agencies response to telework during the pandemic. you can see live coverage of this subcommittee hearing starting at 3:00 p.m. eastern on c-span3, online at c-span.org or listen with the free c-span radio app. weeknights this month we're featuring american history tv programs as a preview of what's available every weekend on c-span3. tonight the national world war ii museum hosts author neil bascomb to talk about his book "hunting eichmann." he describes how a tip from a holocaust survivor and his daughter led to the capture of adolf eichmann. watch tonight at 8:00 p.m. eastern and enjoy american history tv, every weekend on c-span3. brendan buck joins us right

now. he's tlet's begin with the election. what do you think is the state of the republican party after november 3rd? >> it's surprising. it's an election where you had the rare event of an incumbent president getting voted out. down battllot, they did so well. there was a lot of expectation that after this election if the polls were right and it was going to be a blowout for democrats, that there would be a lot of grappling within the party about what it stabnds for and what the future is. i haven't seen that at all. republicans feel like what the outcome particularly down ballot is justification of everything that the president has been doing and that trumpism has worked. you had a situation where democrats were expected to take

another 10 to 12, 15 seats and have lost close to 10 in the house. democrats are very demoralized about not getting the senate. everybody that waswas hoping fo conversation among the party about what we stand for, i think that's put on. for the time being, despite the fact that he lost, it's still going to be donald trump's party and he's going to be the biggest voice. >> how do you react to this headline, counties for biden has higher job losses? >> i think this election was more about donald trump than joe biden or really other factor. this was a referendum on donald trump and people who came out were trying to send a message to the president. the biggest areas of the country, what's the story of the election, the biggest areas of the country that really put joe

biden over the top were the suburbs were more educated, more affluent, particularly white women who had just had enough and they came out in droves and i think that is ultimately what drove the outcome of the election more really than -- i think a lot of us expected that covid would have a bigger impact. and certainly i think joe biden's mandate coming out of this is to address that, that crisis. but jobs, the economy all were secondary to donald trump, his personality and a referendum on him as a person. >> if that's the case, how can you say trumpism worked? >> i'm not saying necessarily it does. that's what a lot of republicans have internalized from this. i think that if there was a blowout election, you would see a lot of republicans saying maybe we need to rethink this. given the strong showing down ballot, the way that republicans who are still in office have taken this is to say, maybe the

populism, the politics that drives maybe some grievance, that works, that sells with republican voters and it shows that we can turn out a lot of voters, republican voters, anyway. but, you know, i don't know that that's necessarily a good long-term play because i don't know that you could have trumpism without trump. i know there's going to be a lot of people who are trying to position themselves to be the 2024 standard-bearer whether or not they can do that with trump sort of hanging out there still is an open question. but i think a lot of the people who are trying to fill that role are really adopting that same populist type politics that donald trump made so famous. i don't know that it necessarily is a good long-term plan, but it doesn't seem like they're moving away from it any time soon. >> what advice would you give to the party about making adjustments based on the outcome and the turnout that you saw in suburbs and the other areas you talked about.

>> the story of the election is that character matters and i think that was really what was on the ballot in a lot of these places. i don't think that the suburb areas are necessarily progressive and i think that is why you saw down ballot races go so poorly for democrats. it's interesting, if you look at polling over a time, people often ask the question, who do you think is going to win? and for a long time, you saw people thinking that donald trump was going to win. and towards the end, a number of voters i think woke up and the polling shows this, they started to say, more voters thought joe biden was going to win. when they thought joe biden was going to win, they thought maybe they should put a check on a biden presidency. that tells me that voters in these areas are not necessarily signing up for a bold progressive agenda, a green new deal, tax increases, large health care plan, they just wanted to end the donald trump presidency and so there's a lot of opportunity still to win back those voters, but you need to

show that you've learned the lesson that you're not just a trump party, that you have ideas, that you care about things, that you have character and those things still matter, particularly on the margins that we're talking about. >> who in the party represents the future. >> certainly right now it's still donald trump and i think people are looking for what's next and i don't think we're at that point yet. obviously it's been reported that the president is talking about running again in 2024. i will be shocked if he doesn't at least present the appearance that he's going to do that for the next two to three years. but either way, he is going to have the largest voice. and i don't -- there's always a bias. i think it's important to appreciate that, you know, the party doesn't exist in a way that it used to. there's no real establishment. there's no one who sets the

