i design a piece of equipment in a drawing, i contest one in my head like a virtual reality computer system. i thought every other designer could do that i found out they couldn't. people about how they think and i was shocked to find out that most other people did not think the way i do. about a church -- ile, i forgot them think about them as slides. ideas.have specific this morning, a reporters roundtable on the week ahead in washington.

later, carolyn yoakam from the government accountability office on the cost of medicaid expansion in certain states. you can join the conversation on facebook and twitter. ♪ host: good morning. congress is said to me for the first time since the 2018 midterms. we will talk about what is on the lame-duck agenda. as we begin in california where wildfires are raging at both ends of the state and the death toll is past 30. weight intrump blaming poor forest management and calling on california to remedy the problem or else see federal aid cuts. we want to know what you think of the president response. democrats can call him at

202-748-8000, republicans 202-748-8001, independents 202-748-8002. special line for california residents this morning, 202-748-8003. you can catch up with us on twitter or facebook. a very good monday morning. we are talking about the president's response to the wildfire in california. here are some of the front pages focusing on that issue. this is usa today. it looks like dante's inferno is the headline. fire lays waste to california community, death toll could rise. paradise, california was in the path of the camp fire. the story focusing on that fire in the death toll there in the l.a. times. that's noting the 29 victims at

this point that have been reported as of sunday, although authorities continue to search for victims amid the ruins from that fire. the source in the l.a. times noting with the additional casualties, it match the deadliest fire on state record, a 47 acre scorcher that killed 29 people in griffith park in los angeles in 1933. this fire had already eclipsed last year's fire to become the most destructive as of sunday night and these numbers have risen since then. 111,000 acres have been burned by that fire rated the l.a. times story is that red flag conditions will last through today creating a recipe of gusty winds and drive fuel that could spark another out-of-control fire. it could challenge the defensive positions. here are a few tweets from president trump over the weekend. he was traveling in france but

noted the fire several times. this from late on saturday, there is no reason for these and costly forest fires accepted forest management is so poor. billions of dollars are given with so many lives lost. all because of gross mismanagement of the forest. remedy dow or no more federal payments. the good follow that up on sunday saying with proper forest management we could stop the devastation constantly going on in california. get smart, the president said. those were his only tweets about the forest fire. he did tweet this as well noting the 4000 people fighting the that haveoolsey fires burned over 170,000 acres, our hearts are with those fighting the fires and a 2002 of been evacuated and the families of the 11 who died. god bless them all. of course since then that number has -- that death toll has

risen. the president tweeted about encouraging californians to follow evacuation orders. it was the first to tweets about the gross mismanagement of california forests that caught the attention of those who went on the sunday shows and started political storm over the weekend on nbc's meet the press, adam schiff, the democrat from california was asked about the president's comments. >> there are a lot of root causes about why it is become so much worse over the years but for the president at a time when people are facing utter disaster to be making a statement like this and a threat like this, this goes to show how little he understands the job he has. that he would be punitive at a time like this rather than coming to the defense of people facing the worst disaster of their lives, he is out there making these broad and false statements and threatening to remove funding from a state that

is devastated right now. >> d think it is a political thing? >> i do. he is punitive and i think we saw that in the tax cuts by taking away state and local tax deductions. that was aimed in blue states. he is only the present in his view of those who voted for him, the rest he could care less. host: senator lindsey graham also on the sunday shows was on cbs's face the nation and had comments about the tweets. takingthe president is an of aggressive combative stance threatening to cut off funding. what is achieved by doing things like this? >> number one my heart goes out to people who lost their homes. there's about 25 people killed. these are historically large wildfires. but we do have a forest management problem all over the country we need to address. california will receive the money they need.

but going forward we need to look at some of the underlying causes of these. it's not just california. we need to look at better forest management. >> so you agree with the sentiment that perhaps -- but perhaps not the tone. this has been a debate about underbrush clearing on federally owned lands. now is not the time to talk about cutting off money, we want to help our friends in california. host: getting your thoughts on the washington journal on the president's response to those fires in california. democrats 202-748-8000, republicans 202-748-8001, independents 202-748-8002 and a special line for california residents throughout this first segment. 202-748-8003. dana is up first from california. good morning britain guest: -- good morning. guest: i was in southern california.

the caliper -- as a californian, we deal with these fires every season, every october to november it seems like clockwork there is a fire somewhere and i want to say god bless the firefighters out there and all the people at the camp fire right now in the other fire are doing their part. god bless you guys. on the president's tactic, i think it's a jab at the state which escorted his agenda on a number of issues. everything from net neutrality to border security and i realized today that the force under federal control and not private control. why he is tweeting to forest management is really more when technically the administrations responsible is beyond me. host: alan in brooklyn, new york, a democrat. guest: good morning and thank you. ,n this veterans day weekend when we are suppose to be celebrating the fact --

sacrifice and bravery of our soldiers in times of war, i remember the saying that in war the first casualty is truth and this president doesn't seem to realize that the erosion of truth is one of the reasons we end up in wars and he has been eroding truth not only about their areas political issues like immigration and tax policy, but also about climate change. the climate change that was documented by the various reports over the last 20 years have made clear that the pack fromin ice winter snow throughout california and other parts of the country would reduce the amount of water in rivers for the balance of the year in the amount of moisture in the ground and that much of the heat content of the atmosphere is increasing from climate change would end up being concentrated in the oceans which then create these dry wind conditions that

exacerbate forest fire risks and for him to be blaming this global climate change trend which is documented by more than 97% of scientists who know about the field on forest management practices is just another evidence that he is basically the handmaiden of the oil industry and the coal industry and is not interested in truth or the welfare of his country and it's a shame when we are supposed to be celebrating people who sacrificed their lives to bring us back to a stable democracy and to a government of truth is eroding all the things that keep us in times of peace and prosperity and protect our planet. host: bob from wisconsin is on a line for republicans. guest: if you look at one of your own graphics -- caller: if you look at your own graphics, you see pines. if you come to place like central wisconsin, you don't see pine trees in the streets, a

pine tree is dangerous even in wet weather with the system allows them to blow over on houses and power lines. urban sprawl is the problem. these people should not build in pine plantations, you can see their modern culture is killing the forest. the accumulation of needles underneath, this was long overdue. thank you. host: do you think the president was trying to point out some of those points you make in his tweets? is that what you read from them? caller: i felt this way long before trump. it's, you cans criticize tone for that, but i don't lose any sleep over it. but i wish people when they want their dream house and want to live in the country, i always say buy a piece of land in the country and go visit it, do not

drive up the road costs or my own ambulance costs or fire costs. that's basically my point. california professional firefighters association represents more than 30,000 andfighters in california brian rice is the president of that organization. here was his statement in response to the president's tweets. the message attack in california and threatening to withhold aid from the victims of the cataclysmic fire is an ill-informed, ill-timed and demeaning to those who are suffering as well as the men and women on the front lines. the assertion that california's forest management policies are to blame for catastrophic wildfire is dangerously long -- wrong. natural disasters destroy regardless of party. and 4es are in mourning million americans have been forced to flee.

at a time we encourage the president offer support in word and deed instead of recrimination and blame. mark is in napa, california. good morning. caller: good morning. my wife and i first saw the fire back in 20 -- with a huge start here. it was really quite something to see emerge and grow. we didn't think it would get that date and we feel bad for those people in northern california, we had everybody from southern california from los angeles and orange county, all the firefighters came up to help with that. and we were so appreciative of that, i work in the hotel industry and we took the hospitality industry, my work, the owner put fire victims up for free. he didn't charge someone sent for people who needed to stay for two months or so and so i am

grateful to have an employer like that. everybody -- aso lot of people in businesses in california were so anti-trump that you could not even say the word trump without people giving you a dirty look and they didn't want then president-elect trump coming out here for anything, they threatened to close the golf tournament if trump came out to the country club out here and everybody was just telling them go away and then when those fire started, everybody was like what's the president going to do about this and all of a sudden everybody demanded things of them when they didn't want anything to do with him to begin with. those people can go punt. i think the president is on a good job. his comments about the fire and the poor fire management is right on and i am glad he is and please god

bless those people in the firefighters that are suffering and working hard. thank you very much. jerryoutgoing governor brown has been holding press briefings threat this crisis in california. this from his latest briefing, this was late yesterday afternoon, he talked about the president's speech. -- tweets. >> i think all the firefighters -- i thank all of the firefighters. -- meanwhile is waiting in flushing, new york. caller: good morning. politics and fire are now coming together. the gentleman before me was saying people who don't like ismp, but the question here the president is playing

politics. the sad thing is these forest fires are normally california. have fires which can destroy so many acres of land, how are you going to -- . if you have such weather, such a , your -- has to be returned. if you live in an earthquake country, you design your buildings. if the area is prone to fire, we need to do something. this is not the case for the trump to be blaming the fire department not doing its job. for me, that is part of california land use has to be a

real study, maybe we need to put -- in that part of california. we can't go blaming politics and firefighters and the present is not smart saying that. unfortunately the ecosystem is changing and we have to fight that. host: tubular the president not blaming the firefighters, i will read that again, the one that draws through the most ire from critics over the weekend saying there is no reason for these massive deadly and costly forest fires in california except the forest management is so poor. billions of dollars are given each year with so many lives lost all because of the gross mismanagement of the forest. remedy now or no more federal payments. we are talking about that tweet and the president reaction so far to these california wildfires, the death toll now creeping over 30, the northern california camp fire becoming

the deadliest in state history or tied expected to become the deadiest, currently at 29 in that specific fire. several fires raging around the state. we are talking about that in our first segment of washington journal today. hour, we in our 8:00 will talk about the week ahead on capitol hill and at the white house with our washington roundtables joined by melanie of the hill newspaper and john bennett of rollcall. also keeping you updated about those uncalled races from the 2018 midterms, the washington post with its staff updated with new numbers coming in. here's where things stand now in some of those high profile uncalled races. ahead byn arizona now about 30,000 votes, more than

30,000 votes in her race to take over the seat of jeff sessions -- in the senate -- jeff flake in the senate. florida, the closely watched senate rates and no recount, senator bill nelson is behind but closing the gap on governor rick scott for that senate seat out in florida. those outstanding governors races we are watching. republicans ahead in those races in florida and georgia, ron desantis, the congressman looking to take over the governor see from rick scott ahead of andrew gillum. brian kemp in georgia, the secretary of state there, i head of stacey abrams. we will watch those with any calls the do get made or numbers

that come in. sticking with california this morning. racesl outstanding house still, but one of those that is off the list is the seat of congressman dana rohrabacher, a 30 year veteran of congress, the associated press called his race for his democratic challenger over the weekend. that race with 100% of precincts reporting. rohrabacher'so 48%. that race called on saturday evening. dana rohrabacher first elected to congress in 1988 represents a district of orange county, traditionally a bastion of conservatives in the state that is otherwise democrat. he has one of the most colorful and iconoclastic members of congress, one of the few republicans backing legalization of marijuana. the wall street journal story noting some of his background noting the nine -- known in the

1980's on behalf of afghan rebels. he has played down the importance of russian interference in 2016 elections. he will not be returning in january. back to your calls about california and the wildfires. president trump's response to them. tricia in roseville, california, thanks for calling in. caller: good morning. i think president trump is right on. he is looking at the big picture where our politicians in california are just wanting to make them look bad. grandchildrend my can hardly breathe for all the smoke and everything that is in the air, it is really causing us a lot of problems. and i have thought for years we should be doing something about clearing out some of these brush and trees that are making these

fires grow so fast. i also am really concerned about the winter when we have our rain, we will have mudslides so badly, they will ruin more property and kill more people. so again, president trump you are doing a great job. i think you are wonderful and i am sorry about these people who don't have the foresight to realize that. thank you. host: staying out west to eugene, oregon. caller: thanks for having me on your show. a simple statement. those who blame mismanagement of the forest are ignoring the externally low humidity during the times of fire. that's all i have to say and thank you for having me on the show. host: smitty in florida,

independent. caller: good morning. my heart goes out to the people in california. at the number of my fellow americans the just want to be stroked, stroked by adam schiff who protects and bank incompetent system and a riot against trump and he is just trying to make us reevaluate the processes that we've used in the past and are under criticism. -- what weshould be do, we shoot the messenger instead of stepping back and saying here is corrupt adam schiff that is protecting these incompetent in the federal government and the influence of these tree huggers with a lot of that areind him

contributing to all of us. only adam schiff not the critic of the president over the weekend from california as well, congresswoman maxine water was on msnbc later asked about the president's tweets. >> the president of the united states does not empathize or sympathize with what is going on in california based on some comments he has made. but my district is fine. the fires are absolutely devastating as the fire has jumped the freeway in addition to areas like calabasas and malibu, we have people who have been evacuated, thousands have been evacuated and we certainly hope that the firemen can get it under control sometime soon. >> we know 23 people so far have lost their lives.

