eugene scalia, the son of the late supreme court justice antonin scalia a testifies before the senate labor and pensions committee with his nomination to serve as labor secretary. watch live on thursday at 9:00 a.m. eastern on c-span3, online at c-span.org, or listen live with the free c-span radio app. is james poniewozik, the author

of "audience of one: donald trump, television, and the fracturing of america," and he is also a chief television critic for the "new york times." thank you for joining us. i want to begin with this moment from president trump's first cabinet meeting on january 10, 2018. listen to what he says as the cameramen and reporters enter the cabinet room. [video clip] pres. trump: welcome back to the studio. you heard the president say, welcome back to the studio. what do you make of that? guest: i'm sorry, i was not sure if it was a question. it is very revealing, in "the new york times," one of the political reporters reported early in the administration that

president trump, who was not only a reality show, but a figure in many ways created by television throughout his advised his staffers to view each day of his ofinistration as an episode a reality show and which he defeat his enemies. i think very much the mindset of showas a production, as a of actual real-life locations as a set, that has not left him. i am not sure if the clip you are showing was from the same cabinet meeting that i recall from 2017, but there was one particularly telling live tv cabinet meeting that he held in june 2017, carried live on cable assembled the

cabinet members, they went around the table and competitively competed against each other to out praise him. what an honor it was to serve for the president. watching that as a tv critic, i said that is "the apprentice" boardroom, and tt is a dynamic we have seen produced with "the apprentice" with the candidates at risk for being fired would go around and attempt to ingratiate themselves with the host of the show. they were the ones that were who emphatic a= with him deserved to stay. so this presidency has very much been a tv show. and it continues. host: where does this come from for the president? in your book, what did you find out? well, donald trump has

always been focused on celebrity. he has always been interested in media stardom, in getting in front of the camera. this goes long before he was the host of "the apprentice." going back to the 1980's when he was the author of "the art of the deal." when he had the unfortunate timing of elevating himself as was pop-culture figure who this swaggering personification of the have reagan 1980's. he had said, i am going to go into the real estate business but i want to bring show business into real estate. he told playboy magazine and an interview in 1990, when they asked him about a lot of his expensive acquisitions, the yacht he bought, the

helicopters, and the planes with his name on the side -- all of the fancy pictures and fabulous accoutrements, he said, these are props for the show. he said the show is trump and it has sold out performances around the world. he has always viewed his life as a production because he has always had this intuition that in a media age, what matters is the image that you present to the camera. if you look like peoples' idea of a successful, flashy businessman, that is more important than being the most successful businessman because it creates an image that lives on in people's heads. that accruesimage your brand and you can leverage it into branding success, you can leverage it into further entertainment success, and ultimately, political success. host: you right in the book that in august 1980, that is when donald trump, the television character, was born.

at this moment, i want to show our viewers. [video clip] >> what happens to some of the old buildings in inner-city, that were works of art? a subject of ay lot of controversy because you ordered some buildings destroyed with a lot of art -- why did you have those buildings destroyed? pres. trump: we purchased a site with an old department store on fany, andis next to tif we had to take the building down. the building was really not arth as an art building or deco building, it was not worth as much. there was an outcry. but that has subsided and people like what we are doing unlike what we put in this place. host: that was from "the today show." explain what you say that is when donald trump the character was born. guest: that was his first, major

national television appearance. the donald trump who has emerged fourperformance across decades, that was basically his debut. found really telling going back and looking at that first interview is that this does not sound exactly like the donald trump that we are used to spilling out of rtv's. tv's every day. the confidence, this swaggering man of business. it is much more soothing, reassuring, less confrontational tone, which, in many ways, it has to do not only with the evolution of his public persona or his personality himself, but as i explore in great depth in the book, this has to do with

what media was like back then, compared to what media is like now. television in 1980 was a three network medium. abc, nbc, cbs. anshow you put on or any performances had to be palatable to a broad range of audiences. what has happened in broad strokes from then until today is that we have developed our thousand cable channel, millions of social media outlets, very fragmented, very niche oriented media environment to which is much more polarizing and often confrontational performances. donald trump, with a great hasinct for the camera eye, evolved and modulated his self presentation over the years to fit the media. host: we are talking with james

poniewozik who is the author of the new book "audience of one: donald trump, television, and the fracturing of america." he is also the chief television critic for "the new york times." let's talk about what type of television appealed to president trump and how did it chase him? trump, while he has always had an intimate relationship with television, he has tended to be a figure of a particular kind of television. -- a creativegs medium on one hand, so scripted ,rama, comedies, and so forth and an art medium the broad lee speaking -- the art medium. news, shows like this, sports, things about presenting live images from one place to another.

