Transcripts For CSPAN Millennial Generation 20150329

Sara i tend to think sometimes that people use no one knew in a derogatory term sometimes because and maybe we need to regrasp what millennial is full stop it is the 1834 age group. Millennial millennial is. It is the 1834 age group. You talk about it in the context of who can do for us. These are the leaders need to be learning from. Barbara i would say because i work primarily with people that are millennials, i often get asked in meetings, tell us what you think. You describe what every millennial thing. There are millions of no one kneels and millennials. I cannot speak for every one of us. Jake we actually dont use the term at mic because we find it is used to stereotype the generation more than it is a word that anyone are eight uses. I had to ask. Our age uses. Barbara are we allowed to use it . [laughter] jake we will use it tonight. On the one hand probably a generation that is incredibly that is averse divers politically active informed. We came out from president obama in record numbers. On the other hand, you have a generation that has been described to me as one of the most stereotyped. If you look in the media, im sure we could talk out of turn but it is everything from lazy to narcissistic to selfie obsessed. Do any of you have a favorite. There is a real misunderstanding as to who this generation is, particularly in political circles and the media. I guess i wanted to start by really asking each of you why you think the generation is so misunderstood and how you and your type of work has approached that problem. Sara. Sara you are detached on it. We are one of the most of the most diverse generation in the u. S. And because of that, we dont all fall under one are two umbrellas. When you look at the generations before, they had certain things going on whether it was a depression, a major war, a major artistic influence that was kind of really grasping most of that generation. With us, it generation with so many things coming at us. Technology ramping throughout generation and separating us from the generation before us and now the generation after us i have no idea what my niece is talking about half of the time. I think we are such a Diverse Group that it is hard to box us into one group and i think that in terms of Civic Engagement and government, people are banging their heads against the wall on how to reach us because there is no one set way to do it. We are that Diverse Group. Look at the people up here, and this room. There is no way olive us relate to one singular thing. Jake how have you approached the misunderstanding oer is very misunderstanding . Joelle i agree there is a misunderstanding of our generation. The power to influence business and government and policy are being we are being disruptive. Were looking at new ways to do things and not necessarily trusting oer in favor of establishment oer institutions. I recent poll shows that our generation trusts institutions far less than any generation before us. I think that is disconcerting to people. There has to be a change to the status quoo in order to engage on people. Think about the past election. People talk about how millennials did not vote but we turned out at the same level in 2010. People do not know how to reach us. They are using old Campaign Tactics to try to reach a new generation. I dont check my no box mailbox for ballots. If you were to contact me via text message maybe i would see it. That is a way we can be engaging millennials in a different way that is not happening as much as it should be. Jake are all of your friends taking selfies all day . Barbara i have a blackberry which people should probably not admit. I cannot take a selfie on it because it is not have a camera. [laughter] i echo what both of them said. I think also, theres a lot of advantages to the fact we have grown up more globally connected. That we do have a voice of whether were using it well are not. That is something that has been confusing to other people. Now with twitter and different platforms where your voice can actually be considered into dialogue, it is a different story. I think those are both huge assets to why millennials had a lot of value right now. Jake totally. I could share my experience but for the people in the audience what is the secret thought . Everyone wants to reach the demo. It sounds like everyone misunderstands the demo. How do you reach millennials . And how have you done it in your work . Tyler i dont think i know the secret. I think i would sell it because it would make a lot of money. Once he could think about when engaging is the vertical forms of engagement will not resonate the way they may have for other generations. We are generation that sits more horizontally. We have more access to different types of people. We are more interconnected, even globally. His idea of what me tell you what to do when you do it does not work. I think that means a lot for institutions, especially government. Millennial believe in the effectiveness of government but it is not happening right now. The question is how do you bring more participation, create a more participatory environment for people to engage in government . That sense of urgency that someone is listening to us. Jake your organization is doing it every day. students across the country. How have you managed to break through and College Students across the country. How have you managed to break through and reach them . Joelle the beauty of our work as we are driven by the ideas of our membership. We have chapters across the country in 38 states. Those people are working on ideas in their own communities coming up with research, publishing memos and taking into stakeholders. One of our students is looking at