wins elective office after everyone told them would win news someone who wins elective office when everyone told them that they would not. this has bipartisan support in congress for sure sanctions against russia. >> if he works one do what president obama has done? rigorousl be for more -- for sections against russia. you will see them come together with a strong sanctions package though, frankly, even what the administration was more than symbolic, it was very meaningful, it is not enough to deter russia. >> the new congress starts today. watch all the opening-day events and activities on c-span. we are live from the u.s. capitol starting at 7:00 a.m. eastern. you will meet new representatives and hear from returning members. noon.use gavels in at

opening day business includes the election of the house speaker my his address to the whole house, and later debate and a vote on rules for the new congress. one rule in particular is getting attention. a proposal to find members who live stream video from the house floor. it is in response to last summer's democratic city and that was -- sit in that was streamed by several democrats. at noon eastern and it includes the swearing in of senators. opening-day continues on c-span 3, with live coverage of the ceremonial swearing-in of members congress. eastern, vice.m. president joe biden presides over the swearing in of individual senators. at 3:00, speaker paul ryan swears in members of the house. replay ofve a full opening-day at 8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span and c-span 2. anybody think you overslept opening day is tuesday, not today.

c-span now looks at some of last year's house and senate hearings. we will show you portions of these events and remarks by reporters who cover the issues. committeeoversight hearings. then a senate banking committee hearing on the wells fargo unauthorized accounts. finally, he said it's a senate subcommittee hearing on cable and satellite billing practices. now a look back at the house inrsight hearing on lead flint, michigan's drinking water. this portion is just under an hour. to april 2014,k when the city come under the

direction of some state-appointed emergency managers switch to the water supplied to the untreated flint river. point, afterwards, nobody knew anything was wrong. the public did not learn about the lead no water and told fall of 2015 can that's when advisories started to go out, suggestions to residents to drink bottled water or get .ilters for their tabs >> when and how did congress get involved in the flint water issue. >> late 2015, there was a growing chorus. there was the realization that something had gone wrong in flint and there were a lot of questions about what had happened, how it happened, some -- house of a like this could happen, whose fault it was, whether the government, state, the fed, who should have prevented this and trying to

figure out what they needed to do to make sure something like this didn't happen again. >> so there's been a number of hearings in the house oversight committee. how many hearings did they hold? >> in february and march, they had three hearings with all sorts of players. there was an additional hearing held by the energy and commerce corpsmen fredr upton held in april. >> what was the state of michigan asking from the federal government? >> i had made a the president dollars $90 newly million with the system.

to help with infrastructure fixes, help get the lead pipes out of the ground in flint. >> in a few moments, we will watch the third of the house oversight committee hearings. who testifies in this particular hearing and what does congress want to learn? testifying will be the administrator of the environmental protection agency, gina mccarthy, and the michigan governor, rick snyder, who is a republican. and they had -- members of kindness had a lot of questions for them. they wanted to know what went wrong, whose fault it was, why things weren't taking care of earlier, why someone didn't catch this earlier, why they didn't listen to it experts, why

they weren't hearing some of the early warnings from residents who were complaining about their waterand muddy looking and >> smelly water. tell us how politics plays -- and smelly water. >> tell us how politics plays and to these questions. >> flint unfortunately became a blame game. it is something you will hear in the hearings, that the democrats were really critical of the state of michigan, which is of course led by a republican run by a republican majority legislature. they wanted to know again why the residents weren't listened to, why the complaints were and why the experts who tried to sound the alarm early on were dismissed and not listen to earlier on. the republican side, they really focused on the epa, on administrator mccarthy.

watchedd the epa had its oversight role, that they should have stepped in early with the state wasn't doing what it should have been doing. and there is also the regulatory framework that the epa has, the rules governing levels of lead in drinking water. those haven't been updated in many years and are overdue for revision. >> all right, let's watch. here is part of that hearing from last march, beginning with questions from congressman matt cartwright of pennsylvania. you do admit that you and your people failed the people of flint. your own task force found that your department of environmental

quality was "primarily responsible for the crisis in flint. do you also admit that here yes. >> i took actions immediately -- and one >> your task force found that your officials did not implement corrosion control, which "led directly to the contamination of the flint water system. do you admit that your today? >> the lack of corrosion control it to this issue. >> and you admit that it was your officials at mdq that did not implement corrosion control, which led to that, right? not instruct the city of flint to do corrosion controls. >> is that a yes? >> that is a city responsibility. but they failed and what i deemed to be common sense and that they should have. >> do you admit that you

personally received a letter on january 10, 2015 from flint's mayor, begging you to take action and warning "there's nothing more important in flint right now than fixing the water problems." on january 18, 2015. you admit receiving the letter? >> i received a letter from your david and i took actions in the items within that letter. about january 10, 2015. >> please share the letter with me so i can confirm that. >> will you hand him the letter. it is exhibit b. we will ask that this be made part of the record, mr. chairman. >> without objection. 2015, from the mayor. the last paragraph on the second page. it is directed to you specifically. he says there is nothing more important in flat right now than fixing the water problems. do you see that? >> do you admit getting that

letter? >> yes. toyou were repeatedly asked come to find. and you admit that you did not show up. >> i'm not familiar. i would have to check my schedule. >> you did not go to flint into october, 2015. >> i do not know if that is correct or not. >> you admit seeing headline after headline about hair problems, hair loss, rashes, e. sewage,cteria, legionnaires disease. did you read any of the stories, governor snyder? >> i read a number of those stories. what i would tell you is those stories, we would follow up on them and get reaffirmation from career bureaucrats that the water was safe. that was wrong. >> the u.s. admit that more cases of legionnaires disease were reported since you've switch to the flint river than " all the cases in the last five years or more combined? " do you admit that?

>> a lot of these cases were at health care facilities. >> you admit here today that come even after the whole world knew that flint residents were exposed to unimaginable levels of lead, you did not declaring state of emergency until january 2016. isn't that true? >> i took immediate action as soon as i knew there was a lead issue. schneider, plausible deniability only worse when it's plausible and diameter am not buying that you didn't know about any of this until october 2015. you were not in a medically induced coma for a year. and i've had about enough of your false contrition and your phony apologies. susan heaven in the epa does not bear 1/10 of the responsibility michigan andned in she resigned. and there you are dripping in

guilt and collecting your paycheck and hiring lawyers at the expense of the boat -- of people and not being accountable. it is not appropriate. pretty soon, we will have men who strike their wives saying i'm sorry, dear, but there were failures at all levels during -- levels. put dollars over the fundamental safety of the people do not belong in government. and you need to resign, too, governor snyder. i yield back. >> know the judgment from michigan, mr. moss. >> thank you. to welcome you, governor snyder and thank you for your willingness to appear before this committee. spoke about the broken culture at many of the agencies and state government. how are you working to change the culture within the agencies, specifically the michigan

department of environment of quality that were negligent or reckless and failed the citizens of flint? >> it began by changing leadership. bisected the resignation of the director. this was a department director who served under two prior governors with distinction. but we had this issue. it was time to accept his resignation. essentially come under civil service rules, we terminated the head of the water division. that was the one that made the terrible decisions with their team to say it should be to six months studies in step saying there should be corrosion control. she was a 28-year veteran of the department. we are going to spend time. we're going to change his culture, a bureaucratic culture that focuses on technical compliance and doesn't have a sense of urgency should not be serving our citizens. there are many good, hearty -- hard-working people who serve the state of michigan. i am committed to finding the

instances where the people having gotten the idea that we work for the citizens. i will be relentless to make sure we make the changes necessary that this never happens again, whether it is in the water area or any other area of the state. >> did state employees and socially withhold information from you? >> i don't believe that was the case. when i would also say as we had a report from the office of the auditor general there responded. one of their conclusions was they did not believe they found any willful misrepresentation. >> what are you doing to make that state employees communicate with you, especially with issues of great importance governor snyder: i stood up in front of the entire

state of michigan in my state of the state address and said these people that made these terrible decisions, that showed a clear lack of common sense failed us, but since they work for me, i am responsible for their actions. and i take that responsibility and i kick myself every single day about what i could have done to do more, but i told the people of michigan that there's a commitment, a passionate commitment to say we are going to change the culture in these places. i apologized to the people of flint. they deserve that. i understand why they're angry. it's terrible what they're having to go through, but i made a commitment to fix the problem. i can't take some damage that's been done as ranking member cummings said, but there's a lot we can do to help the people of flint address so many issues and i am absolutely committed to do that, and we are following through and getting that done. and i'm going back to flint tomorrow to roll up my sleeves and keep working that issue. mr. amash: governor, what is the state's expected budget

surplus and how much of that money will be spent on helping the people of flint? governor snyder: in terms of i presented the budget in february for the state, in terms of surplus, we're actually going through two or three steps. i've asked for a total, including two supplementals or three supplementals that have already been passed by a total of $232 million to help address issues in flint, covering all areas, from the water system and infrastructure to nutrition, to health, to well-being, to economic development, all these fields to do whatever we can possible in terms of improving things in flint. several of these already passed our legislature. in addition, i ask for $165 million that would have been a rainy day fund deposit to go into a state infrastructure fund to say this is not an issue just for flint, but let's start putting aside the long-term resources to say we have an infrastructure problem in the state of michigan that's a national problem. let's get these lead pipes out of the ground, let's look at setting the right standards, that's why i called the federal lead and copper rule dumb and dangerous. it is.

in michigan, i'm making a commitment. i will be proposing legislation, i will be pushing to do everything to put a much more stringent standard in because the people of our state and our country better than they're getting today. mr. amash: i have a question for administrator mccarthy. if susan hedmond had not resigned, would you have fired her? administrator mccarthy: that was an issue i didn't need to face, sir, as you know. susan took the choice to submit her resignation knowing people would question whether or not she accepted some type of guilt or responsibility for this. she fully accepted responsibility and resigned. i accepted that resignation. i thought it was the right step for her to take. mr. amash: so the question remains though would you have fired her? administrator mccarthy: i didn't have to face that decision, sir. mr. amash: i yield back. >> the gentleman's time expired. we recognize the gentlewoman from the district of columbia, ms. norton for five minutes.

since we started these hearings, i talked to staff and we've gotten information that probably dozens of communities are facing the same thing. and they are coming forward and saying that they have unsafe drinking water and high levels of lead and their kids are being poisoned. governor, you did take some action and some people have been fired. is that correct? >> correct. head, youints water suspended other people, is that correct? >> correct. >> and you said everyone shares some blame coming putting yourself, right? >> correct.

-- first ofurbs me administrator mccarthy, you had the ability to act when you find out that things aren't going right in these systems. you have the compliance authority under law, don't you? >> yes, sir. and who was fired or held accountable in epa? was anyone fired? >> no, sir. what disturbs me, hedman, who was in charge, she was underneath you as a regional administrator. she was getting vacation time bonuses. she got the last one may 28,

while the regional administrator is getting vacation time bonuses while the kids are getting poisoned. she finally resigned herself. you never fired anyone. working ateat people epa. >> thank you. >> mr. del toro should get a congressional gold medal. mrs. walters blew the whistle. she came to the local authorities. we had the mayor in here. she told me in march of 2015, she met the mayor at the library and he promised to do everything. she went to city hall april 3 of the beginning of april and no one would see her. she was put off. to the day of the hearing the other day, the mayor had never talked to her after that. you are pretty experienced. you are ahead of the pa.

you can read el toro's report. it is incredibly accurate. this is dated june and not a damn thing was done until really -- until january of this year. asked mrs.back and walters, when did they finally come in? theyayor and others and epa administrator from the district said we acted immediately. they didn't act. they gagged mr. del toro. did you ever see this report, mr. ed -- administrator? end of june? last summer? did you see this report? again, a high school student could take this report and determine that kids were getting poisoned. he confirmed it.

he went in and tested everything, the pipes and the building, he looked at the lead lines, he did a thorough examination, and then he detailed all the things we have heard about with the counterfeiting of flint. violations going back, and you tell me you had the compliance authority, did you ever shut these programs down and go after them? administrator mccarthy: sir -- >> you did not. you did not. no one acted. i heard calls for resignation. i think you should be at the top of the list. administrator mccarthy: mhmm. >> they failed at the local and state level and we feel that the federal level and who was in charge? the district head gets a vacation bonus, the kids get lead poisoned and you are still in office. mr. chairman, i yield back. administer the mccarthy: thanks for the opportunity to answer. >> you are welcome. >> did you have something you wanted to say? administrator mccarthy: i would think it is good, sir.

i think it's important to know that, when we found out finally, because the mpq told us on april 24, prior to that, that there was no corrosion control treatment, reversing that what they told us was they did corrosion control in the system. we had already told mdeq that they had to require the city of flint to move ahead with corrosion control treatment. well in advance of the moment. >> finish. administrator mccarthy: and we consistently said the same thing. that is the report on three homes in the same area because of the complexity of blood, we did not and could not, have made a concerted judgment about whether it was a systemic problem. when we had the information, when we received it from mdeq, which was not until july 21, we told them we are done talking, we now know it is a systemic problem.

you do it or we will do it. they said we will do it. since that point in time, mdeq slow walked everything they needed to do, that precluded us from being able to jump to the rescue. that is what happened. if people are worried about whether we find -- we silenced miguel el toro, he is one of the experts we rely on. he is a hero in this. he remains a part of the decision-making. the simple fact is that mdeq is the one who told everyone he was a rogue employee, to discredit him, just as the mdeq was doing as the governor's task force sent in trying to discredit anybody who said there was a problem with that drinking water system. we were misled, strong gone, and we cannot do our job effectively. >> mr. chairman, i just asked that mr. del toro's report into be included in the record at

this point. thank you and i yield back. mr. chairman: you just do not get it. you still do not get it. we recognize the gentleman from virginia. >> thank you. i get it. we are trying to make sure that blame is shifted here. it is interesting. for committee that has practice alice in wonderland techniques with management -- but there the head. so when there is a problem that opm, off with the head of opm come off with the head of the cio at opm come off with the head of the hantavirus come off with the head of lois lerner. governor snyder, apparently my

friends and other side of the aisle, want to mention your head is securely on your shoulders. governor snyder, do you believe in the philosophy of governing that says we ought to push responsibility and power to the lowest level we can and is close to the people as weekend? governor snyder: as a general rule, yes. mr. connolly: the citizens of your state rejected the emergency manager law you had advocated in a referendum, is that correct? governor snyder: correct. mr. connolly: six weeks later, you reintroduced legislature legislation that was approved by the republican led legislature for a new emergency pa436, is that correct? governor snyder: there was a lot that took to account the concern of the citizens and that was passed by a legislator that represents the people of michigan. mr. connolly: that allowed you to bypass and appoint an emergency manager to act for and in the place and stead of the government and the governing body and the opposite chief administrative officer of the

local government, quote, unquote from the law. governor snyder: your questions are generally. this was a term or there was failure in terms of safety management. mr. connolly: did you appoint an emergency manager? governor snyder: yes. mr. connolly: that means the mayor cannot exercise powers mr. your hand-picked emergency manager let him, correct? governor snyder: initially, yes. mr. connolly: master, we travel to flint and conducted a transcribing to of the last emergency manager appointed, you appointed, gerald ambroise. you appointed, not miss mccarthy. we asked if he considered the city council impotent during his tenure. his answer on the record was "absolutely." you know how many pages of edicts were issued by your appointed emergency managers in

this tragic time period, governor? governor snyder: no, but let me respond to your comment. mr. connolly: hold on because let me show you. i have only five minutes. ladies and gentlemen, hold them up. these are the stacks of edicts issued by your emergency managers, not by the city council oakland. -- not by the city council of flint. do you know how many of those 8000 pages built with meaningful steps to protect the citizens of flint from lead? your appointees? governor snyder: no. mr. connelly: not one. wait a minute, governor. it is my five minutes. i wish i had 10 and in that would give you all the time in the world. this is the failure of what you advocated. there is no evidence, even after you were warned by the mayor of flint. they had problems than ebay due

you to come.ged you ignored him. we had no evidence of you traveling toflint for 7 -- the flint for seven months. seven months, governor. seven months. i am glad you are sorry no. i am glad you are taking action now. but it is a little bit late for the kids inn flint whose health has been compromised, for people whoset help and immunity systems are already compromised, for a city in america that is on its knees because of your emergency managers decision to save $4 million, now it will cost a lot more to clean up. and the stain and taint that state government has put on this country in the form of flint will be a long time been erased.

you know, at some point, the buck stops at your office, governor, with your department of environmental quality that collapsed, with your emergency managers who are guilty of hubris, they knew better than the local elected officials of flint and they ignored the warning. that is your record, governor. i yield back. >> we recognize the gentleman from tennessee. >> thank you, mr. chairman. before i yield my time, i would respectfully ask administrative mccarthy to consider scrapping the waters of the u.s. role as it is clear epa cannot currently handle the issues on its plate. i yield my time to the gentleman from michigan.

