governor has from north carolina has sought -- with regards to this decision. if we're going to get it out we're going to go through it quickly. i don't think the supreme court has ruled on the stake however. >> can someone repeat what she said? commissioner narasaki: i think what she was alluding to was that the state of north carolina has filed for a stay pending an appeal from the supreme. -- to the supreme court. so she's saying we need to get the statement out because it's a shifting legal -- commissioner castro: right. that was in the newspaper a couple of days ago. i'm going to call the question for a vote. commissioner kirsanow, how do you vote? >> no. commissioner heriot, how you do vote? commissioner heriot: i don't know. >> commissioner nirasaki?

>> i recues myself. >> commissioner kladney. commissioner kladney: i pass for the moment. chairman castro: i'll come back to you. commissioner achtenberg how you do vote? commissioner achtenberg: yes. >> madam vice chair, how do you vote? >> yes. >> and i vote yes. commissioner kladney? commissioner kladney: yes. >> so the motion passes with four yeses, two nos and a recusal. at this point i'd like to invite brian walsh our press person to come up and present a suggestion that he had about how we may want to issue these press statements just given the number of them. we obviously want to do this in a way that -- it's organized. brian: sure, thank you, mr. chairman, commissioners, mr. staff director. basically my proposal is to

streamline only the press releases. this has nothing to do with the statements in the sense of publicizing and releasing them. we've already discussed or you have already discussed the peaceful co existing and women in prisons report. those are both press releases in and of itself. those two go out stand alone. the other proposal would be that instead of individual press releases for texas birth certificates, g.c. vs. glouster school board and the statement striking down voter identification laws that because in essence and this is my terminology these are on an legal track that we could issue these press releases. indicating that all three statements have been approved. >> and it would link to all three? >> yes, it would. >> what do folks think about that? i know that there were some

questions about the number of things that we're putting out. commissioner heriot? commissioner heriot: i defer to the judgment of someone who knows these things. chairman castro: any commissioners have any objections to that? commissioner kladney: is what's being said that you combine the three together with links to the full statements -- >> correct. commissioner kladney: because i know in the past all we've ever done is issue through p.r.i., i think the outfitters or p.r.i. or something like that. anyway, there was some statement -- outlet that we would give to press and there was only so many words. are you going to keep going in the group ofxpand people and the manner of delivery of these statements to individual news organizations and outlets? how exactly is the distribution

going to take place especially if you're only linking -- if, in fact, you are speaking about inside the first -- the one and only combined individual press release? >> yes, thank you, commissioner for the question. in essence we still will continue with the procedure of issuing press releases by f.p.r. news wire. we are in early discussions about amplifying the reach so to speak of press releases. in these cases the statements themselves will be posted individually on the website. they will also be referenced in our twitter feed as statements and will try to get those the most expansive coverage we can. but again, in this case what is, just to clarify in the case, the individual statements will be released. they will be posted individually.

this would, again, just be a press release which indicates that these statements were voted on, discussed and passed by majority vote here today by the commission by you all. >> so that would mean that people would have to come to our website if they have further interest? >> generally speaking we have posted the statements as you know on the websites. we have run press releases on p.r. news wire to get the shorter more targeted language out more widely and then anything that runs on p.r. news wire references the exact link to the statement on the website. as you know that's to a certain extent been tradition. we can have additional discussions at a moment in time is the commissioner's decision to decide how we might amplify that. >> the p.r. news wire will have the press release, there will be

an active link to the statement. the person looking at that p.r. news website will click the link and immediately they can see -- >> absolutely. within the single press release there will be a hyper link to each of the three statement and that will be very easy to navigate for anyone that looks to have the press release. commissioner nara sake -- naras aki: i just want to note, i think the context is helpful which is using the p.r. wire is expensive. so the more that we can streamline the process, the better i think that we as commissioners can work with the press office to also give them other places where it can be e-mailed to make sure that as commissioner kladney says there's maximum exposure. chairman castro: any other questions? if not. sounds like you've got our blessing. thank you, brian. brian: thank you. commissioner castro: so now we

we do -- we will move on to advisory committee matters. we will hear from one of our colleagues, a presentation from the chairperson of our north carolina state advisory committee, chairman matty lazo chadderton. she's going to speak about the recent briefing on environmental justice in north carolina where myself, commissioner narasaki and our vice chair attended. and let me just say that the chair of the north carolina state advisory committee did a masterful job of bringing together very divergent points of view that were presenting at that hearing and allowed everyone to engage thoughtfully and respectfully on the issue. and we were very pleased to see her leadership and that of the

