no government money supports c-span. it's nonpartisan coverage of washington is funded as a public service i your cable or provider. on television and online, c-span is your unfiltered view of government so you can make up your own mind. ♪ >> washington journal continues. host: joining us from new york is rob smith, a republican strategist who also serves as a spokesperson for the organization turning point usa. good morning to you. >> good morning. takes aur recent op-ed look at the back-and-forth that has been going on between vice president mike pence and pete of indiana. can you talk about why you wrote this? op-ed.ote the as part of my duty for turning point usa i went to a conference we had in chicago. as a gay man i was a little

unsure, as a conservative i was thrilled. vice president mike pence is going to be the speaker and i had to unpack why i felt so uncomfortable with going to an event where the vice president was a speaker. so i realized that i believe that mike pence was an advocate for conversion therapy. wanted to unpack why i believed that so i did my research and what i found when i did my research is that that is th absolute lie and my based on a complete distortion based on some language in a bill that he made when he was a governor and i have seen this lie repeated over and over again in the media. so a lot of that piece was about coming to terms with the fact that that was a lie and though there are some pretty strong critiques that i can be made with my party when it comes to lgbt writes it's just absolute ts, it's just

absolute fiction that the vice president supports conversion therapy. i have to argue with a lot of people on the left and some of the critiques are valid but this myth ision therapy just based on absolute lie. host: how did the myth come into being in the first place? >> this is what happened. there is language from the ryan white care act back when he was governor pence. he basically said that he wouldn't reauthorize funds for this care act unless there were funds that were dedicated to "hanging the "sexual behaviors of people likely to be infected with hiv. people took that language and said that it means conversion therapy which is a distortion of the language. changed sexual behavior can mean anything from safer sex practices, more condom use.

all of these different things. lgbt activists on the left took that line, distorted it and they repeat the lie over and over again. that sentenceake and say it is widely interpreted to mean conversion therapy and then they will define conversion therapy in the pieces so that people who are not particularly media literate will take it to mean that the vice president at one time supported conversion therapy. and i have seen that done over and over again and still to this day there are people that believe that miss. when you have mayor pete buttigieg who is running for the democratic nomination for president, when you have him picking this fight with the vice president and you have him advocating for gay rights in that way, it's based on a lie. what i think it does as a gay christian is that it moves us further apart instead of bringing us together. talk a little bit about

the fact that this back-and-forth between the vice president and the mayor -- how that affects -- that this is an issue to begin with, what do you think about having an issue? >> what i think the left is doing is they are making this an issue where nothing really exists. what the left really wants to do to gays and lesbians is they want to make them another victim group. i want to make them another victim group because gays and lesbians right now the lgbtq devotes 82% for democrats. that's a really big number. they want to make sure they keep that 82%. if they can convince the vast majority of the lgbt community in america that they are going to be under some kind of continued danger under a republican presidency that they have that vote. and that's what i think the goal is with this conversation right now.

us, (202)guest with 748-8000 republicans. democrats.001 (202) 748-8002 independentss. when it comes to the trump administration itself, how do you think gays have been treated and what has to go forward especially in this campaign? what should the ministration be saying? >> as of right now you have an prettytration that is much is spearheading a global initiative to decriminalize homosexuality. on the left say right now that america is so bad for lgbt people. there are places in the world where gays and lesbians are killed in the street. were there are thrown off rooftops and hung in the streets. where it is criminal to be gay. where people are thrown in prison for being gay.

i'm proud to support administration that is spearheading this initiative to decriminalize homosexuality worldwide. have to get all, we back to talking about the fact that lgbt americans are not single issue voters. we are of various races, genders. we are not a monolithic group of people. and for me personally, my red pill moment, when i became a conservative, is when i saw the the postaction to orlando terrorist attack when a terrorist walked into a gay bar in orlando, florida and killed 49 days and lesbians. that was a devastating attack on our community. and the only people that were forceful enough to call this out for what it was were people on the right. americans that lgbt

