on magazine as hugo gurdon from the washington examiner looks at conservative journalism. as always, we will take your calls and you can join the conversation on facebook and twitter as well. "washington journal" is next. ♪ saturday, january 12, day 22 the longest government shutdown in the u.s. history. ,s the washington post puts it there is no end in sight. many stories in the paper about the first payday without pay. anxiety is setting in. we want to get your latest thoughts and the government shutdown, tell us a story if you are personally affected. if you support the shutdown call (202) 748-8000. if you oppose it, (202) 748-8001

. federal workers, (202) 748-8002. morning, phone this you can weigh in on social media, facebook.com/c-span. here is how politico puts it -- shutdown longest in history as congress hits town. it began the longest in u.s. history, an ominous milestone in the impasse between president trump in congress has left hundreds and thousands without a check and no end insight. in thes left town seemingly endless immigration battle that has fiercely divided trunk and democrats since his inauguration, with scores of lawmakers complaining. for weeks, the president and

lawmakers failed to find a way to reopen the government, with democrats unwilling to give trump more money for a border wall. there is no solution on the weighs, even as trump whether to declare a national emergency to build his wall. entre -- on friday, trump said he would not take unilateral action a day after he said he amid pushback, from his gop allies on capitol hill. here is what he had to say yesterday. >> it is the easy way out. congress should do this. basic. too simple, too congress should do this. if they can't do it, if at some point they can't do it -- this is a 15 minute meeting -- i will

declare a national emergency. i have the absolute right to do it. it says as clear as you can. what will happen? i will be sued. it will be brought to the ninth circuit and even though the wording is unambiguous, just like with the travel ban, it will be appealed to the ninth circuit and we will probably lose their bank and hopefully win -- there and hopefully win in the supreme court. host: the washington post is talking about the personal aspect of this. on the cover is a photo of a couple from bristow, virginia. she is serving as the main caregiver for their disabled daughter. they write that he grew up in fairfax county and became a volunteer firefighter. by the time he graduated from 1983, he had in

and associates in fire service management, fire administration, and fire investigation. after many years as a paid firefighter and training specialists, he joined the forest service to coordinate disaster management operations. theas promoted to supervisory job at the washington headquarters. he is a gs 14, making 135,000 dollars a year. like hundreds of thousands of civil servants who don't get paid this week, he is an anonymous cog in the vast machinery of the government bureaucracy, a band -- a man unnoticed yet one that collectively makes the government function. in the personal stories publications we are meeting today as government employees are starting to miss their first

paychecks. bradley is up first and supports the shutdown, from clear for, west virginia. caller: i feel the wall should've been put up 20 years ago. the united states is being flooded with foreign products, foreign people, immigrants. we are keeping them up just like boyin -- individual little -- i feel sorry for the two kids -- but they said he done got two checks. who is sending the checks and keeping up the medical? they audio have a wall -- ought to have a wall from texas to california and up to maine. friends thatle have just switched. our governor in west virginia just switched.

democrats need to start getting on the bandwagon. let's load these immigrants up and take them to california and let nancy pelosi take care of them. host: what it be fair that you agree with the president this is a national emergency? caller: 100%, and if you need my help, i will do it. host: fred is a federal worker in bowie, maryland. , andr: i support the wall the reason i do is because i think we have a national emergency. because i work in the budget area in the government, i appreciate the fact that we are slowly but surely going to go bankrupt if we keep spending as much money as we are spending. host: are you for load? -- furloughed? caller: yes, i am nonessential. host: have you missed your first

check? caller: i am prepared for that. government workers get paid pretty good money and anyone smart enough to get into the federal government should be saving their money. host: a federal worker from bowie, maryland. lisa from idaho, lisa opposes the shutdown. tell us why. caller: thank you. i just don't understand what this president is doing. him andize, i voted for just because i didn't vote for hillary. he ran on the fact that he was going to help all the people of the united states and i don't understand these republicans in congress, because before the midterms they were all sitting on their hands to see if they would get their jobs back, but

now i don't understand why they are not standing up for him and standing up for their people. nobody is doing nothing. a wall is nice, but there is a lot more ways to protect our borders. they are sending all this money down there to guatemala or whatever. just take that and build the wall. breitbart, page of or the first part of their website, longish shutdown ever with no end in sight. battle for border wall rages. -- democratsinue continue opposition. the house has passed a bill as has the senate, ensuring pay for for load federal workers -- furloughed federal workers. 411-7ared on a vote of and the senate passed the bill unanimously.

house, nancy, the after signing off on the bill to ensure back bay, talked about the shut -- back pay, talked about the shutdown. 92-6, a republican senate initiative that passed 92-6 and the senate, we are putting on the floor here and sending it back to them to say, take yes for an answer. we did exactly what you republican senators wanted. now take yes for an answer and pass the value have already passed, once again. next week we will take up legislation related to passing in committees. some of it voted on by senior -- senator mitch mcconnell.

we should not have a shutdown in the first place. it is again, a temper tantrum by the president. i am a mother of five, grandmother of nine. i know a temper tantrum when i see one. it is most unfortunate because people's paychecks are being withheld that is not right. host: in the meantime, the washington examiner headline says this -- federal authorities -- federal employees are filing for unemployment. they will get their money back at some point. we want to hear from some folks who are affected as well as general supporters or components of the shutdown. larry from pompano beach, florida. caller: what we should do is we could settle this thing in a quick thing if both sides had some skin in the game.

dnceed to have the rnc and equally pay the federal workers with no opportunity for them to be reimbursed. that way i could guarantee you that this thing would be settled in about 10 minutes, if the rnc and dnc had to cough the money up and pay federal workers with no chance for them to be reimbursed. if they feel so strongly about it, they can go back to their donor base and collect the millions of dollars they would pay in lost wages. that is the problem in washington. these politicians to not have any financial skin in the game. the rnc and dnc should pay quickly and it will get settled really quick. host: paul opposes the shutdown, in chesapeake, virginia. caller: what i would like to say is i definitely agree with the gentleman from florida.

i would solve a lot of issues. -- that would solve a lot of issues. i believe the president submits a budget in april and the senate comes up with the budget in june, but yet they wait until the end of the fiscal year to take care of it. if a company is about to go bankrupt, they do not take off weekends, holidays, recess for two or three weeks. if both parties, republican it and democrat -- republican and democrat, are so concerned about the welfare of the american people and them not getting a paycheck, why do they not stay in session? i'm not sure when their next session is, might be monday or tuesday. host: why don't you answer your own question. why do you think? caller: they do not want to negotiate.

the president stated over christmas, and they took their christmas holiday. of course, everybody wants to spend time with their family, thathy should you believe you reopen the government and the democrats would negotiate? if they are not going to negotiate now, whatever you come up with the next homeland security, pelosi has said she will not give any money for the wall. when you go into negotiate again , what makes you think she will give any money for the wall? host: all that being said, how do you see this ending? unfortunately, i may see it ending by the president fromlly using those funds

wherever, whether they be from the corps of engineers or fema or whatever. itortunately, i may see ending out way. retired friend that is from the coast guard, not sure he is getting his retirement check. my sister-in-law his work for the national -- has worked for the national park service and she is retired and getting her check. the department of the interior always takes a hit on the shutdowns. every shutdown, the department of the interior for some reason gets involved. that is my comment. if they are so concerned, i don't understand why they are not in session day and night to resolve this. host: thank you for calling, paul mentioning the u.s. coast guard. in the washington post yesterday

, they talk about the cascade of shutdown problems growing each week. what they talk about is on january 15, three days away, coast guard members will start missing their paychecks so they point out that while the defense the coast is funded, guard receives its money from the department of homeland security and they will miss their first paycheck on friday. -- a tip sheets provided suggested that unpaid employees hold a garage sale. richard has been waiting from nashville, tennessee. you support the shutdown. why? caller: i think it is necessary. i am in my 60's and i have traveled the country extensively, especially the southwest.

yuma, sann to tucson, diego. into rock formations coming into yuma and then some of the greenest patch for -- pastures. it is amazing what this country is main out of. then you come back across towards arizona towards yuma your white sand dunes where it goes into mexico -- and there are white sand dunes where it goes into mexico. for these people to come through the desert like this, you do not need a wall that you need border patrol. of border00 miles from brownsville to san diego. one man per eight hours shift per five miles with three people to man that 24 hour period, you do the math.

then you will have to have the technology. you will have to have helicopters. i have a friend who grew up in el paso and says they used to fly under the rado -- radar and dump their drugs and make it into el paso. the you get into some of valleys and stuff, that is where you have got to have the manpower and walls to protect technology. when you have half a million people coming illegally across that border, that is an invasion of our country. host: as we asked an earlier reviewer, how do you see this ending? what will it take? inler: donald trump grew up new york city, dealt with the mafia, crooked politicians. keep your friends close at your

enemies closer because you better know what they are doing. he has come a long way to get him he has got. whether he is the greatest man on earth does not matter. standup, because someday you will have to fight for this freedom that you want. host: a little bit of social media, it read writes on twitter -- how many government workers voted for the democrats? the shutdown would end tomorrow if the democrats agree to the wall. deborah writes -- the president would declare one immediately. talking about help that federal workers will be getting, they will be getting a break from banks, credit unions, mortgage companies, and lenders are taking steps to help 800,000 workers affected by the government closure. some businesses are offering no

interest loans with no credit checks and are offering customers to skip or delays loan payments. others are waving overdraft or early withdrawal fees. just a little bit of what banks are doing right now. alaska wasski from part of a group of gop senators who introduced a bill to permanently and government shutdowns -- end government shutdowns. >> i have been part of groups that have talked to the vice president, to his negotiating team. i have raised the question to the president. i want to be part of the solution sooner than later. -- owe -- owe people of it to the people of this country to function. when the government to shut

down, partial or otherwise, we are not functioning. so let's stop talking about who has leverage and who doesn't have leverage and when that is going to tip to advantage the other side. let's do what we need to do when it comes to ensuring the security of our nation and our borders. let's navigate those issues. hostage good hold men and women who are working hard to keep us safe every day. host: from the opinion page of the wall street journal -- end this stupid shutdown. trump is not serious and neither are schumer or pelosi. stop this. it is embarrassing and wrong. make a deal. george is calling from hornell, new york. you oppose the shutdown. caller: i oppose it because i

think it is about trump trying to keep the democrats busy because i think they would be investigating him. that is what i think it is about. host: anything else you want to add? because i think they would have -- they would be investigating him and maybe -- subpoenaing his tax resigns -- tax returns. that is the main reason why this election turned out the way it did. , it wast the economy about keeping trump and control. now trump is doing this and is threatening with a national emergency to try to keep the democrats from investigating him. that is what i think it is about. host: thanks for calling, george. clarksburg --

from clarksburg, west virginia. caller: i support the shutdown. i will tell you why. . think we need the wall all the electronics in the world, you have all kinds of electronics letting you know they will have 20 people to chase them down. to me, it is all in constitutional. , andect them, we pay them they are supposed to pass these laws. if they haven't passed by a two from congress, two from senate, should be put in a room, plenty to drink, and not let out until they get something done. whenever they want to do something, i think if they don't get the job done they ought to be locked in a room and cops put

