like no other. since 1979, we've been your primary source for capitol hill. providing balanced, unfiltered coverage of government. taking you to where the policies debate and decided, all with the support of america's cable companies. c-span, 45 years and counting. powered by cab. >> up next, the national press club in washington, d.c., updates the statuses of u.s. journalists detained abroad. among them, austin tice, who was kidnapped in syria in august of 2012 while doing freelance work, and the "wall street journal's" journalist who was arrested in russia. family members and colleagues took part in the briefing this. hour-long event coincided with world press freedom day. take their seat, we can begin in just a minute.

[inaudible conversations] thank you all so much and welcome to the national press club. i'm emily wilkins, the 117th president of the national press club and for cnbc. thank you for joining us on this incredibly important topic. the first world press freedom day took place-- not the first one, but the first one in the u.s. took place in the national press club in 2011 so we're grateful for those of you who joined us both in person and online today. on one hand it's an exciting time all over the world giving important and moving speeches.

some in santiago, chile and all over the world. we'll get the latest information on the three u.s. journalists who are wrongfully being held overseas, you know their names. austin tice, who works for "the washington post" has been held for nearly 12 years now in syria. evan gershkovich, a wall street journal reporter taken in russia one year and two months ago and alsu kurmasheva, editor at radio free europe, who has been held in russia for more than six months. each of the journalists have a unique story and we want you to understand them not just as journalists wrongfully detained, but people who need to get back to their families and to their lives. we've brought an important advocate to visit with each of us today and we look forward to an update on their current status and what might be coming next. while today's event is about

wrongly detained reporters i would be remiss if we don't look at the extraordinary point and journalists are killed at an alarming rate, this is particularly true in the israel-hamas war. since october 7th, nearly 100 journalists have been killed in this war and that's more than all of the journalists who were killed in the calendar year 2023. today we call for all parties to immediately stop the killing and targeting of journalists. we call on the u.s. government to use its significant influence to ensure the safety of reporters. in our support of journalism, we do not take sides, but we cannot ignore the facts, the vast majority of journalists who have died are palestinians and we know that some of them have been targeted by israeli forces. and it's not just killings,

journalists are being wounded, they're being threatened. their families are being threatened. this is unacceptable and this must stop now. journalists also need to be granted access to report firsthand on what is happening on the ground and documenting what is happening in this war. organizations like al-jazeera are an important source of information and need to be able to continue to report during this important time. it's israeli reporters have also been killed by hamas and we condemn these, notably a photographer just hours before his death was bravely documenting that horrific october 7th attack. as we face a possible final assault in gaza, there are only a few journalists remaining on the ground who can document what's happening and we ask for everyone, that great care be taken to make sure that they are safe and that they're able to do their incredibly important work. thank you so much and with that, we're going to be our

focus back to the detained journalists in the u.s. and why they've gathered here today and start by welcoming to the stage, debra tice, austin tice's mom. austin has been detained in syria since 2012 and debra, you've been tirelessly leading the fight to bring him home. your passion, your persistence, your determination has been incredibly inspiring to me and i know many who know you as well. and so, i welcome you to the stage to make a couple of remarks and look forward to a q & a with you. everyone, debra tice. [applause] >> so, first of all, of course, i want to thank you all for being here and i want to thank everyone that's also joining us virtually. it's been 11 years, eight months and one week, three

days, since austin was detained in syria. we are not giving up on our efforts to bring him home. i know that many people feel that's a terribly long time, but it's not unusual in syria for people to be detained in silence for a very long time. so, thank you again, thank you so much, emily, for taking this time this morning. thank you. thank you so much. [inaudible conversations] that you've taken the time to come and chat with us a bit about austin. the last time i saw you was a couple of days ago right before the white house correspondent's dinner and we were talking how

you got a very, very, very brief opportunity to meet with president biden. can you tell us a little bit. what did you tell him? what did he tell you? >> i was really fortunate to be able to have just a few minutes with the president and, also dr. biden was with him, which was lovely to meet her for the first time. the most important message i had for the president is that in spite of the fact that he gave very distinct directives to the national security council on may 2nd of 2022, and he told them to get a meeting, to listen to the syrians to find out what they wanted and to work with them. there was no action taken on that by the national security council until the following february of 2023. and even those engagements have been less than sincere and i

wanted the president to know that his directive has somewhat been ignored. that was the most important message that i had for him. and i hope that that will bring a change in the behavior of the national security council. >> i mean, are you-- i'm curious because you've had several meetings with president biden and spoke with a lot of officials in the u.s. government. are you satisfied with the responses at this point? how do you kind of feel about what you've been told and how the working relationship has been? >> the working relationship has been good. they're very open to engaging with me, which i appreciate, but my -- what i really want is for them to engage with the syrians. i can stay home and keep being the mom, keep being the homemaker, and they can go and engage with the syrian government rather than engaging with me. that would be the thing that i