donald trump has always been much more a creature of that whether it is news, where there is talk, whether it is reality tv and pro wrestling -- these areas that are sort of nonfiction entertainment with artificial elements where there is a fuzzy boundary between truth and fiction. that is the kind of television that rewards confrontation, it rewards conflict, it rewards excitement. light ofget the red the camera focused on you if you can give it something more provocative than you gave it the last time. clearly inou can see the ark of donald trump. first as a pop-culture figure, character whotous plays tv cameos in the 1990's, then certainly as "apprentice" host and fox news figure.

you see the evolution to the more and more in-your-face case -- character that excites the camera interest. host: let's go to calls. joseph is first in albuquerque, new mexico. republican. caller: hi. host: good morning. caller: good morning, greta. president trump is president trump and even before he was a president, he was trump. you knew this, so there is nothing new about him. he is who he is. you had to change his platform when he became president because that is what he is now. everyone should be happy for that because he is the only one. i don't know exactly that i would argue with except for changing his platform. maybe that is a political reference which, i would not necessarily comment on, but i actually think the thing that is

striking since he became president is that there was this theme that, the presidency changes everyone. he will become more quote unquote presidential, he will reach out to more of america because that is what you do. the institution of the office has the effect on everyone and it is greater than any individual person. instead, he has continued to be in the way he deals with media, in the way he watches in response to television and tweets about it, the same way but much, much more. the influence of the institution of television on him has been far greater than the institution of the presidency. host: let's go to tom in hollywood, florida. democratic. caller: good morning, thanks for having me. i disagree with the last caller. trump has been the same all his life. i have observed him for over 40

years. when he was younger, he was a little bit more toned down because it is the same story. he was playing to the crowd which is what he has probably done all his life since he was a child. he tries to show the demeanor and face that he wants people to believe, but as soon things do not go his way or someone says anything to disagree, the monster comes out and he is mean and nasty. and vengeful. he has done many mean things over the year. look how he treated the people in scotland and the town next to the golf resort that he was building -- he terrorized them. all know he iswe a narcissist. psychiatrists to work him up, i would be really surprised if at least two of him did not write him a sociopath. he has gotten nastier and meaner lo at what he did with theent.

press corps. poniewozik, what do you make of people calling him a narcissist and how does that play into "audience of one,"? psychiatristot a or therapist, and i am not in a position to diagnose him. the traits that people are talking about when they use those terms are certainly an evidence with donald trump that we have seen on camera over the years. those are also traits that particularly in the media he is engaged in, the camera kinds -- kind of rewards. particularly reality tv. i talk a little bit about this and i go into it in the book, one thing that is important to remember about being a performer on reality tv, which donald trump, up until he was just

about the presidential run -- it is different from being an actor in the movies the way reagan was. plays fictional characters has to cultivate radical empathy. you have to believe other people are valid and that their thoughts and cares are valid, because you have to be able to embody a fictional character or that are aligned on the page. reality tv is a performance. it is a performance that you are yourself but more, more aggressive, you accentuate the most provocative and attention-getting, and often belligerent parts of yourself createsthat is what conflict and conflict create story, and the camera rewards it. the caller was talking about playing to the crowd and that is an important point. i do think that although conflict and aggression have been key to the trump brand, there is an element of him

wanting to play to the crowd in front of him. one thing we have seen from "oing from the "you're fired guy on "the apprentice" to being a political commentator on fox news, to the presidents, he has been in front of crowds and cameras that reward aggression and assertion. meanness and anger. up and going to amp that you will get what we have now. host: we are talking about the president's use of television. democrats, (202) 748-8000, republicans (202) 748-8001, independents (202) 748-8002. a caller in hyattsville, maryland. democratic caller. caller: good morning. feel about donald trump as a show figure, an actor, or

whatever he is in regards to media, it is what it is. before we elected donald trump, knew he was a presenter, and we can see him carrying the customs and habits of the show business into the administration, which is based on principles, and that is why he does not follow the principles. we, the american people, are to blame. whether he follows the rules of the party or not, he does what he wants, and it is now our turn to make sure we put him straight. host: several callers have made this point. we knew who he was before he was elected president. guest: i think that is true to an extent. i think it is very true what the caller says. this is a big thing i focus on in my book. thinkingthis line of

