“Racial equity starts with equal education for every young child. Policies around inclusion are incredibly important in order to create opportunity in education and the workplace.”
Valerie Jarrett, Senior Advisor to The Obama Foundation and Director, Office of Public Engagement and Intergovernmental Affairs under the Obama Administration, joined us after the murder of George Floyd to discuss racial unrest in the United States.
“Every Black family has conversations and lessons with their sons about how to deal with police when they encounter them.” Interactions with the police serve as a microcosm for race relations in America, where Valerie thinks we’ve reached an inflection point in what we will and will not tolerate.
Turning to the 2020 election, Valerie voiced her support for the presumptive Democratic nominee. “No one understands Vice President Biden’s qualifications and capabilities better than President Obama.”
LISTEN AND SUBSCRIBE
SPEAKER
Valerie Jarrett
Senior Advisor
The Obama Foundation
MODERATOR
Anthony Scaramucci
Founder & Managing Partner
SkyBridge
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
John Darsie (00:07):
Welcome back to SALT Talks everyone. Thanks for joining us again today. We've got a great response to the first few SALT Talks. And we're really excited about the lineup that we have coming over the next month. And we're really excited about the guests we have today as well as tomorrow. SALT, as many of you know, is a thought leadership platform and networking forum. We have an annual conference that we do every year in Las Vegas, as well as international conferences that we've had in Abu Dhabi, Singapore and Tokyo. And we look forward to resuming those conferences in person, hopefully in 2021. But in the meantime, we're having a lot of fun doing these SALT Talks.
John Darsie (00:41):
SALT Talks are a series of digital interviews with leading thinkers and innovators across finance technology, and geopolitics. And today we're very excited to have a senior member of the Obama administration joining us, Valerie Jarrett. Valerie is a distinguished senior fellow at the University of Chicago Law School. She previously served as a senior advisor to President Obama and the Assistant to the President for public engagement and Intergovernmental Affairs during his entire tenure from 2009 to 2017. The office that she occupied was actually the position that Anthony was going to occupy in the White House prior to some shenanigans, which he and Valerie can get into during the talk.
John Darsie (01:23):
She also managed the Office of Urban Affairs and served as the co-chair of the Obama-Biden transition project. She's the author of a fantastic book that came out in April 2019 called Finding My Voice, and I've got to get the new tagline right here, Finding My Voice: When the Plan Crumbles, the Real Adventure Begins. And you can order the book online at valeriejarrettbook.com. And we highly recommend you do that, especially in this moment. There's so many relevant topics that she covers in that book. Valerie be interviewed today by Anthony Scaramucci, the founder and managing partner of SkyBridge Capital as well as the chairman of SALT. And if you have any questions during the talk, just post them to the Q&A section at the bottom of your screen, on the Zoom link, and we will get to those during the course of the interview. And I'll throw it over to Anthony and Valerie.
Anthony Scaramucci (02:17):
Well, first of all, John, thank you, Valerie, great to have you with us.
Valerie Jarrett (02:22):
Thank you.
Anthony Scaramucci (02:22):
I want to personally give a shout out and thank Robert Wolf for introducing us a few years ago. I had the great honor of visiting you in the White House when you were working with the Obama administration. And then you came to SALT a couple of years back while you were a White House official, which really was an amazing part of our story. And I appreciate you being a friend of SALT and so forth. But I want to start out with the book because I think you have a fascinating life story in terms of where you were born, where you were raised, how you developed your relationship with the president and the first lady. And unlike me who only lasted 11 days, you lasted the entire administration. And we both know that Washington is a rough town. So I want to talk a little bit about that. Let's start at the way beginning, if you don't mind. Tell us a little bit about yourself for people that don't know you Val.
Valerie Jarrett (03:17):
Sure. Well, as you mentioned, I was born in Shiraz, Iran, during the mid '50s, at a time when the United States and Iran had very strong diplomatic ties. My dad was born in Washington, my mom, Chicago, and they ended up in Iran, because when my father finished his service in the military, he was a physician, he could not find a job comparable to his white counterparts at major academic institutions around this country. And that's what he wanted to do, was research.
Valerie Jarrett (03:47):
And so they explored other alternatives and landed this job starting a new hospital and chairing the Department of Pathology, in Iran, the Nemazee Hospital. I was the second baby, Anthony, born in that hospital. They practiced on some other poor baby first. And then we lived there until I was five. From there we moved to London and from London, my father landed a job at the University of Chicago Medical Center in the neighborhood where my grandmother and extended family all lived.
Valerie Jarrett (04:15):
And growing up one of the important lessons he taught me is that sometimes the shortest distance to where you really want to go means you have to be prepared to take the long way around. And so his long way around took them halfway around the world, and it really was an important sense of being flexible, being willing to look at perspectives outside the envelope to see where your real possibilities might lie.
