our tourists, and that should be the beacon that supports the tunisian tourist industry. multiple speakers: here! >> my honorable friend makes a great.by local too busy and people who were appalled and that is a great credit to their country. >> because all these people have in their thoughts and prayers the victims of tunisia and their families everybody should criticize the actions in tunisia and there can be no justification. they talk about promoting and defending british values which are intrinsic. comments to distance islam from the severities of the ideology. what more can they do to work with committees on these values.

>> what we can do is carry out institutions to combat radicalization this issue of how we confront the poisonous ideology. and make sure were talking to people directly and not going through some self-appointed leader who does not always represent british mainstream opinion. sometimes criticized for not engaging, and i did not accept that. >> james gray. >> mr. speaker there can be no greater experience than those who have friends who have been missing like a gentleman from my constituency.

try to finalize the list. they can set their mind at rest. >> that is one of the most important issues. what can be done more people needed, police officers, victim identification experts officials working on the ground and are doing as fast as we can to get it done. >> neil gray. >> it would cost him 800 pounds confront last night and then after much what advice can the prime minister to those still trying to get out without

sufficient access to staff as in this case? >> grateful for the honorable gentleman's question, it tells a tells a story which is sometimes confusion and lack of clarity but then a good and clear ansell. my advice to everyone we talked the travel country to love have travel company first and then ring the foreign office online. they immediately look into it to see if they can help directly and will continue. >> sir edward lee. >> the family of my constituent, 24 -year-old young girl who was shot down brutally in front of a town of gainsborough and did not

deserve this. this. nobody deserves this. the question is what do we do now. this affects not just there but everywhere here. so. so will my honorable friend resist the voices trying to prevent from giving the security powers all they need on the internet and umax illegal migration as a dangerous course. can i support him in his efforts to support a convention so that we return and deal with this problem? >> first of all i join with him. it is a heartbreaking story that we have all read about this young woman gunned down

in the prime of her life. he is right to say that the threat is everywhere and the difference between the al qaeda threat that we faced for many years and still face is there we were often dealing with essentially coordinated plots. you could try to work out here how we are dealing with self radicalized so-called you hotties, through hotties, through the internet often from people in syria or iraq and hopefully in many cases we will get advanced warning and be able to stop them, but in some cases we will not. i do think that it underlines the social responsibility of the social media companies themselves but also the need to have the most modern capability to deal with this threat. as for migration we are seeing that increase and want to make sure it continues to work. >> two and a half years ago the prime minister warned about the terrorist threat

the disintegration of libya. i welcome the presence of the home sec. not just to reassure british citizens but the tunisian government and people. he he is having bilateral discussions with heads of government. what is the international way, the platform we can use to defeat this? >> the honorable gentleman asks a very a very direct question, and there are several platforms that can work. the g7 wants a clearinghouse for assisting countries like libya, tunisia, morocco egypt committed to make sure not all countries are offering the same sort of felt but more of a working out who should work with which country and hope it can be put into place and work soon because it makes sense for britain to partner with a a country like nigeria and possibly libya whereas other countries may

be better placed to partner with other countries. that is one network. the other is using the eu neighborhood program to make sure we give better assistance and support in building up civil societies and economies in the countries of south africa. >> cooperation when it comes to combating has focused on the military situation. in recognizing that we have failed significantly to disrupt the financial flow from arab friendly countries and organizations and individuals from within them, failed to disrupt their prominence on social media and failed to disrupt their business activities of what more can the prime minister tell the house about concrete steps that will be taken to combat basis in these other areas? >> i would not i would not entirely agree with my honorable friends description of this.

we have shrunk the territory that isys holds in that country. there there have been great successes in taking down isys social media site, site, pages off of the web, and a number of prominent plots, as many as four or five in the last few months in this country have been prevented. prevented. it is important that we talk up our capabilities and strength and resolve in this way, but he is correct that more needs to be done to finance these to be attacked, we need to bring to bear more pressure against isil in iraq and syria, but we will have to demonstrate real long-term results. if we are not going to invade directly but build up the government and military

we must settle in for the long haul knowing that it is the right answer but will take time. >> literally dozens of colleagues still seeking to catch my eye and i am seeking to accommodate as many as time reasonably allows. clicks thank you, mr. speaker. i agree with the sentiment shared across the country. what we what we need at home, a strong community. to this end will they agree and recognize they are failing in their attempts to engage and commit a systemic and dramatic review to prevent such change? >> we took the advice of an independent review to separate the community engagement done by the department of formal

government which has -- i think that is the right decision. >> the victims including my constituents a partner shot and lost their lives last week. providing special and personal accommodation to those individual brave to new zealand's who tried to warn against the attack as we know, it was not done in their name. multiple speakers: here! >> i also pay tribute to sue m scott and he is right to commend local to new zealand's. people who confronted the terrorists.

>> thank you, mr. speaker. thoughts and prayers are with the victims and their families. this highlights the need for us to fight extremism they seek to drive a wedge between majority of the world's muslims. no truck with what they represent and everyone else we must work harder. continuing to be a breeding ground exporters of violent extremism. >> are very much agree with what the honorable lady said particularly about the states affected by conflict.

a missile can kill a a terrorist, but it is good governance that kills terrorism. >> thank you, mr. speaker. with the prime minister agree with me no security service in the world will be able to identify someone who secretly radicalize himself, trains himself himself trains himself quietly and then operates largely independently which includes the tunisian community. >> largely right but reinforces the issue because you're not you are not dealing with a network that anyone who has any information, getting radicalized looking at extremism online otherwise we can end in the way that it has in the last few days.

clicks obviously what happened is we can support people in tunisia more youth engagement does he not think the destruction of so much government and society. >> the actions we took to stop col. gadhafi from colonel gadhafi for massacring his people? no, i do not. should we try and build these countries yes we should. >> young muslims can see

arab sunnis playing houston iraq and syria rejecting. we double the efforts to reject isil from iraq and syria. >> my honorable friend is absolutely right. we need an iraq or the prime minister is clearly working for all the different sex but we need sunni muslims in iraq to rise up and reject isil because without that it will be more difficult to take this out of that country. >> a couple of weeks ago in terms of the sunni tribes in iraq. the iraqi government is not arming them. without that we will not see

the sunni tribes in the sunnis checking on isil. what is being done in cooperation with the sunni partners? >> absolutely the right question. i have personally raised this with prime minister a body including the g7 summit in southern germany and will continue to do that. have to encourage him to be brave and reached -- reaching out and should work with sunni regimes in the area that themselves can work with the tribes to encourage them to accept the offer of an inclusive iraqi government and reject isil. >> mr. philip davis. >> every year the eu is a smaller and smaller part of the conflict. it is all democratic. it makes it easier for

terrorists and other criminals. [inaudible conversations] >> rather than the renegotiation were they will get next to nothing can i suggest negotiating the terms of burton's withdrawal from the european union? [inaudible conversations] >> i sometimes wish my honorable friend would not speak in riddles but be clear about what he wants. i hope to prove him wrong. in the end they will be the judge. >> words of condolence to the families who so tragically lost members of their families and also welcome his recognition of the need for a counter narrative to bio extremism.

will will he accept that there are many pathways into violent extremism? any counter narrative must be based on the proper discovery of those pathways. will he undertake what is done in the intelligence and security services and open sources so that any counter narrative can be more firmly based? >> i think the honorable gentleman makes a great. better identify and understand not just violent extremists but various extremist groups. i accept and agree that we have pathways into extremism, but we cannot ignore the fact that there are now young people who have been to good schools, good, strong family

backgrounds not suffering material degradation have chosen violent extremism which says we must go on attacking degradation and making sure we are a more inclusive country and go on attacking inequality at home we are we are looking at the cause of the ideological linkages and it is those we need to go after. a single question could represent a parliamentary trial. abcaseven. [inaudible conversations] [laughter] [inaudible conversations] >> could the prime minister explain how the mere promise mayor promise of a change could be legally binding? >> the very same way ireland had a treaty change. the referendum took place in ireland before the 27

countries past the treaty change. >> i would like to join the prime minister in thinking the families of the barbaric attack on the people in tunisia. one is about the recognition as muslims. these people are not muslims and this is gone on for a long time. they continue. what we must do is take responsibility for young people not to be the people are not muslims and we have to take responsibility for dealing with that.

>> great knowledge about this. he is right that these people are bastardizing and perverting a religion but we cannot ignore the fact they are self identifying as muslims which makes it more important that we reject what they are saying that they have nothing to do with what the true religion is about. >> thank you, mr. speaker. the presence where my constituents want nothing more than to go on holiday. the one thing that can be done all the nations on the mediterranean coast are in a dire way.

