kurdish peshmerga in the battle to retake mosul has reached a level that would have been unthinkable a year ago. we are taken steps to help promote and maintain the unity. we know that's the only way to keep isil defeated. as i said earlier, success in in iraq and syria is necessary but it is not sufficient to deal a lasting defeat. that is why were focused on two other critical objectives of our campaign -- combating isil's metastases around the world and helping protect our homeland. when it comes to combating the metastases, we've taken strong actions in support of capable and motivated local forces in libya and afghanistan and elsewhere. in libya, the u.s. military has provided air support and forced to isolate and collapse their

control. as a result, isil is being ejected. in afghanistan, on chairman dunford's and my recommendation, the president this year gave expanded authorities to u.s. forces to proactively assist and enable our afghan partners and operations that would have strategic effect. we also the decided to modify our plan in order to retain some 8400 u.s. to retain u.s. troops there until 2017 rather than 5500, as the earlier plan had called for. we will continue to maintain our financial commitment to the afghan defense and security forces. these robust commitments and authorities on forces and finances will ensure we not only continue supporting the afghan security forces but would also sustain our regional

counterterrorism platform operated out of afghanistan. for example, alongside the afghan partners, we recently conducted two large-scale operations against isil in afghanistan, killing the top leader in the country and significantly degrading its capabilities there. on the campaign's third objective, protecting the homeland, dod is working with intelligence, homeland security , and law enforcement partners fact, supporting them is job and priority number one for our northern command but also abroad. there, we are conducting operations to gather intelligence with a particular focus on destroying isis' external spacing operations cadre. as a result, we have not only killed the chief of isil's external operations, we have also taken out more than 130 30 external plotters.

we have gone after al qaeda's branch in syria, we work with the fbi to systematically eliminate members of an isil cell outside the united states that was inspiring attacks in our country, and including against our armed forces. we directed the joint special operations command to make that top priority of destroying isil's external operations capabilities. the campaign against isil and its results are another example of the military's continued excellence and america's continued leadership in the middle east and world. no other nation could have brought to bear the resources we have. assemble the coalition we have built and led the execution of a comprehensive campaign that the united states has done. we did so in pursuit of our nation's interests. which in this case, are aligned with many allies and partners who are also resolved to destroy isil. we did so despite major,

simultaneous, and growing military commitments in europe and asia. let me now turn to them. first, i want to discuss europe where the transatlantic community is standing up to russia's provocation and aggression. that is a big change for many of us who worked productively with russia in the post-cold war era. i know i did so in the 1990's when we were working with sometimes common rather than cross purposes. at the time, russian militaries and military -- and american militaries cooperated to arrest those of military weapons, and when russia agreed to join the peacekeeping force in kosovo. i remember both. today, unfortunately, russia's aggression and provocation appear to be driven by misguided ambitions and misplaced resentment. russia wants to be considered, and understandably so, as the

important power that it is. indeed its history is rich and its people can and should be proud. but in recent years, some have interpreted that history and to fuel grandiose visions and provocative destabilizing actions abroad. we see that in russia's aggression in ukraine and georgia, its counterproductive role in the ongoing tragedy in syria, its attacks in cyberspace, it's violation of arms control treaties and other international agreements, and perhaps above all, it's nuclear saber rattling. these actions are not what the world expects of a responsible state in the 21st century. rather, each threatens to undermine global security and erode the principal international order that has been so good not only to the united states but to russia and the rest of the world. let me be clear, the united

states does not seek a cold, let alone hot, war with russia. we do not seek an enemy. but make no mistake -- we will defend our allies, the positive future that affords all of us. we will counter attempts to undermine our collective security. to do so, the united states is following a strong and balanced strategy. in it, we are addressing russia's action while pursuing in pursuing bilateral cooperation where u.s. and russian objectives can be aligned. this strategy for deterrence does not simply recycle the 20th century playbook used to deter syria during the cold war because that would not match the russian challenge of today. we have not had to prioritize deterrence on the transatlantic communities eastern flank for

over 20 years, and unfortunately, now we do. that is why the united states is strengthening our posture to be more agile and quicker so that we can respond to threats that russia might pose. our latest defense budget request includes significantly more money for our european initiative. more than quadruple what we allocated the year before. that is intended to allow us to, in addition to the two brigades we already have stationed in europe, rotate an armored brigade combat team on a persistent basis and to pre-position brigades equipment and war-fighting gear to be used by american forces flown into europe, among other steps. we are also increasing military exercises with allies and partners to demonstrate resolve and build the resilience while enhancing operability. we are updating and refining our operational plans and trying to overcome areas such as hyper

warfare and any denial systems. we are investing the technologies most relevant to countering russia. more on these shortly. and we are also recapitalizing our nuclear deterrent because nuclear deterrence is not only the bedrock but our security and also critical to sustain the denial of russia's nuclear saber rattling. the united states is not alone. for more than 67 years, nato has been the quintessential example of nations coming together to respond to collective security challenges. as it did during the cold war, nato will be critical for preserving critical defense in the face of new threats. to ensure it does so, we are working with allies to adapt and to confront the new challenges nato faces like russia. so nato, too, has a new playbook.

one that prepares to counter cyber threats and hybrid warfare, to better integrate conventional nuclear deterrence, and much more. that's why nato created a joint task force that can deploy allied forces on 48 hours' notice to any crisis on allied territory. it's why nato is deploying forward battalions to u.s. eastern flanks. the united states will lead a battalion starting next year. it is why nato is providing support to countries like ukraine and georgia to help strengthen and reform their national defense and institutions and improve their ability to work with nato. everything the united states is doing on its own and with nato will ensure we continue to stand up to russian aggression and that were ready for longer-term competition.

but is also necessary to keep the door open to working with russia when and where our interests align. as i said, there's a time in the years after the cold war where pressure correlated with the united states and other nations cooperated and contributed to the principal order rather than undermining it. i remember that personally and many of you. perhaps someday we'll see that spirit rekindled. next, i want to talk about what we are doing the president obama's rebalance to the asia pacific. it will ensure that dod continues to help provide the security necessary for that consequential region, which is home to nearly half the global population and nearly half the global economy, to remain a place where everyone can rise and prosper for decades to come. that has been the american policy and practice since the

end of world war ii more than 70 years ago. regardless what was going on at home or in other parts of the world, and during democratic and , andlican administration in, during times of deficit, war and peace, the united states has remained economically, politically, and militarily engaged. unlike elsewhere in the world, peace and stability has never been managed by the region-wide formal structure like nato and europe. that made sense because of the asia-pacific's unique history, geography, and politics. instead, the united states has taken a principled and inclusive approach and collaborated with a network of regional allies and partners to enable security and uphold important principles, like resolving disputes peacefully, ensuring the countries can make choices free from external coercion and

intimidation, and preserving the freedom guaranteed by international law. because we did so, out of the rubble of world war ii, economic miracle after economic miracle occurred. think about it. first japan and taiwan, south korea and southeast asia, and now today, china, india, and others rose and prospered. that progress produced incredible things in the region. populations are growing, education has improved, self-determination has spread, economies have grown more interconnected, and military spending and cooperation are both increasing. amid all this remarkable change and progress, america's interests and objectives in the asia-pacific have endured. we still want peace, stability,

and progress there for all -- including ourselves -- because -- but as the region has changed how we meet those had to change along with it. today, the department has been operationalizing one after another and rebalancing. we are not only ensuring that we remain the strongest military and primary provider, but we are also connecting our allies and partners in a burgeoning, principled, and security network to allow all of us to see more, share more, and do more to maintain security in the region. in the first phase, which began five years ago, dod sought to make the regional posture more robust both on our allies, our own partners partners geographically distributed,

