that because this is a mandatory increase the standard for vagueness is precisely the same as the standard we applied to determine whether or not the crime and its definition is in itself vague. in other words, is there a different

vagrants standard for sentencing than a statement whether a crime is at the outset? >> i don't believe it deserves a lesser scrutiny because it is both mandatory and onerous. i am not talking about some other aspects but for that question. and frankly, it suggests that criminal statutes deserve greater scrutiny even though the licensing that gave rise to that statement of every application, they deserve greater scrutiny and this is one of the most onerous penalties we face in practice. >> i understand your argument. to add to the list of crimes or to have an element of a crime. that is the only thing nothing else. >> no, your no your honor, i do not mean to suggest

that at all. it is a better congressional function. >> one move congress to take is to list every requirement they think. another is to say the statute has to have as an element a serious risk of injury to others. but sort of those two. >> your honor, i don't think listing them is that difficult. they list a large number of things. >> listing is okay. saying that crime has to have elements listing danger to another. >> i am not trying to avoid the question. it depends upon what they want to accomplish. almost any almost any sort of felony, they can say so more narrowly to things that are violent they can say so. the so.

the problem is they did not say much of anything. >> i do not want to take up your rebuttal time, time but if congress assigned the committee or person to go through the criminal code of every single jurisdiction and identify those offenses that did not fall within any other provision of aca in the judgment of those individuals residual by standards, how many do you think they would come up with? thousands, hundreds? >> again, it depends on whether congress wants this to be a narrowly decided enhancement or broadly applied three strikes rule. rule. if they gave the commission that guidance instructed by previous cases, then the commission to decide. i do not think it is necessary to look at every state. if they if they specify the definitions like they did for burglary and robbery

that would save an enormous amount of questions and preclude them from having to look at each state code. with the court's permission i we will i will save my last moment. >> thanks, counsel. >> mr. chief justice, and may it please the court the act states, as this court noted, in normative principles that can be applied to various crimes with methodology that does not produce unconstitutional vagueness. >> we did not say anything like that in big a. >> i think i think the court did not volunteer an opinion about vagueness. it did comment in james and said it was not unconstitutional. sykes came later, and the court continued to adhere to the idea that the statute can be applied as it has been four times by the court and in numerous instances by lower court without substantial

difficulty. >> i did not mean to suggest specifically. my issue was it provides a particular test. it points in an entirely different direction. >> what it did was conclude that the similarity of the offenses and residual cause to the enumerated offenses have to be more than similarity of risk and have to have a certain similarity in kind. the court noted that the phrase the court developed purposeful, violent, and aggressive and it made clear that for offenses with a mandatory knowingly or intentionally risk levels provided test. >> it is true. but it points to the problem in my mind. there is no doubt that it causes a risk of physical injury. could it be that congress

really wanted to impose a 15 year mandatory minimum penalty to a person who has two drunk driving offenses prior? it seemed outside the ballpark of what they are interested in which is why i have had a hard time with this in part because of the sentence. fifteen year mandatory minimum and in part because there seems like they had something in mind, but it is hard to figure out. >> i think that it may have been a little bit a little bit too ambitious for the court to try to develop a similarity. that was the petition of the government, for agreed, five did not. we are not asking the court to revisit that today, but once the court developed it it is then considered in sykes whether it provided a uniform

universally a uniform universally applicable test and concluded it was there too restricted to crimes involving negligence liability, recklessness so as not to allow. i think that having done that the court has given guidance to the lower courts there has been some confusion that an opinion in this case could clear up. >> is that all it takes? can we just patch up the statute in ways that have nothing to do with its text? i thought that we did not have any common-law power to create crimes and if that is the case it seems to me it has to be congress. >> i agree. >> congress has not done it and has not done it clearly. it seems to me that the job is over.

>> i agree that the court does not have the power to create common-law crimes. it is engaged in statutory distraction about which members of the court may disagree. this court believes in a similar in kind appropriation, there is a textual vehicle for getting there, the same one that your honor used in the other johnson case the whether batteries involve strong force or simply offensive touching. your honor looked to other laws violent felony, the word being defined and concluded that the word violent in that definition informed what kind of force would count. i think that that was the essential impulse of the court in that case to distinguish between injuries caused by regulatory type violations, pollution and injuries caused in the way that the statute specifies. >> that phrase it seems to me could just as clearly be viewed with confusion.

i do not think certainly not many, i'm not sure any of them involve that aspect. it is not a question of serious potential risk but otherwise its relationship to the enumerated offenses. >> that is not such a big problem. if. the court applies that the way that it did in sykes and the way the lower courts predominantly do it is not a precise system to stickel empirical analysis. congress cannot have envisioned this court and the lower court have available to them statistics that for most crimes do not exist in order to gauge risk levels. it instead intended a judgment exercise based on experience. i want to remind the court that eight members agreed that flight in a vehicle from a vehicle from a police officer in its ordinary case was sufficiently risky to

trigger the residual cause. there was disagreement because of the particular structure of the indiana statute that had an in hands defense that involved via killer flight. >> i i don't know what you mean by a judgment exercised based on experience? what experience do i have regarding these innumerable state crimes? i have not heard any case involving any of those state the state crimes. what experience are you asking me to apply? >> the same kind of like -- logical judgment lower courts have used. >> that is not experience. logic is not experience. logic or experience, which is it? >> it may be easier if i start with the logic. [laughter] logic involves looking at the elements of the offense and asking what the conduct of this offense consists of. let me take an example

solicitation of a child under the age of 14 to engage in sodomy. a court can look at that conduct and say what that requires is an adult attempt to entice a child to a private place to engage in a sex act. is that the kind of act likely as a a matter of logic and ordinary human experience adults are bigger than children. is it likely to produce a serious and potential risk of serious injury? courts don't have difficulty answering that question. similarly in cases of kidnapping you ask what it means. >> i suggest they have not much difficulty because it is a horrific crime, not because there is a basis for saying what the degree of risk and serious potential,

a serious potential risk of injury is. >> i don't think they have to say with precision what the degree of risk is. congress is. congress gave for exemplar crimes to try to illustrate what it had in mind. two of them involved conduct directed against property or potentially a threat of a person and the danger that can arise is confrontation is the burglar encounters someone at the home. >> i see that. i want you to get back to the experience. the thing that sticks in my mind is the indiana case. in fact you look at the words. really you would like to know an empirical fact. how is this? if a larger nest actually used in indiana it might be that it is really used against people who are involved in a violent kind of situation or it might not be.

and and now you turn to experience. i have no idea whatsoever. ) as suggested go and do empirical research. sentencing commissions tried to and cannot start. there there is no where to begin. >> i think the very difficulty and unmanageability suggests that it is not what congress had in mind. mind. what congress had in mind was identifying classes of offenses that judges are confident involve serious potential risks the physical injury to another the similarity to have similarity in kind. what congress expected courts to do was to analyze the conduct involved compare it to the list of offenses and see if risks are similar. >> the department of justice i understand the prosecutor asks.

any guidance coming from the department of justice guidance to the us attorney who will be asking for sentences. >> yes. and they guidance we use primarily an analysis that focuses on looking at the conduct of the elements of the crimes embrace and logically analyzing what it entails, risk of confrontation. >> written guidance? >> yes, there is in the form of guidance memos that we regard as work product involving analytical efforts to separate different offenses into different categories based upon the conduct. to the extent that it comes into play we think that they play with exactly the role that the court used.

first, the court talked about what happens when someone flees from a police officer. >> what about extortion? i mean, the other 3 i can see, burglary, arson explosives, sure. what about extortion? i would be amazed if many of those involve violence and you would know. the extra tee. at the other end of a personal communication or something. if you don't give me money and i am in new york and you are in hawaii, i will reveal such and such. >> i think what congress had in mind, the kind of extortion or someone and.

