(uplifting music) - Hello, I'm Shawn Turner, General Manager of WKAR.

I'm excited to share a special presentation, an evening with Leon Panetta.

Leon Panetta has served in several key government positions, including Director of the CIA and Secretary of Defense under President Barack Obama, White House Chief of Staff for President Bill Clinton, and as a United States Congressman.

Former Michigan Governor and MSU alumni, Jim Blanchard, sat down with Panetta for a candid and engaging conversation as part of the Jim Blanchard Public Service Forum.

A discussion series created to allow our community to hear and learn from national and international leaders, diplomats and writers.

WKAR is pleased to present to you Jim Blanchard's conversation with Leon Panetta recorded live from Wharton Center.

Enjoy the program.

(audience applauding) - Well, here we are.

When did you get the bug of political service, or public service?

- Well, you know, I'm often asked that question.

And there are really three very important factors.

Look, first of all, were my immigrants parents who used to make clear to my brother and I, particularly on Sundays dinners, and we always had Sunday dinners together, made clear that because of what this country had given them and the opportunity to succeed, that both my brother and I owed something back to this country.

Secondly, when I was in the Army, and this was during the draft when the units were made up of people from across the country, not just select few, these are people from across the country.

And I saw these individuals come together and join together in a common mission and achieve that mission.

And it taught me a lot about duty to country.

And then lastly, there was a young president who said, "Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country."

I remember when I got elected to Congress, I used to walk across for a boat at night and I'd see the Capitol all lit up in lights.

And I thought to myself, here I am, I'm the son of immigrants, and I have a chance to serve the United States of America in the Capitol.

I mean, that's a feeling that it's just irreplaceable.

- And I know the feeling, I was raised by a single-parent mom with no one in my family with power, money, or position.

I dreamed of be, I got hooked on politics, dreamed of being in Congress.

And every day I walked there, I thought about it.

I still do when I'm over there.

Son of immigrants, of course, but you know, what I didn't know when I read in your book?

That some of the Italians were mistreated like the Americans of Japanese heritage, that you and I know, many of you know the name Norman Mineta, he was the first Asian American from the Continental United States to be elected to Congress.

We served with him, a fabulous person.

He passed away in May, and we were both friends of his.

But I didn't realize that some people of Italian heritage were relocated, your grandfather was relocated, right?

What was that all about?

- My Nonno, my grandfather came over to visit my mother, And I think it was 1938, and then was prevented from going back to Italy after the war broke up.

And he basically helped raise me 'cause my parents were working in the restaurant.

But then it was within a year or so, he was required to move inland.

Now, it is nothing compared to what happened with the Japanese, but we had to take my grandfather and move him inland and away from the family during that time.

And there were a lot of others that went through the same thing.

And I used to share that with Norm Mineta.

By the way, I always used to say to Norm Mineta, I said, "The reason you got elected is because most people thought you were Italian."

(audience laughing) And he didn't deny it.

And so Norman and I used to always get mixed up.

As Tip O'Neill used to call me Norm and call him Leon.

And the one thing that happened is, this was during the Carter administration, which tells you something about the Carter administration.

They would send...

When the Prime Minister from Japan came, they would invite me to the White House.

(audience laughing) And when the Prime Minister from Italy came, they'd invite Norm to the White House.

Finally, Norman and I got tired of it.

We put together a baseball team and said we're gonna play baseball under the sign of the rising pizza.

(audience laughing) We did.

- This is true.

So, by the way, I remember when that happened, I was in Congress.

(chuckles) You know, we have a bunch of questions from students, and normally I try to ask all mine, do the students later, 'cause I got all these things I wanna talk to you about.

But I wanted to start with some of the student questions.

They're obsessed with the CIA by the way.

And that's, you know, spies.

And, you know, here's one question.

How can the CIA take substantive visible steps to ensure that it's not drawn into this country's internal politics?

- Well, you know, the important thing about the CIA and you know, we've seen the abuses that have taken place in the history.

You know, when the CIA lost sight of what its primary role is all about, the primary role of the CIA is to provide intelligence to the leaders of our country.

That's the primary role.

And that means they have to be objective, but they have to be damn good at getting information about what our enemies and what our allies are up to.

It is about information.

And so we put together this PDB, Presidential's Daily Brief, the one that Trump never used to read.

He did not like to be briefed, by the way, on intelligence stuff.

You can imagine President of the United States didn't want to be briefed about what was going bad.

