Speeches and Remarks

St. Louis Cathedral
New Orleans, Louisiana

6:51 P.M. CST

THE PRESIDENT:  Your Excellency, Archbishop Aymond; members of the clergy representing Christian, Jewish, Muslim faiths across the board, thank you for what you’re doing. 

Governor Landry, Representatives Carter and Fields, Mayor Cantrell, and all elected officials and members of the community. 

Most of all, the families and loved ones of those we lost in this horrific act of terrorism last Wednesday.

I know events like this are hard when the shock and pain is still so very raw. 

My wife, Jill, and I are here to stand with you, to grieve with you, to pray with you, and let you know you are not alone.  The rest of the nation is looking at you as well.

It’s not the same, but we know what it’s like to lose a piece of our soul — the anger, the emptiness, the black hole that seems to be sucking you into your chest, the sense of loss, the questions of faith in your soul.

I know it’s been five days staring at that empty chair in the kitchen, around the kitchen table, and not hearing the voice.

You think of the birthdays, the anniversaries, the holidays to come without them. 

You think of everything — everyday things, the small things, the details you’ll miss the most.  The morning coffee you shared together.  The bend of his smile.  The perfect pitch of her laugh.

The rest of America has learned about them as well.

Students who dreamed of becoming engineers or nurses.Star athletes who worked on Wall Street or helped coach small children.  Warehouse managers.  Bluegrass fan.  Cook, engaged to be married.  A single mom just promoted at work and teaching her young son to read.

They came from different states, even different country.

They were children who had dinner with their parents besur- — before joining their friends on New Year’s Eve.

Some even ran toward the chaos to try to help save others.

We remember them.

Today, we also stand with the 35 people who were injured in the attack, and we think of the brave responders and law enforcement officers — officials who risked their lives to stop the terror and save others, including two of those officers that I met tonight, injured in the firefight.  Now, thankfully, both are recovering and are home.

I’ve directed my team to make every resource available to federal, state, and local law enforcement to complete this investigation quickly and do whatever else we can.

The French Quarter is also home to so many people.  We will support everyone who lives there, all the people of New Orleans as they heal.

And if there’s one thing we know, New Orleans defines strength and resilience.  You define it.  Whether it’s in the form of this atta- — from this attack or hurricanes or superstorms, this city and its people get back up.

That’s the spirit of America as well.

Let me close with this.  To the families left behind, we know from some experience it’s hard.  But I promise you, the day will come when the memory of your loved one — you pass that park, open that closet door, smell that fragrance, just remember that laugh — when the memory of your loved one will bring a smile to your lips before a tear to your eye.

It will take time, but I promise you — I promise you, it will come.  It will take time.  My prayer is that that day comes sooner rather than later.  But it will come.  And when it does, you my — may you find purpose in your pain to live the life worthy of the one you lost.

From the hymn based on the 91st Psalm in my church, “May He raise you up on eagle’s wings and bear you on the breath of dawn, make you to shine like the sun, and hold you — hold you in the palm of His hand.”

God bless you all.  And may God protect our troops.  God bless you.  (Applause.)

6:57 P.M. CST

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U.S. Capitol
Washington, D.C.
 

THE VICE PRESIDENT:  Well, today was a — obviously, a very important day, and it was about what should be the norm and what the American people should be able to take for granted, which is that one of the most important pillars of our democracy is that there will be a peaceful transfer of power. 
 
And today, I did what I have done my entire career, which is take seriously the oath that I have taken many times to support and defend the Constitution of the United States, which included, today, performing my constitutional duties to ensure that the people of America, the voters of America will have their votes counted, that those votes matter, and that they will determine, then, the outcome of an election. 
 
I do believe very strongly that America’s democracy is only as strong as our willingness to fight for it — every single person, their willingness to fight for and respect the importance of our democracy.  Otherwise, it is very fragile and it will not be able to withstand moments of crisis. 
 
And today, America’s democracy stood.
 
Thank you.
 
 END

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State Dining Room

7:02 P.M. EST

THE PRESIDENT: Hello, hello, hello. (Applause.)

Well, welcome to your house.

AUDIENCE: Aw.

THE PRESIDENT: We’re honored to have you here. Look, we host you, the newest members of Congress. It brings back a lot of memories. Congratulations to you and your families.

And thank you all for — steering and policy chair, Amy Klobuchar, who, if I were you — (applause) — I’d listen to everything she says, everything she does. (Laughter.) House Democratic Caucus chair is here, but before that, we’re going to have Gary Peters announced.

Gary, where are you? (Applause.) There he is.

And Pete Aguilar is here as well. Pete. (Applause.)

Well, you made it through the campaign, and now your work begins to deliver for your people. And we’ve — we’ve been in your shoes — the excitement, the expectations, and — and the little bit of nervousness occasionally. It’s okay.

My advice to you is: Embrace the institution you serve. I really mean it. Improve it. Don’t — don’t tear it down.

You know, we — 36 years ago, I — I loved — for 36 years, I was a United States senator. I got elected when I was 29. You have to be 30 to be sworn in, and I wasn’t old enough to be sworn in. And I came down to — down to Washington, and I — when I was in — a guy — a number of the senior senators helped me out. And I was in Teddy Kennedy’s office, waiting to — hiring staff, interviewing people, and I got a phone call in his office that my — my wife and daughter had just been killed, and my two boys weren’t likely to live. They had been struck by a tractor trailer, broadsided them on — Christmas shopping.

And the reason I bother to tell you this story is not to seek any sympathy but to say to you that my decision at that time was to not — not be sworn in, to get the hell out. And we had a Democratic governor, so I knew they were going to be able to appoint a Democratic senator, and that wasn’t a worry.

And — but a group of about seven Democrats and Republican senators, starting with Mike Mansfield, who they called “Iron Mike,” who was a — the majority leader — and a Southerner named Fritz Hollings. And a bunch of folks got together, and they came to see me in two different groups to convince me to stay because I knew that — that they’d get — we’d get another senator, but I wasn’t sure — I didn’t think they’d get another father, my two boys who were recovering. And so, I wasn’t going to stay.

But — but they brought me into their homes, these senators. There were six, seven of them. I won’t name all — bore you with it. But from Teddy Kennedy to Fritz Hollings to Mi- — Mike Mansfield, and they just embraced me. They — and they — they didn’t — it wasn’t overly sympathetic. It was just, you know, “You just come and stay” — I’ll never forget. “Just come and stay six months; then you can go home. Then you can go home.”

But what they did was they pulled me in. They pulled me in. They invited me to their — their homes. There — there used to be, back in those days, Democrats and Republicans were — had friendships, and they would still have dinners at each other’s homes — private dinners and the like. And all of a sudden, I got included. I got pulled in.

And Mike Mansfield, who was the leader of the Senate — they called him “Iron Mike” — from Montana, he has more integrity in his little finger than most people had in their whole body. And I used to have to report this office every day — every Tuesday at 2 o’clock. I thought everybody reported — he’d give me an assignment. I thought everybody got an assignment. Nobody gets an assignment — (laughter) — in the Senate.

But it just ba- — basically, looking back on it, to take my pulse to see how I was doing. Because every time, as soon as the Senate was out, I’d — I’d literally jog down to the — Penn [Union] Station to get on the train to go home because I commuted every day.

Anyway, to make a long story short, there’s a purpose to my telling you this. I was 100 in seniority and — of the United States Senate, and they — they still cared for me. They — they looked out for me. And they gave me strength, and I stay engaged. They didn’t — I — they didn’t stay — I didn’t stay engaged; I — I got really engaged. I was here for 50 years. (Laughter.) (The president makes the sign of the cross.) (Laughter and applause.)

But — but my point is you don’t have to give up your principles or your beliefs to build relationships, to compromise and reach a consensus. That’s often the only way to get big things done, at least in my experience. That’s what I’ve tried to do my whole career.

And I’m proud of the record we’re going to leave you all to build on: an economy that grows from the middle out and the bottom up instead of the top down; the once-in-a-generation investment in infrastructure — over a billion two hundred million dollars and — a trillion two hundred billion dollars; the CHIPS and Science Act; the climate change; clean energy.

The point is that — (applause) — the point is, whether it’s reducing prescription drug costs or reducing gun violence or reas- — re- — reasserting America’s leadership in the world and, maybe most important of all, standing up for democracy.

And every generation gets tested. I taught constitutional law for a long time, and I used to always give a lecture about every generation has to fight for — I never really believed what I was saying, in the sense that I didn’t think I’d have to fight to maintain democracy.

But tomorrow is January 6th. Tomorrow is January 6th. We gather to certify the results on a free and fair presidential election and ensure a peaceful transfer of power.

It’s a day that — that, most of our history, we took for granted, the 6th, but I hope we never take it for granted again.

You know, four years ago, January 6th, this Capitol was attacked by a violent mob. If you can come over to the Oval before I leave, I’ll show you the room that the former president sat in for three and a half hours, watching what was going on on television in the small dining room off of my — off of the Oval Office. And our democracy was really, literally, put to the test. And thankfully, our democracy held.

But the big reason is because of the bravery of the Capitol Police and the local people who stood with us. (Applause.) Never forget them. They’re guarding you. Give them the respect and support they deserve.

But it’s also due to the members of the House and the Senate, who, even in the face of these threats — threats to their life — courageously fulfilled their duty to the Constitution. They showed up and did the work.

Now it’s your duty to tell the truth, to remember what happened, and not let January 6th be rewritten as a — or even erased; to honor the Constitution not only on the most extraordinary of days but — it’s one of the toughest days in American history, January 6th — but every day. You know, you’ve sworn an oath, and I know you’ll never forget the oath you swore to.

But now, four years later, I’m leaving the office of the president. I’m determined to do everything in my power to respect the peaceful transfer of power.

You know, I don’t think a- — (applause) — I wasn’t going to run when I ran in 2020 because I had lost my son, didn’t want any part of getting engaged again. But my son Beau and — who was the attorney general and likely the governor — next governor of the state of Delaware.

But, you know, I think it’s important to restore basic conditions. The last time this occurred, this transfer of power, the losing party never even showed up — never even showed up for the — for any — for — and everybody, understandably, says to me, “Why are you being nice, Joe? Why’d you have him over to the office for two hours? Why are you cooperating?” Because we got to — the — the rules matter. The institutions matter. The safeguards matter. They really matter.

And, look, you know, the core traditions we’ve long respected in America, certifying an election is — attending an inauguration of an incoming president — and this is all part of the tradition we have to begin to restore. And I hope you, too, will work to restore the traditions to keep this country stronger.

Let me — you know, we can never forget democracy — with demo- — everything is possible. Everything is possible — our freedoms, our rights, our liberties, our dreams. And the work of our democracy falls to every generation of Americans to earn it.

I know — I used to teach con- — I used to say that, “earn it.” And I — I never really — I taught it and I knew it was true, but I never felt it. I never believed it. But we have to defend it and protect it because it’s always under siege.

And, look, we’re going through a really — I know a lot of my colleagues are tired of hearing me saying this, but we’re going through a period in American history which is one of those infl- — those inflection points in history. The Cold War is over. The Cold War era is over. We’re in an entirely new era. Everything has changed, not because of any single woman or man. It’s the nature of things that have changed.

Think of the transitions that are taking place in the world, unrelated to who the leadership is. Think of what’s going on, whether it’s global warming or whether it’s the idea that the whole — whole alliances are breaking down and re- — being rees- — being reestablished. And it seems to me that our safety depends — and security depends, in large part, on who our partners are, who our — who our allies are. They matter.

So, you’re going to be in a position to have to deal with ma- — I — one of the things I’m proudest of is I rebuilt NATO. I say “I,” but I did. For real. (Laughter.) I mean, it took — by the way, I spent over — (applause) — no, no, no, no, no, no. No, I (inaudible) said that — it took me over a — we calculated it — 120 hours with these world leaders individually — speaking to them individually on why it was important.

I remember getting a phone call 10 days before he died from Dr. Kissinger, saying, “Joe” — I — I was, half the time, in a different position than Kissinger was because I was a senior senator at the time during the Vietnam War by that time. And he said, “Not since Napoleon has Europe not looked over their shoulder with dread at was going on in Moscow until you came — you guys came” — he said “you,” but it was about me –“you came along.” We’ve im- — we’ve improved NATO. We strengthened it. We put it back together again. We put it back together again.

We’re in a position where we were able to convince — did you ever think we’d be in a position — those of you who are students of history — where Japan would be spending 2 percent of its GDP on — on defense? We’d get 50 nations to support us — our efforts in — in Ukraine? Why? Because the world’s gotten so damn small — so damn small. They all understand: What happens in my neighborhood is going to affect every neighborhood.

We’re — we’re putting together alliances in — in the South Pacific, in the Indian Ocean, the Quad. Did anybody ever think we’d get India, Japan, Australia, and the United States in one organization?

The point I’m making is, everything is changing.

I’ve known — I’ve known Putin for over 47 years. Met with him many times. I remember when I met with him in off — in the off period between the time that we were elected and before we were sworn in — or just after we were swor- — no, actually, before we s- — no, that’s true — just after we sworn in, in early February. And I wanted to talk about re- — reestablishing arms control and dealing with nuclear weapons.

And he started to talk about how Russia had changed and so on and so forth. And he talked about he — his — he has eight time zones. I said, “Yeah, eight time zones along the — around the — the Arctic Circle. And guess what? The ice is melting, and what’s coming out is not greenhouse gasses. It’s methane. You’re never going to control it. It’s sig- — it’s not going to refreeze. What are you going to do about it?”

So, my point is, so much is changing, and we have — and think about this: You know, if we don’t lead the world, who leads? And that’s not a criticism of any of our allies, but who has the capacity to try to hold the world together? Not a joke. We can do it without going to war. We can do it — as we’ve been able to do, God willing — (the president knocks on wood) — since we’ve become — come into office. We can do it without sending American forces to places.

So, I guess what I’m trying to say to you is — you know, let me close with what I call the Senate point of personal privilege. (Laughter.) You know, my father used to say, “It’s a lucky person that wakes up, put both feet in the ground, and believes that what he or she does matters.” Well, you’re among the lucky few. What you do really is going to matter economically and politically.

But one piece of unsolicited advice, and I was reluctant to say this with the press here, but I’m going to do it anyway, because they — because they — they can know the facts here. Going back to when I told you, when I got elected, I didn’t want to stay. Teddy Kennedy and Fritz Hollings and Tom Eagleton and a number of Republicans as well — there were nine of them — decided to, you know, keep me engaged and invite me to everything they were doing. And Teddy used to come over my office and say, “Let’s go to lunch.” And I wanted no part of going to lunch or getting to know anybody. I didn’t want to — I just wanted to do my job, get — get down on Union Station, and go home. I mean, for real. You — and many of you have been through what I’ve been through and a lot worse.

And so, one day he walks over and he says — I won’t use his exact language. He says, “Darn it, Joe, you’re going lunch with me.” So, I went over to the private Senate dining room. There’s two Senate dining rooms. The one dining room where you take — you’ll be able to take someone if you’re a senator, and the House is not fundamentally different.

But in the Senate, there was — I — I was — I was fairly successful at bringing together coalitions as a senator. I — I don’t mean it like — I mean, but I — I work like hell, and it — and — and I — Barack used to always kid me. We’d meet every morning. The first thing, we’d meet with one another at 9:00 in the morning every morning, and the last person we’d each speak to at night when we ended the day was with one another. That’s the deal we made. And one of the things was he always used to say that — you know, I know and I’d always be — I said, “Look, Barack, all politics is personal. All politics is personal.”

And the reason I mention that is that I went over — Teddy had me come over to the Senate. There used to be a Senate dining room. When you walk in the first floor on the Senate side, you go down that hall on the first cross corridor where the — by the elevators. One goes into the foreign relations executive committee room; another goes down to the staircase going up to the floor, as well as an elevator; and then there’s an office door on the left and one on the right. On the right is the Senate dining room.

Those of you who are senators are going to be able to bring any of your colleagues or friends in to have lunch with you. But the door on the left used to be a private Senate dining room. You had to be — only a U.S. senator was allowed in. And you walked in, and it was a — it was a T-shaped. You walked in, and there was a — a buffet table on the left, which had all the luncheon material out, and a long table on the right, like a big dining room table, but it was — seated, I’m guessing, 18 to 20 people. And then you walk straight ahead, and perpendicular was another table by windows looking out over the parking lot, and there was another table that held 20 or so people, and that was the Democratic table.

And so, what would happen — Teddy brought me in, and he said, “All I want you to do is just” — and you know this to be the case — “just walk in, just sit and listen. You’ll learn more in an hour sitting here with these senior senators and others than you’ll learn in the next 10 hours doing anything else.”

So, I remember sitting down. And Jim Eastland — I — I ran because of civil rights in my state. We were segregated by law, to our great shame. And here is Jim Eastland and, you know, John Stennis and Herman Talmadge and all these guys — these Southern, by any definition, racist Senators. And I sat there and listened. Teddy and Eastland would go at it hammer and tong up on the floor. They’d go down and eat together. They didn’t leave their values behind, their points of view, but they sat and — and — and it — and ate with one another.

And so, what happens when you get to know that the other senator — he is — her husband has testicular cancer and is dying? Well, you have a different perspective. When you find out that one of them has a son that they — that has a — a serious learning disability or somebody has just lost their mother or father, you learn about what they’re going through, and it personalizes things in a way that only private conversations and personal things can do.

And you begin to understand and you begin to learn about — and you’ll find this; you already know this in your states as congresspersons in districts — that the next district over, the person may not be a bad guy or woman, but they have a constituency of a very different view than yours does — not bad or good, different than yours does. Not a whole lot of people in Kansas worry about fishing rights in the Atlantic. (Laughter.) Not a whole lot of people in — in, you know, on the Atlantic coast are worried about agricultural issues on corn in Nebraska.

I mean, so, you begin to look at other people’s perspectives, and it becomes less personal — it becomes less personal. It’s not “you’re a bad person.”

The end result of it all is: We lost that. And so, as — as I think some of my sen- — my senior colleagues in this room can tell you, you know, I was — I was vice president for eight years. I think it was the sixth or seventh year, things had really gone to hell in the way we were dealing with each other on the floor, the leadership. And everybody wondered how in the hell I could get along with a senator from Kentucky. He never once (inaudible) — he never once lied to me, whatever he said he did, and I understood his circumstance he was in.

But here’s the deal. I realized that every time there was something going on in the Senate — I think he’d tell you, the main reason Barack picked me to be vice president was my background in American foreign policy, because I had done so much of it, and because of my relationships in the Senate and the Congress. I was — I — I love the Senate. I — I consider myself a Senate man more than I do a president — for real — after 36 years.

And so, I realized there were a lot of new senators I didn’t know, I didn’t have a personal relationship with, and realized what it — how difficult that was for me to figure out their thinking, why they were doing what they were doing, why — why — and what could I do to answer their concerns without violating any principles that they had.

And so, I decided to go over to the Senate dining room. And I walked in the door. There’s nothing there. There’s lounge chairs. There was no place — and I do- — not sure about the House — there’s no place in the United States Senate where a group of senators can say, “Let’s go have lunch together, all together.” It doesn’t exist.

It’s a gigantic loss — a gigantic loss. When we’d do on CODELs, we used to take our spouses with us. It matters. It matters, when you know one spouse is having great difficulty because their husband isn’t being in the position where they’re home on time because they’re taking too much time what they’re doing in — in their job or whatever it is.

And when you get to — think about your personal relationships. The people you grew up with, you have different points of view on. The people you, in fact, know, you — you worked with, who have different perspectives in life, much of it’s because of their present — their — their circumstance. And when you know it, you can almost always figure a way through it.

We don’t do that anymore. And I’m not saying this for the first time, but the single greatest loss we have is we don’t know each other anymore. We don’t know each other like we used to know each other. I’m serious. Not a joke.

And so, I really urge you — presumptuous of me to say this — if you’re a good politician, you’re good at interfacing with people. You can get people to trust you, looking at you, and knowing what you’re saying to them is true. Your word is your bond. You break it once, man, in the Senate or the House, goodbye Charlie. I’m not joking.

It’s fundamentally, fundamentally different. But if you say, “I’ve got to do this because this — my constituency, this is important to them. I know it’s not to your” — forget it.

The end result of all this is, in my career, I have been asked to do the eulogy of the most incredibly different people: Strom Thurmond, 100 years old, on his deathbed, I get a phone call from the hos- — from — from the — from the hospital, from out of Walter Reed. And it’s his wife, Nancy, saying, “Joe, I’m here with the doctors at the nurses station. Strom asked me to ask you whether or not you would do his eulogy.”

And I said, “Well, Nancy” — “No, Joe, it’s important to him. Would you do his eulogy?”

Well, you know, people change. I’m not making them rewrite Strom Thurmond. He was — he was a segregationist. But when Strom Thurmond got elected to the United States Senate, the second time around, the New York Times had a big headline in 19- — I can’t remember the year now — “Strom Thurmond, Hope of the South,” because Strom Thurmond decided that separate but equal is not right — not that Blacks and whites should be together, but if you do separate but equal, you had to spend as much money on Black schools as white schools.

By the time Strom Thurmond left the United States Senate, he had — I’m not making a case for him, but he had more African Americans on his staff than any United States senator had — more. Strom Thurmond had an illegitimate child with a Black woman. Never denied it and never stopped paying for her — his upbringing.

There’s a lot of strange people, a lot of different people. No, I mean — well, I bet I could look at you, and I could find some strange things too. (Laughter.)

No, but I’m really serious. Think about it. Think about it.

And so, when you sit down with people — I mean, the idea that I got Jesse Helms to vote to fund the United Nations. I’m serious. Went to Jesse Helms’s eulo- — I mean, Je- — Jesse Helms’s funeral. You know what Jesse Helms talked about? Before he died, he said, “I made a big mistake, Joe. I should have never said what I said.”

And, by the — I didn’t get on with him at all. But you know what he said? He said, “I should have never said what I said about, you know, all those folks just got out of trees not long ago, like monkeys.” He said, “I was wrong about that. I want to take it all back.”

People can change. But you got to know that — you got to talk to them. Doesn’t mean you can do it. But things can change.

And, folks, we can’t go through another 4, 8, 12 years what we did in the last previous four years. We can’t do it.

And a lot of you have a lot of experience in foreign policy. The rest of the world looks to us. They look to us. We’re the only organizational capacity of any nation in the world to pull these things together.

Who else will do it? They’re good people — the Brits, the French, the Germans, a whole range of people. But do you think any of them can do it? They’re looking to us.

We can do it without sending troops. We can do it without a war. We can do it without a whole — all the things that are the downsides.

And I think with your help and a lot of people — the help of the leadership here, we’ve done a pretty damn good job so far of putting things back on track.

So, please don’t listen to those who say, “Don’t talk.” You’re smarter than most of these people are. You know what you want to do. (Laughter.)

Well, I’m serious. Think about it.

How many people get here just purely based on prejudice, just purely based on the kinds of things that are just lies?

But people change. And so, I know I drove Barack crazy when I’d say, j- — I know, I know, I know — politics is all personal. But think about it.

How in God’s name do you think I got Yoon and the prime minister of Japan, after World War Two, never speaking to one another and hating each other because of what happened to the women, to sit down and sign a treaty together at Camp David? How did that happen? What changed? Not their publics, but they realized what they had at stake, and they decided to move something.

So, my point is: I’ve looked at all your res- — I should — shouldn’t say this, but I did. I looked at all your backgrounds. (Laughter.) You’re smart as hell. You’re incredibly, incredibly qualified.

So, please reach out. I don’t want you to compromise on any principle you fully disagree with, but just understand the other person’s perspective. It’s a way to get to go. Because if we don’t do that, look at — anyway, I’m confident you’re going to be able to change this, turn this around, in a way that we continue down the road we’re on.

And so, thank you, thank you, thank you. And God bless you all. And keep it personal. (Applause.)

Thank you. (Applause.)

7:29 P.M. EST

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East Room

1:23 P.M. EST

THE PRESIDENT:  Please, everyone, be seated.

Well, good afternoon and Happy New Year.

AUDIENCE:  Happy New Year.

THE PRESIDENT:  As we gather in this room on January 2025, imagine March of 1865.  President Lincoln had just delivered

his inaugural address at the Capitol.  And he returned to the White House for a reception here in the East Room.

There were many well-wishers, but he spotted someone whose opinion he greatly valued.  President Lincoln asked him what he thought of the speech he had just delivered to the nation by a divided Civil War.  The man replied, “It was a sacred effort.”  “It was a sacred effort.”  That man was Frederick Douglass.

Here we are, nearly 160 years later, in the room where Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglass stood to unify the nation.

I’m joined by our incredible first lady, Jill.  We’re joined by an incredible vice president, Kamala Harris, and second gentleman, Doug.  Doug is a hell of lawyer, by the way.  (Laughter.)  Finally get to — get to practice again, huh?  (Laughter.)

And for the final time as president, I have the honor of bestowing the Medal of Freedom on — our nation’s highest civilian honor on a group of extraordinary — truly extraordinary people who gave their sacred effort — their sacred effort to shape the culture and the cause of America.

So, let me just say to each of you, thank you, thank you, thank you for all you’ve done to help this country.  (Applause.)  You all — you all literally embody the nation’s creed, “E pluribus unum” — “out of many, one.”

Collect in a [A collective of] people of different backgrounds, beliefs, and talents, from the different generations and different genders, using their remarkable gifts and unwavering passion to strengthen our resolve as one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

It matters.  It really does matter.

As cultural icons, defined statesmans, di- — excuse me — dignified stateman, humanitarians, rock stars, sports stars, you feed the hungry, you give hope to those — those who are hurting, and you craft the signs and sounds of our movements and our memories.

You know, it’s amazing — your innovation, your — you inspire.  You bring healing and joy to so many lives otherwise wouldn’t be touched.

You answer the call to serve and led others to do the same thing.  And you defend the values of America even when they are under attack, which they have been as of late.  Together, you leave an incredible mark — and I mean this sincerely — this group up — you leave an incredible mark on our country, with insight and influence that can be felt around the globe, in major cities and remote areas alike, binding us closer as a people and showing us that — what’s possible as a nation — there’s nothing beyond our capacity — while representing your families, your communities, your ancestors with pride and appreciation at the same time.

I’d also like to take a moment to recognize those honorees who are no longer with us — (a child speaks in the audience) — including the young man speaking.  (Laughter.)

By the way, kids rule in this house.  Okay?  (Laughter and applause.)  Don’t worry about it.  And you all think I’m kidding.  I’m not.  (Laughter.)

Ash Carter, Ms. Fannie Lou Hamer, George Romney, Bobby Kennedy — heroes of the highest order.  And Bobby Kennedy is one of my true political heroes.  I love and I miss him dearly.

I thank their families — all their families.  You know, as — we carry on the sacred effort of courage and conviction that you all began.

So, today, I want to congratulate you on all you’ve accomplished.  And I’m grateful for the work you’ll inspire for generations to follow to stay engaged, to never give up, to always keep the faith.

And in that spirit, from the People’s House, where Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglass and generation of patriots before us have stood watch over the Republic, I ask the military aide to begin the reading of the citations for this year’s Medal of Freedom honorees.  (Applause.)

MILITARY AIDE:  José Andrés.  (Applause.) 

The Presidential Medal of Freedom is awarded to José Andrés.  From his parents’ kitchen in Spain, José Andrés arrived in America with little money and big dreams.  Over the course of three decades, he mastered his culinary craft with renowned restaurants that span culture and cuisine and bring people together.  His World Central Kitchen revolutionized humanitarian assistance by mobilizing fellow chefs and providing meals to people left in the wake of natural disasters and war.  With his unmatched personality and heart, José Andrés shows us that there is a seat for everyone at the table.  (Applause.)

(The Medal of Freedom is presented.)  (Applause.)  

Bono.  (Applause.) 

The Presidential Medal of Freedom is awarded to Bono.  As lead singer of U2, one of the most successful rock bands in history, Bono changes the world through his art and activism.  In an Irish tradition of poetry and protest, rebellion and rejoicing, he has composed anthems to peace and civil rights.  As a humanitarian, he lifts up causes from ending poverty and disease to calling for debt relief for developing nations.  The common beat of his life’s work is the power of freedom, a tie that also binds Ireland and America as beloved friends.  (Applause.)

(The Medal of Freedom is presented.)  (Applause.)  

