journal. from washington dc and across the country, coming up discussions of immigration, border security and campaign 2024. lori robinson talks about combating misinformation. c-span's washington journal, join and live at 7:00 a.m. this weeke, campaign 2024 coverage continues in south carolina. joe biden and dean phillips speak at first in the nation's dinner i columbia and that is live at 6:00 p.m. and torr

nikki haley will be before voters in coaysouth carolina.

♪ host: good morning, it is saturday, january 27, 2020 four. governors across the country are giving their state of the state addresses, highlighting issues from emigration to health care to education. c-span has a long tradition of covering these addresses and this governor's c-span.org remarks on c-span.org . we want to hear your own state of your state. what is the top issue happening in your state right now?

we have regional phone lines. in the eastern or central time zone, please call (202) 748-8000 . in the mountain or pacific time zone, call (202) 748-8001. if you would like to text us, that number is (202) 748-8003. include your name and where you are writing from. if you like to reach us on social media facebook.com/c-span or on x @c-spanwj. the trial against former president donald trump. the headline from the new york times. a jury orders trump to pay carol 83.3 million dollars for defamation. the jury found donald j. trump had asked -- acted maliciously in attacking e. jean carroll and

was found liable last year for sexually abusing her. more from that article. mrs. carroll's boyers has argued a large award was necessary to stop mr. trump from a continuing to attack her. after three hours of deliberation the jury awarded misses carol 65 million dollars in punitive damages, finding that mr. trump had acted with malice. on one recent day he made more than 40 posts about her on his truth social website. former president trump went to that website to make his response to that, saying, absolutely ridiculous. i fully disagree with both verdicts and will be appealing this by then-focused witch hunt on me and my party.]' the legal system is out of control and being used as a political weapon. they have taken away all first amendment rights. this is not america. to let you know, we will be

covering former president trump's comments at a campaign event later today on c-span.org at 4:00 p.m. eastern. with the top issue is for your state rit our numbers one more , for the eastern and central time zone, (202) 748-8000. mountain and pacific time zone, (202) 748-8001. our text line is (202) 748-8003. as i mentioned, c-span has been covering the state of the state addresses for many governors across the country, including arizona governor katie hobbs, a democrat who spoke about efforts to secure the border while delivering her state of the state address. here are some of those comments. day in and day out i hear from leaders on the border who need support because they are stepping up where the federal government cannot or will not. this year they asked for boots

on the ground, approved communication systems, resources to combat human trafficking, and the latest technologies to keep communities on both sides of the border safe. i delivered. by refusing to waste money on geopolitical stunts we awarded $84 million to help border communities manage the massive influx in migrants. so, we must do more. that is why i launched operation secure, creating a border coordination office within the arizona department of homeland security. this session, i am seeking ongoing funding to better coordinate our border response and continue fighting this humanitarian, economic, enforcement crisis.this new funding will expand the operation with critical

investments in border security as well as resources to intercept the flow of fentanyl. every arizonan should know that we are taking significant meaningful steps to keep them safe, even when the federal government refuses to. these investments will strengthen law enforcement efforts, raise awareness through an education campaign, and expand harm reduction and treatment services, particularly in rural areas. together, let us continue to find real solutions, support law enforcement, first responders, and community leaders on the front lines of these issues, and push washington to do its job to secure our border. host: again, we are looking f■ñr your top issues facing your state today. we have a comment already from facebook. dave russell says, economy and inflation remained bad in

pennsylvania. we are wasting money on an ev station. inflation has been a big issue throughout the country. there is an article in forbes laying out the cost of living and disposable income by state, including that hawaii is one of the most expensive places to live in the country with the total cost of living being $55,491 with disposable income per year of just $5,929. doing better would be oregon, although still in the higher end of the rankings at $46,193 per year with a total cost of living with more than $16,000 in disposable income. let's go to your calls. many in stockton, california. what is the top issue in your state, benny? caller: immigration. host: how is immigration

affecting you in stockton? caller: there are too many illegals. they get jobs and then they will not hire african-americans. if you ever went to a comcast store, they treat you bad. they treat you with more disrespect than you deserve. they have taken money from people who need jobs that are legally here, and they are getting the jobs. i saw on the news where they were going to get medicare. that is draining our economy right there. the president should close the border, north and south, east and west for two years. so we could deport some of these illegal people out of this country so that we could enhance our economy. host: thank you for your call.

gina in alexandria, virginia. good morning. caller: good morning. i was just calling to say that the top issue facing my state right now, i am in virginia and i am very happy that we are turning back purpleish blue. right now, i don't know at what point in this election biden is going to say i do need to address the genocide. i need to respond to my part in it. i have been listening to him. i always voted democrat. i am waiting for my leader to say, we are breaking away from israel government. he's not doing that. my state, i am so proud that we

are going to be the last southern state to provide abortion. host: speaking of virginia, early this month governor glenn youngkin, a republican, spoke about efforts to increase education funding while delivering his state of the state address. here are some of his remarks. [video clip] governor youngkin: the largest education budget in virginias budget. heading into this next fiscal year, annual state spending will have increased $2.1 billion over 2021 levels. a 27 percent increase, including 17% increases for teacher raises, record funding for facilities, and even more support for student services. yeah.

this has been a tremendous effort on behalf of all of you. thank you. we know that we have been able to fund our schools at an unprecedented level. i would like to caution us from drawing strong opinions from out of date facts that precede this great work that all of you facilitated. even as we make great progress i know that we can all agree that we can do so much better than the current soq funding formula. my administration is committed to working with you and our great superintendents across the commonwealth to make sure that we meet and beat the november 1, 2024 election. we set together to deliver a

plan to replace the byzantine soq system with a system that puts students first. host: next, marvin in michigan. what is the top issue in your state? caller: good morning. host: good morning. can you please turn down the volume on your television, marvin? caller: yes. host: what is the top issue in your state? caller: donald trump coming to michigan to campaign to be the president of the united states. our borders are in terrible condition. tell the congress not to sign the bill to make our -- my son and my daughter safer in the country that we are living in. host: how are you seeing the impacts of the issues at the border in michigan, marvin? caller: i just left to go to

vegas. nothing against people, but if they do not come here illegally, if you're going to a store and you see people standing there, we don't know who these people are. if something were to happen to us, anything that criminals do, there is no way to catch up to these people. no identification. no anything. they need to come here, like i pay taxes, pay toward social security, i've no problem with people from different nationalities, but they need to come here legally. host: ed in ocean city, new jersey. caller: ed o donnell. the main problem in new jersey and all states is people not getting along with each other. members of families not getting along with each other. verbal abuse. false accusation. lack of friendliness. in terms of the governor of virginia, schools can teach love

■land compassion starting in kindergarten. that should be their first priority. the other thing in this area, haley would be the best president because she is positive and soothing. she is the lawrence welk of american politics. host: anthony perkins wrote in on x, also from new jersey, that the top iue in the state has bthe cost of living in new jersey. even the metrics used to measure our overall quality of life is unfair. the state just reached $15 nim wage. the police and the state get away with murder. almost no accountability. i will start there. looking at the forbes article again in terms of different numbers about wages in states, the average salary by state for new jersey is number five on the list of the top salaries in the country. the average salary in new jersey is over $70,000.

$70,890 only topped by washington state, california, new york, massachusetts. shall be in tennessee. what is the top issue in tennessee, shelby? caller: good morning. in tennessee it is mainly trying to keep a roof over your head because of inflation. everything has gone up. all of your bills, especially groceries and gas. electric. you name it. especially for people on social security, like i am. the congress, it is like they don't care about us on social security. they give us a little increase. it was very low. when you go to check how much they have gone up on medicare it is like a slap in the face. you know, they don't have to worry about how they are going

to try to keep going. you know, it is affecting everybody. -- affecting everyone, i'm sure, across the united states. host: have you seen your lawmakers in tennessee doing anything to address the concerns that you have? caller: i'm not sure, really. i did send them a message about immigration that i have an opinion on closing the borders. that definitely needs to be done, in my opinion, because -- and, they should do it for closing it for five to seven years. let the people who want to come, citizens, work in their own country and mail it back to the united states. the government and congress do their work and do their background checks on these

people before they even consider to come. because we are struggling. america cannot handle this. we need to get up with the times. host: next is been german in brooklyn, new york. what is the topic -- benjamin in brooklyn, new york. what is the topic in new york? caller: specifically in my city, the biggest issue which i think is not equally addressed is the issue of foreign financial entities investing in real estate in our city. it has become increasingly difficult not only for people in my generation but in other generations to become homeowners and business owners. with inflation going up, it is definitely not helping that we have -- especially chinese banks that are buying out the market, basically. it has become impossible for say -- 50 years ago my grandparents

were able to buy a home in flushing. now, to buy the same home in the same neighborhood it is upwards of $1.5 million. host: thank you for your call, been german. the issue of affordable housing is a nationwide concern. utah's governor a republican spoke about efforts to improve access to affordable housing while delivering the state of the state address. [video clip] >> i believe that the single greatest threat to our future prosperity is the price of housing. housing attainability is a crisis in utah, and every statement country. remember, we are not like the rest of the country. no one has figured this out yet. i truly believe that we can. for more than a century, home ownership has been the cornerstone of the american dream. it is the key to financial

independence and the ability to break away from government support. homeownership is also the key to family and community. people who own homes care more about their mayor and school board. they care more about their neighbors. homeowners have more financial capital and social capital. most importantly, homeowners have kids. which, again, going back to that weird thing, it turns out that all of those late-night comedians who make fun of us for having so many kids, guess what? that is the number one reason that our state is number one. that is why i have proposed the utah first homes program with the audacious goal to build 35,000 starter homes in the next five years. while we need more of everything, my focus is on

affordable, obtainable, single, owner-occupied detached housing. most of us grew up or started our own families in a 1300 square-foot home. our kids and grandkids are desperate for that same opportunity. the greatest generation did this after world war ii and we can do it again. the american dream is alive in utah, but it will be dead soon if we do not get this right. host: a couple more of your comments from social media. on facebook, in missouri every elected office, from governor down, including most of the state legislature, has bee by republicans for years. young le mines have been leaving the state in droves bewe rank among the lowest in education andood jobs. our state is beautiful, with streams and hills, and pitiful that it isn't growing. republicans don't do anything for the good of the people.

they are regresse d hold back progress. sad. steve rothstein says that mala is gat education, transportation, crime in baltimore citathe things that need the mt attention. with democrats running the state thes are being dealt with. they are not wastingimon crt , kess, forced birth, tax cuts for the rich, etc. and are doing their job instead. vote blue. diane in ohio. good morning. what is the top issue in your state? caller: good morning. we have several, but the most important one i would say is the fentanyl that is coming across the border by white americans in semis. they always want to put it on the migrants and the republicans are wrong. that is not how they are getting here. my son is a co. every time that they catch the

person that goes to jail for marijuana has fentanyl in it. they don't understand how dangerous this is, buying marijuana. as simple as marijuana off of the streets. host: thank you, diane. mary is in philadelphia, pennsylvania. what is the top issue in pennsylvania? caller: yes, good morning, c-span. i would look at illegal immigration, because i am a retired government worker and baby boomer. it is not a law that we have not addressed in this country as a baby boomer here. we have a law in place -- i don't know why the democrats and republicans are basically ignoring the immigration reform and control act of 1986.

