host: good morning. there is tuesday, july 2. the supreme court released its ruling on presidential immunity

yesterday. in a 6-3 decision, the court ruled former president donald trump is immunity from prosecution for official actions in office but can stand trial for private conduct. this first hour, we are getting your reactions. here are the phone lines. democrats, (202) 748-8000. republicans, (202) 748-8001. and independents, (202) 748-8002 . you can send us a text, (202) 748-8003. send us your name, city, state. and we are on social media. facebook.com/c-span and x @cspanwj. welcome to today's "washington journal." we will start with the headlines of the major national papers. here is the washington post.

the new york times says justices give trump substantial immunity. the washington post, justices give presidents wide immunity. usa today, trump entitled to some immunity. and the washington times ruling gives presidents absolute immunity. and here is the associated press withhis headline. what to know about the supreme court immunity ruling in trump's 20 election interference case. it says that the ruling monday in former president trump's 2020 election interference case makes it all but certain the republican will not face trial in washington ahead of the november election. the supreme court did not dismiss the indictment alleging trump illegally schemed to cling to power after he lost a president joe biden, but the ruling still amounts to a major victory for the presumptive republican presidential nominee. his legal strategy has focused

on delaying the proceedings until after the election. the timing of the trial matters because of trump defeats biden, he could appoint an attorney general who would seek the dismissal of this case and the other federal prosecutions he faces, or trump could order a pardon for himself. trump posted in all capital letters on his social media network shortly after the decision was released "big win for our constitution and democracy. proud to be an american!" president biden also had a reaction last night. here is a portion from the white house. [video clip] >> this nation was founded on the principle that there are no kings in america. each, each of us is equal before the law. no one, no one is above the law. not even the president of the united states. today, the supreme court decision on presidential immunity, that fundamentally changed for all, for all

practical purposes. today's decision almost literally means there are virtually no limits what a president can do. this is a fundamentally new principal. it is a dangerous precedent because the power of the office will no longer be constrained by the law, even including the supreme court of the united states. the only limits will be self imposed by the president alone. this decision today has continued the court's attack in recent years on a wide ranging established laws in operation from taking away a woman's right to choose to today's decision that undermines the rule of law in this nation. host: and we are getting your reaction to the supreme court's ruling on presidential immunity. here is a few reactions from first, t that the people decide on what a majority of

americans already knew, that the doj was weaponized against trump. our constitution clearly defines the separation of powers and the supreme court upheld t constitutional authority of the president. and senator elizabeth warren. an extremist supreme court stack by donald trump has red president is above the law. six right-wing justices have given the president free reign to abuse the power of th presidency without constraint. hyper-partisan prosecutors like jack smith cnot weaponized the rule of law to go after the administration's g political rival. and we hope the left wl op the attacks on president trump and uphold democratic norms. representative steve cohen says today's opinion weaponizes beyond eve trump's wildest fantasies the power and immunity he would now have two go after anyone he perceives as his enemy. erion warp speed for retribution and revenge.

as sotomayor said, democracy is in danger and joe biden is its champion. we will go to the phones now to george in virginia, independent. good morning. caller: good morning. how are you all doing today? host: good. caller: thank you. good morning, america. i agree with the supreme court's decision. i think the democrats are doing what democrats do when they do not get their own way, and that is scream and yell and jump and how like a little child. i think they were counting on these court cases in order to stop donald trump from being able to run for the presidency, and i really do believe they are the biggest danger to democracy,

more than donald trump or the republicans are because of weaponizing the courts. host: all right, george. let's talk to jennifer next in lexington, virginia, democrat. caller: yes ma'am. thank you for taking michael. i regret the decision handed down by the supreme court. i wish that they had not decided that way. i feel like the declaration of independence is now a paper basket article and i wish to encourage democrats and all-americans to hang our flag at half staff, especially through the fourth of july weekend and in standing with every declaration of independence, which i feel has been greatly compromised if not just done away with completely. thank you for your time. host: let's talk to vince in mount joy, pennsylvania,

republican. good morning. caller: yes, good morning. i would like to say first of all i have been watching you guys for probably the past 10 years. since donald trump got elected, it is one trump haight topic after another. i think this is just another one. we are not talking about the 13 soldiers that were killed under joe biden. all of the open borders, the millions of illegals that are here. host: what do you think about this ruling from yesterday? do you agree with it? caller: pardon? host: do you agree with the ruling, the supreme court ruling yesterday? caller: of course i do. they are the supreme court. why wouldn't i? host: you agree with everything the supreme court rules on? caller: of course i would. if they came down on the side of another president, that would have to be the party of another party, i would agree with that too.

we cannot pick and choose what we want to agree with what we like them and when we don't like them. what the hell has president trump really done? host: let's talk to denver in kentucky, independent. caller: yes. thank you for taking my call. they bought the supreme court. thank you for taking my call. host: all right. let's take a look at the portion of the opinion by chief justice john roberts. this is the majority opinion. he says the president enjoys no immunity for hfficl acts, and not everything the presides i official. thidenis not above the law, but under a system of separated powers, president may note prosecuted for exercising his core constitutional pow and he is entitled to at least presumptive immunity from

prosecution for his official acts. that immunity applies equally to all occupants of the oval office. we are getting your reaction this morning. mike is a democrat in lake mills, wisconsin. hi, mike. caller: hey, good morning. thank you for taking my call. i believe what happened yesterday is the biggest political failure in the history of america. the democratic party bears responsibility for this. on january 27 in the year of our lord 2010, president barack obama stood up on the floor, and he mentioned citizens united and all the horrors it would bring. vice president biden sat right behind him clapping and smiling. the democratic party left that chamber just like everybody else. they went, got their unlimited

campaign contributions, and they supplied the favors. the republican party since then, their donors and the party have been planning for project 2025. the democratic party want to bring back abortion and save lgbtq rights. host: so, like, regarding -- mike, regarding this ruling yesterday, what is it you wanted the democratic party to have done? caller: the democratic party should have started right after barack obama's state of the union address, and they should have put something together to get rid of citizens united. host: legislation, you mean? caller: legislation. anybody listening to me right now, unlimited campaign funds is speech? host: you think that citizens united led directly to this immunity decision?

caller: yes, i do. host: how? caller: how? because this cabal of money that is coming into politics has divided our nation. there is just no doubt about that. listen to your callers. everything they are saying is coming right from this cabal. host: all right, mike. let's talk to gary an independent in oceanside, new york. caller: good morning. thank you for taking my call. i usually lean toward the democratic party. i am a union member. where is it going to end now with our country? the president is just a citizen just like us. they need to do some things that are not kosher but they still have to abide the law. what is now to stop by from

turning around and saying trump is a threat to our democracy and we will take him out? where will it end? host: and al is from plymouth, massachusetts, republican. caller: plymouth, massachusetts, where it all started. the oath is clear, preserve and defend the constitution of the united states. we have to prosecute harry truman for killing tens of thousands of people in japan. the presidency is unique, and this is why this has caused a conundrum for the democrats, because you need a qualified president. information is coming into that oval office every hour. it has to be weighed. host: the issue with the dropping of the bomb on nagasaki and hiroshima, the united states was at war with japan so that was an act of war. would you see that as a criminal -- caller: could have been argued

to be handled differently. my point is immunity. the president has to have immunity because it is a unique office. nobody else has that information, and this is why we have to elect qualified people. this is the conundrum for the democrats. they have a vice president now that nobody agrees is qualified, so this is the cost of when you play politics, when you don't elect qualified people, and you play these hollywood political games. now they have boxed themselves into a corner, into this situation. the democrats don't know what to do, frankly. a president needs immunity. it is a unique office. same thing with what obama did with getting bin laden. he went into pakistan illegally. he did not get the approval of that government, but there are things a president has to do to preserve this great nation of

ours. host: ok. carl, chicago, illinois, democrat. hi, carl. caller: yes, good morning to get how are you -- good morning. how are you? host: good. caller: yes. the supreme court screwed it up. they talk about judicial activism. i don't know where they found this in the original intent. to be decided later by a judge who can be biased or not. they just left the door wide open to interpretation. not only that, you cannot have it both ways. you cannot talk about what biden should have went to jail for and whatnot and say that he was

wrong and he should be in jail and now say this is a good thing. you can't really have it both ways, but it shows how this court, they are out of touch. 77% of americans do not believe this. i will finish with this. the reclaiming you have to have the leeway to be bold and make decisions -- they are claiming have to have the leeway to be bold and make decisions. that could have been dealt with already. if you did something like that and he went to court, you go before the court and you make your case. host: since you mentioned polls, this is a cbs poll from last

month so this is a beastly before the ruling, asking the question about former president trump. should he have immunity for actions taken while president? 38% said yes, he should. 62% said no, he shouldn't. this is broken down by party. so democrats, 10% to 90%. republicans, 67% to 33% saying he shouldn't, and then independents in the middle, 36% saying yes, 64% say no. that is on cbsnews.com if you would like to take a look at that. john is next in california, republican. caller: yes, good morning. i would like to say i have been a c-span water and the caller from massachusetts was 100% right.

why does c-span have to get a political analyst or legal analyst? why do you get andy mccarthy or alan dershowitz or somebody like that? the seal team six argument has been put to rest. it cannot happen. that would not happen. it would not be a lawful act by the president of the united states. it is still illegal. it would have been illegal before. it is illegal now. c-span, you got to quit this trump derangement syndrome. you guys did the same thing during the colorado supreme court decision. you had two legal analysts on at two different times within 10 days of each other. one from cbs and a lady from abc. they both argued that, yes, the

supreme court of colorado has the right to keep trump off the ballot, and every other legal analyst i heard, including some of the liberal networks, said that was not right, that the decision would not stand. guess what happened. it went down. not 5-4, 6-3, 7-2. 9-0. two of your legal analysts that you put forward -- host: going back to this court case from yesterday, the immunity case, what are your thoughts on that? caller: my thoughts on that, if it would stand the president has no immunity as the left-wingers want to get trump at all costs, barack obama could be tried for murder because he killed two american citizens in a foreign country. joe biden could be tried and i believe he has done it, violating the civil rights of donald trump by recognizing his

-- by weaponizing his justice department. host: so you think this could be applied to all future presidents? caller: it is a limited decision. yes, it is applied to all future presidents unless some future court overturns it and find a different way. host: let's take a look at part of sotomayor's dissent. "never in the history of our republic had a president had reason to believe he would be immune from criminal prosecuti if he used his office to violate the criminal law. moving forward however, all former presidents will be cloaked in sh munity. if the occupant of that office misuses official power for personal gain, the criminal law that theesof us must abide will not provide a backstop. with fear for our democracy, i dissent."

