on process to be able to make sure we can get that. get one more thing as you are walking through your entities, how do you define significant guidance versus just guidance? because both of your entities, agencies, have very few rules that you declare significant. what is the bright line for you what is significant and non-significant? >> in education we follow the procedures that are laid out in the bulletin for determining what is significant guidance and we have a internal check process that we are classifying guidance as significant or otherwise. i know of know case where someone has complained that we should have labeled something significant guidance. >> that is the same for us. it's a legal question. that is done in consultation with the solicitor and with omb. . .

>> i wasn't even on the one and does what i want to point out. does not policy issued its resist separate set of standards. we will see if we can get any other detail on that one as

well. hold up just a moment. i appreciate the conversation on this. i promise to keep your five hours. i'm sorry i didn't fulfill that. we will follow the. i believe the record opened up to 15 days for other members to submit questions or statements for the record. i really do appreciate the witnesses coming and your preparation. this is the beginning of the journey for us. we asked gao to pull for different agencies. this is an issue governmentwide. we do have to solve this because i can tell you over and over again, americans are saying i'm getting guidance things that i don't know what to do with that seems to be a new obligation that i'm trying to figure out where did this come from and just the sheer volume of them and the number of layers for multiple entities that actually

do regulations for them are causing some major issues for them. and so this is one we will continue to stay on and work with other agencies as well off -- as well as follow-up. i appreciate your testimony today. this hearing is adjourned. >> thank you. >> thank you, senator. [inaudible conversations] >> [inaudible conversations]

[inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] >>

[inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] and a quick reminder if you missed any of this hearing you can watch it in our video library. go to c-span.org. we have more live coverage coming up on c-span2. republican presidential candidate donald trump will hold a town hall meeting later today. he will be joined i that state senator tim scott.

over on c-span and watch our daylong coverage of pope francis visits washington, d.c. at 4 p.m. he will celebrate mass at the basilica of the national shrine of the immaculate conception here in washington. tomorrow the pope will address a joint meeting of congress. that starts at 10 a.m. eastern. you can watch it live on c-span. >> s. signature feature of booktv is out all day coverage of book fairs and festivals from across the country with top nonfiction authors. here's our schedule.

>> next, republican campaign managers discuss their candidate's strategy in the 2016 race. this was moderated by "national review" editor rich lowry. >> i help run the election team here and i wanted to welcome everyone to wish been interesting afternoon. behind all the brilliant youtube ads launched this cycle, behind most of the great debate one-liners and the best staged townhall, there's a brilliant campaign manager. today we get there from the campaign managers. after google and youtube are once again proud to partner with "national review" to bring a

program and and for all americans about the elections process. this promises to be an unpredictable and exciting 2016 cycle. americans are hungry to know more about the candidates, elections, the campaign manager. we've seen a 60% increase in election searches. over 400 hours of video are uploaded to youtube every minute every day. we're proud to do our part today by live stream this event with "national review" on their youtube channel to help you go back and watch it again. we are most proud to all americans want to watch this event today. we are hoping kanye west campaigcampaign manager is out f watching today and taking notes for his election on 2020. so i want to turn it over to our host at national editor, or the editor for "national review," rich lowry. >> thanks, guys. thanks for being here. thank you to google and

youtube are cosponsoring this with us. i'd like to say that my logistical suggestion is that we would do all these entities in keeping with google's before him and beanbag chairs separate by foosball table but that is a privilege radical for our friends at google. i just want to thank all the campaign managers are making the time to come out here. they are truly in the arena. there's nothing easier than being on the outside and criticizing people for all the things they're supposedly doing wrong which is what i do for a career. i've never run a campaign. i've never run for office. i've never had to deal with the press for everyday the way you guys duke it although it may have gotten a hint of what it's like because the weeks ago my wife and i had our first baby. a beautiful little girl, and she -- [applause] that's like getting with the press corps. she's insatiable. she requires constant care and

feeding. and if you displease or she will whine and cry shamelessly. so this may sound familiar, john. john brabender is a chief strategist for rick santorum and thanks much for joining us. >> glad to be here. >> so let me start out with what seems to be one of the big questions confronting your campaign as well as some others. it seems from the early indications that people are not interested in traditional political experience. they are not interested anyone who's been around the block a few times. your candidate was innocent for a while, but left in 2006 and has run for president once before, and has been around for a while now. how do you make him fresh and new, or is that even necessary? >> let me start by doing two things, just so we're clear. i feel like a frog.

i'm not a campaign manager. our campaign doesn't have a manager by design. rick ran for prez in 2012. we also visited i have a campaign manager. we structurally -- structure this campaign different because we feel like this isn't the 1960s anymore. undelete strategist and i'm a media consultant of the campaign. what i find enjoyable because i do a lot of press for the senate as well, going on the air and stuff, is i'm getting as the exact same questions i got asked four years ago, where they said, you have a candidate who lost his last race with 18 points. >> i had not brought that up yet. >> he lost about 18 points. he's running last and all these other things. i will tell you last time when few weeks to go before iowa he was in last place and one polling in iowa. the only reason that was notable was because he was behind jon huntsman who have pulled out of

iowa and even said i'm holding g out because an item called a big is going. in new hampshire they pick presidents. two weeks later rick santorum ends up winning iowa. just refresh everybody's memory, he won 11 out of the 30 states and type into others. michigan and alaska. probably the belief was if he would've won michigan out right, people would've played romney would've gotten out of the race. so too is understanding the fluidity of these types of races, understanding, you look at the cnn poll yesterday in scott walker is under 1%. i remember having a lot of pleasure for three months go people ask me how are you going to stop scott walker? if you go back four years ago, in the lead was herman cain, michele bachman, romney was there, gingrich was there. a lot of people didn't even have -- rick perry.

some of them, most of them didn't get past iowa. you have to take a look and understand the way these races are. the first thing is there's not one primary right now, or there's not one caucus. there's a lot of once. different people running against different people. in other words, santorum is copyright against huckabee to some degree, and maybe cruz is running against chris christie but whatever it is. this multiple primaries. second of all nobody will win this race by giving a bunch of 50% states. they will win by getting a lot of 15% and 18%. so you start running a race that way and it's different. i've been involved in like the last four presidential races. i was with rudy giuliani. and i can tell you it was the strangest experience of my life because we would sit in our war room and we would see all these places where rudy was up by 15 points and ashley up by 15 points. yet we knew that he was going to

have a lot of trouble because he wasn't going to be conservative enough for republican primary voters. everybody's got to take a deep breath and understand this is unlike any other election. those races are on steroids. if you look john mccain probably came this close to getting out of the race when he winds up winning the nomination. and so again i feel like i'm answering a lot of the same questions. we run our race. we don't do it on my. we do it on volunteers. there's an interesting statistic. last time in iowa rick santorum i think state $22 per caucus vote. rick perry spent $768 per caucus vote. and so the other benchmark that i keep noticing everybody trying to use is money raised. money race doesn't mean that much anymore and republican primaries because trust me, when people walk up and vote on primary day, republicans, they are really basing it on fans.

i do ads for a living. police they are not winners 20 candidates or 16 when you get down to what you they matter a lot more in my opinion. >> let me press you on my initial question. d. reject the analysis that pretty much everyone has bought into that carly, carson and trump caligula been above 50 since people want outsiders, they want new and different? are you reading that more as an artifact of temporary polling that you've seen before and saw last time and everyone is overinterpreting? >> i do think there are some exceptions this time compared to any other election. peoples are you kidding me, donald trump? are you serious? i will be the first to say i would on cnn three weeks ago and said, after the first debate, donald trump i believe his 15 minutes of fame will be out. i was dead wrong. the reason is i didn't

misunderstand donald kohn. i misunderstood the people who were supporting donald trump. the closest i can give you is i think about the people supported ron paul last dime. because we see were the more outrageous the behavior of trump, he seems to solidify his base even more. all that to them is evidence that he is not going to be like everyone else. rules of procedures go out the window. number one i do think there is the desire to get at the washington. absolutely without a doubt. second in the early stages that's all they know about some of these candidates come is there at the washington. herman cain was an anti-outside washington candidate who went way to the top because of that. people could hundred little about herman cain. in overtime i think it was proven he shouldn't be president. i'm not telling you that's necessary going to be proven