this was a law that was signed by president reagan. it was a bipartisan law, democrats and republicans. they made it illegal for anyone to rent to or hire an undocumented person in this country based on security reasons. you had to use a verify if you're going to hire the person or if you were going to rent to the person. this is the law that is in place. we have no idea who is in this country now, because we have americans who are illegally hiring undocumented people. we have americans that are illegally renting to undocumented people. 9/11 should never have happened in this country, because we have

the governors, the cities, the states that are not adhering to the laws that are in place, and we are looking at the problems. if we had no illegal immigration that is supposed to be crossing this border. and they are blaming it on president biden. no, you have to look at what you are doing, democrats and republicans. host: thank you, mary. there is a story in the new york times that nine democratic governors have actually been pushing biden and congress to address that my great crisis. it is an effort being led by the governor of new york. a biden ally whose estate has been inundated with arrivals from the southern border. more on that. nine democratic governors have joined gather to join the biden administration and congressional leaders to address what they call a humanitarian crisis created by the migrants seeking refuge in the united states.

it is clear that our national immigration system is outdated and unprepared to respond to this unprecedented global migration, reads the letter that is signed by the governors of arizona, colorado, illinois, new mexico, massachusetts, new jersey, and maryland. next up is jim in hudson, florida. what is the topic in florida? caller: good morning, c-span. my main concern is about a young gun coming in here from china. they are coming here with his blessing and it was alluded to earlier that china owns a lot of property in the united states. i will bet you that these young men are occupying different parts of our country on those properties. host: how are you seeing that show up in florida? caller: he probably has -- china

owns property here. they own all over the united statess. -- all over the united states. these young men are probably on those properties. why are they they there on different properties? what do they have plans for in the future? the other people are spread around the united states, but i bet these young men from china, i bet that they are on these different properties that china owns and are therefore a reason. he is not sending these people over here just letting them come over here. he has a reason. as far as young people go, they don't have the property that china was here. i bet these young people are occupying these different properties. they have a plan to hurt us. host: specifically in florida you are seeing in your day-to-date life that you're concerned about and you want your state leaders to address?

caller: i think all the state leaders should address this. they should find out where the properties are and go out and see if there are young men on these properties and find out why they are there. why are you occupying this property? why aren't you with the rest of the people trying to get the job? host: let's go to another comment from facebook, also from florida. susan smith says that her top issue r the state's property insurance. over thepremium has risen from a year to over $10,000 a yr for less coverage. republican legislators and our governor are more interested in tacking trans kids than solving the insurance crisis. next up is marvin in chattanooga, tennessee. marvin, what is the top issue for you in tennessee? caller: after listening to these comments we probably have many problems. the biggest issue that i am facing as a retired military and

100% disabled veteran is the fact that the state of tennessee , which has attracted a lot of veterans because of their politics and fulfilling their needs, are now beginning to drop the ball in allowing these companies to come into the state of tennessee and -- excuse me, i am having a senior moment. allowing these companies to come in here and take over land, hiring people from outside, bringing in companies that are taking up space where other people in the state can have. like, i am so discombobulated that i'm going to end this call. thank you so much. host: thank you for calling in. we received a text message from brenda in sarasotrida who says, i recently moved to

sarasota, floridaas dismayed at the lack of major transportation. uses to get you from one f town to the other that i could see. no real system from the side afforded to the west. the traffic is abominable. i am sure that a lot of it is because of the fact that the is no other way to get around other than your car. once again, we have regional phone lines if you would like to call in with the top issue in your state. eastern and central time zones, the number is (202) 748-8000. mountain and pacific time zones, (202) 748-8001. junior is in austin, texas. what is the top issue in your state? caller: yes, i am here. how are you doing today? host: great. make sure that the volume is down on your tv and telus the top issue in texas. caller: my top issue is, i am a vietnam veteran, i have served

our country, and i bought a house in 1968. i have a problem dealing with my insurance. that consists -- please listen to this here. the insurance is that in 2021, the sixth of june 2021, i had an electrical fire. then i had asbestos in it. within that situation there, with the firemen coming in, they found out that the house wasn't level as good as it should. some of the contractors came in, left, come in and leave, and i have been talking with my daughter in oklahoma because i

didn't have all of the information associated with the phones, where they are. i am at a -- what you call these houses? host: i don't know. which ones do you mean? caller: that's ok. maybe finish what i was saying. i haven't gotten -- they close the house out. i would say about two weeks ago. that -- but they still haven't completed the issues associated with the problems when i was there. some of the people when i called they are not returning my calls. one issue to another. host: it seems like a lot of people are struggling with the high cost of insurance throughout the country. andy in kentucky. go ahead. caller: thank you. there is something going on in

this country and people don't have a clue about the pros and cons of it. it is so unfairly reported on, because even the reporters are screwed and of this group. this group causes a lot of inflation in this country. they cause a lot of high prices and it is a distortion in wages between certain classes of people. it's illegal, this group is illegal and unconstitutional. it is unfair. host: what is the issue specifically in kentucky that you are concerned about? caller: it causes an unfa ir price on the consumers like the auto industry and their strike, the news media, you all belong to unions. host: i think that we have lost you. let's hear from bonnie in maryland.

what is the top issue for you in maryland? caller: to me, the death penalty and abortion rates up there together. this guy just stabbed his girlfriend's 6-year-old in the back and killed him. they didn't do nothing to him because they say that it is inhumane. for the death penalty, they might feel pain. did they ask that 6-year-old if he did? abortion, these women are so worried about getting rid of the baby they don't care how it happens, where it happens, and what happens to these babies who are viable? nobody knows or cares. i just think it's horrible that these women a lot of them are using this for birth control. i drove a cab, a van, and of these women would wait until they were six months pregnant, there friend dumped them, and

they would have an abortion. these women, i hope that they have nightmares worried about what happened with that baby once it was taken out of them and thrown on a cold table. host: next, we have greg in texas. what is the top issue in your state? caller: good morning. can you hear me? host: yes. caller: my issue is about talking about the border. the border isn't the problem. you have any excuse every year to keep people from not working. american citizens, black-and-white, people from not working. they iort people for cheap labor 24/7. it is called subcontracting. is when the mexicans and blacks were competing together for jobs. now the whites think that they are losing their job and they call ice on those people. now the mexicans have united together and came over here.

they are posting up in every neighborhood, illegal, getting paid under the table. the companies don't have to be responsible for them because they are serving the job out and they are working dirt cheap. it isn't that we don't want to work and i'm tired of you saying that americans don't want to do the job. it is a copout and an excuse. they do the same thing in the military -- i'm not done, they did the same thing when they subbed out the jobs in the military so they weren't responsible for vacation time or leave time like the military. and then they had the jobs in the military, the companies got screwed over because the jobs were not completed i'm not finished. that is the reason why black people don't have jobs and white people are working for these companies come the illegals took every job that you can get. they will take everything that you got. again, black folks are out here running around --

host: we got your idea, greg. i want to go to a comment that we received over text bakersfield, california. they are an indepeen voter. the top issue facing cafoia is a mental health and synthetic opioid epidemic thataserades as a homelessness crisis. it has turned downtown bakersfield into a wasteland. there was actually washington governor jay inslee who spoke about efforts to reduce homelessness while delivering that state's state of the state address, which we will get to an a moment. [video clip] >> policies change lives when they are focused on the people we are here to serve. we give people the chance to succeed. people-focused policies are how we are addressing homelessness.

some think that we can just wave a wand and those living in homelessness will simply disappear. but this is the real world, and we have an honest solution. build more housing, connect people to the right services, and they will have a chance to succeed. at this time last year, a woman named starr draper found herself in a right-of-way encampment on 1st avenue michigan street in seattle. we know that no one can live in danger and expect their conditions to improve. no one can be swept from one dark corner to another and expect life to get better. we must lift people up and give them the tools, the services, the power of community necessary to get life back on track. state and local collaboration got her on her journey to wellness. she says that this program "renewed my trust." now starr has worked, a safe and

private place to live, and is here today. congratulations, starr. [applause] >> washingtonians can see the dozens of encampments along our highways are no longer there. we need to know that that will continue only if we make additional investments. they will see thousands more new housing units thanks to your work as well. i want to thank this legislature for going big on housing last session and trusting that it was a necessary decision, just under $1 billion towards new housing already this biennium. host: c-span is covering all of the state of the state addresses from governors across the country, which you can find on c-span.org. now to a comment that we have received on x from mimi.

a city in each -- in eastern arkansas, a majory black town, doesn't have clean water and rahuckabee is campaigning for tmp. she also gave her fired friend a job as an advisor at 250,000 dollars a year in this poor state. let's hear from ron in oklahoma. ron, what is the top issue in oklahoma? caller: the main issue here is the treaties. the united states has treaties with other countries, but they also have treaties with the nations, such as the muscogee creek nation. they are not abiding by that treaty. the cherokees have a treaty with the united states.

my main concern is the muscogee creek nation treaty. there are 14 articles in the treaty. article 2 is equivalent to the 13th, 14th, 15th amendments, which deals with people of african descent. the article 2 is not being fully complied with the muscogee creek nation. these things are in court proceedings right now. why should we even go to court? the 13th, 14th, 15th amendments still stands through the united states and that has never changed and never will change. so, article 2 needs to be fully complied with the muscogee creek nation. that is the main concern here. these treaties dealing with the tribes here. the governor is fighting with these tribes on certain compacts

dealing with oklahoma. the main thing that the muscogee creek nation needs to fully comply with the treaty of 1866. host: next is eddie in port richie, florida. what do you think is the top issue in florida? caller: i think that it is elderly abuse and elderly care for older people, mothers and fathers, when they put them in those nursing homes and rehabs. then they keep them there for long-term. host: do you have personal experience with that? caller: yeah, my mom is in one. she is still there. they got her there with no rights. i think it is medicare fraud, too. host: do you see your lawmakers in florida doing anything to address these issues? caller: i would say would but

they haven't done it yet. they haven't done nothing yet. the two parties are not doing anything. my mom is still in that place and they are misusing her social security, her whole check and her medicaid. she has no rights. like a pow. she is in there with no say or anything. host: health care has been an issue across the country as well. the kansas governor laura kelly, a democrat, spoke about efforts to expand health care access while delivering the state of the state address in kansas earlier this month. here are some of those remarks. [video clip] >> simply put, our rural hospitals are not doing well. in the past decade eight have closed down, including a hospital that shut its doors in october after 104 years in

operation. soon after that, fort scott lost its emergency room, a gut punch to a community that is already reeling from the loss of its hospital four years earlier. 59 more kansas hospitals are in jeopardy of following suit. that is 59 out of 102, more than half. because so many of our hospitals are hanging on by a thread, they are forced to increase costs to patients, lay essential health care workers, stock offering -- stop offering important services. often counties resort to raising property taxes in a last-ditch effort to keep their hospitals afloat. when that fails kansas must stride longer and longer distances for basic care. so much of the problem boils down to one thing. far too many kansans don't have health insurance. in particular, working kansans

who don't have employer-based insurance but make too much money to qualify for our current medicaid program. these are kansans who work at the local hair salon or barbershop, who care for your elderly parents in nursing homes, who watch your kids so that you can work. remember when i was talking about license plates and what i said about listening to kansas when they strongly support something? i quit over 70% support something -- like win over 70% support something? if you listen, you know that were talking about the vast majority of kansans who want medicaid expansion. host: next, we will hear from gloria in san diego, california. what is the top issue in california? caller: hello? host: we can hear you. what is the top issue in your state? caller: rent prices. host: can you tell me more? caller: no, that is just the rent prices.