>> i thank the gentleman from tennessee. on september 20 6, 2015, this mccarthy, you received in email from peter cravat, director the epa office of drinking water. the whole point of the email is to share market words, -- to share mark edwards's documentation of the flint drinking water problems. mr. edwards ends the email, asking that you pay to "immediately take decisive action on this issue to protect the public." did you read the september 25 email that included mark edwards request for action? administrative mccarthy: i did. >> dr. edwards is the mayor to this committee and the people of flint. do you know who mark edwards is? administrator mccarthy: yes. >> you have met? administrator mccarthy: we have met. >> how long have you known? administrator mccarthy: we have a contract with them to do work with us now. >> do you believe he is an expert on water treatment and corrosion? administrative mccarthy: i think he is an expert but i wouldn't

knowledge the pay has a number. >> the edwards emailed his key the edwards email gives key points documenting that there is no corrosion control treatment, that people cannot afford bottled water. mdeq insists the water is safe, and that they know of a child with elevated blood levels already. if you received an email documenting all of these problems on september 25, including the fact that children have elevated blood lead levels, why did you not act until january 21, 2016? governor mccarthy: sir, you are incorrect -- >> i'm not incorrect. you continue to not take responsibility, including writing articles about it. dr. edwards is an expert on the issue. the people of flint understand that he has been there. you did not even shop until

-- didn't even show up until february of this year. i remind the members on the other side of the aisle, governor spends the many days, this administrator of epa, did not show up until february. dr. edwards said in testimony before this committee that susan hedman, who you will not fire, you would not fire, you will not even given answer if you would, that admin's response was unacceptable and criminal. that is what mr. edwards said. please, tell the people of flint behind you and this committee like mark edwards is wrong. administrator mccarthy: edwards is a good scientist, and i respect him. if you look at the timeline of when we received that e-mail, you will find that the city and county health advisory about the flint water went out on the same day. you will find that october 1, they were noticed to have no drinking of that water without protection.

you will find on october 2, the governor put out a 10 point plan. on october 3, the filters were being distributed. i cannot -- there is no switch i can turn on. rep. desjarlais: i am hearing nothing of your action on that, and you have the law on your side that says in any, any event of imminent danger or health risk, you have the responsibility to act. you wrote an op-ed. excuse me. i am not -- i will give you a chance. you wrote an op-ed in the "washington post," which stated the epa regional office was also provided with confusing, incomplete, and incorrect information. administrator mccarthy: yes. >> as a result, the epa staff members were unable to understand the scope of the lead problem until more than a year after the switch to untreated water. did the epa confirm in early 2015 that flint's water pipes lacked corrosion control? administrator mccarthy: no, i

did not know that. the staff were unaware of that. rep. walberg: they were unaware of that? administrator mccarthy: yes. in fact, they were told by mdeq -- rep. walberg: what about mr. del toro who was disciplined? administrator mccarthy: he was not. rep. walberg: yes he was. administrator mccarthy: ok. rep. walberg: that is a matter of record as well. administrator mccarthy: i am sorry, that is not. rep. walberg: dr. edward said some of the documents received from it epa, they were 90% redacted. dr. edwards waited 10 years, how is this acceptable from an expert? rep. chaffetz: gentleman's time is expired, but you maybe answer. administrative mccarthy: i wanted to be all clear. the emergency order i issued in january was because of continued failure to address the issue. if there is anything i could have done, and switch i could

turn on that would have precluded us, allowed us to go further than was already happening at that time, i would have pulled that switch. what we needed was exactly starting. yes. are the consequences? absolutely. we worked very hard to get mdeq to do their job and get these actions in place. when you are asking if i received an e-mail on a given date, i did. the actions were moving. there was nothing else i could have ordered that would have made that move faster. i did issue an order in january, because even after all of this, the order that i issued was questioned by this state, by mdeq, by the state, as was that really, legally solid? they continue to drag their feet today.

representative chaffetz: go ahead, governor. governor snyder: i am sorry, mr. chairman, but you cannot take so much. all i can do is go to the record. what i would suggest people look at three e-mails. there is an e-mail going back to june 8, 2015, from jennifer crux from the epa is a semiannual call. there is a e-mail on july 21, a briefing paper with the mdeq talking about the federal lead a copper rule, including flint water. at 9:15 there is a talk with the mdeq and the epa working together. they were in regular dialogue. they are talking about how to work together. i am ready to get sick. we need urgency, action, and they keep on talking. it is not about fighting. they are just not getting the job done.

we messed up in michigan to begin with by doing two studies instead of corrosion control. that is what has caused this trouble. i have accepted responsibility for the people that worked for me. it is different to continuing have this dialogue to say it was solely us, this could have been stopped sooner if others had seen it. i should have asked tougher questions and done more, but all those things the epa just did not get the information? i just ask you to take the time and go look at those three e-mails, and that will clear the record up. representative chaffetz: we now recognize the ranking member. representative cummings: you have represented a department that you were unaware of disaster building until october 2015. i find it hard to believe that a crisis of this magnitude

completely escaped your attention for so long. it is so clear that your senior staff, people who report directly to you daily, were very aware of what was taking place in flint. october 12, 2014, 1 of your top advisers wrote an e-mail to your chief of staff saying, if you know there is a problem with the flint water quality since they left the dwsv system, which was the emergency manager. i think we should ask the emergency manager to consider coming back to the system in full and in part as a solution to both the quality and now the financial problems the current solution is causing. i see this as an urgent matter to fix, end of quote. did your chief of staff, who i assume reported directly to you, your righthand man, did he tell you these concerns urgently needed to be fixed in october 2014? did he tell you that? governor snyder: i don't recall.

i do recall we had issues. we talked about color and odor of the water. there was also concern about e. coli. there were several issues, but none of them related to lead. representative cummings: but there was a problem with the water. did you get the e-mail? governor snyder: i did not get that e-mail. representative cummings: i remind you you are under oath. governor snyder: not to my knowledge. representative cummings: after all, if the gm refuses to -- gm as in general motors -- if they refuse to use the water in our planet and our own agencies are warning people not to drink it, the differential between what we now collect and what we face with wvz, we look stupid hiding behind some statement. did you talk to him about concerns in february 2015?

governor snyder: i can't recall, but we had continuing discussions about water issues. e. coli and that pthm. there was an issue of chlorine in the water. it was acceptable for human consumption -- representative cummings: although it was rusting away, brand-new, the water was rusting away brand-new parts at gm, it was ok for human consumption? i do not think that was the testimony, by the way. governor snyder: to put in perspective, ranking member cummings, these are red flags i kick myself. i was getting advice -- representative cummings: i want you to finish. on march 2, 2015, your chief of staff offered the following assessment about flint.

it is tough for everyday people to listen to financial issues and water mumbo-jumbo without all they see is problems. if we procrastinate much longer in doing something direct, we will have real trouble. governor, dated your chief of ,taff, your right-hand man talked to you back in march? governor snyder: governor snyder: i had discussions, i can recall specific ongoing discussions. he was right with race discerns. we took actions with the maximum grant, $2 million earlier in the year to help flint with water structure. we also worked on getting filters. representative cummings: i am running out of time. the next day, he complained about the lack of empathy for the residents. and this is your righthand man, and he subsequently said this was your dq director, dan wyatt, i really don't think people are getting the benefit of the doubt. now they are concerned,

rightfully so, about the lead level studies they are receiving from the deq samples. these folks are scared and worried about the health impact, and they are basically getting blown off by us, end of quote. did you talk to your staff about those concerns? governor snyder: i had continuing talks, and he sought advice and parties from your from career bureuacrats, not just in one department but also environmental allergy. the water was safe, people in the health and inland services did not see an elevation in blood level levels, and they are wrong. representative cummings: there are two possibilities. either she knew you about his concerns or did nothing, or he did not tell you and you are an absentee governor. i yield back. representative chaffetz: i want to recognize myself for five minutes. governor, you have apologized, correct? governor snyder: correct.

representative chaffetz: have there been people who have been fired? governor snyder: yes. representative chaffetz: anyone dismissed or otherwise retired? governor snyder: yes. representative chaffetz: did the state of michigan do something wrong? did the epa do anything wrong? ms. mccarthy: i don't think we did everything right, that is the challenge i am facing. representative chaffetz: the challenge you are facing right now is my question. my question is, did the epa do anything wrong? ms. mccarthy: i would hope that we would have been more aggressive. i would hope we would have escalated this issue if we could have done absolutely anything to stand on a rooftop and scream about the challenges we are having. representative chaffetz: you are just not -- here is the fundamental difference. first of all, we have jurisdiction in congress on the epa. i don't have jurisdiction on the governor. i have jurisdiction to call him

up here, and republicans did call him up here, he volunteered to be here. and we are investigating this. this is the third hearing on this topic. this is the fundamental difference. i hope you and everybody understands this. i see responsibility. i see people getting fired, i see changes. i see admissions that there was fundamental wrongs that happened in the organization. but when i turned to the epa, has anyone been fired? that is a question. gina mccarthy: no, sir. representative chaffetz: has anyone been dismissed? ms. mccarthy: no, sir. representative chaffetz: when the epa reaches five administrators there, susan had the date you finally did take decisive action, when you were questioned

about that, you said that her act was courageous. gina mccarthy: i did. representative chaffetz: i'm going to ask you again. did the epa do anything wrong? ms. mccarthy: the epa worked very hard. representative chaffetz: i have another question for you. no, hold on. did the -- mark edwards has testified here twice. he does not have a dog in this fight other than he wants good quality health for people, and he wants good, clean water. and he happens to know the science behind the water. on those two hearings, did mr. edwards say anything that you think was wrong, or maybe inaccurate? do you think mr. edwards is that anything that was wrong or inaccurate in any of those testimonies? ms. mccarthy: i don't think he was at all informed about epa. he doesn't know how we are supposed to work in the system. he doesn't understand that the problem itself was a responsibility of the state. oversight was our responsibility. we took that seriously, and we

conducted it. does that mean i don't have regrets, because i don't -- representative chaffetz: that is cheap. we just got regrets. that is cheap. that is cheap. ms. mccarthy: you have to look at the way the law works. representative chaffetz: and it failed. you failed. you said, if there is any, anything i could do, you had that under the law, and you did not do it. ms. mccarthy: no, sir i did not have that under the law. representative chaffetz: yes, you did. if there is imminent threat, you can pull this wet. you are wrong. ms. mccarthy: there are two parts to that. you skipped the second. representative chaffetz: you are in those -- i am asking the question. instead of, ok. when you first arrived on the scene, and it was not until

january of the next year that you actually did something. that is the fundamental problem. don't look around like you are mystified. miguel del toro showed up in february. you did not take action. you did not. ms. mccarthy: we took action from that point forward. representative chaffetz: there are a lot of people in this audience from flint. nobody believes that you took action. mark edwards from virginia tech, bless his heart, had the opportunity. they have said things like we failed to get epa to take lead in water risk seriously. the epa added, effectively condoned cheating on the lead copper rule since 2006. your op-ed that you put out one of the most expensive things i could possibly imagine. he said about you, the epa administrator gina mccarthy, effectively absolves any wrongdoing or treating the flint

disaster. if you want to do the courageous thing like you said to susan hedman, then you should also resign. nobody is going to believe you have the opportunity, the presence, you have the authority, the backing of the federal government, and you did not act you had the chance. if you are going to do the courageous thing, you should also step down. >> that was 40 minutes of the hearing. you can see all of it at www.c-span.org. us about back with what has taken place since the hearing. has the water situation improved? there are tests that are promising. the stories we mentioned earlier about folks still needing to use filters, using bottled water, those are still in place. >> did the hearings the to any specific legislation? guest: there are two things i

would mention. one is on the policy side. congress clarify for the epa's role in cases like this in the future, when the epa learns of lead contamination in drinking the state agency responsible for notifying the public has not done so, dep has the authority to step in and notify the public itself, which it did not do. and the other change is they $170ved in december million in funding, $100 million of that will go in grants to theirto help repair damaged water lines and types in the city, get those out of the ground so that cleaner water can start growing -- flowing to people's homes. bill did comect

to the house floor, and it included money for flint. here is a representative who represents flint, making his last pitch on the floor for that legislation. of 100,000 people that still cannot drink their water. this is not a question of access to water. the water flowing into the pipes in flint has poisoned that city. 100,000 people. 9000 children under the age of six, affected permanently by high levels of lead team delivered to them through their usable water system, caused by careless, thoughtless decisions they said on an obsession with austerity by the state government. and that they were told the water was it to drink when that same state government knew it was not. look, we know where we

stand. no bill is perfect. this bill is far from perfect. many provisions included in this legislation i disagree with. but i have been fighting for my hometown and been told to wait and wait and wait, and the people of my community can wait no longer. drinking water is a basic human should be ahat human right exercised by the people everywhere, including the people of my hometown of flint. every day that passes, every week that passes, every month that passes that flint is not not get the relief they deserve, is the day we do not get back -- more people leave, more businesses fail, the city gets more poor and poor and incapable of moving forward. that has to stop and it has to stop right now. it has to stop before this

congress under his. we cannot count on the next congress to get this done. dee, whoses dan kil .istrict includes flint the president signed the bill into law on december 16. joining us again. a few days after the bill was approved, the chairman of the house oversight committee shut down the investigation into flint. y?y: guest: the issued to letters and said the situation was the result of failures at all levels of government. he particularly singled out the state of michigan, their department of environmental quality, and that there have been serious problems there in terms of their misleading epa.

there was significant problems epa which cat -- dragged their feet -- so he also came down on the pa for not lead and outdated copper rule, which is outdated and has not been revised for a number of years. host: so if the congressional investigation is over for now, does that mean water problems in flint are fixed? guest: unfortunately not, no. residents continue to drink bottled water, use filters on their taps, and it will take many years for them to try to get the lead pipes out of the ground. it is a monumental task. host: what is the latest news locally out of michigan on this issue? guest: there is an ongoing investigation at the attorney general's office which so far has resulted in criminal charges

against 13 government employees, including four that were just announced this week. two of those individuals were former emergency managers of the city who had been appointed by governor snyder. host: you can read melissa burke at detroitnews.com. thanks very much for joining us. guest: thank you. host: and a reminder, if you would like to watch the full 1/2 hearing on the water -- full 3 1/2 hearing on the water problems in flint, michigan, you can go to our website, www.c-span.org. >> we are live at 7:00 a.m. eastern. you will hear from you representatives and hear from returning members. business includes election of the house speaker, his address, and later debate and vote on rules for the new congress. one rule in particular is getting attention, proposal to find members who live stream

video from the house floor. it is in response to last summer's democratic city and that was streamed by several democrats. the senate starts at noon and includes the swearing-in of senators. the day continues on c-span3 with live coverage of the ceremonial swearing-in of members of congress, and at 1:00 p.m., joe biden presides over the swearing individual senators, and a 3:00, paul ryan swells in -- swears in members of the house. a replay at 8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span and c-span2. >> tonight on c-span, the annual banquet of the muslim public affairs council. speakers include javier becerra, recently designated to be done next california attorney general, plus van jones and , who compares the

idea to a muslim registry to government actions against japanese-americans in world war ii. >> when i heard that first trial from a a few to go, surrogate for the trump administration, the truck transition team, -- the trump transition team, i knew exactly what was going to be coming down. he talked about a muslim registry, which was a chilling echo for me because back in the 1940's, they had a japanese-american database. they were using the word registry, it is the same thing as what came down on us, a database, where they knew where we were, how many lived in that .ousehold, and what we did

and and after they had the database, they came down with a curvy -- curfew. all japanese and americans had to be home by 7:00 p.m. and stay at home until 6:00 a.m.. we were imprisoned at night in our homes. and then we discovered that our bank accounts were frozen. our life savings became inaccessible. and that was followed by the .oldiers coming to take us away that must never happen again today. [applause] >> the annual banquet of the annual muslim affairs cancel tonight on c-span. c-span is looking back at some of the house and senate hearings in 2016. here's a portion of a september house oversight hearing on the impact of the epipen price

increase. this is about an hour and 10 minutes. in august there were headlines epipen, the shot people take, mostly kids, when they have an allergic reaction, like a bee sting. for example, this headline -- rising cost of the epipen puts pinch on families. senators demanded an urgent briefing on epipen. caroline johnson of "the washington post" joining us now. what led to the stories? guest: well, in august is when parents are buying epipens to stock them up for school. and they're putting them at grandma's house, daycare. and so, this is when people are going to the pharmacy and finding out how much an epipen costs. over the last eight years, the price has gone up from about

$100 for a two-pack, to $600. that is the list price, it is not what everyone pays, but people were beginning to feel that when they went to the pharmacy. and they were putting out word on social media and contacting their senators and representatives. i think that kind of lit the fuse of public outrage. host: so the price increase got the attention of politicians. when did congress get involved, and how did they get involved? guest: well, different members of congress started calling for investigations and hearings into various aspects of the pricing. and they held a very well attended, very lengthy hearing when heather bresch, the chief executive of the company, came before them and was asked to explain a lot of things about the pricing, about the profit that the company makes. it was well attended.

there were kind of an unusual amount of bipartisan agreement, i think, on that these price hikes were unconscionable. host: in a few minutes, we will watch a portion of that house oversight committee hearing on the epipen price increase. you mentioned heather bresch, the ceo of mylan appeared. also, an official with the fda. what does congress hope to hear from the fda? guest: well, whenever congress has questions about drug prices, the question comes up, why hasn't competition solved the problem? is there a barrier? can competitors not get their products through the pipeline? that is a big question with epipen. it is not a new drug, it has been around for decades. and they wanted to know why there are not competitors. i don't think they really found the answer satisfactory, but there is kind of a variety of reasons that it is hard to make

a true generic of epipen, which is both the epinephrine, the drug inside the injector device, and the pen itself. that allows, making a true generic, something that is truly, truly, truly indistinguishable from the brand product, is a little harder for this kind of combination. host: you used the term virtual monopoly in reference to mylan and the epipen. what is mylan's actual market share when it comes to epipen? guest: they have had the vast majority of the market share. it changed a little bit because there have been competitors over the years, but it is around 90%. they have basically the lion share of the market. host: the "guardian" newspaper has an opinion piece written by a mother who says the epipen is a lifeline, not a luxury. what is really at stake here? guest: for parents, especially, this device is something that

they send their kid to school with or to summer camp with, and knowing their child has a food allergy that they could use this device to save their lives, in the case of a severe allergic reaction. so from a parent's point of view, this device is something that is not optional at all, no matter how expensive it is, so that makes it even more frustrating and outrageous when they see the price has gone up so much. i mean, for the company, they have made a lot of money off of this product since they acquired it in 2007. so it has been an important drug for them. and then, from the politicians' point of view, they want to find out generally why drug prices have been increasing and if there is anything they can or should do about it and to what extent it really is a problem for the health care system and patients.

host: now let us watch a portion of that house oversight committee hearing from september. we start with questions from democratic congressman lacy clay of missouri. representative clay: ms. bresch, i want to ask you a series of yes and no questions and i will give you an opportunity to respond in more detail if you would like at the end. first, epinephrine is an essential life-saving drugs, correct? >> yes. representative clay: the formulation of epinephrine has not changed since 2007, correct?

