Rahm Emanuel (3:41)

But I want you to know for lunch, for lunch we had British pizza and they ordered Kentucky Fried chicken. So, so Mr. Secretary, you after spending.

News Anchor (3:51)

Let'S bring in Rahm Emanuel, former ambassador to Japan, former chief of staff to former President Obama as the former ambassador to Japan. You must have a lot of thoughts about this. I want to pick your brain on that. Then I want to go talk about the larger trade war situation that's taken place in your views you and I spoke about two months ago on this topic. So it's good time for an update.

Rahm Emanuel (4:15)

Yeah. So let's do economics Asia and let's do national security Asia because I think there's something important because I can just tell you from my time in Japan, those two weave in and out of each other through the process. Three things that have caught my attention, four things caught my attention on the national security front. A couple months ago, China did an exercise, live ammunition exercise off of Sydney for the first time ever. And that close to Sydney to the point that it impacted civil aviation. And that was a message sent. Second, just the other day near Japan, they came within, I think 300ft in aviation with their jet versus a C130 that Japan was flying in a way that Japan had not seen. And they've done certain things around the Senkaku Islands, both countries claim, but also had something that had not been seen before. Also in the South China Sea vis the Philippines and the Spratly Islands, China had a much more aggressive posture. And Secretary of Defense Hegseth was in Singapore at the Shangri La Defense and Security Conference and he gives an entire speech in which he doesn't really mention Korea kind of reminds you of Dean Acheson absence of mentioning Korea and there is some open discussion in that area about America pulling some troops out of Korea. And then lastly the United States is reviewing the agreement we have between Great Britain, Australia and the United States on some, on submarine production. It was called, it's called Aukus. And you look at all of these events, call it in a 60 day period, you have a much more aggressive China and a much more retreating, unsure America which is destabilizing the confidence of an Australia, a South Korea, a Japan or Philippines, our traditional allies. Allies and not just allies. How America projects deterrence in the region. Split screen. That's on the left side. On the right side of the screen. Economics. One word caught me in what the Japanese who are the largest buyers of American bonds by a foreign government, the largest investor in the United States four consecutive years of which nearly half of their investments are in manufacturing and in industrial. They said we're not going to do a quick deal. And the key word not deal, the key word there is quick. Every foreign government now Japan and China also know that the President is desperate for quick deal. Just a press release, don't care what the substance is. It's an announcement just as the President just showed with China. And everybody understands now on the quote unquote tariffs. All you have to do is be patient because the President is impulsive and all he cares about is a press release. Doesn't really care what's in the press release, doesn't care whether America wins or loses just as long as he looks like a winner. And so they have his number and they know how to use his desire for a quick hit to their advantage and our disadvantage. And that's going to be a problem on a whole host of fronts and already is. And I think you saw this as you said in the tariff discussion with China. We kind of, we don't really have an. We don't have a trade deal. This idea. There's a deal. We don't have a what has. We have a problem economically with China. They always practice economic coercion and they're doing it on critical minerals now against the United States just like they did in 2010 against Japan. Two, they're aggressively involved in intellectual property set and stealing of ideas as you saw with Google on around AI about a year ago. They involved themselves with economic espionage and they're aggressive mercantilists using their very little domestic demand, massive manufacturing underwriting, cheap exports so they could destroy another country's steel or another country's autos or another country's tech, you know, toy business, garment industry, etc. And all that is in place. President's done nothing. And he, because of his impulsiveness, and he said it in his own little tweet, this will be decided between Xi and I. We're going to agree to it. He wanted to look like a strong man in his desire to curry favor with Xi. And they're laughing all the way in Beijing. We didn't get anything on economic coercion. We're going to be continue to be a victim of it because China said, we're not giving you credit dominoes. We're going to do it every six months. Magnets 2. We've had no impact on their intellectual property theft, no impact on their mercantilism, no impact on their economic espionage. And all our allies are watching how China, in my view, cleaned our clock. And there was a story today, and I'll just stop here, where everybody who's applying to get these now magnets out of China are saying they're asking incredibly detailed reports as you submit your application about who the end user is, how you're using them, what do you want? And that's another form of economic espionage. And it's all left in place. These guys are the worst negotiators because all they wanted to produce was a press release, not an economic plan, to.