really would rather have happen. >> and i also wanted to ask about, because i think a lot of times when people first hear about austin tice, and you may have as well, they ask how long he's been detained for, and you say more than 11 years at this point. there's a question that comes up a lot and folks say how do you know that we can still bring him home. how do you respond to those folks? because i think it's something that often comes up around austin and something that you have a really powerful answer to. >> right. usually when i'm asked that question i have to say, yes, i have no doubt, there's -- i get information about austin. i can't share it with you. i can't share my source with you. but i can tell you without a doubt, austin is exceedingly eager to walk free and i hope

we can see that happen before he has to mark that day, however he's marking his time. i just hope he doesn't have to mark the day that he has been detained for 12 years. i hope we can get this done before august. >> i know, the national press club and many of our partners out there are going to be doing everything we can with you completely 100% in making sure that we can get austin home. can you just provide a bit of an update right now on what the latest is, with austin's case, with syria, just really where things stand? >> okay. you can see my notes are a wreck, but i have an answer to that question and i want to share it with you. let me see if i can find it here. >> take your time. >> so the thing that is -- the thing that's most important right now, to me, is we're trying to find -- there was a

meeting in damascus in 2020 with the national security -- part of the national security council, went and had a meeting with the syrians in damascus. and somewhere there is a report about that meeting. we have never received that report and we found out about it from an article by sonna smith and the texas monthly magazine and they were conscientious making sure that it was accurate. so we are asking now for our proof of that because part of this -- part of that meeting was that if certain conditions

were met, there could be a proof of life offered. this was september of 2020. and i really think that if you could see that proof, it would really move the needle for austin. it would move the needle and it would make you more engaged. it would make the government more engaged. god willing, it would make the state department more engaged and more committed to bringing austin home, rather than throwing up their hands and saying, well, my goodness, it's been almost 12 years. so that is a hugely important thing that we found out through the texas monthly writing. and had no idea, it was quite as far it was. >> and surprising given how many folks you've spoken in the government and contacts you have, and how active you've been coming up to d.c. and making sure that austin is

being kept front of mind and that the case on him is progressing at this point. i know we also recently had bashar al-assad saying there were discussions with the u.s. and seems like austin might be a part of that as well. i wanted to see if you had any particular thoughts on that or any discussions around that that you might be able to share. i know that some stuff is confidential, of course. >> there have been engagements, but they've been more of performances, to say that they've had engagements, rather than genuine, sincere engagement with the three steps that requires. someone right now during this meeting is capturing your dog and you are going to have to release your dog. you're going to have three things you need to do. you're going to need to engage.

you're going to need to have dialog, and you're going to have to make a concession to get your dog back. and it's exactly the same with austin in syria. there is going to have to be sincere engagement. there's going to have to be dialog and, yes, at the very end, there is going to have to be concession. that is how hostage situations are remedied. and austin is waiting and our government as we've seen for the last seven months, is exceedingly capable of taking those three steps, should they desire. . when you talk about those steps, you talk about engagement. i think there's one interesting piece of legislation, it didn't get a lot of attention, it wasn't one of the big bills that everyone fought over.

the anti-normalization act of 2023 already passed the house and it's now gone over to the senate. debra, can you talk a little about this bill and what its passage could mean for austin? >> okay, yes, yes, i can. i was in a round table before the house foreign affairs committee this week talking specifically about this bill and how it affects austin. and this is-- the thing is, this bill is a really hateful bill. it even has a hateful title that talks about something like against the assad regime in syria or something, a title like that. and what it calls for is no engagement by the united states government, no engagement by businesses doing business in

america, and no engagement by our allies. that is entirely ridiculous. and the impact on austin by his government would be a life sentence, if we cannot engage, we cannot bring austin home. >> and so, i want to talk about who is behind this bill and how did this bill get approved on the floor with suspended rules 389 representatives signed onto this bill. those would have been asked to talk about what the bill is and what it's about, don't know. they can't tell me what they signed for. they just knew, here is this bill, i'm going to see my

constituents in two days, i want to get a long list of bills completed. that's how that happens. so the real power behind the bill is the u.s.-based syrian opposition lobby. this lobby is trying to keep alive a civil war that is 13 years old and is over. i can tell you that the united states had a war between the states that lasted five years. there are people in the united states right now that would revisit that conflict. but i think we all agree that conflict is over and the syrian arab league agrees that the war

