Died in police custody. It was hosted by Georgetown University in Public Policy and also included questions from students. Mo i want to thank everyone for tuning in tonight. Members as well as the general. Ublic thank you for spend your evening with us. The conversation will begin in a second. We are going to have a conversation, the first part of it, and then we will welcome you to join into the conversation and ask questions. Ofse of you who are members the Georgetown Community here in the zoom room, at the bottom of q a screen, you will see a tab and you will click on that to submit your question. At some point during the course of the evening, our staff will let you know when your question has been selected and then a few moments later, we will put you up on the screen. So make sure you are broadcast ready at that point. Before we move on, i want to thank our partners for social justice at georgetown. They have been tremendous partners in this event. They have some Pretty Amazing resources on these topics. Those are on their website. Also on our website, so feel free to check those out. When our guests first accepted this invitation a a few weeks ago, we were planning to have a conversation primarily on Voting Rights. We will get to that tonight. But since then, the world seems to have changed a bit. We can feel the ground shifting under our feet. And the events of the past few weeks have really focused the spotlight on bigger issues around justice and injustice in america. The covid19 crisis is showing us disproportionate impacts on community of color, and raising questions about health justice. The most recent jobs report that came out last week, while we can all breathe a sigh of relief that theyre not as bad as the economists predicted and feared, still saw black unemployment rising, raising very real questions about economic justice. And of course the senseless deaths of breonna taylor, Ahmaud Arbery and george floyd raises many questions about racial and social and criminal issues. As tragic as that all is, we have felt that ground shift under us as more people are calling for reform and standing up to say black lives matter. But not everyone is there. A recent example, a members president s team denying that there is any institutional racism in america. So was to begin the conversation there. With that question that has been posted by several members from the Trump Administration, is it systemic, is there institutional racism and injustice in america . Let me start with mr. Holder. Thank you for having me. I dont think there is any question if there was institutional racism when it comes to the criminal Justice System. Why would you expect that the Justice System would be any different . We have dealt with and try to deal with problems of institutional racism for hundreds of years. Not as successfully as we might want. I dont think there is any question that society, that we now have was better than was 50 years ago. And 50 years before that. It still deals with the problem of institutional racism. In the society as a whole, and you would expect to find it in the criminal Justice System in particular. I think we have an opportunity now to really attack this problem in ways that we have have not been able to in the past. I think there is recognition of a wide swath of American People that there is a problem with institutional racism and it is a problem that needs to be addressed. If we have a moment right now, questions, but we can convert that into a movement. We can convert it into a concrete effort. The protesters have set the stage for what has to be country togetherness. Mo senator, i wonder if you can share your thoughts on systemic racism and injustice. Because of some of those issues that youve been working. The injustice and how it ties into a broader conversation. Sen. Klobuchar thank you. My has been teaches a death school class at a law and i have spent some time in this. I am really pleased to be here. And my friend eric holder, i look at him and i think of, you dont know what youve got until its gone. And andpeople teargas attorney general who has basically played horrible political games with the law. People have been fired who should not have been fired. We need to bring some decency back to the Justice Department. It in spades. D what i want to talk about his about is the systemic racism. I was thinking as eric talked about this, it is criminal justice. That is loud and clear. But it is way beyond that when an africanamerican woman shows up at a Maternity Ward in new orleans and sets her hands are swollen and she leaves without treatment because nobody listened and her baby dies, that is systemic racism and health care. When you have africanamerican kids that are in classrooms that are way too crowded, dont have good buildings, that is systemic racism. When you have a man like george floyd in my state, that gets murdered by a Police Officer on videotape for the whole world to see as he pleads for his life , and other people from my state , and i see the pain in their eyes every day, standing around saying he cant breathe, stop, and no one listens, four officers that is systemic racism. I think that is what is happened is with the mobilization that we streets and ithe am sure there are people on the call who have been protesting and thank you for that. It was captured for a minute and away we had never seen before and that needed to happen. Think what youre getting is videotape that shouldve been shed a big light in racism and murder we have a going on in so many aspects of our country right now. So to me the answer is health care as you mentioned, is making , sure that people can get health care. The pandemic, you want to talk about institutional racism, the fact that people of color are dying at literally double the rate of the population percentage statewide, will they are the frontlines working. A lot of them are in crowded