debate, stay with c-span as we take her calls and get your reaction to the first season. the cnn presidential debate simulcast, live june on c-span now, our mobile video app, or live on c-span.org. c-span, your unfiltered view of politics. ♪ [gavel] >> the house will be in order. >> this year c-span celebrates rs of covering congress like no other. since 1979 weprimary source for capitol hill, providingernment, taking you to where the policies are debated and decided with the support of america's cable companies. c-span, 45 years and counting, powered by cable. to c-span's 2024 campaign trail. a one-stop shop to discover what thçycountry are saying to voters.

watch the c-span 2024 campaign ai at 7:30 p.m. eastern on c-span, online at c-span.org, or download as a podcast on c-span our free mobile app or wherever you get your podcastsc-span, your unfiltered view of politics. >> "washington journal" continues. >> host: we are back and joined by sean davis, ceo an cofounder of the federalist. tell us a bit about the federalist nyu fou federalist and why you founded it. guest: started it in september of 2013 and what we wanted was something different than the typical washington that collect of the thoughts of the people around e people around the country.

we thought it was time for washington and everyone in what the rest of the country thought it needed to hear. wewe were never all based in washington, most of the writers are not in washington. we bring in people who work normal jobs, have normal lives, not focused on or obsessed the time and they have interesting things to say. we publish them. i think it's been a big success so far. host: one of the pieces that you wrote, sean, for the has this headline, "your you angry at foreign tyrants so you won't notice the ones ruling you." what does that mean? guest: it's a little trend i've noticed. i've years. there's something of a pattern that when things start to break down at home, your leaders try to focus attention on problems elsewhere. right now and our country that is being done with the war in russia and ukraine. we are being told that is a

thing we need to be super on, why we need to send hundreds of billions of dollars, whereas i here with inflation skyrocketing, crime skyrocketing, health care costs that are i look at those problems and i think that maybe we should be focusing on the problem here. maybe instead of being told that we need to hell -- need to worry about the bogeyman overseas, we need to worry about government is taking political prisoners, throwing people abortions and people. that's the kind of tyranny i than something that might be happening 5000 miles away. i think that people should be concerned and aware that whenever their government is trying to tell them that the real enemies are somewhere else, somewh overseas, they are usually up to something attention to. host: just now y put in prison for

praying outside abortion clinics. ca what the law is that they were breaking? it is not against the law to pray. guest: tell that to the people now facing prison for praying outside of abortion mills. there is a completely unconstitutional law cal that penalizes certain speech certain nonviolent protest actions only outside abortionilere to do this outside of a christian school, the feds wouldn't do anything to you, but if you pray and protest outside of an abortion mill, the feds would break into your house at nd put you in prison. host: if you actually prevent people from entering? i believe that is what the law says. guest: that is not actually what has happened at protesting in front of abortion mills. i was alive2020, i watched all the race riots i watched police stations getting torched and bombed, cities under seas forhs at a time.

if you telling me that somehow the real problem is that people who areraying outside of abortion mills while writers go free, sorry, that's just nonsense. host: i want you to primary that we have been watching between bob good, the head of the freedom caucus and john mcguire. call. today is a federal holiday, so we won't know today, but what are your thoughts on that? guest: yeah, it's an extremely close race. when i looked this morning maguire was up to something like 320 seven votes, going back and forth all of last night into the wee hours of the. bob good, the chair of the freedowhat made the race particularly nasty and contentious is because

bob good had endorsed desantis, attracting the ire of donald trump. donald trump, when he looks at endorsements, he doesn't look at ideologically like someone like me would. he first asks himself if this person is for me or against me. so, he endorse compounding that you had kevin mccarthy coming in, angry over how he was being treated tossed threw a lot of money, time, and effort behind the challenger . so, it looks like right now guire has an edge. there is some dispute over whether all of have been counted. yeah, that was onecontentious, close primary races in the house that we have seen this year. host: does "the federalist" ? have you endorsed any candidates? guest: we don't endorse anyone or anything. i know it is popular washington publications editorials where they speak with a single voice about whether

