small network with an unusual name rolled out a big idea. c-span open the doors to washing policy for all to see. bringing content from congress and beyond. a lot has changed, today that big idea is -- on television and online, c-span is your unfiltered guide. brought to you as a public service by your cable or satellite provider. >> this morning, constitutional law attorney david ripken talks about debate over the citizenship question on the 2020 census. you hear from the bipartisan policy center that explores a .ongressional budget report will carless reports's article about active and retired law enforcement officers being members of online hate groups. we take your calls and you can turn the conversation -- join

the conversation on facebook and twitter. host: this is washington journal, july 9. plan toanders and aoc introduce a resolution declaring a climate change emergency. thelution will read emergency is a direct effect of human activities. the move comes one day after trump administration highlighted what they say are key successes when it comes to environmental policy, citing air quality, lower carbon emissions and cleaning up hazardous waste sites. what was said by the president on this issue and you can make comments on the efforts on environmental issues by calling the phone lines. (202)-748-8000 for democrats, (202)-748-8001 for republicans, (202)-748-8002 for independents.

if you want to post thoughts on social media, twitter @cspanwj, facebook, facebook.com/cspan. writing about the event yesterday at the white house, the new york times saying, reviewing polling data, working for the trump camp 2020 camp, unsurprising obstacle from key demographic groups, millennials and women. wasnumbers showed mr. trump never going to get voters who are passionate about climate change. there were moderate voters who like the policies and want to know that he is be responsible on environmental issues. you can still find the event on c-span at www.c-span.org,

president trump and others in his cabinet highlighting what they call environmental success. here are some of what the president had to say yesterday. [video clip] >> we are unlocking american energy and the u.s. is now a net exporter of clean, affordable american natural gas. [applause] we are exporting all over the world. [applause] today, u.s. ranked, listen to this, number one in the world, for access to clean drinking water. ranked number one in the world. [applause] one of the main messages of air pollution, particulate matter, six times lower here than the global average. we hear so much about some

countries and what everyone is doing. we are six times lower than the average. that is a tremendous number. our nations energy-related carbon emissions have declined more than any other country on earth. think of that. admissions projected to drop 2019 and 2020. host: in analyzing statements from the president, one of those times, the new york they look at particulate matter say it is misleading saying america's air is cleaner than it was five decades ago but it took place under predecessors. in thetually increased president's first year in office. noted data for 2018 is not publicly available while

single year increases for the six metrics have occurred under previous administrations as well, adding that independent analysis found air quality has declined under mr. trump's watch. you can find more at the new york times. quality, sites, air water quality, we will show you some of what was said but policy overall, we are getting your thoughts in this first hour. give us a call. (202)-748-8000 for democrats, (202)-748-8001 for republicans, (202)-748-8002 for independents. post on social media. we start in essex, maryland, republican, cliff, you are first up. caller: good morning. thanks for letting me talk on c-span. appreciate it. ,lobal warming, climate change whatever you want to call it, is a pr campaign.

it is a hoax. ok? what are they going to do with all these trillions of dollars they are going to suck out of our economy? everyone's economy? they are going to transfer it to the stock market, create carbon credits and treat it as commodity on the stock market. that is not a solution. it is a tax scam, is what it is. you cannot even talk about global warming or climate change without addressing the global chemtrail spraying program that sprays tons of metal particulate into atmosphere every day, everywhere in the world. the trump that said, administration's approach to environmental policy, how would you great it? -- grade it? caller: i am all for protecting the environment but this is something different. this is a global tax scam. host: ron, bethlehem,

pennsylvania, democrat. good morning. caller: good morning. i have a statement. the paris climate agreement, that took years to put together, the iran deal, took years to put together, trump administration comes in and rips these agreements up that are made not just by the u.s. but also our nato alliance and other nations and then gets up and wants to take credit, when he puts nothing in place to replace all this hard work. host: apply that to environmental policy. right now you see in washington yesterday, the flooding that went on, you see the earthquakes taking place in

california -- obviously, something is going on with our planet. if we don't put anything in trump took president apart, i just feel the whole nation will suffer. host: if you go to national geographic, they have a story looking at the 15 ways the trump administration changed environmental policy. on the top, the pull out of the paris climate agreement. second was changes to the clean power plan, one of the previous administrations signature policis, requiring a cut by 2030. 2017, it was rolled back by the president's epa. number three, epa loosening regulations on air pollution, toxic air pollution, saying regulation involved around a complicated rule referred to as once in, always in, saying that

if a company polluted over the legal limit, they would have to match the lowest level set by industry, and match indefinitely by dropping the standard. companies toced innovate ways to decrease emissions. they are no longer required to keep using innovations once lower targets are met. touting policies yesterday at the white house. georgia, independent, david. caller: good morning, pedro. fellow tothe other give him a score. i give him a d+. something technical. i have been all over the country as a truck driver. in the areas where they drill natural gas, i have delivered pipe, it is like a checkerboard

across the country oklahoma to montana. dakotas, you the could see a glow from the burn off from the natural gas. from thee a city flames coming from the wells. the farmers complain that around some of the wells, they were leaking so bad it was killing the grassland. they have been on that grassland to cut the grass and feed the largest area there is down there in new mexico. they buy all the grass to feed cattle. this has been going on for a while. d+ applies to natural gas or other issues when it comes to policy? caller: you are talking about particulate. i don't see how they can say it is going down, with that much glare being burned by all these wells.

they are throwing away our resources. that is our resources that they are burning. there is a way to capture that. they won't let them do it. that is why scott pruitt was put in, to cover that up. the newest man that has come in as a lobbyist for the coal industry. there are new ways to use coal. you can make electricity by turning it into roofing tile. they are not saying any of this. they are covering it up to keep on doing what they have been doing, which is polluting the air. host: several members of the administration spoke yesterday at the event at the white house. you can see all that at www.c-span.org. florida,boynton beach, republican. caller: thank you. about the was environment and things is that i

know our government is not serious about fixing things or helping the people because we still allow bottled water corporations in our country. they should be abolished. how does one relate to the other? caller: bottled water no, like,ns they have the social corporate responsibility we have all been taught about is a dream like santa claus or more so. we have been told to believe it. corporations don't have social responsibility. they're not living for us. they are living for the prophets alone. when they bought of the water and they buyout the government, they have high markups on bottled water, the plastic, the

5 gyres in the ocean is how they tie together. i packed thenally, same bottle i refill every day so i don't create this plastic waste. the bottled water companies, not only produce to the ultimate plastic waste that we are leaving in the ocean, which is what makes our planet special in this whole entire universe. host: ok. if you go to the guardian this morning, the president and administration on this, when it comes to efforts on the environment, bernie sanders, the presidential candidate and senator and representative aoc expected today in washington to propose and declare a climate crisis and official emergency.

they plan to do that via resolution according to the guardian and others. part of that will read "the global warming caused by human activities which increase emissions of greenhouse gases has resulted in a climate emergency, urgently and impacting the economic and social well-being, health and safety and national security of the u.s." it goes on to say that congress demands a national, social, industrial and economic mobilization of the resources of the u.s. at a massive scale. that resolution today, look out in washington as congress returns and gets back to business this week. trump administration highlighting environmental policies. one thing they did talk about yesterday was pulling out of the paris climate agreement. [video clip] parisry signatory to the

climate accord lags behind america and overall reduction. who would think that is possible? the reason i withdrew the united states from the unfair, ineffective and very, very expensive paris climate accord. [applause] thank you. my administration is now revising the past administration's misguided regulations to better protect the environment and to protect our american workers, so importantly. as an example, there is a very good place for solar energy. i am a believer in solar energy. it hasn't fully developed. it has a long way to go. it has really got a tremendous future. the united states does not have

to sacrifice our own jobs to lead the world on the environment. host: barbara, montana, democrat, good morning. caller: good morning. forgive me, i don't remember the name of the guy who took over said that there were been on superfund sides the books for 10, 20 years, he has managed to delete them. meankind of word is delete when you're talking about some toxic cesspool like we got in montana?

butte? animals go near it, they die. i want to know what they mean by delete? host: when it comes to superfund, as they are commonly known, is that the top issue when it comes to environmental policy for you? caller: yeah. they said they deleted it. when you delete something, that doesn't necessarily mean something good. they just took it off the books. all have emptied our epa over the u.s. workers in the field, are not there anymore. it is scary. host: andrew wheeler serving as the head of epa, spoke during the presentation yesterday, when taking a look at the topic of super funds, the new york times again taking a look at statement said and analyzing saying the

agency completed more superfund hazardous waste cleanup than any year of previous administrations and set records almost every year. "we have made great strides cleaning up michigan, something that was beyond fixing, they thought it would never happen." the new york times saying this is misleading. there are more than a hundred -- there are more than 1100 toxic waste cleanup superfund sites. it sometimes takes decades to clean up a site. sites in the22 current fiscal year. soil cleanup and contamination monitoring wrapped up at a recycling site in pennsylvania in 2016, nearly three decades after was added to the list, two years before its removal. senator patty murray from washington state saying

president trump's environmental record starts and stops with his relentless assault on bedrock environmental pretensions, to benefit his friends in big oil. bernie sanders saying the president's record on the environment is pathetic and embarrassing to the world. "he better start listening to scientists and not his friends in big business." environmentals record is based on radical climate denial, putting the interest of his corporate pals over those of everyday americans and rolling back important protections that safeguard the health of our communities. some of the reactions on twitter. getting your reaction as well. hi.pendent, new york, jim, caller: i usually call on illegal immigration. i was a science instructor for

more than 20 years. i worked at stony brook, and the labs incademy doing chemistry and physics. i can see the amount of ignorance and the populace. people don't know about science. they should educate themselves instead of just saying global warming or climate change is a hoax. for instance, if you have a can and you feel the weight of that, when that is burned, you add one third of the weight of that gasoline to the atmosphere in gas, mostly carbon dioxide. what you could do, if you are really interested, and you want to say this is a hoax, pick up a book or go to school and learn how to balance a chemical equation.

