i don't think as a practical matter you could attach salary payments to the person who owns the social security number. maybe this is what you are referring to, but i don't know. when an individual is using somebody else's security -- social security number and there is a mismatch between the name and the number, because of that and him, those funds going into a suspense file. the payroll taxes that are deducted from the person's paycheck and that going to the federal government and remain there in a suspense file until either the mismatch can be cleared up, or in perpetuity. workers wholions of are contributing to our social security system who don't have any prospect of benefiting from the system at the end of the day. i don't know if that is what you are referring to, that is the current situation, one of the major ways that the trust fund

maine's solvent. host: jessica vaughan, your reaction? jessica: this is a useful conversation to have because it illustrates the federal government has the names and addresses of employers millions of illegal workers and could take action against them based on the fact that there are people out there working with either fake or usually stolen social security numbers. some of those funds could also be used for restitution for the people that have had their identity compromised by illegal workers. this, i think, is a really good way for the federal government to go after the problem of illegal employment and find especially those employers that have a business model of employing hundreds of illegal workers instead of hiring americans and illegal workers --

legal workers. that would be a great place to start with enforcement. identify these mismatches and send notices to employers and tell them they cannot keep hiring these workers, that people should no longer be able to use a stolen social security number. the federal government does not even tell the real owner of that number it's been compromised. this causes lots of problems for people. you hear stories of people trying to join the military and were not allowed to because of problems on their social security number caused by an illegal worker, children who have not been able to access social services because somebody is working on their social security number, giving them income they don't have. we really need to clean this up for the benefit of the entire social security system and tax

system. it will take what eight in between these government -- cooperation between these government agencies. one of the benefits of a legalization program, the daca initiative -- you now have 47,000 young people who are working with authorization. realizing their potential. they are not only contribute into their families but their communities more broadly. absolutely, the current situation is unsustainable and is not in the best interest of the country, the immigrants themselves, or american workers. we are right now not living in the best situation. the question is what is the best policy approach to maximize the gains we are currently getting from immigrants in the country today who are working and paying into the system, doing jobs that we need to be done.

as the previous caller noted, he can then take the next level job, the supervisory job. that is the way that immigrants plug into our economy. the question is how we properly manage that situation. host: let's move onto to the topic of sanctuary cities. with the incoming trumpet ministration, some have vowed to offer sexuality to illegal immigrants. chicago mayor rahm emanuel met with donald trump recently. take a look at what he said after the meeting. >> i deliver to the president-elect and his chief of staff a letter signed by 14 mayors put together from across the country about our daca students. they were working hard toward the american dream. all of us fundamentally believe that these are students, some want to join the armed forces,

they gave their name and address of where they are, they are trying to achieve the american dream. no fault of their own, their parents came here. they are summing that we should hold up and embrace. i presented the letter from all parts of the country, and we are clear, as mayors, these are dreamers who are seeking the american dream, and we should embrace them, rather than doing a bit and switch. i also spoke strongly about what it means to be a sanctuary city where we support the people who are here, like my grandfather who came to the city of chicago .s a 13-year-old 100 years ago chicago was a sanctuary city for my grandfather. his grandson today is the mayor of the city, which is a testament to the values and ideals of being america. host: the center for immigration a map showingowed where there are sexuality cities, counties offering some level of protection for

immigrants. jessica, what do you think about mayor emanuel's comments? jessica: the problem with his approach, under the constitution, individual cities don't get to make policy and decide who stays in the country. we have a federal immigration system. what their policies are actually doing is obstructing legitimate enforcement of immigration laws. that cannot be tolerated. if they are going to have policies that are contrary to federal law and abstract federal law, then there will be consequences like funding cut off, litigation over their abstract of policies. the problem with a sanctuary policy is that they do not helpingtheir goal of establish trust between immigrant communities and the police. they only make things worse by

freeing criminal aliens and protecting them from deportation , who then go want to cause harm in the same communities. host: i want to give tom a chance to jump in. tom: when it comes to deciding what is the best way to police local jurisdictions to get trust from communities to ensure public safety, which is the primary mission of local law enforcement, local officials. i trust local officials and i will not second guess what the chiefs association or what police chiefs have said around the country have said is the best way to ensure they get the trust and corporation of their communities. host: landry is calling from texas. caller: good morning, thank you for taking my call. my question is, should there be a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants?

yes, absolutely. we very strongly support the idea that, if done correctly, it is important for authorized immigrants in the country today to earn a path to citizenship. what that would look like in legislation passed by the senate , by a super majority of senators in 2013, individual that have been here for a period of time can come forward, apply, pass background checks, meet a number of criteria, receive provisional ability to remain. then over time, once they continue to demonstrate meeting the criteria, have the opportunity to get a green card. that is all we are talking about. no one has proposed amnesty where individuals become citizens like this, or even green card holders like that. the idea of a path to citizenship is at the heart of immigration reform packages that have been considered over a decade in congress involving

this long process where individuals can get a green card , that through the normal operation of the law, would allow them to naturalize and then become u.s. citizens. jessica: the problem with these prior approaches is that they always did the amnesty or legalization program first with promises of enforcement coming later. i don't think we should even be talking about big legalization programs until we are able to control illegal immigration and make sure any illegal aliens who are legalized through this kind of a program are not replaced by new illegal immigrants. illegal have to control immigration. if there is a program, it should include citizenship, but we are not close to being able to do something like that yet. rob is calling from

stockton, california. republican line. caller: good morning. if you could give me a few think the immigration system could be fixed so easily, so easily. i think you better put your seatbelts on because you have a businessman who will start running the country. he knows how to get things done. he knows how to do things methodically, quickly, efficiently, and economically. number one, the liberals are nuts. they think the more people you flow into this country and it will make it better, it hasn't. it has made it worse. first of all, the more spanish that comes across the border puts more african americans out of work. it puts more african americans in southern california, chicago, back east come out of work. that is a fact. two, there is nothing wrong with the program they had years ago, and they can go back with that.

it is simple, already figured out how to do. number three, this gentleman who says it is no big problem, follow the illegals in our country not causing problems. they fill our schools, we pay taxes, our kids cannot go to junior colleges because they are filled with illegals. host: that is a lot to unpack. let's give tom jawetz a chance to respond. really know where to begin, but economists have found -- they have done through you on the literature on this. immigrants brought the in this country have a small but positive impact on american workers and the economy broadly, throughout the last few decades. they did find -- the caller think -- tohis, i the extent there are possibly some negative impacts, there are some small negative impact that may be found around immigrants, americans without a college degree.

something, that is also a shooting percentage of the population. by and large, when immigrants come into the country, have a compliment tree impact, not a competitive impact on american workers. they take jobs that americans are not working. they slot into positions that may require more limited english proficiency, so that american workers who work alongside them can work in jobs that require more fluency or supervisory roles. host: i want to give jessica vaughan a chance to chime in. like any other policy come immigration policy has winners and losers. the winners of our current immigration policy are the immigrants themselves and their employers, who can increase their profits by paying less for wages. andlosers are the americans legal immigrants who have to compete with them for jobs or who see their wages depressed because of jobs, and taxpayers

who end up having to pay more for the social services and other programs that new immigrant workers need because, for the most part, the immigrants we are bringing into this country are not as well equipped to become self-sufficient. that is a drain on the economy. that the all things study found, the national indemy of sciences, found the study. that is why we need to enforce immigration laws to avoid those kinds of problems. is calling in from maryland. republican line. caller: good morning. i would just like to say that i would like all of the illegal immigrants deported. we can no longer afford a society to pay for people who do not belong here. our national debt is ridiculous. a lot of it is welfare. as far as somebody living the american dream, why don't you let our young kids live the american dream?

