Transcripts For CSPAN2 Public Affairs Events 20161213

Account at all. Its uncontroverted because nobody says he turned the political stuff off for Guilford County. All they did is a cross check as a Guilford County to make sure it wasnt a retrogression problem with the Guilford County which is exactly what he should do by the way. But talk about theory similarities. It was Guilford County and it was greensboro and cromartie ii, and what this court said in giving that direct evidence relatively minimal rate was to say if you look at the rest of that email, the map drawer was very candid about taking race into account in drawing cd one and theres much less race involved in cd12 so it didnt predominate. The similarities could not be more dead on with this case. The most you can get out of Guilford County is that race was taken into account in some way that did not make it predominate, and this in evidence as in cromartie ii, that if you contrast the way the legislature proceeded with respect to cd one and cd 12, its virtually impossible to think that this is all a pretext. I understand why you want to search a little more when you have a legislature who comes up with his racial maps and they say, race had nothing to do with it. When the legislature repeatedly says we treated cd12 differently from cd one, i would think you would want some substantial evidence before you secondguess that conclusion and overrode it. And i would think but isnt there are substantial evidence that congressman watt comes in and he sits in the witness stand and he says i had a conversation with the map drawer and he said my bosses told me i have to get up over 50 point 1 black votes. That seems like substantial evidence that congressman says, reports on a direct conversation he said with a map drawer, who says he has received orders from on high. No. Thats the thing. Theres a dispute whether that conversation ever took place. In the record in this case you have the senator who protest thats not what happened if you have another witness. Its all in the record. Wasnt there a credibility finding . Didnt the district judge say the three Justice Court say they credited watt and not rucho . They did say that but that only get you to the point that. I mean, even if rucho said that, i didnt get translated to the map drawer. They make multiple public statements that say that cd12 is not a racial draw. Its a political draw. You look at all the other evidence, ebony get back to the maps because heres the thing. You didnt just make that stray comment in cromartie ii. You did at your analysis in the opinion where you look at the maps. It wasnt like the problem in cromartie ii was they didnt have alternative maps. The problem was they had the alternative maps and they showed they are very, very useful just because race and politics also highly correlated. When you try to draw an alternative map as in cromartie ii and its like guess what, you can get a better racial balance only if you pair to incumbent . I understand the problem of cromartie ii. I understand it, believe me. I think that the problem in cromartie ii is it doesnt say in all cases. Its really clear. I write enough for a purpose. The court rights when it sits in a case like this one, its a little ambiguous, but it means it. By the time as time progresses, we face with juicy and i see as the problem right now now, whics a set of standards that District Court cant apply, which will try to separate sheet from goats, without as spending the entire term reviewing 5000 page records, right . That is a problem yet by the time, pretty clear by the time we get to the later cases. I understand your argument. Ill go back and look at it. You think its determinative, the cromartie ii. Im not so sure. I think it is because you didnt just say indicate such as this one. You sit in a case such as this one where, its a majorityminority districts or a closaclose approximation and raf politics are closely correlated. I will give a third criteria. In the cases where the legislators stated goal was politics, not race. You actually said it would your also absolutely right. He for you decide whether its a sheep or goats, i think its fair to say that there are two breeds here, generally. There are the cases where wheree more common ones, the alabama cases, the shock cases, all cases where the state consents and cd one, all cases with a stake in zen says it was race. It was race because of the Voting Rights act. We dont think race predominated. If it did, we survived strict scrutiny. The smaller cases, the state consents as it was a race at all. It was politics. They are highly correlated but it was politics. Its very sensitive cases for the state because if the state does that, as this case shows, if they lose because they are found to have dissembled, they dont even get to the second half of the case. I cant come up and argue as politics not race, but if you think were lying, by the way, we narrowly tailored. You dont have that opportunity. There has to be a high threshold. Cromartie ii addresses those cases like a laser beam. If you want to give guidance to the lower courts, dont tell them you fake them out in cromartie ii. Save that you are going to stick with that and identify this class of cases and said thats the test for those kind of cases. Its not the worlds biggest burden to come up with an alternative map. If the alternative map shows the way you take politics into account to the same extent with better race is by parent income to make a district that looks like this look like this, which is exactly what you found in cromartie ii. You looked at those maps and it was not beyond the ken of man to come up with alternative maps in that case the problem with the alternative maps in the case is that actually showed that the legislation was exactly what you want me to say it is even though the dishes court listen to the map drawer and delete them, and his statements are pretty much against you, and then they heard to other state senators, and they were pretty much against you, and its up to the District Court to if i wouldve the strength of witnesses, and came to the conclusion on the basis of that that, in fact, race was really the explanation. Despite that come everyone who comes in has to have an alternative map. If we have five independent and so forth we will have five or six different alternative maps drawing i dont know, 100 state legislators and so forth. Thats what im supposed to say . First of all, i dont think that the direct evidence here is of a character that is materially different from cromartie ii itself. And i would say that, look, your kind give District Court directions for a whole bunch of cases. Everybodys going to be able to say i have direct evidence. The quality and character of it is going to differ from case to case. What i think you should do is in this class of cases where the states defenses politics not race, is is all five intervenors can get together, pool the cause, kidney at least one alternative map that shows that you give me at least one alternative map without a comparable effect on race. I dont think thats too much to ask. I think would make your jurisprudence much more administrable. It would have the virtue of applying star decisive because you did say in cromartie ii. And again everyone of this court cases says this is an extremely difficult business, that is inherently legislative business, that it is a humbling and big thing to have a court secondguess these decisions. So i think in a world like that especially when you already said it, to say that there is alternative map requirement as a gatekeeping function, to guide a District Court, to give the District Court the same tools you use in cromartie ii, to say its easy to say it was a pretext. But when i look at this, and im going, at the end of the day im going to look at that alternative map in conjunction with the evidence but im at least going to be guided by something that says there was another way to do this, and it really does make you think that this direct evidence is a lot more probative than it might otherwise, because i see there the was an easy alternative. If they really want to help the democrats hurt the republicans or vice versa they could have done with a completely different racial balance. What do we do with our statements in miller, that what the evil we are trying to address is the use of race . Once it is met you dont need a manifestation of it. You did just the use of race. Does it predominate . Thats the evil the constitution is intended to avoid. Your way is to say that state legislatures go out and always say its politics, because its real easy to say politics, even though theres a lot of direct evidence that it really was race, and put the added burden on a plaintiff down to do a map where you will come up and say on their map, this takes care of the problem. Another political reason for not doing it that way. Theres another political reason for not doing it this way. Its impossible to ask a plaintiff to come up with a raceneutral map in light of the entire region. The issue is, are the state legislators prohibited from using race predominantly . If they are and the proof is they have, then they should go back to the drawing board and do it without it. I think at the end of the day in these districts where you basically have one party saying it was politics and the other party saying its race, you do ultimately have to have a mechanism for determining which one it was. Our humble point is everybody agrees that they are highly correlated. That creates the possibility for abuse, so we are not saying they shouldnt be any test. This is a difficult thing. It is a particularly damning thing to say that a state legislature, especially when theyre being candid about their use of race of cd one, to say that they are dissembling