>> harm. the person who makes that threat poses a risk of carrying it out which creates a degree of danger. >> is that the justice department position? it is just blackmailed. you threatened to reveal something about the person's life. that is not that is not covered. >> the generic definition of extortion, seeking to get property from a person consent by the use of threats -- >> or fear. >> threats or fear. >> or fear. >> yes. [laughter] >> fear includes being afraid. >> that's right. >> you do not assert that extortion cleans only the extortion that the mafia might, you know, pay up or we will hurt you. >> the normal version does not quite get you to the narrow view of export -- extortion that you expressed that is a legal question.

the government might make that option in this court might conclude that similar words should be similarly. >> the problem is not what the government argues but what the prosecutor threatens entering the plea got -- plea bargain negotiations an issue that justice ginsburg touched on. you're putting on. you're putting the defense counsel in a situation where they have to do to making the decision whether they want to believe the five-year minimum. her guidelines say a lot. but you should prosecute the maximum extent that you can't. charge the maximum and in the prosecutors go in and say, i could charge you this much or i could add this charge and then you face 15 years. all right.

people read that and have no idea whether they are covered or not. >> i have no idea. >> the ideas are exaggerated >> not enough of an idea to risk an extra ten years of time. >> not charges in the same way criminal charges. typically charges. typically criminal history is not assembled until after the defendant has pled guilty in the plea deal is being prepared command at that time they are more aware. sometimes that analysis can be done fairly reliably. this court sees cases that pose hard questions. resulting legal questions dividing the lower courts. a wealth of activity below the surface that does not get to this court in which there is not enough difficulty in figuring it out.

on pages eight and nine of my brief we cited 17 examples of easy cases. their circuit splits. the definitions the elements of the offenses. one jurisdiction from another. >> the statute can be vague. >> you don't take that position. >> this court's decision all the way to that position in order to conclude -- >> what is the standard? and this goes back to what justice scalia was explaining before. there are rates that everyone agrees that are unjust and unreasonable. how much do we have to say

the court has shrunk and the margins are taken over before we decided to do this >> the starting.is to look at whether the statue states something of an objective standard or and -- that is a standard that an administrative agency could flush out. for a court to do it would involve -- >> it is the same. even as you describe it identify crimes dangerous stuff, crimes that pose a risk of danger how much danger as much as these four enumerated offenses. no one is sure. one of them seems a lot of danger and a few select cases. it seems even as you describe it, the kind of thing that congress wants to be doing. >> one thing to your description of what they

should do with a apply this analysis. they will look to see if they can identify the ordinary case and determine whether the risk is analogous to the burglar extortion risk of confrontation or the arson explosion risk of unleashing a destructive force. and there may be cases where the analysis applies but this is an important issue that i want your honor to think about. if the court is not satisfied on any one of those issues the government loses, not because loses, not because the statute is vague but because the court is not confident and offense fits within a normative criteria that congress is established. the tigers to the offended. >> whenever the statute is vague the government loses on the rule of validity.

therefore there is no such thing. >> the kind of things that are vague statutes as reflected in his court's opinion are those where there is a tinge of first amendment the protected activity or cases like outgoing with the standard is unreasonable rate. it is a very a very subjective stand. >> the hardest part of this test is determining what is the typical case of this particular violation. what is the typical case of extortion? to take one of the four enumerated come what is a typical case? you seem to think it is i will break your leg of us who pay up. i would've thought the typical cases i will disclose something about your life unless you pay up. >> if the court is faced with that kind of conundrum elixir reported decisions of convicted cases and attempt to determine whether it can identify the ordinary convicted case and if it

cannot conclude the ordinary case involves a greater degree of violence then it will conclude that the government has not -- >> one that you think is easy, kidnapping. 40% of the cases they are talking about the parent that does not have custodial rights taking the child from school and not returning him or her or whatever. that does not pose, i would would say, a serious risk of potential violence. the parent is not going to harm the child. yet, you say it is an easy case. i don't know whether kidnapping is prosecuted more often than a case like that or another more violent case where is extortion for money as opposed to wanting custody of a child.

>> we would have to undertake the effort to try to persuade what we thought the ordinary case was command if we failed and did not muster whatever without -- >> how do you look at that? >> do you look at every charged kidnapping case in the state of arkansas? >> we look at the reported cases in arkansas. >> the problem -- >> i want to get to justice kagan's earlier question. for the reasons that you have heard i would like you to spend an hour sometime before you sit down i made it i'm limiting it on limiting it through the use of your appendix which you her describe a minute ago. looking at the language it is possible within the language to go without interpretation. >> i do not think that interpretation is correct. if you look at the exemplar crimes -- [inaudible conversations] >> if you read the words otherwise involves conduct

you look at the examples each of the four examples, jerry determination and we should read those words as requiring the jury to make the determination that there was a serious potential risk you insist on the element of the crime the words or equivalent of serious potential risk. that is roughly what the suggestion was on the other side. i did not want you to sit down at any time you like without addressing the possibility. >> i can adjust it quick -- i can address it quickly. >> excuse me, she me she did not propose it as a construction of the statute but said clearly this court could not adopt that but congress good. that was her proposal. >> i just wanted -- we agree

with the petitioner. the exemplar crimes do not involve an element characteristically of serious potential risk of physical injury to another. another. arrives because of the elements of the crime and the original clause as a freestanding clause and the exemplars were added back in -- >> i see. >> so that is not really a viable solution. the viable solution is for many crimes they do not pose the empirical conundrums. when they do, and the government is not able to satisfy the court or the court is not able to be satisfied there is a fix on the ordinary case that it can say the risk is comparable to the exemplar

crimes. the crime falls out. you can you can have many crimes no one ever contests are covered, mail fraud, gambling and crimes that we have lifted that are not seriously contested. we lifted -- we listed 17 of them. to have to be set aside. >> i think even in the ones that you think are easy they are only easy in the abstract. that was a good example. everyone has a sense that it is dangerous if people flee from a police officer but it turns out there are all kinds of degrees and we have zero idea. i think that was not a fluke. it is kind of every case. we do not have a sense of the statutes connecting to each other and what statutes are used the dangerous ones come and what are used for more minor variance and that is an endemic problem.

is that not right? >> i think what the court is asking itself when it attempts to apply is not a question of that fine-grained level of empirical precision. congress understood that in most burglaries probably nobody assert. many extortion, no one realizes the threat. yet it regarded the kind of person willing to undertake a crime that could lead to that kind of confrontation is probably subject to an enhanced sentence when they have to other convictions and then go use a gun. >> you are talking about something different. i got check. is this the kind of conduct that a bad person engages in? >> i don't think it is that quite amorphous. a much more serious inquiry.

the way the courts have conducted it this court's decision is an exemplar. a look at the conduct examine it. it involves a minor and that adult. i think it is critical to keep perspective that the idea of substantial risk is shot through criminal law. >> that brings me to the statutes in your appendix. it seems it seems to me that those statutes to require a case-by-case determination by the fact that there was a danger in the particular case. and so that is different from a categorical approach. >> yes. >> yes. >> the most of those statutes would survive if this court ruled against you

here. >> it depends upon the rationale. if the rationale were the concept of substantial risk is too amorphous to be grasped and applied in any kind of consistent manner. >> we would never say that. >> but as a logical matter that is essentially what petitioner is saying, it is not possible to get a fix. >> she is saying that you cannot tell the typical crime. when you cannot tell the typical crime you can't tell what the risk is do it for extortion. >> if you cannot tell the typical crime, the government loses. >> that sounds wonderful. the government loses because of the role that the tie goes to the if defendant. that sounds defendant. that sounds wonderful, but one court will say yes. another court will say that the government wins.