housing or credit transportation and they dont have the ability that other people have. To me, the disparities we saw before, the pandemic has just put one big magnifying glass on it. It calls out for a solution. Those are the things like housing, the backlog of section eight and make sure we are investing in better housing. Doing something about health care and getting a public option in place. Something that Vice President biden is committed to do when he gets into office. Making sure that weve got an Education System that works for everyone. So that one of those kids out there one day will be able to develop the next vaccine for the next pandemic. We should not be cutting out a whole bunch of people in our country just because we are not giving them a chance. That is what i am hopeful of. State, not far from where i live. Anything that can be a legacy of george floyd, should be change in the criminal Justice System and in policing, but also a change in our economics. Mo i think the video, as you mentioned, early was a wakeup call to a lot of people. But it is not the first video, tragically, that we have seen. The Police Brutality. I can remember a number of cases where videos of Police Brutality resulting in death have ended up on the news and lasted a couple of news cycles and then we moved on. So im wondering, why is it different this time . Also why havent we been able why havent we have this kind of a moment after seeing those previous videos . Mr. Holder good question. I think in part it has to do with the video itself. Even if you look at some of the other videos, i dont think we saw a video quite as compelling. That is a hard thing to say when youre talking about somebodys life taken in all of these videos, but in this when you have somebody who was face down, handcuffed behind his back, pleaing to be released, bystanders saying he cant breathe, calling for his mother. And it goes on and on and on and on. For eight minutes and 46 seconds, that is a long period of time. It also comes in a year in which we have seen what happened to other people, other videos. What happenedbout to breonna taylor. Also with the quarantine and the pandemic. Hole range of reasons dealing with the problems of the Trump Administration, a lack of sensitivity and a lack of meant by the Trump Administration on anything that would affect the wellbeing of people of color. It is a combination of all that that has brought us to this moment. Mo just a reminder to the audience, the q a tab is opened. You can feel free to populate that with your questions at any during the program. Point to piggyback off of what the attorney general was talking about, senator, it seems Like Congress is at least talking about the issue in a way that it has not in the past. Democrats have put forward proposals, republicans have convened a group to start putting together their own proposals on Police Reform specifically. From your Vantage Point in the senate, what kind of reforms should we be exploring related to these issues . Im especially interested in whether or not you think there are areas where we might be able to find bipartisan cooperation. Sen. Klobuchar first of all, we cant simply pretend that we do a resolution and it is fine. If we answer was silence, we are basically complicit, if we answer like the president and say dominance, we are monsters. If we answer it with action, then we are lawmakers which is , what we are supposed to do. And when you look at the george floyd case, and it is right in my face. The number one is justice in that case. For the attorney general, i think is a good thing and charged all of the officers involved. Number two, a pattern practice investigation, sherrick which eric well knows, the obama started 25 of those. The Trump Administration has only done one. Weve asked them to do that that has to happen in the Trump Administration. Statebystate, they can do that. The first bit is accountability. In a bill that my friends are leading and we have a number of us who are cosponsors and we are working on it, the number one thing is changing the standards where you decide it is ok on what a Police Officer does. It is changing the standards sued, makingn be it more doable to bring the suits in cases like this. The third thing is banning chokeholds. Changing some of the standards we have for police conduct. And there is a whole other grouping of issues related to transparency. To get that information out there, so you can have, as eric noted, have a cop in one jurisdiction moves to the other and they dont know what they have done. Making those records public. Making the use of force and what has happened public. And then finally, training. Ban chokeholds and mandate body cameras. It is a big, sweeping bill of reforms supported by a lot of groups. Now its on us. Your question was about republicans. They have said a lot of things. We saw mitt romney marching with the marchers. Which i appreciated very much. But now it time for them to move. We will see what they do. Again, if they just do a resolution and say we need training and nothing else i think we have seen that before. This is time for major change on the federal, state and local levels. Mo one of the areas on the disagreement at least in the early stage of these discussions, is how much this should be federal response versus state and local response. That is part of the question in this town. I would love your thoughts on that, attorney general holder. How much of this should be left to the states and how much should the federal government pick up . There are 18,000 Police Departments in the country. The federal government cannot oversee all of those departments. There has to be some degree of local and state involvement. But in the way the senator said, to make sure the baseline standards are met. But then there will be the question about how much money the Police Department gets. Those are decisions that