number of people who are in real trouble economically, then it does not matter what i say. that is the objective. that is the objective. the objective is to keep the american people safe so we can begin to get back to normal, rebuilding our economy and bringing back economic growth. thank you. >> [indiscernible] >> thank you, guys. holdsay, president trump a campaign rally in pennsylvania. watch live at 7:00 p.m. on c-span, >> coming up in an hour, nikki fried, florida agriculture commissioner discusses florida and campaign for the 20 and the federal response to the covid-19 pandemic. -- 8:445 -- avik

roy discusses the herd immunity approach. ♪ >> with the new school year beginning in schools and colleges across the country, the acrostic candidate joe biden said if he is elected "help is on the way." to school systems and parents. good morning, this is washington journal. we start the program asking you about your experience so far. how is it going back either remotely or in person, is it working? four those of you in the eastern and central time zones. for mountain and

pacific. for educators, our number is 202-748-8002. if you want to send us a text, that line is 202-748-8003. tell us your name and where you are texting from. -- and ontter or twitter. it was his second campaign appearance after his convention, biden in delaware yesterday. you can find it at c-span.org. the washington post, "biden blames trump" because the education gap a national emergency. joe biden sought to channel the frustrations of students, parents, and teachers around the country i blaming trump for school districts's inability to be open during the pandemic. biden received a briefing from

education leaders at a sparsely filled downtown theater. he said a lack of in person education around the country is an emergency. here is more of what joe biden had to say. [video clip] >> trump still doesn't have a plan of how to reopen safely. no plan of how to make parents feel secure for their children. he is offering nothing but failure and delusions on the start to finish. paying then are price. failure to take this virus seriously early and spread it around the globe. failure to take the steps we needed back in march and april. failure to institute widespread testing and tracing, to control the spread. failure to provide clear national science-based guidelines state and local authorities.

and failure to model even basic responsibility like social distancing and wearing a mask. failure to make sure educators and administrators have the equipment and resources and training they need to open safely under the circumstances we find now. devos trump and betsy have not stepped up. we have. all seen the results. millions of students starting a new school year in the same way they finished the last one -- at home. host: your back to school experience so far. 202-748-8000 if you are in eastern and central time zones. 202-748-8001, mountain and pacific. educators, the line is 202-748-8002. the y tested issue guidelines for reopening -- the white house did issue guidelines for reopening schools.

we believe many school district's canal reopen safely provided the implement mitigation measures, health protocols to protect families, teachers, and students. includeidelines supporting the resumption of in person schooling. trump is standing up for the well-being of american children who need to get back in the classroom and. working parents. hear what trump had to say when those were released. [video clip] >> we cannot stop american children from going to school and harming their mental, physical, emotional development and inflicting long-term damage. i heard a gentleman today from year issay that every $10,000. they lose a tremendous amount of money in the future.

i think he was talking about on a yearly basis, it was a lot. every year of education they lost, every year they gained they gained $10,000. when you have students sitting at home playing with a computer, it is not the same. it is not the same, it can never be the same as being in a classroom. we want to get our students in a class or. host: let's get your calls and input including that educators line at 202-748-8002. this is nelly in alabama. it is not safe for kids to go back because every time you look around someone is coming with the virus. they have too many kids bunched up together. somebody is going to get sick and schoolteachers -- what are when you havedo

kids go back to school with the virus? especially college kids. they call the virus -- they caught the virus. then you bring it back home to your parents -- it is not safe. instead of going back to school, but he is worried about the money. [indiscernible] rob, let's hear from florida. what is your screen so far? caller: the ironic thing about the situation is trump himself doesn't do his homework on just about anything. his mind works in such a way -- he writescally

his own teach each -- his own sheets. he pretends he has done his homework. when you don't do your homework, you fall behind your classmates. you know that others are getting ahead of you when you don't do your homework. you fall behind and you know it so you try to hide it. about it and pretend you are as developed as the others. -- about it and pretend you are as developed as others. i did the same thing. you continue to pound away and prove to others not only that you did the homework but you are on their intellectual level, but you are not. it, your lack of

development, you continually try to convince others you are not undeveloped. it is a merry-go-round. you work at rehearsing and pretending instead of doing the work. that is the situation we are in. host: some comments on twitter. this is alexis, a washington post reporter. four-year-old keeps muting himself and saying i don't know yourself, is this meeting over yet?" -- mama is doing a happy dance. trump unaware mr. controlled all the school districts." " my eight-year-old grandson will begin virtual schooling." educators, your line is 202-748-8002. mountain and pacific, 202-748-8001.

kristof in thes -- york times and his peace and his piece. sone trump -- his private -- the private school his son is attending is sticking to remote learning. computer andve a will be able to eat his fill without school lunches. study found that almost 17 million american children live in homes without high-speed internet and more than 7 million don't have a computer at home. for disadvantaged kids, online learning is an oxymoron. that is in the new york times. sea -- in tennessee, go ahead. caller: mr. biden, we are a federal system and every state

is not alike. understand -- south dakota didn't close down in the spring. they didn't like they needed to. [indiscernible] local people are not stupid. they don't have to be instructed as to what to do. arel and state officials doing just fine. host: we go to michigan. kathy is an educator there. are you back in school? substituteork as a teacher and i work at a hospital. there is almost no information about the schools so i talked to someone about picking up jobs. no one knows anything.

the hospital is probably the faces -- the safest place. right.s kristof was schools where some don't even have running water, some don't have internet, they are going to be undereducated this year and the president could have stopped that. put the gear in schools for people to wear. face masks, shields, make sure there is running water. one school didn't have it for a wolverine.alf, in we have all the water we need right now, we have all the resources to feed our children, to heat their homes and we aren't doing it. we are taking everything for people and giving it to the powerful and rich. host: you haven't been called back for substitute jobs since they reopened? caller: no.

there are software programs. you don't read anything in the local newspapers, there is no information. i don't know what is going on. most people don't. that is difficult. host: back to the nicholas kristof article, he writes the advice of american pediatrics seems right. we do everything as possible to resume in person learning. that is especially true for special need students as well as low income pupils and those at risk of dropping out. this isn't about hurting children into schools -- this isn't about herding children into schools but doing everything safe. that means teaching outdoorsmen possible and gripping didn't into pods.

what is also embraced, bandwidth for all. is as essential today as electricity was then. the ideas of joe biden yesterday in bloomington, the ideas he would do if elected president. [video clip] >> if i was president, i would makes you -- make sure our children get relief under the stafford act. i would make sure that ppe and sanitation supplies qualify as emergency protective measures which is a fruit -- which is a phrase they use to be eligible for federal assistance. i would be working with the of congress now, today to pass emergency packages for schools so they have the resources they .eed in order to be open

safely money for ventilation, i heard that a lot when i had health care experts on zoom. money for ventilation and other health measures also money to hire more teachers. every recommendation we got was they should be dividing into pods, smaller classes. smaller classes means more educators are needed. keeping classes socially distanced, small. money for more psychologists and councils -- and counselors. -- i proposed legislation a long time ago. we have one school psychologist every 1500 children in school. the mental health our children need now, the anxiety they are feeling at home and go to school. not being able to go to school. superintendents

have estimated they will need $2 billion to support k-12 schools throughout the year for safe reopening. we need the money to hire educators. for community colleges, four minority -- for minority serving institutions. politico headline this morning with presidential debate commission announces -- the moderators for all three president of debates advice residential debate. the first debate between trump and biden set for september 29 will be hosted by fox news's chris wallace who became the first journalist from his network to moderate a general election debate. scully, editor for c-span wmata the second debate, a town

hall style event to take place on october 15 in miami. the final debate will be moderated by nbc news and today --w coanchor kristin walker kristen welker. -- between vice president mike pence and senator kamala harris. that debate scheduled for some timber seventh -- october 7. now here with our colleague, steve scully. congratulations, we are looking forward to it. guest: in the first interview i comen c-span -- i have full circle. host: you are hosting a town

hall debate in miami, what does a town hall debate look like in covid-19. guest: we are going to learn the process, but in talking to the commission. some background, the first town hall took place in virginia and that came from negotiations between the clinton campaign and the bush campaign. does is commission now they work with the organization and they will select approximately 30 undecided voters who will be in the debate october 15th and they will have questions. my role is to facilitate other questions, not to tell them what to ask. just so i am aware of what the questions will be so there is no duplication. and then to carry on the conversation. to geter thing, we want

questions from the c-span audience and general public. you can follow me on social and send us a question. townhall@c-span.org. we will incorporate that into the conversation that will take place on october 15. host: you were the back up in 2016, the backup moderator in 2016. tell us how you are planning to prepare for the townhall. guest: it was good training for me to serve as a backup moderator. i went to all four debate prepared as if they were going to call on me at the last minute to moderate the debates. the townhall meeting is unique because it is more of a to listenr role

carefully, to follow up, to make sure that the president, joe biden, and if there is a third participant follow the rules and don't filibuster. my hope is we are going to ask direct questions and push through direct answers. host: give me your thoughts on this forty-year arc of c-span's coverage of these debates from 1980 to 2020. we have been an observer of these events and now stepping into the role as a per dispute. what are your thoughts on that -- into the role as a participant. what are your thoughts on that? guest: it is exciting. this format is well-suited for my background, it is what you are doing right now and every andwith pedro and john greta. everyday we are talking to the

american people. the key thing about these debates is it is the last opportunity you have to see the candidates in an unfiltered format, especially in this covid-19 environment. we came off the conventions which have been prepackaged events. that is how the party put it together. but this is a chance with the candidate debates to hear from the moderators, to hear from the american people. i think it is great for c-span. i think it is great for our approach which is to make this america's conversation, especially in this format. we are looking forward to it. it is a big task, but we are ready for it. host: our viewers and listeners can submit their questions to @c-span.org. we are behind you and good luck

on october 15. guest: thank you, it is going to be a great ride. host: coverage of all of the presidential debates and the vice presidential debate coming up on the c-span networks. full details available at c-span.org. we continue our comments from you, your experience as schools open up this week. after labor day, many more schools will open up. 202-748-8000 is the line for those in eastern and central time zones. 202-748-8001 mountain and pacific. for those of you who are educators, 202-748-8002. vicki is in north carolina. go ahead. caller: thank you for taking my call. grandmother -- i speak as a grandmother, we have the resources to homeschool in

the early years and when he got to the fifth grade we were glad he would be able to enter a middle school and develop social skills which we have lost since we went to online learning. recentlycarolina, we restarted online learning for the past nine weeks. austerity -- as parents of us to stick -- as parents of autistic programs have a program for each of our which is something you cannot achieve with an all size fits all login. have gone back i to our old format of homeschooling him because we felt he would not receive any formal didactic education. i am 64, i recently developed

cancer. -- i have an granddaughter who is in private school and attending on-campus. i faced covid with the choice of how can i participate being on chemotherapy with one grandchild that may be at risk of covid. there are extraordinary circumstances for many of us. host: thanks for your experience. whendent trump in august the white house came out with their recommendations stated his argument for in person learning this is what he had to say. [video clip] >> the american academy of pediatrics has released guidance, recommendations that schools reopen. it said "lengthy time away from school and associated interruption of supportive services results in social