Now look, the PDB is not a good read.

It keeps you awake all day because you're reading about all the threats to this country from those abroad.

But the purpose of the PDB and the purpose of intelligence is to be able to give the president the information that is needed for the President of the United States to make the right decision for our country.

Intelligence for the military, it's the same thing.

You give good intelligence to a commander in the field.

He can't find the enemy without good intelligence.

He doesn't know what kind of battle operations he should put in place without good intelligence.

So I believe that the responsibility is to gather that information and to present it to the president, doesn't mean you have to interfere in another country's business.

Now, if a president of the United States decides that he's gonna give a covert mission to the CIA to be able to disrupt a particular country for some reason, that's happened.

But generally, it is the responsibility of the CIA to gather information using our sources, using the abilities of other countries that we work with and the intelligence they provide, put that information together and then provide it to the president.

In the national security, the console chambers, what happens is when the president comes in and you're talking about a particular crisis, the purpose of the intelligence, both the DNI and the CIA is to present the intelligence on the situation.

What's happening, what's going on.

Not to tell the president what to do, not to tell him what actions should be taken, but to present objective information to the president.

It is an extremely important role if it's done the way it should be done, which is credibly, accurately, and without fear of speaking truth to power.

- Now we're talking about briefings and classified documents, I have to ask you about your reaction to the whole bruja of Trump taking classified documents to Mar-a-Lago and then apparently saying he didn't have them, and then apparently saying he did, but then saying he declassified him in his own mind.

I mean, what's your react to that?

Do you think he's gonna have to be prosecuted on this?

- Well, frankly, he should be.

He took classified information out of the White House and brought it to Mar-a-Lago.

Anybody else who does that would face, you know, action under the security act for violating the classification of those documents.

Now look, Trump is a strange bird, let's face it.

I mean, this is a guy who I honestly think does not understand the importance of classified material and never really took it seriously.

I mean, if he wasn't willing to get briefings on intelligence, imagine here's a guy who's handed these large documents that are classified secret, top secret, and he basically throws 'em in a box and he doesn't read 'em.

He was not somebody who read that kind of material.

And so I think he just threw this stuff in a box.

And when he finally had to get the hell out of there, he had everybody pick up all the boxes and throw 'em in a helicopter.

But what bothers me is that knowing that the president had no regard for classified material, that does not excuse the chief of staff, the people who are intelligence in the White House, who have a responsibility to get that material back.

When I was there, if you provided classified material to the president, you had to account for it to get it back from the president, put it back, and make sure that it was secured.

So it wasn't just the President's fault, it was others that were responsible for protecting that information that are also at fault.

- Another student question.

With regards to Iran, our long-term involvement seems to have gone back when Eisenhower was president.

So what will it take to reach a point where our countries can become more allied in nature and less adversarial?

Well, you know, I happen to believe that that is really important in terms of the kind of world we live in.

We are living in a dangerous world.

I think there are more flashpoints in the world that we're living in today than since World War II.

Just look at the problems.

I mean, obviously, we're confronting Russia in the war in Ukraine.

We're confronting China and trying to figure out what they'll do with Taiwan and the South China Sea.

We're dealing with North Korea and their ability to, they not only have developed nuclear weapons, but they're threatening to develop the capability to put those nuclear weapons on an ICBM and send it to the United States.

They're a real threat and they're a real danger.

Iran, since we got out of the nuclear agreement, Iran has been enriching fuel at a rapid pace.

And now the intelligence estimates are that they are within a few weeks of being able to put together a nuclear weapon.

So Iran remains a real threat.

And then add to that terrorism, which still is a threat in today's world.

It hasn't gone away.

Al-Qaeda is still out there, particularly now with Afghanistan being under the Taliban control.

The Taliban is basically providing, again, a safe haven for terrorists to be able to organize.

You have Boko Haram in North Africa, you have Al-Shabaab in Somalia.

You've got other elements like ISIS wandering around, all of them intent on attacking the United States and attacking Western countries.

So that remains a threat as well.

So bottom line is that we are facing a number of danger points.

I think the key for the United States in dealing with those danger points is to develop strong alliances to be able to confront these threats.

Doesn't have to be the United States going it alone.

We don't have to do it ourselves.

We should do it the way we were responding in Ukraine.

Having the United States and our NATO allies come together on a strategy that is helping Ukraine confront Russia.

That is a successful relationship.

