on-demand radio, think about a jukebox. put that on the internet. you can specify which song up to the hear. you can specify to shuffle on the internet radio stream. so you go to spotify. you want to hear a mix of songs that you like, and you know, but you also say mix it up a little bit, some of it is on demand some of it is prepackaged, but you can also take it from your collection. think about on an on-demand jukebox or some mix of that, and that's the on demand radio. your next traditional model that has essentially morphed to the internet morphed toance and digital, is buying music. some of are you old enough to remember record stores, you know, tower, sam goody. no, ok. they also used to sell other things paraphernalia your parents didn't want you to have, at least in my town. so think about just purchase music. $8.99 an album, that's at the far end of the spectrum. and once you own that music, today you can generally import it to whatever device you want. it comes in primarily mp3 format, although if you're neil young, you're purchasing the new player. the branding is interesting. he wants to do higher bit rate streams, higher quality streams, and he's pulled his music down from all the services that young people listen to, so he's clearly defined his audience as my parent. and i'm a neil young fan. i love neil young. but he put his music out on eight-tracks, so what's the big deal about a lower bit rate stream? the most interesting business model forance and digital music is conditional downloads or subscription services, that let do you a whole variety of things. you're paying $10 a month, $8 a month, $13 a month, to spotify, the new apple music, i'm trying to remember other services, rhapsody what's that? title, another one where the star thinks it's going to make the difference. those are services that let you do almost everything, right? you can stream prepackaged stations. you can stream music you already purchased. you can download conditionally. think about a temporary download. as long as you pay your $9.99 a month, you can listen to that music and port it to your device and take it wherever you want. you can probably even port it to your hard drive and your car. cars have hard drives. they are all out there. some of them are free. some of them are fremium models, and then they try to upsell to you a subscription price, and some of them are subscriptions, and they all mix and match in between. so pandora for free is advertising supported. pandora as a subscription is ad free. but they're both internet radio. they're both noninteractive internet radio, which means they fall under the statutory license that some other folks will talk about. that's really -- some subscriptions offer family plans, right? i will tell you, true story, ted cohen will tell you this story. he was at a record company. they were licensing an early internet music company. the business development person came in and said we want to license this service so that two people can listen to the music at the same time. and the record industry executive said we can't do that we have to charge them double. and the business development person came back and said, you know what, i think we can let two people in, because if not, one person will listen and the other person will steal it, so let's give them a break, and now you have the apple family plan and other businesses are doing family plans, and, of course, just on your capable subscription you can watch on four tv's at once, the record industry over the last 20 years has recognized that we want to make this attractive, and the record industry has come a long way, and there's a licensed -- all these services are legal. they're all licensed. none of them have anything to do with piracy. and you can argue they all substitute for piracy, which is a great thing. and they put billions of dollars every year into artists and songwriters and labels and publishers, and substitute for the fact that tower records doesn't exist anymore. so thank you. tim: that was great. the 1995 act was for sound recordings. again, what you catch on tape, what you store in mp3, the sound r0rding of it. there's other rights, though, that are what makes this more complicated. we're going to layer that on now. al sect probably the best person to talk about, from his perspective, those other types of rights and how they kind of influence the conversations that you hear in the news and on tv and in the industry. so alec, if you can explain the next layer of complexity. alec sure. also to want thank tim and the internet caucus for having me here. i'm going start with a little prop see if this sounds any good. >> ♪ because you know i'm all about the bass no treble i'm all about the bass ♪ alec: everyone has heard that song, i assume. does anyone know who the band is? throw out a name. meghan trainor. does anyone who know wrote that song? so this is the -- this is the core issue. actually actually, there are two copyrights in every piece of music that you hear. there's a copyright in the sound recording that meghan trainor made, the fact that's her voice, everything you hear, there's a copyright in that sound recording. but there's also a copyright in what's called the musical composition. someone sat down, i'll tell you who, and actually wrote the lirtoiks that song and music the musical notes that would be played by the different instruments. so you have a music composition and a sound recording in r song you hear. actually for that song meghan trainor was one of the writers, and another guy named kevin is the co-writer. so you have some guy you've never heard of who is the writer of the piece of music that then was recorded. kevin, you probably wouldn't want to go see him in concert because you don't know him. you probably are not going to buy t-shirts with his face on it because you don't know him. he's a writer. that's his job. that's what he does. and it's a completely different copyright in a completely different business than the sound recording business. i'm going to talk about the songwriter, because that's who i represent through ascap and julia is going to handle the sound recording side. you have two copyrights. now, when you have a copyright, the copyright gives you the exclusive right, meaning you're the person who has the right to do certain things. for music, the ones that are important are, you have the exclusive right to reproduce, to make copies of your copyrighted work. you have the exclusive right to publicly perform your musical composition, and third right is to distribute it. there are two other rights, don't really implicate music, so we won't talk about them. well, to get to kind of the core of what this panel is about, you as a songwriter have these exclusive rights. you don't actually have the right to go out and exercise those rights in the free market in most cases. in your cases, your ability to license the rights to others who want to have them is regulated in one way or another. and to give you a quickover view of what that is, when someone wants to publicly perform your music as a songwriter, and this is you know thst tim talked about the 1995 act, that actually only applies to sound recording. songwriters have had a right to perform their work since the first copyright act was created in 1789. when you want to publicly perform a songwriter's work, whether it's a radio station, so a radio station want to do it, a war, a restaurant, a concert venue pandora spotify , cable television, broadcast television, when any of those services want to perform music, they've got to get the rights from the songwriter. imagine how complicated it would be if a radio station had to go out and find and then negotiate with the songwriters of all the music that you hear on a radio station. well, pop 40, maybe it's only 40 songs, but pandora, it's millions, millions of songwriters. that just isn't an efficient -- you couldn't have that kind of negotiation with all the songwriters that are out there. what are names of people you never heard of? for example, who was meghan trainor's songwriter? i've already forgotten. so you have this market frob a licensee side, from folks who want to publicly perform music, they wouldn't be able to find all the songwriters and actually have a negotiation with all of them over the rights. from the songwriter's song, if you're writing all about the bass, do you want to drive around the country and knock on the door of every bar and restaurant and concert vensandue sit down with pandora and try to cut a deal with them? that's crazy. that's just -- you're going to be spending all of your time on the business side and none of your time on the creative side. so how the market has kind of fixed this, and this has been going on since 1914, is what sprung up called p.r.o.'s, performance rights organizations. ascap is the oldest of them. it started in 1914. it's been around over 100 years. ascap has 500-plus, about 550,000 songwriters that have chosen to be members of ascap and have given ascap the right to license public performances. so ascap now has 550,000 members, songwriter members, a repertory of over nine million songs, and ascap goes out and licenses all the entities that want to publicly perform that music, and then takes in royalties from all the entities. we have over 700,000 licensees across america. takes in the royalties tries to figure out whose music was played, how much, and then distributes that money to the songwriters. so that business model that's come around since 1914 is kind of an efficient way to make sure licensees and songwriters can meet and license the music. but in 1941 the justice department decided the two big -- there's a competitor to ascap called b.m.i., decided to subject them to an antitrust consent decree because of the market share they've had. since 1971 almost 75 years, you had the government as the backstop here, kind of setting the rules for how songwriters' music is licensed through public performance. and i won't get into too much detail, but that's one way the government now regulates this marketplace. it says the government is going to control how rates are set, and functionally at the end, how much is actually paid by licensees to songwriters for performance of their music. that's the performance side, and that's the regulatory regime that applies there. jonathan mentioned downloads you know itunes, and actually spotify, up may not know it also involves copying. you have to have a separate copy that you send a stream from. that world of how do songwriters license reproductions, copies of their music to folks like apple or on c.d.'s and elsewhere, people who want to make copies, that is a completely different regulatory regime that congress has control over because every reproduction is subject to a cat story license. congress in 1909 going way, way back, actually said, if someone wants to make a copy of a musical composition that a songwriter created, they're going to have a right to do so. they don't have to negotiate it with the song writer in the free market. you don't actually have to sit down with them. congress is going to create -- in this case there's a three-judge panel in the library of congress, three administrative law judges who determine the rate that a songwriter will be paid each time their music is copied. you know, the rate today is 9.1 cents. in 1909, it was two cents. so it's gone up a little. but that's how copies are regulated. the third and last is there's actually one area of the marketplace where songwriters' rights is regulated by the free market. every time