News Anchor (10:16)

Your point, also because he wants to project being a strong man while actually also being very weak and damaging to this country here on the domestic front, and we've seen over the past week, many thought was unthinkable. And I want to get your thoughts on it with Trump federalizing the National Guard, calling the Marines as well, by the way, not paying the National Guard, not activating their health care because once again, he did it in such a mess. We Learned that from Military.com they're sleeping on the floor. They're guarding a federal building. The chief of la, or the, yeah, the LAPD chief and the LA Sheriff's Department are saying, we don't even know why they're here or really what they're even doing. We have to shift our resources basically to, to watch them now. So you have that taking place, by the way, more troops now in Los Angeles than in Iraq and Syria and probably a lot of other countries abroad. And then you have this dictator parade that Donald Trump is holding for himself this weekend on the 250th anniversary of the army making it about himself. I know you must have Strong thoughts about all.

Rahm Emanuel (11:26)

But so let me start on the back and I'm, I think it's very telling and really wrong on so many levels. Here you have the 250 year anniversary of the United States Army, General Washington, General Grant, General Eisenhower, just to name three who became presidents, Omar, Bradley, Patton, and I'm leaving many, many others out that. But you get the point and rather making it about those individuals and everybody who makes up that 250 year family of service to the country, to the Constitution and to the ideals of the United States. Donald Trump's decided to make it about the most important person in his view, Donald Trump. He has, he's literally sabotaged this part of this anniversary where America could remember what an art, what the army has served, not only about serving your country, but serving its ideals. And I think it's telling on also the anniversary, although it's a different branch of the armed forces with the Marines, that he is also breaking precedent by using the armed forces on American soil. And so I think it's, that last point is incredibly telling, that Donald Trump's ego, rather than being selfless as the President of the United States and the Commander in chief, holding up the army and what it has done through generation to generation to generation, chapter after chapter of American history in service of something bigger, he's made it about himself. And to me, that tells you the story of Donald Trump, but it doesn't tell you the story of America. And that story still has to be told and reminded. Second, I think what's going on. I have a hundred things about la. You know, you're not one. I'll just start in the back end. You're not going to solve the issue or the challenge of immigration on the streets of Los Angeles, Chicago, Spokane, Washington, or Seattle or New York. We're going to solve it in the halls of Congress. And the one thing the President has refused to do is engage Congress on how to resolve this. Now, 1988, Ronald Reagan signs immigration. By the time Bill Clinton comes along, also a little Bush 41. But every president since Bill Clinton has tried to figure out because immigration has changed how to handle both, being true to the fact that America is a nation of laws and America is a nation of immigrants. Those are the guiding principles. Bill Clinton deported criminal immigrants or immigrants with criminal records. We as somebody, as a point person, we had Operation Gatekeeper in San Diego, Operation Safeguard in Nogales, Arizona, of how to strengthen the border. George Bush had his own manifestations. President Obama created DACA for dreamers, but he Also was protested when he was seen as the deporter in chief at public events. He was protested. So he was tough also about illegal immigrants, et cetera. And everybody's trying to figure out how to manage through the fact that we don't have an immigration process around illegal and around legal. And the irony of this to me is as a student of the politics around immigration reform, as somebody through my old tenure, chief of staff, Congress and down to President Clinton senior advisor today, Democrats are much closer to Republicans on how to confront illegal immigration and the border than they have been in the last 15 years since Ted Kennedy and John McCain had a bipartisan bill in the Senate. And truth be told, you can see it because Steve Bannon attacked Elon musk about this etc. There are strong elements and even the president says this we need to update our legal immigration. So they the Republicans if you may say have moved closer to where I think there's a consensus on how to modernize our legal immigration and leadership would be the president calling everybody down and say okay here's the principles, let's go deal with this. And answers what does the president do? They were in search of a confrontation. They wanted this confrontation in la and that's not this an immigration policy for the United States both one that honors the fact that we're a nation of laws and we're a nation of immigrants is going to be found in the halls of Congress. Presidents have contorted themselves trying to figure this out and never really getting legislation. Governors are doing it. You can see with Governor Abbott, you can see with Governor Newsom, you can see it like governor here. Pritzner cities have contorted themselves with welcoming sanctuary cities type that everybody's trying to work around a broken system. Fix it businesses. Today I saw a story President said that he wants to deal take kind of the foot off the gas because businesses are complaining that they can't find immigrants to do the work that they need them for. They have a labor problem. Well that was known before we did this in Los Angeles. And you know and I'll just say in Los Angeles you have a Protesting in America history is patriotic provocation. Violence is not. You should be arrested and the law will follow find you and prosecute for that. But a government has a also has a responsibility and that is to protect speech and not to provoke the idea that we're calling out Marines and the National Guard in ways that not only unprecedented. The court will decide at least as the National Guard whether it's illegal is insane. When it's not about ruling engage Congress and it's about governing something he's never done. This can't be done by executive order.

