washington is funded as a public service by a cable or satellite provider on television or online c-span is your unfiltered view of government so you can make up your own mind. >> here is a look at our live coverage on friday. ,1:30 a.m. eastern on c-span house democrats hold their 2019 issues conference in leesburg, virginia. at 12:35, germany's finance minister talks about you rest -- talks about u.s. european relations. the european commission vice president talks about brexit and c-span 2.9:00 a.m. on at 5:30 a look at the role of labor unions with labor and they alex acosta head of the international labor

organization. coming up, a discussion about the mueller former federal prosecutors harry sandick and kimberly wehle. and later, john rutherford. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2019] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] ♪ host: good morning. welcome to this morning's "washington journal." today marks the first 100 days of democrats in control of the house. the party wrestled away from the gop the house of representatives after the last election. this morning, we wanted to hear from you, what grade would you give them so far? republicans, 202-748-8001. democrats, 202-748-8000. an independents, 202-748-8002. join us on twitter at @cspanwj or you can go to facebook.com/cspan. this morning, we want to get your calls on the democrats first 100 days in the house.

what grade would you give them, what do you want to see them accomplish, could their grade go up or down? let's begin with the speaker of the house earlier this week talking about the democrats agenda. [video clip] 60% or caucus, which is more women, people of color, lgb come together and say our diversity is our strength, our unity is our power and that unity is how we are building consensus around issues. as the distinguished chairman, mr. jeffries, thank you, talked about is our for the people agenda, which he helped form ,ith our distinguished chair for the people agenda. lower health care cost by lowering the cost of prescription drugs and saving the pre-existing condition benefit among others. lower health care cost, bigger

paychecks, and cleaner government. that was our agenda and that is what we are putting forth. i want to focus so much on health care because that goes ,ight to the kitchen table financial security of america's working family. it is about their health and their financial health. we will be focusing on that. we all agree whatever our different approaches are, we all agree our goal is to have affordable, accessible, quality health care for all americans and let's see how we get to that. one way to get to that is to reduce the role of money and is that route.1 i think if there is any symbol of change with this 100 days that we are proud of is the passage almost immediately of hr1 and continuing with that drumbeat across america, the voices of the people are as important as any voice and we

reduce the role of big, dark, special interest money in politics. the people's interest, not the special interest will be served and that has an impact both on how people view what is happening in washington and on what the results are in washington as well. host: we are in an era of divided governments, democrats with control of the house marking their first 100 days. what grade would you give them? renda in houston, texas, a democrat. good morning. caller: i would give them an a+ ++. i want them to toe the line, stay steady, stay focused. host: what would you give them an a++ for? caller: they have been responding to everything that the more on in the white house -- moron in the white house has been putting out. not, in what way are they

in your ways, falling for what president trump is doing? what are they not falling for? caller: whenever he said -- they numberarly through barr, one. they see clearly through everything he tries to do and they make the american public, that is willing to listen, they make him aware of his tricks and deceits. host: brenda's thoughts in texas. rob, independent in new york. what do you think? caller: good morning, greta, i would like to give democrats an f. i cannot even do that, i would give them an incomplete. you in the media should be fighting hard for julian assange. he is a journalist and you aren't even talking about it. host: we will talk about it later. you would give them worse than f , incomplete, why? caller: they have done nothing but stir the pot in this russia

hoax. i call it a failed coup. it has been 2.5 years of wasted time and it is all the democrats fault. it is horrible. host: you are an independent read have you voted for democrats in the past? caller: i did this past election, i voted for one local guy because the republican woman was so awful, so i voted for brindisi. last week he went and approved cuomo's budget. i guess i had to learn the hard way. host: you will switch back to republican? caller: i don't like republicans either, i will not vote for a republican or democrat. i voted for jill stein in the last election and i do third parties generally because i think the two party system is what got us into this big mess in the first place. york,rob in new independent, voting for third-party candidate. listen to kevin mccarthy on the floor marking the first 100 days

of democrats in control. [video clip] >> the majority of democrats have focused on three rentable's above all else, resolutions, resistance.and 1 in 5 votes in this house that has taken since the end of january were nonbinding messaging resolutions. just last week, we wasted time debating a symbolic resolution on health care. imagine for a moment if we had in stead spent 1/5 of our time actually working to lower premiums, expand choice, or improve quality. imagine all that we could have achieved. right now, we have a humanitarian crisis along our southern border. what if we spent 1/5 of our time working to improve border security? and fix the loopholes in our immigration system?

nope. democrats would rather consider .nother nonbinding resolution i have never known anybody that ran for office that was asked to make sure you go to congress to waste their time on votes that do not matter. they send us here to deliver solutions, not resolutions. mr. speaker, the american people deserve better. perhaps the democrat majority is so focused on resolutions because they don't want the american people to understand the consequences of their radical, extremist policies. host: we turn to all of you. do you agree or disagree with kevin mccarthy about democrats in control of the house? their first 100 days on this friday morning. in north carolina, republican. what do you think? caller: good morning, c-span.

i agree with the gentleman from new york. i think they deserve an incomplete. nancy, her first visit to the house speaker in 2006, she promised then, just like they promise now. they promise now for health care, then the promise was to keep george w. bush -- host: we are listening, are you still there? end of that. tail keeping george w. bush what? caller: they said they were not going to let george w. bush run the economy. that is what nancy pelosi run on in 2006. i don't believe they were that incompetent. i don't believe barack obama inherited a mess, the democrats intentionally tanked the economy . we bailed out the banks and thanks to one of your announcements the other day, i

found out nancy pelosi's husband is an investment banker. did she get her wealth, her $30 million through policies she passed to help her husband? enrich themselves? they have promised health care this time. there has not been one thing they have done for health care. host: as you heard from the speaker, she says that is on the agenda and steny hoyer, democrat from maryland put out there 100 days of fighting for the people and they put on this list, number 3 -- number two is infrastructure, number three is lowering prescription drugs, the ways and means, education -- energy and commerce, held hearings on the cost of prescription drugs. energy and commerce marked up several bills addressing this issue and the ways and means committee marked up the haveription drugs -- they

held hearings, introduced bills, marked them up, they have not passed them yet, that is on the addenda and there are reports in the paper today that the senate republicans and democrats on both sides of the aisle in both chambers could come together on this issue of lowering prescription drugs. if they were able to accomplish that on a bipartisan basis, send it to the president, get this into law, what would you think? would that be an a compliment on health care? caller: if they work together, but you said something about infrastructure. in asheville, north carolina, barack obama started his investmenture, the into america, where he put signs all over the country. interstate 26 was just starting

widening in 2008. 2019, they are still doing construction in the very same place. host: are you arguing for or against infrastructure investment? caller: i am for it, but i would like somebody to hold these people accountable. host: got it. caller: under barack obama, we people inthat killed flint, michigan, bridges that collapsed in minnesota. what have they done? how have they spent our money? assangewhy julian should be extradited. host: i am going to move on. perry in florida, what grade would you give democrats in the house? caller: just two very quick things before my grade. i cannot believe mccarthy sat there and gave that speech with a straight face. as far as a grade for the house, tellget an a++ and i will

you why. they have done just what i want them to do, putting policy passed int is getting the house, they are putting policy through that is good for the country and it goes through the senate to die. the people can see that. also -- i got caught up, but i give them an a+. the are keeping check on president. for kevin mccarthy, it is not the democrats fault that republicans did not do their job for two years. host: listen to house freshman who came to the floor on tuesday to highlight their first 100 days. [video clip] >> i would like to engage in a colloquy of sorts with my fellow colleague, representative hill and to our wonderful co-class

president. what do you think about the freshman class? >> > i am pretty excited to be here today. i get a little tired about bragging about myself, i think that is something you do a lot as a member of congress, but today we get to brag about our friends. >> representative stephens, what do you think about the freshman class? >> i am delighted to be among the freshman class and i am proud of our accomplishments, particularly that we have 18 freshman chairing subcommittees from all the various great committees, science, space, technology, utterance affairs, and small business. >> i cannot agree more and i want to associate myself with the remarks of represent of stephens and represented of hill. we have an incredible freshman class, not only is it the youngest and most diverse in history, but we got straight to work, we hit the ground running and at the end of the day, this

freshman class is making a lot of progress. i would like to give the american people a sense of what the freshman class has been up to. the freshman class has held over 100 town halls and over 400 events, that is a lot of events. >> that is a lot of events and if you recall, a lot of our colleagues that many of us replaced, the former colleagues that many of us replaced, were could to sized for not having town halls. during the february recess, freshman embers made up 51% of the freshman members making -- holding town halls. host: a few of the freshman democrats on the house marking their 100 days. we are asking you to grade them with democrats in control of the chamber. melody in wisconsin, independent. caller: yes, hello, good morning. i have been watching the entire procedures that have occurred for the last two years and you would have to be deaf and dumb not to realize the amount of

resistance that has gone into helping united states citizens and you can talk about ,verything they are going to do look at what they have done. i think that is the record. i am very disappointed. what i would suggest is the state and the union form a coalition a serious within the states to change the position and the government in our country where what happens in a state is passed in a state and not in the federal government. too muchtoo slow and debate and politics. they are not thinking of united states citizens. host: when you say they are not thinking of the united states citizens, what specific issue are you referencing? caller: their ability to get along to think about the needs

citizens,ted states what we need in this country. right here in this country. host: so what are those issues? caller: i am sick of it. i have watched this for two years and i would like to say that i am tired of it. i am 74 years old and never in my life have i seen such poor performance and you can promise whatever you want. i have seen better performance in past years than i have ever seen in this year. i am also tired of this constant naysaying on the part of republicans. i watch it every day on tv, the way they behave in congress, you wonder why children are sliding -- fighting in classrooms. if you were to use your program -- not your program per se, but what they say andrew -- and do

and how they treat each other, it disgusts me and you wonder why they are killing in schools and fighting. host: heard that point, what issues? what could they do for the american people? are you talking about wages? health care? caller: letting go of their political issues and stop the fight for power. host: we will move on to ronald. a democrat in texas. caller: how are you doing, ma'am? host: morning. caller: i would give the democrats a a +. i think they are doing an outstanding job. i like the democrats. can you hear me? host: yeah, we can. you like them because? caller: the democrats i feel like they fight for the people. they fight for the people, they represent the people. i don't know republicans seem like every time democrats get in office, they beat their husband

up, they beat their children up, when republicans get in office, they do worse than democrats and they give them a pass all the time. about, they are christian, they are christian. you have to treat people right. what goes around is going to come around. host: david in new york, independent what grade do you give these house democrats? anler: i would give congress f or an a. a for abysmal read i am wondering why congress is not covering julian assange. host: we are going to talk about it in a little bit. caller: you brag about how unfiltered you are and you come up with something like this.

