>> is the impact of women and men on these issues that relate to family is that it changes the thinking, or reshuffles the republicans, that is a success. it is more important to pass legislation than it is to win the election, unless they don't want to pass the legislation. the fact is they have to hear. know, they have to know that people are aware that these are possibilities. also, and this is my life, no we are not going away. this is not one meeting. this is a way of life.

otherwise people think i will just get through this meeting. we are not going away. in the 70's. there was a bill on president nixon's desk for childcare. people thought he might sign it. that he didn't for cultural reasons. you can just imagine. [laughter] it is similar to immigration. we are not going away. background checks. we are not going away. women's issues. we are not going away. impact.l have an frankly, we would rather have a

change in the law that improves the lives of people. if we have a choice between winning an election or winning a positiveng to have a impact on the lives of women. that is what a political debate is about. president kennedy said, the government has to choose in favor of these issues. i had a visit from a head of state, the president of columbia. not the university. [laughter] >> i was thinking columbia pictures. >> he was telling me all these plans he had for the growth of his economy in this country. i said, do tell. what are you basing the success on. he said i'm basing it on the increasing involvement of women in our economy. i said, we have a slogan.

when women succeed, america succeeds. we subscribe to that. .hat is what our country needs a full infusion of women's energy and entrepreneurship, a sense of what is important in all of this debate. i know this can happen. they have to know two things. how important it is to everybody family. men and women. everybody in the family. that we aren't going away until this happens. 165 years since seneca falls. , and some of the same issues are still out there. we have a golden opportunity. -- shriver report lists lifts this to a higher awareness. it is fabulous.

let's thank maria. [applause] for all the hard work she has done. >> up next, mike huckabee talks about party politics and women at the republican national committee meeting. then, a panel on women in leadership. later, the shriver report on women in poverty. johnson talks about security concerns at the conference of mayors. we will hear how -- we will hear from bill shuster. then, south carolina senator tim

remarks todeliver the republican national committee winter meeting. >> no matter what party they belong to, most americans are thinking the same thing. nothing will get done in washington this year. or next year. or maybe even the year after that. washington is broken. can you blame them for feeling cynical? the greatest blow to our confidence in our economy last year didn't come from events beyond our control. it came from a debate in washington over whether the united states would pay its bills are not. who benefited from that? about theked tonight

deficit of trust between mainstream wall street. the divide between this city and the rest the country is at least as bad. it seems to get worse every year. 's obama delivers this year address. our preview starts live, tuesday night. followed by the response from cathy mcmorris rodgers. the state of the union, tuesday night, live on c-span. >> former arkansas governor and 2008 presidential candidate mike huckabee spoke at the annual . this is 30 minutes.

>> thank you very much. when he was giving the introduction and talking about all of the things i was doing, i was getting nervous and one of these days will he find something he's good at. an honor to be here and thanks to all of you for braving the weather. he was telling about the musician part of me. last night i was in anaheim, california, playing on stage with the new york yankees, bernie williams who is an amazing guitar player and skunk baxter from the doobie brothers. and i wanted to bring them with me. i would have had to play with them and headed right back there as soon as i finished speaking today. i have to be back in california this afternoon and then tomorrow

i will be there with more meetings and organization that provides musical instruments for children and i will take the red eye from california to new york tomorrow night to do my show at fox. funeral services will be held monday. and in the course of this i lost my iphone. don't know if that happened to you but it's a horrible thing. i got it back. i called the n.s.a., they knew exactly where it was. and they put all of my e-mails back in. and i can't begin my comments today about saying heartfelt word to deep thanks to chairman previous who showed an extraordinary level of conviction and courage that so much of us appreciate and that is would have been easy for him to go ahead with a meeting yesterday but in a show of true solidarity with so many people

in our party whoar passionate about the sanctity of every human life. the chairman did a marvelous thing in postponing the events so people could participate. thank you. i think it's time republicans no longer accept listening to the democrats talk about a war on women. the fact is is the republicans don't have a war on women, they have a war for women. for them to be empowered to be something other than victims of their gender. women i know are outraged that the democrats think that women

are nothing more than helpless and hopeless creatures whose only goal in life is is have a government provide for them birth control medication. women i know are smart, educated, intelligent, capable of doing anything that anyone else can do. our party stands for the recognition of the equality of women and capacity of women. that's not a war on them. it's a war for them. and if the democrats want to insult the women of america by making them believe that they are helpless without uncle sugar coming in and providing for them a prescription each month for birth control because they cannot control their libido or reproductive system without the help of the golvet, so be it, let us take that discussion across america because women are far more than the democrats have played them to be and women across america need to stand up and say enough of that nonsense. i think it's time we lead that discussion.

i will be in new york on saturday for a while. as you know i host tail vision show that is on the fox news channel and we tape it in new york. people ask me all the time, are you going to move to new york? i always tell them, even before the governor of new york decided he doesn't like my kind up there -- but even before i said, not moving to new york unless they let me duck hunt in central park. so don't think i will be going. i was shocked, andrew cuomo, the governor of new york says that people who are as he calls us extreme if we believe that every life has value and worth that we are extreme if we think we should be able to protect ourselves and not have to hopelessly stand by and hope that the police can arrive before whatever predator breaks down our door has decided to have his way in our 0 lives and in our homes. and he made it very clear, he said, these kind of people are not welcome in new york.

i'm delighted to hear that and i hope he will exempt me from all of the taxes i have to pay to his fine state because every time i do a show in new york, they decide it's worthy of them taking a significant piece of it. so governor, if you don't mind since you really don't want me there, i'm sure none of my money would be welcome in new york either. well, don't know if you know this or not, but we're coming up very soon in just a couple of weeks to the 50th anniversary of an extraordinary american moment and it has nothing to do with politics. it has to do with the beatles arriving in the u.s. and being on the ed sullivan show. i want to tell thank you little story because there was an untold story of the beatles that you might be hearing about. it was the story of the unknown fifth beatle.

some of you saying there were only four beatles. it's not intended to be that way. supposed to be a fifth one. and the fifth beatle never really got the attention that was deserved. but for those of you who are as old as i am, which means old as dirt, you can understand the beatles coming to america and being on "the ed is sullivan show" launched nothing short of a culture revolution. but a lot of people don't understand why it was a similar moment in the history of america and for that matter the history of the world. the country had just gone through a very painful time of mourning the death of a president who had been assassinated. there was an extraordinary amount of dispair, heartbreak, disappointment and people forget

we were still grieving as a nation because we couldn't believe it was possible for our own president to be assassinated in the streets of one of our cities. and the anxiety of that coupled with the looming beginnings of war and conflict in southeast asia left americans with a real sense of despair. and pessimism. when the beatles came, it was as one person said, so many more people rather had follow the beatles than baptists because the beatles looked like they were going somewhere and baptists looked like they were sorry they had been. but there was a young man who saw the beatles on ed sullivan completely taken by what he saw and so very much said i would like to be the fifth beatle.

