and met death on an even playing. >> the sons of democracy improvised and mounted their own attacks. at tt oment on these beachese turned the tide of theh century. >> the road was hard and long. and traveled by weary and valiant members. in history will always record where that road began. it began here with the first footprints on the beaches of normandy. >> more than one under 50,000 souls set off towards this tiny sliver of sand upon which hung more than the fate of a war. but rhetoric the course of human history. >> we were member those who fell and we honor all who fought

right here in normandy. >> watch c-span's live all day special coverage of the 80th anniversary of d-day. thursday, june 6, featuring a speech by president biden from normandy, france. we are joined by larry sabato, the founder and editor-in-chief of sabato's crystal ball. welcome to the program. guest: thank you so much. host: there's an article in politico with dams -- dems in full-blown free got over biden. a running list of reasons biden could lose. 20 think that? -- what do you think that? guest: if you want a lot of clicks that's exactly the kind

of headline and article you want to publish. most of these media organizations want clicks. look. i have been at this long time. people aren't going to believe it but since 1960. i know i am too young looking. one thing i havedemocrats panic. they panic several times every election campaign, whether they are winning or abusing. sometimes it's justified and other times it isn't. in this case it is too early to panic. that does not stop them. i'm not saying republicans never panic. there is something about the nature of the democratic party that causes them to panic. i know the stakes are very high. they are looking at donald trump and sang, not again -- and sang, oh no, ait's true because they e saying it. i hear it all the time. you can't repeat the off the record and deep background

conversations you have with people. i do hear it constantly. it is obvious what. they believe -- the democrats believe there is such a difference■u between the biden administration and the trump administration in terms of competence in the with a governance so on that it should not even be close. they see all these polls. some have trump ahead. some have them tied. some have barely biden ahead. how can this be? the answer is, because that's american politics. anything can happen and they must know that after 2016. host: what do you think of president biden biden■'s chances of reelection? what is in your crystal ball? guest: in my crystal ball it is very cloudy, because it is still may. here's a good statistic for people. we are still months out from the actual election.

some voting starts at the end of september and continues through october. it accelerates and third week of october and the first week of november. we are a long way out. what about all these public opinion polls? well, on average they are having a margin of error right now of at least 4% to 5%. we have a very competitive race on our hands. we are very competitive country politically. to me that means the polls don't tell you a lot. if you go into the subtext of the polls youelectorate. it may or may not be accurate because of the margin of error is so large for some of the smaller groups. you can analyze on that basis if you want. anybody who draws firm conclusions and he makes campaign strategy based on polls

and may in may should not be -- be in a presidential campaign. host: what are the major issues that will be driving the campaign 2024, whether it is now or if you can predict once voting starts? what do you think that is? we know the old phrase, it is the economy, stupid. do you think that will be the number one issue? guest: there are a lot of issues on the front burner. there are a lot of front burners. it's a big stove. you have to look at what each side is stressing. if it going to look at biden's weaknesses, you start with age which does seem to affect people's views of him to a certain degree. although trump is only three and half years younger. i say this other guy in his 70's. i'm not guilty of ageism. i'm saying as the years go by

your faculties are affected. i have seen that myself. anybody would admit that if they are being honest and not trying for bravado. age would be at the top. then you would have the economy, mainly inflation. most of the other economic measures are pretty positive except for housing. housing costs are too high. the third would be the border. top ones. you can go on all you want. i'm sure some of the callers will about others issues -- otherom issues. for trump, it is pretty clearly the way he conducted himself as president the first time, which definitely includes the insurrection of january 6. i know a lot of people react negatively to that term. if that wasn't an insurrection, i don't know what was other than the civil war. that was a much bigger thing.

i know. i get it. that would be number one in my view. number two would be whenever the results of the legal controversies he's involved in. just this month we have got the decision on the first of trump's trials. they say they will not be anr i listen to the legal analy. i guess they know what they are talking about. that may be the only decision we have and it may not be a decision if it is a hung jury. a mistrial is declared. beyond the actual trial you would have -- there are so many controversies connected to donald trump. be discussed in enormous detail day by day, hour-by-hour between now and the end of the campaign. look. there are things we can't even guess.

already we've got the results of the first trial once it occurs, which i assume will be within a few days or a week or so. then we have the debate, the earliest debate in american history for two presidential candidates. the major party presidential candidates on june 27 carried by cnn and i seem c-span. maybe not live. you'll have to tell us if it is live or on tape. that is just june. ■4then you have the republican convention in mid july. four days of lots of things happening. then you have the democratic -- the republican what is in milwaukee. the democratic convention used were seen at july. not quite the end of august. 3ñthat will be in chicago. that ought to be a red blinking light for at least those of us old enough to remember chicago in 1968. anybody who thinks that will go completely smoothly obviously

did not live through 1968. there are similarities. more differences but you will look at that. i'm not even at labor day and the traditional kickoff point. the next time you hear aon or a pundit panel -- pundit over a pundit panel or an anchor say this will determine the election and here are the top two issues that this will make all the difference in the world -- i forgot to mention abortion. talking to not mention reproductive rights as a weakness for donald trump and the republicans? i should have added that to the list. anybody thinks they know the whole score at the end of may is dead wrong. i would caution people not to be so definitive. i heard so many people do it and write it -- attention new york times. host: let's go back to the hush money trial.

