As my team was helping me get ready, i was reminded of a line from emerson i dont quote poetry often. President reagan quoted in westminster in 1982. An institution is lengthened by the shadow of one man, and there is no man who did more than reagan to restore americas confidence and human freedom in the post world war ii era. There is no better event than continuing that work by launching this new institution 40 years after america sent our 40th president to the white house. People watching online and those in this room are students of president reagan. As a kid growing up in california, i got to see him in action as the governor. It was a very different california then. [laughter] but it was Ronald Reagan as governor who believed in the promise of america and our people. He understood that no other nation under god was conceived in liberty quite the way that we are. His deep, innate understanding of americas exceptional place in the world gave him the strength to face down the soviet scourge. He was confident that every threat he faced we have many threats that remain, but i am equally confident america will overcome any challenge from communist china to the terrorist regime in tehran. Because thats what free people do. We come together, we solve problems, we win, they lose. We execute our Foreign Policy confident that we are the shining city on a hill. That is what i want to spend a few minutes talking about today. I know you all believe in the promise of americas freedom. President trump believes in it. I do too. Our nations story isnt about dehumanizing critical theory. It is not about oppressors and oppressed. It is not about materialism and even that might makes right. It is not the reality it is about the reality that all men and women are made in the image of god with certain godgiven rights by virtue of our humanity. These truths in the declaration, really are indeed selfevident. Never before in all of recorded history was a nation founded on the premise that governments rol is to protect those very rights, to secure them. It is what makes us special. It is what makes us so good. It is what i get to see every day as i work with my team and travel around the world. It is what always made our lives striverstive to the and those seeking a better world. I must say you dont see individual families trying to migrate to iran or russia or to venezuela. Those countries offer abuse, not the opportunities free nations can afford peoples. Ive talked about american exceptionalism. I did so in brussels, in cairo, and in jakarta. Every opportunity i had in my public life, sometimes it was met with a resounding thud as well. Ive walked out of quiet workrooms. President reagan talked about americas founding promise every chance he got to. At westminster, he reminded the audience what kind of people they were. Free people worthy of freedom and determined to not only help to helpmain so, but others gain their freedoms as well. President reagan put his belief in freedom and the american promise at the very center of how he thought about Foreign Policy. So has the Trump Administration. It was a halfdozen years after his westminster address. President reagan returned to england and described how he executed the vision he outlined in 1982. He said his foreignpolicy was one of strength and candor. Both principles guided president trumps policy too. Take a look at the things we have done so far. In the middle east, americas strength is replaced. We killed baghdadi and soleimani and restored substantial deterrence. The effort against the Islamic Republic of iran to deny terrorist proxies tens of millions of dollars. American diplomatic strength conveyed our relationships with our gulf partners, the closest they have ever been. By just simply candidly recognizing jerusalem as the capital of israel and recognizing the Golan Heights is part of israel. It is central to the regions futures. To the chagrin of some in town, delivered new peace and prosperity through the abraham accords. But we are not finished yet. Those pillars of strength are also the foundation for americas policy toward the number one threat to freedom today. The Chinese Communist party. I have spoken about this at great length and followed president reagan in how we think about this challenge. For 40 years plus, we steered a course for action. We changed. Weve ignored all the contrary evidence that showed the regime in beijing really is troublesome. Showed it for what it really is. It is authoritarian, brutish, and antithetical to human freedom. We have said consistently United States relations will not be exceptions carved out by the party. But by simple and powerful standards expected of any aspirations to play a role on the global stage. That means what we told our counterparts in china, accountability to have transparency and reciprocity for beijing is what president reagan demanded from moscow. No more a legal claims in the south china sea. No more stealing of intellectual consulates no more used for spies, no more stealing of intellectual property and no more ignoring fundamental human rights violations. The partys activities in xing tibet will no longer be tolerated. This challenge requires not only diplomatic effort, but strength to keep the peace. ThiS Administration has made historic investments to enhance our armed forces, to focus their efforts and bolster our privacy in the region. I have been the secretary of state for coming on 30 months. Ive traveled around the world talking to our friends and the nature of ccp. I reminded them the west is winning, that we will prevail. The good news is the free world and sovereign nations are now rallying to this cause. Ill often hear, we dont want to pick between the United States and china. We remind them that is not the fight. The fight is between authoritarianism and barbarism on one side and freedom on the other. So we have begun to strengthen institutions so we can achieve we have woken, them up to the threat posed by this marxistleninist monster. The newest result is a reflection of strength and candor, precisely the traits president reagan spoke of. The urgency of this matter is excepted across the political spectrum and shows the Trump Administration succeeded in making this important shift for American National security and indeed for the freedoms of all humanity. It is an accomplishment that will steer a generation of american Foreign Policy makers. We should approach this challenge and indeed every challenge confident in our nations purpose. Sure of our values and determined to protect our way of life, because we believe so deeply in americas promise. Just like president reagan, we have every reason to be optimistic. America itself is a continentwide reminder that freedom is the superior alternative to tyranny. If our policies arent grounded in the love of america, that we are indeed an exceptional nation and our founding principles and our future promise is special. If we get it wrong, our nation will suffer, but if we get it right, our friends and allies will see america leading. We will emerge stronger, more confident and face the china challenge. President reagan knew this. Appeasement and blind engagement makes us weak. Beijing, tehran and other