i think congress is doing what they want to do for the american people. why are there more poor people in this country than all of venezuela and yet we neglect the poor people? we keep giving these excuses, try and go to college, try and go to college, get a higher minimum wage, the minimum wage is good right now, it is the minimum wage, it has -- it is higher than it has ever been. how about advancing from the minimum wage. not one politician will say that. you cannot call this a democracy anymore. myself being a baby boomer, we have had the jfk assassination, robert kennedy assassination, martin luther king assassination and our president stating this ps a true, you don't have cou in democracies. host: i headline from the

washington post, house democrats offer few remedies for border crisis as they plot their agenda to deal with the immigrants coming from central america, that are coming to our country to seek asylum. the headline in the paper says democrats lack a unified stance on solving this issue. the majority leader steny hoyer on his list of accomplishments to, inhat democrats plan the coming weeks when they return to washington after a two week spring break, they plan to bring up the dream and promise act, which would deal with the children brought here by their parents of so-called dreamers, that is on the agenda. as we said, democrats met this week for their annual retreat at a nearby resort in the washington, d.c. region area and

one of the issues on the table besides infrastructure and health care is do they have a unified stance on dealing with the border? marsha in chicago, republican. what grade would you give house dems? caller: i would give them a big fat f, failure. host: tell us why? tell us why? caller: can you hear me? host: we can. caller: and the reason i am giving them a failure is because they are not doing anything. i live in chicago. chicago is a completely democratic party rule and it is totally corrupt. people are trying to get out of chicago, especially black people . i am going to say something i don't think anybody realizes how are educated black people fleeing from the democratic party.

my husband, my mother, all of us, we are now no longer connected with the democratic party. host: why is that? caller: one thing, the immigration issue is a big problem in chicago, it is a sanctuary city. it is awful. it is awful. they drive without licenses, illegal immigrants. my brother is a police man in chicago. even he is complaining about it. host: what do you want the democrats to do? caller: they need to do something with the laws, they need to change these laws. why are they holding this over our heads? this is really life-and-death. it is ridiculous. i heard yesterday something about sanctuary cities -- or there was a plan -- host: it is the headline in the

washington post this morning. caller: to bring them into sanctuary cities, i think it is a wonderful idea. they wanted them here, they should replace the people here, let's go and bring in these illegal immigrants, i think it would be great for the city. host: why? caller: they could deal with it. host: with democrats in control of the house and republicans controlling the senate, would you like to see the two come together and pass some sort of what they call here in washington, comprehensive immigration reform that would include a pathway to citizenship for those here illegally? caller: no, i would not read amnesty is only going to bring the populations of central america into illinois or into the country. i think that is the wrong thing to do. host: marsha in chicago.

the nice in new jersey, independent. high, denise? denise? caller: there are five women on the democratic side that just got in and they are finally speaking truth, nobody wants to confront the hard truth, all i am not anti-semitic, i love everybody, but when you have one power running both parties, it is killing our government. we should not be aligned with it. it's always the same talking points. this is all about 9/11 and what is currently sitting in there, mueller, all of them, they are all 9/11 leftovers from the bush administration, the corruption at the highest levels including who has been on c-span. commanders stole millions of

dollars for profit. thoughts in new jersey. michigan, ruth, democrat. what grade would you give house democrats? caller: i would give it a c. i am not really happy with a lot of the things they are doing. they won the house, which is great, but a lot of those races were by small margins and it was a very brutal ordeal for everybody out here and the first thing that kamala harris does the very first week she is there, she runs off and runs for president, hold my seat . i want her to work for me in congress, not run off for president. in 2018, did not win she won in 2016, so she is not a freshman senator. caller: okay, i am sorry. i did not understand that. host: that's okay, i just want

to clarify for people. caller: still, they are all running often going for president. they are not going to do anything and save everything for a presidential race talking points, you have to do something. you have to have something to .un on like health care a lot of people are dying and going without health care. i don't have health care. a lot of people i know cannot afford it. but keep talking about it, they are going to save it to 2020? a lot more people could die between now and then. they need to do something now. host: if democrats and republicans came together in this congress before the election to lower prescription drug prices, would that be in a compliment in your view? caller: that is just a band-aid. that is only a very small part .f the issue

host: why can you not get health care? what are your options that you cannot afford? there: whatever is out since i am over 60 is just not affordable. you have got like $7,000 out of pocket before they pay for anything. host: can you qualify for medicaid? -- as: cost to pay for it far as i'm concerned, that is like no health care and that is all that is out there for people my age. they need to expand it, at least to 62, medicare or something, experiment a little bit before they go medicare for all like they are all running for, which i think is a good idea depending on how they do it, but i am really disgusted because they talk everything to death. i don't care about all these

committees, i don't care about them wanting to see if trump is impeachable, i don't care, all they are going to find out is what we already know, he is a cheat and a liar, got that along time ago, i don't need committees to show it again, i need them to do something. they have two years, they have a small window. they have a small window to do something like the other lady said, i wanted them to fight for us. host: ruth in michigan, a democrat giving the house democrats a c, wanting them to do more. speaking of the senate, the headline in the wall street journal, four gop senators say they are a no vote on the idea of herman cain serving on the federal reserve. we asked joe mansion, who is our guest for newsmakers again -- about that. he said there is a lack of enthusiasm for mr. kane and abc is reporting this morning that

herman cain could be withdrawing his nomination within days. there is more to come on that story. you can hear senator manchin's comments if you listen sunday morning on c-span, you can listen and watch on c-span.org or listen with the free say app. -- c-span radio the senator was asked about his view of the house democratic freshman class and here is what he had to say. [video clip] >> are you worried about the direction of your party? have said the democratic party has moved left? >> i am worried about you all reporting. maybefreshmen, there is seven of them. we are all-new democrats or blue dog, moderate, they get no press, nothing, they are centrist, they come from areas that basically they have to give and take, it is a process they have to work through.

the josh gottheimer's of the house are getting -- it is awful what they are trying to do to them. i worry about the perception people have that the democratic party has gone completely off the rails. >> house democrats have been in control of the house a few byths, not lead certainly the freshman, but led by speaker pelosi. how would you grade speak up lucy? -- speaker pelosi? >> that is a tough one. i think she has been looking at this and trying to be -- there is no impeachment, she knows that, we are not going down that path. she can count, she is a veteran. she is not going down that vote, she is smart. you want to go out and campaign and play games with it, fine, that does not have traction. she know how -- she knows health care has to be fixed. she knows attorney general barr should be the attorney general

for all the people and not just the white house. i think she is doing a good job. host: senator joe mansion. you can watch at 10:00 a.m. and 6:00 p.m. eastern this sunday on c-span. an update for you on action on capitol hill yesterday from the new york times, senate vote to confirm's former oil lobbyist as interior secretary, senators voted 56-41 largely along party lines in favor of david bernhardt's confirmation. ,oe mansion of west virginia senator kyrsten sinema of arizona and -- supported mr. by heart -- also yesterday in the senate from the wall street journal, there was a hearing on capitol hill before the senate armed fervor is -- armed services committee on this idea coming out of the white house for a space force, a separate military branch that would solely focus

on space. the headline in the wall street journal, senators bring proposed force down to earth. we covered that hearing and if you want to watch and listen, go to our website, c-span.org. let's go back to our calls, beth in pennsylvania, republican. good morning to you. tell us about your thoughts on the house democrat in control of that chamber. caller: yeah, hi. i would definitely give them an f mainly because they seem to just resist everything the president has tried to do, but mostly because up until this president came in, they were for some kind of border patrol and -- i should not

say border patrol, but for some sort of border and immigration reform or doing something about it and now they have totally changed their mind and want open borders. a country cannot be a country if you don't have borders. i think that is a -- just turned around and change their mind after years of supporting that. and just because a president got in they did not like, that was justpposite party, they totally changed their mind. if they are going to waffle like that on everything, how can you count on them for anything? host: beth in pennsylvania. kevin is an independent in virginia. it is a little

soon to kind of give them a grade. this congress came into power in the middle of a shutdown created by the president. ofublicans tell the house representatives, -- held the house of representatives 20 out of 24 years. if there is anything wrong with the budget, it is on the back of the republicans. term, are starting a new the 116th congress coming into power where democrats have control and after this term, it will be 6 years they have held power since 1995. we should give them a chance because i believe they are going to get things done. host: what do they need to get done for you to give them an a? caller: pardon me? host: what do democrats need to

get done during their tenure and controlling the house for you to give them an a? caller: get a good infrastructure bill passed and do something with immigration and health care, do better health care. obamacare would have been a lot better if republicans in the house and senate back then when it was passed would have worked with the democrats and put their input into it. that is about it. they can get good health care by the american citizens passed through. that would be an a. host: rob in new york, a democrat. what do you think? caller: good morning, thank you, c-span. let me narrow it down for you. i am a democrat, i am a proud capitalist like most of my democratic friends and democratic party, we are capitalists. all that rhetoric on the other side is nonsense.

we can fix immigration, democrats could go after the employers, go after the employers with the e-verify system, which eisen -- i know is not a 100% fix, but it is a step in the right direction. democrats can go after the insurance companies who provide the coverage for workers to business and insurance policies -- businesses .ho employ illegals that is how we can start to resolve immigration. democrats, nancy pelosi, she has to be aware of her public persona. she cannot overreach. she does that, aoc, she has to talk less and learn a lesson. omar, these two should study mitch mcconnell, he talked about making obama a one term president. he held up obama's supreme court

nominee. study mitch mcconnell, he held up ethics reform to be voted on a couple of weeks ago. he did not put it on for a vote. this was passed in the other side of the house. he did put on a vote for the green new deal only to try and embarrass the democrats. in terms of our president hiring only the best of the best, look at now herman cain. what does he say, shucky ducky, 9-9-9. maybe he should be the head of the space force. instead of draining the swamp, the swamp is worse -- full of the worst creatures ever and that is what i had to say. host: frank is a republican, fort lauderdale, florida. you are up, go ahead. caller: good morning, everybody. i would give democrats an f.

i am disappointed they have not been able to pass an immigration bill. i think the two sides are interested in different issues regarding immigration. they should be able to work it daca.ke the dhaka -- i am for permanent residency for daca children. that is one of the big concerns, immigration and the other one is the life issue. they are trying to get a discharge position to release a bill called the born alive protection act and nancy pelosi will not allow them to have a big vote on that very important issue. the other day she was awarded the john f. kennedy profiles in courage award for protecting our

most vulnerable people, yet those children who survive abortion are our most vulnerable people. she should not accept that award. host: frank in fort lauderdale. also in fort lauderdale, florida, and independent. what do you think about house democrats in their first 100 days? caller: good morning. thank you for taking my call. i don't know if i would give them anything more than an f. it is a repeat of what happened nancy pelosi became speaker then and she gave us the green new energy deal which crashed the economy and now they reelected her and the new freshman, it seems like they are just going to keep doing what the old status quo was, which is get along, vote along party lines, and as far as health care, not one of them have ever recommended that we could send it back to the states and let

the states figure out the best way to treat the people. host: stephen dinan and alex sawyer have this piece about the majority leader, mitch mcconnell, who is up for reelection in 2020 telling reporters at a policy and politics briefing marking the first 100 days of this congress that he believes democrats have helped the gop with its case by running so far to the left on issues such as the green new deal, sweeping environmental and social policy overhaul, and that a care for all, a government run universal health care plan, that he believes republicans will maintain control of the senate. the majority leader has told his republican colleagues who are up for reelection in 2020 that they should run a campaign independent of the president. you can read more of that if you go to the washington times. republicans hold 53 seats in the senate and have 21 of those seats up in 2020.