Valerie Jarrett (04:40):
And so I was fortunate to have Barbara and Jimmy Bowman as my parents and a huge extended family since I'm an only child gave me great love, unconditional love, more support than I could ever ask for, and set really high expectations of not what I would do, but who I would be. And the sense that to those who much is given, much as expected. And instilled in me this really strong work ethic, which has served me well.
Anthony Scaramucci (05:11):
So you meet Michelle Obama first. She's your first-
Valerie Jarrett (05:15):
Michelle Robinson. Michelle LaVaughn Robinson.
Anthony Scaramucci (05:17):
Michelle. I'm sorry. Excuse, I don't know... Michelle Robinson, I'm sorry, yeah. That's the first lady's maiden name. So tell us a little bit about that. So that's your-
Valerie Jarrett (05:28):
Yeah. We'll be 30 years next summer. So in the summer of 1991, I was mayor Daley's deputy chief of staff. I practiced law for 10 years. Six years in the private sector for the Corporation Council for the city. He had just promoted me to deputy chief of staff and I was trying to recruit people to come and join the office and a friend of mine who was the number two person in the law department sent me her resume, Susan Sherwood across the top, brilliant young lawyer. Please interview her I think you'll be impressed. She doesn't want to practice law at a big law firm anymore. And that was music to my ears, because I had hated the practice of law in a big law firm.
Valerie Jarrett (06:07):
And I still remember her walk into my office, Anthony, shook my hand, had her hair pulled back like I do, only mine is because I haven't been able to get a haircut and commanding presence for a... She was in her mid 20s. 27 year old, kid basically. And what I remember most is she told me her story. And we all now know it as a quintessential American story. Growing up on the south side, working class family, parents who didn't go to college but instilled in her and her brother, this similar value to my parents, that you got to get out there and work hard and do something purposeful with your life. And her dad, and her best friend, she shared with me, had died within the last year. Suddenly, both of them. Her father had been sick for a long time, but they weren't expecting his death, and her friend, who had been her roommate in college-
Anthony Scaramucci (06:57):
I remember that from her book. Yeah, she wrote that so great book.
Valerie Jarrett (07:00):
Yeah. And she said it was just a wake up call to, am I leading that purposeful life that I was raised to lead? And could I explore public service as a way of giving back to a city that I love? And so we clicked, I offered her job on the spot, she wisely said, "Let me think about it." Talked it over the fiance, he thought it was a bad idea. And so when I called to say, "What do you think?" She said, "Well, I got this problem." And I'm like, "Well, who's your fiance? And why do we care what he thinks? What do you want to do?" And so she laughed, and she said, "You got to meet this guy. Would you have dinner with us? And let's talk it through." And that's what we did. And the rest as you might say is history.
Anthony Scaramucci (07:40):
And so now your relationship is continuous. It goes on. Then, young, senator Obama, he becomes a senator in 2006. He wants to run for president. Talk a little bit about that because I think it's also an interesting part of the conversation about his decision to run for president and your advice to him.
Valerie Jarrett (08:04):
Well, I learned my lesson when he was considering running for the Senate. I thought it was not prudent. He'd just lost the congressional race. And I thought, "Well, if you can't win our district," we live a block apart in Chicago, and we know the neighborhood well. And I was like, "Well, you can't win here. How are you going to win statewide?" Illinois, is in a sense a microcosm of the country. You have Chicago is a big city, but you've got farmland and rural communities. And he's like, "Oh, I've been going down state since I was first elected. And whenever I go down, I get headlines because usually state senators from Chicago don't venture into farm country. And I understand their issues, and I care about them. And I think they know that." And Mrs. Obama said, "Let's have a brunch at your home and talk him out of this." Because she also had had about enough of politics.
Valerie Jarrett (08:51):
And by the end of the brunch, he'd convinced us not only should he do it, but I should chair his finance committee for his Senate race when we said, "Well, how are you going to raise any money?" And he's like, "You are." So when he decided to run for president, I think... Well, I actually think after the convention speech in 2004, I saw his ability to connect broadly around the country with this message of, no red states and blue states, it's just the United States. And I thought he had what it took.
Valerie Jarrett (09:19):
And now my parents didn't. My parents thought he'd lost his mind. And again, remember, they grew up during Jim Crow experience, racism and discrimination firsthand. Did not think in their lifetime that there would ever be a black man elected president. My father who grew up in DC, had never set foot in the White House, even on a tour until I worked there. So this was really the difference in generations, whereas my daughter was like, "Well, of course he could win. Why wouldn't he win?" So it just shows you in three generations what a difference it was.
Valerie Jarrett (09:51):
But I felt like they had raised me to believe, he worked hard and he had to go that anything is possible. And after he was elected, my mom, said, "How did you even know he could win?" Not that he would, but Anthony, even that he could win. And I reminded her of how she'd raised me. You know what she said? "Well, I never really believed that." And I realized, "Oh, my gosh," they raised me aspirationally not as reality that they knew, but for me to develop my own. And so-
Anthony Scaramucci (10:18):
Well, I had that identity. I can totally identify with that. My parents did that with us. My dad was a blue collar worker, you and I've talked about that.