this person good or bad. we allow writers to defend own names. in the 10 years that have existed, ever said with a singular voice is that the white house correspondents dinner that takes place every year is an abomination in needs to be canceled. beyond that, we don't endorse for or against. host: if you would like tjoon you can do so. the lines are by party. republicans, (202) 748-8001. democrats, (202) 748. independents, (202) 8-8002. our guest, sean davis. president biden announced executive action on immigration yesterday regarding spouses of american citizens. what was your reaction?guest: this administration's dereliction of duty on the border is nearly criminal, the way that biden and the administration have completely failed to faithfully execute and

enforce the law of the land on the border is a complete travesty. i think there is any number of things that biden could be impeached for at this whether it is his family's business dealings or the lawless law fair of his doj fbi or their host: sean, i hear what you are i was asking about the immigration policy married to american citizens and have been in the country for 10 years. guest: i think either you come here illegally and are a citizen or go through the process or you don't. to me it's not a complicated issue. if you did not come here legally, we shouldn't be doing here legally. there's lots of people and they go through the process. i think that those are the people that should be granted citizenship under the law. 't need to hand out new dispensations while we leave the border wide open. host: in this case the law had alwaysou are married to a legal citizen, you

can get status that you have to leave the country for up to 10 years and said is we want to keep familiescan apply and stay in the country while you apply and stay with your spousehildren. guest: i think we have rules and laws for a r don't buy the new rationale. it's justnother attempt to keep the border wide open and bring in illegal people here who didn't legally. host: what do you mean by law fair? guest: it's a term used to describe whenutweaponize the rule of law the system of law, law enforcement to go after their enemies political or otherwise. for example, a department of justice that chooses not to prosecute a particular politician for classified documents in his garage he's not allowed to have while raidingó another politician, someone challenging the current, a regime that goes into rice to put his political opponents in prison, tries to censor political

and needs to stop. host: do you think a candidate'inal record is a legitimate issue for an election? guest: can you be more specific? host: just that. criminal record, a felony convictionthat a legitimate issue to bring up in an election? guest: one when you are the one running the regime and bragging about how the person you are running against has b convicted in a system that you oversee or people from your own apa were deployed to make it happen, i tell you that's absolutely going to be an i don't think it's going to turn out the way this administration wants, but this business of biden going around and calling trump a convicted felon and thinking that will work, thinking that people don't see through it is crazy. they are going to try it, they don't have a record to run o they only have the law fair against trump to run on. i guess if that i have, they will do it. i don't think it will work well for them, though. host: right, let's start with richard in georgia

deood morning. caller: good morning. mr. davis, you seem to be all over the place in reference to telling the truth. how can you believe a guy that tells over 40,000 in donald trump and then you have two people, from florida, tim scott from south carolina, voting against the voting rights that gives black people the right to vote? then you are going to try to tell us that your agenda is good for america? ukraine, you know good and well that russia has to be stopped. putin has to be stopped. democracy is fading around the world when you have 72% countries being run by dictators. please, you gotta stop leaving in the lie of donald trump. host: couple of things there. go ahead. guest: yes.

so, you know, i was alive the last four years. i was alive during the four years that trump was president. crime was a lot lower in my pocketbook was a lot older area the world was far more stable when tpresident. vladimir putin didn't go and invade russia when trump was pr when joe biden was president. so, i can understand why you might want to focus on ukraine when things here are so bad but i don't particularly care about tyrants overseas, ere have been tyrants through human history and there will be tyrants long after we are all gone. i care about what leadersountry we live in and do their duty to the citizens who9 payir for. so i'm focused now on the problems in the u.s., vladimir putin is not one of my problems. zelinski is not one of my problems. a disintegrating border and a lawless administration with rising crime, those are problems hould be focused on right now. host: richard brought up the

voting rights act. on that? guest: id there other than him being mad at tim scott. i don't really know what i can address in his comment. host: the voting rights general, do you take a position on that? guest: he claims that tim scott wanted to take away black vote. i don't think that's accurate. he didn't have a specific question. host: thank you for having me. i just wanted to make two quick whites. the first is that your guest frequently callsbort clinics, otherwise known as doctors offices, abortion mills. that's disgusting. he wouldn't call a center where kidney dialysis, he w a kidney stripping mine or something. it's nothing but inflammatory man -- language meant to make people upset. second, with response to the previous caller, "the federalist

