guests from the m.i.t. policy research initiative. >> the stakes are higher because we are talking about deploying automated decision-making capabilities. the ability for machines to either assist with decisions about people or unilaterally make those decisions about people. i am a lawyer and i have read so many privacy policies. they are not meant to inform a consumer about how the information is collected or how it is going to be used. we need to have meaningful consent. >> watch the communicators tonight at 8:00 eastern on c-span two. and eliza collins from usa today. later, john lettieri, president and ceo of the economic

innovation group on his organization's recent report on the nation's shrinking workforce. we take your calls and you can join the conversation on facebook and twitter. "washington journal" is next. [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] ♪ this good morning on monday, april 29th. lawmakers return to a busy week in the nation's capital. we want to get your take. what are you watching for this week? here is some of the items on the agenda. william barr will be testifying wednesday and thursday this week . house democrats and the white house continue the battle over investigations, including the president's financial records. schumerlosi and chuck will be meeting with the president on tuesday to talk infrastructure. the house this week led by

democrats are having their first medicare for all hearing. those are some of the items on the agenda. we want to get your thoughts. republicans, 202-748-8001. democrats, 202-748-8000. and independents, 202-748-8002. you can join us on twitter at @cspanwj or you can join the conversation on facebook.com/cspan. we will get to your thoughts in a minute. let's begin with lindsey graham, the chair of the senate judiciary committee. it will be before his panel lawmakers will question william barr first on wednesday. he was on "face the nation" yesterday. here is what he had to say about william barr's testimony and the mueller report. [video clip] >> what is it that you are going to try to focus in on? >> he gave a four page summary. does the report support is summary? support that there was no collusion between the

president and russia? he turned over one million documents to the special counsel, almost everyone around him testified. i cannot think of one thing president prompted to stop mueller from doing his job. from my point of view, i have heard all i really need to know. ont: 10:00 a.m. eastern time wednesday, the senate judiciary committee will hear from william barr, the attorney general, on the special counsel report. that is live coverage on c-span 3 10:00 a.m. eastern time. you can listen along with the free c-span radio app as well. on the house side on thursday, the headline in the washington post, barr may not testify on the hill. there is a standoff happening between the house judiciary committee and william barr. the house judiciary committee says they, in addition to

lawmakers asking questions, would like the house counsel of the judiciary committee to ask william barr questions. the new york times notes there is precedent for having staff lawyers interview cabinet secretaries. during the joint house and senate hearings on the iran-contra scandal, they questioned attorney general edwin meese and george schultz and they note that in 1970 three, committee staff matters -- members questioned the cia alleged --to the involvement of the cia in the watergate scandal. if you are interested in how that looked, you can find the iran-contra hearings and the testimony by edward meese and the staff lawyer who asked the questions. this was a joint committee in 1987 between the house and senate and you also see familiar faces. dick cheney is a member of

congress, william cowan, also a member of congress at that time. the new york times noting there is precedent. the justice department spokesperson yesterday told the wall street journal the attorney general agreed to appear before congress. therefore, members of congress should be the ones doing the questioning. he remains happy to engage with members on questions regarding the mueller report. that is the latest between lawmakers on capitol hill and the trump administration over testimony this week. we are talking about this week in washington and what you are looking for, what you want lawmakers to be working on. pedro echevarria with more on the barr hearing. of thehe potential attorney general to not show up on thursday -- mary gay scanlon also serves as the vice chair of the committee

and sent out a tweet yesterday saying ag barr keeps stonewalling at house judiciary oversight efforts. has me wondering what is barr hiding? one of the things you may have fine -- you may find in these hearings is the statements the attorney general made last time he testified regarding surveillance during the 2016 campaign. it garnered a story taking a what couldentially happen and a letter sent by chairman chuck grassley of the toate judiciary committee the attorney general saying about those efforts of surveillance, please contact our staff to schedule a briefing and answer the following no later than may 9. please describe the nature and extent of your review of fbi surveillance of the trump campaign, president-elect trump's transition staff. it goes on from there.

question 2, how many counterintelligence briefings were provided to the trump and pence transition staff prior to inauguration date? how will your review obtain information needed by those individuals? will you commit to providing the results of the review and what steps have you take to investigate whether the department of justice or fbi officials had unauthorized contacts with the media during the russia investigation. more of those questions and themes played out in the hill story online. host: picking up on what congress will do this week, the washington post has this headline, congress returns to confront impeachment, infrastructure, and much more. out housean tweeting returned at 2:00 p.m. from the 2+ week holiday weekend.

they will vote on natural resources bills -- debate andhis week, vote on climate change legislation. over on the senate side, they are looking at judicial nominations, craig caplan saying they return at 3:00 p.m. from their resource and senators will vote -- there recess. floor attributes are expected for the late indiana gop senator richard lugar, who died early sunday. that is on c-span 2. kathy, we are talking about this week in washington. you are in arkansas, independent . share your thoughts with us. caller: good morning, greta. --ill be watching the testifying. my main thing is that we, as american people, we are tired of

all of this and we need congress to get their job done. everything and it is what democrats want. i hope people open their eyes to see what democrats are doing. host: what is that? caller: the democrats are destroying our country. -- iare for everything hope and pray that people open up their eyes and see this because it is going to be too late. they are destroying our country. host: what is your reaction to the washington post headline that house leaders are trying to keep their democrats and the house focused on their legislative agenda and not talking about or focusing solely on impeachment? want tothe democrats get trump impeached.

it has been all along. they wanted him and preached -- impeached before he even got president. they are not going to get nothing done. they promised they are going to do this, going to get that, but they are not going to get anything done. they hate trump so bad, they want to get him impeached. it is pathetic. host: let me share this headline from the washington post, a majority of americans oppose impeachment. most also say trump lied to the public and they found that most americans oppose it, but democrats are in favor by a 2:1 margin of this idea of impeachment. rosetta in new york. good morning. what do you want lawmakers in washington to focus on? the subpoenas that are being ignored repeatedly.

that is what i have a big concern about and my whole thing is with the democrats because trump is trying to string this situation out, we know that. , ratherne is subpoenaed than talking about fining them or whatever, why don't they just -- democrats say we will put them in jail, we will give you jail time, they will straighten up and fly right then. host: these officials in the trump administration? caller: right because trump vows to say he will not let them adhere to the subpoena and i think they should. host: representative gerry connolly say officials ignoring subpoenas could go to jail. virginia threaten possible jail time for white house officials refusing to comply with subpoenas to testify

before the house oversight committee. more from newsmax.com. arthur, memphis, tennessee. a democrat, hi, arthur. caller: i think the first thing they should do is put impeachment on the floor and let them vote on it. it is time for trump to go. host: without hearings? caller: they don't need no hearings, they have enough right now. host: just because of the mueller rub mueller port reporthi, jack. mueller a republican. good morning to you. let me try one more time. jack. caller: good morning. there is a couple of issues concerning this impeachment the majority of americans are iainst that and secondly, think both sides committed crimes, but i think the hillary campaign was far worse with

their spying and espionage. if the attorney general gets to the bottom of that, if he is serious, holy moly, what is going to happen then. this is the one that bothers me a lot, the synagogue and church shootings, whenever there is a synagogue, there is constant talk about it, constant talk about it, but athletic catholic church or christian church in sri lanka, i think over 100 catholics were killed and there is hardly a mention of it, which tells me a -- lawmakers do you want to do about this issue? we have had this rise in hate crimes, is there anything that congress can do? caller: that is a good question. the thing that has to be done is people within schools or churches have to be armed.

if they are armed, they save lives because they can return fire. then the soft target becomes a hard target. i want to get back to these shootings and synagogues. host: we heard your point, jack, we can get more calls in and get more issues on the table, house democrats having their first that a care for all hearing this week. seth moulton was asked about the medicare for all idea when he show "state of's the union." >> what i believe is what president obama advocated for. what he pushed for was to have a public option, a medicare-like option that competes with private options. what some people in our party want to do is force everybody on a health care plan designed in 1963 and i think we can do better than that in america.

a lot of americans know that, too. they don't want to be forced onto medicare if they don't want it. it should be an option, though. host: the hearing will be before the house rules committee this week. go to c-span.org for more details. larry, memphis, tennessee, this week in washington. caller: good morning. i believe the house should subpoena barr. he does not want to come before the house and they should subpoena him. he should not be able to tell them he is not going to come and testify. everybody knows he is in bed with trump. that is why trump picked him. have a nice day. host: do you think he should have to answer questions from the committee lawyers? caller: yes, he should. he should have to answer questions from them. if he does not answer that subpoena, he should be locked up

. it is his job to work for the people of the united states and not trump. host: we will go to gary in california, good morning. your thoughts this morning. caller: hello, thank you for letting me speak. i did not start as an independent, but i got there goinge of the mishmash bs on in washington with everyone. if they would just start -- sit down and start talking -- stop talking at each other. -- pedro echevarria with more on the death of senator lugar yesterday. host: longtime republican indiana senator and there is a reaction off of twitter. senator mike braun currently in indiana saying this, senator richard lugar is a towering

figure in hoosier history and one of the greatest statesmen to ever serve. he worked tirelessly with leaders across the globe to better the state and the country he loved. also reaction from mayor pete buttigieg saying america has lost a true statesman in dick lugar. set up the world safer, for better foreign policy and he knew to work across the aisle. leading voice for decades on foreign policy, helping create a highly respected program to reduce the chance of nuclear annihilation and he tried to mitigate hunger around the world and in schools and warned about the national security consequences of fossil fuel dependence. it's on the area and topic of nuclear arms that he appeared on our "washington journal" program. in this case, in an interview was asked about his nuclear

policy and the approach he took. here is a little from that. [video clip] >> i will not go through all the traces of the arguments except that it did indicate their formal program to go to weapons stopped four years ago or so. however, the rest of the report goes on by and large to say that in a very is not friendly status with anyone in terms of their developments. the international atomic energy agency is not exactly getting free run of the place to be reassuring to the world or irandy else and, in short, is still a danger because, essentially, they have not given up the thought of progressing beyond wherever they may be read while we sort out all our intelligence reports, the rest of the world reads our headlines and i suspect because there had

been a supposition on the part of some in the world that the president or the vice president or somebody was intent upon war with iran pretty soon, there is a great sense of relief that maybe that is not so. i would pray that it is not so, as a matter of fact. that doesn't, for a moment, take away the threat. the president is trying to repeat that several times and i suspect will continue. others may say at the same time, this does change the ballgame. if, in fact, we are not going to have war with ironic for a while, perhaps we can do other things and solve national policies. this -- i saw a footnote in the press today that the russians may have come to some agreement with the iranians on fixing up that nuclear plant they have been working with on. this has sort of been on hold

and small footnote, but certainly interesting that they, and the course of other things president putin is doing to assert that russia is not controllable by anybody, quite apart from ourselves, sort of back into iran again. host: richard lugar back in 2007 on this program. it was one of nearly 700 appearances on c-span networks and you can find more if you go to our website, c-span.org. ken, thomasville, georgia, republican. what do you think about this week in washington? caller: thank you for taking my call. just a couple points. i think all of this pertaining to collusion with president aump has got to be just cover-up, the democrats have no other option than to stir the to with fake investigations

slow down or hinder the investigations with hillary and .he obama administration because of that investigation, i feel like i am owed a reimbursement for the $40 million plus spent on a fake investigation. that money is just wasted. nowhere in thel, constitution, if i am right, does it say the government can get into the insurance business. i just feel like that should be something private and possibly limits put with conglomerates as far as insurance companies go, but the government itself i don't think should be in the insurance business. thanks. host: richard. rockport, texas, democrat. caller: good morning. i agree with what your caller was just talking about.