politically sustainable. to do so, dod sent tens of thousands of personnel to the region, committed to 60% in the asia-pacific, and begin to modernize the posture around guam. the second phase we committed to sending some of our best people and most advanced capabilities. our newest submarine, our newest aircraft and service vessels to the asia-pacific. we also developed new and innovative strategies and operational concepts and put them into use in more complex and expansive training exercises, both on our own and with allies and partners, none larger than the summer's impact. -- rimpact. we have strengthened our bilateral alliances and partnerships. nurtured over decades, tested and crisis, and we have now

strengthened these relationships so they better reflect the 21st century security needs. there are so many examples 2.2 in the region, whether it is the long time republican korea or australia, or our new partnerships like those in singapore, vietnam but for time's sake i will focus on the two i'm leaving tomorrow to visit, namely japan and india. the u.s.-japan alliance remains the cornerstone of the pacific security, and with their new defense guidelines, the u.s.-japan alliance has never been stronger or more capable of contributing to security in the asia-pacific and beyond. likewise, the u.s.-india defense relationship is the closest it has ever been. through our strategic handshake with america reaching west in the rebalance and india reaching east and what prime minister

modi calls the policy, our two nations are exercising together by air, land, and sea, and we have the technological handshake as the trade initiative grasps hands in the campaign. that is helping the country move towards a more diverse codevelopment and coproduction system for developing and procuring weapons. and now in the third phase of the rebalance, it will be necessary to cement the progress we made in the first and second phase -- and more importantly to build upon it. the united states will continue to sharpen the military so we remain the most powerful military in the region by increasing and targeting investments and capabilities suited to the region to ensure

that we stay the best. more on that momentarily. we will also continue to make leap ahead technological investments, including some surprising ones that will help us keep the lead in the asia-pacific and elsewhere, and we will further catalyze the asia-pacific's growing principled inclusive security network. although it isn't a formal alliance, this burgeoning network is grounded on the principles that i mentioned. it is inclusive sense any -- because any nation, no matter its capability budget or experience can contribute, and it is developing in several ways. allies that previously worked together. for example, the blossoming u.s.-japan republic of korea -- trilateral partnership -- helps us coordinate responses to the north korean nuclear missile

provocations. just last month, three countries held their second effort many countries are coming together on their own by establishing the biological and trilateral mechanisms, for example, indonesia, malaysia, and the philippines are coordinating trilateral maritime patrols to counter piracy, organized crime, and terror activities in southeast asia. that is a good thing on its own, but it's also an important step in the developing network. and even more broadly, the asia-pacific regions are developing a network multilateral regional security, from one end of the region to another, as a central example the defense ministers meeting serving as an important forum. that is all for the good of the region and the united states, but it is important to remember the rebalance security network

is not aimed at any particular country. the network isn't closed and it excludes no one. its objective is to tell -- help everyone to rise and prosper. although we have disagreements with china, including its destabilizing behavior in the south china sea, and it's driving many that work with us, we are committed to working with china where possible on the measures to reduce risk and encouraging them to avoid self isolation. all this is happening today, but even as we confront today's challenges of the strategic time of transition, it would also be necessary for the dod to lead well into the future. today's is the finest fighting force the world has ever known. there is no other military that is more capable, more

experienced, or more innovative, but that isn't a birthright. it is not guaranteed. we can't take it for granted in the 21st century. we have to earn it again and again. to do so, we have to invest and innovate for the uncertain future that we face, and that is why i am constantly pushing the pentagon to think outside our five-sided box and ensure that our technology, plans, organizations, and above all our people stay the best for decades to come. the most recent budget proposal, which i continue to urge appropriators and congress as -- to pass as soon as possible is designed to make sure they maintain their dominance in every domain. we are growing not only the number of ships in the fleet but like the newgality

weapons like the tool capable of extending the community lead investing in the global reach through advanced munitions and payloads of all kinds and also innovative capabilities and platforms, the joint strike fighter. idb 20 -- and some less so like swarming micro drones, the arsenal plane, and others. those are the things we can talk about. meanwhile, we are also prioritizing full spectrum training and readiness for the ground forces. as i mentioned earlier, we are reversing decades of underinvestment in the nuclear deterrent and re-capitalizing it. and we are doing more in cyber and warfare in space to stay on the cutting edge, and in addition to these investments we are pushing the envelope with research development to stay ahead of our competitors and at technology's frontier by putting

nearly $72 billion into the r&d for next year. just to give you a little context, that is more than double what apple, intel, and google spent on r&d last year combined. beyond that, we are building and rebuilding bridges both at the pentagon and in america's technology community. one way we are doing so is through the defense innovation unit which i created with startups and other groups in silicon valley, austin, texas and everywhere in between. and thanks to the managing director for participating those outposts are already producing

results interacting with the company's 31 states to help us adopt technology more quickly that can help accomplish the missions. we will always need the strong existing defense partners to help us build our defense systems. diux will better connect the pentagon to the whole world of american innovation and help our own companies to find new technologies and new people to bring into them, all that is an investment worth making. we are innovating operationally, our core contingency plans are constantly being changed to apply innovation to our operational approaches, including ways to overcome emerging threats such as angela -- and i satellite weapons or -- and building in modularity, planning in new ways for overlapping agencies and injecting agility and flexibility into our war plans

to -- war plans. there making reforms across dod enterprise, streamlining our headquarters, lowering our health care costs and more. we are continuing to support and seek improvements in the spirit of goldwater nichols to clarify the role and authority of the chairman of the joint chiefs and joint staff to help them and our combatant commanders be more efficient and agile and support me and the president, especially in the face of trans-regional and trans-functional challenges. we are also building on the success of our better buying power initiative which has helped to reduce the costs for major acquisition programs very significantly. to improve on this progress, it will be necessary to make additional changes, like streamlining the system itself.

we are ensuring dod is a place where thinking boldly and differently, which is long a strength of the american military, is fostered. one way is with defense innovation. one of their recommendations, and on the recommendation, we are creating a chief innovation officer to serve as a spearhead for innovation activities, such as building software platforms and building human networks across the dod. lastly, we are building the force of the future to ensure that amid technological and labor market changes, we continue to attract and retain and develop the most talented

people america has to offer for our military. in total, the force of the future initiative spans the career of the uniformed service member or dod civilian from recruiting men and women to join to caring for, retaining, and developing them, and then helping to successfully transition those who want to move on. and these initiatives include reinvigorating, expanding the geographic reach of our reserve officer training corps program which marks its hundredth anniversary this year, making common sense improvements to the military talent management and officer promotion. giving components the authority to directly hire civilians on college campuses, and recognizing survey data indicating the importance of family life to retention, after all, our forces are largely a married force.

by expanding maternity and paternity leave and expanding on base childcare hours. among other steps. to demonstrate the logic of what we are doing, let me tell you more about one way we are helping build the force of the future. as some of you may know, today is the one-year anniversary of my decision to open up all combat positions to women. i made that decision so we can benefit from the talents of every american that can meet our high standards and contribute to our mission. in the 21st century, the all that requiresce us to draw from the broadest possible pool of people who can meet our stringent standards. that pool must include women because they make up more than 50% of the population. that's mission-critical. i directed that there be no quotas and that's why the number of women in the previously

closed specialties may be modest, but they will be the best talent for the job. and even for women who don't choose those specialties, the fact that they are open means any woman in uniform will be measured by her contribution to the force no matter what career field she chooses. in conclusion, all of the actions and decisions i have spelled out today were taken to do exactly what my predecessors did for me, ensure that my successor and my successor successors will inherit as fine a fighting force as i lead today. maintaining continuity is our tradition at the department of defense and one i have been determined to uphold. as i mentioned, i depart tomorrow on a two-week trip to visit our american personnel serving in the asia-pacific, the middle east, and europe.

