I really excited to have the opportunity to have this conversation with you today because i dont have a terribly good memory to be honest so i am grateful you took the time to write down so many of the stories over the last year and a half. What inspired you to write this book . My editor called me right after the election and said we have a Record Number of women in congress with so many different districts. Dont you think that would be a great book . You have covered congress for so many years. And with the killer deadline so this will be all the people and to have that experience with the tea party what that was like so i thought they were bookends and it was an interesting contrast. So you tell a lot of stories so what stands out as the most remarkable story that you would want to share . A couple of things. And to watch all of you interact. And to find the National Group of security women. So close and tight knit. The what was interesting to me. And with that legislative memory and just that she had run on that issue with that painful horrific experience with gun violence and so many personal stories and politics obviously the bill did not get any traction in congress and then to see the contrast of the moderate progressive and over the amendments to that. Beverly was an important bill that we spent several decades in legislation on gutting gun safety and it was a personal issue for lucy in particular as i saw in the book he told a story about the motion to recommit, that was associated with that and i think thats one of the things from a memory standpoint strikes me as what its been about in my learning experience there is a concept or an actual thing called emotion to recommit which basically gets appended to every bill of any consequence that gets voted on in congress and as its history being something that the last bite at the apple from the party thats in the minority to be a to perfect the bill and if we just had this happen on the motion to recommit that everything would be committe ped wed be able to pass bipartisan is the heritage of the concept but the interior has become a weapon of the party of the minority in a lot of ways and become something that can be used to run attack ads on the party of the majority and specific members of the party in the majority and this is one of the things that was most striking to me as a person who is a freshman but not only a freshman a firsttime legislator that there are a ready weapons almost like your not in a longer, thats what i was struck by in congress, you wrote a little bit about it with freshman orientation largely with not a lot of concept and so i thought that was interesting too. I was wondering for you when i went to college there was an essay that stands out in my mind which was in one word if you could describe yourself what would that when. Reporter and if you could describe her freshman class, what with that one word be and why would you use that word. I would say remarkable because on the one hand if you look at the fact that the most number of women was still so feel when i interviewed pat shorter about this she said i dont even know what were celebrating. It is striking and an absence of a larger number but it exists. As we talk about that a motion to recommit, only on cspan can we have such a lengthy conversation about this its a fascinating thing. And for me having stood in the speakers lobby with open to republicans in control and a lot of the guys would go out and smoke cigars on the balcony and they wouldnt Pay Attention to them watching Something Like that that is symbolic in the political conversation in a sense. In watching what is remarkable with all the very interesting background and you let your experiences in the newness of it unfold pretty openly, i dont think people try to hide the fact, many people thought it was a badge of honor to not be in politics especially in washington and to let your fresh opinions on how things should begin, even when it did not work out in your favor. You talked about the motion to commit again i was talking with angie craig, the minneapolis suburbs in the coffee shop and she said i kinda regretted that, i realized only after the fact what that actually did, everyone is learning and front of the country and i think that is very different than ten years ago. I think it is very important transparency is really important, is particular important to me anything a lot of my freshman class numbers because we did just get here in a lot of ways and we do have fresh and clean legislative records and were trained to be thoughtful and deliberate with our processes and making sure that we not only are representing people but explaining why we believe we are representing the people in whatever boat that we take. It is important to be human because that is one thing that i hope that you see in a class with more women that we are trying to be our whole selves in terms of how we present to people and i think that is different than some of the women who may have ran before us in terms of how they felt that they may have to prevent to people they did not necessarily feel like they can be there host cells. My next question, you spent a lot of time about people figuring out whether not to run and how to run and whether they were recruited or not recruited, rising sample was not recruited, i literally hit reply to a list of solicitation and attach my resume and said i would like to run for congress in my little reply went to emilys list. Com and i did not they get all that anybody would answer me in the universe and they did for whatever reason because it was earlier on in the process. Also i got a lot of questions early on i why you are not running for school board, why are you not with state or local, and my folks to that time woods im 51, im too old for that and im not qualified. I got a response back of who you are to think youre qualified without having any other qualifications even in government. I dont thing we would have the conversation in the responses with male candidates and i think that is something i would like to understand, what do you think the differences are between men and women in running for office, do you think this is a class that was not necessarily recruited or a large part were