about carly or about ben carson or trump. what i'm telling you is we've got nowhere near where people have made that determination. >> if you look at the difference between last time and this time, you mentioned some candidates are running against specific other candidates rather than the rest of the field you mentioned mike huckabee. correct me if i'm wrong, i would put ben carson in that category. i would put ted cruz in that category, maybe a couple i'm missing. but doesn't that make for a much more crowded and competitive playing aground in iowa than you guys have last been? >> absolutely. at a much more credible field of the last time. one thing we felt very comfortable last time is we could come in the top three in iowa. once you have the top three in iowa, there's a reset, not the romney reset but another reset where you shuffle the deck edge of a smaller number of candidates. then we felt we could be a conservative alternative because without the other candidates

that would move forward would probably not be all that conservative. we saw the path. this time i like to say this about 16 people running, and none of them are probably the front runner. in fact, my argument with the rnc all of it that i can sing but try to limit these debates, i think this might be the greatest of any party running for president in history. i think it's a remarkable field. i think you are seeing that when somebody like scott walker struggling who in my opinion is a very, very credible candidate. so i think they are all well behind in some sense. if you look at the polls in iowa, if you take the people who are at 1% of the people at 7%, it's the vast majority of the candidates. patches show separate the field is, not how poor the field is. i think it's difficult. in some sense they are all long shots at this point. >> there was a suggestion from

sean spicer that there will not be an undercard debate next time. instead it would just be interviews, and you can be beneath the surface there and it sounds like an attempt to sort of rush people off the stage and out of the debate the do you think that interpretation is correct, and if so what would you do to push back against the? >> i saw the comment i think it that's a lot of people interpreted. it's a huge mistake at this point to say okay, we've had two debates, everything has been settled. my client rick santorum participate in 23 debates. so what the rnc did was no, no, no. we're going to narrow it down to 10, 11 debates. okay, everybody got --.org are reducing the number of debates, we are going to pick and choose the person at 3% but the first 2% not. that's ridiculous. case in point is carly fiorina point is carly fiorina.

what if they would've that in the first debate that does not going to be an undercard? carly fiorina never would've made in the second debate. i think at this stage there is nothing advantageous for anybody to do that. >> how would you go about doing it? the 11 on the stage this time around was too many. >> i agree. i think they shouldn't have done it the way they did it. i think it should than random because i think you want a combination of people. i don't know how many of you watched the first debate. it was pretty well covered. they would've done just as we'll invest a debate debate. there's no doubt in my mind that santorum sat there for 23 debates, did great last dime. right now do some of these as a factor to say that somebody got four or 3% is in and summary of 2% isn't, first of all they are statistically tied. second of all that makes no sense as a party. they still the variations. the other thing is this

presidential primary is not about the winner. is more like a three-dimensional chess. who is in and who's out will greatly change the field. so donald trump even if he is not the nominee has greatly changed this election and will change this election. so you can take somebody else you say should meet up your giving someone an advantage by doing that. i just think it doesn't make sense when you talk about people who are in two-term governor, two-term senators from people who have won iowa, both huckabee and santorum last thing. it just seems absurd to me. >> so is rick basically back though to what he did last time, just pounding the ground in iowa come visiting pizza ranch after pizza ranch and hoping to catch our? >> he visited every county projected to. right now i'm doing the governors races in virginia, i mean and louisiana. i'm doing a number of governor

races and senate races next year. everyone is different every candidate is different. every campaign has even given. with santorum remembered just been an elected official since 2006. it's a lot easier if you're a governor or senator right now even running for president to raise money. he doesn't have a tv show like it or trump or mike huckabee did. his last name is not bush. yesterday with the fact that he is not going to ever have money. on the other hand, what he does have is an asset that is developed over time, that is republican primary the most conservative on most likely to vote and facing is a very trusted conservative and they need to go into the pro-life, evangelical community, homeschool, groups like that, a lot of trust and that's the end up winning iowa last time. those people at the end of the day wanted to go for something they believed in. he ended up winning iowa. >> so let me hit you with two

lightning round stock questions light at the end of help to ask everyone. what is the one moment, the one group from another campaign or candidate so far that's made you think wow, that was good, i wish i thought of that, that was issued? and what is the most endearing quality of rick santorum to all of us on the outside may not be privy to but you our? >> first of all i thought trump signing the pledge to say that he would run as a third party. i think, i blew two weeks ago there was a shift in the trump campaign. i think that for the first time they started to believe they could win. i think they've tried to become more credible if i the actually a debate he tried to be more careful on how he chose his words. i think he understands that he has popularity of yes approved that he can be standardbearer that he represents a party. >> do you think you can when? >> again, i told you before i

would've said no, but i will tie you the oddity of auditing after is incredible. i'm dealing and a lot of state elections were icing up popular. i think that, let's put it this way. i never thought herman cain was ultimately possible to be the nominee because i thought he had problems. i never thought newt gingrich would be the nominee. i think there are scenarios where this many candidates in the race that trump has ownership of something. think about chris christos both be the plain talking, right? trop stole that from him. trump have stolen something from almost every candidate that has hurt them and help them so. with as many people in the field i do know how you can roll them out. >> in 20 seconds, the most endearing quality of rick santorum that the rest of us are not aware of? >> my opinion is as a media consultant he doesn't change might add. we did and that against from the

last time we had brought me, iran may look like chasing santorum with what look like an automatic weapon but he was shooting back at him. >> are you sure you should have changed that when? >> i thought when santorum sought he would say i was crazy. if he's not changing that he's not change anything. >> john, thank you so much. appreciate it. good luck. [applause] >> welcome to thank so much. chip englander of the rand paul campaign. so i was sort of start with the same question i asked john, which is there seems to be this emphasis on candidates who are new and different, who don't represent politics as usual. and i think a year ago or so a lot of people would say who does have described as were likely to

be candidate, rand paul? this doesn't seem to apply to them yet. what is your font? >> i think there's no question there's a tremendous hunger out there for some new people. think the system. they want to shake things up and get something that does play to the senders credit. a year ago that something that was maybe very strong associate with him. the reality is as john talked about quite a bit it's a fluid race. things go up, things go down. you might've seen some of the news just breaking up about governor walker and easy going to get out of the race tonight this is a guy who a couple months ago was in first place. that's just how it has historically always been. four years ago he talked about for you to go in august and first place in michele bachman was the first in september. then it was newt gingrich. manifesto even finish in the top two in iowa. four years before that, you had right now huckabee and mccain

were in single digits. four years before that howard dean up by a bigger margin than trump. he loses by 20. this is how these things go. that's what makes it fun. if it was easy everybody would do it spent another factor people will raise with you guys that shape the environment in a way that spreads been difficult to do with his it seems with the beheading of james foley a year ago that public opinion really shifted in a more hawkish direction. certainly among republicans and a lot of people think that's made it harder going for brand than you would have thought. one, do you accept the premise if there's a shift in public sentiment, and has it made it tougher for the camping? >> he follows the ronald reagan foreign policy doctrine of peace through strength. that he believes america should have the

greatest military in the world, but that also doesn't mean we should be for innovation for the sake of energy to the intervention. he opposed the arming of al-qaeda, isis allies and savored the relatives, is isis fight us with western arms. we have to be very careful on our foreign policy approach and have a responsible foreign policy to keep america safe. >> digits of a shift in public opinion? do you think that's a real think? >> i would want to talk to the politicization of beheadings. i think everybody is concerned about national security as we should be, and has verified his spirit is not that the beheading itself is politicized. it's just that after peopl peopt and were appalled by it, you look at the numbers and even for ground troops in theory to buy isis and some polls you see

majority support for that, i believe, which seems to be an issue environment that's much different than immediately after the end of the pushes windows a really reaction on the right, we are involved too much, these individuals didn't work out, we can't do nation building. >> rand thinks we need to have boots on the ground, issued the arab boots on the ground. we don't want to send sort of our young men and women to go and die. the reality is that for a lot of americans are and that's the classic republican foreign policy has been historically. historically. >> i hate to do this but let's talk more about trump. a few weeks ago that i began to go after him hammer and tongs, and the result of that seemed to be evident, certainly didn't seem to help rand. what was the thinking behind that tactic? are you guys going to keep it up

going forward? which will thought? >> nate silver at 530 a few weeks you did the analysis of media coverage out there and they found trump is getting more coverage than all the other candidates combined. that's an extraordinary share of voice in the race. so if you're not engaged, the risk completely falling out of the conversation. if he's going to be the front runner then we need to have a conversation about where they stand. i think that's really about jumpstarting that conversation. >> so was it something that simple particularly expected to gain from? you seem necessary given current status and the race of? >> i think that rand speaks from the heart and he speaks about the things that he cares about. i think that he worries about