have to be made by mayors and governors. There needs to be state control as well. We do not think it needs to be either or. It has to be both. And both sides, the federal government and state and local, they have to make sure they are responsive, and come up with concrete, Real Solutions to the problems that we have been dealing with far too long. This is really a test. As the senator said, this is going to define who you are as a senator, congressman, governor, as a mayor where do you stand on fundamental issues of fairness and justice . That will be delineated by the the positions you take into the votes you cast, the opposition you put up or the support you give. And the voters have to remember this. At the end of the day, where do these people stand . I think it is both. We always try to say it is one or the other. I think as in most things, it is accommodation of both. Mo you just brought up funding and how that is often times a decision mayors make. We have had a conversation the past week or so by some activists and, friendly, some cities. Senator klobuchar, you are on the council in minneapolis. Ofund this movement defunding police. Been attacking the not with, joe biden with defunding more with reforming. Am curious your thoughts on that. Sen. Klobuchar first of all, it is conditioned. One of the things that has happened is that we havent done anything in the washington in washington is untrue. We have done inches instead of miles. Building on some of the work from the Obama Administration to reduce sentences on nonviolent offenders. But now this is what we need to do. When you look at this, if there is money from the federal level, there should be conditions on this. That is one of the proposals in this bill. In addition to banning chokeholds, you could also put conditions on not giving money and they actually put in place a ban. Thats a first way to look at it. Im not in favor of abolishing Public Safety departments and Police Departments, but you can put conditions on funding. Is other thing to remember that part of this, if you can put you can put all the money you want into police, but unless you do one of the things we talked about earlier, improving funding for things like childcare and education in historically impoverished areas, we will never get out of the loop we are in. That is a bigger question worldwide of economic disparity. Mr. Holder if i was talking to the people who came up with the police, iund the would say lets rethink that phrase. I dont think it is as trump and the republicans are trying to betray. Ive seen people talk about it. I agree with it when they are saying in the sense that they are talking about reimagining the way the Police Department and people in Law Enforcement, the criminal Justice System interacts with communities of color. I think you put too much emphasis on the police. We ask them to deal with Mental Health issues. Some of the sheriffs in this country have some of the largest if not the largest Mental Health responsibilities in their states. We have the Police Responding to Mental Health situations when we could have other people doing that. We have Police Responding to a man selling loose cigarettes or potentially passing a fake 20 bill. Respondce dont need to to all those kinds of things. So i think we need to come up with ways in which we define better the responsibilities that we want the police to handle. And we need to think about a peace dividend. We have crime rates now that are at historically low levels. Given that, we should look at policegets we have in departments and make the determination, do we need to spend the amount of money we spend on the police to keep the American People safe . I think it was los angeles, 54 of the budget is spent on the police. Thingst an expert on all los angeles, but that seems to me a pretty extraordinarily high number. So i think we need to ask the tough questions about whether we can spend the money in other ways. Need to think about whether we can spend on prevention activities, so that we can prevent people from becoming involved in the criminal Justice System in the first place instead of warehousing them in the penal part of the criminal Justice System. Theres a whole way in which i think we need to pull back, not to be bound by the past simply because that is the way we have always done it, to use this opportunity to think about how we want to improve things and do things in a different way, a better way. I think thatr even goes beyond the Police Reforms, the federal and state level, also these criminal Justice Reforms. Just reducing the federal sentence, that doesnt get into Something Like 80 of nonviolent offenders. Its things like integrity units. And sentencing integrity units to be able to look back at some of the decisions that were made and evaluate them from the past. There are some really big things we can do in addition to the Police Reform that must go on at the same time. Back to theo go Voting Rights conversation before we take student questions, what before we do that, senator, you have gotten some criticism in recent days from some people who have questions about your record as a county prosecutor. Specifically as it pertains to the officer who murdered george floyd. He wasy you didnt involved in a Fatal Shooting when you were a prosecutor and you didnt prosecute. Now i understand that the practice then was to refer all of these cases to a grand jury to address, and the grand jury did not address it until you had already left the prosecutors office. But i wanted to give you an opportunity to address people who have questions about that and give a little more context but also talk about Lessons Learned and how the system can work at her. Work better. Sen. Klobuchar i appreciate you giving me that opportunity, mo. In regards to the officer with the murder, that is a lie. Its been on the internet, and job as welld a good as some other news