want to be safe. we want to know that the western way of life that we live that accepts gays and lesbians more or less right now has integrated us into the fabric of this society. you want to make sure that you have an administration that will protect us, that will call out this stuff for exactly what it right nowat i think is going on in the left is i think that they are afraid to call these things out. i don't gay american, necessarily feel safe with democrats in charge. host: rob smith is with a point -- is with the group turning point usa. for those that may not be familiar, what is that? >> turning point as an organization that is basically building the next generation of conservative leaders on college campuses all across the country. our slogan is big government sucks. what we're trying to do is we want to make it safe for college students on college campuses to

be open about being conservatives. that is ok for them to be conservative. age, i self,nd people call me a white supremacist, people, trans-phobic, people call me racist, self hating, all of these things specifically because i subscribe to conservative beliefs. what we are trying to do is create a space on college campuses where these kids can be open and honest about their beliefs because the college campuses right now are the battlegrounds for the culture wars. that's where people learn their politics. so manywhere they learn things. we want to make sure that conservative principles are represented on college campuses. host: does it surprise you that there's a story out today that there is a christian university in indiana that has invited the vice president to come speak and that is drawing a lot of protest from the university because of that invitation? >> it doesn't surprise me at all

because like i said, people have bought into the myth so much. what i think that really boils down to and this is a conversation that i have a lot. we do speaking engagements. we are on campuses all across the country. -- when i was in chicago at the event the vice president spoke at, i talked to some of the kids and there are some kids that are trying to reconcile their support of gays and lesbians and support of lgbt writes with their more rights with-- lgbt their more traditional christian beliefs. what i say to them is we need to start talking more about what joins us together as christians instead of what separates us and i think that right now a lot of those students want to protest because he doesn't adhere to what they believe are the christian beliefs they want to it here too.

and that's ok. this is america. but i think that we need more conversation, not less. you need to hear more points of view, not fewer. and an issue that we have with the left right now is not that -- this is america. everybody can believe what they want to believe. that's what makes this country amazing. we have a lot of people that would rather shut down opposing ideas and viewpoints rather than hear them out and discuss them. that's what i think the major problem is going on today. from our first call comes gaithersburg, maryland. democrat line. you're on with our guest, rob smith. go ahead. caller: hello? host: you're on. go ahead. caller: hello? host: you're on with our guest. go ahead. caller: hello? host: we're going to put you on hold. we are going to go to gary and mckeesport, pennsylvania. caller: hello? host: gary?

go ahead. caller: your guest was talking terrorizing or creating fear among the lgbtq's. you can extrapolate that to pretty much everybody else. commercials,the the campaign commercials here, it was basically vote for us or the republicans will take your health care or vote for us or the republicans will take your social security. and like that. it's basically fear mongering is what it is. it's gotten to the point where hate speech and white nationalism and things like that are the new epithets really. political epithets. host: ok. we will let our guest respond. i absolutely agree.

you made the point that these terms like white supremacist, white nationalists, racist. it's almost like they're used so much that i almost start to mean nothing anymore. when you have somebody like me or candace owens or charlie cook or any of these people who are really just conservative thinkers, when you have people throw out that kind of language. number one, the language is offensive and incendiary, but the language is meant to shut down conversation. the language is meant to shut down opposing viewpoints. and i think you are absolutely right that there's a lot of fear mongering that goes on. too much fear mongering goes on on both sides. i always advocate for more conversation, not less. more ideas, not fewer. more discussion. i think that is the only way we going to move forward from this really specific point in history

that we are at right now. host: in texas, republican line. tony, go ahead. caller: first of all i have to congratulate c-span on bringing on the gentleman like this. somebody over there clearly had some courage. they need to be congratulated. i'm a black man. i'm 63-year-old. i have been a democratic presidential voter since jimmy carter. i voted for jesse jackson when he ran. i even voted for hillary although i didn't want to because i believed exactly what the media told us about trump. i knew nothing about him as well so i voted for hillary. i'm glad she lost. man reminds me -- if martin luther king could see him, he would say we have arrived where you should be judged by the content of your character. but you get a lot of hate speech. this gentleman knows what i'm talking about. he comes he is black. he doesn't fear the police officers from killing him. the lesbian and gay community want to be victims. he's right.