Valerie Jarrett (10:26):
Sure.
Anthony Scaramucci (10:26):
And you had to sit at his dinner table at 5:15 in the afternoon, and you had to do your homework and you were going places. He used to drive us into the wealthy areas of the town. He said, "You're going to live in one of those houses someday." And we actually believed it. So if he could [crosstalk 00:10:41].
Valerie Jarrett (10:41):
Yeah. Well, he believed it or not you believed it.
Anthony Scaramucci (10:43):
Exactly. I bought into the whole thing but that was one of the things that... And we've talked about this because something has gone wrong. Because my father was in an aspirational blue collar family. I'm sure your parents, your dad was more educated, but they had these aspirations for their children. When I was campaigning for president Trump and going into certain areas, and I'm sure you experienced this during president Obama's campaign, you felt a sense of desperation. That the economic aspirations of a blue collar family were becoming economically desperation.
Anthony Scaramucci (11:19):
So it's a good juxtaposition to where we are right now. Because we have the race component overlaid on it. And I'm interested to get your reaction to this, this is my opinion. I want to get your reaction to this. It's always been there, Valerie, it's always been systemic in our society. But there's been a very large group of people, white people that have either not necessarily ignored it but have not taken it to full credence. It now seems that we're at a boiling point societally, where people are like, "Okay, we have to get ahold of this thing. We have to figure it out." You were addressing some of this, this morning on Morning Joe. And I was just wondering if you could take us there, what your thoughts are related to it.
Valerie Jarrett (12:07):
Sure. So I think you're right, Anthony, our country has a deep and painful history of racism and discrimination going back to slavery, where I talked about my parents growing up in the Jim Crow era where they couldn't go to certain restaurants, couldn't go to the movies, couldn't stay at certain hotels, had to worry about lynching, particularly in the south, obviously. Went through the Civil Rights movement, saw great strides in terms of protections that were put in place in the Voting Rights Act and the Civil Rights Act. And you began to feel that perhaps we were making some progress and we have. I mean, my goodness, I don't think we should say that we haven't made a great deal of progress. But I do believe that part of, as you described it boiling over, I am hoping it's more of an inflection point, and now a turning point is that all of the cumulative effect of that has had a painful, frustrating, exhausting impact in the black community.
Valerie Jarrett (13:10):
And I think for the rest of our country, those who do not feel that they are discriminatory or racist, have been free to ignore what as a black person you can't ignore. Every black family I know, and I'm not being hyperbolic, every black family I know, regardless of their income, or station in life, gives their black sons a lecture over and over and over again, about how to comport themselves with the police. And the police are a microcosm of a societal problem. The difference is that they take an oath of office and are given a badge and a gun.
Valerie Jarrett (13:46):
And it's also a microcosm of the challenge we have within our overall criminal justice system, which president Obama described after the death of Trayvon Martin. He said, "If I had a son, he'd look like me, and we have to do some soul searching to figure out what why that is so scary to people. Why every black boy and black girl can't have the same trajectory as everyone else." And so I think we have been on this continuum. Certainly during president Obama's time in office, we had Michael Brown, we had Eric Garner, Tamir Rice, Laquan McDonald in my own hometown. And so it has been building for a long time.
Valerie Jarrett (14:23):
And then you bring to this current climate and I do believe that the president, president Trump has as opposed to brought us together, or deescalated tensions, has actually polarized us. And then you overlay on top of that social media and everybody getting information on-demand. It makes it easy to retreat to your comfort zone and not have to talk to people who you might disagree with and try to find some common ground. Then you add a global pandemic, which has had such a disproportionate impact on communities of color, particularly the black community. Health disparities have been laid bare, income disparities, fragility in terms of benefits at work, whether people have insurance or paid sick days or paid leave.
Valerie Jarrett (15:08):
And then we all watch on television, a man die in slow motion, and his death, and I should pause to say his service today is in Minnesota and his family, my heart goes out to him. But then his six year old daughter yesterday said, "My daddy changed the world." And I sure hope she's right. Because the nonchalantness with which those officers killed him, is what's stunning. And they saw the cameras. They knew they were being videotaped. So where are we where police who are sworn to serve and protect can behave in that way in this great country in 2020?
Valerie Jarrett (15:48):
And I think all of that coming together, is what has caused demonstrations, the vast majority, are being peaceful in all 50 states and in fact around the world. Because people look to us as that beacon of hope. And at the same time you have president Trump sending in law enforcement to physically remove peaceful demonstrators using tear gas and rubber bullets. Why? Why? So that he can walk and stand in front of a church that he had not been inside of since Inauguration Day, and hold up a Bible and try to use the church and a Bible as a prop, which has received not only criticism from the church, but also now for the first time in my lifetime that I can remember, from the military leaders who always hold themselves above politics. So all that has come to a head. And the question is, where do we go from here?
