as the new american majority. a group of political strategists and consultants spoke at the net roots nation conference about engaging minority voters and encouraging progressives to run for office. the panel includes the bernie's anders campaign advisor, who explains why they won with people of color under 35. this is about an hour and 15 minutes. aimee: good afternoon, everyone. thank you for joining us today at netroots nation, new politics of the new american majority. we have such an amazing panel of experts in conversation coming up for you today. there are two things we need to be thinking about in the middle of this important election year. we have a presidential campaign that's being settled with next week being the republican national convention and the week following the democratic national convention. we have a senate campaign that

will determine whether the democrats will wrest control in the senate. we have so much at stake. but what we found is that our politics need to evolve. that our political system -- how campaigns are run, who are the prime voters, what are the issues, how do we talk about and talk to our voters, how do we strategize to win as a progressive movement, all of those things are directly influenced by how dramatically our demographics have changed. and the fact that, elect orally -- andtorally speaking we saw that in the book "brown is the new white" by steve phillips -- that we actually have the numbers to win. we have the electoral majority, comprised of those who reelected president obama in 2012. and those who continue to move

to the united states into a country that is majority people of color. that is the reality in seven states and will be the reality, in just a couple of decades, across the country. this new american majority, this multiracial, progressive electoral majority, will need new strategies in order to engage and make sure that not only our politics reflect the new strategies, but our leadership and our issues ,eflect the hopes and dreams and the vision, of those of us who are the majority in this country. so this session is about a new kind of politics that goes deep into how we run our political system and our vision of who should be involved and who should be the center, not only in democratic party politics, it's bigger than that, but in the vision for the party's future. i am extremely thrilled to have a panel of national experts in the new politics for a new

american majority here. first, i'm aimee allison, senior vice president of power pac plus, an organization, pac, that promotes the new american majority politically and has recently released "democracy in color," a multimedia platform as -- that's the voice of the new american majority. we have a blog, a podcast. the idea is for us to examine these kinds of issues. today, the recording will be on a future "democracy in color" podcast, as well as your questions. we will spend about an hour in conversation, and then we will invite your questions, coming up. so, to introduce our panel, first i want to introduce sayu bhojwani, the president of new american leaders project, the only organization in the country

that's dedicated to bringing new americans into the political process. please welcome sayu. [applause] chuck rocha is president of solidarity, the largest person of color political consulting firm in the country. -- nation. the largest. please, thank chuck for joining us. [applause] and carol mcdonald, senior strategist with 76 words, a democratic media firm owned by women and people of color. thank you so much for joining us. [applause] so, i would like to do this. i would like each one of our esteemed panelists to talk with us a couple of moments. then we will come together in conversation. sound good? all right. looking forward to the conversation. let's begin with chuck.

chuck: thank you, and thank you all for not staying in your lunch too long and coming here. i will talk about probably one of the most important issues to me, personally. a man of color who has worked in campaigns for 25 years. my first election was in 1994. i won't tell my age. i shaved all of my gray hair off. my first election was ann richards. as you can tell, i am not from st. louis or washington, d.c. i am from texas, hence why i speak like an old white man. but a person of color sounding like an old white man is the new american majority. we common all shapes and sizes from all over the country. what is the new american majority? who is this rising american electorate? we are a young people. we are people of color. we are lots of different multi -generational multiethnic.

, we are who america talks about a lot but our politicians , do not talk to. this slide should show you the different faces, when i was thinking about the new american majority. it was these faces, and these faces for a reason. it was these faces because all of these people are either current or former employees of mine. solidarity strategies has hired 54 different people in the six years we have been in existence, and over 50 of those were people of color. the ones in red are current employees. when we put staff together, we wanted it to reflect america. luis who was born in mexico. roberto, my vice president, now a managing director at a women of color pr-firm. even kira, former miss america, whose family is from russia. she is an immigrant.

kwami, whose father is from africa and came as a refugee. and keilyn, the latino vote director for hillary clinton. what do you get when you work with people with like mindedness as your own? you can be inspired share your , ideas. my staff brings me new ideas every day. i learned the way the modern new young person of color thinks -- person of color actually looks at politics. solidarity strategies was actually one of the firms behind bernie sanders. bernie sanders spent more money on people of color-owned firms than anybody in the history of presidential primary elections.

hired more people on firms to do any consulting than anybody in the history of president and that presidential primary elections. my firm was the biggest recipient of that. he did not hire solidarity strategies to talk to other brown folks or other folks like myself. we did the general electoral work. we got to sit at the table. when we were having breakfast when you put us in charge of , hiring, guess who we hire? more folks like us. that makes us better as a campaign. some of the tactics we will talk about of why bernie sanders did as well as he did with people under 35, including people of color under 35, how did a white man from vermont, a self-avowed socialist, win people under 35? -- people of color under 35? they are normally not your prime voters. why was he winning these people? because we targeted them and we went and talked to them. yes, we had a lot of money to go

figure out different models. let's take one state where everybody signed up on a website, if they loved bernie sanders in oregon or texas. let's talk about texas. red-ish state of red. year, 157,000this people had signed up on the bernie sanders website in just texas. guess what we did. we took all of those names, addresses, and phone numbers and created models of people who are likely bernie sanders supporters. guess what model they did not fit in? they do not fit in your campaign in a box. the reason our new american majority gets overlooked is that they may not be the prime voter. they may not fit in the box of who the persuadable voter should be. "oh, they're black, or brown, or asian." if they have never voted, we are not going to talk to them. if they vote, we will move them over to the gop universe that talks to them at the very end.