cynthia in south carolina, independent. caller: yes. casey, south carolina. host: casey. caller: i think this up decision is mind-boggling. trump tried to overturn our government by hook or crook, and jim jordan was a party in assisting him in that. trump is not a qualified person to be president. he should be in court now for the charges pending against him, and the supreme court has decided this. i just don't understand. it is like we are headed for a dictatorship because of what trump has already said. host: i want to ask you about what one of the former callers said, that the presidency has special official duties and they know certain things the rest of us do not know so they have to be

protected from criminal prosecution. what do you make of that argument? caller: that is fair, but what trump has done, they are talking about sending out troops or sending people into war situations. that i do not think is criminally accountable for the president unless he sends troops against american citizens. now, i don't know what is going to happen to our country now. it is like i said, mind-boggling. trump, what he has done is total criminal. he has asked people to overturn what the state have stated is there preference for president. he has gone to try to talk. they have him on the phone trying to get the person in georgia to give him 11,000

votes. what more do you need? he is a criminal. this is not anything to do with the presidency. it is just that he wants to be back in that office so he can completely destroy our democracy. host: charles in tennessee, line for democrats, good morning. caller: yes, ma'am. thank you. yesterday was probably the biggest -- the united states had. our presidents, they got free reign to do whatever they want to do. this is awful. in the united states 10 years from now, you will find russia. am i still on? host: yeah, you are. we are listening. caller: it is the same thing. it is the same thing putin does. communism. donald trump is really out of hand. the supreme court is nothing but

a political party. this is the biggest. the other minorities, they have had it. they have had it. and i am white. i am telling you, joe biden should do something about this. if he can be prosecuted, do whatever it takes to right this wrong. host: like what, charles? what are you hoping that he does? caller: take donald trump off the ballot. take him off the ballot. do whatever it takessecure the balance in these states and stuff because this is the biggest blow the united states ever took.

our democracy is falling. it is falling and falling fast. i know joe biden had a bad deal the other night, but people, please do not let donald trump get back to president. i am telling you, they are not going to have a snowballs chance in torment. this is pitiful what is going on. host: all right, charles. let's talk to charlotte, a republican in fort wayne, indiana. good morning. caller: good morning. i wanted to mention about when president biden spoke regarding donald trump's conviction and donald trump said the court case was rigged, president biden said these words, this is his quote, that is how the american system of justice works, and it is

reckless, it is dangerous, it is irresponsible for anyone to say this was rigged because they don't like the verdict. our justice system has endured for nearly 250 years, and it literally is a cornerstone of america. our justice system should be respected. we should never allow anyone to tear it down. it is as simple as that. and so now that they did not get their way, president biden wants to pack the supreme court because he did not get his way. so which is it? are we supposed to respect the courts and the verdicts they give regardless if you like it or don't like it, or are we supposed to dissent now that he does not like the way the verdict came out? you have so many people talking about our democracy. we are not a democracy. we are a constitutional republic.

democracy is mob rule. and if you remember these words, i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under god, with liberty and justice for all. democracy is simply mob rule. host: got it, charlotte. tom is next in florida, independent. caller: yes. i was going to get my dog to call on the democratic side but he cannot talk. this is the worst thing that ever happened. if donald trump is running, in charge of insurrection? no. five cops killed? no. every single state has rules. the only way you can change the election rule -- i literally work for the democratic party

for cook county out of chicago, speaker of the house. i am independent now. billions of dollars for ukraine. open borders. you can castrate little kids because a little boy picked up a barbie doll. this whole thing of the court, it is a unitarian branch. constitution and is the president. the executive branch, the unitarian branch. the department of justice did not exist when the constitution was written. so a subordinate can take the president out. it is just kind of crazy that this thing in florida where i live now, you got them with the 1871 -- i am trying to think of what they are going after him for. there was a kkk bill to keep the klan from keeping blacks from

voting, which was an extension of the democratic party. host: let's take a look at a little bit more from chief justice roberts's majority opinion. he says this, like everyone else, the president is subject to prosecution in his ofcial capacity, but unlike everyone else, the president is ch of government, and the constitution invested in him sweeping pand duties. accounting for that reality and entering the pre may exercise those powers forcefully as the framers anticipated h would does not place him above the law. it preserves the basic structure of the constitution from which that lobby r the dissent's position in the ens down to ignoring the powers and the court's president and instead fear mongering on the basis of extreme hypotheticals about a future where the president feels empowered to violate federal criminal law.

wonder what you think about that. let's go to clear fork, west virginia. democrat bradley, good morning. caller: good morning. good morning. i have been a democrat since i was 18 years old, and i have told this before. i am very seriously thinking of changing, going independent. but with all the problems going on, i am thinking about going republican. you wonder why joe manchin went, jim justice went, and all of these people. the general went from democrat to independent. they are getting so radical. the day they had the insurrection, trump said, protest peacefully. peacefully. you democrats know what peacefully is?

how can you prosecute something when he says peacefully. host: regarding presidential immunity and in general, not just in former president trump's case, do you agree that all former presidents should have immunity for official acts? caller: yes. yes. one of the speakers a minute ago mentioned about the wars, that they impeached when they did the atom bomb. i think they should be held accountable, just like the justices said for personal things, just like, why can't you impeach biden for getting all of this money? pencil and paper don't lie. i think he ought to be covered under certain things, but same thing with trump. but when it comes to personal stuff, just like we are talking about, sending things to murder people, that is personal. they hang somebody when they do

that in my book. that is personal. for these people to get on there and raise about the insurrection and he said peaceful, peaceful means go peacefully, don't burn down stuff. don't kill people. don't beat people up and everything else. they started this stuff that trump tried to whip them around to go back. he didn't. the lies being told, it is impossible to understand either party. so have a nice day. you democrats -- host: all right, bradley. kathy in clearwater, florida, republican. caller: good morning. i just want to point out presidents have had immunity since there have been presidents.

obama gave guns to criminals that killed that border patrol guy. no prosecution. he droned american citizens dead. they were not on american soil. never a prosecution. trump says go to the hall peacefully. prosecution. there is one person dead. she was killed by a park policeman who has had other issues before. he was not prosecuted. so when the donald says that, he is not saying like a person would rig a car to run. he is talking about prosecuting political enemies.

that short of the dual between the two men who went before lincoln was president, that is the difference here. persecution of political enemies. that is what republicans are talking about. democrats are screaming broken laws. he did not give guns to criminals. he sold the weaponry. he did not give it. i am just pointing out the differences in where we stand when we scream persecute, persecute. law is a funny thing. it is quite alive, and it will do whatever it is you want it to do. i think the supreme court did a really good job. some law is covered because he is presidential, and something

he does under the law that is illegal for personal use is not. are we debating that? we are. but for the love of god, people, these are our laws. we all live in one of the 50 states. contact your representatives and run your state. that is what runs the federal government, not federalism. host: all right, kathy. let's hear a little more from president biden last night at the white house. [video clip] pres. biden: four years ago, my predecessor sent a violent mob to the capitol to stop the peaceful transfer of power. side with our own eyes. he sat there and watched it happen that day. attack on the police, the ransacking of the capitol, a marble literally hunting down house speaker nancy pelosi. gallows erected to hang the vice president mike pence. i think it is fair to say it is one of the darkest days in the

history of america now the man who sent that mob to the u.s. capitol is facing potential no conviction for what happened that day. the american people deserve to have an answer in the court before the upcoming election. the public has a right to know the answer about what happened on january 6 before they are asked to vote again this year. now because of today's decision and this -- decision, it is highly, highly unlikely. it is a terrible disservice to the people of this nation. so now the american people have to do with the court should have been willing to do but would not. the american people have to render judgment about donald trump's behavior. the american people must decide whether donald trump's assault on our democracy on january 6 makes him unfit for public office, from the highest office in the land. the american people must decide that trump's violence to preserve his power is acceptable.

perhaps most importantly, the american people must decide they want to entrust the president once again -- the presidency to donald trump, knowing he will be more emboldened to do whatever he pleases whenever he wants to do it. you know, the outset of our nation, it was the character of george washington, our first president, that defined the presidency. he believed power is limited, not absolute, and that power always resides in the people, always. now over 200 years later, today's supreme court decision, once again it will depend on the character of the men and women who hold the presidency to define the limits of the power of the presidency because the law will no longer do it. i know i will respect the limits of the presidential powers as i have for three and a half years. any president including donald trump will now be free to ignore

the law. i concur with justice sotomayor's dissent today. she said in every use of official power, the president is now aching above law. with fear for our democracy, i dissent. end of quote. so should the american people dissent. i dissent. host: that was the president. here is what speaker mike johnson put on x. he said today's rung by the court as a victory for former president trump and all future presidents. and another defeat for president biden's weaponized department of justice and jack smith. here is representative marjorie taylor greene who says, if there is no presidential immunity for president trump, there is none for joe biden, barack obama, george bush, bill clinton, and every single one of those have committed actual crimes as president.

christopher sent us this from texas. with the americans have elected a president to represent us with hard choices to make for us. qualified or not, elected is elected, unimpeded by prosecution, and be able to provide our future direction of this nation. doug is next, staten island, new york, independent. caller: good morning. how are you today? host: good. caller: i am just amazed at the cognitive dissonance of some of these people. i would like to remind kathy and bradley, the former callers, prior callers, before i comment on the immunity, that after he said peaceful, later on he says we will go down to the capitol and i will be with you and you have to fight like hell. you have to fight like hell or else we will not have a country. i guess they forgot that part. but in any event, what i am disturbed about is the instructions that john roberts's decision gave.

i don't know if anybody has covered it yet or not, but what they say is that anything that he does that was considered private or as a candidate, if it happens to have some sort of ancillary part of being an official act like what he did with the justice department when he invited in the acting attorney general, the acting deputy attorney general, and he said he wanted them to send out a letter saying that the election was faulty and that there were problems there and that they have to check this out and do a few things. they refused to do it. they said that basically everything they know he is saying is untrue. so what he did was turn around and say to them i am going to get rid of you and put in this

other person as acting attorney general. and in that, they say that is part of his core executive functions, appointing of people in his cabinet. so all of the stuff that went on after that and before that when he finally decided not to dismiss the acting attorney general because the acting attorney general and his assistant said if you do that we will all quit and most of the justice department will quit on you so he decided not to do that, but justice roberts said that basically that kind of stuff because in the process of saying i am going to appoint this person as the new attorney general because he will do what i want him to do, sent out a letter saying there were problems and do not worry about it and leave it to me. he said leave it to me, and the republican congress people will take care of it.

they said no one will do it but if you don't, i will appoint this person in your place. justice roberts said all of that stuff cannot be brought up because that is official, because it had an official part to it where he was going to appoint a new attorney general so therefore everything that went on his unaccountable. it is official duties. you look at justice sotomayor. she talked about these things, about seal team six, accepting bribes, so on, and so forth. the quid pro quo on this, you cannot have one without the other. you cannot tell me you can appoint an ambassador for $1 million and say, wait a minute, you cannot use the million dollars as a bribe because he is appointing you ambassador. and that is part of the privilege.

