Just as significant than comcast or verizon. Announcer watch the communicators monday night at 8 00 p. M. On cspan two. Next, a look at president trumps most recent order on immigration into refugees. Speakers discuss whether or not it is one hour and a half. Maureen good morning, everyone. Welcome. I feel like a schoolteacher. We are waiting for a few more people to sit down and then we will start. Thank you for coming. As you know, a new executive order on travel and immigration to the United States was signed. The order replaces the january 27 executive order, whose implementation was halted in multiple federal courts. The new executive order is titled protecting the nation from foreign terrorist entry. The new order is similar to the original but it contains revisions and clarifications. It was drafted far more carefully to avoid legal challenges. The new executive order still bans travel for 90 days for muslim majority countries but now we have only six countries. Iraq has been taken off the list. It expands admission programs to 120 days, and it still imposes a cap of 50,000 refugees for 2017 when the refugee admission programs begins. And again, it is stalled in courts with hearings due in may, in the fourth and the 19th Circuit Court of appeals. But the issues surrounding the executive order are not just legal ones of whether it is constitutional under the establishment clause of the constitution, but there are also issues of equity and fairness. Does this executive order address Real National security threats . Does it make us safer . Is the treatment of refugees fair and just and consistent with American Values . These are just some of the issues that arise when we ponder the complications and the directives of the new executive order. We have with us today a very distinguished panel. We have alex aleinikoff, who was a former deputy high commissioner for unhcr and is now with the institution at a school. We have George Biddle, chairman of world connect and a former executive Vice President of a rescue committee. We have James Carafano of the heritage foundation, and we have danielle pletka, and we have the very knowledgeable and capable moderator, our friend, margaret warner. I turn it over to you, margaret. Margaret thank you, maureen. Thank you. Welcome to everybody am thank you to the panel for being here. As maureen said, there are a lot of legal issues, but we are not looking deeply into the legal issues here. What we are really looking at are the Security Issues, the humanitarian issue, and also, i think, the issue of americas responsibility, or do we have one, in just the World Community . And i would like to start out probably with a question to all of you. Maybe i will start out with alex. I just decided that, because this issue came up consistently in both legal cases. It was a basis for the judges overturning this, or at least blocking it. Is this a muslim ban . Alex do you want my legal conclusion . Margaret no, not legal, just do you think that is really what its aim is . Alex yes, i think the president made that very clear during the campaign. I think he repeated it in other comments, and i think it was dressed up to try to make the case that it was not, but he said he wanted to ban all muslim immigrants from the United States. And he tried to do that. He knew he could not do it by simply banning muslims, so we tried to put it into a security context. The reason why it may ultimately succeed is there are Security Issues here. There may be particular countries you want to scrutinize more closely because of possible security interests, but i do not see any change in the president s view on this from what he announced at the very start. The question is whether the initial taint of the first order, which the courts all concluded was there most of the courts has been purged by the rewriting in the second, so it truly is about security, and that will be an issue that the courts will have to sort out as a legal matter, but i do not think there is any doubt that the president , during the campaign, stood up and said, i, donald j. Trump, want all muslims to stop coming to the United States, and he has never backed away from that. Margaret do you think it is a muslim ban at its essence, and if so, what are the implications of that . Him him jim i can categorically state that it is not a muslim ban. And the reason i know that is because i worked on the president s Transition Team. I did not work on that particular executive order, but i worked on the Transition Team from the convention through the inauguration, nonprofit, nonpartisan activities, and i worked on both the foreign and domestic side. I did the foreign side, because i ran the state department Transition Team up through the election, and then from the election through the inauguration, i ran the Homeland Security Transition Team. We are not supposed to talk about what the Transition Team actually did, but if you look at what was actually produced, what came out after the inauguration, you can pretty much see what the Transition Team focused on. There was never an antimuslim discussion. Not reflected in any actual policy. I was in the room for lots and lots of things. Religion never came up. And what you see postinauguration reflects the work of the Transition Team, not necessarily the rhetoric on the campaign trail. We can have a discussion about Campaign Rhetoric, what candidates say, and candidates say lots of things. Woodrow wilson said he was going to keep us out of world war i. Fdr said he was going to keep us out of world war ii. And actually, mr. Trump, i am pretty sure, has withdrawn the statement that he wants to ban muslims from the United States, but that is all rhetoric. If you look at the actual functional policy, it is focused on now is six particular countries, and we all know there is a lot more muslim countries than six. There has been no effort at all to do any kind of religious test of any form of immigration, so there is no reflection here. The president just had the president of egypt here, which has Something Like 90,000 muslims. And the president declared his absolute support and friendship with egypt, which is a muslim country. And the president just actually ordered an attack on a government in syria because of a heinous, genocidal attack against people who are largely muslim. And on top of that i actually met with a number of Foreign Ministers and leaders from countries in the middle east who not only do not find the president to be antimuslim but who actually think the president s policies are good for the region, so if you actually look at the substance of the policies, it is very, very difficult to argue that somehow this is a discriminatory practice based on religion. Margaret i want to get back to that, but let me jump to George Biddle on this question. And, if you would, address the point that jim made. George well, i think i cannot speak to the reality of what was intended, but there is the perception aspect, which is real. The perception. And i think you have to look at that pretty seriously, which, as fast which, just look at it from a refugee angle. Three of the countries have some of the largest refugee populations in the world, syria, sudan, and somalia. So if youre going to put a ban on the countries as well as the overarching stop to all refugee admissions, you are sending a signal to those populations who, very often, as we know, refugees are fleeing persecution and for their lives for a variety of reasons. And when you implement a ban like this, it sends a signal to the mobile community, whether it is intended or not. So there is a facet of that. To a certain extent is less than charitable for those who are suffering, many of them happen to be in majority muslim communities. You get into the Foreign Policy aspects of this margaret first, let me go to danielle pletka. Do you think it is a muslim ban . Danielle no, i do not think it is a muslim ban. Muslim ban is a way we have come to think about it. It is not a muslim ban technically. But we are sort of torn here, because on the one side, and we were all chatting about this before we came down, on the one side, you have a genuine challenge that you face, which is that there are 11 million displaced people, 4. 5 million of them refugees from the conflict in syria, and so the question then becomes what do you do about this . So that is a rational foreignpolicy question. It comes down to that there are a lot of issues that you raised, correctly. There are moral issues, the issue of American Leadership in the world, our reputation, but there is also our security, so you can have a pretty straightforward conversation about this and try and balance the need for our security, on the one hand, and you know, donald trump has a way with words. Whether you like them or not, he has a way with them. And the expression extreme vetting is meaningful to a lot of people. Is that the right thing to do . Yes, absolutely. I do not think there is anybody who thinks there is an entitlement to come into this country for anybody. I am an immigrant. My parents were refugees. There is no entitlement there. Do you have to go through a lot of screens . Yes, because the reward at the end of that is huge. To become an american. Ok, fine. So we need to deal with that security issue. On the other hand, there is the exigency of that Global Leadership question and helping address the problem. Now, you know, at the end of the day, we can go back and forth and forth and back. What they have done and put in place i do not think rises to the level of offensiveness that the rhetoric suggested. To remind everyone, we have attended you to talk about the world as if it started with donald trump. 