Accepting on behalf of Ashton Baldwin Carter is Stephanie Carter.  (Applause.) 

The Presidential Medal of Freedom is awarded to Ashton Baldwin Carter.  A scientist turned Secretary of Defense, Ash Carter was a true patriot.  Over four decades, in and out of the Pentagon, he was a key leader, thinker, and strategist on critical issues ranging from nuclear nonproliferation, counterterrorism, and our sacred obligation to equip, care, and protect our service members and their families.  His scientific and technological innovations made our nation safer, and his integrity and mentorship inspired generations of Americans to serve and protect our nation with honor and dignity.  (Applause.)

(The Medal of Freedom is presented.)  (Applause.)  

Hillary Rodham Clinton.  (Applause.) 

The Presidential Medal of Freedom is awarded to Hillary Rodham Clinton.  Hillary Rodham Clinton is guided by the Methodist creed, “Do all the good you can, in all the ways you can.”  As a lawyer, she defended the rights of children.  As first lady, she fought for universal health care and declared “women’s rights are human rights.”  As senator, she helped New York rebuild after September 11, 2001.  As secretary of State, she championed democracy worldwide.  And her nomination for president broke barriers and inspired generations.  Through it all, her career has been dedicated to an eternal truth: America’s ideals are sacred, and we must always defend and live by them.  (Applause.)

(The Medal of Freedom is presented.)  (Applause.)  

Michael J. Fox.  (Applause.) 

The Presidential Medal of Freedom is awarded to Michael J. Fox.  Michael J. Fox is one of the most beloved actors of our time.  With remarkable wit and charm, he introduced iconic characters to the center of American culture, from Alex P. Keaton to Marty McFly and more.  With undaunted resilience and optimism, he also warms hearts and captivates audiences as a fearless advocate for those with Parkinson’s disease, channeling his endearing personality to advance treatments, move us closer to a cure, and remind us of the power of American possibilities.  (Applause.)

(The Medal of Freedom is presented.)  (Applause.)  

Tim Gill.  (Applause.) 

The Presidential Medal of Freedom is awarded to Tim Gill.  A leading philanthropist and civil rights leader, Tim Gill advances the cause of equality for the LGBTQ community in America and the world.  A visionary entrepreneur, he has helped lead the fight against HIV/AIDS, laid the groundwork for marriage equality, and so much more.  His strong character, unwavering resolve, and indisputable effectiveness in fighting for love and equality for all make him a key figure in our nation’s story of freedom.  (Applause.)

(The Medal of Freedom is presented.)  (Applause.)  

Jane Goodall.  (Applause.) 

The Presidential Medal of Freedom is awarded to Jane Goodall.  From war-torn England to the jungles of Tanzania, Dr. Jane Goodall’s childhood passion for animals led her to explore wildlife in Africa.  Her groundbreaking discoveries of chimpanzees challenged scientific convention, reshaped conservation methods, and redefined our understanding of the connection between humans, animals, and the environment we share.  Jane’s activism, vision, and message of hope have mobilized a global movement to protect the planet.  Above all, she has taught us that when we search for humanity in the natural world around us, we discover it within ourselves.  (Applause.)

(The Medal of Freedom is presented.)  (Applause.)  

Accepting on behalf of Mrs. Fannie Lou Hamer is Doris Hamer Richardson.  (Applause.) 

The Presidential Medal of Freedom is awarded to Mrs. Fannie Lou Hamer.  One of the most powerful voices of the Civil Rights Movement, Mrs. Fannie Lou Hamer spent 18 years as a sharecropper in Mississippi before learning that Black citizens had a constitutional right to vote.  With that newfound freedom, she sacrificed her own safety to organize and register fellow Black voters across the South.  Brutally beaten but undeterred, for decades she spoke truth to power to expand political participation and economic rights for all Americans and left these words echoing in the nation’s conscience: “Nobody’s free until everybody is free.”  (Applause.)

(The Medal of Freedom is presented.)  (Applause.)  

Earvin “Magic” Johnson.  (Applause.) 

The Presidential Medal of Freedom is awarded to Earvin “Magic” Johnson.  With unmatched vision and versatility, Earvin “Magic” Johnson drove the Showtime era for the Los Angeles Lakers: 5-time NBA Champion, 5-time MVP, 12-time All-Star, Olympic Gold Medalist, and the Naismith Hall of Famer.  Under the same bright lights, his honesty about his HIV status shattered stigma and saved lives.  The first — (applause) — the first retired athlete to build a true business empire, he champions underserved communities.  With a legendary will and smile, Magic Johnson rose from the playground in Lansing, Michigan, to become one of the most beloved athletes of our time.  (Applause.)

(The Medal of Freedom is presented.)  (Applause.)

Accepting on behalf of Robert Francis Kennedy is Kerry Kennedy.  (Applause.) 

The Presidential Medal of Freedom is awarded to Robert Francis Kennedy.  Born into a revered family of service, Robert F. Kennedy forged a path toward freedom that endures today.  Guided by the Constitution as his conscience, he was a key strategist to his brother’s successful campaigns for Senate and the presidency before serving as attorney general, senator, and a presidential candidate himself.  With deep empathy and resolve, powerful prose and poetry, he focused the nation’s moral compass on the cause of civil rights, the dignity of the poor, and the ripples of hope we can each cast as we choose not division, not hatred, not violence or lawlessness, but love, wisdom, and compassion toward one another.  (Applause.)

(The Medal of Freedom is presented.)  (Applause.)

THE PRESIDENT:  Anyone who’s not a Kennedy, stand up.  (Laughter.)

MILITARY AIDE:  Ralph Lauren.  (Applause.) 

The Presidential Medal of Freedom is awarded to Ralph Lauren.  The son of Polish immigrants and a U.S. Army veteran, Ralph Lauren transformed a small necktie business into one of America’s most iconic brands, leaving a lasting imprint on the world of fashion, fragrance, furniture, and beyond.  Throughout it all, he remains a dedicated philanthropist, including fighting to end cancer as we know it.  Classic, yet creative, timeless yet innovative, Ralph Lauren reminds us of our distinct style as a nation of dreamers and doers.  (Applause.)

(The Medal of Freedom is presented.)  (Applause.)  

William Sanford Nye.  (Applause.) 

The Presidential Medal of Freedom is awarded to William Sanford Nye.  A Washington, D.C., native, Bill Nye began his career as a cutting edge mechanical engineer in Seattle, before becoming a beloved science educator for the nation.  Earning 19 Emmy awards for his energetic experiments on television as “Bill Nye the Science Guy,” he also earned the trust of millions of children and families.  By sharing the magic of fun and science, he inspires generations of Americans to follow facts and reason and leave the world better than we found it.  (Applause.)

(The Medal of Freedom is presented.)  (Applause.)  

Accepting on behalf of George W. Romney is Mitt Romney.  (Applause.)

The Presidential Medal of Freedom is awarded to George W. Romney.  Born to humble beginnings as the son of Mormon missionaries, George Romney developed a deep belief in the idea that everyone deserves a fair shot at the American dream.  As a respected auto executive and three-term Republican governor of Michigan, he served as secretary of Housing and Urban Development, advanced civil rights, tackled poverty, and stood up for everyday Americans, embodying an enduring faith in God and a love of country.  (Applause.)

(The Medal of Freedom is presented.)  (Applause.)  

David M. Rubenstein.  (Applause.)

The Presidential Medal of Freedom is awarded to David M. Rubenstein.  From a working-class family in Baltimore, David Rubenstein has become a renowned leader in business, arts, and culture.  After serving our nation on the staff of the Senate Judiciary Committee and in President Carter’s White House, David went on to become a transformational business leader and philanthropist, from advancing cutting-edge cancer treatment to restoring our nation’s monuments.  His leadership reminds us that at our best, we learn from, preserve, and share our history so that everyone sees themselves in the story of America.  (Applause.) 

(The Medal of Freedom is presented.)  (Applause.)  

Accepting on behalf of George Soros is Alex Soros.  (Applause.)

The Presidential Medal of Freedom is awarded to George Soros.  Born into a Jewish family in Hungary, George Soros escape Nazi occupation to build a life of freedom for himself and countless others around the world.  Educated in England, he settled in America as he became an investor and philanthropist, supporting key pillars of open societies: rights and justice, equity and equality, freedom now and in the future.  His inspiring generosity reminds us all of our capacity and our obligation to stand up to the abuse of power and to be guardians of democracy and all people yearning to be free.  (Applause.)

(The Medal of Freedom is presented.)  (Applause.)  

George Stevens, Jr.  (Applause.)

The Presidential Medal of Freedom is awarded to George Stevens, Jr.  Born into an entertainment family in Los Angeles, George Stevens, Jr., found his own purpose as a storyteller.  As a young aide in the Kennedy administration, he produced hundreds of documentaries that championed freedom and democracy.  He then created the American Film Institute and Kennedy Center Honors, lifting up the arts and artists at the heart of American culture.  In a career spanning seven decades, George’s creativity, vision has helped redeem the soul of a nation founded on the power of free expression.  (Applause.)

(The Medal of Freedom is presented.)  (Applause.)

Denzel Washington.  (Applause.)

The Presidential Medal of Freedom is awarded to Denzel Washington.  Denzel Washington is considered one of the greatest actors of our time.  Over four decades on screen and stage, his portrayals of iconic figures and everyday people have earned him wide acclaim that includes two Academy Awards, two Golden Globes, and a Tony Award so far.  (Laughter.)  The admiration of audiences and peers is only exceeded by that of the countless young people he inspires.  With unmatched dignity, extraordinary talent, and unflinching faith in God and family, Denzel Washington himself is a defining character of the American story.  (Applause.)

(The Medal of Freedom is presented.)  (Applause.)

Anna Wintour.  (Applause.)

The Presidential Medal of Freedom is awarded to Anna Wintour.  The daughter of a former newspaper editor, Anna Wintour has used her creative talent, taste, and style for decades to redefine fashion journalism in America and around the world.  Pushing creative boundaries, she uses fashion as a mirror to reflect our culture and helps the next generation of entrepreneurs and designers define their vision and find their voice.  From the pages of magazines to runways and red carpets, Anna Wintour has cemented her legacy as a global fashion, cultural, and business icon.  (Applause.)

(The Medal of Freedom is presented.)  (Applause.)

THE PRESIDENT:  Not a bad group, huh?  (Laughter and applause.)

Folks, thank you all again.  Thank you and to your families for your service and theirs to the nation.

Congratulations.  But let’s remember: Our sacred effort continues.  We have to keep going.  As my mother would say, we got to keep the faith.

God bless you all.  And may God protect our troops.

Please enjoy the reception.  God love you all. 

Thank you.  (Applause.)

1:54 P.M. EST

The post Remarks by President Biden at Presentation of the Presidential Medal of Freedom appeared first on The White House.

East Room

5:18 P.M. EST

THE PRESIDENT: Please be seated. Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, as commander in chief, this is the most solemn occasion that I participate in in my four years every time we do this event.

Secretary Austin, Secretary Wormuth, Chairman Brown — General, it’s good to see you — Representative Case, Castro, Ryan, and Takano, and, most importantly, veterans, service members, and previous Medal of Honor recipients: Today is the final time as commander in chief and I’m deeply privileged to honor seven American — seven American heroes. And that’s not hyperbole. These are genuine to their core heroes.

Heroes of different ranks, different positions, and even different generations. But heroes who all went above and beyond the call of duty. Heroes who all deserve our nation’s highest and oldest military recognition: the Medal of Honor.

First Private Bruno Orig. A proud son of Hawaii, Bruno joined the Army when he was just 19 years old. Less than one year later, he was completing a mission in Korea. Bruno saw his fellow soldiers were wounded and stranded under enemy fire. Without hesitation, he ran out to rescue them, giving his own life to save the lives of his brothers-in-arms. That’s valor. That’s the definition of valor.

Private First Class — you know, I think it’s incredible when I think of the men and women who have done — who have gotten this award — but Private First Class Wataru Nakamura. After an attack on Pearl Harbor, he was forced to live in an internment camp, like so many other Japanese-Americans — like my good friend Danny Inouye, who was a hero himself — put in an internment camp.

But still, he signed up to serve our nation during World War II and the Korean War. During his last mission in May of 1951, single-handedly, he defended his unit from enemy attack, fighting until he was killed by a grenade.

Corporal Fred McGee. A Midwesterner, a steelworker, and a gunner in one of the first integrated Army units of the Korean War. Fred embodied the very best of our country. In June 1952, his unit was attacked. They took casualties. They were ordered to fall back. But Fred refused — refused to leave until he helped every wounded soldier evacuate.

Private First Class Charlie Johnson. Growing up, in the words of one of Charlie’s high school classmate, “He was a heck of a football player.” Well, back in 1952, Charlie signed up to serve in Korea, trading his jersey for a uniform. During one battle, he gave his life to defend a bunker full of his wounded soldiers. His valor saved 10 men, including an old high school classmate.

General Richard Ca- — excuse me — excuse me — Cavazos. A young first lieutenant in Korea, Richard led his men through a difficult and deadly mission in enemy territory. Eventually, he was ordered to retreat, but he stayed. He stayed, rescuing wounded soldiers one by one until every one of them was evacuated. Richard went on to serve for three decades in the Army, becoming the first — the country’s first Hispanic four-star general.

And Captain Hugh Nelson. A Citadel graduate, helicopter pilot, and a proud young father. He was just 28 years old when he and his crew were shot down in Vietnam. Hugh freed his men who were trapped in the wreckage. Then, as the enemy began to attack, he used his body as a shield to protect them. It cost him dearly. It cost him his life. Hugh’s commanding officer called it the “ultimate act of self-sacrifice,” which it was.

And finally, Private First Class Ken David, who is here with us today. Nearly 55 years ago, in Vietnam, his company was ambushed by the enemy. Ken’s lieutenant was killed instantly. Then, Ken himself was hit in the back by shrapnel. But he couldn’t and wouldn’t give up. Instead, he shouted and fired his weapon attacking — to attract attention to him, away from others and away from the wounded men. Imagine that courage. “Come get me. Come get me. Don’t get those folks.” That’s selflessness.

Ken, I want to say to you that I wish I could say to every man we’re honoring today: You’re a hero. A genuine hero. A flat-out, straight-up American hero. And we owe you and the families owe you.

Let me close with this. I said ear- — as I said earlier, these are my final days as commander in chief. It’s been the greatest honor of my life to be entrusted with the greatest fighting force in the history of the world. They’re the finest military in the history of the world. And every day — every day their integrity, their patriotism, and their courage.

And to learn the stories of Americans like Bruno and Wataru and Fred and Charlie and Richard and Hugh, Ken. Americans who have not only fought for our nation but embodied the very best our nation has to offer.

Let me also say this. Today, we award these individuals the Medal of Honor. But we can’t stop there. Together, as a nation, it’s up to us to give this medal meaning. To keep fighting — to keep fighting for one another, for each other; to keep defending everything these heroes fought for and many of them died for — the ideals of America, the freedoms we cherish, the democracy that has made our progress possible.

And remember, we are the only nation in the world built on an idea. Every other nation is built based on geography, ethnicity, or religion. But we are the only nation based on an idea.

The idea is that we hold these truths evident — sel- — to be self-evident. All men and women are created equal and deserve to be treated equally throughout their entire lives. We haven’t always lived up to it, but we’ve never, ever, ever walked away from it.

Today, we must say clearly: We never, ever, ever will.

Now it’s my great an- — honor to ask Lieutenant Colonel Anthony Lichi — excuse me — Lichi the Medal of Honor — to read the Medal of Honor citations.

And thank you all for being here. And God bless you. And may God also protect our troops who are still engaged. Thank you. (Applause.)

MILITARY AIDE: Loretta Orig, accepting on behalf of her brother, Private Bruno Orig.

Attention to orders. The president of the United States of America, authorized by Act of Congress March 3rd, 1863, has posthumously awarded, in the name of Congress, the Medal of Honor to Private Bruno R. Orig, United States Army, for conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty.

Private Bruno R. Orig distinguished himself by acts of gallantry and intrepidity above and beyond the call of duty while serving with Company G 23rd Infantry Regiment, Second Infantry Division in the vicinity of Chipyong-ni, Korea, on February 15th, 1951.

While returning from a wire-laying mission, Private Orig observed a number of his comrades who had been wounded in a fierce enemy attack that was still in progress. With complete disregard for his own safety, Private Orig went to the aid of these men and remained in an exposed position in order to administer first aid to them. With the assistance of several comrades from the company command post, Private Orig began removing the wounded to a place of safety. While returning from one of these trips, Private Orig noticed that all except one man of a machine gun crew had been wounded.

Without hesitation, he volunteered to man the weapon. Remaining in this position, Private Orig placed such effective fire on the enemy that a withdrawing friendly platoon was able to move back without a single casualty. Private Orig continued to inflict heavy casualties on the enemy until the company positions were overrun.

Later that day, when the lost ground was recaptured, Private Orig was found dead beside his weapon, and the area in front of his gun was littered with enemy dead. Private Orig’s extraordinary heroism and selflessness above and beyond the call of duty were in keeping with the highest traditions of military service and reflect great credit upon himself, his unit, and the United States Army.

(The Medal of Honor is presented.) (Applause.)

Gary Takashima, accepting, on behalf of his uncle, Private First Class Wataru Nakamura.

Attention to orders. The president of the United States of America, authorized by Act of Congress March 3rd, 1863, has posthumously awarded, in the name of Congress, the Medal of Honor to Private First Class Wataru Nakamura, United States Army, for conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty.

Private First Class Wataru Nakamura distinguished himself by acts of gallantry and intrepidity above and beyond the call of duty while serving with Company I, 38th Infantry Regiment, Second Infantry Division, in the vicinity of P’ungch’on-ni, Korea, on May 18th, 1951.

At about daybreak of that date, Private First Class Nakamura volunteered to check and repair a communications line between his platoon and the command post. As he made his way along the line in the early morning half-light, he was brought under fire by an enemy force that had surrounded friendly positions and were threatening to break the company defense lines.

Immediately, without regard for his own safety and without waiting for help, Private First Class Nakamura rushed the enemy with fixed bayonet engaged. Single-handedly, he attacked and destroyed a hostile machine gun nest and drove the enemy from several of the bunkers they had captured. When his ammunition was depleted, he withdrew under intense enemy fire.

Then he met an ammunition party ascending the hill. Quickly briefing the officer in charge, Private First Class Nakamura rearmed himself and, covered by the fire of the officer and two comrades, returned to the attack. In a fierce charge, he killed three of the enemy in one bunker and killed and seriously wounded another in the last enemy-held bunker.

Continuing to press the attack, he fell, mortally wounded by an enemy grenade. Private First Class Nakamura’s extraordinary heroism and selflessness above and beyond the call of duty were in keeping with the highest traditions of military service and reflect great credit upon himself, his unit, and the United States Army.

(The Medal of Honor is presented.) (Applause.)

Victoria Secrest, accepting on behalf of her father, Corporal Fred McGee.

Attention to orders. The president of the United States of America, authorized by Act of Congress, March 3rd, 1863, has posthumously awarded, in the name of Congress, the Medal of Honor to Corporal Fred B. McGee, United States Army, for conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty.

Corporal Fred B. McGee distinguished himself by gallantry in action near Tang-Wan-Ni, Korea, on June 16th, 1952, in an assault on enemy-fortified positions. As gunner on a light machine gun in a weapons squad, Corporal McGee delivered a heavy volume of supporting fire from an exposed position, despite intense enemy machine gun and mortar fire directly on his location.

Though forced to move his gun several times, he continued to support the assault and give covering fire to the assault elements of his platoon. When his squad leader was wounded, together with several other members of his squad, he assumed command and moved the squad even farther forward to a more exposed position in order to deliver neutralizing fire on an enemy machine gun sweeping the other assault platoon with deadly flanking fire.

When his machine gunner was mortally wounded, he again took over the gun. On order, he directed his squad to withdraw and voluntarily remained behind to help evacuate the wounded and dead.

Though wounded in the face, he heroically exposed himself by standing straight up in intense enemy machine gun and mortar fire while attempting to evacuate the body of the company runner. Forced to abandon the body, he aided a wounded man to be moved to the rear and safely through a huge volume of enemy mortar and artillery fire.

The gallantry displayed by Corporal McGee reflects great credit upon himself and is in keeping with the highest traditions of military service.

(The Medal of Honor is presented.) (Applause.)

Dr. Juanita Mendez, accepting on behalf of her brother, Private First Class Charles Johnson.

(Dr. Mendez kisses the president on the cheek.) (Laughter.)

THE PRESIDENT: (Inaudible.) (Laughter.)

MILITARY AIDE: Attention to orders. The president of the United States of America, authorized by Act of Congress, March 3rd, 1863, has posthumously awarded in the name of Congress the Medal of Honor to Private First Class Charles R. Johnson, United States Army, for conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty.

Private First Class Charles R. Johnson distinguished himself by conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity beyond the call of duty while defending Outpost Harry against overwhelming odds and making the ultimate sacrifice to save the lives of his comrades in the Republic of Korea during the period of June 11th, 1953, to June 12th, 1953.

Private First Class Johnson was serving as a Browning automatic rifleman with Company B, 15th Infantry Regiment, 3rd Infantry Division.

Chinese forces attacked his unit during a massive nighttime assault. During the ensuing battle, overwhelming numbers of Chinese troops assaulted the trenches and bunkers defended by Private First Class Johnson and his squad.

Private First Class Johnson, wounded from a direct artillery hit on his bunker and subsequently from a hand grenade thrown inside the bunker, at the personal disregard for his injuries, administered first aid to those more seriously injured.

Understanding the seriousness of the situation and being under direct fire from the enemy, Private First Class Johnson personally dragged a wounded soldier to the safety of a secure bunker, stopping intermittently to aid injured soldiers and kill several enemy troops in hand-to-hand combat.

Departing the safety of the second bunker, he conducted a search for weapons and ammunition, and then returned to rearm everyone.

Recognizing their untenable situation and disregarding his personal safety, he exited the bunker, placing himself between the enemy and his injured comrades, informing them he would hold off the enemy as best as he could. His brave and selfless efforts were directly attributed to saving the lives of as many as 10 soldiers.

Private First Class Johnson’s extraordinary actions in close combat with the enemy, his unyielding courage and bravery and profound concern for his fellow soldiers are in keeping with the highest traditions of military service and reflect great credit upon himself, his unit, and the United States Army.

(The Medal of Honor is presented.) (Applause.)

Laura Blevins, accepting on behalf of her father, General Richard Cavazos.

Attention to orders. The president of the United States of America, authorized by Act of Congress, March 3rd, 1863 has posthumously awarded in the name of Congress the Medal of Honor to First Lieutenant Richard E. Cavazos, United States Army, for conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty.

First Lieutenant Richard E. Cavazos distinguished himself by acts of gallantry and intrepidity above and beyond the call of duty while serving as the company commander, Company E, 2nd Battalion, 65th Infantry Regiment, 3rd Infantry Division on June 14th to 15th, 1953, in the vicinity of Sagimak, Korea.

On the night of June 14th, First Lieutenant Cavazos led his company in a raid on an entrenched enemy outpost, with the mission of destroying the personnel and installation thereon.

During the initial attack, First Lieutenant Cavazos led his men through intense enemy mortar and artillery fire.

Upon entering the trenches, fierce close combat ensued, during which First Lieutenant Cavazos directed heavy fire on the enemy in their positions.

When an extremely intense enemy mortar and artillery barrage hit his position, First Lieutenant Cavazos withdrew the company and regrouped his men.

Twice more, he led his men through intense enemy fire and assaults on the enemy position, destroying vital enemy fortifications and personnel.

During the entire assault, First Lieutenant Cavazos gave effective commands and words of encouragement to his men and, by his personal example and leadership, inspired them to heroic heights of achievement.

When ordered to withdraw his company, First Lieutenant Cavazos complied, but remained alone on the enemy outpost to search for missing men.

Although exposed to enemy fire, First Lieutenant Cavazos located five battle casualties and evacuated each, one by one, to a point on the reversed slope of a nearby hill where they could be safely recovered by friendly forces.

Returning to the battlefield, he found a small group of men who had become separated from the main assaulting force and personally led them to safety.

When informed that there were still men missing, First Lieutenant Cavazos again returned to the scene of the battle where he located and led another small group of men to safety.

First Lieutenant Cavazos then made two more unassisted trips to the battlefield searching for missing soldiers.

Not until he was personally satisfied that the battlefield was cleared on the morning of June 15th did he allow treatment of his own combat wounds sustained during the action.

First Lieutenant Cavazos’s conspicuous gallantry, extraordinary heroism, and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty are in keeping with the highest traditions of military service and reflect great credit upon himself, his unit, and the United States Army.

(The Medal of Honor is presented.) (Applause.)

Deborah Nelson McKnight, accepting on behalf of her father, Captain Hugh Nelson.

Attention to orders. The president of the United States of America, authorized by Act of Congress, March 3rd, 1863, has posthumously awarded, in the name of Congress, the Medal of Honor to Captain Hugh Reavis Nelson Jr., United States Army, for conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty.

Captain Hugh R. Nelson Jr. distinguished himself by conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity above and intrepidity above and beyond the call of duty while serving as a member of the 114th Aviation Company (Air Mobile Light) on June 5th, 1966, near Moc Hoa, Republic of Vietnam.

Captain Nelson was the acting aircraft commander of an armed Huey helicopter on a search-and-destroy reconnaissance mission when it was struck by a large volume of enemy fire that rendered the aircraft virtually uncontrollable.

With great difficulty, Captain Nelson and the pilot were able to crash-land the aircraft without lateral controls. At some point after the crash, Captain Nelson exited the aircraft and went to the aid of his wounded comrades. Proceeding to the other side of the aircraft, he found his dazed and wounded crew chief still trapped inside. After removing the specialist and placing him on the ground, Captain Nelson climbed into the severely damaged helicopter to assist the door gunner, who was still strapped inside and unable to move.

While Captain Nelson tried to free his comrade, the insurgents engaged the aircraft with a heavy volume of automatic rifle and small-arms fire at a range of approximately 30 feet from the aircraft. Despite the heavy enemy fire, Nelson continued his gallant efforts, freeing the trapped door gunner despite being hit by enemy fire. Upon removing the wounded door gunner from the aircraft, he forced the specialist to the ground and, without regard for his own life, used his body as a shield to cover his comrade from the intense enemy fire. While shielding his comrade, Captain Nelson was hit several times by enemy fire, sacrificing his own life to save the life of his comrade.

His selfless sacrifice allowed his wounded comrade to use a smoke grenade to signal supporting aircraft in the area that there were crash survivors. The supporting aircraft responded immediately, preventing the insurgents from advancing on the downed aircraft and successfully rescuing the three wounded crew members.

Captain Nelson’s conscious decision to sacrifice his own life for that of his comrades saved the lives of his three fellow crew members that fateful day. Captain Nelson’s distinctive accomplishments are in keeping with the highest traditions of military service and reflect great credit upon himself, his unit, and the United States Army.

(The Medal of Honor is presented.) (Applause.)

Specialist Fourth Class Kenneth David.

Attention to orders. The president of the United States of America, authorized by Act of Congress, March 3rd, 1863, has awarded, in the name of Congress, the Medal of Honor to Private First Class Kenneth J. David, United States Army, for conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty.

Private First Class Kenneth J. David distinguished himself by acts of gallantry and intrepidity above and beyond the call of duty on May 7th, 1970, while serving as a radio-telephone operator with Company D, 1st Battalion, 506th Infantry, 101st Airborne Division, near Fire Support Base Maureen, Thua Thien Province, Republic of Vietnam.

On this date, Private First Class David’s company came under an intense attack from a large hostile force. The enemy’s ferocious initial assault mortally wounded the company’s platoon leader and resulted in numerous other friendly casualties. Upon the initial assault and without hesitation, Private First Class David handed his radio to his platoon sergeant and moved forward to the defensive perimeter, unleashing a barrage of automatic weapons fire on the enemy. From this location, Private First Class David bitterly resisted all enemy efforts to overrun his position. Realizing the impact of the enemy assault on the wounded, who were being brought to the center of the perimeter, Private First Class David, without regard for his own life, moved to a position outside of the perimeter while continuing to engage the enemy.

