>> the people who have a lot to say are completely undaunted or for that matter the whole idea that there is, you know, a storytelling, and the triangle that you must learn to do this if you're going to go on to be a fiction writer. it's necessary, but not sufficient. it's not going to make you a great writer. but then you sit down with everybody and discover actually they could all do it. there is nothing about learning to do those things that impede creativity.

>> and we welcome viewers that to the "washington journal" here on c-span. we take you now to new york where we're joined by every pastor, for our restaurant industry ceo an economic adviser to the 2016 term presidential campaign, briefly a nominee for labor secretary. also the author of the book the capitalists come back, the trump boom and the last plot to stop it. any trained to, what is the trump boom? >> it is something that i think we are seeing a lot of people on the left and the media trying to discredit. if you look back at the obama years, every time i did an interview or what not that it was about people not having enough jobs. people couldn't find work, dropped out ofhe labor force where they ended up working entry-level jobs to support families on this entry-level

jobs. that is completely switched. we are a situation where you've got the lowest number of people on the unemployment rolls in 44 years. a lot fewer people in the workforce 44 years ago. the lowest unemployment rate in 17 years since the last year of the clinton la administration. and we haven't historic number of job openings despite the fact we have more employed than ever employed in the history of the country. we really kind of flipped the problems. the problem we face during the obama years was that workers couldn't find good paying jobs. now the biggest problem we are facing is businesses can't find the good jobs going up then. gdp up three quarters. 3.1%. so we are really seeing an economy taking off across all

sectors. >> you start this book with the story of your nomination for labor secretary and why he withdrew your nomination. whyy start with that? >> a lot of people wanted to know what happened, why wasn't there. it was really a setup for the book because the plot to stop it, the forces that are posing president trump and we've never had a president that face this kind of concerted effort by the media and the left to discredit its economic accomplishments. i wanted to talk not only to provide readers with the ammunition to defend the president's economic policies and to share these underreported economic accomplishments, but they also wanted to let people know who it was that was trying information back and trying to stop and he was afraid of him proceeding. i think in the obama

administration, people like me who opposed his policies were concerned they would fail american workers. president trump's policies will create economic growth and jobs and the economic benefits of her cause. i want to talk about the elements of posing president trump in the same element that oppose my nomination for secretary of labor appear to seem like good lead-in. >> why did you withdraw your name for that nomination? >> we had 52 republican senators. you could lose to and senator collins and murkowski are always kind of iffy votes for anybody who had conservative or right leaning. they were a problem for betsy devos who went right before me to secretary of education. i lost onene other senator, johy

isakson. to this day and still not sure why. he said he would not support my nomination. the vice president called and told me that instead if you want to go through the confirmation hearing, the president and i support you. we don't think the process has been fair to you if you want to get out and fight it, can fight it. it was e on the senate floor eay in the trump administration. i did want the president to suffer with my name on it so i withdrew my nomination because i didn't have the votes. >> you regret not fighting for that nomination with allegations of you stemming from 1989 divorce. there were concerns about an undocumented housekeeper. >> yeah, the problem in these proceedings and its protocol for the nominees that you can't defend yourself. so if the media kind of games up with the latinos after you come you've got a big problem. there were media outlet that offended me, but part of this

book is a little bit of defending myself in the beginning. the book is about trump, the boom come in the value of capitalism, how capitalism brings prosperity to every nation that implemented it. but yes, i would very much like to defend myself. i've got to be the only guy in the country thatt has as problem arising out of allegations by former wife made years ago. and it made a period of time after she made the allegations were untrue and her lawyer had gotten her to make the allegations in the divorce youu choose admitted that many times. we are very good friends. dinnersholiday together. we talk regularly. she was very open with the senate committee about the fact that these allegations are just untrue. she read a page and a half letter to the senate, to the health committee, health education labor and welfare committee that i was in front of.ly

whining to rational committee is a crime. i've got to be the only guy in a country without a me too probably doesn't have anybody accusing him of anything. i was ceo for 17 years. nobody claims to use that power to elicit favors from them. my former wife made an allegation the divorce that she admitted within untrue. i very much would've liked to defend about. we did have an employee in h our house who was not a legal resident. she was undocumented. i thought she was working for a service that i was running a company, not paid much attention to what was going on in the house when i asked my wife about this employee, she informed me she was undocumented in the next day i let her go. i told her she could work for us, but i would help her become a citizen if she wanted to and if she became a citizen i would be happy to hire her back. ..,

