the biden administration's manufacturing agenda and made in america economic policies. e&e news reporter lesley clark talks about the confirmation for biden's energy secretary nominee and the administration's energy goals. host: welcome to the washington journal on this wednesday, january 27. yesterday, enough republicans signaled that they will not vote to impeach the former president, donald trump. more on that coming up. we begin this morning with republicans concerned of a cancel culture in america. they say they are being ostracized for their views. do you agree? is there a cancel culture against conservatives?

democrats, dial in at (202) 748-8000, republicans at (202) 748-8001, independenc -- independents, your line, (202) 748-8002. text us at (202) 748-8003. go to twitter @cspanwj or facebook.com/c-span2 post your comment. we begin with conservative media mogul rupert murdoch accepting a lifetime achievement award recently. the new york times reports a quote from him, where he said, for those of us in media, there's a challenge to confront --a wave of censorship that seeks to silence conversation, stifle debate, and stops of cash stops of pieties -- and stops societies -- people

have thought too hard for friedman speech to be suppressed by this awful woke orthodoxy. jim jordan, republican from ohio, also spoke about this. see what he had to say and the response from democratic maryland congressman jamie raskin. [video clip] rep. jordan: this is scary because this is more than impeaching the president. it is canceling all the people you guys disagree with. that is what scares me more than anything. we have seen it play out over the past several days. i have never sought i would see the things we are now witnessing, and i do not know where it ends, but should scare us all. the gentleman should remember this. they cancel culture does not just go after conservatives. it will not stop there. it will come for us all. that is what is frightening.

and i hope you all recognize that. and at some point, we can unite and do things that help those people back home that we get the privilege of representing. reserve our time. >> german reserves. -- gentleman reserves. reppo raskin the cancel kercher -->> the cancel culture of white supremacy tried to cancel our lives. host: william in georgia, democrat caller, what do you think? caller: i do not believe there is a cancel culture in conservatives -- against conservatives. it is against immorality and dishonesty. just so happens that the conservatives now fully embrace immorality and dishonesty. host: andy in savannah, georgia.

democratic caller. hi, andy. caller: i think the senate should impeach trump because he has faced america with lots of crisis -- host: andy, what about our question? caller: because i have lost my father and my mother because of the pfizer vaccine -- host: we will go on to tom and brownsville -- tom in brownsville, texas. you are a democrat as well. what do you think? caller: i agree with the first caller. it cancels qanon lies, conspiracy theories, fake propaganda, fake news. that is what they are going forward. trump needs to be defeated because he will destroy this country. he is a traitor because of what happened january 6. he needs to be held accountable.

and his co-conspirators, collaborators -- host: will talk about what happened coming up with the impeachment trial, but our conversation is about cancel culture. republicans are saying there one against them. what is cancel culture? wikipedia describes it as a callout culture, a modern form of ostracism in which someone is thrust out of social or professional circles, either online, in the real world or both. republicans, we want to hear from you on this as well. let me give you your line, (202) 748-8001. we are getting lots of calls from democrats. republicans, what do you say? robert in baltimore, democratic caller, what do you say? caller: i am a democrat.

i used to respect the gop. i cannot respect them now. they do not know that donald trump, next month, will be living in russia. host: robert, is there a cancel culture against conservatives? caller: not that i can see, except they do not realize what they are doing. donald trump told them last month, if he loses, he is going to leave the country. this is in his mind. he plans on going to russia. he is not going to jail in new york. host: i will leave it there. from book tv last month, the author of the book long time coming: reckoning with race in america, talked about this idea of cancel culture and the connection cc to white supremacy. [video clip] >> i understand why cancel culture involves two arenas we cannot get right, race and

gender and sex. it is difficult, complicated, nuanced. i understand why people want to cancel somebody, harvey weinstein or bill cosby, r. kelly, but most of it is parallel, horizontal. we have to have spectra. spectrums, continuums and continua. we have to be able to say that disease and sorry -- that aziz ansari is not harvey weinstein, you cannot adjudicate a bad date through me too. or -- you are a white guy, did you use the n-word 20 years ago? you probably did, but where are you now? if you are a 13-year-old kid saying some stupid stuff, even

racist stuff, and you get drafted by the mba, are --by the nba, are we going to cancel that kid? just like you listened to some dumb music? i do not think we should cancel human beings. it is white supremacy by proxy. the bible says -- that i read -- and be not the way of your oppressors. -- envy not the way of your oppressors. i want to charge at them, hold them accountable, but provide opportunities for them to be restored and redeemed. i believe in restorative justice, not retributive justice. host: michael dyson on book tv. you can find more on their

website. conservative senator josh hawley writes this op-ed. " the alliance of leftists and woke capitalists hopes to regulate the thoughts of americans and they monitor dissent and misbehavior. a karen who cuts someone off on traffic gets followed home and she named. everyone knows it could happen to them, so everyone shuts down. the circle of trust narrows. conservatives must not shrink back. we must stand up for the basic principles that join americans together, the right to debate openly, speak freely, into --and to address our differences graciously."

josh. caller: you touched on a lot. when you look across the board, you look at companies like youtube -- they allow rap videos, all this stuff with explicit content, explicit vocabulary, but this is part of free speech. but what it seems to be is that in the cancel culture, if you do not agree with a particular ideology, they will shut you down. you can have different spectrums, whether we are talking about covid. like their doctors that had dissenting views all over the board concerning covid, but if you put it out on any social media platform, and if it is not with the mainstream narrative, they will man -- ban you, shut

you down in your words not be heard what so --down and your words will not be heard whatsoever. you look at president trump getting lifetime bans across the board, facebook, twitter, what have you. where's the free speech now? if we have different ideologies, if you are liberal or conservative, if you are liberal views supersede what the majority has to say, that means you are right all the time and the others are wrong all the time. there's no in between. the debate is shut down. this is where we are. there is definitely a cancel culture. host: john, what resonated with you from what michael eric dyson said? caller: he was kind of touching on white supremacy and things like that. we all live in the real world. we all walked these streets every day, east coast, west

coast, midwest. it don't matter. people interact with each other all the time, and i do not really see this white supremacy nonsense they be talking about. racism is there, but on a day-to-day basis, everybody try to do the right thing, try to be respectful, but whether you are in a job and there is somebody discriminating or just favoritism or nepotism, just everything in there, but these are things people have to deal with, struggles people internally have to deal with. the way he describes it, it makes it seem like there are these nazis running on the country -- running around the country. it is ridiculous. i respect michael eric dyson wholeheartedly, but just like anything, i agree to disagree. host: sean in new york. jack dorsey, ceo of twitter,

went to his platform to defend his decision to ban the former president from twitter, saying on january 13, i do not celebrate or feel pride in our having to ban donald trump or how we got here. after a clear warning, we took the decision with the best information we had based on threats to physical safety. was this correct? i believe this was the right decision for twitter. we faced an extraordinary and untenable circumstance. off-line harm as the result of online speech is demonstrably real, and what drives our policy and enforcement above all. having to ban an account has real ramifications. when there are clear --while there are clear exceptions, i feel a ban is a failure of ours ultimately to promote healthy conversation and a time to reflect on our operations and the environment around us.

good morning, greg. caller: greetings yet again from motown, the beginning of a new day in america. as far as the cancel culture is concerned, i do not think there is a cancel culture. i just think, greta, that there are some racist conservative whites out there who do not want to admit that they, indeed, in their heart,, mind spirit -- part, mind, spirit, soul, psyche, there is hatred of people of color, especially black people in particular. i hear it all the time from white conservatives who get offended at being called racist. if you do not like being called a racist, how come you think and believe like a racist, if you don't like being called a racist? i mean, if you hate black

people, you hate black people. i mean, why don't they admitted? host: so should they be banned from social media platforms? caller: i do not think they should be banned. they have every right to their opinion, but they need to be challenged and called out for their hatred of black people. the reason i talk about white conservatives is because no one else will. those are the kind of people who support donald trump. they are the ones who believed donald trump's birtherism against barack obama. one more last thing. i think it is highly hypocritical for racist conservative whites to great about how donald trump --to a gripe --that gripe -- to gripe

about how donald trump is treated when this is the way they treated obama at years ago. if that is not the height of hypocrisy, what else can be? host: i congresswoman who signaled support -- a congresswoman who signaled support for qanon, there is a story about her. they went through her facebook page and other accounts dating back to 2018, and they found support for executing prominent democrats from her posts or likes before running for congress. an example. january, 2019, greene liked a comment that said a bullet to the head will be quicker to remove house speaker nancy pelosi. in one facebook post from april, 2018, greene wrote

conspiratorially about the iran deal. a commenter asked greene, do we hang them? she replied to come stage is being set. --she replied, the stage is being set. in this stanford advocate, marjorie taylor greene, their headline reads, endorses execution of democrats and old facebook posts. they quote her saying in this story that she --this is part of the cancel culture and that she is being censored. you see her on the floor of the house wearing a mask that has the word censored. do you disagree or agree? we will go to randall, chevy chase, independent. hi, randall.

