Democracy is at stake where leadership role in the world is at stake were the lives of tens of thousands of americans are on the line. Incompetent and callous leadership could care less. We have got to change that. Im Jonathan Capehart a Senior Writer for the Washington Post and welcome to Washington Post life. This is a special live recording of my post opinion podcast. In former president Barack Obamas first term susan rice with United States ambassador to the united nations. In her second term she was Obamas National Security adviser are you today rice as a private citizen. She is the author of tough love, my story of the things worth fighting for and under serious consideration to be joe bidens Vice President ial running mate. Welcome back for the third time susan rice. Welcome. Thank you its great to be with you. About one minute before we came on air there was breaking news that the Trump Administration dropped a plan to Deport International Students in on line classes and your reaction was to applaud. Well it was such a misguided, stupid decision that they took. International students are a critical part of our University Structure on our college campuses. They bring talent. They bring diversity. They bring resources antilock down simply because there campuses have decided by virtue of the pandemic they need to conduct classes on line in the fall was callous and extraordinarily counterproductive. I havent had a chance to read the details and the reporting on it but it looks like the Trump Administration saw it is their effort to defend this policy in court that was unlikely to succeed in the back down and it continues to be a victory for our colleges and universities, our students across this country and across the world. So much of our peel and our competitiveness and our soft power depends on people around the world wanted to come here to learn and study and bring their skills and talents. So this is a good day. Talking about Foreign Policy originally was going to start this interview talking about the election and the news of the reelection of president duda. Hes an ally of prison ally of president and a supporter of the the rightwing justice party. Hes been condemned by the eu and democratic watchdogs. Im wondering how you think President Trumps behavior in the foreignpolicy space and his support for leaders like duda have contributed to the rise of illiberal nationalism of the credit regimes around the world. It certainly legitimized the rise of elected autocrats and we have seen that increasingly in different parts of the world. Poland is the most recent example. Unfortunate because poland is an important part of nato and an important part of the eu but its moving in that direction where its its values and its approach are completely out of step with the other members of the alliance. It suggests when it comes the eu their position could be in jeopardy down the road if there is a further move towards the ending of democratic policies and structures. Ambassadors its possible for the alliance to even survive if the superpower and the alliance, the United States, doesnt even bother to champion those small d democratic ideals that have been the cement for the alliance for more than seven decades . The Nato Alliance is under duress almost entirely because of President Trump callous disregard for the purposes and the interest of this alliance. Our alliance with nato is built on common values but its also built on interest as we stand together as north American Allies and north atlantic allies and europe broadly to counter threats to our sovereignty and territorial integrity as an alliance which comes chiefly from russia and when the United States questions the value and turns it into a transactional arrangement when President Trump decides to unilaterally withdraw a third of our forces from germany without even consulting with the German Government and calls our adversary from russia to china to north korea while putting our allies in a very difficult position it does great damage to the alliance and thats one of the many reasons we need change. I dont think nato and our leadership role in the world can withstand four more years of donald trump and thats why we need change and we need leadership in the form of joe biden who comes out of the bipartisan american tradition by supporting our alliances and understanding who our friends are and who our adversaries are in their leadership and their strength in the world when we can bring partners and allies with us. We will talk more about joe biden in a minute but lets keep talking about russia because you mentioned russia. We were talking for a little bit about the news that broke that the u. S. Had intelligence suggesting that russia. Taliban affiliated fighters to kill american jobs in afghanistan. This is what you wrote an oped for the news york times quote our commanderinchief is derelict in his duties over National Security process with us putting our country and those who wear the uniform a great risk. At worst the United States is being run by liars catered to a present whose arch. Is it incompetence or trees and . They are not necessarily mutually excuse exclusive. I do not use the word treason but my point is one of two things and maybe both are happening at once. We have a president who could care less about the extraordinary intelligence that the Intelligence Community deemed credible enough to put in the president s Daily Briefing the most important exclusive process they create that indicate the russians are paying Taliban Forces and taliban affiliated or so to kill american servicemen and women in afghanistan and what does the president of the United States to . First of all he does nothing when that information was brought to him and i believe it was brought to him often written form and perhaps earlier by one of my successors john bolton. Even today two weeks or so after that information first came to public light President Trump has said and done nothing critical of russia, did not indicate any sense of concern or urgency for the safety of our forces in battle, as not to anybodys knowledge initiated any action to respond to russia. That he said we dont believe its true so we are going to bother with it but the Intelligence Community i can assure you believes its true or would not put it in the president ial Daily Briefing and even more so jonathan the most widely disseminated piece of intelligence that the u. S. Government produces goes everywhere including to capitol hill staffers so this had to be a piece of information which they have a good degree in, and even if 100 certainty which is virtually never the case in President Trump has done nothing. He is left our forces vulnerable so either hes doing that out of some mysterious motivation to serve written centrists for which we have seen Many Disparate pieces of evidence over the course of the last four years but no overarching explanation or and or hes running a National Security process where the people around him are so scared, so incompetent that they are unwilling or unable to bring him the information that he must have to serve effectively as their commanderinchief and reject our forces in the field. Either way you look at it its a disaster and made their way you look at it as a message to Vladimir Putin that he can attack americans anywhere in the world with impunity and then get invited to rejoin the g7. I just want to be doubly sure here because you anticipated a question i was going to ask in that is it possible at all but that resident of the United States was not briefed and did not know about this intelligence and judgment answer you just gave its virtually impossible that he didnt know. Heres what i believe. I believe was put in his president ial Daily Briefing. I believe he often doesnt and maybe always doesnt read his Daily Briefing could any National Security adviser would have rather Daily Briefing even if their boss doesnt and when they saw that information done what i would have done which is what directly into the oval office