is a pretty big thing. Its going to be the only issue in the case because there isnt going to be any strict scrutiny because they will say we didnt take race into account at all. Its not beyond the cant of man or woman or anyone else to come up with an alternative map and is not just doing it to be mean or imposing calls. You wont have to look at the cromartie ii opinion to show how they can really show if you do that you will elongated. Thats not going to be the case in every case. In some cases you can come up with a perfectly functional alternative map. If i could turn my attention now to cd one which is a case that is more like the virginia districts in the sense that here it is, it is the about use of race in order to preserve a majorityminority district. As to this one in particular, we think the District Court erred in a blank strict scrutiny simple based on essentially the adoption of a bvap floor of 50 point 1 . The easiest way to the firm is probably to do with the North Carolina Supreme Court did, which also confronted a Distrit Court that applied strict scrutiny because of bvap floor was applied but the lower courts had a blank strict scrutiny we think this is nearly tailored. The north, Supreme Court said this a court screwed up on finding strict scrutiny trigger but nonetheless we agree this is nearly tailored. I think you can do the same here. Youll be reversing the District Court but it may be the easiest way to decide cd one. Because here the map drawers, of course they admitted they take race into account but they were dealing with the difficult problem, which is a had the head benchmark map that had cd one as a majorityminority district. To be sure, it it was a coalition tested, a little bit north of 48 bvap but also lost 97,000 votes. So they want to preserve it as a majorityminority district. Based on the reading of strickland and some of the things they say the safest way for us to do this is to get it over 50. 1 so we will tell the map drawer that we want this over 50. 1 picked the map drawer gets that instruction and draws tradition that ends up at about 52 point 6 . The very fact its at 52 and not 50 point one shows shows its not like this ratio was preserved over everything else. But also i think its worth in escape particular to understand its not like there was a myriad ways to do with the map drawer did in this situation. There were two opportunities. You could either draw the district to get part of wake county, and that would get you over 50 or you could go into drama and get over 50 that way. The first time the map drawer do the map drew in wake county. Thats 50 . There was some backandforth, and he decided we will do the durham county. To what extent and what circumstances does section five of the Voting Rights act require that a contiguous district be drawn in order to comply with strict scrutiny . Assume youre using race and inure to comply with strict scrutiny. To what extent do you think that pra requires a compact contiguous district . I think requires a recently contiguous district. This is a situation where you hat and more compact district and or to get in the wake county or durham you would essential out to extend that district to capture those territories. The one thing i would say before sit down about cd one is i thik it is telling to look at representative butterfields testimony in the record. What the lower court found is the reason that we lost on strict scrutiny was there was not racially polarized voting and cd one, or more particularly the state had not done enough to show that. Nobody thinks that there is a racially polarized voting in cd one. They dont think that. They think we didnt do enough to prove it but itll think that. Representative butterfields doesnt think that and he was the incumbent. The dispute is not over whether his racially polarized voting. Whether well, as representative butterfields testified its got to be released 45 . 46 or 47 is probably better. They couldnt go south of 45 . He said its fully twothirds of white voters will never vote for an africanamerican candidate in cd one. He admits it was racially polarized. All this case comes down to not about whether we like racial targets or dont like racial targets. Its when you get the legislation affects which is between 47 or 48 on 48 on the one hand or 50 point one or 52 on the other. In deference to legislature meets anything that has to be within the deference. Thank you, your honor. Thank you, counsel. Mr. Elias, welcome back. Mr. Chief justice, and may it please the court. I would like to jump in, because just go through district 12 as my colleague did and then talk about cd one. The problem that the state has in cd12 is that finding a predominance was more than amply supported by the record that the trial court found, and we are under a error standard. The question as, justice breyer, you pointed out is whether race was a dominant and controlling factor in moving a significant number of voters in or out. It seems that the primary defense that the state has, in trying to overturn the decision of the lower court, is that an alternative map was not introduced. While certainly an alternative map is a way, it can be that it is the only way to introduce evidence. Theyre all matter of ways to prove that race predominated. I would point out that we offer no alternative map in alaska. I would point out that we offered no alternative map in trantwelve, which was the case you are earlier this year. Well, why not . Because in each of these cases, and in alabama they offered no alternative. In each of these cases there was no need to provide an alternative map to prove it circumstantially what amply existed directly. It is not true that the state of alabama in that case, or the state of virginia in this case, did not assert political motives as a defense to some of the districts. Did they in respect to this district, district 12 . Because when i go back to trantwo, i think his right. It does say that at least when the evidence is close, where its a close question, when one side is saying its racial, the other side is saying its political, then it says the party attacking the legislatures of boundaries has to show that the legislature could have achieved its legitimate political objectives in alternative ways that are equally consistent with traditional principles. It does say that spirit and says, your honor. So what is it that you suggest . My having been quite strong for following story decisive in this, but what do you suggest about that . I would say two things, justice breyer. The first is im taking issue with the suggestion that trial courts are confused. And that this is a reverse of the trial court. The trial court was not confused at a map was not required. The trial court explained why. Not a map but sometimes, some type of evidence they could have achieved political objective with less reliance on race. Thats what it seems to say. Are you saying it doesnt say that . There i may think you might say. Im not suggesting the answer. I want to know what you do say. Or you could say it doesnt matter because we are giving way to the District Court doesnt matter, isnt that important. I dont want to suggest something. Im not. I want to hear what you think. I think that the language in cromartie ii that is being focused on is discussing that case, the case in which as you say there were lots of maps. That was a fundamentally a maps case where each site is proving the case through maps, principally through circumstantial evidence of what was in various versions of maps. In that case you at least have to offer one that shows you achieved the goals, the Political Goals without race predominating. I would point out as an important footnote, on remand, the state and north guillen did draw a remedial map in this case. Case. So its not hypothetical whether they could draw a map that achieve their Political Goals that not jerry mehta based on race because, in fact, the state of North Carolina after this to a map on Political Data not using race data and, in fact, drew this district at a lower bvap and yet protected the republican nature of the district. Did they say that map serves political ends to the same degree as the map that is before us . I dont know what it if they didnt say that then, the fact they were able to draw another map doesnt really prove anything. If a legislator says this was based on politics, and as though we could achieve our political objective without doing this, they cant prevent print a negative. So it makes sense to turn the other side and say, prove that thats wrong. Prove that the political ends could be served without drawing the map that was drawn. Your honor, i think the problem with the reading, that reading and reading that is being offered puts the constitution cart before the horse. The harm is in using race as the predominant factor. There is no constitutional right to political gerrymandering that has to be protected. What has to be protected is by the question is what was the basis for it . Was it politics or race . So if no one can point to a way of achieving the political objective of the fence is a map that was drawn, then thats evidence that politics was the reason. It may be evidence of it. It may be evidence of race serving as a proxy for partisanship, which is not permissible. But even if its not that it may be evidence that doesnt mean the cap\cap other evidence. Would you accept that a map is necessary, except indicates what is quite strong evidence that race was the basis . I dont think that this court needs to define the strength of the evidence. I think the map is evidence. I think direct testimony is evidence. I think like most trials its a mosaic. Its not a smoking gun. The mosaic of evidence in this case how much weight do you think the absence of a map is entitled to . No