Most cios are appointees and maybe only stay two years. Very rarely they stay four years. I think one of the major problems is we dont have continuity of Technology Management because that position has been made an appointee, not not a permanent position, and this week, all the cios are going to be meeting at National Association of governors and cios and the governor across the way is being really strong in terms of bringing the states together and the state cios so could you comment on that . Sure, i completely disagree with your premise that im being tough on cios, because guess what . Im trying to get them more tools. Im the one trying to, i dont just bring them in front of my subcommittee. I bring the cto and the Deputy Agency headle is because they should be getting all the responsibility and authority. You didnt hold somebody accountable if they dont have the authorities to do their job, and so for me, everything we have been doing is to strengthen their authorities in order to do this but yeah, we should be there is not enough continuity and we have to look at why that is. Is it frustration with the ability to do their job . Is it lack of adequate manpower . These are issues im pretty confident that gao has looked at, and we have to make sure were creating the right culture, and that begins with making sure the cio is part of the c suite. There are still many agencies where the cio doesnt report directly to the deputy or the agency head. Thats unacceptable, and so i think making this issue more of a c suite responsibility i think youre going to see the, our cios feel like their work is being valued, because again, federal cios are not getting paid enough. They have huge issues and they have congress breathing down their throats, so i recognize the difficulty of that and thats why i want to make sure they have the tools. And last question, because were actually out of time, and i have to be a bit of a tyrant, but with the that state and local question, what are your thoughts on dhs designating Electoral Systems at the state level . As not a, its actually a sub Critical Infrastructure as part of government operations. So i think jeh johnson convinced me. Chief of staff is in the room. Which is a good move, because what it does is it allow, it prioritized states cios to get supports and training and dollars from dhs. Voluntary. Voluntary, so i think the concern many had was that you know, dhs is going to try to take over managing elections. No. The utilities are considered Critical Infrastructure providers. Dhs are not running utilities. The Telecommunications Infrastructure is considered Critical Infrastructure. Dhs is not running the phone company, right . So i think those fears have been misplaced, and as we saw at black hat this past black hat, where 26 of the Voting Machines were brought and they were all hacked within i believe six hours, this is something that our local municipalities, states and federal government has to be working together to ensure the protection of our voting systems. Congressman herd, thank you for joining us today. Thank you for your service, and thank you for getting things done. My pleasure. Thank you. If i could get our panel up here now. This is George Washington university where well be hearing shortly from White House Press secretary Sarah Sanders. Shes joining several White House Correspondents for a discussion on the media and its access to the Trump Administration. It should be getting under way shortly. This is live coverage on cspan3. President of the White House Correspondents Association, i cover the white house for bloomberg, i do a little analysis for cnn, and its just an incredible pleasure and gift to get to spend the time with you guys tonight. The whca for those of you who dont know represents the White House Press corps. Its hundreds of journalists, whetherer this print or tv, radio, online, photographers who cover the white house day in and day out, and our job is to be a liaison between our press corps and the white house to educate the public, to raise issues about access, and make sure we can get as much Public Information as possible to you, to the public, and we do scholarships, we do awards every year to honor great work and we champion the first amendment, and this is an important time for the first amendment. So tonight we really look forward to being able to bring you the voices of some of the people on the front lines who do this day in and day out and to be able to take your questions on issues and concerns that you care about. And as you may know and if you dont, you should, we have every year a student who has one of these White House Correspondents Association scholarships. We support that student through his or her four years here, and then he or she caps it off by attending the dinner, presuming the president goes to the dinner, and spending time with the correspondents. This conversation here tonight is exceptionally timely, and remarkable, and fascinating. I was a white house correspo correspondent myself some years ago. I was a very young correspondent, kindergarten f correspondent. Youre still young now. I covered the reagan white house, the George Herbert walker Bush White House and interviewed several president s. This president changes what weve seen in many ways. Donald trump ran as a disruptive president , disruptive candidate he certainly was and certainly disruptive president and some of the challenges to covering the white house, the president s criticisms on the media, on news, what he calls fake news, have also been news and have shaped things as well, so im sure well touch on that this evening as well. For us our work every day really is about doing our jobs day in and day out, but there are moments in a presidency and tonight is one of those moments when its also