now there was one problem, he didn't know how to play the guitar. so he began to work towards having a guitar. and for three jeers he did everything possible he could to get a guitar and couldn't get one because he couldn't afford it. after three years this young man's parents were tired of hearing him complain how he wanted an electric guitar so they ordered an electric guitar from the jcpenney mail order catalog and presented it to him for christmas. he didn't know it at the time but they couldn't really afford it. they spent $99 on the guitar and little amplifier that came with it. and he had no idea how much money that represented to them but it took them a year to pay for it. they paid a little bit each month for a year until they got it all paid off. but that really didn't matter to the young man because he knew he would be the fifth beatle. he learned to play and would

practice. pretty much until his fingers virtually bled and he got where he was good enough to be in a band, not a very good band but band. and continued to play thinking the day will come when the beatles will say, you are the fifth beatle. well, let me just fast forward and tell you that never happened. fifth beatle movement never did come to be. he was never discovered to be that great of a guitar player. in fact never discovered to be that great of an anything but he stands before you today because i was that 11-year-old kid who got the guitar and wanted so badly to be the fifth beatle. can i tell you what happened in 1963? i was 8 the first time i saw them. the beatles brought something to

america more than music. they brought hope. i know it may sound is sacrireligious to say the beatles brought hope but we were brought by a nation that had been bruised and the energy, excitement, difference that they brought, brought hope which our country desperately needed and their music was pretty good. today we are in a time when we need more than we ever needed in america before. sense of home and optimism. a lot of people were discouraged and we can tell you why. 92 million americans are not even in the job market anymore. given up. if anyone says the unemployment rate dropped to 6.7%, only because another 100,000 people or so have decided there's no

point in even applying for a job because there aren't any. the highest record of americans that have taken themselves out of a job market in the history of our country, the president wants to talk about income and equality. i think we should have the debate. i heard republicans say let's don't go there. no, let's do go there. let's talk about the fact that the party that has preached poverty and how to fix it has led this country to spend 20.7 trillion in current dollars since the year 1964 when we launched the war on poverty. today more people are impoverished than when we started the war on poverty. the war on poverty sent going very well. and -- isn't going very well. and the reason it isn't is all due respect to the sincere notion of getting rid of poverty, you cannot get rid of poverty until you bring to people a sense of hope and

optimism and that optimism can't be artificial, it has to be real. real hope and real optimism comes when people have the prospect of getting an education, getting a job and going beyond a life that the government wants them to live. our party is not afraid to talk about improving the income quality of people. we just want to make sure we empower people to dream their dreams and live them. and not be subjected to saying well you're going to have to live in this neighborhood because this is the house the government wants you to have. and this is the school, failing school that your child has 0 to go to. and you have no choice. we should be the party that unapologetically says there are way too many people who are struggling and who are poor. one of the ways we need to address it is to build a country whose economy is based on the notion if you are willing to

work and work hard, you can get ahead. and it's not the government's boot that will be in your face every time you try to get your head out of the hole. there are many many in this room who understand what i'm talking about today. there was no silver spoon in my mouth. i grew up in a home like so many of you with parents and grandparents who never had a formal education. i'm the first male in my entire family linage who even graduated from high school, much less went to college. butdy have hope. and it wasn't all based on the beatles. it was based on the notion that i believed america was the kind of place where i started didn't mean that's where i had to stop. it was something else going for me, something that kept me just barely above the poverty line

and sometimes not quite the stable home. ari fleischer wrote a wonderful article in "the wall street journal" this past week and points out something validated by the heritage foundation and many others if we want to deal with poverty, the most important solution is stable families, marriage. if two parents are married -- if two parents are married, remain married, there's only a 7.5% likelihood that family will be in poverty. if the child is in the family of a single mom, there's a 34 likelihood that child will be in poverty. out of wedlock births among whites are 29%. among hispanics, 52%, among african-americans, 2%. no less than liberal daniel patrick moynihan in 1964 when he was young lawyer at the u.s.

department of labor at the unwed birth rate was in the single digits said god help fuss this ever goes to double digits because it will create a level of poverty that we cannot possibly sustain. and our tax policies or education policies that discourage marriage in the family. we ought to be creating policies that incourage the family to -- encourage the basic institution of marriage and makes it easy for people to remain involved in the lives of their family and of their children. we need to empower parents. maybe some people in america don't agree but i think most republicans understand that we much rather the children of america we be raised by mother

and father rather than being raised by uncle sam. we cannot afford to have generations of children who are under the complete tutelage and care of government when in fact what they need are parents who are empowered to make the strong decisions for them as to where they will get their education. [applause] when we do not have those options, we leave those children in a world of hurt. that is why we have to begin to come up with fiscal sanity, which we do not have. think about this. in 1913, the entire tax code of the united states was 100 pages. today, it is 74,000 pages. that is before obamacare.

with obamacare it is probably another hundred thousand pages. do not worry. nancy pelosi said we will know what is in it after we passed it. we passed it. we still do not know what is in it. obviously the people who voted on it, not one republican, the people who voted on it and pushed it on us, they do not know what is in a there. we need to remind them at election time that it was not the republicans who wasted this massive monstrosity on the people of america. it was harry reid, nancy pelosi, barack obama. since there were any for public and fingerprints putting in place, give the republicans opportunity to put something implants -- fingerprints on something that will empower families and doctors, empower nurses, and no longer shackle us

to a health care system that is unaffordable because the affordable care act has proven to be anything but. that is why it is important. that we do not take no for an answer. i think about the $431 billion in last year complying with the tax code. it did produce a thing except paper. and some accounting bills. $431 billion last her was the cost that it took for americans to comply with the tax code. i know not everyone here is a strong proponent as i am of the fair tax. it would limit -- it would tax or consumption. i realize it is a hard sell. it is a long slog. i believe that we need a fundamental change. we do not need to tweak the tax code. we need to fundamentally undo

the mess that has been created and start over with something that will help build an economy. you cannot build an economy as long as you're punishing productivity and rewarding reckless irresponsibility. it makes no sense at all. [applause] i have often said i have learned a lot by raising my children. when the kids all left, they got college educations and went off on their own, got jobs. it was a wonderful thing. the two greatest days in the parents live. the day the guy is born, the day they get out of college and off your payroll. it is a wonderful day. [laughter] something happened in our household as our kids moved away and got off on their own. we had always had dogs. we ended up not with one dog, a second dog that we ended up with, a third dog. three kids, three dogs.

the kids to this day swear that we replaced them with the dogs. they are pretty upset about it. complained a lot. they even said, we think you're placed us with the dogs. we think you love those dogs more than you loved us. to which we told them, the dogs behaved better than you guys ever did. [laughter] i did learn something from raising dogs. if there is a behavior that you want more of, reward the behavior. if there is a behavior that you want less of, consequence the behavior. you get less of it. yet the consequence it a lot as a child. that is how you change behavior. what we do in our culture?