recruited, what did you see in the landscape of all of that. It was a mix, it is funny when youre reflecting upon how you got into the race and talking about qualifications, i go back to that class of seven freshmen in 2011 congress and we spent a lot of time at the pizzeria and that was his Family Business and i dont think anybody said i think they said how are you going to be this incumbent democrat but i dont think he was laughed out of town with regard to experience. Again thats become a badge of honor in washington to be down with the people and know your constituents, to go home a lot. So if you are talking to a woman and say do you have enough experience, thats automatically a different standard, if your standard is to become part of your community of a citizen lawmaker if you will, it is interesting and im curious to hear your thoughts on Elizabeth Warren dropping out which is today on thursday because thats obviously a huge piece of the conversation and there is no getting around these reflective responses to women and frankly, often from other women. I had a lot of women especially the chapter in the book of republican women and they talk about what your talking about they said whos going to watch her kids martha, robie from alabama who is retiring said whos going to take care of your kids when youre in washington on the road. These questions come up all the time and all i can say is my conclusion is in order to combat that, you just need more women, when women can get their primary, they will get elected but they have to get to the primary and i think you see thats where a lot of that start. I was struck by a lot of your book with the democratic and women experiences and there were differences that you assess, share the joy when i look at the democratic side of the aisle and the diversity in the commodity and literally the color because women tend to not wear suits so you see this a path history of america, when i looked to the other side of the eye and see more somber suits and mostly men and i want the other side of the aisle to look like america, i want the other side to be more bright and what comments did you make in the book that had to do with the republican, why cant we get more republican women elected. I talked to many people in washington and they dont believe me when i say this and is probably not universally so but i truly believe in having congress and talking too so many people and republicans do want that too, especially women, they want more women, they want a more diverse congress. Structurally speaking the way that they normally have recruited people and supported people which has to do with their overall political philosophy has to do with homeric proctor see that they want to be genderneutral and always pick the best person and i think republican women in particular especially those in a son raising space are starting to come around that that was simply not going to work, they had to be a gender focus in recruiting women. We all know women have to be talked into running sometimes, there qualified in a man, or challenger. If that is the case with women, you will have to recruit women directly. I talked to a woman who had run in a primary North Carolina and she was stunned to see how many women especially in 50s did not believe another women should have a job. Its something thats very regional but its going to take concerted effort, i think its not we want more women and come on and run the customer structural changes. For me in my particular case, not only am i a woman but im a veteran and also an engineer and an educator and all of those different kinds of things are not very well represented in our congress and largely not represented because of access to capital is the lifeblood of politics sadly and people who are veterans in educator or women are not those people who have vast networks of people who can support them and provide resources for the campaign and that sort of thing. We are in a new time where theres increasingly more and more organizations are recognizing that in some on the democratic side that support women, emilys list and some on the republican side that support women as well, i think there are some that are coming up and supporting stem professionals, people with engineering backgrounds or veterans on one side or the other, i think were making some reforms that are allowing better access to candidates other nontraditional candidates that did not come through politics or come up as lawyers as an example. As a creating pathways for that, course i think would be better if we had a system where we find a campaign that was not about access to capital so it could have a more level Playing Field so more people could be encouraged to run on both sides of the aisle. I thought it was interesting that you spent some time on shirley and patsy, i think that was really fascinating did you see any parallels between that conversation and todays member. In some way, the history chapter was really interesting, and learned a lot. What really struck me was the sexism in the growth was more prevalent in the 70s and i really wanted to labor understand that because so many of the early women in Congress Took third dead husband seat and they were viewed by their male colleagues as adjuncts and their hasbeens campaign and the District Office and so forth. Lucy is okay because thats jerrys wife. So there was not really asserting themselves with their own agency their weight they were accepted when she showed up in town and everybody wanted her lemon pie recipe or. I will make her piper Women History Month and im excited to do that. The 70s is when we ran on their own, thats when theyre pushing back and really upset. That is also when women and both parties came together in the caucus to really have some legislative muscle behind the scenes because they were not all the good communities and did not hold gobbles and things like that, they put a lot of ideological off the table and that was a much more bipartisan time for women in congress. So this class i think is very interesting that the me too movement was happening in the background of all of this, thats not the same of the women coming to the Womens Movement in getting elected in large numbers, its not the same context