caller: i was going to make another comment, but to pick up on what you are talking about, clearly she was crossing the line into expressing violence, inciting violence. i do not think that is acceptable, but on the other hand, i am not sure that means everything she would say should be censored. the point i was going to make was i think there is a cancel culture, but it is an extension of the devaluing of free speech and expression. it seems there's a lot of people today who just do not have much appreciation for how important free speech and expression, the free exchange of ideas, however much you disagree with them or think they are offensive, how integral that is to democracy itself. i mean, there's a reason the first amendment was the first

amendment and why it is in the constitution. i think there is a real problem with that, and cancel culture sometimes is an extension of that. it is sort of a punishment for some types of free speech. i will give you one specific example beyond just trump. facebook's policies have changed dramatically. i run a small group. i am an anti-trumper. i run a small facebook group that is opposed to trump and just made comments about trump, and i noticed, and the last few months, all of a sudden -- and i noticed, in the last few months, all of a sudden, facebook started tagging comments if they deemed something to be not truthful or even partially not truthful, and that's a dramatic change, because i recall mark zuckerberg, about two years ago, was asked about free speech and

he said he believed at the time that holocaust deniers should be allowed on facebook. so obviously there is something that has changed. host: do you believe it has to do with holding these platforms accountable for what is on their sites? caller: well, i think that is tricky. in that case, then they should be regulated, for one thing. they are no longer platforms, they are now curating content. i think it is tricky. we sometimes have trouble drawing distinctions. if people promoting violence, like the congresswoman you were talking about, yes, they have to maybe be held accountable, but if people express ideas that are not inherently inciting violence, not threatening people, they should not be accountable. we cannot have it both ways. either these are true platforms for the exchange of ideas or they are not, in which case,

then, they should be held accountable. if they are going to hold participants accountable, then they should be held accountable. they should not be given the special status they have under the fcc rule. host: let me share with you. matt gaetz sent this tweet out. "impeachment is the zenith of cancel culture." do you agree? caller: no. i am not sure i would go that far. we always take these arguments beyond -- to a certain extension. let me put it this way. i do think there is a point that the people should really have a essay about whether or not trump should be able to run again. -- have a say about whether or not trump should be able to run again. i am not sure it should be the job of the u.s. senate to tell people they cannot vote for him

the next term. i think i should be left --that is sort of an anti-democratic stance. i would say he may have a point. host: randall in maryland there. mike in indiana says this in the text to us. "every platform has terms of service. if you break them, you get banned." rich in california " yes, there is a cancel culture, and anybody who does not agree. i am afraid for my country. when did it become political to fly an american flag? " for years, " they have a right to cancel their contracts with them." bill in ohio says "there is no cancel culture against conservatives, but there is one against crazy."

linda in walker, west virginia, you are a republican. welcome to the conversation. what do you think? caller: i think this cancer culture --what is causing --it is causing trouble between everybody. this is all we hear. it is either about the impeachment or this crap. i mean, when is everybody going to decide? years ago, you cannot even open your mouth about president -- a president, but now you can get on there and cuss him. this is what i am talking about. when is it right to say you can talk and who cannot? what kind of world are we living in? this is not russia. if this it is what is going to be, i am glad i am on my last term of living so i do not have to listen to this crap the

--rest of my life. host: that is linda, a republican. charlotte in new jersey, a democrat, good morning. caller: i agree with the color before this one, jerry. -- caller before this one, jerry. everybody knows right from wrong. it is not a matter of freedom of speech. it is a matter of lying as opposed to the truth, and everybody knows that donald trump lost the election, including donald trump. he knows he lost. soto a lot of the people, especially --so do a lot of the people, especially his followers. are the judges stupid? are the judges unfair? the republican judges as well as the democrats? they know he lost, but read the bible. host: should he be, then, banned from the social media

platforms? caller: yes he should because of lies. he knows he is lying and so does most of america. host: so if you live, you should not have a twitter account? caller: absolutely, because it is spreading false information that affects everyone. host: how would you regulate that? if you are facebook and twitter, i mean, what sort of fact checkers would you have to have been place? -- have to have in place? caller: just what they did, cut him off. have fact-checks come of course. but when they know he is lying, it is awful. this is just totally -- this is all i want to say. america, read romans chapter one. read the last 10 chapters. that explains everything. people know right from wrong, but they would rather believe a lie than believe the truth. host: ok.

former republican senator leffler of georgia in her farewell address last week warned also against this cancel culture. here's what she had to say. [video clip] simple leffler --cephalon -->> they carry only --they care only about their political ideology. the double standards, disdain and contempt that elites and institutions have for conservatives is being revealed. for the sake of our discourse, this cannot continue. as a starting point, we must hold accountable those who limit our free speech and the loss of our civil discourse in this country. the american people are alarmed by the effort to censor conservative voices. we are witnessing a constitutional crisis that threatens to a road the first amendment in silence --to erode the first amendment and to

silence people across our country. as a conservative who still believes in our constitutional principles, i refuse to be intimidated by the cancel culture and its dangerous narrative. not every american feels free to speak up. their voices are being lost. mr. president, this is why this senate is so important. for two 30 years, the u.s. sentence -- for two hundred 30 years, the u.s. senate has been for dissenting views and has celebrated the deliberation of issues confronting our nation. you must be the voice for those who cannot use theirs. host: the former senator from georgia arguing that there is a cancel culture against conservatives. do you agree or disagree? parker malloy rights for media matters, editor a large. she writes this. "just as right wing media has

helped republicans play up their opposition to identity politics while ignoring the role white and russian identities play in conservative coalitions --white and christian identities play in conservative coalitions, the fight against cancel culture is another bundle of hypocrisy wrapped in a bow of a new buzzword. if hawley was being honest, he would come out and defend the incitement of mob violence rather than hiding behind the cancel culture bohemian. until then, it will be hard to hear the words without thinking of hypocrisy." for those of you joining us, wikipedia defines cancel culture this way --the callout culture, a modern form of ostracism in which someone is thrust out of of social or professional circles, either online or on social media, in the real world, or both.

we went to get your thoughts on this. democrats dial in at (202) 748-8000. republicans (202) 748-8001. independents, (202) 748-8002. send as text messages with your first name, city and state at (202) 748-8003. you can go to twitter and facebook as well. let's hear from james in san francisco. hi, james. caller: hi, greta. i cannot believe it. i am so privileged to be able to talk to you. thank you, c-span. these terms being bandied around, they are extreme right wing terms -- cancel culture, all this. the problem is we need the truth. we need facts. if anybody like loeffler, who makes these incredible statements that are so incredibly, arbitrarily --

without facts behind it, we need the media to back up these things with facts, and if they don't and if they play both sides equitably, people are misled, misinformed. we need facts. we do not get it from the right. i will say one thing and then i will drop it. the republicans have not cast one policy specifically designated to significantly support the lower or middle class for over four decades and they hide behind all these vague arbitrary terms. to cover. it blows smoke in people's eyes. host: where do you get your facts? caller: i admit i am a political

chunky. -- junkie. i follow all the congressional bills. i follow all the politicians, both left and right. i watch fox. i watch all the right wing media. i watch what they call the mythological left-wing media. i watch c-span like a religion. it is like four :00 in the morning hearing california. -- 4:00 in the morning here in california. host: i know. caller: ok. i will end this because it is my duty as a citizen of america to be as informed and educated as possible, and if i do not do that, i am betraying my country. host: ok. james thoughts at 4:30 in the morning in california. on facebook, someone says "

there is freedom of speech and there is violence rhetoric. that causes what happened at the capitol. yes, people that spread misinformation and violent rhetoric should be canceled." that is what lynn in massachusetts had to say. clay in louisiana, republican. caller: good morning. thank you for taking my call. i was born in the 30's, so i have seen some of this in one form or another before. i do not do social media. but i will say this. between the i call it censorship on social media and being politically correct, it places you in a straitjacket as far as free speech. and i have seen some of this before. book burning in germany. what comes next?

but burning? -- book burning? and as a final comment to several of your former individuals who came on c-span, as far as the white supremacists and so on, i would like to remind the gentlemen and lady, there was also white suburban women that voted against trump. thank you very much. host: that was clay in louisiana. more under thoughts coming up. but first, what happened in the senate yesterday. a senate reporters joining us. let's begin with the tweet from rand paul. he sent this yesterday. " the senate voted on my point of order. 45 senators agreed that this sham of a trial is unconstitutional, more than will be needed to acquit and in this partisan process. this trial is dead on arrival in the senate." is that true? guest: it certainly looks like

it is dead on arrival, although the vote was not technically on rand paul's motion. it was to table it. there were a few senators, like rob portman, who said their vote was not to declare it unconstitutional but to hear debate over that question, which portman said is --it has arguments on both sides, and so is it possible that five or more republicans ultimately vote to convict? it is possible, but i do think that it does show you where the senate is going, how republican senators like susan collins now saying it is almost certain to end in another acquittal. there has been some talk of maybe doing a censure resolution. tim kaine has been talking about that as a possibility, but we will have a trial starting february 9.

we still do not know a lot about exactly what it is going to look like, how long it will take, but it will probably not take that long because the democrats want to move on with the rest of their agenda. republicans certainly do not want to have a lot of time spent on the events of january 6. so we will see what ends up happening in the next few weeks as both sides prepare their briefs and what their battle plan is going into that trial. host: how many senators are needed to convict? guest: you need 60 seven senators if everyone shows up. two thirds of the people who show up and vote have to vote to convict. that has never happened before with the president or vice president -- or ex-president, so you need 17 republicans to vote to convict. we have five new sort of crossed party lines yesterday to get rid of rand paul's motion. that is a dozen short. one of the more interesting

votes was mitch mcconnell. the reason why this vote was being held now, and why it was an issue, is because mcconnell, on january 13, when the house voted to impeach, put out a statement saying he was not going to bring the send back for a trial while trump was still president. yesterday, he voted against tabling rand paul's resolution. we don't have a full explanation on him and how he views the trial, whether that is a procedural vote or he has come to the opinion that it is now constitutional. he was very strenuously opposed the donald trump's effort to overturn the election. he was unhappy with the mob, obviously, and then, on january 19, the day before trump left office, mcconnell blamed trump and said he had provoked the mob and that he had lied.

so mcconnell clearly not happy with trump, but does that mean he will vote to convict? yesterday, there was an indication he might not want to do that. host: does it matter that the house impeached the former president when he was still the president? guest: there's a lot of debate among constitutional scholars. there was a report not too long ago saying that most scholars believe that the congress does have this ability to impeach and the senate does have the ability to try an x official. this happened in the senate. but it is unprecedented. there is a question. if the senate were to ultimately convict trump, theoretically, he could go to the supreme court,

try to appeal that this is unconstitutional. it is unlikely the court will get involved. the last time the supreme court had a case about impeachment powers was several decades ago and they said the senate has sole authority. it is a political question. host: that brings up who will preside over the senate trial. why isn't chief justice john roberts doing it and who is doing it instead and why? caller: under the constitution -- guest: under the constitution, if the president is being tried in the senate, the chief justice must preside. trump is no longer the president. so the explanation has been, well, if it is not the president, typically the senate president pro tem, the highest-ranking senator, longest serving senator, and third in line for the presidency, has to preside.