as far as universal health care, i think we ought to have universal health care because i don't agree with giving billions of dollars to foreign countries that their citizens have universal health care. it just for an example, israel has the space program. why are we giving billions of dollars to them annually and they have public health care. we don't have public health care except for senior citizens and medicaid. we are one of the few industrialized countries in the world that does not have universal health care or free health care for their citizens. host: will you be interested in this hearing before house rules committee tomorrow at 10:00 a.m. eastern time on medicare for all? caller: absolutely. thank you. host: you might be interested in truth out.org. only one of the four witnesses

is for universal health care and this is the list of witnesses for tuesday, 10:00 a.m. charles will house is the author of the study finding medicare for all, 32 trillion dollars over 10 years, he is one of the witnesses. baker -- dr. sarah collins, vice president for health care coverage and access, , and a doris brown doctor who is an emergency room physician as well. the other minority witness is grace murray turner,. that is tomorrow at 10:00 a.m. eastern time before the house rules committee. we are talking about lawmakers returning to the nation's capital. they have been in their districts for two plus week spring recess talking to constituents. the headlines this morning of

their return, this is the wall street journal, battles set to heat up in capital. what will you be watching for? greg in massachusetts, independent. caller: thank you for taking my call. host: what are you looking for this week? report, ie mueller have not had a chance to read it and i don't know if i will. i have been watching adam schiff saying truth is in plain set that the -- plain sight that the president is this, the president is that. i would like to know if mr. mueller even talked to adam schiff and if he did, what were his questions and what were his answers. ishe did not, to me, that proof that the whole thing was like a big cover-up like one of the callers said to draw attention away from hillary and obama and my other comment is about universal health care. if we end up with universal

health care, are all the president -- to me, universal means everyone in this country, that should be -- they should be on the same thing that stick on us and i bet you $1000, there is not one of them that would be on it. that is my comment. a republicane is in washington, d.c., your turn. admittedly, a am, lincoln republican and i am appalled that we have let the party be taken over by a group of people who are segregationist, racist, and so forth. i am concerned as to where this country are going because we are now the party of putin and hitler./ until america wakes up, we are in trouble. my comment on health care is that everybody needs health care

. if we don't have it, we are putting ourselves in trouble. how can a department come up with a policy that says someone person in this country is above the law? this man is not above the law. washington,seattle, democrat. caller: good morning, greta, and thank you for c-span. seems to be -- although he may have passed the barr long ago, i think he has been hit in the barr too much. he is a paid person by trump. trump hires mediocre people so he can get rid of them, fire them, that goes against the union movement, loyalty to the contrary, he wants everyone to be expendable. he will find out he is expendable soon. democrats need to impeach him

and vote him out, both of them. host: do you have any concerns that if democrats in the house focus on impeachment and don't have some legislative victories lowering care, may be prescription drugs or infrastructure, that that could hurt them in 2020 at the election? caller: they should not be worrying about what hurts them. they get paid over $150,000 a year and there is a democratic majority in the house. hemp is only 1 man and maybe has got mcconnell and the senate, but he is falling fast theyou should not let blowhard get much -- so much publicity. talk to democrats, moderate and right-wing -- left-wing democrats and say what they say, you are going to the right to much for the last 10 years. host: mark's thoughts in

seattle, washington, you will be able to listen to the question answers to the attorney general wednesday at 10 :00 a.m. before the senate judiciary committee on c-span 3 or watch on our website. you can also download the free c-span radio app as you go about your day and listen to that conversation. the following day, the attorney general will be before the house judiciary committee as we told you at the beginning, the headline in the washington post is that barr may not testify on the hill because of this standoff over the format. house democrats want the committee counsel to be able to ask mr. barr questions for 30 minutes following five-minute rounds from lawmakers asking their own questions. your thoughts on that as well this morning on the "washington journal." we will go to tom in south carolina, independent. caller: good morning.

with congress coming back, we are going to get more of the same, which is basically nothing. all these congresspeople, especially in the house, they are up for reelection, they are in reelection mode already, it is not something they are going to go back and try to compromise with infrastructure or medical insurance or prescription drug coverage is, which affects everybody on a daily basis. if president trump is impeached or not impeached, it is not going to change most people possible lives a nichols worth. if congress comes back and actually does its job and presents a coherent infrastructure bill, immigration bill, that the president is toher forced to sign or gets the point of the president, then something gets done. cities, ifin our own

our city council operated like congress and you did not get your garbage picked up or your streetlight prepared or the pothole filled, you would get rid of them, but we keep accepting the same nonsense of you elect us and then we will change and the opposition party says you cannot do that, we are going to stop you from doing that. our garbage is not getting picked up. all the important things that affect people on a day to day basis are not getting done, we just focus on impeachment. you can impeach a bottle of water. getting it convicted is a different story and that will not happen in time. it never has. host: you might be interested in what else is on the to do list for lawmakers from the washington post this morning, a major piece of unfinished business for congress is a disaster aid bill that would

distribute $13 billion for natural disasters across the country including wildfires, hurricanes, tornadoes, and volcanic eruption's. it has gotten hung up in a fight between trump and democrats over how much aid to send to puerto rico. the island continues a slow recovery from hurricane maria. negotiations to resolve the impasse have been fitful and the outlook is uncertain. there is a strong desire among lawmakers to reach a deal, but also increasingly bitter acrimony on both sides about how the dispute has played out. house democrats planned to move forward this week with their own 172 -- $17.2 billion disaster aid will, which includes money for flood ravaged parts of the midwest. it is unlikely to unlock the impasse in the senate. trump met with key republican

senators before the congressional recess began and indicated his desire to find a path forward, creating some basis for hope for a resolution. that also on the agenda for members of congress this week. will that impact you? are you waiting for washington to act on this disaster impact bill? pedro echevarria with news on campaign 2020. host: the associated press's -- donald trump's campaign is mapping out a strategy to win pennsylvania the second time and the republican will not easily seat a state -- if you go back to the website outside the beltway, it talks about an effort happening statewide. nearly 20 states have introduced legislation that would require

all presidential and vice presidential candidates to release tax returns in order to appear on the ballot. this according to data from the national conference of state legislatures. bills requiring those candidates to disclose tax returns are pending in the following 14 states. arizona, california, connecticut, hawaii, and a soda, it goes on from there. you can -- highlighting the trump campaign and fundraising saying texas a top state in fundraising for the reelection campaign. far, the topso state for him, followed by california and florida. new york at $2.6 million and $1.5 million in fundraising ohio. senator kamala harris in ohio as part of her effort to become president addressed a form of presidents -- democrats talking

about the shooting that took place in the synagogue and what it means for the campaign going forward. [video clip] >> my home state in california ine clear, what was clear charlottesville and the tree of life synagogue, let's speak truth, racism, anti-semitism, sexism, homophobia, trans-phobias are real in this country, let's speak that truth and let's speak it in a way where we all agree that these are born out of hate, hate which has received new fuel in these last two years. let's all agree that whenever and wherever we see those expressions of hate, we must all stand up and speak out. let's agree that anyone who is ever the subject of that hate should never be made to fight alone. host: that was senator kamala

harris reacting to that synagogue shooting in california . we are talking about this week in washington. outside of the beltway, former vice president will be campaigning tonight in pittsburgh, late afternoon, 4:00 p.m. eastern time. we will have coverage of that on c-span 3, c-span.org, and the radio app. the headline from the launch of the former vice president's campaign from the new york times a couple days ago in the first 24 hours, joe biden raised $6.3 million. paul in florida, republican. caller: good morning. i am a republican and if the democrats think they have got something, go ahead and put impeachment on the floor. i think what you are going to the out if that happens is law convicts people who are

criminals, but it also protects the innocent. since there is no proof donald trump did anything wrong, i have a feeling the other side of the law is going to come into play on that. i think the two main things congress needs to tackle our immigration and health care and that has a lot to do with the 2020 election. if i was hispanic and hoping for immigration reform, i would vote republican for one very good reason and this is proven over time, there will be no immigration reform unless illegal immigration is stopped, it just won't happen. if i was a hispanic, i would vote republican and try to get that wall built as fast as i possibly could. host: before you go on, on health care, what do you want them to do? lower prescription drugs? caller: this is the compromise i see coming on health care and i

hope republicans and democrats are listening to this because i think this is where we are going to end up, i think the compromise is going to be that we raise the deduction for deductionthe paycheck to the upper limits and then lower the qualifying age for medicare to let's say 50 or 55. this will relieve a lot of pressure off the medical system and this will allow for the republican side, a private insurance solution to lowering the cost of health care. if you put that together with lowering the cost of prescriptions. really, what happens with most americans? they go to the doctor and get a drug to cure their ailment. that is probably 95% of everything. if you can lower the cost of drugs, take pressure off the

system by lowering the qualifying age of medicare, save the system by increasing the fee is paid into the system, i think that is what the solution will be. host: do you think everybody has to pay more into the system, or just the wealthier in this country? caller: you can play around with that. i would not be opposed to lowering it for the lower income people and increasing it for the upper income people. i think that is where the compromise will be. i don't think there will be a medicare for all. people who have paid into the system for so long would vote for that over there dead body. they are not going to let people come in and take all the money they paid into the system, it would not be right. i think the compromise is going to be lowering the age of medicare, increasing the amount of money paid in -- upper income people, that takes the pressure off the private system.

state sales ofs insurance and really put the thattition on steroids, will be the solution. host: paul's thoughts in florida. house rules committee taking up this first medicare for all hearing in the house led by democrats tomorrow at 10:00 a.m. eastern time. c-span last week covered an event with two former administrators of medicare talking about the ideas for medicare for all, all the different proposals laid out. they took questions from reporters and if you are interested in that conversation, go to our website, c-span.org. you can find it there. mac in north carolina, democratic caller. caller: how are you doing? question about -- as

far as this america is going to be so great and all these dreams would never be great. i did 22 years in the navy, but america will never be great unless we demand the truth from the people that are supposed to be running it. do we not know what the truth is? america is made up on a lie and we do not want to believe the truth. that is basically all i have got to say. these people that talk about all the service they is doing, they are servicing themselves. thank you, ma'am. host: steve, independent. caller: bernie sanders is not getting his fair props. he went on the fox tv show and medicare for all and everybody cheered him on. i think if bernie sanders does

credit, i am going to vote for trump again. host: again, did you say? caller: yeah, i will vote for trump, i am not going to vote for joe biden. host: steve in illinois. keep listening, pedro echevarria has more on medicare for all. host: one of those testifying at the hearing you spoke about during the opening moments of the program is profiled in has als, also known as lou gehrig's or motor to road of -- he will travel to attend the hearings of the house rules committee. he was invited by two democratic representatives, nancy pelosi and jim mcgovern. he will give evidence using a computer system that tracks his eye movement and converts text into speech.

he will be one of the ones profiled as you look to that hearing and watch it on medicare for all. the bangor daily news takes a look at one of the other things that needs to be addressed when it comes to congress. it's about automatic spending cuts and negotiations that have to go between democrats and republicans saying those cuts, a legacy of a budget breakdown eight years ago are bringing the power duo together to see if a deal can be made. at stake are tens of billions of dollars for military and state domestic programs. there is plenty of time to reach an agreement, but failure to do so could usher in spending cuts of $125 billion next year. if you go to the times and democrat, there is -- jim clyburn talking about infrastructure. the president set to meet with

leaders on that topic and one of the things represented of clyburn would like to see is money for rural broadband. there are federal dollars to provide that funding, he says. another person said they will -- their county will seek a $30 million grant to expand broadband in the country and the country would have to match $8 million. the country is doing -- county is doing what it can with money set aside for broadband. you can read more of those thoughts that represent jim clyburn on rural broadband at the times and democrat. host: ted in ocean ville, hawaii. we are talking about lawmakers returning to washington. what will you be watching for? caller: thank you very much and i really enjoy your show and thank you to your contribution, you are invaluable. i am a retired farmer of 40 years here in hawaii, just recently required -- retired and i am on medicare.