in syria is over. there are embassies, especially the uae, has opened their embassy in damascus. it is peopled with an ambassador that's been accepted by bashar assad. it is over, so, why are these people continuing to push the importance of this conflict? these are people in our country. this bill is a huge win for that lobbying, but a horrid loss for the syrian people living in tents. living in tents in syria, living in tents in lebanon. living in tents in jordan. this is not a bill friendly to these people that need to have their lives rebuilt. the syrian opposition was funded originally by saudi

arabia, qatar and the uae. they have stopped funding that of opposition long ago. and that will tell you a lot. i challenge you, as investigative reporters, to look into who in america is now funding the syrian opposition? they are very active on capitol hill, i can tell you, to get 389 representatives to sign this bill without even reading it. the united states government needs to wake up. the state department, which is a vigorous defender of this syrian opposition group, needs to wake up. our congress needs to wake up. the conflict is over, the time

has come for rebuilding. >> that's a very, very strong words, debra and important light is being shed and i cover congress and they are a chunk of bills that go quickly throughout the week and it's notable, all of your interactions with lawmakers, they haven't really been able to tell you what the bill does and seems like it realizes there is some implications for their vote for it and obviously, i know there's work being done to have the education campaign in the senate. i also just wanted to ask, what do you see right now as the biggest obstacles to austin's case? >> that, that is the biggest obstacles to austin's case, is this insistence that we cannot engage with syria and then, our government kind of being in the middle of that, so they have to perform engaging because the

president gave them that directive, but they're walking a tightrope, i guess. and that is the problem. our government needs to have a determination and a commitment to austin that we have seen with other hostages for the last seven months. if austin had that kind of commitment, that kind of dedication, he would have been home longing ago. >> and when you talk to lawmakers earlier this week at the panel. what was their response? >> it was mixed. it was mixed. some of the people thought that i was very much out line to speak so strongly against that bill. and my congressman, congressman al green, lucky for austin, was very supportive that this is, you know, we've got hr3202 in

the house. we've got 2254 at the u.n. but these are all inhuman, inhumane for the syrian people. these are not-- this is not the road that we want to be on. we need to get on the right track. >> debra, i want to kind of pivot the conversation a little bit just because we talk about austin so much in our desire to have him come home and free him, how that can happen. can we just spend a minute speaking just about austin, who he is as a person, what is he like? just kind of give us a sense of this individual who i feel we spent so much talking about the strategy around him and haven't spent a minute talking about him and i just want to give you a minute to do that. >> it's more than a minute. >> go for it.

>> this is my first born son and the one that made me a mom and the choices that he has made in his life have just made this mom over the moon. he has always been strong-willed, very strong-willed. when he puts his mind to something that's the way we're going. and you know, he's an eagle scout, he's a decorated captain in the united states marine corps. he gave -- he decided to serve his country after 9/11. he felt like that he was called to that. it wasn't something he had been thinking of prior to that. he is the best big brother you could ever want. all the tropes about big brothers, he fills them. he loves being the oldest. we have seven, and his youngest

sister still misses him horribly. he was her mentor. she now has a masters degree. she's served in the peace corps. but every decision that she made, she made it at the last minute because she kept hoping and hoping that her brother would come home and be able to help him make those decisions. he only knows one of his nieces. she was three when he was detained. every friday they would have a zoom together and they would sing the song ♪ friday, friday, got to get down on friday ♪ >> no matter where austin was. he was sheltering in a stairwell in syria and he still kept his friday obligation to his 3-year-old niece. he's just an amazing, loving

person, with a huge, huge personality for sure. >> debra, thank you so much for sharing that with us, for being being here today and for all of your advocacy and in journalism we often talk about speaking truth to power and you've done that many, many times over again and we at the press club are behind you and fully support you and we cannot wait to be able to welcome austin to the press club one day very soon. thank you, debra. >> thank you, emily. you guys are amazing. [applause]. >> all right, if you just want to-- i can double fist for a second here. next, we will be calling to the stage the president of radio free europe, radio liberty, steven, he's going to be chatting with us a little bit about the case of alsu

kurmasheva. steven? >> thank you so much. good to see you, too. >> thank you. >> yes, no, thank you so much for being here with us today and all the cases, and a year ago there were only two reporters and now unfortunately, we have a third. i just wanted to see if you could just begin by talking a little about alsu's case, where things stand. i know there are some complexity that come with it, she's an american citizen, but also has russian citizenship and seems to make things more difficult for her. >> well, alsu is our colleague from radio free europe, radio liberty. she's worked there for 25 years now. she's an american citizen. she made the decision that changed her life to go back to russia because her mother was ill. and when she entered the country, she was able to visit