members of the advisory committee. so i'm very glad she's hear today to talk to us about the work that they've done. i think we've all seen the report as part of our effort to finalize our environmental report for our statutory report. this will be a chance to dig a little deeper on the report. madam chair, are you on the line? madam chair: yes, mr. chairman, thank you. chairman castro: please proceed. >> should i begin? >> yes, go ahead. >> thank you, mr. chairman, for your kind comments. we were so honored having you and commissioner goodsen and narasaki come in for the representation of the small commissioners for a small town was the highlight of the day because we didn't feel alone and especially the residents.

and i would like to thank everyone of the commissioners today for allowing me to share with you about our study and a little bit of this observation, -- background and observations -- important as her patience as andve 10 minutes i believe then some recommendations that is the most important. 2016 the advisory committee convened in north carolina at the border of west virginia. the committee wanted to hear testimony regarding environmental justice issues in

the state, especially as related cold -- coal ash disposal and its civil rights impact on communities of race and color. really we heard about, you know, everyone, local residents, duke -- nonprofit organizations, the industry, duke energy and the north carolina department of environmental quality. we are very glad that this place was chosen, like any place in this public meeting was ash. going acoal

little back, on february 2, 2013, [indiscernible] -- a metal pipe burst open and leaked an estimate of 82,000 tons of coal ash and 27 million gallons of contaminated water to the river in north carolina. for a week, heavy metals such as arsenic, selenium, chromium, and mercury, spilled into the river. according to the news, coal ash was found as far as 80 miles downstream at the bottom of the river. after the 2014 bill, duke energy pled guilty to nine charges of violations of the clean water act and agreed to pay $68 million in fines and $30 million

of environmental projects and land conservation. additionally, duke energy entered into a $3 million cleanup agreement with the epa. however, it's estimated the total cleanup cost would be as -- could be as much as $300 million. -- wevited parties invited everyone. it was an open invitation, and we had amazing speakers, including from washington, d.c. and from rural and urban north carolina. whoever could not attend personally, they submitted written statements and offered their perspective.

in spite of several attempts, no representatives from the epa were present at the hearing. what the important findings were, and if you have questions, feel free to ask these. the following result was directly from the testimony received and it reflects the views of the seated panelists. where industrial produced toxic waste and air pollutants are disproportionately concentrated in and around communities of color, particularly black, latino, and american indian. the other observation was that

the environmental protection laws that exist prohibit the contamination of water by improper disposal of toxic waste. furthermore, there are provisions that protect the civil rights of communities from damage based on race, ethnicity, and socioeconomic status. however, without proper enforcement by state and agencies this law fails communities who depend on it. the next observation from these -- this town hall meeting was that there has been insufficient scientific research conducted on the health and environmental

risk associated with coal ash. the full observation was that reader, representative of the north carolina department of environmental quality stated in his testimony that the ncdeq and governor mcquarrie are taking steps to address the coal ash pollution. and the final observation was title vi of the 1964 civil rights act, in addition to other regulations, it ceased to withdraw funding and enforce compliance with civil right laws.

our recommendations were quite a few, and the number one was the nc department of environmental quality, epa, and duke energy should look into long-term solutions to prevent coal ash leakage and contamination such as conversions into cement and other waste disposal operations risk ofns which do no going into the water or the air. and the second that -- was that epanorth carolina deq and should take action that prevent low income communities and communities of color from being affected by coal ash disposal. third, the epa should conduct an

investigation to see whether the state of north carolina is in compliance with all epa regulations, including civil rights law. and before we have a few more if you allow me. is that the epa should ensure that the programs it funds like ncdeq be more considerate of the environmental effects that there theirre regulations -- regulations on coal ash has on minority populations. the epa should investigate risk levels of residents living the closest to the coal ash pond and potentially provide economic means for them to be relocated.