outlets that it was the case that was presented to the grand jury seven months after i became a u. S. Senator and the investigation was ongoing while i was in the last month or two in my time as a county attorney. I know people have put that out there. Its just not true. I never made any decisions according to those in the office now. I was not involved in it. But as for how we handle Police Shootings in general or Police Involved killings, i want to make clear that what i said at the beginning, i truly believe one of the reasons you have not seen these cases brought in the past maybe the attorney general can shed some light on this is the standards are such as we just discussed. Ofsonable can mean a lot stuff. So you can go to Something Like necessary force. It would make a big difference for prosecutors to be able to pursue these cases. Making changes to the standard when it comes to when officers can be sued. Banning practices like chokeholds. When i was in there, i valiantly tried to stop one of the Minneapolis Police chiefs from taking these investigations in house. I actually publicly took us on. Took this on. He took them in house and i thought it was wrong for officer involved deaths. Wassecond thing i did relied greatly on drug courts, it actually reduced africanamerican incarceration office,hile i was in which was something i was proud of. We diversified the office. We hired and promoted africanamerican attorneys. Workedted i significantly with the Innocence Project when it came to eyewitness identification. To pioneer a new way to do it to misidentification, and pushed Police Departments to do it. I nationally advocated with the Innocence Project. That is why i was so interested in body cameras when it came to that. We did a host of things. Those were cuttingedge things back then, but now, after what we have seen and acknowledged the institutional racism that existed back then and exist now, now at this time with the whole world watching, it is time for us to do more with criminal Justice Reform as well as policing reform. Think thats why it is important that if it is something that goes over the heads of people who are are not a lawyer or law student, reducing the standards of the federal government has in order to bring these crimes in cases is really critical. Look for that standard, we wouldve brought more cases during the obama years. The standard i think is unnecessarily high. It ought to be reduced as contained in the bill that has been introduced. If you have the standard, then the Justice Department can serve as an appropriate backstop. First has to be considered by state and local prosecutors. Also i think having independent prosecutors look at these cases makes a great deal of sense. The Justice Department can be independent in that sense. But i think having state attorneys general having cases as well since. Theyre doing it minnesota and new york now. But that standard is unnecessarily high and prevents the federal governments from being all that should be when it comes to making sure that justice is done. And that Police Officers who engage in Inappropriate Conduct are held accountable. Thats what the American People are looking for and why that part of the bill is really critical. Sen. Klobuchar i also think having people involved in the system work to fix it, work alongside people who are advocating for change makes a difference. Because when we had the first changed thewhere we sentences for a lot of the federal, nonviolent offenders, it was held we had some of the people who had worked as prosecutors in the past say you know what, we have to change this, this is wrong what is happening. It makes a big difference. Mo we will go to questions in a minute. I want to ask this before we do. I felt one of the most provocative, thoughtprovoking tweets that i saw on the last 24 hours, was by lebron james. It said everyone is talking about how do we fix this . They say go out and vote. How we vote is also structurally racist . Yesterday we saw a complete breakdown of voting systems in georgia. I think debacle is a kind way of describing what happened there. Predominately afro american precincts are where we saw the most problems. Know you have been working on various elements of voting issues and election security. I would love for you to take a few minutes and talk a little bit about those issues. About Voting Rights. Mr. Holder lebron is right in a lot of ways. You look at georgia yesterday and what happened two years ago, when it comes to the electoral system, it is a hot mess i dont think it is something that is serendipitously happening. I think people who have the responsibility for ensuring Fair Elections occur are something not doing so. They are running the system in a partisan way. It has a disproportionately negative impact on people of color, africanamericans in the state. This is really something that is critically important. I understand the election for president this year is a existential importance but you also have to focus on elections at the state and local level. A lot of the situations that we are concerned about and these reforms want to put in to place, they have to be voted on by state legislatures. They have to be approved by a city council. So who we put in place in those bodies will really determine how successful we will be at making reforms at the state and local level. That has to happen in addition to what happens at the federal level. So focusing on voting issues is really important, other it is partisan and racial gerrymandering, voter suppression, voter purges, these are things put in place by republicans that should reversed if democrats are in control of the legislature. It happened in virginia. Democrats took over the entirety of the legislature and virginia has a democratic governor, and they undid the unnecessary photo id law put in place by republicans. Just because these things exist now, does not