we will have to review every one of these until the law is clear. >> the court does what it typically does, review cases and established general principle. the lower courts make an effort to harmonize rulings. it it is not unique the statute has generated a lot of litigation. three different cases interpreting the meaning of the word use and one interpreting the word carry higher ratio of cases to words for mobile what it says is that when there is a lot of stake many years of prison time people litigate hard. >> is the test the same year for vagueness as when determining the validity of a statute? >> i i don't think that is so clear. this court indicated there is a lesser degree of

clarity required for vagueness doctrine in the sentencing context. >> when it is a mandatory -- mandatory five years no possibility. if it were up to me this person should get two thirds. really clear statement. >> let me say two things about that. the statute involves recidivism. there was never a question about what conduct was prohibited. he knew or should have known because because the statute is applied as a matter of law by courts with do novo pellet review it achieves a a level of clarity through

the litigation process that will be sufficient to meet whatever heightened standard the court might impose. >> i disagree with the statement you made. because there is so many involves people litigate hard. i think people won't litigate it all. when they go to trial facing such a large enhancement i think there will be compelled -- it gives more power to the prosecutor in the plea negotiation. >> not so much year for two reasons, mr. chief justice. section nine 22 g prohibits possession of a weapon. i we will not say that there are no contested cases, but it is not the hardest crime to prove. the 2nd thing, it is not totally up to the prosecutor. the presentence report we will indicate the defendants pre- criminal history.

i don't think this context presents quite the same plea-bargaining pressure. >> now about the prior times how is the judge supposed to no? >> mansur? the chief sentence report required to be prepared by the probation officer does a criminal history check, get his information, synthesizes it, and makes recommendations. >> thank you. three minutes remaining. >> thank you, your honor. briefly, i think this is an evolutionary answer. we look through every opinion we could find. we did not find a single case nationwide were a court has applied validity to find a marginal case should not

count under the residual clause. if you will post the solution of the government suggests it needs substantial invigoration to be the answer in the gray area. the 2nd thought is that this suggestion that the court can decide what the ordinary case is from reported decisions is also skewed in favor of the government. consider a standard offense were some someone a fair -- commits a less egregious case were all they do is refuse to be handcuffed versus resisting arrest. this case is likely to get a higher sentence and lead to appeals and challenges and a report decision. perhaps more likely to be resolved with a suspended sentence and never appear in reported case law. so if all we're doing is turning to the reported case fund that will give an artificially skewed sense of the aggressive nature of those cases. finally, well it is true this court has granted it

provides an example of what is supposed to happen. when this court points out a flaw in a statute which your honor's have now done for different times, congress answered and changed it to try to address the court's decision and concerns. that answer has led to additional questions. let's give and let's give and take discourse is missing in this case where it has been clear for a long time the statute needs help. i think that the idea that i should go to the defendant is important, but it is not happening because of the subjective .-dot check your honor his mentioned. judges substitute a feeling of a sexual a sexual offense involving a minor sounds better violent, so it must count. i invite your honors to look at the footnote where we

highlight there are several cases finding where the offense is unlawful because of the age, it does not count as a violet effective are violent offense. that has. that has to be more quantified, limited, have specific guidance. whether this court decides in favor of mr. johnson on the merits application of the rule of validity deciding that the statute is unconstitutionally vague as applied to possessor offenses or whether this court takes the steps i think it is time for and declares this cause unconstitutionally vague i think the appropriate result is from mr. johnson to win and be resentenced. >> thank you, counsel. the case is submitted.

>> "washington post" national security reporter on the situation of the middle east in his opinion on the 2003 invasion of iraq. >> one of the things about the bush administration was to never claim to be an expert on the middle east or iraq and proved it and history has proved it. we look at things from our own.of view and we get deceived by it. you can go back to vietnam as a great example of the 1st time we should have dated openly but have a history trying to think other people are like us. the world is different particularly in the middle east it is a totally different culture. >> sunday night at 8:00 o'clock eastern and pacific on c-span q&a.

♪ >> good evening, and evening, and welcome to the latest in our conversation with the candidate series. our guest this evening bernie sanders. i we will i will get to know him and where he stands on the key issues out there. i we will ask the candidates questions and after the break we will have studio

audience asked questions. before we start with that that, let's get a quick look at the candidates biography. the influence of big money and politics. married with four children

and seven grandchildren. >> let's introduce senator bernie sanders. a lot of candidates. you are independent. what party should you running? >> that is one of the issues where dealing with right now a lot of disappointment and disillusionment with both major political parties, and i am the longest serving independent. on the other hand putting together together a campaign in 50 states outside the two-party system requires a lot of time energy, and money. >> is there a preference? >> if i were a billionaire. i am not. >> the likelihood is you would run as a democrat. let's talk about some of the things that have been in the news. a lot of opinions. combating islamic terrorism.

>> let me start off by saying that i was disappointed but the letter sent by 47 of my republican colleagues essentially chine to sabotage the effort of john kerry and the obama administration to reach an agreement so that they do not develop a nuclear weapon or do it in a way that does not require. we have been in two wars. against the war. i do not want to see a a never-ending quagmire. i hope very much that agreement will be part of it the 2nd issue, i get concerned by countries like saudi arabia who literally border iraq where isis is functioning and say, we want american troops on the ground. saudi arabia -- and people

don't know this -- the third-largest defense budget in the world. uk. at the end of the day the war is about a war for the soul of islam which will have to be one by the muslim nation and so. we should be supportive and are supportive of the air attack. the day-to-day struggle being waged by the muslim countries themselves. >> more limited approach and know boots on the ground. >> correct. >> as to the letter you are alluding to do you believe they should have the capability? >> absolutely not. destabilize the region that is already extraordinarily unstable.

if it's a war i want to do everything i can. the process to prevent. >> the role of the middle east. we are we're seeing homegrown instances of where they are able to recruit. >> organe region. along with the rest of the industrialized world we have to give them support in terms of airstrikes, special operations but we have been at war for well over a decade. the cost has been extraordinary. the idea of getting involved in a never-ending war in that region disturbs me. the muslim countries themselves will have to take the lead.

>> you know what, burying your head in the sand. by the time we get aggressive they will be on our door. >> i don't accept that. we have been in afghanistan and iraq. how did it work out? i think it destabilize the entire region and let the many of the problems nursing right now. i don't think the united states is going to win the war for the soul of this country. they are going to have to be >> how much does the immigration debate play a a role? do you believe that to be separate? >> primarily a separate issue. >> as that issue is being debated a lot of people believe the country can't

sustain. >> i believe i voted several years ago against the immigration bill because they were positions and then i worried me very much. real unemployment is 11 percent african-american youth unemployment is higher than that. i do not think we should bring in low-wage workers from -- public countries. on the other hand what i believe absolutely is that we need to develop a path toward citizenship. it will not ship them elsewhere.

the last bill, which i did support, managed to get 1,000,000,000 and a a billion and a half dollar provision amendment included which would provide money for youth employment opportunities, a significant step forward. >> beefing up border security, a priority? >> sure, absolutely. >> we will take a a quick break and get to our audience. stay with us. ♪ >> now conversation with the candidate continues. continues. ♪ >> welcome back. tonight's guest bernie sanders. questions from the audience. let's get to our 1st question from the audience. in addition to voting in each of our elections what

can we as individual citizens do on an ongoing basis to hold this congress more accountable. >> i think that is extremely important question. in my view what we have right now is a congress heavily dominated by big money interests and large campaign contributors. that is the sad reality. billionaires families spent hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars. we have to address the issue of voter turnout. you are right in saying the least we could do is vote but 62% of the american people did not vote. 80% vote. 80 percent of young people did not vote. lower income people did not vote. the 1st thing we have to do is create an environment american democracy is supposed to involve all people, not just the people on top. what we need to know is developing a middle-class

agenda that says that our main section in congress is to reverse the decline of the american middle class. raising the minimum wage in my view, raising the millions of jobs that this country desperately needs to asking the wealthiest people to stop paying their fair share of taxes. politicians in washington are not prepared to support the middle class thank you but no thank you. your you. your term is over. >> i thank you for your question. this one coming from kathleen allen. >> thank you for being here. with the average security yearly earned income of around $15,000 how to seniors get the message accepted by politicians and the voters that we cannot afford cuts to the social security and medicare programs whether by privatization plan cuts. >> thank you for that

question. i said that as the founder of the defending social security carcass in the senate. senate. just a few facts. let me be very clear. social security is going broke they are simply not telling you the truth. today social security has $2.8 trillion and can pay out every benefit owned. social security is not going broke. the average is getting $14,000 a year. seniors in new hampshire, vermont will try to get by on 11 12 13,000 per year. criminal and cool to talk about cutting benefits for those people command i have helped lead the fight.