we are expecting to get a verdict possibly this week. can the trial itself -- has the trial itself changed polls and opinions? do you think a verdict would? what kind of information were, that has not already come out that my sway voters? guest: you are going to have competing reactions. democrats -- assume it is a guilty verdict or a hung jury, democrats will be outraged and both announced donald trump and say it is just a taste of what would have happened had we had three or four trials before election day. particularly the january 6one. may the classified documents, too . they will use that information all the way to november. i think i guilty verdict would cut a point or two off trump. if he found innocent, which i think is the least likely but

you can't eliminate it, that would pump trump up. a hung jury. i can imagine the trump campaign and supporters seeing that avicg held in heavily democratic manhattan. i will predict one thing. i may be dead wrong. i hope people re-show this if it's wrong. ■maybe in a month, month and a half, two months, i will bet you most of the effect from the trial, whether it pushes trump up or down, it disappears. the reason i say that is because that has been the norm for donald trump. especially in our highly partisan era where democts stay with democrats and republicans stay with republicans. relatively handful of real independents, not the 44% gallup tells us, because being an

independent is a social plus. i'm independent. i will not be pushed into a corner by any of those parties. the truth is they must always vote for one party or the other. they are hidden partisans. they are really only 4to 6% of the people that are movable. there's a larger percentage in terms of voting. are they going to vote or not? if they vote, will they vote for one of the two major party candidates or vote for one of the independents for third-party candidate? these are the questions. nobody can have the answer to this. i hear people saying rf cable heard this one -- rfk will heard this one or that one. they don't have a clue who rfk will hurt if he hurts either one of them. host: there's another trial set to begin in hunter biden's federal firearms charges. that is set to begin monday. what do you think about that? any impact to the biden campaign?

guest: what it will do is stir republicans. they are really focused on hunter biden. they are going to be outraged at whatever ituncovered in the trial. if he's guilty, they will have material for the campaign. if he's innocent, they will talk about it's a fix by the biden administration. the justice department did this. there is no evidence of that but nonetheless that is what will be said about it. he republican base. it will probably increase a little bit republican outrage. maybe a lot. that will be a plus for trump and therefore a minus for biden. is that going to dominate the headlines? it will be one of the stories but last i checked donald trump and joe biden are the two major candidates running for president. hunter biden is not in it. the children of donald trump are

not in it. they are bit playersthe two maj. you have been around longer have to see this. every president, every president -- i remember eisenhower. i was born under truman. everyone has had a relative or two or 10 who were problematic. they got into legal trouble or whatever it may be. i can't remember one of those relatives who actually cost the incumbent president much. maybe temporarily a few points in the polls. in election, no. that is way down the list compared to the ones i discussed at the beginning of this broadcast. host: if you would like to call and ask questions to larry sabato, director of the center for politics at the university of virginia, you can do so. democrats, (202) 748-8000. blicans, (202) 748-8001.

independents, (202) 748-8002. you mentioned, larry, the first debate happening in about a month. the earliest ever. does that mean that is the kickoff to the real campaign season when voters are now tuned in and paying attention? what is it going to mean? guest: we don't really start at labor day. in the old days, decades and decades ago. that honestly was the kickoff. people would save lots of things for labor day and the few months or weeks that followed labor day. that has long since faded. john f. kennedy announced the presidency on january 2, 1960. the year he ran. think of that. now they announce years before

they are running or we know they are running even if they have not formally announced. we have a permanent campaign on both sides. stephen the third parties an independents get into that mode as well. i would say yes. this is so unprecedented to have a debate between the presidential candidates in june. start in september. the kennedy-nixon debates were in september and october. they had more n they were interesting. i encourage people to go to youtube and other places to watch those debates. some of it will be foreign to them because the issues have changed. it's interesting to see the demeanor. oh, how we have gone downhill. my god have we gone downhill. kennedy and nixon were actually respectful of one another.