new york city parking policy, how that reform can bring in revenue to affect local communities. He is looking at new york city coming up with his own ideas and the are supporting it. That is the kind of horizontal engagement im talking about. Not us telling you what your agenda should be but you being able to build it ourselves. Sara if you look at the elections we have seen over the past few years democrats lost an insane amount this year. Some of us warned it, some celebrated mourned it, some celebrate it. We dont relate to a candidate as much as we relate to the issues they are running on. That is a horizontally based animation. The woman and his audience, we are caring whether a candidate runs on health care for women whether they think they have a right to tell me what i should do with my body are not. For people from immigrant families, whether were not that politician believe that Immigration Reform is a priority. Those are the things that are Generation Cares about and i think that is how for me, we are learning to engage people. For instance from our office, we are looking on legislation for campus Sexual Assaults. We could do a campus legislative Sexual Assault bill, go to city council and pass it but instead, she is bringing her built before 200 students and let it rip it apart and rewrite it. That is a better way of engaging them and coming political perspective, it is a much better built. When the community affected is involved. Jake what is the secret sauce, barbara . Barbara i dont know that we have figured it out. I work for a nonprofit that works on solving Global Health issues. Every one of ours wants to solve problems. They want to figure out how their skills up and backgrounds might be able to help solve issues. They are excited about figuring out how to fix the broken system. I am an architect, what will i do with my Design Background to think of a new solution . For us, it is easy to engage millennials. We except to percent of the people who apply to our program because they are desperate to get their foot in the door to be a part of the solution. Jake for us, it is about authenticity of the boys. Young people make up our staff. They are writing in a voice that resonates with the way we look at the world, which can be a bit hard for some people to understand. We say why do young people need a Media Company . Are we look at the world differently than our parents. We have really different perspectives and for us, it has been engaging young people on the issues that matter, not talking down to our generation and not treating us and stereotypes but really focusing on what are those issues. As editorinchief, ask everybody one question, what drives whether it is a store and not. Is it something you would share with your friends over dinner . It is a different audience than if you are sitting with your parents over dinner are someone else. For someone else. One thing i wanted to touch on is there are a few examples now of big moments. We have seen millennial mobilization more recently. He ferguson black lives matter protest. You see young people all over the country all over the street. My question for people here is are these movements difficult to sustain. In the case of occupy, we didnt see a long, drawn out movement. Time will tell what happens with the ferguson movement. How do you engage in this generation to stay motivated and sustained on an issue over time and do we have a shorter Attention Span . That is a stereotype but do we have a shorter attention spend to make it more difficult . 1sara we dont see the occupied protest much anymore. There was a lot of occupied the court system. The Movement Still continues for me. It is not just about the people, it is about the conversation. Occupy wall street may not have bodies on the ground camping out but they were a catalyst for a discussion that has continued all the way up into the supreme court. People are so talking about things that movement brought up whether it means the affordability of college, the 1 . Those things are still happening. I think the movement is still continuing. Maybe it is just different. That is what is different about it in a ration. The Civil Rights Movement different about our generation. The Civil Rights Movement has not happen in our day and age. Mlkj whereof never wanted us to continue to have to fight. But we still see it today. Jake i get asked by friends all the time living in overseas, they cannot understand after the arab spring why young people here dont stand up more and protest and arent in the streets. If the situation is that, why dont we speak up . Is there something to this point . Young people engaged differently when they want to make their voices heard and not maybe in the 60s sensibility of what it meant to be an activist . Joelle i think there are a lot of people still engaging and direct action. You see them in ferguson, staten island. People doing those direct action tactics. What is different about this generation is our ability to amplify those beyond those who they would normally affect especially using forms of technology. Yet seen the emergence of black twitter. We have seen the emergence of black twitter. I think that ability to amplify things from the ground level is different because we have technology that facilitates that. I think it says something for how establishment institutions need to think about how they are going to engage with our generation. We had not figure out how young people in the communities we have built online and inperson are actually going to be able to marry with institutions like government and large corporations. It is something we have to sort out. Barbara i think it is a combination. Yes, there is protesting. That can be part of a movement. Also, there