I think we need to build the same kind of alliance in the Pacific using the ASEAN countries, using Australia, using South Korea, using Japan, building a strong alliance to confront North Korea and China.

And I think we need to build the same kind of alliance in the Middle East in confronting Iran and terrorism.

I think we should have a strong alliance with moderate Arab countries and with Israel so that we can not only confront and try to contain Iran, but also be able to deal with terrorism in that part of the world.

I think the key to dealing with these danger points is to have the United States build those kinds of strong alliances, Latin, Central America, Africa, other places because I think that is going to be the key to preserving peace in the future.

- I assume you applaud the way President Biden, Tony Blinken and our allies have come together here in combating Russia and what they've done to Ukraine, correct?

- Very much.

You know, look, it's not easy.

I'm not suggesting that these things happen easily.

They don't.

When you bring 50 countries together, they all have their own priorities.

They all have their own interests.

They all have their own goals.

It's not easy to make 'em come together in an alliance.

I can remember going to Belgium and speaking at the NATO conference.

Everybody had their talking points.

Everybody gave their talking points and then they got the hell out of there.

The ability to be able to really work with our allies on a strategy that everybody supports can have a tremendous impact.

I mean, the fact that NATO is working together with the United States to provide sanctions, to provide arms and weapons to Ukraine, to reinforce NATO.

I mean, that is a successful effort to try to confront an autocrat and a tyrant in Putin.

We need to build that same kind of alliance in other places in the world, but it's gonna take strong diplomacy.

It's gonna take maintaining a strong military capability for our country.

It's gonna take all of that in order to make it happen.

- We seem to be doing a lot with regard to Ukraine helping them.

Is there significantly more that we should be doing?

- I think this is one of those cases where you've gotta continue to not only supply what has been supplied because a lot of this wears out very quickly when you're in battle, you've gotta be able to provide that, but you also have to look for new weapons that can be provided to be able to give them the capabilities they need in order to confront Putin.

I think that we ought to be providing a comprehensive air defense for Ukraine so that they can knock down those missiles that Putin is firing at infrastructure in other areas.

In Israel, we work with Israel to develop what's called the Iron Dome System.

So that when Hamas fires missiles into Jerusalem and Israel, they are able to send missiles up that take 90% of those missiles out of operation.

I think we ought to be able to develop the same kind of comprehensive air defense system in Ukraine in order to make sure that Putin, when he sends these missiles, that we're able to knock 'em down.

- You know, on the domestic front here, it seems clear that in addition to racism, antisemitism is on the rise and I understand even on college campuses.

Is that your sense, at least the rising antisemitism?

- Yeah, I mean, again, you know, when a former President of the United States meets with a racist and a white supremacist for dinner and then he says, well, he really didn't know it baloney, baloney.

He knew well who he was having dinner with.

Trump always uses that, he uses stupidity as an excuse.

- That's true.

- And the reality is when he does that, it clearly inspires other racists and white supremacists to continue what they're doing.

And today, synagogues have a lot of FBI people trying to provide protection to synagogues because they're worried about potential attacks.

We've seen what white supremacists have done.

We saw what happened on January 6th, if 9/11 was a wake up call regarding foreign terrorism, January 6th was a wake up call involving domestic terrorism.

And so I really do think that we have got to be willing to confront that.

Now, you know, I know that there are political leaders who are worried about offending certain people in their base and who don't wanna really offend them by, you know, attacking Trump or attacking what's happening.

But look, we don't elect elected leaders to go back to Washington just to protect their rear end.

We elect them to go back and to govern in the interest of the country and do what's right.

(audience applauding) And that means they've gotta speak out.

They've gotta denounce this kind of racism and white supremacy.

They've gotta denounce those that would embrace that pattern of life in our country.

We are a democracy made up of immigrants from around the world.

I happen to believe that's the strength of it.

I'm the son of immigrants.

I think the strength of this country is that we draw people from all over the world that become part of our society, that become part of our country.

What a great thing.

That's one of the great strengths of the United States of America.

And to suddenly turn that into something evil, to turn that into a racist comment that tries to divide people based on race or color, or creed, or whatever, I think undermines the basic strength of our American democracy.

So yes, do people have to speak out and condemn openly when that happens?

You're damn rights they have to, because otherwise it basically excuses it.

(audience applauding) - Now, when you were a budget director for Bill Clinton, I was up in Canada as ambassador and the president was able to get the Congress to enact a ban on assault weapons.

It seems to me that's the least we could do.

But I want you to comment on guns generally.