isolation making it difficult for schools to identify and address important learning deficits. the doctors also warned about the risk of increased abuse, substance use, depression, and suicide. the national education association recently stated despite the momentous efforts of educators during the pandemic, online learning has never been an effective replacement for in person learning and support. " when you sit at home looking at the computer, your brain start to wither away. host: our line for educators is 202-748-8002. in maryland, eric. good morning. caller: i work for a private school, i am the i.t. director. we were one of the first schools in maryland to shut down because

of covid. the reopening has been very interesting. since march 12 i have been working 15 hour days to make sure we have -- a. -- an environment. i disagree that online learning is ineffective. it comes down to teachers to make sure they are properly trained. hours a day of aggressive, robust online training for our students from pre-k through eighth grade. you as the i.t. director at a private school, we read a column earlier for the new york times pointing out the issues of broadband access across the country. i know it is larger than your private school, but what are your thoughts on being able to

get access to broadband, get access to high-tech gear for students in the inner-city and rural parts of this country? caller: that is a great question. my location is an interesting question -- interesting location when it comes to demographics. when it comes to equipment, , if theally equipment school and the families were very slow at managing their logistics supply train they're going to suffer. as far back as april this was going to be reality this fall. even though i knew that, i still managed supply chain issues not just for electronic equipment but for supplemental equipment. one of the big projects we did was we put brand-new cameras

mounted in every classroom, microphones in every classroom so that we could support an hybrid environment if the covid environment ever allowed it. when it comes to broadband, that is a huge issue. this pandemic didn't exist, broadband was an issue as it is in terms of cost and availability. i work with a friend of mine who is a trainer and is trying to help his business do remote learning for his clientele. broadbandking at the in his area was extremely expensive. there is one provider and the performance was substandard. they wanted almost $400 a month for a cable internet. when you're trying to do multicast environments, that doesn't work. and looking at the service platforms. capping the quality of his video from not being hd even

though he is paying for it to barely being sd. --adband issues exist existed before covid did. years down say two the road, do think hybrid learning is here to stay in some form? caller: that is a great question. i wish i could answer that with an definitive answer. in terms of two years down the road, i am not sure we are going schools,ing a lot of either private or charter, still in business. there is a who -- there is a huge boom in homeschooling right now. there are a lot of challenges down that way. in terms of hybrid two years from now, i think it comes down to comfort level of the vaccine, the availability of the vaccine, the effectiveness of a vaccine, and what schools demonstrate

value to parents during this pandemic and how they are able transition effectively. and not to aggressively, as we have seen in a number of states when they open, they immediately have issues. with my institution, we are watching the numbers not just of the state of county and local area and make sure we make the best decisions possible. unlike some schools, we have great elation. we have put in -- we have great ventilation. we have put in uv light's. we are still concerned about the impact of making the wrong decision too soon. we were one of the first communities in maryland to have desks. thanks for your experience and input. that line for educators is 202-748-8002.

eastern and central time zones, 202-748-8000. mountain and pacific 202-748-8001. or solicit text at 202-748-8003 ohio, ilican, columbus, do not have small children. one has graduated college, one has been forced to not attend college. i will be leaving ohio soon, trump-pence, four more years. i hope everyone can do what is best for their kids. covert had less than 81% infection rate in new york for one month but the schools are not outfitted for ventilation, so i am fine with my grandkids learning online. some of the districts in our inte have staff and students quarantine. some of the districts in our

state have staff and students in quarantine. [video clip] >> what do you say to the teachers were afraid to return to the classroom even with safety protocols in place? v.p. biden: i understand their concern. so many of the teachers also have pre-existing conditions that lend itself to the fact that if they contract covid-19 that they would be very susceptible to being in real trouble. it is understandable why they are doing it. the first thing to do is make sure all the protective capacity we have available to us is made available. and then make choices about whether or not -- let the district make choices about whether they open fully, rotate, and if those teachers are able to teach from home and remote learning. .t is really understandable look at what is happened in this covid crisis so far -- 100

million -- 100,000 people have died who are above the age of 65. not000 out of 200 some -- 200 some, 189,000. i have heard the estimations over two significant 239,rsities, one will be one will be 312. i don't know that. understand why it is a political problem. politics about not being willing to go in and help, provide protective capacity for people to be able to go back to work and go to school? i can't fathom it. host: usa today details behind

what joe biden is proposing -- proposed yesterday. that biden said school superintendents estimate they need $200 billion for extra costs and more would be needed for colleges. the former vice president said the federal government should cover costs for protective equipment, sanitizing cleansers and additional staff to keep classes smaller. this is amelia and mount airy, maryland. good morning. caller: good morning. i have a couple of comments. decisions about opening schools are made at the local level. here in maryland, the governor came out last week and said schools should try to open if they can. with the has to do local school districts in the teachers union that negotiate contracts with local school districts.

on a national level, all the president can do -- and i guess the secretary of education -- is provide guidance and there is money out there. there are billions of dollars that have been allocated but have not been used. it is disingenuous of the media and the different people like biden and the other campaign people to accuse the president of being responsible for schools not opening. those are my comments. host: from the new york times this morning, college students shutter police -- many at the assignment. a small group of students crammed in a kitchenette, cheering on is a shirtless guy arm wrestled a laughing young woman, nobody was wearing masks. a mocking caption, the people who mention you are not social distancing are the ones who would not have been invited.

within days, an online petition was created demanding the student's admission be revoked. the petition has collected more than 3500 signatures. -- thisuniversity cannot be done without immense safety precautions taken in the compliance of every student, a group calling itself concerned student coalition. we need to hold these students accountable for their actions. president trump spoke to the issue of returning to college campuses. [video clip] pres. trump: college age students continue to be one of the lowest risk demographics. deathsan 99.8% of the from this horrible disease, the invisible enemy we call that, occur in people over 24 years of age. over 24cur in people

years of age. for this reason, it could be safer for them to live at a school rather than them live with their older parents or grandparents. you have to go to school. we have to open up, we have to open up our schools and our businesses. a lot of it has been opened, but we can do better. host: president trump from mid august, our topic on your experience in schools so far. (202) 748-8000 for those of you in the eastern and central time zones. (202) 748-8001 in the mountain and pacific. .ducators, (202) 748-8002 there is a text from a virginia high school teacher. almost every teacher is on rollerskates between learning new technology, lowering expectations on learners. it is causing serious stress all around. we are doing the best we can but hiccups are reverberating

throughout the teaching profession. you cannot imagine the teacher and stress on special ed teachers. steve said there is a lot of homeschooling regardless of covid. we have a neighbor who homeschools her teacher. mothers are teachers, neither likes what is going on in government schools. understandable. for months i have been pointing out that poor, mostly minority students will suffer the most if in person schooling does not reopen. it is not broadband alone. familiarity with online systems and other cultural considerations weight against the poor. if we care about the poor, we must find safer ways to reopen the schools. good morning. caller: i am looking at our world online and they have a lot of graphs on coronavirus

throughout the world. biden said something about how europe has it together and we don't. caseaccording to them, the fatality rate versus tests for confirmed cases as of september 2, we are not even on the list. they have every country under the sun -- italy, canada, ireland, switzerland, finland, denmark, iraq, australia, japan, thailand, singapore, new zealand, they have everybody on that list. we are not even on the list, on the chart. he is misleading people and i don't think that is very good. i think we should be as honest and open about what the true numbers are so that people have a good idea of what is really going on.

i think transparency is absolutely the ultimate thing we should be doing. it is absolutely what we should be doing. host: give us an idea of what they are doing in the olivia, washington area. caller: i think we have about 1900 cases totally. can look upite, you different states, different countries. it is really a fantastic site. host: i guess i should have been more clear. give us an idea of what they are doing with local schools. that is my fault. caller: i see what you mean. someplace, you have to have a mask. if you are going into a public setting, you have to have a mask on. host: what about the schools, though? caller: i think that is going to because every county,

superintendents really decide what they are going to do. i think there is a difference between public schools and private schools. i am not really sure. i think it is kind of a potpourri. host: san diego, california, good morning. caller: good morning. diego grandmother in san packing as we speak to go help my daughter homeschool my five-year-old grandson. the thing i find most distracting is there is no procedure. i have grandchildren in florida, grandchildren in ohio, grandchildren in south carolina and none of them seem to be on the same page.

i find that frustrating, and aside from politics, which i have an opinion about that, these the kids -- they don't toe any concept of having sit in front of a screen. it is really frustrating for children, for grandparents, for parents who are working at home. it has been an alarming time. host: you said you are packing. does that mean you are traveling? caller: i am traveling to florida to become a homeschool helper of a five-year-old. in california, we have been pretty much quarantined. i have been inside. when duty calls, one has to -- rise to the occasion. host: safe travels. warrenton, virginia, wendell is an educator. good morning. caller: good morning. how are you?

shoutout toto do a prince william county, virginia, and my superintendent and principal, all of the staff at fark yourh school and of there was a lot surveys,ng, -- outside of the concern of students disengaging with school, we are fully prepared. some of the older teachers struggle with technology, we are trying to support them. for the most part, we are ready to go. the students who are most at challenges, those

students will be in the building. ppe wet us all the needed, they did health assessments, mask fittings. i am grateful that i am in the district i am in, both living and working. i feel like we will be ready to go. you a questionk i asked earlier of an educator in maryland. looking two years down the road, do you think some form of hybrid learning is here to stay? i do. -- caller: i do. you can't put the toothpaste back in the tube. those technologies will mediate learning for the foreseeable future. even once we go back to in person learning, we will still be using canvas or google classroom.

snow days will be out the window. if you get the flu, you can probably teach from home. my kids now, i have a seventh grader and a fourth grader at home, they are learning how to powerpoint,ocs, they are learning technology skills they would not have come otherwise. host: i am glad to hear from you. let's go to dan, also under educator line, in new york. sides of the two coin. procedures that are used for protective means are not known to work out. bacteria, it is a different situation. a lot of people are very contagious before they are ever symptomatic. on the other site, i really schools ora lot of

trying to go into the hybrid system, where you show up a couple of days, you don't a couple of others, and then others you stay on the computer. i would like to point everyone yu,professor galloway at n who is accusing universities of looking more at their bottom line the safety of students. he presents a history of higher education and how it has been porkbarrel for the system rather than the students, and that is cut out some of the people. corona is an opportunity for some of us to see what they are doing with educating our children and qualifying them for the future tomorrow, to now argue color students need to be on campus -- to now argue college students need to be on campus.

labs they can always take. we have to look at motivations because lives are at stake. when lives are at stake, motivation is important. we have to look at a balance between medical and educational. that is very tough for most people because many people are either-or. when you are both, you can see more or less what the motives are operating. i suggest professor galloway y's podcast. host: i appreciate that. we talked about politics earlier with her own steve scully, one of the moderators. in early poll postconvention reported in usa today with the biden's trump cuts into lead. joe biden leads donald trump in the race for the white house by