she did not sign on for that. she signed on for the major decision but she dissented, objected. the only good thing that will happen is this will now go down to the lower court again and the judge there is basically going to have to go through all of these things. this will take months because the sides this -- because besides this there are 32 counts in arizona. there are 63 counts in georgia. there are i don't know how many dozens of counts in other states, so this will go on and on and on. host: all right, doug. we got your point. let's go to joe in austin, texas, democrat. caller: thank you for taking my call. what is very interesting about giving the president immunity now is that for an official act, joe biden can take the official

act and jail donald trump and his family because they are a threat to our democracy. many people have called in. and i would also like to say please do not fact-check anybody who calls in here because somebody who also writes, you cannot make up such hyperbole and nonsense. this is the result of an uneducated populace. it is really sad. i personally and looking to leave the country. thank you. host: larry in washington, republican. caller: hi. yeah. i have been hearing all of these people talk about joe biden, that he is upset over this supreme court decision. you know, he should not be upset because as soon as he gets out

of office, there is a lot of things that he has done that he would have gotten sued over so he should be happy. as far as this nda case in new york, i don't know you know, i don't know why these people think that this case was not rigged, because -- host: are you talking about the hush money case? caller: yes. host: ok. caller: you got an all democrat jury. you got a prosecutor that is from the justice department. host: but larry, sticking with the supreme court case, you fully agree that presidents should have immunity, all presidents going forward, not just mr. trump? caller: yes. yeah, i think so. we are not -- the president is

not going to be able to do anything. he will be afraid to do anything because he is afraid he will get sued as soon as he gets out of office. it is all just weaponization of the justice system, you know, and that is why the supreme court acted on this. the democrats are going after trump. every time he turns around. as soon as he started trying to run for president, they have been on him the whole time. why don't they just leave him alone and let him do his job? he was a great president. better than joe biden, better than anybody else. i have been around for 60 years and he is better than any president. i just don't understand these democrats. they need to back off and leave him alone and let him do his job. he is a great president. he does great things. he does not let 20 million illegal immigrants into the country. he does not pay terrorists like iran to kill israelis.

host: got larry. let's takanher look at a portion of justice sotomayor's dissent. let him exploit the trappings of his office for personal gain. let him use his official power for legal ads because if he knew that he may one day face he may not be as bold andlaw, fearless as ld like him to be. that is majority's message today. even if these nightmare scenarios neverlay out, and i pray they never do, the damage s been done. the relationship between t president and the people he serves has shifted irrevocably and every use of official power. the president is now aching above the law -- a king above the law. wonder what you think about that mark in pennsylvania. what do you think about that? caller: i wholeheartedly disagree with the supreme court decision. i agree with justice sotomayor.

here is a question that i have not heard anybody mention. the supreme court said that the president has immunity in official acts. ok. is it an official act then for a president to have an organized plan to install fake electors in various states to overturn a legally conducted fair election that even by his own appointed -- personally appointed judges mr. trump, his arguments were shot down as far as voter fraud and all of that. so there was no mass rigging of an election as he claimed. his own judges, every court case was thrown out with that argument, so is it an official act for a president to have an organized plan to install fake electors to overturn illegally

-- a legally conducted fair election? also, is it an official act that one gentleman mentioned a few minutes ago, to tell his supporters to go to the capitol and fight like hell? that is another piece of the puzzle a lot of people have not mentioned. he did not say do everything peacefully and let it go at that. he said you have to fight like hell or you won't have a country left. we as a country can see everything that happened on the tv that day. the things that he instigated that day, are they considered official act? that is my comment. i think we are in really dangerous territory. i think our democracy has been shot full of holes, and i think the future is really, really bleak. thank you. host: we go to brooklyn, new york, next to malign for democrats. lance, hello. caller: hello, thank you for taking my call.

i am a 71-year-old man, and i am totally confused by everything i am seeing. there is a right and wrong thing. there is a up and a down. right now, anything anybody says is supposed to be legitimate. i believe when mitch mcconnell denied barack obama's opportunity to pick a justice, that delegitimized the court. when lindsey graham says he would never support an election right before an election, that delegitimized the court. my question is, if joe biden reasonably believed donald trump a real problem could he just have secret service protection drop and have him assassinated? is that the ruling? because i am totally confused. micah said, i am 71. i have never seen anything like this. i am a first time caller.

i just had to get in. host: the ap has a poll on what people think about the supreme court. this is from last month. it is seven in 10 americans thinks the justices put ideology over impartiality. they are more likely to be guided by their own ideology rather than serving as neutral arbiters of government authority . it says the survey found seven in 10 americans think the high court justices are more influenced by ideology but only about three in 10 u.s. adults think justices are more likely to provide an independent check on other branches of government by being fair and impartial. linda is calling us from arkansas, republican. hi, linda. caller: yes, i agree with the supreme court. and joe biden should be very thankful for them because -- i

don't know who but it is not joe biden. he should be thankful. joe biden, he can be prosecuted. the illegals that came in. he did not ask the american people if he wanted them. he just threw them in. he still flies them in. joe biden should be very thankful he has immunity coming, and i don't know how people think that this election is just beat donald trump. what about the united states? who is going to run the united states? joe biden cannot run it for four years. he will be make it that she will be lucky to make it six. if you want the vice president to be president, make him give it to her. under false pretenses and will

be joe biden because six hours a day is not what the president is. he has to be there 24/7. joe biden is definitely not their 24/7. thank you. host: jim is an independent in chicago. good morning, jim. caller: yes, good morning. the issue i have is with the justice department. i never thought there would be some kind of weaponization or politicalization of the justice department. not the doj. the justice department itself, the supreme court. i wanted to ask this question. so now what about congress and the senate? can they now claim the same privilege? they are with the government, so that is my main concern and that is it. host: on the line for democrats in georgia, tina, good morning. caller: good morning.

thank you for having me this morning. i strongly disagree with the decision that the supreme court made. clearly this was a decision made with some sort of allegiance to donald trump, and it is not fair. decisions that affect our country should be based upon fairness and the laws. ever since this man got into office, there has been nothing but chaos. when someone does something wrong, they should be held accountable, no matter who they are. so i disagree with the decision. and people that are ill intent should not be placed in these positions of power. the act of january 6 was not

done out of the best intentions for the usa. it was done out of a personal intent and a selfish purpose of donald trump, and the world knows this. everyone knows this, so we need to get back to basics. people need to get back to being human first and choosing leaders with good morals and qualities and character to represent us as the united states and as who we are. thank you. host: on the line for republicans in west florida, nancy, good morning. caller: good morning. i agree with the immunity, the limited immunity for the president. and i think some of the callers ought to go to your archives if they are upset about january 6

and have them look at the national guard whistleblowers congressional hearings. maybe that would help answer some of their questions. instead -- host: sorry, nancy, thought you were done. catherine in new jersey on the democrat line. caller: good morning. you know, presidents have always been able to do their job without this threat of having immunity. the only reason the supreme court did this was to protect from. it is fairly obvious. i grew up in the 1960's and 1970's. i have always had faith in the supreme court that they would always do the right thing. for the most part, they really did, but now i no longer have faith in them. i really don't. this is clearly partisan. it is just not right. i'm sorry.

thank you for listening. host: all right, and here is the new york times from this morning. trump moves to overturn manhattan conviction citing immunity decision. it says former president donald trump took the action hours after the supreme court ruling granted him immunity for official acts committed in office. it says that in a letter to the judge overseeing the case, mr. trump's lawyers sought permission to file a motion to set aside the verdict, doing so hours after the supreme court issued its landmark ruling involving one of mr. trump's other criminal cases. the letter will not be public until tuesday at the earliest after which prosecutors will have a chance to respond. the move from mr. trump's lawyers comes 10 days before the former president was set to be sentenced for his crimes in manhattan where a jury convicted him on 34 felony counts related to his cover-up of a sex scandal in the run-up to the 2016 elections.

and roger, you are next, fort wayne, indiana, democrat. caller: good morning, c-span. good morning, america. personally, i don't agree with the supreme court's decision. personally, i think the trumper's calling in our lying. i think they are just flat out lying. i think they just want total immunity for trump and themselves. i think the conservatives just want to be able to do whatever they want, say whatever they want without any accountability, responsibility, or any consequences. right now, even though they are saying immunity applies to all presidents, right now they are trying to impeach joe biden for some conspiracy about his son's laptop.

watch and see if these conservatives go after democrats and try to prosecute them and all of this stuff while they are claiming now this immunity is in place. i think the supreme court is rigged. america, let's take back our country from trump and his cult members. we need to take back our country. they have a stronghold on our country, and if we do not unite and let them continue to divide us, they will topple us and take over. host: all right, roger. oklahoma city, oklahoma, republican, good morning. caller: good morning. thank you for taking my call. yes, i have been watching with regards to with the prior gentleman just said, the underhanded things that are taking place.

when you look at 34 counts in a recording, the way it happened with donald trump, i feel like it was very transparent what they were trying to do. they were trying to take him out of the campaign. as far as biting is concerned, he did -- binding is concerned, he didn't excellent job of doing that. of course -- as far as biting is concerned, he did an excellent job. the supreme court, when you think about the number of cases that have gone to the supreme court lately, you have to ask yourself why. why are there so many cases? the reason there are so many cases, there was an unwritten line. you don't cross this line, go after your opponent in a political race, and therefore the arbiter had to be the supreme court because the

democrats were willing to cross that line. it was common sense. it is all very common sense stuff. if you read case, you have to ask yourself, any reasonable man that was going to run for president, would you want to be up against that for any prosecutor or persecutor in the case of bragg and others would just go after a president for whatever reason they saw fit #who would put themselves in that position? that is all we have for this segment. we will continue our conversation about the supreme court decision yesterday and what it means for the upcoming criminal trial with jeffrey rosen, the president and ceo of the national president -- national constitution center.

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the national constitution center. thank you for being back. guest: wonderful to be back. host: what was your take on the supreme court's decision? guest: it couldn't be more important. the majority said it is crafting a role for immunity for the ages that is necessary to protect future presidents against political prosecutions by their successors and the defense says this is an invented rule without basis in constitutional text, history or a structure that will imperil democracy in justice jackson's words is a five-alarm fire for the future of america. there are many historic supreme court decisions that it is striking that the majority and the dissent emphasized the historic stakes and have a completely antithetical view of what the constitution requires.