mean they have to be there forever. It does mean we have to go through a cycle that will be tough and we have to fight through these inappropriate impediments that have been put in place. But if everyone gets out there and votes and puts up with the long lines and what they throw at us, we can get to a better place. We can also handle the long lines by people having the ability to vote at home, vote by mail. That is something that, given a pandemic, makes a great deal of sense. People should not have to decide between their health and civic responsibility. For the pandemic, we should make available that people can cast ballots at home. Sen. Klobuchar exactly. Aen i think about it, i read story this morning about an 80yearold woman in georgia who actually marched with dr. King. There she is at 6 00 in the morning with her plastic mask on, one of the ones that come down over her face because she is so at risk because of her age, of covid. And having to stand in line and waiting and waiting and waiting. And she said, we waited years to get the vote and i will wait to vote. This should not happen in america in 2020. People in garbage bags and homemade masks standing in line in the rain. And on the others, you have the president of the United States voting in the luxury of 6000 pennsylvania with his mailin ballot from palm beach. Thats what we have right now. That is what is going on in our country. So this bill that we have introduced, am actually leading the bill with ron wyden, and we have support from so many groups, and Michelle Obamas latino,e has, and voto and widespread support across the country. It is pretty much in the heroes bill that just passed the house. Billion, which would give us the postage and envelopes and most important, as we know so many people are still going to be voting around election day not everyone is going to cast a vote by mail as much as you want to give them the ability to do that and we will have huge increases like we saw in wisconsin. Right now, 5 of people in new had to vote by mail in the last election. In oregon, it is Something Like 99 or something. So there are big changes. Training poll workers. A new generation of poll workers. This has passed the house. Senators,d republican some have said they will support some of the changes, they have said they are open to more money for this. This is not just a democratic issue. Republican governors from all over the country are crying out for this money. We have people voting from home across the country. We have a republican secretary of state on our side. Trump is passing out lies again when it comes to voting and saying it is somehow a corrupt system and you know exactly why he is doing that. But we do have i partisan the port, including from people like michael steele, the former head of the Republican National committee, who want to pass our bill. Mr. Holder if you look at what happened in iowa mo i think you are muted. There you go. Mr. Holder if you look at what happened in iowa, a republican secretary of state really did the right thing, got ballots out to everybody. They broke records for the number of people who voted in a primary in iowa. And now the Republican Legislature is saying we cant have that in november. They are trying to undercut that which the republican secretary of state did extremely successfully, trying to pass a bill that makes it more difficult for people to vote at home and by mail in november. That shows what at least one party is all about. They want to restrict the number of people who vote. They want to pick their voters as opposed to the way it is supposed to work in a democracy, to let their voters pick who the representatives will be. Mo there is so much more on this topic to discuss but i want to transition over to the real tough questions now, from the students. ,s we call on each of you please remember to introduce yourself, who you are, why youre here, what you are studying, and where you are zooming in from. We will try to get to as many of u. S. Possible. First of all, we have luke. Hi, everyone. I am a sophomore from indianapolis, indiana. That is where i am tuning in from. Im majoring in government. I want to go back to the idea of Justice System reform for a minute. I know that both of you at some point in your career, obviously on different levels, were public legal officials. I was wondering for both of you, what was most difficult part of that job, or what was something that mr. Holder the most difficult ast of the job for me attorney general was to make determinations. Trying to decide whether we should have the Death Penalty. Making those determinations were probably the hardest thing. With theike to do away Death Penalty. I would like to have in place of things we had during the Obama Administration. To reduce the use of mandatory sentences. Where we use the Law Enforcement capabilities we have in better ways. Epidemicbout the crack and how we got there. We made it a criminal justice problem. We prosecuted people and put them in jail. Now, we are dealing with the opioid problem and we have declared it a Public Health problem. Two different bodies of people. People perceive as being involved in crack and the use of opioids. There is a racial component there. I would like to take out of the system those types of determinations. And put Law Enforcements in places and put Law Enforcement in places or they are needed. In places where they are needed. There is disparity when it comes to arrest rates. Africanamericans and whites use marijuana at roughly the same levels and get your four times more likely to go to jail using their one you are a person of color come if you are black as opposed to if you were white. I would like to take all of that stuff out of the system and i think we have the possibility now given all of the protests we have seen and where the nation is. Sen. Klobuchar that is a great question, luke. We dont have