live coverage on the c-span networks. and president trump heads to to ville this afternoon speak at the farm bureau annual convention. also, expected to join the tennessee senator bob corker. we take you to nashville live at today.m. eastern before that, though, live at noon eastern time, a discussion bout countering terrorist recruitment and the role that cities around the world can play with remarks by state department advisor michael duffin and on capitol hill, the house starts 115th ond session of the congress today. the agenda this week includes consideration of a resolution protests in he iran. and on thursday, reauthorizing fisa that expires january 19th which is the day that the latest extension expires. the senate rurndz at 3:00 p.m. eastern to debate a judicial nomination. ou can follow the house live here on c-span and the senate live on c-span 2.

>> "newsmakers" is next with democratic senator chris van hollen of maryland. after that, we'll show you the swearing in of senators doug jones and tina smith this past week. followed by senate leaders mitch mcconnell and charles schumer discussing the congressional agenda. >> you guys have narrowed the advantage in the senate this week. it looks like there are some ther interesting senate races, some retirements. e're less than a year from the midterms. will the democrats win the majority back in the senate this november? >> this was a great week for the for alabama and for the country with the swearing-in of jones who ran a campaign based on kitchen table issues so not going to make any predictions about what will 2018.n in november, what i can say is all the signs you have a very

nergized democratic base plus lots of independent voters who are crossing over to support democrats as they did with doug of disaffected republicans and i believe that the republicans in congress have taken are actually going to make things a republicansor those including the passage of this tax bill which is a total while y to corporations millions of middle class taxpayers are going to see their taxes go up. on in these ocus campaigns and things are headed in the right direction. >> senator, when you are making priorities, is your priority defending these 10 democratic senators that are up for re-election in these trump states? you going to go on offense and win states like rizona, texas and tennessee where you have all these

pickups? both.'re going to do reason they've been successful in political successful states focused on the people in their states. that's been their north star. to help k very hard them. most of them, it's them knowing what to do in their states. and we'll look for every pickup opportunity that are out there. here are a number of pickup opportunities. and this is also cycle where we've seen as in the case of alabama where no state is safe for a republican senator. >> so following up on that, where do you think you can expand the map beyond the races that have already started merging and establishing? >> look, there are 33 senators time.is 25 of them are democratic incumbent senators so we've obviously got to work hard to they continue to succeed. and then there are eight republican seats.

alabama, of course, was a seat that we recently picked up. and all of those eight are going to be in play. we have candidates today and every one of those eight seats with the exception of mississippi which we're talking to some very strong candidates. all of them are strong potential states. now, having said that, obviously, state of nevada is a big pickup opportunity for the democrats. arizona, very much in play. but i wouldn't discount any other states. we have really good candidates. want.l of they a former two-time governor of tennessee, of course, running there. always governed, based on a pragmatic governing approach. trying to address issues that were important to people regardless of party. like you said, you have these 10 states where you're defending won in 2016. which one of these states is the one that keeps you up at night? what's the one state you're most concerned about?

>> i'm not going to get into ranking the states here today. we take nothing for granted. more importantly, our senators take nothing for granted. in these states. elected y they've been and they are very focused on trying to make sure that they interests of the constituents in their states. sometimes that means fighting with president trump. for example, when it's a big tax giveaway to corporations that's for by people in their states. sometimes it will be working with president trump. again, their goal is to make sure that they have as their top priority, the people in their state. so there are lots of competitive states out there right now. but we also have incumbents who are really strong positioned. >> in some of these state, we're seeing democratic primaries unfolding. the biggest one is california. could also be general election with two democrats. there are some other states that we're seeing incumbents get primary challenges.

how complicated does it make your task this year as you look at some of these merging democratic primaries? sen. chris van hollen: the story of this election is how few democratic primaries we have, at least on the senate side. i expect dianne feinstein will do very well in california. expect that senator dianne feinstein will do very well in california. but in other states, we have really, very few primaries whereas on the republican side, you have lots of very bitter primaries in a whole range of states. partly caused by the fact that the republicans were unable to so uit their top contenders you have very tough fights among the republican primary contestants. california a bit on there, in recent years, we've seen some cases where the republican campaign committee has had to spend money in primaries to help

protect their incumbents. do you anticipate where they need to go into california, expensive state to help out senator feinstein? sen. chris van hollen: we strongly support senator feinstein but we also believe she's really strong position both in terms of her record and fighting for the people of california. and the campaign that she will run. so, i don't anticipate having to invest any funds in the state of california. >> zooming out a bit talking about the messaging, a lot of democratic activists and some lawmakers have expressed some serious concerns about the president to the point where they have said there should be a move to impeach president trump. who questions. one, do you think president trump to be impeached, do you think congress should be moving in that direction and what sort of messaging mean on the campaign trail, especially in some of these red state where is president trump is very popular?