a television studio takes music and wants to incorporate it into a movie or a tv show, they actual have the to get the rights from the writer. they're actually making a copy of that musical composition to include, along with the sound recording in a movie or tv show. background music theme song, etc. that negotiation between the producer of the tv or movie and the songwriter is a free market negotiation. you know they've get the rights and they have to -- if a songwriter doesn't like what they're being offered, capital cities "safe and sound," they don't like the price they're being offered, they can say no. excuse me, the songwriter, capital cities is the band so. those are the three big baskets and the ways functionally that songwriters' licensing of their invites regulated. tim: we've only scratched the surface. alec just went over the composer's rights, and we've talked about having part of that system be governed by d.o.j. consent decree. another portion of that, the copy portion being controlled by a three-judge panel somewhere the copyright review board. those are the other rights. let's get back a little bit to what congress did in 1995, which was the digital performance right for sound recordings. that really kind of says a lot to explain the services you listen to on your phone. to help us kind of understand that and over the past 20 years, how the marketplace has grown and what has enabled that to grow, because alec kind of said his organization, like ascap and b.m.i., have really enabled songwriters to get compensated with -- and focus on the creative and not the business side. the marketplace for the performance rights that congress made in 1995, julia can explain more about how that has evolved and the role her company plays in that. julia: ok. it's funny, so i thought i would have to lay agrot of ground work here, but you guys have laid a lot of the ground work for me alec talked about the two copyrights in every recording that you hear. there's the composition, the notes and lyrics, and the sound recording. the sound recording is that artist, that recording artist's interpretation of that composition. and then fixed permanently somehow to be a recording. so before 1995 and 1998, before the performance right was created in those two laws, there was no performance right for sound recordings under federal law. but suddenly in 1998 there was, and there was no one to collect royalties for that performance right. and so as services developed, and as the need to pay royalties developed, the industry collectively created an entity to collect royalties, and that was sound exchange. so initially it was kind of this -- in the corner of an office a group of people trying to figure out, how are we going to do this? as alex was saying, if you have to go to every person who makes a recording and every copyright sandorn figure that out, that is very time consuming and complicated, and we probably wouldn't have many of the services we have today if that was the way things had to work. so sound exchange was born, and in 2003, became an independent nonprofit collective that represents the entire recording industry. so signed artists, mega stars, local bands, major labels, indie labels we represent all artists, recording artists, and copyright owners which is normally a record label, but it can often also be the artist who decides to record for themselves and owns their own master recordings. i should also tell you our board reflects we represent the entire industry. our board is half representatives of record labels, indie labels, major labels, and their trade associations and half artists and their representatives, and artist managers and artist unions. and every dollar of royalty social security paid through sound exchange is split 50-50 between the copyright owners, usually the record label and the artists. and that is something that is unique, and it is a reason that -- a reason that artists love sound exchange. it is a reason that people often point to sound exchange as kind of the bright spot for transparency in the recording industry which is a big issue that a lot of people are talking about right now. the other things we do besides distributing royalties, we represent everyone at the copyright royalty board, which is the entity over at the line rather of congress that alec mentioned earlier that sets the rates for all of these royalties. we also advocate on behalf of the industry up here and where else to try to protect those rates and to support fair pay for artists and copyright owners so. that's the really easy view of what sound exchange does. i have a more complicated view if you want notice get into that. tim: no, not yet, not yet. i guess basic what will you're saying is that you know, whether it's alec's organization or your organization, the very highest level and the goal is to make sure that artists creative people could get compensated quickly, services could get access to music in the most efficient way possible, to get it out to people so they can listen to it in a variety of different ways. julia: let me fwalk that for just a second. kind of the mouthful i like say of what sound exchange does is the nonprofit collective designated by the board to collect and distribute royalties paid for the public performance of sound recordings via noninteractive digital audio transmissions to u.s. listeners pursuant to the statutory licenses that congress created in section 112 and 114 of the copyright act. most of the first part of that sentence you guys understand because the terms have been defined by everybody else on the panel so far. you understand what public performance is what a sound recording is, sort of what noninteractive is. you understand that it's audio, not audio visual, so it's not youtube. it's only this part. and that it's digital. it's not terrestrial, which i know we're not going to get into this, but that's the fact that terrestrial radio does not pay artists any royalty and never has is a big inequity in the industry. tim: you mean a.m./f.m.o. your old car radio, you're saying that whoever broadcasts that does not pay the artists but they do -- if i had a new car radio with wifi and it was streaming pandora, they do. julia: yes. tim: this is getting complicated. julia: lest you think this is only about spotify and pandora there are 2,500 services that pay royalties through sound exchange. so it's webcasters like pandora. it's satellite radio, which right now is just sirius x.m. it's am/fm broadcasters who decide they want to simulcast online, and it is capable and satellite television systems that have music on them, the stations that are way up at the top of the the big numbers on cable. that's the complicated description. it's important just in terms of the history of it, to understand. in 2005, when sound he can change made its first distribution of royalties, the total distribution was $20 million. half to rope copyright owners, thoof artists. last year, sound exchange distributed $773 million so. this is where there's exponential growth in the industry where everywhere else you are hearing that industry revenue as a total is going down. we really are where technology and music meet. and part of the reason for that, and this is, you know, when we get to the question about who's more powerful accident taylor swift or congress congress created this platform. and this is the platform -- congress created this in 199 , and this is the platform on which this whole industry was born. and now it is $773 million last year. about this year it will probably be closer to $89 hundred million for -- to $900 million for artists. tim: some definitions are just money. so this is one piece but congress is just yielded like 3/4 of a billion dollars for artists through this system. weep keel that in mind. kevin has been asked to do clean-up, but one thing we haven't talked about is taylor swift, is she just the meghan trainor the guy i can't remember who wrote the song? we haven't even talked about that. where does the powers of taylor swift come from? kevin: a lot to digest. so everybody understands there's two kind of copyright. is there a microphone? oh, what do you know? everybody understands there's two kinds of copyright embedded in everything you listen to. so there's the sound recording, and there's the composition, h. the sound recording compensates the performer and the owner is usually the record label that sometimes the artists themselves. and the composition, which compensates the publisher. we also understand that there's different kinds of internet streaming. there's the noninteractive streaming, which among other things funnels its royalties through sound exchange, and then there's interactive streaming. interactive streaming is set up different ways that often requires direct negotiation with the owners of the sound recordings which is usually the record labels, and that was part of the act. congress mandated that they have to negotiate. they have to negotiate those licenses because they're not -- the statutory created, so the absence of a statutory is why they're having to negotiate that ok. and then for unaffiliated artists, people who don't have a record label at all, up to the get your music on spotif aye. you go through an aggregater, which is somebody like a c.d. baby, these companies that can get your music stocked in any on-demand listing environment, and usually they take a percentage or flat fee. got all that? it's a lot to digest. you can start to understand why, back in 2013, when the head of the copyright office was giving a speech at column i can't university law school about the next great act, she said something to the effect of music licenses is so complicated, that if we get that right we can get the whole statute right. for now, musicians are sort of doing their best to navigate all of this different policy structures at a time when they're already often expected to do a lot more than they used to do, keeping track of all these different revenue streams and figuring out how to patch it together into something resembling an income, often serving as their own managers and publicists and trying to market their work and keep track of all these rapid developments and how it impacts them. somewhere in there, had a there has to be time to write and record and perform music. one of the things we do is we try to make that a little easier by demystifying the assistance. we tried to take a lot of the information you just heard and sort of cris applize it into a series of infographics, but like -- and we did but even this is complicated. [laughter] kevin: look how big this is. incidentally, you can get a copy of this chart at futuremusic.org or just google music and how the money flows and you can find it. we made it for artists, but it is also useful for folks trying to wrap their heads around all this stuff. sometimes people see this and just think, oh, if what if we just wipe it away and throw out the middle men. i think it's well intentioned, but also naive. as i said, musicians and songwriters don't have time to go around to every potential company that wants to license their music. musicians and songwriters need partners to bring it to the marketplace. they need platforms publishers, record labels, distributors and aggregaters. not every artist needs all of those things but many of them do, because there's no way to do it themselves. the important thing is all those partners need to be account sandabble transparent. an important thing to understand about this in the policy context is with nearly any partner, the