Washington Foreign Press Center Briefing on the “Elections 2020 – The Role of Federalism in the U.S. Electoral Process”
Transcript
Good morning, everybody. My name is Olga. Bash Bush. I am the acting deputy director of the Washington Foreign Press Center. I want to welcome you today for this on the record zoom briefing on the role of federalism in the US electoral process. This briefing is being live streamed on the Foreign Press Centre’s website, which is f p c dot state dot gov. We will produce a transcript and video after the briefing and post them on our website. If you publish a story as a result of this briefing, please share your story with us by sending an email to D. C F p C at ST dot gov. Just a couple of things to keep in mind. While using Zoom, we have muted all the participants. Please ensure that you have clicked on the participant list, hovered or over your account and changed your account. Reflect your name and news outlet. This will help us during the question and answer portion of the briefing. Our briefer, Mr Akram Elias, we’ll give short opening remarks. Then we will open it up for questions. If you have a question, please go to the chat box. There is a feature that allows you to virtually raise your hand. At that time, we will a mute you and turn on your video so that you can ask your question. And with that, I’m honored to deuce and to introduce Mr Akram Elias, co founder and president of Capital Communications Group Inc. Mr. El IUs has 35 plus years of professional experience in the field of international relations, public diplomacy, cultural intelligence, strategic language services and communications strategies. Mr. Elliott’s has a profound knowledge of the American system and structure of government. He will provide a brief history of the American form of federalism, put our system into context and explain how it affects Americans daily lives and, most importantly, their vote. Mr. Elliot is also a frequent briefer with the US Department of State’s International Visitor Leadership Program. A link to his impressive biography was included in the media advisory we sent you. And with that I will pass it on to Mr L IUs. Thank you for joining us today and helping us relaunch our US elections. 2020 programming. Mr. Elia’s. Thank you, old. I appreciate it. And good morning. Afternoon. Evening to all of you are joining us from around the world. It is indeed a great pleasure at an honor to be with you. And please feel free to call me Akram. That’s my first name. We tend to be less formal, quickly move to using first names, so feel free to do so when it comes to the Q and a part. I’d like to take a few moments in the beginning to share with you some some foundational concepts regarding how federalism operates in the United States and most importantly, how that impacts elections in this country being the 1st 1 fundamental thing I’d like to share with you. And I ask you kindly to keep it always in the back of your minds. The in the United States, there exists no national central government. This is fundamental to always keep in the back of your minds. So the U. S. Government is not a national central government. It is referred to in this country as being one thing and one thing only. It is a federal entity created by the States and the people’s off the states. And as you may know, we do have 50 states today in this country. So the U. S. Government is a federal entity created by the states and the peoples of the states originally 13 today, 50 in order to help the states manage the affairs off their union. So this is a union off states. And keep in mind that the states and the people’s off the state’s managed the affairs off their union through a Congress off states that is convened every two years in the federal capital of the United States. Washington D. C. So Congress is not a national parliament. There is no national parliament. For the United States, Congress in English means conference instead of being a Congress of Teachers, the Congress of Engineers, Congress of workers, off Farmers. This is a Congress of the United States Congress of States, so the states could meet through a congress to manage the affairs of their union. So this fundamental concept I kindly ask you again to keep it in the back of your minds as I proceed. And I’d like to share my screen with you using some slides to help me as I present to you, those fundamentals on at this stage. Let me go there on I want to see from you. If you are, at least somebody can tell me whether you see that first laid on the screen. We do Mr Elliot’s. It is on there. Perfect. So now I can move. So let me describe very quickly a little bit this non centralized system. So the U. S. Government is a federal entity. If you’re looking at your screen here on the left hand side, the U. S. Government is a federal entity created and managed by the States to enable the states to govern fundamentally for sovereign domains. I call these the sovereign powers off the U. S. Government. My sovereign. I mean, no state by itself can make laws or policies in any one of those sovereign areas. Thes sovereign policy areas must be governed. These are keywords must be governed by the 50 states always together, never separately and only federally meaning using U. S. Government or federal meaning institutions. And the four are in order of importance. First is the defense policy of the United States. That is the number one responsibility off the Congress of the state’s every two years. It is to establish policy and funding for the defense