having somebody that, i think as many parts of trump's record better concern to lots of conservatives out there. the primaries are the time to litigate those things. >> to our people who will tell you in iowa, and to be honest those of them are associated with the ted cruz, but they would to you that ted cruz has been able to eat into rand paul's libertarian support out there. do you think there's any truth to that? how was i was lining up for? >> i'm sure ted cruz you what to ted cruz is doing federal. no, i think things line up very well for us in iowa. the reality is you take a look at the iowa caucuses. so caucuses put disproportionate valley on passion and organization which are things that we do very well at the there's 131,000 people who participate in the iowa caucuses four years ago. there are 120,000 students in iowa. four years ago, ron paul

finished 3803 short vote of winning the caucus. and they were genuine to the why is that significant? winter break. this type is february 1. this be the first time in over a decade the caucuses have occurred when school is in session, when students are going to be a round. you look at that map and you can see how much opportunity there is. caucuses and organization and student strength, those are where we are very well positioned. >> so in other words, some of those kids who are at sea back every year and loved rand paul and make him a winner of the straw poll of you are going to be in school in iowa speak was just absolutely. >> how -- >> iowa has doubled the population of new hampshire with w the participants because it's a caucus state. when you look at how many citizens of the aisle is also not one of the biggest of big it is schools like university of

iowa, iowa state. those are two of the biggest schools in the country. so there's a massive student population. he mentioned the cpac. since they canceled the iowa straw poll, this was the biggest straw poll of the year this. rand paul one that. we still one that. that's indicative of the strength of our organization and the passion amongst our supporters spin talk about a specific aspect of that organization. something ron paul was kind of minor at was the digital, the online, the e-mail organizing. how do you guys talk about and pictake the ball further down te field of? >> the reality is that republicans are going to be competitive, this isn't the simplest and to go capture what obama did digitally.

if republicans natured to what obama did, and we're going to lose. there will be a whole evolution and digital and rerunning the savviest, as digital campaign. it is a crowdsourced digital campaign. we are the only campaign that is released our local, we have bumper sticker and t-shirt design contest. we are putting out videos every single week. we are the first candidate to do a snapchat and to be. we did a periscope and if you. we have millions of followers between twitter and facebook. we have a real emphasis on the. the reality is that facebook and love these digital things have become the 21st century doorknocking. >> so the other side of the coin in these campaigns is big dollar fund-raising and there have been reports out of it senator paul doesn't necessarily like doing that so much. which i wouldn't blame him for. >> listen, i've been working on political campaigns.

my first like a with 2000. a lot of candidates out there. it's one of the important parts of the campaign. he works out in the desert. he makes those calls. there are stories put out by bad guys about the reality is -- that's just all part of the process story people are into. >> jon just before he came osac now everyone is running against a certain set of other candidates come not this is what the rest of the field. do you think that's true, and who is rand paul running against? >> i think we are just running against ourselves. the reality is that the country has intractable problems. people want a bold transmission leader. i think senator paul is the first thanksgiving after a talk about our flat tax, i plan to balance the budget, his support of term limits. i think we do those things and we are in great shape.

>> he is real hell on career politicians. some critics though look at the maneuverings that happened in kentucky so he could run both for president and for senate by changing from primary and caucus and sent if there's anything that we define a typical career politician type move, that would be it. >> the reality is if you look at most, it's been pretty common in presidential elections. just four years ago paul ryan while some of those running for reelection to the house. before the joe biden run for reelection in the senate. is a fairly common thing that is not unusual spent something politicians do all the time. >> paul ryan is a typical politician? >> he doesn't claim not to be career politician i don't think. >> i don't think anybody would ever classify rand paul as a conventional politician.

>> so are you privy to how often he talks iran? and has wrought havoc in advice and say this now it's been? >> ron has been out a few times. he was at the announcement speech. they saw each other, rand was in texas a month or so ago doing some fund-raising and ron was there at an event. just two weekends ago they saw each other in st. louis at an event where rand's mom received an award from eagle forum. so they see each other from time to time. >> let me ask you to question i would ask the book at him. is there any moment from another candidate or campaign we thought that was smart, shrewd, we should've thought about that? what is the most enduring rand paul quality the rest of us may not be aware of? >> there have been several moves. there have been several really good campaigns that there. i think the way carly handled trump and remark that come have made about her appearance, i

thought that was well done. >> she really cut his balls off with a precision of a surgeon. [laughter] >> i thought carson to his closing statement from two debates ago, that was well done. i think would be a announcement was well done. i think there's been a number of opportunities that people have done well. as for rand enduring qualities, i think the fact that for about 20 years he has done three eye surgeries to agilities in ophthalmologist and his eyes searching and he's been doing charitable ones. >> i hear from donald trump he's an okay surgeon. >> yesterday went to haiti. last you want to guatemala to do. i think that speaks to his heart and his passion. >> and how long have you known of? >> i've known him for a few years in cycles past. he has supporters and candidates

that i worked for. but really working day, so while really less than the. >> chip, thanks so much for being with us. really appreciate. >> thanks for having me. [applause] >> we are waiting for danny diaz of the bush campaign. he might be too busy reorganizing strategy in light of the scott walker news. i felt a little like dan rather when someone handed me the know, ap reported scott walker quitting the race. is this a true? [inaudible] "the new york times"? "new york times"? if the new york times says it, of course it's true. ladies and gentlemen, danny diaz

making his dramatic entrance on the stage. [applause] >> so thanks so much for being with us. >> thanks for having me. >> how shocked are you by this news about a scott walker? >> it is surprising. i think in these campaigns, they are tough. mr. walker is a good guide and we will see what the news is that's coming out of this. i think his press conference is that five central. i'd like to hear it first. he's a good man for sure. >> so let me ask you a couple questions that come from the conventional narrative about your campaign. you're obviously welcome to push back. one narrative is that you guys coming into this supposed shock and awe.

you made were going to scare people out of the race but you certainly were going to be in a fairly dominant position from the beginning, police were that romney was which was pretty solid second al-balawi the people bumped up ahead of him at various times. and instead we see bush kind of, 90% but just kind of there. >> i think when you're running for the president of the tragic you can take nothing for granted. he had to work hard every day. we have a candidate who will not be outworked, who works, outworked to staff each and every day. we are very confident that our team and our strategy and everything that we put forward has a long game focus. this isn't about being the president of the kind in september or october. it's about rising in february, being competitive in the march states come in being able to communicate your message more effectively than anyone else.

i think from our perspective we are pretty confident once all the cards are on the table that jeb bush will be the nominee. >> and usually outworked his staff, tell us what that looks like. >> he's putting in 18 hours a day every day to be elected president. anyone who knows him should know that that's not entirely surprising. that's the way he governed for eight years as governor of texas, or as governor of florida. so from our perspective that's what we see each and everyday. >> so another thing to hear often said about the governor is that he famously said prior to getting anomaly going to do it if i can do it joyously. it seems as though a president, presidential campaign just sort of inherently is not the joyous for a guide who is maybe a little bit of an introvert. especially this time when it's been dominated by anti, i would

be almost certain jeb bush considered donald trump a cloud and he's losing to him. he doesn't seem to particularly enjoy this process very much to those of us looking at it from the outside. >> well, someone the looks out from inside what i can do is speed i see what you did there. that was good. >> i think the thing is jeb enjoys meeting people. hewitt enjoys hearing their stories. he really likes talk about his ideas and policies and impact they will have on these individuals. when the governor rules out a tax policy and because the liberal people to talk with the impact it will have for them, when he's able to kind of look back on his gubernatorial record and talk with some of the stories particularly in the areas of education, i if you wi, i think enjoys that a lot.

you may see something different but i get to look under the hood. >> is also taken as gospel among journalists that the constant low energy jibe from trump has gotten under his skin and gotten in his head because he seems to bring it all the time himself now. and, in fact, his secret service code it is going to be responsive to this charge. is going to be ever ready because that's high-energy. >> well, ever ready was the term he used even when he was governor. i think there's a lot of talk in presidential campaigns. i think there needs to be more showing in presidential campaign. i'm not worried about the blip in september. i have a candidate who is out of work out every day, rolling out a series poses, but it's out to be crisis, whether time to grow the economy, with its regulatory we form tomorrow, and on and on.

those ideas buttressed with a record of performance that that is unmatched in the field, unmatched. he has the best conservative record accomplished in a few. i think it's a lot of credibility when he goes out and says, this is what i'm going to do for america. why? because this is my record in florida, 4.4% growth. 1.3 million jobs. 19 billion in tax cuts. eight years of a balanced budget. $8 billion in the bank account, aaa bond rating. america would be a little better off if we directed like that and some that stewardship of our country. so from our perspective we know that if we tell that jeb story, we are confident he will be the last test and in the nomination battle. >> so you're a real pro and you been at this for a while. did you at any point, at any point now where the jeb as well as a bunch of 2002 has some rust?