line with those partners, some of the times, maybe a lot of the times, and then they're going to diverge some of the time. that's why it's important to get perspectives from artists themselves. preferably a divert array, because different artists have different business models, and where an artist is is going to determine how they feel about a particular development in the marketplace. with streaming, they've been very excited about some aspect of these services, and some have been really concerned and critical about some aspects of the streaming services. there's been a lot of diverse opinions in the artists' community, because they're working with different expectations about the scale of their potential audience and they're at different stages in their careers, their goals are different, different genres have different business models. but today rather than get too deep into the content of the different kind of critiqueses, i want to offer a smple way to wrap your head around this stuff and give you a frame work for how to think about music policy generally. the question is how are the decisions made by congress impact them. there's two big categories here. category one is access to audiences. category two is fair compensation. both of these are really important. the access stuff is really important. the flourishing of new services has created incredible opportunities for artists who in the past would have been shut out of the marketplace and unable to reach out to really start thriving and connect to people all over the country and all over the world. equally important is compensation. there are some serious questions equally important is compensation. there are some serious questions we have to ask. especially for artist that don't have the kind of reach that taylor swift does. it can be difficult for congress to really know what the impact is going to be. in addition to all these licensing questions, there is this larger policy background of decisions that congress is involved in that has impacted the way the streaming music landscape looks now. >> i think as far as time goes, i think we have a good baseline going. we have not gotten into what taylor swift is beyond this omnipotent being. ishii a composer -- is she a composer? what is our power come from? -- where does our power come from? >> we do know that she is a songwriter and a performer. she benefits from the sound recording copyrights and the composition copyright. she is also someone that records for an independent lentil -- label. she has a degree of freedom to speak out and the ability to pull her catalog from some services in a way that could potentially be more difficult if she was recording or a major-label. you know the song we are never getting back together when she talks about her axis -- >> i was really upset by that. >> she said something about some in the record that is cooler than mine. i always thought that was interesting because she is on an independent label. >> just one important thing to add their is -- taylor swift pulled her music. the thing to know is she had the right because she is a recording artist to owns her recording. she did not have the right to pull the musical composition. if someone else wanted to record the sound you just mentioned and put it up on spotify or apple or whatever, she would not have been able to pull that off. because she is a member and subject to a consent. just to clarify, she could pull her sound recordings, but she was not able to pull her compositions. >> so her powers are limited. what is limiting her power in that particular instance? >> the federal government has said that through the dissent degree, and a member of bmi or ascap have to license any service that asked for a license , even before there is a price set or a negotiation or a price. >> she has the power to pull her songs from spotify? can she pulled her songs from a noninteractive streaming service, like pandora? >> the sound recording, but not the composition. >> not the sound recording. because we did not talk much about what the statutory license means. but in the land of pandora where they are relying on the statutory license, the license gives them access to every piece of commercially available music, as long as they pay the statutory rate assigned to them. at some point we are going to talk about that a little bit. the artist does not have the right -- >> so congress gave that invincibility to pandora? >> those types of things we could go through each service and talk about. even ask for scan get confused about that stuff. here is a chart. this would make your head hurt, even more so than the chart that kevin had. rates are heavily regulated by the government. the government is involved in different ways that can control how these rates are -- it is not just fair market. >> the rate standard -- if you want to start a digital streaming service in the united states tomorrow, if anybody in this audience decides they want to start a digital streaming radio service, you have two choices. you can go to every -- this is just on the sound recording side -- you can go to every record label, or every copyright owner and try to negotiate a rate with them. you can start your service with whoever you are able to negotiate a rate with and figure it out. you can figure out a way to pay all those people. or, you can go to the copyright office, the lot a one-page form with a questions on it, give them a $40 check, and you then have access to every piece of commercially available piece of music ever to use on your service. and the next thing you do is you call sound exchange. you say this is the kind of service that i have, what is the rate that i paid? -- what is the rate that i paid? the rate standard used to set that royalty rate is in the law for webcasters. it is a fair market value rate. for satellite radio, it is a different rate. >> we can go through all the different establishments. >> you asked about the different rates on the composition side. there are some really crazy results that happened because of the different regulatory structures. pandora streaming all about that base -- without the music composition there would be nothing to record, without the recording there would be nothing to listen to -- what pandora pays to the songwriter and the performer are completely different amounts. the performer gets 12 to 14 times more than the songwriter does, because we have two different regulatory structures. there are some crazy results that happened at the conflicting regulatory issues. >> it gets even more complicated from there. >> i have time for one question. gentleman in the back. please make it a quick question. >> nothing about music was involved in the transatlantic -- transatlantic deal. what does that mean? there is no music involved in that and that is a commodity out of the u.s. >> >> does anybody have another question? >> if somebody goes out to buy a cd they could give it to their sister or donated to a charity. you cannot do that with a digital thing. i wonder if you could address the sense of that. >> the first sale doctrine has protected consumers rights to resell copyrighted material if they are reselling or giving away the specific item that they have purchased. if you buy a book you can go to a used bookstore. the same is true for a cd. i believe that has been litigated a couple of times in the context of digital products. the courts have essentially said when you are giving away the digital download that you purchased, you are actually reproducing that download in order to give it away. unless you actually hand somebody your hard drive you are not giving away the specific purchased item, you are giving away a copy. >> and then it gets even more complex, because you have to look at the terms of service. you have to be very clear about that. it gets very complicated. there has been talk about having a first sale doctrine. we had an entire 60 minute panel on this last summer. you can download the mp3, and you can own it as far as i'm concerned. it talks about that very question. at the end, i asked the panelists if they downloaded something from the service do they own it. copyright professors were saying they had to go look at the terms of service, i am not sure. it is very complicated. that is just one slice of the entire pie. that is a great question. and the answer is not easy. i guess with my four minutes left who wants to take the question first? who has more superpowers in the internet music marketplace? taylor swift or congress? >> i think alex laid out what the limit is. while there is a statutory license, there is a limit. because she cannot take her recordings off of services that are using the statutory license. if you want to take a crack at the rest -- >> clearly the government is more powerful on the composition side. the government tells her she cannot take her music off. >> she does not have to join one of those services. she actually could afford a bunch of cells people to go out and license every radio station if she chose to. >> she is uniquely powerful. just because of her sheer scale she could rise above that particular regulation. >> going back to taylor swift. she obviously is tremendously powerful and getting the message about supporting fair pay for artists out there. congress right now is looking at copyright issues, looking at music licensing issues. we spend a lot of time appear talking about one basic thing that we should do in music licensing reform. we should make sure that artists and copyright owners have the opportunity to get fair market value for their work. >> beyond her rights in her music she has influence. if she wrote a polite letter to congress, with a turnaround in 24 hours? >> i don't know. there are people in this room we could ask. we write a lot of polite letters to congress and it has not worked yet. >> it is important to understand the rest of the independent sector had done a lot of groundwork for taylor swift. i used to think taylor swift was omnipotent until she got stuck on that elevated stage thing on monday night. she cannot just lie off of it. if we are going to use taylor swift as a proxy for artists especially artists who are sticking up for themselves and saying they should have a voice and how the new digital marketplace is structured, and that it should not be about competing business interests only i would say the best situations happen when artists and congress were together and create some ongoing working relationships. that is democracy. that is where the real power comes from. >> i think the most powerful recording artists are they one that can stop presidential campaigns from using their songs without their permission. taylor swift is at a magnificent arc in her career when she has influence, which is not to be confused with power. she cannot undo the statutory license. it pays are the very same amount per stream that it pays an artist that no one has ever heard of. that is a pretty interesting limitation on power also. >> i think if you think about how the american public response in poll numbers, it isn't so high. i think taylor swift is clearly the winner on that one. it is a very interesting question. hopefully it served as a baseline for when congress starts looking into some of these things. it's really complex. hopefully everybody is invested. i want to thank the panelists and thank everybody. [applause] >> this weekend on the seat c-span networks. on boot cd, saturday morning beginning at 11:00 eastern, we are live from new york city. and sunday night at 10:00 political commentator ann coulter