ashink they are thriving businesses, as consumer delivery systems. they recently announced a really bold initiative in which they've attempted to dramatically increase broadband speeds to the american home over the next several years. announcer: watch "the communicators" tonight at 8:00 eastern on c-span2. ♪ brian: joan buskupic, author of ."he chief chief justice john roberts. you spent 20 hours with chief

john roberts. seven different times and interviews, but off the record? joan: he let me put some things on the record to use in the book. most of it he kept off the record. it was instructive, brian, to sit facing him as we are facing each other, over a long period of time. brian: what would you say would be the first thing you learned sitting across from him? joan: it reinforced the control i could feel. we both had things we wanted to know from each other. i was aware how much he was treating this process as, you know, lawyers refer to it as the discovery process. he wanted to know where i was: with this -- where i was going wanted to let i who i would talk to and where i was going with this. i wanted to run everything by him. i wanted to let him know the topics i was taking on. i did not want to let him know exactly who i had spoken to. especially if those people were

on background. i would write a note to myself at the top of my notebook that said, "remember, you want information from him. you don't want to give him information." i was also aware, brian, since you read my earlier bios, especially on justice antonin scalia, who had given me 12 on the record interviews. i used to think that if i sat across from the chief, if we had thought doubles over our head, he would say, i wish she would stop asking me these questions, and mine would say, i wish he was justice scalia. justice scalia saw me for 12 on the record interviews. with the chief justice there was a negotiation over what i could

and could not use. brian: what did you take away from your biography, your autobiography of sandra day o'connor? joan: she was fascinating. you are -- you might remember that the link came out in 2005 cast her not so much as the first woman on the supreme court, but as a politician on the supreme court. during her tenure she was the only one elected as a legislator before she came to the bench. i felt like she learned to maneuver among the justices to coordinate to get those critical five votes. that is how i saw her. that was how i viewed sandra day o'connor. brian: we have read that she is not well? joan: right, she is not. brian: do you know anything new about her situation? joan: no. the family put out a letter in 2018 where she was acknowledging alzheimer's. that was going on for a while, unfortunately. brian: you did a book on antonin scalia. what was your number one take away from being around him? joan: he completely owned who he was. he was proud of some of his outrageous statements. he felt that he was always right, never in doubt, as they say. i would sit with him for two to

three hours as i did with the chief, and i would be exhausted. i would usually be the one who said, we are done. he was so interactive. he loved talking about his childhood. that was a real contrast. antonin scalia a loved talking -- antonin scalia loved talking about where he came from, his people. the current chief justice was much more reluctant. brian: what did you take away from your sotomayor biography? joan: that was more of a political history of how she got there. it was a tale of how someone who came from the bronx, the projects, makes it onto the short list for a supreme court position and beats out the others. it was more, how do you go from point a to point b and all the things that could interfere along the way? in her case, it didn't. she was enhanced as she went along. brian: i want to show you videotape of chief justice roberts at cardigan mountain

school on june 6, 2017 and get your reaction. joan: sure. [video clip] >> from time to time, in the years to come, i hope you will be treated unfairly so that you come to know the value of will -- so that you will come to know the value of justice. i hope that you would suffer the trail, so that will teach you the importance of loyalty. sorry to say, but i hope that you will be lonely from time to time so that you do not take friends for granted. i wish you bad luck, again from time to time, so you would be conscious of the role of chance in life, and understand that your success is not completely deserved, and that the failure of others is not completely deserved either. school?is son's joan: yes, when his son was graduating from ninth grade. that was a very moving speech by the chief, and it went viral. he worked on it with his wife.

it struck a lot of things that i think -- themes that i think resonate with parents and viewers. people were really impressed by it. brian: how often did you interview jane? joan: jane spoke on the record. in fact, for all of those who spoke on the record, i tended to bring two tape recorders. for jane i definitely brought two. she was very valuable to me twice. twice, extensive interviews and washington, d.c. brian: what did you learn from her that you did not learn from him? joan: a lot more. she is the opposite in terms of personality. she has got a very out there sense of herself. she litters her conversation with things like, that is who i am, that is who we are. justice john roberts does not really want to tell you who he is. i have learned a lot about what she thought had gone on in his family when he was young. i would talk to cousins to try to verify things. she told me something really interesting about his time at

harvard undergrad. he went to harvard undergrad and law school. he was very insular in his life. i had known that from talking to people who had gone to school with him. i had known that he stuck to his studies and did not do many extracurricular things. but jane said the whole time he was in cambridge, maybe only once or twice he went to boston. i thought that was revealing of his liking of small worlds. as you probably noticed, the indiana native that you are, he had gone to a boarding school in northern indiana that was quite prestigious. it was a tightknit community. i felt like he continued to re-create the tightknit, loyal was not unlike the school that he is speaking at for his son in the clip you just showed. brian: page 23 got my attention. i want to read it to you and get your reaction.