but there are similarities in terms of whats going on nationally and happening in our culture and women reflecting that in women from different backgrounds who would never be considered for Public Office in a federal Office Coming up and deciding to run in getting elected. Thats where i saw some parallels. You mentioned the spouses of dead congress with people in pennsylvania has only had seven elected people before the cycle, seven women total and i think four of them were the spouses or the wifes or the former members of congress, only three women in history have been elected in their own name. Now we have four, we went from having a women in pennsylvania at the time i was elected to having for. The fab four. I remember having a conversation and you include this in the book with the donor and a woman lawyer who had been around for a while and she was talking to me about being supportive of my campaign and candidacy but basically pleading and begging with me if she was going to support me that i would commit and i would not leave the Congress Unless i felt there was a stability in a pennsylvania caucus for women in pennsylvania had a heritage of only having one woman at a time and that was our limit and now we do have four and i think we are collectively committed to making sure there was not an aberration in a permanence as well. You did write something in the book that says once in congress, no one wants to lose and for borrowed time. Can you talk about that dynamic and how it played out in the last year for tickly for the women member. We are seeing this. Specifically the democratic primary. It is remarkable to me how many people in the country who are very excited of having this many women in congress or democrats were excited about democrats taking back the house, really struggle with the concept of how that occurred and how it occurred was democrats beating republicans. How did that happen, it did not happen with the most liberal and most progressive members. The focus of the Democratic Party whether criticizing or embracing them has been to focus on the progressive element, the notion that the party itself is organically moving to the left. There is some research to back that up her right now if you look at how people are voting and we see with going on on the democratic primary, if you want to attract centrist and republican to is a coalition you need to win the white house words more republicans are equal youll need that coalition to win house the, you cannot be embracing the most progressive position and probably naturally you would not be because youre running in that district and that tension of where the most progressive faces in the prominent faces of that election obviously we know who were talking about, for tickly alexandria ocasiocortez with the burning part of the party, Bernie Sanders has done very well as a primary, he was one of the last people standing, theres no question that its there with them but thats not the green session and certainly not the only part of the party. When youre divided government with any hope of getting anything done, the sense that you can only do things progressive legislation or not a real democrat, i watched that with a moderate to her say not only do i want to hold my seat but thats only way you will keep the house, the tension never seemed to fully become resolved from what i can see, women were the backbone and a lot of those races. In my particular district i have held the seat for the vast majority is a county called Chester County and its been a red for more than 160 years in my community is 40 democrats and 40 republicans and 20 independent and we are a very purple place and i think i am one of those people that you are mentioning in terms of the race in the house seat that i was able to flip being one of the pragmatic perk will places and something that i hope women bring to the people and veterans as well and understanding that you are part of the same team and honestly across the aisle youre all the same team, were all patriots and part of the solution and whether were red, blue or purple i think its important that we recognized that were there to represent 100,000 or so folks that are in our community that were brought there hopefully because we represent those people. I might not be the same person as alexandria is, i might not be the sound person from a red district, but that is okay because that is our job, were there to find a Common Ground and try to come together, one thing that i tried to explain to people in my mind it is not a linear spectrum of red and blue, it is a circle and in my opinion the blue and the red, the hard blue and the hard red come together at the very top of that and thats when you see some interesting coalition that happened at the very top because there in some ways more similars than they know they are. Down in the purple area you also have synergies going on particularly in the congress we have a lot of veterans in the purple part because they flip seats, you have a strong red and strong blue like authorized reused of military force is a great example where we might have the opportunity to have real conversation because were representing our communities and because we come from different places. I think it is really cool. How we define the moderate this change so much, the most compelling example is the notion of the public option, now with progressives not to support medicare for all, many people dont, they prefer public option, the public option has become a squished position for democrats, lets not forget ten years ago that was very far left, people lost their seats over that. We dont think of the public option now as a leftwing policy concept at all, that was 30 years ago, that was ten years ago. I think it sometimes how we define people, we could complicate that. The topic is something a little more fun, i left that you included the part about the member orientation so i found it to be a frustrating experience during the freshman orientation you literally had different buses for democrats and republicans, we spent a lot of time focused on things that were very hr which of course she would expected in orientation but very little on things of what is an mtr and why should we care about it, or very