Each time the enemy attempted to concentrate its fire on the wounded inside the perimeter, Private First Class David would jump from his position and yell to draw the enemy fire away from his injured comrades and back to himself. Refusing to withdraw in the face of the concentrated enemy fire now directed toward him, he continued to engage the enemy. Although wounded by an exploding satchel charge and running perilously low on ammunition, he tossed hand grenades toward the attackers to effectively counter their fire. The unit’s medic, realizing that Private First Class David had been injured, moved to his position to provide aid, but Private First Class David assured him that he was okay and continued to fight on.

Private First Class David’s courageous and selfless actions continued to draw the enemy fire away from the incoming medevac helicopters, allowing the wounded to be safely evacuated.

After allied reinforcements fought their way to his company’s position, Private First Class David carried a wounded comrade to a sheltered position. He then returned to the contact area and continued to engage the enemy and provide covering fire for the wounded until the enemy broke contact and fled, at which point he too was medically evacuated.

Private First Class David’s conspicuous gallantry, extraordinary heroism, and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty are in keeping with the highest traditions of military service and reflect great credit upon himself, his unit, and the United States Army.

(The Medal of Honor is presented.) (Applause.)

5:49 P.M. EST

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Oval Office

12:25 P.M. EST

THE PRESIDENT:  Folks, I wanted you to come in because these eight men have done things that are changing not only their lives but lives of families that were able to celebrate Christmas (inaudible) but they did.  They saved children.  They saved people in serious distress.  They jumped into freezing water.  They did it all.

And I think it’s — I think it’s very important that the public see them and know who they are.  I know you have all their backgrounds, but what they did — they allowed people to continue their lives in ways that they never would have been able to.  There’s a lot fewer empty chairs around the kitchen table and dining room table because of what these guys did. 

And what they did is — is amazing.  They literally put their lives at risk — some of them at the point that you wonder how they could have had the nerve to do it. 

In addition to that, I want to thank their families, because if you’re the spouse of a firefighter or a police officer, you always worry about that phone call — that one phone call you’re going to get when the — know the alarm went off.  And — and so, I want to thank them, because I’m confident they wouldn’t be able to do what they’re doing without their s- — the support of their spouses and their families. 

So, thank you, guys.  I really mean it.  You’re the best America has to offer.  I’m so damn proud to stand with you.

And I know you have a lot of questions for me, and I’m not going to answer them unless they’re related to this.  I’m going to be talking later today. 

So, anybody have any questions about these guys?  (Inaudible.)

AIDE:  Thank you, press.

Q    Mr. President, have you spoken to any of the families of the victims in New Orleans?

THE PRESIDENT:  Yes, I have. 

Q    What have they told you?  What have their reflections been?

THE PRESIDENT:  How —

AIDE:  Thank you, press.

Q    Any thoughts, you know, on the suspects in those incidents?

(Cross-talk.)

THE PRESIDENT:  I’ll talk to that later.

12:27 P.M. EST

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THE PRESIDENT:  Good evening.  I know I can speak for all Americans when I say our hearts are with the people in New Orleans after the despicable attack that occurred in the early morning hours.

To all the families of those who were killed, to all those who were injured, to all the people in New Orleans who are grieving today, I want you to know I grieve with you.  Our nation grieves with you.  We’re going to stand with you as you mourn and as you heal in the weeks to come. 

I want to thank our brave first responders and law enforcement personnel who stopped the attacker in his tracks before he could kill or injure even more people.

And I want to thank you to everyone at the Department of the Homeland Security, the Department of Justice, including the FBI, for working nonstop to investigate this heinous act.  The FBI is leading the investigation to determine what happened, why it happened, and whether there is any continuing threat to public safety. 

Here’s what we know so far.  The FBI has reported to me the killer was an American citizen, born in Texas.  He served in the United States Army on active duty for many years.  He also served in the Army Reserve until a few years ago. 

The FBI also reported to me that mere hours before the attack, he posted videos on social media indicating that he was inspired by ISIS, expressing a desire to kill — a desire to kill.  The ISIS flag was found in his vehicle, which he rented to conduct this attack.  Possible explosives were found in the vehicle as well, and more explosives were near — were found nearby. 

The situation is very fluid, and the investigation is at a preliminary stage.  And the fact is that right now — excuse me — there you go — the law enforcement and intelligence community are continuing to look for any connections, associations, or coconspirators. 

We have nothing additional to report at this time.  The investigation is continuing to be active, and no one should jump to conclusions.  I’ve directed my attorney general, the FBI director, the secretary of Homeland Security, the head of the National Counterintelli- — -terrorism Center, and the intelligence community to work on this intensively until we have a full and complete information.  And once we have that information, I will share that information as soon as I — we can confirm it. 

Additionally, we’re tracking the explosion of a Cybertruck outside the Trump Hotel in Las Vegas.  Law enforcement and the intelligence community are investigating this as well, including whether there’s any possible connection with the attack in New Orleans.  Thus far, there’s nothing to report on that score at this time.

I directed my team to make sure every resource — every resource — is made available to federal, state, and local law enforcement to complete the investigation in New Orleans quickly and to make sure there’s no remaining threat to the American people. 

And we’ll — we will support the people in New Orleans as they begin the hard work of healing. 

New Orleans is a place unlike any other place in the world.  It’s a city full of charm and joy.  So many people around the world love New Orleans because of its history, its culture, and, above all, its people.  So, I know, while this person committed a terrible assault on the city, the spirit of our New Orleans will never, never, never be defeated.  It always will shine forth. 

We’ve seen that time and time again throughout its history, and I know we’ll see it again in the days and weeks ahead.

May God bless the people in New Orleans.  May our — God bless our police and our first responders.  And may God protect our troops.

And we’ll keep you fully, contemporaneously informed.

Thank you.

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State Dining Room

3:34 P.M. EST

THE PRESIDENT:  Thank you, thank you, thank you.  (Applause.)  Thank you.  I’m sure you’re clapping because I finally showed up.  (Laughter.)

I do apologize.  We had a very busy schedule the last — over — from New Year’s Day on, dealing with two crises — one in Louisiana and one in Las — in Las Vegas.  And I’ve assembled the entire Defense and intelligence apparatus of the country in the Situation Room, and we’ve been spending a lot of time there.  But I’m going to take another two minutes to talk a little bit about that and then go on to the — what we’re here for.

I want to give an update on the investigations into yesterday’s terrorist attacks in New Orleans and the truck explosion in Las Vegas.  I’ve just come from the meeting — not “just,” it’s been — while we’ve prepared these remarks — better part of an hour — from my Homeland Security team.  The number of people killed in New Orleans has risen to 15, including the attacker.  Thirty-five people were injured. 

Today, the FBI briefed me that, as of now, no information — we have no information that anyone else was involved in the attack.  They’ve established that the attacker was the same person who planted the explosives in those ice coolers in two nearby locations in the French Quarter just a few hours before he rammed into the crowd with his vehicle. 

They assessed he had a remote detonator in his vehicle to set off those two ice chests.  So, there’s no question that — remember all the talk about other people were involved, placed them?  They have him — they have established he’s there and even established that he had a detonator to explode those — those ice chests.

As I said yesterday, the attacker posted several videos just several hours before the attack, in- — indicating his strong support for ISIS.

Federal law enforcement and the intelligence community are actively investigating any foreign or domestic contacts or connections that could possibly be relevant to the attack. 

And so, we’re also continuing to investigate whether or not there’s any connection between the New Orleans attack and the explosion in Las Vegas.  As of now — as of now, I’ve just briefed they have not found any evidence of such a connection thus far.  I’ve directed them to keep looking.

The individual who rented the truck to explode — that exploded in Las Vegas also served as active duty U.S. Army.  And the FBI is working with the Department of Defense on investigating, including the service member’s possible motives and all those he worked with in — who served with him — what things he’d say and do.

I directed my team to accelerate these investigations so we have answers to our unanswered questions.  And I’m making every single resource available to get the job done.  And we’re going to share the facts as soon as I learn them so the American public doesn’t have to wonder. 

In the meantime, like I said last night, New Orleans is a city of tremendous spirit.  It can’t keep it down — you really can’t.  And we are seeing that today.  The Sugar Bowl is back on.  Kick-off is going to take off very shortly.  If I don’t get this damn thing done, we’re going to be in real trouble.  (Laughter.)  And the FBI in handing control to Bourbon Street back to local officials, security of the area has been reinforced, and it should be open for business later today.  The — Bourbon Street. 

The people of New Orleans are sending an unmistakable message: They will not let this attack or the attacks — attacker’s de- — his deluded ideology overcome us.  None of us should fear it’ll — he’ll overcome us. 

And we’re going to relentlessly pursue ISIS and other terrorist organizations where they are, and they’ll find no safe harbor here.

I’ll continue to provide updates on New Orleans and Las Vegas as the facts develop.

Now to the business at hand.  I can’t tell you how much I appreciate these two men.  Not a joke.  You know, I want to — the fact of the matter is that the Ma- — Majority Leader Schumer and Chair Durbin, they — their leadership has been invaluable. 

You know, from my days of leading the Senate Judiciary Committee 200 years ago — (laughter) — I have made judicial nominations a priority.  And some of you may remember, I was involved in some very contentious Supreme Court nominations over the years.

And today, I want to recognize a major milestone.  The Senate recently confirmed its 235th federal judge, which is the largest number of confirmations in a single presidential term since the early ‘80s.  That includes 1 Supreme Court justice, 45 Circuit Court of Appeal judges, 187 District Court judges, and 2 judges on the Court of International Trade. 

And they represent the best of America.  It’s all about preserving the Constitution.  I made two — three speeches in this campaign — in this — my term as president.  One when I first entered, saying democracy is at stake.  One I later made at — anyway.  I made three major speeches.  The institutions are in jeopardy, in my view.  And some of the decisions coming down, to me, made no constitutional sense.

They’re all highly qualified people (inaudible).  They’ve had distinguished legal, judicial, and academic careers. 

It matters.  Judges matter.  You know, shaping the everyday lives of Americans.  Protecting our basic freedoms.  I never thought we’d be talking about this.  Defending constitutional liberties.  Replacing pr- — you know, respecting the idea precedent matters — precedent matters.

These judges will be independent, they’ll be fair, and they’ll be impartial, and they’ll respect the rule of law.  And most importantly — I know this sounds — I never thought I’d be saying this — they’d up- — they’ll uphold the Constitution.  They’ll uphold the Constitution.

When I ran for president, I made a promise that I’d have a bench that looks like America that taps into the full talents of this nation.  And I’m proud we’ve kept our commitment, with the help of these two men and many others, bolstering confidence in judicial decision-making and outcomes. 

We have a record number of judges with backgrounds and experiences that have long been overlooked in the federal judiciary, like advocates for civil rights, workers rights, immigrant rights, and so much more — the first former public defender to sit in the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. 

I’ve also continued to put forward men and women who have been prosecutors and plaintiffs attorneys, which has been a — a distant past in the — of — of courts. 

No matter who they are or where they come from, all these appointees — all these appointees understand the role of a judge and are committed to the rule of law, the institutional safeguards built on our Constitution, that upholds the rights and guarantees of the Constitution. 

You know, I have appointed the most demographically diverse slate of judicial nominees ever in the history of America that represents all of America and the best of America. 

There is numerous s- — there is numerous historic firsts.  The first Black woman on the United States Supreme Court.  I made that promise and we kept it.  More Black women to the Courts of Appeals than every other previous administration in American history combined — combined.  (Applause.) 

Other historic firsts for Hispanic Americans, Asian Americans, Muslim Americans.  The list goes on. 

Look, the point is: For the first time in a long, long time, we have a bench that looks like and represents all of America.  All of America. 

And a special thank you again to — to Leader Schumer and Chair Durbin for working tirelessly to move these nominees through the committee and onto the Senate floor in a very — I think it’s not an understatement to say — a very contentious political period in American history.  (Laughter.)  I — but think about it.  One — one-vote majority.  I mean, it’s amazing what they did. 

Other senators, Democrats and Republicans alike, worked with my administration to fill vacancies in their states. 

You know, all these Republican senators, they were — they weren’t sending me Democratic nominees.  They were sending me Republican nominees.  But we got the — sort of back to the basics, finding basic commitment to civil rights, civil liberties.  Whether it was your counterpart in the leader of Republican party, in Kentucky, or wherever, we got people who are people who understand the institutional limitations and safeguards in the Constitution.

I don’t want to get anyone in trouble, but this includes some of my conservative friends in Indiana, Oklahoma, South Dakota, and Texas.  But they’re — also got appointed, and they’re not Democrats, but they’re — understand the institutional structure of the court.

Together, these judges are going to hear cases on issues ruling from everything as whether Americans can cast their ballot.  I mean, literally, where they — how they can cast their ballot, when it will be counted.  Whether workers can unionize — I thought we settled that in 1934 — and make a living wage for their families.  Whether children can breathe clean air and drink clean water, and we mandate it by the Congress to do so.

These judges also are a vital check on the excesses of — of other branches of government, including Congress and the executive branch when they overreach and run afoul of the constitutional and institutional safeguards. 

So, let me close with this.  I’m proud — proud of the legacy that we’ll leave for our nation as it relates to judges.  And I’m proud of the men and women who stepped forward and heeded the call to serve.  I really mean it.

Think about it.  If I looked at some of you and said, “I want to nominate you.”  You said, “In this time?”  (Laughter.)  No, I’m serious.  I — I’m being — I know this room is probably the only room that fully would understand and comprehend that.

And, folks, I know — I know they’ll continue to uphold our nation’s founding principles of liberty, justice, equality, and do it for decades to come. 

As we say in my old neighborhood, it’s a big deal.  (Laughter.)  It’s a big deal.  And — and I — bless me, Father, for I have sinned.  (The president makes the sign of the cross.)  (Laughter.) 

But all kidding aside, I really — I’m really proud of the caliber, capacity, willingness, and the academic backgrounds of all these men and women who we appointed.  In fact, we appointed more women than others.  That’s just because I’ve — was raised in a household where all the women are smarter than all the men.  (Laughter.)

But all kidding aside, I really think we’ll be proud of these women and men that have been appointed.  And I think we’re going to reestablish the safeguards that were built into the Constitution.  Everybody, everybody, everybody has an equal opportunity.  That’s what it’s all about.

So, thank you all and all the leaders in this room for all you’ve done.  It wouldn’t have gotten it done without you guys. Thanks for the recommendations and all the help.  But most importantly, these two guys.

The idea that if — in the beginning, when we had that first conversation, Chuck said, “We’re going to appoint all these judges.”  We looked at each other like, “Are we kidding ourselves?”  Right?  (Laughter.)  Thank you, pal.

LEADER SCHUMER:  Thank you, Mr. President.

THE PRESIDENT:  Thank you, thank you, thank you.  (Applause.)

And, Dick — by the way, I’ve ruined his reputation by bragging so much about him.  I — I was hesitant to do it during an election year because it might hurt him.  But all kidding aside, every time we get in trouble, I literally ask my staff — I say, “Durbin is there.”  (Laughter.)  “Durbin is there.”

SENATOR DURBIN:  Thank you.

THE PRESIDENT:  You’re the best, pal.

SENATOR DURBIN:  Thank you. 

THE PRESIDENT:  You really are.  Thank you.  (Applause.)

Thank you all so very much.  (Applause.)

 3:46 P.M. EST

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At The Brookings Institution
As Prepared for Delivery

Supply Shocks and Supply Chain Fragility

I am delighted to join you for this discussion on strengthening America’s supply chains as we release the first ever Quadrennial Supply Chain Review.

When President Biden came into office, the economy was experiencing the most disruptive supply shocks in a generation. Shipping costs skyrocketed as over a hundred ships queued up at the Ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach, and thousands of containers piled up on our docks. And when Russia invaded Ukraine, we saw further shocks, disrupting global grain and energy markets.

Following several decades of relative calm, the Global Supply Chain Pressure Index spiked to unprecedented levels. As disruptions led to shortages and price increases, goods inflation surged, after falling for much of the pandemic shutdown in 2020, tracking supply chain disruptions closely with a short lag.

Not since the oil price shocks of the 1970s had the U.S. economy experienced aggregate supply shocks of this magnitude. Both businesses and government were woefully unprepared.

Market pressures led businesses to adopt just-in-time, lean inventory practices and to seek out the lowest- cost production location for many components in their far-flung value chains. We now know that this came at a cost. When the pandemic shuttered semiconductor factories overseas, unfinished auto assemblies began piling up in America. Car and washing machine prices spiked, and wait lists lengthened.

The government had neglected to make critical investments in the resilience of our supply chains. Rails, ports, roads, bridges, and airports had fallen behind as successive administrations failed to secure the necessary infrastructure funding from Congress and did not take action as some foreign governments provided significant non-market incentives for investments in key strategic industries.

A New Playbook for Supply Chain Resilience

In short, we needed a new strategy to make our supply chains more resilient—and new partnerships with businesses and labor to make it work, as well as with foreign friends and allies. In his first month in office, the President signed the Executive Order on Supply Chains laying out a strategy to strengthen our supply chains. The new playbook rests on recovery, risk management, investment, and diversification.

Recovery

The first order of business was to restart the flow of goods.  The Administration immediately stood up a Supply Chain Disruptions Task Force to work with state and local officials, businesses, labor groups, and farmers to resolve bottlenecks.

An acute shortage of truck drivers was creating a major bottleneck for the 72% of shipments that move around the country by truck. In response, the Departments of Labor and Transportation implemented the Trucking Action Plan, which increased trucking employment by the most in two decades and doubled the issuance of commercial drivers’ licenses.

Similarly, with cargo piling up at our West Coast ports, the President appointed a Port Envoy, who worked with businesses and labor to clear the docks and get shipments moving again. As a result, the shelves were restocked in time for the Christmas shopping season.

Risk Identification and Management

Our goal was not only to restore the nation’s supply chains but also to build capacity to spot emerging risks and to resolve emerging problems sooner. We worked to build durable capabilities in key agencies to enable data analytics and information sharing with the private sector and states and localities.  

These new supply disruptions capabilities strengthened our ability to respond in 2022 to a significant baby formula supply shortfall due to a production quality lapse. To restore supply, the Administration used the Defense Production Act to get ingredients to manufacturers, coordinated air freight shipments of formula from overseas, and provided expedited pathways for new manufacturers to enter the market.

The Department of Transportation built out a new Multimodal Freight Office and a Transportation Supply Chain Indicators Tracker that gathers and publishes metrics in real time on container dwell times, sectoral employment trends, and rail intermodal volumes. Now when we start seeing a back-up in any of our ports, we can take action right away.

The Department of Commerce created a new Supply Chain Center with a first-of-its-kind diagnostic risk assessment tool known as SCALE. SCALE utilizes a comprehensive set of over 40 indicators of risk such as supplier concentration, reliance on a single point of entry, and inventory-to-sales ratios to evaluate supply chain conditions across more than 400 industries. With this new data, we can spot looming challenges early and take action before they become a crisis.

These data tools are critical for the private sector no less than for the government. When crisis strikes, the hundreds of independent operators that rely on or support our logistics networks must make decisions based on the information that is available to them, which may be only part of the bigger picture. It was vital to institutionalize greater data sharing and coordination to enable the hundreds of independent operators to manage risks more effectively.

The Department of Transportation created the Freight Logistics Optimization Works (“FLOW”) program, a public-private partnership that has built a shared data resource picture of live supply chain networks. Today, more than 85 FLOW participants use these data to inform their logistics decision making, helping to avoid bottlenecks, and shorten lead times for American businesses and consumers.

The collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore last spring was a crucial test of whether the new capacity we had built around supply chains would work in a crisis. Hours after a ship crashed into the bridge at 1:30 A.M., the federal government had already convened the Supply Chain Disruptions Task Force to minimize disruptions to the critical goods moving in and out of the port. We were immediately in communication with state and local officials, and we initiated calls with shipping companies, labor unions, ocean carriers, and other ports along the East Coast. We coordinated with rail and trucking companies to help reroute the flow of critical goods in real-time. This all-hands-on-deck approach kept goods flowing throughout the region, workers at their jobs, and the local economy operating at full capacity until the Port of Baltimore was able to fully reopen in less than three months.

Investing in Infrastructure and Manufacturing

The pandemic supply chain crisis also highlighted the costs of decades of underinvestment in the supply side of our economy. Our nation’s infrastructure had fallen further and further behind. Companies spread their supply chains to far flung parts of the globe as they focused on the costs of inputs, and not on the risks associated with where they were made.

In response, the President secured landmark legislation to revive the federal government’s role in supporting private sector investment in the critical value chains that underpin our economic and national security.

Thanks to the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, the federal government has so far invested more than $568 billion in American infrastructure across 66,000 different projects. We are investing $8.7 billion in 18 of the nation’s most economically significant bridges that are vital to our supply chains, and we have announced $13 billion to improve our ports. These are investments that will pay dividends for decades to come.

When the President took office, almost 90% of semiconductors—vital for everything from advanced AI to gaming—were manufactured abroad. In the energy sector, we rely on China for more than 80% of the solar manufacturing supply chain, and there are at least 30 foundational mineral commodities for which the U.S. is more than 75% net import reliant—in many cases on sources that are Chinese or owned by Chinese producers. These aren’t just economic vulnerabilities—they are national security risks, and we cannot afford to wait until there is a disruption to take action. 

Together, the landmark CHIPS and Science Act and Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) have catalyzed nearly $1 trillion in announced private-sector investments in critical industries. Because of the CHIPS and Science Act, the U.S. is now projected to host nearly 30% of global leading-edge semiconductor manufacturing—up from zero—and we are already seeing the leading global manufacturer achieve production yields in the U.S. that are comparable to those in Taiwan.

Similarly, when the President entered office, U.S. producers were only able to supply 5 percent of global lithium demand. Because of the clean energy provisions of the IRA, the U.S. is now on track to supply more than one-fifth of global lithium demand outside of China by 2030, enabling us to power grid storage batteries and electric vehicles.

Diversification of Supply Chains

We are also working with likeminded partners to diversify our supply chains and manage risks. China has used a wide range of non-market practices to gain significant global share in key supply chains, including legacy semiconductors and electric vehicles. China’s growing overcapacity has caused a proliferation of unfairly low-priced exports that now make it difficult for competitors to meet market hurdles for investment and production. To level the playing field, we have coupled our investment incentives with tough trade enforcement measures like tariffs that are carefully targeted against those unfair trade practices in strategic sectors. Today’s Quadrennial Review lays out a comprehensive set of additional actions related to procurement, supply chain transparency, and market standards to counter non-market practices.

Importantly, we are partnering with allies to diversify global supply chains and ensure they are not excessively dependent on Chinese companies. By aligning our approaches, we are helping to ensure that the most vital global supply chains are diversified and China cannot undercut American industries, businesses, workers.

Building Future Resilience

We have come a long way. The Global Supply Chain Pressures Index, which in 2021 peaked at 4.4 standard deviations above its historical average, is now negative—a sharp decrease. The number of container ship stuck off our shores waiting to unload has fallen from almost 150 three years ago to around a dozen today. The days of sales covered by retailers’ inventories has increased by nearly 10% since June 2021 and is now close to the pre-pandemic average. Shipping rates to the West Coast have fallen from over $20,000 per container at the peak of the disruption back down to around $4,400.

The work on strengthening America’s supply chains should continue since we are likely to encounter additional supply shocks in the years ahead. In the past 4 years alone, we have confronted supply chain disruptions not only from the pandemic but also from hurricanes, foreign wars, and cyberattacks targeting critical infrastructure and digital supply chains. We saw 28 climate disasters last year that each cost at least a billion dollars—the highest number in U.S. history. Geostrategic instability, including Russia’s war in Ukraine and conflict in the Middle East, continues to disrupt global energy markets. Cyber actors regularly target supply chain operators as a way to take down major companies, including hospitals. And we have seen a variety of disruptions in shipping, including the Houthi attacks on cargo ships in the Red Sea and reduced water levels in the Panama Canal.

New dependencies are constantly emerging, and some supply chain chokepoints create national security risks, such as the ability of a foreign adversary to cut off supplies of a key mineral used in defense applications. It will be important to utilize the full scope of our national security tools to protect supply chains when necessary, as with the Department of Commerce’s ICTS rulemaking on data security for connected vehicles, ensuring that foreign adversaries cannot exploit consumer products that Americans use every day for harmful purposes.

Certain critical product areas—including minerals, information technology components, and medical supply chains—will require additional investment to achieve an acceptable level of resilience.

We can’t repeat the mistakes of the past by allowing future core technologies to completely leave our shores. America’s global position in the strategic industries of tomorrow require ongoing active attention. We need to work in partnership with the private sector when they identify a critical bottleneck. For instance, it is important support the rapid development of the requisite compute power through clean energy in the U.S. for the most advanced AI models.

Closing

When they are working smoothly, most people don’t pay any attention to supply chains. But when supply chains break down, it can impose tremendous hardship on our households, workers, businesses, and farmers. 

Supply chain resilience has always been vital to our economic and national security. President Biden once invoked a proverb attributed to Benjamin Franklin: “For want of a nail, the shoe was lost. For want of a shoe, the horse was lost…” and on and on and until, finally, “the whole kingdom was lost, all for the want of a horseshoe nail.” Our nation’s founders recognized that the breakdown of even minor inputs or processes can cascade into monumental national costs.

Building resilience in our supply chains is not a partisan effort. It’s a national priority borne out of hard-fought experience. It is also a shared responsibility—government enabled and private sector led. American workers are also vital to these efforts.

Today, not only have we recovered, we’ve come out stronger, and have laid the foundation for America’s supply chains to be more resilient in the years ahead.  Now it is important to build on this new playbook for resilient supply chains in partnership with business and government and in alignment with friends and partners around the world.

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The post Remarks by National Economic Advisor Lael Brainard on Making America’s Supply Chains More Resilient appeared first on The White House.

New York, New York

MR. BREMMER:  So, I mean, for a lot of us here, this is the coolest thing going on in New York City right now.  There’s a lot of self-selection in this crowd.  (Applause.)  So, a very warm welcome to my friend, Jake Sullivan. 
 
And also, just to say, we’re going to run this for, like, you know, 45 minutes, an hour, and then we’ll get some questions from the audience, which will be fun.  They’ll come in on cards, so please fill them out, make them interesting and hard and engaging, because we both like that.
 
And also, this is being livestreamed, and I don’t know if they have any capacity to send us questions, and I suspect we’ll ignore those.  But nonetheless, we’re delighted that there are people that are joining us.
 
So with all of that, Jake, welcome.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  Thank you for having me.  It’s really good to be here.
 
MR. BREMMER:  Thank you for being here.  You just got back from the Middle East.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  Yes.
 
MR. BREMMER:  We’re going to talk about the whole world, but maybe start there.
 
You know, in the last year, you and I have spoken a lot more about the Middle East than we had before.  I’m wondering, in terms of biggest surprises, is it how much the Israelis have established, reestablished escalation dominance?  Is it Iran and the Axis of Resistance looking like a big deal and then imploding?  Is it what just happened with Assad and the rollout in Syria?  Where would you stack the “this is the thing that we probably least expected”?
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  Yes.  (Laughter.) 
 
I mean, not to be — every one of those pieces has been maybe not surprising directionally, in the sense that, you know, one could see the ways in which Israel — frankly, backed by the United States in terms of much of what it has accomplished — was taking the fight to its enemies.  One could see the weakening and the fracturing of the Axis of Resistance and the weakening of Iran.  And one could see the pressure on Assad, particularly because his two main patrons, Iran and Russia, were distracted and weakened.
 
But the speed, the scope, and the scale of the remaking of the Middle East in this short amount of time, I think you’d find very few people who could have predicted all of that and that we would be sitting here in December of 2024 with the picture looking the way that it looks.
 
MR. BREMMER:  Does the picture today look at least modestly more stable than it did a year ago, or does it look worse?
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  You know, I’ve been reflecting on this question, because the thing about foreign policy and geopolitics is that when good things happen, often bad things follow.  When bad things happen, often good things follow.  And nothing is ever fixed in time.  There’s always something around the corner.
 
So is there a huge opportunity right now?  Absolutely.  In that sense, the possibility of a more stable, integrated Middle East, where our friends are stronger, our enemies are weaker — that is real.  And in fact, Iran is at its weakest point in —
 
MR. BREMMER:  Decades.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  — in modern memory.
 
