Speaks in richmond. Then Maryland Governor larry hogan talks to legislators in annapolis. Later Connecticut Governor dan malloy speaks in hartford. Next, Virginia GovernorTerry Mcauliffe delivers the annual state of the commonwealth address. He outlines his legislative priorities and speaks on increased investments in the state. From the State Capitol in richmond, this is about hour. [ applause ] all right. Thank you. As speaker of the how was delegates and president of the joint assembly, its my pleasure to present to you his excellency the govern of the commonwealth, the honorable terrence r. Mcauliffe. Thank you. [ applause ] thank you. Thank you. Speak ter howell, leader norman, ladies and gentlemen of the virginia General Assembly, thank you for inviting me to speak with you this evening. And to the people of virginia who are with us tonight who are are watching from home, thank you for the honor of serving as this commonwealths 72nd governor. We are joined here this evening by our great Lieutenant Governor ralph northham. [ applause ] and our great attorney general, mark herring. [ applause ] these twos virginia leaders have been great partners as we work to build a stronger, more open, and more prosperous virginia. I thank them and, of course, our first lady is with us here this evening, dorotor mcauliffe. [ applause ] dorothy your work expanding access to healthy nutrition, promoting National Service and making our commonwealth more welcoming to military families has made our state a better place to live. Thank you for your leadership and thank you for our partnership for 28 years. That alone is worth a great round of applause. We are free here to meet tonight because of the brave men and women at the federal, state, and local levels who rick their lives to keep cuss safe each and every day. We thank all of our men and women in military uniform and we are joined this evening by one family that embodies the service and commitment that our men and women in uniform and their loved ones make to protect our great country and our commonwealth. Sean talmadge is a key member of our commonwealths Emergency Management and Disaster Response team. He is also a Lieutenant Colonel in the Virginia National guard. While we were celebrating the holidays with our families this past year, sean was separated from his on a deployment to kuwait with the 29th infantry division. Seans wife malana is with us here tonight with her two children. I hope you will join me in thanking her and fair famiand e single virginian who serves and sacrifices in uniform to keep us safe. [ applause ] before we begin, let us pause for a moment of silence in memory of our great friend and colleague chuck colvin. Senator kohlman was the longest serving member of the Virginia State senate and a true example of a virginia gentleman. He will be dearly missed. On this day three years ago, we met on the steps of this historic building. And i was honored to take the oath to serve the people of virginia as their governor. That was a day of celebration. But we all knew at that time that a significant amount of work lay ahead. Virginians hired each one of us to work for them here in richmond to solve problems and to make their lives better. In a state as large and as diversity as ours, that can be a down thing tack at any time. But we began 0 our partnership in a unique moment in our history. For years, virginias economy had floated above a massive wave of federal spending that had creates millions of jobs and brought billions in Economic Activity to Northern Virginia and hampton roads. That relationship created Economic Opportunity. But it also made tus overly reliant on federal spending. We all nope what happened next as other states began to climb out of the great recession, congressional dysfunction and defense cuts as well as sequestration severely hampered virginias ability to regain its footing. Sequestration cost virginia 9. 8 billion and 154 thousand jobs between 2011 and 2013 alone. And unless Congress Takes action, another more severe round of sequestration will hit our economy this october. And so as we gee gin our work as we did three years ago, we had a choice. We could sit back and watch external forces limit our growth or we could Work Together to open up a new chapter of opportunity here in virginia. We needed to build a nud virginia economy, one that would grow and create opportunity no matter what happens in washington, beijing, or anywhere else in the world. We needed to redouble our focus on Economic Development and make virginia more attractive to job creators in sectors like cybersecurity, bioscience, Data Analytics and advanced manufacturing. We needed to align every public system from transportationing to Public Education to Workforce Development with the needs of aid 21st century economy. We needed to build a more open and welcoming climate to attract families and job creators from every single walk of life. And so we got to work. Recognizing that 95 of the worlds customers live outside the United States of america. We took the virginia story to 19 countries and every corner of the globe. We took every meet wiig could get and convinced job carats to bring new operations to our commonwealth or to buy our world class goods, agriculture products or services that our businesses were offering. And those efforts have paid off. As of tonight, we have helped close 853 Economic Development deals worth 14. 