" has a dark record on relations with african-americans. until october 22, the federalist had a black crime tag with articles related to criminthe phrasing of the black crime tag was called "unfortunate, by law fair review, it's a real thing that happened that you cannot explain away. the federalist society fights tooth and nail to hide itsrs. guest: we are not the federalist society, sir. we are not the federalist society. get your facts right. i would also add, by the way the articles that you are mad about that supposedly had a black crime tag was an article written by a black man from a speech fromng about crime in the black community. i'm not sorry. caller: it's the name of your organization. guest: we are not thfederalist society. host: this is a publication

called "the federalist." caller: what is that, to me what that is. host: i think he answered that. you could talk about the funding you get, where does that come from? guest: this person seems to be a very faithful reader. sell ads like everyone else. we have subscriptions. i would thank him personally for funding us by visiting our website. : julie is next, good morning. thank you for taking my call. i wanted to say thank you to this gentleman for speaking the truth and not hiding. so many people you say trump they run. they run. it's sad very sad. donald trump has done so much for this has taken this just about over the cliff. this country is not a democracy. it's a republic. i am so sick of hearing the

democrats spewing that. i'm also not afraid to say that i livedyears under president trump. as a retiree under biden, i had to go back to work. thank you so much the truth. goodbye. host: any comment? guest: she's awesome, we should have more callers like her. host: beverly hills, california democratic line, good morning. caller: good morning, how are you? host: good. caller: basically, i totally disagree with the comment about law biden being behind all of trump's legal issues and i will tell you why. this gentleman is dismissing the very fact that trump has been engaged in lawsuits snares, and legal cases his entire adult ofes life. over 4000. 4000 to 1970's.

he is the equivalent of legal drama. whether or not he was running for the presidency or not, he would still be involved with legal drama. 4000 is a lot and it says a lot about the man. it says a lot about his character. furthermore, no one needs to lift a finger, no one needs to lift a to do anything to for him. finally, the criticismut president biden being old and out of touch people, -- evil, if that is true, how would he be master nine to coordinate with so muchion under so little time all of cases against trump? thank you. host:guest: she made a great point biden is such a doddering, senile kind of old fool out to lunch, doesn't know where he is, how could all of

this stuff be masterminded? that's a great question. can all see biden on television. he is not the joe biden i remember when on capitol hill. not the joe biden i remember as vicest a step. he's lost a marathon. r a question, he's not running the show. anyone this administration and thinks that joe biden is calling the shots is delusional. it's obvious to me that you have a bunch of obama hands potentially obama even himself running the show behind the scenes and it is why the white house was so furious about the video of this celebrity event over the weekend, when biden off by obama. led off by obama. wizardind the curtain. if biden is such a doddering fool, how can he be doing these things? there are other people behind the scenes pulling the strings. host: mentioned a considerable number of lawsuits that have beenfor quite a

while during his long, professional career. what do you say that? guest: the man was a real estate i don't see how you can possibly do that and not constantly be involved in lawsuits. as far as the other issues, none of that stuff started until he beat hillary clinton. show me anything past 2016 and i will roll my eyes because it is political. host: quakertown, pennsylvania, inde yes, hello? host: go ahead. caller: i have a difference with most of the politics in washington dc. it all starts with o letters, fix it. if there's a problem at the border, fix if there's a problem in ukraine or other places around the our senators, congressmen, the president were sent to washington, d.c. to fix it. all we get other. one party says the sky is fall going to go over the edge, the other