wait. I think the fact that there is a map that was enacted is obviously, and the evidence that they produced at trial that race and party correlate to a large degree is obviously evidence that it was political. In this case look at what it is that rucho and lewis said. Before we get to the map drawers lets talk about what they said, what the sponsor said. Quote, because of the presence of Guilford County, this is not descriptive. This is because, but for. Because of the presence of Guilford County in the 12th district we have drawn our proposed 12th district at a black voting age level that is above the of black voting age population found in the current 12th district. Dad is the statement from the sponsors that it was race. What did the experts say . The expert said in his expert report, the general assembly, mindful that Guilford County was covered by section five of the Voting Rights act, determine that it was prudent to reunify the Africanamerican Community in Guilford County. This could avoid the possibility of a charge of fracturing our community and inhibiting preclearance by the department of justice under section five. This extension of the new 12th district further to the north east into Guilford County caused, caused the circle circumscribing circle abov by te district to increase in diameter and lower i think the evidence with respect to Guilford County is your strongest evidence. Beyond that the rest of it is not very strong. But that is where race predominating. Race predominated in a district justice breyer, to question you asked in the last case, this was a district that was overpopulated by 2800 people. 2800 people. This was almost spot on one person one vote. And yet they moved 75,000 africanamericans into the district. So to say Guilford County is my strongest case, yes, that is, in fact, where the mood. Did the state ever put on any evidence that that was necessary to avoid a retrogression problem . No. They offered no evidence that it was to comply with the Voting Rights act at all. Why is that . Why wasnt that at issue . Whether it was a strategic litigation decision made by the trial lawyers that i they wanted to put all other eggs in the politics, not race basket, or whether expert wouldnt support that this was necessary to comply with the Voting Rights act, i dont know. But that was not their argument. Its also important to realize that the evidence doesnt stop there. You have mel watt who by the time he testifies before the District Court, hes out of congress. He has no stake in this district one way or the other for himself. He is moved on to the administration and a life after electoral politics. He says hes told that the reason why this happened was that it had to ramp up to over 50 to comply with the Voting Rights act. They did make the case. They said we did that, and the reason we did it is most of the africanamerican voters vote for democrats and we want to get all the democratic voters in one district so the 15 that are republican. Thats just what the democrats did last time. Thats the kind of argument that they make. What about that . What mel watt was told is that he as a respected africanamerican is going to be expected to sell to the Africanamerican Community. Thats what he said. Hes going to be too expected to sell that this needed to be over 50 to comply with the voa. He laughed. He said its not possible because the people in this district will know that there isnt a reason why this has to go about 50 . To comply with the Voting Rights act. The trial court also discounted the testimony that my good friend and colleague has suggested was offered by the map drawer about what he was told and he only used used, he turnef race and only use partisanship. That whole analysis, the District Court didnt credit. Didnt credit. Said i heard the testimony, i listened to the live witnesses, and i didnt credit it. It wasnt believable. Can i go back to congressman watts testimony . What you highlight in your brief is double hearsay. Congressman watt said rucho told him somebody else told him something, and none of those people is actually the person who drew the maps. I dont even know whether any of that is admissible to prove the truth of the matter. But if it if it is pretty weak evidence. It was admitted. There was no objection to the evidence. It is evidence that the trial court in giving the witnesses and weighing all the evidence in front of it credited as important evidence. The Supreme Court, you can do whatever you want. Wound up with 50. 66. Its not coincidence . Shocking that they turned off racial data and they drew a map and it just so happens that it came in the 50. 66. That is not a coincidence. The fact remember that ultimately came in was just a hair above the threshold for a section to district does not coincidence good further evidence raised predominated. I would like to ask you about the procedural issue in the case. Another case investing or issues just decided the opposite way. You are urging to your era by which we should judge what the court did. But if we had the state case before us, i suppose their findings would also be touched by this database. It is the state case that came to us. We would look at that and say no error. I have two responses. First is the Court Applies clear error to the case before it where there is a finding of fact. That is the rules of appellate procedure. This is what the court has done for many years and what my clients are entitled to. This is their case. They are entitled to have it adjudicated under the normal rules. Justice ginsburg can pursue and protect the unquestioned. Theyre just luck of the draw and its true that draw and its true that state case was first. The second point i would make. The second point i would make, Justice Kennedy is the state case was quite a different case. In several respects. First of all, the state case was predominately to use the word has come up a lot, was predominately about the state lines. They were challenging Congressional District that most of the testimonies didnt relate to these districts. It actually related to the state districts. Number one. Number two is there are not the findings of fact in this state case. There are not specific paintings of fact about the credibility of witnesses that are found. This trial corp. Is very meticulous in laying out what facts they found most credible, but they were relying upon. The state court action was much more conclusory because he was dealing with the mountain of evidence around the state legislative, state senate districts. Finally, i would say, your honor, there are other mechanisms available to this court and District Courts generally to handle the question of multiple cases moving through the system. Congress made a decision that in the cases of statewide redistrict gain, they would be an expedited process for cases to move up through the federal system. Whether that was good policy on the part of congress are bad policy on the part of congress, it was a policy decision that the case is that, part of the federal courts come from a threejudge panel to this court and the other case goes through the normal channel and this court might choose to hear it, might not choose to hear, but that is not an accident. That is not fortune. That was made in structuring your review. Finally, i would say this is a question of the application of federal law and the federal constitution. Our claims are in fact federal constitutional claims. The defenses are largely under the Voting Rights act and there is no reason why this court wouldnt get the same normal weight to a federal threejudge panel in the finding of facts and those kinds of cases and somehow do for. Its not a question of deferring. The state courts have an obligation to construe the federal constitution to the same extent the federal courts do. Without that was a pretty wellestablished principle. They do, mr. Chief justice but its equally established that this court, judges court, judges finding of fact by lower courts under clear error. Whatever the state of North Carolina it doesnt seem responsive to the states you made which i understand we have to give greater deference to findings in ruling that we would respect the decision from the state court. Im saying we should follow the rules. We should follow the ordinary course, which is the case before you is the case before you and finding the fact trial court in this case a defining fact entitled to clear error. What i think i was trying to address is there are circumstances, for example in the gross situation where you have a deadlock, where there is no matter before a state court. The maps either been deadlocked or thrown out. The court said lets let the state court gophers as theyre exercising a policy judgment state. Here is the federal constitution and if the federal Voting Rights. There is no unique state perspective that to cause you to overturn 100 plus 200 plus years of jurisprudence about plaintiffs having a right to have their case heard. T. Think we should give any consideration to the state decision or should we proceed as if it never occurred . You can read that decision the way you agreed any other decision of a lower court that may be of interest to the courts. I dont think its entitled to any more or less deference than a decision that the North Carolina Supreme Court that may have had a racial gerrymandering case from 1998. It certainly can inform your thinking at the case, but i dont think the findings of fact are entitled to anyway in this case. The clear error standard applies. With respect to Congressional District one, my time is about to expire. I want to make the point that this was the court relied on an incorrect reading of bartlett that led it to believe to destroy across local district, which is what it did where there was no evidence of racially polarized voting actually preventing africanamericans from electing the candidate of their choice. Appreciate your indulgence. Thank you, counsel. Mr. Chief justice, may it please the court. Other to start with Congressional District of the serpentine district, the one everyone agrees looks terrible in the question whether race is the predominant motive for weather was politics. This determination the court has said is one thats reviewed for clear error and the District Court had a lot of evidence before it went through a threeday trial. I want to highlight key evidence it relied upon and finding bracelet is the predominant voter. That starts with congressman watts testimony to one of the architects of the plan told him that they had to ramp up the minority voting percentage in the district to over 50 so thats the racial target at the starting point in order to comply with the Voting Rights act. As counsel mentioned we had the target being hit on the nose 50. 