what is the solution? we are not in crisis. right now if someone is making to million-a-year someone's making 118,000 and are paying the same exact amount. you lift that $250,000. you not only extend social security until 2060 that expand benefits. i was just last week at a press conference with the national committee to preserve social security and medicare. 2 million signatures on petitions from seniors all across the country, don't cut social security. i we will be in a fight with my republican colleagues who want to cut social security. it is an enormously important issue. for so many of our people, we must expanded. >> do you believe that you can expand benefits to social security without means testing? >> what is the mean?

that billionaires. forty or $50,000. an increase in poverty among seniors. people are struggling to determine whether they will pay for food heat, medicine. >> thank you. our next question coming. thank you. >> if you were chosen as the next president of the united states a child born in your inauguration day would probably graduated high school in the year 2035 and retire from the workforce. your ideas, plans policies that you would put in place to ensure that child is able to compete and increasingly complex and difficult marketplace. >> let me be frank.

my views are a little bit difficult. let me start off. we treat children in this country abysmally. every american should be ashamed that we have the highest rate of childhood poverty in the industrialized world. that should not be the case. our track -- child care system is a disaster. very difficult to find quality affordable childcare for kids graduates high school and wants to go to college, and as you indicated a highly competitive global economy kids go to college because the cost is less.

working here, your kids can't go to college. >> the next question coming from social media.

over the years there have been a variety of labels placed upon you not the least flattering of which is socialist. do you feel you are a socialist? >> i am a democratic socialist meaning that it makes sense to look at countries like denmark and norway and sweden and countries throughout europe who have accomplished great things for working families. they don't have great discussions about whether or not people can afford healthcare. it is the right of all people. that is true. guaranteeing health care for all people as a right. something to be learned from those countries. in terms of higher education huge issue. country after country throughout europe have had

labor governments are democratic socialist governments. that was a zero. retirement benefits are stronger. in denmark the minimum wage is about 20 bucks an hour not too bad. i think as a nation we should learn from those countries that have combated child poverty, health care free college education. there and progressive. >> there totally convinced that money buys campaign and are discouraged.

unfortunately it contributes to the huge percentage that do not vote. >> that is an enormously important question. i think it is not only effective and congratulations on your were taking care of the homeless and most vulnerable people in society. it is not just homeless people who think the deck is stacked against them, tens of millions of people who understand that while they may have the right to vote, billionaires can spend hundreds of millions of dollars to buy and sell politicians. changing that will not become easy. i would hope regardless of a political.of view know american is happy on 62 percent of the people not participating. what we need in my view is to give hope to people

through an agenda which speaks to their needs. what the low income people need, decent paying jobs. we have to raise the minimum wage to a living wage. people in the state to make 25, $30,000 year and don't get any overtime when it -- women making $.75 on the $0.5 on the dollar compared to men. we have to change that as well. we should not have homelessness. i have introduced and passed legislation to have low income rental housing so people can live with dignity we have we have some 45 million people in this country living in poverty, more than anytime in the modern history of america and the same time a proliferation of millionaires and billionaires. >> i think the senator. >> my pleasure to be here.

my question is a form of isolationism in order to not send men material command money overseas until we get our own va and social security taking care of. >> i am hearing you say before you spend billions abroad let's take care of the needs of the american people. >> yes. >> as the former chairman of the veterans committee and the senate who worked in a bipartisan way to pass the most significant veterans legislation in many years which significantly improved health care for veterans clearly we need to take care of the people in need in this country. i we will also say that we cannot bury our heads in the sand. sand. it is a dangerous world out there. as i just mentioned, i do not support sending american combat troops into iraq to

take on isis. that is primarily a job of saudi arabia the uae jordan. those countries should lead the effort. on the other hand we cannot be isolationists. isolationists. what you are talking about is changing national priority, taking care of people hurting and not giving more tax breaks to corporations is _-dash money in the cayman islands. why does that happen? that is the power they have politically. that politically. that is what we have got to change. thank you. ..

look, let me touch on an issue that i know is controversial. i happen to believe and agree that the overwhelming majority of scientists can tell us that climate change is real it is caused by human activities, it is already causing devastating problems and if we do not get our act together the situation will only get worse in the years to come. so i believe they need to transform our energy system away from fossil fuel. it is unacceptable to me that you have coal companies and oil companies putting forth all of this carbon and not paying the costs associated with it so the answer is yes.

i do support the carbon tax. >> just to be clear when you talk about climate change being real in your opinion how far should the government go to combat it, deal with it? >> i read with the world's scientists that climate change is a major environmental crisis they think the planet that they are estimating in this country the planet will become five to 10 degrees fahrenheit warmer by the end of this century leading to floods, droughts, weather disturbances, coastal communities under water. i think we have a major crisis and i think the government has got to be very bold along with governments throughout the world not only american problem but an international problem and transforming our international system. >> let's go to social media question from jeffrey flanders. he writes quote a couple of states legalizing marijuana may

consider it. where do you stand on nationwide legalization of marijuana? >> when i was mayor of burlington we had one or two kids smoking marijuana. that was a joke. there were more than one or two. i don't recall too many of them were an issue with the highest priority kids smoking marijuana. i am also have cosponsored legislation dealing with medical marijuana. in colorado was the first state in the country to legalize marijuana. i want to take a good look at the pluses and minuses and we can go from there. >> with a couple of minutes. let's go back to the studio audience right now. >> senator welcome to beautiful downtown manchester. the cost to do with alzheimer's and other dementias are rising in alarming ways yet research to find to prevent these

debilitating diseases is inadequate. would you support investing in high levels of funding for research in order to curb future costs that could bankrupt medicare and medicaid at some point? >> we have about 30 seconds. >> the answer is absolutely and you are at the projection in dealing with alzheimer's is going to be many tens of billions of dollars so it makes a lot of sense to us from a human point of view as well as as well as a cost-effective point of view to try to find ways to help that terrible business and i certainly support funding. >> that's all the time we have right now. coming up next on our conversation with the candidate donald trump is going to be on the program. while we are signing off on television this is the conversation with senator sanders awoke and continue on line as well as our mobile app. 30 more minutes of questions

first duty of audience. thanks very much for walking -- watching. have a great night. >> good evening and welcome to our conversation with candidates. i am josh mcelveen and our guest rand paul kentucky. we will be getting to know senator paul embraced dance on the key issues. the start of the program i will ask the candidates questions and after a short break we'll have our studio audience joined to ask questions of their own in a town hall style format. before we start with that let's get a quick look at the candidates biography. rand paul was born in pittsburgh in 1963. a u.s. senator from kentucky is the son of former presidential candidate congressman ron paul and like his father is a doctor graduating from duke university school of medicine. he founded an organization that provides eye exams and surgery to the needy. he is elected to the u.s. senate in 2010. he is a vocal advocate for