tyrannical regimes take advantage of weakness. We cannot afford to return to the days of america sacrificing its National Leadership to multilateral institutions that in fact erode american sovereignty. These institutions with liberal we and intellectual cant sustain an empty dialogue with regimes that have no intention to respect the free and open order that we worked so diligently to build. President reagans life offers us incredibly valuable lessons. It was in 1952, near the start of the cold war, Ronald Reagan the actor went to the middle of america, not far from kansas. He went to where churchill had given his iron curtain speech a few years earlier. From there he said, america is an idea that has been deep in the thoughts of man ever since man started his long trail from the swamp and is nothing but the inherent love of freedom in each one of us. That idea, the inherent love of freedom, led millions in Eastern Europe to tear down the berlin wall 31 years ago yesterday. And the iron curtain in the months that followed fell too. We have seen this desire for peace across the world. We see it in the people of hong kong waving the american flag. We see the people of venezuela, tired of nicolas maduros destructive regime. We see it in nicaragua. We see iranians and belarusians. All longing for this very human condition. It is within each of us. America has debates about how to confront the soviet threat, and have debated and will continue to debate how to approach the china challenge. I think that is good. I think that is healthy in a democracy. Our true north, to which we must always return a more Perfect Union and greater human freedom in the world must remain. This place. This special place, the Reagan Institute will play a key part in that. Today, youre reaffirming americas belief in the great things at the heart of an amazing nation. I am glad you are focusing your work on that westminster address, when president reagan spoke about fostering the infrastructure of democracy and leaving soviet communism on the ash heap of history. Those remarks, they were early on in his presidency. It was bold. What he says is true. It was grounded in americas first principle. But it was forwardlooking. It was optimistic. Because reagan knew those principles were right. This center will continue to march on. It will continue that march of freedom and democracy and you will keep lengthening the shadow of the man that reminded america that we are in fact great. That we are in fact special and that the world needs us to live up to our nations providence. Providential promise. It is an amazing honor to be here as you are getting started. I look forward to following your work and taking questions today. May god bless the United States of america. Thank you all. [applause] thank you, mr. Secretary. I was about to tell you how to put the mic on, but you are capable of handling that. We are going to take we have time for a few questions we will do from the stage and for those in the room and online, i think you will agree that was a remarkable set of remarks. Inspiring, actually, the way you integrated president reagans legacy with the work you have done as secretary of state and the Trump Administration. Lets start with china and the Chinese Communist party. That was a big piece of your speech. You referenced president reagans speech in missouri. Many people look at churchills speech in fulton as the iron curtain speech of the beginning of the cold war. Your administration, the president S Administration and your time in thiS Administration, have you witnessed a moment where you had that iron curtain moment, where you recognize this regime, the Chinese CommunistParty Presented a challenge that the only frame of reference was going back to the cold war . Sec. Pompeo if you look at the president s remarks from his campaign and before that, he had identified a number of the challenges connected to the Chinese Communist party and its behavior. As we developed our National Security strategy, you see the theecome to be fleshed out, bones being put beneath it. I got to see firsthand every morning what these characters were up to. When i say that, you get a chance to have a glimpse inside of the apparatus and its intent, which is critical. Weve lived with communist regimes in the world. Theyll choose their own governments model, but they dont impact the world in the way xi jinping intends to impact the world. This combination of capacity and intent on behalf of the leadership of the Chinese Communist party, it became clear this was the central challenge faceadministration would and we believe the central challenge america will face in the years ahead. We put together all the apparatus and institutions in the state department to fundamentally shift how we think about the world. My ambassadors, no matter where they are in the world, have china at the top of the list. If you are an ambassador in the democratic republic of congo or in south korea, you know the Chinese Communist party is intent on impacting that country. We are determined to make sure we use our capacity to push back against that challenge. Articulated those remarks most clearly at the nixon library, where we for the first time took a complete lay down of the scope with the challenge presented and how the Trump Administration laid out both the american response and the response we are working on so the world can do this collectively. Just as reagan needed partners in the fight against the authoritarian and soviet regime, this will take a Global Response as well. Just to drill down more on china, we see this image of president reagan in front of the berlin wall. Tear down this wall. Iconic now. Quite controversial then. They didnt want him to use those words. They got that wrong. When you think about china, you think about the great firewall, which reflects what china is doing in the digital age. Obviously, wrestling how we manage competition with china, some would suggest we reinforce that wall and keep the free world outside of it and let china live within its great firewall. Give me your thoughts. Maybe we should take down the great firewall and aspire for that in the same fashion we wanted the berlin wall to come down. Sec. Pompeo in the end, the people of china will ultimately be determinative of the course just as the people of the soviet union were determinative of the course of history in that country. It is our fundamental effort to make sure the Chinese People have access to information, data, all the things they will need to see so they too can share in these freedoms we care so much about. So yes, the analogy of the cold war is imperfect. We can talk about the places is different. Make no mistake about it, this innate desire for freedom, for autonomy, for Human Dignity is something, just as reagan said, rests in the souls of each of us. For each of us to have the capacity to permit them to tear down this firewall that has been built around china would enable the people of china to make a much different set of decisions than the one their current leadership is taking. Separating the people from the party, big emphasis of your remarks. Recently, i had the opportunity to have a conversation with a famous dissident from the soviet