communications supports c-span as a public service, along with these other television providers. giving you a front row seat to democracy. >> all this week we have been inng you c-sp's washington journal interviews with authors. da reverend wheeler parker junior and christopherenn discuss their book " a few days full of trouble: revelationon the journey to justice for my cous aest friend, tell." -- emmitt till." ♪ >> today watch c-span's 2024 campaign trail, around of of c-span's campaign covers, providing a one-stop shop to discover what the candidates across the country are saying to voters. along with first-hand accounts of political reporters, updated poll numbers, fundraising data,

and campaign ads. watch c-span's campaign trail today at 7:00 eastern on c-span, online at c-span.org, or download as a podcast on c-span now, our free mobile app over every you get your podcasts. c-span, your unfiltered view of politics. host: welcome back. we are joined by terry schilling, the president for the american principles project. thank you for coming. tell us what it is, what your priorities are and where your funding comes from. guest: it is a political action committee for the american family. there all of these bags, big pharma, oil and tobacco but we also realize that there was no one actually representing american families that was punishing, -- politicians that ruin our kids' education.

we hunkered down and started crisscrossing the country and building support. we are supported by about six -- 15,000 donors, a lot of small dollar donations and emails and online fundraising. we represent the american family from a center-right standpoint. we believe that parents should be in charge of the parent -- the kids' education and make health care decisions for them and to protect the kids in a crazy digital world. the internet is a crazy space and we need more protections. host: has the organization endorsed former president trump for the election this year, are you supporting him? guest: we are totally supporting him. we will be spending $30 million this election cycle to get him elected as well as some down ballot races. we will be investing tens of millions of dollars into the quarter -- the core four states,

arizona, wisconsin, georgia and north carolina. there has been no one who has pledged to protect our children from all of the threats approaching them and attacking them. host: you do not feel that nikki haley has done that? guest: nikki haley is more libertarian than i am comfortable with and i think they had more american families are comfortable with. she has been reticent to be able to commit anything at the federal level. donald trump, we did a scorecard earlier. out of all the candidates, regraded them on five things, protecting kids from transgender ideology, the hormone surgery and all of that, protecting them from poor and online. donald trump got five checkmarks out of the six we were grating on and everyone else fell short. he is a very good profamily candidate. host: if you would like to ask our guest a question or make a comment can do so on our lines

by party. republicans, 202-748-8001. democrats, 202-748-8000. independents, 202-748-8002. you were a panelist yesterday at cpac on trans issues. can you tell us what it was about and what you talked about. guest: it was primarily focused on how to protect kids from the surgeries and hormone blockers that cause permanent harm and damage. i was so blessed to be joined on the main stage by reputable doctor, his name is eton hime, who was a whistleblower in texas. governor abbott and attorney general paxton essentially came out with orders saying that these surgeries and hormone blockers are not to be prescribed to children and they were saying was child abuse. dallas children's medical hospital and dallas, the largest children's hospital said that they were not doing it. he was a whistleblower that

expose them as misleading the public. it is important that these whistleblowers are coming out more and more. there was a nurse that came out of st. louis that expose the children's hospital there for reckless endangerment of children. but we are told all the time that these surgeries do not happen to kids and these hormone blockers do not happen to kids. but these whistleblowers are exposing the truth which it is happening and it is really horrible. host: on your website you have a 38 page report called the transgender of ifn and if people want to read that it is americanprincipalsproject.org. explain the word leviathan. guest: when we first started working on this issue it gets very polarized very quickly. what was very clear to us was that there was a whole industry behind the transgender movement. and we did not think it was fair to brand it as a civil rights movement because it is a back

end thing. the civil rights aspect is just to protect the profits of the transgender industry. what the report that we published covers is the whole apparatus for the transgender industry. it covers the media complex and how that is pushed on the american people. the educational aspect and the surgeries and hormone treatments and how much money is made off of all of these operations and procedures. just to point out one number which will be shocking to a lot of people watching. the transgender industry just off of surgeries alone made $2.2 billion. grandview research is a company that analyzes verious industries and markets and gives recommendations to investors on where to get the prophets. they are projecting the transgender industry in the surgeries alone to go over $5 billion by the year 2030, and that is not the hormones or the