i think it works well. i am hoping the people on each side of the aisle will listen. i think we can get somewhere if the people will listen to each other. if they just spout they are lying or they are not listening, everybody needs to listen. that is what your show does, it gives equal time and we need to do more of that. i think it is critical we do that so we do not end up in what would seem to be a near civil war over all of this. we need to listen and cooperate and be understanding and do not just call liar or fake news. we did not hear fake news until two or three years ago. can't we go back to just reality and facebook, twitter, go back to cbs, c-span, pbs, all the main known news valid stations, can't we do that? host: what should lawmakers -- if they were to take your advice to work together and listen, on

the policy front, what should they do first? caller: they do need to straighten out the medicare situation. i have recently been on it for two years. i think it works well and it is efficient. they need to take that and run with it and agree, start coming up with things they can agree on, i think that is most critical. host: landon, virginia. republican. caller: how are you doing? i have listened to what people i actuallyrump and never criticized him because there are so many things that have been done wrong, for one thing about him, he was not planning to be president. he just did not know what to do so i should blame him for that because he got elected. people talk about medicare, medicare insurance, medicare for all, the united states

government is not an insurance agency, number one. if the united states government determines we need insurance or whatever, it goes to inch current -- insurance companies prayed i have always paid for my insurance. in high school i got a job. it was not a fancy job, but i had the union insurance and i have union insurance today. some would say i am insurance poor because i have medicare, medicaid, whatever, social security plus my insurance i actually planned for in the past. it's all about impeaching trump, it's not worth it. it is not worth trying to impeach the guy after all of this because we don't like him impeached clinton.

they went after clinton because they did not like him and he got impeached for a ridiculous idea of him having sex and this woman -- spending all that time impeaching trump. see trump,d to do, i nancy pelosi, and schumer together. they like each other and when you see these people get together like that, trump being a republican and democrats -- they always talk about democrats this and democrats that, what they fail to understand is trump going afterd by -- by republicans. republicans went after trump and then what we got left is mueller and barr sparring with each other over who is the most intelligent. the american people looking at it trying to pick sides andes

two guys are very -- and these two guys are very intelligent guys. cases, i paid this guy all this money to represent me in court and he is representing trump. if trump -- trump really doesn't care about anything. we all loved trump when he first came out, but he makes so many mistakes about everything. host: i will leave it at that point and listen to what pedro echevarria has to say. you were talking about the president meeting with the speaker of the house and the democratic leader in the senate. host: tuesday is when they will meet to discuss an infrastructure bill. if you go to the axios website, some background saying according to sources this is what democrats will demand in that meeting. any infrastructure bill must be

real money, major federal spending not by public-private partnerships or the regulation. they need to know where the money is coming from. senate democrats have put out a plan last year that proposed raising the corporate tax rate from 21 to 25%. the bill must include strong labor protections and require materials be american-made. and the final point leading up to the meeting, the bill must address climate change with major investments in renewable energy. more of that available at the axios website. pittsburg,n california, democratic caller. caller: thank you for taking my call. i enjoy watching c-span. ,earing people on both sides the past weekend getting congress to talk, but here we are, the average person, and we have a healthy debate and

conversation, it sounds like we can get more done than they can. caller: tom, hopefully many of them or their staff are listening. caller: i am not a trump supporter, but the fact of the matter is people have a right to say what they want to about donald trump and i respect their opinion. i am kind of confused on this medicare for all. are they talking about eliminating private insurance entirely and we are all going to be on medicare? is this what the plan is? host: there are several different proposals on how it would work and that is why i am saying, if you are really interested and want to have a better idea of what democrats are talking about when they say -- talk about medicare for all, go to our website, c-span.org. if you go to the top of our website, you can find, there is a search box at the top for our video library.

put in the word tom scully because he was one of the former administrators at this event we covered last week and he and others -- and he is a republican, they debate the pros and cons of this idea. you can find it and also, if you are interested, if you go to factcheck.org, you can find facts from medicare for all. i encourage you to go there because it sounds like you are trying to figure this out. caller: the fact of the matter is as a retired employee of the federal government, i am paying for my private insurance as well as i have medicare. my private insurance -- what my private insurance does not cover, medicare does. i see there is room for compromise. if we are going to eliminate private insurance entirely, i would be forlorn -- this is getting outrageous.

putting out a lot of money for medications for people, like my wife. they should be lowered. this is not a one time deal, this is a life-sustaining medication, for instance, people with diabetes. the amount of cost we are putting out out-of-pocket each month for these individuals, this is something congress should address, we should lower the cost for these people. this is people who are diabetic, are going to be on this medication, these type of things for the rest of their lives. host: we covered hearings about the cost of the diabetic drugs as well and tom, just to note for you and others, this is something the president talks about, lowering prescription drugs, democrats say it is on their agenda, it could be something the two sides come together and pass legislation. caller: i hope somebody comes

soon. as far as the mueller report goes, if congress feels that barr is stonewalling them, my feeling is let's take the gloves off and bring mueller in and ask him all the questions that we are not getting answers from anybody else. thank you for taking my call. host: tom and others who are interested in what will happen this week with the attorney general, he will be on capitol hill wednesday 10:00 a.m. eastern time. you can watch on c-span 3, our freete, c-span.org, or the c-span radio app. let's go to claude in riverview, florida, independent. good morning. caller: good morning. thank you for taking my call. let's be clear, donald trump has been named, according to the

attorney general of new york, as an uninvited co-conspirators -- co-conspirator in the history of crimes. donald trump is not concerned about my health care, your health care, donald trump is in campaign mode, first of all. secondly, and most importantly, the 10we account for items listed by mueller in the report of donald trump actively trying to obstruct justice? answertrump needs to these allegations. everybody associated with this needs to be investigated, needs to report to congress that are named and questioned by mueller. why not? that is what the constitution is for. we have to have some rules of the road. donald trump cannot instruct

people not to testify. it is very simple. we are being led by an unindicted co-conspirator of crimes. all the people around donald down, manafort, did we go the list? there are so many that are serving sentences and being sentenced for crimes committed at the behest of donald trump. this is not a mystery. the media is not focusing on it. host: if you missed it yesterday, kellyanne conway telling the reporter yesterday that the president may use executive privilege to prevent don mcgahn from complying with house subpoena saying it is always an option. we are talking about this week in washington, craig caplan with this tweet that the house rules

committee meets today to prep legislation, requiring potus to develop a plan for the u.s. to meet goals to combat climate accord.et by 2015 paris house debate expected to begin by wednesday on this legislation with a final vote thursday. it is one of top 10 addenda bills for house democrats this congress. , climate change, health care, mueller report? it is all on the table? go ahead. caller: yes. your last caller talking about trump being a co-conspirator, there is no such a thing. if mueller had found anything wrong, he would have charged him . other than that, these folks are out of their minds. five investigations and our clean,nt has come up

green, i don't understand these folks. mr.whole thing gets down to donald trump being a very rich man and he paid for his own campaign and he does not owe anybody nothing and they can't control him. tot: i am going to move on linda in mississippi, democratic caller. caller: yes. i am concerned about the president. host: linda, are you there? caller: can you hear me? host: you are back. we lost you for a second. caller: i am concerned about the president. we consider as norms that the other 45 presidents observed the norms in this

country. this man, donald trump, thinks he is a want to be dictator. he cannot tell don mcgahn not to testify because of executive privilege. -- to already given him testify with mueller. , i doout medicare for all not want them to mess with medicare. that.ave aca, fix you took long enough to get that towardsey need to work fixing what is wrong with it and leave medicare alone. host: david in south carolina, a republican. this week in washington, what are you watching for? caller: the two issues you were talking about, medicare for all, i have been listening to that for a while. the simple fact about it is it

does roll off the tongue nicely and is a nice concept, but it really replaces medicaid and it takes power and structure away from the states and puts it into the federal government. medicare being a totally federal program and medicaid depending on how states manage it. it is a move to increase the size of the federal government at the expense of the states. when i listen to democrats talk, i hear many ironies and i could write a book if i had written them all down. here is one. they accuse the president of using foreign influence to throw the election. there is no evidence that the election was affected by anything he did, but what is actually happening is democrats are using foreign influence to affect elections and this is by increasing the population throughout the country of people

who have been brainwashed who are -- or are likely to vote forcrat and they sign up traditional pro-life, conservative views -- by raising the population in states, it increases the number of representatives and the size of the electoral votes for states, which is a direct effect on the outcome of elections, even general elections regardless of whether people can vote. host: david in south carolina, we will go to philadelphia, crystal. democratic caller. good morning. caller: good morning, america. i want to make a comment about aboutbbi, so appreciative donald trump giving him a phone is with hisald trump subsidiary rhetoric, like an

arsonist, burning down the house, and then show up later with a bucket of water. i'm sorry, look at your house burning down. i don't know what flavor of kool-aid that these folks are , listening and believing donald trump's lies. it must be a bitter taste. it makes no sense. this man blatantly goes out to these rallies, spreads all these lies. got these people in the back cheering for lies. host: keep the calls coming in. this conversation rolls on. we are going to add two reporters coming up here, "national journal's" just crush our is here, and eliza collins.

some people call it the new nafta. "the wall street journal" talking about efforts by democrats to push back against a deal. the story saying democrats say they want to make it easier to enforce new rules to strengthen labor rights in mexico, hurting wages and job prospects for workers, adding that the trump administration officials say these concerns can be handled on a follow-up legislation that would implement the agreement. the agreement must be ratified by three countries and no deadline is set for that to happen. you can see more of that at "the wall street journal." if you go to the hill, the highway of interview and a survey done by manufacturers, the national association for business economics. they surveyed those members andt the president's steel aluminum tariffs since march 23, 2018. quarters, 75% of

respondents in the goods producing sector, it includes agriculture, mining, and manufacturing, report that recent tariffs have had an impact on their firms. that includes 40% of respondents in the utility sink and --ication sectors that had utilities and education -- the tariffs that had a negative packed on their businesses. -- david in -- negative impact on the business. if you go to the website ag ripols, saying that it is on the hill that the agenda includes moving appropriations bill for the new fiscal year over the first, but the top item for lawmakers to do with many in

agriculture, a disaster bill to cover last year's hurricanes and wildfires. the senate has been unable to pass the bill because of an ongoing dispute over aid to puerto rico. it was at the recess that the house democrats introduced a revised version in the chamber in january that would authorize soybeans and corn to be stored, and were inundated with march flooding. when it comes to hurricane maria, senator marco rubio, on a tweet he sent out this morning, links to the pbs newshour, adding this in his tweet -- # hurricanemarialegacy. thousands of students in puerto rico show ptsd symptoms. host: john crush are from "national journal" joins us come along with eliza collins. thank you for being here. i will begin with you. let's talk about the two weeks

that lawmakers have been back in their districts, in their state spirit what are they hearing from their constituents, and how is leadership alan singh the desire for, by some in the democratic party, -- how is leadership balancing the desire for, by some in the democratic party, with the legislative agenda? guest: the hearing is about the legislative agenda they are not hearing about impeachment. people are not talking about russia. aids, even the most liberal districts, they were not talking about that. they talk about potholes and the high cost of their health care. that is really what leadership is having to balance, because there are not the members that do want to impact -- there certainly are the members that want to impeach the president. they have wanted to impeach the president, thinking that what was in the mueller report were impeachable offenses. they will have to think about how i -- having to go forward

with this robust legislative agenda. there is all sorts of drama surrounding that. there is the need for this -- these vulnerable members and competitive districts, they need to pass legislation that can be signed by the president they have passed a bunch of messaging bills that are going nowhere in the senate, but there is a sense that especially from the moderate numbers, that they need to have legislative wins that they can go back and say look i worked with republicans. guest: the politics are fascinating because nancy pelosi knows that impeachment is a looping -- a losing issue for democrats. a love democrats do not want the an investigative posture. base that isa clearly -- on the cable news shows, some of those progressive

members -- that is going to push the party in an investigative posture. they want to go to the left of where leadership is comfortable with. those tensions will be dominant. you watching for with the ag barr hearings this week? guest: we are not even sure he is going to come to the house. the senate is a friendlier environment. lindsey graham is a republican, an ally of the president. barrys he will bring in first. thendiciary committee will -- the judiciary committee will then bring barr into they wanted it to be a hind close bars -- closed doors with their counsel. he might not even come in. the judiciary committee is now threatening, or at least likelying, saying it is that the administration does not cooperate, discussing things

like finding members of the administration if they do not play ball. this could get messy quickly. 's are waiting and seeing barr schedule. they made the request for mueller to come in. not clear if he will. committee has asked for trump's tax returns, they were supposed to get an answer by may 6. all of these things could be pretty explosive. guest: the tension between whether barr is going to come on the hill or not reflects the democrats' desires to have the staff attorney questioned the attorney general. and the more talented questioners getting extended time. if they can pin him down, talk about the inconsistencies in his summary versus the mueller report, it can be an effective moment for democrats, giving them political victory. but as you know, with all these political hearings -- with all these committee hearings, it

gets very partisan and unproductive. that is what democrats are trying to avoid, and that is why the white house is reticent of having barr testify. host: our viewers who watch the hearings, lawmakers -- they know lawmakers get five minutes to ask questions. .ome take 4.5 minutes , it is theirembers moment. some are good questioners, but not all of them. and they all get equal time, at least under the current format. host: we will be at the william barr hearing at the senate judiciary committee on wednesday, 10:00 a.m. eastern time, on c-span3. c-span.org also, and with the c-span radio app. eliza collins, talk about the blocking by the white house for these subpoena requests, for these documents.