2, 3 billion in new capital investment. I am proud to say that is nearly 5 billion more than any administration in the history of the commonwealth of virginia. [ applause ] and so let us start out the new year with a bang. Tonight, i am proud to announce that Navy Federal Credit union has agreed to locate 1400 new jobs and invest 102 million in Frederick County, virginia. [ applause ] i hope i hope that you will join me in welcoming Navy Federals ceo, Cutler Dawson and the vice chair of the Frederick County board of supervisors gene fisher who are here with us tonight to celebrate that major victory for the commonwealth. [ applause ] and as you can imagine, i am very pleased that we beat out the state of florida for this important project. Got sharks in their water and everything down there, forget it. Bringing new products like this one to virginia is critically important. In fact, i just took the red eye back after two days of Business Outreach in california and we are closing in on bringing thousands of new jobs and billions of new investment to virginia which we will begin to announce in the next month but we also need to build a lasting infrastructure that will generate even more jobs and Economic Activity for generations to come. And working together, we are doing just that. Last year, we passed a budget that invested more than 1 billion in Public Education. The highest level in virginia history. [ applause ] we are transforming our k12 system to prepare students for the jobs of the 21st century. With a particular emphasis on modernizing the sols and how we deliver high school education. I want to recognize delegate tag agreeson and the late senator jon miller for their partnership in transforming our commonwealths Education System. [ applause ] thank you guys for clapping for tag. Thanks to the leadership of our first lady, we are connecting more students with the nutrition that they need to thrive in the classroom and to grow Healthy Minds and bodies. Virginia students are hungry to learn but they cannot learn if theyre just plain hungry. That is why im so proud that last year alone, virginia schools served 5 million more School Breakfasts than the last year before and i thank you, dorothy, for your effort. [ applause ] that success would not be possible without leaders who recognize in strong accessible nutrition programs are essential to a quality education. Dr. Scott bray brand is one those leaders. As superintendent of the lynchburg city schools, dr. Bray brand helped oversee a 20 increases in School Breakfast participation in just one year adding 550 students to the program. He has also thrown his support behind after school and summer meal programs to help insure that more than 6,000 students who who rely on school meals do not go hungry when classes end. Let us welcome scott here this evening and thank him for his leadership on behalf of his students. [ applause ] over several sessions we have reformed virginias Workforce Development system and insenty advised institutions and students to complete degrees and credentials in high demand industries, and this work comes at a very critical time. Virginia is very unique. Our problem is not that we dont have the high paying jobs available. Its that we dont have the trained workers to fill those jobs. Last year, virginia saw 149,000 jobs open in the Technology Sector alone. And today, we have 36,000 cyber jobs open. Parents who are watching tonight, listen to me. The average starting pay for these jobs is 88,000. Our mission, all of us in this chamber, is to prepare students with the skill sets they need to fill these jobs so they can lead our economy into the future. We have helped veterans get into the private workforce faster by offering workforce credit for military training. We expanded the virginia values program to help more than 20,000 veterans find work. We funded the opening of two new veteran care centers so that he virginia men and women who have served in uniform no longer have to wait for the federal government to get its act together to get the health care that they need. This they wont do it, we do it for our virginia veterans. [ applause ] we launched healthy virginia to extend services to 10,000 virginians with serious mental illness. And helped 378,000 virginians Access Health insurance through the Affordable Care act. [ applause ] we took Great Strides forward on transportation. Undertaking significant projects in high traffic corridors across virginia, like. 95. 64, and i66. We passed the smart scale priorization process so the decisions are now based on data about the benefits that our taxpayers will receive for the economy, not on back room deal making. After several disastrous public similarity private partnership deals that cost virginians hundreds of millions of dollars we have transformed the process and brought a Taxpayer First approach to negotiating these important deals. The results of our efforts are clear. If we had followed the old process, the. 66 outside the belt way project i Just Announced would have cost taxpayers 1 billion. However, by reforming our system and strengthening how we negotiate, the final deal will not require virginians to invest one single dollar. And winning consortium, think about this theyve agreed to include an additional 800 million in transit improvements, 350 million in corridor improvements and when we go to financial close, they are going to write the commonwealth a check for 500 million. Our reforms and leadership resulted in a 2. 