the most endangered incumbent is probably democrat senator doug jones of alabama who wanted a special election in 2017 after a nasty gop primary left republicans with roy moore. faced accusations he dated teenage girls. among the toughest races for republican held states are for cory gardner, martha mcsally, thom tillis, and david purdue in georgia. those races are ones to watch over the next year or so. atchell in tennessee, democrat. good morning to you. go ahead. caller: good morning, greta. chattanooga. i finally got in to you. it has been a while. i try to keep up with you every now and then. host: what grade would you give house democrats? caller: i would have to give them a b, may be a b+.

they are moving pretty quickly to be 100 days in. i have not seen the democratic party move that fast. this is really the second time actually watching. what gets me, what i wanted to call about was i don't want to be a racist or anything, but people call up and say this about the black people -- you don't know nothing about the black people, you are an individual calling from another state. this woman talking about black people leaving illinois because illinois is so corrupt. leaving illinois and go where? people leaving the democratic party. i have a problem with the republican party. i think the republican party has a problem with people of color, all the days of slavery. when you can steal somebody's children because they are your property, you have no problem dividing people at the border.

that border has been there ever since they were born on this earth. that situation down there was man-made, he did that himself. there is no need to do people like that any other way. republican,is a north carolina. your turn. caller: hello? host: good morning, go ahead. caller: yes, let me turn the tv down. host: there you go, just listen to your phone. caller: okay, thank you. host: go ahead and talk, we are listening. hello. oh, rating onng in about the democrats. i have been watching c-span, i keep up with them. i told the girl i am 77. something has happened to the democrats. my mom and dad years ago called

in democrat. these democrats have gone nuts. they won't pass nothing. the border is flooded with all 50 differente from states and they will not pass nothing to help the president out all because they hate him. you can't be that way in this life. we are all american, supposed to be. we have got to get along and nancy pelosi needs to straighten out with them three girls. there is no green new deal, nobody wants socialism. look at venezuela. it has really got bad. people had better straighten up and pray for the president because i don't see how he stands to hold on. host: trina in north carolina. on the julian assange story, a couple things to note for you. from the new york times, the

indictment, which was unsealed yesterday, reveals prosecutors had not charged mr. assange under the espionage act. instead, they charged him with conspiring to commit unlawful computer intrusion based on his manningt to help ms. break and accorded portion of pass code that would have permitted her to break into a network. what they are charging julian assange under, what law they are charging him under is a 1984 law. this from the washington post. they are charging him under the computer fraud and abuse act, america's premier anti-hacking statute, that law prohibits accessing a computer without authorization. the legislation has long been dogged by critics who say the law is so vague that it has been abuse to go after innocuous

behavior that happens every day. that is the law. the papers noting this morning that this is long from over, the extradition of mr. us on could take years and the court case also taking years. more on that coming up on the washington journal. david in colorado, good morning to you. tell us what you think about house democrats. .aller: good morning, greta i want to give the house democrats an a. the main thing i wanted to see them do was stand up to 45 and i think they are doing an excellent job doing that. additionally, there are several pieces of legislation that congress has passed, progressive legislation that died in the senate. we have control of one house of congress and we are doing the

best we can under the legal ship -- leadership of speaker pelosi. i would like to say one more thing, greta. host: yep. caller: you had the caller from chicago who went on and on about the people immigrants and i want to say to her, do you think separating children from the border -- do you think this administration would have done this so white children? i don't think they would have and that is what i say to that caller from chicago. host: david talked about the legislation that has been passed. from the list put together by steny hoyer, he notes passage of the for the people act, which deals with ethics and money in politics also passed in the house the paycheck fairness act, a bipartisan background checks bill passed in the house along with violence against women reauthorization act passed recently.

nato support act, yemen war is as resolution, which joint resolution to direct the removal of the united states armed forces from hostilities in yemen, and also the john dingell junior conservation management and recreation act condemning the trump administration? 's legal campaign to take away her -- takeaway america's health care. the safe internet act which would undo the net neutrality rule put under the trump administration, expressing opposition to banning service in the armed forces by openly transgender individuals, and a resolution on the mueller report saying it should be made public. those are the resolutions and bills that have passed in the house and have not been taken up in the senate. there has been criticism of house democrats not being on the same page when it comes to spending and unable to pass a budget before they broke for the two-week recess. here is steny hoyer on that. [video clip] >> we had a victory yesterday.

our republican friends would think it was not and, frankly, it was reported as somehow we lost control. you speaker pelosi and i were in charge, along with .r. clyburn for four years we never lost a vote that we wanted to win. frankly, we would not have lost any vote this week if we had wanted to win and we did win. we set the numbers. we set the numbers for appropriations and in my view, the fact john yarmuth and his committee were able to report a number, which is the number we adopted on the floor of the house of representatives almost unanimously on our side of the aisle to give to the appropriations committee the necessary direction that they needed to mark up their 12 bills .

i believe those bills will be passed by the end of june, which i believe will be the earliest time all 12 bills have passed certainly in the last 40 years. host: steny hoyer talking about this washington post article. house democrats canceled budget vote as liberals demand more spending on social programs. agatha in the bronx, a democrat. good morning, go ahead. agatha. let me try that one more time. agatha in new york, a democrat. cup --see, lisa and ida idaho, independent. caller: good morning, c-span. i agree with the lady from michigan, with everything she said. i don't think the democrats are doing nothing. i think the republicans are doing nothing. there is nobody in the middle

that can get these two people together. down at the border, they are having all those kids being separated and then years from now, they are going to be the new daca kids. i don't think president trump -- i don't trust him. he is getting all his lobby buddies in for the epa and everything else and it is really disheartening to see all these democrats running for president and i really do think that might hurt their system if all those people tried for president. that is what i think. severalsa and there are road 2020 events we should tell you about in our coverage coming up. we begin with tonight, bernie sanders is holding a rally in madison, wisconsin, and that will be at 8:00 eastern, 8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span.

you can listen along with the free c-span radio app and go to your computer at c-span.org. we also have the official launch of cory booker's campaign. that will be on saturday around 2:30 p.m. eastern time and also on sunday, mayor pete booted at -- the mayor of indiana, south bend, will officially announce his campaign. go to our website, c-span.org. road to the white house 2020, you can find all of our coverage . agatha in new york, democrat. caller: yes, hello? host: good morning, go ahead. caller: i am giving the democrats an e for effort. they are trying. they have tried from the beginning since president trump got into office. they have been trying.

it looks to me like i have not seen this before, what is going on in the presidency, the white house. i have never seen this. i am in old person, 75-year-old, and i don't like that they took the kids away from the parents. that is ridiculous and now they cannot find the parents. this is trump. then they want to take off the social security. host: what should democrats do about it? caller: they should put their heads together and not be afraid of trump and the republicans. they are the congress. they are supposed to straighten that all out. host: democrats have control of the house, but republicans have control of the senate. fred, what do you think? what grade do you give house democrats? caller: i give the whole congress an f. they get down there and they

fight with each other mainly, trying to get a gotcha on somebody. president trump in office told us what he wanted to do and he has tried to do everything he said he could do, that is why he got voted in. host: where should democrats work with the president? goodr: the border is a example. this lady that just got off talking about children, this started with the obama administration. intojust put the kids cages. they showed what was done during the past two years. they are blaming what has been done for the past 30 years on president trump, he has only been there two years. old, a veteran, used to be able to split a ticket. you could vote for a democrat if

you seemed good in one area, but that cannot be done anymore in my book. , at: fred in new york republican. some news about the death penalty and supreme court from cnn. supreme court says the execution of an alabama inmate can go forward hours after it was called off. kevin in maryland, i democrat. caller: i want to give them an a+. host: tell us why. caller: because we have a corrupt executive and nothing is going to get done as long as we have mitch mcconnell in control they are ate, but least showing the public what is going on and that is why we elected them. we need somebody to counterbalance all the corruption in d.c. it is the worst i have ever seen it. they are doing a great job and they are speaking up. host: robin in alabama, a

republican. caller: how are you doing this morning? host: doing fine, robin. caller: can you hear me? host: yes, we can. go ahead. calling toas just add to a couple of callers talking about the democrats are just being obstructionist and the thing they need to do is try to get to work together and at 1:00 today, anybody listening to pray on those mountains. we need to pray for president trump. we need to pray for him to do some changes and make some changes and i believe this country -- if this country will get behind him with prayer, this administration will change. i appreciate your time, but i morethe democrats would be

workable to them and not be such obstructionists. host: we will hear from the democrats this morning as they wrap up their retreat at a resort here near washington, d.c. they are holding a news conference on their first 100 days led by the speaker of the house and other democrats. that will be at 11:15 this morning. you can look for our coverage if you go to c-span.org. charlie in ohio, democrat. caller: good morning. a far i give the democrats for effort. let me bring something up about the republican congress. host: a for effort is early, so what do they need to do? caller: they need to protect social security and keep trump from dropping medicaid and medicare. now let me bring up what i

called to say. mccarthy -- what mccarthy said was rich, wasting time. how much time did they waste when they voted to repeal obama care 50 sometimes? how much did that cost? let's do away with ethics. we are republicans, we don't need no stinking ethics, look at our leader. that is my comment, i could go on. host: randy in new york, independent. greta. good morning, thank you for my call. first i want to make a comment. i am listening this morning to both sides talk about separating the kids at the border. let's all step back and remember kids being separated at the border started under the floor as amendment. i am not sure exactly when it was, but both parties have separated children. host: let's focus on the grade

and what you want democrats to do about this issue. caller: i give the new democratic congress probably a c. i don't want to be critical of them, but they have not really done anything yet. , itou gave the list earlier is stuff they know is never going to be taken up in the senate, so it is a total waste of time. ast: we are going to take break and when we come back, we will talk to two former federal prosecutors's, kim wheel and harry sandick will break down -- kimberly wehle and harry sandick will break down the mueller report and the issues at the heart, the legal words you keep hearing about and later on, john rutherford of florida, a key appropriator on the homeland security committee will be here to talk about border security. we will be right back.

[captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2018]] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] >> barbara busch had finally had enough. they were out of the white house. she didn't need to bite her tongue anymore. took offense he at it, that reporters were at her door asking questions about it which was not true. that was just designed to give nancy reagan a little heartburn. and she said to nancy reagan and don't you ever call me again. and she hung up. >> this week on q&a, "u.s.a. today" washington bureau chief susan page on her biography of barbara busch, a matriarch.