- Well, you know, I mean, as I said, I think one of the problems we're dealing with is obviously rising violence in this country.

I mean, there are now protests where there are armed bans on both sides of an issue for God's sakes.

And you know, we've known for a long time that there have to be limits that are placed there.

When Clinton took this on, it was not easy at that time, but it was bipartisan.

It was bipartisan.

We had republicans, John Kasich was one of the co-sponsors and one of the individuals who helped us try to get it through.

And it was not easy.

- That's former governor and former Congress from Ohio, John Kasich.

- Yeah, John Kasich.

And there were other republicans as well who supported what we were trying to do.

And again, it was not easy.

I mean, Tom Foley, who was I think majority leader at the time, no, he was speaker at the time, you know, came from Washington in an area that was not big on gun control.

But even Tom Foley stood up and said, you know, when it comes to these automatic weapons, it's time to stop it.

And I think that ultimately, it was a combination of Bill Clinton constantly talking to members of the Congress to try to persuade them to vote for it.

Not easy to do, but we were able to get it done.

It was part of the crime bill and we were able to get it passed.

And it saved lives.

It saved lives by virtue of doing it.

The assault weapons ban, I think really did save lives.

When it expired, we suddenly went into this spin of just, you know, people buying assault weapons in every other possible weapon.

This is not about hunting, it's not about, you know, protecting your family.

It's about basically the potential to assault other people, as we've seen with these mass killings that have taken place.

I know, I mean, Joe Biden will try to get the assault weapon ban.

I don't think there are the votes in the Senate to be able to get it done.

The house has already passed it, but it's like everything else, you cannot give up.

You have to continue to push and continue to look for opportunities to try to put rational gun control in place.

- We all know at this point that many of our leaders are old (audience laughing) by the standards of our sons.

My nephew who's here today, my grand nephew.

Well, they've done a great deal.

I don't think anybody could have done as well as Joe Biden in this situation and I don't think in my opinion, there's no one that would've carried Michigan against Trump than Joe Biden.

But I'm looking at Biden, you've worked with him.

I'm looking at Nancy Pelosi who I think is fabulous.

I just want you to reflect on that because like us, they've seen better days.

They know better days can occur.

They know with hard work it can happen.

But I want you to react to Joe, what I said about Joe's accomplishments and also Nancy Pelosi 'cause I'm not sure anybody could do what she's done.

Yeah, well, you know, I have tremendous respect for people who are willing to stick with it and to use their experience to try to help our country.

I'm not one that, you know, that thinks that just because there's somebody who's been around a while that you wanna be kicked outta Washington and sent back to the farm.

I think it really depends on your ability to get the job done.

That's my test.

I've seen people in Washington, very frankly, that have gotten so old that they really are not doing their job and that it's time to go, it's time to go.

But if you have the capability to do the job and do it well, then there's no reason why they shouldn't be in a leadership position.

Nancy Pelosi has been one of the best speakers in the House of Representatives.

She's somebody who had the ability to put a caucus together to support important legislation.

Not easy to do.

The house, you know, 435 people.

You've got your own members that are usually number around 218, 220.

You've gotta be able to get them together to be able to vote on tough issues.

And you've gotta do an accurate count.

You've gotta have a whip count to make sure you know where the votes are.

And you've gotta be able to make sure that you know how a vote is gonna turn out.

And Nancy was one of the best vote counters in the business and knew how to be able to bring her caucus together.

My youngest son, who's a member of Congress, Jimmy, you know, never ceases to say that only Pelosi would've had the ability to put together the votes that were able to pass some of the key bills that have been passed.

Because she has the ability to understand where members are coming from, what their needs are and what needs to be done.

It is a very pragmatic institution.

I remember I was doing war rooms with Bill Clinton when he was trying to get some things passed.

And I told the story in the book, but we were trying to get the budget passed and we had actually, it was a woman Congressman, Congresswoman from Detroit, a Democrat.

- I know this story.

- Democrat.

And she was listed as voting no.

And the president said, you gotta go up and talk to her.

And so I went up, I was chief of staff at the time and went up there and I said, "What's the problem?

You know, we've got the budget.

It's a very important vote for the president.

We need your vote."

She said, "You know, Leon, I just have some problems with it."

I said, "Well, I hope you'll think about it."

I went back to the White House, told the president, then I got a call from her the next morning.

She said, "Come on up, I need to talk to you."

So I went up and I said, "What can I do for you?"