gasoline,o burn that you need the same number of molecules on the left as on the right. you end up with carbon dioxide. host: overall, the administration's approach to policy -- what would you cite a specific concerns of yours? caller: the administration's hands are tied. the platter is so full of people. we need this energy. i don't see a way out of it unless, like china had with their one child policy. the globe is too crowded. i don't see any way out of it. nature is going to take its course. host: when you say we need energy, is this fossil fuel energy? opening moreuld be nuclear power plants but that is not going to happen because everyone is afraid of it. that is clean energy. what are you going to do? yetle say this is a hoax,

all the science they use day in and day out is not a hoax. host: we talked about that earlier. teresa inve on to minnesota, democrat. caller: thank you. this is important to my area. minnesota, we have a situation that is getting news. i would point you to the newest article i saw from the hill, mining, clean water, solution for the nations favorite wilderness. we have a company up here called sulfide nickeler mine and there is another that

wants to piggyback that called .win metals chilean oligarch rents his mansion to ivanka and jared in washington dc, creating a bacterial to the president to get this controversial set up -- back channel to the president to get this controversial set up going. they have now greenlighted and laws, ando many epa there is a big controversy and scandal in minnesota with epa because they have not, they suppressed epa comments in the permitting process for polymet. it big thing with polymet is

did not have much money as a small company. funding has been infused by glenncore. it is a qatari investment wealth fund. would your concerns over the overall approach to policy, to the administration, what would that be? caller: this is what is making me mad. he is touting the environmental stuff. epasitting here, is corrupt in been suppressing comments the permitting process for these mines, that said this is dangerous and there is no way we can enforce any of these permits. there is no way that this mine

is not going to pollute. we have these big corporations. host: i apologize. you went into detail. we will go on to catherine, ellicott city, maryland, republican. catherine, hi. caller: hi. i would like the administration to support the energy innovation and dividend refund act in the house. it is a bipartisan piece of legislation, supported by citizens climate lobby, founding members, george schulz and james baker, two top republican administrators in the george h w bush administration and george w. bush administration. this is not a tax. money collected would go back to citizens. it would be managed through irs.

i think if this administration wants to demonstrate real interesting climate change, that is a good way to do it. host: how does the act work? fee on carbonut a starting lower and increasing gradually. the money collected is redistributed to american citizens on a monthly basis through irs. this fee ishy has, put on products, the manufacturer, or the use of them, creating carbon, including other countries. we would put a fee on any product, say coming in from canada, and the money collected would go to american citizens. that would encourage canadians to develop this process for their own citizens, and that would spread throughout the

world. this is a bipartisan effort. host: talking about the legislative effort when it comes to environmental policy. previous caller mentioned ivanka's influence saying it was her husband and her, raising money in the past for democratic candidates and often seen as tubing issues -- as championing issues. withdrawal is seen as a defeat for the first daughter. her influence on this may be growing and environmental protection may be another item on her portfolio, ranging from empowering women to fighting human trafficking. voice of america carried that story. independent line, massachusetts.

caller: thanks. i appreciate c-span. is, i want to make a point this climate science denial is not helpful. that is not limited to president trump. panels, theut solar fastest-growing greenhouse gas, which comes from production of solar panels. its presence in the air doubles every five years, thousands of times as strong as co2. remaining in denial about that is not a good idea for the president or the democrats. one good thing that has happened in the past two weeks, trump administration released the first greenhouse gas inventory, which the administration, required to do. i'm glad to see they did not shirk that duty.

the best thing that is happening here in the most positive thing emp has been legalized under president trump. with hemp, the university in sweden has proven we can get clean fuel, carbon neutral fuel, biodiesel and ethanol, biogas, to replace fossil fuels we are now using. we could be energy independent and on only carbon neutral fuel in 50 days if we went into it right now. host: norman in massachusetts. when its on social, comes to the administrations environmental policy. armando saying, what environmental protections, unless you mean the opposite of protecting the environment, they are 100% successful.

david saying, he pulled out of the paris climate agreement. he has no business talking about environmental leadership. joseph on facebook saying, cutting out regulations to bring in new technology is a brilliant move. you can find that on facebook and twitter, @cspanwj. the previous administration, when it came to previous efforts, has a clean power plan, at the time required states to meet targets for cutting emissions from power plants. the goal was to reduce u.s. power sector emissions 32% below 2005 levels by 2030. that was taken out and replaced by the affordable clean energy rule of the trump administration. it would lower power sector emissions by 10 million tons by carbonhe world reducing emissions by .07%.

statesd leave it up to to improve efficiency. one of the efforts touted by the administration yesterday, amongst many, you can comment on the trump effort, the efforts on the environment, (202)-748-8000 for democrats, (202)-748-8001 for republicans, (202)-748-8002 for independents. connecticut, democrat, linda. caller: hi. i cannot believe anybody believes anything coming out of tom's mouth. all he has done is destroy agreements -- trump's mouth. he is not saving us money. we could have more jobs and less pollution if we used wind turbines or hydro. we have dams all over the country. we have deserts. we have the sunshine. it is free. this would create any jobs lost

in the facile fuel industry, which we don't need. onare seeing billions wasted climate change destruction, every day, when we have these awful storms killing people. they're not doing anything about that. they're not doing anything about anything. for him to say we are number one in the world, is a joke. we are the laughingstock of the world with this man in the white house. i cannot believe he is still there. host: republican, syracuse, new york, joe. caller: i found that to be interesting. in order to make a tesla battery, 80% of that is nickel. what country do we want to exploit to get raw materials, strategic raw materials to build turbines and windmills and solar panels and to get the polysilicon, the lithium, the nickel, the cobalt? i wish msnbc, you people and fox

would show grass. united states produces 5 billion metric tons of steel per year, from u.n. standard says it is 45 billion metric tons and then when i talk to people, they think exxon mobil produces the majority of the world's oil. no. the world produces 100 million bears of oil a day. exxon only does 2 million barrels. the soviet union does 11. host: when it comes to the trump administration, what do you think about the approach? caller: his approach is good. let's keep the price of electricity down. in order to make strategic metals that go into our sustainable future, electricity helps to do that. you cannot make a solar panel without coal. you have to use coal in order to purify the polysilicon . host: what do you mean by the

approaches good? caller: minnesota. yes. mind,do a mind a nickel in minnesota, the lady was crying about that. 80% of a tesla battery is nickel. what country do you want to get it from? host: let me stop you. we brought that issue up already. brad in nevada, good morning. georgia ando joe in patricia in minnesota. have, what'sss we going on now, talk about windmills that generate stuff but they kill golden eagles, baldheaded eagles. all these people get is just a little bit of charge.

you are saying that, when it comes to environmental policy, the trump administration's efforts overall, something you agree with? caller: yes, i do. they want to clean our forest up. turn it back to the people. the people took care of our forests. wherever.izona, don't just say it is public land and cut us off. his policy is good. host: national geographic highlights some of those policy changes when it comes to environmental forests, saying the administration officials propose changes to handling the endangered species act, say that in july, 2018, they want to change the way the act is administered, saying more weight would be put on economic

considerations when designating endangered animal habitat, when it comes to opening of public lands. number 12, unlike national parks which have to be approved by congress, national monuments can be created by executive order, which the president -- which means they can be dismantled just as easily. earswas the case for bears and grand staircase in utah. tribes and environmental groups are challenging that interpretation in court. national geographic keeping a list of changes in environment a policy. fort lauderdale, florida, republican, paul. caller: i have a question for democrats. where did all the ice go from the last ice age? did emissions from coal make all

the ice go away? idea that a bunch of champagne drinking people figured out a multi trillion dollar water faucet to shut off global warming is the most ignorant thing anybody could ever think of. here's the thing. where were the democrats on saving the oceans? for the first time in history, a trade agreement includes cleaning up the oceans. provision that plastic will not be allowed in the oceans. that is where our food comes from. ,f you want to be frightened molecules of plastic are getting into the fish that we eat. not a word from democrats.

no action from democrats on protecting our food supply. thank donald trump. tactical environmental stuff might help. host: one of the things he mentioned at the event at the white house yesterday. another thing was comparing how his administration approached environmental policy to that of the democrats. [video clip] >> we are focused on plaque trickle solution -- practical solutions, more than 100 democrats in congress support the green new deal. their plan is estimated to cost our economy, nearly $100 trillion, a number unthinkable, a number not affordable even in the best of times. if you go 150 years from now, and we have had great success, that is not a number even thought to be affordable. crush theons of jobs, dreams of the poorest americans

and disproportionately harm minority communities. i will not stand for it. we will defend the environment. we will also defend american sovereignty, american prosperity and we will defend american jobs. henry.ew york, democrat, caller: good morning. think the current administration should get a+ for success. hitting 93 now. that is real. france, 115 degrees. temperatures are going up, off the chart. believe what you want to believe. study what you want to study. make a decision. we are in a problem. a+, give me give it

specifics. caller: it is too early to give specifics. host: you gave it -- caller: a warmer alaska is a better alaska. are you kidding me? host: robert, paisley, florida. caller: good morning america and thanks for c-span. want to comment on what the retired science teacher said about overpopulation. i don't think there is a lot we can do, one way or the other with any of this, until we get some kind of grip on overpopulation. the planet is exploding. each human take so much water and food, so much paper products. to me, it is not being addressed by anyone. host: colorado, republican, mark. caller: good morning.

worth 2anders is million. joe biden, elizabeth warren, kamala harris, all worth millions. the paris accord was mentioned off about. working people in france protested it so badly the government had to pull back on efforts to reduce emissions. they wanted gasoline at $17 a gallon but working people couldn't get to work if they had to pay seven dollars per gallon. it is a bipartisan effort on both sides, mostly extreme is werelly, but all people, protesting the paris accord. you are tabbing the paris accord? what is that about. host: that is marking colorado.

when at put out by the american fuel and petrochemical manufacturers, small manufacturers, and one of the topics they are concerned about in this ad,, which will run in swing states, is that of ethanol. [video clip] a president trump offered win-win energy policy for all americans. for small refineries, they are job killers. our workers are fueling the countries manufacturing come back. we cannot go backwards now. president trump, only you can fix this. please keep your promise to refinery workers, keep ethanol mandates from killing our jobs. paid for by afpm. host: in other news, when it comes to reelection and electoral efforts, ellie x 18 reporting amy mcgrath, a retired colonel and combat pilot, hopes to challenge the republican senate majority mitch mcconnell for his seat in 2020.

in her launch video, she speaks softly from a living room, while piano music takes aim at mcconnell saying it started with , dividing washington. she goes on to charge that he has year-by-year turned washington into something we all despise. that is on her twitter feed. you can watch the announcement today. that is available on twitter. north carolina, primary runoff for deciding which doctor they would like to succeed walter jones. between greg murphy of greenville and joe perry, has largely been about who can carry the best conservative mental. walter jones died in february. the candidates have similar platforms. runoff has evolved into a

battle, expenditure committees and well-known republican lawmakers. policy andironmental what you think of that. ohio, independent, mark. caller: good morning, c-span, thank you. trump basically is dragging his feet. he does this well. it is part of his agenda. solutions, ifve he releases them, or even mentions them, the powers that be will probably have them knocked off, our industrial military and technology, that we live under, they already have, for lack of a better word, the antigravity engine. we have had it since 1928. there is no reason for any american to pay gas bills, oil bills, electric bills. tesla was into this.

