silence your telephones if you haven't already. for our viewing and listening audience feel free to also follow along on twitter using the #pressclub. for our c-span and radio audiences please be aware in our audience today are members of our general public. so any applause or reaction you may hear is not necessarily a reaction of the working press. now, i'd like to introduce our head table. please hold your applause until each head table member has been introduced. head table participants please stand up when i say your name. we have jamal abdul alim, senior staff writer at diverse, issues in education. we have jerry weller, foformer u.s. representative from illinois's district and the state society in washington. we have mike, a supervisor here in washington, d.c. we have tony trem, star scholar graduate of harry s. truman in chicago and an incoming northwestern student who's planning to study neuroscience. we have armando rodriguez. we have lisa matthews co-leader of the npc headliners team. we're going to skip over our guest speaker for a moment. we'll do it, i promise. we have lynn sweet, washington bureau chief for the chicago sun times. we have dr. gregory jones prince pal at kenwood academy high school in chicago. we have bob wiener, president of oped columnist and npc team member who helped organize today's luncheon. we have michael smith, ceo of green smith public affairs and a contributor to campaigns and elections magazine. we have caroline hendry, executive director of the education writers association. thank you for joining us today. i'd also like to acknowledge additional members of the headliners team responsible for organizing today's event. betsey fisher martin, lorry ruseo, eleanor hurmen, and press staff liaison haywood. thank you all. so long before today's guest became a politician, he attended sarah lawrence college. he spent his first two years there studying to become a preschoolteacher, at college, before politics and long before he was president obama's chief of staff, chicago rahm emmanuel taught preschool. his love of education followed throughout his political career. into his 10ure as chicago's mayor with where he oversees the third largest school system in the united states. he is credited with adding more than 200 hours in the school year, taking chicago of having the least educational time of any large school district in the country to being an par with its peers. he implemented full-day kindergarten for every chicago child and fought and won new accountability measures. during his tenure the district wide chicago graduation rate has grown by 16 graduation points, more than three times the national average for growth. and mayor emmanuel beca-- chang hasn't been easy for this big city mayor. early in his first term chicago endured a historic teacher strike, and the state budget impasse now entering its third year has had devastating impact on chicago schools. he's also had to confront his city's persistent gun violence and grapple how to run a police department facing questions about its treatment of african-americans. even with these challenges, the may mayor or rambo, as he's known in some circles because of his tenacity, has kept a steady eye on education. this year the mayor introduced a plan. it uses education not as an end point but as a pathway to further education and employment. the mayor's initiative will require high school seniors to provide proof of college or high school aacceptance in order to graduate. this starts in 20/20. the atlantic calls plans like the mayor's a seismic shift in american education. rahm emanual served as a senior advisor to president bill clinton in 1993. in 2002 he was elected to illinois's fifth congressional district. he served as president obama's chief of staff from 2008 to 2010. a year later he became chicago's mayor and was re-elected to that post in 2015. of course education is not the only issue mayor emmanuel has faced. and we look forward to hearing him address other matters as well as he works to move the windy city forward. please join me in welcoming mayor rahm emmanuel to the press club. >> thank you. i just want you to know i started this job 6'2", 150 pounds, and now i'm 5'8". thank you for that introduction. a little over 30 years ago secretary bennett called the chicago public school system the worst public school system in the united states of america. let me give you the results today. the graduation rate when i first became mayor was for 57% and now it's 67%, a growth. third, 42% of all our students today graduate with college credit. 42% of our kids go on and are accepted to college equal to the united states of america. and trust me, our demographics is not the united states of america. another 21% go onto community colleges are the rate is 22% nationally. so even with the demographics for chicago is different, we match with kids going from high school to college to community college. third, our eighth graders led the united states in math games. our fourth graders were third overall in reading games. there are only three districts whose math and reading won't up. every measure of the city of chicago's educational gains are pointing in the right direction and surpassing -- and i'll go back to high school for a second -- our graduation rate for the last five years, every year was triple the national average. so if william bennett can get through tsa, i'd like him to come back to the city of chicago and see