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LOVETT: National Dems aim to turn N.Y. state Senate to the left New York Daily News Toward that end, state Senate Deputy Democratic Minority Leader Michael Gianaris, who heads his conference's campaign operation, recently met with former U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder to talk about the need to flip New York to total Democratic ...

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LOVETT: National Dems aim to turn N.Y. state Senate to the left - New York Daily News

Former President Barack Obama will deliver the first public remarks of his post-presidency here in his adopted hometown of Chicago on Monday, three months after handing off the baton to President Donald Trump.

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The 44th president is slated to speak with young leaders at an event at the University of Chicago, billed by his office as a "conversation on community organizing and civic engagement" and a part of Obama's goal to "encourage and support the next generation of leaders."

Obama's highly anticipated public appearance comes just days ahead of the symbolically significant 100-day mark for Trump --- a milestone that one Obama adviser insisted is "far from his mind." But while the ex-President does not intend to directly confront or take swipes at Trump, he does plan on being forthcoming --- if asked --- about where he stands on specific policy matters, including areas where he and Trump clearly disagree, a source said.

Issues at the top of Obama's mind these days include Obamacare, foreign policy and climate change, an adviser said.

In the final stretch of the 2016 election, Obama actively campaigned for Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton. More than five months after Clinton's loss, Obama is still not interested in taking center stage on politics, an adviser told CNN.

"He's going to be more of an adviser behind the scenes and not necessarily be in the forefront right now," the adviser said. "At a given time, when it's appropriate and necessary, he'll be out there. But not right now."

Obama is also sensitive to creating space for and supporting his former administration officials in their new endeavors, including former Education Secretary Arne Duncan, who is working to mentor young leaders, and former Attorney General Eric Holder, who is focused on redistricting.

Monday's event at the University of Chicago came together because of Obama's desire to speak directly with young people, a source close to the former President said. Three hundred students from universities around the Chicago area were invited to attend the event. While Obama will take the stage with six students and have a dialogue with the group, he is not expected to take questions from the audience.

On Sunday, Obama spoke at a roundtable discussion with young men from the Chicago Create Real Economic Destiny program, which aims to provide job skills and positive connections to at-risk youth. He was invited to participate by Duncan, the program's founder.

"President Obama listened to the young men's stories and shared some of the challenges that he faced growing up," Obama spokesman Kevin Lewis said of Sunday's conversation. "He expressed that he was optimistic about their potential to positively contribute to their communities and support their families because of the services provided in the program."

For the most part, Obama and former first lady Michelle Obama have steered clear of the public spotlight since leaving the White House. The former President has been spotted playing golf and vacationing on a private island in the Caribbean, but his schedule has been kept tightly under wraps.

The Obamas are also busy working on their memoirs after landing a deal with Penguin Random House that could yield them tens of millions of dollars. The couple plans to live in Washington until their younger daughter, Sasha, graduates high school in 2019. Obama is also slated to appear with German Chancellor Angela Merkel in Berlin in late May and is due to accept an award in Boston prior to that.

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Obama set to deliver first post-presidency remarks Monday - WGBA-TV

The laundry list of problems with Uber continues to pile up by the day.

Executives are dropping like flies. Former attorney general Eric Holder is investigating the company's alleged culture of sexual harassment. Uber CEO Travis Kalanick was caught on camera two months ago arguing with a driver over falling fares and later issued an apology.

And that's just scratching the surface of the issues the company has dealt with this year. In short: It's not just a public relations problem. It's a crisis.

"This is the size and scale of a company that I would say normally takes 30-40 years to develop," Janelle Sallenave, Uber's head of customer support for North America, told NBC News. "And we've done it in six. And what that means is we haven't necessarily had the time to sit back and reflect."

One of the points Uber has been doubling down on in recent months is investing in the driver experience.

Sallenave took NBC News on an exclusive tour inside Uber's newly revamped driver hub in Long Island City, located just a few miles from Manhattan.

The 30,000 square foot facility, which Uber calls a "Greenlight Hub," is one of more than 650 locations around the world positioned to help drivers with everything from the onboarding process and learning about the app, to taking classes on how to properly install a car seat or improve their ratings.

Drivers sign in on iPads, then grab a coffee and wait less than 15 minutes before a support professional assists them.

The hub in Long Island City serves an average of 800 drivers on any given day, Sallenave said. Worldwide, she said Uber will do 20 million driver service interactions this year.

"We have been spending a lot of time over the past few months talking about the driver experience. Are we thinking about our support policies the right way? Are we responding fast enough? Are we getting the right staff in the right place?" Sallenave said. "This is the kind of stuff day in and day out that we are just obsessed about because we want to be a world class support organization for our drivers and our riders."

Related: Uber Hit With $1.1 Million Fine Over Handling of Drunk Driver Complaints

But with falling fare prices, complaints about the mapping system and competitors sweetening incentives for new drivers, why would anyone want to drive for Uber? Lyft, Uber's biggest competitor, also has driver hubs in some of its busiest cities.