my wife stephanie and i are looking forward to thanking them and their families, wishing them all a happy holiday season from their commander in chief, from the leadership, from their country, and i'm sure from all of you. i would ask all of you during our holiday season to help our fellow americans understand and appreciate what those troops are doing for them. each and every one is ensuring that we continue to meet the challenges we face, defend our country, and make a better world. not just at the strategic transition, but well into the future. we are able to do so and bring unrivaled strength to the missions because the work, the contributions, and the ideas of people, supporters, and leaders like those in this room. we can do so because of the decisions and leadership of the

presidents, defense secretaries, senators, and congressmen of both parties over decades, and most importantly, we can do so because of the service and sacrifice of our people, every soldier, sailor, airmen and airman and marine and their families. i know there are missions demanding and constantly changing, but i couldn't be prouder of them for what they do every day. doneor what they have all for all of us. i ensure you feel the same. god bless them at this holiday town -- time and got bless the united states of america. [applause]

>> c-span where history and full daily. 1979, c-span was created as a public service by america's cable television companies and is brought today by your cable or settling provider. coming up live on c-span, a discussion about policing and criminal justice, after 78sident obama granted pardons and 153 commutations yesterday. the conversation will be hosted by the brookings institution. the discussion was scheduled to's dark a couple of minutes ago, we will take a look at one of our conversations with a new member of congress. tell us your background representative. >> i am a former new york state

representative. it includes harlem, washington heights and the northwest bronx. the birthday of adam clayton powell junior who first represented this district. district, i diverse am the first dominican american elected to be a congressional member. this is an exciting time for the district. >> why do you think that is important? why do you think it is important, your background, heritage to this office? a government wants to be collection. governmentants a they can connect with. from their own background it is very american to have a diverse

government. i think that is the strength of the government. >> what about your work at the state level? in political office? how do you think it will help you up. washington? >> minority in the solid -- senate, to come to washington and get things done. there are lots of areas that we can work together. reform that immigration is still an important issue that we must addressed -- that we must address. think that is important. education and housing are two medical issues of families across the district. peopleto bring in the under the same tent to hear the -- to hear them be part of the solution. what do you hope to build on

from charlie wrangle's legacy? they are two legends in congress. these are very big shoes to fill. vision.at my own i think i bring energy and a new insight in what the people want. i think that is exciting. i bring that with me now and i hope to bring -- be just as good or better. i hope i can bring everybody together again under the same tent and make it happen positively. affordability continues to be a major hurdle for families. new yorkers make -- find it very difficult to make ends meet in new york. in you loss.maries what lessons did you learn from that? charles rangel showed me a

lot and these races. his realm of experience is something to learn from. he has a wealth of knowledge. i look forward to being his ally and he is my mentor now. he has shown me around congress. he is getting me to meet the right people. so i can be an -- an effective legislator. andnt to come in early leave late. i think that is important to really be sure early and leave late and work the midnight hours, to make sure you get either in the early hours of the morning or late at night. i will be a champion against gentrification. >> tell us about your family, will they be joining you in washington? i have a two-year-old

grandson and my children are both grown. they will be staying back. i hope to bring my two-year-old grandson to see the capital. i know when i came as a young old, i couldn't even speak a word of english back then. i came to my school. of i am here is a member congress. great nation, great story. >> did you always want to serve? >> i always had it in may. me.lways had it in as a teenager i was involved with a summer youth program and was very active. i began very early on and in college i studied political science. i came out and became a state legislator. i served for 20 years. what impact did your grandmother have on you? rock ofas really the

our family. she was the first one here. she was a factory worker, a seamstress. a great work ethic. she is very much the person we look to even though she is not with us. >> what would you like to do out here, some of the fights that you which are in washington? >> the affordable care act preserved, i think there will be an attempt to salt -- also it. i think with this new administration and the hostile rhetoric of the campaign, i must be worried about immigration and to the peopleen that are here undocumented.

they are a very important part of our economy. i want to make sure their story is not left behind and they continue to be listened to. we should not be our heads in the sand. >> what is it from your life experience that makes you want to waste that fight? -- a member a met of congress. anything is possible in america. we are fighting for the spirit , was a long time ago when i was a little boy in the we heard republic it, the streets were paved with gold and that anything was possible. i became a citizen and a member of the state legislature. and now i am walking the loss of congress. great american's walk of these halls. this is a great nation.

isolated frombe the rest of the world, we should be the leaders of the world. >> why is it that your family came here and made the decision to overstay their visa? they wanted to better for ourselves. our grandparents were already here and the rest of the family was here. we felt this would be an avenue , that we wouldes do better as kids here in the united states, and we did. we are very proud of that. why should we be denied that opportunity to someone else? >> what do you remember about that? >> i remember just crossing the tarboro bridge and seeing all of the lights and everything the city could offer. i thought what a great view to see the city lit up your guy came from a small country time. night onur lit up at my first walk in new york city i

will never forget that. >> thank you for talking to c-span. live now to the brookings institution in washington dc for discussion about policing and terminal justice. introductions are underway. , ronald davis eight director of community oriented policing services for the u.s. department of justice, -- carol mason the assistant attorney general in the office of justice programs, and the chair of the equal opportunity employment commission. they are a remarkable group and we are fortunate to have them with us today. at a time when so much of policy dialogue in the public domain become ideological and political , the seriousness of today's panel participants is of great importance. we at the hamilton project are committed to carrying the flame

for serious policy discussion. i would like to recognize the extraordinary efforts of our managing director christine akin , for pullingintosh together today's logistics. i will turn the microphone over to roy austin. thank you. thank you very much i really appreciate it. and i appreciate a lot of you being care. i see good friends in the audience. gatheredl -- i really together my best friends. people i work very closely with over the years. let me just kind of frame -- and i think she did an amazing job talking about criminal justice reform. in the obama administration we do criminal justice form not just because it is economical,

not just because it helps to is right., but it this is the right thing to do. for fellow americans and human beings. , thisthis administration is some of the things we have accomplished over the last eight years. led by ericitiative holder, the task first on 21st century leasing, led by ron davis. a stronger civil rights division then we probably ever had under the leadership of tom perez and now bonita gupta. act, powderstinct cocaine to crack switch moving it from 100-1 to 18-1. the hate crime prevention sacks, another huge these of legislation was passed. also legislation with the blue thet act and we also have

custody reporting act, something that carol mason's a shop has worked toward. checking for body worn cameras. we have seen over the last eight years the proliferation of the use of cameras. the clemency initiative, which another 158ay individuals were granted 11mency, most for the past presidents, more than the last 11 presidents combined. we have limited the use of solitary confinement, juveniles in the federal system can no longer be held under solitary confinement. deputy attorney general sally -- the state initiatives, transparent to the way we used data, and looking at super utilizes. in overalso brought 1000 law enforcement officers

from 900 agencies to the white house to hear briefings on the task force on policing. how many people are locked up? more than anywhere else in the world. that is a problem. that is where we are right here. we have more people locked up than anywhere else in the world. it has grown by 350% since 1980. how much are we spending? we are spending $80 billion a year just on incarceration. we are not talking about billion. $80 a number of things are listed there but we can eliminate the tuition and every one of our colleges and universities for $80 billion. much better use of our time and resources by locking people up. here's a quote from president obama. important to realize that we also have a system that is not fair that ann's of discriminating people. a growing body of research shows

that people of color are more likely to be stopped, frisk, .uestions, charged and detained african-americans are more likely to be arrested, likely to be sentenced to more time for the same crime and one of the consequences of this is that around one million fathers are behind bars, one in nine african-american kids have a parent in prison. what does this lead to? it leads to enormous troubles between the community and our law enforcement officers. here we have a chart showing a difference in trust between whites and nonwhites, for whites, trusting the police is 60% and nonwhites 49%. how does the community feel about their law enforcement? 52% for latinos to 4%. how many people in the community feel that the police use

excessive force? for whites, 74 percent feel they 34% feelor blacks only they do not use excessive force. present discusses reform and he talks about community, the cellblock in the courtroom. another way to look at that is no entry, entry and reentry. we want to keep people out of the system in the first place. we want no entry. how are the ways that this administration has pushed in promoting all entry? we look at the school to prison pipeline. we look at school resource officers and discipline. now 3.45 million kids are suspended out of school each year. kids as young as four are being expelled and suspended from school.