what's happening. but every measure on high school, college acceptance, college attendance as well as in reading and math scores at fourth and eighth great levels, chicago is exceeding the norm of the united states progress. while the math of chicago students are not the norm for the united states of america. now, some of the things that were noted earlier point to that direction of what was happening. when i became mayor half of our kids had a full school day -- i mean half our kids had a full day of kindergarten and half were not. if you looked at the math ones that were getting a half day, needed a full day and ones that were getting a half day needed a full day. every child in the city of chicago today has a full day of kindergarten. we've had a 60% of increase in our full day pre-k for our children. we ran the first race to the top for our early childhood so parents could compare the models of early childhood education. and we've also increased the funding where, as i said, for full-day pre-k for all four-year-olds. and the reason is we can see the data for full-day pre-k, what it does for kindergarten and first grade and onward ward, i have a fundamental shared by our schools that kids drop out of college in third grade. kids do thought drop out freshman year. if they're not reading and doing math in third grade, it's not fourth grade is any easier. i do not believe the kindergarten and 12th grade model -- i told you a couple of things we've done on the earlier side. a 60% increase for education in our full day pre-k in one of our online portals that's now being praised by the united states government. i have -- we're in the process right now of a reinvention of our high school and what it prepares for. i just finished a graduation, i did about five or six different schools across the city of chicago. crane high school, which is on the west side, 100% college acceptance. finger all the way on the south side, 100% acceptance. chicago bulls, 100% full college acceptance. we have with us -- ibm to graduate, they have a little over 90% of their students have graduated. seven of their students have graduated already with their associates degree in hand. they've won over $4.4 million in scholarships for their students. all of them are going onto post high school education to college. that's on the far south side. i have also gregory jones from kenwood. kenwood is also on the south side of the city of chicago. 95% of their freshman are on track to graduate. more than half the students are earning college credit while they're in high school. he said to me 72%. they earned this year $35 million in scholarships at their school. they have the largest dual credit, dual enrollment in the city of chicago. now, what we are about and what we're trying to do is take our high school graduation, which was at 57% by the class of 2019, we're on track for 87%. that's a 52% growth rate. we're triple the national average. we have a series of things we are doing to ensure that every child is college ready and college bound. we live in a period of time where you earn what you learn. you get a high school degree, that's probably going to be your income. you earn a two-year associates degree, you earn a college degree, you earn a post-dockerate degree, we live in a period where you earn what you learn. our question as mayor and one of the prince pals here is what are we doing to prepare our high schools for that economy? more than 56% of our economy will require a minimum of two years college degree. we're a pre-k to college model. first and foremost while you're in high school, we have the largest international backleriate program in the united states of america. and it's fancy way of saying liberal arts education. and it's a way now for people become ibm schools in chicago than we can keep up with. because when you take that test, you have that under your belt. dual system in our city, mayor all directored, is the second largest in the united states of america. so when i became mayor there were about 4 to 600 students in dual credit, dual enrollment. today we're north of 4,000. so kids are not only getting a high school degree, they're graduating with college credits under their belt. in fact at kenwood, greg has more students involved in that dual credit dual enrollment than any of the high schools, 110 of them in the country. so they're not only graduating high school but with college credit under their belt. third, advance placements. we have one of the largest programs, and my data point i think it says 67% of people passing those tests. swel as well as with ap advance placement we are ensuring the kids of chicago grad what with college credits already under their belt and unless their parents went to school, the college experience under their belt say enough about what that means for kids who are not at or below poverty level. their familiar with it, and they're familiar with the rigor of that effort. today right now in the city of chicago 42% of all our children not only go to college but 42% graduate with college credit underneath their experience at high school. we set a goal by 2018 to grow that to 50%. at armando's schools, which we have four of them at that level, they're not only doing high school, he had seven graduates that ragratuated with not only a high school degree but several of them have grad watted with an associate's degree already under their belt. free, did i mention free yet? parents don't