She said, "Leon, last night, I had a dream."

I said, "What was your dream?"

She said, "Jesus talked to me."

I said, "All right, what did Jesus have to say?"

This is the honest to God truth.

So what did Jesus have to say?

She says, "Jesus said that if I get the casino I need it in downtown Detroit, (laughs) I should vote for the bill."

So I immediately called the Secretary of Interior.

I said, "Come on, get this done, we need the vote."

It passed by one vote, passed by one vote.

So Nancy has the ability to sense that out and look in a democracy, if you wanna get it done, you've gotta do the work.

I mean, that democra- you know, people think you can slam dunk things in a democracy, hell no!

It is about consensus.

It is about compromise.

It's about cutting deals.

It's about working with people's needs and building a majority vote in order to pass it.

Not easy to do.

And there are few people that have the ability to do that, but she has done it.

And I give her tremendous credit for it.

And, you know, at the same time, I think she made the right decision to step down.

It's time.

I think that ultimately, it's the responsibility of people like Pelosi and others to make sure that younger members have the opportunity to be able to get into leadership positions and be involved.

We've gotta open the system up a little bit so that a new generation, frankly, can get involved in politics.

We're gonna need that in the 21st century.

(audience applauding) - Well, and you and I remember when President Kennedy said that, and he was at that time, 43 years old.

It was an amazing time, as you know, a special time.

I wanna do a couple human side stuff.

Your family had initially before the Walnut Farm, they had the Italian restaurant.

What was the specialty?

And do you cook Italian food?

Are you any good at it or are you just a spy, or a cabinet member?

What's the deal here?

- (chuckles) Well, you know, Italians are about eating.

I remember when I got elected to Congress, I went on the floor of the house for the first time, and you'll remember Frank Annunzio from Chicago.

Frank Annunzio came up to me and he said, "Panetta, Panetta, that's Italian."

I said, "Yes it is."

He says, "You're gonna join the Italian caucus, right?"

I said, "of course," I wasn't gonna say no to an Italian from Chicago.

(audience laughing) I said, "of course I will."

He says, "That's good."

He says, "We don't do much on issues, but we eat good."

(laughs) My father opened a restaurant in downtown Monterey, it's called Carmelo's Cafe, served Italian Foods, spaghetti and meatballs.

And it was during the war years and in Monterey, we had a military post called Fort Ord.

And there were literally thousands and thousands of young men at that time who were being trained for the battlefields of World War II.

And I can remember as a young kid having these uniforms, all these military uniforms coming in, it was their last stop with civilization.

And having a chance to get a good dish of Italian food was something that they really loved.

And I remember my parents used to invite some of them to our house for Christmas.

And I never forgot it because as a young boy, I thought, you know, and I remember thinking to myself, they're gonna be soon at war, and they may very well lose their lives.

And I never forgot that, particularly when I was Secretary of Defense because the toughest decision I had to make as secretary, is to deploy people into harm's way, knowing full well that when you do that lives could very well be at stake.

So I never forgot that.

Lastly, I do make a hell of a dish of gnocchi.

(audience laughing) I'm very good.

my Italian mother used to make gnocchi for me for my birthday and for special days.

And I watched her make it and learn from her.

And now I do it.

Matter of fact, for Thanksgiving, I made gnocchi and everybody loved it.

There was no room for the Turkey after they ate it, but it was great.

(chuckles) - Now you had a dog, you loved your dog, Bravo.

And normally, you know, one isn't able to include their dog in their office.

Bob Dole did, by the way, in the law firm that he did, his dog leader, had a dog in there and a little dish and everything.

And in our law firm, we were happy to have him.

But your dog also participated in your office.

Tell us about Bravo.

- Well, Bravo is a golden retriever.

And for those of you that have met or owned a golden retrievers, I mean, they're a dog that, you know, all they have to do is look at you and your heart melts because they're just...

They want nothing but love.

It's unconditional love from these dogs.

So I used to bring Bravo to work.

I actually started, when I was director of the CIA, I brought 'em to work and I'd bring 'em into meetings.

And of course, you know, a lot of these hardcore analysts and CIA types, you know, they'd look at the dog and Bravo would go around and he would nudge their hand up to pet him.

And here's these guys are going, oh, you know, and finally, they start to pet him and they really began to like it because Bravo responded.

And so Bravo used to be there when we did the briefings on the Bin Laden operation.

And he was there during most of the briefings.

