satellite provider. unfiltered view of government by television and online. so you can make up your own mind. >> now, newsmakers with democratic national committee chair tom perez. our interview with mr. perez was recorded on friday, before it was announced that robert mueller had completed his investigation into rush upon involvement in the -- russia's involvement in the 2016 u.s. election. this is just over 30 minutes. >> newsmakers is pleased to welcome tom perez. he served as the secretary of labor during the obama administration. thank you for being our guest. two political reporters will be asking questions. chairman perez, you set up

the base of the democratic per 1% ofl primary to make it the polls or 65,000 donors. we have seen candidates for to become one of the 65,000 donors. cerebral -- to make charitable constitution -- contributions of two dollars for every one dollar. >> our goal in putting this together was to give multiple pathways and a debate stage two candidates. election,out from an it is the only pathway to a debate stage -- if the only way to a debate stage is polling, we thought that was potentially

unfair. i think the grassroots is a veryg pathway viable pathway and it is important to empower the grassroots. we took this by looking at the 1971 campaign finance laws. we tried to modernize them. and we came up with a formula that i think is not a layup for any candidate but it is also not a full-court shot. i think it is wonderful that so many candidates have understood that what we are trying to send -- the message we are trying to send is that you need to engage with grassroots. i see candidates who are out there doing that. that is good for the process. >> for the next round of debates after the june and july summer debates, are there any plans to change the criteria that we have now for candidates as the field itself may whittle? >> in all of the prior

primaries, we saw the thresholds evolve as the campaigns evolved. this will be no different. as we get closer to the first caucus in iowa, i think it is important for candidates to show they have made progress. so, we have not made a firm decisions on what those thresholds will be. it is absolutely undeniable that as we move forward, that we will adjust the thresholds to reflect the fact that we are closer to the caucus and to voting. people have been in the race for a while and they have to demonstrate that they have made progress. we will make sure that we give candidates ample notice. we announced these thresholds a while back so that everybody knew and they had a few months to go in the grassroots setting or make sure they were reaching the threshold. --what is the time while

timeline of when the threshold of the debates will be announced? >> we will do it as soon as possible but we want to do it as thoughtfully as possible. our first two debates are june and july. we hope that prior to those debates but i am not certain because i want to make sure we get it right, we are actively thinking about what these next thresholds should be. at the moment, it is premature for us because we don't have the data, in part because the field is not fully formed. we want to make sure that we have a good set of is everybody going to -- who is going to race,the race entered the we want to do it as soon as possible. we want to get it right and do it as thoughtfully as possible. >> given what you said earlier about pulling and the full criteria, should we expect these new standards will also be more than just polling? or have you not ruled out making

it just polling? >> i think when you get closer and closer to an actual election, the criteria can becauseith that, simply come first of the year, there will be new requirements. such as qualifying to get on the ballot. that might be a requirement. how many states have you gotten on the ballot? i'm not saying that will be one but new criteria emerges. as you get closer to iowa and the other primaries and caucuses that will ensue, now you are toing beyond simply name id starting to make an impact. wheres the point in time is getting show who traction as opposed to who is simply known by the most people. arestar is to make sure we giving everybody a fair shake. the actualyou get to

probative the more the polling data becomes. >> when you emphasize fair shake, with the republicans, the last cycle, with so many candidates, it seemed like nobody was happy with the debate stage. and how you thinking are you talking with the networks about making this fair for the candidates? >> what we are doing is unprecedented. has never been a grassroots fundraising threshold to get on the debate stage. i think that is, especially early on in the primary season, allowing an alternative threshold is important. we also learned from the last cycle that the varsity, jv, undercard format did not work so well. it was not well received. that is why what we are doing is unprecedented in the sense that,

let's assume for this conversation that 14 people qualified for the debate stage. what we are doing is that we will have consecutive nights, seven and seven. we will do random assignments. there is no bars the and no jv. nowill do the -- varsity and jv. we will do the same thing in july. the upside to this is -- i have worked with most of these candidates, they are spectacular. people ask am i worried about a big field and i am not. it is a great challenge to have. these candidates all have a story to tell and a record to talk about. and a vision to share with the american people. i want to make sure they have that opportunity. by having no jv, varsity on these first two debates, i think we will have record viewership. arethe first bay, we partnering with nbc and it will

not only be in bc but it will be msnbc,msnbc -- nbc, telemundo. however you consume your news, you will be able to watch this debate. there is certainly an acute interest. buzz feed reported in february about the state of fiber security and the degree which the dnc may or may not be sharing. in the interest of fairness, not wanting to give too much to one campaign or the other. can you talk about how those plantings may or may not have advanced in terms of cybersecurity sharing its information? >> absolutely. cybersecurity is front and center of what we are doing at the dnc. it starts with hiring the right people. our chief security officer is a guy named bob lord, who was the

