiasm at the beginning of the administration making a big change to having an impact, and that is great and we want to sustain that, but how do you antain that across years of administration . How do you deal with the Advocacy Community to keep energized around what you are trying to get done . What is your advice about making change and maintaining the enthusiasm . Newmcdonough i see your colleague in the back. That is a nice higher for nice hire for cap. She is in the back of the hall there. I want to say two things, jump off of what susan and michele said. One is the calendar of crisis. Thingsre a bunch of where the current president is saying he is solving a problem when in fact he is ignoring one. A perfect example of that is the crisis on the border. When you think about when the president elect will be coming with his or her transition team, think about the fact it will be in the early days of the seasonal upswing of migration, in a position where there is a lot of pentup demand, if not expectation on the border not addressed by any significant investment in development in the northern Central American region. The president elect will have a crisis on his or her hands because the current president is so fundamentally ignoring the challenge. In that respect, i am happy to know dan and a couple others are working on this expressly to the point about intellectual property having a view about what should happen. The question of norms is important. We had a pretty big debate about the strategic Framework Agreement with the iraqis. 2009. 008, early frameworkn that agreement by the Bush Administration was a timeline. To reduce american presence in iraq. There was debate within our team about whether we should not accelerate that reduction. At the end of the day, a powerful normative argument that has held true across many administrations until now carried the day, which is to say an an agreement with a president , irrespective of the party of the president , was considered binding on the incoming president. By that president himself, heretofore all having been meant. The point i am trying to make is democratsogressive have a question about that to resolve. In that specific case, within a series of other norms, which is do we want to try to restore the respect, for example, the independence of the department of justice . Do we want to have an attorney general who will restore the postwatergate view of independent of the attorney general . These are not easy questions to results. There should be spirited debates. We should be very intentional about those questions. Then the question about how to make the best use of people and which i use of time, think was your question being made. I think you have to show up and youve got to engage the question. I love susan rice, okay . I can tell you that susan rice and i had it out on a number of different occasions. Ms. Rice we have witnesses. [laughter] mr. Mcdonough true. True. Somebody is getting written up in the book. She didnt write it, though. The point is, lets have it out. These are hard questions we have to resolve, and we should make sure that in the christian of progressives, the tradition of taking on big challenges, let your hair down and have it out. That means both inside the government so having a robust interagency process. Apparently now they dont have many interagency meetings too substantive and too spicy. We should be comfortable. The other thing is we should make sure we recognize congress has congressional responsibilities embedded in article one. Lovee article two, but i article one. The fact is that our people who have responsibility under each of those articles that we need to carry them out. You shouldnt hide from them. You should engage them. The same time we should be engaging opportunities for gathering information, ideas, from each other, inside the agency administration, inside a transition team, within the Broader Community of thinkers, we should also recognize that we have a lot of really interesting experienced voices on capitol hill and theres a lot of experienced republicans as well. And so those things dont happen as we now witness unless you are intentional about it. My manager to your question is my main answer to your question is the intention. Can i pick up on the congressional theme . A number of us are thinking about what if you have potential a democratic senate, or if you dont, even facing a potentially Hostile Congress and youre trying to implement a progressive agenda. You worked with congress in different roles. How would you be thinking about the relationships necessary to build the coalitions that are necessary to build, to get some of the big agenda work done potentially with either a Friendly Congress or a nonfriendly . From my work and the pentagon, one of the lessons i took away was the times when we were smart enough to bring key Congressional Staff and members in early on an initiative or on a problem set that we were trying to solve and kind of make them part of the group thats trying to think it through and craft a solution, we tended to do a lot better. I understand there are times when you cant. But i think more interaction, more informal interaction, more investment in building key relationships, more sharing of problems and enlisting good thinking on solutions, i think the more we can do of that, the better we tend to do in actually getting things executed or getting things funded. Mr. Mcdonough i guess i would say one thing two things. One, find a means one, by no we have it all right. I think my colleagues did. The intentionality of showing up is more than half the battle. Thats number one. Number two, theres a big debate about whether our Democratic Candidates should be more realistic about how you do with how you deal with majority leader senator mcconnell. Some of them should trim their sales on their ideas, because senator mcconnell will not be for their ideas. When a democrat wins, i think theres a really interesting challenge in washington for somebody else, namely the Republican Party. And what does the Republican Party postPresident Trump want to be . It is a party at the moment that looks so in opposite of what it has been historically on fundamental ideas that i think some of the analysis in the press would benefit from asking that question, which is, what kind of choices will the Republican Party make post President Trump . Are they comfortable where they are . Are very tell you they uncomfortable where they are. They cant say that publicly because it gets