50% to 43%. that advantage narrowed from the 12 percentage point edge he held. the survey finds significant skepticism about whether the election can be trusted. if their candidate loses, one in not voters say they are ready to accept the outcome as fair and accurate. ralph here in washington, d.c., go ahead. caller: i think the kids need to go back to school. the need to take certain precautions. the thing is, the children are not suffering, it is the older people. andlook at the death counts it is primarily older people. i want to make one point and i hope you don't interrupt me. there was a study in indonesia

that show that 95% of the people who died from coronavirus were vitamin d deficient. you are three to four times more likely to die from the virus if you are deficient in vitamin d. narrative, black people are three to four more times likely to die than a white person. yet they only have 20% to 25% more diabetes and heart disease. why do black people do this? black people have a deficiency in vitamin d. host: we have spoken to medical experts, as well. school openings have been delayed. choice model will be implemented september 14. each parent submits a declaration to select virtual or in person.

schools and colleges in kentucky are having problems with covid-19 -- he is talking about the sturgis bike rally. bikeing in some schools, rallies are super spreaders. all children and staff are masks in to wear arkansas. 3, voting poll is november masks are not mandatory. arkansas is an interesting place. it is like vote at your own risk, with no mast required to vote in person. the lead picture on the new york pandemice coronavirus outdoorstrance exams into a sports arena on wednesday.

edtennessee, good morning to . go ahead. caller: thank you for taking my call. my son is doing virtual learning. in april, this country got shut down. i had by son take karate virtual, they did it through zoom. the teacher could see the students. everyone says kids can't die, but if it is your kid that dies because of the virus, that is important in the equation. he watches videos and answers questions. on the videos, the date on the videos is from 2011. i tried to have him get help in honors math on tuesday, not until monday did he have a teacher he could speak with. diduntil the end of july they start contacting parents in terms of the options available.

process, they had enough time to think about it between april and july, they should have done a better job being educators. host: elizabeth is an educator in lexington, kentucky. good morning. caller: good morning, thank you so much for taking my call. how are you? host: i am doing fine. how are you? caller: i am about to go to school. the man before me who spoke, in regard to what he said, i am an educator in kentucky, we are doing everything we can to make sure that all kids are getting the education we need. we have limited supplies. we have had a lot of technical difficulties, internet outages , comingl, you name it up to disrupt the day. in respect to michael and all schools in kentucky, we are going above and beyond to make

sure kids get the help they need. andst want to say that, thank you to all of the educators out there, and thank you c-span for letting us be heard. host: glad you could get through before school. we go to troy in pittsburgh, pennsylvania. because am calling before corona, 32% of students that did online learning completed a four-year degree on time. corona, what is it going to be now? it is not going to go up. your nontraditional students, it is going to hurt them the most. that on ground is still the way to go.

i had a class last night, and i had a room that holds 22 students and i had six students. i don't think anyone got sick. everyone had a mask on. i believe students learn better in person than online. i teach online. host: what do you teach? how old are your students? i assume they are all adults. caller: yes. host: you had six last night. aside from social distancing issues, in terms of engagement in class, did you find it more engaging to have fewer students? caller: as an educator, yes, you are getting more one-on-one. whole, theoverall overall whole is being hurt, because i would usually have a class of 22.

host: nobody was able to participate unless they were in person? caller: it is a hybrid. my class last night that was on zoom, at the beginning of the class, the microphone went out so i had to reload the system. everything is not running as smooth as people think. for my nephew, they had to be school at the high because they did not have enough laptops. now, they go to school one week later. host: campaign 2020 coverage on the c-span network coming up this afternoon -- this evening, rather -- the kennedy school of politics will host a discussion with political reporters on the campaign, that begins at 6:00 p.m. eastern. president trump with a campaign rally this evening in latrobe,

pennsylvania. we will have that live at 7:00. that is also on c-span.org in the c-span radio app. joe biden is heading to kenosha, wisconsin. here is what joe biden said about his trip today. [video clip] v.p. biden: there have been overwhelming requests that i do heal because we have to . we have to bring people together. my purpose of going will be to do just that, be a positive influence on what is going on, talk about what needs to be done, and try to see if there is a beginning of a mechanism to bring the folks together. we have to heal. this is about making sure we move forward. advice i have gotten from sitting members of the

congress and the senate, as well, to go and i should go. i am not going to do anything that have meetings with community leaders, as well as business people and other folks in law enforcement, and to start to talk about what has to be done. i am not going to tell kenosha what they have to do, it is what we have to do together. the idea that we are saying -- the president's current people retreating to their corners and keep this moving is just a mistake. i spent my whole life, including in the city you're in right now, bringing people together, bringing the community and police officers together, business leaders and civic leaders together, and that is my purpose of going. host: a couple comments on text and twitter, i think virtual is great, we can see what teachers are teaching in the schools. this one said the people's

republic of california just allowed a few schools to reopen, but as of now, if you can navigate safety. maybe they should go back to the basics and teach, reading, writing, arithmetic and history. make it simple what they need to know, not a bunch of nonsense. if one person got covid last semester, everybody would have freaked out. now a lot of people are getting like,d universities are wash your hands. caller: i appreciate c-span, first of all. union need toers be disbanded and the need to get rid of these people. host: sorry.

james and arlington, texas. go ahead. do --: my comment has to i have a nephew he is at the university of colorado. virtually allre virtual. my sister had him come home. apartment and his brought him home for the coming semester. he is not going to be having any personal classes himself this semester, but he will be taking the rest of his courses. the other issue has to do with a neighbor of mine who is a substitute teacher. lates definitely in her 60's. the kids may not be so vulnerable to the virus, but what about the actual teachers

themselves? host: ok. kentucky, brenda. your thoughts, go ahead. caller: yes, thank you. i think what people have not taken into consideration in ,rying to get the schools back is that you have the virtual , what they don't take into consideration is that this is a crisis and it is going to be over. it is not something that will be on and on until the vaccine comes, then they can all get back to school the way they were. it is just a little bit of time, let's take it easy, do the virtual, which is what kentucky is doing right now.

right now, they are going virtually and everything is going along just fine. everybody does not have to get back into the classroom all at once. that makes no sense. it's whatever is the best for your community. host: i had on washington agriculture and consumer services commissioner nikki fried will talk about florida and campaign 2020 and the federal response to the pandemic. from theik roy foundation for research on equal opportunity will talk about the u.s. response to the pandemic and the idea of herd immunity. all of that is coming up. ♪ bidens record is a shameful rollcall of the most catastrophic betrayals and blunders in our lifetime. spent his entire career

on the wrong side of history. >> our current president has toled in his most basic duty the nation. he has failed to protect us. he has failed to protect america. and my fellow americans, that is unforgivable. >> the first presidential debate between donald trump and joe biden is september 29. watch live streaming and on-demand at c-span.org or listen live. sunday night on q&a, the washington post former afghanistan pakistan bureau chief talks about her experiences covering the region. >> people will say things that are very critical of the united states or the west. common than

somebody saying something offensive about being a woman. generally speaking people tend to be more helpful to a woman then to a man. they can also try to take advantage of you in various ways. my experience is if they are not going to like something about you or going to miss trust something about you, it's not because you are a woman. it's because you are an american. >> washington journal continues. ,ost: joining us is nikki fried florida agriculture and consumer services commissioner. she is the highest-ranking elected democrat in the state of florida. a lifelong floridian. welcome to washington journal. for joeicted a victory

biden and kamala harris in the state of florida in 2020. what gives you confidence that they will win? downturn's an economic because of covid. decrease in the state of florida, it is the largest economic driver. what has happened here is we have 1.2 million floridians out of jobs. they are looking for leadership. former president who has a plan to not only beat covid but also get our economy back on. heren't get tourism back until we get our economy under control. is going tobody who be empathetic to the situation, have a plan and are smaller farmers who have been waiting for support from the federal government. they are looking for new

leadership. to donald trump is not going buy the game plan he's been putting off the last four years. host: just to remind viewers of the challenge ahead for the democrats, just looking at some recent votes in florida. in 2018 and the senatorial vote, rick scott edged out mel nelson by a percentage point. the governor's race in 2018 as well area tight. ron desantis twinning. and your own race was a 50/50 split practically between you and matt caldwell. what are democrats doing differently on the ground in florida. guest: all elections in the state of florida are very narrow margin.

have done this year differently. we are more organized. we understand it has to be not only getting out the votes protecting the votes. we spent a lot of time the last year and a half. and getting a message to not just democrats but independence and modern republicans. we took our shot last time with trump. we made a mistake. he was not ready to be president. he has not stood up and became a leader during covid. we have a message about a plan for the future of our country to make sure that we are not just focusing on the top 1% or's. in ourreally investing small businesses, cities and communities. the joehe message of biden kamala harris ticket.

we are taking the message to not just democrats but independence and modern republicans. we are organizing, we have a clear concise message. candidate with a character that is going to bring us together, isn't going to be inciting violence but really bringing hope and peace and become a beacon of light for the country in the world. floridians understand that the road to the white house goes right through the state of florida. ofocrats in the state florida are ready to step up and make sure we are delivering florida to joe biden. host: nikki fried is our guest. we are talking about campaign

2020. we welcome your comments and questions as well. for those of you who support joe biden and kamala harris, (202) 748-8000. resident -- president trump and vice president pence supporters (202) 748-8001. (202) and undecided 748-8003. guest count not only are we having more engagement from a , but theemographic demographics are changing. some peopleseeing coming down from the northeast moving here to the state of florida. we have about a thousand people moving to the state per month. we have a great economy outside of covid. so we are seeing a lot more of our companies that are coming here to the state and expanding

the workforce. they are all middle and lower class economy individuals. making sure they have representation is going to be the change of this election. a lot of people are starting to get engaged and hopefully that court case will be heard and decided before november which will expand the voting base significantly. would beon floridians affected by the restoration of civil-rights. line fordo have a florida voters. coronavirus in the state of , the number of cases 600 33,442. total debts so far 11,651.

the total hospitalized in florida 38,859. desantis'sn ron cabinet. assess how you think the florida government has responded to covid-19. and've been very upfront honest about that. ron desantis was not ready, is still not ready for what was put in front of him. i called for a statewide shut down three weeks prior to him initiating it. i had a very data-driven methodical plan and he didn't follow it. he arbitrarily opened up our state into phase one and two, brought wwe into the state of florida. opened up our gyms and bars. wasy step along the way he following donald trump's lead. there was nothing he did in the

state of florida the didn't have the permission and express thumbs-up from the president. we saw there was a lack of transparency, mismanagement. he was trying to give it all to the local governments and when the local governments did something he would track their power and there was a lack of data coming out of the department of health. misinformation from our nursing homes and prisons. medical examiners were told to change their data. so every step along the way he has made mismanagement and missteps. 7000 to 8000 additional individuals who died because he was rushing to open up the state. a victory lap on across the country saying we beat this.