And I've told people, I've said, "You know, the one thing Bravo did was he never leaked a word of what we were doing."

And I did the same thing at the Pentagon, brought him to the Pentagon, same kind of situation.

And people asked me, why did I do that?

And I said, you know, Harry Truman had a great statement, he said, "If you're in Washington and you want a friend, buy a dog."

(audience laughing) That's why I had Bravo with me.

(laughs) - You know, what are you reading these days and what books would you recommend to us?

- I think that I really like history books, and I love the books on our forefathers on Adams and Washington, and Jefferson, all of those involved.

You know, I just enjoy going back and trying to think about what they had to confront in building a Nation.

I also enjoy books on World War II, I've read all of the Churchill books and I recommend that any books on Churchill in terms of leadership, if you're interested in leadership, the books on Churchill and the books on FDR are really good to read.

- Do you have favorite authors?

- I really like the...

He was the guy who just died from New England.

- David McCullough.

- David McCullough, yeah.

Really, he was my favorite.

- I recommend you read the books by Lynne Olson.

They're fabulous.

We'll talk about it later, but those are about that time period.

They're really, really good.

But I like the same stuff, so I- - Yeah, and I like John Meacham stuff too.

John Meacham, you know, what I like about John Meacham is he can kind of bridge the gap between what history says and what's happening today.

And I think that's a good quality because frankly, I think we have to keep reminding ourselves about what happened in the past in this country, and learned those lessons in terms of trying to deal with the problems we're facing today.

- What was it like working directly as chief?

I mean, chief of staff to a president, I think would be the toughest job in the world, but it's certainly in America, really tough.

What was it like to work?

I mean, I know him reasonably well and known him a long, what was it like to actually work for him in that sense of trying to manage that office and all the people, and this guy who's an incredible genius has read everything and has ideas on everything.

What was it like?

- Well, I'll tell you the story of, you know, I went in as OMB director and obviously was working on the budgets and working on appropriations, and we were able to get the budgets passed and, you know, we were pretty successful.

And the president obviously cared a great deal about that, but, and worked hard it, but the White House itself was pretty disorganized.

They had appointed a pretty good cabinet, but then when it came to people in the White House, a lot of them were campaign workers and it just wasn't organized well.

And Clinton was not disciplined.

And so when he had a meeting in the Oval Office, you know, 50 people would gather in the Oval Office and nothing would get done.

We had people that had titles like General Consul, well, when you're a consul to the president, what the hell's your responsibility?

And these guys used to wander into the meetings, talk, and then have nothing to do.

They walked out.

And so, you know, it was very disorganized.

And I remember Al Gore, who was a classmate of mine in '76, Al came up and said, "You know, the president's thinking of appointing you as chief of staff."

And I said, "Well, I don't think so, Al.

I think I'm more valuable to you as OMB director."

And suddenly, I got an invitation to go up to Camp David and Al Gore said, "You know, I'll take you up to Camp David."

I went up to the Vice President's house, we took the helicopter, it was he and Tipper Gore, and we flew up to Camp David and went to the president's cabin.

And I walked into the President's cabin, and there was Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, Al Gore, Tipper Gore, and me.

And I said, "This is not good, this is not good."

And the president said, you know, he raised it, as he said, "I think I'd like to have you be chief of staff."

And I said, "You know, Mr. President, look, one of your great legacies is passing the budget.

I've been able to get the budget passed.

We do appropriations bills, we're funding your priorities.

I really think that's really important.

I think I'm more valuable to you there."

And I never forgot what he said.

He looked at me and he said, "Leon, you could be the greatest OMB director in the history of the country, but if the White House has fallen apart, nobody's gonna remember you."

(audience laughing) Exact words.

So I said, okay, I'll, you know, president wants you to do something, I always respond to that.

So I said, you know, I need to have your support.

I need to have Hillary's support.

And I went down to the White House, and a couple days later went to see my predecessor, Mack McLarty.

And I said, Mack, I mean, he knew what was gonna happen.

And I said, "Mack, I need an organization chart for the White House."

And Mack said, "I don't believe I have one of those."

(laughs) Oh man.

I said, so what I had to do was take my Army experience basically and develop a chain of command in the White House.

So, you know, chief of staff, deputy chiefs of staff, what are they responsible for?

You know, everybody needs to have a supervisor to make sure that they're reporting to somebody.

So I organized the entire staff to do that, organized the president's time so that he had a clear schedule each day as to what was being done.

