Senator Murphy discusses his progressive foreign policy vision and national security interests in Yemen and Saudi Arabia.  TALEV: Thank you. I’m going to be really concise, conciser than normal, this morning because the Senator actually has somewhere to be a little bit early, so we’re going to do half an hour of the you Q&A in twenty-five minutes. So we’re going to make this happen. Good morning. Welcome to today’s Council on Foreign Relations meeting with Senator Chris Murphy. I’m Margaret Talev, the politics and White House editor for Axios, and I will be presiding over today’s discussion. Senator Murphy, as you all know, is the junior senator from Connecticut. He is a member of the Foreign Relations Committee, and the top Democrat on the Subcommittee for the Near East, South Asia, Central Asia, and Counterterrorism, which will explain all of his planned adventures this summer, most of which got cancelled and redirected. He is also a leading advocate, as all of you know, in the bipartisan push right now for a gun control package that the president or Republicans can get behind. And his congressional district before joining the Senate included Newtown, Connecticut, home to Sandy Hook Elementary. So with that introduction, Senator Murphy, please come on up, make a few comments, and then we will move to this portion of the conversation. Thanks, again, all of you for being with us. (Applause.) MURPHY: Well, thank you very much, Margaret. I’m excited to spend some time with you here on stage. Thank you to all of my friends at the Council for having me back once again, and for all the great work that you do to keep the foreign policy community connected to Congress here in Washington. I want to talk to you a little bit this morning, for about ten minutes or so, about the future of what I will call progressive foreign policy, with an eye towards the next administration. In the two Democratic debates that we’ve had so far, if you count generously, candidates about spent about thirty minutes talking about foreign policy out of nine hours of debate. That’s less than 6 percent of the time on stage. And only two of the candidates have released anything that could be fairly characterized as a foreign policy plan. And we’ve seen a lot of plans from candidates. I get that primary elections generally aren’t decided on international issues, and this one probably isn’t going to be different. But if tonight’s debate plays out like the first two, I’m going to actually stat getting worried for my party for two reasons. First, I just think Democrats who are running for president have a civic responsibility to flesh out their vision for the world before they sit in the Oval Office. If Congress remains divided, then it’s going to be foreign policy where the next president has the most discretion. And I want a president who has given some real, deep thoughts to these big, hairy questions of how America intersects with the world before they get there. But second, I think in the last few months, and indeed just in the last few weeks, we have seen a major opening for Democrats to seize on the issue of national security. Trump won the election in part by selling himself as a deal maker who could get big things done with Iran and North Korea on nukes, with China and Europe on trade, with Mexico on the wall. But Americans are now coming to grips with this realization that none of those deals are getting done. It’s the most potent indictment of those dealmaker claims. And Trump’s casual flirtation with war with Iran, and his waffling on troop levels in the Middle East have made Americans really worried that Trump can keep us safe. Now, Democrats maybe can’t completely close the national security gap with Republicans that traditionally exists. But Trump gives us reason to try, because if we did we could make more progress on this gap, this election, than in the past. And that might make the difference in 2020. So here are a few thoughts to chew on, a little

Senator Durbin discusses the U.S. role in the world, countering historic and current strains of American isolationism, and the importance and benefit of continued global engagement.

