saying the same garbage that our president does. host: we always appreciate the feedback. billriminal justice reform , the status of that in the final weeks. guest: it is an mitch mcconnell's hands. he has been reluctant to bring it to the floor. -- as been he is said last week that he had 77 votes for the bill. including most republicans. whipcornyn, the republican was not necessarily as convinced about that number. ted cruz came on board. that was a big get. previouswas opposed to versions. so, the fact that ted cruz was convinced that probably, maybe,

that pushes them over the finish line in the senate. it takes a week an mitch mcconnell does not want them to take a week on it. host: is mitch mcconnell onboard ?eck guest: so is chuck grassley. the chairman of the judiciary that hee is not happy thought he had a promise. the votes and now they come to the floor and he is not a happy man. chuck grassley often gets what he wants. the incoming senate finance chairman is go to be a popular guy. when the president of united states want something and ted cruz want something, these kinds of things don't want -- don't happen very often. it would be a rare bipartisan capstone in the job administration.

host: >> here is a look at our live coverage on tuesday. on 10:00 a.m., the house returns for general speeches. members will consider several including one that condemns russian actions toward ukraine. debatee senate continues on picking the new deputy treasury secretary. is a house judiciary hearing with the ceo of google testifying on data collection policy. a woman's leadership summit , with white house secretary sarah sanders among the

speakers. joins us now as we take a deep dive into the looming federal funding shutdown showdown. he is currently -- he previously spent years working on capitol hill. whyain how we got here and it would only be a partial shutdown goes past the december 21 deadline? guest: we got here by not getting all of the pills done by september 30, which is the end of the fiscal year. do wellr, congress did in the appropriations process, much better than they have in previous years. they got five bills pasts. they got the defense bill passed. construction, a legislative branch bill and an energy bill. that still leaves seven bills and severn agencies -- seven agencies. so, we have a two week reprieve to give them some breathing room

to get things done. if there is a shutdown come december 21, it won't be the whole government because congress has done part of the government already. host: where our most people likely to experience this? how are federal employees decided which are essential and which are nonessential? guest: that depends on the agency. the agency's work with the officers money and budget to agree to who is essential and nonessential. and a lot of times, you have the people who work behind the desk who are going to be the ones that go on furlough. then there are others were deemed essential or who do lawrity for their agencies, enforcement activities and things like that who continue working. you don't see the secret service working for a few don't to be heard it -- you don't see the secret service not working or the border agents not working but they continue to go teresa down.

-- through a shutdown. host: we are hearing about nettie pelosi and chuck schumer meeting on tuesday. is it likely this does not go all the way through december 21? guest: it is. i don't like to make the predictions. i think there is not much appetite in congress for a shutdown. there is often, a lot of times, people know that the politics of a shutdown do not help them when it comes down to it. and you haveee seen a lot in the past week or two, is that as congress does not work drop the spring and summer, it rests with the committee. ire committee's do the work. when we get into these showdown situations, it rises to the leadership level. people like nancy pelosi, chuck schumer, mitch mcconnell, lita

mccarthy, you will see those folks be the ones who will actually be negotiating. the committee takes a backseat to what the leaders put together. host: you did not mention speaker ryan. we have not seen very much of him negotiating. he may well be but the people who are out in front are nancy pelosi, you see kevin mccarthy and some of the other ones were expected to be there in the 116th congress. the: if you want to join conversation as we walk through a potential government shutdown, phone lines, as usual. republicans, (202) 748-8001. democrats, (202) 748-8000. .ndependents (202) 748-8002 take us back to the government shutdown showdown when you are on capitol hill. what worked with the negotiation process, what does not work? thet: it all depends on

give and take a. sometimes, people think they have given up their principles, they're compromising too much, you'll hear that from both sides of the aisle. --se pre-christmas so downs showdowns i become more and more normalized. in 2012, they were in on new year's eve, negotiating up into new year's day. they were voting at 2:00 in the morning on new year's day. so, it depends on the situation. a lot of times, it really has revolved around government spending. people did not want to add to our nations budget deficit and to the national debt as a whole. so, we saw a whole lot of showdowns that came down to the wire over whether or not to raise the debt ceiling. funding,get emergency it gets to be something people are concerned about. this year, part of the