>> no. >> and you don't think he has, you think his performance right now is as good as it's going to be three months from now? >> i think any candidate, every candidate needs to improve everyday as does his team. that's part of the process. from our perspective we are working hard every single day. there are always things that can be done differently or more creatively or whatever else. so from our perspective, as i said, this is about growing. this is about building on yesterday. this is about getting better. this is about winning. that's what winners do. it's a long season. we are not going to declare who the winner is the baseball season halfway through. you need to get to the playoffs. from our perspective that's where we are at. >> so circle back to trump. a couple months ago the governor

made a really definitive statement, i am done talking about donald trump, enough, i'm just going to do my own thing and not addressing. and within another couple of weeks he was really deliberately going after him and at war with them. what changed? >> while i think, you know, your colleagues in a great fourth estate have a tendency to ask questions that are exclusively focused on one individual. so that is bad but from our perspective, while that may be focused on, i think what needs be focused onto a greater degree is a policies usually outcome what he's doing each and every day. for instance, today address the u.s. hispanic chamber of commerce, a regulatory policy tomorrow. that's the crux of this campaign that is those ideas, those policies, and that's what he saw to day in and day out. in the scrum of the campaign,

some things make a kind of heightened kind of attention to its the nature of the beast if you will. but i think if you look at what the candidate talks about in its entirety come in its totality, i think far, i think for any what he is focus on what he believes what his record is and how he can help people. >> so there was no moment where people sat down and said, everyone about trump would be a summer phenomenon, that's not true, we have to throw some punches? >> look, no candidate or campaign is going to allow attacks to go on responded to you. so there's an element of that pressure. you win the presidency by selling yourself. you win the presidency by selling your ideas. you win the presidency by making sure you connect with people on how those ideas are going to positively impact their lives in a forward-looking way. that's what needs to be met. that's the threshold that needs to be cross. we are ready for the highest

office. so from our perspective when i'm either candidate that's created the record of achievement, when at the candor with the best vision to move the country forward and i think has the most credible argument to be a great president, why would i hide that was why wouldn't i put that front and center and make that argument the crux of what we do each and every day, and that's what we are doing. >> how seriously are you guys going to play in iowa? can you survive a fifth or sixth place finish in there? >> we play and play to win. you don't play to lose spencer you expect to win iowa's? >> him our perspective we intend what a competitive campaign in all the early states and we intend to do very well. we have a candidate who ran three times, the third most popular state in the country, the most competitive purple state, the largest purple state. he left office for something

you're i think 60% approval rating. somebody who got an outsized number of hispanic and female those. we believe with that record of success with a policy idea that we can compete anywhere, and we will. we happen to the resource to be able to do it. >> so so not be some of his cute footsie that mccain and perhaps romney played there? >> i think we're playing to win spent in iowa's? >> we are playing to win it all before primary states, in the march states, we are playing to an afterwards. >> new hampshire, i didn't come here probably planning to win there. >> smart man. >> i learned, slowly. how much harder is it going to be in new hampshire having to deal with a john kasich at least early on your has shown some potency in new hampshire, and chris christie who i think we can conclude from the last

debate may have more like him than he's shown so far, and the conventional wisdom is those are two more establishment center right candidates who are in your lane. >> look, i think the republican party should feel very kind of proud of the embarrassment of riches that we have on stage. that are a lot different accomplish guys win for the highest office in our land. from our perspective we are going to compete in can be very hard in new hampshire. we have visited they are frequently. that's going to continue to be the case. i think when you look at the issues in new hampshire such as the economic and tax issues, the governor's record of accomplishment it fits very nicely. when you look at some of the concerns with how d.c. is so broken and dysfunctional, and you look at the reforms instituted in tallahassee, look at the policy is put forward

with regard to term limits, the balanced budget amendment. you look at some of these other areas, line-item veto. those are policies that resonate strongly with voters in new hampshire. we look forward to a spirited conversation with governor christie, with governor kasich. as i said speaking should i read that as a threat? spirited conversations a threat to? >> i think what you can get the best most established conservative record on the stage. i think with the sound is policies and we look forward to the conversation. >> what do you think is one of the governor's best moments in the debate last week when he pushed back against trump. one thing i know that my brother is he kept us safe. ever since then you've had liberal columnists and advancing that's untrue and showing photos of the world trade center getting attacked on september 11. what do you think about which back? >> i think what the governor stated is fairly apparent and

obvious for any kind of objective person that's looking at what transpired and, you know, very proud of his family as he said repeatedly, his dad and his brother. so there's that, once again i can get back to what i was saying earlier, kind of my core message. when you run, particularly of the presidency, it's the most personal note that a voter makes. when you look at the next most personal is probably like a governor. voters are going to look at you. they really want to know who you are, what you believe, what you've done and whether they're going to watch you on the television set in their kitchen for the next four or eight years. so from our perspective we need to show our heart. we need to run hard. we need to tell our story. likely we believe that we have the resources to do that fairly effectively and were going to

compete everywhere. we're going to build a grassroots organization that's technologically savvy and we're going to compete to win. >> so comprehensive immigration reform, some version of which the governor supports was defeated in 2006, almost sank john mccain's campaign when he supported the when he supported it. they can eight bill was defeated this time around and marco rubio took a spoon at least immediately after that. >> terri is in the wing so you can ask him about that spirit this as a warning to kerry. it might come. [inaudible] but even i look at the part and dissent further right on immigration that it was in '06 that was a year or two ago. how hard does that make it for the governor to sell his position on immigration, one? and two, are you guys worried that with photographers about immigration, the well has been poisoned some and jeb's anti, not his entire an element of

this german election campaign is appealing to hispanics will be much more difficult? >> i think the polling data clearly demonstrates that people want a solution. there's a problem, they want to resolve. i think that covers the four-day conference a plan with respect to the one addresses the border. he's written a book on the issue of immigration. and this is one of those big issues. one of the big issues in like three years since it's been address. who has the wherewithal to get it done for me be the person i dealt with medicaid in florida can maybe the person who have big, big achievements. so that would be a key indicator of who has the wherewithal to get it done. it's an important issue that we need to debate. when we talk but governor bush, as i said, he's someone that had an outsized performance with hispanic voters in florida. he's somewhat even today who i think around 35, 37% in polls

general election polls with hispanic voters. he's someone who can compete. he can win. he's campaigning with his arms wide open. he's campaigning bringing people into the process. i think conservatives can be confident that he is someone who put forward a solution that will secure the border and that will put in place the mechanisms of being sure that this is an issue he addressed and address once and for all. i think the record bears that out and he will continue to campaign for someone who is solution oriented spirit so quickly, best moment for another candidate or campaign, most enduring holy? >> i think the most enduring of is that he gives out his e-mail address to everybody he meets. he responds. and the exchangers are like, this isn't you. is this really you? if the back and forth pretty someone who really wants to engage people and at the very individual, personal level.

i think that it is a really important quality in a leader. as far as something one of the other campaigns did that was pretty smart, i thought the response ad from carly fiorina's super pac two that don't trump attack was well done. >> great. thank you so much. i appreciate. [applause] >> next up is terry sullivan of the marco rubio campaign. welcome. >> thank you very much. >> so since we're living in an instant reaction welcome any instant reaction to the think that's not quite happened yet but is report is going to happen scott walker's exit? >> right. we've actually just nail down his new hampshire state co-chair to endorse marco.