"an early promotional brochure described long beach, indiana as america's finest country and home community and playground. offering 20 reasons why better referred to the glistening blue waters. the safe sandy beaches and a fashionable golf course. it touted that good moral character to have residentses noting that "long beach is a highly restricted home community. all residents are caucasian gentiles". why is that in your book? >> to give the history of the place he was from and that goes on to say even under modern census records it is still basically an overwhelmingly white area. i wanted to describe the beauty of this place. it was a vacation area.

in fact, to play on your own knowledge of northern indiana, i remember the first time i went out to see his home, i flew into midway, which is you know, in chicago, but the southernmost airport and i started driving toward his home. i was going through gary, indiana. i was going there all the steel mill areas. i thought wow, this is the first time i felt a little bit for john roberts. this is a tough area to grow up in with all the smells and the ndustrial sense. when you get to long beach it is like an oasis. you want to pull out a picnic. in terms of the visual description from the passage you just read, it is lovely. the brochure that explains long beach to visitors, it talks about the restrictions. by the time the roberts moved into that area, the supreme

court already said that you cannot even enforce any restrictions. that was created as a special place. not just for communities, but for a certain kind of person. brian: how wealthy were his parents? joan: his father was an executive in the steel industry. they were well off enough to send him to a nice private school. to do well by the children, they were not millionaires of their era, like we have billionaires of our era, but they were comfortable. you know. he did not want. they lived on the water. their house was back a little bit from the water, but they had a boat and they could vacation nicely. it is not like they traveled to europe, the things you see children doing today in more comfortable lifestyles. brian: one word i saw several times in your book was anger. are we not seeing the anger that has existed behind-the-scenes of the court? is that what you brought out in this book? joan: anger and distrust among the justices. it is a subtle theme.

some people picked up on it, some have not. i had to figure out how much i wanted to stress that. they want to put on a very collegial front. i understand that. there is a lot of tension there, not only between the right and the left, but within the right where john roberts is. as you know, there is a whole chapter on his flipped vote in the affordable care act case of 2012. that left a lot of distrust. through the years, there have been other incidents. i think the chief wants to present a certain image. that is what made him reluctant to be a subject to this ook. the image he is part of who he is.

there are other parts and it is layered. there is anger behind-the-scenes in certain cases. not all the time. there are tensions. i believe that watching the court today that those continue. brian: he worked as a clerk for chief justice rehnquist. joan: william rehnquist was an associate justice. he wasn't yet chief. brian: i wanted to read, roberts said that clerks gave rehnquist a lone ranger doll because he staked out so many conservative positions by himself. what impact did working for rehnquist have on chief justice roberts? joan: i think he learned from the soon-to-be chief, william rehnquist became chief in 1986 and john roberts left his office in 1981 when he worked for ronald reagan. he worked with a smart man. william rehnquist was highly intelligent. he also knew how to plant the seeds for future rulings.

and john roberts is constantly looking at how one ruling can lead to another, can lead to another, can lead to another. william rehnquist was excellent in putting in legal theories that he could pick up on later, or maybe would entice a different court as a got more conservative. which it indeed did. when john roberts took over the helm of the supreme court he had a five-justice majority. we know that five justice majority has been further cemented on the right wing. brian: when was the last time a democrat was chief justice of the supreme court? joan: gosh, we would have to go back pretty far. as a liberal we would think of earl warren. he was appointed by president eisenhower who was a republican. brian: and earl warren was a republican in california. joan: yes, testifies a governor,

and he became so effective as a liberal icon. in that era, in that era, you could say there are no eisenhower judges. there are no truman judges. there are no roosevelt judges. you could say that in terms of trying to deny the politics. i don't think you could say that today. now a president basically knows what he is getting. president eisenhower appointed william brennan who was also a liberal. chief justice earl warren and those two defied the politics of the president who appointed them. just as justice john paul stevens did for president gerald ord who appointed him. david souter, y, who george h.w. bush put on. that was the way. a president of one party could end up with an appointee who did not adopt all his ideology or

policies. now, you really don't have hat. brian: these are the ages of all the justices. there are nine of them. justice ginsburg, 86. justice brier, 80. justice roberts, 64. justice sotomayor, 64. clarence thomas, 70. elena kagan 58. mr. gorsuch its 51. brett kavanaugh is 54. joan: you got them exactly right. brian: what does that say? joan:it says the younger ones are the conservatives the two in their 80's are the liberals. depending on what happens to any of these 9 and president trump gets another appointee, the court could move further to the right. so much hangs on who is going to be -- so much hangs on for the nation and for the supreme court of will becomes president in 2020 because of these ages. brian: how many years have you covered the court?

joan: full-time, since 1989. when i started at the washington post as a supreme court reporter it was 1992. brian: your first appearance on this network. 1990. we are going to show a little bit of it right now. joan: this is my punishment for coming on. brian: no punishment. joan: all right. [video clip] >> the headline with justice scalia. what is he like? joan: very argumentative. very engaging. he will go after with -- a awyer with real vigor. very entertaining. he seems to be one of the more vocal ones. sometimes certain hypotheticals just to see.

