school questions to answer it i producing a short documentary about a constitutional right, national characteristic or historic event and explain how it defines the american experience and we are awarding $100,000 in total cash prizes, including a grand prize of $5,000. this year's deadline is january 20, 2019. for more information, go to our website, studentcam.org. greta: this week on "newsmakers," vermont senator democrat patrick leahy is with us for this week's newsmakers. we also have kate irby, mcclatchy newspaper congressional reporter, and kellie mejdrich, appropriations budget reporter with cq roll call. senator, kate irby is going to kick off with the conversation about judge brett kavanaugh. kate: the new yorker came out this morning detailing an alleged attempted sexual abuse

by kavanaugh in high school, a woman is alleging that he held her down when he was 17 and attempted to sexually abuse her. i am wondering what your take is on this. do you think this confirmation process of judge kavanaugh should continue until more evidence is found, or do you think this is disqualifying? sen. leahy: i have not seen "the new yorker" story. my concern on the process is that it has been rammed through. this is the same republican leadership that for years, stalled any action on a supreme court nominee. it stopped merrick garland who would have been confirmed overwhelmingly with both republican and democratic votes. they wanted to see how the elections came out and allow

president trump to nominate whomever he wanted. now they are rushing to get done before the midterm elections. as a result, there are thousands upon thousands of pages of material we have never received about judge kavanaugh. a lot of background things we have not received. the issue you have raised, i cannot talk about "the new yorker" artical, i have not seen it. any issues that have come up have been turned over to the people who do the background investigations. we will see what they come up with. greta: we should note in "the new yorker" that judge kavanaugh released a statement saying, "i categorically and unequivocally deny the allegation. i did not do this high school or -- this back in high school or at anytime." sen. leahy: okay. kate: senator durbin suggested that the confirmation process should be delayed until the fbi can further investigate this. do you agree with that? sen. leahy: that would make sense. another week or two, what difference does it make?

we're talking about a lifetime appointment. two weeks, three weeks? the american people, whether they are republicans or democrats, are going to face the consequences of who goes on the supreme court. let the investigation get done. for that matter, take a few more weeks and release all of the papers that the archivists say would take until sometime in october to get. i think of when president obama nominated elena kagan, i was chairman of the committee, the ranking republican was jeff sessions. he said we wanted all of her papers and memos from when she was at the white house. i said ok, that works for me. we joined together in a letter requesting. we got 99%. the 1% we did not get, we both realized we did not need those.

the others were all there for others to talk about. we have 10% of judge kavanaugh's papers. kate: it has been reported that the fbi is not seeking a criminal investigation into judge kavanaugh. have they indicated to you or any members of the judiciary committee how they intend to proceed with this? senator patrick leahy: not to me, but i am not the ranking member. i gave that up to become the vice-chairman of appropriations. that is a question that they would discuss, i suspect, with senator feinstein and senator grassley. kellie: i usually have my head buried an appropriations, as you know. senator patrick leahy: you work very hard. sometimes i am sympathetic because numbers of subsection three and section five, blah blah blah. kellie: i read all of the sections. [laughter] kellie: my question is, given

that these allegations have been around and judge kavanaugh has gone through other confirmation process, have you ever heard about this issue at all? i wonder why it did not come up. senator patrick leahy: i am just referring to what we have seen in the press. i have not heard about this before. greta: is it appropriate that senator feinstein at this moment, a week before the senate judiciary committee is going to vote, makes public this letter and asks the fbi to investigate? senator patrick leahy: it is not the fbi, i thought it was the people who did the background check. whoever it was, what would be inappropriate is if she had the allegations sent to her and did not ask somebody look into it. greta: but she has had it since july. senator patrick leahy: she is usually very careful, and acts with integrity. i think about what would happen

if there was an allegation and after a confirmation, somebody said, by the way, we ought to ask about this. again, this is the problem that happens when you rush something. when you get last-minute. i had things i wanted to ask judge kavanaugh about in the hearings, especially things that are committee confidential. i said i want to ask questions about that and i are to be allowed to use it. about 3:00 in the morning of the hearing, they said ok, you can use it. we're asking questions and there had been a republican staff member who stole a lot of material from democrats on the committee.

