them. what i will do is with all elements 69 coalition, indigenous folks, what i'll do is continue to reinforce their mistakes until they get to a part where it is to my strategic advantage. and that's a difference between focusing on winning versus focusing on fighting. >> sir, thank you for the insightful remarks and for taking all the questions. ms. shoup, would you -- >> i'll just say thank you very much, general. it's been a very informative and interesting evening. i think we all have learned a lot tonight. thank you very much. >> my pleasure. [ applause ] all this week on c-span, we'll show you interviews with retiring members of congress. tonight it's wisconsin republican tom petry and democrat carolyn mack car think. this is what congressman mccarthy has to say about the

future of her party's leadership. >> we have a lot of talented younger members. it's not just, by the way, mrs. pelosi. i think she's been a great leader. and she is really good at raising money. that's not one of my fortes. i was never good at that. but they have to start training younger people and bring younger people into the caucus, to become hopefully the future leaders. one of the things that i certainly believe with all my heart and soul, you have to know when to leave. and nancy obviously does not feel that this is the time to leave. many of us thought that she might stay for, you know, maybe this coming year. hopefully turn the reins over to somebody else. but when i look around, is anybody really ready to replace her. i mean, it's a hard job.

i give her a lot of credit for what she's been able to do. but i think it's time that the leaders stop looking at who's going to fill my spot. we're all replaceable. there might be some bumps in the road. but i do always believe it's time for younger people to take our spots, with fresh ideas, and new ways of doing things. i see nothing wrong with that. that's a progression. that's a normal progression. you can see congresswoman mccarthy's full remarks along with our interview with republican tom petry tonight starting at 8:00 eastern, on our companion network c-span. tonight, on the communicators, tim wong founder and ceo of fiscal note on their technology that predicts outcome to congressional legislation, using data mining and artificial intelligence. >> our analytics get more

granular than just seeing whether or not something passes or not. we can actually break down on a legislator by legislator basis how likely they are to vote for a certain bill. from a tactical perspective, there's a lot of opportunities for attorneys, you know, lobbyists, whatever, to be able to go in and say, let me look at this bill, based on the co-sponsors, here are the people most likely to vote for it, here are the people least likely to vote for it. you can look at developing a strategy in trying to get at the information that you need. so what i will say is that, you know, our analytics don't provide all the answer,s, it's not a crystal ball. that being said, there is a lot of power being able to combine some of the analytics we provide with raw industry intelligence, or human intelligence on the ground. sort of being able to combine those two things should be able to get to the answers that you would like to get to. >> tonight at 8:00 eastern on "the communicators" on c-span2.

coming up, a part of a forum from the international foundation for electoral systems, examining elections and electoral trends in the united states and around the world. in about an hour, a look at the complexities of campaign financing and monetary transparency. in about two hours, we'll bring you a discussion on the 1965 voting rights act and how the federal government plays a role in elections at the local level. but coming up first, election law advocates talk about the role of candidate debates in elections. >> ladies and gentlemen, we will get under way and hope more of our colleagues will join us as we go along. as you know from previous sessions, we have translation on the headsets, and it might be an advantage if you wear a headset just for sound quality and also if anyone should ask questions

in languages that you would like translated. on channel 7, we have english, on channel 8, we have arabic, on channel 9 we have french, on channel 10, we have indonesia, and channel 11 we have spanish. so today's session is point and counterpoint, the role of candidate debates in political discourse. and we have from 1:30 now and until 2:30. so one hour total. one of the most exciting parts of campaign season are the candidate debates, when nominees and political parties get to publicly express and defend their views on key issues of the day. debates are often televised giving the public a firsthand unedited view of the candidates, while debates primarily target undecided voters, all voters are excited to see their candidate go head-to-head with the opponent.

on screen now you can see a p k picture that i brought along from the recent 9 july election in indonesia. my family and i are fortunate enough to live in this beautiful country, and i was in the audience at all these debates. these de waits had a profound impact on a fiercely con tectd and very important election in asia. in the final debate, only days before the election, the now president changed back to his checkered shirt. he rolled up his sleeves, he took on his sports shoes and he won the election. i actually believe if we look at those elections, the debates were immensely influential in him getting six points ahead of his opponent. so this was a decisive moment in the election. and i do not believe we would have had the result, had it not been these final gestures by the

candidate. i believe that these debates are becoming increasingly important for the electoral races that we as election administrators help administrate administrate. some. election commissions that are guests here with us, also themselves are in charge of the debates. so for example, in the case of indonesia, it is actually the election commission that stages the debates and manages these. this is also an expression of the work done by some of the colleagues that are with us. my name is peter erben. i know many of you in the room. i have met you over the years. for those who do not know me, i've been traveling around the world since the early '90s, and specialized in helping on leadership and managing elections. and today i'm a senior electoral adviser and i get to work out of indonesia where i also work as the country director.

i'm extremely fortunate to be joined by two speakers today. and i start with diane. diane carlin is the vice president of international initiative at the st. louis university. she is a professor of communication. and associate vice president for graduate education at the university where she's teaching. a cause on political debates. she's the co-editor, and contributed to the 1992 presidential debates in focus, and the lead author in the u.s. presidential debates, debate watch, and your reactions, 1996 to 2004. matt dippel is also with us today. as a deputy director of latin american and caribbean at the national institute. for more than a decade, he has organized democracy strengthening programs in some 15 countries in the region. he also served as nbi's global

debate program adviser and liaison with a commission on the presidential debates, cpd. in 2004, 2008, 2012, he took leave from ndi and worked on campaign teams of the presidential and vice presidential debates. he's worked to help groups in more than ten countries organize televised debates. so, we will have -- matt will go first today. and then followed by diana. they have 15 minutes each. and we look forward to your questions following the two presentations. so if you will be patient with me, i'll get the technology up and running. over to you, matt. >> thank you, peter, for the introduction. and thank you for the opportunity to be with you here today. as noted, i'd like to speak a little bit, well, look beyond

the midterm elections tomorrow, and look toward wednesday when we'll be talking about presidential elections in the united states. i'd like to present maybe the u.s. as a case study. case study in managing presidential debates here and then look at some international trends that we've seen. in the united states, as some of these slides to my left will indicate, candidate debates are expected to be an integral part of u.s. elections. two watershed forums are often highlighted to illustrate the significance of debates in u.s. political life. the 1858 senate debates between abraham lincoln, who later became president, and steven douglas, and the first televised u.s. debates in 1960 between richard nixon and john kennedy. in that respect, i'd like to discuss the role of the commission on presidential

debates in continuing this debad debate tradition. it's a nongovernmental, nonprofit organization to produce debates for the u.s. presidential and vice presidential candidates. and to provide the best possible information to viewers and listeners about candidates and their policy platforms, to help voters cast their ballots. also to make debates a permanent part of every u.s. election process. the commission is purposely focused only on debates, and serves as a neutral broker, and has no other roles or interests that could conflict with staging debates. the commission was founded in 1987, as a result of recommendations of independent studies by groups at georgetown and harvard universities, after the 1984 elections.