we create an entire might cover a policy that says if you are productive we will punish you. if you work and earn something, we will tax it. if you save it we will tax it. if you invest it, we will tax it. if you invest it, then later sell it, and you make a profit, we will tax that. if you have done well and you have saved through your life, and give something left because you didn't go blow it all while you were here, even when you die we will tax that. every aspect of productivity in this country, we decide we're going to tax. that is when the government decides that what they do with our money is more valuable than what we do with our money. the message we need to send them out -- ascend to working people across america, those full by the democrats that higher taxes is a wonderful thing to see, is to tell them that when the government taxes you, that is the way of saying that they do

not value the work that you do. they value what they are doing with your money. not what you did to get it. i know people that come home every day from work bone tired, exhausted. they lift heavy things. they carry loads. their muscles hurt. the government, but wanted to tax them more, is saying what you do isn't very important. what we do as a government is so important that we are willing to take more of what you do and do with it what we think is more valuable. when is america going to say government, you do not have much to show for what you have done. you have spent money you didn't have. you bothered money that you couldn't afford to pay back. we can never pay back what they borrowed. never pay back what they have spent. a be the people who worked hard and earned the money ought to keep more of it. that is the republican message. it is on a message i am ashamed

of. i do not think is a message to any republican ought to be ashamed of. it is a message we should take to every working person in this country. i am tired of the democrats are out there for the little guy. the democrats of cap their feet on top of the little guy, keeping him the little guy. i want and to have the opportunity to be a big guy. he can't the government on his throat. obamacare is going to be the issue of the selection a matter if the president wanted to be or not. it should be. i cannot think of a better opportunity than today governorships to increase their numbers in the house, and to take the senate and finally make harry reid go sit in the back of the room and went to mitch mcconnell tells him what bills he can talk about and which ones he can't. that would be a wonderful turn in this country. [applause]

the only thing that would keep us from seeing that happen is that we would decide we would rather fight each other, them he had to fight for the people of this country deserve a different and better kind of government and barack obama, harry reid, nancy pelosi. understand, i have differences with other republicans. i do not see everything i to i would probably everyone in this room. some of you do not see everything i to eye with me. i get that. we are part of the same family. when i think about everyone in this room and he goes and votes in republican primary, if there is some differences, they are minute compared to the differences that i have with those on the other side of the aisle. after all, there are no republicans who voted to implement obamacare.

i don't have any republicans who are advocating we jack up the federal income tax. i don't know of any. i don't know any republicans who think that we ought to be a weaker nation and systematically destroy the strength of our military. i do not know of any republicans who think that we ought to unilaterally disarm not only ourselves but our friends and that we ought to go and ask friendly nations like israel to stop building that rims and don't have the guts to tell iran to stop building bombs. i know of no republicans do take that position. not one. [applause] whatever differences we have, compared to the differences that we have with the other party, they are small. that is why i have asked republicans to stop using the term rino. let's stop calling each other somehow less republican than

someone else. be for the person you are for. when i'm thinking sometimes in our attempt to fight for some level of artificial purity, i want as, did they vote on a particular standard what it means to be a republican? have you done that this week question mark i haven't seen in the papers. i am waiting. let us know if that happens this week. you are elected representatives. each of our states reelect you. you come and represent us as a party. i don't member the rnc has said here is what one must believe to the nth to be a real republican. anyone not here is a rino. if there is going to be an organization can set that standard, it is you. you are the body of policymaking for the party on the national level.

maybe you should do that. maybe you shouldn't. would certainly ask this. that we would accept the reality that if you are with me, 90%-70% of the time, you are still 70% closer to me than i am to nancy pelosi and harry reid and barack obama. i will take you any day, any time. [applause] this coming monday, i'm going to be in a remarkable ceremony at auschwitz in poland. it will be the 60th anniversary of the liberation. the majority of israeli -- is going to fly to auschwitz

accompanied by a holocaust survivor. many will be called -- many will be going back for the first time since they were children. it is going to be a powerful day, i am sure. as i think about it and anticipate what the day is going to be like, i realize the horror of what happened in that place where 1.1 million people were brutally and savagely murdered, it all started when people were devalued. when people were deemed less than someone else. when people were deemed that they were not worth as much. maybe because they were old, sick, couldn't work. sometimes, just because they were jewish.

we look back on that time in history and we think, how could educated among thoughtful people, university trained, how could a nation with all of its resources, a vast level of its population, with higher education and replaced with you do something so heinous? you realize, the only way you could end up there is that when you start that some people just aren't as valuable as you are, it is why as a believer, the one thing that i have to consular mine myself is that none of us are better than another. no one is less than any of us. if i except that after the great uman family.

surely i will be able to value the life of those who voluntarily join me in a party that i joined when i was a teenager. i am not an independent. i'm not a libertarian. i liked some things libertarians believe. i like the spunk of the independence. i don't think the democrats are even wrong all of the time. most the time, i think they are wrong. [laughter] not all of the time. by choice, i'm a republican. proudly. gladly. nd hopefully, responsibly. if i can find value in every human being on this earth, i sure as heck not going to somehow devalue the people in the political organization that

i have voluntarily decided to affix myself to, be an active part of, and be a part of this i as a teenager. that is why i asked us to fight the real battle. he real battle in this country is joblessness. it is despair. the lack of hope. it is the weakness our nation will have if we don't have strong leaders who recognize that we are exceptional, and that what god breathed into us, the life of liberty, he gave us a gift for which we must be good tewards. if we can join in that, we don't have time to fight each other. we have a bigger battle to fight and to win. thank you very much. [applause]

>> republican mike huckabee called his party to push back on democrat efforts. he went on to say if the democrats want to insult the women of america by making them believe they are helpless without uncle's sugar coming in and providing them a prescription for birth control because they can't control it without the help of the government then so bit. we'd like to get your thoughts. you can weigh in on facebook. >> now a panel of women talk about leadership in the republican party. reince priebus helped moderate this event. it's 45 minutes.

>> good afternoon. i want to welcome to you our rising stars panel. we launched the rising stars panel and our first group at our last meeting when we were last together. i am so honored to have the opportunity to be here together with our new group of rising stars and i'm honored to introduce them to our committee and the media and the world. when we are looking at what we're doing, we are not just talking to women, we are empowering women, we are training women. we are going around the country finding dynamic women that want to run for office like these women. and we're not just talking about it or talking to them. we're going out there and we are reaching them. we are training them. we are empowering them and

working with them to make sure they understand fundraising, media events, communications. whatever it may be that those individuals and these young women and more women around the country that share our principles and values, that they understand the importance of what we're going to do together. when we look at these individual, we know you are going to see them in the days ahead. these are the rising stars. this is our party's future. it is my honor to introduce the chairman of the committee. a great partner and somebody who does understand the importance of strong, principled empowered women across the country. reince priebus. >> the rising stars program is something we started about a year ago. as part of our effort on top of highlighting different voices in

our party, it's part of our more ormal effort to have different people and train different people to start speaking for our party, both regally and nationally. that we show america that we have a party that looks like america. we try to find people across the country that can help us achieve that goal, that want to step up to the plate and lead this country. that's what this program is all about and we're proud of where we're at. i want to quickly introduce the folks you see up here and just give you a little bit of background about each of them. first of all, to my right, to your left, chelsea henry serves as senior advisor to the chief financial officer of the state of florida. in 201 at the republican national convention she was highlighted in national journal, mfv among others. she was a speaker at cpac 2013

and recognized as one of bet's ten republicans to watch. she's a entrepreneur and says she is a perpetual optimist when t comes to the grand old party. that's good, you need to be. he holds a j.d. from florida coastal school of law and under graduate degree from the university of florida. please welcome chelsea henry. [applause] >> to the right of chelsea and maybe appropriate, allison howard is a conservative activist who speaks on prolife and pro-family issues. she has appeared on radio and tv outlets across the country. he currently serves as

communication direction or the for concerned women for america and speaks around the country. please welcome allison howard. [applause] > to your right, i avoided the left, to your right alex smith is national chair for the republican national committee making her the first female elected as national cr chairman in its 120 year history. [applause] >> she's a native of pennsylvania and a graduate of the catholic university of