off their union. Second is monetary policy, not economic policy piece. Keep in mind when it comes to economic policy that is fundamentally managed at the state level monetary policy, meaning the governance of the common currency, the dollar. That is why we have a Federal Reserve that governs the dollar. But there is no federal Department of Economy, no federal Department of Planning, no federal department off industry, no federal Department of Development, because thes economic development arenas are fundamentally under state controls. The third fundamental sovereign power that the 50 states must govern always together, never separately and only federally is their foreign affairs. And by that I mean all types of formal relations that may exist between the Union of the States as one body is one entity and the rest of the world going out to the world or coming in from the world. So that includes, obviously, foreign policy, international trade agreements, things like immigration, border control. I actually excuse me duties, um, tariffs, etcetera, And the last sovereign domain is the regulation off trade or commerce between the 50 states. We So we call that interstate commerce we want tohave free trade within the Union And now, my dear friends, every other policy domain outsized these four sovereign areas. Okay, everything else Education, health care, economic development, internal security, energy it doesn’t matter. Everything else falls immediately automatically under the powers off the 50 states that comes now to right side of the screen. The state powers. And this is based on the 10th Amendment off the U. S. Constitution. The 10th Amendment is, in fact, Article 10 off what we call the bill off rights. So it basically says, As you can see, all powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution nor prohibited by the states are reserved directly to the States. So the states and the people of the States may decide to basically do other things together using the federal government. But what they must do first and foremost, is governed Those sovereign arena’s. Now, why do the States do share powers you? I’m sure you’ve heard about things like Obamacare. You’ve heard about education Every in fact, today I can tell you that the 50 states collaborate, cooperate federally in every policy domain you can imagine. So why do they do that? Why is that so important? And Now we look at the bottom part of the screen to the left hand side. He is one thing very important in this country, things like civil rights. You may recall the ugly history of the United States slavery, that horrible cancer that led to a civil war to extracted with the 600,000 Americans died between 18 61 and 65. Slavery was abolished. But even after that, the cancer basically metastasize, using here a medical expression and spread in a different form. We called it sank relegation, like apartheid in several parts off the states for another 99 years until 1964. Because civil rights are not one of the four sovereign domain areas, each state prior to 1964 basically legislated regulated civil rights on its own. So some states fought discrimination. Other stage states, institutionalized, legalized segregation, institutionalized discrimination on the basis of race. So in 1964 the Congress off the state’s past for girl civil rights law, U. S federal US civil rights law basically stating that we agree that there should be no discrimination on the basis of race, So civil rights legislation was adopted federally that means if you look now at the right side of the screen, the bottom part, right? So how do these states handle those rights? Those rights become minimum mandatory, so each state now can give more rights, can give additional rights, can give greater protections but can no longer lower those. So that is the new minimum threshold that is important to have the country move forward without centralization in an area such as individual rights. The second very important area for why they choose to collaborate federally is to provide minimum access to every citizen of this country across the 50 states. I’m giving as an example here the Americans with Disabilities Act. So the Americans with Disabilities act again. Each state regulated access. How do people with disability? Let’s say somebody on a wheelchair. What we’re really their minimum access to access public buildings, you know, office space, parking, bathrooms, etcetera. Well, in 1990 the 50 states, through their Congress, passed the Americans With Disabilities Act to basically say this is the minimum access that we agree to impose on ourselves. Each state that imposes it within its own territory. Again, states can now provide greater access but no longer lower access. And the third fundamental reason for federal collaboration is to establish minimum standers. Take, for example, the environment. You know, if we wanna have environmental protection, wanna have food safety? All these things fall under the domains of the 50 states. But shouldn’t there be some minimum standards of the 50 states constantly, Congress, after Congress, pass federal laws think this is the minimum protection we’re going to impose on ourselves again. States can now raise the protection, for example, in a state like California. They decided, for example, to combat global warming that all industries that produce greenhouse gases within the state of California must reduce must reduce their emissions by an additional 10%. In other words, it’s a stricter standard 10% on top of what the federal minimum