most of us cannot afford college educations for our kids. that is it. thank you. host: how feasible is it to deport all illegal immigrants? jessica: i suppose the government could do it if it really tried but i don't think it's necessary. but we found is it does not take much of an uptick in enforcement to make prospective illegal immigrants reevaluate the cost benefits of coming here. when illegal immigrants cannot get a job, cannot get a drivers license, cannot collect benefits, cannot live here as if they are here legally, then fewer of them are going to come to begin with. those who are living here illegally are going to go home on their own. at some point in the future, we may want to talk about a legalization program for people who have been here a long time, but that would have to be offset

by cuts in legal immigration. you don't have to go door by door to roundup every illegal immigrant to start controlling illegal immigration and bring the population down. it can be done with a small uptick in enforcement. we did a study of few months ago about what the economic impact would be for removing the unauthorized workers in our economy. the impact would be a hit to the gdp of $4.7 trillion over 10 years. the economy cannot afford to remove 7 million productive members of our workforce from the country. that is something the country cannot afford to do. presidentjawetz, vice at the center for american progress, jessica vaughan, president of policy studies at the center of immigration >> follow the transition of government on c-span. as president-elect donald trump

select his cabinet and republicans and democrats prepare for the next congress, we will take you to key events as they happen without interruption. watch live on c-span and on demand at c-span.org or listen on our free c-span at. -- free c-span app. where history unfold daily. in 1979, c-span was created as a public service by america loss cable-television companies and is brought to you today by your cable percent light provider. from austin, texas is a reporter covering the border and he is here to talk about immigration policy and how it affects border states like texas. texas. thank you for joining us today. guest: thank you for having me. what are some of the

biggest optical is that the incoming trop administration faces when it comes to border security? guest: number one will be trying to convince members of congress that represent texas to build 1002order wall across hundred 50 miles of the texas-mexico border. it is by far the largest border with mexico than any of the border states. my colleague, not more than two weeks ago, polled every member of the texas delegation. not one member who responded was in favor of a brick-and-mortar fence. combination of a wall in some parts, a fence in other parts, ariel surveillance, a virtual wall, cameras and technology. that will probably be the biggest hurdle. secondly is what to do with the so-called dreamers, the young, undocumented immigrants who came here to pursue a college education. even the president-elect a few

weeks back in his interview with time magazine said that they will find a solution that democrats will be happy with. number three is trying to pass mandatory e-verify for private businesses. even at the state level in texas, it is a very conservative , red state, a lot of rhetoric about illegal immigration, but even the state legislature has not required employers to use e-verify. that will be something that you could see back and forth on. it will not be as easy as just saying you will do it and waving a magic wand. what have local officials there been doing in preparation for the incoming trump administration? guest: a flurry of activity from lawmakers meeting with the trump administration. obviously, rick perry has been selected as the secretary of energy. our lieutenant governor dan patrick was the chair of his

texas campaign. there has been a lot of activity. no doubt there is a lot of excitement going into this legislative session that begins in two weeks about what a trump administration means for the border. republicans say they have been ignore the last eight years, traveled over by the obama administration who refuses to secure the border. host: you write about the fact that border crossings have seen an increase after having a in 2015, a spike in 2016. you write, overall, the number of apprehensions increased by ine than 77,500 two 408.870 2016 compared to the prior years ,333.1 the 2016 figures represent the second time in three years that central americans outnumbered mexicans trying to cross the

southern border illegally. the trend continues a pattern that began in 2014 when tens of thousands of central americans from el salvador, guatemala, and honduras began fleeing violence and poverty and began arriving at the texas-mexico border. tell us more about the current situation and who is crossing the border. guest: a very important point that you bring up. the number of central americans thesing, it sort of pads number of unauthorized migration. has beenrom mexico even or negative in the last two years. their economy is somewhat better than it was years back. in some places, the violence that we saw in northern states is down. but the central americans that are increasing the overall crossing statistics, they keep coming. listening to the previous segment, speaking about jobs, crime, that is a valid concern, but a lot of folks on the

border, democrats will say that these folks are coming from central america. they are mainly children traveling alone, mothers with young children fleeing violence. , continued, honduras to be two of the most violent countries in the americas. that will not stop soon. about thene issue unauthorized immigrants, the people coming here in secular cities, e-verify, and then there is this other component of exodus from central america. the politics of those areas do not include in the near future anything that solves the social problems driving the influx. sector ofande valley the u.s. border patrol continues to be ground zero for this influx. two years ago, the state of texas allocated $800 million in border security and were largely secured -- criticized by saying you are militarizing the border to get women and children who are not trying to evade law

enforcement. on the other side, you have people saying there is a lot of to take care of these folks, they are released with a promise they will appear before an immigration judge, and they disappear. that is a good point as well because sometimes they abscond and blend in, and years later, nobody knows were they are. we are talking to julian aguilar from "the texas tribune" and covers the border and immigration. we have special lines for this segment. now we have manny from cambridge, massachusetts. caller: good morning. cambridge isecause the first city going back to 1985.

mostly due to the language of the years used towards undocumented immigrants. a couple of things i wanted to point out. there is a huge difference between calling them criminal, illegal aliens and undocumented. this is a civil crime, not criminalized violence. people that are anti-century city -- sanctuary city need to realize undocumented immigrants are often witnesse or victims of crimes. they are less likely to report them if they believe it will be supported -- deported. this helps in cities like cambridge being sanctuary cities. host: you write a little bit about the sanctuary city and the debates taking place in texas. he said the issue with sensory cities, a term that refers to a

local government does -- that does not inforce federal policy. governor greg abbott continue to fight he started with the dallas county sheriff. he accused bell this a create -- aldez of creating century city in dallas. valdez said her words were taken out of context. + talk about this intersection of the issue of century city's and border communities. guest: i think it's important to note that sanctuary cities have two definitions. in 2011, when there was a bill debated in austin it was local cops being able to ask immigration status of anybody that was detained or arrested. the question was, what does

detainment mean? that can cause a lot of concern, even a month moderate republicans that syndicate lead to racial profiling. that has become county sheriff immigrantsturn over in their jails to immigration and customs enforcement. across-the-board people would say that is not the way to go. what happened in the dallas county case, she said she would work with us on a case-by-case basis. the governor and several republicans were upset about that because they assumed she would not turn over people that have been convicted or charged with crimes. actually we did a story through an open records request with customs enforcement. 2014 tonking from september of 2015, during that time span taxes have fewer than 1%-- texas had fewer than not honored.

they are doing a pretty good job of cooperating with customs enforcement. they say ice does not pick them up or changes its mind whether such a medication. that is why people point their finger the federal government. isn it comes to jails, texas good at working with ice and local venous abilities -- municipalities about policing. sheriff's all testify against these policies because they say it will erode the public trust as the previous caller said. they will be reluctant to report clients or -- crimes or work with law enforcement. host: judy from maryland, you are on with julian aguilar. caller: i just want to point out the conversation focuses on these are undocumented persons. that there is is criminal conduct in the employers employing people and

evading taxes. there are reports from the office of the inspector general of the office of social security that annually reports this issue. they sent these no match letters. guestior speaker's -- the mentioned the no match letters and fund. that is an employer who knows the law. immigration reform and act saysns control employers are supposed to to verify. to hire not supposed undocumented people. -- what happened to my local neighbor was he

hired a person, got that letter that said it was no match and he said i'm not getting rid of this guy. i spent six weeks training him. if he doesn't pay the social security tax that he owes as the employer, he pays the employee in cash so the employee does not which is 50%ntage of the income that does not go into this -- 15% of the income that does not going to the social security fund. neither are paying income tax on the benefits gained from employing this employee. host: let's let julian aguilar respond about this issue of employment. guest: i think the caller brings up an excellent point. as far as what i have seen in texas, i am interviewed employers that told me, i accept these documents and i know they are probably fake. if ice does not run the numbers