america. she formally served as national co-chairman during the 2012 cycle and as chapter leader for the catholic university college republicans. she's a student at university school of law. welcome chairman alex smith. [applause] > and next to her is kimberly. she represents arizona's 20th legislative district in the senate sand the first asian woman in the legislature. she worked for state treasure dean martin. she also served as a member of governor schwartz schwarzenegger's can net. she and her husband are small business owners. please welcome kimberly. [applause] and the best for last we have onica young blood. she's on the board of the rslc

future majority project and was named one of gold pack's 2013 emerging leaders. she's a native of mexico and raised by a single mother. t age 19 she became a single mother but she was determined to tend cycle of poverty so she set out to give her daughter a better life. monica now runs a successful real estate business and works as a marketing consultant. she and her husband chris have two children. please welcome our new r.n.c. rising stars. [applause] we're going to have an opportunity for all of you to get up and ask questions at the mic. i'm going to ask each of our participants two questions. we'll try to move quickly and then open up the mic. first question is to chelsea s. you said you were the first republican in your family.

the first question is why and what about the republican party appealed to you? >> thank you mr. chairman. i'm chelsea henry, born and aised in jacksonville, florida. my mother had me when she was 16 years old. or the first few years of my life we were on welfare. i learned at a very early age the value of a dollar. i learned how to live on a budget. i learned the phrase delayed gratification and what that means. when there was something we wanted, we saved and planned for t. when i think about conservatism and what we stand for, what we all believe in, it's less taxes, it's smaller government. and those things resonate with me because i understand with my mom being a single parent for a decade of my life that every dollar in her paycheck

counted. i understand what it means to go to the grocery store and you want frosted flakes yet you have to get the generic brand because those 80 cents matter. i understand how it impacts lives. i'm about economic prosperity for all. i'm about a hand up and not a handout. that is what resonates with me. it's because those values of what we all believe in are the values i believe in and how i was raised. first republican in my family. no one else in my family shared the republican message. but because of the sacrifices my mother lived i understand what it means to be a conservative. since i've been involved the past few years, my mom is now a

republican so the message works. >> how can the party better connect with independent women and our conservative principles? >> thank you for having me and thank you for being here and bearing the terrible weather. i think right now there is an opportunity to reach out to women on issues that really matter to them. women make the majority of economic decisions in their households and are making a majority of the healthcare decisions as well. for me, i think it's most important for conservatives to alk to women as the smart, intelligent purpose driven women that they are. we care about so much more than the left presents to us. and pandering to us for a vote is so easy to see and women in this room all know that. if we can come around the message of upward mobility and

talk about what limited government does for women, talk about what situations they are best in economically, socially, psychologically then there is a neat way that we can message to women, reach out to them and tell them they can do better than this administration has brought to them right now. i think we're doing that. i think it's a way forward. things like this when you are showing up and you care and are concerned about so much is really important. >> thank you. alex, why is it important for republican candidates to engage with young voters but most importantly what do you think some misconceptions are that we tend to have about voters in college? >> thank you so much for this tremendous honor. these are two of the strongest youth allies that we have in the conservative movement so i thank them for their support of college republicans. i go around busting youth myths all day. a couple of them are that the youth vote was an obama henomenon. that younger voters turned out for the president because he was not cool and they are not going to turn out again. the youth group has grown 1% per president. t started out 2,000 went up to

9% in 201. let's not give the president credit for a trend that started under president bush. the youth vote is only growing. it's growing as a percentage of our electorate. another one is younger voters will get more conservative as they get older. we saw the age demographic 30-34 it was only demographic to mprove for the president in 20 -- 2012. growing upand ot getting more conservative. they are not buying a home and becoming parents because they can't afford it. again, just being sensitive to that as a political party. once a younger voter votes with a national political party twice in a presidential election, they are likely to vote that way for the rest of their life so we need to cap tour them now. these are two rounds of votes to president obama so we need to be sensitive to that. the biggest myth is that younger

voters are liberal. they are not. there was some research that found that younger voters agree with us on size and scope of government. what they don't do is connect these fundamental values about spending and the size of government to the republican party brand. that's where we need to bridge that gap. [applause] >> you are the first asian [applause] american woman elected in the arizona legislate tour and one of just a few in the entire country. what can the party do better to engage with asian voters across the country. >> there are 15 million asians in this country and growing. asian immigrants are the fastest growing ethnic group in the united states. what we are doing here on this

stage today with our rising stars is the best start that we can do which is reach out to the various communities and speak out about the great work that asian american republicans are doing from community to community across this country. what is exciting is that when we look at asian americans, they are highly educated. they are higher wage earners. and for the most part they own their own businesses. so that message, those principles of our party should resonate naturally with the asian american population. what we need to do is go out into the communities, to be able to show case people like myself who are in those legislative seats to say this is what this person is doing and they are standing for the very same values that you hold dear in your families. what is interesting in 2008 when i was a delegate at the national convention in st. paul, i looked at the thousands of people around me on that floor and there was no one that looked like me.

and that was very telling because when you look at a brand or look at a group, the person will wonder do i fit in and it's a natural response. so what they need to see in our party is they can fit in and when they are part of our group we will embrace them and we have so much to do for them. part of your strategic initiative is to be able to show case that great work. we have so many opportunities before us. these are people that we can bring back to our party. they voted higher in the george bush administration and then they left during the obama run in 2012. i believe this is the time we can bring them back in 2016. >> thank you kimberly. monica, you talked about the fact you were raised by a single mom and you wanted to end this cycle of poverty. where do you see the republican party fitting in in that fight? >> thank you for having me.

it's an honor to be here. growing up my mom was always a republican. i remember her crying when president reagan got re-elected and i didn't understand at the time. as i've grown up, although i didn't agree with her when i was younger, i understand the republican party to be the party of self-reliance, of personal responsibility, of opportunity for all no matter the color of your skin, no matter where you are from, what side of the tracks you are on. i resonate with republican party because i want to determine my worth and i want to determine my success. and one thing that my mom -- when i became a young mom which i was rebellious and didn't want to listen to my mom. she told me monica no one will ever care more than you do about your success, no government

entity or entitlement program will care more about your success than you. looking back at my community, i see that unfortunately a lot of people depend and get caught up in this cycle of dependency and never reach the success they may have dreamed of as a young erson. >> chelsea, you talked about growing up on welfare and with government assistance and going through some similar issues. what benefits, blessings, less sons did that cause you to learn from going through something like that? >> many lessons mr. chairman. and so one lesson i can say is how conservative principles work. and i say that and mean that from the bottom of my heart which is why i'm so passionate about being a republican because again every dollar counted when

i grew up, you know. when it was dinner time and we had a long day -- my mom had a long day at work, it was do i get two or three items off of the dollar menu today and that was my biggest decision of the day. those lessons have continued with me and it has allowed me to want to continue to give back and be a public servant. in 2010 i had the opportunity to run for a local seat there in jacksonville. i was elected and became the youngest female elected in my city's history. it was a big deal because for people in my neighborhood they had never known anybody on the