5 billion turn around on this project alone. We won 1765 million federal grant for the 1. 4 billion at lant at that time gateway project which will unlock travel and commerce on road and rail all across the commonwealth. We returned the port of virginia to financial solvency and made record investments to position our commonwealth as a leader in global trade for generations to come. As a result, the port which had suffered seven straight years of operating losses and was once unwisely put up for sale is now profitable and leading the nation in import volume growth. [ applause ] we ensured a Bright Future for private space flight notice virginia by strengthening the mars space port. Thank you, lynwood. We let from the back of the pack on Cyber Security signs, Autonomous Vehicles and Renewable Energy to now becoming a National Leader in these cutting edge industries. Im particularly proud of the work that we have all done together working on Cyber Security. This is a critical issue for the commonwealth. Last year in virginia, we experienced 70 million cyber attacks. That is one every four seconds. We have a responsibility to protect our data from cyber criminals and to realize the Economic Opportunity that this industry presents. As chairman of the National Governors association, i have made Cyber Security the centerpiece of my agenda and i am now proud to say that virginia is leading the way in america. We made virginia safer by reforming our juvenile Justice System and posting the lowest adult recidivism rate in america. [ applause ] we took action to protect virginia from the threat of Climate Change and Sea Level Rise by winning a 120 million federal resiliency grant for norfolk and other communities in hampton roads. Im proud to say, this is the largest grant given to any state in the United States of america. [ applause ] we have made Great Strides protecting virginias hick and natural assets, as well. After 30 years, attorney general herring and our team finally reached an agreement with du pont on the largest Natural Resource settlement in the history of virginia bringing 50 million back to virginia to improve our environment in waynesboro and the surrounding areas. [ applause ][ applause ] we undertook an initiative to preserve 1,000 virginia natural historic treasures for the enjoyment of generations to come. We accomplished it one full year ahead of schedule, and tonight, i am proud to announce that after three years of negotiations with the United States army, we are now finally having an agreement to expand virginias historic fort monroe and take possession so that for generations to come, fort monroe will be for our virginia citizens. [ applause ] these three years have been defined by significant substantive accomplishments on one key policy initiative after another. Those achievements are not victories for one party or another. They are victories for virginia. We an cleebd them by working together and doing what takes to build a new virginia economy from the bottom up. And if you look at the numbers, its clear we are making substantial progress. When i took office, virginias Unemployment Rate was 5. 4 . Over the course of this administration, it fell to as low as 3. 7 which represented the steepest decline in any governors term in 32 years. Claps today as more and more vanyians responds to our strengthening economy by returning to the workforce is higher and now the Second Lowest rate of any major state in america. In total, virginia has created 167,100 new jobs in the last three years. These are important indicators that our efforts are working and that our trajectory is indisp e indisputably upward. But we should also remember that these numbers actually represent real people with real stories. I would like to take a moment to tell you about a few people who have benefitted from actions that we have taken working together. One of my proudest moments of my life came on april 22nd of last year when i stood on the steps of the capitol and brought virginia into the line with 40 other states that restored the civil rights of people who made mistakes and hop have served their time. [ applause ] now, as you know, that action was greeted by cheers from some corners of this room and lawsuits from others. But folks, the principles of redemption and Second Chances are essential to a healthy society. And i was very proud to fight for them. Since that day, my team has worked hard to restore the rights of individuals who have served their time and reentered society to build Productive Lives and tonight, i am proud to announce that thanks to those efforts, we have given more than 127,000 virginians a Second Chance at citizenship since i took office. [ applause ] i would like to you meet one of them tonight. Terry garrett was born in 1968 and grew up in Northern Virginia. After two decades of Substance Abuse and frequent incarcerations, she found so bright and she turned her life around. Today, in addition to her role as a loving mother and grandmother, terry is a respected Community Leader