it would not be politically advantageous for kamala harris to be sitting there day after day hearing arguments about trump. so it will be patrick lahey. he has been in the senate a long time. he has a lot of strong relationships on both sides of the aisle. he was sworn in by the previous republican pro tem yesterday. he went to the george washington university hospital after he did not feel well, was released a few hours later, in a statement from his office, said he is looking forward to getting back to work. i think that was something a lot of people last night were paying attention to. the health of every single senator really does matter in a 50-50 senate. the democrats are trying to do a budget resolution as soon as next week.

they do not -- they cannot do it if they have 49 people show up and the other has 50. host: let's talk about the 50-50 power-sharing agreement. what is the status of it? guest: they have basically ideal in principle. one of these organizing resolutions. there are details to work out. this will formally give the committee gavel to democrats and set up a rule to how it will work in a 50-50 senate. there are some unusual rules. democrats and republicans will have the same number of seats on each committee, but chuck schumer will continue to basically set the agenda on the floor as the majority leader and democrats will hold the chairmanships. also, they will have the same amount of funding for those committee positions. this is the same agreement they had in 2001, the last time we

had a 50-50 senate, when tom daschle and trent lott, the two leaders who had a pretty good relationship had a power-sharing deal. the deal did not last long because a few months into george bush's presidency, a senator switched parties. it shows how tenuous this majority is for the senate democrats. host: finally, let's talk about senator rob portman, republican of ohio, his decision not to run in 2022. what was the reaction from his colleagues in he would run to replace him? guest: everybody in ohio politics has to be looking at this. it has been a shock. i think rob portman is pretty popular. when he ran in 2016 he easily outperformed president trump, and the blowout win -- in a

blowout win, so he is one of those republicans who managed to do this jiu-jitsu where he stayed popular among republicans while criticizing trump. he is looking at this 2022 race and looking at the senate and has decided he has other things to do with the rest of his life, so it is not an encouraging sign for the senate, i think, or the sort of more establishment republicans who want to cut bipartisan deals and work on the intricacies of legislation, which rob portman has often wanted to do. it is much more of a senate where if you get attention, if you decide you are going to block things and make a lot of noise --and that is not really rob portman. he does not like bomb throwing in that sort of thing --and that sort of thing. jim jordan, the congressman who is very close to the former president, has been talked about

as somebody who could run, but i think there's a lot -- you know, if you are a politician in ohio, these senate seats do not come along all that often, so i could be a potentially large field, and potentially, depending on how it shakes out, you could end up with a real fight for the future of the republican party. will it be more of a trumpy republican party or more of a rob portman sort of chamber of commerce style republican party? we will see that play out on the republican side. and then, for the democrats, they have a real challenge. they have been losing ground in ohio. trump won easily again, but they do have a democratic senator, sherrod brown. if they can figure out how to bottle sherrod brown's magic elixir and win another senate seat, that would be enormous for the democrats. host: to follow the senate proceedings, the impeachment

trial and all things legislative agenda in the senate, follow stephen dennis at bloomberg.com or on twitter.com. thank you. guest: good morning. thank you. host: back to our conversation about whether there is a cancel culture against conservatives. larry in cleveland. thank you for waiting period an independent. -- thank you for waiting. an independent. caller: good morning. the republican shouted fire in a crowded theater. this is a matter of right and wrong. with all the crazy things that president trump has done, you know, he has turned this pandemic --500,000 people dead, lying to the country. he has pitted white against black by ignoring social justice issues.

we had anti-masters versus -- anti-maskers versus maskers. rick perry was right during the campaign, the 2016 campaign. he said this man is a cancer on the party. lindsey graham said that he would destroy the party. rubio said he was a con artist. ted cruz said he was a pathological liar. now they all want to spread lies about the election and let the president off the hook again, even after what happened at that capitol. we missed an opportunity to get a good man like john kasich as a candidate. what do we teach our children? host: i will leave it there. here's a tweet from one of our viewers, who writes in to say

what about the cancel culture on the right? it is trumpists who are canceling other conservatives who are not true believers. bob in philadelphia, a republican, what do you say? caller: thank you for taking my call. anybody who does not believe in cancel culture needs only to look as far as c-span. i am only the third republican caller you have taken. if that is not trying to cancel people out, i do not know what is. maybe we should have the ministry of truth, or we could cancel out people who have worked for the trump administration who are now actively being blacklisted. is that cancel culture? i think that it is. we have harvard, one of the ivy league colleges, saying they will take away the degrees of people who have worked for the trump administration. ok? is that cancel culture. that is straight up mccarthyism, ok?

and please explain to me, greta, why i am the --i am only the third republican who has been on the line, ok? host: let me explain -- caller: this is not done evenly. host: let me explain how it works. you call in. we do not call you. we cannot control who calls in. you probably heard me say at the beginning we are getting a lot of democratic callers. republicans, here is your line. i repeated it. we take calls as they come in and try to balance the calls between democrats, republicans and independents. caller: i called repeatedly in the past 20 minutes. busy signal. what you are trying to tell me is that there are no republicans. that is a straight up lie, greta. host: you have the busy -- we cannot give you a busy signal. caller: listen.

you have deliberately screened so that only three republican callers have made it in this morning, ok? you are straight up lie. you are part of the ministry of truth. you will regulate what truth is. you will regulate what the argument is. that is a shame, because c-span used to be split down the middle. you could not tell what side the moderator was on because they cloaked whether they were republican or democrat. the only one left on your channel now who cloaks themselves is pedro. the rest of you -- it is just too obvious. you guys are part of the cancel culture. i am sure that my number has probably been given out by c-span now. i will probably get an audit or something, but -- host: no, bob. tony in flushing, new york, democratic caller. caller: that guy is something

else, accusing your show of not being true. i had the same problem of the line being busy and i just kept trying. just ignore that. you know. just ignore him. i will tell you something. he will call you a liar too. that is really bad. what i wanted to talk about was, like we were saying about trump being, you know, prosecuted and everything else, and with the senate and everything, but i mean, i don't understand why nobody wants -- the republicans don't want to go with this guy. he is out of office, but he has to pay for his mistakes, the things that he did. he set those people up to --he sent those people up in a riot in the capitol. if i, common man, made threats,

i'm going to go to jail. i will get prosecuted. do you mean to tell me that this guy, because he is the president, he can say whatever you wants, which he has been doing for the last four years? what about that senator or congresswoman, pelosi, that she should have a bullet put in her head? those people do not get prosecuted? if i made that thread, i would been jail. host: tony in new york. matt on facebook says, looks that way. seems like there are consequences for having a different ideology than the liberal left. matt agreeing that there is a cancel culture. we have taken nine republican calls so far this morning. the lines are democrats, (202) 748-8000. republicans, (202) 748-8001. independents, (202) 748-8002. in other news this morning,

reuters is reporting that the u.s. is actively looking at mandating a covid-19 test for domestic air travel. if you are u.s. bound from another country, the biden administration has put in the mandate for a test, but they are also looking at domestic air travel. axios reports that mark meadows, former chief of staff to president trump, has a new gig. he will join the conservative partnership institute, a group run by former south carolina senator jim demint, that operates a networking hub for conservatives, sources tell axios. the hill has the headline " biden's cabinet gradually confirmed by the senate." janet yellen being sworn in yesterday by the vice president for treasury secretary. politico this morning with the headline " the president putting an end to private immigration detention facilities." you can read more on their

website. the washington post -- pentagon restricted commander of the d.c. guard ahead of the capitol riots. appropriators on capitol hill yesterday had closed-door meetings with law enforcement about what happened on that day, january 6. we have about eight minutes left here in our conversation. is there a cancel culture against conservatives? david is a republican in riverside, california. hi. caller: it is an honor to be the 10th republican caller today. host: welcome. caller: i do not want to dispute the other guy. in the 60's, there was a liberal free speech movement on college campuses, and once the liberal media took over, they canceled free speech because they took over. any time somebody takes over, free speech goes away. used to be free speech except profanity, vulgarity and the incitement of violence. but the modern interpretation is

anything liberals do not write, which is radical liberalism --liberals do not like, which is radical liberalism, not classical liberalism. free speech is on the way out because they are winning these days. look at how many things they control. the colleges, the media, just about everything. host: david's thoughts in california. david new jersey, democratic caller, what do you think? caller: what you have is the right does not want to be critiqued. most of the right's speech today is hate speech pure and simple. i go on the right sites and i debate. it is about race. i do not understand what they are talking about that it is not about race or gender. the right is always complaining about other people. the other thing is --you ev that -- you have a right to free speech, but you also have consequences, and the right does not seem to want to have consequences whatsoever.

trump, no matter what he does, there is always an excuse for it or they use whataboutism. if they want to set up their own sphere as far as communication, they have parler, and it was a hate filled racist site. you talk about what you want, but you have to be held accountable for what you say. republicans do not want to do that. that is what the problem is. host: apple and these other phone providers take that app --should apple and other phone providers take that app off of their phones? caller: they should. they screamed like banshee's when that happened and parler had to come up with new terms of service. the second parler came online, i used to go to reddit, and 99 percent of the statements there were racist.

it was a cesspool. they had to cut it off. trump is the same thing. literally, get a tweet that came out talking about white power. --he had a tweet that came out talking about white power. when you bring up accountability, they say free speech. sure. say whatever you want, but you have to be held accountable for what you say, and they do not want that. it is that simple. host: here is roy thomas on her facebook. respond to him, because he rights, there is a cancel culture. social media platforms are banding conservative constantly. new platforms are shut down. no one complains about anything other than political ideology when the head of iran still has a twitter account. caller: no. this ludicrous. -- that's ludicrous. you literally just put up a frame where a congressman was

talking about shooting democrats, or agreeing with that, and that is not the first time. it has been bubbling up for the past five years and now it has hit a crescendo. when trump said the things that he said and everything happened, you would literally see people talking about it, saying, this is fun, this is awesome, but when they realize there are consequences, it is not fair. you cannot have it both ways. it in the law is the law for everyone were not. -- or not. host: do you think congress needs to regulate these social media platforms? caller: the answer to that is no because congress cannot be trusted. host: why? caller: first of all, the right want to say what they want without consequences, and the left does have an issue with cancel culture. the left is too sensitive about stuff. do not get me started on that,

but right now, we have a problem with the right. they demand everything and feel that if they say something, they should not be held accountable. what the rest of america is saying, why they are getting canceled in restaurants and things like this, you have to be held accountable for what you did. this is not right and it will not stand. host: dave's thoughts. we will go to charles next, an independent in illinois. what do you think? charles, good morning to you. caller: hello. host: you are on the air. your turn. caller: mi on the air? -- am i on the air? host: you are. caller: it is a line that goes all the way, starting with president roosevelt back at pearl harbor to adam schiff, is lying to the fbi, the cia.

