Our guest this week, perfectly positioned to address this critical and evolving set of issues with not just implications in washington, not just implications in seoul, but implications around the world. And we are lucky to have mr. Denis mcdonough, former white house chief of staff. Cabinet rank, we have broken the cabinet rank ceiling here. Former Deputy National security advisor and former advisor to the n. S. C. He is someone who has sat at the nexus of Foreign Policy, u. S. Politics and communication and he knows a Little Something about northeast asia as well. The pride of stillwater, minnesota, he currently is a professor at notre dame and i , think he microing mores the st. Johns University Athletic department from afar. I see the football helmet in the background there, an institution alum. Ch he is a proud he holds a masters degree from Georgetown University and most, i think, notably for those with follow entertainment, played by john hamm in the movie the report. Not many people can say that. Welcome, mr. Mcdonough, to the excellent. Great to be with you. Been looking forward to this conversation and happy to see victor too as well. Finally, someone using my usual title. Lets go to our usual panelist, victor cha. Professor at georgetown, former bush n. S. C. , welcome back victor. How did notre dame get , mcdonough . What happened to the hoyas . Seems like the recruiting game was off. What is going on at georgetown . Victor this is a real problem. We have to figure out how to rectify this. Im going to say right here and now well give dennis the job at georgetown, how about that . Well just do it. Lets just do it. Emergency faculty meeting after. This welcome back, victor. Last but certainly not least, dr. Sue mi terry, former n. S. C. , former Columbia University and currently advisor here at csis, and sue i think you overlapped , with dennis at the obama n. S. C. And welcome back to the show. Sue thanks. fun jon hamm fact, i didnt know that lets get into it as they say. Im going to turn to mr. Mcdonough, our special guest, as we always do. Mr. Mcdonough you served as key , advisor to the obama campaign, the obama transition, in addition to other government positions you held. And right now theres lots of , machinations here in washington. All of us have been fielding questions from friends in all corners of the world about whats happening. Can you just share your expertise and your analysis from the place you used to occupy in tells of Foreign Policy, government experience, communications and i mentioned, i should have mentioned too a Longtime Health staffer as well. Walk us through whats happening in washington. Denis thanks so much. Its good to be with you guys. And i hasten to add that most of those things that you generously cited in my bio i did with you or because of you. Or because of you. And so its really good to be , with you and to be reminded of our long professional careers together and the many kindnesses , you have shown me along the way, and the valuable friendship we have developed along the way. Its really good to see you. Look, theres this period in the United States called transition. Its the period from the election in the first week in november, until inauguration on january 20, per our constitution, at 12 01, the point at which the president elect becomes the president of the United States. At that moment hes addressed by , the chief justice of the Supreme Court as mr. President. And when that happens, the former president goes off to the rest of his life. And its all been men so far, thats why im saying his. And the president elect then becomes the president of the United States. That transition period is a period at which time people like you, and like victor and sue, People Like Us work, you know, if were coming in with a new team, we work with the Outgoing Team and we work importantly with the existing professional career professionals in the government to get ready to understand what the best available intelligence on what is happening for example, in , north korea, whats the status of personnel in important agencies . Where are there vacancies that need to be filled . Where are there planned retirements . And then, looking at the budget. How much money is remaining for the fiscal year to do this thing that has to be done, as soon as the president and his team become operative on january 20 at 12 01. There is a very particular thing that has to happen for all of that work to start, mark, as you know. Which is, the little known head of a little known agency called the General Services administration which basically staffs and provides Office Supplies and support to all the other federal services, the head of that agency, by law makes the , determination for purposes of the transition when the president elect is indeed the president elect. Its called ascertainment. When that ascertainment is recognized, all the things we just talked about can begin. You know, you going in to talk to victor and sue at the white house or in the agencies about getting ready to govern, as we did in late 2008 and early 2009. But if ascertainment is not recognized, then that whole process is on ice. Nothing is happening. And so thats a space we find ourselves in right now, which is basically a moment of suspended animation on when president elect biden, Vice President elect harris and their team can begin the preparations for governing. And one very concrete example is something that we know very well, which is, we were assigned to stick with president elect obama when he took the president ial daily brief every morning starting two mornings , after the