the Death Penalty in minnesota which is fortunate so i dont have to make those decisions but every day i have 45 Police Jurisdictions and 400 employees. A decisionyou have on cases. Sometimes, it would be a race case where the evidence falls apart. Will you roll the dice and try to go to trial . And then, and we would always say make the decision most right and then explain it to people. There are always hard things about these cases and one of the hardest is the race cases. I remember a case that we had where a guy who was an immigrant and he may have been drunk, i cant remember but he was not obnoxious. He was just standing on a bus and would not move. He stood there. The people on the bus started yelling get off the bus, maam. And the bus driver was just sitting there. Finally a guy gets up, a white guy come he gets up and the guy is just standing there. And he pushes him off. He falls down. He hits his head and eyes. Dies. He hits his head and i cannot remember the degree we charged it in but the prosecutor said we do not think the jury will convict. Let us reverse the races. What if this was a white woman with alzheimers who is standing on the bus. It could happen, right . And then some africanamerican kid comes up and does that. What will happen then . We just have to keep thinking like this. And as we said, there is racial bias within the system and that would make it hard. They might say what will the jury do in this case . The guy got convicted and got some sense. But the point of it is is that is one of the hardest things in the system. Where you are trying to be fair and look at it this way. And the last thing is the limits on what you can do. Im sure eric felt this too. You have one part of the job but you know what is really needed is in the house. Maybe you can contact housing and try to help but the system is all siloed. That is why i keep going to economic justice. Or what they really need is a good school to go to. They will not get involved in bad things then. There are all kinds of things you cannot do that you want to do that would make the world a better place and that is why i hope his marches and all of their justice we are seeking will extend way beyond the criminal Justice System. Mo thank you for the question, luke. Mo next up is anna. Anna thank you for taking the time to talk to us. And im a rising senior. I am joining do today. How can we educate nonvoters about the importance of voting for legislators and judges so ginalized populations mr. Holder that is a good question and it is something that we try to focus on in the committee. When you talk about gerrymandering, people glaze over. But if you say if you care about a womans right to choose, if you care about criminal Justice Reform come if you care about the expansion of medicaid, of health care come if you care about those issues, you really need to focus on who is serving at the state and local level. The president is obviously important. Senators are important. Theon a daytoday basis, people who most impact your life are those that the state and local level. Those kindsged in of elections and focusing on those elections and making sure that you vote down ballot. Dont stop at the president and the governor. Keep going. Make sure you put into Office People that will represent the people as opposed to the special interests. That is something we have tried to push. In january,his 2017. I think we have seen more people start to understand what we are saying. It is true. Seeink you will start to the impact of this kind of a push in the elections that we will have this cycle. I think you have already started to see that in the last couple of years. I think people are much more conscious of how important the state and local elections are. I have a windshield a poster was put on my car from one of the protesters. And is that dont forget to vote down ballot. I thought here we go. We are in the same place. Protesters out talking about criminal Justice Reform and voting down ballot so i think that is critical. Sen. Klobuchar i did a lot of virtual graduation speeches this year and i would note that when i did them, your generation actually is the most diverse than we have already had and is the most globally minded. And studies show you are working harder than other generations. That is a good thing to add for peoples parents. I think this generation in this moment in time has to translate into record voting. You have all of these people trying to push back in terms of making it hard to vote. There are some states that have the mail in ballot like alabama where you need a notary or two witnesses. Are lifting those kinds of restrictions but we need to use this moment in time during this pandemic to do everything you can in every state and tell your friends how to educate yourselves on how to vote early. Ways to get people to vote. And if you are happy with the way this president has handled the pandemic, then i guess that is what you will do. If you are not and it has affected your life in some way, then vote. That he stoodike in front of a church in washington, d. C. And waved a bible like a prop, then turn this anger into voting. Mo thank you for that question. Next up. Still. On mute student i am a rising senior at Georgetown Universitys adding government economics and im also the chair of the students for biden so i have been very passionate and active about these issues. My question pertains to the Justice Department and Holding State and local governments kind of a accountable because a lot of these issues happen at this level. I know the Vice President has promised to create a Police Oversight board within the first 100 days of taking office. Im wondering what you think the federal government can do to hold state and local Police Departments more accountable from the perspective of the Justice Department. Sen. Klobuchar a lot. I will let eric answer that one. Mr. Holder the