agenda. we are -- we chase personalities these days. and donald trump is clearly the biggest personality and the way he's taken ahold over voters is the most important thing to appreciate. it is not that members of congress who go along with whatever he says are doing it because they like him necessarily or they respect him personally. it's because when they go home and hear from their constituents, the number one things that their constituents want to know, are you with the president? i heard it so many times when i was in the house. we would be trying to sell a bill, here's a reasons you should vote for that, and members would say, i'm with you. i understand what i need to hear is that trump is for it because that's all my constituents care about. you have a lot of voters who are really still the number one issue for them is support for the president and that flows up to members of congress. are there other people who may want to take the party in a different direction, you look at mitt romney has staked out his own ground. i don't know that he has any interest in running for anything

else ever again. you see ben sasse who clearly is not a donald trump-style republican. the problem for them is that the lane, so to speak, out there is very narrow for those types of people. so many republicans are all donald trump republicans at this point. he's taken it over and so they can try to lead a movement and i don't think there's a lot of space for that. there aren't a lot of voters. you're not leading a movement because there's nobody there. >> i want to show you and our viewers what representative kevin mccarthy, minority leader in the house, had to say about the future of the party. >> you're assuming president trump is moving on. i think the president, regardless whether he's president again or citizen trump, he will continue to play a part in this nation. i look at the numbers of members who got elected, they got elected under president trump. the president helped them get elected in the process as well and we expanded the party. how is the party going to look

different. it's going to look broader. it's going to reach more people than it reached before. it's going to expand like we haven't seen from new americans to first generations to the expansion throughout. i think you're going to continue to see a desire to put america on a path where the next century is ours, that we have rebuilt our military to continue that, to make it stronger, despite what the progressives would want to do on the opposite side. we've watched -- we've looked forward in making our streets safe and secure despite what the other side would do. we watched criminal justice. we'll continue to build on all of those things that we believe in. >> why is he making those -- bringing up those specific points? >> i think he's trying to make the point that republicans had a really good election night down ballot in the house and expanded

the -- their numbers by electing women and by adding african-americans to the -- and asia americans to the conference in a way that we haven't been able to do in a while. i think he has a good story to tell from the election. and the fact that the president seemed to overperform with minorities particularly, hispanic voters, i think there's a story to tell there. whether that is enough to get you over the top, i don't know. i think what kevin mccarthy is going to be doing over the next two years is going to be running hard against the joe biden administration. i think kevin did an incredible job bringing republicans basically right near the finish line. we are, you know, going to have a republican minority that is in the teens. you need 218 and they're going to have 214 or something like that. so close. and i think what you need to do now is pivot from just being a donald trump party to being a

good opposition party running against that progressive agenda that he was talking about. >> how do you do that? if you were in your role that you have been in, your roles, to the speaker's office, what advice would you be giving kevin mccarthy houston about how he plays out the next two years? >> i think they need to be laser focused on the democrats. it's much easier to be a minority party when you have an administration to sort of take on. i think the biden administration's legislative agenda is probably taken a serious hit without having control of the senate. we don't know that for sure, but it seems that way. there's no shortage of things that joe biden is going to end up doing through administrative action and executive orders that were what people were expecting from a joe biden administration. he is a centrist but he's facing a lot of pressure from the left,

the progressive wing of his party to do more, to go big, be bolder and i think he's going to end up doing a lot of those things. and i don't think that the country is center left, i think the country is center right and that will provide a lot of opportunities. to the extent that joe biden has to continue appeasing, you know, the if aocs of the world and he will have to do that at certain points, those are opportunities, every single time, to remind people that who is in the house really makes a difference and that they can serve more as a check on a biden administration. that's the most powerful message you have in a midterm election going into 2022 is what party can serve as the check on an administration. would you rather have a conversation that helps a president pass their agenda or would you rather have one that serves as a check and overwhelming the american people, they like checks and balances. they want a check and that is what the message that i'm sure kevin mccarthy will be running

on in two years. >> and he's promised or predicted, i should say, that republicans will take back the house in 2022. let's get to calls. sabrina, independent. >> caller: hi. i'm curious, the stimulus packages, i understand biden is not for those, but we desperately need them. north carolina has several businesses that are closed due to covid and there's hardly any work here. do you think that biden is going to pass any relief packages for the people? >> well, i think he wants to. this is one of those situations where everybody saying they want to do something, but what that something is continues to get in the way because everybody has a different idea. i was disappointed that congress didn't get something done before this election. it was very clear late, at least, that the administration was very eager to get a last win