On the other hand, there are huge risk factors, and you can see them maybe most in living color in Syria, where the Syrian people have the chance to build a better future in a post-Assad world, but where there are very evil people who are looking to take advantage of this current moment, starting with ISIS, but other terrorist and jihadist groups as well.  And it will take collective resolve, wisdom, and willingness to act in order to ensure that we don’t see in Syria what we had previously seen in Libya, but on a larger scale where the geography is actually even more dangerous for not just our interests, but the interests of our friends and allies.
 
So I think we’re at a moment of profound opportunity but also a moment of profound risk, and that means that we have to handle this situation with clarity and effectiveness.  And the interesting thing is this comes in the middle of a presidential transition in the United States.
 
MR. BREMMER:  Which makes it harder for you.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  It makes it harder because —
 
MR. BREMMER:  I’m thinking specifically Syria, for example.  Right?
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  Yeah, I mean, it makes it harder because — you know, and this is something that my successor, Mike Waltz, has actually said — other countries, other actors, particularly our enemies and adversaries, look at transitions as moments of opportunity, because you have this seam between an outgoing administration and incoming administration.
 
And so, the imperative on us, both the outgoing Biden administration and the incoming Trump administration, has to be to lash up more tightly than is typical, to spend more time together than is typical, and to try to ensure we are sending a common, clear message to both friends and adversaries in the Middle East, and we have endeavored to do that over the last few weeks. 
 
Obviously, we disagree on a lot of things under the sun, including perhaps on certain aspects of long-term strategy in the Middle East or elsewhere, but where we agree is on many of the fundamentals here and especially on the point that we should not let anyone take advantage of the United States during this time of transition.  And so that has meant that Congressman Waltz and me and other people on each of our teams have tried to work so closely together.
 
MR. BREMMER:  Because I’m going to dig in more on Iran and the Middle East than other pieces.  But before I do, I want to beat on this, which is that, you know, I think some people were surprised that when Trump won, that Biden and President-elect Trump had a very civil sit-down discussion in the White House, despite what they had both said about each other over the previous months.  And more recently, you’ve had several very constructive meetings with the incoming National Security Advisor.  And frankly, my sense is that the alignment in how both of you see the world is a lot more similar on a bunch of policies than most people in the public would presume.  Is that a fair thing to say?
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  I think it’s fair at an elemental level of each of us being totally committed to the American national interest, each of us recognizing that we have real adversaries in the world, one of them being Iran, and we have friends and allies who we need to stand up and defend and back, one of them being Israel.  And so, that gives you a basis to work on.
 
Now, you know, I have been myself, President Biden has, the rest of our national security team has been subject to lots of criticism from President Trump’s team over the course of the past years.  We’ve criticized President Trump’s statements and record on foreign policy.  So it’s not like we see everything the same way.
 
But at this moment, on big-ticket items, when we need some degree of smoothness and continuity in the handoff from one administration to the next, I think both the outgoing and incoming administrations see the bigger picture.  And that’s really important. 
 
We will get back to the debates on hard issues and real disagreements, and there will be things that the next administration does that I won’t like.  I will tell you, I’ll be a lot less vocal about that probably.  Having sat in this seat for four years and listened to people criticize what we do, one thing I’ve realized is unless you’re sitting in this seat —
 
MR. BREMMER:  It’s hard.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  — it’s hard. 
 
But for this moment, what we are trying to do on behalf of the national interest of the United States I think is extremely important, despite, you know, the deep differences that do exist in terms of the outgoing and incoming president and outgoing and incoming administration.
 
MR. BREMMER:  Now, I mean, the Iran story — which, of course, is America’s biggest adversary in the Middle East — I would argue we’ve managed — you’ve managed quite well over the last year.  I mean, there were many moments, at least a couple of moments, where people were very concerned that this could lead into a direct kinetic war between Iran and Israel that the Americans would have to get involved in.  And a lot of proactive diplomacy thus far has prevented that from happening.  Now, in part, that’s because Iran is in such an abysmal strategic position, and they’ve lost so much. 
 
If you’re Iran right now, how much are you trying to just do anything possible to stabilize relations with other countries around the world?  How much are you thinking, “Oh, my God, if I don’t, like, get nukes at some point, I’m in serious trouble”?  Is it all of the above?  I mean, what do you think their strategic calculus is?
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  Well, I think their strategic calculus has a couple of levels.  One level is: Can we turn to other significant countries in the world to provide us capabilities that right now have been badly weakened and degraded.  Take their air defenses, for example.  So, they look to the Russians, but the Russians have their hands full —
 
MR. BREMMER:  They’re busy.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  — with Ukraine.  Can’t help.  Perhaps they look to Beijing.  But two years ago, you and I would have sat and talked about how China is on the come in the Middle East, they’re going to become a major player, they’re going to be a mover and shaker.  Where have they been in the last year?  Completely absent.
 
MR. BREMMER:  Almost radio silence.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  So Iran, in this kind of alignment of autocracies — Iran, Russia, China, North Korea — which is a real factor that we have to look at — in practice, it’s not exactly a solution here to Iran’s problems.
 
So, then there’s this question: What about Iran’s nuclear program?  And here, you can look at the public statements of Iranian officials, which have changed in the last few months as they have been dealt these strategic blows, to raise the question: Do we have to change our doctrine at some point?
 
MR. BREMMER:  Members of Iranian parliament (inaudible).
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  And the fact that that’s coming out publicly is something that has to be looked at extremely carefully.  We have to consult closely with Israel on that, with our Gulf partners, with our European allies, and with others as we go forward.
 
And I will tell you that, you know, when I was answering your earlier question about how, you know, positive things happen and then bad things follow, an adversary that has suffered blows that weaken it is — you know, obviously presents — we could say that’s a good-news story.  But it also generates choices for that adversary that can be quite dangerous, and that’s something we have to remain extremely vigilant about as we go forward. 
 
And here again, this point of making sure that vigilance crosses that threshold of January 20th into the next administration is very important.  So we’ve been bringing the incoming administration into the intelligence picture, the consultations with allies and partners on this so that we’re all basically reading off the same song sheet.  They may choose a different course, a different strategy, but I want to make sure we are starting from a common base of what we are facing with respect to the threat posed by Iran’s nuclear program.
 
MR. BREMMER:  Now, on the war with Israel, at this point, you feel pretty confident that the Hezbollah ceasefire is going to stick, is going to become permanent?  Does that feel like it’s on the right trajectory?
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  I have learned the hard way not to use the word “confident” and “Middle East” in the same sentence.  (Laughter.)  So, I won’t quite go that far.  But I will say that there are incentives for this deal to stick.  There is also the fact that Israel has demonstrated that it is prepared to ensure that it is not going to tolerate violations.  The United States and France, as two outside players actively working to ensure the deal is enforced, we are making it known that we’re not going to let this be 2006 all over again.  I think the Lebanese people do not want to turn the clock back now.  They would like to see a better future for Lebanon.
 
So I think that the pieces are in place for this not to be temporary, for it to be durable.  But it is also subject to risk itself — risk of overreach by Hezbollah trying to rebuild its terrorist infrastructure, risk of potential spillovers from Syria that could complicate the picture. 
 
But in the main, I think we have got something in place that was a feat of Israeli military capacity and a feat of American diplomacy that can endure.
 
MR. BREMMER:  Now, Israel has been very engaged with the United States, and constructively, on Lebanon, Hezbollah; very engaged with the United States, and constructively, on Iran; very engaged with the United States, I would argue somewhat less constructively, on Gaza over the course of the last year.  Has been harder to get the Israeli government to align with a lot of what President Biden publicly has been saying. 
 
Talk a little bit, to the extent that you can, about challenges when a close ally, the most important ally of the United States in the region, is also creating that kind of tension for day-to-day management of foreign policy.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  Well, first, just taking a step back, the challenge posed by an entrenched terrorist enemy with hundreds of miles of tunnels beneath a densely populated area, determined to keep fighting month after month, is a real challenge.
 
So we believe Israel has a responsibility — as a democracy, as a country committed to the basic principle of the value of innocent life, and as a member of the international community that has obligations under international humanitarian law — that it do the utmost to protect and minimize harm to civilians and that it do the utmost to facilitate humanitarian assistance so that people don’t starve or lack for water or medicine or sanitation.
 
And we believe too many civilians have died in Gaza over the course of this conflict.  And at too many moments, you know, we’ve felt we’ve had to step up privately and publicly and push on the humanitarian front to get more trucks, more aid, more lifesaving assistance in to the people of Gaza.
 
MR. BREMMER:  And you were doing a lot more privately on this front than people have seen publicly.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  Look, I think there is not a conflict in the world, in modern history, where as many people in the U.S. government, up to and including the National Security Advisor, could count for you the daily number of trucks, the crossings, the road blocks, the obstacles, as in this case.  It is under the most intense microscope, understandably, because people are suffering and great harm has come to a lot of innocent people who are caught in a circumstance where Hamas is using schools and mosques and civilian infrastructure to hide and use to attack Israel and Israeli forces, but also where Israel has been constantly and persistently attacking across the entirety of the Gaza Strip.
 
So it’s understandable that the microscope is there, but it means that, every single day, I personally am getting a report on the humanitarian situation, I’m getting a list of the things that we need to ask of Israel to try to alleviate it.  And working that day in, day out, and never being satisfied — because at the end of the day, in a war zone like this, you always want to be pushing for more, and then publicly, we have to also speak to our values and say, yes, we want to see more humanitarian aid get into Gaza — there’s nothing inconsistent with that, in my view. 
 
And standing up strongly and resolutely for the security of the State of Israel and for Israel’s right, indeed its duty, to get after the terrorists who attacked it and caused the greatest massacre of the Jewish people since the Holocaust, and who say they want to do that again and again if given the opportunity, we should be absolutely resolute in our moral authority on that point while also being resolute in our moral authority that we can do that and also ensure that innocent people in Gaza have access to basic sustenance and lifesaving necessities.
 
MR. BREMMER:  Well, not only are those two things not in conflict, but I think you would argue that ensuring that humanitarian aid to a much greater degree is actually incumbent on ensuring Israeli security long term.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  I agree with that.  I think — you know, one of the things that Israeli leaders are grappling with right now is how do you take tactical gains against Hamas, and they have been significant: smashed Hamas military formations; the elimination of the top leadership, including Yahya Sinwar; the decimation of their rocket capability.  Those tactical gains are real. 
 
How do you convert that into a long-term strategic endgame where Israel is secure on a durable basis and where Gaza emerges where Hamas is not in power?  And the best way to do that, in my judgment, is to have a political solution, a political track alongside the military track.  And that starts with the basic concept of essentially trying to make sure that the ordinary civilians of Gaza, the innocent people of Gaza are not being put in a position where things are so bad that they all become radicalized and you have nothing to work with going forward.
 
MR. BREMMER:  Which is kind of the direction of travel, right?
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  I think that there still remains an opportunity to build a better future, to drive towards what President Biden has called for since long before he was President: a Palestinian state living alongside a secure, democratic, and Jewish state, meeting all of the necessary conditions so that Israelis can be confident that they are secure.  And I think that is still a possibility, that we have not given up on that as a long-term goal, and we need to be taking steps towards that, and that begins with simple steps like dealing with this humanitarian situation.
 
MR. BREMMER:  But I will not ask you if you are confident that that can happen, as you know.  You’ve been through that already on the Middle East.
 
So one more bit on the Middle East before we move on — there’s a lot to cover — and that is Syria.
 
Now, here’s one where, I mean, I can see the incoming Trump administration causing you a bit of heartburn by, you know, publicly saying, “Hey, stay out of this, no matter what, militarily.  It’s up to Turkey to decide kind of what to do.  They’re critical.”  And meanwhile, we’ve got significant questions on the ground as to how to ensure that this new regime that’s taken over can ensure a level of stability and inclusion for everyone on the ground and not allow the Turks, not allow others to take advantage.  How can we manage this?
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  Well, first of all, we have to recognize that the minute Damascus fell, ISIS began to look for any opportunity it could take to reconstitute, grow, spread, and ultimately recreate a platform from which to threaten the United States and Americans around the world.
 
And so, within hours of Assad falling and HTS rolling into Damascus, the President ordered the U.S. military to take military action against ISIS personnel and ISIS facilities in the central Syrian Desert, the Badiya, and we’re going to have to continue to do that.
 
So, point one is we need the capacity to go after ISIS in the east, and that’s something that, you know, we have advised the incoming administration.
 
The second major issue is how to ensure that we are standing up for and standing with our best and closest partners in that ISIS fight.  That’s the Syrian Democratic Forces, Kurdish-led forces, but also with a lot of Arabs fighting alongside them.  We need to stand up for them and ensure that they are secure enough in their position that they can continue to be the good partners they’ve been, including with respect to the administration of these very large prisons and prison camps where you have thousands of ISIS fighters and tens of thousands of family members, wives and children of ISIS fighters, who, if they were all to get out, would represent a really quite considerable threat to the region and ultimately to the United States.
 
So we need to stand with the Kurds, and President Biden intends to do that.  We need to stand up against ISIS.  And we need to maintain our capacity in the region to be able to do these things effectively so that we don’t end up with a repeat of what happened in 2014, 2015, where ISIS came sweeping across eastern Syria and western Iraq, and we ultimately had to deploy a considerable amount of American force to beat them back. 
 
And that was a campaign that began under Obama that ultimately came to fruition under Trump — President Trump’s first term.  So, he has the experience of actually fighting ISIS in eastern Syria, in Raqqa, to ultimately rid the world of that caliphate that posed such a grave threat to Europe, the United States, and beyond.
 
MR. BREMMER:  But there is a real and extant risk right now that Syria could become not quite Afghanistan, but, I mean, a — not just a civil war, but could actually become a primary hotbed of radical Islamic terrorism. 
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  There is a real and extant risk of that, and I don’t think we should sugarcoat that fact.  But let’s keep in mind that it’s my job as National Security Advisor to frequently see the risk in a given situation.  I would be remiss if I didn’t say there isn’t also a real opportunity. 
 
Assad was a butcher, a brutally murderous dictator of his own people.  Assad, you could say — you know, you could kind of take the measure of that man by his friends — Iran, Russia, Hezbollah.  Him being gone is not a bad thing; we should shed no tears about that.  And it presents this opportunity for the Syrian people to actually build a better future, an inclusive future that is consistent with what I think not just all of the various communities of Syria want, but which these guys who’ve rolled into Damascus are actually saying.
 
Now, converting words to deeds is another matter.  It’s something we will be watching closely.  But Syria, to me, to understand it, you have to see both the real risk — and it’s as you described — and see the opportunity and try to push things in the direction of opportunity while minimizing the risk.
 
MR. BREMMER:  No, look, I’m asking not because I think HTS is automatically a problem to be dealt with.  I agree the opportunity.  I’m asking mostly because if the United States, in a short period of time, says, “Not my problem.  Vacuum.  Have at it,” what the potential implications of that are.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  And I think you put that very well. The potential implications of us precipitously creating a vacuum are highly determined, highly experienced jihadists, starting with ISIS, will look to exploit that; take territory, particularly in eastern Syria; and as we have seen before, use that territory to plan, to inspire, to direct, and to enable attacks, including in the American homeland.
 
MR. BREMMER:  And in some ways, some of the biggest geopolitical challenges that have emerged over the course of the last decade has been a proliferation of vacuums, a proliferation of space where bad actors can act asymmetrically, some of them virtual, some of them physical and territorial, some of them sectoral.  But the implications of that being for stable democracies to pick it up or wither.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  That’s right.  And also for us — I said earlier — I used this phrase about moving fast and moving decisively.  Part of that is about being prepared to engage early with the new players on the scene in Damascus, with HTS.
 
And Secretary Blinken, you know, let it be known a couple of days ago that we’ve actually begun to have direct engagement with HTS.  And we are — Secretary Blinken sat with all the Arab states, with Turkey, with France, a couple of days ago in Aqaba, Jordan, to try to get everybody on the same page.  Because the other lesson of the potential for vacuums to come in is that if you’ve got one group of strong countries on one side backing one group of folks, and you have another group of strong countries on another side backing a different group of folks, you’re more likely to have those vacuums emerge because the major responsible countries of a given region are not all pulling in the same direction.  We saw that in Libya in spades.  We can’t see that in Syria, which means trying to get everyone aligned around a common picture for how we go forward.  That is no easy task.
 
But if we end up with a proxy war in Syria, I think it is only going to exacerbate the risks you’ve just described, with the possible expansion of this vacuum.  And America being a part of that, being present, being engaged, not just with our physical presence but with our diplomatic initiative, is going to be vital over the coming months.
 
MR. BREMMER:  Okay, so let’s move on.  I spent — we spent a lot of time on the Middle East.  Not a surprise.
 
I want to move to China.  When you first became National Security Advisor, conventional wisdom on China is: huge powerhouse, going to become the largest economy in the world in relatively short order.  That is not what we are looking at today.  Their economy is in the worst shape since the ‘90s, maybe the ‘70s.  You and I have talked about a meaningful possibility that they’d never become the largest economy in the world.
 
So, clearly, it feels like they’re on the back foot. They’re not taking the kinds of decisions that would be required to get them out of this structural economic decline for now.
 
How different is it dealing with a China that feels like it’s playing defense than it is in Anchorage, in the first meeting, when we’ve got a much more robust, confident China saying we got the world in our hands?
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  You know, it’s interes- — it’s a good question, but I’m not sure that if you pushed the top echelon of leadership in China on the question, one, “is America in secular decline,” and two, “is China inexorably going to become the leading power in the world, economically, technologically, diplomatically and so forth,” they wouldn’t say yes and yes.
 
Still to this day, I think they’re totally wrong, and a bet against America is a very bad bet.  And the engines of American power are humming right now.  And I think the trajectory of China, this inexorable juggernaut, the objective evidence does not point in that direction. 
 
But I don’t think it has actually fundamentally yet shifted entirely their mindset of statecraft about the world.  What it has done —

MR. BREMMER:  The timeframes have certainly shifted.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  The timeframes have shifted, but the basic logic of “the East is rising, the West is declining” I think remains present to this day.
 
MR. BREMMER:  So it’s a tactical move.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  And so — exactly. 
 
So I think what we’re seeing instead is just we have storms, we have to weather them, we need to manage this, but fundamentally, the long-term strategic outlook I do not perceive has altered in a significant way.  And I believe that, basically, that means that U.S. policy should not move dramatically because of these developments with respect to the Chinese economy. 
 
And it has to be built on two basic premises.  One is what I just said, which is China does seek to become the world’s leading power.  I do not believe that is in the interest of the United States.  And the second is: No matter what the trajectory, the United States and China are going to have to learn to live alongside one another as major powers in the world for the foreseeable future.  And we need terms upon which we can do that, even as we compete vigorously in all of these different domains.
 
That has been the basic thrust of the diplomacy that we have engaged in.  It has been to create a effective management of a highly competitive relationship without for an instant taking away from the actions that we need to take to protect our technology, to enhance our deterrence, to deepen the strength of our economy, and to support our friends.
 
And so, we’ve tried to do both of those at once.  And I think we are handing off a relationship with China where America is in a very strong, competitive position, but also where we have the ability to engage diplomatically with China in ways that help ensure the competition does not veer into conflict.  That is not an easy feat.  It is not a task that is ever complete.  That is going to have to be an ongoing aspect of U.S.-China relations into the future.
 
But the hand that we were dealt was one thing; the hand that we are passing off when it comes to U.S.-China, I believe we have significantly enhanced America’s position.
 
MR. BREMMER:  Look, I mean, I think it’s pretty clear.  One, you’ve got general bipartisan agreement on what a U.S.-China relationship should look like, which is not true of a lot of areas of foreign policy.  And two, the relationship has been stabilized, even potentially strengthened, without the Americans giving up any fundamental equities.  So, I mean, those two things definitely help.
 
But I want to press a little bit on the tactical shift, because I accept that China still thinks long term, you know, the world is their oyster.  But, I mean, clearly, the last year has gone a lot worse for them than they expected.  Zero-COVID went a lot worse for them than they expected.  We see from Chinese leadership now them talking about concerns, even on social instability and dissent, that this can’t be tolerated.
 
So it’s clearly getting up to the top leadership, and they’re saying, “What are you guys doing?”  We see, like, all of these ministers of defense, minister of for- — other — U.S. ambassador, right, getting done up for corruption.  So it’s not been the best few years.  It’s been a rough ride for them. 
 
And you have spent — I’m not sure if the audience here knows — but you have spent an extraordinary amount of personal time with Wang Yi over the months, right, since the APEC Summit. 
 
Talk about, tactically, how you have perceived a shift in China’s negotiating stance, position; how engaging they’re willing to be; how, if at all, they’re seeing the United States right now. 
 
And I’m specifically asking this as we all are thinking about 60 percent tariffs coming from Trump, thinking about a much more potentially assertive out-of-the-box position that China — that they’re going to be facing.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  So, you know, I think one feature of my conversations with Wang Yi — and we tend to get together every few months for two days, and have somewhere between 12 and 15 hours of conversation — but we don’t cover every issue under the sun in the U.S.-China relationship.  We focus on a few key subjects.
 
And what makes that conversation different in 2024 than it was in 2022 is that it is much more about each of us kind of asking questions of the other — what our limits are, what our boundaries are, where are we taking things, what’s this all about.  There’s a much more inquisitive dynamic to the dialogue than there used to be.
 
And I’ll give you an example.  We’ve taken a series of measures to protect American advanced technology so that it can’t be used by the Chinese military to threaten us or our allies, including advanced semiconductors and semiconductor manufacturing equipment.  Obviously, the PRC did not like this.
 
MR. BREMMER:  And we’ve done that with allies.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  And we’ve done it with key allies who —
 
MR. BREMMER:  The Netherlands, Japan, South Korea.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  — are part of that semiconductor ecosystem so that, collectively, we can ensure that Western technology, built on an American backbone, doesn’t end up being used by the PRC.
 
MR. BREMMER:  Which they really don’t like.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  They don’t like it.
 
So it used to be that it would just be what, in diplomatic terms, is called a demarche, but, you know, which in layman’s terms is just like basically a screed against, you know, “You have done these terrible, evil things.  You are very bad.”  And that would be the nature of the conversation. 
 
Now the conversation is them asking us or us asking them, “What do you see as being the boundary between economics, on the one hand, and national security on the other?  Define that for me.  How do you think about it?”
 
And I’m not naïve enough to think that this is just some Socratic seminar.  You know, they’ve got a purpose behind it.  So do I.  But it creates the opportunity to have a strategic conversation to try to clarify intentions, to try to look for opportunities where we can come to better understanding. 
 
And frequently it’s going to lead, at the end, to deep disagreement.  They strongly disagree with what we are doing, just as when we talk about the relationship between Russia and China, or their support for Russia’s defense industrial base in the war in Ukraine, I’m pushing them with a series of questions, and at the end, I’m not satisfied with all the answers, which is why we take certain actions that include PRC entities.
 
But that, to me, the aspect of the relationship that has evolved is the ability for the two of us to engage in a dialogue that is less about the exchange of demarches and more about trying to feel one another out what we’re up to and, you know, what the actual right and left limits are of the kinds of actions each of us are taking. 
 
Then there’s one other aspect of the relationship that has evolved over time, which is: We had a big debate early on between us, which is, our view was: You can compete and you can also work together in areas of mutual interest.  The PRC’s view was: If you are intent on competition, then why should we cooperate with you?
 
I think we have evolved that to a point where we both see managed competition as involving elements of relentless and intense competition, on the one hand, but also areas where we can, in fact, work together where our interests align and where, frankly, we have to work together. 
 
Just one very simple example.  For the first time in decades, President Biden and President Xi actually put out a statement about nuclear risk reduction.  It was a very simple statement.  It said that humans, not artificial intelligence, should be —
 
MR. BREMMER:  Have a hand on the switch at all times.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  — what determines —
 
MR. BREMMER:  Absolutely.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  — use of nuclear weapons.
 
MR. BREMMER:  And that was just a few months ago.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  That should be apparent to everyone.  That took months, maybe years, to negotiate.
 
But we are there.  We are finally there.  Even at the same time that they’re placing export controls on certain critical minerals, we’re updating our export controls on semiconductors. 
 
All of this is happening at once because there is a recognition that managed competition requires being able to have some areas where we can work together and see if you can expand those areas, even as you’re competing vigorously in technology, in economics, in the military domain, and in others.
 
MR. BREMMER:  Well, and part of that is just understanding and being able to articulate that the intention of U.S. strategy in the long term is not regime change in China.  It’s a recognition that we’re going to be living together in some way.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  Well, it’s interesting because there is a school of thought that is fairly prominent in Washington that says, in fact, the position that we, the Biden administration, have taken — which is we would like to put ourselves in the best possible position to compete effectively on behalf of ourselves and our allies, that we will take actions to do that, but we also are going to have to live alongside China as a major power — that that second part is wrong; that, in fact, we should be driving towards a defeat or capitulation.
 
And, you know, there was an op-ed written by Mike Gallagher, a person I respect enormously —
 
MR. BREMMER:  Smart guy.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  — but disagree with him on this particular point —
 
MR. BREMMER:  On that issue.  Absolutely.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  — precisely making this argument.
 
So I do think there will be a debate in the years ahead in Washington between those who say we’re going to compete and we’re going to be clear-eyed and relentless in the competition, and those who say but that there’s got — there’s not an end state, it’s a steady state of competition, and those who say, “No, no, no, you’ve got to bring down the CCP.”
 
MR. BREMMER:  But I want to be clear what I’m saying.  I believe the reason that there has been movement between the U.S. and China in recognizing that we can do managed competition and also have cooperation is because the perspective of the United States government today is that the U.S. is not trying to ultimately engage in regime change in China.  And if that were to change, I suspect the Chinese position on this would be quite different.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  Right.  Action would cause reaction in a quite dramatic way, and I think you would have considerable destabilization.
 
MR. BREMMER:  So I want to ask you an intellectually challenging question around this.  Given that the Chinese are now willing to engage with you and vice versa, in not just demarches, what have you learned from China that you didn’t know before, a year ago?
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  Oh, man.  That’s a hard question.  It’s like — it’s sort of like being asked what’s your biggest weakness.  And you say, “I try too hard,” you know, kind of thing.
 
MR. BREMMER:  Yeah, don’t do that, because — (laughter) —
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  (Laughs.)  What have I learned from China?
 
MR. BREMMER:  That’s why I warned you it was going to be intellectually challenging.  I wanted to give you a second, you know?  Because (inaudible) live, so we can take out all of the hum and —
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  I mean, at some level I’ve learned a lot — just, you are going to learn a lot talking to someone on issues of substance for 15 hours — about their perspective, their calculus, their logic, their strategy, and including kind of what they say and what’s behind what they say.
 
But in terms of, like, larger lessons, it’s a good question.  I’d have to think about it, and I worry that any answer I give you today is just going to get me in trouble.  (Laughter.)  So, I’ll —
 
MR. BREMMER:  Well, and you only got a few weeks to get in trouble.  So from that perspective — (laughter) —
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  Yeah, come back to me on January 21st.  I’ll give you a full laydown.
 
MR. BREMMER:  Well, I’ll ask you over dinner.  It makes it easier.
 
So, okay.  How about big picture, China and macro-geopolitics, which is — actually, another difficult question.  I remember when the Secretary of State put out a recent piece in Foreign Affairs talking about kind of an axis of Russia, North Korea, Iran, and China.  NATO Allies have also talked about that a fair bit.  My perspective is three of those countries would be very happy with different government.  Three of those countries, we don’t feel the need that we have to live side by side with them long term.  One of them, we do, as we just discussed.
 
I’m wondering to what extent you believe that some of the areas that we can work with China, should work with China in the long term, have to do with stabilization of the global environment.  I mean, they’re the largest creditor to the Global South.  The United States is also really interested in the Global South not falling apart.  Very different than Russia’s perspective with the former Wagner Group in the Sahel, for example, right?
 
At the end of the day, as you said, the Chinese aren’t doing very much in the Middle East, but in principle, the Chinese want stability in the Middle East, because they get a lot of energy from the Middle East; they want to invest in and through the Middle East.
 
Russia invading Ukraine was supposed to be over in a couple weeks, from China’s perspective.  Now it’s screwed up their relations with the Europeans.  That’s a problem for them.
 
So how much can, how much should the United States be trying to treat China as a country that should want to have a more stable environment geopolitically?
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  Well, what I say to my Chinese interlocutors is that part of their public messaging, and in their private messaging to us, is we don’t want a new Cold War and we don’t like what they call bloc confrontation.  This is their asserted position.
 