2013, and now i am going to get it wrong, and somebody is going to correctly, but i think the United States took in, in 2013, 36 Syrian Refugees. Something like that. It was either 36 or 34. And, by the way, the numbers in the subsequent years were, by no means, a shining, golden light around the humanity of the Obama Administration. In 2015 to 2016, it was 10,000. And the total, total number, from the beginning of the conflict, was about 80,000. So we are really talking about a drop in the bucket, and that is under the Obama Administration. It was not nobody said anything, but it did not lead. These are the issues at hand. Nobody expects that we are going to take in 4 million refugees. What is the number that is reasonable that we can take in, that is between everybody who needs it and nothing at all, and that, somehow, is the balance to be struck, and that is the intelligent conversation to be had. Trying to play a game of gotcha, is this a muslim ban or is is not a muslim ban and by the way, it does not in any way serve the people who need so much our compassion, our humanity, our help, which is the Syrian Refugees. Margaret alex . Alex actually want to agree with this. You asked the question. Margaret i wanted to provoke the conversation. Alex youre right. There does need to be a question about humanitarian needs balanced with security. Interestingly, the courts will decide if this is a muslim ban, because if the courts find the initial language by the candidate is enough to taint it, they will declare this violation of the constitution. But as a matter of policy, it has to be balanced. I think what we need to keep in mind here is as the administration goes through its 120 day plan, they will find there was already extreme vetting in place. Refugees, the vetting is extraordinary, and the proof of that is there has never been a single terrorist attack by any refugee that has come in. Never. Except for people who came in as very young kids and were radicalized inside the country, but certainly with Syrian Refugees, no recent cases. So the vetting is working pretty well, and the vetting should be there. What i am wondering about what the Current Administration is i was thinking about this in terms of cuban refugees. We took almost one million cuban refugees over a 10year period, and we took it as a political matter because we wanted to make a statement, whatever anyone things about that long political fight that i think we are now finally over. What im wondering about why does this administration see Syrian Refugees as cubans . What what i mean is that the president has now said mr. Assad is an enemy. He has said that isis is an enemy. These are people who are fleeing isis and assad, and why arent we embracing syrians like we did with the cubans . As people fleeing a political enemy. That is what i would like to see, that this administration could make that statement. Danielle the last of ministers and did not do that either. Alex i agree with you on the last administrations efforts being inadequate. I fully agree with you. They got 10,000. It was not enough. Canada, when the new Prime Minister of canada came in, he brought in 25,000 syrians in a matter of six months. So i fully agree with you on that. Margaret do you want to jump in . Jim yes, i want to just back up and explain why the administration took the course, and it actually was not related to Campaign Rhetoric at all. And i am wondering if we will have a Supreme Court precedent based on what president s say during a campaign. We will have interesting governing in the 21st century. So here is the administrations thinking and to your point about refugees being terrorists, youre absolutely right. The only numbers we have, and even though those are very very small numbers, it is people who are brought here as very young kids and who were radicalized later. So that is absolutely accurate. But it kind of misses the whole point. We have, actually, such a tiny radicalized population to begin with in the United States, and terrorists in america are a small data set of terrorists, other than other terrorists. So we are actually dealing with a very, very small population. So if you craft any policy to keep out the terrorists, you are being inefficient, because you cannot pick a group that is going to sufficiently define terrorists for you. But here is some of the administrations thinking. Terrorisnt looking at because one of the things we do at heritage is keep track of terror plots against the United States since 9 11, and it keeps changing. We are like in the 94 to 95 range. Overwhelmingly, in the last three years, almost all of them have been homegrown. And that was one of the criticisms. That you do not need it because it does not reflect the threat. But that misses the point. That is not the threat the administration is looking at. Rather than looking at the present threat and being reactive, the administration is actually can have a future threat, trying to be proactive. Looking at the future, what they were concerned with is this. You have tens of thousands of foreign fighters flowing into the conflict zone during the course of conflict, and as the space for isis shrinks, the remainder of them will likely outflow somewhere, and these countries were the ones where people believe they would most likely outflow to, and of course, you have iran, who is a state sponsor of terrorism. And the question is how do you keep the people who might outflow there from getting into a refugee line or immigration status . Even though the odds of that are relatively small, because we actually have seen people do that. Not to the next state, but we have people in refugee lines get into western europe and other places. So that was a concern. And the idea was we want to make sure that the vetting we have is in place and adequate and appropriate to deal with that threat. And the administration is not the only one concerned about that. European countries are very concerned about people coming from these countries, the foreign fighters. Canada is. United states is, the past administration was. The administration wanted to go the extra mile. Here is the logic for that and you actually saw it reflected in what happened recently in syria. The day before the president decided to do the missile strike in syria, he was being roundly criticized by many people, including people in the administration, because you are doing nothing on syria. Ok, so the last administration had years to come up with a viable syrian policy. We have a president in 11 weeks or so, and all of a sudden, syria is all his fault, and bad things are happening, children are dying from gassing, it is the president s fault. Thathere is a fairness to is on hisbecause it watch. And i think one of the concerns of the administration, a day after he became president , he was going to be responsible if something happened at home, so if you had a refugee come into the country and have a terrorist attack, everyone would say it was his fault. So this was an element of Due Diligence, an effort of risk mitigation, to make sure we have it right. That is why when we talk about these bans, they are not permanent and everlasting. Which raises the question. If the original ban, taking a pause for 120 days, making sure we have it right, by the time the court is finished with this, past 120 days and the point may be moot. Margaret lets extend it, i am turning to George Biddle, who is ready to say something. And i know you want to say something, but let me ask you this. Arent these countries, these six countries that do not convey, do not share the kind of information about their passenger that the United States wants to know before we accept them . Isnt that a distinction that has some validity to it . George could i just address it for one second, and i will try to bridge this. Couple of facts. Alex mentioned 3 million refugees coming into this country since 1980 after the refugee act was passed. No terrorist attack on american soil by a refugee during that period. Granted, risks are heightened based on the Global Situation as it exists today, but i think one of the things that is really important to bear in mind is that after 9 11, there was a twomonth hiatus where refugee processing stopped, and the Bush Administration worked very hard to up the security protocol on that, because they recognized lives were on the line. That is the thing about refugees. We have to humanize them. You cannot think of them in one bulk mass. You have to individualize. If you get to the syrian border, which i