says the greatest issue facing the u.s. is immigration. we are live with the warren g. harding symposium on modern first ladies. and a little after 9:00, the national archives of kansas city shows how the u.s. government used propaganda during world war ii to persuade citizens to join the military and keep national secrets. get our complete schedule a c-span.org. tomorrow on washington journal. your phone calls on washington journal live saturday. this sunday on q and a an artist on her use of drawings. >> around the country, you can lend in solitary for your art readings, sexual orientations, or your friends. very often when you have a big camera, it puts a big distance between you and the person. you are taking these images. they cannot see what you are taking. when you draw, it is a vulnerable thing. they can see exactly what you are doing. it is more of an interchange. most people have not been drawn before. a lot of times i just try people because i like to. i like talking to them when i do it. >> today's white house briefing with press secretary josh earnest. [laughter] >> welcome to the friday briefing. it is finally friday. i decided today to pull a little page from a strategy that has been employed very effectively by some of our cable news colleagues here. in addition to the regularly scheduled programming, we will have a little bit of a crawl across the bottom, with additional information as it relates to the historic iran agreement. i am happy to discuss that if you would like. i know that it there are a number of other questions that may be top of mind. >> a couple of questions on the shooting yesterday in chattanooga. i was wondering if there is any information emerging yet concerning a possible motive? >> this tragic shooting occurred only about 24 hours ago. the president yesterday took the opportunity to convey his condolences to the families of those who were lost in the shooting. those families continue to be in his thoughts and prayers even today. the president received a briefing yesterday, both from the director of the fbi, as well as his top counterterrorism adviser at the white house, to get an update on the investigation. the attorney general is obviously involved in these ongoing investigative efforts. at this point, i do not have an update on the status of their investigation. i know that the fbi made clear yesterday that they are looking at a variety of possible motives, including the possibility of domestic terrorism. that is a part of their ongoing investigation. but i will allow the investigators themselves to provide you with an update when they are able to. the president indicated yesterday that he wanted to try to keep the american public informed as much as possible. i am confident that our investigators will do exactly that. >> what about information about whether anyone else was involved in the shooting? >> i don't have official information about that. >> the army chief of staff said earlier today that security at reserve centers -- >> the president certainly believes that it is appropriate to conduct steps like that. there was an announcement from the department of homeland security about some additional steps that they would be taking. there are some facilities that are jointly operated by the federal government and the department of defense where the department of homeland security has jurisdiction. there will be some steps that they will not be able to discuss publicly. that is certainly makes sense that the department of defense would be considering doing something similar. >> usually you while it would just say he is remaining overnight. can you flesh out the father daughter weekend a little bit? >> the president has been scheduled to travel to new york for a fund-raising event. that is not particularly unusual. but the president is looking forward to a rare opportunity that he will have to spend a little personal time with his daughter's in new york over the weekend. i don't anticipate we will have a lot of details in advance about their activities. but the president will obviously be there. we will inform your colleagues who will be -- maybe not participating, but traveling along -- we will make sure that you guys are aware of what they are up to. >> what can you tell us about the president's with the saudi foreign minister this morning? whether any discussions of commitments the u.s. might make to defend saudi arabia in the context of the iran deal? >> this is a meeting that the king requested the president host in the conversation that the two leaders had earlier this week. i think it was actually on tuesday that the president had the opportunity to speak with the king via telephone in philadelphia. as a result of that request, the president did sit down and have a discussion with the saudi foreign minister to discuss a range of regional issues, including the recent historic agreement that was announced this week. if you will recall from the camp david meetings that occurred back in may, the president and the gcc leaders pledged to further deepen the security efforts between the partners. that includes building a strategic partnership that is stronger. in the context of those discussions, the foreign minister and the president also talked about the important bilateral relationship that exists between the united states and saudi arabia. i guess that will be the subject of some discussion that secretary carter will have with his counterparts when he visits saudi arabia next week. there also was an opportunity for the president and the foreign minister to discuss some other regional issues, including the ongoing humanitarian crises in yemen and syria. there was discussion about how to move both those conflicts toward a political solution. we certainly value the kind of contributions that saudi arabia has made. >> where their discussions about how to further enhance -- are they farm or ongoing? >> they were a continuation of discussions that took place at camp david back in may. you will recall that the strategic priority that the united states has identified is to not just deep in the bilateral security cooperation that exists between the united states and each country, but whether to facilitate better coordination and cooperation among the gcc countries. and that there may be equipment, skills, and training that the united states can offer that would make those countries more effective in coordinating their security efforts. in some cases that involves hardware. in some cases that involves facilitating training. the president and the gcc leaders when they discussed this issue agreed that there is clearly an important role for the united states in terms of standing closely with our gcc partners and it comes to their security situation. that should not be to the exclusion of the gcc countries operating more effectively when coordinating with one another to provide for their own security as well. >> this morning secretary kerry was on -- speaking on americans detained in iran. he described it as he is very hopeful that tehran may release the americans. does the president share that same level of optimism? what evidence does secretary kerry have to be that optimistic? >> i would refer you to the state department. i think what his comments should indicate to you is the priority that the president places on the safe return of these americans. i think the president gave a persuasive explanation in his news conference earlier this week in describing why he did not believe it was in the best interest of those detained americans to be used as bargaining chips in a nuclear negotiation. the first reason is that it was not a foregone at conclusion that a nuclear decision would be reached. attaching the plight to a deal that may or may not go through does not seem to be the most effective way to guarantee their sacred time. i think the president went to greatly to convey this as well. their return is a great priority. i think secretary carries reporter: is there evidence? josh earnest: what there is evidence of is a rigorous u.s. government effort to try to get these individuals, but i do not have an update. reporter: you just mentioned that there might be some equipment for our expertise. does the president made such -- make such an offer? josh earnest: the discussions that took place, both on the telephone and the overall office -- the oval office today were a continuation of the discussions that took place at camp. the other thing that i think is notable about this is that there was unanimity of opinion that those kinds of conversations are constructive and do further deepened in advance -- and advance the relationship between our partners in the middle east and us. the president understands that the u.s. relationship with those countries is critical for the national security of each of the countries. the president has also concluded that a strong relationship with those countries is in the national interest of the united states. these are consultations that will continue when secretary carter visits saudi arabia early next week. reporter: when will this be put on the schedule? josh earnest: i will start by saying that it is a little unusual for the president to meet with the official of a country that is not also of that state. this was a particular request from king some on that -- king solomon that the king made in context of the telephone conversation. this was not necessarily on the president of guidance, but that is my explanation. reporter: and the outrage the white house has been doing with the people here as well as overseas -- the white house mentioned yesterday that there were a number of offers made to have these intensive consultations with israel, but they repeatedly turned it down. why are they not wanting to have those discussions right now? josh earnest: i guess that is a question you should ask them. the fact is that this is -- the president believes strongly in the value of the security cooperation between the united states and israel. there are a variety of ways in which national security cooperation benefits the united states and our national security. we have heard a number of israeli officials indicate that the security cooperation -- relationship that israel has with the united states is critical to the basic national security of israel. that is measured in a variety of ways. i think the most illustrative example is the effectiveness of the iron dome system that was initiated, implemented, and ramped up under the direction of president obama. this is a system that last summer shot down a number of rockets that were fired by extremists in gaza that were aimed squarely at israeli civilians. that has turned out to be a very powerful pool in saving the lives of israeli citizens. the president has communicated directly to prime minister netanyahu a willingness and even a desire to enter into specific discussions on how our security operations can be deepened strengthened, and further enhanced. we stand ready and eager to initiate that conversation -- to enter into that conversation when israeli officials determine they are prepared. i will indicate that this is not -- this is not an indication that somehow the security cooperation between the united states and israel has been degraded. in fact, prime minister netanyahu has indicated that the level of security cooperation that his country has received from the obama administration is unprecedented. that cooperation continues. i can give you to bring examples of that over the course of the next week. the first is defense secretary ash carter will be traveling