Hi i am Suzanne Spaulding director of the Democratic Institution project and the International Security program at the center for strategic and international studies. I want to welcome all of you to part one of a twopart conversation, connecting the issues of racism, National Security, and Civic Education and empowerment. This conversation is part of a broader Strategic Dialogue with civics as a National Security imperative. The Broader Program and todays program are generously funded by the Craig Newmark philanthropy. We are very grateful for his support. Todays amazing lineup of speakers will focus on the ways in which systemic racism in addition to being a fundamental violation of our commitment to human rights, is also a National Security issue. From sidelining essential voices and talents and National Security to undermining our influence around the world to presenting an all too tempting targets to exploit. address the inequities in the National Security threat. All of us must be engaged in sustaining our democracy. Civic education can help equip us to be better, more effective to see change and to hold our institutions accountable for doing a better job of living up to our aspirations. It can remind us of our shared values and of the value of democracy and that it is not inevitable but must be fought for every day. Moderating todays panel is my friend and colleague, beverly kerr. She is a fellow and director of outreach for the center for strategic, for the International Security program. She also heads our smart women, Smart Power Initiative and she hosts a smart woman, smart power podcast. Prior to joining csis beverly was a journalist and worked for a local and National News organization, including nbc, npr and pbs or stay focused largely on Domestic International politics and government. But first, i have the privilege and honor of introducing today my former boss, secretary jeh johnson to help set the scene for our next two days conversation with secretary johnson is currently a partner in the Litigation Department at all whiteware, i believe he was working in 2001, when he and i served together on the American Bar Association committee on law and National Security. Prior to that time he had been assistant u. S. Attorney general for the Southern District of new york and also had been gentle counsel for the varmint of the air force. In 2009 he was tapped to be general counsel for the entire department of defense. Waiter i had the honor of working for him when he came in as secretary of Homeland Security from 20132017. During which time i was responsible as the undersecretary responsible for Cyber Security and critical infrastructure. I saw firsthand how secretary johnson prioritized outreach efforts to communities around the country that might otherwise still feel marginalized. Devoting significant time to travel and meeting, particularly with communities of color. He devoted significant time and effort to recruiting black americans and other minorities to our workforce our workforce including our cybersecurity workforce. I cant think of a better person to kick off this two days of conversation about systemic racism as a National Security threat and the role of Civic Education. That, my friend, secretary jeh johnson. Thank you for joining us and i know you are supposed to be cheering another meeting and we are very grateful so lets get right to it. Over to you. Thank you very much, suzanne. Good afternoon everybody. Suzanne, i want to thank you for your Public Service as well and for your work as secretary of the department of Homeland Security. As many of you know there is a new agency and the executive branch called the cybersecurity and infrastructure security agency. What you may not know is within the executive branch Susanna Spalding is the Single Person most responsible for the creation of that agency. She pushed for the creation of that agency and never gave up and as the result today we have an agency of our government devoted to cybersecurity. Thank you very much for that suzanne. I was asked to speak to you this afternoon about racism and the importance of Civic Engagement. If anyone asked me to Civic Engagement important in bringing about social change my answer is a resounding and unequivocal, yes. I think i know why suzanne asked me to talk to you this afternoon. I recently gave an interview about black lives matter and the aftermath of minneapolis and the interviewer quoted my grandfather. My grandfather was a sociologi sociologist. He lived in the middle part of the last century and died in october 1956. He wrote a lot about civil rights. He lived his entire life in the jim crow south in the desegregated self, road in desegregated Railroad Cars and notwithstanding all of that, not extended the fact that my grandfather, my own grandfather once had to testify before the House Unamerican Activities Committee in 1949 to deny he was a member of the communist party. One month before he died he wrote this which the interviewer asked me about. This was an essay from the new york times. This is a man who lived his entire life in the jim crow south. It is expected that negro southerners, as a result of our limited status, in the racial system would be bitter or hostile. Bitterness grows out of hopelessness and there is no hopelessness in this situation. Faith in the ultimate strength of the democratic philosophy and code of the nation as always been a stronger than the impulse to despair. I believe that too. I have quoted it many times in speeches i gave while i was secretary of Homeland Security. That was charles s johnson, my fathers father. On my mother side of my family, my mother was a native washingtonian bird her family were all native washingtonians. They were all postal workers. They found job security and stability living in the Nations Capital and the postal service. They believed in federal service. They believed in Civic Engagement. In my experience as a Public Servant and as a africanamerican who has lived 63 years now. In my experience any Great Movement for social change needs to have within it as a centerpiece Civic Engagement. You look at the Civil Rights Movement of the 50s and 60s, something that my own grandfather not have the opportunity to live to see. We had within it conservative elements more moderate elements and for lack of a better phrase, more aggressive elements. This is on the more conservative side you had, for example, naacp and on the more aggressive side you had the black Power Movement of the mid late 1960s and in the center was Martin Luther king. Doctor king realized that Civic Engagement, engagement with our government was crucial to bringing about social change. Though, some may have been critical of efforts to engage the government, many believed that it was certainly important for passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Voting Rights act of 19625 and i saw this myself and government. Being on frankly the receiving end of efforts to bring about social change. When i was general counsel of the department of defense we repealed working with congress. Dont ask, dont tell. I met and interfaced with many parts of the movement to repeal that law and some more aggressive, ambitious elements, more moderate elements and those who knew how to have a seat at the table to negotiate policy change. That is critical to any movement for social change. Same thing with the movement to inform our immigration system. When i was secretary of Homeland Security very often there were those who would engage in peaceful protests even disrupt some of my own speeches but there are also people who we could sit down with and engage in a Meaningful Exchange of bringing about better policies. All of these different elements of a movement complement each other, frankly. While