facility they learn how to criminals more quickly and end up being in trouble for the rest of their lives. we're, i think, moving in the right direction. we still have a very long way to go. >> another issue you wanted to address as pretrial justice, over half of the people in our count jails or city jails, there are more initials in city jail, not due to you, but over half of the people are waiting in trial and people lose their jobs and so forth even if not convicted and there's various issues, not having prompt representation. interested in your thoughts how to address that. >> well, when i was in the maryland senate i was chairman of the judicial proceedings committee, tried to get reform of maryland's pretrial justice system and failed. it's -- it's a wasteful and

inefficient system. there were, i think, a couple of months ago somebody looked at the baltimore city jail and found that there were over 100 people there who were incarcerated for awaiting trial because they couldn't make bond of $100. the money bail system discriminates against poor people. it fails to take into account the most important criteria, the most important things we want to know when thinking about deta detaining somebody before trial, is the person likely to show up for trial, number within. number two, is the person going to offend while he -- and i say he advisedly, it's almost always he -- while he gets bail. what the arnold foundation has done great work, excellent way of using data, big data.

looked at over 1.5 million cases and trieded to determine what would be priedictive of whether somebody vee late or offend out on bail and show up for trial. and the factors aren't what you might intuitively think what judges think. well, he lives with his mother, sure he's going to show up. he's got a job, you know, that means he'll be okay. not so -- the things that determine that are predictive of those two things are more likely has the person committed a violent offense in the past? has the person ever skipped bail before, been charged with something and failed to show, things like that. there are i think nine different factors that are very objective. you don't need a long cross-examination. it's very simple. those are things that courts

ought to employ in determining whether or not to hold somebody over for trial and not the subjective determinations that most judges make on a daily bas basis. >> i have -- do we have time to take a couple of questions from the audience? i was going to talk about human trafficking and re-entry. i'd love to throw it open so we can get the audience to any questions here. otherwise, we can proceed towards one of the two topics i mentioned. we have a question back there. okay. >> hi. i'm lisa. i'm with the family offenders sentencing alternative graduate. i wanted to touch base with education in prisons which we can appreciate the trade schools going there. however, has georgia done anything for when they are released? do you set them up with

employment, because per experience, even if you have the certificates and you have this knowledge, society as a whole has a hard time accepting felons to be employed or even find safe housing, which i validate all of their feelings. everybody is cautious. do you -- what has georgia done to help them find gainful employment? >> i'm going to give you two answers. in the traditional sense, the state has a ban the box. so i have two employees in the department of law that have criminal records. they were both young, they made stupid mistakes and they're outstanding employees. also, we do the certificate, as i mentioned, that goes to them that literally comes from the department of corrections that says give this person a chance. now, on the other hand, the other answer is we have grants

to community-based organizations because i don't think that government is really good in this space in contrast to faith-based organizations. so we specifically reach out to faith-based organizations to provide the housing, additional education, and food so that when the folks are released from prison or county jail, they're not looking to rob the convenience store because they have no money and they have no food, and you provide additional training there. and then we work with community-based, faith-based to find jobs for these individuals. >> thank you. >> if i could mention. texas, last session, we passed a ceiling law for misdemeanors where you can get conviction, after you've been on the straight and narrow in the community a few years, you can get it sealed. prosecutors, judges can still see it, still use fodder future enhancement but when you apply for a job and housing. it passed one of the chaum bers in west virginia and pending in the other claim ber.

>> hi. carrey jefferson. mr. frosh, your state's unique. you home the sro finra, 70 mediation centers across the country. would it not be an idea for the a.g.s to get together and put the criminal behaviors from finra into the criminal system, collect fines and use that to benefit the prison system? finra's got four business leagues labeled or presented as charities. the war chest is healthy, if you'd like at guidestar.org but you've got criminals not going to jail, not pleading guilty, pleading without admitting or denying and they're based in rockville. you can take the lead here with help out the other states and cover the $100 fine that can't be paid. if that's a good idea. the soros foundation, open society, went into baltimore city a few months ago and paid -- bailed out a bunch of

people. that's a very good idea. >> i'd love to talk with you afterwards. >> fine. >> any more? >> okay. >> if i can ask, i work with offenders, been working with offenders in prison and outside of prison over 22 years and i find the biggest stumbling block to someone getting out of prison is not being able to find a job, not being able to find a place to live, and i believe that there's real discrimination going on against felons. and it's just like this country has no -- has made it -- made it a, you know, discrimination is not stood for at all, whether it's gender, sexual, whateveren but when it comes to felons everyone's allowed to discrimination against fells and there no law on the books. in florida you can't rent an apartment if you have a felony

on your record. it impossible. you have nowhere to live. you have to live in some -- and the same thing with work. if there are no laws made by attorney generals stating it is illegal to discriminate against a person who has a felony, this is all a waste. are there any laws in georgia or maryland? how do we write these laws? >> i would tend to think that the federal housing laws would control in that area. >> they don't. >> i would also tell you, in texas, we passed a bill last session to say landlords can't be sued for renting tax offenders but some worried about the liability. it doesn't solve the issue. >> i'll be happy to look at it. it's an interesting concept. >> i would say, as attorney general, neither sam nor i gets to make the law. we enforce it. >> you get e-mails every day telling you how to vote. >> that's right. but we have struggled in

maryland to help offenders achieve re-entry. it's very, very difficult. it's difficult politically. we have been struggling -- the past couple of years there's legislation that would allow felons to vote, expand voting rights. one of the most basic rights that all of us have as americans, and that's been an uphill climb. so far, not complete success even in that. >> okay. looks like another within back there. >> hi. i'm a visiting fellow with the u.s. department of justice, working with both bureau of justice statistics and office for victims of crime for better dissemination and translation of statistical data to support the crime victim assistance field. i wanted to go back to the part of the conversation addressing how do we better support victims, and this conversation, like most conversations in these context, goes straight to topics like restitution, compensation,

access to recovery serviceser for those victims that we see in the images projected in media and policy, the victims sitting in the courtroom. implementation with fidelity of those rights and services for those victims is so important. as you all know, the product of many decades of a movement and hard fought victories in law and policy for victims. but what i wanted to bring up today, because i think it doesn't get enough air time in these conversations, is that those victories were for all victims of crime. and the truth is, less than 15% -- less than 50, 5-0, of violent crimes are report in the country and less than 14% of violent crime victims get access to services tinded for them. that number plummets to 4% when it's not reported. and also, to bring up then

credible nexus with the topic that's important to many in the room about addiction and unaddressed trauma, as a result of the statistics is that many of the victims will self-medicate and this further cycles future vulnerability to further harm a violent victimization and justice system involvement. so my question to you is that, when we think about a better response to crime victims, what in the context of your state plans particularly through this lens of prevention that's a centerpiece of smart on justice that we're all thinking about, are you doing to try to address these concerns, especially breaking down the false dichotomy between who are victims of crime and who are people that are involved with the system. >> so, first of all, i'd welcome an e-mail from you on what you think the best practices are. a.g.s can't be experted in everything. nor like lawyers. i would tell you that, as i sit

here today -- how do i want to word this? -- a female lawyer arrested for stalking me. for the first time on a personal level i'm dealing with what it's like to be a victim, keeping lights on outside my house, having the police department tell me my gun needs to be loaded, i'm sort of seeing this from a different genre, shall we say, all of a sudden. but one of the things that i think partially is responsive, because we need to go further as you say in this area, is we are now have some police chiefs and some sheriffs telling their communities we want folks that are addicted to come in and to send you straight to recovery centers. we're not talking pretrial, we're talking prearrest. that will mess up statistics with pew, et cetera.