i've been black all my life. everybody wants to be a victim but they don't want to be black. try being black in america when you have two, all the things that we go through each and every day including up until today. we don't all consider ourselves victims. we don't even get victimhood status when we deserve it. i don't blame vice president pence. i don't blame him -- these people are crazy out here. the left is crazy. don't meet with women who are not your wife. i'm a businessman, i don't meet with women anymore in a one-on-one. i don't do that. i don't associate with women outside of office hours. i go home. i don't do any of those things because you can be accused of anything. and of course you are target. he's a target. simply because he doesn't agree with their accusations that everyone is a victim of the republicans. host: ok.

we will let our guest respond. number one, that's a really good compliment. i appreciate it. i'm very thrown by that. he makes a really good point. there is a reason that i don't particularly find myself a very controversial figure. i'd also getting any of these things that i'm saying are controversial. as a matter of fact, i worked hard to not use incendiary language. but the reason why people like me whether they are black conservatives or gay and lesbian conservatives are so controversial is that both of these groups are -- have had this victimhood status drummed into their head. it has been going on as long as i have been alive and i'm sure the gentleman that called in can go back even further than that. we are seeinghat and what i'm really excited to z --rt of millennials, jen

saying we canare live without having these things completely define every aspect of our being. we can live without having these things define every aspect of our politics. and i really do think that african americans in general in this country, one of the reasons why i'm doing what i'm doing as far as the part of the movement and being open about being a black conservative, you can't have any political power in the country when 90% of your vote goes to one party. i think african-americans that have been voting democrat for all of their lives and we see what the policies have done for us over the last 50 years which is actually not much. i also believe it's really important to pass policies that support business owners, that support job creators. people that are actually bringing the jobs within the communities. is why so many african-americans are moving to

the republican party. specifically african-american males. out there on the road a lot and i talked to the people and i talked to a lot of young black men that are coming over to conservatism because they are business owners and i think that's really important. but i would like to thank the color for his complement. i really appreciate that. host: from washington state. democrats line. you are on with rob smith. caller: good morning and thanks for c-span as always. smith, i'm a democrat. i'm almost 85 years old. i'm also a disabled veteran who spent 30 years in the military and i lived among and worked among people of all sorts throughout that time. came to accept an off a lot of people. people. lot of farming days would never have expected. i have openly gay friends and i can tell you that over the span

of my lifetime there have been tremendous improvements in the lot of most of our citizens. i'm a democrat. -- david eisenhower. that's a long time ago. i'm a democrat and you define me differently from the way that i think -- mr. trump in the white house does the same thing. by demonized every day people who don't have a single clue. who have never walked in a democrats shoes. who has never striven to make this a more equitable world for everybody. folks, white folks they did not mix. you didn't talk to each other. you avoided each other in every way. in 1960 i was a scoutmaster for three years. had two more years to go.

the phone rang in my office. i answered. it was a woman obviously because of the tone of her voice she was black and she asked of her son could be a member of the troop i told her of course. bring him over to our meeting. that night the boy started the meeting. i had talked to him for that. paperwork so they could get merit badges and the like and comes a knock at my door. and it was a woman standing there. a very very large woman. chargedrom my desk and across the door, had open, should her hand, welcome turkish i asked her where her son was. she said to me, you know he's black. i said ma'am, did i ask that question? she said what will the boys think? i said bring him in, let's find out. i took hair out in the meeting room and asked the boys if anyone knew this new young lad. and asked if they would like to have a member of the troop.

and the hands went up. and in southwest texas in 1960i was getting questions from blacks and whites and -- how can you do this? host: we will let our guest respond. that -- i i think think that what you're saying from the comment in the story is you think that republicans and democrats kind of identify each other a little bit too harshly. i'm saying that liberals are bad and democrats are bad and you guys are saying republicans are bad i think there's a point there. we like i said, i think that need to have more conversations across the aisle. i'm harshly critical not necessarily of democrats and liberals but what i like to call leftists. gothe leftists of the world to the events that i have on college campuses and have no

desire to do anything but shut the event down. scream, shout, posters, bullhorns. all of that stuff. those people i'm very harshly critical of because i think that they are getting in the way of democrats and republicans or conservatives and liberals actually having a conversation about how we can get together and help of this country. so i understand what you're thatg and i deftly agree sometimes we all identify each other a little bit too harshly and that's nothing we can all work on. i'll take that. host: regarding the policy of the administration, a recent one dealt with the military. this was a ban that would go into income and transgender troops in the military. what did you think of that move? >> what i think about that is that it's really complicated and i am going to be doing a lot more work. i'm going to be doing a lot more work in terms of writing about it and really unpacking it. i haven't tweeted much about it.