look what they did to him. florida,ond beach, democrat. caller: good morning. thank you. i have lived in florida for 40 years, sometimes i hate seeing this state go down the tubes. this is a red state. i hear the same lack of regulations, weakening the endangered species act, under george w. bush. it has continued. polluted,ays are so and my husband is a retired microbiologist. if these toxins become airborne, and there is some evidence that they are on their way, animals and fish are dying like crazy. why? -- don't everows regulate the companies and corporations, oh my god, don't ever do that -- they will not stop the runoff from industry coming down into the water,

agricultural, big corporations, the pollution continues to this day. it is polluting the air. the air is unbelievable. a business owner at the white house event said when it comes to algae, he has seen a reduction. caller: they are lying very well. we have a president that lies. you don't think the people under him or not lying? host: this was a separate business owner from florida. caller: when facts are looking you in the face, face them. these trump people -- [indiscernible] stanley, erie, pennsylvania, republican. hi. ok.er:

guys talking about this weather we haven't all this climate control and everything else, you know, this, you know, look in the bible, and basically, this stuff is happening right now because of what is happening, what's going to be happening in future. host: how does that deal with trump environmental policy today? caller: it all has to do with it. what trump is doing, the climate control, that he, the earthquakes, all the stuff, has to do with signs of what is to come, and that is what all the stuff, it has nothing to do with control,mate, climate nothing, nothing like that. the bible says, says so in the

bible, this is what is going to happen in the end times and that is what is happening. host: miami herald looks at the announcements, or the presentation made yesterday and applies that to floridians, particularly saying the reelection campaign has a plan to talk about the environment for florida voters, addressing the problems you see, not the causes you don't. it has been a winning strategy for republicans in florida for over a decade. the tactic is to address specific challenges affecting florida communities, algae blooms, the everglades, without describing the change. politics have shifted since the 2016, whenn skepticism over the extending causes of climate change proved immaterial. republicans in florida who ran successful campaigns avoid

climate change and now acknowledge it as a threat. rick scott featured it in a campaign, vowing to serve as a steward of the environment. this year they characterized it as real requiring increased resiliency efforts in concrete solutions. if youmi herald has that want to read that for yourself. martina, massachusetts, independent. caller: thanks. i want to go back to those comments earlier about overpopulation and the environment. investing in the poor, can help with that rate. most developed countries have birthrates of 1.7%. the least developed have 4.3%. when you get people out of poverty, they have fewer children. that helps with overpopulation.

everything is connected. when we talk about environment, we need to look at it from every single point of view. host: the illegal conduct server -- the league of conservative voters saying without the acknowledgment of this as a threat, his record on the environment can only be described as a total failure. under this president, we have seen 80 rollbacks on everything from the clean power plan, pesticides, enforcement of environmental law, down more than 80% on his watch, and the president's environmental record is such a toxic disaster, it should be declared a superfund site." brian, southgate, michigan, independent. caller: good morning. i want to put out an analogy -- i do not understand, just like your pocketbook, your budget, if

you have unexpected expense or lose your job or something, the first thing they get rid of his luxuries. entertainment, eating out, et cetera. if we are in this climate crisis, why are we not tackling getting rid of nascar, jet boating,rs, hydroplane motocross.ck jams, it is all entertainment to see who comes in first and we are clapping and cheering while the earth is coming in last, if you believe everything. host: you are saying because that is not happening, there is no crisis? justr: if you are serious, like your budget, the first thing you would get rid of his entertainment. -- is entertainment. not make everyone change every window. that is where you would start logically, if it is real.

host: are you saying it is real or not? caller: i believe we are adding to it. i believe the earth will compensate. it is billions of years old. host: ok. commenting on environmental policy and topics. you can do that as well in the remaining minutes for this segment. . (202)-748-8000 for democrats, (202)-748-8001 for republicans, (202)-748-8002 for independents. twitter and facebook available. electoral politics news. the washington post saying it the formerbach, kansas secretary of state, once on the short list for the commission saying he will launch a bid for the senate to succeed pat roberts.

this immediately stoked fears his cannons the -- his candidacy coming after a failed gubernatorial campaign could impair a crucial seat. this is not a time for a quiet senator. it is not a time for a senator who wants to make everyone happy and does not want to take a stand. establishment wants a tool, a quiet, useful tool who will keep status quo. guess what? the washington establishment is not going to get what they want. more of that in the washington post. sylvia,, mississippi, independent. caller: hi. [indiscernible]

i feel like i'm sitting in a skillet. .he area is so hot the oil the tankers have been spilling, down in mississippi -- [indiscernible] hot. just too [indiscernible] host: ok. matt, washington, d.c., republican. caller: hey, thanks for having me on. a lot of callers are calling in the onlye u.s. was developed nation in the world that reduced emissions last year, even though trump pulled out of the paris accord, it does nothing to address russia, china, india, the ones actually

polluting the majority of co2 world emissions. unless you tackle them, nothing will change. on top of that, alternatives are good and everything else but for the amount of energy people use in technology, there is just not enough, what do you call it? not enough energy output, to fit the need. the only thing that fits the need is coal and gas. unless alternatives become more efficient, if you want to use your laptop every day, you will have to stick with coal and gas. that is how it is. thanks. host: on the topic of the president's environmental efforts.a couple of events on c-span during the day starting at 10:00, senate judiciary committee looking at children's online privacy and protection of that data. that coverage will begin at 10:00 on c-span, www.c-span.org and the radio app. later today, the former mexican

ambassador from the u.s. who panel, among a discussing security issues along the border, hosted by the american enterprise institute. 11:00 this morning on c-span3, also online and the radio app. the commander of the u.s. other command will testify about the national defense strategy before a senate armed service subcommittee, 3:00 on c-span3, online, and you can also watch it on the radio app. we will talk about the issue of the citizens of question, whether it should be added to the 2020 census. david rivkin will talk about the constitutionality of that. we will look about concerns of growing debt in the next hour, william hoagland joining us for

the discussion. when it comes to the democratic field of candidates, one candidate dropping out as of yesterday, eric swalwell. he talked about why he has decided to get out. [video clip] >> we have momentum after the last midterms. i believed the best way to seize diverse caucusng for the democratic party, and 18 fewer nra members in congress. to have a leader in the white house who could seize that momentum, that is why i chose to run for president. i was excited about what i saw across the country over the last three months, building on the work we did. staff andwife and our my constituents and supporters, we are only running for one reason. to win and to make a difference. not a vanity project. not to write a book.

not to make this about anything other than the people who really really needed that promise to be fulfilled to them. being honest with ourselves, we had to look at how much money we were raising, where we were in the polls. to prove we were serious, we qualify for the debate immediately, made the first cut, got on the stage, had campaign operation with staff in iowa, new hampshire, south carolina, new york, washington and california. moved the needle on the debate stage on an issue i was passionate about. believing that every candidate should pledge they would support a ban and buyback of the 15 million assault weapons in our country. frontrunners, on the stage with me, vice president biden, senator sanders and senator harris, all three said they supported that. we have achieved that.

communities across america stricken by mass shootings now know at least three of the front runners support this idea that these weapons of war do not belong in our communities. we have to be honest about our own candidacy. >> washington journal as deputyguest served director for the policy development services for constitutional law attorney. he is here to talk about the citizenship question. good morning. you talk about a certain approach the administration could take in getting the question on the 2020 census. what is that approach? caller: administration -- guest: the administration can argue that it compels the giveal government to information on citizen numbers. it can be done by executive

order, that the president would sign, ordering the department of commerce to put this question on the census. i also want to emphasize that the supreme court decision agoed two weeks specifically stated, by a majority, that it is admissible to ask this question. the congress did not block the president from doing that. the problem wasn't entirely procedural. it is certainly something that can be carried. it happens all the time where a government agency or department on asomething it has power stature to accomplish, but doesn't do it well. it happens to a bunch of upper agencies. host: when it comes to the section two of the 14th amendment, to read from the op-ed he wrote on this, you said the section two of the 14th amendment provides the state denies the franchise to

anyone's eligibility to vote should -- the language is absolute and mandatory. compliance is impossible without lives.g to many citizens where does that come from? guest: it's part of a war amendment. providing -- to prevent the states from engaging in discrimination and denying citizens rights. at the time, only male citizens 21 years or older were allowed to vote. it was changed by the 19th and 26 amendment. what this language try to do is come up with a mechanism of penalizing states that this franchised a portion of their citizens. there was no version of the

language in reference to race. that got changed to more generic language, referencing the race and color, in the 15th amendment. about people that tweeted it, this leg which has never been used by congress, but it does not matter. there are a lot of provisions in the constitution unutilized. postwar amendments have been used in an enforcement sense for many decades, but it is a provision that has to be enforced. the only person who can do that is the president. why census? section two of the 14th amendment amends section two article one, the very same section that deals with the census. that information is meant to be gained from the census. the president is the only one who can do that. congress does not run the census. what is important is that congress of never -- congress never objected to the charge of

constitutional duty. it does not specifically mentioned this, but nothing in the census act prevents the president from doing it. how do we know that? the supreme court said 5-4 that it is permissible under the statute. host: our guest with us to talk about the citizenship question on the 2020 census and his arguments he laid out in an op-ed, you can find it online. if you want to ask them questions, call us at (202) 748-8000, for democrats. (202) 748-8001 for republicans. independents are (202) 748-8002. if this is done by executive order, is that a weaker way of getting this done versus the other -- guest: it's strong in two ways. first of all, it's quickly. second, if the president proceeds in that fashion, they take off of the table the administrative questions about

amassing the record. the sole question on the table would be, is this constitutional? is this within the scope of the president's powers? the answer is yes. an interesting tidbit is that criticism is not addressed but has been lodged by the president's equal protection clause. the argument is that doing this discriminates against portions of a population, therefore violates protection laws. , in 1974,e court entertained a challenge to the california policy of this franchising -- disenfranchising. that contravenes the equal protection clause, because of section one of the 14th amendment. the supreme court parsed section one and section two and made a specific point that something that is expressly allowed on the section two, section two allows abridgment of voting rights of citizens who participated in

rebellion or crime. the courts said you cannot possibly violate equal protection clause by doing something specifically in section two. people who wrote the 14th amendment were not at war with themselves. that definitively answers the question of whether or not the section two compliant policy can never be considered a violation of the protection clause of section one. guest: there's a gentleman -- host: there's a gentleman named matthew frank writing for national review. let's take your analysis of the approach of the op-ed. he had said that the admin meant on the 14th amendment, doesn't actually protect any voting rights by any direct enforcement action by the federal government? it's the worst kind of "keeping the constitution into with the nonsense to say that today's male citizens over 21 mean all

eligible voters as they claim." guest: to put it gently, he is wrong for a couple of reasons. first, the reference in section leo was to mail citizens -- ma citizens. franchised was changed, legitimately so in my opinion, perfectly good thing. amendment, the fact that the reference there is the male citizens does not -- how the constitution works. the other point remains, which is frank lee silly, is that he does not see much of an opportunity for judicial enforcement. that's not necessarily true, but there are numerous provisions in the constitution that are not provisionally enforceable. they can be something that the judiciary is not equipped to enforce. it doesn't mean they are not binding. the notion the clear

constitutional command -- i can tell you this much as practicing -- unconstitutional it has not been sufficiently enforced area the only way you can supplant outs additional language is having an amendment that officiates it, which happened in the original one whichn article changed by section one of the 14th amendment. he's just wrong. what is interesting, the reason i emphasized that case, in 1974, after the 19th amendment, the 26th amendment ratified. instead -- they treated section two as a pivotal part of the decision the california policy of not allowing x felons to vote was constitutional.