have to pay for it. in greg's class i think it's 72% graduating with college credit. free. and the big challenge which we all know is cost for higher education, chicago has got a model regardless of color, zip code, background, can graduate with college credit under their belt free, where cost is not the prohibitive factor. i do not agree parents should have a second mortgage to give their kids a college degree. then what we've done additional is if you get a b average in high school, we're the only city in the united states, we make community college free. two years of your education is free. and then we have what we call the chicago star. the chicago star plus, which is what tony is part of, is if you maintain your b average in community college -- so high school, average, community college free. you maintain the b average in community college, everyone of the universities in the city of chicago, northwestern, columbia, north eastern, any one of them will give you anywhere from 25% to 40% off your tuition. tony went to northside college prep. best high school in the state of illinois. that's just not me, the report. he got in even though he could not afford it, that's with a scholarship. he went to truman community college with a barks average, maintained the b average and now he's going to northwestern for free. he will come out from northwestern university going for neuroscience and basically have no college debt. put that in your pipe and smoke it. so that's our educational plan in a net shell in chicago, go from kindergarten to fourth grade to pre-k through 12 model. and finally what wave established and embarked upon is what was just described. and let me give a full description of it, which is today if you look at college acceptance -- community college acceptance in the armed forces. and i want to get back to the armed forces because i forgot about it, chicago has 65% of our kids already going to college or community college. they're taking college credits in high school, they've got ap or dual credit, dual enrollment. and we match the united states, as i said, in both of those categories even while our population is different than the over all united states demographics. what we want to ensure and then 42% of our children are graduating with college credits under their belt even though we match that all together, we want to make sure everybody, the class of 2019, 2020, every child has a post-high school educational plan that the economy is already requiring of them. so we want you to have a letter from college or a letter from a community college, these are acceptance letters, a letter from a trade or a letter from a branch of the armed forces and a letter from a job. it's essential to make sure that while kids are in high school, they have a post-high school educational plan. one, in a 21st century economy you know the data already. basically 80% of all the future jobs are going to require a minimum of two years of higher education. second, we already got 65% of our kids getting there. i cannot in good conscience as a mayor allow the other 35% to not have a plan but the economy is going to require them. when you have all the support system in place in a school rather than when they graduate and oh, i'll figure this out when i'm 18, that other 30% needs that support in high school so they can execute. and fourth, while i don't know everybody in this room, i can say this is a father of three. for any parents in this room, any one of you, leave it to chance to your kids? raise your hand if you say figure if out on your own? okay. well, honey, if you've got seven, i'm building you a bridge in grant park. because let me just say this, on the first two you didn't leave it at chance, by the last five you say i'm over this. i've got three. we do not leave it for your children. and as a mayor, as our two prince pals, we don't leave it to chance. not when you have the support in place, not when you're the first child in your family to make to it to college to chance. not when the an economy tomorrow requires that an education today equals it. so when you're in high school we're going to ensure you've got college credit and you graduate with the confidence you can do it. you graduate not only it with the confidence but your parents don't have to pay for it. it's the number one thing stressing parents out how to figure it out. third, we would not only want to have 65% of our kids going to college, going to community college or the armed forces but also make sure that the other 35% don't just happen to have it played by the russian roulette table. sole wave given ourselves three years to prepare the system and prepare the expectations of our children. i will let you know it's not just in high school. across the city of chicago, in elementary schools, we have teachers in schools who put up college banners in the hallways or in the front doors of their classrooms, from kindergarten forward, so kids get the expectation and the awareness socially at school about expectations. you raise those expectations and trust me, the two prince pals and the student will tell you this, not just me, if you raise those expectations and support the effort, kids will meet those goals. everything i'm telling you if i've told you about crane school, sarah good school, bull school, kenwood school, all the cynics, all the naysayers, all the did you tellers would have said not those kids. not from that background, not from that socioeconomic class. fanger, 100% college acceptance. sarah good, 94%, $4.5 million in scholarships. kenwood, $35 million in scholarships. 