have been to several times, in lebanon, turkey, and you meet with Syrian Refugees and meet with them who have fled horrific situations, your perspective on this is altered by the reality. I think if the president went out there, he would have a different opinion. If he was moved by the Chemical Attacks and there is a parallel type of sensitivity that i think needs to be brought to bear on this issue. The other two things is the Obama Administration spent time increasing the security vetting of refugees. In their case, they did the increased security vetting as the refugee process went forward. They did not stop it. They slowed it down, and it involved 17 agencies working intensively with each other, many intelligence agencies from dod to cia to the fbi. There are three interviews. Two fingerprint checks. There are biometric readings. It takes, on average, about two years to get here. So the process right now is very intense. It cannot be compared to what happened in europe, where people walked across two consonance and arrived as asylum seekers. They were not processed abroad, checked out for two years, and then brought here, so you cannot compare the security risks of europe and the United States. I think what you do have to bear in mind is one half of the resettled refugee population globally on average, and, alex, you can correct me on this, it normally has been the United States. It has been our latest demonstration of our commitment to human rights. These people and individuals are the most vulnerable globally, and we have traditionally taken in one half of the globally resettled population. Maybe under that in certain times, but around 60,000 to 80,000 out of the 160,000. So a small percentage is resettled in general. And maintaining that commitment, they are often the ones most on the line and are the most honorable. The most vulnerable. They are often women, children, disabled, people with acute medical needs, etc. So if we think and posit that all of these people are terrorists because you come from a region with terrorists, you have to remember that immunity is diverse. Humanity is complicated, and it is also very vulnerable. I was also frustrated with the Obama Administration. To bring refugees from syria and, and we also have the security factors and that agencies came together. We do not want to lose that momentum. The fact is a 120 dayban can lead to other delays, because then medical clearances can run out, and sometimes their lives depend on it, so i think that humanitarian context and a couple of facts are something to lay on the line. Margaret feel free to talk about the humanitarian aspect of that, but i want to dig deeper into that. Danielle . Danielle one thing i find frustrating is that we do end up talking about refugees and first of all, they are not humanized. But, second of all, we do not really recognize or seem to care very much about what their actual needs are. You know, most refugees do not actually want to come to the United States. Even though we are obviously awesome and enormously attractive to everybody on the face of the earth. Most people like to be where their parents are buried, where their jobs were, where they actually speak the language. 90 of refugees, i am told by people who know this issue much better than i am, actually do generally go home postconflict. But this is the word we have to look at. Postconflict. At the end of the day, nobody is going to take all of syrias refugees. We have got 20 of jordan that is now refugees. We have got one quarter of lebanon that is now refugees. 2. 5 million in turkey, sitting on the border. These are not solutions for these people. And this is what i find frustrating is the notion that the United States shows leadership by taking in half of the worlds refugee population. It is not leadership. It is like telling people they cannot find jobs no, no, we want to up your unemployment, and you can go on welfare, and dont forget food stamps. People do not want that as a solution. People want to live their lives, not being the object of our charity or humanity. They actually want to be their own success. We understand that. The right solution is not to focus on whether or not we are taking 10,000 more or 10,000 less or whether the canadians are awesome because their Prime Minister is so handsome. We need to show leadership in the region, and that is where actually i am much let down by the fact that barack obama took in more refugees from the democratic republic of congo last year than he did from syria. And much more depressed about the fact that this conflict started in 2011, and we have been sitting on our hands, and, actually, the first government that is thinking about what to do, and we have to watch this space is the trump administration. I wouldnt have said it was eltello be them, i will you flatout. If it is. Ed if this is something that they are going to bring strategy to, right thing is not to focus on the muslim ban. The focus should be on the middle east. Jim there are the original challenges that are driving the global refugee crisis and how we address them, which i think is the more important issue. But just to kind of wrap up the discussion on vetting and everything, going back to the notion that this is obviously a muslim ban. I think what really is very telling is the fact that when they reissued the list, iraq was dropped from the list, and the reasons why iraq was dropped was very telling. The iraqis came back after the first list and said, dude, how do we get off of the list . And the Administration Made some demands, certainly in terms of data sharing, but also about accepting and repatriating people we throw out of the country, and the administration said, great, that is exactly what we are looking for. You are off of the list. Now, it is unlikely other countries could do similar, because they have a lack of governance that they can make these kinds of guarantees, but the fact that you took a country off of the list, and you took it off for reasons because your security situation is met. That undermines the notion that somehow this is designed to be punitive. I think we need to get past this notion, which i think is a political debate. That this is a punitive action against muslims. We can have a debate about if this is the most efficacious way to deal with the issue. But we have to get over the issue that this is about partisanship and about people hating muslims. Because i do not think it is about that. It is about what is the best way to deal with the tragic situation that we have going on. Alex a couple of fact checks here. 90 of refugees do not go home. And not clear they want to go home. The real problem today is that there are ongoing refugee situations. Solved. t get very few went home, and the u. S. Does not take half of the worlds refugees and never has taken half. It is 5 or 10 of the overall amount. [crosstalk] and also, margaret, just in terms lets keep things clear. There are two Different Things that happened in the executive order. One was a ban for those seven, now six, countries of all visas. And i think jim might be right. It might be moot. The other is the pause in the refugee admissions. These were separate programs, and we are talking about them together. The problem for jim here is it is not clear he is right. Not all muslim countries were selected, but to a lawyer, that i am, it seems like these were chosen because they were previously chosen by obama and congress and were put on a visa waiver program, but when you look at where terrorists have actually come from, it is not these countries, and the countries that the terrorists come from were not on the list. So the courts will have to test whether this was actually irrational, even if the defense for security was that there was that kind of rationale check. Maybe they can prove that, and the standard is very low. My guess is, by the way, the administration will win these lawsuits in the end. But there is still the question of, if this was purely security, why these countries were chosen. The administration has never that this forward. Last point i would raise on the president obama finally listened to danielle, and said we have to go up. 10,000 for this current fiscal year. The executive order reduced from 110,000 to 50,000 of admission of refugees with no explanation, none offered. It is yet to be given. It cannot be the security grounds, because we are already hypothesizing that extreme vetting is taking place. So what on earth is the justification with a lack of American Leadership, why would the United States cut refugee admissions by more than 50 . Jim i want to respond to both of those points, because i answered the first question already. Those are the countries where the concern is, which is not just a u. S. Concern. It is widely shared throughout the west. That those are the spaces where foreign fighters are most like you to flow to and why you are worried about them flowing out of. Picked. Why they were that is why the Obama Administration focused on them. That is why European Countries focus on them. You are right. They are not the number one terrorist places. If