if you can, sort of run through the big ones right now. where is there tension between the democrats and the white house? guest: the democrats have amped up their investigations and requests. one request was to get the president accounting firm to come in for questioning. the white house has actually sued to stop the president's attorney from coming in -- or accountants from coming in, not attorney. we have got the request for barr, which looks at this moment like he is still scheduled. as we said, that could change. there has been a request for robert mueller. barr has said that currently mueller is still an employee of the justice department. barr has said that he is ok with mother coming in, but we have not gotten any answer on when mueller will come in, if he is going to. there are also the tax returns, ways anddent's --

means committee chairman richard neal made a request for the president's tax returns to the treasury, which is part of the tax code allows him to do that. and the treasury has blown past a couple of deadlines, even when the treasury secretary got back and said we have some questions, we feel like this is partisan. we will get back to you by may 6. the white house has said no way they are getting the president's tax returns. it is the president's administration, so i imagine may 6 is not just going to be a handover tax return type of thing. week,another issue this democrats would like more focus on, is there medicare for all hearing. they will held the first one -- they will hold the first one tomorrow at 10:00 a.m. when we talked with a viewer this first hour, it was a mix between the mueller report and the investigation and please do

something about medicare. politically, what do they need to do? poldoes medicare for all l? guest: health care is a major issue for democrats. hot potator all is a for democrats because you listen to the rhetoric from a lot of the leading 2020 candidates -- namely bernie sanders, elizabeth warren -- they favor a single-payer option, a government-run elf care program. when you look at polling data, -- government-run health care program. when you look at polling data, the idea of having more benefits, government paying for health care, but when you look at the details, public support drops significantly. nancy pelosi knows that. democrats in leadership and moreand-file members are supportive of incremental legislation that would not overhaul the health care system like some of the more

progressive members support. democrats are cautious. they know health care can be a winning issue, but they do not want to talk about the revolutionary plans for 2020 candidates. host: run through what else is on the agenda this week, both in the house and senate. guest: the senate will continue to move through nominations, but they also -- the house and senate have to do something about disaster aid. fight oversically a puerto rico. the president has taken issue with puerto rico, he says, the way they have spent money and that they are not grateful enough that the -- over what the administrator and has done. blaming thee president, the president is blaming democrats. it is messy. a bunch of states need disaster aid. in another time, this would not be a partisan issue. we have to see some movement on that. house and senate democrats reintroduced a new bill that was

fuller, including more recent disasters, and there will be negotiations. there is acknowledgment that something has to be done. we will see that. barr will take up a lot of oxygen. in the house, they are expected to move. they say they will get back into the paris climate agreement. that is something they say they are aggressing -- they are addressing climate change. if not this week, than next, there will be some movement on the green app. -- the dream act. there is something that the house is pushing through. --ority leader mcdonnell has majority leader mitch mcconnell has introduced a bill raising age for tobacco purchasing from 18 to 21. i think there will be movement

for that. where all this partisan bickering is going, we could see major change. host: another big event or meeting that people will be watching, is when the president gets together with speaker pelosi and chuck schumer. that is on the schedule for the president, it is open up to camera -- we will see if it is opened up to cameras. from our republican line, good morning to you. caller: good morning. in all fairness, i think that underlying our nation, whereby we always claim it is so odd that we are -- underlying that is fairness. does anyone believe that mueller 's team was fair with 18 democrats and tribbett into hillary's da campaign, and one republican? and now that the reports come

out, do they think it is fair to take further money and time without passing legislation that will benefit the country? whether you are a republican or democrat or not even involved in politics, we do not have time for this nonsense. let's get on for the country, come together whether we like order not. we do not have to kiss each other, but let's get on and do something out there. host: ok. bill is talking about the political perils. guest: i think there is a bipartisan consensus before it came out. if you look at mueller's favorability, republicans were relieved that the president was cleared of collusion or any kind of conspiracy with russia. , a wide-open set of facts when it comes to obstruction. ultimately, both sides were content with the conclusion. the big question is how it will

be handled in the aftermath. democrats have opportunities to define the president as abnormal in his activities for the russians, postured towards them in the 2016 campaign. heis a hot potato because has risks that you could overreach and focus on the russia investigation, mother report. roy, st. louis, missouri, independent. caller: hello to your guests, and thanks for this excellent program. i want to sort of point out the obvious, that it is already baked into the population. russia did intervene in the election on behalf of president trump, and the reason why people are not saying it is a major issue is because they already realize it has happened. and the fact is trump has done absolutely nothing to ensure it

does not happen again. in fact, he won't even take questions about it from his own cabinet. he will not hear from them. they are told not to talk to him about it because it makes him angry. well, it makes me angry that something like that happened and that it could happen again, because they say it is going to happen again. the reason people are not listing it as a top thing, they know what happened, they just do not know what to do about it. the president certainly does not plan to do anything about it until the next election. so we are waiting to see if anything is going to happen with the investigations in congress because that is our only option right now since the president vetoes everything that comes to him, or he absolutely d funds people who are trying to fight ds or he absolutely defun

people who are trying to fight the cyber attacks. guest: there are some members on both sides of the isles who came out of the report -- both sides of the aisle, who came out of the report, and there were members of both parties who said let's make sure that this does not happen again. coming out, there were statements. there are discussions over at the capitol about how to do that, how to fund programs. nothing major has passed, but the mother report, there is something that there is bipartisan support for, and we could see some movement because it does allow them to come together in an otherwise bipartisan issue -- an otherwise artisan issue. democrats.m marilyn, -- j from maryland, democrat. caller: not to take away from your guests today, and i know that you all do not take any ratings as far as demographics

and so forth. -- i think it is absolutely shameful that we have newspapers, and i never see any representation from those medias, including howard university. my question is, my comment, joe biden is pretty much the czar of mass incarceration that has grief,so much hardship, anxiety, and the black community . and for anybody in the community who would even vote for him, yeah, it is wrong what happened moreanita hill, but even greater impact that has spanned

generations is him being the author of that crime bill. for him to even be considered is just ridiculous. jay, josh crush kraushaar withush more. theer: if you look at polls, african-americans support joe biden more than any other candidate. the big question is, his position to the center of party that potentially alienates black is the close relationship between him and president obama good enough to win the lion's share of african-american voters? of bottom line, the votes

african-americans, he needs that to be successful in the democratic primary. there are aolina, lot of key elected officials including james clyburn, in elected leadership. he needs strong support to win the nomination of the african-american community. c-span3verage begins on , c-span.org, to listen to the folks -- to what he has to tell the folks there on c-span radio. you can get the app for free. kraushaar. it is the first 24 hours. how did he do this week with fundraising? guest: he raised more money in the first when he four hours than any of the other presidential candidates, including bernie sanders. about 6.5 million in the first day. you should expect the former strongerident to have

connections than other political candidates. you have bernie sanders and elizabeth warren who some donors.f they want something one who is electable against president trump. but the big test over the three month period, how many small donors, biden has never had as much success with that group. host: eliza collins, what are you watching for as the vice president unveils his third bid for the white house? guest: well, the vice president has experience, right? he has been in office for a very long time. he has lots of legislation that people can cling onto as either failures or successes, unlike some of the other candidates. , inre seeing pete buttigieg

his 30's, that is half the age with much less experience. so i am curious to see how joe biden does with this very long history that people can cling onto. as josh mentioned, he is the former vice president who has a large donor base, but this is a different time. bernie sanders came into 2016 and shook the whole fundraising world with grassroots money. a lot of the other candidates have followed suit by swearing off big money. biden is not able to do that. so how is he able to fund raise, and who is donating to his bid? it is interesting to watch right now. it looks like the front runners are joe biden and bernie sanders, who are very different. so what groups are the democratic party aligning themselves with, each one? host: don from mount victory, ohio, republican. caller: how are you folks?

my question, i am going to keep it in health care, although i have a lot of questions for you folks and your business. i think one of the problems in this goes with health care. you said earlier, one of you did, that people do not like to get into the details. well, that is where the answers in the problems are, in the details. inn will one of you folks the journalism business, who, for the people who clamor for health care for all, get down and ask them questions about, this is a price control procedure -- a price control, procedure can come home -- procedure control, and my question concerning politicians who want health care for for all -- is it going to affect them? washington people too often impose their ideas upon the rest of the people and do not live by what they vote for.

so in health care for all -- and i am going to pick on aoc here because she seems to be the whipping post for things to go wrong, and i do not agree with her policies at all. in fact, i think she got cheated at boston college where she went. is she going to get the same doctor that is going to be put upon the people who get health care for all? the house rules committee takes the subject up at 10:00 a.m., i believe, tomorrow. collins,gine, eliza that lawmakers are going to be asking some of these questions. caller: absolutely. they will have those five minutes to ask those questions. people on both sides of the aisle will be able to ask actual professionals who understand the topic very well, on both sides of it, what it means, how to pay for it, who will be affected. we will get a lot more answers this week at the hearing. proposal, legislative

proposal,re for all is bound to deal with resistance from voters. voters do not like change. we are incremental. anytime you propose something with a wide reach on the public -- president obama learned this technocraticairly obamacare, which gave more coverage to folks who were uninsured with pre-existing conditions, but he dealt with huge opposition from not just republicans, but from voters who did not like change. guest: i will point out the democratic party is not all aligned around this. the actual members of congress are very divided on this and have been. i was out covering the 2020 election, as josh was as well.