conversation can be the wildfire suppression funds that you had several wildfires out in california that were devastating. you have hurricane and storm relief that sometimes get thrown in the mix as well. sometimes they can go late in the year. that can be something that people hold their breath on. thoughts on fixing the budget process, let's bring in some calls. charlie from arkansas, independent, go ahead. foremost, i amnd backstabbing to the previous conversation regarding the whole wall situation and budget. i think one ties into the upper. -- other. on -- a lot of it going that going on as far as capitol hill is concerned. my question would be how do the

people -- obviously our representatives are not representing us. being a small-town american, i can guarantee you that the decisions that are being made on capitol hill have nothing to do with the interest of independent wills -- individuals like myself. how do we get a voice, how do we thate that the individuals we are empowering to rep is in our interest, how do we make sure they carry that out? guest: you mentioned the elections. there are people who are frustrated with the elections. is, the truth of the matter dividedican people have government to washington more often than not in the last 20 years. it seems like the process may be broken but it takes more come

rise in the decision-making -- compromise in the decision-making. it is about being educated on the issues and sending people to that work for you. i think elections do matter. when it comes time to elect a representative or a senator, you need to make sure that has -- that person has integrity. i think this is our way of democracy. to washington to represent our interests. it is important to stay educated and involved in that. host: in jacksonville, florida, go ahead. caller: i want to make sure i heard the gentleman you have on the correctly that employees would not be furloughed because the bill has been passed -- the defense bill has in past. your people that are out there in north geoeye with the snowstorms.

-- north carolina with the storm storms -- snowstorms. guest: when it comes time on december 21, that would not be part of it. they have seen the full year funding for the year. it would only be a partial shutdown. host: the bills that a pass defense,-- past, energy and water, labor and health and human services. agriculture,t of ,ommerce, homeland security transportation, housing and urban development and smaller agencies as well. we're talking about the shutdown with aaron jones. explain the committee on budget process reform. -- hascongress is reached a frustration level with the budget process where they feel something needs to be done. and, so, for most of the year, a

special committee has been working on a budget process reform. and this was chaired by the budget committee chair. the appropriation's chair on the democratic side has been working hard on that. they have nothing and to come up with any concrete solutions by their deadline. they certainly did advance the conversation, i think throughout the year. host: were you involved? not.: i was i was just an observer. a lot of things they talk about are things that were talked about on capitol hill for several years. biennial budgeting, which would be two your budgeting, rather than doing it one year at a time. also, trying to find some way to the processce into budget deadlines. throughw they can go the deadlines without any real problems. there has been a lot of

discussion to create some way that would jot -- drop if there was something they would miss. host: what about the idea of bringing air much? that would help desk would that help? -- what about the idea of bringing earmarks? would that help? i think it's some cases, they may help people come to the table and work together. i don't think you're going to have people who would normally vote against a bill, particularly people who are in the minority in congress, they may not vote for a majority still because there is in your mark in there. i do think that it does leave some room for negotiation. were you on capitol hill went your marks -- -- hen your marks guest: when i came into

mark processe ear had been as it always been. then you had the scandal to try and tighten up on it. there was the first moved to try and tighten up on it was to pick more chance parity -- transparency in the process. sure they to make knew where we were coming from. the exact place it was going to go to. all of that was put up to a website. rk requests puta into the bill were put into the websites of that people could do that. the9th -- in 2009, when democrats came in, they were banned by the republican side. ban, before there was a altogether. in that time, it was higher than it had ever been.

as a of folks look at that way to really go back to doing that. if there is a way to do your rmarks and a way that people can see out in open -- the open what they are -- host: good morning. guest: -- first of all, because of the cap calling you pager, you should've said that wasn't your name. -- the caller that cap calling you pedro, you should have said that was not your name. also, the republicans that on sayinghim, he ran that mexico was good to pay for the wall. now, he is putting the burden on american people.