standard is and when state raises the standard. State law is supreme in that state. Because federal law is not national central, it means in the area of collaboration, minimum standard and last very important reason on mentioned here, the most important reasons for federal collaboration. Of course, there are a few others, but the fourth major reason is to collaborate in the budget area, using portions off the federal budget to invest in research and development. TOE helped build capacity whenever they raise standards. For example, in the area of education, now you need teachers that need to be trained to raise their capacity, their ability to meet these new standards. So parts of the federal budget are then allocated to the states to help in building that capacity to doing R and D. This is where you see a big role of the federal government and investing in the kinds of technologies kinds off in specific areas constantly aimed and how to advance the economy for all the 50 states forward. And that means that states, through that federal collaboration in the budget area, become more interdependent on one another. All right, let me move to the other quick aspect. Here it is decentralization, So non centralization governs the relationship between the 50 states and the U. S. Government above. Now we have 1/3 level of government below the states. It’s called local, so each state decentralized, decentralized by delegating to local government powers. And in this case, I’m just mentioning some of the key types of local government counties cities, districts, towns. To these are different forms, different types of local government and fundamentally, local government. In the United States today we have more than 89,000 local governments, 89,000 local governments. Their fundamental responsibilities are having been delegated to them by the respective states. They are school on school education. This is why there is no national curriculum for public school education in the United States. Second, law enforcement. That is why there is no national police force for the United States and no National Ministry off interior or internal affairs. With the national centralized security system, law enforcement is fundamentally state government responsibility. Of course, the state’s collaborate federally in law enforcement for the reasons I mentioned earlier, but it is fundamentally the responsibility. But instead of keep pickin centralized within each state, each they decentralized and delegated that to their local government. This is why you hear about, for example, New York City having its own 35,000 to 40,000 police force headed by a commissioner who is appointed by the locally elected government off the city off New York, and they are funded their salaries. The budget come primarily from the local budget, so taxation is also decentralized, and the third very important responsibility off local government is economic developments. And it is at the local level that you will hear primarily off public private partnerships between civil society, the business world and the locally elected government working three way together to think together how best to develop their locality. So I mentioned all this background to you now to bring into elections. Therefore, since we have three distinct levels off government because of this non centralized and decentralized form of government, we have obviously non centralized and decentralized elections. It goes without saying so. At the federal level, we have election laws. Thes election laws basically governed the eligibility. Who is eligible to run for office at the federal level, For example, if you want to run for as a member of the U. S. House of Representatives in the Congress, you need to be happy. 25 years old, standard three years old. Okay, These are federal eligibility requirements. When the election states What are limitations? Where are the regulations governing the actual practice? Excuse me? An execution off the elections. What about campaign finance laws? All these are federal state governments because each state is pretty much autonomous within the union. It has its own laws now governing the same areas, plus voter registration, campaign finance and their level. Primaries and caucuses, Primaries and caucuses are governed at the state level and then, obviously because of decentralization with within each state. So these 89,000 local governments have their own now systems off government elections and regulations as delegated to them by the respective states. On lastly, you have the role of political parties. Political parties do play a very important role in establishing the laws and regulations within each state when it comes to elections. So how are nominations done? How is it a candidacy? How does one become a candidate for office and that is going to vary from state to state and from party to party? Okay, how are international committees etcetera? So now apocalyptic about federal elections. At the federal level, we have the truth, big areas. I’m going to focus on the U. S. Congress. The US Congress is I mentioned is basically a conference off states for a period of two years. Once the two year period ends, the Congress is dissolved, its finished. The agenda is over. Come, let’s say January, for example. We have elections coming up now in November. So in January 2021 you Congress will be convened for another two years with its own agenda. What is the objective here is in the Congress is to create a system of checks and balances between the rule of the