Female Speaker: This is
kind of a cynical town sometimes and there was a
lot of talk about, you know, gosh maybe the President's
last two years weren't going to be so exciting. I think we've put the lie to
that notion and the notion that cynicism is the right
way to operate, I think, has been blown out of the water
by the events really of the last several months,
particularly this summer. President Obama: That's
why we do what we do. Female Speaker: Yeah, I
had been working on health reform my entire adult
career so I was sitting there staring at the blogs,
staring at my computer, staring at my email when
the news came through. Female Speaker: You could
feel the whole building holding its breath because
we weren't expecting it that day and I'm reading it
and I'm not believing it. Female Speaker: So you
think about what happened on that decision day. No longer was it about
partisan fighting. Now it was just simply about
how do we make sure on a daily basis people have
access to coverage, they can afford coverage, that
coverage is high quality, and it indeed is no longer a
law but integrated into the fabric of America. President Obama: We finally
declared that in America, healthcare is not a
privilege for a few, but a right for all. So this was a good
day for America. Female Speaker: Friday
morning we were all gathered in Denis McDonough's office
for our morning senior staff meeting and so
much had happened. We had already had the court
decision come down just the day before about the
Affordable Care Act and we really weren't expecting
any more news as early as Friday. Female Speaker: And an aide
brought in a note to Valerie Jarrett and she opened the
note and her face lit up. Female Speaker: And it
said, "Marriage equality, we win 5-4," and so I
said, "My goodness! We weren't expecting it. It came down." And so the room went up in
applause and several of us went down to tell the
President and he came down and gave amazing remarks in
the Rose Garden and changed the world. President Obama: Sometimes
there are days like this when that slow, steady
effort is rewarded with justice that arrives
like a thunderbolt. (singing) Female Speaker: Well there
was obviously grief and yet a celebration and I think
what was clear to me when I first walked in and saw the
size of the crowd that was there was just how revered
Reverend Pinkney was and how much he meant to
the community. You could just feel the
connection between the President and the audience
and the crescendo was when they responded so quickly
to his first few words from "Amazing Grace." President Obama:
Amazing grace. How sweet the sound. That saved a wretch like me. Male Speaker: I knew that
week when the President gave that incredible eulogy
in South Carolina, the healthcare decision came
down, the gay marriage decision came down, I knew
that we were about done with Cuba and I knew that
Iran was coming in. It almost felt like it was
over to us, you know, after these dramatic domestic
and social breakthroughs. We did not know we were
going to get this deal done. If you'll remember that the
team was out in Vienna for weeks. Secretary Kerry was abroad
in one place for a longer period of time than any
Secretary of State has gone anywhere. I was able to go into the
Oval Office with Susan Rice and tell the President that
we were going to have a deal, that this was
going to get done. We learned that the deal was
going to be complete the day before although that wasn't
public that afternoon. Because Vienna is six or
seven hours ahead, we had to spend that night getting
ready for that rollout, writing his remarks almost
overnight because again, they were going to announce
it in the afternoon in Vienna. So it started very early. We saw him right before he
gave the remarks and then afterwards, you know, we all
were able to reflect on the fact that this is, you know,
actually what he was going through was all the people
who no longer work here. There are people across the
last six and a half years who were apart of this so we
were actually talking to him about, you know, all the
people who were part of this who weren't able to
be there that day. There are very few days
where you come to work and history happens. The day that our embassy
opened in Havana formally and the Cubans raised their
flag over an embassy here and again, played the Cuban
and American National Anthems, I think, was a
day that marked, in many respects, the end of
a period of history. Cuba U.S. relations were a symbol of
the Cold War, kind of the last remaining symbol
of the Cold War. You had both the embassy
openings with Cuba and the Iran Nuclear Deal take place
in that proximity is a fairly remarkable testament
to the fact that you can realize the promise of
engagement and that it takes time. Male Speaker: For me this
summer, the personal highlight is without a doubt
his visit to El Reno Prison in Oklahoma. First of all, he's the first
President to ever visit a federal prison. It was huge. It was absolutely
-- it was amazing. We've seen this problem with
mass incarceration around the country and we have
about 2.2 million people who are incarcerated but we have
to understand that our jails should be places where we
actually make people better, where we go back to the idea
of rehabilitation and you can't send that message
without actually being there and seeing what
is happening. Female Speaker: I think
what we saw this summer were the results of, in some
cases, decades of work of people who are committed to
a cause, who believed that if they just kept at it and
kept at it and kept at it, that what might come
down would seem like a thunderbolt, but it was
truly work that had taken so long to come to fruition so
it was very validating to the President's whole
philosophy about grassroots efforts and hopefully
encouraging people to continue to fight vigilantly
to make our country that more perfect union. Male Speaker:
West Wing Week.