--his lying to the fbi, the cia. --it has been going on since lyndon johnson. and it has continued on and got worse. they aren't even ashamed that they are lying. but one thing trump did do was he opened up where people can see just how rotten our government is. and the thing is, i think hillary and bill --but they will not prosecute them over everything. and the third party they want to help, what they should do --and whoever gets the most votes. host: i will leave it there.

don in washington state, a republican. what is your answer to the question is there a cancel culture? caller: there is. don't take this personal, but i have watched c-span for a couple years, and the last caller, the republican caller that called you out for the three calls this morning, the last few months, you guys don't take any republican calls as much, and it is obvious for anyone that sits and watches. you can have a pen and can count. host: don, did you watch yesterday? we did republicans only for an hour. caller: i know. that's a thing that you guys do to say, ok, six days a week we do it this way, and one day we will give them new dues --give them two hours on a sleepy day. host: do you understand that we

have to take the calls that come i understand how a telephone works. my concern is like the gentleman said, when i first heard it watching this about four years ago, it would be -- you really couldn't tell. it was just a call in thing where people can voice their opinion but definitely in the last year, everything from the gavel-to-gavel to the stuff you show at 11:00 at night, you guys have helped cancel culture and the thing about cancel culture it is all about finger-pointing. where is it going to stop? we had the summer of love. many businesses, people killed,

police, michael bloomberg let people out of jail with his money, and you don't hear nothing, and i'm not saying violence is good. it is not right, i don't care what side of the line you are on . you can't finger-pointing and put certain actions -- at least similar actions and try to draw a line and pick and choose. it is either all or nothing. i am glad that i haven't seen your hand really close to the button because you do as soon as you get a republican caller. host: i have to move the conversation along as all host to sit in this chair. we tend to move on if you are off-topic. we are also going to move on so we can stick to the conversation. this conversation is over for now. we are going to switch topics. coming up later on in the program, we will talk about president biden's new oil and gas lease moratorium on federal

land. we'll also talk about his environmental and climate change agenda. lesley clark, energy reporter from e&e news will join us. coming up next, we will be joined by scott paul, president of the alliance for american manufacturing, to talk about president biden's executive order, strengthening by american rules. here is the president on his by america rule, yesterday [video clip] -- yesterday. [video clip] >> we are sitting clear expo nations and we will go to the core issue with a centralized coordinated effort. today, i am greeting a director of made in america at the white house office of america -- of management and budget who will oversee all of our government made in america initiatives. that starts with stopping federal agencies from waving by american requirements with impunity as has been going on.

if an agency wants to issue a waiver to say we are not going to buy an american product as part of this project, we're going to buy a foreign product, they have to come to the white house and explain it to us. we are going to require that waivers be publicly posted. someone seeking a waiver to build a particular vehicle or facility and it is going to buy the following foreign parts. that waiver is going to be posted. then we will work with small american manufacturers and businesses to give them a shot to raise their hand and say i can do that in my shop, in my town. i used to have a friend who said you have to know how to know. these small businesses don't even know they can compete for making the product that is attempting to be waived and be bought abroad. we will review waivers to make sure that they are only used in

very limited circumstances. for example, when there was an overwhelming national security, humanitarian or emergency need in america. this has happened before. it will happen now. host: scott paul is the president of the alliance for american manufacturing, here to talk about what the president just had to say about his new buy america order. what was your reaction to this executive order? guest: thank you have it -- thank you for having me on and presenting this topic. i think that the president's order and his remarks were a very promising good start. we do need to rebuild manufacturing in this nation, and a big piece of that is leveraging the power of the federal government's procurement.

we have a patchwork of laws in place, as the president said that nearly for 100 years, but they have not been particularly well enforced. there have been loopholes and waivers and erosion, and the president's actions this week by signing the executive order will set into place a series of processes, rulemaking, adding positions, that should strengthen the ability of our tax dollars to buy american goods made in american factories. host: which sectors would benefit from this? guest: that is a very good question. because procurement is so broad, you think of everything from electronics to grants that the federal government makes, states building roads and bridges. there is a lot that goes into this. if you think construction materials, infrastructure spending, steel and concrete and

literally bricks and mortar, that is a big aspect of it. the president referred to the federal vehicle fleet, which is substantial, including the postal service and the federal government employees. you also think of pentagon procurement and the amount spent every year on supplying our troops, both from perishable goods to the armored carrier that they ride in. you think of the supply chains. there is a broad benefit to large swaths of american manufacturing, from having a stronger federal government commitment to buy american laws. host: you said this is a good start. what else is needed? guest: in addition to the rules, which i think are important to establish that foundation, you also need the investment. to me, i think that combination

of leveraging procurement and then having new investment has the chance to turbocharge american jobs, particularly in manufacturing. if you are talking about a nine or 10 figure investment in infrastructure, in clean energy, that could be truly transformational to some industries in the united states, and specifically, i'm thinking of lithium batteries that go into electric vehicles. i'm thinking clean technology, things like solar panels and solar technology, wind turbines. the folks that would be making parts and supplies that go into charging networks. from an infrastructure perspective, i refer to it as materials.

we are going to be rebuilding schools, and we are going to be rebuilding water systems. bridges, roadways, that is going to put a lot of americans to work, and that is going to create a lot of demand for materials in those american factories who produce it. host: we are talking about the manufacturing agenda for president biden. we are dividing the lines, democrats, republicans and independents. those of you who work in the manufacturing center -- sector, we want to hear from you. your line is (202)-748-8003. how many jobs are there in the manufacturing industry? guest: right now, there are just over 12 million jobs in manufacturing. the manufacturing jobs like every job category just about, has taken a hit during the pandemic, and there was an immediate sharp drop of over one

million jobs over the course of a couple months. we are still more than 540,000 jobs in the whole -- in the hole in manufacturing since the beginning of the pandemic. historically, and you factoring jobs reached a high point in 1979 -- manufacturing jobs reached a high point in 1979, and they had to track macroeconomic factors like recessions. from 2010 to 2018, we saw steady growth in manufacturing jobs. over 800,000 manufacturing jobs were added over that period. even in an age of automation and globalization, if our economy is strong and we have the right policies, we can see manufacturing jobs increase in this country. host: a viewer sent us a tweet saying it about time we will buy american. china has been beating us up in manufacturing, due to

conservative economics the last four years. making it fashionable to offshore jobs and money. guest: from a partisan perspective, there is a lot of blame to go around. there was a prevailing philosophy in the united states that opening markets was generally a good thing and free trade was a good thing. with the expectation that those countries would follow the rules and that their governments would mostly get out of their economy. with respect to china, that has not been the case. the government is deeply involved in the economy, and i think every administration would say that china hasn't been playing by the rules. certainly president biden has said that, president trump said that and obama said it before him. this has been a long-standing concern, and we do have tools at our disposal to encourage manufacturing growth in the united states and a level playing field with our economic

competitors. i think procurement, this buy american order is how we do this. if we can leverage the federal government's power of purchasing, we can re-sure some of those jobs and make sure our tax dollars aren't peeking to countries like china. host: what are some of the other tools? guest: we have trade enforcement tools and we saw the last administration use the broad use of tariffs. it is not unusual for presidents to apply tariffs in the case of unfair trade practices. president obama did it frequently, when the industries brought trade -- trade cases to his attention. what set trump apart was this was the foundation of the trade policy, and he used tariffs to both gain leverage with china during the course of trade talks, but also for the purpose of protecting some national security interests.

for instance, keeping armor plate production in the united states or other critical technologies to our military. one can debate the success of those policies. i think they left a lot to be desired in terms of results, but trade enforcement is one of those tools. the other tools would be tax policy. are we promoting tax policies that encourage investment in our domestic factories? that is one factor. another factor is, is our educational system aligning with these goals? do we have adequate career technical education at the secondary and postsecondary level, so that we are preparing the next generation of factory workers? if you look in factories today, a lot of these workers are in their 50's, and our baby boomers and they are approaching retirement age. we need to desperately ensure that we have a pipeline in place

to get a younger generation of workers. that pipeline has eroded the last couple of decades as we have seen some manufacturing job decline. host: the latest numbers on u.s. manufacturing employment, according to the labor department, 38,000 jobs added in december 2020, 543,000 jobs lower than in february of 2020. with all of that information on the table, we will go to john, republican in orlando, florida. good morning to you. caller: good morning and thank you for taking my call. briefly, it is not so much about -- the calls about some of the past comments that were made. in particular, i am a lifetime democrat who changed to republican over the past four years. there is no debate anymore in this country. it is hateful rhetoric going on -- host: we have moved on from that conversation.

do you have a question or comment? caller: i waited for an hour to get through to you. you could at least listen to my two minute statement. host: we are going to move on because we are changing topics. bill in palm springs, california. democratic caller. you work in manufacturing? caller: i did, i worked 32 years in the steel industry in northwest indiana. the second largest -- was being built right next door. i was laid off, luckily only two years from 1992 to 1994, but what an interesting thing is, i was talking to one of my buddies who lives in phoenix, and he was telling me that in the port of indiana, some deal that trump

made with russia that allows -- that lousy steel was coming in from russia. they had to melt this stuff down, mix it up again and start over because it was trash, but it was one of those deals that was made under the previous administration. the gentleman is spot on about training, because all of the vocational schools throughout the united states have been shut down, almost 100% of them, and that was 20 years ago. people need to be trained. i can take a sink apart and put it back together and make it work. a lot of kids cannot even screw in a lightbulb. training is paramount. there is so much that needs to be done over and caught up with. host: scott paul, do you have thoughts on that? guest: i do, and i empathize. i was raised in northwest indiana, in the shadow of the steel mills.