we're talking about his new book "the capitalist comeback: the trump boom and the left's plot to stop it." if you want to join thepl conversation. andy puzder, you describe your book as a most wanted list of institutions stand in the wayhef freedom and prosperity. who are they? >> guest: i think these are sectors of our society that event infiltrated very effectively over the past 100 years by the progressives which progressives have deep roots in socialism. our education, the education system has been deeply

penetrated. we have even in high school we've got kids being taught from a book by howard zinn who is an admitted marxist and write wris work history of the united states as a history of oppression as opposed to a history of political freedom and economic freedom. you see it in our colleges where people are afraid to hear opposing opinions. number one would beuc the education system. number two would be the entertainment industry, tv and movies.ie even kid movies, children's movies often have a suspicious number of businessmen or businesswomen are corporations or ceos, people who have realize the american dream as the bad guys. it's brainwashing from a very early age, who are the good guys and life and/or the bad guys in life? you can see in thehe labor unios and their outside influence in politics. don't get me wrong, labor unions served a very good purpose in the last century.

nobody wants ten-year-old kids working in coal mines but beginning with the roosevelt administration they begin feeding their authority to the federal government to protect workers. whether it's the wage and hour division at the department of labor or eeoc or osha, you get agencies that inside to protectd american workers which had been the function of t unions. the unions look to government for relevance and to sustain their membership and end up supporting things that really don't make sense like a $15 minimum wage that research repeatedly shows in the cities even the richest cities like san francisco and seattle that implement it it's really hard working class americans. in fact, working class americans, union members understand this. theyan understand their leadersp is out of touch and the best example of that is this last election where 42% of union households voted for president trump also because his immigration and trade policies were consistent with what should be the goals of union.

thee unions supported hillary clinton with over $100 million in donations. that 42% number includes government unions, and government unions want bigger government. they want more money into government becausebi that so government junior employees elevate their salvation lifestyle. if you look at private sector unions, autoworkers, steel workers, coal miners, it's more like 60% voted for president trump. you have union leaders that are out of touch. supporting these progressive socialist causes. they have deep roots. the union movement has deep roots in social movement. the education system and the entertainment industry all working against the interest of the free enterprise system and trying to do everything they can to make sure that this president doesn't succeed. if president trump succeeds after president obama, the comparison is going to be something you won't be able to wipe out the peoples minds for many, many years. >> host: as the capital is

defined any tension between capitalism and an america first governing philosophy? >> guest: i'm not sure what the definition of an america first governing policy is. we probably need to talk about specific examples. i don't necessarily see any conflict between an america first policy and capitalism. after all, we are an independent sovereign nation and we should look out for our interests. our interests involve worldwide trade. we needol to be sensitive to tht but no, i don't see any inherent conflict. >> host: andy puzder taking your calls a this morning until 9:40. tim is up first line for democrats. tim is for michigan. good morning. go ahead. >> caller: i don't believe this guy. i can't believe that you would actually say that the president now has gotten static from us when what happened to your memory? what about republicans and how

they picked on obama? as far as me being in the union and you saying that union members went along with your policy is just a big joke. everything out of your mouth is a bunch of propaganda. >> host: i will let you respond. >> guest: as far as the unions i was just talk about the numbers. i'm not opposed to unions. i don't object too unions. i think that you know leadership this country particularly big labor has lost its way. i didn't say unions are union members all supported the policies. i said they voted for president trump private sector union members, a majority of them voted for president trump but i soon they were voting for and because they support his policies because union leadership with any other direction. republicans including myself are critical of president obama's policies. i never criticize president obama himself but it always was very critical of his economic policies, not because i i wantd those policies to fail but because i was concerned that

they wouldn't succeed. the difference is people are attacking president trump on a personal basis, not on the basis of his policies but on a personal basis which we didn't do it present obama, at least i didn't.n' they were attacking not in the hope his economic policies will succeed. we are seeing great success buts he's being tapped fored this pot is in way not because they might fail because they might succeed and that would set the progressives back from a we asked viewers in the first hour of our program whether they thought president trump its cabinet enemies been treatedn fairly. how would you answer that question? >> guest: swwill, certainly i don't think i was treated fairly. we got somebody, let's take a better example. mike pompeo. in what universe do not just simply vote to approve mike pompeo? this is an imminently qualified person who was selected by the president of the unitedes state. he's to be secretary of state. he was already approved as the head of the cia. why on earth of them trying to

hurt president trump, why wouldn't he just vote for this guy? john kerry got approved almost unanimously and people in the senate didn't like john kerry. hillary clinton got approved almost unanimously. republicans didn't feel she had the right policies but you fall for secretary of state because you want somebody qualified that the president selected and will support the president's policies. he was elected fairly and honestly under the system to carry out certain policy and he is allowed to take us cabinet. mike pompeo is probably the best example of the resistance we are seeing but even ifee you take it down aa level. when i was nominated to be secretary of labor there was a general the named at the zealous who is as the chow recommend to me to pick us assistant secretary which i wouldn't. i wanted to nominate him. was nominated,a we talked. i recommend to them that and he selected pat to be his number two. i thought pat would be approved by may or june.