they are out of hand. host: how is that affecting you, gloria? caller: i am lucky that i have lived in my apartment for approximately 45 years. they have not raised my rent. i am not talking about myself. i am talking about other people. i am lucky. host: thank you, gloria. gary is in mt. juliet, tennessee. what do you think is the top issue in tennessee? caller: thank you. it is the economy. it is immigration. let me tell you something that i know for a fact. i see it every day. my business shares space with a company in the building trade. it is not illegal to hire these people. they have them every day coming in. they cannot speak english, but their boss can. the government is handing out

w-7 tax forms like water. they have no idea who these people are. the criminal enterprise comes in from these hispanic subcontractors that -- their w-7, it shows the government how much they have been paid. but it is not a true figure. these guys own homes, they are wealthy. and -- host: the person that you say is their boss, have you ever asked this person about who they are hiring and their practices around that? caller: yes. they don't like to tell you much, but the guy who is hiring them to do various building work, he is only responsible to see that w-7 form. he gives out there tax papers. here is the deal.

these guys are renting house living space from the hispanic owners of these subcontractors. it's a cash business. these young kids who cannot speak english, they do not have bank accounts. however small that check is, the other is cash handed back to the subcontract owner for their ren t. these guys are wealthy. they are not bad people, not at all. host: what would you like to see tennessee lawmakers do about this? caller: they can't do nothing. it is federal. the border is wide open and it was done on purpose. trump was working on this. he went through two years of being impeached for nothing. then, covid comes along. that killed the last two business of business administration.

host: i want to pause for a moment to poin out an article in the washington post about the border. it was a headline that biden vows to shut down an overwheld border if the senate bill passes. senators hope to release the legislative text of the bill next week, but it faces stiff odds in the republican-led house. president biden said on friday that he would use new emergency authorities to shut down the border when it becomes overwhelmed if congress passes a bipartisan immigration plan that the senate has been negotiating. the comment signified a remarkable shift in tone for a democratic president and underscored the urgency of the issue for his reelection campaign as immigration remains one of his most vexing political and policy challenges. in a wrong statement on friday, biden prai bipartisan border deal that senators have been negotiating calling at

the toughest and most fair set of reforms to secure the border that we've ever had in our country. it would give me as president a new emergency authority to shut down the border when it becomes overwhelmed, he said. if given that authority i would use it the day that i signed the bill into law. biden is referencing a new explosion authority that senators have negotiated that would kick in on days unauthorized border crossings reach 5000 over a five-day average according to two people mill your with the outlines of the bill on a condition of anonymity for deliberations. that story comes from the washington post. on the topic of immigration we have a text message from chris in texas. i am a canadian trying to assimilate in texas legally. we have been working, living, paying taxes as texans. documentation to stay in the u is very time-consuming and d causing multiple issues.

work issues are on a very limited timeline. what is being done to speed up legal immigration? next, michael in connecticut. what is the top issue in connecticut? caller: thank you for pointing out what you just pointed out. that is that it is the republican congress and donald trump creating the problems at the border. you now have senators and the white house in agreement on strong border policy and donald trump does not want it approved. he is trying to kill it all. that is where the problem is. getting back to the reason that i called, what is the problem in connecticut? it is the same problem nationwide. preserving democracy. you have a republican party that is trying to end democracy and install a donald trump authoritarian ruler. we know what the problem is. we just have to make sure that

in the next election donald trump is not put into power to do the disastrous stuff that he wants to do. one last point. ignorance is a huge part of what's going on in america right now. fortunately, you just pointed out some real facts and it is important that people heard that. thank you for that. if you listen to so many of your callers, blaming dark skinned people, blaming chinese young men -- they immediately get racist and ugly. that is not the problem. ignorance is the problem. you need to preserve democracy. keep that in mind in the next election. thank you. host: ryan in orange, massachusetts. what is the top issue in your state? caller: it is illegal immigration. our state of massachusetts is giving money to illegals. it is in housing, property values, and creating a housing

shortage. i would also argue that she has committed treason to her oath of office and should be removed from office. the reality is that the illegal immigration problem was exacerbated by the democrats. donald trump solved it. to call donald trump an authoritarian when he did stuff the american people like order control is absurd. host: what did you think about the criticism from the previous caller about republicans potentially blocking the bipartisan senate deal on the border? caller: well, they should be blocking it. it is filled with ukraine payout giveaways. why would we want to give money to ukraine when our own border is not secure? that doesn't make sense. host: do you think that giving money to ukraine is worth the border deal or it should be separate pieces of legislation? caller: no, the republican party

and donald trump should table it because all bite is trying to do is make it look like -- all biden is trying to do is make it look like i'm doing something on illegal immigration when the reality is that he is waving a flag before the november election. he didn't do anything about it at the beginning of his presidency. host: thank you, ryan. we have a comment from lance in asheville, north carola. our biggest problem is gerrymanri. the poputi is evenly split, yet mew the gop has a veto-proof majority in state legislature. theodore is in central new york. what do you think is the top issue in new york? >> good morning -- caller: good morning. thank you for taking my call. the gentleman i think who was from connecticut who said that ignorance was one of the main problems.

for me, and i have first-hand knowledge of this, elder abuse. elder abuse. i am in a nursing home. i don't have alzheimer's or dementia, with the services that they are supposed to supply to me, being a blind person, they are not providing it. and some other things. i have been abused in this facility. i am talking things like a tray table directly into me, and then she backed it up saying i'm trying to move it. she hit me again. when -- host: what do you hope that new york officials would do about this? caller: i listened to the

governor's state of the state address a few days ago. she -- i think that she covered some great things. she had some great ideas about programs. but elder abuse, she said nothing about it. that needs to come to her attention. and democracy, what the gentleman from connecticut said. host: thank you, theodore. let's hear from ray in pleasant view, tennessee. what is the top issue in tennessee for you? caller: immigration and everything that this president is doing to this country. immigration, this new thing that they got, the bill that they are trying to pass, why are we saying that 8000 illegals come

in? they are illegal. there is a right way to do things. if they don't put it back to the way that it supposed to be like a donald trump had it they are going to ruin this country if we are not already in jeopardy. joe biden and the people who run this country should be ashamed of themselves. the people who voted for him should be ashamed of themselves. until we get donald trump back into office to try to straighten this mess out, we are in bad shape. host: do you think that congress should work on passing any kind of legislation on border reform this session or wait until the next president? caller: well, it doesn't look like anything is going to be passed. the bill is crazy. they are trying to let people in here that are not supposed to be coming in here. that is plain common sense.

do it the right way. put them back where they have to stay in mexico -- you can't just let these people come into our country. we are right now in bad shape. host: thank you for your call. we have another comment on gerrymanderi fm pennsylvania. audrey is in philadelphia who said over text that in pesyania our biggest problem is gerrymandering, which has givens a regressive gop legislature that has kep the minimum wage at $7.25, feeds trump election theft illusions, etc. laura is in spokane, washington. what is the top issue in your state? caller: the morning, everyone. my biggest problem is the over taxation and the lack of respect for the red line that the government has. especially our governor. it is the over taxation of everything. when it comes to emma kratz they

want regulations -- when it comes to democrats they want regulations and taxation. we are being charged to death. those people are coming at the request of the white house because those people are being paid by the u.n. there are huge chunks of money, which is everything they get, which is just about everything. the money is sent to the u.n. and earmarked for the illegal immigrants, to pay their way and to pay their way and our country. host: where are you getting that information from? caller: newsmax and fox news. a new scandal just broke out where they found a bunch of hamas terrorists stealing the money that should have gone to the palestinians working in the wnwra.

a whole bunch of stuff is going on with their money. it is all at the ok at the white house. it seems the white house speaks for china and the squad. they don't speak for the american people. they don't respect our constitution. host: i want to get to one more call on issues from in washington. reggie, what do you think is the top issue in the state? caller: yes, immigration. the presidency. host: how is the immigration issue showing up for you in washington? caller: we are a state that allows in emigration, washington, against. but there are too many people in the united states. the first ones that should be taking care of our the native americans. they were the first ones here.

we are spending money on people who aren't even -- there is a debt still owed here to the indians, the native americans, the indigenous people. host: thank you very much. we are going to end it there. next up, tim graham of the media research center will be on with us to discuss the national news media's coverage of campaign 2024 and the biden administration later on, we will hear from kate shaw, the podcast strict scrutiny. we will be right back. ♪

>> american history tv, exploring the people and events that tell the american story. we continue with the series free to choose. co. pronounced by milton friedman and rose freeman. it looks at the great and lessons learned on lectures in history, the first of a two-part lecture by michael ross on the 1925 scopes trial aboutea evolution and its cultural significance in 1920's america. on the presidency, father matthew talks about his book, when harry met pablo, looking at harry truman and pablo picasso's time together during a mediterranean vacation. it talks about modern art, commutation -- communism and how they forged an unlikely bond. first, a look at a 1992 speech

by bill clinton in portsmouth, new hampshire. followed by president ronald reagan, who spoke at the iowa republican caucus kickoff in 1984. exploring american stories, watch american history tv and find a skull jewel -- schedule on your program guide or at c-span.org/history. >> sunday on c-span's queue and day, retired -- q and a, betty shares stories from her book, scenes. a collection of great chronicles of u.s. history she presented to senators during her caucus lunches between 2009 and 2023. >> they had to be sustained and to the point because you had five minutes to tell the story. but it had to tell a complete story. it was an interesting task and a

good challenge and one of the best learning experiences i had through the years as senate historian. senators kept coming to me and asking me to produce a book and put them into the book because they wanted to share the stories with other people. >> betty cohen with her book, scenes, sunday night at 8:00 eastern on c-span's q and a. you can listen to q and a on all of our podcasts. >> healthy democracy does not just look like this. it looks like this. where americans can see democracy at work. where citizens are truly informed. a republic thrives. get informed, straight from the source, on c-span. unfiltered, unbiased, word for word. from the nation's capital to wherever you are. the opinion that matters the most is your own.

