[applause] when i was there, we were usaid forward. if this sounds like usaid way forward.to thank everyone in the audience who is with us alive. those that are live streaming, thank you for joining us. those in the overflow room, thank you for joining us. i want to thank joel and his team who pulled this off and everyone who has done so much work to pull us together. all of the fellows, everything you have done, [applause] finally, all of the students that are here today. you represent the future and i want to thank you for your commitment, your and her g, for correcting me every time i'm wrong, which is often, and i look forward in the coming years to how we can all work together to make the world a better place. thank you for joining a. [applause] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] announcer: a panel of military officials, legal experts and advocates testified before the judiciary committee on the ongoing operation of the military prison at guantanamo bay. witnesses talk

>> it has been a big priority for decades at usaid. we recognize that economic development cannot fully take route if you do not have countries abiding by the rule of law and human rights. that is having a democratic ecosystem that will be much more sustainable over the long term for all of the economic develop at work -- development work we promote and moreover democracy elements, the freedom of the press and strong institutions and anticorruption measures and rule of law and quick governance. all of these things are values in and of themselves. u.s. id has invested around the world in helping civil society promote all of these elements in their own country. so, it has long been important and will continue to be important that we are wrapping up efforts in a couple of areas to meet the president's call on this initiative to really restore and replenish democracy, globally. >> let me ask you a question, isabel, that i hear sometimes when i travel abroad. people say to me, sometimes, you americans put so much stress on elections. you mu

through decades of programming, usaid has learned that long-term approach, long-term support to local civil society actors coupled with appropriate diplomatic and multilateral pressure can be effective in strengthening civil society organizations to advocate for democratic change. the early identification and quick action before the passage of repressive laws can help scale back such efforts. we know empowering local voices and strengthening domestic philanthropy are building blocks for expanding civil space. we also know the world has changed dramatically. the ripple effects of the covid-19 pandemic has in many cases allowed autocrats to clamp down further, and the plague of myths and disinformation eventuated by increasingly sophisticated authoritarian regimes is a growing challenge. as we take stock of democracy this week, it is easy to lament an authoritarian -- limit authoritarian encroachment over the years. this problem is real but not the whole story. citizens are fighting for democratic rights all over the world, more than ever, even in the most repressive environments. it wa

the new us government aid agency, usaid, replaced morrison knudsen.outhern afghanistan in these boom years, seeking jobs in schools, hospitals and factories. glenn foster had no doubt in the power of technology to bring about profound social change. kandahar�*s brand new airport used the latest technology. the outside world was drawing closer. we didn't see our new airport as the product of far away cold war between the united states and the soviet union. to us, it was a marvellous new opportunity. we were building the international airport. the airport included large underground fuel tanks, very high capacity fuel tanks. it included very sophisticated refuelling system, electronically controlled, right out of the apron. it included overnight facilities for maybe 100 people. back in the �*50s and �*60s when a plane stopped to refuel everybody got out and stayed overnight wherever you were on the way, while the aircraft was serviced, and then the pilots and everybody would get back on, it the next morning! ——it might be the next morning! it was designe

on the bases in the middle east who are either state or usaid people. the first priority right now as i said, is american citizens and green card holders, but we're working to evacuate afghans at risk and other people closely associated with the united states government. there's a number of applicants for the civil immigrant visa program who already have a visa. they got a visa back in august. an electronic visa. we are trying to arrange flights for them. sen. romney: deputy secretary, i'd speak for myself. if there is need for additional resources, financial resources to provide additional personnel to speed this process, i would for one be very anxious to provide that support. i think we have a moral responsibility and american commitment to help those who helped us and leave no one behind. not just our own citizens but others who fought alongside us. on a very different area, many of us have a great deal of concern what china's ambitions might be with regards to taiwan. one, because of the people there who've enjoyed a freedom from the heavy hand of

and we eliminated a lot of the capabilities we had built for usaid, for dod frrx state. we did it in afghanistan, we did it in iraq. there's four or five countries, and i'm saying we shouldn't do it. but we're starting that slippery slope again. and that's the one thing -- one lesson learned about this type of effort is it starts small and it grows. and it starts like a roller coaster going down, and the next thing you know, we'll be pumping more troops and more money in there. so no, we don't learn lessons too well in the united states. we should. because otherwise, we're going to spend another trillion dollars and have a horrible result. on the classification, all i can tell you is, again, i have been here maybe as long as you have. i have been here since 1982. i have been dealing with classified information since 1978. and i have learned one thing, and i'll take it to my grave. that is, governments don't classify good news. that's the one thing i have learned. and i don't think it's changed since vietnam, probably since world war ii. if a government classified good ne