the recommendation from the north carolina advisory committee is the epa and duke energy should investigate the safest way to excavate coal ash. number seven, the affected community of walnut creek should to haveto the town political representation. number eight, in addition to environmental justice as related to coal ash disposal, the commission should consider other sources of land and water contamination such as fracking, as well as air quality concerns such as high exposure to other diesel emissions and other sources of fine matter. the commission should consider

the cumulative effect of these contaminants on environmental justice communities and the extent to which failure on the part of regulators to such effect may result in inadequate environmental justice protection. we found three more recommendations to you all. the north carolina department of health and human services should immediately conduct a thorough health study through the university of north carolina medical school of the affected walnut cove area using guidance established by the centers for disease control and the council of the state and

epidemiologists. these results should be directly reported to the lieutenant governor, speaker of the house and north carolina senate. the number 10 recommendation, the state of north carolina and the epa should investigate ways to compensate community members for health care expenses and land devaluation that has resulted from coal ash contamination. the last one is, the epa should investigate the lasting effects of coal ash disposal from areas after the waste has been disposed of and relocated. thank you so much for your patience. commissioner castro: thank you, madam chair. again, very excellent work done by you and your staff.

you should know that we are including your report to us as well as a similar report from our illinois state advisory committee as appendices to our environmental justice report, which will be issued prior to the end of this fiscal year, and we also do incorporate some of your hearing findings and recommendations into those that we make overall, so the work that you have done will be well represented as part of the work we are doing here at the national level. with that i'm happy to open it up to any questions from our commissioners. commissioner narasaki: i just want to thank the chair for undertaking -- and the committee for undertaking this study. it was very helpful to hear directly from community members

in addition to the people who formally testified. the commission did have basically an open mic for people in the audience to be able to participate. it was incredibly powerful to hear from the people themselves about the impacts on their loved ones and their way of life, so thank you, this very emotional hearing and it was difficult to run and you did a magnificent job in running it. kladney: i would like to thank the north carolina chair as well as the rest of the state advisory commission. one question i did have, during the briefing was it ever suggested that business entities dealing with these types of substances be required to place funds in trust for use in purposes of cleanup, medical medical expenses, and other expenses if necessary, and when

they were done using them they would either be expensed with -- for those purposes are reimbursed back to the company. with that idea put forth? >> i don't believe so, but that is an excellent idea. if you allow me in this very moment, i would like to take a personal privilege to thank you for the approval. -- as were energized said, it takes the whole village to do some work. in this case it's only one person in the village. there is an amazing colleague and team player here and a hard worker.

he is on the phone call. thank you. thank you for your outstanding work and service. commissioner,l, being asked to recommend that, but that would be a great idea, a great recommendation. that would help a lot. commissioner castro: any other questions from commissioners? none, then i want to again thank you, madam chair. if you want to stick around were going to be voting on reappointing your state advisory committee, but feel free to stay on for the rest of the call. otherwise if your going to be hanging up, convey our thanks to all the members of the committee for their work and their continuing service on behalf of

the commission and the people of the united states, we appreciate it. thank you. >> thank you, mr. chairman. on.rman: now we move we have packages to consider. let me now make a motion that the commission appoints the following individuals to the north carolina state advisory committee based upon the recommendation of our staff director. harold brooks, heather ford, stephen green, kevin hale, kennedy,ho, dorence rick martinez, david moore, olga donna oldman, jenna robinson, and maddie chatterton. pursuant to this motion, the commission appoints maddie chatterton chair of the north

carolina state advisory committee. these members will serve as uncompensated government employees. under this motion come the commission authorizes the staff director to execute the appropriate paperwork for the appointments. do i have a second? the vice chair seconds. any discussion? commissioner heriot: i plan to vote no on this slate. i'm afraid that this particular sac has been handling quite an extraordinary way. as i understand it, two weeks ago, the regional staff director reached out to special assistance to get help because he felt that this north carolina sac was not balanced sufficiently with regard to

viewpoint diversity so he called on those he thought was most likely to come up with proposals for conservative members. 10:40 on a friday morning. my special assistant responded very quickly with some names by about 1:40 that afternoon. the commissioner's assistant was working on developing an additional list and began -- he began reaching out to the people that have been proposed. but at 3:00, just an hour and 20 minutes later, we got an e-mail that there was a final slate and it did not include any of the names they had come up with. one of the special assistants

e-mailed to find out if there had been some sort of mistake and was told no, there was not a mistake, that we could add names at the last minute. i understand that to two-- i understand that recommendations that were made have indeed gone on, but there was a very good candidate that ms. mulder came up with who inexplicably has been left off of this. as i read it now, we have 10 left-leaning members of this proposal with only five what i would call leaning to the right in the group. we recently passed an administrative instruction that features the notion that these sac's need to be ideologically balanced and my understanding is or one special assistant who believes they are not balanced and that there should be a meeting of all