sen. chris van hollen: so i think the focus for people who want to make sure that we uphold -- hold donald trump accountable is to win the 2018 election in the house and in the senate. and that should be our focus. and that means fighting on these issues that are important to people in all these states. so we saw the country rally in opposition in the effort to eliminate the affordable care act which meant millions of americans losing access to the affordable care act. you saw them rallying to fight that. rural hospitals were very longly opposed to that effort. that was the first signal that donald trump and republicans weren't really out there for the forgotten americans. in fact, they were targeting forgotten americans. and this tax bill, you tell me the big corporations are the real forgotten americans. they do very well in the united states congress and now they have a big tax windfall. millions of folks in the middle will see their taxes go up. foreign stock holders in 2019

are going to see a $48 billion windfall. foreign stock holders. how is that america first? so there's a whole lot here to talk about on the issues that people care about and that should be our focus. >> does it make it harder than some of your democratic colleagues and activists when they're talking about impeachment? sen. chris van hollen: i don't think any of our senators or senate candidates are focused on impeachment. they're focused on the kitchen table issues. that's what doug jones did in alabama. he really focused on issues that people care about when it comes to income security, job opportunities, pay, pensions. those were the issues in his campaign and on election night, he talked about protection the children's health insurance program. those are the kinds of priorities that folks will be focused on. week, it was reported that a

psychiatrist that traveled down from connecticut to d.c. she worked at yale to talk to members of the senate and members of congress about president trump's mental health. i think some more questions about that came out after his tweet regarding the button in comparing his button to kim jong-un's in north korea. about that came out after his is that something that you have any concerns about and something that you think that is the type of thing that could potentially lead to impeachment? sen. chris van hollen: i have said he is unfit in my opinion. that is why it is very important that people hold him accountable. people in red state, blue state, purple states want members of the senate who are going to hold the president accountable. and again, that means fighting the president where the policies that he proposed are bad for their states. where he proposes policies that are good for their states our members have been willing to work. we've been willing to work on a

bipartisan basis. we laid out early on this tax debate a number of principles. if you're going to have a middle class tax cut, everybody should have a tax cut and nobody should see their taxes go up. we said that folks at the very top should not get a big tax break. in fact, steve mnuchin, the secretary treasury said that folks at the top, we're not going to get a tax break. well, at the end of the day, folks get an average annual tax break of $70,000 a year while corporations get a permanent tax cut. so we're going to be very focused on those kind of issues and our members have been always willing to work on a bipartisan basis when it's in the interest of people in their state. >> some of your republican colleagues were over at the white house today to talk to the president. about immigration which is obviously at the center of the policy debate going on in congress right now.

would you be willing to vote for another spending bill if it comes up later this month for around january 19 if a daca solution is either not included in that bill or has not been resolved before that time? sen. chris van hollen: so there are a whole lot of items that we need to resolve before january 19. we need to first of all, to make the adequate investments in our country, in our national defense, yes. but also in our kids' education. right now, we've got republicans proposing to dramatically increase defense spending and ut that portion of the budget that we invest in our kids' education, being innovative research. if we want a strong country, we need a strong economy and we need those investments. second, children's health insurance programs. doug jones talked about this on his election night. we need to resolve that. make sure community health centers have funding. we need to do with pensions. there are some folks who put their money into pension plans. we need to make sure they're strong. and before january 19, one way or another, we have to deal with

the daca issue. i mean, these are kids who were brought here through no fault of their own. they've grown up in our schools. they've always pledged allegiance to the american flag. we need to resolve these issues. and frankly, you know, mitch mcconnell promised senator jeff flake that we would address the daca issue when he voted for this tax plan. so we hope to be able to resolve all of these issues. we can't be kicking the can down the road. >> specifically on this daca legislation, the dreamers, if it has not been dealt with in one way or another before the spending bill is brought to the floor, how do you vote? sen. chris van hollen: so i want to make something really clear, which is that donald trump is the only person who's tweeted about a government shutdown. republicans now have majorities in the house and in the senate and they control the white house. so they need to work with everybody to make sure that we don't have a government shutdown. and the extent that they're