-- i have read pieces over and over about donald trump sort of getting at the question of, who is donald trump, really? what is he deep down? is this actually what he is like or is it a performance? i think the surface donald trump, the evidence that we have seen on the screens is more imaginary, deep down secret donald trump that a therapist might probe. i would agree in so far as that goes. whether everybody exactly knew who donald trump was, the evidence was all out there, you know, in thousands and thousands of hours of tv footage, but on the other hand, a lot of people apprentice," they kind of react saying this person is mainly a media personality.

no, no, he was a businessman. and because he was such a successful businessman, he was cast on "the apprentice." he was cast on "the apprentice" because he was tremendously successful and talented at presenting the image of a businessman. that is what reality tv needs. it need someone who embodies the picture that you have in mind of, what does a rich guy look like. that was the point of donald trump for years. service for a great him in that it took all of those symbols that he had aggregated and that presentation of himself, and it polished it up and applied production values to it, and it put it on tv for 14 seasons on a show whose premise donald trump is super successful, super rich, and super accomplished, and inflated

the extent of his holdings, and = hisccess of businesses, and that has affected some people who have watched the show because the point of the show was to try and present him and polish him up as not just an entertainer but extremely legitimate. host: how did that assist and his presidential campaign? well, there is a long history in politics of -- that predates trump of promoting the idea that the company should be run like a businessman. therefore, a businessman might be the best person to run the country. mitt romney made versions of that. russ perot made versions of that.

trade with a soundtrack -- so being portrayed with a soundtrack, with excitement, with america's popular businessman on nbc news, that is a valuable asset. host: susan in hampton, virginia. republican. caller: hi, good morning. host: good morning. caller: hi. world's ae said the stage and we are all players on it. so that is basically how we go through life. we have to live in these certain purse on as. -- personas. even the bible speaks of you portray yourself, you do not see yourself that way, but you act that way, and then it will happen. those are my comments, thank you. guest: it is interesting your

caller mentions that because it is true -- everyone performs in one way or another. she says, going back to shakespeare and throughout history, this idea of life is performance. one thing that is interesting in donald trump's early biography is that he was a follower of -- a congregant of norman vincent peale, the power of positive thinking. and his father was also a follower. reality tv notion in "the power of positive thinking," which is that it encourages people to sort of perform themselves into as if successful, and then you will become successful. ingis kind of a notion of liv

your life kind of like a reality tv performance. him carryy helped that forward into being an actual reality tv performer. host: a caller from lakeland, florida. republican. kudos:es, i want to say to the gentleman that called from new mexico. addresswould like to the gentleman speaking. he says he is not a psychiatrist or whatever, but nevertheless, that is all he is doing. playing like a psychiatrist or whatever. diagnose donald trump. he is who he is. we voted for him. he was not the normal politician.

like the gentleman to explain how well he knows donald trump before he wrote the book. did he personally have knowledge whoonald trump like many do stand up for him? host: let's take that question. guest: first off [laughs] i think i am arguing the same extent that your caller is saying which is that donald trump is who he is, and the evidence is in front of our eyes. that, maybe she feels it is disrespectful to camera, how he is on how he is as a media figure, but show me the lioness. i do not see what is wrong with acknowledging that this is a person that has created what he

has done through the media. , the notion that donald trump -- again, who has been a famous public figure for decades -- that he is a good --ticl], that he public figure for decades, that that he isstical, braggadocio is, it is ridiculous. that everything i am saying here is backed up with the ample evidence that he is given through his performance and his words and his character. host: why it write the b -- why write the book? guest: i think that television is the nervous system of the democracy. tv is the way we communicate with each other. i think tv is probably the main

means for the spread of ideas in our country. in which main form political campaigns are played out. i think that while tv has been important to elections going back to the 1960's with kennedy against nixon, it is a significant change when you get to the point where tv is not just a tool that a politician election,to win an but it is actually the means of gaining power. donald trump is not like ronald aagan going from being hollywood actor to governor of california for two terms to ultimately the white house. . his last episode of "the celebrity apprentice" aired four months before he declared his candidacy for president. that is a big change in this country. i think that someone who has

studied and understands that change in television over the years can make a fair amount of sense of it. i think a lot of analysis i was seeing a donald trump after he won -- how we got trump, how trump won sort of treated his media career as incidental to his other pursuits, to his business and political interests, but it has been the main thing about him from the beginning. if you understand tv, then you understand trump. to understand how we got to a point where the star of the -- of "the apprentice" got to be elected, you have to understand how tv changed over those decades. host: james poniewozik is the author of the book "audience of one: donald trump, television, and the fracturing of america." next in safety harbor, florida. independence. caller: good morning, thank you. i do agree with your person, the way he is talking about donald trump.