and i think from my perspective, nancy pelosi got in the way of that. i think she did not want to change the dynamic of the election in the last few weeks. she was clearly running out the clock on the trump presidency thinking that she could she cou potentially get a better deal with the biden administration. i think that was -- i thought it was time and that was a risky proposition. >> the idea that republicans who were hesitant to get there under a donald trump administration will now come and be with the biden administration on a covid relief package is -- i'm pretty skeptical about that. so do i have a lot of confidence anything will happen right now in the lame duck? all appearances are no. it doesn't even seem that there are conversations taking place and the president has not demonstrated a lot of interest in governing at this time, but i think it will be the top priority of a biden administration. if there was a mandate beyond just being a good guy, i think

the mandate was to resolve this crisis of covid and not just the public health crisis, but the economic crisis which is just as large. so he's going have to find a way to do things. the problem is what senate republicans want and what he wants and what nancy pelosi wants are on largely two different planets in detail, but also scope. so -- and this is again where joe biden's reputation will have to come into play. he's obviously known as a dealmaker and someone he can get along with and a track record of working with mitch mcconnell to get things done, but i will say there is a long playing field here that they will need to cross before they can get to the finish line. >> brent in quincy, michigan. democratic caller. >> yes. good morning your republicans in the congress, from what i remember, expressed their real

opinions of donald trump before he was elected which was basically he's a joke. he's a carnival barker and he's a con man which is all supported by his trump university, lawsuits where he had to pay out -- what was it? over $20 million for defrauding students, $2 million lawsuits for defrauding charities. anyway. they gave their real opinion and now all they do is they jettisoned the dollar integrity except for mitt romney, he's the only one left with a spine. they pander to the base come is basically a call to personality. beyond that --? okay -- >> my question is i'd like to know -- i've got two questions. one is that i always try to get

answered. what happened to the republicans that care about deficits? you've -- >> brent, let's take that question because we have other callers waiting. >> you're starting to see them doing that now, and i think that was one of the biggest hang-ups on the covid relief package. nancy pelosi was talking about another $3 trillion, $4 trillion like that in her first offer and i think one of the things that set back negotiations early on was you had a lot of republican senators from straight out of the gate said we're not interested in spending that much money again. they -- it was remarkable the first time that the c.a.r.e.s. act passed and the first covid relief package and trillions of dollars that passed in a number of days with big republican support and that's unthinkable just a few years ago and i think it's starting to catch up with them a little bit and certainly, deficits have been going up. this is a president that didn't

ever really care about them. certainly my old boss tried to convince them of the importance of that and he made very clear early on that that wasn't something that motivated him, but you know there's only so much that you can ask out of a republican to keep voting for trillions of dollars worth of spending and that was early on one of the hang-ups. i think if donald trump had leaned into this early on, it really wasn't until september, october, when he woke up to the fact that this wasn't getting done and it was too late at that point. if he had come out earlier in the summer and said republicans, you need to do this, you need to get behind this then there may have been a different story and his absence from the scene on this debate let so many republicans come out and say we're not going to spend this kind of money and that's yet bill that the senate republicans have come up with, which is in the level of 500 million, far less than what was before us, but i think republicans have sort of had enough of the

spending. >> joanne, fallon, nevada. republican. >> good morning. >> good morning. >> i -- i -- i joined -- got into and became a delegate in 2008 because i didn't like the centrists of mccain, how centered. i think we went too much to electing centrists and there was no area for them to go to to bargain on a deal. everybody just met in the middle and everybody was happy and everyone checked their salary and i had to work for mccain to get votes for him. we couldn't get people out to vote for him. mitt romney, we couldn't gather 20 people in a car wash, for god's sake to me because nobody liked him.

he didn't bring the party together. trump has brought the party together. we make deals. you go to the right, let the democratic party go to the left and then let's make the deal and meet in the middle. you people have led us down a bad road for 30 years. we're tired of the centrists. >> is that what happened? when republicans held the majority in the house, when you were there serving speaker paul ryan, is that the strategy and did it work? >> i think that call is a great example of the state of our politics right now. there is very little center and i would argue there's actually very little deal making going on. we are a very divided country and both parties largely taken the approach that you stick with each other and you bring out your base and you fire up your own voters and that's the path ahead and that leads to and i

would disagree, and it doesn't end up to a lot of deals being made and what happens is you have a breakdown in the legislative process because there is no compromise at any stage and you end up having to govern by crisis and i mean by that government funding deadlines and the fiscal cliff is a great example where we're running up the deadline because there was no ability for lawmakers because no one was able to compromise and the leaders try to stave off crisis and avert disaster an pass a deal in the last minute and it's a terrible deal to legislate and it's what we're left with and people would get frustrated seeing that. i would argue that it is a reflection that the polarization has not allowed us to come together earlier on and have a really functioning, legislative system. >> let's go to fred in millbrook, new york. independent.