"We simply have the volume so that you can stay busy. You can be driving when you want to drive in the places that you want to drive. I think we also have a very strong commitment to working with our drivers to support them," Sallenave said.

When several drivers visited a hub recently to ask about confusing pay statements and earnings going to an unrecognizable account, Uber's green light hub team members were able to flag the problem to corporate's fraud team that drivers had been hit by a phishing scam, Sallenave said.

"We are the human side of the technology," she said. "We get to hear that feedback day in and day out from our drivers."

Perhaps one of the biggest complaints from drivers on Uber forums is falling trip prices. It's also the reason why Uber driver Fawzi Kamel confronted Kalanick in that now infamous video.

Sallenave said the pricing issue boils down to "how do we make sure supply and demand is balanced?" She declined to share ridership numbers, but said Uber is "very much in an active growth mode."

Of the reported 200,000 people who asked Uber to delete their accounts during the #DeleteUber movement in February, Sallenave said only a fraction completely left the platform.

"We've been tracking very carefully the number of re-ridership rates and many of those that initially requested for their account to be closed decided not to complete the process and so, actually remain to this day as active accounts," she said. "And many of those continue to be used."

In an exclusive interview with NBC News last month, Kamel said Uber doesn't care if drivers are "not even making minimum wage."

Sallenave said her approach is to work with drivers to help them hit their earnings target, making it "not about the trip, but the day, week."

As for that video, Kalanick apologized in a blog post after it surfaced in late February, sharing that "this is the first time I've been willing to admit that I need leadership help and I intend to get it."

That means hiring a chief executive officer, an experienced leader who can help lead Uber into the future. Uber is essentially looking for a Sheryl Sandberg.

They're currently reviewing candidates. A company spokesperson said there's no official timeline to share yet as to when Kalanick and the board may install a new second in command.

In the past few months, several Uber executives have left the company. Uber president Jeff Jones left after six months at the company, citing differences in beliefs. Brian McClendon, vice president of maps, followed shortly thereafter, returning to his home state of Kansas to explore politics.

Rachel Whetstone, Uber's public relations executive, departed earlier this month. Sherif Marakby, vice president of global vehicle programs, left the company last week.

"The commitment and passion of our executive team has not changed," Sallenave said. "A lot of the press in the last few months has, if nothing else, reinforced our commitment to be the best company we can be."

That also means getting firsthand experience of what it's like to be an Uber driver. Sallenave drives a few hours a week and so do many other employees, through an employee driving program.

It's something she said they refer to internally as "dogfooding."

"You can't be customer obsessed and you can't be truly focused on making the best driver experience if you don't know in detail what that driver experience looks like," she told NBC News.

Kalanick has been keeping a low profile since all hell broke loose at Uber. However, a company spokeswoman said the CEO still "regularly tags along when other employees go driving."

"He mentioned in a staff meeting the other day that his driver's license is actually suspended not because anything happened, it just expired, so it's on his to-do list to go down to the DMV," Sallenave said. "I think there is a lot of interest for him and the whole executive team to be on the road."

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Inside the Place Where Uber Tries to Make Nice With Its Drivers - NBCNews.com

Brian McClendon, former Uber executive and co-creator of Google Earth. Nick Krug Lawrence Journal-World

An Uber executive who stepped down in March says he wasn't responding to the company's recent scandals he wants to get involved in politics in his native Kansas.

Brian McClendon, the former vice president of maps at Uber, told Fortune he was dismayed by the results of the 2016 election, so he decided to return to his home state.

"Now was the time I wanted to do something and Kansas is where I was going to do it," McClendon said this week. "You can't leave it to the other guy anymore... [It's] too important to not get involved."

McClendon is staying quiet on the exact role he'll pursue in politics, but in the meantime he's taken a job at the University of Kansas, his alma mater, as a research professor in electrical engineering and computer science.

He's one of many people across the country who decided to change careers after President Donald Trump was elected including hundreds who have expressed a new interest in politics . For example, Run for Something , a group that launched on Inauguration Day that aims to recruit millennials to run for office, already has 30 candidates on ballots in races ranging from state legislatures to city councils, according to TIME . The group hopes that number will grow to at least 50 by the fall. And Emerge America , a Democratic training group for women, saw an 87% increase in applications for the groups training sessions since the election, according to NPR .

McClendon is also just one of several recent high-level staff departures at Uber amid a difficult few months for the company, including female employees' allegations of sexual harassment. In February, Uber's CEO ordered an internal investigation led by former U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder into the issues women raised about working for the company.

"If I hadnt needed to come here [Kansas] for politics, I would have stayed and helped Uber through this," McClendon said. He sees the company's recent "cultural challenges" a difficult passage in Uber's history that will make the company better in the end. "I believe in Uber very strongly," he said.