we are continuing to access which will allow restaurants and hotels, anywhere you are congregating, there should be access to an epipen. did you make that statement? >> yes. reachedreement was preventing it from putting a generic on the market until 2015 or earlier under certain

circumstances. is that correct? >> yes, sir. delaying theit by entry of a generic drug into the marketplace, mylan has had less competition? do you admit you have had less competition, due to that delay, by having the delay? >> we have had competition to epipen every year. >> ok. "the new york times" reported that although mylan was once 0% price increases a year, it was taking -- when it seemed eminent? inyou admit that

anticipation of potential lan raised theyal price more than it should? toas i have stated, we get 74 of the 608, so we received an average of 8%. do you admit these price increases were intended to generate even more significant revenue before generics and visit the market question mark was that the intent of the raising of the price, that you ?eceive additional revenue >> we received additional revenue. anhave you ever witnessed individual having an epileptic seizure? 1960's, and ihe

had a friend who i witnessed in a couple of occasions these scissors -- seizures question mark -- seizures? >> no, sir. >> modern medicine has advanced in a way that is beneficial to patients. but to have companies like yours take advantage of this situation, take advantage of these people who are really in need of this medication, i think that wes to something are better than that. and i would hope that the corporate america pharmaceutical industry is better than that. in the last few seconds, tell me

-- how do did we get to this point, that we have a culture like this incorporate america that wants to stick it to consumers? >> all i can speak to is our lan has, which has mya for 50 years to provide low dose -- low cost pharmaceuticals. our premise is to provide access. what we worked on with epipen was to be able to give 700,000 withpens to schools attached -- >> but you put it out of reach of the average consumer? >> the gentleman time has expired. i think the question was answered. i recognize myself. recent news articles have

documented a lobbying effort on behalf of mylan to add the epipen to the list of preventive services by the services task force. preventative medical services are those that prevent illnesses before they cause problems. arrently treatments receiving grade of a or b by the task force are required to be offered to consumers with no out-of-pocket costs. supporters of adding the epipen to the list of preventive medical services argued that this measure will help consumers get access to epipen's with no -- epipens with no cost sharing. will adding epipen to the provided medical services list, well lit do anything to lower the price of the device, the overall reason for the hearing today? liste preventive drug

would make sure everyone has access, but what we have done with the generic drug and dropping the price to $300, we believe provides that similar access, but believe obviously the importance of epinephrine auto injectors should be part of the preventative drug list. >> you're still pushing to have it on that list? >> i absolutely think it should have -- yes. >> du you believe spending lobbying resources to add the epipen the preventive medical list and shifting the price of the drug to other sectors is realistic solutions to stem rising drug prices westmark -- prices? >> that is what we did that was unprecedented. we reduced by half the price of the generic. >> but you still went on the list? >> just showing the importance -- >> why not reduce the price

instead instead of using those lobbying resources? >> the lobbying resources have been about creating public access and getting epinephrine to places in schools, just like a defibrillator. we recognize you when you need it, one second counts -- that do not disagree with at all. we appreciate the product can be there and can be used. but this list, we need to plumb the depths of that. go beyond the generic drug, questions about that, it won't this in fact shift the full cost of a depends -- of epipens to payers, medicare, leading to an increase of premiums of other cookies on consumers? on >> no, sir. over 85% of our patients a out-of-pocket costs.

by reducing it by half, it reduces that further. shipping,t about cost but making sure everyone has access and understands the importance of epinephrine. pressure off bad publicity, for a cost factor to get it paid for by medicare, medicaid, etc. let me shift over to mr. throckmorton. about the concern delay, the time, the bureaucratic maze. some drug companies are taking advantage of your agencies' failure to approve more generic drugs. we have seen that. what can we do to expedite approvals to ensure we have multiple generic competitors to prevent price spikes? we heard testimony in alaska around that there is a lot of -- in our last go around there is a

lot of bureaucracy. >> i wanted to thank you for the question. i will take issue with that characterization. there was a time when our resources were not able to keep up with the applications that we were receiving for approved generic drug products, not authorized products him a true products. there was a time in 2012 when we did not have the backlog. he had 4400 applications that needed to be reviewed. in 2012, with congress help, we got additional resources to allow us to hire new individuals. the result of that had been 2200 approvals or tentative approvals since 2012. we have made progress in breaching conclusions regarding approvals of true generic products. >> what about the markets? are you doing anything to thatify rock -- markets

are at risk of becoming monopolized by a single generic? >> absolutely. we agree with everything that has been said today about the power of competition and the importance of us taking a challenge on. just making it possible to develop new products, in particular when you are talking about products like auto injectors for epinephrine, the public health value is even higher. for this product we need to put particular work and attention on. we have done several things specifically about difficult to develop products like the epinephrine auto injector. i mentioned some of those earlier, the guides is that we have put out talking about how to put these products on the quickly, howently, we will review the data, the kinds of information ud. to with any we need company that comes to us with a product that has this public health value. we offer to meet with them

individually. we respond to the questions and writing. >> i appreciate that. my time has expired. i would make a statement that if there are companies that have members on i think this panel would love to hear directly from them and come correctly to you. this, havedeal with the competition. we want to see the price reduced. and we do not want to have hearings like this on a regular basis. my time has expired. i recognized mr. lynch of massachusetts. >> thank you. i want to go back to the $50 profit number you announced today. year, the price was about right?r two, [no audio]

so let's go to your chart. the documents you gave us are totally deficient in trying to figure out how you are charging people and how much it costs you, just so you know. we have some outstanding document requests from your company, so i hope you can reply with those as soon as possible. it will help the committee. there go off your chart e. , $530 in 2015, and a whopping $608 this year. so far. money were you making per epipen in 2014 then when you were charging or hundred $400?s? --

>> i'm saying the church at a five -- that 235 -- >> i am not talking about. >> we received $235. >> answer the question. when you were charging $400 back in 2014, how much were you making? equivalent to the $50, approximately $50 -- >> ok, fair enough. >> $40. >> $40 back then? to $500.you went up 1980's --ived 200 $219. we made about $48. >> you must've been losing money

in previous years because you in the overall00 price, the tom price him but you are only making $50. i cannot understand that. they stop documents you have given us -- $608 is the acquisition costs. >> we have done that that's. the 274.profit off >> let me ask you, you do business with the v.a.? i know it is a different population. >> yes, sir, we do. >> what is the v.a. paying? >> i am not sure -- >> they have the ability to negotiate their cost prices. we should let them deal with their own prices directly with

pharmaceuticals. it was not your intention, but you might have helped congress get around an issue by showing the blatant disregard you have a disrespect you have for the people who definitely need this medication. and you talk about x banding the ability -- at -- expanding the ability of people to have the epipen. people in my district cannot do it at $608. a lot of those people do not have discounts. middle-classlar people. they do not have that discount. theredicare part d, upreases, -- the access went since you bought the company from merck, but the cost is up 1151% based on the study here individuals.rom

i want this entered into the record. is disgraceful what is have doneere, but you us a bit of a favor by just showing you what is wrong with the system, what is wrong with our health care system. discussing.as i will yield back. >> the gentleman yields. thank you, mr. chairman. i just wanted to try to get largesthe mind of a drug company ceo for a minute. decide after 2008, that you decide to use this model of price increasing, and how did you come to that decision? >> it was recognizing the fact that there is a severe,

shockingly low understanding of anaphylaxis, and there is a shockingly low number of people who were prepared to be protected epipen. raiseyou decided to your price? how much have you made? >> it is our>> largest product. >> how much did you make? >> i do not have the number. >> do you think you were charging too much? $600 is too much, or are you going to keep rising the prices? >> which is why we took the unprecedented action of putting the generic in at $300. >> we will get to that. did you plan on increasing the price and 2017? >> no, we did not.

tobut do have a plan raise it every five or six years? >> ii -- >> did you have a plan to raise the price? and fromsed the price, what we received, the 278 of the 264 is what we were management. >> you think you were fair to raise the price -- i know you made a fancy cracker because i had one of your reps come by my office and show me how to use it. when a drug goes to generic, does the price go down? >> which is why we dropped it to $300. >> only if you jacked it up to $600. you fix the price on the drug, did you know

you were going to release a generic? >> several weeks ago. >> but when as a company? you knew. an authorizeding generic in the market, which is the equivalent of -- we are supposed to feel good because you are going to drop the price to 300. >> we were receiving 274 out of -- >> do you think they were charging too much, at $600? >> we believe it was a fair price and we now lowered that price by half? that? did you leave it at >> we wanted to address that are patients who were addressing the costs, which was not intended. the system was not intended for people to pay the wholesale acquisition costs, and that is what is happening, it was the

step to put the generic in and be able to -- favor're doing everyone a come at try to make us feel good about it. i just do not. i am not buying your argument. do you have a guilty conscience about any of this? >> putting it in public places, giving 700,000 epipens and wanting to get into public schools all across the country -- bucks, yousts 20 could give it to them. jacket price us, and the lower it. you took a very inexpensive drug and profited handsomely on it. i do not have a lot of problem that you can make money in a free-market enterprise, but what i have a problem with as a physician, and you take drugs that are lifesaving drugs, people do not have a choice. they cannot go to a certain store to get a tie.

her mother were cut off her right arm to get that drug. 600started charging her for bucks. that is probably about 10 times what the drug should cost. i understand you got to make some money, but you can sit there with a clear conscience and say that is ok and you just decided because you are such good company to cut the price from $600 to $300? is that your testimony? >> we want everyone who needs an epipen to have an epipen. >> are you going to lower the price? >> we believe all the programs we have in place from the generic to the higher patient cards,nt program to the trying to address every facet of patient to make a -- make sure they have accessed is what we will remain focused on. the chairman will now recognize the gentleman from

virginia, mr. conley. i wasentative connolly: struck by what humanitarians you people really are. and if you listen to your testimony, you would never know -- do understand the nature of the report? believe the story got ahead of the facts because i had because of the complexity around the pharmaceutical system, us being able to now put on the record what we are making, what comes to mylan -- i dosentative connolly: not mean to cut you off, but i want to get to questions. let me get this straight, the

chronology, sequencing. you took over from the previous in 2007,- manufacturer and the price of epipen had been fairly stable up to that point? >> yes. >> since 2007 you have raised the price 15 times? >> yes, sir. >> what happened between 2007 and 2015 different from the previous manufacture? the production costs skyrocket for you? >> there was an increase for sure. >> how much? >> almost a hundred percent. >> and what was the comparable cost of epipen in that hundred percent cost increase? >> i'm saying over the last eight years. >> you went from what to what in

eight years in what you charged the maximum price? i took your point not everyone pays that. have a system where we have all kinds of different layers of pricing. -- what wassumers the comparable increase, what you are absorbing in eight years, 100%, what it cost to you to produce, what is the comparable cost in theory to consumers in the maximum cost during that time that you charged by raising costs 15 times? >> $274 that we receive. i was asking for a percentage increase. apples and apples. if you are going to content production costs went up 100% about what is the comparable price increase for consumers during that time? your testimony you and knowledged -- acknowledged you raise the price 15 times.

>> 300%. presumably that is profit? the delta? goods comes cost of out, and then you -- profit.ca is built on profits are an incentive. what i care about is what you could charge consumers who have no choice. if i understand you have a stranglehold on the market, you control 94% of that market, is that correct? >> we have a large market share. we do not control -- >> you have 4% of the market share? >> correct. >> i would call that a stranglehold. you do not want to call it controls, don't, but exterior -- consumers are experiencing it differently. does you have a stranglehold, you can do what you want to the pricing, and you have.

>> we have had many competitors in and out of this marketplace. that just underscores the complexity -- >> your competitors do not equal 6% of the market. that does not even pass the arele test what you asserting. you virtually have a monopoly and have used it to your, that unfortunately is it is at the extent of those who needed. this is a life-saving drug who need it. people do not have a choice. they have to use it. and i am wondering what your sense of social responsibility is to those people. how do you balance -- i could go through for you statements you have made and the company has made in the annual report to investors, and it sure is different than statements we we have heard today. i cannot hear it humanism, i did not hear the philanthropic call.

i heard statesman about favorable pricing, about how to prevent continues to post strong results, double-digit growth to date. that is because of your pricing. >> that is because we are reaching the amount of doubling the patients and risky being able to be prepared for everything. we have expanded reach an accident to patients who are at risk instead of putting in of public places, like the schools program. >> during the calls to investors, one question asked you was, what are the prospects for future price increases for epipen? this is an investor meeting. your answer, you should foresee that just continuing as we continue to maximize the epipen franchise. what did that mean, if it was not reassuring investors that we were going to maximize every the prophet, and i do not think profit is a bad thing, but i think it is a bad

thing when somebody exploited at the expense of consumers who live on its price or do not. >> that is why we have taken every step to ensure that everyone who needs and epipen -- an epipen has one. the schools program grown so that our 700,000 free epipens throughout the 65,000 public schools, and we want to reach the others. >> i think my time is running out. there is this dr. jekyll mr. hyde in this case, dr. jekyll mrs. hyde, quality of your testimony. there's one message for the public, and quite another for investors. i yield back. >> we will recognize the gentlewoman from illinois, ms. duckworth. representative duckworth: i want to highlight the stories of two families in my district.

eurosmily has an eight and son who was diagnosed with severe allergies before he turned 1. began vomiting and his mother's nightmare came through. he said, mom, i do not want to die. brian knew how serious his body's reaction was, he knew his throat was closing, and on this saved hisn epipen life. another woman, who is concerned about skyrocketing prices. haveusband and daughter life-threatening allergies, so their family has to ensure they have two auto injectors everywhere. what it is tows depend on the safety of this device him and that is why she wrote me and urged me to ensure everyone, even those less

fortunate, can protect their children with the same level of care. the families are likely. they have good insurance, but they do not know that they will always be in this position, and one day they may not be able to afford epipen as prices go higher and higher. i agree. ton a single life lost accessibility is one life to many. i would ask you to keep your answer short,, yes or no questions, or short one word answers. do not try to filibuster and run out my time because i need to answer yes or no. earlier you said epipen is given 000 to schools across the nation? >> yes. tomylan also gives them --ograms yes.

>> illinois, a program in schools that your mother was instrumental in getting states to adopt in her capacity as the president of the national association of state boards of education. so we can better understand the scope of this program, from manyt 12 to may 2016, how schools signed certification price?or the discounted four free -- we give -- congresswoman duckworth: how many schools have done this? resch: i don't know how many.

duckworth: you can tell me how many schools have actually taught epi-pens from you in this program that you are so proud of? ms. -- >> it is very small number. congresswoman duckworth: i'm concerned about your monopolistic practices. there is confusion in the reporting. could you confirm, yes or no, whether schools have purchased have hadd at the pens to make any representation that they would adhere to certain conditions in order to access the discount price you give them? ms. bresch: schools did not have to purchase any at the pens. -- any epi-pens. congresswoman duckworth: do they

have to certify or make any certifications to mylan in order to get the price? ms. bresch: for people who wanted to buy it at the discounted rate, yes. the free epi-pens -- congressman duckworth: not talking about the free at the pens. intold like to enter this the record. it is a certification form were mylan actually says that the school hereby certifies that it would not in the next 12 months purchase any audits that are autotitive to epipen injectors. so you put into practice, forcing schools -- and you are so concerned about these kids that your limiting the school's ability to buy from someone else. so we will sell it to you for $100. we raised it to $600. so if you are the discount, you need to sign this so you cannot buy it from anybody else. don't answer. i'm not asking you a question. that is what you have done here.

i don't agree with that because they did not have to buy our pants. congresswoman duckworth: but if they wanted to get this price -- ms. bresch: yes. duckworth: the heavily discounted prices $100 -- one or $20 -- $120. you need to sign this and say you will not buy it from anybody else. i'm not asking you a question. this is what you have done. your own document says this. ms. bresch: they don't have to buy them. congress woman duckworth: that's right. is out theremother lobbying to mixer they are in all the schools. many members of the board didn't even know that there was a family connection between mylan and your mom through you and she was out there trying to pass out

your guides for mylan talking to school boards, pushing for these epi-pens to be put into the school districts and then they cannot buy for a lower price when you have 90% of the market. and then you can't bite at the old price because the us unless you promise not to buy from anyone else. that to me is an unfair monopoly. i yield back, mr. chairman. >> thank you for much. i think you had a lot of questions today and a lot of pressure put on you. i appreciate you coming. i am hesitant to go down the path of government getting involved in what the government -- and what individuals make. we start goingn down that tree. my concern is where the bottleneck is occurring. an abbreviated new drug application is when a company

wants to manufacture a generic drug. that is what they must utilize. >> for a true generic. unauthorized generic like we have been talking about now, that is not approved. hice holland you know how many are represented with the fda? that weve 17 responses sent back to sponsors requesting additional information. we are waiting for that information to come back. there are 2300 applications .efore the agency

we approved 600 products through the middle of the year. representative hice can you get the numbers back to me, the number of applications submitted versus those being approved? next, can you tell me the median approval time for generic drugs right now? >> i don't have that information before me. it's also changing. before we got the user fee -- representative high school and i'm talking about now. the generic pharmaceutical industry says it is taking four years. >> that is a misunderstanding. representative high school and what do you mean that is a miss understanding -- a misunderstanding? >> any products that are being

approved now -- from the beginning of the process to the end of the process, are you disputing that it takes four years? >> for products that come in today, i'd will not take 47 months. hice: for those who have been trying, they've been trying for years from the time they start to the time they finish. probably -- products or come in and they are insufficient to get approval. sometimes it is because the data they submitted is inappropriate. representative hice: how long does it take from beginning to and did the people who are involved in the process tell us it takes four years. generic manufacturers have been paying fees to the tune of billions of dollars to try to speed up the process through the generic user fee agreement.