72% with college credit rate. and with every measure some profeller out here would tell you based on background, race, income, neighborhood, family socioeconomic class, those kids couldn't do it. it can be done, are it should be done, it must be done. you don't just put a requirement on it. you support kids and you raise your expectations and help them all the way. there's not one of us who are parents in this room who wouldn't do it for our children. and the other 35% we make sure they have the support to prepare. it's not like we're going to drop it on them senior year. we prepare them, work with them, give them the support how to apply to college or community college or branch of the armed services, a trade or a job. i left out of my litany what we're also doing in terms of largest id, largest ip. they have basically seven applicants for every seat, 80% graduation rate. i just told you just last year where it's nearly 74%, and they have a 90% college acceptance. every school is a one or level one plus school. so the armed branch and the armed forces, so it's not just when we say it, we have also the largest -- program in america, 10,500 kids. and lastly let me talk about one thing when i talk about what we have done and what we have accomplished, i believe firmly in the power of education. none of us would be in this room if we didn't have two things in common, the love of our parents and a good education. and as mayor i have a responsibility to ensure every child has a chance to succeed. and i have to make sure the system and the structure and the support and our prince pals have what they need to succeed. we did expand the school day. we had the shortest school day and the shortest school year. these data points are not mine. they are what our principals, our students have changed. not one point is going in the right direction and the others are going the wrong way. at the elementary level, the high school level, the testing into college and the college acceptance are all pointing on the north end. now i'll close on this one point because we're in a big debate, i think the debate is wrong. it is not a debate of neighborhood versus chatter, although both principles here are from neighborhood schools. it is about quality versus me mediocrity. i think the entire debate that's happening nationally and even in my city is not the target. if you're a parent and sitting around thinking about schools, you don't think about oh, is this a good reform school, you think about quality versus mediocrity. my responsibility as mayor is make sure you have a semienrollment school like our students went to or any 1 of our high schools. it has quality, and then you put the right school for our student, your child. it is quality versus mediocrity, not charter versus neighborhood. we have expanded charters have closed failed charters. we have expanded neighborhood schools. crane high school is a perfect example and also turned around schools. quality was our north star. that's where this debate must go. and i'll close on this other point. it's also a mistake to have an entire debate around just teachers. one, you've got to have three things. an involved parent, a teacher that will motivate you, and a principal that will be held accountable and is not scared to be held accountable. every child is home schooled. every child. and their jobs are easier when that's happening. when it's not, we need to make sure they have all the support from early childhood education to highly motivated teachers to principals that are not only scared to be held accountable but want to be because they want the independence to be held accountable. and i would say to you that the principals and the parents have been left out-of-the discussion of last 20 years which are always about just teachers because the other two don't play a role in the education and socialization of our children. and we're missing the debate, and you think go back to your own experiences, that's what motivates and changes education. if you're going to make fundamental reforms, that's what has to happen. i suppose to other last point i made, we may be the first school district in the united states to embark orch on a post-educational high school model. but mark my words, we're not going to be the last. new york has their deal, arkansas has their deal, tennessee has their deal, city of chicago has ours. but everybody going to be going this way because that's what the economy requires, that's what our children need if their going to succeed in the 21st century. thank you for being here, and i look forward to taking your questions. >> thank you, mayor emmanuel. how are you funding, starting with questions from the audience. how are you funding the education add on-ones you've described and how do you convince your constituents to make your investment. >> let me walk through a couple of things. just as examples, et cetera, the chicago star, which is if you get a b average, community college is free. we spend today at community colleges around $30 plus million on remedial education. so we took a portion of it into if you get a b average or better you get free community college. why? i'm awarding success rather than purchasing an insurance policy on failure. so we just channel the dollars differently. second, on greg's basis at kenwood, which