this is what democracy looks like. c-span, powered by cable. host: -- >> washington journal continues. host: welcome back. we are joined by tim graham, the news busters executive director at the media research program. can you tell us about news busters? guest: news busters started in 2005 as a product of the media research center. the media research center was founded in 1987. i'vei5x been there since 1989. we have been at this a while. we are not anti-news. we are news watchers. we are recording all of the news programming on broadcasting table. we are capturing streaming services to monitor news and the way the news comes out to people. what they are covering, what they are not covering and how they are covering it, all of those things. host: you say you watch out for

media bias. how do you define that? guest: in the old this idea thas supposed to be subjective with fair coverage of both sides. we have a list of things where we find media bias by how much time you give to something in the newspaper. where do you put the story? is it the front page or is it buried? conservatives are ultraconservatives, liberals and democrats are called anything. these sorts of patterns. this is big at a time like this, what stories are they not telling you? here are stories that might appear in the new york post or they might appear on a website that the regular media are ignoring. there are biases like that and that's generally what we post on our website. host: where do you get your funding? guest: there's lots of citizens

across the country, lots of conservative citizens who are concerned about this issue. we also have some foundation donors. i don't really read the annual report to know who they are at this moment. but we definitely have some passionate supporters that fund this. host: you mentioned you have broadcast and streaming. what about things like social media posts? guest: yes, if the social media person is a journalist. yeah, we did create a free-speech america project to focus on social media in the sense of how the big tech platforms are being used or being suppressed and suppressing people. we remember in the 2020 campaign for the new york post toward her account got struck -- shut down for 17 days after they published hunter biden's story. that's the kind of story we would do in free-speech america to talk about big tech censoring

conservative accounts of social media. host: i want to bring up polling from gallup about partisan trust in mass media, which is pretty low and has been falling. media confidence in the united states, matching 2016 record lows, according to gallup. the percentage of people with a great deal or fair amount of trust or confidence in mass media to report the news fully, accurately and fairly since gallup started gathering this data in 1973, and if we go all the way up to 2023, it's down to 11% for republicans. 29% for independents. 58% for democrats. what do you think explains that low confidence in mass media? guest: when 58% of democrats like the media and 11% of republicans do, that often tell

you -- tells you who the democrats think the media is helping. think the key part is fully accurately and fairly. the whole idea of fair and balanced coverage has gone out the window. the discussion you hear in journalism schools or newsrooms, public forums where journalists assemble is you can't normalize trump. you can't give him air time. the associated press ran a story the other day about newsrooms having to debate whether to allow donald trump to speak live on their airways. that's where people are saying you say one side of the debate needs to be censored, curtailed and not allowed to speak because they cannot be fact checked at the same time. republicans would say joe biden lies and nobody covers his feet.

-- feed. joe biden is starving them of access and they don't seem to care. host: you were mentioning cutting trump's speeches. fox news has a story about cnn and msnbc facing criticism for cutting out of trump's victory speech in new hampshire, which both of those -- with both of those networks refusing to air the victory speech in full. fox news has a larger audience than cnn or msnbc or any of the other cable networks. and yet, the, you know, the mass media idea is not trusted by republicans. how do you reconcile those things? guest: fox, when fox came on the scene in 1996, they were apparent that they were going to try to offer fair and balanced. they figured what is working for

us is our conservative opinion shows so we will give more of that. they both look like bubbles. there are more liberals on fox news then you will see conservatives on cnn. because there republicans are generally seen as fake republicans. host: i don't understand that. guest: adam kinzinger was a republican but he hates all the republicans now. not just donald trump but anybody who has ever supported donald trump. what that person is going to say when they come on the air is going to basically line up with what all the democrats on the show are saying. are you getting fair and balanced? you are not getting a balance read you are getting a republican and a democrat who agree on everything. and that is one thing that people don't like. i guess you could say which republicans who want to hear donald trump speak are watching rachel maddow?

cnn and msnbc want to cut that feed because their audience doesn't want to hear trump speak. that challenges the idea of a news channel who runs live news events. host: in the hill, they have a story about donald trump pledging to investigate msnbc's parent company for threatening treason. this was comcast who he is referencing. former president trump pledged to investigate comcast for nbc and msnbc. if he is elected in 2024, saying they will be thoroughly scrutinized for their knowingly dishonest and corrupt coverage of people, things and events. i'm going to bring up this truth social post. it's quite long. they are almost all dishonest and corrupt. comcast with its one-sided and vicious coverage by nbc news and

in particular, msnbc, often incorrect referred to as msdnc. it is one big campaign contribution to the radical left him a credit party. i say upfront, openly and proudly, when i win the presidency of the united states, they and others will be thoroughly scrutinized for their knowingly dishonest and corrupt coverage of people, things and events. why should nbc or any of the corruption dishonest media companies be entitled to use the u.s. airways. they are a threat to democracy. the fake news media should pay a price for what they have done to our once great country. you think it's appropriate for a president to investigate the news media for their coverage like this? guest: i'm all for scrutinizing the news media. it's what we do. i don't think the government --

he's not being specific about the federal communications commission. the fcc can't regulate cable. they are supposed to regular broadcast and they really don't do that. we do not support some sort of federal prosecution of msnbc for being pro-democrat. that's not what a democracy is. the irony of all of this is the people running around and saying trump is a threat to democracy and they don't practice democracy in the way they report the news. they don't allow the republican point of view to surface. i think everybody who watches msnbc, i joke all the time if i watch morning joe, i'm getting pure, straight democrat talking points. but it's a free country. you can say that on the airwaves. you can have another channel with a different point of view. that's democracy. we are for democracy.

there is a lot things he said about russian collusion. they turned that story around and it did not end up amounting to anything. it was a false story after two or three years of investigation. host: want to get to your questions in just a bit. our numbers are for democrats, (202) 748-8000. for republicans, (202) 748-8001. for independents, (202) 748-8002 . before we get to callers, i want to bring up one more quote from an article in fox. eric levitt had a piece about why biden may not be getting quite as much credit for the economy as some people think he should and for economic indicators. part of the quote is that there are plenty of unabashedlyess centered -- left centered media outlets.

fox news is more consistently propaganda and boasts a 42% larger viewership. sinclair broadcasting, one of the largest owners of local tv news stations is an ardently ervative, family-owned firm that donates to the gop and disseminates rig wing propaganda on its affilia stations. and although the audience for fox news and wing talk radio may consist largely of republicans, viewersf local ideologically diverse.s are trump has a much better apparatus for maintaining the approval and enthusiasm of his party's voters and receiving politically favored -- favorable narratives than biden does. what are your thoughts that the media might have an anti-biden bias? guest: this requires a

multi-paragraph swfox has a larn cnn or msnbc. but you compare it to the newscast of abc, that is greater than fox. when you add them together, it is greater than fox. you could argue that maybe sinclair's local tv. maybe they say you should say these words or do it this way. a lot of sinclair stations that are abc affiliates or nbc affiliates or cbs affiliates, what they are doing in a lot of cases is putting out what you would call mainstream media news. we are always going to disagree with the idea that somehow the conservative media has greater influence than the liberal media or greater reach. i'm going to disagree with that. yes, we feel that the media is dominated by -- look at the white house briefing room.

how many reporters in the white house briefing room voted for trump? maybe three. and there's 80 people in there. i think that is where we are coming from. most of what we call the legacy media, the established media and the big brands of media are liberals and democrats. >> when you try to discern balance and try to push back against bias, do you think equal time and attention should be given to narratives that are known to be false? guest: you've asked where the fight is. that has been the fight for the left comes in and says the right is wrong. area on the huffington said -- arianna huffington said the right is wrong and they don't deserve any attention. that rules today. because trump exaggerates a lot of stuff, he is a fact checkers nightmare.

and they are like you can't let him speak life. anybody who supports trump and has ever voted for trump can't be trusted. you have these debates over what's true. on some level, this is the hard part. objectivity on some level says we are going to let the people decide. we are going to let this person say this. that person can say that. journalists should fact-check these things. part of the problem we have, we have a problem called fact checking the fact checkers is fact checking is a liberal democrat media that checked the republicans way more often than the democrats. if you go to put a fact.com and politicians who are -- pollitt itifact.com and politicians who are fact checked --

were the fact-checks accurate? the first thing i will tell you is it suggests that they think the people who art republicans are a pile of liars. host: my question was if there are known facts, do you think that people who say things that are contrary to that should be given equal time for those argument? guest: it depends, if we are having a fight over something in particular and we wanted to say climate change is one of those where the media says that is happening. you are not allowed to say it's not happening. not only are you n a not happenu can't really have a debate over if we establish that i'm a change is a problem, what solutions do we need to impose? -- climate change is a problem, what solutions do we need to impose? we want to make sure nobody has a gas stove in their home. you are not allowed to disagree with that. i think that is the problem.

when liberals have this idea that their cause is the truth, you can't get a word in edge wise. host: ed is in atlanta, georgia on our independent line. go ahead. what's your question? caller: thank you for asking me to go ahead. i want to talk about the free press. i want to mention jamaal khashoggi, who was murdered so we could enjoy a free press in this country. kimberly, you do a good job of inspiring the people to go ahead and say what they called to say, instead of having to start -- stop the whole world. host: did you have a question for tim? caller: yeah, i have a question. freedom of the press needs to be more about saying good

morning to each other. we need to talk about the issues. thank you very much. host: thank you, ed. guest: he mentioned jamaal khashoggi, the saudi journalist who was murdered in a savage way. that is a terrible thing. obviously, journalism can be a dangerous thing to practice. that is something we have to keep in mind. journalists risk a lot in dangerous places to tell us what's going on and that's important. the saudi's hated his guts. he was taking a bunch of information. that doesn't justify what happened to him. but, it's important to be -- we are pro-journalism. pro-journalist does not mean you can't criticize a product. >> steve is in florida on our

democratic. good morning, c. -- good morning, steve. caller: the reason i am calling is as i listen to news, we can argue all day on if the right or left has more bias media. but there is one constant. i'm listening to news. i would like the person who delivered that news to look at me as a moderately intelligent adult and speak to me in full sentences and present an issue that can be debated using facts. what's happening now is so much of the news on both sides is subliminal. bullet phrases, conspiracy, misinformation is just aimed at our subconscious -- sub conscience.

nowadays, when we walk into a workplace or the grocery store, we hear people just regurgitating. you can hear it on c-span. i was listening to it this morning. people regurgitate what they heard on their media. caller: it would be nice. i grasped onto the part of can you give us the news like we are moderately intelligent people? we are watching the evening news programs and we write down what the stories are and how much time they get and so many times, it's like well, the first four minutes of the newscast was it was snowing in nebraska. and you are like well, i guess they think this is what scores in the ratings. a lot of times, the campaign is often seven minutes or 10

minutes or 11 minutes into the news. i'm a snob, i'm like is in politics the most important news? obviously, there are some weather events that are so adverse that you could see why they would lead. so much of the news is narratives. for example, we will look at the republican presidential race right now. oh, it's over. is it? we have a primary and a caucus. i believe the delegate said trump has 32 and nikki haley has 17 and the winner has to have 1215. and it's over. this reflects that the news media sees its role as reflecting conventional wisdom. is that the way it's going to turn out? quite possibly. but it's like calling the football game in the first quarter. host: clark is in south dakota

on our republican line. go ahead, clark. caller: hello? host: yes, turn down the volume on your tv and go ahead with your question. caller: my question is i believe the fox television, my question is is cnn fake news? it seems like cnn is more fake than fox. caller: this is where -- guest: this is where you say fake news -- i think when i watch a newscast, there is a lot of factual information in there. on the left, you would probably get more facts. when people use the phrase fake news, they are talking about things like did brett kavanaugh commit rape as a teenager? we asked that question for weeks. or, did that end up being fake? and so, russian collusion, did trump actually collude with the russian government to get

elected in 2016? that turned out not to be true. you could say it's fake news. they could say we are merely reporting on what they are discussing in washington. the news media also framed and pushed what will be discussed in washington. on some level, the news media has to take responsibility for their role in making the national conversation what it is. i don't think you would look and -- at an entire newscast and say everything is fake. that's not true. what we complain about is so much of the news seems to be a set of narratives. if it matches our narrative, we like it. if it doesn't match our narrative, it doesn't make the news. it feels more plastic and manufactured. >> and is in philadelphia, pennsylvania on our independent -- ed is in philadelphia, pennsylvania on our independent line. caller: i want to thank you for

being here today and mentioned that journalism can be dangerous and making that sound like a threat. this guy is dealing in the most absurd level of doublespeak. we just heard a series of collars whose primary issue is immigration. a caller said washington is a state that allows immigration, i guess. you are right, tim, that journalism and tv shows like the ones you appear on have a responsibility for shaping what is discussed about people and what's discussed in washington and where our priorities are. host: you said tim engaged in doublespeak. what do you think was doublespeak? caller: there is an overwhelming convenience in referring to this monolithic idea that the legacy media or the mainstream media.