you look at our plot list, 20 of those plots have a connection to pakistan far and away the largest. Saudi arabia . Jim well, no, but pakistan, by and large, 20 , is the foreign country that has the most islamists or plots against the United States. So why is pakistan not on the list . Because it is not appropriate. Dealing with concerns out of pakistan. The foreign fighter one is you want to make sure that the visa and refugee flows are screening those out. That was the logic. But the second point is 50,000 is the number that is in the law. And lets be honest. We can have a moral argument. But from a quantitative standpoint whether the United States takes 50,000 or 100,000, that is not going to affect global refugee flows at all or solve any refugee crisis at all. Period. Now, it might affect the cases you take, and there might be a real humanitarian argument, but from a strategic standpoint, the difference between 50,000 and 100,000 is really a drop in the bucket. And from my limited understanding, because i do not want to claim i am an expert on this, but when we were doing the transition, it was our sense that we really had a system that was designed to process about 50,000, and it was straining to get to the higher numbers. And i think the question is where do you this administration seem to say you shake your head, but the numbers have been consistently above that. Excuse me for jumping in, but it is a floor has been consistently above. The state department but more people there. When trudeau wanted to bring and in 25,000 syrians, they brought them in. We have the capability of doing that. That is really i do not have an opinion between the two of you, because i do think it is a moral argument, but i think your suggestion about give, having been on the end of this previously is manifestly untrue, actually. Anyone who has been through tsa, just take that and extrapolate how we managed to screen refugees. We do a lucky crack job. I am sorry to say. We do a terrible job. Soup to nuts. Because we do not know what we are looking for. The reason we have not been attacked is mostly because we are lucky, not because our screening is screening refugees that is luck. Other]g over each margaret lets get george in here. I will come right back to you, danny. I could not hear you. I apologize. Margaret go ahead, danny. Danielle we should not lie to ourselves about our capabilities. Justin trudeau made a political decision. There are not 500 brilliant arab speaking people who are working for the canadian government who are sitting on their hands, saying i can watch a soap opera in the afternoon or go and work for the canadian government as a refugee, and actually know that story well enough, not to simply speak the arab language but to ask the correct questions. Understand providence, go through social media. To all of the things that need to be done, because at the end of the day, that is not true. We do not do a great job of this. Yes, there is extreme vetting in place, but the point that you make that this is mostly luck is, in fact, true, and people do not want to talk about that. Most refugees we let in are people who want to be let in because they have an identified fear of persecution. But lets not pretend that situation is anything other than a political decision. That is what i want to say. Just a couple of things and i would like to get jims take because he was on the Transition Team. From the slowdown occurred in the Obama Administration when i was working at the International Refugee committee, we had discussions what was the likelihood of the process moving quickly, collaboration among literally 17 u. S. Government agencies to vet an individual coming into the United States. These are not flybynight agencies. We are talking about the top of the various intelligence use in the United States government. I dont think it is quite as flybynight as you might deposit, danielle, i do agree. There is a moral aspect. It is critical in a number of fronts as we lead in multiple forums. There is a National Security component to this which is even though i like taking 50,000 more refugees and putting the number back about 100,000, it may not change the refugee flows globally because we have a situation where there are over we have not seen a situation like this where there are over 20 million refugees. Close to 65 million displaced people in the world right now, the most since world war ii. It shows americas commitment to be in solidarity with allies who are shouldering the burden of posting these refugees. Kenya, ethiopia, the three neighboring countries to iraq, jordan, lebanon, and turkey. We are talking millions of refugees. If we say none for us, we are not taking them, what if kenya went through on its threat to expel all the somalis out of the camps . What would it mean to regional horn . Lity in the what would it mean for what happens inside of kenya . We know the pressure points on jordan, lebanon, and turkey right now are profound and intense. Not to mention the syrians were are having a difficult time for obvious reasons. The parallel is a question as well. A different element, but cuts to foreign aid can have a huge impact as well. We have to make sure those host governments get major support from the United States. And not just temporary relief support. Most of these crises last for years and years. It puts huge burdens on their infrastructure. Education, water supply, the ability to maintain an economy with the extra people. The u. S. Also has two match that with aggressive foreign aid strategies. That is not necessarily being linked to what we are reading in the budget. We will see how that turns out. I do think there is not just a moral aspect here. There is a critical National Security component tied to this in sending both real signals and solidarity signals to allies around the world and maintaining Regional Security as a result. I would like to agree with everybody. [laughter] i think danny is right. The decision to go from 50,000 to 100,000 is a political decision, not a humanitarian decision. This is one of the great ironies. The executive order gets attacked for being mean and mean spirited, and actually the criticism from people who know the decision, which is what more can actually do . It is not that they would it terrible things. This is much i do about nothing. Ado about nothing. My understanding is they bought it, the own it. I understand why they want to put their stamp on it. We are willing to live with the negative consequence of that. Margaret jim, on this transition, what was the level of concern about people who have committed terrorist attacks in france and belgium and germany carafano see, that is where you kind of need to understand the process. We have what is called vwp, the visa waiver program. If youre from a country that has the visa waiver thing, you can come to the United States without a visa. That sounds a lot more risky than refugees. Well, the reality is we do a lot of data sharing with these waiver countries. Even though you get to come here visafree, you go through esta. You fill out information to get to the government, which is quite honestly substantial. Do i want a hammer or a saw . Do i want the right tool at the right time . Margaret those tools are working. Lt. Col. Carafano it depends on the country. This is the thing. It is not about the geography. Its about terrorist travel. You want to focus on the terrorist and how the terrorist might be trying to get from a to b. The answer is never just cut that off. If he cut off every way a terrorist travels, nobody can ever come to america. Everything conceivable, including shipping containers. The answer is not making a fortress wall around america. The answer is the different ways you can travel to the United States, having done Due Diligence to make sure you have done the right cost benefit analysis and minimize risk of that terrorist traveling. More importantly, introduce multiple points to intercept that terrorist. It is always a bad idea to say we will stop in at the border. You dont pick one spot along the process. You want to have multiple interdiction points, which is one of the things if youre doing refugee screening right, it is a pretty tough system to get through because you have to go through multiple screening points. If you have good data, which is one of the challenges where we potentially dont, but if you have good data and you go through multiple screening points, it gets a lot harder. Refugee fraud is a big problem. We have to know was that. We have seen lots of examples of refugee fraud. It is something we have to be concerned about. Can i lob my hand grenade into this . Margaret sure. I want a hand grenade. Please. Lt. Col. Carafano here is my concern. There is a movement that believes human migration is a human right. People should have the right to anywhere in the world that they want. One of my concerns is some of the vitriol against this is trying to link the refugee to this large reduction of people have a right to move anywhere in the world they want. In many ways, and the public issues we are starting to deflate these