incredible condolences to those families. what you make of the fact that president trump eventually blamed the management of the forest for your fires. the president of the united states tends to talk about things that he has no knowledge of. he does not even understand what goes into fighting a fire and for him to come out talking about poor management is just another indication president is not willing to learn anything and he is on the attack all the time. and sots out attacking we wish you would keep his mouth shut, california does not need him to be talking about things he does not know. we need him to bring people together, to be concerned about the safety of our families and so again it is another trump who is again reaching in talking about things he does not understand and we need him to just stay away from us.

reaction to the tweets about california from the governor-elect of california, the current lieutenant governor tweeting over the weekend oh -- "entire towns have been burned people are being forced to leave their homes, this is not a time for partisanship. it's a time for coordinating relief and response and lifting those in need up." caller: good morning, thank you for taking my call. i have a couple of comments. for the lady in roseville and her children and grandchildren having to smell smoke or it i am sorry about that. up here in northern california there are children that don't have homes anymore, so i'm just wondering what is happening to the heart of our country. carr an evacuee during the fire and now it -- and i got to witness the people of paradise -- i have to do with the people of paradise dealing with this

loss. these tweets just reinforce the rest of the people that don't have a heart. i don't know how people can look at this and go right away to forest management. it also has to do with climate change. today is november 12 and it will be 76 degrees. that to me is climate change. that's about all i want to say. host: richard in massachusetts, good morning. these: california have fires year after year and nothing has been done. not too long fires ago before this fire started. these people, what has happened out there? do they know what really happened? change has been changing for years. it is just natural. we can't just keep throwing money after money and get

nothing done about it. it has to be something done. year and i, every agree with what trump said. it's got a be something to do with mismanagement or they got to sit down and decide what they are doing. they have to cut fire lines. that's all i have to say. our question in this first hour of the washington journal, some of your reactions to the president statements about the california wildfires. we will see if the president continues to tweak this morning about it or if he makes any further statement. the phone lines in this segment, democrats 202-748-8000, republicans 202-748-8001, , andendents 202-748-8002 we will keep that special line

open for california residents 202-748-8003. also show you some of the other reactions from outside the political world in the world of entertainment. katy perry tweeting about this topic over the weekend, this is an absolute heartless response, there aren't even politics involved, just good american families losing their homes as you tweet evacuating into shelters. leonardo dicaprio saying the reason these wildfires have worsened is because of climate change and historic droughts. helping victims and fire relief efforts in our state should not be partisan. want to hear your thoughts this morning. colorado, republican, go ahead. caller: i was a california to puthter and i want this on it for the people out there and i'm also a realtor right now selling properties in colorado. these fires and what you are

going to see in the future is worse fires because of global warming. i am sitting here looking at whole mountainsides in colorado that have beetle kill due to global warming. you can research this extensively. these fires are going to continue and i'm sure were going to see nationwide is and we are is that insurance, if you want to buy a mountain property, insurance is going through the ceiling and you will see flood insurance going through the ceiling. it is all due to this global warming and it is going to continue and it is going to cost us billions. this isn't a political matter, i do not care if you're right or left, this is science and this is real and if you really dig , io it and figure it out just can't even go on anymore

about the costs that is going to arise over the next decade. it is going to be astronomical. host: page is next from california. good morning. where are you in california? caller: hi. no moreident knows about forrester and management than he does the presidency. no one is addressing how the fire began, we have a lot of homeless people here that can accidentally sparked fires. we had x fire fire start fires. you can all google this stuff. , i haveparticular case been here for 31 years and the winds have been crazy. here,ople that don't live these are residential, these are homes. but the wind was 45 miles per hour where i live and about 40

minutes away from me in calabasas from those places it was 77. in malibu it was in the 70's. so you put the fire with a residential homes with palm trees and pine trees making it worse and the winds carried inland. i don't remember it being this close to home, but it was and that's what made it worse. that's what made it worse. nobody's talking about the wind , i have beenening your 31 years and i've never seen it. and i grew up in chicago, the windy city. it reminded me of chicago. you could barely stand up before a fire started. when they spread -- when it started, they spread in minutes. so people who do not live here need to think twice about their opinions, it is not always the forest. calabasas is not a forest.

little need to do a geography before they make their comments. the president knows nothing. host: have you ever had to evacuate yourself? caller: once about maybe two years ago but that was only when i was visiting somebody. space ands more open more for a straight. like it was earlier in the year, i think it was last year. in those cases where you have people who live in smaller towns , they are surrounded by trees in the forest. there were a few towns here in southern california where they used to film movies and stuff like that that are far out. but the wind made the big and it spreade the fire so much faster than you normally would. helicopters could not stay in the air. host: how do you feel about the

ability to communicate those of activation orders to residents and that process for evacuating, do you think it could be improved or is it going well? caller: the evacuation process is fantastic. it comes across on the news very quickly. everybody on facebook, it it -- everybody is aware of that. to do is stand outside a matter where you live, it wasn't normal weather. that's all i can say. , in you think of the wind looked up and you could see it coming from way off in the distance and it was -- i spent the whole weekend with a face mask on. you can't breathe and i am almost an hour away and it's only starting. so people need to ask how the fire started and talk about the wind that made it worse and

leave all these other insensitive comments to themselves. should have that you his federal government. host: one of the things, from one of his tweets on saturday was a series of tweets saturday about it talking about how quickly the fires can expand in some cases 80 to 100 acres a minute and people don't evacuate quickly they risk being overtaken. the president encouraging people to listen to evacuation orders from state and local officials. some of the newspaper coverage about these fires today, the , allre here from usa today that is left of the rock house restaurant as you look at that picture and some of the numbers compiled by usa today, there are wildfires burning in the state, three considered major. we focus on two of them this

morning in particular the camp fire north of the capital city has become the most destructive fire in state history charring 109,000 acres. of the 6700 and 13 structures up liberated,uctures of the death toll now stands at 29, tying it for the most in state history. the numbers expected to go up. here are some of the front pages from california papers. this is the fresno, the headline with the governor calling for a disaster declaration as those wildfires rage. that declaration being asked for by the governor of the federal government amid the ongoing disaster out there. also focusing on the governor's response to the front page of the press telegram this morning, the governor calling the fires and the fire emergencies that

seem to take place as normal in california. comesvernor's warning amid a slight reprieve in the woolsey fire ahead of what is today expected to be more anticipated high winds. the front page of the mercury news focusing on that camp fire in northern california, matching the state's deadliest. and one more from the san francisco chronicle, the blaze does slow. a special phone line for those in california, we want to hear your thoughts. go ahead. caller: good morning. , i haveling and i do with your all my life, we have never seen fires like this. they are not managing the forest, they will stop everybody from even taking the dead trees, the lady that called earlier from whatever said the santa ana

winds, they have been coming forever. we have them every year, they had them last year, the year before. i am not sure what it takes for governor brown and now knew some coming in -- newsom to get a grip. malibu, one of the richest in the united states burning down. these people are building, they are not maintaining, they are not doing anything to help, now they hate trump and they wanted to come in and save them from a disaster they are creating. they can manage the forest, they can cut the -- who says that global warming. it's a drop. then do something about it. build temporary dam. there are so many things california can do but they are choosing to spend their money on this stupid fast rail that is

never going to be built, nothing will ever get done. then thet illegals and people that actually live here in this state are suffering. so yes i agree with trump. cut it off. if you can't come up with a plan to stop all of this or even if youte 50% of it, eliminated 50% you would need federal money, would you? host: have you ever had to evacuate a wildfire? caller: we have them up and use emily. they are only -- yosemite. i keep thinking i'm in this other part of the state and why are we managing it better than they are? arease they are wealthy and i'm going to be honest with you, those areas generally vote democratic. we vote republican.

we want our forest managed. we want the tree huggers to stop this. let them cut out, let them go under and clean it out, that is what we want, but nobody will listen to us and you are going to keep having it and everybody is saying global warming. this is ridiculous. we get facebook alerts, we get this, no we don't. we do not. i don't know where these people live and i feel sorry for half the people that live up here because they are going to vote the same way over and over again and pretend they know, they are our saviors. but where are the saviors now? host: a few tweets we have been having this conversation. forest managed themselves just fine long before us. overdevelopment and in some cases human behavior, the point

is the wildfires are nothing new for california and the state should've figured out by now how to do more to deal with the problem instead of expect in others to deal with it. alexander says trump supporters don't get it, i pray nothing happens to them because they will first blame the citizens and then after a few hours will apologize in a vague tweet. that is what we are dealing with. jody saying donald might not of created the problem, but he is the one american chosen to fix them and is failing miserably saying he will pull funding for california wildfires. there must not be a trump hotel or golf course in california. that reaction from her twitter and facebook pages. you can call in like frank did, in independent from oklahoma. caller: you read some tweets or

something earlier, some guy for supposedly blaming the people that are suffering and that is not sure though. he never did that. years a tree expert in tulsa and we've got pine beetles and when the trees are killed by the pine beetles, you have to get them out of there because it's nothing but fuel for the fires and pine trees naturally shift their branches because of the sunlight getting blocked from the upper growth and those forests become littered with this fuel for the fire, full of flammable and then people build right up next to the forest and they are

surprised when the santa ana winds blow the embers into the residential areas, the forests are not managed correctly, this has been a problem that has been talked about for decades. refuse tolifornians take care of their forests. trump doesn't deny global warming, he denies that it's man-made. and so why, i think it is natural systems -- so do i. i think it is natural systems and changes in climate of her all the time for millennia past. trump guys quit blaming or lying about him and spreading or evenke news things that fake twitter thing.

got to about all i've say except god bless the poor californians. host: what is the fake twitter thing? caller: the thing you read where the guy said trump was blaming the victims. it was about 20 minutes ago. host: gotcha. glenn in lancaster, california. you said two native won.cans i would like to hear their names. about the fires, trump tweeted about before one third of our trees in california are dead from the bark beetles that haven't been touched to the last two administrations. god bless donald trump and god bless america, our people need and we a are -- up here

do need to remove these trees but the prior caller said because they are a tinderbox up there. you can drive through any forest up here and see that these trees are dead. get them out of here. god bless donald trump. he is working very hard for and that's all i have to say. can you talk about the fire management in lancaster and what happens on the community level? caller: lancaster is a desert. i have had the privilege of traveling the whole united states because my parents took me and showed me all of these places. aboutup in the redwoods five or six years ago. i could see dead standing trees everywhere and then all of a sudden all these fires hit in all these places.

it is mismanagement. we need to get rid of the dead trees. more jobs here in california for the citizens, not bring millions of illegal aliens in here so we have more people living in tents all over the streets of l.a., all over the rivers in northern california and the police can't do anything about it because they have no residents. if they taken to jail, they go -- they have no residence. host: glenn, you were asking about more information about the first native american women elected to congress last week. davids and --e holland.