they occasionally complemented one another. they call each other mr.r. nixoe president, senator. it is depressing in a way to watch them. we have deteriorated so much. that will be a nightmare. the two people i feel most sympathy for another two candidates on the stage. it is the two moderators. how on the world they will run that and control it, i don't know. they are able to turn off the but i bet the candidates can be heard by the other candidate's mic. it will be tougher than they think. host:s talk to the callers. patrick up first on the life of democrats from allen, texas. caller: my name is patrick. people call me chud. i'm 25 now. i was a college student around 2019. i wanted to talk about how the

trump trial will impact the cus of everything involved. i tnk i may play a large part as a regular bystander. also, my friend said that this trial is definitely going to impact a lot of situations in regards to the trump he will dog future. he thinks it will be an absolute gem of a debate in 2024 because he feels our politics are a lot more focused on entertainment nowadays. .p lalso, i wanted to say for te last mentions8, -- host: he talked about the debates.

what kind of an impacted they have in 2020? do we think they will have an impact or is it just entertainment? guest: we have long since entered the age of infotainment. that will not change. trump comes out of that world. i don't think he would have been president without "the apprentice." almost everybody agrees with that. infotainment is part of the game. i think we need to remove or of these debates are early. the first is the earliest ever. totally president, june 27. the second is mid-september. we have had plenty of debates in september but normally we have the second debate in october. facets, debate is the second debate -- the september debate is the second debate. will that last? that is the question. will they last? people focus on things and say

this thing that happened today is the most important thing that has ever happened or ever will happen. you go a week later and people don't even remember what it was that was the most important thing that has ever happened. that is the nature of ouru worl. it the debate, whether one of the candidates makes a terrible gaffe or in biden's case shows his age horton trump's case -- or in trump's case shows his temperament. both campaigns hope that is not true for their candidate but it's true for the other candidate. we will see. i do think your point about this kicking off the election much earlier than usual is completely true.■ then you are following up with the republican national convention just a couple of weeks later. you are following up with the democratic convention. we always pretend the campaign

against on labor day. you have a second debate a couple weeks later. this is going to be an election full of big events that will keep people focused on the election. whether they can remember all those big events and calcu basia very different question. host: wayne in harrisburg, pennsylvania, republican. caller: i would like to ask the guest on a debate issue we heard donald trump going on eight years. what could they do to get the poor people, black, white, hispanic, any race, poor people need help now. if they wanted to make any

difference all they have to do is go up on the minimum wage to $21. whoever does that will win the election. host: larry? guest: i'm not sure what they will do an minimum-wage. it is much more likely the democrats would wage it then republicans. republicans say it 11 eighths jobs. democrats say poor■#xq people ad lower middle class need the additional increment, especially because of inflation. i leave that debate to people who are experts in the field. i would listen carefully to the debates. people say it is just rhetoric. but they say doesn't matter. at the least they are held accountable in office for they said in the debates. if they promise a and deliver z directly in contradiction to whatever they promised, they suffer for it to a certain degree. there favorability ratings may

fall -- their favorability ratings may fall. it does not matter as much as what they do. always remember what the campaign manager for richard nixon said after nixon won the close election. he said don't listen to what we say. watch what we do. that is true for all presidents. that doesn't mean their words don't count and the words don't matter. host: independent in whiting, vermont. caller: good morning. i have a different take on the elections. i am working sir and not about who was middle-class or how much money people are making, which is very important. i'm worried about the world health organization. it is meeting soon art has a meeting now. world economic forum. globalist movements is affecting

american citizens. open borders are part of it. nobody talks about that. americans are fighting amongst ourselves over pennies, this, that. we are in effect joe biden is the biggest globalist by far. 's working with all these countries underneath the noses of the american citizen. the person speaking, the man there, can we talk about the world health organization? it's bigger than people know. guest: i certainly agree that international affairs and international organizations are connected to the u.n. and some are separate from it but are important. there are things we should pay attention to and learn more about. i have to tell you i'm not an expert in any of that. i am sure all my invitations to

their important international meetings have been lost in the mail. we have a terrible problem with mail delivery. i have a wonderful mail delivery person. let me add that before i stop getting mail entirely. i'm sure that's what's happening to my invitation to the big events. if i ever getable to actually ai will have a better answer for you. you are certainly right that we ought to pay attention to those things and many, many other things. if i had one prayer to be answered it would be that americans pay more attention to politics and read reliable publications and watch reliable tv shows. they can be liberal, conservative, moderate, does not matter. as long as you're trying to learn and absorb the voters we are going to make mistake after mistake after mistake. host: in talking about foreign

policy, the israel-gaza war is something that is starting to hurt presidentpopularity among f voters. guest: i'm on a college campus. we call it the ground. they don't do that at virginia tech. they just call it campus. she's from virginia tech. i'm sorry. i don't know what your reaction is. i don't have you on screen but i know you agree with me. we have had demonstrations just like almost every college campus has.virginia tech has them as w. most universities in this state and across the nation and ahead them to varying degree. some are violent. we never want that. it is contradictory to the nature of the university. young people are interested in issues. they are paying attention. it is true for both sides. jewish americans are paying