solo bit of news therefore you that i got just a minute ago. and working hard i think with a few other folks but you know, we are prepared as people move on from the race, to kind of capitalize on it and pick up their supporters. >> how shocked were you given his? >> not really. i mean, people don't stop running for president because they run out of ideas or they run out of desire to give speeches. they stop running because they run out of money. it's why we have run such a lame campaign at times, taken knocks for it, but keeping control of the bike is such an important thing. we don't know what exactly but i would assume that is the case. >> so tell us a little bit more about helping the operation -- what are some examples of things you guys are not doing that other people are doing that you think is a smart way to

husbandry resources? >> staff is so expensive. it is extreme to expensive to go out and pay someone from a special early star trek late staff, we are paying someone for three months. it's not too bad when you're paying them for 12 months. it's a big difference. everybody on our campaign has taken a pay cut to take the job, myself included. at whatever job they had come some people came from the official office, of the people came from other lines of work or other campaigns. everybody was joined the campaign is making less. i want people in the office to be there because they want to be. but also, we don't make staff newspaper we don't send out news releases. it's not a money-saving thing but it's a state of mind. we are all here for one person. it's for marco. it's not about us. we are not fighting our own news releases. it is really about saving money,

staying clean, disciplined. every expense over $500 in the entire campaign i signed a piece of paper on. it is a giant pain in the. ass. there are days that i question why they put that policy. ..

you can actually put in if you want -- >> pay to be part of the campaign? >> if they want to, you could sponsor someone, you can sponsor someone and that i want it sent here or in there so a lot of people come on we just need this or that, volunteers say we need it, great, we will sit wherever we want and find a donor, some folks, go find someone to spend the one hundred dollars on the web site and it happens and it works and part of it is you say that is only $100 a year but it adds up and create a culture, a mind-set that is very different, marco flies 95% commercial, always coach, he gets mileage upgrades, we spoke to an airline's frontier flight for him, a kind of special hell for

anybody. winning campaigns that losing campaign is about how much money in, not how much that they have or anything else. >> let me ask the way everyone else has some hostile questions. >> i was -- >> quick catch up. one thing you will hear , at least prior to the bump that is occurring after the last debate, one reason marco rubio is so low is he needs bush to collapse on the launch pad. any truth to that? and whether or not there is truth to that, is bush fizzling on the launch pad? >> we need everybody not named

marco to fizzle. that is the plan. we need everybody to fizzle out and we think they will, no disrespect to them or their candidacy or their campaigns, it is just that we are building this for the long hall. we have a candidate we believe is designed for the long haul in that he is not going to make headlines every day. he is not going to be the guy in any debate has the best 1-liners at the debate, just not going to be him but over the course of the debate i am kind of comfortable and i believe that voters want to elect a president they can drink a beer with but they note is responsible enough not to drink so much that they drive home after words. that is when it comes down to. >> paying a cut rate for this stuff. >> just paid me a beer.

the sense that you want someone more responsible and frankly feel like they have a command and control of the situation but -- >> identify with them still. >> so the -- that is where marco is. you watch him on stage, from a personal, this is a guy who can talk east coast versus west coasts, at the same time amazing on foreign policy and the best of foreign policy experts. said to have someone like that i think is a unique candidate and we are fortunate that way. >> so to simplify and some of what you said, making a bet on his talent and you think it is a very good bet. >> this sounds a the alike spin,

but i think every campaign, successful campaign has to bet on their candidate. every candidate has strengths and weaknesses, but you have got to. you try to make your candidate somebody they are not, say what you want about voters, sometimes i do, but they have a unique ability to sniff out the s. if you are trying to tell from this is not what our candidate is, look over here, instead of saying this is exactly what our candidate is and you may disagree with him on some stuff but at the end of the day this is to our candidate, that is why that is a good thing. our job is to say why it is a good thing, not to say it is this or that. when you try to make voters believe someone is something they are not it doesn't work. >> speaking of having a dim view of voters one of my favorite statements of that is mo udall who lost badly in the new

hampshire primary and came out to the podium and said the voters have spoken, the bastards. q m making this bet, of the criticism you will hear of the strategy is it is much riskier than candidate who has a clear ideological base the way ted cruz does or john kasich at the other wing of the party, or of clear geographical base away again i think ted cruz went in the south. >> you are saying like john mccain, mitt romney, george w. bush, bob dole. none of our nominees have had either of those for quite a while. so you hear a lot about which legs of the three latest lie you going to be, which is your line and this and reporters say this, it is a three legged stool for reason and republicans do best

when they embrace all three legs and when you are only a one legged candidate you can't stand up and so to that extent, we are not a niche candidate where we only have one leg and we will double down on that lane. we also don't scare anybody. when you look at these you have to become the first choice of enough people, but the pathway to do they is not to go to any part of the party. there are die hard ted cruz supporters, who like marco rubio. there are die-hards who like marco rubio, that is important because marcos said to me once a long time ago, probably in trouble when i repeat conversations, but i would never want to be the nominee of the whig party. to that point, if you don't have

a sustainable party and you are not a sustainable candidate for a general election what is the point? you should not be about general elections or abandon your principles or be about a general election, but you should absolutely not sacrifice, have you seen our candidates in the past get hurt by that, by trying to overcompensate, say things they probably don't believe in order to win a primary and then have to backtrack in a general. >> was there ever a moment you saw trump's rise and considered what to do about it? or did that fall in the category of everything you just considered noise in your long-range plan? >> no because the couple things. number one, last week our research team, let's look at historically speaking has been in first place at this point,

the second week of september based on recently the real clear politics, looking at things, in four years ago last week, the front runner was rick perry by 11 points. eight years ago it was hillary clinton by 16 points and rudy guiliani by e devon. you can go back from there. the point is i said a lot, early polls don't mean anything. i was wrong. if you are in first place the second week of september your guaranteed not to be the nominee of your party. there would be nothing worse in my mind than being in first place right now. it is terrible. we were there for a while and that was when we were most concerned because the new york times writes stories about how big the windows are on your house and immediately, how well manicured your yard is, we are

very -- ideally i want to be in first place on one day. if i have to be a few more than that i am ok with it. >> comprehensive immigration reform. i understand it, senator marco rubio supports every element of that to this day but just wants to do it on a different timetable land in a different way. >> here is why it is called meat the campaign managers and not meet the policy directives which no one ever paid me for my policy advice. i am not a policy guide. i can speak to the plan, he tried to do something about it. i go back to not trying to make your candidate something you are not. marco is about getting stuff done. he is a bundle of energy and wants to accomplish things. he very much did on immigration reform. a lot of people come to him and say we need you, this has got to

happen so he took the ball and ran with it, he failed and he is the first to admit we did it in a wrong way so i don't want to put words in his mouth, and wouldn't do that on any issue much less this one but he now believes, politics is the one thing in business or anything else if something doesn't work and you continue to do it, you are an idiot. in politics if something doesn't work everyone expects you to continue doing or you are a sellout. kind of unique but he believes the only way to get anything done, the heart of it was no one believed we would secure the border, probably rightfully so, obama administration was not going to secure the border so proving to the american people here is what we are going to do. there was more from there. >> so completely shamelessly superficial question, do you ever worry you look too young?

>> no. no. not any more than bill clinton's campaign or barack obama's campaign or john f. kennedy's campaign, i only talked about democrats, but -- >> never nominate -- >> i got to believe this, we get kicked when we don't, when we do the retread, no disrespect to some of the nominees we had but when we do the person whose turn it is we get trounced and there's a reason for it. when of american voters are faced with the choice between the past and the future they pick the future every time. charlie brown the democrats's lucy, let's not try to kick that football again. >> we are out of time but a couple really quick questions. was there ever a moment when you knew jab was getting in, they thought marco rubio would never get in.

>> never. never. >> jeb is going to cut off fund-raising, take his base in florida, he is friends with them. >> the point is he is going to clear the field and no one would consider getting in because he is going to be a juggernaut and it hasn't worked out. steady wins the race. we were never intimidated by the prospect of a jet the candidacy. >> personal question and please be honest. at you ever had a ride on marco rubio at luxury speedboat to >> i have not. a try to convince him for the fund-raising but he said absolutely not, that is wide but. >> best known for someone else.

>> the best moment for anybody else is ted cruz who has run a really smart campaign for the candidate he is. a rebound ted cruz to my earlier point, they have actually -- i am sorry. they are third candidate, they are not trying on somebody he is not. so inviting donald trump to that press conference is brilliant. none of you would have covered it. no one would have covered it, but instead they carry ted cruz live on all but net works. never would have gotten that coverage but he got it because he invited donald trump. he is smart. like i said, just kind of intriguing to have a candidate you can talk about music with. first time you talk with bono,

they start talking about music and marco explains how he really believes you 2 was the first christian rock band and here is why, goes into that, you're embarrassing me, this is bono, please don't and he is like you are right. we try to have a message, so he is somewhat of our generation and that is pretty cool. >> thanks so much. [applause] >> not unexpectedly we have a a little change in programming. i am elated that wreck widely from the walker campaign will not be joining us and instead we are going to go to to me people of the bobby jindal campaign.

