scholar harold holder and best-selling author share their perspectives on c-span's new notedhe president historians rank america's best and worst chief executive sunday night on the span. . at our table, tom steyer to take your questions and comments on efforts to impeach the president. how much are you going to spend or have you spent so far and how much do you plan to spend going into 2020 on that effort? guest: i don't really know the answer to the question. i think we said we will spend whatever it took. how much am i going to spend? how long is it going to take question mark i don't know. it is a question of what can we do to make sure the american people are kept informed? what can we do to organize their voice to make sure in this question about impeachment that the voice of the american people is listened to.

really, it is their decision about what happened. host: it is up to the speaker of the house to decide that these articles of impeachment come to the floor. pelosi's standard for whether to move ahead on impeachment remains unmet. no republican lawmaker has joined democrats calling for the public to remove the president and public sentiment has not shifted in democrat investigators' favor. 60% are not in favor of moving forward with impeachment. guest: the thing that is going to move the american people, that is going to inform the american people is to allow them decision with televised hearings. we want all these people brought up so the american people can watch them explain what happened

and react and come to a conclusion regardless of partisanship. i believe the american people way to see this on tv the -- we will get emotional responses to the most corrupt president in american history. you are on the air with tom steyer. caller: actually, i am a democrat, but i also approve of impeaching. i must have called the wrong number. host: no problem, go ahead. caller: i think trump was behind the firing of comey. i also believe the meeting at the trump tower was definitely collusion because first of all, they all lied as to what the meeting was about. it was about other matters. thirdly, i think the republicans

better get on board with the truth because they are ruining their own party. look what happened in the house, of votes an avalanche -- people are going to start equating republicans with liars. first of all, i applaud all your sentiments. let's start with where we are. in my opinion, the argument is over as to whether this president obstructed justice. he clearly obstructed justice. i believe it is very clear for public information that it is corrupt and he takes money through his military operations from foreign companies and american companies under his jurisdiction. the argument about whether he met the criteria for impeachment is over. the question we keep reading about is what to do about it.

the question is are we going to allow the most corrupt president in american history to be above the law? that is the only question left. if we do, in effect, we are giving up on the idea of equal treatment under the law. camp.ntirely in your i don't believe speaker pelosi should wait for republicans to allow her to stand up for truth. i believe that is the only right thing to do and when the american people see through televised hearings what is going on, they will insist their representatives of whatever party do the right thing and remove this president. maryland,r marlboro republican imposing -- opposing impeaching. caller: good morning. how are you? i do not support the move and i think speaker pelosi is right that impeachment is off the

table. the reason being if democrats are so strong, so great, why don't you try to vote him out in the 2020 election? it is only two years from now. if you have the guts to do it, go ahead and do it. guest: if, in fact, the president is not removed before the 2020 election, i promise we will work very hard to defeat him in the election, you don't have to worry about that. there is something else going on here and that is whether or not we are going to establish the precedent that this corrupt behavior is fine, that a president can refuse to accept oversight from the congress and in effect, he has declared himself above the law. that is exactly what is going on right now. if, in fact, the congress of the united states decides to do nothing, they are setting a

precedent forever that we have a completely political situation -- completely different political situation then we have had. that is a rogue president deeply corrupt who disobeys the law, to thes his oath american people that he will put us before his own interest. if we decide to do that, it is a tragedy. if you look around the world at the places where we have this kind of corruption, you can see the results on their systems are devastating. i think we have a very simple question, we know this president is corrupt. the question is do we have the guts to do it -- do something about it? host: what is the evidence of corruption when robert mueller does not find him guilty in this report? caller: the -- guest: the mueller report does not deal

with corruption at all. the idea of corruption is that he would sell condos to foreign companies, rent floors of trump tower to foreign states. that people would use his real estate operations as an indirect way to pay him off for decision-making. if you look at the constitution, that kind of bribery is explicitly forbidden for a president. -- goes right to the heart of this presidency, the idea that he would put his own interest, his own money ahead of the interests of the american people is deeply offensive and dangerous. host: do democrats need to pay more attention to that talk or about what you claim is corruption by the president? guest: the two things we have

said for a year and a half of that we believe are obvious and open our obstruction of justice, if you read the mueller report, he lays it out clearly. the president is doing right now is refusing to meet subpoenas, refusing to allow administration officials to testify to congress, refusing to allow former administration officials to testify is obstruction of justice. we not only have it directly and clearly in the mueller report, but we have it live from the president himself. the idea that he did not get rid of his real estate operations, that people around the world buying hisws who is condos, who is renting his office space, renting his hotel rooms is something that is an open secret, everybody knows it. the daughter of the president of the democratic republic of congo bought a $7 million condo from