around the world usaid is building data systems to track vaccine deployments. they are providing training to health care workers and setting up vaccination sites. they'll continue this vital work. it is increasingly important as there are greater and greater supply of vaccine around the world. i think just overall stepping back the united states is doing just what the president said we would do, which is leading the effort to vaccinate the--the world. by supplying the 1.2 billion doses to the world with no strange attached. all donated. we'll continue to share more and more doses. we'll continue to help scale manufacturing both here and in other countries. we are going to do all we can to get the world vaccinated because we know we are not safe here until the world is vaccinated. it's the right thing to do. thank you for today's briefing.s left. dr. scott weaver, the national windstorm impact production director at the national

so what struck me in the book, obviously, you and i both having served as administrator at usaid, is a lack of appreciation for what happened in that bush presidency for humanitarian assistance, humanitarian leadership, and crisis response. and obviously, you were there at the time. and then eventually, sort of extended and mobilized these tools when you became administrator. so andrew, if you would, talk a little bit about the innovations that we saw from the bush 41 team with respect to usaid and humanitarian leadership. >> let me tell you an interesting story. ryan crocker was dean of the bush school and a good friend of mine. in fact, good friend of all of ours. and ryan said george bush was a great president, andrew, but you need to also say, you know, he made some mistakes. one mistake is he didn't do anything about the reconstruction of afghanistan after the russians left. and i was going to write that in the introduction. i said, you know, i really need to check this out to make sure ryan is correct, and ryan was wrong. ryan didn't know this, i didn't know it. it's so obscure

and thank you for your service to our country, both in congress and usaid. and now at the wilson center. andrew naxios deserves 99.9% of the credit for making sure the collection of essays and reflections comes out. i'm credited with having helped him but really he helped me help him. he motivated me. and the most remarkable thing is read the introduction he wrote to this book because he sums ares all the rest of the chapters but he does it in a way that is -- i'm going to say both optimistic and pessimistic. it's optimistic we know what we should be looking for in a president. pessimistic in saying it's going to be hard to get there. i think it will be very hard to have another person like george h.w. bush in the field of candidates that could successfully compete to be president of the united states. and i say that because his track record of responding to the noble call of public service is almost unique. none of the predecessors had it and i don't think any of the successors to him will have that breadth of knowledge and it's best summarized by what andr

last week, usaid added 400 million dollars. that brings the total to one one $7 billion for global vaccine readiness. -- that includes within that 400, efforts to bolster storage in various countries and set up field hospitals and train health workers, building data systems, and a support campaign to increase vaccine confidence. we will continue to do all we can to support getting vaccines to countries. importantly, as you point out, taking vaccines to make sure they become needles in arms and actual vaccinations. that includes efforts to support with needles and syringes to do that. next question, please. >> jeremy dimon at cnn. >> thank you for the briefing. so far the committee on immunization practices this meeting to discuss the j&j vaccine. i am wondering if dr. walensky could say why that meeting was called and whether you believe the benefits of getting j&j no longer outweigh the risks. suddenly, given the rapid spread of omicron and the data on production against omicron from the booster shot versus two does recommend

likewise, there were state department and usaid officials writing back urgent memos to the leadership saying things are going wrong. some people call those dissent cables, i call them honest assessments. those are the honest assessments we want to get step we need to find out what wrong with the information flow because i have talked to too many commanders, captains, colonels sergeants, privates, ambassadors, junior state department officials who knew this was going south and they said they were reported so where did those reports go and why -- maybe they were -- why weren't those reports sent over to the leadership so we didn't have to hear this happy talk for the last 20 years? >> please ask a question and not have a comment. >> i wanted to ask with all of this information being out in the open and many junior and mid-level officers and ngos openly said this is not going well, do you think the issue is that the white house and even in congress, that there was no endgame because there was no goal, as it were that they thought we are never leaving. so we can just take this -- kick thi

this book is focused on what happened on the international side and efforts under usaid. very dramatic in spreading the compassion of america around the world. that comes out in these chapters. how did he staff his government and bring people in? what is he looking for? he was not looking for people who would just echo his views, he wanted to challenge his views constructively and make a difference. i have to tell you. we all know he was president and was vice president before that. a lot of people didn't know about his track record in service or his son who was president which was pretty darn unique but i would deck out the first time i was campaigning with him, i was volunteer chairman of the campaign in 1978-79 and the 1980 process. there was an event, he was speaking at an event in springfield, connecticut, hartfield, connecticut and i got a call from james beckett iii who was part of the campaign and said ambassador bush is speaking at an event in hartford, connecticut, 45 minutes away from springfield, massachusetts. put together a key or something for ambassador bu