this past july, fda actually said they acted on 94% of the generic applications. throckmorton: there was a total of about 4600 applications that we needed to review. we have acted on more than 90% of those. there are fewer than a hundred of them that have not gotten a response. hice: so 4500 have been approved? throckmorton: those products that have a full dossier had given us the data that we need and have been a -- have been approved or have been intended for approval. i don't think you want us to rubberstamp this. hice: the free

enterprise system works when you have multiple copies out there offering products and options for people. market,ot 94% of the whatever, and you're the only major player. and the reason for that is because you guys are not processing a host of others who are trying to get in the market. and when is taking 3, 4, 5 years for that to occur and how many millions of dollars to go through the process, no wonder the whole system is not working. i'd like torton: show you the trend data. that is not the trend we are seeing. hice: thetive european counterpart ali has 24 generic drugs we for approval. and they do it from beginning to and in less than a year. that is not what we are experiencing here. mr. throckmorton: the european system is quite different from ours. hice: because they are not taking as long as

ours. mr. throckmorton: i'm saying that it is apples and oranges. hice: we have concerns about a drug going to $600. there is issues you will deal with. but we can't place all the blame on new p at fda has scott to get their act together and start working the process and -- has -- but we can place all the blame on you. the fda has got to get their act together and start working the process. >> like you for having this hearing. your opening statements set the right tone. is asking whether we can do something at the fda. i'm all in if there's something we can do that won't compromise safety. mylan has an excellent

in vermont.acility many vermonters work there. we are very proud of it. it is a good employer. what drug companies do, i totally agree, is vitally important. here is the dilemma. it is best summed up by a letter i received. my four-year-old son has a severe peanut allergy and i am a single mother working a low-wage job with little health care coverage. i can't afford to pay this much affordpen's and i can't not to because that cost is possibly his life. is that the matter here moms and dads are being given a

choice. they can pay more than they can afford or risk a loss they cannot endure. that's why it is so urgent that we were together to get to the bottom of this. i want to focus my questions on some of what i think are the market breakdowns for lack of competition. , maybe wedge the fda need to make some reforms are, but there are some things that are happening. the your company bought epipen, that was into seven, right? how many were sold then? ms. bresch: much less than today. than half.ainly less representative welch:

significantly less red usually when you sell more of something, the per unit cost goes down. is that not the case with epipen? ms. bresch: cost of goods has gone up every year. and our investment has continued. we have continued to invest in the product. representative welch: you will give us the figures on that. 50 bucks in your pocket would be reasonable. -- butyou can tell a lot as you can tell, there is a lot of head scratching. i'm going to ask you to get your graph out that you gave us where the wholesale acquisition price is $608. that is what people are paying. and then at the bottom is $50 for the profit per pen.

that $50 sounds reasonable. but the rebates and allowances, who is getting all that money? between thethat is other people in the supply chain, the pharmacy benefit managers, retail pharmacy, wholesalers and insurers. representative welch: isn't the benefit that the pharmacy manager provides is essentially to negotiate the best price with a pharmaceutical companies to get a given drug and they get a rebate, right? ms. bresch: probably would be better to have -- philosophically, i think the pharmacy manager, the system that that is -- representative welch: i'm not talking. italy. we are trying -- i'm not talking. italy. we returned to understand how works. discount from pfizer or from you and they keep some

of that and that's the way they make their money. part of their way of negotiating is the so-called formula. so if you have heart disease, there may be a drug option of a, b, or c. and they put on the formulary drug a and there is increased volume and they get a rebate. with respect to epinephrine, there is no formulary. anaphylactic shock, there's only one thing you need and it is the product that you sell. >> there's -- ms. bresch: there's been competition. if i could just get this point. q launched to their product in 2013. not being on the formulary due to the competition in the market place. representative welch: somehow you've ended up with 94% or 97% of the market. q was recalled

off the market for safety reasons, which is a rare event. isresentative welch: what impossible to understand is how to summit cost -- how does something cost $608 when the company that sells it is only making $50. that is hard to understand. i understand how complicated and how head scratching that is, witches why i've said i would welcome the opportunity to sit down -- i know this is about epipen. representative welch: i don't have talent -- time. we have to keep going. taxpayers.tough on our medicaid program in 2011 was paying $111 per script. this is a lot of money for us in vermont. spent than $111.

now it's $557. $256,000 in taxpayer money to $1.7 million. that's tough. ms. bresch: that's why the generic, being able to put it would helprket health care costs across the board. representative welch: but the generic am i understand it used to be the position that you had, mylan had, that doing these authorized generics was a really -- was a real threat to the generic industry. that's the record of your point of view. ms. bresch: a decade ago. i know this is complicated, but the authorized generics are keeping a first generic or competing with the generic, in this instance, that's not the case. representative welch: one other epipen in cost of the the netherlands is $55. that's where your headquarters

are. $105 and youet move your headquarters to the u.s. from the netherlands. get $105 and we pay $608? ms. bresch: i'm not sure the cost. but what i would say is they have a completely different system. representative welch: i yield back. some would appreciate clarification on that. carter: before i start, can i inquire of you -- the witnesses took an oath and they are under oath now? >> yes. representative carter: have you ever had -- have you ever seen a child have anaphylactic shock? have you ever witness that? ms. bresch: i have not.

carter: have youarne ever gone to a pharmacy and carried to epipen's and told the mother of a child who has analogy that the price is $600? ms. bresch: no. carter: have you seen a mother cry because she cannot afford the medication for her child? the reason i ask you this is because i have. i've experienced it. i've seen it. i've seen a mother go out and have to call family members to see if she can get the money together to try and see if she can pay for this medication that she knows her child has to have. i've witnessed that firsthand. none of us are without blame , none of us. and i could my profession as well. of yesask you a couple

or no questions. first of all, does the $608 wholesale acquisition, is that -- ms. bresch: no, sir. representative carter: you said your company receives approximately $274 after rebates and allowances. after you take at the expenses like acquisition costs, regulatory compliance, all of those things, your profit is even less than that, is that correct? ms. bresch: that would be the $50 per pen. representative carter: after you do that, do you have any , pharmacywith pbm product managers? ms. bresch: yes. it's around multiple products,

to participate on the formulary so patients have access to the product. representative carter: we established earlier that over half of the list price does not go to mylan. do you know how much the pbm receives? ms. bresch: i don't have a breakdown between the channels, but that is -- carter: itive understand, but do you know exactly how much the pharmacy benefits manager receives? ms. bresch: i don't know the breakdown between the pharmacy, wholesalers, and the retailers. presented of carter: nobody carter: representative nobody knows because there is no transparency. that's the problem. how much the pbm receives in rebates and other fees that are related to the bpm -- the pbm whenever it is

adjudicated to the pharmacy? ms. bresch: i don't. representative carter: nor do i. all i know is my computer cause insurance and they tell me how much i am supposed to charge the patient. i don't know how much are getting as a manufacturer and i don't know how much the insurance company is getting. i don't know where pbm -- how much the pbm's getting. do know how much of the related to mylan?s get back ms. bresch: i don't know. representative carter: remember, you are under oath. do you know how much rebate you get from a pbm? ms. bresch: i don't want to give you an inaccurate number. representative carter: can you get that number? ms. bresch: i can go and look at that. i'm just saying i don't want to

give an inaccurate number to you. carter: you don't know how much the pbm receives. nor do i take no does anybody else. whether it is the manufacturer, the insurer or the pharmacist, nobody knows. prescription prices, prescription drug prices have soared and so have the profits of pbm's. they are in the billions of dollars. transparency more in the pbm market, we are going to continue to see these kinds of cost increases. we will continue to see them. bills likewe need house resolution 234. my friend doug collins from georgia has entered used this bill called the mac transcat yakked. this would help us and take a step towards transparency. mr. chairman, i want to thank you for holding this hearing today and i want to reiterate my request that i have made to you

and this committee from time to time about further investigating how deceptive practices by pbm's are impacting drug prices. would you agree with that? ms. bresch: i certainly would agree that transparency is needed. the health care system has evolved dramatically over the last decade. i'm sure you have seen as a pharmacist that the system has not kept face with the evolution of the health care system. carter: the pbm's have had billions of dollars in profits. i have to sit there and take a prescription to a mother whose child has suffered from anaphylactic shock and watch her cry and watch her call family members in order to get the money to pay for this medication. and we don't know where it's going. you say it is not going to you. where is it going?

i need to tell her. i need to tell her where that money is going. ms. bresch: the most immediate thing i can do is put a generic into the market. representative carter: don't go there. you know i know better than that. that is a crock and you know that -- and you know i know that. .here is no defense whatsoever half -- do price in not do that to me. don't try to convince me that you are doing us a favor. you are not doing a favor by that. you could have dropped the price of epipen's just as well. but instead, you said no, we will make a generic. ms. bresch: the point of the wholesale acquisition is getting to those patients, to make sure everyone who needs one has one. i couldn't ensure that that would get -- representative carter: you did

not want to cut the price on the brand because you wouldn't have gotten your rebate from the pbm like you get them now. i'm waiting for the information that you have promised me that you will send to this committee. esther chairman, i'm going to hold her to that. ms. bresch: what i can tell you immediate thing we could do is to put a generic in because it bypassed the formulary -- everything you are just describing. representative carter: are you getting the rebate on the generics? getting the rebate from the pbm? ms. bresch: i don't -- those are still under an ago -- we haven't done those. representative carter: are you planning on getting a rebate from the pbm? ms. bresch: i don't know. i honestly don't know. representative carter: remember the oath. tell the truth. i'm not negotiating

those contracts -- but i can tell you come as you know, the formularies and the pbm's in the generics are very different than on the brand side of the house. i just want to help verify something. i want to take this one step further. do you know what you get from the pbm's for the regular epipen? how much rebates? do you? ms. bresch: that's what i said. i don't want to give an inaccurate -- desperate you thing get that information. you can expect to be getting rebates from the generic. yes or no? ms. bresch: he asked specifically about the pbm and i don't want to give an inaccurate -- representative cummings: i didn't ask you that. ms. bresch: we pay rebates on the generic as well.

representative carter: that's not what he's talking about. you know what he is talking about. i can't sit here and tell you a comes back on the generic. but i can tell you there are discounts and rebates paid, but it is a much smaller degree on the generics. representative carter: this is a shell game. that's all it is. i hope you never have the experience of going to a counter and telling a mother of a child who has suffered from anaphylactic shock that she needs to pony up the $600. i hope you never experience that . mr. chairman, i yield back. >> that was about an hour of a three and a half hours oversight committee on the epipen. you can watch all of it at c-span.org. us.lyn johnson joining you wrote a story with the headline mylan's of the pen profits are 60% more than it told congress. what happened?

nfc --: according to an an fec filing, the profits that they reported at this hearing, where they repeatedly showed this poster board and said they , $50 of profit per pen, were actually calculated using a tax rate that they don't pay. of 10,ual profit is $80 according to that filing. although they justify the way they presented the numbers, it just further annoyed members of congress who already seem to be frustrated at that hearing for and i getting straight answers to some of the questions they asked. of the committee asking about mylan's marketing of the a p pen, what role has marketing played in the growth of the company itself?

mylan but the struggle to thousand seven, it wasn't a huge drug. but not only through marketing, but through lobbying, they help and stategh federal laws requiring epipen's to be stocked in schools in some areas or in other places. they also did a lot of outreach to the patient community. that helped grow the drug into the brand name recognized product that it is today. where a lot of parents don't necessarily even -- they just say epipen. they don't say epinephrine autoinjector, which is how doctors will refer to it. they just referred to the brand name, sort of like kleenex or other brand names that actually usurped the original product. ceo's mother was

brought up. carolyn: there was a usa today story about heather brush's mother who, at the national association of state boards of incation help play a role getting guidelines so that schools would be more open to stocking these as an emergency measure. something that didn't go much farther than that. but if definitely shows -- but it definitely shows how a family connection may have helped because they dominate the market, mylan was the named beneficiary. >> because of a settlement with the justice department, tell us what that was about.

the way this drug is ,lassified under medicaid medicaid gets a rebate depending on whether it is a brand name drug or an older non-innovator drug. what basically congress has been writing a lot of letters to senators -- dissenters and medicaid services is to find out drug evenon-innovator though it's been around for decades. maybe the government has been paying too much for -- the medicaid program has been paying too much for the drug. the $19 million salary and

the nearly 500% price increase, you -- from your writing and your investigation, what is the take away from mylan and epipen? carolyn: i think this is part of a recurring pattern, where congress is very concerned about the consumer pocketbook issues of access to drugs. they have had other ceos come and try and explain high drug prices. they talked about possible solutions. ashink one of the realities, who covers drug prices in the industry, this is an extreme a complicated issue. it is hard to fix it with a band-aid. it's also not going away. consumers are increasingly shouldering more their health care costs. that raise the

prices of their drugs in outrageous ways do risk inciting the wrath of politicians. this, i thought this was probably something we are going to see again, something we've seen before. and we will see what kinds of solutions happened. but it's kind of a symptom of a much larger issue that continually rears its head. >> you can read carolyn atnson's story add "-- story washingtonpostdoc on. and viewers can watch the complete hearing on mylan any of -- hearing on mylan and any of the hearings at www.c-span.org. >> we are live from the u.s. capitol starting at seven clock a.m. eastern. you will meet new representatives and hear from returning members. the house gavels and at noon.

opening day business includes the election of the house speaker, his address to the whole house, and debate and rules for the new congress. one rule is getting attention, a proposal to find members who live stream video from the house floor. it is in response to last summer's democratic city and -- sit in that was streamed by democrats. opening day continues on c-span 3 with live coverage of the ceremonial swearing-in of members of congress. at 1:00 p.m. eastern, vice president joe biden presides over the swearing-in of into the senate. we will have the full replay of opening day on c-span and c-span 2. >> tonight on q and a --

>> while people were starving, van buren was having fancied parties in the white house. .t was part of the image making here was this rich man in washington sneering at the poor people. harrison was a very wealthy man. but he was portrayed as the champion of the poor. women came to the parades and waved handkerchiefs. some gave speeches. some wrote pamphlets. it was shocking. they were criticized by the democrats who said these women should be home making cutting. and his newhaefer book. tonight at 8:00 eastern on c-span's q and a. >> we continue our look at some of the house and senate hearings in 2016. in september, wells fargo's john

stumpf spoke before the banking committee. this is one hour 40 minutes. what was happening at wells fargo that got the attention of regulators? pointeth: this came to a in september when it was announced that wells fargo had overed a settlement allegations that it had opened more than 2 million accounts without customers knowing about it. this is something that immediately got the public's attention as well as outrage from lawmakers on both sides of the aisle. theumer protections and

size and scope of this misconduct had gone on in for so long, allegedly touched thousands of employees. the bank had failed to stop it in five years. questions about materiality, whether the bank had failed to inform investors about what was happening with the bank and what they were doing about it. the backlash came from both sides of the aisle very quickly after the announcement was made about the settlement. shelby, chairman of the senate banking committee called the ceo of wells fargo at the time to testify and give more information about what the banquets doing about this, who knew what good a lot of the basics really. lawmakers, republicans and democrats, were outraged. it didn't help wells fargo's case that this was two months before an election.

as you can imagine, lawmakers use wells fargo as an example to advance a number of issues that were important to them in the financial services. is it was able tough morning. it had to be a tough morning for john stumpf. he was getting a grilling from both sides of the aisle. it's interesting what came out in the hearing. one of many issues was that republicans saw this as an opportunity to look at what the regulators new. and whether or not they were so to see -- so to speak asleep at the wheel. democrats look at this as to why there needs to be more consumer protections. -- somey was a fiery very fiery exchanges from both sides of the aisle.

>> how did congress even first hear about the issue? and why did they decide to hold hearings? elizabeth: it was public. the announcement was made that they reached this settlement. the details were made public about what was known about the scandal and how many customers it might have affected, how many accounts, i should say, may have been affected and what the bank was doing about it. that's when it all caps alike. part of what spurred lawmakers to takenly react and action was the scope of this, that this had gone on for so long and raised questions about accountability and whether or not executives, including ceo john stumpf at the time, should return their compensation, whether or not they should be reprimanded. and itl became public was a reaction to a public announcement really. >> what was the reputation of

wells fargo before all of this came out. elizabeth: here in washington, wells fargo had always aintained an image of being hometown, big, regional bank, even though the bank is one of the largest in the country. and does engage in investment banking and trading and other traditional wall street businesses. boat washington had spun this image of this hometown bank. it was interesting how a lot of the folks here in washington knew this was a business that was not a wall street or a very copper catered business. this was in the traditional bread-and-butter consumer community bank at wells fargo. foras pretty simple consumers and anyone to that the bank was

opening up accounts and misleading and essentially lying to its customers. about the reputation of the ceo, john stumpf. before this came out and after. elizabeth: wells fargo had always stood out as a bank that scandals, so to speak, since the financial crisis, that some of the other big hanks have. that has certainly changed. the bank has taken quite a records it -- quite a reputational hit. it's an issue of trust. it has raised a lot of doubt about trust with the bank. john stumpf has since stepped down from the bank as ceo and chairman. ken slone has taken the helm as ceo. and other executives have returned over $41 million of

compensation. they have in taking steps to try to show that they are holding their executives accountable and writing this wrong so to speak. but a lot of the image -- the damage has been done. >> stay with us. we will take a look right now back at some of the senate hearings, both house and senate hearings. we will start with the former ceo john stumpf and we will come back and continue our conversation. swear that the testimony you are about to give is the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help you got? you -- so help you god? you may be seated. welcome to the committee. mr. stumpf: thank you for letting me to be with you today. am chairman and chief executive officer of wells fargo

, where i have worked for nearly 35 years. to lead thisilege company that was founded 100 and six he four years ago and has played a -- 164 years ago and has played a vital role in the history of our country. we employ more than 268,000 team members, 95% of whom are in the united states. adultsevery 600 working is a member of the wells fargo family and we have a presence in all 50 states. sorry that we failed to fulfill our responsibility to our customers, to our team members, and to the american public. i've been through many fargo, butwith wells none the pains me more than the one we will discuss this morning.

behaviorsales practice in our retail banking business goes against everything regarding our core principles, our ethics and our culture. vision ofunter to our helping our customers succeed financially and it is not representative of wells fargo as an institution. i'm here to discuss the situation today, tell you about the actions we have taken, and our commitment on how to move forward. our entire culture is centered on serving our customers. and in this case, we let our customers down. our retail banking practice , sales issues are not a reflection of our hard-working intelligent team members who deserve thanks for helping our customers with their financial needs.

clear thatake very we never directed nor wanted our team members to provide products and services to customers that they did not want. that is not good for our customers. and that is not good for our business. it is against everything we stand for as a company. that said, i accept full responsibility for all unethical sales practices in our retail banking business. and i am fully committed to fixing this issue, strengthening our culture and taking the necessary actions to restore our -- customers'rist trust. let me tell you here today. the wells fargo board is actively engaged in this issue. to holdd has the tools senior management accountable,