[end of video clip] brian: that was 29 years ago. my question to you is -- joan: the hair. brian: you are a lawyer. joan: i am. brian:what has changed in your mind about the court in 29 years? joan: it has become so much more political. our times have become so much more obviously political. it is not just our current president, donald trump, who likes to talk about the judiciary as he can own his republican appointees and that someone should be criticized for being a democratic appointee. it is not just the fallout from the 2016 election that everyone feels one way or another. there has been a progression. for example, that is 1990, the hair is ok, i thought it would be worse. ok. that is 1990. you know what else happened in 1990? right after that interview was

when david souter was nominated. i referred to him earlier in our conversation as someone who did not fulfill the hopes of conservatives affiliated with george h.w. bush. that gave the rallying cry, no more souters on the part of conservatives. now presidents go through this extensive vetting process to make sure their appointees are going to approve their appointees of what they want in the court. definitely since clarence thomas in 1991, that has happened. you have that. while the rest of the country has become more transparent -- i am not convinced, despite the protests of the justices, that they are transparent about the work that they do. they can act in very political ways also. brian: justice rehnquist is one f the few members of the court

who approaches a docket from a clearly conceived ideological perspective. this is from linda greenhouse at the new york times, who we know now after she is no longer a reporter. why was she calling justice rehnquist ideological and not referring to this court on both sides is being ideological joan: that quote, she was characterizing william rehnquist in the 1980's and what he had done. that reinforces what i said about how he came with an agenda. he definitely came with an agenda. i would say, for better or for worse, samuel alito came with an agenda. i think he approaches a law with clear-cut ideas about how to read a statute, how to read a constitution, and he bases it on precedents to be sure.

he, as opposed to retired justice anthony kennedy, has a very consistent outlook that is ideological. for better or for worse. i am not using the word ideological as negative. brian: if you were republican and had been either eisenhower, or name your president, and you had william brennan, then you ad john paul stevens, than you had david souter, when you tighten things up if you were republicans and he saw what they did on the court? joan: there are many strains to republicanism. i would say that is what happened. george h.w. bush did that. georges w. bush did that. certainly donald trump. here is what has changed since

eisenhower. they have very strong outside advisement will handle a lot of vetting. brett kavanaugh and neil gorsuch were heavily vetted. more so than john roberts. john roberts was vetted by the federalist society. and samuel alito. you and i both remember the nomination of harriet miers. remember how that one went? brian: withdrawn. joan: she was one person who had not been vetted by the federalist society. robert bork, who also was a nominee at one point in his life, he went on the air after she was nominated and said something like she is a nightmare in every way. he meant it from the point of view, not that she was a woman, not that she had not had an extensive background in constitutional law, but they cannot trust her ideology. that is what is at stake.

we know from the polls from 2016 that many people who voted for 2016 did it because scalia's seat was vacant and they put a lot of stock for a republican to name the individual. brian: how much anger was there behind-the-scenes over obamacare? -- over the obamacare decision? joan: a lot. brian: can you explain that. joan: i knew half the story at the time. i did not know the whole story. i knew how angry justice scalia was. i knew how angry some of the other conservatives were. chief justice john roberts switched his vote twice and gave mixed signals. they felt betrayed. then he felt betrayed because some things were leaking out. the liberals were baffled. two of the liberal justices switch their votes on the medicaid part. so much of the reporting focused

on the individual mandate in the affordable care act. it's that everybody had to buy insurance to keep the system afloat. there was another major provision in the law. a really important provision that expanded medicaid. coverage for poor people, so that more people would be covered. that had been upheld by all the lower courts that have booked at the affordable care act. when it got to the supreme court, chief justice john roberts voted to uphold it and then voted to strike it down. associate justices stephen breyer and elena kagan switched their votes to go with him on that. brian: explain what happened behind the scenes. joan: you have an unusual three days of oral arguments in late march of 2012. hey meet for the first time in their conference that friday. and vote it is 5-4 to strike down the individual mandate. chief justice roberts was leading the way.

