One stage. The presence here today of these candidates represents an outreach hand, an important signal that they take our outreach and communities and each and every one of you very seriously. As the nations largest civil rights urban advocacy and social justice conference i also believe that their presence here speaks volumes. I would like to declare that they welcome all the candidates to come and address us and share their plans for saving our cities. As each of you know the National Urban league is a Nonpartisan Organization and does not endorse any Political Party or candidate. As a nonpartisan 501 c 3 organization, the National Urban league extended an invitation to any 2016 president ial candidate who either appeared in a reputable Public Opinion poll such as gallo rasmussen or others or reached out and contacted us before july 1st. You might be surprised but according to the federal Election Commission there are so far at least 484 individuals who are vying for the president ial election. You can run for president too. The National UrbanLeague Conference is not big enough to provide a stage for 484 candidates to have a fair opportunity to speak. If we could, what could we possibly learn from such a circus . All we ask is that they work with us in a timely fashion to coordinate their appearance at this private event. We are grateful to them that they did just that. It made our community and our concerns a priority in addition to the candidates who will address us today, the following candidates were invited but had to decline due to scheduling conflicts. Senator rand paul of kentucky. Senator marco rubio of florida former senator jim webb of virginia former arkansas governor, Mike Huckabee senator Lindsey Graham of south carolina, louisiana governor bobby jindal ohio governor, john kasich and the following candidate its were invited but never responded in any way to our invitation. We believe in transparency. Those candidates are former hewlettpackard ceo carly fiorina, George PatakiRick Santorum new jersey governor, Chris Christie and new York Real Estate tycoon, donald trump. Perhaps we will hear from them in the future. We are here because we want to listen to the canned dates plans plans to save our city. We gave the candidates a little homework. We shared with them some of our very best ideas for saving american cities. Each of the candidates has received the 21st century agenda for jobs and freedom, which is endorsed by 60 civil rights and social justice organizations. Put together in conjunction with the 50th anniversary of the march on washington. That dockument and agenda identifies five urgent domestic goals for the nation, economic parity for africanamericans, equity in educational opportunity, protection and defense of Voting Rights, elimination of Health Care Disparities and comprehensive criminal Justice System reform. We also shared with the candidates our tenpoint plan for Police Accountability and includes recommendations for body cameras and dashboard cameras and a comprehensive overhaul of Police Hiring and training practices. We are here to save our cities and not just ourselves. In memory of our brothers and sisters, such as michael brown, eric garner, tamir rice, sandra bland and so many others we will say their names because their lives matter. We say black lives matter, because every life matters. You know that while Police Tactics may have been the spark that ignited explosions in places like ferguson and baltimore, poverty, hopelessness and joblessness, they are the tinder, they are the kerosene. It is time we come together as a nation and demand reform not only in criminal justice but in policing and economics and education. These issues are inex trickablely intertwined. The National UrbanLeague Movement will be working with the next president to implement reform that is meaningful, that can help us all create a, stronger, more equitable and more inclusive america. We look forward to hearing from each candidate and after a few words from our chairman, we will be off to the races and our program will be underway. Thank you once again. I ask you to please join me in welcoming, michael naidor chairman of the board of trustees of the National Urban league. Good morning. I am not a candidate. I want to thank you for continuing to welcome he so warmly in this organization. As mark has so eloquently stated todays plenary is one of the most important sessions. 22 major candidates that have officially declared their candidacy, 21 of whom were invited here. Yet only five are here to share the tenets of their platforms. Lets say the others were busy campaigning. As a ceo of an organization that largely shares a constituency with the urban League Movement i am specially interested in hearing what these candidates have to say. To me, it is okay for republicans and democrats to stand across the aisle and have differing perspectives on how to accomplish the goals that are best for all americans. It is not okay to ignore a disenfran choiced community for any reason. Urban leaguers represents the hardworking families like the ones that built this country. They are mostly the background and the next president would do well to remember that. So lets all listen with open minds and ears. I know thats what ill be doing and hope you will as well. Thank you and bring back mark. Well said, michael. We are fortunate to have you as the leader of our team. At this time i would like to acknowledge pepsico, our session sponsor for this plenary. To deliver a brief welcome, please join me in greeting tony west executive vicepresident of governing affairs and corporate secretary for pepsico. As he comes out lets take a look at what pepsi is doing. Pepsico, with 