>> i think my honorable friend is right. not enough and not focused on enough things that make a real difference to the economy. .. lessons have been learned from previous tragedies and i think that's what is so important the

honorable member for lost a relative in the bombing is involved because i think as a country we have developed better ways of making sure families are kept in touch with developments. there's still more to be done but lessons will be learned and we would be as sensitive as we can. >> my constituent lost his life last friday. can my right honorable friend assure me that he got those others who died, and all their families will never never be forgotten of? >> i can certainly give that assurance. and again with him more lost of his constituent. i think it's important we speak with families in the coming days and weeks to think of the best way, to have a fading memorial to their suffering at to what this is that one of the largest losses of life in a terrorist incident that britain has suffered in many years. >> thank you, mr. speaker. i'd like to ask the prime

minister what discussions have taken part by the governments with traveling interest countries to ensure all those people horror in tunisia and wish to come may do do so free of charge of? >> the honorable lady raises an important point. mitogen is that companies have offered travel back to the united kingdom to a lot of planes had been laid on. we believe that system is working. where there are cases where it's not working we're getting onto the company concerned and trying to make sure the problem is fixed. where, for instance, the issue people have been injured or returning the bodies of those who tragically have been killed, that is where we are stepping in directly with transport via the raf to try and help. >> thank you, mr. speaker. will the prime minister please pass on my thanks to his fellow european union leaders? every time one of them refuses to agree to one of his very modest request in communications from process, because every time

they do so they make our task of those of us who are arguing -- the european union, makes it a little bit easier. >> i don't want to disappoint my honorable friend too much but the reception i've had from my fellow european prime ministers and presidents has been rather more positive that he might suggest. >> thank you, mr. speaker. i wanted to ask what consideration as the prime minister given to reviewing and get messy upgrading our sport and trade secret forces in other countries where british civilians might face a threat from dish? -- daesh speakers i think i will jump makes an important point. it should be about these issues as well as the more traditional issues of protecting and defending britain is so because we are a country where our people work and travel and live

in all sorts of different countries and making sure we work with the scotch to enhance their security is an important part of what we do. >> thank you, mr. speaker. my constituents were injured in the attacks last friday. they have now returned to the uk after being treated in hospital. i would ask of a right angle that would assure me that the hospital received all the support it needs at all our other nhs hospitals also received the support, putting extended counseling for victims of? >> let me join him in paying tribute to his constituents who are caught up in this terrible attack. i'm sure there will be assistance made available for counseling because what happened was a deeply dramatic event that will affect people for many, many months and years to come. >> earlier this year the prime minister said he wanted to

propofol on treaty change. how can we take these negotiations seriously when he's dropped his recent event in the first round of negotiations because i haven't dropped his demand at all. >> mr. speaker with my constituent john metcalf recovery from his wounds in tunisia, together with his uninjured a girlfriend, janice to associate myself with a right honorable friend remarks? kind of strongly welcome the direction of travel he is a set out for european reform? but cannot ask them how is it just by political integration been on the eurozone member states in order to achieve free trade? >> the point i would make to my honorable friend is that different european countries do have different views about integration. there are some who absolutely signed up to the idea of a close reading and wants to every country to every step pretty much at the same time. there's a growing awareness in europe that actually we can have

a europe of the different forms of membership as i said countries that are in the year, countries out of the euro indeed we sit around the table now discussing issues like living security for you got some countries that are leading members of nato come some countries that are neutral and not members but i think we should relax about flexible encourage it still further. >> thank you, mr. speaker. this atrocity serves to awaken promote many horrible members about atrocities of mass murder in my own country. and so i welcome the statement by the prime minister. and welcome the fact that a fight we will be able as a nation to pay tribute with a minute of respect. kind of ask the prime minister was --

[inaudible] towards the education of people that are away from fundamentalist belief? >> well, i think the answer to this question is not enough. the aid and assistance has been much more about trying to build a tunisia and democracy and the institution of this legend democracy but i think given the threat we face we'll have to look again at this partnership programs and education should be part of that because of the danger of radicalization which tunisians are looking at themselves. i also think we've got to try to make sure that these countries often have parts that are wealthy and parts that are behind to that we need to try to address that challenge too. >> my right angle friend has already said that the threat here remains severe. he and my constituents will have read the report in the times this morning that scorpion

automatic weapons may have been imported into the united kingdom. what comics can be made regarding that which will reassure the people of this country? >> well, i wouldn't comment on a specific report but he's right to say the threat level in britain is to be. it's set individually by the joint terrorism assessment center. severe means that an attack is highly likely. the point it makes is an important one. we should continue to do everything we can to keep the trade in weapons including replicate weapons, you know out of britain. a lot of action has been taken. we need to keep up the pressure. >> thank you, mr. speaker your mr. speaker i am ashamed to think that this summer many of those will swim in the sea where people have drowned because they are simply fleeing war violence and poverty. is the reason why the uk is failing to take its fair share of refugees because of this government finds human suffering

easy to bear that -- [shouting] >> i, i just don't agree with the honorable lady. britain is fulfilling its moral obligations by picking up those people come so far i think 4000 people come in the mediterranean rescued by the royal navy. we are one of the only rich companies and -- countries in the world that kept its promise about a state budget and its aid budget is being used to this country. but do i think that it is somehow the correct act to be part of a relocation scheme for people who already arrived in the eu? no, i did not because i believe it would add to the business model of the smugglers. the idea that you can only have a more upright position on this that you take part in the european scheme that i believed to be misguided i think it's just wrong. >> here, here. >> thank you mr. speaker. i'm delighted to report that my constituent and his girlfriend and her family were on that

fateful beach, at the time of the shooting were offered shelter but a local tunisia and in his house. would my honorable friend agree with me it shows the innate kindness of the tunisian encouraged by the tunisian people of? >> i would absolutely agree. they are many examples of this courage and kindness, and it's good they're coming out because they are a credit to the tunisian nation. >> i associate myself with the comments of the prime minister and the lid of the opposition relation to the terrible events in tunisia. on the european council specifically on the issue of migration, did the prime minister take the opportunity to discover with other leaders the situation? does he think the eu proposal for relocation systems will help or hinder the efforts there? >> the short answer is they won't make any short-term impact. in the long-term in my view, they might make it worse by encouraging more people to make the journey. i did have a brief discussion

about the situation in calais and my viable friend is meeting the french interior minister later this week. because there's more that we are going to do in terms of spending money and providing indian of action including sniffer dog teams and electrical and help the french and work together with them to reduce the problems in calais. >> as part of our present structure we rightly banned hate preachers from coming to the uk. sadly their message and their perverted ideology is being direct to her young people by social media and also by satellite, directed to certain mosques and communities centered. what further action can often make prevent this or mappings because i think my friend makes an important point. we can ban the preachers but we got to look at their use of media not just socially but some of the individual television channels and make sure that where there are messages that are endorsing extremism and

violence that we have a way of stopping the but i think this is very important. >> thank you, mr. speaker. a day before this terrible incident in my constituency a neo-nazi was convicted of a machete attack on a random individual in the supermarket in broad daylight on the streets in north wales. radicalized by internet content which is equally as bad as internet radicalization for those who undertake islamic attacks. could the prime minister just genuinely look at with the internet providers how we can stop that type of information being brought into people's bedrooms where locals can use that information? >> i will surely do that. with the internet watch foundation we have acted to take down a lot of pages of extremism. appointing makes this an important one.

just as it is argued about violence and not by the extremism also applies to the extreme right. we have never condoned in his this house the ideas we will tolerate the national front that will go after combat 18. we don't do that when it comes to fascism. we don't do it when it comes to islamism fascism either. >> the right honorable lady highlighted the appalling treatment of the gave people and the women by those who sub scribe to this people believe. is there not something powerfully symbolic particularly young muslim women that it is a female british home secretary who in the aftermath of this attack is stand in solidarity with them in tunisia today? >> i think my friend makes an important point and, indeed, in tunisian democracy, i think actually the role of women is a very important one in moving the country toward democratic future and we hope the continued. >> can i get my best wishes to matthew games as well who is an

engineer who took three bullets in protecting his fiancée in tunisia, coming around in the hospital. but can i say in talking both shia and sunni from bangladesh and pakistan, from iraq there is one insane that daesh are imposters, gangsters, murderers? and with the work side-by-side with the muslim mainstream muslim community and given give them the resources they need to combat radicalization providence is it their fault that their problem? if our problem. together we must solve it together spent i think the way he put it is right. they have a role to play and we should help them play. one of the challenges i think is sometimes been the relevance of the mosque to young muslims. when sometimes it can seem less relevant to their lives and that's why we need to address

