hearing on election security. in an hour, we will look at president trump's infrastructure plan. and -- with mark hearing on elen security. scribner. in our spotlight on magazine series, in these times contributor doug had one -- doug henwood. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2016]] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] host: on "washington journal," the sweeping indictment of 13 russian nationals charged in a massive scheme to interfere with the 2016 presidential election. the indictment part of the investigation by special counsel robert mueller's team and announced yesterday by deputy attorney general rod rosenstein paint a picture of a campaign to damage democrat hillary clinton's campaign and to boost donald trump's bid and the russian reached tout unwilling

trump filler but states no investigation nor that the melding campaign altered the election's results. so today, we're getting your thought hopes dimets of 13 russians charged with election interference. republicans can call 202-748-8001. democrats, 202-748-8000 and independents 202-748-8002. the justice department special counsel announced a sweeping indictment friday of a notorious russian group to have internet trolls charging 13 individuals in three companies with a long running scheme to criminally interfere with the 2016 u.s. presidential election. the internet research agency based in st. petersburg was named the indictment as the hub

of an ambitious effort to trick americans online into following and promoting russian set propaganda that pushed 2016 let's owards then -- look at rod rosenstein announcing that indictment yesterday. >> a grand jury in the district of columbia returned an indictment presented by the special counsel's office. the indictment charges 13 russian nationals and three russian companies for committing federal crimes while seeking to interfere in the united states's political system including the 2016 presidential election. the defendants allegedly conduct what had they call information warfare against the united states. with the state goal of spreading distrust towards the candidates and the political system in general.

caller: this is an example of what they were talking about all along that the main problem in merica is mostly race. as long as we got these racial problems in this country, we're always going to have people melding in our elections. it's a disgrace that we've been born these many years. i remember when i was in the first resurrection of the consciousness of black people and i remember the hardest thing for us to do would be to convince other people from across the water when i come back from vietnams the hard ething for us to do would be to convince international people -- this was when malcolm and martin was trying to do. now with facebook and social media, let me tell you something and donald trump, it's easy for us to convince the world that

we're just like apartheid and this is what we should do. i mean what, we need to do and everything is connected, young lady, even the guy down the florida. he had racial problems. everything is connected with race in america. and until we deal with that problem, we're going to always be vulnerable to outside influence. host: ok. and joining us now to give us a little bit more about the indictments that were handed out yesterday is the senior white house reporter for "politico" and he joins us on the phone. hi, josh. guest: hey, good to be with you. host: give us the highlights about this indictment. what exactly were the main points that deputy attorney general rod rosenstein pointed out about this russian operation? guest: well he gave us some new details that we didn't know. he alleged that some of the participants in this effort vivid the united states in 2014 in person although it appears

that by 2016 when the bulk of this activity took place during the election, they were controlling this remotely from heir office in st. petersburg. it seemed like an effort to cause strife to use social media . but sometimes to organize protest one at the white house, others, in new york city, one outside trump tower. to raise questions about things going on during the campaign and mostly challenge hillary clinton the democratic presidential nominee and as you said earlier, o seem to assist donald trump. but there were other signs and they were careful to put these into the zimet that the effort

was really aimed at really wreaking havoc on the u.s. political and causing conflict among americans. and perhaps a primary goal may not have been to simply elect donald trump but to achieve some of these other object i was. one reason that makes it a little complicated apparently after the election in 2016, these individuals allegedly carried out or tried to carry demonstrations, protesting donald trump's victories. it seems that they were simply interested in making trouble in the american political system. host: so josh, one part of the indictment says that some of these russian nationals reached out to some trump campaign officials who are unwitting in this, according to the indictment but talk a little bit

about what happened there. guest: yeah. so rosenstein was careful to say during this press conference that he had that i was at yesterday that these, as you say, that people that the russians were in contact with organizing rallies, protests and social media activities, he used this word unwitting, meaning that they were not aware that these were russians that they were dealing with. and he also said during this ress conference that the indictment doesn't allege any impact of the u.s. election but there's a fair amount of details showing how the social media activity took place. and how there were efforts to contact people who were county or state level trump officials in the broader attempt to