i don't understand why his supporters are not outraged. guest: i think that is one of the amazing things about this country. news and somuch much people can find out about what public officials are doing and then we have places like the washington journal where we can talk about that. host: let's talk about why the wilson center is interested in specific reforms that you're congress looks to reform the process. guest: one of the things we do thewe want to make sure american people are as informed as possible as they can be. we actually have a serious game. which, we created a game called the fiscal ship. we worked with the workings institution to create a game where you have to guide america's fiscal ship into brighter waters.

you make choices to change the way the budget is going. one of the great things about this is you are not just pulling levers to say i want to lower this and i want to raise that. you actually have policy implications that go along with that. which goes with what congress members have to deal with. in order to win, you have to create system where the budget is on a sustainable bath and meet the policy goals you set in the beginning. pat and meet the --path and meet the policy goals you set in the beginning. whether it is increasing education or creating a better safety net. those have budget implications. when you come to a budget negotiation, it is difficult to say i want to do this and that without having something happening to your policy goals. wherewilson center.org is

you can play the game. fiscalfiscal center -- ship.org is where the game resides. supported. a trump -- supporter. we are ok with the government they talk about border security. if you look at the cartels and and howy are doing ms-13 is growing in this country, that is a concern for us. is whatn is -- question about balancing the budget gap is there any discussion at all happening on that part? guest: not as much as it was a few years ago. the truth of the matter is we went to a period of budget cutting in the discretionary millionnd there was 100

dollars that was removed from the discretionary budget. congressman starts to feel like they have taken care of the low hanging fruit and the only way to start making some troop cutbacks is to start going into the entitlements. that is a difficult situation politically for both parties. because, mandatory spending, which is where the entitlements reside, it takes up more than two thirds of the federal budget. you have almost three chilean dollars going to those programs. -- $3 trillion going to those programs. people rely on those and they feel entitled to them, which is why they're called entitlements. the reform to those is stopped once the political discussion begins. the caller mentioned the national debt. we are creeping up on $2 trillion.

larry is in iowa, democrat, good morning. caller: good morning. thank you. earlier, you were talking about reforming the budget process. i was curious, i really don't like these government shutdown things. , if they don't pass one of the budgets on day,ulture by a certain the budget automatically becomes the budget for the next year along with that, the authorizations for that particular program would also be extended by one year? that's my question. thank you. guest: i think that is a good point. that is wanting to discuss. -- one thing to discuss. nothing that happens that would create a situation where they would say no, we want to make sure we get new money for agriculture rather than

relying on last year's money. this can actually happen at several points in the budget process. the president is supposed to come out on the first of -- first monday of february. that was very late. there was some discussion like why can't less just budget proposal be put in place a bet if the president comes in so late with it. .he same with budget resolution way, congress would usually say we want to have new priorities. you want to make sure things will change each year, we can be noble and change the priorities. -- nimble and change the 40's. present job does not have a good track record when it comes to whether they actually set something up like that. congress created a special committee that was supposed to come up with a new budget reform deal.

they cut chileans out of the budget. they cannot make it happen. the frustration was supposed to be the act which nobody wanted to handle. nobody wanted to take that on. yet, we passed the deadline and see a kick in and we live with that for several years. before we were able to have in other budget deal in place. host: looking ahead, is this budget fight for a fiscal 2019 going to december 21, is impacting the process and timeline when the fiscal 20 toy budget? are we putting ourselves behind the eight ball next year? -- fiscal 2020 budget? are we putting ourselves behind the eight ball next year? guest: we have been putting ourselves behind the eight ball because congress has not been ine to pass it before time the past fortysomething years. congress has done well with being able to handle two fiscal years at the same time. changed the process on the administration's

side. always startstion its budget process around labor day of the previous year. the agencies to submit their documents and get everything ready for the president's budget release. all of that is still moving forward. congress will just have to do two things at once. they'vew many times been successful in this modern budgeting process, here's a chart from the pew research center. there are four were congress was able to pass all of its 12 spending bills. remind us of this time period where nothing was passed. guest: 2006 to 2014. there were a lot of crs passed.