when he himself admits that fox is a larger -- has a larger market share than any of its competitors. i'm sure he has appeared on talk radio. host: what's allowed him to respond to your criticism. guest: i will start right there. you know what the largest talk radio network in america is? national public radio. they have talkshows. and they have new shows. and they have impressive reach. they have impressive reached because the federal government has put them there so that there is 300 npr stations across the country. whenever somebody tries to say the right wing dominates the radio sphere, i don't think that's true. it's a place where conservatives feel they get to speak to each other. and they get to say things about the democrats that the democrats don't want you to say on their legacy media.

and that's a problem. we are talking about immigration this morning. the washington post story you read a little while ago, you said joe biden said republicans should get tougher on the border. to the average person, this is weird because biden is the president. shouldn't he be held responsible if we have massive, uncontrolled illegal immigration. aren't they supposed to make sure the border is secure? the media does not hold item responsible for that. biden is not held responsible for anything. biden is not held responsible for inflation. he didn't cause that. we have 6 million american hostages in israel. he's not jimmy carter. that's part of it. i reject the idea that somehow the conservative media has way more power than the liberal media.

host: nancy is in bowling green, kentucky on our democratic line. go ahead. caller: thank you. good morning, everyone. mr. graham, i have been sitting here listening. there's so much i want to say to you and so little time to say it in. the republicans have a victim mentality about them. they want to promote a lot of fear. the border, the money, so much fear. my sister is a republican. love her to death. unfortunately for her, i guess i'm a democrat. i watch fox all the time. i can't believe when, you know, shannon or whoever is talking and she's asking a question and i guess she's not getting the response she wants. she talks over the person. she does not allow them to speak . and it's very disturbing.

and she is always saying she is canceled. my sister. no, you are not canceled. i just heard everything you said. i hear it on tv. no one is canceled. their thoughts may not align with mine. but i can still hear your frederick. so, -- your rhetoric, so technically, you are not canceled. host: this is a common criticism that many conservatives complain about being canceled while there are platforms like talk radio that have a large audience. guest: obviously, sometimes people get canceled. tucker carlson got canceled. chris cuomo got canceled. cancel culture is a term amongst conservatives. obviously, the president, you can argue is saying he has been

victimized. when we study the news media and how negative they are toward trump, it's been 90, 89, 90 1% negative. you might feel like you have been victimized. you could also say this is the way that trump wins in today's day and age. the more negative coverage he gets from the legacy media, that tends to help. that might be odd to liberal people. i wanted to respond to one other thing. this idea that the conservatives are so in fear and they are dividing people. this is where we say what's your reporting on the climate if not driving fear? what's your reporting on hate speech or any of these stories if you are not sewing fear and division or suggesting conservatives in general are hateful people? that is a divisive thing to say.

we should acknowledge, let's be objective about this. here is something all politicians use. you appeal to all the emotions. that's just the way it is. hate is something you could argue any political side is engaging in by being critical. those are universal. i don't think you can say oh, they do all the fear and division and it's only the conservatives. that's a divisive statement right there. host: tom is in bethlehem, pennsylvania on the republican line. what's your question? caller: good morning. i called to make sure the house of representatives does not take the deal with the southern border. let me tell you why. host: did you have a question for tim on the media? caller: media that happens to be pushing the fact that we have a deal at the southern border. an't seem to want to honor that deal.

let me tell you something. president biden drew executive orders. host: keep it more focused on the media and the immigration story and the border story has been a huge topic. guest: the senate democrats and ng to make a deal. they set the outline for the deal. donald trump said he did not like it. the house republicans don't like it. the house republicans want to get something closer to hr to, which was their version of border control. to me, the oddity of all of this is trying to say that biden does not own this problem. and he is out there tweeting like if you want something, you would agree with me. you have not been serious about the border since 2021.

just look. the story came out yesterday that the last month, december was the worst month in years, in terms of how many people are pouring in across the borders. republicans are disagreeing on this. they are saying the senator should not accept the deal. but, we don't know what's in the deal. that's the weirdest part. host: it's not been released yet. guest: we are having a debate over something and we don't know what it is. host: next up is michael in huntington, indiana. go ahead, michael. caller: i agree. i don't blame the media for bias because they are both biased. the republican -- host: michael, how do you define bias in the media? caller: bias is when one

person thinks they know it all. and it's not that way. i don't blame trump or biden for having, you know, material from the archives because that's stupid. they got people up there and they send it out and you put it in. they are responsible for it. not biden or trump. host: you talking about classified documents, right? ok, did you have a question for tim about the media? caller: yeah. do you think -- i think they are all liars. but i am a 78-year-old person. and i just don't -- global

warming, i like it. host: this gets to that trusting media question that we started off with. guest: you'd like to sit here and imagine what would it be like if we were trying to present here is what happened today. the president said this. the congressional leaders responded with this. house republicans want this language, this stricter language. that would be straightforward and factual. and it's not the product that we get when you are watching these things. we have this news nation channel that's trying to say let's present both sides. for example, they would have dean phillips on, the congressman from minnesota who is running against joe biden in the primaries. you want to see somebody who

they are trying hard not to talk about on the news media, it's dean phillips. he got 19.6% of the vote in the new hampshire primary which maybe is not great if you think he's going to win the whole thing. but he got that with almost zero news coverage. they are discussing well, the news media is like the general election is on. they are pretending there is no such thing as a democratic primary. that is where you sort of say who decides that is not news and that is where people question the integrity of journalism. host: melvin is in fort lauderdale, florida on our democratic line. melvin, good morer: good mornin. this -- let me tell you one thing. one thing with respect to media and fox. in all the red states and a lot the northern states, ohio and pennsylvania too, they don't have anything other than fox

where you can listen to alternative news. host: are you talking about fox the cable network or local fox affiliate sciacca -- affiliates? caller: both of them. don't cut me off yet because that is just part of it. i'm talking about the cable networks. they don't have those cable channels in the red states and northern states like ohio and pennsylvania. fox is on all of them. in addition to, he's talking about trump. name one thing that trump has not been involved in and talked about. going back to the russia investigation, he was found to be colluding. russians were brought up and charged with collusion. they didn't want to go into it because he figured it was part of the deal. host: i'm going to stop you there. the charges were not directly

related to former president trump himself. i'm going to let you respond. guest: let's start with the notion that fox tv, fox television affiliate stations or fox broadcasting is now disney. fox news is on most cable systems. so is seen in and msnbc -- cnn and msnbc. his new station on every cable system? no. -- is news station on every cable system? no. is it a comcast conspiracy? i don't have at my house. i think it's important to see them all. i say if you don't want to liberal media, come get the low lights. if you want to know what's going

on in the media, come to news busters. you don't have to watch all of those things. you might say that is not representative of what you saw. a lot of it, we leave on the cutting room floor because it's ok. host: next up, steve is in san jose, california on the republican line. go ahead. caller: thank you for taking my call. tim, i want to get your opinion on an episode that happened this last year regarding bridgeport, connecticut and a classic example of the election corruption. it was involving two democratic candidates running for mayor. one incumbent and one challenger, to where a judge throughout the election and made them redo it because of video

evidence that there was ballot stuffing going on. host: hold on. tim, you are nodding as if you are familiar with this story. guest: i am. most people would not be because that was not a national story. this is a democrat on democrat sort of situation. i'm not pronouncing that ballot stuffing happen. it was a story that the local media was doing. again, it's a subject they don't want to discuss. host: and that's becausof partisan issue or because it was a local issue rather than a national one? guest: local issues become national issues sometimes. that's part of the news

judgment. what local story are you going to choose to do? for example, we have this massive story about a woman in texas who was denied an abortion. her health was threatened. that was a massive national story. it's a local story but not if they don't want it to be. there are lots of federal cases. you are choosing one. you choose the story you want to choose from local. with abortion, we can talk about the doctor who was found guilty of neglectful killing a woman in philadelphia. we don't want to do that story. i'm simply saying one of the things they don't want to do is acknowledge that voter fraud or ballot stuffing exists anywhere when you want to say it does. it feels to them like a trump type of topic and we don't want to do it. host: next up is dennis in

california. caller: good morning. great show. i love c-span. i think what we are missing is that since they repealed the fairness doctrine, all of media is nothing more than a sitcom. under the reagan administration, they repealed the fairness doctrine and that was a rule that all broadcasters had to present what was called opposing views. if you had a democrat that was supporting a bill or a piece of legislation, you have a republican. and in those days, each person would sit and they would talk about it and share their views. it was called opposing views. under the reagan administration, they repealed it. and they decided that media was nothing but a drain on the corporate bottom line.

they got rid of the investigative journalists and they made media -- host: pause one moment and let tim respond. guest: it was removed during the reagan administration. that came long before fox news and msnbc in 1996. i'm old enough to remember this. it's not like there were a lot of fairness doctrine cases. it was not like donald trump's dream, msnbc got dragged to court. there was not anything like that but they had the idea that a broadcasters responsibility is they should provide equal time and that's clearly not the way we are today. host: the last caller we can get to is manwell in colorado on the democrat climb. go ahead. caller: hello. host: hello, we can hear you. caller: i'd like to ask this

gentleman, you made the statement that stations, msnbc and cnn have less conservatives than fox has liberals. host: that's not what tim said, tim said the republicans that appear on those stations tend to not be as conservative as those who appear on conservative networks. caller: he said the amount. he said about the radio stations, one station is across the nation. all the other stations. 90% of them, are a.m. hate radio and have been since rush limbaugh. this guy is talking through his head. host: would you like to respond? guest: i think what needs to be said, the five for example on fox has a democrat every day. you can watch it and say that is

a fox democrat. this is where we would say they are a cnn republican. you want them to all be civil to each other. if you have somebody who comes into fox on the daily or a semi-daily basis, you want them to get along. but it's easy for you to say i did not hear my viewpoint represented in this republican or in this democrat. that really is a test. i think that fox does more to incorporate a democratic point of view. joe scarborough is nobody's idea of a republican. anybody who is watching that show -- that's a comedy program. host: we will have to leave it there for now, tim graham. the executive director of news busters at the media research center. also the co-author of collusion,

how the media stole the 2016 election and how to prevent it from happening again. thank you for joining us. coming up next on "washington journal" we will have kate shaw, cohost of the podcast strict scrutiny to discuss the podcast and the legal news of the day. but first, we will have more of your calls and comments in open forum. the numbers are on your screen. we will be right back. ♪ >> american history tv, exploring the people and events that tell the american story. we continue with the series free to choose, coproduced by milton