[applause] >> i have asked everyone in alaska used to react to the news about governor walker. >> surprised me. >> why? >> we saw that he did get an early rise in the polls, he came out really strong in january and it is always hard once you take a dip down to come back but i still didn't expect him to drop out this quickly. >> as you have been lurking back there, i have been asking questions based on conventional wisdom so fair warning, the criticism you will often hear of governor jindal in his campaign is here is a guy who was running the state health care system, age 26 or something, who is almost every room he is in is

the smartest guy in the room but he seems to be running kind of a bomb throwing campaign that is not necessarily true to who he is. what is your reaction to that? >> our most visited page on our web site is policy position and he laid out policies on repealing obamacare and replacing it, the only candidate in the race with a plan to replace obamacare, he has a position on energy, education, position on national agendas, you still have to break through the clutter. you still have to -- you have 17, 20, 40 candidates in this race and you have to date through the clutter, putting out 40 page policy papers, break through the clutter. the press is not interested in covering that. so if you are going to break through the clutter, make your

point you have to do it in a way that will be important. if it is not important is not said. >> would have been those moments when you feel he has broken through the clutter? >> i would say he came up here to lay out his case why he thought donald trump was the wrong candidate for america, the wrong candidate for conservatives, that we shouldn't put our trust in somebody who is unproven, who doesn't share our conservative values and i thought that was a way to cut through the clutter. >> talk about the strategic decision if it was one to go after donald trump that hard. >> i think the decision was more of this election is monumental,

we are at a crossroads, you look at that candidate donald trump and if we go ahead and invest the presidency in a man like trump who cares about himself, who doesn't care about freedom, conservative values, liberty, the first principles we are going to make a big mistake as the country. he doesn't have a problem with big government lynch's problem is that he is not in charge of it. he is not going to reduce the size of government, he is not going to get rid of the burden of taxation and get the economy going. he is not going to get the federal government out of education, allow choice to spring up. the things we need the country

to bring back freedom he is not interested in. and somebody needs to say this is not the right guy for the republican party, he doesn't represent our principles. >> was there any worry that kind of attack on donald trump so far hasn't seemed to work for anyone, rick perry, if anything it seems to have don rand paul malware. how much of the concern is that? >> definitely a risk involved because he is able to use of megaphone when he responds but it was important at this moment in the campaign. at the time he was the issue of the campaign. and it was the wrong direction for our party to go, the wrong direction for our country to goes the regardless it was important to say. >> >> plot out for us what you guys see as by the gentle -- jindal's

break out, what is going to happen? when is it going to happen? >> it is an early strategy, it is iowa. he is on the 99 county to war, he is half way through it, he spent a lot of time in iowa, and the great thing about america's presidential elections is is not a national primary, that gives people in iowa and new hampshire chance to get to know the candidate on a 1-on-1 basis, not just from what they see on tv or in the news but actually visit with them and they will go to every event, meet them, ask some questions and make their own decision that is the key to our strategy for success, spending time in iowa, getting to know those voters 1-on-1 and allowing them to get a sense of who

governor jindal is at his experience in his vision is >> i sometimes told people if governor jindal could campaign in rooms of 12 people at a time he would win the presidency going away and that is a little like your strategy and iowa. >> you need a little more than 12 in a room. but he does have -- louisiana is the state that is very retail have the. is a state that they expect running for governor is that you will visit with someone and they will get a chance to get to know you and he was an unlikely candidate for governor when he ran but he spent time, voters got to know him and they elected him twice. >> are there any harbingers, anything you guys look at as early indications of jindal catching on? >> in the polls you see they go up and traditionally your image

questions are leading indicators. we are watching that. as he is traveling are around you can see over 600, 662 volunteers lined up in iowa and filling out the organization, looking at the number of volunteers and does it before the election. >> what does he say or do that gets most reaction. it seems to me not having been on the trail with him but hearing what others say and reading reports that hideous immigration without assimilation, is that the thing that gets people going? >> it has. i'd tell you, religious liberty is an issue that has people worried. this idea that we are losing something as a country if, as a

christian businessman you can't operate a business according to your beliefs and according to your conscience, we are going to force people to attend religious ceremonies against their conscience, that is something that strikes accord. most recently, a conversation with is going on in d.c. republicans have control of the house and senate but it seems on the big issues we continually surrender. when democrats are in charge they have no problem trying to get done what they want to get done. you look at socialized medicine, ted kennedy pushed it, then hell the requested and obama came through and rammed it through, despite in a lame-duck session they never gave up on it. republicans tend to surrender even before we get a chance to

fight on it. look at the corporate framework we went ahead and unilaterally set let you do this. there is a loss of painter about republicans and inability to fight and accomplish what we campaigned on. >> is the governor more angry at mitch mcconnell and barack obama? you might think mcconnell hasn't been too aggressive, too much of a tactician, where president obama is traveling on our laws and displacing our country overseas and going as far as socializing things. >> the anger comes in from the fact that president obama and the democrats are honest about what they want to accomplish and they go very hard at

accomplishing what they want to accomplish and we are told by republicans this is what we hope to accomplish, this is what we go going to accomplish and then we are told later that we really can't do that. >> you think mitch mcconnell and john boehner, they don't want to stop them? >> i just wish we had the same fight on our side that they have on their side. >> sean spicer has said there will not be an undercard debate next time and seems to want to show the candidates down at the polls to interviews rather than a debate stage even early debate stage, what do you think of that? how will that affect you guys and how do you push back the answer? >> c r n c has a lot of important roles but i would not

think an important role of the rnc is to limit the field, limit the candidates you have on the debate stage prior to anyone actually voting. i know the a lot of smart people died in a room after the 2012 election and decided the reason republicans lost that election was we had too many debates, we allowed the front runner to get asked too many questions and to be criticized too much and too much conflict, when as a party did we become afraid of ideas? when do we become afraid of having robust debate about ideas? that is a great thing to have in a democracy, you wanted to be a meritocracy. the idea that folks in d.c. say we need to limit the number of debates and the number of people participating in the debate because we decide that is the

best thing for voters to have. >> using the rnc is trying to shut down the debate and shutdown candidates. >> i think autopsies wanted to do, fewer debates. they felt mitt romney got beat up too much. that is healthy, as a party we should not be afraid of debate for ideas, let's have these debates. >> one criticism you will hear governor jindal especially from the left is how is this guy running for president and a possible presidential candidate when he is so unpopular at home? is the unpopular at home and if so why? >> i think right now from what i can tell, he has an approval rating, the reason is he told

people that he was going to shrink government and grow the economy. and louisiana, we had a very top-heavy government for a long time. he created a government that was outsized. we couldn't afford it anymore. it was crushing our economy and so governor jindal came in andover eight years he cut the budget by $11 billion. that is a lot of money. he fired 30,000 state employees. so in a state where you have 2 million adults, everybody knows somebody who got laid off, is it popular? if you want to be popular with you do is give money away. you expand medicaid so everyone gets health care, you'd give free stuff to people, that is how you are popular as governor.

he didn't run to be popular, he ran because our state needed generational change and that is what he did. he shrunk government. we had a government run hospital system in louisiana. government run hospital system that had been fair since the 1920s. now it is all privatized. people said you can't privatize the hospital system, it is too ingrained into the culture of the state. but get education, statewide school choice, he got rid of tenure for teachers, not popular to get rid of tenure for teachers that he got rid of tenured teachers, he gave the largest tax cut, income tax cut in louisiana history and that resulted in fewer revenues, people say we have budget problems, they are not budget problems, we did it on purpose, we cut revenues so we could cut government and he cut government. when he ran, he won by at historic march and the first

time. the only non incumbent governor to win in the primary, 50% and got a record reelection rate. and he went in and accomplished what he needed to accomplish. but i think -- >> i can hear someone tweeting jindal's campaign manager, jindal campaign and popular. mitch daniels took a saloon when he came in and changed things, scott walker did in wisconsin initially, chris christie backed down a little bit, initially swoon and came up when people saw results so what is different in louisiana? >> we have had to continue to reduce the size of government. it is not always popular to cut the size of government. i think at the point we are in america there is too much government spending. i think the debt is too large and spending is too much and

does take somebody with backbone to cut spending. i think spending is going to threaten our security, economic security, president obama, didn't have the leverage he needed with iran, at, we know china a bunch of money and the amount of debt we had is affecting us as a country and our strength as a country and cutting government is important. >> what is the best moment for another campaign or a candidate when you thought that was really smart and what is love most endearing quality about governor bobby jindal that the rest of us don't know? >> trump's hat, that is fantastic. never wear a hat.