host:host: explain presumptive immunity? guest: it means we presume the president has immunity but can be overcome by showing the act is not official in the majority opinion establishes three categories of immunity. one of absolute immunity for activities at the core of the president's article to function. presumptive immunity for conduct that is at the periphery of those core activities, and third, unofficial ask for which there is no immunity. the defense said it is unclear what the line between these categories is and inviting lower courts to make these determinations, the majority is creating so much confusion that in practice immunity will exist in all categories and the president will be above the law and that is the nature of the dispute. host: what you think the impact will be especially based on what we know about what the founders

intended or what we think we know about what the founders intended for presidential power and checks and balances? guest: it is so important to discuss this as we approach july 4. to figure out with the founders would have intended. the majority disagree about this. both site alexander hamilton, and in particular federal 77 in hamilton's insistence that there should be energy in the executive and the majority sites that to support its conclusion that the president has to have brought immunity or be deterred from vigorously exerting presidential power and the majority quotes hamilton's letters where he talks about the importance that there be unity in the executive and the president be able to act with vigor and dispatch. the defense said they are misreading hamilton and justice sotomayor are quotes to say that

the president has to be vigorous but will be amenable to prosecution and sheet size this meant hamilton assumed the major check on the president would be that like any citizen he would not be above the law and could infect me prosecuted in criminal court. she also quotes other framers of the constitution come in particular james wilson, the guy who came up with the idea that we the people of the united states as a whole is sovereign and also charles pinckney and others who said that they imagine the president would be liable to criminal constitution and justice sotomayor accuses the majority of of being bad originalist and so stairs designed to ensure the president isn't shoulder -- -- and only

when they hear about it and she says they are ignoring tracks in history here. that's what makes it so important and vigorous. host: cap to the present day, the january 6 tribal facts of the lower courts. what does this mean for the judge. what are her options? guest: she has a lot of work to do and has to go through the major categories of conversations or activities in the indictment and on a case-by-case basis decide whether or not the acts were official. the majority opinion says only one category of act's core executive functions and that is the president's conversations with the acting attorney and that the majority says is immune from prosecution but as for the other categories of discussion, in particular the discussions with the vice president in the effort to get mike pence not to certify the election results as well as the conversations with

state election officials and the tweets after january 6. in all of those cases, the judge has to decide whether or not they were core official acts or at the periphery of the court powers. the dissent said there is little guidance in making that determination and the judge is at sea trying to decide whether it was official but has to do all of those activities. and there is another important complication and that is last friday the court in the fisher case now at the scope of a law that makes up two of the four charges against president trump in that january 6 is in the majority in a footnote said that the judge can decide based on that opinion whether or not those two charges can survive. so those are among the things you have to do. host: if you have a question for jeffrey rosen, president and ceo of the national constitution center, you can give us a call.

the lines are democrats (202) 748-8000, republicans, (202) 748-8001, an independents (202) 748-8002. regarding the other cases against trump in georgia in the mar-a-lago case in florida, how does this affect those? guest: in each of those cases there will have to be a determination about whether or not the president is being charged on the basis of official act or acts at the core of his power and he will move to have total immunity found and had the charges dismissed accordingly and the judges in those cases will have to make a fact-based determination on whether those were official acts. host: as far as official or unofficial, is it always the court in which core and how is that decided and can everything

get appeal? guest: another great question. the defense says this has one clear effect, to empower courts to diminish the power of congress to regulate the executive the ability of courts to decide and dds in each of these cases, trial courts will make the determinations in each could be appealed in each could ultimately be decided by the supreme court. host: there is a reporting that mr. trump's lawyers have moved to overturn the manhattan conviction based on this ruling. is that possible? guest: my understanding of this is that, to the degree he was paying hush money to stormy, none of those acts could be

considered anywhere near at the core of his executive functions. therefore my sense is that those charges will not succeed but the judge will have to worry on them. host: we will take some -- will have to make a decision on them. host: let's take a call from florida. caller: i wanted to talk about how barack obama could benefit from this ruling because we know there was an american citizen who was assassinated by barack obama without due process. it was an american citizen in against the law put he is the president, right. we need to start being real about what we are talking about instead of being hyperbolic. we are ruining the country by not being honest with one another. ignorance comes from the greek word ignore and we are ignoring

the stuff we should be paying attention to. host: what do you think. guest: very good point that the biggest beneficiaries of this decision will be former presidents and president obama cannot be prosecuted for stuff he did in office and president biden if he ends up being reelected will not be able to be prosecuted by his successor. now the dissent notes the example you gave of the drone strike and even under existing law there is no question that ordering drone strikes as the core of the president's article to power and therefore he would not have been able to have been prosecuted on the basis of drone strikes even for this opinion but no question at all the whole decision is that presidents shouldn't be deterred from vizard -- vigorously using their article to power in the biggest beneficiaries of this today will

be former presidents in the united states. host: even before this he said president obama could not have been prosecuted for that drone strike. guest: that is correct. there is no existing criminal statute that would cover president's exercise of his responsibility in the military and that was the point of the dissent. host: richard in louisville, kentucky, the publican. caller: hello -- republican. caller: can you hear me? host: yes, we can. caller: i am not a constitutional lawyer but in listening that everything that has been happening and i listened to john roberts with the scope of this ruling is for the ages. everyone keeps saying it is about donald trump. donald trump just so happens to

be in the position that he was president of the united states and he was the one who asked the supreme court to rule on some of the things that he did as president of the united states. and they come back and said this is for all presidents, past and future. so if i'm in a young woman and growing in through college and proceed with my life, run for office, am a congresswoman and become governor and then become -- decide to become president of the united states. if i didn't have immunity to protect me that says you run the strongest country in the world and sometimes you have to do things like. am i protected? john roberts and the supreme

court said, yes, you are. that is, i wanted to hear. host: can you explain any -- amy coney barrett's lines she was drawing? guest: i want c-span viewers to read the decisions and the center they are written for americans and you can make up your own mind. she said the following, she doesn't agree with creating a broad new presumption of immunity for the president. she would have taken a different approach and asked two questions, does the criminal statute at issue apply to the president's actions and second if it does apply, what applying it to the president unduly imputed on executive functions and in the case we have been discussing with the drone strike, she would have concerned -- decided that the murder wouldn't be in at and they

wouldn't move forward with any prosecution on that but she disagreed with the idea that conversations with executive officials could not be introduced to prove criminal offenses and she gave the example of bribery and said if the president corruptly took money in exchange for a bribe, it would certainly be appropriate to introduce conversations with other executive officials to prove motive and she found out reason to exclude as the majority would have done in more broadly she challenged the whole idea of thinking of this as a form of immunity rather than a fact that the criminal laws cannot be applied in ways that unduly intrude on the president's function and she said that it is striking that the majority of the court rejected her approach and it is conceivable there may

have been a moderate consensus around an approach like the one she suggested but her conservative colleagues wanted to take a broader approach and it was the nature of the disagreement. host: next call a democrat in -- on the democrats line. caller: yesterday it was unfortunate that we find ourselves here. on the supreme court decision on donald trump that presidents should have some type of immunity is going to give them access to do what they want to do. i don't think there is any reason for any president to think about going through his

job other than doing what he is advised to do. in this case, it is now time to the supreme court. it is just leverage for them to do what they want to do. get in the office and the right thing. that is all. host: there have been callers that have made the point that this means that president biden can just rest former president trump, his whole family and say he is a threat to democracy and put him in prison and do whatever he wants. is that true? host: the caller's point is when the justice sotomayor made. she said to agree the president

is deterred in the president not participating in criminal acts and you don't want to ignore that. the majority takes a different view and is very concerned with the idea of president biden trying to prosecute president trump for future president trump in the second term prosecuting president biden. that is the main reason they have recognized a new form of immunity for former president's that is what is novel about this decision. it is not a question of immunity from prosecute them for sitting president in office, that was something no one ever challenge that this is the first time it is immunity for former presidents that has been created and has been created so that while presidents are in office they want to be afraid of future prosecutions once they are out of office and that is the nature of the discussions. host: here and in -- karam in

illinois. caller: to the previous point, you are just saying this applied to presidents out of office. it doesn't apply for actions out of the office, like having documents in your garage or in your state that you are not have classified documents. and while you were running in cases like the stormy daniel cases. is it before or after or just only drink the president. how does this positively and negatively affect all the cases that donald trump has? guest: two great questions. it does apply to proving alleged criminal activity that took place before you came to office or after you came to office. you are not immunized for things

you did before or after but won't be able to introduce conversations you had while you were in office in order to prove the subsequent actions. that is the nature of the dispute in the january 6 case, can his conversations with his attorney general arrest present b -- or vice president be introduced to show what he did during or after the election. that is the nature of the dispute and the dissent makes -- said it just makes it harder to prove the previous or subsequent actions if you can't note anything he did in office to prove a motive. and how does it apply to the other cases? my sense is that in each of them president trump will move to dismiss the cases claiming they are based on immunized conduct in the judges will have to decide whether or not the kind of was immunized or not. host: the key decision last week overturning the chevron

doctrine. can you explain what that is and what does it mean that it is overturned? guest: another usually important decision also written by john roberts and the gun control was also. chevron was a decision that was in place for almost four years and held that when the reviewing records are looking at regulations that administration industries like environmental and securities, they have to ask questions. first, did congress clearly on the issue in question. if it did speak clearly then the matter of the court has to enforce what congress wanted but if congress' intent is ambiguous according to chevron, courts defer to the administrative agency. there is an environmental issue and it was ambiguous, the court should defer as long as the regulation was reasonable.

this decision last week overturned chevron and said that there should not be a presumption of deference in the face of ambiguous statutory language but instead courts should decide for themselves whether or not the regulation is consistent with the statutory text. they can take the administrator's views into account but have to exercise their own independent judgment and the majority said this is consistent with principles of separation of powers which shouldn't unduly exalt executive deference and also the text of the administrative seizure act that was passed what to do when looking at regulations. viewers have to read this decisions. the dissent by justice kagan said this would fundamentally transform the administrative state and exult judges at the expense of the executive rate and justice kagan said judges

are not experts in questions like environmental policy or security regulation and it is a failure of humility to exercise their own independent judgment in a related case. a year or so ago she said now the court is in charge of all environmental policy and climate change and that is scary with the words cu's because she suggested the judges were experts. host: she said the court is making itself into the administrative czar. guest: strong language and vividly chosen. she is concerned that the power is aggregating decisions that are best left to politically accountable officials. she wrote an important article she was a vessel -- professor endorsing the idea of a vigorous executive but saying that means every time a president wins election they should be able to appoint agency administrators who refract --

reflect the policy views he was elected to put in place and that it is a failure of democracy. the judges to substitute their own understanding of complicated regulatory policies for those of politically accountable officials. another huge separation of power and opinion. it is interesting in both the immunity and the administrative decision, the dissenters are accusing the majority of exalting judges of being judicial supremacists and increasing judicial power at the expense of the president in the case of chevron and congress and the president in case of the immunity. host: what do you think of the long-term impact practically for the american public of the chevron decision? guest: the majority and dissent disagree about this. the majority says this isn't going to be a big change but in practice chevron already had been guided by the supreme court for lower courts for the past

decade or so. judges have been increasingly exercising independent review and they will do that. the dissent that it is a fundamental challenge to the essence of the fate of the regulatory estate and since the new deal era in the 1930's, the regulatory estate had gotten lots of deference after 1937 when the supreme court got out of the business of striking down administrative decisions by applying skeptical scrutiny. the court said this would both turn judges into administrative czars and also basically drive a stake through the heart of the administrative state. host: let's talk to cheryl in holly hill, florida, republican. caller: thanks for having me on. first of all, the ruling was absolutely probably the best that could have come out of this and it protects all presidents, not just trump. this attack on the supreme court

for their ruling by the left is ignorant and very dangerous. in to hear that from by himself on the world stage is unbelievable for a man who has done nothing but break the rules and spit in their face directly and bragged about it with regard to the student loan debt that he transferred onto the backs of hard-working americans and opening the border and putting national security directly at risk directly violated of office. how many times you can't even count but it is dangerous to be saying that all of the sudden, commonsense sense thrown out the window and it is ignorant for people to say this stuff. there is no common sense in this country whatsoever anymore. and you even said it, the

immunity ruling was meant to historically protect sitting presidents from prosecution even after they left office, which is post office is previous presidents. and they should be protected from community and should be prosecuted for things they did in office. biden is a very, very dangerous man to say the things he is saying to the world. host: comment? guest: is a very important, that the nonpartisan legitimacy of the rule is what we are seeing. and we are seeing a tax on that both after president trump when he attacked the prosecution and by president biden when he criticized this decision although he did not criticize

the genesee -- the legitimacy of the court but said he strongly disagreed with it. it is a good point that all elected officials need to be mindful with presidential decision and from court last week cited lincoln's refusal to accept the finality of the dred scott decision as a justification for overturning precedent. his presence to them they have said but he tried to argue to overturn. criticism is fine but attacking the legitimacy of rule of law is more troubling. host: warren is a democrat in arkansas. caller: good morning. i want to make a statement to

conservatives. i am 89 the conservatives screwed up the civil rights deal, they screwed up the voting rights deal and now they have a up the supreme court and the president where president biden had trump put out precedent is in place in case happened to a president. she is qualified and able to take over and run this country.

