Joined by my friend larry cohen who is vice chair the commission and i hereby call the final meeting of the Reform Commission to order. I would like to first as the members and those with us to join for the pledge of allegiance. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of america. And to the republic for which it stands one nation under god with liberty and justice for all. Thank you. I now ask you to call the roll. Thank you madam chair. [roll call] [roll call] [roll call] we are missing a few Commission Members but we certainly have a quorum and i would like to start today by acknowledged in chairman perez who is here and we are very thankful for his participation. [applause] and more than that for his leadership of the Democrat National party so we are really glad to be here. Good morning everyone. Thank you. I want to start off by saying thank you for your hard work. This was a very important exercise it was laborintensive and came to it with an open mind and with a remarkable set of ideas so i want to say thank you to all of you but i want to say particular things tour cochair. We have been meeting regularly rainstorm and regularly and i cant say enough wonderful things about both of you. You have entered this enterprise with a spirit of old passion and a spirit of ingenuity in the spirit that understands this is the most serious test on our nations democracy perhaps in our history and the work of this Committee Commission is so critically important. Larry and jen thank you so much for what you have been doing. Its impossible to overstate the importance of the work that youve been doing and everybody else here has been doing. I come to you both with a sense of remarkable sobriety given what is happening in washington and around the country and the president and a sense of optimism born out of what we have seen on the ground. If you look at the chaos and carnage that we see every day from this administration and the stakes couldnt be higher. The tax bill that people like congressman fudge and others fought against an absolute abomination. It is a break for wealthy people people, wealthy corporations at the expense of virtually everybody else. 13 Million People potentially losing health care all in service to a taxcut for large corporations and wealthy people who dont need it. They tell us theres no money to reauthorize the state Childrens HealthInsurance Program but yet they want to eliminate the estate tax which is said and for the 1 of the 1 . You see what is happening overseas where we have become a laughingstock around the world. Other countries have figured out how to handle this president. You roll out the red carpet and then you take him to the cleaners and thats what happened in china. That is what has happened elsewhere and get our allies in europe and elsewhere rather than having our back this administration stabs them in the back and thats why we are a much less safe country in a much less safe democracy and thats why this work is critically important moving forward. We all understand the seriousness and yet i come to you with a sense of optimism because as we have seen in 2017 will we can do when we are united in the last time we won the governors races in new jersey and in virginia in the same year was 2005. We saw what happened in the house of representatives a year later in 2006. We saw what happened in both new jersey and virginia but in other places. We saw what happened when we were united. We saw what happened when we organize. We organize early and we organized everywhere. We are going to places like virginia and say its for all and not a privilege for a few. Voters responded to that. It was the number one issue in virginia by far the Democratic Party crashed on that reason and that was a big reason we won in virginia and elsewhere. We have a lot to look back on in 2017 and it wasnt simply new jersey and virginia. We have proven we can win elections virtually anywhere for the special elections in oklahoma that took place this past summer, three special elections in deep red states what they all have in common is we won all three elections. Elections in New Hampshire had gotten hadnt gotten on the democratic side since 1984. A special election in florida where republican won last year by a doubledigit margin and won that race. We see what we do when we lead with their values and we see will we do when they organize and we see what we do when we listen. When we take the word off here are the lexicon of the Democratic Party. We have gone to school on many of the lessons of the state in the past on the lessons we have learned from the past is the mission of the Democratic National committee must always be to elect democrats up and down the ticket from the school board to the oval office and we have done just that. With the help of this commission we are going to be able to do that on an even bigger scale because the recommendations you have put forth today are remarkably important and moving forward as we turn the corner. I believe again democrats can win everywhere in partnership with their state parties. We call it every zip code counts because again we understand we can win everywhere and we have demonstrated that an election set of taken place this year. We also understand we have got to spend money on infrastructure. We havent spent a dime on television and the dnc. Our Summer Program led by deputy chair Keith Ellison wayne knocked down over a million doors to invite americans of all walks of life to join us. We made those investments in virginia up to about 1. 