the whole issue of making sure imams have good english when you're dealing with potentially alienated and radicalized young british people. >> peter bone. >> mr.. >> mr. speaker, today the prime minister said that they will put a common mark at they have value for eu membership or i'm sure that there's people and myself will be shoulder to shoulder with him on that. and why is it that this british figure says he can't do this with a note he won't accept anything less than fundamental reform and a common market speak with can i thank the honorable gentleman for his support and say that i want to continue this closer. usthis ever closer union between us for as long as possible. [laughter] >> thank you for that, mr. speaker. we hope and pray for the safe concern -- [inaudible] more general in the region does the prime minister agree daesh

tried, kurds, adco soonish and then those that you can eat elsewhere these doing to build a united front against the? >> let me join in wishing his constituents well. his constituents well. entrance of the united front there is not an enormous international coalition that includes many arab and gulf countries. and we need to keep that coalition together because all of us bring different things, and some of those countries and sunni arab states will bring that ability i think to talk to sunni muslims in iraq and to bring them away from the daesh and towards believe in integrated iraqi government spent i'm afraid we've made type of question with you but if colleagues are willing to imitate the apple example of the honorable friend the member, i shall endeavor the honorable gentleman was sitting there beaming. i so do my best to accommodate them. >> mr. speaker, following last

friday's terrorist attacks in tunisia, john and janet stalker my constituents are still unaccounted for. can i have assurances from my right honorable friend that all nhs records that may be required i the tunisian authorities to identify those victims will be made available today? >> i dan serwer given that assurance. we have victim identification specialist and police officers out in suits working with the tunisian authorities on exactly this sort of issue. >> in the midst of this tragedy with the prime minister to me and commend all those who went about their business this weekend, particularly post-award and support our armed forces it is? >> isolated. i was delighted to join the armed forces day parade in guilford. it was an enormous turnout and people might have read about potential plans were disrupted they would've been put off and that's the british way.

[inaudible] what conversations he's had a domestic security response for people traveling to the coastal region can expect? many people will be making decisions the next few days and will really want to know more. >> what i can share my honorable friend is that we are talking to them right now and the home secretary is in tunisia pocket or opposite member to make sure our offer of help with security is taken on board i think it's important. >> would my right under the friend agree with the brady -- alongside each other is a sign that terrorists cannot win? both divided together to provide that help? >> i think my honorable friend is right. this is going to take resolve and patience and determination. amongst government and people. >> we need to do all we can to disrupt a vile propaganda from isil unsocial me. is the prime minister agree it's

time on mainstream board printed to review the editor policies and stop publishing stills and is a blessing us with the faces of smirking terrorists pricks and instantly see the faces of those two nations who stood arm in arm to protect citizens speak with i think she makes an important point. they may have to exercise thereof the about social responsible to what they should and shouldn't publish. i really hope the bbc to look again at this issue of calling this our decision islamic state. is not islamic it's not just a. into tears or possession to call the isil, colin daesh but don't give it the dignity to which it is asking for. >> thank you, mr. speaker to someone am an awesome fate his father, father wasn't imam, grandfather was an imam. i see guys who had been. as the prime minister agree each and every one of us has a duty to challenge not violent

extremism whatever it is in our community? >> my friend speaks with great knowledge on this issue. the answer is yes. members of parliament can all play a role in shifting this debate on this vital issue. >> i'd like to join the prime minister in praising the role of our brave air force whistling in the skies over iraq. brave kurdish peshmerga forces but i don't daesh. will be joined in agree that now is the time for the peshmerga forces to be properly armed and also receive the funding promised from baghdad? >> i will look into the issue terms of the funding from baghdad. all i can say is that we are helping the kurdish forces with training, with support. >> i'll welcome the extension. we are still open to some criticism of too little, too late. compared to other countries providing refuge for those student i think you look across what we do taking a five to 10

you get in terms of how the people have given asylum to we are consistent in the top five european countries for giving us one at a think on that basis we can say we play our part. >> will the prime minister agree it is fundamental that we retake complete sovereignty over control of our british borders if we are to prevent the evil ideology from creeping further onto our short? >> what -- it is important to have strong border control but i think what calais demonstrates its importance in the age of fairies and your time and the rest is that we work with our partners in order to deliver the security we need. >> can he tell the house what steps they take to ensure that intelligence is properly share by national security organizations? in the asian country that should be allies? >> we are sharing intelligence. we have different relations with the different countries but the more we can build up trust before we are able to do this.

>> in relation to safety here at home with the prime minister agree with the security services identify people who are a threat and with the people are here illegally, can we agree deport them speak what i ask what a great one of the reasons we want to alter the arrangements in the human rights act which can sometimes get in the way of the arrangements. >> thank you, mr. speaker. may i share the sentiments of what the prime minister is that also about the families. given what's been going on in that particular region with people trafficking, people coming across the border with terrorists in the region can live my friend consider taking resources to help combat terrorism and the people around we need is? >> i will look at that point my honorable friend makes because there is obviously a number of pressure has been put on bases like malta. at the beaches in gibraltar and

i will have a look. >> on wednesday my constituent ms. richardson traveled to the beach resort with his -- have agreed to a 70 cancellation fees. -- and my friend comment on what we can do to show compassion in relation to alternative booking? >> what we've done is encourage the tour operators to treat people properly and definitive and complete offered people cancellation without penalties and the money back with a specific point he makes perhaps i will ask the court off the stimp to take that one up. [inaudible] his daughter is a constituent of mine. that dignity of the family the credit to mr. wilkinson is in stark contrast , right honorable friend inshore that the bereavement's booklet for many

months because such circumstances can take very many years. and a join and say we do need change what we call these terrorists are they are not an islamic state. >> here, here. >> let me join my tribute to bruce wilkinson and the way his family have handled this terrible tragedy. the point he makes about islamic state is well-made and on the issue of making sure we continue with help, part of that will be how we commemorate and remember these dreadful event. we are just coming up to the anniversary of 7/7 and that's a reminder of how important it is that we mark these things probably because relatives go on morning four years and decades into the future. >> with regard to the desperate and growing wave of human misery that is taken to the mediterranean in leaky boats from the north african sure,

what advice has her majesty's government and the european union taken from the australian government about the success of way to tackle large scale organized see form human trafficking? >> we have looked at what the australians have done and we've looked at what the spanish did with respect to migration from west africa to the canary islands where one year they received 36,000 migrants. just a few years that was done this year. what they did was break the business model of the smugglers and find a way of returning people to those african states and working with those african states. that i think is the model that we need to adapt. there is more competent in this case but that is the long-term answer spent i am much grateful to the prime minister. >> a quick reminder you can see british prime msha david cameron answer questions from members of the house of commons live tomorrow morning starting at seven eastern here on c-span2. coming up tonight its booktv in prime time beginning at

eight eastern. earlier today new jersey governor chris christie tossed its hat in ring for the republican nomination for president. he becomes the 14th republican to declare. here's a look at some of what he had to say during his announcement today in livingston new jersey. >> i spent the last 13 years of my life as u.s. attorney and governor of the state fighting for fairness and justice and opportunity for the people of the state of new jersey. that fight has not made me more weary. it has made me stronger and i'm not ready to fight for the people of the united states of america. [cheers and applause]

america is tired of hand wringing and indecisiveness and weakest in the oval office. we need to strength and decision-making and authority back in the oval office and that is why today i am proud to announce my candidacy for the republican nomination for president of the united states of america. [cheers and applause] >> you can see the entire campaign an announcement tonight starting at eight eastern on c-span. >> the c-span cities to as part of with our cable affiliates as we travel across the united states or two in his and documentation as we can ever learn about the history of literate life of omaha nebraska, where the de porres club one of america's first advocacy groups fighting for

racial equality. >> omaha had a reputation in the african-american community in omaha and in the united states as a city that wendie king and if you are black you needed to keep your head down and you need to be aware that you were going to be served in restaurants and you are going to be able to stay in hotels. when the de porres club began their operation, the idea come and affect the terms of rights wasn't, they use the term civil justice. that idea of civil rights was so far removed from the idea of the greater committee of omaha or the united states, but they were kind of operating any backing her i was like to say that they were operating without a net, that the were not the support groups, there were not that prior experiences of other groups to challenge racial discrimination and segregation. >> we look back to the union pacific and how do construction and union station health omaha's economy. >> the union pacific is one of

the premier railroad companies of america. .. >> see all of our programs saturday at noon eastern on book tv and sunday afternoon on american history tv. clicks live now --