trust is not the ability to run government. it is not a businessman, he is in business. he buys them run some into ground and takes the money and from and it runs. host: any comment on the ballot cases? that was the case that was cited a while ago about trump being on the ballot because of the 14th amendment. guest: another hugely important case because the first impression was that the court never ruled on section three before and that is another case where the majority and dissent are strongly disagreeing about original understanding. the majority held that the 14th amendment section three is not

self and congress has to act before a candidate can be disqualified and cited as a precedent. justice chase' holdings during the civil war that held congress has to act or former insurrectionist can be disqualified. and dissent said you are making this up that there is nothing that suggests that congress has to act first and in a related case during the civil war, the chief justice seemed to suggest that section three was self-executing and no congressional action was necessary and therefore the 37 if you are expanding judicial power at the expense of the history of the amendment. host: gilbert in toledo, ohio, independent. caller: i stayed up late last

night listening to the constitutional lawyer and teacher and he is basically saying the same thing your guest is saying, very nice guest. i have one question, who gets to decide on all of this? is it the supreme court, person to people did not elect? is that the people who are going to decide? and i looked at these people who have been taking bribes and money, millions and millions of dollars and they got to rule on this. i just can't understand why they got to rule on this when they are clearly trying to, i would say overthrow the government. that is what i am looking at.

i don't know how you are seeing it. lawrence tribe said it and this gentleman said it. it is very dangerous they are doing. in the women on the supreme court who are smarter than the men, our voice and echoing this. i would just like to know what this man thinks. guest: the question you identify, who decides? that is one of the central questions in these supreme court decisions. should it be the people of the united states to their elected representatives, should it be the president representing people or congress or should it be judges. in all of these cases, the liberal dissenters are claiming that the court is wrongly aggregating power for itself and making federal judges the last word in deciding and in that

sense diverting or second-guessing the democratic process. it was exact charge the conservatives made during the morning and burger era that liberal judges were subverting the decisions and exalting their own power and how the tables are turned. i appreciate your nice words. i am trying to describe the arguments on both sides because that is my job at the national constitution center and i do want to make a plug c-span viewers for the amazing interactive constitution that the constitution center has. we have some of the greatest server and liberal scholars in america to write about the constitution, describing what they agree about and disagree about so that is been, the people, can decide. if you click on the habeas corpus clause, you will see justice amy connie barrett and others about what they agree and disagree about.

it is marvelous and extraordinarily rich and important resource page you can go to any of the articles we are talking about and read the essays and the primary text associated with them and watch the videos and listen to the podcasts so that you can make up your mind because in the end, we, the people have to decide. host: independence day is the day after tomorrow. i wanted to touch on your most recent book which is called "the pursuit of happiness." what did the founders mean by the pursuit of happiness and why do you think they put that in? guest: this was the most meaningful project covid error i have engaged in wanted to figure out what thomas jefferson in the founders had in mind -- covid era i have engaged in and wanted to figure out what thomas jefferson in the founders -- and

the founders had in mind. the section on ethics, there are philosophers and then enlightenment philosophers and when i read the books, i was first that all of them contained the phrase "the pursuit of happiness and they find that is not feeling good but being good. not the pursuit of immediate pleasure but long-term virtue. by virtue they meant self-improvement, character improvement, being your best self and overcoming your unreasonable actions and emotions like anger, jealousy and fears you can achieve calm tranquility that allows each of us to be our best self. it was a transformative experience for me to recognize the close connection the founder c between personal government -- the founders saw between personal government and professional and through

self-improvement they think the republic will fall in the brooks profile for all of the founders, franklin, adams, abigail adams, lesser-known great founders like phyllis wheatley, the first black poet and warren and james wilson and asked how did they apply this in their lives. they struggled constantly with anxiety, self-doubt, wondering if they were using their industry enough. but what is so sorry about them is what readers they were. i had fallen out of the habit in doing daily reading and inspired by jefferson's schedule, i read for two hours every morning and watch the sunrise the sonnets summing up what i learned and have tried to keep that habit of the meeting ever since now when i wake up rule that i am not allowed to browse or serve until i have done my reading and it is amazing how much greeting you can do when you do it every morning and i am so grateful to

the founders for having inspired this. host: max is in maryland, republican. caller: this was an interesting discussion and was breezed over quite quickly to points that were at the crux of this decision made by the supreme court. what was asked was good the current president detain the former and current political rival of the current president and be immune for those things after he was out of office, regardless of how it unfolds. he could under the auspice of protecting democracy for preserving democracy will lock up a political enemy. you could in this instance do that. on top of that, that if you don't agree with somebody and you believe there is a danger to democracy that you can don't attack them as long as they are

offshore and not in the united states. guest: you're so right that the focus of the majority opinion is the danger a former president might be prosecuted by a vindictive sitting president. that is what the immunity is designed to prevent. it is the sitting president who controls prosecutions and the fear that those vengeful prosecutions might deter you know former president while he is in office is the focus of the majority's concern. in the drone strike example is also one that the descent -- the sense -- dissents used. that is the nature of the dispute. host: jeffrey rosen national constitution president and ceo in the offer of the book "the

pursuit of happiness." thank you for coming in. happy fourth of july. guest: remember that the second was when it was voted on. let's celebrate today, tomorrow, and on july 4. host: later we will talk in campaign 2024 and the role of young voters with a progressive commentator and a conservative commentor. but first, more of your phone calls in open forum. start calling in. democrats, republicans -- democrats (202) 748-8000, republicans (202) 748-8001, independents (202) 748-8002. >> saturday, american history tv

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hosted by the brookings institution right after this program at 10:00 a.m. eastern. also, last thursday senator's sheldon whitehouse of rhode island in bear cassidy -- bill cassidy posted a debate and topics included kleinman and energy policy, border security, immigration, health care and abortion. the senate filibuster and also the state of u.s. democracy. you can watch that debate tonight at 8:00 p.m. eastern here on c-span and also on c-span now and c-span.org. going straight to the funds, myron in norwalk, -- going straight to the phones, myron, california. caller: i would like to comment on president drum -- biden stepping down from the race and

i have some comments about kamala harris also. i would like to see president biden drop out of the race and i would like to see him finish his term in office and leave the white house. i was very to see during the debate that president biden had the state of decline and he is certainly one of the most talented. host: what is it about sure that you particularly like? -- what is it about amy klobuchar that you particularly like? caller: i like kirk from minnesota. she was my favorite cake during the last presidential election, although i have no voting for president biden also. you might remember she was one

of the last front runner still standing back in 2020. but she graciously stepped aside and gave her endorsement when president biden entered the picture. i think she could have been a very effective vice president under president biden but after the controversy with george floyd it became apparent that a vice presidential pick of some of color was probably more appropriate. i think amy klobuchar extremely knowledgeable and on the issues of interest to the american public. she is the real washington pro and a person with experience and dedication. i don't we need any more amateurs in the white house, especially billionaires who can buy their way in and out of trouble. some of these individuals launch challenges in the courts and

that may have possibility of undermining our country when it suits their purpose. host: let's talk to lou in tampa, florida, republican. caller: thank you for taking my call. i have a couple things to mention. i am concerned that we are not talking about so many issues facing america. i see some wildfires in canada and

what percent of the population of america holds in percent of the wealth. it is not a problem? these are issues we have to discuss and there has to be more fairness in america. a lot of people are struggling. thank you for taking my call. host: -- moses in newark. are you there? florida, democrats. good morning. caller: i am just wondering who these people are.

we just gave him permission to steal everything. you will store the dollar. i texted the "washington journal over a year ago telling you to tell everybody that it is over. what happened to the $500 billion that donald trump in 2020 from the cares act? nobody is asking about that. no wonder he still has power. $500 billion. they told members of congress that where the money went is a secret. that has never happened before in this country. the "washington journal said nothing about it. where did the money go? we just gave trump permission through the supreme court to steal every ounce of gold this country has got. he is going to destroy the dollar and destroyed the country. he has already done it. he has made us a third world

country. who are these people to story -- who are these people who support him. how did this happen? how did we get to this point and how did you guys let it happen? you let it happen. the "washington journal" let it happen. you didn't tell the truth you didn't tell people what a thief trump was. it is over. host: on the public in line, jacksonville, florida, diane. caller: good morning. sorry you had to experience that anger. i am studying russian because it looks like that is the direction america is headed toward being a dictator country. i am very that and by the supreme court ruling, even though i am a republican i am

said that any president, biden, trump, obama, whoever would have that kind of absolute power. i would like for people to come together as a country and realize that no president should be above any law and that is basically about it. host: i am curious why you are studying russian because you think we are going to be a dictatorship? caller: yes i do. when i say that, because i actually believe trump is in cahoots with russia. it is always been my feeling and it has nothing to do with hillary clinton. i wish they would stop even mentioning her name. you know what was president and she never had power so i don't know why they are infatuated with this woman. she is and is sitting with her grandchildren. we need to move on and focus on

what is happening now, not what happened when hillary was running for office. that is past tense. i am scared that given the president that much power is going make a present morals break all kinds of laws. i am not even worry about him stealing the gold. he has been doing that all the time when he was resident, they were seeking money out of there. at least that is what i believe -- when he was president, they were seeking money out all of the time. at least that is what i believe. the part that scares me is when a man talks like that. host: called in marietta, georgia, independent line. caller: i am calling because the decision that the supreme court

made it is scary. as an african-american, a veteran that lived under segregation, i know where this is headed. i want to set the stage because i hear all of the republicans calling about democrats versus republicans doing this. the republican party was formed in 1854. they were liberal abolitionists there they were trying to stop from moving to the west. the republican party was founded by hoodlums. the civil rights bill in 1964, that was every democrat outside of the south voted for it. the only ones who voted against it were the conservative dixiecrats. when the supreme court is now giving license to trump which i

agree with the last collar, to become a dictator and in this country into a dictatorship. i lived under segregation. i know what it is about it i was born under and lived under it and served in the military during the cuban missile crisis. what it allowed him to do is turn this country back into segregation. an example, black lives matter, he doesn't like them. he would have his military round them up and put them in concentration camps. he could do that to anybody. if this country doesn't wake up, we will be in a dictatorship. and to the blacks, that is important. those who don't remember the past are destined to live it. host: cap, a democrat.