5 million in virginia. Again 0 20 to television every thing went into making sure the tax tools were there to help our friends in the progressive ecosystem and the same thing in new jersey. We were able to help people up and down the ticket. It was an honor to campaign on behalf of of candidates because as i said early on i dont simply want you to win, we wanted to govern in the best way to govern is to flip the house of delegates. The last time democrats won this many seats in the Virginia House of delegates was the late 19th century. It wasnt a coincidence. In the 15 republicans were about to become former members of the Virginia House of delegates are all men replaced by 11 women. Remarkable. History made including the first two latinas in the history of the Virginia House of delegates, the first asianamerican in the history of the Virginia House of delegates and the first openly transgender person in the history of the Virginia House of delegates. We can win elections when we are organized when we are running campaigns everywhere and when we leave with our values. That is the progress we have made. Thats the momentum. We need to scale back the money to make sure we are doing that everywhere in 2018. I was with the Democratic Attorney Generals Association yesterday and i was also with the dlc see yesterday again reiterating that message that the new Democratic Party has spoken up and down the ticket and where working to organize everywhere. I believe we can win everywhere and i believe we can win everywhere as long as we are continuing to organize and continuing to put in place the recommendation of this remarkable commission. As we shift into this commission i want to take just a moment to tell you some of the things we party put have already put in place because its really important. They are inspired by many conversations ive had with people in this room because we recognize we need to be looking towards 2017 which we have been doing but we also need to have an eye on the future. We need to build the party that can win today and sustain those victories tomorrow. We need to make sure we are preparing now for the 2018 election but we are also preparing ahead for the 2020 election and as we think about 2020 third many things that are very important. We have spent a lot of time learning the lessons of the past and learning from our mistakes. The areas where the dnc fell short. Its critically important and that starts now that the dnc does not put its thumb on the scale. Nothing the dnc or Party Officials do to give a primary candidate in unfair advantage. Toward that end we announced a while back that one innovation we are going to do to make sure we are true to that admonition is we are going to announce her to the schedule the democratic primary well in advance of when we know when who the candidates are so theres no perception that there is a thumb on the scale for any one candidate. I know there are other things we could do and thats why we have this commission and im committed to make sure that our fundraising agreements are transparent and available to all of the candidates. We need to make sure we give voters more opportunities to participate in our primaries and we are doing just that. The recommendations here on the primaries are some of the most important things we can do. It makes absolutely no sense to me to have a Voter Registration deadline on one day and the deadline to change or Party Affiliation that 60, 90 or 100 days earlier or even one day earlier for that matter. That makes no sense to me. I suspect that makes no sense to anyone on this commission and thats a really important reform reform. I look forward not only to adopting but implementing because its one thing to adopt and another thing to make sure we move forward with our recommendations. We also need to make sure that we remain vigilant in making sure we expand opportunities for people to develop and not contract them. Miro work as a civil rights lawyer has given me a front row seat to the fact that Voter Suppression is a permanent part of the republican playbook. The sooner we understand that the better we respond. They have been talking about this for decades, notches for months and theyve been implementing it through not. Not just voter i. D. Laws but many other provisions, vehicles are making it harder for eligible people to vote rather than easier. Thats why we need to make sure Voter Protection and Voter Empowerment defense and offense are part of our playbook and these recommendations by the commission and i commend the chair and the cochair for the work that they have done in this area because there are too many working people who cant vote in this. We have had a robust dialogue and i want to thank everybody who is working on the issue because obviously we want to make sure if you are a shift worker you can both a caucus and if youre a member of the military or someone else who has been left out of the process that we can do that, but you can vote in that you can make sure your franchise is exercised and its been remarkably important here. Opening up the caucus process consistent with the recommendations of the commission are going to be gamechanging. I applaud the work you have done done. As you know in 2016 superdelegate superdelegates made up 60 of delegates in the commission at the time when you are negotiating Unity Commission both secretary clinton and senator sanders agreed on the mandate to provide a significant reduction in the number of unpledged delegates and im excited about the fact the recommendations are going to reduce that by over 50 . That is so critically important. Finally and i shouldnt say it, should say finally if we want democrats to win and stay in power we have to reform our party in ways that will build it from the ground up. We need to put a down payment on that effort in grassroots organizing. We are going to continue this and again i want to commend mike called my colleague Keith Ellison. We have been making investments in our state party making investments in working with our colleagues within the ecosystem. Some of these organizations dont have the chief Technology Officer but what they have is Tremendous