Justice Department has to meet a standard in order to meet standards. Thealso have to enhance criminal section, the civil rights department. In addition to what the Vice President has proposed. I think he is putting a greater focus on this. The role of the Justice Department. Getting prosecutors the tools and resources they need. If you do that, the Justice Department can be a good backs up and there can be a accountability to a degree that we do not have currently. Mo thank you for that question. Next up. Hello, mining is julia and i him rising junior studying government. From theing philadelphia suburbs. Sen. Klobuchar is that a purple room . Student yes. My question is about some of the senator klobuchar, you mentioned reforms regarding body cameras. Know attorney general holder you talked about how there was a significant percentage of the Police Budget and how we could reallocate those. Would you advocate for some reforms that would allow increased funding and what message with that send to the Police Departments . Thank you. Mr. Holder i think that what we need to do is make sure that you build budgets that are consistent with the aims that you have. Howas always been said that you budget is a real indication of what you think is important. I think we need to step back and look at the way in which we have our system as it is presently constructed city by city and state by state. They will all be different. Different concerns and needs and priorities. And then make assessments. Just because we have given x amount of money every year, do we still have to do that . Or do we need to plus it up . Or has it been effective . Money tocan move the other places. This is the time to try other approaches. Making sure as senator klobuchar said that we have to focus on that breedsyou see crime like poor housing high rates of unemployment. These are the kinds of things that if we invest there and give people an opportunity there that we will have less people in the criminal Justice System. With entrenched interests and we can push back. The time is now to push against those entrenched interests and say just because we have done it this way forever, does not mean we will continue to do it this way in the future. Sen. Klobuchar exactly. And i think sometimes people think you just throw money at things. You dont have to do it that way. You can make things conditional. You can change the way money is spent. And in this case, as i said, think about drunk driving way back. Finally the federal government said you know what . No highway funds to a state unless you change your standards for drunk driving. And you can do the same thing at the state and federal level when it comes to making decisions about funding. You put conditions on the funding. I just wanted to add one more thing. Eric raised Mental Health. I spent a lot of time in iowa last year and i remember one specific. There are only 64 Mental Health beds in the entire state of iowa. And i would hear about it all the time. That is an example. A lot of times, it is the school, the teachers or the Police Officers becoming Mental Health counselors. A lot of this is looking at how we spend our resources and how it can work that are for everyone. Mo thank you for that question. Alejandra. To alejandro. my question comes from the previous question. Im curious from a local Law Enforcement level, that would obviously look a lot different from lapd or the twin cities but what would be the First Step Towards criminal Justice Reform from that perspective . From local Law Enforcement, when you look at the Police Department themselves , it is very clear that we have some really good officers and then we have officers that have been in trouble numerous times. Should not be happening. And it should be easier for local Police Chiefs and cities to do something about that. That is something that happens independent from some of the things we may be doing broader on criminal Justice Reform. What i was talking about was finding out the information on use of force and making that public so people can figure out what is going on. Ive always believed that more information in some ways is better because people are accountable for what they are doing. Literally, there is as there are stories about someone getting in trouble at a Police Department and they just moved to another. There is a bill that i noted that corey booker and come all of our leading about the national listing. Secondly, you have all of these reforms we have are ready talked about. Just voted to get rid of cho colts. While we want to do that on a police level, local departments and cities can do that on their own. Were are many reforms that have talked about on a National Basis that can also be undertaken by local police. Bad cops comeave in this case a murderer, they cops justf the good like they hurt all of the people out there. We have to remember that because there are people trying to do their jobs and they get ground down by the kind of murder we saw on tv. The key is to have standards and good people will meet those standards. I dont know if you want to add anything, eric. Mr. Holder that pretty much says it all. Mo thank you, alejandro. We could keep going. There are a lot more questions. We are coming to the end of our time. I want to close with one more question. We are talking to a lot of very engaged young people here tonight. Beides voting, what would your advice to a young person who is trying to figure out how they can have the biggest impact in achieving some of these for morend fighting justice . What is something they can tangibly do besides vote . Sen. Klobuchar ive mr. Holder i would say this. Georgetown university is one of the preeminent schools we have in this state if not the world. Getall have the ability to to this place and do well at this place. Lot that has been given to you and a lot that has been earned and with that comes a special