shedd examines the role of law enforcement in schools. you can join the conversation with phone calls, facebook, and twitter. president obama: the state department has decided that the keystone xl pipeline would not serve the national interest of the united states. i agree with that decision. ♪ host: you just heard president obama announcing at a news conference yesterday that he has rejected the proposal for the bill for the keystone xl pipeline. the controversial project would have run from canada to nebraska and would have moved 800,000 tons of barrels of oil a day. this is our topic of discussion today. you can start darling and now, to less know what you think. if you support president obama's decision to reject the keystone

xl pipeline, you can call us at (202) 748-8000. if you oppose the decision, you can call us at (202) 748-8001. you can also less know your thoughts on social media. we are on twitter, @cspanwj. we are on facebook at facebook.com/cspan. you can send us an e-mail at journal@c-span.org. president obama's announcement was on the front pages of many of the nation's newspapers today. here is how "the new york times" reported the story, "president rejects keystone pipeline, invoking climate."

host: joining us now for more on this decision is elana schor. she is the energy reporter for politico. good morning to you. thank you so much for being here. tell us a little bit about what went into this decision for as obama. what were some of the factors that swayed him to reject this pipeline project? the first argument being economics. during the last 18 months, the lack of direct job creation for the project made it easy to deny the permit. the president is looking at what is called the national interest, a bunch of factors.

politics, economics, the environment. elected a newada prime minister that is far less supportive of keystone, it was easy to say no. the upcoming climate change talks in december, how did that factor into whether or not he wanted to move forward at this time? guest: that was the key environmental factor motivating him. what is the module through at -- demonstrative, thanks to an activist, is the international symbolism of this project. i head of the un's climate talks, rejecting sends a message that obama is serious. host: what has been reaction from lawmakers on capitol hill? guest: every member of the

senate, and most in the house sounded off on this. and some democrats think this was a bad decision. ,ou are likely to see more intensifying, the two parties, in their corners, if you will, as the election approaches. host: do you think this will be a major issue in the 2016 campaign? guest: honestly, that is in the hands of the republicans. right now, you have every democratic candidate against keystone, and every republican for it. that is really a tough decision for republicans because keystone has not been seen to move so many votes. host: what has been some of the reaction from democratic lawmakers from the states, in

which keystone would have been impact? an are using some bipartisan switching? guest: not really. much democratic presence in those states to begin with. they have really moved on to crude oil exports as their single big issue. you mentioned the seven years that we have been talking about the keystone pipeline. was this a surprise at all? what are the next steps for transcanada, the company planning to build the pipeline? guest: it could not have been less of a surprise. as for transcanada, there are really intense meetings -- keep in mind, canadian oil is very expensive to extract. they are slashing jobs, and now

they will have meetings to decide what to do with this project. host: is there a possibility that transcanada could sit tight until 2016, or early 2017, and wait for the next president? could the next president reversed this decision? guest: transcanada would have to reapply and change certain aspects of the project. that would not be hard. what would be hard would be another environmental review process under another president. there are certain boxes that must be checked under the law. host: they have to go through this entire process again, and who knows how long that would take, in other words? president obama recently pushed through other environmental regulations, some are calling a very tough and strict. what does this president what

his legacy to be on climate change? as close wants to come to saving us from it as possible. remember, the commitments that itese presidents made -- would not get us to the threshold that scientists say is crucial to avoid climate change. that does not mean that the president will not try. ,ost: that is elana schor energy reporter for politico. thank you for joining us this morning. times,"financial "victory for green groups as obama blocks contentious keystone pipeline." mr. kerry said a critical factor for him is that keystone approval would have undermined credibility at the

in paris ins december. it would not have lowered the truly impressive, and would have brought a particularly dirty source of fuel to the u.s.. ahead of the petroleum institute group, said, by rejecting the keystone pipeline, the president has put extreme ideology over american opportunity. the president of the national resource defense council said in favor of the environment. ja first club will be que, opposing the decision. caller: i do reject the idea. i am a conservative. jacque,hat was

apparently we have lost you. we will go on to the story from "the wall street journal," theuding some response from chief executive of transcanada, the company behind the project. he said that the state department own review present compelling evidence that keystone xl wa would not exacerbate greenhouse gas emissions, and that misplaced symbolism outweighed merit and science. the story goes on to report that he has said that his company was unlikely to abandon the project entirely, but he also said in an interview last month that transcanada would consider

writing off the $2.4 million that it has already spent on the lie shallow.let it by shallow russell, you say you support president obama's decision, why is that? caller: for the three reasons he gave. i thought that way before -- i felt that way before. my position would be, why doesn't canada run their pipeline through their own country, and run it from north of montana over to vancouver? and build the refinery over there. they do not have to run through our country. the same way they could go east with the pipeline through canada, the same as they ran their railroad lines through canada. i do not see why they have to run it through the united states.

the second point i would make is obama wouldident have supported the pipeline , the republicans would have said it was a bad idea. it is sort of the old thing of whatever he is for, they are against it. those are my comments. the: are you worried about economic impact of rejecting the keystone xl pipeline? this is supposed to create thousands of jobs over the next few years. how do you feel the economy will do without this boost? caller: i think it would have no effect. it was a temporary thing. after it is all completed, it would just be less than 50 jobs that people would be monitoring the pipeline. -- let's say the

pipeline meeting, or having and oils will, or something like that -- far exceeds the benefit we would get economically. host: our next color is tom from pittsburgh, pennsylvania, calling to oppose president obama's decision. why do you believe the pipeline should have gone forward? opposed tohink, as the previous caller, transporting oil by pipeline is much more safer and efficient .han by rail car we have seen what happens when there have been some derailments. it is the devastation to the area, and wherever the trains derail. i think the main reason he is choosing not to use the pipeline is he wants to have the railroads transport the oil,

railroads owned by warren buffett, his very good friend. host: all right, tom from pittsburgh, pennsylvania calling in opposition to the decision. next up is lori from pennsylvania -- lots of colors from pennsylvania this morning -- you reject the decision, why is that? caller: most of the reasons i have been hearing that far, and i agree with them in the sense that it is an environmental concern, it will not increase the jobs, it will not help the economy. andtype of oil that it is, if that spells into the aquifer through the heartland, you know, that is disastrous. also, i think it negates the need for us to look at other ways to increase things like using wind and solar power. those are the kinds of things where we need to keep our focus

and decrease our reliance on fossil feels. how: how do you feel about long this process has taken -- dragging out over seven years -- do you think this decision could have come earlier? caller: yes, i do, actually. i think the president was waiting to gather as much of the data as he could possibly get. that was partly the reason for a long period of time waiting period plus, the fact that it is a republican-controlled congress, and they have been in favor of this pipeline since it started. i think working through congressional issues alone has but a delay on this. host: now, some reaction from lawmakers. newly minted house speaker paul ryan issued this statement in a is not- this decision

surprising, but it is sickening, by rejecting the pipeline, the president is rejecting tens of thousands of good paying jobs, rejecting all without the american people and a bipartisan majority in congress, the president wants to spend the rest of his time in office , buting to his interests it is wrong. this tree as well from fred upton -- the charade is over ,espite seven years of bluster increasing energy security and job creation is not a top priority for this demonstration. said, after seven years, the demonstration finally keystone xl,on on i'm for doing it was driven by cts.tics, and not fa next is tom in california, calling in opposition to president obama's decision. it is early where you are. caller: it sure is.

that is the worst decision in the world. it is so biased. the government with high-tech state of the art projects. this is a pipeline, it is not moved, it transports oil. when a project is submitted, it is submitted to the government, the government then looks at the project, and they make their own modifications, which the state department did. they approved it. at that point, the project becomes the government's project because they would approve it. the sister glee -- this is strictly political. the present said, when he was elected, we were going to change our supply energy system. regardless anything he said, this is harmful to the country.

we have millions of miles of pipeline in the united states. it is just a one man's political opinion. it is harmful, and the stupidity of not looking out for the people of the country. good benefit. the more energy we can have going, the better. the senator from virginia was on tv the other day and said, i think 82% of the nation's energy comes from coal and oil. the obama administration supports stupidity by s, and goesalist along with it. you have to have people in office that work for the country. host: all right, malibu, california, we hear you this morning. we also want to make sure we get tweet from frank

forone -- i commend potus rejecting the keystone xl pipeline, we have wasted end of time on this canadian pipedream. a story goes on to report that it would have little impact on the economy. a state department analysis concluded that the leave the pipeline would have created jobs, but the total represented 1/10 of 1% of the nation's theal employment -- department estimated that the 35ject would create about

permanent jobs. yesterday, in his announcement, dismisst obama doe some of the economic arguments. here is what he had to say. [video clip] president obama: the pipeline would not make a meaningful conservation to our economy. if congress is serious about wanting to create jobs, this was not the way to do it. wethey want to do it, what should be doing is passing a bipartisan infrastructure plan that, in the short term, could create more than 30 times as many jobs per year as the pipeline would, and in the long run, would benefit our economy and workers for decades to come. 13.5usiness has created million jobs over the past 68 straight months, the longest streak on record. the unemployment rate fell to 5%. pass angress should

serious infrastructure plan, and keep those jobs coming. that would make a difference. the pipeline would not have made a serious impact on those numbers. what "the new york times" had to say about the potential environmental impacts of the keystone xl pipeline. the story reports that the process of extracting the oil planet about 17% more warming greenhouse gases than the process of extracting conventional oil. numerous state department reports concluded that the pipeline would have little impact on whether that type of inciting hisd, and decision for the reason, president obama said that the of theepartment findings pipeline would not have created a significant number of new jobs , lowered oil prices.

what do you think of president obama's decision to reject the keystone xl pipeline? our next call comes from south dakota, jeff. you are calling in opposition for this decision. what does it mean for where you live? are you there? caller: yes. host: you are on the air. what does this mean for south dakota? like to callld saying that i oppose his decision. mayor of winter, south dakota, a small town on the pipeline route. we would have approximately 54 miles of pipeline, to pump wo pump stations. after the job is done, approximately 12-14 permanent incentivea good tax for us. i understand the environmental

concerns. had worked on i many pipelines. i feel this one is very safe, very efficient. the safety record is very good. i feel that -- look at the accidents on the rail so far. are twice ashere many, or at all as many, that could happen with the pipeline. i understand the aquifer. if you look at the maps of the pipelines currently there, it looks likable spaghetti. host: jeff, you say that you are of winter, south dakota, as you talk to the people in your town, do many of them share your feelings, that they are disappointed by the rejection of the pipeline, or is the town divided?

go ahead and turned on your tv, juef. we have not had talks of the decision. we have not had any meetings yet since the decision, but in prior talks, the town is about 50-50 on the pipeline. , it would doeeling our town very well. where we are sitting, is a pipeline comes, all areas will benefit -- all the counties through south dakota. there is a lot of opposition in this area, but personally, i feel it is a poor decision, and i feel we could have a very good economic boost. what is the economy like

right now in south dakota and where you live? have you been impacted by the plunging oil prices? go ahead and answer, you are on the air. a real community, agriculture-based. we do very well. good community, a hard-core community, and a very proud community. said, we will welcome any of the aspects of the pipeline. i have been in touch and talking with keystone for the past few years on this project. we are ready for it.