i have certainly seen the ups and downs. it is interesting, what the caller mentioned about the russian steel being melted. believe it or not, there is a federal law with respect to procurement that addresses that. it is called the melted and poured standard. steel that goes into federally funded projects has to be melted and poured in the united states, so that slab or scrap coming in from russia or china can't be considered. that is one of the safeguards we have in place, to ensure that we are growing our steel industry. i will reiterate with respect to career and technical education, that we aren't going to return to a system where we have shop class and all of that in every school for everyone, but i do think that we need to offer more pathways for the majority of kids who aren't going to end up obtaining a four year bachelor's degree. part of that is providing both

academic training and practical training, in the skilled trades and in professions that will continue to be in demand, like electronics, welding, robotic engineering, and industrial repair, that we will need if we are going to compete successfully, looking ahead in manufacturing. host: mike in new york, democratic caller. caller: hello, good morning and thank you for taking michael. this situation of manufacturing under the trump administration was awful. we saw that during his presidency, he doesn't care about anything but his interests. because of this, all institutions are cutting ties to trump, and i believe republicans must do this, isolating trump and his cronies.

this must become a movement in our country. host: i'm going to go to jim in virginia, republican. what do you do? caller: i am in printing and manufacturing. host: your question or comment about manufacturing? caller: here in our county, there are a dozen manufacturing plants that have closed over the past 20 years, outsourced to other countries. would that be included in these restrictions? canadian and mexican plants that would be producing these products? because they were forced by big manufacturers to buy overseas, and it is just not a logical argument. it is it -- is it possible for a white house office to be able to enforce this, to be able to even keep track of this? it is a nonsensical initiative.

we want to keep jobs here? yes. is it possible to be able to do that, afford the products if at the same time we increase the minimum wage to $15 an hour? it is ludicrous. it can't be done. thank you. host: scott paul, your thoughts? guest: the caller raises some interesting points, that covers both trade, wages and how effective could having an office in the white house be in managing all of this procurement? i think these are all good questions. with respect to the office, i do believe that having a director at the omb that is looking at procurement would make a huge difference and i will say it for this reason, in procurement practices, when there are, -- when there are subcontractors working for what are called waivers from buy american, saying it might be too expensive so we want to import this product --

they generally deal with the compliance officers at the agency. sometimes those relationships are a little too cozy. having a level of scrutiny and whether the waiver is in the national interest will be helpful. along with that, leveraging the resources -- is going to help scout out small and midsize manufacturers across the nation that can fill orders like that. i do think that there will be some measurable benefit. with respect to our trade agreements, this is another interesting question because in our trade agreements, we have permitted countries to enter our procurement market, as if they were american made goods. we think there should be strict limits on that, and that certainly if there is an american factory that can supply

the good, that there is no reason to seek that product from mexico, canada, or any other trade partner that we have. i would add, because i completely agree in more rural counties in virginia and across the nation that when these factories left, they left devastating consequences and reforming our trade policies will be very important. that was one of the few signature bipartisan achievements i think in the trump administration was a revised nafta agreement called the usmca, that the trump administration negotiated with nancy pelosi, believe it or not, to get through the congress and to get some new and better rules into place. host: suzanne in washington, republican. caller: yes, the title of biden's proposal for made america and buy america first

sounds good, but the creation of a new department with high wage earners just seems like more red tape that people will have to go through, that corporations will have to go through. everything's got red tape. every time i see a bill from congress, it has red tape everywhere and -- a way to make tax money and make it fairly is to remove the exemption status from every federal, state and local government worker, because right now, federal i know for sure has tax exemption and that way, politicians you have to pay taxes will be better financial protectors of our money and stop giving it every way -- stop giving it away. host: let's get a response. guest: some interesting

questions, and i want to make sure the callers understand the purpose of this order is not to create a new bureaucracy or more red tape, but it is going to add more transparency and if all of the waiver requests are published online and are publicly available, that will give small and midsize manufacturers a better chance to compete for that business than just learning about it through network channels or having to search it out themselves. having that level of scrutiny for waiver requests like if you are requesting products to come in from china, to supply the federal government, i think that deserves an extra layer of scrutiny. a couple callers have mentioned this, one word about wages in manufacturing. wages in manufacturing are already mostly middle-class supporting wages. the average manufacturing wage

is well above the minimum wage and there is a reason for that, because it requires additional skill building and some experience. raising the minimum wage, i don't think at all will impact manufacturing jobs in any negative way. in fact, i think that if you were to raise wages in service and retail jobs, you will likely see more people be able to make things like durable good purchases, buy that washing machine or automobile that they couldn't before. that will spur manufacturing job creation. i think in general, raising wages, raising the minimum wage could have a beneficial effect, not only on our economy but in manufacturing in particular. host: on the president's buy american executive order, how do you respond to the chamber of commerce? wall street journal quotes the chamber saying, doubling down on an already vigorous buy american rules could drive up the cost of government projects, undermining

the potential to create jobs and spur economic growth. guest: the chamber is flat wrong. they represent a lot of u.s.-based multinational companies that have an interest in weakening our buy american laws. you can take what they say with a grain of salt. i will give a great example of this. one of the iconic bridges in the san francisco area is the san francisco oakland bay bridge that was damaged in that devastating earthquake in 1989. it took a while to rebuild and when arnold schwarzenegger was governor of california, he decided he wanted to make a deal with china. they contracted with the chinese steel company to build the main frame of that bridge, the center span, under the notion it would save california taxpayers money. it ended up doing no such thing. it ended up costing more, running late and needing massive repairs. and in the process, it took job

opportunities away from workers in the united states. there is a reason why we have buy american laws. it helps keep a manufacturing base, keep a skill base in the united states, rather than subsidizing it overseas. it just makes no sense. a more recent good example is the rebuilt bridge in new york, which is somewhat famous. they are, buy america was utilized -- there, buy america was utilized and it provided a lot of work for steel mills and foundries and metal fabricators throughout the united states, and was able to put people to work. host: our next caller from florida. what do you do? caller: i am in construction. i am calling because he said we are not going to go back to school having in school learning trade but i am in the trade for 50 years and i see a lot of kids

that are not going to be going to college and are not quite a have a chance in the outside world unless they have this training. i do understand why they don't teach home economics, they don't teach construction like i'd learned when i was in school. i made a career out of construction. i will tell you what, if you think that you're going to teach all these kids -- is going to cost money just like if they went to college. how about welder construction in school where the kids who don't have a chance in college are going to have a chance to do something because there are a lot of kids out there i know a lot of people -- i would love to be in a school, teaching kids as to what they can do and what they can't do if they don't get into college. host: could you share with us how much you were making? you said you made a career out of it? caller: i started painting as a

kid because i broke my ankle in the national guard. i had to find something to do, so i learned how to paint. that was my first trade, and i was a corker at five dollars an hour when i first started painting. i worked my way up and i worked in massachusetts painting multimillion dollar pay -- multimillion dollar mansions for $32 an hour. if it kid can work his way up to make $32 an hour instead of sitting there saying what am i going to do, i can't go to college, while if i can get into a trade and work my way up to $32, you can work your way up. there is a starting minimum wage . my minimum wage was five dollars an hour back in 1980, and then i worked my way up. now i work for myself, but i'm disabled, but there are a lot of kids out there.

you learned a different trait, so you went into different trades and you actually taught yourself how to do different trades and you had a life. host: scott paul? guest: i completely agree and i am sorry if i thought -- if i left the wrong impression. i believe there is a place for career technical education. but i was referring to was that 30 years ago when i went to high school, rebutted took shop class no matter what. i don't think we're going to return to a model like that, but what i think we should do is for kids who want to pursue the skilled trades, that should be a part of the core curriculum that they are going through, and there should be those opportunities. i have seen some high schools around the country do some really innovative things with manufacturing and partnership with local manufacturers and learning the skills and then having apprenticeships and it is

phenomenal. we need to scale those opportunities and the argument i think i want to make is that we should not have a goal necessarily of getting every kid into a four-year college and obtain a bachelor's degree because the majority of americans either don't want that or can't do that for a particular reason, and if we make these jobs good jobs, if we provide a pathway forward through both academic work and practical work, we can create good career opportunities for lots of young men and women in the united states today. host: we will hear from charles in colorado, independent. caller: in mr. paul, in my high school, we had a program where there were students who weren't doing well and were not going to be able to go to college and they had those types of programs where they said hey, let's go out to it&t and do this, and you

will get a trade. i agree with you 100%, it worked splendidly in our high school. my next question is it seems like it is hard to compete with countries like india and china, who are paying their workers absolutely nothing to manufacture products. if the tpp was revamped and came back into play, where we put constraints on china, because their other trading partners would be nullified if they came over to the tpp, we could stop china from globalizing manufacturing, and we could also stop china from stealing our intellectual property, if we were playing by all the same rules and had enough training partners -- trading partners to nullify their efforts, and they would have to play nice. thank you. host: mr. paul, go ahead. guest: i think trade is going to

be critical for the success of manufacturing. manufacturing, unlike many industries in the united states, is in direct competition with many countries around the world and private sector companies around the world as well, and those trade rules matter a lot stop the trump administration did focus on some trade inequities will stop a lot of that dealt with intellectual-property, technology transfer, but to the caller's point, not much at all dealt with wage disparities or lax enforcement of labor and environmental standards. through the comments he has made, joe biden indicates that this would be a priority in trade agreements in his administration, and he also indicated that he doesn't have a desire to pursue new trade agreements until we get a solid

framework in place in the united states, to make us more globally competitive, through research and development and innovation, through workforce training, and also through application of our trade laws where we can push back against those unfair trade practices that may be costing jobs in the united states. host: stephen california, independent. what is your question about manufacturing? caller: i have a few comments to make. number one, i had a steel mill in the 80's and i remember very vividly what clinton said, that manufacturing is never going to come back to this country. and as of recently, we have obama, who had a vice president, that said that manufacturing is not going to come back to this country.