>> she said you will never see my diaries. her diaries are kept at the busch library but they are not available for public view until 35 years after her death. and i understood that and i thought she was unlikely to let me see her diaries and at the end of the fifth interview, she said and you can see my diaries. and that was an incredible gift. >> sunday night on c-span's q&a. >> once, tv was simply three giant networks and a government supported network called pbs. and then in 1979, a small network with an unusual name rolled out big idea. let viewers decide all on their own what was important to them. c-spanned on the doors to washington policymaking for all to see. in the age of power to the

people, this was true people power. in the 40 years since, they landscape has clearly changed. there's no monolithic media, broadcasting has given away to narrow casting. youtube stars are a thing. but c-span's big idea is more relevant today than ever. no government money support c-span. it's non-partisan coverage is funded by your cable or satellite provider. c-span is your unfiltered view of government so you can make up ur announcer: "washington journal" continues. host: and we are back to talk about the mueller report and the law. joining us from new york, harry sandick who is the former u.s. here in attorney and studio with us, kimberly wehle who is a former associate independent counsel for the independent counsel ken star. law professor at the university

of baltimore and cbs legal analyst. kim, i want to begin with you on this question of obstruction of justice. define it for us. guest: so obstruction of justice is an attempt to interfere with an ongoing investigation knowingly. so it can be things like tampering with witnesses, threatening a juror, taking steps in one way or the other to thwart or make it difficult for the criminal justice process to function and to do that on purpose. the idea is we don't want people to be able to bully and flout the criminal justice system because we want it to function for the generic public for their safety and for the integrity of the entire process. host: and the definition reads "an act that corruptly or by threats or force or by any threatening letter or communication, influence, obstructs or impedes or endeavors to influence, obstruct

or impede the due administration of justice." when you look at those words, what acts could be considered obstruction of justice? guest: so very broadly worded as you're suggesting by reading it and i'll just read from the now attorney general bill barr's memorandum of june, 2018 where he said obstruction prohibits a range of bad acts such as tampering with the witness or juror, destroying, altering or falsifying evidence and any kind of impairment of the integrity of the decision maker. so his focus is a little bit on the truth finding process. but obstruction can be any action that is going to stop or frustrate or undermine that process. so you think about a prosecution or criminal investigation t about finding -- facts and that comets comes from developing and

collecting documentary evidence, finding witnesss and presenting that evidence before a grand jury and later before what's called a petit jury, the jury that cities and someone did the right thing or didn't do the right thing and then we have a neutral judge that is going to make that determination. so any action that would frustrate the functioning of those gearses the processing of that process, so to speak, could be obstruction of justice if it's done corruptly, that idea is if the person did it on purpose and not by mistakes. so if you're driving to work one day and it turns out that one of the jurors in a high profile trial this front of you and you rear end that juror by mistake and that juror can't do to go to trial that day, that couldn't be obstruction of justice because that was done by mistake. if, however, you pull a juror aside on their way to starbucks and say if you vote yes on this particular defendant, i'm going to come and break your knee caps, that would clearly be an

obstruction in addition to other crimes, the idea of being i don't want this process to function. i want to make it go in a different direction. i want to just let the cards fall where they may and that effort knowing to stop that rocess is a crime. host: harry sandick, i want to get you involved. collusion and conspiracy sit. define them both and then tell us the difference. guest: sure. conspiracy is a legal term. there's a federal statute, more than one that makes it a crime for more than one individuals to work together or two or more individuals to work together to carry out a crime and that agreement itself is a crime of conspiracy. it doesn't matter whether the object of the conspiracy actually works out or people -- four people could plan to rob a bank but if they take preparatory steps, they get the

guns, they get an insider at the bank, even if they didn't succeed in robbing the bank, that's conspiracy. and conspiracy is one of the most commonly charged crimes in the federal system. collusion itself is really a word more than a crime. it's a except has some relevance and anti-trust law but really although people have spoken a lot about collusion in the past year, collusion just means sort of people working together towards something. it doesn't necessarily reflect that a crime has been committed. the crime is conspiracy. and you can have a conspiracy to harm a person or you can have a conspiracy what's in new york called the crime conspiracy to efraud the government. so one of the things that people will be looking for in the mueller report what is does the report say about evidence

conspiracy? does it apparently from the barr letter, it maybe doesn't say that the prosecutors believe there were sufficient evidence to charge a crime. we accept what's in the barr letter, but what evidence was there perhaps short of that sufficient to charge a crime and that's what people will be interested in seeing. host: what about motive? and how does that play, mr. sandick, into conspiracy and collusion? guest: so motive is not something that is typically required as an element of the crime of conspiracy, but motive is useful for prosecutors to explain why people took certain actions. ou know, a person engages in some sort of securities fraud. maybe they did it in order to obtain money. that's the motive. in this case, people have been interested were there steps taken? coordination with russia or with people working on behalf of russia in order to win an

election? so the motive would be to win an election or to get information that's damaging about your opponent in the election. but technically, you don't have to prove a motive in order to prove conspiracy. however, it's very useful if you're trying a case before a jury to explain why these people acted illegally. host: kimberly wehle, could someone be guilty of obstruction without being guilty of the underlying crime? guest: yes. and this, i think, is one element of mr. barr's summary of the mueller report that is a bit confusing because he indicates that he made the decision that there wasn't sufficient evidence to prosecute mr. trump on obstruction because there wasn't any underlying crime that he was allegedly trying to cover up by the obstruction. so if you imagine you have a witness in a trial that knows that you also did something bad,

you committed a crime, you are involved in the robbery, for example. you don't want the witness to implicate you and so you obstruct the justice process by threatening the witness. so that theory would be if you threat then witness just because you don't like the justice system for no other reason, you just want to muck up the process, that would be obstruction even if you're not trying to cover something up. so mr. barr used that, i think, that distinction to conclude that maybe the intent element wasn't there but as a matter of law, you don't actually have to complete the obstruction for there to be obstruction. and if you think about the reason why, i off tell my law students, it's important to think about why we have those issues. we don't why -- want people to -- with e messing it the jury system. you don't need to prove some

additional underlying crime. and i want to make one other thing that's unclear about the mueller report completely. prosecutor's job is not to find out whether there's any evidence of a particular crime, but whether there's enough evidence to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the person committed the crime such that they would be convicted at trial. so prosecutors walk away a lot from situation where is there is some evidence of a crime just they haven't had the slam dunk standard that makes sense to go forward with it. so i think the black and white discussion around full exoneration versus oh, you know, there was conspiracy. hat's a bit of a false dichotomy. because just because a prosecutor decide there's not enough doesn't mean there's zero. so the question is how much will there be in that report if there will be evidence of potential

crimes, just not enough based on mr. barr's determination in his mind for obstruction and not enough from mr. mueller's determination to prove conspiracy with respect to hacking into the d.n.c. servers and conspiracy to basically do a distorted social media campaign leading up to the 2016 election. but those are very discreet issues in connection with the overall story of russia. host: mr. sandick, what do you think? yes, please, go ahead. guest: and i agree what kim said and in fact, one useful way to think about this is according to barr's letter, the mueller report team obtained hundreds of search warrants. for a search warrant, you need to be able to show a judge that there is probable cause to believe that a crime has been committed and that evidence of that crime is in a particular place or e-mail account. maybe not enough to prove beyond

a reasonable doubt and so a good prosecutor wouldn't charge a case unless they were convinced there is proof beyond a reasonable doubt but it's clear -- so what people want to find out what, the public wants to find out what is the underlying evidence is, not just the characterizations of it by the attorney general. and although there are some rules that restrict the types of information that can be shared, grand jury secret circumstances classified information, there still should be considerable room for the attorney general to release a report that allows people to understand basically what happened here. host: to both of you -- what is your opinion about robert mueller who is serving as a special counsel and in that role, him making the decision that he did not want to or he

would not rule on this question of obstruction of justice? kim, go first. guest: why mr. barr felt the need to go in and make that determination. it's unusual for a prosecutor to not do a thumbs up or thumbs down determination like mr. mueller apparently did or did not do but we're in uncharted waters here. there's a big wrinkle with respect to the fact that this is the president of the united states who is in charge of the executive branch and everyone beneath him, including mr. mueller and james comey. that creates some gray area around obstruction that doesn't exist in a normal situation. so the whole reason rod rosenstein appointed mr. mueller, the entire reason ken starr was appointed, i worked on that investigation, leeon in watergate, we see this over and over historically, the reason

that these people are appointed is because the idea that someone would be investigating their own boss and their boss, the president could fire them is a onflict of interest. it's undermining the whole purpose of having mueller in that position to begin with cause barr does answer directly to the president of basketball operations -- president of the united states. -- so the nt political fallout plays for barr when the evidence of obstruction becomes available and the question will be why did you feel a need to not just let this play out in the congress and in the court of public opinion which many people think is the only way to hold any president accountable.

guest: what recommendation he made is a mystery. if he wasn't making a decision, who was he leaving it up to? was he leaving it up to the attorney general? the attorney general didn't exactly say that. he was more ambiguous whereas it would have been easy for him to say yes, mueller asked me to make that call. he said something like well, that's how it works. i get to make the call. which is not exactly a direct answer. and many have thought that to the extent that mueller did punt that he was to use the words, he was punting towards congress. because ultimately, the question of whether to taken a action against the president would be a congressional decision, at least while the president is in office based on existing department of justice policy, which is that a sitting president should not be charged. and the standard for, you know,

oversight of the president, whether that's sensor, or conducting impeachment hearings or anything else is different from the standard of law. their is less relevant and more relevant about what the underlying facts show and collusion might have relevance because congress and the judiciary committee and the house is where those hearings would begin. is entitled to consider proof and evidence that doesn't rise to the level of the crime. in other words, the standard for impeachment is different for the standard for indictment. host: mr. sandick, if this report has evidence of both collusion and conspiracy or do you think it will, and what would be the outcome of that? guest: so it seems likely that there would be some discussion of evidence, who the evidence points to, whether it's somebody

in the administration or not, we don't know. we'll have to wait and see what the report says. but it does seem logical that the judiciary committee needs to look at all of the underlying evidence and then make its own independent determination about whether it needs to conduct any oversight, whether it needs to have hearings, whether it needs to speak to certain -- excuse me, whether it needs to speak to certain witnesses on its own. because you have a different standard and also sort of a different set of obligations. the constitution speaks of high crimes and misdemeanors and although the word crimes is used there, most scholars don't think that requires proof of a crime there are long historical reasons for that but that's not really what the term means. so congress needs look at the fitness of the president, whether he has engaged in conduct that makes him unfit to be president. and so that's the question that congress needs to look at.