them in trouble with the president in the white house but i think they will have to ask themselves some questions. Are they comfortable being associated with a movement of very nondiverse, much older voters, when the country is changing and has been changing . Are they comfortable being where they are as a party on National Security matters on questions like alliances, where historically some of our republican colleagues have been among the more robust defenders of nato and our alliances in asia. These are interesting questions that are think the republicans will have to wrestle with. Thing . I say one there will be an enormous temptation on the part of a new administration to take advantage of thiS Administrations habitual jettisoning of all the requisite norms. The president and Administration Lie everyday, and apparently have gotten away with it. The ignore and vilify congress and the courts, and have abused the press, and to a very frustrating and concerning extent, at least thus far, it hasnt cost them greatly. There will be those who question why a new administration of the opposite party ought to play by rules that the other team doesnt. And i think weve got to be very clear and very committed to resisting that temptation. And recognizing that at the end of the day, we are serving because we care about this country. And these norms that have been violated of truth, of transparency, accountability, of respecting the fact we have a separation of powers, ultimately serves the country well, even if in the moment it may not be politically expedient. And i cant tell you how frustrated members of congress are with how things are operating or failing to operate here in washington. I spent some time last week with the democratic caucus, and there is this pent up fury that their role as the Article One Branch has been completely disregarded and, of course, if iran and the lack of information, the lack of transparency is just the most recent example. But whoever comes after that will have to deal with that fury. Its not going away. And unless we come in with a real respect for the other branches of government and almost overcompensating for what has happened, which is completely antithetical to all of us who worked in the executive branch, and not expedient in many respects, but again for the longterm health of the democracy, i think vitally important. I think the blowback we received from our own colleagues in congress, our own party, would be really detrimental to any kind of governing agenda. Thats a very good point. Speaking of governing agendas, theres a domestic agenda and theres a Foreign Policy agenda and we all know we have one president and so much limited time. Usually the way it works is domestic policy, Foreign Policy is fighting for time on the president s schedule. Thats a common theme, but nowadays it feels to me like one big paradigm shift is the connection and linkages between domestic and Foreign Policy. Michele, you raise it in your opening comments about how we will compete with china. Much of that will be driven by the decisions we make on the domestic policy side, the Economic Policy side. You raised the importance of technology in shrinking the gap between the Silicon Valley and u. S. Government. How should we thinking about connections between domestic and Foreign Policy . Strengthsobviously and tradeoffs, but how do we find synergies between them and leveraging that in a new presidency . Mr. Mcdonough i think a lot of it, as you suggested, is selfevident. I think the work of everybody in the room has made clear that we cant really wall ourselves off from these challenges overseas. One is being eyes wide open about it. Two is having a functioning set of processes inside the agency and across agencies inside the white house to ensure that youre making decisions transparently and informed by the full range of responsibilities that the president has is the best way to do business. I used to say to people that spend we are on our 45th president , but every one of those president s has had a piece of the white house. Adams lived there for several months, left a nice quote on one of the fireplaces. Obviously madison had to move out because of the brits. Thanks a lot. [laughter] partlythe canadians responsible for that. And the trumans had to move out, but everybody had a piece of it, right . Had to movetruman out because they did such a bad after madisong it moved out. The point is that the institutions and the processes and the norms that are developed inside that building are important. They come up for a reason. I think the question for policymakers, for leaders, is to ask themselves whether they are in a unique situation where somehow those processes and the wisdom that was generated over years as susan said, a battle among the three branches, is useful and applied to the situation you are in, or somehow you are in such a new scenario that you should just do things entirely new and throwing out the history of that council. We have a president now who is testing the latter, but one of the real lessons i think at the heart of that experience is what came out of world war ii and the National Security act of 1947 and what susan did so well, which is having a place where these questions are wrestled to ground. Ensure there is visibility across those lines of effort, to inform these decisions. So i guess what im saying is that the prescription for what ails us is not for us to be less what we are, but to be more of what we are. And what we are is collaborative, argumentative, transparent, progressive, thoughtful leaders. When we are back to that, there is no challenge irrespective of how big or how not enough it is between foreign and domestic that we cant handle. I mean, that building has seen it all and done a pretty good job of it along the way. Maybe i will have one more question and then we will go to the audience. Theres a lot of bad news around the world, a lot of challenges we will all talk about later today in the sessions. We have a rise in china, challenges with our allies will have to restore credibility with. Forever wars. If youre looking around the world and where American Interest lie, what you see as strategic opportunities . Thinking about where we can take the world, where do you see new opportunities . Where do you want to start . We will start with the smart ones. Michele . [laughter] i think there are a number of opportunities, but i start with many things that fall under the rubric of renewing our moral leadership. Leaving on respect