some within a movement may be critical of others they all complement each other. When you look at the present day efforts, black lives matter, we see elements that call for defunding the police. Well, it doesnt literally mean if you ask what that means it literally doesnt mean Public Safety in its entirety but it means redirecting a lot of resources, funds toward things that might have the effect of influencing the community, rebuilding the community in a positive way rather than pure policing. Many on the right would be critical of the message to defund the police but the reality is all of these elements of the movement complement each other. I think it is critical to understand that and i think it is critical to understand that and how our democracy works. I too have confidence in the code of the nation and our ability to effect change through Civic Engagement. Thank you for the opportunity to speak to you. Suzanne, back over to you. Thank you so much, secretary johnson. I will take it from you here. And beverly kirk and i direct the smart woman, Smart Power Initiative here at csis and i am a fellow in International Security program. We have a panel of National Security experts here to talk about systemic racism and National Security. Let me introduce them. Wendy parker is the National Security advisor to the office of the u. S. Speaker of the house of representatives. Prior to joining the Speakers Office she served as deputy staffed director and general counsel for the Health Permanent select committee on intelligence. She has also been an assistant state prosecutor and previously served as an attorney at the cia and fbi. Elizabeth scott parker is dean america of the Mcgeorge School of law at the university of the pacific. Prior to becoming dean she was general counsel of the National Security agency, nsa and cia. She previously served as the executive director and ceo of the state bar of california and early in her career she worked as a cooperating attorney with the naacp Legal Defense fund. Doctor skinner is the top professor at Carnegie Mellon university and director of cmu institute for politics and strategy and also directs the center for International Relations on politics, Washington Program and the institute for future analysis. Prior to joining cmu doctor skinner served as a director for policy planning and Senior Advisor to the secondary of state. I should also mention she is a fellow at the Hoover Institution and a visiting fellow at the heritage foundation. Welcome to you all and thank you so much for being here. For our audience please know that you can ask questions of the panel through the ask a question button that is located on the csis. Org website on the events page print please find nat and be thinking of your questions and in about 20 or so minutes we will turn to the audience questions and prevent them for the panel. Welcome everyone. I want to start with a very general question and ask it this way. It was two years ago i read an incredible oped who is the president of the naacp Legal Defense fund and the headline on that oped said it is time to face the fact that racism is a National Security issue. Are we now facing that fact, given everything that is happened in this country over the past several weeks and i guess almost one month now. We will start with you, wendy. Wendy, if you are speaking you are on mute. Doctor skinner, lets move to you print lets have you answer that question. I do believe that racism is a National Security problem and i have seen it as an academic and as someone who is been a president ial campaign for the National Security side and more recently from the standpoint of u. S. Diplomacy at the state department. The Common Thread that i see in all of these is that when you do not have people of color at the table you cant represent america very well. For whatever reason we are in a multigenerational time in which there are just not enough africanamerican, hispanics and asians at the court aspect of Foreign Policy. Let me be a bit more specific. I think in order to represent the best of the United States, the worlds most fully functioning multiethnic democracy you have to have people of color in every level of government. At the state department, for example, they are needed in greater numbers in the regional and functional bureau and they should always be at the table. I dont believe in identity politics but it makes sense to me to have china specialists who happen to be chinese who speak the language and africanamericans who spent time on the continent of africa involved in regional discussions about u. S. Foreign policy. We dont have many at this time. We had very few as a result in the interagencys discussion of the u. S. And the making of u. S. Foreign policy. We have almost no one at the top of the state department who is of color and we have very few diplomats and those representi representing. It seems almost impossible to me to represent the best of the u. S. When you dont have the best of the u. S. At the table. There is something missing. What we have will bring a more Diverse Group together and is that what we get different perspectives and that you would not hear otherwise bring i see that in the classroom and with my faculty but i dont see it happening with diplomacy. If i could followup what type of issue or problem or challenge doesnt create what we are sending diplomats to other parts of the world and we may even be commenting on their internal situation where it concerns ethnic minorities and what kind of challenge doesnt present when those countries points back at us and say what about your own problems . I think let me answer that at a couple of levels. What it does is we have only one demographic representing us abroad for the most part and we get a particular point of view and that doesnt represent 300 million American People who live in a very vast land and very different state. I think we just get something that doesnt really represent us. That is what worries me and it may be someones interpretation of what that policy is today. As a another level i thank you asked me about what people point back at us and ask our own inequities on the race side. I understand that but i see its a little differently than i think what you were implying. Often they look at the inequity of the u. S. And think people of color, who are always agitating for change, and often i think that gives them hope because no one does it better than americans in terms of peacefully making it happen. It takes us a long time and we expose a lot of flaws but we do the hard work so often i think our International Partners have more respect for us as a result of the weight we address race but i worry now that we are inflicting wounds on ourselves by not doing the obvious things. At the state department for example we have enormously talented people of color who should be in more senior roles and who are talented and women as well. I would like to see some structural approach to this because the outcomes would be phenomenal and the secretary of state would be, hugely surprised, at how we ought are received around the world if we do what im talking about right now. Elizabeth parker, let me bring you into this conversation and get your perspective on th this. Thank you, beth. I really hope that doctor skinners more optimistic view is the one that will prevail as we go forward. I would like to turn the conversation in a different way and i totally subscribe to but i will capture insane unless we are diverse we dont show who we are in these international settings. I like, if i might, start with a personal experience. After leaving federal government i was involved for several years in multilateral conversations on disarmament and overall several of these i got to know two