there. when i get something passed, they get out and that is it -- they get something passed, they get out and that is it. the people who are working, they are not suffering. they kendra unemployment and there are other ways they are getting money. -- they can draw unemployment and there are other ways they are getting money. host: carol from anderson, south carolina opposes the shutdown. caller: i support president trump, but not on this page. there are legal citizens. there are people here on work visas and college visas and they are helping people from their country to come in here. they are being paid big money. a lot of these people are right under our nose that are brought

in in our nail salons. , you wouldn't even think they are doing it. they are very nice-looking people that might be living next door to you. i do not think the wall is going to help stop people coming in here. i am against the shutdown. host: carol from south carolina. kathy is calling from st. george, utah. you are a retired federal worker. caller: thank you, c-span. i just want to give you my information i know of as a form of fred all -- former federal employee. employees have a thrift savings plan and it is similar to a 401(k) retirement. i think these employees that are ed and working without

pay should be given the opportunity to pull their funds from this to get them through this hard time that is being placed upon their shoulders, and -- theyiven any type of are penalized. as congress, while you are sitting -- ask congress while you are sitting and waiting to get it resolved to remove that penalty. get these people in a better situation so that they are not ponds. --t: these federal workers an early caller said these federal markers -- workers make money of money and it is just a pity party. caller: that is not true. all of us, working or retired in this country, do not make billions of dollars compared to those sitting in washington

making decisions for us. there savings is called a thrift savings plan. it is effective for when they retire. they should be able to withdraw and take this money and survive on it, and not be penalized because they work for us. host: we understand the point. speaking of salaries and money, john writes -- there was a time in most of our history when working for the government meant making less than the private sector. now it is the opposite. to an earlier caller who wondered about the congressional session, they are back in session on monday. a supplemental emergency appropriations bill is for disaster relief around the country and that is what the democrats are putting forth.

the senate is in on monday as well, continuing work on a bill. if you watch c-span two, you know they bill. if you watch c-span two, you know they have procedural issues moving on to the bill. the vast majority of democrats are voting not to advance then will, -- that bill, not because bill.ave problems with

if you watch c-span two, you know they have procedural issues moving on to the bill. the vast majority of democrats he is a federalo advance worker and a veteran. what trump is really doing, and always scares people. we do not need a wall. punishing doing is americans. -- investigating on

whether he had been working on behalf of russia against american interests, according lawn -- according to law

enforcement officials and others with knowledge. counterintelligence investigators had to consider actionsthe president's constituted a possible threat to national security. also, whether mr. trump was knowingly working for russia or had unknowingly fallen under moscow's influence. the president is up and tweeting this morning, following up on this story -- just learned in the failing new york times that the corrupt former leaders of the fbi almost all fired or forced to leave the agencies for some very bad reasons, opened up investigations on me, for no reason and with no proof, after i fired line james coney, total sleaze. pamela, a total work -- government worker. doj.r: i work at

federalurloughed employee. i heard the woman from utah say we should be able to tap into our retirement savings, which is tsp. we shouldn't have to do that because we had nothing to do with this. host: have you missed a paycheck so far? caller: will be missing one. i happen to have a little i happen to have a little savings, but i don't know how long that will last depending on this shutdown this shutdown la.

frankly, i don't think government

in 2006 when there was a bill forut $50 billion in place border security, this democrat said -- it will authorize some badly needed funding for better

fences and security along our borders, and that should help stem some of the tide of illegal immigration in this country that was in 2006. you can quote republicans. i will quote democrats. that bill passed and i did not put the money there. need $50 say we billion but if you do not appropriate the money it is not there to build the fencing that is needed. >> was that brought up in the house? >> how to fund the wall, the structure, call it what you will. the president has said you can title it whatever you want. what barack obama and chuck schumer voted for in 2006 is the authority to build what is needed, but did not put the money there. it is hot air unless you put the money on the table.

host: mr. scully's -- scalise was talking to steny hoyer. 22 days now under president trump. clinton, from 1995 into 1996, 21 days. days in the, 17 tail end of the fourth quarter of 1978. obama wasdent president, 16 days from september to october 2013. jimmy carter had a 12 day shutdown while he was president from september to october of 1977. alice is on the line -- allison is on the line, a federal worker. caller: i am a federal worker but fortunately, i am part of an

agency that is fully funded for 2019. it is the absolute reason is a federal worker that i would not move from this agency now, not under this current administration. i am hearing a lot from callers that are obviously not a part of the federal system in these comments that federal workers are cushy and should have plenty of money. i stand to tell people that federal workers make different incomes across the spectrum. some are on the lower end, some are in the middle and some are on the higher end. it is a terrible mess to think that all federal workers make to think thatmyth all federal workers make tremendous money. our benefits package is very good. i was in the private sector and i left because of the better.ities that were

i resist this demonization of federal workers out there, particularly from this administration. better. ithat is why these federal workers have become collateral damage and i stand in solidarity with my brothers and sisters, and praying that the shutdown is over quickly. my stance that this administration, particularly this president, has no compassion whatsoever for these great public servants doing a great job. it is sad and disheartening. anybody that i know, every federal worker in my circle do not support this administration, not one bit. host: let's go down to florida, john is calling from sea bearing -- sebring, supporter of the shutdown. caller: we did not want them negotiate anything with these

daca people. they are illegal aliens that their parents smuggled into the country and we took care of them all these years. we do not want the president negotiating anything. 1950'sn the draft in the and the 1960's and the military to go to protect our country from being invaded. , theypelosi and schumer took these oath's and now they are not wanting to protect our country. they need to be held for criminal charges. we want the wall. we want $25 billion. are not saying anything about the $50 billion last week's the democrats proposed to countries, i believe

it was 5.8 alien dollars and mexico, -- $5.8 billion in honduras and $5.8 million for mexico. countries, i believe it was 5.8 alien dollars and talking about the pay raise, trump said he stopped that. i think pelosi and schumer and that bunch has got the dna of the devil in them. let's move onto anthony in hackettstown, new jersey. you oppose the shutdown. caller: the president wanting a wall was one of the first things he started with when he started campaigning, and the last two majorityh a republican , why was funding never brought up? i don't think the republicans really wanted it and now they do not have to deal with the fact is not going to appropriate the money.

the president had two years of smooth sailing with the majority. it was never brought up, whether paul ryan stifled it, whether mitch mcconnell just didn't want it and found a way to avoid it. why is no one asking what happened the last two years? host: thanks for calling. from the c-span archives, we mentioned a previous government shutdown that lasted 21 days from 1995 into 1996. bill clinton was president. bob dole was in the senate and newt gingrich was the speaker of the house. the second longest shutdown, 21 days. president clinton: as the secretary of state says, this is not how a great country behaves. and has i have said for months and every day since

the shutdown occurred, this is not how to balance the budget. it is not influencing our talks. we ought to reopen the government. say i'm convinced both sides want to balance the budget. we have different philosophies about how. based on the hours we have spent working together i am convinced we can do it, but it is wrong, deeply wrong the shut the government down while we negotiate. under the illusion that somehow that will affect the decisions that i would make on specific issues. only castingis is a shadow over our talks. i will continue to do everything i can in good faith to regenerate agreement, but it is wrong to shut the government down. let me complement the senate on abandoning that process and voting to open the government while we work, and ask the house to follow suit.

januaryll clinton from 1996, a 21 day shutdown. what was until today the longest and american history. judy is from rochester, new hampshire, supports the shutdown. caller: i supported and jim costa from cnn proved the point. he stood at that fence and said he saw no illegals coming cross, then it was serenity. he proved the point. he is standing in front of a fence and there was no illegals coming across. that is the first point. i am from yuma, arizona and i know what goes on. i live in new hampshire but i communicate with my friends who tell me what is going on. people need to listen to the border control, nevermind the democrats and republicans, but listen to the border patrol.

they are the ones doing the work . they are the important ones to listen to. why in the past when obama wanted it, it was fine. this is all political. calumet to susan in city, illinois, a retired federal worker. caller: i feel the wall is needed. you see all these people coming over, watching them come over. it is needed. then they get over here and they do not want to assimilate. they want a little mexico here. host: as a retired federal worker, what would you tell a current federal worker who is furloughed and not getting a paycheck? caller: hang in there bank, because -- hang in there, because it will get better. host: the new york times writes

there is a worry the shutdown could snarl airport traffic. so far, the impact on passengers has been relatively limited but at least one airport, miami international will close one day becausely each of a shortage of screeners employed by tsa. the washington post tells us air traffic controllers are suing the president over a lack of pay. they filed the lawsuit yesterday against the president another top federal officials, saying they are provide -- uprising controllers without -- depriving controllers of their calculation without due process. charles is in gastonia, south carolina. -- north carolina, sorry. support the not shutdown because the first

thing, i don't understand why donald trump would allow himself to put these people in jeopardy. a wall will never stop people from getting in here. people have money. they can pay to look the other way. it becausever stop if you got money, you can always get something you want. congress, the white house, the house of representatives. standing that people --ind him are not getting that they are not doing their job? it is more americans killing americans than them coming over here. most of these people that come over here, they like to stay discreet. they will not open themselves up knowing they are illegal. , it is really sad

that they are still standing up for donald trump. he is going to blame it on the democrats. this is ridiculous. the panel has lost it. -- the man has lost it. i did not vote for him. he hired criminals for the right test for the white house. house.the white raymond from the louisiana, federal worker. what kind of work you do and what is your status? caller: raymond from the louisiana, federal i work at th. medical center but we have funding. we are ok. the thing is, some of my colleagues are out of work, not getting paid. it makes no sense for a wall.