there is a whole press conference of president pence where he's yelling at the media saying, i told you we would beat this. weeks later we are the epicenter for not just the country but the entire world. because of his arrogance and his lack of empathy and information, he really has lost the trust of the state of florida and its citizens. mentioned schools a moment ago. what is the status of schools in the state of florida? is it virtual, some sort of hybrid or totally in person? >> that was the problem. there was an order that came down that said they had to be brick-and-mortar. you had teachers and parents very concerned. back.tarted to pull

the second he started doing that they said, if you don't open up work and mortar we are going to withhold funding. most of our districts are actually back open with brick-and-mortar. just the firstn few days we had hundreds of students across the entire state that were sent home because there was a closure and have to quarantine for two weeks. it didn't have to be like this. we could let teachers and school districts decide what was right. we could be saving a lot of lives. while we know that covid doesn't spread as easily for 10 and under, 10 and over children have just as much chance of spreading the virus as an adult. we are concerned about the parents that they come home to.

we have people all across the been contacted, behavioral health experts. they are not even mandating masks inside the district. there has been a huge push from experts saying we should be expecting in the month of september spikes again in the state of florida. host: let's get to your calls. (202) 748-8000 democrats. republicans.1 (202) 748-8002 undecided. (202) 748-8003 floridians. our guest is nikki fried. first up is gaily in newport, kentucky. in newport, kentucky. caller: it's easy to pick a winner. i'm in kentucky, the horseracing capital of the world.

easy to pick a winner. it seems democrats always come up with a good plan after the facts. blaming this on one person and state, it'sn the sad to use this covid as a in an election. applies in kentucky doesn't necessarily apply in florida and it has to be handled on a statewide basis and state to state. that bident think and henry offer anything different. it wouldn't change. it's easy to pick the winner after the race is run. host: nikki fried. guest: no one is blaming donald

trump for creating the virus. control overhad no the fact that the virus is happening. he kept deflecting things saying it was going to go away. did not put any type of credence behind the severity of the cases and what the virus is going to do. complete mismanagement. you are even seeing today, we have a political divide in our country about wearing masks. if the president would have just been a leader and said we need to all wear masks, there would be no question and everybody across the entire country would have put their politics aside and worn a mask. time -- lastst week, the amount of times it was mentioned made it seem like covid was behind us. he continued to try to say that this is not as severe as possible. was pushing for our schools to open.

pushing false kinds of vaccines. during times of trauma and drama in our country and turmoil, we expect our leaders to stand up, to unite the country, to show leadership. we saw that during the great depression, after 9/11. every time our country has been whether it's high or low, you look to the president to be that individual that is the only position in the entire country that everybody gets to vote on. in congress you only have your districts. so we are counting on the president of the united states to put partisan politics aside for things like this and rise up to the occasion and show leadership. host: let's hear from val in florida. caller: i would like to mention

two words to this woman. andrew gillum. where did he end up? bad data all the reporting that was reported on fox, our station down here about how you are reporting deaths that weren't actually attributed to the covid virus at all. and third of all, i love ron desantis and i'm from flagler county that has very low cases of the covid virus. not a lot of people are wearing masks. and we do very well here. our school is open. doing just fine. you don't stand a chance in florida. guest: obviously we have a very different opinion of the status of our state. they are seeing record numbers

of deaths in cases across the state. florida, in in south have a 90-year-old grandmother. my mother herself went to cancer and they can't leave their house for months because of what is happening in our tricounty area as well as orlando and tampa. seeing a significant amount of people that are concerned. every single day i'm talking to teachers that are very scared of what's happening here in the state of florida. when it comes to round two santos, he walked into 2020 with a high approval rating. he has dropped 35 points in his pulling since the pandemic has hit. created just me who has criticism and not been supportive of ron desantis's opinions about how he has dealt with covid. host: let's hear from bob on the

joe biden line. hello my man from c-span. i just love what biden said which makes me just love him. said the virus, the sickness first. and then the economy. and that makes so much sense. just common sense. and then everything else will fall into place. you and i appreciate you being on today. fried, let me ask you about the economy. report of central florida economy stuck in plateau. the main thoroughfare stays .ight address that issue of the economy in a state like florida that does rely a lot on tourism

and the hotel industry. are a $1 trillion gdp. we are a large economic driver for the country and most of that is reliant on tourism. 60% decrease had in tourism. not only are the residents in the state not going out to movie theaters and restaurants, people aren't coming here because of the fact that covid is still rampant. people aren't traveling. industry,cruise line all those problems are down significantly. people are not going to travel. here's the other aspect people need to realize. peopleave 16 million across the country that are unemployed, a great deal of joe's -- those jobs are never coming back.

while we are seeing record numbers in the stock market because we are infusing trillions of dollars into the stock market and the one per centers but the american people are without jobs. they cannot afford to purchase those goods and services in the stock market and are certainly not even having the financial capability to travel. american people are struggling and suffering and they don't have expendable cash to come to the state of florida to visit our amazing beaches and theme parks. control get covid under and start to rebuild our economy by putting money into the pockets of our actual middle-class and working-class here in the united states, people aren't going to be able certainlyand they aren't going to travel when they see we have a governor who believes covid is behind us and has disregarded the severity of covid.

do and a lot of work to it will take until covid is under control and beaten. host: on the florida line. i would like to ask your guest. it was just a couple days ago our governor in the state terminated the contract of quest laboratory because they made a data dump of 75,000 cases of the covid. and it dated all the way back to april. goes, he'soe biden talking about raising $4 trillion in taxes. over 400,000.ke do you realize a lot of small business owners make $400,000 a year and they plow a lot of money back into their businesses. i have worked for family-run billy -- businesses and they do a good job.

takesen the government and puts regulations, which increases the cost where they are not able to hire people. winded $400,000 in this country become rich? host: headline in usa today reiterating what he was talking about. withtis, doh's advertise quest diagnostics. guest: we have been having issues with testing results. people waiting in florida for weeks to get results just defeats the purpose of why you are testing. if someone has to wait weeks to get the result, in the meantime they are going around and talking to friends and visiting establishments and spreading the virus. with quest there was a significant backlog that they

dumped and we canceled the contract. the contract they had initiated and because of the lack of leadership and oversight they really didn't understand what was going on in the state. certainly we have a lot of work to do to put back the trust of the citizens in the state. charlotteear from next. caller: i have three things to say. they keep saying that president trump we should all wear masks, everybody would wear masks. that's a lie because the democrats wouldn't follow a damn fitting that he said to do. the other is that he hasn't done anything. follow the science. we had dr. fauci. this has a very low chance of coming to the united states. so when president trump shut the

airports down from china, all of a sudden he was a racist he had nothing nice to say about this man. it doesn't matter whether he cured cancer. you still wouldn't say anything nice about this man. your hatred for this man is just unbelievable. fried, any response? guest: we obviously have a difference in opinion about his leadership in the white house. my dad is a diehard republican. my mom is a diehard democrat. i was brought up in a household where i listened to both sides and came up with a rational .ecision of how to govern the trump administration has polarized the situation and certainly if the president had stood up and shown leadership on closed down the

airports, but then what happens. this was a virus that was spread communally. it was all about going to tulsa and going to a big rally and we saw how many people got infected afterwards because it was all about his ego. i am somebody that i don't care if you are a democrat or republican. if you've got the right policies, i'm going to support them. we would be in a much better place here in america today. you are the agriculture commissioner for florida. canrote about what covid-19 teach us about food. covid-19 has exposed weaknesses in every link of the food supply chain. tell us about that. guest: here in the state of florida, we had first and we direct how our

children are getting fed. of our over 2 million kids. we had to start redirecting where our kids were able to pick up food. when all of our restaurants shut down, our cruise line industry, our theme parks, our typical service industries, our farmers didn't have direct access to the people because everybody is so used to the farmers going directly to the restaurants or having a distributor distributing the food to larger establishments. handing to redirect how to get the food directly to the consumers was a challenge for all of us. we saw a $522 million hit in the state of florida. milk being spilled out. our food banks didn't have the capacity to handle so much the perishable food. they are so used to having some perishable food but mostly a lot of canned goods.

being able to take the food that was coming off of our farmers to the food bank just wasn't practical. giving waivers to allows to purchase directly from our farmers. you saw a lot of hiccups in the system. we were able to pivot quickly. community commodity website that allowed agriculture producers and growers to update all of the different commodities they had available, where the farmers markets where an arc consumers were able to go onto that website and buy directly from our farmers. hopefully we start fixing those issues and have more of the consumers buying and wanting local produce. we have been very critical of usmca, the new nafta deal that has been illegally dumping produce from mexico into our state.

our smaller farmers had to plow on dative fruits and vegetables and then go to the nearest food vegetablesll the right there in-store are coming in from mexico. he saw this glaring problem that got escalated because of covid. now we are taking methodical ouroaches to increase marketing in the state and make sure the consumers understand the powers in their wallet and they can go directly to the the groceryemand stores to be carrying more of our locally grown produce in the state as opposed to that is being imported from across the world. about 15 minutes more without against, nikki fried. the only statewide elected democrat in that state. we have a lot of florida voters lined up. starting with jesse in shalimar,

florida. go ahead. caller: i want you to know that i'm a republican and i intend to vote for donald trump for president. but i wholeheartedly agree with this lady when it comes to the wearing a mask. i believe that we have enough circumstantial evidence that stop orring masks helps at least hinder the spread of the virus, and i'm not happy alsoour leaders are not trying to encourage us to wear masks. i think masks should be mandated. that's all i have to say. host: nikki fried? guest: i agree. i called and governor desantis to issue a statewide mast mandate. do so evensed to

until today and a lot of his supporters are actually challenging in the court system the local mandates. they have lost every single one of those cases. and this is something so simple. when we are in a car we have to put on a seatbelt. we have to put our kids in car seats. this is just fundamental of what we have to do to protect ourselves. if you're not going to do it for yourself, do it for your family members. this is something that we know doesn't stop the spread but it certainly slows it down. why wouldn't we do everything possible to slow down the virus, start rebuilding our economy and really trying to beat covid. this is a very simple thing. i wear my mask everywhere i go. host: we say hello to sergio.

morninggood commissioner. theuestion is basically coronavirus, everyone is afraid here in florida. how can you bring it down to a lower level especially people that ride buses and want to go back to work and whatnot. how can you get the vaccine so it can become lower and people andt get infected anymore how can we wring it down again especially for parish foods? guest: i agree. we lost our smart campaign because i didn't see leadership coming out of governor desantis. it is simple things.

it's in background for making sure you are wearing your mask, you are socially distancing, avoiding crowds, washing your hands and throwing out disposable gloves or masks. it's really making sure everyone is doing these small little things. our campaign was in multiple languages and had a lot of social influencers that had use that we posted all over social media and different platforms to encourage everybody to take these little steps. everybody wants to get back to work. our children don't want to stay home. we want to go back to work. we want our economy up and running. until we get the virus under control and make sure we are doing everything possible to protect our people, at economy is just not going to bounce back. take personalto responsibility. make personalt to

decisions. we have different phases that are happening all over state. one.da is still at phase in order to make personal decisions about what is best for ourselves and families, they need to make sure they got the information that is accurate. when you hear all the stories all across the state and a data dump from qwest and how we are reported cases and we are not going to report asymptomatic cases, people don't understand what's going on. at the very least, they want to know their leaders are working together. that if there's people in government that care about them and we are not just numbers. know that their leaders are trying to put them first.