and now a responser to recovering addict and former offenders. Terry made mistakes. She served her time. She became a productive member of our community. But our policy of disenfranchisement made her a second class citizen. Until last year. Afterrys rights were restored in august, she walked into a voting booth for the first time in her life this past november, regaining her place in our society and showing all of us how powerful a Second Chance can be. Terry is here with us tonight on behalf of so many virginians who are proud to have a voice in their commonwealths future once again. I hope you will join me in welcoming terry to our capital. [ applause ] when men and Women Volunteer to fight for our country in the armed forces, we have a responsibility to support them when they return to civilian life. Unfortunately, too many end their military service and face enormous challenges with too few resources or opportunities for success. Many find themselves without a place to call home. Shortly after my administration began, First Lady Michelle Obama sent a challenge to all the mayors in america. To end veteran homelessness in their cities. I can still remember the look on secretary john harveys face when i suggested that we take that challenge. Not just for our virginia cities but for our entire commonwealth. But he and the fantastic team at the department of veterans services, social services and housing and community development, they got to work to find safe, affordable and permanent housing for our Homeless Veterans and on veterans day, 2015, i was proud to announce that is virginia was the first state in the nation to be certified as functionally ending veteran homelessness. [ applause ] na accomplishment should be a source of pride for all of us. Particularly when you meet the men and women who have benefited the most. Deon sa roberts is with us tonight from chesapeake. He bravely served in the Army Airborne in several Missions Including operation desert storm. Like too many others, deodis faced challenges when he returned home after nearly 11 years without a reliable roof over his head, deodis finally received permanent housing thanks to the great work of our virginia public servants. Deodis, i want to say thank you for joining us this evening and thank you for service to our great nation. [ applause ] these virginians and their stories are an uplifting reminder of the impact that we can have on peoples lives when we Work Together. As ive traveled virginia and met the families that we serve, i have taken great pride in the process that we have made for them to help them with their lives but despite our enormous strides, we still have problems that we need to work on together. The agenda that i present to you this evening builds on the work that we have done together over the past three years. Every single proposal is tied directly to building a new virginia economy that creates opportunity for families from every walk of life and every corner of our commonwealth. One of the most severe challenges facing our commonwealth today is how we care for our fellow virginians who suffer from Behavioral Health disorders. As too many recent tragic events have taught us, our Current System is too fragmented and underfunded. The budget that i submitted to you last month includes new funding to allow our Community Service boards to offer same day service to virginians who are experiencing health crisis. This allow our csbs to serve virginians rather than turning them away at risk of their health and risk of others. One result of our challenged mental system is that too many individual whos suffer from Behavioral Health and they have these disorders, sometimes they wind up in jail. Where there are not enough resources to properly care for them. To solve the problem, i have proposed legislation and funding to expand Mental Health screening in local and regional sxwrals and as we work to prevent future tragedies i have proposed legislation giving the virginia board of corrections the authority to investigate deaths in virginia jails so that that role is very clear if one does occur. But before we move on, i want to especially thank senator cree deeds for his vision and his leadership on then very important issue. [ applause ] we cannot fully reform our Mental Health system without tackling the massive epidemic that virginia and other states face across the nation. We are confronting the issue of heroin and prescription drugs. In 2015, we saw more than 800 of our fellow virginians of all ages, of all walks of life, die due to opioid addiction and overdose. And when the final data is available, we expect to noeths 2016 to have exceeded 1,000. Tackling this problem is a matter of life and death for people in every corner of virginia. My Budget Proposal includes 5. 