but what he has exposed and now is we have people that are -- -- he has bought brought out first in china, and the border. the border is a problem. i am from massachusetts, originally. and they want to make illegal immigrants with licenses, that is wrong. but you put a donald trump sticker on your vehicle, and you are in an area where south americans are present, they will destroy your vehicle. host: how do you know that? guest: i had a person that had a pick up and they had a restaurant, and they had written over the vehicle with some kind of soap. host: what is your point? caller: my point is the country is divided. he will not bring it together. he will try -- bridge this

-- businessman, he was not that successful. and wea divided nation cann let everybody in, and he tried to stop it. but i like the way you wrote your book about tv. you want to look at violence on tv, that is the problem with our kids. the other problem is, the shootings, the lawyers -- why should we keep someone 28 years in jail. why can't we get rid of them after 90 days because the lawyers have a thing going called money? host: ok, a lot there to choose from. guest: it is interesting that your caller brings up violence because one thing that again, watching donald trump as a candidate, and the way he , apaigned through the media very recurrent theme and a lot of is talking, particularly in the 2015 campaign was speaking

approvingly of violence or nostalgic for violence. when there would be protesters, he would say, i'd like to punch that guy in the face. when talking about football games and how football is better in the old days, when you could hit harder and there were not 15 yard penalties for it. commented,lly, he that is the problem with america, nobody wants to hurt anybody anymore. i think that is significant to unpack. this is someone who has worked in entertainment format particularly in "the apprentice," that are about conflict and fighting in zero sum games as being the greatest, most productive state of humanity. in hist manifests campaign. it manifests in the way he talks about how people deal with each other.

often, there are people who are trying to take your stuff, there are enemies that we must defeat, so i think your caller is right. america is very divided in ways that go beyond donald trump. he is not want to bring it together, but also, he does not have interest in bringing it together and is very adept and conscious of using his media platform to intensify divisions. host: what are you getting at when you write and the title "donald trump television and the fracturing of america"? ? the fracturing of america, i am not necessarily speaking about something that donald trump has done. again, there are divisions in this country that have been going on a long time that will continue after. really talkingis about, and i think this is understandably, collars are more

interested in the politics callers are more interested in the politics aspect, but we have moved into mass circulation publications and agreed on bases of fact the situation where people are watching more or less the same things and had more or less the same experiences. , i have myion where facebook feed and you have yours, and they tell us different things and they both tell us that our views of the world are universal although they are very small bubbles. we have cable channels that are targeted at this micro demographic or this particular interest, and we have political media that are increasingly catering to partisan audiences and partisan niches, and reinforcing beliefs. it creates this fragmentation that in some ways, by the way,

as a tv critic, has made for great television. the fact that you have more media outlets means we have been able to have great shows like "the sopranos" that could not have existed 50 years ago. but it has much more fractured public discourse. and that is something that has all sorts of effect on the election of donald trump as just one of those, but it is a pretty salient one at that time, specifically considering his connection to media. host: we will go next to jack in maine. independent. caller: hello? host: good morning. caller: how are you? host: fine, go ahead. caller: my lobster, china is not buying them. this, our commment is product is democracy.

and we need a salesman. trump is the penultimate salesman of all time. his name is known more than coca-cola. everybody knows that. fdr's fireside chats. that is why people like his tweets. tv is a cool media. like computers and other things where it is interactive. so some people get their information from cool media, but many more are getting it from hot media, nowadays. guest: that is true. i do not know which part of that i should address first, although, you sold me on the lobsters. presidency, i do not think it is insulting to say that the president is a salesman. i think your caller is right. it is a job of persuasion.