the commission has produced every general election debate since 1988. most recently, the debates between governor mitt romney and president barack obama in 2012. the commission does not organize primary debates. the commission's approach is shaped by u.s. laws, including regulations from the federal election commission, and internal revenue service. i would add a few more facts about the commission. it's led by a board of prominent public servants, including former elected officials, and business, civic and educational leaders. the commission has a staff of one and a half people. it's very small. but grows to over 100 people for the actual debates. the commission is funded by grants and private contributions. it does not receive funds from the u.s. government or political parties or candidates. and the commission's debates are usually held on university

campuses, not tv studios, to help engage students and local communities as part of the commission's overall educational mission. i would add, too, that in the u.s., there's no law that requires candidates to debate, and therefore, no guarantee that they will attend. despite a long history of debates, the u.s. shares the same challenges with other countries of getting candidates to take part. and i'll give you an example. after the 1960 kennedy/nixon debates, there was a 16-year gap before the ford/carter debates in 1976. in the u.s., we found the main means of getting candidates to debate is the public's demand and expectation that debates will happen, and pressure in the media if candidates balk. in addition to help create the expectation of debates, the commission's organizational process is designed to be public and transparent.

and the process starts about two years before the elections. so things are actually starting to get moving now in the u.s., looking forward to 2016. so although sometimes in the u.s. it will take two years to organize the debates, they've also been done in a week. it's not a recommended approach, but it's been done here. the organizational process has done by working with tv networks, to identify the best dates for debates. to reach the most voters, and to avoid conflicts with other competing broadcast events, like sporting championships. it also involves creating and publicizing the criteria that determines which candidates will debate. and in that respect, many americans do not realize that there are more -- there are often more than 150 candidates for president in the u.s., which is obviously an impractical

number to have debate. the commission's organizational process continues with planning for the big issues, which includes selecting university hosts, setting up a media center to help promote coverage of a debate, making security arrangements with law enforcement officials, designing the dates set, and format, among other areas. a key part of preparations is to select moderators for the debates, and the commission uses a single moderator who asks the questions and manages the debate. the debates are broadcast live on tv and radio, by a special events pool of the largest u.s. television networks, which provide their -- provide the air time at no cost as part of their contribution to the public good. and the commission also negotiates with candidates on the details of the forums. the commission also organizes debate related civic education

activities, such as debate viewing parties, to further engage voters as part of their educational mission. in terms of impact to date, the commission has organized 26 presidential and vice presidential debates. exit polling shows that americans say the debates are the single greatest factor in determining how they vote, although the vote -- the debates don't generally change people's minds on who they were going to vote for. the viewership of the debates is second only to the most widely watched tv program in the u.s., which is the super bowl, which is the final of the u.s. style football championships. so to put it in scale, in comparison, a well-watched primary debate in the u.s. will have 3 million viewers, a typical network news program will have 6 million to 7 million viewers, and while a poorly

watched presidential debate will have about 37 viewers, and a well-watched debate some 75 million viewers here in the u.s. and probably many more overseas. so i'd like to shift gears at this point and discuss the commission's international work, which is often done in partnership with the national democratic institute. in response to requests, the commission and ndi have collectively helped groups organize more than 300 debates in more than 35 countries around the world. as you may have seen in your own country, or as the slide show indicates, there's a global movement toward candidate debates -- making candidate debates a part of elections in a diverse range of countries. it's at least 65 countries so far. and i suspect the number is higher. why are more countries organizing debates? i think there are several

reasons. debates provide a unique opportunity to compare candidates. they are generally the only time in a campaign when voters see and hear directly from the candidates, appearing side by side, in the same forum, at the same time. debates also increase focus on policies in a campaign. in some countries, candidates traditionally campaign on personal attacks or slogans, personality, religion or ethnic loyalties. in contrast to our debate, forces candidates to have more in-depth positions on the issues. for example, in jamaica, polling after a 2011 debate showed that 70% of the public was more informed on candidate policy positions because of the debates, and 30% actually said they changed their vote as a result of the debates. in the u.s., after the 2012 debates, some 60% of voters said

the debates were more helpful than the campaign commercials in deciding whom to vote for. i think we've also seen the debates lower political tensions and promote tolerance in countries coming out of civil war, where elections can be a flash point for violence. debates can reduce tensions and show that even bitter political rivals can express their opinions respectfully and shake hands on national television, which sends a message of national unit to the whole country. for this reason, many countries coming out of conflicts such as afghanistan, iraq, liberia, and sierra leone, have held debates. for example as well, in debates in ghana, ma louie and kenya, the candidates publicly agreed during the debates to accept election results or go to the courts rather than the streets with their complaints. debates also help citizens hold

elected officials accountable. once in office, the specific positions taken by candidates during debates are on the record. the public and the media can hold them to their promises. debates also promote a positive international image. they're high-profile events covered by national media. i recall the debates in peru picked up an additional 25 million viewers, because cnn espanol covered the event. and from a broad debate, they're seen as signs of a growing or healthy democracy. debates can project positive image internationally that can hopefully promote tourism. and the neighbors likewise ask, if leaders there can debate, why can't we do the same here. i'm reminded of an editorial that appeared in zimbabwe by citing debates in nigeria, and the u.s. and led to inquiries from groups

following to seeking suit in tobago. at the same time the benefits of debates for candidates is many. debates provide the chance to speak directly to the electorat unfiltered by the media. th they can reach more voters in a debate. the nigerian debates in 2011, i've heard estimates they were viewed by 50 million people. so that's coverage that you can't buy. candidates can also connect with independent or undecided voters who are less likely to watch or attend a campaign rally, than the party faithful. debates also level the playing field where one party dominates the media. and showcases emerging leaders, and show inclusiveness. but despite the benefits, holding debates can be hard, and many fail for political or

production reasons. universal challenge is to get candidates to commit to debating, especially incumbents. as i mentioned in the u.s. we had that problem with the 16-year gap. on the production front, the tv production front, another example was in 1976, the audio went out at the u.s. ford/carter debates. the candidates stood silent on the stage for 27 minutes on national television. which as you can imagine was very uncomfortable. and to increase success rates, we found the debate groups can benefit from pooling their lessons and expertise, and in that respect, i would close by noting debate resources that are available for those who are interests, including the website of the commission on presidential debates, debates.org, and debatesinternational.org that has debates from around the world, including the debates international network which is an 18-country association of

debate organizers. thank you. [ applause ] >> thank you, matt. we will follow that by diana, and then open it up for questions. >> good afternoon and thank you to afis for participating in this forum. as peter mentioned, i do a lot of research and writing about debates. i've also been on several ifis projects, including in georgia. did some work in afghanistan recently. and did an ndi project many years ago in benin, and in south america. so i also have had this international experience. but as a professor, the research is the thing that has been of most interest to me. and i've had an opportunity to

compare some of what viewers -- how they respond to debates in the united states, and whether that is similar in other countries. so what i want to do is talk about basically what makes a fair debate. and we'll start there. kind of the purposes for debate, which i think matt outlined very well, it is a side-by-side candidate comparison, and it's usually the only time you'll have that throughout a campaign. many years ago, after the kennedy/nixon debate, a media researcher in the united states noted that there are usually three agendas going on at a debate. the candidates debate because they have something they want to say. and it's usually not what the questioners want them to talk about, which is why they don't often answer the question they were asked, or they talk about something other than the question once they've answered it. the media obviously have an agenda, and they're creating the questions in most of these situations. and then the public has an