>> live now to the american heritage institute. this is just getting underway. >> we are a nonprofit nonpartisan a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization conducting research on school choice issues in k-12 education. we use our research is to inform and educate legislators at the state level around the country. i want to give a special think to the whole education policy study team for hosting today's event. a good opportunity a good opportunity to share results and findings" we have been learning. where releasing the latest installment of the "schooling of america survey" survey that we have a doing for a few years now. before we get into the slide

because they can throw at you acm data and it can be overwhelming, but i thought we should step back and get a better understanding of the social and political developments around the country. that could signal the underlying context for survey results. i do not know if you are fans or watch cbs this morning. i am a big fan. there is a great segment called their world in 90 seconds. why don't we call this k-12 america in about 90 seconds. let's get going. common core is a hot button issue at the state and local levels. increasingly it is becoming

nationalized as a political issue. then just yesterday lives in a couple of states taking steps to further distance themselves. here's a picture of protesters somewhere in the northeast that opted out against standardized testing. we have seen over the past year -- and the seeds were planted when no child left behind was being first implemented, but it started to accelerate with common core getting more attention that we have pockets of resistance and protest around the country. so we will see if that becomes broader and wider as

a social movement or if we will see isolated areas around the country. back in back in my home state of indiana we have mike pence and superintendent of instruction when the ritz sitting side-by-side. this picture encapsulates the tension at the highest levels of state politics between education reform in the education establishment. this has been getting a lot of attention to the confrontation was couple of years. we will see. it is likely that they will face off in a gubernatorial election. education is a high-profile issue and will continue to.

here is a picture of nevada governor brian sandoval who signed into law the most ambitious school program in the country where more than 90 percent of k-12 students are eligible to receive a multiuser savings account a new type of program introduced first in arizona about five years ago and then florida and nevada and a couple other states. if this will be interesting to see the implementation and how things develop. that was a positive development for those of us who are school choice proponents, but yesterday there was a negative development for school choice advocates, the colorado state supreme court decision that rules on the

will on the douglas county voucher program as unconstitutional saying that it violated the state constitution, particularly the blaine amendment. we will see if this case gets appealed all the way to the us supreme court. so what is happening here? when it comes to no child left behind and reauthorization, not a lot, and it has been that way. we. via's picture of secretary arnie duncan testifying in front of several senators. there has been an lot of discussion and debate, bills being introduced but it is unlikely to be reauthorized in the coming years. so so we will see how things progress here in washington.

so that is some context around the country the social and political developments. background for our survey that we will talk about. a survey profile, some of the particular specifications of the survey and how it is conducted and administered. i would like to give a special shout out to braun research who have been our data collection partners for almost seven years. they they do a great job conducting live telephone interviews providing data quality control, providing us with data. the interviews occurred at the end of april beginning of may. more than all of this the key thing to look at let's consider the population sample of the survey and

national population of adult americans age 18 and older eligible to take the survey. more than 1000 interviews were conducted and the margin of error is plus or minus 3.1 percentage points. when i talk about and we discussed subgroups like republicans, democrats, low income, high income age of those have their own sample size. so that smaller sample size raises the margin of error which is something to keep in mind and makes the numbers a little less reliable than those we are reporting for the total national sample. we are we are not reporting today and releasing the results for african-americans latinos, and, latinos, and other subgroups based upon race

and ethnicity. we will release those results later on in the summer toward the end of august. thinking about our survey and the types of measures are looking at there are levels of response positive or negative to whatever survey item we have which is pretty basic and will we see most often reported in the news media. it can be more informative. if you look at margins of the differences between the aggregate positive response in the area negative response. some people call them a gap a gap a spread but it can signal a likelihood for that group to go lean toward a positive a positive direction or negative direction. there are net intensities. this metric simply takes the difference of the strongest held views on both ends.

a strong positive and negative the difference between the two which gives us a sense of the net intensity particularly when we are thinking about school choice questions, common core, etc. with any type of research it is good to get out there and talk about the limitations that come with research and caveats. first and foremost this is exploratory, descriptive type of reporting not meaning to imply any kind of causation or suggest causal connection. we are reporting on the total sample and subgroup, the differences and so forth there are relatively few data points to establish long trendlines. two, three, four years worth of data still relatively few who trendlines. the subgroups have a smaller

sample size of our survey. of those will show more volatility year-to-year when you look at the subgroup results, and with any type of research design and program for particularly with surveys and pulling they are challenges and potential for confirmation bias. what we try to do build and as many checks and safeguards to guard against potential confirmation bias when we think about wording of questions the ordering questions, the ordering of questions on the questionnaire, randomization of response skills within the questionnaire. there are things that can be done to safeguard against confirmation bias. some of the general findings i would like to go over for a couple of minutes. americans are continuing to

be negative about the direction of k-12 education. we have seen this the last couple of years, and it persists. there even more negative about the federal government's performance with the government's handling of k-12. wide gaps exist when you compare them to school enrollment and patterns of enrollment. there is a big disconnect. on the questions surrounding school choice reform we see large margins of support across the board tax credit scholarships. there has been some change since last year but we have seen a dip a different charter schools from 61 percent supporting to 53. tax credit 64 to 50. we saw an increase for

esa's. so we are seeing subtle changes since last year. it is important to remember that even though they are having changes, generally speaking americans support any school choice reform to 21, positive to negative which is an important thing to remember. there are mixed messages that continue to persist around common core. we see a positive margin of support. however, the intensity is negative in contrast to some school choice topics. and so then we asked questions about testing pluralities, subgroups of cool parents say there's parent centers too much time spent on standardized testing. here is an outline of the

topics that we will cover for the rest of the presentation today. going from the general to specific. rating the federal government performance them in and schooling issues. school type preferences for the total sample why village -- why they would choose one type versus another and then go through charts about the reform and wrap up talking about common core standardized testing as well as state intervention in low performing schools. here we see trendlines. the redline has been stable. this year 60 percent of the general public said it is having on the wrong track. 32 percent said the right direction, and we have seen an uptick on the positive response but it is still 221 negative view of the

direction of k-12 in the country. we look at the public rating of the federal government eight government, eight out of ten americans give the federal government a fair or poor rating. it is it is interesting to note that the strongly held negative view of the poor rating is almost twice as large as the combined aggregate positive response. 20 percent give a rating of good or excellent. and then the line at the bottom, 2 percent said that the federal government was doing an excellent job. now we will move on to questions expressed by those who to go survey. we asked the question if it were your decision and could

select any type of school, what type of school would you select? and other things being equal. we see a plurality. 41 percent private, 36 regular private 12 percent charter, 9 percent homeschool. compare that. the the proportions on the bottom reflect actual enrollment of students in the school types. 84% of students in the country are going to a regular public school. 4 percent to public charter schools, 9 percent to private school and 3 percent estimated being homeschooled a huge difference between privately personally expressed preferences during phone interviews and actual enrollment patterns. and here are the trends that

we see on this question of the last four years. private school preferences have been the plurality for the last three years covering in the low 40s to mid 40s. more than a third has been the public school preference in the mid to high 30s. roughly one out of ten prefer public charter schools and one out of ten preferring homeschooling. just thinking about the subgroup of school parents and our sample this represents roughly one quarter of the respondents who take our survey. we ask a question, why would you choose that particular school and this is an open-ended question. our friends will record verbatim responses usually a single word or phrase or sentence and we have

categories of the code responses into which is how we come up with this. the largest proportion said better education quality which is not too surprising. then 14 percent say they would choose a school because they want their child to get individual, one-on-one attention. 12 percent say better teachers. 10 percent said academic and curriculum. and we could even collapse these more. if if you check the first, third, and fourth categories you would see 39 percent are saying something about school quality student learning, teaching academics as a reason why they choose the school and

you can combine your second and fifth categories that reflects something larger about 24% are saying they choose a school for some measure of personalized, customized command -- individualized learning. now we will move on to questions about school choice. charters, esa, tax credit scholarships. consider the level of support and opposition. support is the majority across the board. 62 percent are supporting. 61% of the total sample supported vouchers, tax credit scholarships and majority support charter schools. one third are opposed to vouchers. 28 percent esa's, 27 percent opposed to charters. >> there may be folks on the room who are not familiar

with some of these terms. for survey respondents you would explain what it was for those who did not know. >> that is a great issue. we define and give context for each of these types of school choice policies. we have a pair of set of questions for charters and vouchers because these policies have been around longer. we ask a set of questions what you think of the school voucher. so with no information provided by us. those numbers which are not reflected on this chart but are still pluralities that support without us giving any information. these numbers do rise up and we took the same approach with common core questions later in the survey. if we look at the margins --

and i apologize. it it looks like the alignment has gotten off. the margins are higher across the board with esa's having the largest margin with positive and negative responses. the net intensity looking at those two strongest held views plus 16 points for esa's and ten for charter. here are trendlines. we can see that there has been an uptick in the support of the last four years from 56 to 51 percent and an uptick in the opposition of vouchers. one interesting issue we see a strongly positive view

on vouchers matching the combined negative view. 34 percent strongly favors school vouchers and 33 percent said they were strongly or somewhat opposed to vouchers. here is a here is a trend line that looks different for education savings account. the line is wiggling which makes sense. this type of program is new to a lot of people, and a lot of the folks taking the survey of being exposed to the concept for the first time. last last year 56 percent of the public supported esa. last year 34% opposed and this year is 28 percent, and i expect these as we continue in future years still to wiggle. it will take some time for

education savings accounts to diffuse in terms of understanding among the general public. quickly to go through demographic findings that stand out to sell groups relatively seeking the most likely to oppose school choice in the least likely to oppose school choice our seniors, democrats and leaving democrats pretty clear across the board. on the flipside -- conversely you have your school parents low income earners young adults and republicans and leaning republicans. on our voucher question we saw that suburbanites were significantly more supportive than urbanites. that -- for someone who has been doing this a while it is a curious finding where

the conventional wisdom is that urbanites are more supportive. we will see if that holds up and persists. republicans and independents a lien on charter school voucher, tax tax credit, scholarships, showing significantly higher support the democrats. all supporting at about the same level with no significant differences. when it when it comes to state intervention in low performing schools it was another interesting and surprising finding to see the democrats were significantly more likely to cite school choice where states intervene, more intervene, more likely than republicans to.school choice.