bernie sanders did not operate his campaign that way. one reason was he would not win the primary with regular democratic voters. they were locked down for hillary clinton, as they should have been. he had to expand his universe, and but he did it this way. mostly, they expand into suburban housewives, folks who are marginalized. that is never any of us. so we will talk about that strategy. lastly, nontraditional approach where thousands of new registrants in four months. in oregon, there were 121,000 new registers. this week in florida, the florida nine, the orlando area, i polled that there were 13,000 latinos who had some voting history. back to your number. we always do, right? but because i am running the campaign, i said let's check how many new people of color have registered there in the last six months because of the presidential primary, whether hillary or bernie -- 8500 people

of color, in just this c.d. they had registered in the six months. no one will ever target those people because they have never voted. we are. i will send mail. love sending them some mail. that is how daddy gets paid. we will send mail. we will also call and send digital advertising, to see if they are interested in a young state senator by the name of darren soto. he will run for the congressional seat. that's only because the old mexican is running the campaign. that's the difference here. when we are in charge of doing this, at every level, we think outside of the box. what we will talk about is that change. and i will turn it over to the next people, and we will talk about some of the strategies and how you put them into of that. -- into effect. up wast slide we put some of the digital and mail and peer-to-peer hiring strategies we have.

hiring beautiful people to deliver that mess to generate power away. [applause] aimee: carol mcdonald. >> yeah, carol. carol: oh, hey, hey, i brought my fan club. let me take a few minutes to switch my powerpoint slides. how are we doing today? all right. thank you. thank you. i am from the south, so that is very important. we practiced before we got here. that's fine. my presentation had both my prompts and a cute picture of my daughter, because i always say, when i come to things like netroots, i always feel like i am in a room of experts. so i hope i have something new to impart to you. when my presentation goes sideways, i always turn to the

picture of my girl, because she adorable and that is a good way to deflect. i am carol mcdonald. i work at a firm called 76 words. one of the things i want to piggyback off of what chuck mentioned is we are a firm owned by women and people of color. there are four of us. me, an african-american women, a latino woman, and a latino man, and one white guy just for good measure. there are few media firms that look like us. some of our other staff and interns are all young people of color. what that does for us is it changes the way we have a conversation. it changes the way we think about our clients and how we represent them, both our clients and our clients not of color. one of the things i noticed when i am in spaces like netroots,

although i will give this organization a lot of credit over the last few years of being deliberate about diversifying participants as well as presenters. i have been doing politics and political work 20 years now. you go to places, our firm is d.c., likeington, america votes. i was recently at a campaigns and elections conference where i was asked to speak on this topic. a lot of what i hear from fellow consultants -- and this is going to be a loving calling in of our community and people who do this work -- is that you have a lot of white consultants, particularly who are in messaging and media, like i am, and they talked about how they take their general message they have developed for whatever campaign or candidate and how to adapt it to communities of color. how do we adapt it for a latino

audience. how do we adapt it for a younger audience? as we have talked about before, if the demographics of our country are shifting, and the demographics of voters are becoming more black and brown and young, why are they the side audience and why are we not treating them as a main audience? when you treat them as a primary audience, then everything has to shift. everything has to look different than what it does now. i think we have gotten to the where we are at a tipping point point and we can no longer votersr black and brown and young voters as a secondary audience. chuck mentioned, as we look at non-traditional approaches and dig deeper into the voter profile and stop looking for those voters who have voted consistently in the last 3, 4, 5 elections and look at new registrants, it changes the picture completely. i really wanted to show -- what

i do is messaging and media. what i have an example of is "how does the product differ?" when voices of color and women and young folks and unmarried folks and those of us in nontraditional blended families, when we are at the decision-making table of what the message looks like, what are the differences? so once some of our other speakers have gone, i will try to figure this out. because the interactive part of this exercise is how to look at us and help us illuminate and point out what some of those differences are. i have a very amazing clip i want to share with you. but before i let go of the mic, i want to acknowledge one of our clients who is in the room. that is tishaura jones. she is the city treasurer in st. louis and is running for reelection.

i am super thrilled our firm will help her in that effort. what we need are more tishaura's of the world, moving a little bit away from talking about the electorate and those of us in office and running for office. she has been a tremendous asset to the city of st. louis. again, as a black woman brings a different perspective to the politics, one very much needed. so we are thrilled to support candidates like her and building out a actually building deep practice of supporting women of color, particularly black woman, as they seek elected office. let's snap for that. [applause] what? what? i will turn this over to my fellow panelists and then try to find a mouse to make this work. aimee: all right, thank you. ok sayu, sayu bhojwani. ,

sayu: i have my own show and tell. they are live. there's three alum from the project here today. they did not know they were going to be called out, but i will call them out because then you guys can call me out if i say things that aren't true. jessica rubio, ernesto -- [applause] carol: look for them on the ballot from arizona and orange county. i am sayu bhojwani, founder of the new american leaders project. i want to take a little bit about why i started the organization and what we do. the thought is i am doing the long view, but actually, we have 30 people on the ballot, mostly in arizona and orange county, which are core areas we have been working in over the last few years.