for human rights, elevating development and reenergizing and reforming the way we do it, tying it appropriately to trade and investment, but really putting our money where our mouths are and making sure that in our early budget Trump Administrations early budget wanted to cut the 150 account by 30 . We should be looking at very thoughtful and deliberative ways to not just restore money that is cut. Congress didnt let that happen to the fullest extent. But there are definitely elements of our capacity to invest in development that have been neglected in recent years. So investing in democracy, human rights, development, multilateral diplomacy, multilateral trade opportunities i think are all important aspects. I think we need a radical shift in our approach to refugees, to immigration, and to openness to ettedorld, allowing wellv but substantial numbers of students to be able to come back to our universities. We had put up, not just literal walls, but practical walls that have cut us off in our institutions off from not only the talent and the innovative capacity that is out there in the rest of the world, but has built up real barriers to peoples openness to trust and cooperate with us. On this people front, the human dimension, there are vital opportunities to do more. Undoing the travel ban and that stuff is vitally important. I talk about revitalizing our alliance structures. I would add i think theres obviously some urgency on the question of new start and whether or not we try to seize an opportunity to renew it. I think we showed. Beyond that, there are opportunities in arms control that we shouldnt be shy there to take advantage of. And then i could go on and on, but just to give one more example of areas that have been so badly battered they dont serve our interests that we need to be looking at, and thats her that is our whole relationship with the palestinians. Having cut off all our aid, having done a series of things that completely marginalized and destroyed that relationship. We need to assess whether thats really where we want to be and whether that is sustainable. Obviously i think it is not. I think in the whole nexus of our relationships, both with respect to the israelpalestine relationship, but also with respect to the broader middle east, we have some rethinking and refreshing to do, to put it mildly. I would endorse everything susan suggested, just add a couple of ideas. One is that we seem to or thi S Administration has sort of forgotten diplomacy. Even when we have been, even with our fiercest competitors and adversaries, we have in the past figured out ways to have Strategic Dialogues. We need a Strategic Dialogue china. Part of the problem is that we are approaching them in this very transactional and highly unpredictable and highly inconsistent way. We need to be in a much deeper multidimensional dialogue with them. We cant make the progress we need on Climate Change or on nonproliferation or, you know, name your list of transnational global problems, without china in some kind of partnership. And oh, by the way, we are in a new world with the technologies that denis mentioned, ai, cyber, space. What are the norms . What are the rules of the road that are going to define how we maintain strategic stability when we are in a very new technological era . That requires dialogue and discussion even with some of the countries that challenge us the most. And im not suggesting that we will all agree on the set of norms and everybody will abide by it, but the value of doing the norm setting, you may be able to take certain catastrophic things off the table by mutual agreement, and where you disagree, if you get enough of the democracies, the countries that share a common set of values and interests on board with a set of norms, that becomes the basis for International Action to hold those who violate those norms accountable. So i think theres value in that. The second thing i would highlight is that he was government is an amazing demonstration platform. One of the casualties of this presidency has been the word of the president , the word of the United States of america. We are going to have to take action to show that we mean what we say in any future administration. One of the things we can do is to challenge ourselves to actually walk the walk, not just talk the talk. So for Climate Change, u. S. Government is probably, if not the largest, one of the largest real estate holders in the United States. Its one of the Largest Energy consumers and the United States. Its one of the largest fleet operators in the United States. I mean, its a tremendous demonstration platform to hold ourselves accountable to the kind of standards that we are going to be hopefully reclaiming leadership on and asking others so i think there is tremendous opportunity in figuring out how we not just talk a new talk, but walk a new walk, using the u. S. Government does a platform to demonstrate we are serious about change. I wont add anything to all the good stuff susan and michele said, but notwithstanding all the bad news, why am i optimistic . Two things. One, all the Democratic Candidates envision a massive in ourn our end d funding,ing in r the life led of what susan and michele just said. Optimisticeason i am is because of this group and this team. Teammagine if we put the on the table that actually takes advantage of all the strength and capabilities that the American People offer. , notwithstanding the bad news, and informed by good ideas, im extraordinarily optimistic, optimistic about the upcoming november and optimistic that our best days are ahead of us. As president obama used to say, we dont fear the future. It,un headlong into informed by exchanges we have and by the people. Moderator if you have a question, raise your hand. This lady in the back, please identify yourself and keep your question as brief as possible. Quacks k dozier, time magazine. Do democrats have a plan to win with grace, or does there have to be bloodletting after the fact after what has happened in the past four years, kids in cages, etc. . Next question, this gentleman in the front. We will get the mic for you, sir. Hold on just a second. Paul im paul apple card. Importance of the Smart National development strategy, and using that as a tool for National Security, but my question really goes back to building and rebuilding. Lliances and i just want to see what the prospects would be where at least, i believe, we snatched from the jaws of victory with a Transpacific Partnership and rebuilding