Energy and when we harness that energy and use our technology and use the tools that we have in the dnc thats a force multiplier because we all can see what we can all succeed previously son virginia and elsewhere we are at our best when we are united and when we have our oars in the water and we are rolling together. Thats where doing and thats why we are continuing to make sure we make these investments. Im proud of the fact that we are now providing every month to state parties but its not a blank check rates accompanied by accountability measures. We are working together with state hearties and political stakeholders in each state to develop a Strategic Plan for success that enables us to win not only this year but for many years to come. Part of the Technology Infrastructure we are building at the dnc. All of those things that enable us to work across the states to make sure we are empowering folks. We need to continue to empower them. Our diverse grassroots democrats at every level to make sure they have a seat at the leadership table. Lets build on our recent small dollar fundraising success and let stand by her pledge to ban corporate donations. We have come a long way but i wasnt born last night. We have got a long way to go in this commission is i think a critical part of that process moving forward. I am confident that senator kennedy once taught me, he taught me many things but he said you know tom we are at our best when we are united and in it he doesnt mean unanimity. We may not agree on everything but when we recognize what unites us far exceeds what our differences are thats when we are at our best. Thats why senator kennedy have such a distinguished career of accomplishments moving the ball down the field forward in families, making sure we protect the rights organize making sure we protect womens rights making sure we protect immigrants rights. When we move forward in that spirit and im confident we agree on many things here and im equally confident that there are areas where we still may have disagreements but i know what unites us far exceeds what our differences are. I know moving forward this report is going to make a big difference. You have my assurance. Im going to work with all of you to make sure. Today and the work you do today and tomorrow is the end of one chapter but its the beginning of an equally important chapter by chapter of implementation. I want to make sure when history looks back on your work, our work that history records a moment in which democrats came together around this issue of opportunity for everyone and empowerment in the community. Construction of a pathway not only for victory in 2018 but for longterm. Thats when we are at a vessel i want to say thank you to all of you and i look forward to hearing the final results. I have a lot of optimism moving forward as this is a big group of folks who know what our northstar is. Our northstar is taking back america making sure we build an america that works for everybody everybody, everybody in every community. When we do that we are at our best so thank you jen and thank you to larry and everybody on this commission for your great work. [applause] thank you so much mr. Chairman. As someone who has spent a good amount of time working on the party i just want to commend you and your team for the hard work you have undergone and the new evolution of the work you are doing across the country. I think seeing the amazing wins in virginia and the down ballot victory we are seeing in other places. We are here at the final meeting of the Reform Commission and i want to first start by saying thank you. As you can imagine this is not exactly the sexiest job that all of us do and it requires a lot of work. As i was explaining the commission to some of the other day is that this is a workers commission. Every Single Person here is putting in the time not just in Public Meetings but outside of them. To really think about hard sticky topics income up with soft wall ideas and solutions. I think you will see that throughout today and tomorrow but i just want to commend the commission for their participation their passion in what they what they believe in and on behalf of the party and the work here. Im really confident that what we are going to end up with after it today and tomorrows going to be a report that will help unify the party but will also bring major reform, greater reform that i have seen in my time doing political work and in a way that is 100 on the mark mandated to be more open and inclusive in thinking about grassroots participation. Im confident we are going to have a good state but i want to make sure we set the tone and everyone is here and everyone that is tuning and understands the work is behind a team of commission workers. I also wanted to take a moment to thank everyone who has come today and many i see who have been there for many meetings. Thank you for your participation in being here but thank you for caring about this. Not just the folks that are here in person, we have thousands of outrage from people in the party across the party and across the country. People have input that they have shared to the web site and we have taken that very seriously. This is something obviously its about all of those. We thank everyone that is here today. As we have started this meeting i think about whats happening in the world and ensure what we are doing is not a silent effort but concrete to the reality. Unfortunately for every single meeting i have had too many things that the chair ed mentioned as well. We can point to the Trump Administration in the Republican Party that are taking away and hurting the people we care about and the values that we share. As we go through this process let us just remember as we sit here we have gone through in the last 10 days everything from the republican tax bill to more discussion on t