but it's really the next step. when you have law enforcement that gets it, and they say if you need to go in recovery, before you commit the crime, before you're a crick tvictim o crime, come into my office, let me get you in a treatment center, you don't have a criminal record. you go through the center, you're not paying for the treatment, you don't have any criminal record at all, and hopefully you become productive. so i think that's one of the next steps. so when i do talks all the time, one of my standard sentences is, addiction is a disease, not a felony. now let me tell you, that's not easy for folks in law enforcement or public safety to say. that takes an educational process. but i firmly believe it now and i walk into rooms with families that have lost their loved ones to drug overdoses, heroin overdoses. it's a huge step for law enforcement and public safety to get there. i applaud all of those police chiefs, all of those sheriffs

that now get it, and are encouraging folks to voluntarily come in for treatment rather than avoid the criminal justice system to let the criminal justice system help them. >> well, i wish we could continue because it's really been a wonderful conversation but i have been informed we have to stop the proceedings at this point and a believe lunch is upon us. thank you so much to both w wonderful attorney generals and great questions as well. >> if you want to stand up for a

moment, feel free. one more session and then we'll have lunch. my name is raul ayala. i'm a public defender in los angeles. this here is my privilege to be visiting attorney adviser with the defender service office with the administrative office of united states court. it's been a real pleasure in working with the institute to putting together this symposium and this next panel, of course, near and dear to my heart, being a federal practitioner. i'm not going to reread the bios in your program. each one of the judges are experienced in the issues of alternative sentencing. it's a rare occasion that we have the three levels of federal judges. we have a circuit court judge, judge donald, district court judge, judge gleason, and a magistrate judge, judge wells. next year, perhaps a supreme court judge and we'll have all

bases covered. i did tell caroline it's a risky proposition putting a seasoned trial attorney with a microphone, at a podium and a roomful of people. i'm going to resist the urge and keep it brief. i'm also privileged to be a team member in alternative sentencing program in los angeles. we have two very distinguished programs. one is a pretrial diversion program conconviction and sentence alternatives. it has two tracks, track one will lead to complete dismissal after a year in the program and you get the services that you made need, to address the issues that got you arrested in the first place. and we also have a post conviction drug court to address repeat offenders instead of sending them right back to prison, do what we can in offering treatment. and the key is we have really a good collaborative, cohesive group, led by the heads of each

of the departments. and i don't see here quite yet but i think -- is chief kiry here? no. in our district, we have a good working relationship between for the pretrial, with chief -- pretrial services officer, george walker, represented by supervising pretrial services office, calvin thomas. our u.s. attorneys, well, we've had a couple of them, in our district promoted and supported our programs, ultimately neither -- neither of the two programs would have been in effect had it not been for the discretion and leadership given by the united states attorneys office following directive of then-attorney general eric holder and the smart on crime initiative. our office represents the people in the programs. we are rounded off with treatment providers both in our

pretrial and our post constriction programs. we've all heard proposals to change federal criminal statutes, right? a couple of bills sitting up on the hill. the smart sentencing act and recently the senate committee passed or voted to proceed on the care act, conviction and rehabilitation act. addressing some of the issues we're talking about here today. as federal long-term federal practitioner, you'll hear from judges, too, there's little to address the issue of alternative sentencing. the smart on sentencing initiative is on the back end for people in prinson to modify mandatory minimums, perhaps edge courage individuals in the federal bureau of prisons to participate in rehabilitative efforts so they can reduce their time and custody but little on the front end. so up until now, these programs have really rested largely on

both prosecutorial discretion, which i applaud, and judicial discretion, you know, within the law of judges do have a certain amount of discretion. n you'll hear directly from a couple of the judges. some of the judges go out on a limb. judge gleason is famous, for those that follow, have put out a number of public opinions to trying to stretch the discretion within the boundaries of the law. without further adieu, if i can ask the judges to come up. judge donald. the other exciting fact, judge donald's currently the chair of the aba criminal justice section. we'll tell you what the section is doing. in that regard, magistrate judge wells, who is a leader in establishing a mental health court in the federal system,

which is basically unheard of until recently in the district of utah last couple of years. and of course, judge gleason, who has been a pioneer for many years on alternative sentencing. having been a longtime practitioner and probably never have this opportunity again i'm going it take advantage of my discretion and say, your honors, individually and collectively, i'm going to grant your motion to address this audience. >> raul, i have taken the prerogative of assigning the order in which we're going to talk. judge gleason is going to go first. >> thank you, your honor. >> thank you. night to be here. it would be nice to see you if they didn't have these lights frying my retinas. i know you're out there. i can hear you. i wanted to speak to you briefly about -- i wanted to speak to you at great length about a lot of things but we don't have a lot of time. so i'm going to speak to you

briefly about alternative to incarceration programs in the federal system. and specifically, the two that we have in where i sit, in the eastern district of new york, we have -- these are presentence programs. now, those of you familiar with the federal system are familiar with re-entry courts, and they're wonderful. they've been around for more than a decade. they're pretty much around the country now. what i'm talking to you about today is not -- are not re-entry programs. they're no entry programs. they're intended to provide alternatives to the routine incarceration to which we've subjected too many people in the federal case load. specifically, there's a drug court we call it the pretrial opportunity program, which is a

federal presentence drug court for essentially nonviolent peoples w people whose substance abuse is well documented. we get the sense the conduct that brought them into the criminal justice system arose from their addictions. obviously a strong track record for this modality in the states. weech borrowed from it. it seems like a bigs revolution in the federal system. it shouldn't. we're ridiculously behind. but the social science has pretty much proven the efficacy as ways of enhancing drug treatment retention, ways of reducing recidivism. the impetus of the drug court was, my sense, why are we waiting for people to get out of prison to deal with their drug

problems in a drug court model, a judge-involved model, only after they finish a prison term? why don't we use it up front and use it as an opportunity for them to avoid a prison term at all. that program began in january of 2012. we just had our 50th monthly meeting. i'll give you a little bit of data in a second. it been enormously successful. second alternative is a youthful offender court. it is only of reason vintage, as a judge-involved supervision program, for many years it was a form of pretrial supervision. the great jack weinstein, my colleague, thought we had too many kids being detained pretrial arising out of -- their cases arose out of what appeared to be a complete utter lack of

supervision. kids who never -- who grew up in places where no one told them to get out of bed and go to school or look for a job or go to work. and as a form of pretrial supervision we call it the s.o.s. program, special options services program. it been around for more than a decade. but once we started the pop court we asked -- i think she made be here. is she here? there in the back. amina's a saint. she's been working with our youthful offenders for many years. after we started the drug court, i asked her if she thought judge involvement, using judges, a monthly meeting with judges, would be a useful tool in her toolbox. she said yes. so since 2013, that's also been a judge-involved intensive supervision program. these programs together don't capture -- we recognize especially when it comes to drug courts, we recognize the