ballot. so when they went into the ballot box they were able to check a name of somebody they knew. somebody they can call on facebook and get a response to. when i think about the lessons, most importantly it's to give back. it's to share our message because it works. we talk about war on poverty. the answer is the conservative message. it works. [applause] >> allison you work a whole lot on campuses across the country. what kind of lessons and what can we do better to engage and what is working on your end on college campuses? >> chelsea, that was an amazing answer and i enjoy hearing everybody's stories. one of the most important things we are doing is sharing our story. just like everything they said, if you walk into some place and you don't recognize anyone that talks like you or thinks like you, you don't think you fit n. we've been working for young women american chapt terse that are college chapt terse of conservative young women that

get together each week and some of them are like a prayer group with action items. they get together and pray for the country and tell each other what is going on. people in college are in a bubble of sorts. to be informing them is what we are here to do and that's what leaders are doing everywhere to get together. a lot of them are doing thing on college campuses that you'd be really proud of. the left will tell you they only care about same sex marriage and abortion. that is not true. we have young men and women out there that are going and combating sex trafficking, that are serving the homeless. that are getting into the communities just like everyone here outlined and like the r.n.c. is trying to do and the conservatives are trying to do. it explains why conservative principles work, to elevate

yourself in a position you want to be at. as women we have unique positions, as the best talkers to communicate that we're alking all the time. what we get to do as young people especially is talk and use the platforms we have in front of us, whether that be social media, facebook, twitter, instagram, don't complain about what the p.t.a. is doing if you're not willing to go and be a part of it. i can't talk about that if i'm not willing to serve my community. college campuses we are getting young leaders pulling them in and saying it's cool to be conservative. and they are starting to see that. if we can community that to them there, is a place for them here. student loans, getting a job, what does that look like? it's hard right now for our young people.

if we can take this unique opportunity that they are seeing what big government does to their opportunities when they graduate and what their paycheck looks like if they get their first job, then conservatives will r going to have a group of young people that will fight with passion to protect that paycheck and these rinciples. >> alex, someone is running for president and they come to you and they say i want to win over college students, tell me how i can get it done. hat would you tell them? >> the answer is a simple one and one of the things we found out in our research was to go where younger voters are and give them something to share. that means channels and messages matter. channels online, going where young voters are. going to pandora. if you are talking to them in

mail, you are not reaching them. they are online. they are consuming content online and that's where we need to cap tour them. by channels, i also mean the campus. i say to candidates when we speak about best practices and tactics, if you are too afraid to go to a campus because the environmental club is going to protest you or something, you are leaving the weight of our work as a party on the shoulders of 18-year-old college republicans who have to carry it alone. so candidates must go to campus. they must engage with younger voters where they are. and the messaging matters too. i'll give you an example. in our research we found the term big government was a nebulous one with younger voters. they didn't understand what we meant.

we said how do you feel about a candidate who proposes to fight big government? they were like the windows are too big, what are you talking about. for young voters big isn't scary. big is getting a million followers on twitter and being able to send a message to them in an instant. what is scary is an intrusive government. it's about the language we use to describe this. if we talk about reducing spending. the things we mean when we say big government. e just say them differently to younger voters in a language that is relevant to them. what matters is just talking to younger voters. it's just a basic tenant of human interaction.

if someone isn't talking to you, they don't think you care about them much. we need to talk to younger voters. >> have you effectively used the prolife message to resonate with voters. ou want to talk about that a little bit? >> i have the opportunity in the senate to sponsor a lot of bills, i do education policies, and tort reform. the prolife legislation that i sponsor and i see passed in both of our houses, that is the legislation that is the most meaningful. that is the legislation that tugs at my heart strings. as a woman and a new mother of a four month old, i can relate to the issues about women and how it affects their individual lives and really about the health and safety of women when we are talking about these practices and ensuring that someone out there is standing for those little tiny babies that can't speak for hemselves. those are the things that we hare, that i share when i go

out into my community and i knock on the doors and i talk to these moms and families, they are the ones that are often making the decision for their household about who to vote for in the next election. as a woman, i really feel that we have to share that story. i often go back to, i was the sponsor of the ultrasound legislation in arizona that allows a woman who is getting ready to have an abortion to see the ultrasound image before she moves forward with that decision. i sponsored the bill that the u.s. supreme court just rejected. there was a nurse that testified on the bill and she said when she turned that monitor to this young teenage cup that will came in for an abortion, the young teenage boy put his hand over his mouth and said that's our baby.

and they ended up, that young ouple turned around and walked out of that clinic and they kept that precious child. those are the stories that matter and those are the stories that i hope to continue to share. because once they hear the significant gains that we have made in arizona with the passage of many of the prolife bills, we have decreased abortions 7% year over year. that's about 1,000 babies that have been saved. we have more work to do but this is a start and i'm proud to be a part of it. >> thank you kimberly. and the last question before we open up the mics goes to monica. we told you she's from new mexico. she's been successful running for office. eavily hispanic community.

what do you think the secret is for winning over hispanic voters? >> in new mexico we are very much hispanic population. we concentrate on talking about issues, reminding people of the american dream. it's never depicted in movies as an entitlement program. it's always achieving your goals and reaching that. governor martinez has done a great job being relatable to hispanics and to people that live in new mexico, letting them know we are important. we don't talk about party a lot of the time. we talk about issues, we talk about conservative issues across the state because we need them to vote for us and it's worked. we just elected mayor berry to his second term which had never been done before. and we will re-elect governor martinez because people in new mexico know that she is and feel like they can relate to her.

that is my advice across the nation as far as bringing hispanics in is understanding their issues, not asking them to change their party but focus on the issues that affect their families. >> what do you think about our rising stars? pretty bright, right? >> if i could say something, we saw the rising stars have done great work for us before. i'm very proud that our communications department and our committee if you look at this stage, we sent five dynamic as you've seen extraordinary women. thank you. very proud of you. thank you for all you do. >> questions? >> i live in the middle of the state where we have no major ndustry, so we are all agriculture. so immigration reform is huge for us.

ow do you as women address this? because i know we can tiptoe around issues and we can talk issues without saying we're republicans or necessarily we hit on prolife or we sort of tiptoe around some of the dangers what some people consider as dangerous subjects. how do you address when people ask your stance on immigration eform? >> why don't we start with allison and move this way? >> we don't take a position on immigration so i might not be the best to talk to on this panel. i think an easy way for us to address it is to protect the borders and enforce the law. the rnc has just said we need immigration reform to make better gains in that community.