and a cow's back and they say this person is not legit, they fire that person and that person turns around and goes and gets employment with somebody else on a cash basis only. there are two ways normally the higher. the first is you not only take false papers and fire that person in the very off-chance ice tells you they don't match. the second way is to call them an independent contractor as opposed to an employee. that puts all the responsibility on the employer to pay his or her own taxes. ie employer can then say didn't have to check the status because he's a contractor in that is up to him or her. they skirt the system by not paying taxes on these folks. again, at the state level -- i can't speak about the rest of the country, but at least in texas the business lobby, the construction lobby, the service lobby testifies against these

bills because it will ultimately hurt their bottom dollar. host: krista from florida, and illegal immigrant. you are on with julian aguilar. guest: caller: hello. legal immigrant because my family came from cuba. shore, the to minute you are on dry land you are a citizen. i wanted to speak to the illegal immigrant because my husband was an illegal immigrant. together we have brought 11 people from central and south veryca because of the unfortunate policies of the united states and certain presidents. people have a lot of misconceptions. number one, the agriculture industry could not exist without illegal immigrants. it is a known fact that they

will work and other americans will not take these jobs. we need them for our economy and we need spanish speakers of all kinds. i know how hard it is to bring people because my husband, when he got here he became an entrepreneur. he had a very big company. he employed people and $25 an hour full-time in jersey. he did very well. a lot of spanish speakers that come here have family. we want to bring our families. and we can't because of the way the policies are working. host: but give julian aguilar a chance to respond. guest: they come here legally and do it the right way. the problem is the system is so backlogged and the visas are so limited there is rarely a way to do it legally. if you claim asylum, you are

still going three years of immigration court and maneuvering. visa, the to get a , they resentisa limit within a week or two after the policy starts over again. those are cap. -- capped. we need reform on several levels. i think what people are also saying is you want to bring your family and keep them together, a windy you cut the cord and say we will let this bunch and but no more. she brought up an interesting point about cuban policy. that is something we have seen in texas as well. after the obama administration begin speaking with the castro regime, we saw an influx of people traveling to mexico. or asnot as popular dynamic as the overall immigration policies as a whole,

but that's another subset that will be interesting to watch as far as people from cuba. host: we are talking with julian aguilar. he covers politics and border affairs from the texas-mexico border for the texas tribune. one of the things you wrote recently talks about the two way force -- porous border issue. you wrote about guns going from the u.s. into mexico more than 73,000 from 2009 at 2014, as well as the two way contraband stream. you write in one story the steady demand for people and illegal products nourishes a giant international smuggling ecosystem. until policymakers reduce american demand for latin american supply, experts say the 2000 mile you a site in mexico border will remain porous." tell us more about that. guest: that is another issue,

the southbound traffic of cash, weapons and the united states' desire for illegal narcotics and various other contraband coming north. compared to what country -- the country and the state of texas spent on treatment versus incarceration and security, the gap is so wide. they cringe when people write the stories. they say mexico is only turning over the weapons will be traced active united states to make united states look bad. that is a fair point. the mexican government is not known for being the most honest, but they can't skirt the fat it -- fact in texas we have liberal gun laws in some people want to start by closing the gun show loophole which would require background checks. the gun folks lobby say they do

everything by the book. it is the people that turn around and sell them it legally that are the problem. it is a two-way street when it comes to what people are coming here. becauseeople come north jobs are readily available and you can argue americans would or would not do these jobs. the fact of the matter remains these jobs are available as soon as you come to the states. secondly, if lawmakers will say there is a threat of violence, some people say you should consider the fact the violence is due in part to the weapons that are fueling it down here. host: we're speaking with julian aguilar about four issues. california.y, good morning, nancy. caller: hi. earlier,n on

everything that came out of his mouth was untrue and propaganda. supportedhey have around 400 -- 2.5 million come in every year. california is the worst state. we lose thousands and thousands of jobs every day because illegal hispanics have no respect for our laws as far as speaking english. they are too lazy to learn how to speak english. 75% of them are on welfare in california. thatorld bank has stated mexico's economy would collapse without the remittance sent back to mexico, which in 2015 was over $30 billion. they absolutely do not make one

positive contribution. give -- let's let julian aguilar respond. guest: i don't cover california but on two issues, with respect to learning english, she is right. there are some folks that speak spanish and they don't want to learn english or they don't have to because for that reason they don't have to. there are plenty of people that speak spanish because their employers speak spanish. on the flipside there are a lot of folks when they go to school or a get ahead the first thing they want to do is speaking wish. there -- speak english. their immigrants from central and south america and all over the world that no learning english is something the need to do they want to excel. with respect to the mexican economy, mexicans working here do provide a great source of income for those folks.

i don't know the economy would collapse of mexico, but it would be dealt a tremendous blow. that is a fair point. at the state level there is legislation to stop remittances with taxes so high that it's a burden for the folks. that is another issue that cash flowing down south, whether it is for cartels or families that smuggle down there. gain, to many of the callers' points, it won't stop of the people can keep getting jobs. host: we are speaking with julian aguilar of the texas tribune about border issues when it comes to immigration. people who live in border states, you can call (202) 748-8000. those who are illegal immigrants, living in the country illegally, (202) 748-8001. and all others can call (202) 748-8002. al is on the line from charleston, rhode island. good morning. am -- on one of your

points as far as the spanish mexicans or south americans here, they don't want to report crimes because they will be exposed for being a legal. that is a red herring, and absolute red herring. if you look at the papers, and they want tell you, i mean crime statistics. 97% of crimes committed in the major cities of this country are from the black and brown people. 97%. you talk about our border patrol. they can't control anything anymore. i have been to mexico three times. every time i went the travel agency said, whatever you do, don't lose your papers or your passport. they will keep you in jail and you will be there for 30 or 40 days before you can get free. we don't have those kind of laws. it is not illegal immigrants that are the problem. we have laws. if i drive down the street and

don't have my seatbelt on, i can get a ticket. that is a law. yet we have people coming to this country illegally and it is draining the system. that taxpayers can't afford the amount of people in school that are not supposed to be here. people on welfare. people have kids in this country we have to support. it is a never ending thing. they just can't go on like this. host: let's let julian aguilar respond. go-ahead. guest: having traveled through mexico and central america often, i will agree. you want to keep your documents close to your chest because those countries operate differently down there. far as theay, but as crime statistics whether it is a red herring are not, this is what law enforcement testifies to the state-based hearings with respect to community policing. whether that is a line they are saying session after session, or it is true, that is up to the

border communities and the lawmakers to decide. i can't speak to the statistics because i don't cover crime policy up there. reportedlso to what is and classified as a border crime. colleagues here at the television studio they did an in-depth report about the prospects of border crime. they can be something as minor as a traffic violation or drug possession from selling that occurs hundreds of miles inland. crime stats do not always tell the whole story because people in committees have agendas and don't tell the whole story. host: one issue the president-elect has brought up is screening. increasing screening, extreme vetting. it was focused on many ways coming from other countries. describe validity vetting -- describe a little bit the vetter

details of how president-elect trump could alter that as it stands. guest: step one would be to stock up on the agents charged with the screening. whether the initial screening at cvp, it includes the border patrol and the agents at the ports who are tremendously understaffed. to put into perspective, just before the christmas recess republicans and democrats from texas celebrated the fact they got a bill to the president's desk that would allow the private industry and local governments to pitch in and help cvp staff up at the port. it is surreal, the fact they are asking the private sector for more agents of the border. not only does it facilitate trade to have more staff, that helps with initial screening. ishink that is an area that -- the core backlog i mentioned earlier, they say ok, report to so-and-so at this time. even if a person follows

instructions, it takes so long. registries expert in and muslim migration or people fling other countries, but generally speaking once you get to the border they are so understaffed and there are 70 levels you can get lost through. i think a lot of people both on the left and right would agree we do not necessarily more border agents, but more staffing at the point of entry to do this intake and facilitate legal trade. host: clyde from san antonio, texas. good morning. caller: good morning. it pains me to no end to listen to your previous guest and others calling in that blame people for the problems that , reallylectively europeans and africans have