termites a balanced budget amendment and believes the country's debt is a major threat. he's been married for 24 years and has three sons. >> senator paul welcome to the program. good to see you. let's talk about 2016. seems at this point the decisions are all made up. how close are you? >> very close. i've been traveling the country for the last year or two trying to spread a message that maybe is not the same as people apart from republican candidates before to try to gauge whether or not that message has resonance in whether or not the message has enough of a constituency to have a chance. >> poll numbers suggest you have quite a bit of support in new hampshire as did your dad. but do you think there is a ceiling bear because it seems to reach a certain point in how deep ranch that out wring more people into the conversation? >> i think the message i'm trying to put forward has not only constituency in the republican party by the

constituency among independents and democrats. i'm one of the few candidates who is not only fiscally conservative baby as conservatives as they come but who is also reached out and worked with cory booker on criminal justice or kirsten gillibrand on sexual assault. i think it's a mixture of issues that actually is kind where people are. a lot of people aren't neatly republican or newly democratic but some people say plurality are neither. maybe one third of new hampshire call themselves that. >> a lot of people attach the word libertarian they talk about you but the definition varies a little bit. do you consider yourself a libertarian and two what is a libertarian? >> i like to use the word libertarian --. i'm a conservative republican but i'm also libertarian-ish and they believe that i believe in the right to privacy and i

believe the government has no right to be looking at here records unless they have a court order with your name on it probable cause and signed by a judge. i have had a great deal of objection to this old collection of your phonecalls. the warrant that was revealed by snowden said verizon on it. i don't know mr. verizon and mr. verizon has no right to release my phone records. if you want my phone records you put the individual's name on it and you say what papers you want and you should have probable cause that the person committed a crime. a great deal of objection on privacy issues but also criminal justice issues. i'm one of those who i think can attract people beyond the republican party but i'm not a fan of people. i think a a kid that makes a mistake for marijuana shouldn't go to jail. i don't think that a kid that makes a mistake with marijuana should go to jail for 55 years. "rolling stone" had a series and they did an article not long ago. a kid named timothy tyler was

caught with lsd when he was 23 23 years ago. he is 46 now that he will spend the rest of his life in prison for lsd. i don't approve of that. i think lsd is better marijuana is bad but we want to put you in jail particularly this horrendous things happening where people go to jail for decade after decade. if you look at the statistics who is going to jail disproportionately black disproportionately hispanic, does her portion away toward. is an inadvertent racial outcome coming from this but it is real. if you look at surveys of whites blacks and drug use you will find whites are using drugs just as much as blacks however people in prison are black because of the way we do policing police happen to show up in cities and urban environments so it adds up over time. we have a real problem with the criminal justice issues like this their reach beyond the

traditional republican ceiling as you said. >> i would like to ask you about a recent letter that a number of senators sent to the iranian leaders about their irene -- nuclear program. he later explained he did this for all intensive purposes to help president obama and probably raised a lot of eyebrows. >> i'm a stickler for the constitution. the constitution gave the power to write laws in congress and to execute the laws. the president is not allowed to write laws so i have voted for sanctions against iran with the hope that we will negotiate it. i don't want war. i think war is a tragedy and a last resort. i also don't want an iran that is nuclear and will threaten its neighbors as well as our allies so i voted for sanctions. sanctions have been passed by congress and a law. the president can sign a separate agreement with iran. he has asked for permission. the reason we separate the

coequal coequal branches so they would be checks and balances and no one branch of government would vote too strong. we have these debates with the president on whether or not he can amend health care law's whether or not he can amend immigration laws and now whether or not he can induce sanctions without our approval and also we have had this debate over war. wars the most important vote a legislator makes in the constitution was clear that war was to be initiated or declared by congress. the president agreed with me when he was the candidate. he said no president should unilaterally go to war without congress. so i think the letter simply furthers what i believe to undo sanctions it will have to come back to congress to be voted on. >> we are going to take a short break in just a moment but not wanting something and preventing something are two entirely

different things when it comes to nuclear iran. how far do you think this country should go to keep that from happening? >> i think in order for diplomacy to work there has to be the ultimate threat of use of force. i think iranians need to know that we are serious about this. the sanctions have worked and i have seen the sanctions as a way to not have poor. i do honestly want there to be an agreement. i said i wanted to strengthen the hand and some people scoffed and said how can that need. i am sincere good do not want a war with iran. at the same time i don't want to see a nuclear iran that becomes a menace to the world. >> coming up after a quick rate we will go to our studio audience this conversation so stay with us. we will be right out. >> now conversation with the candidate continues. >> welcome back to our conversation with the candidate. tonight's guest republican kentucky senator rand paul it's

time to to bring in questions for audience. i will jump jump in a follow-up is needed but let's get right to it. our first question coming from war and -- lauren. >> what would you differently in this current administration dealing with isis? had with isis. [inaudible question] east of the terrorist group whose main goal is to destroy as much as possible and ultimately bring about mass destruction? >> i think we go to war we have to go toward an orderly fashion according to the constitution. the way the constitution intended was that the legislature would initiate war and declare war and decide his prerogative it is. right now we have been at war for eight months in the president is doing this on his own. even though the president ran for office in 2007 he said no president should unilaterally go to war without the authority of congress. i don't think we are doing it in the appropriate fashion. had i been president in august of last year i would have come before a joint session of congress laid out the reasons why think isis is a military

threat. i think we have to respond militarily. i think when you debate over when america needs to be involved and where america needs to be involved you have to debate and for me it becomes a personal debate. i have three teenage boys. i debate as if i were going to be sending one of them to war so it's a very important debate. with regard to isis with purse weighs me that we should do something as they very quickly to mosul the city of 1.5 million people and within a day's march over beal where we have a consulate. i've been very critical of hillary clinton for not defending the compliment benghazi and i think it would be inexcusable for us to do the same thing under our watch. so i say we should defend our consulate and we should defend the embassy in baghdad. it's time to do something militarily. i do tell people though that i am disappointed that we are

fighting against our own weapons. many the weapons that were sent into the syrian civil war simply went to isis almost without any hesitation. some were probably given directly if not inadvertently to isis. i warned against it and i voted against sending those weapons into the syrian civil war pics i said the irony is we will will be back to fight her own weapons within a year or year after he voted against giving those weapons to the syrian war rubble sure enough now we are forced to go back and fight against their own weapons. there are times when intervention makes things worse. i think their intervention in the syrian civil war made things worse. i think hillary's war in libya made things worse. if there's one thing that is true in the middle east is that when we have topple the secular dictator we have gotten chaos and we have gotten arise of radical islam so libya is on utter disaster. they there are jihad is run amok

in libya. gadhafi was a secular dictator. he actually suppressed radical islam. there is no great jeffersonian democrat that he kept peace and order and he didn't allow radical islam. it's worse for us now. it's the same thing in syria. assad is a horrible dictator who gases his own people but when president obama won two bomb i thought i opposed that also. if we would have dislodged aside i think isis would be in damascus. i'm somebody who is not eager for intervention. i will intervene when our american interest is at stake and we have to i think we need to have a strong military might to deter attack but we should use it wisely and use it reluctantly and that is what reagan meant. >> thanks very much for the questions. another one from her audience this one coming from keane and paul. >> thank you senator paul.

you addressed this earlier in a specific context but could you please address your priorities in your philosophy when you are confronted with an issue regarding the balance between individual privacy and government provided security such as law enforcement or national defense or other contexts as well. >> benjamin franklin said those who give up their liberty for security will have neither. i believe that. i don't think it is a trade-off whether we should have to give up liberty for security. i think that we can capture, deter and protect our nation from terrorists and use the constitution to do it. the reason i'm hesitant to allow blanket surveillance or allow the police to go in any house in america without a warrant is that is what we thought the

revolution over. one of the things we objected to the british as the british soldiers were writing their own warrants. under the patriot act we love it in our country. fbi agents can write their own warrant and i think that's wrong. it wants to have separation between the police and the judge judge. why? because people and government aren't all perfect angels. i know my local fbi agent says don't you trust me? i say of course i trust you. i know you would do anything wrong but the reason why to call the judge is there's a time in our history particularly in the south were you might have had people who decided they want to go into the house because the black person lives there were a jewish person lives there. i want there to be a separation so some sort of bias or ill feeling when someone makes irrational hatred for people could never occur with the person given the warrant is writing their own warrant. there's a check and balance.

