Meeting internet connecticut. His constituents asked about health care, trump ties to russia and the Justice Department criminal said theme guidelines. This is an hour and a half. [applause]. [applause]. Sitdown. Sitdown. Thank you, everyone. Thats very very nice. I have a massive cold and it that makes me feel better today. I feel more well given the introduction. Thank you martin. I asked what i should say it he said whatever i say make it short. We have a lot to cover and i think he reference to we have, but i want to thank all the folks here at stanford. You do a fantastic job every single day bringing Educational Opportunities to kids and adults in stamford. Thank you for opening this up. Representative caroline simmons, thank you for being here and i want to get right to the meat of this because im sure you have loads of questions about whats happening, what has happened and i want to answer them. We are going to talk about a lot of things, but i think at the foundation we will talk about the rule of law. [applause]. We are going to about the simple idea thats been at the root of this country since our founding that no individual, no matter how powerful, no matter what title stands before their name is supposed to be above the said rules we all played by. That has certainly been the topic of discussion in this country for the last week, but frankly we been talking about it in some way shape or form in the last 110 days. I went to turn this over to your questions. First, thank you for giving me the opportunity to do this a job. I dont come from a family that has background and politics my mom mom grew up in the housing projects of new britain, connecticut, and one generation removed from poverty i get to be a United States senator and whether you voted for me or not in this room that i did people of the state place their faith in me to be one of voices in the senate is an honor and to be honest its a thrill and so im so thankful to you for giving me this chance. Im Getting Better at it every day because im learning from you about what the priorities are about what you care about, about how i should prioritize the fights before i sanded this is an exercise for me in trying to learn and listen and i do a lot of these town halls and as many of you know i try to engage proactively in innovative ways as well. I am one of the few members of the senate that does my own twitter feed and facebook and snapchat. I walked across the state of connecticut this last summer going 130 miles from [applause]. One side to the other talking to lots of people that would have never taken to themselves to show up to a town hall or write or email, so i try to engage in learning creative ways as well as in traditional ways, so first, thank you for giving me the chance to do this job. We are going to talk today about the rule of law and checks and balances. I first want to admit why we are here. We are at this moment in part because donald trump fairly transparently advertise to people he was going to blow up the way things were done in washington and advertised he said famously in his nomination speech that i alone can fix this and people were drawn to that whether we like it or not. He won a lot of votes in part because there is this i dont know how to put it any other way, but theres this tiring of democracy and that sounds like a hard phrase to handle, but, i mean, for a long time people understood the trade you gotten democracy that you got all this inefficiency and it took a long time for something to become a law from an idea, but the trade was in exchange for that inefficiency you that outcomes that benefited the whole rather than the elite. In a dictatorship you have policy made much faster, but you tended to get results that were the good for the elite rather than everyone else so people were saying i dont get that trade anymore. Its more inefficient than ever and yet the results coming out of washington still seem to accrue to the top one or 2 , not me so people started asking themselves whether weise should still be invested in this big great experiment and trump with his advertisement of a high alone can this started to look more attractive than he would have 10, 20, 30 years ago, so we need to recognize this is a moment not just to take on enormous policy challenges that trump confronts us with, but also to remind people why we are engaged in this exercise of selfdetermination and to talk about how we could make our democracy healthier, so we will talk about immigration and healthcare in the fbi, but i also want to be reminded that you shouldnt take for granted this democracy is inevitable, that is just something you will live under for the rest of your lifetime. We have to breathe new health into it and remind why we are invested in it. I will say there are parts of this experiment that have been holding. There are checks and balances inside this endeavor that have worked. The president out of the gate tried to pass immigration order that was plainly unconstitutional, the idea you would stop people from coming into this country based upon religion violates the basic premises of the original document and the amendments attached to it and of course, recognize that you cannot do that. The president is in the midst now along with republicans of trying to push through a healthcare bill that is an absolute humanitarian catastrophe waiting to happen. 