Anthony Scaramucci (16:47):
So I want to ask you this question, it's a little bit of a pointed question, but I'm curious to get your reaction to it. There is a commentator on CNN by the name of Van Jones, we both know him personally. The evening of president Trump's election, he said it was a white lash. I don't know if you heard him say that.
Valerie Jarrett (17:10):
I remember. I remember it very well.
Anthony Scaramucci (17:11):
And I didn't get it at the time. I have to totally confess that obviously I was pro Trump at that time, I was trying to help the president, I saw that blue collar despair in those white communities, frankly, a community I grew up in. I mean, we had blacks and whites in our community, but it was a blue collar community. And I'm just wondering, is that over? Meaning, are we at that inflection point that you're describing? Assuming that Van Jones was correct in 2016, you could tell me if he was or he wasn't, but assuming that he was, are we at an inflection point now, where we can move this society to a post racial society meaning where your skin color, my skin color, is going to be irrelevant? Are we there or is the stereotype so hard in the society, that we're not there? And then if we're not there, what is it going to take to get there?
Valerie Jarrett (18:11):
Well, let me say a few things on there. First of all, I think that what we saw with the economic crisis in 2008, coupled with the advances that technology have brought to efficiency and needing fewer people in the workforce to do the same jobs, do different jobs with higher requirements of training, that you're right, for the first time, many white Americans wondered, would their children have a better opportunity than they had had? And that was a first for them. And in a sense, they were experiencing what the black community has worried about all along. And now that it was a crisis with them, the question is, well, whose fault is it and what do you do about it?
Valerie Jarrett (18:54):
But in terms of the backlash, I think we should also remember that our elections in our country have always been close. President Trump lost by three million in the popular vote. He lost in three states by fewer than 100,000 votes. So it was a very close election. And 100 million eligible voters did not vote. And that is really where I've been focusing my energies. Is what can we do to get people who have looked at Washington or even their local elections and decided, "This isn't relevant to my life."? Or, "They're all bums. I don't like any of them." Or, "What does one vote count?"
Valerie Jarrett (19:34):
And I hope that over the last three and a half years, we've had a real civics lesson. That elections at all levels really do have consequences. It's one of the reasons why Michelle Obama and I started an organization called When We All Vote. Michelle is a founding member of it, we've been able to bring in lots of coaches. It's non-partisan. And she wanted to do a non-partisan initiative about voting. It's called When We All Vote because we think our country is stronger when all Americans vote. And we've been working really hard over the last couple of years since it was launched in 2018, to focus on not just who's president of the United States, albeit important. It matters who's in your local. Who's your mayor? Who's on the city council electing or appointing police chiefs? Who are the prosecutors making decisions about who to bring cases about? Who are the judges sitting in judgment and affecting our lives? Who are in the state legislatures drawing districting lines and appropriating funds? And certainly who's the check of balance in Congress?
Valerie Jarrett (20:32):
And then if we can raise the awareness and make people see the nexus between their lives and voting, then we'll have a stronger democracy regardless of which party actually wins. And better accountability in our senate. Because what I've observed, and I'm curious, Anthony about what you think about this, is that president Trump seems to be really focusing his energies and his message on a relatively small part of our country, assuming if he can get them very excited, that that is energy will result in turnout. And that if everybody else is apathetic, then he wins. Without actually getting the majority of the American people to be supporters.
Anthony Scaramucci (21:10):
Well, there's no question about that. I mean, I'll add evidence to that. The last time I talked to the president was Easter Sunday of 2019. He was sore at me, because I had written an op-ed, that the press is not the enemy of the people. You can find it on hill.com, just expressing the understanding of the Constitution, the institution of it, and the need for the press, not only to hold people in power accountable, but the press does something else for our society, which you and I have talked about, if we can teach our second grade children to speak and think freely, they go on and become great economic innovators. They invent Facebook and Google and all these other great companies. If you don't teach them to speak freely, like in China, well then what happens is you're narrowing the band of their creativity.
Anthony Scaramucci (22:00):
And so he got very sore at me. I said to him, "Well, what about the independence and the moderates?" And he said something which was very telling. He says, "No, no, I'm worried about the base. Let me work on the base, everything else will take care of itself." And to your point is, he's making the bet that the vote will be down, and the base vote will be up. And it's also something that concerns him. Because he said it repeatedly and general Kelly and I, we're going to be with general Kelly tomorrow on a SALT Talk. General Kelly and I have talked about this, the president really believes rightly or wrongly, that if that base turns out in a magnificent way, to use one of his words, he'll win the presidency.
Valerie Jarrett (22:43):
Well, of course [crosstalk 00:22:43].
Anthony Scaramucci (22:44):
Irrespective of the popular vote or all that other stuff. So everything he's doing on Twitter, that walk across Lafayette Park, that is designed for the base. That photo op, I mean, holding the Bible. I mean, my wife said something funny, I probably shouldn't say it, but we're on live and she was like, it was almost like a soiled diaper the way he was holding it. I mean, he wasn't holding the Bible like somebody at any level of general familiarity with the Bible. So I mean, look, it is what it is. We're here now.