,ncluding me and carried posted the former head of our retail banking business. actions taken with our executive officers will be immediately disclosed. i want to be clear on this. i will respect and accepted the decision of the board. leadership, we have already begun taking steps to ensure that the sales culture in our retail banking business is wholly aligned with our customers' interest. weseptember 13, 2016, announced a major decision that we will and product sales goals for everyone in our retail banking business. because we want to make certain that nothing gets in the way of doing what is right i our customers. the new leadership team's

primary mission will be to provide the best possible service to our customers. i'm also announcing today three willnitiatives that reinforce our commitment to our customers. first, we are expanding the account review and remediation to include both 2009 and 2010. second, we will be contacting every single one of our deposit customers across the country, using the same process that we agreed to with the city of los angeles for our california customers. have begunwe contacting hundreds of thousands of customers with open credit cards, including those for whom we have already refunded fees,

to confirm whether they need or want their credit card. in addition, we've recently started sending customers a confirmation email with one hour, within one hour, of opening any new deposit account, and an acknowledgment letter before submitting a credit card application. we recognize now that we should have done more sooner, to eliminate unethical conduct or incentives that may have unintentionally encouraged that conduct. we took many incremental steps over the past five years in an attempt to address the situations, but we now know those steps were not enough. in 2011, a dedicated team began to engage in proactive monitoring of data analytics, specifically for the purpose of rooting out sales practice violations.

in 2012, we began reducing sales goals that team members would need to qualify for incentive compensation. in 2013, we created new corporate wide. wide incentive plans. in 2014 we further revised our incentive compensation plans to align pay with ethical performance. in 2015 we added more enhancements to our training materials, and began a series of town hall meetings to reinforce the importance of ethical leadership and always putting our customers first. throughout this five-year period, we identify potential inappropriate sales practices. we investigated those, and we took disciplinary actions that included terminations of managers and team members for sales policy violations. the 5300 terminations over the five years that had been widely reported, despite all these efforts, we did not get it

right. we should have realized much sooner that the best way to solve the problems in the retail banking business was to completely eliminate retail bank product sales goals. one of the areas that we missed was the possibility that customers could be charged fees in connection with accounts opened without their authorization. deposit accounts that are not used are automatically closed. we assumed this cannot happen. we were wrong. and we took steps to refund fees charged and made changes so this cannot happen again. in august 2015, we began working with a third-party consulting firm, price waterhouse coopers, which conducted extensive

large-scale data analysis of all 82 million accounts and nearly 11 million credit card accounts that we had open from 2011 through 2015. a proximally 2% of the accounts, 1.5 million deposit accounts, and 565,000 consumer credit card accounts, were identified as accounts that may have been unauthorized. to be clear, pwc did not fund these accounts that had been unauthorized because it could not rule out the possibility -- these accounts were further review to determine if any fees being charged. pwc calculated that

approximately 115,000 of these accounts had incurred $2.6 million of fees which had been refunded to those customers. even one on authorized account is one to many. this type of activity has no place in our culture. we are committed to getting it right when hundred percent of the time, and when we fall short, we accept responsibility, and we will do everything we can to make it right by our customers. i will close by saying again, i'm deeply sorry that we have not lived up to our values in this way. i also want to take this opportunity to thank our 268,000 team members who come to work every day to serve our customers. today i'm making a personal commitment to rebuilding our customers and investors' trust, the faith of our team members,

and the confidence of the american people. i'm happy now to address your questions. thank you. >> thanks for calling this hearing. what we have been learning is so deeply disturbing at so many levels. first, we discover that wells fargo has a sales culture that was blatantly antithetical to what was best for customers trade we discovered the -- customers. we discovered the management had far too few common sense controls in place to prevent abuse that customers were subject to. in a 2011 forms article, wells fargo was rated the best at cross-selling its products and the only problem is we discovered wells fargo wasn't always cross-selling, signing up customers for products when you know the customer doesn't want the product, failing to notify customers about these sham accounts -- this isn't

cross-selling. this is fraud. and then we discover way too little done to prevent it from continuing even after it was discovered. so, wells fargo employees continued for years to literally forge customers' signatures on documents to open up accounts, and in the case of carrie tolstedt bonuses between 2010 and 2015 were awarded because of strong cross-sell ratios. yet we know in some cases she was hitting numbers by these fraudulent accounts. let me begin. do you acknowledge that the employees who engaged in this activity were committing fraud? >> i'm not a criminal officer, and i don't know -- i'm not a lawyer. i know this.

they broke our code of ethics, they were dishonest, and we did everything we can to support law enforcement on these issues. >> i'm not a lawyer either. most adults are not in america. i think most people understand the meaning of the word fraud. fraud is a miss knowing -- fraud is a knowing concealmentation or of material fact made to induce another to act to his or her detriment. how does falsely signing a customer for an account they don't want, how does that not meet the definition? >> if that the definition -- i can tell you this. it's absolutely wrong. we found this out, we got rid of those people, and they have no place.

that behavior has no place in our culture. if that meets fraud, that means fraud. >> at what point did you notify law enforcement that you had probably criminal activity happening on a large scale? >> it was 1% of our people, senator. >> 5000 is a big number. >> it's bigger than my hometown. we also had a vast majority who did the right thing. let's talk about those. if it happened one time -- >> i'll have five minutes. mr. stumpf: we did everything -- >> did you refer to law enforcement? mr. stumpf: when it was required, we did everything according to the rules. >> when did you begin to disclose in sec filings that you had is potentially adverse set of circumstances that could have huge damage to your reputational value? mr. stumpf: i can't answer that, i would have to get to our legal team.

this was not -- i would have to get back to you on that. i don't know. >> we haven't been able to discover such a disclosure, and disclosure is required of material adverse circumstances. i don't know how this could not be deemed material. i think the market cap plus 9% over the last couple of weeks is pretty material. mr. stumpf: from a financial perspective, $2.6 million to much, $185 million was not deemed material. >> i get those dollar amounts may not qualify as material to a bank the size of wells fargo, but the reputational damage done to the bank clearly is material. and that has been manifested by effect onadverse

stock prices. when thousands of people conduct the same kind of fraudulent activity, it's a stretch to believe that every one of them independently conjured up this idea of how they would commit this fraud. isn't it very probable that there was some orchestration that happened at some level? i'm not suggesting it was you personally, but doesn't defy common sense to think there wasn't some orchestration of this? mr. stumpf: senator, i don't know how, what motivated or why people did this, but we did fire managers and managers of managers and an area president.

this 1% is way too many. i don't want to minimize it. i also want to make sure we recognize the vast majority that people did exactly the things they wanted them to do. we have put a number of other controls in place besides taking sales goals off a table. >> we don't open any deposit account that signature. while they are a couple of cases where 88. we're doing investigative shopping. one-houring them a notice by email or by letter to ensure that we know exactly and they know exactly what they open. >> it seemed like a duck and often long time to impose those sort of basic controls. as the time. thank you mr. chairman. since this came to like, you have said repeatedly, i am accountable.

but what have you done to hundreds of accountable? have you resigned as ceo of wells fargo? >> know i have not. >> at he returned one nickel of the millions of dollars you were paid while the scam has gone on. >> first of all, this was by 1% of our people. >> that was not my question. this is about responsibility. have you returned one nickel of the millions of dollars that you were paid by this scam going on. >> the board will take care of that. >> and he returned one nickel of the money you earned while the skin has gone on. >> the board will do that. >> i will take that as a no. thanks have you fired a single senior executive? people who about actually lead your community banking decisions or your compliance division. >> we have made a change in our

regional banks. regionalt asking about managers or branch managers i'm asking about if you have fired senior management. the people who actually led community banking division. this fraud.oversaw with the compliance division that was in charge of this. >> did you fire any of those people? no? ok, so you have a #, you haven't protected nickel of your personal earnings. you are a single senior executive. accountableion of is to push the blame to your low-level employees who don't have the money for a fancy pr firm to defend themselves, it is gutless leadership. in your time as chairman and ceo, wells has been famous for cross-selling. pushing existing customers to open more accounts. cross-selling is one of the main

reasons that wells has become the most valuable bank in the world. wells measures cross-selling by the number of different accounts the customer has with wells. other big banks averaged fewer than three accounts per customer. eightu set the target at accounts. every customer of wells should have eight accounts with the bank. that is not because you read the numbers, and found that the average customer needed a banking accounts, it is because eight rhymes with great. this was your rationale, right there in your 2010 annual report. cross-selling is not about helping customers get with a would have was, you to squeeze your employees are to make it happen. cross-selling is all about pumping up wells's start price -- stock price. >> no cross-selling is shorthand

for deepening relationships. >> are you say no? of 12re the transcripts quarterly earnings calls that 2012articipated in from -2014. the three full years in which we know this scam is going on. i would like to submit them for the record if i may mr. chairman. >> these are calls where you personally made your pitch to investors and analysts about why wells fargo is a great investment. in all 12 of these calls, you personally cited wells fargo's excess at cross-selling retail mainnts and one of the reasons to buy more stock in the company. let me read you a few quotes that you had. april, 2012, we grew our retail banking crossover ratio to a

x per household. a year later, april 2013, we achieved a record retail banking cross sell of 6.1 product's per household, april 2014, we achieved record retail banking cross of 6.17 products for household. up.ratio kept going up and it didn't matter whether customers uses those accounts or not, guess what, wall street loved it. here is just a sample of the report from top analysts in those years. all recommending that people by wells fargo stock in part because of the strong cross sell numbers. i would like to submit them for the record. thank you mr. chairman.

when investors saw good cross-selling numbers, they did. that was why the scam was going on. that was very good for you personally, wasn't mr. stump russian mark --? do you know how much your holdings gained while the scam is underway? a scam and cross sell is a way of deepening relationships with customers. >> mr. stump we have been through this. do not how much the belly of your stock went up while the scam was going on? >> all my compensation is an hour public account. >> do know how much it was? >> it was in the public file. >> you are right, i looked it up. while this scam was going on, you personally held an average of 6.7 5 million shares of wells stock. the share price during this time. which comesbout $30 $200 millionhan

gained. thanks in part to those cross-selling numbers that you'd talked about on every one of those calls. here is what really gets bad about this. if one of your tellers took a handful of $20 bills out of the cash drawer, they would probably be looking at criminal charges or theft. they could end up in prison, but you squeezed your employees to the breaking point so they would -- cheattomers customers and you could drive up the value of your stock and put hundreds of millions of dollars in your own pocket. and when it all blew up, you kept your job, you kept your multimillion dollar bonuses, you went on television and blamed thousands of $12 an hour employees who were trying to

meet cross sell quotas that made you rich. this is about accountability. you should resign, you should give back the money that you took while the scam was going on and you should be criminally investigated by both the department of justice and the security and exchange commission. this just isn't right. stand -- steals a handful of 20's but wall street executives who almost never hold themselves accountable. not now and not in 2008. not when they crushed the worldwide economy. the only way that wall street will change is if it has executives facing jail time when they reside over massive fraud. new laws to hold corporate executives personally accountable and we need top prosecutors's who have the courage to go after people at

the top. until then, it will be business as usual. a giant bank like wells fargo seems to be cheating as many customers, investors and employees as they possibly can. thank you mr. chairman. >> some tough questions from senator -- senator elizabeth warren grilling the former ceo fargo, that was in september. we are back with elizabeth my. she is a reporter with bloomberg. of of the keyme portions of the senate hearing. what happened immediately after the senate hearing and what happened right after the house hearing that happened a week later? >> she has been one of the most outspoken critics of this misconduct that occurred.

wells fargo's response to it as well. that is definitely just as you saw, a fiery exchange. she in particular continue to call for the ceo to resign and put it to be a criminal investigation. and other executives at the bank and involvement. immediately after that, as you just mentioned, the house held a hearing which was arguably more painful for john stumpf. there were more questions and quite frankly, the criticism could get personal at times. ceo johnr that, the stumpf this step down. he also did for the second hearing had returned, he had other executives at the bank returning quite a bit of their pay. of bank has taken a number steps. bank, they at the certainly have been trying really hard to reach out to customers, their own employees,

people on the hill. they want to answer questions and be more accessible and right the wrong so to speak. but this continues. people on both sides of the aisle have continued to call for investigations, there is a number of government agencies, including the sec who have been looking into various aspects of this. it definitely will continue, wells fargo continues to be in the hot seat, regulators across the board are under pressure. more so than even before. they want to demonstrate that they are on top of this. specifically what happened at wells fargo and other big banks. work fargo has a lot of and continues to do a lot of work to remedy that. >> you mentioned in reaching out to customers. what have they been doing to help affected customers? to help in place them i fired?

strategy that is there as well. looking for aspects of how they -- one issue is to help identify customers to see if their credit score had been affected. the bank is working with credit bureaus to identify customers who might have been affected and that theirck to see credit scores are not harmed. they are taking many steps to demonstrate and rebuild a trust. as well as actually fix the problems that exist in the bank. >> dimension regulators. what steps have been taking exactly? >> one of the regulators that

was part of the settlement in september has said that they are going to be looking into sales practices at other large banks. certainly the fed has indicated that they will be looking at compliance over all and how well banks are following through on what they should be doing. i think that we have already seen wells fargo recently, separately a report about whether an annual report said that all banks have to go through that shows whether or in they can withstand case of a bankruptcy -- that they heavy adequate tools to -- that they are up to the task. it shows you how wells fargo continues to be in the hot seat in washington, it is something that is very much on our regulators. >> do think that is going to continue? did some decision will be coming in, republicans are in control

of congress. you think that will continue or what can we see in terms of the laws? will they stand? >> there is a lot of uncertainty had a lot of unknowns. usecrats will continue to wells fargo at the example to illustrate why they think more consumer protection and other financial regulation is needed. it remains the question about whether or not this will be as elevated an issue as it would have been had democrats been in control of congress. you mentioned. frank. the truck administration. indicated that they would love to see changes to dodd frank. that will certainly, and it will certainly be there. whether or not you have additional hearings like what we of with the edits -- the ceo

wells fargo, it remains to be seen. >> you can't find her reporting at bloomberg.com. if you for joining us. find the hearings, both the house and senate dealing with wells fargo on our video library. visit c-span.org. >> the newcomer starts tuesday. what all the opening day events and activities on c-span. you are like from the u.s. capitol starting at 7:00 a.m. eastern, you will meet new representatives and hear from attorney members. the house gavels in afternoon. opening day business influence the election of the house speaker. his address to the whole house and rules for the new congress. one will in particular is getting attention, a proposal to five members who live stream video from the house floor. it is a response to the last democratic sit in that restrained by several democrats

on c-span2, our live coverage of the senate starts at noon eastern and includes the swearing-in of senators. opening day continues on c-span3 with law this coverage of the ceremony at 1:00 p.m. eastern. vice president joe biden the size of individual senators area at three, speaker pauline swears in members of the house. we will have a full replay of opening day at 8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span and c-span2. >> tonight on c-span, the annual banquet of the muslim public affairs council. speakers include congressman hobby of becerra, recently designated to be the next california attorney general. they all compare the idea of a muslim registry to u.s. government action against japanese-americans during world war ii.

>> when i heard that first trial balloon a few weeks ago from carl higbee, a surrogate from the truck administration, the truck transition team, i knew exactly what was going to be coming down he talked about a muslim registry which was a chilling echo for me because that in the 40's, they had a japanese-americans database. they were using the rape -- he's the registry but is the same thing as what came down on us. a database. they knew where we were, how many live in that household and what we did. after they had the database, they came down with a curfew. all japanese-americans have to be home by 7:00 p.m. and stay at

home until 6:00 a.m.. we were imprisoned at night in our homes. that ourdiscovered back accounts were frozen. becamee savings accessible. that was followed by the they came to take away. that must never happen again today. 9:00e annual banquet is at tonight on c-span. now a look back at the senate possible investigation on satellite practices. this is about 40 minutes. >> joining us now to talk about the senate hearing on cable and satellite billing problems is daniel frankel. he is the editor and digital

publishing head. aboutt to hear a problem cable and satellite those. >> you have to go back to the where you have a. of cable operators. they don't completely do that with each other. each have their own footprints and they act cooperatively instead of competitively. directve operators like and dish network before a cd universe and verizon fires and all of them got into it, the game of cable was just a no competition business by your cable operator. you pay for tv and you didn't have a lot of choices. of billing myriad

issues and customer service issues. over time, if you are in congress, you heard a lot of complaints. the industry has grown more competitive with the introduction of new technologies. justification of things like the internet. legacy reputation left over from this presentation your of business practice. >> the specific charges whether talking about that before combining about? >> they run the gamut. like serviceues protection plans that ostensibly protect things like the cabling in your house that are sometimes put on the go without the customer even knowing about it. they asked for five months. if you actually needed, the coverage is very very narrow. you are unlikely to have a problem of something five

covers. if you have any kind of pay-tv tovice, you are on the hook get the signal and use the service. that costs anywhere from five or $12 a month. then there are things like atv surcharge and a regional network sports surcharge. operators are sneaking in mysterious charges in the bills to repeat some of those. headline said comcast charter under fire. it reports catholic -- satellite cable customer service. >> if you have billing problem or technology problem, overcharge, cable companies are

notorious for putting you through the ringer and making you go through and was a frustration to fix the problem. these problems manifested an embarrassing viral video situations for companies like, asked. the sensors call this hearing about constituents a bunch of times. it got and. comcast try to address it. they pledged to spend $300 million on the technology and hiring employees and reorganizing call centers. it is still a challenge. >> else about the cable and satellite executives that testified at the hearing. >> is interested to know that the operators did not send their top-tier executives. executivesse are that don't appear at earnings calls or in front of wall street.

it is difficult to say what the outcome was. a lot of definitely important action on the judicial-regulatory front. >> to the lawmakers in washington -- digit the sense that lawmakers were just learning about this issue or learned something from the testimony of those executives that they didn't know before? >> i didn't. claire mccaskill have been petitioning for constituents to offer up their stories about the industry and the complaints years in advance, the sec was already addressing a key component of billing complaints which was the business. and class action suits to address pay-tv charges that were springing up.