3 million for increased Substance AbuseDisorder Services and new tools to prevent overdose deaths. I have also introduced a pag of legislative reforms that include limiting opioid prescriptions written in Emergency Departments to three days. Requiring e prescriptions for all prescription narcotics and allowing Community Organizations to distribute delox zone during opioid response training. The men and women affected by this crisis, our sons and daughters, mothers and fathers, husbands and wives, if we acted together boldly here in virginia, we can fight this epidemic and keep these virginians and their families and their communities healthy. I look forward to working with members including delegates john obannon, john bell and todd billion to confront this urgent problem. These investments and policy changes will enhance our Mental Health system and confront our growing opioid epidemic. Additionally, as we wait for congress to derryl the future of the Affordable Care act, we should always remember that Medicaid Expansion offers us an additional 300 million per year tore strengthen our Behavioral Health system. As you know, the budget i submitted gives the governor the authority to expands medicaid if an enhanced federal match is available after february of 20 17 and even if that is not the case, we should all the agree that we do have a responsibility to help as many people as we can Access Health care. Virginians elected us to solve problems. 400,000 People Living without health care is a problem. We should never stop seeking ways to solve this problem. [ applause ] another matter that deserves our attentioning is insuring that our criminal Justice System is keeping our communities safe and in an eve and cost efficient manner. I am proud of the progress that we have made transforming virginias juvenile Justice System from an adult style incarceration system to now a data driven enterprise aimed at putting our young people on to a better path. We can build on our progress reforming our criminal Justice System with smart policy choices this session. Up with way to accomplish this goal is to increase account commonwealths threshold for felony larscy from 200 to 500. Right now, virginia is tied with new jersey for 50th out of 50 for the most punitive felony threshold in the nation. Let us Work Together to bring virginia up from the bottom of the rankings on this very important issue. [ applause ] another step that we can take to protect virginians economic productivity is to limit the number of people whose driver licenses are suspended due to unpaid court costs and felon driving related offenses. Suspending peoples drivers license limits their ability to work which only makes it more difficult for them to earn the money to pay off the debt and to build a better life. Additionally, im proposing to make it easier for people who have been wrongly convicted of crimes to clear their names. This bill will allow individuals to petition for a writ of actual innocence if new evidence indicates that they were wronglily convicted even if they have pleaded guilty. [ applause ] last month, i submitted my amendments to the commonwealths biennial spending plan for physical years 2016 through 2018. The plan that i presented to you addresses the commonwealths revenue shortfall while protecting Core Services like education and public safety. It hasnt always been easy but our Work Together on the budget has always been marked bibi partisan cooperation. I particularly want to thank chairman jones, wehr, norman and hanger for your continuing partnership in dealing with virginias budget and spending plan. [ applause ] our state workforce is the best in america. And they deserve more compensation than they currently receive. I am proud that we have worked over the past three years together to pass two such salary increases. While the language in our budget stricted the second raise due to our revenue shortfall, the budget offers virginias teachers, state employees, state supported legal employees a 1. 5 bonus as a stopgap until our revenue conditions allow for a permanent increase in base pay. If our revenue continues to improve, im eager to work with you to prioritize more significant pay increase. Even as we have dealt with a challenging revenue picture, the budget that i submitted to you does not make nel program cuts to k through 12 education. [ applause ] it also requires fewer reductions from our Higher Education system than originally anticipated. I am proud of the work that we have done together to strengthen virginias Education System from prek all the way through higher ed and mid career workforce training. This session we can build on those accomplishments together. We all agree that Technology Provides us with the opportunity to offer high quality education to students who are unable to attend school in a traditional setting. This year, i am proposing to offer fulltime high quality Virtual Training to every single student in virginia. I am also proposing several pieces of legislation aimed at helping virginians access Student Financial aid and pay those loans off as quickly and easily as possible. Right now, virginians collectively owe over 30 billion on student loans. But too often, those loans lack basic Consumer Protections against predatoriry loan services. To meet that challenge, im proposing a borror hes bill of rights with basic Consumer Protections and more information assistance on repaying debt. I am also proposing legislation that will give virginians institutions of Higher Education the authority to restructure Financial Aid to incentivize students to be complete degrees within four years. This proposal will help schools minimize the amount of debt students republican incurring on the way to a degree. Delegate kirk cox and senator diz sazlaw have been leaders on this issue and i look forward to