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Former Uber Exec on Why He Left the Company to Go Into Politics - Fortune

Attorney General Jeff Sessions is making aggressive law enforcement a top priority, directing his federal prosecutors across the country to crack down on illegal immigrants and "use every tool" they have to go after violent criminals and drug traffickers.

But the attorney general does not have a single U.S. attorney in place to lead his tough-on-crime efforts across the country. Last month, Sessions abruptly told the dozens of remaining Obama administration U.S. attorneys to submit their resignations immediately - and none of them, or the 47 who had already left, have been replaced.

"We really need to work hard at that," Sessions said when asked Tuesday about the vacancies as he opened a meeting with federal law enforcement officials. The 93 unfilled U.S. attorney positions are among the hundreds of critical Trump administration jobs that remain open.

Sessions is also without the heads of his top units, including the civil rights, criminal and national security divisions, as he tries to reshape the Justice Department.

U.S. attorneys, who prosecute federal crimes from state offices around the nation, are critical to implementing an attorney general's law enforcement agenda. Both the George W. Bush and Barack Obama administrations gradually eased out the previous administration's U.S. attorneys while officials sought new ones.

Sessions said that until he has his replacements, career acting U.S. attorneys "respond pretty well to presidential leadership."

But former Justice Department officials say that acting U.S. attorneys do not operate with the same authority when interacting with police chiefs and other law enforcement executives.

"It's like trying to win a baseball game without your first-string players on the field," said former assistant attorney general Ronald Weich, who ran the Justice Department's legislative affairs division during Obama's first term.

"There are human beings occupying each of those seats," Weich, now dean of the University of Baltimore School of Law, said of the interim officials. "But that's not the same as having appointed and confirmed officials who represent the priorities of the administration. And the administration is clearly way behind in achieving that goal."

Filling the vacancies has also been complicated by Sessions not having his second-highest-ranking official in place. Rod Rosenstein, nominated for deputy attorney general - the person who runs the Justice Department day-to-day - is still not on board, although he is expected to be confirmed by the Senate this month. Traditionally, the deputy attorney general helps to select the U.S. attorneys.

Rosenstein, who served as U.S. attorney for Maryland, has also been designated, upon his confirmation, to take on the responsibility of overseeing the FBI's investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 election and any links between Russian officials and Trump associates after Sessions was forced to recuse himself.

Rachel Brand has been nominated for the department's third-highest position as associate attorney general. She has also not been confirmed.

By March of Obama's first year in office, the Senate had confirmed the deputy and associate attorneys general, along with the solicitor general. The Senate had also confirmed an assistant attorney general for the national security division.

When Obama's first attorney general, Eric Holder, launched an ambitious plan to reform the criminal-justice system, it was the U.S. attorneys on the ground who were in charge of carrying out his plan to stop charging low-level nonviolent drug offenders with offenses that imposed severe mandatory sentences.

Now, Sessions is taking steps toward reversing that policy - without his top prosecutors nominated or confirmed.

Last month, Sessions sent a memo to his acting U.S. attorneys and assistant U.S. attorneys directing them to investigate and prosecute the most violent offenders in each district. He also traveled to Nogales, Arizona, on April 11 where he directed his 5,904 federal prosecutors to make illegal immigration cases a higher priority and work to bring felony charges against who cross the border illegally.

This week, the attorney general flies to Texas and California to meet with law enforcement officials about his priorities. But, until he gets his U.S. attorneys on board, Sessions will be hampered in moving forward with new policies, former Justice Department officials say.

"An acting U.S. attorney doesn't speak with the same authority to a police chief or to a local prosecutor as a Senate-confirmed U.S. attorney does," said Matthew Miller, a former Justice Department spokesman in the Obama administration. "If you're a Democrat, you're probably happy to have these positions filled by career officials because they're less likely to pursue some of the policies that Jeff Sessions supports. But if you're a supporter of the president, you probably want them to move on those positions."

The U.S. attorney process could be delayed many more months because of what is known as the "blue slip" process in Congress, which dates to the early 1900s. Traditionally, the administration consults with the senators of each state before choosing U.S. attorneys. Sessions said the Justice Department will ask for help from Congress and "a number of [names] are going over now." The Senate Judiciary Committee sends a blue piece of paper to each senator to voice their approval or disapproval of a U.S. attorney nominee from their home state.

The attorney general said Tuesday that the U.S. attorney process "does take some months and has traditionally." Sessions himself was asked to resign as the U.S. attorney for Alabama in March 1993 by President Bill Clinton's attorney general, Janet Reno, who, like Sessions, asked all her U.S. attorneys to resign and didn't begin replacing them for a few months.

The Washington Post's Julie Tate contributed to this report.

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A month after dismissing federal prosecutors, no U.S. attorneys in place at Justice Department - Chicago Tribune