unseated congressman kevin yoder. that the cnn story talking about the history made there. lynn in california in palmdale. caller: thank you for c-span. you are a national treasure. i want to call. i'm from palmdale which is about 15 minutes from the man that called from lancaster. so i am in the same area where he lives and we are sometimes close to the fires that have been blazing here in california, but i wanted to set -- give some information to some of your callers. that were talking about the

mismanagement and gross mismanagement of the fires. there is an article in the and he searchlight discussed the majority of the largest blazes in our state's history, the 410,000 ranch fire this past summer burned in large parts of land managed by the and therebyservice counties of san francisco. the 16 most instructive wildfires in the past way five years in terms of structures destroyed occurred on federal lands. so we have to stop the blame game, my heart goes out to everyone that has passed away or lost their property. i'm a little stressed out when the fires start and the winds start moving up here. i've only been evacuated, it was a self evacuation, once because

i could smell smoke and i got extremely scared and i evacuated myself, thank god we were safe here in our area, but you never know what is going to happen tomorrow or the next day. i wanted to sort of clear up some of the information and it is not -- the state has to do their job as well, but i wanted to clear up the majority of the fire was started unfortunately on federal lands. i thank you so much for taking my call. the call fromor california, that special line for california residents 202-748-8003 is that number. want to show you some tweets from california members of congress, we showed you adam schiff on the sunday shows yesterday. here was his tweet in reaction to the president's about the california wildfire saying i don't expect anything better from trump, but this threat issued as people are literally

fleeing for their lives will not go unanswered. for those of you in the path of a firearm of lost love ones are your homes, we will be there for you even if our president is not. a tweet from congressman brad sherman of california. president trump attack california and threatened to hold federal assistance while the fire raged is abhorrent. in an of leadership in a time of crisis, congress will not allow president trump to shortchange california. one more from congressman eric about the president's trip over as he was tweeting his statements about california, he was in france for those commemorative ceremonies over the weekend. president trump's european vacation was as bad as the movie. he went out -- went out on honoring our fallen troops anduse of a misting insulted fire victims and he was scorched by the french president. this is not winning.

this is a national embarrassment. here is more from the president from his trip to france, this was his remarks -- some of his remarks issued yesterday at the cemetery in paris honoring the 100 years centennial of the end of world war i. 1918,this day in the year church bell rang, families were racing celebrations. filled the streets of never before in town throughout europe and the united states. but victory had come in a terrible cost. among the allied forces, more than one million french soldiers and 116,000 americans say a risk -- service members have been killed by the wars and. millions more were wounded, countless would come home bearing the lasting scars of trench warfare and the grizzly horrors of chemical weapons.

of thethe final battle war, over 26,000 americans lost their lives and more than 95,000 wounded. it was the single deadliest battle in united states history. think of that, 26,000 americans lost their lives in a battle. grounds lierevered more than 100 -- 1500 u.s. service members who made the ultimate sacrifice in the first world war. among those buried here are legendary marines who fought in the battle of bella would -- wood. american marines, soldiers and allied forces fought health to turn the tide of the war and that's what they did.

they turned the tide of the war. it was in that battle our marines earned the nickname , arising from the german description of their ferocious fighting spirit. host: that was the president yesterday. if you want to see the entire remarks you can view them on our website, www.c-span.org. the president is up and tweeting this morning, we will keep you updated on some issues he is talking about including the florida election for governor -- senator there. it should be called in favor of rick scott and ron desantis who is running for governor of florida in that large numbers of new ballots showing up out of the -- out of nowhere the president said. an honest vote count is no longer possible, ballots massively infected. must go with election night is what the president had to say. rick scott specifically was on the sunday shows yesterday on

fox news talking about his race against bill nelson for that senate seat in florida. , the laws are set up to stop fraud. let's look at what happened yesterday. we know nelson's lawyer said a noncitizen should have the right to vote. senator nelson has gone to court to say fraudulent ballots that were not properly delivered, signed, whatever, should be counted. senator nelson is clearly trying to trying commit fraud to win this election. that is all this is. >> you are accusing bill nelson of trying to commit fraud? >> his lawyer said that a noncitizen should vote. that is one. number two he is gone to trial and said fraudulent ballots should be counted. ballots that have already been thrown out because they were not done properly.

he said those should be counted. >> and you think that the senator himself is committing fraud? >> it is his team. nelson l withbill a statement from his campaign yesterday in response to the ifarks of rick scott saying rick scott wanted to make sure every legal ballot is counted, he would not be trying to sue to legal voters -- ballot being counted. he is worried that when all the votes are counted he will lose this election. we will not allow him to undermine the democratic process and use every legal tool available to protect the rights of florida's voters. we will keep you updated on anymore out of that closely watched recount happening down there and all the uncalled races. a few moments left in this segment of washington journal to focus on california on those wildfires in the president's response to them. joseph has been waiting in san diego. caller: good morning.

this president has clearly never --wn leadership and loves using a bad pun -- throwing gas on everything. from a california perspective is we have to look for solutions, i believe global warming is real, for those that don't think it is man-made, i think they are clearly mistaken, but the reality is is that the area is extremely dry, temperatures are rising. winds are 60 or 70 miles per hour the last few days. i think we need to have systems. i think there needs to be some type of summit between state and federal governments and look for solutions and just ignore the president and not get outraged by his lack of leadership.

there needs to be solutions on this and that's what the focus needs to be. host: where do you think the solutions can start? caller: i think there has been some improvements with properly manning the fire departments and i'm glad to see other states that are sending them across that the state level. i think it needs to be publicized where there needs to be working with the department of interior and forest management that has very clear and open press coverage, but it needs to be done in a civil manner because a president is quick to go partisan and attack. and it really has to be done at the mid-level engaging with the federal government and i think from the state government i think they need to do a better job. you have global warming that is

real, you can do minor things that can help. if a democrat hadn't been elected global warming would still increase. we need to manage our people better and our coordination between the federal government better. education to what individuals can do. i see the state and federal bureaucracy not working together. host: bill is in bend, oregon, independent. caller: good morning. right off the say top that my heart and prayers go out to the people that have lost their homes and families. i was born and raised in the timber capital of the nation.

they manage of course just fine. the situation down there happened to come from the winds 13 whatnot, we lost firefighters in colorado that were sent out there. it is devastating. the management of the forests needs to be done, they need to clean them like a garden. clean the rubbish. but then again what we need to do is to look at certain areas where these forests. people have been mentioning pine beetles. we have that situation appear think thatimes i

with the forest taking care of themselves, way back when when the american natives let them burn, it was a situation that happened. there are a lot of good debates going on here and then there are some that are not. on the standpoint of the president accusing -- host: we only have about a minute left but go ahead. caller: apologize. think with the debates going on i just want to finish right now and say that my heart goes out to the people losing things, let's all pull together. built, our last caller in this first segment of

the washington journal. plenty more to talk about today including the next, president trump back from that overseas trip. lawmakers back on capitol hill since the election. we will talk about the week ahead in washington with melanie and john. and we will be joined by the government accountability office is here on yoko to discuss -- carolyn yocom to discuss the price tag for state and federal governments. we will be right back. ♪

>> tonight on "the communicators," verizon senior vice president and chief network officer nicky palmer on verizon's push implement 5g, interviewed by technology mccabe. david >> what's different about 5g? 5g gives us new currencies on which to develop services. and what i mean by that is 5g networks give us massive speed and bandwidth. average toe speed on 4g networks and about 1000 times the bandwidth because the way we are deploying it and clayton knows, we are calling this ultra wideband and that's because we are using spectrum in the millimeterwave range and there's a lot of it.

and when you have a lot of spectrum, what that translates to his speed and throughput. >> watch "the communicators," on c-span2. >> c-span, where history unfolds daily. in 1979, c-span was created as a public service by america's cable television companies. and today, we continue to bring you unfiltered coverage of congress, the white house, the supreme court, and public policy events in washington, d.c., and around the country. c-span is brought to you by your cable or satellite provider. >> "washington journal," continues. host: with congress that to me for the first time since election day and president trump back in town for mr. overseas have always been the next hour of "washington journal," focusing on the weekend in washington.

plan to talk about and covering both ends of pennsylvania avenue is john bennett and melanie zanona, congressional reporter for "the hill," newspaper and the lame-duck session kicks off this week so take us through what to watch for this week, the highlights as house republicans leadership. guest: they start with leadership elections are sickness wednesday and not whole lot on the schedule but behind the scenes they will be working to try to come to a deal on government funding and the next deadline is december 7 and they have a few government agencies already funded, the lion's share of the funding has been taken care of but of course, department of homeland security which has jurisdiction over the border wall have not been funded getand trump is itching to that money, especially now that he lost control the house so certainly something we are looking out for, potential government shutdown is the biggest one to watch for now. something we will focus on quite a bit. for the immediate leadership

elections, take us through how that works for republicans and where is it going to happen and take us through the leadership, top leadership races. guest: there will be a closed-door vote with just public and lawmakers, a caucus vote and that it only takes a simple majority to get to the minority leader and we are accepting kevin mccarthy to have the votes even though jim jordan, a conservative number, is also want to be challenging him. we don't expect it to be a problem for kevin mccarthy and steve scalise is going to run for the number two spot and they don't need to vote on the house floor, they will have their own behind closed-door conference road and then they will have the vote on the floor in january for speaker. host: take us through president trump's relationship with kevin mccarthy and jim jordan. do you expect him to weigh in at all on the leadership race? guest: i wouldn't expect them to weigh in on sometime wednesday. it's interesting, president has lawmakers,h of these

he has gotten closer in recent weeks -- recent months and i think by design with leader mccarthy, mccarthy sensing that trump is very influential obviously within the republican caucus and really wants to show that the president believes in him and they have a close relationship and that he could pick up the phone and talk to the president and get the president on the phone. they talk almost daily, we know that. mccarthy is trying to shore up that relationship as a sign to the rest of the conference that he has the president's ear but notably, the president has recently as last week over week before all these rallies ran together in my head by the end, he is in ohio lavishing praise on congressman jordan, calling up on stage and calling a champion. i think with the present will come down on this, all evidence points to be will be fine with the leader mccarthy and he talked to that ohio rally about how he likes to see congressman jordan on television defending him, calling him a bulldog and a tough guy.

president trump may say some nice things about jordan and make us all think there's an entry here, but i think he likes , the conservative cable news warrior on his behalf. zanona, where does ?im jordan end up guest: there are couple of breaking number of positions that will be open on oversight and judiciary and trent does like human that attack dog role and if he is on the oversight committee, this would be pretty depend usattacks to defend the president on. it could be a good fit for him, but he is really loyal to numbers of his own conference, there's also the argument that they should have someone more battle tested, a member of leadership like doug collins who also wants judiciary. to wait and see but i am certain it is a link he is very efficient in. seven from the freedom

caucus group, that seems to be his base of support, can you talk about their role in the leadership election? guest: we are thinking you will have the 30 to 35 block of broke decibels from the freedom caucus and he could pick up a few more supporters from conservatives the republican study committee, the largest conservative caucus on capitol hill that he needs 100 votes to get there and that is just a very tall order for him. that's why we think kevin mccarthy has this on lock because mccarthy did crisscrossed the country and help the campaign and raise a boatload of money for republicans the summer and this fall. i don't think you will be only get there but jordan could make a case for another slot. weekend on both ends of pennsylvania avenue, phone lines, democrats, call (202) 748-8000, republicans, call (202) 748-8001, independents, call (202) 748-8002. john bennett, take us through the president's schedule this

week. publicnothing on the schedule today and that's not out of the ordinary. president obama would have slower days after a foreign trip veggies earlier, he is already up and tweeting. i would expect that probably go on throughout the morning. there are things he wants to weigh in on. he was busy yesterday and cancel the cemetery visit on saturday when he was busy with the official armistice festivities were ceremonies yesterday and then traveling back. week there's not a lot of interaction scheduled with congress i was curious if we might see congressional leaders had to the white house or the president, and talk to house republicans after they lost last tuesday. nothing like that yet. with this being the trump presidency, you just never know. anymore shakeups you are expecting to see in the coming days? all eyes are on interior

secretary ryan zinke he has some allegations of misconduct and some travel allegations of other things out there. and the president has not ruled out pushing him out or firing him. and finding a new interior secretary. i would put another nomination on the senate docket and that would probably just at this point in the calendar, that would almost be in the new congress. same thing with the keep saying by the end of every week he is going to announce his pick for u.n. ambassador rice replace nikki haley and he hasn't done that is said he was going to do before he left for paris and friday morning on the south lawn result is it could be a few weeks before he makes that pic. those the two big ones are looking at. what happens when linking and he selects to be the chief envoy to the u.n.. clockthere is a ticking to the countdown to a potential government shutdown in december, december 7. what is the president's