it's something a lot of women are dealing with. it's a growing conversation. >> i think being a lot of times immigration reform is directed to latinos and latinos across our country. at a state level, you have to understand we depend on the federal government to do their job. we need to embrace immigration reform. the senate took a step in the right direction and we are waiting to see how it plays out n the house. i think at the state level, we have to look to the federal

government for guidance on this issue and really just embrace that it needs to be done and be come pass gnat in doing that. -- compassionate. >> i agree with what they said. we have to embrace immigration reform. i think there needs to be a olution and the conversation needs to continue. >> anyone else? - >> i come from arizona, the state of 1070 so i have a few things to say about immigration reform. absolutely, we need to wrap our arms carefully, diligently around comprehensive immigration reform. we cannot delay. coming from a southwestern border state, we see it every day. o the first and foremost thing

i would encourage for the developers of whatever plan we will soon see is please listen to the border states, hear us out. we need to share the issues that we deal with day in and day out. the businesses, the families, all of them are affected daily by the immigration, those who are coming undocumented across our lines. and so this is a conversation we have got to wrap our arms around. it's not easy. it's going to take some time. but as republicans i think the messaging we should have is that we are for every community. and we stand for what they want so we need to bring everyone to the table and do that successfully. >> so i represent college republicans. we don't take a formal stance on issues but this is an issue we studied carefully in our research. if voting started at age 30 governor romney would be president today. a growing number of that youth vote is young hispanics so this as an issue we studied

carefully. we found the language of compassion could go a long way starting a dialogue with younger voters, choosing carefully the words we choose and explaining our positions. > i'd like for each one to comment on what governor huckabee said at lunch today. he suggested that maybe we have a war for women and we take the offensive because we have great rising stars like we have today. >> why don't we start with alex, this war on women rhetoric, opinions on that. >> when we study the youth vote and look at the composition of a younger single female voters are a huge part of it. they have unique needs as a demographic. for example, more women are

entering into higher education and post graduate degrees than men at this point. what does that mean? it means that college affordability becomes a big issue. students loans come to the forefront. getting a job after graduation. women are not monolithic voters or centered around just a few issues. younger female voters are especially concerned about the state of the economy and in terms of creating a future for themselves and their families. >> the phrase war on swim really just a liberal democratic tactic they use in the media that cannot be proven because here we are. we are examples of women in this country. [applause] e are conservatives and we

stand for families. they cannot ever define when they use that phrase what that really means because we are real examples that live day-to-day and we stand for conservative values. we stand for business out of our homes and business. obama care will be telling. hey will see all the women across the country will see that government intrusion in the ives of our families will be enough and we will see that turn around soon enough. unfortunately we will have to work towards getting that message out that we have real examples and we are just the start on this stage. >> thank you. monica. >> i agree. i think the war on women is a tag line that just got picked up in the media and unfortunately i myself was accused of a war on women and i'm a woman and i have

a daughter and i really was very confused by the concept. but again, it was a tag line that caught. i think it was a reckless tag line because you look across the world and there are women truly suffering through a war on women. and we used it and threw it around our media did and it made it into a conservative or democratic issue where it shouldn't have been. >> when i heard war on women, i ould just think to myself what war on women. you have five amazing young women up here who are contributing to their communities, contributing to

their state, contributing to the party, so what this is about is just a normal political rhetoric. but what we show here today and what you've done mr. chairman is shown we are for women, we are for women being in leadership. i think about governor martinez, governor haley. let's highlight the fact they are in office. [applause] we have two representatives with us here today. that's the war for women. we are showing them we don't have to use the word war. it's about what do our results show. >> i think that's a good question and really relevant. so the war on women, speaking to that is the left attempt to narrow women down to one issue voters. that is not true. on both sides women look at a broad spectrum of issues, fiscal, economic and social. but the war for women is an attempt for women's vote. it's a huge voting block and we should be honored so much that people are trying to figure out what we care about enough to speak to us. conservatives have an opportunity speak to women about he broad spectrum of issues, not just one. because the question is in this country right now what are you

willing to pay for? the president's health care law has put that before us. what are you willing to pay for. and for many of us, for many families i'm not willing to pay for someone else's anything because it's tight. especially something i might morally disagree with and religiously disagree with. the war on women is little sisters of the poor. that group of catholic nuns who was forced to sue the administration because they were being asked to fund something they disagree with. and this administration is forcing catholic nuns to play for birth control when they've taken a vow of chastity should enrage us as men and women protect or thes of life. if we can take that back on our terms and explain we are the party of passion and restoring dignity, i think we're doing that. it doesn't look like politics and policy. it looks like demanding dignity

and honesty in the media, demanding dignity and honesty in the music your children are listening to and demanding honesty and authenticity in those speaking to women. we are not monolithic. we care about so many issues. the conservative party is the one willing to talk to women bout those issues. > i'm national committee woman from connecticut and i'm a ember of the resolutions

committee. yesterday we passed a resolution, it was initially entitled the war on women, we changed it, i can't remember to what. however, we are focused mostly on life issue. in my experience, there is not much talk among women about the glass ceiling. it goes beyond that. it always comes down to the life issue. now i noticed yesterday at the rally there were many young people in support of life which is quite a change. last night new polls came out, i think it was a fox news poll but 48% of americans polled were prolife, 45 pro-choice. and what we emphasized in the esolution yesterday were the statistics on how many people support parental notification. maybe a 24 hour waiting period. what do you call that test you have? so in my experience, effort we address issues on women, it lways comes down to the choice

issue. sharon, you came to a luncheon in connecticut last summer. what did the ladies talk about? life issue. so hopefully the entire membership will pass that resolution tomorrow. thank you. >> bill. >> thank you for bringing forth such wonderful rising stars this time and before. we understand how important it is for to us get the youth vote and female vote if we are going to win. how important is it to have a youthful person or female on the ticket in 2016 and do you see one being more important than the other? > i like the juxtaposition

female or youthful. i think it's important people see someone they believe in something they believe in, whether that's a male or female people understand this is the person that runs the country and deals with international affairs. people are looking for someone that speaks up for what they believe in at the end of the day. >> i agree. why not have a youthful woman. why not put them together? it's about someone they can relate to, that they can trust and that they can believe in. >> i think it's about being relatable and i think we still on policy we still need to talk about policy. being relatable is important to young people and as women i think too. >> i absolutely agree that if we are going to be politically strategic in the 2016 elections

and if hillary clinton is one of their candidates then we need to consider a woman on our ticket. it's easy to do because there are a lot of leaders you can choose from. what will be very important is to really place that female element. because when we were talking about the importance of showing our party as a compassionate one, that's what a woman can do on that ticket. >> when we talk about the youth vote, we are talking about young female voters and young hispanic voters. those are huge subsets of the youth voters. in terms of having someone that will be attractive to both young people and females, we are really talking about one in the same when we talk about the demographic.

authenticity is tremendously important, just being who you are. if you are not talking to younger voters about that true self-, about your position, explaining to them, showing up on their campus and running a thoughtful media strategy and advertising to them online, they are not going to be able to see that. the candidate who goes to where younger voters are is going to be the candidate that succeeds. >> real and authentic is key. with the communication we have now in this country and among young voters, all of us now, real and close has to be the case in order to make a connection. last question to jason, go ahead. >> thank you mr. chairman. this goes to monica and kimberly. i'm first generation american. my family is from the island of jamaica. those who come from the island are very conservative and don't identify with the right party. my question is how were you able to remove the d and r and connect to people on a one-on-one basis and if there

was one particular issue, what was that issue to help your message connect? >> for me, it was really talking about the american dream and prosperity. we talked about the housing bubble. i talked about we saw a lot of foreclosures in our state and when you talk to people about how people walk away from their homes and are getting bailed out, people really resonated with that. the life issue, that's another issue with conservative democrats in our state that they will relate to us with. when you go back to the american dream and freedom pros sper, that is where we identify with each other. i don't ask anyone to change their party. i ask them to think about the things i stand for and vote with me or for me if they agree. >> i share a personal story how my grandfather opened up a small

business in the heart of pittsburgh and my grandfather opened up a grocery store in phoenix, arizona. they came with nothing to this country but they were brave men that did this for their families and future. eating at a restaurant, i'll talk to a local restaurant owner and they'll find out i'm a republican and an asian and they don't understand. i'm a strange animal. and i'll share we have a lot in common. we own businesses and i ask them do you want that hard earned money that you work so hard for every day, do you want the government to take that out of your pocket or do you want to keep it and use it the way you want to use it? just having that conversation with these individuals one by one, face to face puts a personal element and we can bring them over one by one that

way. >> we clearly hit a home run with our rising stars here in washington, d.c. we're going to work with the rising stars throughout the entire year and as i said earlier, the plan here is to show america what we've done, what success has been out there in our party. we've had a lot of success. i think sometimes our party is lousy at bragging on it. we've got to do a better job. this is part of that effort to bring new faces and new voice as cross this country to speak for the republican party. thank you all foring with here. we have a lot more events coming today and tomorrow. od bless you, thank you.