they criticize trump for saying how he was going to bring back these jobs. we have a little bit of history here. i don't understand how all of a sudden biden got religion and is turning back things like nafta, that destroyed a lot of manufacturing in this country. that is number one. the other point is that the infrastructure jobs, let's be honest, that is code for government regulation, government taxation in order to create jobs. if i go out and create a job, i have to use my own money and i have to bill my -- build my own steel mill. infrastructure is taxing things and creating things like solyndra. $600 million that went under. we have to get real here. this is going to be nothing more than one big stimulus. everyone says we want to build bridges and we want to build roads and where is all that

money going to come from? is it going to be greeted out of private industry? it is going to be created by taxation. la dee da about what the government is big taxation that is going to go to war the government being in the middle of it and you know anytime the government does something, it takes $.50 before it spends a dollar. host: steve, we heard your point. scott paul, your sponsor. guest: with respect to presidents, i don't disagree and one of the reasons you want some -- you saw some democrats fled from the party was things bill clinton was saying about not believing in an industrial future in the united states. i think obama believed much more strongly in manufacturing and it was the centerpiece of several of his state of the union addresses. they had a robust manufacturing

program and we gained manufacturing jobs from 2010 to 2018. that was the longest period of manufacturing growth we saw in our country for some time. i think joe biden and donald trump understand the importance of this, certainly from a geopolitical standpoint. with respect to infrastructure spending, i completely disagree. this is the government giving grants to states and the private sector to build these roads that are a public good, and that is why we have a government. this is very traditional. alexander hamilton developed a manufacturing plan and part of that was investing in infrastructure because that is something no private firm can do on its own. we need the government to help coordinate that, for bridge construction, road construction, waterworks, reports, and that

will make us more competitive, that will bring more jobs and stimulate more economic activity, and yes it does have to be paid for. i think the latest notion is that we can borrow this money because the interest rates are incredibly low right now and it may be foolish to deferred them when interest rates could go up and these projects would be even more expensive. i am for infrastructure spending. i do think the states and localities will know how to manage this and they will know how to spend the money wisely and that we should make bets on a clean energy future and there may be a few of those bets that don't work out, but there is an awful lot that will, and it will transform our economy and ensure we are making those electric vehicles and batteries in the united states, rather than importing them from china. host: mitchell is from florida, a democratic caller. caller: scott, you are moving in the right direction and our country is moving in the right direction. i'm 78, so my generation, we saw

the whole nine yards, and what it boils down to is the south has been given what the north had from the time that we established this country, so now that they have all the automobile manufacturers down in the south, they are dealing with everything that the north had, and to add insult to injury, what they've done was cut their nose to spite their face. we need biden, we need these programs, and it is going to work because the conservatives didn't want blacks, didn't want mexicans, didn't want brown, didn't want asians, didn't want from the middle east, they thought it was their country, what is our country and scott, believe me, it is going to work because biden saw what happened during the time that you were a

boy, i was a man and i serve this country and i know what the real deal is, and now it is coming home to roost, and we need to keep these programs. we need it, because the usa is vibrant and needs to help not only this country, our people, but help those that have fallen, those that have a problem. host: i have to go to scott paul. go ahead. guest: i appreciate the caller, and thank you for your service. two observations. one is that we did see a lot of manufacturing migrate from northern industrial states to the south, that helped to re-industrialize the south. unfortunately, that was just a pitstop for somebody factoring that when -- that then went on to mexico or asia, and that is the race to the bottom we want to prevent. we want to make sure we are boosting manufacturing, boosting wages and doing this the right

way in our nation. i do think there is a path forward and it is an inclusive path. manufacturing often is a pathway to the middle class, for minorities in this country, for immigrants, for black americans, for latinx americans as well. investing in manufacturing will help with the president's equity goals as well. these are middle-class jobs. manufacturing is one of those. host: our viewers can find more information if they go to americanmanufacturing.org. scott paul is the president of the alliance for american manufacturing. thank you. guest: thank you. host: we will take a short break. when we come back, we will take your phone calls on your top

public policy issue. there are the lines on your screen. start dialing in. ♪ >> listen to c-span's podcast. this week, the former chief of staff in the george h w bush administration and former deputy chief of staff in the george w. bush administration, shares his advice for biden's chief of staff. >> i actually told him to pay attention to decisions being made by the president. we don't want the president making just government decisions. the president should be making presidential decisions, not every government decision. he will be blamed for every government decision, but the president's precious time should be making presidential decisions and getting ready to make tough presidential decisions, rather than making government decisions . making sure people making government decisions are making them the right way.

>> joined c-span's the weekly, wherever you get your podcasts. biden cabinet nominees are on capitol hill this week for their confirmation hearings. three hearings. today at 9:30 a.m. eastern on c-span, jennifer granholm, energy secretary nominee. at 10:00 on c-span3, linda thomas-greenfield, nominative for you and ambassador. at 3:00 p.m. eastern, former obama white house chief of staff dennis pickton a, nominative for secretary of veterans affairs. on thursday, one hearing for two nominees, ohio congresswoman marcia fudge for secretary of housing and urban development and cecilia rouse, nominated for chair, council of economic advisers. once the confirmation hearings live on c-span and c-span3, on demand at cspan.org, or listen on the c-span radio app.

>> "washington journal" continues. host: your top public policy issues. that is our question for you, for the next 20 minutes or so. what do you want to see from the new president and this congress? you can dial in, for democrats at (202)-748-8000. republicans, (202)-748-8001. and independents, (202)-748-8002 . this is the schedule for president biden today. he will get his daily briefing along with the vice president this morning. around noon time, they will be a press briefing with the white house press secretary. at one: 30 p.m., the president is expected to take executive action on climate change, jobs and scientific integrity. the president yesterday spoke about promoting diversity and inclusion in his administration. here is what he had to say. [video clip] >> in the weeks ahead, i will be

reaffirming the federal government's commitment to diversity and accessibility, building on the work we started in the obama administration. that is why i am resending the previous and administration's harmful ban on diversity and sensitivity training and abolishing the offensive counterfactual 1776 commission. unity and healing must begin with understanding and truth, not ignorance and lies. host: president biden on the action he took by executive order on diversity, on promoting diversity in his administration. what is your top public policy issue? ross is up first in california, democratic caller. caller: good morning. how are you doing? host: good morning. caller: in the late 1970's, i was in a program where they trained people in a lot of different areas and i think that is something that would really put people to work, whether it

is growing food. my thought was to have -- replace the plastics industry with the hemp industry and produce paper. we get a ton of paper from china. if we were to put the paper end-to-end, of all the paper we have used in this country, it would probably wrap the planet earth several times. the idea is that we can make that stuff right here. one thing that donald trump did was he authorized the use of american production of hemp. we can make paper. we don't have to start with steel. we can start with vegetables and fruit and paper, common products that americans need every day. a government-sponsored program by jimmy carter, that was great. host: where would you rank manufacturing in your top public policy issues? caller: where would i rate it? one person made the point --

everything has changed in this country in the last 20, 30 or 40 years. we have to be willing to start over and and you factoring is going to be critical. a lot of things can be done, like they could be using hemp for car bodies. host: is this in your top five? caller: i don't know that i could list a top-five, but i just wanted to make the point that i made. host: we heard your point. i will go to paul in florida, republican. caller: thank you for your service on public policy. i think we should empower the people, the public, not government. two examples. one is the economic stimulus policy. there are two ways of doing it. one way would empower the people, the other empowers government. the way they are doing it empowers government.

the example is that every trillion dollars that the government has allocated and we are up to $4 trillion, every trillion, we have to teach these people arithmetic. if you divided that equally into the hundred thousand family bank accounts, one trillion divided by 100 million, that is $10,000 per bank account. that means by now, they would spend enough for $40,000 per family bank account. host: how does the government do what you are saying they should do? is it nothing? caller: no. what they should do is minimal involvement, $40,000 of new money in my bank account. without a lot of paperwork and without a lot of government

control. i didn't get $40,000. i got less than $2000. where did the other $30,000 go? where it went is the policy to empower government, not the individual. host: bob in york, pennsylvania, independent. caller: one of the things i think we should do is through this pandemic, we found that we don't manufacture basically the majority of our pills, our antibiotics and the rest of our medication. a lot of that is being done in china. they have us unfortunately by the short hairs, because they are the manufacturer of the medications we use. if biden really wants us to do something through his executive orders, make an executive order on that, because you know with a 10% rate of approval in congress, they are not going to be voting, and they are not

going to be coming to any agreement on that, based on the benefits they get from the pharmaceutical companies. i think that would be key. that would give us back some degree of what we can make in america and to be self supportive. host: ok. clarence in new york. your top public policy? caller: good morning. i want to give my two cents on this, on the manufacturing issue you were talking about earlier? this country is not going to make it on jobs that are not in the manufacturing industry. 60 years ago, we had manufacturing jobs and factory jobs. when the 1970's came in the