talking to more vulnerable members, they were very unhappy with the proposal and wanted to focus on bolstering obamacare, lowering the cost of prescription drugs. we have the hearings on medicare for all, but they have also introduced legislation that would help bolster obamacare, and that is probably where leadership will be moving first because the majority of the caucus is not actually on medicare. host: from new jersey, democratic caller. caller: good morning, everybody. i am a registered democrat. i voted for obama. i voted for trump. i absolutely love the man. he is shaking up all of washington, draining the swamp. but what i cannot get over with the news media is you are not following through. you want to talk about the russian collusion, but you do

not follow through with what hillary did. i do not get how you are not talking about hillary, buying the dossier, paying for it. the woman is corrupt. i know you know it. you want to spend taxpayer dollars and time investigating hillary clinton, even though she is not in office anymore, because of why? caller: because she started this whole thing. one in spite, she was so devastated. that woman took a hit and she could not even come out to concede the election. she had a nervous breakdown. when you see her now, she is horrible. you could see it on her face. you see it with everything she is doing. she is so bitter, angry. she did all that she could do to not only not get trump elected, just like she did with bernie sanders in that election. but you have got to look at what

she accomplished here. host: i will leave it there. laura, choi, michigan. independent. caller: good morning. c-span, before i voice my opinion, i want to thank you for book tv. i have read more books that i never would have even thought about due to that wonderful program. host: that's great. caller: i have a couple of comments to make. if a lie is repeated often enough, sometimes people think it to be the truth. mueller group of attorneys are not all democrats. i do not know how many times i have heard people review how often some of them, most of them, are republicans. it does not make any difference. if you are honest, you are honest, whether you are republican or not. another thing that drives me crazy is, the attorney general is supposed to follow the law,

not the law as he sees it. another thing is that donald his health,mpeting how joe biden is sleepy i'd and everything. something donald trump has forgot to mention, as far as his wonderful health, he forgot to mention that he is definitely obese when i saw a picture of him playing golf with rush limbaugh, used to be kind of a chubby guy, donald trump is now chubby or than rush. donaldet's talk about trump second term here. how is it looking? guest: right now, the president is a front runner as presidents tend to be. he had a really hard time getting over a 45% approval rating, which means it makes it

difficult to win the white house. 2016hat did not happen in -- but what is happening that did not happen in 2016 is a giant operation. he is fundraising. it has been reported in politico about how republicans who swore off him in 20's 15, supporting int romney and jeb bush, -- 2015, supporting mitt romney and jeb bush, they are not only donating to him, but he has a strong staff behind him, and he is the president, so name recognition, he needs no help there. people know who he is. we heard from callers who really support him. you will have to figure out -- he will have to figure out how to get his approval rating up and get some of those voters in the middle, some of those independent voters. that depends on who democrats nominate. ushaar, hiskras

approval rating? guest: his campaign strategy relies on rallying that base. like him, republicans will show up and organize for him. , he knows thaty he won in 2016 not because people loved him but because people viewed hillary clinton as being less palpable. he is hoping that democrats nominate somebody who is too extreme, someone like bernie sanders, who is far to the left. with a good economy, do i really want to take a risk with someone talking about pretty progressive policies? california, arom republican. welcome to the conversation. caller: good morning. i would like to know when the democrats are going to stop it with the lies about the so-called manufactured crisis at

the border? i was at the border in san isidro there there is nothing manufactured about this crisis. it is real or they are pouring in left and right. i do not understand how it is that the democrats are posing -- closing their eyes to the crisis going on in california and texas and arizona. when are the democrats ever going to do some work? all of this investigating on trump is ridiculous, and it is just taking taxpayer money, throwing it down the toilet, because we know there is nothing there. they hate trump because he is an outsider, and they hate trump because he beat them at their very own game. kraushaarll have josh give us an update. where are we at the border wall with the efforts with funding? guest: we are getting nowhere because democrats and

republicans are miles apart. the dreamers, for example, children of illegal immigrants, are looking for legal status. jared kushner, interestingly, has floated a proposal that skilledioritize immigration, as opposed to family connections with those in the country. could the jared kushner wing of trump world -- it is much more supportive broadly of legal immigration, and they are more likely to view some type of deal as opposed to hardliners like stephen miller. but the odds of immigration -- we have been talking about immigration, a comprehensive deal, for over a decade. the odds of that happening under trump seem as remote as ever. mentioned you dreamers, those who have come to

the u.s. as children for a long -- it wase president rewarded and that is a sticking point. it used to have republican cosponsors, and now there is broad support from both parties to not pick those people out, how long they should stay, whether temporary or permanent, has completely broken down. so we are going to see democrats bring up that legislation in the house, and they are hoping to press some republicans on the senate side. few months ago, we had a government shutdown over the wall. that was a huge, the longest shutdown on record. the president wanted more money for his wall. the democrats in congress would not budge. we had a divided government. both sides dug in their heels, and in the end, the president got less than $2 billion for his wall, less then what was

originally offered six months before from democrats. that is where we are. everyone's heels are dug in, and they cannot agree. host: there is another spending deal that is necessary to make, looming over lawmakers as well. explain what is happening there. guest: the government funding runs out in the fall. it took a long time for them to be able to hash out how to fund all of these government agencies. but a lot of it is very bipartisan. last year congress actually passed more sections of the funding bill than they had in a very long time. but the sticking point was the department of homeland security and that wall money. allgovernment set down not of it, but the agencies that they could not get funded, because of a fight over one tiny section. so all of this other stuff, there was very strong bipartisan

agreement. appropriators agree on a lot. they really work well together. that is one of the few committees left that is very bipartisan. they might be able to hash out most of this, but hot button issues like immigration, especially with this president, who has made that his one signature issue, it is going to be difficult. if they were not able -- if they were not able to do it before and they still had divided government, i am not sure that they will do it now. host: climate change legislation is on the floor this week, dealing with the paris climate deal. is this the green new deal? guest: absolutely not. this goes to the medicare for all argument. that they are the progressive wing of the democratic party that would like to make these massive changes to the whole system. the green new deal is that. we are talking about congresswoman alexandria ocasio-cortez. this is her legislation and it would be huge overhaul to the

country's infrastructure and how it deals with climate. that does not have. party -- that does not have full party support. but the party would like to go back into the paris climate accord. it is unlikely mitch mcconnell will bring this up in the senate, but it is something where they do have agreement. it is a very modest step or at how speaker pelosi does not -- it is a very modest step. says thatker pelosi other committees will have a piece of the climate conversation i interviewed her last month and asked about the green new deal. she very promptly dismissed it and said that is not even a legislation. it is just a budget idea. she said they will do actual pieces of legislation that are kind of hard bills that they can do, the first one getting back into the paris climate agreement. host: the politics of climate

change headed into the 2020 election. guest: it is challenging because people innately support tackling climate change. they realize the mistakes, but republicans and even independents do not even want to take the steps to mitigate. not only do democrats and republicans have different views on how to deal with these issues, but they often do not know what the top issues are anymore. republicans look at national security, immigration -- they will put them in the top three. democrats put climate change in their top three. republicans do not even think it is an issue. so you talk about the divide in congress. not only is it difficult for them to solve problems, they do not even agree on the significance of climate change urgency and dealing with it as democrats believe. host: from west virginia, a democrat. caller: i have several comments.

first, the lady in california -- as a democrat, i am concerned about the crisis at the border, but i see it as a humanitarian crisis. i also see that the wealthy have exploded the people of south america and their resources. second thing, there is so much vitriol on both sides. you get on facebook and you are talking, and as a democrat, i cannot even say that i think melania trump is a good mother because she takes care of her son and keeps him out of the spotlight. i am bombarded with stuff. well, the third thing i want to say is, in the original what they call obamacare, it has a part where you could buy into medicare. the republicans had it stripped out, and they would not even vote for it. so my thing is, we should be able to have people be able to then if medicare, and

they want to pick up extra insurance, they can. change, welimate have to as a nation start doing something. even the simplest things like we used to have recycling in our town. there is no recycling. everyone-- well, not -- but there was a lot of put in there to be recycled, and we do not even have that. that is my comment. beach,tephen, west palm florida, independent. caller: hello. can you hear me? host: yes, go ahead. caller: i want to bring up some things. i know quite a bit about government and politics, and i thought about this stuff, why we keep having these same debates over again. i think there are basic principles of good governance that we seem to be violating over and over again. we are confused why we have all

this conflict. let me give you an example. with the health care law, the whole idea was to put all these people in a pool so that we would drive down the cost of health care for everybody. instead, they skyrocketed for everybody. please do not tell me that was going to happen anyway. so what does that represent for somebody? if you are somebody who has to get health care -- just about all of us do -- what does it represent? it represents an indirect tax. taxation without representation. nobody said that was going to happen with health care. second, when it comes to these principles, we hear constantly about -- you hear patty murray all the time, a budget is a values-based document. government is not about ethics and values and morals. how do we know that? is there a good foundation for that in our system? yeah. forbids anxpressly

established religion by the government. host: you are breaking up a little bit there. guest: caller: part of th -- guest: part of the challenge of governing in washington is that parties are divided on values. issues likes to health care and immigration, you're dealing with divided values that cannot be papered over so easily. health care, even when satisfied with health care and people like the status quo. in people are satisfied with obamacare, which is remarkable. that is a lesson for congress. you do not want to upset the apple cart too much you want to make incremental change. health care is going to be an issue in 2020 because they have a democratic nominee who is

calling for more widespread change, calling for all. host: eliza collins, this meeting between the president and the democratic leaders in congress -- it is expected to be tomorrow on infrastructure. where are they with having some side of -- some sort of bipartisan agreement? guest: when you talk to both sides of congress, they insist this is one of the topics they can get something done on. the white house says the same thing. withw the report come out all of this mudslinging. out of that, the president announced they would be meeting on infrastructure. so it is something they seem to feel they can block out the noise on. the problem is that when they get down to it, there is disagreement on how to pay for it. again, it is not something you can paper over easily. both sides agree something needs to be done with the country's infrastructure, but how they proceed is a real breakdown. democrats say they are working

on legislation that should be out this summer. i am not really sure what is in it, and i am not sure -- they say they are working out legislation. it is very critical here. there are reports that the president is willing to spend big on infrastructure, but that would put him at odds of his own party, who does want different pay for it. we will have to see how this comes out. i am not sure we will be able to proceed in this narrow lane when all this controversy is swirling around. we can see that congress is finding members of the trump administration for not showing up for subpoenas. i just do not see how that does not affect legislation. host: we will go down to macon, georgia. tony is watching their, a republican. caller: how are you all doing? i used to be a democrat, but i switched to republican because one of the things that affected me was obamacare because i am retired, a business owner, and i pay out of pocket for my

insurance. thatemocrats are the gift keeps on giving. there is medicare for all, reparations, the green new deal. they are going to be the gift that keeps on giving for trump. as aitch mcconnell -- leader, he did not do anything on immigration. liket feel as a republican our senate is being held up because of people like mitch mcconnell. can you speak to that? guest: the caller respects a pretty -- the caller reflects a pretty sizable constituency. they do not like mitch mcconnell or republican leadership. when you look at the loudest voices, there is a line on cable news, far light or -- far right or far left. most polls show that they are in the middle. i think there is a hunger that

whichever candidate comes up in the primary can be more pragmatic. whichever candidate is more in the middle, more in the mainstream of the country. host: mitch mcconnell is up for reelection in 2020. has he changed the way he conducts himself as majority leader when he faces voters in two years? guest: he always has a challenge. kentucky,s, even in are not the strongest for republicans. but he has -- he is a very savvy tactician. democratsady -- the -- there was a tough campaign in a republican district. she is talking about a possible challenger. but mcconnell money and savvy, he has been able to win a bunch

of campaigns in kentucky. that will scare away a lot of the democratic opponents. has hishile mcconnell critics, he has grown support in the republican party because he is aligned with the president. he has been able to push through a massive number of judges and rework the whole system of the court. he got brett kavanaugh on the supreme court, which was quite a fight. while he and president trump disagree on a lot of things, they have been able to push that aside. -- that has earned him some respect there. was going to say, the opening video of mcconnell plus reelection campaign mentions cavanaugh, cavanaugh, cavanaugh. that went over with the base and with swing voters. host: a democrat, hi there. caller: yes, hi.

hi, c-span. how are you all doing? i am a moderate democrat. different sides of the fence. i have been with the federal government since december 1, 1973. by keeping it under my belt. a nutshell, this fall, i have been studying. legal, some dear to our hearts. none,mes they take sometimes they take $4.50 an hour. sometimes they may get their off.rs cut

it doesn't make me become a moderate. , louisianathe wall to the west tip of california. host: we understand you are for the wall. what are you getting at? guest: this is it. the solution in those days was, illegals could have working wage., get minimum they could skip that job, go to another job. that was the solution. that was the idea. host: eliza collins, let's talk more about immigration. jared kushner has a plan, and when will we learn more about it? guest: it is supposed to come out, i believe, over the next month and he has said that he has united multiple different wings in this administration, which there certainly are many wings on the immigration issue.