created. language barriers. people who were here originally who are here still did not create the spanish. they did not create english. if there is any such thing as an illegal alien, it would be the european who now chooses to call him or herself a white. you have to remember this is humanity we are talking about. the europeans came here essentially for the very same reasons, because of wrong way columbus and others who followed him to escape european oppression. that is essentially the problem we have now. you can choose to accept the science associated with anthropology or not. host: less with julian aguilar respond. a deepquite delves into

reaching sociological issue, that he is not alone in the sentiments. there are folks here that agree and say unless you are native american you are in illegal immigrant because it's been going on for hundreds of years. taxes was a part of mexico -- texas was a part of mexico, but mexico lost the war. he brings up an interesting issue. he is not alone in the sentiments about english only, or what or who is an immigrant and historical patterns of trade in migration over century's. -- centuries. host: those living in border states can call (202) 748-8000. those who are living in the country illegally, (202) 748-8001. and all others (202) 748-8002. moment aboutfor a an issue we hit on briefly earlier about who exactly is

making up the influx of people coming over the borders. according to an associated press report, it's not letting up. customs and border protection commissioner said wednesday after touring a temporary holding facility in the rio grande valley, the influx of the number of apprehensions along the southwestern border can be close to 2000 a day with most people turning themselves in. talk a little bit about this surge that continues to go on. after 2014 there was a spike in the amount of what the government calls unaccompanied minors and family units. say you have 50,000 family units. , is at least two

or could be many more, of the united states government did toton 2015 to -- try in 2015 help mexico defeat the immigration problem at their border. try toer countries create social reforms and criminal justice policies that would stop. but compared to a be spent to 80 countries in the middle east -- aid countries in the middle buckett is a drop in the and it will not go a long way. some people say we should not have to spend that money. it is their country, let them fix it. that people consider it their problem. or military rule in other countries or the overall violence, is not going to stop. i think people on the left and

right are frustrated. rightly so, because the surge keeps coming. temporaryking these holding station -- ice is making these temporary holding stations. this goes to the problem of emigration judge backlogs and the fact we have different policies when it comes to immigrants from mexico who try to enter without authorization. you have to go before a judge. process. be given a the same thing happens from mexico. you can be sent back immediately. there was a call to uniform for everyone from latin america and it failed to years ago. this is separate from the issue. this is a humanitarian crisis from what the president says. it will continue for the near future if not beyond. host: shelton, washington. good morning, ted.

caller: good morning. how are you? host: you are on with julian aguilar. caller: what we start talking sanctuary cities and illegal are in the there farming industry places where you have to import labor. the whole issue of this labor has been they have driven down wages. i lived in las vegas and build houses. that brought them in. cannot even swing a hammer. in a few days we started seeing our pay go down. they got rid of the union and the pay went down from about $32 an hour down to $14. they could get illegals to do it for eight dollars. illegals were running companies and the employers are the one bringing the men. don't tell me they are coming illegally. they are actually bringing them in to drive down wages.

they brought them in the early days in the chicken industry to break the union's. that is where they started bringing in illegal aliens. it has nothing to do with the farm stuff in california, which i lived through. it all started off as margaret farm laborers. some well -- migrant farm laborers. maybe we need nato to come up and said -- set of free areas and south america. it is cheaper to take them back and make free cities down there instead of bringing them up here in feeding them and keeping them going. guest: as far as the driving down wages, that is a common argument made in texas as well. you get an undocumented worker from mexico and you pay them eight dollars or nine dollars, one dollar is 20 pesos at the

current exchange. even though it is lower than what people are used to being paid here. he brings up a common argument. if you're paying everybody less, on average you get paid less as well. in houston there is a settlement -- gentleman who always testifies against these misclassification loopholes in the construction industry. he says if i do everything right and my competitor's skirt the system and knowingly hire these people, they get the bids for the contracts because they can offer them at a lower rate. it brings up a good point because if they pay people less than what their competitors are paying them, you will probably be able to the job for less. it does have a compounding effect. it also opens the door to a lot of expectations for these workers. dozens of cases are pending right now in texas where folks are accusing the employer of not paying them what they said they would pay them, taking their wages from them.

a lot of people say the system exists for the employers to report these folks. they are here without authorization. it is a double-edged sword for the caller has appointed people do accuse employers and only hired cheap, undocumented labor to run down wages for everybody sells. host: go ahead. caller: good morning, how are you doing? host: go ahead, sees that. -- susette. caller: there has been a lot of twist the knife comments made about illegal immigrants or whatever. whatever you want to call them. but they are people to begin with. my thing is this. instead of getting mad at the worker, shouldn't you be getting mad at the government and beginning mad at the corporations who enlists and

will encourage these people to come over and they paid in cheaper? i hate it when people say americans will not work. we will not work for a certain wage or something like that. these jobs go to these immigrants because we will not work. you can't work at a low wage. you have to work at a livable wage. work --rporations, they look for cheap labor and they will hire those people. host: we will give julian aguilar a chance to respond. guest: a lot of folks say their anger is not directed at the worker. it is the person offering the job that should be punished. that goes back to the e-verify or screenings. a lot of these employers know it will affect their bottom line. host: julian aguilar, reporter from the texas

>> the obama administration announced that the spelling 35 russian officers in response to russia parts interference in the presidential election. the "new york times was quote reports that moves are intended to box in president-elect donald trump who has consistently doubted whether russia was behind the hacking of the democratic national committee. asked about the impending sanctions, mr. trump said i think we ought to get on with our lives. i think computers have complicated lives very greatly. haswhole age of computers made it where nobody knows exactly what is going on. c-span, inon memoriam -- a look back at some of the public figures who died this year, including nancy reagan, antonin scalia, when i

fall -- gwen eiffel. reagan'swith mrs. funeral. here's a few remarks from reagan cabinet maker -- reagan cabinet member james baker and then an interview with the first lady. >> the cold war president reagan did so much to end brought them together. davis0, the name nancy appeared on a list of communist sympathizers. would the hollywood blockbusters no this was a different person and not the young actress? she took her problem to her union boss, the president of the screen actors guild, ronald reagan. they met at a hollywood restaurant. the dinner would be brief. they agreed because each had an early casting call. neither had an early casting call.

an early casting call was the standard hollywood excuse to put a quick and too unpleasant dinners. i open the door, she wrote later, i knew he was the man i wanted to marry. think ronald reagan could have been elected president without nancy reagan? [laughter] >> oh, my. well, i think i may have helped a little, maybe. i hope so. [applause] >> more of nancy reagan passed easterntonight at eight and we will look at the lives of supreme court justice antonin ,calia, journalist gwen eiffel

and abner mcclung. kva.bner mi >> your some of our featured programs. the librarian of congress, carla adin, archivist of the united states, david verio, and david's gordon, secretary of the smithsonian institution on the importance of treasures. >> he wrote that he wanted the institution to be oriented toward what he called the increase and diffusion of knowledge, and that is what the smithsonian has turned out to be. >> then, the inaugural women's leadership summit. the next generation of young women at the reagan library. then federal appeals court judges both from the d c circuit and a senior federal judge from the fourth circuit discuss the history and impact of the bill of rights 225 years after ratification.

to theying those words factual circumstances and disputes over more than 200 years is what is challenging. >> on sunday, author jean epstein, law professor richard epstein and a member of the law foreign wars.te >> judgment becomes an essential portion in the way in which we have to start to deal with these things. if you start with the frame and make it funny, over time, you use force and it's going to be a calamity and when you don't use force, that is where it happens. >> than the muslim public affairs council with remarks by democratic congressman hobby or andrra, actor george to k, a muslim goldstar father.