none of this makes any sense in this country for us to be pushing kids out of school. because of the efforts of the department of justice and education, we see more jurisdictions like los angeles and miami-dade, the use of school suspension. every kid -- if they are going to be suspended, they will be suspended in school because the truth of the matter is the best punishment for a kid who was bad at school is more school. it is not sitting at home watching tv. it is not being out on the street. this is more school. sure thatking to make school resource officers are trained not to go in and handle little things like ron colored socks or some small and minor disturbance of the classroom. if you use the school resource officer are there to protect the kids. we are working on raising the age. have seen liberal states like louisiana and south carolina finally realized that when you

are less than 18 years of age you should not be in the adult system. have seven states where getting it wrong, new york and north carolina in particular, who are lacking up 16-year-olds with adults. that is an enormous problem. task force in 21st century policing. every single state in the there is a police department in every state in the country that has implemented parts of the task force on 21st century policing. this is a big deal. this is moving the ball forward. i know that ron davis will talk about that. the areas that the task force areas,en on, broad policy and oversight to officer wellness and safety. one of the problems we have in the system right now is too many people who are mentally ill or suffering from some kind of and little crisis are entering into the criminal justice system, law enforcement officers are forced to deal with them and what we are seeing is the number in 2014

about 25% of the 990 fatal lease thatings involve someone was exhibiting some form of mental illness. that number is probably a low number based on other research that has been done. we are criminalizing poverty. this is something that loretta lynch has talked about. nothing shows us more than the of thethat came out civil rights division. how do we have a place where more people have arrest warrants that people live in the town? by a dramatic -- by over 10,000. that is insane. to do the town but not that many people drive to the town. how are we in this day and each still locking people up for jaywalking. that is silliness that we are locking up people for jaywalking. we are finding these people exorbitant amounts of they cannot pay, so that's how they

end up being locked up. that it is discriminatory when 95% of the people who are arrested for jaywalking are african-americans. that is a real problem. mentioned this earlier, this administration has promoted the use of body cameras because it tells a different story than simply the eyewitness testimony do. we also have to realize that we are creating a state where the police have video of all of us all the time, every interaction. what do we do with a domestic violence victim, a sexual assault victim when the us is a shows up with a body camera on them? what do we do protesters who have body cameras on them all the time. what do we do with all that video? we have an absurd amount of video right now and who will look at the video. when is it going to be shown and when will the public access to it and how will it be used.

our data in the criminal justice system is horrific. we have to do better data. it has to be consistent across categories. it has to be better audited. my fantasy football data is better than our criminal justice data. that is a real problem but it is true. we need timely data. we just put out the 2015 hate crime's number in november of 2016. we know that more and more agencies are moving to the reporting system, this is a much better way to collect data. we need everybody to be using it, all of the major law enforcement agencies agree that we will all move that by 2020. this should not take that long, this is that important for public safety. crimeed about our hate numbers. i want to put them up there for

a moment. the problem with these numbers are that this reflects less then 1/10 of the agencies across the country reporting at least one hate crime. agenciesects 1700 reporting. why do i see these numbers are problematic? 117 hate crimet supported. alabama 12, mississippi, zero. mississippi has cured the problem with hate crimes because they went him one in 2014 to zero today. that is an incredible problem that these are the numbers we are relying on for hate crimes. we have to do better. we have something we call the police data initiative. putting your data out there for the public to see.

louisville for example, puts up every single citation the issue in real time and it is aggravated by race and gender. is it iss doing telling the public what is happening in your communities, this is who we are stopping and citing. and community members can look at that data and say this is what is happening. we need more agencies doing this. saying we are willing to show our data. this is from montgomery county chief tom major. he is my police chief and i want him to feel good about me being in the community and to help my 14-year-old one when he messes up. said, police departments understand that if they are going to arm the confidence of neednities they serve they to be accountable and transparent. the more information the police put out there the more opportunities there are for the public to have that confidence in the police department. transparency deals confidence. we need more police department is to understand that.

we also have the data-driven coveringnitiative, over hundred million people have peoplehat we rotating in and out of our jails and prisons. they are not getting the help they need and they're costing us enormous amounts of money. how do we do met -- better for them? just hiring social workers to work with these small liberal people say these cities and enormous amount of money. act, one of the pieces of legislation's that we passed. the president signed this. blue alert act, matthew shepard prosecutors, we have to start talking about prosecutors. ,rosecutors are in my mind

probably the most powerful critic people in the criminal justice system. they decide who gets sentence, how long to as the judges for sentencing and we have to make prosecutors a part of the conversation. forensic sciences, report was just put out talking about the fact that we have some sciences out there that are not really asified, may be questionable far as the scientific quality. we cannot have innocent people going to the system at the basic level of the criminal justice system. we have to make sure they are as strong as possible. diversion, we need to find ways to have people not come into the system. there is something called law ,nforcement diversion pre-booking, keeping people out of the system. they need to do more with that. courts, we need judges who are experts in their areas who understand problems people are facing so that we are getting people to help they need.

just a thought about drug courts, we have a no entry side. that is where we spend the most weour time, that is where should be spending our time. there are people who are going to be locked up. this is a photo of president obama visiting a prison in oklahoma. we have to do a better job with aretry from the time people incarcerated, the minute they step into a prison or jail we should be thinking about reentry. this is the mantra of the brutal of prisons. -- the bureau of prisons. we know this works. worth spendingis the money. you give them an education they are less likely to recidivate. we spend less money. that is why this is the right thing to do. we instituted to the department of education, unbelievable anders of people

institutions wanted to participate in this pilot. we are revamping the entire school system in the federal , how they are doing school in the federal prisons. every prison system should be looking to do the same thing. that is how you present -- present recidivism. federal prison industry is something that works and it expanded., should be everybody should be looking at ways to implement this and arms systems. and treatment. we cannot have people coming into prison addicted to drugs and alcohol and put them out and and put them out addicted to drugs and alcohol. how do we do better and make sure they are getting what they needed when they are first lady. solitary confinement. the present route and i'll bet ,- president wrote an op and

up being assaulted while he was in jail, he was a kid and ended up getting out and committed suicide after spending an enormous amount of time in solitary confinement. this should be the base level of what we do. to solitary help? how many times are we taking people straight from solitary and putting them out on the streets? far too often. then we wonder why people recidivate. it is brutal and should not be happening in this country. we in the department of justice are working very hard to in the process as much as possible and are encouraging states to do the same. and then reentry. under the leadership of carol we have over 20 agencies all looking for ways

that they can do a better job to ensure that people are successful. every agency on this board has found ways that they can help people who were formerly incarcerated do better. that is amazing. something that should continue regardless of who is in office because it is too important. legal aid roundtable run by lisa foster. doing amazing work and making sure that people who do not have the means to get the legal help they need to get out of whatever trouble they are in. this is an important part of the work of the department of justice created under eric holder and continued by loretto lynch. -- loretta lynch. training and licensing, too many barriers for people who have a record. how do we make sure they are not a licensing scheme