special assistants to deal with the problem. that meeting has not happened here. instead, we are just pushing through this sac. oddly enough, it is not one of those that has been out of commission for very long. this one is being jumped ahead. some that have not been completed for a longer period of time. i don't see why we need to rush with this one. i don't see why the person that was proposed by ms. mulder has disappeared from view here, and i really don't think this is ideologically balanced. commissioner castro: so two of the three that you recommended didn't make it, is that what you are saying? commissioner heriot: right now we have twice as many people that are left-leaning than our right-leaning. our instructions are that they are to be balanced. commissioner castro: balance is not one to one.

like every time, even in white conservative states. name me a sac where the conservatives are in the majority? there are always twice as many. "why does that bother you, ms. heriot?" well, it does bother me. name one, 1, 1 state advisory committee where the majority is conservative. over and over and over again, i am asked and told we cannot come up with them. it is being pushed through. i think it is inappropriate and i object. commissioner castro: commissioner, i suspect maybe some of this is because we have cameras here. commissioner heriot: have i not objected in the past? commissioner castro: we did not put d.c. and ohio up -- commissioner heriot: ohio is not -- commissioner castro: did you raise north carolina before this? i have no doubt we would be

pulling that off right now and looking for balance. we were following, and you could've easily raised these issues before the meeting today, and we would have gladly pulled this aside. commissioner heriot: i did. commissioner castro: it was not brought to the attention of the chairman. i know you want to say something , commissioner narasaki. commissioner narasaki: i just want to note that the commissioners are all well aware of which state advisory committees are open and need recruitment. my staff and i have gone out of our way to help as much as possible the staff to identify people. i have to say that not every commissioner is doing that, so one of the problems we have, as commissioner heriot well knows, is we have a large number of state advisory committees who

are open and not filled, and we need to get them done because as we just heard from the report today, they play a very important role. so staff is doing the best they can to try to get these slates up and running. i would be happy to entertain a waiver of our rules to go back and add some people, if there are some qualified people to some of these slates, but we need to start getting some of these slates done. as the chair has pointed out, we held up d.c. because of your concerns, even though d.c. is hardly a majority republican place, and the reason is not through any malice or ill will or political gamesmanship. it's just sometimes in a place like d.c., for example, it's difficult to find people from the republican party in a state

that votes 90% democrat. so i understand your frustration, but i would suggest the way to deal with this in the long term -- not this case necessarily -- but in the long-term is for the commissioners to get more active and really trying to help identify potential members for the staff. commissioner castro: staff director, then commissioner heriot. >> thank you, mr. chairman. that i have worked with every commissioner's special assistant, and in particular in this case, i worked with both commissioner heriot and the other special assistant when they brought attention to their concerns about the balance. asked themth them, i

for their assistance. theireve on a couple of recommendations, they did not submit applications. we wanted to prepare and give commissioners enough time to review the slates so that any objections to a specific ifividual could be resolved that were the case. there were none. i agree we need to do a better job working with balance. they cannot be perfect, it a one to one balance, but we do the best job we can with the applications of nominees. sometimes we get nominees from commissions and for whatever reason they don't submit an application. we go back to them and asked them if they are interested. they do not submit it in time for the deadline. so we had that situation with

north carolina. we've had that situation with kansas. several of them were able to submit applications on time. made withons were regard to the district of columbia, so we are working with special assistants to try to find a way to resolve those issues and get these sac's going. if we keep having you object because there's three more of one persuasion and to another, we will never get things done, and quite frankly, in the case there are five from one ideological persuasion and four from the other. conservative and for being bent, andprogressive to complete independent. so we're not here trying to stay that they always have to be one way or the other.