priorities in this upcoming budget fight? guest: he wants the ball funding. in the press conference wednesday morning at the white house, at least that's what he says going in the once all the remaining funding and depending on even the white house has different estimates on how much the entire project would cost. they are gone as high as $30 billion, sometimes as high as $23 billion. he's got $1.6 billion already and he wants the rest of it and he senses that with the democratic-controlled house, getting these incremental amounts, $1.6 billion or so every year the democrats might have that off. we don't know what the carrot is that he might dangle to house that, is to try to get know if we think they have the votes right now for $20 million and will funding. my sense is they definitely democrats on the senate side so

the president wants all the funding, it would probably have to be something like a permanent or semipermanent fix to the daca program. as the only way he's going to get democrats in the senate and i think he knows that. negotiatingsic from come under to the furthest extreme and then see if anyone links and you can get all or most of what you want. but he's got to get democrats something on daca. take us to from the democrat perspective how they said up this budget fight and what they will be looking for? guest: on the house side, they don't want to get of anything. -- give up anything. but he don't eat house democrats printed union senate democrats and chuck schumer as minority leader of the senate has signaled he is going to make some sort of deal and he has reiterated they are committed to securing the border and he did offer a deal earlier this year that would have been a doctor for a wall deal and this is conservatives biggest fear that

your office when you take a deal that only includes all funding and a deal for daca and none of the other provisions that republicans in the house are pushing for for border security. immigration, the visa lottery program, those are some things. think if trump is eager enough and he knows is essentially his last chance to get this done at least to the next two years, you could see something get done. may tiemocrats protecting mueller to the spending bill. hearing anything on that? guest: house democrats are racing to get this done and there's a real sense of urgency. there were the probe is either going to be completely shut off or hamstring, whether through registry moves, not approving subpoenas, so they're trying to figure what they can do now before they have the majority and is one of the tools they have is demanding that a mueller protection bill get attached to a must pass spending bill. back is a potential showdown in government shutdown of republicans don't go along and

neither leader in the house or senate on their public insight has said this bill is necessary. republicans might have to really go to the brink on this one, on whether or not they want to prove that. host: does president trump sign a mueller protection bill? the $64,000is question i think it depends on what else is in the bill. if he gets a large chunk of all funding in whatever they might attach it to, he might be willing to sign it. the wall is a huge promise to his base. with suburban college-educated voters in places that went for trump two years ago, they didn't go for while republicans on tuesday, especially college-educated white women. it's not clear if you consist together something in two years to get the 271 electoral college votes without some members of the groups that he lost last

week. he has to turn on his face an even bigger numbers in two years so he can get that will funding and run on that as a chance build that wall and however hundreds of rallies is going to hold between now and then. instead of there and say i got this, this project is moving forward now, school steam ahead and that would be big for the basin turnout in two years. the issuesa few of we're tackling, let us know what you want to talk about, democrats, call (202) 748-8000. republicans, call (202) 748-8001 , independents, call (202) 748-8002. jeremiah's first from birmingham, alabama. good morning. all ofuld like to wish

my veterans who gave and sacrificed all for our country, happy veterans day. caller: i appreciate your services as i do mile service. and i would do again. that, i like some of the things that president trump has put in that, i place, other, i do not like. trumpgoing to vote for when he ran, but as i began to and accusations that came out against him in the things he says against women, i decided to vote for hillary clinton and i certainly did not want to vote for her. before we lose you, take us to the 2018 election and what you're most interested in seeing coming out of that election? caller: i want every vote to be

counted. and i dislike politicians who announce themselves winners before every vote is counted. host: jeremiah, we got your point. bennett, take us through vote counting, president tweeting about it this morning and we showed it to viewers in the last segment, the president saying the florida election should be called in favor of and scott and ron desantis that large numbers of new ballots showed up out of nowhere and many ballots are missing were forged and must go with election night was with the president tweeted about a half-hour ago. thishe was a florida several ts to stump for governor scott ande thinks that his side has won.

president trump's mind, when he has won, he has won, and discussion. his argument here meets the character sketch that we have all kind of built over the last three years, the race is over as far as the president is concerned, he wants that vote in the senate, he wants to flip it, he wants to say that he, and he has already been a little bit of this with that florida race, that he was the difference maker. that he delivered that percent republicans and deliver that for the base. president is the going to get any more involved here other than tweets and wep's will say to guys and gals like me at the white house. he is trying to pressure this thing through some kind of end before the recount, which could take a while, which will take a while. he is trying to pressure some kind of end before then, try to get the win because it's all about the win. zanona, the role

congress plays of these uncalled races, especially florida. guest: with the way this president has been tweeting really underscores what's at stake, and win for trump and for the republicans would give them another pickup opportunity in the senate that would pad their senate majority and also would deliver a key ally for trump and governor rick scott. he came out very early and supported him. thisit comes to recounts, is the law, the state law in florida is that it's a slim margin, it goes to an automatic , it wasn't politics but republicans are seizing on broward county which is how long and controversial tweets histort just bush versus gore, but other controversies in the past as well. guest: the president's tweeted about how governor scott has asked him for federal hurricane funds and other help the

required residential approval. the president clearly feels the rick funds and other help the scott is going to know him if he becomes senator scott and the vote becomes something the president can bring up, i gave you all of that hurricane funding. and the republican party in florida and then you can go on to the entire state. the president feels like he has a little leverage on scott and if we have some" was divided government she can lean on senator scott to vote with him. host: a reminder of where that race stands come the latest numbers, "washington post," rick scott 4,098,107 votes to bill nelson's 4,085,545 votes. it's 50.1% to 40 point s 49.9%. independent line. good morning. caller: good morning. i'm excited about tuesday's results for several reasons. number one, we're going to get more new faces into the congress

and the fact that democrats have a majority in the house will provide a check on the executive ruptured ofh governments should be all about and i would like to see mccarthy on the republican side, however, i do not want nancy pelosi as speaker of the house. i think if she is put back into a leadership role, that that will be a setback on tuesday's election, because i think she has the temperament to be able to work with president trump, we need somebody more in the tip o'neill mindset to be able to work with the president white president trump. i don't think nancy pelosi -- i think the democrats step up and even though she's a huge fundraiser and give a leadership role to somebody that's going to really workt and for representative government

think nancy pelosi is the person to do that. host: melanie zanona, a preview of the democratic leadership election and how it is different from the republican election? guest: we have nancy pelosi was speaker in 2006 in animus vote, is likely to be a cakewalk this time and with the colleges that that aally the argument lot of nancy pelosi insurgents in congress are making right now which is if they handily gavel again, they're going to lose their majority in 2020, especially some of these candidates who ran in swing districts were more moderate who vowed to oppose her on the campaign trail, if they were night on that if you come back to haunt them. host: who is the leader of that? guest: tim ryan, there's 12 of against going to vote foreseeable florida the floor and not all of them have gone public so it's a little unclear whether they all are willing to go there quite yet. they are very vocal and they are trying to get a challenger right now the problem they are facing is that nobody wants to go up against pelosi. tim ryan ready concerned 2016

and he only got 63 votes behind closed doors in the senate is when he does not want to run against her but he is not ruling it out. host: they have two weeks for the challenger to emerge again of the votes. why is the democratic house leadership election so much later than the republican house leadership election? guest: because they were frustrated rank-and-file members who said they need more time to digest the results and the figure out who really should lead our caucus. they wanted more time to think about it and to incorporate like the caller just said what the constituents really feel and what they think should be leading the next year. talk us through a president trump really feels about house democrats leadership elections? was also tweets from him on election night in the morning after. guest: the president tweeting and he said out loud at that press conference last wednesday that he thinks nancy pelosi , at leastthe speaker post-midterms, trump believes she earned it and he said wednesday she has been out there

battling. i think -- was on the campaign trail a very different message from president trump about potential speaker pelosi, you said she was the leader of this andrt to install socialism to throw open the borders, which of course, he thinks automatically brings rampant crime. i suspect that was going on here is the president would love speaker pelosi as he begins to run for reelection. foil andybe his top issues in that top spot in the house, which is one of the most powerful positions in all of washington, she is going to be on fox news, she's even be out there every day and he is in between about her for two years and he wants her in that position, it will be a central part of israel election campaign. four still, maryland next, joe, good morning.

i want to talk about the election real quick. i republican but i ended up voting democrat in a few races and i just want to say about the local elections, those are really, really important. some of these judges, they get elected for like 15 years or whatever and that stuff is pretty important and most of these elections don't get paid attention to a whole lot because we are very focused on the what was thee, but question, the topic? what local election, so was the local race you were to test paying attention to the maryland? joe, but john bennett, you want to talk through a little bit on the topic of the nationalization of the 2018 elections and the localization of the 2018 elections? which ended up winning out? is a mixed results and

voters did hand mixed results in governors races, not so much of the house, but definitely in the senate, and the president want this to be a national election. he was very open that he understood it was in large part a referendum on his presidency and the policies and some the moves he has made as well as his personality and the approach that he has to the presidency. in that regard, i think the president gospel decision and i think he's ok with that. we saw him kind of do a victory lap on tuesday night and then wednesday at his press conference. and that is continued. in the last few days, even in paris with some of the suites and we settled in way out of the white house on friday morning. when you drill down here, the republicans lost governors races in wisconsin and michigan, those of course were two states that were key to the president's upset win two years ago. the president can look at the senate results and declare

victory but he doesn't really talk about what happened with some of these other races and republicans have launched -- lost state and local seats across the country and the president doesn't talk about that. he talked about where he went to campaign and he said and when the final days to campaign for 10 republicans and he pointed out it is prepared opening wednesday the nine of them one. it's a mixed bag. of the states he traveled to was indiana and gary is impartial, indiana, democrat. to the good morning beautiful young lady sitting there. today,e to our veterans dead or alive, and on behalf of a lot of people, we appreciate your service. the one topic on bring up real heck is infrastructure and gets thrown around ever so often but what gets said about it. sick, people keep

saying -- talking about their condition, they refused to take them to the doctor also it makes about as much sense. we all know the roads and bridges and other structures are deteriorating and crumbling and yet we've got nowhere as far as yearly progress towards getting these things underway and jobs are an issue, they would create a lot of jobs, there is every reason to tend to this and no reason not to, so people of your out there listening, i would like to save you, mr. trump mentioned he feels like his face didn't win whatever, the democrats didn't accomplish sweeping victory either. it is going to be interesting to see what happens, it's going to be hard to anticipate what we

have to look forward to. to theooking forward weeks ahead, miller is an owner, take us to the upper structure is shown what we might be here. guest: infrastructure has become somewhat of a punchline because everyone talks about it and nothing gets done. when is infrastructure week? guest: in may, but i think with infrastructure, it is of the that is easy to both sides can point to saying we want to do jobs and rebuild roads, it's very easy for them to latch onto but we start leading into the details, this a lot of disagreements between her public of the democrats come democrats want to inject money straight into these projects. republicans are prefer public private projects. whether or not something , do they wantdone

to play along with the white house and handed trump bid victory heading into 2020? especially as they are investigating the trump administration and slapping them with subpoenas, it's hard to imagine that can be a bipartisan environment at the same time, democrats know they have to say that they can govern and they are not there to get something but also for something. it anything can get done next her, and potentially could be upper structure. -- infrastructure. guest: i think so. i think that is the building will start on an earnest and get organized in january and that will take a little while. the president will probably be impatient, he's an impatient guy how it helped him get elected and i think you'll pressure them to start moving on infrastructure bill maybe sooner than they are comfortable with, it takes a little while for new committees to get up and running. the question i believe will be guests come into democrats want to give trump a win on infrastructure was another one of his big 2016 promises, that

can they make enough progress on a bill that the momentum is downhill at that point before these house democratic investigations of the president really get serious. they will have to hire additional staff how they love to get documents before they can start bringing in witnesses. they've done some of this work with there are things they haven't been able to get his they were the majority and they will be in early january. but that will take some time. in both chambers and the white house get together on infrastructure, how to pay for it is one of the reasons the apart,ouse plans fell even congressional republicans especially senate republicans started relying too much on private funds. can they make some progress before these investigations really get serious and get close to the president's? he warned on wednesday, if they get too close and they are too intensive investigations, he will go to a warlike posture he said nothing will get done. host: halfway through the week ahead in washington roundtable