22 billion brands that are global icons and 50 years of delighting consumers when it matters most, celebrations with family, fun times with friends moments that bring communities together a Pioneering Company that has repeatedly adapted and retooled always with an eye towards the future. Healthy nourishment or a simple pleasure. Products you love and trust. Committed to performance with purpose. Ranked among the worlds most ethical and diverse companies. More than a company, a community of families. This is pepsico. Thank you. Good morning, National Urban league. Thank you National Urban league on behalf of our ceo and on behalf of pepsico. Thank you, mike moreal for inviting us to participate in this remarkable form. We are here to talk about an important and timely topic the future of our cities and how we will Work Together to build a better stronger more equitable america for our children and for each other. Every four years we have this great opportunity to engage in a National Conversation with those who would be our leaders about where this nation is and where we are going, about how we will prepare our young people to compete and win in a global marketplace. About how we will help a disproportionately high unemployment among people of color, young africanamerican people and how we can harness the diversity to propel ourselves into a future better than our past. For the National Urban league, this is not a new conversation. You have been putting these issues front and center for more than a century. The country listens. Thats why when you call on president ial candidates thisey show up or they should show up. It is no surprise the National Urban league is pressing this agenda. Why pepsico . Why us . We are located in cities and countries and cities and towns throughout this country. We are an integral part of the community. What we know as pepsico is if the communities in which we operate dont succeed we dont succeed. We are all in this together, all of us, teachers, parents activists and policy makers, business and labor. All of us are in this together. Each one of us will rise when all of us are lifted. At pepsico, we call this corporate philosophy, performance with purpose. It is a corporate philosophy that says we must be a value added not just to our Share Holders in the shortterm but to all stakeholders who are in the societal ecosystem of which we are a part. Thats why we have for the last seven years invested in young people. Over 16 million in something called diplomas now. It is a program that boosts High School Graduation and college matt tri cue lation rates among africanamericans and young latino youth. We will have served over 100,000 students. Thats why we have invested about 1. 3 billion every single year in women and minorityowned businesses as part of our diversity supply chain program. It is why we stepped up to answer president obamas call by being a Founding Member of the my brothers keeper alliance. Something that we know will make a difference because of the investment we make in our young people. Each of us rises when all of us are lifted. So on behalf of pepsico i want to thank all of you for being a part of this important, important National Conversation. Thank you. Thank you, tony. We are off to the races. Time to get to the reason we are here. Ladies and gentlemen, our first speaker and president ial candidate is an author and retired neurosurgeon. A little more than ten years ago, the National Urban league honored dr. Ben carson for his incredibly important work in the field of neurosurgery. Urban leaguers and guests please welcome president ial candidate, dr. Ben carson thank you very much. Candy and i are delighted to be here. Urban league is so important, what it has done historically. I am very, very cognizant of the many people that worked so hard, including Whitney Young im delighted the Whitney Young award is going to benjamin crump. I have had a chance to know him. Enormously proud of him. Individuals like him and myself would never have been able to accomplish what we did without the blood, sweat and tears of so many people that sacrificed and no one will ever know who they are. It was their foundation that provided the freedom for us to do what we do. Thats something that i think everybody always needs to keep in mind. I remember as a 9yearold. Sitting on the steps in the ghetto in boston, having moved from detroit after my mother, who was one of 24 children, hadnt gotten married at age 13. They had moved to detroit from rural tennessee. She discovered that my father was a bigamist and that led to a divorce and we went to boston to live in dire poverty with her sister and brotherinlaw. I was looking at the building across the street of which all the windows had been broken and the sun was shining through and there was a sun beam and it made me think about my future. I remember thinking i would probably never live to be beyond 25 years of age. Thats what i saw beyond me. Both of my older cousins who we adored had been killed. I had seen people lying on the street with Bullet Wounds and stab wounds. It seemed like a pretty dismal place but, you know, the fact of the matter is with all of that going on america is a place of dreams. My mother had a dream of education. She had never been able to get much education herself. She worked very hard two, three jobs at a time leaving at 5 00 in the morning and getting back after midnight scrubbing floors and cleaning toilets. She didnt want to be on welfare. She didnt like the concept of being dependant on other people. She worked long and hard and occasionally accepted some aid but for the most part, was able to stay off. Thats not to say that i dislike people on welfare. There