things. I think we are losing the argument. I think what we have done and i do blame the Obama Administration for part of this we have done great violence to the processing of refugees because it has been politicized by both sides for their own political agendas. I think people have tried to rise up the anger against it because they said if people accept the notion that a refugee can go anywhere, then thats one step to saying anybody can go anywhere. That is destructive because what it is doing is undermining our confidence in our commitment to the Refugee Program. We are putting a program that has real value to the united ace states at risk because of a partisan debate that is wrapped around it and that is unhealthy. Margaret you are nodding. I am agreeing with jim. Lt. Col. Carafano let me rephrase. [laughter] alex the refugee circles i travel in, this is not in terms of a Broader Campaign a free movement. I go back to my point about why accepting or cutting the refugee numbers is a political statement. I think the administration has a way to make a Strong Political statement by raising them up. Even if they want to keep very tough policies on the southwest border im not suggesting because they dont i dont agree with the policy, you can make a strong statement. We are taking people that there is something to be said about refugee mobility. We could have another discussion about what to do with these longstanding places and how we can help people oversees more. One could imagine a refugee regime where you sign the Refugee Convention and what you are adjudicated, a refugee the refugee can move to other countries in the regime. Maybe those countries have quotas and could allow them a bit more choice than locking them in the camps. The u. S. Will say you will take 50,000 or 100,000. The situation we have is where people are stuck in countries for asylum. There was not an adequate system of global sharing. It is not the u. S. s job. We are doing more than our share. There should be dozens of countries that joined the global system of sharing of these refugees to reduce the burden on the front line. Margaret i want to go to questions from the audience. I think we have a roving mic. Is that how we do it . Just a final question while everyone gets ready to answer questions. What are the humanitarian lets say nothing changes. Lets say the ban is upheld. Out in the field where jordan is bursting, lebanon is full to bursting. The turks are taking more is that is continuing definitely . What happens . Danielle thats the right question. At the end of the day, the refugee conversation is about us, and what lovely people we are, and arent we better people than that, and no, we are not better people than that. First of all, that is a hugely selfish way to think about it, but but if you want to come back to the National Security argument, which i think fundamentally this is the matter how you look at it, you have to understand we cant keep up. The number of countries that are now unstable, the number of countries that into which over the last eight to 10 years al qaeda has spread is staggering. Lets not even talk about keeping people from those countries out. Lets not talk about whether they are generating refugees. Lets just talk about the National Security risk to us from these places. We have been talking about travel bans and the rest. We did not talk about the ban on bringing Electronic Devices on aircraft in certain countries. Where does that come from . Oh, that comes from the fact that al qaeda on the Arabian Peninsula are trying to develop something that will take down an aircraft. These are countries that we do not have adequate screening or we do not feel confident about no multiply those countries. Forget about refugees. Lets talk about the number of countries where this is going on. Where you have government the donor control over the entire territory, or you have warring groups that are providing space. This, at the end of the day, is what happens when you ignore Foreign Policy. This is what happens when you ignore American Leadership. It is not about 50,000 or 100,000 refugees. That is not leadership. That really is just politics. This, this is leadership. That is what will pose the threat. Not the one guy who slipped through the net. Margaret lets go down the line. Alex . You are an expert on refugees. What do you think are the easy are the number of countries taking them now, is that infinitely expandable, or is there a breaking point . We have had so many from the world, but we have never had so many from one region. Alex this is an entirely manageable problem. I resist using the word crisis. Europe hit the fence when one Million People showed up. Lebanon has one million refugees in a population of 4 Million People. Europe could have handled this problem if they had done it earlier in a measured way. There are 15 million refugees in the world. That is a large number. That does not include Palestinian Refugees in the population of 7 billion. That is easily manageable if you have a Global Responsibility sharing kind of thing. I will be really quick. What happens if the ban is upheld . What does that mean for refugees . I want to keep separating that out. The ban applies to six countries. The major hosting countries danielle i understand that. I was trying to say immaterial of the outcome. George two points. I do think there is an important symbolic as well as critical humanitarian aspect to our commitment to what we do that a resettlement level. At the end of carter years we brought over 200,000 refugees annually. Southeast asians, russian religious minorities, dissidents, a host of people that came in including a large number of afghans. We have at times when there was a need stepped up in a big way. It sent a signal to those posting them. In terms of the solutions being discussed, obviously the refugee population has swelled. There are new approaches to this. Not to burden sharing but the fact that you do need Development Assistance for these societies that are hosting them. Look at them not as burdens but as potential support mechanisms for the larger society. Job creation. There are new efforts in the private sector to think about actually investing in places where there are refugees where they can be used in concert with host populations to provide a viable good. Be it manufacturing or other things. For instance, call centers are being discussed among Syrian Refugees. Obviously, that takes time, but they are so cyclical and are not going to resolve themselves quickly, these populations are going to be where they are and the Global Community needs to think creatively how to manage that, and the u. S. These to be an active player in foreign aid and direct assistance and resettlement, as well as the private sector can get involved at the same time. Lt. Col. Carafano i dont think america is morally superior for taking 100,000 instead of 50,000. I talk to a lot of foreign officials from these countries. Nobody thinks because the administration wants to take less numbers, it will lessen our commitment. I think these countries understand there may be cuts in foreign aid, but it will not be to these countries. The administrations strategy is to get a more peaceful middle east, and you dont go by the destabilizing jordan or lebanon. I think those are areas where the administration is not stupid. They are trying to stabilize the region. People run the numbers differently. Something toion take care of all the refugees. People make all kinds of numbers up. Lets say is 1. 5 billion or something, to take in another 50,000 refugees a year and sustain them. And again, who knows with the right numbers are, but you can support 10 or so refugees in the region for the price of 30 here. From a u. S. Perspective, i would much rather see us take that 1. 