politics is a job of persuasion. show is an element of business in persuasion. problem and the point where it gets dicey to me is when you then get into this area of where there is this sort of moral compartmentalization and this rationalization or cynicism where it is, well, there is hype and there is a andain amount of bow everything, so what does it really matter what is truth? i am not saying that ca ller is saying this, but it is our time.e of everybody is lying, who knows what is really true. doesn't really matter if the guy that i am behind -- does it really matter if that guy that i

am behind is honest or trustworthy, or does it just matter that he is on my side? is it so important in a cricket world where everyone is out to get you that somebody is good or decent, or cares about other people? or is it just a matter of who advances your interests best? and that is an argument that again, it is kind of a philosophy of a lot of reality tv shows. you may backstab, you may deceive, but it is a part of the game and it is about rewarding the person who plays the game better. if you apply that too much to public life, it creates this moral permission structure where support goes and i can whatever behavior by whomever but still tell myself i am a good person because i am not a part of the game. host: richard in california, democratic call. caller: hi, good morning.

there is a whole bunch going on here. think trump is actually playing a role as president. he is like reality show president. --was not qualified and in any kind of direction to be president. he was a failed businessman was propped up by the show to make it look like he was successful. fraudulenttcies and lawsuits, bankrupting people out of millions, and blue-collar workers being bankrupted, and then bailed out by the russians is not a successful businessman. and i do not even think he thought he was going to win the presidency. and i hate people to say that we elected him. he lost by 3 million votes. it was the electoral college that elected him. he was the most unqualified, unstable person to be president.

if we really knew who he was, it would be scary because he is playing a role at all times. if he is a salesman, he is a poor salesman because he has lost all the confidence in our allies, 60% of the american people, and divided the nation even more. the problem with someone like him is he has no moral integrity by which to direct himself, and we are talking about the most powerful person in the world i can start a nuclear war by touching a button. an impulsive person who has , demeaned, bullied, character assassinated, and attacked every institution with someone disagrees with him because he is a super insecure, narcissistic personality. host: richard's opinion of the president there. you, how has cable

news coverage of the presidency changed during his tenure as president? ways, i think it is a complicated answer because it depends on which cable news coverage you are talking about. if you are talking about fox news, there has emerged this almost surreal symbiosis between the network and the president to his watching it all the time that basically gives it the biggest title. one" is a reference widely used to donald trump as the viewer and chief of fox news to who if people want to get their attention, they need to get his attention by going on the tv program. for fox news, it has become the royal court. it is where one goes to petition the president and to reach him

and influence him, and it often sets the agenda of his morning and his tweets and therefore, our days, and therefore, the life we live in whether we watch cable news or not. and msnbc, ratings wise, it has been a boom. constant excitement, constant provocation, constant shock whether your audience likes or does not like trump, that is generally, ratings. have they changed their approach? i think that there is undoubtedly a lot of tough coverage of the president, even adversarial coverage on cnn and msnbc. on the other hand, he still very much drives their narratives. by its nature is about chasing the shiniest object. if someone is emptying a bucket

of shiny objects for you every -- on twitter, those shiny objects are going to be chaste. host: what do you make of the president's use of twitter? guest: what do i make of? [laughter] that could be a whole other book. it is fascinating because in one sense, it is like a real time feed of what is going through his head often. i say often because i think some tweets are more planned and strategic than others. one thing that twitter has been important as for public figures whether it is celebrities like kanye west and kim kardashian, or whether it is a politician,

or a celebrity is a politician is that it allows them to be their own press agents. donald trump famously impersonated his quote, unquote press agent john baron in the 1980's, and now he can be his make his ownn, announcements, spin the story the way he wants, or just when he is angry about something. it has been very powerful, but it is nothas also, just independently powerful. his twitter feed, it has not affects thatching it has because it is amplified by tv news. designed special graphics that said "trump tweet" in big letters.

him to ways, it allows be the assignment editor of american media. ,ost: beverly, tampa florida. independent caller. things ii have two want to hit on. i am not a real articulate person so i will not pretend to be. i remember being a young girl and my father, i lived in western new york, taking us to anything where the president or the people running for president or vice president, and he wanted us to be a part of history. our commander of our country is someone we should respect as he should respect us. today, i would not have taken my child or my grandchild to any of that debates or anything president trump was involved in. why? because he is crude, rude, i

would not have wanted my children or grandchildren to grow up thinking that the commander of our country, that was how he displayed himself. the next one is guns. my family originally came from pennsylvania. man guns.guns, hunts i think we have been in other countries for years and years to bank atrs, trying countries and not hurt each other. host: i am going to jump and and we need to stick to the topic. i am going to move on to jim in redline, pennsylvania. caller: good morning. i think the reason that trump administration so successful is that trump is the first republican to fight back. if i can recall the 2012 election in which henry reed identified mitt romney for not paying his taxes for 10 years from the senate floor, and then falseon a proved to be a

story, nobody fought back. the stories continued. i just read "the new york times" story that is fundamentally false about a supreme court justice, and trump is fighting back on it. elected himwe because fundamentally, the republican party has been too polite, and politics is a blood sport. we have treated it as a sport gentlemen. the democrats are not gentlemen. i do not agree to what the previous caller said that he is a racist. i cannot find any statement that president trump has ever made to show that he is a racist. -- gook, mr. poniewozik ahead. guest: first thing i was going to say was that your republican caller right now, i 100% agree with him, with trump, the fighting is the point.