in 2008, when we are in the middle of another exciting presidential election, i was sitting around the table in d.c. with immigrant rights advocates. we were beating ourselves up again about what had gone wrong in 2006 and 2007 and how we were going to fix that with a new president and how we were going to get immigration reform in the first year and first term if president obama won. well, here we are eight years later with no immigration reform. so, at the time when we were having a conversation i realized , we were constantly blaming ourselves when it was not the immigrant rights community that where the problem. it was the people in office who were the problem. we needed to change who was in congress but who was in office at the local and state level to build that pipeline to congress. so that's what we do train , people to run for office

because they are deeply connected to their communities, understand the experiences of their communities, and can win campaigns and govern in ways more responsive to immigrants and people of color. there are three strategies i think are central to the way we do our work. one is we do not see immigrants as an outreach strategy. we see immigrants, first, second, third generation -- anyone who identifies with that experience -- as core and central to the work we do. the way we do that work is to conduct our campaign training in a way that was designed for this population. not "here is campaign training, here is how we have always done it, and now let's get more diversity." our strategy is one about inclusion that says here is campaign training where you can talk about your immigrant experience in a way that can affect and reach voters of all backgrounds in a value-based

framework. you can talk about targeting in a way that is not just about prime voters, but also about low and new propensity voters. and you can fundraise, even in communities portrayed as low income and as "takers, not makers". you can create opportunities for those folks to feel like they are part of american democracy. in terms of the story, donors, we are really doing campaign training in a different way that is designed with the immigrant community front and center as the key linchpins of changing the way democracy works here. so that is the first thing, not seeing immigrants as an outreach shortage, where you plop down an existing program. the second is that we reframe the conversation around policymaking as not just how you create a policy and then go and translate it or figure out how to get out to immigrant communities and tell them about that policy. what we are saying is that we create policy that is now much more -- that can be more

cognizant of who america truly is. 38% of the country are people of color now. 38%. so when you talk about policymaking in america, you can't the talking about policy in a certain old frame and then say let's go get it out to latinos and asian americans and african americans. you really have to design policy in a completely different way, so up turning what we are doing from the very beginning. and the third thing is to put the "public" back in "public service". although that sounds like a sound bite, it is really a critical component of how we train and support people who run for office. because one of the things we heard over and over from people is "i got a lot of support when running for office, and then i got put into office, and people were like bye, we will check in with you and make sure you pass all of the policies that we want you to pass" -- but that is not

how it works. politics is politics for a reason. you have to learn how to play the game at a certain level. and so part of our job as an organization is not just to train people to run for office but also to support them when , they get into office. to help them remember and help them understand what it means to be a movement builder once you are an elected official. because we are training movement builders and we want them to keep those guys once they are in office. those values are like continuing to engage your constituency. continuing to create a feedback loop, so you're hearing from folks are about what they need. being kind of a constituent relations officer in a way. if you are at a very local level, you are responding to every day constituent needs , and by doing that understanding what they need from you as a policy maker. for the purposes of emphasis, i want to share that i said 38% of the country are people of color

-- only 14% of our state legislators are people of color. 14%. we have a big gap. it is actually a smaller gap in congress. i think more people look at high profile races, but i think all of you in this room, and certainly those of us on the panel, believe state and local is where the action is. the last point i will make is that there is not a single state legislature today that has a proportionate number of asian and latinos proportionate to its population. not one. not one single one. not even california. not even hawaii. not even new mexico. those states i mentioned because they have a high proportion of latinos, for example, in new mexico. a high proportion of asian americans in hawaii, but in terms of being commensurate with the population, there is not a single state. so we have a long way to go to just to catch up, never mind be ready for 2020.

we all know it is not just about numbers and faces. it is also about the need and responsiveness to our communities. so i do want to end on that, the journey is not just about getting diversity, but about creating a more inclusive conversation, both about representation, but also about policymaking. thank you. [applause] aimee: i have so many questions. i want to start with the new politics part of this conversation, and i want to invite everyone here on the panel to be in the conversation, so just jump on in. i am from a big family, so feel free to do that. i want to start with some of the comments you suggested, all of you actually. we have a political system that is broken and that is not really addressing and engaging the new american majority. what is your assessment about

the things on the top of your list? the things that make you crazy and are damaging in terms of holding and engaging this electorate and what you would do to fix it? sayu: you want me to go first? aimee: i want you to go when ever you want to go. sayu: many things drive me crazy, but i am concerned that the progressive movement has not invested in the long term and is still, frankly, not interested in investing in long-term pipeline development. we don't find school boards sexy. you throw a fundraiser for a congressional candidate and lots of people come. this star-fucking, if you'll i think thatd -- whole sort of obsession with the

person at the top of the ticket extends beyond the presidential. it is also the congressional. so what happens is we get a very shortsighted strategy. we get excited about the -- in 2014, there were three or four major races with latinas, and none won. it was distressing and disappointing, but it was really be long-term investment and we are not interested in it. aimee: is that on your list, carol? carol: absolutely. one of the things that drive me crazy. we have known for decades -- we said this time and time again -- that voters of color, black voters in particular, have a history of being taken for granted. the assumption is that because the candidate on the other side is so terrible that it automatically becomes the motivator for turnout. that is absolutely not true. it will be interesting to see how that plays out in this election. i think you all saw the other day that apparently trump has 0% support in ohio and pennsylvania.