>> what we were trying to do was highlight the values of the constitution of the united states, the values of freedom of speech, practice of religion, equal dignity, equal protection under the law and due process of law. those values are challenged today. >> watch on c-span and c-span.org or listen on the free c-span radio app. in to the 114th congress two years ago, c-span spoke with freshman congressman about what they were expecting for their first term in office. this year, we spoke with some of them again about their experience in washington over the last two years. we start with oklahoma republican steve russell. >> i think the framing of the constitution was a giant compromise. you had the states that wanted

autonomy. you had the need for a road and communication and defense system that they could not really provide. willing to ditch the articles of confederation for the constitution and, they labored over it. they debated, they studied, they looked at past democracies and determine that we needed a representative republic with checks and balances so that once i could not usurp the other. divided it further monday branches. when we hear complaints that you cannot get anything done in washington, it was designed that way. it was literally designed so that there would be competing interests. i think when you come to overlapping circles of need, that's where you can find a compromise.

that's where you can find the things that most americans can get behind and you can do. >> with congressman steve russell, the fifth district of oklahoma. when we talk with you in 2015, you talked about the checks and balances in our system of government. coming into the new congress, we have a republican president now, and likely a republican president dominating some of the supreme court. how important is the function of checks and balances now, and how does that happen with republican control in so many areas? >> our republic has seen the pendulum swing in some rare all the legislative branch and executive branch being held by the same political party. i think as we look at it, our republic is pretty resilient. we have a judiciary branch,

think we have to respect the judicial branch as an equal branch of the government. a lot of times we are unhappy with decisions that a been made for one reason or another. it just plays into the checks and balance system. so these appointments will be very important that the will of the american people has a chance to influence those checks and balances. you toeasy was it for work with the other side of the aisle? >> i have a handwritten note from president obama, i take great pride in that. we saw eye-to-eye on a couple of things. many things we didn't, but one thing i learned as a lawyer, you can always find common ground. when people are in conflict, there is always something you you agree on. you focus on that and try not to highlight the differences, if you can. >> you were one of several freshmen members of the 114th

that we interviewed who are iraq or afghanistan veterans. what sort of influencer impact to you think your class of veterans had on the body as a whole? a great deal. the combat veterans we saw from iraq and afghanistan, we work very closely in a bipartisan fashion, last year and again this year. there are many things. we all worked very well. we have seen eye-to-eye on central issues and we came together in ways that had a big influence. in fact, when you look at defense authorizations, there's a lot of amendments and legislation that came just from us. talking near the end of the 114th congress. looking back over the last few years, what you think your biggest accomplishment was?

>> we've certainly become known for our targeting of waste. the legacy from the great dr. tom coburn, we've taken that battle with our waste watch series and was turned that into true reform. speaking of bipartisanship, working with matt cartwright, a democrat from pennsylvania, he and i worked as cosponsors of the megabyte act which is estimated to save $4 billion just in software licensure reforms. even in this town, $4 billion is still real money that gets people's attention. to that area, look ahead to the next congress, security the first six months of the 115th. what are your hopes and expectations there? >> am very concerned about the posture of our military. i think many are on both sides of the aisle. we're always concerned about dollars and resources, but the

end our republic, all the other things don't matter all that much. we see new partners that are trying to assist us in that effort, but we also see new threats that have emerged that are powerful, old threats at he did not imagine we would be facing again, and we have to get prepared and we have to strengthen our military. foreign policy, there are some great opportunities among our only speaking partners around the globe. also with the pacific and european trade initiatives, there are a lot of good things that we can do. one neat thing about bipartisanship, most of the time we see eye to eye on an awful lot when it comes to foreign policy. >> in addition to your military experience, what about your first few years of congress? have you had a chance to travel with delegations as such? >> up into 22 countries this term and i'm going to three more by the end of the year. so i would say yes, i've done extensive travel.

i've often related that trade is better than tomahawks. let's go get engaged around the globe. i've had the privilege to meet with heads of state to talk about things that we share, things that are concerns, anything from our potential conflict where we don't want to we see inlict like asia, or like in europe, the refugee crises that are shaking the foundations of governance is there. we see an ascendant russia that nato members. our we have not even touched on her central and southern african partners that are concerned about their stable countries becoming unstable with what we see in the northern parts of the continent. so there are a lot of things that we need to be engaged in. >> how about steve russell personally?

how the past two years been in terms of travel, being able to get back home and meet your constituents and be with your family? >> we've done a lot of engagement in our community back home. i have the capital city in my district. urban areas are not always red meat like obama is known for. we been able to engage in when we have had things that might've been volatile, we've been able to actually work through quite well. when i was elected, foreign policy and defense were important. people knew that, so they have allowed me the privilege and freedom to engage in that area. time for personal time. i am a more gracious reader. i've read a lot of different things that are completely unrelated to my time in congress. i have even learned how to fly an airplane for the first time in august. why not? you always have to keep yourself

moving in stretched. i made a promise to myself after my wars that i would try to live a life appeased and without conflict, and then i ran for congress. imagine that. but it is important that we try to have a moment where we can take a step back and enjoy our great country. we are so very privileged to live here. make steve russell, congressman from the fifth district in oklahoma. thanks for being with us. >> thank you, it's great to be here. >> where in guatemala is your family from, and have you been back there? >> i have. i'm from a coastal state. i been back twice, once as mayor, and three years ago i went as a state assembly member. i was invited by the government the second time around. it's very difficult for me to travel to guatemala. i had no idea they had been

inlowing my political life the central american countries. this is an issue we been trying to address, the government are very, very corrupt. the people saw me as an example of someone who works full-time, ands the graveyard shift, still serves their community. i think that's what they want to see out of their government. are you the highest ranking guatemala and in our government today? is a difficult position to be in. not only do i have my district represent, but we get calls from all over the u.s. it's quite an honor that the people from the 35th congressional district have given me.

wait square with california congresswoman norma torres. we showed our audience a clip with you talking about your status in thety guatemalan community and abroad. how has that community reacted to the 2016 presidential election? >> it's there and -- it's been very tough to them adapting to what the reality actually is. a president that was pretty mean-spirited to immigrants in the u.s. and abroad. so they are scared. they feel there is no real safe place for them in america. my job right now is really to reassure them, for them to understand there are people like me here in congress and in the senate that have their back and worked to support them, and that we need them to continue to go to work and to send their children to school who are

american citizens. >> the conversation last year in a previous interview, you expressed some frustration in the case of getting things done here. did any of that change over the remainder of the 114? no, i'm still a little frustrated about how slow things move here, but i'm really proud that is a first-term member, i actually got a lot of work accomplished, and i'm very proud of that. very proud of the team that i was able to assemble that help me deliver not just to my district in my home state, but also to american citizens throughout the u.s.. >> water a couple of the top things that you feel you got done for your constituents in california? >> we introduce and passed out of the house a few pieces of legislation dealing with cyber security. one of them led to training that

help to train police officers across the u.s. by putting that pilot program into law. and for my district, public-private partnerships for water projects, for infrastructure projects. remember, i could not get a single hearing or a single republican member to co-author that deal with me. yet we were able to work with our colleagues in the senate. we're able to insert part of that bill language into the bigger senate transportation bill, it got out of the senate, here in the house we were able to do the same thing, and my bill, even though it doesn't have my name on it, it is law. >> we saw the issue on california's drought come up in a couple of waterville debates. what would you like to see the house in particular do to provide further relief for

california pot drought -- four california's drought? >> at think we may have an opportunity with president-elect trump, he's talking about putting more money into infrastructure projects. i hope that he sees the necessity that we have in ourfornia to shore up recycled water, to ensure that we have the ability to deliver and have the infrastructure to deliver that recycled water into areas that would typically not be able to get it. it's a lot of money that we need to spend on that in doing that, and i hope that we will have an opportunity to talk to him about that. >> as the 115th starts, what do you think are the biggest challenges facing both congress and more broadly, the u.s.? >> the biggest challenges that we have facing not just congress but the u.s. is the fact that we have a president that will be

taking the oath of office who has been so mean-spirited to many groups across the u.s. and that process of healing, that process of bringing about peace to our communities is going to take a long time. we've already seen many cases of racism playing out, not just in our streets, but in our schools, from kindergarten to high school, to college campuses. i think that is one of our priorities that we need to in bringing about calm and civility to archimedes. >> what do you think is the biggest thing you have learned in our -- in your two year so far in congress? >> the biggest thing i've learned here is that we have to get along with everybody. we have to build bridges. there is humility that comes with that. for example, two of the biggest

pieces of legislation that i've passed that would help my district do not have my name attached to them. and that's ok, because more than caring about having your name on a bill, i cared about the legislation that was needed in my community. an airport that is back in the hands of local control. that, for me, is a great reward. >> you come to the decision as former mayor -- you come to the position as former mayor, you been a police dispatcher in ramona, california. how well do you think the congress has addressed the needs of cities like pomona? not just the big cities around the country but smaller cities like yours. challenge that even the republican party has not heard enough about those needs in those communities.