and it may well be at the end of thises the answer is no. but the only way they can once their obligations are is to know hat the evidence is. even if the public can't see every word of it. host: ms. wehle, your thoughts on that. guest: they were worried about the leaders of the newly formed united states. they did not want our government, our president, to be able to be influenced by other countries. and so in this instance, we do know publicly there were over 100 contacts between the trump campaign and putin. we know that paul manafort, his campaign manager shared polling data with the russians. we know that trump didn't tell the truth to the public about

negotiations with moscow over a trump tower deal in russia. so that kind of information as harry suggested could bear on this question. listen, is that a problem for american democracy, for national security that there's a tight relationship between trump and putin that really doesn't make logical sense where he's alienate our traditional allies. conspiracy requires an agreement. so what appears to be missing from the evidence for purposes of a crime is the russians and the trump campaign saying hey, guys, let's get together and make this election work for trump. that agreement did not -- there's not evidence of that particular agreement. it doesn't mean that there's not evidence of communications and maybe winks and nods or expectations of some kind of quid pro quo that would bear on the broader question of whether this president should stay in office, first of all. but i think even the bigger

question is what to do in 2020, november, 2020. so there's two pieces here with respect to public disclosure. one what is congress see. and congress can see national security information. the public might not see that. so congress is going to get potentially more than the public gets. in my mind as a constitutional law professor, the bigger question is what's the public going to see and one of the biggest problems with the 2016 election is that the public was not made aware of things like the trump tower negotiations in russia. maybe it would have made no difference but the idea behind an electoral process is all of that comes out so that when we go to the ballot box and cast our votes, we are fully informed and i think it's that element of being fully informed that is absolutely crucial before november of 2020 and that's why i think the mueller report needs to be made public as a matter of the structure of our democratic process. host: professor wehle has a fourth coming book, "how to read the constitution and why."

mr. sandick, i'm going to get some calls here. let's go to raymond in silver springs, maryland, a democrat. raymond, you are up first. go ahead. caller: mr. trump had a press conference where he invited the russians to look for the e-mails , mrs. clinton's e-mails and release them. and how did he know that? secondly, he also help with his son write the letter in airforce one to mislead the investigation as to why he had -- his son had the meeting with the russians. he also fired comey saying because of the russia thing. so how could all of that not amount to anything? that's my question. host: ok, mr. sandick, take that question first and if it doesn't amount to anything, what does it amount to? guest: sure there. are two different aspects of

this. first, with respect to the statement that based on news reporting, president trump and his son worked on together and also the firing of comey, that could be evidence of obstruction of justice. certainly, if you fire somebody in order to try to shut down an investigation and indeed we know that president trump was thinking about that because he told lester holt on nbc news that russia was in his mind and it's been reported that he told russian officials himself the next day that that was part of why he fired jim comey in substance and also creating a false narrative to convey to the public and perhaps the prosecutors. those are the types of things that are evidence of obstruction of justice. and so given that, even in barr's letter, he quotes mueller as saying let the report does not exonerate president trump. once it's because of evidence like that that there was some

evidence of obstruction of justice and hopefully when the reports are released we'll see it. on the first piece, russia, if you're listening, you know, find hillary clinton's e-mails, what's very interesting about that piece of evidence is according to one of mueller's indictments on that day after trump made that speech, folks in russia actually did start trying to intrude on hillary clinton's server. and so that goes to what kim was saying. was there an illegal agreement or was there just conduct by russian state actors to aid president trump? host: well, mr. sandick, is that -- that's conspiracy, that's not collusion? guest: i don't think it would be conspiracy unless you had the illegal agreement. the illegal agreement doesn't have have to be a formal meeting and have people sit in a room together saying let's do that but there has to be some agreement of the agreement is.

it is possible that where the evidence was short here was the evidence of actual coordinated agreement between the campaign and russia. it does seem as if russia did many things to try to influence the election, to try to help president trump get elected. but there's an open question here of whether trump played a part in that, whether any of his advisors or associates played a part in that or if that is all done without any agreement, without any coordination in which case maybe trump's campaign benefitted from some of these acts. from a counterintelligence perspective, that would be highly important for our government to know. for voters in the 2020 election, that might be important information for them to know. and when assessing whether congress needs to take any action, that would be important to know. even if it was ultimately not sufficient to indict anyone.

host: kimberly wehle, when you hear the caller lay out these things, the question of coordinating, do you hear conspiracy, collusion or neither or both? guest: well, i don't have access to all of the information and what i would like to say is, you know, it's like reading a summary of a moby dick or a war in peace, a four-page summer rife that is not going give us a real sense of what the story is and what's what is in the mueller report and in the underlying documents. it's not just the 400 paige report. it's the thousands of other pieces of information that went into the 400-page report. but i believe that mueller is a neutral straight shooter. so with respect to those two pieces on conspiracy, i would assume that there isn't sufficient evidence to prosecute but based on what we know

publicly is deeply, deeply troubling as a matter of the integrity of our electorial and oss people need to remember. the institution just sets out some baselines. if it's not enforced, if there aren't consequences for doing things that aren't consistent with what we want our government to look like, then that stays in our government. so for any kind of tolerance of communicating or sort of having any kind of clues siff -- clues svitolina -- collusive agreement, mr. putin is not happy to help the system in the american way of life, that is quite serious.

and that was 100% clear even from mr. barr easumry that the russians did attack our process. host: diane is on the phone. good morning. caller: i have a question about the law. the law that you cannot prosecute sitting presidents. he does this kind of thing and gets away with it. that means any fascist, any nazi, anyone who wants to rule our government in the wrong way can get away with things for a long period of time. they can cause a lot of destruction. and as far as the senate is concerned, they should be for the people. for what is good for the people and i don't see that. this worries me to death. i've been watching this for two years and i can't understand hue president who has ruled over the

american people can cause all this destruction, put the worst kind of people in there and defend them and get away with it. he walks around like he has a feather on his cap. host: ok, diana, i want to take the first part of your comment. not prosecuting the sitting president. ms. wehle, you go first and then mr. sandick. guest: that is not any rule in any source of the actual law. a statute passed by congress, a case coming out of the supreme court of the united states. none of those exist on whether you can prosecute a president. but within the department of justice and if this memo came down under president clinton when he was you should investigation by ken starr, there was a determination in the memorandum as a matter of policy, we are not as a justice department going to go after a president or indict a president. that has taken on sort of a lure of its own and had so much power

but if that question were to get into the president of the united states, they might not say you can or you can't. but diane is absolutely right. as practical matter, it's a bit of a checkmate. that is duo need have accountability for the president. if it's not going to be through the judicial branch, then it has to be through the political branch for the political branch to function, the information mr. mueller gathered has to be made public. otherwise, we do have one branch of government that basically has no boss. and the people should be the boss. if the people are in the dark, they can't be the boss. and diane is spot on that memorandum has thrown a monkey wrench in how the separation of powers really work. host: mr. sandick. guest: i agree with that and i would add two observations. one is that the policy is that a sitting president can't be charged. it doesn't say anything about what can happen to a president after they leave office.

people will recall president ford pardoned former president nixon about a month after president nixon resigned and he was subject to being prosecuted if he hadn't been pardoned. it was possible. because that policy of the department of justice, not part of the constitution only applies when the president is in office. the other point that i would like to make and i've seen some scholars discuss, particular a lawyer named joshua mats who wrote a book on impeachment last year. tried to say if you tried to impeach a president and fail, in a senses the president comes out stronger than before. so that's why impeachment is not an automatic decision. it has to be -- it's a political decision. it has to be weighed by political actors. what is the right thing to do?

and it might be the case that a failed impeachment would send even a more incorrect message about what is tolerated than an effort toism peach than not trying to impeach at all. host: let's go to christy from florida. caller: i want to get in layman's term the reason why you o not impeach a president. the question i have was looks like the collusion is not going to be beyond a reasonable doubt. so you have "the o.c.." congress men and senators can't talk on the senate floors. ut they have protection.

do they have protection? host: what protection are you talking about, chris? he's gone. kimberly wehle? guest: he could be asking about sort of this notion that as a politician, you make statements and sometimes those statements are going to be taken, you know, in what is that maybe are harmful to certain constituents or misconstrued and that is certainly part of our political and ross part of our political system. but that doesn't mean that because you're in office, some of the things that you do won't pass a red line at some point, right? so whether it be a president obama or president clinton, there's a lot that we tolerate and i think what the question for americans is where's the ine?

those people did not hold their elected leaders accountable. and they slipped into something that was -- didn't look like a democracy and what people don't understand is the structure of our government, that is the fact that no one is above the law, that everyone has a boss in office. that keeps individuals free. that keeps -- that protects our rights. that means they can't discriminate and bully individuals based on arbitrary criteria. so it's easy to say for demps, under clinton, this is an unfair attack on clinton and for republicans under trump, this is an unfair attack on trump. but the bigger question is the overall structure of the government. whoever's directing traffic on the bridge at one given point in time, it's less important than whether the structure of the bridge itself is strong. because if the structure of the bridge falls apart, then everyone goes down and i think it's not just this presidency but also the congress as someone

mentioned that has broken down over the years such that it's not functioning in the way that perhaps the framers designed it to function. and i can talk about that at length but congress is really a problem in this big picture. host: carol in royal oak, michigan, a republican. hi, carol. caller: hi. i'm curious to know if either one of your guests have given any thought to the collusion and obstruction going on secretly by the f.b.i. or if they've given any thought to every president hat gets to choose their own attorney general as in obama choosing his, of course, eric holder and then again, loretta lynch, and now all of a sudden, because trump chose barr and barr passed the test, it's the horrible conspiracy thing, and

that he'll have no problem. and my last comment is our president was a private citizen and he has hotels everywhere and he did want a trump moscow. so what? when he became president, he took over running the country. host: mr. sandick. guest: so i think the reason why the trump tower moscow has become relevant to the discuss is two -- discussion is twofold. the political aspect is that he made various statements during the campaign that he was not doing business in russia or trying to do business in russia to some extent. but it left people with the impression that he wasn't trying to do business there. and we have rules in our constitution in the clause being one of them where we don't allow or shouldn't allow a president to receive payments from foreign

governments. because it either compromises that president or at least creates the appearance of compromise, which is almost as bad. and so that's it think from a constitutional perspective why the trump tower moscow became a significant part of the story. we also know that michael cohen pleaded guilty and was convicted of making false statements to congress about the time line for the trump tower moscow. he has said that he believed that he was or encouraged to make those false statements by the president and by others working with the president. and so that's a significant issue that mueller in his report presumably addresses. so that's why people are interested in that set of issues. again, going back to what kim was saying at the constitutional convention, there was great

concern about foreign corruption. there's litigation in a number of courts about whether president trump even now as president through his hotels including in washington, is essentially receiving money from foreign governments. it may be that it has no impact on his decision making but the constitutional rule, what the framers intended was that we wouldn't have to address the question of whether it was influencing a president because it just wouldn't happen. and presidents in the past have been very careful to try to avoid business conflicts while they were president. so even something as seemingly minor as jimmy carter owning a peanut farm, he was told by government ethics advisors you have to sell your farm because that could influence how you viewed farm policy and he did and we haven't seen that divestment from his business by president trump. host: let's go to joe in east point, michigan, democrat. caller: good morning.