to israel early next week where he will be meeting with his counterparts in other senior israeli officials to discuss our ongoing security cooperation. just to this week, i understand that the head of counterterrorism at the state department convened an important security cooperation meeting with the israeli national deputy security advisor. this is a discussion where they talked about a range of issues including shared concerns about iran destabilizing activities in the region, including by supporting their proxies like has the law that do -- like hezbollah, that do minister israel. this type of cooperation is ongoing and the administration is eager to seize on the next opportunity that emerges to start discussing how we can deepen that cooperation. the state department meeting occurred earlier this week, i'm not sure which day. reporter: the outreach you have been doing with members of congress, even some democrats have skepticism. is the white house's stance that if they were to vote and possibly override a veto to keep congressional sanctions in place, with the u.s. then be in violation of the deal, or with the deal break apart, or what are you conveying to members of congress that would be the biggest problem if that were to happen? josh earnest: the fact is, if the united states congress were to successfully kill this agreement, it would have a terrible impact on the standing of the united states in the world. this is an agreement not just between the united states and around -- this is an agreement between the united states, russia, china, germany, the u.k. , france, and around -- iran. this is an agreement that is supported by 99% of the international community. for the united states, because of a congressional action, to isolate our country on such an important issue would be devastating to our standing in the world. it also would have some very practical consequences. the first is that the reason that our sanctions regime against iran succeeded in compelling them to the negotiating table is because it had a devastating impact on their economy. economic ties between the united states and iran are not particularly significant primarily because there are a whole host of other sanctions and embargoes that the united states has unilaterally played. the key to success in this latest round of sanctions has been the aggressive enforcement of countries around the world including countries that are not a party of this agreement -- countries like india, japan, south korea, and others that previously relied heavily on the importation of iranian oil. i scaling back their oil purchases, it had a negative impact on iran's economy, but it also had a negative impact on the domestic economy of those countries. the point is that this sanctions regime would collapse if iran were to kill this deal. what this means is that the international leverage that we have previously used to reach this agreement would vanish. the second is, a run -- iran would still obtain the financial benefits of sanctions release something that our critics have described as a financial windfall. the problem is ironic -- iran is going to get all that money and the united states is not going to get anything for it. right now, because of the sanctions relief that is being offered, iran is taking steps to significantly curtail their nuclear program. they will dramatically reduce their stockpile of uranium. they will remove 13,000 centrifuges. they are going to overhaul and essentially dismantle their plutonium reactor at a rock -- iraq. and, iran is committed to cooperating with the most intrusive set of inspections that have ever been in -- ever been imposed on a country's nuclear program. if there congress decides to do away with this deal, i ronald will get all the benefits without having to give up anything. that ultimately has to be a fundamental question that members of congress ask themselves, because the fact is, at this point, based on the conclusion that has been reached by the international community iran will begin to receive sections relate after they have taken verified steps to significantly curtail their nuclear program and to make a public commitment that they will not maintain a nuclear weapon and that they will cooperate with a set of international expections that will verify that they did not maintain a nuclear weapon, or congress can vote to allow iran to get out scot-free. that is the question facing members of congress, and this is the essence of the case that administration officials have been making to individual members of congress, and this will be the case that senior administration officials will be making in an open testimony to congress next week. reporter: you said the number of times, 99% of the world community, the president said 99% of the world -- what is that number coming from? josh earnest: when you look at the population of the countries that are represented in this particular agreement, the vast majority -- 99% of the world -- is on the side of the united states in and limiting this agreement. reporter: is it the map of allies -- what percentage of our allies in the middle east support the steel? -- this deal? josh earnest: i will let them all speak for themselves, but when it comes to the foreign minister who is at the oval office today he indicated that we, meaning saudi arabia, welcomed the discussions on the nuclear program between p5 plus one and a, and saudi arabia has been insured that ron is denied a look clear weapon, and all pathways to one will be closed. reporter: do the saudi's support the steel? josh earnest: i am saying they will speak for themselves. reporter: i am talking about our allies in the region. josh earnest: again, you can ask them the views of the agreement. -- there views of the agreement. -- their views of the agreement. reporter: do israelis support this deal?josh earnest: i think they made it clear that they don't. [laughter] josh earnest: but the british the russians, the south koreans the chinese, the indians -- all the countries were involved in pressuring iran to come to the table in the first place. reporter: the president is going to be in new york, we understand he is not staying at the waldorf -- is this because the chinese now own the waldorf? josh earnest: i don't have any details about where he will stay tonight. obviously there are a number of factors that influence this decision and i don't have an update in terms of those logistics. reporter: this is obviously the home of the united states ambassador to the united nations. it is the place where the president typically stays in new york. is there a concern about basically being hosted by the chinese? josh earnest: i don't know. it is unusual for the president to be spending the night in new york. typically the president will just do a day trip. typically the only time he would spend night overnight in new york is when he stayed two or three days for the united nations assembly and when he does, he typically stays at the waldorf, but i don't have an update. reporter: i also want to ask you this question of congress -- the number of senators in both parties have raised concerns that basically this deal is going to be voted on at the united nations before it is voted on by the u.s. congress. is there any indication about that here in the white house, to go to the u.n. before congress? josh earnest: no, and the reason is that it is important to reflect that disagreement is not between the united states and iran, this is a disagreement between p5 plus one and itran. p5 is actually a reference to the five permanent members of the un security council. it certainly is natural that those who are party to this agreement would be acting promptly to take it up. what is clear are a couple of things -- the first is, there is nothing that the united nations security council do that will have an impact on sanctions that are imposed by the united states . sanctions imposed by congress by executive order. the united nation's security council has no jurisdiction over that and will have no influence over decisions made about u.s. sections. the second thing is that the way that this vote is structured actually does reflect significant deference to the united states. that is that we do anticipate that in the next few days, there will be a vote by the united nations security council but it will not be adopted for 90 days. what that means is that there is a 60 day window for congress to consider this agreement. that means that congress will have ample opportunity to do so within their 60 day window before this agreement is formally adopted after the un security council. justin. reporter: i am wondering if that means -- i know you guys don't pick its likely that congress will have a veto approved, a way to overturn the deal -- but if they were, would you go back to the united states and's during that 30 day period? -- the united nations during that 30 day period? josh earnest: reporter: reporter: the other day you mentioned house democrats. is that the group year are mainly -- on showing up at this point? josh: what that letter said, this was a letter written in may by signed by 150 house democrats. that is enough to sustain a presidential veto. what they indicated at the time is that they were supportive again, gently speaking, you go up from the letter. they were supportive of the final agreement that reflects the kind of outlined that we established in the lausanne agreement in april. so that does give us confidence that we have got strong support among house democrats. that surely is not support we take for granted. there have been a number of conversations between senior white house officials, senior national security officials, and house democrats. but those are certainly not the only conversations that have occurred. the president himself has had conversations with senior leaders in congress in both parties. and between -- reporter: later you read out. josh: i can confirm they are in both houses and in both parties. but there have been, again, a large number of other conversations that sector -- that secretary kerry has engaged in and chief of staff the national security adviser, susan rice, all of those officials have spent significant time on the phone with members of congress and even have meetings in persons. . e have been another of -- a number of group meetings that have been convened by other national security advisers to the present. these consultations will continue. in these conversations will continue between democrats and republicans. if there is anybody in congress who has questions about the agreement, look, it is complicated. many of you have thumbed through this already. a lot of technical details are included. and we have acknowledged on the front-end that these technical details are important. frankly, that is why we blew past the deadline on june 30 to make sure the details were right. so it is certainly understandable that there would be specific questions people would have, and we would welcome the opportunity to get to answer them regardless of who in congress is asking the question. i can assure you if their individual members of congress that want to have a phone call to discuss this, that we can put them in touch with a relevant member of the presidential security team to answer all the questions they have. reporter: travel? are there any plans for the president -- to go to chattanooga. the second is to the fundraiser today in new york. in previous off years -- a number of fundraising goals for the president and the dnc. we are going into the 2016 elections. that