hello. >> thanks for taking my call. i just want to say both political parties want puppets. you get trump who isn't controlled by any political party. i always thought he would get assassinated. i always thought to myself what would happen if they had a non-democrat or non-republican president like a libertarian. i would figure the democrats and republicans would get together and assassinate him. i think why donald trump didn't get assassinated is because he's under the republican banner. let's go to john, democrat. >> yes. i'm an ex-republican. i used to like john mccain. and i'm a vietnam veteran. i went to war for men like donald trump to say, hey, listen, i've got bone spurs and take off for golf lessons instead of taking care of this

pandemic. now his party and him are guilty of spreading this dirty, nasty disease around the country, and the gentleman on the panel, i don't care what you care, i don't care about your party. i quit your party because your party has nothing to offer me. and i only care about me like donald trump cares about him. now the reason he's not admitted to the president elect is that he wanteds the election and he wants to hold on to something that he ain't got. he stole the apprentice from mark bethea and he's done no good for people in the building

his buildings in atlantic city. >> okay, john. i'm going to join in. do you think it's time for president trump to concede this race? >> oh, certainly. i think it is nonsensical, and you know, one of the things i've learned over my years, with this president, you have to demonstrate why he should do something because it's in his own best interest and he's not terribly interested in helping the party or anyone else. i think what he should appreciate is he's hurting his owning well see by doing this and he's hurting the potential to hold the senate majority which i think would hurt his legacy by doing this. there's absolutely no basis for this. his time is running out and you'll have states starting to certify results very shortly, but i do think that what he's doing is very harmful. i'm from georgia. i'm looking at those senate races down there and those runoffs that will determine the outcome of the election and his

message to voters that your vote doesn't matter. elections are rigged. democrats are out to get you, is starting to seep in to voter psyche down there and it could hurt turn out and it could give democrats those two seats which would give democrats the senate majority and i really think that he should stop for his own best interest. >> we're talking about senator david purdue, the incumbent republican being challenged by ossoff and kelly loeffler chal edged by reverend warnock. the runoff race is taking place january 5th. susan in tulsa, oklahoma. republican. susan, good morning. >> good morning. >> go ahead with your question or comment. >> i just wanted to say i don't believe we have a national agenda, and i don't believe we've had a national agenda for many years. i can't remember really, the

immigration on this last election and the verbage that people in america and i think that might have been important in this last election, but prior to that, i think it possibly was balancing the budget and when we had three candidates and he did have the expense of americans however, we need another national agenda and maybe these new gop women will be bear cats in there and get this country back on track instead of pandering to all of these minority groups. we have fought these fights over and over again and they keep coming up just during elections and nothing really gets accomplished and i think people do appreciate the fact that president trump actually did do some of the things that he promised and he's just trying to complete that now with the troops. we didn't go over there to win those wars and we went over there to make an influence in the world and vietnam was the

same way. so this is all kind of crazy, this talk and these things that these people say. they don't even understand what's going on. >> susan, i'll have brendan respond to you about a national agenda. >> i think what she's getting sat there haven't been a lot of things that have pulled us all together for some type of national unity to get something done and attack a major problem. >> i think the covid crisis will be that, and i think it has been for the last year. i think that that is going to be the dominant story for the next six months in politics both in responding to the public health situation across the country with what cities and states are doing and certainly in washington trying to pass a new legislative package, and an administration f you have vaccines online and this could be a moment when we're happy with the outcome because we're able to pull together, but we've got a long way to go.

>> what are the vulnerabilities of kevin mccarthy as a leader? >> vulnerabilities. kevin's strength has always been the ability to have junior member of the leadership. he understood politics better than anybody, and now he is not necessarily -- if you want to contrast him with my old boss, he's definitely less of a approximately see person, but to his credit, he is much more of a politics person and always understood, and i think that's why they work so well together so while kevin wasn't necessarily as focused on the policy or the details of the bill we're bringing up, he really understood what motivated members and i think that's what's going to be helpful for him in the minority with trying to take back the house and it is largely politics and you're not writing bills in the minority and setting a policy agenda in the minority and understanding what is good for members to help

them do what they need to do to get reelected and like i said the finish line of taking over the majority and he's very well positioned for his position in the minority because of his political acumen and less on the policy agenda. >> give us an example or the story that illustrates kevin mccarthy's political savviness. >>. >> early on, they used to call his office in the clubhouse because there were always members there, welcome there and he made it basically a hangout in his office and everybody would sort of joke about he's got food and video games going ins on office or movies, i should say and you sort of laughed at it, but it showed very early on that he understood that politics is played at a personal level and personal relationships are what drive getting things done, and he developed trust across the conference, and that's what