so we will finish talking about common core standardized testing and state intervention in schools. we have been asking questions about common core and essentially the national sample, the sample, the results are unchanged, roughly 50 percent are supporting common core with definition and context. 40 percent are opposed. school parents it is a little murkier. just under 47 percent say they oppose common core. it is about breakeven. and then some questions about standardized testing. for the national sample and the subgroup of school parents we have seen an uptick in those who say that the time spent on sent to

have standardized testing is too high. if you look at the red bars last year the general public 36 percent of the general public said time spent on standardized testing was too high. among school parents it has gone up from 44 percent to 47 percent more than twice the other end of the spectrum saying that time spent is too low. and finally we have a question about state intervention and low performing schools and asked each of the respondents to give a rating scale from one -- on how useful a certain action would be for the state intervenes. we're starting to see this across states where they have different types of mechanisms and ways of

implementation and have seen parent trigger type policies emerge in certain areas especially on the west coast when we asked this question 41 percent the largest portion said the supplying of voucher scholarship esa would be a useful thing. compare that to one quarter's and ®-one-quarter converting district schools to charters would be useful. 25% said this missing school staff and would be useful, and one out of five said that closing the school and reassigning students with useful. to review some specific findings, an increase in support for esa a drop in support for charter school. again,. again, it should be noted

that opposition has not grown. what what we have seen in our panelists might have insight and comment. there is -- those saying they supported charter schools last year are moving into the uninsured category. that alone it is to report on odd to report on don't know responses, but that was an interesting finding. as i mentioned a couple of minutes ago: the state intervened the largest proportion saying that a particular action would be supplying students with of voucher, scholarship, esa they gave that response. margins are positive but the intensity is in the other direction, going negative in stark contrast to the choice questions.

we see mild to moderate positive intensities. four out of ten respondents said the amount of time spent on testing was too high and that proportion is higher among school parents. almost four out of five, 77 percent give a fair or poor rating when it comes to k-12 education matters which is something that will be discussed. with that, thank you very much. [applauding] quakes great. we will go right down the line. i line. i have asked our panel to remind them that brevity is the soul of wit but to max five minutes of your quick responses, what struck you first. we we have the president of the center for education reform.

take it away. >> there we go. thank you. great results. one observation that i have that we were speaking about before. i look at the charter school question and the decrease in support and have one observation and throw out something for the group to consider. we have seen a lot of activity and state houses across the country trying to get voucher programs past and have seen on the other side and chartering the rollback charters overregulated for there is little or no progress. eight states without charter school laws. a long time a long time ago they were the only thing taking off but now that we have elected officials boldly trying to expand

action i wonder if the public has more knowledge because there is more talk about it in the charter. one thing i would suggest is in front of families do not even know that they are in a charter school especially in a state a state where only local school districts can authorize a charter school. a lot of families don't know that their in a school of choice or that it is something different. those are just observations clicks next up we have gerard robertson. it was just recently announced that he will be joining us as a resident fellow. before that had a couple of the nice gigs secretary of education for the commonwealth of virginia virginia, commissioner of education for the state of florida. if anyone would have a view

on these findings it would be you. >> thanks a lot. education matters because it matters to states because right now 41 states have education as its number one line item. and so when they look at the budget education matters. when i look at the findings two things come to mind my great dissatisfaction which does not cheer me up that makes me wonder where we are going as a nation. the majority will have to be made to work. work. democrats, republicans leaning forward, over 50 percent agree. that should be a wake-up call. the second take away 84% 84 percent of those people have the kids in public schools. look how many said they want vouchers, charters.

even those what options. i don't see it as a pro a pro option but generally to diversify how we deliver education and by doing so will be a stronger nation. >> and our final panelists. we have the senior fellow at the brookings institution and research director of the brown center on education policy. >> thank you for the invitation. i want to say that these surveys are important and it is important that they are gone. there are also other education surveys. it is important that we have all of them. surveys were not done you

have to just go on the new york times telling us that parents are upset standardized testing. i think it is great that we have them. i particularly like this survey being focused on school choice and how it dives into the other education surveys. largely on charters and vouchers it makes sense in some respects. 41 percent of parents the sky was the limit. but you have to have something of a political conundrum. you see majority support. they get past once in a while but it is politically

controversial. controversial. not to say that we should go up on them but one area would be to probe more deeply on choice among traditional public schools that 84 percent of children in this country are attending. the kind of the kind of questions and things that can be learned more about are things like comedy parents have enough choices? to 41 percent of parents say they want a private school is it because they're thinking they are thinking of the traditional public school option as a given or would they be interested if it was not the one in the neighborhood where they can afford to live. do they understand the choices? they don't actually know

they have different options are understand maybe they do but don't understand the details and find that they have enough information to make informed choices. it is one of my hobbyhorses. obviously focusing on the ultralight policies. meaningful choices. this whole of area. clicks thank you. going through the findings finding that surprised you the most. you conducted the survey. >> that is a good question. some of these differences based on my respondents live

the difference between the suburbanites and urbanites in the voucher question was going against what i think is conventional wisdom of school choice members. and then the question about state intervention and a useful remedy significantly higher. some of the differences that persisted that is meant the last topic that i would make. let's come together and i i think that it is important to build bridges. we do see differences, significant differences between republicans and democrats which is just a reality that we must

confront and face. >> most surprising finding? >> from the parent perspective or the respondents who said that they were with school aged age children despite the fact that many of them felt that there was too much testing or pressure on testing, it is almost a 5050 split. then they evaluate quality more or better education. and it goes to the national debate going on right now and what parents value but i wonder and some of those questions when you were categorizing them into better educational quality where there -- did it feel safer? what was the quality?

>> that is a great a great question, and we do not really define quality. it is just one of those trigger words. better quality, higher quality. we take it and code with things like safety, structure, discipline. a little bit surprising. >> most surprising finding? quakes democrats and republicans actually agreeing on something that we need options and that we don't like the way the country is going. it is almost i don't like it and i don't like which way we are going.

yet when yet when you introduce bills you see republicans and democrats split. on school choice you see it at the state level. what scares me is how many people think they're going in the wrong direction. >> i was surprised by that statistic. the people who are most interested in nonpublic options. the 9 percent, it reminds me of this cartoon ran a while ago. i believe in the concept of public education. [laughter] >> that is very interesting. a three to one homeschool split.

as opposed to doing it. that is an interesting. you did some trend line analysis. observing these numbers, a lot of what was presented or stable numbers. we tend to see the same numbers over time. i i understand going beyond with the survey says and am asking you to conjecture. , but of those numbers did you see some that said these have the potential for moving over some just baked in? 6030 for vouchers for the foreseeable future, 5040 or do you see them moving around? we will maybe start with you clicks we have done similar surveys.

when you explain charter schools to families or parents, we found 72 percent support them. you have done polls about parent choice. word choice is important but the long and short of it appreciate school choice whether public, private charter red green, whatever. as we see more and more of these take off to know the mr. love them. you see increases. access to vouchers more of the population and charter schools i i think that you

would see growth in those numbers. a continued increase. you see growth in a faster rate. it benefits me quickly. and look for services outside. traditional vouchers will continue to grow. and more importantly in terms of language parental choice will continue to grow and expand but on the private side they will shoot up. it is important to be candid

about the limitations of any kind of survey that you would do as i'm sure paul is aware. the way you ask the questions matters. he did not talk about it much. it can change their opinion about the survey. it can matter. new line asking people a bunch of questions about something we all think a lot about every day. that is why you get these sensitivities. most people do not know a lot about a given policy area. i once heard folks do a survey of americans. this is a tax credit that is worth a lot more.

