>>. [music] >> host: then joins us on the conversation on votingrights . served as president for the american way, first remind viewers what your group's vision for theamerican way is and how you carry it out . >> we believe freedom, opportunity, justice and equality really is what creates democracy. we were founded 40 years ago by congressman barbara jordan and norman beer, a man who brought us good times and all the family and facts of life and taught us families who love each othersometimes have to fight .

what we focus on is really empowering the people of this country to have their voices heard on the future of our democracy f. and on key issues like public safety. >> what with the enactment of w the for the people act mean for people's empowerment to havetheir voices heard ? >> what is fundamentally about is making it easier for working people to vote and harder for billionaires to buy elections. that's why the chamber has become such an obstacle. and that's why the coke industries have become an obstacle. they like it when billion-dollar corporations can buy elections. 83 percent of the people support before the people act . >> host: fowhat is the path forward for the for the people in the wake of what we

talked about this week, senator joe manchin not in favor of ending the filibuster. >> manchin's statements unfortunate. it's arguably a democratic editor would the person who held onto the jim crow filibuster which held back important protections of our neighbors writes. that seems to be the position he's taken. 83 percent of the people support the bill because it's about making it easier for working people to vote and harder forthem to buy the election .jo that's not just the overwhelming majority of democrats, it's the majority of republicans and majority of west virginians . people of west virginia at the people of this country will make sure that 13 how they feel. it's also important to say not every republican has closed the door to the for

the people act so we are on the full-court press president biden, chuck schumer said failure is not an option . and the people of this country are very clear. these are the types of reform we need out. >> you mentioned republicans on the for theblack . a voice there is mitch mcconnell. this is what hehad to say on tuesday . >> would you consider supporting the john lewis voting rights bill that made it as an alternative to that solution. >> the voting rights bill is intact, the law extends well into the preterm. what this rewrite does is grant to the justice department almost total ability to determine the voting system of every state in america with their trying to do directly through hr one. they would try to achieve indirectly through this

rewrite of the voting rights act. the supreme court did not strike down the voting rights act. it's still the law. what they struck down was the preclearance part of it that applied only to the southern part of the united states caused the supreme court concluded the conditions that existed in five no longer exist today . so there's no threat to the voting rights law. it's against the law to discriminate in voting on the base of race already. so i think it's unnecessary. >> host: mitch mcconnell this week. on those comments and as you claim the difference between hr one and the john willis voting rights act. >> in a nutshell, the difference between the john lewis voting rights act and which is hr four and that's one that passed the house ,

the for the people act is that hr four, the john lewis voting rights act would restore the victory that he helped which is the voting rights act that has been gutted, section 5 in particular. it's been gutted. hr one, the last one on the other hand before the people act is what john lewis at the last five years fighting because john like so many people in this country is a good friend and it comes to the realization that billionaires are buying our elections. there are buying our ti politicians to. mitch mcconnell is essentially the whole subsidiary of coke industries. there was an exposc in the new yorker recently where charles coke and his advisers were caught on a telephone call and they were talking about the fact that we really shouldn't talk about what an s-1 because 83 percent of the american people including overwhelmingly democrats and the majority of independence and republicans supported the

actually in that exposc, you'll see them gloss over the fact that republicans don't want and republican voters, not mitch mcconnell and his minions on the hill republican voters do not want alien errors buying their elections either. then they paused and they said don't worry, mitch mcconnell will kill it for us . that's what we're trying to deal with is that we've got to have greater transparency if billionaires, if billion-dollar corporations are seeking to buy our elections, the coke brothers tried many times to buy our politicians and they own a few on the hill like senator mcconnell, he should know. we shouldn't have to today do with that. >> until the bottom of the hour, 9:30 eastern. you're taking your phone calls as we talk about the

issue of voting rights legislation. the path forward and what's happening this past week on that front.202-748-8000 24 republicans, 202-748-8000, independent 202 74 8002. robert is in doylestown pennsylvania, an independent. good morning roberts. >> thank you for molistening. your washington journal is a terrific program. it's fair for both sides i'd like to ask a question. let me ask one first. you're so critical to identify the coke brothers area maybe you're right and maybe you're wrong. what about all the billionaires that are sitting on the other side of the fence. i don't see how you're being critical of them and furthermore, doesn't this country and almost anything we do don't we have to identify ourselves that we are the people who are signing for let's say going to drug companies, and