organize rallies, protests and so forth during the election season. host: but what comes next? i mean, these russians are in russia. there's no extradition agreement between russian and the united states. what happens next with respect to these people who have been charged? guest: not much. you know, this is something the u.s. government has done in some other cases. they've done it involving hackers from russia before or for china and from iran. one interesting thing here is while you listen to the charges and it sounds like some sort of russian government operation, there was no mention by rosenstein or in the indictment that this was actually directed by the russian government. you could argue that it was implied but they didn't actually come out and say that. in the past the justice department argued in these kinds of cases, there's a central they call naming and shaming the participants or the alleged

participants in these crimes and there's a possibility that some of these individuals could be arrested if they went to another country. that the u.s. had better diplomatic relations with and limit some of their travel but the main impact of this indictment is going to be political debate and dialogue. in the united states, we've already seen that the white house and president trump is probably going to have move from his rather skeptical position about the fact that the russians made some effort or the claims that the russians made some effort to interfere in his general benefit in the 2016 election. and he tried to move forward with the argument yesterday that there was no sign that this effort had actually benefited his campaign even though i'm not sure the indictment really devils into that issue in any -- delves into that issue into any details. -- details.

host: gary is on our republican line from philadelphia. good morning. caller: good morning. how are we feeling today? host: i'm good. what are your thoughts about these charges about these 13 russian nationals? caller: well, two be honest with you, it just pretty much confirms what i already suspected now that it is out there for everybody. i like to know what did g.o.p. leadership is planning to do? because it's pretty obvious this was a terrorist attack against our election. now, they're in a position where they could either be complacent and do nothing or they could either apply those sanctions that donald j. trump will not try. and due to the fact that he won't sign those sanctions, that's showing him to be at least complicit with these individuals. so i mean, it looks back for

donald j. trump. you're either a, incompetent, or b associated with them. either way, it looks terrible for you. host: all right eileen is from our independent line from east hampton, connecticut. good morning, eileen. caller: good morning. thank you, c-span. i've been watching you guys for the last couple of days over different events and it's been, i don't know, kind of nice to touch base with like just everyday american people that listen to and what they have to say. anyway, i'm glad that some information has come out and honestly, there's a lot of people who are very gullible to that kind of information that's out there. and i think we all need to take some personal responsibility for when we read something or when we hear something or when we watch something, you know, think how reliable is this information and am i getting opinion or am i getting fact? so those are my main concerns.

and the other is, you know, like the caller before me mentioned that and also the guy that you were talking to, josh mentioned the skepticism of the president because he's so defensive that this is somehow implicating him. so he's so sensitive about the possibility that someone interfered in our elections because it implicates him. and it may or may not be about him and i'm not even going to talk about that. but he needs to not be skeptical. we were attacked. our election process was attacked. but, again, i really do go back to we as people taking in information. we need to be a little more responsible in what we read and in what we see and just kind of thinking about it and reflecting on it and not just believing everything that we hear. thank you very much, c-span. host: ok.

in the "new york times" has a little more detail about that indictment that came down yesterday that the russian operation began four years ago well before mr. trump entered the presidential race on the fact that he quickly seeds on in his defense, russia started their anti-u.s. campaign in 2014 long before i announce that i would run for president, he wrote on twitter. the results of the election were not impacted the trump campaign did nothing wrong no. collusion. but mr. trump's statement ignores the government's conclusion that by 2016, the russians were supporting the presidential campaign of then candidate dolet j. trump in disparaging hillary clinton. -- host: michael's on the democrat line from huntsville, alabama. michael, what did you think about the indictment? caller: good morning, ma'am, and

good morning c-span. and i think even though that none of the russians are really probably ever going to be indicted, mr. mueller was saying to the president this ain't a hoax. this is real. and this fixing to get -- it's fixing to get very real. the russian's influencing in our elections is just extensive. and i kind of live on twitter and you see these russian bots all around. nd the russians are going to explore a lot of these colleagues -- cleavages in the country and mr. mueller, god bless him. he's the only person in power in this country that is actually fighting for us. he's saying that yes, it is under attack and the three revious callers laid this out.