a lot of said they would like to have the deduction. some go so the.about how you go from republicans and democrats holding hands and say we support school choice too much more polarized political debate when esa or vouchers get proposed. you are going from a sterile environment to a much more politicized environment. unless this question. party i have no i have no allegiance to is telling me that this is terrible in my opinion changes. maybe we should not read much into any particular survey but i think that once again restate rebranding different things can help.

vouchers have a troubled history but if you can take what is a voucher history and rebranded you can get the same thing in a much more politically tolerable way. >> this is on everyone's fact sheet. in the lower left-hand column you broke out those schooling preferences. i am seeing everyone rifling through their bags. looking at those different school types and the reasons that people the people chose this particular school types was interesting to me. for those people, and ideal public school they value diversity, socialization the highest better education individual attention. so when i respond to that it

makes the horse race narrative talking about private versus public we tend we tend to try and evaluate them based upon the same metrics, the test scores of kids and charter public. part of me says these choices might be driven by things other than parents saying i want to disclose can maximize reading and math scores. so as we have mixed opinions that are upon the panel how do you react to those? the motivations of families are very different from one another. >> you talk to parents.

we support it options for low-end working-class middle income families. when we talk to parents as to why they decided to move from a traditional to charter school, sometimes safety was a factor smaller classrooms may have been something to drive in the direction, sometimes it was a religious folks which gave advantage to private or public, and education main difference as well. there there are gradations of whether education is first or second but a number of areas of reasons why people choose school other than academics. taking a look at this it does not surprise me the diversity and variety i would like to see fleshed out because it is broader than a phenotype. >> just to piggyback on what

you are saying this is somewhat of a surprising finding. usually a few every year and that brokenness and other states and even state-by-state is different the types of responses. so researchers like to look for reasons and further research and exploration. this item is subjective and hard to come than a concrete conclusions but does set the table to further survey work or other types of research looking into, are there different cultures surrounding regular public district traditional schools compared to public, private charter school cultures significant differences and

reasons. i think it lends for future research. >> this is interesting. investment and time needs to be taken into the infrastructure and information. but it also begs the question i'll be a step or two away if we do not know what parents unnecessarily looking for, what information to tell them? do you have thoughts on how this could guide other researchers to understand better the parental decision-making processes that we can develop the architecture better inform parents. >> the scenario of variation in any of these groups it's an interesting starting. think about future work. i would guess parents who say, you know, who chose a private school or did not

the wanted to a lot of different reasons. relatively affluent relatively affluent families with access to public school was that they had -- were even more affluent and could send their kids to the -- or for the lower income family the catholic school down the street is what they really want access to. so the variation within these categories to help us learn a lot more. clicks maybe one or two more questions. those of you following along at home, it looks like a ton of people are already tweeting which is awesome. feel free to share. my kind of last thing before we open it up to the crowd

any time polling happens in washington dc people want a broader electoral implications. one obviously common core there is a wide republican primary taking place with varying opinions. how do you see these numbers reflecting or possibly having an impact on potential candidates? >> we did ask questions that had electoral implications on whether the response was more or less likely to support a candidate who supported vouchers or esa or common core. frankly, more than half said it did not make a difference , but of the half of the total population surveyed there was a significant margin between

those who said they were more likely to vote for a pro- voucher or esa candidate. it was there was a difference in the negative direction on common core where they were more likely -- excuse me and less likely to vote for a pro- common core candidate. but i think -- and we mentioned this before. there are relative differences. there are relative differences that are pretty significant and speak to that intensity especially in a positive direction among republicans. i was reading this morning today an article by charlie cook of the cook political report talking about what republicans need to do to move forward. you know and adults are

maybe the most supportive of the different types of choice policies. low income earners are significantly positive. nontraditional at least what is being projected in the media and public perception, not your traditional republican constituencies but we are seeing these groups in our surveys. i think that there is something there. on the democratic side the majority support or plurality support for these items their seems to be a disconnect a disconnect between your average or leaning democrat and your elite and those in positions in the party and the positions they take. and that could have implications going forward. >> fascinating.

another angle i think that this would be -- again, 41 41 states, education as their largest budget items one of the top line is that it seems education is the highest priority but trails behind a lot of other stuff like economy and jobs. i wonder if you might speak to state versus national. salience. >> for political aspirants of both parties, if i were to talk to them if more than 50 percent of the people are telling you the public education system is going in the wrong direction , you need a strong public school message not just to be politically

correct but so that it is the right thing to do. the republicans of course support school choice which is important. you cannot you cannot support school choice option and leave public schools untapped. you must do a great job making sure states have the right to run schools the way that they should. they should not be an overly heavy regulatory environment stifling innovation at the local level. well-meaning programs that trickle-down we strangle too much innovation. i think there is a divide between state and federal. lastly if the parents are telling you that they want options, be open to options. over $130 million being invested between 1990 and 2014 into democratic candidates they have a fine line to walk.

money coming from the public unions and some of the people are saying we want something outside of the public school system. that should be a national conversation but ultimately is supported. state first, national conversation, but let the states do what they need to. >> we can open it to the crowd. microphones that will come out momentarily. i may start with a twitter question partially because it was perfectly en masse wheelhouse. done some of the best research. in talking about standardized testing there were some questions in the survey the amount of money. how much money could be saved by eliminating standardized tests and replacing them with smaller pragmatic competency tests.

maybe you could speak to the broader view because i think it dovetails nicely clicks the short answer is not much at all. i did study a couple of years ago and comes out to something like $30 per kid. iran simulations. now, across the country it looks like a big number. back at the envelope but that number really only comes out to like a textbook per kid. reducing class size. so given the emphasis that policymakers are putting standardized tests some have those results are used it's a small price to pay.

if we are worried about the quality of those tests we ought to be thinking about not having spending too much but too little. >> fascinating. thank you. a question from the audience. right up front here. i would like to share with you that we generally have tools. be so kind as to identify yourself. ask a question. i wanted to talk to matt was saying about how when it's working to the political system it gets lost a activists in your company's

organization can focus on some of the localities. .. >> in our traditional systems. we've made it really intimidating for a lot of parents to go to school board meetings and stuff. we've made it intimidating for them to approach principals. so i would say in your capacity as a school board member, finding solutions to inform

parents about what your school district might offer, welcome them to go to things go to parent events so you get to know them and what their needs are, but i think you've got both ways you need to be looking at, how can we inform parents of their options or potential options, and how can we be listening to them more. and if more i think local school districts did that if more in our traditional public school system did that, we might have a different result. it's when we see parents who are able to make choices and are in schools of choice that are far more active. so we've seen a lot of communities and people who we've said, oh they don't know how to choose schools. they actually know how to choose schools really really well. so if we empower them to make those choices and help educate the community about their choices and what's going on, then i think we'll have a better result. >> i agree. >> i agree. >> outstanding, love it. unanimity. appreciate it. other questions. yes, we have one right up front

here, if you could wait for the microphone, that'd be awesome. >> hi. sharon -- [inaudible] voice of a moderate i wanted to talk to you about educating parents, because i've been talking to the suburban moms, and basically they hear a rumor and then it kind of gets carried away. like the charter schools are supported by the people that support for-profit presses. so then all of a sudden, you know, you hear these people talk about how they're going to have these schools that are going to have the same structure as a prison, and that's why america's going to go downstream. and then you have the pro -- anti-common core people, but then you have people with learning disabilities had a big problem with common core. but everybody talks about education, and there's no one definition of what common core is, because nobody really seems to get it in the suburban world but what is the definition for charter versus school choice, and when you talked about the states and also the testing so

we're all on the same platform, you know, so people can move from state to state and have the same educational standards. my daughter moved to illinois from -- my question is how do you have a national standard and still have this debate? because people do relocate. and if they relocate from the south to the north my daughter was two years behind. >> so this is a question specifically about the common core standards or just about information about schools in general? >> you can't talk about an issue until you have a definition. >> okay. sure maybe that's a good question, which is how do we, people that are interested, if nothing else in informing the public and public debate standardize definitions of this is what a charter school is, or this is what the common core is. thoughts on that. >> i'd chime in and say it's really hard to educate people about, you know, kind of we think about education it's sort of our pet issue but, i mean, i think about noneducation areas and how little i know about them and how hard it would be to educate me if i weren't particularly interested if

someone was trying to rain the information down. and i think when education does become politicized as it often does, that can often work against the effort of trying to educate people. a friend of mine, political scientist down in louisiana did a study of attitudes about the common core, knowledge of the common core. so you think the hypothesis was well in louisiana common core is a really hot topic. you think all the public attention it's getting people would be getting more informed about it in louisiana and elsewhere. but when you actually ask people to respond to factual questions about common core, they're more likely to get them wrong. so if anything, it seemed that the political polarization had pushed people away from kind of the knowing the simple facts about things. so it's kind of a depressing response but -- >> in our increasingly polarized times. >> so when i hear you mention for-profit prisons charter schools, you know challenges with definition isn't something that's endemic just to public education.