And so, the point I make to them is: Putin does want a new Cold War, does want bloc confrontation, and North Korea is happy to go along with that, as to your point, probably as Iran.  I think Iran has, you know, kind of got just a different agenda that’s more regionally focused, but nonetheless sort of along that line.
 
MR. BREMMER:  They’re also in a lot more trouble.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  Yeah, exactly.
 
China has a choice to make.  China has a choice to make.  And it can either continue to tighten those links militarily, diplomatically, and otherwise, and end up in a circumstance where it is really part of an axis, or it could do what I think is much more natural from the point of view of China’s perspective, interest, and opportunity, which is to be a huge competitor to the United States; let’s make no bones about that.  And we are going to compete vigorously for shaping the future.  And I believe that if we fall well behind in that competition, it will be to our tremendous detriment. 
 
But on climate, on macroeconomic stability, on questions related to ensuring that the risks associated with things like artificial intelligence do not spin out of control, even on issues like the Iranian nuclear program, we ought to be able to find a way where our interests and China’s interests sufficiently align, that having a constructive agenda to go alongside the intense competition serves the American people and serves the people of the world, for that matter.
 
But that comes — a lot of — you know, most of the time, people ask that series of questions from the point of view of, “What are you going to do, America, to help make that happen?  How are you going to be nicer to China so that China, you know, is willing to do these things?” 
 
And I think we’ve reached a point in this relationship where, really, actually, it’s China’s choice to make more than it is ours.  They have to decide is Xi going to, you know — going to make the Xi-Putin kind of personal relationship the dominant issue, or is the PRC going to think of itself as a distinct kind of actor that is not part of this axis.
 
I personally don’t think they fully made that decision one way or the other.
 
MR. BREMMER:  Which is a good reason to press them on it.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  Exactly.  The risk is really there that they will go down a darker path.  I think it’s our job to engage in statecraft and diplomacy, backed by the types of competitive actions we’ve taken and backed by strong allies who are all aligned around a common vision to try to get them to make the right choice that would serve our interests better for them to tack differently from the way these other countries are tacked.
 
MR. BREMMER:  So is it fair to say that labeling them part of an axis with Russia, North Korea, and Iran is not necessarily the most helpful way to accomplish that?
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  Well, that’s an interesting question.
 
What I would say — I would just put it differently myself.  I would say that there is greater alignment today, including China, among these countries, and we’re seeing it in ways that are quite worrying.  But it is not preordained that China ends up foursquare in this axis.  And we can do things to shape the environment, and China then has choices to make.  And I think the world should put the onus on China to make the right choice.
 
MR. BREMMER:  See, this is why he’s National Security Advisor.  That was a tough question to answer, definitely.
 
Okay, so to pivot to Russia, but use the China thing — I wasn’t planning on pulling out a Trump tweet, but I’m going to for the hell of it, which is — you know, he came out the other day talking about Ukraine, and at the end threw in this “and China can help.”  I was a little surprised by that.  Were you a little surprised by that?
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  Yes.  That stood out to me.
 
MR. BREMMER:  Why?
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  Because it’s something I’ve grappled with, actually, personally — is, you know, having had long conversations, not just with China but with Europeans and with the Ukrainians, about what kind of role could China play in all of this.  And, you know, the Ukrainians have made no secret about the fact that they want to engage and talk to China about, you know, how we get, ultimately, to a just peace in Ukraine.  And, you know, Ukraine has been concerned about some of the initiatives that China has put forward, but has wanted to really engage them.  They have a relationship with Russia. 
 
And so, you know, the idea that China could in some way be a part of the conversation about generating a just peace in Ukraine is not — that’s not a crazy idea.  Now, on the other hand, you don’t want China dictating terms in Ukraine, and you don’t want them becoming the dominant broker in the European theater. 
 
So it’s a question of figuring out what is the appropriate way for them to be engaged as a permanent member of the Security Council, as a significant player on the world stage, and as one of the few countries that Russia would have to listen to if China really spoke up. 
 
I think that President Trump putting that on the table is logical, because I’ve kind of worked through the same thought in my own head.
 
MR. BREMMER:  Yeah, and because, look, we hadn’t been in a position where we were talking about imminent negotiations; we now appear to be moving in that direction.
 
If you were national security advisor in that environment, and talking to Wang Yi, my expectation is that would end up being one of the major topics that you would discuss.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  Well, it would be to say, you know, what is the shape of the table going to be, who’s going to be at it.  Obviously, Ukraine and Russia have to be there, but who else. And what could China bring to that in the way we ask that question about what China has brought to the P5+1 negotiations on Iran —
 
MR. BREMMER:  With the JCPOA —
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  — or anything else.  Yeah, that would be a question.
 
Now, I don’t know exactly what the answer would be.  I see pitfalls in all of that, but I think it’s an interesting thing that needs to be explored as we go forward.
 
MR. BREMMER:  So let’s move to Russia before I take a couple questions from the audience, and maybe a little technology, because we haven’t discussed that really.
 
On the Russia front: Clearly, I mean, we’ve had three years where the Ukrainians weren’t much interested in talking about negotiations; now they appear to be much more.  Some of that is Trump.  Some of that is the situation on the ground becoming more challenging for them.  Where do you think an eventual — what does the shape of a settlement look like, in your view?
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  I’m going to disappoint you with my answer to this, because I’ve given the same answer for three years, which is, at the end of the day —
 
MR. BREMMER:  It’s up to the Ukrainians.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  It’s up to the Ukrainians.
 
MR. BREMMER:  I knew you were going to say that.  Yeah, I know.  But the Ukrainian position is changing, right?  By definition.  I mean, they’re now saying maybe they need to give up land.  They didn’t say that before.  I mean, NATO looks like it’s getting kicked down the road more and more.  Trump probably wouldn’t accept it.
 
I mean, if you’re Trump, is it useful for you to be leaning into Ukraine just to get more space to say that we can get a negotiation?  Is that a good way to start it?
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  Well, I think one of the most critical things that the United States — the current administration, the next administration — need to show is a willingness to stand behind Ukraine and ensure that they have what they need to defend themselves, because that is going to be the leverage necessary to get a good outcome at the table.
 
So I would like to see a continuation of the basic proposition that the United States will continue to provide Ukraine with the defensive capacity, the military capacity necessary to withstand the Russian onslaught, to pressure Russia militarily as we pressure them economically so that Ukraine is in the best possible position on the battlefield, which will put them in a better position at the negotiating table.
 
I think just coming out and saying we’re going to do a deal, without that extra piece, is not going to put Ukraine in the best position at the negotiating table.
 
MR. BREMMER:  Is it fair to say that the United States was counting more on economic sanctions early on than they should have, and less on military support for Ukraine than they should have?  And those positions have balanced out?
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  I think it is fair to say that the predictions about the impact of the sanctions on the Russian economy have not borne out, certainly not on the timeline that was anticipated back in 2022.
 
I think it’s equally fair to say that Russia’s economy is in real trouble right now, and that trouble is going to mount in 2025. 
 
MR. BREMMER:  How will it manifest?
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  So, first, you have significant and growing inflation.  You have interest rates above 20 percent, which is putting a huge dent in the ability to invest.  You have Russia having to stretch further and further to recruit soldiers, paying more and more to do so, expending more and more of its budget, spending down its sovereign wealth fund so that it’s depleting its cash reserves.
 
And all of that has a compounding effect over time.  And when you add that to the fact that the casualty rates among Russians are just eye popping, and even more so in the last couple of months, I believe that these costs over time are going to grow.
 
Now, could I pick a month where they all come together to put real pressure on the Russians to come to the table?  I couldn’t.  But I think the conventional wisdom from a few months ago, which is Russia has got it made in the shade economically, they’re going to be okay, they can do this indefinitely — I don’t think the economic signals we’re seeing right now bear that out.
 
And I would make one more point that I think is really important for people to take into account.  We tend, I think, as democracies, to think, “Oh, we’re not doing so great, and those dictators are so strategic and they’re doing so well.”  If I had told you three years ago that Joe Biden was going to announce a special military operation to take Ottawa in a week, and three years later, he was in the wheat fields of Manitoba losing thousands of soldiers a month, with inflation over 10 percent and interest rates in America over 20 percent, 600,000 Americans either dead or wounded, and we’re inching out little Canadian town by little Canadian town —
 
MR. BREMMER:  Because this is the Trump plan, by the way.  I don’t know if you know this.  (Laughter.)
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  (Laughs.)  Yeah.  
 
I mean, you would have said — you wouldn’t sit here saying, “Wow, America is really winning that war in a big way.  That’s great for America.”  You would never say that.  But somehow we’re saying, “Oh, the Russians, they’re doing great.”  They are not doing great.  They set out on a strategic objective of taking the capital Kyiv; wiping Ukraine, as we know it, off the map — maybe not literally wiping the country off the map but —
 
MR. BREMMER:  The regime.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  — (inaudible) democratic, independent —
 
MR. BREMMER:  Taking the regime out.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  — Western-oriented Ukraine, gone.  It would be a vassal state to Russia.  And they have failed in that, and they will fail in that.
 
They are now fighting and imposing huge costs, and I don’t want to discount those costs.  But let’s not forget that Kyiv stands, Ukraine stands.  Ukraine will stand at the end of this.  And the thing we can most do is create circumstances for a negotiation where they have some strength and capacity behind them and it is not imposed upon them.  And that’s what I would like to see in the months ahead.
 
And, frankly, I believe that whether it was President Trump, which it will be, or it were President Harris, had she won, this turn to negotiations is something that Zelenskyy was looking to do.
 
MR. BREMMER:  It was necessary.  Yeah.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  Now we have an opportunity, but that opportunity should rest on the proposition that Ukraine is in the driver’s seat and is not going to have an outcome imposed
upon them.
 
MR. BREMMER:  And NATO is stronger, and people are spending more money and more committed to it, and there are two additional members.  And, I mean, you know, Assad just fell. 
 
I mean, there are a lot of ways that any one objective can say the Russians are not winning.  I think there are lots of ways objectively to say the Ukrainians are not winning too, to be fair.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  That is fair, and it’s important actually to pause on that point for a moment, because my account really kind of only speaks to one side of it. 
 
I mean, what has been visited upon the Ukrainians, on the brave soldiers on the front lines, on people — innocent people in towns and cities having missiles and bombs rained down on them; on Putin attempting to plunge the country into cold and darkness in the heart of winter and so much else — I mean, I’m not trying to be cavalier about any of that.  That is real.
 
Now, at the same time that that is happening, the Ukrainian people want to make sure that they are not just stopping the war for the sake of it.  They want a just peace, and we should support them in wanting a just peace.
 
MR. BREMMER:  I’m glad you said that.  Not that I’m surprised by it, but it’s useful to mention.
 
Okay, we’ve got questions here, and fortunately, there are also a couple aligned with technology.  And you and I talk about technology a lot.  The technology space is moving a lot faster than the national security government space.  AI is an area that previous administrations haven’t had to deal with.  You have.
 
Tell me — on the one hand, the United States has a strong geopolitical position with so many of the world-changing companies based in the U.S.  On the other, increasingly, this is a group of people, a group of companies that aren’t necessarily fully aligned with U.S. national security interests.  Tell me where you see those tensions and what you’re most concerned about for the next couple of years.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  Well, first, I think the big American technology companies have done a quite remarkable job in driving innovation forward in artificial intelligence.  You see it with Google, you see it with Microsoft, you see it with Meta.  Like, having major American technology companies with capital to deploy and ambition to deploy has pushed the edge of artificial intelligence in ways that have given the United States a competitive edge and a real lead.  That is a national asset.  It is.
 
Now, on the other hand, America’s technological edge has always rested on not just having big tech companies, on having startups and a very competitive, very mixed ecosystem.  And so, one of the risk factors I see is making sure that we are continuing to nurture and ensure that these companies can come forward, the little guys, to produce new innovations and new technological solutions.  So, that’s one issue.
 
Second issue is that we need to, on the one hand, balance between ensuring that the most advanced AI at the frontier continues to be generated, produced, so to speak, in the United States so that we’re not outsourcing it to other countries and we’re not trading one form of dependence for another, but on the other hand, we’re allowing this technology to be diffused globally so that America maintains its technological leadership elsewhere.  How you strike that balance, I think, is extremely challenging.  It’s something we’re focused on right now and the next administration is going to have to focus on as well.
 
MR. BREMMER:  I got a question on TikTok as a risk.  Do you think that it is a security risk to the United States?
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  Our intelligence professionals, our national security professionals — not the politicians, the professionals — have looked at this and have seen the national security risks.  That’s why you have this legislation from the Congress for divestment. 
 
And I will be — not say much more than that, because there’s a whole legal process associated with it that I shouldn’t speak to, but there are both data risks and algorithm risks associated with TikTok under current ownership, and that has been laid out not by me, sitting here, but by the intelligence community and those who sit and kind of look at and try to size up these risks.  And it has led to a circumstance in which we have this impending deadline.
 
MR. BREMMER:  When you look at the principal actors in artificial intelligence in the United States, how much do you think of them as geopolitical actors that have degrees of real independence from what the U.S. government might or might not want?
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  I think of them as geopolitical actors in that they have a big impact on geopolitics.  I’m less convinced that the leadership of these companies sit around and think, “I’m going to shape the world with my image, or I want to play as a geopolitical actor alongside a nation-state.”
 
So I think of it more as the result of their existence than as the object of their existence.  But we have to take that — seriously, that is part of the firmament in geopolitics now.  And we have to consider the fact that, yes, as you said, these are American companies, but they’re not like Chinese state-owned enterprises.  They have their own incentives.  They have their own strategies and objectives.  And much of that is very much aligned with the values and the direction that the United States wants to go.  But they are independent actors, and we have to take that into account.
 
MR. BREMMER:  I remember talking a couple of years ago with you about the fact that you said, like, one of the biggest frustrations is it’s hard to have a trade policy.  And there are a lot of political constraints around that. 
 
It’s easier to have an industrial policy.  Do you think that the industrial policy the U.S. government has right now in the tech space is adequate, is up to speed for what it needs to be geopolitically?  And if it isn’t, what else needs to happen?
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  I think that we’ve taken great strides forward with respect to investment in the basic research and the innovation base of the United States, with respect to semiconductor manufacturing, clean energy manufacturing; the infrastructure that will get built out that can help propel economic and technological growth in all dimensions; steps we’ve taken on biotechnology and biomanufacturing. 
 
I’m extremely proud of the legacy we leave over the last four years.  And that’s not just a domestic economic story; that is a national security story.  It’s something that I personally have cared passionately about as National Security Advisor.
 
If I had to pick one thing that makes me nervous, it is the need for us to deploy clean energy really rapidly, to have sufficient clean energy to power the compute necessary to continue to stay at the cutting edge of artificial intelligence.  And that is going to require us to take steps to break down barriers, remove obstacles.  And we’re trying to figure out if there’s anything we can do just in our remaining time to be able to make that happen.  But it is also something that we will be communicating very vigorously to the next administration too.
 
We have got to be able to increase overall clean energy output so that we are increasing our overall capacity at a basic level of compute so that we maintain the lead in AI and in other technological areas.
 
MR. BREMMER:  Closer relationship with Canada, if and when they have a government, might be part of that.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  Yes.  Not invading them, I guess, would probably help.
 
MR. BREMMER:  Yeah, yeah.  That’s probably right.  Well, if he’s already the 51st governor, you know, for now, it’s already taken care of.
 
So here’s an interesting question that I bet a lot of people are thinking about: Why did President Biden’s foreign policy for the middle class never gain traction with the broad American public?
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  It’s a good question.  I mean, first of all, I think that foreign policy in general tends to be more difficult to penetrate, unless it’s at a quite elemental level — the United States is directly at war, or you have a dramatic event like Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
 
I think the way that I would answer that question is to say I think the tagline never penetrated, but I would posit to you that, over time, if many of the things that he did — the technology protections, the industrial policy, the supply chain diversification and resilience, the friend-shoring and building out of allied ecosystems — these are things that don’t happen in a year or two years; they happen over a decade or a generation.
 
And I would posit that we have now planted the seeds that will be harvested in the future in ways where people say, “I like that.  That is working for me.”  I feel like we have an industrial and innovation base here that can generate good jobs and economic growth.  I feel like we’ve got supply chains that are not going to get cracked because of a pandemic or because of China.  I feel like our technology is not being used against us in ways I don’t like. 
 
These are all things that I regard as part of foreign policy for the middle class, that if you’re sitting in 2023, 2024 in the U.S., you’re at the very early stage of that.  But we carry that forward over a generation, and I think you can build a new consensus around that.  People would say that is the kind of approach that I would like to see, not just as a matter of domestic policy, but as a matter of international economic policy. 
 
And frankly, one group of people who looked at what we have done in this regard and said “Hey, we should be doing that too” are all of our allies.  The Japanese the Koreans, the Europeans have all said, “We’ve got to do that.”  Draghi just put out a big report, basically describing —
 
MR. BREMMER:  Competitiveness report.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  — this sort of theory.
 
MR. BREMMER:  Absolutely.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  So —
 
MR. BREMMER:  It’s great in theory.  Yeah.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  I think it will take longer for that to fully penetrate, but I think — I have conviction that if we stick with it as a country, I believe it will penetrate.
 
MR. BREMMER:  Interestingly, I mean, not only do allies recognize that this is a strategy they need to do more of, but, I mean, I would argue that this is an area of foreign policy that the Biden administration, the incoming Trump administration actually do have a lot of overlap on.  This is a place that I wouldn’t expect to see a great deal of difference.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  I think that’s right.  I mean, it’s hard to know exactly, because there are a lot of different voices, and it’s possible to take the basic core of this strategy in an extremely aggressive direction, like the 60 percent tariffs you were talking about earlier.
 
MR. BREMMER:  Or 25 on Mexico.  Yeah, sure.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  So, for me, that the essential insights I think are fairly common.  The manifestation or the implementation of those insights could look radically different and we’ll have to wait and see what actually happens.
 
MR. BREMMER:  Okay, before we close then, let me give you a completely random one.
 
South Korea.  What the hell, Jake?  (Laughter.) I mean, you know, good ally, solid ally.  We got the Japan-South Korea relationship stable and everything.  And then he just kind of completely lost the plot, in very short order.  Did you see that coming?
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  I cannot say that I saw the declaration of martial law, you know, on a night come and then have it reversed 24 hours later and everything.  No.
 
MR. BREMMER:  It was like six hours.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  Did not see that coming.
 
But we had January 6th.
 
MR. BREMMER:  Yeah.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  So, I think it’s important for us to recognize that dramatic events happen even in highly advanced, consolidated democracies.  And the real test is, can the democratic institutions hold at the end of the day, even if they bend. 
 
And if you look at those dramatic moments in South Korea, with protesters pushing aside the guns of the troops that were deployed to block the National Assembly so that the assembly couldn’t go in to repudiate the declaration of martial law; if you look at the fact that, actually, now the processes are working, they’re going through their paces — it was quite a moment and something that I think we’re not entirely out of the woods on because there’s still more, you know, chapters in this play until everything has worked through the courts and so forth.  But the institutions in South Korea are holding.
 
It’s a good reminder, though, that surprising things happen.  You know, if you had asked a lot of people around the world was January 6th going to happen, they would have said, “No, I was very surprised by that.”  We’re going to have more of these surprises in the future. 
 
I mean, one thing that we have to keep in mind is we are in a new era.  It is — the post-Cold War era is over.  There’s a competition underway for what comes next.  It is challenging.  It is at times turbulent.  And from my perspective, what the United States has to do is try to strengthen its fundamental hand so it can deal with whatever comes next, and there will be surprises.
 
So as National Security Advisor, what I ask myself is: Are our alliances stronger than when we found them?  And I think the answer is yes.  Are our adversaries and competitors weaker than when we found them?  And I would say yes.  Have we kept the country out of war?  Have we kept the homeland safe?  Have we protected our technology for being used against us?  And do we have the instruments of American power — our economy, our technological engine, our infrastructure, our defense industrial base — in a better position?  Yes.
 
So we should have confidence that we can deal with this challenging and turbulent world.  But it’s tough.  It is tough out there.  And it’s not just in places like the Middle East.  It can happen in the ROK.  It can happen in the United States of America.
 
The real key is do you have the basic elements of American power and capacity in a place where we can deal with our geopolitical competitors and also deal with the great trends of our time — the clean energy transition, AI, and so forth — and can you pass off a better hand than the hand that you were dealt despite all of the things happening in the world. 
 
That’s how we have to keep our eye on the prize.  And I think the United States should look at what we’ve got going for us and say, “Man, you know, it’s challenging out there, but yes, we are in a position to do very well for ourselves, for our friends, for our people, if we keep our wits about us.” 
 
And that’s what I would like, at the end of the day, the conclusion of my time in this seat — I guess, literally this seat, but also the National Security Advisor seat — that’s really what I walk away from.
 
And then, coming back to your question about China, maybe that’s part of an answer.  I think this is how they —
 
MR. BREMMER:  I knew you were going to get their eventually.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  You know?  But honestly, as part of listening to Wang Yi, they tend to look at success, so to speak, in geopolitics and foreign policy as not about doctrine or about, sort of, a narrative.  They look at it on the basis of assets and liabilities: You know, do we have strong friends and less strong enemies?  Are we entangled in war?  Is our homeland under attack from terrorists or others?  You know, where do we stand on technology, on the economy, on supply chains, and so forth?
 
That is something I think that the PRC, over 30 years, what helped them move so rapidly is they had that kind of mindset.  I think in a challenging and turbulent world, the United States needs to be thinking about that as well, not just in the chess board of geopolitics, but in terms of us being up for the big challenges of the moment.
 
MR. BREMMER:  And in the strategic ledger.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  Yeah.
 
MR. BREMMER:  Long term, who are the people that the Americans feel like we can count on around the world.  And there, the Chinese, if they took an honest-to-God strategic look, shouldn’t be thinking the United States is in decline.
 
MR. SULLIVAN:  Exactly.  And also should be saying, “Wow, I’d much rather have what the U.S. has, these powerful, capable democracies, even if they have weird moments like the martial law declaration, as opposed to when China looks around at who its really core group of friends are or could be.
 
So, yeah, we got — we have a lot going for us, without for a moment trying to whistle past huge — a huge plastic moment of turbulence and transition that’s going to be with us for quite some time.  We’ve just got to be prepared to say we have what it takes, alongside our friends, to navigate this moment in a way that will serve our people well.
 
MR. BREMMER:  Ladies and gentlemen, please join me in thanking National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan.  (Applause.)

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Q    President Biden, do you have any plans to speak to the press before you leave office?
 
THE PRESIDENT:  Sure.
 
I’m heading home now for a memorial service.
 
Q    Will you hold a press conference before the end of the year?
 
Q    Mr. President, what’s the explanation for all of those drones over New Jersey?  What — what’s behind all of that?
 
THE PRESIDENT:  Nothing nefarious, apparently, but they’re checking it all out.  There’s a — they think it’s just one — there’s a lot of drones authorized to be up there.  And I think one started, and they all got — everybody wanted to get in the deal.
 
But I’m — we’re — we’re following it closely.  So far, no sense of a danger.
 
Q    Will you speak to Prime Minister Netanyahu about a ceasefire deal in the next month?
 
THE PRESIDENT:  I’ve spoken to him, and I’ll — we’ll speak again.
 
Q    When did you last speak?
 
THE PRESIDENT:  Thank you.  Thank you, guys.

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Prince George’s Community College
Largo, Maryland

11:50 A.M. EST

 THE VICE PRESIDENT:  Can we hear it for Lauren?  (Applause.)

Good morning, everyone.  Have a seat, please.  Good morning.

AUDIENCE:  Good morning.

THE VICE PRESIDENT:  Oh.  (Laughs.)  (Applause.)  Oh, I just love seeing all of our young leaders.  You know, when I look out at all of you, I know and I feel so strongly the future of our country is bright.  It is bright because of all of you.

And I want to thank Lauren for her kind words and her commitment to your community, Lauren, and for the example you are setting.

It is so good to see all of you.  (Laughter.) 

AUDIENCE MEMBER:  It’s good to see you!

THE VICE PRESIDENT:  So, I — well, you know what?  (Applause.)

So, l- — let me start with just what has happened, actually, yesterday — before I begin my other comments — about the horrific shooting yesterday in Madison, Wisconsin.

Of course, it’s another school shooting, another community being torn about and — torn apart by gun violence.  And, of course, our nation mourns for those who were killed.  And we pray for the recovery of those who were injured and for the entire community.

But, look, as we hold our loved ones close this holiday season, we as a nation must renew our commitment to end the horror of gun violence — both mass shootings and everyday gun violence — that touches so many communities in our nation. 

We must end it.  And we must be committed to have the courage to know that solutions are in hand, but we need elected leaders to have the courage to step up and do the right thing.  (Applause.)

So, with that, I will return to the reason we are here today. 

And I first want to thank all of the incredible leaders who are with us, including Governor Moore, my dear friend —  (applause); your extraordinary Lieutenant Governor Miller — (applause); and someone I have worked with and known for so many years, your Senator-elect Alsobrooks.  (Applause.)

And to all the young leaders who are here, I thank you for your service to the people of Maryland, because, look, each of you has decided to dedicate yourself to the work of service, the work of lifting up the condition of other people — people who often you may never meet.  The work you do in service will affect people who, for the most part, will never know your names, but their lives, because of your work and your dedication, will forever be touched in a positive way.

You know, I do believe that public service is a noble calling.  It is noble work.  And is a — it is an expression of optimism, which is you know and believe — and it is being verified to each of you every day — that the work you do that can life people up has effect.  It matters.  Your work is about the optimism that comes with knowing that one individual can make a difference in the lives of so many people.  And God knows when you have a whole group like this doing it together, the impact you have on our nation and, by extension, the world.  

So, today, I came by to express my gratitude for the work you, like so many across our nation, have been doing to lift up our fellow American.  And I am here to reaffirm our shared commitment to the work ahead.

You know, over the past several weeks since the election, I have received tens of thousands of letters from people across our nation — many of them young leaders — Americans from every walk of life; people of every age, race, faith, and political party.

These letters share a common theme.  Yes, there is disappointment, but there is also resolve for the future.

One letter in particular stands out, which I’ll share with you.  A young woman named Sasha writes, quote, “There is nothing in the world that will take away my drive, energy, passion, and the destiny that I have to help the people of our country.”  And I think any one of you is Sasha — could be, right?  Nothing is going to take away that drive, that passion, that energy, that commitment. 

So, Sasha, like all of you, inspire me — young people who are rightly impatient for change.  I love that about you — impatient for change.  Who will not let anyone or any circumstance defeat your spirit or your sense of purpose.  You will not allow your spirit or your sense of purpose to be defeated. 

You, who have, I think, by your actions, adopted some advice my mother gave me a long time ago.  She would say to me, “Kamala, don’t just complain about what is wrong.  Do something about it.  Make it right.”  That’s a life you all are living. 

 You reflect the best of the America I have seen, be it during the campaign, during my four years as vice president, and throughout my life.

An America where we recognize that we are all in this together.  That no matter our background, we share the same dreams, aspirations, and ambitions for ourselves and our family.  That we all have so much more in common than what separates us.  That is our knowledge. 

An America, where we are guided by the ideals that have always defined us when we are at our best: dignity and decency, fairness, freedom, and opportunity for all.

An America, where we recognize that the true measure of the strength of a leader is not based on who you beat down; it’s based on who you lift up.  (Applause.)

And the story of America’s progress — you all know history — the story of America’s progress, when we have made progress, in many ways is the story of people who stayed true to their ideals, even in the face of difficulty; the story of Americans who, yes, faced disappointment but did not grow weary — did not grow weary; who faced setbacks but did not give up; people who refused to let the light of America’s promise dim or burn out in moments of challenge.

The movements for civil rights, women’s rights, workers’ rights — the United States of America itself would never have come to be if people had given up their cause after a court case or a battle or an election did not go their way.

What Sasha wrote and what we here know is that, in moments like this, the true test of our character is how resilient and persistent we are to pursue the future that we all can see.

The true test of our commitment is whether, in the face of an obstacle, do we throw up our hands, or do we roll up our sleeves? 

And as we approach — (applause) — (laughs) — and as we then approach the end of this year, many people have come up to me, telling me they feel tired, maybe even resigned — folks who have said to me that they’re not sure whether they have the strength, much less the desire, to stay in the fight.