i think a lot of these issues have been addressed and are being addressed. here is what we are going to do, we will show you somehow it from his at a hearing and come back and hear more from our guest daniel frankel. we will start here with the opening statement of senator claire mccaskill. >> thank you and i want to thank you for allowing me to pursue alone you and your staff this investigation. feel greatt we can just thisfact that investigation and hearing have cost of things to happen for consumers as it was to pay-tv. as you indicated, we had a change just from the investigation, but charter and time warner agreed to issue credit for customers overfill. are allowed

customers to cancel about an argument. we can claim some small victory as a result of these investigations. this is an important area for us to continue to look at. me when weng to begin asking for input, the volume and passion of input that we got from people about how they feel like they are mistreated by their pay-tv providers. for the first time this morning, companies's largest are testifying together about their customer service and billing practices. they are here because the subcommittee has brought you to investigate issues that affect the american people. i tried to have his hearing as the chairman of the subcommittee and i got no cooperation from any of these companies in connection with that hearing. munson 2014 -- in the later

made a promise i that i would not give up. and i'm grateful that we stand on this. the five companies provide video services to more than half of all american households. they enable or than 71 million subscribers and their families to receive news, entertainment and other programs. while we may love watching our shows, we don't love our cable and satellite bills. cable andem with the satellite companies. although the companies have made some gains in the past year, some remain among the most disliked industries in america. this year, a survey of consumers thed that more than 20% of people who i interacted with tv providers report having a bad experience during the previous six months. he highest level of any industry. begin than the

struct was with a personal experience. i called one of my providers and asked russians about my bill. in the process of that conversation, i learned that there was a $10 charge on my for a certain service that now was included in the basic package. well, so i paid $10 that i don't have to? any person on the and kind of said yes. you are paid $10 and you don't have to pay it. i said where you going to tell me this? and they said no you have to call in and ask. that is exactly the kind of stuff that it curious people. and asked,l call in at of the my bill today. based on the billing practices of the companies represented at this hearing. so, we have done a huge investigation and i have reviewed a lot of material and i decided toand

days ago, i would take another spin. thei know a lot, now i know difference. now i know what to say and have to say. so two days ago, i called one of website,ers and on my people can listen to the recording of this conversation. -- i don't think this is necessarily one company versus another, i'm not going to talk about what company it is and goal of the recording. -- not going to read here here's how the conversation went. the first part of it until they got me to that magic protection specialist. hello and the software calling, they are accurate? i'm claire mccaskill. can you spell it for me? i proceeded to spell it. i proceeded to give the representative my service address.

i proceeded to give her the name of the account as a that that was my husband's name. she asked me what my relationship to the account holder was an asset was my husband. then the woman said ok and how can i help today? except i would like to have you removed. there is a be on here and i don't know how he got on here for a protection plan. i don't recall find that or even asking about it. i like to have it removed. now she was to have my permission about my account and my active credit card to make sure i am the person that i say i am so she goes through what credit card i have on file then she says all right so you said you are seeing a charge for the protection plan to know what it is or. i said no take it off. >> all you like to take it off? asked yes. all right but you are aware that the protection plan covers a equipment upgrade every two years and you you will lose your equipment we will place for you know charge.

the women iy that have is my or yours? issues, sayare any for example, spills or the candlestick cut, then we will replace that for you. i said well let's just say that that if it is your equipment and something goes wrong with it, though you have to fix it anyway if i'm going to get the service i pay for? quest lets it is remote sales or say it is not working". i said what would that cost? what would it cost to get a fix if i didn't have the protection plan? the woman says will information on that is actually done in our equipment department. so i would like to connect to their for more information. >> i said no, i knew better. >> i don't do that. if you do that i have to wait until this gets out of story all

over me. i want to find that white you can take up the protection plan. i can that think that take up i just love you know the benefits you get the protection , i didea >> i understand i understand, i think it is a ripoff because you own all the equipment. you have to did fix it with us is equipment and you can't that i could get the service and i wouldn't pay for the service and i would definitely go to another provider. so i'm asking is would you just disconnected. i don't want to pay 799. i don't even know how got on my bill. i was in close attention was on put it on my bill. said all right. but if i actually have the protection plan take off, there will be a $10 disconnection fee. it would be a $10 disconnection fee for me to quit pay the seven not -- the 7.99. that is correct. and it is a one-time disconnection fee? and is one time.

pay for success russian mark clemente for -- -- what am i for paying for. i think it is time for me to switch carriers if you're going to charge you $10 to quit charging me for something i don't want anymore than i think it is time to switch carriers. >> basically that is just policy. ,o once i take up to $10 charge it will be automatically on your account. >> what you're are saying is if $7.99 then youl will charge me $10 to do that. you have no choice? i have no choice. you can't wait that? it is policy, that is correct. do you have discretion to give me a one-time credit of $10 to do away with that? i'm really sorry, i don't think you want to lose me as a customer do you over $10? well we do value your business but it is a policy here to once

i take it off there will be a $10 charge. there is nothing you can do about that. you do not have the option to it. she says no i do not. i said club blu could with the $10? she says i would have to give you to the retention specialist. and i'm not really sure how it works in that department. so then she switched me over to the retension specialist. now this is typical. it's typical. and more importantly, when she switched me to the retension specialist, i knew what to say. i knew to quit -- keep threatening i was leaving, keep threatening i was leaving, not give up. keep threatening i was leaving. and by the way, it was a long call. even when we edited to take out some of the things that are not personal, it was longer than 15 minutes, and at the end of the call, i managed to get the $7.99 off. i was told by the retention specialist i never should have been charged the $10, and i got so mad and escalated as this is

called in business that the retention specialist ended up giving me $10 off a month for 120 months. they were looking at at screen that told them all information about me including the fact that i'm a pretty good customer. my bill is pretty high. so i say this because i think this is what the industry maybe doesn't completely understand in terms of the anger. we found that customers being charged a host of fees not included in advertising pricing, some of which are for programming that used to be included in a customer's video package. we also found that just as many customers have long believed some of these fees, like hd and dvr service fees, aren't really a true reflection of the cost of the company of the service but rather are based on the revenue goals of the company. and the price of the customer is willing to stomach. in fact, some of the fees are charged to old customers while new customers get the same services free of charge. existing customers may not be

informed of this, and when they finally figure it out, they have to call and complain to get it taken off. we found that customers who called for help on their accounts face agents whose job it is not to just solve the customer's problems but in fact to sell them additional services. at one cable company, even when the customer called in to ask about why their bill was going up, the company told them, "the price adjustment brings with it an opportunity to upsell customers, and these agents are compensated in part on their ability to sell you more." then if the customer decides they want to cancel the service, they have to jump through more hoops. although all the companies here today allow people to sign up for service, or upgrade their service online, none of them provide customers options to cancel service online without speaking to a company representative. and if they call, they have to speak to salespeople like the one i spoke to this week who are trained to prevent the customers from cancelling and hopefully selling you more product. even when customers don't say --

say they don't want to have this discussion, the agents are expected to ask questions about why the customer is cancelling. customers trying to save money by lowering their level of service or often routed to the same agents which -- and should be prepared to negotiate aggressively. we found evidence that they train their agents to question customers' decision to drop channels and make offers in a top down fashion so the customer must repeatedly push and push and push to get the best deal. finally, we found that two of the companies have failed to provide notice -- provide their customers with notice that they have been overcharged or refunded of past charges. as the chairman pointed out, thousands of people in our states have been impacted by that. the time from missouri, time warner overbilled 4,332 customer -- missouri customers last year for a total of $44,152. and charter estimates that it annually overcharged approximately 5897 missouri

customers a total of $494,000 each year. i want to acknowledge the cooperation we received from all the companies represented before each year. us today as well as acknowledge the commitments they have made during the process of this investigation to improve customer service. unfortunately, our investigation suggests that there is a long way to go. and as did my conversation with one of my providers just two days ago. i thank the witnesses for their testimony and look forward to the opportunity to ask you questions. >> let me start, if i could by saying i really appreciate the testimony. we have learned a lot. we followed up in terms of competition. let me zero in on this issue of providing refunds to customers. i appreciate you being here. you are a private-sector individual now not in particular company but as a private citizen. yet, you were in charge during

this time period that we looked into, which was before time warner merged with charter and even going forward, some of the time warner practices that did not allow customers to get a full refund or charges they should not have entered. especially with equipment. my question to you would be, when you look at the data, 40,000 ohio customers in 2014 were charged $135 what they should not have been charged. they are getting no refunds for that.

they are getting no refunds for that. the first five months of this year, 11,000 customers are being overfunded $11,000. mistakes happen. talked about that. i checked i encountered at the first restore example of that -- at the grocery store example of that, they corrected it. they don't say we will charge you less next time you come in. they said we will do it. so it seems to me the company could have looked at these overcharges, and companies of represented here have. it was simply too provide them a refund for that, do you agree with that? >> i think i agree with that. but if given the opportunity to give a quick overview of the situation that we are discussing and how we handle credits and refunds. >> sure. >> i like to bring up something that started, which is that we are under charging customers significantly more than we are overcharging them. that is what we found and submitted as a part of a revenue assurance program. that is noteworthy in the context of this discussion. secondly, as a company, we provided over $150 million in credits a year to customers and allowed -- a lot of those are done in real time, and many of them are done when we know the origination of the air date and when we can quantify that

customers impacted. we do provide the exact amount of what the credit will be. several years ago, we build the revenue assurance program. this revenue assurance program was really designed to find these kinds of issues. over time we found these issues. what the revenue assurance program found as it looked to tie out whether equipment was being charged properly on the account, up to 37 million leases of equipment that we have active on the network, a very small fraction were being improperly built. on top of that, if you bring it down to the customer level, it was about 0.7% had a problem. so what i said earlier about this, we take it very seriously. it does not matter if it is 10,000 out of 2.5 million customers.

that 11,000 is what we have got to get right. rob portman: we are talking about 30,000 customers in ohio alone who were overcharged. 40,000. you're talking about many more thousands of that in states represented around this panel. it is easy to say, well, we under charge some people, we overcharged others, it all evens out. not for those 40,000 families. not for the family that is getting overcharged. what i'm suggesting is if you're overcharged and find out about it you ought to make them good. what i'm suggesting is -- that's what other businesses do. i use the example the checkout counter, but it's true in other businesses that you and i deal with every day. my question to you is simple. should you have, having

identified those people, simply provided them and still you're not doing it because what you're saying is you're going to give them a month credit where it could be years of having equipment that they were over charged for, isn't that accurate? >> it is not accurate to say that they have been overcharged for years. and i will just -- rob portman: how do you know that? >> if i could just take time to explain, in the revenue assurance program, we are looking for pieces of equipment, and we are trying to figure out if that ties to the actual equipment. because of the amount of volume equipment we are turning over whether upgrading modems, upgrading surcharge equipment or actually going all digital and launching dta's, there is a lot of transactional volume. what i have sold and what i have learned through the revenue program is that a mismatch is being driven when a customer is during this transition window of putting equipment on account and taking equipment off the account

and matching that up to the actual service charge. what we are doing is proactively every month running a report to find those discrepancies, based on what i've heard from our team is that i would venture to say that the majority of those are more recent and within the actual 30 to 45 day span. rob portman: the majority are more recent, but you don't know this hasn't been years. you are now doing this monthly analysis, which is a step forward, as i said. and i think this hearing has created improvements in customer service for you and charter and based on what others have said. it sounds like you be looked at your processes and come up with new suggestions. so that's positive. but still, you're not providing people the money that they're owed, even though you know they deserve a refund. >> thank you, mr. chairman. thank you for hosting this hearing. senator paul is mentioned as well, there is a context to this. as i mentioned and read through

the notes and received early this morning, late last night, one of my first thoughts on the section of not getting an answer on the first time you make a call in customer service, i wondered how many times are constituent service folks in our staff have tried to call v.a. or social security or multiple other agencies, and we will work for months to get an answer to a question that should be a straightforward issue. so there is a great deal and government right now that is lacking in customer service as well. i think that deserves it very public announcement. all of us have a long way to go dealing with cable customer service is the pot calling the kettle black as we work through this process. saying all of that, i have had people call my office that have been incredibly frustrated not getting attention with their cable provider. he reached a point where they called their cable provider so many times and got nonanswers

that the eventually called their senator, who we called someone that we knew, and they got attention. it was the oddest thing to think, why does it take an act of someone in congress to try to get attention on someone who has a billing program -- problem, especially for senior adult i call our office? -- that call our office? i understand there result of selling and work towards prophet, saying the people on the phone want to actually sell you a program is not shocking to me. it is not shocking to say there is gambling in casablanca, people are trying to stay in business and selling product. i do have a concern often when we deal with people that are senior adults that do not understand the billing, so the request i have is, whatever customer service upgrades you have made, and all of you have made comments about increased

training and capability, would you make sure you are paying attention to the fact that they are senior adults who are calling who have no idea about this billing practice and all of these packages, and they are being taken advantage of? that is something entire -- intolerable in this process. let me ask you something in this. somebody give me a guess. in the typical customers paying for cable services, what example is state, federal, and local taxes that they are paying when they pay that that monthly bill? can somebody give me a guess? i see lots of thinking. pen and paper is coming out. >> i can say that at a minimum, we, we charge, you know, what is

called a franchise fee, which is around 5% at a minimum. and other tax and fees on top of that. the reason why it might be difficult to give you those exact numbers, it varies by state sometimes. >> right. so on an average $100 bill, i think 5% is a minimum number, and then i think you could work off of that number depending on the market for fees and things like that. >> anybody have a different number besides 5%? >> i would guess at least 10%. >> ok. at least 10% of state, local and federal taxes, some sort of fee that is attached to it? i want to talk about an ongoing challenge that we have with packaging, and then i also want to get to streaming. we're going to have a conversation about some of the streaming services. i know you are experimenting a great deal right now. the cost of the actual content that's coming to you -- there's an ongoing conversation about that.

what i hear from cable providers, is do you have any idea it costs for xyz content coming in? where does that fit into the typical billing practice? you are trying to forecast five years from now when you talk about hardware, when you talk about fiber being put in the ground, when you talk about content, where does that rank? when you do your own analysis, where does content fit into that? >> i'll take that, senator. the content costs rising is a really significant issue. i don't think consumers truly understand the dynamic that's in place. we talked a lot about pricing, billing and fees. but you know, for us, eight out of the 11 years, the cost of the content has exceeded the pricing that we've passed on to the consumer. and so we're in a difficult position, you know, it's a very challenging thing to do to pass on pricing to a consumer.

no matter how you notify it, you know, it's going to be something that causes a negative reaction from customers. and from 2005 to 2015, content costs grew 195%. and to put that into perspective, it's growing at three times the rate of any other goods or services. and so, i think it is an issue. i think it's exacerbated by the fact that the agreements require you to carry a lot of channels that consumers don't have demand for. and both of those things i think create pressure and create a sort of a structure that's not in the best interest of the consumer. >> so going back to senator paul's conversation and senator portman and senator mccaskill have all raised this issue. the ongoing conversation in the country right now is about just streaming content rather than actually buying cable or satellite providers.

y'all are doing both. we're streaming content as a separate service with sling, is that correct? and then also through satellite. so tell me about modeling for that and work through providing competition in that area for another completely different delivery device, because the key thing for me is, 10 people get content they choose to get in the medium they choose to get it in. another completely different if they're ticked off about the latest $3 to $6 fee per room that they have to pay for it, they have some other option to go to it. >> the sling is our over the top product we have for streaming. sling is a little bit more modular in terms of what we can do to provide content. so where we have a bit more bundling with our traditional product, sling is more modular in that customers have more choice in terms of having a basic package that's affordable and then adding, you know, slimmer packages to it.

so it gives them more choice along the line, along those lines, and so does that answer your question? >> it starts that. this is a longer conversation that we can have that we don't have time for right now. i have to tell you, i along with every other american gets incredibly frustrated. senator mccaskill did a good job of outlining a basic call on customer care. all of us get ticked off at that, not only the length of time, but i am especially concerned about senior adults in my state. and the potential for them to be taken advantage of in this process based on the complication, but also the difficulty they have had even

seniors who have called me saying, i can't even disconnect my service or get an answer, and they just want to say no, but they're so incredibly kind and nice, they can't seem to turn things off. and so that has to be addressed in the days ahead and should be addressed in a way that actually honors the people that have been part of that service and paying customers all along. thank you. announcer 1: we are back with daniel frankel, after that senate hearing. what did satellite and cable companies pledge to do? what are they doing in the wake of not only that hearing but the senate investigations? >> comcast continued to push customer service initiatives. it pledged to to send -- spent $300 million improving customer service acumen, and it did improve on some customer service ranking. it has still suffered from bad rap, that use of egregious customer service and interactions with the public still leaking out. the industry -- announcer 1: what about the overages reported at that hearing? >> well, in washington, the attorney general bob ferguson lost a $100 million suit against comcast, alleging the service

protection plan was not properly advertised and violated state and simmer protection law. -- consumer protection law. they will decide if it will go forward. that is expected next week. this will be very costly to comcast, not only to itself an expensive one $100 million, but the attorney general is alleging 1.8 million violations of consumer protection law, you outline that, it comes to 3.6 billion dollars, and if it proves successful in washington state, other jurisdictions where comcast has gone over 20 other states, they can find themselves spending in other places. they have top counsel on that

one and defending itself vigorously. announcer 1: senator mccaskill is clearly passionate about this issue. any other plans for the 115th congress that you know of? >> idle think so. based on -- i don't think so. based on the change in governmental direction, i think the paid tv capital -- cable satellite issue has sort have been backward. all of the analysts who covered for wall street are fairly bullish on the sector. craig moffett, who really updated charter to neutral to buy, studying all of the regulation including title ii and the rate regulation that has regulated the future of these cable companies, has gone away. republican control the house and senate and executive branch. anything that sort of regulates

the telecom industry does not look like it will go forward anytime soon. announcer 1: go ahead and finish. david: tom wheeler, who is a democrat, he pushed a fairly aggressive regulatory agenda on the telecom industry, specifically cable on -- fueled by claire mccaskill's hearings and others in congress, other democrats in congress. he is stepping down in january. the fcc will add a republican majority and a much wider hand on the cable industry. announcer 1: that is the case, as a follower of the satellite industry, what is your advice if people see something on their bill and have a question about it, want to question the company, what should they do? david: first see if the company will cooperate. the media is very vigilant.