about assessing where weve been, where were going and whether anything really has changed and how. Our panel will join us in just a moment. Well start by asking a question on a different topic of each member of the panel and then well open it up to arefor a br conversation. We will open it up for your questions later on this this evening. There is a discussion. When that point in the night comes there will be microphones. You can spend the next hour and a half, next hour, dont worry, thinking about what questions youd like to ask and well give you some instructions later on. Couple of things we did want to mention, thanks to some of the folks in the room who are former president s of the White House Correspondents Association, thank you for coming and being here tonight and wed like to welcome all of you students, media, academic scholars, members of the public. Very much want to welcome the media in the room. It is okay to look at your phones tonight as long as you dont do it too much, if you want to engage your social media wed love to spread the word. We ask to you do it in a full and respectful way. One of the things most under siege is civil discourse and we at gw very much want to stand for that, serious, honest, direct engagement but always civil and respectful. And tweet away or snap or whatever you like, but please turn your ringers off and if you can, please keep enough of your attention focussed so you can hear whats actually going on in progress. We are really looking forward to this conversation. Margaret and i had a couple of drinks, nonalcoholic, yesterday. It was, coffee. Just like where do we begin . Hmm. Well, probably a good place to begin would be with introductions. Lets do it. So it is my great pleasure to start our introductions with someone you know, even if you dont know him. Because you probably have seen him or somebody playing him on saturday night live, please welcome glen thrush from the new york times. [ applause ] thank you. Have a seat. You also know our next guest from fox news, and also because President Trump feels safe and comfortable with him, likes his questions, he likes to engage with him, so please welcome john roberts from fox. [ applause ] safe . Thanks for doing this. Just because im trump bait for those of you at the school of media and Public Affairs you know our next guest, were privileged to have her as one of our turker fellows. She spends times with students and faculty and wellknown to millions of americans and others around the world for her many years at the white house. April Ryan White House correspondent with American Urban Radio Networks and also an analyst with cnn. April ryan. [ applause ] hi, april. Do i get one, too . Yes. Thank you. Our next panelist is the Vice President of the White House Correspondents Association, who will succeed me next summer and also the chief washington and White House Correspondent for yahoo olivier knox. [ applause ] hi, olivier. Nice to see you. Do we have students in the room . How many students in the room, raise your hand. Oh, look at that. Any Political Science majors in the radoom . Anybody studying politics . Anybody taking a course in Political Science . This person needs no brough ducti introduction. Shes written about congress, legislative gridlock, next book is on the federal reserve, sarah binder, professor sarah binder. [ applause ] and last but certainly not least, it is maybe a little bit intimidating to look at a room like this and panel like this and think that youre the representative of the Trump Administration, but we know that she is more than capable of doing a great job tonight. We really want to thank her very much for her participation tonight, Sarah Huckabee sanders, the White House Press secretary. [ applause ] thank you. Thanks, frank. Before you sit down, sarah already on the hot spot. Didnt take long. No, no, this is im fascinated and i think people are here, too, why you came here, and what it is you want to be able to talk about. Maybe you should ask me that question about an hour and a half after this is over and well see how it goes. No, i think forums like this are important. I think the ability for the administration to be open, transparent, answer questions is very important part of my job. I try to do that every day, and im hoping maybe this crowd is a little bit nicer than the one i sometimes face. You brought a few of my friends back here, but i think this is again a great opportunity to talk about some of the things that weve done over the last year, and hopefully have a friendly and fun backandforth conversation. I think we want to understand how you go about your job, how you view your job and how you think your boss is doing his job. Im looking forward to hearing you respond to that. Oh, good,ily have some time to think on all of those. We pegged tonights event or we got as close as we could to about a year since that historic election last november. Of course on november the 8th, President Trump and you will be somewhere in the middle of a 12day trip across asia. So tonight is an opportunity to assess all of the changes, not just to the white house, but to the political landscape, to the way journalists and president s interact, and perhaps some comparisons between the campaign and the way President Trump has governed. So i know for my part im very interested in hearing your thoughts on that. This should be a great night. Excited. Thanks for having me. Join us. Thanks, john. So as i mentioned, id like to start by posing a question, and margaret and i will take turns with this, to each of you to get the conversation going and then well open it up, as i said, and i mentioned to the audience theyll join us in the questioning a bit later. Sarah, lets start with you. Since were taking stock of things. The president made