1980's came, everything went downhill. how are we going to make it in this country without factory jobs? that was the base of america. host: so should that be president biden, and the democratically controlled congress's -- one of their top items on their to do list? caller: right, that should be the top. there are a lot of people struggling out here. they don't have jobs. it is a whole thing. if people had jobs, they would be better off. host: michael in portland sends us a text to say top public policy issue for me is the urgent necessity of avoiding a literal or figurative civil war. if president biden can make a cabinet level secretary of national unity. we will go to joe in florida, republican. caller: i just wanted to mention -- i have heard it from a couple

callers about china. i think that is the most important that the current administration can have. my concern unfortunately along those lines is that you have a president who not only personally may be compromised in that area, but also that his family, his son, and as vice president, he took his family to china to make some deals, so it is very concerning to me, what his actual push would be, to deal with many of the issues that we talked about. china may recently be testing him in the last few days. there have been multiple incursions by the chinese government, in the taiwanese airspace which had not happened in the previous administration. very concerned. on top of that, the fact that the media has been very dishonest, regarding issues where -- has basically said that joe biden had lied to the

american people, that tony belinsky had conversations with joe biden regarding dealings with himself and his son in china and turned all information over to the fbi. that is my top concern. can this current administration with a compromise president and the media, unwilling to actually explore these issues and be honest with the american people, regarding the biden family, i am very concerned about what can be done with china in that regard. host: on the international front, the washington times, biden, putin, push new start extension. they held their first phone conversation as counterparts on tuesday, in a phone call that underscored troubled relations and the delicate balance between the former cold war foes. mr. biden raised concerns about the arrest of opposition figure and that the two also talked about mr. biden's proposal to

extend the new start arms control deal, one of the last remaining major u.s.-russia weapons treaties. the associated press this morning sent out this tweet with breaking news, saying the russian parliament lower house has approved the extension of the last remaining nuclear treaties with the u.s.. they voted unanimously to renew the new start packed for five years. catherine ohio, democrat caller -- catherine in ohio, democrat caller. caller: i would like to see constitutional law, rule of law, and high moral authority. all three of which were given away by the republican party in the lasted administration. you just said, is it the responsibility of president biden and the democratic party to bring manufacturing back to the united states? it is not only the

responsibility of every walking democrat, but it is also the responsibility of every american. we forget that the lasted administration broke every constitute -- that the last administration broke every constitutional rule and law they came to. now after the coup on the steps of the capital, the republican people, or i call the trumpites, now they want everybody to come and heal. host: how is that related to what you just said about americans being responsible for manufacturing in america? caller: i didn't say americans were responsible. i'm saying that not only joe biden and the democrats are responsible, to make sure that we bring back manufacturing and all other jobs under --

administrations have gone by who sold us out, because they could make more profit in other countries. host: catherine in ohio. scott is a republican in tennessee. your top public policy issue? caller: i would like to see him actually work with the whole idea of america first. that is my goal. i would like him to make sure that we keep the federal government cut back as much as possible so that the companies can actually work and employ more people. i would like him to work with our corporations and not with our government as much. the government is in control of everything as it is right now. what i would like to see him do is give some of that to the people and allow the people to work and give him a chance to open a business because there is not so much regulations. i have tried to start a couple businesses and i have owned a few businesses in the regulations involved in it and the amount of work it takes to

keep your business running, and the amount of money you have to spend just to keep the business running makes it hard to employ people. if they cut some of the regulations back, that would make it easier for people to get jobs. it would make life easier. we could get back to a normal united states again. host: in case you missed it earlier, the washington times reports the senate fell short of support to convict -- rand paul raised a constitutional challenge to the trial. he argued the founding document does not envision a trial for a president who is no longer an office. he lost that vote but those 45 trump votes will be more than enough to acquit the former president. a conviction requires 67 senators. that, and the washington times today. larry in olympia, washington. democrat caller. what is first on your to do

list? caller: ok, first on my to do list would be to revamp the sec -- the fcc, because as far as counterculture and alternative reality and false facts, that is being sold as a form of propaganda that used to be associated with the ussr. we don't have truth in our news agencies now because they can be listed as entertainment to the fcc and still come out with themselves as a new station that is reporting facts when in fact they are not reporting the facts but because they are an entertainment company, they don't have to provide facts according to the fcc. the fcc needs to regulate cable as well as airways. that is my thought on what is happening, with misinformation in america today. host: the associated press has

an update on vaccines today. they are tweeting out french drugmaker -- a french drugmaker will help reduce the coronavirus vaccine since the pfizer vaccine is approved and destroyed -- and this french drugmaker's vaccine will be ready until 2021. tom in pennsylvania, independent. caller: i think i am parroting a call you had a little bit earlier. people need to remember that this current malaise in manufacturing started before clinton. clinton really skyrocketed it with that nafta baloney. i knew at the time that it was going to be a problem. over thebut over the years, peod to ask themselves, who made

money off of this? if you follow the money trail, you will find many more republican backers that made billions off of shipping. through their agreed, they made money overseas, to the point where now we have given away our intellectual property. i i do mean giving it away. -- given away. they sent it over to china with the stipulation that you had to give them your intellectual property, your manufacturing secrets, your knowledge. people need to remember that the most important thing is to look at who made the money off of this. and i say that there are many more republican backers that made money than democrats, which is why i am no longer a republican. host: ok, tom in erie.

next, we will turn our attention to energy and climate change. we will speak with the energy reporter for e&e news, leslie clark, when we come back. ♪ announcer: use our website c-span.org/coronavirus to follow the response to the outbreak. watch our videos anytime on demand and track the spread with interactive maps, all on c-span.org/coronavirus. ♪ announcer: book tv on c-span2 has top nonfiction books and authors every weekend. on saturday at 8:00 p.m., "kama la's way." we talk about the life and career of kamala harris. at 11:00, the book "the great

demographic reversal, aging societies and inflation revival." on sunday at 9:00 p.m., a new york times columnist on "the devil you know." he will be interviewed by robert woodson. watch book tv this weekend on c-span2. ♪ announcer: "washington journal" continues. host: lesley clark discusses president biden's energy policy agenda now. let's begin with what is about to happen in 30 minutes, the nominee for energy secretary, jennifer granholm and discusses , will get underway. guest: she is the former

governor of michigan. she was governor when the economic crisis hit the state, hit the u.s. pretty badly, michigan in particular with the auto industry. she proved herself to be a champion of alternative green energy during that time and really pushed it in the auto industry as a way to get them out of tough times. and i think that she met then vice president joe biden when he was pushing the obama administration stimulus act at that time, so they have known each other. she has personal and work experience there. host: who might object to her nomination? guest: i think she will be confirmed. there will be objections. republicans have already made it clear that they have some objections to her, although i do not think they are insurmountable. the objections will be to the larger biden agenda on energy,

as well as a former governor and as a speaker at the doc, she was outspoken on her criticism over republicans, so i am sure we will hear about that as well. host: what is the timeline, when could she get a vote on the senate floor? guest: i guess it will depend on if they vote today. it seems like it is different in every committee hearing. but i would expect it to be soon. it's a giant agency. obviously, this administration wants to get going quickly. she also has the benefit of having a relationship with the incoming chairman of the senate energy and natural resources committee, senator joe mansion. he's also a former governor, so they share that. he has had nice things to say about her. that will help her confirmation process. host: viewers can watch the

confirmation hearing here on c-span. we will bring you to the senate hearing room at 9:30 a.m. eastern time. you can also watch and listen on our website, c-span.org, or listen with the free radio app. the biden administration has already taken several actions on energy, including rejoining the paris climate agreement, revoking a pipeline permit, and they are also looking at oil in a national refuge. can you just rejoin the paris climate agreement? guest: no, it takes time. just like getting out of it did. president trump signaled that the u.s. would get out of the paris accord in 2017, right after taking office, and it did not officially happen until after the election. so, it will be a process working

through it. president biden is also facing opposition from some summit republicans, who oppose the u.s. getting back into it. i think like every thing else in washington, it will be a process. host: what is the opposition to rejoining? guest: many republicans are opposed because they feel like the paris climate accord puts the u.s. at a disadvantage. that it expects too much of the u.s. to commit to climate goals, by allowing other countries do not do as much. and they are afraid that china and other big countries will get out free and fair. host: we are talking with a reporter for e&e news covering energy, lesley clark.

what has president biden done on the domestic energy sector in the united states? guest: the administration moved quickly. he promised during the campaign that he would ban new leases for oil and gas exploration on federal land. and they are going to be releasing a number of new environmental and energy regulations, like two hours after jennifer granholm goes for her confirmation hearing, so there will be even more stuff they are doing. they are looking to ban the leasing on federal land. they are talking about rejoining the paris climate accord. they are also wanting to set aside land for parks, more conservation land, by 2030. it's a host of stuff. host: let's talk about today's actions, expecting to halt the

leasing of a federal land and water. which industries would be impacted? guest: that is already a hot issue among the oil and gas industry, which wants -- if the administration moves to do that, they will restricted the ability to get natural gas. so republicans on the hill have already made it clear they will fight them on this one. host: can they fight an executive order? guest: they can make a lot of noise about it, and certainly the industry will, you know, could take it -- they could litigate it. host: we are talking about the energy agenda for president biden. let's show his goals. 100% clean energy economy with net zero emissions by 2050. d carbonized and the u.s. power sector by 2035. -- decarbonizing the u.s. power

sector by 2035. what are your questions? lesley, when you look at the goals, what would that entail? guest: it is an aggressive agenda. some have said it is probably the most climate change focused agenda any president has tried. they have already made it clear that this will be an across-the-board effort by the administration. you have janet yellen as the treasury secretary, sworn in yesterday, mentioning that she will set up a finance team and treasury to look at all of the decisions they make with an eye on climate. the commerce secretary yesterday , governor raimondo, saying she considered it a national crisis and that she will look toward

climate change is a major issue. one of the arguments among the critics, especially in oil and gas, is that you will bit thousands, hundreds of thousands of americans out of jobs. the administration says they see this -- you will hear it this morning and testimony -- is they see it as an opportunity for green jobs, for different jobs in the solar industry and wind industry, and electric vehicles. bottom line, it is a huge effort to be able to do that. it will probably take a lot of money, as well. biden has proposed, i think, you $2 trillion plan for green energy. that's everything from adding electric vehicle charging stations to better making sure that our homes are not losing energy, that appliances are up-to-date and delivering a lot

of -- that they are delivering a good deal on electricity, as well as on conservation. host: we will have live coverage right here on c-span of that testimony, coming up in 20 minutes. let's hear from johnny in st. petersburg, florida, a republican. good morning. caller: thank you for taking michael. -- taking my call. can you hear me? host: yes. caller: i think the energy initiatives are a good idea, but the problems are bigger than energy initiatives in our country. i think those initiatives will happen whether we do anything about them or not. and we will probably wind up being the world leaders in that industry, like we are in so many other industries. host: what industries specifically would do well on their own? caller: one i think would do

well on their own, the way things are going now, i think that the cybersecurity, firearms, defense, things along that nature. we are probably heading that w ay. host: let me go to tim in arkansas, an independent. caller: good morning. thanks for your show. to c-span, congratulations for -- this is the first time i have been able to call, congratulations for getting your guy elected, nice work. a unifier and chief, two hours in, canceling the pipeline. the pipeline brought oil here without having to run it on trucks or run it on locomotive trains. it was the cleanest way to get it here, but he shut it down. apparently, everybody -- he wants everybody to be like