when the decision is made to do it. again, i feel it is a poor decision. host: thank you so much for calling in. the next caller is julian from the louisiana. you say you oppose this decision as well, why is that? caller: i am for building the pipeline. the reason you build the pipeline is because the job creation. off, both ends, it would be the same thing as to it.a hole and burying the reason you build it is so that for years after, energy will be cheaper. it is more money in their pocket to spend on other things.

those other things are other jobs. host: what are the issues facing the -- one of the issues facing the economy right now is that oil prices are so low. do you think they could go even further? isler: what you want to do keep them low. if they can go low, that's fine. even if it gets a nickel a gallon, that is more money in my pocket to spend somewhere else. a suitcaset to buy or a dishwasher, or something. the more money i have in my pocket, that is buying power, that is where wealth comes from. adam smith wrote about this, "the wealth of the nation's." look it up. host: we are taking your calls this morning on president obama's decision to reject the keystone xl pipeline. i want to get in a couple more headlines for you on that topic. here is the story in "the

washington post" on the job report. the story reports that the u.s. t is almost fully healed, raising expectations that the federal reserve will begin withdrawing support for the recovery by the end of the year. government data released showed that the economy added a blockbuster 273,000 jobs in october. unemployment rate dipped to 5%, and wages raised at the fastest rate since 2009. a healthy labor market can also give policymakers the confidence to raise its key interest rate target for the first time in nearly a decade. "the wall street journal" has charts showing how far the economy has come since the recession. here you can see the jobs lost in 2008-2010, and the blue bar

represents the number of jobs that have been added to the economy since then. you can also see the increase in the number of full-time workers in the job market. the endbarely see, at here, it is just above where was pretty recession -- p re-recession. you can also see that wage growth has been stagnant since 2009, while the ampligen may have also fallen dramatically. be will also be featuring sacramento, california as part bookr c-span's city tour, coming up today at noon here and we will be talking about all of our sacramento literary programming, including an interview with the author of "dan through the crack -- dandelion

through the crack." [video clip] sagebrush andto sand. you see this big old sign in the desert. i thought to myself, we are death on the indian reservation. u.s. history in that the indians were well taken care of. landwere sufficient, had to hunt on, and then i found out that we were right in the middle this -- 200,000 acres of sagebrush and sand, the indian reservation. allhe middle of that were

hold 18,000 ofto us. host: we are taking your phone calls on president obama's decision to reject the keystone xl pipeline. we want to know what you think. our next caller is from tallahassee, florida. you say you support president obama's decision. why is that ? caller: yes, i do. i support it in a scientific way. i also supported in the context of the economy. talk about callers the lack of jobs that we are going to lose. well, we have infrastructure building you would talk about usrtly that would give millions of jobs. somehow, we are not goin willing

to do that, but we are willing to give a country, a country that just elected in a landslide of prime minister that did not run to support this in his platform necessarily. yet, somehow, we are willing to take eminent domain from our own property owners here in this country. the infrastructure bill would build schools. it would give our engineering and science majors in college, who are not employed with full-time work, long-term employment to transform the economy that we need. the president spoke about, even , it. to this decision -- we would go to the educated, you know, not the dirty work. we need our young people, who

are educated, qualified, and engineers, trains, schools, broadband. that is what we need to do for our own country. like canada, like the gentleman build building pipeline -- the pipeline through their own country. they don't even want it. we are for ithat for ideological purposes. regional trains could give our people clean trouble. we are already down with the gas prices. gone.as is the oil pricing is going to remain. the whole world knows with the the climateing -- change conference, they know that we must make this transition. for those men that are stuck,

wanting this dirty work, we know learned it need -- no longer need dirty work. host: next up is robert from massachusetts, calling to oppose ionsident obama's reject of keystone xl. caller: construction jobs are all temporary. when you were construction, you're expected to finish a project, which they normally do. it is only in the government where projects go on forever. i'm really surprised at how ignorant people are on on a pipeline.d this pipeline would have been good for our future. you never know what will happen tomorrow. i think the country is going to experience what the chinese called an interesting -- living in interesting life.

and for julie, that is a curse -- unfortunately, that is a curse. is wanda from michigan, calling in support of the decision. go ahead, you are on the air. caller: i don't understand why canada cannot build their own -- tost, they send their trash michigan, then they want to put their nuclear waste near lake huron. then, they want to send the low tode oil down to the gulf get refined. i do not understand. this would not make long-lasting jobs for anybody. it does stand to make environmental issues terrible. we have had a pipeline break and michigan -- in michigan. they do not keep up these pipelines. they do not maintain them. why should our country have our

stuff in canada, and take the chance of them ruining our environment? canada needs to take care of their own stuff. thereave vast country where they can build. i do not understand why anybody would want this coming through our country. people havel mentioned the political environment in canada. here is another story from "the ."w york times, thestory reports that , replaced this week had made the approval of keystone xl its top foreign-policy party, even though canadians were divided over its importance. trudeau will be free

to pursue a campaign promise, improving canada's record on greenhouse gas emissions. our next caller is jack from wisconsin, calling to oppose this decision. go ahead. levels,just on a few one of the last callers talked about the dirty jobs, and the previous caller talked about oil, dirty oil coming through the united states. oil willd that the still come through the united states, it will just be on rails . that is not going to stop. oil prices have dropped because of the sand oil that they are pumping out of canada and the dakotas. host: all right, we hear you

this morning. this comments from ernie sanders on twitter -- bernie sanders on twitter. i strongly applaud the decision to kill keystone xl. meanwhile, the sierra club tweeted this, thank you potus for rejecting the keystone xl. kimberly is our next caller. go ahead with your thoughts this morning. caller: good morning. thank you for taking my call. i totally support this. , myself, whyt too can't they build a refinery? ks inalready had two lea their own country for over two weeks, and they did not even know it was leaking. they were trying to tell our country that these are sophisticated pipes, there will not be any leaks. i remember the kalamazoo leak.

they are still cleaning that up. that is five years after. i have signed petitions to stop this. no, i do not want it. thank you. i really do support the spirit host: all right. a few more comments from twitter. points, an old political 2009 issue, we need to move on. another tweet -- we are supposed to be prospering, not fretting about symbolic climate images. another comment from twitter -- president obama was wrong on keystone xl, we will be dependent on fossil fuels for generations. from new york is on the phone lines. go ahead. caller: good morning. how are you? host: good. what are your thoughts about keystone xl? i see it is covered with

a whole bunch of periodicals. host: yes. caller: somewhere in those periodicals was the new prime 's itinerary on what he was looking to do. maybe it will give some of these knuckleheads in the united far this pipeline is going, and everything else they reject that the society is moving towards. host: all right. our next caller is marcus from that sylvania. marcus is calling in support of keystone -- in support of president obama's decision to reject keystone xl. caller: i'm so glad that president obama rejected. village, and we are full of the oil people. they have taken over our

village. there are no jobs. i have received two letters from my water company telling me that they had to put more chemicals and because of the fracking. the reason why they are coming to the united states -- vancouver rejected the pipeline coming through their part of canada. here -- buyroperty no property here, they rent. they come in with her trainers, they don't look good. .he worst part is our water thank god for president obama rejecting it. i'm scared to death of our water . we have buy water from our supermarkets. our property has gone down in value because of this. and, no jobs. i know of no one who has a job. and, the trucks. not one truck, but 5, 6.

all of these companies, they have ruined our little roads. the republican presidential candidates also weighed in on president obama's decision. here is what marco rubio had to i'mon twitter -- when president, keystone will be approved, and president obama's backward energy policies will come to an end. rand paul says that keystone xl pipeline should be approved. this is a statement from transcanada, the company that has put in the bid to build the keystone xl pipeline -- misplace some chosen over merit and science on keystone xl herman decision -- permit decision. to opposee calling the decision, why is that? caller: good morning. i think, after all these years

of research and funding that we spent on this, and also our relationship with canada, i think this should have been approved. we deserve it all. we can have this, roads, infrastructure. i don't understand why it is such a bad deal. i think it is good for the country to approve it. host: why do you think this decision took so long -- seven years that we have been talking about this. could president obama have made a decision earlier? caller: yes. i think there have been decisions that have been made much earlier. ofmy area, there are a lot small businesses that do landscaping. a lot of them are immigrants. they have had to increase their prices. they have had to lose work. it is ridiculous how the gas is going up and down, up and down. theink we need to have all natural resources we can have,

and all the fuel that we need to operate. in the meantime, develop -- we have the smartest people in the world -- develop energy that is clean and efficient. we can do it. james, callings in support of president obama's decision. go ahead with your thoughts this morning. caller: good morning. my first thing about this pipeline was they did not buy .he pipe y -- this is totally wrong. the canadian company was trying to take domain overate united

states property to run the pipeline. i agree with the other people. they should run it western east, but not south. host: next up is lewis from new jersey. go ahead with your thoughts. caller: good morning. the reason that obama and the democrats are posed to the pipeline is because warren buffett owns the rails that transport the oil. if you remember, last year, the rails had three derailments, one of them was in a river. does anyone remember the shovel ready jobs that were not ready? host: all right. from national,k

tennessee, calling in support of president obama's decision. go ahead. caller: yes. i support president obama on his decision to cancel the keystone xl project. the thing is canada can run that pipeline through their own country, instead of trying to areas down to our coastal and pollute the united states. they can send their oil to china, and have the oil run through their own men, instead of run through the gulf of mexico. also, if the jobs that are going to be created -- republicans could have passed obama's job stimulus, and got that project going to have jobs in america. republicans refused to get that done.

is i think it is about trying to provide more money for the oil companies. these oil companies do not need .hese tax breaks too they need to take these tax break away from the oil companies and provide tax breaks to the american people. host: we will have to leave it there. that concludes our segment on president obama's decision to reject the keystone xl pipeline. ourilwe will continue discussion on infrastructure in the next segment. we will talk about federal funding of road and bridge projects with alison premo black of the association of road and transportation builders and chris edwards of the cato institute. later, we will talk about police officers in schools with carla of columbia university. first, and richard is our guest on "newsmakers" this week here and she discussed refugees from syria.

here is what she had to say about how much is being done to help those migrants. [video clip] >> who is not doing enough? i would like to see more income from the gulf states that are well i relatively wealthy compared to jordan and lebanon. i would also like to see more from the so-called brics -- these are the emerging economies, the wealthy states that care about the region, and could, and should be doing more on the humanitarian side. is>, ifcond question i'm not mistaken, the number showing how much money has been pledged in response to the u.n. appeals have been going down in percentage terms. i believe, for the current calendar year, the pledges stand at only 45% of the actual need

for this year. in previous years, it was higher. here is the question. as the magnitude of the crisis response of, the the global community appears to have diminished. why is that? you are absolutely right that the response to the appeal for syria, but also the response to appeals for crises all over ak, andld have been we left what we call a 60% gap of funding the odd to becoming an, and is not. the fault is not on americans. americans are leading the world in providing assistance to these crises. collectively, the world is not doing enough. we are seeing a quick turnaround in europe on this. they are trying to raise more money to provide to turkey, and other countries in the region,

food rations that continue, and there are not cutbacks in assistance to the refugees as winter comes on. there is a shift going on, but it is not enough. >> "washington journal" continues. host: we are trying to highway transportation funding now. is chris this morning edwards, of the cato institute. we also joined by alison premo black from the association of road and transportation builders . before we get into the nuts and both of the highway transportation bill, i would like to ask you a broad question which is what you see as the state of the nation's infrastructure? how are our roads and bridges holding up? have some significant challenges. we have about 25% of our bridges that need some type of repair.