the minority of justices on the supreme court in 74 made the same point about what, in their opinion, was wrong with section two of the 14th amendment. it only protected a portion of eligible electorates. six justices disagree. i'm happy this up in court majority -- to be in the supreme court majority. host: there are calls that the attorney general says he sees a path forward in getting this question on the census. you suspect -- do you suspect the path is the one you are advocating for? guest: i'm hoping that is the case. it is not the only path, but the most expeditious path. i have a lot of respect for doj. i think they will find the right way to receipt -- proceed. host: did you talk to them specifically about the stuff that'll? guest: no. they can figure out -- stop at all? guest: no. they can figure it out themselves.

host: jack, republican line, go ahead. caller: thank you very much. i'm not a lawyer, i'm a retired engineer. ancestors came into the united states from germany in the 1880's. i don't know what the immigration laws were then, at that time. my grandparents were born here, but my ancestors came -- they had skills. they were tool makers. and, i'm a retired manufacturing engineer now, so i would like to know, what would the immigration laws -- where the immigration laws at that time in the united were the immigration laws at that time in the united states? and i support the question on

citizenship. it should be asked. guest: the immigration laws throughout history were quite unrestricted. we were welcomed, pretty much everybody, with very few exceptions. until they had the infamous chinese exclusion act, the first ofr to cap certain types immigrants, the chinese, from arriving here. that was the political judgment made properly and was not done in resistance mode. it was political judgment made by congress at the time, and it made perfect sense. to be clear, there's a good relationship, in my opinion, aside from section two, having a good snapshot of the distribution of citizens and noncitizens throughout the country. and, seeing from one census to another, what the trends are. secondaryion, is a point but helps to have a more informed discourse, hopefully,

civilized bait about immigration. host: out of seattle washington, eric is next calling on our line for independents. good morning. you are on. caller: good morning. thank you. i feel like something that would help the census is two things. number one, we need to stop changing people's nationality when they come here to the united states. what i'm saying is that they are considered russian, german, chinese, whatever they come from. when they come from the united states -- to the united states, russians are allowed to say they are white people. once people get to the united states, all caucasian people, wherever you are from, poland, you are just considered white. tost: how does this relate the citizenship question and what would you like to ask the guest about it? caller: i would like to ask in this. trump's mother was an immigrant and came here.

wives, both of them are immigrants. host: color, thanks. guest: i think this country benefits from immigration. i came here as a refugee, as a young lad. question abouthe citizenship does not discriminate against anybody and does not block anybody from coming here. i believe people should come here illegally. i think legal immigration -- here legally. i think legal immigration is something that should be managed, but i don't see a problem asking the citizenship question. it's important for your viewers, that this question was asked until 1950, every single senses. on antinues to be asked sample of the census forms after 1950. the concept that this is unordinary is untrue. host: the viability, if you

taken that question, what would it do for the account overall? guest: i'm not a statistician, but i find it implausible. there are strong laws in place to bar the use -- misuse of data. there are two criticisms that i heard about the consequences of putting the citizenship question on the senses. it would precipitate considerable percentage of people to fail to respond. the second is that it would not be accurate because they will lie, in a sense of somebody not a citizen saying i am a citizen. i don't see, logically, how both of those things can be true. host: let's hear from north carolina, mike, republican line. go ahead, please. caller: good morning. is it true the citizenship question was on the senses and the obama administration had its removed? thank you -- it removed? thank you. guest: i don't have any idea if that is true.

it is conceivable. one of the things i would like to suggest that benefits not only the debate about this issue but other issues, who cares what happened a long time ago and who did what to whom? the question as far as the interagency battles and all of this is concerned, does it make sense to ask this question? is it constitutionally permissible? is it legally permissible? the critics, for example, it is not the question. critics point out some gentleman who died in 2015 who wrote a memo suggesting adding this question might be politically beneficial to republicans. had any impactat on this process? to me, it doesn't do much quality on discourse to be pointing fingers. host: you were previously at the

justice department saying the legal team said this question was being replaced and those lawyers may be coming from the consumer protection branch. is there anything there that you might add? guest: no. from what i understand, the people who originally defended the census rulemaking were part of a federal programs branch. they brought other people, civil vision included, and it happens all the time. when i was litigating a number of years ago, i challenged obamacare. that is the case that went to the supreme court. was a deputydy who assistant attorney general and replace a number of line attorneys. times.ppens a number of

i wouldn't draw implications or speculate. [indiscernible] preparedwyers are not to defend this case. there plain city. host: virginia is from riverside california -- riverside, california. democrats. hi. caller: hi. glad to speak this morning. under his breath, when he started talking about this, he was saying, in my opinion, in my opinion. where is it documented in his opinion and wears it in black-and-white in 1952? i'm 75 years old, and i understand the senses. i've never been asked that question. i've been here while. is parens.uestion didn't they just drop that a few years ago -- parents. didn't they just drop that a few years ago?

are they going to be citizens because trump is president? a good question, i think. guest: on the first question, change came in 1950, again. if you look at the duration, most of our history, the question was asked. we appreciate0, the fact that it is not asked to and all of the census forms, the short forms. the long forms, asked questions about trump's parents -- not trump's parents. the parents of melania. i'm sure they will get the form, but i don't see what it matters. is, whyhe real issue does it make sense to ask this question? is it legal? host: talk about the legal challenges. what does it face? guest: there will be legal challenges, unfortunately. i think it is eminently

defensible, but the lower courts have stopped the rulemaking from being implemented would rule against the administration. is going to seek an emergency review by the supreme court during the summer. quite unusual, but happened before in history. i have every confidence the supreme court would uphold this. host: how to put the citizenship back in the census. you can find that on the wall street journal's website. republicanlifornia, line, you are next up. good morning. caller: yes. if you count all of these illegals in california, that is going to give california and other sanctuary states more representatives in congress than his proper, so if they don't ask that question on the census form , i will just boycott the whole

senses altogether -- census altogether. that's how i can lower the count in california. the census will be very inaccurate. host: ok. guest: i would encourage everybody to respond to the census question. i understand the concern some people have expressed. about the fact that you have states that are disproportionately attracting illegal immigrants, undocumented immigrants, and therefore, artificially beef up the allotment of seats in the house and there rep position -- representation in the electoral college. viewers need to understand that, currently, a portion is done, numeration is done based on total population numbers. there are people who argue that you need to get back to a baseline. this is not what this debate is about. we are talking about having a givetion that would

accurate information, not the way -- changing the way the process unfolds. host: were you surprised that the chief justice was the right majority on that opinion? guest: i was surprised. i have a lot of regard for the justice. i disagree with him strongly on this issue. to be fair, the administration didn't do a good job at developing the record -- not the administration, the commerce department. they made themselves vulnerable, and the chief justice was concerned about this lobby rulemaking record. are sloppy, ins my opinion. the way things work, administrative law, that was good enough. in twor, the chief -- different majorities, they put the proposition legal onto the census act and a 5-4 majority, a

joined chiefority, justice is that it was probably done. -- first time in history because it was somehow pretextual. i think there's a compelling language in the senses that suggests a lot of times you develop -- census that suggests a lot of times that you develop multiple reasons why you get there. the reasons you choose to articulate may not be the most important reasons. work, so ithings thought it was wrong -- a wrong decision. important to emphasize, if the trump administration comes out with

another approach that violates ,he supreme court case decision just being totally disingenuous, the court is clear that you can take another stab at it and another stab. it happens all the time. government agencies and departments are being forced to redo things by the courts all the time. it doesn't mean -- host: after the sloppiness of the original argument, how would you boil it down? guest: for reasons that are probably obvious, this became institutionally and politically airy controversial. that's where the number -- politically became controversial. that's where the number of came. that's called democracy. were not talking about political masses from mars, political masters that reflect the policy preference of the administration voted in by the american people,

the majority of american people. let's go to florida, independent line, john. answer waiting. caller: good morning, pedro. if you could give me a minute to make my point. kin, you kind of confuse me with your answer to the woman from chico, california. how does this not affect apportionment in the electoral college? isn't everything based on the census as far as representation goes? there are no 11 or 12 million illegals in this country. it's closer to 40 million illegals in this country. i need a better answer from you regarding that, because to me, it doesn't make sense. how do we base apportionment, based the electoral college if not for this census? guest: thank you.

the current law is using the total person baseline. the census numbers are going to come in, i assume a citizen question will be on it, and it will say this many citizens and this many noncitizens. those numbers would be aggregated. let's say the citizen number is 10 and noncitizens is two. 12 would be the total baseline going into it. the supreme court, in a case called even wheel out of texas, dealt with a question where the plaintiffs argued it is constitutionally required to use the citizenship numbers. the supreme court was not impressed with that argument and rejected it, leaving on the stateshe question if wanted to use citizenship numbers rather than total persons could do so. there will be quite a bit of litigation on this issue, but for purposes of the 2020 senses, all of your viewers need to be

assured that having decision -- the citizenship russian would not -- citizenship question would not take off from the citizens. the criticism you may have heard was that the noncitizens might be scared to answer so they would take themselves out of the census, if you will, instead of two, you would have 10 and one. i'm not a statistician, so i don't think that argument makes a whole lot of sense. host: this is from virginia, nadia, independent line. hello. caller: hello. sir, in my opinion, this administration and the supreme court's opinion, this administration wanted to place the question, the citizenship question on the census for extremely various reasons, so in my opinion, this administration should be blocked from putting this question on the 2020 census

, and coming forth with another reason is quite frankly unacceptable. we know, for a fact, and the supreme court stated that they wanted the question for nefarious reasons. so why you are putting so much credibility in this administration baffles me. they are not about the democratic process. they are about suppressing boats. there are -- votes. there are factual other sources that are more accurate to obtain citizenship numbers. that is a fact, sir. guest: a couple of things. i'm a lawyer. i happen to be a republic and supporting this administration. not on this issue, but many issues. even if i felt totally differently, the law is the law, the constitution is the constitution. this is a very unfortunate part of our debate to say because

this is a bad administration and trump is a bad guy that nothing they do should be counted. i think it's wrong and un-american, frankly. the second point, i'm a lawyer. that is not what the supreme court said. they didn't say anything as far as majority is concerned or nefarious motives. they said the particular rationale put forward reason.the real they didn't say it was a bad reason. they said it was a good reason, but not the real reason. it happens all of the time where epa, federal energy regulatory , the exchange commission have the rules struck down because of administrative deficiencies. the entire administrative state would come to a halt. if you try something badly the first time, and you cannot fix it. it doesn't work like this.