working with them in the next coming weeks. [ applause ] dic duh vozenilek devos and. As we prepare our students to work and succeed in the new virginia economy, we have a responsibility to use taxpayer dollars wisely to ensure that there are jobs waiting for them when they graduate. I know we all agree that we should strengthen how our commonwealth serves taxpayers with respect to Economic Development. Im proud of the recordbreaking successes that we have had bringing new jobs and Economic Activity to virginia. However, if we are going to truly build a new virginia economy, we must use every single dollar to its greatest impact creating jobs and opportunity. Ince it was created nearly 22 years ago, the virginia Economic Development partnership has served our commonwealths primary Economic Development driver. There are many hard working men and women at vedp, but as a recent report identified, the organization is in need of stronger management and accountability. Reforming vedp should not be a partisan issue. Its its problems have persisted over the terms of five previous governors and 21 General Assembly sessions. I am ready to work with you to ensure that virginias Economic Development infrastructure is delivering the return on investment that taxpayers have a right to expect. Making virginia the best home to veterans and military families is another area of significant bipartisan achievement over the course of the last three years. The budget that i propose to you will expand the success that we have had connecting veterans with jobs through our v3 program. I am proposing a twoyear pilot to assist veteran entrepreneurs who want to Start Companies in high growth sectors. We can also direct our social Service Agencies to better coordinate with the military authorities in the cases of family abusen an neglect of military children. These initiatives will strengthen our commonwealths position as the best place on earth for veterans and military families to call their home. [ applause ] last year, we worked together on a historic bipartisan package to keep guns out of the hands of domestic abusers and people who could not pass background checks. I want to thank todd gilbert for the great work in assisting us there. Lets give todd a great round of applause. There goes his career. [ laughter ] im only teasing, come on. The legislation that we passed included the first meaningful restrictions on dangerous gun ownership in a generation. And showed the rest of the world that common sense compromise is possible on this issue. This year, we have an opportunity to strengthen the Domestic Violence protection law which is already the toughest in america. By expandsing it to include nonfamily abuse orders as well as permanent protective orders. This change which is being sponsored by senator janet howell and delegate Kathleen Murphy would keep more virginians safe from gun crime. Additionally, let us go ahead and make 2017 the year that we make universal background checks for firearm sales the policy of the commonwealth of virginia. [ applause ] over the years, weve also worked together productivititively to reform our commonwealthetic system. The reforms ta we passed including a cap on gifts that could be accepted from lobbyists have contributed to a new culture of accountability here in richmond that reinforces virginias worldwide reputation for clean and well run government. This year, i propose that we ban the personal use you have campaign funds. There is room for honest disagreement on many ethical issues, but we should all be able to agree that political contributions should be spent informing voters and not in lining politicians pockets. [ applause ] any effort to build a stronger economy and society must begin with as many giving virginians as possible a full voice in that society. Unfortunately here in virginia and across the nation, too many laws have been passed that are designed to restrict access to democracy rather than to expands it. When it was passed, our photo i. D. Law made it significantly harder for many virginians to vote without any evidence that voter fraud is a problem here in virginia. And so this year. Reporter hope that we will repeal that will law. [ applause ] i will also submit legislation this session to allow nonexcuse inperson absentee voting and to are add a new excuse for absentee by mail for child caregivers. These reforms are based on a simple principle. That virginia is strongest when were working together to make it easier to votes, not harder. For the past three years, our Work Together has been seen far more by the partisanship that we have done together than i did advicive battles. Were not always going to agree. Thats what democracy is all about. While political fights rage in washington, weve proven time and time again that virginia is a place where leaders can still Work Together to get things done. In fact, over the past two sessions we have worked together to pass 72 of the initiatives that i presented to you, and i sincerely thank all of you for that. We can build on that record this year, but only if we remain focused on the issues that are most important to virginians. As we begin our Work Together this session, our neighbor, North Carolina, remains mired in ady visive and counterproductive battle over laws its Legislature Passed that