by structurally deficient, it means there is some sort of issue with it superstructure was substructure where we really need to get in there and do some work. if they are socially obsolete, the design is not in lines with standards today. -- when youlk about talk about structurally deficient or obsolete, does that mean it is unsafe? guest: no. they will take measures like posting a bridge for a little, which is the restriction for trucks that cross, or the number of cars. there are economic co consequences to every time that decision is made. host: chris edwards, what do you think? guest: oftentimes politicians say that our bridges are

falling down, and the roads are filled with holes. exaggerates the negative. the share of bridges that are declined steadily. and, the surface quality of the interstate highways has actually improved steadily over the last couple of decades. it is true that our roads are getting more congested, and we need or capacity, but actual quality is reasonable. i think i would agree with allison that we need the best infrastructure in the world, but we may differ a bit on how to get there. ,"st: in "national review you wrote that the real conservative solution is to cut spending by 14 billion dollars per year to match revenues, and this reduction in federal aid would encourage states to pursue privatization. can you explain that? guest: there is a giant gap in

the spending in the highway trust fund and the revenue. the spending is around 53 billion per year and the spending is around 40 billion. i think we should reduce spending. i think we would have more efficient spending if we decentralized the funding and decision-making for infrastructure. people say, we ought to raise the federal gas tax. to me, there is no advantage to raising the gas tax. i think they get much more efficient spending if we left those decisions at the state level. when you put things -- when you throughmoney washington, you get mismanagement, misallocation. i think some states that need more highway money don't get it. texas is always on the short end of the stick for highway funding.

the issue is not the overall spending on now, but the quality of spending. i think he would get better quality spending if you left the decisions at the state level. states are actually making decisions about where the money is spent. washington is not telling the state, you have to spend on this bridge or this exact project. states have that control. the thing about the federal suream is it is making that states are investing in a national transportation system. about 25% of our roads are eligible for the federal aid program, but they carry about 80% of all of our traffic. ,e ship about 70% of our goods our freight is by truck. we need those roads and bridges across the entire country to get goods to the store. host: you can join the conversation as well. we are opening of the phone lines for your questions and comments. democrats can call (202) 748-8000. republicans, the number is (202)

748-8001. .ndependents, (202) 745-8002 you can also find us on social and be you. send us ar your thoughts on twitter, @cspanwj. e-mail atnd us an journal@c-span.org. alison premo black am i want to ask you about some of the economic impacts that you mentioned about central funding for infrastructure projects. you briefly put together a study that found that employment and purchases generate 510 billion dollars in annual economic activity. tell us a little bit about what is behind those numbers. guest: that is all loads of transportation. havedition to that, you who are employed by those companies going out and making purchases, creating

additional demand throughout the economy. that is the ripple effect. that study does not take into effect the long-term benefits of improving access to ports and airports, including reducing travel time. those are long run in packs. -- impacts. host: with the impacts be bigger if private industry were in charge? guest: i agree. if a structure has an enormous economic impact. the vast majority of infrastructure exactly done privately, when you think about all of the oil pipelines, refineries, and all of those things. the dollars are much longer than than thech larger dollars in the government infrastructure. i think the united states has lagged. a lot of things we do at the local, state level -- other countries are privatized. cap that, as julia, britain, they have done a lot more

privatization. have gone private money into providing this infrastructure. i think you get more efficiency, and more of a user pays principle. there is an advantage to decentralizing and privatizing are in for structure. host: we will go now to the phone lines. first is lydia from maryland, calling on the democratic line. , the same. edwards republican, conservative nonsense. we are rallying along the northeast corridor. if you go to europe, they have state of the art airports, terminals. have a high-speed train that you can take to germany, and one hour later, you are in paris. it is a disgrace. america makes our country look like a third world country.

all across europe, they have high-speed rail, beautiful roads, bridges, and airports. we are here arguing about pennies. they are pocketing all the money offshore. host: all right. what: i totally understand the caller is talking about. if you go abroad, you often see beautiful, shiny airports and infrastructure, better than we have in america. the difference is, in europe, much of it is privatized. in london, vienna, other places, they are privatized. in america, it is all government owned. i think that is a mistake here in the same with roads. it happened privatized in a lot of places. privatized inbeen britain, and other places. often the best infrastructure in the world is private. host: i would say that areic-private partnerships

good financing mechanism. there are number of projects where they work. about two thirds of all highway projects have done in six states over the last 25 years. you have to have a revenue source. they are a great tool, especially for getting new capacity and some larger areas, but it is not going to work for the highway or the repairs on the interstate in the middle of the country. i think the real issue is when we talk about the federal the last time we raise the federal gas tax was 1992. there is no way i could pay my mortgage on a salary from 1982. we have not kept up with the cost of inflation. that is why we have significant challenges with our infrastructure. we are not gaining any ground. we are barely treading water. host: let's talk about the

funding potentials for the highway transportation bill. where's the looking like the money may come from -- both for the first three years, and the last three years? guest: right now there are a number of budget gimmicks. we are moving away from the user pay principle, where the user pays through a gas tax. i think that is a big challenge right now. congress is using a number of different ways to try to pay for this. host: to support raising the gas tax? guest: absolutely. host: mr. edwards? guest: i think states can raise their own gas tax whatever they want to pay for their highways. we would have more efficient funding if that were the approach. that is fine with me. bestnot say what the approach for taxes is -- for

texas is versus vermont, versus virginia. i think we should let the states decide for themselves. they should be the laboratories for democracy on infrastructure. some states like texas have gone towards athat was used to wident and virginia, which i think worked well. states that have raise the gas tax, how controversial has that been? it is less controversial than the federal government. most people are against raising gas taxes. i would favor a decentralized approach. it is up to legislatures and governors to balance the pros and cons themselves. do they raise the gas tax? do they increase polling? that is probably the most efficient way to raise money for fixing and expanding the interstate. or, do they cut other parts of the budget?

statistic is that about one quarter of gas tax money goes to non-highway purposes. themselves to improve their highway funding should move their gas tax money back to highways. that is something they can divide themselves. host: next we have a call on the republican line. caller: i think we need to do some work on our structures all over the united states. people know that those highways are made of oil? we are shutting down all of our oil because our president does not like it. how are we going to make our highways? what are we going to do? because there is oil and all those highways. it costs money for oil. from riverton wyoming. we will get another color. susan from massachusetts on the independent line. go ahead.

caller: yes, can you hear me? i had a couple of points. as you know, new england had one of the most brutal records, one thing that i'm opposed to is the use of salt. it is highly corrosive and only provides part-time gains as far as access to the roads. also, the clouds go out and start shoveling when there is not even any accumulation. grading of these industrial clouds against the road is number two. i think it is disingenuous as a nation that has promoted across asntry multistate trucking our main form of distributing goods. over rail travel which is much lest harming to roads and everything else. these trucks are highly destructive to our highways. third, i traveled extensively in canada by road on the maritime

and charlotte in toronto. i know that all throughout canada the roads are in amazing shape. they seem to constantly be engaged in infrastructure. there are now tolls. those are my three points. a bigonald trump is proponent. he is anti-salt. i think we can get a long more longevity out of our roads if we decided to abandon salt. thank you for your time. she is i think something bringing up a showing some of the challenges that face us in terms of our past. states are spending their money and a lot of different areas. that is why the federal investment is so important when you are looking at what is coming down on capital outlays. that is construction and engineering purpose. all the things you really need for making your road.

when you look at the federal investment, that is 50% of all the capital outlays in the country. so, the federal aid program where talking about is extremely important. if we raise the gas tax by 20% that increases by $.25 a day. the economic savings in terms of costs of goods coming traffic and congestion, nobody wants to raise gas taxes. you need to talk about the outcome from that investment which happens a lot for every american. host: why the gas tax? are there alternative sources? caller: absolutely. guest: people talk about the travel tax. it has we have cars that are becoming more fuel-efficient over time, that does erode or reduce the total volume of gasoline. the challenges that we need to make, we have not raised that

since 1992. the states have been doing very well to be more efficient to do more. there is only so much that we can get out of the current investment level. the caller raise the issue of canada, they have a more decentralized system than we do here. i think the color is correct that the roads up there are very good. they are dealing with local responsibility. indeed, they actually have numerous highways. one of the first major electronic tolls in america was in metro toronto. so, canada has more decentralized funding. they have got more privatized infrastructure. host: rob woodall recently questioned the role of federal funding and local projects. here's what he had to say. >> i represent a very conservative area. we do not care for taxes of any

kind. we do not mind taking care of one another, it would feel like we do it to better ourselves. the speaker rejected a federal gas tax. past a $200 million bonding initiative to build roads locally, because they believe they would get it done. users are paying for those roads. there is not a conservative in this country that is unwilling to pay for what it is that they use. it is our job to sell that. if you use it, you need to pay for it. there is no shame in that. it is a constitutional responsibility. it is something which be proud to support. i will say to my friends that we might have some epa discussions. my folks back home do not believe that if they send a dollar to washington, they will

get a dollar worth of roads back. they do not. they believe 10% will come off. and there. it'll be race did on regulatory compliance. it's a be wasted on federal mandates. they will get $.50 per road. i do not think they are all wrong about that. i think there is a lot of wisdom in that suspicion. host: we are talking with allison primo, the american road and transportation building association. in chris edwards from the cato institute. we just heard representative will talk about the fact that georgia rejected federal funding, tells what is happening? the congressman talked about how the state itself could raise the money and spend it better itself. an interesting thing about america's highways and even interstate system, the interstate system is owned by the state itself. the you have a road like

81, it owns their share of the interstate. it tells me that the primary responsibility should be at the state level. they need to expand their interstate. they need to do more maintenance. i think state governments have to fund they interstate. when washington gets involved, i think it raises costs. host: do you think it should be state government that manages the local infrastructure, or do you think the state should be facilitating the private industry? guest: the solution, i do not know the best solution for any other state is. i think each state should decide themselves. we were discussing, some states have done more privatize asian and more polling on highways. that is fine. let's see how it works. i think states should be laboratories for democracy. they can learn from each other. some are more innovative than others. i think we see that

going on with the states. ballotwe have tracked initiatives, including some just this past week that are overwhelmingly approved by american voters that they do want to raise their own local or state taxes for and transportation investment. the challenge with a federal system is ensuring that there is investment on some of the key roads. states get to choose which project they want within those 25% of roads that are carrying 85% of traffic. they are absolutely essential. it gives states the incentive that they will make investment. otherwise, they might just be making choices purely on local politics and concern. that means that as a national system, we do not have the cohesive list needed for our economy. host: next up is martin on the democratic line. go ahead. what i was saying they

should do, is that the american should building interstate railway system. that way freight can be transported from state to state about 1/5 the cost of what it is now. we let these businessmen like t boone pickens divert they chemicals to natural gas. these railroad companies could pay to use the railroads like people pay to go across a bridge for tolls heard all this would give the united states better independence from foreign oil. we would sell it to other countries because they have a four year plan on any domestic oil. talk with chautauqua getting off of oil completely.