donald trump two weeks ago. if someone paid you $7 million, would it affect your decision-making? host: let's go to vivian in virginia. you support impeachment? i have got to push the button, sorry about that. start over. caller: thank you for taking my call. yes, i do support. it is plain as day in the media. the media is at fault, just like they were with the weapons of mass destruction. people in325 million the united states. what about us? this mayonnaise so corrupt. they said his family is not taking a salary, we are paying for their staff. it is plain. what has he done? gas.rday i paid $2.59 per when obama left, i paid $1.59.

what has he done? up.cost of health care, co-pays, up. medicine, up. what has he done? spew hate. these people hate so much they would rather see their country destroyed? , you aret me say this making a really important point that i entirely agree with. that is if you find someone with deep personal corruption, it always bleeds over into political corruption. there is never one cockroach. if you find a cockroach, you will find a nest of cockroaches. we have a president who corrupt through obstruction of justice and taking money through foreign countries and american companies . it bleeds over into political

decision-making in the most profound ways. you are talking about his use of vilification and racism for political purposes. we also see it in terms of his tax bill that was highly skewed to the biggest corporations and richest americans and his policy where he is putting everyone at risk denying science in an attempt please fossil fuel companies and political donors. what your point is i find dramatically important and that is when you find personal corruption, you will find political corruption right behind it and that is a devastating fact for every american. host: we will go to massachusetts. tim is watching, a republican. caller: good morning. oppose anwould impeachment proceeding and i do have issue with several of the things mr. steyer has been talking about.

first of all, to conflate policy disagreements with impeachment hearing is strange to say. talk about to corruption and collusion or anything like that, you are welcome to go through the mueller report, which found there was no underlying collusion. usually has to be an underlying crime for you to claim there has been an extraction -- obstruction. it to talk about foreign donors and things like that, i am sure we will find in the coming weeks more and more about hunter biden receiving millions of dollars from the ukrainian gas company while his father read -- withheld funds from the u.k. -- ukraine and gets the prosecutor fired. if you are really into fighting political corruption, you will have a lot to say about joe biden. you have a right to say whatever you want. let meet meet -- guest:

say this. i don't believe mr. trump is impeachable based on his political corruption. i believe he is impeachable based on personal corruption, i am sorry if i did not make that clear in the first place. i think there is something else going on when i talk about political corruption and that is denial of the truth. standslook at where he in energy policy, he is unwilling to accept scientific findings by scientists all over the world because it does not fit politically. if you look at his tax bill, he is unwilling to follow the facts from the last 40 years about what happens when you cut taxes the way he cut them and who benefits from them. there really is no argument. i am not saying he should be impeached based on policies i disagree with. i am saying the only thing he is impeachable for is obstruction of justice and corruption. what i am saying is his personal

dishonesty and putting himself ahead of the american people is entirely consistent with his political dishonesty where he is willing to exhort the truth and trumpet falsehoods for political advantage and that to me is why this is so urgent. you never see personal corruption like we are seeing without political corruption as well. the entire combination threatens our constitution and threatens the basis for democracy, which is trust. regardless of whether we disagree. if you and i disagree, i am fine with that as long as you are telling the truth and putting the american people first. then we can disagree on absolutely everything and that is democracy. if you are going to lie and put yourself ahead of the american people, i have a real problem with it because that destroys the entire basis for democratic conversation. host: george in tennessee, republican. caller: yes.

top of the morning to you. knowteyer, i would like to what is your problem with the president? did you have problems with him before he became president or this just something that happened january 2017? caller: i have absolutely no personal problem with the president, george. to me, i have no personal vindictive feeling toward him. if he can be removed from office, i have no interest in pursuing him after that. my concern is something completely different, which is, i feel as if we are in a very divided america, that we need to go back to a conversation that involves shared facts and shared values. i have traveled around this country for the last 6 years and what i found is democratic voters and republican voters and independent voters share the

same values overwhelmingly. to me, what is important is that our leaders go back to trying to address that and that we share a vision of what we are trying to do together in the 21st century where we are supporting each other and recognizing that each other's success helps us both. that we gooncerned back to an idealistic america where we lead the world and understand that by doing the right thing, we will not only be more just, we will be more prosperous, better paid, and we will do it together. by my realizing that your success is my success and you are realizing that my success is yours. host: bob, independent, you oppose impeachment. yeah, i do. i would like to say recently --