66 and then we have direct evidence of the way that the states did it and that came from the mac maker and he said although he did also say first he did not use hell need his politics, did not use race. He made contradictory statements and said he did use race that he pulled the black population from Guilford County to comply with the Voting Rights act. If you look at the record, justice breyer, you would be which you anticipated which was this tape was polling and concentrations of the black voting age population in the concentrations were so high that supported the imprint that they were using race and there is the plainest brise in evidence in our brief that shows you have the concentrated polling. Thats how it was done with respect to Guilford County. I think this is important that the District Court made credibility findings that the political motive had been discredited. Mr. Clement is right there is evidence there about political motive but the District Court found it just wasnt credible and congressman watts testimony which the court credited and the mapmaker had been used race and contradicted by the architects of the plan who kept trying to downplay politics in their statements. So when we look at this particularly in light of the clear standard you have a threejudge panel that went through three days worth of evidence, credibility findings and even the one judge that disagreed with respect to this particular holding recognized that the majority did was reasonable, referred to it as eminently reasonable. And in this case is i dont think you can find clear error. What you have to say about the Voting Rights . I mean the clear error standard with respect to the state Court Decision as well. It is certainly something of a gratuity that we have it before us and not the state case ended over the state case would be reviewing their factual findings on the same question for clear error and 90 save us from this year so we should define clear error. It seems to me that response is not terribly helpful in addressing the conflict that is before us. A couple of responses. The way the court deals with potential to bite at the apple problems is the proclaimed preclusion doctrine. To the extent youre trying to figure out what we defended the state Court Decision has, we think that is the appropriate lands. Whichever one was decided first whichever one arrives first. You have to ask whether the principles it wouldve been a state court been decided first but you have to ask whether the principles for mac. You should apply to res judicata principles and that would lead us to favor the court. No, im not saying that. You say we should apply it. The application would depend because we dont have a position on North Carolina law. The way that you deal with this question is their application of the raised judicata like saying we wont use clear era anymore or Something Like that. You want to apply raised judicata to apply this question and you dont have a position on what the answer is. I think if the court is worried about the state court have an effect to ask whether there was a raised judicata come in the state would have to overcome in order to show that there was a judicata, whether it was fate is addressed in the brief. Second of all whether the actual predicate is fair and also a substantial question on that and third whether North Carolina law uses a concept of privity that is very expansive beyond where this court was in the taylor versus turtle decision. My point is not that you need to resolve that were decided certain way. If you are asking about what to idea what the state Court Decision, the lady figure out what to do this by using principles here but you dont do was simply deferred to the state court findings. This case is here on appellate jurisdiction. You need to decide the case before you. We dont think he would do something because after all rule 52 which mandates clear error factual findings applies to this applies to this core. This court should decide this case as it comes to it and that is with the clear error standard with respect to district 12. Just on district 12, you said there was racial predominant strict scrutiny fails because . The state didnt give any reason to pass strict scrutiny. The only reason would be section five that the state has suggested then that would make sense because section five is to prevent retrogression and they increase the what is your view of imap should be required . We dont read the decision to require imap anytime it is asserted. We take the court at its word in a case like this one and that is the case of circumstantial evidence of race. There is very little direct evidence. They thought should attract evidence is so insubstantial. Strong evidence of politics and correlation between race and politics. The strong evidence of politics from a little evidence or reason correlation and it made sense in that particular case for the court to sad since the maps were put in, give us an alternative that shows this. When you have a case that is a strong come attract evidence of a racially dominant motive come it doesnt make sense because the equal protection law gives you not having recipes for an unjustified reason. Not the map isnt per se. The map is an evidentiary thing you could have or not have. There is not strong direct evidence would it be necessary . We think the court has tried to give flexibility improving racial predominant. We see a strong direct evidence of politics case. Maybe one other thing i might say is we think the court if they were adopting a mac requirement for some clear set of cases that Wouldve Couldve explained in its opinion and done something. What is going on in part is a tough matter. Go back years ago. There were many states that had many black citizens in no black representation. There was a name called both of majority minority districts. The problem is how does the law permit the creation of back and at the same time prevent the kind of packing that might appear in other cases, which is gerrymandering. And no one i think is a good answer to that question. So if you are too tough in this case in rejecting the notion that it was politics, which is correlated with race, then what is going to happen out there to a successful effort to create majority minority districts where matters change, times change, oceans rise, it better. And how do we keep d. C. The problem . We are very sympathetic in the has tried to be sympathetic in the court has done it in decisions like alabama. Two things in particular. At the constitutional interest in seeing that minorities have representation in reality in the legislatures. Ray. So what this court has done is ask about racial predominant was raised by the predominant motive, not one factor, but show us your evidence in the District Court in the District Court had that evidence. The second thing when we get strict scrutiny common mistake is said to mr. And that is the problem at the first Congressional District at the state was operating on an error of law first of all and second that it did not provide the justification and thats what the Voting Rights act section two and section five focus on is not just as the site in alabama, not taken a number out of thin air, but showing us theres a problem with respect to retrogression and with respect to the first Congressional District in this case there just wasnt evidence of a potential problem because the lower percentage not been a majority minority district, the Africanamerican Community is able to elect its candidate of choice on a sustained basis over a period of many years and by wide margins. This is on page 40 9a of the District Courts opinion. The state did make the case. It also said the state was operating on a mistake of law. Getting back to your question, we understand this is a somewhat delicate balance and we think the court has attempted to balance the important interests protected by the equal protection clause against the concerned states have been the flexibility states made by adopting these two different parts of the standard racial predominant in a strong basis in evidence for strict scrutiny. Thank you on the council. Sir clement, four minutes remaining. Thank you ministership testis. Personalities with recognizing six Trial Court Judges at that Congressional District 12 and four out of the six sad that politics not race prevailed here so it is a funny sort of law that will differ to the minority of two. I dont think you can ignore the state Court Decision and said they were specific enough or something. I would point you to appendix b 161 through 163 which are the relevant factfinding that the state trial court or they were unanimous in finding among other things dr. Hhotel are constructed at 11112 Congressional District based on a whole voter tabulation district in which president obama received the highest voter total during the 2008 election. The only information on the computer screen used in select gained inclusion in the 12th district was the percentage by which president obama won or lost a particular period of course packets to the need for an alternative map of the difficulty here. Its all well and good to say we looked at it afterwards and they pulled in all these africanamericans. Guess what, they pulled democrats do. What they could have done which wouldve been simple enough that they were true is to try and map that shows he is a liar. He wasnt using the 2008 president ial election results. The used those who would come up with a different matter. They didnt do that. Any alternative map would have been easy to do here and they didnt do it. They said they didnt do it in other cases as well in two reasons explained that, either reflect particularly well on the idea should get rid of the mac requirement. One reason is analogous cases as long as they could get the state to say we had 50. 