with her mother, with her family and then when she went to leave, she was prevented from leaving. she's now been imprisoned for more than 200 days, which is a significant amount of time. it's-- it pales in comparison to what austin and evan has been through, but to a family, this is yet another family that has been ripped apart simply because she's a journalist. she's a mom, she's a wife. and she was acting as a caring daughter when she went back to russia and she's still held. the charges make no sense. they came at her because she had not declared herself as a foreign agent and it almost doesn't matter what the charges are because, none of them are

just. this is an unjustified, wrongful detention and we're doing everything we can to keep the spotlight on her. i will thank you, personally, emily. you've been great and the national press club has joined with the likes of the committee to protect journalists and worldwide press organizations to keep the spotlight on her case and we have no doubt that that has helped raise her profile. just this morning, we saw an announcement from president biden calling for the unconditional and immediate release for alsu, for austin and for evan and the president's words are strong and powerful and they should be heeded. >> absolutely. and we do, of course, appreciate that, you know, during the way of correspondent dinner biden made similar

remarks and it's very important work and we're proud to be able to partner with you on it, even though we wish we didn't have to partner with you on it because we wish it never happened in the first place. one of the most baffling thing about alsu's detention, the united states state department has yet to declare her has wrongfully detained even though it's obviously to everyone involved that's exactly what she is. stephen, can you talk a little about that circumstance and maybe also, a little bit. wrongful detention is more than a label or just words. this has real world impacts on alsu now and when she is freed. >> well, we don't think there's any doubt that alsu meets the criteria for being wrongfully detained. we know that the state department has given due consideration to this. we think that the deliberative process has gone on for a long time and we're ready to welcome

the day when that designation comes. we think it will come at some point. but we've also heard from the state department and from other american officials that alsu's case is front and center. they are continuing to pursue efforts regardless of weather the designation exists. they're continuing to pursue efforts to seek her release. but the designation, as you say, is not just a title, it would afford opportunities for alsu to be visited in prison by u.s. officials, to get-- it would open up a whole other avenue of communications about her situation. it would allow efforts to commence, to try to engage with russia, to secure her immediate release, and so, yes, we look

forward to that day that that happens. we know that it doesn't automatically change her situation. there are americans who have had this designation and have-- are still behind bars today, you know, all you have to do is look at evan's situation to underscore how -- what the united states government is going to do everything they can. i believe that to my core, as somebody who grew up in bucks county, pennsylvania. i'm a true american and believer in this country and i believe they will do everything they can to bring these journalists home. at the same time, russia in this case is-- they're the bad actors in this equation. and they have a seat at the table, if you will, in deciding the fate of the people who are held there. and so there is no

justification for keeping a mom of two wonderful girls imprison. for keeping a loving spouse imprisoned for no good reason. alsu should be home and we look forward to the day. and we actually think that this is something, that point about her being a mom and a loving wife is something that is valued inside russia and so, for whatever the reason, bring her home. >> absolutely. and i know that alsu's husband pavel was in d.c. this week and he was at the correspondents' dinner and we got to have the press club. i've also had a chance to receipt alsu's daughters, wow, two incredible young women who are really to go out, advocate for their mom in what must be an absolutely devastating situation for them, but just a lot of poise, a lot of grace.

can you tell us what it's been like to work with the family at this time? >> yes. it's tough not to get emotional when you think about those young women. they've had to grow up awfully fast over the last half a year and they've been brilliant, poised. i've walked with them through the house of congress and they've interacted with members of congress. they've spoken forcefully on, you know, places like cbs news and others, to cnn. and alsu's daughter had an interview who is 15, jake tapper. and if you had an opportunity what would you say to putin?

>> and anybody given an opportunity to say something like this would take a moment and probably be nervous. this young woman waited while cnn figured out which camera to have her speak to, and then with great poise, she delivered a beautifully powerful message on behalf of her mom. and miriam and bebe come by the offices now and then and the first time i met alsu was at a company picnic that we had in prague where radio free europe is headquartered. and alsu and the girls were there with pavel and those were the kind of people who dedicate themselves to the mission of our organization. and so, yeah, for 25 years. more than 25 years she's been an integral part of this

organization, and yet, she's just one of so many who come to work knowing the risks, knowing the dangers and knowing that these play books that the kremlin has come up with for cracking down on journalists, are being passed around from one place to another to another. everywhere it operates is a dangerous environment these days. so, the mission is important, the mission is vital. we're some of the last independent journalists to operate in places across our coverage area. >> yes, as you noted radio, free liberty radio europe do an incredible job of providing the clear consistent news source in areas where it's not always easy and your reporters certainly face huge risk. i wanted to see if you could chat a little bit about the