News Anchor (18:03)

We've talked about the foreign, we've talked about the domestic in the present. Now let's talk about where we go. What's your plan? How do you see we address this? How do you see what's the vision for the future?

Rahm Emanuel (18:21)

When you say this, you mean immigration or in large, where America is and.

News Anchor (18:25)

Et cetera, in large part where we are today, both foreign policy, domestic and where we go more broadly.

Rahm Emanuel (18:33)

Well, let me just start on a kind of a look take away from this moment, but step back and take a wider lens for you. Our politics becomes unstable at exactly around the same moment. The American dream becomes unaffordable. They're interlocked. And exactly when the public both not only loses confidence that they can have access to the American dream, but that the system is rigged. All they want is a shot at the American dream. They want their children to have a shot at the American dream. Owning a home, saving for your retirement, your kid's education and ability to afford your health care. The system and the public's right about this is rigged. My kids are going to be fine. But that's not how you score this, that's not how we keep score. Whether your kids or my kids are going to be fine, that's whether the American dream is open to the American people, not open to a segment of the American people. And it's crazy. The ability to get a home. First time home buyers. You have people that were at the President's inaugural. I would put myself. I wasn't at the inaugural. Amy and I have more than one home. But we have people in America that can't get access and afford single home. That's crazy. The system's not written like that. I grew up in a home. My dad was a doctor, my mother was a nurse. When you said a second medical opinion, it was another healthcare professional. Wasn't some insurance bureaucrat that tells you you can't have that procedure, you can't have that medication, that you have to go to bankruptcy for that. This is. And people are using their 401k to backstop their paycheck rather than save for their retirement. And this is crazy. So to me the American dream is unaffordable. It's inaccessible to the American people and that's unacceptable to me. And you're going to work like a dog to solve that. And that means if you work for a living, you're going to finally have a government that works for you. That's their pledge. Second, I'm passionate about this but that education and I've kind of laid out, you know, you can't if you. I don't mean to get theoretical or historical. Every great period of American growth is anchored by education. Every period making high school universal. You can see the growth in American economy, the GI Bill growth in American economy. I mean land grant colleges in their Lincoln growth. Every great period of economic expansion in American history is anchored by making education more universal, more acceptable. We have a crisis in this country. We have a 30 year low in reading scores, 30 year low in math scores. Covid was devastating. Horrible what was happened and permitted to happen by adults. I've laid out what I think what I call art attendance for a. We have what used to be single digits, 3, 4 or 5% absentees. Over a year kids are now running 18, 19 to 20%. We should have a national standard. If you're, if your absence is greater than 5%, you can't go to the next grade. We need to re establish the standard. Be in school, not at home. That's a R Reading Mississippi. There's a thing called the Mississippi miracle. They just went back to the basics. More time on reading, back to the basics of how to do it. None of this new kind of stuff that got got everybody sidetracked. And Mississippi's showing incredible gains in reading starting in 2010. And among the most difficult communities, poor kids, black males, they're showing incredible growth, surpassing national numbers. And then T for truth, which is B, go back to testing and letting parents and schools know how those kids are doing. And reading math, et cetera, against national standards. Not educating to the test, but having data so you know where you are and what you have to do to improve art attendance, reading truth. And that to me would recalibrate now education back to the fundamentals. And then third, I would say overseas. The United States needs to modernize its relationship with its allies and friends. You're not going to confront Russia, China, Iran without allies and more importantly just allies, allies picking their weight with a clear path to the strategy and the relationship between both security, defense spending and diplomacy. And America, I still believe is an essential country that others want to follow, be partnered with, et cetera. And then when I think both about my experience in both the Middle east but also in Asia, you're not going to deter China from California. You're going to deter it because not only are resources in Japan, which is the largest military footprint the United States has overseas or Korea or Australia, you're going to deter it because of our forces anchored with other countries, forces that want to be a part of it. And that has a deterrent level, as does the diplomatic efforts we do in the economic coordination. And to me, that's kind of how I view it. And if we strengthen ourselves at home, we will be incredibly strong abroad. That's one of the things, you know, I say from my time in Japan, I learned a lot about Japan, learned a lot about the Indo Pacific. But being away from America, I learned a lot about what's special about our country and how many other countries and publics see America as their benchmark and want to be associated with it. And that is an incredible resource to draw.

News Anchor (25:06)

I think that's what makes this time also very challenging when you see America, which used to be the benchmark, being viewed differently. But Rahm, I want you to come back. I want to talk about I'm sure there's going to be a lot of developments coming up every single day. We love having you on. Thank you so much once again.

Rahm Emanuel (25:23)

Oh, thank you, everybody.

News Anchor (25:25)

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