difference in the case mix federally as to that of the state systems. we don't capture a huge segment of the case load. the two most mature programs are our and casa program in l.a. we capture 4%, 5% of case load. so far combined, we've had roughly 75 participants in pop and s.o.s. since s.o.s. is judge-involved supervision program, 34 have completed the program of of those, 25 completed it successfully. 24 of the 25 did not get prison terms. and then, to show you how great an idea this turned out to be, our attorney general, lore ret ata lynch, was the u.s. attorney when we first started pop and s.o.s. and its current format. i went to her and said the goal, we want your cooperation, the goal is to take this segment of

folks that we've been routinely sending off for three, four, five year prison terms and do something better with them. she saw me and raised me, because of the 24 successful participants, 8 of them, 32% now, of our successful participants have had their charges dismissed entirely. to thattic tent, these are not just become alternative to incarceration programs but diversion programs. we've had a great deal of interest expressed. it's all grassroots. for the life of me i can't figure out why the sentencing commission refuses to places -- place -- i've asked it to fashion a departure forparticip. judges on the way down -- judges have been asking for this for years. on the way down, i'm cleaning out my office, i'm leaving the bench in two days, and on the

way down, this last night i found this federal judicial center results of a survey in 1996, two-thirds of federal judges in '96 responded to the survey by saying there ought to be alternative to incarceration programs. doj supports them, aba, right on crime, across the political spectrum but we don't have the support from the sentencing commission because it doesn't lead the way it sloul. we've had visits from a dozen districts around the country. judges, probation officers, prosecutors, defenders. now there are programs like ours, one or two veterans courts. there's a veterans court in utah. most of them are youthful offender courts or drug courts. mainly drug courts. up and running around the drawing board, 21 districts around the country,

notwithstanding the fact if you look at guidelines manual you can't get a departure for them. i'm having the prosecutor come in and say to me, on sentencing day, for successful participants in these programs, i'm having them say to me, they're not going to have a conviction at all. yet, if you look at guidelines plannual i'm not permitted to downwardly depart. we need institutional support that an authorized departure would give. we need help gathering data. i know the stories would make you cry out of happiness turning these people's lives around. they are unbelievably compelling stories. i know that you don't justify these programs by reference to anecdotes you do it with data, just as they did in the states. and we need help capturing data. these 21 different programs all

have different permutations, different laboratories. so we need help gathering the right data, analyzing data, we need to prove going forward what i know in my bones is the truth, which is that these work as they've worked in the states and they put a human face on a criminal justice system so desperately in the last 25, 30 years in need of a little humanity. this is the right thing to do. >> thank you. judge wells. >> thank you. [ applause ] >> a panel or so ago, i heard someone ask how does this -- how does this movement translate to the federal system. and i thought, well, our panel can help address that question. i want to, first, say, thank you

to the state courts who were the originators and leaders in the specialty re-entry court area and it's upon whom we now in federal courts, at least i have in our district of utah, have modeled from. there are also in this audience today a number of pioneers in federal court system who have brought this issue full at center to our federal courts. i would indicate to you that our programs in the district of utah and, yes, we're western, and, yes, we have a lower population, but we have the same issues and problems as anyone else. but our judges are behind our

efforts 100%. and we've never had to worry about judicial support. i want to tell you about two things. first, about our mental health court system which is the first mental health court but not the last in the federal system. and then i want to tell you about how we have expanded the role of the federal judiciary and its partners in the reinjury process. i'm going to tell you two stories, both of which are true, and began my journey of the interest this area. and one instance there was a gentleman who was clearly seriously mentally ill who was facing again serious felony

federal charges. he also was afflicted physically with what were apparent tumors on his face. they were very large and protruding, as well as similar ones on his body. we knew he was mentally ill. he was ordered to go off to a -- for a federal psychiatric evaluation at one of our federal institutions. after about three months he was returned to the district with a psychiatric finding of incompetence si. the problem was during that period of time his physical problems weren't addressed and he then quickly died in custody as a result of the cancer. that story touched me because it

was addressing one need without addressing the second and very obvious need. his mental health addressed but not his physical health. the second one involved a man named mr. cannidy, also seriously mentally ill. he was also a serial bank robber whose comfort level was in an institution rather than being out. he was returned one friday night to the district of utah and he went as instructed to the local halfway house. unfortunately he was two days early and was not accepted into custody. so what he did is he slept on the street, then he went to the bank he had robbed repeatedly

before, robbed it again, and sat down and waited for the police to come and get him. he had no other choices as a seriously mentally ill person with nowhere to go those two incidents sparked a response in our district, as is not uncommon, many of our people in federal probation, federal defenders, sometimes the u.s. attorneys office and other agencies migrate from the state system to the federal system. and i have been asked numerous times why can't we have a mental health court, why don't we have a drug court, and this was some eight or nine years ago.

and the simple answer at that time was, we never have. so what we did is piloted a program with the permission of our chief judge without really mentioning it to other district court judges figuring we had better opportunity if we asked for forgiveness, not for permission. and fortunately, that was met along with our pilot drug court program with great enthusiasm from series of judges who as the judge has stated, didn't like their lack of options and opportunity, even though they had seen the problems. we are now in our eighth or ninth year of behavioral health

court, as we now call it, as well as mental health court. but because of the open mindedness with which our judges and our probation people looked at these opportunities, we have been able to expand our programming far beyond. we now have an overall district wide program that is called a.r.c., assisted re-entry to the community. that encompasses all of our re-entry programs which, i think, has the judge indicated, also involved the first federal veterans court, again modeled after a state similar court. we have also recently started a

tribal re-entry court which is another pioneering effort from our district which serves and provides re-entry services for those that live on or near the two largest native population reservations in the state, but which some of them are seven hours away by car. we also stole from the casa program in los angeles a wonderful preentry diversionary court. we have taken our utah defender offender workforce development program again, a model of the eastern district of missouri, which we started around the same

time as the re-entry courts, which is a collaboration between our federal and our state representative to provide masters level training provided by our federal partners with state officers as well as our own probation and parole officers to provide incentive, training and incentives to prospective employers about, in many cases, the benefits of hiring those with felony convictions. we also, as well, train individuals coming back from periods of incarceration, how to interview for jobs, how to prepare a resume, and we match

those employers up with those persons. i want to say the word offender, but i've chosen to strike that word from my vocabulary although i just used it, because it carries such a stigma with it. i also want to tell you about another program that we have begun called pretreial pathways which involves an educational program for those who can be anticipated to spend federal time, so that they learn how best to behave on pretrial release, if they're given that. but also so they and their families have the opportunities to learn from those who have also been incarcerated, what to expect in an institutional setting. so as to ease the way and the

journey to and the jury from or through those institutions. so i would encourage everybody to open their minds and think outside the box and see what you can do in this important area. thank you. >> thank you, judge wells. good morning. let me say how delighted i am to be here with you this morning and delighted i am to know that there are so many people really committed and interested in dealing with these issues. i would say we have a very distinguished and wise panel this morning. we were not wise enough, however, to bring water with us up here. here we go. any w anyway -- >> is that an order, your honor. >> i'll just see what happens. thinking back to --