5 billion and invest it and it places like lebanon and jordan than i would taking 50,000. I think for the United States can be a better example in terms of refugees is by taking more numbers. I dont think the world it makes the difference. Its what we do with our refugees. We can do a lot more in making refugees better Human Capital then in turn making them dependent on the government. We should be a light for how you turn refugees in the Human Capital, not just make them a burden on society. I think there is a lot the u. S. Government can do. I think doubling the numbers is not it. Margaret i want to turn the light on the audience. Im sorry, everybody. A question right over here. If you would just stand and say your name. Im a student. My question is for jim. Since you said that it is not a muslim ban, and its not based on religion, why in the First Executive order, there was a priority given to christians . Specifically when the numbers on refugees in the u. S. , there are about 38,000 Christian Refugees and 40,000 muslims. There is not much of a difference. Why was there a priority . Lt. Col. Carafano that is a great question. There was this concern that the administration wanted to be seen as catering to the most oppressed and endangered populations in the region. I dont think anybody argues that christian minorities in the middle east have been increasingly persecuted. They wanted to send a signal they were concerned about that. Now, from a practical perspective, i agree it does not make a lot of sense. The wayactually we are implementing the refugee processing is not discriminating against christian minorities. We did a big analysis on that, and we pretty much firmly concluded that. In many cases, they dont need to come to United States. There are a lot of support groups in the region to take care of them. In some cases, they are afraid to identify themselves as christians because they are afraid they will be persecuted. Whatever reason, there are not masses of Christian Refugees trying to flood the pipeline and get into the pipeline from these countries. There is an argument that that doesnt need to be there and why in the revised ban, they dropped it. Margaret right back here. And then you sir. You know what. Either way. Bill hi. My question is for alex. Margaret identify yourself please. Bill my name is bill, im a student here. We hear its a muslim ban. I hear it from some professors as well, and you opened up by saying its a muslim ban. I take the points of the rhetoric and the rollout. All that stuff not good. But if you look at the order itself, for the reasons the panelistsentioned mentioned, it is pretty clear it is not a muslim ban. All these reasons. Im kind of confused why it perceptions matter, and obviously they do, and we acknowledged that if it was a veritable muslim ban how that it would be for international relations, recruitment for jihadists. Margaret can you get your question . Bill my question is if you acknowledge all these things, why you do insist on calling something that is not a muslim band and muslim ban . [laughter] alex i will answer the question. I agree with danny. This is not the issue. I think the president made it a muslim ban and he never walked to the back. That is not how i talk about it. But the fact it doesnt cover all muslim countries you can and discriminatory policy that targets people based on race, even if not all people of race that race or all people with that religion are covered. The court has to decide if there is a legal issue in their mind. To me thats not the issue on the refugee side. Lt. Col. Carafano can i just beat a dead horse . One of the things i did in the Transition Teams work on the confirmation process for secretary kelly, who i think is a great american. An outstanding individual and the best guy to run this department. If you read his testimony and the questions and answers, he was vociferous in stating he is not antimuslim. He is not doing this based on religion. If there was a muslim ban he said it 1000 times. If the number one guy who is implementing this and i dont think anyone has undermined the integrity of general kelly. If he is doing this, and he does not see it as a muslim ban, it is strange to see how you can argue it is a muslim ban. Because he is the guy who is doing it. Margaret danielle wanted to jump in. Danielle the reason people persist in calling it a muslim not, isn though it is because they are political, and they want to apply this is a bigoted and antimuslim administration. While i think there are people in the administration who are antimuslim, who shall go unnamed, and i think the president was loose with his rhetoric, at the end of the day, the reason they persist in doing it, despite the fact that it is untrue, is for solely political reasons. Margaret the gentleman right there. Im with the Bloomberg School at johns hopkins. There seems to be agreement on the panel that the decrease from 110,000 to 50,000 is political. You all seem to agree with that, but i would like you to unpack that. What does that mean . It seems to me it is based on animus towards foreigners. The government said no Syrian Refugees in our state. The hostility towards Somali Refugees in minnesota. What do we mean . What do you mean when you say it is political . Is there any kind of moral justification for that political decision . Margaret were you addressing it to anyone in particular . All of them. Danielle yeah, thanks. I was hoping you were going to say was for them. [laughter] danielle the short answer, this sort of mindless answer is every number you see issued by the u. S. Government is political. I hate to tell you. The budget, how much we spend on x you can build it and make the numbers look like anything you want. When whats his name, trudeau, brings in extra Syrian Refugees, it is political. When they cut the number to 50,000, it is a political choice. Could they have cut it the 75,000 or 42,000 . That is how the decision is made. Is it animus towards foreigners . That is a huge, huge question. What you see in any cyclical period like this one is there are attitudes towards other people that are wrapped up with your economic wellbeing. And that is a big part of these questions. People dont think the refugees are stealing their jobs, but they feel insecure. Antitrade attitudes are wrapped up in all of this. If you try to tease one out and say its because, as some have said, republicans hate foreigners, xenophobes, bigots, that kind of thing, you are not really capturing what is happening in society as a whole. But also you are not really capturing what happens behind it. They are trying to answer a question which is we are concerned about refugees, you are concerned about refugees, we need to have a talk. Why did you pick the number 50,000 out of 100,000 . Is that a scientific, intelligent way of doing business . It is pretty much the way we do a lot of business in the u. S. Government. Alex i think the question was getting to the huge impact. These are 50,000 human beings. They are living in terrible conditions in these hosting states. It is not as if they are choosing between paris and new york city. The settlements the refugees are living in around are awful. Syria are awful. Lt. Col. Carafano and around the world. Alex and around the world. People go to these places. It is not as if one 500 people are randomly taken. They are talking about women and children and people who are obviously vulnerable and in need. People who have been victims of torture and jails and prisons. This is not a random situation. I agree entirely with jim. I think you are right. I am talking purely humanitarian. 50,000 lives that barack obama said, we want to help. This administration for no reason except for political gain for a particular part of the party said they cannot commit. Come in. It went from 50,000 to 85,000 to 110,000. It took him time to get there, but weve reached that as a consensus. Can i take one second more . Let me lt. Col. Carafano i will lament one thing. I would say the Refugee Program historically has had more bipartisan support that any than any humanitarian program that exists in the u. S. Government. I think its a real shame it has become so politicized. I dont know whether the 50,000 figure is a political number or not, but there are plenty of people across washington and across the United States. We got a surge in volunteer applications that the irc when it was cut. People wanted to go out and help. I think if we can get beyond that and put a human face on this and get back to basics, because the president ial determination is approved by congress. It is a joint process. There is a collective decisionmaking element involved in this. You used to have people on two sides of the aisle. We had a dinner years ago where we had ted kennedy and we had sam brownback. They were up there supporting the refugee cause. One of them is no longer with us, and the other has slightly altered his reception on this , and i feel that is a shame. I feel we have to get back to the bipartisan aspect of this issue. He relates the human beings supporting one another in a global context that is complex and there are risks associated with it. We dont want people who want to do harm in this country to come in, but we have a system where obviously anything can be approved. But it needs to be done in a way that doesnt harm people that have a chance to live a life in safer life in this country. Lt. Col. Carafano i dont need to be disrespectful, but the tenor of the question sounds to me like you are not beating your wife. There is no evidence the implementation of any of these programs is racist or xenophobic. There is no evidence there is anything that is racist. The problem is we have taken this issue and turned it into a political partisan issue. We have done exactly the wrong thing with it. Instead of accusing each other of being racist, when you get back to policymakers who are sitting down and talking about what we can practically do in concert with our interests . What we forget is we have an absolute vital interest to see the middle east be at peace and stable. Its never going to turn to the land of milk and honey. I get that. We may not have a palestinian state in the next 10 minutes. I get that. But generally not having wars iraq in the region were millions of people are displaced and people are running around the he destabilizing governments, we should be against that. That is not in