it's why myself and other leaders are having to stand up and try to bring some clarity and leadership and hopefully get this virus behind us as much as we can. host: a snapshot of the race, who's ahead in florida. joe biden showing a lead in the average of polls. also this from a viewer who texts, if biden takes florida it would be an early election night. what are some of the early signs to watch in florida on election night it's going well for joe biden and kamala harris daca guest: if you live in the state of florida, you will know to not trust polls. we know that as elections get -- a good indicator will

be wherever our turnout is coming from whether it's in our tri-county south florida area, ri for corridor, some about big metro areas. vote by mail, a lot of those been -- should have been counted early. caution everybody here in the state of florida. as someone who still has ptsd from the 2018 recount, elections are close and sometimes it takes longer than just that evening to count all the ballots. just because election results might not come in that night doesn't mean there's anything fraudulent happening. it means democracy is working, every vote is being counted.

democracy wasn't built overnight and we need to have the right people in place. from drews hear largo. caller: good morning. i have just a couple of things to throw in. the reasons why i'm supporting donald trump for president is things that he is not. is not a a lawyer, he politician, he's not in it for the money, which puts him way ahead of most of the people in washington who don't belong there after so many years that they've been sitting there. biden, people say he may be a nice guy, but nice guys finish last and that's a proven fact. if someone told joe, this is your last chance to go to say i'm so he would

happy, i have already bought a house in seattle. wherefried, i wish you the governor of florida instead of this clown that's there now. that's all i have to say. i hope you have a nice day. host: do you have further political aspirations in florida? right now my goals are to make sure that agriculture is thriving and strong. making sure that we are strong through this pandemic. we have a lot of guestworkers coming back into our state for our next harvest. my number one priority is getting joe biden elected in 2020. so my plate is full right now and that is where my focus is.

caller: i'm not here to bash donald trump. i don't think he's even the problem. my problem is with the american people who go out and vote him. of a historic society here in new jersey and according to history, from the beginning of time until this very moment here, all the for twohave failed reasons. financial exhaustion and military overreach. so here we are today here in america deliberating who should be in power. the people are trying to make this choice and the average american has no clue in reference to their financial history. if you bounce all the way up to today and just bounce back a little bit to the great

fromssion in this country, the great depression up until there's been about 11 recessions. underthem happened republican presidents. host: nikki fried, any thoughts? guest: baby boomers trying to get ready for retirement in 2008 lost everything. i was a foreclosure defense attorney in 2007, 2 thousand eight during the foreclosure crisis and saw how everybody was promised this american dream and put all of their life savings into buying these homes they couldn't afford and lost it all. i saw the generation above me that aren't as well-off as their parents were. -- there isa justin

exhaustion and we need to take a look at how we are building our country. we know $6 trillion was printed by the fed. most of that going to the one and the top corporations. what happened to building middle-class and making sure everyone has an equal opportunity to the american dream? our focus has been on reagan trickle-down economics and that just isn't proven to work. we need to bring back the american dream and make sure that when people are working hard that it's not just about a paycheck. it's about their pride. being able to go out for dinner with their spouses. we are missing that connection right now with our financial and monetary policies. on need to be focusing more empowering the american people with their jobs in the economy on --op trying to focus we've got bailouts that have

happened throughout our history and we have proven that has not shown to be successful. we are not investing in our people. we are investing in corporations and hoping they do the right thing. host: this tweet from a viewer saying we need more affordable housing, not million-dollar homes. in lakeland on the florida line. caller: good morning. it's an honor to talk with you. as a kid i used to daydream about being florida commissioner of agriculture so it's an honor to talk to somebody that did that. i am a moose herder republican for biden trying to get those criminal republicans out of office. our michigan governor rick slider just came out that he is for biden. snyder just came out that he is for biden.

we must ask other republicans to see the light. the choice is between a cruel government of trump or a kind government of biden. cruelty or kindness is a choice the voters have. says.s. constitution congress can appoint a presidential fitness tribunal to determine when a president is unfit to serve. will you join me in getting both presidents -- parties to promise they will appoint a committee so that we will have a group, probably the ex-president can be on that fitness pride -- fitness tribunal. barack obama, george bush, bill clinton. we must have a presidential fitness tribunal. host: nikki fried, any comments? won't needfully we the tribunal because we will have joe biden as our next president.

certainly appreciate the support and i think you are right. american people are at a crossroads. do we want to listen to the fear and scare tactics and divisiveness. this is donald trump's america that we are seeing violence in our streets. covid ramping up across our country. or do we want a president that shows empathy to the american people that have a vision of bringing everybody together, sending money back into our american workforce, rebuilding our jobs and making sure that we are buying american-made products. that's a better vision of the country i see for the future. fried,hank you, nikki commissioner of agriculture services for the state of florida.

there's more of the program ahead here on washington journal. we are joined by avik roy. we will talk about the u.s. response to the pandemic and the idea of heard immunity. also more of your calls and comments on issues of the day here on washington journal. ♪ contenders about the men who ran for the presidency and lost but changed political history. and it's on a senator and vice president of the united states if you are to humphrey. the contenders, this week at 8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span. >> american history tv on

c-span3, exploring the people and events that tell the american story every weekend. coming up this labor day weekend saturday at 6:00 p.m. eastern on the civil war. historians discuss how we remember the civil war and whether to remove or contextualize american monuments. then sunday on american artifacts, we will preview photographs of native americans from the smithsonian national museum of the american indians collection which includes more than a half million images. at presidential retreats including abraham lincoln's summer college, herbert hoover's .ishing camp monday night at 8:00 p.m. eastern, august marked the 75th anniversary of the bombings of hiroshima and nagasaki. washington journal looks back at the events that led to the bombing and their legacy with author ian told.

and president truman's grandson. exploring the american story. watch american history tv this labor day weekend on c-span3. c-span, yourng unfiltered view of government. created by america's cable television companies as a public service and brought to you today i your television provider. washington journal continues. by avik roy.joined here to talk about the trump administration's response to the pandemic. good morning. welcome to washington journal. let's start off with a topic we talked about earlier in the program. wrote, why it's mostly safe

to reopen the schools. younger children urgently need to get back to their classroom and the evidence from europe shows no wider harms. as you see the schools opening across the country, has your opinion changed on that and what were you trying to get at in your opinion piece? >> i would say the reopening experience we had thus far confirms and is consistent with the evidence we've had around the world and that evidence is overwhelming when it comes to children under the age of 12. for reasons we don't fully understand, younger children don't appear to not only are they actually themselves at very serious illness or death from covid-19 but they also appear to not transmit the virus to adults and this is counterintuitive for a lot of people. most of us have been parents are

used to our kids picking up whatever bug is going around at school and bring it back to us. the idea that coronavirus doesn't work that way is counterintuitive to a lot of people. whenever schools reopened particularly for those younger childrendid not see transmitting the virus to adults or to their parents. have a strong case in that instance of reopening schools, but it may be that one of the reasons why europe has had success over the summer is because the schools reopened. when they reopened schools in thatpring, it may be actually reopening schools served as a brake on the spread of covid-19 because the kids for reasons we don't fully understand may have developed

some sort of low-level immunity to the virus and thereby limited the transmission to others. host: tell us about your think tank. tank are a nonprofit think and we focus on expanding economic opportunity to those who leased have it. economyhe 21st century work for everyone. host: in terms of covid-19, you talked about research from europe. how difficult has it been for your organization to keep abreast of the latest scientific research, the studies coming out during the pandemic since it broke earlier this year? >> in a certain way we are living through a renaissance or an explosion of scientific research in real-time. my father was a molecular oil

just. the traditional way of doing academic research is you do a study, you come up with something and then the journal spends six month reviewing it and finally a year later your research is out there. we are something completely different happening now due to the necessity and emergency that we are in. journalsernet-based were people will put preliminary findings online before they've gone true that -- through that traditional process of academic peer review. research isn't as rigorously vetted, the fact that it's coming out in real-time means people are able to learn from each other very quickly and our knowledge and understanding of the virus has improved over the last month.

host: our guest is avik roy. for supporters of joe biden and republicans., undecided and all others. new trump pandemic advisor pushes controversial herd immunity strategy, worry public health officials at a picture of dr. atlas, an advisor from the hoover institution. tell us about the concept of heard immunity and you agree -- do you agree with dr. atlas in this case? >> there's two things to mention. what is heard immunity and what

are dr. atlas's actual reviews. or population immunity is basically the principle that at a certain point if the broad community or population in a particular country or region develops immunity to a virus or any other infectious agent that basically even if not everybody has 70%nity, let's say 50% or or 30%, if a certain percentage of people in that population have developed immunity to the virus that the virus has difficulty gaining any traction. it can't spread with the exponential speed that it does in a naive population because a lot of people are immune. to a forestight be fire. forest fires happen when there's a lot of dry kindling wood in a forest. if the trees are healthy and they have been well fed and they are somewhat wet because they have water content, it's a lot

harder for those trees to burn down. similarly, the idea of heard immunity is at a certain point if the population is immune to the virus are enough of it is, the virus can't take off. there are two ways to achieve heard immunity. one is through a lot of people getting infected with the dangerous version of the virus. another version is when you have a vaccine. world, you have a vaccine, most people get the vaccine and it can't develop any traction. you can have a combination of both as we hope to do in this situation. host: are there cases where we have used the heard immunity to conquer viruses? a heard immunity is not

strategy per se. it's basically a what are your alternatives. if you take the example of influenza a hundred years ago, the great pandemic of 1918, we didn't have vaccines back then. the technology of vaccines was just starting to get underway. so there was no alternative. you could shut down society and they did at times particularly in cities like philadelphia that had really bad out rakes of influenza. we effectively had heard immunity regardless. sweden isappened in sweden had a deliberate strategy where they said we will than that large gatherings, maybe really enclosed spaces like bars that get very crowded, but we will keep schools open and we will otherwise have a relatively

light touch. their argument has been because a vaccine is not forthcoming in the timeframe that we are health damage the from lockdowns can be pretty we keep ourf havemy mostly open, we may some deaths from covid-19 but we will emerge from lockdown faster. the argument of the swedes is ,hat if you lockdown and weight you have the damage that comes from lockdown but you haven't developed any immunity to the virus and then when you reopen, the virus has basically the same impact that it had before. that's the theory. host: let me get your response to an argument. we are talking about 200 million plus americans getting this and a fatality rate of 1%, that's 2

million americans who will die in the effort to get hurt immunity. those are preventative -- preventable deaths of our loved ones that we can't let happen on our watch. >> there are a lot of if's in that sentence that you just recounted. we don't know the percentage of people that need to be infected in order to achieve heard immunity. some people looking at the influenza model assume it's about 70%. others look at the data emerging and say it's more like 20%. we don't know the answer and everyone who is expressing a percentage is guessing. we are all guessing. percentagee that the is much higher to achieve heard immunity, that's a problem. it is whatce of percentage of people who are infected are actually at risk of

serious illness or death. not thecase 1% is correct number. early on we were seeing a much higher what's called the infection fatality ratio. partly it's because most of the infections and deaths were happening in nursing homes. debts in the united states from covid-19 have been occurring among vulnerable seniors who live in nursing homes and other assisted-living facilities. 0.6% of americans live in those facilities, so almost half the deaths in the u.s. are occurring in 0.6% of the population. you think every day the headline in the newspaper would be what are we doing to protect vulnerable seniors in nursing homes and yet we are keeping schools close. there are 57 million kids in america aged one to 15 and only