with alex selected him i think alex thought the same thing by may or june we would have somebody who could help him who really understood the system ane the department. he got approved yesterday. they are dragging this out, it's ridiculous. they're looking for any flaw they can to try to not approve people and it's not a fair process, so the answer would be no. >> host: in harrisburg pennsylvania, and independent. good morning. >> caller: people shall in their history. i'm from human family, former democrat. i've waited 40 years when we are fighting the japanese imports on steel for a candidate to say america first. the first heard the term america first was from jesse jackson. people should learn the history about that.y number two, you take away the names, just put economic statistics, nobody has been better than trump has done so far in his first term going back three presidents. and finally the reason why to collective security is because minorities are doing fantastic.

you talked to by northcom they don't care about starbucks. they don't care about golf courses. they care about the bottom line and the economy, and minorities doing excellent in thi economy. >> host: andy puzder? >> guest: he's absolutely right. in fact, the unemployment rate for african americans justus hit historic lows in recent months. people are findingow jobs. we turned the economy upside down from an economy where people couldn't find jobs to an economy where businesses can't find workers. hispanic unemployment is near historic lows. what he said is absolutely true and i'm glad it that he realized that because i think these facts are definitely uncovered by the media. it's good to get the word out. >> host: kimberly in washington pennsylvania republican. go ahead. >> caller: good morning. i voted for trump and i just let the union. matter-of-fact java had i was a

slider at the job i had before was. [inaudible] a little more pay but i was seduced to go togo you because they're supposed bere better, me benefits, blah, blah, blah and it was far less, way less. in a span of three months they took $880 out of out of my pay. that was crazy. i left the union and that was with the pipeline for crying out loud. any rate, i have relatives who were in accountable. they just sold out. they were making $17 an hour. when they sold out the new company took them down to nine dollars an hour. it's crazy. as far as the obstructions, the democrats, i have never, i am 55. i have never ever remember ever any president being threatenedan with impeachment before he even took office. that set the precedent right there. >> host: andy puzder? >> guest: again, i agree with much of what she said.

i think the unit that simply lost relevance for american workers and if they're going to keep looking to government and pursuing the government as the source of their success, nor do theyio always want to pass legislation to try and a copy of the goals rather than to meet the needs of their constituents, look, the unions are in trouble. we've seen union membership, this young lady, and i can call, i'm 67 so i can call 55 young, but these young lady joins a very large group of people that have left unions. union membership, is at or near historic lows. we've even dropped significantly from the 1970s and the 1980s. union membership had its highs in thed 1950s and a steadily declined. all you have to dol is read the newspaper to see what's happened with automakers in the southeastern united states where people have built plants because the right to work states we

don't have to belong to a union. in plant after playing the union has been outright rejected. boeing even in south carolina recently rejected the union. unionseed to get more in touch with what the workers need, what their workers want, get out from under the dominance of the progressive and that big government socialists and start worrying more about the workers of us about the government, a political support they get. >> host: since president trump is taken office within the national debt take past $20 trillion. according to u.s. debt clock.org it isoc that $21,155,208,000,000 with trillion dollars deficits expected to start hitting by 2020. onat is your recommendation to president trump on how concerned she should be about that? >> guest: very concerned. and i think he is. the deficit and the debt is a huge problem in this country and some people might wonder why

knowing that president trump would've signed recent omnibus billif which significantly increased deficit spending. i think the reason is, and like the president of wish he had not signed it but i think when you're in the white has come when you're in the oval office, when you're behind the desk the world looks a lot different than it does to those of us were economic analysts out here, trying to criticize economic policy and direct economic policy. our military was severely depleted, and as president you want to make sure you can defend this country and that we've got the military strength to bring peace through power, rather than peace throughgh appeasement. i think ronald reagan said there has never been a war fought because america was too strong. it's when america isen too weak. i thinkk i would've done the se thing the president did come if this is what i had to do to get

money for military spending. i would've done it. now that is done. this is a president the we need to take on this one. lhe fact they're trying to have backups on the spending they voted to approve. i think that's a real positive but we need to address nondiscretionary spending which is entitlement. discretion is spending is an increasingly small part of our budget and when we spend all our time talking about that, we're wasting our time. we need entitlement reform. we need something like the art income tax credit.ef we need to reform social security so that young people have social security when they get older. we need to reform medicare so it's more effective and less costly to the states. there are many things we need to do with non-discretion spending and we've got the time to do with the tax cuts, we've got the regulation of wish we could've repealed and replaced obamacare. that's a a problem we have to l with as a party. i think it's time to face the nondiscretionary overspending that we're doing as a nation