agenda. there are certain things the public want to hear. as matt referenced, the debates focus on issues. and after you have heard hours and hours of negative advertising, or very short clips on newscasts, it's really important to have some extended time devoted to it and they want to hear about the issues that are important. and what's happened with technology is we now have far more opportunities for the public to have input into the questions that the media are actually asking. whether that's through the polling data, or through the use of questions that the public sends, oftentimes realtime, as we'll talk about in a minute. so all of those agendas, everyone gets to have a piece of this debate, and it's one of the few times you have that in a campaign. obviously there's more depth. and they do reveal leadership traits. some of the research that i've done over the years in conjunction originally with the commission on presidential debates was to establish a

program called debate watch, where we encouraged people to invite friends into their homes, or to open up schools, or community centers, watch together, and then talk. and if you go to the commission's website, you'll see debate watch, and the kinds of questions that we ask people to discuss. i had hundreds of these groups that we had transcripts of. and what we found was that the debates collectively, as they watch over the 90 minutes, or hour or two hours, begin to see what kind of a leader this person will be. they see how they think on their feet. they see what happens when they're attacked. they are given difficult questions to ask. and so both their verbal and their nonverbal communication tells something about what kind of leader they would be. to give you an example, in 2000, when president gore -- or vice president gore debated then governor bush, at the first debate, one of the agreements was that they thought was that

the camera would only show the person speaking. but they were doing split screens, where you were seeing the person who wasn't. and the vice president was sighing, rolling his eyes, reacting to things that governor bush was saying. when i went into focus groups afterwards, people were saying, he was rude. and he was doing it on stage with television cameras. what if he brings the world leader in, and he's rude to him. and so people interpreted this behavior as some indication of how he might govern. so they were saying, we found out something about his personality. it was very interesting. and i looked at the transcripts from across the country, and we had similar kinds of reactions. so they do provide that type of leadership trait. and then as matt also mentioned, they synthesize issues. as i've said, if someone were asleep, and woke up the night of the debate, they would know basically everything that they had been talking about in the campaign up to that point.

because all of the major issues come into play. when i go into negotiated debate, or help plan a debate in the united states, or in another country, i always start by saying, what makes for a fair debate. one is you have clearly stated rules. in the united states, the agreements are now 20-some pages long. and they talk about things such as the hith eight of the podium whether or not the audience can react, or who will be in the audience or what kind of shots you can have on the camera. so it's very important that the rules are developed by the sponsor, or jointly developed by the candidates. but that everybody knows what they are. they don't change. and everyone has agreed to them. and this was one of the things i've spent a lot of time on when i've done some of this -- and i'm sure you have, too, matt -- is making sure everyone is aware and you don't change the rules once somebody shows up. one of the most important things is that there is an opportunity

for equal time. there are some debates where it's very clear, you get the time signals, and you alternate and everyone has the same amount of time to answer. but there are other debates that are more flee-flowing. and it's very important for someone to be keeping track of how many questions went to one person as opposed to another. and how long they really talked, so that you can begin to even it out. believe me, here in the u.s. when we have our informal debate where they're sitting, someone is probably keeping track of that time, and it's usually reported. it's very important everyone has equal access. that doesn't mean a speaker will use all of his or her time, but they at least have to have the opportunity for that. uninterrupted speaking opportunities, where no one is going to interrupt them. they have their time. that doesn't mean it doesn't happen. but then the rules begin to come into play, if somebody's interrupting, the moderator may take time from the person who interrupted. all of those types of things are recognized.

and both with american and also international debates. the format matters. whether you have a single moderator or you have a panel, it makes a difference in the dynamics of the debate. which is one of the reasons why the commission went to the single moderator. the focus groups, a lot of feedback in general, indicated that the single moderator would really provide more emphasis on the candidates and more opportunity to debate rather than switching among people. if you have the town hall, where citizens are asking questions versus a journalist asking questions, you get a very different result. citizens ask very different kinds of questions than journalists do, which gets back to that agenda idea. whether you have a single rebuttal opportunity, where you have a chance to ask follow-up questions means you get more depth to an answer, especially if someone's evading. so that's been a really important piece of research.

who's debating, how many candidates there are makes a difference. and in parliamentary systems, you're going to have multiple candidate debates. we typically have two-party debates here, but in 1992, when we had three candidates, when ross perot joined the major party candidates, it made a real difference in the dynamics of the debates. the number of people there makes a difference. who's asking the questions. is it journalists? is it the public? do you have experts? and do you have the opponents asking questions? and one of the debates i'll show you a brief clip from, they are doing more of that in non-presidential type of debates. and oftentimes in the primary debates for the u.s. president. but this has also happened in a lot of international debates. and it's important in many cultures that the candidates actually do directly connect with one another. what else matters is the context of the campaign.

when does the debate take place. in the u.s., they typically want two weeks after the last debate. and that's usually the way the timing works. because if there is a major error, the candidates want time to clarify that, to go out and deal with it, to talk about it, and to have the debates a little more in the distance. whether it's a close race or not makes a difference. and this may make a difference as to how many debates someone participates in. an incumbent who's in a close race is usually more willing to debate than one who isn't. whether it's an incumbent or a challenger. and their style of debate is often influenced by whether it's an incumbent or a challenger. challengers are much more aggressive. incumbents have to look presidential. and so it really makes a difference in their demeanor and in the way they approach their arguments. the time, how long they get to answer, the length of the debate itself all has an influence on how much the public is going to learn. the culture.

this is one of the things that i find when i do work internationally is to get a sense of what the viewership culture is, and whether or not the culture is amenable to something like a town hall. the corian broadcasting center brought me and a few scholars in to talk about our debates, and said, a town hall wouldn't work here. that may not be the case ten years later. but ten years ago because debates were so new, they didn't feel it was appropriate or the right time to do it. so there are a lot of other cultural issues that come into play with how one does the debates, even who you are inviting. in georgia several years ago when i helped organize the mayoral debates, we had two rounds of debates. one was with the qualified candidates, and the non-qualified, the parties who had not reached a certain level in the previous election or didn't hold enough number of seats in the parliament.

we made sure everyone had a chance. we ran it on two consecutive nights. the staging of the debate. are they standing up, sitting down? are they able to move around and talk to the people who are asking them questions? all of that, once again, affects the dynamic of the debate. and then the post-debate coverage. that's one of the things here where we have the spin doctors, people who talk about what happened and why it was important or why it wasn't. of course, everyone thinks their own candidate won. the post-coverage often influences what people think about the debate good they didn't have a chance to watch all of it. they read the coverage, listen to it, read the blogs. that can have as much influence some of the time as the debate themselves. because it often clarifies factual errors that were made. so the coverage is also important. basic thing is, do they matter, why do we do them. and they do. for people who have already made up their minds or leaning, they reinforce their choice and they

often mean somebody gets up and goes out and votes. they feel better about the person for whom they're voting. they tend to reinforce more than they change. for undecided voters, especially first-time voters, they are very important. once again, 20 or 30 years of research, of surveys, focus groups, and also exit interviews have shown that. they provide new information for nearly all viewers. even people who follow the news have told us, and we found the same thing when we did this in other countries, they learned something that they didn't know about their own candidate that became important. they provide these unrehearsed, real moments. there's always a question that no one expected. or some type of a reaction. and how they handle it says a lot. and then they demonstrate the leadership traits. so they really do matter to voters. okay. the impact of the social media is huge. and i won't -- i think -- if we can get the picture.