people and the rule of the states. That is why in the Congress we have two types off delegates, representatives and senators. Representatives are elected proportionally to the size of population, more people, more representatives. So California, for example, being the most popular state has excuse me, 53 representatives state like Montana, has only one. You have to have a minimum off one eso and the idea is in order to get the majority vote in the House of Representatives, you must have the majority off the people because representation is based on population. But we have a second category of delegates gold senators. And why that second category? Because we’re not the Republic off America. We’re not the Republic off. The people of America were the republic off the United States of America It’s a union of states, so we must have the rule of the state’s check and balance the rule of the people. So in the Senate, each state, no matter what the size of its population, is a huge California has two senators and very small populated. Montana has also two senators, 50 states. That gives us a total of 100 senators now very important no federal legislation and be passed by the Congress nothing in the federal budget and be passed by the Congress and sent to the president to execute unless and until a majority in the House, meaning the majority of the people and a majority in the Senate, meaning the majority off the states both must agree using the same exact language before that piece of legislation or budget are sent to the president. This is too forced again the checks and balances between the majority of the states and the majority of the people. Which brings us now to the president. Why is the president elected the way today? He one day she why the president is elected the way he is? Well, it’s the same objective we need to create systems of checks and balances between the rule of the people on rule of the states. If the people elected directly the president than big states like California could controlled basically the presidential elections. As a result, the other states would start feeling basically slighted. And this may lead to secessionist movements, forms off rebellions. And we I would like to avoid those. So the checks and balances helps us keep the union together. And so how can we do this balance? Here’s what happens. Welcome to the Electoral College. So the people in each state vote vote in their state to choose whom they prefer to be president. So once the majority, let’s say off, Californians voted like in the last election, 2006 16 for the president, the majority voted for Secretary Hillary Clinton. The majority of Californians have basically ordered ordered their state California toe elect her, which means that California gave her its 55 electoral votes period. It doesn’t matter how large or small the majority vote she won. She could’ve won by one vote. She won by more than two million votes. It didn’t matter. California was ordered by its people to elect her, giving her it’s 55 electoral votes. So now what happens? This happens in each one of the of the 50 states, and the total number of electoral votes in the Electoral College is 538. So who becomes president? Is the person who wins, not the majority off the total votes off the peoples of the 50 states? No, that is irrelevant. It is whoever wins the majority off the electoral votes off of 50 states. And that means 270 simple majority fivethirtyeight divided in half plus one. And if you look now at what happened in 2016 Donald Trump got 306. He needed 270 to become president while Secretary Clinton got 232. You become president off the United States, not off the people, by winning the majority off the state’s not the majority off the people. One last thing I mentioned and then I will shut up because there is another very important system of checks and balances at the federal level, and that is that has to do with the federal courts. I’m not going to speak much about the federal courts except to mention that federal judicial branch headed by the U. S. Supreme Court is extraordinarily powerful. And he checks and balances the president and the Congress and the idea being we need the rule of law to check and balance the rule off the people, the rule of the states, the majority interest, the national interest versus individual rights. And here we have few statistics about the number of federal courts. And with this, my dear friends, I thank you. And now I am. Viewers will stop sharing my scream. Thank you so much, Mr Adalius. Now we’re going to open it up for questions the way that us The question is, if you go to the participant list, hover over your name and there is also an option to raise your hand virtually I am surprised. There are no questions. This is a very unique system. What we do. We have one from Alex from Azerbaijan. All right, we’re going to un meet you and turn on your video. Yes. Hello? Okay, Casey, me and hear me way. Good morning. Great to see you today. I’m good morning, Azaleas. My name’s Alex. Raffle on deficit. Just independent newsagents. it’s run. My question is about off election. There’s so many things that can go wrong. If if the events off last few years are an indication, we have disinformation, foreign interference all affected 2016 elections, and now we have to pandemic. And there are talks about alternative watching methods such as I’ve heard about Male wanting and wanting, etcetera. The question is, how should the federal government officials and local leaders confront close challenges? And