responsibility. There are a whole host of ways you can be engaged in this reform process that we have talked about. You can certainly support organizations and become involved in those that engage in electoral reform. Send us resumes. We would be interested in seeing what you might be able to do with us. There are reform groups focused on police issues, try to get involved with them. There are also young people, younger than you who are starved for the kind of attention you can give to them. And there are not generational barriers where some old guy like me tries to interact with someone that is 14 years old or 15 years old. My music is different. I like motown and they like. Ayz that barrier does not exist between you and them. Sit back and find out what is it interestsest you you and where do you think you can make a difference . There is a program out there that will match your interests. Bendsng said it towards justice but it does not bend on its own. Ask yourself what am i doing . What am i doing . What am i going to do . Trained,ll superbly unbelievably bright, you have a great responsibility and capacity to change this nation. And i am optimistic about where we are as a nation. Cautiously optimistic. That with the involvement of young people like you, this nation can finally live up to its founding ideals. Sen. Klobuchar well said. I would add to that, campaign and getting involved in politics and not just thinking it is a dirty word or something that is without reach for anyone. That is not true. I always encourage people to get involved in some of the local campaigns. I got my start managing a council race and that is where i learned the value of putting up lawn signs on your opponents street. The guy won and then he moved to florida a year later. A lothe point is, i got of training from being involved in that local race. And then there was an all volunteer campaign. Doing those local races for something that you believe in, they dont usually moved to florida so it matters. Remember that as well as these big, National Campaigns that will be so kate and they are funded work on in a different way. You get to know some of the people though some of this is virtual. You guys are uniquely qualified as eric points out with the work you are doing but also you know a little more about how all of this is going to be working on social media and the like to make a difference. You will have unique skills given the virtual environment. Much of our campaigning will be there. Criminal Justice Reform that can mean everything from marching and advocating and calling members of congress and local officials but i remember one of the things i did was i was in the private sector and i volunteered for nearly a decade with the rope in our state. You would visit people in prison. I visited a woman at a young age who got a long sentence for killing her boyfriend. And that is something i will never forget. And she actually got out and invited me to her wedding. So there are ways to get involved where you get to be part of the system in different ways besides what comes to mind as an answer but you have to make sure that you like it. Dont just do it to check a box. Do it because it is something you feel strongly about and you can use your skills and passion and that is i you get things done. Thank you for having us, mo, and that is a great question to end on. Mo you Better Believe the students on this zoom will take you up on your offer to send you their resumes. Sen. Klobuchar keep in mind that we have resumes too. [laughter] senators point about politics not being a dirty word. Our motto is that Public Service is a good thing and politics can these and it is important days with everything happening in the world. I would like to thank you both for your continued an ongoing Public Service and for taking some time to share your thoughts with us tonight on this very timely topic. And to everyone that turn tuned in tonight, thank you for sharing part of your night with us and for engaging in the conversation. Keep following us because we have a lot more conversations like this planned over the summer. And again come i want to thank the center for social justice at georgetown for partnering with and follow us for a list of on race, racism, justice issues and america. Again come a with that come i would like to thank everyone for joining us and senator, attorney general, thank you. Sen. Klobuchar thank you, everyone. What do you think we can do about that . With Police Reform, protests and the coronavirus continuing to affect our country, watch our live unfiltered coverage of the government response with briefings from the white house, governors and mayors from across the country updating the situation and from the campaign 2020 Election Campaign trail. Join washington journal and if you missed any of our live coverage, watch anytime on to on demand at cspan. Org or listen on the go with the free cspan radio app. John Charles Fremont brought the Pacific Coast into the United States. At the beginning of the story, the United States did not have the Pacific Coast. There was territory in oregon that was disputed territory of britain. Fremont encouraged the american settlement of oregon and took conquest ofamerican california just in time for the gold rush. He did play a real role in changing the map of the United States. Stephen skate on his book imperfect union. Onday night at 8 00 eastern cspans q a. The white house did not release a weekly address from the president however, Congressional Black Caucus chair, representative karen bass of california in the democratic weekly address. She discussed Police Reform legislation. Rep. Bass hello, i am congresswoman karen bass and i represent californias 37th district in los angeles. I have the honor of serving as the chair of the Congressional Black Caucus. The caucus is known as conscience of the congress. The cbc was established in 1971 and