is going to be extremely expensive. how many fundraisers does he go to? josh: i do not have any updates as it relates to tennessee but we will keep you updated if that changes. i do not have a tangible number two gives you in terms of our fundraising goal. the president is mindful of both the significant states and the next election and also his ongoing responsibility, even though he is not on the ballot to be strongly supportive of those democrats who share his vision for the future of the country. and so, the president has been engaged in spun raising efforts already. i'm confident over the next year and a half, the president's engagement of the next -- in advance of the next election will increase. josh: let's go back -- reporter: let's go back to the issue of the u.n. why submit a draft resolution at this moment? i understand asked the nation you get. it seems like at this moment you are trying to tell this field of lawmakers to get them on board. why do this at this moment? josh: again, this is an agreement that was negotiated between iran and rththe five permanent members of the un security council and germany. it makes sense was that agreement has been reached that the u.n. security council would act promptly to consider the agreement. and that is what they are doing. out of deference to the united states congress, there is a 90 day window before this approved resolution is formally adopted. what that means is it means that there will be time for congress to use all the 5 -660 days they themselves requested to review the agreement and consider that agreement and even vote on it before the action thtaat is taken at the u.n. is adopted. it bears repeating that there is nothing the united nations security council can or will do to impact the sanctions the united states has put in place particular those sanctions over which congress has jurisdiction. reporter: secretary kerry said earlier he will travel to doha to speak with officials and the gulf states about the iran deal. what will the president's outreach look like in the coming weeks? and what does he say to the argument that officials are making this -- it ultimately emboldens iran? josh: well, the administration will contain to engage with our partners in the region. reporter: what was that outreach? josh: secretary carter is traveling to the middle east over the weekend and into next week where he will spend time both in israel and saudi arabia meeting with top officials there. i'm confident there will be some discussion of the this iran agreement but certainly not the only thing on the agenda there. you mentioned secretary kerry. you made careful note of all the telephone calls the president has conducted this week with our allies and partners around the world to discuss this. so i think that is an indication that there is an high a commitment to high-level engagement when it comes to discussing this issue with our partners and our allies. as it relates to the question you have raised about an emboldened iran, i guess i would disagree with a basic premise of that question, because, as a result of this agreement, iran will not obtain a nuclear weapon. there is nothing that iran could do be further emboldened then to obtain a nuclear weapon. so, by the taken the prospect of a nuclear armed iran off the table, we can now focus on the other steps that are necessary to constrain their threatening of israel, their support for terrorism, their support for proxies that destabilize the political situation in the middle east. these are other significant concerns of our allies in the region. the united states remains committed to helping those countries address them. as the president said in his news conference wednesday, there is a reason that this has been preventing iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon has been a top priority, because a nuclear armed iran only makes them more dangerous and does further emboldened them. this is a deal that has been our articulated by -- been articulated by prime minister netanyahu himself. reporter: what issues did come up during today's meeting? josh: i do not have details, but you can be assured that this was a civic and part of the discussion was on this particular issue, both the agreement that has been reached, but also, deepening the security cooperation between the united states and our gcc' partners to counter iran's destabilizing activities. reporter: i want to ask you about a domestic issue on some employees of planned parenthood captured on video talking about the remains of aborted fetuses. does the president have a reaction? josh: i'll acknowledge i've not seen a particular video in question. the news reports indicating that the policies that are followed by planned parenthood are entirely consistent with the strictest ethical guidelines that have been established in the health-care industry. but for those details, i refer you to planned parenthood. reporter: more broadly, does the president think it is ethical to view the remains of fetuses for medical research. josh: planned parenthood, i understand has said they follow those guidelines and the highest of those ethical guidelines. further compliance with them and what that means, i would refer you to them. i do not have intimate detail or knowledge of the kinds of practices they engage in. reporter: and you have not seen the videos. so indication the president has. josh: i do not know if he has or not. andrew? reporter: israel, is the administration considering the release of jonathan pollard? josh: well, i know that there is -- i would refer you to the department of justice on this. honestly, mr. pollard is somebody that has been charged with serious crimes and is being confined in our criminal justice system. i do not have any update on his status. i would refer you to the department of justice. reporter: in a meeting with prime and asked her -- was there discussion of [inaudible]? josh: i do not have any potential this is to talk about at this point. if we have any updates, we will let you know. j.c.? reporter: continuing on the discussion with the ambassador. was there any indication or discussion with the president of the ambassador's team meeting with his counterparts in israel in the lead up to the iran nuclear deal? josh: i'm sorry. say one more time. reporter: was there any discussions with the president in that meeting with in terms of any saudi meetings with the israelis in the lead up to the iran nuclear deal? josh: i am not aware of any meetings between the saudis and israelis. i refer you to those two parties for details. reporter: i'm wondering if the president, obviously opposition to the steel in israel is bipartisan -- this deal is bipartisan. with the president be interested in going to israel and explaining the deal to the knesset and b.b. did come here to congress? josh: that is a provocative idea. right, exactly. yeah. to answer your basic question, i am not aware of any plans to do anything like that. but more generally, the president is mindful of the fact that this agreement is something that is being carefully scrutinized in israel. the present, i think -- the president, was forthright about it knowledge and in the news conference he convened on wednesday that he is not jsut aware of the concerns -- not just aware of the concerns that many israelis have about iran and iran's behavior. the president was forthright about acknowledging those concerns are entirely legitimate. and the president has also been forthright about acknowledging that the president has those concerns in mind when he goes to this effort to prevent iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon. it continues to be the president's you the best way to prevent iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon is through diplomacy. it is through diplomacy that iran voluntarily take the steps needed to shrink their uranium stockpile by 98%, remove 13,000 centrifuges. so fill in the -- at their heavy water reactor with cement to ensure it can no longer be used to produycce weapons grade kryptonian. this is the best -- weapons grade tony him. -- plutonium. the important part is not that iran may those commitment that that we can check to make sure. and we have imposed the toughest, most intrusive set of inspections that have been imposed on the country's nuclear program to verify their compliance. what is also true is that this does not eliminate other concerns with iran's behavior, but when iran threatens israel and uses anti-semitic rhetoric to do so that's something we strongly condemn. and we understand the president understands the very significant danger that that poses to the nation of israel, but that danger would be even more severe if iran had a nuclear weapon. and that is why the president has made this a priority, and the president is committed in conversations with prime minister netanyahu, to try to work more effectively together to counter mahny of the destabilizing actions that iran engages in, including by supporting has below. -- hezbollah. reporter: the israeli prime minister -- he said all of the options are on the table -- what if the israels found the facility is some of these other iranian nuclear facilities, how would the u.s. response? obviously -- how would the u.s. response? 0---- respond? we have more support for the israelis in almost any regional war. what if they create a regional war we do not want them to? josh: i would not want to speculate on that hypothetical beyond technology met obviously the leaders of israel are entitled, of course, to take the steps they believe are necessary for the defense of their country. they have a responsibility to make those decisions. but the president has also indicated that the military option on the part of the united states as one that continues to be available, but the more effective way, the best way for us to prevent iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon is through diplomacy, an agreement that is structured exactly like this one that requires iran to take significant steps to curtail the nuclear program and to agree to have those steps be rigorously verified by the international committee. reporter: ash carter is going to be in israel next week. he will be asking what the israelis need. what if the israelis ask for these bunkcerer busting bombs and equipment that allow them to do the bombing raid on their o wn? josh: i do not want to preview those conversations. as a general matter, i can tell you that part of the message that secretary cartyer will be delivering when he travels to israel, his first trip as secretary of defense, the message he will be delivering is that the united states and president obama himself is committed to strengthening the security and cooperation relationship that prime minister netanyahu himself has already described as unprecedented in its scope and depth. reporter: one more. as part of the deal, iran can appeal to the security council -- if any members of the p5 are not abiding by the agreement. if congress does that down, the u.s. will not be able to abide by the agreement through sanctions if the u.s. does not lift engines, iran c-- sanct ions, iran could appeal to the un security council. will the security council tromped the united states congress? is that a concern? josh: i am not going to speculate about what would happen if congress were to devastate the standing of the united states and the international community. essentially give iran the opportunity to get all the benefits of sanctions relief without having to take any steps to submit to international