the emails i wanted to make public and we were finally allowed to, shows that those were given to brett kavanaugh. we even had some even suggest i do not want to meet with you at the white house or on capitol hill, how about my house or somewhere private because i want to show you these memos. the things he had were stolen, including from me. kate: to clarify, if senator feinstein had never shared the document, you think that would have been inappropriate? at least she shared it? senator patrick leahy: yeah. i would allow the people to do the background checks, let them look at it and let them make the decision. i was a prosecutor for years. a lot of people said, this one is guilty or that when is guilty. let's get the evidence and make up our minds based on that. i have found that people do the

background checks, whether they are republican or a democrat nominee, are very professional and very thorough if given the time to do it. kellie: i wonder, at what point these kavanaugh issues bump into the senate schedule. do you think there could be floor antics that result from this? senator patrick leahy: i don't know. my work in the senate has been very concentrated on the appropriations bills. we have gone decades sometimes decades without getting them through. when i became vice-chairman, i started working at cochran and i came back to doing our work, doing what we are paid to do. when dick shelby became

chairman, he and his wife are very close friends of mine and marcel's, we are poles apart politically, but we believe in the senate and we want to make it work. one of three committees and the senate who has a vice-chairman, intelligence, ethics, and appropriations. we started working earlier this year, the two of us, we talked about it at great lengths and traveled together to nato and other things. we said, let's make it a place -- get it back to where it used to be. let's not make it a place to grandstand the right or left. we have done that. we have kept things that we individually might like to have seen past, but no kill the ed, but not kill the

process on both sides. as a result, look where we are. the senate has moved our past it, farther past it and has in years or decades. we will continue to move. the appropriations bills will continue. i am looking at my notes. that is a trillion dollars. >> nearly. sen. leahy: 999.8 billion. close enough. kellie: the senate has made great advances, the house, not as much but some advances on some things, looking at the way they have been able to -- consistently report. looking ahead to the elections,

i wonder, how would democrats control things to family if they were in control in the house, the senate, and looking ahead further to the presidential election, how do you keep this bipartisan comity when there are no budget deals for the next fiscal year and there is a presidential election running up against the process you are carefully trying to manage? senator patrick leahy: excellent question. i have been there longer than anybody else. what i came to the senate, republicans and democrats worked together. hubert humphrey and very go bar chitchat talking about things and work on a deal. nobody would ever break their word. all the way up to the senior center with bob stafford, mr. republican. i am the only democrat from

vermont ever elected to the senate. we worked together. he taught me bipartisan is him. hism.artisan is the senate really was the conscience of the nation when it did that. i want to come back there. i will continue to work hard. did shelby want -- dick shelby wants it. i do not know who will be in the majority next year, i hope democrats are. i want to continue to do this. i invite republicans and democrats to meet with me privately in my office at the capital, which has a beautiful view. we can sit around and chat about everything from our family to how do we get out of the bind we are in. let me tell you a short story of how this works. back in the 1980's, howard baker was the majority leader. he had a bill on the floor and

we were all tied up on and we could not get it moving, and he was going to keep us until midnight. some of us worked out a deal. we went into his office, ted kennedy, and myself and we worked it out. why don't you just recess and we will have it written up tomorrow , and we guarantee it will go. word, and wet our did it. about 45 minutes after we left and all the staff had gone home, everyone had left the senate, a bomb went off. people forget about that. a bomb went off in a corridor outside the senate chamber. we came in in the morning to shards of glass. paintings were destroyed. you could smell the gunpowder. the doors were blown in and the place was a mess. we did have 100 senators come in and say we are not afraid. how many staff members would

or injured?lled how many senators would have been killed or injured? the majority leader took the word of republicans and democrats. i want to go back to those days. the country was better off, the senate was better off. we can do it if we want to. that,: does going back to as a tool for appropriators, we see you are in support of this. senator patrick leahy: my earmarks are telling me a billion-dollar capital does not mean a billion plus 20 million per year. -- per earmark. something, proposes they have to have their name on it, and we have to vote on it. i never understood why, when congress has power we will not really say how it is spent, we

just turn it over to whoever is in the white house, republican or democrat. kellie: i wonder how you sell that to the american public who hears senator bob jones is getting his pet roger. is there a better way to go forward? senator patrick leahy: make sure it is all done publicly and openly. i assume you're not have some projects past and you have something that people care about. sometimes what somebody wants is a pet thing but it turns out to be very good. for example, when i was chairman of the agricultural committee, i wanted for years to get a bill to set up organic farming in the country. it was all blocked until i

became chairman. we passed it and it is a $52 billion industry. almost every state in the country, think of the people employed by that, the people who se food is paid for by that. sometimes these little things, -- they could be able to pass in a way that everybody knows what it is and it cannot be done behind closed doors. you have to have your name on it. kate: i want to ask you about hurricane relief funding. i saw something that said we have $26 billion and the accounts. are we confident that will cover this hurricane season? senator patrick leahy: i don't know what is happening right this weekend. you watch the news and see pictures, it is something i have never seen before. i remind everybody that we are the united states of america.