you've seen right now. >> look -- whether i'm working for boehner or paul ryan, it was the freedom caucus that was our biggest problem. they were always shooting at us and they were always trying to come up on what we were doing, and has been able together with an alliance with the freedom caucus that i didn't think it was possible and because he worked so hard on those personal relationships and you always knew you could get something done by sending kevin to talk to folks because he'd worked so hard on that and there were plenty of times when things had blown up in the last few years when we were in the speaker's office and particularly with the administration. you needed someone to go in and deliver a message and it was always kevin because not just in the house, he had developed such a good relationship in the white house with the president as well as his senior staff. did he ever push back on being that ms. efrjeessenger?

he loves the personal interplay between people. he craves conversation. he's always talking to somebody. i actually worked for kevin for a little while and one of the things that was most stunning to me when we first got in -- we were getting in an suv and he pulled out his form and started calling reporters and i was his press guy and i was taken a back by that and it just demonstrates he loves talking to people and he loves hearing what people are hearing and he loves knowing where you're from and knowing your wife's name and your kids' name and your dog's name and developing that connection and it's not fake, it's who he is and he's a people person and he loves going in and loves being the one in the room to solve the problem. >> savannah, georgia, maria, an independent. >> yes. >> maria, can you please turn off your television? listen ask talk through the phone. >> it's off, ma'am. >> go ahead. >> okay.

yes. i've enjoyed the conversation mr. buck is providing. it is the first time i've had some sort of idea of what's happening with the republican party. the president can salvage his legacy if he concedes the election and then spends the next four years working at building up his base, he's got 72 million people out there and then leaves the precedence we dignity and respect for the democratic party. >> brendan buck? i absolutely agree. this president has developed a following unlike anything i've seen maybe ever in presidential politics. the loyalty to which republican voters give him is remarkable. it has -- it rears its head everywhere throughout our politics and the legislative process and the electoral process and he'll be the most sought after surrogate in the 2020 midterm for people to come

out. he really is the party at this point. the question is what can he do with that? can he use that remarkable power that he has whether it's the power to marshal voters and the power to get our attention? . he controls what we talk about and we never figured out and maybe joe biden is the only one to figure out how to deal with that. the problem is he's never been able to use it for good and what i mean by that is most of the super powers he has, he uses for his own self-indulgence to get attention for himself as sort of the end goal in itself and i think what he could potentially do and he had the potential to do all kinds of things nah no other president can do was to get a deal with daca, the dreamers on immigration and get a deal on guns that no republican could do other than him. >> use those powers that he has to have people follow him, no matter what policy he's for or

to use that remarkable power he has to get attention for himself and drive towards outcomes, drive toward policy goals and not necessarily saying those are the only two things he should be focused on and he has the ability to do all kinds of things that no other republican could, and if he just focused his energies and following and his power to get attention on an agenda, it could be powerful and something he could run on in 2024. >> brendan buck, did paul ryan share the opinion that he had super powers that he didn't use for good and did he try in his conversations with the president when he was in office to try to convince him of that? >> i certainly think he was in awe of the president's political powers. his ability to rile up voters and his ability to almost move past policy, in a lot of ways the last few years have been a post-policy world where it is really whether you are with or against the president that

defines and clouds everything, and it was really hard to, at first, to grapple with that, and everything has to be looked at through the prism of where the president is on it. certainly, one of his primary jobs for those two years was trying to help the president be a better president and that was a lot of conversations and advice on things that you should or shouldn't do or shouldn't say or approaches you should take. i'm well aware that he is one of the many voices that the president was hearing, but it was definitely his goal from the outset of those two years to try to help him be a better president. how successful we are, i think that's hard to judge, but he talked to him quite regularly. certainly, i think, more early on than toward the end that they were as close at the end of that term, and i know that the president still has some issues with the former speaker, but he certainly tried to help and

tried to give him a lot of advice about using his megaphone to advance things in a positive way. >> their relationship publicly seems strained, the president was critical of him. what impact did that have personally on paul ryan? >> he's a pretty resilient guy. i don't think it impacted him too much. he understood this is part of the job and he knew it was a unique president. >> welcome, everybody. thanks for being here. this is is the hearing for the sub commit, modernizing the telework, lessons learned during the covid pandemic. we should have something good come out of this pandemic. this is about what has be