election. President obama got the brief on that thursday morning, then took it six days a week. Not on sundays, not on holidays until january 20, 2017. , so took it basically for eight years and six weeks. Now, Vice President biden or president elect biden is not afforded that courtesy. So, one comment, im worried about that. Because we have ongoing intelligence issues around the world that im hoping that him and his team can get up to speed on and hopefully that begins , soon, because ascertainment will be recognized. Sorry for the long answer there. Mark no, thats great. I was just going to say, to to your true to your former playing days as a free safety you beat me to the spot of the , ball. What i was going to come in and ask you, how serious is this . Let me ill editorial myself and provide historical reflections, as you referenced the transition felt short to me. , a lot of work, not enough time. Number one. And number two, we, like the biden team, faced some pretty urgent crises especially the , financial crisis unfolding all around us. But there was iraq, there was afghanistan, there was terrorism a whole host of things. , in this case, you have the pandemic, right, you have Economic Issues associated with stimulus and or recovery in , addition to the issues you mentioned, not getting the p. D. B. , north korea. How serious is this . And whats likely going to happen to break the stalemate here . Denis its a really good question, mark, on whats going to happen to break the stalemate. It looks to me like theres an effort in two ways to try to address this and then ill get into the seriousness. An effort in two ways to address it. One is, i think the president elect and Vice President elect and their teams are doing everything they can under the circumstances to get ready. So it looks like theyre consulting really aggressively with nongovernmental experts. Obviously the president elect is , Going Forward with the traditional congratulatory calls with foreign leaders, providing readouts of those calls handling , those calls in appropriate fashion. That is to say, taking the calls from our close allies first, getting into calls with our competitors and adversaries later. So theyre doing as much of the work as they can absent access to the government offices and information and personnel. The second thing that others around them are doing, you know, members of congress on the hill, the press, and others, is trying to urge the g. S. A. Administrator , who determines ascertainment, to make that determination. So you could call that pressure, you could call that efforts to promote transparency around that process but those are the two , ways theyre trying to address it. And then the question, how serious is it . Maybe the best way to address itsriousness, address address its seriousness, mark, is to go back to that issue you highlight which is the financial crisis in 2008 and 2009. Think for a second back to the campaign, you remember that when you and then senator obama were on the road campaigning. He came off the road campaigning , to go to the white house for a meeting on the financial crisis after the fall of lehman brothers. And that began a process of, lets call it a warm handoff from victor and his teammates at the white house and in the federal agencies to the incoming president elect obama team and president elect obama and Vice President elect biden. To kind of crystallize that even more clearly, remember that the secretary of treasury designated by president elect obama was tim geithner. And i remember, you and i saw him in the chicago Transition Office and we both saw this guy , who looked like hes about 30, and we were wondering who he was. Somebody kind of straightened it out for us a little bit later. Ends up being a very critical appointment. He has a relationship with secretary paulson, because they worked together when paulson was at the treasury, geithner was at the new york fed. Not only do they have a relationship, but president obama had been in close consultation with the Bush White House on these questions. And then the Treasury Department , itself, personnel there, welcomed the Obama Transition Team into the building. So that meant that throughout the month of november, december and january, there was coordination on the Big Questions in the Global Financial system, such that that handoff from secretary paulson to secretarydesignate geithner ends up being pretty smooth. Notwithstanding the fact, obviously the economy is still significantly, but clearly it would have been worse , had there not been as effective a handoff. And i think thats a question we have to ask ourselves now. Handoff from secretary mnuchin to whoever his backfill is, at the moment does not appear positioned to be as smooth and as kind of transparent as that last one. And so that gives me some concern. Mark i would add too that it also facilitated, as i recall, this is 10plus years now so, recollections are fading, but it allowed the Obama Transition Team to launch secretary albright and then representative leach to the g20, i think in an observer role, to begin at least facilitating theres only one president at the time, but to collect information in coordination with the outgoing Bush Administration on the global response. So thats the global picture, that is the laydown. Let me bring it a little more to northeast asia and from a different perspective, and thats over to sue. Sue, you were, i believe, in the white house as a career official detailed to the nsc. If im right on that, can you talk about what that looked like from your end, two, thoughts about whats happening