our interest to do that. I agree with ted. The of ministries and is investing in bringing peace and stability to the region, which is something we should all support. We cant have an objective discussion if were just sitting around saying, prove to me this administration isnt racist and xenophobic. [indiscernible] lt. Col. Carafano i actually did answer that question, sir. This administration said what is a reasonable throughput we can support and a better allocation of those dollars and using them for the refugee system . I think your argument is 50,000 is a more sustainable number. If we are going to spend an extra 1 billion, we should be supporting the refugees in the region instead of trying to bring another 50,000 here. Danielle can i echo partly what all of us have said . The way to get back to the consensus that did not exist during the Obama Administration, when we were not bringing in the right number of refugees, but the way to get back to a time before that perhaps is not for one side to say, if you guys could just stop being racist, and then we can get back to the consensus we used to have. That is not building a consensus. Margaret we have a question right here. That is some of the rhetoric. Margaret yes, please do. Hi. This is addressed to jim. We are using the word racist somewhat in context i think may not be appropriate. But be that as it may, the issue i see is that prejudice is complex. And you know, jim i started in , 2003 myself. Margaret you need to get to the question. I am sorry. The issue is that had we not made false assumptions on certain things, i think we would not be here. Im wondering what do you foresee as a possible one or two steps in the middle east that you think would help to bring stability to the region . I mean, you know, just specifically. Lt. Col. Carafano one, i think it is a strategy beyond taking a black flag down in iraq and mosul. The recognition that to contribute to stability, we have to come to go beyond that. I think it will be a more sustained engagement in iraq. Not that we will go in and fight again, but that we will be engaged in a sustained way to try to help keep that country together. Obviously, it will be a lot of support for the refugee populations in the region. Keeping them stabilized and safe is vital. It will be a lot of support for lebanon and jordan. Reengaging egypt. Egypt has human rights issues on its own, but at the end of the day, it is the largest population in the middle east. Its an important country for the United States. Egypt is an important part of the process of bringing stability to the region. Look, i think syria is unsolvable. If we are lucky, we will get a frozen conflict. Everyone acknowledges we cant just ignore libya, somalia, and yemen and let those faster and become launching pads for more bad things. A have to engage in constructive way. Im semihopeful about libya. A lot of people want to see libya the a success. If we can agree on what we are doing, i think its a place where we can make some real progress. I would love to see a more proactive u. S. Libya policy. We also need a somali policy and a yemen policy. That is what im looking for. Margaret question . Right here. If you just wait for the mic. I hate to have to admonish you sayso really if your name, affiliation, and what your question is. We have a lot out here. Hi. Advocate, human rights first. I want to shift gears. Refugee vetting. You hear wildly different claims about the system. Some will say its nonexistent and others say its extreme. I just want to sort of get on the same page. Is attacking the vetting system is that also political or a goodfaith effort . And if you disagree that the system is working, what are the improvements . What are the conversations are being held around that . I hear no substantial points being made as to how that could be better or how they can be improved. I am at a loss. Lt. Col. Carafano i unfortunately dont have a security clearance to know how those agencies operate. George i unfortunately dont have a security clearance to know how those agencies operate. All i know is there was a concerted effort. Im giving you what i am told by the government under the Obama Administration that the intelligence agencies wanted to continue the program, wanted it to be robust. When you have an interdepartmental effort, it becomes complicated. That behindthescenes effort, citizens outside the security process dont know. We know with the system was tightened under obama , significantly due to an incident in bowling green, a problem in iraq, apparently there was Great Success in agreeing on a system that was tight and more secure. Beyond that, i cant answer it. Do you have to shut the whole thing down in order to improve it . I dont believe you do. I think you can continue to admit Vulnerable People and know they are not terrorists while you tighten up for potentially more risky populations. Alex the problem with answering that question is you have to go in behind the door, and you cant do that. My sense is there was some marginal improvements that can be made in terms of training and information sharing that would make the process better. You have to shut the program done to do that . I think its a largely political decision. I think the administrations argument is something that happens and we are responsible for it. We think the risk of keeping somebody out is balanced with the risk of somebody waiting longer. You can disagree, but thats the logic. It makes for unsatisfying public debate. Margaret we had two or three questions. Can i just say one thing . It does not matter because it is going to change. As soon as you move to a new refugee population, you reset the whole thing. You might be great at getting the iraq down cold margaret somebody sitting, near you the gentleman behind the. And then take the two together. Just because were almost out of time. Matt thank you very much. I am matt wilkes with the u. S. Conference of catholic bishops. I have a brief statement, but i really appreciate the call for bipartisan support and also for comprehensive elements of the refugee Protection System overseas. Lifesaving resettlement. The third for sure is a root cause of migration and trying to address that. My question goes back to one you asked earlier, margaret, and that was about the countries, those six countries providing information for people who want to come into the United States. I guess one of the concerns is that we would have about that if it becomes a blanket rule that certain countries are banned would be for refugees coming from those countries. From some of those countries, the countries themselves are the ones persecuting the refugees. I just wonder if that can be addressed in a way of sort of how the first part of the executive order, the 90day ban is connected to the refugee ban. It is not a permanent ban. It is just a review. People share your concerns. That is why it is not a permanent ban. Ramon my name is ramon and im an intern at the embassy of ecuador. Talking about syria in middle eastern refugees, america is also suffering from conflicts. Margaret sir. We cant really understand can you say that again . Slow down a little. Ramon my question is that we are only talking about syria and the middle eastern refugees. Margaret because that is the topic of todays discussion. Were not going into other parts of the world. Ramon yeah, but i would like to know the thoughts of the panelists here, if they can talk about it, like mobilization of people in the latin american area. What about these refugees, and what can we do about them . For the u. S. , that is mostly about asylum, which is a different process. I think the u. S. , led by secretary kelly and secretary tillerson, are interested in doing more in Central America to help bring stability in Central America. That is the real solution for our borders. I think you will find this administration will be really keenly interested in engaging in Central American countries to address some of those issues. That is my guess. Margaret do we have others . We did. Over there and then that will be the last two. I am sorry. Unless you want to ask a question and we can do all three. Hi. I with the voice of america. Am you discussed the issue of migration, danny. I am addressing this question to you. Migration in the refugee flow is caused by larger issues than just actual migration. How do you end that taking in the migrants is not really a leadership the u. S. Should or should not have shown . How do you think the u. S. Should address this leadership issue . Both domestically and internationally . Domestically, we see whats happening with congress. Internationally, things are kind of shaky as well. How exactly do you see that establishment of that leadership . Margaret i will go ahead and have everybody who wanted to ask a question, if we can just get the mic to them. There was a young woman over here, and there is somebody there, and then we can take all three together. Im a student studying conflict management here. I have two questions in and , actually, and i will keep them very brief. The first one is for mr. James. You