24 Million People could lose insurance and rates could go up on everyone. They thought they were going to get this done in february. They thought they would pass this thing, tied up in a neat though and walk onto the next priority, but they have been stopped over and over again because the legislature in interesting ways is responding because people are rising up and saying if you vote for this monstrosity we will vote you out. Means its taken a lot longer to get the vote bill vote through and its kind of stuck in the senate right now because republican senators know there are consequences for voting for something that is this cruel and so the checks and balances in a legislature thats ultimately responsible for the people is holding for the time being, but there are other places where checks and balances are not holding and i know thats where we will spend time talking today we will clearly spend time talking about what happened the last week. You cannot have a functioning democracy when the president of the us can dismiss body horsemen individuals and leaders carrying out investigations against the chief executive and im sorry, but the explanation donald trump offers does not hold water. Jim komi did not get dismissed because he unfairly treated Hillary Clinton in the election. He was fired because he was onto something and getting closer and closer to a very damaging story about the Trump Campaign interaction with the russian government and we dont know what the end of that story is, but we know that director call me was going director james komi was pursuing the investigation in the end and its hard for me to think its a coincidence that a week later he was fired. We will have the Deputy Director who wrote the memo before the u. S. Senate next week in a closeddoor hearing to ask questions and we will get closer to the truth during that meeting, but this is a direct threat to the rules of law and i hope as my republican friends go home this weekend and talk to their constituents they will choose to rise to the location. As i said on social media this week and there are rare moments when you choose between your party and the republic and my advice to my republican friends is that you will never regret choosing the republic if that choice comes to you, so this [applause]. You know what i think the path forward is here. I ultimately believe the investigation and the department of justice is for the time being fatally compromised and we need a independent prosecutor. [applause]. Lets give the weekend for republicans to think through this and make the decision, but if they choose not to than democrats and likeminded republicans in the house and senate will have to consider all the tools at our disposal to try to push this country forward. [applause]. Recognizing the gravity of this moment. Let me talk about the other threat to rule over law and one thats not in the news as much as it should be and then i want to move on to your questions and thats when it comes to the conduct of Foreign Affairs and international relations. Jim hines and i have thought about the americas role in the world and quietly covers over the course of the last 10 to 15 years has abdicated its responsibility to be a coequal branch of foreignpolicy. I simply did not believe that there was authorization, legal authorization for this administration to take military action against isis. I did not think it was wrong for the administration to take military action. Thought they needed authorization from congress in order to do that and my worry is that today its much harder to declare war against an enemy than it was 30 or 40 or 50 years ago. These are shot a week enemies that we face today. Its not two armies marching against each other over time with a peace treaty that something thats harder to define with victory that is much harder to get your head wrapped around, so i worry that if congress does not authorize war against isis and allow for the president to take military strikes against bush are all assad without justification then we will never authorize work again as a congress and you will lose your voice and making those decisions. Whats happening in syria today should be worrisome. Reports that the president has ceded his responsibility for setting sending troop levels, a slow creep of us troops inside that country from a number that was close to zero a year ago to a number that now looks like a thousand, a mission that is very hard to define extensively about helping local groups retake rocca, but looking like a mission that will also encapsulate the holding of rocca and the intervention of accounts that will happen after isis is removed from rocca between all that exists around that town. If that is the case, then syria looks a lot more like iraq and yet with no debate in congress about whether its a worthwhile endeavor for this country to participate in, so i really worry about checks and balances falling apart when it comes to Foreign Policy in this country getting into another major major intervention in the middle east without a full debate in congress and we can talk about the situation of north korea as well presenting challenges for the question of rule of law, also. Unhappy the checks and balances have held in part. I think this massive uprising of activists across the country is making a difference. It sort of creating this molasses around the trump agenda that doesnt naturally mean there are parts that will be able to push its way through, but its slowing everything down anyway thats meaningful and making their allies in Congress Stop and think as to whether they want to endorse some of the most reckless parts of this agenda. Im trying to raise my voice. Obviously my first obligation is to represent this state and i would be happy to talk about important wins week on for connecticut and southwestern connecticut in the last appropriations bill in the Mental Health reform act that i was the author of last year and im also trying to raise my voice on a National Level to be part of what i think is a defining moment for this country im perpetually glass halffull guy like you can begin this job and not ultimately see the light at the end of the tunnel and heres how i view this moment. You know, im stealing a bit of this from a colleague of mine who talks about these words and declaration of independence which are in a way on our north star is a country that says all men are created equal and raise the flawed phrase from the beginning because at the time all men were not created equal and the phrase just said men, but it was a radical idea, this idea of the quality and you can kind of read our entire countrys history as trying to get a bit closer to that reality , that reality of full equality. Equality of existence, opportunity, equality of experience and yet you can also read this nations history as one of two steps forward and then one step back that when you make enormous amounts of progress in a short