and then so folks on this side are saying that is great. however, that does not necessarily mean those black voters in those states will turn out for the democratic candidate. and it goes back to sayu's point about long-term investment. it is not just lacking on the pipeline side, it is lacking everywhere. in every single cycle i have been doing this work -- and i have been doing this work for out the need point for long-term investment in communities of color, talk about the turnout. and here we are in july, still. i work with a lot of the organizations that are already here existing and in place that work on doing political work in communities of color. and they are still underfunded in july of a presidential year. like, what the fuck? we can't start building the show now. we should have started in july

of last year. the fact that organizations, --tiatives, collaboratives why are we not making it rain on them? these are the folks on the ground. these of the folks who have the relationship. these are the folks who are in communities. it takes time to scale up and run large-scale programs. that is what we need to turn folks out. -- you we have this know, when you compare the left to the right, we understand there is a significant funding gap, right? the right, generally, has the capacity to raise more money than we do. and so we always rely on people power. but that takes time and investment, and that is not something you can turn on a dime. aimee: when i learned that black

women in 2012 were the demographic, more than any other race or gender, with the highest voter turnout, upon which president obama's reelection hinged, and the democrats are absolutely dependent on black women in particular to turn out in large numbers. the fact that groups like higher heights, who focus on engaging candidates,men as were underfunded is not logical. chuck, what is on your list? what is on the list of things that have to change it like stat. chuck: we can be there all day, if you want to go through the rocha list. let's go through the highlights. the highlights will be what drives me crazy. what drives me crazy is a media consultant translating an ad in english into spanish and that being their latino program. it drives me crazy that for young kids of color cannot afford to take an unpaid internship to try to make connections in washington. [applause]

chuck: it drives me crazy to think that the elite industrial political class in washington things that just donald trump being on the ballot will turn out people of color. it drives me crazy to think about the industrial complex of political consultants, who should be in this room, listening to fascinating ideas, and people demanding their place in a chair. i look at jessica because i love her.. there are certain people at the tip of this spear. people, long before my crazy ass, that set the path. we all have skin in the game. we all have to eat. we all have to feed our kids. we were all raised by a mom and a dad, or 2 moms or 2 dads. they loved you know matter who you were, right? that should be reflected in our politics. the reason you do not see people go for african-american woman is

because 99% of that consulting class are scared of them, do not know how to talk to them, and ass they areow bad and would not take their shit to begin with. i have had good sisters who taught me well. but unlike most political consultants, i can be taught. that is what we have to do. we have to put passion back in our politics. we let donald trump win some of the wars because he makes it much more simple. no one can get more simple than this redneck from east texas. we need to put passion back in our politics. also, make sure it is reflective of everything that we do. i think that is at the core of what makes me most mad. aimee: i want to -- yes. carol: i want to put a finer point on what chuck said. it just astonishes me to this day that we treat people of -- like if they are talking to people of color is like speaking a foreign language. sometimes it is.

sometimes there is translation that is involved. but talking to black voters -- we are not aliens. we all -- and so the idea we have to talk differently, no. what needs to be different is who are the decision-makers. we can't translate a white message to a black or latino or an asian audience. that is not how it works. if we are going to change the frame, then we have to change the people behind the cameras, writing campaign plans, driving campaign budgets. when i go to these gatherings of political class technocrats -- it can no longer look like an all-white room and chuck and i are the only brown spots at the table. aimee: it is not just cannot lie, we actually can't win. how many in this room are interested in winning? everybody. so it is less of a moral argument or a desperate plea

invisible people invisible to the decision-makers and more of a direct statement. democrats will not win if they do not figure out how to fund, properly resource, engage, run candidates, and run the issues that appeal to the hopes and aspirations of the new american majority, of whom people of color are the vast majority. can't be more simple than that. i guess my question is for those of you who work in campaigns, there is something called the "prime" voter you go after. steve called it the swing voter, you know, chasing the swing voter. had we need to evolve who the most important voter is in a city council race or the presidential races coming up in

the fall. how do we think about who are the most important voter is not a campaign should be organizing around? sayu: chuck talked about in the strategy he used in orlando, the newly registered voters. i want to put a personal point on this. i have been living in this country 17 years before i became a citizen. it was just the way the process worked. in 2001, i voted in my first election. then in 2002, i became commissioner of immigrant affairs. so what i was telling folks this morning is that i was an appointed government official in new york city before i was a prime voter. and so that we do need to disrupt our notion of who is a potential civically engaged individual. you think about people like jessica, for example, or many others in our country now who are in positions where they are more highly civically engaged than someone who is a native born american citizen, whose

primary form of engagement is showing up at the polls. every single election. so that prime voter, that image of a prime voter who shows up every time to an election is not necessarily our most engaged citizen in the way that our young people who are out there marching for legal status, testifying in congressional hearings and all of that. there used to be a time, and this the last point i will make when you came to this country, , you got your legal status, and you became a citizen and you voted. that was the trajectory. right? now there are so many points in which you enter the civic engagement trajectory. we are not really accounting for those ways we can really honor immigrants in particular, their , particular commitment to this democracy. so we do need to disrupt our notion of not just prime voter but engaged american.