what kushner does have, which many people in the administration do not, he has experience actually working with lawmakers on a bipartisan basis to pass major legislation. he works on criminal justice reform -- he worked on criminal justice reform for quite a long time. and republicans sat at a table and hashed it out. that is one of the only bipartisan pieces of legislation that passed in congress during the president's term. i do not know if the immigration plan -- i think it is a tricky issue. -- withde room justice criminal justice reform, there was more success. in the crosshairs of the mueller members of congress

sat in the fight. i am not sure what is in the bill. host: we will go to jacksonville, north carolina. jackie, independent. caller: hi. here is what i think about at least health-care. -- they spend $10 trillion on nafta -- on nasa. people, we do not need nasa. we need health care. hospitals,ent pharmaceuticals, research should be done by the government. that way it is cost effective. people will go to the doctor once or twice a year. prevention will help you, you know. you go to the dentist twice a year. you do not get a mouthful of cavities. all your teeth do not fallout.

if you find out you are diabetic, you can take cautions -- you can take precautions. the hospitals, the research, the pharmaceuticals, and the insurance companies are just making billions and trillions of dollars off of people who get no benefit. host: that is jackie, in jacksonville, north carolina. an independent who says she wants congress to work on health care. we are talking about the week ahead in congress. on the agenda, several things -- climate change, infrastructure meetings or you have william barr testifying both before the house and the senate judiciary s.mmittee and there is a back-and-forth over subpoenas. done in lynchburg, virginia. republican. good morning to you. caller: good morning.

i believe in global warming. other than that, we would be in the ice hp the biggest cause is we have cut down trees. it releases oxygen, which is what we want to have. in the 50's, you could look over the countryside and find a smokestack. we were producing more pollutants in the 1950's than we are now by a longshot. one comment. in the last 10 years, we have had about seven of the coldest winters in the north american and european arctic at have ever been reported. they have only been reporting maybe since the 1870's, but we have seven of the 10 coldest winters ever. the global ice cap is coming back in the last 10 years. it has not receded. host: got your point.

fred in pennsylvania, a democratic caller. caller: yes, ma'am. i am worried about why nobody is talking about social security and medicare and why they are going to fund it. they should be cutting the tax cuts of bush and trump. they should raise the age to 70 with no early out. a 5% raise on the tax of your social security. on the payroll check. i think there is no reason why -- they are talking about this foolishness with mueller and all these other things when they should be talking about the biggest economic bomb that is going off if they do not have money to pay for social security. host: let's talk about it. guest: that is always the biggest political challenge for both parties. raising the social security eligibility age or cut benefits, neither party wants to engage in that. in the past, paul ryan, a former

speaker, that was his big issue when president trump came to office. really criticizing that type of mentality. no party would be willing to touch this. you need bipartisan support whenever you're going to take something away or raise an entitlement age there there is no appetite in congress now. no one wants to eat their vegetables, and in this environment, it is hard to see how entitlement reform or any of those structural reforms will be done. medicare by 2026, social security a few years after that. guest: as josh said, this is an onue the president ran protecting, so it makes it very difficult for his own party to break with him. republicans have been sounding the alarm for a long time on this. this was house speaker paul

ryan's big issue. this is the one thing he felt like he was not able to accomplish when he left. the white house saying that he is going to protect these issues, in congress -- and a congress that is very partisan right now with lots of other things to talk about. it makes it easier to avoid this issue. but we are hearing alarms that congress needs to do something. host: robert, arkansas, democrat. caller: i am glad we are talking about entitlements. we need to look at the andnition of "entitlement," i understand it as government subsidies. for some reason, we only limit that to welfare, social security, food stamps. when you look at it, businesses, lunches, mar-a-lago -- all of that comes back in a tax credit and a subsidy. i am sure you all have defined benefits in your plans. what is happening, there are people who do not have that opportunity.

yet we see people -- what i see as missing and the real hypocrisy -- social security has a limit. food stamps, medicare, medicaid -- they have limits on your income. but when you get to the more defined benefit programs, there is no limit. you can make millions of dollars and still take advantage of having your meals paid, your housing, your automotive. all of these. my question to you -- do you two make enough money that you could do without your subsidies? and if not, how much money can a person make and get no subsidies? i will take my answer off the line. host: would either one of you care to answer? guest: in the form of deductions, if you're talking about the tax cut bill that passed congress and is now law, the big challenge is that reformers wanted to cut these deductions in the favor of a

flatter tax. there were tax cuts. i think in the case of taxes, it is more a case of deductions people than favor favoring avenger industries. tom, an independent. caller: i do not know if there is any research being done on eligible voters in this country what, why they do not show up to vote. guest: the midterm turnout in the 2018 elections is as high as we have seen since 1914, over 100 years. so under president trump, that may be changing. younger voters, voters who have shown engagement, have become

more engaged. that is a big question for the next presidential election. who shows up? turn up -- turnout has been up. it is on the rise. in 2018. i would expect very high turnout in the 2020 election. host: let's start with both of you answering the stories you are following this week. guest: joe biden's announcement. i think the first month of his campaign is going to test whether he has what it takes to be a front runner to really show that he is the most electable and centrist democrat in the field. if he doesn't prove his mettle than this could be a wide-open affair. this is going to go a long, long time. gets backgress tonight. i'm really curious about this a discussion on impeachment following the mueller report. we have seen some reaction to the mueller report but they have

been able to avoid reporters. they weren't hearing about impeachment at home so what do they do now and are they able to ,o the parallel tracks infrastructure, health care at the same time as conducting what's going to be pretty messy oversight? host: if you want to follow eliza collins reporter -- reporting, usa today.com. josh kraushaar, you can follow him at national journal.com. thank you both. we are going to be back in a minute talking with economic innovations groups -- economic innovations groups john lettieri. first a news update from pedro. >> there has been a change in leadership at guantanamo bay. was removediral from the post on saturday according to a brief statement

without giving details about why. the spokesman for central command told reuters the decision was the result of a month-long investigation completed earlier but it declined to provide specifics. he had led guantanamo since april 2013 and the leadership put out a statement saying this change will not interrupt the safe care and custody provided to the detained population. the wall street journal this morning says that the boeing corporation did not tell southwest airlines and other carriers that they began flying 737 max 8 without a safety feature that were found on earlier models. the story adds that the faa wasn't told as well. safety inspectors and supervisors responsible for monitoring southwest, the ,argest of them 37 max customer were also aware of the change. pilotsrts informed

whether a sensor known as the angle of attack brain is transmitting errant data. investigators linked that data to the ethiopians air crash -- ethiopian air crash. you can read more on the wall street journal. the cdc is taking a look at adults who might need and updating when he comes to the measles shot. story saying according to the cdc, people who were vaccinated prior to 1968 with an early version of the vaccine made from an inactivated virus should be revaccinated. that leaves one dose of live measles vaccine. today's recommended vaccine protects against measles, mumps and rubella. this is intended to provide those who may have received measles vaccines from 1963 to 1967 and was not affected.

host: at our table this morning, john lettieri, president and ceo of economic innovation group. the nation'sss shrinking workforce. what did you find? guest: the u.s. is experiencing a three-pronged dumb aggression -- demographic challenge. counties are losing prime age workforce and the country as a whole is aging pretty rapidly. not just a national challenge. it is highly localized in certain regions. this is going to erode their economic and fiscal sustainability and they need to types of policy tools counteract the shrinking workforce. host: why is it happening? guest: is a combination of lower fertility rates, out migration of mostly skilled workers from those regions, and stable

immigration rates. nationally we are facing the slowest population growth we have seen in 80 years. we are seeing the first time in 100 years sustained low population growth overall. this is an unusual challenge. not one that we are used to dealing with as a country. typically, demographics have been an advantage for us as a country and separated us from other industrialized countries in terms of economic vitality. and in shrinking away some cases, the advantage is completely gone. host: what could happen? is notpopulation loss just a consequence of economic decline, it's also a cause. lenses throughe which to understand those challenges. the fiscal health of these local economies. you lose your tax base and tax revenues. a lot of the caring cost of a larger population and the infrastructure you build around that maintains.

you still have to pay as much, but your revenue base is shrinking. two, it erodes the housing market. you can see the consequences of decline. blight and vacancies set in. is also the staging ground for crime and other types of socioeconomic decay. relationshipusal loss between population loss and startup rates. host: i wonder to our viewers, if you are experiencing this where you live. what do you think is contributed to this? eastern/central part of the country, (202) 748-8000. in the mountain pacific area, (202) 748-8001. john lettieri, where is it the

worst and where are their glimmers of hope? guest: this challenge is highly localized in two particular regions. one is the midwest. the state of michigan lost 12 percent of its primate workforce. ohio lost 6%. you'll also find this in the upper northeast. entire states are losing their prime age population. every county in the states is losing prime age population. a lot of these postindustrial economies that have struggled to make the transition from manufacturing and heavy industry are bearing the brunt of this national issue. where it's bright is in the west. the west and the southeast tend to see the most buoyant, youngest, most vital population growth. presents a real challenge because the returns to those type of advantages. dense populations, big metro areas.

young workforce. those have a aggregating effect. that's why we are really calling for new attention to the scale of the challenge which i think is not fully appreciated as well as the fact that we have tools that we could be using to do something about it. host: what are those tools? guest: immigration policy could be one of the great advantages. the fact it is especially when it comes to skilled immigration, our policy is implicitly biased towards large coastal areas. allow look at the way we in the numbers, those policies tend to benefit places that are doing very well already and disadvantage places that have the highest need. in the are proposing paper is a heartland visa. this would allow welcoming communities throughout the country that are facing demographic challenges to become eligible for a dual opt in type

of program where immigrants choose to settle their and where the communities choose to host them. there's no risk of going to an unwelcoming place. these are places that have opted in based on their eligibility. this could be something that adds wind to the sales of any community. look at the city of dayton. the city of utica, new york. these are places that have affected some turnaround in their population growth. this is actually working in many places already, just without the programmatic support that washington can provide. host: what do you make of these numbers? the bureau of labor statistics. job openings versus people. work, 6.2 million. guest: that's the benefit of a tight labor market.

employers around the country are saying we can't find enough workers to fill positions that we have open which is a restraining factor for growth. any rational conversation about immigration would say if we have the advantage as a country of being a place where the most skilled entrepreneurial people from the country want to live -- we should connect those dots. this is one of the most rational things we can do in terms of the economic evidence. host: what type of migrant workers are you talking about that are needed in this country? host: -- guest: we are particularly focused on the skills in the paper. right now we let 65,000 skilled workers each year.

looking for something generally analogous in terms of scope to it provides a way for immigrants to connect with places, not just single employers. it is an employer driven program where you are tied to one employer. we are advocating for something that would be tied to place. if you choose to settle in dayton, you would be free to work anywhere in that labor market. but you are tied to that place for a term of living and working. an immigrant would be given a choice of hundreds or thousands depending on how many communities often. signallaces would try to , and so you have some matchmaking that goes on on the front end. focused on skills because that is where the economic evidence is the most clear and concise in terms of the benefits. .hey bring economic dynamism

they tend to be entrepreneurial. these immigrants bring not just supply, but demand. they provide more demand for local services and businesses. we think the evidence is very clear on the skilled immigrant side. a lot of these economies are agricultural. they did seasonal workers. a lot of the needs are on the lower skilled side of the spectrum. we should think more broadly than just the skilled side. we should start read the evidence is most obvious. host: we are talking with john lettieri, president and ceo of economic immigration group -- economic innovation group. trump says the u.s. is full. much of the nation has the opposite problem. an aging population and a declining birthrate among the nativeborn population means a shrinking workforce in many areas.