you have to remember, the just trying toks come across the border is going to do jobs that everyday americans won't even do because that is not the right pay level to raise a family. that is all i wanted to say. host: thank you for calling. more from our archives on previous government shutdowns, atwill look back to 1990 this point where there was a shutdown. george h.w. bush was president, george mitchell was majority leader and tom foley was speaker of the house. it had to do with democrats in congress. was that the president would not sign a temporary spending bill unless it was paired with a deficit reduction plan. : let them go up

and negotiated. this is the business of congress. i will not mislead the people if there is something so outrageous i cannot accept it. flexible. i have already compromised. i am not saying i cannot take a look at new proposals, but you have to put together a majority and that is where the leaders are having great difficulty. members of your own party dislike the deal so much. how could you and your advisors have misjudged the sentiment of you and your own -- of your own party? members of your own party dislike the deal sopresident buo say when you do not have to stand for. i have an election in three for --and i will vote not enough growth or not enough incentive. any individual member can do

that and maybe it plays well at home. the president and leadership of both houses have to be responsible for the overall good of the country, have to make something happen. i cannot get it done just my way. i do not control both houses of congress. therefore, we have had to compromise. host: october 6, 1990, george h.w. bush on the government shutdown. steve is calling from richmond, virginia, opposing the shutdown. caller: good morning. thank you for taking my call and happened here. -- happy new year. we know donald trump don't have any compassion for the american people nor these employees. i blame this right now all on mitch mcconnell. host: how come? caller: he could put legislation on the floor that would pass 100% in the senate that would put these employees back to

work. host: why do you think that is not happening? caller: because of mitch mcconnell being a patsy to donald trump. he is being a coward to the american people. what he need to do is not go home for the weekend, come back, and put this legislation on the floor to get these people back to work. plus, he should put legislation on the floor where these people get four times the damage of their pay. what he need to do is do his job , get these people back to work. mitch mcconnell is being a coward and donald trump should not get a done for his wall. -- dime for his wall. not one penny. fencing,curity,

judges, lawyers, whatever you need to make order security safe, but donald trump should not get a penny for his wall. put these people back to work now. host: down to our last couple of calls, larry from gallatin, tennessee. caller: thank you for taking my call. separate theave to -- the bille bill to refund the government. to refund the government and then negotiate on the wall. this is the way it is normally done. this is weakness on trump's part. he has so many conflicts with

insia and people that work his election campaign, ties with russia. this is part of main emphasis that in wants to create havoc within the united states, and this is part of the plan, shut down the federal government. host: thank you for calling. the cdc, according to cnbc and other outlets, it is another bad flu season, 3.7 million people sick so far, half have been to the doctor. 83,005 hundred people have been hospitalized because of the flu. there is also representative making ag who has been

ton of news, fresh outrage for republican's racist remarks, this time from his own party. steve king, who has outraged liberals, is facing blowback within his party after an interview with the new york times when he questioned why white supremacy is considered offensive. he narrowly won reelection. -- he has been making decadestatements for but the party has mostly ignored them. top republicans as well as former gop presidential candidates and conservatives in took toa -- mr. king the house floor friday to explain his remarks. >> as i told "the new york times," it is not about race,

has never been about race. one of my most strongly held beliefs as we are all created in god's image and the human life is sacred in all forms. all of my life's work, public worker -- public work, all of my bills and activities support that statement, that human life is sacred in all of its forms and we are created in god's image. i regret the heartburn put forth on this congress in this country, especially in my state and district. ie people who know me know would not even have to make this statement because they do know me. they know i have lived in the same place since 1978. there is nothing about my family or history or neighborhood that would suggest that these false allegations could be supported by any activity whatsoever. i reject that ideology. i demand america -- defend

american civilization. host: you can watch the full remarks on our website, c-span.com. tim scott, republican senator from kerala -- south carolina has jumped into the story. he is the only african-american republican in the united states senate. this is why republicans are accused of racism, he writes in the washington post. wonder some in our party why republicans are constantly accused of racism and goes on to talk about immigration being the in which somehow our affection for the rule of law has become conflated with a perceived racism against brown and black people. i support border security not because i want to keep certain ethnicities out but because i support our laws.

if you break our laws, there should be consequences. it has become almost impossible to have a real conversation along those lines. he writes that king's comments are not conservative certain prs mean equal opportunity for all to succeed -- regardless of what you look like or where you are from. it is impossible to see that some folks see this and have these good intentions tarnished by radical perspectives. rights senator tim scott of south carolina. thank you for calling on this first hour about the government shutdown. we will be talking about the shut down for the rest of the program. when we come back we will look at how the shutdown, in day 22, the longest in history, is impacting federal comp pastor -- federal contractors we will talk with alan chvotkin, of professional services council. we will later be joined by christian branco -- kristen

brengel. , the new chairman of the house on whether president trump should declare the national security -- should declare national security to build a wall. >> it is looking likely that president trump will declare a national emergency at the border so he can use funds from the army corps of engineers to start building this wall without congress. in your view, does he have the legal authority to do that? and regardless if he goes ahead with it, what steps can a democratic house take to try to curtail that action? >> i hope president trump does not declare an emergency declaration. access to the corps of engineers funds would put communities at risk that are already being ravaged by wild fires, hurricanes, floods, and what have you. and many of the projects

dissociated with those natural disasters are being remedied with those corps of engineers funds. so i hope you would not do that, nonetheless, we have three branches of government. if the executive branch chooses a path, then the legislative branch can do its will, either passing a resolution saying we itd to court and challenging , and obvious of the judicial branch will look at it. i hope we, for whatever reason, do not get to that point. i hope president trump's advisors will tell him that this man made catastrophe on the ander is not something that emergency declaration should be about. i would say to the president, this is not the way to go. holding those 800,000 federal

employees hostage in terms of making them work without pay should not be a part of this discussion. but from what i gather, it is seriously under consideration. but i would say to the president if he asks me, mr. president, you shouldn't do it. can watch chairman thompson on newsmakers, the program there's tomorrow, sunday, 10:00 eastern. table is alanthe chvotkin, the executive vice president and counsel for the professional services council, here to talk about government contractors and the shut down. good morning. explain the role of your organization? guest: the professional services council is a professional trade association representing almost 400 companies, all technology and professional services for the government. we are an advocacy organization

for government contractors. host: we have been talking for days and days about federal employees, i wanted to spend time talking about contractors. what is their status right now during the shutdown? extent that to the some federal agencies are shut down, and federal employees are furloughed. many of the contractors at supporting those organizations have also been told to stop work, denied the ability to come to work. so employees for those companies, those contractors, some have been doing other types of work, in training. some have been furloughed. host: who are these people? how many of them are in this country? where are they? what kind of money do they make? guest: they spend the spectrum. some are companies, some are small businesses, some are household names. our member companies work in every federal agency across the government.

we have members with workers in all 50 states. workers expand the spectrum of job skills from the low-grade, to the midgrade, to professional and technical services. minimum-wage, the wage established by the federal government. up to the executive level. host: we will talk about the impact on federal contractors and efforts from congress to help. we are with alan chvotkin, with the professional service council. we will put the numbers on the bottom of the screen, two numbers, one for federal contractors, if you're in that line of work and we want to hear what your statuses. and we want to hear from all others as well. we will keep the numbers on the bottom of the scream for a couple of minutes. -- of the screen for a couple of minutes. i want to throw a number at you in terms of the overall impact. reading this at bloomberg. the shutdown threatened $200 million a day in federal

contracts. that sounds like a lot of money. put this in perspective. guest: the federal government contracts for over $400 billion a year in the purchase of goods and services. inut half of that is services, everything from information technology to engineering services to research. that is an average number based on past spending, an assumption that that's what the government spends each day in contracting -- that the government spends that each day in contracting. many of that is in services, and that's were member companies do their work. host: speak not just about the contractors themselves, but the companies that actually employ them and do the contracting. downdoes a 20 today shut and one that may last -- 822 day shut down mean and one that could --a 22 day shut down

mean? guest: it affects their ability to maintain employee's, like any other employer, when they are not provided the business opportunities are the revenue, they are in trouble. have reserves, some have other clients, other federal agencies are open and doing with as, so companies range of contracts across the federal marketplace, the impact will vary. but there are clearly some member companies and other contractors who work primarily in agencies that lack appropriations. and they are having significant impacts. host: there was a subheading in this piece in bloomberg, it says the shutdown threatens 200 million a day in federal contracts, and this could mean lost or delayed money for providers. do contractors get any of this money back? was work performed

before the shutdown, where companies will have to invoice the federal agencies. those invoices that were not paid before december 22 are not being paid now. so there is money outstanding. there are federal contractor employees who are working because there agencies are working, they are going to be billing for work. delayed revenue stream. and then there is work that is not being done at all. federal contractors have never been reimbursed for lost money for work not performed. host: before we get to calls, what is your organization trying to do? guest: we are being aggressive in our advocacy work. we have written to the senior leadership in the congress and the president, we are meeting regularly with executives and members of congress and staff to try to address -- the first to bring a rapid end to the shutdown.

secondly, when the shutdown ends to make sure that federal contractors and contractor employees are compensated to the same extent as federal employees would be compensated. host: let's hear from james, in california, for our guest, alan chvotkin. good morning. caller: good. the contractioned employees are sometimes minimum-wage, or federal minim wage, i want to ask, are you referring to davis-bacon? or actual mom wage? -- minimum-wage? you, there are several minim wages, davis-bacon is one of the laws that provides minimum wage for contractor employees, primarily in construction, there's a comparable minim wage called a service contract act for those employees primarily providing services to the federal government. a presidential

executive order that requires a certain minimum wage at $10 and 40 -- at $10.40. that is why i used the phrase federal minimum wage, because it varies based on the nature of the work. caller: why do you ask? -- host: why do you ask? caller: my personal extremes with davis-bacon is that contract employees that are in construction are probably paid more than double then what would be happening in the private sector. many bigk for companies. and my employees make half the money when they worked in those, but every time i went to a federal base, every time i went to work for a federal government -- part of the federal government or even for a state i had to pay my employees double.

i think it's wrong to have to pay that kind of money when you would never pay that work in your private home. law,: that's the public the davis-bacon act is the prevailing wage statute in the federal marketplace, it's the wage set by the market of labor. it provides a guaranteed floor for those wage categories. today, the law as it is we can talk about whether it makes sense to change it but that is the law that companies are working on. host: we have phoenix, arizona, on the line. what is your name? caller: hans. host: go ahead. caller: why aren't the federal workers looking to tell the democrats to put the money towards the wall to get this

over and done with? is,fact of the matter representative louie gohmert from texas was on before yesterday and he said why don't the democrats go home this weekend and knock the walls out of their house? because if they think walls are , or not capable of doing anything, than they should do that instead of being hypocritical. , we see jim acosta from cnn making the point of the walldent about the steel one he said there was no coming across, or no trouble at that area. it was laughable. the point was there was no wall there. there was a wall there.

so could you talk to a couple of these things. host: before you answer mr. chvotkin, actually, go ahead and answer. guest: at the professional service council, our member companies -- we don't have association positions on whether we should build a wall. we have strong views that we ought to put the federal government back to work. it has important issues to perform that are not being performed, we believe there is lots of bad news to address with priorities. was going to ask if you take things like positions on walls? no. guest: no. governmentederal contract workers could be out to an million dollars, there is in thert of breakdown

homeland department of security, 1 -- -- this goes all the way can you please numbers in perspective and what the effect is of all of this contracting work that goes on to the general public and what does the shutdown mean? guest: the federal government relies heavily on the private sector to provide good ends -- goods and services. under supervision and direction of the specific request of the federal agencies. so the $19 million that the department of homeland security has, the combination of salaries for federal employees, equipment , and theorder patrol federal emergency management agencies, the contract support can come through information technologies, it can come through labor support,

construction, services contracts, in the shutdown there are two types of federal employees. those that are working at agencies where they have no money, that are still working. they are called accepted employees. their work is continuing and they will be paid for the work performed when funds become available. because of those functions, there are contractors who are continuing to work and support those missions. many contractors supporting the customs and border patrol in their work today, that work is continuing, even though the agency has no current appropriations. and there are federal employees who have been furloughed. that's usually the first action the government takes, they put an employee on furlough. it's actually the last action a contractor takes with respect to its employees, because they want to make sure they have an ability to continue that pay for

that employee as long as possible. so companies will follow their personnel strategies of putting a personal -- a person in training, or seeing if there's other work to put the employee on. if so that's what they'll do. only if they find that there is no other possibility will they put that employee on furlough. so the fund flow is the contract awarded, not all of money that you refer to is contracts dollars, but clearly the department of homeland security is a huge element of the agencies that do not have money today. host: let's hear from sharon --shannon, in illinois. caller: good morning. i have a question. with federal contractors, would they be upset if the government announced that maybe 22 million new french contract workers were going to come in

illegally and take their jobs for one third of the pay? inhink there may be a bias america against french people. you know if the french people come in and work very cheaply, all the federal contractors would try to have to find jobs at mcdonald's. i am just wondering if maybe 22 million illegal french people started coming in to take all these jobs, do you think american federal contractors would be upset? that's an interesting question. oftentimes there are qualification requirements, just as we spoke earlier with the earlier caller about some of the statutes that exist that provide certain types for of functions.

