2:30 P.M. EDT
Real Audio of Briefing 
MS. HOLWILL: Good afternoon. Welcome to Washington Foreign Press Center. We're very happy this afternoon to have with us Kay Maxwell, who is the National President of the League of Women Voters and Marcia Merrins, who is the President of the New York State League of Women Voters.
It's hard to believe that women in the United States have had the vote for only about 84 years. Founded in 1920, the League of Women Voters is an outgrowth of the suffragist movement. The League of Women Voters is the original grassroots citizens' network. It's directed by the consensus of its members nationwide.
Although it neither supports nor opposes candidates for office at any level of government, it is wholeheartedly political, working to influence policy through education advocacy. This year, they have joined with a group of organizations working to register 18- to 30-year-olds to vote and to encourage the turnout among that age group. And with that, I'd like to introduce Kay Maxwell.
MS. MAXWELL: Thank you very much. It's a pleasure to be here. As you indicated, the League of Women Voters was an outgrowth of the Women's Suffrage Movement. And the women that have worked so hard to get women the right to vote realize that once that had been accomplished that the next task was to educate women so that they could understand the issues and actually participate and be able to vote and understand the issues.
So we grew out of the suffrage movement, but issues have always been important to the organization. And it was originally a women's organization, although in 1974 we began to admit men. So we do actually have some men who are members of the League, although we're predominantly still a women's organization.
But the main purpose of the League of Women Voters is to encourage the active and informed participation of all citizens in their government, not just women, not just youth, not just men, but all citizens, because we recognize that if we're going to be a vibrant democracy, we've got to have the participation of all of our citizens in that democracy.
We focus on voting, obviously, during an election year, although, as you mentioned, we do also address many, many issues. We're a grassroots organization. I'm the national president. Marcia, as she indicated, is the president of the New York State league. And then we have local Leagues of Women Voters in communities across the country. So the local communities deal with local issues; the state leagues deal with statewide issues; and at the national level, we focus on national issues.
Some of the kinds of issues that we focus on are things -- everything from things such as education to gun control, to reproductive choice, to the United Nations, I mean, a whole range of issues that go way beyond what people may think of when they think of women's issues. We're citizens. We're interested in all of those issues.
I'd say this year our focus, of course, is on registering and getting people out to vote. But I'd like to just turn to Marcia and have her mention, perhaps, what some of the things are that you're doing at the state level of the organization; then we can come back and talk about some of the others.
MS. MERRINS: New York State has about 6,000 members of the League of Women Voters and 53 local leagues just in New York State. So we range from rural communities to urban communities with the populations covering all minorities and all ages. And so our effort to get the vote out is widespread and it covers many different arenas where we can help people understand what they need to do to vote and get out the vote.
MS. MAXWELL: And as I said, issues are important to us. We want people to come out and vote, but we want them to understand the issues. And we do that in lots of different ways. One of the ones where anyone in the world can go onto the Internet and go to DNet.org, d-n-e-t dot org.
You can go on there, anyone. You can put the zip code, click on a particular state in the United States, learn who the candidates are in those states or various statewide offices, find out where the candidates stand on the issues, or now go in and look at the presidential candidates, see what their stands are on issues.
So it's a major effort to provide a service to citizens and voters so that when you want to find out where a candidate stands on an issue, you've got a place to go.
MS. MERRINS: It's also a place where you can -- the Internet is also a place where you can communicate your views about a certain issue to your elected officials as well as other office holders, statewide and nationally and locally, using an advocacy tool that is available on the national website, and also the state website.
It's called the "Citizen Action Toolkit" at our -- in New York State, and you click on a tab that says, "Take Action," and there will be pre-prepared letters that you can send to your elected officials, or you can write your own. So that is also available so you can understand what candidates are thinking about now and how to get your message across.
MS. MAXWELL: And when we talk about election time and providing information on candidates, one of the reasons why people come to the League of Women Voters to find out about candidates and issues is because they trust us. For over 80 years, we've been a non-partisan organization. As you mentioned, we never support a particular party or a particular candidate. And so we're trusted as a source of basic, solid information. And it's one of the things that we're very proud of, and one of the things that we guard quite jealously.
We're volunteers. Marcia's a volunteer. I'm a volunteer. At the national level, we have staff here in Washington. Marcia, you have a couple of staff at the state level.