this morning, to veteran reporters from two capitol hill papers john bennett from rollcall newspaper and melanie zanona of the hill newspaper, congressional reporter jordan is to talk about the topics you want to talk about, democrats, call (202) 748-8000, republicans, call (202) 748-8001 s call (202)t 748-8002. who are you most interested in meeting from this class of freshman? guest: it was the year of the woman, over 100 women elected to ,ongress and a lot of firsts cortez made waves when she took down joe crowley a primary race and she is seen as a rising progressive star and we also have a on a presley in boston who also won a primary race as use the first black woman elected for massachusetts delegation so there is a whole new crop of faces and i really influence can have an

on the democratic agenda especially comes to women's issues. these candidates ran on things like equal pay, paid family leave, the sexual harassment overhaul of the capital they still have not finished, neck and face renewed pressure in the new congress. those not just the makeup of congress is going to change, we also see the agenda change as well. host: your beat is mostly capitol hill that of the freshman last, who is someone who interests you? guest: i would be assisted to see -- we're watching are there any freshman that really catch the president side -- the eye?dent's allies, he have likes folks who are out on cable news, sony relationships that the president might be able to leverage down the road again once we get into a divided house and senate, or thereabouts to be had, to the president see

someone on cable news defending him and try to bring that person into his orbit and you can use hise relationship against own leadership, he has done that in the past i would expect that in the future. host: you mentioned rick scott, who also be in orbit? guest: it changes in its interesting on the trump orbit can change. scott is probably the one to watch and also josh hawley, and is going to be a new senator government look and senator from missouri. he took down claire mccaskill with the president's help and the vice president help. the white house really surged in the missouri to help out the state ag and i would think he is someone again the president geteves owes him so when we some of these" that we expect next year, i would expect scott and holly to be one of those in

the president orbit and he talked about this at the rallies , so-and-so did not vote with me, he likes joe manchin from the democrat senator from west virginia, they agree on some things, but as the president points out, usually when it's time to vote, joe didn't vote with us, so it's a deal for the president i would expect him to lean on the folksy campaign for to vote with him. fred, republican. good morning. caller: as a veteran, i sure appreciate this country i want to go on to say we are fortunate that only three times in history to the president say in the midterm, the senate. happened with clinton or obama, obama lost more seats than 4000 seats across the

country, in the senate in the congress. and we as losing both got understand, things are going on that's help in this country better than ever before in my lifetime, and 78 years old, and a veteran. can see very well if it goes the way the democrats want it, you just see another holding doug and it's going to continue if we let these people run, we got the stories group of people in the democrat area that we've ever had in our history. god it didn't go any worse than what it did. in this country today and if you don't think there is things going on, look around your , if you don't have a prosperous, growing economy, you are not going to get infrastructure done. york, melanie

zanona, john bennett, talked with the president declared victory in the 2018 midterms, taken from nancy pelosi's perspective and a thoughts about winners and losers in election night. guest: losing the house is not a victory. they had three levels of power controller or public in hands of the significant one because the house is going to be able to subpoena the white house and investigate the white house and they can potentially launch impeachment proceedings and while the cooperation of the senate president like impeachment, they are promising to go aggressively as possible against the drug administration that's what a completely halt the legislative agenda is going to come to a screeching halt on capitol hill and they're going to deal with this is going to suck up a lot of the action the room -- the oxygen in the room. if they can't get in for structured unfrequently, hope for anything is going to quickly fade as the investigations really kick into high gear. host:they had three levels of hw congress sits do you expect the first one of these to launch?

guest: it can't happen on the first day, they have to get new committees staffed up and wants document denied, they would issue a subpoena, so it doesn't happen right away but they are promising to start going after some of these issues right away, including the firing of jeff sessions become a top priority for tax returns, even the wall street journal article that came out friday suggesting that trump had direct involvement in the last 20 payments to stormy daniels, these are all things that are going to be top priority next year as they get into the majority. host: deborah's next in spokane, washington. deborah i'm ae is veteran and a trans woman. i want to thank all of our veterans for their service. yesterday was veterans day, was spending a lot of time with you over our history has always been so much segregation in our

country and elsewhere in the world. i feel as though with hindsight, you look back at the people who were once not allowed to be in , speaking mostly of african-americans, that they had to have their own division and they were eventually brought in to fight because we needed them. we allowed them to fight and the same thing with the japanese-americans during the korean war. i see the same thing going on who likesgender people to serve our country. and i think that in a number of years, maybe a decade or two decades, we are going to see the same thing happening over and over. where some people will be and i just think it's awful that somebody was suggests

andedefine what gender is make it all about sex of your genitals at the time of birth. i wish we could take a different approach to this. science and medical research they have done now. scotland has became the first lgbtqy to mandate curriculum in schools. i don't see any harm in doing that, i see much more harm in us.ng to segregate i see the same thing going on in our local schools that special that areespecially segregated from the other kids in the classroom. thanks for the call in

washington. john bennett, take this issue of transgender troops and secretary mattis's view on that topic. the caller had a right, a decade plus is probably what we are at, this is a complicated issue. i think secretary mattis is trying to strike a balance and tried to move the pentagon along with the way social change on the issue is going. he's going to go slow, whoever icceeds in whatever that is think we'll continue to go slow. as a culture within the military that having covered those issues for over a decade i think would be resistant to this. i think there is a recognition among defense leaders and defense thinkers and lawmakers that this is something that is coming eventually and other changes that have been made to go into combat. i don't guess is that this congress and this president can

tackle this in the next two years for the next six years. i think the military sometimes lags behind social changes and i think this is one and that will be the case this time. i wouldn't see any changes in the next decade. what is the last time president trump weighed in on this topic? guest: he has weighed in from time to time and he talked about wanting to be friendly to the all to be teaching community -- the lgbt community out of the biggest since the he has really deliver on his campaign promises that he mentioned it at a rally here and there has been no substantive policy push out of the white house really. 15 of 20 minutes left, will try to get to as many of your calls as we can. .emocrats, call (202) 748-8000 republicans, call (202) 748-8001

. independents, call (202) 748-8002. sarah is a democrat. caller: what troubles me most is how radicalism and extremism is almost consider the new normal. i'm very disturbed by that. because we see the crimes that are literally around the world now it seems like. thattroubles me most is saudi arabia is the biggest extreme country in the world because they have spread radical islam around the world, they are the ones that provided the 9/11 bombers that killed 3000 americans. but more than that, how can we, as a western nation, sit idle by and support saudi arabia it is

literal extermination of up to 14 million people in yemen because saudi arabia has completely sealed off the country from anyone. he can do whatever they want with american and european help as wemit atrocities celebrate the end of world war i. host: sarah in edgewater, maryland. talk three u.s. saudi relations right now in the wake of the criticism they received after the death of jamal khashoggi. host: this is really -- guest: this is really the trump administration's military policy has become and say iran policy and countering iran's nuclear weapons program, countering what they see as iran's aggressive behavior throughout the region, they saw -- they call it destabilizing behavior be at in iraq or syria or any host of countries there. now into the inevitable

discussion about the sunni shia split and of course, saudi arabia and iran are on different ands of that religious let saudi arabia is iran's number one and most powerful and most heavily armed ally and wealthiest ally with that much military force in the region. so the u.s., the enemy of my enemy is my friend and of course right now with saudi arabia and iran, they go back and forth, things that we are really pay attention to it in the region, there's a huge rivalry there. so the trump administration and the white house and the president comes up in john bolton is national security advisor, they come right up to the precipice of saying this flatly, they can't execute their counter iran strategies without saudi arabia's help in the region.

and then you throw in u.s. arms sales saudi arabia the president is a businessman. lineoks at the bottom which has been disputed by defense experts whether they bring in as much revenue for u.s. companies and create as many jobs here in the u.s. as at least the numbers the president uses and those change almost on a daily basis. usually. the iran strategy and trump sees this as a business matter. he does want to use the arms sales. host: melanie zanona, what do you expect? pushingelatives were the administration to take a harder line. they requested an investigation on the magnitsky act of is that we should possibly cancel arms they'll saudi arabia, especially

if the kingdom was advocated in this journalists death. that caused some tension between republicans and the trump administration they were not having the conversation and will be curious to see if it takes backup is the get back in town for the first time since we learned details about the death of saudi arabia's role. i think the trump administration is in a tough position, the main saudi arabia cornerstone of their policy to counter iran and its would be difficult to push ahead with something strong lexington source canceling arms sales. host: tommy is a democrat. good morning. caller: i like to thank the veterans for their service and all the people of the world, i hope that we can find a peaceable 3-d and the european area. i find it very strange that we have a president that lies consistently and we have to put up with -- we're getting looked at poorly on the world because

of him. i think it's very terrible that these things are happening in this time. i work for an oil company and saudi arabia is cutting the production as of yesterday 5.5 million barrels a day oil production. i think there's a lot of things we need to consider about the honesty of our president, because it looks bad. and that's all i have to say. left, tom istes waiting in lancaster, california. republican. go ahead. caller: is going to be a bunch more fake news. this week, like our congressman here in california attacking the president instead of doing their job. my heart goes out to all the people up there in paradise and orville looks like it's going to be next. earlier, salmon fishing all the time, he started

call this frenzies really worried about them. here's another thing, these condors with, that was their job. congressman, that was their job. we signed things to get the dam fixed and it took all that time and thank god donald trump got in there and give the money to get the dam fixed. now the fires are going to tear it up but guess what, the floods after the fire are going to tear the dam up. host: go ahead and finish a comment. caller: fake news, how come you one nativethat american -- on the force recon vet, native american, cardholder for the cherokee nation. host: one that's tom in lancast, california. we talked about this topic in the first hour, the president's

response to the wildfires in the criticism he received since his tweets this weekend, take us through you are expecting today. guest: i expect that to continue until this horrible, scary situation is resolved in these fires are put out or at least pushed back away from residential areas. don't forget the jerry brown is the governor of california, a democrat. he has been mentioned at least as a potential 2020 candidate that's very much on the president's mind, reelection is on the president's mind pretty much every hour of every day. think until governor brown says he is not interested in running or not running, i think this will continue and it's a good -- the president views it as a good message for his base.

to go after the california government, if you spend a little bit of time with conservative media, california state government comes up a lot. california's representatives here in washington, a lot. they view them as part of the problem, as liberal effortto goa to as the president says install socialism and other things. for the president, his loading fruit, even though the experts will quickly point out that some of the things he says about the water and with california state government is doing is just false. he views it as a good message. staying inie zanona, california, on the line for democrats. go ahead. caller: i just from the behavior reallyld trump, normally stayig pay a lot of attention, the politics and all that stuff, but this guy has got my attention and what i hope he has done for himself is doug such a deep hole with the mueller investigation

and i'm so proud, first of all, let me tip my hat to the veterans, i'm a vietnam veteran myself i'm proud of the women that have stood up and got elected in the congress and so forth. that -- and you for a fact he dug a hole for himself when he started to defend the women -- offend the women. hopefully the mueller whatevertion opens up they find and shares with the public and we get to the bottom of all this. , never believed in fake news never heard of fake news until you brought it up and everything -- i've never seen any people in cabinets fall out of office or get away from a guy refusing to work with him. something is wrong. melanie zanona, couple of

issues you talked about. republicans women problem is top of mind a lot of republicans returning to washington. they had a problem with women voters was only exacerbated in this last election. we saw in exit polls that women went for democrats over public ends by even wider margins and they did for both hillary clinton and obama and white women who trump carried in 2016 action broke evenly. this is got to be very concerned for republicans particularly in the suburbs we saw suburban revolts where a lot of the states flip from red to blue in the midterm election and a lot of these moderates and independents, we like the policies we don't like the tweet of the rhetoric, especially towards women towards evil journalists and minorities. this type of rhetoric has pushed a lot of moderate republicans and independents away from the party and that could be a serious problem for the president's reelection push and 2020. host: the center for american ween's and politics, where

go to get some of the stats on this issue, their release after election night, when hundred two women will serve united states house in the next congress and the previous record was 85 set in 2016. that we sorted and will serve the united states senate which ties the previous record of 23 as well. check it out, center for american women in politics, we've had some of their officials on this program before to talk about that issue. bart in houston, texas, independent. go ahead. i want to talk: about nancy pelosi and i think she should be reelected as the chair. many of the people were not supported by the dnc see during the primary i think that may be a problem. the fact is the majority of the people who are in congress and that's the reason why you can't really find someone who is going to challenge her is because they

recognize that her strength as a fundraiser and is somebody who actually is instrumental in this democratic change -- we had a problem -- i'm in the seventh district in houston and we had a challenge between laura mosier and lucy fletcher. dnc fletcher was the choice, laura mosier, who believed in medicare for all, whereas lucy fletcher wanted to repair the affordable care act and that was choice, laura mosier, who believed in medicare forhere ise lucy fletcher one. the issue here, that was one of the big issues i believe the nancy pelosi, there's an institutional knowledge, nobody is talking about wanting to challenge mitch mcconnell in the senate and the fact is the nancy pelosi is a woman. and of course, i believe this is a trumped up saying vulnerable

because to try to demonize her just like they demonize hillary. that was position and you folks would discuss about the strength of nancy pelosi and the reason why she should be the speaker of the house. because these new people who are coming in really do not have the anditutional knowledge wherefore how to get things done. host: melanie zanona. guest: the consensus is she will gavel. novel -- the it would be very hard to deny the gavel to the top woman in the party right now. she is a fund-raising juggernaut and about tested leader who knows that a deal with trump she worked with their public and president before when she was a part of the desktop of the party. it's all the reasons why the challenges are going to have a tough time making the argument against her. newberry, friend in florida. good morning.