there's been over 200 crs passed and we've had over 20 shutdowns. when people talk about regular order that is an elusive thing. in the last 40 years we have only done it four times. regular order seems to be not getting it done and getting to a continuing resolution. host: loretto is waiting in mississippi. independent. good morning. caller: good morning. host: go ahead. i was calling about the wall thing in the budget. my daughter's boyfriend is undocumented immigrant from mexico and also i have a niece that had a baby with a guy that was in the ms 13 getting from california -- gang from california so i know the immigration thing personally and my aunt had a man tried to break who was anuse

illegal and the cops didn't even want to fool with him breaking into her house. i was calling about the wall thing. they tried before why can't they work on the document of kids that come here when they are children on the way to become legal citizens and also build the wall? is talking about a possible deal on immigration issues. guest: that's the main sticking point in this budget fight right now. the president has asked for $5 billion for the next year. theress has already put in house bill was close to the president's request. there's a large gap there. the things that needs to be negotiated through. there has been some discussion of may be doing half of that this year with an advance appropriation for the other half for next year. negotiation -- in

negotiation. in congress two weeks is a very long time. there's still a lot of time for them to negotiate on that point. dale's in portland, oregon. republican. good morning. good morning. are there any statistics that evidence how much the government saves when there's a federal shutdown for two weeks for example? guest: i have heard it both ways. i have heard there are times when the government ends up spending more and ends up spending less. theink it depends on how administration actually has a lot of leeway in how a shutdown actually unction and they choose how the agencies are going to run. the other thing is that in all of the previous shutdowns those workers who did work got back pay when congress did created new bill. there wasthe bill

something that would say that they got the back pay. host: how likely would it be for that to not be included in a real? -- reopening? guest: anything is possible in washington today. there's a lot of representatives of federal workers who would not want to see that and would fight against that. if history is any guide we have seen them get back pay. host: dale was the caller who asked the question. do you think it would be worth it to risk a shutdown for the wall? caller: we have done this and we have done it successfully. i'm concerned if we are closing down the government because we don't have the funds for it to continue and it costs more is it prudent to do so? i don't think that's really part of the logic. i think the logic is the shutdown becomes a bargaining

chip because nobody really wants a shutdown. everybody would like to fund the government. people see the political problems that come from having a shutdown. there's also a question of whether or not a shutdown. really going to feel a shutdown like they would over the memorial day holiday. host: have they done the essential/nonessential employees study to show where people would see at the most? -- it the most? guest: those things are decided by omb. so every agency has its own plan of how they would shut down if there came a lapse in appropriations. each agency has that worked out in the administration is a time can dictate how things will shutdown. host: pat in pennsylvania. democrat. caller: good morning.

how come theyg don't raise the taxes on rich people to balance the budget and another thing i don't think it cares if the government shut down unless you are in washington, d.c. that's athink discussion that's been going on for quite a while now. wealth inequality, raising taxes. the differences between the parties on whether or not raising taxes would bring in more revenue or lowering taxes would bring in more revenue. we do have a progressive tax system in this country. the top are paying the most in taxes and those at the bottom are not. thinkk there's people who we raise the taxes on those at the top. there could be some validity to that. it's not something you're just going to have one silver bullet

is going to fix everything. you're going to have to do a mixture of things. nobody really wants to have that discussion. host: if they want to game out that discussion what's the website? guest: the game we have is fiscal ship.org. coming up this morning, we will discuss president trump's nomination of the next attorney , with john malcolm of the heritage foundation. then, william kerr of the harvard business school. crisis withioid regina belle.

be sure to watch washington journal, and it seven eastern this morning. join the discussion. night -- this party had 20,000 supporters who came to rally at madison square garden. they show stormtroopers giving a nazi salute. the rally was for george washington's birthday. there was a very active fascits st movement. hurchwell looks at the history of the terms america first in her book "behold eighta" sunday night at p.m. eastern. >> here is a look at our live coverage tuesday.

a.m.ouse returns at 10 eastern for general speeches with legislative business. members will continue several bills, including one that condemns russian aggression toward ukraine. c-span2, the senate continues debate on the nominee picked to serve as deputy treasury secretary. then, the house judiciary hearing with the ceo of google testifying on the tech company's data collection policy. then, a women's leadership summit, with the white house press secretary among the speakers. >> when the new congress takes office in january, it will have the most diverse freshman class in recent history.