wouldn't it be great if these trucks are not on our highways? it takes $500 to fill up an 18 wheeler with diesel fuel. we should change them to natural gas, building interstate railway system. at some point we wouldn't need an army the middle east. host: thank you. guest: i think railways are a vital part of the transportation system. it is not a one or the other approach. guest: i would agree that the freight rail is incredibly important. he regulated freight rail act in 1980's. good for him. we had a rapidly growing freight rail system in the united states.

japane like europe and which may not make much sense. it has worked extremely well. also mentioned the need to look at transportation holistically. but that is controversial. the money from the highway trust fund does not always go to highways. in the funding bill, at two under 61 9 billion for safety program. how do you reconcile that? transit is an important part of the system. yout: the idea is that when are investing, or pain money, some of that will transfer at about $.20 for every dollar. it is going into the account. now, trucks and diesel fuel go just to the highways. the idea is that it will support both urban and rural transit

organizations. so, we have over 7000 rural transit agencies in the country where 82% of the buses that are used by folks, many times they might have mobility challenges, mainly paid by federal investment. the idea is that you are providing mobility choices. it is more of a congestion , we think about the east coast northeast corridor door in terms of some of boston and pc. aboutare also other coats them that use public transit. it is not just the east coast, but the idea is that you are using mobility choices. host: is this an important way to spend federal dollars? moneyh of federal highway goes to the transit rail system across the country. there has been an explosion and

rail building for the last few decades. if a city like portland or charlotte or north carolina wants to build a rail system, good for them. they should do show so with funding. up on the republican line. go ahead with your thoughts. ok, thank you. you have to bridges get anywhere in the united states. probably the most controversial challenge arctic and are -- article ever written was to contact the library, june 3 1966. aside from that, and pennsylvania it is my understanding in the pennsylvania state police and otherwise, and historians and there are more roads and bridges and pennsylvania than any other state and the entire united states. yet, overall, for many journalists, they say that the

high point is this. toyou cannot get entertainment places, stadiums and public events, you are messed over on the idea that if there broke or dilapidated, who makes the sensationalism on to create a dollars? thank you both. guest: i was a pennsylvania is a state that raise their own revenue to increase state investment and highways and bridges. to even despite those increases in revenue, they are only getting back to decide the investment levels before they are by the recession level 2008. and federal investment is still around half of their programs. again, even those states and local governments are doing their best, they still need help from the federal program. host: this comment from twitter. privatize and subsidize the taxpayers. then, you pay again to use the

roads. guest: i am not in favor of that. i'm in favor of getting private money in and moving the risk to the private sector. so, for example, when the capital beltway was why didn't, if a private company came in and provided three quarters of the $2 billion in cost, the state of virginia used one quarter of the cost. the private company took the risk it, they follow the design and construction. it has worked out really well. the project came in on time and under budget. that is the kind of discipline that private companies can bring. from california is terry. on the independent line. go ahead. first of all, as an informed a person about the environmental realities of our national society's, and of this planet, we must transition off of petroleum.

we could transition to electric , andle fleets for freight obviously for passenger vehicles. integratedave an railroad system. lastly, on the federal government, it has to integrate whatever transportation we do, including the highway trust fund activities. and we need to dispense medical funds. when need a nationally integrated conference of highway system. state governments cannot be trusted or relied upon, especially in my art -- observation. we have corruption that diverts billions of dollars of federal and state money improperly to the more wasteful politically collected -- connected builders that is a disgrace to our national fabric. guest: i think he raises a good point about the investment and the importance of a national system. absolutely, we need to think about this in a conference of

way. that moving tos an electric beagle -- vehicle will benefit. i do not see how has to be generated at power plants most of which are natural gas. argumentnderstood that about electric cars. saying that you need central control from washington to a record and system simply is not true. let's go back to railroads. freight railroads are not top-down design by washington. the independent rail corporation, they have these great national north american wide systems that they have designed. let's talk about some of the political dynamic around transportation. who is a congressman top democrat on the house committee. he was complaining that the bill is not adequately funded. >> the biggest and most glaring

omission by the rules committee is any attempt of not allowing any attempt by this house to fund the bill. that is extraordinary. we do not even have three years of pretend funding, because some of them spent last week in a big budget deal. it sure is not anywhere near six years of funding. even if we funded this bill for six years our infrastructure will be more deteriorated than it is. increase federal gas task. does not happen since 1993. a user fee created by dwight eisenhower. it raised again by ronald reagan. clinton, it isl a bipartisan idea. user fee, fun infrastructure for

transportation with a user fee. u.s. chambers of congress supports an increase in the user fee. american trucking association supports a user fee. we are being backed by interest groups. .e are representing consumers do something. vote on something. i offered a simple little amendment. let's index existing gas tax so we do not lose more ground. if we did that, gas would go up 1.7 cents a gallon next year. i think consumers would be ok. there be pleased. they be happy with we start getting rid of the potholes in the detours. host: we're talking about transportation funding with chris edwards. he is at the cato institute. and allison at the american rotor transportation building association. lawmakers are facing a deadline to come up with any solution to funding the highway trust fund.

what you think is the likelihood that they will come to an agreement? guest: it seems that the house has passed a big bill that the house and senate will come to an agreement on. think as is pointed out earlier, there is only three years of funding. the democratic congressman you just had on, he is right. there's a lot of smoke and mirrors in funding the federal highway system. that is why, i have argued that we should just cut spending down to gas tax revenue. one interesting thing is that right now we have an 18% gas tax. sinceas not been raises 1993, which is true. but in a decade prior, the gas tax was quadrupled. back in 1982 under ronald reagan, it was only four cents per gallon. the congressman was correct. reagan raised it. it quadrupled.

there has been a big increase in gas tax, just not recently. localyou argued that construction projects should not be as they are. is this the way to go about it? letting a transportation bill died? will that be beneficial? caller: i think the current where is a crazy thing congress cannot do long-term highway deals. they cannot take down the roads. that doesn't make sense. state governments cannot plan for the infrastructure system. that is where favorite decentralization. states knew that they're , i think they would step up to the plate, they would add more secure funding. have: i would say that we the states increase their gas tax of the next few years. georgia had not raised their gas

tax. i think leaving this to the state, especially when we're talking about the investment on key roads, it is going to create a situation where we have some states that can raise or gas tax, or that can provide additional revenue, and then we will have others who cannot. that'll have a real impact on the national economy. host: i mentioned we had the stopgap measures. temporary funding measures. guest: that has had a huge impact on our measures. plan and design, provide equipment, they have these features and it has been extremely challenging because there have been a number of projects because they have not had that stream of federal revenue and the certainty that a long-term federal bill creates. is half,ral investment it is delayed by congress.

it inhibits their ability to do their job. alabama,t up from virginia, how are you? edwards, i, mr. worked for the federal government for four years. first of all, we need to identify you. you worked for the koch brothers. they have been in charge with the cato institute. the cato50% of institute. i want to tell you, i do not think that the highways should ever be privatized by any state. i agree with the myth of california, they should never be privatized for the simple fact that that to be a cause for tolls like in florida. everybody would pay a toll when they even drive on the highway. i feel also that for you to come up. until the american people about

privatizing the highways and the bridges, you are supporting the koch brothers. i think they use the highways for petroleum and transporting petroleum. they should pay 25% of the fee for the highway, because they are destroying them. host: thank you. the institute is a nonprofit organization washington. we have tens of thousands of wonders. in the past, i knew they had given up money. we will take money from a broad range of individuals and businesses. you know, we get such broad funding that no one is here more than our scholars themselves. the main funding for highways is the gas tax, which is a tax on the industry.

are little awed, arguing that an oil company would have a big impact on the legislation, yet the main way we fund highways, which is a good way, is user fees on the cost of gasoline. that is a good thing. host: mark from north carolina is calling. driver? truck i am.: my thoughts and comments. you have all these colors coming in, disrupting truck drivers. it cost me $1000 per week to purchase this truck. then, you have taxes on the truck. it cost me $65 to cross a bridge one time. that is my toll. what are these cars paying? they are paying one dollar. maybe $.50. when you talk about tolls and put it on the back of a truck driver, you're talking about an economic system.

with that system that we also have to pay, we pay freight then, that raises the cost of what john wants for his bicycle for christmas. of food youthe cost want to come off the shelf. you are talking about taking and turning these trucks and a propane, you're going to disrupt the system so much for the cost of the truck, trucks or not run on electricity. i could go 35 miles and i have to recharge. the hours that we have. we are regulated by an hours per service law. you guys are ready screwed that up. what is not 14 hours? we have dozens of regulations. we have other regulations as far as safety check regulations. that takes time. we used to be able to split our clock. we cannot do that anymore.

be able to take way from rush hour traffic. to help alleviate some of the traffic. these people are in these cars. they need to realize what their exit talking about, because it is almost impossible for a truck and do thesee chores and do these things they're talking about. host: i hear a lot of frustration. very ors that you paid truck, does that cannot of your pocket or do you get reimbursed? caller: it comes out of my pocket. i do not hit reimbursed. come tax time, yes, we get some type of a tax break, when it cost me. you are talking about accountants in the tax break. it cost $600 for me to have my taxes done. it is not very much of a right off. host: final question.

as you driver in the country, driving your truck on the roads and bridges and highways, what is your assessment of how well they are holding up? caller: there are some bad -- bad places. pennsylvania, new york, there are certain bridges we cannot cross. there are some restrictions. they are not very well posted. in fact, most of the times it is is too late.en it we are stuck between a rock and a hard place. then, there is a cop waiting on the bridge to give me a $1500 ticket to pay for their state roads and taxes. host: mark from north carolina. truck driver. caller: i think some of the things he is highlighting are the challenges of moving freight around this country. that is when we talk about federal gas tax, the role of the federal government, it is to

make those investments. i know with some members of congress and others, they were to make sure that we are investing this money in these freight corners. we want to provides relief to truck drivers who are trying to move goods across the country. it is a challenge. caller: two major frustrations. taxt: the taxes and the gas is a reasonable way to fund most highways. betweenould be equity individual drivers and truck drivers. on the second level, regulations, a lot of regulations you mentioned are federal regulations. that is where i think washington should listen to some of the complaints about unnecessary regulations. host: bob from philadelphia pennsylvania. -- philadelphia, pennsylvania. caller: thank you. the job i currently have is a carrier from philadelphia.

and, my service area in delaware county, frequently i'm stopped at railroad crossings where there are huge long freight lines. they are made up of more than one half of the large black petroleum tankers. guests, what the they thought if we did build the pipeline, if we did take those petroleum cars off the rail lines, how much more efficient it would make our rail lines and flake in transportation. i think the caller raised a good issue. motorn move energy by freight, or by pipeline. i amesn't seem to make him not an expert, it seems pipeline is safer and lower cost.