pharmacy. i just think if you people were fair, isay you people, i mean peopleyou support warfare , let's change everything . let's have somebody have identified going forward for everywhere, not just the voting rights for what you support which is understandable. >> guest: i appreciate the spirit of your comments. what i would say is the transparency we're talking about, what's different between our organization which is founded by democrats and republicans, moderate republicans who feel like the party has left them is you know, the transparency that we support would be for everybody. i was in a back-and-forth with ted cruz on the senate subcommittee and he asked that we disclose our funders

and i asked if all groups did it and then we did anyway, the conservative groups don't want you to know. when we disclose our top five funders over the past 10 years three of them worked were requested by people whose average was less than $1000 during their lifetime and then gave part of their estate, part of the value of their house to our organization. we are an organization of regular folks who believe in transparency for both sides quite frankly would like to see a return to the bipartisanship was there and our founding. that was there when i was a young patriarch. the reality is we are absolutely right, the transparency should be on both sides and this would impact billionaires of full-size was different about the coke brothers is they have been waging a war on this bill and ewaging a war on voting rights on this country for more than 10 years. the reality is that if you go back in the history of our country and you look at voters prescient it has been

targeted on working people and ultimately historically as it was on women and people of color. full to fight in the massachusetts regiment of the revolutionary war, of the colonial army and the talking for god sake, privates in the colonial army, those white men who were forbidden from to. so whenever you see this, the tax on voting rights, they disproportionately impact black people because they are disproportionately poor and impact working women because they are disproportionately poor. they also usually impact working-class white people . so the coke brothers work will impact blacks and whites, democrats and republicans and yes, our push for transparency will require both credit and republican billionaires to be transparent about their efforts to influence our elections . sp>> you mentioned a second ago your group is looking for a return to bipartisanship.

joe manchin in part of his reasoning for not porting s-1 that 1,to embrace election reforms and policies solely supported by one party area that he is looking for bipartisanship when it comes to election reforms. that's the only waythey will be embraced . so why isn't he right? >> he is, we would like to see murkowski and so many others. the problem with redistricting is made everything extreme area the congress more extreme. we would sit down with republicans and we used to have the report card now has an f and there they've been quite plain, look 2025 years ago. 20 percent of my district was black. 30 percent was democrat and i could say to the entire district, sometimes it's got to support things that the democrats are hinterested in, especially on inthe right.

but now the entire district, republicans like me with 94 percent of it, and it's hard for me to explain to the district frankly why i should be moreinclusive in my voting pattern . we've got to, that's one of the other things that were pushing hard on you we got to reform redistricting. it's hard and redistricting is a huge problem and what happens of course is that congress days in more because it's gerrymandered so obscenely. they essentially are promoted senate to show off their more extremist views. >> host: how would f1 help the gerrymandering issue. talk about what it doesfor redistricting in this country . >> it would create icincentives for the states to finally move beyond partisan redistricting as it would create, make it hard for the states to limit early voting. it would also make it hard for the states to continue to

formally incarcerate people. from voting. if they paid their debt to society, their rebuilding their lives they should be able to vote . so it's dealing with all these obstacles. frankly disproportionately making it harder for working-class people to vote . and at the same time, requires hopes who would try to influence our elections. >> in sun city center florida, republican, good morning . >> caller: good morning, thank you for your show. i have a couple things to say about the bill thedemocrats are trying to pass . first of all, it gives politicians contributions from the taxpayers like a 6 to 1 ratio. secondly, they want to do away with voter signatures.

voter id. we need ids in this country to do almost anything . so i do not understand why they want to do away with that. states like florida, a lot of the states have early voting. which gives people the opportunity not just to vote on election day but some as much as three weeks, a month before the election so i do not understand. the other thing is the constitution gives the power to the state legislators the voting for their state. so if people don't fourth delaware. biden's home state. they tecannot even have early voting. so i don't understand why they think this is voter suppression when they changed all of the laws in the swing states, not by the legislatures but by judges

and secretary of state. >> can i ask you one question ruth. >> you talk about some of these issues, about mail-in voting. is all mail-in voting area what's your thoughts onvoting that way ? >> i think absentee voting is fine. but you contact your precinct and asked for a vote to be male or about to be mailed to you and then they identified you by your signature. i don't think that just mailing out votes to everybody on the voting list. some of those people aren't even alive. a lot of people have moved their names have not been deleted from the roles and that law that they're trying to pass would eliminate anybody being removed from those roles.