friedman and his wife, rose friedman. lessons learned on lectures in history, the first of a two-part lecture by michael ross on the 1925 trial about teaching evolution and its cultural significance in 1920's america. on the residency, father matthew talks about his book, when harry met pablo. looking back at harry truman and pablo picasso's time together in 1958, during a mediterranean vacation. the story details cold war era politics, modern art communism and how the two forged and unlikely bond. watch historic campaign speeches. first, a look at a 1992 speech by bill clinton in portsmouth, new hampshire. followed by resident ronald reagan, who spoke at the iowa republican caucus kickoff in 1980 four. exploring the american story. watch american history tv or

watch anytime online at c-span.org/history. ♪ >> nonfiction book lovers, c-span has a number of podcasts for you. listen to best-selling nonfiction authors and influential interviewers on the afterwards podcast. on q and a, here wide-ranging conversations with authors and others who are making things happen. weekly hour-long conversations that feature -- about a wide variety of topics. and go behind the scenes with insider interviews and the best sellers list. find all of our podcasts by downloading the free c-span now app. or, wherever you get your podcasts. and on our website, c-span.org/podcasts. ♪ >> a healthy democracy doesn't

just look like this. it looks like this. where americans can see democracy at work. and citizens are truly informed. a republic thrives. get reformed -- get informed straight from the source on c-span. unfiltered, unbiased, word for word. from the nation's capital to wherever you are. you get the opinion that -- because the opinion that matters the most is your own. this is what democracy looks like. c-span, powered by cable. >> "washington journal" continues. host: welcome back. we are in open forum to hear your thoughts on the news of the week. democrats can call in at (202) 748-8000. republicans at (202) 748-8001. s independent -- independents at (202) 748-8002. one of the big stories was the verdict in the defamation case against former president donald trump.

headlined from the washington post that a jury ordered trump to pay eugene carroll more than $83 million for defaming her. that was a civil jury that ordered donald trump to pay e. jean carol $83 million. a remarkable denunciation of his rhetoric. the jury delivered a stinging courtroom loss to be president as he closes in on another republican presidential nomination. it illustrates the degree to which trumps year can be defined as much by courtrooms as the campaign trail. as the verdict was handed down, trumps lawyers issued this statement outside the courtroom. >> we are seeing a violation of our justice system. ladies and gentlemen, you are not allowed to be stripped of every defense that you have. you are not allowed to be told that you can't bring it up.

and imagine a point where a judge tells the lawyer, the former president -- that your client, the former president of the united states, the leading candidate an obvious nominee of the republican party, before he takes the stand to defend himself, tell me the questions you are going to ask in open court and tell me what he is going to respond. and then edited my questions. edited the responses he was allowed to give. and guess what my client said? he took the stand and abided by the rules of this corrupt system that i have seen. we will immediately appeal and set aside that ridiculous jury. i want to remind you, i will continue with president trump to fight for everybody's first amendment right to speak. anybody's right to defend themselves when they are wrongfully accused, and to be able to say i didn't do it. host: and now to your calls in

open forum. michael is in orlando, florida on our republican line. go ahead, michael. caller: i'd like to make a comment on the current senate negotiations on the border deal. there is a -- i believe they are allowing up to 5000 migrants or illegal immigrants to cross the border every day is the quota, before they do anything. if you add that up, it's 35,000 people coming into our country every day without any kind of checking, screening them for diseases. or whatnot. i don't understand how people can sit back and say they are stopping, they have a deal but they have to go forward with the deal. can your other collars or people speak to that and say why -- we can't have 35,000 in new mexico

every week and just walk into their border. why is that ok? thank you. host: next, we have monty on the democrat line. go ahead. caller: good morning. i want to say that i am glad that donald trump has to pay this lady. nobody is above the law. i don't care who you are. it's such a humiliating thing for tim scott. host: hopefully we can get you back on a more stable line. next up is milton. go ahead. caller: good morning. i'm calling to remind folks that immigration is a tool republicans use to scare people. think about it. --

there would be no donald trump. they said this publicly that if we allow all of these people to get residency or citizenship, there would be no republicans winning elections anywhere in the country anymore. these are tools they use to keep the country separated. to prevent anything from going into law that would benefit the people. think about it. all of these folks who are coming at the border. america needs 10 times those people. they are living 30 to 40 years more than what they pay into the system. all of these folks worrying about the immigrants coming, you are going to need a lot more of them. host: steve is in oak ridge, tennessee on our democratic line. good morning.

caller: excuse me. good morning. i'd like to say i think you did a great job. there is so much i could talk love. i am a moderate democrat. i want to talk about perception and perspective for a minute if i may. i never watch msnbc. if i only watched fox news, my perceptions would be based only on what i hear on fox news. you are not getting the full picture if you are listening to one or the other. what this leads to is ignorance on the part of everyone that only listens to one side. you are not getting everything. you are doing a disservice to yourself. i would say the problem in tennessee is ignorance and stupidity. you see it by the people who

call in. have a great day. thank you so much. host: next up is ted in washington on our republican line. good morning, ted. caller: i was just talking about -- the guy before had a lot of good things to say. but, once you realize that, you get a sense of what's going on in america. as for the border, you should keep people away from the border for now, until we figure out -- when you say free for everyone, you can't have an open border. host: looks like we lost you. next up is robert on our independent line. caller: ready? host: go ahead and turn down the volume on your tv. caller: the previous judgment that you had on, some of the things he said about the media

were quite interesting. i watched all of these different channels. i watch msnbc, fox. occasionally newsmax. it's quite interesting to observe. when i watch fox, about 30 percent of the time, when i hear what i hear, i want to roll my eyes. cnn is about 50-50. msnbc is about 70% of the time. i can't believe it. you watch joy reed and chris hayes -- reid, chris hayes and rachel maddow. it's obvious you have a bias. the other one is newsmax. sometimes it's fair to question exactly where they come from.

the best i think from fox was greta. i think they were stupid to get rid of her. this story goes back to some of the relatives. they never dispud it. he wanted a defense analyst position. a high paid fants analyst position and trump didot give it to him. that is what set adam kinzinger off against donald trump. if he got the defense analyst position, he would have never been on the january 6 committee. host: thank you very much for your let hear from andrew in las vegas, nevada on our democratic line. go ahead, andrew. caller: thank you for taking my call. i was upset in 2016 when trump won and as we were watching

the returns come in, msnbc and cnn were reporting won iowa, pennsylvania, michigan, florida, etc. not one of the people like me that was upset got angry and mad at them for reporting those results. however, in 2020, if you recall, fox news was the first ever network to call arizona for trump. the gentleman call had been with fox news for 20 years. he got fired for that because trump called rupert murdoch screaming and yelling and outraged and all these viewers were boycotting and going to newsmax. i wanted to ask your previous guest, did he think of an example of a journalist getting fired for getting his story correct and early? as we now know, arizona did go for joe biden and they fired him for that and they got mad at him for reporting that.

people on the left, not one person i know was angry at msnbc for reporting trump won in 2016, but that cannot be said for the republicans in 2020. host: thank you for calling. that's all the time we have for those calls on. we will be getting to more of your calls and a bit. i want to go to gavin jackson, who is the host of this week in south carolina on south carolina etv, who will discuss president biden's visit to the state today for the first in the nation celebration dinner at of the state's 2024 primary. welcome. thanks for joining us. guest: thank you for having me. host: tell us about this dinner put together by the south carolina democratic party. it seems self-evident but what's it about? guest: it's a fundraising dinner the party is hosting because they are first in the nation.

they got that designation after joe biden pushed for that and jimmy harrison -- and jaime harrison, who pushed for that, got it done. it's key to helping two of the nominees. south carolina dealt joe biden the biggest win back in 2020 when he was running for president the first time. this is morris start the campaign operate. it will be an easy one for joe biden and south carolina. we saw him in new hampshire. he's coming back to south carolina, where it started for him. he will kick off the campaign from here and he has a bunch of surrogates and people in town. he's been in south carolina multiple times this month giving speeches and such. it's a big kickoff. the campaign is in full swing. host: it sounds like an event

very much about joe biden. what's he expected to highlight? guest: it's going to be big. he released an ad featuring congressman clyburn talking about the economy and the winds under the biden administration. it's fascinating to hear people talk about electric vehicles and the like. what we saw from the infrastructure law and other legislation i got past to grow that industry -- legislation that god pass -- got passed to grow that industry. a lot of that is because of subsidies and investment from joe biden. it's funny to hear the messaging happening but i think the democrats need to lean more into talking about it. expect to see a full court press happening out of south carolina. that's really what the democrats are liking. host: this is being hosted by

the south carolina democratic party. there are other candidates in the democratic primary, including marianne williamson and representative dean phillips. will they be invited? guest: dean phillips will be there but i don't know if anyone will know who he is. it's not like new hampshire, where he can paint. i know think people are paying attention to dean phillips. we expect to see that. i think it's more of a courtesy thing. they are letting everyone talk. host: you will be able to watch -- our viewers will be able to watch south carolina's celebration nn on c-span at 6 p.m. eastern on c-span.org and ourpp. but beyond this event, what is the mood in south carolina?

after having been bumped up to the first primary in the nation. guest: i think folks are just now understanding how important that is. the democratic race is more of a foregone conclusion. the democrats want to solidify that role for the future here because south carolina has a very diverse demographic when it comes to democrats so it's about -- just because we have a substantial number of voters in the party doesn't mean they will all go for the same person. they are hoping to do that in the future by that. host: south carolina democrats will head to the polls february 3. who exactly will be on the ballot and where do they stand?

i'm guessing joe biden is in the lead now. guest: is joe biden. it is pretty much is to win at this point. i guess there are others on the ballot. i honestly don't know. i am sure dean phillips is on the ballot. but it is joe biden's to win. and of course we have open primaries. democrats might peel off and vote in the republican primary on february 24. i doubt we will see that happen because democrats have a long memory and remember their time under nikki haley here. i don't expect her to get a boost should that happen. host: can you speak more about the open primary process in south carolina? guest: we do not register by party here. we have early voting. people can pick which primary they want to vote in. they cannot vote on the -- on one and then the other and

vice versa. everyone is pretty much on board with how safe and secure our elections are. we saw democrats and republicans pass bipartisan legislation recently on this. it's pretty much normal voting. no big issues here. the primaries will be on saturday, which is unique, but it gives people an opportunity to get out to the polls. host: the gop primary is coming up february 24. nikki haley and former president trump are on the ballot. how are each of them spending their time? guest: we saw haley returned to her home state -- return to her home state recently, to conway, red-hot republican country. it's interesting to see the demographics and geography of our state because we have a lot

of retirees from the north that have moved down. it's more affordable in different areas. you have blue-collar people who have moved to the middle beach areas and a lot of white-collar people in the low country. we are seeing haley start to ramp up here. we are seeing advertising on their. she also has people knocking on doors since they endorsed her in november. she has that group doing that. we have not seen much from donald trumpet. we expect that will change. we have also not seen any big polling. the last poll i saw was early january and much has changed since then. it's still very much an uphill battle for nikki haley. i'm sure the 30 point difference will narrow but it is still term country. he has a lot of support from top lawmakers here, the governor and the like, so he will be