they also vote on medicaid. they vote to uphold that, which is what they had done. they don't vote at all on congresses taxing power. i mention that because, in the end, the whole decision becomes hinged on congresses taxing power. in 2012 they don't vote on that at all. it does not seem to matter. and then slowly behind the scenes, chief justice roberts has a change of heart. he does not want to strike down the individual mandate and have the whole thing fall. brian: for those who have not paid close attention to when you say individual mandate. joan: that is a requirement where everybody has health insurance either through their employer on the marketplace exchanges. the idea was, the way you cover everyone in america is to make sure people who were healthy were part of the system so that you do not have what was known

then as this death spiral. people would get coverage or medical help only when they desperately needed it. the system was not being funded in an ongoing basis. to keep the system funded, everybody had to have insurance. i think the timetable at the time was -- the law was passed in 2010. by 2014, everybody had to have some sort of insurance. there were marketplaces set up to accommodate that. 2012 is when it came to the supreme court. brian: in your book i kept thinking, what in an incredible and political institution the court is. why is the court, after the ongress voted, to extend medicare -- medicaid, why are they going to change the decision of the congress? joan: they changed the decision -- rian: why? joan: the challengers said that, n the individual mandate

requiring people to purchase insurance, they said that that violated the constitution's commerce clause which regulates interstate commerce and business. they said congress could regulate activities that were already in place, but they could not regulate a non-activity. that is the failure to buy insurance. that was the argument on hat. on the medicaid one, it was more f a coercion argument there. the federal government funds most of this throughout the state. they already had restrictions on how states spend their medicaid dollars. congress in the affordable care act added a new one. the states were saying that iolates congress is spending policy because it is coercive. it says if you do not provide

medicaid coverage, you lose all medicaid funding. that is trying to commandeer the states and that violates the constitution. brian: let me show you some video of the conference room. you allude to the fact in your book that only the chief justice, you had seven meetings -- joan: it was eight meetings. you are reading the earlier version. brian: he only took you through he conference room once. tell us why you think he took you through on that occasion. joan: ok. brian: and how important is that room? joan: it is a great room. this is really the room where it happens. this is really the room where it happens. no clerks -- can people hear me still? no clerks or secretary assistance of any kind are allowed in that room while the conference is going on. if any justice has forgotten his or her eyeglasses, you have to call for them and a little knock on the door comes and a junior justice opens the door.

i love the look of that room. brian: is at his office at the end? it does not matter. looking at this room, do they ever sit around -- have you gotten a clear picture that they argue in that room? joan: yes. yes. some of the justices say, i have never heard a voice raised in anger. but let me tell you, when i talked to scalia, he certainly portrayed to me plenty of angry conversations. anger from his end and anger that he felt he received on a couple of incidents. they are judges. they are basically mild-mannered people. the real anger plays out in the writing. the unwillingness, maybe the compromise on things.

i definitely do not hear of repeated shouting matches of any kind. brian: as a reporter, do you feel any reason that you cannot talk about off the record stuff if somebody has died, like justice scalia? joan: there are so many negotiations that go on with the nine members of the supreme court, it is really not an ideal situation. to tell you the truth, i am really wary when people want to go off the record or on background because i worry that they are aligned without owning something. i have to worry about that a lot. i am worried about casting -- people casting thing from their point of view. if i cannot test it out in the real world, because i cannot attach somebody's name to it, it becomes tricky. i have to take pieces. it is like a puzzle. i went back and read through all my on the record interviews with

scalia. interviews i had done when i was doing the justice sotomayor your book. it was all during the period in question. things that did not make a difference for me in those respective books suddenly made a difference from me here. there is a wonderful line where he is comparing william rehnquist to john roberts. and john roberts is new at the time. there was no reason for me to include it in my bio of scalia. it did not matter. but it mattered for this book. justice scalia is talking about john roberts personality, the way he works, and some of his concern about what others think. he says to me, bill rehnquist had enough years in to toughen his hide before he became chief.

that reminded me of the fact that, william rehnquist had been an associate justice for 14 years. i had not thought about the consequences for how easy it was, using the term easy relatively speaking compared to the current chief, for him to step into the leadership role. when john roberts became chief justice, he had only been a justice on the lower court for two years. he was younger than all of them. he was only 50. the youngest chief justice and more than 200 years. so many people discounted that and did not pay attention to it because he exuded such confidence and such authority. that did not make things easy across the board in the beginning. so i threw it out. they have all been around. brian: i am going to read her background quickly so we can get to the questions. georgetown law. university of oklahoma. master's degree.