are phases to it. I think about the aids movement in the 80s were a lot of gay men in new york and San Francisco were protesting and realize that even though they do not know policy, they were mainly the big leaders in the space. They were lawyers, working in real estate, they werent every they learned everything about policy and were able to speak to the nih at what they were dealing with. That looks different than standing in the streets but it is equally if not more so important because it changes policy to affect millions of more people. I think we need to remember it is both. There is one much more of a stark and that you can remember in your mind. There is one going on behind closed doors we need to be a part of all suck that is all of our response ability to be educated on how that can happen. Joelle i want to ask specifically. I think another way of asking the question is president obama in 2008, ire member his victory speech where he came out and said, this is a great victory but if this is about you and not about me. Everyone needs to be service in their communities do service in the committees. Our young people are young people as motivated and engaged . We saw a lot of enthusiasm at the beginning of the obama presidency. A lot of friends of mine never heard of Committee Service all of a sudden were doing Committee Service. Community service. I was doing a story recently about enrollment numbers for tsa going down over the last two years. I wonder, what would you say about that. If National Service is it a way is it hard to sustain for this generation . Barbara maybe it is because i work on it every day but i see hundreds of people joining Global Health core every are. They are all 30 and younger. The average age is 26. 40 have masters degrees. Theyre trying to figure out how they fit into building a healthier world. As we mentioned before we accept 2 of the people who apply. We are five years old to we are basically a startup. The fact people are coming to an organization without a bigname front to figure out how to work on these issues means a lot. I read that article also. I dont know it is a defeat for them. If you ask them five years ago where do you think your application numbers will be, they would not have dreamed where they would be last year for the year before. Their numbers rose anonymously after 2008 and that was huge. I dont think they have dropped. It can be perceived in different ways. I meet people every day that are basically begging us, how can i figure out how to work on Health Issues . Im not a doctor, a nurse, but how do i get my foot in the door . That means people want to serve and service may look different. It might look like working on really challenging issues. Joelle i would agree service does take place in a lot of different ways. For us 80 of the people in our network go into a career in public service. We are working with a lot of young people who are really dedicated to that. We are now 10 years old. We were founded on the idea that aside from putting boots on the ground, young people can change the policy process with their own ideas. That is now we have people in state government, running for office, working in the white house. There is a generation we have another attempt an imperative. Jake we had a writer on mlk day this year you talked about as he called it the santa claus of ification of mlk day. It has become a big day of service. It scares the purpose of the day. Obscures the purpose of the day. I want to go that out there as an idea. How do you react to Something Like that . These National Days of service are they the right way to think about National Service for this generation, specifically oer maybe not or maybe not. Sara im going to suggest teach for america. I am an alumni. It was an incredible way to jump in and after two years, i want to the hill for five years because i truly believe legislation was the way i could affect students in the classroom. I think that programs like what jolleelle and barbara are doing encourage people to leave their jobs. We can look at startups as a way to be a part of a social movement. There are plenty of startups from our generation that are really helping people. For instance, there is an app for women when they have been sexually assaulted on the street. Holler back ap. P. That is incredible. It is allowing government throughout the nation to be able to look at that data and say it is a real problem. I think looking at it a little differently as with National Service is has also changed in our generation. As a four Santa Clausing the holiday, i am of the opinion that if you can get more people out on a day to go to your community and have that one experience where they have that spark to go and say, i want to do this more, i dont see that as a bad thing. It is hard for me to say that for us to push it on the National Front as a day where Everyone Needs to come out is bad. Jake i am a believer of more questions from the audience and not less. Maybe i will do one order to more and open it up. I want to ask a question about political participation. I think another issue for this generation is the barriers of entry for running for office are participating in unelected political life. An elected political life. We look at it a lot different than others. Running for office may are may not be the best way to participate in service. I would be interested to hear what you have to say but what are the biggest their ears for young people to participate in politics for why our young people not doing it Biggest Barriers for young people to participate in politics . Joelle we see all of this bickering over things that dont seem to matter. The big issues are affecting us. Young people getting jobs, doing something about