1 or 55 we are off the land so we dont need a map on predominant spirit that is wrong in the court will say thats wrong. The second reason is most of these challenges are brought by people who are at least as concerned about democratic local acts as they are about avoiding rates. The problem with putting an alternative map together issued you actually prevail, the no good dirty republicans on the other side could use the map and so you can complain about there being a part of chairs in gerrymandered. If you want people to bring race claims and addressed a partisan claims, and make them put together an alternative map that works. As to Guilford County, several responses here. First of all its good to say that pulled in 70,000 africanamericans are hauled in all these africanamericans. They were all democrats as well. If you have an alternative map that showed a different way to give Guilford County and that would prove democrats and not bring in africanamericans. Then you have something. The fact that they brought in a bunch of africanamericans because they were trying to bring in democrats is about as interesting as the sun coming up in North Carolina because everybody agrees theres a 90 correlation between race and partisan identity. The second thing is a very good reason Justice Kagan that we didnt make as section five defense because this wasnt about Guilford County. Their theory is not the redesigned the nefarious enough areas to overly comply with section five. Their theory is cd 12 was drawn as a majority minority district. They did present those theories. They set proposed findings that it was purposely included in a substantial number of africanamerican residents in cd 12, the intentional placement of black voters with racial predominance. If i may respond to get them to 50 . If they focused on Guilford County they wouldve had two problems. One wouldve had a section five defense. They apparently believe doing so was necessary to avoid retrogression for section five purposes. Exactly, your honor. Everything they said was a concern about retrogression, which is why when they talked about cd 12 and Guilford County, he didnt say enjoy that the majority, minority district. We avoided any problem by making sure that we had at based on higher percentage than the benchmark not end up would avoid any potential five concerned with splitting the county of putting the africanamericans and Guilford County and the neighboring cd six and they would be the first to complain about that. Thank you. Thank you, council. Cases submitted. In just over half an hour, let to a discussion on Media Coverage of the 2016 president ial election taking place and hosted by the Brookings Institution live at 2 00 p. M. Eastern here on cspan2. President elect trend continuing his meeting with cabinet nominees than leaders in his administration. We will stop now and look a little bit. [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] you can look in on the lobby of trump tower all day on our website at cspan. Org. If you watch him laugh a minute, you saw former senator pennsylvania senator rick santorum. Jim brown and ray lewis walked through after their meeting. Entertainer on u. S. Was there short time ago, philanthropist bill gates had remarked to reporters. We will have this comment later on here on cspan2. The Associated Press reporting major republican fundraiser wayne berman. Sources earlier saying mr. Trump has selected Texas Governor rick perry and today officially shows exxonmobil ceo omar mateen to be his secretary of state. Elaine kamarck is that their desk. Our topic this morning thats why president why president s fail, which is also the title of your book that came out this year. I want to begin with what needs to the successful presidency. Go lay out three things that successful president need to balance in order to be successful. What are they . Is successful president needs to get the policy right, needs to be able to communicate theo t policy and then it needs to be able to implement the policy. So those three things should be in balance because it is wonderful to have a good policy, but if that ever happens or if it happened it gets all messed up. You argue modern president s lose that balance. But part of that gets out of balance. I drew three circles in the book twice. First one has been in balance. The second one is a small circle of implementation is a small circle and communication taken over everything. You know, modern president s get to the presidency by talking a lot and then when they get to the white house, they keep talking and speechifying and now president elect trump tweaking. They are just constant machines. What happens is this pushes out the need for actually making sure that what you say is what you do. The problem comes because when what you say isnt what you do or doesnt happen and up on you modern president s haveve discovered that they cant talk their way out of the mess. Host examples of where the succession with communication a he refers to it, or at least a president ial failure. Guest there are so many i talk about in the book that democratic went than republican ones a completely bipartisan look at the presidency. Sh one of the big ones for george bush was the failure to react in a timely manner and effectively after hurricane katrina. There was nothing that george bush or his campaign could say that could erase the image of those image in the superdome in new orleans. This was a massive government failure and massive government failures are massive failures. Moving on, there was not in president obama who was quite is eloquent could say to the people who are trying to get Health Insurance back in october and november of 2013 and the website kept crashing. So when theres a bigre governmental failure, the president cant talk his way out of it. Enats when i say they need to pay a little more attention to implementation and a little bit less time talking. Host we are talking with Elaine Kamarck, the author of why president s fail. The lines are open if you want to call in and talk about president ial failures. Transcendence recommendations to avoid those failures were given to those as well. 2,027,488,001. Independents 2,027,488,002. Lets talk about our president t elect going a transition process. You write about transitions in your book and how modern president s intended to deal witv transitions. Every president ial transition is soaked in hubris and one of the consequences if they can impose their priorities on the world, but the world rarely cooperate and instead present time. An example of the transition process. The first way they usually bubble up as they bubble up with appointments. The appointments, almost every transition makes an appointment that either they have to pull back or that doesnt make it through the conservation process and may eventually have to replace the person. That we are going to see for instance today Rex Tillerson looks like he will be appointed secretary of state. Hes got confirmation problems in congress and let see if he actually makes it through. Donald trump says appointing people he knows people he knows are extremely rich and it doesnt look like theres a very elaborate vetting process going on. From the vetting process,ly usually people backgrounds and taxes make sure that they pay all the taxes they were supposes to pay to make sure that their business dealings are on the upa and not. I so who knows what is going to come out. That is a frequent problem with president ial transitions. Both parties have had it. Host what are your recommendations for avoiding those early stumbling locks to avoid the early failures. Pr it gets worse when a president comes out of nowhere. He doesnt have the depth in his party have relationships. He doesnt know the things about the colleagues. Even if there were a governor any of the other governors. So he more than most president needs of vetting team that is on the ball. We dont see too much evidenceeg of that, how much theyre been in the com out because then these people go in the senate. Believe me, theyll put them to their faces. Studie shes also a fellow at the Brookings Institution and the center for respective management with us for the next 40 minutes. Phone lines are open. Republicans 202847 well start with glenn in illinois. Democrat, good morning. Caller good morning. Im just wondering how many president has lied like this one we got going now. I dont know if it is a thing that you do when youre running or question going back to your concern with communication. Theres always a tendency for president to exaggerate things, look for great line in the speech, if better. Outright lying is fairly unusual in the president date, unusual for republicans and democrats. President elect trump seems to have a problem with this. What has been said around washington recently