so it's, i'm glad that manchin who represents the republicanstate is against it . >> that's rude in sun city center florida. >> let's talk about that for a second. i voting. the president. [inaudible] those cousins are long-distance truckers. they go out three, four weeks at a timesometimes . that's why early voting is important. working people have patterns that don't always allow them to show upat a 9500 tuesday . and some of them can be out of their state, away from home for weeks at atime. early voting is easier for them to vote . we also have cousins who have work in places where there

had just in time schedules that always change. sometimes they're working 9 to 5. again, they will not know the tuesday before election day what their schedule is going to be next tuesday and whether they can show up to vote and if they do show up to vote that means they're not work, they could lose their job . so having early voting is absolutely about making it easier whether you work at the mall or drive a truck for working people to vote. similarly we believe in this r country you should not haveto pay money in order to vote . you do have to pay money to get ids and sometimes getting the id tiyou need can be arduous. there are older folks in this country whose records frankly were lost when the court houses burned down before everything wasdigitized . you can find it extremely hard. doctors, rural doctors have made it their businessto help their elderly patients get ids. it can cost hundreds of dollars and take months .

we in this country believe voting should, all of us, americans of all parties overwhelmingly believe that voting should be safe. it should be easy. it should be accurate. we do not need to make people buy ids to do it. it's worth noting the republican party has said for example states golike texas, they passed laws you can vote but not with your student id. that's just partisan mischief . the reality is that what we're talking about here is a bill that would simply make it easier for working people to vote. make it harder for billionaires by elections area when you go by but in the bill, point by point with voters, 53 percent of americans agree. let's also be clear here.al talk about public financing of elections. it makes it easier for people who aren't rich to vote. when i ran forgovernor , i wouldn't have been able to do it if i couldn't afford to not work for two years.

then when i ran for governor, i was told quite frankly that we could raise even within $10 million of what it would take to get name recognition 100 percent. with it was an object lesson for me warns of money in politics, most of the parties won't even recruit somebody for senate who doesn't have in that worth $1 million. only public financing. folks like the caller for her children or neighbors feel confident if they are best able to lead this country there will be no wealth requirements implicit or explicit and that's what public financing is all about . >> host: we've been talking world to voting rights bills, the expansionof before the people act , the john lewis voting rights act and i

wonder your thoughts on how to move forward. if you get the john lewis voting rights act and bipartisan support for that and as atjoe manchin as indicated there is, lisa murkowski is on that bill and if you can move that bill is that a steppingstone to the for the people act peor does the passage of that shut off the interest in passing another voting rights built on top ofit ? >> guest: there's a massive demand in this country for the for the people act, over 83 percent of this country. the voting rights restoration act, your politicians over more than 40 states pushing 300 bills to make it harder for working americans to vote. we rationalized so much in this country and we act like we've got a voter suppression measure. in 1902 in virginia, it was the jim crow constitutional convention.

mom's side, we dissent from thomas jefferson's grandma by her other grandchildren who are her were her family slaves and in that state, sandra glass in 1902 with the five votersuppression measures, one of them a lifetime ban onformerly incarcerated people . it's this , and it explains very plainly, the purpose of the bill is to restore white supremacy of the law to restore white supremacy at the law of the land in every county in virginia then he goes on to explain that it's going impact a lot of white people and his eyes it was voter suppression would impact more blackpeople so it would be okay . that's what we have to be clear about is that these voter suppression loss are being passed in over 40 states with 300 bills that would limit early voting. it would impact long-distance rather than black or white that would require people to buy expensive ids. it impacts americans when they lost their driver's license or lost their id or

have a student id but don't have a gun license. to go pay money to qualify to vote. all they're trying to do is to make it harder for working people to vote. i always want people to be clear that whenever you hear someone talk about votes purity, it's usually an apology a if you will a and defense of why therefore voter suppression. give you a couple of examples . we have seen a republican politician, republican politician about 20 years talking about voter fraud. and then they go out there and they investigate and they find specifically almost nobody. you have a better chance of knowing somebody who truly believes they've been abducted by a ufo then you have a case of voting fraud or for that matter better chance of finding somebody who's been bitten by a shark and finding a prosecutable

