Thank you for being here. This is important. What we are doing oday. This whole festival is on behalf welcome to the festival and to our oneonone with susan rice. We have an hour together. Thats going to include at least 15 minutes of time for your questions and answers, so youve got 45 minutes to think of some killer questions and im looking forward to hearing them. You all know ambassador rice. She served as u. N. Ambassador then security ide viser and then secretary of state under the bill clinton administration. You may also know that she has a book coming out soon, tough love my story of things worth fighting for. Its not out officially for another week or so but you can get it today and shell be signing copies of it after were done here. So i think thats at 800 congress. They asked me to let you know. So you can do that after this. This book because none of you have read it, let me give you a preview is a book in three parts. A book about ambassador rices personal story, her family life, about her experience in government, and then about the Obama Administration, the policies and her explanation and kind of thoughts in the rear view mirror about some of those policies. To me one of my favorite parts about this book was the personal chapters and i want to spend some time talking about that. But because its friday at the end of a very historic and sustained newsweek i think i want to start out talking about the development this is week about ukraine, the houses actions on opening toward impeachment and then give us time to talk about the book. You closely followed everything thats happened this week tand transcript and the whistleblowers complaint. I guess im just curious based on the information that is now publicly available what would your next set of questions be . What do you want to know that we dont know yet . Well, thank you for doing his. Thank you for that very generous introduction. What a week. And what a set of revelations. I think the most striking thing from my point is this is yet other particularly stark indication that we have a president who cares nothing for the National Interests and is all about his personal political and financial interests, and its there in black and white in that remarkable transcript. So just to put this in context, as you know, ukraine has for five years been suffering from an invasion, an occupation by russia. That war is still going on. There are ukrainian soldiers being killed every week. And the United States, as the ader in the west and as an adversary of russia, at this stage by choice of putin, frankly, has been supporting ukraine economically, politically, and militarily with assistance to help it combat this russian aggression. And what President Trump did it appears is to withhold congressionally appropriated funds of military assistance of the ukrainians desperately need in order to come it seems, to extort information for a bogus investigation that he could use against his political opponents domestically. It is an extraordinary interference in our democratic process. Sponsored by committee sponsored by, encouraged by, and solicited by the president of the United States. And nowhere in that phone call does he talk to the new ukrainian president about the issues that have long concern the United States, russian aggression, sanctions, how to support the ukrainian government. None of that. Is all about what the president of ukraine can do to help donald trump advance his partisan political objectives. Do you believe it is within a president s purview to use military assistance as a lever to prod policy action . Susan yes, if it is policy action in service of u. S. National policy interest and goals. The United States has leverage. We employ sanctions we get aid, we give aid, and we do not. But we dont do it to advance the president s personal political interest. And we dont hide it. We do it openly and transparently and communicate to the world and the governments in question why we may be providing or withholding assistance. What is so striking about this is that it was not utilized to advance our national interest. It was utilized to advance his personal political interests. And frankly, this is part of a pattern. It makes you have to go back and review very carefully what we learned about 2016. It makes you wonder about all of these other interactions that have seemed somewhat dubious. Whether it is with mohammad bin salman of saudi arabia are any number of leaders. From kim jongun to other adversaries that he has praised and wonder what is underneath all of this. There are internal transcripts or notes from us all of those calls were meeting, if not all of them. As a former National Security advisor, im assuming you have always advocated the importance of the president or other foreign leaders having a modicum of privacy in their conversations. They are not to be made fully public so that there can be room for actual conversations. How do you balance those two interests . The president and the need for the precedent for the need for president s for leaders to have internal deliberations that are not entirely shared with the public versus what you are talking about here. Are you advocating for the transcripts or notes of President Trumps calls with mbs . With putin, with cc to all be released to congressional investigators . Susan obviously, in normal times, there is utility in the communications between foreign leaders having a measure of confidentiality. These are not normal times. What is unprecedented is the president of the United States abusing his office. That is what is unprecedented. I care about all of these things you mentioned, but i care more about what we dont yet know about what the president of the that states has done behind closed doors that runs counter to u. S. National interest. This ukraine example is the perfect case. And recall the other problem. The other problem is, according to the whistleblower report, that instead of this transcript, which by the way we have not seen. Normally, there is a full, verbatim transcript. What they did instead of storing it in the normal system, which