is kind of odd. Ive never heard this and ive been here almost 40 years. The Trump Supporters are saying, well, only his opponents taken literally. Everybody else takes them kind of figuratively and metaphorically. Thats kind of odd because when your president , your words matter in your words particularly matter in foreign areas and International Relations was a kid translated, where other countries act in response to what they think the president is doing. Its a little nervous making. In your book, the blame for some of this comes from the nomination process that we have today for our president. Guest you bet your readers to nominate president the way the rest of the world dominates their leaders in closed party conventions. That seems very undemocratic except that what was going on here was that the Party Leaders and followers were controlling o who had their brand so to speak write . When we opened up his only the United States has done this, when we open up the system to primaries, what happened was parties lost control over who their nominee was. And so it became this freeforall. It was not until this election,d how whether, that someone gotpun nominated who had no deep roots in the Republican Party. In fact, we used to happen in the old system and there were downsides was that you have an element of what political scientists call peer review common meaning that other people who actually knew this person and new things about them was he or she capable, was he or she a . Alcoholic, did he or she has money problems . They knew things about them that voters are not likely to know. The peer review gave us some pretty okay president s. We dont have that anymore so anybody can get nominated. This is an argument to get more power back to the socalled party of late. There was talk everybody d was complaining about the democratic superdelegates, right on the republican side they were wishing they had more superdelegates as this one on. This is something both Political Parties have to grapple with because this is done can young people a lot of people wonder if theyre qualified to bemorni. President. Kansas city, missouri. Carl is a democrat. Caller good morning. Can you hear me okay . I have a couple things to say real quick here first of all, the banks that lent the money, the bank has sent land i ran money for boeing. They are going to buy airbus. Now to the point we are talking about now, that i blame the media and i know everybody says that, but this guide didnt get it through. His son several years ago was bragging. Im talking about trump, racking that the russians were pouring money into the trump enterprise. That is big news, especially what hes doing. It is clear to me how did he get in there without showing his taxes and without knowing what his companies are doing and these guys. The chinese and the russians own trump. Its no big secret. Everyone wants their big tax cut. Guest i think you are right that the media could have been more sincere in its investigation. The fact that the matter is he banned the media a hard time doing that, that would use that happened was people the Party Process of nomination waspe controlled to actually knew the players. One of the reasons they disintegrated as it was hard to get new players in there. On the other hand, the virtue you see in our neighbors inn canada, you see in Great Britain and other democracies is a comment to let the parties parties and therefore that the government tend to be well fed it. They are well vetted by the press, but they are well vetted by people who know what theyre. Are, what their business dealings are, et cetera. This season went on to the surprise and consternation of most of the Republican Party and they were worried about this guy. The capability of the candidates Getting Better or worse in your mind . I think it is getting worse. The reason it is getting worse as the media is under a lot of pressure to get eyeballs and gave viewers. And so, if you put a shiny thing over here, say donald trump is tweaking about miss america or Miss Universe pageant and everybody sort of runs over the, there. Its easy to distract the media. Trump is very good at distracting the media,st particularly when they start doing complicated and sorted or in things like what his business callergs are in the world. Arlington, south carolina. Jesse is the republican. G good morning. Good morning. Guest caller i am a veteran. Ive had major issues in colombia. I was doing fine, but because of just not doing the right thing, ive lost money and i think thats another reason why president s fail because they dont pick the right people to r look over these things. I waited 8. 5 months. Thats unacceptable. I only waited four months before in 2011. Valdez since all of this has taken place have lost money. I wont get into whos involved but i had a director hang up on me at the columbia va. That is wrong because they madei mistakes and they dont want toi fix them. Ive been to the ip. Ive had Case Management from there. They didnt do nothing. Senators, congressmen not doing anything or me and getting this thing done. I went so far as to the leader of the va system. I didnt get no results there. The va system i talk about the va system and the bug and i talk about it as one of president obamas failures. There is no secret when he took office that the veteransadminisi administration was having Serious Problems doing what it was supposed to do. Nor was it a secret that they ci were cooking the books so to speak to make it look like they were treating people like our collar in a timely manner when they were not. That is a classic example of one of the things i talk about in the book which is president s getting fire removed from thee government that they ran. When the scandals finally broke into the news because of a veteran who actually died for lack of care, the Obama White House acted like i was a surprise. They were surprised by the whole thing. I should never have happened. The president should not be surprised. Be the president should be able toi anticipate what is going on in their government to fix that appearsti one paragraph from your boatt most of the people the presiden sees every day will be the same people he saw campaigning. The people of the president doesnt know of the 4 million or so who work for him in the executive branch and military. The president is aware intellectually that they are there, but few president s go out and walk the halls of the federal Office Buildings in washington d. C. Who was the last president you think it back, was caught atkn being handson and knowing what was happening in those hallwayst not many. Part of it is this is a particularly modern problem because our government is now enormous. Its about 4 million people. The president had 800 people who were running 4 million. The thing i come back to time and again in the book is at any given point in time an organization that day, something is going very right that something is going very wrong. President ial failure tends to happen in two directions. First of all is in the example of their dna with the failed Iranian Rescue Mission years ago with president jimmy carter, when something is going wrong its because the president doesnt see and understand the level of organizational incapacity in the government. The other way they make mistakes is that they fail to see what the government knows and they fail to learn what they should be learning from the government and we saw that time and time again in the Bush Administration particularly with theirio intervention in iraq. So it works both ways. Either they dont see the problem that then blow up in their faces or they dont take the good and the smart stuff in the government and use it in their policymaking. Host the book again is why president s fail. It is a book that one Washington Post reviewer recently sent us a book he must wish is incoming president elect donald trump would read. Taking your calls with Elaine Kamarck, the author. Michael is in alabama. Democrat, good morning. Caller good morning. Its been months since i was able to talk to the span. There are several indepth sundays when i wanted to ask you about these questions. These are the two main concerns i have about any president and you hinted this wonderful journalist or historian hinted that one of these. The cabinet members that any president for lack tend to be even as partisan as or even more partisan than that president and i only see most president s choosing the manner women and get a theme to have when they claimed to get things done, itoe is usually buy one hand washes the other. You do what youve got to do. I would say from emanuel, butde even though hes a fellow christian, the secretary of the interior under reagan, the first one in a neat example of than i am too young to remember the corruption of Vice President spiro agnew under nixon, the lord knows i heard his name soso much on the evening news when i was on kindergarten and Elementary School and countless Paul Wolfowitz and the last torch w. Bush administration and the education secretary who gave what i call, although she met while, no standardized test left behind the didnt leave nearly it wgh flexibility for the state. And one more problem that i see that i wish you would address. Each president appears to have the secretary of the treasury board the choice for attorney general ordered the irs toto really inspect the books all ofl any charities, sometimes charities, but usually lobbying groups and think tanks that are the opposite from the way the party in power in the white house think that time. I thought i had some pretty choice example is of that wonderful veteran who had so many of those problems getting the va to do anything for him. My heart really goes out to him. Well, the caller said a lot of interesting games and of course