would bekers protected. it is true in the federal marketplace that there is an enormous competition for a lot of what the federal government does. the government often awards contracts based on lowest price, so there are incentives and disincentives that drive salary. i don't know about hiring french workers, and those kinds of minimum wages. there may be jobs open for that kind of competition. most of the jobs require some , andof background review there is a strong preference for hiring u.s. workers. with alanre speaking chvotkin, executive vice president on counsel for the professional services council to explain what your group is doing, here is -- to claim what congressmen are doing, here is a tweet from don bier, a democrat from virginia. legislation to

give federal employees back pay, we will make sure it passes. that is from don byer. there is a piece in mother joan --ing this, federal contract saying federal contractors have never gotten backpay from federal shutdowns, democrats are trying to fix that. we have been talking about backpay for federal workers, but it's never happened for contractors. guest: that's correct. yesterday contractor -- congress passed and the president said he would sign legislation to provide backpay for set -- federal workers. we assume the bill will be signed when the shutdown ends. it does not provide the backpay until the shutdown is over. contractors have never received backpay. we are working with a large coalition of democratic and republican members of the house and the senate to try to rectify that and provide a quality of treatment for federal contractors and their employees. there is an interest in doing

that, the mechanics are more complicated, just because of the business relationship between the federal government and the contractors. and contractors paying their , whereas with federal employees, the federal government as their employer and it's easier. but the concept is the same in many members of congress are talking about it. host: do you think this would pass in the house and senate? guest: that is our hope. we are pleased to have a bipartisan group of members in both the house and the senate who are working on that, and we are hoping that before the shutdown is over and shortly thereafter we will be able to work out an approach that provides that. host: have you heard the president's opinion on this issue? guest: we have not. we have been speaking to senior leaders at work and some of the key federal agencies about that. there will be more conversations

next week as well. host: more calls from our guest, patrick, from california. thank you for waiting. caller: i hope these groups realize that the democrats are playing politics with their jobs. that realistically the democrats have never understood that they are working with other people's money. and not their own. this is the american people's money that they are working with . and, and, and, and, and, and it seems clear that their political motives are stronger than their motives to help the american people that care more about illegal immigrants than they do about the american people. there are 20 million plus illegal immigrants in this country, lots of crimes have happened. the crime is not the issue. the issue is that we are a country that is broke. we are broke. and then a lot of the contracts that we are putting out to the people like these people for price the wages, again, they are

spending other people's money, the american people's money, i want to know how many of these projects are earmarks? creating jobs to create a political image that we are creating jobs in america? the whole thing is politically motivated by the democrats. they voted for the wall. they wanted this wall in february of last year. and now because it's the presidents wall they are not going to give it to him because they don't want to give him that political advantage for 2020. host: what do you make of that political commentary? i have am not sure common, there's politics and everything that goes on. our view is that there are critical missions undertaken by the federal government. and we want to get those missions underway for the federal employees and bring them back to work and bring our contract employees back to worse.

we see on twitter a private sector, the primary mission of contractors is to rebuff the government? with: i strongly disagree that. contractors work to support federal agencies, at least in the federal marketplace. a work under strict rules and under supervision by federal employees. many of them have been federal employees and they are providing support to those same missions, not at all true for contractors to be in business to rip off the government. host: i wanted to ask about the democratic effort to get backpay. we did read that it was lower income contractors, what would be considered lower income in the contracting world? guest: there are certainly for lower wages, cafeteria workers, some security guards, it's our view, with

respect to contractors, we are pushing for equal treatment of all federal contractors and their employees and federal agencies. so our lawyers at the department of justice have been furloughed, the oceanographers at the national oceanography and atmospheric and ministration have been furloughed. there has been no wage -- administration have been furloughed. there has been no wage differentiation on the worker side so there should not be on the contractor side either. host: let's go to howard, good morning. quick point. my son works for someone that works for the federal government for minimum wage for them, he got paid around $50 an hour doing his job normally. when working for the federal government they made over $220 -- over $120 an hour. my second point, one that is more critical and more addressed towards c-span, is why do we

keep trying to denigrate, divide, and terra part country? up our-- and tear country? i have watched c-span for years, i covered you when i was taking journalism in college. i went to the introduction of -- we pay for that, we pay for c-span, we pay for it to our cable bills and through our satellite bills. we really need to get c-span to start thinking about the country instead of about the politics. host: what are we doing to denigrate the country? what can we do better? i know that during the iranian situation, and the health situation, i didn't use

to -- see you saying what is congress doing passing a bill at midnight by a 51-49 vote in the senate on christmas eve in order grosse 1/5 of the federal insurance on the private sector and put it in the hands of government. you did not do a good job of denigrating our last president as well as you are this one. and it's embarrassing. it's a shame. i think we should have a c-span 2. it will be a c-span that will deal with these situations in the same manner that you dealt with the last situations of the last president. host: thank you for the input. it's important that we hear input from our viewers on how were doing. we will take note of everything you have said.

anything you want to respond to from that collar? let's go to the subject at hand, warren, from north dakota? caller: that's correct. like to make a comment. i don't see punishing government workers for the congress not doing their job. to me that's unacceptable. between the democratic and the republican from 2008 fromed 2018 they flipped. they are hypocrites. the federal worker does not deserve to lose their pay. congresses need to have their pay stopped, their pensions stopped, their health care stopped, because they did

not do their job. bob, -- froms from warren, let's hear from bob. caller: i disagree with your caller before last. i think c-span is a blessing to america. it's the only place i can get truth. i'm think about cutting off my cable but the only reason is that i have to keep c-span. thank you. host: we will take the positive feedback, anything on the subject at hand? the contracting issue? caller: yes, our federal government was formed for one reason, the only guarantees the constitution, to protect each state from invasion. congress is breaking that guarantee. they are violating the constitution. trump is empowered --

he is the executive, he supposed to enforce the law. the law is to protect each state from invasion. president trump is doing the right thing and congress is cutting his knees off. it's an article for, section four. i'm sorry, i get excited. seven words: shall protect each state from invasion. contractors, but they have to know where the source of this cash -- we have one guarantee, and congress is breaking it. host: bob, thank you. final thoughts? this is a difficult situation. federal employer -- federal employed contract workers find themselves in this to chew -- difficult situation. the federal agencies with no funds are unable to perform across the whole spectrum.

it has been our view that congress and the president onto find a way to reopen the federal government, and restart those missions and fairly compensate federal employees and contractors and contractor employees for the times they were unable to work. host: what are you telling contractor these days? the individuals who work in the companies? what are you telling them in this interim period? of thethe heart conversation is responding to how long this will go on. circumstances change every day. some employees that were furloughed are being called back to work. support them are called back to work. others were working because they had other sources of revenue and now they are being furloughed in their support is stopped. things.on top of and document the impact that is taking place. be prepared for rapid reopening

of the government and recalling employees back to work. host: alan chvotkin is the executive vice president to the council. thank you for the information. guest: thank you for the opportunity. host: when we come back, another guest and we continue our discussion of the federal government shutdown. we will look at the impact on national parks, our guest will be kristen bengal of the national park -- kristen brengel of the national park association can't -- conservation association. speak withe will hugo gurdon of the washington examiner. ♪ coming up this weekend on eastern,today, at 645 kamala harris details her life and career through her book, the

truths we hold. >> i believe the strongest politics or coalition politics -- are coalition politics. and it is hard about understanding that the vast majority of us have so much more in common than what separates us. and rejecting the idea that we live in silos, and that we don't share values or concerns, and when we wake up in the middle of the night we don't share the same thoughts about what we need or what our family needs. the vast majority is that we have so much more in common. >> and author oz guinness talks about his book. last call for liberty. have seene crisis we growing over the last 30 years, i have rarely ever heard an american leader today addressing the present crisis in the light of the founding vision. addressing the better angels of

the american nature in the light of liberty and justice for all that comes from the declaration. ,n other words, at the moment there is no lincoln like vision of courage and leadership. no one will make america great again unless they ask what made it great in the first place. afterwards, atn 9:00 eastern, a journalist discusses her book, it was all a dream. a new generation confronts the broken promise to black america. she is interviewed by the root editor-in-chief. >> barack obama got nominated for president, and our political climate totally changed. that the was the idea american dream is may be possible for black americans. maybe it wasn't created for this idea that you can do better than your parents if you work hard enough and it does -- your lot

in life doesn't matter. but it doesn't seem like that's actually the reality, even now. and that's profoundly disappointing. >> watch book tv this weekend on c-span2. washington journal continues. host: joining us now as kristen brengel, vice president of government affairs at the national parks conservation association. thank you for joining us. can you slain the role of your organization? -- can you explain the role of your organization? aroundwe have 27 offices the cult -- the country and we worked to protect and enhance national park's for future generations. host: as we look at the government shutdown we have heard a lot of stories and seen a lot of pictures from national parks about what is going on with this shutdown. how many national parks are there? what is in national park?

what percentage of them are affected by the shutdown? 418 nationalare park units, battlefield, seashores, lake shores, and about a third of them are closed because they have a lake -- a lock and key, like the federick douglass house here in washington, d.c.. many have been told to stay open during the shutdown. the interior department directed it. in some cases the parks that have excessive snow have closures because you cannot get in. you have to plow the road and the park service can't pay to plow the roads. in other cases people are getting into national park's without visitor services. host: what has the impact been? guest: it has been terrible. battlefields are losing some of their artifacts. a joshua trees have been cut down and used for firewood. off-road vehicles have been driving into wilderness areas. the muster magic impact across the board in many parks is trash

build -- the most dramatic impact across the board and many parts of trash build and human waste. there will be a huge cleanup effort after the shutdown is over. host: here's a picture from a tweet in joshua tree national park. visitors are cutting down joshua trees and driving into sensitive areas where vehicles are banned. we have had some extensive four-wheel driving. speak to us, what is the impact to the parks? guest: damage. it's damage, potential looting .f artifacts we will not know the full picture of the damage until the shutdown is over and we get staff back into the parks. because of the way the shutdown works you can only have essential staff in, only 16% of national park service tax -- staff are in the parks now, it's mostly law enforcement. there is not enough people. yosemite has 800 staff and only