as i again just north of north park or chicago, they have the largest use in the city of dual enrollment. so kids are in their high school getting college cloosz classes or they go up to one of the higher ups and take classes. in our other model, they're in the high school date taking already college classes. so that's an example of how we're funding it. and i'll just say this, i think we've proven -- and i've raised taxes for public schools. not only for the teachers pension, but for school modernization facility. i cannot have kids in hallways, wells -- i'll give greg credit. he's going to laugh about this. he had seventh and eight grade which is called academic excellence plus high school where squaer going to take another school over and put the seventh and eighth graders there. so we held a meeting in a room without air-conditioning. let me just say by the next school year they got air-conditioning. it was in the middle of the summer where but by the end of the summer we'll have air-conditioning for all schools. what i'll also be upfront about, you want more revenue i'll give quality. i'm for more revenue that succeeds quality versus mediocrity. >> do you anticipate you might use some of that revenue to hire more guidance counselors, to increase the ratio of guidance counselors to students? >> i think you're going to always use more. we're going to have use more to get to our goal. you know one goal, i don't know if they're in your school. one goal is a nonfor profit, does superb work. we're going to have to invest in this. now, that's why in our policy we gave ourselves to 2019/2020 class. we're already at 40% to all our counselors trained in this. so there's two goals to remember, by 2018 we want to be at 50% of our kids graduating with college credit already under their belt and by 2019 to graduate, when we'll support you, a letter of anticipatance from one of five things, college, community college, armed forces, a trade or job. >> how are you preparing your community college system for the influx of students? i imagine you anticipate more students registering with community colleges. >> well, i'm very proud of this. so when i became mayor, we were one of the worst systems in the united states. the world bank came out three years ago and wrote a report that chicago's got the best college to career program in the united states. so a, has the most diversified colleges in the united states of america, actually the most in the world. we copy, you ready, the german model. malcolm x on the west side is all health care. the lead is with children, troegsers, abbot, baxter, they help us on the curricular. all professional services. it, advance manufacturing, human services. every school is aligned with the fastest growing part of our economy with the fastest modern jobs where the industry helps us on curriculum. it was written up as the best college career program. they are getting an influx. but first of all, i don't mean to do this to you, tony, but tony went to the best high schools i told you in the state. north side, it's also one of the top 30 in the united states of america. trust me truman community college never had a northside graduate. they have a northside graduate who's now going onto become an alumnist. because of the chicago star scholarship, which is free -- have i mentioned free yet? it's free. and now because of the partnership of star plus, he's going onto northwestern to graduate debt free. that's how we're going to do it, and we're going to increase the quality of our students. and more importantly for the students who don't belong to northwestern, they are not just coming out with an associates degree. they're coming out with a degree that was designed by the industry, so they know the credentials. and they're not just getting a job, but if they're in health care, they get a job that's leading them to the middle class. key difference. you're in health care, you want to be a nurse, we got a way to do it. second, you want to bounce yourself up in a higher grade as a nurse, we have an educational system. so we're more than just a job. we're a career that helps you get up that economic ladder. >> with the new requirements for students starting in 2020, if a student doesn't present these qualifications -- >> they go to that woman's family's house. we'll just send them to her home. >> will they be considered a drop out, or what are their alternatives? >> let me say this, it is a requirement, but let me do two things. first of all, it's not like we just tell you senior year in september this is -- we're doing this all the way through and helping kids and giving the support to get there. that's a. b, i'm going to tell you this outside of you, nobody in this room doesn't do this for their own children both subtly and directly. i'm going to make sure those other 30% aren't just by chance but have a support system. and we're going to help them get there. today to graduate you have to do 40 hours of community service in chicago. you have to do four credits worth of science. to graduate sarah good, you take four years of it. we have a whole host of requirements. i don't think it's a -- and our kids graduate our graduation rate's going up. i do not think it's a stretch to -- yes, it's a requirement but we're going to support you to also ensure you have a post-high school educational plan. you have to do 40 hours of community service in chicago to graduate. you have to have science