overall strategy when it comes to alsu and getting her home. we certainly heard reporting about potential prisoner swaps between the u.s. and russia. has alsu come up in any of those? what are you able to share with us at this time? >> i'm not sure we would know. we're not in a position to know things like that. we read accounts in the same publications that you do about what may or may not be happening, but, look, the -- right now, we're focused on the day-to-day. we're concerned about her conditions inside prison. we're concerned that during her last court appearance, she was able to speak to some of the gathered media in the courtroom and said her own health was starting to fail in some areas. and that that, by the way, was the first time that alsu's family had been able to hear

her voice. they've had no contact with her and so, we're worried about her conditions on a daily basis. we will do anything to improve those conditions. the wrongful designation-- wrongfully detained designation would help with that for sure. but beyond that, all i can say is, we don't know what type of machinery is at work to try to free not just alsu, but austin and evan and we can only hope that for successful conclusion, it's taken far too long in the case of my two colleagues every year and we admire the strength of debra and that the compassion around which the wall street journal has gathered in support of their colleague, we stand with them. we call for their immediate release as well and we look

forward to the day when this podium is a little more crowded with some people who are going to have a story to tell. >> we're very much looking forward to welcoming alsu to the national press club. thank you so much for all the work that you guys, that pavel, that that the family is doing in regards to alsu. again, i feel like a broken record here, we're 100% behind alsu. we'll be having an announcement recording alsu later this afternoon. i'm not supposed to spoil it now, but stay tuned around 2:30 or so. >> interesting. thanks again for your personal support and for the national press club and everybody who has taken note what has taken place. these unjust detentions must end immediately. thank you. >> thank you so much. [applause] >> all right. and last, but of course, most certainly not least i'd like to invite to the stage, paul beckett. you know what? i know you have assistant

editor for the wall street journal. i'd like to think of him as editor this chief getting evan back home. that's as far as i'm concerned your official title and i want today take a minute to thank you. paul did something incredibly generous, it's going around the press club, we have a lot of different front pages, some framed front pages upstairs and prints of front pages and we try to get the important and historic moment. we added one more, wall street journal's incredibly powerful front page from the one year anniversary of evan's detention. and it's displayed in the lobby and we got it last night at 8 p.m. and i was like, hey, guys. huge thank you to the staff and thank you to paul for having such a powerful reminder that we've clearly displayed so anyone who comes to the club will see it. thank you so much for that. >> thanks emily, thanks to the national press club and to all of you for joining us this

morning. we greatly appreciate it. i just want to jump into it because the wall street journal did report at one point there was a potential deal on the table had been floated by the white house. basically there was an assassin that is held in germany that russia is wanting free. and germany and u.s. about it, and alexei navalny was a part of it and unfortunately a couple of days later we learned of his death. i want to ask you, is there still a deal on the table? where do things stand? >> thank you, emily. the last 13 months of evan's incarceration are these glimpses of conversations that have gone on between the united states and russia. initially we heard about the first one, a deal potentially for evan and for paul whelan, of course, who has been there for five years. and that proposal was made

sometime late in november and it was rejected and then, as we've reported, there was some discussion of a potential deal that would have involved navalny and since then, we've been assured by the government, u.s. government that they continue to work very hard on it. roger carson is the special presidential envoy, has said a new proposal is being put together, which we find very encouraging. the issue for us is that this has to be done now. we have a window now to make a difference in securing evan's release and we'd like to see the u.s. government take full opportunity of that. they themselves have identified this window. it runs to june 30th, which is the end of the current pre-trial detention that evan is held under. the reason it's so important now is what happens next is

completely opaque to us and we see challenges ahead potentially. we don't know if -- we assume that evan will go to trial at some point on this baseless charge, but we haven't been told. we haven't seen any evidence of what russia purports to have that may have caused this baseless charge to be filed in the first place. we don't know if we would see a trial. we don't know how long a trial would last. there's so much that is in the hands of the russian government that we feel that this window, running to june 30th, is really such an important time for the u.s. government and russian government to make progress on releasing evan. and it is one of those equations where there's only one definition of success. we really appreciate all the work that's gone into trying to

get this done up to this point, but him being home is the only thing that counts for success in this equation and we'd like to see it done now. >> and now is really-- it was always now, i think, from the moment he was [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2024] >> including the secretaries of state and defense to immediately notify the white house and congressional leaders of any personal medical emergencies that would effect their service. votes are expected at 6:30 eastern this evening. live coverage of the u.s. house here on c-span.