Climate Change making sure there is health care for all. These are the issues that young people are invested in but we dont see that happening in congress. We dont hear about corporate interest. A revolving door happening between big Financial Firms and the u. S. Government. We think, why would i want to be that person . That doesnt mean i dont think an people believe in the potential for government. The Campus Network ru survey thousands of people across the country of the what their government opinion was. We think that government can provide for the common good and debbie wellmanaged and serve as , good and be wellmanaged. I think that what matters is that we invest in organization, local and state government, places where we can gain access. Where we can provide opportunities for participation at a wider scale. I think that can lead to a widescale change in government. Jake dream job . Startup . Politics . Sara probably more times than most i am asked if i will run for office. I dont know. My inkling is a no. I think a dream job is continuing to do what i am doing and that is my job and my office is a Public Relations to the community. What ever i do when i grow up is going to have to be something that is connected to service because it is important for us to reconnect. I do want to touch on how we can we more politically active and want to be in office. More of us need to develop. I dont understand why election day is not a national holiday. If we want to talk about Santa Clausing thanks, give people an opportunity to vote. That would change things going on in congress. When we but, we influence who stepped through that door on capitol hill. Unfortunately, maybe a lot of us theres not enough of us. If you look at who voted in a the the mayoral vampiagn, less than 10 canton, less than 10 of i think we will see changes and be more inspired to be in office and ill have an easier answer when someone comes to me. Barbara dream job. I have no interest in running for office. I love policy and i dont love politics. I think that is ok and i love working with people everyday that are trying to figure out how they can learn skills on the ground. Jake i promise this will be my last one added will take maybe two minutes. A few quick hits. A oneword answer. I think the first thank, what would you say to the one thing that people the first thing what would you say to people over 50 who dont understand young people . Joelle i guess i would say interconnectivity. I think the way that we are connected, whether it is on a devices are device our devices. It is something maybe some older people dont understand. I think people assume that the way we are interconnected means that we are self absorbed. That because we are constantly sharing, putting things on twitter, it is a sign were not paying attention. It actually can be indicative of the potential for connectivity we have and how that can be used for wider scale change. When it comes to thank for technology where people are taking advantage of that connectivity, build strong communities, allowing for sharing of resources. Jake what should our leaders know about young people . Sara that we are watching you. [laughter] we will tell everyone what you did. [laughter] everyone has their phones. It is true. How many of us have seen and we have a couple of politicians in new york who have done this drug done something down on twitter are facebook and it goes through the news. We are watching you. We have this tool. I am more than my phone. I will tell the world. I will let them know what you are doing. Jake barbara, your opinion at the super bowl. Barbara inspirational . Jake let me ask a real question. [laughter] jake what is the one issue the you think will be most important for young people in 2016 . Barbara my goodness, so many. I think this is not a oneword answer but i think we all have issues that are important to us and where we live. Not saying there is one issue that is most important. Every issue is connected. Figuring out how to have a bigger lens. My last thing to copy your question to her is i never really understand why older people dont understand millennials. You can ask you what they are interested in. You can ask them how they want to communicate. I think in some of categorizing one group as an Elusive Group we have the power to make relationships with people. Jake i will close by doing a quick survey of the audience. On the question of what is you most young people are interested in andin 2016,. What do people think the most important foreignpolicy issue is a 41835 year olds . For 1835yearolds. Yeah. Global warming . Jake ding, ding, ding. You got it. You are the reporter, i think. [laughter] Climate Change was the most important issue. On a national issues, what do people think . Immigration. Jobs. Marriage equality. Economy. Jake it is actually income and equality and income disparity. We should have a prize. [laughter] jake i dont know whether those will be the most important issues but i thought it was interesting. Lets open it up for questions. I want to remind everybody if you ask a question, use the microphone. It will be on cspan. I know there are a lot of millennials watching cspan. [laughter] jake if people want to tweet i will have my phone also. 1i heard john stewart will be on cspan. [laughter] i am a researcher. You mentioned religious institutions. Everybody talks about engagement. They ask me, what about loyalty . Can i make a candidate a lifelong ex party person . Is that a model for a broken, older model . Jake i think it is absolutely true that once you become locked in as a brand person you are locked in for good. There are some brands that have done great things with demographics. That is why you see more brands coming out on