speaker, people in wisconsin's first district and across america have a visionary leader who is not afraid to walk the walk. oute republicans have laid a better way agenda that proposes bold ideas to address the challenges that the nation are facing. i was proud to serve a long with speaker ryan and we were both elected back in 1998. let's hear from you. first, from albuquerque, new mexico. we will go to russell. good evening. you are on the air. : good evening. i am calling from california. i thought it was a very good speech by paul ryan, but because he is very well respected and high up in the republican party, i really truly would like to see him start to help more to unite the republicans, what i call resistors, the people who are and notlding out supporting our candidate that we the people have voted in, and i

would like to see him put that extra effort forward to really morethat he start speaking highly of mr. trump, because he has not always, and that is what i would really like to see that kind of work from him, that he starts to unite our party. host: ok, thank you very much for the call. earlier, we checked in with the washington bureau chief from their walkie journal sentinel. he said it would be an easy victory for the house speaker. that is exactly what happened tonight, and he is rejoining us. craig gilbert, thank you for joining us. caller: thank you. were right about the first congressional district. let me go back. why so much attention in this particular primary? guest: i figure was donald trump first and foremost. he kind of injected himself into the primary in a surprising and dramatic way last week.

it turned that this was a referendum on paul ryan by his voters back home, and in all of the polling, it has been building among republican voters. district has been in the 80's, and that is where he is in the voting, so i think it is very clear what led to his victory. i think he got attention because a lot of the discord and division is in the republican party, and paul ryan is representing a sort of different , andn, style, and agenda sense of the future of the republican party than donald trump does. : if you hear the story tonight, it is interesting how he parsed the words, talking about a better way agenda and also not playing to the fears of the electorate, which is in why donald trump was able to win the primary, and yet, he is facing a very different electorate as we move to the general election, donald trump is.

when asked about why he won by the margin he did, he said i say what i mean, i mean what i say, and i do it without being mean, and that can be read as a slam on his opponent, paul nehlen, whose campaign said some very strident things about paul ryan. oncould also be a slam donald trump. the language that ryan used tonight about being the party of inclusion, not division, a party of hope, not fear, those all can be in contrast to donald trump, who paul ryan has endorsed but willas criticized and probably continue to criticize. he was asked tonight about the statement, the controversial statement, that donald trump said about second amendment people putting an end to hillary clinton. he said it sounded like a joke gone bad.

host: and yet, that was a really brief news conference, and he dominated the news. he tried to backpedal on it tonight, saying,,, believe me, that is not what i meant, and yet it seems to be dominating what other people are hearing on the cable channels. guest: yes. he was repeatedly asked about donald trump last week, and there was a sympathetic talk radio host, and one of them asked him at one point, can you be an enthusiastic supporter of donald trump and at the same time be criticizing him over these issues and the rhetoric, and ryan said, you know, that is a good western. i do not know if i have a good answer because he keeps saying things, and also some of these require aoccasion response, and he said, you know, we have let like 30 of them go.

like 30 more compared to the five or six good answers, so that tells you that paul ryan if anything thinks he has cut , sold trump some slack trump supporters will not feel like he is criticizing too much. a statement issued, congratulating his friend paul ryan on his victory tonight, and we have been hearing a lot of payments from the the about the chairman's frustration with -- we haven't hearing a lot of statements -- have been hearing a lot of statements. guest: first of all, they have handled it different ways. governor scott walker, who was a one time rival of donald trump, and reince priebus, he has been trying to rally the party around

trump, and he is the most invested in trump. he praised ryan's opponent last week and kind of poked ryan in the eye by saying he was not ready to endorse him and worked hard to get trump to reverse himself, but ryan has charted his own course. tricky one. it is a balancing act, very awkward, and it invites criticism from all sides, but he has stuck to it, which is to maintain his position of support from trump that criticizes him when he thinks trump has really, really crossed the line, and scott walker has been, early on, and he dropped out of the race, he urged other republicans against trump. finally, at the convention, you know, he gave his sort of most expansive endorsement of trump but then took ryan a side, not surprisingly. leadingepublican party

figures have been kind of up ended by donald trump, as other republicans have been. they are dealing with it in their own way. it has been painful, and i think it will continue to be awkward and painful through this election cycle. host: paul nehlen saying -- so what impact did that favorable tweet from donald ehlen have on the n campaign, and, of course, donald trump this week say he supported speaker ryan. : it does not seem to have any impact at all. when donald trump gave his initial comments, that was a en, but then he turned around and endorsed ryan.