host: morning. caller: the young lady covered several things that i was going to say. the constitution after all as hitler referred to, it's a scrap of pay. how badly do the american people nt to function as a republic quasi democratic way of life? this is a serious time. i'm 83 years old. 83 1/2. am i going to see people in the streets anarchy, guns in hand? is trump going to be the one who calls the generals and says look, i can't leave office or i'll have to move to russia based on the things that i'm facing. is there going to be a cool hitch? could there be a coop here in the united states? we're brainwashed here. i view it like money. what backs our money? it's only as good as they say it is. you know, it's not backed by gold or silver or lead or

anything else. caller: one thing i want to focus on is the concept of trarns transparency. if we go to a used charlotte, it's really important that we get good information as to whether it's functioning well, if the seller doesn't tell us that, we feel wronged and we might be able to get some kind of leave. the presidential election process is the same way. so trump tower moscow, any kind f amoment that needs to be exchanged, that's what we need to know. the other point that i wanted to make with the last caller has to o with this idea of faction.

the framers under the articles of confederation, we just count up votes and the most votes won and that was changed to the republicans form. and the reason that we have representatives in congress is because the framers were worried that we would get so ideally divide that we would become so polarized that people would stop paying attention to what's good for the country as a whole and it would become so tribal and angry that things would go a ittle bit off the rails. i don't think it's pure hyperbill to be worried about that and people like putin is clearly paying off that. there are two conspiracy indictments involving russia one in february of 2018 and one in

july of 2018. the russians conspired to interfere with our elections and they took publicly available data and feed it into individual people's computers and phones, distorting facts so that people would go to the ballot booth and vote in what is that really weren't accurate and they were being manipulated and they didn't even know. that's the kind of thing that regardless of where you are in the political spectrum, you have to be a little bit concerned about that being our democratic process. i personally want my vote to matter. i want to it be informed and legitimate and not influenced by anyone else, particularly non-americans. host: tom in virginia, independent. caller: good morning, and thank you for c-span. i have so much -- for your screener, for your hosts, for all the people you're dealing with. and it's nice to hear these experts on here this morning. that's kind of a gray day out here in virginia.

but i'm kind of confused about something which you might be able to help me out here. my memory is that this whole thing started when they started asking questions of the attorney general and did he meet with the russian ambassador? and he got up a hearing was like well, no, yeah, maybe, and it was leek well, did you or didn't you and there was never a definitive answer which made me think something is going on here and the next thing before that was this general flynn and it just seems to me like there's a lot more going on here than what the president and some members of congress, especially on the right, they're saying about what really has gone on here. i think back to mccarthy and those days when, you know, somebody had showed up to the president's personal residence and had been from a country like china which has just happened, you had mccarthy saying there's a nest of spice. well, i mean what, more do you think can know that there's people showing up and trying to sell access the president's

personal residence? there's a lot more than meets the eye ear and i just wondering why did the president go after the attorney general and start making fun of him and calling him all these names if he had nothing to hide? the attorney general did the right thing he said there's a conflict of interest here and i'm out. he took the honorable thing once he realized the level of what was going on. and i appreciate what you do, c-span. they should get brian lamb one of those medals of honor from the president. host: they already did. presidenteive it from bush, george w. busch. you can go to our website and you can see the honor there. mr. sandick, go ahead and respond to the caller. guest: sure. i mean, i think the caller points out a lot of public reporting about different issues. why did flynn lie to the f.b.i., about his call with russian state figures at the of december of 2016 saying he wasn't talking about sanctions and he was?

why was there maybe inaccurate testimony from jeff sessions before a senate employee in response to some questions to now former senator franken? the truth is we really don't know. the mueller report probably makes sense or at least tried to lay out what the evidence is and then explains whether it can provide some animating principle, some context by these things when you look up in the sky at night and you see stars. but only sometimes can you see a constellation of stars that actually looks like something. and that's essentially what a prosecutor is trying to do. you look at the evidence and you say well, is this all random, sort of unconnected evidence? or is this evidence of some sort of crime where each of these points of evidence can be read in light of each other one? and we don't really know the answer to what mueller concluded. we know that he said his report

was not to exonerate the president on the issue of obstruction of justice. that's pretty serious when you step back, the idea that there would be sort of a close case or a jump ball involving the president and obstruction of justice. that's a very serious matter even if it doesn't lead to an indictment of anyone. even if it doesn't rise to prove to beyond a reasonable doubt and it's something that members of congress can consider as they go about doing their job. and as we've already said this morning, the whole subject of foreign influence over american politics, this would you something that if you go back and read the minutes of the constitutional convention as i happen to do last summer. it's part of a podcast that we host at the firm, you can see throughout the discussion, there was concern. if we had this rule, doesn't that open us up to foreign influence and take over our democracy? and that was believed to be the biggest risk to the

constitutional system that they were creating. so i think that it's important that people try to wait for the evidence to come out, wait for the report to come out but then read it carefully and hopefully, it won't be so redacted that we're not able to make sense of it. host: kimberly wehle, what do you make of mr. mueller putting those words, it does not exonerate him in his report, and what did that force mr. barr to do? guest: well, mr. barr put it in his summary. so obviously, it was an important component and the two of them spoke in advance of how this unfolded. i do think at this point, it's mr. barr's decision as to what to do with the mueller report. but it suggests that we've heard mumblings from the mueller report team that it's not a pure exoneration walk off the stage. there's not a concern here as harry suggested. i think it says a lot that mr. mueller went out of his way to say essentially there is

evidence of obstruction. there's not enough evidence for him to -- for sure to make a determination has to whether it could be prosecuted but there is evidence of obstruction and that obstruction bore upon both clinton's impeachment and nixon's impeachment. both of those presidents had articles of impeachment that included obstruction. so obstruction is front and center on the impeachment platter, so to speak, assuming that that is even considered by the demps. but it matters for the next election because on the crime front as harry suggested that it's the statute of limitations would run. if he gets a second term, he would not be prosecuted after eight years, after a four years. there probably would be crimes that he could be prosecuted for the one -- the only one that we know, assuming there's evidence, the only one we to the about is the campaign finance crime that

he was identified as participating in the southern district of new york. host: is the investigations being done by the southern district of new york, those -- what do you make of those? people say the president should be concerned about those but why and can they go forward while he is president of the united states? guest: so i think he should be concerned about them. those are the -- that investigation and the michael cohen finance campaign investigation led to cohen and even prosecutors endorsing the idea that cohen's payments which were a crime, were directed by the president. they were a little bit coy about whether in fact that amounts to a crime by the president. there's an intent element, a knowledge element as well that you would have to show that president trump knew that this was a campaign finance violation and we don't know whether or not he did. cohen's a lawyer so we presume that he knows the law. but that's why people are pointing to that as an area of

grave concern. now, assuming that the southern district of new york follows the d.o.j. policy, not the law but as a policy within the department for many years about charging a sitting president and one should not charge a sitting president, that raises an interesting legal question. because these crimes occurred in 2016 and maybe you could say the conspiracy continued into 2017 if there was one. and so the statute of limitations is usually five years. but would that statute of limitations be told? would that be sort of paused by the fact that the president is in office? if you can't indict the president under the constitution, which is the theory behind the d.o.j. policy that our system of separation of powers doesn't permit a judge to pass on the criminal activity of a sitting president. and then there's a question of whether that statute of limitations should be paused and not be allowed to expire until after he leaves office?

so if he loses the next election, he would be a private citizen and subject to prosecution if he in fact committed a crime. that's a big if. but then there's also a question if he were re-elected of whether the statute of limitations could be paused in some way. these are novel legal questions that really have never been litigated. the department of justice policy is a matter of great contention. lots of very smart people over many years have said, including saying today that the policy is wrong, that no person is above the law, even a sitting president should be chargeable. and we know that a sitting president can be held accountable in civil court for a tort because that's what the supreme court said in the paula jones case in the 1990's. it's not such a big leap to say the president should be held accountable through a criminal process. but the truth is the department

of justice policy itself will encourage, really prevent prosecutor necessary southern district or elsewhere in the department of justice from going rogue, so to speak, cricking that policy. host: michael, new england, pennsylvania, republican. guest: caller: yes, good morning, greta. host: good morning. caller: long address, thanks for taking my call and thanks for having these experts on this morning. i'd like to get to the question quickly. turf predicate it a little bit but it involves evidence. when the grua agents were indicted by the mueller investigation on evidence provided by the private company crowd strike, which is a third-party non-governmental and the person -- president putin said he would abide by the agreement of 1999 involving crimes, i guess, and under that agreement, i believe it only

governmental entities can provide evidence for indictments. so under the agreement, it appears that the crowd strike evidence would not be admissible in russia. could i be indicted on third-party non-governmental evidence? host: ok. mr. sandick, do you want to take that? guest: sure. you know, when a grand jury hears evidence, a grand jury can hear evidence from any source. sometimes that evidence is evidence from a government agent. so you might have an f.b.i. agent testify in the grand jury about their investigation what, they saw what, they did, why they did it. but you can also have non-governmental witnesses in the grand jury and you do all the time. so for instance, let's say you want to know about whether a person made a particular phone call. the prosecutor issues a grand jury subpoena to verizon, let's

say or at&t and gets those records and puts them for the grand jury. let's say you're doing a financial fraud case you may need securities trading records or bank records. you can go to citibank with a subpoena and say we need these financial records. so i don't think it is the case. and certainly not been my experience that grand jury proceedings are in some way limited to evidence that is particular to a governmental entity. grand jury can consider any evidence as they decide you were the guidance of a prosecutor whether there is probable cause to believe a crime has been committed. host: what is an unindicted co-conspirator? guest: it is someone that potentially was within this agreement that's conspiracy agreement, remember, in order to have a conspiracy crime, the has to be an agreement, but that is not actually named in the indictment. it is not actually charged. it's not one of the people that the government is trying to potentially put in jail for the crime, but it's indicated in the

indictment that that person was actually part of that conspiracy, but for whatever reason, the government did not decide to literally name that person or entity the conspiracy and prosecute them in court. host: what does that mean for the mueller report? guest: well, some people have suggested that as harry was mentioning the michael cohen indictment regarding financial crimes that individual one that was named in the sentencing memorandum regarding michael cone's sentencing that he ever -- michael cohen's sentencing that referred to the president of the united states. it really is a legal matter. it doesn't mean a whole lot because if there's not going to be a charge, they're not anything. the fact that there are unindicted co-conspirator, the keyword there is unindicted. so they're walking around like regular people and so it's not that -- it's not that sort of legally significant. as far as in a mueller report,

we do know is that in those two conspiracy indictments and the caller mentioned the one involving the russian military intelligence investigation, mueller decided there was not sufficient evidence. he could not add americans to those conspiracies. so there were conspiracies between russian who attacked our electoral process. we had two years, lots of evidence. what he decided cannot add americans but that's as far as we know from the barr summary is a very narrow, narrow conclusion. it certainly doesn't answer all the many, many looming broader questions about collusion which as harry indicated it's not a legal term. it's a conversational term to mean coordinating with russia. host: and the penalty for collusion? guest: the penalty for collusion would be a political one. because there's no crime of collusion. the penalty for collusion would be listen, we want to have a