it is time for us to do something or they're going to play a price in those number. there's no way around it. you've got to deal with it or you're going to be crossed with at the polls at those numbers. thank you, ma'am. host: allan is on our republican line from scottsdale, arizona. ood morning to you, allan. caller: thank you for c-span. well since nobody really wants to talk about this indictment correctly, what it screams to the american people is one thing , that ok, they're going to indict these people but when it omes to the melding in our election, the democratic party, the dossier, the paying for the dossier, the people in the b.i., just every department,

larry nassar, c.i.a., in terms of -- n.s.a., c.i.a., in terms of every possible way to stop the campaign campaign from going forward is amazing. and mueller never said anything about and there's all kinds of indictments sitting there for people -- for mueller to go after the clinton cartel for everything they did even against bernie and when you even look at the fact that they're still talking about in chicago, when trump just tried to do a rally. a gentleman pays from the democratic cartel, pays for eople to incite riots. and i don't get it. i don't get where the truth is from this 13 indictment. host: move on to the "washington

examiner" which reports that devin nunes is blaming the obama administration for failing to act on russia. he blames the obama administration for not heeding his committee's warnings of for an election meddling interfering in the 2016 presidential election. he said the obama administration "failed to act on the committee's warnings but offered a congratulatory nod on ueller's efforts -- milton is on the democratic line calling from philadelphia. what do you think, milton? caller: good morning, and thank you for taking my accustom you

know, sometimes we have to put our country ahead of our party and that last caller is a clear example. ok, trump, congress passed the sanction. he refused to enact those sanctions against russia. he clearly, you notice he goes after and criticizes everybody but he refuse to say one bad thing about putin. and congress and the republican leadership is -- it's not like they not defending this country. and it really gets to me that as an american, we are not standing up to this. i mean, they make all excuses for collusion. trump and his people meet with the russians like his son-in-law, his son, don jr., then when the meeting is discovered, they lie about it. circumstances the attorney general, talks to the russian also domplete they lie about it. i mean, it must be one good fire down there for to it be -- you know what i mean? and they significantly lie when they get caught.

what is trump doing about it? nothing. thank you. caller: you look at our country, the biggest melder in our elections has been israel. you have to taken a oath to support apec which is the israeli lobby. any meddling whatsoever should be frowned upon or watched against. but we do just as much melding in any other people's elections. people have been doing -- countries have been doing it to each other for a long time. there's nothing major here. i mean, there's actually --

israel let's money to our candidates that are running for office. so i mean, we got to watch out for that stuff but we have to call out who's the biggest influencer right now and it isn't russia. it isn't. host: let me ask you this. are you concerned about that though? do you think that the white house or congress should take more action to stop interference from any country into our election? caller: 100% agree. every country should be on the list about who's influencing. i bet china -- i mean, they probably tried to influence our election or at least some of the senatorial seats. this has been going on. we got to watch out for all of it and friendlier foe. america needs to protect our election process. and we have to call out even france. host: all right. palti is on the independent line from north blanford, connecticut. good morning. caller: good morning. just give me some time to talk,

lease. this is like the movie casablanca. when the inspector said i'm sorry, there's gambling going on here. this russia, russia, russia, is all b.s. the collusion is with hillary. thes do area and also iranian one. your show does nothing -- no topic ever comes up on this. and this is -- people all know about it. they are not hiding it. and another thing i want to ask you, kimberly -- kim, you go on msnbc and you speak there biased against trump. i know you work for "the boston herald." i swear it thought you were from the "boston globe." i was very shocked. so, i mean, you know, we got to go halfway here. thank you. host: all right.

pat, what do you think about the indictment handed down yesterday? caller: well, i hope to strike a blow for democracy and truth this morning. i'm even at the risk of having my cereal get soggy at the bowl while i'm waiting. a couple of calls ago a gentleman said he wanted to tell the truth of this whole thing and here's what the truth is. mr. trump unfortunately does not have the honesty or the ntegrity to run a sidewalk hot dog cart much less be the president. and if he can stand up there and tell the american people and the world that these shenanigans on the part of the russians have no bearing on the outcome of the election is -- he's braindead. he's clinically insane because pennsylvania, wisconsin, and michigan racked up 77,000 votes, the margin that caused him to carry those three states and win the electoral college.