Anthony Scaramucci (23:16):
But I guess my question, though is, Robert Kennedy got it right. He said in 1968, that there would be an African American man as president. That he saw that inside of 40 years, there was a possibility that an African American man would be president. And Barack Obama was sworn in 40 years to the day from that statement. I guess what I'm asking is, can we move the society again? Can we move it where we can become from a policy and a stereotyping point of view post racial? And I'll say one thing too, that I know you'll get, my first year Harvard Law School two African American kids were picked up walking to the convenience store. They were in my class. 30 years later, professor Gates is with you and president Obama having a beer with the cops that did that 30 years late. So it's clear that it didn't happen in my adult lifetime. But can it happen in my children's lifetime?
Valerie Jarrett (24:16):
Yes. Now, post racial is a big word. Will we be able to eradicate all racism in our country in our lifetime?
Anthony Scaramucci (24:23):
No. Of course not. No, no, of course not.
Valerie Jarrett (24:25):
But can we develop this sense of empathy for one another? And in a sense, that's what this crisis point shows. When you have crowds all over the country that are not just black people marching, but they're white people and Latino people and Native American people, young people, old people, people of all walks of life, around our country have resoundingly expressed not just in their physical presence on the street, we're let's face it, in the middle of a pandemic. They're taking a chance with their life. And so they feel so strongly there, that they're willing to go out there and notwithstanding the fact that our experts tell us it's not safe.
Valerie Jarrett (25:07):
But we also, I think, when you add to that, which gives me some hope, is that we're seeing action on the ground. And so there are two issues here. One is racism. And that's within our own hearts. And we've got to work that through. And I think some of it is generational, and it's young people talking to their parents and talking to their grandparents. I had this conversation with my mother this morning. She said she was very influenced by my daughter. And that we shouldn't think that older people can't change, they can't learn and can't grow. So I think that that is happening.
Valerie Jarrett (25:40):
But the other thing that is so important, and this is a piece of what president Obama was talking about in his town hall yesterday, is that we have a right to expect that government's role is to ensure that there is justice and that it is using whatever levers it has at its disposal to try to make sure that even if people don't feel a certain way, that they behave a certain way.
Valerie Jarrett (26:05):
And so I can't tell you what's in your heart, but I can insist that you treat me with respect. And when we talk just about the police, for example, yesterday, president Obama asked mayors to make a pledge that they'll work with their communities within the next 60 to 90 days at the use of force. This is a hot button item for many people of color. And it was one of the recommendations in the task force report that he presented when he was in office. And gave to all of local law enforcement because we have something like 18,000 local law enforcement agencies in the country, and they're the ones that make the decisions about how the law is meted out.
Valerie Jarrett (26:46):
Well, I called a group of mayors yesterday whose texts numbers I had, just to see if before president Obama's remarks we could get some to commit. So I called the mayors of San Francisco, LA, Minneapolis, Chicago, DC, Atlanta and New York. All of them, literally just like that said, "Of course we'll do that." A few of them were already going through that exercise. Mayor of San Francisco, London Breed, is right in the midst of implementing the taskforce report. So I say this to say you expect the government to ensure that if we are about law and order, as president Trump said yesterday, that it has to be fairly meted out. That there has to be equal justice. That there has to be transparency and accountability.
Valerie Jarrett (27:27):
And so if the police departments around the country can start to take those necessary steps, then at least we can control the behavior. And I would also add that this Justice Department has been missing in action. When Michael Brown was murdered in Ferguson. And we had demonstrations as a result of that, president Obama sent Eric Holder to Ferguson to meet with the police department, with the advocates, with the family of Michael Brown, with the faith community and say, "What is going on here?" And it triggered a pattern and practice investigation which the Justice Department can do, which is an enormous stick to hold over local law enforcement agencies. It's the best stick that they have. And guess what they found in Ferguson? A pattern of practice.
Valerie Jarrett (28:15):
And so then they can get a judge involved and enter into a consent decree. And so all of this is to say, our government, even if our culture isn't there yet, we need to have a justice system that protects against the discrimination that comes from racism. And I think that this younger generation, just as we've seen with LGBTQ rights, where we've seen a revolution in thought over less than 10 years, I think that this has really been a wake up call. You saw yesterday, businesses announcing, we've got to look at our diversity and inclusion policies. We've got to see what is our role in being complicit in this. It's not enough to just be quiet. People have to speak up and they have to change their behavior. And I think by doing that, it will also change hearts.
Anthony Scaramucci (29:05):
Well, I certainly hope so. And I do appreciate the sentiment. Before we turn it over to outside questions, I want to talk a little bit about the campaign, November 2020. What do you see president Obama's role, first lady Obama, yourself? If you had to gauge the activity of the president and the first lady, where do you see it?