for some event that really shouldn't matter at the end of the day. that make sure that people who have a record have a rule, we have 150 educational institution who signed a fair chance higher education chance. commutations, here's the president sitting down with seven people who were granted clemency by a variety of different presidents. different presidents. this president has done it more in the last -- the lowest 11 presidents combined. --0 76 people who have not who should not have been incarcerated for as long as they were incarcerated for. but what we need for real's

legislation, to change away we are doing it we have a system where we are locking people up under mandatory minimums that don't make sense. if we put it on the floor congress would pass it in the have not yet. that is the real change that needs to be made. we need to continue and all of this progress. i look forward to talking to you . this is the work that each of these people have been doing. thank you so much. [ applause] >> you should have found on your chair a note card. we find we can get three more questions if people write down the questions. legibly and in about a

half an hour we were collect those and i will start reading the questions from the audience. a question for care of mason. can you talk about the tension andeen alternatives preventing young people from coming into contact with the criminal justice process to begin with. how do you think you can balance? >> thank you for giving us this opportunity to talk about these issues that we are very passionate about. , i wantu to all of you to make sure that you all know that we could not have done that without many of you in the room. we have crime rates going down and incarceration going down and that is thanks to a lot of the reform work that we have been doing. the tension you talk about between prevention and

alternative to incarceration, i don't see it as a tension come as a president said, i think we are all capable of multitasking and doing things multiple times. to three areas where we need do work, in the community, in cellblock.om and the in terms of on the prevention side we have made great strides in doing things under the of this initiative which is designed to make sure we get young people of color a sick -- an opportunity to succeed. don't call me at risk, call me at home. sees all the potential and every one of our young people. for those of you who think it is targeted to one populations, we all know the statistics. with believe if we provide a system that allows them to succeed, we all succeed. i encourage you all to look at your communities, and look at

about thee are doing support of school discipline flip we have changed the the script. we no longer talk about the school to prison pipeline. ask a question about who in this room never got in trouble when they are in school? up andhad one hand go she was a child of a preacher. i said i know you are lying. my chief of staff is back there, and ceases frequently we are out the data,here we have the research and we know what works. inknow that when people are our system that we have to make sure that they have an education. the challenge is how do we implement and invest in what works.

that means investing in our young people, investing and making sure that they stay in school and that they have the proper health care. we have something called the it ison silence -- accessible to anyone if you google youth violence prevention , you will see that we have given a roadmap to communities about how to come together and come of their silos -- silence and created an empire number people can succeed. i encourage you to look at that. side, one of the that there we know are people who will be caught up in our criminal justice system. how do we equip them to succeed? people are going to come home. we want them to come home. we need to focus on the education through the program that roy talked about.

but also making sure that services, jobs and people stay connected to their communities while they are incarcerated, and also connected to the children. roy mentioned the number of children who have a parent in the criminal justice system. doneadministration has fantastic work on this. an earlyways remember program at the white house where we talked about -- talk with children whose parents were incarcerated. many of us think we know what is best for those children. they told us we don't care what our mother or father did. the are still my mom and they are still my dad and we need to was that bad to keep the connection with their parents. we have grant programs that are keeping kids connected to their parents and keeping the parents connected to the children. you help the children to be successful and you help the parents is successful when they come up. i can keep talking about the wonderful things that have been

happening. but i want to end my comments by challenging you, that you have seen remarkable movement in the space that roy just outlined. it will continue if you continue to work with us and continue to push the federal government under this new paradigm, we work -- roy talked about that these are all his friends. we do work closely together day in and out. not just here at the department of justice and we have close relationships with a lot of departments. we have collaborated across systems. i hope you will continue to demand that kind of partnership because we all know from the data that the criminal justice system reflects on other underlying issues that are happening in the country. become mental health hospitals. we have people in the system who have issues with drugs and alcohol. young people push boundaries and

they test limits. and their responses to be developmentally appropriate and figure out what is going on that is causing them to act out and to give them the support they need. i hope that you will continue to demand that your federal government give you the support and resources that we need in the communities to continue to do reduce the for friend of our criminal justice system. thank you. applause division andrights is open to a legend misconduct. wondering what would, the efforts with the change of administration? what can we expect in the work going forward? it is upon all of your work

and advocacy that we have been doing our work in the federal you allnt and i know will continue to fight for justice. there has to then a lot of anxiety and prognostication and theat will happen policing work and the like. just a couple of things that i about policing work. it is one tool among several at the justice department. there is the did diagnostic center that does a lot of the funding for state and local. cops office davis, which has a collaborative reform program. they have done a ton of work with police agencies. we have had in the obama

administration 25 investigations of police agencies. we are currently in forcing consent decrees. the reality is that consent decrees are already filed with federal judges with independent monitors. i was at a conference before the election with about a half-dozen of those federal judges and independent monitors. they are not going to slow around the enforcement of the consent decrees. they are very rigorous and robust. i think that is very important. a more important point is really worth noting. this gives to a lawyer is talking about. the world of policing and the conversations are happening in law enforcement today are kind of well on their way.

a conversation happening among law enforcement leaders now that some of us may think was not happening three or four years ago. i think there is lot of credit that goes to activists around the country for pushing forward and ensuring that people in this country once again people focus on the difficult issues of racial justice. to knowommunities get what public safety is? i have been given the rooms i have been in what law enforcement and community leaders in recent years that a banning -- abandoning the approached reform would be a radical departure and out of step where the field is. our consent decrees reflect the pillars that are in the task force on 21st century policing. they are a research desk resource that are being used.

doj has been a supporter of change. we have in some communities been a driver of change. hasreality is that reform always been about policing at the local level. it has to be responsive to the local community. -- there is a national standard, the constitution and the work we do at the civil rights division is to enforce that where there has had such a severe breakdown of trust that is required. thereot of ways, i think is such a momentum on these issues. some of the stuff that roy had described about all the data stuff, that is infrastructure that has been built out. an consent decree don't have infrastructure to allow to sustain community engagement to direct the priorities of our police department, to make it more transparent. all of this is transferable.

i don't think we're going back to any day of your it i think the video technology has changed. i think it will continue to be videos that may create -- across the country. by the kindinspired of leadership that i have been around a law enforcement as well as community members that there are mainstream remedies out there where there is a growing consensus around them. that work relative to who is in the white house is not going to slow down the momentum because of where the field is today. it will require a significant amount of pushing. to advance those pressure points i think all of us have to take ownership of that and continue to do that work. you, from yourto

vantage point of the eeoc, how administration change in national dialogue going forward? this you for hosting important conversation. we are focused on advancing opportunity for all -- icans and i am be glad am very glad to be part of this conversation. ist of what is so important ensuring that there is economic opportunity. that is the part we are focused on. progress i have seen and reentryolicing and removing obstacles for people who have arrest and conviction records, to be sure they have opportunities to work. on the first area of diversity of policing, we have a terrific relationship with the civil rights the pit -- division of the doj.