union which impacted the Reagan Administration in so many ways, from beginning to end, and he talked about almost viscerally about the concept of linkage and how president reagan and his secretary of state, secretary schultz, no matter what the conversation was with the soviet union, the plight of people seeking freedom always began the conversation. It was always top of the list. Talk to me about the importance bylinkage as explained president reagan and secretary schultz. Do we need more of it . How do we continue advancing that, whether you are dealing with the Chinese Communist party even our friends and partners . Sec. Pompeo sure. A complicated topic. Ive actually spent a lot of time, so two things in the state department. One, i put together a commission. It is the commission on in alienable rights. It takes 40 minutes to flip through, but it was an attempt to reground american Foreign Policy in fundamental understandings about Human Dignity. I think the foundation did a phenomenal job of going back to the universal declaration of human rights and accounting for these things, these prepolitical rights that were provided by god, not by government. I think it refocused our effort in the state department. Down not just policies, but principles on how we think about freedom run. Free rights. Second, we spent a lot of time working on religious freedom issues. I put those two as a baseline to answer your conversation because it is the case no matter what country we are dealing with, the weather they are people we have a security relationship with were the communist party and the horrors inside of china, catholic churches are being synthesized seeing christian , faith stamped out in tibet, and now in now northern mongolia. Everyplace humanity wants to flourish, the Chinese Communist party is resisting. Each time we have a conversation at every level between the United States and china, we raise these issues. In part because the president had it right to link them, it matters. Secondly, we have a fundamental obligation to do this on behalf the american people. Your remarks, and we only have a few more minutes. The referenced International Organizations and how they often sought to erode our sovereignty. You also did that in a section of your speech talking about strength and candor and the need to have a Foreign Policy that advances and speaks that way. At the same time, International Organizations have been used and are necessary despite their critique in your speech and in many conservatives view, iran and dealing with iran through the Security Council or with covid and the need to engage with International Organizations. Give us your take in terms of sitting atop foggy bottom as our diplomat in chief, how you have come to think and appreciate the role of International Organizations as we advance u. S. Interests. Sec. Pompeo appreciate, not appreciate. Some of each, to be sure. We come at this from first principle. It comes back to our central understanding, our nob. S. Understanding. Does this thing work . If that institution is 70 years on or 100 years on, is it still functional . This is what every person does in their personal life, what every business does. Does the institutional structure permit us to get to the place we are intending . The very statement of mission the institution has. If it is broken beyond repair in spite of Great American efforts, i give you the Human Rights Council at some point i dont want to be connected to that. I cant fix it. I will create something outside of that that will deliver on human rights. There are other things you try to fix. The World Health Organization. We have been through three, maybe four efforts at reforming the World Health Organization. Significant efforts, real efforts, american led efforts over the decades, republican and democratic administrations alike. Epic failures. The president concluded on my recommendation we ought to build an infrastructure that will deliver the outcomes the World Health Organization is designed to deliver. So it is about purpose, function, does it fit, does it work . I will give you an example where we made one better. There is an Organization Called the world intellectual property organization. Turns out this matters an awful lot to american jobs at home. To americas wealth and jobs here at home. It was run by someone controlled by the Chinese Communist party. There was an election, we were about to let that person continue and the state department built out a team. We got someone who cared about Property Rights running the world intellectual property organization. Stunning. [laughter] listening, it seems that seems like we are bragging about this. Turns out it was a close call. It was a hotly contested race. What we did was we said this is an institution that matters. If we think we can make this institution function, lets make sure we get the right team, the right structure in place. So we did. We built up the counterisis coalition of 90 countries. Almost 50 nations who refuse to put Chinese Telecom and infrastructure in their country. I remember my first trip abroad, where i pitched a country giving up huawei. I read the next day pompeo throws himself up against a wall. Epic failure. But it turns out good work, rational thought, candor, data, has now led 50 countries and dozens of Telecom Companies around the world to say we will not let this happen. International infrastructure matters. We should use it for the good of the world, but we should never permit ourselves to be in these situations where one organization has no possibility of delivery a good outcome. That framework, the infrastructure, the models, the approach. That seems to work for you. We were talking about International Organizations. Lets wrap up with this question. The organizations that came out of president reagans westminster speech, the National Endowment for democracy and all those umbrella organizations, those are nearly 40 years old. They continue to do great work. We have people in the room here who led some of those organizations. At the same time, the world has changed dramatically since then. What is your thinking about what we do as a country to sharpen, modernize, in terms of how we as a country promote and advance freedom and democracy in the world . Sec. Pompeo anytime something is 40 years old that includes me it often needs a makeover. I think a lot of these institutions need makeovers. We all know voice of america. We all know these institutions that delivered in powerful ways across the world. But communications have changed, times have changed. The capacity for nations to screen information and the way that they do it has changed. I am not convinced we have it right yet. I think we made progress in our four years, but there is an awful lot left to do. There are places that have an Important Role to play around the world in advancing democracy. We need to make sure we empower them with the right leaders and tools so they can deliver on those objectives. Secretary, pale secretary pompeo, i would be remiss without commentating you are the embodiment of peace through strength diplomacy with your socks, being a footsoldier. We certainly notice and appreciate. [laughter] please join me in thanking