But let me be very clear.  No one can walk away.  No one can walk away.  We must stay in the fight, every one of us, including the fight for an economy that works not just for those at the top but for working people, for all Americans; the fight to make sure everyone has a fair shot to pursue their ambitions; the fight for our id- — ideals, including the equality among us, the freedoms to which we are entitled, the dignity that we possess and is possessed by every one of us.

So, we must stay in the fight because that is the responsibility, in my opinion, that comes with the privilege of being an American.  And that responsibility has always, then, fueled the American experiment. 

In our country, you see, the recognition that we are all created equal, with certain fundamental rights and freedoms — the belief that here, in our country, anything is possible — the promise of America itself is a powerful yet fragile idea. 

Powerful because it has inspired billions of people and made it possible for us to become the strongest, most prosperous nation in the world, yet fragile because that idea is only as strong as our willingness to fight for it — only as strong as our faith that we, the people, are the ones who make it real.

So, I will say this as we close out this year.  I ask of you this: that those here and anyone watching, that you will not walk away, that you will stay true to your spirit and your sense of purpose, that you will continue to fight for the promise of America.

And I ask you to remember the context in which you exist.  (Laughter.)  Yeah, I did that.  (Applause.)  Uh-huh.  (Laughs.) 

I ask you to remember that this struggle is not new.  It goes back nearly 250 years to Lexington and Concord.

Generation after generation, it has been driven by those who love our country, cherish its ideals, and refuse to sit passive while our ideals are under assault.

And now, this fight to keep the light of America’s promise and to ensure it burns bright — well, this fight now, it continues with you.  You are its heirs.  We are its heirs. 

So, I’ll end with this.  Get some rest over the holidays.  (Laughter.)  Spend time with the people you love.  You know I believe family comes in many forms.  There’s family by blood, and there is family by love. 

I urge you, then, after you have had some rest — in fact, I challenge you — to come back ready — ready to chart our path to the future, chin up, shoulders back, forever impatient for change, and, like Sasha, ready to summon your drive, your energy, your passion to help our fellow Americans; and be ready to get back to work fighting for opportunity and freedom, fighting for fairness and dignity, and fighting for this country we love and the future we share.

God bless you.  And God bless the United States of America.  (Applause.)

                              END                    12:06 P.M. EST

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East Room

8:12 P.M. EST

THE PRESIDENT:  My name — my name is Joe Biden, and I’m Jill Biden’s husband.  (Laughter.) 

And I was raised by — some of you know me well — by a righteous Christian: my dad.  My dad used to come home and rail against the fact that we didn’t let the ship in — let — after Auschwitz, we didn’t — we didn’t bomb the railroad tracks, et cetera.  And my dad would always talk about our obligations.  And my dad was the one who inspired me. 

And I see my fellow father-in-law out there, Ronny Olivere.  Ronny is a good friend.

And my — my — what happened was that — my dad always thought that we had an obligation to — to step up and — and talk about what happened, and he inspired me to take every one of my children and grandchildren — when they reached the age of 14, their first trip in an aircraft overseas was to Ausch- — to — excuse me — to the — to the camp — that I wanted them to see what it was like, wanted them to see that no one could have misunderstood that there — what was going on in those camps.

And so, they toured the camps.  And they toured them, so I wanted them to know that you couldn’t pretend it didn’t happen and it should never happen again.

And so, I learned a long time ago: You don’t have to be a Jew to be a Zionist.  I’m a Zionist.  (Applause.)

A little early, but Happy Hanukkah to everyone.

Jill and I and Kamala and Doug are honored to host you here at the White House. 

Doug, thank you for being such a great friend. 

And thank you, Anne.   You’ve been a true friend and a real leader.  And tell your son how proud of him I am — of you.  She has a beautiful son.

And I want to thank you all for being here tonight. 

Look, when you walk around the White House, you feel the history and the story of our nation, including the story of the Jewish people who came to our shores in the 1600s after fleeing persecution abroad. 

Here in the East Room is a portrait of George Washington.  In 1790, a local Jewish leader from Newport, Rhode Island, wrote a letter to President Washington expressing his hope that America would be a nation of religious freedom for all its citizens, a nation which, quote, “gives bigotry no sanction and persecution no assistance.”

Like the ancient Hanukkah story when Jewish M- — when the Jewish Maccabees fought for religious freedom thousands of years ago, a letter to George Washington echoed the same vision for freedom.  And ever since, the values and contributions of the Jewish Americans have shaped the very foundation and character of our nation. 

That’s why, two years ago, Jill and I displayed the first-ever permanent White House menorah made of the original wood from the White House building.  We displayed it again tonight to make clear that history and vibrancy of the Jewish life is woven into the fabric of America, every aspect of it, and it’s permanent.  It’s permanent.

But I know this year’s Hanukkah falls on the hearts that are still very heavy.  It’s the second Hanukkah since the horrors of October 7th.  Over a thousand slaughtered, hundreds taken hostage, unspeakable sexual violence, and so more.  The trauma of that day and its aftermath is still raw and ongoing. 

I’ve gotten over a hundred hostages out, and I will not stop until I get every single one of them home — every single.  (Applause.)

Last month, we secured a ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon so residents can safely return home.  And I’ve said many times before, my commitment to the safety of the Jewish people and security of Israel and its right to exist as an independent nation-state is — remains ironclad. 

I know — (applause) — not just me — I know the Jewish community is also suffering from despicable surge of antisemitism in America and all around the world.  It’s immoral.  It’s wrong.  And it must stop now. 

And, Doug, I want to thank you.  Thank you for your leadership in this effort.  I really mean it sincerely.

And I know it’s hard to find hope while — while carrying so much sorrow.  But from my perspective, Jewish people have always embodied the duality of pain and joy. 

You know, the late Rabbi Jonathan Sacks said, “A people that can walk through a valley of shadow of death and still rejoice is a people that cannot be defeated by any force or fear.”  “Any force or fear.”  (Applause.)

That resilience and that capacity to find faith and joy despite centuries of persecution and pain is your light, like the light of miracles throughout the Jewish history, from the menorah oil lasting eight days to the miracle of Israel itself. 

Look, let me close with this.  Throughout my life, rabbis, Jewish friends, colleagues have always been there for me and my family when we’ve gone through very tough times — and I mean it sincerely — been there on our doorstep, in our home with us.  They taught us so much about the optimistic spirit of the Jewish people. 

Above all, they taught me one thing we can never lose: hope.  Hope, hope, hope.  I’ve seen the power of that hope in my own life and in the life of our nation. 

Next week, you’ll light the eight candles in your menorahs.  My final Hanukkah message to you is this — as president — this is: to hold onto that hope, shine your light — shine the light of optimism, and above all, keep the faith.  Keep the faith.

May God bless you.  Happy Hanukkah.

And now I turn it over to Rabbi Cosgrove.  (Applause.)

Rabbi Cosgrove, who — by the way, who I visited his — as I was — his synagogue in New York.  He was still nice to me afterward too. 

Rabbi, it’s all yours, kid.  Go get them.  (Laughter and applause.) 

8:19 P.M. EST

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South Court Auditorium
Eisenhower Executive Office Building

Good evening.

We owe our schools and our communities better. We cannot accept this as normal. We must protect our children and educators from gun violence.

Thank you for being here.

It’s hard to believe that this is one of our last gatherings of educators at the White House.

The day after Joe was inaugurated, nearly four years ago, I began my time as First Lady by thanking our nation’s educators, alongside Randi and Becky.

The pandemic was still raging, so we sat six feet apart. And on that day, I promised you that as long as Joe was in the White House, educators would always have a seat at the table. That promise has been my guiding light over the last four years, and I hope you have felt your impact in all we’ve accomplished together. 

We began this journey together.

I asked Randi and Becky to help gather us again as this chapter comes to a close.

And my message to you is simple: thank you.

Over the last four years, we’ve built an even stronger education system in this country—and it took all of us. Because policies don’t work unless we implement them in our classrooms. And our schools don’t transform lives without educators who are dedicated to this calling.

So thank you.

Thank you for opening your hearts and your classrooms to me, all across the country. For joining me for the first-ever Teachers of the Year State Dinner here at the White House. For coming together during the last election. For using your “teacher voice” to organize and get out the vote.

And I know that you will continue to push our nation forward in the way that only teachers can, making sure that our students are front and center.

Joe and I will be there with you every step of the way.

Most of all, I want to thank you for devoting your lives to our nation’s students through the good days and tough ones, through setbacks and breakthroughs, through careful lesson plans and all the surprises we could never plan for.

Being your First Lady has been the honor of my life. But being your colleague has been the work of my life.

Last Thursday, I taught my last class of the semester, and my final class ever at Northern Virginia Community College.

I will always love this profession, which is why I continued to teach full-time while serving as your First Lady.

And I couldn’t have done it without the love and support of fellow educators.

At every turn, you’ve stood by my side, lifted my spirits, and helped me remember that we’re in this together.

And I will always be grateful to those who lead us forward.

Becky, thank you for being a bold champion of students and educators—and for encouraging them to become change-makers too. You help us set our sights on a brighter future, and show us how to fight for every inch of progress.

Randi, you are a force, and you use your power to lift up educators so that we can lift up our students. You remind us that we are not alone, and that we are unstoppable when we act together.

Joe and I are so grateful to both of you, and all of the educators that you represent.

And now, I’ll turn it over to Randi.

***

Thank you, Becky.

Just a couple of weeks ago, on one of my final overseas trips, the U.S. Ambassador in Qatar told me about how, all of these years later, he still remembers the English teacher who changed his life.

All of us have someone we credit for creating an inflection point in our lives. And you are that someone.

Every day, you see something in your students—a spark of passion, a glimmer of talent—and you say, don’t let the world miss out on your light.

Thanks to you, light shines out of your classrooms, every student a sun ray of your legacy.

We don’t always see how far that light travels.

But right now, someone out there is standing a little taller because you helped them find the confidence they needed.

Someone is working a little harder because you pushed them to try.

Someone is braver because you helped them find their courage.

And someone has become a teacher and mentor to their own students, because all of us are links in an endless chain of educators.

And while the world shifts under our feet, we will always have each other.

So right now, more than anything else, my message to you is this: Lean on each other. Be each other’s strength. And never forget the power of education to transform lives.

From the bottom of my heart, thank you, and happy holidays.

###

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U.S. Department of Labor
Washington, D.C.

12:38 P.M. EST

THE PRESIDENT:  Hello.  (Applause.)  It’s a good day.  (Applause.) 

Thank you, Acting Secretary Su.

AUDIENCE:  Thank you, Joe!  Thank you, Joe!  Thank you, Joe! 

THE PRESIDENT:  Thank you.  I — I had no choice.  (Laughter.)  My grandfather would come down from Heaven if I didn’t do this.  (Laughter.)

(Coughs.)  Excuse me, I have a little bit of a cold. 

Folks, you know, this is an incredible honor.  I really mean that.  And I want to thank Acting Secretary Su and the Department of Labor for this incredible honor.

You know, I measure the importance of the — any award I ever received based on the character and consequence of the organization that’s bestowing it.  And the Department of Labor is an organization of character and consequence.  And I’m honored — (coughs) — I’m honored to be joined today by leaders of character and conscious, many of them sitting right here in the front row.  Half of my Cabinet is here.  (Laughter and applause.)

I want to thank all — all the labor leaders here today, including Liz and the AFL-CIO; members of the Cabinet, including Interior Secretary Deb Haaland.  You know, you talked about that list that she — that the secretary brought in her pocket when she met with Trump — I mean, with Roosevelt — Trump? — Freudian slip — (laughter) — and — but I — I think she had a relative she left behind. 

Would you stand up, Madam Secretary — secretary of Interior?  (Applause.)

I’ve been around a long time, and she’s the only secretary I’ve ever worked with or had working for me who when I say, “That’s done,” she’d — “No, no, no.  We have this to do now.”  (Laughter.) 

Thank you, kiddo.

Look, you know, former Labor secretary, who is now in the White House, senior advisor (inaudible), is Tom Perez.  (Applause.)  Where is he? 

Tom, thanks for sticking with me. 

And members of Congress, including Maine — Maine senator, Angus King, and Cherlie [Chellie] Pingree — where — where is Ch- — where are you guys?  All over here.  Okay.  There you are.  (Applause.) 

And, by — and, by the way, last night, we were doing a — a Christmas event at the house, and I got finished talking to a group of folks from Labor, and my wife said, “And, by the way, his wife is a member of a labor union too.”  (Laughter and applause.) 

I’m Jill Biden’s husband.  She’s not here today, but she’s been a long-time union member of the National Education Association.  (Applause.)

And it’s fitting, with all these powerful women here, that we’ve gathered at headquarters of the Department of Labor, named after one of America’s greatest labor leaders — and that’s not hyperbole — Frances Perkins.

You know, we’re honored to be joined by her grandson, Tomlin.  Where are you, Tomlin?  (Applause.)  Thank you, bud.

Saturday, March 25th, 1911, Frances sat down for afternoon tea at her home with a close friend from New York City.  Suddenly, they hear the sound of a distant screams and sirens.  The building was in flames.  Her instinct was to run to the scene.

As she approached the fire and smoke, she recognized the Triangle Shirt[waist] Factory, a company that employed hundreds of workers, mostly immigrants and women, who worked long hours crammed into tight quarters, where managers locked them inside to make clothing.

In an instant, those workers were trapped in a brutal blaze.  With no safe exit, some workers forced to climb out the windows, holding on for dear life until their fingers gave out.  Others just jumped — prayed and jumped.

A total of 150 lives were lost that day.  It was the deadliest industrial disaster in American history. 

Frances was devastated.  But that fire ignited a passion in her.  It strengthened her resolve to fight even harder for working Americans and working families.

In her decades of service, she became a fierce defender of unions and workers’ rights, an architect of the New Deal, the first woman Cabinet secretary — the first woman Cabinet secretary.  I increased on that a little bit — (laughter) — because I know what my family is like.  All of — all the really bright people in my family are women.  (Laughter.)  And the longest-serving secretary of Labor in American history, God love you.

And the story goes, after Franklin Roosevelt asked her to become his Labor secretary, Frances Perkins immediately responded by outlining her goals, what she wanted done.  She said, “I want unemployment relief, overtime pay, child labor laws, minimum wage, worker’s compensation, national health insurance, and Social Security” — (laughs) — many of the benefits we take for granted as a consequence of Frances’s dedication to inciting courage. 

But that — can you imagine walking up to Roosevelt and saying, “Hey, I’ll take the job, but here’s the deal, man.”  (Laughter.)  “Let’s get this straight.”  Like I said, a little bit like when I asked Frances to do my job.

Hard-fought battles and — with Teamsters and, you know, at her — look, a real testament to her skill as an advocate for public servants.

An example that, through the Fair Labor Standards Act, she cemented the idea that if you’re working a full-time job, you shouldn’t have to live in poverty — a simple proposition.  If you work a little extra, you should have extra money for overtime.  Not a crazy idea.  Even — some even argue about it now.

Frances understood what my dad taught me, and I — you’ve heard me say this a thousand times, but it — he really would say this.  He said, “Joey, a job is about a lot more than a paycheck.  It’s about your dignity.  It’s about respect.  It’s about your place in the community.  It’s about being able to look your kid in the eye and say, ‘Honey, it’s going to be okay,’ and mean it.”  That’s my dad. 

In fact, during her 12 years in office, she accomplished everything on her list, except expanded health care for health insurance.  It took 65 years later and a guy named Barack Obama and I to get the Affordable Care Act passed.  (Applause.)  And thank God all of us here have protected and expanded the Affordable Care Act.

Look, it’s clear that Frances Perkins and a generation of activists and labor leaders laid the groundwork for much of what we’ve accomplished in the last four years.

We’re fundamentally transforming the economy by breaking an economic orthodoxy that has failed this nation for generation after generation, in my view: trickle-down economics, the notion that if you — every — the wealthy do very, very well, a little will trickle off — off their tables onto our kitchen table. 

My dad used to say, “Nothing ever trickled on my table, honey.”  (Laughter.)  No, I’m serious. 

My dad was a really well-read man who didn’t get to go — he went — accepted to Johns Hopkins, but during the war, he never got to go.  But my dad was a well-read guy. 

Well, you know, the primary benefits to the very wealthy and the biggest corporations were trickle-down economics, and that didn’t do much for working people and the middle class and left too many people behind. 

Together, we built an economy from the middle out and the bottom up, not the top down, and because we know this simple truth: Wall Street didn’t build America; the middle class built America, and u- — (applause) — and unions built the middle class.  (Applause.)  Un- — and that’s a fact. 

In fact, as th- — as the secretary of Treasury will tell you, I asked her to do a study because I was going to get hit, because I knew they’d say by having unions increase in their numbers and their wages go up, we were going to cost people thing.  Guess what?  The study the Treasury did showed that when unions do well, all workers do well -– union and non-worker [non-union], across the board.  (Applause.)

It matters.  It works.  It’s fair.

Kamala and I are so proud of the great job creation record of any — actually, the greatest job correction [creation] of any single president in a single term: over 6 [16] million jobs so far, including over 1.5 million manufacturing and construction jobs — good-paying jobs you can raise a family on and don’t have to require a four-year degree.  And get this: There are more women, especially mothers, in the workforce than ever before in American history.  (Applause.)

We’re so damn proud to have protected pensions of millions of union workers and retirees — (applause) — when I signed the Butch Lewis Act. 

You know, think about that.  Imagine what the average American would say if you were going to do that with their Social Security, which this guy wants to do.  Imagine if he said, “Your pension, you can’t count on it anymore.” 

In addition, we’ve recovered more than $1 billion in back wages and damages for over 600,000 workers here in America.  (Applause.)

We wo- — we’ve pushed for a right to a living wage and your right to overtime pay.

Jobs and factories are coming back home to America because we invested in the American agenda.  We’re modernizing American infrastructure. 

Last time, this guy had — last guy had the job, he had “Infrastructure Week” every week — didn’t build a damn thing.  (Laughter.)  Well, guess what?  We’re — we built a lot.  And guess what’s coming? 

Look, folks, one of the things that is frustrating — I knew this was going to happen because I’ve been around a long time, and I talked over to the secretary of Agriculture and other places.  Guess what?  All the things — we have $1.4 trillion in economic — in — in infrastructure growth.  That’s thousands of good-paying jobs. 

The CHIPS and Science Act investing billions of dollars — billions of dollars — building these fabs that are going to house hundreds of people working, thousands, and they’re going to be ba- — getting paid about average of $102,000 a year and don’t need a college degree.

So much — so much is going on.  But it’s going to take a little bit of time.  But we got to make sure to protect — protect the — the onslaught that’s going to come, because it’s hard to see right away.

And, by the way, I know I got criticized by putting as many of these programs in red states as blue states — actually more.  Well, guess what?  The red state guys screwed it up.  (Laughter.)  And we got a be- — benefit — we — we represent all of America, not just — not just blue America, not just Democrats, but all of America. 

Look, as we do all this, we’re — we’re buying America, using American workers, using American products.  And we’re standing up to Amer- — for American steelworkers against China’s unfair trade practices.

We appointed a National Labor Relations Board that actually believes in unions and has pro-union members on the board.  (Applause.)  A strange notion.  And a special thank you to the chair of the board, Lauren McFerran — (applause) — (inaudible) — who is here.  Where are you, Lauren?  There — thank you, Lauren. 

Don’t be so shy.  Raise your — stand up.  Let everybody see you.  (Laughter and applause.)

And it’s no accident — no accident that petitions to form unions have doubled — doubled under my presidency.  (Applause.) 

I got all this credit for walking the picket line.  It never crossed my mind not to walk the picket line.  (Laughter.)  No, I’m serious.  I didn’t think it was any big deal.  I walked a lot of picket lines.  The fact that I was president, I hadn’t thought about that.  And then Pamela [Kamala] walked the picket line.  We support the right to fair contracts.  

Here’s one, you know, that doesn’t get enough attention: When workers in sectors like construction, manufacturing, mining inhale toxic silica dust on the job, it can lead to lung cancer and other deadly diseases.  It’s been a major problem for decades, even under Secretary Perkins.  She led an investigation, but despite the science, big business blocked the regulation.

But not on our watch.  Not on your watch.  With your help, we carried Frances’s — Frances’s mantle and issued a rule that finally reduces such dangerous exposure. 

And, by the way — (applause) — our secretary — the secretary of Veterans Affairs is sitting in front of me here — one of the really good guys.  I really mean it.

And, you know, we — what we’ve done — what we did for the CHIPS and Science Act, and then we went — made sure we were going to take care of veterans.  We said all those folks, in my generation, exposed to Agent Orange couldn’t prove that their illness was a consequence of it and all those, like my son’s generation, that were exposed to toxic burn pits in Iraq and other places, that it’s assumed that — my son came back, for example, with Stage Four glioblastoma.  More brain injuries than anything else.  And guess what?  They’re entitled to the benefits that they were going to get if they had not lost their lives — their family.  (Applause.)

And to ad-lib here a little bit, I — I think the American people are beginning to figure out all we’re doing is what’s basically decent and fair — just basically decent and fair.

We have a lot of sacred obligations — I got into trouble for saying this before, but we only have one truly sacred obligation: to prepare those we send into harm’s way and pre- — care for them and their families when they come home.  And that’s a simple proposition.  Finally, that’s happening.

What — what you got?  Another million now?  A million you’re taking care of.

I make no apologies.  I’m so damn proud of that.  (Applause.)

Look, folks, in our four years together, we’ve made historic investments that have changed the course of the nation’s future and will have a lasting impact for decades to come.

And I’m here to say, to state the obvious, we could not have done this without the dedicated professionals here at the Department of Labor and all across this administration.  (Applause.)  Could not have done.

And I’m damn proud to be known as the most pro-labor administration in American history, because we are.  We are.  We make no apologies.  (Applause.)

Look, let me close with this.  Frances Perkins once said, “The people are what matter to government, and the government should aim to give people — all people under its jurisdiction the best possible life” — “the best possible life.”

For my dad, it was a simple proposition: Everybody deserves a shot.  No guarantee, but a shot.  Everybody deserves a shot.

All of you have helped the — upheld that vision, putting the people first, no matter who they are.

Another important legacy of our administration is making sure we learn from history, lift up stories that often have gone untold.

Earlier this year, during Women’s History Month, I signed the first-ever executive order on recognizing and honoring women’s history to increase representation of women and historic sites — in historic sites all across America.

Today, I’m proud to stand here in the Frances Perkins — Perkins Building, headquarters of the Labor Department, to designate Frances Perkins Homestead in Newcastle, Maine, a national monument.  (Applause.)

And Secretary Haaland is also going to be announcing five new national historic landmarks to honor women’s contributions to American history.  (Applause.)

They includes Charleston Cigar Factory — (coughs) — excuse me — where Black women led a workers’ strike that opposed gender and racial discrimination and advocated for better pay for working conditions.

Look, too many people want to rewrite history or ignore it.  Look, we wa- — all we want to do is make — le- — make sure we record history — record history — the good, bad, and the indifferent — who we are. 

I was able to show up at Indian Country and apologize for what we did to the Indian Americans, for the schools we made them go to and took them away, off the reservations with their parents.

Throughout our history, women’s vision and achievements have strengthened this nation, to state the obvious.

That’s why I’ve kept my commitment to have an administration that looks like America, and that includes having more women in senior access all across the board, starting with my amazing vice president, Kamala Harris.  (Applause.)

It’s about time we honor them in building the American Women’s Museum and — History Museum on the Mall — (applause) — and the Women’s Suffrage National Monument on the National Mall.  (Applause.)  

And, by the way, it’s time for Congress to move in authorizing that legislation — moving it forward.  They should do it now, before this Congress ends.  (Applause.) 

Folks, our administration is coming to an end, but our work continues.

We get up.  We keep going.  We keep the faith.  I know I will.  I know you will.  We just have to remember who in the hell we are.

We’re the United States of America.  (Applause.)  There is nothing beyond our capacity when we do it together — nothing, nothing, nothing.  (Applause.)

May God bless you all.  And may God prote- — protect our troops.  (Applause.)

And now I will sign the proclamation.

Thank you, thank you, thank you.  (Applause.)

Here.

(The proclamation is signed.)  (Applause.)

12:57 P.M. EST

The post Remarks by President Biden Honoring our Nation’s Labor History and the Biden-Harris Administration’s Work to Strengthen America’s Workforce appeared first on The White House.

Via Teleconference

4:47 P.M. EST

MODERATOR:  Hi, everyone.  Thanks for joining our gaggle late in the day today.  Kirby has some words here at the top, and then we’ll get into as many questions as we can. 

MR. KIRBY:  Hey, everybody.  Good afternoon.  Sorry for the late afternoon gaggle.  Obviously, lots going on here.  So, again, thanks for joining late.

I do want to start by expressing our deep condolences to all the victims and the families, and certainly the community of Madison, today.  Just horrific news, and news that no family, no parent, no sibling, no son or daughter ever wants to hear.  So, just terrible. 

And we will continue to stay focused on the community there in Madison, and we’ll obviously offer whatever help may be required or needed of local and state authorities. 

I can tell you that the President has been briefed on the school shooting there and that senior White House officials are, as you would expect we would be, in touch with our local counterparts there in Madison to provide whatever support that they need. 

Now, I want to address a couple of more things here before we take your questions, and first to the continued interest in drones. 

And just at the outset, I think it’s important to remember a bit of context here.  There are more than 1 million drones that are lawfully registered with the Federal Aviation Administration here in the United States, and there are thousands of commercial, hobbyist, and law enforcement drones that are lawfully in the sky on any given day.  That is the ecosystem that we are dealing with.  And it is legal.  It is proper.  In fact, in many cases, these drones provide valuable services, both on the commercial side and on the law enforcement, public safety side. 

And with the technology evolving as it is, we have every expectation that the number of drones in the skies over the United States is going to increase over time.

Now, with respect to what’s going on in and around New Jersey, the FBI has received now tips of some 5,000 reported drone sightings in the last few weeks, about 100 of which they felt needed to be followed up on.  So out of 5,000 tips, they did the analysis and determined that about 100 required following up on.

We also have federal government resources and personnel supporting state and local officials as they investigate these reports.  We’re obviously quickly working to help state and local authorities prioritize and follow up on the leads that are still being followed up on.  As Secretary Mayorkas said, we have sent additional advanced detection technology to the region, and of course, we’ve sent some trained visual observers as well.

Having closely examined the data, having closely looked at the tips and collated them as best we can from concerned citizens, we assess that the sightings to date include a combination of lawful commercial drones, hobbyist drones, and law enforcement drones, as well as manned fixed-wing aircraft, helicopters, and even stars that were mistakenly reported as drones.  We have not identified anything anomalous or any national security or public safety risk over the civilian airspace in New Jersey or other states in the Northeast. 

The work continues.  So that said, we obviously
recognize the concern among many communities.  We continue to support state and local authorities, as I said, with technology and law enforcement support.  And we will continue to follow up, as appropriate, on the leads that are still active. 

But I want to stress again: Our assessment at this stage is that the activity represents commercial, hobbyist, law enforcement drones, all operating legally and lawfully, and/or civilian aviation aircraft. 

As we continue to work through the leads that are out there, we’ll continue to share what we can.  And I would add that this assessment that I just read out is coming from law enforcement officials. 

I want to add that we urge Congress to enact counter-UAS — unmanned aerial systems — legislation that has been proposed and repeatedly requested by this administration that would extend and expand existing counter-drone authorities to help identify and counter any threat that does emerge.  There are gaps and seams, for instance, between the various government agencies — federal, local and state.  And this counter-UAV, counter-drone legislation would help us close some of those gaps and seams.  So we need Congress to act. 

And so, when Congress reconvenes in January, we’re going to be calling on them to put in place a bipartisan task force [commission] to examine congestion in the skies and to help set appropriate rules to address the public’s concerns.

Now, additionally, there have been a limited number of visual sightings of drones over military facilities in New Jersey and elsewhere, much of which is, of course, restricted airspace.  Such sightings near or over DOD installations are not new.  And DOD takes unauthorized access over its airspace seriously, as you would expect them to do, and they coordinate closely with federal and law enforcement authorities as appropriate.  And they are actively engaged with local commanders to ensure that there are appropriate detection and mitigation measures in place. 