because i hate to use a word that is so, use that almost loses meaning that this truly is unsustainable. >> host: line for democrats, rob is in tulsa, oklahoma. good morning. >> caller: good morning to you and good morning, andy puzder. i support anything you say right knee. i happen to be disabled, and i don't, i noticed everything under come everything over the years as i've gotten older, i'm 50, have got up and up and up.if that's just life, you know. i have a lot of friends that are low and middle class and they don't see the jobs that you're talking about. i friends that work at walmart that lost hours when they got a pay raise. so i don't understand why you sit and bash the democrats and you say trump just drain the swamp. all of hisam cabinet, most of hs cabinet and ceos are bigwigs,

plus they are being investigated for spending endless money on private telephone booths. the man from oklahoma, scott pruitt, it's just ridiculous i just sit and say things because you support this president who is a liar. >> host: andy puzder? >> guest: look, i'm very sensitive to the needs of working class and even lower working classr individuals. i was, my family was working class. i didn't have a silver spoon or a paid education to college. neither by the government nor my family. i worked my way through college and law school with a family. i remember those months where i wasn't sure that is going to be able to pay rent at the end of the month or buy enough food to feed everybody. it was tough and i'm sensitive to those needs. that's one of the recent we need and earned income tax credit. i think would be very meaningful and very helpful.

as for us at the jobs for these individuals, i will tell you right now there are 400,000 jobs open in the manufacturing sector and to win a 50,000 open in the construction sector. there were in january 6.3 million job openings here are 6.2 million. now, those are historic high numbers. so to the individuals who are unable to find jobs or feel the need to better job than they did at walmart, andwa i can't tell u why walmart cutrs hours, i'm involved with walmart, but if they are looking for jobs, there are jobs out there. i would encourage them to talk to anybody that they can that handles a job search organization, o whether it's the government or private sector, because if they want to get the training and if they can get the trading and that couldul be through an apprenticeship for internship or more schooling, they can get very great good paying jobs. if you want to justd- get in and start the our job openings. as i said there are construction job openings.

as long as you don't have a criminal history or a serious drug problem, you should be able to find employment in this economy.d as i see more people unemployed than ever have been employed and are moreor job openings then there's ever been. i hate to d disagree with his individuals personal experience and ability can't rectify the problems for the people he knows, but the jobs are there if you wantre them. >> host: how concerned should we as americans be between the growing gap between the richest and the poorest in this country? >> guest: any time there's income or wealth inequality there some reason for concern but in a free market economy you always have that. i've got a chapter in a book on this. i would encourage people not like to buy this book and read themselves but to buy it and give to kids for your grandkids if you want to and understand how the free enterprise system works and outrk benefits people. i have a chapter that comes incomeme inequality at length. it is not as bad as you're being told it is. the only way you can shrink

income inequality, you can't shrink it with government mandates. you can order the rich to get for in the fourth to get richer. what you have to do is create jobs and good paying jobs so that people that are in the working-class can increase their incomes. john kennedy said a rising tide lifts all boats because the massive tax cutss and the notion that an economic tide come when the economic type of company but his life improves and that's been so throughout american history as we have lifted ourselves on 13 kind of backwards colonies up to the nation by 1885 we have the largest economy in the world and short of it out with the highest standard of living in the world. all of that was brought about by capitalism, the economic tide lifting all boats which quite also puts the lie to the argument that wealth is a zero-sum game which is what this inequality argument is about. in other words, the notion that

the rich only get richer when the poor get poorer. that's not the case. economic tide could make everybody richer and should make everybody richer which puts the lie to this progressive notion that class warfare is either necessary or desirable. if we get economic growth, wages will start to go up. income inequality will decline and everybody should benefit. i'm excited about where we are and the potential going forward and i hope people take a look at the book and share it with the kids and grandkids who may be buying into the socialist progressive ideology. >> host: time for one or two calls with andy puzder. alex, flint, michigan, independents. go ahead. >> caller: good morning. w andrew, let me be clear and let me talk really slow so you cannot spin this. when president trump became president, the economy was humming right along, but you and your talking heads on fox news kept telling the american peopl