case of voter fraud. but if you go back to the history of the country there's been consistency. if you look at they said that my ancestors, my mom's ancestors should be able to vote, black shouldn't be able to vote, they made it very clear that they thought that basically we were softheaded and that other folks could influence mathe elections and they were making sure people who lacked mental faculties to understand policies could vote for were too uneducated or too slow. it was a lie area women were more sharp they said if you go back to the attacks on women's voting in the 19th century and 18th 1century, they actually argue that a man with a wife would have to votes, honestly, try that whole. try telling your life to vote . the how it turns out to you. that was the argument and then goes back to those

working-class white men, the privates of the revolutionary army who were been voting until the 1840s. they said a man who owned no land, will not type any therefore conflict is the elections from election day. it was a lie. they use that specter of voter fraud from the weight of the american revolution to ultimately justify attacking working ability to vote and it was prior to the revolutionary party, men were who were able to vote by the middle of the 19th century. they all lie about eywomen and black folks as well. l it's just time for us. let's just embrace the fact every american has the right to vote. we are a country that gave the world the notion of one person, one vote. and it's critical that we truly live up to it and we

stop p the cynical politicians who would put politics before principal. extreme partisanship before principal and finally pass the vote the people act area a three percent 83, 15 minutes left, former democratic nominee in 2018, president of the naacp taking your phone calls. lines for begins, democrats and independents. nothing is waiting .pines florida, morning. >> thank you for taking my call. mister jones my daughter is extremely mentally handicapped, she's in her 40s . we have to have government issued are for her. for her to be able to do just about anything. healthcare, you name it. got to prove who she is. your position that getting an identification card is difficult has some merit to

it area you have to go to a government center and you have to pay a few dollars and you have to wait in line and then you have to get your photograph taken, etc. area there is no reason e my daughter needs a government id card for basic services, why someone shouldn't be able to get an identification card to prove who they are and prove they are an american citizen before they vote. that is reasonable. it is not unreasonable. i'd like to point out that george soros is very much a literal and he gives millions, perhaps even billions of dollars to the kinds of individuals that you would probably vote for. so with all due respect sir you seem like a decent guy

but take to your positions. i think they are misled properly due to your own personal biases. >> host: let me give ben a chance to respond. >> guest: thank you sir and thank you for being the good committed parent that you are. it's just impressive the parents who stick with their kids through everything. it's what we do as parents and it's what's expected from us and yet it deserves commendation andi respect you for caring for your daughter . what i'd also say is that the country was 600 million people and we've got to make sure our voting laws fit all of us and i've sat with elderly women who bought their birth certificate was lost in the fire in the courthouse, 67 years ago and

their state have to have an original copy of your birth certificate order to get the idea that they need to vote and they're pulling their hair out and we got to go to judges and to fill out affidavits. in this case when i was talking to was her. doctor taking up the cause of the making sure all that patients that practice which is a real practice , a lot of elderly couldn't vote because she was shocked that new laws in her state, that she was president of the naacp that the state was keeping her elderly clients voting because of a piece of paper. that everybody knew that burned up couldn't be produced. i got to make sure that as far as transparency, i support transparency forevery billionaire . my family from both sides, goes way back in building this democracy. in new england, the black site in virginia to the old colonies, families that from

each side came hereabout 400 years, my dads side is 346 . we have always fought to ensure that our democracy works for all of us. it's sad to me that we have, we are back in the days of partisanship. the reality is that the leaders of the daily republican party looks like the leaders of the democratic party 100 years ago. the leaders of the today's democratic party look like the leaders of the republican party after the civil war. i'm really can't put a whole lot of stock in parties. but i do care about people. you care about yourdaughter . and i care about this country sir just like you care about thiscountry . all i ask is that we make it easier or every american to vote. we did for centuries and it's only been here in the last 10 years the coke brothers piled their millions of dollars attacking voting rights,

making it harder for people to vote, attacking early voting on sunday , requiring government ids area things quite frankly that americans just have to issue with historically but libertarians have had an issue with h historically we got to get back to first principles. first principles, voting should be accurate and. >>. >> host: this is glenn, good morning. >> caller: ben jiles has got his talking points and he's got a script. >> the coke brothers and the voting rights, in georgiathey will take you to get an id . that lady in the fire, she lied area and she can get an id area see how they skipped

over the george soros billionaire with the left wing, he's a left-wing, i don't believe you have honesty here did you want to respond poorly to go to barbara. >> just to be clear, george soros, charles coke, anybody who's writing big checks in our elections, there should be transparency really it's just a basic value. i'll point out that ted cruz only challenged us. he challenged other conservative groups to to disclose their top fivedonors and we were happy to do it . i askedconservatives to join me and they all declined . i doubt if they show their top five donors three of them would be people whose average gift would be under $100,000 and gave the house and there will area we are truly people for the american way. we are not a subsidiary of in the way that mister mcconnell truly has become from the coke brothers. >> barbara, california democrat, good morning.