>> it is counterintuitive but it is great. the most enduring quality i think about governor jindal is he is a very kind man. i think that doesn't always come across because he has got so much intellectual horsepower that you don't see it. >> give us an example. >> very kind man. times he calls me on my phone and one of my kids will answer and he will talk to the kids and just take time with people. just makes people feel at home and welcome and you go to iowa town meetings and he won't leave until everyone has a chance to talk to him. he will talk to every single person and he is a kind person. >> thanks so much. best of luck. [applause] >> joining us next will be

christian ferry of the lindsey graham campaign. [applause] thanks for coming. your reaction to the scott walker news? >> like everyone else has said, kind of a surprise to see that news this early in the race, but the one thing i would say is it tells everyone, whatever you are meeting today in the polls, whatever you are seeing in terms of conventional wisdom, who is winning, who's losing, it is all nonsense to try to determine what is going to happen next january or february based on where you see things today. scott walker, a good governor, good man, has done a good job in wisconsin, good for our party. and he was at one point the front runner in this ra. today he is gone. things change quickly. i don't mean this to be an insulting question.

but personally curious because senator graham is so lively, he loves the game. in that first debate was there something, was seasick? was the under the weather? it was night and day, that first debate, the second debate was the typical tim perry funny lively been the graham. >> that was his first debate but it was a strange debate. they put those candidates in an arena with no people in it. you could hear a pin drop from behind, it was bizarre, a very difficult situation to expect just like senator graham who feeds off of people, who lives in direction, has a great sense of humor, to perform in such a scale environment. i think that was a really

unfortunate way to introduce those candidates in that sort of setting. >> were you guys aware beforehand there would be not a soul in but arena except for a few? >> i don't want to get too far into what we heard. >> that is what we are your for, to get into the weeds. >> we were told a number of different things before and afterwards, things changed and we knew there wasn't going to be much of an audience. >> how did he do in the second debate? >> i would say he was by far the winner of the first forum that the reagan library and i am a little biased i guess, but i would say he was the only one of anyone on either stage to have energy from day one to lay out a plan how to defeat radical islam and prepare for that task. >> i have been asking the campaign managers based on conventional wisdom, i am a

conservative journalist, so the knock on senator gramm is a one issue candidate, a one issue candidate, one policy candidate, what he comes back to again and again, 10,000 troops in syria. >> trying to do the same year. let me turn the question back to you. what is more important than getting this right? these people are trying to destroy our entire way of life, they are wreaking havoc, it doesn't matter what social security policy is if our citizens are not safe. if we don't get this war against radical islam write nothing else truly matters. our country is that threat, our citizens are at threat, our families are at threat, we have to get this right and that will be the major focus of the

campaign. >> you are not a military expert, at least i assume you are not and military experts. where does the number 10,000 come from except for being a round memorable number? because my limited understanding of military affairs, if you have 10,000 guys in the country when you take logistics', when you take force protection, when you take search and rescue, you probably have 50 guys who will be actually fighting. >> i am not running for president of the united states, senator graham has been working in the arena on this for decades, he has been on the ground 35 times between trips as a senator and reservists, he talks to military commanders, he talks to foreign policy, national security experts, these are numbers i think he has become comfortable with based on those conversations and his experience. i couldn't tell you based on my

own experience because that is not where i become a political consultant evennowing military advice. >> so when does he get his bump? do you expect any bump this week? >> i expect a little bit of a bump from that debate. the campaign has a long grinding process and the facts were determined today we wouldn't bother to run a campaign. our job, my job as campaign manager is to have gradual incremental progress and peak in january before people vote. not trying to win a race in september or the year before, trying to win the next year when the caucuses start happening. and we will have a slow gradual climb to do that and that has been our strategy all along. >> and how does he match up in your mind in iowa? the conventional wisdom would be i a what tends to reward these very conservative, very socially

conservative candidates and senator gramm has a reputation as more center-right guide. >> that is a fair point. i also think we have to see how this race is going to shape up in iowa. a few weeks ago we were talking about scott walker being the front runner in iowa. he is not in the race today. i don't know how many candidates will be in the race next year and i don't know how the ideological break up is as far as who is dividing up what segment of the vote but senator gramm if you look at his schedule where he is spending his time, new hampshire, it will continue to be new hampshire. >> about the other guys, this question, sean spicer said there won't be an on the car debate last time, that is a policy that seems to be designed to relegate candidates like yours to some sort of interview format and not let the onstage. >> it is interesting to hear the rnc say that because it has

nothing to do with the debate criteria. i would ask the of lindsay how is it you know what cnbc is going to do if you don't know what they are planning to do? let the next moderator of the debate determine their criteria and i think the rnc as any republican should want has a lot of great candidates running for president. let's find a way to feature as many of them as we can. it is good for our party. we should be seeing this as a good thing about a conservatism, a good thing rather than having the party play a role of the one the voters are supposed to play. the voters get to win the race, not the rnc. >> would you be open to participating in some alternate debate sponsored by some other organization? >> you had one of the best ideas i heard from other people, take all the people who are in the race, divide them by random drawing and have two forums. you can really see in a smaller

setting all these candidates show off their talents and make their case and i would hope the rnc, cnbc and others, i don't know how many will be left when we get 28 so this may be a moot point. >> how would you characterize the thinking on where the party is on immigration? he has been out there, very forthright about his position for a very long time and hammering away at it, banging his head against a wall and it seems the party is sliding further right. >> the key thing from senator gramm's perspective is immigration is a problem. we are not doing anything about it right now. we have got to find a way to fix the problem, by doing notng we are continuing to grant amnesty. that is the one thing all republicans agree on, we got to do something to solve this problem. different ideas how to do it but

senator gramm as he thinks about most issues looks at it in a pragmatic way, what is doable? i am going to be honest with your helps me politically or not, honest with the american people and give them the straight story. >> would you characterize his personal view of donald trump as appalled? >> i don't think he liked it when donald trump gave out his cellphone number. that was an interesting day. why did your phone rings? at you thought it was a booker for sunday's show. it has got to be great, i hope their donors which was not, it was very angry donald trump supporters. i think his personal views about donald trump probably the donald trump is not ready to be commander-in-chief of the greatest fighting force in the world and we should be focusing on candidates who are. >> of reuse secretly relieved that donald trump forced the

issue and forced the senator to get a more modern phone? >> it is of mixed bag because now he knows how to use apps and read polls show he is getting a lot of information on his own but i am glad he has joined us in using a smart phone. as i said to him when it happened, i have only been his campaign manager four five months. donald trump did something i have been trying to do for five months. i am a total failure. he is pretty good at it so it worked out well. >> as i read it by the senator's criteria no one besides him is fit to be commander in chief because no one else is on board isn't out and -- 10,000 troops in syria. >> we are waiting to see how this race shapes up and how people feel about that particular issue. from his point of view there's

no debating it any more. what we need to do in syria, what we need to do in iraq and the mistakes we made before he has been very vocal fighting against during the obama administration, i think he feels this is the right path forward, he is going to make his case, he thinks he is best prepared or the would not be running for president. >> as you clocked out your path to breakout does it requiring number of other candidates including jeb bush to fizzle out? >> i am not sure, any time in politics you need to have a little bit of luck to have a consultant say you it is a genius in our heads. you need to have a little bit of luck. ..