marquette for your bachelor's. he worked at the tulsa tribune. milwaukee journal. the washington post, 1992 to 2000. usa today. visiting professor of university of irvine. reuters 2012-2016. and currently at cnn. why are you in television nstead of print? joan: that part you showed in 1990, maybe that launched me. brian: your debut. joan: i work for tv, but i do not consider myself in television. i'm still doing the same thing. all those jobs, i have always covered the supreme court. it has been exciting to cover the supreme court for all these different news entities and media. at cnn my role is to offer analysis, and to try to go beyond the daily story, and to bring in a lot of the context of what we are talking about here. i love it. it is fun. i wanted to be like you. is that it? brian: the oldest of nine

children? joan: yeah. brian: are they all still alive? joan: yes. thank you for asking. rian: are any of them lawyers? joan:two others are lawyers. two younger brothers. brian: this on page 95, back to chief justice roberts. the involvement in the whitewater and monica lewinsky investigation in the clinton presidency in the 1990's would change his reputation? joan: wasn't that amazing? he was known so differently for those of us who had covered him. ken starr, just so your viewers know, he plays a major role in john roberts wife. he is a person who hires and when he goes to work for ronald reagan. in 1981. ken starr is the one who hired john roberts on a recommendation from william rehnquist. ken starr is solicitor general when roberts is a deputy general. they had lots of interaction

throughout. ken starr, he was on the u.s. court of appeals for the d.c. circuit judge same way john roberts was. he had a reputation for being a conservative, a moderate conservative. as solicitor general, he did not have a far right reputation. he had urged the overturning of roe v. wade. he followed through with a conservative republican agenda. he did not have a firebrand reputation. he easily could have been positioned for the supreme court. as arguments on roe v. wade did not help him. in her department rivalries also urt him. when you see the monica linsky thing, and how that unfolded in the name -- in the late 1990's, it is different than the ken starr we had in the late 990's. wouldn't you think?

brian: let's go back to john roberts. this is from an interview, and ou quoted, february 3, 2016, react to this when you see t. [video clip] >> do you remember your first oral argument? >> absolutely. a case called united states against halpert. i was very nervous. i was very nervous when i did my last oral argument as well. i think if you are a lawyer appearing before the supreme court and you are not nervous, you don't understand what is going on. [end of video clip] brian: you use the word nervous a lot in the book. joan: it is fascinating how well he was able to control his nerves. he said he gets physically sick when he had to appear in public and give speeches. i was shocked when i started learning what colleagues said about how his hands would shake

before he would get up to do a lecture. when you just showed the speech from his son's prep school and when susan interviewed him there, he is the picture of calm. he has such a measured tone. he exudes such authority and reasonableness. it is fair, but he had to work very hard at that. that oral argument, just to tie into when you were talking about how wanda have been covering it, i have been covering it full-time when he made that first oral argument in 1989. i went back to listen to the transcript. even though there were times he ad to answer i don't know, his voice did not pitch rate him. his voice never betrays him -- betray him. his voice never betrays him. brian: 24 times he was representing someone before the court. joan: he was in the solicitor

general's office from late 1989, let me make sure i have my time right. he argues his first case in january of 1989. that is the one he was asked about in the c-span interview. ken starr become solicitor general under george h w bush in 1989. he comes on late 1989 as his deputy. brian: mr. chief justice and it pleases the court. you say he wrote that down. oan: the opening phrase that lawyers have to give is, mr. chief justice and may it please the court. i would write a at the top of my legal pad, remember you are there for information. he would write at the top of his legal pad this statement in case he froze. he never froze, but his preparation was so extensive and

so paid off. he said that when he had trouble pronouncing someone's name, which many of us do, you don't, ut the rest of us do, he would figure out a way to refer to the individual may be by his or her occupation rather than say the name and stumble over it. one method that he had that is different from the way other oral advocates prepare is, he would have these no cards he would mix up and figure out his transitions. ay a justice asked him about a due process question in the argument about excessive fines. he would figure out how to pivot off of the due process question into another constitutional rationale. no matter what was asked, he wanted to get back to his main

point, no matter what order. he was always working on sequences, but prepared for everything. brian: did you let him read the galleys? joan: no. brian: explain what it is. joan: it is an uncorrected version. especially if you are working on a book in the middle of a supreme court nomination. i was under a tough deadline in the middle of anthony kennedy's retirement and brett kavanaugh's nomination. both of which went so smoothly. i had to submit the original manuscript in april of 2018. that was before anthony kennedy retired. i was constantly updating. i got in went chief justice roberts said there are no obama

judges, there are no trump judges. i got that in but my editor said, this is not a newspaper. you cannot keep putting things in, this is a book, you have to cut it off. brian: do you believe that? that chief justice roberts comment about no obama judges, no whatever judges? joan: there is a version of that that is true and the version that is not true. the version that is true is the one that counters the notion that there is an automatic vote with the president. i believe that most judges are not there to promise a vote in an automatic way to president obama, president trump, whoever nominated it. -- nominated the individual. there is no way a president does not want his nominees to reflect

what he stands for, as opposed to what his predecessor stood for. brian: you say chief justice roberts has had two attacks. one of them in maine, like an epileptic fit. joan: i think seizure is the word. brian: what is an update on his condition? what was the first one? joan: the first one was in 1993 when he was on a golf course laying golf. that is the first one that they know had happened. brian: any impact on him? joan: people close to him say there have been no subsequent incidents since 2007. that was the one where he was in maine and fell on the pier. that is the one your viewers will remember.