target the rights of lgbt citizens. As we have seen that, state and others attacks on equality and Womens Health care rights dont just embarrass the states that engage in them, it kills jobs. Since North CarolinaLegislature Passed hb2 and their former governor signed, the state has lost out on millions in Economic Activity and thousands of jobs. As organizations like deutsche bank, paypal, the nba, the ncaa have withdrawn investments in that state. At the same time, virginia has taken a different approach. Over the past three years, weve worked to send a message to the families and the job carats all over the globe that our commonwealth will not tolerate zrijs discriminations against anyone including the lbgt community. [ applause ] this year virginia competed directly with North Carolina for the star Group Research head quarter and we started out with a disadvantage when they put a package on the table that was three times the size of ours in virginia, in the end virginia open and visit climate trumped North Carolina attacks on quality and co star is bring 732 new high paying right jobs right here no richmond, virginia. [ applause ] to tonight, im asking for your assistants to bring more to virginia rather than turning them away. I will veto that undermines the constitutional Health Care Rights of our virginia women. [ applause ] im 710 on veto override. I hope you deny opportunity by restraining from sending to me things counter productive. We must protect our climate by eraising division from our code in our constitution. After a landmark ruling, Marriage Equality is the law of the land. We should not wait for another session to comply with that ruling, lets take it out and ban it from the books here in virginia. [ applause ] in years past virginia created laws that are overt efforts to undermine a womans right to Reproductive Health care. I pledged to combat virginia law attempting to shut offices that offer abortion. Filing a lengthily regulatory process, im proud to say we kept our promise and preventing that law from closing a single clinic here in virginia. [ applause ] that law along with virginias law forcing a medically unnecessary ultrasound on a woman, does not keep people safer or health year, they enjekt government into decision that should be made by a woman in cultulation with her doctor, so lets repeal them both this year. [ applause ] if we can Work Together to roll back attacks on quality and constitution of rights and stand against future proposal, we can send a message that virginia is equal for every walk of life. The next 45 days offers us to submit progress we have made and to address the problems that need to be solved. If we seize this opportunity we can continue to build a New California economy that works better for people from every corner of the commonwealth and other every walk of life, we can strength our Economic Development efforts so every taxpayer dollars going to activities. Expand Virtual Learning and offer virginiians shot at education. Better place to live who are eager to start in our commonwealth. We can continue to show the nation and the world that virginia is a place where leaders come together to get things done no matter their political points of view. Three years ago, we met on the steps of this building and began a Unlikely Partnership after a long and difficult campaign, we had every reason to retreat to our partisan corners, we took different course. We identified issue where compromise could be reached and wet get to work making life better for the people we seven. So this even as we begin our section together, i want to say to all of you thank you, thank you for your leadership, your partnership, your dedicated overcoming political obstacle on the way to doing the right thing. We have real incentive to Work Together. As the father of five, i share the dream of every single virginia papt parent. That my children will find the opportunities to live, work and raise family in our home state. But that will not be possible without the vision and leadership of the people in this room here tonight. So as i conclude i hope you will join me for one more section to strengthen the foundation we have laid and build upon it im ready to work with you to i chief the goal and i look forward to con legislation you will send to me. If we take this opportunity, i know we will emerge with a stronger resilient economy that works for all virginia. May god continue to bless the greatest state on earth the commonwealth of virginia. Thank you. [ applause ] [ cheers and applause ] friday a discussion on future of free speech during the trump administration. Live from the cay toe institute on cspan 3. Friday former cia director petraeus joins on the role afghanistan played on starting on cspan 3. Sunday indepth will feature nick adams, taking call, tweets during the program. Despite the problems of america, this is still by far and away the greatest country in the history of the world. Nick adams author of great is good. How the turn around nation will do it again. Retaking america, crushing political correctness. Founder and director american greatness an organization promoting to combatting annism worldwide. Noon from 3 00 p. M. Eastern sunday day on cspan 2. Next, Maryland Governor delivers annual state of the state address at capital indianapolis