And, you know, thank God, I had Erskine Bowles and Harold Dickeys as my deputies because they were both good and disciplined.

And so we put together a tight ship and I ran it, you know, similar to Jim Baker when he was as chief of staff, I required that everybody had to go through me in order to have a meeting in the White House and be able to get things done.

And before you went into the White House, if we had a meeting with the president, I required that they come into the chief of staff's room and provide a briefing as to what they're gonna say to the president and provide it to me so I could basically make sure that it was gonna be done right.

And I think, I mean, the president appreciated that.

But I also have to tell you that, you know, I mean, working for Clinton, I mean working for Obama, these are very bright, capable people.

I mean, Bill Clinton had a mind, like a steel trap, never forgot a name.

And he could read into the most complex issues.

And he understood politics.

He understood what makes people think and what makes people do what they do.

He understood that.

So he had tremendous talents and capabilities, but discipline was not one of them.

(audience laughing) - But after you got it organized, he was reelected.

- Yeah.

- Decisively.

- I think we put together, you know, but you know, he would go and speak to a group and he, first of all, he was very good, when he spoke to a group, whether it was a business group or an ag group or whatever, he knew what they were thinking, he knew what they were concerned about.

He spoke to them, but then he wanted to go and meet every one of them and shake their hands.

And we had three other meetings to go to.

And so, I literally had to drag him out of meetings.

And I remember going to Los Angeles once, and he spoke, he gave a speech, he went to a university, he went and spoke to another group, and we had a long day, and we were gonna go back to Air Force One and then fly back to Washington.

And we got on the plane and I was just looking forward to lying down and going to sleep.

It was gonna be an all nighter.

And he said, "No, no, we gotta play hearts."

I said, "You gotta play hearts, are kidding me?"

He says, "No, no, we gotta play hearts.

And you're an important hand, you gotta be part of it."

So he starts a hearts game and he plays it all the way back to Washington.

And it just, that's the way he is.

He was, you know, he's a guy who was 40 feet off the ground but he was tremendously creative.

He was tremendously innovative.

He wanted to do the right thing for the country.

And that keeps you going, that keeps you going and dealing with those kinds of issues.

but it's tough.

- Yeah, you mentioned in your book something I noticed when I was riding with him once, and he wanted me to brief him on a meeting with the Canadian Prime Minister and cabinet, but he also wanted to talk about his reelection, but he was also working in New York Times crossword puzzle.

While we're driving along, he's working that asking me these questions, and I figured he didn't hear a single thing I said.

And when we got to the meeting, he did it.

He did exactly what I had recommended.

- Yeah.

- I didn't understand how he listen to me.

- When I became chief of staff, the first major crisis we had was with Haiti.

And we were very concerned about the situation in Haiti, and we were going to send troops into Haiti.

And what we did was we sent a delegation made up of Colin Powell and a couple others.

I think Carter was part of it.

And we sent him down there to try to see if we could negotiate the government stepping down in Haiti.

And Shalikashvili, who was Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, said to the president, we were in the Oval Office, and he said to the president, "Mr. President, we've got about five minutes here.

I've gotta get the SEALs to go in and clear the mines and stuff so that we can send our troops in to Haiti.

So I need you to tell me, go or no go."

And he was sitting behind the Oval Office desk doing a New York Times crossword puzzle.

And I was leaning, I'm, you know, I'm a new chief of staff, I said, "Mr. President, we need a decision here.

You know, we're gonna be sending troops in now to go in and clear the mines, and we need to do that now."

And he, you know, he kept working on the crossword puzzle, and I thought, oh man, what the hell's gonna happen here?

And finally he said, "Well, if we're gonna have to do it, we have to do it."

And just then Colin Powell called and said that they had gotten a deal to be able to resolve it in Haiti, but it was nerve wracking to go through that at the time.

But he, again, one of those minds, he could do a crossword puzzle.

He could read, he read a stack of stuff that was this high every night as president.

He went through it.

There were writings on it, I got him back the next morning, he had read through all of it, and I got direction.

So it was really...

It was a unique experience to be able to work with a political person who has all of those talents and yet, has his weaknesses as well.

And you've gotta basically try to deal with that.

I mean, you've gotta discipline him to go, we would have this intelligence briefings I talked about in the morning, and the president wouldn't be there.

I had to go over to the White House, get up, go upstairs, he was still showering and shaving.

I said, "We gotta go to the intelligence."