good morning. caller: -- jack, a democrat. good morning. caller: like to dictatorship is. find the flag upside down, this country is going in a handbag. i am 90 years old. one thing the caller said about russian stuff. i think trump and putin big buddies we are going to have three of them trying to take over. host: time in woodbridge,

virginia, republican. -- tom in woodbridge, virginia, republican. caller: i just cannot over how ignorant so many people are about how our government works. they insist on saying the democracy, but it is not, it is a republic and most of them don't know the difference. this is demonstrating the failure of our public education system. host: tell me what the distinction is for you between a democracy and a republic. caller: thank you. what it means is this, we are 50 dates, individual democracy that have come together to form a union. so that is why we have a representative government where

we send to senators and a number of congresspeople to represent states values level so that there is a uniform rule of law over the whole country and enforced universally over the entire country, even though we are separate dates. when you talk about a democracy at the federal level, it is really just like the delusion because it is it is a democracy at the state level but as a public at the federal. the other part of that is that is why our electoral college works the way that it does. if we did not have this representative form of government, then you could become the president with just the votes of three or four states and three or four big cities. south dakota can go to hell,

montana can go to hell. you would not need votes from the smaller states. that is a very simplistic way of explaining it. people do not understand we are a republic and that is what has made us so strong. there is no such thing as the popular vote for a president. it does not exist in the constitution. it is a leftist narrative which is a direct attack. talking about the popular vote is a direct attack against the constitution. the last thing i will say is i think the supreme court, the last several decisions ultimately going back to roe v. wade, what the supreme court is doing is they are restoring power back to the people and they are getting the bureaucrats

out of our lives. restoring our rule of law based on the constitution. that is why the presidential immunity situation is so important. you hurt your last guest. presidential immunity is essential -- you heard your last guest. presidential immunity is essential for a president because they have to make decisions that their political enemies would prosecute them for down the road. this protects democrats and republicans at the executive level from having the executive weaponize itself against its political opponents. host: we got it. don in new orleans. independent line. caller: happy independents day

to all of the independents. we look at the issue of caveats. the constitution ward against tierney and having a -- the constitution warned against tyranny and having a king or queen or monarchy. the implications financially and in the law. caveat emptor. then you have caveat ventor. sellers beware. caveat lector. be mindful of what you read. caveat auditor.

be mindful of what you hear. we have a responsibility for freedom and democracy. people say this is a democratic republic. it is also a capitalistic society. host: let's get one more call in. jackie in milford connecticut, democrat. caller: to all trump supporters, listen carefully. if biden loses the 2024 november election he can tell vice president kamala harris to not certify the electoral votes just like trump told pence to do. now the supreme court says this is an official act and biden would get away with it. host: up next we will be talking

about campaign 2024 at the young vote. we have two commentators, progressive david pakman and conservative tonny kinnett joining us right after the break. stay with us. ♪ >> stay connected to c-span for uninterrupted and unfiltered glimpse of democracy at work. watch the republican and republican -- watch the republican and democratic national conventions on c-span, c-span now, and online at c-span.org. c-span, your unfiltered view of politics, powered by cable. >> nonfiction book lovers,

c-span has a number of podcasts for you. listen to bestseller nonfiction authors and on q&a here interviews with authors and others. book notes plus our hour-long conversations that feature authors. the about books contest takes you behind the scenes of the publishing industry with industry updates and best sellers lists. find all of our podcasts by downloading the free c-span now app wherever you get your podcasts and on our website. >> if you miss any of c-span's coverage you can find it online at c-span.org. videos of key hearings, debates, and other events feature markers that guide you to interesting

highlights. these points of interest markers appear on the right-hand side of your screen. this timeline makes it easy to quickly get an idea of what was debated and decided in washington. scroll through and sprint a few minutes on c-span's -- and spend a few minutes on c-span's points of interest. >> house will in order. >> this year c-span celebrates 45 years of covering congress. since 1979 we have been your primary source for capitol hill, providing balanced coverage of government. taking you to where the policy is debated and decided, all with the support of america's cable company. c-span, 45 years and counting. powered by cable. host: we are back talking about young voters and campaign 2024. joining us are david pakman,

host of the david pakman show, and tony kinnett's host of the tony kinnett cast. to both of you. -- welcome to both of you. guest: good morning. host: i will ask each of you about your program. what is it about? >> my program started on low-power fm radio a very long time ago. longer than i would like to admit. over time it became a syndicated program. now we have moved completely to online platforms, sort of as a decision about where the audience is. youtube is a big platform. 2.2 million subscribers there and we have an audio podcast that is a progressive political commentary ship. host: tony, what about you? guest: the tony kinnett show

started out with me guest hosting on a weekend situation and they did not hate me so they brought me on for a weeknight show. we put that online on twitter and youtube because as david said, with the online explosion of content, whether that is through podcasting or livestream, it is a nice addition to the radio. it is getting to provide conservative commentary and punditry what we like to say is the average hoosier individual out of indianapolis. that has grown as the show has grown into a broader national audience, arguing basic cultural principles in favor of the middle class. host: let's get to the big news of the day which is the supreme court decision from yesterday. what was your reaction? guest: i was not usually surprised. my expectation was there would be some kind of decision that

there are core presidential acts that are absolutely protected by immunity. we can think about the effects of military decisions is often one that is cited. there are definitely some acts that be extraordinarily difficult to justify. it is this middle ground where one of donald trump's attorneys was on tv saying setting up slates of they collectors in the state biden one is an official act. i am not a legal scholar and it will be up to the judiciary to adjudicate that, but it does seem to potentially set up a dangerous president wearing joe biden as an official act could determine trump is a threat to the nation or whatever come up to and including an

assassination, and from the legal opinions i am reading that is the big concern, which is once you have opened up this door, where does it stop? i think it should be concerning to people on the left and the so-called constitutional conservatives as well. host: tony, what you think of that? guest: as a former teacher i will be moment when my students did not read the assignment and that is what i've seen from left-leaning individuals, who are making up things about kings and pulling things out of chief justice roberts decision in creating a new scenario in which the president is immune from all these things that is not at all what the decision states. the president of the united states has official actions outlined in the united states constitution and legal precedent and the supreme court says it is up to lower courts like the one trump is currently involved with to determine whether his actions regarding the election were official and therefore immune,

or unofficial and therefore subject to prosecution. host: what you think of that as far as the official acts related to the january 6 the indictment? caller: the supreme court was very specific and clear in this case they were not making any decision based on these actions because it is not their place. the rover court has not ruled on that. injustice amy coney barrett she stated quite clearly that -- and justice amy coney barrett stated quite clearly that if trump did something with collectors that would be subject to prosecution. you're not hearing it from left-wing pendants because of the handwringing of kings seems more useful to try voter retention. host: the other big story was the debate from last week and president biden performance on that debate. your thoughts on that. guest: i thought as i outlined

immediately after the debate president biden's performance was quite poor. i think the real question now for the democratic party is what to do next. the interesting thing is that in addition to president biden's performance being quite poor, former president donald trump's performance was also terrible. there was a 64 second period where he told six lies, which is extraordinary rapidity and pace. i think there is real question around does biden get replaced? there are people who drive cliques are taking very black-and-white positions on this. president biden absolutely must be replaced or absolutely must not be replaced. it is a difficult thing to be determined. most of the folks whose names are being floated as a replacement actually pull worse

than president biden. i think it is a difficult situation. on the other hand i also recognize that former president trump lost in 2020 and since then incited a riot on january 6 , was indicted four times, was convicted on 34 felonies, was found to be a civilly liable sexual assault or which a judge determined meets the definition of rape. it is hard to imagine starting with the 2020 loss and somehow winning in 2024. i think anybody making it appear as though this is a cut in dry here is what is going to happen is definitely putting the cart before the horse. host: tony, your thoughts on what david just said. guest: i think david is right on the money when it comes to the democrats being between a rock and a hard place when it comes to getting rid of him or not. if biden steps down it is unclear whether the campaign

funds donated to the biden harris campaign can go with them. that is a huge issue considering trump is out raising as far as money is concerned. americans have known biden has been mentally declining for some time while a lot of individuals on the left try to assure americans that he is fine. he is just slow down. there were paratroopers all over the place. certainly he was not following up the stairs. now americans have seen the democrat establishment is very willing to lie to them about the president's condition and they cannot replace the president, they can also not keep him because he continues to deteriorate by the day. as someone who is taking care of an individual in my family with dementia, i mean this, there no aspect of punditry, it does break my heart to see a man who should be retired and spending time with his family being paraded around the country for political tokenism. guest: there a couple of

different things. sometimes in these formats it can be hard to unwind each aspect of it. a couple of things i think are important to discuss. one is it is simply untrue that former president trump is out fundraising president joe biden. look at the fec documents. between 50% and 100% more fundraising from the biden campaign then from trump. i think the second important thing to talk about is when it comes to fitness, the postdebate poll from abc on this issue found that 72% of americans believe biden is not fit to serve and 54% believe trump is not fit to serve. if we want to do talking points and grenade launching discussion

we can do it. being knowledge the difference in the percentage of people who believe biden and trump are unfit to serve is relatively slim. i am sure my counterpart has seen videos of donald trump adding completely wrong who was president, who he ran against, who ran into thousand eight, who ran in 2012, the name of the person in charge of capital security on january 6, looking around for rudy giuliani, wondering away and having to be brought back to his car. the numbers show is a difference, but i do not think that tells the story of what will happen in november. it is dishonest to suggest that. host: you wanted to respond? guest: i find it concerning that after describing the president of the united states who many americans observed falling apart on national television, immediately the response is but trump.