chief cyber ops are at yahoo!. -- officer at yahoo! and at twitter. he knows his stuff. shortly after he got to yahoo!, he of -- uncovered a hack that was a russian hack. i look at the dnc's role in the upcoming presidential cycle as kind of a public utility metaphor. we are here to help everybody. a few days ago, we did another training for presidential campaigns. we get everyone together and talk about the basics of cybersecurity. a two factor authentication. there are some basic things every camping must do. my biggest fear is that when you start a campaign, you want to get the grassroots organizers, you want to get the people and

you may ship -- pay short thrift to cybersecurity and the bad guys will penetrate you at the outset and be there throughout. that is why we have conducted multiple sessions with presidential campaigns and we will continue to do that. we will continue to provide information and training to folks. we -- that is why we have on staff at the dnc, a full complement -- we could use more. this is a very important issue. we have people who spend their entire day on the internet. otherdentified bots and -- identify bots and other nefarious actors. and then we are contacting, whether it is facebook or twitter or whoever we need to contact, we are doing that and it is not simply for the benefit of a presidential campaign, it

is for the benefit of issues. we have seen the weaponization of the internet. starting in 2016, we have seen it in the state races and seen it throughout. itook at our function as relates to cybersecurity and i am appreciative that you asked that question. providing a service to every candidate. we will continue to have these regular briefings of campaigns, not just for the next couple of months but throughout this campaign cycle. we want to help everybody make sure that they do not endure what happened at the dnc. >> you have talked about and a lot of the presidential candidates have talked about as a threat to institutions of democracy in this country. at the same time, we have seen candidates talk about eliminating the electoral college and increasing the number of justices in the supreme court.

support some of these efforts? do you think it is appropriate for democratic presidential candidates to be proposing them on the campaign trail? >> it is important not to try to our what i would assert false equivalencies. there are no democratic candidates using words like the press is the enemy of the people. there is no democratic candidate who is proposing to have a candidate that has a culture of corruption that has engulfed this president. there is no candidate on the side that says they love kim from north korea. there is no essential candidate who would propose to exit nato. there is no president shall candidate who would take on the institutions of our democracy. of thes get to some specifics of your point. the electoral college had been debated for a number of years.

the constitution says each state itsdecide how to apportion electoral votes. the state of nebraska and the state of maine apportion their electoral votes differently than other states. every other state has a winner take all. nebraska and the state of maine do it differently. we can and should have a robust conversation about how we deal with the apportionment of electoral votes in this country. there are a number of states, including my home state of maryland that have passed a provision of state lost saying that when states totaling 270 electoral votes choose to apportion their votes to the winner of the national popular vote, that state will also do the same. that does not require an amendment of the constitution. ,hat is not anything that is other than trying to vindicate in my judgment, the one person, one vote construct that is a big

part of who we are. the conversation the democrats are having are about electoral reform and i think a lot of them are about democracy reform and we will continue to have those in the primary. >> do you think it is appropriate to increase the number of justices on the supreme court or have a discussion about increasing the number? >> i think that will come up in the primary in part because of what happened to merrick garland. it was unconscionable and unprecedented. there is no historical precedent to what happened -- for what happened to merrick garland. what happened there was unconscionable and unprecedented. people are frustrated. discusseding to be during the course of the democratic primary. the voters are going to make a judgment based on what candidates say on whether they think it is a good idea or a bad idea. when you have what happened initiated by mitch mcconnell, -- and ie feeling like

understand this feeling -- that seat was stolen. chair of the democratic party, my job is to make sure that ideas have an opportunity to flow throughout this debate. i believe that health care is a right for all and not a privilege for a few. i don't think it is my place to say how do we get from 90% coverage to 100% coverage. every democrat running for president understands that is what we need to do, unlike the republicans. i don't think it is my place to say we should either do a single-payer system or a let's move medicare eligibility 255. i think i will before the voters to decide which candidate reflects what their views are. >> the president has been rude decrying -- repeatedly the democratic party. there is a growing willingness to criticizeocrats

the israeli government. do you think it is time to mount a more robust defense that the criticism is valid? d think -- do you think it is fine? >> the democrats have been very clear in their support of israel. the obama administration, democrats now and our support of a two state solution, negotiated by the parties. at the table. this president has made the possibility of a two state solution that much more remote because he has lost credibility. we can support israel and still criticize president netanyahu. i can support the unite states of america and still criticize president trump -- united states of america and still criticize president trump. we want to make sure that the israeli people, and palestinians