and, that is the way we should move most oil. in recent years, more and more of it has moved by rail, i guess because of the issue of the cost of new pipelines. that is something we should deal with. caller: i think that is an holistic approach we need to have. guest: that includes energy. host: a comment from twitter writes, does anybody ask what the private industry gets back? when: private companies, they invest money should get a return. for example, i raise the issue of watching the beltway here in virginia. the companies will manage extra lazy attitude of the beltway over many decades. they will earn a return on these polls that were imposed. that is a good way to find highways.

because the user who uses the system ends up paying for the cost. that makes sense to me. guest: we can see it working, especially in areas that have some new challenges. you can get the return on investment. it is a great financing mechanism. it is not a funding mechanism. it is not appropriate in that way. host: is there an equity issue with using the user tolls to finance infrastructure? i have driven on the expressway and it can cost $20 to go back and forth. yout: the challenge is that are paying for that road. you are paying for that piece of the network. that works out. the challenge is that through the gas tax we are not paying to maintain the system we already have. free.not maintaining those roads, it takes an investment.

we are doing enough to do basic maintenance. guest: it depends on what you mean by equity. equity is that people use the facility should pay. generally, i'm in favor of, as andinterstate system fades we knew to increase maintenance, the heavily congested areas, like the beltway, i think an electronic toll is a reasonable way to go. it will help raise money. i am not in favor of controlling all the interstates, but i think most places that are efficient should be left to the government. they can judge how residents feel. again, i think decentralization is the way to go. states can go a different way. we can see what works the best. from virginia is calling on the independent line. go ahead. have you driven any toll lanes? i have been involved in

highway construction for over 50 years. and, from the contractor side of it, the highways it should be state owned, inspected, and maintained. they should be built by private contractors in a low bit process. this is the cheapest way you'll get a highway. by, they should be financed an adjustable mileage and fuel tax. , and the highway from aused be separated socially manipulative presentation such as light, rail, and amtrak because on most one third of the budget is being spent on other than highways. people do not realize all of this. the future of transportation will be the autonomous vehicles of all different types. that will happen on the highway

system throughout the country. economic tilt and well-being of this country will still be on the highway. i thank you. host: bob, from virginia. our association represents a lot of people like him who are building highways. is $40 investment billion. each year in the highway is 10 year transit. that is a mix of some money from the gas tax and general funds that are put in. i think those are all important components. host: conrad from oak olla, florida. caller: good morning. i want to ask a question, we know we need the highways. i hear people saying that the state should decide which funding they get. well, this day and age, we have schools crumbling. no jobs. so, you cannot expect a state to

put up 100% of the highway when they cannot even find their school or take care of their elderly, or help people in need. so, what isn't this just be built up like social security? you can't rely mistake to take care the highway. money,pany does an emmy the president said we don't have a money. last week they sent $20 billion overseas. of that money, our highways in schools would be straight. we wouldn't even need this conversation. they do not want to do it. host: thank you. guest: money does not grow on trees. highways have to be funded some way. and not see any advantage raising taxes in washington to fund highways when the states can make their own decisions. looking ahead,t if you look at the federal budget, we are running a $400 billion deficit. that will expand over time.

as the entitlement programs expand, things like our programs will get squeezed. so, i do not think the current highway bill that there discussed in congress is going to reduce spending, from my point of view, i think down the road highway spending will get more squeezed as entitlement programs grow. we have to think about decentralizing the funding of highways and transit. there is simply not going to be room in the federal budget. caller: i think he raised a great point. federalhen you look at investment, 90% of that money, over 90% has to use for capital outlays. states and thet money that they bring income on average, it is about 20% spent on those that maintenance. so, they are spending their money and a lot of her places. the federal money and shores

that we are spending the money on imported roads. the: we talk about distinction between state decisions on infrastructure and federal money. explain to us exactly how the money in the highway trust fund trickles down to two states and a local level. choose where the money is being spent. they select a project through their own process. again, the main stipulation is that it has to be used on capital outlays. it has to be spent on roads that are part of what we call the federal aid highway system. that'll be major roads connecting the cities, the interstate system, our ports and airports. and all, that is about 25% of all roads the country. they carry 85% of traffic. host: how do they determine how much they get? caller: it is in proportion to what they put in. based on how much they contribute, things are getting

back 90% of what they put in. states youfor some might have in a rural state that has not as many people. maybe they are getting more back than they put in, again, those are roads that are important to the system. at this point, we have summary general transfers, every state is getting back more than they put in. ont: here's a question twitter. once a toll road is built, how long before private companies get a return on investment? seems like forever. tolls never go away. puter: private companies money into these toll road projects. often, their return comes over many decades. maybe 50 years. that is remarkable when you think about a private company being willing to wait that long for a return. partialseen this privatization in many countries around the world. canada, britain, australia have

done more than we have. spain also has. it works well. it is not perfect. contracting,rnment there can be flaws. i think the way to think about tolling is that it is a better way to do contracting, and a better way to build highways because it moves some of the risk to the private sector. it gets efficiency indiscipline into the road building project. think you often would get cost overrun because of politicians and government. you get bureaucracies where they do not handle money as well as the private sector. let's get entrepreneurs and efficiency more to the highway. i think that will be good. host: dan, from new york is up next. you are on the air. are you there?

will move on to tom from pennsylvania. go ahead. back, aa while gentleman come i do not catch ray from called in and asked the man sitting there from the institute, the people who backed the cato institute, one of expecting to get back? obviously, what he wanted to know was what is the return going to be? skirted the question come he never answered. i do not believe he does not know the answer. this is ridiculous to put these people on their and for the commentator not to call them on it when they are obviously ducking a question. are they expecting a 10% return? a 20% return? or 40% return? there is a reasonable amount of return. every time we have what is operations getting privatized,

the ripoff goes on forever. i'll take the garden state park in new jersey. to travel from the shore 50 miles north, it cost you $.10 per mile. this is ridiculous to a guy like that sit there and not answer the dam question that summary called in and asked. host: tom from pennsylvania. there arein come hundreds of thing takes and associations in washington. they are all funded in different ways. some get funding from private individuals, some get funding from corporations, nato generally does not. laboret funding from unions. some get money from the government. i think the caller question, he is suspicious about our research, because of the funding. that is something you can talk about with every organization. it is reasonable to question who fund them.

for 15 years is that we believe in small government and free market. the people who fund us believe in the same thing. they donate the money because they believe the same thing that we do. about mys ever told me opinion. i believe in small government, because i believe it is good for the american society. call hasnot think they much weight, because can look at any organization and you can ask questions about funding. we are no different in many organizations in washington. host: that was our last caller for the segment. we will give our guests the chance to make a final statement. pay morebody wants to in taxes. there's no question about that. i don't pay more taxes. but, you have to think about the return on investment. people value their mobility. americans, 75 to

80% say that they value their mobility as much as their cell phone, internet, like tristan, all of these things that we cannot live without. we're not making the effort to expand that roadwork. we are talking about one quarter per day. that is it. i agree mostly that we need the best infrastructure in the road. it was be the best for our economy. you get that by decentralizing the decision-making and funding out of washington. the states be laboratories of democracy and go their own way with infrastructure. i think we'll get a better system. primo, anson economist at the american road and transportation builders association. thank you. we'll be talking to carly from the university. schubert discussing the growing

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joe klein and his book about to war veterans who use their military discipline and values .o help others and james woods on his connection between fictional writing and life. and sunday night at 11:00, a discussion with the former first lady of massachusetts ann romney on her book in this together. about her journey with multiple sclerosis. get our complete schedule at c-span. orc. >> washington journal continues. host: our guest is carla shed. she is the sociology and african-american studies professor. she is here to talk about the role of school resource officers in the classroom. welcome. caller: thank you for having me. host: there has been a national

debate after the viral videos that showed officers using what appeared to be excessive force. can you give us a little bit of background around what these school resource officers are and how their role has evolved. guest: since the middle 1990's there has been a grown alliance between systems of criminal justice and education. peak of a violent crime in 1993, 1994, we saw the movement of more police officers into urban public schools, high schools in particular. new york is one example where the school safety officers went from the jurisdiction from the school to the nypd. , the other big cities have followed suit. they embed actual police officers into schools. they have the school safety agents being known as peace officers within the schools. barrett part of the police

force, instead of being part of the education staff. host: what is their role and tended to be? isn't security, community building, what are they supposed we doing? caller: it should be multipronged role. they have a mission of educating and protecting. if you look at the school resource officers association , but they cannot only council, the majority of the time they are they are to arrest, they have arrest making capabilities, they are there to protect the property come and the safety of the students. that is their mission. it is under the guise of law enforcement. not necessarily under education or counseling. host: i should mention that you are the author of unequal cities, race, schools, and injustice.

are these officers primarily found in urban educational settings you go urgently -- settings? the biggest forces were formally embedded in public high schools, chicago, each high school is mandated to have at least two police officers in every school. you can see this for other big cities like los angeles, philadelphia, new york city. many of the public and charter schools are other private parochial schools can hire their own safety agents. but, it is not mandated by law. within the urban public high schools, that is where you'll see a very physical presence of school police. we want to know that you can join the conversation. if you're a parent and you want to land with your question or comment you can call us at 202-748-8000, if you are an educator you can call at

202-748-8001, if you are in law enforcement you can call us at 202-748-8002. everybody can find us on twitter. we are at c-span wj. leave us a comment on facebook. us an e-mail at journal at sea-stand.org. to carla shed. she is a professor at columbia university. of race,e author schools, and perceptions of injustice. you mentioned that school resource officers began to be posted inside of classrooms with the rise of crime in the 1990's. is there a connection between the level of a disciplinary issue inside a school, and the number of resource officers? those two trends are positively correlated. we have seen a number of arrests since the 1990's happen within schools, we also have the

institutionalization of zero-tolerance policies, they came from drug enforcement. it allowed them to use it in the school environment for school-based infractions by young people. so, with those, we did see an increasing number of suspensions, expulsions, arrests in schools in the 90's and early 2000's. but, those numbers have started to come down. they coincide with the larger crime drop in america. but can was still have the same infrastructure of officers within our schools, and in almost increased infrastructure because we have those budgets that have gone up and up for school security. we have increased surveillance capabilities where nypd or chicago police department's can monitor live feeds from inside of the school. they are monitoring surveillance, and much of this

has occurred within the last decade where we still see the buildup, but do not necessarily have the violent crimes that come inside. host: the national association of school resource officers is the institution that represents police officers inside a school. time magazine did an interview with the group, they said the national association of school resource officers refused the notion that the presence of police officers leads to more students being arrested. our executive the rest are points to numbers from the u.s. shows thatof justice the number rest between 1994 2009 dropped 50% while the number of resource officers increased. the quote is that there is no way long force meant referrals if school resource officers are doing their job right. they are building relationships. officer'shat the overall mission is to raise the gap between law enforcement and

youth. can you talk a little bit about that connection? what is your response to this? i think they definitely have their numbers. we also have to think about the number of cases that may not, in terms of data on their place. but, they are referred directly to the prosecutor's office, or to chicago juvenile justice court. we have moved those numbers round. school-based assaults or other offenses at that come into the jurisdiction of the formal justice system. i'm not sure that their data would accommodate for that, even though many police departments as well as schools offices do share their records. they share information about young people's arrests both outside and inside of the schools. host: on a broad level, why is a troubling to you that these

officers are inside the classrooms, if there is indeed a crime or infraction that is taking place? guest: i did not necessarily say it was always troubling. it depends on the context of the school. there,we have an officer we actually have in chicago, every school has metal detectors. the ways in which they use these pieces of equipment differs across the school. so, there are some schools where kids are comfortable having a patdown. having the metal detector. they think it is warranted in terms of safety concerns. there is great nuance. everybody is not always against having police officers in the school. but, it depends on the context. it depends on how finely tuned their efforts are in protecting the students. unfortunately, in my research, i have students who say i felt criminalized.