aimee: chuck, you run campaigns. how does one do that? chuck: it is hard. in all honesty you want to speak , about the truth. it is all driven by money. at the end of the day, no matter what we would like them to do campaign and talk to all of the poor black or brown votes, they have a targeted budget. they are supposed to run this campaign in a box. they talk to us the day we were putting up yard signs, right? "you have to do it this way." but you do not always have to do it this way. this morning, i said every cycle -- the beautiful thing about what i get to do, beyond working with great, beautiful wonderful , people, is i get to be inspired and learn new things. that is what you should get in a political consultant. they should be having their ear to the community and understanding what that community is. every campaign consultant is taught you go into a race,

figure out what the win number is, based on the number of people who are supposed to turnout, who have turned out historically in the past, put out a layered communication structure and talk to them. , you send them a few pieces of mail. you may just send digital ads targeted to that community who has a greatest likelihood -- and then that is how you target voters. every single consultant will run the campaign the exact same way. nobody in any campaign i have ever worked in until i worked with bernie, and there was a person of color at the table helping make the decisions. but if you want a solution, how to get around is to show the growth. use the florida nine example. because i am latino and tied into that community heavily i , know because of what is happening on the island in puerto rico, there are droves of people moving in with their family in orlando. because of that, voter

registration is spiking, on top of there was a presidential election, right? so there are these anomalies quo consultantsquote do not know about. and people moving from puerto rico are inspired to have a say, because their government just -- that's where your institutional consultant makes it better. carol will be be tied into another part of the community in d.c., it is a fresh concept of how do we test another model and that you can come back and have a larger audience to make social change. that is the bedrock of it. carol: and i guess my job here is to piggyback off of things chuck says. you talked about money in campaigns and campaign budgets. havenk the reason why we the reliance of prime voters, who have a proven track record,

honestlyhey are quite cheaper per vote to get to the polls. if you have someone who has repeatedly voted all you have to , do is persuade them, and the that of their own volition will get out on election day. that, per vote, is cheaper than investing in turnout. investing in folks who if you get them to go to the polls will vote for your candidate or issue. it is a turnout game. quite frankly, when you're talking about african-americans, latinos, unmarried women, they have a lot more challenges to even get up and get out to vote. so in order to -- we talk about getting them off the couch and to the polls. it takes a lot more money. you have different cycles and averages, but i have seen a persuasion voter is five dollars per vote. a turnout voter is $21.

we also have to get used to what will investment look like. it may cost more money per vote, but that is the way you are going to expand your base. aimee: we are going to see the big national campaigns invest millions in tv ads. does that get new american majority voters to the polls? carol: it is a combined strategy. you can't just rely on one tactic alone. tv is a tactic, a way to communicate to a large audience. it is the most cost-effective way to get numbers. but you have to layer that. when you are talking to the new american majority with more intimate contact. a few years ago there was a book release called mobilizing for inclusion written by two academics in california that talked about the way they were able to get these new voters out to vote just by knocking on doors and having intimate one-on-one conversations. so yes, tv can help. and tv can help -- and it is not

just television. right now, your tv and digital strategy need to go hand in hand. because people are not just watching and consuming media on their televisions. most of it is coming from your phone. so how does your communications strategy translate from television to your tablet to your phone and whatnot. it very much has to be a layered, integrated strategy. sayu: you brought up the issue of the intimate voter to voter contact. another thing i shared this morning that has been bugging me is this notion -- this movement for automated voter registration, which i think conceptually is a great idea. definitely brings more people automatically into the system. however, automatically registering a voter does not provide the intimate voter to voter contact. in fact, you lose something. the type of work that candidates

and nonprofits do when they are registering voters in the field that allows a conversation about democracy. we will lose that. so the work that will come -- we should not assume that just because people are automatically registered, they will show up. i think there is this extra we have to make sure we are responding to. how do you really connect with these folks on a person-to-person level? that is what is missing. people feel very disconnected. people turn out in the presidential, because it is this movement, though there is no guarantee they will turn out for the democratic candidate because they are disillusioned by the republican. in the down ballot races -- 1, you absolutley absolutely have to have the person to person contact. otherwise, they will not know there is an election. secondly, i will mention that

tom long, a board member of the new american leaders project, has done incredible modeling on reaching new and low propensity voters. part of what he suggests is that there is a group of prime voters in which yes, it is cheaper to reach them, but perhaps, because they are almost guaranteed to turn up, that if you reduce the amount of contact -- reduce contact with the number of prime voters and use some of the dollars to reach new and low intensity voters, that that is also a strategy. it is not an either/or strategy. it is supplemental. but for down ballot races, for those in pipeline development, reaching new and low propensity voters is more cost effective, because we are already engaging with those communities. you have already crossed some