36 have died of covid-19. understand where the risk is and where the fatality ratios are. here is to really work harder to protect high risk individuals, high-risk communities like seniors in nursing homes, but also understand that for children, the infection tally ratio is extremely low. it's like one in 2 million. we have the opportunity in those instances to reopen society and the open schools. host: we have calls waiting period we will start with hawaii. we have our own issues in hawaii. hopefully you won't cut me off. i'm going to throw a few names at the doctor. i noticed you are an md. michael leavitt, who is not a physician but as a biophysicist,

and his concepts on the statistics -- more importantly what i'm curious about is a lady who is a professor at ucsf named monica gandhi who is with a lot showta that people are actually getting immunity by wear a masks, t-cells, not anti-bodies. protocols, testing you are talking about letting kids stay in school, that is fine, and protecting the elderly. but there are elderly teachers into substitutes in the schools and if masks are not well enforced, we have the danger of transmission. there are studies both ways. it depends which you pull out of a hat to defend your argument on

whether transmission occurs in the under populations. guest: you brought up a lot of points. i will get through the key ones. in terms of the studies -- while i went to med school, i'm not a practicing physician , so i am not giving medical advice here, looking at the data only. but in terms of school anpening, we have not seen increased risk of transmission among teachers in people who work at the schools. on my twitter feed, also on our ansite, we go through enormous amount of the data. click on the covid-19 link on the top of our webpage, and you can go through all the data and there are links to every single page, in terms of reopening

schools. mentioned, in terms of measuring covid-19, we may be wrong. we are doing what is called an antibody test, where we measure a specific type of antibody response to the coronavirus. this is called igt. that is one way -- you can have igt based immunity, but there are other forms, as you alluded to. t cell immunity is a different form. it may be that we are under appreciating or undercounting the amount of immunity in the population. there is research that suggests, this goes back to what we were talking about earlier, there is research that suggests that this virus is biologically related to

the common cold. are also theolds coronavirus. it appears some people have been immunity to this novel coronavirus because they have had the, cold and they have developed immunity to that. so we do not know how much baseline immunity is already in the population due two experiences with the common cold and other related coronavirus is. avik roy -- host: linda in missouri. good morning. you are on the air. go ahead. one more time, linda? a question for you on twitter from mark. "do you know the number of people who die each year from the flu compared to the coronavirus?" guest: it is a great question. we have done a whole study on this, looking at historical data over 10 years, from 2007-2017,

anderms of deaths from flu pneumonia, compared to this year's deaths from covid-19. if you split it by age, roughly ,peaking for those adults working age adults around 25 and today or theance probability of death from covid-19, you are at about three times more likely to die of that than influenza in an average year. but for children, probability goes in the other direction. if you are a young child, if memory serves, something like eight times less likely to die of covid-19 than the flu. you are more likely to die from influenza, yet we do not shut down schools for influenza pandemics. covid-19 -- by the week when death is not the only important problem. you could have a serious illness

as a result of covid-19. but we have statistics we can compare influenza versus covid-19. so people are trying to understand, there is a lot of alarmist headlines and people want to know how dangerous is this relative to other things we encounter every day. and the answer is covid-19, based on what we see today and the epidemiology and transmission of covid in the united states, about three times as many -- the probability of death is three times what would be for the flu for individuals who are older, for those who are middle-aged, but for children it is much lower. avik roy we are talking about the trump's administration -- we are with avik roy talking about the trump's administration -- responseonstration's to the coronavirus. caller, go ahead. caller: good morning.

it is refreshing to hear someone who actually knows what he is talking about regarding this pandemic. in myhere has been covid own family. i am 71. my wife and i contracted it, but neither one of us got sick. my sister and brother-in-law contracted it. they were both hospitalized, but they survived. my father, who was 94, contracted it and he passed away from it. we have experienced all of the various, different aspects of the effects of covid-19. coupleow, i was tested a weeks ago for the antibody. and according to the results, my wife and i have the antibodies. we have 0% of getting the covid again. not givefore, we can

the covid to anyone else. but the question is, how long with a antibody last? shuter aspect of this to down the what have you -- another important aspect of this is my son lost his job as a result of the shutdown. despite all the various inconsistencies in the shutdown, that covid has continued to spread up until a certain point, which seems to be a result of g place,unity takin which now seems to be putting a damper on the spread of covid more than anything else. host: let me get you to respond to his statement. he said if you have the antibody, you have 0% of getting it again is that true?

guest: let me express my condolences for the loss of your father. i am glad your sister and brother are doing better. we do not know how long immunity will last, if you have it because you have been infected, or even from the vaccine. there are now reports in scientific literature of cases of reinfection. there was one out of hong kong. i think there was one from the united states. and there are other anecdotal reports of reinfection. part of the reason you are seeing reinfection, it is not about whether the antibody stay in your system, our experience with other coronavirus is, our best guess is immunity may last around six months, plus or minus. but in wildcard is the coronavirus tends to be -- a lo t. we have already seen many different strains of the novel

coronavirus spread throughout the world. some are more dangerous and they kill more people. some are more mild. and that could be part of why we are seeing different statistics in different countries, because they have seen different strains of the virus come through the populations. so there are many unanswered questions on how long immunity lasts, but we can hope it will last about six months. and most importantly, we hope that if there are mutated versions, that they will be less dangerous. that is our hope, but we do not know for sure. one thing we have talked about in our think tank is many people appear to be putting all their eggs in the basket of the vaccine, saying, let's lock down the economy until the vaccine comes. it's just around the corner. and we are hoping they will get a vaccine sooner rather than

later. but we cannot be certain a vaccine will come back quickly. never in our history have we developed a vaccine in a timeframe shorter than five years for a novel virus that we have never encountered before. science has gotten better, so it is possible we could break that record, but we cannot be certain of that. we need to have a plan b, just in case they do not give as much immunity as we hope. host: so the white house is saying states should be prepared for vaccine disruption, why? guest: it is important to be prepared because if we are successful at developing a vaccine, what will be important at that point is to get the vaccine to the population, which requires an incredible amount of logistics. manufacturing,le get the vaccine to every part of nd you have to

have people to administer the vaccine. the administration is trying to be as prepared as possible with the hope that a vaccine get through and be successful, up through the clinical trials. one other question that was mentioned is whether or not lockdowns are achieving their stated effect, to limit mortality. the evidence is not as clear as conventional wisdom would suggest. new york did a lot, they had a strict lockdown, yet they have had the most deaths per capita of any state in the country. california and texas, compare those states, similar when you look at the charts in terms of the caseload, deaths, but california had a strict lockdown and texas did not. when were predictions of texas and florida would reopen their economies. yes, they saw a late-summer

increase in cases and deaths. but so to california, which did not take the same path as texas and california there have been overly simplistic commentary about how lockdowns work. and there is reason to believe that the lockdowns overshot the target, meaning a moderate lockdown, where again you keep the bars closed, limit large gatherings like sporting events and conventions, but you allow businesses to operate and function. you allow the schools to reopen. that could be the sweet spot, especially if people are doing social distancing and wearing masks, that we can restrain the transmission of the virus and enough that without overly disrupting or army the economy, and the kids and public health, not related to covid. so checkups and things like that. host: we are getting back to calls. sue in massachusetts. caller: good morning. host: make sure that you mute

your volume so you will not get feedback, ok? you are on the air. caller: alright. 180,000 deaths have occurred already. it's not a nothing deal. and nobody knows what is going on. i'm 66. i have been isolated, because i am disabled. i am fine. i'm negative. but this immunity thing that this guy is talking about -- give me a break. wait until we are all annihilated before somebody know something. but putting kids at risk is insane. so, you know, i am an independent. i am voting for joe biden. i voted for governor baker, a republican, in massachusetts. he has kept us safe more than the president has. host: any response? guest: it is important to

understand that the risk of serious illness and death from covid-19 varies considerably based on your age. younger people in general have a very, very low risk of death or serious illness from covid-19. school age children, 1-15 in age, only about 40 have died in the entire country. 57 million people in that age bracket, and only 36-40 have died, that is about one in a million. so that is a pretty low ratio. when you thing about the other things that kids die from, drowning, car accidents, they happen at a higher frequency than about 39 or 40. we have to be aware of that. on the other side of the spectrum, people who are elderly, people who are disabled and living in nursing homes or assisted-living facilities, they are at a high risk.

massachusetts has had problems. they were one of the states with the highest percentage of nursing home deaths in terms of a share of the population in any state of the country, new york, new jersey, connecticut -- those have also been hardest hit. so that has been a huge problem. instead of having the one-size-fits-all panic lockdown from the beginning, if we said we will try to protect people in nursing homes, or we will let the schools reopen, particularly for the younger children, we could've had a much more effective response. host: marianne in denver, pennsylvania. caller: thank you for taking my call. i have a couple points to make. i'm a patient at johns hopkins. i go for routine treatments. i will go in november, december, january into february. no precautions were made. there was nothing mentioned,

except, have you been to china in the past 12 months and have you been near someone? nobody was wearing face masks, not even the staff. no special distancing. no hand sanitizer. and i called them and i asked, and they said they do not understand why people were saying, as far back as january and february, that the president seriousth experts knew it was -- they said that was a fallacy. they said that they would have never put their own staff and international patients at risk if they had any consideration. so people are saying that there has been a slow response. they are not looking at the actual data. closepatient who frequently to johns hopkins, and they take good care of their patients and the staff.