i would just on the floor asking for these two usaid administrators. it was not senator coons who was objecting. it was senator marshall. and so this remains a crisis that i hope this committee can wrap its head around. lastly, if i could send you some information on a bill that i'm introducing today, with senator cornyn, on sub national diplomacy. trying to help the department organize mayors and governors to be able to represent the united states abroad. this is something that you care deeply about and believe in. my time has expired but i'd love to continue to work with this committee and try to work with and buttress our core and represent america. broad i happen look at that senator. this is of great interest to the secretary. thank you miss >> thank you mister chairman. >> thank you senator. >> thank you mister chairman. i'd like to speak to senator murphy's point and come to senator barrasso's defense. with all due respect senator murphy, this is about priorities. it's not how they set priorities it's about how time is utilized on the senate flo

that dimension, in particular human dimension of delivery in these countries that 400 me and dollar usaid program is welcome. it is much needed. fraction of what is really required. the united states is doing more than any other country and rising to the occasion. we've invested about $18 billion in the last year or so toward different forms of the response, but much more is going to be needed looking ahead. host: let's hear from jeff in new york. caller: thank you. i have a comment about basically the entire responsive solution for the world of covid. i think people need to step back and look at the historical his specs that we -- look at the historical aspects. we knew for 20 years that there was going to be a pandemic somewhere along the scale of 1918. exercises that were held for 20 years are indicated that capacities were not here -- were not there. the problem with that is we weren't prepared. that's what you pointed to. health care systems get overrun, the workforce is depleted. we don't have the capacity. more importantly, we don't have the trust. we don't have the trust of the pe

just last week, usaid added $400 million. that brings the total to $1.7 billion for global vaccine readiness. and that includes, within that 400, efforts to bolster the cold chain storage in various countries, set up field hospitals, train health workers, build data systems, and support campaigns to increase vaccine confidence. so we'll continue to do all we can to support getting vaccines to countries, and then, importantly, as you point out, taking vaccines and make sure that they become needles in arms and actual vaccinations. and that includes efforts to support with the needles and syringes needed to do just that. next question, please. kevin: let's go to jeremy diamond at cnn. reporter: hey, thanks very much for doing the briefing. so, tomorrow, the advisory committee on immunization practices is meeting to discuss the johnson & johnson vaccine. i'm wondering if dr. walensky could say why that meeting was called, and whether you believe that the benefits of getting j&j no longer outweigh the risks. and then, secondly, g

so i obtained an internal plan that usaid had put together which basically said we have to really surgeresponse if we want to meet biden's pledge to help vaccinate 70% of the world by september 2022. so it proposed essentially a $10 million global plan of which $2.5 billion u.s. share to surge up teams that could help with logistics in numerous countries around the wld. what i learned is that plan had been circulating inside the government since around october, but nothing was done. and as one source explained it to me, they have not gone and asked congress for money in part because they're facing a narrow senate majority, their focus on infrastructure and build back better, and they have not actually requested the funds. so the plane has been sitting there. and as the plan has been sitting there, we are saying this omicron variant developed out of southern africa, most likel and this is what all of the public health experts have been warning about precisely. juan: what is the problem, the biden administration has too small a team of the top coordinating this stuff or is that they have

she was an usaid official.en she spotted the 10 children who everyone was reviewing the footage saw said, listen, i don't think those children are transients, meaning they are merely passing through, i think they live in or near this target compound. the military disagreed. they continue to classify the children as transients, meaning they believed they could mitigate the potential for the harm to those kids by carrying out the strike at night when they would not be outside playing or wherever it was they had seen them playing by the structure and the target video, the pre-surveillance video. shortly after this airstrike, video surfaced online family members whom i had met four years later i believe, who were picking up the bodies of their loved ones and trying to salvage everyone they could. at least 21 people died from that single family alone in this airstrike, and they were civilians. when that video surfaced online, it triggered a credibility assessment in which the u.s.-led coalition took a look at the ev

our overemphasis on contractors versus building the capabilities inside usaid or state is broken. our whole authorizing and appropriating cycle. our approach to a whole of government issue. and that's what you are faced with right here. and i would say, and i'll use a term from my -- not my home state, but where i run and hide all the time, up to maine. wickedly. every wickedly difficult issue we face as americans is due to the fact that it is a whole of government problem and we are not designed for, equipped for for dealing a whole of government problem. and i'll throw it out to you. think of any problem you are faced with. education, the economy, the problem of healthcare. retirement. those deal with multiple federal agencies. nobody is in charge. so one of the problems why it was 20 one-year wars was nobody is in charge. and our staff is going out there from multiple agencies, who's in charge? congress. you got multiple committees and subcommittees looking at the same issue. so what i'm saying is, read that report and focus on the whole-of-government issue. the classic example

because what it is saying is those from the international agencies usaid the department from international development in my country they all say we know how education should be done. we know how it should be done and then go from the sons of liberia and the slums and south sudan all these places but then they go there and actually parents prefer a different way to do it they like the low cost private schools because they are accountable to them they don't have tai chi teachers who don't strike but they were card and the children are abandoned so what i say when i see that that this is amazing we haveoi parents that are doing for themselves look at this amended amazing educational self-help and african countries and i say let's look at parent choice thing we don't have any abilities outside that might be invaluable but then they say liquid parents are doing. it is wrong. it's not public education. so therefore let's get rid of the schools and impose a proper public sector and sometimes they call them an .ignoramus. and then to come to the public sector then you get a proper education. >> w