can live in peace. that is what we want. that is what we are fighting for and that is what we will continue to fight for. i think the long-term solution is a two state strategy. negotiated by the parties. it is absolutely clear to me that this president has made that goal that much more elusive. because he is not an honest broker in the debate. what he did most recently as it relates to the goal on heights was an obvious effort to help netanyahu win the election. >> did you reach out or have conversations with congressman -- congresswoman omar or congressman oak osseo cortez? -cortez?o >> this is an important issue for the democratic party. what we can do as democrats and what we should do is make sure that we are vigilant in calling

out injustice. statements,forms of conduct et cetera that are inconsistent with our values. that is what we will continue to do. 1 beta -- --beto o'rourke do you agree with that sentiment? , i think is aw himselfctions align with a far right party. it is exceedingly ill advised. i would not do it. i think it reflects incredibly poorly on him. ideals of inclusion that have always been a hallmark of israel. and i think that was incredibly wrong. winould you prefer he not

his election? >> i'm going to leave that to the people of israel. we saw donald trump with his thumb on the scale. with his statement. that is absolutely not what a president should be doing. that is exactly what he is doing. the voters of israel are going to decide. i just hope that in the run up to the election, there is a discussion of issues and that there is not dog whistle politics. that does a disservice to the values of democracy that are the values of israel. going back to cybersecurity, every major democratic campaign has pledged to not use hacked materials against opponents. the trump reelection campaign has not made a similar public pledge, would you encourage them to change that stance immediately and take that place right now, particularly given 2016? >> the reality is that in 2016,

we filed a lawsuit about this, the d&c got hacked and others got hacked. dnc gotot hacked -- hacked and others got hacked. they used that information during article moments in the election cycle to undermine secretary clint are -- clinton and others. that is what they did. it should come as a surprise to takee that they refused to a similar vow that democratic candidates have taken. them!e it helped why would they want to do it again? i think it is unconscionable. the attacks on democratic institutions, i don't think there is any time in our nations history where we had to deal with the issues that we dealt with in 2016. i think it is so critically important, moving forward for

the democratic candidates and i applaud them for doing that. that should not be hard for this president. it should not be hard to speak charlottesville, against white supremacy. it should not be hard to speak out after new zealand but for this president, it is a different world. >> it sounds like, as critical as you are, you are resigned to it a similar issue should come up with them abusing materials obtained through hacking. >> it will not surprise me at all if they attempt to use materials obtained through hacking in the upset -- upcoming cycle. it will not surprise me at all and not only will it not surprise me, i fully expect they will continue to engage in voter suppression efforts across this country. that will not surprise me. they have been doing it for years and did in the most recent cycle. that is who they are.

an affront tos our democracy. >> why should the democratic nominee disarm on that front if materials are available on the desk about the president's reelection -- about the president's reelection campaign. >> we can win. when they go low, we go vote. that was how we won in 2018. we did not win by going out and trying to obtain hacked information. we won in 2018 because we went out and talked about the fact that it you have diabetes, we are going to make sure you can keep your health care. if you have diabetes, we will bring down the costs. if you are working a full-time job, you have to be able to feed your family. those are the things we fought for. that is what we will do that will enable us to win. >> we have three minutes left.

>> we talked about the size of the presidential campaign. i think there are 16 candidates, we are waiting for word on vice president biden and what he is going to do. do you expect there will be a nominee in place for the convention next summer in milwaukee? or are you anticipating going into milwaukee without knowing the nominee is going to be? >> i think we have -- will have a nominee by the time we get to milwaukee. i think the field will narrow quickly. super tuesday is a sickly a month after the iowa caucus. super tuesday includes california, texas. people will be voting in california the same day that people are going to the polls in new hampshire. because of the early vote. other states have early voting as well. i think you are going to see a narrowing of this field pretty quickly. here is the other thing.

i have a lot of confidence about. that is that everybody running for president understands that are singularly most important goal is to defeat donald trump. this is not about any one candidate, him or herself. this is about the democracy imperative to make sure that we win november 3 of 2020. so, we will have a spirited campaign. passions will be high. that is who we are as democrats and i am proud of it. there will be a campaign about the issues. in our upcoming debates, we will talk about health care, not hand size. we will not be looking to figure out a catchy nickname to give our opponents. we will be talking about how we help people get access to health care and how we deal with climate change and how we deal with all of the issues. that is what i think is going to happen. i think that every candidate who does not make it to the mountaintop is going to