good morning to you all. recently, you guys did an expose or set up about the worst -- best of the worst presidents and you gave barack obama the number 12 spot. is he getting kudos for wiping him out? we spent more money than every president combined. you are talking about a c-span's new book, the president and it is based on a survey based on historians. historians rated president barack obama number 12. if you want to learn more, you can go to the website and find the book and learn more about it. what about your point on impeachment? caller: the impeachment, i don't understand it. everybody hates donald trump. this guy from day one has been

on his case and dogging him since he was elected. this man has all kinds of backward things he is doing, too, and when he starts this civil war, is he going to have somewhere to go hide with his guards? was: we lost bob, but that two calls in a row that wanted to know when you decided that you would spend your money and efforts to impeach this president? it was before the mueller report. what was it? guest: what i said, it has been a year and a half, october 20, 2017. it was clear to me from public information that this president was obstructing justice and putting money in his own pocket at the expense of the american people in a way that is explicitly forbidden by the constitution. we all know how divided america is and how troublesome that is for the country moving forward.

i felt if you go back and look, if we came together on the simplest values, that we don't believe in corruption, that we do believe in equal justice before the law, that the richest and most powerful americans as example five by this president also are subject to the rule of law, that is something we should be able to agree with regardless of where we live and regardless of what political party. this is about patriotism. i know if we remove this president, the next president will be a conservative republican from indiana. i don't agree with him on most policies. that doesn't matter. what we are talking about is a system that works going forward where we stand up in public for our deepest values. if we don't do that, that is a statement, too. people are talking about the risk of impeachment. impeachment is really an

indictment, we want him to be tried. it is not trying him, it is we want him to be tried. if we don't do that, that is a choice. people are asking like we either send him to the senate to be tried or not. actually deciding not to do that is a precedent and a statement of who we are and are we so scared to stand up for the most values, equal justice before the law and the truth? why is that scary? host: how many times have you made that argument to speaker pelosi? i have made that one in person. host: more than once? guest: i don't think so. host: what was her reaction? guest: i don't think it is ever appropriate to discuss what someone said to me in private, but i think speaker pelosi says in private what she says in public and i don't think it was different. i think she is consistent and i

think she is evolving because the facts are evolving. if you follow what she said in public, it has changed because the facts have changed. i am sure it is very hard for the speaker of the house to watch her branch of government be completely stonewalled by a president will -- where he will not allow anybody from the administration to go and testify on anything where he will not allow oversight, that there is no document he is willing to share where he sues, personally, the chairman of the house oversight committee. there is a level of contempt for congress that is so obvious, i am sure that puts her in a tough position because it certainly makes all the congresspeople aware of how the president and the administration feels toward that. host: tom in illinois, republican. steer: good morning, mr. yer.

i have followed you in the news when i have seen you on tv. thank you for letting me on. and i county board member am not satisfied with the way obama sent directives down to the county level that we had to vote on them. , youis impeachment thing said equal justice before the law. is he presumed innocent or presumed guilty? you in favoris are of going back and seeing where this dossier came from? are you in favor of going back and seeing where this thing started? it started from hillary clinton. are you in favor of having her bleached white and

utensils destroyed because she hid 30,000 emails? are you in favor of doing that to find the truth? host: let's get a response. guest: what i am interested in is the people of the united states being allowed to be treated fairly and their voice being heard. our voice being heard. right now, we have a president who is not putting the american people first, who is obstructing justice, and who is corrupt. i would not conflate that with clinton did, who is not in office, is not running an office, and whatever is true about her emails is a thing in the past. we are dealing with the existing president of the united states and what i am advocating is he be treated like an american citizen and not as somebody who , above thee law

oversight of congress who can do whatever he wants regardless of the impact. rs.tever happened with m clinton is not relevant now. when we remove trump from office, i will not spend my time worrying about him as a private citizen and whether he broke the law and has to suffer criminal prosecution. my concern is the american people be heard, that they be given the truth and -- in televised hearings so we can make up our mind and that the system itself be just and fair because this is a system which we all rely on and which we are going to have to rely on together to answer really basic questions. we have a dysfunctional federal government, if you have not noticed. this seems to be a very simple question, this is not a partisan question. do we believe in the rule of law for a sitting president?