Valerie Jarrett (29:34):
Well, look, I think, as president Obama said, when he endorsed vice president Biden a few weeks ago, he's all in. He's going to do everything within his power, as am I to help vice president Biden. And look, nobody knows vice president Biden in terms of his qualifications for this than president Obama because he worked with him each and every day for eight years, as did I. So I think we both think he has the track record, experience, empathy. This is a man who grew up in a working class family, whose father had to move to get a job. They were in tough economic strain, and he's had more personal loss than any one human being should have to have. And rather than it making him bitter, and pulling back, it actually has made him incredibly empathetic.
Valerie Jarrett (30:20):
Just one little story about Joe is when my dad died, we were in the administration. And his assistant called up and said, "Vice president Biden's on his way to your office." And I said, "My office?" My office was on the second floor. I'm like, "I'll come down." She says, "No, no, he's coming to you." And he came in, he closed the door. He sat me down and he said, "Valerie, I promise you that when you think of your dad, that the tears that you have today will turn to smiles. Just give it time." And we hugged. I mean, I cried, he cried. We talked about his losses and mine.
Valerie Jarrett (30:52):
That empathy, and it turned out he was right. I now smile. I'm bursting in tears every time I think about my dad. And the empathy that I know he has, and that he's able to convey with complete authenticity, because he's been there, I think our country hungers for that right now. So the question will be, in this environment where you can't go and campaign, you can't knock on doors. You can't do the conventional things. We don't even know if we'll have conventions coming up this summer, what do you do? And I think we have to get creative.
Valerie Jarrett (31:21):
And we'll be using the internet and all kinds of things. So I think we're all in, we're going to do everything we can. I think he has a great message. I think it's terrific. He's going to have a woman as a running mate that sends an enormous signal to half our population, how important he thinks it is to break that barrier. But it will, as I said earlier, it's going to rest on turnout. It's going to rest on people, and part of why we're pushing early vote where there's no evidence whatsoever of vote fraud, part of why we're pushing early, not just early vote, but also vote by mail. Again, no evidence of vote fraud. And also vote by mail, no evidence that it leans into favor of either political party is to make it easier for people to vote when they shouldn't have to choose between their health, and exercising their-
Anthony Scaramucci (32:07):
No, well, I mean, look, it's very obvious to me, the president is saying all that stuff because he wants to suppress the vote. He's figured out exactly what you know, suppress the vote, turnout he's base, that's his pathway to reelection. But with that, I'm going to turn it over to John Darsie. He's got some questions from-
Valerie Jarrett (32:27):
Great.
Anthony Scaramucci (32:28):
... our audience. So one of our audience members texted me. He said, "Well, it was not tear gas. It was smoke canisters." And so he said, "This is what's going on in our society now." It really doesn't matter whether it was tear gas or smoke canisters, you're-
Valerie Jarrett (32:46):
Well, you know what? [crosstalk 00:32:46].
Anthony Scaramucci (32:48):
... clearing innocent people from Lafayette Park-
Valerie Jarrett (32:50):
Exactly.
Anthony Scaramucci (32:50):
... so that a guy can stand with a Bible in front of a church where the bishop inside the church actually doesn't want him there. And you're disrupting, what general Mattis said, the classic, most important right in our society to freely express our values and who we were. And you have foreign film, Australian film, British film, European film, where that park was very peaceful at 6:30 PM. So anyway, that's where we are now though. We're going to debate tear gas versus smoke canisters because we got a certain-
Valerie Jarrett (33:29):
Let me push back to say-
Anthony Scaramucci (33:30):
And by the way, when I get off this thing I'm calling him to yell at him. This is a young guy who I genuinely like. Okay. But let's turn it over to John Darsie.
Valerie Jarrett (33:40):
Well, as we're turning it over, let's just say, and I heard this yesterday, if you look up the definition of tear gas, it includes smoke canisters, and when you saw people out there, whose eyes were burning and who were throwing up in the streets and who had been exercising, as general Mattis said that constitutional right, the question is, is that what we should be doing? Is that what we should be expecting from leaders?
Anthony Scaramucci (34:03):
We had to allay the president's insecurities about being stuck in that bunker. And so that that was the big deal. So all right, let's turn it over to John Darsie.
Valerie Jarrett (34:12):
Hey, John.
John Darsie (34:13):
Yeah, when we talk about systemic racism, police brutality is only one piece of the puzzle. And there's been a lot of talk about economically how we empower young African Americans and people of color in the United States. What type of New Deal economically do you envision for black America? Robert Johnson, the founder of BET, recently came out calling for 14 trillion in reparations. What do we need to do from an education perspective, from an economic perspective, to just close the opportunity gap? The opportunity and equality that exists in America?
Valerie Jarrett (34:45):
Well, sure. Well, it starts with a equal education for every young child. Part of what president Obama's focusing on with his initiative, My Brother's Keeper, is what can we do to keep our young boys and men of color outside of the justice system to begin with? And that is to put their life on a better economic trajectory, which we all know begins with education. And affordable education. We all know that so many young people don't go to college because they can't afford the loans. And they know they'll never be able to repay them. And so how do we bring down the cost and increase the access to education?
