The author of our translation work. We are now turning to u. S. Global leadership in 2020 and beyond. Our two guest need very little introduction. First and foremost, former secretary of state, john kerry from the u. S. And from the alliance, the former head of nato. Welcome, gentlemen. Good to be with you. I will turn to you first, secretary kerry. Global Public Opinion is not looking good for the u. S. Every country surveyed and china had a better response to the pandemic, but rights can be abused in countries that did not have checks and balances, much more easily in this situation. Does the pandemic make you an optimist or a pessimist . I am an optimist by nature and an optimist because i believe that america is waking up and taking stock of the position the administration has put us in. There are reasons to be concerned about the pandemic carrying into 2021. I think that is clear. That is going to be very difficult. It will present the next president with Major Economic challenges, as well as global and strategic challenges. I am optimistic about that. I believe we will have a new president. I think we will see record levels of turnout in this election. People are seized by a number of issues. Obviously, enormously moved by what happened with George Floyds murder. The aggregate of all the civilrights components, including environmental justice. People see a linkage between covid19 and the unwillingness to listen to science, to listen to facts, to listen to experts. The climate crisis, where they are unwilling to listen to the facts. The u. S. Has succeeded in the last three and half years of literally alienating itself from our friends. It has made the world a more dangerous place, without question. Nuclear agreement, Climate Change, walking away from the agreement, a fake trade war that has raised prices for people. You can run down a long list. The president standing feet away from president putin and disavowing his own Intelligence Community saying, why should i have a reason not to believe putin. We have seen things that none of us would have ever believed we would have seen or heard from any administration, republican and democrat alike. I think the dam is breaking. I see the latest poll. Vice President Biden is well ahead. I have run for president and i know what happens in the last weeks. I am quite confident that americas future, providing we have a change in leadership. If we do not have a change in leadership, all bets are off on many issues. I will go to the heart of the matter. We were secretary of state in 2016 when we saw russia interfere in the election. Now we are looking forward to the next race. What threats are you looking are you worried about most for 2020 . I am concerned about two things. I remain concerned about the foreign threat. President trump overtly, according to john boltons book, he invited china to get involved in the race and help him win. I think that we know that russia is engaged not just here, but in europe and elsewhere. Down took down 6. 1 billion fake accounts last year. You can bet your boots that is not the end of the problem. They are very sophisticated in finding new weaknesses or opening up new weaknesses. Undoubtedly, there will be attacks there. I am also concerned about something that affected my campaign in 2004 and al gore in 2000. It has affected other campaigns in the country the last few years, most recently in georgia, where certain officials of a particular party purposely make it difficult for the other party to vote. They control those matters, so we have precincts there are not enough machines and people are waiting in long lines. Access to the ballot is supposed to be one of the greatest things of democracy. Here we are, having held ourselves up as the leader of the free world for a long time. We are not meeting the standard that we ought to be meeting. I am deeply concerned about protecting the vote. Certainly we have to make sure that people actually do vote. I think those are the key items that are being worked on now with a lot of people focused on this. I am hopeful that we will have so many people voting and that the vote will not be close, so that things are definitive and we have a clear mandate for the future of the u. S. I do not know about you, but as a australian, i find it mindboggling in the u. S. Alarm bells everywhere. What is your top threat in 2020 . First of all, we definitely need American Global leadership. I hope to see that after the elections. I am concerned about foreign interference, but i think the u. S. Is much better prepared than four years ago. We have seen that the russian playbook has been adopted china, by other autocratic regimes in the world, so i think we still have to put a close eye on those developments. This is also a reason why we decided yesterday to continue the work of the Transatlantic Commission on Election Integrity that was established with joe biden a couple of years ago. The purpose of that commission is to monitor elections and to look into possible foreign interference with our elections. We are better prepared, but i think that we should still focus on it. Secretary kerry, you have your own experience as a president ial candidate in 2004. You were very gracious and quick to concede when you did lose narrowly. How do you think the citizens and political operatives will cope in 2020, if there is a delayed vote . A close result or a contested result. And the followup, do you think trump will actually leave in the way that we are accustomed to . If he does lose the election . I was not all that quick to concede. I did not concede into well into wednesday afternoon because they were serious questions about what happened in ohio and other places. I finally did concede because i thought with america at war, we were only one year in with the war in iraq. The last thing we would benefit from was a contested election and the same result so he did not make sense. My feelings about it now are that i want to do everything in my power to make sure this is not a close election. The way it is going right now, it will not be a close election. I cannot speak to what will happen if it is. It depends on the circumstances. But i believe americans want to move in a