And lastly, if I could, turning to North Korea and Russia. 

Throughout this conflict, we’ve seen North Korean support for Russia’s illegal and unprovoked war, including the transfer of missiles, artillery ammunition.  And, in October, of course, we announced that more than 1,000 North Korean troops were deployed to Russia on a purported training mission. 

In reality, Russia, due to Ukraine’s strong defense, and out of military desperation, sought additional support to facilitate and to perpetuate its war. 

Over the past few days, we have seen these North Korean soldiers move from the second lines on the battlefield to the front lines on the battlefield meant to be actively engaged in combat operations.  It’s not surprising — and of course, it’s also not surprising that now North Korean soldiers are suffering losses on the battlefield in response to Russia’s escalation, which, of course, the introduction of North Korean soldiers represents in terms of escalation.

The United States has announced new assistance, including the use of long-range capabilities to degrade North Korean and Russian forces before they attack.  And we have continued to surge security assistance, announcing two drawdowns in just recent weeks, and one USAI package.

Today, the Biden-Harris administration is announcing new sanctions on nine DPRK — North Korean — individuals and seven entities, including banks and shipping companies, all of which is over, of course, Kim Jong Un’s support for Russia’s war in Ukraine, as well as the DPRK’s continued ballistic missile testing. 

These sanctions contribute toward broader efforts to degrade the DPRK’s ability to continue generating revenue for its weapons of mass destruction program and for providing munitions and ballistic missiles to Russia for use against Ukraine. 

We’re going to continue to hold accountable all actors who facilitate financially and militarily Russia’s illegal and brutal war in Ukraine.  And it goes without saying, or at least I hope it goes without saying, that we stand by Ukraine and the Ukrainian people as they defend their freedom, their territorial integrity, their sovereignty, their citizens, their lives, and their livelihoods.  That’s been a consistent theme, it’s been a consistent effort by this administration since Mr. Putin decided to cross the line in February of ‘22.  And I can assure you, with every day that we have left in this administration, we’re going to make good on that commitment. 

With that, I can take your questions.

MODERATOR:  Thank you.  Our first question will go to Nandita with Reuters.

Q    Hi.  Can you hear me?

MODERATOR:  Yep.

Q    Thank you.  I wanted to ask about President-elect Trump’s comments on Ukraine today.  He’s obviously raised doubts about President Biden’s strategy of sending long-range missiles to Ukraine.  Today he said Ukraine has to agree to a deal.  I’m curious what you think of Trump’s comments and what they mean for President Zelenskyy and the future of Ukraine.

MR. KIRBY:  I’m not going to engage in a public back-and-forth here, but I do want to make a couple of points. 

There are things you’ve heard me say before, but, my goodness, if you need to hear, I’ll say it again: Nothing about Ukraine without Ukraine.  We’re not going to have talks about them without them involved.  We’re not going to force their hand in terms of what their next steps might be. 

President Zelenskyy was elected by the Ukrainian people to be their representative in the executive branch of their government, and he is.  And he gets to decide if and when there’s going to be a negotiation. 

Now, we all believe there should be a negotiated end to this war.  That’s probably the most likely and the best way it’s going to end.  We recognize that.  But President Zelenskyy gets to determine under what terms, what conditions, when, and how he wants to engage in negotiations.  And as we have made clear to him in the past, so I can today: When he makes that decision, as long as President Biden is Commander-in-Chief, he will find in this administration a supporter as he moves forward to negotiating.  But he gets to determine that.  And if he does do it, he gets to determine the conditions.

What we’re going to — the third thing I’ll say is that between now and that day, whenever that day is, we’re going to make sure that his army has what they need to continue to succeed on the battlefield and to push the Russians back and to make it harder on Mr. Putin to continue to fight this war. 

I mean, even as we’re talking here, it is true that the Russians have made some plodding progress in the east, and it is true that they are going after Ukrainian lines in and around Kursk, but they’re doing it with North Korean soldiers, because that’s how desperate he is.  And the progress that they’re making in the east, yes, not denying that they’re making progress, but it’s coming at a heavy cost for Russian soldiers as well. 

One of the things that Mr. Putin has had to buy a lot of in terms — and he’s bought a lot of missiles, he’s bought drones, he’s bought artillery shells, and he’s getting them from all kinds of different places.  He’s also had to buy a lot of body bags.  And I think that shouldn’t be forgotten.  And that’s it.

MODERATOR:  Thank you.  Our next question will go to Aamer with the AP.

Q    Hey.  Thank you, John.  One question I had was: Did the administration consult with President-elect Trump’s team before the decision to loosen restrictions on the use of American-provided ATACMS? 

And then, just secondly, on your point about North Koreans now being seen moving up to the front lines, is there anything specific triggering this?  And is there an assessment of how many North Korean troops have been injured or lost thus far?  Thank you.

MR. KIRBY:  So, let me take your second one first.  I don’t know that we have an exact number, but we do believe that they have suffered some significant losses, killed and wounded, but it’s difficult for me to put an actual number on it.  I would say certainly in the realm of dozens, several dozens. 

And we’re just now starting to see this movement of them from the second line to the front line.  So it’s a fairly new development, Aamer, and we might be able to have a little bit more granularity as days go on, but I wouldn’t have put it in this opening statement if we didn’t assess that these were fairly significant losses.  Again, we just don’t have a hard number on it, but just the figures that we are seeing and trying to triangulate tell us that, again, this has not been an insignificant set of losses for these guys. 

And, look, we said it at the time: If they want to enter the fight, they do so at their own peril, and now they’re learning what that means.

On your first question: Look, the conversations that we were having inside the administration about ATACMS started before the election.  All I can assure you is that in the conversations we’ve had with them since the election, and we’ve had it at various levels, we have articulated to them the logic behind it, the thinking behind it, why we were doing it, and to stress to them that this was in response, quite frankly, to the North Korean troops being put on the battlefield, which they did before the election.

Q    John, just real briefly, is it incorrect when President-elect Trump said that he wasn’t consulted?

MR. KIRBY:  Again, Aamer, I’m not going to get into a back-and-forth with the President-elect or his team.  I can only tell you the decision about ATACMS was made before the election, before we had a result, and it was made internal to this administration, as it should be.  And it was made because of a decision by Putin to use North Korean troops, which was a decision he made before the election.  So, all that happened pre-election.

Post-election, we have had the appropriate level of conversations with the incoming team about various national security issues, including the war in Ukraine, to explain what we’re doing, what we’re seeing, why we’re doing it, you know, so that, as I said the other day — I think I said this in the briefing room — there should be no decision we are taking or that we have taken in recent weeks that should come as a surprise to them.

MODERATOR:  Thank you.  Our next question will go to Francesca with USA Today.

Q    Thanks so much for doing this.  I had a question about something else that the President-elect had said today.  Kirby, he said that the U.S. military and both President Biden know where the drones are coming and going from.  He indicated perhaps that you know more than you’re letting on, and said that you should stop keeping people in suspense, that you should tell them what you know.  Could you just respond to that and whether the administration does know more, whether the military and the White House do know more about where the drones are coming and going from?

MR. KIRBY:  I’ve talked to you guys last week.  We did a backgrounder over the weekend.  And I’m talking to you all today.  And today, as I think you hopefully picked up in my opening statement, we are now able to tell you what our assessment is to date, and our assessment is to date, as I indicated, what we believe these things are. 

Now, again, that’s the assessment to date.  So I would say that we are making a very good-faith effort to be as open and direct with all of you and with the American people as we can.  And that will continue.  That will continue all throughout the coming days.  There’s absolutely no effort to be anything other than as upfront as we can be. 

Now, what we’re not going to do is speculate, and we’re not going to hypothesize.  We’re not going to provide content that we can’t be sure is accurate. 

So, you know, I recognize that some of the criticism over the last few days has been that we haven’t said more of what we know.  It’s because we didn’t have as much information as we do now after a few more days of extra resources, extra personnel, extra analysis. 

And so, that’s why I’m coming out here at 4:30 on a Monday to let you know what we’ve learned.  And we’re going to continue to do that, because we know there are, you know, ongoing concerns about this. 

But I want to stress again: Please, if you do anything in your coverage, please make sure that you remind people that there are over a million legal drones in the country and that thousands of them are flying around on any given day, legally, lawfully, performing valuable services, including for the betterment of citizens on the ground.  It’s okay to fly drones.  It’s legal to do it, you know, if you’re registered with the FAA, and our assessment is that the vast, vast majority are. 

And the other thing I’d ask you to please keep front and center is that we’re watching — we’re monitoring this in real time and analyzing it in dang near real time.  And still today, on Monday, we have not seen anything that indicates a threat to national security or a public safety risk.  And obviously, if we did, we would, as appropriate, take the right action, do the right things, execute the right policies, and be as transparent with the American people about it as we could.

Q    Kirby, if I just could really quickly, not to get into intelligence assessments, but is there anything that you’re seeing in the intelligence that perhaps he was referring to that you’re not able to tell us about right now?

MR. KIRBY:  No.  I mean, the short answer to that is no.

Look, you know that I’m always careful when I’m asked about intelligence assessments one way or another.  But if there was something there that would indicate — that would contradict my statement that there was no national security threat at play right now that we know of, or a public safety risk, obviously I wouldn’t say it that way.  You know, it’s not like there’s a bit of intel out there that I’m obfuscating or obscuring from you. 

If we had information, intelligence or otherwise, that told us that there was a national security threat posed by this drone activity, I would say that.  Maybe I wouldn’t be able to tell you exactly what the threat is or who it’s from or what the purpose is, but I would.  And I can’t — I just can’t say that to you honestly, because we haven’t seen it.

MODERATOR:  Thank you.  Our next question will go to Kayla with CNN.

Q    Thank you.  And thank you, Admiral, for doing this. 

First, I just wanted to see if you could elaborate at all on the nature of the discussions between the White House and Trump teams on Ukraine, in which the President-elect has said he wants to see a ceasefire on day one. 

And second, I wanted to see if you could comment on the impeachment of President Yoon in South Korea, what it means for the alliance, and whether the U.S. believes, as some in the country do, that President Yoon should be charged with insurrection.  Thanks.

MR. KIRBY:  I will defer to the incoming team to speak to whatever policies that they want to pursue from a national security perspective.  That’s the appropriate thing.  You know, they should speak to whatever decisions that they believe they’re going to make or approaches that they want to take.  I mean, that’s not for me to comment on or to go into any depth on.

I would just tell you — well, I don’t want to just repeat what I said before.  I’d point you back to my previous answer.  Nothing about Ukraine without Ukraine.  We want to put President Zelenskyy in the best possible position so that if and when he’s ready to negotiate an end to this war, he can do it from a position of strength, from a position of some leverage.  And that’s why we continue to flow so much security assistance to him in these closing weeks of the administration.  And that’s going to continue.

What the next team decides to do or how they want to handle that, that really would be for them to speak to.  And I just don’t think it’s useful or productive for me to go beyond that. 

Obviously, we continue to watch events in South Korea very, very closely.  A significant ally.  Remains a significant ally.  An alliance that is incredibly healthy now after the result of these last four years of really working on our alliances and partnerships in the Pacific. 

As you know, the President spoke with the acting president, Han Duck-soo, over the weekend — I think it was on Saturday evening — to congratulate him and also to reaffirm our commitment to the South Korean people, to the alliance.

I will not speak to internal domestic issues inside South Korea, your question about whether he should be charged with insurrection.  Those kinds of things are for South Korean officials, South Korean legislators, the South Korean people to determine, not the United States.  All I’ll say is that, as the President said to Acting President Han Duck-soo, this is an important relationship for us, it’s a terrific alliance.  The United States is going to stay committed to it.

MODERATOR:  Thank you.  Our next question will go to Cheyenne with ABC.

Q    Hi.  Thank you for doing this.  The President-elect also mentioned changing a trip to Bedminster.  Do you have any reason to believe that Bedminster, New Jersey, has been at all at risk with any of these drone sightings?

And also, you’ve talked about the thousands of drones flying around legally on any given day.  What’s your explanation for why this became a concern just recently in New Jersey?  Do you think it’s just a chain reaction?

MR. KIRBY:  I don’t know the answer to that.  I don’t.  But I can tell you we’re working hard to triangulate all of these sightings.  And as I said, of the 5,000 that the FBI took in, and the local law enforcement, there were about 100 that were deemed — that required, I should say, to follow up on. 

So, I don’t know.  I can’t explain the number of sightings.  Many of them are duplicative.  In other words, you might get, like — this is an example, not — a hypothetical example — but you might get 10 sightings of a single aircraft.  So that counts as 10 sightings, but it may only be one aircraft.  So, as this has become a story locally and certainly through the media, more and more people are looking skyward, and more and more people are seeing things, and more and more people are calling them in and taking video of them.  But in a lot of instances, it turns out to be the same thing seen by multiple people.  But I just can’t explain.  I don’t know.

But your question, I think, gets to why I made those comments at the beginning: to remind people of the sheer size and scope of unmanned aerial systems that are flying legally and lawfully every day over this country.  And again, it’s to our benefit, commercially and even from a public safety and law enforcement perspective.  So, that there are lots of drones in the sky I think is without dispute, and that the vast, vast majority of them are doing good things for people on the ground also should not be in dispute. 

As for the issue of Bedminster, it is already designated as restricted air space, so it is unlawful to fly in that space, with or without it being a manned aircraft, without the FAA’s approval.  So it’s already restricted.  I can’t speak to the President-elect’s travel or what he’s decided to do or where he’s decided to go, but I think it’s important to remember that it is already restricted airspace.

MODERATOR:  Thank you.  Our next question will go to Nadia.

Q    Thank you.  I have a couple of questions.  First, the mother of Austin Tice has sent a letter to Prime Minister Netanyahu, asking him to hold Israeli strikes outside of Damascus because she believes that Austin Tice might be held in a jail there.  Do you think that Israeli strikes might affect his chances of being found alive?  And I have another question.

MR. KIRBY:  I really don’t have anything for you on that one, Nadia.  That’s a — you know, I think that’s a question better put to the Tice family and to the IDF. 

I would just tell you that we continue to work very, very hard to try to find out where Austin is, how Austin is, and stemming from that information, what we can do to try to get him home.  And sadly, regrettably, I just don’t have additional detail to provide for you on that today.  We’re still working this very, very hard. 

Q    Okay.  Also, the President-elect Trump said today that Turkey holds all the keys to what’s happening in Syria.  In fact, he’s insinuating that Turkey is a major player of what’s taken on unfolding events in Syria, and he praised President Erdoğan as a smart guy.  What’s your assessment of Turkey’s role on what we have seen so far in the fall of the Bashar al-Assad regime?

MR. KIRBY:  There’s no question that the Turks are significant players here in whatever the outcome in Syria is going to be, as they have been over the course of the last 14 years.  And that’s why Secretary Blinken went to Turkey last week.  It’s why we continue to have conversations with them at all different levels about what they’re doing, what their concerns are.

As I have said in the past, they have legitimate concerns with a terrorist threat along that border with Syria.  Turkish citizens have fallen victim to terrorist activities there.  You can’t very well blame the Turks for being concerned about that threat. 

On the other hand, we have a relationship with the Syrian Democratic Forces to go after ISIS.  We want to keep that focus of them and us, and so we have certainly talked about our concerns with respect to that mission set as it relates to Turkey’s military operations on the other side of that border. 

And if there’s a need — as there’s a need to deconflict and to work through some of those overlapping concerns, well, we’ll do that because Turkey is, as you rightly said, a NATO Ally. 

So they have had, and legitimately so, have had a large interest in what’s going on in Syria.  We recognize that.  We also recognize that sometimes their goals aren’t exactly the same as ours, and so we talk to them about that, and we’ll continue to do so.

MODERATOR:  Thank you.  Our next question will go to Alex with the Wall Street Journal.

Q    Thanks so much.  Real quickly — Kirby, I noticed you said that this assessment is coming from law enforcement.  Just checking if any intelligence agencies, or especially military intel, is part of what went into this assessment, knowing that some of the drones went over Langley and Wright-Patt.

And just trying to get a sense of, you know, how did the administration work to get this info.  You mentioned, you know, you didn’t have it before.  Now you do.  Sort of what went into this?  Is this like — you know, were there a bunch of meetings?  Did FBI send a bunch of folks out?  Can you just give us some detail on how you’ve gotten to this point now in the assessment? Thanks. 

MR. KIRBY:  I kind of already did, Alex.  I said we surged resources, detection capabilities.  We surged personnel, including visual observers, from federal agencies, predominantly DHS.  The military, the Defense Department has surged some additional detection capabilities, certainly with respect to Naval Weapons Station Earle and Picatinny Arsenal. 

So, the assessment I was able to offer today was really the result of the collective action of all of these efforts, including continued work by local law enforcement and state officials. 

The work continues.  This is our assessment to date.  We will continue to look at this as hard as we can.  But it is really the result of an influx of resources and personnel applied to this particular problem set. 

I think the Pentagon already spoke to Wright-Patterson.  There was no — as I understand it, no disruption of operations.  I think some of the original reporting out of there was lacking some context that I think the Pentagon added to and provided. 

And, look, on intelligence, I would just say that this is a true interagency effort, and we’re all working really hard to apply the right resources to the problem set and to be as open and transparent with people as we can be.  And I think I best leave it at that.

Again, I want to foot-stomp what I said earlier.  It’s important for people to understand the ecosystem of drones over the skies of the United States.  I mean, there’s a lot of activity.  And again, the vast, vast, vast majority of it is legal and lawful.  And we believe — again, to date, our assessment is that the sightings thus far have been of that ilk.  But we’ll continue to keep looking.

MODERATOR:  Thank you.  We have time for one more question, and we’ll go to Robin Wright.

Q    Thank you, John.  Can I take you further afield to Syria and ask you: Has there been any more contact between the United States and HTS?

And secondly, can you give us a sense of what Iran is doing in Syria?  The head of the IRGC said that there have been evacuations of 4,000 citizens from Iran.  Do you have a sense of what Iran is doing in the aftermath of Assad’s demise or what it’s planning to do?  Thank you.

MR. KIRBY:  I can tell you, on HTS, as Secretary Blinken indicated, we have been in direct contact with HTS, as we have been with other groups.  We also have indirect ways of communicating with all those groups as well, and we’re pulling on all those levers to make sure that we can very closely monitor this transition to what we hope will be — well, we hope it will be a peaceful transition, but to a stable, secure, sovereign Syria that meets the aspirations of its people. 

But I don’t have any additional or specifics about conversations with HTS, except to reiterate what Secretary Blinken said.  We have been in touch with them and I suspect we will be going forward. 

I also think, Robin, you shouldn’t — no one should expect that we’re going to get into a detailed readout of every single conversation that we have with every rebel group or opposition leader as it unfolds.  I wouldn’t expect that you’re going to see that. 

And as for Iran, you know, I would be lying to you if I said we had, you know, perfect visibility on everything that Iranian leaders are doing or deciding when it comes to Syria.  I can go so far as to say we certainly have seen indications that the Iranians are pulling people and resources out of Syria.  That is true.  But at what scale and on what timeline, it’s difficult for us to be very granular on that.  We just don’t have perfect visibility.  But it’s clear to us that they certainly weren’t willing or able to come to Assad’s rescue.  And in the aftermath of his departure, it’s clear to us that they are reevaluating, I think is the best way to put it, their presence in Syria and have already started to move some people and some resources out. 

That’s really as far as I can go.

MODERATOR:  Thank you.  And thank you, everyone, for joining us today.  As always, if we weren’t able to get to you, please reach out to the NSC press distro, and we’ll get back to you as soon as we can.  Thanks all.

5:24 P.M. EST

The post On-the-Record Press Gaggle by White House National Security Communications Advisor John Kirby appeared first on The White House.

Willard Hotel
Washington, D.C.

6:06 P.M. EST

THE VICE PRESIDENT:  Good evening, everyone.  (Applause.)  Good evening.  Good evening.  Good evening.  Happy Holidays.  And thank you all for what you are, what you have done, what you will do. 

Dr. Jill Biden, let me just say, it has been an extraordinary four years, as you have said.  And the work that we have done together — the four of us — I wish some of you were privy to seeing just, you know, before we come on stage when we’re hanging out in the back, or just those long nights when we’re talking about what we want to get done, the challenges we face, but our commitment to seeing it through.

And I’ll say about Jill Biden something that probably most of you know: She’s a tough cookie — (laughter) — who cares so deeply.  You know, Jill is tough.  She has a tough exterior.  She has one of the biggest hearts of anybody I know.  (Applause.)

She cares about the people.  The way she talks, for example, about her students, the way she talks about people who are often overlooked, are just not thought of in any way that they should be, that’s who Jill is.  And so, Jill, it’s been an extraordinary experience to work with you, and our friendship is lifelong, as you know, and I love you.  Thank you.  (Applause.)  Thank you. 

And can we hear it again for the first second gentleman of the United States — (applause) — also known as my Dougie.  (Laughter.) 

It is so good to be here with everyone this evening, including Chair Jaime Harrison, Finance Chair Chris Korge, and so many others.  (Applause.)

And we are here tonight to thank you all for the work that you have done.  And it has been tireless work. 

When it mattered most, through the entire campaign, including those 107 days, you all rallied.  You rallied.  You opened your homes.  You reached out to your friends and your family. 

You put your personal capital — and by that, I mean your relationships — at stake to talk with people because you care so deeply, and you connected with people and took the time to remind them of what is at stake and what was at stake. 

You sacrificed an extraordinary amount of time not doing other priorities in your life to focus on this campaign and, by extension, to focus on our country and its future. 

With your help, we brought together people from every walk of life and every background, all united by a deep love of country, all motivated by enthusiasm and joy in our fight for America’s future. 

And as a result of your leadership and your support, the National Finance Committee held more than 700 events across the country and raised nearly $700 million — (applause) — an historic achievement, which without a doubt made our campaign stronger. 

So, I thank you again for all you have done.  And I ask that — everyone here that you hold onto and know in your heart and in your spirit that everything you did made a difference and mattered and has impact that is lasting. 

All the work you did to bring these resources together allowed us to do rallies where people from every walk of life would come and they would look around and see that we are one community of people called Americans.  They would look and they would see people they had never met before and feel a sense of their own power in knowing that they are not alone and that we are all in this together. 

You gave people and allowed them to have that feeling, and that can’t be taken away. 

And as we look to the future, we will continue then to rely on your support to make sure our party can continue to do that kind of work, which is about being on the ground, being where the people are, going to them to organize and mobilize and remind people of the power of their voice. 

So, look, the holiday season is one of my favorite times of year — that and my birthday — (laughter) — and our — and our wedding anniversary, of course.  (Laughter.)  Just going to keep digging this hole deeper and deeper.  (Laughter.)

But it’s a time of gratitude and a time of celebration.  And so, it is so important this holiday season to remember we all have so much to celebrate. 

We have a country we love.  We have ideals that we’re very clear about in terms of their importance and the importance of us fighting for those ideals.  And we have each other.  And our work is about being intentional about building community.  Our work is about being intentional about building coalitions.  Our work is fueled by our knowledge that the vast majority of us have so much more in common than what separates us. 

We, who understand that we are all in this together.  We, who, as I like to say, look in the face of a stranger and see a neighbor.  That’s how we do our work.  And we, who know that the true measure of the strength of a leader is not based on who you beat down, it’s based on who you lift up.  (Applause.) 

And that spirit — the spirit with which we do our work — and hear me when I say this — that spirit that fuels the countless hours and days and months of work that you have put into this, that spirit can never be defeated.  Our spirit is not defeated.  We are not defeated.  Let’s be clear about that. 

We are strong.  We are clear about why we are in this.  And because you’re here right now, I say, again, thank you, because not only are you clear about all of that, you’re willing to put in the hard work.  And that work must continue.

We cannot let any circumstance or situation or individual ever take away our power to know why we do what we do and our ability to then get that work done.  And especially because we know what we stand for, and that’s why we know what to fight for. 

We here believe in the promise of America.  We believe in the promise of freedom, of justice, of opportunity and dignity not just so- — for some but for all. 

We know that fighting for the promise of America takes hard work — now, you all can help me finish this; many of you have heard me say it — but we like hard work.  Hard work is good work.  Hard work is joyful work.

And in the new year, we will continue our work with hope, with determination, and with joy. 

So, I’ll close by saying, this holiday season, like any time of the year, let us really be conscious of all the blessings we have.  Let us celebrate the blessings we have.  Let us celebrate in advance the blessings we have yet to create. 

And let us always remember our country is worth fighting for and our spirit will not be defeated.

And I promise you, I will be with you every step of the way.  Thank you.  (Applause.)

And with that, it is my great honor to introduce an incredible leader, who I have had the great blessing and honor and joy of working with for the last four years — spending time with this leader, be it in the Oval Office, the Situation Room, or just sitting around talking about, “Hey, I think we can get this Inflation Reduction Act done.  I think that actually people want a CHIPS and Science Act, and we can get it done.  I think that even though there have been, you know, about 150 years b- — since there’s been a real upgrade on America’s infrastructure, I think we can get it done.  Think we can get done bipartisan work around smart gun safety laws.” 

And I’m going to tell you something about Joe Biden.  He is relentless.  He never gives up.  He cares so deeply about the American people.  And he spends full time in all these places that I just mentioned, including on the world stage, fighting for the American people and fighting for our strength, the respect which we are due, our honor, and our ability to have vision that actually benefits people around the world.  And, most importantly, he is a dear friend to Doug and me and our family. 

I bring you our president, Joe Biden.  (Applause.) 

THE PRESIDENT:  Hello, hello, hello.  (Applause.) 

Hello, DNC.  (Applause.)

I want to thank Jaime Harrison for his leadership as chairman. 

There was a congressman down there in his state that called me one day.  He said, “Joe, you’re going to have to decide on a chairman.  Let me tell you who it is.”  (Laughs.)  I said, “Sure.  Whatever you say.”  (Laughter.)  Anyway, it turned out that, Jaime, you’ve done a hell of a job. 

And, you know, the fact is that when we started off — as you’ve heard me say many times, I didn’t plan on running again and — because things had changed in my life.  And — but I got a call from Chris Korge and — and others saying, “You know, we ought to do this.  There’s a lot at stake.” 

I spent my — I know I — you’ve heard me say it, but I know I only look like I’m 40, but — (laughter) — but I’ve been around a long time.  And there’s one advantage of having been the oldest president in American history: I’ve gotten to know virtually every world leader in the last 50 years. 

I know them pretty well.  And what I realized — and more intensely than I ever did before — that we are the essential country.  That’s not hyperbole.  It’s not about what we want to be. 

Ask yourself the question: If we don’t lead the world, who does?  Not a joke.  Who does?  Who leads if we don’t? 

And when I decided to run, it was so we — I thought we could win.  I determined I was going to have a c- — a — a — an administration that looked like America, representing every aspect of America.  And we’ve kept that commitment.  I don’t think anybody is going to be able to turn that around. 

And thanks to all of you for your support to the DNC.  Jill and I, Kamala and Doug could never have gotten to the White House without you.  And that’s not — again, not hyperbole.  We never could have gotten as much done as we did without you. 

You not only contributed to campaigns, but you were — you did something I think even more important.  You’re willing to lend your names, your reputations, and your character to the effort.  You signed that check, you knew what you were doing.  You were putting yourself on the line.  And we’re forever grateful for your character. 

The one thing I’ve always believed about public service, and especially about the presidency, is the importance of asking yourself: Have we left the country in better shape than we found it?

Today, I can say, without — with every fiber of my being, of all my heart, the answer to that question is a resounding yes — yes — (applause) — because of all of you assembled here.

We can be proud we’re leaving America in a better place today than when we came here four years ago. 

This country was living through the worst pandemic the country had seen in a hundred years.  Our economy was in a tailspin.  Millions of people were out of work.  Businesses were being shuttered.  Schools were closed.  And there was no plan for going forward.  Just two weeks before being sworn in, we had just witnessed something we thought would never happen in America: a violent insurrection, encouraged by the man sitting in the White House, on January the 6th.  And so much more.

We’ve come a long way since then.  We passed histor- — historic legislation — laws that literally — are literally building the strongest economy in the world.  There’s not a world leader you can name for me who d- — hasn’t told me at these G7, G20 meeting — all these meetings I meet with them — they wouldn’t trade place with us in a heartbeat.  Laws that, when fully implemented, are going to change America for decades to come. 