>> f.b.i. director will talk to law enforcement officials at the national sheriff's association meeting tomorrow morning. and on c-span 3 kentucky governor will talk to the healthcare organization families u.s.a. about medicaid expansion. watch live coverage at 10:00 eastern. >> watch our program on first lady barbara bush saturday on c-span followed by a recent interview with her at her home in houston at 8:30. and monday our series continues. >> bill came right after graduating from yale in 1973 and hillary came a year later. her career began right oh outside this building where she was a professor and taught

classes. hillary was a well educated ivy league law school grad. >> first lady hillary clinton monday night at 9:00 eastern on c-span and c-span 3 and c-span radio and cspan.org. >> next a conversation on women and poverty. we'll hear from nancy pelosi. the atlantic a woman's nation organization and the center for american progress co-hosted this forum on the latest findings of the shriver report on women. >> today we'll be discussing

>> today we will be discussing those issues with the foundation. we will hear from maria shriver and others as we talk about the fundamental question. why are millions of working women in america more economically vulnerable than ever before, and what can we as a nation do about that? i would like to extend a special thank you for you all for joining us at the museum. hopefully the fog will lift and we can see the capital outside. i would also like to thank you joining us online. i give a special welcome to c- span viewers who are with us today. many thanks for those who organized the shriver report. our gathering today is made possible by the generous support of our underwriters. i would like to give them a special thanks as well. many thanks to them for helping

make this gathering possible. as all of you know i hope, for 155 years the atlantic has been covering the largest societal issues facing america. in our earliest year we were very much on the issue of slavery and the abolition movement. we have written about women suffer it. we have written about civil rights, and we have written more recently about same-sex marriage. this is very much appropriate that maria shriver and her team approach the atlantic. we were honored to have them here but also for the coverage on the report and related materials. you will find a terrific piece maria authored called "the female face of poverty." you will also find other strong women's voices particularly on our channel called the sexes launched in 2012.

that is a digital for him for conversations ranging from gender dynamics in the court case to portrayals of men and women in pop culture. i invite you to look at that site. also in the magazine you will find strong female voices and terrific coverage, including major cover stories that have changed the conversation. voices and terrific coverage, including that haver stories changed the conversation. women cannot have it all and a piece called the end of men. oath of those will be with us today along with many other strong speakers, men and women including senator deliver and -- pelosi gillibrand, nancy , and tony porter. today we will have them all discussions and video presentations as we discussed

public and private-sector practices intended to prevent american women from living on -- from achieving long-term security. we would like to ask you to turn off your cell phone. keep your questions short. we ask you follow us on twitter and asked westerns there. you can use #what women need. you will find a comment card, and we really welcome your feedback on today's program. i would like to welcome one of the leaders in creating the shriver report. just prior to being president,

he served as ceo of. served in the obama and clinton administrations and work in think hank. for healthas advisor and human services, working on president obama's health reform team in the white house. she was named one of the most influential women in washington by a sister publication, national journal. we are delighted to be working with them. >> thank you for that kind introduction and for the partnership with atlantic. we are very proud of this day, and atlantic gives us so much ability to communicate these ideas and gives us such innovative ideas.

at the core of our mission is expanding opportunity for all americans. we believe when all americans have a fair shot we are better off, and that is why the work we have done with maria shriver on this book and this project have been so important and so critical, because ensuring that women who are one paycheck away from poverty or already in poverty themselves, ensuring they have real opportunity we believe will ensure their families do better, our countries do better, our communities do better, our businesses do better, and that we are really all better off. we honestly believe as a guiding principle that just because you are down does not mean you are out in america. that is a critical principle. it is something that guides our work, but it is also personal to

me. i grew up the child of two immigrants. we came from india decades earlier. we lived in a house in massachusetts, which is a middle-class typical town. when i was five my errands got divorced, and my dad left. my mother was on her own, and immigrant. she had never worked, never held a job before, and she faced a tough choice of going back to india or going on welfare. she had two children to support. it was a tough choice, but she knew if she went back to india she and her children would face stigma for the rest of their lives. then nobody got divorced in india. they don't get divorced much now. tough choice to stay in this country and go on welfare. on food stamps.

we got section eight housing. we were lucky. bedford,ble to stay in and i was able to go to bedford schools. my mom eventually got a job as a travel agent, and i remember days in which i got sick and had to go to school because she couldn't risk losing her job. sometimes there were days when i and just from school stayed home in our apartment he goes there was no one there, and i amouldn't leave her job. very proud to say that after a few years she got a string of that are jobs, and by the time i was 11, she was able to buy her own house in bedford, i amchusetts, and incredibly proud of her. i know it is not just her courage that got us through all that. there are a variety of programs , notwere available to us

but to help us get out of problems we had. there are people who believe in expanding opportunity for all americans, and i think it is so appropriate we recognize those programs are working to help me be herep you like -- help people like me be here today, and i am so grateful because opportunity has been available for me, and i think it is important we expand that opportunity to more and more americans. and you read the materials listen to these women's stories, all they want is a little help to do right by their families. want us to do the work for them. they are working pretty hard. they just need that extra help,

and in a country as great as ours, it seems that is an easy ask, so we at the center for american progress are they full to join maria in this effort. thatve a fantastic team has been working it seems like decades on this project. we honestly believe the book not just fortant conversation but for real policy from paid family leave to increasing the minimum wage. we hope this initiative will move from important conversations to real policy that place that is hopefully clearing out we will be able to see today. this project would not have

happened without the incredible vision, foresight, leadership of maria shriver. as i have said, her spirit has been with this in every way, thinking of new ways to communicate with evil but also visionary ways to lift these voices up. all of these women have a friend in maria shriver. we are thrilled to work with her. great honor to introduce maria shriver. [applause] >> thank you. good morning, everybody. every morning my kids know i start with meditation. i will not walk through what i say, but there are always two lines. i say, today they there be peace

within, may i trust i am exactly where i need to be. i believe i am exactly where i am meant to be, right here this morning with everyone who has made the effort to be here and forith the atlantic the center for american progress, listening to you standing up here brought tears to my eyes. her story about her mother, to have the courage to tell that story, to tell it about her mother, to tell it about her family and that she stands here today as the leader of one of the great think tanks in this country, doing incredible work is a testament to her mother's work and her own. she's denser representing the 42 million women represented in this report, in the 28 million