And I had to sit there and make sure that I got him, held his hand, brought him to the Oval Office to be able to go through the briefings.

But, you know, it was a tremendous honor for me to have the ability to do that.

But it was also a great learning experience about what leadership is all about.

- Here's another student question, and I think, I assume they're talking about those that are directly in espionage, but how does the CIA help its employees maintain some sort of life balance and healthy boundaries when so much of their work has to be a secret?

What sort of toll does keeping secrets take on people who do that for a career?

It's a damn good question because I mean, I think it does take a toll.

I mean, look, people in the intelligence business and the CIA are called Silent Warriors for a reason because they do incredibly risky stuff.

And you know, when you're in the military and you do something that's risky, you get a medal or you get an honor, and you're recognized.

In the intelligence side, you don't get recognized.

I mean, you do, you know, we do provide honors inside the CIA, but you don't get publicly recognized for what you've done because you know, you're dealing with secret stuff and you can't tell the public what, you know, the sources that we have and what we use in order to try to get the intelligence we need.

And so when somebody's out there in a very risky position, and some of the sources we have are in very risky situations.

They are with adversaries.

They're at a high level.

If they're found out, they probably lose their life.

And imagine being in that situation and having to get that information and living with the fact that, you know, you could be found out at any moment, and still you do your job.

They're incredibly brave.

They're incredibly courageous.

We have in the CIA a wall, where we have the stars of those who've been killed in the line of duty.

And that wall has grown with additional stars every year.

But many of those stars have people whose real names are not presented to the public because they were serving in a very highly classified position, in a covert situation in which you just can't reveal what their name was.

So does it take a toll?

I think it does, but at the same time, the thing that impressed me about the CIA is that these were people that are, they're not Republicans or Democrats.

They really are Americans just trying to do a job, a tough job.

And I saw the work that they did, and I developed tremendous respect for their willingness to put their lives on the line to be able to get the information we needed to get.

- We talked earlier about President John Kennedy and of course you've worked, you didn't work with him, but you've worked with a lot of presidents.

But as you look at history, and you're reading it, obviously, and helping make it really, who are your heroes?

- Heroes?

- Heroes, yeah, other than your dad and your mom, and your grandpa and Sylvia, for sure, but I mean- - They are hero, they're all heroes, yeah.

I think, when I first went back to Washington, I mentioned this.

I got out of the army and I had to make a decision whether I go into the practice of law in Monterey or whether I would try to get a job in Washington.

So, this is interesting.

I mean, I wrote a guy named Joe Califano who worked for Lyndon Johnson.

I didn't know Joe Califano, but I wrote him because I figured he's Italian, I'm Italian, what the hell?

So I said to Califano, I said, "I have a tremendous admiration for you, are there some jobs, that I might be interested in?"

And he actually set up appointments in Washington for me.

And I went back to Washington and I walked, I went to Justice Department, I went to the Pentagon, I went to defense, I went to other departments.

Then I walked up to Capitol Hill and walked into a senator's office, Tom Kuchel's office because I liked him.

He was a man of tremendous integrity.

And I just walked in and said, "I'm just interested, is there any opening?"

And sure enough, there was an opening for a legislative assistant.

And I talked to his AA and he set up a meeting with the senator, and the senator hired me.

And so Sylvia and our kids, we've gotten a Volkswagen and drove all the way back to Washington.

And when I got back there, I remember going into Kuchel's office, he was a minority whip under Everett Dirksen, who was a minority leader.

And the office is there in the Capitol, it's in one of the small circular areas in the Capitol.

And I'll never forget, he said, he brought me into the office and he said, "Look, Leon, you're gonna be tempted a great deal in this town."

Those are the days when lobbyists bought lunches and gave presents, and did all kinds of things.

"You're gonna be tempted a great deal, and they're gonna try to get my vote as a result of that.

And I want you to remember one thing that we are here to serve the interests of the people of the country and the people of California.

And also, remember this, when you get up in the morning, you have to look at yourself in the mirror."

I never forgot that because what he was saying was, "in the end, you gotta protect your integrity."

You know, for all the temptations in Washington, you still gotta do what's right.

So Kuchel was probably the one hero for me personally, who taught me the importance of doing what you believe is right in protecting your integrity.

- We're gonna wrap it up.

I want to thank, in particular, the students who are here.

And I think when they leave, they'll have a hero in Leon Panetta.

Thank you, thank you, thank you.

- Thank you very much, Jim.

(audience applauding) (uplifting music)