squeaky clean or almost squeaky clean government where people that are elected to office are working on behalf of the american voters the american citizens, not for their own interest not for the interest of hostile foreign powers. that's a problem. host: let's go to dan, independent, in oregon. hi, dan. caller: i would like to talk about the secret vote in congress and getting away from the public vote and going back to the secret vote. because look what happened to john mccain for having to go out there. and they will be primary by their own people. and i also believe we ought to go the fairness doctrine too. thank you very much. host: dan, i'm going to leave it there. i want to talk about the prosecution of julian assange. 1984, not being prosecuted under the espionage act. but instead, this 1984 law that charging him under the computer law and abuse act. kimberly wehle, what's your

reaction to this charge and is it a threat the first amendment? guest: that's something i might hand off to harry because i have not studied that particular question. host: harry sandick, what do you think? do you any reaction to it? guest: sure. i think people were understandably concerned before the charges were announced about whether assange would be prosecuted for something that looked a lot like news gathering. we don't want news gathering. in other words, a reporter gets a call from a source that tells them something that's really important, something we would like to know. think about the pentagon papers back during the vietnam war and we don't want to see reporters prosecuted for doing their job. what they charged here though is something different from that. it's under this statute that makes it a crime to essentially hack into a computer. and that's what they've alleged assange to have done in coordination with chelsea

manning. and so that would be a different type of crime nan what some people originally feared, namely a violation of the espionage act which raised the risk of are we prosecuting people for news gathering-some so the computer fraud and hacking statute that we're talking about, that is a statute that's charged all the time. it is a somewhat unusual statute in its operation and part of the problem is that we have such rapid changes in technology. we've seen this in many different areas involving computer crime and how search warrants are obtained and just speaking at a very high level, these statutes are passed when technology is in one someplace and over time, technology changes, sometimes very quickly and the law remains the same. so it would be useful for congress across a variety of areas, not that this is necessarily a top priority, but to revisit this statute and other statutes that involve both

computer crimes and the collection of evidence so that there can be a better fit between the technology and practices of people today the charges against assange are fairly narrow and relate to this unsuccessful acting. is this just the tip of the iceberg? , werere charges coming these the only brought in order to get him arrested? having asked the question, we don't know yet. there are rules about extradition, when you bring someone from a foreign country to the united states to face trial, the courts have to approve that decision. they have to be told that the crimes are. beassange is going to prosecuted for more than just this one count, that decision will be made before he comes here. it he can't be brought here and then once he's here face 12 new

charges. it will be interesting to see whether there are new charges and what happens in the u.k. here, what the evidence turns out to be in if he is convicted. thank you both for the conversation. we appreciate it. we are going to take a break. we come back, we will turn our attention to border security grid of we will talk to congressman john rutherford. we will get your reaction to the arrest of julian assange. we will be right back. >> book tv his live weekend coverage of the los angeles times festival of books, from the campus of usc.

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>> washington journal continues. we are back with congressman john rutherford of florida. the president said he wants a tougher direction on border security. guest: i think we do need to situatione border from two angles. i bifurcate the situation. i think we do have the security of the border, the other is the emigration policy and law that is encouraging individuals to migrate in a dangerous way. as a former sheriff, i have put out a lot of security plans were different operations.

security plans are always a multi layered process. you deal with personnel, you deal with technology, also barriers like a wall. all of that, its leaders. to visitopportunity the southern border. we traveled from san diego to the rio grande valley, looking at the security aspects of the border. what i saw was as far as san looked likezona, it things were pretty well in hand. replacement,ome fencing, things were not very well designed. around arizona,

they had drones, the local enforcement was working together amazingly well. they shared intelligence and data and information. they had all the surveillance necessary. when you got past that going had world war ii balloons in the air. they had to come down when the wind hit. some real challenges in the area. we have to address the security issue. theave to address immigration laws that are encouraging these people to come to the united states and try to enter through these ports of

entry. house floatede the idea of taking migrants they have arrested and then putting them in sanctuary cities as a way of punishing those cities. do you think that is a smart idea? guest: i do not. i think we need to follow the agreement. a judge from california has helped to exacerbate the situation at the border. ruled on this in 2015. agreement, it grew out of a case involving an unaccompanied minor who was detained the border. there was a case brought.

case wasement of that they would not be detained longer than necessary. they would get them released as quickly as possible. standards ofeate care for them in their detention. they would be released to a guardian.legal did, she was an unaccompanied minor at the border. expandedjudge did, she that to children accompanied by a mother that was accompanying a juvenile. now, you hear the traffickers

and drug cartels, those who want to traffic these individuals, those who want to get into the country illegally telling these migrants to get a child and bring them with you. that is your visa. ruled that releases quickly as possible met 20 days. she put a number on it. they know that if they come with a child, they will be incarcerated, held for 20 days, released in the country. that is their visa into the country. see a 2000%e increase in the number of accompanied children.

if you watch the video of the border, what you see is migrants running from them. they are running to them. they know how catch and release works. they are not trying to avoid cvp. transportedually be , get into the system and be released into the country. host: let's go to calls. john you've got to listen and talk to your phone please. go ahead. inler: my question is regards to the financial aspect of who is supplying the financing for the migrant caravans to, not only from the drug cartels which we've alluded

to, but in the united states? are they getting financial risk for death support? guest: someone is financing some of this. as you see, they are on buses that someone is paying for. there is some organization to this. i will tell you an interesting fact. last summer iras believe it was. i was surprised to learn there are more hondurans in america then honduras. i was surprised to hear that 20% of the honduran gdp is remittances back from the united states. there is an economic driver behind this. they get into the country and work and send money

back home. 20% of the gdp of honduras is from the united states. host: richard is an montréal. caller: good morning. 8, 97% of democrats voted against the resolution that would condemn illegal emigrants from voting in american elections. that's why the democrats don't want border security. they want illegals to vote. why isn't this being reported? guest: thank you for making that public. they want to allow 16-year-olds to vote. that was voted down.

they want to bring emigrants in and then at some point allow them the right to vote. ron is watching in florida. caller: hello. we have the largest in course rated population in the free world. when people serve their time and get out of jail, they are unable to get high-end jobs. competing withre illegal emigrants for work. isn't that a form of double jeopardy? when did our government begin to serve people that came into the country more than people that serve time? it creates a conveyor belt of crime. do whatever back to you did to get in jail when you can't find work. thank you very much for your

time. as a former sheriff, the people returning to the community and making them successful was one of my number one priorities. if they come back to this community and we don't find ways to make them successful and help them be successful when they come back, they will go back to what they know. that is drug dealing for most of them. we had a very robust program in jacksonville dealing with reentry. communities, they give you a bus ticket back home. you get off the bus with your close and your on your own. we wonder why they fail.

a seminar to help them integrate back into the community. specialists who would find employers are willing to hire convicted felons. we are trying to help those individuals. that's why we need to change these immigration laws. we need immigration. i am not opposed to immigration. in as to be done controlled and legal way. how do you respond to this bloomberg op-ed? the fixation on the migration has compromised other security efforts.

guest: that is part of the problem with these caravans. what they have done is overwhelmed the system so that we -- they may have real asylum needs and they get overlooked. when you look at the numbers, unaccompanied juveniles coming to the border who get asylum out of all of them is about 21%. for adults, it's 6%. mass getting lost. that's were the danger is. issue, if people don't think the drugs crossing

the border is a problem, i challenge them to meet with me in jacksonville. that's the morgan. i can show you where our medical examiner has done more autopsies than anysed teenagers other county in the state of florida. this is a serious problem. it's got to be stopped. host: we will go down to new orleans. caller: good morning. i've been picking up on what the gentleman was saying. let me say something that will be critical to my mindset. i was 17 years old. i went into the military. when i turned 18 to vote, i had served a tour and a half in vietnam. i came back to the united states

and the first thing that ambushedto me, i got by people who didn't believe we should of been there. as far as people are concerned , i decidedp in jail i couldn't work in law enforcement. everything was against the law. this thing about people not being able to read habilitative themselves is false. i was stationed in fort bliss. that is junk. say 100,000 people are at the border. there, that ist nowhere near 100,000 anything. anything about ms 13 the way they put it in the news,

it would be tattooed on everybody. you need to get off that. not overrunning our borders. thank you for your time. guest: i want to thank you for your service to the country and your community as a law enforcement officer. i know the sacrifice that takes. i will say this, the videos that , i see of these caravans don't think that's where the ms 13 members or the drug cartels are going to be spotted. they are running between the ports of entry. evp are running from this instead of toward them like the crowds you see on television. we will go to chicago.

go ahead. toler: it is not illegal cross the border or present at a checkpoint. it is not illegal to request asylum. that doesn't make it illegal. you said you were a sheriff in jacksonville. what should you do to stop the trafficking, the chinese and russians are coming there to have citizenship. would you be ok if hondurans did that? is that more controlled way to do things? it's not illegal for people to come to the border and request asylum. guest: there is a process for doing that. individualshese when they cross the border, there running to the cvp. they are not trying to get away.

they understand the process. the understand it better than most americans. that's why they know about catching release. they know they will be released into the interior of the country. we had a situation in jacksonville. populations illegal in your community, living and working. here is the challenge. they create a subculture that does not want to be contacted by the police. they will not contact the police. will praythose who upon that subculture. some men discovered they could rob these individuals. there were several mexicans

staying in hotels. they would start robbing these folks. if they robbed them inside their , then these individuals got so emboldened they shot them in the leg. that's how the situation came to my attention. there was a subculture of crime going on that wasn't being reported in my community because thats in this subculture is protecting itself they were calling the police.

i created an international affairs unit to start working inside that community, to work with churches to get inside that community. i let people know, if you are we're not of a crime, going to ask your immigration status. that's not a sanctuary city. inside myence is jail, if you came to jail, by the icen trained agents to use their data.

the difference was they had been arrested for another crime. the sanctuary city is where you , you don'tme in report them to ice. deportation, we began the process on literally thousands. host: welcome to the conversation. i think the best way to is tot the immigration continue aid to the countries of origin for many of these people like honduras. i think they are struggling there from hunger and famine and war.

causes,n reduce those we can prevent the amount of illegal immigration. guest: i agree with that. states is the united doing a lot of work in central america with colombia, with honduras, i can tell you one of the things i was most impressed they had police officers. they went through a program called the purge. they vetted all of their police. they terminated about 5000 because they were breaking more laws and they were enforcing. that, violent crime went down. that tells you the situation.