beauty blockers for the pharmaceutical -- puberty blockers or the pharmaceutical aspect or the social media aspect or the money made from advertising. it is a huge monstrosity. we wanted to reframe the debate. we think that transgender -- people who identify as transgender, we actually love them and we want to help empower them. we think they are being exploited. this is something that has happened throughout american history. there have always been new and novel things that have happened. we used to do a lot of lobotomies. i think the person who invented the lobotomy was a nobel peace prize winner and it came out to find that that was batting causing damage. i see a lot of similarities between what is going on here. there is a lot of reckless behavior and endangerment of people. and we want to help everyone and we want everyone to have a peaceful life in this country. we are seeing so many people come to regret their sex change procedures and they have no one

to support them. a lot of these insurance plans, they will cover the transgender surgeries and hormone treatments, but then when the person comes out and decides they are not transgender they were misdiagnosed, they will not cover the cost of repairing their bodies and getting them back to where they are. frankly, it is a bit hypocritical because they call the transition surgeries gender affirming care. it is gender affirming care if you detransition to cover the cares and costs. we want to protect everyone and we want everyone to have a good life in this country and we do not want people being exploited. host: ready to talk to callers? guest: i love the colors. host: mary from california. democrat. caller: why do you hate america? i served 20 years in the marine corps. donald trump is a disgrace to america. i know you do not want to answer anything answer this question.

what did you think of january 6? honest answer? one more thing. there are seven ways -- do you know anything about that? guest: i do not. i am not an expert on being gay. i have seven children. my dad was a member of congress, i ran his campaign and i have been all throughout that building. there are incredible things and historical things and the marble steps that are are grooved because of how many people who walked into the building. that is the people's house. so when i saw the images and video coming out i was scared for my country. i did not like what happened january 6. but frankly, i think if it was intime or b -- antif or blm that they would be burned to the ground. i think it is unfair that we give a pass to the left-wing protesters who caused damage

throughout our country and blame everything on the people that showed up and did not burn down that building. they had to have a perimeter established around the white house just that summer. and i just think that it really unfair. to start off a question with why do you hate america? what are you talking about. that is no way to start a conversation with someone. i talked to 70 people that disagree with me. i love talking to people who disagree with me because i get to learn different things and strengthen my arguments and sharpen things. i think part of the problem is this country -- with this country is starting conversations with asking why you hate the country. i am not really bothered by it that if you really want to fix the country, may be start by assuming that the other person you are talking to is not evil and does not hate the country and has good intentions. host: a republican in south lebanon, ohio. lane. caller: good morning.

i would like to ask kerry a question. host: go right ahead. we are listening. caller: i got a question. what would you do about doctors that goes off and kills your wife when she has two kids and three grandkids and she is not getting to see them grow up? guest: i would turn them into the law, i would be upset about that. and yes, i would let the law and the authorities handle that. caller: i have done that and they have not done nothing. guest: yes. i think that is a really complicated case. but i do not know all of the details. i would be really upset if someone did that to my wife. host: southfield, michigan. democrat. good morning. caller: good morning. how are you doing?

host: go right ahead. guest: first of all i want to make this statement, when a woman is carrying a baby in her womb, the baby is both sexes. one sex dominates the other. and i do not feel like any of his business to tell a parent if her child can have surgery or not to transform him into what he is. it is like when my mom told me when i was a child she knew that i was going to be gay, when i was little. so, i am trying to understand where he is coming from helping parents with their kids when they do not even want to take care of the kids once they are here? so, how can you get behind a person that is against the united states of america? host: we have it. guest: i would say this issue

gets brought up all the time. there are limits to what parents can do with their children. we have all types of laws that protect our children. i cannot give my kids alcohol, marijuana, tattoo them illegally. kids cannot consent to sex, so my opinion they cannot consent to a sex change. it is common sense, and frankly i dispute the entire statement that you are both sexes when you are in your mother's womb. you are determined xx or xy at birth and there are exceptions to the rule. i am talking 99 .9% of people are born male or female and created that way from conception. there is not a debate about this. it is silly that we are having to discuss this because for millennia, i am not talking a few decades. i am talking millennia. the consensus is that men are men and women are women and that is not how they are always going to be and they will change --