one of the things about our cabinet secretary is that they do not have the discretion that i think the caller thinks they have. They are in fact found by laws. The other way to look at this is the cabinet secretaries have to manage even the stands that they dont like. So lets take Donald Trumps incoming head of the epa, the Environmental Protection agency. Yes i think that person would like to do a donald trump and run around the agency and page you are fired, youre fired, youre fired. The epa doesnt exist because someone made it up. It exists because congressss passed the laws telling it what to do. So you cant just get rid of that because your cozy with this person or your president yesman. You have to convince congress to repeal the clean air act, repeal the clean water act, et cetera. They may do that, but frankly that is more difficult. Remember that we are a nation of laws, not men. While president trout may want to walk in and tell everybody they are fired, they would say great to see you, mr. President. Can we have a filthy with you,u, but now i protect it by the merit Systems Protection Board and Civil Service and you cant tell me im fired. Host which could be a topic for a whole another segment down the road. Speaking of cabinet picks, our viewers know that expected it of Rex Tillerson made official by president elect donald trump this morning saying his chosen one of the truly great Business Leaders at the world. Chairman, ceo of exxonmobil to be his secretary of state. He now faces nominations on capitol hill. Brandes in new york. Go ahead, brian. Yes, good morning, cspan. I want to get into the news media because it is so importann when we are misinformed almost on a daily basis. A point to cnn. They are the most evasive, the most deceptive news media out there. They lie all the time. I give an example. When donald trump went to meet with the president of mexico, and they met and when donald trump came back, cnns start off in the morning and the first thing they said donald trump lied about his trip. Wa he said there was no discussion is building the wall. Now that was a lie because this is all coming from the left. They call it a euphemismfascistt liberalism, but they are leftwing fascist these people if you look at what they destroyed throughout the t worl. But heres where they went wrong. Donald trump went to mexico and the mexico president said to him im not going to give money to build the wall. Donald trump said was told that in advance. I didnt come to talk about that. So he didnt discuss that. The way they extrapolate it is based on a leftwing bias. It goes on and on. We had, for instance, they call them a racist. He called the mexican judge and mexican. Well, that the way we talk in new york. If i figure my best friend growing up was an italian kid born and raised in brooklyn, that would make me a racist under the pc left wing sick thinking. Host Elaine Kamarck. Guest the caller identified one thing in the last election which his people wered sick and tired of the little correctness. To go back to the two different ways of looking at donald trump. So his opponent are really worried about him and appalled about him. The geekiest abrasives. They dont believe that he is going to be a good president because of what he says. His supporters think that is the first politician matter to speak honestly and speak truthfully. That is something we are going to have to see if that works b out. One of the points of my book is that all of his staff, what you say, how you say it, et cetera, once you are president , reality matters. N both all of this, you know, bologna and those guys that you heard during the campaign, the president comes into office thinking they can continue to play that game. They cant. Th reality matters. If donald trump wants to get the chinese come to get the chinese. If he wants to put a tariff on stuff, go do it. It is however the prices at walmart when a bullet in the year. That is reality. Wn suddenly, people know the reality of their own situations. The point of the book is there comes a point in presidency is when the reality of your own situation is much more important than whatever bologna or nonbologna depressed or the president of the United States is talking about. That is what president s have to worry about. North hollywood california. James is a democrat. Good morning. Good morning, wow. I would like to first thank cspan for everything they do. F i think this Elaine Kamarck for coming on. N. I have a lot of questions i will lay out there. Host one or two questions. Caller okay. Its unfortunate to me that so Many Americans dont see theer American Government and im trying to connect with some of the things not of Elaine Kamarck has says. The policy and communicate iny the policy and implementing the policy. Es my question is, where do you think president elect donald trump is coming in thisnticipat framework and how will you anticipate it will impact the Foreign Policy and i hope they have you back again. You have so much to offer. Guest thank you. I think the thing we have to worry about what donald trump is on both sides of that. Both the policy and implementation of the policy. This is the first president ial candidate in a long time who does not have a lot of reading papers on their website, didnt hand out the typical stack she that go along with president ial speeches are candidate speeches during the campaign. We dont know exactly how he tends to do these things. We know he wants to get tough oo immigration. People elected him and were drawn to him to get tough on immigration. We dont know if he can actually create a registry for muslims. That is going to be fought through the courts. In your preparations, it better. We dont know whats up i was going to turn out to be. We are to have lots of the lack track sensors and then places the wall on the border. So what more does donald trump do and does that really work because of course once you build a wall, people could go under it and people could go over it. Does that really solve the problem . Of course the business in mexico is paying for it is completely idiotic and basically he doesnt say that anymore because they think he knows it is a great camp and mine. A lot of the things that president elect trump has sad have real problems beingimplemen implemented. Ba the question thats going to be going back to this literal or figurative is what do hisn two . Supporters conclude in a year or in two years . When there is no wall, do they lose face or do they say we wanted him to be tougher . Administration, what do they say . That is what we are interested in seeing and that is one of the things going on in washington now. People are saying, do not taken literally. Host sherry, republican. Caller good morning. Caller good morning. I would like to i am not really up on all of but i been trying to read about it. I am 74 years old. This is the worst ive ever seen election go. I never knew there was so much corruption in the government until this past. The line, the stealing, the killings. What is wrong with our government and how can we fix some of this . Some of the things she is saying donald trump lied about. Hillary came out lying worse so please help me out on this. Guest thats a matter of perception. We do have a fairly active judiciary that does a pretty good job of finding out corruption and government. There are two members of congress who got indicted this year for corruption and bribery, and they are, they lost the elections and there on the way to jail. Host news this morning of chalk up a tall receiving year sentence for corruption. Guest we do tend to find corruption. Those are two people out of 538, however. The federal bureaucrats in washington are constrained by lots and lots of rules and regulations designed to prevent corruption. In campaigns we do have a lot of line. We do have, i think is sought on both sides and im completely sympathetic with that. Bubut i think you need to separe out what happens in campaigns, and this was a thickly dirty, particularly ugly campaign, from what happens in the government. I have worked in 35 countries in the world, and boy, i can tell you theres a lot of corrupt government and we dont even come close. Imagine being in a country, ill give give you one example, where when you go to the hospital it is routine practice that your family has to pay off the nurse in order to get treated. It is also routine practice that the doctor says to you, you need this drug but we dont have it in the hospital. But i have a clinic down the street and you can buy there. You go down the street and you buy at an exorbitant rate and the doctor owns the clinic. This is not an unusual story. Most countries in the world have levels of corruption that we cant even anticipate. We cant even believe. I just want to give you a little, im not saying theres no corruption. I just want to give you a little historical perspective, that our government is much less corrupt than most people think. Host the book focuses most on the executive branch, the legislative branch doesnt get off without some criticism. The Founding Fathers must be rolling in their graves. A branch of government meant to check the power of the executive branch is reduced to a few thousand wellconnected kids getting the tickets punched that they can go out and make big bucks. The members spend so much time in the district raising money that they cannot be bothered to learn much about the government they run. Right. What is going on here, back to the last question, is that the executive branch of the government is home alone. To use that phrase from the movie. Congress has all but abdicated its constitutional responsibility to oversee the executive branch, to hold them accountable. Are you getting done what you are supposed to get done . Are you spending the taxpayers