different direction. This has been chaos for four years. There are major issues. You know this. We are looking at cyber, where you can press a button and stop completelybusiness and services in that nation. And nothing is being done to followup on what we started in the obamahyden administration den administration to work with china on setting the rules for cyber. That is a negotiation just as important as their weapons, as it was in reykjavik. We need leadership that is prepared to move in a new direction. We also need to face the Nuclear Issues coming back. Not just india and pakistan but russia and the u. S. We are seeing the threat of an increased arms race. It is dangerous. It is a vast expenditure of funding that we do not need to do. And then you have Climate Change. You have the challenge of global unrest over the populist nationalism that is being exploited. There are many huge challenges. You have to have global engagement. The United States must be there. Today as we are talking, it is no exaggeration to say we did not have a leader of the free world. The institutions that we put together, you know this. World war i, we said we do not want chemical weapons. World war ii, we talked about how to deal with torture. We created the u. N. None of this was done for the sake of doing it. It was done because we knew it would address problems and be a better way of making the world a place where we can operate and Work Together and get things done for a better life. That is not happening today. We have people praising dictators and moving in the opposite direction. Im going to continue to believe that this election will not be close. If it is close, we will have to deal with whatever the circumstances are at this time. Hopefully we have late enough groundwork to be well prepared. Picking up on that point, he re is an audience question from a journalist and he is asking about what will happen if donald trump is reelected. I throw in there all of the International Organizations that the Organization Administration seems intent on undercutting. How word are you about the future of american Political Institutions . Worried are you . I am worried. It is very simple. Too much money in our system. Far too little sensitivity to the plight of a bunch of people. The disparity of Wealth Distribution in our country is growing worse and worse by the year. We have major challenges. If people do not have adequate access to the ballot, that is the stuff from which revolutions are built. You begin to deny people the capacity of your democracy to work, even the Founding Fathers wrote in the declaration of independence, we have an inherent right to challenge that. I am worried that increasingly, people are disaffected. What encourages me is this incredible spontaneous reaction to the killing of george floyd by those Police Officers has a a torrent of awareness that people see this unfairness and i think it is becoming a voting issue. Issue, it a voting may now become one. This has been a fascinating year. We have not had a year like this when Martin Luther king was assassinated and Bobby Kennedy was assassinated and we had major challenges in our streets. I am more optimistic now that we are going to see a massive response and perhaps real change, for the better. That will strengthen america in the world. If we get a new president who the world respects and is ready to listen to and believe, i think you will see a world of difference in other countries as well. One area where we might see ise more Common Ground u. S. China policy. It strikes me that there is bipartisan support towards china. That ranges from the democratic issues in hong kong, trade policy as a matter of dispute. Is it trump policy that is wrong or mostly his execution of it . It is a combination. Your policy is part of your execution. Everybody has agreed that china presents real challenges when it comes to what they are prepared to do in reciprocity, in fairness in the Economic Exchange of nations. They operate by a different system. That system, which can sometimes force companies to be forced to give up their technology in order to do business, or that dont get equal access and a marketplace, that is unfair. Every country in the world should care about that. Donald trump is right to raise that issue. But that is all he has done. He walked away from it. We now see in john boltons book, he did not just walk away from it. He was ready to trade help for buying more goods. He said if you buy more goods, that is the end of the trade issue. No, it is not the end of the trade issue. The president s policy is not correct to the degree that you cand can concern discern what it is. I think that we have to recognize that we will not stop Climate Change without china being deeply involved. We got them to be involved in obama and biden administration. The chinese came on board for the first time and it was critical. We need to thank the chinese for the work that they have done. They have taken Climate Change quite seriously. They still have a problem with plants, but we will have to address that. None of that has been talked to by donald trump. He is making life far more tenuous and risky for people all over the world, affected by his attitude as the leader of the Worlds Largest economy. It is critical that the United States lead on this. While he may have defined some of the problems with china, he has not executed thoughtfully at all. We are far worse off today in the relationship with china then we were when we started. I wonder, how can americans maximize their impact on the issue . Does that include governors or other actors was going and partnering or negotiating with china directly to get those back regardless of the administration . It is a simple answer, what can americans do . Vote, vote, vote. In 2016 when trump was elected, the turnout of eligible americans was 55. 6 . Ran it wasan i , about 62 . When obama got elected, it was 63. 