caller: good morning. i'm a vietnam veteran and a icipient of the bronze star spent some time in germany two. the whole time i was over there i didn't see statues of taylor and his generals. in the southern cities, most of it is part of our history. it learns part of germany's history -- hitler's part of germany history, but i'll see statues of his generals and stuff. at the same time, president trump is supporting this mess with the conservatively -- with the confederacy. they were slave owners. host: take us to the issue of confederate monuments. it hasn't been in the headlines

as much as i has been early. guest: the president has drawn heavy criticism from democrat lawmakers and other critics in the charlottesville riots in the president seemed inclined to sign with those far right protesters. he came out in support of statuesup confederate and he dropped some words we hear on the far right like heritage, those are important to our national heritage but big it's pretty clear he was talking to a subset of the u.s. population and the electorate. most things with this president go back to the conservative base which he knows he can't win again without a huge turnout is melanie was pointing out that we mentioned earlier, suburban defection from republicans, especially white women, the math gets harder for the president

but he can't do it, one thing for certain he can't do it without the conservative base and this is why sometimes when these old deeply rooted racial issues come back out, the , isident finds himself believe come almost feeling like he has got to give a nod to his base and of course, that turns out a lot of ill will across the country. host: conrad on the line for republicans. i'm a republican, as i stated my called, but there some things i like with the president does and a whole lot i don't. i listen to some of the people who call him today, how nancy pelosi shouldn't be the speaker, nancy has a deep pocket book and she knows how to cut checks and if you don't know how to cut don't care what party you within, you're not going to get nothing. if you call and try me your senator, it might take to six months, but if you are donator, it will be six seconds.

everybody thinks they are all against each other with the tv goes off, these guys are wining and dining, swimming going out with girlfriends and mistresses and everything else so the world is to wake up. it's about who has the money. another thing for president with the wants to be millionaires with a wind except him and now i see why. the way he ask now, you'd ever seen a republican in this history talk like a republican. mind anddone lost his the vice president is supposed to be so religious with his bibles, he needs to take that on trunks rear-ended. rear-ended. host: what you were looking forward to this most of this week in washington. guest: i want to see something comes together with the border funding fight that's coming. we got leadership elections this week and will let drown everything out?

will we start to see some type of compromise and of course, what does the president think about it? one tweet to blow that up. guest: for me, it's all about leadership. if antiballistic challengers find a challenger, issued to get more votes? host: you can follow melanie , john with the hill bennett with rollcall white house correspondent on twitter. i appreciate both your time. up next in the weekly your money segment, we're joined by the government accountable is office, carolyn yocom to discuss etiquette expansion in the price tag for the states and the federal government. expansion plus what new states face as they expand their programs. we will be right back. ♪

announcer: tonight, verizon's senior vice president nicky palmer on verizon's push to implement 5g. she is interviewed by reporter david mccabe. >> what is different about 5g? and so on, but 5g gives us new currencies in which to develop new services. 5g networks give us massive speed and bandwidth, ok? 20 times the speed on average to 4g, and 1000 times the bandwidth. because the way we are deploying it,and clayton knows, we are calling this altra wide band because we are using spectrum in the millimeterwave range. and there is a lot of it.

and when you have a lot of spectrum, what that translates to is the speed. announcer: watch tonight at 8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span2. announcer: c-span, where history unfolds daily. in 1979, c-span was created as a public service by america's cable television companies. and today, we continue to bring you unfiltered coverage of congress, the white house, the supreme court, and public policy events in washington dc and around the country. c-span is brought to you by your cable or satellite provider. "washington journal" continues. host: each week in this segment we take a look at how your money is at work in a different federal program. this week we are focusing on the medicaid program, and to do that we are joined by the government accountability office's health

care director, carolyn yocom. we will talk about medicaid expansion and the costa states and the federal government. remind us how medicaid was expanded under the affordable care act, who became eligible for inclusion under the expansion. guest: the category of people who are now eligible for medicaid who were not before our nonelderly, nondisabled adults. medicaid had always traditionally covered children, people with disabilities and those who are elderly. so that is the new population. host: how many states have taken medicaid expansion? guest: about 37 right now. host: what does that translate to in terms of number of new people who are being covered under medicaid? guest: it is up around 70 million, up to 70 million right now. host: what is the cost right now of medicaid per year? guest: right now come adults in the medicaid program are about 50% of the cost.

the medicaid expansion component is 10%, because there were some adults already covered by states who had chosen to do so. host: what does that translate to in terms of dollars with the cost of medicaid compared to last year? guest: with $596 billion last year, so about 15% of that, 10% would be about 59 million. host: how does that compare to pre-expansion? guest: the growth has been about eight -- a 10% increase. medicaid has been growing all along. the primary areas of growth are the people with disabilities and those who are elderly, those are the largest components of growth. host: and in this segment of the washington journal, special phone lines. those for medicaid recipients, your experiences in the program, especially if you have been covered under the expansion, call 202-748-8000. all others, 202-748-8001.

we are coming off of the 2018 elections, medicaid expansion was on the ballot in some states. idaho, utah and nebraska approved ballot measures to expand medicaid. what is the process from here? guest: many of the things under the affordable care act had to do regardless of its decision to expand medicaid, so they had to do a new eligibility determination that was basically textbased. -- tax based. and they also had to coordinate with exchanges where people could purchase federal insurance, subsidized or -- i'm sorry, purchase private insurance subsidized or on their own. so for those who decided to expand, two things -- one, make sure they have systems that follow the rules under the affordable care act for the expansion population. and secondly, there is a

different amount of federal contributions. so they also have to make sure they are getting the right amount of money for those individuals. host: what would the cost sharing deal that the states that chose to expand took when they made the expansion? guest: initially, it was 100% federal funding for any state to that decided to expand for that particular population. over time it will go down to 90%. so it is a higher matching rate. generally the states' matching rates are 50%-70%. host: that payment by the federal government is for those estates that are newly expanding their medicaid programs, do they get that right now? they are coming in midway through? guest: midway through, so closer to 90%. host: when will it hit 90%? guest: 2020. host: what are some different ways states have thought to

cover their share of the payment? guest: most of it has been through really, state revenues. itut three fourths of states comes from state sources like taxes, sales tax, those types of things. 25% comes from other areas. and there are two broad categories. one is health care providers, they may tax a hospital or others to work with revenue for the state share. and the other is local governments. the city governments also contribute. host: what state has a unique program for covering this? guest: they are all unique. [laughter] the variety across the states and the way that they finance and operate medicaid is really amazing. some states are at 100% managed care, others do combinations of everything you can think of. host: explain managed-care.

guest: that is where you essentially are contacting with an organization to provide all of the services for a set payment. and generally, it can be a per member, per month, but it has been a way for states to manage the cost and have more predictability of cost. host: the kaiser family foundation, this shows the status of state medicaid expansion adopted in 37 states, including washington dc. you can see on the map those with the blue and gray stripes, those are the ones we are talking about with the ballot measures to expand their medicaid programs. oranges states, those who have not adopted medicaid expansion. we are talking about the program. we want to hear your experiences in the program, especially if you are one of those who started receiving coverage under the affordable care act. 202-748-8000 is the number for medicaid recipients. 202-748-8001 for all others.

we are talking with carolyn yocom from the government accountability office. how long have you been covering issues there? guest: since 1990. host: how much of your focus is the medicaid program particularly? guest: close to 100%. i also look at the children's health insurance program. host: charlotte is up first, a medicaid recipient in st. louis, missouri. caller: good morning. i wonder if you could tell me why -- what the difference is or the concern that people have with managed-care versus the concern people have with managed-care, because i hear so many bad things about it and i am unsure if it is a good or bad thing. and also, the difference between spend down, or explain what that is, too.

i have that through medicaid on my medicaid coverage, and i do not really understand how they calculate that. thank you. host: thank you for the question. guest: first of all, managed care can be a great way to provide services in the medicaid program. the things that we have raised about managed care have been a lack of information. we do not always know how the money is a spent or where it goes. and we do not believe that the risks are being accounted for. and in managed-care you can have a risk of the money going out the door, but the service is not being provided. and we would like more assurance that the money is going out the door into services are being provided to those who need it. host: what are some of the big providers people may have heard of? guest: united health care, and

mary group, -- amerigroup. host: how many are there total? guest: a fair number that are participating in managed care, i could not give you an exact number. host: are those that you mentioned, do they make up the majority or are there a couple big players? guest: more than a couple big players. and they can be regionally based. there are programs that operate in particular parts of the united states. to get to charlotte's question about spend down, spend down is what happens when you are not in an expansion population, you are in a different category of medicaid that has a was been covered. and what happens, if you have to spend it down your income and resources in order to meet the income and resource qualifications for medicaid. it cannot get -- i cannot get specific, because each state has

different levels in which they provide coverage, but essentially what they are doing is tracking that your income and resources are low enough that you qualify for medicaid. host: another medicaid recipient, greg in texas. good morning. caller: good morning. guest: good morning. caller: i'm glad to have this talk. this was the most embarrassing thing for me to get medicaid, because i thought it was mainly for people who did not want to work and were lazy. and when i had my insurance, i had of the worst insurance that i could get paying insurance. and when i got on medicaid, i got the best help from the best doctors. they would fight to get the approval from the insurance companies, but medicaid takes care of me better than i have ever been taken care of. and i am embarrassed to get it. another question, i do not have anything against people coming over here, but there are so many

people coming over having babies, in my neighborhood they are having babies every six months and it puts a burden and they have hoodlums working. and they usually get identification to claim these benefits and parents people who really do need medicaid. and all of the stimulus check, they are getting hundreds of dollars every month for kids. and they are blowing it, buying cars and all this other stuff, in the black community too. we have to cut down on that. medicaid is the best thing that ever happened to me. host: do you want to talk through a couple of the issues he brought up? guest: i am really glad to hear medicaid has done its job for you. that is always the best news. with regard to people who are noncitizens, medicaid does have a citizenship check. notso an individual who is

a citizen of the united states only gets really emergency care at most, and sometimes not that, depending on the different circumstances. so it is -- i understand the concern you are raising, but for the most part citizenship is one of the base requirements. host: the color said originally he was embarrassed -- caller said he was originally embarrassed to get on it. can you talk about work requirements. how states have implemented those and the status of that? guest: i can tell you what we will be working at. we will be working at what kind of approvals are there for beneficiary and work requirements. we are also going to look at the administrative costs associated with implementing that. does it take extra money to implement work requirements? and how those centers for medicaid and medicare review