barnstorming too. last year, he only held two rallies in south carolina, so we expect more of that this year. host: speaking of nikki haley, she will be ifrt of voters tomorrow at a llin conway, south carolina. we will be carrying that on c-span at 5 p.m. eastern and it will be on our website, c-span.org as well as streaming live on c-span, our free mobile app -- c-span now, our free mobile video app. haley is looking at this as a fight on her home turf, but you just said it was trump country there. how have south carolinians kind of embraced the former president since she was last governor in 2017? guest: he is wildly popular here in south carolina. he has gotten a lot of big endorsements here. most of our congressional delegation, governor and

lieutenant governor. it helps haley continue the underdog messaging she has had since she ran for governor in 2010. you had a lot of people saying she should drop out and get behind donald trump and i think she is trying to prove a point that i'm your last best hope for winning the general election. primary voters versus general election voters, a different situation. a lot more motivated primary voters and they are donald trump voters. it's been difficult to get the message across. i expect her to get moderate republicans, people to -- people who want to see some sort of change, may be disaffected democrats. it's a huge margin she would have to overcome. she will be working on it over the next couple weeks, but again, it's going to be a

difficult battle. but she has the money. she has delegates going for. they will be a thing until the math does not add up. i don't see her listening to establishment people or donald trump saying let's wants to pro. when it comes to the general election, and should donald trump lose to joe biden, which he is predicting, she can say in 2028, i told you so. host: so you think she stays regardless of the results in succulent? guest: she will until the math does not add up. she just raised $2.6 million since the new hampshire primary, so that's pretty crazy money. she also is having some wall street fundraisers next week. host: when you are talking to people in south carolina both in your own networks and when doing your reporting, what are you

hearing about the state of the race on the democratic and republican side? guest: i don't want to say it's a foregone conclusion but i think it's not as spicy, not as energetic, not as exciting as years passed. we almost did not have the primary because people were calling for nikki haley to drop out. i'm sure the republican party folks are happy this is still going on even though we saw attempts to quash this. they want people to come through here. they did not have any debates in new hampshire, so it's a different cycle. we are running this donald trump era of politics. we will see excitement leading into the primary. now, it's maybe a little bit of an autopilot situation. she will put the time in and do the work but it's not what it was in 2016 when you had all these candidates coming through nonstop.

it was donald trump countries in tebow. likewise for the democrats. i will be interested to see what happens in the future. host: is there any discussion of policy in these races in terms of policies that matter to south carolinians? guest: immigration is still huge but at this point it seems like a personality contest. there's a lot of similarity between trumpet haley when it comes to their views -- between trump and haley when it comes to their views. but at the end of the day it is who they like more and a lot of people want to return to the time under donald trump. it's not dissimilar to what you hear in south carolina.

even of the economy is stronger under joe biden, people want to go back to what it was under donald trump. so i think it is messaging going forward and her talking about chaos, chaos versus policy, personality versus policy. that's what she's trying to bank on and get people to see there's a lot of difference between donald trump and her. she's trying to make this argument but i don't think it's resonating. donald trump brought a lot of the party just brought a lot of voters into this party that were not engaged -- brought a lot of voters into the party that were not engaged previously. he has not budged in the polls. that's what people need to understand when it comes to a trump voter. it is not just him but the engagement the party has now that it reported not -- it before did not. host: appreciate your time. let's get to your calls on open

form. catherine is in texas on our republican line. you have been patiently waiting. thank you. go ahead. caller: yes. i was calling to talk about the primaries on 2/20. now, i need to tell you something that's very important. host: i'm sorry, catherine? caller: all of them. host: go ahead. caller: when they did it, all the votes was for trump more than it was for biden. because i watched it all night long. i turned my tv off to get up in the morning and then i find out that biden won. you know what happened? i will tell you what happened. they flip-flopped. that means all the voters that went for trump, they

flip-flopped and gave it to biden, and then they took biden's votes and put it in the way of trump. now you might think i am crazy but i'm not. i got this information from the top, which is god almighty. host: thank you. let's go to robert in galveston, texas on our republican line. go ahead. caller: top of the morning to you. host: thank you. go ahead. caller: i want to make a comment that this lady who just hung up his line on god -- just hung up his lying on god because god is for the right thing. trump hurts people, people trying to make it from day-to-day. he is lying to people. him and the republicans are against the little people because they want servants. the civil war and stuff.

they want slaves and stuff. they want some people under them. god is in control. listen. god is in control. host: ok. thank you, robert. that's all the time we have for open forum, but next up, we will hear from kate shaw, law professor and cohost of the podcast "strict scrutiny" to discuss her podcast and the legal news of the day. we will be right back. ♪ >> next week on the c-span networks, the house and senate are in session. they will vote and debate on immigration-related bills, including legislation denying entry for anyone involved in the hamas october 7 attack on israel. the senate will consider nominations.

congress will also attempt to override a biden veto. tuesday, mike pompeo and leon panetta testified before the house committee on the chinese communist party, investigating china's support of u.s. adversaries. the homeland committee markup of the decision to impeach ella hunter mayorkas -- of alondra mallorcas. wednesday, the fbi director and the commander of the u.s. cyber command will testify before the house select committeen the chinese communist party concerning the chinese cyber threat to america's homeland and national security. watch next week on the c-span networks or on c-span now. head over to c-span.org for scheduling information or watch

live and on-demand anytime. c-span, your unfiltered view of government. c-span now is a free mobile app featuring your unfiltered view of what's happening in washington live and on-demand. keep up with the day's biggest events. all at your fingertips. you can stay current with the latest episodes of washington journal and find life scheduling information for tv and radio and a variety of compelling podcasts. c-span now is available at the apple store and google play. scan the qr code to download it for free today or visit c-span.org/c-spannow. c-span now, your front row seat to washington, anytime, anywhere. >> a healthy democracy does not

just look like this. it looks like this, where americans can see democracy at work, where citizens are truly informed. our republic thrives. get informed straight from the source on c-span. unfiltered, unbiased, word for word. from the nation's capital to wherever you are. the opinion that matters the most is your own. this is what democracy looks like. c-span, powered by cable. >> washington journal continues. host: welcome back. we joined now by kate shaw, cohost of the "strict scrutiny" podcast by crooked media. kate is also a professor at the university of pennsylvania law school. dr. shock, welcome. guest: thank you for having me. host: can you tell us about "strict scrutiny" and? what it focuses on guest: we have been hosting this

podcast for five years. it will be five years in may. that's me and my cohosts, law professors. we launched the podcast just under five years ago for a couple reasons. one, a recognition that the supreme court was not receiving sufficient attention, that americans were not paying enough mind to this institution that looms incredibly large and renders important decisions that affect our lives. we thought we could bring some expertise of constitutional -- expertise as constitutional law professors and people who have been studying the supreme court for a long time to make this relatively opaque institution more accessible to people who are interested but maybe lacked an entry point into the work of the court. we really wanted to center questions of gender and also of race and disability and sexual orientation and power and think about how the court's decisions affect all of us but especially along those dimensions.

the second thing is in 2019 we launched the podcast. the court felt like it was in this moment of transformation. we were coming out of a fairly unprecedented blockade of president obama's nomination of merrick garland to fill the vacancy left by the death of justice scalia and justice kennedy had been replaced by justice kavanaugh, so the court looked like it was in the midst of an important shift. that prove en more true in 2020 when ruth bader ginsburg passed away and was replaced by amy coney barrett, cementing this rocksolid 6-3 consumer rid of -- rocksolid 6-3 conservative super majority in the court. american jurisprudence has changed a lot. we discussed the substance of the decisions but also the institution of the court and the justices. host: who do you talk to in addition to each other?

guest: mostly it's the three of us but we have regular guests. we have had legal luminaries. we had the former director of the naacp and the current director on the podcast to talk about racial justice and the law and the supreme court docket and other litigation in lower courts. we have had advocates who work at the center for reproductive rights and the aclu working on issues of reproductive rights and justice, transgender rights, and the legal campaign to target transgender individuals, in particular children, in a lot of states. we have individuals who work on questions of environmental law and justice. we try to bring legal experts but also folks who have real insight into the on the ground effects of the court's decisions. more recently, we have had a number of journalists on the podcast to talk about some of

the investigative reporting that's going on from the last year or so, people from the new york times and propublica discussing the ethics questions that have been raised her in the justices, particularly justice thomas but also justice alito. things that sometimes involve the largess of billionaires that have gone undisclosed. it's largely the three of us trying to reason through and make sense of and explain what the court is doing day in and day out. host: remind us what the term strict scrutiny means in a legal context. guest: it serves two purposes in the podcast. one, it's a legal doctrine. to simplify, courts, when they review something and government actor has done, whether a legislature or an actor in the executive branch, there are

questions of how to review it. the court can use something called rational basis. most of the court will take a look to make sure there's a reason for what the actor has done and that is it. the court is not supposed to second-guess whatever it is reviewing. there is something called intermediate scrutiny, which is a more skeptical look. then there is something called strict scrutiny, the most searching former review, where the government actor has to work hard to convince the court that their actions should survive whatever constitutional challenge has been brought up in court. it comes up a lot in first amendment cases and elsewhere. searching review is a good summation. the term does double duty in their podcast because there's this double entendre because we

are kind of skeptically and strictly and certainly reviewing the output of the supreme court. host: we will be taking questions for the professor shortly. democrats can call in at (202) 748-8000, republicans at (202) 748-8001, independents on (202) 748-8002. again, if you would like to text us, that number is (202) 748-8003. be sure to include your name and where you're from. because of your expertise, i need to ask you about the news of the day, which is a jury in new york ordering former president donald trump to pay more than $83 million to e. jean carroll for defaming her. what is your take on that lawsuit and the outcome? guest: it is interesting. that suit, which was pending, the initial sexual assault civil suit and now the defamation suit have been under the radar for a couple years since the initial

sexual abuse charge or civil complaint was filed. and i think these issues are rightly getting a great deal of attention. i think it is striking that th's decision to actively participate in this phase of the trial probably catapulted the trial more into the public spotlight than it would have otherwise been. i think those of us who followed the proceedings closely were struck by the way the former president comported himself in the courtroom, which was not consistent with the ordinary behavior of a defendant. he did seem to walk the line of manifesting outright disrespect for the court in the proceedings in some of his activities and utterances during the trial. there had previously been a finding by another jury that former president trump did sexually assault e. jean carroll into the issue has was focused on statements made, many of them

continuing through the trial proceedings themselves, that allegedly defamed e. jean carroll, suggesting she lied, had invented the underlying attack, and that all of that -- the sort of speech directed at e. jean carroll by the former president both directly impacted her personally and professionally and foam minted responses from others -- and fomented responses from others, hurting her life and reputation. the jury agreed and returned a significant figure. there have been questions about whether, you know -- will the judgment be paid? the answer is almost certainly yes. there will be an appeal. the former president has already said that, but a bond of some kind will have to be put up prior to the appeal. when that actually changes hands, it very much still to be

determined. we know former president trump has been uniquely effective at using the slow pace of justice, both civil and criminal, to delay any final accounting and many of the legal proceedings he is embroiled within, but i do think it's hard to see any ultimate result that's not going to lead to e. jean carroll not receiving the payment. the amount host: on the recent podcast you talked about the slow pace of some of these cases related to the presidential election. can you talk more about that? guest: there is one case on a faster track which is argued this week in the supreme court and that's the most important case in respect to the presidential election. that is whether donald trump is

legally able to appear on the presidential ballot at all or whether he is disqualified by section three of the 14th amendment that says anyone who has taken an oath and engaged in insurrection against the united states is disqualified against office. the argument that january 6 amounted to insurrection and therefore disqualified from serving against being president. an academic argument that has been out there but at the end of last year, the colorado supreme court said donald trump was disqualified by appearing on the ballot by the 14th amendment. that is the opinion he is appealed to the supreme court

and they accelerated their consideration. this thursday, they will hear arguments about this really profound question with democratic consequences which does this provision of the constitution allow president trump to be on the ballot? it could mean that different states have different answers. either he appears nationwide but not in some states. i'm sure they will need to feel -- they will need to answer that question. there is a criminal case against president trump arising out of the events of january 6 in that case is on pause because donald

trump has raised this argument that he is immune from criminal prosecution for his activities around january 6 because he was doing them as president and they cannot be criminally prosecuted. there were arguments of the d.c. circuit about this case in the district court rejected this argument that presidents are not kings and you don't get immunity for life. that is on appeal before the d.c. circuit and a lot of people anticipate they will answer quickly but they have been sitting on it for weeks. every day they set on this question makes it less and less likely that the trial initially scheduled might proceed on march