i felt like they are waiting for me to do something bad. because they are here, it's just escalates from not being a simple conflict with my teacher, arithmetic. , it becomes a criminal matter. so, there is great nuance and how young people view the host: presence of police in schools. host:we turned the phone lines. tom, is an educator. tom, what you think about the presence of resource officers? tom: our school is one of the largest in michigan. safety staff a that knows the students. so, we do not have those problems. i wanted to ask your guest if she thought that more money spent on early childhood development and making companies give adults, or making adults get a livable wage would help solve some issues.

if she research that area. talk: you are right to about development. my work is mostly focused on young people and their perceptions and experiences. i would bring this back to the current conversation in that many of these police officers are not change in child or adolescent development even though there in the school context. their police officer training they of safety training. emergency training. they do not necessarily have any human or child development training. correct to go beyond the bounds of what is happening just with in the classroom. with police officers, we have a lot of work to do with getting the resources to people. so that way education can be a priority and set up surveillance and control. host: the national association of school resource officers posted this on their website. it is a statement on police involvement and student discipline.

they said the national association of school resource officers developed this statement in regards to a recent .esponse there are other incidents with the involvement of sros and school disciplinary situations. now, they recognize that school resource officers have the best intentions for the students at heart. and say that a clear concise understanding is essential. every law enforcement agency that places an officer in a school should have a memory of understanding. they also say that school resource officers must receive special training regarding special needs children. they said the use of physical restraint device meant -- devices is really necessary. we're talking to carla shed. are all school resource officers situation? how

standardized is the training? i think there is the advocacy group. guest: the training is quite an evening. in new york city you might have 15 weeks of training for school safety officers, but in philadelphia public schools you 4.ld have there is quite a bit of variation in what is done in this training modules. we really do have to think about special populations. students with special needs or disabilities. most, policy does not always coincide with practice. we are talking about individuals -- individual level decision and actions that are happening every day on the ground. according to the department of education were 92,000 arrest in the united states in schools last year. we have many points of interaction and all of this does not happen aboveboard or by the

book. we have to is knowledge there is a great deal -- acknowledge there is a great deal of variation in training and practices. host: our next color is -- caller is dawn from michigan. don is a parent. go ahead. caller: yes. i think we should have officers in schools. clipes to show the one where the officer was taking the young lady out of the classroom pretty forcibly. i bet before that she was probably asked to leave the classroom or asked to put the phone down and leave and did not. so once she does that that disrupts the learning for all the rest of the kids in the class. it starts at home. if you send your child to school and he asks a fool he should be expelled right then and put out of the system. let the parents teach him at

home if he does not want to be taught in the school environment . i bet you that young lady was asked politely to leave the classroom. so she basically disrupted all the learning for every other kid in the classroom. it starts at home. thank you. host: carla shedd? guest: thank you for your comment. the mostight, influential years of young people's socialization is at home. there were actually some disruptions in this young girls home life that then trickled over into schools. that is one big thing that i try to convey in my research, many of these contexts lead together. home and neighborhood and school converge. you are right, she probably was asked very nicely but the fun away, but there might have been another way to handle that where you might have asked her as the teacher, because you know her,

hopefully, is there something going on? are you expecting a phone call? do you need to call someone? let's step out of the room. other folks could have evaluated the videos. they beat a credit removed the audience of young people. thatlooks like something was a point of interaction problem between the teacher and the administrator that got ramped up into a criminal matter once the school police officer gave the order. how do youow you -- deescalate a situation? how do you defuse an altercation whether verbal or physical? are their best practices that you have found in your research for law enforcement to use? guest: yes. i talk a lot about procedural justice where young people say if you actually hear my side or give me a voice and then tell me and concise way why you are seeking to discipline may or even to arrest me, than they actually are ok even if it is a

negative outcome. and true of respect engagement with young people matters a great deal in how they receive punishment and how they receive discipline. we also have to remember we are talking about adolescents. we are looking at them at the point where there is so much going on in terms of different changes in their minds and bodies and new experiences. they are not perfect unfortunately. but they are supposed to be in this space to be educated and to be socialized, and instead we add an additional layer where perhaps they can be punished or criminalized. i want to work to show how we can increase the former, education and socialization instead of the latter. host: next up from albany, new york, is fran. fran, you are an educator. what do you think? caller: yes, i am calling as an educator. thank you for taking my call.

there are some things, some layers of intervention that are not evident to the public at large. ist happens in the classroom that there is not just a teacher there trying to manage the classroom, but there are support people. counselorducation that is what we are talking about. what happens is by the time is dated has escalated there is a whole series of events outside the school and inside the school where the student has already reached a critical level for behavior. problem is a leg space -- like space problem occurring. oddly, i am going to be working in a program for incarcerated 21, and in that setting the intervention of the officers has been decreased

because of the use of education isnselors so that the school planned out to run as efficiently as possible. i find it interesting that some of these things are being used maybe in a correctional setting, but they could very easily be adapted to be used in a school setting. a lot of times the funding is not there so these conditions are the first one to be cut. it is a matter of building relationships with the students and the teachers so that there is a supportive environment to know there is something that can be done. happened way before the critical level where law enforcement has to be engaged. host: carla shedd? guest: that is a great comment. if you look at city budget you can see where we are allocating the money. in my book i show that the

school safety officer budget is three times that of educational counselingor it -- in chicago public schools. so it shows our priorities. what you are describing as the sort of educated response to our young people and a facility for young people who are already in , it is hopeful that it is also a distraction because you don't have the same thing for young people in schools prior to them perhaps being involved. we really have to realign our priorities and put that in alignment with our budget allocation. host: on october 27 "the reported thist" story. the fbi and justice department are investigating the south carolina police officer who threw the student across the classroom. the story says that federal authorities opened a civil rights investigation on tuesday based on the video showing police officer throwing a high school student across the

classroom. quickly spread on social media sparking outrage. the department of civil rights division and the fbi of columbia, south carolina, and the u.s. attorney's office are conducting a civil rights probe into the circumstances surrounding the arrest of the student. this incident occurred in a math classroom involving a white officer and a black female student. sheriff said he would -- he was shocked and disturbed by what the video shows, however he also said that officials have uncovered another video recorded angle showingnt the student resisting, hitting the student resource officer with her fist and striking him. the sheriff added she bears some

responsibility. if she had not disturb the class she would not be standing here today. from columbia university, what do you think of his comments? guest: there is a lot going on there. we can think about policy or whether or not the officer violated some of those positions to make it so that the sheriff would pass this on to the federal government. however, from what i heard from thestatements they said officer was losing control of the suspect. when he threw her across the room that was his opening for showing that there was a breach in protocol. i think that is quite distressing. you can't necessarily put the same level of blame on the young student as you would a professional. i would think, in a school setting where you have to someone who is 14, 15, 16 euros old, dealing with an adult who should be professionally trained.

i think there is a false equivocation of the actions here . you think about the scope and scale of those points of contact. i think it is a bit overblown but we have to put this in context. these arrests happen every day. they are not always this violent but this particular episode at least shows the american people more about what is happening in the urban school environments, thinking about the practices on the ground of police in schools, and figuring out how we can best increase safety but not necessarily criminalized and traumatized young people in the process of doing so. thomas from new jerseyans up. what are your thoughts? caller: thank you for taking my call. i appreciate you allowing me to voice my opinions. i kind of agree with what the last gentleman said. most of this stuff starts at home.

when you have parents that are not disciplining their kids, not teaching morals, right and wrong, this is a breakdown of society that has been going on for 30 or 40 years. when i was a kid in the 60's going to school i was more scared of my parents that i was of any teacher. i was taught to respect them. i was taught not to act up in class. this goes back to the parents. where is anybody talking about the parents role in taking care of these kids? thank you. host: carla shedd? guest: thank you. the home definitely matters. for this particular case there is a lot of disruption in this young girls home, and we can say for other people who might be involved with the justice system, there is instability in certain neighborhoods and in certain communities. but we have to think systematically what might be the cause for that. as one of the other colors -- callers said, can we talk about human development? should move outside

of what went wrong in this particular classroom to think what we can do to put more resources toward the communities fostering-- employment so that people have a bit more stability and some of behavioralhate -- disruptions that may stem from having an unstable home environment or not getting the resources you need are moving into the school. but you are right. it matters a great deal that people understand and respect and authority, but they also want legitimacy. they want to be treated like people. engage withve to them as people and not see them as a group of recalcitrant people ready to just act out and act up. really think about them as holistic individuals. host: next up is david from tennessee. as a parent what do you think of all of this jacket -- what do

think of this? caller: i'm sorry, could you repeat this. host: what is your question or comment? caller: what was the question? host: i said what are your thoughts on this? caller: my question was for does she shedd, really think that they should interrupt instruction time, 30 students times 10 minutes is a lot of interruption. does she really think that we should have a conversation in front of the rest of the students? i don't really think what i saw -- she was probably given 10 or 15 warnings before the officer came into the room. he has a lot of his plate. i think when you take it all into consideration the talk about criminalizing what he did when he was trying to get her out of the classroom, she hooked

her feet around the desk, she struck him which is an assault on an officer, and i think this whole thing has been blown out of proportion. guest: i mean i am a professor. classrooms not in a high school that columbia university. all of my students are not paying attention every day. i have to engage with them, i have to know them, maybe talk with them before or after class. you are right. there was a time before the police officer was brought in, but why couldn't it have been a counselor who came in? or why didn't the teacher perhaps no about what was happening in her home life? want to extrapolate too much from this one case as i am into data and social science, but there are many kids who have things going on in school.