time theres this natural tendency for americans we shouldnt forget how much progress we have made over the last 10 years with the election of the first africanamerican president , the ability to think about healthcare as a human right rather than a privilege, hundred years of talk about universal healthcare and enactment of a law that is closer than ever in the decision to allow people to marry whoever they love upon who they love rather than sexual orientation, our ability to bring in waves of immigrants in the tradition of those we brought from europe and asia before this progress in a short time and there has been this decision amongst parts of the American Public to just put a pause on it, a trench for the time being and yet i would argue the definition of this country in the end is not about the two steps forward and step back, but our ability to decide to build a ladder out of that trench. After the pause to decide to move once again on the road to the north star and thats one of these moments. Thats what it is, a moment in which we decide whether we are still on that journey or not and i just fundamentally believe we will make the decision that we are and this resistance movement, whatever you want to call it thats been built up over the course of the last 110 days across the country is a collective effort to build that ladder out of that trench and get back on that journey and if that is the case then count me as part of that resistance movement. Thank you very much. So, hello to the overflow room. We have two microphones, so if folks could line up at the microphone and we will take as many as we can. Sorry we will take as many as we can. The roads as you know are awfully jammed it today. I will take as many as i can in the next hour and lets get to it. We will rotate from there to their end upstairs. Held the is at the microphone they are. Quick questions and ill give quick answers. Talk into the microphone. Joanna, Founding Member [inaudible] seem at first, thank you for all you do and i will address the independent commission issue. In the face of the comey firing the Washington Post yesterday ran a piece entitled Senate Democrats can stop trump russia scandal from becoming the new normal reviewing the Senate Strategy to get to the bottom of trumps tactics such as asking mcconnell during leader time to yield for a question. Use of the filibuster and withholding of consent. In light of the front of this weeks events to the underpinnings of our democracy will you agree to use these measures until such time as your republican counterparts agreed to an independent commission and special prosecutor to investigate trump russia ties . Thank you for the question. I have not read that article, so i cant a pine on it, but i think you heard me say my opening comments that i think we absolutely will have to use every tool at our disposal to try to translate our colleagues in the senate and house and the American Public how serious this moment is. If they dont join us i dont think we should underestimate what a tight close make moment this is for the republican party. We are asking them to step outside of their party to directly challenge this president to call for the appointment of an independent counsel and i understand they might not be able to make that decision on a dime and it might take them a couple days to figure out the gravity of this moment so im going to give them a little bit of stage, but we dont have the luxury. The betrayal will grow cold. The message being sent to the fbi is a chilling message about pursuing truth if it accrues to the detriment of the chief executive will get solidified, so i went to give my republican colleagues time to understand what they need to do here, but that cant be limitless and then we will ultimately have to use whatever power we had. You teased out some of the tools we have. You know, they have limits of efficacy excuse me you are talking about asking questions of the majority leader in the problem is we dont control the house or senate so we have procedural tools at our disposal that ultimately arent this positive in the end, but we should look at using anything we have. Hello. Good afternoon. Diane from stanford. The conservatives have them a phenomenal job over the last few decades of controlling and shaping the messaging to the public. Now they are attacking the democrats as the party of no, no new ideas, the party attached to obama and the clinton machine. Can you provide us with a bit of confidence that the democrats have a strategy or progressives i should say have a strategy, brush bold ideas, press fresh messengers, some people in the pipeline who will be attractive to the general public and said of the whole person, you know, anti messaging thats been going on . Thank you for your fantastic work here at stanford. So, i mean, im not here to deliver a sermon on the state of the democratic party, but i will take the premise of your question and try to answer. You know, listen, i think we have to understand that people have watched this economy technically recover and they just dont believe its recovered for them and ultimately we have to be a party of Economic Growth, but not just for the top 1 . We had to be a party of Economic Growth for everyone, not just millionaires and billionaires and we have to be a party of inclusion, a country including everyone. It does not have to be rocket science. With a be a party of Economic Growth for everyone and inclusion, a country that includes everyone and then we have to be a party thats not scared of big ideas. The fact of the matter is that Bernie Sanders during the campaign talking about free college because it was unrealistic. So what if its unrealistic . Its a great idea that everyone should be able to afford to go to college in this country. So, as a party i think we have to be consistent about our messaging and make sure its based in peoples real economic fears and we cant be afraid of putting really big revolutionary ideas on the table that might not be realistic tomorrow, but the country about the division of where we wanted to go deep into the future, so i think right now, we are at a crisis moment in which thi