the second point, people are also blaming the president for not making nationwide mandates. in the beginning, he attempted to do that and governor cuomo governornor murphy and wolf of pennsylvania all decided together to let the president know that he is not king, those were the exact words that governor cuomo used. he said he cannot tell us how to run our states. we know better than he does. i wanted to bring up those two points. thank you for having this conversation. it is very informative. guest: in the u.s., our system requires the states to have a more significant role in responses like this. states have made consequential decisions regarding covid that have ended up being harmful. one example is governor cuomo in

new york and governor murphy of new jersey forced nursing homes o had not patients wh recovered yet from covid-19, but had recovered enough to be discharged from the hospital. italy of pictures in the hospitals getting overwhelmed. they thought, all we have to care about is clearing the hospitals, it does not matter if the nursing homes get infected. that was backwards, because if you take covid positive patients and put them in nursing homes, everybody will get infected at the nursing homes, then you have more people coming back to the hospital with serious illnesses. so those were literally catastrophic, fatal decisions. many people have been affected by those decisions. and that has not been as important or prominent in the conversation nationally as it needs to be. decisions around nursing homes, really, the overall problem we have had with people in nursing

homes is really important for us to look at and think about what we could do better with. florida did better. they were more intelligent early on saying, we will restrict visitations to nursing homes, we will not let the hospitals discharge positive patients back into nursing homes. that would only lead to more people back in the hospitals. that help to stem the tide of covid. so we have seen variation in state responses. it has been healthy in the sense that if we had a one-size-fits-all response from the federal government, when we did not know a lot in the beginning on how the virus behaved, i think we could've had much more negative consequences than we have had, allowing some room for experimentation and alternative approaches. host: tony in florida. good morning. caller: good morning. subjectu for having the being discussed on c-span. and the speaker -- i did not get

his name, but still the same. i would like to simply suggest that you consider thinking of s a social thing a illness, or social disease, so to speak. and look at it like that. with a second thing is, social issue like this, i believe it does not make sense to call in -- it's irrelevant whether you support joe biden or is -- justnt, here look at it like with the children and school. that's because they are socially innocent and they do not have the social stress and the challenges that older people

face, so that is the reason why they would not be affected by any illness or by a virus. you know, it is not so much immunity. that's just it. they are so well-balanced. that mindset, attitude, the desperation and everything, that when it comes to an illness, yeah. he of the part is if society as a whole is compromised, stressed and socially corrupt, and if they are morally corrupt, you know, uch, thereociety is s is no way heard immunity could -- herd immunity could work. if you want to look at it as a theory, that's simply not going to work. is is whatample -- th

i will end on -- if that patient is already psychologically, or mentally stressed, and is being compromised by all the issues and problems in his life, then of course he would be totally o fighting the t illness. that's what you need to consider. but you have not talked about it. the culture in america is already stressed and compromised to begin with. host: i will let you go. what are your thoughts? ofst: first of all, in terms the fact that children do not appear to be getting seriously ill or dying from covid-19, certainly not in meaningful numbers, i personally do believe there is a biological basis for that. we do not know what it is yet,

but there are hypotheses and theories related to the way that the virus interacts with what is ealled the ace receptor, or th converting enzyme receptor on various cell surfaces in children that may be different. at lease there is good reason to believe that there is biological data. i do want to say it is absolutely true that social disparities are a big part of why we have seen disparate challenges, particularly in the african-american population. i have testified in congress this year on this particular topic. it's pretty clear that african-americans are seeing a disparate impact from covid because of i would say the legacy of slavery and segregation, and how that has led to disparities despite our efforts to address those disparities. we can still see them, especially in health status and

underlying conditions and that and a serious illness, death possible from covid-19. so this pandemic has highlighted that. another thing the pandemic has highlighted is unemployment for minorities. prior to the pandemic, the unappointed rate for black was at a record low. for hispanics at a record though. for whites and asians also at record lows. races disparity between and unemployment was at record those. -- lows. those have gone out the window with the pandemic. that shows the cost of the lockdown. when you have lockdown, who is affected? it is not software engineers who can work from home, it is the everyday people who work at jobs where they are not in front of a computer into the cannot order -- of a computer all day. people who have to be at work

have been the most damaged. that is why it is important we are only engaging in lockdowns or economic restrictions that really have an impact on the virus. i am afraid in many states and localities we have gone too far. host: dave in california. caller: good morning. where notcalifornia, only did we have a lockdown, but we have had a mask mandate ever since it was recommended. and we have by far the most number of infections of any state in the country. a prettyhat we have good idea of what the infection rate of the population needs to be to make a significant difference in the transmission of this virus by looking at new york city. they have had such a terrible outbreak. now the infection reaches almost 0%. that is not because their

behavior has changed. ithe outbreak was going full force. what has changed is 30% of new yorkers have been infected and they have recovered from the virus. that's a good indication that people are not getting reinfected, because if they were, the new infection rate would be much higher. i have been disappointed that there has not been more of a debate about our approach in dealing with the pandemic. prolongoach has been to the pandemic as long as possible. and you can see what the damage has been. know, it is-- you true that there are more deaths that have or would have occurred if we had not taken this approach, but on the other hand the pandemic, we would be over with it -- the pandemic would be

over much sooner. host: we appreciate that. guest: well, several points to make. first, i agree with you, david, that i believe what appears to have happened in new york city and the new york city region is herd immunity. that was not the strategy . they locked down and did other things to try to stem the tide. major moveray was a of transmission. and because it is a dense city. other cities around the world did not have the same problem. i think there were some decisions made by new york that contributed to the problems there, but what we are seeing now is you are not seeing new cases, not because of the lockdown, but because there was massive transmission and fatalities. so i think that is an example of, you want to know what herd immunity is, new york city is a good example of that.

the other point about california. as i said, that is where they have had lockdowns, mask mandate, yet they still have the placesfection curve as like texas and florida, which have had a lighter touch with those measures. i want to make sure i am clear about this. i do believe that masks, wearing masks and distancing and washing hands do reduce transmissions, and they are things we should do to limit the spread of the virus as much as we can. if we want their economy to reopen, if we want a normal life, as close as possible, those are steps we you can take that we do not need the government to tell us to do, that can make a difference. host: what about events, like the sturgis bike rally. they reported about 4000 people there. positive,tested 260 so far, and one death reported from that now.

was it too big of a gathering? guest: those are small numbers when you consider the size of the gathering. there is a law of accumulated evidence at this point that when you are outdoors, transmission ust does not -- it j transmission as rapidly, or the probability of getting effective from somebody else is lower if you are outside. we had the big protests after the george floyd death. we have not seen a correlation between the big protests and the outbreaks in those specific locations. outdoor protests or gatherings do not appear to be as risky as crammed, indoor gatherings, particularly in places with poor ventilation. host: one more call from roseann. she's in wisconsin. caller: i had a couple questions. nobody seems to know the origin of the virus.

people have been talking about the bats, wet markets. looking at the history of sars, that supposedly happened with cats. mers came from the middle east. i was wondering, did the virus jump from species to species? another point i wanted to make, when you have a capitalistic society and you are talking about people not being able to are most people that compromised are the people that make terrible wages and they cannot afford good nutrition, like fruits and vegetables. then you have a compromised society of people that are overweight and have problems, because nutritional needs are not being met. so they purchase junk food instead of nutritional food, because of the wage disparity between the rich and the poor. i wondered what your comment

would be on. guest: again, a number of points brought up. in terms of the origin, i think there is reason to believe that it did originate in an animal, and then jumped to humans. this is a common occurrence with viruses jumping from one animal species to another. the famous 1918 pandemic, for example, the best theory is it originated in pigs. that is widely believed. has been swine flu virus to bird flu. it is common enough for them to jump from species to species and that could have been what happened in the wet markets or other laboratories in china. on the question on whether our economic system is the reason why the pandemic has been so challenging in the united states, um, we have seen pretty

severe pandemics in a lot of different countries with different types of economic systems. people who admire european, single-payer health care systems, one argument you hear is if we had a single-payer health care system, we would not have had a serious pandemic. but italy has a single-payer health care system and they were overwhelmed by covid-19. the united kingdom has a socialized system or the government is the insurance company and they on the hospital's, and they have had a more severe pandemic than the u.s. in terms of death per capita. and france, another single-payer country, they have had a comparable number of deaths compared to the u.s., per capita. so those countries with systems that people say, we should be more like them, they have also had serious pandemics. spain is another example. the large european countries, except for germany, all have had

pandemics that are as severe as the u.s. you hear people say, well, the u.s. has done the worst of any other country on covid-19. that is not true. if you look at deaths per capita. on our website, we put a lot of metrics up to take a look at the u.s.'s performance compared to other countries. the u.s. is not doing great, but other countries have done worse. and that is a point we should make more often. is president of the foundation for research on equal opportunity. thank you for being with us this morning. guest: thank you. host: ahead, for the rest of the program we will turn back to the campaign, the actual race between donald trump and joe biden. if you support joe biden, that line is 202-748-8000. donald trump, 202-748-8001. for the undecided voters,

202-748-8002. ♪ >> when you read the things that were said about thomas jefferson, that he was an infidel and an agent of the french government. it sounds reminiscent, doesn't it? the things said about abraham lincoln, the things said about fdr, that he wanted to be a dictator. so it does come with the territory, but i think in the case of donald trump, at least in the modern political era, post-world war ii, i have never seen anything like it. announcer: on sunday at noon on ourepth, our live to conversation with author and faith and freedom coalition founder ralph reed, whose books and his"active faith," most recent, "god and country."

watch on c-span2 at noon eastern on sunday. announcer: "washington journal" continues. host: we are asking you your top campaign issues. there has been a focus on wisconsin. the reporting here in "the wall street journal." " wisconsin is emerging as a battleground. its status has been underscored -- asickup under trinity a pickup opportunity in the campaign where donald trump is playing defense against his challenger. minnesota has not backed a gop candidate since 1972, but mr. trump came within 45,000 votes of winning the state four years ago and campaign aides say it is trending his way. as of the dozen states rated the most competitive, minnesota is only one of two, along with new hampshire, won by hillary clinton in 2016." the president tweeted this

morning on our topic of our previous segment on covid-19. here is what he says about new york. theernor andrew cuomo has worst record on china virus. 11,000 people alone died in the nursing homes because of his incompetence." if you support the president, line 202-748-8001. if you support joe biden, 202-748-8000. we have a trump supporter in north carolina. caller: good morning. what i am wondering is, is it gay if me and my buddies are holding hands? host: wanda is in lancaster, california. caller: yes, i am supporting joe biden and kamala harris, because donald trump is the first president that has started a war in the united states of america, against americans.

he needs to go. people, vote this man out. host: from "the washington post" about the spending that has happened to fight the pandemic. "the u.s. government debt nears a mark not seen since world war ii. for the first time since world war ii, the u.s. government's debt will equal the size of the entire american economy by the end of this year. is largely duee to the surge in spending that the government authorized as it tried to control the economic impact of the coronavirus pandemic. by the end of 2020, the amount owed by the u.s. will amount to 90% of the nation's gross domestic product. that is up from 79% last year. the total government debt will surpass the size of the economy next year."

you can read that at washington post.com. congress is out this week. they will be back next week with a lot on their plate. no congress coverage today on c-span, however, we do have campaign 2020 coverage coming your way beginning at 6:00 p.m. this evening, when we will cover a discussion at the harvard kennedy school. we will follow that with president trump in pennsylvania with a campaign rally there in latrobe. that is at 7:00 p.m. eastern. both of those events will be live on c-span and on the c-span radio app. joe biden will be in kenosha, wisconsin today. we do not have specific coverage plans on that, but we will keep you posted with anything available from him visiting kenosha. this is pam on our donald trump support line. go ahead. caller: i did support donald trump.