example,structure, for that needs to be financed and approved. the homeless crisis that we have in our major metropolitan cities needs to be addressed. my own home city of pomona has a huge crisis in dealing with the homeless population. assisting our veterans. there is a lot that we have not been able to work on together that we need to ensure we do a better job doing. >> the last time we talked, you talked about getting used to things like the weather on the east coast. how well have you adjusted to the bicoastal travel and the schedule of the house? >> at travel every week. i go home every weekend whether it's a short weekend or a long weekend. you never get used to eating at the airport and taking naps on airplanes, but it is part of the job and part of the challenge of being a member of congress.

norma torresman from california, thank you for being with us. >> the obama administration today announced the u.s. is expelling 35 russian officials and closing toy russian own compounds in the u.s. president obama issued a statement saying in part, "the world must work together to oppose russia's efforts to undermine established international norms of behavior, and interfere with democratic governance." and the reaction from house speaker paul ryan, it is an appropriate way to end eight years of failed policy with russia. >> followed transition of government on c-span. as president elect donald trump selects his cabinet and republicans and democrats prepare for the next congress, we will take you to key events

as they happen without interruption. watch live on c-span. watch on-demand at www.c-span.org, or listen on our free c-span radio app. the c-span video library is an easy way to search and view c-span programs and to help through its use is dr. robert browning, executive director of the c-span archives. whichto www.c-span.org, is the main website. look on the front page on the left side are all the hearings as a presidential events of that day, political campaign events, and right underneath that on the left side is a link that says recent events. they appear in the order that they were on the network. you can search for a person's 170,000ery person, people have pages that contain all their video. and on that page is a search box and you put in a word. find say you want to

sheila jackson lee. put in climate change. >> members will receive the signatures and public statements of those demanding that this body fully support president obama's clean power plants. want -- or if you want a talk about iraq. put in those words and that will pick up small pieces, almost like paragraphs where they made their remarks. >> the soldiers were members of italian combat team of the first cavalry division. these american soldiers for volunteers that's for to protect the united states. >> across the top we have a link all oury all -- to video clips. you can find all the clips that people make that are available for other people to look for.

obama oraves first, assad? >> there is another tab that says mentions. these are quotes that are valuable. decision byzarre the president of mexico to invite donald trump down there. >> spin on the far left side there are breakdowns, much like you would find on any other shopping website. you could say i want to see a particular person's name, a particular senate committee, or attacked for a policy. the left side is very valuable or narrowing down. play onh, click, and the c-span video library at www.c-span.org. the center for right-wing studies at the university of california berkeley recently hosted a discussion on the election of donald trump and

what it means for the future of the republican party. you will hear from college professors in the fields of sociology and political science. this is an hour and 20 minutes. >> without further redo, let me turn to introduce today's panelists. first, we will hear from carol joffe, who is a professor at the standards and new reproductive health program. i had to look at my notes for that because that is really a mouthful. she is also a professor of sociology emeritus at the university of california davis. she is a formal scholar of the social division of reproductive health and has written widely about provision among other ,opics including a recent book dispatches from the abortion war. our next speaker today will be paul pierson. professore john gross

of political signs here at berkeley. he is an expert in american politics and public policy, comparative political economy and social theory. he is a new york times best-selling author of a number of influential books on american politics and public policy, including most recently a book he co-authored with jacob hacker and title american amnesia, how to war on government led us forget what made america prosper. our third analyst is lawrence rosenthal. he is chair and center of the berkeley center for right-wing studies. he writes widely on the right in the u.s. and italy and is currently working on a study of the contemporary american right in comparative movements of the right in 20 century europe, a topic that has taken on increasing sort of relevance and importance. the format for today's panel is that each panelist will talk for

approximately 12 minutes or so, and then we will have questions and answers. the weight will work is that we will pass out cards, people will write questions on them, and i will collect -- selects a couple of questions and have the panelist answer them, and we will do that back-and-forth a couple of times. so without further redo, let me --n the microphone oath or without further ado, let me turn the microphone over to terrell joffe. -- carol joffe. [applause]

>> thank you, kim. and thank you to my friends and colleagues at the center for right-wing studies for organizing this. and thank you for coming. so, my assignment today is to talk to you about how abortion and lgbt issues played out in this campaign. what i will argue to you is they instead play quite an important role and that the religious right play quite an important role, although not in the way we have seen in previous elections. much of donald trump's frederick

-- i'll argue that these issues are very important in this election. let me start by talking about what didn't happen. optimisticuch more point of view from the last election. it shows you the various people, various republicans, who made outrageous statements about reproductive issues, both abortion and birth control. this was in the 2012 election. and they lost. the first and probably most famous, the first quote there, it is from representative tom aiken who should have won a , senator seat in new jersey. he said nobody has ways to shut that whole thing down. that did not work for him. the next person -- i will not go through all of them.

the next most famous was again, a republican who had been predicted to win in indiana and he basically said a pregnancy resulting from rape is a gift from god. he lost. and on and on. after the 2012 election, i recall reading that the republicans were told how to talk, or how not to talk about abortion and contraception. they were told, you do not talk about rape, ok? and they didn't. we saw remarkable discipline from the republican candidates in this last election. with periodic exceptions from donald trump himself. so, what did the candidates, both democrat and republicans, say? hillary said what you would have expected, a strong support for abortion and marriage equality.

she talked about the court. for the first time, and this is significant, this is one of the ways that bernie sanders pushed her. for the first time she came out in support for the -- excuse me, repealing the amendment, that legislation that forbids the use for medicaid patients, for poor women to get abortion services. what did trump say? trump, you might remember, has a very interesting interview with chris matthews at a town hall where he said -- where he was asked, do you believe in punishment? trump finally said, yes. and he did not know what the punishment should be. it is not part of the slide because i did not want to make it too long, but it is part of this back and forth. at one point he was asked, should the guy involved get a

punishment? and trump said, no, absolutely not. needless to say, this was a gas, precisely because he is new to the antiabortion movement, he never got the memo. that is not how the movement talks. you don't talk about punishing the woman who gets an abortion. she is a victim. the person you punish is the abortion provider. so, he walked it back a little while later. the only other notable time that he talked about abortion came in the very last debate. chris wallace asked both of them about abortion. he made a very strong statement, a very sensationalized statement that has very little relation to reality, but basically, was a very loud dog whistle to

antiabortion movement about the partial-birth abortion, when women can get abortions at nine months and the baby is ripped out. i'm not sure i have to tell the audience this, but somewhere between 1% and 2% of abortions in the u.s. take place in the third trimester. not always, but that is very often because of severe fetal anomalies or serious life-threatening illnesses for the woman. ok, and so, what did trump say about gays? his talk about gays was actually quite different. after the very horrible incident in north carolina, you might remember, the gay nightclub was shot up. -- the horrible incident in orlando. his statement was, i am going to protect you. he said a nice thing about gays by taking the opportunity to

trash islam, but we won't go there now. but the point is, quite interestingly, a very different tone throughout the campaign about abortion and about gays from trump himself, not necessarily as people see from both who support him. -- from those who support him. and this worked. what the campaign was doing was taking very important steps to make clear to the evangelical community, a very important voting block, but never mind what trump says, we, the trump campaign, are taking care of you. the most important aspect of this of course, was the selection of mike pence. mike pence, as he often says, christian first, and that a republican.