>> they don't that for district judges. >> clearly not. >> thinking back to -- this reminds me of the work of charles dickinson and opening passages where he said, you know, it's the best of time, it was the worst of times. and we've heard this morning sort of the state of criminal justice, the numbers of people incarcerated. we heard wonderful programs. so it reminded me of that because there's a lot of hope and yet for the people who are out there in those institutions there's a lot of hopelessness. i served as district court judge for 15 years and i dealt with sentencing issues. i wanted people close to that talk right now. i want to share couple a of thins and make other points in my capacity as chair of the american bar association

criminal justice section. as i said, i spent 15 years on the federal trial court, and in that time i sentenceded a lot of people. in that time, our court in western tennessee created a re-entry program and a drug court program, and those are still functioning, and they've had some levels of success. as you might imagine, a few people go through those programs. it doesn't have the capacity to handle huge numbers of people. but every individual who is and can be helped in one of those programs i counted a plus. our program has involvement of judges, u.s. attorney's office, and our u.s. attorney is here, has the involvement of probation and the u.s. marshals service. and we have been in operation now for about eight years and

that's good. one of the things that i wanted to talk about this morning is a term that judge gleason used, no entry, because i think the focus has to be there, no entree. when i say no entry, i don't mean for people who have violated the law and committed infractions. i'm talking about intervening in lives before they get to the criminal justice system. i'm talking about interrupting the school to prison pipeline. i'm talking about the reality of the communities in which people live and grow. as chair of the criminal justice second, we're looking at a program, we're putting together a program, coming up april 28th in new mexico, a shameless plug, but part of that program is going to be prestaged with the

mcarthur foundation coming out and talking to us about the program, explaining to us about the role of neuroscience and helping us to address some of the critical criminal justice issues. dr. carrey wrestler from harvard will come and talk about the role that environment plays of brain development or lack therefore. when he talks about is the impact of growing up in high violence, high poverty, communities that are also high density communities, and the effect that that has on brain development. what he says is that individuals who live for long periods of time in environments like that have constant and unrelentless stress on the brain which can lead to neuroconnection between that and certain behaviors. as a society we have to be mindful of that. we have to look at what's

happening to children in schools and while we have burgeoning criminal justice budgets, if we are in fact diverting resources from that early development, preschool, whatever, knowing that kids don't have the reinforcement of the intact family or mentor to sort of guide them with all they see is the kind of negative behaviors that we're trying -- talking about today, what we're doing, then we are not really interrupting that flow. what we've been talking about today is really great, but it's all back end. we have got to star foe ccusing front end. the amount of dollars we spend front end will be less than what we are required to spend back end if we do what we are doing on the front end. i know that's not an easy task but i think that everything we do to try and influence that has

got to be -- will be positive. somebody mentioned mental health earlier, a huge issue because we have now, reposed and the commissioner said that we've reposed a lot of mental health treatment in jails and prisons, and people are coming into jails and prisonsing sometimes because they haven't gotten the treatment on the front end. we need to honestly policymakers need to address that. i want to talk about children. people talk about the number of children who have parents who are in prison. dr. john hagan, with northwestern, a scholar with the american bar foundation, in consultation with -- not the department of health and human services system, the disease and control unit out of atlanta, i've forgotten the name -- centers for disease and control -- thank you -- there was executive conference at white house four years ago and people have been studying the effect on the educational

outcomes of children of incarcerated parents, and what that research says is that children of incarcerated parents have higher incidents -- first of all entry into the criminal justice system, they have lower rates of graduation from high school and lower rates for go into college. but the startling thing was that children of incarcerated parents have higher degrees of asthma, diabetes, hypertension, hiv-aids, certain allergies and a whole range of things. and if you think about what i just said, think about the cost of treating that in the community or more importantly, think about the cost of not treating that. the other startling thing that came out of that was that while the rates of -- the education outcomes are lower if a parent is in prison, for boys, if the

father is in prison, of course the rate goes way down. if the mother is intercourse rated parents -- and you heard this morning there are higher numbers of mothers in prison -- if the mother is the incarcerated parent, then the rate of graduation all goes down close to single digits and that is something that we have to be concerned about. i hope that shocks you because if you have that level of people who are not able to get an education and go into the workforce, then you have that many more people who are not being able to contribute as meaningful citizens to the workforce. i've got a lot of things but i'll talk about them in closing remarks. the american bar association's criminal justice second is working on a range of programs that i'll tell you about tomorrow, not today, but one i want to mention today because we're working on this program

really at the request of the justice department, and there's a lawyer, as a judge i'm the chair but there are certain things as a judge i cannot do. so we have a lawyer with the criminal justice second, jim feldman, out of florida, and he is, along with the criminal justice section led by his initiative and collaborative partners working on what's called clemency project 2014. you've heard about the sentences for low level drug offenders. there are a bunch of them in prison. the justice department, at the request of the president, says review these folks who are there who would receive lower sentences were they sentenced today as a result of the reform laws. and let's see if something can be done. let see if some of these people merit clemency. i wanted to take you back to 20 years ago when i was a trial

judge. two young men arrested for street drug dealing. their cases got separated. they were tried separately. defendant number one tried on that drug offense. got defendant number two got tried and was convict and because of his criminal history, he was looking at a mandatory in prison without parole and i take an oath as a judge to follow the law and with the mandatory minimum, that's what i did. as a result of this program, president obama granted him clemency after having served about 20 years. you have to serve at least ten years before you qualify. this whole army of lawyers are looking at 60,000 petitions that they received. getting lawyers to take on these things pro bono.

that's a back end issue. there is so much work to be done in communities, at the policy level and the legislative level and every level. none of us in here can do everything, but everyone can do something. every one of us are obligated to do the thing we can do. i want to go back to our u.s. attorney. they understand that it is so important for kids trapped in communities of poverty to see someone often times who looks like them and has not taken that road that leads to jail or prison and is doing something that is positive and tells them that you have worth and if you apply yourself, you too can succeed. in addition being smart on crime, he is also in communities talking to children and inspiring hope giving them a

model. 7:00 in the morning. it is important for kids to understand that there is an expectation and a realization they can do better. we have to do more of that. i needed to say that this morning. all of us can do something and i will end with a quote. attributed largely to dr. king. the ark of the universe is towards justice. is only intends for those beyond this who are pushing and pulling to make certain that that ark bends towards justice. thank you.