the fighting is the big part of his appeal to this base that he connected with when he became a regular commentator on fox news, appearing on fox and friends we "fox and friends" weekly. that was largely one reason his campaign was underestimated. people saw that he was leading the republican primary in the polls but believed that would fall apart. they missed that there was this base of theked off party that was cultivated by fox news and others for whom fighting and being a fighter, that was a part of the argument. he would go into a debate and to do something like launch an attack on rand paul, and would allt be like a, why would mr. trump launch into this debate?

cases,ity tv and in many on television today, no fights is pointless. it is a way of making a meta-argument to the audience saying, i will do this for you. i will be merciless to your enemies and the people that you do not like, i will make them upset and sad. that gets your previous caller's comment which is that i do think we have lost a kind of poignant thing -- and this notion that whatever disagreements there are , at least the presidency is something sort of greater and the concept of it is something that unites us beyond our individual struggles. valorizedave fighting from the highest place in the state ofn the highest humanity, obviously, you are going to lose that. and that changes us.

anthony in south river, new jersey. democratic caller. anthony? good morning. caller: hey, thank you for taking my call. love the show. i am a democrat, registered democrat and i am leaning more towards independent. what you guys are talking about is the med cerage. dirtymocrats, it is so and the talking points, on and on and on, spinning it around, it is really disgusting. and name-calling. i will give you two examples. one example is the new brett kavanaugh story which we have a person that did not even say anything happened, but someone talks to somebody who talks to somebody who said something happened, and we have no record of it or anything like that, similar to when dr. ford came and said, i do not know when it

bigened, it is all a show. host: what is your point? is in new point externale have the ledger and that is a political that is so slanted when you read the editorials, it is all for the democrats. i will give you a new jersey example, that is why i am calling. we have something that did not happen years ago. our senator, the honorable cory booker says, in peac -- impeach and mr. kavanaugh, mendez came out and said, i believe her. in new jersey, we have a woman who worked for governor murphy, a democrat, who accused one of the campaign people of raping her. she went through the trouble to go to the hospital -- to ouran you tie this

conversation about television? caller: well, because we do not hear anything about that in the news. i would suggest that your caller heard everything he heard from the news. that is generally the case when someone makes that sort of complaint -- why isn't this something that i learned about in the news in the news? i do not have much more to say about it than that. there always stories that are under covered, but i follow the news and i heard the stuff he was talking about, and i am assuming that your caller does not have all of that as firsthand, personal information. it is probably in the news. host: will go to tennessee, rick te creek. guest: i would just like to comment, all shakespeare said all the world's a stage, and everyone is putting on a r

what they have tried to do with this president, it is unbelievable when you look at snbc and the coverage of president trump. the disgraceful rhetoric. the attitude, the tone, the way they talk about the president of the united states is turning people off. guest: i think we have a lot of issues with tone from a lot of people in the media these days. it is notk it does -- disrespectful to comment that one of those peo areashington journal mugs available at c-span's new online store. go to c-span store.org. see all of the c-span products. here is a look at our live

coverage wednesday. on c-span, the house meets at 10:00 a.m. for general spaces -- speeches with general business at noon. workers -- they will work on contracts that require employment, consumer, antitrust or civil rights dispute to be resolved through arbitration. on c-span2, the senate is considering executive nominations for the state department and treasury. on c-span3 at 10:00 a.m. eastern, there is a hearing on the mental health needs of migrant children in u.s. custody. after that, the house gun violence prevention task force holds a discussion on capitol hill with gun-control advocates to highlight the impact of gun violence on children. that is followed by a news conference with t party members discussing gun-control and second amendment rights.

>> arizona governor doug ducey joined u.s. chamber of commerce executives tom donahue and neil bradley to talk about the united states-canada-mexico trade agreement. they called for congress to ratify the usmca. mr. donahue: businesses all over the country have a voice in washington. this meeting comes at an important time for businesses from arizona to new york and wh