if someone in manchester today or tonight is accused of rape and they are behind a door and you didn't see see them going to their house but you are pretty sure they are in their the police will stand outside the house call a judge on the phone and you will get a judge's permission to go in. we need that separation of powers. why these things in checks and balances are so important to prevent abuse or to prevent bias. >> thank you for the question. another one from the audience from barbara shultz. good to see you. >> we take steps to end the corrupting influence of money in politics and it's so specific we well with those reforms the? >> i think it's a good idea. we have tried in the past to do campaign finance reform and then struck down as an infringement on the right people to speech. even paid speech is a type of speech. i think there's a way that is consistent with the constitution

that you could limit the effect of special interests. i think special interests and money has to much influence in washington. one way of trying to fix fix it that i think would pass muster with the supreme court that it had been thinking about is when they give out contracts let's say you come to government and you need a billion-dollar contract you signed that contract i think you could put limitations in the contract that says that you agree to limitations on using that money to lobby government for more money. you get a billion dollars or a contractor gets a billion dollars and you take the first million hire a lobbyist and ask for more. it's a vicious cycle. what we do is we wouldn't preemptively say you can't do this. we say if you get the contract he can do this. there is a precedent for this. if you are an active duty military you are not allowed to run for office in uniform. you are a federal employee the hatch act says you can't campaign so we have with the

limitations you voluntarily agree to with the military signing a contract with them i'm limiting campaign laws the same way the hatch act think we should do for contractors. the only way you would get past his you would have to limit business contractors and unions. as both of them were equal in you have preventions builds of the contract so there's a government union that has 2 million people working for 500,000 people they would have to have the same restrictions that a contractor would have. i am in favor of doing something good. >> thank you senator. let's go back to the audience from another question. >> senator paul good afternoon. as president how would your administration address our energy economic and climate security? >> i think the main thing we need to do is to become energy

independent and one of the good things that have come from the technological advances we have now is we are getting to the point where we can export oil. in the 1970s we passed a law because of opec and the embargo that we would have no export of oil but now we have so much in so much natural gas but i think we are at the greatest or the largest producer in the world. i think we have have come a long way towards energy independence. i think you can have both a clean environment and economic growth but i think you have to have a balance of those. i am one that says the epa the balance has shifted in one direction and we need a clean environment and a robust economy. i will give you an example of how sometimes i think we have gone too far. the clean water act says you can't discharge pollutants into

a navigable stream. i agree with that. i would have voted for that but somewhere along the way over 40 years of rule after rule after rule we have now defined dirt to be a pollutants and my backyard to be a navigable stream and that's wrong. the government is wasting so much time harassing private property owners they are not doing what they should do. i want them to police the ohio river. if someone is dumping benzene in the ohio river put them in jail but the comment to onto my back there because leads that have black on the bottom to determine my backyard is a wetlands and you can put me in jail. i'm not making this up. ken lucas from southern mississippi went to jail 10 years in jail and his crime was conspiracy to violate the clean water act. he was putting clean dirt on his plan to raise the elevation. i think we have gone too far but i think we are getting better as far as energy. >> how much of an issue do you

believe the topic of climate change should be? >> i think there needs to be a balance and we shouldn't be alarmist about things. we have had rules, this is where everyone in washington gets dumbed down. he worried there for the environment or against the environment. maybe we would be for the environment and the economy at the same time. when we look at the environment and this is a great question and jon stossel has done this question. do you think the environment is cleaner now are cleaner in 1960? they are all like oh my good as the polar bears are drowning and the statue of liberty is going to be underwater. it's a lot better. have you seen pictures of pittsburgh in 1919? i'm sure manchester when you walk out at noon in pittsburgh and your white sure would be completely covered in soot. we are doing a lot better than we were doing. there have been rules on admissions for smokestacks

probably since the 30s. everything that comes out of the coal-fired smokestack has gotten better over the last 40 years by sulfur dioxide and nitrous dioxide and mercury have been trending down. we think people gone too far in the other side is they want to make the rules so low that you have no business. right now 40% for electricity comes from coal. you might know i come from a coal producing state so i have a bit of interest in this. we shouldn't just shut them all down tomorrow. let's have reasonable world where we can have electricity and the only other thing i tell people when we are talking about the balance of this, the countries that produce the 10 largest amounts of electricity versus the countries that produce the least amount of electricity the top 10 live 25 years longer than the bottom 10. what we need to do is not be so

alarmist because we don't want any cars but try to balance the environment and civilization. >> yankee for the question. let's switch it up and go social media question from facebook. von gardner ask where do you stand on gun control? senator? >> i think i'm control is a freedom issue and you would have to change the bill of rights if you want to have gun control. i think we have had some terrible tragedies and some very emotional debate about this. i can understand. if mike kids got shot at school i would be emotional too so i understand the emotions of it but the thing is we do have a problem. either through mental illness or spiritual brokenness their young teenage boys primarily committing these sorts of crimes. the interesting thing you'll see about everyone of these crimes not one of them happens at the police station. these kids are crazy.

they are mentally ill or whatever's wrong with them but they don't show up and shoot 20 policemen because the policeman will shoot back. what we have done in our society is put up signs on all of our school saying there are no weapons here. that's that's like assigned to a crazy person and shoot our kids. maybe we should do the opposite and put a sign on every school saying we have an armed security guard whether you do or don't. i think we should send the other message two crazy kids that you don't get a free shooting spree these show up at a school but above and beyond that the 2nd amendment in our bill of rights and the people wanted to be different if to after change the constitution. i'm a big believer in the freedom and the right to bear arms. >> ellen cobb from our intent to question. >> senate do you think hobby lobby decision was a net win or loss for liberty? >> it was in that win.

>> leave it at that? >> you told me to go shorter on my answers. the thing is that religious liberty is important. it's very important to me and i think it's also sort of a bizarre case and the people were trying to insist somehow i think there were 15 forms of birth control available at hobby lobby and there has to be three more or something. a lot of these decisions should be outside of the governmental realm. for all that craziness there is no republican that wants to ban birth control. it's got nothing to do with that. the other thing is the community health clinics you can get birth control anywhere in the whole country so it isn't a huge issue on birth control. if you own hobby lobby and you were a profound religious belief that certain types of birth control and you have a religion objection to its your right and the government ought to stay out of your business.

>> do you consider this topic a distraction from issues that are important as we head into 2016? >> i think religious liberty is important. >> as we have this discussion about about women's health care and affordable care act and things along those lines these do have a place. in 2012 folks thought that this was a -- >> the one reason why it was a made up in ridiculous issue was insinuating that anyone in america wants to ban birth control on either side. it gets dumbed down and after a while people see these ads. they do this in colorado. they tried to go after the candidate out there and they went on and on. finally people just said they ran an ad saying republicans didn't allow comments to be sold sold. it became so ridiculous they voted the other guy out as the sets were so ridiculous nobody would believe him anymore. all of the issues can go too far but the underlying issue of religious liberties in portland.