now, especially from a north korea National Security purview that is your specialty . Dr. Terry i was with the cia to the nsc during the Bush Administration, and stayed on through the transition. Everything denis just said is true. I was there. I have to say the transition from president bush to president obama i think was as good as it could get. Of course the obama , administration also propelled the transition from obama to trump [indiscernible] and he just talked about that. But everyone, i remember, cooperated with the Incoming Administration as much as we could, trying to make the transition as seamless as possible which is really the , hallmark of american democracy right . , during the transition period, the new folks that are coming in came into our offices at the executive building, at the nsc. I remember seeing them all through november, december, staff detail, policy memos on what weve been working on. And of course the Intelligence Community also prepared massive rethink books on all these issues for the Incoming Administration. So its really sad now that we are in this situation. You know, as you mentioned, transition time is a chaotic period. Its not enough anyway. Its a short period, even if everythings going smoothly. So its really sad. Also, you have to remember, you want to talk about north korea. You know what north korea loves to do is to greet the new administration with a series of provocations. This happened with the Incoming Administration of obama, in the first four months we saw a series of provocations. We saw this in the second term of obama. We saw this when President Trump came into the office. So we need to be completely fully prepared. , so im very dismayed that what were going to see is the messiest transition in American History given that president is still not conceding and making it difficult and , calling this election illegitimate and so on. So im very concerned. Mark ok, sue, great stuff, as always. Im going to bookmark the north korea piece. Were going to come back to that in just a little bit. Good stuff there. And over to victor. Victor, thoughts on these threads of issue here . Victor a couple of thoughts. So i was i left the government before the transition, but my understanding of it was the same as what sue said. At least as the at least at the nsc, steve hadley was the National Security advisor and it was very important to him that there be a seamless transition and that the Outgoing Team provide as much information as possible to the incoming team. And i only know because, as they prepared those things, they reached back to people who had worked on certain issues to offer their insights for the purpose of providing a good transition book or transition papers or files for the incoming obama administration. And my understanding and you , guys could speak to it better than i, was that that was something that was very much appreciated by the incoming team. I think what is happening now is just an absolute travesty. As sue said, there are many, you know, there are many very important and boiling issues around the world which the president elect and the Vice President elect are not getting the highest quality information on. I mean, theyre relying on People Like Us on the outside to try to help them and they need , that information. And then i want to just emphasize one point that mark made which i had not thought about, and that is for you guys, you were actually in a transition from november to january, mark, you said that felt like a very short period of time. And that makes me even more concerned. Because as sue said, who knows what the North Koreans are doing, who knows what the russians and the chinese are it is we havent even talked about the pandemic. Let alone the pandemic. So from a National Security perspective, it is doing a disservice not just to the , incoming team but to the nation, to be behaving this way. Where the incoming team doesnt have budget, doesnt have office space in the buildings as they sort of get themselves ready. It is just a travesty. Mark and victor and one quick , followup before i get back to denis and resume that thread, because its just been fantastic in his insights already. We want more. But one quick one to you. I saw there was a call between jaein andmoon president elect biden. What should seoul be thinking about . Victor i think for all the allies, it puts them all in awkward positions. Because theyre not able to fully interact with a Transition Team thats fully stood up and will be able to hit the ground running in january. And so yes, we see the Foreign Ministry coming over, there are a lot of Ruling Party Members that are coming over. But without that ascertainment, denis said, it makes it very awkward for all u. S. Allies and partners who want to sort of get to work with the new team. And so its doing a disservice not just to domestic policy and , National Security, its doing a disservice to all of our allies and partners. Mark thanks, victor. Back to mr. Mcdonagh. Round two, coming back to the buffet again in the course of this show. We cant get enough. So lets go a little deeper on policy. You sat as a key Decision Maker in the west wing for eight years. Can you just run us through two really interesting elements here that people ive heard people that people ive heard people ask about. One, the challenges that the Biden Administration will face, especially Foreign Policy comes to mind, and how to prioritize those challenges . And really the subtext for this show, which happens to be in and around government topics in and around northeast asia, will there be enough time and attentio