little about how do you get something through procreation and thats largely because i think we had a huge class of people who needed to have that background where he wouldve thought that wouldve been helpful but you been here for a while so you probably see a couple things i wouldnt have seen what he think the weirdest thing about congress when you go out of the beltway to talk to people about us, i talk about the mtr i think thats the weirdest thing is there something you can think of. In some ways were continues to strike me, a lot of people who Cover Congress have been in washington a long time. I have a little bit of an unusual background because i had my career in your city and i was not a washington reporter. In some ways i was a freshman, these things were very new and anytime on capitol hill what struck me in which i enjoy watching, members interact with more of a bizarre fit physical nature and how you go about things, the amount of walking, i cannot tell you how many conversations ive had about the need to buy new shoes in the way that the footwear issue is huge. The amount of walking that goes on, the funny things with the mailslot in the rotary phone with the member elevators. And they will be called to vote and there was a time way back when when the process would be eating oysters and drinking champagne and aids would have to come by. And say its time to vote. Some of those things are gone we dont have oysters in the rotunda. Its a very formal place, people you must know before you came to congress there is an actual live debate who can expose shoulders on the house floor there is something more formal perhaps needlessly so perhaps charmingly so, until they get to the workspace kinda cannot imagine, and be curious about was your experience miniature back home i teach ap government classes or classes to college and high school in Grade School Kids with the day in the life of a congressperson. Most days i am walking between s just a typical day, on most days im only in my office maybe ten or 15 minutes a day. Largely what i am doing is all over the congress in one of the things which ironically were on cspan2 talk about it i never understand why nobody wants to be on work on congress, id be watching the television and say where is everybody the seats are empty. What i discovered there on 3 4 different committees and six or seven subcommittees and all happening at the same time. As an outsider looking in and looking at those empty seats, what im not recognizing is that that member is Walking Around the 8 miles of their day to sit in the chair further five minute conversation to represent their community and then theyre bringing back information to their team, their staff to work on legislative items or agendas, that was a real eyeopener because they did generally think where is everybody and why are they not at work. I try to convey in the book people have these preconceptions about members, maybe some are true and maybe members of congress have bigger egos than your average person because they think they can run or different quarks, but they are not lazy, these are hardworking people and when they go home for recess that is not a recess, the running from 14h meeting to meet with the mayor, constituent, i had one member who told me that sometimes she had people come to her house on sunday, she cannot get home over the weekend, thats a lot of work and i think youre right, that is something that people dont get about congress. One of my new classmates jared in maine, hes not exaggerating bringing a sixpack and knocks on somebodys door and he sits down and has a beer with them and thats what he does on the weekends, and im at home in our community and congress is in recess and i hate that expression because you know the everybody is back home working hard to be present at home when theyre not here in washington, d. C. In speaking of all of this visual cues between media and whats happening on the ground. Two things strike me that contradict me, one thing is really important for people to understand, there is no questi question, people come down to the floor and some of that is informative and some is extremely hard with the debates and some is very personal and very certain circumstances and women have brought that to the table in the past couple of decades in making policy very personal and their own experience is. And the way people feel about legislation, its hard and meaningful. In the true acrimony there is no question, i think what people dont understand how people get along, and then you get in the member elevator and go to the escalator or watch people, republicans and democrats, they mean what they talk even people who are ideologically opposed, i would stand outside the speakers lobby on the house for and watch people and who talks to who and its amazing to see democrats and republicans have massive policy different that were yakking it up from the same state and what they were working on together in a restaurant that they both know because you can hear these conversations sometimes. Some of the acrimony is informative and some is genuine but it does not extend to the personal relationship. In fact one conclusion i make in the book, if you look at the entire nature of the political discourse in our country, Congress Might be one of the few places of the ideological differences where they do mix every day and get to speak their mind to each other and at each other pretty regularly. That was one part of the book that i have a note on because i am seeking that, im freshman and i am seeking friendships across the aisle and im seeking friendships that are ideologically not my own and that doesnt even mean that i have to be across the aisle, to your point it can be to my left or my four right. What i have been struck by and would love to have some hope on it from you, i would like it if our debates were of more substance on the floor, i agree with you and i see the behind the scenes and they see the enclosed doors, i see that frankly in classified briefings for people have the opportunity just to listen to the information and to ask questions that are not necessarily going to be the five minutes youtube opportunities. I would really love to see more substantive debate where people actually