50 are working. they are not protecting the resources, they are not being protected and the interior department is favoring giving folks access without providing that protection. host: we have the phone numbers on the screen for kristen brengel. we have a separate line just for recent national park visitors, if you have been there, tell us why you were there and what you saw. number48-8002is your --(202) 748-8002 is your number. and a separate line for our other guests. so what are you doing now? guest: we are trying to work with congress to get the parks open. we are advocating strongly the senate move to pass the interior appropriations bill, which passed in the house yesterday. but all of the parks need to be open with their staff.

it is paramount that we get them parks back open. we work with our members across the country to advocate to make sure that parks are funded and well staffed. host: how many folks are affected? people who work at the parks around the country? guest: 15% of park rangers are on the job, so that leaves a large number who are not, 80% are not there. they are furloughed, they did not get paid yesterday. these are people who are dedicated public service -- servants who love the parks. they protect the geysers, the wildlife, this is demoralizing for them. and they are going to have to clean these places up when they get back to their jobs after the shutdown is over. seeing so much science, some of the scientific studies that have been going on

for years, sometimes decades are being interrupted by this. the impacts are going to continue after the shutdown is over. host: and what is the financial impact in terms of fees and moneys collected? guest: the parks cannot collect parks collect7 fees, they are not doing that and you -- now. it's a loss of about $400,000 a day to the park system. if i'm doing the math correctly, it has lost about $8 million now. this is money used for interpretation, education, law enforcement. this money will be lost forever. they will never get this back. congress is not going to supplement them at this point with the current appropriations bill. this will have lasting impact. in addition a lot of that fee money is used for maintenance. 55% is used for maintenance. we have a $12 billion

maintenance backlog in the parks. we have water pipelines in the grand canyon that are bursting. we have historic homes that have roots that are collapsing. are collapsing and because the fee money is lost forever we will not be able to fix them. recently visited national park, tell us about it. spoke tour guest here one of my questions, which was visiting the blue ridge parkway i see a lot of things that are broken, picnic tables, trails in disrepair. what is the administration doing to try to fix our parks? thank you. guest: there have been bills introduced. one bill we have been advocating for is called restore our parks, which will hopefully be reintroduced early this congress. for $6.5ould do is pay billion worth of the maintenance

backlog. that means it would repaired buildings, and other amenities that people enjoy in our national parks. when you think of a national park you don't think of it as a town. but in some cases it has its own water infrastructure, its own sewage infrastructure. over time the lifecycle of these different types of infrastructure starts to deteriorate. it's quite important that congress put money behind deferred maintenance and make sure the parks are getting the funding they need. we hope the bill will pass in the house and senate. karen, anotherto recent visitor from columbus, north carolina. caller: i'm calling about the same parks system, the burnsville gentlemen from north carolina called about it. i was up there recently and it's sad, individuals, i don't know

what their political leaning is, but they are bringing up trash on purpose. they are bringing up their household garbage and just like the gentleman said they are destroying items like picnic tables. it is sad to see people's mentality, they are just so demented that they would do this on purpose. it breaks my heart because they should take pride in their parks. it's heartbreaking. at this point in time, with the government shut down. thank you for taking my comment. karen, thank you. i want to ask, are you encouraging people to visit? guest: we don't want to discourage people from visiting parks, they are there for us to enjoy. but there are issues that happen when you don't have park rangers at the gates, directing people where to go, telling them what to do. just the other day i watched a video of people jumping off of a boardwalk at yellowstone national park and walking

towards the geyser. it's extremely unsafe. you should never do that. the water is extremely hot. the people are doing things they typically wouldn't do if there were park rangers on the ground helping check the resources and educating people about protecting resources. host: i'm going to ask you to put some numbers in perspective, seven people have died in national park's since the shut down. but three had to people year die in national parks, canepa those numbers in perspective? what -- can you numbers in perspective? what are you bracing for for personal safety? host: -- guest: it's a huge issue and park rangers try to prevent accidents but even when parks are well staffed accidents happen. railings on the side of the to becanyon -- you have careful when you go. that's why we have staff people there educating people about what to do and where to go and to hold your kids tightly on the

boardwalk's near the geysers. and don't get near wildlife. keep your distance from wildlife. when there is no one there to direct you and tell you what is currently happening under this makes people more vulnerable to hazards. host: we will hear from frank in california. caller: good morning. i am familiar with national parks, slightly. on thea vacation home edge of a national park. and i met the concessioner of occasionally -- i became very familiar with it. fight not quite how did the land become

government instead of private? it's because the owners of those properties were given an incentive to donate the land to the government by stating, and that anyact now, business concerns of the national parks are in private hands. they made the prophet, it is maintained by the government, and they make their living off of it. sometimes selling concessions and the work and maintaining is done by the government itself. there are people in the last -- it is aty park private concern to run the concession in the park and other employees are living in the vicinity of the park and i know a lot of them. ,hey have housing in mineral and that's how it works.

you have private people and the national government people, and it's maintained by the government, and what a wonderful incentive to people to let them make the profit from it. host: frank, thank you. issue thataises an we are equally concerned about, the gateway communities that surround national park's. these are people who all showed -- also care for parks and provide services. we estimate that in january these communities are losing upwards of $20 million a day during the shutdown. these are small communities in a lot of cases, like the color pointed out, small towns that are dependent on people -- like the caller pointed out, small towns that are dependent on people buying their gas and their lunch. so people not visiting has a deep impact. host: let's talk about congress,

a member of the appropriations interior subcommittee said this about the impact of national parks. >> there are over 1100 federal workers and their families in -- alone. this includes employees in the acadia national park and the wildlife refuge. the air and water program officers at the epa among them. this shutdown has made life difficult for these workers and their families. it has halted critical duties that they perform. programs funds bio that we use every day to protect our resources, to learn about the environment, to protect americans to our national -- to connect americans to our national treasures. so far the administration has used accounting gimmicks to give the appearance that these parks and agencies remain open. but you cannot hide the real consequences of this shutdown.

for example at national parks there have been reports of habitat destruction, injury, and death since the beginning of the shutdown. we do not need gimmicks, we need to reopen the government. , bettyet me add to that mccollum of minnesota wrote that the law is clear, the national parks must be closed to protect public safety and pristine spaces, it is not acceptable to use the recreation enhancement act funds to keep the parks open and the department of the interior's actions likely violate appropriations laws. so the is there a law being broken? do you see it that way? guest: we sent a letter to the inspector general to open an investigation immediately on the legal violations undertaken by this administration. the administration, unlike previous administrations has put

a policy in place to keep parks open. because the parks are open, that is why the damage is being caused. what we are saying is that they are violating the law because they are creating a health and human damage by keeping the parks open. but if they had them closed, -- they are manufacturing a crisis here. and the national park service was established over a hundred years ago, it was established by a law that says parks are conserved unimpaired. everyre being impaired by standard. this administration is not taking a cautious approach, they and welating the law need to make sure that we learn from this mistake. that is why we are calling on the inspector general to investigate. bill,back to the phones, from palm springs, california. caller: good morning and god bless you. i can't imagine what is going

through your head and what you are seeing. i'm up the street, 30 miles from joshua tree park. the plans are literally hundreds of years old, they don't look like much, but because of the lack of water and the topography and the types of flora and fauna we have these things survive on very little. two of my buddies from church helped run the park, and a lot of people in the neighborhood are bringing in toilet paper, cleaning the toilets, taking the trash out, things like that to help them. punks other side we have with four wheelers destroying the parks. cutting these trees down and driving their four wheelers through places they have no business. the time,e news all and i'm sure across the country it's the same way.

just after the election i was in utah. i was listening to talk tv, local programming in the morning , in the mountains. i hear the movers and shakers talking about shrinking the parks, dig everything up out of the ground, cut all the trees down, the spotted owls cannot even fly through the forest, we will cut down the trees. and we have these lobbyists in the trump administration pushing for this. thatshrunk bear ears park president obama put together. that was donated land, just like people have been saying. this is donated land. these people want to come in there and suck all the oil out and take out the minerals, whatever they want to do, it's criminal. it's truly criminal. and the people running this current administration don't care. they do not care. thank you so much for what you do. bless you. guest: thank you for those kind

words. i can hear the despair in your voice. i was in joshua tree in november. i got to experience the beautiful forest of joshua trees, unlike anything you could ever see anywhere around the country. it's meg for sent, -- it is magnificent. it's one of the few places you could have a true wilderness experience. to know that any of it is being dissed -- to know that any of it is being destroyed is heartbreaking. utah's one of my favorite places in the country. it's terrible and we are suing the interior department for shrinking bears ears, which is a travesty. a lot of sacred sites are going unprotected because of the move the administration made. online --ave a viewer we have brian, from massachusetts. kristen, thank you, and

paul as well, c-span is important to us, as are the parks. my wife and i spent an afternoon parknational park, it's a run by the federal government. there was a security out guard -- security guard, he was employed that day. -- is typically what we have always done for our federal employees, aren't they leaning towards protecting what they love to do for a living? i would be surprised, i never met a park ranger that does not , i'm surpriseddo that 800,000 employees are not actually at work, knowing they will get retroactive pay. hit $5 millionl worth of employee pay and benefits based on hundred

thousand dollars on average if benefits, pay, the and the debt interest. that's the payroll that we have not spent for the past 22 days. guest: there is a law that prevents the federal government from bringing people back in in order to work. ,ou have to adhere to the law there is a statute. but i agree that park rangers are amazing. they do a wonderful job. they are so proud of the work that they do interpreting our democracy and our history and our natural and cultural resources to the public. that's why we want to make sure we are taking care of them and make sure they get paid after theyhutdown, and that don't feel completely demoralized by having to do a massive cleanup because the administration is keeping parks

open. guest: -- what is the average pay of a price range -- park ranger? and what are they doing those shut -- doing during the shutdown? guest: they are furloughed like every other employee, hopefully not many are struggling but we hear stories of people who are struggling with paying their rent. can they volunteer if they like? guest: they can, in some areas, some of the efforts, especially with human wastes, i would urge people to be careful in terms of going in there. but if folks wanted to volunteer, they should. wanda, ins go to chico, california. caller: i called senator feinstein to find out whether or not government workers who are furloughed get unemployment checks, and they do.

it's a little strange to me that nobody mentions that. so why don't you worry about all of the damage the illegal immigrants due to the desert when they come through with their trash? they piled up their trash and their human waste all over the desert and they damage the desert a lot more than what this shutdown is damaging. host: let's get a response to the critique. guest: the damage tapped -- the damage happening to our national parks is widespread. i can't overemphasize that. artifacts have been taken from battlefield at gettysburg, we have seen off the road a and people driving through big bend and texas. dunes atmping into the white sands new mexico. people jumping into geyser basins at yellowstone national park. this is happening all over the country. the damage is real.