>> to judge wells. microphones? >> we have almost ten minutes. okay. >> i'm a rcher with a few trusts here in washington. speaking with you in the past about this question, i was hoping for you to elaborate on it as well and you from your trial court days. i wanted to ask about probation sentences and why they have been going down so sharply. about 90% of all convicted federal defendants get prison sentences and that used to be about less than half in 1980. obviously mandatory sentences and guidelines had something to do with that. i would be curious to know how common it was for you to want to send the defendant to probation,

but be prevented from doing that either because of a statute or what the manual told you to do. >> i will try to give you the one-hour answer to that. yes. it was preguidelines from 40 to 50%. one major problem is 994 j of title 28 as a congress that wasn't exactly feeling warm and fuzzy. this was the 1984 format. 994 j said the commission of inappropriateness of a term of incarceration for first offender who have not committed a crime of violence or otherwise serious

offense. i have presumption of probation for folks who are first offenders. or otherwise serious offense. it could be better. we are lawyers. we know that means it's a presumption of incarceration for those who are first offenders and they have a seriousness akin to that. they don't have it that serious. what is the original commission doing? they decide not just to ignore that presumption of probation, but defy it. it defines every white collar offense as serious. you read serious if you read the introduction to the guidelines. it quotes 994 j and provides a definition and puts the word serious in quotes and goes on to say it places probation oust

bounds for every one of the offenses. then they do fine in one of the drug courts. the drug court or the youthful offender court. that doesn't look like a sentence. that is time served. that is over and over again. they are fond of saying that even when given the opportunity, judges don't impose sentences that are probationary sentences. and that's because the data can be confounding. someone does one day in prison and that's not a probationary sentence. that's a prison term. they need to fix the data as well. there more answers, but those

are two. one affects the data and the other -- people listen to the commission. when that book says you can't give probation, there is a lot of judges that are not going to give probation. >> i would agree with that. i know that the current data shows that the judges are still sentencing in conformity with the guidelines. not much deviation. yes, ma'am. >> i'm a special assistant with the legal partners team. i think one of the biggest elephants in the room is the prison industry. i know one of the panelists mentioned it, but i don't think it is talked about enough. i wanted to ask, i know some states have contracts with the cca. the corporations. the correctional corporations of america. how do these contracts with the

states hurdle true reform if there contracts with the guarantee and there has to be a concern amount of prison population in the state? in tennessee, i wanted to highlight this. >> since the judge was leaving the bench in two days, why don't you take that. i hang around the circles and as many as i have seen, even getting agreed upon reform they get the ratio it's like turning the green mary around slightly.

i have not seen or heard the complex to impinge on the policy. i hear about it all the time. that must be an issue in the states. federal federally and a lot of decisions get made, but i haven't seen that issue infused into the policy debate. >> okay. we have one final question. >> my name is joe and i'm a professor of law at the district of columbia. i run a clinic doingests to reverse the prison pipeline. one quick comment in response to the judge and what you said. also 19 kwor congress killed the federal youth corrections act. they allowed the sentencing for

younger than 22 at the time of conviction. the wave of mass incarceration. the rest of the comments and the question directed to you, you are absolutely right about the front end versus the back end. we need to look at the systemic pressures in, for example, early screening and diagnosis. the special ed program. people feel that they are not budgeted to do the work that would have meaningful interventions required by law to do the kind of work you are talking about in a brought way. give any number of examples of that. in doing the work that you are suggest, we need to look at the pressures and figure out ways of braving the funding so that the incentives are there to do what

the law requires. people are violating the law left and right. they create the other systems. >> that's the question i would say, yes. >> i have to tell the judge. they staff is in morning that even in the judiciary, they have to say that. >> it was wonderful. it was a wonderful time. we thank you for your work on many fronts. >> that's it for the questions.

they make any final comments you wish to make. >> no. this is an invigorating experience. this renews our wish to go back and accomplish more. >> any final word? >> thank you for having me and having this wonderful program. >> thank you all. >> thank you for that very enlightening and important presentation. just before we conclude for lunch, take a break for lunch, we wanted to acknowledge judge donald who is also a coach here for this summit together with the judge. thank you very much. we look forward to your feedback through the e-mail and twitter so we can continue to enhance the program.

we will now break for lunch and welcome you back in approximately one hour, just after 1:40, closer to 2:00. thank you.

>> the white house coverage on c-span 3, this is westerville central high school. we are here as the sign can say

as i rally for john kasich with the primary set for tomorrow. he will be joined by the former 2012 presidential candidate mitt romney. joined by rob portman here in westerville set to get under way according to the "wall street journal" today. mr. kasich leads in his home state ahead of the tuesday primary. they show the governor is the preferred pick of 39%. likely primary voters at 33%. texas senators at 19% from the "wall street journal." the rolling average of polls in politics has governor kasich up by 3.7%. they showed with bernie sanders winning the race and an upset

where you have to take the polls with somewhat of a grain of salt. we will have live coverage from westerville when it gets under way. we wanted to show you the comments and our discussion with former 2012 mitt romney adviser and speech writer. >> a senior fellow at the ethnics policy center. before that, he served on mitt romney's campaign. they were a self described child of the revolution, a speech writer. that makes this cover piece interesting. the party of reagan is no more the headline and what happened this this piece, you write that donald trump is the antethesis is so much what reagan stood for. what do you mean? >> they are both in personality, temperament and disposition and

philosophy. i think donald trump is the antethesis of ronald reagan. he was a man of philosophical depth and consistency and had a set of ideas a governy agenda and i don't think donald trump has any of that. he has considerable grace and class and decency and daniels who was a successful governor worked ronald reagan and during a meeting, mitch told how he was getting amped up. he thought they were out of bounds and unfair and uncivil. he said we don't have enemies. donald trump were used as enemies and i think they were destroyed by american democracy. on pretty much every scale that

matters, ronald reagan was answer to donald trump. i think donald trump was an active threat to the republic and the republican party. >> you said ronald reagan tried to snake a welcoming party. he argued that he brought millions of new people to the republican party. look at the numbers on primary voters and they are up across the country and they had a primary so far this cycle. >> what i meant by welcoming party, ronald reagan was a friend of immigrants if you read his speeches on legal immigration, he wanted to welcome people to this country. that's very, very different than what donald trump wants to do on legal immigration. ronald reagan offered three million illegal immigrants and

they want to deport the people in this country. i would say a couple of things. one is that ronald reagan did that too. the reagan democrats which would say like michigan people. donald trump is bringing in blue collar workers to the party, but at the same time a lot of people will be leaving and from a demographic standpoint, trump is supporting a group that is drinking and alienating groups that are increasing. as a political matter, what trump is doing in the redefinition of the republican

party that will be problematic. let me illustrate the point. if you read about the election of 1956 or 1960 when eisenhower won and nixon lost to kennedy and see how many, around 38% of the black vote, you go to 1964, barry gold water. gold water was against the civil rights act of 64 which was a monumental issue of course in the life of black americans and gold water won single digits, 6 or 7% of the black vote. since that time, 64 republicans have not gotten more than 10%. as a regular basis they don't. that moment was so searing to black americans that republicans have never been able to reclaim

that group of americans. since then they made efforts to do it. i wonder and i think if this trump continues, you will see the same thing with hispanic americans. they have the ethics and public policy center. they had a front page piece and the headline on the front page, what happened to this party is who really destroyed the party of reagan. john is up first. >> good morning, john. reagan was not that much different than trump. it was much smoother without a

doubt. this is the guy who opened his campaign in philadelphia and mississippi. the civil rights workers were killed and they talked about the welfare queens and pink cadillacs and that kind of thing. he ignored age and laughed at people who had aids. magic johnson was named the fitness director for the country and he tested positive and he was immediately fired. reagan, his entire cabinet was indicted. they were just pardoned. reagan was just trump and most other presidential candidates in sheep's clothing. >> yeah. thanks for the call. you are wrong factually on several things. your reference to magic johnson. it was in the george h.w. bush

administration and magic johnson was not fired. he was left on his own volition. when you say the reagan cabinet was indicted, that's silly. this is historical fact. you are entitled to your opinion, but you can't make up facts. that hasn't happened. all you can do is argue about the record itself and see what ronald reagan was in his words and in his deeds. i'm not saying ronald reagan was perfect. no politician is perfect, democratic or republican. he in the totality of his acts was a different person than donald trump and it's part of the reason why he won over as many people as he did. if reagan was as the caller portrays him to be, say reagan had the people in 1980 and they would have thrown him out in 1984. he won 49 out of 50 at the

betrayal that john makes, it would be lieutenant chris to think he won 49 out of 50 states. >> you mentioned the words and the deeds. i want to compare the style and the words of ronald reagan with donald trump. there is a new ad that talks about the types of words he uses on the campaign trail. the conservative nonprofit. it has been note to be aligned with establishment republicans and set the stage for that. here's that ad. >> i went to an ivy league school. i'm very highly educated. i know words. i have the best words. he gets the nomination, they will sue his [ bleep ]. she said he is a [ bleep ]. we will beat the [ bleep ] out of him. they are ripping the [ bleep ]. [ bleep ]. what the hell are we doing. >> you are not going to raise that. >> i have the best words. you can tell them to go