hell, in michigan, the difference between the two candidates were like 12,000 votes. you got to think that presumably, some people who did vote for mr. trump did so on the basis of the misinformation and disinformation that was being put out there by the russians in an orchestrated attempt to muddle and meld in this last election. so to stand up there and say it had no bearing on the outcome, you would have to be stupid to believe something like that. and it just didn't tears my heart out and i'm 60 something years old. i remember a time when the republicans supported the f.b.i. and believed in the job that they were doing. and even the president's own intelligence heads said that there was meddling. and yet he doesn't believe that -- he's only now acknowledging

that it might have happened and he's still saying beating that dead horse saying oh, but it didn't make any difference. host: all right. "u.s.a. today" has some highlights from the findings or the charges laid out in the indictment yesterday. among them says an unknown trump official contacted that the russians reached tout a still unnamed campaign official at trump's campaign website to get information about organizing rallies and also said more than 200 people help the russian coordinated people to work -- more than 100 u.s. citizens, the indictment said in one case the russians learn from an undamed real u.s. person that they should focus their activities on purple states. some other highlights are illegal campaign contributions cited in the indictment the creation of false counts on social media are contacting a florida trump official as well

as bragging about their impact, pressing black voters and making false voter fraud claims. let's take a look at deputy attorney general rod rosenstein explain the lengths to which these russian actors went to conceal their identities. >> the defendants posed as politically and socially active americans, advocating for and against particular candidates. they establish social media pages and groups to communicate one witting americans. they also purchased political advertisements on social media networks. russians also recruited and paid real americans to engage in political activities promote political campaigns and stage political rallies. the defendants and their -conspiratorers presented to be grassroot activists. they did not know they consider communitying with russians. after the election, the defendants allegedly staged

rallies to support the president elect while simultaneously staging rallies to protest his election. for example, the defendantses or ed one rally to support the president elect and another rally oppose him, both in new same day. caller: i ask myself if i was living in russia today as an russian, as an everyday russian watching the news about what's taking place in the united states. i would be amazed to look back russians have such an impact on the united tates.

countries have been doing this for decades. having an influence on what they can in the united states. it's not going to stop. but you got a lot of callers who call in and saying the russians attack and the russians are trying to do this. and i'm old enough to understand what it was like to live in the 1980's, the last age of the cold war. and frankly when i wake up in the morning, the last thoughts on my head are what the russians are doing. as a real american, there are things that i am concerned about and frankly, what the russians 18. doing comes up maybe 1 host: what are the things that you're concerned about? are you concerned about the russians or any other foreign country potentially meddling with things like american election? caller: connection to what other

countries are doing having an impact on my safety? because "good, bad and ugly," because i believe we're the most safe country which the world and we have been that. i would like for c-span today to put on the screen one example of hat a magazine, any media that would show what one of these individuals actually did to actually have an impact on the election. i have been seen one thing written or published on. i would like to see at least -- you can show me one thing tied to appear individual that it

showed up somewhere on facebook or social media that you can say this impacted a certain number of people to vote a certain way. i haven't seen that. host: that's not -- that wasn't what deputy attorney general rod rosenstein specifically said that the was not evidence of that. is that what's impacting your view about the indictment? caller: well this idea that there was collusion, the idea that there was influence by certain individuals in russia to have our elections go one way or the other. i know this has been kind of the talking points, you know, for the entire year. the russians are going to be here for the next 200 years. host: all right christine is calling in on our independent ine. caller: i would be more worried if we had thousands of russians,

you know, here with the russian flags out like the an teva people. we had people that are illegal with rallies with the mexican flags. that's kind of a threat to the american flag and they burned down buildings and throw rocks with people with american flags. if we had thousands and thousands of russians in our streets with the russian flags, you know, throwing rocks at, you know, republicans, i would be worried, you know, that they were trying to take our jobs and, you know, if they wanted to stay here lylely and try to take over the democratic party like mexico's doing. it's the same thing. i'm not too worried about 13 russians. it sounds like they want to go to a trump rally. i don't think russia manipulated any americans. americans are going to feel the

way they do if people call it nationalism. you can be a person of color and like they're included. that's where the divide comes. i have nothing against mexican people. they're nismse i have a lot of mexican friends. but my mexican friends are legal and they would never stand out and try to bring out the american flag. i wouldn't go to mexico. i wouldn't demand that i take mexican jobs. i would imagine if there's thousands -- with the american flags burning down buildings in mexico saying we want your jobs and you better let us stay here and went to become citizens.