think about the buy america campaign. buy an american car and someone will say half the parts are coming from a different country is that really an american car? i think frankly what we need in america is not a common core conversation but a conversation about a common chord, a chord that links us to what are the principles that made this country great, what are the values we think are important to inculcate from one generation to the next and what role can education play in sustaining the economic well being of this nation? gets us on the same page to say what do we think is important and then we can maneuver from there. so for me, i guess from a civil society standpoint, we need to have a higher conversation and then work lore. >> great. maybe go to another twitter question. there were lots of comments that were related to the finding poll that the age breakdown, that opponents to school choice tend to skew old supporters tend to

school young -- skew young. i'm interested in the responses of folks on the panel of why we think that is or, kara, you wanted to jump in. >> well, i mean, the people who don't want change are the status quo, and typically they're older people who think the only thing was the kind of school they went to. but the fact is that school is no longer the same way it was. or, you know, a lot of the population you've had teachers who are tenured and have been at this for a long time and do not want change. the young people are the ones who have just come out they've tried to either maybe enter the teaching profession and have found it to be very hostile for them, or they've been in schools themselves and are experiencing it and understand freedom. i think millennials understand freedom a lot more and the freedom to choose and the power to choose. so i definitely think those are contributing factors that, you know, you've got the status quo that's going to fight for no change, and then you've got young people who want change. >> you also have an aging population, particularly what we

call a dependent population those who are 65 and older. they tend to vote a lot, and they're going to vote their interests. and often they want to make sure that we're not spending enormous amounts of money on one thing that's not going to support what they need, whether it's support for, you know, medicaid, but more importantly, educational issues. for me it's also i'm older i need to make sure i protect this versus the younger generation. some of them, like i have an older drawer. she lives off -- daughter. she lives off us still so she can be more liberal about her ideas. but at the point she starts paying her own bills she'll become more conservative. [laughter] >> great. maybe another question from the audience. we have some more off twitter which i'm happy to go to, but if we have one here -- yes right here. >> hi, i'm overdix i'm working at the nea. so i have a comment -- >> just end it by kind of going -- >> i will. [laughter] so first i just wanted to bring the attention to, you know sort of the sample size of a thousand and then mention that

the subset was of parents was a quarter of that, so we're only talking about 250 people who are potentially involved in making choices that are actually aboutw3 their students, but to what mr. robinson just said, that voters tend to be people who are not necessarily in that demographic. so they may not, as you mentioned, like have all of the correct information. that's the comment. the question sort of stems from that, and it's a two-part, so to mr. robinson and to mr. chingos what's the anticipated impact provided everyone could have as much choice as they want about the type of school that they send their child to on public education, and the second part of that is if there's an expanded ability to choose within public education as mr. chingos said, what does that look like? >> so with all the states we have with charter schools

public school students remain the majority. and so within the next decade, that'll probably remain the same. i think you've got to make the math easy, what 50 million? k-12 students in place right now. if you open up with esea vouchers, tax credits, you'll see more students leave. but what's more important to me in terms of impacting education is what and how we deliver education. there's some parents who say you know what? i have enough money to pay for a private school at a very elite place in this city. but i put my kid in public school because i believe in the mission and because it's also close. so there's a transportation factor. so for me, i don't want see public education as some would say being destroyed by school choice. in fact, that's not even the mission of school choice. it's simply to diversify how we deliver options to a diverse group of americans. >> i think the impact of choice on public education depends on how you structure the choice program. so if we say that, you know, we're going to give a $10,000

voucher to the first hundred parents who show up on tuesday at 10:30 a.m. at the office to apply, that's going to attract a very different group of parents and have a very different impact than a different kind of choice program like the one we have here in d.c. where you go through a lottery right rank the schools that you want. and i think the main drawback of that system is there's still a default school, which is the school in the area where you can afford to buy or rent real estate. but you can imagine a version of that that broke down those barriers and provided to all families the kinds of choices that only affluent families currently enjoy through their ability to choose where to live. now, just providing that choice on its own isn't enough. be my brookings colleague russ white herself has done work

documents how choice functions in more than a hundred districts around the country. so it's not just about, oh, choice is a great thing it's going to raise all boats and it's all going to be great but it matters do you provide accessible and accurate and relevant information to parents to help them make informed choices. do you have a system that's accessible to everyone and not just to the people who show up on tuesday at 10:30. do you cover transportation costs, or is it only a choice for parents who can somehow figure out transportation and so on and so forth. so that also covers your second question of what it looks like, what it actually look like varies a lot. but i think we do have some clear ideas about what it ought to look like which is going to determine the effect it has on the kids who make those choices and the broader system. >> and paul you wanted to jump in -- oh, gerard, go ahead. >> when we have black friday, we have hundreds of thousands of people standing in line to buy products. if we had black friday every friday you wouldn't have that

many lines in place. that many people wouldn't wait. same thing with choice. when we give parents choice and we see thousands of people line up and take advantage it's because they've wanting -- they want something different, and now they have an option to do so. but if you made it every day you know, we mow this internally, there's thousands of seats in states that still are unfilled. they're available. people qualify. but they just haven't had it. so there's some more work we have to do. just because you make it available doesn't mean everyone will jump. >> and i would also point to d.c. real quick d.c. experience as we brought up a little bit. we've seep that really take off -- seen that really take off where apartments have the ability to choose we've seen even our traditional public schools improve dramatically, do things to try and attract parents, treating them as consumers. so i wouldn't say, to gerard's point before it's not trying to abolish or dismantle public education, i think it's helping to create a more thriverring market for all sorts of -- they'ving market for all --

thriving markets. your options are better because of it. >> great. one question from twitter. another kind of spread that was interesting, i think people are actually digging into the report itself, which is awesome about the urban/rural split. that it seems like something you brought up, paul, was there was kind of a suburban/urban split but it seemed to be a lot of rural folks who were not fans of school vouchers, tax credits education savings accounts even though we might traditionally think of them in a sort of republican constituency that might do that. gerard is nodding so maybe we'll let him go first -- [laughter] >> no, this is a really good question. and, actually, this kind of goes back to the earlier, you know what were some surprising findings. and we did see in small town and rural areas when we asked, you know based on where -- how would you describe where you live and there was substantial support among rural and small

town americans and significantly higher support for vouchers compared to urban folks. and that's another finding that kind of goes against, you know, convexal -- conventional wisdom. but the thing -- and i didn't pull out rural respondents as much because the sample size is a little bit smaller than those who were in the urban pool of respondents. so the margin of error tended to be a little bit higher. but to get to the point that was made earlier about the sample sides of roughly 250 school parents in the survey i mean there's 70-plus years of science that have gone into survey design and constructing these surveys so that they can reflect, truly reflect the population that you're trying to evaluate. and through randomization, we're able to -- and then with some waiting after the field work

which is an industry standard med -- approach for correcting for discrepancies, i mean, we can get an accurate reflection of school parents within a margin of error even with surveying 250 folks in our survey. >> all right, friends. i think that's the witching hour so if we could have a round of applause for even up front here. this will be up on youtube tomorrow i believe. it was great having you. [applause] [inaudible conversations] or

[inaudible conversations] >> tonight here on c-span2 it's booktv in prime time. begin canning at eight eastern we'll have authors and books related to the book publishing industry. it'll include a panel discussion on ininnovation and data and an interview with the editorial director at broadside books. you can see those events plus more tonight here on c-span2. >> earlier today new jersey governor chris christie officially announced his bid for president of the united states. he said that after more than ten years of fighting for the people of his state he's ready to fight for the people of america. here's a quick look. >> i have spent 3 -- 13 years of my life fighting for fairness

and justice and opportunity for the people of the state of new jersey. that fight has not made me more weary, it has made me stronger, and i am now ready to fight for the people of the united states of america! [cheers and applause] america is tired of hand-wringing and indecisiveness and weakness in the oval office. we need to have strength and decision making and authority back in the oval office, and that is why today i am proud to announce my candidacy for the republican nomination for president of the united states of america! [cheers and applause] >> a portion of governor chris christie's presidential announcement from earlier today. he became the 14th republican to announce that he's running for the nomination. we'll show you his entire remarks again tonight starting at eight eastern over on c-span.