children who depend upon them. they are not statistics. they are human beings with real hopes, real dreams, and that really was the mission of everyone who worked on this project. there is an incredible team of people who have been working for years led by karen ann olivia morgan, roberta hollander, danielle, melissa, , all of whom meera have worked so hard and all of .hom share the same mission what united these teams and what united everybody who wrote for this report and who has been working the front lines of humanity is the believe that these women cannot only lift themselves up but lived their entire families and putting

then at the center of economy is not just good for women. it is good for men. it is good for boys and girls. it is good for the country. that is the purpose of this report, to change old stereotypes, to put a new face to this issue and to talk about it in ways people can understand and see themselves, and what we have seen and what we have heard with all the coverage on andvision and with inks appreciation to beyoncé, who has put this out into spheres i did not know existed, and what i toe heard with the responses in bc, this is my story. it is not about the glass ceiling. the foundation. it is not a story against men but including men. what isstory about not

good for girls or boys but what is good for women, about the incredible struggles they face to be breadwinners, to be caretakers and caregivers. i want to bank all of you for coming here. interestyou have the in the subject, that you believe we can be a more compassionate, caring country. i really believe that. we have tremendous power to move this nation and move that hill. in a uniquere position. lyndon johnson called up daddy and said, you are going to lead the war on poverty. my dad was like, what is that? i need to talk to my family. he said, don't you have any balls?

this project took a lot of balls. what daddyo much of s, yet thereo work is still work to be done because the american family has changed, and we talk about that in this report. 70% of women not having one sick day. we can do better, and we will do better. i have no doubt about that. i don't want to spend a lot of time, but i want to introduce this video called "she's the one." really is the one. millions of women are starring in it. look, there is a picture of me

with president obama up there. that was really exciting. if he said yesterday, i am impathetic to these issues, understand these issues, and i want to make a difference on these issues, we will. i want to thank you. i hope you believe you are where you need to be today. have peace within, and i hope you will be able to take in all this material in your head, and your heart, and that you will leave here today believing you are part of the solution. "she's the one? ♪ >> there are 42 million women like this one and this one and .his one

you see her everyday. one house down or one desk over. childreneaching your or going back to school herself. she works hard to hold down a job or even two, to provide and also without a partner, to juggle the needs of young children and elderly parents, be the backbone of her family. she's the one doing it all because she has two. -- she has to. she is one missed paycheck, one sick child, one broken down car away from losing it all. you may know this wife. she might be a lot like you.

she could be looking to shatter the glass ceiling or just to this one andeet. the millions like her make up the foundation of our country. keeps our families moving, our community going, and our economy growing. the 128 million kids depend on. help lift her up. we are the ones. story visit the website. tell us what women need now. welcome sister joan. -- please welcome sister joan.

>> what do we do with what we just heard. it was written, the only effort is to construct the future. that is the only reason all of us are here today, to talk together about what each of us can do to create a new future for women. why? even now when men are still being made and visible everywhere. women are being denied the resources they need to become who they are. the world is being denied the resources of women. their mission is being ignored. their wisdom is demeaned. as a result, two thirds of the hungry of the world are women.

two thirds of the illiterate of the world are women. two thirds of the poorest of the poor everywhere are women. that can't be an accident. that is a policy, and that policy must change. decided womenhere are worthless. the world was not made as it should be. the world was made as it could be. the great spiritual task we are faced with today is how to complete what creation began, a world of bounty for everyone, a world where justice is defined by equal the, not gender, and a world where all of us can never be whole until we respect the rest of us.

at thisen need is moment at the top of this worldin to shout to the that everyholy truth law passed, every national time must be evaluated as much through the eyes of women as it has the ambitions of men, and you and i must take responsibility today for seeing that it is done. taskcient story makes that even clearer. before the holy one on the prayer rock came the beaten and the broken. god, the prayer cried, if you are a loving god, why don't you do something for these? back.swer came i did do something.

i made you. it is true nothing we do changes trueast, but it is also everything we do changes the future. we are asking ourselves today for the sake of our daughters, for the sake of the world, we must do something to construct a better future for women all of us can become what we are truly meant to be, men of conscious and women of courage, because that is what today is really about. [applause] welcome barbie, melissa, christine. [applause]

>> this is my story. i am a mother who knows what it is like to force your children to bed at night without a meal because we didn't have anything for them. five years ago i was living in a house with no heat, and because of frigid conditions my son was going blind. i was constantly in the emergency room with him, and when i would go in the emergency room, a lady would ask emma do you have a working stove? do you have heat? i saidme she would ask, nothing. until the day they told me my son needed surgery, and it would require needles to go into his eyes to try to salvage his vision. on that day i told the woman how i had no heat. i told her how the father was in jail, how i

as in an abusive relationship. i told her things i had never told anyone before. a few months later i met a doctor. she offered me a free camera and asked me to take pictures of my life. what started off as just me later turned into two of my 40 women and is now all over the country. she called the project witness to hunger. our mission was to let legislators know exactly whom their decisions are affecting, and what it is like to be a woman of low income. not only was i featured in a documentary about hunger in but i also got a job. here i was, this woman of low income in the system receiving

lfare. it would have helped many families who needed assistance. today i am a full-time college student on a full scholarship. my dream. my dream is to finish college with a masters degree. try to turn struggles into success. [applause] >> hi, my name is marissa, and this is my story. eight up in a section development in a middle income community in new york. my whole life. i married my high school sweetheart and joined the military. there we decided to

start a small family, and we came home stateside. brooklyn. back to to look for i had housing, and it up on social services, and had a hard time finding a place to stay on a fixed income. i couldn't get the job for the simple fact that i had no place to stay, and i didn't have child care. to find ae important place to stay. to stay, it a place made things easier. up. ings a lot of emotions i am sorry. basically what happened is i took two years to find an affordable apartment.

trains in thef neighborhood to see if there mye places i wanted to raise children. i asked what is this neighborhood like? is it safe? is it decent? people told me, you don't want to live here. years, and io stumbled onto section eight housing, which helped stabilize my entire life. i was able to get a job in my i currently serve on several boards that advocate for affordable housing. yes, social services has been there for me. i have been employed the whole time. shrunk since ive have been there.

my dream is to be able to run for office to help other families put them in a position where they can become stable for tomselves so they don't have struggle the way i did. hello, my name is christina. this is my story. we went through many struggles. i eventually left home at a young age, and by 18 i was you may see a did. -- emancipated. everything around me. i had my first son omar at 20. we lived with his father's family in a house with no water, no electricity. pregnant with was

my daughter angelica. we went to a homeless shelter. , no familyme support. i had nothing. i put my with it children in the head start program. they offered me a job as a classroom aide. and they paid for my schooling and eventually i became a group teacher. i got my first low-income apartment at that time. i answered into classes, a $1-1 program. and eventually it led me to homeownership and even though i was classified in high school as a remedial student, in may i will be graduating with my bachelor's degree from in behavioral science. i am now a homeowner of seven years and i work in a doctor's office. my dream is to further my

education and receive a master's degree in social service and help women who have truggled the way i have. [applause] >> my name is alnida and this is my story. i was born in st. mary parrish, louisiana, the 11th of 13 children. to parents who made it off of a alary of $27 a week, for two weeks, in the local nearby sugar cane field. i always wanted to go to college. but i kept taking detours. after a shotgun weding to my husband, gabriel, an army veteran, i had my first child at age 17, and four more after that. gabriel also dreamed of going to college. but with a wife and five children to support, he found a job at the local ship yard