MS. MERRINS: We have three paid staff for the whole state. So it's an amazing organization because the grassroots volunteers are what makes the League as strong as it is now.
MS. MAXWELL: And volunteerism is so important to this country and around the world. If you want to have organizations in any country, who deal with citizens, who provide information, who do work the government or business can't do, these kinds of volunteer organizations are critical. And we, of course, are prejudiced and think that the League of Women Voters is a perfect example of a terrific volunteer organization that does a lot of work.
Now, as I say, it is an election year, so we do do some other things. One of the things we have this year is a publication called Choosing the President 2004. It's a publication we put out every four years, non-partisan information, basic information in it.
This year we're also focusing a lot on young people. You mentioned that at the beginning. We always work to try and get all citizens who are eligible registered and voting.
But we're putting particular emphasis on young people because I think we have recognized in this country that unless we get better participation on the part of our young people, they become part of the process, they do vote, that we're going to pay a price as we move along in the years when we just simply won't have an engaged citizenry like we all want and need.
So one of the efforts this year -- it's a little bit unusual. We -- in fact, it gets a chuckle every time we mention it. But there is an effort called "Smack Down Your Vote," and it's an effort that is sponsored by World Wrestling Entertainment. It's a serious effort on their part to try and register several million more 18- to 30-year-olds to come out and vote this year.
And so they've taken the lead on a coalition that's made up of some unusual partners that don't normally work together: World Wrestling Entertainment, as I said, is the lead; we're a partner in it -- the League of Women Voters; the Hip Hop Action Summit is part of it; the Harvard University Institute of Politics; Rock the Vote, so it's a lot of different groups who are coming at this from different perspectives, but all of whom want to try and reach young people and get them to register and understand why it's important that they vote.
Now they've helped us with -- we have brochures that they've helped us with that we're putting out across the country that encourage young people to vote. We also -- they focus on issues and did some research in terms of what the issues are that young people are truly interested in. And the research shows, for example, that issues relating to Iraq and security, education and jobs and the economy are the issues that young people are really focused on.
But as I say, World Wrestling Entertainment has taken the lead and they funded a Public Service Announcement that is going to be shown across the country on television stations encouraging young people to register and vote, and we are going to turn to that and see what that looks like.
(Several public service announcements played for audience in English and in Spanish.)
MS. MAXWELL: So we are grateful to our partners who are helping us to get the message out to young people.
MS. MERRINS: We also, local leagues are trying to get involved with engaging children way before they're old enough to register to vote to get involved with the process.
We have something in New York State called, "Take Me To Vote." And it is in cooperation with local boards of elections. And what happens is, the children have this post cart that they bring with -- when their parents go to vote, and the election sector signs it. And then they get a pizza if their class has the biggest number of children that went to vote with their parents, so that they are being exposed to the process at an early age.
And I think that is significant because there are many families where parents are just too busy to get out and vote. And somehow, if your child asks you to take them to vote, they may actually vote for that reason, for the pizza more than anything else. So that is something that we're doing in New York State, as well.
MS. MAXWELL: But so many organizations and groups want to partner with the League of Women Voters during an election year because they recognize that we do have the credibility and that we can work together for the common goal.
Now, one of the other publications that the League puts out, it's called Navigating Election Day. It's a guide especially for those who have just turned 18 and will be voting for the first time, or for new citizens. It walks them through the process of how to register, what to expect when they go to the polls on Election Day, what questions to ask so that they can go fully prepared.
MS. MERRINS: And we also, New York State, and I'm sure in other states as well, we have one that's specifically for New York State. And so it is similar to that, and it also walks first-time voters, not just 18-year-olds, but all first-time voters, through the process of voting in New York State. And that could change from place to place, as well.
MS. MAXWELL: Surely. And we've had the publication in Spanish, as well. And of course, many leagues, depending on what part of the country they're in may do things in other languages. Some leagues do them in Chinese, various languages, depending on what their local populations are.
And just one other example of the kind of partnerships that we're doing this year in order to increase voter turnout: This is a partnership. It's an election guidebook for local broadcasters that we're doing with the National Association of Broadcasters.
It's a publication for all of their broadcasters across the country -- things that they can do, how they can partner with the League in order to encourage everyone to get more engaged.
And we'd be the first to admit that we're not proud of the turnout that we have in this country. We certainly wish it were a lot higher than it was, and it's something we feel is critical, that we're working hard to change. And as I say, it's not just during an election year that we do this, although we get perhaps a little more attention during an election year.