unwilling to work with everybody else to resolve these issues which have been around for a long time, then they're going to have to shoulder the responsibility for any kind of government shutdown. the funds in the budget that will be voted on are some of the money that donald trump wants to use to report the daca recipients in march. we need funds to make sure we educate our kids and invest in our schools. so this has got to be a negotiation and it's got to make sure that we deal with these priorities. so we've got to address all these issues by january 19. whatever form it's in. maybe there's a freestanding vote on the daca legislation. maybe it's part of the budget. but all of these issues that we're talking about need to be addressed and resolved by january 19. we can't keep kicking the can down the road. >> do you think it's good politics for some of these trump states, senators that are facing

re-election to draw a line in the sand on daca? some of these people, senator tester for one, voted against dream act, i believe, in his first term. do you think it's good politics for them to now draw a line on the sand saying we're not going to continue to fund the government unless we get a solution? sen. chris van hollen: so, first of all, i make it a point never to advise my colleagues as to what's best in their individual states because they have obviously, a much better sense of doing that. right now, our entire caucus is in support of the dream act. how we resolve those issues and how each member resolve those issues is something that, you know, they're going to have to decide in the context of what's in the budget, what's in other legislation and, again, always focus as they have been on what's best for their state. >> this week, we saw the department of justice take a step to reverse a marijuana

policy that had been put in place under the obama administration. what is your reaction that move? and secondly, is this a decision that you think could affect some of these campaigns across the country that we're seeing unfolding? some of these senate races that could decide the majority? sen. chris van hollen: it could. let me first say with respect to the decision. i think it takes us in an absolute wrong decision. we should be focusing our federal law enforcement resources on going after violent criminals, not locking up people in federal prison for marijuana use, especially in states where the people of those states have decided to either decriminalize marijuana or to legalize marijuana. in my view, we shouldn't be locking people up for marijuana use in any event. so that is a bad use of federal law enforcement resources when we have so many other challenges here. i would point out that corey gardener from colorado, a republican senator, sent out a

tweet this week indicating that the decision was a total contradiction of what sessions had told him. again, that is always a decision to be made by the senator representing the particular state. an issue in certain states. >> two-part question here. do you support the full legalization of marijuana and considering that marijuana legalization is now extremely popular, more popular than it's ever been, pretty overwhelming majority of americans support it now, why haven't democrats fully embraced that issue as part of their political platform? a lot of people suggested it's a good way for turnouts.

for instance, it's very popular among young people. sen. chris van hollen: these decisions have to be based on the policy merits. and not the politics. and my view is we should decriminalize marijuana and leave the states to make decisions with respect to legalization of marijuana. you've seen that in certain states like colorado, washington state, now california. i really think that in this case, we need to make sure that the states have an opportunity to sort of weigh in on that. we should at the federal level watch closely. i don't think we should preempt decisions made by states. one way or another. but i do believe we should decriminalize across the country marijuana laws to the extent that we can. i do not think people should be locked up the united states of america for, you know, possession of marijuana. that's not right. and it's certainly a bad use of federal resources to go after that kind of activity.

>> we've seen some campaign, melding in republican primaries in a way that's advantageous to democrats. you mentioned mississippi which is a state where there could be a pretty intense republican primary. maybe some other places. are you open to perhaps spending money to try to dictate the outcome of a republican primary that's here in a way that would help the democrats? sen. chris van hollen: in this cycle? republicans are doing a very good job themselves of beating each other up in these republican primaries. don't anticipate us getting involved in those republican primaries. obviously, that's, you know, a decision for people in those going forward. clearly know, there is

a situation on the republican side, anti-republican mood that is complicating things for those senate races. >> live now here on c-span, we ead to the american foreign service association in washington, d.c. for a discussion about how cities the world can fight terrorism recruitment with state department advisor michael duffen.

>> good afternoon, welcome to the first monday, the first working monday in january. this is a partnership of three organizations. my name is adam powell, i am the director of washington