yes. one of the things that's happened in the u.s. in the last couple of elections, and it's also been done in some other countries, are the meters, where they get a group of people who are across-section who watch the debate and then react to what is being said. it's either a positive reaction or negative reaction, or neutral. there's an example of this little device that they click on if -- they turn the dial if they're positive about it, they'll turn it positive, if they're negative, they turn it negative. if they keep it in the middle, it's neutral. and then this is the way the graph comes out. so you can see the blue is positive, the red is negative. you can see when somebody says something and it tracks the actual moment in which this happens. so you begin to see which questions people reacted to out in an audience. they're nonscientific because it's a small number of people. but it at least gives some

indication. and on some of the networks, they will actually show these meters as the debate is going on. the other impacts with social media are that you can have realtime questions from viewers. one of the examples i'll show you in a minute is where they had this group of journalists sitting off in the corner with their laptops, and people were e-mailing, or texting questions that they wanted asked, and then the journalists would screen them. and for one part of the debate, they actually used the questions that were coming in in realtime. the other thing that's interesting is that twitter and facebook, people are reacting. the media reports on that, in the u.s., about how people were reacting. what were the most common tweets. what did people respond to. chat rooms, people will be on live. once again, when i was in georgia, they actually had a chat room going on simultaneously with the debate. and then when they rebroadcast the debate, you could see some of that going on.

instant polls, which are not scientific. as soon as the debate's over, you can punch in a number, text it, tell who you thought won. and you're getting this very instantaneous poll. and comments on news stories. if you read the news stories, that are online, there are hundreds and thousands of comments about the debate. that people begin to get a reaction to. so the social media has made these far more inclusive and interactive with the public. then in 2014, for the non-presidential debates, what we've seen is that many of these are very traditional with a panel. and that's because they're often done in a studio. and so that's the most common way that they tend to be. we've seen more multi candidate debates, especially if public television is broadcasting those debates. the libertarian party has qualified candidates for many positions throughout the country. some of the debates will actually have everyone who is on

the ballot in the debate. we've seen new formats with questioning the other candidates, or formats where at a certain point they bring in the questions from the audience. and then the more traditional town halls. a real variety of formats. much of the experimentation in the u.s. with new formats comes at the non-presidential or the primary level. and we're seeing much of that this year. social media, as i said, is very strong. and then we have added new twists on rules disputes. something that's now called fangate, which i'll show you a short clip of that in a minute, down in the florida governors debate. so i think we're ready now to -- yeah. first one i want to show you is the florida governor's debate. this is an interesting one, because the democrat candidate is a former republican governor who switched parties. and so there was a dispute over -- it gets hot on these stages. and the former governor, crist,

wanted a fan under his podium. and this was -- move it forward a little bit. >> governor crist has asked to have a small fan placed underneath his podium. the rules of the debate that i was shown by the scott campaign say that there should be no fan. somehow there is a fan there. and for that reason, ladies and gentlemen, i am being told that governor scott will not join us for this debate. >> you can hear the audience reaction. governor scott did eventually come out and debate. but this is an example of what i talked about with the rules.

the rules being clear, people needing to follow the rules, and here was a case of where governor scott did not believe that former governor crist was abiding by the agreement. and he made his point and eventually he did come out. but the point was made. another example is -- are these a multi -- no, this is an example of some innovation that was going on in the georgia senate debate. this is a three-way debate with an independent candidate. so here is an example of where in the united states, in addition to the two parties, we have an independent candidate. and one of the things i wanted you to see was joining the discussion. and there's the twitter. so that people knew where they could tweet to give reactions. >> democrat michelle nunn, republican david purdue, and third party candidate amanda

swaford. the political reports the race is a tossup. this debate is an hour. >> this was one where they brought in audience questions, but they also let the candidates question one another. and then there were follow-ups to the candidates' questions of one another. so it was a very different format than what we've seen other places. if you just want to go to the last one. the last one i want to show you is vermont. and this is a multi-candidate debate, where everyone who is on the ballot for governor is in

the debate. they did the same thing for a congressional seat, where every person on the ballot was on the debate. this is very atypical in the u.s., at a general election stage. >> good evening, everyone, and welcome to our biannual debate. i'm stuart ledbetter. as you heard, we've invited all seven candidates for governor this year to be with us tonight and all seven have joined us. from left to right, they are, peter diamondstone, representing the liberty union party, chris erickson, an independent, dan feliciano, representing the libertarian party. bernie peters is an independent. emily peyton is an independent. and peter shumlan is the nominee of the democratic party.

our format is pretty straightforward tonight. i'll ask a question, everyone gets a minute to respond. if needed, i might ask one or more to rebut. thanks to our time keeper, laura, sitting at my right. we'll have time for a closing statement as well. >> okay. so this was one where it was a very traditional format, but some of the questions came from the viewers. they had been sent in ahead of time, and also they were collecting them during the debate. those were some of the changes we have seen this election cycle. at the state and congressional level. and i guess i'd close by saying that, after researching debates for the last 30 years, and being involved in planning of many debates at many levels, i am a firm believer in their importance. and i do think they have a major impact on the political culture. i think they have made, especially in the u.s., it's

difficult for someone not to debate. it's difficult not to face the public. and the attitude that many americans have is, no one asks -- no one gets a job without doing an interview. and if you think about the debates as a very high-pressured, high-powered visible interview, that's really what it is. >> thank you very much, diana. [ applause ] so we'll go straight to questions and answers. and we have microphones out there. i would ask you to introduce yourself when you're speaking, name and affiliation, and then give us a short question so that we can get several questions before we're up in about 12, 13 minutes. so who would like to present the first question? please? >> i'm from senegal.

>> translator: what you have just told us is particularly interesting, but i'm very curious about something here. i was struck because in my country, in senegal, we are not used to seeing these types of debates on television for the public -- for public consumption. and these are traditions that exist in certain advanced democracies. in france, of course, there are televised debates. in senegal, however, the electoral campaign takes place under the supervision of a public body. which watches over the whole thing, and makes sure that the candidates are on equal footing, and that opportunities are equal on all sides. especially when you have to promote -- when they're

promoting their platforms. so the television debates are moments during the campaign, the electoral campaign where the candidates may avail themselves of a certain air time in order -- but equal air time for all candidates is provided. and they can make a statement, or there may be meetings that are organized by the television channel itself. but there are never these types of side-by-side debates, such as you have just shown us. so my question is the following. in such a case, in this kind of a format, is there a sort of oversight mechanism of the statements made by the candidates? is this controlled? or are they free to express themselves as they wish according to the tradition that we are used to seeing in the united states, and contrary to what we see in my country, where

in my country the statements made by the candidates are verified, facts are checked and verified in order to make sure that there are no slippages, or that something hasn't been said that might compromise the campaign of another candidate. so everything that is broadcast has to be controlled, and monitored, so that afterwards they can make sure that the candidates have not abused anything, and that it is a public organization, the national council for audio/visual regulation, or words to that effect. so there is a very different approach -- the approaches are very different from one country to the next. it seems that there is a complete coverage of everything in the united states, whereas in my country, freedom of expression, it would seem, is constrained by certain ethical rules, and the official public organization has to oversee

everything before statements to be broadcast, either by television or by any other media. so when there are two candidates running for president, during the second round, this is when we have the -- well, in my country, there are two rounds. and in the second round, the two candidates might face one another. but in the second round, they are in the campaign themselves. but we've never seen two candidates in the second round start getting into a public debate on television. so it's a very interesting experience that you have shown us. but my feeling is that freedom of expression is complete and comprehensive in the united states, but perhaps it is imprudent, or not such a good idea for some of these debates,

or formats to exist in countries such as mine where it might be much more of a foreign issue and complicate things. >> thank you for the question. who would like to respond? >> can i start. >> go ahead. >> okay. >> okay. very interesting question. and in the u.s., what has happened over the last several election cycles is that they have sort of fact watches. so university of pennsylvania has an entire center that does fact-checking. factcheck.com. so the statements that can be made can be checked online. the media also does fact checks. and you will find those often times in some of the reporting. and that was one of the things that i was talking about is that the coverage after the debate is very important because when there are incorrect facts stated and both candidates tend to do it, you will see newspaper articles online that will give

that to you. given your political culture and election culture, i can see where this would be difficult because -- and i've worked with other countries where if an ad is put on and it's not true, the election commission would pull it. never would happen here. if you were to do debates, you would have to build in some way of doing that verification afterwads. here, we are free to say whatever. >> can we have the next question, please? [ speaking foreign language ] >> we don't have translation. >> do you have translation now? i'm sorry about that.