what corners you are cutting, and what it means to be lean and mean in the lindsey graham world? >> we have an extremely small national team. a dozen people. we sit in one giant room about the size that we all yell at each other all day long. it's a great deal of fun, fun place to work. i think that reflects a lot of our candidates personnel the. i think a good campaign should reflect your candidate is our campaign is kind of like that. we are all a small team. they are for the right reasons,

there because we believe in lindsey graham. if we were doing this for the money come if we're doing it because he was a front-runner, because the polls, we would all be there for the wrong reason. >> do you buy, i've asked some of the others candidates, former senators, do you worry that just the mood is so much in favor of outsiders and people that have no political experience, the single worst issue can make as a candidate, i've been in the senate a long time, i know things, i try to do things, gave me this job. >> it's a tough case to make right now, isn't it? but i think at the end of day when you get close to election time people start thinking about different things. they're going to think about who's ready to take this fight to radical islam. is going to think about who's ready to be commander-in-chief. for military families out there they're going to say, who do i want commanding my son or daughter as they go off to do their job? who do i trust to make sure that

our troops have the capacity, the weapons, the support they need to do their job? i think when we get down to it, get down to crunch time, the importance of your commander-in-chief is going to be is going to be more relevant in people's minds and that's what lindsey graham is truly going to shine. >> can you talk to us a little bit about the history of lindsey graham as a vote getters in south carolina? my understanding is he's the best vote getter in south l.a. history, eclipsing even strom thurmond. >> he is never lost a race in south carolina. he won his last primary against six opponents with an overwhelming majority. until recently, not message of been seen as the front-runner in those races. but he's a great grass-roots politician. what you see is what you get with lindsey graham. he can interact with people as good as anyone i have worked with. that sort of talent that helped him so much in south carolina is perfectly tailored to iowa and

new hampshire as well. >> would you expect him along the line. you begin to pick up endorsements from his fellow senators speak with i don't know if endorsements are really the name of the game. i think the key is how you're doing in iowa, new hampshire and south carolina. that's going to be more of our focus. >> do you have a secret weapon in iowa and a large number of people there in the national guard? >> i think that certainly helps out. senator graham is the only candidate in the race today aside from jim gilmore who has served in the military. he was in the national guard. he's been a reservist. i think there's a large population of national guard and reservists in i was going to be good for you. there's a strong veterans population in new hampshire and in satellite as well. >> does have a particular strategy for reaching out to those people? >> i think that talking about his national security credentials is important and also talking about how we make sure that our veterans are cared

for, taken care of is something that's important to that community. serving in the senate on those issues, working on them for a long time, he is a good breadth of experience. >> last the questions i've asked everyone. what is the moment another candidate or campaign has had that you've been most impressed with that you wish you guys a ton of first or something like that. and what is most endearing quality of lindsey graham that you see an inside working with him closely that the rest of us may not be aware of? >> one of the things i find most fascinating about this campaign, and hopefully in the long run it's a good thing, is donald trump has truly turned the political consulting conventional wisdom on its head. he's done everything that people like me would only candidate not to do. maybe that's a good thing for my profession. maybe we are too many political consultants who are operating out of the same playbook. >> do you think that's a good

thing for you? >> i think it is. we have people who are challenging the way things have always been done. on a single drop is doing it the right way but i think it's good for folks like me to have to think differently. i hope the whole consulting class is looking at the trump race and going, are we really, how else can one look at what we do? in terms of lindsey graham, i think the one word i would use to describe them is sincere. what you see with lindsey graham is exactly what you get. he's as approachable as anyone i've ever worked with in politics. he is as sincere, caring a person as i've ever been around and is also just funny. he is a really funny person to be a round. it's not so much that he has at the same kind of jokes voucher over and over and over again. i worked with john mccain. i can tell you, john mccain's six of jokes front and back. if you asked me to do what the fundies think lindsey graham is our said, i'm not sure to come

up with it because everything is something you. that creates and about and is a great deal of fun to work and i'm thankful for the opportunity. >> christian, thanks so much. >> good to see you. [applause] >> so up next is barry bennett. with the ben carson campaign. [applause] >> thanks for coming. so we have this breaking news maybe in about 10 minutes that scott walker is out of the race. what do you make of that? how to analyze that? what does it mean? >> well, you know, i'm surprised. i knew things were going well. that was obvious but i'm surprised. i think the lesson a lot of folks learn from the governor pawlenty getting out early. don't give up. you're going that route spot.

but apparently he's getting out. >> explain to his ben carson if you will. what you hear over and over again from the pundit class is i just don't get it. i don't get the man's appeal. i don't get why he's lighting a fire out of there. he's so soft-spoken. he's not a bomb thrower. in this environment that rewards people for saying outrageous things and never apologizing. he took the slightest possible implicit swipe at donald trump's faith, and didn't apologize for it. which is completely the opposite of what donald would you. what is the appeal? >> he really is certainly the smartest guy i've ever met, for sure. but he's also probably one of the nicest people i've ever met. he's got, start off, he's a physician with a pediatric specially. quite endearing. then you add world-renowned

brain surgeon, living legend, the smart. >> played by cuba gooding, jr. in a made-for-tv movie? >> yeah, that helps. he's caring and is more. he's got a tv likeness ability. people just love it. he's very likable. and he's got his life story that gives astonishingly inspiring. i mean, like i who literally saw his cousins who lived within us and i honestly. never thought he would to be an adult let alone get inspired, start reading to reduce weight into -- he applied to one school because you have enough money for one application. never visited the yale campus until he visited the first day.

but applied to yale in our because they beat them in the quiz bowl that year. >> how did you get to know him and become part of the operation? >> a friend of mine called and said would you be interested? i said no. no. way past that still that tells us about your career private -- >> i have business partners, a political, consulting shop which is where for a while, or was. i'm not there. i always want to do this. when i was younger, as a kid. so i said i'll go talk to them. i went down to florida and is said to david, and i got into car to go back to the airport and called my friend and i said i'm in, let's do it. he's just an overwhelmingly nice, likable, smart. >> and you have no doubt that as someone who has all these amazing accomplishments and activities that you many, most

people wouldn't dispute, and never having run for office before, never having any really significant executive experience, he will win this nomination and be elected president of the united states speak with and i tell you what hundred% is winning the nomination? of course not. that would be ridiculous. but a i am telling you he has a lot to offer. >> see, that's sincerity and honesty right there. >> yes a lot to teach and has a lot to help the republican party. that's what i really became interested. make the party bigger, bolder and better. and through this i think he probably will be our nominee. but even if he isn't i think that it's a nation that is good for everyone. >> what are those lessons that has to put in your terms is out teaching the republican party? >> like so far this month we have campaigned, or last month, we campaigned at harlem, ferguson, detroit, inner-city

chicago. we're going to places where, you know, we didn't see the romney-ryan team make a stop. baltimore. and he talks about lifting yourself up in any the cycle of dependency in the way that frankly none of our other candidates can do that. so i think he can be very helpful. you don't have to, you don't have to, it's not just the african-american vote that we're going after. we're going after those suburban soccer moms pickup barack obama elected. but he speaks in a compassionate way that is very inspiring. people want their kids to the same opportunities that the spirits a stupid question. when he's going to this kind of places is he talking to african-american audiences, and easy resident within? >> yet i sat in a room with him and ferguson were around the are

sink and went to african-american business owners whose businesses were obliterated with protesters and ministers and police. and he said something that most politicians never said i'm here to listen to tell me your story. and it was great. >> so how important is it that he is soft-spoken? because if there's any quality you would naturally associate with political success, that would be very far down on the list. >> yeah. .com i i agree. but in a field of 15, maybe 14 candidates, looking, sounding, talking and behaving different is very afford. it distinguishes yourself from the rest of them. at the debate, i would you come i wish you would like yelling and throwing bombs like the rest of them. that's nothing. i'll take two hours of national tv time offense connected all trump any day. anybody who wants to give it to me. >> a lot of people missed his

standout performance in the first debate. going back to my initial question, didn't get it. did you know especially the last couple of questions come one about race, and the closing statement, he to think in ben carson turned he is killing it, and he's going to have a big bounce because of his? >> we were watching. nowadays everything is dashboard. i've got 10 dashboard, office i watch. i can tell you how everything is playing down to the second or so i knew through social media at t what he was saying was really resonating with people. the shares of the postwar going through the roof. i think that first debate because some 300,000 new facebook fans during the debate spent 300,000 into our? >> nothing like that is happening in the last few days spent how many facebook fans does he have? >> at that .1.6 and went up to almost 2 million. yesterday alone we gained

109,000. since the debate we've gained almost 900,000. we are 3.8 million right now. >> do you know that compares to other candidates? >> is three times more than hillary. 15 times more than jeb bush, and we will be above donald trump who are committed is after three years on the apprentice, we will go past him this week. >> so how to take advantage of that? >> i think one way to take advantage of it is working candidates on the republican side, comment on the democratic side is not clear yet, plus all their superbikes compose on the outside money. if you count on winning the election from television advertising in des moines in january, you are probably not going to do that. so we built a lot of these networks around talk to the voters, 70,000 people in iowa that i want to talk to through