Randall Stephenson discusses his business strategy and lessons learned from leading AT&T. The CEO Speaker Series is a unique forum for leading global CEOs to share their insights on issues at the center of commerce and foreign policy, and to discuss the changing role of business globally. HAASS: Well, good afternoon. Welcome to the Council on Foreign Relations. I’m Richard Haass, president of the Council, and today we have one of our meetings in the series on CEO speakers. It is on the record. Anything you say can and will be used against you. STEPHENSON: I didn’t know that. I want to dismiss myself. (Laughter.) HAASS: Do you want to leave now? We are pleased to welcome Randall Stephenson of AT&T to the Council for a conversation. He has been chairman and CEO for more than a decade now, twelve years give or take. STEPHENSON: Sounds like fifteen minutes underwater. (Laughter.) HAASS: Well, hopefully this won’t. He’s, obviously, been involved directly and personally in any number of consequential decisions, most recently with the acquisition of Time Warner. I should also say that AT&T’s been generous, committing over a billion dollars over his years to a variety of education, retraining, and diversity initiatives, some within the company, some beyond the company. Full disclosure—important to give that—they’re a corporate member here at the Council on Foreign Relations, as was Time Warner in its—when it was an independent company. What we are going to do is Mr. Stephenson and I are going to have a conversation for a few minutes. Then we’ll open it up to you, our members, to ask the tough questions that I didn’t have the wit to ask. Let me just—thirty-second plug for the Council on Foreign Relations. Just this morning we issued our most recent task force report, Innovation and National Security: Keeping Our Edge. And I commend it to anyone in this room and beyond because it’s a real emphasis on what we need to do here at home, and that one can’t ask everything of our diplomats or our military. There are certain things we have to do as a society in order to put ourselves in a position where we can do what we need to to look after all aspects of our national security. So again, I really recommend it to you. Thanks for coming today. STEPHENSON: Good to be here. Thanks for having me. Happy to. HAASS: So let’s begin with China. I’ve been in this business a while, and I can’t think of another major relationship with the United States that has changed, and to give a sense of directionality, deteriorated as quickly and as dramatically as the U.S.-China relationship has in the last couple of years. And everyone decries the lack of bipartisanship in Washington; this is actually fairly bipartisan. If you listened to the Democratic debate the other night, the anti-China rhetoric was pretty—was pretty robust. What has been your experience with China? I mean, for example, a couple of questions come to mind. One, do you—are you aware that they’ve taken your technology? Have you—have you had a problem with that with China? I know you’re doing business with Huawei in places like Mexico. What has—what has been your experience with them? Have they been essentially a good partner or something less? STEPHENSON: (Laughs.) One of the companies over in China that’s a large-scale creator of—builder of telecommunication equipment, one of the first products they ever put out, and did quite well with, was a very close replica of a PBX back in the old days, in the 1960s, that was made by AT&T. (Laughs.) HAASS: What a coincidence. STEPHENSON: It was, probably coincidental. (Laughter.) So in terms of firsthand experience, you know, we’ve had our share of, you know, challenges and concerns in that regard. In terms of, you know, implications to AT&T specifically, we’ve had few issues because by and large we’re not allowed to do business there. We are prohibited from doing business. Now, we do have some points of presence and so forth. We’re allowed to do some thi

Jason Bordoff, Brenda Ekwurzel, and Kanta Kumari Rigaud analyze climate change and environmental management, with Karenna Gore moderating, as part of the 2019 CFR Religion and Foreign Policy Workshop.

Steven A. Cook, Bernard A. Haykel, and Ariane M. Tabatabai discuss U.S. involvement in the Middle East, with Trudy S. Rubin moderating, as part of the 2019 CFR Religion and Foreign Policy Workshop.

C. D. Glin, Andrew Small, and Jen Spies evaluate equity, development, and innovation in sub-Saharan Africa, with Michelle D. Gavin moderating, as part of the 2019 CFR Religion and Foreign Policy Workshop.

U.S. Ambassador-at-Large Sam Brownback discusses international religious freedom with Elizabeth Dias, as part of the 2019 CFR Religion and Foreign Policy Workshop.

Sabine Lautenschläger discusses Eurozone conditions and the European Central Bank's economic tools, as well as the effects of U.S. trade policy on the global economy. The C. Peter McColough Series on International Economics brings the world's foremost economic policymakers and scholars to address members on current topics in international economics and U.S. monetary policy. This meeting series is presented by the Maurice R. Greenberg Center for Geoeconomic Studies.

Charles Evans discusses the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago's role in the U.S. economy and policies for economic growth.   The C. Peter McColough Series on International Economics brings the world's foremost economic policymakers and scholars to address members on current topics in international economics and U.S. monetary policy. This meeting series is presented by the Maurice R. Greenberg Center for Geoeconomic Studies.

Mark Carney discusses monetary policy and the challenges facing the Bank of England. The C. Peter McColough Series on International Economics brings the world's foremost economic policymakers and scholars to address members on current topics in international economics and U.S. monetary policy. This meeting series is presented by the Maurice R. Greenberg Center for Geoeconomic Studies.