i would imagine they would be upset. that's what i think. thank you. host: a little more from the "wall street journal" today about the russian meddling effort. according to the indictment, the russian group coordinating the effort encouraged u.s. minority groups not to vote in the election or to vote for third-party presidential candidates. a false instagram account titled "wolf black" posted a message on october 16 2016 saying in part "we cannot resort to the lesser two devils meaning there is clinton." the indictment allegation were coordinated by the internet research agency. michelle is on our democratic line from wisconsin. good morning. caller: good morning. i just want to make the comment that if barack obama was still the president, this would be investigated on him. if hillary clinton had won the

presidency, the investigation would be on her. the point is they're not sitting in the white house. president trump is sitting in the white house. so anything going on that melded in the elections should be -- meddled in the elections should be investigated and this is think what needs to be done. we still don't know if they have anything to do with this as the investigation goes on. we may find that out. but regardless, we still have to be cherish u.s. still has to control of our voting and ethics nd morals and everything else. it should very well concern everybody because that means if other countries view at this and say well, russia's gotten away with this, why can't we do this?

the next thing you know, all these other countries are going get involved and election frauds and trying to influence what they want done is just wrong. the u.s. is separate from everybody else. everybody needs to have their integrity and ethics to follow what the elections are meant to do when the constitution and everything was put in place. those things were put in place to avoid this from happening. and it happened anyways. so that means this needs to be check into farther. host: all right. b.j. is calling on our republican line from minneapolis. good morning, c.j. caller: good morning to you. thank you for letting me get in on this one. i am a driver. i'm a truck driver in the twin cities and i drive over 200 miles a day. and the radio is my best friend as far as communication. right? so when i'm listening to the

radio, i can tell which ones are for the republicans and which ones are for the democrats. and with that being said, there are some radio shows that completely defend trump and won't even talk about some of the issues at hand that he's doing and they blame it on obama and they blame it on hillary. so the communication between some of your callers that call in, i can tell what radio shows that they got their information from versus, you know, the other lad. with that being said, our system of communication is so biased that unless you listen to them on a regular basis, you can tell that the political parties have their influence other

agendas and with that being said, you know, we are really in a lot of trouble, in this country. we've never been great to me. the only way i can see that is that i'm a veteran and a family of veterans and some of these people just don't have what it takes to be in the political party. thank you. host: rose is calling from orlando in our independent line. what do you think, rose? caller: i think -- i'm not for the russian meddling in the united states elections and i think it was correct for obama to throw them out of the country. i personally don't want like the russian influence and i do not -- i think all americans are for freedom and i should continue on that p.a. i wouldn't want to

live under putin. that's it. host: ok. kimberly is calling from washington, pennsylvania, on our republican line. hi, kimberly. caller: hi, kimberly. [laughter] caller: did i get that right? did i hear that we have been investigating this for like four years? host: according to the indictment, the activity of the 13 people began in 2014. caller: yeah. so did anybody get a heads up that was even running? any of the 17 republicans in the three democrats? did they get a heads-up about this or was this some big secret as well? i don't understand that. host: what's your concern about that, kimberly? what's the concern? caller: my real concern is they're getting everything twisted up. everybody's getting everything twisted up. we're hearing all this crap about hillary which we knew about her because she was going through that before she started

to run for president. and then we're getting #memos, accusing it with a bunch of russian -- a lot of things are being proven be untrue. so i'm not going to jump the gun, you know? the verdict's still out. but if this is the truth, it's been going on for four years, why are we just now hearing about it? and does this have anything about obama kicking aus all those diplomats out of the country before trump came into his presidency? there's a lot of unanswered questions. this doesn't pass the smell test. that's what i'm saying. it just doesn't pass. host: ok. henry is calling from new york city on our democratic line. good morning. caller: good morning. thank you for taking my call. i like to recommend two boofpblgs one by edward berneir's called "propaganda." written in 1928 and quite relevant today. berneys. and the other book is called