brian: here is 1993 video of chief justice roberts testifying before the congress. [video clip] >> habeas corpus is the leading area of what began as the protection of civil rights that has been stretched so far that it simply impedes laufered without serving a valid purpose. this problem is not new. justice jackson recognize that the for the list habeas corpus petitions that were flooding the courts acted to overwhelm the occasional meritorious one, which became like the proverbial needle in the haystack. the judge decried the fact that conviction and sentencing in our system was not the end of a case, not even the beginning of the end, but simply the end of the beginning. paraphrasing winston churchill. end of video clip] brian: he was deputy solicitor at that time.

what are you seeing? joan: he was a former in 1993. he is someone who is very interested in tougher restrictions on crime. brian: august 23, 1993. joan: clinton would be in by then. brian: what did you see in him? joan: a very strong commitment to stricter enforcement of criminal laws. in that appearance he talks about stricter enforcement of miranda, as well as habeas orpus. he is a little bit of a take no prisoners approach. brian: given his background and how he got to be chief justice, and worked for republicans all his life, if you are on the court and you were on that side would you be irritated with him and what he did on the obamacare decision?

what did you think of that? joan: what did i think of it? brian: yeah. what did you think of him coming up with this tax idea? joan: i approach it as a journalist. i think about, what his motivations and what was he trying to do and what were the consequences? what does it tell me about what he will be like now, going forward when there is so much tension between both sides and so many eyes are on the supreme ourt as they were in 2012? that is part of it. part of what happened in 2012, so much of writing -- so much was writing on what happened in 2002. he would not pull the trigger to strike down something congress passed and a democratic president had chimed into law. i think he had many motivations there.

i think they crystallized only s he had to face it. because, clearly, when he first voted on this at the end of the oral argument week, he was ready to strike it down. he was not ready to strike down the whole thing, may be part, but as it emerged that he would not get the backing from other justices to do things he wanted to approach it, that is when he went to the taxing power. i should say, not to defend or reject anybody in the scenario, but the obama administration had argued vigorously for congress taxing power in this. justice scalia said that was not part of it. he characterized it as a flyby. that was part of the obama administration's argument why the affordable care act should be upheld. the justices themselves never

even voted on it in conference. that is what chief justice roberts clung to in the end. brian: page 276. the justices were accustomed to start differences among them, but sotomayor's writing was so personal that it put some of them on the defensive. joan: i was able to find out a lot about what was going on between chief justice john roberts and justice sotomayor behind-the-scenes for the sotomayor book. i replay much of a here. -- it here. there is a justice who really is the opposite in so many ways. her background is foreground. his background he wants to keep back there. she is so proud of her latina heritage. she wants to speak out. the section you are reading from is a 2014 dissent that she s in an affirmative action case

where she talks about the need for affirmative action program needed in higher education. she refers to the putdowns that eople of color still feel. she writes this very passionate dissent. he is so put off by it that not only does he sign the majority opinion by anthony kennedy ruling gainst this affirmative action policy action in michigan, but he writes separately, a separate concurrence to admonish just a sotomayor for, in essence, airing the dirty laundry that went on behind the scenes. he strikes back at her for suggesting that maybe he does not get it, so to speak. brian: it seems to be central to your book, this whole subject.

have justices always spoken out, have they always given interviews and have they always done what ruth bader ginsburg did and take a very strong anti-trump position during the campaign? joan: no. brian: why are they doing it now? joan: i would say there is a variety of reasons. those who write books want attention for their books and their views. justice sotomayor is still promoting her book. during 2013 when her book came out, she gave lots of interviews. she spoke a lot. sure she was on your air a lot. hat was part of her message of her identity and where she came from. she wanted to communicate that. that is one thing. justice stephen breyer wrote out when he was promoting his book. his books are more not about him as an individual as somebody who

made it, as with the story with just the sotomayor, it is about his approach with the constitution. his book is a counter to the idea of originalism that justice scalia so embodied. it is part of them trying to get their message out. then you take justice ginsburg who i think was calling it as she saw it. but then you remember on the donald trump thing, she did walk it back. brian: did it matter at that time? joan: i don't know. interviewed her when she said she thinks he is a faker. brian: what was your reaction when she said that? joan: i went in there after two other reporters talked to her and she said she would move to new zealand if donald trump was elected. this was in the summer of 2016.