>> good morning, what an honor to speak with you. i believe we need to get rid of the filibuster because we are not getting nothing done area andi'm frustrated . and these callers that are calling in about theleft-wing , all i can say is wow. so i want the democrats to start fighting harder and let these people know we need to stabilize elections, get rid of these people and getour people in their . >> host: then. >> guest: let me say one thing, i'm always worried when we start to type cast each other as evil. and some of the callers today , you could kind of feel that little bit of venom or. >> my uncle works in a

lumberyard in northern new england and i'm sure he voted for trump in the primary, i love you . course most of my family voted for bernie or hillary and i loveall of them to . the reality is that c-span i thank god for every day because it allows us to come along in a format, not soundbites and in a way that gets back to the old kind of conversations for this time of social media and everything just kind of being a singer. i really appreciate that color and i appreciate all the callers. we have a chance here. to really come together as a country is going to be up to the people of this country to do it. right now we should start talking about senator manchin and my faith is always in the people . when you look at the people of this country we agree on a lot. politicians who want to get us against each other all day long here we have bill, f1 has already passed the u.s.

house, for the people act. 83 percent of the american people support it. generally speaking we think that if you're rich and you want to have outsized influence in our election you better know who you are and what you're trying to do if you're working and you want v to vote , americans it should be easy for you to vote. that's a still is about. and again i would encourage anybody who wants to know how mitch mcconnell operates the coke brothers operates to the new yorker and look at the expose of a few monthsago . it's shocking. at the end of the day, billionaires, their fate is in using mitch mcconnell as a shield against the will of the people. >> host: returning to tt bipartisanship is the goal,is getting rid of the filibuster the answer ? adding rid of mechanisms that force one party not to be able to move things on a party line unless i guess i have more than 60 members in

the senate but would it help bipartisanship to get rid of the filibuster? >> in this case it would because the bipartisan's are talking about the american people coming together and when you see bills a three percent of americans support being stopped by 40 senators, a minority of the u.s. senate it doesn't make sense. he believed you. in so many aspects of our government. who becomes mayor, who becomes congress person and all of a sudden in the u.s. senate, they can't even operate by the rules that their city council does and say if we have a majority of votes it passes. roosevelt agenda, or economic agenda would not have passed if wehad this filibuster . key voting rights protections up to this day have held back and mitch mcconnell has shown

judges that it's not sacred to him and he's shown in his hypocrisy around the supreme court that he has no principles. his only principle is power. and power to run the government should belong first and foremost to the american people. 83 percent of us support, how dare minority of senators get in the way of that bill g. >> host: amherst massachusetts, this is bill and independent. >> caller: thank you for taking my call, i'm a leftist in the green party. thank you mister jones. i agree with you on having the filibuster. it's patently unfair and i agree with those statistics throughout your career but i have a problem with hr one. even though it does contain things that help voting rights, it also has a vicious crackdown against the green

party and other left-wing parties by increasing the amount to find matching funds 5000 to 20,000. and it also cracks down against the poor using several provisions and one that increases giant donations from the party committees from 5000 $200 million. and there are three party committees so that's $300 million . which helps the idea of billionaires buying the election. >> i'll look into all that so feel free to reach out to me at people for the american way you can reach out to me on twitter at ben jealous. what i would say is the course of the u.s. senate, no bill is perfect but every bill is the start and when you look at this bill it's a

good start and quite frankly there's no way to improve it if it doesn't pass. >> host: bob, republican, good morning. about five minutes left with ben at this point. no answer. >> good morning sir. >> i first want to say there's nothing wrong with voting systems. you and your organization want to get in and throw everything upside down and tear it up. constitution and our forefathers were much smarter than you. they said the legislature shall have jurisdiction on how voting goes down and you can't help stupid. i don't feel a bitsorry for people who don't go down and get an identification . your organization for the american way, i think it's for the illegal persons way

