Inquiry. This is an hour. Margaret good morning and thank you for joining us for the news shapers breakfast. We have an awesome lineup today. In the new white house and for axios. Itor happy to be joining the family so thank you for helping me through my first breath this year. We have great food but if you do not like things that taste like pumpkin, youre in trouble. Theres definitely coffee and i had one of those muffins that was really good. We have got a great lineup of guests today. We have ambassador susan rice, here to talk about her new book, love and maybe a couple of other questions. We have the you ambassador Stavros Lambrinidis and congressman jamie raskin. I also want to thank bank of america for making todays program possible. So please turn your attention to the screens for a word from our sponsor and then we will be right back. [video] we have said we are here to drive responsible growth got to grow, no excuses, because if you dont, someone else will be here. You have to do it in a customer focused way. You have to do it by taking the right risk consist without risk appetite. The last part is to be sustainable. By sharing our success with communities here and around the world. When we look at all the problems there are, what is the most efficient way for the world to solve the problems and what role can we play. You can get a lot of agreement and a lot of common thinking around global problems that we are all trying to solve as responsible corporate citizens and members of a global community. One of the things that has become apparent to people is there is not enough philanthropy in the world. You need somehow to marry capitalism and philanthropy to create the kind of investment you need to make a dent in the issues. To get capital moving, youve got to engage all the different parties and communities. That is going to be banks like ours. But it is also going to be partners who share common visions and goals. Whether it is Affordable Housing or Climate Change or gender parity, we feel we can be part of the solution of the much larger issues that are going on in the world today. [end of video] margaret so before i introduce our first guests for the morning, for those who have not attended before, we are doing it like our axial smart breakfast, where brevity is the key. We want to make this fun and tell you what you need to know and leave you with one or two big takeaways. If youre watching along at a tweeting, please use the hashtag axios360. If you do not already get our newsletter, now is a great time to sign up, before i start talking, and you can sign up at signup. Access. Com we are going to dig into news of the day. I will tell you little bit about ambassador l ambrinidis and asking to join us. He is the e. U. Ambassador to the United States. He has been on the job for about six months. And a longtime practitioner of trade, economics, Foreign Policy and how it all fits together. He spent many years in the u. S. Prior to his latest incarnation. We will get to talk about that as well as Foreign Policy and some trade. Please welcome ambassador lambrinidis. [applause] thank you. Margaret thanks so much for joining us. From neighboring ,bulgaria, but lambrinidis it is still hard to not switch the letters. So forgive me for hesitating. Sometimes people say you could have been called lamborghini and you would not have to work. [laughter] are great i want to abouttalking with you very recent announcement where the u. S. Is planning to put 7. 5 billion on the e. U. On aircraft, food, and some booze because of the e. U. Subsidies on airbus. Where is all this headed. Is a trade war between the u. S. And europe inevitable . Amb. Lambrinidis i hope not, but it is not a good place to be in. What happened is the World Trade Organization ruled in official rulings that the European Union was subsidizing airbus and that the United States was that the diving boeing. So both of us were found to have was subsidizing boeing. So both of us were found to have been at fault. We from the first moment told our american friends that when youre in a situation where both have lost the case, you sit down and try to settle it. And to settle it and discuss issues of settlement, that can be applied to others. Subsidy principles are a very sensitive and important sill important in the aircraft industry. Now, the u. S. Has decided that it was going to apply what it legally can apply, tariffs in this case, for the airbus case, the boeing case and how much we would be entitled to receive comes up in about six months, and then we will be forced, of course, to apply our own tariffs. So instead of sitting down and settling, we are getting into a situation that is entirely unnecessary. The key thing here for everyone to understand is that as we are talking about this issue, the countries around the world, china, russia, others that are building civil aircraft today, with 100 subsidies, without any controls or any rules, are hoping that they can flood the International Market with those aircraft in a few years. It is and our fundamental it is in our fundamental strategic interests, europeans and americans, not to be fighting over this issue, but to be settling it and to be setting the rules for everyone else as well. Margaret youre saying as the u. S. And europe are fighting, everybody else is gaining ground. Amb. Lambrinidis without rules and we can set the rules. I hope he will begin discussing very, very soon. And i hope we can avoid most of these negative consequences, in cluding those announced tariffs. Margaret you might have heard there is a u. S. President ial election in about a year . Amb. Lambrinidis really . [laughter] maragaret does that help or hurt this effort. Do you see this latest tariffs a message,t as political messaging or the opposite, the need for the economy to remain in good shape is going to temper some of the president of the include president s inclinations . Amb. Lambrinidis i think terra tariff wars have proven until now and in the future