twitter during big events like the super bowl were other big events and actually make their social issues their policies on social issues known. You see many more Brands Taking a stand on gay rights, Climate Change. People recognize that for millennials, once you buy into the egos, you are locked ethos, you are locked in for good. For politicians, the same can be said. Authenticity is really important. The best example of someone who uses facebook and twitter well is cory booker. He is tweeting everyday. Only one person has access to his twitter account other than him. It may be about serious things everyday life things. That real this and real lness is important. Many people in our generation are excited about him as a candidate. We watch his rise closer than others. Sara i think that is right. At the same time, the tools we have to social media is that if you do mess up and you lied to us, much like people are dropping American Apparel oer Urban Outfitters over things, they had brand loyalty but once something came out about them being antigay for having a sexual abuse problem immediately their loyal ship dropped. That is a power we have in our generation. The growth of opportunities is shaping the generation. You have a generation with inequality as a hardening of a movement from one class to another. With jobs that are less stable. How did all of that, in your opinion, shape the outlook and politics and culture of the millennial generation . Jake i think this is a deeply skeptical generation. We feel like we have been lied to want to many thais by politicians, corporations, media. We are optimistic. One to many times by politicians. If you ask young people to same question, they say yes. We are the entrepreneurial generation. You spoke to that earlier. I started a start up Media Company. There are some examples of young people who say the economy is bad but make lemonade out of lemons. We go out everyday and try do to make the best of it. It is a very unique thing for this generation. There is an optimism that we will make the world the better place. That is how we have dealt with a lot of the problems you mentioned. Barbara my experience echoes yours. This was an unsure job market to say the least. The benefit of that was a lot of people reconsidered what their careers could look like and thought about if i am watching things fall apart, and thinking what do i want my future to look like . I think i should think about what the world is that i want to see. What do i care about . That had a huge impact on our generation. We started at the same time as you did around then. There is a huge start of states. There is a town of social enterprises vocus on problem solving in startups. Focus on problem solving in startups. Joelle there is something to the fact that we grew up during a serious economic crisis, longstanding foreign wars, partisanship bickering. That coupled with our optimism makes our generation desire to see ourselves reflected in a lot of places. When companies mess up when it comes to not respecting certain communities, a generation diverse and interconnected as ours does not see that as something we stand for. We want to see our standards reflect in these spaces. During a lot of our comingofage, leadership has failed, especially in establishment institutions. Sara our generation relates to think that previous generations have. We still have civil rights struggles, women getting every 70 . 77 for every dollar men are getting. We are now an emerging group in the United States as latinos. I think we are a more introspective generation. We are more comfortable with talking about how we feel about issues. I think what you do is important because it is helping us to not repeat history. It is probably going to be a struggle for the next one. We do want a legacy that may be as brighter and more optimistic. We are still fighting the same sites are produced animations did. Our previous generations data on my s did. Following up on a comment that jake made about the companys taking on causes as a way to brand themselves. Two examples, Goldman Sachs came out for gay marriage in 2012 four 2013. Or 2013. American apparel came out on Immigration Reform but not on sexual equality. Should we look at this as a carbon credit where they can buy a certain cause and pollute in another cause . [laughter] jake who wants to take on the corporations . A great question, by the way. Sara it is tough because the idea is important. That as a baseline. You should not it should be a standard that companies are good on social issues. Your example about American Apparel, that, to me is like baseline for us. What matters is where people stand on policy issues and i think there is an opportunity. We see a lot of these social media campaigns with a lot of young people starting nonprofits getting involved with the policy process. Saying we support Immigration Reform will only go so far because there are a lot of people looking into what American Apparel is doing on workers rights. Jake there is an authenticity to it that cannot be overlooked. These are not token things to throw around where you support gay rights on twitter and all of a sudden, you are a great company. There are other things young people know and can talk about. That being said, the super bowl was an amazing, amazing moment this year, i think. We have an identity section that is focused on feminism, the intersection social justice issues. Every year, the super bowl has sexist ads are ways that take advantage of centralized depictions of women. Sexualized addictions of women. Not in the same way you have seen in years past. Our coverage was mostly positive. There are degrees of it. It was mostly positive relative to years past. I think that is by and large a good