is protected and classified, even though there was no classified substance in the discussion. Instead of putting it where it normally resides, they hit it hid it on a highly sensitive and compartmented server that very few people in the u. S. Government have access to. In order to bury it. How many times did you move over to a more secure server . Susan they would not have put it there unless they were legitimately and their contents classified. [inaudible] susan of course not. But it is rare that a normal conversation would be classified to the highest level. Is not impossible, but very rare. Even when two leaders are discussing classified information. Here is a case with there was nothing classified and it was moved to the most secure, sensitive server. The contents of those notes would never have been moved to the classified service system. Ok. I want to ask you another question before we get out of this. Where there ever concerns about Vice President bidens dealings in ukraine . President trump has now raised issues. Was that ever an issue or serious concern inside the administration . Susan no, and let me explain why. There is an extreme distraction play here, to try and conflate what ended at obamas behest for transparent policy objectives, pushing back on corruption in a country with United States and allies were providing millions of dollars of economic assistance and trying to bolster this nascent democracy in ukraine. Vice President Biden made phone calls and took trips in support of that u. S. Policy objective. It was transparent, it was stated openly. It was backed by our western partners in the imf. There was no secrecy about it. They were not hiding the records and transcripts. It was all the basic work of diplomacy. To suggest that there is some equivalence between the president of the United States, this president , extorting a foreign leader to advance his partisan, personal interests and the Vice President or president of the United States in biden or obama pursuing a policy that is open and transparent and backed by congress that was pursuant to our interests is completely apples and oranges. Before this past week, speaking about the book, i had asked you if you would take a short excerpt to read since nobody in the audience has had the chance to read the book yet. That kind of sets is in the mood for your experience and the story you wanted to tell the public. Would you do us the honor . Susan thank you, i would be delighted. Let me explain what this is. As margaret pointed out, the got fourhas really parts. First is my upbringing, my child history growing up in washington washington, d. C. In the 60s and 70s and the story of my parents and grandparents on one side. The descendents of slaves in south carolina. On the other side, immigrants from jamaica coming to portland , maine in 1912. And what they shared in common was this extraordinary commitment to education, to the american dream, arising and each generation bettering the next. That is the foundation in which i was raised. That it continues with a pretty then it continues with a pretty bald discussion of my parents painful divorce your divorce. The second part is after my education. That is the section from which im going to draw an excerpt to read from you. And the third part is about my time as National Security advisor, which often includes stories of my family, and balancing motherhood and having sick parents and all of that combined. What i would like to read is the story that is a small story that occurred when i was assistant secretary of state for african affairs. We are in 1998. I was a very young assistant secretary of state. I took the job at age 32. Most of my colleagues, the ambassadors who reported to me were 2030 years my seniors i was a brandnew, breastfeeding mother. And at first blush, not a particularly expectant leader of this bureau. We are on a trip in africa, small planes with three of my colleagues. We are flying from south africa to angola. From victorino to rwanda, pretoria, to rwanda, angola. Let me take it from here. Such trips were intent intense and exhausting as we hopped on small, private planes. Commercial Airline Connections in africa were scarce, unreliable, and often dangerous. As an assistant secretary rather than a cabinet officials, i did not rate a dedicated military plane. We often least four or 60 6 seatt leased propeller planes which were vulnerable to whether and mechanical challenges. It was a particularly memorable leg from rate for ray toriano, south africa to rwanda, angola it required a refueling stop in rural namibia. We left early in the morning to arrive in angola by midday and go straight into meetings with senior officials. Along the way, we plotted our message to the angolans. The four of us sat close, almost toe to toe. Faced forward with john and howard facing us flying , backwards on our tiny plan. It made for convenient conversation, but soon was to too intimate. One hour into the flight, i felt clammy and weak. As my perspiration increased, my stomach turned over, signaling it was quite a discontent. I announced to my colleagues i was not feeling well. I reached for the airsickness bag, which thankfully was handy. With muffled apologies, i opened the bag. Apologies to you all is well. [laughter] and threw up voluminously. To my horror, i felt my lap growing warm and wet. The bag had a hole in the bottom and i was covered in puke. My lightweight dress with polka dots, once ready for a meeting with the president of angola, was ruined. And i would have no time to change before our meeting. In a flash, i caught howard and john, sitting there slackjawed in shock, but canny enough to pull back their feet to try to save their shoes from the vomit pooling beneath us on the floor. As soon as i finished being sick and realize the gravity of the situation, there was only one thing i could do. Laugh hysterically. Kindly as friends, they all join me in howling at the insanity of the moment. But we still have the problem of the dress. And the leader of our delegation being a smelly, on presentable mess. We landed on a dirt patch in