how can we avoid the myriad off problems that could affect the elections? Thank you much. Oh, well, thank you very much for this very perceptive question, Alex. Well, I guess this is what everyone around the country at the state, local and federal governments are are dealing with. This is not new. First, let me say this is not new to to the United States. What is really different today compared to as a student of American history, I look always at the longer spectrum of things. Can you imagine elections during the Civil War? Can you imagine elections, you know, during the Vietnam era and the turmoil of the sixties when cities were literally earned, You know where you know where I worked Washington, D C really suffered some tremendous, you know, turmoil, all kinds of things you can imagine. Um, what is obviously very different today is that we live in a 24 hour news cycle. It’s instantaneous, and things can be further amplified. And eso increasingly what is happening in this country. It’s gonna take a little time, so this is a rough period. But increasingly, people are being basically advised, and they’re realizing that they need to take some distance. They need to really take some distance away from this instantaneous or so they can process information. There is a huge difference between data and knowledge, and today we live in this big data environments. So I call it the Fog. The fog of information. Okay. What is true? What is not true? What is room and what It’s fake? What is real? Oh, my gosh. Now practically speaking, the states and the end at the federal level as well We have dealt with various forms off conducting the election, including doing things by mail, going all the way back to the Civil War era. So it is not again, something totally new. What is definitely different is that we’re dealing with technology. We’re dealing with the ability, as you mentioned off interference from the outside. I can tell you since the 2016 election, there are all kinds of measures that have been put into place. I cannot tell you I cannot. No way anyone can guarantee that things would be flawless. No, but states working together with the federal government. This is an area where they collaborate. If you recall, I mentioned, the four major reason for collaboration outside of the sovereign powers is to build capacity. So there’s been a lot done and more is being done to help build capacity to ensure the integrity off elections are there. Covet 19 is something that is really hugely unknown factor in how to deal with that. So states are right now experimenting with different ways. Let me explain how they’re collaborate. They collaborate not only through the federal, with the federal government and through the federal gun. They collaborate directly among themselves. There is a conference of governors. There are regional conferences, and there is a national conference, you know, off association off governors off the United States. They have standing committees and subcommittees including things that focused on elections so they can exchange best practices. Learn from one another. So we avoid centralization by enabling more creativity, you know, risk taking eso. We can constantly experiment the ideas of their 50 laboratories to experiment with experimentation. You have higher risk. So that’s a cost we pay to keep things always moving forward through a healthy environment of competition. By Excuse me by experimenting. So a lot of these things are taking place. But I cannot predict the future. And I cannot tell you what may or may not happen, but definitely people very smart people are putting their brains and energies together to figure out how they can preserve the integrity off the elections with this added covert 19 child. Thank you. My pleasure. Thank you so much for that question. We will now go to Elena. Let NSA we will be a muting you and turning on your video so that you can ask your question directly. Hello. Good morning. Um Akram, I wanted to ask about the mail in voting and especially, what can the parties the political parties do to make it more difficult or even to help? It happened because we know that voting system is made really regulated by local governments and state governments. But what are the legal parties? Um, what are their first to interfere in this? Thank you. Sure. No, thank you very much. Elena. Nice. Nice to meet you too. Um, as you mentioned it is state state laws and local laws that really regulate and govern How these elections going to take place, including, you know, male in elections, Absentee Bowers as well as Malin. Now what parties can do and what parties are doing. And that is again being done in different ways across the 50 states. But there’s always the idea off partnership when it comes to elections in this country, it is fundamental toe. Have the major stakeholders the major stakeholders, be part of the process? Were these the major’s first and foremost civil society? And that is why in every election, no matter where it takes place, there are observers that come in representing, you know, different civil society groups to make sure they’re there to make sure that the integrity off the election is preserved. That for the purpose of transparency you hear, for example, about the league of women voters, you know, which is organized in all 50 states. This is the women who want to make sure that basically elections take place. That second part of civil society is that each and every citizen in this country is encouraged to and is invited also to play to