secretary of state for launching our center for freedom and democracy. [applause] thank you so much to secretary pompeo for those wonderful remark and for that insightful conversation. Policy is rachel half, director at the Ronald Reagan institute and it is my honor to join you today, those in this room and joining us virtually online to launch the newest policy center at the institute, the center for freedom and democracy. As we turn to the second half of todays event, we will focus on the policy work the center will that, iand as we start would like to call us back to a quote roger shared in his opening remarks. It is from the westminster address. That speech animates so much of the work of the center for freedom and democracy. President reagan said we must be staunch in our conviction that freedom is not the sole prerogative of a lucky view, that the inalienable rights of all human beings. Remember, it wasnt just conviction president reagan demanded of us. Which heard today, it was the westminster address infrastructureur to proactively support democracy around the world, and architecture weve relied on for nearly four decades. As we approach the 40th anniversary of the speech in a few years, the Ronald Reagan institute launched the westminster to point a working group under our center for freedom and democracy. The goal is to take on the challenge roger and secretary pompeo or discussing of modernizing efforts to promote democracy and the strategy and toolkit for advancing freedoms in todays world. The need for this work could not be more clear. Secretary pompeo told us about our adversaries. They are authoritarian, british, antithetical to human freedom. Work not only to oppress their own people, but to undermine democracy beyond their borders. They are leveraging new tools, new technologies in order to restrict freedom so the job for freedom and democracy in this group is to answer the question of how we should leverage new tools to advance freedom. What should be the westminster approach of the 21st century . How should we organize our government, Civil Society institutions, and our alliances to execute that approach . In this work, we are honored to be led by two esteemed coaches, ambassador mark green and kenneth wallace. They have joined us here today. On the working group, there are two of 20 members, current and former public officials, technology experts, freedom and democracy advocates, leaders from the business community, who will spend the next two years digging into this conversation and after receiving briefings and deliberating, produce a report around the anniversary of the westminster speech with findings and recommendations for how to do just that. We will preview those conversations today with a conversation with mark and ken. Mark green is executive Director Director of the mccain institute. He served previously as a u. S. Congressman of wisconsin. He was ambassador to tanzania. As the president of the International Republican institute, ken wallick he serves on the board of the National Endowment for democracy and he cochairs the commission on president ial debates. Please join me now and join me in welcoming them. [applause] i thought it would be useful to start today by picking up on where secretary pompeos were marks left off. He spoke about the westminster at the end of his remarks and described that while it was rooted in our nations founding principles, it was also forwardlooking and optimistic. Share with us your own reflections on the speech and its enduring legacy. Ken well, i remember the speech. It was a few years before i joined this enterprise, but what was most surprising to people it visionary,as but it institutionalized democracy in a motion. It had the atlantic charter, the marshall plan, the preamble to the 1961 foreign assistance act. President carters human rights policy. Matter of fact, legislation was introduced years earlier by the chairman of the House Foreign Affairs committee in florida. Don fraser from minnesota. But none of those efforts really crossed the finish line in the sense of institutionalizing the infrastructure of democracy that president reagan talked about. I think that was why it was such a historic event and a historic speech. Contac but dante at the time, who became the godfather of National Endowment for democracy on capitol hill, thought it would something everybody could support. Republicans and democrats all coming together to support the principles that were outlined in the president s remarks. Little did he know it was something for everyone to dislike, as well. If republicans and democrats, business and labor can agree on such an initiative, you have to be suspicious. What was the motive . The motive is these were institutions that were looking to feed off the government trough. As roger mentioned earlier, it crossed party lines and philosophical lines. There were those on the left who saw this as a reagan initiative and therefore, it was a tool in the cold war. It was not going to challenge authoritarian regimes on the right. And there were those on the right who felt that our larger struggle against soviet communism should be the priority and feared that the downfall of friends on the right would lead to takeovers by communist insurgencies, ther it was i would just conclude by saying what was ironic about all of this. It was the snap elections in the civil opinions of 1986. It changed the entire debate over this enterprise. For those on the right, they saw there was a Democratic Alternative to pinochet in a Democratic Alternative to marcos. That in fact, they had a symbiotic relationship between the forces of the communist insurgency in the regimess, that they needed each other and the regimes, they needed each other. Given an opportunity, as the secretary talked about and president reagan talked about, there was a broad crosssection of society that wanted certain functioning Democratic Institutions and a political voice. So the right suddenly saw there was this alternative. On the left, they saw there was a challenge supported by the institutes of the endowment to challenge authoritarian regimes on the right. It changed the entire debate in the congress. And so, as i go back to looking i reread this last night. It is as relevant today as it was back then. It led not only to the institution of democracy promotion in the u. S. , but i think it led to the notion of democracy promotion by other intergovernmental organizations, networks of Civil Society organizations that had a profound effect on the sort of International Democracy architecture that is still in existence today. Mark you know, it is interesting. That speech, like some of the greatest speeches we all hearken back to, wasnt appreciated at the time. References made by secretary pompeo and roger to the iron curtain speech, if you go back and actually read the press accounts of the iron curtain speech, it was not appreciated. In fact, it was dismissed. The same thing with this speech. It resonated in some places here in washington, but i dont think received its due. For me, it was several years later. I was a young teacher in kenya. Just north of the equator. And actually saw the infamous cueing collections in kenya. Where they held up