these are practical strategies that are being used by police departments to enhance diversity build inclusive workplaces. we know that diversity and policing is not the sole answer to the many challenges that are facing the police and communities. we know it is a critical part of the conversation that can help to drive trust in the communities and the police department that serve them. we work together to interview police departments that were building more transparent hiring processes, that were making sure that the public at large in some different communities who have not been part of the police force new how to apply. they realize that where certain -- itities will tap down could be a disadvantage to those communities where you might be the first in your family to

think about a career in policing . it also highlighted strategies to build trust in communities where these departments were going into high school and talking about opportunities to serve and why that was a valuable contribution to your community. shifting to how some young people saw policing. the third is being willing to consider how you are both hiring , how you are building your culture in the workplace as well as advancement opportunities. the second area on reentry that we have been focused on and working with others on the workingcouncil has been with employers to set of practices that allow people with prior convictions to be considered. they offer many talents that are often overlooked in the workplace. many of you may know that the -- 2012 issued updated guidance on employers use of arrest and conviction

screens in the employer -- employment process. in the 1970's, the courts recognize that it is not a legal to use conviction screens as part of your process. but if you are using the information in a discriminatory way, that can raise title vii issues. both treating people differently or if you build a process which has a disproportionate impact, and it is not sufficiently job-related. what we have saying is that more and more employers are changing their practices. , weave been happy to see have worked in the past three years we have worked with over 30 employers to change their practices, to ensure they are giving opportunities for people for people with proper prior convictions. case of bmw. they hired a new logistics

contractor, and they required all their current employees to reapply and pass a new arrest and conviction screen. they had a blanket exclusion for people with certain type of exclusions -- convictions. hired 100 current employees that had been performing the job, 80 who are african-american. had beene women who employed for 14 years and has been a good employee. anyears ago she had had assault and battery conviction over an altercation she had with her daughter's school bus driver who would not allow her on the bus. it carried a 137 dollars fine. for that offense that was very old she was fired. we have seen that in places around the country. they may not recognize the talents they are using with those kind of screens. we are happy to see the work that opm has done for the federal government so we can

ensure we are being a model employer. thank you. ron, turning to you. community explain that policing service of this wants .o increase data collection i cannot overemphasize we love this. how can this impact the public distorts -- discourse in the years ahead? good afternoon everyone. it is a pleasure to be here. it's a goodng think there is a lot of good work.

i think that before i came direct -- the director i spent 30 years in the field as a police officer. , andnt 20 years in oakland and these are very diverse communities. i share that with you because what i am hearing is on what it is like to manage police departments, what it is like to oversee or supervise police officer and have a responsibility of providing public safety services to a community. as a policeg to me chief what do i need from d.c. to help me do a better job? what role d.c. should or should not play. if i were asking everyone to the

new administration, and answer it anyway, the role that d.c. has to play, leadership in d.c. --. if you think about all the issues we are facing, presidential leadership, d.c. leadership matters greatly. a lot of the challenges that you president obama put together the task force that brought the field together so that the feel-good help itself question these issues, challenges and identify solutions and push the can of reform that is necessary. we need support. there is funding and research developingnds for best practices. so you're 18,000 police departments like local, state, is one of the greatest components or aspects of local enforcings 18,000 law

-- enforcement. tryingatest challenge is to nationalize that is counter to who we are but we need to find a difference of 20 having national best practices and policing more of a profession versus a location. is guided by a body of knowledge and set standards. you would expect whether it is a hospital or a small town or new york city that you follow certain procedures that you are expected to know whether you have appendicitis versus heartburn. you want to diagnose that using evidence in science. if you are looking for an attorney you don't want to hear

that i am not as good as someone else because i am from a small firm. you expect them to be up on the case law and committed to that body of knowledge. when i'm looking at policing , datain this 21st century is one of the key components on how you get to that level of professionalism. responding to violence with any doubts is dangerous. that is when you come up with the inevitable disparities that we all know exist when you start responding to crime about the data. isa to me as a police chief like a pilot with the radar. i may have flown this route a thousand times but as soon as it gets cloudy i am really going to like that radar. i need to be got to where i'm headed. i need to be guided so i know exactly what i'm doing.

we did a project recently in tampa, two things stand out. i give the police chief significant kudos for asking for this assessment. they were sharing the concern that they were stopping -- bikes in the community. community leaders, activists, the local naacp share the concerns that there was a stop of young men of colors on s that are being stopped or they knew the disparity was minimized by there were a series of robberies on young men on bicycles. therefore it would make sense. too late -- to take a look at it is that there was a series of

robberies, but it was a small group having a significant impact. the disparities to stop crime had no impact on the robberies isthe robbers themselves, it just disenfranchised the minority committee where the stops are being done. even that argument, if you pause moment to accept it was false. now what you have is activities where the police department believes in the heart and soul that i am responding to the crime and i'm trying to make the community safe. my son can't walk outside , thingsgoing outside you don't take people to jail for. collided next to data. data shows work is not effective and now it allows temperature we

deploy a justice policy and work with the committee close the sure therey and make is no collateral damage. andink this idea of data posting public data is significant. about dataprehension because people will be afraid that it will be used to show that there are disparities and racism. . share the same optimism we are looking at a generation for 30 years i have never seen law enforcement in this position in the three years i have been here where there were acknowledgment that it needs to historical injustices have been apologized. the first step, it is not a panacea. we are starting to see the kind of movement that they know they want to make.

to be able to empower them whengh data and show them data does show a disparity it is not i told you so moment. if there are disparities, if there is discrimination and even when there is no intent the .mpact is all the same i have a 19 euros son and if you get stops, there was no reason for so we need to work together to make sure we stop it. data is one ofn, the most significant things here and it shows the community when you post the data that you are not afraid of the truth. data equals truth in many ways and what you are saying is as a chief i'm not afraid of the truth. hurt.uth may if you decide to purposely be ignorant to what is going on in your organization, then shame on you.

that is a failure to serve your community. you may find out something you don't want to know. that is the obligation you have to your community. that is the obligation policing should have to all is community. we will find out there is a lot of disparity that we can control. we will also find out that a lot of disparities are attached to the systems you are talking about it can be no surprise that this high crime if you have low graduation rates. when you do have for example program windows, responding -- response cannot be taking people to jail. you provide jobs for the people who were breaking the window. you provide services. you make sure kids have an opportunity. that.est in that is a strong investment.

my budget doesn't necessarily increase as much as you need to re-and kreis -- rate increases savings if we reducing -- incarceration, and terribly jobs -- at the sames time i am a necessary component of the city because i work in partnership with you to make it safe. data is safe. [applause] about regression analysis made my heart tapping. i wanted to ask you the same question. you mentioned that there are innovative things done with data. >> data has been important and convincing employers to hire

people with conviction records. there have been interesting studies, job hopkins looked at their workforce. they had a commitment from hiring people at the community. what they community, including those with prior conviction records. they found those employees who had prior convictions stayed on longer. they had a higher retention rate. they looked at people after 40 ,onths and found 500 people those with prior convictions compared to comparable people without stayed longer in the workplace. some researchers, including those at harvard, looked at the army, over one million soldiers and found some thing similar. they used a whole person screening analysis to grant waivers to people with prior convictions, and looked at qualities that those individuals had in terms of the age of the conviction, type of conviction, the types of personal references, other things they had. they found people with prior

convictions both advanced faster in the military, and stayed longer in the military. they also found positive correlations. that kind of data helps employers think differently here maybe i am missing out on a good torsion of the workforce. one in three adult americans have some arrest and conviction record. you are missing out on a third of the population. when we have also seen increasingly our data analytics, the use of big data to develop screens that can help employers that identify people who are at low risk of recidivism. some of these data models pull together many different factors, looking often for qualities such as conscientiousness, impulse control, which may have seen correlated with successful job performance. what they will do is measure your current workforce and say, this is the average risk of

someone in your current workforce committing a crime. every employer has some risk in your current workforce. your is a risk assessment of your current applicants. do you feel comfortable with this current risk compared to your workforce? while i cannot endorse these models, because i don't know the details, it's important for employers to look at the actual factors going into some of these algorithms. hand, could the one build in discrimination into your algorithm, if not done carefully. on the other hand, it can help employers make more sophisticated decisions. we have seen often, without information like that risk assessment, your hr folks and andaverage employer, they do not want to be blamed. it could cost them their job.