and after it's over, we'll take your phone calls and comments. >> tomorrow on "washington journal," adam gelp of pew charitable trust talks about a recent report looking at the growing number of prisoners incarcerated and proposed changes to sentencing guidelines. following that, steven moore of the heritage foundation will discuss the various tax plans being offered by 2016 presidential candidates. we'll also take your phone calls, your facebook comments and your tweets. "washington journal" live wednesday at 7 a.m. eastern on our companion network, c-span. >> here are just a few of our featured programs for the three-day holiday weekend on the c-span networks. on c-span friday night at eight eastern, radio personalities and executives at the annual talkers' magazine conference in new york. saturday night at eight an interview with new york times'

chairman and publisher arthur sulzberger jr. and executive editor dean mckay on the future of the times. and sunday night at 9:30 eastern, members of the church committee. former vice president walter mondale and former senator gary hart on their ground-breaking efforts to reform the intelligence community. on booktv on c-span2, friday night at 10 eastern author martin ford on how the increasing use of artificial intelligence could make good jobs obsolete. saturday night at 10 on "after words," carol berkins on why the bill of rights was created and the debates it spurred. and sunday live at noon on "in depth," join our three-hour conversation with best-selling author and government accountability institute president peter schweitzer. he's written over a dozen books including "clinton cash," "extortion" and "throw them all out." and on american history tv on c-span c-span3, friday evening

at 6:30, keynote speakers california governor jerry brown house minority leader nancy pelosi and u.n. secretary-general ban ki-moon. saturday night at eight hear a brooklyn college classroom lecture on the revolutionary war and how individual personalities, supplies and timing often influence the outcomes of major battles. and sunday afternoon at four on "real america," a look back at a 1960 film featuring joe brown about a nationwide search for old circus wagons and the circus world museum's efforts to restore them in time for a july 4th parade in milwaukee. get our complete schedule at c-span.org: >> up next, a house armed services subcommittee holds a hearing on america's reliance on russian rocket engines for space launches and the ongoing programs to develop an american-made rocket propulsion system. members heard testimony from private industry individuals as

well as military and government can officials. it's about three hours. [inaudible conversations] >> good morning. welcome, everybody, to the strategic forces subcommittee hearing on assuring national security space, investing in american industry and to end reliance on the russian rocket engines. and before i get started, i think we all ought to take note today is the day of the funeral of those nine families in south carolina, and this is a real tragedy, and i know our hearts and thoughts are with them and our condolences to their family and friends. as for today's business we'll be conducting two panelings. in this first panel, we have phi expert witnesses from the industry who represent current and potential providers of the space launch and rocket propulsion for the evolved expendable launch vehicle program. in our second panel, we have

three senior government officials who have responsibilities in managing the eelv program. on panel one we have tori bruno president and ceo of united launch alliance. mr. rob meyerson, president of blue origin. ms. julie van kleeck, vice president of space programs at aerojet. from frank culbertson, and mr. jeff thornburg senior director of propulsion engineering at spacex. thank all of you for participating in this hearing and providing your perspective on national security. i know it takes time and energy to prepare for these things and it's a real inconvenience to come up here, but it really helps us a lot in developing public policy, so i really appreciate your service. this is our second hearing. we've recently conducted on space. we are dedicating the time to this topic because of it's significant -- significance to

our national security. without an effective space launch program we lose all the advantages we gain from space capabilities. losing space for our war fighters is not an option. there are key policy and acquisition questions regarding the future of national security space that need to be addressed. as we've said before, i'm committed to ending our reliance on russian rocket engines. i believe we must end our reliance in a manner that protects our military's assured access to space and not trading one monopoly for another. the house bill accomplishes this, and i look forward to perspectives of our witnesses on the current legislation under consideration for fiscal year 2016 ndaa, both the senate version and the house version. because we are committing to enduring -- ending our reliance on russian enins, we u.s -- engines, we must invest in the industrial base. investment in our industry for advanced rocket engines is overdue. while we may lead in some

areases of rocket propulsion, we are clearly not leading in all. this is a painfully obvious fact considering that two of the three u.s. launch providers we have here today rely on russian engines. and it's not just the russians leading the way. according to online press reports, the chinese may be flying a new launch vehicle on a maiden flight this summer with similar technologies as the russians using advanced kerosene engines. the time has come to resume u.s. leadership in space and i believe the companies before us today can help us do that. however, i am concerned with the air force's recent approach and what they -- i am concerned with the air force's approach in what may amount to a very expensive and risky endeavor and development of new engines new launch vehicles and new infrastructure. congress has only authorized funding for the development of rocket propulsion systems. launch vehicles are not the problem, the problem is the engine. thank you for being with us this morning. i look forward to your testimony

and discussion on these important topics. i now recognize my friend and colleague from tennessee, the ranking member mr. cooper, for any opening statement he may have. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i think we should approach this hearing as all others with a great deal of humility, because i think the bottom line is if we'd gotten last year's ndaa right, we wouldn't even be having this hearing. so we're correcting a self-inflicted wound here. now, there are many self-inflicted wounds depending on how far back you want to go in history. it's a little embarrassing for america that we haven't been able to duplicate or exceed the russian technology already given the billions of dollars we've extended. but actually there are tremendous signs of hope because if we'd had this hearing a few years ago, that's when we really should have been worried, but we weren't smart enough to be worried back then. now due to the investment sometimes of our own billionaires and their love of space, there's some amazingly exciting things happening. so we're really just managing this transition.

i'm confident we can do it. i wish and i don't know whether the chinese with their long march missile have is, in fact bought the rd-180 or at least copied it successfully, something we apparently have been unable to do, but we don't want to just be held to the past standard. there are new generation technologies that are even more exciting, more capable be, is so how do we effectively there's to that -- transition to that. company competition can be contentious sometimes, but it's also exciting, and sometimes it brings out the best in us no matter how painful it is. so i'm glad we're having this hearing. i hope that the net result will be superior congressional performance as well as superior company performance so that we can have assured access to space. thank you, mr. chairman. i look forward to the testimony of the witnesses. >> i thank the gentleman. and the chair would inform the other members if they have opening statements, they can

submit them for the record. now we will move to our first panel. the witnesses were asked to summarize their opening statements. your full opening statements will be accepted into the record, and we will start with mr. bruno. you are recognized for five minutes to summarize your opening statement. >> thank you. chairman rogers, ranking member cooper, members of the committee, i appreciate the opportunity to come here today and talk, and talk about our ongoing transformation of ula and our journey to replace the russian rd-180 with an all-american solution for our rocket ebb gin. as you know, we partnered with blue origin last year for the development of the be-4 engine. it is a methane engine. it was three and a half years into its development and the engine portion of that effort was fully funded allowing us to move out smartly on that activity. rocket science is hard, and rocket engines are the hardest part. so prudence required i also enter into a partnership for the

ar-1 rocket engeneral as a backup. -- engine as a backup. that's a kerosene engeneral. it is, at present 16 months before simply because it started later, and it does require significant government funding in order to continue. both engines are currently on plan. they are meeting their project and technical milestones, and most importantly for our nation, both will bring the advanced engine cycle technology that is present on the rd-180 to american shores and allow us to regain our leadership in this key technical area. now, as we do all of this, ula's focus will remain laser sharp on mission success and schedule certainty. we're very proud of our perfect on-time, successful record of now 96 consecutive launches many of which were critical national security assets. now, in order to do all of this and avoid an assured access gap and to generate the commercial funds necessary for this

investment in this new engine, it is necessary that we be allowed to continue competing with the atlas launch vehicle in order to support those missions and provide the funds that are required to do this. and so i am grate of to the house and -- freightful to the house -- grateful to the house and the work you have done to correct the situation that ranking member cooper referred to that will allow us to have true and proper competition going forward while we protect our own national security. now, as we stand here today the industry has matured to admit a second provider for national security launch. i think that's a good thing. competition is healthy for the taxpayer and it it is healthy for the industry. i look forward to competing in this new environment and i am confident that when there is a fair and even playing field yo ula can come to that field, and we can win. so i'm optimistic about the future of space launch. i am inspired by the missions that i have the privilege to be entrusted with, and i look

forward to your questions. >> great. thank you mr. bruno. mr. meyerson, you're recognized for five minutes. >> chairman rogers, ranking member cooper and members of the subcommittee, thank you for the opportunity to speak before you today. assured access to space is a national priority and a challenge that we must meet domestically. blue origin is working to deliver the american engine to maintain u.s. leadership in space and deliver critical national security capabilities. our partnership with ula is fully funded and offers the fastest path to a domestic alternative to the russian rd-180 without requiring taxpayer dollars. for more than a decade can, we have steadily advanced our capabilities flying five different rocket vehicles and developing multiple liquid rocket engines. we're spending our own money rather than taxpayer funds, and we are taking a clean sheet approach to development. as a result, we're able to outcompete the