requirements. you have to have arts requirements. and i'm a former dancer as i told you. i'm for that. the idea that you are going to actually have a post-high school educational plan and all of a sudden we're putting a burden on our kid's backs, i bet the children in chicago are going to have a better education than any other child. i'll tell you this, i'd rather leave the insurance policy of the kids who go to high school -- at sarah good, and i can go through all the schools i mentioned, these are kids of color. overwhelmingly on free and reduced lunch. i don't know the percentages, but a good percentage who are the first ones in their family to go to college. now, i and amy have five degrees between us. that's my wife. we have all the support we can give our kids if they want a college counselor, advice, tutor. i'm supposed to leave to chance a child, the first one of their family to go to college, outside the support of sarah good and all the infrastructure around? it would be morally representhensible for me to do that when we could do the opposite. so that's what we're doing. it is a requirement. when they get there, we're going to ensure they have a plan. >> giving your priority on education, what would the government administration's proposed cuts in college loans and grants do in chicago? how would that affect chicago's -- >> you mean the u.s. >> yes. >> it's hard for me when you say cuts not to think of the state of illinois. >> we'll get there. >> lisa and i have just talked about this. she's talking about group, but talking about the return on investment of college education and over a lifetime. i bet you the return on investment on higher education is higher than the return of of a home. that is an education over a home. i'm telling you guys i mean i grew up in a home -- i mean this is engulfed in me and beaten into my dna, and i had a father who was an immigrant, so couldn't have been cheaper about everything in life except for one thing, education. that's true of how i raised my kids. don't talk about if it's education, it's just not a sacrifice. and i just think we're nuts a country given what we know, the competition is getting more fierce in the 21st century nost not just from china but a whole host of countries, we would not make higher education affordable. i think it's morally wrong to ask parents to take a second mortgage, second job -- to give their kids a shot at the american dream. and i'll just tell you this, i left it out. the chicago star scholarship, which is a free community college, is the only public scholarship in the united states that's open to dreamers. and every one of the programs i've mentioned, meaning the chicago star and chicago star plus is open to everybody and dreamers included. meaning northwestern, they do the add-on, north eastern. i think it's crazy to cut funding and leave it just to banks. again, i'm using tony as an example, but there's hundreds of students, i know there are students because at sarah good they graduated with not only a high school degree but an associate's degree. these are working families. tony could not go to the university of illinois because of the aide in a school, basically the aid was too expensive. i think it's crazy what we're doing as a country, and we're trying to take a stab and make it better. >> so coming to illinois's state administration -- >> you guys got another hour? >> i wish we did, i really wish we did. >> so do i. it would be more therapy for me than anything else. go ahead. >> two related questions. do you think the state of illinois will enact a budget before the 2018 election and will chicago schools open on time this fall if the state of illinois doesn't pass the budget the. >> we've already answered number two. we're opening up on time. parents don't need the anxieties about that. we're opening up on time. it's time the state of illinois meet their responsibility. let me just say a couple of things. first, sils dead last in funtding public education. we beat out mississippi for dead last. the city of chicago is the second most competitive economy and seventh in the world. now, we're going to open up on time. we've gone 700 plus days without a budget. the governor has gone 700 days without introducing a budget. you will never have a budget until the chief executive in a city or state, in this case a state, introduces a budget. i can't make a prediction. i can tell you i hope it does, it needs to. the governor has an obligation to introduce a balanced budget that shows all his priorities. our students are going to school. that's where they belong. we will do whatever it takes to ensure our kids go to school. our doors will be open. they will be learning, and we'll be beating records. now, i didn't mention this. in the last three years every gain in the state of illinois, either graduation, reading or math has come out-of-the city of chicago. if you take the city of chicago out of illinois, which i'm telling you every day i want to do, if you take them out, every day their reading rate is either flat or declined, their math rate is either flat or decline. illinois without chicago would be falling backwards. we're opening our doors. the governor will have to figure out what every ert school district does that is poor or represents minority kids, but chicago will be open for the future. i can't say that about illinois. >> including education, what has been the biggest disruption for the city of chicago from the budget impasse? >> oh, from the budget impasse? well, i'll give you -- well, there's two things. look, let me give you a couple of other points that you may not know. for five years in a row chicago is the number one city in the united states for corporate relocations. not one, not two. every year for five years. for five years in a row chicago is the direct for foreign investment in united states of america. and in 2016 we're our entire investment was greater than atlanta and montreal all combined. this grew faster than the united states, faster than new york, faster than washington, d.c. i'm getting to my answer. i was just giving you data points. the reason is because we've created certainty. 