the trash and litter pickup is real. this needs to come to an end. we need to get the government up and running and we need to make sure that the park staff can go out there and protect the resources. the: we spoke about interior appropriations bill let's talk about the secretary of the interior, ryan zinke has stepped down, who would you like to see in that position and what would that person need to bring to the operation? guest: i'm not going to name a name, no-name surfaces in particular that we are looking at. but i can tell you that as one of the previous collars discussed, we need an interior secretary -- previous caller discussed, we need an interior secretary that protects the land, so far 2 million acres of land has been taken away from protection. it is tragic. no other president in the history of our country has

reversed and used the antiquities act to not protect our public land. this administration also has energy dominance agendas. they are leasing oil and gas all over the west and right near national parks, right at the doorstep of national parks. they are putting in place wildlife policies that will not protect wildlife and will harm them long-term. we need an interior secretary who will protect wildlife, protect resources, ensure that we are conserving our public lands and supporting the staff. the major thing the administration does every year in our budget. this administration two years in a row has fought for cuts to the national park and the public land. this is not ok. we need someone in this position who will protect these lands that americans hold sacred. host: mitch, in delaware, good morning. good morning, thank you

for taking everyone's calls, i really like this, i'm 18 party democrat-- a tea party , i remember when president to anput up a barricade open air plaza world war ii memorial and put guards around the outside in the veterans had to storm it using their wheelchairs and their walkers and they knock down the barriers that would have otherwise been accessible. that being said, i want to offer some encouragement to the hundreds of thousands of federal employees that are being furloughed right now by paraphrasing the current speaker of the house. the worsturing recovery in the history of this country, when hundreds of millions of private citizens were laid off. and she, to paraphrase, said to

use the time to use the opportunity to pursue other hobbies. i would like to offer those words now, to encourage those employees being laid now to ence employees who are being laid off at this time. have a good day. host: thanks for calling. final thought on the condition of the national parks and what you are looking toward. guest: i think the parks are emblematic as to why it is so important for congress to pass a funding bill that moves forward the interior appropriations bill that is signed into law to get our parks back up and running. the resource damage that is happening right now is just tragic. when you to make sure parks are protected, and the only way to do that is to get the parks back up and running. this is just unsustainable right now, and the half measures put in place by the interior

department is not enough. host: kristen brengel, vice president of the national parks conservation association, thank you. guest: thank you. host: we have another hour of the "washington journal." when we come back, hugo gurdon of the "washington examiner" will join us for our spotlight on magazine segment. and we will take more of your calls. we will be right back. ♪ >> i remember as a little kid, you knew when they flag went by you that you were to stand and put your hand on your heart. stand andou were to sing the national anthem, and we were to recite the pledge of allegiance. america,"on "reel

interviews with president ronald reagan during his final days in office. reagan: what i have to say is this is countering the total media distortion of the process that was underway, and i cannot understand it because i, as you know, the day after that leak revealed the covert operations, and toldfore the press him exactly what the operation was. we were not doing business with the ayatollah. we were not trading arms for hostages. of ad received word i way third country, israel, that a delegation of people at a time when everyone was saying that the ayatollah was not going to live out the week, and the factions were rising up as to who were going to be them. this group was, as i say, a third country, as a response to

the citizens who wanted to make a meeting somehow with representatives of the united states as to how there could be a better relationship between a government of iran and the united states. america" this weekend on american history tv on c-span3. >> "washington journal" continues. host: in our spotlight on magazine segment, today we feature hugo gurdon, editorial director for the "washington examiner." here is a look at the first national issue of the "washington examiner" magazine. "who is right? what it means to be a conservative in the age of trump." mr. gurdon, good morning. : good morning.: host why this, why now?

we have discussed this for four or five times, and it has, over the course, and it has been a successful magazine, whether or not we should take it national come up until the first of january, the magazine has been distributed inside washington, primarily through policy and political and professionals, so we have had quite a few people outside washington who would like to see it. we decided that now is the right time. we have tripled our readership online in the course of the last four years, so there are a lot of people who see the "washington examiner" as a reliable window on washington, and we decided now is the time to go national and to expand the range. host: for those unfamiliar, what can they expect to be reading in the months ahead? guest: right in the middle of the magazine, we have something called the washington briefing, which is th essentially , issues one had

capitol hill, but we added a live in arts section. we write about the culture, entertainment and high culture, and we have a section called "your land," which is sort of a national issue, the social culture of the country, things that are going on with her not, strictly speaking, political, but things that educated readers would be interested in. host: phone numbers for the bottom of our screen for our guest. we will get to your calls in just a couple of minutes. our guests previously was editor-in-chief at "the hill," editor and reporter at "the daily telegraph" of london. how has being a conservative republican changed in this trump era? as far assome ways, we are concerned, it has stated precisely the same, and that is

stick to the values that you have. one of the things that has happened, not only to conservative journalists but also to opposition journalists is they become reflectively either for or against this president. he is obviously an enormously polarizing figure, and he has a lot of characteristics which a lot of people dislike. what we have decided to do, and i think this is one of the reasons why "washington examiner " has become increasingly influential, is to not be deflected by some aspect of personal statements, stick to the conservative values we have always had. beple do not know if we will critical or praise president trump on any given issue. obviously, the people know what you're going to say, then they don't want to listen. if they don't know what you are going to say, they will want to find out. host: talk about conservatism. guest: conservatism, as far as

we're concerned, is about values of freedom -- free enterprise, freedom of conscious, freedom of ssed byn, all buttre american global leadership, and i think that is what it has always been. the reason we have the symposium is that a lot of people disagree. we had people who might be described as coming from the who say thatamp, being a conservative these days is to feel somewhat without a group, without a tribe, to feel lost and in because of the president. there are those conservatives who wrote to the publication who conservative right now feels very much to what president trump is trying to do. one of the writers in the symposium noted that back in one of the debates during the presidential election, president trump, and all of the others in the primary, were asked what

conservatism was, and he said "conservatism is about conserving america," in other words making america great again. and what larry was saying in his piece is president trump was and that america itself was in danger, so the principal motive of conservatives should be about saving the country. withs something several people in the symposium disagreed with. host: what do conservatives think about the shutdown? i don't think, as as were a matter of thinking, stsservatism or conservati think any differently than anyone else about the shutdown. it is regrettable. it is not a good way of governing to have the government shutdown, and as your previous guest has pointed out, there are things that do not get done with

really need to be done, and i do not think anyone wishes the government be closed. it has all sorts of essential functions. at the same time, there is an impact over policies, and we have had shutdowns many times before. i do not think, however, that conservatism itself has any specific points about the shutout. host: you wrote a letter from the editor, january 1, this year, to readers and potential readers. what else did you say in that letter? guest:, well i pointed out what was in the magazine. i mean, the specifics of the there are think that a lot of people who are engaged in politics -- they are not necessarily following the day-to-day twists and turns of political debate, but they are interested and concerned about what is going on in the country, and that means about the way the social mores of the country are changing, who is pushing for

them, who is resisting them, the damage that those people think are being done to the country by those people. we wanted to touch more on conservative journalism, especially the "weekly standard" story in the last couple of weeks. here is the headline in case people do not remember, the "weekly standard" has criticized trump and the shutdown. what is your take on thhis? guest: i was not involved in the "weekly standard," even though it had the same owner as the "washington examiner." i do know that it was strictly a business decision. there has been actually rather a lot of nonsense suggesting that its closure had something to do with the criticism of trump. i do not think that that had anything to do with it. talk less directly about the "weekly standard," i think,

that the reason that the owners i think decided to invest in the "washington examiner" was because we had tripled our readership in the course of three years. i know the "weekly standard" had been losing subscribers at a faster and faster rate over the course of several years. it is not unusual for a business to make business decisions about investing and success. conservative media to heart on the president, too soft on the president? what is your take? guest: look, there are things said about the president which is extremely tough, which i agree. i think there are some people opponent,e reflexive whether they are on the right or the left. i think some credits are unfair. that he is doubt crude and bracelets and sometimes rather brutal and his demeanor, and his rhetoric, and there is absolutely no reason why people should not object to those things, because they would

with anybody else. host: let's go to john from hot springs, arkansas on the democrat line for hugo gordon. go ahead, john. theer: yes, mr. gurdon, budget deficit under a real conservative president is $1 trillion. how much do you reckon would be under a liberal administration? guest: [laughs] well, i am afraid i am no budgeter. obviously, the deficit has increased substantially during this presidency. it was, i think a trillion dollars earlier in the obama presidency, and it gradually reached below half $1 trillion, so it fluctuates. the deficit is an enormously serious problem, because the country cannot sustain this kind of a deficit indefinitely.

haveugh interest rates risen somewhat recently, they are still historically rather low. money is borrowed at this rate indefinitely, interest rates rise. if it becomes more expensive to borrow, the exact size of a deficit under a liberal president, i could not tell you. host: do you have faith that president trump if you serve two or maybe six more years in congress can do anything about this debt? guest: no, i don't. i don't think either of president or congress in general will do anything about it. this is why it is regarded as a really serious problem. it has been a very long time. i was a financial reporter in the late 1980's and 1990's, and we were writing about the federal deficit then, and speaker ryan, who has just left congress, has been talking about this train wreck, and one of the most predicted and predictable train wrecks that there has ever

been. so it is a very serious problem. host: let's go to seaside, oregon now, jason is on the line for hugo gordon. good morning. caller: good morning. how are you? guest: i am doing well, thank you. caller: i have a question concerning the national debt. i am a volunteer for the volunteers of america, and some of my colleagues work for local newspapers throughout portland, oregon, and we are wondering why mr. trump is spending so much money towards the wall and trying to get the congress to settle on his side when he is actually stonewalling all of the rest of the departments and the interior. guest: when you say "spending so much on the wall," i think that is what you said, if i heard you correctly, i would certainly dispute that. he has asked for $5.6 billion

currently, which is, sadly, sad to say come almost just a rounding error. as one of the previous callers a $1 trillion deficit each year, so 5.6 ilion dollars is a tiny amount, at least marginally speaking. so i would not say he is spending a great deal on the wall. that there is a low maintenance that needs to be done on the wall. he is also perfectly clear that or serious barriers have been installed, such as in san diego, there has been a reduction by 90% or more in the number of illegal aliens crossing the border. it is his belief and the belief of a lot of republicans, i imagine of a lot of democrats, too, that a strong idea., barrier is a good of course the reason that the government is shutdown is that a lot of people disagree with

that, too. of thehat do you make potentially strong executive action by the president to declare a national emergency? guest: we feel at the "washington examiner" that governing by emergency is a very bad deal. might the reasons why it be possible for the president to declare an emergency and to do this without congressional authorization is that congress a lot of its authority over the course of the decade to the executive. that is partly because congress, members of congress do not like to make difficult decisions, because they want to get reelected. so they have allowed more and more congressional authority to leak a way to the other branches of government. so it is not a good way of governing. i believe that there is something like 13 national federal emergencies in operation, and i believe 18 of them have lasted since the