she made a little bit light of it. she is already getting criticism in the media. i went in to talk to her about john roberts. after we talked about john roberts for the book, i did it with my two tape recorders, because she spoke on the record, i said, do you regret saying what you said about donald trump? she was starting to get criticized. she said, no. that's when she doubled down. i thought, well, this is good. but then she did two days later. so we have the record straight. two days later, she realized she should not have gone that far and she made her regret public. brian: you said that they want to get their message out. it sounds self-serving, but i want to know what you think. why don't they do the simple thing of allowing us to see their oral arguments on television?

joan: i know exactly what you are talking about. i am definitely sympathetic about that. you know how many members of the regular public were able to get in that room to hear the affordable care act case? so few. we are talking a couple dozen because the seats were taken up. you can hardly get in there to see cases because the room only seats a couple hundred and there are reserved seats that people have to rotate in and out of. the lines are so long that we don't get to see the nation at work. as you know from the testimony we heard from justices elena kagan and samuel alito, they are not being as explicit as david souter said when he said over my dead body, but the message is he same. the gay marriage case. brian: in his written opinion, roberts went further comparing the ruling to the dred scott decision of 1857. ater on you say, he was trying

to be less strideant than scalia in the instability of who includes homosexuality between bestie alley and provoked outrage. roberts did not want to be seen as critical when it came to gay people. the use of dred scott not to celebrate the constitution, it had nothing to do with it, rang harsh. critics said that in resisting, roberts was setting himself up to be the roger tawney of his time. joan: that is the criticism. ere is what i think. this was an important moment for judge roberts. he used his only dissent from the bench ever to speak out against this. he wanted to make clear to everyone that he did not believe the constitution covered it. he felt that the five justices majority had very seriously crossed the line.

he compares it to dred scott. brian: why is dred scott significant? joan: that is when then chief justice roger tawney said they orslaves cannot be citizens to their freedom. it is a decision that justice is invoked when they want to say this is the worst. that is what the chief justice did. i thought it was surprising that he invoked dred scott. maybe he went too far. critics compare him to roger tawney who went to far. there it was, as harsh as it comes. the reason i make a big deal he of it in that section is called so much attention to it is because he made so much attention to it. brian: you quote richard, i guess he is retired now, he was a republican and a conservative.

joan: yeah. brian:you called -- you said he called roberts you about the gay arriage issue heartless. joan: yes. some people felt that. i have a cousin of his who happens to be gay. brian: john roberts has a cousin? joan: yes. she was great on this because she said, look, i can easily look past it because he was in the dissent. judge posener wanted to call him heartless. he really struck at him not just having heart, or no heart, but on the intellectual underpinnings of it. he got a lot of criticism for that dissent. brian: what do you think the relationship is on the court between justice sotomayor and the chief justice now? it seems they have problems. joan: i think it is cordial enough.

they come from completely different places. you can hear tension during oral arguments because she tends to be one of the ones who will sit back and wait her turn all the time. what she says is, i have questions to ask. sometimes she says she cannot quite here if someone else is speaking. the chief wants things to run really orderly. he was once an advocate. he does not like it when the lawyer is cut off as much as been happening these days. i don't think it is a terrible elationship. i think everyone up there recognizes that they are ppointed for life. i think that there are more tensions among the conservatives these days than between the liberals and the conservatives because hey, the conservatives control. john roberts controls -- however john roberts of now that anthony

kennedy is gone, he will determine the law of the and. the liberals want him to come over, inch over a little bit, but the conservatives are trying to hold him back where he always was. meanwhile you have this chief justice declaring, there is no such thing as an obama judge, a trump judge, a bush judge, he wants to project a bench that is not political when they all have their agendas of sorts. brian: let's go back to the 20 hours in his office of you talking with him. looking back on those 20 hours, how did you change your opinion of him after 20 hours of personal -- and were you the only one in the room with him? joan: yes, yes, yes. it was reinforcing many things. it was interesting how much he -- i could still feel his very trong need to control.

strong need to counter may be what i was hearing from others, challenge and understanding i had after i talked to other judges. very much aware of the difficulty of trying to get beneath the surface. time helped. he seen the hardback version? joan: i sent the copy to one of his closest friends. it does not roll off the presses for another week. brian: no reaction from him? joan: no. brian: do you have another justice in mind to write another book on? joan: i am thinking of stepping back and looking more broadly at the court. i am kind of running out of one's who -- do you have one you want to know more about? brian: they are all interesting. are you running out of people who will let you in the door?