application or any of the steps required to curtail the nuclear program. major? reporter: let me follow up on a couple of those lines of question. take this step of a potential israeli military strike backward. -- that with the deal it is now less necessary and less -- less threatening to israel in terms of the nuclear question than it was before the deal. is there -- are there any reasons israel might entertain are less menacing as less menacing? josh: that is part of the argument. that is because the foundation of this argument is as, what our intelligence analysts assessed right now is that -- the breakout period is two to three months. once this is implement it, the length would be lengthened -- the period would be lengthened. we would be in position to verify iran's compliance. that means we have greater insight into the detail of iran 's nuclear program, and we do believe that that when you compare a nuclear armed iran versus an non-nuclear arms r iran, we would much rather have the latter because it is not as dangerous when it comes to israel's national security. that is not downplay the concerns we have a number of their other activities in the region. reporter: does the defense secretary kerry the same message to israel based on this assessment? -- does the defense secretary carry the same message israel based on this assessment? -- would be informed by that judgment? if there is a request for some of the material, those requests would be viewed within this new context. iran is less threatening. the danger is diminished. therefore, that is the context in which all of those request will be judged, not the one that existed before the deal. josh: i think it is fair to assume that. however, what i would also commenced your attention is the reminder that for some period of time now the united states has been having conversations with a israel about how we can strengthen our security cooperation. these are conversations that have been had between the two leaders of our countries. reporter: the fundamental question is every discussion about whether it is within israel's right to strike the materials -- they might havave to carry that out are in a different context with the steel to the threat is diminished. all those conversations are completely different context. josh: what is true is that the breakout period has been lengthened. and that means that, and we have assurance, or he will have assurance that iran is complying with the agreement. if at some point we determine they are not complying with the agreement, we will continue to have a wide range of options in front of us that we do today. whether that means snapping back sanctions or deploying the military option. the other thing i would point out about the military option, if the agreement has been implemented and iran has started to take steps to, and it'll be implement it once iran has taken the steps to limit the nuclear program. that was one of the thing -- sanctions relief will not start until iran has taken all of these steps to begin to curtail their nuclear program. that is important thing for us to keep in mind. if over the course of this 10-year agreement, at some point iran's leaders came and decided they want to cheat or publicly indicate that they are going to break out and try to obtain a nuclear weapon, it would take a year for them to acquire enough fissile material to build a comb. bomb. the military option would remain on the table. that option would be enhanced because we had been spending the intervening number of years gathering significantly more detail about iran's nuclear program. so when it comes to the targeting decisions that will be made by military officials either in israel or the united states, those targeting decisions would be significantly informed and our capabilities improved based on the knowledge that has been gained in the intervening years through this inspections regime. reporter: it should wait? josh: again, what we believe -- it is the best way for us to prevent iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon is through diplomacy. if at some point down the line after the agreement has been implemented, if iran does indicate a willingness to cheat or they just announced they are going to sprint toward a nuclear weapon, that distance would be much longer than it is today. and the ability of the international community to respond would be strengthened because our political hand would be strengthened and the capability of our military planners would be enhanced because of our increased knowledge of iran's nuclear program. reporter: i want to ask about the pollard situation. your predecessors have never hesitated. but previously onewhen pollard's name has been brought up, it is not on the table. a crime is a crime. a conviction is a conviction. despite the fact there has been annual lobbying. every year from the israelis about jonathan pollard's release. did you hesitate because that is not at some level or another being discussed, or were you not anticipating the question? josh: not anticipating the question, but what i can tell you is i am certainly not aware of any renewed discussions about what i previously discussed about releasing him outside of the normal department of justice procedures that are in place. there had been some discussion about releasing him primarily that had been reported on about releasing him prior to his next parole hearing. and so, i do not want to leave you with the impression that that position has changed. reporter: a new topic within the conversations and the aftermath of the iran deal or any other things that might sweeten israel's assessment of it? josh: not that i am aware of. for the details of his current incarceration, i encourage you to check with the department of justice. reporter: after mr. to oklahoma the president said -- after meeting with some of the inmates, they were there after doing stupid things, making mistakes, he said. there but for the grace of god, suggesting that -- i want to ask you about this. does he mean to sit just the people in there he met with were arbitrarily arrested, prosecuted, and they are because it was an accident or such a low level mistake that they should not have been there in the first place? or that their sentences should be reduced? if the latter is tehhe case, my reading of the legislation does not take away mandatory -- it provides more discretion. in the main, it keeps most of the sentencing guidelines and prosecution of the -- in place. does the president want to go farther than that? josh: well, there are a number of factors that influence the sentences given to the individuals who are charged and convicted of serious crimes. and well, i should say, also of crimes that relate to nonviolent drug offenses. and they are influenced by a number of things, mandatory minimums, but also things like the policy that is in place for prosecutors who are trying to make charging decisions. there are significant decisions that need to be made by prosecutors when it comes to how syriza crime individual should be charged with based on their conduct. so the point i am making is that there are variety of things that influence the kind of sentence that is handed down. it is those variety of things that will be considered in the discussions with congress as we sort of work toward some criminal justice reform. as it relates to the president's comments, let me give you -- the president was not trying to make either of the points he suggested. the point the president was trying to make is that for him in some ways the point he's trying to make is outside of the context of the criminal justice system, that these individuals did things that landed them in prison. it also set them on a path that may prison more likely, because they did not benefit from the influence of good. or good schools or caring teachers. or people in their community that can provide some structure to their lives that even if they did make a mistake, that they would not allow one mistake to put them on a path that had them end up in prison. the point the president was making -- he'd knowledge she made some mistakes in his own life, but he benefited from having grandparents in hawaii, teachers at his school, obviously a very devoted mother who worked hard to keep him on the right path despite his mistakes. the point he was making is if he did not have that kind of support structure in his life it is not hard to imagine that he would've ended up on the same, the same path that led these men to this prison. reporter: you and on the structure, not the underlying crime or the accuracy or the fairness of the prosecution or the sentences meted out. josh: clearly, all those things are related, but the point the president is making is a specific one about the kind of support structure that is needed for young men of color. this is part of my brother's keeper initiative that the president spent a lot of time talking about. trying to put in place these support structures for young men of color that may come from us in. home and may not be coming from the highest rated school, that they will benefit from additional support. even if they make one mistake could prevent them from going down a path that ends in a prison cell. reporter: thanks josh. i wanted to fire you up at something you said earlier. i was trying to understand, secretary kerry was sharing conversations with iranians he would bring up the american captives held there. yet the president made it very clear that it was not part of the deal because it would give the iranians more leverage and would make the deal more difficult. i'm trying to make sense of the two. josh: the point, the point the president was making kevin is that if we included the well-being of these americans as bargaining chips in the nuclear deal it would only make it harder to secure the release of these american citizens. the reason for that is simply that the successful completion of a final nuclear agreement does not -- was not a foregone conclusion. if we had gotten me, the case of these americans wrapped up in a nuclear discussion that ultimately did not come to an agreement, the ability of the united states to to -- to secure the release would have been set back.so, what the president and secretary kerry did was they worked assiduously to keep them separate. to not allow these american citizens to be used as bargaining chips in a nuclear discussion with iran, but what secretary kerry did in the context of these meetings is insist on the release of these americans who had been unjustly detained. we're not going to make concessions to iran -- we think they should be given the opportunity to come home and that should not be contingent on anything. reporter: i want to ask you about the tragedy in chattanooga. there has been some discussion about the fact that perhaps of military personnel were able to be armed and could have protected themselves, if that were deemed appropriate by d.o.d. would the white house support that? josh: these decisions about how best to ensure the safety of our men and women in uniform are decisions that are made by the department of defense. ifas you alluded, there is a policy that has been in place for quite some time. that in a workplace, like a recruiting station in the united states, that would prevent military personnel from carrying weapons. but those are security decisions to be made by the department of defense, and they will be made not with politics in mind but with the safety and security of our men and women in uniform and mine. those are the kinds of policy does issues