said time and again rhetoric does not matter and there is a need to move beyond it. I dont understand what you mean rhetoric does not matter when its coming from the president of United States. Do you mean that his statements that go out to the public have no implications . People can have very intellectual discussions about how to break up policies, but what goes to the general public is a message and a signal. And when you mean look beyond rhetoric, could you please clarify what that is . I fail to see with that conveys. Number two is to danielle. Again, there were a lot of questions about how this administration is not doing enough. You went back to how the Obama Administration did not do as much as they should have. My question for you is as simple as how was the Previous Administration not doing enough . A justification for the Current Administration . If you could throw some light on that. Margaret and we have one more over here. I was wondering you talk about getting bipartisan support and this is being made into a political issue when it is not supposed to be a political issue. But when ingrained prejudices that do exist throughout the electorate and representatives, an advisor called islam a overlook this prejudice called islam a cancer, how can we overlook this prejudice that is ingrained in the party . Danielle there seems to be two margaret there seems to be two very similar they seem to very similar. How can public rhetoric of a candidate or his advisers be separated from this discussion . Every president and every presidency has a balance of rhetoric and action. I think president ial leadership is determined more by action than rhetoric. I dont think anybody would remember fdrs speech on december 7, the day of infamy, if the United States had not actually gone out and fought world war ii. Everyone remembers obama gave a speech in cairo. Nobody remembers what he said. The reason is because there was very little connection between that speech and action. He did little to save the arab spring, very little to bring peace and stability to the region. And so we forget the rhetoric. The challenge i see is the we live in a hyper partisan political environment today, which is as toxic as its ever been. If all you do is focus on the rhetoric, then you will be swept up in this hyper toxic, hypercritical, hyper angry talk. You will never see the forest for the trees. So what i do and this is me personally, you can do whatever you want i tend to ignore the rhetoric. I focus on what the government is actually doing. I dont listen necessarily to peoples criticism of what they say about politics or their attitudes towards religion, i look at what they do. If you look at what this administration is actually doing, which is your question, the administration is trying to find a way to defuse the middle east. And lower the temperature on some of these conflicts and stabilize the population. And to be honest i think bolster many of the countries in the region against the influence of iran. I think they are right. This is one of the destabilizing influences in the region, they are a state sponsor of terrorism , they are an aggressive country despite the iran deal. I think they are one of the problems. Getting rid of isis and al qaeda and ending conflicts in pushing back in iran, that is the administrations formula for peace and stability. That is the reality. Can you knit that together from listening to the president s Campaign Rhetoric . No. Is that my problem . No. Margaret my problem is, i have to wrap this up on time. [laughter] Margaret George and alex . George im not getting into rhetoric versus action. I think rhetoric has a profound impact, and thats just the reality. It paints the situation. Lets talk about refugees. You want to get beyond the rhetoric, lets talk about the good things about refugees that people never seem to discuss. They do come in at 2000 per capita assistance, but they have to be employed within three or four months to survive. They become taxpayers immediately. They are proud to be here. They are Small Business owners. Calledttled a refugee andy grove recently. He started a Company Called intel. He founded one of the most companies in the United States. Celebrate refugees. Dont make them out to be that bad people. [applause] alex the action rhetoric is an interesting one. I agree we should look at actions, but i think people are responsible for the implications of their rhetoric. Jim, i think you are not hearing you think anybody who says the rhetoric has hurt my community is calling the administration racist. There are things that opened up the door to hateful speech and hateful actions that assaults that insults them as americans. The same thing is true about the rhetoric on immigration. The Latino Community has been terrorized by things that in set by theen said administration, and by their actions, quite frankly. You have to hear that and realize you cant just say lets talk about action. These are real things people are feeling in their communities. As much as we have to look back one final thing. I know it is time, but one way to merge rhetoric with action other countries have private sponsorship of refugees. This may be an idea whose time has come. It would take your 1 billion , send it overseas, and let people bring it in. Margaret danny . Danielle im still trying to reconcile that latinos in this country are proud to be here or whether they are terrorized and unhappy to be here. They can be both. Danielle how do you address the problem of leadership . You do take in refugees. I say we should take in 100,000 refugees, but i not the am president. Im not eligible to be president , either. How do you address the problem of leadership . There are lots of different ways of showing leadership. One of the biggest disservices that i think barack obama did is the notion there are only two ways of doing Foreign Policy. One is doing nothing. And the reality is we have an enormous federal government that has tons of expertise that enables us to do lots of things, to both preempt the kind of dissent into violence and also to address those issues once they become a problem. We do need to resource our budget to do that. That is a legitimate question. On rhetoric, some people should just shut up. [laughter] danielle no, lets just say it. There are things that should not be said. There is a special burden on you when you are the president of the United States. Anyone of us who says that is , who does not recognize that, is frankly not understanding how momentous the office is. That is why i was always so upset when the president failed to use the power of his office to stand up for people who deserved to be stood up for and used the power of this country to stand up for people who deserve it. It goes both ways. Yes, some people should shut up. I dont think recognizing the manifest failure of the Previous Administration is a justification for this administration, but i think the pretense that the last administration was somehow the paragon of virtue on any issues deliver us tolp the rotten situation we are in now is also wrong. By the way, islamic cancer. You finally asked a question that sykes prepared me for. I graduated from sykes. It is wrong to say islamic cancer, and it is also wrong to pretend it has nothing to do with muslims. One of the biggest terrorist problems we have is called islamic state. Guess what . Thes islamic, and it has pretense of being a state. Those are real issues. When we deny agency, we deny the facts on the ground. For me dont suggest there is an issue related to islam that everyone of our arab allies would agree with. Margaret with that, we have to end this. I wanted this to be lively and it was. I wanted thank my panelists. Thank you all. [applause] [captions Copyright National cable satellite corp. 2017] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. Visit ncicap. Org] [indistinct chatter] on newsmakers this weekend, our guesses david scholl can. He talks about efforts to make the a hospitals more accountable for the services they provide. Secretary scholz is a medical doctor who served as the v. A. s undersecretary of health under the Obama Administration. He was unanimously confirmed by the senate in february to serve as the a secretary. Today at interview 10 00 a. M. And 6 00 p. M. Eastern on cspan. In case you missed a come on cspan, cia director mike pompeo on National Security and wikileaks. Pompeo individuals such as Julian Assange and Edward Snowden seek to use that information to make a name for themselves. As long as they make a splash, they care nothing about the lives they put at risk for the damage they cause to National Security. A former pakistani president they must understand , thetans sacrifices sacrifices we have created fighting terrorism. Secretary general yen stoltenberg. Stoltenberg we have a core task ever since we were created back in 1949, and that is that we are an alliance and we have promised to protect each other. One for all, all for one. Nobel prize laureate Malala Yousafzai addresses the canadian parliament. 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