>> thank you very much. that's all the time we have right now. we will sign off on television that this is a conversation with senator paul double continue on line and are mobile app. you will find 30 minutes of questions from her studio audience but thank you very much for watching wmur-tv. have a great night. ♪ ♪ [applause] >> our guest is mr.. i will ask the candidate questions and after the break we love her studio audience join in in a town hall style format. before we start with that will take a quick look at the

candidates biography. >> donald trump was born in 1946 and learned the heart of the real estate deal in his father said's eye. the son of brooklyn developer fred trump donald joined his father's company after graduating from the wharton school of business in pennsylvania in 1960. he is continued a family approach bringing priebus five children of the trump organization. his name headlines properties around the world new york to waikiki seoul and a stumble. those lecture programs include numerous golf courses part of his lifelong passion for sports. these days many people known best as the producer and the star of the apprentice and for his role in the miss usa and miss bernard -- universe pageant in universe pageant than two dozen 77 truckers you to start on the hollywood walk of fame. trump is married and resides in where else but new york city. >> with that out of the way donald trump thanks for joining us. good to see you sir. this week you announced you were officially exploring a presidential run.

a lot of people might be asking why do you do so many different things? >> you are right and i'm giving up a lot. i love building buildings. i'm building a beautiful building on pennsylvania avenue the old post office side -- site or that god in the obama administration. we have a great plan and we are doing so many things all over the world. i'm giving up a tremendous amount of things that i love doing by doing this but our country is in serious trouble. we are being led by people that are either grossly incompetent or basically don't know what they are doing. i look at what's happening i work the art of the deal one of the greatest selling books of all-time maybe the best i guess that's all about we have to bring back our jobs. we have to bring back money. we have to bring back money so we can save social security and save medicare and medicaid and every other republican candidate

cuts social security and cut medicaid. it's unfair. we take back the money that china stealing from us and the money that countries including mexico are stealing. we look to what happened on the front page of "the wall street journal"." mexico taking jobs from tennessee that are moving into mexico because mexico has incentives and we give them incentives to move to mexico. on top of that the borders disaster and what they are doing with the border. people hundreds of thousands of people flowing into the country through mexico. we have to end that. it's a tough business and it's going to have to be done. our country frankly is going to hell and politicians i have dealt with them all my life. i get along with all of them but they are all talk and no action and that's what i'm doing this. >> it's fair to ask obviously you have a successful business but what would you do differently in the white house that others have in the past? >> number one when was the last

time you heard something good about our country where we have a victory over china economically, over the country's? there is never a victory for us. there is never a victory like the united states -- -- yuriko china became the number one economic power in the world. this was unheard of. if you go back 10 years if you would have said that people would have laughed at you. there's no reason for it. they are taking our jobs. they are taking our money. we are rebuilding china. apple the great american company make their product in china or most of it. they don't make any here but they make most of their product in china. so it's wonderful and i'm all for apple but they are making a product in china is the beneficiary of apple not us. i would turn everything around. if you look at what other countries are doing, japan, china. the other day a friend of mine a big construction person come up

to tractors. japan is evaluating the currency and for the first time he can note tractors. he is buying, -- come up to tractors told in japan. they assemble them here to get away with murder but there are so many things we could do to make our country rich again and make our country great again. >> we will expand on economics, guitar audience that i want to talk about national security foreign policy. you said the president you would call unquote knock isis out-of-the-box. it's fair to ask why are you qualified to make decisions that could impact the well-being of american men and women? >> a lot of those decisions are common sense. i don't want to say what i'm going to do. the president gets up and he says we are going to attack them in two weeks. general macarthur and generals patton are spinning in their graves.

we will be dropping bombs and we will be here and there. what is this? we are fighting these people. we are telling them everything we are doing. they leave areas. they here we are going to be attacked at a certain time in a certain certain day they leave and go someplace else. they put other people there so we kill people that we are not even supposed to be fighting. i think it's very bad. you're not supposed to be broadcasting for political reasons all over the world. i would be very tough on isis on isis would come to the table very quickly whatever is left but they would come to the table quickly and that situation within. what is going on in the middle east is a travesty. i did save when we broke up iraq to take the oil they went after iraq and i've been saying that for years. i have been to new hampshire law. i have a lot of friends up here and i'm here a lot.

it's a great place. i said take the oil. we spend $1.5 trillion and thousands of lives lost. the wounded warriors all over the place, helped have them all the time. love them. people don't talk about them. they don't talk about the vets. even the vets in new hampshire they don't treat them properly. in new hampshire we don't even have a path -- hospital dedicated the vets. there are so many things but i said keep the oil. do you know who has the oil right now? isis has the oil. i said we are going to leave iraq and iran and by the way iran is not taking over. >> we have 30 seconds before you take a break. is there and we would engage in diplomatic talks with iran about their nuclear program or is as a black-and-white? >> iran cannot have a nuclear weapon. we have to preserve ourselves and preserve israel.

i said this and you can go back and check for five years ago. they were two countries of equal strength fighting for decades and decades. they would go to feed here and to be fair. we obliterated iraq and now iran is taking over iraq and it's exactly what i said five or six years ago. i did say a player leaving key to oil. >> will take a quick break and be back with her studio audience to continue the conversation. stay with us. >> now conversation with the candidate continues. >> will come back to a conversation with the candidate. tonight's guest republican donald trump that it's time to bring in the audience to ask questions. i will jump in if there is need for follow-up of right now let's get to it. our first question coming from jim adams. >> mr. trump your business experience and success are well-known. how do you take that and move it to a place where are you going to have a lot of differing opinions and give these folks

work with you? >> it's about leadership and you have to get people in a room and learn to lead. obama can't get involved with israel. he can't get along with netanyahu. he can't get along with anybody. he can get along with the republicans so you start signing executive orders. i can't get along with anybody here's an executive order. ultimately they do the right thing it'll be totally in constitutional. he doesn't leave. i don't think he works very hard frankly. i don't think he meets with people. i don't think he works hard. people that are in the senate never hear from him. even of his own party. you have to be able to lead and work very hard. one little thing that took place on thursday that was horrible. it was significant in terms of what it represents. obama, president obama goes to california on air force one a massive boeing plane. his wife was the same day an hour later write at the same

time but they vote goes into burbank. they're going into the same -- same studio and they go on separate planes. then they say that was a the way the schedule. i guarantee you there's no question about it colon to generous and jimmy kimmel would have come to the white house. they could have at least taken one plane but they take to massive boeing planes to go to two different interviews and in the same location in the same city. that's the way the country runs. whether it's that are 5 billion-dollar web site or obamacare that never worked properly and still those who were properly. there are so many things you can do and one other thing last week they came out 125 billion dollars in waste that they found. somebody like me -- somebody like me would do a great job. i'm an outsider and the republicans a lot of people the insiders don't like this because they want politicians.

as i said before i have dealt with politicians all my life. politicians are really easy for people like me. they're all talk. there are no action. but they are good at is self-preservation that they preserve their own job but they don't help us. it's about time we had an outsider going in and i will tell you what i could do one hell of a job if i decided to run. you would be very happy. >> jim thanks for your question. let's go to jeff johnson. >> how are you doing mr. trump? i have to take care of my household to keep us out of debt. why doesn't government had the same idea applies what is your plan to get us closer to being out of debt and the u.s.? >> our money is being trained by foreign countries. totally honestly every deal we make is a bad deal. these aren't deals like you and your deals are tough.