. >> i met usaid. -- i am at usaid. you mentioned reengage with africa. senator blinken outlined a partnership approach to africa but with the goal of having a smaller impact compared to early years. how is the administration engaging economically with africa beyond vaccine diplomacy? how is the administration planning to work with the continent to build back better and in light of covid, grow the economy? mr. sullivan: one of the side ship initiatives that came out of the g7 earlier this year, which we spent the rest of the year building and will launch in 2022, is build back better world. what it is fundamentally is the mobilization of significant amount of government resources. they will be refracted -- refl ected in the budget. it leverages hundreds of billions of dollars of investment for three forms of infrastructure -- physical, health, and digital. think everything from ports and dams and electricity projects and grades, to new vaccine manufacturing and distribution facilities, to the form of digital infrastructure we believe protects values and p

and as it would have triggered the suspension of usaid and she had to support this regime, c, it was an, a coo, it was pre qu, which doesn't necessarily lead to the tater ship nor to pregnancy. the mainstream media followed the official line that the national party or the coup party was improving the country. how the most dangerous place on earth got safe for the new york times ro. they told the security of a regime that over saw the highest murder rate in the world. i guess these were safe murderers, and they had final answers. these were the kind of murderers you can raise your kids near to miss seriously, the hunters cru saga disappears from a paperback edition of clinton's hard choices. apparently, those pages were scored out of the book at gunpoint. it looks like less of a hard choice and more like a bad choice when hundreds of thousands of people are fleeing despite millions of dollars of us aid. and that's not a migrant caravan. it's people fleeing a us train us back military grub, norco gang dictatorship. caravan the country had become so violent and the local elections were

think it's important for us to be able to implement the programs that the congress authorizes that usaid and other imaging agencies be able to directly carry out the program. >> carrying it out directly goes against the democraticallyelected partner of that company . >> eceverything we do with our partners is negotiated and agreed with the government of columbia. >> so you're saying the agreed to this agreement this is what they wanted to see happen . >> they've signed an agreement on assistance programs whether it's with usaid or with ino. >> did they agree with the delisting and other direct delivery of 82 former elements ? >> i did not personally participate. >> was this an nfc process? was crucial in this process and again, i think i don't want to give the impression that there's anydaylight between the governments of colombia and the united states . they are super partners. >> i think we will hear from them and i can tell you i know what their opinion n on it is. they want the delisting and aid to beprovided to these people be provided to them but let me talk about the reality on th

and usaid, pepfar supports more than 70,000 case care facility, 3,000 laboratory, 300,000 health care workers across 55 country, all of which have been vital in supporting the global fight against covid 9 by strengthening country's ability to fight aids, we have improved our collective ability to fight other diseases. and i want to thank and recognize a guy that i can't believe all he's done, dr. john kingason. stand up. [applause] doctor, you can call me joed bien. -- joe bid dervetion n. -- bidden. he is my nominee for am bass -- ambassador at large to oversee pepfar. our global effort to combat h.i.v. i understand you're joined by peter sands. peter stand up, will you. executive director. of the global fund. this marks 20 years of the global fund and the united states is proud to be both a founding member of the fund and largest contributor in the united states -- and the united states is looking forward to hosting the global fund's seventh replenishment conference next year here. thank you. [applause] can't kid ourselves, particularly about the disparities we see nestcally and glo

he took usaid really gimme the things that are not associated with great revolutionary and ever after all, um, do you believe that it is legacy really lives on the fact that he wanted more participation from women in african societies all across the continent. and his obsession with environmental politics, which arguably would fit in with good effie and the importance of green politics. yeah, i mean, i think those are really, really good points. i mean, i think that he has the car had a certain kind of vision of society, almost of utopian vision. you know, $11.00 in which you know, women to be equal to man. and which, you know, the citizens would be good custodians of their natural environment. as you're suggesting, he was in the kitchen. yeah, i mean, i think there was a lot of pushback against that. i mean, you had this head of state who was preaching feminine discourse and lobbying and pushing for women's liberation. but you had a kind of, a patriarchy from below that was, was responding to that. so it, it actually was a huge liability for him. and he didn't have a very strong male