i forgot what is in the middle. but a christian first. oh, a christian first and then a conservative, and then a republican. nobody in american politics has better, more impeccable, antiabortion and anti-gay credentials than mike pence. you might remember that when he was governor in indiana he signed one of the most severe anti-gay bills, which made him quite unpopular. he also signed one of the most stringent antiabortion bills while governor, a bill that is quite unusual with respect to anti-legislation. it was not just the selection of mike pence. the trump campaign released a list of potential supreme court nominees early on that had been vetted by the heritage foundation. and probably most significant,

because throughout the campaign there was a discussion in evangelical circles, can we really support a guy who has been married three times, who brags about grabbing women's genitals? there was some turbulence. but this letter he released in september, when hillary was still ahead, we no longer know what that means, if she really was, but anyway -- he released a letter addressed basically to all of the major antiabortion organizations, where he laid out a series of premises which was the antiabortion wishlist. defunding planned parenthood, signing a ban on abortions after 20 weeks, even though roe v. wade guarantees a constitutional protection to 24 weeks. and it worked.

trump got more evangelical voters than george w. bush. he got 81% and george bush, w., only got 78%. this was not only an election promise. we can see some real commitments and some very important things that have happened since the election. right after the election, trump went on "60 minutes." she asked him about roe v. wade. and he made it clear, as he had said earlier, he was still committed to overturning roe. she said, what will happen to the women? he said, they will go to other states. at the very end, you can see les lie -- well, we will be what happens. signaling to everybody that he

meant what he said. on marriage equality he was a little more equivocal. do you support marriage equality? well, it is irrelevant because it is already settled. no, one could argue that roe was settled in 1973. the very wonderful decision on marriage equality was settled in 2015, if i am remembering the year correctly. whether this difference between abortion and gay rights has to do with what trump himself really feels, or whether it is his sense, and i am more inclined to think this reason, that the american public is more on board with the marriage equality than abortion, but who knows? anyway, so, we see some difference there, but lgbt activists should not take much

comfort, just because he hates abortion, or is more willing to attack abortion. both issues will have serious troubles in the trump presidency. we can see this immediately. this is from the health care page of the trump transition website. the very first item is a commitment to protect individual conscience and health care. those are very nice words, but what do they mean? they mean something very specific. that means no health care provider will be forced either to participate in any aspect of abortion, not just performing the abortion. it could be scheduling. there is the case of an ambulance dispatcher who refused to send an and he loves to a woman in crisis and needed a life-saving abortion. the same is true with respect to gays and health care. this means you do not have to be involved in transgender care.

you do not have to be involved in assisted reproduction for same-sex couples, or single individuals who are lgbt. and the second one is arguably even more worrisome, protecting human life from conception. this is a statement of personhood, and what a long-term strategy of the antiabortion movement for many years has been, not simply to overturn roe, but to establish the fact that a fetus has the legal status of a person. this would obviously not only wreak havoc -- it would make abortion obviously, illegal. if a fetus is a person, you can't murder a person. it would also make various forms

of contraception illegal. it would also make all kinds of stuff more problematic. this will not happen right away, although the person who has campaign, which has up to now failed in the state -- we have one way of getting there. it would be a constitutional amendment, which is not easy, but we know it would take 2/3 of the state. we now have 33 republican governors. so, this is something to worry about. but the main thing that has happened after the election, and where we can see that trump has taken very seriously his commitment to the religious right and their issues, look at the appointments. besides pence.

his chair of domestic policy for the transition is blackwell, not a household word, but a very conservative african-american who is best known for his commitment to "pray the gay away," the believe that homosexuality can be prayed away. jeff sessions, who is best known for not getting a judgeship because of his very troubling racial past, even though he is best known for that, he is also deeply antiabortion, deeply anti-gay. tom price, who was just named the head of health and human services, his signature issue is the repeal of the affordable care act and in particular, he is known for opposing the contraceptive provisions. one of his famous quotes is, "there is not one woman in america who cannot afford contraceptive on her own." maybe they are some people who cannot afford a condom, though i suspect there are women who can't. but nevertheless, the most effective form of contraception,

probably the main thing that is responsible for the rate of abortion having dramatically decreased in the last couple years is something called long-acting reversible contraception. this is the best that is out there and it costs $1000. it is not a bad deal because it lasts for 10 years. $100 he year isn't so bad for most women. but the kind of women who are dependent -- i mean, let me put it this way. a lot of women in society do not have $1000. the aca does pay for it. since trump's election, planned parenthood has reported a 900% increase in women calling their clinics, wanting to get their l arc before it is taken away. finally, we don't have time at this moment to go through all the things that supporters of

gay rights, supporters of abortion rights have to worry about. there is one thing i do want to call to your attention. that is the witchhunt that was going on in congress before the election as a result of the 2015 release of very misleading, heavily edited videos from a group that did sting operations on planned parenthood, leading to the accusation that planned parenthood and other abortion facilities "sell baby parts." marsha blackburn has chaired this congressional committee that has been described again and again as mccarthy-esque. they have subpoenaed all kinds of documents from health-care providers, just going on a fishing expedition. i have studied this world for 35

years. none of the hundreds of providers i have interviewed sell baby parts. what they do with the patient's permission if they are connected to a university is donate the fetal tissue for research. research that has by the way, brought us the polio vaccine, which could also bring us the zika vaccine. this is just one letter from a doctor in colorado. in the letter speaks for itself. ok, let me stop here and say that the social conservative wing of the republican party i don't think we'll ever go away. i do not think the battles over abortion will ever go away. too many people vote on this basis. this is too crucial a resource

for the republican party. another thing we can draw from this election, and from a partisan point of view it is a little bit dispiriting. conservatives pay a lot more attention to the court and what will happen to the court than liberals do. this is what we have got. thank you very much. [applause] >> ok, i'm just going to sit here and thank the organizers and all of you for coming. i am just going to launch right in because 12 minutes is not very long to talk about -- you shouldn't have given me longer, but you know, these are momentous events. i think it is undoubtedly, a turning point in american politics and american society. i am just going to talk about one aspect of it. before i do that, i want to say that i think all of us should be

very humble in trying to project what is likely to happen. i think there is enormous uncertainty. certainly, political scientists should be humble. one year ago when trump's candidacy was taking wing, i think i knew one political scientist who thought there was a reasonable prospect of trump becoming president. all of us should because this about making projections. it is also true because i think there is tremendous uncertainty. we have not been here before. this election will break through some institutional barriers by

giving republicans unified control. and we know that that by itself will produce a lot of change. we have also broken through a lot of normative barriers during this campaign. we are seeing things that i think would have been considered unimaginable a handful of years before. and i think there is a lot of room to worry about the extent to which our institutions, that we see as so stable, themselves turning out to actually rest on normative foundations. shared understandings of what is appropriate and what cannot be done. they are a lot less firmly established. we should all be cautious thinking about what should happen next. there are one million topics worth talking about and i will focus on only one, given the amount of time i have. what i want to focus on is the relationship between president-elect trump and the republican establishment with respect to domestic policy.

international affairs is going to be a distinct and wild west domain, and i have no expertise there. i want to say something about the interaction with domestic affairs, which i think there is a very good chance that will be pivotal. i want to start by reading you a couple of quotes from different conservatives. there are two different ways of thinking. the first is from grover norquist, a longtime leader in the tax reform. he said this during the run up for the 2012 primaries and it is a wonderful quote. he captures a lot with no holds barred.