it doesn't work as a philosophical matter about what you should do, and it doesn't work like this as a matter of law. host: david rivkin, constitutional lawyer and other law here in washington, d.c., a longtime person of washington as far as working in the administration, served as the deputy director of policy to 1989.nt from 1981 lee is from the democrats line. georgia. good morning. caller: be honest with the people. man who put in that book was hired by the republicans [indiscernible] that's what he did, tried to get it onto the citizenship thing. [indiscernible] be honest with the people. don't sit on tv in front of your family in the world and tell

lies like l don't know what's going on. what'sl don't know going on. that man was hired to do that. that question had not been on there. obama didn't take the question off of that thing, off the citizenship thing. the question had been out of there from 50 to 70 years. host: let our guest respond. guest: i don't know when this question -- what was the policy of the obama administration, and i don't think it matters. there has been all sorts of speculation about nefarious purposes of putting down this question. happened and what what was in people's hearts and minds, and i'm not prepared to speculate about it. what i'm prepared to say is that this question is constitutionally required, number one.

that would be true no matter what administration is in power. the question is legally defensible and permissible under these census act -- the census acts. i don't believe this question would have any political implications as far as responses. me to speculate, i would say the people opposing it with such vigor are doing that's because they don't want the breakdown of citizens and noncitizens data to be available in this format, if you will, because they understand that would have implications and would have debate about any other matters. how was more information about thing in a democratic society? -- is more information about anything in a democratic society about thing? caller: good morning. this census question is good for

immigrants legal in this country. we enter in this country and they already have [indiscernible] from green card to citizenship. if this question differentiates between legals and illegals, this is a good question, and i don't think any legal immigrants should have a problem with that or if there is anything wrong with this question. guest: i don't think there's anything wrong with the question. i think it's a good question. i happen to think even if an illegal immigrant -- i can't say this question couldn't get you into any trouble, but i don't think people will want to respond to this. there are two issues going on. a knee-jerk reaction from some callers but also quite clearly in this day and age that anything this administration is doing is by definition wrong.

second, there are people that do not want to have the information about the total number of noncitizens in this country, legal and illegal. as information is already exist. recordse administrative , social security, et cetera. having this question come from census would give additional credibility. there are people that say we have 11 to 12 million illegal aliens. i don't know what the right number is, but having this information is a useful, key into the debate. the people that don't wanted are not doing justice to their own position. host: a wall street journal piece is called how to put citizenship question back into the senses and david rivkin is one of the co-authors of the piece. thank you for your time. we will talk about that and deficit with the by policy heter's william hoagland and will talk about the national debt tripling in the next 30 years.

later in the program, will carless on his recent piece about the hundreds of active duty and retired law enforcement officers being members of online hate groups. those conversations are coming up on "washington journal." ♪ announcer: in 1979, a small network with an unusual name rolled out a big idea. let viewers make up their own

minds. c-span open the doors to washington policymaking for all to see, bringing you unfiltered content from congress and beyond. a lot has changed in 40 years. today, that idea is more powerful than ever. on television and online, c-span is your unfiltered view of government so you can make up your own mind, brought to you by your cable or satellite provider. >> there has been discussion about an appearance before congress. any testimony from this office would not go beyond our report. it contains our findings and analysis, and the reasons for the decisions we made. we chose those words carefully, and the work speaks for itself. the report is my testimony. i would not provide information beyond that which is already public in any appearance before congress. announcer: robert mueller is said to appear before two committees of congress on wednesday, july 17 at 9:00 a.m. eastern.

he gives testimony to the house judiciary committee. later in the day, question's from the house intelligence committee. both open sessions. of thatrage will be live on c-span3, online at c-span.org, or listen with the free c-span radio app. announcer: "washington journal" continues. host: this is william hoagland of the by policy partisan center here to talk about the effect of debt on the federal budget. thank you for giving us your time. looking out in 30 years, what is the potential when it comes to the debt in the united states? guest: the total amount of debt will grow. a lot of factors are involved in that. these are all projections that could be off, but generally, because of the changes in the way we are an aging population and the fact we pay a lot to medicare and social security,

the benefits will continue to grow. as a consequence, along with paying the interest on accumulated debt itself means we will be looking at the possibility for the debt growing from where it is today, at a historic high, around 78% of gdp, well over to 150% over the next 30 to 40 years. there was a report a couple of weeks ago that made these projections. host: 144 percent of gdp by 2049 or so. guest: right. that is historically very high. will noto think that happen, but if it should happen, it is something unprecedented in terms of the country's history. host: if you had to make a list of the drivers of this debt, what would you put on the top? guest: in the near term, it is the entitlements, spending we have created particularly dealing with the aging population. social security benefits,

medicare benefits. those are the major drivers of our spending to the future. the other factor involved here is always the flipside, the revenues. that is being that if you are trying to control the debt and deficits, you have to balance it with the amount of resources you are taking in. revenues are important too. they are not growing as fast as spending. you will have accumulation of debts going forward. it's a combination of spending in the major entitlement programs and the rate of growth in revenues and growth of the economy. host: is there a way to factor in tax cuts passed by republicans into these final numbers or projected numbers? guest: these are projected numbers. projectionsy, the that the congressional budget office and others make assume current law for those taxes. is, the25, i believe it taxable republicans past in 2017

drops back down, so it is a situation in which those are carried onto the future. host: our guest is having a conversation to take a look at that in the united states. if you want to ask him about some of the things he said, you can call him at (202) 748-8000 for democrats. (202) 748-8001 for republicans. independents, (202) 748-8002. make your thoughts available on social media on twitter and our facebook page. at the wall street annual meeting last month talked about there was a constituency in washington that still cares about that and deficit. i will play a little bit of this to get your thoughts on it. >> the difficulty we face is deficit hawks. i feel like the guy standing on the corner with a sign saying "the end is nigh." sooner or later, i will be right, but i'm not sure if it is now. we've been saying the deficit is

a problem since the 1980's. i never forget that, the first year i was in the house, the old bulls walked up to me and laughed and said it is always fun to see the cycle repeated itself and budget hawks to come back. he said welcome back. i've seen them come and go, and i wanted to know that you will be gone in a little bit and i will still be here. [laughter] and i will spend that money. so you get that, and i'm not sure how fashionable a fiscal conservatism is. i believe the president believes it takes two to tango. host: what do you think about those comments? guest: i think is correct, it is not a top priority for the american public or congress in terms of debt or deficits. says something that i would

is in both houses. the difficulty, as he pointed out, is the fact that you don't know when that last drop into the test tube will turn blue and you will have a fiscal crisis. we used to refer to it as debt and deficits being something like the termites under the front porch. they are there, eating away, and in the long term, someday, you will all through that porch. the difficulty, from my perspective as one who has worked at this for a long time, is the fact that it is a tax on future generations. this is reducing the level of what i would say the living standards are for our children and grandchildren as we accumulate more and more debt and deficits going forward. it may not have an immediate effect, but in the future, it is not popular to talk about that or deficits, but it is something, in the long-term future, is something we have to deal with. host: a quick reminder for the folks at home. the difference between debt and

deficit. guest: good question. deficits are the annual differences between spending and revenues. that is a deficit. the accumulation of those debt deficits over the history of the country, from the beginning of the republic, is the accumulated debt. today, we have accumulated, from the beginning of the republic deficit, or debt, of nearly $22 trillion. closerual deficit is to about $1 trillion this year. host: democrats line starts us off, michael, from grand rapids. go ahead. caller: the debt. you mentioned ending social programs like social security, possibly, to accommodate the debt. we spend several times more than any other country in the world on our military buildup.

beware of the military-industrial complex thing. what effect would it have if we would think about what we are doing with our military? soldiers want to serve in the military, et cetera. guest: first of all, in terms of our federal spending for national security, which is part of the constitution and thatction of our country, is probably about 15%, 12 to 15% of total spending. the total number of entitlements , in terms of social security, medicare, medicaid and paying the interest on public debt that has to be paid, we are talking about 70%. there's a difference here. you could reduce defense spending. it's not something popular right now. the president has asked for an increase in defense spending as well as there seems to be consensus in the congress there

should be an increase in defense spending relative to where we are today. even though the uncertainties. i'm not disagreeing with you or suggesting we shouldn't look for finding where there is waste abuse or whatever, unnecessary spending in defense and nondefense programs, but still, after said that -- having said that, the major drivers to spending will be on the entitlement side. host: from florida, independent line. hi. caller: how are you doing today. -- today? i keep hearing medicare and medicaid -- i mean medicare and social security, but those are things people paid into, sir. i never hear anything about these pension plans that were put into the 80's when people were getting a certain percentage, but now salaries have gone up so high, and these people get free medical, free dental, free this, free that, for them and family while they are serving. nobody ever talks about what is

that doing to the debt. it has basically ruined the bond industry, the municipal bond industry. the city tensions, state tensions have destroyed these states, the bond market. you never hear anything about is about wealth, which $800 billion plus every year that these politicians just giveaway. that doesn't include the empowerment zones that they put in these cities that they have tried to do over and over again. it always turns out to be a fad. host: we will stop you there because you said a lot for the guest. guest: in terms of the tendons you are talking about, those are private -- tensions you are talking about, those are private pensions, not part of the federal government -- pensions you are talking about, those are private pensions, not part of the federal government. , the type of pensions

you are referring to are in the state and local level specifically. i'm not going to get into the weeds too far, but in terms of $800 billion in spending for welfare "programs" i think that is an overstatement unless we add in the state and local level. much less of that is spent here at the federal level for welfare programs. the federal food stamp program is probably less than $80 billion annually. host: a viewer on twitter says, can you name me any insurance policies that has raised premium ? social security is the most significant insurance the american people have had. guest: i can't identify any insurance premium that has not raised premiums. i want to come back -- this is always very dicey. i understand sensitivities to this. the social security trust fund

is a trust fund where we are paying in and those who are working and paying into payroll taxes, and there are benefits going out. as of today, that balance between what is in the trust fund and what is being paid out will exhaust in the year 2035, i believe. 2035,hat perspective, in we will only be able to pay that which is coming in. there won't be any trust fund to pay those benefits of what people thought they were going to get. it would probably be, as an average, a 20% reduction on what people thought they would get in social security. yes, social security is never -- has never not paid its benefits, but to make it functional for the future, we have to make changes in the social security program. host: what's the most efficient change you can make in the amount of time we have those excesses? guest: i would point to two.

