650,000 so-called dreamers to stay and work in the u.s. illegally, while waiting for a decision on their legal status. the house intelligence committee holds a hearing today to examine online foreign influence operations during the pandemic and as elections approach. c-span,ve at noon on online at c-span.org, or listen on the free radio app. joining us as the former naacp president and the current president of people for the american way. you just took over as president for this group. what is theiewers group, how are they funded, and what are your priorities for it? guest: thank you. we started 40 years ago by a congressman. as and multiracial group, to

really make sure that our country stays on the course toward freedom and justice and inequality and opportunity -- and equality and opportunity for all of us. we organize across the country. in this moment, we have folks who are deeply involved in their cities and counties on the issue of public safety, on the response to covid, and who are fighting to make sure that our supreme court, quite frankly, comes back to the values we hold dear. does not keep lurching toward being the institution that could end health care as we know it, since obama passed the aca. we were funded primarily by people, some support from foundations. we built a movement across this country, to really make sure that this country remains a place for all of us. frankly, with the great dream of

this country, the dream that you can rise as high as your own ambition and intelligence and ains true, because without the american dream, quite frankly this country would be a hard place for our families. dot: on police reform, what want to see congress to? this is a day after congress spent time marking up the bill from the democrats, at the same time republicans unveiling their legislation. guest: the gop bill could be summarized in 10 words, they are more afraid of police unions than police killings. and we have got to get to a place where every person in this country is certain that their son is going to come home when they go to the grocery store.

when black men do not feel that sense of terror when they are pulled over by a cop driving in our neighborhood. and for each of us can count on our tax dollars supporting public safety that truly benefits the public, each of us. we are so far from that right now. i have spent my adult life pushing for justice reform across this country. we as we have made progress, have been working with newt gingrich -- we worked with newt gingrich at one point, to push through reforms. we got a consensus on a lot of this issue. public safety remains highly politicized. and here we are right before juneteenth, and it remains rooted in the issue of slavery in this country. what makes it is exciting is it

finally feels like the whole country, after 30 years of watching video after video of black men and women be killed by the people who had sworn to protect and respect them, has been forced to reckon with what black people have known for hundreds of years, which is that the police do not work for all of our communities. we've got to get to a place where all of us transform public safety in a way that all of us know we are being well protected. host: i will have you respond to senator scott who led the republican efforts on the senate side to put forth a proposal. here's what he had to say about the debate over police reform. [video clip] too often we are having a discussion in this nation of are you supporting the law enforcement community or communities of color?

this is a false, binary choice. the answer to the question of which side you support is i support america. if you support america, you support restoring the confidence that communities of color have in institutions of authority. if you support america it means the overwhelming number of officers in this nation want to do their jobs and go home to their family. it is not a binary choice. this legislation encompasses spirit. it speaks to the fact that we believe the overwhelming number of officers in this nation are tryingople working hard, to keep order in the communities. jealous, your response. guest: there is nothing to disagree with there. that is a general sentiment shared by virtually everybody in this country.

my family is a law enforcement family. cousinsfather, my picked up their badge and went to work in federal law enforcement. peopleue is not the versus the police. the police are the people. the issue is we have bad officers who have been protected by officers for too long. they have a code of silence that has to be broken and trust that restored. we can't live in a country where an officer can kill a person because of the color of their skin and get away with it. what we saw in colorado last , banning qualified immunity was a good sign. we are getting to a place where if an officer commits a hate crime, or literally treats someone different because of the color of their skin and takes

their life, they can be held accountable. we've got to keep moving in that direction. from soldiersance in the revolutionary war through the massachusetts regimen inspired by the boston massacre, where the first person killed was a young black man. himself painted him out of that moment. activists, thets abolitionists, had to paint him back in. it's a reminder that from the aninning there has been opposition to police brutality, but denying the sacrifice people have paid.

that is sharp, biting, persistent, and leaves all of us feeling less secure. i have no doubt senator scott is deeply respected in the state and has to grapple with the fear that all black men and black women have to grapple with in on country, and i hope folks that side of the aisle listen to him and think deeply about what it must be like to be the one black senator in your state. i suspect often like all of us in a situation where you feel like you're not being judged by the content of your character or accomplishments, but find yourself stuck in an old pattern that goes back to deeply in our country. black people living in terror of the very officers who have sworn to protect them, not because most are bad, because a few are and not held accountable by

and now we ask the people of the country have to rise up and say we will hold them accountable. we will make sure they are held to account. host: brian is up first in michigan, independent caller. caller: thanks. i grew up in detroit and worked in most major industrial cities and in well-traveled throughout the world in united states. whenever i get confused i always go to math. when we start using words such as systemic and institutional, that we don't support those words with math. then we go to the visual and pump that out every single night -- i would like to see some math that supports your theory we have such widespread racism. i have not found that in my life, sir.