photographs of candidates and you simply lined up behind the photograph of your candidate and they would count the number of people in each line. My school was a coal in place and i watched. They had the photographs up and they were jockeying back and forth from the lines and right before the predetermined time, one line figured out the other line was going to win and they all went over. It was unanimous. I remember chuckling to myself, my wife and i were talking about what we had seen. A kenyan instructor came up to me and said it is flawed, but at least we were counting heads and not breaking them. It startled me, because it put things in a context. I read the reagan speech, and instantly, i thought, this is it. This is what america stands for. This is what i believe in. Be a republican didnt have the same impact on ken, but it really was something to which i could throw myself into. For a lot of americans interested in going into Public Service and trying to make a difference, this was a vision you could embrace, because it at once held up Human Dignity and at the same time talked about a global effort. It was not fully appreciated at the time. It was also interesting, ken is right, the relevance of the speech is just as great today. What i find fascinating is going back and looking at the historical context. We are all talking about the challenges we see in the world, the economic challenges, the challenges of covid, look back at westminster. The American Economy had contracted the gdp by 2. 5 . There was a lot of talk about the soviet models success and the advance. Not exactly the best time to make a speech like that. But it was his boldness, it was completely blowing away all the assumptions that so many people had. That is what made it startling then and that is why i think the speech is so important today. This is the time, given the challenges we see in the world, we talk about the rise of authoritarianism, this is precisely the right time to step back, as reagan did in those days, and reaffirm those principles that unite us. Conservative, conservative, liberals, across the generations. I think it is a fantastic time for the institution to take this project up and im delighted to be part of it. Rachel as you think about your work and the organizations that emerged from the inspiration of the westminster speech, etc. , here most recent role as director for the u. S. Agency on international development. Leading those organizations, what did you identify as kind of a thread of successful effort on behalf of Civil Society . What is working . Mark a number of things are working. One thing i will point to that i think is doing particularly well these days, and that is the relationship between the ndi and iri and the symbolic importance of the institutes working together in those places around the world. They are not partisan organizations, but symbolically, they were set up to represent the aspects of american political life. What i think is remarkable is to see the impact in various settings and various when they go together. It is a projection of consensus and the fundamental importance of freedom and democracy and human liberty that i think is particularly important right now and resonates in many places, where sometimes people see partisanship in the u. S. And elsewhere. So that, i think, symbolic partnership is having a real impact. Ken think there were two parts of this that if we had been successful in this effort over the last 40 years, the first has to be joining something larger than ourselves. Democracy promotion has been portrayed inaccurately, wrongly, as sort of the u. S. Export product. It is not. From the very beginning, we saw this as being part of an International Solidarity network, with other democrats around the world. It was not a country seeking, asking them to cede something to the United States, but rather having those democratic partners on the ground become part of something larger. Part of a support network internationally. Also, we dont have all the expertise and experiences of going through a transition. Its been 250 years. Other countries have a more relevant experience and expertise. In chile, it was the filipinos that went to chile to share their expertise. Later, it was the chileans who shared their experience on Coalition Building with 16 Political Parties are in the world. Building this network of people who could share those experiences i think was so important. The second has to do with relationships. David brooks wrote an interesting column in the New York Times a number of years ago about a family that was engaged in turning disaffected youth around. He asked this youth leader what programs are most successful. He said, ive never seen a program that has been effective. Its relationships that have been effective. I think overseas, when we look back, it is not organizational frameworks. It is not programs themselves. It is the people who have been engaged in this and the relationships of trust and partnerships that are developed. Programs are only effective when those relationships are built and sustained in these countries. When programs fail, its because those relationships fail. Mark something i would like to pick up on what ken said in his first point, in talking about the International Solidarity in recognizing this is the universal aspiration, not merely an american project or policy, it is interesting when you look back at the westminster speech. It was as though reagan were anticipating those arguments today. My favorite line from the speech is where he says, goes after critics who argue democracy cant work in various settings, cant work in africa, cant work in latin america, and he says that is cultural condescension, or worse. It is as if he were anticipating the arguments we sometimes get pushback on, particularly in authoritarian settings. He anticipated it. We should take that and hold it up. It was ndis vice chairman, the founding chair of ndi talked about this notion of imposing democracy, which she called an oxymoron. Democracy is about choice. It is not about imposition. But it is overcoming this stereotypical view of what democracy promotion is. Americans going overseas and standing in front of a classroom, telling them to adopt this structure or support this principle, but it is something much more complex and profound than that. Mark the strength of the or ment comes not from iri ndi. It from students in hong kong. It comes from women in belarus. It comes from the ladies in white in cuba. That is the power of this. What we can do is stand with them and help to provide tools and assistance and support. But make no mistake, if it does not start overseas, it fails. It cant possibly succeed. But when it starts overseas, theres no stopping it. That is what scared the authoritarians. When authoritarians do their crackdowns, that is not a sign of strength, it is a sign of weakness. They are afraid of their own people. Ken oftentimes, when those same regimes go after organizations like iri and ndi, we become the canary in the coal mine. We understand they will soon thereafter go after local trying but they are also to delink these groups from International Groups and international partners. To deny it to their own