work requirements and make approvals. host: for viewers of the program, you may know what the government accountability office is, but for somebody who has not heard about it explain what you do there and your role when it comes to oversight. guest: we have a special role in the federal government. we are in investigative arm of congress and we work for both parties. we pride ourselves on our work being nonpartisan and fact-based. so our focus is to provide convert -- congress and the american public with the facts they need to better understand the program. host: joe is a medicaid recipient in new york city. good morning. caller: good morning. thank you for c-span. i want to echo what you heard from the gentleman in texas. host: what is that? caller: my spirits with medicaid -- i am close to medicare age, but i have had insurance from

fortune 100 companies, from start up companies, over a different kinds of health insurance in my lifetime , and i have to say the obama medicare expansion really saved my life. and it is the best insurance i have ever had. [sigh] guest: thank you, it is gratifying to hear the program is working for those who need it. one of the big areas of uninsured individuals in the united states prior to the affordable care act really was people in their 50's, potentially employed, potentially not, but without access to employer-sponsored insurance. host: you talked about your concern with the transparency of managed care programs. where else has gao expressed concerns, what is not working? guest: we have expressed another area of concern, probably two

broad areas. one improper payments, making sure payments are going to the right place. level,ee for service those improper payments are at 12%. so when you're not in managed care, they are paying on a bill by bill basis. so that money has been 12% error rate, that is what we have identified and reported. host: how does that compare historically? guest: that has been growing. we have some work coming out that is looking at those improper payment rates and what is going on there. a second area, medicaid offers flexibility through demonstrations, where you can expand the program and waive particular parts of the program to provide services differently. thi can be -- this can be a

really good thing, because health care has changed over the past 50 years. the downside is states have used some of the mechanisms here to shift cost over to the federal government. and this is a partnership program. we think people need to come to the table with some better sharing of the dollars. is thegain, gao.gov place to go for these reports. carlos in fort lauderdale, florida, a medicaid recipient. good morning. caller: good morning. i want to congratulate carolyn yocom in the program and for being for us and talking about this subject. i just turned 65 and i am concerned about the future of medicare. and we are covered under the medicare. and i - i am concerned about the

our medicare how .enefits will be affected they might cut, the government might cut the funding for that. and i would like to recommend that i think we -- or the government needs to separate the cost of medicare and since medicare recipients pay into medicaid, i think that that should be separated so they know -- so they try not to affect us. and if you divide it into other groups, who is receiving medicaid, the government can actually go to try to control the cost or reduce the cost. so that is my recommendation. thank you. host: thank you. guest: medicare is financed and

pay for separately. so in some ways the money is already segregated, carlos. medicaid comes from state revenues and from federal expenditures. medicare operates pretty much via trust funds that are set up and established especially for those programs. um, there are people who qualify for both and they are called dual eligible people, the qualify for medicare and medicaid. under those circumstances, medicaid pays cost-sharing for the medicare programs. and medicare does what it always does. host: and from new carlisle, ohio, good morning. caller: good morning. guest: good morning. caller: i was wondering how many illegals are on medicaid. and how much is this costing the american taxpayer?

guest: as i noted before, anna, citizenship is a requirement for the program. you have to show proof of citizenship. and also a social security number in order to be eligible. host: is that for the children as well? guest: yes. host: ralph, charlottesville, virginia. good morning. caller: i have a question for miss yocom. the medicare program, i think there is a lot of abuse and fraud in the program. i will tell you why. in virginia, i know several toes, i have talked community members and know several cases of individuals who are not disabled and have two or three children and are on medicaid and working. and now i know of a situation where an individual just got a job after two or three years in virginia, the two children are on medicaid and the individuals are cared for by the mother.

and the mom is under a government program, whereby she is receiving medicaid for the children, and it is illegal. there is a lot of illegal stuff going on and i think it has to be corrected. i want to know the percentage, you mentioned the percentage of people on medicaid, the majority was elderly and disabled. but it is hard to believe that is a majority, because children make up a large amount of that cost in medicaid. and um, i think that those percentages are, that you have given, i cannot see that as well as a lot of community members cannot see that. and i am not saying people do not qualify for medicaid, but that has to be looked at totally -- who qualifies in who can get medicaid. and a lot of people who are not disabled -- i have no problem with that, i do not have a problem with the elderly, but we

need to pull out the fraud and abuse and there is a lot of that going on in every state in the union. host: maybe these numbers will help before carolyn yocom expands on them. this from the gao. medicaid enrollment, 36 million children. about 13.7 million from the expansion. due to medicaid expansion under the aca. 10.2 million other adults, a point really am blind and disabled americans. 5.4 million elderly. guest: thank you. and overall, children are less than 20% of the cost, but almost 50% of the population in the program. children can be inexpensive to care for. they need immunizations, regular checkups, but it is always not expensive. you are correct to be concerned about eligibility. one of the unfortunate things

that has happened since the affordable care act was passed, is there have not been public, open reviews of eligibility determination. estimated, an improper rate due to people not eligible for the program, they froze a rate of 3% and have not been reporting it. gao has been very concerned about that. this is the first year where cms is once again going to be testing and measuring eligibility, so it has been four years since we've had a number that is actually real. host: about 10 minutes left in this segment. again, special phone lines. if you are a medicaid recipient, 202-748-8000. we want to hear your questions, your experience with the program. all others, 202-748-8001. pat is a medicaid recipient in willis, texas. caller: good morning.

i am not a recipient. i happen to be calling in. i had -- i guess my question is, what is the eligibility to get on medicaid? i know of a friend who came down with cancer and he didn't have personal insurance, but he was above the level to get on it. and he eventually died without any treatment at all. so i am curious what are the entry levels that people need to be about to get this type of coverage. guest: yeah, it is complicated. medicaid has different eligibility levels depending on the categoryof -- of population we are talking about. for children generally, the relationship is to the federal poverty level. and it is 133% of the federal

poverty level. 200%me cases, states go at or 300% for children. host: so the state can set that level? guest: they can. with the expansion, that went to the 133%. and then for other adults in the program, it depended on the retion on what the poverty level would be for adults. in some cases, it can be as low as 9% of the poverty level before people are eligible. in other states, it has been higher. the other way that people can get on medicaid, this goes back to the question about spend down that was earlier in the program. people can spend it down their income and resources and qualify for medicaid, but the unfortunate truth is if you have something like cancer and spending it down takes a while,

you could be difficult -- it could be difficult to get that care as soon as would be best. host: what are the requirements in the category of those who are disabled? guest: it will also vary by state. and there is also a need to be determined disabled. host: what does that mean? guest: caller: some states -- states do it through the social security programs, other states do it themselves. so the assessments that are done can also vary. host: carolyn yocom with us from the gao for a few more minutes, taking your calls and questions. we have a line for medicaid recipients. our caller from oregon, good morning. caller: what is the problem with medicaid and medicare covering alternative medicines? on medicaid, we had to sign a waiver promising to pay for our visit, just in case there was no

money available to cover. and in medicare, it only covers chiropractors, not acupuncture. guest: i do not know much about this area. i do know that states can have discussion on what gets covered. there is a benefit package for medicaid and a there can be approvals to expand that benefit package to things like alternative medicines. but it would really be a discussion between the state and the centers for medicare and medicaid services. host: sandra in springdale, pennsylvania. good morning. caller: good morning. guest: good morning. caller: i am on medicaid and i am 62 years old, disabled. i have been for 30 years. i am on social security disability, which i worked for. in food i get $41

stamps in a month. i have an acquaintance that has children that gets $800 plus hud. how does this make sense? guest: i can tell you about the medicaid component, but i am not familiar with the other program. host: do you want to talk through the medicaid program a little bit? inst: yes, medicaid has -- some ways when someone has worked and is eligible for ssci, medicaid operates a little bit like it does with medicare and people eligible for both programs in that it can help pay premiums and copayments, and provide additional support. host: bill on that line for medicaid recipients from gary, indiana. caller: good morning. i'm 69, low income, and i am on

both medicare and medicaid. even though indian is a split state, we are sometimes democrat, mostly republican. we now have two republican senators and a republican governor, and the state legislature has a super majority of republicans. but medicare should not be a political issue. in my opinion, medicare and medicaid saved my life. so i will be a booster of the program and i believe everybody in the u.s. who is qualified should receive it. there is probably fraud in everything. i do not know how you can kneel down a specific. you have different cases. i know they investigate in indiana quite thoroughly. they will even come to your home. in terms of fraud, i think it is like a bullet point thing than in emotional issue, because these two programs are doing a fantastic job. and i got as old as i did because of them, because i would've died of heart problems.

i would not have been able to pay for them, even though i did have private insurance most of my life. when i became disabled, marr world it changed. i -- my world it changed. i wish people would walk in others' shoes for a while so see life and how it is. i was medically fit 100%, everything was to me like people are taking advantage of the system. i would have bad thoughts like that. but once i found out exactly what we are needing in this country, because i am a baby boomer and we are old. we are getting older. we are elderly and we are getting different diseases, some sections of the population are living longer, but we still have to tackle alzheimer's, that is a big issue, especially for women. those are my comments. host: thank you for sharing your story. carolyn yocom, before we get close to the end of the program, we talked about bounce initiatives earlier and the

state looking to expand medicaid. montana had a ballot initiative that would've looked to continue funding for their medicaid expansion passed june of next year, but the initiative failed. so what happens from here and what happens to the people currently in montana's medicaid expansion? guest: it is going to be up to montana. i cannot speak to their particular circumstances, but states from time to time have run into situations where they are concerned about the ability to finance medicaid. there are choices that can always be made -- they can constrain costs, limit eligibility, change benefit packages to make that work. so, and states over the course of the program have done all three of those. host: in terms of making medicaid work for the long-term, what are the current projections right now for the fiscal health of the program? guest: it is projected to hit $1

trillion i think in about 10 more years, if i remember correctly. so it is growing very quickly. and it -- host: how concerned is the gao? guest: we are concerned about the growth and affordability of the program, yes. and wanted to make sure that every dollar spent is really going -- we have heard it stories of people who need the program and rely on it, but our job is to make sure every dollar spent goes to the right place. host: one more call from betty in pennsylvania, go ahead. caller: hi, this is betty. good morning to both of you. on military, are they not medicaid because it is a government program? there can be service members who are on medicaid. medicaid is what they call a payer of the last resort, so if

you have anything else first it pays, the medicaid covers the rest. so for the most part, service members to have coverage through va, but medicaid can be a piece of that. host: carolyn yocom is the health care studies director at the government accountability office. gao.gov. we appreciate your time. guest: a pleasure. host: coming up next, we will end our program in open phones. any public policy issue you want to talk about, whether we talked about it this morning or not, the phone lines are open. democrats, republicans and independents can start calling on the phone lines on our screen. -- your screen. and we will be right back. ♪ announcer: tonight, verizon's senior vice president and chief network officer nicky palmer on verizon's push to implement 5g. she is interviewed by reporter david mccabe.