specifically the consumer media that covers technology about these companies. there has been a lot of attention paid to the way they treat customers. there is a lot of interest in terms of leadership and viewership about this issue. take your complaint to the local tv news station, write to the editor of a tech blog, let somebody know. news companies are very responsive to that and don't want to see anymore. write to your congressman. it does not hurt. announcer 1: and pierce cavil, our guest is daniel frankel. you can learn more at fierce cable.com. thank you for being with us. david: thank you. announcer 1: you can watch the entire hearing on cable and satellite billing practices on our website at c-span.org. announcer 2: the newly elected 115th congress comes in tuesday, january 3. watch our coverage on c-span. here is one of the new members

to be sworn in, republican -- we are live from the u.s. capitol, you will meet new representatives and hear from attorney members. the house gavels in at it. opening day business includes the election of the house theater, is addressed to the whole house and later a debate and vote on new rules from congress. one rule in particular is getting attention, a default to find members who lectured video from the house floor. it is in response to last summer's democratic said and was trained by several democrats. on c-span2, our live coverage starts. it includes the swearing-in of senators. opening day continues on c-span3 with like coverage of the ceremonial. besides over the

swearing-in of individual senators and at 3:00, paul swears and members of the house. we will have a full replay of opening day at 8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span and c-span2. >> tonight, on q&a, >> people were starving, he was having these fancy parties at the white house. harrison was the candidate for poor people and here was this rich man in washington swearing at the poor people. but hea very wealthy man was portrayed as the champion of the poor. women came to the parades and with handkerchiefs, and gave -- some give speeches. it was very shocking. they were criticized by the democrats who said this woman to the homemaking putting. >> rep. schiff:, the author of the book the carnival campaign.

tonight, 8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span q&a. 150 session of the of congress which gets underway tuesday. on today's washington journal, this is 45 minutes. back to a piece you wrote about a month and a half ago comparing senate democrats to visiting the cafeteria, trying to find something palatable. the headline, democrats plan to pick their battles with the donald trump. explain. guest: democrats are in a period of mourning given the elections and election of trump as they do not have either chamber. analogy.eria

let's say you're in a cafeteria a you are unhappy with a you do not want to eat something and maybe you can find a couple of things you want to choke down. will send the democratic strategy with the incoming trump administration. the republicans who will be calling the shots. democratsalk about about compromise, you hear about infrastructure is one thing. there might be a couple of other small things. will see strong democratic opposition right out of the gate. obamacare, unified democratic opposition to that. depending on what the infrastructure package looks like, that the be an area of some overlap. toocrats have been trying sort of do infrastructure spending for quite a long time and quite unsuccessfully. havees schumer and others said they are open to the concept. if you look at the early signals from the incoming

administration, they want to have some type of largely private-sector initiative around tax credits for creation of private sector jobs. i think there would be pushed back. returnsul ryan as he following the election returns back in november's from reporters about what to expect when the new congress convenes on tuesday. house speaker ryan: welcome to of a new- dawn republican party. a government focused on turning president-elect trump's victory into real progress for the american people. our team is excited and we cannot wait to get to work. we recognize that task ahead of us is enormous. if we put our country back on the right track, we have to be bold and goal bit. this country is expecting no less. in the days and weeks ahead, we will work closely with the president-elect and his transition team to put out our

ambitious plan. --t seems led by mike pence that team is led by mike pence and we are working hand in glove from the start and want to make sure we hit the ground running to deliver on the president's new agenda. better days lie ahead for our country. tot: he was reelected another term. how unified will the republican party be with the donald trump? guest: we will see less friction within the hubble the party right out of the get -- we will see less friction within the republican party right out of the gate. the most hard-core republicans, what they wanted for the past several years was a stronger, firmer stance and aggressive posturing toward president obama. they have a the same party. scissors some real with a both parties that we can see going forward.

one of the things that are trump made a hallmark was unlike many republicans he does not necessarily want to go after long-term and title programs. -- entitlement programs. that is something speak ryan has been aggressive about wanting to privatize elements of medicare. that could be one area of tension. in the democratic ranks, you have divisions on the house and senate side. on the senate, grassroots energy with democrats, the bernie .anders, elizabeth warren wing the 2010 map for senate democrats is brutal. there defending 20 56 including a bunch that trump won by 20 points or more, west virginia, .orth dakota, joe manchin they will be up for reelection. is trick for the democrats to find ways to keep their

pockets together when conservatives are sweating. host: two democrats that met with the donald trump for possible seats. senator john mccain who donald trump was critical of will be holding a hearing we will be covering this thursday. .he issue of cyber threats donald saying it is time to move past the sanctions put in place by president obama. this thursday, live on c-span3. streamed on the web at www.c-span.org and c-span radio. what can we expect? seeing is the are potential divisions among republicans you were mentionable for. donald trump has had a friend julie posture toward -- friendly posture toward russia. even congratulate russian president putin for not retaliating when obama announced sanctions and diplomatic penalties on russia.

on the other hand, you have a real defense and national security hawks on the republican side led by senator mccain. i think he is raring to go, look at out of the gate, the first week back, he wants to put a real spotlight on the russian meddling the russian involvement in our election. that is an immediate source of tension between some of the defense hawks and trump. it is now much love lost between john mccain and donald trump. we remember things like very early and donald trump's campaign and one of the things people thought would be fatal to his election that did not turn out to betrayal, if you recall in 2015 he questions and criticizing john mccain's record as a war hero. i do not the mccain has a great reason to shield donald trump on this issue. host: one of your areas of expertise is energy.

we will have a confirmation hearing for governor perry and all of president-elect trump's nominations. why did he want the job and white except the job? been: rick perry has interested in energy for a long time which makes a lot of this. he was a longtime governor of the state of texas. that is a dominant oil and natural gas producing state. there's a lot of wind power in texas. he may several successful efforts as governor to expand wind power there as well. running the energy department is a really, sort of, fascinating job. sure, it is involved with research and development programs on specific energy technologies. the bulk of the budget is on something that's on related to energy, which is maintaining emissions and nuclear stockpiles. is in them is in -- perry for an interesting confirmation

and will be asked about a series of nuclear security issues. a department he talked about cutting as a presidential candidate in 2008. guest: he had the famous moment momentople -- oops that people thought ended his candidacy. he cannot remember the energy department was the third one of them that he wanted to eliminate. one footnote is he is not the first likely energy secretary to be late in the department he tried to abolish. spencer abraham was george w. bush's first energy secretary. he cosponsor legislation that would have abolished the energy secretary. energy department. his legislation one not have done with all sectors, it was a euro credit realignment. rick perry gets a lot of attention. not the first energy secretary

to do so amazingly enough. host: let's get your calls. our guest is ben gorman at "national journey policy." line for-8000 is our democrats. we have new numbers today. don from houston, texas. caller: good morning. host: you are on the air. -- whatthe question is would our energy policies look like had we embraced more of tesla's ideas? tesla came here with ideas. host: thank you. guest: to bring it back to perry.

when you think about tesla motors. back in 2014, the wind is was governorship launched an aggressive effort to a tesla motors build their huge factory in texas. ultimately, nevada won the competition. if you were to look at some a brutal for-eight years pretty you have cabinet picks including rick perry whole denies climate change. -- who denies climate change. if they want to find more keenly signs, rick perry understands the job crating potential of energy sources of all kinds. he wanted the tesla he plant in his country but because he simply realized it is a lot of economic development and jobs. one of the things on the

electric vehicle front is as congress looks to do policy overhaul, what will be the fate of the test credit for purchasing electrical vehicles which the important right now. there is a credit for purchases that make the vehicles more attainable. if that were to fall victim for an overhaul, that is something the industry would feel punished by. host: sometimes we switch and numbers. the number for this segment is (202) 748-8000 for republicans. democrats.48-8001, we will keep the numbers on the line. sean, independent line. you are next. noticed we discuss politix ad nauseam, we dissect as if it had great importance.

i am a former investigative broadcast journalists whose my -- i find it a waste of time if we were such great detail a harry potter movie and i second get. it was seem to me it would have as much importance. is notrage individual taxed at all about what is happening. it is not real, whoever is in control of whatever is making the decisions. but we have such energy in this discussion as if it actually meant anything. it is an incredible waste of time. and very, very depressing. i am curious of your position, you as an expert in politics and discussing these matters in such a detail and death and expertise. -- depth and expertise. does it have anything to do with anybody?

would it not be more important if we put our energies elsewhere ? the political races are some sort of sporting event where the outcome is probably -- anyway, a very pleasant good morning and a happy new year. host: thank you for the call for the does it matter? would respectfully disagree with the caller a little bit. respectfullyould disagree with the caller a little bit. the political horserace journalism but one of the reasons is the policy stakes of these races, up and down the ballot are quite that it. we will see it very quickly out of the gate and the new congress. one of the things republicans what to do fairly quickly is move to repeal a number of obama administration's regulations. their ability to do it is compromised by the way the regulatory process works.

there will be some regulations and donna lake and the president's term using these privileged proof resolutions notr something that's been very done much. to get back to the caller's point, one of the things republicans might try to go after his department of labor's regulations on overtime. that is something that would because a for a lot of people. they are poised to go after environmental regulations. one of them could be some very recent finalize interior department regulations that deal with prevent country from dumping coal mining waste close to streams and appalachia and elsewhere. yes, back to the caller's point, a lot of attention to the horse race, but the policy stakes are very real for very large numbers of people. host: all this with a new

democratic leader, charles schumer. here's what he had to say. something none: of us expected, i suspected that is true for many of you in the press as well. it certainly do not go the way we democrats hoped. it was a tough night, no doubt about it. election likean this, you cannot flinch. you cannot ignore it. you need to look at it right in the eye and ask, why, analyze it and learn from it. one thing we know is that we heard the american people loud and clear. they fell to the government was not working for them. they fell to the economy was rigged against them in many places. and the government was so beholden to big money and special interests. there is a debate going on on whether we should be the party of the diverse, obama coalition

or the blue color american in the heartland. something we need to make a choice. and spend oliver energy focus on one group of americans or spend all of our energy focused on one group of americans or another. i believe there does not need to benefits -- division. there should not be a division. we should be the party that speaks to and work on behalf of all americans. and a bigger, bolder, sharper asked economic message -- sharper edged economic message for those struggling to make it to the middle class can make a there and deal with the unfairness and the american economic system. andill unite our caucus speak to the blue-collar worker ,n west virginia, in michigan as well as the people who live along the coasts. bolder, sharper,

the words from charles schumer as the democrats lost an election. as he takes over as leader on tuesday. guest: if you are the incoming leader, this need for a sharper message on the economy and the working class voters, the democrats will be tried to road test that message fairly quickly for a couple of different reasons. you will have a whole series of nomination hearings. we were talking about governor rick perry and also a whole series of other confirmation hearing scheduled for the opening weeks of this month. what i am hearing from democratic aides, they want to use the hearings took rate contrast between the wealth of the nominees, multiple billionaires. they will try to say, while trump campaigned on a message of appealing to working-class voters, democrats will try to

say his nominees are not sort of faithful to those messages or those goals. another thing after the date is that republicans are going to take the first steps to end obamacare. the way there are going to do do not because of they have enough power in the senate to beat back filibusters, they need to find a way to strip away striptop they need -- away. they need budget reconciliation, which means there will be budget resolutions introduced fairly quickly that essentially paved the way for future legislation down the line, but one of the fascinating things about budget resolutions, which are often have this burst of relevance, likely will seek soon is that they allow for a full series of boats on the senate floor and members can bring up essentially

what they want, often times, the senate floor is famously slow and difficult to get with you want up there. in this case, there are a lot of opportunities to test out the message and try to enforce the of party into taking a difficult vote. if you're senator schumer's plans for how democrats resent goals going forward, they will be able to go through this the confirmation hearings and all the upcoming budgets. host: tomorrow morning, "the washington journal" will focus on your message to washington as we begin a brand-new year and are start of the 115th congress gets underway wednesday morning, january 3, at 7:00 eastern time on c-span's "-- tuesday morning on c-span's "washington journal." live all day coverage on c-span and c-span2. stephanie come you have been patient from new jersey. democrat line. good morning. caller: good morning and happy new year. host: happy new year. as far as question is

congress goes, all the things they say they will to, which they did not do this past eight years, and why all of a sudden to do these things? they did not want to spend the money for infrastructure, this andother, and donald trump others say that the way to go is and heg industries in also said they will be making money off of this. ok? erssaid that the contract would pay -- contractors or pay taxes and then be taxed again, which means contractors will pay for this and so will taxpayers. host: based on stephanie's question, office of the debate she outlined. the point that stephanie

was making on calls is that for years, there have been great deals of discussions on the need to rebuild various types of like crumblings bridges, highways and airports but there are other infrastructure needs, as well. how to pay for it is going to be a topic of great debate, you can till with deficit spending come at a time when borrowing rates are really attractive or do do what the incoming president is looking to do, which is have the system or you provide incentives toward private industries. is in thee devil details. you hear that everyone is on board with the concept of infrastructure but how far they can go remains to be seen. not only you look at how it is paid for but what type of infrastructure, so one example democrats often want to seek the type of infrastructure that supports green or low

carbon development and they could be in any one of the infrastructure packages. and where democrats come around would depend on some extent to some competing wings of the party because senator of west virginia, schumer put him in the new democratic leadership team and he will have a voice around run the table, but senator bernie sanders also has a seat on the democratic leadership team on the chairman about reach , something to what extent that is within the democratic caucus, given who is up for reelection, will dictate where they come out. host: the headline that bernie sanders wants to help congress and bring some of the issues to the floor by having his base storm congress as the chair, the chairman of the outreach, national journal.com. beth from tennessee, republican line. good morning. caller: good morning.

i have some concerns and questions. on the federal reserve, can you hear me? host: we sure can. go ahead. caller: sorry about that. it concerns me that with donald trump, i think one of his main goals is to get control of moneys, or about the federal the federal bank, and my concern, especially on the , donald trump does slam the environmental protection agency, are we going to get more businesses by polluting air like china has? -- water systems westmark systems? will it placate the middle class in a way with infrastructure but have the main money people control pretty much everything. host: thank you. there,my wife is from

great place. i like it there. on theg with the points epa, that will be one of the flashpoints. pull betweensh and the parties regulations in general, to what extent are protections for clean air and clean water? how far should we go? whathould we dictate industries need to do? the president-elect and a lot of congressional republicans have for years wanting to be here back what president obama has done through climate change and other things. how far they can get with that will be one of the most interesting stories going forward. becauseon for that is republicans have this view that these regulations will be damaging to the economy, but how much that they can unwind the -- depends on factors

because we think of executive actions with a broad paintbrush, but what kind really matters. from executive order can be unwound quickly come up something general policy matter, like insurance department policy not giving any more: dining in western states, that would not be hard to unwind. what is known as formal notice in rulemakings, that is the bulk of the most aggressive policies of the obama administration carried out to the epa and you cannot just snap your fingers and take them away. you need careful documentation under the environmental procedure act, and it will be howly heavily litigated, so much of the kind of obama regulatory kind of prolific regulatory efforts and what we see can unwound will depend on different factors because it is a slow-moving thing. host: our guest with "national ," and fred is next on

essex, maryland, independent line. good morning and happy new year. caller: good morning, happy new year. my question -- can you hear me ok? host: yes. is related to germany and the changes going on in germany. it looks like germany is going to fill the void in leadership. i guess that is a controversial matter of leadership in general, , thatwas just wondering is my one question about germany . my other question is about i think the biggest events in the last year was a discovery by the chinese scientists and scientists that the bloomberg school medicine at johns hopkins, that it is much more sensitive to pollutants than two and these thought scientists are just coming out and saying point-blank that the regulations are not adequate.

apparently, the mass media has not read this or discovered this. inhink it needs to begin publicity and have some bearing on our energy policy. host: thank you. on both points, a response? guest: sure. on the second one, i'm not familiar with the research fred was referring to, but it does get to the kind of the debate on regulation, which is how much should the federal government be levelsng to the types of of different a mission that can happen in what will be the economic effects of that? defenders of the epa will say, ourave been tightening pollution standards and it has not hindered or humpback economy or growth. that said, they drill down into specific sectors and it could be more pronounced. donald trump talks about the coal industry and a qs president

obama waging a war on coal. it is accurate to say epa regulations to some extent had an effect on coal in the electricity sector, but the dominant and strongest reason that coal has been declining for years now is because of the rise of relatively cheap and natural gas developed through fracking techniques, circuit court of the difficulties donald trump might have is if the sort of tries to andg back the coal industry simultaneously try to provide the natural gas industry with deregulations, those do not sing in harmony. but is good for natural gas is not good for cold. on germany, i am not sure what the caller was referring to. germany has had an aggressive program on conditioning the energy sector, but -- host: a new year, a new congress . we welcome our listeners on c-span radio, check out our free radio app and serious xm, live

every sunday morning on the potus channel, 124. kim from pittsburgh, pennsylvania, republican line come you are next. caller: good morning. this global warming, this debate ist saying the over. we never had a debate. these global warming people are going to lose. i would like to ask you a question and i went to ask you and i'll tell you why i am asking the question. what is the diameter of the earth? me?you tell host: wehost: have no idea, so why do you ask? statement gore made a that it is one billion degrees in the middle of the art. [indiscernible] in this global warming nonsense, there has never been a debate. produce they are being paid by the government. host: thank you. guest: certainly, i guess i would disagree with the caller

to some extent. if you look at the overwhelming opinion of the scientific community, whether we talk about federally funded science or science conducted within preparation like exxon mobil, which you can get to in a moment, the dominant scientific view is the earth is heating up and warming at this point since the middle of the last century has been human activities, notably burning of fossil fuel and deforestation and other types of industries. heating up at what rate? guest: the last several years, i think 15 of the 16 hottest years on record have occurred during this century. heating up at what rate? guest:the one that was not was , so it has been very pronounced. what is less concern is how much warning we are in for. climate of the paris change and the goal of a lot of experts is to hold off some of the most dangerous forecasted

effects of global climate change. you would not want to see global temperatures rise by more than two degrees celsius over their preindustrial levels. we are about halfway there right now. if we did nothing to abate emission, you could see projections that go far higher than that. how much you can hold lower than that is difficult to say. is theer question of global warming, is it human induced, and will it have a dangers affect on the road and do we see some of those effects come into being already? i don't think there is a huge amount of this paper, but the economic effects of u.s. policy and how far we should go is something that is subject of massive debate and a lot of that plays out quickly in congress. there will be a lot of focus on repealing the affordable care act and that will be a source of contention and they have one of the chance to pay back what they see as overly aggressive obama administration and regulations.