thing. Theres always more to be done. On specific advertisements, there may have been wanting more from a company. As things change, it is a good thing. The grammys is another example where there is a lot to poke at but also the fact that black life matter was mentioned. The president came on tv and talked about Domestic Violence social justice issues were a big part of the grammys in a way we have not seen. It did not change the fact chris brown was in the audience but it moved from where we are at. Sara you think it came to my mind when you said that is the nfl. The nfl had this long going stance. This year, we saw them pushed against a rock and a hard place. While goodall and his organization has a lot of movement to make, i cannot help but be happy the conversation has started and they are putting money into Domestic Violence campaigns. Does that mean i think the nfl is the absolute soapbox to go to to talk about Domestic Violence . No. There are major problems still whether it he from contracts to how the players are treated for taking paternity leave. I am happy that accompanies making a stand. Our generation is not as shallow as Companies Think we are. Because we have that tool of social media, when American Apparel had Migrant Workers in their campaigns and made them look like they love all imMigrant Workers and they were not even paying half of the people and those ads, that came out quickly. I dont know. I applaud companies that get that they need to put their money behind issues that matter to our generation because i think that is a stepping stone to actually becoming better companies. My name is bill. Im a journalist and author. I came here today and in part thinking about kayla mueller. I think she is a real tribute to the best you guys have to offer. That being said, i do find a lot of the insularity of millennials kind of annoying. Sometimes, you are reinventing the wheel. We are involved in the crisis of legitimacy on the part of our leadership. How are you going to avoid those issues . If you have to do a word cloud right now of what was on the panel, you would have lgbt rights twitter economic disparity is less big. We have some friend lines. Trendlines going that are not good. Part of that is our dysfunctional leadership. What will you do that is different . Jake is the question how we will solve income equality . Personally, i think income inequality and a lack of upward mobility will kill this country. We will not become a social democracy like europe. We will have to figure this out. If you do promise that that is the challenge, what do you see your generation doing that other generations are not . Jake i dont know if that is the Number One Court challenge that everybody and this demographic is working to solve. As we have highlighted, everybody has different religious challenges they think about. I have friends in the streets of new york for the protest and that will be their issue. I think when activism gets a really bad rap. Particularly for older people that it is a very lazy type of activism. I dont think that is true and i think it is overblown. Plenty examples now where ch ange. Org petitions have resulted in change policies. There are some amazing moments that have shown that this generation is not unengaged and does activism differently but is still doing activism. Secondly, just to be point earlier on a panel about the biggest barrier in politics, the money in politics is insane. For me, the biggest barrier for more young people our age entering politics is the amount of money you need to raise in order to run. It is difficult for someone under 35 to do it. I think it has resulted in other forms of activism and working to change the system. So, i think there is a lot of great work being done by everybody on this panel. Im not sure how we will solve all of the worlds problems but i think it will look a lot differently than working within the system. The people there will be people who do that and that is a good thing. It will look a lot more diverse than it does. Joelle on the beat of think that could be different, i think we talked a lot about online engagement, twitter and social media. What is yet to be seen is how online actually translate into offline committee building. Community building. For us, at the student Campus Network, we work on an initiative where students look at how the universitys relay to local Economic Development under the banner of income inequality. There are people looking in d. C. , new york am a california new york, california all connected you all my platforms. They connected via online platforms. That is on the net could be different. The confluence of offline and online activity. Sara i think we have to go from having a carriage to a pr ius. Things like black lives matter, that has to do more with been wthan with race and equality. While those issues are not coming out as much, underlying all of that movement are the issues that you brought up that are important. Income inequality is a huge problem in this country. I dont think anyone in this room would argue with that. The way the generation is choosing to move behind it is in a different vehicle then generations before us. Jake in the front. [inaudible] i am intrigued about the fact you gave around the millennials core issues, global warming, Climate Change. Nationally i run income inequality. If these are the issues, given the demographic, what are the panels views on the physical landscape of the u. S. And the impact on policy, particularly related to those issues . Sara i think money and politics shaped my view of the political landscape. The emergence is super pac. The fundraising does dramatically affect our political landscape. We see the same thing time after time. Those faults