she might have felt safest in the classroom, but you are right, the police officer should not have been doing that. there are several steps that should happen before where people could have engaged with her and perhaps said, come with me and we will talk. or if the teacher was able to give some work to the other students until he handed her off to someone else. there are other modes of .ntervention but you are right. focus on classroom management. i am known as a pretty tough professor. i don't really messed around but i also know my students and they know they can talk to me. atlantic" referenced a report from the united states government of justice and department of education. the report is called guiding

principles and it is quoted as saying, school resource officers should be focused on protecting the physical safety of the -- protecting the physical safety of the school and preventing criminal conduct. educators not officers should handle discipline. when the officer is involved in everyday discipline and responding to adolescence defiance the result is inappropriate. carla shedd from columbia university, what do you think? those those alignments, sort of guidelines are in alignment with the idea that school safety officers are there to protect the people in that space. increase ine an this protective overlay after 9/11 when they want to make sure they are ready for any terrorism or a shooter incident. they are really thinking about the extreme but day-to-day. might beee how it possible for teachers to say ok,

i am only here to teach. i don't deal with any issues of bodily control or trying to manage the discipline. don't we have a police officer? that is where the practice on the ground has the verged from ground -- guiding principles we might have about police in these spaces. i will say again, young people aren't always against having them there. many of them feel safer. young people say, i do feel protected. i wish more police came around. but it depends on how they view the actual workings of those officers and protecting them. one on one where people say i don't like the police but i like officer smith and cannot claim made a physical connection to them. that is what i want to highlight. there are many possibilities of having these relationships, because this is their

introduction to criminal justice, law enforcement. these are police within the school environment so how can we make it positive? host: quick question for you. we talked about this incident in the high school. do you find school resource officers at other levels of education as well as a middle schools, elementary schools? guest: yes. usually they are not the formal uniformed police officers, but they are there at school security guards and safety agents, not in as big numbers but they are definitely present in the lower-level schools. that is our young people i talk to, they say yes, we have this officer. you get more of the officer friendly mode from them. once they get into true adolescence the end people say oh, it started to change. they started looking at me differently. maybe because we walk in groups

and we are allowed. but we are just being kids, we are not doing anything criminal. coincideopment does with how they are treated differently. is upjim from tennessee next. you are a parent, what are your thoughts? caller: you know, for a professor that is having a class or showing up for a work job, you need to quit protecting the and blame that on the student, not the police officer. he did exactly what needed to be done. host: ok. we will get in one more caller and then hear from our guest. ron from indiana, you were in law enforcement. what do you think? say is what i wanted to that right away everybody looks at 35 seconds of the tape.

let's look at 15 minutes and then let's see how it looks then. right away for the officer to be in that classroom to do that job , it is all the time that is wasted on this one student. you need to go right back to those first few minutes. we will have to leave it there. carla shedd, your thoughts? guest: you know, people can have their opinions. , my professor, as a teacher focus is my students and their well-being and figuring out what is going on with them. to have thatat tape. what other things could we have done to deescalate this noncompliance? she is a young person, an adolescent, she is not perfect. we have to understand that.

he gave her the order to put her phone away and come with him, and he did it in a way that reached the call. we have to talk about that. there isthinking that a way that we could have avoided him even coming into that space. host: carla shedd, is there a time or place, or under what circumstances would it be appropriate for a school resource officer to engage in that disciplining of the child? guest: if the child is about to harm herself or other people in the school environment, yes, they should jump in. yes, treated as if it was an issue of true safety. that is what they are therefore. but they are not policing someone on the street who is a grown man but doing this to a child who might he 13, 15, 16 years old within a school setting.

you have an audience of young people looking at this. affect fromential just intervening in this childlike -- child's life. you really have to make contact matter in thinking about the roles and responsibilities of everyone who is an authority figure, from the teacher to the principal to the actual police officer. this does not go wrong every day. but when it goes wrong it goes horribly wrong. how do you use this as a teaching example for how we should proceed with more positive and productive ways? a fewif you comment -- comments from twitter. one person writes that student deliberately stayed on the phone. another person writes, time to school is.ut of it let teachers earn their combat pay in inner-city schools. why did we not need cops in the 60's and 70's?

just: a lot going on in those two comments. again, we are talking about young people and not ryan. it happens every day. how can we perhaps get them to do what we need them to do in ways that are less reliant on criminal justice measures? i would say we need to go that route in terms of combating even that youth -- particular attitude that we are bringing to the table about what is happening in these spaces. the kids in their behavior might be a reaction to that. i think there is a lot to be said about young people and their ability to gauge who is there to care for them, ,ocialize them, educate them and have really good intentions about doing so. i would want teachers in the class who actually want to be there and you want to engage with students, even if they may have problems. this happens not just in classrooms in urban public high schools.

there are kids with problems in private schools. there are kids with problems in the suburbs. we are not treating every child is if they are equal and that is a real problem. their point about why we did not need cops in the schools in the 60's and 70's, have things changed inside the classroom? or has attitude changed that has led to the growing number of resource officers? many: we have had transformations in the landscape of education and also housing. so we can think about how these public schools are now mostly filled with black and brown young people. white students are in our larger cities on -- under 10% of the population of the public schools. we have a changing demographic in the schools, and we also have that coinciding with fewer resources allocated to these

schools to perhaps make them the safe space that they need to be to better educate the young enrolled within them. we can talk about resource deprivation, differences across places, and also think about what are the demographics we are ?ducating in this base those disparities that we see in discipline and criminal justice involvement may stem from injustices happening in the school environment early on. host: you bring up a good point. in the video the police officer is a white police officer and the student is african-american. is there an issue of race at play here? what does the data tell you about the level of disciplinary incidents involving students of different minorities and different backgrounds? guest: there are definitely racial disparities. for some people i know they view this as the black kids are

overrepresented in these school arrest are just acting out more. but we have data that shows that is not necessarily true. instead they are getting punished more for the same behavior. i am not afraid to talk about race. there are kids when i interview tell me aboutid, any contact you had with police. tell me more about this interaction. they would make the distinction between well, it was a black officer, it was a white officer. sometimes you could hear them say more positive things about engaging with a black officer because they thought, he has a sense of history. he knows. he has seen kids like me. in youngn't matter people's assessment of police performance and contact. i have seen that in the data as well as kids saying they are just all police officers and they asked the same. there is some variation in how

young people view the actions of police officers by race and even by gender. what i have seen that mattered a deal is that some of them said, this particular officer got to know me. i actually come by the office and say hi. so they have been willing and able to establish positive relationships, but their assessment of police matter a in how the substance of the encounter works out as well as the structure in place. my research really shows there is new off and variation. no one is saying all police are bad, no one is saying all white police officer's are bad. but there are different assessments. host: we have time for just a few more collars -- collars -- callers. our next one is william from raleigh, and our calendar. he is a grandparent. caller: my whole thinking on

officer's should be in the school to protect the acts ofrom outside violence. but when it comes to interacting with kids in a classroom, we are talking about a telephone. we are talking about a student on the telephone. we are not talking about a student with a gun, a nice, or anything to harm anybody. we're talking about a telephone. if that is the only way that can have been taught or know how to deal with a child with a telephone, then that officer has no business ever being in any classroom. sure, you teach your kids to do things and you bring them up right.

but when that child leaves your house and goes to school you are not there. all you do is you teach them the best you can. that day when they go out in public, go to school, you hope they do the things that you teach them to do. kids are kids. we are talking about kids. host: ok. we have to leave it there. we will try to get in one more caller. johnny from texas who is in law-enforcement. go ahead. caller: listen. these kids that you are talking about are six feet tall, football players. this girl was just a girl. she had a telephone. why would they have phones in school and why won't you answer the question that was asked? sros in thee have 50's 60's and 70's? , your finalshedd

thoughts? guest: i did not do research in the 50's and 60's, but i can say from the archives, we had a different configuration of schools. teacherst have -- might have had the power of corporal punishment. they might have been able to have much more leeway intervening in school discipline issues. but i am a sociologist, not a historian. what i can say is with the buildup and the changes, not only school discipline and school police. we often can put a criminal overlay onto adolescent misbehavior, and that is what the grandfather, william, was trying to say. they are being kids. we are talking about a phone, not a gun erie it when you have police in this space to protect and punish for these infractions it gets ratcheted down. if there is no active shooter we look at what else is happening

and we are trying to be efficient with the use of these officers. we really have to put into perspective what are we talking about. are we talking about adolescence and misbehavior? or are we really criminalizing actions to a certain degree that that will put kids on a direct path to criminal justice, to having to be under the control of the criminal justice system? my and just is thinking about where those #burridge and how it happens within the school environment so that young people that end up having different lives -- like trajectory. what are the mechanisms by which we begin to sort people? oft: carla shedd, author "unequal cities." african-american studies professor at columbia university. thank you so much for your time. and next, donald trump will be

hosting saturday night live tonight and some are calling for nbc to keep him from hosting the program. what do you think about the decisions? we'll be taking your calls. we'll be right back. all persons having business before the honorable supreme court of the united states are admonished to go there and give their attention. opposedlawsuit boldly the forced internment of japanese americans during world war ii. after being convicted for failing to report for relocation , he took his case all the way to the supreme court. >> this week on c-span's landmark cases, we will discuss the historic supreme court case of korematsu versus the united states. president franklin roosevelt issued an evacuation order, sending people of japanese

origin who live close to military operations to internment camps throughout the u.s.. >> this is a re-creation of one of the barracks. they were 20 feet wide and 120 feet long and they were divided into six different rooms. they did not have feelings, they did not have a floor. the onlyd have been -- heating they would've had would have been a potbellied stove. this would not have been able to heat the entire room in a comfortable way. >> challenging the impact -- orematsuon order, k decide -- decide the order and is kate went to the supreme court. find out how the court ruled. we speak with peter irons and the executive director and

daughter of the plaintiff. the mood of america and the government policies during world war ii, and we will follow his life before, during, and after the court's decision. that is coming up on the next landmark cases. live it monday at nine clock p.m. eastern on c-span, c-span3, and he said radio. for background on each case, order your copy of the companion book. it is available for $8.95 plus shipping. >> "washington journal" continues. host: we are talking about donald trump. he is scheduled to host a saturday night live tonight on nbc. we want to know if you think he should continue to host the show. some groups are not happy about his presence. let us know what you think. democrats, (202) 748-8000.

republicans, (202) 748-8001. .ndependents, (202) 748-8002 us and findt as -- us on facebook or send us an .-mail here is the story in the new york times. donald trump's scheduled appearance on saturday night live draws protests. unconcerned with the possibility of angering latinos since declaring in june that mexico was sending rapists to the united states. about twoay evening dozen protesters gathered behind metal barricades opposite nbc headquarters at rockefeller center in new york to demand that the network rescind its invitation to host saturday night live this week. dump trump.hance of

there were people dressed in costumes including a man appearing as a cartoon style plutocrat complete with a black emblazoned eyeballs with dollar signs. congresswoman loretta sanchez is among those who have called on nbc to dump trump. she was on the house floor recently to say that his remarks have been racist. [video clip] >> i rise today to encourage saturday night live to does invite donald trump from posting your show this weekend. many may believe that mr. trump is just seeking controversies of you can get attention, but his divisive and racist remarks have very troubling and real-world consequences. many businesses and individuals have severed ties with mr. trump, and even snl's owner, university -- universal, has

said that respect of all people are corner store and -- cornerstones of our values. perhaps this blunder happened because currently there is no andno cast member on snl there have only been to in its entire history. i hope saturday night live's producers, writers, and cast members will consider how donald trump hosting will compromise the integrity of their show. having mr. trump degrades the quality of the humor because racism is not funny. it is lazy and it is cheap. comedy has the power to highlight hypocrisy in society and reveal important social truths and political commentary. snl has achieved that in the past. i hope it returns. host: we are taking your phone calls. should donald trump host saturday night live? our first collar is built from

pennsylvania on the republican line. what do you think? caller: good morning. there,y you have out tell her to go back to mexico. host: do you think donald trump should be on snl? he should be on, he is an american, he is a very successful man. i will not vote for anybody in this country today until donald trump. he is the only one who can change this country. i have been here from greece. look at what you are doing to greece. these liberals have destroyed this country. country,on't like this i don't care about the greeks. i have family there. i don't care of they died. host: ok. floridarom fort myers,

is up next on the republican line. what do you think? i think it is humorous to hear the congresswoman spend more time focusing on saturday night live then she is focusing on the division in congress. people have to understand there is a difference between an illegal alien and immigration. these people, like this congresswoman, luis gutierrez, all of these are folks who are trying to play big only against people like donald trump, who never said anything about legal , the issue is illegal aliens. i am so sick and tired of your callers who will be liberals trying to vilify -- i challenge one,f them to, number properly identify them as illegal aliens. and i challenge any of them to stand up and say this is

actually what donald trump said. carersonally, i don't because at the end of the day it is just a television show. this is what people like gutierrez do. they are liberal belief. host: here are some of the comments from hispanic lawmakers on twitter. i stand by the revolution -- resolution calling on nbc2 does invite donald trump. gutierrez of said racism is not funny, sexism is a funny, so why is nbc letting donald trump host snl? tony cardenas -- said i wrote a column in time magazine. and you heard the earlier comments from loretta sanchez.