play the role of a judge on election judge, for example, I was invited. I got the invitation from my local area. Say, would you like to be and volunteer your time to be an election judge? This is to give ordinary citizens not just organized civil society groups, ordinary citizens to play that role of the judge in order to make sure it’s the and thirdly and third very important stake holder are the political parties. So the parties have their own representatives there also because and that’s the idea. You involve the major stakeholders. So it becomes much more difficult for people to say there were irregularities. People would see the irregularities if they all participated. And it’s the same thing that is taking place now. Eso when these you know Mel in, comes in. How are they gonna be comfort? Who’s gonna oversee that? How do you ensure the the integrity and security off the off the place there being collected etcetera. Okay. And I would like to echo what Mr Elliott said. I have been a volunteer for the last six years here in Virginia. I’m just a regular election worker. Um, and that means that we receive training and its regular everyday citizens that are at each polling station. Um, I was also an election worker during the 2000 and 16 election, and I again echo what Mr Elliott said. We had a representative from the Republican Party, a representative from the Democratic Party. There is a representative from the Green Party, and there was a member of civil society that were there with us the entire election day and observed the entire election in my polling station. And when it was time Teoh, when voting ended and we were turning off the voting machines and we were counting the votes, I had four people watching me. A close the voting machine with a fellow volunteer. So everything is very secure. Everything is observed, and all the volunteers receive training. Um, at least in northern Virginia, if there is ever any question election workers can call a central telephone line and they will give get specific instructions if there’s some sort of issue with the voting machine. But everything that Mr Elliott said is I I can confirm that because I lived it and I participated. And I also want to mention that mail in voting, um, has gone on for many years. Um, I have been with the State Department, Um, now 16 years and 10 of those years I was overseas, So I have voted in all of the elections, but be a male, So that is something that is very common. E. I have any questions about again the mailing, voting and absentee voting. There is a little I know in the news people that think that there will be no neutralization off the voting off the absentee voting or mailing. So what are we talking here about? And again, are the political parties involved in the neutralization of us? Let’s see if I got it correctly. What you what you’re hearing about are basically people expressing loud basically concerns or skepticism or worries, and that is quite human. There are people whenever you’re faced with an unknown first most people don’t pay attention to history. So they think what is happening today. This is this is this is it. This is the end of the world and, you know, God, we were seeing problems like I’ve never seen before. All what it takes is for people to take a step back a little bit and look at history and see that these are recurring phenomena in humanity, no matter what country where it is. In other words, whenever a human being faces the unknown or insurgent e anxiety, consent fears and that ignorance plays into this mix, and then when you have freedom of speech, people can express themselves obviously more openly about their fears and anxieties of people may say, you know, the vote may be neutralized here. The vote may be compromised, their etcetera. That is, if I’m getting correctly your your question. So that is, that is quite normal toe happen, and what you’re seeing are educational efforts, people who are trying to basically come back and say, Well, wait a second, let’s dissect this issue. 12345 So lets put things back into perspective. Let us as Franklin General Roosevelt way back when the country faced against this. I’m using that as an analogy because we covered 19. What is happening in the country today with the anxiety is not only about health but also the economy and the future outlooks. How long this thing is gonna last, etcetera. So I’m comparing a little bit to the thirties because of the Great Depression and so so many people that became unemployed and fell into severe poverty. And the main idea Waas, my FDR, Franklin Delano Roosevelt appealing to the American spirit to the people by telling them the only thing we have to fear is fear itself. So what is happening right now in this country? Our efforts grassroots across the country, trying to say, OK, let’s not let fear control us. Let’s dissect the problem. Let’s approach it scientifically and rationally and mitigate. Let’s not reject, totally reject when people express their fears. Even if those fears may sound to you as irrational or not well founded, it is very bad to dismiss because perceptions as we all know, our reality for the people who hold those perceptions. So there is a difference between perception and fact. Facts are reality, but so our perceptions. So it’s important not to dismiss but engage in conversations and in mitigating, you know, those potential threats. Thank you. What? Could? All right. Um, Claude, please go ahead. We’re going to meet you and turn on your video. We can hear you, you know. Yes, sir. Okay. Um, hi. Thank