"we are not auditioning for fearless leader. we don't need a president to tell us in what direction to go. we know what direction to go. we want the right budget. we just need a president to sign this stuff. we do not need somebody to design it. the leadership now for the modern conservative movement for the next 20 years will be coming out of the house and the senate. pick a republican with enough working digits to handle a pen to become president of the united states. this is a change for republicans. the house and senate doing the work, with the president signing the bills. his job is to be captain of the team, to sign the legislation that has already been prepared. " it does not matter. mitt romney, newt gingrich, as long as they have the working digits. that was 2012, and it probably sounds like quite a while ago. here is david brooks from this morning's "new york times." reflecting on the intense

polarization, he writes "donald trump's victory smashes all of that. he is hostile to the republican establishment. his proposals cut across the partisan lines. this could be a president with many caucuses. and what follows from there is a column, maybe the 100th he has written about how a flourishing of centrism is around the corner. comparing those two quotes. many people would say, we did not get the president with the digits, we got the fearless leader. but what i want to suggest is with at least respect to domestic policy, the grover norquist vision is likely to be closer to the truth, at least in the immediate future. there is considerable room i think for a very aggressive, but pretty standard moderate,

republican agenda and they argue that for several reasons. first, congress is central to policy formation, especially when gridlock is broken. congress writes the laws. when i teach my introduction to american politics course, people are always surprised that we spend a lot of time on congress because the media spends all their time talking about the president. there might be a lot of reasons to focus on a trump administration. there certainly are a lot of reasons. but congress, particularly in the situation where they can actually pass laws is going to be a formidable player. the second reason is because congress is organized and ready to go. four years ago, grover norquist was talking about the budget. well, it is still there. they have been updating it, but it is still there. the conversations surrounding that are the cornerstones for domestic policy thinking within conservative circles and they

have been for some time. they are not going away. they are ready to go, unlike the trump administration, where they do not yet even have a secretary of the treasury nominee. congress gets to set the agenda. they get -- the president can give speeches, but in terms of most areas of domestic policy that requires a statute, it has to move through congress. they will be in the situation that grover norquist rightly captured. they will be putting thing on the president's desk. his opportunity will be to sign it or not. and finally, and i think this is very important to recognize. in many areas of domestic policy, and what carol was saying, trump does not disagree with the republican agenda. he does not disagree with the ryan budget. this, i should add is also true for many of the "mavericks" among republican senators.

if you look at the list of people who are being trotted out, and i think it is right to focus attention on them because in many issues, the handful of republican votes who are likely to dissent on various issues administration, they could play a pivotal role. but most of these folks are mavericky on issues unrelated to the ryan budget or core parts of the domestic agenda. what you are likely to see is what i have called in an earlier book the republican swiss army knife, which has two blades. one is tax cuts for high income people and the other is deregulation. very quickly, i will rattle off some of the things that are likely to be an extremely

expensive domestic policy agenda in the first three months. one, you are going to see the bush tax cuts reduced. you will see huge tax cuts once again and overwhelmingly, at the highest income groups in the united states. all the nontrivial progress that was made over the last few years in reducing inequality -- and i do not want to say there was huge progress made, but there was nontrivial progress made through policy. it will be undone pretty quickly through those tax cuts. secondly, you will see a lot of deregulation. you will see deregulation with respect to finance. if you actually look at the stock market -- i have taken the stock market over the period since the election and it is concentrated within financial industry stocks. they are doing very well all of a sudden for reasons that i think are not that difficult to understand. consumer protection, you know,

the consumer finance protection board for example, which was set up under dodd frank, and which has saved tens of billions of dollars for consumers is likely to end up on life support. environmental protection, there are likely to be dramatic changes, many of which can be pursued just through a trump administration, even without further legislative action. we are likely looking at radical retrenchment of the welfare state. not just whatever will happen to the affordable care act, but medicare is clearly on the chopping block. there is a prospect. this is likely to be contentious and i think actually, this is the place where it is suggested that congressional democrats have decided they are going to plant their flag in trying to defend medicare, but there is a real prospect of moving towards what is essentially a voucher system for medicare, which is where the government promised is

going to be to provide you with a check in some set amount, which you can use to purchase private health insurance with the idea being that over time you would save money, the government would save money. by essentially not having that voucher increased as much as health care costs will increase. this legislation would be a stunning, huge change following the campaign, in which president-elect trump promised he would not do anything to medicare or social security. it would not only shift the burden of absorbing health care costs from the government to old and sick americans and their families. it would also remove most important source of counter bargaining power within the american health care system, the only formidable source of organized institutional bargaining power vis-a-vis, the

private health care sector, which is the main reason it is on the chopping block. this will be a really brutal and rude awakening time for many people who voted for donald trump if it is carried out. and finally, i would just mention the courts. i agree again with carol that this is an area that conservatives recognize to be tremendously important in shaping domestic policy. we now are going to get likely, several conservative appointments to the supreme court that could have profound effects on wide areas of domestic policy. a lot of those areas are pretty self-evident, but i just want to emphasize one thing i think is not fully recognized. and that is the possibility that you could end up with a supreme court that would, as i think

many modern conservatives do, including speaker ryan, a court that views most of the modern domestic edifice of the federal government as illegitimate. there were four votes in 2011, or whenever it was -- there were four votes to eliminate the affordable care act entirely as unconstitutional. it is not that far from that to just saying a whole host of federal activities could have been broadly accepted within the purview of the federal government as also unconstitutional. you could end up with a series effort on the part of the court with justices embedded for a very long period of time who are trying to move back not to a pre-great society or pre-new deal court, but to a late 19th century court where most areas of federal activity are rolled out of bounds by on removable

judges. none of this is to say that donald trump is just a guy with a pen who is going to sign everything to the republican establishment. but he will sign a lot of it. if it reaches his desk. and a lot of it will look like very conventional, but at the same time, very radical republican policy. [applause]

>> is this on? yes, ok. thank you all for being here, and thank you to everyone who organized to this. in some way i should have come before paul. this is a bit more about how the election came to pass as it did. it might dovetail with paul a bit at the end. in a well known exchange in their first debate, donald trump castigated hillary clinton for retreating from the campaign trail in anticipation of the debate. hilly clinton -- hillary clinton responded that she had been busy preparing for the debate and she

added that she had as well been preparing for the presidency, a remark that elicited one of the illicit applauses from the audience. the implication was that donald trump, whose campaigning included shooting from the hip, found himself not prepared for the presidency. but that was not the case. donald trump had prepared himself in a serious manner for his run for the presidency. his method was to immerse himself in right media. this included talk radio with rush limbaugh and michael savage. monitoring tea party websites and discussions and following right wing news websites, like the drudge report. what trump found there was a collection of themes and online memes which constituted a

universe of taken for granted understandings. trump stood these up like a reservoir of riffs that would be available to him, that he could pull out when he felt the moment right. this was the stuff of his style of campaigning. all these themes and memes resonated profoundly with crowds at his rallies. to the outside world, liberals and democrats, and established republicans, what he was saying was outrageous, embarrassing and offensive. things like, presidential elections were rigged, that hillary clinton would surely end up under indictment. that clinton and obama had created isis. that the second amendment types might have solutions when all else fails. all of these were common places

in the right wing world of discussion among themselves. liberals and the establishment called for apologies, but donald trump said time and again, we are saying what is on our minds. for the establishment folks who do not like it, that is just political correctness. let me describe the state of opinion he encountered in the far right media. first, the democrats. first the democrats. the long standing against the liberal elite going back to at least pat buchanan was not only alive and thriving, it had taken a new dimension since the obama presidency. race became the subtext of projections like the famous accusation that obama hates white people.