i grew up in detroit when guys like me, i am a white guy who grow up in a white neighborhood. i spent a lot of time in the city and i am a city boy in that regard. we didn't have any of that even in the 1960's. were martineroes luther king or sports heroes of that era because i was impressed and how hard they worked and what they believed in. i'm not buying that it systemic. i'm not buying that it's institutional. but we do have some jerks in this world, i do admit that, sir. i do admit that. but it's not as widespread as the visual being pumped into our brains. our brains work 90% over the visual coming in. host: i will leave it there so charmaine yoest can rate -- so ben jealous can respond to you. agree that the

videotape we have seen in the rodney king case has forced all of us to reckon with what is happening in our country. the issue with the detroit police department in the 1960's and 1970's are legendary. i would encourage you to read that history. they were tremendously abusive of black detroiters for a long time. the police chief is doing the hard job of trying to reform that department. i would encourage you to look at the history of that department. i did my graduate work in criminology. 10%,es recently suggest 10% to 15% of a given department is likely to be abusive and problematic. you have 10% to 15% of a given department likely to be courageous and confront that pattern of abuse by one out of

10 or one out of eight of their peers. in the middle, the vast majority of the department wants to go along to get along and not rock the boat. that is the code of silence we talk about. we do have a problem institutionally in departments across the country. friends whog to two are mayors. one of a large city and one of a small city. the one in the small city said for six years his department use outonality tests to weed officers likely to be abusive. who 75% of the applicants met every other measure of fitness in the last six years failed the test. just a reminder we have a deep problem, and we need to make sure all of our departments have a high standard to how officers are trained, behave, and that they weed out the officers who

are most likely to be abusive. one thing i would say is we look at officers most likely to kill done by professor philip g , what you find is even more important to whether or not a officer is racist and would kill a black how authoritarian they are. that is why president trump's call to the most authoritarian in departments is so dangerous. we have to deal with history of racism and this cross current of authoritarianism. one out of 10 if you don't obey them, that could be the end of your life. that is what we saw recently in atlanta at the wendy's.

a man was running away from an officer with a nonlethal weapon and was killed. there is no way the officer felt his life was threatened. host: the front page of usa today, x atlanta officer charged with murder in that case. facesvicted the officer the possibility of the death penalty or life in prison. we -- do you want to comment on that? they need to abolish the death penalty, that's a reminder. that said the officer needs to be charged and convicted with murder. host: thomas in deerwood, maryland. caller: good morning greta and ben. i would like to have a comment and quick question. the protests and everything going on, i have

noticed when they had it on tv, almost all of the national guards were white americans, almost all of the state troopers were white americans. that seems to be systemic. i noticed you had all the reporters -- i won't say white -- but the majority were white. this seems to be systemic, too. also, when you talk about the congressman from south carolina, or wherever, -- guest: senator scott. caller: senator scott, i'm sorry. he has to walk a fine line. we know republicans are not going to stand up for anyone who makes a misstep. we have seen what the administration does, how it gets rid of people, and how trump will go against you when you run for reelection.

that is systemic and systematic, too. my question for you is this. when i recognize all of this, and i would like for you to comment on, why am i seeing so many of the national guard, state police, and police by americans? are black americans not applying for these jobs? our black americans not qualified for these jobs? what's going on here? away withhave to do the way officers are recruited. what you will find is there are things that have nothing to do with being an officer. lots of departments will use credit scores. not highcore is enough, they won't hire you as an officer. with the credit score correlates

most closely with is your net worth at birth. if you were born into a family where the family has a positive net worth, the credit score is likely to be higher because if you have an emergency, you have the resources to handle that emergency. a white person has 4000, and a black person has zero. that is related to the legacy of slavery. selecting officers is frankly part of the systemic racist pattern network we are talking about. dois has nothing to with how well that person is going to serve their community. similarly, the use of pot. it is constant across all racial groups, yet historically young

black people have been prosecuted at a much higher rate, then young white people smoking a joint. that will disqualify you from becoming an officer. it is pattern of enforcement who determines who is prosecuted, not pattern of use, which is constant. those are the types of barriers keeping young people out of departments. one thing we are doing in baltimore better than most other because we have been dealing with a huge pattern of corruption and taking them on head-on. one of the smart things one of the chiefs did in the last five years is we will no longer consider past use of cannabis whether or not you can be an offier -- an officer. more young black folks were able to apply, because that history

of discriminatory law enforcement was no longer keeping people out of law enforcement. host: lincoln, nebraska. -- host:y question host: moving on to tom in port richie, florida. republican. comment, like the guy before me. if you look at all of the major cities they are almost controlled by all blacks. les andve their ma councilman all controlled by blacks. host: talking about who are in positions of power, the mayor, the council members, etc. guest: it is absolutely true that the representation in most inner cities is more likely to

be people of color, more likely inbe black and brown, than most counties. yet, the culture of policing has not changed enough. there is all kinds of reasons for that, including going back to some of the patterns we talked about. one of the biggest one is too ors, politicians of all col in both parties have been unwilling to take on the hugely problematic, dangerous, and deadly culture of public safety in our country. with the young people in our country are demanding, and people of all colors and both parties are demanding in this moment, is we finally transform public safety to take our

cities, counties, and states to a place where we can all feel safe. we are all paying taxes, sales tax, income announcer: "washington journal" is available at c-span.org. we will go to a hearing just getting underway, examining how foreign governments are using social media during the pandemic and its influence on the upcoming election season. >> issues already challenging our nation, such as immigration, the second amendment race relations and other issues. today's hearing is not intended to look back at 2016 come as much as it is to look forward. election day is only five months away, and malicious actors, including russia, but also others, persist in their attempts to interfere in our political system in order to gain an advantage against our country and to undermine our most precious fight,