"psychological warfare against germany." these books will explain to people that it's not so much as pressing the button down on who you're voting for but the process of suggestibility and manipulation that leads up to the vote which i happen to think with the russians are quite xpert at if we think about the work history of the current -- of mr. putin. as not just a politician but a ully trained k.g.b. agent. i will conclude with this. -- host: ok in. other news, a former massachusetts governor, former

republican presidential candidate mitt romney is running for senate out of utah. former massachusetts governor one time republican presidential nominee mitt romney is running for president in utah. romney, 70, was a republican bear presidential standard in 2012 evenly losing the general election to then president barack obama with romney's potential arrival comes real tension between him and the man now occupying the oval ffice, president donald trump. let's take a look at what governor romney said about the indictments issued against the russian national. >> i want to note that i pointed out in the 2012 election that russia is a geo political adversary, that they poke their stick in our eye any chance they get. they've obviously been trying to influence elections here in this

country. i agree with the president that they didn't determine the outcome here in our nation in any way. but what they've done is unacceptable. i'm glad that they're being held accountable and believe that without question that russians are trying to interfere with the principles of elected democracy and that's got to end. host: country is on our independent line from beaumont, texas. good morning. caller: good morning. thank you for taking my call. i'm glad this is finally getting opened up for folks to look at. i think americans are very naive and spend a lot of time around the world and you see a lot of stuff happening around the country and it's used very successfully. and what's the sad part about it is when you take and see what's happening here in this country, they grab this bait and run with it. they didn't realize there was hooks on it.

and what happened was they jumped on and support what had the russians are tickled to death to see this happening and they were fed information that really incited them and inflamed them intentionally and they were not smart enough to look at it. and what this all goes back to in the -- and the reason behind it and i'm sorry to say when van hillarys crying is that ally held the russians and dealt with uniform one, got lots of money out of them and that really incensed putin. i mowen, this is a fact. and when he saw an opportunity to go after them, he pulled there was no bars held back. and they opened it up. and when you get into the uniform one and understand really what happened with -- uranium one and what happened to that, the state department was selecting which contractors and

which persons could get involved in projects overseas with u.s. governments supporting funding and they were i'vening money off the cite just like in haiti. i really hope all this does get open up and folks realize what's going on and pull back so people can see the transparency of it. things that happened that our politicians to stick in folks' minds for a long time. that's my comments. host: ok. caller: and i'm glad you guys are looking into this and i really -- things are not as black and white and i don't ink -- but there's lots of folks behind the scenes that's playing these little mind games. and they're doing it with real went and it is for the death of this country and to have someone like president trump standing this out and pointing this out, nobody wants to accept the reality. host: ok. and in some other hmms on the front of the "new york times"

today. it said that the f.b.i. warned about the suspect in this week's florida shooting. says the f.b.i. received a tip last month from someone close to nikolas cruz that he owned a gun and had talked of carrying out the school shooting. the bureau revealed friday that it acknowledged it had failed to investigate. the tipster who called an f.b.i. hotline on january 5 told the bureau that mr. cruz had a "desire to kill people erratic behavior and disturbing social media post," the f.b.i. said. the information should have been forwarded to the miami f.b.i. field office, but it never happened. on wednesday, mr. cruz, 19, killed 17 students and teachers a his former high school in parkland, florida. the tip of that mr. cruz appear to be the second in four months after another person told the bureau about the online comments that he wanted to become "a professional school shooter."

mike is calling from the democratic line from laurel park, new york. what do you think about yesterday's indictment? caller: i think it's about time .nd it's like the second inning and all this is going to go back to that guy that called before about trump exposing stuff. mean, if he wants to vote in putin-trump in 2020, fine. donald trump was bankrupted four times and he needed money. he couldn't get it here and most of it came from over there, olgarks. -- ol gators. as far as the twitter and facebook crshts, they had hundreds and how to of accounts and twitter wasn't around in 2008. so this is new stuff, you know. tease people who talked about -- this has been going on forever. it really hasn't. it's been going or for one election. and they can follow when somebody did a search and

clicked on something anti-hillary or one of these fake accounts, trying to stir up a racist war, they get count clicks and where it gets consent and who clicks on it and there's a multiplier effect millions of times and they can trace to it zip codes and towns and they can see where votes are flipped ver. the more i hear about it, the more i think that it actually did drive the election to trump. and, again, all of this goes back to him, his family, needing money for their deals and, you know, there's going to be other aspects of this. it's going to be traced to other areas too. and i can't wait to see trump get impeached. thank you. host: all right.