on the democratic phone lines, benny from california. what do you think about donald trump? go ahead. are you there? caller: i think he should host snl. this is a country of freedom of speech. you can say whatever you want as long as it does not impugn anyone's freedom, so let donald trump host snl. it may be a good show. about the forum yesterday -- host: go ahead. voters,all you african-american voters that are behind hillary, you must remember hillary and bill signed

the bill to have all african-americans arrested and imprisoned for a whole lot of years for having marijuana. i don't think america is ready for a female. that is not sexist. host: ok. now hillary clinton has actually appeared on snl herself. here is a clip. [video clip] >> great dane. i'm val. so hillary, what brings you here tonight? >> i needed to blow off some steam. i have had a hard couple of 22 years. >> what do you do for a living? >> first i am a grandmother. on god'sam a human green earth. >> oh, i get it. you are a politician. >> yes. how about you?

ordinaryam just an citizen who believes the keystone pipeline will destroy our environment. >> i agree with you there. it did take me a long time to decide but i am against it. >> nothing wrong with taking your time. what is important is getting it right. >> i will drink to that. host: we are taking your phone calls right now. ?hould donald trump host snl we saw a clip of hillary clinton appearing on the show earlier. the washington post reports that his appearance could open up a legal can of worms. here is why. hillary clinton appeared on saturday night live for three minutes and 12 seconds on october 3 beginning at 11:53 eastern time. that filing alert of the agency that they had provided three

plus minutes to a presidential candidate for free. why does the fcc care? that triggers the equal opportunity clause of federal communications law. sure enough, larry lessig had already sent a letter to nbc affiliates demanding an equal opportunity to appear on the station. the last dates that if a candidate is allowed to use a broadcast patient the station must afford equal opportunities to all other such candidates. but does not hold for bona fide news programs but probably holds for something like a scripted appearance on snl from south carolina, wade is calling on the independent line. what do you make of all this? caller: thank you for taking my call. i couldn't agree with the previous collar anymore. 110% agree. these folks coming to the country and take advantage of the system. they want american jobs.

yes, trump should be on tonight and every night. host: do you plan on voting for him? caller: i am undecided right now but i am glad he is running. host: ok. next up is lisa from kentucky on the republican line. lisa, should he host snl? caller: i think you should be able to do that. they have had other people on their and i don't see why he is then some of the other stuff i heard on there, like that one time when they were making it look like child molestation is ok. that was not comedy. it was not funny at all. in hereher people come and try to run our country and tell us what we can do. we don't get the tell them what they continue in their country. host: ok. that is lisa from kentucky.

this story from nbc news, the congressional hispanic caucus asked snl and nbc2 does invite trump.nbc to diss invite said in its statement that his rhetoric demonizes latinos and immigrants and has created fear in these communities around the country, many of which are represented in congress by members of the congressional hispanic caucus. on twitter there are a few more thoughts. one person writes, good grief. why should any member of congress weigh in on whether someone should be on snl. this is nuts. another person writes, it is a free country but i hope the ratings tank for the show as it is a very selfish move for nbc. and finally, i believe that donald trump can take a joke and let as have fun with him. we will see tonight.

from kansas city, missouri, artemis is calling. what do you think? caller: first of all i'm very glad that he is there protecting americans, and i am certainly going to vote for him. in fact i will promote his campaign. but also i think it is very important that we understand that there are only three races and mexican is not one of them. it is a nationality. hispanic is an ethnic group. they are not races and they just use that term because it has become -- to be racist has become a crime worth than murder in this country -- worse than murder in this country. host: next up is charlie from new york calling on the independent line. go ahead. caller: yeah, hi. should beink trump

allowed to host saturday night live. he is abusing our democracy by using his wealth and politics, and he does not have any guilt against it at all. , the free market climatef, has caused change. they never talk about that. he is basically abusing our democracy by using his wealth. these other people, the average guy or woman cannot get to speak about politics to the extent that he does. host: ok, that is charlie. next collar is robert from florida on the democratic line. do you think donald trump should host snl? caller: absolutely. the man is in his element. he has comedy show and proven himself to be an excellent entertainer. i believe representative sanchez, even though i am a democrat, i believe she was wrong to take time on the floor of the legislature when there

were so many issues that need our attention. we don't have to watch if we don't care for him. host: do you think other presidential candidates should get equal time on snl? does this set a precedent? caller: look, it is a comedy show. they should have whoever they deem funny, and he is it. host: all right. now a few other headlines for you this morning. we will still take your calls on donald trump, the just the few other headlines in the washington post. this story about the blockbuster jobs report, it helps odds of a raterate -- said -- fed hike. government data released friday showed the economy added a 231,000 jobs70 --

in october. the unemployment rate dipped to 5% and wages rose at the fastest pace since 2009. the wall street journal included these charts on its front page from which you can see the improvement of the labor market over the past seven years. you did see the number of jobs that were lost during the 2009, andin 2008 and then the blue bar is extending the number of jobs that have been created since the. you can also see the number of full-time workers has returned to its pre-recession average. we will go back to the phone lines now. should donald trump host snl? uanita is our next color. what do you think? caller: of course you should be able to. that is a comedy show. can i say one other thing? i don't understand why people

get so upset about people who accept jobs offered to them. in,ink anybody who called if they need a job and someone offered them a job, they would accept it or it don't get angry at a legal people who are working, get angry at the people who hire them. next up is luke from louisiana on the republican line. what do you think? caller: how are you doing? host: hi. caller: trump has the right to go on and i am sick and tired of all these people calling him a racist. he is calling it like it is. people seem to forget that these people coming over here illegally. they are illegal aliens. host: do you support trump for president? caller: yes i do. host: ok. now a quick programming new -- note for you all. the reference a few days away american history tv will be live

from the national world war ii museum in new orleans. we are going to look back 70 years to the wars and and its impact on american history. we will take a museum to her and your calls and tweets. coverage will start at 11:00 a.m. eastern on c-span3, and if you're in new orleans please stop by the museum for a tour. you can follow our bus on twitter and in again. the user handle is @cspanbus. and you can visit www.c-span.org /history. calls taking your phone on the donald. it should donald trump host saturday night live tonight? jeremy, go ahead. caller: hello. host: go ahead. do you think donald trump should host snl? caller: absolutely. donald trump is one american who

believes -- he wants to bring greatness to america again, and of course it is very good for him to write his opinion and go ahead and show another side of him. but he isl him a joke a serious candidate and i wish him well. i would vote for him. will as a democrat you vote for donald trump. that is jeremy from florida. rodney from virginia is next. what do you think? caller: yes. folks should focus on not donald trump. i thinkuld focus on -- that they should focus on more important manners -- matters beside a comedy show. you have a lot of stuff that the american people are going through besides them focusing on

a comedy show. .onald trump is funny host: ok. now we have been taking a poll on twitter to see whether or not you think donald trump should host snl. 42% of you say yes he should be to host tonight. 58% say no he should not be hosting. it is not too late to get your thoughts heard. you can call us on the democratic line .(202) 748-8000 republicans can call us at (202) 748-8001. isependents, the number (202) 748-8002. you can send us an e-mail or tweet at us. massachusetts, james is our next collar. go ahead. caller: how are you? i think donald trump is going to

be our next president and i just don't think the democrats can take it. i take it scares a lot of people from both sides. like i said, i think he is going to be the next president and i think that bob is a lot of people. host: do you plan to watch tonight? caller: what? host: do you plan to watch? caller: absolutely. host: if you are comments from twitter. hillary was on snl, why not trump? i can fast-forward through his segment and get to the news. another person right -- right, i don't care. i bet -- i don't benefit one way or the other. steve from california on the democratic line. what do you say? caller: no doubt he should be .llowed to be on s&l -- snl if people want to be outraged they should get their priorities in order and be outraged at the liberals for putting on the commercial just recently having

children cussing and swearing and flipping the bird. that is what they should get outraged at. host: all right. another comment now from twitter, the damage trump is doing is sending a message that boorish behavior will be rewarded and that is a shame. , few more headlines now justices to take on another challenge to obamacare. the supreme court agreed friday to hear another challenge to the affordable care act, this time to decide whether religiously affiliated universities such as hospitals, universities, and charities can be free from playing any role in providing their employers with contraceptive coverage. of case pits questions religious liberty against access to health care coverage. it will be the fourth time the court has considered some aspect of obamacare.

meanwhile in the wall street journal drug prices are drawing more scrutiny. the justice department have ratcheted up scrutiny of drug pricing practices. the u.s. attorney's office for the eastern district of pennsylvania and the justice department's civil division are howing information about companies calculate and report drug prices. illinois is calling now on the democratic line. what do you think about donald trump echo -- donald trump? caller: good morning. first of all because of who he is and what he has done i would like to say, as a veteran of the united states, you are fired. we should invest in mexico and stop the cartels. we are north americans, we are are the greatest

country in the world. he cannot make america any greater. host: all right, that is tony. next up is dee. what do you think? are a free country and i think he should be allowed to be on s&l -- snl. but i would also like to take into consideration that the native americans were here first so if donald trump wants to put people on a boat than all of you people should be put on the boat. be first.mp should our last caller from this morning will be airing from florida on the republican line. you have the last word. caller: absolutely donald trump should host snl. i think he is going to do great job. as far as the question about equal airtime, there are other ways that the other networks can

share the wealth as far as airtime. but absolutely he is going to do a great job. i look forward to it. .ost: that is eric from florida that doesn't four-hour for our show. thank you for joining us and please stay tuned. tomorrow we'll be talking with the author of "rent proceeds." we will also have on the former ambassador to morocco and advisor to president carter. have thely we will correspondent for usa today talking about the department of toense payment of $9 million sports teams were patriotic events. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2015] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org]

>> coming up this morning on c-span, a look of the future of warfare. followed by some of our recent road to the white house coverage, featuring candidates jeb bush and donald trump. later, we will be live from the campaign trail with a campaign meeting with hillary clinton in orangeburg, south carolina. >> the senate armed services committee recently held a hearing on the future of warfare, focusing on geopolitical challenges, and the military use of new technology. among the witnesses, retired general keith alexander, who heads the nsa and cyber command. we begin with his opening statement.