have to sit in less than opposed to spending their time with her five minutes of time, three minutes of talking about what happened to the last of administration or ten years ago or 30 years ago. I hope you see Something Different that i did on my committee. I was really struck by the conversation in the book and i had more hope because of what you wrote in the book and i need to look harder for that. It does happen, that can be very animated, that is televised as well but obviously most people are not tuning in the way they ought to. It definitely does happen but to get to my second point i was a bit contradictory, it reminds me when i covered Hurricane Katrina in th all the internet was knocd on the phone, i would go from one town in the next 20 miles away in the hanoi deal what was going on 20 miles down the road because they were looking at me what is happening down there. Sometimes with republicans or democrats i see that and reporters talk to everybody so you might go to republican and say the democrats have their going to do such and such for the legislation, they have no clue what youre talking about, youre a reporter, you should not no more than the members do about people on their own committee what theyre doing. That goes back to your point about the buses and orientation, there is so little, it seems mixing of the parties to actually know each side is thinking and doing from the policy and also to have those conversations. And maybe structural and you have to address is the legislature more than anything else. There is a new temporary group thats the modernization of congress and some of the ideas theyre putting forward our about those issues which i think is an example would be nice if those Committee Hearings did not happen all the same time, i would not be committed to seven subcommittee meetings within three hours of one another and along the lines of high school where have three girls and i think you mentioned you have kids too, my kids are grown but when they were in high school they had a block schedule where you could not provide this class with that class because i had to happen at different times. I would like to see that modernization where were obliged to be in her committee and to hear the conversation that is going back and forth because when im able to stay in my committee long enough to hear everybodys conversation i benefit from their knowledge and whats important to them and a half to bring it back. Im out looking for that and im also looking can we not sit left and right, can we sit in a popcorn way were sitting next to people i am probably the most person on my committee and that necessarily mean them sitting next to the most junior republican as well, im lucky i get to sit by the republicans of the committee but it would be cool they had the opportunity to stay where we are for longer periods of time into have to mix it up a little bit. I think that would be helpful too. Lets see, my next question, you talk in your book about descriptive representation which is the firsts time i think i have seen that with the words put together, im an engineer so forgive me if its been around and i just dont know it. Can you tell us a little bit of what that is. I learned in reporting the book, do not feel embarrassed, i certainly did not know it, descriptive representation means youre a person who represents a specific group, it tends to be racial and ethnic groups but as veterans if you were a committee representing a lot of veterans in your veteran you are representing that professional group or that group of people. We do tend to think of it more in racial terms and its usually used to describe latino lawmakers but its kind of interesting because i think that we think of this as being something sort of important and of itself but its nice and that is probably true but i think youre starting to see i would be curious to hear your opinion in terms of whether it makes a difference, i dont know in the social interaction, id be very curious i got some sense of thought and i think you do see it impacting legislation, i think its been very important for example, native american women is very important them to see them in office. They made that extremely clear and then you also see those women working on a lot of really intense travel issues that not only get fuel with them but when they go to talk about the issues, they can have a conversation in people with their own Community Know about the tribal laws and the specific things and other people on the committee may not know about because that is their whole life. It has substantive impact and im curious. I completely agree, we do have a class on the democratic side that has a lot more veterans and members who have served in the cia or other places than the past many serve on the arm service or Foreign Affairs or Homeland Security or Veterans Affairs and i think we have a unique experience personal experience that were able to bring forward improving as an example i am a veteran and im a pre9 11 veteran and i think im the only member of the class that serves before 9 11 and im also a woman in one of the things i was able to do early on is with womens veteran caucus and it seems like we have a group of people women of service and veterans this has 50 or so bipartisan of people who have served and have not served and who are coalescing around the issue of women who serve and why this is relevant and were about 20 of the veteran population, women are in the Service Member population and increasing more and more were probably be 30 more by the decade and we are 51 of the total population of the country so we ought to be thinking about the women who serve in their entire trajectory of power they recruited because theyre probably recruited differently, how are they when their active duty and their issues of family is example, i separated because they didnt have access to childcare and i could not figure my way out of the problem. Once a separate air there veterans themselves, what kind of healthcare issues do they have, thats just an example. I think not only this is half of the women of service in their family but it helps us in terms of readiness in preparation to make sure were ready to fight and we do struggle with making sure we have