i haven't said much about it because i really do think that transgender is not a one-size-fits-all identity. i'm not entirely sure if there needs to be a one-size-fits-all rule. i think that's a very complicated discussion. i don't have the 30, 45 minutes to an hour to really unpack that. but what i hope to do is to use the knowledge that i have about the transgender community and some of the connections that i have to really not only unpack morean -- ban a little bit to be a my work but to understand what exactly transgender identity is and how can we understand that a little bit more. host: you are an iraq war veteran. do you support the ban all -- at all? >> it's complicated. i'm not on record as saying i support it or i oppose it. it's very complicated. first of all, when you want to

talk about serving in the military in general because i did serve in the military and i did protest against don't ask don't tell. i got arrested protesting against don't ask don't tell during the obama administration. when you talk about the trans man, there is a lot of medical stuff going on. there is a lot of psychological stuff going on. the fact of the matter is that 71% and that number may be a little high, but a very high percentage of adults to matter what between 17 and 24 are medically disqualified from military service. so the difference between the transgender ban and the band ban fromian -- lesbians, gays and bisexuals is there is a psychological element to the transgender conversation that really complicates things and there are a lot of people who don't necessarily understand it. i think the public needs to be educated a lot more in a more

straightforward way about the intricacies of transgender identity because you have a lot of people that are trans activists on the left that are saying one thing and they are saying things that are not based in reality and there are trying to abolish biological sex and all these different things and you have people on the right that don't really know a lot about transgender identity. all they know is that boys that identify as girls are now beating boys on the sports field. i think that it's a really that weted conversation would all do to really look in grandto host: junction, colorado. republican line. you are on with our guest rob smith. to ask mr.anted smith if the citizens are getting in the way of them. i was just going to say that i thought the fact was they were illegitimate because obama said he couldn't change gay marriage

but then the supreme court decided they were going to go ahead and make it so and we know congress makes the law and if i say anything bad about it you know all men are created equal but not hate speech. what's controversial is the fact that the pledge of allegiance says one nation under god and you know that's not the way it should be. i will pray for your souls. >> i don't even know what to say to that but ok, thanks for calling in. hold on, let me respond to that. that's a gay conservative i get a lot of messages like that on social media. i get a lot of messages from people that are conservative the sinnerke, love hate the sin everything like that and this is what i always say. i'm a gay christian. i have a relationship with christian. god loves me and i love god. we are good. there's not a human being on this planet that is going to tell me that god has more or less love for me they stormed

their interpretation of christianity. host: do you get asked about evangelical christians who largely supported the president and the position they may take to somebody like you and they >> iot agree with you? really do get asked about that a lot and like i always say, look. this is america. everybody is entitled to believe what they want to believe and it's a very specific area that i'm in right now being somebody that is a gay republican christian and a lot of people have questions about this and what i say to them is as long as what you believe is not hurting me in any way you can believe whatever you want to believe. but i think that sometimes people will -- people's christian beliefs can wait into the waters of discrimination when it comes to public policy.

i don't conservative agree with any federal dollars being used to discriminate against anybody because my gay tax dollars are going to this. so that's a very complicated conversation that i am thrilled to have with evangelical christians. mentioned mayor pete buttigieg. what does that suggest to you about the future of this issue particularly in politics? >> the fact that he is a credible candidate for the presidency on the democratic side tells me that we have really pushed the needle forward it comes to acceptance of gays and lesbians in america in all capacities. republican. he's a gay democrat. we have really pushed the needle forward and what i'm trying to do with the space that i occupy

right now is to push people beyond gay as an identity or gay that means a whole lot when it comes to people's political beliefs. as a gay men should be able to believe whatever i want to believe. pete buttigieg should be able to believe whatever he wants to believe. that's what makes america great and what i'm trying to do right now is to open the eyes of lots of gays and lesbians in america and say hey, maybe democrat policies don't work for you. maybe voting with your sexual orientation is not going to be the thing that is the most important for you when it comes to your bottom line and the changes you want to see in your day-to-day life. host: here is larry from chicago. independent line. for our guest. good morning. caller: thank you for taking my call. i want to upgrade the conversation. this idea. think of