commander-in-chief would support. reporter: one on the meeting with the saudi foreign minister. can you understand that the main concern they would have, especially given the proxy wars with the iranians, and what can the president due to assuage their concerns that anything you do to elevate iran economically or even politically makees them a bigger player in the region and therefore a bigger threat to the saudis? host: there is no scenario where iran is a bigger threat than when they have a nuclear weapon. and that is why the president has gone to great lengths and support of nearly two years of negotiations to prevent them from obtaining a nuclear weapon. and that is the case the president made to not just members of congress but to our partners all around the globe. that i non now way is intended to diminish the concerns are partners in the middle east have with iran's support for terrorism, their support for proxies that destabilize the political situation in countries throughout the middle east and we are going to be responsive and we are going to continue to work closely with those countries to deepen our security cooperation and effectively counter israel's efforts to support, for example hezbollah rebels that are operating in lebanon or hutti rebels destabilizing the situation in yemen. reporter: i want to ask you about glass-steagall. there has been some talk about bringing that back. elizabeth warren, bernie sanders. i think that would be a good idea. does the president a great? josh: we believe wall street reform has been incredibly effective in reforming our financial system in a way that looks out for the interest of middle-class families and taxpayers. you will recall the wall street reform created consumer financial protection bureau for the first time. middle-class family have an independent watchdog that it is not beholden to corporate interests. this has led to important reforms in both the mortgage banking system, but also to the student loan system and a variety of other reforms that have protected the interests of middle-class families against the interests of larger financial institutions. what wall street reform also included were restrictions on the banks that prevent them from making risky bets that would result in taxpayers having to bail them out. and that's why the president is pleased with the important progress that has been made when it came to implementing wall street reform. the and limitation of a lot of these rules was aggressively fought by - -the implementation of a lot of these rules was aggressively fought by some of the highest paid special interest in d.c. it is because of the president that these rules were put in place, that maximizes benefits not just for taxpayers, but for our broader economy. reporter: glass-steagall, thumbs-up? josh: at this point, we believe that ongoing wall street reform is the most effective way for us to protect our economy and protect middle class families and tax payeres. s. who we got in the back? reporter: i wanted to ask about cuba. is the present making any headway in getting congress to lift the embargo? josh: not that i've heard of. reporter: monday we were told the opening of the embassy is that going to usher in a new push from administration to get opponents reevaluate their position? josh: there is bipartisan support for advancing the policies the president announced to normalize our relations of cuba. but there have some partisan interest that have tried to block this in congress so far. fortunately, there are numbers of steps the president can take using his executive authority to begin to make changes. the president is implement and these changes because he believes it is in the broader strategic interests of the united states. we have removed the chief sticking point in our ties with countries throughout the western hemisphere. by removing that, we have now effectively isolated cuba and the, at least the concerns of countries in the western hemisphere and focus them on the cuban government's treatment of the cumin people and the failure of the cuban government to respect the basic human rights of the cuban people. so that is one way in which this policy change has been important. t second thing that we knowh is that this is a policy that is overwhelmingly supported by the cuban people themselves. they recognize this is an important to -- a tremendous opportunity for them to have a government that treats them with the respect for basic human rights and allows them or makes it more likely they can achieve the ambition may have laid out for themselves. so that is the reason that i think many people are pretty unpersuaded by the be objections raised by some in congress. they claim to have the best interest of the cuban people at heart, but when you look at some of the public data, more than 90% of the cuban people support the. so, this is why i do not anticipate this is going to cause a significant change in the minds of that small but vocal minority in congress that opposes this policy. reporter: if they were a vocal my door -- minority, it would be easy to lift the embargo. josh: if only the senate work that way. as we have seen, it does not. there continues to be confidence that this vocal minority in congress, in the sentate, could filibuster this legislation. there are number of republicans who have come out favor of this policy change. reporter: any triple announcement in terms of the president making a trip to havana? reporter: following on that, the president talked about the human rights record in cuba? . can you talk about what the administration would need to see from cuba in order for you to consider having the president go. what would be the bottom line our benchmark this administration would apply to key countries like that when deciding whether it deserves a presidential visit? josh: for a detailed answer, i refer you to the state department. i can tell you in general that some of the things we would like to see is we we would like to see the rights of a political opponents of the cuban government inside of cuba not be thrown in jail just because there -- of their political views. that would be one step. the second would be respecting of basic rights of independent journalists in cuba, that -- there are is evidence to indicate that there is not free speech in cuba. and independent journalist who say something that could be perceived as critical of the government have their views also by the government. so a respect for a free and independent media would be another interest -- another step we would like to see them take . for more specific benchmarks, i refer you to the state department. ok?\ reporter: i think mitch mcconnell said it would be unlikely that they would approve an ambassador to cuba. is there were a way around that, and do you have someone whose name you want to --? josh: i do not have any personnel announcements. i think there are probably good candidates in mind. i am not aware of any intent to nominate anybody anytime soon. but look, we have seen republicans in congress use all kinds of excuses to not act on nominees put forward by the obama administration, even when they have important and noncontroversial roles in the government. so you recall a couple weeks ago i came here and talked about the plight of adam zubin the individual responsible for putting in place sanctions and targeting the financing activities of isil. this is a career civil servant who served in democratic and republican administrations somebody who is unquestionably a n excellent lawyer and very skilled at the technical job he has. but yet we have seen congress republicans in congress, block him from even having a hearing. there is no legitimate explanation for that. it does reflect a dereliction of duty when it comes to republicans in congress when you consider that we have got thousands of u.s. military personnel helping counter iphone in -- isil in iraq, and all we're asking congress to do is hold a simple hearing and yet something that is republicans are willing to do. point is based on the kind of inexplicable obstruction that we have seen even for noncontroversial nominees, i would not expect any rapid progress in the republican dominated senate when it comes to the consideration of a nominee to thebe the and bass idiot -- the ambassador of cuba. it seems possible. for that rather unique scenario to exist, that is something that would require the continued partisan obstruction of republicans in congress. i guess you would have another exhibit that numbers in the tens of thousands of this point. that is certainly possible. i do not have any details. i give you the last one. reporter: i am told somebody is giving a speech tomorrow in which it is respect that he will respond to the iran deal. which does cross several of his red lines, including inspection of military sites. what are your concerns that he's going to come out strongly against the deal? josh: i would not predict at this point what the ayatollah may have to say tomorrow. i'm not concerned about it no. let's go to the week ahead. well this is weird. let's see if i have the week ahead. this is the week ahead for this week, actually. so let's see, maybe it is in the back pocket. it is a lot less interesting -- i was about to tell you about the white house conference on aging, which i know you covered with a lot of attention this week. so let's get to the week of july 20. there are some interesting things. on monday, the president will host a nigerian president at the white house. the visible underscore the united states friendship with nigeria, our commitment to strengthening our partnership with nigeria's government and our support for the nigerian people following their democratic elections and peaceful transfer of power. that afternoon, the president will deliver remarks at a reception for the 25th anniversary of the americans with disabilities act. on tuesday, the president will travel to to pittsburgh to address the 116th veterans of foreign wars national convention. so we will have a preview of those remarks earl next week. ywe will have something adjusting to say there. following the convention, the president will travel to new york city and will take an appearance for "the daily show wit jon stewarth." that should be entertaining at on wednesday, the president will meet with small business owners to discuss the importance of the reauthorization of the xm bank. on thursday, the president will attend meetings at the white house and later that evening the president will travel to kenya. the president will spend most of the day on friday en route to kenya. with that, i wish you all a good weekend. >> thank you. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2015] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] >> tomorrow on "washington journal," daniel helper looks at the 2016 republican presidential campaign and the latest polls and develop its with the candidates. after that, former undersecretary of state for arms control discusses the iranian nuclear agreement. plus your phone calls, facebook comments and tweets. "washington journal" is live every day at 7:00 a.m. eastern on c-span. >> this weekend, the c-span cities tour travels across the country with time warner cable to learn more about the literary life and history of accident and, kentucky. -- of lexington, kentucky. edward prichard had a tumultuous political career. >> in the mid-1940's if you had asked who was the bright shining star in american politics, on a national scale, someon

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