big and disruptive promises as a candidate, and a lot of the promises he made he said were going to be quick or easy, or suggested that. The wall, repealing obamacare which was going to happen on the first day, tax reform, inf infrastructu infrastructure. Hes had a lot of trouble with each. In thinking about that and where he goes, this is the question. And it revolves around priorities. Secretary mnuchin said on fox news tax reform is the top priority. Cory liewandowsky said if donal trump doesnt build the wall he wont get elected, that should be the top priority. Poll of republicans showed their top priority was repealing and replacing the Affordable Care act, 53 said that was extremely important. What does the president think he could have done differently to get any of these things done, and what is his top priority now . I think that one of the reasons that donald trump is president is because there is such a frustration with the way that washington functions, and i think weve seen a lot of that over these first nine months in office. You have so many things get lost in process, and its very hard to push things through regardless of whether or not you have a republican majority, particularly when its a narrow majority, it makes it very tough to i think enforce big and bold change, like donald trump would like to do, but we are making a lot of progress, maybe not as fast as certainly i think the president wants and certainly probably not as much as america wants, and i think thats one of the reasons that the congressional polling numbers are so low, because there is such a frustration that its so polarized that they dont have the ability to get a lot done. Right now, i would say the biggest priority is tax reform. Were in the heat and heart of that. I this i that we will get that done by the end of this year, and i think that historic tax cuts that the president has proposed and is pushing through will be a massive change to our Economic System certainly, really i think empower the economy in a new way through these historic tax cuts, help the middle class families, thats a big priority for this president , and something i think that were going to see happen in the next couple of months. I know i said wed move one on one but i want to ask one mini followup. You said thats one of the reasons congresss numbers are so low but nothings been done. Is that one of the reasons his numbers are so low . His numbers are a lot better than congress. Ill take the president s numbers over congress any day. Again, i think one of the reasons that you have President Trump is the president is because he is not your typical politici politician. They were looking for somebody to come in, change washington, change the status quo, shake things up. I dont think anybody could argue he hasnt done that, that he hasnt been somebody who disrupted the way the system normally operates. Does that mean were getting everything done on day one . No, but weve gotten a lot of things done in very short order. You have isis on the run. You have the economy stronger than its been in decades. You have unemployment at a 16year low. I mean these are massive things that have taken place in short nine months, and a lot of these things hes been able to do more, frankly, i think in these eight months particularly when it comes to things like the strength of the economy, like the defeat of isis and the toes that were in, far more in the first eight months than obama did in eight years and thats a big progress and big steps in the right direction. Well come back to all of that im sure. Mr. Thrush just ill go with what she said. What she said. President trumps first year of course has been marked by a lot of wellknown and reported internal competition, some staff turn, everyone from Michael Flynn at the nse, jim comey, the hhs secretary, mr. Price, sean spicer, anthony scaramucci, steve bannon, reince priebus. I feel like i might be forgetting a couple people. And there are a couple of remaining cabinet advisers or top advisers who have been sort of under threat of will he wont he, stay or go. How, other than the kind of political rapportage, how do you think that has actually affected the management of the executive branch in the process of governance in the early months of this white house . A great question. The first thing id like to do is id like to thank sarah for coming. I know its very difficult to be kind of outnumbered. Kind of outnumbered . Incredibly cool that you would come here and submit herself to this sort of thing. Its just a conversation. Youre setting it up to be real fine. No look, i think part of the problem with this white house in general has been the fact that they are learning on the job, so a lot of the disruption that weve referred to, and theres no question that the mood in the country or significant parts of the country is restive. People wanted a change. They want things shaken up but i dont think they wanted it necessarily quite shaken up in this way, and you see that reflected in a lot of the polling which shows that the president has lost a significant amount of support from independents, without whom particularly in the southern part of the country he would not have been elected president. Somethings going on, is that me . Ooh. I shut it off. Why do you always accuse me of things . Im off. Check your phone. My phone . Check your phone. Its dead. Yeah, its dead all right. Keep going. This makes you even more questionable. Ill just let that one go. I think in general part of the issue is this guy is learning on the job. He had no experience in this and that was a benefit during the campaign and i think part of the problem is his brand precludes him from saying he was on the job, so he cant necessarily do what a lot of president s in this position, and a lot of pr