>> translator: so i'm well aware that debates are very important in the electoral process in the united states. and i'm from haiti and i work for the president's cabinet. i have a little concern here that i'd like to express. i'd like to take the example of the two debates that i followed in my country, by example. and, in france, the latest presidential debates, i'll use as an example as well. we realize that these debates, indeed, made it possible for the candidate who won the debate to win the election. however, they prepared in order to convince their constituents and voters but not always on the basis of, how should i say?

verifiable facts. so this is, to me, a new practice in order to win elections for a candidate to win elections to well-prepare his statements and his discourse, but without necessarily taking into account the voracity or the objectivity of the information presenting. do you not think, therefore, it would be necessary for organizations, those that organized the debates, that they carry out a sort of objective, well, verification of the debates beforehand in order to not create more frustrated people. because if proposals are made during the debate, these promtszs are not kept, it still can make the population very frustrated. and, also.

>> and a second question tied to that. i see that you're not mentioning any of the advantages -- or rather the disadd van stajs of the debates for candidates. >> the issue of fact checking was dealt really well with in the session. and i work very much to make sure that the words that are said by various politicians does, indeed, get called out if it is not correct. i realize what goes beyond here

goes a little bit beyond just checking the bagsic such. >> they provide more information than in a campaign where you have rallies, a candidate can get by with just a quick slogan. peace, development, democracy. and it doesn't give the voters a lot of information. a debate, as i think as mentioned, you go on record, publicly, and the media in the country and others have the opportunity to analyze those statements and say whether they're true or fashion, which i think affects how candidates are seen by the voters.

that can be part of the discussion, as well. to do all that you can to make sure it's an honest exchange of ideas. i think for every candidate it's a personal decision, whether or not they want to participate. some debate other than others. but, at the same time, i would think on balance, most benefit from the exposure and they can certainly take different strategies if they feel someone is a better debater than another and play down their expertise and positioning in the media.

they they will they will have the opportunity here from kabd dats and really lay out their plat forms. >> one last question from the audience? one last question of the day? please? >> translator: my name is anduk from indonesia. my question says how is the process in making the questions or raise the questions in the debate. from the debates and the u.s. e lixs? how big is the process to change

their mind. thank you. >> if i understood the question correctly, what is the process for selecting questions in the u.s. on the presidential level, and it may vary, i think, for the general election, president shl debates, a moderator is selected, an experienced tv journalist, usually, and they are solely responsible for the content of the questions. only they know what they are. the commission does not. so that is one way you can come up with questions. they can come from the internet, they can connell from voters in

the audience, they can come from a panel of journalists, they can come from a sirngs e single journalist. there's no one formula. and, often, you'll see mixed formats and debates to give dichbt flavor, color, to the discussion. >> i interviewed a couple of the journalists who were the single moderators for commission debates. and what they both told me was that they had their research units of their networks what the common themes were, in the campaign speeches on the ads, they looked at what was in the nightly news, in newspapers, what the polls were saying were the important issues that the public want to discuss. e. and then they provide briefing papers to those moderators and they develop their questions out of those. some of the debates i've worked on in other countries, we've followed a similar pattern. and then have even let the candidates know ahead of time. and we've done that now in the u.s.

that there will be four topics and here's the general area so that ench knows ahead of time that there will be nothing unexpected even though they won't know the specific sequels. >> with this, i'd like to close this session and thank you, the audien audience, for giving us your time and our presenters very good questions. and thank you to matt and diana for coming here today and indulging on this extremely important issue. thank you.

>> caller: i just have to tell you, to see these people in person, at the panel discussion or congressional hearing, it is so important to understand the context and to listen to the statements in its entirety. >> hi, i've been watching "book tv" for a few years and i really think "book tv" is the greatest program on tv. i really like how they pick a time to not only present summeries and gists of what they write, but the moderator always does a great job of stimlating the conversation. yeah, i think it's ad lib. that's what i look forward to on the weekends. i watch as much as i can. >> i watch c-span all the time

when i'm home. it's the only station i have on most of the time. i think it's absolutely excellent. i watched all of the debates around the country. thank you for the book talks and for the history. i like all of it. and i'm thankful it's there and i use it in my classrooms. i teach at a community college in connecticut. thank you very much. >> and continue to let us know what you think about the programs you're watching. call us at 202-626-3400. e-mail us at comments@c-span.org. or you can send us a tweet at c-span comments. >> coming up next, the international foundation for electoral foundation for forums continues. they talk about the complexities of campaign financing following the citizen's united ruling by

the u.s. supreme court. it's about 50 minutes. >> welcome, everybody, to campaign finance. we will deal with all of those issues in the next 60 minutes. in case you need interpretation, please note that english is on channel 7, arabic on channel 8, french on channel 9, indonesia on channel 10 and spanish on channel 11. if you need headset and you don't have one yet, please indicate that to our colleagues who are providing them.

i've had the privilege of working with them around the world. on my far left is trevor potter, a former commissioner and chairman of the federal election commission. he's republican and he was counciled for john mccain's 2008 presidential campaign. he is also a member of the washington, d.c. law firm of cape tan andristao and president of the legal center regarding money and politics. on my drekt left is mine traub who was not named in 2002 and who has seen served twice as chairman of that commission.

and in the true interest of bipartisan ship, she is a democrat. and she was previously counsel to perkins coyle l.p. where she counseled clients on federal and state campaign finance and election laws. political ethics, nonprofit law, recounts and lobbying regulations. before that, counsel to the house of representatives ethics committee. she also served sedentary in chief of the house ethics manual. and principle contributor to the ethics manual, two documents that i'm sure are needed. why not the committee? why counsel members on investigations and often have lead responsibility for the committee's public education and compliance initiatives.