ted is on our republican line from santa ana, california. good morning, tet. caller: good morning. just wanted to point out that president obama played the same game with the israeli election to get the president from getting elected over there and i saw barack obama at a news conference when they asked him about russian melding and he told them to knock it off. that's not very strong -- what they were doing and the russians have been doing this since they were the old soviet union. and nothing's going to change. it's going to continue. this report even said it's going to continue. and it's been going on for a long, long time. president obama was impotent at stopping this and now everybody's trying to pile on

trump saying it's all his fault. i just wanted to point that out to everybody that this really is not that surprising what's going n. host: van is on our line from miami. good morning. caller: a lot of people figure that this russian's activity as noise. people always try to promote something and advertising. why do people advertise it? because they believe that advertisement is going to have some effect on their product and reach the customer and the stomer going to act on their input. also, the president keeps talking about false news. you know why he keeps doing that? ecause there are -- explain to

him the reason all the russian is doing things. and the russians is promoting false news. that's why he keeps on saying that everything is false news because the poor are false news. what he wants to do is -- truth and classifying it as false news. i don't know the gentleman. i don't know the president. but what i understand from him, from people who knows him is hat he promotes the things the last person tell him. and after he was bereaved on what the russians were doing, his reaction is this. mr. putin or mr. russia, if you things, what ry do you call that thing? they keep doing, saying that she

does -- host: her e-mails? caller: her e-mails. if you can crack hillary's e-mails, you will be well rewarded and when you realize she will be well rewarded by the middle, the media, the false news people before you. host: ok. in some other headlines yesterday, president trump and first lady went to a hospital in florida where several people were treated from that parkland shooting according to fox news. president trump and first lady visited broward health hospital op florida to pay respects to survivors and medical professionals involved in this week's school shooting massacre. they flew from washington to florida friday afternoon. incredible recovery, trump said. first responders, everybody, the job they've done is incredible.

the president and first lady going there to pay their respects to the injured and the first responders there. mercy is calling from shreveport, louisiana, on our democratic line. what are your thoughts on the indictment? caller: the indictment should be a lot more. and i also want to know what they plan on doing about it. the president hadn't put the sanctions in against those people and i also heard that those guys came back to the united states and got president obama kicked out. so i think he hit -- that's why he's not saying anything bad about them. he's saying everything bad about everybody except the russians. i think he had business by not standing up for the american people and say this would not happen. and it would be easy to put all

the sanctions against -- and everything and everything is going to come up. they need to just put more sanctions on him. and that's all i have to say. host: ok. bet sis on our republican line. -- betsy is on our republican line calling in from columbus, georgia, but i'm not being able to pull her up there. there she is. betsy, good morning. thanks for your patience. caller: gonch i've got several things i like to talk about. there are few calls back veteran, i was very surprised to hear him say that he thought trump was doing such a terrible job and everything was his fault. i'm an older person. grew up during the vietnam war. as a human being, president trump is bankrupt. he's done things as a man. but i think he has stood before the american people and tried as

hard as he possibly can to try to fix situations in this country that have gone down in the past 20 years. and i know everybody thinks obama's great. i love to hear him talk. he's a great speech maker. but as far as action goes, i think trump has been -- done the most. and i have to say this. it doesn't matter who you are. if you're obama, if you're me, if you're trump. everyone has feelings. and how do you think it would feel to go and put yourself out in front of this whole world and have everybody laugh at you and criticize you day after day no matter how hard you try to fix things? and i just want to live to the day that hillary clinton gets jailed for the things that she did. and i am happy about this russian indictment. i think it's the right thing.

i hope mueller continues on. i'm not worried about trump doing anything bad. that would have been out by now. also, i just want to make one more comment. god be with the families of those precious angels that were killed. thank you. host: all right. and in some breaking news from the "associated press". president trump's national security adviser says that the f.b.i. indictment show russian meddling in u.s. election is beyond dispute. trump's national security adviser making that statement today. and we are continuing to get your reaction from yesterday'svection meddling. rachel's calling from forney, texas, on our independent line. what do you think about it, rachel? caller: i have a lot to say but what i want to say is, you know, when obama was elected, when bush's name came up, they said, you know, he's no longer president and i'd like to get