But we did know that many of the laws we passed were so consequential it wouldn’t be implemented right away.  It takes time to build those fabs, the factories for chips.  It takes time to get this construction going. 

Over $1.4 trillion in infrastructure — $1 trillion so far in private sector investments in America; the biggest investment ever in climate in the history of the world; and fundamentally transforming our economy to grow from the middle out and the bottom up, not just the top down. 

I fully believe that America is better positioned, because of all of you, to lead the world today than any point in the last 50 years of my career. 

That’s because of you.  Again, not hyperbole.  You lend your reputations, your names to this effort.  It’s not just the contributions you’ve made.  It’s just stepping up, putting yourself on the line.

You should be so damn proud of the work we’ve done together.  You should never forget all you’ve done for the country. 

I’m also proud that we can say we’ve done all this with a deep belief in the core values of America.  Those values are — were all created — I — you’ve heard me say it a hundred times.  You know, we’re the most unique nation in the world.  Every other nation was based on geography, religion, ethnicity, some common factor.  But in America, we were built on an idea — an idea — an idea — the only country in the world. 

We hold these truths — self-evident that all men and women are created equal.  Everyone should have a fair shot.  Hate should never have a safe harbor in America.  That’s what we’re about. 

We’ve never fully lived up to all of that, but we’ve never — we’ve — we’ve stuck with our principles and set a high standard of character, integrity in public life. 

Let me say, it’s been the honor of my life to serve as your president, but the title I’m most proud of is being Jill’s husband.  (Laughter and applause.)  No —

I know it’s well-known by now: I had to ask her five times.  Thank God, she said yes the fifth time.  (Laughter.)  But I think she’s been one of our greatest first ladies, and I mean that sincerely.  (Applause.)

She wasn’t kidding about the first speeches she made.  She was scared to death to go out and make those speeches.  But look at her now — whoa.  (Laughter.) 

Yo, I’m in trouble.  (The president makes the sign of the cross.)  (Laughter.) 

Well, look, it’s also been an incredible honor to serve with someone of immense character that she demonstrated through her entire career: Kamala Harris.  (Applause.) 

I knew what I was doing when I asked her to be my vice president.  I knew her.  I knew of her.  I knew about her.  I knew her record.  I trusted her.  She always served this country with purpose and integrity, and she always will. 

And you’re not going anywhere, kid, because we’re not going to let you go.  (Laughter and applause.)  You’re not going anywhere. 

You know, just as our great first second gentleman — (laughs) — I love that, “first second gentleman.”  (Laughter.)  This guy is one of the best lawyers in America.  This guy gave up a pra- — this — this guy is an incredible guy. 

And one thing we have in common — I used to practice the law for about 10 days, but I used to practice the law — (laughter) — and — but the thing Doug and I have in common: We both married way above our station.  (Laughter and applause.)

Thank you, Doug and Kamala, not only for your service, but Jill and I are grateful to call you dear friends. 

Look, let me close with this.  While our time in office is coming to an end, the America of our dreams is calling us to stay engaged.  We’re not — Jill and I — and I don’t think Kamala and — and Doug are — going anywhere.  We look to the future. 

It’s more important than ever to keep organizing, to keep talking to folks. 

We all get knocked down.  My dad would say, “When you get knocked down, you just got to get up.  Get up.” 

The measure of a person or a party is how fast they get back up, and to know what we believe in is really worth fighting for. 

That’s the road ahead: to never give up, to keep the faith, to know — to know that what we’re doing matters. 

I know.  I know I’m going to stay engaged.  I know Kamala and Jill and Doug are going to well — as well. 

And I know you will.  We need you, badly.  The country needs you, badly. 

We just have to remember — you’ve heard me say it a thousand times — remember who we are.  We’re the United States of America, for God’s sake. 

At — many of you are students of history.  No other nation in the world has come through every crisis stronger than they went into the crisis, and that — except the United States.

And, folks, look, all the things we passed — we knew people weren’t going to see it.  How long does it take to build a fab that’s going to h- — hire thousands of people?  Billions of dollars being invested.  It just takes time to get it built.  It takes time to get it going.  It’s not going to happen for another five, six months, in many places.  It’s just getting started. 

The United States of America — there’s nothing beyond our capacity when we do it together.  But we knew a lot of this was going to take time.  But look what’s out there: everything from the —

Anyway, I won’t get — I’ll get going.  (Laughter.)  But you really did a hell of a job.  I really mean it. 

And the thing I most admire about working with all of you: You have great integrity — great integrity.  You’ve stuck with the deal.  You’ve been honest.  You’ve been decent. 

We’ve run a — we ran a campaign that’s basically scandal-free.  That’s hard to do in American politics these days. 

Anyway, I just want to thank you very much from the bottom of my heart. 

The bad news for you all is I ain’t going nowhere.  (Laughter and applause.)  We’re going to stay engaged.

And having been listed the poorest man in Congress for 36 years, I may be able to actually contribute now.  (Laughter.)

But all kidding aside, thank you very, very much.  You’re — you’re a group of the most decent people.  (Applause.)

God bless you all. 

Thank you, thank you, thank you.  (Applause.)

 6:28 P.M. EST

The post Remarks by President Biden and Vice President Harris at the Democratic National Committee’s Holiday Reception appeared first on The White House.

The White House

Thank you, Lieutenant General Anderson. Joe and I are so grateful to you and Lieutenant General Laster for your decades of service and leadership. Both of you have built inspiring careers guiding troops and giving back to our communities alongside your amazing Toys for Tots team.

To the senior spouses who are with us today: through your care and resolve, you lift up all of our military families. Your service doesn’t go unnoticed by the Commander-in-Chief. Thank you.

Welcome to the White House!

The festive music we’ve heard today is performed by the President’s Own Marine Band. Joe and I are grateful to them and to their families for their service, and for filling the White House with talent and grace.

Each year, we decorate this house for the holidays—and I’m so glad that all of you can be part of the magic.

Did you see the gingerbread house in the State Dining Room?

This season can be filled with excitement and wonder—with colorful lights and hot chocolate and presents. But if you only remember one thing from the holidays, after all the wrapping paper is cleaned up, let it be this: you are loved.

There are so many people who care about you—from your family and friends, to your teachers and classmates, to the President and me.

And the best thing we can do with that love is to let it overflow—to share it with others who might really need it.

I know that you already do this in so many ways: by caring for your siblings and cousins, by being a friend to a kid at school who feels lonely, and you’re doing it today, by helping more children experience the joy of the holidays.

You’re also part of a special group of kids who help everyone in our nation, through your families’ military service.

And I want to thank your parents—for your dedication to this country, for raising such wonderful kids, and for bringing delight to children across the nation who will have these gifts under their tree this year.

The President and I are grateful, and we’re honored to open the White House to all of you.

Merry Christmas and happy holidays.

And now, let’s get to sorting!

###

The post Remarks as Prepared for Delivery by First Lady Jill Biden at a Toys for Tots Event with Military Families appeared first on The White House.

Tel Aviv, Israel

5:23 P.M. IST

MR. SULLIVAN:  Good afternoon, everyone.  I want to start by taking a moment to reflect on the last year and take stock of where we are.  This is my seventh time visiting Israel as National Security Advisor.  I was here on October 18th of last year when I joined President Biden to send a strong signal of support to the Israeli people following the horrific terrorist massacres by Hamas on October 7th.

President Biden believed at the time it was important to come to Israel shortly after those attacks, becoming the first American President to visit Israel in a time of war, because he wanted the people of Israel and also the people of the world to see that the United States would stand with Israel in its time of need. 

A year after that trip, I was with the President in the Situation Room, where, for the second time in a period of five months, President Biden ordered the U.S. military to take direct action to defend Israel from a significant attack launched by Iran.  Side by side, U.S. Naval destroyers joined Israeli air defense to intercept a rainfall of inbound missiles, ballistic missiles fired directly from Iran. 

Over the past 15 months, we’ve remained vigilant to the further threats and attacks from Iran and its proxies, including Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis. 

People seem to forget the basic fact of this conflict and these past 15 months: Israel did not seek or start this war.  Hamas started this war, invading Israel in military formations, killing 1,200 people, kidnapping and holding hostage hundreds more — Israeli citizens and citizens from around the world. 

Iran then made a fateful choice to join in and open a multifront war against Israel.  Backed by the ironclad security partnership with the United States, Israel has defeated two direct attacks from Iran and directly struck into Iran in response, degrading Iran’s military capability.

Hezbollah’s leaders are gone, and we have concluded a ceasefire in Lebanon, the terms of which made clear that Hezbollah can never again rebuild its terror infrastructure to threaten Israel. 

Hamas’s leaders are gone, including the masterminds of October 7th, and we will make sure that Hamas can never again threaten Israel as they did on October 7th, ever.

And now, the Assad regime in Syria is gone, removing the primary client state of Iran in the region and the lifeline to Hezbollah.

When Joe Biden said to those who seek to take advantage of October 7th and to use that tragic day to threaten and attack Israel, “Don’t,” this is what he meant, and we still mean it.  Don’t. 

The balance of power in the Middle East has changed significantly and not in the way that Sinwar or Nasrallah or Iran had planned. 

We are now faced with a dramatically reshaped Middle East in which Israel is stronger, Iran is weaker, its proxies decimated, and a ceasefire that is new and will be lasting in Lebanon that ensures Israel’s security over the long term. 

The purpose of my visit today has been to continue to build on this progress to ensure that that ceasefire sticks and is fully enforced; to capitalize on the opportunity of the fall of Assad for a better future for the people of Syria while vigilantly managing the risks that come with the change in Syria, including the possibility and the risk that terrorist groups like ISIS are able to take advantage and create new threats against the United States, Israel, and other countries in the region and around the world; to continue pressure on Iran while remaining vigilant against the continuing threat from Iran, including the threat from its nuclear program.  And President Biden remains committed to the simple proposition that the United States of America will never permit Iran to acquire a nuclear weapon.

And to build on all that we’ve done, we’re now looking to close a hostage release deal and a ceasefire, which would stop the war and reunite hostages with their families. 

Just over one year ago, we reached a deal that brought 78 hostages out of Gaza and home to their families.  It’s time to finish the job and bring all of the hostages home. 

Before departing Washington, I once again met with the families of the American hostages still held in Gaza.  I made a commitment to them, the same commitment that I’ve made every time I’ve met with them: that I will do everything in my power to try to bring their loved ones home, to do my best to help them see their loved ones again.  I had them in mind today when I met with Prime Minister Netanyahu, Minister Dermer, and the security team to try to bring us closer to a deal.  And from here, I plan to travel to Doha and then on to Cairo to continue to advance this effort. 

A ceasefire and hostage deal would start bringing those hostages home.  It would also allow for a massive surge in humanitarian assistance.  We discussed the humanitarian situation and the suffering of Palestinian civilians in Gaza today.  We discussed recent steps taken to increase the flow of much-needed assistance and further steps that need to be taken in the days ahead. 

It is an American commandment and a Jewish commandment that every innocent life has value.  I have previously quoted a poem that means a great deal to my family, a poem from John Donne, which says, “Any man’s death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind.”  That is the spirit that the United States has brought to this conflict — to stand up strongly in the defense of the State of Israel and try to reduce suffering of innocent people wherever they may be. 

We are now in the midst of a political transition.  I have been engaging my successor, the incoming National Security Advisor, in a professional and serious way on all of the issues that affect the State of Israel, the threats and the opportunities.  And we’ve had good discussions, constructive and substantive discussions, and those will continue to ensure that there is a smooth handoff on January 20th. 

There’s also something else important in those discussions, which is that it is my personal commitment to ensure that the U.S.-Israel partnership rests on a solid bipartisan foundation going forward.  And I’m going to continue to do everything I can to contribute to that, because I believe it is in my country’s interest and the interest of the State of Israel. 

So, thank you for bearing with me as I set the context for my visit today, report on some of the things we discussed and the current events, and I will be happy to take your questions. 

Yeah.

Q    Michelle Kelemen with NPR.

MR. SULLIVAN:  Hi, Michelle.

Q    Do you get the sense that Netanyahu is waiting for Trump to reach a hostage deal?  And if so, do you think the hostages can survive until then?

MR. SULLIVAN:  I believe that every day brings increasing risk, which is why there’s such urgency to try to get this deal.  Obviously, we’ve seen the tragic death of hostages since the massacres of October 7th and over the course of the past 15-months conflict. 

So as soon as we can close this deal, we should close this deal in the interest of bringing those hostages home. 

The answer to your first question is: No, I do not get that sense.  I got the sense today from the Prime Minister he’s ready to do a deal.  And when I go to Doha and Cairo, my goal will be to put us in a position to be able to close this deal this month, not later. 

Now, we’ve been close before and haven’t gotten there, so I can’t make any promises or predictions to you, but I wouldn’t be here today if I thought this thing was just waiting until after January 20th.  I am here today because I believe every day matters, and we are going to use every day we have to try to close the deal as soon as we possibly can.

Yeah.

Q    Thanks, Jake.  Jake, what new concessions have Israel and Hamas made or indicated that they are prepared to make? We’ve seen, in particular, reports that Hamas is willing to allow Israeli troops to remain along Netzarim and Philadelphi for longer than previously.  Can you confirm that Hamas has provided a list of hostages who they would release?

And then, just on Syria as well, if you could comment.  The Israeli military has conducted nearly 500 strikes in recent days on Syrian military assets, not only chemical weapons depots but also missiles, helicopters, things that presumably a new Syrian army would need in the future to maintain stability inside of Syria.  Are you at all concerned about the impact of those Israeli strikes?  And did the Prime Minister provide you with any assurances about how long these strikes will continue for, if indeed they will?

MR. SULLIVAN:  So, on your first question, I’m sorry to disappoint you, but I can’t negotiate in public on the terms of the hostage deal.  I’ll leave the details where they belong, which is behind closed doors among the parties and the mediators.  And as soon as we come to something that is an agreed document to bring forward, we will bring it forward and you can see all of its terms. 

With respect to Syria, what Israel is doing is trying to identify potential threats, both conventional and weapons of mass destruction, that could threaten Israel and, frankly, threaten others as well, and neutralize those threats.  That is part of its effort to protect the country in the midst of a very fluid situation.

We are in deep consultations with the Israeli government about where this goes from here, what that will look like in the days and weeks ahead.  I’m going to leave it at that for now.  But the efforts taken to date really have been focused on the types of capabilities that could represent a genuine threat to the State of Israel. 

Yeah. 

Q    Hi.  Thank you so much.  Owen Alterman from i24NEWS. Two questions that are related. 

First of all, we’ve seen reports in the last few days of American-backed Kurdish troops that have been shooting at and been shot by Turkish-backed troops in northeastern Syria.  What are the red lines of Turkish involvement in that part of the country from the perspective of the administration?

And the second question: There’s concern in Israel that Turkish activity in Syria could ultimately, in the medium term even, be hostile to us and be hostile activities up to and including on our border.  What kind of assurances can you give the Israeli public that that scenario won’t materialize?

MR. SULLIVAN:  So, first, our commitment to our partnership with the Syrian Kurds, especially the Syrian Democratic Forces, is deep and resolute.  And that commitment exists because we are in a partnership with them to fight ISIS.  And they have been very capable counterterrorism partners not just in suppressing the threat from ISIS, but also in holding ISIS terrorists in large numbers in detention facilities in eastern Syria.  And we want to make sure that that ongoing work is not disturbed. 

Second, our own commitment to the continued defeat — work to defeat ISIS has just been renewed in a quite vigorous way over the weekend with a series of strikes on ISIS personnel and facilities in the central Syrian Desert, dozens and dozens of targets that we hit with real, intense American capability, B-52s.  And what we are saying with that strike is we are going to continue to hit any ISIS threat where we find it, and we’re going to work with our partners to do so. 

I have learned, maybe both the easy way and the hard way, not to speak about red lines in this part of the world publicly, so I do not intend to do so from this podium.  But I do want to just make the point that we are engaged both in consultations with our Kurdish partners.  In fact, General Kurilla was just recently very deeply in conversation with our Kurdish partners.  And we are in conversations with Turkey as well about our expectations and about what we see as the best way forward. 

I think those conversations are serious, they’re intense, they’re ongoing.  They have already produced some results, including this de-escalation around Manbij that both Turkey and the Kurds have kind of informally signed up to.  All of that is tenuous.  It is fragile.  It is something that is going to require ongoing work and cultivation, and it is something that we will be very vigilant to as a top priority going forward.  But beyond that, I cannot comment further today.

Q    What about assurances did Israel (inaudible) about Turkish activity in Syria (inaudible)?

MR. SULLIVAN:  So, we look at the situation in Syria as having a range of different risks presented, including the potential for fracture in that state, as well as power vacuums that can give rise to terrorist groups that can threaten beyond borders, as well as the potential for groups to be in charge in Damascus who bear hostile intent to outside forces, including to neighbors like Israel. 

All of those are possibilities.  All of those are risks that President Biden has spoken to publicly and that we are dealing with partners on privately, including dealing with the Turks, who do have some measure of influence here, and where we have set out our views and expectations. 

But again, given the nature of the situation, given the sensitivity, given the urgency, it’s important, I think, for us to be able to carry out those conversations behind closed doors as we make progress, and then we will share with you the results. 

Yeah.

Q    Jake, Raf Sanchez from NBC News.  I know you’re not going to negotiate in public here, but there does seem to be more flexibility from both Israel and Hamas right now.  What do you attribute that to?  Is it the killing of Sinwar?  Is it the weakening of Hezbollah?  Is it President-elect Trump injecting urgency into this?

And just on Syria, the Israeli government is saying its presence in the buffer zone and outside of it, inside Syria itself, is temporary.  Do you believe them that it’s temporary?  Did the Prime Minister give you a sense of what conditions would need to be met before Israel would withdraw?

MR. SULLIVAN:  We didn’t go into deep detail on the conditions, other than to say that those conditions would require Israel to feel that the kinds of understandings that were in place before the fall of the Assad regime to ensure stability, predictability, and security for Israel are put back into place. 

And, yes, we do have every expectation that it will be temporary.  The Prime Minister, the Israeli government have made that point not just to the United States, but have made that point publicly, and we take them at their word that that is the intention here as we work through a new arrangement that can ensure that Israel is secure in light of the risks that have been laid out in previous questions. 

There are any number of reasons for why contexts change in negotiations, especially in a situation as fluid as this, but I would point out that Hamas’s posture at the negotiating table did adapt following the announcement of the ceasefire between Israel and Lebanon.  Why is that?  It’s because, for months, we believe Hamas was waiting for lots of other actors and forces to come to their rescue, to come to their aid.  And when we got that ceasefire, it was clear that the northern front had been decoupled from Gaza.  And from that moment forward, we’ve had a different character to the negotiation, and we believe that it puts us in a position to be able to close this negotiation. 

It is also, of course, relevant that Israel’s ability to meet so many of its military objectives in Gaza is relevant to the negotiation too, including the elimination of the top leader, Sinwar; other authors of that October 7th massacre; and the dismantlement, the destruction of the organized military formations of Hamas. 

So these are relevant considerations that we think have put this onto a plane where it could get done.  Whether it does get done still depends on both sides ultimately signing on the proverbial dotted line. 

The last thing I will say with respect to the incoming administration is, actually, we’ve had, as I said in my opening comments, very good consultation and coordination with them, including on this issue, where we keep them apprised of how the negotiations are unfolding.  We talk to them about how we can send a common message that the United States, no matter who’s sitting in the Oval Office, no matter whose party is in charge, wants to see this ceasefire and hostage deal and see it now.  That is all part of the American contribution to an effort to ultimately produce an outcome here, and we’re going to keep working until we get it done. 

Yeah.

Q    Thank you, Mr. Sullivan.  (Inaudible), Channel 14.  Regarding the continuation of passage of humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip, knowing what we know now, that Hamas takes advantage of this aid and holds it as a leverage for its own rule, was it a mistake by your administration to push Israel to maintain the transport of humanitarian aid and, by that, to strengthen Hamas?

MR. SULLIVAN:  It absolutely was not a mistake for the United States to seek to ensure that women and children and innocent people in Gaza, who have nothing to do with this fight but who, in fact, are being put in harm’s way by the way Hamas fights — using schools and mosques as terror infrastructure, hiding behind civilians, making it that much more difficult for Israel to carry the fight against Hamas and destroy its capabilities — those people deserve the basic sustenance of life.  They deserve food, water, medicine, sanitation. 

And, by the way, that’s not just an American position; that’s a requirement under international humanitarian law.  And it is also the position of this Israeli government, who is not standing up saying we should give no humanitarian assistance to the people of Gaza.  They’re saying something different.

Now, we have viewed various critical points over the course of the past 15 months as moments where not enough was getting in to ensure that people had what they needed to survive.  And we made no bones about pressing on that.  Because we think, at the end of the day, feeding starving children does not harm the security of the State of Israel, but it does vindicate our common shared values of humanity. 

And so, as I said in my remarks, the American commandment, the Jewish commandment that every innocent life has value, that is a present factor and it’s something we have to take seriously, even as we take seriously that Israel has every right — indeed a duty — to go after its enemies with everything it’s got.  You have done that, and we have backed you in going after your enemies, Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iran itself.  We have helped defend you against attacks, including from Iran itself.  And we have also stood up to say: Let’s make sure that Israel is not responsible for the third famine of the 21st century. 

We think that that is the right way to pursue a principled and just and strong, robust policy, and we will continue to do that as long as we’re in office. 

Yeah. 

Q    (Inaudible) Jewish Insider.  Do you have any update on the three Americans who are still believed to be alive?

MR. SULLIVAN:  I only can tell you that we have received the tragic news about the passing of Gadi and Judi and Itay and Omer all on October 7th, and of course, the godawful killing of Hersh during the course of this conflict.

We believe the other three Americans are alive.  We don’t have a proof of life from such a short time ago that I can tell you that for certain, but we believe that they are.  And of course, we saw the video of Edan Alexander. 

So we are operating on the proposition that there are seven Americans being held in Gaza currently — three of them alive, four of them deceased — and we want to bring all seven of them home. 

Yeah.

Q    Thank you.  Itamar (inaudible) from (inaudible).  I wanted to ask you if there is a linkage between the hostage deal and the ceasefire deal and the normalization between Israel and Saudi Arabia.  Is it realistic to bring about a deal, a normalization deal, before January 20?

MR. SULLIVAN:  These are not linked.  The ceasefire and hostage deal is something we are pursuing on its own, because it is, we believe, a humanitarian imperative to bring the hostages home, and it is in the strategic interests of the State of Israel because all of its interests, its core interests, are protected in that deal.  We also believe it’s in the interest of the Palestinian people because it will allow for this surge in humanitarian assistance. 

So we are pushing for that deal on its own terms, for its own purposes, because we want to follow through on our commitment to do everything possible to get the hostages home.  So, there is no link there. 

Of course, we continue to believe in a long-term vision for the region of normalization and integration, and the President has laid that out.  And everything we do, we want to point in that direction.  But I don’t have any updates for you today on the question of normalization. 

Yeah.

Q    Thank you.  Gil Tamari, Channel 13 Israel.  I would like to follow up on one of my colleague’s questions.  The Prime Minister said today that Israel will continue to hold the territory in the buffer zone until there will be a governed force in Syria that will be able to oblige to the 1974 agreement.  And as you may know, this might take years.  So I would like to know if the United States is satisfied with the long-term Israeli position of — possession of the buffer zone. 

And also, is the G7 statement relay also to Israel when talking about the territory of Syria? 

And I know you cannot take us into the negotiation regarding the hostage, but can you give us the feeling?  What makes you this time a little bit more optimistic?  I know you hate to use the word “hopeful,” but what makes you this time a little bit more optimistic?

MR. SULLIVAN:  So, first, on the question of Israel’s move into that border zone in Syria: This is a fluid situation.  Fast-moving.  I would submit that everyone in this room, both sitting in these chairs and behind the cameras, was not thinking about the fall of Assad one month ago.  So that’s how fast things are moving. 

What Israel saw was an immediate threat, the collapse of a structure that had been in place for a long time and the potential for that vacuum to be filled by a direct, proximate threat right across its border.  So it moved in to fill that threat.  That, from the United States’ perspective, is logical and consistent with Israel’s right to self-defense. 

How this plays from here: We are a few days into this, so we will stay in close consultation with our Israeli partners, as well as with stakeholders in Syria, as well as with stakeholders across the region, and we will develop and elaborate a perspective on the best way forward in a coordinated way. 

And I just can’t sit here today and begin projecting out years into the future, given that just days ago, Assad still sat in Damascus. 

With respect to why there is more optimism in the air, shall we say, I think it’s partly for the reason that I laid out, which is: I do believe the ceasefire in Lebanon has generated a different context.  I actually believe that the loss of Iran’s client state in Syria has contributed to that different context.  Israel’s military progress against Hamas’s infrastructure formations and senior leaders has contributed to that context.  So, the surround sound of these negotiations is different today than it has been in the past. 

And then, the other point is that the people involved in these negotiations seem to me to have a little bit of a different feel about things than they did before.  That’s less measurable but I think still present.  And so —

Q    (Inaudible) not negotiating directly with Hamas.

MR. SULLIVAN:  No, I’m not referring to the Prime Minister.  I’m not referring to the Prime Minister. 

So those are the reasons why.  But, look, we have been in a place before where American officials have stood before podiums and said we are close, and we were close but we didn’t get there.  I believe we are close again.  Will we get there?  It is not yet clear whether we will or we won’t, but we are determined to try to drive this across the finish line. 

I’ll take two more questions.  Yeah. 

Q    So as we get ready — Maayan Hoffman from The Media Line.  As we get ready to, potentially, as you said, optimistically sign some kind of ceasefire or hostage deal, that would be, presumably, with Hamas.  And ultimately, the goal was to eradicate Hamas, to move them politically out of ruling Gaza.  As we sign the ceasefire, is there any indication or vision for Hamas continuing, therefore, to rule Gaza in some perspective, or do you have a vision of somebody else taking over in the interim?

MR. SULLIVAN:  So if you go back to President Biden’s speech in late May, laying out the terms of a phased ceasefire and hostage deal, the basic elements of and the basic framework of that deal are still live and part of the discussions that are happening today. 

In that speech, he said that this is a roadmap to end the war, and it’s a roadmap to a future of Gaza without Hamas in power.  Now, there’s a lot of steps between here and there, which is why a deal like this proceeds in phases.  But that has been the stated position of the United States government going back several months. 

Q    But is there any progress (inaudible)?

MR. SULLIVAN:  What I would just say is: The first thing that we need to do is get into the initial phase of the ceasefire and hostage deal; begin to produce the actual releases, the images of hostages being welcomed home to their families, as we saw a year ago with the 78 who were released.  And then, the terms of the deal are built on the idea that there will be ongoing discussions, diplomacy, negotiations to move from phase one to phase two.  So that’s an ongoing process that will continue. 

Final question.  Yeah.

Q    Thank you.  You have said before that you believe Prime Minister Netanyahu is willing to reach an agreement, and the defense minister has said yesterday it is possible; he told it to Secretary Austin.  How close are we?  And have you heard from Israeli officials that they will be willing to stop — to end the war if we will get all the hostages back?  And can you honestly say that, after 14 months, Prime Minister Netanyahu has done everything in his power to bring the hostages back home, and it’s not Hamas have been always the obstacle?

MR. SULLIVAN:  So I expected a question on kind of who’s responsible for this or for that, for the other thing.

I view my job and America’s duty as taking where we are today, which is close — I believe close — and bridging that final distance until we actually get into a deal. 

Again, I want to reinforce that we can’t rest until it actually happens.  It might not happen.  But I believe it can happen with political will on both sides.  The Israeli government has indicated, including the Prime Minister, they would like to see this done.  We see movement from Hamas.  We see commitment from the mediators.  And I will go to Doha and Cairo to try to ensure the final impetus is there to bring this all together. 

Beyond that, I’m not going to characterize the state of play, other than to say the reason that we are so determined to do this is, at one level, fundamentally human, which is to get people safely home to their families and to create calm for a period where suffering people in Gaza can get relief.  But it goes at another level, deeply strategic.  We think it is in the American strategic interest, as well as in the strategic interest of Israel, to do this deal.  That’s true of the current administration.  It is true of the incoming administration.  It is true across the aisle in the United States.  And that’s why we’re going to continue to work together to try to get this done. 

Thank you all very much.

5:53 P.M. IST

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