>> what is different about 5g? 5g givesioned 1g, but us new currencies on which to develop services. and what i mean by that is, 5g networks give us massive speed and bandwidth, ok? 20 times the speed on average to 4g networks, and 1000 times the bandwidth, because the way we are deploying it and clayton, we are calling it ultra wide band because we are using spectrum in the millimeterwave range, and there is a lot of it. when you have a lot of spectrum, it translates to speed input. announcer: watch tonight at 8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span2. announcer: c-span, where history unfolds daily. as a79, c-span was created

public service by america's cable television companies. and today, we continue to bring you unfiltered coverage of congress, the white house, the supreme court, and public policy events in washington dc and around the country. c-span is brought to you by your cable or satellite provider. announcer: "washington journal" continues. host: it is open phones. any public policy issue you want to talk about, the phone lines are years. -- yours. democrats, 202-748-8000. republicans, 202-748-8001. independents, 202-748-8001. -- 8002. the assessments of the election continue, expected to continue for some time longer. this column by john lewis, jason lewis -- i apologize, of

minnesota. a republican who represents the second district. he lost his election last week. and the title the calm today, ?"ho lost the house he says the republican party lost their house majority when senator john mccain ended the party's seven-year quest to repeal obama care. it came to a last-minute decision, prompted a green wave of liberal special interest money used to propagate false claims that the house plan gutted coverage for people with pre-existing conditions. that was the boat -- most potent attack in the midterms, is what the congressman rights. -- writes. his grievances were well known, but this up session on the part of the never trump republicans has two and. disapprove of the president's style, but do not sacrifice policy to pettiness. that is jason lewis's column in

the wall street journal today. and now your calls for the next 20 minutes until the program ends. jim in philadelphia, a democrat. good morning. caller: thanks for taking my call. i want to talk about the naming of the matthew whitaker by president trump. everybody is focusing on the robert mueller investigation and his involvement with the that, but there is another point to be made about this matthew whitaker. this company he worked for it is -- it is a patent company, but not really impacted company. world patent marketing, he was on the board of this company and they were running a bait and switch. they would get people with inventions and they would think they were getting help for a say paythen they would $3000 for something they called in global invention royalty analysis. and once they got them on the hook, then they would charge

them more. host: are you still with us? finish your,. comment. caller: they would start overcharging people. they would charge somebody $55,000. by the way, this company has been investigated by the fbi. and, here we have the attorney general -- how does this go to the -- host: that was jim this morning. concerns about that company and other parts of matthew whitaker's background, reasons why the editorial board of usa today writes matthew whitaker is not attorney general material. write abouty him, the less he seems attorney general material. that is what the caller was talking about. there ishe has said

nothing wrong with campaign officials meeting with russians who claim to have dirt on hillary clinton, citing him saying to cnn, that you would always take that meeting. common sense and patriotism suggest you do not take a meeting with russians buried there, you call the fbi. he is saying the courts are supposed to be the inferior branch of government. and the fact he said that among the worst supreme court rulings was marbury versus madison, the foundation for the court's authority rule on the constitutionality of laws. if you want to read that in the usa today, the subject of the acting attorney general came up on yesterday's sunday shows as well. here is jerry nadler on "state of the union" talking about the appointment of matthew whitaker. >> the very first thing is to protect of the robert mueller investigation. the president's dismissals of jeff sessions and his appointment of matthew whitaker,

reals the lackey -- a lackey is a threat to the investigation. and the investigation is of utmost importance in making sure we adhere to the rule of law, and the administers and is held accountable. and we will certainly hold a hearing on that. our very first witness after january 3, we will subpoena mr. -- or summit -- summon mr. whitaker. >> what would you ask him? >> well, the questions we will ask will be about his expressed hostility to the investigation, how he can possibly supervise it when he has come out and said the investigation is invalid, that contrary to the findings of every intelligence agency there was no russian interference in our election, and when he has expressed legal opinions that go against the foundations of american law.

his only qualifications seem to be is the president wants him to be the hatchet man to destroy the robert mueller investigation. >> be that as it may, you called his appointment you legal, but the law in this case -- illega l, but the law in this case has authorized the president to replace the attorney general, in this case jeff sessions, with any senior official serving in the same department, as long as they are acting capacity for fewer than 210 days. so regardless of your opinion, he meets those requirements. >> i do not think so. is goode constitutional law that regardless of the vacancy you cannot have an attorney general, or for that matter in acting attorney general, it was not been confirmed by the senate. and anything he does is invalid. that could be tested in court. but meanwhile we will ask the claimed attorney general for

assurances that he is not going to interfere with the investigation by robert mueller, because the rule of law must be maintained. and no official can be above the rule of law, not the president. host: taking your calls in open phones. cindy in st. joseph, minnesota. a republican. good morning. caller: i am hoping someone can count the total votes in our state of minnesota. the reason being, in our newspapers they have a section that is news for refugees. and it looks at detailed information on how they go about voting. i would like to know the total votes, i would but to know where each and every county ended up with the numbers -- something is not adding up and nobody is answering those questions. it is concerning. host: cindy in minnesota speaking of counting votes. this continues in several key races.

here is one of the headlines today on it. both sides dig in over florida recount, that is the wall street journal story today. and here's the latest numbers, these being continuously compiled by the washington post. rick scott's lead shrinking in florida. 4,085,545. with few percentage points of separation at this point. that other florida race, the governor's race, ron desantis is ahead. but that gap is closing as well. andrew gillum, formally of 42,995 votes. keeping you updated on the arizona race. kyrsten sinema ahead now by about 32,000 votes. seeking to fill the seat of jeff

sessions. and the republican was ahead at the end of election night, but kyrsten sinema has been able to close the gap and surpassed her. 46.9% in favor of kyrsten sinema, to 48.1% for martha mcsally. we would keep you updated as the week goes in these key, uncalled races. velma in new york. independent. good morning. caller: good morning. i wanted to get information in regard to the managed care program. that helps people with medicare and medicaid. because i am 74 years old, and the company that i have, they give me $125 for over-the-counter medication. and i think it is so wasteful, because i used to buy medication, put it in my medicine cabinet and it disappeared because i have

grandchildren i am happy to take care of. and i wanted to say to other people that have this extra -- that money is a waste, because most of the time i do not use it. and like i said, if i get over-the-counter medication it disappears and it is contributing to the drug abuse with the youth. host: our guest from the government accountability office no longer with us, but a good place to go for some of these topics you talked about and the issues that you specifically talked about, managed care, is the gao website, gao.gov. one report from over the summer, july 26, calling for improvements and better oversight of payment risk when it comes to medicare and medicaid programs. if you want to read that report. an independent from texas, good morning.

caller: good morning. i want to talk about the fifth amendment. i have a solution on how to end this -- you know? -- toe need to do is use --, you know?le fires ofior, like the cars, not only inflatable but like boats. these can be connected end to end to form hundreds of miles long hoses that can carry water from parts of the country where there is no fires and send it to these areas where there are deadly fires, you know?

these hoses can be connected by an inflatable hose connected to one end of a pipe, and the other end of a pipe connected to another inflatable hose, connected to another pipe. then the end connected to another, and to we have hundreds of miles of length of hoses. host: we got it, domingo. on the issue of the wildfires, here are the front pages of several california newspapers. this focusing on the governor's call for a disaster declaration of the wildfires rage. the death toll creeping above 30 now in those fires around the state, including two of the largest fires. amid the horror of a loss, thees go slow, focusing on camp fire. and destruction continues, one of the pictures there of the

fires at night. the camp fire responsible for 29 dead at this point. that tied the record for the deadliest fire in state history, although it is expected to continue to rise. and this from the enterprise record this morning, focusing reain on the camp fire -- "mo confirmed dead, as rescuers and those searching through the death and destruction continue their efforts." the president's tweet that caused controversy surrounding the white house response to the fires was this from saturday. "no reason for these massive, costly forest fires in california, except forest management is a so poor. billions of dollars is given each year because of gross mismanagement. remedy now or no more federal payments." we talked about the reaction the president received from those tweets.

paulette in florida, democrat. good morning. caller: good morning. is there a record we could see that shows how much rick scott and his cronies paid back after their medicare and medicaid fraud cases were resolved? that is definitely what needs to be shown. everybodywas -- talking about donald trump rolling back regulations, can we see a list of those and what has hurt as as americans that he rolled back? thank you. host: we have had segments about changes in federal regulations under the trump administration. we would encourage you to go to and lookte, c-span.org back through some of the previous episodes. but we can also always appreciate suggestions for future segments. jeff in carrollton, georgia. go ahead.

caller: yes, thank you. i appreciate c-span a lot. on a cell phone, so if i break up it is because it is raining pretty good here. i want to talk about medicare and medicaid for everybody. i was a navy veteran. i was denied my veteran rights because i make too much money. i was told to get on obamacare. but the veteran administration -- i have been paying my whole life between 45- -- between $45-60 five dollars a week for medicare. i have three degenerative discs in my back, but i am not allowed to get on medicare because of my age. however, my wife is 10 years older than i am and she is retired now, and it is very hard for her to get on medicaid and medicare. i have had to quit my job so she

can get medicaid to pay for her medical, which is averaging around $50,000 a year. tot do taxpayers have to do earn their right to medicare -- to have a free medical? what does the taxpayer -- that is me, i paid over $2000 a year for 40 years and i cannot get medical. i cannot get insurance, i cannot afford it. insurance has gone up to $600 a month. past my paycheck when my work -- half my paycheck goes this is a security for other people. what are taxpayers going to do? i want to know what the government is going to do for the taxpayers. i voted for donald trump and he is trying to change this. he is trying to help veterans, but i still cannot get on veterans care.

i broke my leg in the navy. i just wanted my leg fixed. i have arthritis. i was hit by a forklift. i worked my entire life and i paid my taxes, my social security and my medicare taxes every week. but when i go to the doctor, all they say is -- see is hispanics. host: what do you think about this debate over universal health care? od you think -- do you think health care should be a right in this country? caller: yes, but why are taxpayers denied it? because it is ok if half of the country works, the other half don't. the only people getting health care are the people who do not work. host: leonard is in edgerton, wisconsin. a democrat. good morning. caller: good morning. good morning, c-span. our hearts go out to the people

in california. the reason for my call is not the current news of cycle, but going back and finding out how the republican party got to where it is today. and when the zimmerman incident i did ada happened, little looking and i found in -- iame of paul wyrick believe that this paul was responsible for where the state of the republican party is. it goes back to the republicans kind of reconstituting itself after the disaster with barry goldwater. and that is a long time ago, but audienceif the c-span could look up on their computer

and find out all the things he is responsible for for the last 20 years. host: where do you think the republican party is headed after the 2018 midterms? caller: well, i think that it will reconstitute itself again after this whole thing plays out. but -- host: what is this whole thing? caller: the party of trump, tr umping and all, all of that that i think that it is sad that people like jeff flake, who i watched when he was in congress and i felt as a democrat looking at the republicans, that he was a pretty straight shooter. and he had a lot of good ideas back when he was in congress. and fellas like this that had to step down because of the current, the current cycle of

the way things are going. that -- uh, it is very interesting that all of the things that paul did while he was alive, that i think he wayld be given away moe -- more credit. he is like unknown. and i -- a little bit of fault to c-span for not getting into the weeds on this to say where we come from, where we are at, how things have changed, and what is going to happen going forward. host: leonard in wisconsin. robert in brooklyn park, maryland. go ahead. caller: hello. i want to talk about the crime rate in -- host: where? caller: baltimore city, and in maryland a particular. -- in particular. it was reported that it was

considered the multiple -- the murder capital of the united states, and the heroine capital of the united states. and that is atrocious and terrible. it is atrociously terrible. i called all my congressmen and senators about this and it seems like there is nothing being done about it. they have been in office for years, and nothing has been done about it. i want to know, isn't that the most important thing we have? it is more importantly and forest fires. inhave 360 some murders baltimore. that is the most terrible thing i have ever heard. so our congresspeople, it seems like they do not know how to cure it or what to do. they put billions of dollars in this stuff and it is the same rate. i see no difference in the rate for these kinds of crimes. and that is one thing we have to work on in this state. and all of our congress people have to consider that. what can they do?

the only thing i know to do is open up an open carry law in the state of maryland. with all these murders going on, it is scary to walk down the streets. host: the number from fox news in baltimore, fox 45 there noting in october there were 34 homicides in baltimore. so far in 2018, this as of november 1 when the story came out, 263 homicides over the course of the year. gloria in illinois, a democrat. good morning. caller: hello. i have a question and a couple of statements. my question is, why was the senate in recess? i thought they had -- to keep them open. and then the man complaining about, he would have to pay $600 for the affordable care act.

i am on medicare and i pay $600 a month for my insurance. paul ryanher one on rick -- paul, just so people 1970's, wed in the do not want people to vote. the more people vote, the less we win. host: the house and senate are back in session this week, returning for the first time since the 2018 elections. the next to vote specifically in the senate on tuesday, scheduled for 5:30 p.m. and we will be back here tomorrow morning on "washington journal" from 7:00 a.m. eastern until 10:00 a.m. eastern. we hope you will join us in the meantime. have a great monday. ♪ [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org]

>> congress is back in session tomorrow for a postelection lame-duck session. the house will debate legislation to remove the great wolf from the endangered species list. returns to consider legislation on coast guard and a nomination for the rent -- for the federal reserve board. >> c-span, where history unfolds daily. in 1979, c-span was created as a public service by america's cable television companies. today, we continue to bring