party says well we are going to save the world, and nobody comes together with a plan to do either. believe that russia, china, iraq arson -- are winning the battle of splitting the united states and of the wedge they are using is the internet. the internet now gives all of the whinersn the country the opportunity to whineve a fix-it attitude. they just keep pumping the internet, dividing us with one party has these values, the otherat about american values? that is saving our citizens. to the best for the citizens, not what is politically effective. you get more points. we, the citizens of thisntry are going down the tubes. host: go ahead. i'm with him. i think most politicians in washington don't care about us. they don't care about fg blems we face our problems they created

either intentionally or through general ineptitude. i completely agree with him. people want someone who will come in and fix things and get things back to the way they were, make the country profitable and safe again. great point. host: on the republican line in toronto, canada, godfrey, good mornine you. i just wanted to make a few comments. first of all, for these democrats that are denying that biden hahing to do with they know very well that biden is the beneficiary of [indiscernible] necessarily remove biden from this. they know that biden will be the beneficiary. they know this. i was just going to go to work i saw the you -- i saw you

wanted to ask you about the cndebate coming up. i don't know why trump agreed to do it. cnn is not a particularly objective news outlet. the only news outlet in america today that has the hand for holding the debate for these guys is c-span and i wonder why you didn't insist that it be held on c-span. look at who is moderating the debate.basht of barack obama. jake tapper's to the left of they are not going to ask about the economy. they are not going to ask about interest rates. host: you said you had two points, what is yo point? caller: my second point is the the nominees for the vice president. elise stefanik is my choice, b has not floated and i'm so shocked two-term

governor of the great state of wisconsin, scott walker. scott walker would be a great vice president. help me talk to the trump campaign, if you can. host: let's get a response, those two things, sean. guest: the debatesup which i thing is totally wild. i don't have at the top of my mind a memory of a debate happening before the nominating conventions happening in the summer. i think that's fascinating. i don't know exactly what's behind it. as far as allowing it to be hosted on cnn, i would agree. jake tapper is a prime hoax and everyone on cnn has to be a diehard lefty in order to work there. i don't think it will be a fair one on one debate. i think it will be versus cnn versus joe biden, but it will be more entertaining maybe. as far asw, tru has a lot of great choices. there is a pretty deep bench on

the republican side right now. i haven't heard scott walker in the mix. he was great. stefano, i happened to partial to sarah sanders in arkansas. trump is on predicable on this. i wish i had a good read on who he might pick. we will all just have to stay es up with. host: spring, maryland, is next on the independent mine. caller: thank you to c-span for what you do. do you have an opinion on the unattended children who are ming? adults are one thing, kids are another. i think it fundamentally comes down to lack of leadership in country. i would like to hear your opinion. do. have a good day. goodbye. guest: that's a really good question. i think it comes down

really, what's happening at the border. the border is wide open and as a result, a lot of the cartels are trying to get illegal immigration across the border in ing the narco state that mexico has become. they charge obscene amounts of money. they will go and take children who are not their own and charge ridiculous amounts of money to get them across the border and i will say, this doesn't happen when you have a border that is closed. this only happens when you have a completely leaky porous border with awful people doing awful things trying to take advantage of that to make money. so if you are worried about unaccompanied childrening everyone is worried about if you care at all about a stop to that. there are a couple of ways you should put a stop to it on the backend, let everyone in and sorted out when they are here, or stop them on the front end and redd incentives that are therefore people try to ship children border.

if you close down the border and stop up the illegalonppening, the problem goes away. host: when youborder, do you mean to revoke the law that would allow anybody to cla asylum and have asylum hearings in the united states? would you take that protection away? guest: that's a loaded question. right now the asylum system is being completely abused.there are very specific things, conditions that have to be set in order to get asylum that have been weaponized by this government. and cartels over in mexico. what we need to do is enforce the asylum law and say that if you are not actually fleeing civil war, fleeing natural disasters, if you are not a political prisoner at risk of genocide, you are not qualified for asylum specific legal definition that has completely been ignored by this administration. i don't want to revoke it, i want the law applied as written. host: would you fund additional

judges to hear the cases? right now there are too many people for the number andueaerngqmee

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