But the League of Women Voters itself is not just focused on education and the election. We're a public policy group, so we are constantly working to change public policy at the national, at the state and at the local levels.
MS. MERRINS: One of the things we are working on in New York State right now is collaboration with newspapers and education. And the -- our attempt is to get information to voters through their newspapers, both in other languages other than English, and also into the classroom.
And I think when -- one of the reasons people, I think, don't vote, besides being busy and otherwise engaged, is that they don't know enough to make an intelligent vote. And so I think the attempt is to get these voter guides to people before Election Day so that information is disseminated over a wide area.
MS. MAXWELL: And as I say, the League, we're a citizen organization. Our goal is a non-partisan one. We're trying to get people registered not in a particular party or not to vote for a particular candidate, but because we believe every citizen in this country has both the right and the responsibility to participate, and voting is just the most basic.
MS. MERRINS: It's a representative government, and if you want representation in your government, you have to vote. Otherwise, nobody will listen to you. So that's what that's all about.
MS. MAXWELL: Well, and our message to young people particularly is, if they're not going to get engaged and vote, then they're leaving the decisions to people of my age and older. And if they want to have a say in what their government is going to be doing, they need to get out there and participate and be sure that elected officials are addressing the issues that matter to them. Because elected officials recognize who comes out and votes. And they'll talk about the issues that matter to the people that do get out and vote. And if young people don't do it, then they can't expect candidates to really be addressing their issues.
MS. HOLWILL: Anything else? Now we'll open the floor to questions. Would you please identify yourself by name and your media outlet?
Yes.
QUESTION: Thank you. This is Tulin Daloglu from Turkey's Star TV.
On the Election Focus 2004 that you distributed to us, on the very first page, it's full of very interesting statements. Number one, it says, in 2000, women voters surpassed men voters in U.S. for the first time, and then there is one part, which says, women have more often supported Democratic candidates, and then on another title you talk about the security moms.
So I know you don't like to, you know, hash all these one lines together, but I'm, you know, curious whether you can give us a perspective in general the contribution of women on the Election Day? And number two, you know, this year is really interesting, I guess, for the all voters, regardless of women or men. But specifically for women, how do you foresee the impact of war continuing in Iraq and Afghanistan? And today the FBI Director Robert Mueller was talking about a possible -- a possibility of a terrorist attack in the United States between now and the fall, the Election Day, I guess that would be.
So how do you foresee that would have an impact on the women voters on their decision? Thank you.
MS. MAXWELL: Well, first of all, even though we're the League of Women Voters, our focus is not on women voters only. We are not -- do not focus specifically on getting just women registered to vote or getting them out to vote.
We pay attention to women's issues, and some of the things that you've quoted is some research that's been done on voting patterns, and it is true that more women are registered than men. More women actually turn out to vote than men. But in the same way that men are not a single voting bloc, neither are women; and we certainly would never expect anyone to vote simply on the basis of gender or ethnic group or any one of a range of possibilities. We want them to focus on the issues.
Now, some of the research has shown that women are particularly interested in certain kinds of issues, for example, in the health care field or education. There are some differences between men and women as to what issues they might put as their top priority, but everyone is concerned about the issues that you've raised, I mean, security and all of those kinds of things are important to everyone.
I wouldn't begin to try and predict how the election will turn out. Our goal is to have everyone educate themselves about the issues, make their own decision about how they feel about those issues and then go and make their voice heard on Election Day. And we're not going to know until the end of Election Day.
MS. MERRINS: I think people vote, and women in particular -- referencing your question -- if they feel that their vote is going to make a different as an outcome. And if women have a strong opinion about the outcome of the Iraqi war, they may vote accordingly to whatever they believe. So I think it has to reach home for a lot of people to vote, and oftentimes, they feel their vote does not count. And it's the job of the League of Women Voters and other organizations to educate voters to what the issues are.
MS. MAXWELL: And I think we always urge everyone, look if there's a range of issues. I don't think any individual goes and votes strictly on the basis of one particular issue. There are the things that resonate with them at any given point in time, and we can't predict what may happen between now and Election Day.
MS. MERRINS: For the youth vote, it's the economy.
MS. MAXWELL: Right.