to vote. they don't have a right to vote in this country until they are an american citizen . our constitution is to protect american citizens, the united states of america, not the federalists of america area this is not a federalistcountry . it's the united states and that's why our legislators have jurisdiction. >> my child was between northern california and baltimore add i do a lot of time in stockton. it's a beautiful place. but i would say sir is california is very different than virginia. california history, virginia story are very different. virginia, georgia. i had hoped black-and-white in poverty for generations and it's easy to find folks who are 80, 90 years old. my grandmother turned 105 in november who had serious issues getting documents because quite frankly they

didn't need their birth certificate when they were 30 years old and the court house burned down. the records were that they eventually lost they drop their drivers license and they went back and were told well, we pass the votinglaw in 2010 or 2012 . now you're going to have to have an original copy of your certificate to get this id. >> .. he is, look there are a lot of great things about the u.s. constitution. it is true in the u.s. constitution also made it possible for states, at that time, to bar women from voting

and to bar black votes from voting. and to bar white men who do not land -- own land and we have all benefited from the evolution of our protections and of our rights as americans in our elections and that is what we're doing now. now what has become clear, the time between the gap of the have and the have-nots has become so massive that it is just become there be a billionaire is trying to bite the elections and some on the left and the right and all of them need to be held to a high level of transparency. >> host: last call. we went short on time. cornell, waterworks, new jersey, democrats, make it quick. >> caller: yes, i will make it quick. they keep talking about the voter id. i see other bigger problems such as why is it that only democrats people are waiting hours in line to vote. i mean, six, seven, eight hours to vote.

why is it that they've closed a lot of polling places and if it was only the voter id why did they come up with over 300 new voting bills, it is definitely planning to make it harder for people to vote and the fact of the matter is, it's like in the last election with -- there was a massive amount of people voting because the pandemic it was easier for people to vote when they mailed it in and that is why you had that enormous turnout. the problem is when people vote republicans can't win and the filibuster should be demolished because nothing is getting done. >> that is cornell, new jersey. we'll give you the final minute. >> guest: yeah, absolutely right. this is about making it harder for people to vote in every way and we probably spoke too much about voter id today but we have

not gotten into the fact that they have been pulling away polling places and forcing people to get on buses and you use to walk to vote and all sorts of things. it simply trying to make it harder to vote. while i frankly believe that for a lot of statewide elections and presidential elections with voter suppression is about suppressing the vote because one party frankly believes there needs to be changes in the country and they aren't in their favor. i'd like to point out that there is another option which is that they get to seek to appeal to more black folks or working women or two more brown folks and that would moderate our politics. i'm all for two-party system or a multiparty system. all four parties have to compete for the vote of every voter and we should not allow people to bend the rules when they can't win. instead we should require them to bend an ear and listen to the people of this country and figure out how they actually

earn our votes and that is what for the people act is all about. stop buying elections, make it easier for working people of all colors to vote. >> host: been jealous as a president of the people for the american way, pfa w .org and thank you for you the time and come back and talk to us again. >> guest: all right, sir. thank you very much. >> we're live now for remarks from u.s. attorney general merrick garland. he will be announcing steps the justice department is taking on voting rights and access to voting. he speaking from the justice department main hall here in washington dc. should get underway in just a moment. live coverage here on c-span2.

[silence] >> we are a few minutes away from remarks from u.s. attorney general merrick garland. this afternoon he will be talking about voting rights and access to voting for he is speaking from the justice department main hall here in washington dc. should start in just a moment. live coverage when it gets underway here on c-span2. right now a discussion from washington journal. >> host: we welcome back the doctor to our program. surgeon and professor at johns hopkins university, author of the book the price we pay what broke american healthcare and how to fix it. that book now out in paperback with a section looking back on

covid. one conclusion you come to, doctor quote, it is clear that our entire healthcare system was too slow and too rigid to respond swiftly to the coronavirus pandemic. what was the main reason for that slowness, that rigidity and how we learned at some of the lessons needed here? >> guest: john, healthcare became for years ago officially the largest business in the united states. $3.5 trillion industry. and yet, we were unable to pivot, not just in terms of capacity management but also in terms of our research systems. the pharmaceutical industry moved quickly with prepayment of that vaccine but the rest of our research info structure was not able to move quickly. for example, when the pandemic it the entire country was asking some very basic with clinical questions. how does it spread? do masks work? how many people are a symptomatically man what are the most contagious? not of those questions were