>> a working-class president that thinks like ronald reagan and plays guitar like elvis? yes. ok. with the segment on studentcam winners. at the end of the segment it was the american flag next to mcdonald's. franchise america. that's not healthy. from california originally print frank capra was a friend of mine and i got him to come to the information school in indiana in 1980 to discuss the why we fight series. is to preserve freedom and hopefully bring us together as a people. so that's it. brian lamb knows me. hope you have a healthy day. host: let's go to rudy in california. good morning. caller: good morning. i agree with you as an old black

liberal that colleges should allow people to speak. i have called colleges to allow that here in california. now my only problem is about the conservatives is they don't have enough african-americans representations in their ranks. i realized there's only a certain amount of chairs at the table but if the republican party looked a lot more like the country as a whole i think they would have a better shot. they only have those complex republicans in all of the congress on the conservative side so i would like to find out what's that problem with conservatives bringing an african-american politicians. thank you very much mr. smith. >> thank you and that's an amazing question. i definitely agree. and the republican party have a branding problem. we really do. i think part of what i'm trying

to do is be one of the people that can change that. when you look at how many blacks are represented in the republican ranks compared to how many blacks are represented in the democrat ranks you have to realize that republicans -- i feel like the conservative movement is just now getting to a point when it comes to people in the media, people represented on social media. we are just now getting to the point where there are real credible voices that are out here saying that you can be african-american and support the republican party as well. i think the democrats have had only kinds of voices, not have they been politicians but they have also been african-american celebrities, rappers, entertainers, ballplayers. you have so many people that are represented on the democratic side whose entire existence is about pushing the idea that

blacks can only be democrats. pushing liberal policies and liberal ideas to the african-american community. understand that the conservatives definitely have a branding problem in that way and what i think is really special about this moment right now and if anybody has heard of candace owens and the movement for black exodus from the democratic party , there's a really interesting movement happening with black conservatives and they are getting their start on social media. i just started speaking out and becoming more visible about it on social media. that is what i truly think is going to move the needle for african-americans to come over to the conservative side and i think it is very important that we have a republican party that looks like america and reflects america. democrats havee us because they can trot out every color, religion, orientation of people under the

we represent everybody. the conservatives have a really hard time doing that. i think it's getting better. i think it's changing. the organization that i'm part of it is really amazing at finding these young conservatives of every color and getting them on the college campuses and really train them to be the new generation of conservative leaders. i really do think that we are moving the needle right now. when you look at what's going on i think you're going to see a whole lot more representation of african-americans on the republican side. host: do you get that sense of outreach with trump administration with its 2020 campaign? >> i do. from seeing what i'm seeing on there is a major play for african-american voters that is going to happen leading up into the 2020 election. what a lot of people don't

realize is that democrats cannot win national elections without african-american voters. specifically without 90% of the black vote. you moved that needle to even 13, 14% of blacks voting republican they cannot win a national election without us which is why we are suddenly having the reparations talk and we are suddenly having this talk on the democratic side ♪ announcer: washington journal. live every day with news and policy issues that impact you. coming up thursday morning, james enter will be with us to talk about the forthcoming release of the mueller report and its potential impact on campaign 2020. then, new york times health and science reporter andrew jacobs will talk about his these examining the cbc will that bars

the agency from publicly identifying hospitals battling to contain the spread of pathogens. be sure to watch washington journal live at 7:00 eastern thursday morning. join the discussion. and following tomorrow's washington journal, we will have live coverage of attorney general william barr as he pulls a news conference to discuss the redacted release of robert mueller's report before it is sent to congress and made available to the public. it will be joined by deputy attorney general robert rosenstein, who oversaw the investigation when it first began. that is live at 9:30 a.m. eastern here on c-span. next, democratic presidential candidate beto o'rourke campaigns in alexandria, virginia. this town hall meeting is just over one hour.