we are trying to find the balance the best we can. is a complicated job, you're trying to get 15 people to submit applications in a short period of time. i talked to the special assistants about their first they -- frustrations and our frustration about trying to pull all this together. one of the proposals is that we will do more of the -- the regional coordinator for the out and going to reach we've had preliminary discussions about this. 120 days before the expiration, what we are thinking of doing, we have not thought it through completely, is that we would put forward a notice to all c,mmissioners that this sa

let's say new york, is going to expire in 120 days. please provide us with your nominees, if you have any. there is a certain number seeking to be reappointed, but we would like to reach out to you and provide us with a list. 30 days after this, these are the nominees we receive from you and these are the ones who have responded to us. we still have 90 days before we together.t the sac 60 days out, we have a more robust and clear alignment of , so if there's another 30 days we need to get down and anda more balanced sac there are further objections, we have time to work on that, so by the time i give it to you which is two weeks before the vote, before the consideration, if there is an objection, we can pull it down and work our way

through that. that is the idea. we are doing the best we can. i sense your frustration, commissioner heriot and all the other missioners, and we are more than willing to work with you to find a way to get these completed so that we can hopefully reach the mandate and request of congress to have as many as we can fulfill before the end of the year. a couple of heriot: points here i think need to be made. first of all, on the notion of whether or not we should have well, wemore persons, -- regional staff members are telling us not to propose so many people. in fact, we were told that we

should only propose people that we personally know, which is again, just nonsense and not advice that i am planning to take. informedl assistant the staff director that that is the advice that we were getting and that we object to it, and she got no response on that. with regard to the notion that we don't always get applications, that is true, you have applications from the person proposed by ms. mulder, and yet somehow he didn't make it onto the list, despite the that this particular sac on the notion that maybe we should have procedures. we just worked for months to create a procedure that would eliminate the possibility of having to deal with this in a meeting. we are supposed to have a meeting of special assistance when a particular staff is

thought to be unbalanced by the special assistants looking at it. that did not happen in that case. we worked very hard on those procedures. them. already violating i would have more sympathy for the notion, now and then there will be a staff, where the liberals outnumber the conservatives. the notion that this is balanced because the number of republicans and democrats is similar, the problem is our independents are not democrats because they are further to the left of that.

it is not a question of how many republicans and democrats you have. you have to work at the actual political ideology. we are trying to get ideological diversity. so people can come together and talk about these issues. >> i will call this for a vote. >> my understanding, the issue of north carolina and meeting.s raised at a the second thing, around the issue of personal recommendation, i think what staff is dealing with, some commissioners would put forward the name of someone they did not know and they had not actually tried to recruit them to reply -- apply.

the other issue is upon close aboutationr, it is not partisan leanings, it is about backgrounds that are problematic . committed crimes or something like that, for example. in the case of ohio, the objection was not about political leaning. it was about having violated the commission's role. i take a front at this notion that somehow we are out to get the conservatives. i have recommended and gotten placed several republicans on the stated by three committees. i spent a lot of time telling people, we need to find more republicans for these state advisory committees. there is not some kind of

conspiracy. it is important to make it clear that it does not exist. case that all the independence on the state advisory committees are independent because they are so leaning left that they are falling off the earth. any of them are truly independent -- many of them are truly independent. >> i will call the question. >> how do you vote? are you still there? >> i vote no. >> i vote yes. >> i will abstain. chairman, i should have spoken up. i will vote no.

i feel like given the assertion that it is ideologically out of mean, i cannot tell whether what happened is characterized by commissioner harriet is what actually happened or did not happen, but as a commissioner, i want to andr to the explanation whatever happened, if it is the soe that it is ideologically out of balance, as a matter of -- we typically reconsider those

things. i do want to associate myself with commissioner norris saki's saki's comments. most of us lean over backwards someeate some parity, compliance with the spirit. i will vote no. that this iscase so unbalanced, it probably means to go back. for reconsideration. chair if shee vice thought this was balanced. if anybody should know whether this sac is reflective of north

carolina, it should be our north carolina representative. could you speak to this? >> are you interrupting the vote? [inaudible] frankly, i was surprised.

[inaudible] i did not realize there was a problem or concern about this. >> that was the concern many of us have. maybe we should pull this back and revisit it. >> i would ask that we do that. i would support that. because i had no

knowledge. >> i will table my motion and by consensus, we will possess over until september and in the interim, run it through the appropriate process to ensure everyone feels comfortable that there is balance. >> thank you, mr. chairman. >> you are welcome. now onto kansas. let me make a motion that the committee appoint the following individuals. mildred edwards. russ brian. mark dodd. martha had smith. ron holt. christie lambert. phyllis nolan.

gabriella vega. the commission appoints mildred edwards, chair of the state advisory committee. under this motion, the commission authorizes the staff director to execute the appropriate paperwork for the appointments. do i have a second? what was that? the vice chair? discussion?s, we will call the question for a vote. commissioner harriet? >> i will vote yes. >> yes. >> yes. >> yes.