answered with any sort of rapid research and the nih gets $40 billion a year and they couldn't pivot one dime of that in the first six months to answer any of those questions so basically you had a vacuum of knowledge and political opinions fill that vacuum. >> host: one place where we sought rapid research and rapid development was in the development of a vaccine in this country. now widely distributed and is that one place where there wasn't slowness or rigidity and the concerns that you have? >> yeah, it makes you wonder why we can't move that quickly to address cancer and heart disease and other problems. if you look at the average time from development to fda approval it is about ten years. if you look at the funding cycles of the nih my research team at john hopkins applies for an nih funding all the time and it is about a year until you get the money. we got to move quicker in science. it is time to start using mrna technology for other diseases that was developed in the 1990s and apply for the first time in for mask use with covid

but what about an mrna vaccine for hiv now and certain types of cancer and malaria and we address other major health problems with this sort of speed that we saw with covid. >> host: how would you grade the cdc and the fda during covid? where they some of the causes of these bottlenecks you are concerned about? >> guest: i would give them a barely passing grade, if at all. the cdc has basically been late or wrong on every issue in the pandemic. first of all, on warning of the pandemic so why was a small group of us physicians out there sounding the alarm every place we could trying to prepare the country and the cdc and many of our agencies, nih, they were not sounding the alarm and as a result when we had the closures it was like the rapture. , people were rushing to pick up their kids and scribbling to get to the grocery store within an hour and people were stuck on trips and overseas travel.

we should've gotten more preparation and geared up. they were later wrong on masks and they were late and wrong on schools and late and wrong on vaccine allocations and i'm recommending two doses early when we had a limited vaccine supply. we should have focused on first doses and finally why were we immunizing early on when we had a very scarce supply of vaccine, people already immune with natural immunities. that made no sense. >> host: this is not the first time you are raising some of those concerns but you are raising those concerns at the time. >> guest: wrote, i wrote the first piece of a universal masking in "the new york times" in the spring of the initial pandemic outbreak and i took criticism for that and the reality was we should have been hearing this from our agencies. fda took three weeks to meet just to assemble their experts to decide on the vaccine and it was a very small database and it was very, it was a no-brainer. there is serious zero serious

adverse events so how many tasks you need to run on the number zero and the experts voted unanimously which tells you and people who defend the fda saying they got to take the time but look, don't cut corners but cut through all the red tape. if you look at after the experts met it took another two days to issue the eua. what was happening during those two days? that is the kind of bureaucracy we should not tolerate when we are losing thousands of americans per day. >> host: doctor marty mcgarry joining us, author of the book the price you pay: what broke american healthcare and how to fix it. the professor and surgeon at johns hopkins university. taking your phone calls this morning on a phone line. but up regionally if you are an eastern or central time zone, 2027 for ##8-0000, mountain or pacific, (202)748-8001 and if you haven't picked up the book is now out in paperback and you can pick up today's wall street journal on the opinion pages of

today's wall street journal and that is doctor marty mcgarry with the power of natural immunity. what is that? >> guest: that is what you have the infection and it turns out that about half the country meets that criteria. 10% of the country has been confirmed to have tested positive for covid and that is about 10% of americans. for every one person that tested positive there is for five or six people who have had the infection but not tested positive. all in all upwards of 50% of the country has had natural immunity and the zero prevalence studies of antibodies and the random population in california support those numbers as i go through in "the wall street journal". that is about half of the unvaccinated that have natural immunity. 64% of adults have vaccination and about half of the unvaccinated had natural immunity. that means 80-85% of adults walking on the united states have immunity. if you ignore natural immunity as our public officials have

done it changes everything. all of a sudden the ways of the path to 85% of the population is through mandates and we clearly includes and demonizing that people have a good reason not to get the vaccine and if they had the infection in the past. >> host: but what is the harm of having those who might have natural immunity and getting a vaccine and taking the dose? >> guest: the harm is when you have a scarce vaccine supply people are dying because they are begging to get the vaccine and can't because of where supply constraints and this is a global problem right now and we got people dying in india and brazil and all around the world and we are immunizing people already immune. once there is enough vaccine supply it is a sufficient and, by the way, the immunity protection is probably lifelong from natural immunity and from research that i've summarized today in the wall street journal. >> host: what about the immunity protection from the vaccine. is it worse or better than the natural immunity? >> no one knows. we have not had enough follow-up

and we have actually have more follow-up data on natural immunity then vaccinated immunity because natural immunity has been around for 18 months and vaccinated immunity has been around for about nine months and so, no one knows but in general people think they're both long-term and durable. >> host: already for you we have callers. dave in maryland, up first. you are on with marty makary. >> caller: thank you, thank you for taking my call. you know, i think where the doctor is is spot on with the pressure going on and i will take the perfect example in the doctors playground, the largest hospital associations, healthcare, you know, organizations in the country and with their national conference this year they are actually requiring people to have the vaccine in order to attend and again,.