i think he has done more in the last four years than the democrats did in eight. i like that he has a tough stance. my father was in the u.s. air "ice, and i grew up with pledge allegiance to the flag" when i was in school, and i still believe in that. i think people should be more patriotic like we used to be. it seems like the younger generation now just was not taught -- they took the bible and prayer out of the schools, and they have tried to take god out of everything. and i think what has happened -- that has happened to a lot of our kids. support donald trump and mike pence. i am ready for the next four years with them. line,from our joe biden this is mike. caller: hi. every to say that i hope self-respecting christian votes

donald trump out of office. he has done nothing but besmirch your name. keep religion out of schools. host: pinehurst, north carolina on the undecided line. here is ginger. caller: thank you. good morning. host: good morning. caller: i was happy to see the headline about the national debt, which i believe is a huge crisis that must be addressed. shown as undecided, but in fact i am -- i guess i am, wouldsgusted -- i probably vote for jo jordgensen if she had any chance of winning, but i am waiting to see the results of the campaign and the debate. i am very disgusted with the blame game. that is polarizing our country.

talk about thee opposite party and their officials. i initially was not elected,hat trump was support -- i do not admire him in any way, shape or form and i think it is damaging to this country to have a president who says things like, uh, go back to where you came from to women born in america. es, you know,charg accusations of sexual impropriety during his campaign

by essentially saying the woman was not attractive enough that he would have been interested. as a survivor of attempted sexual assault, and also the victim of sexual harassment, i can assure you that attraction is not the reason for that. to exert power. iden supporter line, john. caller: there are a lot of reasons i would support joe biden over donald trump. social security will be done by the year 2023, if donald trump gets in again, as far as funding. ut, you know, he is all about taking money and dumping more co2 in the atmosphere. is vanishing on the

methanewhich makes release into the atmosphere, making it warm even more. we how multiple feedback loops making it so we will not be able to stop this. we really need to address moving to green, renewable energy as soon as possible. and this is a lot of the reason why young people need to vote. they know this, they are educated on this, and they know that their lives rely on getting democrats elected across the board. our topic this morning until 10:00 a.m. eastern, the cap campaign 2020 issue. you can call 202-748-8000 if you are a joe biden supporter. 202-748-8001 for those who support president trump. on twitter, stephen says,

"science is my only issue. it can stop the virus, which is affecting our schools, economy and social fabric." lisa says, "judicial nominees. and i can add reopening the country, no restrictions. the flu disappears after the election." brian says, "keep in mind that each day we wake up is one day further into a future that our constitution writers could have never imagined." a trump supporter in tennessee. william is up next. caller: this is william and i am supporting trump because i do not want america to go into socialism. that's where the democrats are leading us. michigan.jim in good morning. also a trump supporter. caller: good morning. how are you? host: good, thank you. caller: i have to remind people that this is a business and a

country, and we need to run it like one. it is not a church, mosque or he the united nations. those who do not like this place need to pack their bags and leave, because we need to start making it rock. and i think donald trump is doing a great job. look at unemployment, look at the interest rates. let's run it like a business. that's just my opinion. times,"he washington the headline, "trump orders aides to cut funds. he ordered the justice department to create anarchist jurisdictions allowing lawlessness to spread on the streets and told his budget director to try to figure out ways to pull federal money from those places." he singled out new york city and

portland as places were "anarchy has beset communities. my administration will not allow tax dollars to fund it cities that allow themselves to deteriorate into lawless zones." percy in los angeles, good morning. a joe biden supporter. caller: i am supporting joe biden. i have never seen a president as figng the media news. his university was declared illegal. his charity that he was taking money from -- a number of his staff members have been indicted for criminal activity. this president is beyond competent and interchange must take place immediately. host: the headline from "the hill," after several nights of unrest in kenosha, the mayor lifts the curfew, siding peaceful night's. the mayor said on wednesday that the curfew imposed after more

than one week of protests would be lifted, siding relative calm there. on the trump supporter line. dorothy, you are on the air. caller: i am a suburban woman. i'm supporting trump. the reason is i do not believe in socialism. harrison is a socialist and a radical, that frightens me to death. the various people that joe biden will have behind him if elected are socialists. they want to take away our guns. so i do not know why democrats and independents do not understand how severe that could be for our country. we do not want to be like socialist countries. we want to be a democracy with liberties and freedoms. and socialism is communism. and i do not know where people

listening, biden are but they need to listen to more woan one tv station and get t opinions of the various things come as far as socialism and a trump. one sided propaganda is being pushed on other networks, and people are only hearing one side of the story, but they need to hear both sides. we also need a debate before the 27 states are going to be voting, because we really need to hear both of them, then make a decision. and i think, i really think that and a couplen, months later he is taken down, how did democrats explained that they lied to the american people about his mental dementia? covering it up is another cover up and lie, and it will be a sad

day when we get a radical like harris for president. host: support from a former republican governor for joe biden. a republican 'i'm vote for joe biden. donald trump lacks a moral compass.' " that is an opinion piece. dy on the undecided line. caller: i have asked this question too many people and hardly anybody knows it, but how do you have communism? you have communism by taxation. both parties are for taxation. and we just have to understand that churches, everybody in america is involved -- we are a commune. the list taxation, the more rights and freedoms you have, it does not have to be just

monetary to be a tax, it is anything the government does. so understand that we are a communist nation. there is nothing that is not taxed. so we are communist, but you have to decide where you are going to go to and how much of somebody else's money you're going to steal in the name of the lord, to give to yourselves or to the people that you think that you can decide who should have your money. because you are a better decider of it than what god gave you to understand with your own money, your own freedom. so just take it for granted that you are a communist nation and see where you want to go from there. host: a similar sentiment on twitter. caller who doesn't want communism should refuse her medicare. i hope she does not use national parks or the federal highway system.

do not call 911 in an emergency." unemployment figures are out, the jobless claims. the jobless claims remain high. "the new york times" reports that the government said today new 833,000 workers filed claims for unemployment benefits last week, the latest evidence that the pandemic is still battering the labor market. the figure represents an increase from 826,000 the previous week. wasnumber from last week 881,000. of course, on friday, we will get the jobless numbers for the month of august. lewis is a biden supporter in maryland. caller: i would like to make a couple points. trump, when he ran for cohen liedmichael

when he said he didn't want to be president. whocannot elected president has a checkered past like he had and think he would come out of it. two, the republican lady that said something about the lies. what will be sad is when we have donald trump on the stage with a fact checker, with joe biden at the same time -- how do you think that will come across? people have got to understand, when you run for president, why do you think he said those things about john mccain. he did everything he could to show that immigration got him across. and now it is everything -- it goes all the way back to when he was born, there is so much stuff he has done. his friends, anybody who has ever touched him, that is how

the president goes. host: he is referencing the debate that was announced yesterday. the debate will have solo moderators. the president and joe biden will have a single moderator in each of the three matchups. those were announced on wednesday. the first will be september 29, incurred by chris wallace. the second will be october 15, moderated by steve scully, a political editor here at c-span who served as the alternate for the 2016 debate. that will be a town hall. that will involve kristin weaver. and susan page, the bureau chief for usa today will moderate the vice presidential debate on october 7. we will have live coverage of the debates here on c-span. the details and times are ahead. you can watch our interview with our keeley -- with our colleague

steve scully on our website at c-span.org. to charlston, mississippi, good morning to roger. caller: good morning. host: good morning. becausei am for trump, trump has done the best job that presidentd done since ronald reagan. why anybody would wilford joe biden, i do not understand. he's against everything, everything that donald trump has done has been for the americans. he has given in this money. money.ess he gave unemployment. he has worked for the working people. and i want to say that i think he is the right man. host: mississippi will have more than just the presidential election on their ballot, they will get to choose a new flag.

the commission recommends a magnolia design. they will decide whether they will pick a new magnolia flag, to replace the old one that had the confederate battle emblem. a commission voted to recommend the magnolia over other final designs that featured a shield with lines representing water. that will be determined on election day in mississippi. mike is in tucson, arizona. a biden supporter. caller: i wanted to make the comment of i cannot believe our nation could listen to a president that -- as wide as this president. and i think across the nation, faare devoid o fact -- of cts. somebody just told me the death rate for covid was a 6%. the way they took it that

approximately 95% were fine. i found out that that was just a single -- the people who only had that as their death reason. that was 6%. and every other pearson had -- e person had morbidity problems. the disinformation has been spread to a point i have never seen in my lifetime and i wanted to say that i look forward -- that i would vote for a toyota corolla over donald trump. top: on twitter, "the campaign issue, a lack of law and order." this is anna. caller: i am calling because i am voting for president trump. called and said we would lose our social security. i and 84 into have gone through a lot of presidents, -- and i

have gone through a lot of presidents, and joe biden and barack obama, they got rid of $760 billion of medicare to put it on obamacare. and they took $700 billion from social security to put on for the refugees. and i do not think joe biden is worth a diddly-darn. if he makes it, i really do not think he will live until then. his health is just too bad. host: scott in new york on our joe biden supporters line. caller: i am scott, a god-fearing, human loving christian american. i want to start by saying all the humans, how much hatred does it take for one human being to shoot another in the back seven

times in front of his children? that is a lot of hatred. what has caused this hatred? that we war on drugs declared in 1980. the law enforcement went from protecting and serving to fighting a war, so basically half of america is their enemy. there are good and bad police officers. i go to a mega church. and a preacher is a form of police officer. the sheriffs that go to that church are police officers. i worship god with these people that look different than me. however, in this church in new york, one of the biggest in the city, nobody wears a mask. i went to a funeral the other day at another church and they then i temperature and

went to another church, they are following the rules, but the church i go to that is basically a bunch of my brothers and sisters in law enforcement, who make a mockery of helping each other by not wearing a mask. about the debates, the one thing that would make them interesting is if joe biden and donald trump took lie detector tests when they start making misleading statements. and then shock them with electricity so they will not lie. and then have joe biden and get somebody that looks like don king. host: a tweet from craig kaplan, the headline in her hometown, "the san francisco chronicle," up by aays, i was set salon.

this was reported on many news channels. evelyn in pennsylvania. caller: hi. trump. i am for host: anything else? you want to expand on that? caller: if eitan gets in th -- watch out.in, and beware of kamala harris. think about the economy and what trump has done. it has given us. thank you. host: thank you for all your calls this morning. we are back friday morning, tomorrow morning at 7:00 eastern. hope you can be with us. have a great day. ♪ [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2020] ♪

>> you are watching c-span, your unfiltered view of government. created by america's cable television companies as a public today bynd brought your television provider. >> coming up, to members of congress take -- chairsfederal reserve ben bernanke angela yellen talk about monetary policy and the federal response to the pandemic. joe biden is traveling to kenosha, wisconsin, where there have been protests over the shooting of 29 people jacob blake. we expect to bring you live coverage of the remarks. later today, president trump holds a rally in pennsylvania.

that is live at 7:00 p.m. eastern on c-span, online at c-span.org, or listen with the free c-span radio app. ♪ contenders," about the men who ran for the presidency and lost but changed political history. tonight, vice president hubert humphrey. "the contenders," this week at 8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span. congresswoman mary scanlon and congressman steve cohen for part of it event at the national constitution center on freedom of the press. you will hear from rich lowry from the national review.