[ bleep ] themselves. >> can you imagine ronald reagan using those words? >> i can't imagine ronald reagan using those words privately when he is angry. this is not people who work with reagan. the worst he would have said would be hell and i think even in his diaries wouldn't even spell the word out because he felt that was over the line. there is donald trump in all his glory and i want to say something about that ad. it's an anecdote. i sent that to somebody and i know a friend of mine, an evangelical christian. i am as well. he was somewhat supportive of trump. i sent that video to him. and because i wanted him to be aware of it. it would be something i would

want to factor in. he said thanks for the good laugh this morning. i thought that's quite amazing. somebody sees that in an evangelical christian. that kind of language being uttered by a man who wants to be president of the united states in an audience with women and children and his responses gave me a good laugh. a couple of things about it. that's not funny. if you ask me all the problems i have with donald trump, cursing is low on the list. a lot of things worry me more. once upon a time, conservatives scared about our common culture and popular culture. they used to think the character of a president mattered because of the nature of office and the visibility of the individual. what that person says and how he conducts himself sends radiating messages to other people and that is true in the good and the bad. when donald trump says that kind of trash, that has an effect.

he is a foul mouthed guy. the thing is that people hear this stuff and think this is a s sin -- sin him in for toughness. this is an odd period. >> here's the inside page of the "time" magazine the piece. the party is known for common sense and the gop gives way to donald trump. he is our guest for about the next half hour. troy, michigan. on the line for republicans. good morning. >> good morning. >> morning. >> before we defy ronald reagan, don't forget iran contra. i have been in the political scene since i was 12 years old. donald trump really doesn't say what he plan on doing aside from

building a huge wall and mexico of course has told them they would not pay for it. the people that are in these frenzied rallies, they don't seem to know the powers of the presidency. a president can't summon ford motor to come back and there many different ways of doing that and it's just kind of appalling the ignorance of the people that are out there rallying and jumping. i think sometimes i think these people are just going to these rallies, many of them to see what kind of a side show there is. many of them probably have no intention of voting for him. i certainly hope not. our country needs serious

people. >> can you ask you who you are supporting? >> actually i haven't decided yet. that republican is going to be independent. i mean even though i am or was or may be a republican, when i see the democrats, their discussions are so much more sane and civil. these trump rallies are like going to a circus. >> we got your point. >> a couple of things. i try not to defy ronald reagan. he was a very impressive man and iran contra was a bad and dark moment. if you look at how he handled it, there was a model there. he fired the people in his administration and they worked

very, very closely and openly and honestly with the committee and looked into it. he dealt with the problem. in terms of donald trump and his policies, i agree with you. that's one of the stunning things to me about trump. people who once cared about inside in american politics are supportive of trump either actively or at least leaning in the direction of him. this is a man who is a centimeter deep on public policy. he doesn't know the difference between the cuts and the kurds. he was asked what the nuclear triad was and fast forward several months, he asked a question. i would get in a republican debate on it. he still would have an idea what it is. he didn't take the time to google it.

even in a recent debate, he was asked about the skilled workers and the immigrants. he within a matter of 12 hours reversed himself three different times. his website said he was against it and he said i changed my mind. i'm not for it. he was against them and in the debate he renounced his website and he said i switched. after the debate, his campaign came out and said no, he is still against it. this happens on and on and on. you asked him about the budget deficit which concerns a lot of republicans. they care about limited government and so forth. he is an active opponent of entitlement which is the only way to relimit government. if you ask what he is going to cut, he talks about fraud and abuse. this goes to the point of no

governing philosophy. one of the really sad things about this campaign and we saw it this morning in terms of the calls about trump. in terms of the complicated issues. we need a conversation about trump spouting all over the nonsense. he wants to seize the microphone at the moment. they are having a debate rather than a real ask substantive debate. that is one of the tragedies of election 2016. >> it's like st. louis, missouri. james is waiting for democrats. good morning. >> good morning. >> thank you for your time. i wanted to elaborate on the republican party. i have been checking it out for a long time and the democrats and the republicans and the republicans have been in bad

shape for a long time. they don't seem to be getting any better. i looked at what happened with the bush and gore. when gore had florida that night and i never in my life had seen something like it was. he gave it to bush. people were talking to that and they knew it was wrong. his brother would not lose in florida. you know the things that happened than when evening as far as stopping people from going to the polls and arresting different people for different things. >> james is wrong. bush didn't lose, he won it and they had recounts after the decision. bush 2000 and bush won it. he won that state. that's just factually incorrect. in terms of the broader

problems, the problems with presidents and so forth. that's fine. people can blame republican and democratic presidents for the bind we are in. there is no question that the public is struggling. i wrote about this many year particularly people who were in manufacturing jobs. low skill jobs. the nature of the american economy is changing and the nature of the world economy is changing. i think that people need to be cog send of the fact that we have it going on and in some respects we have economic changes. a huge transition time and it's analogous to the industrial revolution and a lot of what's going on and why american workers are finding it hard has to do not because of a republican or's democrat. it has to do with the globalization. the shifts in automation and huge advances in technology.

in other words, you are getting more efficiency by machines that's causing this displacement effect. you can't stop progress like you would have been insane to say we are not going to move towards automobiles. if you were a person that was in the horse and muggy business, that would have a displacement effect. that would go on on larger scales. how you adjusted the changes and that's what politics have to do. that's earlier in the segment in pennsylvania. my congressman, my senator said these issues are complicated. they are simple. there is a complicated element to this. people who are elected in the public life are not stupid. they are not necessarily einsteins and they are problems with gridlock. some of these issues are difficult. people have to take that into account. >> one of the places you can

take these, about two months ago today. who are you supporting in this cycle. >> it depends on who the republican nominee is. if it's anybody other than donald trump, i would take that person whether it's john kasich or marco rubio or ted cruz. if it's donald trump, i would not vote for him under any circumstances. i cannot do that in good conscious. i would not be inclined to vote for hillary and bernie sanders because they stood against everything i stood for. i am a conservative. i would write in a name or if there was a third party candidate, i would vote and certainly vote down ballot. on why i wouldn't vote for donald trump, i got criticism

from fellow republicans about that who can't fathom that decision. the short version is i think he is an active threat to the country. he is erratic and unstable and unprincipaled and temperamentally, he worked with one president and public character matters and i can't envision anybody with a worse even temperament than donald trump. he is scary and beyond that, beyond what donald trump could do that hillary clinton and bernie sanders could not do is redefine the republican party in a very injurious way. i think trump for a variety of reasons would be problematic. >> a lot of callers waiting. >> all of that at c-span.org and taking the microphone is rob portman introducing the rally

for john kasich. >> now i know we are in kasich country. it's great to see the huge crowd here in his hometown. it doesn't surprise me. we are proud of the campaign he has run. we care about our country. the next president of the united states should be john kasich. we know our country is in trouble. that's the guy to fix it. we have seen it. when he represented this area in the congress, he went to washington and department give speeches. he didn't play politics. neal armstrong walked on the moon.