it shifts that natural impulse to be overly cautious in your hiring, where an employer can actually develop a reasonable screen that can a valley with the types of people who can be very successful at performing a particular job. there is a lot of interesting developments in this area that can help employers utilize more of the talent we have across this country. i want today and in more on reentry, a lot of questions, and then i know we are opening up to the audience soon. carol, i will start with you. the hamilton project is very interested on the issue of reentry, then we will continue to face this in the decades to come. the president suggests reentry is a key to a more fair justice system. you had mentioned a little bit about this connection between parents and kids. i wonder if you could talk about other specific programs you have funded that showed promising results and what capacity of scale is up. was will say, when roy

talking about the pledge, the when ie, and i like it can tell that an audience like this -- we at the program have taken the advice that we have asked you all. i hired someone who has a prior criminal record. she is running our second chance program. she is fabulous. i say that there are many people who are caught up in our criminal justice system, that if we do not have their talent, it is at our peril. there are so many gifted and talented people. we also hired a second chance fellow from north carolina who also served time in prison, and rebuild his life afterward. lawyer, amarkable remarkable advocate. one of the things we learned ism the reentry counsel work

that we needed to have different voices at the table. we started meeting regularly with individuals who had been formally incarcerated. i just spoke couple months ago at their first national conference. to see thousands of people who had been caught up in our justice system committed to rebuilding their lives -- if you need inspiration, work with them. you will see how committed they are to helping other people. what we have done with our second chance dollars is fund programs that work with communities to help build opportunities for people coming out of prisons. , again,what works connection to family, jobs, and education. in partnership with the department of education, who is also running the pell program, over 12,000 people who were incarcerated now have a chance to get a higher education thanks to the pilot program.

it is a pilot program because of the change of the law in the 1990's, we cannot do it across the board. i encourage you to encourage people to change that. we have spent $4 million in this administration prepare people to come back out and be successful. again, i go back to the children and incarcerated parents program. we also recognize -- charles samuels, who ran the bureau of prisons, we did a lot of work together. he was preparing people to come back out into our communities, and i wanted to make sure that the minute they were released, our services were there to pick them up. we are not allowed to use our funding to help people in federal prisons, but we came up with a creative partnership. we found providers that will work with children of incarcerated parents in the communities. i encourage you all, we have a resource called the reentry resource center, where we have

not done everything available across the country, what we know about research on reentry, so you can build successful programs and model them. the challenges we had limited federal resources but we try to invest in programs that we could evaluate. if you can go to the reentry counsel website, you can see what works and replicate them in your communities. the wonderful thing is, we have technical assistance available. if you have problems in your community, please contact the diagnostic center. we have to be invited in. tell us what your problem is and we will bring you the resources you need to address your issues. if you don't mind, i would like to share a story. chief for six months after i got the phone call that one of my officers had been shot and killed in the line of duty.

the guy that did it had been out of prison about four months. i remember being faced with the choice, as the chief, and that legallyuld declare -- -- war on all parolees and knock on every door and do what was necessary to exact the kind of remedies that you would expect when an officer is shot and killed in the line of duty. but it was the family of the officer then asked me the most significant question that help to change my life. they looked at me and said, what would have happened if there was something for the young man when he got out? why is he walking around with a gun to begin with? this is the part of reentry that is sometimes lost. it starts with the concept of redemption. the human belief that people deserve a second shot, that people are not born criminals. if you were to come up to me when i was a cop in oakland and

you asked me, do you believe in reentry? i would say absolutely. you look at that time and that was the prevailing thought. it was the war on drugs. that was the collateral damage we are living with now, devastating communities. but if you embrace the idea of redemption, we ended of doing to fund programs. advocates talking to and that opened my eyes to things like reentry. for many, it is their first reentry, the idea of redemption. little things. we are running this program statewe basically had funding of the police department for the first time in california's history to do reentry. men coming to the department every day, and we pride, we gave them

jobs, giving them something to do. you can see the pride in their eyes. they were working hard and earning the dollar. it was amazing to me and it was print formative -- transformative to me and my agency. the work that karol has done is amazing. at the time i was chief. she said, did you know that when they were getting out, if you owed child support, you cannot get your license? i said ok. how do you get a job without a license? so this guy is coming out of jail and already one foot is already back in jail the moment he walks out. he cannot get his id. policies with housing, he cannot get a license, which means he cannot get a job, which means he cannot child support,

which means he is back in prison in six months. to hear that they came up with 40,000 administrative processes that are just by design or otherwise, obstacles to reform, means we have a lot of work to do. this is one of the most significant areas that you should push local law enforcement to participate in. if a chief is telling you that they are fighting crime and violence, how can you deal with that reentry? it is like being your car mechanic and not touching your engine. our rates were in the high 70's for recidivism and people in our program were below 14, just by investing in them. you can tell i am passionate about it because we spent so much time investing in incarceration. some people need to go to jail, we know that. but it is not even close to how many we are putting in jail right now. is their besttry step to never come back into the system.

if i were making a recommendation for the future, it is really investing in reentry. and her team karol has done is nothing less than amazing. >> i want to say one thing about child support. look at the new rule released yesterday. we are addressing those issues. i think the reentry piece is so important but i also think it is really important for us to understand what is undergirding so much of the work that we have been trying to do, that we have been doing on criminal justice for warm across the spectrum. reentry is a point of that, but undergirding so much of that is the criminalization of the people of color and the criminalization of poverty. chance,olks a second there is a lot of communities where the door is too wide open or there are too many people coming in on the front end, so the onus has to be on all of us to connect those dots and recognize that spectrum.

something that has been important for this administration has been connecting those dots, looking at how policing practices and policies set by local elected officials can ship it content priority set around who is getting stopped and arrested, who is getting searched, but happens when people enter the system through police priorities down the road through incarceration. the ferguson report that was put out in thatted investigation looking at the police department, policing practices in the city of ferguson. it quickly became apparent to us that we will not -- were not going to be able to address the erosion ofnd massive trust between the communities and police departments without understanding the philosophy around policing was deeply connected to the way the courts were operating, municipal courts in particular in ferguson,

around profit-driven policing that had created a local justice system that was really focused on revenue generation rather than public safety. once we began today in -- i hope you have seen our report on that . there have also been a number of folks working on these issues, debtor prison issues, before we issued the ferguson report. the ferguson report catapulted this bucket of issues. we were getting calls from communities all over the country where they were saying these problems around unlawful imposition of fines and fees, the role of policing and municipal courts, had really eroded people's faith in the legitimacy of the justice system , and had resulted in entire communities feeling they were criminalized. obviously, the criminalization of poverty, in many cases, in this country, is equal to the criminalization of race. one thing i'm proud of that we

did at the justice department was to use the moment where there was focus on this issue of debtor's prisons, fines and fees , and to issue a package of resources both through funding dot karol is providing to reform, but also to state and local judges, to identify practices that have become normalized, where local justice systems have been funding themselves off of the backs of low income individuals and black and brown individuals in this country. the conversations and the reforms we are seeing take place in court and police department department around the country on these issues has been quite profound. i'm excited about where this area will go. there is a lot of need for increased engagement. but that front end pipeline is important. also, school discipline. as you are having kids,

especially kids of color, who are criminalized early for behavior that used to once be attributable to a principal's beice -- that once used to handled with a trip to the principal's office. incredibly are so minor but that are resulting in this pipeline, derailing kids, preventing them from getting diplomas and instead going to jail. that has been amazing about this work is recognizing just how many points along the spectrum the need for reform is crying out because we cannot have transformative or form without connecting those dots. undergirdinging all of this requires a culture shift in the country around race and poverty and justice. that has been the enterprise that i have been proud to be a part of. >> i will turn to questions from the audience.