e same respect for, you know -- but when they were questioning sessions flynn and trump told him i could pardon. i still have the right to pardon. told them to shut their mouths and not to talk to the f.b.i. when they were talking in the f.b.i., they said that they only -- they didn't meet with him. and then they said ok, it slipt my mind. i did meet with them. and they offered them plea deals their. if there was nothing going on, why are they taking plea deals? and we've got trump meeting at the summit with russian putin talking to him saying he's only talked to him about 15 minutes and we found out it was only an hour and there was no media in there other than the russian

media? something's going on. and another thing i want to say. some people will defend trump. this man came out and said i could shoot somebody during the primaries and you would still vote for he if they did. host: ok. and some other news, "the washington post" reports about e.p.a. chief scott prosecute and his first class business trips. his verbal confrontations with members of the public prompted environmental protection agency administrator scott prosecute to switch to flying first or business class whenever possible according to officials. henry barnett who directs the e.p.a.'s office of criminal enforcement of forensics in training said in an interview thursday that the head of prosecute's security detail --

host: he said he was not aware of the administrator facing any physical confrontations since taking office a year ago and compared to the verbal insult and threatening language he said it's much more prevalent with this administrater and he's recognized much more when he travels. robin is on the line on the independent line from coleman, alabama state what are your thoughts, robin? caller: oh, good morning, c-span. my thoughts on this is that we don't need to worry so much about the russians and we need to start worrying -- i mean, we need to worry about the russians and not worry about each other as much. the democrats and republicans. it should be americans against the russians. and i'm going to pray for all the black americans in this country because they seem to just can't let go of race cards.

i wish they would just let it go and start worrying about the country more than worrying about what donald j. trump's trying to do because it just seems like he's trying to do what his job is and nobody's giving him a chance. host: ok. arnold is on on our democratic line from daytona beach. what are your thoughts today? caller: a little while agos you had a lady that called and said it didn't pass the smell test because obama kicked out, you russia e diplomats from right before we left. he had -- he got a smell of what as already going on. what really pass the smell test this congress passed sanction against russia that's been setting on donald j. trump's desk now for several months and he has not putting on those

sanctions into place. that right there kind of tells you where the bad smell's coming from. and, you know, for the lady that was talking about mr. trump getting made fun of if he quit opening that big fat mouth of his, he probably, a lot of a that he brings on himself. and not only that, this makes his i think 15th trip to mar-a-lago since he's been a quote president of the united states of the united states. a roundtrip ticket for him and his family down is costing us $6.5 million per trip. that's right at $100 million that he's cost us to go down there and so he can feel better. you know, it's so bad that somebody's made fun of him. he's down there. he's ok. i mean, he's a big boy. if he can't

needs to get out of the kitchen. host: we will turn to the topic of infrastructure. we will take into the details with two experts, kevin degood with the center for american progress, and marc scribner from the competitive enterprise institute. later on, we talk to business writer doug henry. we will be right back. ♪ >> sunday night on afterwords, former u.s. trade negotiator ira ,chapiro with his book "broken can the senate save itself and the country?"

he is interviewed by tom daschle. >> politics was supposed to be about finding a way to overcome some of those differences through principled, extended discussion and a real legislative process, through principled compromise. it was not supposed to be about one party winning on their own. as you know, the times in history where one party has been able to do this on their own, very few. and 1934, fdr dealing with the depression. and 1965. even lbj reached out to republicans, and fdr had republican support. rds on c-spanrwo twos booktv. >> this weekend on american

history tv on c-span3, tonight at 8:00 p.m. eastern on lectures in history, former virginia governor douglas wilder at virginia commonwealth university. >> i have a one word definition i use for politics. can anyone guess? i said one word would define politics. money. give me something that is a proposition before any tribunal that does not involve money. >> sunday at 7:00 p.m. eastern from the west point center for history, a combat medic during the vietnam war. >> my grandfather served in world war i. my father served in world war ii. man, nevera black you served, it was your military service you hope would confirm your bona fides as a

first-class, red-blooded american citizen. america,0 p.m. on reel with the cpac conference next week, we look back to 1988 when president reagan spoke at a cpac dinner. >> american people know what limited government, tax cuts, the regulation, and the move toward privatization has meant. the largest least time expansion in our history, and i can guarantee you they do not want to throw that away for a return into the liberal special interests. >> watch american history tv, every weekend on c-span3. "washington journal" continues. host: joining us now is kevin degood, the infrastructure policy director at the center