host: you bought up -- you brought up trump immediately regarding his decision. -- guest: you brought up trump. the president of the united states is currently deteriorating in office. regardless of what you think about trump or rfk junior. guest: i did not mention any of those. host: let him finish. guest: the clear point in this situation is that i have seen donald trump in the last couple of months do several rallies without once looking at a teleprompter. going on several different tensions. the president of the united states in his current situation cannot even get through reading a teleprompter at a rally without tripping over himself like donkey kong walking over a banana peel. it is insipid to think otherwise. host: holland. -- hold on. guest: where did trump do a

three hour rally? guest: trump has done three hour rallies in addison, michigan. host: if you'd like to join our conversation with our guests, you can do so. our lines are democrats (202) 748-8000, republicans (202) 748-8001, and independents (202) 748-8002. we also have a line set aside for voters under 35. if you're under 35 we would love to hear from you. that number is (202) 748-8003. you could also use that same line to text us. there is a youth poll harvard did in the spring and one of the findings was for young voters was there was broad support for a permanent cease-fire in the israel-hamas war. where are you on that? what are your thoughts on how

republicans can appeal to those young voters. guest: the core issue with a lot of foreign policy situations would probably boil down to specific assets. one being there or not a lot of specific details regarding the conditions of a cease fire, regarding hostage release, as well as a lot of the places those polls were taken, university settings in which students, many on the left have strange pro-hamas and pro-palestine sentiments. it is not surprising. people tend to grow more conservative as they grow older, and that is shown by the increase of information that comes from taking a look at foreign policy situations around the world and perhaps not something you have seen from viral progressive video on tiktok. host: david, your response on foreign policy and the israel

hamas war? guest: is one of those conventional wisdom's that is not true that people get more conservative as the age. at any point you survey people older generations are more conservative. there is no evidence that people become more conservative as they age. that is not the main thing. it is tough to keep up with the firehose of falsehoods. as far as the foreign policy issue, israel-gaza. foreign policy in general and specifically israel-gaza rank between 10th and 15th or not at all and torments of order of importance in terms of 18 to 29. this issue generates strong feelings for anybody, including young voters. i struggle to find the data that suggest it will be an issue in this election, given what the

voters are saying about the importance of economy and education and the border and so many other issues. i recognize their voices that say that is their issue on which they will vote. in the polling it does not seem to be polling at that important of an issue to any group, including young voters. host: let's talk to a young boater. this is michael in texas was under 35. good morning. caller: how are you doing. david, i like your show but i've a question for tony. i feel like it is disheartening to have a president in a country where freedom is supposed to be our main thing we have someone who can ban you from tsa without it being able to be looked into by congress. can take away people's immigration status through ice. it is super scary. as someone trying to build a life in this country it is super scary to me.

host: michael, how are you? caller: caller: i am 20 years old. host: who are you planning on voting for? caller: joe biden. host: tony, your response? guest: the question is -- i am struggling to find the question. if you're concerned that a president can order the tsa or order a bureaucratic organization in the government to simply revoke rights you have as a citizen, that is not true. there is no legal precedent that allows any executive official to simply write off your rights as a citizen in the united states. if you are here as a legal immigrant or you are here is a citizen, you enjoy the same rights and freedoms that are entitled to your particular status. as a foreign national you cannot be written off by the tsa just because. there has to be a verifiable threat given some of the ones we've seen regarding individuals

connected to terror organizations. those individuals were not here as legal immigrants. i understand the concerns regarding bureaucratic organizations. they have a lot of power. as far as writing things off carte blanche for individuals with set in stone rights, that is not something that occurs in this country. host: john in california, independent line. caller: thank you for taking my call. my comment or question is here is the next day and trump's attorneys are already trying to have the manhattan case dropped. he is going to try to get out of every single thing he has ever done. my question is if he becomes president and after four years he decides for the benefit of the nation i will remain president, and he tries to do exactly what he did in 2020 to negate whatever the results of

an election are, can he be prosecuted? host: david, do you want to take that one? guest: is a question for a lawyer. it is speculation. the caller is correctly bringing up a major fear that has been opened up. the idea that sending a slate of fake collectors to say we cast our electoral votes for trump even though biden won, arguing that is an official act is very scary and that is not a hypothetical. it was done by one of donald trump's attorneys yesterday. i think the pollard's right to be scared. it is a question i do not have the answer to. host: tony, part of a harvard youth poll says confidence in public institutions continues to decline among young people. what you think needs to happen to turn that around? guest: a few things. these public institutions that have taken the trust of americans and thrown it away

needs to be evaluated in the amount of power they hold, reevaluated in the structure. we have unelected bureaucrats at a lot of these institutions. host: give us an example. guest: in my field, the department of education which is governed by fiat over the last several decades and has written all of these weird and not scientifically backed rules as far as academia and education is concerned for states to receive education funding that creates a spaghetti bowl of laws and regulations intertwined with each other and a large mass. when the system goes wrong it creates backdoor regulatory flag you have to jump hoops through. you lose a lot of trust in that institution. there needs to be a reevaluation of this fourth branch of the government, this idea that has been an abysmal failure in the united states. host: david, your reaction.

guest: it will not shock you that i've a different perspective than tony as far as institutions go. i know this is not the sexiest conversation. if we zoom out at a basic level, the larger society gets the more we need to have institutions to which we can delegate. my preference would be we properly fund our institutions with the right amount of oversight. i am the last person to say take some money and do whatever and let's talk to you in 15 or 20 years. when it comes to the department of education or fda or whatever institution, i think the only way forward as far as anthropology and group psychology and sociology and all of these sciences take us is we

need these institutions, but we need proper and correct oversight. they need to be adequately funded. that is the starting point for what are the most successful countries and ways of organizing ourselves. i know it is very top level. starting from a point of taking away power for the sake of taking it and defunding for the sake of defunding. rick perry listing off departments and forgetting which ones they were he wanted to eliminate. i think it is backwards and i think the global success of the countries with the best business environments and the highest standards of living show us that is the right approach. the way project 2025 once to. guest: -- the way project 2025 wants to. guest: the executive branch

increasing its authority unilaterally. you would also increase the authority of the executive branch with these bureaucratic organizations. guest: certainly not. my point was a broader one. nothing in what i said gives the president as an individual more power. if we learned anything during the trump presidency, it is that a lot of people on the left came around to what some on the right believed. maybe we do not want -- maybe our checks and balances are not strong enough, maybe we do not want so much unrestricted power. my point is a different one. it has nothing to do with presidential power. guest: who appoints the bureaucratic heads of those organizations? guest: the president appoints some of them, but as we know now what project 2025 wants to change is taking career bureaucrats and making them even more of them political appointees. it sounds like what you're

advocating for is going the opposite way of what trump and project 2025 have said they want to do. if i understand correctly, i'm sure you'd announce project 2025 on that basis. guest: i am confused as what you're suggesting project 2025 has to do with the administrative state appointed by the president of the united states. guest: i am confused as why you do not think taking the institutions we have, what you say are already too politicized and saying let's replace the career bureaucrats with overtly political actors, how that gets us any closer to the scenario you are try out -- you are drawing up. guest: i did not say replace bureaucrats with different bureaucrats. i said reduce the number bureaucrats. i do not know where i am throwing down the uno wildcard and changing the color of the bureaucrats. the bismarck progressivism that failed in germany has failed in the united states and by

suggesting the sciences are necessary, that anthropologically, psychologically, and social logical he would need to delegate authority is very weird and strangely 20th-century dystopian. host: we will go back to the calls. mike is in new jersey. democrat. caller: good morning. kudos to c-span and the two guests. this is when c-span is at its best when you have two people arguing two different points, bringing up good points on both sides. great job. a question towards tony. i do agree democrats are overreacting to the supreme court decision. i think a lot of it will be the "official" acts and not personal acts. i think the other side of it is watch out, republicans. joe biden is still in office and it opens up the door for a lot of things.

i think the supreme court is anything but supreme. tony, you are talking about your family member that had dementia. i feel for you. you are in education. in lesser education was in a medical field i would stay in your lane and try not to make diagnosis by what you see on tv or what you hear from other people. it is not fair to him and fair to other people that have the disease. my question is did donald trump lose the 2020 election? guest: yes, he lost the 2020 election. i have a background in biological education. as to the dementia, i am referencing his age -- is paid which leaked the president's -- his aid that leaked the president's condition. host: are you saying they set

his been diagnosed with dementia? guest: i said they said he has shown dementia behavior. given the president's availability between 10:00 and 4:00, giving his inability to maintain direct focus, giving his inability to maintain straight lines that are common in almost every single case of dementia we see in the public life, both in the public sphere as far as the media is concerned with corporate diagnosis, and of course that is not an official medical diagnosis. the president of the united states arabs -- has refused to take -- the president of the united states has refused to take a cognitive test. host: morning. caller: my first statement is i do not agree with what the supreme court did yesterday. i feel that this country was founded not on a king.

did we not read the dissent of sonya sotomayor that this president now and do all kinds of things and all kinds of things. what is happening with nixon in watergate, would he now be free? would he have gotten away with all of that? host: who wants to take that? guest: if he had trump's lawyers, they would be saying absolutely, and the same way his fake slate of electors according to trump's lawyer was an official act. i am sure nixon with trump's lawyers would be making a similar argument. host: robert in silver spring, maryland. you are under 35. caller: 34, so just barely.

host: you got in under the line. caller: as an elder young voter, my first election was 2008, obama and mccain. i support trump for two reasons. first i think the democrat party is way too left on the issue of abortion, refusing care to babies that survive abortions. the real reason i am supporting trump is these big democrat-controlled cities, the people are using hard drugs everywhere. all kinds of violent crimes. the district attorneys and city councils are worried about appeasing their progressive electorate.

i wanted to ask the conservative guest, as i am in ethnic minority, has he heard of younger minorities going for trump or voters in general that are worried about issues of unchecked crime in the big cities? thank you. guest: when i went up to michigan just north of detroit and i spoke to young voters on the picket line outside of fort, i did speak to a lot of young people who were black or brown, not on the white slate. they were telling me they were planning on voting for trump. one lady told me trump may be an a-hole, but when he was in

office i had money in my pocket and food on the table. i think that is the most definitive reason a lot of young voters, regardless of color, regardless of creed or class plan to vote for the republican slate in the upcoming election. it is because as david asserted early are the two primary issues for voters being immigration and the economy. host: david, your reaction to the caller's point about violent crime and democrat run cities. guest: fortunately just about everything the caller said is untrue. you can lead a horse to water but you cannot force him to drink. it is a big representation of the problem, which is we are not operating with what we could call a set of facts. his comment about abortion and democrats being too far left, the reality is in many states abortion policy is well to the right of where the average american is.

americans are more in favor today than at any time since roe v. wade was put in place that abortion should be legal in most cases. these ideas of post birth abortions does not exist, does not happen. total conspiracy theory. widely debunked. with regard to the economy, and this goes not only to what the caller said but what tony said. whatever this one person tony spoke to who said she had money under trump, we know that under joe biden's when we have seen wage growth exceeded inflation for the first time in a very long time. the first time we've seen unemployment below 4% for this long. when it comes to the issue of law and order the caller said we need trump to get us back to law and order. trump is the convicted felon. trump is the guy who says criminals convicted on january 6 our hostages he will pardon.

there is nothing further from law and order them donald trump. i know i'm not convincing anyone who believes that stuff. that call is the opinion me of total disinformation taking over someone's brain in an irreparable and unrecoverable way. guest: that is a statement to make. the points he made were about inner-city crime and i would be happy to host you. we could walk through eastern indianapolis force outside chicago. blue run cities with a lovely crime rate. guest: unfortunately anecdotes tell us very little about policy. if you're planning a vacation may you consider anecdotes, but if you want to talk about policy and the historic reductions in crime, we cannot say let's go visit a block of san francisco together. i agree we have a homelessness

problem in much of the country. we have drug use problems in much of the country. i am with you and i want to solve those problems. this playing coy with let's walk through east indianapolis. it does not tell us anything about public policy. host: let's talk to shakir it was under 35. caller: i love this part of the conversation and i appreciate all of the callers. i want to say prayers for our troops home and abroad. i am from a big city and with respect to crime in the big cities, we are worried about the militarized police states as well as the criminalization of homelessness and substance abuse , but also part thefts. i want to speak to david. i want to speak to david. is there a way you can talk to the president. republicans have exacerbated the

boarding -- the border situation. as soon as joe biden became president they were talking about the border is open. if you display those videos and get those tapes and tell them these are the same people who complain about the issue that exacerbated it. people were seeing those videos and they were encouraged to pump because republicans were saying -- they were encouraged to come because republicans were saying the borders were open. that is what they were doing every night. the same drum. it is really despicable. the fact that they were able to send those migrants all over the state, it was very disconcerting. thank you. host: david? any response? guest: i have no access to the president so that will be a different -- a difficult message. maybe tony can help if he has some access.