are part of an existing hierarchy. That money and politics issue is critical to solving any cooling be Playing Field for the future political landscape. A lot of people in our generation are not always excited about political candidates. Where are the new people . I think if we can get to the root of the money and politics issue, we see a landscape our generation will be happier with. Barbara we cannot expect to see very different people in positions of influence we are not ensuring there are other people rising up to where they have equally as powerful networks and understanding the policy and advocacy change. That is a something they are doing with younger people every day. That is really encouraging to know that thinking about in 10 years, how many people have we seen that we wont see in 10 years . Jake there is a Huge Movement now for people who want to elect elizabeth orrin. Warren. There are a lot of people out there who have bought into her indictment of our political system so much that Hillary Clinton, for progressives is actually not a as interesting as elizabeth w arren. She talked about income inequality every day. Young people are listening. That is been interesting. The other piece of it. Climate change, i dont think we have cracked yet as a country and certainly amongst political leaders. It is not something being talked about day in and day out. We have not seen a Mass Mobilization yet and i think thatll change in the same way we saw change on lgbtq writes. Rights. What you see is more people like that it is not have to be somebody on the west. There are plenty of people who are libertarians. Sara finance reform is huge. Maybe we will not be able to elect oer run for office with a lot of money but what we can do is change all those running for office run. One huge thing i am from texas originally gerrymandering hits home. The fact people can redistrict their areas though they can continue to win and remain in office. As any generation, we should be hitting hard on these politicians that think redistricting reform is not important. I think it is extremely important. That is the way we get people in office and a higher voter turnout. Stopping people from creating voter id laws that keep people from going to the polls. Maybe we cannot raise as much money but we can sure as hell can i say hell sure as heck raise issues for people in office. This put some Major Pressure on people regardless of how much money they have. Jake this generation is the most diverse. This is a survey of mic readers. These are important issues. Again, this is a lot of other ones that really matter. People our age are voting based on a series of things. She removed to this person over here . Should we move to this person over here . First of all, thanks for being on the panel. Second, i thought it was time for smoking on voices. [laughter] third, i want to transcend the United States. Given how interconnected we are and given in this energy and is content around the world whether it is turkey, mexico, or india, how do we harness that energy to create whether it is alliance is, or sharing understanding on these issues or given that all of us will be leaders at some point, would be better to have more countries as friends and enemies . How do we harness that energy right now . Joelle i can speak to that. We working three countries including east africa. Our fellows are from 22 countries. I have been talking more about american was just because of the audience. We perceive more applications from uganda and anywhere else. It is interesting that 60 of People Living in uganda are 35 and under. The Unemployment Rate within about group is 60 . It is a very large population. That does not have a job market. We worked a lot with them, and they are doing the same thing as other fellows. We worked a lot with them because its more of a society of others using the public narrative framework to figure out how they can use their voice to affect, change and do it in a positive way. Their president is, i want to say 85 years old. He does not get elected anymore. All of our fellows feel a huge disconnect between themselves and the issues that people in power care about. But they have not had opportunities to explore their voice and advocacy. Where i see a huge potential for impact we havent fellows in uganda who are connected to 450 other fellows. They are building advocacy campaigns where they have a lot of voices. There is safety in having a lot of voices together. That is one thing that is cool. In addition, our world is so global we could look up and see what is going on in uganda right now on the internet if we wanted to. It is much easier to understand the parts the issues in other parts of the world. We do this in new haven, at yale. Two years ago, one of our fellows, who is nigerian stood up. He said, it is going to be so convenient when imd minster when i am the minister of health and uganda. It was a really cute moment. It is even cuter because it she is now getting her phd in harvard, p ministry of health in nigeria. Paid by the ministry of health in nigeria. There is a huge luxury to all of us being connected. That said, there is a difference between using your voice and using it responsibly as knowing how to speak to power. And knowing if you are in that position, what skills you need to be effective, rather than just speaking. Also want to do a time check. Jake one or two more. You have been waiting. Thank you. I actually present a previous millennium. [laughter] but i do have a daughter who is a millennial. I very much appreciate your involvement on the global scene. I also feel that the United States is responsible for maybe over 20 of gdp in the world. I feel it is very important we use the infrastructure that we have to