joan: you know what they always start out saying, "you cannot come in the door." they all inevitably let me in. one way or another. can i tell you my scalia story quickly. he would not let me in, iran -- i ran into him at a wedding and he was like, you can talk to my friends but not me. i told him what i learned about his family. i said, you know the first time your father was mentioned in the new york times was when he got this great fellowship to study romance languages in florence and rome, i thought i was telling him something really interesting. he said, sure. but did you know that is where i was conceived, on that ellowship. i told him more about his family at the social event. he called me the next day and said, come see me. eventually, you go in with information and they want to tell you information. brian: the name of the book is

"the chief." the life and turbulent times of chief justice john roberts. thank you for joining us. brian: thank you, brian. >> all q&a programs are available on our website, or as a podcast that c-span.org. >> next sunday on q&a, historian and author douglas brinkley talks about his book, "american nor its shot." next sunday at 8:00 p.m. eastern nd pacific time on c-span.

>> all this month on c-span, we'll feature the winners of the our student cam competition. middle and high school students presented videos answering the question what does it mean to be merican? r winners eight graders at natomas middle school. their winning entry is titled equality for all. progress for lgbq rights. >> freedom for all people. >> to have freedom. >> you're welcoming of all religions. >> america is a place for veryone.

>> we welcome people of different cultures, religions and beliefs. although america is a very diverse country, individuals who lgbq mbers of the community are often disregarded. >> truly learning to accept the differences, we truly become american. >> america needs stronger federal protections for every american citizen. >> there is still a battle over whether at the national level we are -- not that much has changed. >> we have to pass the employment nondiscrimination act. that will protect the lgbq community.

>> particularly protect people if you are targeted and you are victimized because of your gender, your sexual orientation and get a longer time in jail. >> it is less about the laws and more about people. not being afraid. >> there are many organizations started because of religion that claims lgbq citizens shouldn't be given a place in society. roughly 33% of americans don't support same-sex marriage. >> there was a shift when there were things that started to allow gay marriage. it is like the dam breaking. once it started and people ealized -- >> a lot more acceptance. people are scared of what they don't know. >> understand their fear and understand where they are comesing from, you're going to have a much harder time hating that person. >> would not be free to live as

openly as they do without media having influenced their friends. there are great strides made through the media that has made people outside and folks with an lgbq family member. makes them feel more comfortable with the lgbq community. >> when you only see someone like caitlyn jenner who is a celebrity, so when she transitioned she leveraged her and e to go and access other people see that and think that must be how it is for trans people. the reality is many of us live in poverty. >> members of the lgbq community have been mistreat. members to have lgbq

community protested. there was an uproar over the protests. >> when harvey milk was elected at the city supervisor, we thought our country was taking a step faurt. less than a year into his term, he was assassinated proving that many are still opposing lgbq rights in america. lot of violence towards transwomen of color. >> we feel like people are victimized because of their gender or race or orientation. people have to live in an area where they don't fear going to police. >> it can go backwards if we don't work hard so we can't be come placents.

it is made before vigilance. we have more work to do. >> a lot of gains that we have made are if not being taken away, attempted to be taken away. gendert of stigma behind and when people don't understand or don't have an education, they on't know how the face people. it has grown leaps and bound for the lg part of lgbq. >> raise awareness by educating our youth. educating citizens in their community. country have to preface.

we have to be willing to open our minds and realize that we all have the same riges. >> the more educated we are about the community, the better we will be able to accept. not necessarily understand but at least accept the fact that we are here and there is no way that we will ever be erased. >> you can watch every winning student cam documentary online at studentcam.org. >> next we're live with your calls and comments on "washington journal". live at noon, the u.s. house of representatives begins their session with general speeches, legislative business beginning t 2:00 p.m.. >> this week on the

communicators, michael powell. mr. powell is interviewed by a "washington post" reporter. > i think it is in transition. but its talk of demise are dramatically premature. i think the industry has nicely transitioned to the significance of broadband that helps compensate for the marked competitive pressures on video and manages the video better than people would have imagined. i think they are thriving as businesses and consumer delivery systemings. they recently announced a really bold initiative to dramaly increase broadband speeds to the american home. >> watch "the communicatesors" tonight at 8:00 eastern on c-span 2. >> this morning get to know the freshmen members of the 116th congress as we profile this

year's most diverse group of lawmakers in history. as always, we take your calls and you can join the conversation on facebook and twitter. "washington journal" is next.[cl cable satellite corp. 2019] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] ♪ host: the freshman class of the 116th congress has been billed as the most diverse set of lawmakers in history with the first muslim americans, native americans, and latina women serving in office. several of them are dominating headlines and collecting millions of followers on social media. they are pushing legislation and pressuring their party to change . we want you to learn more about this group of lawmakers and get your reaction on the impact they are having on politics and policy. good morning. we will spend today's