it is the case that the entire immigration story is an example appear as the stated principle from the republican party but then there is the political reality of it. when republicans worked to put forward a package that would deal with the lion share of the problem they identified or claimed to have identified at the border, trump said kill it because he does not want it solved now. he wants it to remain a problem so he can run on it and claim to solve it if and when he becomes president. i do not think there is much to discuss. i am sure tony will agree that was a bill that was still for political reasons because trump wanted to keep it as a campaign issue and we know solving the problem is not the most important thing. it is having stuff to run and keeping it as a problem. host: tony, your reaction? guest: i do not agree with that and i do not agree with bill's where it is the save the puppy

act and inside the bill it says kill all kittens, and if you do not agree with the kill the kitten things it must be anti-puppies. as far as the border situation, there were things in the bill that did nothing to solve the border. i will not solve it -- i will not sign on to these omnibus packages that do not do anything useful to the country except throwing money to the bureaucracy without holding it accountable. that is what we have seen with ellie on job mayorkas -- with mayorkas. the money was to ferry the people -- i think the immigration system be reformed. by supplementing this cartel trafficking operation which i've seen personally, observe directly where people are brought up to the border, left out in the middle of the desert for u.s. border patrol to pick up and then ferry across the country is a poor use of resources.

expanding that process instead of fixing that process by suggesting donald trump is doing some kind of political chess to solve it after he gets elected. guest: what trump did was too obvious to be considered for deep. -- to be considered 4d. tony and i could both find things in the bill we disagreed with. probably me more than tony. it was negotiated with republicans who trump said as the people to go to on this issue. it had their stamp of approval. it had what they believe needed to be done in trump said you have to kill it. host: let's talk to david in dallas, pennsylvania. republican. but ahead. caller: i have a question for david. i have listened to liberal

pendants including david for months or at least all of last year downplay or ignore biden being extremely mentally impaired. assuming biden does win because we saw in the debates that biden is having trouble doing basic tasks, assuming biden does win, do you think he will be able to perform as president or do think he will step down? guest: i believe he will perform similarly to the last three plus years where we have any economy that is by all traditional metrics doing extraordinarily well. inflation reduction act. infrastructure packages. record student loan debt forgiveness. i know these are not things the caller is likely to agree with. here is my general view in the context that 72% of americans believe biden is fit -- is unfit for the job, 54 percent believe trump is unfit for the job.

if you say either of these guys is unfit, who do you want in the oval office? is it trump with his brown nosing sycophants who will try to implement project 2025, or the people who have been around biden? if they are both unfit the last three and a half years of biden have gone well so i would expect more of that. host: we have a text from paul martinsburg, west virginia. he is rs old and myment to the guest is neither joeen nor donald for the presidency of the united states. i am still holding out hope that both of these candidates will be replaced by the time of each of the national conventions. tony, i will start with you. what you say to young voters who have that feeling? guest: this is why you need to get involved in the primary process. if you have concerns about the

candidate that is up for the general election the primary vote is where you need to get involved. this is something that has lapsed in american society. "it is a republic, if you can keep it," the founding fathers set. if you are like me and you want the government to leave me alone, that is something you have to fight for. you do not fight for that in november of the election year, you fight for that in the primary process making sure the candidate you want gets to the top of the ballot in november. i sympathize with people who do not like the choices they have now. this is not the time to issue those concerns. that was in january of last year , when you really start looking at candidates who you are going to submit for your party until the upcoming election. i get it. this is why primaries are so important. guest: hard to disagree with everything tony is saying. i think you and i are united on this one. guest: wrap it up and send it

home for christmas. host: not quite yet, we still have 10 minutes left. this is from tufts university with the headline 41 million members of gen z will be eligible to vote in 2024. aging into the electorate enjoying a diverse and politically active generation that can have a major impact on elections. david, what do you need to attract those voters that are aging in getting them engaged? guest: the group that is the least likely to actually turn out and vote. what i would say to them is you can have an outside impact because all of the polling methodology and every prognosticator is assuming you are not going to participate, not you as an individual but that your cohort will be the one that disproportionately -- it is

always the age group with the lowest turnout. the message is you can have disproportionately more impact if you and your cohort decide to show up. as tony said, do not to show up to the november presidential election. you have to be involved in the period between elections and the primaries and the off year elections. there are a lot of folks in that age group whose only exposure to the political world is stuff that is algorithmically fed to them on the social media platforms. that is not giving you a full view of what is going on. i would encourage that group to get involved and their impact would be disproportionate because none of the pollsters think they are going to. host: jan in minnesota, line for democrats. good morning. caller: good morning.

i have a question regarding the decision of the supreme court. the more far arching implications of this ruling. if it is not specific to the incidents of january 6, how will it apply broadly in the future? my next question concerns the debate. i watched the debate. i was disappointed in joe biden's performance. in thinking about it seriously, i realized that a two minute time limit was an impediment. joe biden does have a disability. he has a speech impairment. not a mental impairment. he had to take time to consider the questions being asked and the responses of donald trump. donald trump did not respond to the questions asked, he peered off on immigration and crime and

on and on, never truly answering the questions. i think joe biden struggled because he was trying to remember, as any good debater would, the statistics he had to repel what was being stated. in other words, this person, this is the number of crimes, this is the number of immigrants. i think that was the reason for his lapse. he was tired and he tried to have a debate with someone who was not debating. basically spewing information that did not relate to the questions. host: let's get a response. tony, you want to take that? caller: regarding the question about the supreme court's decision, if something is unclear, it goes to the lower courts. the decision of the supreme

court stated clearly that official actions are presumed, there is a presumptive immunity, and if the actions are unofficial they can be prosecuted. the decision as to whether those actions are or are not official goes to the lower courts. for the future it is a lower court decision. when the appeals made past that point, as is stated very explicitly in the decision, that is when the supreme court will make a decision, if that even gets to them. every lawyer on every individual team will argue that the action was official or unofficial. that is for the lower courts to decide. this is why constitutional literacy is important. regarding your second question, president biden made a lot of claims during that debate that had nothing to do with the speech impediment. when he was a senator from delaware, i never noticed any kind of stutter or speech impediment. it only seems to pop up in media

after he was president of the united states. do not notice this during his term as vice president. i will note the president of the united states suggested no soldiers died during his administration, incredibly disrespectful to the 13 who died in afghanistan, as well as the weird claim that he beat medicare. those were at the end of his answer, not at the beginning as your suggestion poses. host: samuel in south pasadena, california. republican. caller: thank you for taking my call. i want to talk about the debate. i like both of them but i think biden is little too old to handle another four years. i thought trump was right on. he did good in those four years. he was under a lot of pressure and having court cases against him and they were trying to impeach him and everything and they put everything they could

throw at him and he is still running the country. i just wish they would let him run the country but he was doing a great job. i don't think joe biden knows what is going on. opening that border and let all of these people through and then beating up the police officers in new york and those girls that died. i wish this -- he did not have to let all of those people in this country. he was even making the move. the far left democrats are the ones that did it and they put that information to his head. i don't think he knows what is going on. host: will get a response. david? guest: that is a tough one to handle for a number of reasons that will be evident to the majority of the audience. what i would say is which far left democrats put which information to whose head to pick up on the last thing the

caller said. host: william in jackson, mississippi. independent line. guest: the caller is gone, sorry. host: i want to ask tony a question at the end of my rant. my grandmother, my great-grandmother, i've been around with dementia. i did not see what other people are seeing. what i saw was two moderators asked a question and donald trump to not answer. he spent his two minutes attacking joe biden. optics is everything. joe is looking at them like you're going to allow him to do this. this is what i want to ask you, tony. don't try to skirmish and politic. what policies does donald trump have that is your favorite policies?

what are your favorite policies? host: we will get that response for you. guest: i can give you three of them. i like the foreign policy situation of carrying a big stick and making sure american interests were protected at home and abroad. economically i was a fan of the tax infrastructure as well as making america energy independent by making sure the drilling practices continued and pipelines had the necessary funding they needed to make sure those were shored up. i appreciated things like remain in mexico and executive orders regarding the border that president biden and alejandro mayorkas major removed the first day of biden's term in january 2021. host: david, i will let you respond as far as what your favorite policies are from president biden. guest: i have to go back to what

tony said. the abraham accords were trump injecting jared kushner into the middle of negotiations that were already ongoing which did not fundamentally impact the israeli-palestinian conflict which trump said jared kushner would solve by the end of his first term. with regard to energy independence our surplus with regards to oil and natural gas under joe biden are bigger than they ever were under donald trump. guest: the strategic petroleum reserve is low. guest: the strategic petroleum reserve is a drop in the bucket compared to the total difference in experts forces imports on oil. all i want to know is that if you like trumps energy independence you must love biden since he grew the surplus, right? guest: i am a big fan of the $5 billion that was given to secretary of transportation pete buttigieg to build electric charging stations of which he

built seven or eight. guest: oil import -- admit biden extended our independence as defined by you. guest: he did not extend our independence. guest: exports versus imports has grown under biden. guest: you can still dislike the guy but you can admit that biden did more of what you like. guest: i am answering your question. if you're talking about pros export regarding the increase of price, that is because you are saying the growth increased does not mean you are good thing. if the graphic goes up that is not a political argument. if we are talking about the cost of services and the ability of resources, those things matter. if you will talk about statistics for biden, saying the oil went up is not a metric of measuring success. guest: is a metric you tried to trump. guest: i said energy independence and i was careful

to phrase it that way. energy independence meaning the united states was able to provide its own resources and away its own citizens for purchase locally sourced energy at a price that was cheaper than the current administration. guest: by that same definition, evening knowledge and it is gobbledygook, biden has expanded that by the same metric. i know i will not get you to agree. host: let's go ahead and talk to another caller. john in missouri. republican. caller: first of all, mr. pa kman, your name is pac-man and you are playing a game. biden has led in 9 million immigrants. social security, medicare, and everything and we have people living on the streets all around the nation. gasoline was a dollar something cheaper a gallon and trump

wanted to keep drilling, keep drilling like you said. biden closed down a lot of the permits to get that gasoline. then what the democrats are doing, they are sending the gasoline leak get an oil to different countries. i worked at a nursing home for years and i worked when people had dementia. the light is on but nobody is home. host: let's get an answer on the energy, david. guest: i do not know that i heard a question in there. can you restate what it was. host: he talked about gas was cheaper under former president trump and he also talked about theborder and 9 million people being let in and given social security and medicare. guest: undocumented immigrants don't get social security and medicare. they don't.