newly half of americans live in a country where the prime toking age population is 25 54. shrank over the last decade. ron in texas. europe first. -- you are up first. caller: here's what i was thinking about. 300,000 baby boomers retire every month. are those the jobs that they say are created? they are going from working and creating a salary to drawing social security. thatsay every month 200,000 jobs are created. are those the jobs they are talking about? retire,hen baby boomers those are not the jobs being created. the jobs being created right now are mostly pulling workers who are looking for work out of the nonemployment sector into full we are seeing

because of the tightness of the labor market is a lot of people who previously reported being unable to work are now finding work. it's the demand of the strong labor market: people off of the sidelines. of a lothis challenge of people retiring. we are hitting a time when baby boomers are increasingly exiting the workforce. that presents a challenge. had this article from the trustees report. ratio ofe that the workers paying taxes to beneficiaries receiving benefits will decline as the baby-boom replacedn ages and is at working ages with subsequent lower birthrate generations. what's the impact of this? guest: a simple numerator and denominator challenge. and to keep transfer programs and entitlement programs -- this

really is just a math problem. ist national challenge localized in a lot of places that are facing their own fiscal challenges with paying pensions, challenges with paying into the kind of a sick services. you don't have a healthy tax base, you have to make the kind of cuts that make it harder to draw more people in. cutting arts from school programs. not providing the kind of resources to local police and fire departments. these are things that are solvable problems, but they cannot be solved without human capital. we have the example of what other countries have gone through ahead of us as they face their own demographic decline. it's not something we have to experience crude we have a choice. this is the role of policymaking. kyl in san ramon, california. good morning. i understand your point

about filling in some of the demographic needs for fire departments and all of that, but what about the effects of automation? see going around, things are getting more and more automated. we just need less and less workers. people may not need to commute to jobs because they work from home. i work from home most of the time. i wonder what the effect of all of that automation is on the demographics of our workforce. look at the industry and manufacturing and all of that. we are just office work automating things. that's my thought. guest: that's a great question. there's no doubt automation is playing a role in our economy in a way that is impactful, but it's not replacing workers wholesale. the stat you quoted earlier about the amount of open positions versus the amount of

available workers is just one data point in a number that show that the demand human labor is here, it's strong and it's not going away, and in particular the demand for skilled labor is here and not going away. i don't think we have to worry about having too many skilled workers in our economy. the places that drive today unquestionably are ones where skilled workers tend to congregate and we need to provide new pathways especially when we know based on all the evidence that there are plenty of skilled workers from around the world who would love to be there. in some cases we are talking about entire states. justis not a question of moved to a better opportunity. automation tends to complement human work, it doesn't tend to replace it entirely for most jobs.

we have always had a technological change influence the labor market. right now our problem is electric supply, not elect of demand. host: what are some communities, counties, cities doing who are decline in their population, eroding tax base. what did doing to try to get people to come to their communities? >> we don't really have to guess as to whether this could work. we have actual examples. there's a program called welcoming america that works to help them take the steps to market themselves and make themselves welcoming to new immigrants. the city of dayton is one of those places. has been one of the key factors in helping to turn around the local economy and helping to turn around population loss. dayton's peak was 260,000 people. 160,000ed down to people.

it has been a key factor in the local revitalization of that community. there is still a lot of work to justat goes beyond attracting human capital. you're not dealing with the scarcity in your taxpayers. you the flexibility to tackle and reinvent your economy in new ways. you you don't have the, have much fewer options and the options you have are much worse. it's going to be true on a national level as well. right now we enjoy an advantage that most countries never have, which is the ability to pick and when and how people want to be here. the u.s. has had primacy in the national conversation for a long time. i don't think we should assume it's always going to be true

that we have that kind of attractiveness. we think we should lean into that advantage. it will provide tools to communities that have the will to welcome and reinvent their economies but also need the resources they can provide on their own. host: what happens to wages in those communities where they are welcoming more immigrants? guest: they tend to go up. this is true everywhere that you want to take for granted that the economy is doing well. it is clear and consistent in the data that are thriving places today with high-paying labor markets and a lot of access to economic opportunity are places where skilled people congregate. we want to replicate those type of characteristics in more places around the country. not everywhere is going to be silicon valley and they don't

have to be. they just need to do more with the tools that they have. in many cases they have anchor institutions like a large universities. they don't have the kind of dynamic bottom-up economy that you see in healthy and thriving places to one thing that we know contracts to that is skilled immigration. this is a challenge on top of the demographic challenge. with the great recession, rates of entrepreneurship bounced to historic lows. immigrants are disproportionately entrepreneurial. twice as likely to start a business as a domestically born person. we know that bringing them to a local labor market has a dynamic effect on business and the business environment that you want to be able to replicate. host: let's go to kathy in ohio. caller: i think that bringing in

skilled workers actually brings down wages. we have a lot of college students out there who can't even find a job. what's your answer to that? thet: i'm not familiar that -- with any evidence that the program brings down wages for local residents. i also want to distinguish what we are proposing. this would be a different program that is not tied to any single employer. wages in the communities that don't have immigrants are particularly low. correlation between local population of immigrants and overall economic health is very strong. correlation between lack of immigrants and other economic malaise is very strong. the preponderance of evidence that we look at across every field says that skilled immigrants in the community has an uplifting effect for everybody. more opportunity. they are bringing supply of work and demand for local business.

base's a broader customer on top of the fact that they are bringing tax payments to improve the local fiscal conditions. they are occupying vacant houses. a new emigrant in san francisco might be marginally displacing someone who there. in dayton or akron or south bend, that's just not the case. there's a lot of unused capacity we want to put back to you's. that means the entire economy thrives and is more likely to succeed. so the evidence is very strong. host: brian in illinois, good morning to you. good morning. if you flip the coin, i have had some college level business and econ classes. if there was really a shortage of workers, wages would be rising a lot. but for the past four decades, they haven't. they have been stagnant. you are representing corporate america and here's what

corporate america wants. they want a vast pool of workers that are desperate to work that will take any wage they can get. we have corporate america right now. record level profits. record level. but they've kept wage levels just minisculely creeping up because of best levels of immigration. your story doesn't add up. i'm familiar with the i.t. industry. or the just a corporation. they made their i.t. department train the replacements from india and then they fired all their i.t. workers and have the replacements work for 50% of the money. that's corporate america. corporate america, all the people in the sea suites are grabbing all the money. host: let's get a response. guest: wages are actually going up fastest for the lowest end.

exactly what you expect to see in a tight labor market is happening with wages rising very quickly at the bottom end. i want to distinguish this from the current policy. aat we are proposing is not perpetuation of current policy. it would be directed to places that are clearly struggling and left outside of the national growth benefits that we have seen for much of the country. the evidence is very strong, skilled immigration does not bring wages down for domestic workers. it does not erode the local health and vitality of the economy. needed and this is not something corporate america is asking for. this is something mayors are asking for. when you look at the city of , when theyyork became a refugee resettlement area, i saw for the first time positive growth in their local economy and if you talk to people who come from these communities, they say that was a

transformative turning point in the history of their community. these were classic examples of dying cities. thanksve found new life to become the welcoming to immigrants and refugees. we don't have to guess. we don't have to rely on theory. we can look at local examples where this is already working and local leaders are connecting the dots and we can go off those in a practical way. we are talking about skilled immigration where we've that a onlysmall number in and through one door. katie in norman, oklahoma. caller: question and comment. i don't know if skilled immigration is the way that we solve this. i moved from the east coast.

i'm a millennial. they price me out of living. basically i couldn't live there anymore. main point is i think the issue actually comes in where and are requiring degrees ton of work experience and paying very little with novell of -- with no benefits. guest: certainly that is happening for some workers and that's a challenge for some workers and there's no doubt that new jobs being created are ones that certainly compared to pre-recession require higher educational levels and higher skills. but letting more skilled immigrants come to this country is another way of letting more employers come to this country. skilled immigrants are disproportionately entrepreneurial they are more likely to start a business. prime challenges is a shrinking number of local businesses.

it's hard to have job growth with wages and benefits without a growing number of employers and without growing demand for local business. with new skilled immigrants you supply, but demand. this is a way of helping to revitalize and add the kind of attributes that any healthy local economy takes for granted but that you can't take for the country.ch of 80% of the counties are using primate workforce. there's no way to argue that's a healthy statistic. policyly with federal are very few levers you can pull to help counteract that. the most obvious is a change in immigration policy. we can look at local examples where this is working. in so allow places to opt no one is compelled. our guess is that a vast majority of places that would be eligible gladly opt in because

their options are so limited in the power of immigration is so strong for communities. host: roof is watching in kansas. caller: good morning. i'm very pro-immigration. if we couldondering have the same kind of program for inner city. if blacks, hispanics, or whites were unable to find jobs and unable to have a livable situation because of expenses and so forth if they might he offered training and repositioning and replacement into the areas that are needing more young, healthy workers. would it not be a benefit? it would be another type of immigration. would it not also be a benefit to get people who are already in this country every situated voluntarily into something that would benefit both sides.

guest: i think that's a really interesting perspective. from my perspective i think we should experiment with a lot of different ways of attracting newforces and giving incentives for people to get off the sidelines and into the labor market. there are interesting ideas relating to the earned income tax credit or a wage subsidy to provide a stronger pull for people on the sidelines into the workforce. you also have local economies like the city of tulsa that has offered incentives for teleworkers to come settle in their city. they provided a cash benefit for have relatively high-paying jobs and a lot of mobility to congregate in tulsa. seeing a lot of this local experimentation happening around the country. where you also need support is at the federal level for a

broadly advantageous policy that helps to direct and open the pathway for skilled human to reach places our current policy doesn't really encourage. connie is in tennessee. you are on the air. caller: ok. up corporateng malfeasance. only because it's talked about , but it'sthat now been going on for a long time. and i know this to be a fact. i live in tennessee, but i know employers send people to mexico to bring them back legally. they use them.

hope that we can change our tax laws so corporations pay their fair share. and i think that we should have immigration. and i think we should definitely be welcoming people to our country. living in horrible conditions. host: for folks who want to learn more about this report, they go to ei g.org. what should people look at? guest: number one is the sense of urgency. this is a real challenge. we used to talk about the country of japan as being one of the dangers of decline. about 40 million americans live in a community that looks like demographically.

we know that this problem is here. we know that it's coming in larger waves in the years to come. the sense of urgency that needs to come with that is one piece we hope people take away from it. the other is a sense of hope. tools to actually address this issue and address it favorably. it requires policy action. i would say if you are an average reader in your community, talking to your mayor , calling your congressman. to revive theg in aspirational american spirit that we have taken the granted. the evidence is here in terms of the challenge, but the options are also here. host: john lettieri, thank you. we will be right back with your calls about this week in washington. >> the attorney general william before set to testify the senate on wednesday, but

whether he will testify before the house is still a question. that's raising a tweet from representative val demings from florida, saying if the attorney general is confident that he behaved appropriately, then he should have no problems explaining his actions before congress. the president is set to meet with leaders tomorrow at the white house to talk infrastructure. saying it was last month's st. patrick's day lunch that the president told the democratic chairman of the house ways and means committee that he wants to spend close to $2 trillion on infrastructure. why it matters, the president meets with them -- the democratic leaders to discuss that. pelosi requested the meeting because they know the president would happily spend a ton of federal money on infrastructure. it's his own party that will let him. you heard earlier in the day about that first ever medicare

for all hearing. eddie berger said to be one of those testifying. he tweeted saying, safe and sound in do see, i'm already feeling the power of thousands of patients and advocates who have been fighting for this --ent #medicare for all you for all. here's how you can let us know what you think about those topics. republicans (202) 748-8001. democrats (202) 748-8000. independents (202) 748-8002. you can always post on our twitter feed and on our facebook page at facebook.com/c-span. are going to get those calls in just a minute. following up on the william barr testimony this week, he will be there wednesday before the senate judiciary committee. our coverage on c-span3, c-span.org or the free c-span

radio app and then he will go over to the house side on thursday to testify before the house judiciary committee. there is right now the standoff between the justice department and lawmakers of that committee because they would like the committee counsel to be able to ask the ag some questions. justice department right now saying that they are happy to take questions from members of congress on the mueller report. lindsey graham was on face the nation. here's what he had to say. >> what is it that you are going to try to focus in on? >> he gave a four-page summary. report actually indicate there was no collusion between the trump campaign and the russians. i think the idea that this issident obstruct justice absurd. he turned over a million documents to the. almost everybody around him testified.