understand the democracy imperative to help the nominee win. >> one of the questions that has come up, especially for many is whether or not a man would put a woman on their ticket as the running mate. the ticketative that be split one way or another? >> one way i love that is one thing i love about our field is diversity. we have five women running right now. you look at the geographic diversity and i think that is spectacular. i am confident whoever wins the nomination will ensure that the ticket reflects the diversity of america. theay have two women on ticket. not sure. depending on the outcome of the primaries. what i know will happen is that whoever wins the nomination understands what they have to do. which is to build an america that works for everyone and have a ticket that reflects who we are as a nation. that is why i have a lot of

confidence coming out of these primaries that we are going to have a remarkable ticket of people -- of candidates who inspire america and are going to appeal to our brighter angels. when you put hope on the ballot, you do well. when we allow others to put fear on the ballot, we do not do so hot. we have optimists in the democratic field. that is why i feel a lot of convents that we can pull this off with a remarkably diverse ticket that reflects america. >> there will be no democratic debate on fox network. how do you feel about donna brazile taking a paid commentator spot on the network? >> that is up to her. andve appeared on fox news will continue to appear on fox news. i have colleagues who do the same. that is up to her. i have had a number of conversations who have thought

about hosting a debate. i thought long and hard about it. the reason we did not do it is i have an obligation to our candidates to make sure they will get a fair shake during these debates. these debates are more important than any of the other debates we have done, i think. what we have seen going on at fox news at the highest levels of fox news is something that does not inspire confidence. our time.it for thank you for being a guest. >> always a pleasure. >> we are back after a conversation with tom perez. nice in the -- march.n the 25 they are hovering around the word socialism and democrat socialism and how the government can be more involved, what are

the biggest factors that have moved the party in this direction? >> if you look at what these presidents -- candidates for president are running on, a lot of them are things that were on the fringe of politics before bernie sanders campaigned in 2016. he has pushed ideas like medicare for all or free college into the mainstream of democratic politics. you have a number of candidates who either cosponsored some of this legislation or who have adopted it or adopted some version of it. a lot of what the next year and change has determined is how far left has the party moved and art democratic-- are primary voters willing to put their faith we hide a cannabis who is -- candidate who is farther to the left than anybody before? >> joe biden is still

contemplating getting into this race, it looks like he is getting closer and closer to a decision. what are the challenges for a candidate with his long pedigree in the party? >> joe biden has said he has the most progressive record of anyone running. as nolies defined that other person in this field has done what he has done in terms of getting obamacare passed, expanding protections for lgbtq americans. these are all obama achievements. there are liberal activists who have a huge sway over the democratic party's message and agenda who are not impressed. they say he is a relative of a past age. we -- relic of a past age. to atoneeen him try for his advocacy in passing the 1994 crime bill which has been blamed for increasing mass incarceration and hurting it

minority communities -- minority committees. -- hurting minority communities. young liberal activists are displeased. about theh talked advantages and disadvantages for the two parties, on the democrats, there is a wide field of candidates. on the republicans, they have an incumbent president who is combative. presidents rarely lose when they are up for reelection. george h.w. bush lost and jimmy carter lost. both of them had primary challenges before their campaign. gerald ford had a primary challenge in 1976.

has the biggest megaphone. he has access to millions of people on cable television whenever he wants. democratic candidates are speaking to smaller slivers of voters. of the early states, the expectation is that at most, there will be 250 or 300,000 people participating in the iowa caucus. you are talking about a small slice of the country that the candidates are holding their message to. president trump can spend his time trying to talk to everyone. >> the other thing he has going for him is the economy. dotainly, democrats can and say on the campaign trial that there is rising income inequality. all that is true but president trump can point to some strong numbers in terms of joblessness

and he is doing that, which increases the power of the incumbency. when it comes to democrats, no one has gone negative yet. that probably cannot hold. i will be waiting and watching what happens when and if they start picking at each other to whatever degree they do. that will affect the ability for them to come together and keep prioritizing the feeding trump. theaw in 2016 that clinton-sanders divisions are still persistent. president trump is going to have an unprecedented amount of money for reelection campaign. the democratic candidates, with the exception of jay inslee have sworn off of super pac fundraising. elizabeth warren has gone so far as to say she will not do any

private fundraisers altogether. in an effort to attract support from grassroots donors. it is a different electorate from the primary to the general election. if these candidates have not built networks with potential themselves, they put at a significant disadvantage come the general election next summer. >> 30 seconds left, anything to add? >> the secondary worry is the tv to not do geo the job they needed to do. suburban women were what powered the 2018 victory for the democratic house. we will need higher latino and african-american turnout and that takes money, investment and real cooperation. we don't know if it is going to happen. >> it is early in the process but it is certainly interesting at