i think it probably did not have an effect, but maybe it boosted turnout. it looks like the turnout will have been higher than it was in 2014, not massively higher, but higher. it would be hard to imagine all of the media attention not boosting turnout on some level, but it was not transformative at all. and certainly i believe, and i think the polling suggests that the driver was ryan's sort of home turf popularity within his own party that did not seem to be affected by donald trump. in fact come to go back to look at some of the statewide polling from earlier this year, and from this number, there was no evidence that pro-trump republicans in wisconsin were any more critical or any less supportive of paul ryan then pro-trump supporters -- than anti-trump supporters. it is a different story in terms of the challenge that he has to

negotiate as eager of the house in washington and also as a leader in his party through this very stormy period. are talking to craig gilbert, the washington bureau chief for the milwaukee journal sentinel. while we have you on the phone, ron johnson seeking his second term, a rematch from 2000. foring and a primary battle wisconsin, so in this rematch, it is one of the senate races that will very likely determine who controls the senate in 2017. the race right now? : well, right now, the challenger has been leading in all of the polls, and the idea that donald trump is struggling at the top of the ticket, that makes it harder for the incumbent to win. it is a hard state or republican incumbents to win anyway. so are a lot of factors working against ron johnson and for russ feingold, and ron johnson at

this point has to hope either really putstrump wisconsin into play and closes the gap with hillary clinton or that he can significantly outperform donald trump in november, and that is what he is up against, and with that, i think i may have to sign off, because i have to british my story for the milwaukee journal sentinel tonight. : craig gilbert, thank you very much. appreciate it. guest: any time. ryan wins easily. john joins us from arizona on the republican line. : yes, thank you for having me on. i was wondering why paul ryan did not cover the unlicensed contracting that is going on for all of our state, taking our , with billion-dollar

homebuilders, commercial builders, and with that going on, it causes going to our federal government, which they do not trace, and the illegals are using this to take our jobs on our construction site. host: ok, that is your statement? caller: yes. host: chairman reince priebus talking, and going on to say it was a well-earned victory, saying that paul ryan has faithfully represent to the people of wisconsin and making the statement that conservatives have never changed and that his principled public service has made him a leader in our party. i know that paul will continue to articulate his vision as a confident and strong american. i look forward to seeing him return to congress as another

term as speaker of the house. joining us from janesville, wisconsin, the hometown of speaker ryan, good evening, patrick. caller: thank you for having me on. we cannot be more proud for speaker paul ryan for his integrity, his leadership, and all of the visions he has shared with us to make america a better place. solutions are growing, real solutions to growing problems. with the current administration, trying to find a better way to make and the agenda our government smarter and more efficient. i really think we have a great future. ant: and as he indicated, overwhelming victory now with about 85 percent of the vote in the primary, about 15% for paul nehlen, so why is it an

overwhelming victory for paul ryan? : he has gone to d.c., but he has not forgotten. he is back here, in touch with the people in this district, and he has not gotten out of touch, outsider. host: thank you. our line for independents. good evening, sir. : i do agree with the caller before about across the nation. a lot of developers are not paying their fair share for but whyucture problems, does not the media talk about -- well, donald trump brags about we are going to do infrastructure and all of this and that, but it was the republican party who voted obama'spresident

, and at there bill same time, over the years, why has republican -- over the past four or five years not the been --an party creating this gerrymandering law. thepaul ryan one because of gerrymandering law -- paul ryan won. so why has not the supreme court step in and say that is illegal? law or it is the id reducing the time to vote? : from albuquerque, thanks for the call.

inh about 83% with the vote from the first congressional district, house speaker paul ryan with an overwhelming victory in terms of raw numbers, almost 48,000 votes, compared to , hisover 9004 paul nehlen republican challenger, and nearly 16% of the vote for mr. nehlen. tweet from mr. ryan -- n is next, democrats line. : i am a c-span fan. i listen on my way to work. the conventions -- : since you mentioned, we have a new c-span radio app that you can check out on our website, c-span.org.

will, i will. see the convention was awesome. i did not have to hear the talking heads. so, yes. paul ryan. 84%. i am not a democrat, but he is a good politician. you have to know your base, and nehink trump, he endorsed len. he thought there is no way that this nehlen is going to win, and then haul ryan by 84%. i think that is why he went ahead and endorsed him. i do not think trump likes paul ryan, and i do not think paul ryan likes trump. paul ryan is honest. he has integrity.

i do not agree with most of what he says, but he is a totally different politician than trump, and the wisconsin republican party got it together. they have an agenda. they are together. ryan, he is trying to save his party, and it is so factious and disillusioned. it has been eight years. instead of cooperating and compromising and making deals with obama, they just obstructed. need kickbacks. people will kill me for this, but we need kickbacks back. when we had kickbacks, at least we could get stuff done. getting my bridge done. host: one more call it we will go to john, joining us from ohio. john, good evening. you have got the last word.