MS. MERRINS: You know, it wouldn't be the war in Iraq. It would be the economy.
MS. MAXWELL: Well, except that the research on the youth did show the three things that the youth are most interested in --
MS. MERRINS: Right.
MS. MAXWELL: -- and it is Iraq and security, education, you know, getting scholarships and grants, as well as jobs and the economy. At this point in time, those are the things that came through.
If you look at different segments of the population, they've looked at unmarried women versus married women, for example, in terms of turnout. It turns out that married women vote in much larger numbers than unmarried women. Why? We're not sure. And different issues strike different groups.
But, as I say, I think there's some, some themes that run across it, but I honestly don't personally believe that there's any one issue that makes a difference. And people are voting -- the other thing to remember, too, is people are voting for much more than just president.
I don't mean to put that down at all, but we're not -- when I go to the polls, I'm going to be voting on local officials; I'm going to be voting on statewide officials; I'm going to be voting for the President and Vice President. I may also be voting on a certain referendum or questions on the ballot, so the election is much more -- even though we get the focus on the presidential part of it, there are a lot of issues that play out in terms of how you're going to vote, especially at the local level because every community's got different issues that matter. And some people are coming out more focused on the local issues than they may be on the national ones -- so very hard to predict.
MS. MERRINS: Did that answer your question? You don't look like it did.
MS. MAXWELL: Probably not. (Laughter.)
MS. MERRINS: I'm not quite sure. You had a long question there.
QUESTION: Right. Thank you. Let me rephrase it like this: There is, you know, men voters are 58 percent. Women voters are 61 percent. It's still not, you know, 80 percent or 90 percent we are talking about.
Do you expect this year, as, you know, really, this issues we are all talking about is really very important issues, I guess, not only to Americans, but everyone around the world. Do you see or hope that these numbers will reach to 80 percent or whatever?
MS. MAXWELL: We hope. I don't think that we're being realistic. I mean we've been working for years to try and increase the turnout. We all hope, any time there's an election that the issues are going to be such that it's going to increase.
A lot of people are hopeful. There are signs that registration is increasing, particularly among young people, but we're really not going to know. I think it would be unrealistic to think we're going to jump up to 80 percent. But we want to see an improvement, and so we're not going to predict any particular percentage, I don't think
MS. MERRINS: Even after 9/11, I think the expectation was that in the elections following September 2001, that there would be an increase in voter participation and less apathy. And it wasn't significant at all. It didn't happen.
So, you know, to say we are living in difficult times and people should pay attention to it and vote, we hope, but I don't know if that will happen. We spend a lot of volunteer hours mobilizing people to not only get registered, but to get them to the polls. And it has to be a process that people feel is easy for them to do, also.
MS. MAXWELL: We'll all cross our fingers for an increase. I think there's someone in the back.
QUESTION: Excuse me, I speaking English very bad but I question make Indonesian. Tenri A. Pallalo, Hafajir, from Journalists Harian (inaudible) Indonesian.
(Question posed in Indonesian.)
VIA TRANSLATOR: It appears that this woman's organization is very strong, and I'm just wondering if you can tell us how you were able to build this into such a strong organization?
(Question posed in Indonesian.)
VIA TRANSLATOR: I'm also wondering if the woman's organizations sometimes want to support a particular candidate that they feel women will support more strongly?
A PARTICIPANT: Never. (Laughter.)
MS. MAXWELL: We'll start with the last part of that question.
A PARTICIPANT: Never.
MS. MAXWELL: No.
QUESTION: (Question posed in Indonesian.)
VIA TRANSLATOR: And also for reproductive health, I'm interested in your opinion.
QUESTION: (Question posed in Indonesian.)
VIA TRANSLATOR: And especially abortion.
MS. MAXWELL: Right.
QUESTION: Thank you.
MS. MAXWELL: First of all, the organization, The League of Women Voters, does not support, ever, a particular candidate or a political party. Many other organizations do, and certainly a lot of people belong to those organizations, and that's fine. But the League does not, and that really is one of the reasons why we are as strong as we are and why we are as trusted as we are. It's because we have maintained that non-partisan approach.
And when we go to speak with either members of Congress at the national level, or members of the state legislation in New York State about a particular issue and how we feel about it, we are listened to because we have a reputation for having done our research and our homework, and having looked at both sides of an issue before we come to any judgment as to how we feel about that issue. So all of that trust is what has helped to keep us a strong and trusted and valued organization.