7 . Young people have the greatest stake in climate in the future. Only 19 of people between 18 and 25 voted. If people come out and vote, we will change the direction of the world. I think that is the foremost thing that folks have to do. People need to understand. I have worked on this issue for 30 plus years. I had the religion of leading our negotiations in paris and working on the whole road up to paris. Even if we did everything we were able to achieve in paris, we would still see the warming of the planet to three degrees or more. We are currently on track to hit degrees by the end of the century. We had just not getting the job done. China is a bout to bring more power online. That is the end of it if we like these things happen. Let these things happen. So, we have a monumental challenge ahead of all of us. What is exciting about it is, it is not a downside, economically. If we make the right choices and do the right things with the right level of cooperation, there are millions of jobs to be created, extraordinary benefit in terms of health, less particulates and less cancer, less emphysema. Less asthma for children and so forth. There is a huge benefit to the security to all of our nations by building new security base at which we are not at risk of sending people to the middle east to fight a war to defend our ability to run our factories and heat our homes. It is an exciting future and we will grab that feature, but we only have about nine years left to make the decisions that will make the greatest difference for us in avoiding the worst consequences of the climate crisis. We have to get to work and get to work fast. That can only happen with President Biden. It simply will not happen if President Trump were reelected. I was interviewing joshua wong, and he was very frustrated with the statements of concern about the situation in hong kong. He was critical of the eu for not doing more to stand up. Being in those rooms and crafting that language, at what point do you flip the switch and move into the trade embargoes, the sanctions or other measures . He was clearly frustrated. I wonder if you had to make those judgment calls where it is time to step out of hong kong . You are the guest of honor, so it is natural that you are the one who has spoken the most, but what we do need is now i am speaking for europe. We need a more united european stance. We should send to the democratic activists in hong kong. I think we should speak up, stand firm and tell china that they are not fulfilling their International Obligations by passing the security law. We should step up our support for taiwan. The chinese adhere to the principle of one country, two systems, but we can support hong kong and taiwan much more. Let me conclude by saying that i am so grateful for you meeting with us. I fully agree with you that the covid crisis has taught us that we need more, not Less International cooperation. What we need is the free world to form an alliance of democracies to stand up against autocracies to use new technology etc. I agree with you. We should never not stand up for democracy. Democracy is the foremost principle in our being. It is in our dna and no place knows better what happens when you are not vigilant, than europe. Europe has lived a tortured history because of fascism, tyranny and so forth. We have to do a better job. I think you know that. America, our congress has been dysfunctional. We did not even pass a budget. There is almost no bipartisan budget passing. That is not a function of the system. The rules are the same when i was there in 1980. We worked across the aisle in bipartisanship. What has changed with the people and leadership of politics, where people are not standing up for the institution and the system. In recent days, again, john boltons book plays out pretty clearly that President Trump did not stand up to president xi with respect to the uighurs and said intern them all. We have got other things to talk about. If you dont stand up, that is when things run away. That is when evil can take over. I think it is vital for us to remember as i was saying earlier, we created this liberal order as we call it not to be liberal, not to just have a structure there to talk about. We created it because it put in place institutions which would help us work more effectively, live more effectively, be safer. And we have been. Nato is one of the greatest alliances ever created in the world. And yet our president has been attacking it these last few years. I think the road is clear. I dont think we need to keep repeating the challenge is making democracy work which means voting. There is no automatic pilot in democracy and there is nothing the desperates in the world love better than the west wringing its hands over where to go. We are wasting so much Political Energy it is astounding, brexit and so forth. My god. Europe has been on hold for the last few years. It certainly wasnt a waste of our time. Thank you so much for the discussion. Time to move on to the next session. I wish we could speak longer but everyone has limits on zoom. Time to move on. Thank you so much. Take a short break before the next session. The house education and the Labor Committee holds a hearing to examine the Coronavirus Response and possible racial inequities in education, healthcare, and the workforce. Coverage begins at noon on cspan, online, or listen on the three cspan radio app. Free cspan radio app. What do you think we can do about that . With police reform, protests, and the coronavirus affecting the country, watch our coverage of the governments response with rethings from the white house, governors and mayors from across the country updating the situation and from the campaign 2020 trail. Join the conversation every day live call in Program Washington journal. And if you miss anything, watch anything on demand on cspan. Org or listen with the free cspan radio app. Week, watch house votes on policing reform and statehood legislation. Thursday live on cspan, the house will vote on the democrats policing reform bill. The george floyd adjusting and policing act. And on friday, the house will vote on legislation to designate the District Of Columbia as a state. Watch this week live on thursday and friday on cspan online on cspan. Org, or listen live on the free cspan radio app. More now from the copenhagen democracy summit. We will hear from former secretary of state, Madeleine Albright backslidin democratic
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