very bad for the art i in the past and in the future bad for the u. S. Economy. You see today industrial and affecting investment in the United States slowing down to radically. Every business person i talked to tell me that is because of the insecurity created around the world, with the weakening of the World Economy because of the trade wars, is the reason why they will not take the risk to invest in things they do not know if they can make money out of. Especially because supply chains, as you know now, no product is created in one particular city in one particular town in one particular country, the whole economy is interconnected. Absolutely, if there is a tariff trade war between the u. S. And other major countries of the world, that would have a negative effect, both on their economies and on the u. S. Economy. Margaret the vice premier, chinese vice premier, and President Trump are meeting. How do you see the state of play between the u. S. And china right now, and has that been instructive in understanding what is next for the e. U. , or do you think they are fundamentally different approaches that the u. S. Is taking . Amb. Lambrinidis look, china is a really bad trade competitor. Unfair, steals intellectual property, subsidizes its companies and products. It does all these things the u. S. And the e. U. Want it to stop doing. So the real question there is, what is the best way to achieve that . There is no question in our mind that only if we Work Together, europeans and americans, can we ensure not that china plays by where the rules need to be amended, like with the wto in some instances, this can be done with a maximum possible consensus of everyone around the world because china is, whether or not we like it, a major World Economy. It is out there doing things, said, unfair things, bad things, so for me, my goal is to build this alliance. I have another there you to there to highlight as i did in massachusetts last week, as i did with kentucky and texas and other states recently, to highlight we are each others best partner by far. What people dont know and they should know is the European Union fundamentally is 28 major world countries coming together. And those countries deciding that they are going to eliminate the 28 individual regulatory and legal regimes and combine under one. That, which is a hugely difficult exercise, has created the socalled Single Market in europe, the biggest, most open and most prosperous in the world of 520 million people. The fact we have the European Union and therefore that market has allowed u. S. Companies to be able to set up shop anywhere they want to and be able to trade and sell everywhere to those 500 million rich consumers without any barriers. This is revolutionary and that is why European Companies make in europe more money than they make anywhere else in the world, and that is why we have big, strong, rich European Companies that invest in this country, also creating millions of jobs for americans in every state in this country. Margaret you are arguing efforts to weaken the eu as an organization would hurt u. S. Business. Amb. Lambrinidis i am arguing that we have the biggest relationship anyone has in the world together right now, and if we build on it, we can create even more prosperity for our people. This is my goal at least in my job. Margaret i want to talk about texas and kentucky in a minute. I want to do a little more Foreign Policy first. Some very disturbing developments at the turkeysyria border. What is the eu doing to address turkeys moves into syria . Well, we haveis done at least two things in the past our president , president 24 hours. Juncker, our as secretary and our secretary of state, we united. We called on turkey to stop immediately its military action. We are not wishywashy about this. It is remarkably dangerous and destabilizing. It also fundamentally weakens the alliance we have against daesh, with the way it is dealing with some of the allies we have in the alliance on the ground in syria and we have made a very clear announcement that we will not in any way fund or support any efforts of turkey to forcefully transfer refugees back to syria to change the demographics of the country and basically put them there. This we also think is a dangerous thing and destabilizing. Radicalizing people and take away human rights for millions of syrians and create more violence. Our concern is what turkey is doing now can create more violence and we think we should all be stopping it from doing so. Margaret you used the word wishywashy. Is not being wishywashy. Do you think the u. S. Is being wishywashy and you think there has been clarity in terms of response from this administration about the u. S. Position on what turkey can do and what the consequences will be . Amb. Lambrinidis we certainly follow very closely the develop into of u. S. Policy in the country right now. All we can do at this stage is ourselves make clear to turkey, which is a candidate country to the e. U. , so we have a special relationship with turkey, and to what we think should happen. We have an influence independently. We have told turkey its should be concerns addressed, but not with weapons. It would only create more violence and harm turkeys interest. We will continue supporting turkey in turkey, where it has 3 million refugees from syria and elsewhere. The e. U. Is the biggest by far supporter of the refugee camps in turkey, under the turkish government, and we will continue doing that. But we will not be supportive in exporting and exploding this problem back into syria in a way that violates security concerns and human rights. Margaret you have been on the job here since march. Amb. Lambrinidis indeed. You are saying this like it is a good thing or a bad thing . [laughter] maragaret like you sort of have to hit the ground running because there is a lot of stuff. Amb. Lambrinidis i have not stopped hitting the ground. The ground has not stopped hitting me. [laughter] maragaret we all feel