clinton presidency. so emergencies are not andicularly unusuall, we have seen far too many of. host: sunday, we will have a program what national emergencies are. there are a few dozen active national emergencies out there. we will learn more about them on tomorrow's program. herald is calling from new jersey. good morning, harold. caller: [laughs] i am a 95-year-old veteran, world war ii. at the end of that, we did not have fake news. that is our big problem. we do not have the hate. probably the opposite. we need people to support the constitution. we need the supreme court to andge from making laws to forcing -- essentially the supreme court has not done it

sincelong, long time, franklin roosevelt wanted to put 15 people on the supreme court. he was not successful with that. the supreme court has got to -- i don't know, we cannot force them to do anything except take their money away. we should take their money away until they begin to support the constitution. host: mr. gurdon. guest: well, i don't agree with that prescription. i would not take the money away from the supreme court, but i would agree with you that the supreme court has, on many occasions, as many conservatives believe, invented the law, written the law, acted as a kind legislature and not simply representatives of the constitution. one of the classic cases is roe v. wade, which has divided the country for more than 40 years now. what we are now is a president

who, in the case tha of the two nominees that he has put forth, neil gorsuch and brett kavanaugh, has put forth what are sometimes referred to as originalists, but more appropriately textual ists, and they don't believe, as i believe a lot of others on the other side of the spectrum believe, that the meaning of a law changes over the course of time. my own view of textualists is that there is one thing you have to say about law, it means the same thing to everybody over the course of time, meaning it does not change and according to your when. -- whim. host: on the screen, they are asking -- who is a true conservative right now? guest: i am! host: [laughs] guest: there are a lot of true there areves, and

scores of millions of true conservatives across the country. are as big a number as the true liberals across the country. of truee plenty conservatives in both chambers of congress, and plenty of true conservatives in the media and amongst the punditry. [inaudible] is president trump a conservative? guest: certainly in some ways but not in other ways. he is not a conservative when it comes to government spending. he promised medicare, social security would not be touched. i think those two are really important contributors, really dangerous and important contributors to the increasing spiral of federal debt, and yet they need reform, but he of thed, and this is one reasons, presumably, while he

was elected, he promised not to touch them and that they would be safe, so to that extent, he is not a conservative. he is certainly conservative in the appointment of justices to the supreme court. i think the target originally set when he came into the white house was that for every new regulation that was put in place, two would be eliminated. i believe over the course of 20, i do not know if it continued in 2018, the federal government was eliminating something like 20 regulations for everyone. i think that is a very strongly conservative part. i think the production, the cuts in taxes was conservative. it has, of course, increase the president that, but i think the debt is primarily about spending, not from the government taking too little from people. i think, especially the reduction and business taxes, to make american businesses no longer the most highly taxed

businesses in the developed world, is enormously important. i think that is one of the reasons why the economic growth rate now is approximately double what it was under president obama. host: don is on the line for hugo gurdon. good morning, don. caller: good morning. thank you for taking my call. in reference to the boost in the economy, that really began with the obama administration. everything trump is doing is really anti-conservatism, and actually he is doing his job in reference to the fact that he is doing exactly what putin instructed him to do, even to the statement of justifying why russia invaded afghanistan. this guy hashings done is just a fiasco of administration, with all of the people under arrest, the investigations, it is unbelievable. i am a 73 euro veteran.

if you remember with nixon, there was a senator, david denison or whatever it was, he gets saying "there is no evidence, there is no evidence, and till they came out with the they voted ton and peach him. so stick around. there is more to be revealed. this person is a con man, and a person would have to be really stupid or, i don't know, blinded by ignorance i don't understand. guest: i wonder if the caller things that president putin ordered the president and therefore the entire united states to destroy entire military unit in syri. i disagree with the caller. obviously the investigation of alleged or perhaps assumed collusion between president trump's team in the 2016 is beingand russia

investigated. it will continue. there will be findings, there will be a report from robert mueller, the special counsel are. there may be something there that will shock everybody and condemn the president. on, withoutt goes the evidence to support collusion, the more once us to one suspects there won't be. host: how would you describe the "examiner's" relationship with the white house? good: we have a relationship with the white house. we know that they read us. we have been able to meet with the president to meet with the president two or three times, three or four times since he entered the presidential race, and i think two or three times since he has been president. our relationship is strong. it is the kind of relationship that you would want as a

journalist, which is to say you want the access, which we have. one of the things i am really pleased about is when we have wen critical, for example, were once critical of some policies that were put in place by mick mulvaney when he was omb as soon as it came out, mick mulvaney called us, his people called us and wanted to set up an interview. they mind what we say, they read what we say, because they know we are an important voice, and they want to sway us. host: we touched on "the weekly standard." from twitter, and once you know if you will be the replacement for the "weekly standard." are not a we replacement for the "weekly standard," and we existed when the "weekly standard" was around. we know a lot of people have enjoyed "weekly standard" and will enjoy the "washington

examiner." ourill certainly send magazine to those subscribers, but it is a very different magazine, very different in its content. i would say that we are -- we are not just a magazine. we are primarily a magazine of political news and ideas. i think they were more just a magazine of conservative ideas. there is a very substantial straight news section in the middle of our magazine. host: here is another tweet -- "i enjoy good conservative voices. i like to keep them sharp. it is unfortunate that those voices have been muffled by the supremacist agenda." guest: i am not really sure what she is referring to when she mentions "supremacist agendas." i do not think any voices are being muffled, frankly. anything, aif

vulnerable and free market of ideas. obviously the internet has made it very easy for people to express their views. i think it is an audit phenomenon under this president that people talk about the silencing of views. i do not think anybody has been silence or even threatened with silence. host: james in baltimore on the democratic line. hi, james. caller: thank you for taking my call. in 2013 when so-called republicans and conservatives isl in, ba a conservative ideals, then real americans, everybody who says he is a liberal, he is a democrat, they should be stoned to death.

making $14 million a year, but the reason they are suffering, all the white folks in the south, you know, do some research. they sent them a. =-- they set them up. is this about tax code and no abortion? because to me, they got their just waiting are to sign some legislation, you know. host: all right, james, i think we get the point. guest: the caller had a lot in there, a lot of points he was making, some of which i disagree, but one point he was making is a very important one, and that is the idea -- he said

something about liberals, you know, the idea that some people think liberals are evil or conservatives are evil and people should be stoned, and all of this sort of thing. whichlive in environment i think it's troubling when it comes to political disagreement. accelerated,much turbocharged by social media, twitter, etc. that is the idea that you either have to be a complete full or to disagree with me or you or whomever. it is perfectly possible for highly intelligent, well-informed people of goodwill to disagree with each other. they simply disagree. that is something that really is being lost in the political environment in which we now operate. it is just thought that somehow or other you are morally failing or intellectually failing simply if you do not agree with the views that are being expressed. host: two what point might be media have driven the? that?ped drive

certainly they have. they are considered, thoughtful, temperate views, very unlikely, but journalists, as much or else isan anybody up on twitter, engaged in the battle. it is one of the things that we at the "washington examiner" have tried very hard to do, and i'm sure that others have as well, and that is to say to journalists, do not just get down in the mud pit and fight each other. you are ambassadors of your publication, and the value of the publication is that it is awful, and it is knowledgeable, and it wants to present itself as an expert on any given e are, and it wants to present itself as a temperate voice. journalists -- it is

more about stirring up passions. that is about the economics of tv. host: time for a couple of more calls with our guest. judy from ohio, republican. hey, judy. caller: i want to thank your guest today for his honesty and his forthright, that he is trying to tell the truth of what is going on. journalists anymore perverted the truth, and this gentleman is very nice and very thoughtful, he is trying to be honest on both sides, and i appreciate that. host: any question for him? pardon?beg host: any questions for our guests? caller: well, i don't have a question, i want to thank him.

he is one of the true members of the media. the media anymore perverts the truth, and that way we do not get the other side. host: ok. guest: i would obviously thank the caller very much for kind words, but she points to something which is very unfortunate, something i say to my editors and reporters a lot, that is if we are in any news, we are in the truth news. if we are not telling the truth, we are not doing our job. and frankly, what is the point? at theto work in london foreign desk of the "financial times," and people used to say "our readers have to much invested in lies." the truth is that everybody used to hear the truth. we are in the truth business. if we are not, we are just letting people down.

host: in illinois, good morning. caller: good morning. i am basically a libertarian, that my question is this. during the campaign, the "weekly standard" came across with a op-edondemning be piece against mr. trump, claiming basically that he was a new york liberal. the other thing, mitt romney, is always touts that he conservative, well, an op-ed in the "washington post," basically undercutting the president. people who claim conservatives, they came up with a part d medicare. they have never seen a war they don't like, and now we have the president, who has basically try to do what he said he was going

to do. and many people, "conservatives," have not been in full support of this president, and it is very disturbing -- but not surprising to me. many people who say they are conservative are basically, you know the old thing about remocrats and depublicans, there is not much difference between them, and those differences need to be sharpened. those comments, i want to hear what mr. gurdon says about that idea. host: thank you. guest: what i would say if there is such a wide range of political and immunological positions in this country, and

whether you divide those people up into democrats and republicans or into liberals and conservatives, you are creating tents.ery big there is legitimate disagreement within those two camps. there are those who, in the conservative camp, thought the iraq war was a very bad thing, and there were others that thought it was necessary. there are people in the i amratic party who -- sure there are a lot of people in the democratic party who do taxagree that the marginal rates for high incomes should be 70%, which is what is being pushed now by socialists within the party. there are a lot of people that disagree with that. i do not think that one should refer to so-called conservatives or so-called liberals. the truth is, those are big

tents, and the job of politicians is to try to unite people, a sufficient number of people, whether they are conservative or liberal, that they are elected, and then they lead and govern. host: one last call from rock with park, new york, nigel. good morning. caller: good morning. c-span, fro for taking my call. i know you call yourself a conservative. do not call myself -- politics divides us, when we put labels on ourselves, like some fox -- they are democratic, they call each other names, they are just people who get into their boxes, and they refused to come out. so that is the first thing. i would like to know how conservatives feel, how do you

feel about the supreme court decision in 2010 that said that versus theited, federal elections commission, said that private corporations, soulless entities, entities who cannot have children, who cannot have every day woes, have the right to donate unlimited amounts of money to political, believe, who want the influence of government. this was never in the constitution. they never warsaw -- our foresaw, thisver sa day and age, i believe as long as money is belonged in lobbyists?- how many hundreds of thousands of lobbyists in washington, and as

long as there is an outdated and obsolete electoral college, we will never have another free election. host: thanks for calling. we do have to move on. final thoughts from our guest, mr. gurdon. guest: i will respond to that. i think citizens united was a decision taken in line with the constitution. it had been what the supreme court said, and i think rightly, where on constitutional limits money was in which spent, prior to an election, the way in which people see is through tv, through other media. to do that, and limiting the amount of money is the way to limiting speech, which the first amendment protects. " now "washington examiner national. guest: national. host: how can they read this? guest: go to the "washington examiner website, and click on the first page". host: we have been showing the

first edition, but the second edition is out. guest: the second edition is out, and the third edition will go to the print on tuesday. we are looking at the left-wing mob and its godfather in the next edition. will focus onon problems with president trump and foreign policy, particularly with saudi arabia. host: hugo gurdon with "washington examiner," thank you for being here. guest: great to be here. host: we will have another segment on "washington journal" for open phones. anything you have heard or would like to discuss, democrats, 202-748-8000. republicans, 202-748-8001. independents, 202-748-8002. wj is our twitter handle. on can post comments facebook.com/cspan, and we will be right back. author andn "q&a,"

columnist james grant. write a column which is much too expensive for some of the people out there. whether you have a name, either, wall street is an epithet in most of american history, right? but i think what we ought to be more on our guard about are the institutions in our federal government that may be benign in their intentions, the treasury department, the treasury, these are institutions set up as benefactors for the public, and increasingly, they are not so. >> author and columnist james grant sunday night at 8:00 eastern on c-span's "q&a."