citizens. Rachel lets talk more about those places where freedom is on the march. Ambassador green, you mentioned belarus and hong kong. Where do you see these movements, regardless of the u. S. Role we have been talking about . Where do you see freedom on the march . Where are the people making change, and maybe further, how can we replicate not necessarily we, to your previous point, but how can the free world Work Together to try to replicate some of those previous examples. Mark first of all, we are about the sweep of history since westminster. There are a number of democracies around the world. Reagans vision had a remarkable effect and impact in that framework. There are Extraordinary Stores ries all around the world. Place of what mongolia. Mongolia only has two countries on their border. China and russia. Its a tough neighborhood. And yet, they spontaneously chose democracy. The framework of assistance back here provided some tools, provided some support, but it came from mongolians who saw painfully the cost of authoritarianism and also saw what they wanted. But places like liberia and the iron ladies of liberia, who overthrew the warlords, i look in dramatic and remarkable ways. I look at the strength of people like juan guaido in venezuela. Now theres a guy with gumption and backbone. To me, the march for freedom is represented best by those who refuse to be pushed back by the authoritarian crackdowns. I look at the Student Movement and the strength of Roman Catholic priests in places like nicaragua. Their refusal to back down and hisowed by ortega and regime. Or the ladies in white Everything Else on the march peacefully on behalf of their brothers and fathers and relatives who are occupying prisons in havana. There are plenty of examples we Everybody Knows, it is sort of a strawman but Everybody Knows elections dont equal democracy. It is obvious. Nobody makes that argument. But you do find that in many of the revolutions that take place, many of them surround elections flawed, but only fraudulent. And people stand up for their rights. If you look for the socalled Color Revolution from serbia, to georgia, to ukraine, to kyrgyzstan, to gambia, they all followed seriously flawed elections in which the regimes use elections to legitimize themselves, but they are stagemanaged. A lot of times, elections, because it is a way of judging the way institutions and government treats people. It is the only event in which the judiciary is involved, the executive is involved, Security Forces are involved, the media is involved. It is a way of taking a snapshot of what is going on in the country. People rise up to defend their vote. So around elections and around protest movements, there have been many studies of the protesters are motivated not necessarily by economic considerations. There are economic consequences, but it is about dignity, it is about democracy or a better democracy. It is about corruption, it is about honesty in government. It is about political issues. So those are the issues that motivate people. And animate people to have a political voice. But we cant ignore the fact, the challenge about sustaining democracy. The late former foreign minister of poland once said democracy is does not necessarily go from triumph to triumph. Perhaps we were a little naive in the early days. It was the idea that democracy going fromr process, triumph to triumph. Is, newe problem democracies, fledgling democracies dont deliver on the promise of democracies, one of two things happen. People go to the streets, which is not the way Public Policy issues should be resolved, or they vote for huger chavez, who famously once said i am not the cause, i am the result. He was the result of failed political institutions. I think one of the great challenges of this century will be, how do you sustain democratic governments so they deliver on the promise of democracy . You asked earlier about successes and what do we point too. One of the differences from the heyday of the rapid increase in the number of democracies to today is the rise of what is referred to as sharp power. We have hard power, soft power, sharp power, which is the effort by authoritarians to pierce the political process, the machinery of democracy, to undermine it, token it, did delegitimize it. In many cases this is not a linear journey forward, it is also under attack. We see a free press under attack, we see all those different institutions that we all recognize as being part of the core of a Democratic Society with a Hostile Force trying to undermine them. That is part of the challenge. Because therun, power that we believe in, that which we affirm lies with people , will win because the people will eventually prevail. But this is not a linear progression. It is a series of challenges. I think the worst thing we can do and we are guilty of making the mistake over and over again, is, we get to a successful election and say, great, thats done, see you later, and we pull out too early when the institutions of democracy are fragile. It is a terrible mistake. We wonder why it didnt survive or we wonder why it was shaken because we that is got carried away and we abandoned some of these countries right as the machinery of democracy, which has to deliver, and it has to be responsive to peoples needs, right around that time that the , ahinery is under threat performance threat, we tend to walk away and it is a terrible mistake. One that we have made numerous times, republican administrations, democratic administrations. And it is a mistake. Ken i would add if you look at propaganda, int the 1970s and 1980s, it used to be our tractor is better than your tractor. It was never particularly effective, because nobody believed it. But the propaganda today and the Disinformation Campaign is quite different. It is if you think we are corrupt, look at your own system. It tends to resonate in some of these populations, because they are skeptical about their own governments performance. They view government as being corrupt, out of touch, and so therefore, those types of relatively inexpensive Disinformation Campaigns can have a huge impact, whereas the old soviet propaganda campaigns i think were ineffective. Rachel that leads into this concept of the westminster 2. 