Valerie Jarrett (35:18):
And then we have to work on the employment side. And look, there's so much that every business leader who's tuning in today can do to go out and recruit. And the good news here is that you're not doing it because it's a nice thing to do. You're doing it because the evidence now shows that diversity is a strength. It gives us a competitive advantage in a global marketplace. And that goes to people of color and it goes to women. And also the good news is that the majority of CEOs now understand that, but the question is, does it trickle down within the culture of the organization?
Valerie Jarrett (35:54):
And so you have to put in place both structural and cultural changes that make it easier for people to enter the workforce, have that upward mobility and stay there once they're hired. And that's when policies around inclusion becomes so important. Now, I always say to people, if you want to recruit black people, who are you sending out, and where are you sending them? Do you recruit at HBCUs? And when they come in, do they see anyone who looks like them? And I think there's a greater level of sensitivity to the importance of implicit bias training, for example, I'm on the board of Lyft. There isn't anyone at Lyft, to hires who hasn't first had to go through implicit bias training to try to level that playing field. Because we all have implicit biases.
Valerie Jarrett (36:38):
So I think that the beginning is the education and then it is increasing opportunity in the workplace. And it's making sure that people who are hired feel welcome and that could be everything from the affinity groups that I know a lot of companies have, to ensuring that they have mentors that help them move up the corporate ladder. And also helping businesses get started. Access to capital is a huge barrier. What are we doing to ensure that black owned businesses have that access to capital so that they can grow their own net worth, without having to depend on others? So there's so much that we could do. And the good news is that I think businesses are beginning to wake up and realize that.
John Darsie (37:24):
Thanks a lot, Valerie. We have another question about process and organizational management. So the Trump administration has become notorious for a revolving door personnel and a lack of organizational management and structure within the White House. What did an average day in the Obama administration White House look like from a process perspective? And what you can tell from the Trump administration, how did those two processes differ?
Valerie Jarrett (37:52):
We were big on process. Process was important. We wanted to make sure that recommendations that went to the president were soup as we called them. That we didn't take half baked, and mix my metaphor, ideas to him. And so we put a structure and a process in place. But before that, and I co-chaired his transition team, we spent a lot of time on recruitment. We spent a lot of time vetting folks, which is painful, as Anthony can tell you, it's a horrible process that you have to go through. You just have to lift up your skirt and tell everybody everything. But that's so important on the front end, not just in terms of making sure that folks who needed to get confirmed would be able to get confirmed. But of the people that you're hiring, share your values, your perspective, your determination to move the country forward. And then you have to work to build a team.
Valerie Jarrett (38:40):
But let's go back to the process for a minute. So the average day for us consisted with a senior staff meeting, with the chief of staff, a small one with the most senior advisors, then a larger one where our direct reports would come in. We'd focus both on the challenges of the day, but we always made time for what are the longer term projects that we're working on so that we can keep those in the back of our mind and prioritize? We'd meet with the president. We'd go over the recommendations that were coming from the staff.
Valerie Jarrett (39:08):
Our staff secretary had a hugely important job. It doesn't sound very sexy. But that person was responsible for making sure that the paper that went to the president had been fully analyzed by the necessary parties, whether it was the policy councils, the domestic policy, the economic policy, national security policy. Whether it was the cabinet agencies had weighed in. And then it came to the senior staff for us to weigh in. We would spend enormous effort on the paper. President Obama spent hours, hours every night after dinner, reading memos that we had sent him. Decision memos or our discussion memos, because the most important precious quality that the president has is his time. And we wanted to make sure that we were efficient with his time that it wasn't just the last person who walked in the room that was changing everything. And we stuck to that process. And I can say every chief of staff he had, was really good at trying to make sure the process was tight.
Valerie Jarrett (40:11):
And we worked on our culture. And I'll tell you, early on, some of the women were having a tough time. And I described in my book, president Obama who said, "Wait a minute, your voices are important. You're here because of your subject matter expertise, but also because you're going to present a different perspective." And how we had to work on that culture, which takes time and energy and determination and intentionalism. And that applies to any operation, any business, private or public. And by the end of the first term, he told a reporter, "In the beginning, I had the best team on the field. And by the end of the first term," the best players on the field. I blew the punch line. "By the end of the first time I had the best team."
Valerie Jarrett (40:50):
And I think that's also a message, how do you work with people so that they trust one another? So that if you have a crisis like one of our biggest self inflicted debacles was when our website for healthcare.gov crashed. And we had spent months trying to get it right. And the president had been so clear, "Is it going to work? Is it going to work?" "Yes, sir, it's going to work." And then it didn't work. And we didn't spend one minute blaming one another for it. Nor did he, I might add. It was like, "Get to work and get it fixed." And you can't do that, unless you are sure that you are a team and that you have each other's backs.