i remember when hurricane irene hit vermont, and it was devastating. it was like some my parents told me about when they were youngsters, huge destruction. i started getting emails and calls from other senators, including several very conservative republicans, saying, vermont stood with us when we had the earthquake or tornado, and we will stand with you. we are the united case of america, whether it is a volcano in hawaii, an earthquake in california, flooding in the carolinas, or puerto rico. we are all part of the country. that is why i was worried about the way puerto rico was handled. they are americans. this is part of the u.s. we will do it.

to answer your question, we will do it. i have not talked to a single republican or democrat who has said we can't find the money. we will find it. which is why i am worried when i see the white house taking money out of fema and putting it into ways to deport people or handle the mess they made along the mexican- u.s. border. years ago, the a took hurricane sandy became politicized. you don't anticipate that happening? senator patrick leahy: some might try to but i would fight against that to do now. while they are republican states, i will fight for them. kellie: i want to ask more broadly on hurricane aid. at what point does congress -- they cannot open the purse string anymore?

we have these disaster after disaster of horrible weather and often in a very developed areas. these are flood prone areas. how do you change how we approach that? senator patrick leahy: that is going to be a debate, and a debate we should have. those who deny global warming and deny what is happening, open your eyes. we have to take steps on that. states have to take steps. we cannot have a place that is flooded out twice or three times . two years ago, three years ago, four years ago. kellie: do you think we should sell flood insurance for those areas? senator patrick leahy: you have to start being realistic on it. we also have to realize that we are the united states of america. we have to figure out what is best. should there be real debate on environment, global warming, on these things?

yes, you do not deny that by having the u.s. is the only country in the world pull out of global warming treaties. or agreement, rather. so. kellie: i also was curious, i think it was your colleague who said in the past couple of days, that getting to a point of disruption and politicization that a supreme court nominated by president that needed to be confirmed by a senate controlled by the opposite party would no longer be able to do that. do you agree with that? senator patrick leahy: i think the senate should be working the way it should be. i voted on 19 people over the years in the supreme court,

republicans and democrats are . i voted for some, but not all. you have republicans and democrats talk about what is best for the country. what i worry about is that there is destruction in the integrity of the federal courts if any president can just politicize it. when president trump says i'm going to have this advocacy group give me the names of who they will accept and i will pick from there, no. you are picking not for a single issue or inefficacy advocacy group, you are picking for the united states, and i think that is what is hurting the country. also, the senate should stand up and do what they should do. i've heard senator saying look at this terrible thing. we forget republicans, a number of republicans voted against robert borer.

some democrats voted for him. it all the republicans voted for him, he would have been confirmed. ronald reagan hoped he would dry his name. republicans said no, he should not be there and they voted against him. go back to the time when you can do that. anthony kennedy nominated by ronald reagan in a presidential all but one oron two votes in the senate, republicans and democrats. kellie: i have a burning question. how do you finish the fiscal 19 process, the current officiate -- appropriations process? given that the homeland security bill is so divisive and that president donald trump has made the wall between the u.s. and mexico seem like a keynote task for his signature for the bill. does that mean we do not finish fiscal 19? senator patrick leahy: they take it out of money for cancer

research, money for things that atually help us just to make bologna wall that everybody has said will not work. we have parts of the wall. a wall the work, but whole u.s.-mexican border, that is a fantasy. it would destroy a lot of , americans,g homes like in texas. it totally breaks the promise that donald trump made during the campaign in mexico to pay for it. they will not pay one cent. kellie: now they are saying $5 billion is what they want. is that too much? senator patrick leahy: they want $30 billion. it will probably be $40 billion before it is done.

do the american people want $40 billion spent on a useless wall to fulfill a campaign promise that was never intended? or do you want to spend it on cancer research? or spend it on improving the v.a. health care system? i could go through a whole list of things here in the united states that we need. that is really the question. up or downt to an vote on the wall in the u.s. senate in the house of representatives. up or down. i guarantee you, it would not pass because republicans and democrats know how foolish it looks to most americans. greta: final question before we go. paul manafort deal. senator patrick leahy: yeah. greta: what is your reaction to

it? what stands out to you about this? senator patrick leahy: we are still getting the details. i was a prosecutor for years and i never had cases like that. i look first at what happened in virginia, where 11 of the 12 jurors wanted to convict him on all counts. one was a strong trump supporter who held out so there was a mistrial. greta: 10 of the 18. senator patrick leahy: very serious cases. now this, i would assume there is no plea deal without cooperation. robert mueller is the one person throughout all of this who has not had any leaks from his office and he does not speak to the press. i have known robert for years. i have avoided calling him during this for obvious reasons. he is very methodical, very honest. prosecutor.ecutor's