yes. >> and i vote yes. it is unanimous. we move on to management and operations. i will turn it over to our staff director for the discussion of a few items. staff director? >> i want to go over a couple of things quickly. it is almost noon and i know folks have things to catch. -- planes to catch. the one thing i do want to talk about, the 2017 business meeting calendar. i provided a draft of that to all of you and i worked with staff to make sure there were no conflicts with any religious holidays or federal holidays.

this is the draft we have come up with. opinion of itour or discussion about it and then if that is on that amenable so we can start planning for next year. around toan e-mail -- sinceommissioners this calendar is before me, i looked at my calendar and had a couple of proposed changes. i suggest january 27 be moved to generate 13. -- moved to january 13. i was informed by -- the latter out, our -- it turns

9,h anniversary is september if we were to hold a meeting on september 8, there might be a anyto marry our meeting and commemorations. changingsk reconsider the proposed january and september dates. >> september 8? that is fine with me. >> january 13 -- the 20th is inaugural. i thought the 13th might work as a result. our folks ok with that?

-- are folks ok with that? we have done meetings on friday the 13th and they always turn out well. i would make a motion that we accept the agenda of meeting dates with the change from .anuary 27 to january 13 is there a second? was that the vice chair? additional discussion? all those in favor, say aye. opposed? the ayes have it. >> as you mentioned, we are

aware the 60th anniversary of the commission will occur next year. we wanted to begin the planning process. wallick to brian lead the effort, since he has expertise in public media and public outreach. i wanted to throw that out there for a discussion. i am thinking about putting together a working group or .lanning group everybody is really busy in the next few weeks, but if we could get something going in early september. specific things people are interested in, we did a very good job working together for the commemoration of the 13th amendment.

now is the time to start putting our thinking collapse -- thinking caps on. maybe put together an outline of preliminary planning. if anybody has any high-level or willxpress them now make it to the planning stages, that would be great. worked really well in a bipartisan fashion. in putting us together and i would imagine a very similar structure so we can begin to give some serious thought to this. it would be appropriate for us to his knowledge this important anniversary. -- russ to acknowledge -- for us

to acknowledge this important anniversary. interested in this group, let your staff director now. >> i sent an e-mail out earlier .his week regarding the website to make thatterate transition as smoothly as possible. bear with us and we will let you know. i want to call attention, we have made the vacancy announcement for the office of civil rights evaluation for the

analyst. it was announced yesterday by maureen rudolph. what we would really like, if you could send it out to your network so we get a good pool of applicants. chairman, i am working with brian to enhance the use of social media to amplify the commission's messaging to a wider audience. social media is not the only vehicle to do this, but it should be a part of the overall commission outreach. page hasing twitter 371 followers. we believe we can have a good potential increase, exponentially over the next three to six months. we are going to be standing up

the commission facebook -- setting up the commission's facebook page for the first time. we may be having to update the ai on public affairs. i wanted to let -- we will provide you with more information on we get to the point where we can get off. e kick it off. i wish everybody safe travels. >> any questions for the staff director before i adjourn? it is now 12:04 p.m. eastern time and this meeting is adjourned. [captions copyright national

cable satellite corp. 2016] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] the c-span radio app makes it easy to continue to follow the 2016 election wherever you are. it is free to download from the apple app store or google play. get audio coverage and up to the minute schedule information for c-span radio and c-span television, plus podcast times for our popular public affairs, books, and history programs. stay up-to-date on all of the election coverage. c-span's radio app means you always have c-span on the go. >> next on c-span, "washington journal" is live, then several panels on innovation and technology from techcrunch new york. later, a panel on climate change and the economy at stanford university. coming up in about 45 minutes, national journal political correspondent adam wollner takes a look at congressional races in this election cycle and whether

the public and can keep the majority in the house and the senate. then the associated press homeland security and immigration reporter alicia caldwell talks about the obama administration's policy bringing syrian refugees into the u.s. ♪ ♪ host: good morning to you. ,"day on "washington journal how the house and senate races are shaping up this election season. look at president obama's pledge to admit 10,000 syrian refugees and the flooding in louisiana. but first, we will discuss the cost of childcare. country, itlf the now costs more to send your children to preschool and it does to send them to college. trumpy clinton and donald outlining plans to help ease parents' financial burden.