you also have to look at the courts and prosecution. it's an organization, an international organization that is gone in to help go through and point out the corruption in court. hondurase better in than they have been. why are these hondurans coming with children to america? decision in of the 2015 to allow accompanied miners that they fall under the floor as agreement. that was a mansion -- massive expansion of the agreement. i am a veteran, a

christian, a true independent. i want you to know that it bothers me to see you try to make people fear those that are i hope of their lives, when you go to church on sunday, you and the other christians stop and think about what you were doing. you are using other people to advance your political party. the entire world. host: in what way? caller: i have been watching you lately. is nothingdent party but gop trying to crowd your airways. thank you and have a good day. understandn't really the fear aspect. i haven't tried to give

desperate. everyone. tot: we will move on illinois. forer: i want to thank him being there in speaking the truth. should be voicing their opinion through their heart. the reason i'm calling is about the service. the government is allowing these to pop up through the years. i had to deal with these workers. they must start taking the documents they get from workers and submit them to the irs quarterly. the company is using the temp services to pay illegal workers and keep the wages down.

that is really what i want to say. services are keeping the low-wage workers down. i can tell you, congress is looking at this issue. year, at the end of congress, we actually had a bill that would've secured the that was $25er, billion. that would've been used for the man pair we spoke of. technology,, the the barrier, all of that would have been there. that, $1.8 billion

-- dreamers would've received legal permanent residency so they can work, pay taxes. they had to do it legally. the key is we have to be able to migrate. they need to be in the system legally. control it so we don't have a negative impact on wages for american workers. host: thank you for the conversation, we appreciate you being here. reactionome back, your to the news of the arrest of julian assange. the phone line numbers are on your screen. we will be right back. >> the c-span buses stopping at

middle and high schools across the country to present awards to the winners of our video competition. throughout the month, you can see the top 21 winning entries every morning. documentary along with those honorably mentioned. >> barbara bush and finally had enough. they were out of the white house. said that she took offense at it. reporters were asking questions about it. she said to nancy reagan, don't you ever call me again and she hung up. >> this week, usa today.

chief on her biography of barbara bush. >> at the very beginning, she said you will never see my diary. they are capped at the bush library. they are not available for public view until 35 years after her death. i thought she was unlikely to let me see her diaries. , shee end of the interview said you can see my diaries. that was an incredible gift. night on q&a. >> washington journal continues. we will finish up with your reaction to the arrest of julian assange. the new york times have the -- has the headline.

do you agree or disagree with the new york times and the way they frame him this morning? extradition, this could take years to happen. a court case await some here in the united states. skirt firsts to underent concerns here in jeff sessions, the former attorney general, there was an investigation into how the anti-secrecy organization founder could be charged without running afoul of press freedom. this is how it came about.

the washington post notes this law that they are trying to prosecute him under is from 1984. it's the computer fraud and abuse act. it's the premier anti-hacking statute. the 35-year-old legislation has been dogged by critics, it is so gone afters innocuous behavior.

good morning. what is your reaction? commenting. i think whether he gets persecuted or not, this is great. up what the democratic party is doing. i don't think there was nothing wrong with it. stuffre hiding a lot of that we don't know nothing about. a guest on this program is a professor at george washington university. morning, this washington will crucify assange.

this is what the editorial board is arguing today. this case does not jeopardize the first amendment or journalists because he stopped being a journalist when he accessed that computer and committed a crime. what are your thoughts? good morning to you. caller: good morning. i think the real crime was committed by chelsea manning. with her security clearance and the release of thousands of classified documents. there is some hypocrisy here, especially on the charge against

julian assange. i don't think there is a lot of difference between what's going on there and the pentagon papers. manningst to clarify, was pardoned. the obama administration said he was serving his time and let other jail. caller: can you imagine having a top-secret clearance and doing all that and then escape with a little bit of prison time? i was in the dod. we would lose our jobs, our pensions, serve prison time. imagine chelsea manning getting off as lightly as she did. that if you believe chelsea manning committed a crime by accessing that computer

and the government can prove he helped him access the computer, is he not part of the crime? to be proven.s i'm just giving you my feelings on what i've heard. julian wasnding is just accepting the information that chelsea was sending it to him. thousands and thousands of documents. host: dennis is in florida. caller: good morning. he would want to come over here to tell his story and shed some light on recent history. host: what do you mean by that? caller: he's got a story to tell. there's the opportunity, the biggest story of recent history

over whether or not there were elements of our political parties cooperating with agents from other countries throughout the world. he may hold the key to the truth. help me with your town? caller: i was calling about julian assange. when hillary clinton was secretary of state, she committed treason when her and bill clinton went to russia and he did a speech for $500,000. uranium.20% of our 148 million she got dollars.

i would like to know how much obama got. she couldn't have done this alone. i would like to know where i could call and get my share of the money. why should her and obama get to keep the money. if it was sold, why do they get to keep all the money. karen is in washington. caller: good morning. pained attention to some of the information that has been coming out recently about a whistleblower group that julian assange was a part of. i haven't been aware of this until just recently. there were several members of

secure drop who have died mysteriously. it's a little unclear if the group was infiltrated and the people who were members were they died ofther unusual causes. the important thing that i take away from it is it tells me we need a better mechanism for whistleblowers to be able to communicate information about wrongdoing in the government. if we don't have that, it's hard to understand how we keep our government on the straight and narrow. i think when all is said and , at the end of the day it may be a situation where what he

did it was something that we need all journalists to do. he will be prosecuted for it. he may be deserving of a pardon at the end of the day. this is something margaret sullivan writes about. the method by which julian assange accessed this , techniques that journalists use. in thetes in her column context of a criminal conspiracy , using encryption, protecting a he employedity, journalistic practices. there is where there could be great area when prosecuting him and a threat to the first

amendment. lisa is in tampa florida. caller: good morning. i am kind of on the fence. the firstin amendment, the freedom of speech, the press. i think there is something going on. he's aboveboard ingested journalists. what he did was clearly breaking the law. under the guidelines of what they are showing us. everyone is innocent until proven guilty. twistedhe's actually the first amendment to be able to break the law. caller,with your last there should be better mechanisms for whistleblowers to come out. we have an imperfect government.

we need that way of bringing out the bad to get rid of it. i really think a lot of people are going overboard. i believe he is a criminal. the opinion pieces that have surfaced, is he a journalist or a thief? he is about to face music. , his real sins was preventing hillary clinton from becoming president. he got what he deserved. don't fall for his sympathy fleet. we are getting your reaction. let's go to seth in tennessee. caller: good morning.

you are handling this situation very well. what i would like to know is when wikileaks publishes how -- to get his bank records. host: ok. terri is in indiana. caller: good morning. corrupt oure how government is. we need more people like assange. it's terrible the way it is. after they pass the alcohol laws, the crime weight when 70%. there were no drug gangs until they passed the drug laws.

proved that because nothing but murder, crime, and corruption. they repeal the law, the crime goes down. host: we are getting reaction to the arrest of julian assange. does the first amendment protect julian assange? failed plea a bargain in 2017. he offered to help some cia files they were publishing and it document dump. collapsedmitigation after they were revealed some sensitive cia hacking techniques.

william is in jersey city. caller: how are you doing? i wanted to make a comment. i don't have an opinion either way about the chelsea manning situation.

--sounded like were you are she is a woman, not a man. i just wanted to make sure that you have her gender appropriate. was referring to bradley manning at the time, he was working with julian assange. it reads like this in the washington post. the ended a socket with crusader beyond their reach. u.s. prosecutors confirmed for the first time they charged him last year with conspiring with an analyst to obtain secret u.s. documents. they were published online. he is accused of helping chelsea manning then known as bradley ofning for cracking government password. michael is in maryland.

caller: thanks for having me. support what he's done it i think it's a great thing. the videolook back at he showed us with the helicopter pilots, they were clearly not armed. that's really just a horrible thing to do and be involved with. something andid told the country what was going on. the whole thing with bradley thinkg or whatever, i that whole thing is mentally ill. i respect what he did. you have to stand up and say let's write. that's what being an american is all about. americans were made aware

of the nsa surveillance program because of wikileaks. caller: exactly. i totally support that. they have been known for honesty. the new york times worked with them. hopefully, c-span has some more. i like their news broadcast. jane is in california. clear: i wanted to make that wikileaks is a publishing company. there is a love that protects that. they did not break any laws. to breaknal intent is in or create a password. this is a made-up charge. that they exposed election fraud

is in or mislead important. in virginia.is what do you think? caller: the crime he is being indicted on has a five-year statute of limitations. i think it was the washington post address that. under the federal law, prosecutors faced a deadline to file charges within eight years of the 2010 disclosures. according to the indictment, they did so just under the deadline. caller: they are trying to defend it as a terroristic act. host: ok. jared is in georgia. i think the trump

administration needs to leave him alone. i don't know if they are trying to get information out of them. i want to know who leaked it to him. i would like to know that. trump should leave him alone. paul is in las vegas. caller: good morning. goes, is julian assange don't believe he should be prosecuted. prosecuted, so should all the pundits on tv. tv and turned on out to be false information. prosecuted, they should be prosecuted also for

receiving information and broadcasting it. host: the president was asked yesterday about the news of the arrest. stillestion was do you love wikileaks? >> he said i know nothing about wikileaks. kim is in minnesota. i am kind of amazed at how people are trying to gloss over the issue of mass surveillance and the common denominator with edward snowden and julian assange. me, it's just another fine mess the two big money parties got us into. it's keeping people fighting. that's what i wanted to say. how are you?

host: what do you think about the arrest? i think the doj and the trump administration will use assange to get information on the democratic surveillance. they will use that to help them indict them. i think there is a lot going on behind the scenes we are not aware of. the papers this morning are reported it will take years him.tradite the bbc reports this morning that the labour party leader is saying he should not be extradited to the united states. the washington post says more charges are probably forthcoming. they have 60 days to present their case to the government.

the region of prosecutors have been in touch with prosecutors in new york who are probing the disclosure

steve is in pennsylvania. good morning to you. caller: good morning. they can for taking my call. mention theto press, the free press can receive classified information and can release classified information from sources. they don't have to dive folds their sources. thest want to correct previous caller. said he changed his sex to female. ast's why they refer to her chelsea manning. he changed his identity. i wanted to clear that up. thank you for taking my call. host: michael is in new york. caller: i was calling about the person that got upset and

offended chelsea manning before. that's why you don't need transgender in the military. they are too touchy. host: thank you all for your phone calls. we will be back tomorrow morning at 7:00. enjoy enjoy your friday, enjoy your weekend. ♪ house democrats have been holding her pleas in the last two days in leesburg, virginia. at the conclusion, democratic leaders will be speaking with

reporters. that is set for 11:15 and you can see it live here on c-span. >> the complete guide to congress is now available, it has lots of details about the house and senate for the current session of congress. contact and biographical information about every senator and representative, plus information about congressional committees, state governors, and cabinet. the 2019 congressional directory is a handy spiral-bound guide, order your copy from the c-span online store for 1895. -- $18.95. cory booker officially kicks off his presidential campaign this weekend with a rally in newark, where he served as mayor from 2006 2013. at that rally is set for tomorrow.