4 and make it impossible. in addition to the disqualification argument there is a real interest on the part of opponents and supporters of donald trump and having this case go to trial before election so if there is a conviction voters could know that and if there is acquittal voters can know that too. but we are in this period of uncertainty where we don't know if there will be a trial at all. host: we have lots of questions coming into you. let's start from rant from lincoln, nebraska. what is your uerstanding of the phra lislating from the bench does the original roe v. wade fall into that definition? guest: legislating from the

bench is an attack on the courts that was made from the right, conservative court watchers who took the position that the supreme court's decisions, but that is later than some of the decisions refers to decisions from the warring court from the 1950's-late 1960's which was a progressive court. it changed american law and inaugurated a revolution in criminal procedure. also, recognized the numbers for what became roe v. wade. it is a critique of the court

references the warren court, that those justices were a bunch of liberals using their position to implement social policy. they felt individuals should have the rights over their own bodies. that was the conservative critique of the liberal warren court. it's not a phrase we hear today because it's a conservative catchphrase in this court is energetic, implementing the policy preferences but it is the conservatives doing that. there are many critiques that sounded like those from the

right to the warren court but they take a different phrasing. host: let's hear from edward in michigan on the democratic line. caller: i had a question about the supreme court rulings on the 2020 election, the accusation that there was election fraud in one or several of the states and how many of those cases got to the supreme court and has the supreme court settled the question of whether there was voter fraud in 2020? all the evidence i have seen is that there is no evidence of vote fraud in any of the contested states. can you say the supreme court

has settled the question or not? guest: i sure your sense that everyone who has looked closely at the question has reached a uniform conclusion that there was no significant fraud in any state around the 2020 election but i don't think the supreme court has ruled on it because it has not been confronted with the question. there have been decisions about ballot return questions around the pandemic and in light of the pandemic they will not be able to return absentee ballots in time to get counted and people didn't want to go to vote in person.

to account for those conditions they extended ballot return deadline said there were challenges to those things. the supreme court tied on one case but they did not agree that the pennsylvania supreme court made a mistake. there was a state case from taxes against pennsylvania challenging these covid decisions. the supreme court turned away that challenge without saying anything substantive about it. it never on his spirits address the question. host: david from our independent line. caller: is my understanding that

all presidents have lifelong secret service protection. my first question is, if former president trump is convicted of a felony he can't go to prison can he? why is it considered murder outside the womb as opposed to inside the womb? guest: as to the secret service, i don't think it would mean that a former president coded receive a prison sentence but it would present logistical questions. confinement would override the statutory requirement to secret service they would have to work with prison officials to ensure he remain protected and safe.

the system of justice as a unduly thwarted by that entitlement. i imagine complex negotiation would accord. we have seen that with criminal proceedings with president trump they negotiated the terms of the da in florida case, the number of criminal cases against trump. they would unfold around an actual criminal sentence of confinement if we ever got to the point. on the second question, there has long been a difference in treatment in the law of individuals who are pregnant versus an individual who is a living, breathing person.

that's not something that was invented by roe v. wade. the distinction is well grounded in the law. host: in florida on the republican line. caller: i want to keep on this topic here. dobbs said we had no constitutional rights to abortion but reading the constitution in amendment 3, 4. amendment three said no soldier should be quartered in any house without the consent of the owner nor in a time of war and a mentor to be prescribed by law in amendment four is talking about unreasonable searches and seizures that will not be violated without a warrant.

my question on abortion is, if you can't be required to houses soldier how can you be required to carry a fetus in your body? as far as search and seizure, what is the requirement the ultrasound without a warrant? guest:f■n six the supreme court shared this point if you think they have to contain an explicit guarantee that there is a right to abortion or an individual shall control the right to abortion about that's not something we have ever required of the constitution.

in cases that are antecedent to road, griswold versus connecticut, the court is saying in this is true in roe there are a lot of things that clearly communicate individuals have a right to privacy and autonomy. the prohibition on searches and seizures without a warrant and nine which reserves a right to the people and guarantee of liberty, fifth and sixth are criminal procedure protections about individual autonomy and the power of individual against compulsion and when you read that together it seems clear to earlier courts that the constitution does protect the

right to autonomy, liberty and privacy. the right to control one's body including whether to carry a pregnancy to term and become apparent. to say that that is a right the constitution protects does not mean is an absolute right. what roe did was to try and strike a balance to say there are some important rights that the individual possesses both states have an interest in the potential life of the fetus and they need to strike the balance of those two important claims. a woman has total control over what happens with that pregnancy.

in the state can control the latter part of the pregnancy. if a state wants to say you cannot have an abortion except if you are really in danger, that is something estate could do. they tried to strike a balance because there were competing interest■é and in dobbs they say there is no right on the part of the woman, the state interests and rights are the only one that matters. host: next up michael in new york on the democratic line. caller: i want to thank you for bringing this information to make it clear. i have two quick questions. do you think the justices will be held accountable for their corruption?

has anything like what is happening in texas like the senator and governor's are voting against the supreme court? has anything like that ever happened? if they go against that all the republicans go against the judicial system to break it down because i believe that if trump gets in we are in danger of fascism. guest: on accountability the ethic reporting i mentioned earlier i think a lot of it is in the hands of congress which has shown some interest in but not enough in searching for some real accountability. they could try to keep the issue front of mind and required the

justices explain themselves. that's a possibility we could see more of as to the standoff you are referencing in texas insisting they can maintain this razor wire fencing the supreme court with the narrow margins said texas has to allow federal officials access including cutting fencing and you are right that they are walking up to the line of defying the supreme court and they are drawing historic parallels and the response to brown versus board of education where they said we are not going to abide by the supreme court's ruling in

the supreme court double down and said what we say is the law of the land in every state must abide in saying that any uniform way put it to rest it would be very important for the supreme court to do something here. they have emboldened states to resist. host: next up is kevin on the independent line. caller: i'm enjoying the show, i always do. being an independent i was trying to get to the original source of the new story and i see the book is crooked media? guest: we are part of the larger crooked media which is a podcast network.

caller: related to the trump trial against jean e carol i wanted to go to the original sources is so the jury was divided on whether there was any physical contact and they may know ruling on physical contact how can the verdict be sexual assault most people consider it great. people were saying that he was convicted of rape how can that be if the jury was silent on that on any physical contact. through searches i found out

that words of the sexual nature can be considered sexual assault. is that what they convicted president trump of? is it the words that he said that were being construed of a sexual nature is it a sexual assault on those charges? it wasn't any kind of physical thing? guest: these are civil suits so these are not criminal cases so it's a question of liability and damages awarded and i'm not sure were talking about the earlier verdict with the actual finding with a sexual assault committed. there was a finding of not simply verbal abuse. the words were at the center of

the case because it wasn't the underlying allegation but what happened next in terms of the accusation in the public sphere that child lodged against carol so there would not be a finding against any sort of physical assault. host: from florida jim on the republican line. caller: i am just curious. i am a big c-span fan i'm not familiar with ms. shaw. could you fill in the blanks philosophically on the spectrum of left to right. relative to the 14th amendment argument the leftists media

continues to trot out the document that mr. trump should be convicted. he has not been convicted of any criminal statutes and that's the basis for which one would be prohibited from holding office. it seems like this is a specious argument. host: we will let professor shaw . your podcast and your 14th amendment argument? guest: as a p podcast on the and obama era lawyer but i'm also a law professor and i

try to present in a neutral way i'm trying to provide a fair and complete answer to these questions. some people have claimed that there needs to be a criminal finding about insurrection before the dmm of the. what the colorado supreme court decided is there was some evidence and fact fighting that did conclude that what happened was properly understood is insurrection. that is what is required to establish that someone engaged in insurrection.

host: in ohio on the democratic line. what's your question for professor shaw? caller: i am really concerned about why people are so supportive of donald trump. it doesn't take a rocket scientist to see what he is doing. he has already said that he's won the election already and if he doesn't get in he is wanting to start a civil war. can't somebody do something about that? guest: i am a law professor but from the most part the constitution leaves to the people for who will govern them in the limitations are he

needs to be over 35 years of age in a natural born citizen and if the vivid applies -- this is the big question that will tell us whether donald trump will appear on the ballot and if he does the law will not intercede but whether the american people decide who chooses to govern them. host: we have roy on the republican line. caller: good morning, i would like to ask the professor three things. you played a clip of donald trump's lawyers where she was saying the judge added to the questions that could be asked donald trump and his answers i would like to know the legality of that. the second question would be how

do we hold media accountable when they do violate journalistic ethics. where in the place where we print today and retract tomorrow and could you please explain to the people what authority jurisdiction means? host: i wrote this down for you. the first question was about the accusation from trump's lawyers and that defamation case that the judge edited the questions and the answers and what can be done to hold people -- the media accountable? guest: i think it is perfectly natural and something that routinely occurs the trial judges impose limitations grounded in the rules of procedure and evidence about what kinds of questions can be asked and answers given.

i am recalling correctly, this was a requirement the judge imposed that if trump took the stand he should not try to relitigate issues in the trial and that's just enforcing the rules of procedure. he was not scripting what could be said but demarcating boundaries. print and retract with respect to the media i think the media does a standup job trying to report what it can in the new cycle i think errors occur in retraction is admitting fallibility. i'm not sure what the reference to the jurisdiction is so i will have to punt on that one.

host: that's all the time we have today but thank you professor shaw and also the cohost of the podcast strict scrutiny. thank you so much for your time this morning. guest: thank you for having me. host: we will have quite a bit of coverage of campaign events and that will continue with the vincent south carolina first up president biden and dean phillips will speak at the south carolina first in thnaon dinner in south carolina live on c-span and tomorrow, south caroli governor nikki haley will be in conway, sout carolina and both of those events will stream live on c-span now our free mobile app

and online at c-span.org. that is all the time we have from washington journal. thank you to everyone who called or wrote in have a wonderful day and we will be back at 7:00 a.m. eastern tomorrow. ♪ .q