the senate confirmation hearings for william barton to become the next attorney general of the united states begin on tuesday at 9:30 a.m. eastern. in december, president trump to replacer. barr jeff sessions. william barr is now a of counsel at the law firm of kirkland and ellis and served as u.s. attorney general for president george h.w. bush. watch the confirmation process for attorney general william barr live tuesday at 9:30 a.m. eastern on c-span3. >> "washington journal" continues. host: we will do some open phones now for the next 20 minutes, before the top of the hour. tony is on the line from joplin, maryland. hello, tony. caller: good morning. thank you for taking my call. i would like to address a couple

of comments in regard to the shutdown. host: sure. caller: in my opinion, i think we need a total, 100% recall of washington.ck in they are acting like the lawless lawmakers. open the government up to federal employees, give them back pay. and congress needs to get no pay until negotiations are completed. up with a comprehensive plan and implement that policy and secure the country that is all i have got to say. host: thank you for the call, tony. break recordngress for longest government shutdown," this is from "the hill" today, 22 days. a lot of people say there is no end in sight. of 21, whichrecord was set in 1995 and early 1996 during the clinton

administration. other shutdowns, during the jimmy carter administration, 17 days. president obama, 16 days. president carter again, 12 days from the congressional search service. let's get a call from lewis in florence, alabama. good morning, lewis. caller: good morning. people talk about democrats shut the government down. republicans had two years to get this done, and they did not do it. democrats have only been in for eight days, and the government is down 22 days, so the republicans are the ones who shut the government down, not the democrats. host: ok, thank you for calling. harold is in georgia. harold, what would you like to say today? caller: my name is harold. anyway, the whole situation boils down to read. the agreed of one party or another.

as citizens, we have got to eliminate this greed factor that just runs our government. one party headers to the poor, one party panders to the rich. it is all people against people in this country. the domestic citizen is just getting the royal shaft over this. host: how is this going to end, then, harold? what is it going to take? caller: what is it going to take? to reelect people who are statesmen instead of politicians for their agenda that is a off by the -- paid off by the almighty dollar. host: thank you, harold. we want to let you know about a live event later on on c-span, part of our road to the white house 2020 coverage, julian castro, from a mayor of san

antonio, texas, he is going to make his presidential announcement later on today. you can watch it live here on c-span. correspondentth a from the "san antonio express hearst.d bill, as we get started, remind is, hisulian castro career, and what he will bring to the presidential field. guest: good morning. good to be with you. julian castro was a mayor of san from 2009 to 2014 when he was chosen by the obama administration to take over housing and urban development, 85,000 employees, a $40 billion budget. he was elected city council.

decried san antonio. joaquinis twin brother, , were educated at stanford and harvard law school and came back to their hometowns to make a now he hopes to be in the clinton administration. that did not work out for him. now today he is embarking on this country, seeking the democratic nomination. make thehe will announcement in texas today. one of the stories in your paper, with your byline, "how julian castro prepared to announce his presidential run." what are you writing here? guest: yes, i have traveled with him over the months from new hampshire to iowa a couple of times.

just this week, he was in iowa. he has been laying the groundwork. he has been rather coy about his plans, as are a lot of the democrats in this huge field that is just now taking shape. today, i am down here, just writing his announcement. we will see what he has to say. i think the people watching c-span can see him live. out on thewill be stage at 11:15 a.m. or 11:30. we will all see what he has to say. host: tell us more about what he has to say in a general sense. what was the message of julian castro be to the country, to democratic voters? he wants to be president. why is that? guest: i think he will use the word "opportunity" a good deal. life,l talk about his own

growing up mostly with the household with a single mother, his immigrant grandmother, who was an orphan at age seven in the 1920's, and how he and his extremelyho works sharp students, graduated from high school in three years. they went toned, stanford, did extremely well, and i think he will be talking about the need to provide opportunities for a lot of people. immigration will certainly be an important issue. he told me yesterday he wanted to talk a lot about housing in his campaign, given his sense that a lot of people are

struggling with rent. affordable housing is an important issue that he sees being neglected over the years. i remember him telling me that you could probably go to the presidential debate transcripts over the last three decades and perhaps not find a question or an answer about the critical issue of housing. forward, theing message that there will also be factors of money and organization. how do you expect julian castro to do in those two areas? guest: i have asked him about that. he is not going to take p.a.c. which is, as we saw from another texan, beto o'rourke, who may announce himself one of these days, you can survive without p.a.c. money, which

seems to be a trend now, particularly among progressive-oriented candidates. as just before he announced, i mentioned in that piece today that you alluded to, he convened about 20 potential funders in san antonio, and he came away thinking that he will have plenty of money from those types of campaign bundlers, also with he can raise on facebook. certainly the new and preferred method of raising money, at least, as we saw with beto o'rourke and we saw with president trump. seemingly change the rules of campaigning for president. mbrecht is aa correspondent for the "san antonio express-news" and he arst.

thank you. guest: my pleasure. host: again, the event will be 11:00 eastern time, and we will have it here on c-span. julian castro, a democrat, is expected to announce that he is running for president of the united states, 11:00 live. we have about nine minutes left. we have david from alabama. what is the name of your town, david? go ahead, sir. caller: well, i am a retired veteran, disabled, and i have been navigating the political scene for many years as a volunteer. i think what they need to do is they need to go back to square one and start over again, because we have allowed congress and the senate and the government itself to control the people instead of the people controlling them, and the money $1going out so fast, and

trillion -- it is not $1 trillion. it is $24 trillion. it is ridiculous when our children are rated 58 on the education scale, and we are the greatest nation on this earth, forwe spend more money other countries than we do our own children to go to school. our colleges have turned into a moneymaking instead of a money producing program, and that is shouldous, because kids not have to spend $300,000, $400,000, or more to get an education. we have no doctors, we have no nurses, we have no -- we don't have anything, what we are supposed to have, if we did what we were supposed to do. and that is monitor, maintain a tight rein on our lobbyist groups, and say ok, if you want

to be here and you want to represent me, then you need to represent me. host: thanks for calling, david. we get the point. it is a 22, as we mentioned, of the federal government shutdown. thousands of federal employees, this is the first day cycle where they are not being paid. we know of no significant talks that are happening this weekend. congress has gone home for the weekend. they will be back in session on monday. there is no bill to open the government that they will be debating. separate passed four bills the latter part of this week to try to do something. the senate back in as well on monday. so we will at least see speeches on the floor of each body, if and when a bill comes up. roy is on the line from woodstock, georgia now. good morning, roy. by the we can start

media being honest with the american people. when you think about it, all the presidents -- president obama, president clinton -- wanted to do something about illegal immigration. the difference between them and president trump is that trump likes to get things done. he keeps his word. he said he wants to do something about border security, and they don't want to. president obama, schumer, and clinton saying the same thing about illegal immigration, but they are part of the resistance. they want to resist everything that he has said, everything he wants to do. host: thanks for calling. let's go to mark in medford, oregon. s, i was listening to what the other guy was just saying, at least trump is trying to do something, trying to put up the wall and all this.

i normally do not watch the news. i did not really take the time. how much money and how many he have paychecks does to take a way to get his way before it is going to end? host: thank you, mark. president trump has been tweeting about this story this morning, the lead story in the "new york times," the headline "the fbi investigated whether trump worked for the russians." so enforcement became concerned by the president's behavior that they began behaviorting .

up thee can bring president's first week of the day if we can hear, but you can read more of this piece at the new york times. the headline says "fbi investigated if trump word for the russians." let's hear from jim in omaha, illinois. good morning. caller: good morning. i want to know why mitch mcconnell will not let the senate vote, so everyone could go on record, you know, to the way he voted and really represented people. host: what is your estimation? from what i have been reading, mitch thinks that they are not going to pass it, so

what i say is let them go through, and let the members vote on it, and let government function. i cannot see why one person upld hold the whole senate because of his ideas, him thinking it will not pass. host: do you see this ending soon, jim, or do you think it will take much longer? caller: i think if mitch mcconnell would let the government vote on it, then government could vote. people will talk amongst themselves and vote their conscience on what the people, representatives, feel. host: ok, jim. the senate is back in session at 3:00 on monday. they have a series of policy bills that they have been working on. they have been trying to vote to actually receive the bill. democrats, the vast majority are voting no on pretty much anything unless it is a bill to reopen the government, or in the case of promising backpay to

federal workers. they didn't vote on that. you can watch the senate on c-span2. president's first tweet of the morning, following up on the "new york times" story. he wrote "wow. just learned in the failing "new " that the corrupt former leaders of the fbi, almost all fired or forced to leave the agency for some very good reasons, opened up an investigation on me, for no reason and with no proof." he has released a few other tweaks. let's go to janet. caller: good morning. i agree with the previous person , when he set about mitch mcconnell, and a few before, that the gentleman was mentioning our education. they all make very good points,

but i am also wondering, reading about how the president went to see aboutorder, this crisis, and he met with all of the mayors of the towns that surround the borders, that are on the border, and they were all stating they do not want a wall, and that there was no prices there. i want to know why they are not covering that, in people are not recognizing that the actual people that live there and they would be the most impacted, it would impact their economy, their lives, their environment. and the president came back saying that it is a big crisis, denied -- andely people denied exactly what he is saying. and also why mitch mcconnell will not let people take a vote

on this, so we can hear the midnnds of all of our representatives and what is actually happening. host: ok, janet, janet representing the president's trip to the border. we showed the meeting with the border. there if you want to watch the roundtable meeting. that is it for this saturday edition of "the washington journal." at 7:00be back tomorrow eastern, as we are every day. in an hour we will hear from cooley and castro -- julian castro, who is widely expected to announce that he is running for president of the united states. see you tomorrow. ♪