let's not conflate that with old clinton true,mrs. false, or in the middle. let's deal with issues on the table relevant for all americans and who we are and set examples for our children that we have real values that we stand up for. when the chips are down, america's do the right thing. a democrat.nessee, you impose the impeachment process. , i am totally confused about it. it for they should give five weeks and the way he is blocking everything, i think they should go ahead and do something because he will ride it out all the waita 2020. he was so transparent, why would he not allow any investigation of any kind? block thehe try to

banks and things? this man is running scared. host: what do you feel about that, give it four or five weeks and let it play out? guest: i definitely agree and i am afraid i did not catch that caller's name perfectly. i apologize. i definitely agree this man is running scared. a step back for one second and think about a president of the united states who calls people th in front under oa of his justice department rats who says people who refuse thate to testify or lie our stand up good guys. we all know where that language comes from. we have all watched crime movies. that is exactly the attitude of a very guilty criminal. we are seeing behavior that is absolutely consistent with a criminal mindset, criminal behavior, and criminal guilt.

every single time we see it, people keep saying, is he within his rights? you have to ask those questions. that is appropriate. we also have to ask ourselves, why have we seen this president for two years obstruct justice? because he is innocent? i don't think so. no tofrank, you same moving forward on impeachment. caller: yes. mr. stier says we need more public hearings. we have already had public hearings for the last two and a half years. with that public house hearings, senate hearings. we have had adam schiff reading passages from the dossier into the public record, which is never been verified. steyer thinks this is going to convince the american people that trump should be impeached.

how many more publicans do you need? you have the mullah report that shows there is no obstruction of justice or collusion. you go through those 10 items in the mueller report, none of them prove obstruction of justice. that is why he was not indicted. host: robert mueller did not say he was guilty of these 10 incidents of obstruction. guest: what he said, and i forced myself to read the mall report so i could answer this question. host: 448 pages. guest: what he said is it is justice department policy not to indict a sitting president. i am not going to say anyone is guilty, including this president, if they are not allowed to then go into a court of law and defend themselves in short order because otherwise i am basically a prosecutor, and there is no other side. i am not saying he is innocent, and here are the facts. those facts are very damming.

that is my first point. it is a case that he did obstruct justice. we have had one hearing that has to do with the president's corruption and obstruction. it was michael cohen. it did move people. that was the one hearing we have had into an half years that moved people's views on impeachment 6%. think back to the brett kavanaugh hearing. americans saw that very differently. that is democracy. we got a chance to see what was really going on and to react to it. we have really only had in the last year two hearings where you could see real people in real time. americans tuned in. i asked people, if we got mcgann, the former white house counsel, would you watch it? yes. there,got donald junior

would you watch it? if you got jared kushner, would you watch it? yeah. i don't think we can expect 320 million americans to read a 448 page legal document in their spare time. they don't have spare time. what they will do is tune into the biggest soap opera of history. diego,ichael, san republican, supporting impeachment. caller: yes. thank you. good morning. steyer, i agree that donald trump has done things to deserve impeachment. the you think that all the -- do you think that all the republican senators that lineup behind pence to lick donny's

boots will convict him? host: you need 20. guest: i take your point. the people i am counting on are the people of the united states, not the senators. i believe are for the people of the united states see what is happened and see it on tv and feel it in their bones, we will make a decision. it will not be a partisan decision. i trust republicans in this country to have real values and to be decent people. i think they are going to watch this, and they will come to the conclusion that it is not ok, just as you have. i believe that is the most important power. i'm a democrat with a small d. i want the power to the people. i want us to be able to make this. if we decide that what has happened is wrong and the president should be removed, those senators will have to listen to us. that is the process i believe in.

i believe in the voice and the mind and the values of the american people. i believe elected officials will have to listen to us. that is what i have been pushing for televised hearings. host: which of the candidates in the democratic field running against the president do you think makes the best opponent? guest: i think we don't even know what the field is yet, greta. we have not had a chance for the ones that have announced, i think 20 people, to lay out their policies and explain. i think it is not just policies, it is their priorities. if you are going to be a president, and you have 19 different policy positions, that is great. we know you're not going to get to 19 different policy priorities. beto o'rourke laid out his policy priorities.