they will not take change that. if you are talking about tolerating and allowing people to live and express their personalities i am all about that. people should be free to dress and live how they want. but once you start across a line and impact how people are living their lives i think we have a different conversation to have. by the way i want to say, a lot of these parents are emotionally blackmailed and taken advantage of. these parents are called in by counselors in a lot of cases and therapists and told that they have to choose between having a living son or a dead daughter. that is emotional blackmail to force them into a for-profit industry making a lot of money off of very vulnerable and confused people. for the last century when we started to diagnose people with mental disorders, gender dysphoria has always been a disorder. in fact, you can go on twitter. you are allowed to call it a

mental disorder online on all of these websites that heavily restrict speech. so please, let us not conflate things. there is a biology that exists and there is no question about that. but there are infinite personalities that exist. i am fine with allowing people to have a diverse amount of personalities and i do not want to force anyone to live a life they do not want to live. when it comes to kids they can wait until 18 to get your reversal and sterilizing procedures that guarantee they will never be able to have children when they get older. host: roy in massachusetts. independent. good morning. caller: good morning, how are you? host: good. caller: i wanted to question mr. schilling. you said that out of all of the republican candidates donald trump was the most -- was going to protect the kids the most. tell me how he has a better candidate on that topic than ron

desantis was? ron desantis lives and breathes protecting our kids and families. guest: yes. that is a great question. frankly i think ron desantis is the greatest governor that we have had in a very long time. but, when it comes to what you are going to do at the federal level, ron desantis was unwilling to commit -- that many federal protections for children. he was a good on a few of our issues. but he really struggled with using federal power. and the problem with that, sir, is that you have to be able to use federal power at least to reverse it. what a lot of people do not understand is that all of this transgender nonsense is coming from the federal government. the federal government is forcing insurance companies to power these procedures by laminating this grim nation gender identity.

they are funding the procedures and mandates and funding executive orders banning discrimination on it which says if you are in a school where they do not allow the boys who

has to compete hard for bringing in ncaa tournaments and they would target the law and drag up momentum. ron desantis with disney located, the left was not able to boycott to protect children from these procedures. i want to be very clear. i'm not against ron desantis. i love him and think he was a great governor and will continue to be a great governor for florida but at the federal level we have to have people willing to exercise power. i think part of the problem why the republican brand is hurt and damaged nationally is because the american people have given us power time and time again at the federal level and never exercise it. we make all these promises and never deliver. i think that's part of the problem. and ron desantis, i hope he has a long term in florida and hope

he comes around on being able to use federal power. but now is not the time to cite federalist 45 and talking esoterics. our nation is under attack and these guys will chew us up and spit us out if we let them. host: is your organization in favor of a federal ban on abortion? guest: we are in support of a federal limit on abortion with exception for rape, incest and life of the mother. host: at how many weeks? guest: we prefer 15 weeks. the problem with the abortion level is there is a political crisis. when dobbs was decided there really was no consensus where the country needed to head to. i'll be frank, i spent almost a million on polling and messaging to see where the american people are on a host of cultural issues. and where the vast majority of them are is between 15-20 weeks with exceptions for rape, incest and life of the mother. we have to take into

consideration the will of the american people if we want to win elections and save lives. frankly, the criticisms about the 15-week bill, i think donald trump is flirting with a 16-week bill and it wouldn't save enough lives. when you unpack that, there would be 60,000 lives saved by a 16-week bill. every life is precious and if we can save 60,000 babies in this country, that's 60,000 lives saved and more than all the murders in this country, there's 25,000 homicides but also, there's 50,000 suicides every year. that would save a lot of lives in this country and we should center around that, the vast majority of the american people, doesn't matter man or woman or whatever race you were, the vast majority of americans support a 15-20 week bill. host: good morning, diane. caller: i'm a little concerned with my guest. i'm