>> there are many factors that influence the electoral process. many are covered in the program. but one factor that is always important is the role of money in the electoral process. i have yet to visit any country where people say money isn't important in our election process. whether it's the candidate's nomination in the democratic

party in nondenomination systems. the importance of this factor is now recognized around the world. and in a recent study, 180 countries they couldn't find a single one: however, there's also growing understanding that creating laws is only the first step. finance laws around the world are not implemented. for ifis, sporting legal report is an important part of our work with political funds. but it is only the first step. the vast majority of our work focuses on supporting the implementation of such

regulations. as part of this, we cooperate with many public institutions, such as election management bodies, that have a mandate to enforce negative provisions. and in this context, i want to mention the recently publishes political scientists over-sized handbook in your packets. and there are more copies available outside. this is, 234 turn, part of our training in detection and enforcement curriculum. and one of the people who kind of helped us to field test this curriculum is commissioner waynetraub. we also spend a lot of time assisting civil society dprup e groups that monitor campaign finance, including in the tunesia elections last week. and there on the porch, which should be out in a month or so, will be the first campaign monitoring reports ever in tunis tunisia, if not in north africa.

during the last 15 years, ifis has financed over 40 political relationships in over 40 countries. and there's no sign that the need for this work is declining. one excellent example that the work with political finance can never end is the united states. and even though the first rules came in this country over a century ago, and several decades are forming in the 1970s, there is a lot of work still to be done. and, indeed, many are arguing that the transparency and oversighted of the role of money in u.s. politics has gradually gotten worse in the last few years. >> thank you. it's a great pleasure to be with you today at ifis. i admire the work of ifis and

have had an opportunity over the years to spend time with groups such as yours who were coming to these elections. i always enjoyed greatly because it gives me a chance to step back and think through what you are about to see. but i have to say you are about to see is probably more confusing today than at any time that i have known in my professional career. so i don't necessarily envy you trying to figure it all out. >> thank you for your opening remarks and setting things in context. i think americans tend to forget that there are other democracies in the world struggling with the same issues we are. they're not unique. and i think from your

perspective, you will have an opportunity to see how the issues that magnus has raised of how money is spent, how it is disclosed are, indeed, once faced by most countries, any country having an election. our system has a. >> congress passes lawings, which means they have to pass both chambers, the house and the senate. and then they have to be signed by the president. they are a law, but they are interpreted under e by the supreme court under two circumstances. either if a case arrives where the party says we think the law

says action e skprks and another party or the government says no, the law says y. then, in those sell r circumstances, the dispute goes to the court to observe what congress meant. the other circumstance says that the law is contrary to the constitution. that congress and the president have created a reck latorial system which is not permitted by our constitution. and that is something that the court has said frequently in the coming years.

we had a scandal called the watergate scandal, some of it contrary to the laws that existed. some of it not disclosed. some of it appearing closer to a bribe. some of it reacting to that that limited money, disclosed money. and there, our supreme court stemmed in when those laws were challenged in court. and what they said is our first amendment is reasonably unique and that it is an absolute prohibition on government doing certain things. the full text is congress shall

make no law respecting the establishment of religion or prohibting the free exercise there of or abridging the freedom of speech. or of the press. or of the right of the government to peace fwli assemble. all of this went back to the period of the revolution there the late 1700s and was a reaction to the things that the british government had done in the american colonies. but if you listen carefully, you didn't hear anything about the government regulating or not regular lating the spending of money in elections. what has happened over time is that the u.s. supreme court shall make peace of that congress shall em bridge no law

to encompass spending money in elections or giving money to candidates or parties. as a version of speaking. the comment being clearly speech is standing on a street corner and speaking. it might be standing on a street corner and speaking with a microphone. or you may have to pay money on a microphone, buy it somewhere. and certainly you are speaking by taking out television advertisements in a system where we do not have government television. it's all commercial. you have to pay for advertising or mailings or phone calls or staff. there are others that may not. which is which? we're going to decide what cases

come to us: it makes figuring out what the government may or may not do in this area very complicated. particularly because the members of the supreme court change over time. so, as an example, congress passed in the 2002, the mccain feingold campaign format which was designed to deal with problems that congress had thought arisen since the watergate laws 40 years before, 30 years before. those laws were challenged in the court. they were almost entirely upheld by the supreme court. then there was a change of one justice who retired. her replacement felt differently and the court, since then, has gone back and struck down important pieces of the law they had just upheld. so if you're congress writing a law, you do your best, but you're not sure what the court is going to do. and the court itself may not be sure, depending on who was on it at that point.

the final piece of this structure, which complicated es life, is that we have, as i'm sure all of you do, administrative agencies whose job is to interpret, to explain and to enforce the laws that are passed by congress and up ed by the supreme court. and, in our case, the prips pl agency in this area is the federal election commission, which i was a commissioner of sometime ago, commissioner winetraup is now. and that agency is essentially evenly balanced between the parties. not more than their six commissioners. not more than three of any one party.

>> the commissioners have to be sincere about making the law work because you have to compromise and agree. what has happened in the last five years or so is that the commission has split 3-3 on most major votes to exchange the law. the result is no policemen on the beat. and the result is that things get wilder and wilder because nobody is there to stop them.

so that's our structure. congress has said that there is a limit to how much individuals may contribute to political candidates and political parties. those limits have been upheld by the supreme court and they're not particularly high. it's $2600 ffr an individual giving to a candidate. more if that individual wants to give to a party committee. the three is going to be about a hundred thousand dollars.

a lot of money in any country, but not enormous given what's being spent in our elections. congress said and the supreme court has agreed so far, that corporations and unions cannot give to individuals or parties. that money is required to be fully disclosed. that said, it is permissible to limit how much individuals give to candidates and parties but it is not permissible under our

first amendmented right of flee speech to limit how much individuals can go out and spend on their own. so you have two different systems here. you have the give money to candidates and parties. that can be limited. spend it on your own. go out and take your money, buy television advertisements and say vote for obama. vote for romne yrksz. defeet so and so, elect so and so. that cannot be limited to what congress can spend. congress had said about a hundred years ago, corporations

cannot spend money in the case of elections. and that had been the case in this country until e till citizen's united in 2010. so there has been a significant change in our system saying corporations and unions, again, u.s. corporations and unions, have the same rights as u.s. individuals to spend unlimited amounts of money. what the sfreem court said, though, is that that money should be disclosed and is required to be disclosed under the law. so if i give to a candidate or a party committee, the candidates and party committees disclose it. if i, as an individual, spend the money on my own, so i take out an ade that says vote for smith, it could say paid for by trevor potter and i would be required to file with the government something that says i

took out this ade to re-e lejt smith. instead of taking out an ad in my own name, doing that and saying paid for by general electric, committees have formed, called superpacks, which simply means political committee that is are registered and reporting with the federal election commission. so they disclose their donors. . and they can take all of this corporate and individual money and run the ads in their name.

>>. >> it will run the ade and it will say paid for by americans for a better tomorrow. you may not know who thinker, but it is public information. the press can go to the fec and find out who the donors were and it can say most of the donors were krpgss or labor unions. there is another type of group that is spending money this year. that is called, by the press, dark money which means money that is not disclosed as to isz source. so those are not super-packs. those are ngos. they are nonprofit organizations that are created by individuals or corporations. their principle purpose is not supposed to be to engage in politics.