and greet the president of the United States or early if they knew he wasnt going to see it in writing and say to the president look mr. President we have deeply concerning information about russia. Im going to work with the Intelligence Community to validate it. In the meantime im going to work with the other agencies and the principles to pull together options for you to respond and i will keep you posted. If the current National Security adviser didnt do that to me would be an abdication of his or her responsibility and if he did do that than the president of the United States is lying again. But what i also believe is that john bolton who has hinted that information similar to this came to light in 2019 while he was still National Security adviser he would not have been so intimidated not to bring that information to the attention of the president read i believe one way or another the president has chosen not to act. Ambassador rice my followup question is given everything that you said in its entirety in response to this is the president of the United States a National Security threat to the United States . I think by virtue of his dereliction of duty, still you to protect americans whether on the battlefield in afghanistan or here at home would be a grave threat from coronavirus and his very bizarre penchant for cozying up to our adversaries in doing Vladimir Putins bidding is in fact acting against the interests of the United States and that is about as friendly as i can put it. We have a president who is acting against the interests of the United States. We have a president who likes to disseminate conspiracy theories. One of them is that president obama and the Obama Administration signed on his 2016 campaign in interview with the christian broadcasting network. I believe in june he sets quote treason. When i came out a long time ago i said they are spying on my campaign and that was meaning a modernday version of payday. Its all the same thing but a modernday version. They have been spying on my campaign. Did that happen ambassador rice . Jonathan you know what i know in most of the pair in American People know absolutely no comment did not happen. That is false and thats another lie designed to deflect from the president s bizarre relationship with russia to distract from those much validated realities that russia interfered in the 2016 election to benefit donald trump and President Trump isnt some sort of a fever dream about the Obama Administration with always tried to do was execute despite the Trump Administration or incoming administrations reluctance for the most responsible transmission we probably we possibly could. We prepared over 100 individual reading papers to the incoming National Security adviser. I spent 12 hours in four separate sessions breathing my successor on all the important issues that might arise that were on the table ranging from russia to china to pandemic are. In this. Our effort was despite the bizarre nature of election and despite President Trump strange behavior before during and after our approach was to do our utmost in a responsible hand off from one administration to the other just as president bush has done for barack obama. One of those papers come you mentioned papers on pandemic spread one of them was a 59 page paper that when we spoke in april used the word pandemic for dummies. When they spoke in april you said that the idea of a pandemic was quote keeping me up at night is way up not begun to hit the top of the curve here. As for the president you said quote indie brag. If he hasnt done anything maybe 2. 2 million would have died in 240,000 is a good outcome. Im what circle of is that a good outcome is what you said to me when we spoke on the podcast in april. Is it safe to say three months later that your assessment has not changed . No, its change. Its gotten worse. Not only did the president , President Trump wastes two months and do nothing in january and february brushing this off as nothing more than the seasonal flu, not only was he slow to order and recommend the shutdown of various states when they were thrown into the first part of this crisis in march and april but then he came behind that and all too quickly in the interest of his own reelection and in the interest of his own personal benefit not the Health Safety and economy of the United States champions the premature reopening of various states in what we are seeing now is the result of that extraordinarily irresponsible rush to reopen and we are seeing it tragically in parts of the west and the south which were among the states to first reopen it to do so very rapidly without the super cautions like mandating the use of masks and the like. Its gone from very bad to frankly worse and the numbers bear that out. Its frightening to contemplate how high that death toll may go was longest donald trump is putting his own interests ahead of that of the well health and welfare in the economic wellbeing of the American People. Now he is championing the reopening of all schools everywhere with full class sizes and live teaching regardless of the circumstances at the local level. Nothing could be more irresponsible. Hes willing to sacrifice the health and safety of our children and teachers and the staff at these schools in order to convey the false reality, the false message that america is back and ready to reopen. If we had done with people and countries in europe did which is to wait until the curve was truly bent and until the infection rate had gone down and the number of new infections were close to zero before beginning the process of reopening had we done it gradually and responsibly and mandated things like mask and had adequate testing and Contact Tracing we would be a much better place in our schools and mud to the country would be able to reopen with minimal risk at the beginning of the school year. Now they face the horrific choice of opening prematurely and putting all of the people in those schools and adults and everyone in their family at Community Art at hand is to risk or kids are going to be forced to lose time and quality of life. It didnt have to be this way. Ambassador rice given the fights that have been happening around the country i take it you dont think schools should reopen period. Thats pretty clear. Jonathan i think you have to look at the subtle local level. You have to look at what is the disease doing it . How fast is a spreading and what is the reinfection rate . Whats the Positivity Rate . They are going to be places where things are relatively better than other places but in the socalled hotspots of the south and the west when schools are said to reopen sometime in august its very difficult to see how they can do so and then even when they do reopen the cdc guidance before her was manipulated and is going to be manipulated has been that its very important to be able to maintain social distancing in schools at least 6 feet between students in a classroom. I jonathan was the cochair here in washington d. C. Of mayors reopening d. C. Advisory group and we worked for all these issues but i was particularly involved in the educational aspect of our recommendations. The reality is you cannot reopen safely if you cant maintain that safety and most schools dont have the physical space to reduce class sizes by half or more which is what you are talking about to enable students to have that space. Even when the risk are moderate to low youre not going to have every student in the classroom all day every day. You will have to have some kind of cowording or a certain amount of days on investor demand of days off and on the off days do virtual learning. Then youll have kids jonathan hubei or chew up their own Health Circumstances and that of their parents and grandparents dont feel like it safe to return to schools. Youll need to have continued on line learning even in those places where its possible to begin to have some version of inperson teaching. Ambassador rice do you think that we as a nation earlier the pandemic should we lock d