is a nasty rumor going around that carson wants to get rid of all welfare programs and all safety nets for people even though he must have benefiteded from him. The people that say that kind of stuff, they have an agenda. They are trying to undermine and divide people. I have no desire to get rid of safety nets for people who need them. I have a strong desire, however to provide a ladder to get people out of dependency so they become part of the fabric of america. That is really what we need to be talking about. We dont need necessarily to be dependant. We have to understand what true compassion is really about. There are those that came along claiming to be very, very compassionate. They are going to eradicate poverty. There is a war on poverty. We have spent a lot of money since that started in the 60s. Over 19 trillion dollars. What has been the result of that . Ten times more people on food stamps, more welfare, more poverty, more incarceration, out of wedlock births, everything that was supposed to get better is not only worse, its much worse. And i think there is a reason that god actually gave us brains, so we could actually analyze things. We have two choices. When we maeblg a decision to do something and it doesnt work, you can say, maybe we should try Something Else . Or you can say, dleets more of it. I think, quite frankly, it is better to use that brain to think about what things do work the other way around. We need to be looking at the Economic Situation of this country and how do we get it jumpstarted so that we can give people courage and hope again. There has been a lot of change. There is not a lot of hope. We have to bring real hope here. One thing ive noticed spending decades in Corporate America is we have a lot of corporate money overseas. Some people take that to mean american corporations are horrible greedy and unpatriotic. Our secretary of treasury said American Companies that do business overseas to escape the high taxes here are unpatriotic. You know what that indicates . A basic fundamental misunderstanding of our system. People dont go into business to support the government. They go into business to make money. If youre smart, you create an atmosphere that is conducive to them making money here. Of course you do much better if they are making money here, because you get more revenue and you are able to do more things. Thats the way it works. We have this strange mentality that has taken root where lets just say you have a tax system where you have a 10 tax rate based on the bible, tithing. The guy makes 10 billion. He pays 1 billion. He makes 10, he ways 1. Now, some people say, well, thats not fair. Because the guy who makes 10 billion, he still has 9 billion left. We cant let him still have 9 billion left. We have to take more of his money. You know, the problem with that kind of thinking, i with is called socialism by the way, is that you now dont have as much money as that guy with 10 billion. So next year he is going to put in less than 1 billion. More importantly he is going to take what he does have and try to hide it somewhere. Now, the american system that made us a great nation and catapulted us to the pinnacle of the world in record time had a different philosophy. It said, that guy just put in 1 billion. Lets create a system that encourages entrepreneurial risk taking and Capital Investment so that next year, he can make 20 billion and he can put 2 billion in. Thats what expands the pot. Thats what causes real growth to occur. There are people who try to demonize that and they try to say, no thats the wrong idea. The ideal is utopia, where nobody has to worry about anything from cradle to grave. Well take care of all their needs. It always ends up looking the same way. Small group of elites at the top, a rapidly diminishing middle class and a vastly expanded dependant class. Thats not what we need to do. What we need to be thinking about is those corporations over there they have 2 trillion of assets of money over there which they dont bring back, because they dont want to pay a 35 tax rate. They are asking what can they do with it over there. What if we were smart enough to say, we are going to declare a sixmonth hiatus where they can bring that money back without paying any taxes and 10 of it has to be used to create jobs for Unemployed People and people on welfare. You want to talk about a stimulus that doesnt cost american tax payers a penny and has an enormous effect, there you have it. Those are the kind of things that we need to be thinking about. Now, a lot of people when i was growing up concentrated on racism. A lot of racism. It is going to keep you from being able to do things. There was racism. No question about it. There still is. There always will be. There was yesterday and there is today and there will be tomorrow. As long as there are people with small brains and evil forces to stimulate them, it will be there. What do you do about it . I remember when i was in the eighth grade having turned things around tremendously because i was a horrible student before and my mother made us read books and we were not happy about that. Back in those days, you had to do what your parents told you. I was reading these books and as i read about people, particularly people of enormous accomplishment. I remember one of the first books i read, up from slavery by booker t. Washington, i began to recognize that the person who has the most to do with what happens to you in life is you. It is not somebody else. It is not the environment. They cant stop you. Once i developed that mindset, i stopped listening to all the naysayers and the people that were telling me that i was a victim. As an eighth grader i was the only black