you for doing this. My question to you is fida rallies when it works. It’s fine. Uh, when it doesn’t, it might be a little bit. Countries. I’m talking about the panda. Me. Uh, the United States doesn’t have a national strategy. And why Iraq is doing better than we do. It’s because they’re varies National strategies. Government said, Do this, Do that with old the states. You together this patchwork of what you see, Uh, some states where mass? Some dope on. And so how do we see how can in a period of crisis, how can we use the federal Isma in a productive way in a positive way? Well, thank you very much for this yet another very perceptive question. Clothes appreciate it. It’s let me give you Of course, I’m giving you my perspective. You can hear different perspectives, obviously, by speaking toe other American experts. You know, in American government, my perspective is always the following. Whenever a choice is made, there are benefits and there are costs. In other words, an ideal choice doesn’t exist in the world in which we live very much of a realist while an optimist. In other words, I can. I believe that we can change the reality, but we cannot basically ignore reality, so we have to start with that. So the choice that we made with federalism, the benefits of it, are tremendous. And they have proven they have proven over 200 more than 200. You were approaching 250 years. By the way. That is in 2026. About 5.5 years would be, you know, 250 years off this experiment, if you want that started back in 17 76. So the great benefits are the idea that there were 50 laboratories. There is risk taking, as I mentioned earlier, but that keeps the economy keeps the country moving forward. In other words, whenever there is a major setback, you typically see the United States coming out of the set back much more quickly. As a result off this experimentation, the cost we pay is that when it comes to the federal collaboration federal collaboration to establish something like a nationwide strategy dealing with something like over takes longer to put together while experimentation is taking place. So there is a cost that is incurred whenever you have gaps like these. Now, one thing definitely was missed. And I can tell you as an as an expert, watching the system was missed in this country is that we did not learn from what happened several many years ago with the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Health and Human Services have looked at put in, put a lot of studies, and a lot of money was put up collaboration in anticipation for prevention purposes. Okay, were put in in case off. For example, what if there was a biochemical, you know, attack already big incident in this country. How do you deal with something like that or a bacterial? Think nobody was thinking necessarily off of it. Although experts were predicting that something like over 19 was gonna happen, it was a matter of Wen because that is again the cycle off of humanity. So all these studies were done. Unfortunately, things we’re not put in place to really carry through on those. And that took place over both Republican and Democratic administrations. Because priorities, we’re we’re diverted to something else s. So I think there’s a huge lesson here that moving forward. Once this thing is into place, they’re gonna put it together. But short answer is it is It is a shortcoming right now and you’re feeling it that way. And the United States may not be doing a fairing as as well as some others are, but that is part of that institutional cost. But when it comes to post post, this federalism is gonna give it the energy and the dynamism to move forward. Because once you are once you deal with the health matter, you know there was once a vaccine is developed and once the developer and it seems like now, with all this experimentation and again, the competition here is quite helpful in this regard. Once this vaccine, which appears to be we’re headed towards by early next year at the latest march, they saying on once you’re able to vaccinate at a mass and global level. You’re dealing now with the post post over 90 economic recovery. How are people going back to work? What is going to happen? This is where federalism in the United States is going to show its tremendous positive ability. He goes, you’re gonna have 50 economies are gonna turn themselves in at a different pace at a different ways, and they’re learning from one another, and that will help the country in that phase recover much more quickly. That is a prediction I can make. Thank you. My pleasure. Are there any final questions for Mr L IUs? All right. I guess there aren’t so, in conclusion, Mr Elliott’s thank you so much for sharing your expertise with us today to our participants. A transcript on a video will be posted to our website f p c dot state dot gov this afternoon. If you publish a story as a result of this briefing, please share your story with us by sending an email to D. C F. P C at ST dot go. I also want to encourage you to join us tomorrow. August the sixth at 2 p.m. Eastern Standard time for our briefing on the 1/100 anniversary of the 19th Amendment ratification in the United States that granted women the right to vote. Our briefer tomorrow at two PM will be Notre Dame. Professor Christina will break. If you are interested in participating in tomorrow’s briefing, please send an R S v P email to D C f p C at ST dot gov. Thank you all and good afternoon. Thank you. We’ll go. Thank you. Thank you, Mr Julius. My pleasure. Thank you.