money wisely . We dont have a lot of evidence that people are stealing taxpayers money. Thats very hard to do in the federal government. We do have a lot of evidence its not necessary spent in the right way that theres a lot of inefficiencies, et cetera. And congress used to hold oversight hearings, and they basically have gotten out of the oversight business. And im hoping that they will get back into it because they are now being derelict in their constitutional duties. Host wyvern, republican, good morning. Caller good morning. Ive got a couple things i would like to say. What other things, cspan, in my opinion, they pick a lot of these textures tried to undermine the president elect askehucksters. I think this lady is one of those. Also she makes a statement that we are a democracy. We are not a democracy. We are a republic. Thats what sets us apart from the rest of the world is our elect, elected system. And whats happening with the Democratic Party is theyve taken on, become socialist, a communist. I unlike the rest of the world we are unique to we rejected that. Thats all i have to say. Host might be a good time to go through a bit of your resume. Guest i am a democrat. I have worked for bill clinton in the white house. Im also a political scientist and a scholar, and so, in fact, there been times when i aspired to be a political hack but it dont think i really am a political hack. I cant help but say to the caller, im worried about donald trump, and its quite apart from his views come his conservative views. In fact im sort of sympathetic with some of them. I think we do need tax cuts. I think we need Corporate Tax cuts because i think we are not competitive because of our tax structure. Im quite sympathetic with some republican policies. Its not just me. Theres a lot of people in the country who are worried about Donald Trumps temperament to be president. Thats quite apart from ideology. Doesnt have anything to do with socialism or any substantive policy issue. And it has to do with a way of behaving that president s usually do, because their words matter and the words have an impact in the rest of the world. I think thats the word about trump. Yes, its my worry. But i say it exceeds my worry as a democrat. Host brookings. Edu which is a panel of four distinguished journalists who are going to be talking about a very, very topical subject right up there. But first i would like to give you just a little bit of background on how this particular event came about. About three years ago my colleagues here at brookings and i felt that, like a lot of revolutions, the digital revolution, exciting as it is, and in some ways may be very positive that it is, has also produced some victims. And one of those victims is longform journalism. So to try to keep that genre alive, we have launched a periodical series of what we call brookings essays. They are webbased. They take a lot of advantage of new technology, but we keep a premium on highquality, indepth writing relevant to the big issues of public policy. And an example is the disruption of the fourth estate, in particular, the rise of and the spread of fake news. So that led to us asking Susan Glasser it should be good enough to write a brookings essay that tackles that challenge in the context of the 2016 campaign and its outcome. Its harder to imagine a better offer for this venture. She has extraordinary insight, experience, and i might add a whole road ability to meet deadlines. And that, of course, is because she is very often on the other side of deadlines. As i think you all know, she has made politico a supreme platform for reportage and commentary. Earlier this year she and her husband, peter baker of the New York Times, moved to jerusalem. Yesterday, they announced that they are going to be returning to washington to cover the u. S. Role in the world and in a very interesting era that we are now entering. So welcome back to d. C. , susan, and welcome back to the Brookings Institution where you have been a really good friend to a lot of us around here, both institutionally and also personally. Shes now going to offer some opening remarks, and then she will moderate a discussion and will introduce them. The podium is now yours. Well, thank you, strobe, in particular, thank you to all of you for sharing some of your time this afternoon with me, with brookings, and with my colleagues. I want to say first of all that writing an essay about 2016 and donald trump and the media and putting it out there in the context of our posttrut posttd is kind of like inviting the troll to a dinner party. And so we can discuss a little bit what the reaction has been to the peace. The first of all i do want to thank strobe, because not only has he had the vision to really embrace long form and put the commitment of brookings behind this very provocative and powerful series of essays. Ive had the privilege of both writing one now and also editing and partnering with brookings in versions as his thesis that it had life in many different mediums as the result and i think its a very contribution. This is finally my moment as a journalist where im not entirely sure that the class that transformation is halffull. Halffull. Certainly we are here today as a result of one of the positives aspects of the media transformation and the digital revolution, which is that everybody can potentially be a publisher. Brookings has the same tools we have at politico are at the New York Times or buzzfeed. We are all grateful to brookings to putting some of its muscle into thinking about how to publish big thoughtprovoking ideas in a new world on a new set of platforms. That being said, this is my moment when i finally after 25 years as a Digital Transformation optimist has sat back down at the table, looked at the class and wondered if i i had been misreading it a little bit. I appreciate strobe are doing the hard work of explaining why the entire conclusion of my essay, which is im going to leave trump to washington moved to the middle east is not operative. So yes, i am retracting the conclusion of my essay. I like to say that after three weeks in the middle east with god it all cracked. I fixed it all and we are returning here to washington where the politics is really dysfunctional, you know . Jerusalem, you know, very same place in comparison to this place. In all seriousness, it is dizzying and extraordinary what the response and then try to come determine what the role of the meat in the 201 in the 2016, and even in the short not even two weeks since this essay was published by brookings, lets stop for a second think about the incredible series of news cycles over and over again that weve been living in. And again this is just in the last 10 days since we published this be weve been living in the great take news panic of 2016, and here as washingtonians we are typically aware of its iteration and come to our favorite neighborhood pizza place and the moment when fake news became real threats is something that were going to be thinking about i think a longtime after 2016. We have been living in the cia versus the fbi versus trump great new cycle over the question of russia and its intervention in the United States election, and to what extent is that real news or is it fake news . I think the things i have noticed which is really striking and will not be a surprise to anyone whos read this piece or thought much about the media, who now is claiming fake news around every corner and under every bed . Donald trump himself, right . Yet this incredible circle classic upon itself on whatever metaphor you want to have, but the person who is now complaining about fake news is the guy who the journals are kind of figure out how to cover and stop from purveying fake news. So we are i think any sort of fully realized hall of mirrors that results from some of his longterm trends i wrote about. What has the reaction to the essay didnt . Well, i think that metaphor of invading trolls to the dinner party is not entirely unwarranted. Know when he will be surprised to know that either this was widely prohillary essay in which we were basically making apologies for the democratic nominee, and none of it was her fault and noted that wasnt the journalist fault. Or conversely, there were a lot of people who felt that absolutely completely failed to account for the fact it really was the meet his fault that Hillary Clinton lost because we over covered her at the extent of not covering donald trump sufficiently. And, of course, theres a part of lease it was not only a coverup of Donald Trumps to needle but a coverup of Hillary Clinton is true evil and that it was written with that in mind. Another strand of criticism which ive encountered perhaps not surprisingly is that we wrote to a hardhitting stories about trumpet also that we were covering up russias intervention in the election by spending our time writing the hardhitting stories about trump or writing a hardhitting stories about clinton. And also of course i think one of the takeaways, this what i think might be fair little bit was at that i wrote this, as we making journalist feel better about the fact that nobody cares about what they do anymore. Last but im not entirely sure about that line of attack but it recovered enough in some of the island counter i thought i would throw that out there for you. Now, of course, there was many people i would say also objected to the notion that i wrote the sentence about the media being smug, insular and out of touch in the past tense. And many breeders of this essay would like you to know that they believe that the media is in the current present tense smug come into and out of touch pics i think thats a fair critique and my point was slightly different one. But there enough. And, of course, been theres just a lot of people who do matterha