many pieces of criminal justice reform our bipartisan. congressman's the of the administration persisting or not in the next four years? a related question, what are you all doing to institutionalize the work you have done, especially interagency work? let me just start with the bipartisan nature. we have seen senator mike lee, senator john cornyn hand in hand with senator patrick leahy, senator durbin, senator booker, on criminal justice reform, completely understanding the system we have right now does not work. increasing impact on people that are poor, on race, on our budgets, and want to see change. for some reason, the rest of the

legislature is ignoring the facts, ignoring the data that says that we can do better. the smart on crime initiative, sally yates has talked about this repeatedly. we have done we can incarcerate people for less time, use mandatory minimums less, and have a little bit of an increase in the number of april who take pleas. and we are seeing crime rates go down while we are having these reforms. and frisk.about stop new york has reduced the number of stops by an enormous number, and crime is going down in new york. that is a fact. that is what we should be looking at to see and make sure we are replicating around the country. we are talking about fines and fees and kicking kids out of school and all of these stupid things that we are locking people up for. our clearance rate right on homicide is about 60%.

the thing we are worried about most is public safety and we are worried about some kid with mix matched socks? someone jaywalking? our police officers do not want to be doing this stuff. they want to deal with real crimes. they don't want to be spending all of their time on little things. a bipartisan spirit around it. we hope to see it continue. i don't want to guess what the neck's administration will do, but my hope is, number one, that they see the faqs, they see the data, they see that everything we have done a run criminal justice reform has been the right thing to do in the right direction to push. if they don't see it, that the community sees it, and at a minimum, state and local governments see what is going on, realize what is going on. the liberal state of texas, the liberal state of georgia are doing criminal justice reform better than much of the country,

and there is no reason why we cannot be doing the same thing nationally. i just wanted to answer the question of how we institutionalize this work. it already is. as roy said, from my perspective, the bulk of our criminal justice work is at state and local communities. the federal criminal justice system is small compared to the footprint of the rest of the system. three quarters of our states, primarily red states, have been participating in the call justice reinvestment which is re-examining their criminal justice system, looking at how it needs to be retooled so you have the resources where they need to be. we cannottioned, sustain $80 billion a year for corrections only. people are getting smarter and looking at what's happening, what are the social indicators of things that need to be addressed, not by the criminal justice system, but in a less-expensive way, doing things on the front end.

i am reassured that the work will continue because the states are getting it. i am also reassured that it will continue because the audience here, it and your interest in the subject, that you will continue to require us to work cross agency. we have learned how to leverage resources and work in a more collaborative fashion. at the department of justice, we transferred money to the department of labor to work on expungement's. sotransferred money to hud that people quickly rubbed their records and have the opportunity to be successful. worked collaboratively with the department of labor in our second chance grantee awards to make sure we enable people to get out and get a job. the department of transportation , with the collateral consequences that ron mentions, we now have data that is being updated. all of that will be updated, so the department of transportation

now understands, and a prison systems understand, when people leave, they need a government id. you cannot do anything without a government id. we know what to do with the question is whether we will invest in it. with you all continuing to advocate for these things, they will continue. >> we had a direct question about whether the reentry council will remain in existence in a new administration. thees, it is funded for next few years, so it will continue. >> with regard to the president's task force and earlier, i mentioned have not seen this embrace been a change in 30 years. now as far as we are seeing, institutionalizing it, we have projects with the international chiefs of police, major cities, law enforcement executives, pretty much every

major law enforcement organization is partnering with us to advance the recommendations of the task force report. the president brought 11 people together who were all external, law enforcement leaders, community, civil rights activist, youth leaders, and they went out into the field and got recommendations. we know that it will be institutionalize because the recommendations came from the field. we have since worked with all the organizations, we met with every post director at the state every director responsible for training officers. at least 36 word committed to the and the core principles of the task force. we met with city managers, , most recently, risk thaters, with the idea 21st century policing reduces risk.

litigation, injuries to officers. we met with people who have insurance carriers. many small cities cannot afford to be insured so they become risk management pools. leaders with oversight of police who are benefiting from 20% three policing. the big thing is this is now being driven by policing itself. we have a project with the chief of police association where we identified 15 cities where we funded to identify the best ways to implement the task force recommendations. they are putting out blogs, implementation guides. it is now being driven by the chiefs association and these other law enforcement, which tells me something, not that it is the administration driving it, but it is the administration sparking it. to seeg a group together that we needed to do this. now that they are adopting it, i would imagine the law enforcement field is sharing

their priorities. i think everyone here has alluded to it. their priority is building trust and confidence, reducing use of force, not just excessive force, but the need for any force. these are the priorities that the field is grappling with and i think they will make their priority. the challenge for me is not the desire to change being institutionalized. as we are grappling with these challenges, as we need to spark innovation and do further research, we still need leadership from d.c. to support that. that will be the challenge and that is where you come in, that we make sure any administration continues to provide that support. i am extremely optimistic. we went through a lot of cycles. i have never seen it like this. ferguson was not a moment. it started a national movement. ofone that realizes history

the question for law enforcement is, what side of the line will you be on this time? we know what side they were on in the 1950's and 1960's. -- iou see chiefs marching am not naive, we are not there yet, but there is a theme. you have to keep driving it because i think it can work. there are so many more questions and we have time for only a few. about your work with women and girls. several people have asked about specific needs for women in the prison system. we had a convening at the white house on friday by the president's council on women and girls. one of the things that we know from research and data is that the pathway into the criminal justice system for women and girls is very different. it tend to be a pathway where they have been sexually abused.

the question and challenge for everyone is to recognize, that is a pathway in. we have done wonderful things in this administration. now specifically provide that if people are incarcerated, you are able to provide victim assistance from federal money for them. part of the challenge is, first, on the front end, when people are exhibiting certain behavior, ask why, what is happening in their life, and not to criminalize them when they have been traumatized. the second is if they are in our criminal justice system, provide them the right kind of care that they need so that they can come out and be successful when they leave. that is the biggest challenge, recognizing the different pathways into our criminal justice system and providing that informed care on the front end and on the backend. division civil rights -- we conducted a few in the

past two years where there was a strong concern around unequal investigation, improper investigation techniques of victims of sexual assault. caner bias and stereotypes obviously play a negative role in the ability of law enforcement to investigate and for prosecutors to prosecute .ases we did a lot of work to really change this, not only in schools , but in communities, in montana, new orleans, and the like. one of the things that we found was important was to do the training and provide protocol that were victim-centered and issues.nformed on these

last year we issued a guidance on gender bias policing that was very informed by the field of law enforcement around these interview techniques, appropriate techniques to really help advance the kinds of special investigative techniques and protections that needed to be offered for victims of sexual assault and a mystic violence. that is something we are proud of, trying to change the culture in which some of these problems end up playing out in the .orrection psalter, are. with >> i want to mention the prison rate elimination act. andimportant it is to men women being sexually assaulted when they are incarcerated. it is not what they have been sentenced to. when you to make sure we continue to strengthen that. we end up with people who are further damaged by their incarceration. we also need to push that further as we move forward.

>> final question, a lot of interest from the audience, from ahead,e, looking thinking about where we can expect to see movement in the next four years. i know we have touched on that, but related, in whatsoever civil rights issues have we seen the most progress in recent years, and also the least progress? >> it goes to the body cameras. president obama said, for the first time, everyone in the world is seeing that these communities are not making this up. communities of color have known for a long time about the fact that they were more likely to be arrested, stopped, searched, to face use of force, to face excessive force. the body cameras have shown the entire world that what all of these communities have been saying is, in fact, true