nowhere, namibia to refuel as planned. There was a single gas pump, a waterhole with hose, and some rudimentary bathrooms. The men gave us some privacy as gail turned the hose on me and my dress. Spraying me down until i was thoroughly drenched in the desert. She and i then went into the bathroom to strip down and ensure we had washed away all signs of vomit. Confident we had succeeded, all that remained was for me to air dry over the ensuing couple hours. [laughter] [applause] welcome to high style diplomacy. Margaret it sums up working at the white house. Vomit on yourself, get hosed down, go to work. Both of your parents died while you were working in the ministration. As first chunk of the book and when you were working on the was, a lot of the books dedicated to asking questions you werent able to ask your parents anymore when you came up from the government. For father was an airman, your mother was a pell grant. How hard was it to find out that stuff and why did he want to did you want to share that stuff with the public . I know that the experience, your experience both going through the tragedy of benghazi as a Public Servant and also your experience with how that played in the media and how Many Americans know your name now was part of your motivation to write the book and introduce yourself to the public. But why did you want to share your personal story with the public . And what did you learn that you did not know about your parents . Susan let me begin by sharing what i did this. Why i did this. First of all, with this unusual background that i come from and the extraordinary privilege i have had to serve two president s and our country into different andn two different contexts to represent the United States in the world and to keep us safe. I feel like i have learned some things along the way. From my family, from my upbringing, from my service that i want to share. That i think are valuable broadly to people who are trying to compete and thrive in unforgiving environments. And if they have been knocked down, to get back up. But personally i felt that for the years between benghazi in 2012, when i was characterized by the right as a villain and by the left as a victim, that i was really unable, until i left government, to do anything other than speak for the United States and the president. I did not have the ability to speak in my own voice until the and tell my own story. That rubbed me the wrong way, because as he might discuss some one of the critical lessons i learned from my parents is not to let anybody to find me for define me for me. That i had to be my own advocate my own champion, and my own , spokesperson. And that overlays with some lessons on race, which we can potentially come back to. So if i was going to tell my own story, and i wanted to, i had to be honest. This is not a book for selfpromotion, running for office some other kind of thing. But i have surely written an unorthodox book. This was a book to tell my story in all of its dimensions. And that require talking about required talking about the painful stuff, but also enabled me to go back and spend time dissecting. And, excavating some of these chapters in my life going back to my childhood and my parents divorce in particular. That i had just rushed through to keep trying to strive with and excel and do my best. It was a painful divorce, violent and terrifying. It shaped me in many ways because i was a little sevenyearold trying to mediate between my parents and protect my little brother. I had wonderful parents. Highly accomplished, brilliant, devoted, who gave me and my brother everything we could hope for but they had no business being married to each other. They broke up in a bitter way and put us through that experience in a very bitter, public custody battle and out of that, not only did i learn, for better or for worse, a Little Something about mediation and conflict resolution, but i learned that, you know, i could take a hit and keep going. I wouldnt let something that painful that early get me down. That was very valuable also down the road. You asked what i learned that i didnt know. Its interesting. I had a childs perspective on my parents breakup. With the process of writing this book, i actually saw the documentary records. I found my deceased fathers papers, legal depositions my parents had to provide in the course of their battle. And nobody should ever read the legal depositions of their divorced parents, its not pretty. But it was enlightening. Because i came to understand both their perspectives much more clearly and could digest them from the Vantage Point of a grownup who is married myself and has children. There was a lot that i learned. And im glad i had the opportunity to do it. Margaret your parents divorce was a foundational experience. You had another difficult experience, the you didnt know about it until later, i hope its ok for me to share this, its in the book, you actually would have been a twin. You had a brother and he was stillborn. And you learned about that many years later. Susan my mom and dad, as i said , wonderful people who had no business being married. One of them was that my mother wanted kids and my father thought he didnt want kids and my mother got pregnant and my father blamed her for tricking him. And i was the product of that first trick, so to speak. It wasnt a trick. And it turned out that my parents learned that my mother was in fact bearing twins. And they had been living in nigeria when i was conceived, long story, i wont go there yet. And they were making their way back to the United States from west africa, flying thru paris. And they were on a plane crash, the plane took off, t. W. A. Aircraft took off and instead of lifting off it crashed nose down into the ground in, i guess, may of 1964. None of the passengers were killed. They all evacuated safely, including my parents, but it was a traumatic, emotional and physical experience for my mother. When they got back to the United States, she was on bedrest for much of the rest of her pregnancy. And when she came to deliver, my baby brother was stillborn and i survive