hurdles that some random person coming into the community has to overcome. aimee: i want to ask, does anyone care to assess our national campaigns and how well they are doing on said approaches? i just want to say -- chuck, you just came from seven months, hiring every single person of color for bernie sanders, running that campaign. that being the core strategy for winning voters for sanders under 35. you have that experience. you worked on the national and presidential level. so now i would like some assessment. we are going into the democratic convention in two weeks. we will have a nominee and a presidential and vice presidential, we have a set of senate races, and all of the

other down ballots. how are we doing and is the party getting with it or not? chuck: the easy answer would be no. let me give some credit and take some blame and give credit. in our staff, i always tell them it is easy to be an asshole and hard to be humble. we need to learn that in the consulting class. hillary, she is putting together a phenomenal team. she is gathering the best, but what is the "best"? they are doing good at hiring lots of people of color, some of which are literally my best friends. let me and the people on the know, who are running the day-to-day of the operation, and i know what they will do a week before they do it because they are doing it the way everyone

does. so they will do well. they have done good in hiring people. even doing well in hiring people of color. latino decisions will do good polling. in her case, i would give her a b minus, because there is more she could be doing. but i will say thank god they are running against donald trump. b is the good score. the bad score is every senate race in america. it may be the last bastion of the "good old boys" system. not just me but every consultant i know that represents the new american majority has met with all of those people in the senate. they still run things with someone's brother in law and someone's friend. they translate an ad into spanish, and it is good enough. so i worry constantly about those campaigns.

they have been one of the slowest institutions to show change or the ability and want to run change. and the dccc is run by a great guy. he is gay, progressive. but there is more than just one man or one woman who runs something. they should be more open and the entire process. the dccc, now run by a latino, called me to run spanish programs in the california primary. i have never been called to do something like that before. in full disclosure, steve phillips, and the book, have helped push the envelope more than i have ever seen done in my entire lifetime. [applause] take it from the old man who has been there, who has been taught by a wonderful group of white people. i say this everywhere i speak. like "chuck, what do you have

against white folks?" i love white folks. my mama is white folk. white folks have changed my life forever by giving me an opportunity. i am saying in a consultant complex that has to change, not only in the party but in the progressive movement. the same group of consultants who run the dccc run most of the -- aimee: we often can point the fingers, but the organization in our movement, some who may be in the room or in this conference, sit on millions of dollars that will be invested this election cycle. and if the same consultants with the same frame of mind, without involving their idea of the prime voter, without a commitment to engaging the new

american -- if they decide they will run the campaign the same old way, it will result in the same ins. how do you assess, what is your assessment? carol: i actually came from one of those organizations. for 11 years, i worked for planned parenthood until i went into the private sector in january. one of the things i credit planned parenthood for, that i would love other organizations to look at, think about, and engage with those folks on, is several years ago, they realized it is not just an issue of diversity. you can change the staff you have here and you can hire more people of color. you can even give them a seat at the table. but planned parenthood recognized they fundamentally needed to change the way they operate. the way that inequality and discrimination get perpetuated, that is institutional and internal.

so policies and practices need to change. that recognition led them to go through an internal change process. that is something you do not just put out externally as an organization. it is also the way you make decisions, who gets to sit at the table, how those tables are constructed. that will fundamentally change the way they engage, do work. it is already showing some impact. i think you will see that in the way they make investments, both in their own programs as well as supporting programs from organizations on the ground that already exist. aimee: i read an inflection point where our largest progressive organizations, if their leadership is almost exclusively white, we have a problem. that is a hard conversation to have amongst progressives. but given the connections, engaging the american majority in the electoral space, it is a

crucial time to have a conversation. i want to talk about trump, because no conversation would be complete without figuring out -- when you said "thank goodness hillary clinton is going to run against trump" -- and all three of you called into question the fact that we had this horrible, racist -- that is attracting and saying all of these things that are essentially anti-new american majority, in every sense of the word. we had him running, but you are also saying there is no guarantee that people of color would be motivated to go to the polls. why is that? why would people not say i have to beat him, so let me vote for hillary clinton? carol: there are a lot of things we do not talk about that keep people from engaging in the political process.

one is the structural disadvantages that our opposition have been able to put forth, in terms of our voter id and voter suppression laws. and redistricting. these are all structural disadvantages and barriers we have to overcome to get our people out. secondly, people are so disillusioned in the political process. the fact that trump is even -- has made it this far should be laughable. in no way, shape, or form, is this person qualified to run one of the most influential countries in the world.

so i think people are checked out. aimee: that is kind of a sad state you are we so checked out we will not even go to the ballot to be trump? chuck: there are a couple of points. on the last point, i will give credit to the dccc. but i believe in not only sitting and bitching and lifting people out. trump -- let's think about numbers. because trump got 13 million votes in the primary. keep in mind mitt romney lost four years ago by getting 60 million votes. there is a difference between 13 million primary voters and 60 million people who voted for mitt romney. and people assume, because he is so outlandish -- the biggest thing i said is "assume." never assume anything. i have messed up a lot in life because i assumed things. folks in our movement think they can take the money they had set aside, what little bit that was, chicken scratch that was, for

latino or african-american or new american majority outreach and think they can move it out, because donald trump alone will move that people out. i will remind people there was a governor in california, who had a very anti-immigration bill that was supposed to mobilize latinos in california -- >> prop 187. chuck: thank you, prop 187. it was not just the proposition and an evil man at the top saying evil things, like trump -- but there was an orchestrated effort of $10 million into the neighborhoods registering latinos, educating latinos, and turning out latinos. that single $10 million investment has literally changed the state forever, to where there is a latino state speaker and state senator that control almost everything. >> and ushered in a super

majority for democrats. chuck: what you take back is you do not have to invest in the whole people of color universe across america. start out small. take a bite out somewhere in colorado. it is ok. because donors just need to be shown it is ok. and if they get reciprocal results, and if you show them that at the granular level, they are smart enough to do it. they are smart enough to be millionaires. you lead that horse down there, splash a little water, they will get it. aimee: yes. now what do you have to say?