one of them is probably increasing the payroll tax. that would probably have to be had. at the same time, the other aspect is the fact that that we -- the fact that we want to focus on demographics on aging and make sure they receive full benefits. we have moved that out to retirement age of 67, but we can move that forward. the good news is, here, we are all living longer, are healthier , and as a consequence, we need to adjust our pension programs to reflect we are a much longer living population. host: is there a magic number when it comes to the age to make social security most beneficial? guest: i can't think of one off of the top of my head, but we want to move closer to the 70-71%. something in that neighborhood. kansas,shington state,

on our republican line. good morning. caller: good morning. i want to discuss to you about foreign aid as an example. what about investing in different countries like the congo? it's been proven many times that if you involve other countries into the world economy, it helps balance the deficit. guest: first of all, the amount of federal spending that goes to foreign aid is always overstated significantly. too percent goes into what we would define as foreign aid -- 2% goes into what we would define as foreign aid. of issues facing on the border today, as it relates to the difficulties having to leave central america

to get out of the difficult situations they live in, i think investment in those countries would improve the living standards, maybe control some of the poverty in that country, and would avoid problems with immigration today. i'm one who has always believed this is a global economy, but let's be clear, the first and foremost aspect of this is that we don't spend that much in foreign eight -- foreign aid. it would increase the deficits further. carolina, north democrats, this is carol. caller: good morning. guest: for years and years, all of these different presidents and money has been taken out of social security and medicare like it is a piggy bank. law thatng, we need a money cannot be taken out of those laws to fund wars or other

government expenditures. we don't know what is being taken out of those funds and how much. every now and then, we hear about it on the news like someone is taking out for obamacare. these funds are robbed all the time. then, you hear about all of these big expenditures the government wants to spend this on. where's this money coming from if we are so short on social security and medicare? where's all of this money coming from that the government spends on all of the different things to spend on. thank you. guest: this money comes from the taxpayers who pay their taxes. it also comes from a very important aspect of something we are dealing with right now. we borrow the money. right now, as i explained to pedro, we have a debt in this country of nearly $22 trillion. we borrow $22 trillion and we

have to pay interest on that. that is where, when we are --ning deficits, we have to we have revenues coming in, but they are not covering expenditures that we have to borrow. i disagree with you. we are not stealing from social security or medicare. those programs have their funds, their trust funds, they are spending the money that comes into them. i think when you talk about obamacare having induced spending -- having reduced spending and medicare, it was the fact that the expansion of particular benefits reduced the pand onneeded to ex medicare. to first and foremost, answer your question, where's this money coming from? taxpayers and borrowers. about 50%, today, of the money we borrow, thank you very much, is from investors overseas.

i have a friend that's a former cbo director that likes to say we are the best looking horse in the glue factory. we are still looked at as a good investment and people were -- willing to invest in this country. host: will interest on the debt exceed medicaid or defense spending on a yearly basis? guest: good question. in 10 years, you will see that expended. projections, and it depends on interest rates, and we know today that interest rates, tebow interest rates are at a low level. 2% i believe. if those interest rates start to grow back to what we call normalized, back up into the 3%-three .5%, the fastest -- --%, the fastest growing

in fact, figures in yesterday looked at the first nine months of 2019 it showed interest in humans grew 16% last year. host: headline to show you. the treasury department could reach its debt ceiling by early september. what does this mean in our discussion of budgets and such? guest: very good. this is a bipartisan policy center. we tracked this. at what time does the federal government actually run out of borrowing authority? we reached that date on march the first of this year. since march, we have -- the secretary of treasury, has been initiating extraordinary measures he can legally use to make sure we are able to borrow the money to fund. at theown estimates

bipartisan policy center, we believe there is a risk that we could run out of our borrowing authority by sometime in early september. it is a risk. it depends on what happens from into september, particularly as it relates to income. we have seen not the growth in corporate taxes people thought. they have been flat this year. personal income taxes, relative to the same nine months last year. we are thinking the federal government is facing a significant cliff, which is that we could default. ae federal government in 230 some year history has never defaulted. i don't think this president wants to be on watch that says the federal government went into

bankruptcy. that is what a default means. it has never happened, but to deal with this conger -- this, congress has to raise its authority to borrow or suspend it so they can pay its bills. host: which adds to political discussions we have seen over past congresses. guest: this is a confluence of two events. we have a fiscal year that begins on october the first, where we have to find government. -- fund government. we have to have the money to fund government. makeifference i want to is that a default is something that has never happened. that is the federal government in bank or to up -- being bankrupt and cannot pay. good morning. my question is, instead of spending so much money on defense, it isn't the united

states using the federal budget to fund foreign aid, specifically to prevent global conflicts through peace building? there's a bill in the senate, the global fragility at, that would use the international affairs budget to eliminate global conflict around the world. that would boost the united states economy, yet it is taking a lot for senators to sign on, even though it is a bipartisan bill and reduce defense spending. guest: i think a previous color also raised the issue of increasing spending on foreign affairs, foreign investments. again, it is something that is a serious proposal. staffer for 33 some years. foreign aid is something, yes people look at from a humanitarian perspective, and yes it does have a peacekeeping focus, but at the same time, when it gets down to it, we are still needing to maintain the

benefits and security to our own public. whether it is social security benefits, pension benefits, health care benefits. this is a balancing act. how much do you invest in foreign investors or foreign countries versus investing here in the united states? host: budget caps for 2020 fiscal year. without action by congress for the white house, budget caps on the pentagon were cut by 71 billion dollars. fill in the blanks. guest: here we go. , we passed an act called the budget control act of 2011 which set caps on spending for 10 years. those caps set a level for defense and nondefense. we are, at this

point, about to reach 2020 terms of the fiscal year. the caps adjusted a year and a half ago now will be dropped act goesuse of this through 2021. to adjust, in order them, congress has to pass a law, or they leave them where they are. if they leave them where they are, they would issue an outline that would be a 10% cut in the fence. in fairness, some people -- in defense. in fairness, some people would like to see that cut. i don't think this congress or president would support that. at the same time, it would result in a 10% cut in nondefense spending at the same time, such things as education, science, technology, infrastructure. the negotiations ongoing right now, separate from the debt

limit we talked about earlier, is what to do, how to adjust those caps for 2020 so we don't have those cuts. government shuts down and we can pay anything at this point. host: from michigan, the republican line, helen. caller: hello. wondering why on earth can all of these illegals, they get everything for nothing, and we live here and i've worked for 50 , social security is getting cut off you say. but, everybody else gets something for nothing. food stamps and a lot of people that work can't hardly afford the food. what about the democrats that everybody to arrest

for -- just to find out something that don't mean anything? host: we will leave it there. thanks. guest: i'm not sure how to respond, helen. first of all, your social security benefits will not be cut off. what we are talking about is a reduction in 2035, a potential reduction, if we don't adjust or make changes in the program going forward relative to what people expected. host: here's pat from pennsylvania, democrats line. morning. -- good morning. caller: i have three things. if you lift the cap on how much people pay into social security, that would help. , people say that would increase their benefits, but rich people die young too. second, how come everybody that works in a chair all of their lives once to increase the age limit on social security for the workers that do work out here? the third thing, how much is corporate agree about

adjusting the cap on payments going into the fund. i think that's $118,000. raise, thee that you i'm blanking on what it was specifically. the trust fund has to be addressed. corporate waste is out there. i have always found in my career wastehat one person pots -- persons waste is another persons income. host: if you look at changes that could be done to start to

tackle the debt, what would you advise? guest: you have to approach this in a bipartisan manner. you are going to have to focus on spending and revenues. i think we are not -- i want to be clear -- we are talking about slowing the rate of growth in some of these programs. we have to focus on the pension programs, the retirement programs. makebelieve we can adjustments to those programs going forward, to lower the rate of growth. spend money on foreign aid, defense, rebuilding our infrastructure out there, we are going to have to say we are going to have to have additional revenues. the carbon tax is another approach we might want to think about going forward that would

benefit generating revenue and improving the environment. host: we have one last caller from kentucky. when the government lets a contract by material, that's a bump to the economy. andr that job is finished the product starts going to use, that's a to bump. bump counts more, it's a up and down. they never want to talk about this. guest: if i understood the question, there was a bump up. we did with the tax cuts in 2017. part of the growth in the economy, the low unemployment rate is associated with a bump up.

that's in terms of the tax cuts that went into the economy. long-term, they go away. you have to stabilize going forward. we're going to have to find a way to reduce that level of debt that will be a tax. the bipartisan policy center. you will see analysis from the cbo on debt and deficit. thank you for your time. we are going to hear from reveal news. will carless has a new piece about law enforcement officers being members of online hate groups. we will have that conversation when "washington journal" continues.

>> washington journal mugs are available at c-span's online store. check out the mugs and see all of the c-span products. >> the house will be in order. >> c-span has provided america unfiltered coverage of congress, the white house, the supreme court, public policy events from around the country. in 1979.eated by cable it's brought to you by your satellitelocal provider. >> washington journal continues. host: joining us from san diego, news.arless from reveal

he is a reporter for that organization. he has a new piece out, looking at ongoing -- online hate groups. good morning. first of all, what is it? guest: reveal is the radio show produced by the center for investigative reporting, a nonprofit organization based in the bay area. we've been around for more than 30 years. we are a nonpartisan funded by philanthropy. it's a news organization that investigates. have, anda piece you intersection between online hate groups and members of law enforcement. how did you come upon the story? guest: we figured out a way to find out who the members of different face groups are. the datable to go into

and get the membership lists of various different extremists and hateful groups we identified. we went looking through those groups to find members of law enforcement and identified almost 400 officers from around the country who are members of groups like islam a phobic groups, racist confederate groups, militia groups. defineow did you find -- hate groups? guest: we worked with the researcher out of north carolina who is been working for a few years to identify hateful groups on facebook. she has put on a short list of these groups. we took a closer look, dove into whether they met our own criteria for hate groups. we weeded out some of them, but cap some of them. host: you went through an outer

rhythm. what number of people did you start with as far as possible people? how did the weeding assess go? guest: it is complex. 1200 hate groups we identified. we had about 250 police related groups. we downloaded all of the members of one set of groups and the members of another set of groups and we put them in a van diagram to identify people who were members of at least one hateful group and at least one police group. that gave us about 14,000 people. those are a lot of profiles to look at. we look more closely at the profiles, we were able to sift through about 2000 of those.