the ability that we can possibly use it. The question my daughter had is what should we be doing about student debts and the cost of Higher Education in this country . It looks as though it is very prohibitive for many people. Jake anyone want to take on student debt . Sara if you look at things happening on the state level the president announced that needed to colleges were going to be free. Is that what was . There are some big things, and i think your daughter has a point. Joelle and i were talking about this the other day, we cant fathom how our parents got through college. The fact that thgerere our people every day that have to put themselves there are people every day that have to put themselves to work mostly minority groups. It is about holding the president to his promise. One of our students at San Bernardino Valley College out in california. They dont particularly said that how we solve the Higher Education crisis isnt by involving more young people at the table. Two students from d. C. Went to a department of education meeting. That is part of the first step. A lot of times we are just analyzing and looking at reports, having panels, etc. But what really matters is if you have the people who are working two jobs and trying to go to committee college, or even nontraditional students try to put themselves to college or trying to shape this idea of opportunity in this country those are the types of people we need involved in the policy process if we actually want to make good policies for a large portion of the population. Jake we have time for one more. In the back. I have from columbia journalism school. I wonder what the panel thinks of the notion that a socially liberal, fiscally conservative kind of candidate can do to mobilize young voters. Jake i think that is very possible. I think people often ask me, as editor i am biased, but i like to say is that i am biased towards young people. What i mean by that is, there are certain social issues that are nonstarters for this generation. Lgbt rights as we have been saying feminism, these are issues that if you ask people in our generation, everyone universally agrees. That there are other hot debates. Fiscal policy, as you mentioned is one of them. Foreign policy is another. What will be interesting to see in this election, i do not know who that candidate will be. It will be interesting to see any next election cycles. If you ask most young people if you are liberal or conservative they will say neither, we are independent. It gives an opportunity to carve out that each and an opportunity for the gop is the party to appeal to this demo if they can strike the right balance. One person to watch will be rand paul, particularly in 2016. It is clear that on certain issues there are things young people really agree with, and others not so much how people weigh those factors will be interesting to watch. One thing about your question the term socially liberal, fiscally conservative is insanely loaded. When we look at and its like Henry Quentin versus elizabeth warren, people want to label Hillary Clinton versus elizabeth warren. People want to label clinton as conservative. I dont think that was before and is liberally on that plane. I have a problem with labeling people that. When you look at the bigger nation, in order to win people in the midwest it has to be relatable to things that matter to them. Things like student debt, job stability are going to matter. Is what we make the candidate talk about during the campaign that actually matters. We have to admit that when someone runs for office, they are catered to whatever questions are being asked of them and whoever is paying attention. That is why i want us to be paying attention more. Because then we are going to be able to ask the questions and put them on the spot. Jake ok. There are snacks in the back. [laughter] we will hang around for a little bit. I want the audience to join me in thanking all three of our date all three of our great panelists. [applause] i certainly learned a lot from all three of you. And yes, stop by and say hello. Thank you. Okay, well that was fun. Yeah. That was really good. Thank you so much for the perspective. Next, the 71st annual radio and tv correspondents dinner. After that, the congressional gold medal surmounting honoring jack nicholas. Gold medal ceremony. And then more issues important to millennials. On the next washington journal usa today Investigative Reporter steve riley talks about Security Breaches with the nations power grid. Ceo of the Wounded Warrior project talks about the groups 2015 policy priorities. And child smit has the Charles Schmidt have the latest on yemen. We will take your questions on facebook or twitter. Washington journal, live at 8 p. M. Eastern on cspan. This sunday, one q and a, eric larson on his new book dead wake the Last Crossing of the lusitania. Eric the question gets commentated when the question arise as to what ultimately happened to the lusitania. Why was the lusitania allowed to enter without escort, without the kind of detailed warning that could have been provided to captain William Thomas turner, but was not. And this has led to interesting speculation. Was the ship set up for attack by churchill, or someone in the admiralty . It is interesting. I would have found a smoking memo if that had existed. There was nothing from churchill to jackie fisher, or someone else in the admiralty saying that we should let the lusitania go into the sea. At 8 p. M. Eastern and pacific on cspans q a. The radio and Television Correspondents association held their annual congressional dinner yesterday in washington dc. Texas representative yoking casto and his Joaquin Castro and his brother hosted. This is one hour and 25 minutes