and you have to stand at the mic. so there's a difference between a comment and a brief question, and a speech. and tell us who you are. it is for the recording. >> so my name is ernesto, straight out of compton. one of the questions i have is a lot of political consultants, whether from people of color or otherwise, spend so much time in legislative and executive systems of government. but we spent so little on the judicial branch of our government. but they are more -- to me to be more effective in getting representation there as well. when you look at citizens united and the hobby lobby case, a lot

of these decisions were done by scotus representatives, which are not as diverse. we start looking at the different judges appointed by the government, who are not always represented it of the -- representative of the constituencies they represent. is there some sort of strategy for a movement going on there to start shifting and focusing on the judicial branch? aimee: it is really about the underinvestment in judicial. i want to throw in about these district attorneys that have such influence on the local levels in cases with police killings. what we, as a nation, experienced in the last week. those are largely elective. over 90% -- the women's organization funded a study that shows that 90% of district attorneys go unopposed.

and they are mostly white men. that has a great influence on the judicial process. who is charged, what they are charged with, how fast they are charged, and if they reflect what the committee wants or needs. sayu: pipeline development. good idea at all levels. there is so little money and so little motivation to run that we have a very broad recruitment strategy, not specific to any office. the idea of creating programs that are specifically targeted at recruiting folks to run for da, treading them, giving them -- training them giving them , the whole range of support they need, doing the same thing for the judiciary -- you can go to law firms where there are lots

of people of color who are interested in the issues. recruit them and get them to run. i don't think it's a different strategy. the strategy is not being employed right now because of the limited pipeline development. >> chris prior from rock trust -- rochester, new york. i'm representing myself. you keep talking about we need money, we need money -- who should i give money to? if not the senatorial, congressional committee or congress -- how do i get it to where you people say it should go? aimee: as an individual? >> i will be giving money this year. i have not given them money yet because i do not trust them. who do i give money to? aimee: it is a question of resources as we've heard over and over again. steve and susan are organizing

progressive donors to develop a series of best practices before they give. those are large donors who give a lot of money to campaigns. how can you make sure that campaign is actually committed to engaging the new american majority? they are helping through the democracy alliance and other progressive donor circles to educate and bring donors in. there are also individuals who have to decide what campaign or what funding vehicle and then we get into this question because the organizations -- power pac, for example, we are committed to funding candidates and initiatives at the center of the new american majority.

how are -- power pac, individuals can give to. when you look at nonprofits or other institutions, it gets a little more murky. carol: i think you are right -- chuck: i think you are right. it is connected to the judges. people do not vote for judges because people do not talk to them about it. if you would tell a voter about what is at risk or at stake for them -- to people who want to donate, it is targeting. there are more people talking about the donor networks. you have people who all want to pull a card in the same direction, but you have to tell them how it's going to get there. we all wear so many hats. i'm also the vice chairman of a

group called latino outdoors. i'm very passionate about the outside and taking young people of color and getting them outside in our national parks. i give my money to groups i feel strongly about. it was targeted to make him i found out about it and i got active and now, i'm the vice-chairman. >> you could also give to the new american leaders. newamericanleaders.org. i highly recommend it. i have a report right here i can give you. carol: you can also invest in higher heights for america. sayu: this is a tax-deductible contribution to either of these organizations.

political contributions are not tax-deductible. >> i'm jennifer with the women donors network. i wanted to mention to the last question, there is a new effort i'm on the advisory board of called movement 2016. the idea is to mobilize in this election year, donations a small and large to community-based groups reaching the new american majority. you can go state-by-state, find groups in those states to invest in, you can donate right there. it's a great resource everyone should know about and it's just starting. i wanted to mention that. there was a panel earlier this morning about the prosecutor piece, lifting that electing -- electing reflective candidates to these really important criminal justice positions. it's exciting because this

movement is starting to happen where people are getting involved in these elections. she is trying to get these lawyers to run for these offices and they are 87% unopposed, according to our research. the research we did really lays it all out. i just wanted to offer that. aimee: thank you. great. >> i'm deputy director of public assistance, global trade watch. i used to work with stan greenberg and we did the polling for women's voices, women's vote. the rising american electorate. i'm glad to hear you folks talking about it today. we are at an important moment where we are trying to increase our outreach, especially with trump really playing up on bernie sanders in the trade movement. one of the issues we are facing, it is a very labor heavy and a lot of people have said white

heavy movement. when we've done polling and focus groups, we've found stories from folks from latin america who were displaced from their homes after nafta. that's why their family immigrated to the united states. there's these other stories, the nabisco factory that close to not too long ago. we are trying to raise their voice. our biggest concern right now is that trump is really using trade to electrify white working-class americans again. there is a whole subset of rising american electorate, new american majority folks who are being left out. i was wondering if you had ideas of how we could better amplify their voices and get them involved.