that the economy was a disaster. it was humming right along. but before the ink even tried when president obama -- president trump took office, all of a sudden the economy switched and took off. could you pointof to anything tt president trump did in his first three months of his administration, point to anything thatti he done that cae the economy to take off and the unemployment rate to fall, especially among african-american communities? anything. be clear. don't spin -- >> host: got youral question. g andy puzder, who had tried to ask him again. let's talk about that for a minute. when president obama came in and had that $800 billion in stimulus spending, enacted dodd-frank, enacted obamacare, the economist in the obama

administrationst forecast that n 2011, gdp growth, gross domestic product in this country, our economic growth would come up 3.8%, and in 2012 and 2013 it will go up over 4%. that was a rational cancellation because in the prior ten recessions, during the early years of recovery averaged about 4.3% gdp growth. now, 1% gdp growth is a ton of money. it's a ton of money for taxes and attentive jobs and is more than it sounds when you talk about 2.5-three, 3.5. president obama never had one year of 3% gdp growth. not one full calendar year. he averaged 2.1% postrecession rather than the 4.3% average, and its last year in office, gdp growth averaged 1.5%. those are very, very bad numbers. when president trump was

elected, even before he took office, if you look, go on the web, there's a website for the national federation of independent businesses. they do a monthly optimism index measuring optimism amongst small businesses. you can go to the chamber for optimism among large businesses, but the nfib optimism survey comes up every month at it shot time of the election. the reason president obama had the economic growth was because this is his were not investing. they felt overregulated. they felt overtaxed. it concerned about whathe the nt big government program was going to be, what the next regulatory roadblocks that would be put in the way would be. businesses were not investing. following president trump's election as he promised to deregulate and begin to do so almost immediately, to reduce the number of regulations, and he promised to cut taxes which achieved, he also want to do repeal and replace obamacare which didn't happen, by cutting

taxes and reducing regulations that that optimism. optimism has been in the top 5% of the nfib poll for the past eckstein monster that since the election. the follicles back 45 years. businesses are optimistic. businesses are invested because other optimism. they are investing because they have more money to invest following the tax cuts. except for the tax cuts which took place at the end of the year, that optimism took place before the election and regulatory reductions begin to take place andni were significat in the first three months. what was the result of that? the result was for the first three-quarters of president trump's presidency, , so the fit three economic quarters, gdp growth has averaged 3.1%. cbo is projecting for next year, that's the congressional budget office, is projecting next year it will be 3.3%. i'm not trying to spin this, and

you can check these numbers. i've written about them, if you google when it aoo look at articles i've written recently, i wrote an article that went over all, this, it's not spin. it's the economic numbers for comparing the numbers, the bureau of labor statistics and the labor department came out with during trump administration during the obama administration. we've seen significant growth and significant increases in the amount of people that are working at the amount ofhe jobs that open, and benefits to the minority communities like the african-americans have never been better in the job market than they are today, the book is "the capitalist comeback: the trump boom and the left's plot to stop it." the author andy puzder. you can find on twitter at andy puzder. we appreciate your time this morning. >> guest: glad to do it and hope people will buy the book and give it a chance. thank you. >> here's a look at some authors recently featured on booktv's "after words," our weekly author in the program that includes best-selling nonfiction books

and guest interviewers. >> whenever you talk about the left having some responsibility for backlash to lead to donald trump, naked figures can we didn't vote for the sky, this is the way the republican party has been going for long time loblaw block and there's some truth. i have been feeding of the

republican party but you can't go around saying, you know, yes all white people are racist you get current talking about how it's amazing how the white working-class, blue-collar guy, joe lunch bucket -- from fdr until the day before yesterday. joe biden bragged about that. that's what the votes came from, union guys. >> archie bunker was a democrat. >> the second the vote for donald trump, they are all chickens of whites of ramsey all races. it's like the day before the 201616 election, the electoral college, what was it called, the blue wall where they had electoral college, democrats celebrated. the date works against them all of a sudden it is an institution of white supremacy.

the point i'm really getting at is you can't demonize people forever and expect them to say you're right, i'm horrible. what people would do is they will say wait a second, my dad was a pretty good guy. his father fought in world war ii. my great, great grandfather, you know, he fought for the union in the civil war. white people did some pretty good things in this country. you get defensive. that's the normal human response. so now we are seeing increasing numbers of white people identifying of saying they're quite unity comes from being white. >> "after words" airs on booktv every saturday at 10 p.m. eastern and sunday at 9 p.m. eastern and pacific time. all previous "after words" are available to watch on our website booktv.org. >> c-span, where history unfolds daily.

in 1979 c-span was greeted as a public service by america's cable-television companies and today we continue to bring you unfiltered coverage of congress, the white house, theupreme court and public policy events in washington, d.c. and around the country. .. "after words" is a weekly interview program with relevant guests host interviewing top nonfiction authors about their latest work .