>> for a variety of reasons, it is not doing anything about those groups. it was never envisioned by our supreme court when it changed the laws because the supreme court said that even though corporations and unions can spend an unlimited amount in elections, it will be disclosed. what's happened is corporations and vimgs who are willing to disclose who they are, given the superpac spends an unlimited amount and you know who the donors are. if you want to hide who they are, they give to one of these ngos.

personally, i think they are required to disz close their donors by law. but the agency does not have four votes to pass that law. now, i will say commissioner winetraub is one of three votes trying hard to enforce that law. but there's not guilty a majority.

the only way in our system to get it to do its job is to sue it in court. people who don't like their failure to enforce the law and have required a disclosure has sued 234 court. lit rally hundreds of millions of dollars is not disz closed as to the source of the funding. and u as a result of citizens united and the introduction of corporate and union money to our elections, we have, also, a great deal more money being spent in elections than we f traditionally and historically have. so the election you're seeing this year is totally, privately funded.

if the money is by candidates and parties, it's limited and disclosed. if it's by these outside groups which are supposed to be ind pen debit of candidates and parties, then it may or may not be disclosed depending on whether it's through a superpac or one of these ngos. with that, commissioner winetrksz raub will tell you just how bad the system i've described is in practice, in terms of the amount being spent. >> well, thanks for that lead-in, trevor. trevor is a republican and i am a democrat. i want to take a step back. i any there were really

important principles at play here. one issue that is really important in this country is that our courts in particular have been extremely protective of the right of every citizen to criticize the government and to do so without fear of any kind of penalty. or reprisal. >> it is important to remember that. if you watch the tv ads, and they are often ugly and unpleasant to watch. but the courts see this as a fompl of protecting the rights of citizens to criticize their own government. and the candidates from office and the office hood lers. now, there are different ways that one might go about doing that. i think it is particularly interesting, particularly in an international group, to take a

look at some of the different ways that could come to rest on these e news issues. an issue of public concern is by having no limits on spending that goes behind these political ads. and that way, this side can spend all they want and the other side can spend all they want. and, in the end, all the issues will be flushed out and we'll have a great, robust debate. that's not the only one one could look at this. in fact, if one traveled a little bit to the north, and i understand we have some canadians in the room, their courts, who i also believe, believe that they are protecting free speef rights look at it in a different way. and they say when you have no limits, that allows very wealthy people to dominate the debate and to drown out the voices of others. so the way to protect the most

robust debate and make sure that everybody has a chance to get their points across, is, in fact, to have some kind of limit on spending. so you ever two countries side by side and u yet, their courts and their laws have evolved in very different ways and have come to very different conclusions on this precise issue of regular lating campaign finance, money and e and politics. i agree with what magmus said earlier. that enforcement is a really kwee poent. >> if you have laws and nobody

is enforcing them, you might as well not have the laws. they have a reputational swres at interest at stake. they don't want people out there saying they are lawbreakers. because, then, people won't vote for them because they don't want to vote for office holders or lawbreakers. but the further you get from the candidates, the less con strant comes to bear. so when you have these groups that are removed from the candidates and are running ads and it's not transparent, who is behind them? no one is really acountable to the message. it's not necessarily reliable in its truth 68ness because no one is held acountable for the message. so when we talk about money and politics here, the first question everyone wants to ask is how much money is being spent. and there is a lot. this year, we will probably end up spending close to $4 billion

e on this election. the presidential election two years ago, we spent between 6 and $7 billion. and the 2016 presidential race will undoubtedly be even more expensive. and people listen to that number and it makes headlines and they think, wow, that sounds like an awful lot of money. in fact, we probably spent more money last week on halloween holiday where children dress up in kosz tombs and we hand out candy and have parties than the 4 billion dlarsz we will spend on this election. so, to me, the key question is not how much money is raised and spent, but how is it raised and spent? is it done in a way that is transz parent? is it done in a way where someone is acountable for the

money that's being raised and spent and the messages that are put out there. because, as i said, when no one is acountable, the message becomes a lot less reliable. is it done in a way that promoets citizen participation? and one of the problems with having all of these negative ads out there is that the voters get turned off. and sometimes they say they are just not interested in par tis pating. they see the wealthy donors are so much, they say why should i give $25 when they see there's a billionaire out there giving 25 million dlarsz. what's my $25 going to do? and voters say i see all of these negative ads and i think i don't want to vote for any of these people.

so i think there is that negative ramification. and i think that there are a lot of people in this country who have concerns about that. i should say that the 3 splits that trevor eluded to on our commission, they aren't prevalent. but it doesn't work the way you think it might work. it is not a question of the three democrats protecting democrats and the three republicans preshlgting republicans. there is an ideological divide on the commission that the republicans on the commission believe in this more libertarian view, they believe that the first amendment protects all of this money that's being raised and spent and that we should not be registration lating it. and the democrats believe that

there are laws on the books, particularly laws about disclosure that have been upheld. they were passed by congress and they were upheld and we should investigate groups that appear to be engaged in political activity and aren't registering as plilt kal committees. so it's -- although it sounds like a part san dispute, it eets really more of an ideological dispute about how the laws should function in terms of regular lating politics. why does it matter who is behind these ads? as i said, part of it duos to how credible they are. and part of the rational for disclosure goes to what information the voters come away with. and i'll tell you a story in my own home state of m.d. med in

the last election, we had a question that asked if we should have casino gambling in our state. someone said yes, this will bring money into the state, we'll have more money for education. we should vote yes on this question. and then a group started advertising and i always look for the sponsor of the ad. it said vote no on proposition 6 or whatever the number was. so i got no information from that. and these ads said there's no wade of knowing that this money will fund education reform and it's just going to be a big give away to the casino interests. so don't support this. because we have good dise disclosure rules in my state, it came out that the sole funder saying vote no was a competing casino in the next state of west virginia.

these weren't people who cared about the education of children in maryland. when the initiative pass, they came to maryland and filed a license application to try to open a casino in med m.d. i think it's important, and the supreme court has recognized this, that voters know who's behind these ads. and what we have now is a system where -- and it changes from one election to the next. mpblt in. in the top ten senate races is where a lot of the attention is being focused.

the senate made the change and control from democrat to republican depending on how the votes go tomorrow. in the top ten, most of them, this's more money by a long shot being spent by outside candidate groups than by the candidates themselves. in the most exz pensive race, in north carolina, which is not a big state, which is not an expensive media market. but it is the most expensive race so far. as of last week, over $112 million was spent in one state over 80 candidate groups. they're taking smaller and smaller a role on in their own campaigns. some of these spending groups are run by friends and associates of the candidates and are funned by saying donors who support the campaigns.

sometimes they are supported by family members ft kand e candidates. and, yet, these groups claimed that they are ind pen dent of the candidates. so we have the candidates and the party committees that tell everyone, every e every donor of over $200 and every exspend e pendture of over $200. they're very detailed reports. and then there's another category of the superpacks that trevor described. they do file reports with us, not as frequently as the candidates do.

there's an article in today's group that has ma nip lated the process. so they held off their donors until after the last report was due for 2 election. as of october 15 thd, that was the last reporting period for the superpacs. and, all of the sudden, we're seeing a flood of ads by these groups that one wonders well, how could they afford this? in their last report, they didn't e didn't seem to have that much money. but, obviously, they've asked their donors to not write the checks, not transmit the money until right after the roring period. so there will be this flood of as vertizing and nobody whoa e knows who's paying for it. so there's a lot of money being spent. we will eventually see the ades and we need to know from the

forms filing with the federal communications commission. how much money was spept on ads. but we won't necessarily see all of the money that is spent by these groups. some of it will go to reaching out to voters and trying to bring they want to the polls. there's a whole infrae fra structure ha has developed. there are bilgeon that are e theirs wo are creating their own party organizations that are mimicking what the parties do, kpept in a much less transparent way. and we may never know how much money is being spent on those endeavorer es and where it came from. i think the voters have a right to know who is supporting the candidates. and the candidates need to be accountable for their own supporters.