chuck: you would not think that trade would be a latino issue. i went to work in a factory in east texas when i was 19 years old. my father worked there. six of his brothers and 12 of his cousins. i literally went to work in a factory. i never graduated college. that's where i got educated, working on that assembly line. that factory shutdown. my entire family lost their jobs and 1300 men and women were out of work. i've watched how that can decimate a community made -- a community, the tax base, and all the people around it. they were handing out pink slips. they gave them to black people -- brownd people people, not just white people. it was synonymous with the struggle we were in. i was doing bilingual mail in certain states, i used the trade issue and jobs issue and drove

them together because i'm very familiar with the organization if you take one thing from the message, it's that you cannot just put all latinos and immigration -- in a immigration box. african americans in a box. you come from a polling background. it's how you build commonality and become a trusted messenger. immigration may open the wound, but you pour salt in with trade and that's i you move that -- and that's a move -- aimee: that means bringing in people that actually can understand and translate the hopes and dreams and needs of the community. chuck: i could go into a latino community and talk about my strong latino family who lost our jobs because of trade. i was putting a face to it.

>> i have one quick question. of the people you guys have running for office is, what percent is first-generation immigrants? sayu: that is a good question. i do not know off hand. probably about 50%. on that list, for example, there are people who got amnesty in 1986, people who happen on the no-fly list -- have been on the no-fly list. quite oh wide range of ethnicities and backgrounds. >> from the question -- there is some bit of fragmentation in terms of how different organizations or different candidates are doing their work. outside of the broader dnc, is there an umbrella or combination under which progressives can come together, share similar

strategies, share best practices and maybe have a funding funneled that allows different candidates to embrace these ideas? aimee: the short answer is no. the longer answer is that it keeps getting tried and there are lots of different groupings that come together at certain points that don't manage to sustain themselves, partly because one of the things that happened is that we have these strategic conversations and then election time comes and everybody goes into their silos. a couple of things i want to say, just like we can't put latinos into one bucket or african-americans into one bucket, there is a different side of the problem. we are not always coming together. even the work in these communities is often

politically, ethnically siloed. you have the latino organization , african-american organization, organizations working in communities, and in our case, because we are trying to do the -- it is very befuddling. funding comes down and these -- in these ethnic silos as well. corporations have african-american community relations and asian-american relations. just like there is that issue, there's also the issue around progressives. there's women's donors groups -- we were told when we first started, we are not even going to have a conversation with you if you can't guarantee us that every single candidate you run is going to be pro-choice. i'm not going to ask them that

am recruiting them to run for office. they probably are pro-choice, but i don't know. there are very specific ways in which people think that -- that has been a real challenge for us. it is a nonstarter. aimee: i just want to say that there is great hope and possibility. this is not just about how things aren't and should become -- should be. it's about what we want for our country and how we want to do the business of politics. really briefly, your greatest hope right now as it relates to the new policies for new american majority. carol: the greatest possibility and greatest hope is that we have the chance to fundamentally transform the way our politics work and the policies that have come out of that.

one of the things i encourage all of us to do, when we close our eyes and try to think about what our vision is, what it would look like, i really do believe that we have the opportunity to get there. chuck: i hope you will ask your employer if they are hiring someone of color. -- hiring a person of color to be there consultant. young people are more progressive than i give them credit for. my last hope is that you would follow me on twitter -- [laughter] sayu: my hope is to be as charming and charismatic as chuck, also as brilliant. i also hope you will follow me

on twitter. but my other and most important, -- most sustainable hope is that every day we are training more americans to run for office. we've gone from having three alumni in the room to a fourth alum in the room. every day, we are increasing the number of young people, people of color immigrants getting , ready to run for office. they really are the only reason i am hopeful. aimee: finally, i hope you will go to democracy in color on twitter and facebook. the voices of new american majority means that amazing national experts doing -- experts who are doing the work of the future of politics in our country have a platform and a voice. that's what we're all about. democracy and color. that is what it is all about. i hope that if you are in philadelphia, you will join us

at our luncheon. come and talk to me if you want to be there to talk about the leadership of women of color and uniting the party and leading the nation. my book is coming out in september. very excited to bring together the issues of women and people of color, women of color and the exciting possibilities it offers as part of the new american majority. finally, i hope you have a fabulous rest of the conference. please give these amazing people a round of applause. [applause] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2016] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org]

>> today, candidate donald trump outlines his economic agenda in a speech at the detroit economic club. our live coverage begins at noon eastern on c-span.

on thursday, the white house cyber security coordinator joined other officials in a discussion on the president's cyber incident toward nation plan. people described their roles. this is an hour and 30 minutes. have many oft we our national security task force members, our cyber security leadership council members joining us today. thank you for taking time out of your schedule to be with us. he shaded. we are talking about cyber incident ordination. welcome michael daniel. joining him today will be