Valerie Jarrett (41:28):
And so I'm not in the current White House. But I will say, having a revolving door, having so much leaking to the press, having a message changed so many times in the course of the minute, let alone the day and the hour, and not having the discipline of ensuring that whatever the president says is accurate and evidence based. And I remember one of our press secretaries once said, when I was into a briefing before he went out to the briefing room back when there were briefings, if you're not sure, I can't say it. He said if I go out there and I say something that is not true that will reflect on president Obama. That doesn't mean we always got it right. But it shows the intentionality of the effort.
John Darsie (42:13):
Thank you, Valerie. One more question. And this relates to the 2020 election, you talked about the importance of voter turnout and how you and a lot of Obama administration alumni have been focused on the voter turnout piece. But if you're vice president Biden or his campaign manager, and you're trying to zero in on one, two or three core themes to hit on that are going to resonate with swing voters in swing states, there's obviously a lot of things that you could nitpick about, or not nitpick that you could criticize president Trump about in terms of character flaws and dividing the society. What are the core themes that you think he should really focus on, vice president Biden, in order to really pull those swing voters to his side?
Valerie Jarrett (42:55):
Well, I think the economy. Look, it's front and center. Millions and millions of Americans have lost their jobs. We have higher unemployment than anytime before the Great Depression. So for those who lost their jobs and who don't know whether by the election they'll have their jobs back, those whose jobs were changing anyway, as a result of technology, what are we going to do to rebuild the economy, not just back to where it was, with a very low unemployment rate, but with a lot of people underemployed, what are we going to do to make sure that we are building an economy that works for everybody? That people aren't slipping through the cracks. What are we going to do about our healthcare system to make sure that we move on the building blocks of the Affordable Care Act, as I said earlier, COVID-19 has laid bare the health disparities that exist.
Valerie Jarrett (43:41):
I think that people who are in swing states want to know that we are going to also re-enter the global dialogue as the leader of the free world again and not necessarily just go it alone our own way because the big challenges that we have as a world, really have to be solved through cooperation. The Paris Climate Accord that president Obama so successfully was able to get nearly 200 countries to sign require that effort because the United States can't combat climate change alone. The deal that we had to keep Iran from developing nuclear weapons required Russia, China, Great Britain, France, Germany, the European Union, all working together to put pressure on Iran. Big challenges require... Pandemics. The reason why Ebola never reached our shores was because president Obama got on the phone with other critical world leaders and said, "We have to work to contain it so that it doesn't bleed out and enter into our countries." The goodwill that you need in order to do that is something else that I think vice president Biden brings to the table.
Valerie Jarrett (44:47):
So the economy, health care, making sure people are treated equally. Being a world leader, again, participating and working with our allies, not chastising them and aligning ourselves with those who don't reflect our values. All of that's important. And then the final point, which is really the vice president's message is, he wants to really bring back the soul, restore the soul of our country. And I think that's the empathy. That's the sense that we are better when we are together. The [inaudible 00:45:17] of our message. I think that that is important as well. I think that will resonate not just with swing voters, but with many good Republicans and Democrats, too.
John Darsie (45:31):
Valerie. Thanks so much for joining us today on short notice. You were our first call when all the social unrest and the situation with George Floyd happened, to get your perspective on what's going on in the country and the path forward. I want to give another plug for your book. If you haven't read it, you go to valeriejarrettbook.com. Valerie, I think has one. I put the camera on her.
Anthony Scaramucci (45:50):
Well, let's get it up on the camera here. Valerie, hold it up. Let's take a look. All right you look-
Valerie Jarrett (45:57):
That's the paperback.
Anthony Scaramucci (45:58):
Let's face it, you look-
Valerie Jarrett (46:00):
Pardon me. Well, I was saying pushing the paper back because I added two new chapters, at the end. One of them presciently about my grandson, at the very end in the world. I hope that he has, he's black and I'm brown. And I talked about his parents having to give him that talk. And this was long before the current crisis. And so in a sense, I hope people will read it with the thought of my grandson in mind, and what can we do to make sure that his life and the lives of so many other people of color are better than they are today?
Anthony Scaramucci (46:33):
Well, I'm certainly looking forward to it. I read the one last year that you gave me and thank you for that. And I'll read those concurrent chapters. But go ahead, John, everyone's focused on the duck behind you. But go ahead, John, do your best here to finish it up.
John Darsie (46:48):
All right. Well, yeah, we want to thank Valerie again for joining us. Her and Anthony have struck up a great friendship. And when Anthony was set to serve in that OPL position in the Trump administration, Valerie was extremely gracious and kind and helping him make that transition. So just it's been great to watch that friendship blossom across the aisle.
Anthony Scaramucci (47:08):
She told me not to do it. I didn't listen to her, Valerie.
Valerie Jarrett (47:10):
I did tell him not to do it.
Anthony Scaramucci (47:10):
So from now on, I'm going to li... I mean, before I make big decisions like that, I'm going to call you. Okay? You'll tell me what to do.
Valerie Jarrett (47:17):
Please do. Please do. Thank you all. It's a pleasure to be with you.
Anthony Scaramucci (47:19):
All right, guys. Thank you.