if this is a plea agreement on a case where they could have easily gotten him on all of the counts, i suspect there is an agreement for cooperation. there must be a lot available in the corporation, at least that is looking through the eyes of a former prosecutor. that is what i think. greta: does it give you a timeline for when robert mueller might wrap up the investigation? senator patrick leahy: my knowledge of mr. mueller is he is usually several months ahead of where all of us think he is. that is the mark of a good prosecutor. they are usually that methodical. i don't know. he is not taking anywhere near did.ng as kenneth starr he is looking at russia trying to take over our country through

our electoral system. that worries me. i don't care who is president. russia is not our friend. i hope mr. mueller is able to find out exactly what they have done and to stop it from happening again. greta: senator patrick leahy, thank you for being this week's ."ewsmaker thank you so much. we are back with our reporters. kate, let's begin with the brett kavanaugh nomination for the supreme court. you heard the senator request not just in light of the letter that senator dianne feinstein has made public about alleged sexual abuse when judge kavanaugh was in high school, but beyond that, democrats say a vote should not take place here when is a vote supposed to take place? senator feinstein did not

make the letter public but the . allegations are public. the vote is scheduled to go forward on thursday, october 20. senator grassley has made no signs that he plans to delay. as the allegations came out this morning, his office sent out a letter that 65 woman from judge kavanaugh who know him in high school who spoke toward his character. they have accused senator feinstein as using a delay tactic. it remains to be seen what it looks like a plan to push forward with the vote. greta: when would the full senate take it up? kate: i do not know if that has been decided yet. i am not sure. greta: senator mcconnell has said he would like it to happen soon. kate: right.

greta: the other topic for senator patrick leahy was the budget appropriations process. he is the vice chair of the committee. you began by seeing what happened he has been able to do this or that they haven't been able to do in years past. kellie: this is a watershed moment for the senate. they have been trying for years to move bills to the process in a bipartisan manner. i think the joint effort by chairman richard shelby and senator patrick leahy has gotten a lot of these bills onto the floor and into conference. what i was struck by was his willingness to bring back your s when i askedrk him how or whether democrats might run things differently if they were in control. that follows along with what some republicans have been saying. even democrats, house minority came out in favor of this.

it shows that as congress puts more and more effort into the appropriations process, in terms of time that they have been devoting to them on the floor and committee, they have realized that energy fund specific projects, it is hard to do it without an earmark, especially if you have a water project down in alabama, a water treatment plant, how do you fund that through a grant program? sometimes an earmark is a way you fund things more efficiently , and i think that was the pitch that senator leahy was making, and a pretty interesting moment for appropriations reporters that it was just back in 2010, everyone was saying earmark for the hallmark of corruption. it seems that the tone is delivered we changing on both sides. greta: he also sounded

optimistic that the senate would help out with response to hurricane florence, that congress would provide money that is needed for this hurricane and any other potential hurricanes. how would they do that? are they talking about an emergency supplemental bill. onstion kellie: it depends bill? a healthyere will be amount of money in the disaster relief fund. it is quite possible with profound flooding that we have seen that the funds could be exhausted quickly. what happens is in the aftermath of the storms, fema in partnership with state and local governments, is responsible for putting together a disaster needs assessment. there is other things fema can do in the interim to open it up to small businesses. opening andl start

it will start draining. then what we need to wait for is a white house request for supplemental funds for hurricane relief. once that is sent to the house, then it gets processed into a bill by the appropriators and then it goes through the house and senate and get to the president. that would be interesting and also very procedural kind of issue we will watch in the next month or two. thank you for being part of this week's "newsmakers." i appreciate it. tonight on q&a, a historian discusses his biography of herbert hoover, and uncommon man. >> hoover said when all was said and done, accomplishment is all that matters. when you stop to think about is

.nsentimental the sort of thing you would expect from an engineer. that is one of the keys to understanding his life, his success in everything but the presidency. >> tonight at 8:00 eastern on c-span's q&a. >> leading up to the 100th anniversary of the end of world war i on november 11, every weekend on american history tv, we feature special programs about the war. 1918, general pershing created the first united states army under his command. immediate steps were taken to concentrate u.s. forces on the line. artifacts,n american northeastern france for a story and visiting villages, monuments, and the american

cemetery related to battle, fault 100 years ago on the western front. >> the weather was horrible, rainy, chilly. the u.s. launch the attack heading where we are standing. unbeknownst to them, the germans who occupied this whole area, had begun to withdraw, and they were starting to move troops, but they did not move them quick enough. by the end of the day of the 12th, the americans reached not only the main objectives, but many objectives following day. by mid morning of september 13, the whole salyut had been liberated. american artifacts at six ago p.m. on american history tv on c-span3. p.m. on history tv on c-span3.