[audio difficulties] >> host: dave, are you still with us? we are losing you there for a second. >> guest: that's a good point. vaccine mandates for people who already have immunity don't make sense. when you create this artificial construct in the united states that as our public officials and cdc have done, you got two groups, the vaccinated and unvaccinated and you are alienating and disenfranchising the half of the unvaccinated that have natural immunity and those that tested positive in that counts as immunity. let's stop talking about the vaccinated and unvaccinated and instead talk about the immune and non- immune. >> host: variants are a topic that gets talked a lot about so when were talking about vaccinated and unvaccinated. this is doctor anthony fauci recently on that topic. >> one is boosting against the original wild type for which a person was originally vaccinated

and the other is a variant specific boost. we are approaching both of those but the one thing that we are noticing that is important is that the higher your degree of immune response against the wild type the greater the secondary coverage you have against a wide array of variance which is the reason why, as we have reported in previous press briefings that when you look at particularly the double doses primary boost of the mrna vaccines, which we have the most data it was rather good protection that spills over against multiple variance. you can boost against the wild type and still cover variance, including 617. >> host: doctor anthony fauci just yesterday during one of

these covid briefings. doctor mccarrick, could you put that in plain english and tell us whether you agree. >> guest: i agree with it that you can boost your immunity and that might increase your antibody level which could potentially help prevent against future infections but the question is, do you need to do that? if the immunity protection that people have right now with the standard two dose regimen or if they've had natural immunity or state natural immunity and windows which is generally what i recommend for people who had the infection, that immunity protection might be lifelong so why are we talking about boosters? i think the booster conversation will likely be relegated to those who are older and don't have good immune responses and immuno pressed community. >> host: nevada, can waiting to talk to you. can, you are on with doctor makary. >> caller: you were worried about the u.s. health care system and the biggest, the most inefficient industry in america

is the u.s. federal government and they got their hands in everything and yet people like doctor anthony fauci who have their own interests, it is proven that he's been helped funding the wuhan lab in the various and he has his interests so he is running -- anyway, the federal government as inefficient as they are they continue to get bigger and more inefficient the healthcare system is going to be a mess forever and that's all i have to say. thank you. >> host: doctor makary. >> guest: first of all, i have disagreed with doctor anthony fauci on almost every strategy of this entire pandemic but i do believe he is the best intentions and i do believe he loves this country but in terms of our healthcare system it is spiraling out of control and going to take down the entire economy if we don't change our ways. right now healthcare spending is 48% of all federal spending. if you look at the hidden ways that we spend money on

healthcare. for example, about 20 plus% of our federal spending goes to social security checks. guess where seniors are spending their social security checks? have are spending on co-pays, deductibles, coinsurance and noncovered services. the defense department, the va benefits for federal workers it is not just medicare and medicaid but it's internal at 48% of all federal spending that goes to healthcare now. what are we talking about increasing that to when we talk about fortifying our healthcare system? we got to change our ways. we got to change the payment models and we got to start talking about treating the underlying problems that bring people to care. i'm not just talking preventative medicine. i'm not just talking mammograms and what age you start that but i'm talking about food as medicine and treating patients as a person and the conversations we are having now to treat more people with diabetes with cooking classes rather than just throwing insulin at them. you can't just keep throwing

meds at the problem. we are the most medicated society in the history of the planet and medication prescriptions doubled in the last ten years. we got to talk about school lunches is much as we talk about bariatric surgery. we got to talk stress management and sleep science when we talk about high blood pressure instead of just throwing meds at the problem. with back pain we got to talk more about ice in physical therapy, not just surgery and opioids. these are the conversations we are starting to have and this is the destruction in healthcare right now. it's exciting and taking place and it will fix healthcare, not through legislation but by changing it from the ground up and that was what i was privileged to profile in the book, the price we pay. >> host: the price we paid what broke american healthcare and how to fix it now out in paperback. i should note that doctor, by and large americans have not had to worry about the price we pay for covid treatments or shots but is it going to continue