0 working group. ,t is about the modernization about the makeover. As you look at these new Disinformation Campaigns and as we face new competitors, as we think about the role that, the increased role that corruption and anticorruption or transparency or emerging technology play in these conversations, what would it aally mean to reimagine westminster approach for the 21st century . I dont want to prejudge the working groups. I think weve got experienced, thoughtful individuals engaged in those working groups. Many ut there are so i look to get forward to what they put together. But there are so many new tools that we have that i think we have not quite figured out how to fully harness. When i lived in kenya in the 1980s, there was but one wind up telephone in the village and it was literally a wind up telephone in the box, and you had to wind it up and say operator, give me nairobi and you would sit under the mango tree and half an hour later, your call would come through. The young man who was my night watchman now calls me every every week on his mobile phone. The connectivity around the world is extraordinary. It can be challenged, because authoritarians know how to abuse it. On the other hand, as tools of transparency and tools of connectivity, those are opportunities that reagan could not have imagined. Understand, and this is frugal technology, not cutting edge technology, this is frugal Old Technology that we are applying to the challenge, i think the promise is enormous. Ken i think a big difference existed 40 years ago, and reagan referred to this in his speech, there was no International Architecture on democracy. He made reference to the german party foundation, they were basically the only entities in the world engaged in this effort. They played an Important Role in spain, portugal, and helping to steer those democratic transitions. Today, that has changed. I think, and president reagan deserves a good deal of credit for helping lay the foundation for that. There are intergovernmental organizations organized around the principle of nonintervention that are engaged in democracy promotion. There are networks of Civil Society organizations and Political Parties and parliaments. There are donor aid agencies and governments engaged in this work. They dont always work effectively, but they exist. Nowthe lexicon of democracy important plays an role in bilateral relations and in international dialogues. And the question is, how do you harness that . How does the United States play a leadership role but we are coopt but work cooperatively with this architecture that didnt exist so it has the capability . I think when we confront the malign actors, russia, china, iran and others, we dont want to go into countries and say, you have to choose between them and us. That is not the approach, because then people get the sense in terms of partnerships that we want them to join us in order to serve our interests. And no one wants to be seen as serving a National Security doctrine of the United States. But we have to join with others to convey that notion that they are enjoying a community, the chinese dont have such community, the russians dont have such a community. The United States and its friends and allies around the world do have a community. And how to strengthen the community and then apply that strength, use that strength in various countries, and confront what has become transnational issues, whether it is corruption and migration and Climate Change and other issues, those have to be addressed collectively. They cannot simply be addressed by the u. S. How to deal with that International Architecture i think is a huge challenge and something extremely important in this field. Mark what percentage of ndi staff are not american . Ken ndi staff has 100 nationalities and they are represented on the staff. The Largest Program of ndi was in jordan, and it was run, still is, by a close of our who ar who startedosov as a driver and translator and runs the program now. A yemeni ran our program in afghanistan. The faces of our institute are not necessarily an american face. It is a mostly multinational face of the organization and i think that has an important impact. The yet the relationships within the parties are important. I have always said this. Because it provides some standing, some reputation. We are part of an international craddickmalld them parties across the world and there are 150 countries that belong to this club so we can go into a country, work at the grassroots, and the next day meet with the president or Prime Minister on these issues because they see us as International Arms of american institutions. It provides i think sort of an important calling card, establishes important relationships at the highest level. It is a multinational effort and that is what i can give the endowment and other organizations a great deal of strength and credibility. Mark one of the most important principles in the work that we do is we make it clear, not every democracy is the same. Not every democracy needs to look like ours. We have to understand the cultural context and it has to be there democracy, which we can support, we can offer lessons, we are most successful when we are honest about our own mistakes and shortfalls, but when you have that kind of relationship, you can in fact foster democracy, citizen responsiveness, human liberty, Human Dignity, it doesnt have to all look like ours, and in some cases i am delighted it doesnt look like ours. But it is a way of advancing the broader cause that was at the heart of westminster. Rachel lets talk about our democracy. We talked about democracy around the world. Even before the elections, this deepsaw a real and societal divisions over fundamental issues, like human rights, the rule of law. And now, we are seeing in many ways a stress test of our very democratic system, the it. Itutions that protect that process that we are going through here impacts our ability to support democratic movements or the advancement of freedom around the world. When i served overseas as ambassador, one of the things i always said when i talked to my tanzanian partners was, im not saying we have all the answers. But maybe we have made all the mistakes and you dont need to make the same mistakes we do. They actually loved it, because it made us real to them. It made us human to them. Talking about the lessons we have learned in some cases the hard way i think is a particularly compelling story and message in advancing democracy. So i think, we are in a turbulent time at the moment. This will be resolved, and i think it will be resolved in a way that we can all point to and say, look, at the end of the day, democracy prevailed and the institutions that enforce democracy prevailed. That is not a bad story to carry with us as we go to work. It is a great question, and it is a complicated answer. First of all, there are a number of countries who will say we aspire to have the problems you are having in your country. , the challenges we have here, and they are real challenges in our political system, and in our political discourse, when you are working in Northern Syria trying to work with Community Groups that can electiveurn with many elected Administrative Councils in syria and the Administrative Councils can try to live or on priorities identified by the citizens in their communities, it is really grassroots democracy that you hope can take hold once there is some type of peace and stability in syria. They dont look and say, you are having problems redistricting in the United States. It isnt particularly relevant to them in terms of the struggle they are engaged in. They can very easily compartmentalize. I think as much as it is one of the messages of democracy, one of the former Foreign Ministers of israel said democracy does the right thing but only after exhausting the alternatives. It is true. It is a messy system. But ultimately, it is the most stable of systems. And i think that people overseas understand that. I think when there are problems here, when there are certain weaknesses of our system, and those weaknesses somehow are amplified because of who we are, i think it gives us time to license