i can't think of one thing the president trump did to stop mueller from doing his job. he never claimed executive privilege. from my point of view, i've heard all i need to really know. now we are looking to find out how this happened. host: the attorney general will be up on capitol hill before lindsey graham's panel and whether or not he will take questions from house judiciary is of the air. may not testify on the hill. he is scheduled to be there, but whether or not he will agree to take questions from the council is something besides are working out. your thoughts on this week in washington. , independent. what are you watching for this week? caller: i don't reconsider going to happen because the sacramento politicians used the drought to .lackmail than developers

the people in washington are threatening medicare for all so blackmail medical insurance companies, hospitals and pharmaceuticals for campaign contributions. it willhy i don't think ever happen. host: the medicare for all of the, the first one 116 congress is happening on the house side led by democrats before the house rules committee at 10:00 a.m. eastern tomorrow. conrad. republican. caller: i went to ask about the medical coverage for everybody. i'm just curious that we have politicians that say who's going to pay for it. they have to realize taxpayers .re paying they have one of the best plans in the country.

so the same people that staying for the president, the congressman and the senators, that's the same people that are going to pay for the unfortunate, like some of us are. five dollars and a month for taxes, fine. the same people that paying for theirs. they don't have to pay no co-pays. now every time these senior citizens in florida and pennsylvania walking -- working at the walmart so they can pay their health care coverage. these people are 60, 70 years old cleaning bathrooms. a work all their lives. they shouldn't have to be working as of lamentable job to decide whether they're going to eat or take medicine. we've got all these geniuses in washington. they should solve this in a hurry. they are sending all our money to everywhere but the people

paying their taxes. we're not going to suffer if they ask everybody for five dollars extra. enough of this nonsense in that white house that they don't know what to do. give us the same coverage you've got. host: berry in michigan. caller: i don't think that's going to work until they get these doctors under control. i have had three spine surgeries. $800 toital let me pay $900 for an mri. as soon as i was covered under government insurance, the same mri's went to $2800. and i went through it for 10 years. once i was covered under medicare and medicaid, it was even harder to find a doctor or to do the surgery. it took nine years.

so we are going to have to get these doctors under control or this country will never be able to afford it. host: in addition to the attorney general testifying and that medicare for all hearing, you also have house democrats genuine to request for trump administration officials to testify and hand over documents related to the president's tax and other investigations that are happening on capitol hill. you also have nancy pelosi and chuck schumer heading over to the white house to meet with the president this week. they are going to be talking about infrastructure to house democrats are taking up legislation this week dealing with climate change. they want to see the united states back in the paris climate agreement. also the house working on

legislation for so-called dreamers in this country as well as their own disaster aid package. there is disagreement between democrats on capitol hill and the president over how much aid to give in disaster relief to puerto rico. something they're going to be working on as well. on the senate side you have judicial nominations and other nominations on the door this week. our coverage on the house here on seized band and the senate on he spent two. andrew, independent. caller: thanks for taking my call. i just have a couple of comments on medicare. i agree with your previous callers. i think the biggest issue that's been going on with the american public is they want to see congress get something done and fix the problem. so if they don't focus on real issues like medicare, it's going

to be reflected in the election coming up. i think that is related. the mueller report and how they continue to handle that it is going to suck the life out of all these other issues. it's going to be payback if they continue that because we know that hillary paid a foreign agent to get information from russia to use against trump. and's all common knowledge comey during the obama administration. so there's enough ammunition there to rehash the whole thing again that mueller has investigated for over a year. starts to focus and goes down that road of indication or payback, then people are going to get angry again and congress is working on real issues and that's the message that politicians because they are no longer politicians. they need to do their job which is legislate, create laws, fix

problems. host: willy in st. louis, missouri. caller: i'm here. if we would have enough money for social security if they would stop messing with it. meeting and was asked about how trump makes a fool out of all his people. they said, they believe everything he says. andakes a fool out of them you don't want this guy to testify because he doesn't know what's in the report. know if he doesn't testify so i wish they would make him do it. host: pedro chavarria with some news on campaign 2020.

a former democratic candidate for congress and lieutenant governor into the race on tuesday. the georgetown resident will off her campaign. she told the state she was inspired to run during a discussion with an african-american history class at the college of charleston. how people will contribute to the wealth will not be able to create from the wealth they create. there were questions about representatives -- whether was going to enter the race against john cornyn for his seat in the senate the texas tribune says , this his closest friends is the second time he has thrown his support behind his colleague dan castro spent much of the spring of 2017 publicly mulling a run against ted cruz.

exasperated about the indecision. you can read more of that on the texas tribune and nbc news is reporting the headline when it comes to better o'rourke. plan he hasn released to combat climate crisis. host: richard in austin, texas. democrat. what are you watching for? caller: more the lies that are being spread by the news media who allow comments like the one that was made before by the democrats. both of these are republicans who stole money to investigate hillary. if you look at the 2002 senate cut andon the 2001 tax look at what the fed chief, the number one banker in this country said after he walked out

of the hearing. and they said last 2001you were against the bush tax cut, but this year you are supporting it why is that. his statement was, i got to thinking how the world would perceive the united states being debt-free in 2004. 2004 of notnths in going a single penny to anybody on the face of the earth and himselfnyn who has paid over a million dollars free of social security and medicare. i'm a 72-year-old disabled veteran who had to fight from 1983 when the air force said i had a heart disease and c.o.p. like johnse of people

cornyn who were more willing to steal money from veterans and in texas today they are voting on a bill to move money to the border security when they got children living in black mold houses while their mother or father is irving afghan is then getting shot at. host: in austin, texas. bob is next in baltimore. independent. not -- caller: not necessarily baltimore, but maryland. problems with finding capable. to do all these jobs. is all these areas of the country that have been destroyed by the democrats. he will just talk about baltimore. i am close to baltimore and i do know people. i'm a white guy, but i do know

many black folks in baltimore city in the worst areas. a lot of those guys used to come up and work for us. these are black guys you really don't want to meet. these are pretty tough people that have been destroyed by for example, you've got a criminal down there. cummings.d elijah black folksd that are doing well now in the country under president trump to ever since that guy has been in charge down there, that place went down to where it's hopeless. there come very capable guys. give them a job. bring them out here. work. they can do it. host: joe in wisconsin. democratic color. your thoughts on washington this week. caller: good morning.

i wanted to comment on social security. i really don't like the word entitlement. i paid to get my social security. my employer paid. there is no reason it should be called an entitlement to it's not. we earned it. it's an insurance we paid for and i think the whole idea of this being an entitlement is just crazy. i think it needs to be brought up and people have to realize something we paid for and we have a right to. my state retirement has been robbed twice i republican governors. now it's finally settling in and making money. to quit robbing social security just pay the general budget. it doesn't work. host: in florida, republican. caller: hi there.

i have comments to make. this bernie sanders is getting so old and so outrageous. he needs to go work for kentucky fried chicken and get the and fellow out for prisoners and give them a three piecemeal. every single day. ok. and this o'rourke guy, he's just ridiculous. host: all right. you will hear from one of the candidates. joe biden will be in pittsburgh his first campaign rally after announcing last week. that's at four clock p.m. eastern time on c-span3 or you can watch on c-span.org. you can also listen if you get the c-span radio app. we've got a little less than 10

minutes left in our conversation with all of you. lawmakers have been back in their district and states for the past two and half weeks. this week to take up a number of issues. what are you watching for. in miamisburg, ohio. >> i want to make a comment about the gentleman previously talking about social security. that's not an entitlement. i've been paying into it since i was 14 years old. i think it's a disgrace that are take the fundans and put it into the general fund. it was set up to be a separate fund for social security. but then all these great politicians and i'm speaking of all of them. republicans and democrats. they are all just alike. they are in it for themselves and their lobbyists because the

lobbyists increase their pockets. more ondro with medicare for all. profiling senator richard blumenthal, he's one of the 14 cosponsors of the medicare for all act introduced by senator bernie sanders. the bill would establish a health insurance system financed by single-payer, but the collateral damage to the health-insurance industry and insurance in general. there's a debate over how to do fix the affordable care act. the story at the largest provider of health insurance in connecticut is aetna. also if you go to the washington post this morning, space force is the topic of the story. three states competing to host that. alabama, california and colorado.

it would oversee and coordinate all the aspects of the space establishment of the space command is a key step in the process of standing up. space force which in time would be the sixth ranch of the armed forces. c-span has covered a lot of hearings about the proposal. m at c-span.org. you can see everything that we've covered since it was first proposed by the president. in oklahoma. republican. caller: i wanted to thank you for taking my phone call. that first comment of all, i have worked a lot of

years to pay in to the social security savings account and i have also paid into medicare savings account. politicians the have their own social security retirement fund and their own and they spend our and do not take into account that that is our savings account, not theirs. and they let all the illegal immigrants and all these special interest different to our social security and are medicare and that is for us. we paid a to it all of our lives. host: steve in new haven, connecticut area democratic color. caller: i just wanted to comment on the medicare for all.

i'm on medicare now. i'm 67. and medicare isn't all that good. age orlly for someone my no hearing.'s you can't get your eyes. you can't get dental. understand why everyone is saying medicare for all. it doesn't make sense. medicare needs to be fixed. kim in tennessee. independent. what do you think about lawmakers returning to washington this week? what do you want them to be working on? i just wanted to make a comment. i remember trump saying mexico was going to pay for the wall. i also remembered him saying that the politicians because the rich give donations, they make

loopholes in the tax code so that they can get around thing their taxes and trump said he was going to fix that and he won't release his tax returns. but what has he done? he didn't fix anything. he just eliminated it. fargo $75aying wells billion in tax breaks. to sustain the fines that we've forfor -- they've got breaking the law. none of them ever seem to get arrested or tried. going to the prisons that were paying the bills. he said he's going to fix the loopholes but he just went in and eliminated completely. caller: i've been listening to all the comments coming in and i

just want to say, we are a nation of laws. we are nation that is free. and my concern is with everything going on in our , our elections were hacked into. our intelligence agents told us so. while they kept out certain information to protect sources, they told the american people a foreign adversary hacked into our election and that in itself should be alarming to every because in this country if we allow foreign entities to take over our nation, what are we going to be? is it ok for our children to be told when to go to school? to let a foreign entity take over our country and we live like automatic countries -- the regular people just get

?or host: those are questions that will be asked of attorney general barr. at 10:00 a.m., c-span.org or the c-span radio app to he will talk to lawmakers on that committee. thanks for watching. that does it for today's washington journal. we will be back tomorrow morning at 7:00 a.m. eastern time. [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] today, there will be a hearing on the trump policy

toward iran and that coverage starts at 12 noon. or you can listen live with the free c-span radio app. coming up at two eastern, the house will gavel in after their two-week recess and will work on natural resource committee bills this afternoon and later in the week, climate change. the senate will take up the president veto of the war powers resolution to end u.s. involvement in yemen. here is more on this week's schedule. kristi noem marcos of the held joins us. the house and senate hearings with attorney general barr will be the focus on the house floor. members are taking up climate change legislation in the coming week. what's the purpose of that bill?