hardest tickethe in the house, giving that the outgoing ceo of exxon mobil is the nominee for secretary of state. the biggest source of questioning for him at the senate foreign relations committee is quite certain will be his views about russia, gigantic explorer -- expiration deals in russia, and rex tillerson was awarded a medal by the russians, so i think what the senators will be looking for is on both sides of the i/o is some type of signal from rex tillerson and that he is willing to adopt a somewhat aggressive posture toward russia or at least they will be looking for him to sort of not just be buddy-buddy with vladimir putin -- host: i think i'm correct in saying the former senator tower forlast time nominee president elect herbert walker bush, designated him as treasury secretary and it was scuttled by

the senate. to think >>'s tillerson -- see think rex tillerson could face the same or he will be confirmed? guest: if i had to guess, and everyone who guesses is wrong, but if i had to guess, he will be confirmed. i would imagine democrats to be fairly united against him, so you only need three republicans to go against him. john mccain, lindsey graham, marco rubio and some of the other hawks in the senate will look for some fairly strong reassurance that he is committed so if thatf solid goal can be filled, it is hard for me to imagine them floating him down. there was one nominee that will face the most difficult road and it would be tillerson and to bring that back around to the climate issue, i think we will see a lot of questions toward him or some about his own company's history of in the past funding organizations and think tanks that sort of tried to show doubt about the reality of climate change, but that said, i think the greatest number of

questions will be about his connections and experience with russia as the ceo of exxon. host: it begins tuesday morning with the swearing in of the 115th congress, live on c-span2, asked the president of the senate, vice president joe biden swears in new senators, an interesting thing to watch. we stream it on the website. we will be your place for all of the confirmation hearings, the president-elect nominees for cabinet positions, you can check out the full schedule as the hearings continue into february orthe website at c-span.org that's go to janice in east st. louis, illinois, democrat line. good morning. caller: how are you? host: we are fine, good morning. caller: good. you know i called -- it was the and he wasn earlier telling the geither what he was saying wasn't really important or doing any good -- i apologize for him because what that guy is doing is very important.

again to what i was about to say can you hear me? host: go ahead. caller: my phone was cutting out. all those people will be nominated, every last one of them, will be sworn in. every last one will get the job everyone -- job. everyone except that the president. the first time after he swears in an officially got that seats, the first [indiscernible] will be the one to impeach us, and i'm talking about the republicans. guest: i agree with janice insofar that she mentioned everyone of the pixel be confirmed. i think that would be -- if i had to bet -- that would be my suspicion. we talked about difficult to tillerson my face, but in 2013, the democrats in the senate were

forced to able change that prevents filibuster some cabinet nominees. while i think the democrats will try to exact the political crisis against the current administration, [indiscernible] i think it would take some sort of really damaging or major revelation from these hearings that has not come out yet. host: two democrats regret that moved by harry reid? guest: i think they viewed it as necessary given the slow pace of executive appointments. i think they did say that eventually, the she would be on the other foot, and guess what? it is on the other foot. henderson, north carolina, republican line. good one. caller: i would like to ask a question to the gentleman. i really do not trust the media and he is using a lot of democrat focused words, such as da,atizing health care, the

all these other organizations. no, i think donald trump, his message then he put out is he wants to personalize, , the taxze the v.a. code a little fairer, personalize health care and out like to know what he thinks about that. i think that is the brother -- that is the better word to what mr. trump has put out in his speeches. host: thank you. guest: i think with the term privatize, i was referring to past her puzzles by congressional republicans on have it be something about the voucher program. a lot of that will be hashed out in the coming months in the .attle over obamacare certainly, republicans feel the health insurance law is heavy on mandates and heavy on taxes and has not been that good for

people, even though on paper, it has increased the number of people who have insurance. of the thingsne the caller gets to you is what precisely they want to replace it with this something that is more big. -- more vague. people gained insurance through and it will be a runway, not losing the insurance right away but as digitally at the law, what are the parameters of the replacement what they look like is unclear but they andbuying themselves time they have to work on that replacement legislation in fairly short order but they have to give themselves plenty of time to seek an early transition, undercutting the main parts of obamacare. democrats of do their darndest not to let that happen. obama is going to

capitol hill on wednesday to meet with democrats to talk about how they can try to make the defense of that law as robust as possible against this incoming onslaught. host: i went to share this tweet from donald trump yesterday. he talked about political enemies -- happy new year to all, including my many enemies and those who have fought me and lost so badly, they just do not know what to do. love? -- love! guest: [laughter] beloved part notwithstanding, a fairly aggressive treat. -- tweet. something that will give congress harper and is anything -- giverump -- anytime congress a hard time is anytime donald trump says something over twitter, they are asked to respond and that happens frequently. i would be curious to hear what the next thing he tells people or how congressional republicans will respond. from let's go to lee and

austin, texas. democrat line. good morning. caller: good morning, happy new year. thank you for the show, i appreciate all the information i get. i worked for the army my entire life. when regulations are put in place, they are reviewed. and all of the experts are placeed and they are in for our safety, and it concerns me that mr. president-elect trump -- had a hard time getting that out -- it concerns me that he is so blase about the work that went into the regulation that was put in place to begin with. host: thank you. guest: i think that gets to the .arameters of the debate

i think what you will hear, congressional republicans are saying, and incoming president saying, something to counter that would be the argument that companies when they had -- if there are too many requirements put on them, it would include safety and environmental protection that they would need to free their hands to try and find the more flexibility to it. on way to reach we will see a couple of measures to repeal the obamacare legislation. i think they will try for something [indiscernible] which is essentially giving congress much more sway over whether regulatory agencies go forward. there is simply not 60 votes in the senate, but the fact that it comes up quickly does show that russia andabout

obamacare, and tax overhaul, regulations and paring back to within thestate is priority of the administration and incoming republican congress. , george december 2008 w. bush said he would make room for barack obama, and he essentially did that. based on what we have seen in this transition over the last 1.5 months, what will do think we will see from president obama when he leaves the stage but stays in washington and working with his foundation in chicago and new york? guest: i think he will give the incoming president some deference. advocate for ex presidents going back for a long time is that they do not weigh in on the news of the day. president obama gave an interview on dick black survives podcast and obama addressed the

question head-on and he said there is clearly a need and you would like to encourage new voices within the democratic if they arend out talking all the time and it is hard to develop. he also made the point that when he sees foundational principles something to that effect, he threatened they might speak out, so i don't think we will hear a lot from president obama. i think he might speak a little georgee frequently and w. bush has been very off the states, but to say that he has been more active in that, i don't think we will hear obama talking about the new cycle of the day. host: amy joins us from south carolina. you are calling on the republican line. good morning. caller: good morning. happy new year to you all. i wanted to make a comment on global warming and the drama

.ith the media i think certain people that believe that people are so powerful they can change the think that from what i have read, you have linda shifts, plates aat are shifting, we have change in our weather. host: thanks for the call. this is an area you focus on. guest: i think it is true that there are immensely powerful national phenomenon that happened with her without human induced carbon commissions or with without global warming. i think the concern is not so much that global warning or human induced climate change

creates strong storms but creates a signal boost, sue can have certain climactic effects that are quite dangerous and damaging in long-term drought, terrible wildfires, and huge storms, that it is not just [indiscernible] it is not that these things do not happen as a global warming, it is that when you have so much more carbon in the atmosphere, it is a signal booster to things that are already dangerous and can be made more dangerous by add-on effects of global warming. from chicago, democrat line. how are you doing this morning? host: we are fine. caller: before you cut me off, this is to the host and gentlemen, can you go in your computer or laptop and pull up all the businesses that donald trump has outsourced to mexico and whatever? i was just looking at cnn and he was saying he will put a 35% tax

on exports, so if that is the case, and of the people who voted to him, if you will put up time from other people shipping jobs out of the united states, is he going to do the same thing for his is this? he is making suits and everything all over it world, and everything, including the host of all of these, you do not bring up stuff like that great when president obama was in the white house, everything that man did, including the color suit he wore, you had something on your station pertaining to that. why is it that people are not concerned about this man just putting some of everything in his? -- in his cabinet? he has some of everything, and he claims he will be a people president, but he has nothing but millionaires and billionaires surrounding him. "the washington post" did a point on your point

about the number of jobs he might have lost in the u.s. trump profiting from foreign laborers, and look at his signature collection made in china and bangladesh and other foreign countries. guest: i do not want to speak for the president-elect, but i think what he would say with his businesses and with a sort of behavior under the tax code is he has done what is legal and allowed and when he is now seeking to do is rewrite those rules to the economy that a much more protected of jobs in the u.s. we saw with the deal with indiana manufacturer caria carrier, i believe it is 700 to 1000 jobs here, how much trump doesn't that going forward is something to watch. handleifficult to one-off deals, everything will be manufactured, but he has threatened to impose heavy tariffs on companies that he feels are not behaving properly

toward the u.s. economy. whether or not he goes through with that, we see push back. there are some things where we see the chamber of commerce and butony in the same sheet, there are concerns about hesitations about what he might do. host: you congress on tuesday, august 2 the ceremonious aspects? guest: there will be a lot of pomp and circumstance in the coming days. we have the swearing-in tomorrow and we have the president here on wednesday to meet with democrats later in the week. we will hear about the electoral college and where there are not that is the house and senate on friday in a joint session with formal accountings of electoral votes. are the kind of events happening next week and the hearing that will happen on thursday about russian cyber attacks, so we will have democrats in the senate and the

believe they can get to work on these resolutions that set the stage to unwind obamacare, so it will be an incredibly busy and fascinating week. host: b washington journal, live every day with news and policy issues that impact you. monday morning, we are taking your calls and emails and treats, and we will also speak with columnists and radio show hosts from around the country to share thoughts on what leaders in washington should focus on in the year ahead. you should watch c-span's washington journal, live at 7:00 a.m. eastern monday morning and joined the discussion. c-span's freshman interview with representative tom -- representative elect tom garrett. he will represent virginia's fifth district.

>> representative elect tom garrett, republican representing virginia's fifth district. tell us about your background. >> i grew up in rural central virginia and paid for college using the military rotc scholarship and served for about six years in the army and then went to graduate school and spent my time following graduate school as a prosecutor and then had the opportunity to serve as my local elected prosecutor and then ultimately in the virginia senate and here we are. got two wonderful daughters and a great wife and just blessed to have the opportunity to serve. >> how many years in the virginia senate? >> five. >> what would you say you accomplished? >> it's funny and think it's a good lesson to bring in here, and that is that we came in as a fiscal belt tightener, you know, sort of spending funds that are appropriate for each level of government but we left and if i had to tag a legacy, i'd say k-12 reform and having to stand up in some areas where perhaps some conservatives might not

have and serve a decent libertarian bent to repeal the crime against nature laws in virginia where the state law told adults of consenting age what they could or could not do in their bedrooms. with the k-12 reform things, sometimes you come with a passion and sometimes your passion finds you and something where we identified we thought shortcomings in the system, we have wonderful public schools in virginia but shouldn't compare them to the other 49 states but comparing them to the world. for the fifth best in the nation is great but not where we want to be so you identify the problems as they present themselves and figure out a good way to tackle them within the appropriate role of government in whatever level you're working at. >> why did you decide to run for a house seat? >> ultimately the odds of being born in the united states 1-26 plus or minus and the odds of being born in the united states to a two-parent household with some discipline and encouragement, i've been very, very, very lucky.

as a prosecutor, i stand across s usually-- the dai from a young man no different from me but had different influences early in life so i feel like from whom much is given or to whom much given, much is expected sort of if i feel like i'm holding strong opinions and am right on issues and can do something to influence the issues to sort of hand that mantel to the quality of opportunity to the young people moving forward i probably would be remiss not for try. so there it is, and you're perpetually humbled in the fifth district of virginia because jefferson lived there, there's the father of the declaration and then madison was the first congressman so there's the constitution and john marshall retired there, patrick henry, barbara johns started the civil rights movement in prince edward county in 1952. so great appreciation for the wonderful work done by people like that who preceded those who wanted to perpetuate that for the future. >> where did you grow up and

what were your influencers? >> i grew up in loosea county virginia which ironically enough is in the seventh district. i loved history and studied history in college. my father, the decisions he made, my mom was diagnosed early on in my life with what was thought to be terminal cancer before the internet and my father would stay awake dialing phone number after phone number, the mayo clinic or johns hopkins wouldn't take her, u.v.a. wouldn't take her and my dad doggedly pursued finding a place to treat my mother and she celebrated her 73rd birthday, ironically we lost my dad a few years back but that sort of determination and persistence and then when you decide something's right, that the right thing to do is x, y, off -- or z, then dam the torpedoes and full speed ahead in doing it. my first cousin ironically i think turned down baseball scholarships to go in the marine

corps and people like like that had those opportunities and delayed the opportunities to serve something bigger than themselves, then when i sit in the military and looking around, again, with the women and men with whom i served, anybody who serves, you had brian mast on earlier, i agree really there's something in their lives bigger than them and worth sacrificing for and to be around men and women like that and then when you're having a bad day you think everything in perspective, it's not so bad, so those were things that sort of shaped who i am and who i want to be, right? i tell my children it's not about who you are but who you want to be. you're not who you want to be yet but if you are, you're probably ready to go. so if you identify who you want to be and take steps to be that person, you should be able to look in the mirror and be happy. >> any piece of advice that stands out to you from your dad over the years that you sort of carry with you? >> just, you know, this may not be politically correct but i

have no -- it's not that i inherited it from my father, i have no admiration or tolerance for somebody who quits. if what you're doing is right and doing it for the right reasons and you get knocked down, so what? the successful woman or man is the one who has gotten up one more time than they've been knocked down and my dad was persistent and dogged and tenacious and those are the sorts of things -- if you think of dr. martin luther king and what he went through and the people whose names we don't know went through, you just keep coming back and legislatively in the statehouse of virginia, we did that with some bills where i knew what was going to happen but we moved the ball further each time around and that's a good character trait. >> what will you be dogged about here in washington? >> we ran on a student security sort of proposal that would allow young people with student loan debt to choose to defer to receive social security benefits to exchange forgiveness of

student loan debt and would make our social security promise to our seniors solvent for perpetuity and allow young people if they chose to and only if they chose to, to help erase some of that student loan debt. it's a winner all around because you've taken an entire generation out of the producing class, you don't start a small business if you've got student loan debt and you don't buy a car or get married to paraphrase ms. clinton, you don't move out of mom's basement and don't mean it in a pejorative sense and that innovative thinking, i'm looking forward to have the opportunity to fight people across party lines. it doesn't make anybody do anything, right? you choose to enter the program. it doesn't change the benefits my mother receives, which you don't break that promise you made yesterday, you change maybe the setup for tomorrow but that sort of thing, to know when it's over with we made a mark and moved the needle. nobody's going to remember me but they'll remember what we did while we were here and that's what matters.

>> appreciate your time. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2017] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] announcer: the new congress starts tuesday, watch the opening day event and activities on c-span. we are live from the u.s. capitol starting at 7:00 a.m. eastern. you'll meet new representatives and hear from returning members. gavel's in at noon. opening day business includes the election of the house speaker, his address to the whole house and debate and a vote on rules for the new congress. one rule in particular is getting attention, a proposal to find members who live stream video from the house floor, in response to last summer's democratic sit-in, streamed by several democrats. on c-span2 the live coverage of the senate starts at noon eastern and includes the swearing in of senators. opening day continues on c-span3. with live coverage of the

ceremonial swearing-in of members of congress. at 1:00 p.m. eastern, vice president joe biden presides over the swearing in of individual senators. 3:00, representative paul ryan swears in members of the house. >> the presidential inauguration of donald is friday, january 20. c-span will have live coverage of all the days events and ceremonies. andh live on c-span c-span.org, and listen live on the free c-span radio at -- app. >> this week on "newsmakers," craig fugate.

the administrator of the federal emergency management agency. thank you for being here to talk about the last eight years heading the agency and the state of federal emergency management. also in studio with us is reid wilson of the national correspondent for the hill newspaper along with the energy and environmental reporter with the national journal. i wanted to ask about the evolution of disaster response and preparedness overtime. let's say hurricane sandy happened today. how would the federal response be different than clutter years -- then it was four years ago, both in terms of the immediate response and how flood insurance is dealt with? >> we were able to add to the team, it was really the energy sector. historically, energy has been one of the things at the local and state level that has coordination. as sandy demonstrated, when you are talking about local states from the mid atlantic the densely populated areas, you

need to be able to give to national utilities and their association that focal point. that is one thing we did differently that the department of energy has codified into their function. we have done a total revamp of the program. two things that stood out was the lack of trained people to go into the program and administer that, and a lack of focus on customer service. two things that we have taken a lot of work in the last four years, lessons we have learned to apply to the most recent floods in louisiana and matthew, to focus on the customer, the service of the products, and giving the adjusters the -- to -- trained to do the policies. >> has the agency changed over the last eight years? there was low morale after hurricane katrina. >> they started the process with

the post-katrina management. when we came into office, they had started to begin the implementation of that. i saw some areas we could improve upon. when you have large scale events and no formal request, if we think it is going to be declared we can keep moving. that was our shift to start putting more emphasis on if we think something bad has happened we respond. that if the state and local government. the next part of that response needs to be in motion. we can always turn things off and we don't get time back. that was putting an emphasis on time. do not wait until you have all the information and facts.