decide.o early to from my standpoint, what we're looking for in a presidential candidate is this positive vision. what is it to be an american in the 21st century? what are the rights in the 21st century of american citizens so we understand why we are safe and our families are safe, and we can create the future we want t. host: is there a democrat that is not in the race yet that you want to run? guest: there are lots of great people. i don't think it is good to stop at 20. there are definite several people who are still talking about joining this race who have not. stillnny thing is, it is april of 2019. normally at this time, americans are thinking about the nba

finals or the stanley cup playoffs, not 18 months ahead to the presidential election. host: would you ever run? guest: i have said all along that i would do whatever i thought would have the most positive impact. i really would do anything. i think we are in clearly a political crisis. it.ink people hate to admit it is painful. we are in a situation where we honestly have a rogue president who is deeply corrupt, and we are struggling with oversight of that president. we are struggling with a dysfunctional federal government . if you think about it, we are the only country in the world that is not part of the terrorist climate accords. we have -- paris climate accords. we have 11 million people living undocumented. we have a gun violence

problem that has been going on for a long time. in new zealand, they had one incident of gun violence, and they solved in nine days. we have a government that cannot come together and trust each other and get things done. the basic stuff that you would expect would be solvable. i think there is a real question about hanley share a vision -- can we share a vision of who we are and what we are trying to do and accept each other as fully american? from that foundation build the kind of america we all want. i think people think it is either impeachment or deal with the future. we have to prove that as americans we can come together on the basic values. we all care about the same things. americans are deeply generous and brave and compassionate.

we need to go back to that and stop tearing each other apart. host: you still could get into this race? you said you would do whatever it takes. guest: i would. if there was some reason i felt like it was the answer. we are sitting with 20 people in the race and more to come. they are just starting to talk about what they stand for. host: we will go to jeanette, washington, d.c. you are against moving forward on impeachment. caller: yes. as much as my heart is with you on wanting to impeach the president, i think the aftereffects of impeachment would be even worse for this country. i think we need to do our due diligence and have facts and an explanation and reason of who and what happened before we get to a conclusion on we need to get rid of the president.

illinoisgentleman from , people do have their own facts and beliefs. as long as we are this divided, going straight to impeachment would be so detrimental to the country. i think we need to give democracy a chance to work. that is why waiting until the election is the better idea. we need to know what happened. he is like a celebrity president that we want to vote off the island. we just cannot do that. ,f you look around the world everybody is so chaotic that their governments in democracies are not working. we need to figure out why this happened, how we can prevent it in the future and commit to solving it. we can learn so much from this. if it happened once, it can happen again.

guest: i think you said a couple of things. one was that we are jumping to impeachment. the impeachment process is really a series of hearings to get to the facts that you are talking about so that the congress can make a decision on bether the president should tried in the senate. it is the democratic process in the constitution to do what you are talking about, to get the facts to the american people so that we can all see what happened and then decide whether he should be tried in the senate. it is not jumping to a conclusion. it is setting in motion the process you are describing and that the founders contemplated for a corrupt president like we have now. you are comparing us to england, where i suppose what you're talking about is the decision to leave the european union,

so-called brexit. i would say it is comparable. i would say that is a good point. i would not limit it to england. we are seeing the kinds of nationalism that mr. trump represents, us against the rest of the world, and the kind of specific nationalism that breaks down on racial and ethnic boundaries. we are seeing that around the world. it is a response, i think, to not having a communist enemy. it is a retreat from the idea that the world will progress cooperatively as opposed to completely competitively. when the president says america first, he is saying we don't cap allies. he is saying -- don't have allies. he is saying we don't have people we cooperate with. a dramatically

important and devastatingly stupid point. when you think about how you are successful, think about your own life and your own community. the way things get done, the way good things happen is when people put aside their self-interest and work together to make things better for everybody. that is what we were doing traditionally with our allies around the world. we understood we had shared interests, and we would do better working together. this kind of nationalism, self-interest, and disregard for that mr. trump displays in the united states, he also displays outside the united states. it is leading us to a very dangerous situation and is contrary to the kind of leadership that america has provided around the world for over 100 years. heis basically saying to

ck with the rest of you. you are on your own. we are on our own. justice we believe in and freedom and democracy, and we will leave that movement around the world. lead that movement around -- we will lead that movement around the world. to try to stick to the truth as much as possible. hand tocross on my remind myself that if you tell the truth, it will work out. it may take 2000 years, but if you stick to the truth, that is what you should be doing. you should not compromise on that even in the face of any kind of opposition or attack. host: is this something you do everydaymore of that available e new york times. host: joining us from new york this morning's alan