close attention. they want to know or candidates stand on israel and the u.s. backing israel. care of americans want to know what the u.s. is really doing for gaza, both to stop the killing of civilians, innocent civilians and providing aid from what is really a near famine. they both have important bdconcerns. they will consider them. i also have to tell you i have seen a lot of evidence that aret it, when forced to make a choice of a candidate it is actually not in the top three or four issues that they mention and actually are basing their vote on. i'm not saying it's not important. it's critically important. a cease fire please for everybody's sake. you have to take this and context -- in context. all these issues have importance for millions of americans. host: beverly in wyoming on the

line for democrats. caller:i thought the debate witp and biden was terrible at the last debate. because trump never lets anybody speak over him. i thought it was very rude, terrible. then to have touting that he won before the cat was even divvied. they were doing a victory lap in every thing else before the votes were in. i don't understand these people that can this into that. then he brings all his flags with him. that is embarrassing. it is demeaning.

ackerman is taking all the credit for what joe biden's got on the agenda. i don't understand the republicans. they want to take the credit but they don't do the work. that is what i've got to say. host: any comment? guest: i will comment on the first part. the first part is important. one of the major changes that i'm delighted about in the debate process is that the moderators cannot turn off the microphone of the candidate who has either met or exceeded his time limit for each question. if you don't have control of the debate, it becomes more negative, nastier, more chaotic. just look at the past debates and you can see that is true. i think this rule should have been in effect decades ago.

i'm thrilled it is taking place. come also thrilled there is no live audience. i love the energy that live audiences bring. in the old days they would be careful about keeping quiet. they obeyed the moderators. they paid attention to the rules. they kept quiet. the time they are cheering or jeering was often subtracted from the candidate. they did that with the hurt their candidate. now they could care less. they scream and cheer and chant can make it difficult to watch a debate and have any coherence to the debate. maybe it will work and maybe it won't work. we have two debates where be contested out. important and will set the precedent. i hope on june 27 that somehow those two cnn moderators are able to insist that the rule be obeyed and that by turning off

the mic you can't really hear the other candidate interfering with the candidate who is speaking. fingers crossed, toes crossed. host: you have in your website an article down bill the consequences of trump's vp options." tell us who you are thinking is in the lead for that. what do you mean by the down ballot consequences of that pic? guest: certainly. let me complement and single out kyle condit and miles coleman, cristobal steph -- in my crystal ball staff. they know so much that it's writing. -- frightening. many have gone on to careers in politics over the decades. down ballot means the people running for senate and house and

governor and state legislature and sometimes even city council and mayor. is some affect that the candidate for president can have on those other races. when there is a hometown effect first say a candidate for vice president who is from that state, it can add a point or two. it doesn't always have to but it can. d when you pick strategically a vice presidential candidate it can affect more than your own state. it can affect the category of voters. it can affect the region. it used be the south would respond favorably to the selection of a southern candidate for vice president. this is going to be, certainly for thea squeaker election. . close. both sides agreed that the side that was the majority will be lucky to get a majority of 10 or 15. that is not insignificant.

there are 435 house members who vote on the floor. in the senate it can add a point or two or subtract a point or two. we have quite a number of close and it races. unfortunately for the democrats, the vast majority are democratic for states that are competitive and swing states. that is what my mean by down ballontest. the choice trump is really going to matter. it probably matters less than usual because trump absorbs the heat and light of any campaign. i don't know that the vice presidential candidate will make as much of a splash as usual. the vice president can raise money. the vice president can be in place as a candidate cannot and so on. in terms of swinging boats

divine of you as much affect. we will wait and see. the list changes every couple of days. it's a strategy. you want to keep people interested in the choice. the trump people want to have a counter headline from whatever's happening in the trial. beyond that, trump also changes his mind. you can have different choices three times a day . we will see who we end up with. he was satisfied with mike pence during the administration until january 6 of 2021. he definitely but probably will want to pick a vice president÷= to obey him if he tells them to hold that the election. you decide whether that is good, bad, or indifferent. i personally think it is bad. we ought to adhere to the rules in the constitution and the law.

that is an important criteria for trump. as far as biden is concerned, the decision was made long ago to continue quest camille colleges and public discusses his organizational efforts to support young voters in this election cycle. and then sean spicer talks about capital 24 and political news of the day. she spans washington general. join in the conversation light at 7:00 p.m. eastern thursday morning on c-span, c-span now, our free mobile app or online at c-span.org.

c-anred unfiltered congressional coverage for 45 years. here is a highlight from a key moment. ? how these and most especially might wife and family i've heard you all deeply and i beg your forgiveness. i was prepared to lead our narrow majority as speaker and i believe i had it in me to do a fine job but i cannot do that job will be the kind of leader that w be under current circumstances. example that i hope president clinton will follow. i will not stand for speaker on the house on january 6. i will mean as a backbencher in this congress that i so julie love for possibly six months