it in some form somewhere. I dont care if we call it the trump pacific partnership, but to rebuild that. A group of countries working together seems to be a good thing. What would the prospects be for that . Basically i think tpp, is her an opportunity to reconstitute or rebuild it. Is an opportunity to reconstitute or rebuild it. The gentleman right here in the middle, please. My name is tom. My name is tom. Im now with pan america. I served in the Obama Administration, and a couple of agencies. My question about the first 100 days, and you point to a couple of early crises the new administration will be confronting, like the border and so on. But that is going to be a big crisis from election day to Inauguration Day and through the first 100 days if a democrat wins because the outgoing , president will not want to leave and he will be undermining the credibility of the election of which is lost. Hes laying the predicate for that every day, that the system is rigged against them, et cetera, et cetera. So the biggest crisis, it seems to me, would be assuring the American Public of the legitimacy of what would be a messy, compromised election if the democrat wins. How high on the priority list do you put that . Moderator three good questions. who wants to take the winning with grace question . I think were all very graceful. [laughter] absolutely we can win with grace. That is, i think, our instinct. And that has to be our guiding principle. I see no benefit in engaging in retribution, or behaving in the fashion that we have spent four years decrying. Moderator ill take the tpp question, so denis can take the last which is a lot harder. One,[laughter] tpp, i think our failures one of the great successes of the Obama Administration was tot we led the tpp end got the point of getting others to sign it, but i think our biggest strategic mistake was giving strategic importance of asia to the u. S. Prosperity and security over the next 50 years. No region will be more important. The opportunity to have a high standard, raise the bar and to be central in effort was a real , missed opportunity. Now, i dont know we can just waltz back into it even though our allies and partners have kept the door open for us, and for that we are grateful. But i do hope the next president will make the strategic argument for why its so important for us, and why it benefits the American People, if we accompany tpp with legislation that addresses the needs of some of the populations that have been most hurt by trends like automation like certain aspects , of globalization and so forth. Historically been unable to pass much in the way of multilateral trade deals without that accompanying investment domestically. So what my hope is you would have a democratic would lead that charge and get us back in there. That would do a lot in terms of actions speaking louder than words. That would do a lot to reassure our asian allies. I would add two sentences to michele said, which is this goes to the point about making sure where taking advantage of all are members of congress. I was very proud of the speaker and the team that announced they put changes in the new usmca agreement, drawing on the the heart of the tpp, for example, to put enforcement including labor enforcement and Union Leadership questions in the heart of the agreement rather than a side agreement. So i think theres a lot of Good Progress thats been made on thinking around what new trade agreement should look like, supled with michele observations. And as a result of the democratic leadership in the house, which brings me to my last point about this transition i think the most important thing , i think that voters can do is to recognize that their vote matters. One of the reasons that democrats are in the position that they were in to influence usmca as profoundly as they did is because of these new young by the way, principally women members of congress. And thats because turnout in 2018 was the highest for a Midterm Election in 100 years. And when you even desegregate and aske, 18 to 24 euros in 2016, they voted above 23 . So the best way to guard against things we cant control is to control the things we can. And the things we cant control, are registering to vote and turning out the vote. And i think you see a lot of exciting opportunities about this being undertaken on this across the country. Thats winning with grace, to, which is getting new voters into the system, overcoming at the democratic, small d democratic efforts by the opposition to make it hard for people to bow, to vote forcing older voters , to stay out, long lines, people of color to stay out in long lines. That is in our control to turn , people out, to let there be no doubt about the outcome. And just one last point about that, which is, last night i gathered that the midterm the average age of a member of congress by 10 years. So thats an astounding number. And as we think about where the energy for these challenges that we face will come from, its from that voting base and from that team of colleagues who represent all of what america has to offer. Moderator we are out of time but thank you all for joining us , today. Thanks for sharing the wisdom. [applause] i just want to say one more thing about history. These three people have been instrumental in building the democratic National Security bench, and it really want to thank you for. I think youre saying the fruits of it today, and hopefully we will continue to [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2020] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy, visit ncicap. Org] house impeachment managers have released a 111page legal case in accordance with the deadline ahead of next weeks Senate Impeachment trial. It reveals the articles of impeachment and the case against the president. A passage from its final section removethe senate should President Trump to avoid serious and longterm damage to our democratic values, and the nations security. The white house released a sevenpage statement, also in accordance with the saturday deadline to respond to the senate. Toonclusion, it reads, ensure a oneparty impeachment linda. Should not become the new the,l, and to vindicate American People the senate must reject both articles of impeachment. In the end, this entire process is nothing more than a dangerous attack on the American People themselves and their fundamental right to vote. The statement is signed by white House Counsel passive of any and the president s personal attorney, jacek u local. Next