You asked about reproductive choice, we are a strong, pro-choice organization. We will actually be participating in the march this Sunday. And we -- as I said, we have positions on many, many different kinds of issues, but they come out of a member agreement process. So we don't have a position on every issue, and it's not me as the president of the national organization, or Marcia as the president, New York State that decides how the organization feels about an issue; it's the membership itself
MS. MERRINS: The national organization has a convention every other year, and the states have it on the alternative -- alternate year. And delegates from the leagues, the state leagues and the local leagues gather and they actually reach consensus about positions that they think the national or state league should have.
In New York State, we are now studying the death penalty -- the league is studying the death penalty. The state league does not have a position on that, and we will -- there are studies going on in all of these local leagues, and information will be disseminated and then the membership will vote on a position about the death penalty in New York State and whether or not the league should advocate for or against it.
MS. MAXWELL: I should also add that we have had a position for about 30 years that we just reaffirmed this past year, which is, we believe that the Electoral College should be abolished. I don't think it's going to happen any time soon, but we would rather see direct election of the president, so that's one of the kinds of positions that we've had.
We've also been very focused over the last couple of years in trying to see that our elections are well run: that we have workers at the polls, you have enough of them, that they're well trained, that people's names are on the registration lists, and if they're not there that they're given a special ballot.
We want the elections to be well run, and we want people to feel confident that when they go to the polls, they're going to be able to vote and that their vote will be counted -- so a lot of emphasis on assuring confidence in our election system.
MS. MERRINS: Yes. Okay.
MS. MERRINS: You're -- she's directing.
MS. MERRINS: I almost jumped right in.
QUESTION: Okay, thanks again. I don't know much about your organization, so if this is an absurd question, please do excuse me, but I'm wondering whether you're only working to attract more women to vote on the election day, or are you also supporting to increase the numbers of women representatives or senators at the U.S. Congress, and are you at any effect working with, you know, cooperation with other organizations around the world? I happened to sit with Ms. Debra (ph) here, and she mentioned a little bit about your cooperation in Bosnia-Herzegovina. And so can you just, you know, elaborate more on that? Thank you.
MS. MAXWELL: Surely. Well first of all, as I say, we are not focused on just getting women registered and just getting women out to vote. We want all citizens, and I can't say that more strongly.
That having been said, though, we also want to we also want to encourage more equality of participation. We need to see many more women running for office and getting elected to office. More than half our population is female, and so there should be more women holding elective office in this country. We would like to see that happen.
We like to see women going through training courses to run for office. A lot of the international work that we've done has been in a place like Bosnia, for example, helping them create an organization modeled after the League of Women Voters in terms of its education work and what it does to try and get citizens out to vote.
But the work we did there in Bosnia, they were focused on women running for office there, so we helped them put on a televised debate among the women candidates for parliament that particular year.
So we want to empower everyone. And what we see as we look around the world is that women have not yet taken their rightful place in terms of their participation and their in their communities in terms of holding elective office, in terms of jobs, all of those kinds of things. So it's a mixture, but we want -- we don't focus on just getting women out to vote.
MS. MERRINS: And there's a lot of reasons for that which are social issues that for different places reflect the lack of women in elected office, and I think there are lots of reasons why women don't run for office as well, but we --
MS. MAXWELL: But we're seeing increases. I mean, --
MS. MERRINS: Yeah.
MS. MAXWELL: -- we're slowly, we rank pretty poorly --
MS. MERRINS: Yeah, as equality raises.
MS. MAXWELL: I think we're about number 40 or 50 in the world in terms of the percentage of women in our Congress when compared to national parliaments around the world.
We'd like to be a lot better. I think Sweden may be number one. But as I said, I think we believe -- we firmly believe that women have a role to play in their communities, and that includes holding elective office and all of the rest of it.
MS. MERRINS: And in New York State, in the New York State Legislature, there are no Asian legislators in all of the representatives in New York State. Because that is a segment of New York State that does not get to the polls. So, you know, that's kind of an interesting little tidbit there.
MS. MAXWELL: And as I say, we try to work with women's organizations around the world -- sharing experiences. I mean, not trying to go and tell somebody how to do something. Obviously, we haven't figured out the perfect way to get everyone participating, but you know, what's worked, what hasn't, and just to support each other -- community organizations. And we don't just work with women's organizations around the world. It's civic organizations, in general.