enough people and were not looking to the women in our communities then shame on us. I think having a perspective is really interesting and sad that it took until 2020 to have somebody say wait a minute we need this in the caucus. This also started with women in stanton caucus with technology, engineering and math, and specifically i wanted to add the arts to the stem profession and again, this is one of the things gutfeld like of course we should be talking about women in underserved and underrepresented communities and being and professions, but it had not happened before in this time. So similar to your story with the diversity of her class of more native americans, those are issues that everybodys thinking about what you need 70 to say its not been represented well enough in our communities. That is a real challenge to figure out how do we bring more diversity, not in gender but all kinds of experience to washington to be able to legislate. The professional issues are interesting and i think about the veterans. It was incredibly pivotal for the colleagues who are not veterans informer said citizens, when i heard those women and men talk about this to their National Security experience, that was impactful to me. When you are bringing whether being a racial or ethnic group or veteran or any other kind of subsidence of our culture, it definitely brings credibility to those issues inside the chamber. Is there anything that you see is hopeful to help heal the divine i consider myself to be kind of a glass is half empty kind of a person and i turned to look for the takers in the world to tell me the glass is halffull and particular with the women in larger the democrats and sadly we lost a lot of republican women in losing this time around i cant remember who told you why we are celebrating, Pat Schroeder do see what were seen unless congress thats different than some other time. You should probably know reporters are takers. But were trained against the almost, well see what happens in the primaries with the republican woman. I think that thinking cap is on with that group and you may see more women in that party and you might see more women. The problem is a special mind with Elizabeth Warren still remains at the top in some ways. That the country kinda has to see someone elected in the toptier physician into a bottle test you would not think so, you look at Hillary Clinton in the secretary of state and all the things that she did as a u. S. Senator and you would not think the people would have to wonder and she had her own obviously in her own set of issues going into that race and is going to be harder for theyre down ballot when people dont see that, this is enormously helpful. Having said that within congre congress, a woman said to me, the men are starting to crumble, were getting sick of hearing about the women. They were feeling that it was, located because they were made to understand it was to celebrate what they had to struggle with seeing a power move in their own numbers reduced. That will take a generation of men to embrace these changes and to encourage more women to run. I would imagine we need to change a bit. Speaking about takers i can report that mice freshman colleagues in my male colleagues, i wont name them by name but they are the men that you are looking for and they are involved in thoughtful and working hard to change the face permanently of not Just Congress but business and all those other places in one of my colleagues and particularly, we joke because whenever we sit in hearings with a crossed at the folks who are testifying in largely when you look across the aisle, largely men, largely white men so i had started in my early days with my term asking the question, gentlemen look to your left, look to write, look behind you, what is wrong with this picture and what can we make for the next time i sit in front of you all that it looks a little different. In some of my colleagues have started to take up the question on behalf of me. So they will text each other and i will say it is your turn to ask that question. Because i think it helps when it does not come from a woman all the time. So we are working collectively and its actually part of the veteran group that we are working on having those conversations more collaboratively. That reflects the culture at large with the conversation and the term allies. You look at this again in the Younger Generation of men, a lot of them are leading in different ways and interact in different ways, in some ways you triggered a thought in my brain about paternity leave. I see so many men on generation x and so many millennial men taking for granted that not only can they do that but they should do that and i remember there was a male colleague that said i cannot, im too busy at work and the female turned to him and said if you dont take your paternity leave then your signaling thats a weakness to take paternity leave and youre not leading by example. He really took that on and took his leave. I think again you mentioned the workplace and broader culture, that will be reflected in the house of congress as well. I talk about that a lot where i say my spirit animal, my hero and shes famous for having said you cant be what you cant see. So we try really hard in our jobs in my office to make sure that you can see all the Different Things that you can be but not just as a woman but a veteran or an engineer or an educator, all those things and i will also tell you a quick story as well. When i was on the bus, it tells you a little bit about our diverse class, i was sitting with another woman, another veteran in the head of us were two men and they were sharing stories about nap time of their infants and bottles and nursing and the two of us were amazed that the conversation that was so cool that we the women were not having that conversation, was the newly elected men having the conversation about their families which is really cool and means were making progress about worried about getting home from the district or being here and not home for the kids. It is really, really nice. As long as bosses and leaders do that as a positive, its a huge piece of it. I will say one thing speaking to the diversity of the class and the uniqueness of the