profiles, we looked for photographs of people in police uniforms. some say they work at the police department. out of those 2000, we found about 400. we've got enough of a sample here. we are going to put the story out and see what people think about it. host: what postings are these members making? what is the concern from your reporting? guest: the concern is that when you get inside these groups, you have a group like confederate brothers and sisters. it looks like a history group. a say they are about confederate history. once you get inside the group, we joined several dozen of these groups and look to what people were posting. they were complete with racist meme's, denigrating african-americans and emigrants and latinos. these were not nice places to

be. the concern for us was that police officers taken upon themselves to join these groups or add to these groups and interact with the hateful content that's going on while at the same time they are supposed to be policing in an unbiased manner. host: when you say you joined these groups, did you identify yourself as a reporter? guest: we did. handles.eate separate we did not want to use our personal accounts. they had our real names. in many cases when you join these groups, these are closed groups. these are secretive. you can't see inside them unless you are a member. in order to get into these groups, they will ask you questions. we always answered those questions truthfully and

frankly. that often involved diplomacy. for an islamic phobic group, you believe that islam should be banned in the united states? we would respond with something like i prefer to keep my political views to myself. that did not get us into all of the groups. some really nasty groups would not let us in. we were in several dozen of them and viewed police officers interacting inside them. host: the story is available online at the reveal news website. you can ask him questions about it. you can call the lines. (202) 748-8000 for democrats. for republicans, (202) 784-8001. for independents, (202) 748-8002 .

when you engaged with these people online, what engagement did you have? what responses did you get? guest: my engagement was purely just to observe. i was not communicating inside the groups. i joined them and i sat back and watched. i went through, searching for police officers that identified inside the group to see what they were saying. to see if they were commenting on posts. after idid do was identified a police officer, reticulated if we saw them active in the groups, we put together a letter that we sent out to the department, informing them of what we found. so-and-so, hetive is a member of these groups. we saw him posting.

we would like to know what you think about that. we asked them to respond to our findings. was anybody willing to say this is why i post? i don't think there's anything wrong with it? guest: i certainly did. i took the extra step of contacting the individuals themselves. cases, i was ignored or hung up on. i did have some lengthy conversations with people. it almost always went along the line of i can have a political opinion, i can have these views and engage in the start humor, it doesn't impact the way i do my job. that was what i was almost universally told. a few people had more chagrin about it, that were more embarrassed about it. i spoke to a couple of people who claimed they had been hacked

and there are accounts and been taken over by somebody else. none of those people were able to prove they were hacked. i got the whole gamut of responses. host: did you see if their opinions they placed on these groups played out into their working lives? guest: wouldn't that be nice to know? in the united states, law enforcement is really hidden by this they'll of secrecy. to getmost impossible disciplinary records for police states, in most including the most populous states and some with the darkest history with policing. in the cases you can get disciplinary records, they are very limited. we tried. once we identified an officer and put a red flag on their name, we went to the department and asked for disciplinary

records. across the board, we were denied. we could not find out what the records were. cases, just by searching public records, we found out some. we identified a deputy in mississippi. he is been deposed as part of a lawsuit by the aclu against his department that alleges racism. there is a guy in a facebook group called white lives matter. ultimately, we have to throw our hands up in the air and say we can't find out whether what these people are doing on facebook is moving into real life because the department's won't tell us. -- departments won't tell us. host: we will start with michael in new york. go ahead. i would just like to

make a quick comment. i think the number one hate group is antifa. they should be put on ankle monitors and lose their right to vote. guest: i will comment on that. i cover extremism and hate in the united states. one of the things that gets thrown at me by people on the right is why don't you cover antifa? we have. i have spent several weeks embedded with them, getting to know them. i wrote a couple of stories that led to me getting blacklisted by them. i won't say whether or not i agree with the caller. this is a group that we have taken a look at. it's not really relevant to the story we are talking about today. host: in montana, hello. caller: thank you.

i have a question. do you think the presence of byice is partially driven increasing stress levels about immigration? is not aigration record high levels, conditions are really awful. do you think that's contributing to people participating in these groups? guest: i think it is. there's no question. i have spent a lot of time in these groups. some are just kind of racist that haven't anti-immigrant bent to them. they are anti-immigrant. groups were of

people who are members of groups connected to antigovernment militia groups. a big part of those organizations and the way they bring people in is they are extremely anti-immigrant. what you see in these groups, some really hateful stuff and content directed toward immigrants and toward the problems at the border. i don't think is any question the subset of people we found in these groups were driven thereby by fear and hatred of immigrants. host: what's the 3% or's? guest: it's an antigovernment group that is not particularly organized. they have chapters across the country. in thelieve

constitution, they essentially believe the federal government is largely illegitimate. most of them believe the only in any giventity area should be the local sheriff followed by the constitution. that may seem like a niche group. there are thousands and thousands of these people out here. they grew up in the wake of the first obama presidency when president obama was elected. there was a lot of fear in certain communities that there was going to be bands or limitations on the second amendment. that led to the creation of militia groups like the of keepers. oath keepers. caller: when you did your

investigation, how did you know the difference between those who are actively involved in true hate groups or those who were just using their position to like when hate groups they put a police officer in with bikers? guest: that's a very good question. ultimately, if we had just identified the people inside the hate groups and gone out and publish their names and said look at these guys we found, that would be misguided for the reason your collar mentions. what we did instead was wrote letters to all the departments where we found these people. we attempted to contact the department or the sheriff. we attempted to contact the individual. in not one single case that i get back the answer i'm in this

group to keep an eye on them, it's undercover police work. fidesebody had the bona to back that up, we could -- would not publish their presence in the group. we were very careful about giving these police officers the opportunity to respond. ort: did the police groups the departments themselves say this is something we will look at? caller: they did. guest: a lot of people did ignore us. a lot of them told us it was none of our business. 53 of the departments we contacted launched internal affairs investigations. texas who wasin i would not result, be surprised if in the coming weeks there are more firings and

suspensions that come out of it. host: rob is from independence, missouri. caller: good morning. would you please comment on steve bannon, who was instrumental in getting trump elected. theent to italy to court white nationalist movement in europe. italy whered out of he was. i saw something to that effect on tv. i would imagine you would know more about it. the people who follow trump can understand there are white nationalists who did work for trump and are probably still working for trump. guest: it's a little off-topic. i will speak to this because this is something i cover and have covered. i think your collar is somewhat right and somewhat wrong.

cover, thed i presidents -- presence of steve bannon in the white house was extremely interesting and something we thought we needed to pay close attention to. steve bannon has a long history of association with white nationalists and also it's documented that he has connections to the nastiest corners of american thinking, right down to neo-nazis. i think now that he is no longer in the white house, it does take the heat off of the topic. had the ear of the president. that should be a chapter of american history we should remember. host: there would some who would

respond and say this could be a free speech issue for them. why should it go further than that? guest: i did hear that a lot. there are a couple of points. long hadpartments have an unspoken or spoken rule that if you are a police officer, you should comport yourself and behave in a exemplary manner, that doesn't ring disrepute to your department. every human being has a right to free speech. that's true. the moment you sign on to work for a government organization, when the people pay your wages benefits, ifour you are a public servant, you give up some of those rights. you can't simply go out and say whatever you want to. you can't join hateful groups

and say hateful things because your department could kick you out. they could decide they don't want you representing their department. this is public trust. what we heard was we don't want people to associate our department and our officers with these groups. we don't want them involved. we don't want them saying these things. is areedom of speech issue sidetrack. it doesn't quite get to the root of it. your freedom of speech is curtailed the moment you start to work for the government. host: let's hear from steve in new york. caller: i just want to tell you one thing. this liberal fascist is trying to take the freedom of's breach -- of speech away from police officers.

i work in the personal service. that law about not talking and using your freedom of speech has never been challenged in court. it has never been challenged in the supreme court. who is this guy to decide what it hate group is? it's just his stupid opinion. host: there is no need to insult the guest area -- guest. guest: i'm used to this. about whether the freedom of speech issue has been questioned in court. it has been question by the supreme court. the supreme court found in favor of public bodies being able to fire people as a result of their speech. your collar is wrong. fascisms the liberal and who gets to decide what a hate group is, we have decided

that certain types of speech are wrong. judging people based on their gender, their sexual preferences, the color of their skin, their religion, is wrong. we have hate crime laws across the united states that basically say changing -- attacking somebody on the basis of these factors is a more serious crime than other crimes. my opinion. i didn't wake up yesterday and group orat was a hate what is frowned upon. these are long-standing things we've been deciding for decades. the idea that i made this up is silly. host: did you get a response or talk to facebook themselves? what do you think about social

media and their role in these practices? guest: i talked to a facebook spokesperson. their line is basically we don't accept hate speech. we will not accept hate speech. speech,on't accept hate why are there still groups on facebook called things like death to islam undercover. it is full of hateful content. it is easily searchable. it could be gotten rid of tomorrow. either they are not being proactive enough or they decided these things are ok. they continue to allow hateful content on the platform. they don't seem to be very serious about it. maryland.is from go ahead. caller: thank you for taking

michael. there was an earlier color that said that antifa is a terrorist organization. they must've forgotten about the klan. they are guilty of killing people. 2006, the bush administration fbi released a report that said the ku klux klan has infiltrated police departments around the country. they are killing unarmed black people. news wondering if the guest about that report? guest: your collar brings up a very good point. it speaks to why we did this project in the first place. there are lots of extremist groups we can spend time investigating. we spent more than a year investigating this story. why?

howanted to take a look at white supremacy, how racism, how discrimination is embedded in the framework of american society. we are not that interested in taking a look at the latest greatest hate group it's getting all the attention. is about antifa or richard spencer or steve bannon and what he's doing in your. the reality for the majority of people of color, of the lgbtq community in the united states, they have to deal with discrimination every day. from law enforcement, from places of work, from the mainstream of american society. we want to take a look at how that manifest itself. we decided to take a look at law

enforcement. has a veryment checkered history when it comes to these hateful groups. fromtudy that he mentions 2006, there was a study in 2015 done by the justice department are showed far right groups working to mainstream themselves and integrate themselves in american policing and the military. i believe this is an extremely important subject. that's why we spent a year taking a look. host: this comes out with some members of customs and border patrol for dissipating in these groups. guest: frustratingly, i wish you hadn't brought it up. this was right after my story came out. i got a tip about that group read i was working to get inside that group and take a look at it.

got to that story first. i'm glad that is out there. i think people should be very concerned in taking a look. what this comes down to is how to these officials who are paid out of public dollars, how do they behave when they think nobody is looking. groups on social media is a good place to look. that's what we are reporting. that's what some other people like buzz feed our reporting. the american people know a lot more about how long enforcement and border protection, how these people behave when they feel it no one is looking. host: how did you get alerted to the story in the first place western mark -- place? guest: we wanted to look at the connection between hate groups

and law enforcement. that's a very tricky thing to go after. method that this facebook would allow you to find who the members of the groups were. , weing with this research had a eureka moment when we thought if we can get the membership rolls of police groups and the extremist groups, we can put them together and identify people who are police officers who are in these extremist groups. it was a little bit of locke and just pointing ourselves in the direction we wanted to go in. host: this is tom in michigan. caller: good morning. i wanted to ask your guests if , is it a efforts necessity for law enforcement to get involved and interact with

hate groups online in order to prevent crimes? i think it is. i understand the point. it speaks to the point we had earlier. tool of lawen the enforcement to embed themselves and spy on these groups. yearst three investigating law enforcement in san diego. we asked police officers to explain themselves. we asked them to explain why they were in the groups. not one of them said they were undercover. that,ld ask them to prove we would have taken them out of the story. i acknowledge that it's an important part of the process for police officers to embed themselves and become involved in these groups. i'm pretty certain that's not why these police officers we

identified were members of the groups. host: one more call from fort worth, texas. becausei was wondering in 2008, i saw a couple of black panthers standing in front of a clubs,area with billy keeping people from voting. we had five police officers killed at a black lives matter rally. willld like to hear if you infiltrate those groups. we see them causing problems. we see these people every day on the news. you haven't mentioned them. are you working as hard to go after these people?