that way right about now. For those in the audience who really dont know you yet, can you give us a quick like minute or two introduction . You were born in greece and but you have been in the United States since you were a teenager, basically, then college, back to greece. Amb. Lambrinidis i was raised in greece. I was born in greece. I went to a boarding school. I didnt have strong reasonable connection to stay in greece for university. I came to the states to study. I went to Amherst College in massachusetts, a small liberal arts college, and then i did not know what to do with my life so i went to law school. [laughter] amb. Lambrinidis and then i went to yale law in connecticut and then went to washington and practiced here in a big law firm for a number of years. And then the greek army found me. Every greek male has to serve. I went back and got caught back in greek politics and i stayed. I did many things in my life since then. Sometimes i look back and think, my god, it is just too many. Recently i was Vice President of the european parliament, foreign minister of greece, and then i ran the human rights Foreign Policy for the European Union. Then they thought he has been to enough difficult countries doing human rights, lets send him to the u. S. [laughter] maragaret easy rotation. Some of your legal background also was in trade, all those years back. Amb. Lambrinidis absolutely, it was in trade. That makes it easier for me to deal with complex trade issues issues havee trade always been top of the agenda. There is a rhetoric that somehow there is unfairness in our trade relationship, and i think it is very, very important to address this. For those of you, trade is fundamentally three things. Goods, services and investments and profits you make off of those. When you look at the openness of the u. S. Market to europe and the openness of the European Market to the u. S. And look at the facts and figures, the u. S. Has a slight trade surplus with europe, when you look at those things. That is something you never hear. There areometimes deficits in goods trade, but the fact of the matter is that it is consumers who make decisions on what to buy and what not to buy everywhere. Both in europe and the state. People in the states decide there are some european goods that they very much appreciate and want to buy, that is their right. People in europe decide there are American Goods they want. That is the way it works with open economies. We are not unfair to the u. S. We u. S. Is not unfair to us , have disagreements. Friends sit down and negotiate. I am very hopeful we can negotiate any disagreements we have. In fact, we are doing it already. Look at what has happened when it comes to imports of energy, lng, natural gas from the u. S. They have exploded after juncker and President Trump met in july. We decided we wanted to diversify our Energy Supply to make sure we dont rely on any one particular country to give us everything. The u. S. Has a renewed and amazing ability to export lng and we have invested billions in Building Energy terminals allowing for the guests to come in. It is a winwin. A win for the u. S. , a win for the e. U. , this is what we are focusing on and i hope the u. S. Will as well. Maragaret mr. Ambassador, as we close this conversation, we like to talk about one fun thing. There have been really fun things at your residence recently. A party for and about and with many guests from kentucky and some bourbon. And a party with some art from texas. Im wondering you have taken an approach of kind of flipping the script on what an e. U. Party should be about. Amb. Lambrinidis usually ambassadors come around and go to washington and different states and tell people why it is that the u. S. Should like them. So you should like europe because they are creating millions of jobs for the u. S. , you should like europe because of all of these things. That is something i have to do. Everyone does. But rarely has the opposite happened, which is to try to find ways to indicate to americans why it is that the europeans love you. This is in fact a daily thing. We have 60 million europeans in this country and descendents of europeans who have come and made their families. In your case, for example, margaret. The bridges we have built, economic bridges, personal bridges, family bridges, they are huge. When i came to my house in washington, which is a very beautiful house, the obamas were two houses to the left and the kushners were two houses to the right. Just to give you a sense of [laughter] amb. Lambrinidis i am very well protected. I walked in and the walls were empty. The previous ambassador and his wife had moved out and of course, they took everything away. I asked my people and they said ok, we will get some european art, if we can. And i thought ok, that is interesting, but i dont want my house to be a mirror reflecting myself. I want my house to be a window connecting me to the country i have come to serve in. And then i thought, can we get art from a state . And thankfully, for a number of fortuitous coincidences, the angelo museum of fine arts in texas decided to donate to me a huge collection of art, a fantastic collection of art, which now is in my house. In the case of kentucky, we decided to have a celebration of kentucky, in which we had the biggest bourbon producers in the state bring the best sorry you were not there. [laughter] amb. Lambrinidis the best bourbon. We had light blue grass. In both events, we had congressman from kentucky and from texas, which would probably not be interested to come to my house if i committed my favorite greek art yes, i dont know. But they are there. And of course there was a lot of press and media interest. And we had the mayor of louisville in the case of kentucky and then other mayors in the case of texas. So we created something entirely different. We are not in this country to tell people only why we are grateful for this country, although we feel like we are. We want to tell ameri