experience, native american representation, another example that i can bring out is an congresses session i put forward legislation on rareEarth Elements because im really interested in the supply chain of those elements and what we need to make herself on the collateral at work and National Security depends on whether we know whether these elements are coming from and we know who has them and who does not have them in putting forward the legislation, we were able to find money by selling off tungsten which is rareEarth Element and that was able to be the combined to help begin to pay for paid family leave. And to begin to pay for paid family leave in the Defense Department environment, you are able to bring the progressive caucus along, the folks were more left of me because they very much and we all ought to be interested in paid parental leave and paid family leave so they were brought on as a coalition and supporter of the deity legislation and when that move forward into the senate, the senate understandably was not as interested in paid parental or family leave coming out of the deity budget even though it was for federal employees. What was interesting ended up becoming a bit of a honey for avon could trump in the administration because they brought on in support paid family leave or paid parental leave. In the end, this very Strange Coalition of folks on the Armed Service committee, rear Earth Element interest, paid parental family leave in the administration ended up for the firsts time ever 2. 1 million federal employees having access to paid 12 weeks of parental leave. Thats decades and decades in the making and a lot of people including ung congresswoman maloney and my chairman mr. Smith, its a signal of what can happen when you have weirdness in the air like rareEarth Element. Thats what makes congress great. Something that is s bazaar is so fascinating and how things come together people dont see the background all the time. Absolutely. I have one more question and then i will open it up for you for the questions that entry did not ask. Who should read this book and why. Anybody that is interested in whats happening in the Current Party in whose watching the primary and interested in the outcome of the election i think and learn things because i do think your class and the 116 congress is a bit of a dress rehearsal in terms of how the parties interacting and what happens to the republican party, will happen to the Democratic Party and how we come together as a country and what those complex are. I think its an interesting book for young women so they can see the different paths that different women from a variety of background have to possibly be in Public Office, i brought up charisse who is native american and i stayed do you feel it overwhelming to feel like youre representing the group of people and she said yes and away if i think about it but she said i have just as many people that come into my office to say i go to a Community College and you went to a Community College so there inspired in that way, so theres so many paths too so many people and whether youre a veteran, whether you have an entire career and people are retiring and you decide to be a freshman in congress, youre young, your old, your poor, your rich, your middleclass, youre black, youre right, whatever background youre coming from there is a pass for you. I think these paths are explained there. Anybody who is interested in history because there is a lot in the chapter of how women begin being in congress and that was a fascinating for me too learn. I enjoyed the experience in some ways of rereading what happened to me in the last year end a half into my classmates and i would encourage other people to read as well. I am understanding that we are out of time so you dont get to have the opportunity for your own questions but i really appreciate being able to have the tables turned into be able to ask questions of you and if you noticed three times she tried to get me. [laughter] it is nice to be with you. Thank you. You are welcome. This weekend booktv, saturday night at 915 eastern former Federal Reserve chair ben talks about the action the fed is taking to mitigate the economic effects of the covid19 pandemic. His latest book is first responders. Again what were not really talking about is a stimulus package because people cant really go out and shop but were talking about emergency relief, what we need to do primarily in the physical package is make sure that people can survive this. With very lowincome and businesses that are losing revenue can pay their bills, pay the rent, pay the utilities. Sunday on after words cofounder jim mckelvey offers his thoughts on innovation and competition for startup in his new book the innovation stack. He is interviewed by katzer press key. It turns out theres a thing this process that can happen when you start to solve that is not been solved before. Most of the tools and training and comfort are what exasperate into p. M. And hacking door would, of letting counsel jamie looks at the future of genetic engineering and discusses that the technology can be used in the fight against covid19. The george innovated and able to see and watch the viral mutate as a spreads around the world which is critically important. Watch booktv this weekend on cspan2. Television has changed since cspan began 41 years ago. Our Mission Continues to provide an unfiltered view of governme government, already this year we brought you primary election coverage, the president ial impeachment process and now the federal response to the coronavirus. You can watch all of cspan Public Affairs programming on television, online or listen on our free radio app and be part of the National Conversation through cspan daily Washington Journal Program or through the social media feed, cspan created by private industry, americas Cable Television company as a Public Service and brought to you by our television provider. It was such a pleasure to read your book in such an honor to speak with you today. Thank you. What kept going through my mind as i read your new book is what a hard book and mustve been for you to write, you uncovered so many deep and extremely painful parts of your past and your families, can you ll