those people work on video. host: you are breaking up a little bit. clear thehink it's caller has been watching this show. we've talked at length about my work. interviewed antifa and exposed them to some extent. he is incorrect that we haven't mentioned it. the far left extremist groups are very high in the public consciousness. we have taken a close look at them. we don't decide to go after people on the right or left. the death count over the last two years, the number of people who have been killed by members of extremist groups on the far right far far exceed the number that a been killed or injured by members of

extremist groups on the far left. people are in a tizzy about the far left, they should take a look at who the real extremists are in this country and who is ultimately hurting people. host: where -- will there be a follow-up? touch we are still in with these departments. we will keep hounding them to see what information we can get out, if they will take action or if there will be more firings coming down. from this is will carless reveal news. thank you for your time. until 10:00, we want to hear from you about your public policy issues. this could be the environment or the aca. if you want to share what you want, (202) 748-8000 for

democrats, (202) 784-8001 four republicans, and independents (202) 748-8002. we will take those calls when washington journal continues. >> there has been discussion this any testimony from office would not go beyond our report. it contains our findings and analysis and the reasons for the decisions we made. we chose those words carefully. the work speaks for itself. the report is my testimony. provide information beyond what is already public. >> robert mueller will appear before the two committees of 9:00ess on july 17 at eastern. he will take questions from the house intelligence committee. both are open sessions.

our coverage will be live on c-span3, c-span.org, or on the free radio app. small network rolled out big ideas. they let viewers make up their own minds. c-span open the doors to washington policy, bringing you unfiltered content. a lot has changed. the big idea is more relevant than ever. unfilteredour coverage. it's a public service brought to you by your cable service provider. >> washington journal continues. host: tell us about your top public policy issue. (202) 748-8000 for democrats. (202) 784-8001 for republicans. (202) 748-8002 four independents

. if health care is on top of the list, this story from vox. it's been challenged by the courts again. today, the fifth circuit court of appeals will hear arguments a suit brought by 20 state attorneys general. it's the latest legal challenge to the aca. 2018mes after a 28 -- decisions that ruled it is unconstitutional. sides havets on both argued the reasoning was faulty and will be overturned by the fifth circuit. the appeals court will weigh the evidence today. if they decide to reject the it could discourage the supreme court from taking up the lawsuit, leaving in place

president obama's signature domestic policy achievement. that comes out of new orleans. so, anotherhour or entry into the democratic field, tom stier announces he is going to enter the race. this was reported on axioms. s. he promised to put $100 million of his own money into the campaign. that could make him a player in the race. he has an online video. points memo says the chief architect of the cup tower moscow project will testify tuesday after he was subpoenaed last month when he did not voluntarily appear. he will testify behind closed doors.

policy issue perspective, we go to mike in spring hill florida. -- spring hill, florida. caller: i wanted to comment. strange that before the aca, there were so many people who were uninsured because they could not afford insurance. have millions you of people who were insured. i don't understand how the thinkcians, how they , we wouldd of the aca go to something much better. aca, weget rid of the will go back to where we were before. millions of people would be uninsured and could not afford health insurance.

all of the stuff about the pre-existing conditions, that would not be protected. i just don't understand how people believe that it would be something better than what we had. i know it needs to be better. going back to watch -- what we had is crazy. host: victor is next in florida. caller: i have a comment about the health care situation. i think they need a public option and let the republicans put on the plans they want and let the people choose the best plan. there would be more innovation. security, all they have limit on so the security, let people pay. you won't have a problem with

social security going broke. the first year we will get an increase. seniors did not get an increase this year on so security. they are suffering under this system we now have that is very good for the rich, very good for the corporations. it's very bad for everybody who is not a millionaire or billionaire. host: from new hampshire, this is ted. caller: hello. the speakerd talking about about certain issues. the one that really bothers me the most and doesn't seem to the getting addressed is the andless and how housing -- housing. more people are showing up homeless than i've ever seen.

i am 68. that should be a major concern, not just for cities, but for rural areas. rising rents. people on him him wage or low income housing, it's not available. i have a friend who was about ready to be out in the street. say you've seen changes in new hampshire, what you pointing to? how do you identify that? caller: it's the numbers. streetore people on the that weren't always. they have assigned in manchester that says do not give money to the homeless people. they are taken care of. i found out that's a lie. that's not the case at all.

these people don't want to be out there homeless. for $.75 anrked hour. he had more back then than people today making $12 an hour. host: let's hear from maryland. caller: hello. say i think a big andlem is global warming what could be done about that. there is a lot of stuff happening that shouldn't happen. trumpr thing is president is the worst president we've ever had. a lot of the stuff that he is doing is terrible. i think a lot of this is because he's not a trained lawyer. warming,k to global why is that the top of your list? there are seems like

different storms and situations that you never used to see before. and coming up to the beach, the flesh eating disease, you didn't hear about stuff like that. something is wrong with the water. , let harris is a phony. host: ok. maggie in wisconsin. i would like to talk about the border. i would like to know why people think it's ok to come here illegally and break our laws. what the hell? line, hello.ts caller: my greatest concern the entitlement

programs. they continue to balloon the deficit. is proposingnders $1.6 trillion to pay off student loans. they don't want millennials to be held responsible for anything. that's why they have no coping skills. this will force me to vote for trump in the next election. i'm a registered democrat. i didn't vote for him last time. i voted for gary johnson. i will probably end up voting for trump as a result of these entitlement programs and pandering to constituents. host: that is pat. you can do the same up until 10:00.

nancy pelosi has called for the labor secretary to resign amid concerns over his handling of charges against jeffrey epstein. he engaged in unconscionable agreements that were kept secret and prevented the victims from seeking justice. the senior advisor told reporters that he was doing a great job. we heard about tom stier entering the race. april,on the program in talking about his political plans. >> you could get into the race? if there was some reason it wasn't being answered, we have 20 people in the race and more to,.

he is in the race as of today. you can go to our website www.c-span.org. good morning. like toi would just talk about social security. all of these people are offering free medicare. they are not thinking about the elderly who are already on medicare. they never talk about when they are given full medicare, they don't talk about the fact that through medicare premiums every month. it's not an entitlement. this is a paycheck. we paid into this. now, every time you get a raise on social security, they take it

for your medicare premium. people are not looking at the older people out here. i've heard nobody say they will take away our premiums if they give everything away free. i just wanted to get that out. it's unfair that over -- older people are being overlooked. host: this is scott from kansas. caller: hello. watching the tv. issue, iobal warming saw where the scientists were is --g about the earth they said every 125 years, the earth warms up.

nobody ever takes that into consideration. people do,uff that it's hurting the earth. orting rid of exhaust pipes going to electric cars, where do the batteries go? cars.does electric have, i have no resale value? natalie is in los angeles. go ahead. caller: hello? how are you. trump,at up with donald what he is doing to the country. i am on disability. i just had a knee replacement. president to run for

as well. they don't know what they are doing. host: that was natalie and los angeles. this is the new york times. governor cuomo has cleared the way for congress to access the state tax returns of the president. here is pete in pennsylvania. caller: hello.

is low moralroblem standards we have. there shouldn't be people on the street. we should be taking care of them by lifting them up. it's all about money. money is the root of all evil. there should be housing for people like that. have with birth that is degrading. ,ll kinds of things like this everything points toward the love of money. i thank you for taking my call. host: two bits of news from politics. the gopa mosh has less conference.

he has withdrawn from his committees. departure in as scathing washington post op-ed. he was removed from the conference. the committee will make a recommendation that who could fill his vacancy. a virginia beach republican who lost his seat in the house last year is aiming for the u.s. senate. he will challenge mark warner. he is a former navy seal. he was defeated. he served in the virginia house of delegates. mike is next in florida. show.: a great just a brief comment about a

caller about the so security increase, that there wasn't any. maybe he doesn't know or doesn't year, it was a 2.8% increase. 2012.as the biggest since the cost of living this year, point --oximately one 1.7%. this will increase next year. that was just a comment. host: new york, hello. one of the top things i think that needs to be addressed citizens united, overturning

citizens uniting. it's basically legalized bribery of politicians. i'm not concerned about their constituents, it's the donors. 98% of scientists agree climate change is man-made. this idea that it happens every it's unprecedented the things going on now. you can see it, it was 90 degrees in alaska. extreme weather is constantly happening. third, the military budget is insane. of gdp. about are talking medicare and medicaid. look at what we're spending on the military.

it's eight times the amount combined of everyone else in the world. i think we need to prioritize our budget. host: more tweets this morning about the secretary of labor. him to resign.on in minnesota, we will hear from steve. caller: hello? programn watching the for many years.

, almostf these issues all of them involve the money. we should go back to the old saying, follow the money. my top issue is to reform the banking system and the federal reserve. 2%, there isot for no way we could talk about all of these different things unless we perform the banking system. if we don't reform the banking system, we will go bust. my top issue. conway, south carolina. caller: good morning. thank you for c-span and a chance for us to voice our views in public.

i have many gripes. chief among them is the judicial system. i think it's a joke. we have to sexual predators on the supreme court. mitch mcconnell would not even garland appear before the supreme court. that effectively blocked a lot of the views of the american voters. i have seen corruption at the lowest level by a judge in virginia. system our judicial needs to be looked at and overhaul. perhaps we need a new way of nominating supreme court justices. thank you. host: let's hear from joe

on the democrat line. caller: i am a longtime listener. yesterday, you had a discussion on the 2.0. instead of getting a one-sided a representative that speaks for the working men and women, the second thing i would like to comment on is the democratic primary. that i saw, debates i don't think there is a democrat that can win the trump voters based on the simple immigration question, we need to put immigration to rest. immigration is an important part of america. we need to agree on immigration once and for all. trump is using this as a wedge, the same way adolf hitler used

it as a wage. adolf hitler blamed the jews like trump is blaming the immigrants, especially the brown and black immigrants. it will destroy our country. host: that is joe in west virginia. last call for this show. another addition of the program will come your way at 7:00 tomorrow morning. we are going to take you over to the senate side. the senate judiciary committee is holding a hearing, set to start in a few minutes, taking a look at protecting children online and data privacy. that starts momentarily.