[inaudible] >> by the way, you are part of the debt that is $58,000. that's why it's important. they are representing this area and he went to work. he balanced the budget for the first time since the 1960s and he pushed through welfare reform. he actually accomplished things that are needed right now. we saw it first time here. we saw it here in ohio. john kasich inherited a state that was in the ditch. under ted strickland, we lost 350,000 jobs. our unemployment was above the national average. unfortunately we were 48th in the country in job creation. 48th. he was also left with an $8 billion deficit. unprecedented in the history of

our state. when john got elected, you will have to raise taxes to cut the deficit down. we are not going to raise taxes. we will reform the tax code and cut taxes and fix regulations and bring back the jobs. and we all know what happened. today, ladies and gentlemen, instead of losing the jobs, we brought back over 400,000 jobs and the unemployment is below the national average. we are not 48th in the country anymore. we are top 10 in the country and on the way up. and thanks to john kasich, remember the deficit we talked about? today thanks to john kasich's leadership, it's a $2 billion

surplus. that's what john kasich has done. we have seen the leadership. again, i turn your attention to that over there. don't we need to go to washington, d.c. and get the economy moving to help people to have the ability to get ahead? that's exactly what john kasich has done for ohio and what he can do to the united states of america. folks, just like john kasich picked up the pieces after four years of the strickland administration, we need him to pick up the pieces after years of barack obama. so we are about to see not just john, but also a guy who ran for period in the last go around,

mitt romney. wouldn't it have been great to have him for four years. he predicted that obamacare would be a failure. he was right. he's the guy who predicted if you left a rock, you would have a vacuum and the country would be less safe and russia would win and he was right. he was right about a lot of things. he is right about john kasich being a great president of the united states. thank you, guys for being here. god bless you. 08!

>> and the next president of the united states, governor john kasich! >> wow, what a welcome! >> wow, that's quite a welcome. they must know you here.

john, this is your hometown, right? this is pretty impressive when the people in your town come out and cheer you on like this. who are you voting for tomorrow? exactly right. this is exciting. i came here to make it real clear that all of america is watching what ohio does. ohio is carrying out a bit of an interview, if you will. to see if you want to be president in the united states. you may have gon the interview, some of you younger ones haven't. a few of you have. you get all nervous and you wonder what it's going to be like. in this case you are the person doing the interview. he is the interviewee. you have done this before. years ago, the people of ohio recognize things are in tough shape. you lost over 300,000 jobs and

the budget said you were down $8 billion and taxes were going through the roof. businesses were fleeing and so you went out and looked for a chief executive, a governor and you hired this guy and this family. how do you feel about your choice? pretty good? now you see when politicians run for office, they say about the same thick. say say these great things are going to do, but years ago, i don't want to hear what you have to say. i want to hear what you have done. you looked at john kasich's record and saw when he was in washington that he was there and he helped balance the budget and he was the architect to get the budget in balance. when he was in washington that balance budget and other changes got the economy going.

you said not just based on his words, but also based on his record, you hired this guy. look what he has done. you know what the story is. if you haven't heard it by now, 400,000 new jobs and $8 billion in the hole to a $2 billion positive number. jobs coming back and businesses coming back. right now the nation looks to do another job interview and to see this man and he is the person we ought to vote for tomorrow. two things go through my mind. the problems we have in the country are at least as severe as the problems you had in ohio six years ago when he became your governor. we have not just $8 billion in deficit. we have almost $20 trillion in debt as a nation. we have businesses that are

doing this thing that goes outsided the u.s. to gtake jobs away. wages are rising. you promised if you liked your health care, you can keep it, but they didn't keep that promise. premiums would go down $2,500 a year. has anyone seen their premiums go down? that's what i was afraid of. there real challenges here. at the same time let me know that there is a very great prospect for the future of this country. i say that because the world is changing and becoming more driven by innovation. and the energy economy and the information economy and the international economy and all these things will be who can innovate the best. nobody compares to america and it means a lot of change with

the right leadership to get washington out of the way. you will see the entire country come back the way ohio has come back. i want to make sure that you guys do the right thing tomorrow and you get out there as we used to say in massachusetts, vote early and vote often. i know that's not legal in ohio so i wanted to make sure you vote early and get your friends to vote. we have to turn out tomorrow and make sure we send a signal that a man of integrity, a man with a clear track record and has shown what he can do to get his state to turn around can do the same for the country. welcome the first lady of that great man, karen kasich. karen? thank you, thank you. great to be here. thank you all so much. i'm going to have the pleasure of introducing my husband who i

have been married to for 19 years now. i will tell you something. i have been proud of him over these years always, but never more proud than i have been over the last eight months watching him campaign for president of the united states of america. he has run a positive campaign, a campaign of integrity and a campaign on the issues. he has not run a mud slinging campaign where you call someone names or slurs. i am so proud of that. i know why that is? that's because when you have records you can stand on, you don't need to get down in the mud with other people. you can stand on your record. you just heard about john kasich's record and couldn't be more proud of what he has done for ohio. i hope tomorrow you will join me in giving o highwayo g highwhio

vote for president of the united states. >> i want to see if emma or reece want to make a speech. do you want to say anything? reece? emma? you never know, right? one thing i want you all to know is how much i love my family. my daughters and my wife, all of

us love our families. the most important thing in the world. i want to thank senator portman. when i'm president, i need smart people to work with and leaders and we will send him back to the united states senate with an overwhelming victory. we can't have people running against him. can you imagine how much better america would be if mitt romney would have been elected president four years ago? not only is he smart, talented, effective, but look at this guy. he just looks like a president, doesn't he? we don't have to get that carried away. what about me? just kidding.

i'm standing here and we are just so close to my home. i have been in westerville for really all of my adult lifetime. you are our neighbors. if you see me at the westerville grill, i have shorts on. that's me. i'm running for president. right. you see us walk through westerville and that was -- you saw me getting that ice cream over there. he gave me a chance to be a state senator when i was a kid. never thought it would happen. sent me to congress at the age of 30. i went down there to fix things. i didn't go down there to play politics. i went down to say there certain

things we have to do to lift our country and make sure that towns like westerville where we are knitted and a town like this where somebody has to stand up for it. in washington, so many years, i did fight to balance the budget and i knew a result in a more prosperous america. i fought so the men and women on the frontlines were going to have what they needed to defend our country. i rolled that rock up the hill and all the people would push it back down. at the end of the day, we have it like we balanced the budget since neal armstrong and others had walked on the moon.