36% of the kids in the city of chicago have a four-year college degree or better. in the united states it's 27%. we have the largest cap tal investment in the united states both public and aviation. we have a community college system as i already outlined to you. we have a transportation, technology, training, transparency, and also what i said in the effort of the transportation system, all the five t's. talent, training, transportation, and technology. we've created certainty. the biggest strain on the city of chicago is uncertainty with the budget. what businesses, big, medium, small, any size is looking for is certainty. you create certainty around talent. you create certainty around the pool and resources of talent coming in. you create certainty around a 2013 traps portation system, certainty arnt talents and you'll get investment. you create uncertainty, and you'll get the biggest strain from that. seventh most competitive economy in the world, second in north america is uncertainty. there are other human resources as it affects to homeless, domestic violence shelters, taking care of the indigent and poor. and i can't tell you what it means just in funding and budget, the actual infrastructure in supports is attrofying. go look at a state that doesn't fund basic operations. it's in a third world place. so it's not just -- so i would say on the human side it's been tremendously draining. on the side of the business environment, just don't be a drain. if you can't be a net plus to the state of illinois, just don't be a drain anymore. okay. >> thank you. >> i could go on. the governor is about to give what he calls a special session. he is about to give a speech. i just want a budget. just make the -- look, harry s. truman, signed. did he say go see sam rayburn or the buck stops here? every chief executive, it is the responsibility of the office, says here is the budget, here is where i'm going to invest, here are the choices i'm going to make. we've gone 700 plus days with our chief executive never once introducing a budget. everybody walks around scratching their head saying, you don't have a budget. well, we don't have one introduced. i've been in congress, introduce it and we'll get to work on it. >> do you plan to run for a third term as mayor of chicago, and what will you campaign narrative be in a nutshell? >> okay. first of all, i plan on running for a third term, and the first person that i'll talk to will be my wife, not you. but, yeah -- no, i'm joking. so i plan on running for a third time. i have already said that before so it is not a big surprise. i have been honored to work for president clinton, president obama. i have been honored to represent the north side. no job has been more intellectually and emotionally rewarding, any mayor would tell you that. it is also emotionally also challenging, but i look at what we've done. i can't say we got it 100% right, but i can tell you we are trying. i was at the other day a community college. we did our first cohorts of what we call the chicago star plus. a young man just like tony introduced me, he was a star, got a "b." he got a "b" average in community college and he is going on to dominican school, dominican. he said, i'm going to graduate debt free. he said i'm the first in my family to go to college. an immigrant, a dreamer. he says, i could not do it without what you did, mr. mayor, and i want to thank you. i got to that podium and i could barely hold it together. i cannot think of anything better in public life than to know that you can make an imprint, put your thumb on the scale and tip it towards justice and equity. i will say to you that in a time in which we live with greater polarization, a period of time where people want more of a sense of ability to influence their own lives in the democratic process, local government is where that's possible. right now the rest of us look at this city as disneyland on the potomac. i would just tell you if you look around the world, there's 100 cities that are driving the economic, intellectual, cultural energy of the world economy, and chicago is one of them. i plan on continuing to keep it in the top ten as a global leader, economically, culturally. and then my measure as a mayor, my measure as a mayor is to make sure -- i got it -- that the kids of rogers park where tony went, the kids of rave enswood where i live, and the kids on the far south side, when they look at this great city and they see the power represented by the city that they all share the same sense, that that's my city. and if they do, berlin, london, beijing, tokyo, new york, watch out, chicago is coming for you. nothing will hold us back. that's the measure of our success. >> thank you. >> do i have a few more minutes? >> yes. i'm