so we're moving towards a less transparent system. and, also, a system that is empowering more very wealthy people. we are seeing more money, but fewer dollars. we are seeing tens in some cases, mill hundreds of melons of dollars from individuals. i think one has to ask what will those donors expected in return for those massive eive contributions. that's kind of where we are today and what some of my concerns are as someone who

tries to enforce the laws. >> if you can please introduce yourself and your affiliation. yes, sir? [ inaudible ] >>. >> translator: why the members of this commission are not ind pen don't or not belong to either democrats.

is there a penalty that would be poshlts for them using the political money. thank you for listening. >> translator: the political party. where do they get the money from? campaigning is -- cannot be separated from money.

how do you resolve that? >> translator: i am from haiti and would like to learn more about the elections. i have heard that candidates do not have public financing to them. now, you are members elected to the federal commission. are you a source of funding at all? without funding, how d does that happen? >> would it be better to have

ind pep dense? we have questions about sanctions and violations. >> let me start with your question about where do the appointees come from. like everything else, social security e it is a result of inevitable compromise as laid out by our constitution. officials elected by the government are nominated by the president and confirmed by the senate. so you have a compromise between the president and the senate. in reality, what has happened for the entire existence of the

kmis is that the party of congress choose their people. and even though they're all technically a presidential nomination, if the president tries to no, ma'am nate someone for the party seat, you have compromise and has developed in the current world the democrats being apointed by the president, confirming with his party and the republicans being selected and then both are confirmed together.

i think i'm right in saying there have only been two commissioners confirmed in the last six years. the others were affirmed before this presidency. there's been no greemt between the parties, another area where we have deadlocked. there have been no new commissioners. and the ones who were there before remain there because nobody has been slikted to replace them. >> trevor, if you had not left, you could still be there. trevor is exactly right. e was elected by president bush. although i am a democrat. my name was recommended to the democratic senate leaders at the time. and that is typical. >> we should have some sort of an ind pen dent commission. that's clear.

other countries do. our norms have not caught up with that. truly independent and not a wolf in sheep's clothing. those are issues. i think they are ones we will have to address. our current deadlock system is creating a serious problem. >> we do have one commissioner now who is an independent. he is a person of no party. he is not a democrat or a republican. he was selected to fill a democratic seat and he generally votes the same way as the democratic commissioners because that's what he believes is the right thing to do. it's complicated. it was set up to be a bipartisan commission so that one party couldn't control. at various points in its history has worked better than it is working today. as trevor pointed out at the

beginning, the last five or six years, it hasn't been working very well together. there hasn't been a lot of common ground, a lot of meeting in the middle. the earlier part of my tenure, we did a better job than that. i hold out hope that that could happen again. financing is largely private in this country. we have a system of public financing only for the presidential race. not for the house or senate. various states may have their own system of financing for state level elections. at the federal level there's only private financing except for the presidency. the way our supreme court interpreted that law that allowed public financing, they said it couldn't be required. so it's a voluntary system.

the way the system is set up, if one accepts the public funds, one also has to accept expenditure limits. now, what has happened over the last number of years really since 2000, it's become clear that candidates even under contribution limbs have been able to raise so much more money than the expenditure limits would allow them to spend if they took the public money that they don't participate. so the system needs to be amended. there's bills in congress to fix it, but they aren't going anywhere. i think there was a question about enforcement. yes, it does have authority to impose penalties. most of what we do is to enter into negotiations and try to come to a settlement agreement once we agree there's a violation but the problem of late has been getting to that

agreement that there's a violation for law. >> thank you very much. we have several hands in the air. this is what happens when you talk about campaign finance, you simply run out of time. people are waving at the back of the room. to respect the agenda, we will have to did you -- continue the discussion during the break. please try to grab our two percenters before they leave the building. we sat in this session 2012 selection program. hopefully we will be sitting here in the 2016 u.s. election program as well, which is when we'll be electing a new president. i welcome you back to that event. i just want to things that i heard. things are getting wilder and wilder. more money raised by fewer

donors with less disclosure. there's a lot of work to be done. on behalf of myself, i want to thank for the presentation and everyone for participation. if you're interested in work, campaign finance, please grab me at any point during this event. we will take a break and reconvene at 4:00 in this room for a session entitled "more power to more people, how the americans with disability act and rights expanding political rights." thank you very much. > . tonight in our companion network u.s. attorneys, former senior justice department officials and a number of other discuss efforts by prosecutors to reduce prison population and

violent crime. here is a quick look. >> i was born and raised in new orleans. i'm the second youngest u.s. attorney right now in our country, and i also happen to have lost a brother to street violence in new orleans. so this issue of trying to intervene in the lives of young people is near and dear to my heart. right now what we are doing is using on the one hand initiative student pledge against gun violence where we are going out into all 450 schools throughout southeast louisiana on one day, october 15th of this year, and the pledge is quite simple. we're simply asking young people to pledge thought to bring a gun to school. they promise not to use a weapon to resolve a fight or dispute. lastly, they promise to use their influence with families and friends to ensure those individuals don't use a weapon for a fight or dispute. simple pledge.

it's been around and 10 million across the country have used this and taken this pledge. this the first time we'll be doing it in new orleans. i think ultimately on that day we'll be sending a very powerful message that our young people individually and collectively are taking a stand against violence in our community and in our schools. >> see the full remarks from u.s. attorney tonight at 8:30 eastern on c-span 2. with live coverage of the house on swx span and senate c-span 2, on c-span3 we compliment by showing you relevant congressional hearings. on weekends c-span3 is the home to american history tv. unique series, civil war's 150th anniversary, visiting battle fields and key event, american artifacts, touring museums and sites to discover what art fax

review about the past. history book shelf, best known history writers. the presidency, looking at the policies and legacies, delving into the past. new series real america archival government and educational films 1930s through '70s. c-span3 created by the cable tv industry and funded by local cable or satellite provider. watch us in hd, like us on facebook and follow us on twitter. now form on elections concludes with look at 1965 voting rights act. we'll hear from two lawyers who also speak about how the federal government plays a role in the elections at the local level. this is about an hour.

>> thank you all very much for being here today. i'd like to get started so we can stay on schedule. first welcome to the u.s. election program and to our panel from selma to montgomery and beyond 1965 voting rights. i'm director for center for applied research and i'm joined by an expert on election law and voting rights specializing in electoral reform issues. he's also the author of election law in a nutshell and co-author of "election law cases and materials." i'm also joined by brenden more ski, of counsel at brandy rain.

litigation focus practice assisting clients with trial and appellate matters before courts and agencies. he was counsel to shelby county, alabama in its challenge to section 4 and 5 of the voting rights act. just a couple of very quick reminders. for translation, english on channel 7, arabic 8, spanish is on channel 11. for today's discussion, we're going to try to keep each panelist's comments short, about ten minutes each. but they will do two sessions of ten minutes and then we'll have the rest of the time for question-and-answer. a level playing field at the heart of genuine democratic elections. work to support the right of every person to participate in free and fair elections. our work, therefore, includes

equal rights, justice, inclusion from marginalized or underrepresented groups so they can participate fully in political life. voter rights especially contention in the united states and litigation to protect equal voting rights continues to be a subject of litigation and debate. the landmark case of shelby county versus holder resulted in supreme court striking down section b of the voting rights act of 1965 and effectively removing coverage determining which jurisdictions require federal preclearance before enacting changes to their voting laws. in an attempt to share insights on american electoral, the u.s. election program the panel will discuss implications of shelby in the broader context of voting rights and political inclusion.