QUESTION: Thank you. Tofan Mahdi from Jawa Positive Daily News, Indonesia.
Just two short questions so far as how is the response from the government so far to your movement -- the movement by League of Women Voters? And then the second one is does your organization has working together with the same organization abroad? Thank you.
MS. MAXWELL: I'm sorry. The last part again?
QUESTION: Okay, does your organization working together with the same organization in the -- outside the United States of America?
MS. MAXWELL: In terms of that, we've done a lot of work in a number of countries around the world. We wish there was the support so that we could continue long, long-term relationships with organizations that we've worked with in various countries.
Obviously, it's become easier to stay in touch because -- with e-mail and all of the rest of it, we're able to share much more than we were, you know, even ten years ago. So we stay in touch in lots of ways that may be more informal than formal.
We also stay in touch with organizations around the world through the United Nations. We, actually, as an organization have three women who are volunteers who are our observers at the United Nations and are engaged in promoting the work of the United Nations, reporting to our membership on activities of the United Nations. So there are lots of ways that we try and stay in touch with international groups.
We also work with other organizations within this country. We do coalition work. We recognize that no single organization can do it all. We join together with other organizations to work on certain issues in the same way that we've joined together with certain organizations to promote voter registration. We'll join with some to push for certain kinds of issues.
And the first part of your question related to --
QUESTION: -- from the government, yeah.
MS. MAXWELL: From the government?
Well, generally, I mean, we never get all we want, but I think the important thing is that we've got a good relationship with government. And I used to serve -- when I lived here in the Washington, D.C. area -- we have a group of volunteers who are League members here in Washington, who are members of what we call our Lobby Corps. They go up to Capitol Hill and they lobby members of Congress on behalf of the League's position. And they do it as volunteers.
And when I was doing it, we don't just go to see those that agree with us, we go and talk with those who disagree. But we've always been able to have a conversation because we want to have a reasonable discussion. We can recognize we're not going to always agree with legislators. But they understand that we're coming from having done our homework, having looked at the issues, and so there's a respectful dialogue that can continue even when there's disagreement on a particular issue.
MS. MERRINS: In New York State, we have briefings at the United Nations -- just to dovetail on something that Kay mentioned -- we have had briefings on the status of children around the world. We've had briefing on the status of women around the world. And this fall, we will have a briefing on October 5th on the status of the global environment. So you can see, our issues are widespread. And it's just an education piece, really. It's just to educate other organizations about some of the issues that are more global.
QUESTION: Okay. Kay, I am Octo from Indonesia. (Inaudible?)
MS. MAXWELL: It's working fine.
QUESTION: (Question posed in Indonesian.) Thank you.
VIA INTERPRETER: As you know, war always involves women and children victims, and so I'm wondering what your organization is doing in the case of this Iraqi war in supporting of women's and children's issues?
MS. MAXWELL: We haven't done anything specific. Well, let me back up. We have been considering becoming involved, hopefully, in doing some work with women's centers, with women's organizations, say, within Iraq.
That is not happening yet. We don't know the, you know, when it might because there are obviously a lot of issues surrounding that. But we do see that we, as an organization, do have a role to play in helping women in countries like Iraq, Afghanistan, wherever it might be, again, to share, to share experiences and to be able to work together on the issues that we care about: We all -- women around the world care about the educations of their children. There are mutual issues that matter to women around the world. And to the extent that we are able to go and do that kind of work, we certainly want to and are ready to, but there's nothing that's happening in that area right now.
MS. MERRINS: We are grassroots organization, so a lot of we do is done at very local areas where people vote. And getting international is beyond the scope of what somebody in central New York can, can effectively deal with. So it's a national --
MS. MAXWELL: The fact that we have a lot of our local members from around the country have participated in our international programs -- travel to Africa --
MS. MERRINS: Volunteers.
MS. MAXWELL: -- South America as volunteers, again, sharing experiences, you know, how our organization functions and working with them. So we have a lot of members who've done a lot of work. And as I say, it's all as volunteers.
MONITOR: Any more questions?
Kay, Marcia, we're delighted. I learned a lot. I think everyone did.
MS. MAXWELL: Thank you, and it's been my pleasure Indonesia in the past. I'm was simply pleased to have been able to meet with you all today.
Thank you.