going to try two more questions. >> got it. someone often credited with being one of the architects of the democratic takeover of the u.s. house in 2006, what will it mean for your party's prospects in the 2018 midterms if john ossa wins tonight in ga and if he loses? and do you -- you helped lead the last democratic takeover of congress. can it happen in 2018? >> sure, it can happen. anybody that tells you it will happen this far out hasn't been in campaigns. it is too far to predict, a lot of things happen. i would rather be a democrat today going into 2018 than a republican, and you didn't pay me to say that. okay. every time the house of representatives has ever flipped, it's been in a midterm election. so that's a fact. no party has gone into a midterm with a president this unpopular at this point -- remember, it is 18 months, or 17 months -- without a severe consequence to that party's position in the house. you have three factors, maps, voting rights and money that are different than any other time before. we don't know the consequences. in '06 in the sixth year of a presidency, which is not the first time and we did it last time, you had beginnings of a recession, two up popular wars, an unpopular president and a corruption scandal. it was enough, and there were enough candidates in the places to create a wave and then to ride that wave. i don't know what's happening across '18, but i also want to say as somebody who spent my life building the party, we are 1,000 seats shorter to date than we were in 2009 or 2008. this is not about one election. it is about building a party, building an apparatus. what i mean by that, chris murphy out of connecticut, the class of 2006 to congress. christine gillebrand, the class of 2006. john donnelly, the class of 2006. i'm about building a party. so if it is not about one election, it is about making sure we win state house seats in north carolina, georgia, new mexico, in all of these areas, and other people and promote them not just to congress. so anybody that says what is happening in 2018, i say okay, what is happening in 2018, 2020, 2024, and are we doing what is necessary intellectually, organizing and party building to make sure we're prepared for the next decade, not for the next election. >> thank you. >> thank you. >> before you leave, we have a small gift for you. it is a longstanding tradition at the national press club to present all of our luncheon speakers, each one of them, with a mug from the latin national press club. we hope that you use it in good health. >> thank you. >> thank you very much. >> thank you very much. [ applause ] >> and very, very briefly, i wanted to ask you, who was your favorite teacher and why? >> larry gould, history teacher in high school. he was also my home room teacher in high school. >> wonderful. thank you so much. [ applause ] >> before we close today's luncheon i would also like to invite all of you to join us on thursday, july 27th, when we will hear from army chief of staff general mark millie. the national press club is the world's leading professional organization for journalists. for more information about the club or to apply for membership, please visit our website at press.org. to donate to programs such as scholarships or training opportunities for journalists offered through the nonprofit national press club journalism institute, visit press.org/institute. we are adjourned. [ applause ] at a senate judiciary committee hearing on free speech on college campuses. the president of williams college unilaterally canceled t the speaker. they made bringing speakers to campus in a specially arduous process for my student group. what i find impermissible, undemocratic and against the characterst college a tend is the president's decision to disinvite a speaker solely on the basis of his inflamatory remarks about race. >> congresswoman diana deget on the opioid crisis in the u.s. >> and ways sitting next to the denver public librarian. i said what are the issues you're facing here at the denver public library? and i thought she would say something like, you know, cybersecurity or access to books. she said, you know, we have people overdosing in the library every day and we need to get our librarians in a lock zone so they give it to people that overdosed at the denver public library. >> and john mccain at the confirmation hearing of patrick shanahan. >> we're now have an executive from onest five major korncourt appeals that's corralled 9 a% of our defense budgets and on onest major issues that this committee had hearings about, has had markups about, has reported out our bill and you want to find out more information. not a good beginning. not a good beginning. do not do that again mr. shanahan or i will not take your name up for a vote before this committee. >> c-span programs are available at c-span.org. right on our home page, or by searching the video library. >> c-span's washington journal live every day with news and policy issues that impact you. coming up tuesday morning, georgia republican congressman barry loudermill will talk about his proposal that will allowed conceal carry permits to be legal in the district of clom yashgs particularly for members of congress. and vermont democratic congressman peter welsh will join us to discuss his disappoint ment with the trump administration and we'll fwauk the need for more security personnel at federal maximum security prisons. be sure to watch "w