anyway your situation is tougher. if you have somebody as a president who knew what he was doing that's easier than straightening out your situation but when i would straighten out the big situation your situation would follow. in a country that's in trouble is hard for the people to do well. when the country itself -- so china is joining us. japan now is going to start again big time draining us because there are cutting their currently like crazy and selling things like they have never sold before. japan is going to be big time going after us. mexico is a disaster for the united states and i'm not only talking about the borders and by that we have to build a wall like we had never seen before. don't even talk about it but beyond that they are taking our jobs. we don't negotiate well with anyone. if we did this country would make a fortune. social security could stay the same. you could keep your social security without cuts medicare

and medicaid in all of that. no politician is going to be a let's do that because they don't have the competence. remember this all talk no action. i have done very well with politicians. it's about time we had an outsider. >> eric thank you for your question or just just announced the just announced time for eric chaska question. >> mr. trump small businesses are the engine of the hash is a commie that they can afford to have invested millions of dollars to fund election campaigns and to hire lobbyists like the corporations do to maintain political influence. how would you prevent corporate cronyism from ratzinger government? >> is not only corporate but the fact a lot of the people you think are representing you aren't really because the lobbyists have them totally in control. i have always wondered how opec for so many years got away with murder. they have every lobbyist in washington on their payroll and

the senators were afraid to go against them. these lobbies give big campaign contributions to everybody. representing opec. opec. you couldn't find someone to go against them. there are other industries like them. somebody like me, i don't need money. i have my own money. we've got to do what's right for this country. it's all about the small business they are so important not only in new hampshire but all over the country. the small business owner is being crushed and it's being crushed by bad trade deals that were making with other countries. you go to new hampshire tennessee with what just happened moving to mexico and what happened in iowa. they are moving out of iowa and

into another country. we actually gave tax incentives to these countries. if someone is in small business and there's nothing closer to my heart than small business, i started as a small business and i built a great company. last time when i was when i was thinking about running, and i have to say i was very disappointed with mitt romney because in the end submit failed. he should've been able to get there and beat obama. something has to be done for the small business person and something has to be done for the middle class. the middle class in this country are being absolutely crushed. >> have you identified if or how much money you would spend on the campaign? >> probably mostly my money.

i got a check from a woman the other day for $10. she was 79 years old and i'm desperate to see this country get right again in this is all i can afford. that was a beautiful check from a beautiful woman who loves her country and said you're the only one who's going to do it. i watch these people all my life and you're the only one that's going to do it. the last thing we need is another bush. we've had bush, we've had clinton and the last thing we need is another bush. it will just be the same old deal. you don't need it and i don't need it. it's probably going to hurt me to say it because of someone gets in there not to love me. who cares i want this country to be great again and it's not going to be great if we have job at books with his immigration

policy. do you remember his statement of love, they comment for love. what was that all about? i don't even think he knows what it's about. then about. then you look at education. he wants education to be run by the federal government. education should be a local standard. the parents, the teachers they should be setting the policy. they know more than someone sitting in washington picking up a paycheck not knowing what they're talking about. job is in favor of federal government running education. this is not what i want. >> hears a social media question on a social issue. this a social issue. this comes from tom riley who writes how do you feel about gay marriage. >> i said i'm a traditional person and i'm for traditional marriage. >> will leave it at that. >> i will says republican ivan getting that question more and more. it is a question that a question that the republican candidates are being asked mormor. it's an interesting question.

>> how would you fix the countries broken taxes. >> it's too complicated, it's too big, and were paying too much. this is the great secret that nobody knows about. we have court prorations leaving this country because of the tremendous countries taxes. were the most heavily taxed nation in the world. one of the problems we have that's too complex and has to be changed. there are many procedures you can use, all of which are better than what we have right now. right now we have a system that is so complex -- i have the biggest firm and i spend millions of dollars just for preparation of massive tax returns. you get deductions for this and penalized for that -- you have

to hire these people in it cost you a fortune. other people have to go out and higher. i want to put h&r block out of business because there's no reason you shouldn't be able to do your own tax return and we have to make it simple. we have to make it much more fair than it is right now. >> inc. you for your question. >> the recent threats to recent ambassadors in asia proves that we have a problem overseas. how do we strengthen our image overseas to protect our financial and social issues here at home. >> what they did was absolutely disgraceful and that's really a lack of respect for our country. it's a lack of respect for our

country and that's going to change. it all starts at the top. there are those that say hillary clinton was the worst secretary of state in our country and now she's running for president. she's going to do very well despite the e-mail scandals and the polls cam out and she still the most popular. she's not going to be challenged or significantly challenged. it all starts at the top. people don't respect the united states of america anymore. they used to, but they don't anymore. were not the same country. if you had the right leader, it would stop. >> let's go to another question. >> i work at a local soup kitchen and homeless shelter. what do you see as the best way to solve the problem of

homelessness. >> it's a tremendous problem a tremendous problem and more so in some states. if you look at what's going on with the food stamps and so many other things, there's never been anything like it. we've never hit the numbers that were heading right now. so if you're looking for a job and you stop looking for that job, they consider you unemployed. you know the unemployment numbers are a total fraud and a total joke. the numbers are not 5.6%, the real number is probably 21% or higher. 21% or higher. that's why you're asking this question because the unemployment in this country is unbelievably high. those numbers that they come out with every month are totally skewed because they want to make the politicians look better. we have to put our people back to work and that's the way you get rid of people who want to

work. they want to work they want a job. unemployment has probably never been worse. now you have another new phenomenon caused by obama with obama care. everybody is becoming a part-time worker because under obama care that is the cheapest way to do it. obama care is absolutely a disaster. this whole thing has to be changed. another phenomenon you're going to see and remember obama care doesn't kick in until 2016. in the meantime, 2016. in the meantime, our people aren't going to have it, senators aren't going to have it and people who are supposed to be dealing with this problem they're not doing it.

when obama care kicks in in 2016 wait till you see the catastrophe that takes place in 2016. drs. are leaving their profession because they say they can't do it. it doesn't work for them and they have to hire more accountants. they accountants. they use to hire nurses and now they hire accountants because it's so complicated. obama care has to be ended and jobs have to be produced. if we have the right leader, leader, jobs can be produced. we have to take it away from foreign countries. >> you brought up public health. a big problem in this state and other states is heroine addiction. what would you do at the federal level to combat that? >> that's a that? >> that's a very big problem because heroine is very addicting. i would say in terms of health and marijuana you have people

dying because they don't want to give it up. you have to help people. heroine is so addictive that when they take those shots of heroin they can't get off it. something has to be done and you have to come down very slow on that. it starts at the border. people are flowing into this country. people in many cases, who are very bad. they are sending their criminals and they are not going to help us. i'm sure there's going to be some wonderful people, but for the most part those people are not going to be helping. we are getting criminals, gang members the worst of the worst and were just letting them flow right in. and now they're going to be voting? the democrats like this and they wanted to help.

these people are going to be voting a hundred% for democrats. >> that's all the time we have right now for television. coming up next is senator rand paul on the program. this conversation with donald trump will continue online and with our mobile app. there will be more questions coming from the audience. thanks for watching and have a great night. ♪

it creates an illuminating, entertaining and inspiring read. it's available in your bookstore or favorite online bookseller. >> a report al a government report alleges homeland security official alejandra mayorkas gained special access to the visa program known as eb-5. here he testifies on the alleged favoritism before the house homeland security committee. from capitol hill this runs two hours. >> the committee on homeland security will come to order. the purpose of this hearing is to receive testimony regarding the immigrant investor program

known as the eb-5 program. i now recognize myself for an opening statement. on march 24th the department of homeland security inspector general released a report detailing allegations against deputy secretary mayorkas that relate to his time as director of the uscis and his oversight of the eb-5 program. the ig office conducted more than 50 interviews reviewed more than 40,000 phone records and obtain more than 1 million documents and e-mails. this investigation was unprecedented and that there were more than a dozen was the blowers they came forward to the inspector general's office. the findings are troubling as the ig made some very serious charges against mr. mayorkas. chief among them were that he used his position to influence outcomes in select cases for the benefit of clinically connected and powerful individuals. in general these allegations fall under four categories.

special access. allegations were unequivocal. mr. mayorkas gave special access and treatment to certain individuals and parties. clinical favoritism. quote we receive complaints from uscis employees that the application for politically connected regional center gulf coast funds management received extraordinary treatment as a result of mr. mayorkas' intervention. additional uscis staff understood that these applicants were prominent or politically connected. blished processes. he was in contact outside the normal adjudication process either directly or through senior dhs leadership with a number of stakeholders. according to the employees