sometimes to autocratic leaders overseas who want to irrigate power to themselves, to say, you cant stand up for these principles, look at what is happening in your country. I think in that community, among authoritarians who now have relationships with each other, part of the authoritarian learning is these autocrats have a community now and they communicate. The laws that are passed in russia one day find themselves appearing in an african country three weeks later. Ruled by law, not rule of law societies. I think in that community of autocratic leaders who does undermine this effort or weakens this effort overseas. Mark also i think it is important for us to remind ourselves that, yes, we are seeing partisanship right now and we are seeing some bickering, if you will. But that is because we have a free press. It actually gets covered. In many places around the world, such stories never make it to the newspaper. The first time a journalist reports on it is the last time a journalist reports, period. In the most difficult places where we work, they understand that. They look at the freewheeling debate and discussion, and what they see in the media, as a strength. They actually like that. They like the ability to debate and discuss and work things through. Especially as this gets resolved, they will look at this process, they will look back on ,his process as one that is many of them will say, we would like to have the problems you have. Democracy is messy. We never argue otherwise. We never go into a country and say, tell you what, we will take care of everything, you just do what we tell you to do, no problems. We are very open. It is messy. But at the end of the day, it is the only way that a government can reconstitute itself and realign itself according to the aspirations and the needs of their people. Democracy is accountability. Democracy is transparency. Democracy is finding a way to embrace the will of the people. That is something we should not apologize for. We should talk about it openly. I think ultimately, it is a source of strength, not a source of weakness. Rachel let me ask one final question. Here in america, what would be your response to a skeptic, a fellow american, who says, we have our own problems here at home, why should we do this work elsewhere . Its not the first time you have been asked that question, im sure. Hopefully you have a wellprepared case. In when my daughter was fourth grade, she went to Lafayette Elementary School and she asked if i could come in and speak to the class. I spoke to the class about the work of democracy support around the world and took a vote after my remarks, whether the u. S. Should be doing this. Half the class said yes and half the class said no. It sort of reflected the debate in congress at the time. I said why shouldnt we . They said what you we have our problems here. I say, what is the name is of your Elementary School . They all knew who lafayette was. I went over one over one vote as a result of that. I think there is a growing recognition in the United States that what happens in syria does not stay in syria. This is not the tagline of a las vegas advertisement. That what happens for good or for bad overseas impacts everybody. And if you look at the countries around the world where, that are hotspots, that harbor terrorists, that are the source of refugees across borders, that produced drugs, these are all what the Defense Department would call the arc of instability. Most of these places are nondemocratic. What happens in these places, as we have seen with coronavirus, affect us. So therefore, we not only have a responsibility, but an interest for a more stable, prosperous, democratic world. Because that ultimately provides greater security for the United States and it benefits everybody. I think there was a growing understanding, even among Foreign Policy realists who cared more about what countries do outside their borders than what they did inside their borders. I think the world has changed, and i think there was an understanding that democracy is not only the end of human development, but the best means of achieving that. I ascribe to the moral argument, we should be doing this because it is the right thing to do but that is not how i sell it. I sell democracy assistance because it is in our interest. It promotes american interests. How . We know citizen centered, citizen responsive governments are better trading partners, better security partners, they are less likely to produce weapons of mass destruction, they are less likely to spawn refugee movements that destabilize the world. It is in our interest. And i would now make the argument that they are less likely to hide the emergence of a virus. When you take a look at the story of what happened in wuhan, you actually had local officials detecting and saying, we have a problem here. But immediately, they looked at their bosses up the authoritarian chain and said, im not going to tell them. Are you going to tell them . That is what happens in authoritarian societies. It is in our interest to foster democracy, to foster citizen responsiveness, to foster transparency, not everywhere has to look like us but more that you can create that transparency and foster this culture of responding to the needs and desires of the people, that is in our interest as well as theirs. Rachel thank you very much for joining us today. Thank you for taking on leadership with us in the westminster working group. For theu for joining us launch of the center of freedom and democracy in stay tuned for more of our work. Thank you. [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] every day we take your calls live on the air on the news of the day. We will discuss policy issues that impact you. Coming up wednesday morning, Washington Post political reporter and pbs Washington Week host robert costa will talk about the latest development in the postelection standoff between the Trump Administration and the biden campaign. Leo shane of military times will talk about issues affecting veterans and the fallout from mark espers termination. Watch washington journal live at 7 00 eastern wednesday morning. Join the discussion with your phone calls, facebook, facebook comments, texts and tweets. Wednesday is veterans day. President trump will lay a wreath at the tomb of the unknown soldier at Arlington National cemetery. Watch live beginning at 11 00 a. M. Eastern on cspan come online at cspan. Org or listen with the free cspan radio app. Watch American History tv in primetime on veterans day starting at 8 00 p. M. Eastern. Military historian Patrick Odonnell on his book the unknowns the untold story of americas unknown soldier and world war is most decorated heroes who brought him home. 9 00eal america films, at p. M. Eastern the 1977 film African Americans in world war ii a legacy of patriotism and valor. Then, the 1945 film the americane. Watch history tv wednesday, veterans day, starting at 8 00 p. M. Eastern on cspan three. President Derrick Johnson spoke on the Election Results and africanamerican voters. The Meridian InternationalCenter Hosted the event. This runs 50 minutes. Good morning from washington, d. C. And thank you for joining us today. I am the president