we had four straight years of balanced budgets and paid down the national debt. in time square the debt clock was going backwards and coming down. i left and i came home. i didn't want to go anywhere other than westerville. this is my home. this is what i live for. i was having a great life and i looked at ohio and i tell you something. the toughest trip i had was when i withstand to new york to meet with the rating agencies and they told me you might as well give it up. ohio is dead. things were shaking all over the

state. at night beyond the news, we took the formula of common sense regulations. we don't rush our small business people. our small business people are the heroes because they hire our kids and create the jobs in america. we knew that would work. we knew that we wanted to cut taxes and we did. the largest amount of tax cuts in the entire united states of america which is really cool when you think about it. then we also said we got to reform the government. mitt is right. can i have that for a second? you see the mentality that you have to change and reform and innovate. you will have a lot of people fighting to try to keep you from

doing it. when businesses don't innovate, they die. when government doesn't innovate, they ring up $19 trillion worth of debt. right now, my further told me 50 years ago, you have to look good because someone will see you on the other end of the phone. are you kidding me? we shop on this. medicine is different. transportation is different. everything is different. you have to move at the speed of light and the speed of business. when i go down to washington, we are going to start moving at the speed of business and send a lot of power back to where we live. i want to tell you something. there so many projects and programs i want to implement, but i will tell you one. our combat veterans will get access to health care wherever they need it. we will not have a homeless or unemployed veteran in america.

we are going to work to uberrize the federal government. i get more smart phone this is way. there is another element of this. i want to send so many back and infrastructure and health care back to where we live. that will allow us to innovate. it changed the country to make the federal government smaller. it can do the things it's supposed to do. you give me a chance to go down there, i will take care of it. you have figured that out by now? it means nothing to me.

i don't care about polls. i don't care about focus groups. i care about listening to you when i see you on the corner. the letters you write and the e-mails i get. i hear you. all you want is somebody that is going to call them like he sees them. call them like she sees them. i promise you like i have done, the entire time that you have given me the privilege to be in public life, that's what i have done. you necessary my mind's eye. let me tell you something i have learned. i have changed running for president of the united states. you know why? i had some of the most emotional experiences that i have ever seen in my lifetime.

people come to our town halls. i don't just stand on the stage and speak like now. we have been taking questions across america and hearing what people have to say. they come to these somehow they. they feel safe in talking about some of the greatest concerns they have. we have a bank of media people in the bank and they have come to these rallies and some of them when i talk to them privately say they can't believe what they see. people talking about the death of a child or people talking about their fears, about their loved ones in military or people who say we're fighting in our family the problem of drug abuse. i mean, people come and they say these things and you know what i have learned? i've learned there a lot of lonely people out there. my father, john the mailman, he's a great example for me. because he delivered on the same mail route for 29 years.

and i came to find out after my mother and father lost their life in that car accident that my dad was in every home when the kid scored a touchdown on friday night he was celebrating. when the daughter sang a solo in the choir, he was celebrating. and when somebody in that family lost something or lost someone they dearly loved, he was crying with them. and people stood outside of that funeral home in a big line to tell me how much my dad had meant to them. and you know why? he was just a mailman delivering the mail but he was delivering something else. he was delivering his love. the strength of our country and why do i love westerville so much? because the strength of our kunduz not rest in big wig politicians. oh, listen. i know when ronald reagan did for us. i was there.

i know -- i've read and studied and seen the things that winston churchill did for the free world and it was terrific and it was wonderful and he got people to rise. but you know where the strength of our country is? it's in us. it's in our families. it's in our neighbors. it's in our communities. it is where we live doing everything we can to remember that the lord has blessed us to do certain things and to live a life a little bit bigger than ourselves and not wait for somebody to come riding in to westerville to solve our problems. we will address our problems right here in our hometown and revive the spirit of america right here! right here!

you sigh, see, i've become pretty convinced the reason i survived -- you've watched this debate. will anyone ever call on our xwofr nor? okay? when the debates were over, you said why don't they ever talk about him? you know what? one foot in front of another. and it's down to four. there's only six people now who -- of the whole country that could be president. and you know the reason why i think i have survived is not just because of the record and balancing budgets and cutting taxes but telling people to believe in themselves. to believe that we can make a difference in the way this world works. reaching out. you know, the most underpaid

people we have in our society are the teachers, the ones that work in this building. and they do not because they make a lot of money. they do it because they believe they can change a life. you know? right up here at st. anne's, those nurses that spend the extra time with the family, telling the family this it's going to be okay, those doctors like my doctor who i know, dr. ports, i mean, he doesn't sleep at night when he has somebody he's worried about as a patient or when we pay attention to the widow who lost her husband that doesn't call anymore. that's changing the world. that's changing the world. we have to have the confidence and the knowledge to know that that's what's expected of us in this life. you know, we're not looking for st.hood. i'm certainly never going to achieve that but i know that every day i slow down my life

and pay attention to somebody else a little bit it's going to make a real difference. so i us to think about that and think about something else. do you know why they didn't call on me in the debates? you know why? do you know why they didn't talk about me after the debates were over? but you see i want you to understand something. i'm carrying a torch for you. i'm responsible to have a good reputation for you. i'm here to be a good role model as best as i can for these kids and my daughters. i'm going to tell you something. i'll never take a low road to the highest office in the land! i will not do it! thank you.

thank you. you know i used to go like that. you know? but here's the thing that i want you to know, too, sometimes i have to call them like i see them. and friday night i turned on the television. i don't turn on the television. if i ever watch anything in our bus out here, i watch the golf channel. i don't need to be spending my time worrying about what they're saying, what the pundits are saying. but friday night the people that

work with me and i love them because they work so hard. and i get -- i get the spotlight and they just work hard. and they come in my room and they said you need to turn the television on. and i turned it on and i watched the presidential campaign rally with people slugging one another. and i looked at those images and i thought to myself, this is not how we fix america. we don't fix america by demon e demonizing people. we don't fix america by fighting people. we fix anything, kids, anything in life by bringing people together. because we're stronger when we're unified. we should -- those images are being shown all across this globe. and there are people saying, what's happened to america?

am i right there, sir? what's happened to america? and i'll have more to say about all this down the road. but i want to tell you that these problems that we have today, they're serious. i understand them. i grew up in them. job insecurity. the wages aren't going up. i don't any interest putting my money in the bank. when do the kids get a job? what is happening? we'll fix it. and i got to tell you that there were much tougher times in america than today. i'm tired of hearing people say terrible everything is in america. things are -- we got our challenges. but america's incredible. it's great. the world depends on us and they depend on us to be strong.

and you think about the sacrifices of earlier generations. the depression. we climbed out of it. second world war. so many lives were lost. and america came out of it. like the phoenix rising, as the strongest nation in the world and the protector of human rights and the guarantor of freedom across the globe. and then we saw the attack on 9/11. we survived that, as well. we are going to win that war, as well. we will win that one, as well. and i want you, though, to know -- that we can fix these problems. it's just we got to remember we're americans before we're republicans and democrats, and that is the key to bringing this country together.

so there's one last thing. the country's watching. ohio, we're the geographic center of gravity in every political election. and it's happening now. and it will happen again when i come here so that we can beat hillary clinton this fall. okay? i was going to say, i was going to say that i need you one more time. but i'm going to need you two more times. and maybe practice -- maybe practice will make perfect. but the whole country's watching us. and the whole world is watching us. frankly,