california. california cannot even keep their power on. they want to manufacture electric vehicles, but they cannot supply electricity now. so the price of gasoline is going up. guess what? it's going up. i think that your previous guest , saying manufacturing, 10% across-the-board. if we cut own throats, only china is going to win. host: thank you for your comments. guest: the caller brings up an interesting point. that is something the biden administration is grappling with, the idea of the competition with china that you mentioned. that plays into the energy industry. what they have said, and what researchers have noted, is china is doing leaps and bounds, particularly on soil and -- on

solar. people see it as a wave of the future. and so part of it is competition, it is global competition. and the u.s. has -- there are 17 national labs where they have spent money on doing a lot of research, and to not to it would set us back on the global stage beard host: his comments -- stage. host: his comments about the pipeline, that they were going to use it to bring gas and oil across the country, but now what happens with the cancellation? and the impact on jobs. guest: i will address the jobs. there have been numbers thrown around on the impact of jobs. the other day, i think the number was 11,000. there are a lot of construction jobs. it's actually completely not

built yet, so i think they are talking about construction jobs, the estimate around 4000 over the lifetime of the pipeline. so, you would need to maintain it with about 50 jobs. so the jobs numbers have been overstated a lot. the idea of it coming down on trucks and things, the idea is to move away from those fossil fuels and to alternative energy and alternative forms of energy. host: what has the administration said about why cancel it now if it is almost built? guest: well, they do not want to do more fossil fuels, the building of a fossil fuels. that was another campaign promise from joe biden, that the u.s. must turn away from fossil fuels and embrace green energy, a green energy future. host: a caller in wyoming, an independent. caller: good morning.

does the administration plan to incentivize auto manufacturers to produce self charging electric vehicles, like those produced in munich, germany? guest: that is a terrific question. one of the big ideas, or one of the big efforts that jennifer granholm, it will be at a confirmation hearing today, the department of energy oversees a huge loan program that has about $40 billion in it, and it's offered to places to do groundbreaking, sometimes entrepreneurial research and development on things like solar, cars, or electric vehicles. and it got a lot of bad rap, if you remember in the obama administration, for backing

risky propositions, including one that went bankrupt. and the obama administration had to do hearings on that. but it also gave a big loan to tesla, which everybody is a pretty familiar with now. they have been pretty successful as a company, an electric vehicle company. that will be interesting to see what they do with that program. and with that money. that's what it is set up for, to offer loans to riskier businesses that might just need government help to get started, then they pay at that, like tesla did. host: stephen in fort lauderdale. a democratic caller. caller: good morning. i just wanted to say that as a democrat and someone who considers himself in the resistance, that i think most democrats thought joe biden was the best alternative to trump.

in reality, joe biden has been a breath of fresh air and honest with the american people. we love him dearly. host: on energy? caller: -- all the horrible things that donald trump did. host: i will move on. lewis? what do you do? caller: i grow a special treat. i want to talk about energy. food is energy. we have a big problem coming, not just in the u.s., but the whole world. and it's fertilizer. there is a component, cyanide. the middle number, the first number is nitrogen, the second number is a phosphate or phosphorus, and the third number is pot ash. that middle number is a problem. we can deal with the first number. you can deal with the third number.

but the middle number is a problem. host: what is your point, lewis? caller: well, across the sunbelt we can't grow corn and soybeans, which are our biggest proteins, without -- systems. because the jet stream moves north. -- in the summer. and these trees, they are called swamp white oaks, the same tree planted at the 9/11 memorial. host: what do you want the government to do about this? caller: i want them to take a look at it. guest: he brings up an interesting point.

i'm not sure this is the same point. a lot of the fear of climate change is the changing climate is making it inhospitable for different tree species to live where they have been. you will see them migrating, like you will see people migrating, because of the rising waters on the shores and so different tree species are moving, different birds to find places and they are better able to live. so that is one thing that tackling climate change seeks to address. host: a republican caller in delaware. caller: i think a committee should be appointed to go to the oil builds and talked to the people doing the work, who have done the work, and it should be brought back. i think that with the trucks on the roads, the railroads, it is not good.

there are a lot of accidents. i think that there should be a committee to draw a line and get all these things being changed looked at before they cancel the amount. but thank you. host: ok. guest: keystone in particular, the pipeline, has been under review -- i mean, the obama administration put the brakes on it -- i do not even remember the year, but they first put the brakes on it and it was under review for quite some time, for several years. the state department did a review on it. then they trump administration gave it the go-ahead. and now joe biden has put the brakes on it again. this will not be the last of it. host: rick in texas. caller: i was calling -- i've been in the energy business for 25 years.

and anybody who thinks the paris peace accord is a good deal, has not read it. i wonder if this lady has read it. also, i have done a lot of wind and solar projects. and they have never been profitable. right now, it takes billions of kilowatt hours to run our good. we are number two in the world and wind energy and all it produces is 50.4 billion kilowatt hours. solar is a joke. it produces 14.4 billion kilowatt hours. and we are number four in the world in that. so, we do not have the battery capability. but when they do the battery capability, it will devastate the third world because they put women and children to work to get the batteries in third world countries. now they are talking about going

into the oceans to get the nodules. it will be an environmental nightmare, too. it is a good alternative energy, but there is no way it will run the electrical grid. it's impossible. it's make-believe. host: can i have our guests respond? guest: he brings up excellent points and illustrates how difficult it will be. i do not think anyone thinks it will be easy. biden has a $2 trillion plan, i do not know what that means for taxes, but obviously they think it means a lot of money to get this effort off to the races. and you also bring up an excellent point on critical minerals. critical minerals will be necessary and battery storage. the battery storage they make. the department of looking at that, ways to take various

byproducts from other processes and use them or mine them for critical minerals. you bring up excellent points. it's a giant situation. host: john in new jersey, democratic caller. caller: lesley, what i -- host: good morning. go ahead. caller: ok, i have been learning the last couple weeks about the hydro motor. that we will do away with the electrical combustion engine. and they will show the world how it works, everything runs on it, trains, airplanes, trucks, and i heard they will showcase it in tokyo over the summer. there will not be a need for oil after that. they are going to retool a

factory in michigan and get americans back working with these hydro vehicles. and it will be unbelievable. and you can make it out of hemp nowadays. the only thing i can think of you need oil for is asphalt on the road. host: go ahead. guest: he brings up another really interesting research area and new development place and they are going into, hydro. i'm sorry i am not as familiar with it as i should be, but it is definitely an area the energy world is focused on. there's also nuclear, we haven't talked about that. i think two thirds of the department of energy's budget is on the nuclear cleanup side, but there is also nuclear energy. host: we are talking with lesley

clark about the biden administration's energy agenda. his nominee for the energy department will be leading that, that is the former michigan governor, jennifer granholm. she will be testifying before the energy and natural resources committee in a few minutes . will have live coverage of that. it will be on c-span.org or download the free c-span radio app. leading the committee is democrat joe mansion from west virginia, and lisa markowski, the republican of alaska. sandra in ohio, go head. you are next. caller: thank you for taking my call. i have a question. all this talking about the electric car. and putting up these things for

people to plug into, but when you run on electric, you have to go to gas. what's gas made from? how are they going to do this so quickly? he should have waited until the country was back on their feet with jobs, when people were back to where they were before this happened. then think about the pipeline. that way, those people were prepared. he did it right out the first day. he wasn't in office two hours and he stopped 1000 jobs. i do not understand. give me an answer, please. you ladies have a lovely day. guest: well, i can answer what the biden administration expects -- the push for green energy jobs, that the push for green energy will result in jobs. he said millions of jobs on the campaign trail.

they expect them to be in solar, wind, and in hydro, as we mentioned . that is there push, that it is -- their push, that is an economic opportunity. that if you invest in something like tesla, which was a startup company that turned into a behemoth. and as we mentioned on the keystone, that was construction jobs, that they probably would've resulted in 4000 jobs, 50 over the long haul. so they make the argument that better jobs are in green energy. i must say that the market is agreeing with them more and more. they have a lot of support with a lot of companies going away from investing in fossil fuels. host: on the website for e&e,

"republican opposition grows more vocal." explain. guest: it's about the proposed leader for the -- of interior. the administration is looking to ban drilling on federal lands. that would go to the interior department. so, the biden administration is pushing this, but that is bringing opposition to her. host: she would be the first native american to hold the post. an independent from maryland. caller: hello. it's been a while. please give me the time to say what i want to say. host: we are listening. caller: i would like president obama -- biden to ban uranium and clean up the uranium left

from grand canyon to mount taylor, from arizona to new mexico, on the navajo reservation. my people, so many of them have cancer, even -- they are even finding traces of uranium. we want that land. how long are you going to take uranium out of there and ruin our land and our water? host: i have to get a response because the hearing is about to get underway. go ahead, lesley clark. guest: environmental justice is another plank of the administration. they want to spend more time looking at communities that have been unfairly affected by developmental oil and gas

resources, and other disruptive industries. host: i want to read this text from a viewer. dana in los angeles wants to know, what experience the former governor has managing any energy company? guest: i do not think she -- she owns stock in energy companies, but i do not think that she has any private company experience in running an energy company, her experience is in the government's fear. -- sphere. host: what has she said about alternative energy? guest: she said in a republican -- she said it several years ago that we need to turn away from fossil fuels as soon as possible.

host: you expect that line of questioning today? guest: i do. i expect them to push around that. and like the callers said, on the cost and on how can you turn the economy away from fossil fuels to an economy based on green energy. host: who will you be watching in the confirmation hearing? guest: we will be watching the former governor very closely, so he feels a kinship with the governor. so he has not on board with everything the biden administration wants to do on green energy. environmentalists were very disappointed that he will become the chairman of the committee, because wanted to see somebody -- they wanted to see somebody who is more of an environmental champion. he's a senator from west virginia, which has a healthy history of coal mining.

and he believes in taking care of his estate. so that will be a big issue for him. as well as the ranking member is a republican from wyoming. that is another large coal state. i'm sure he will be inquisitive about the plans of for green energy. and the cost, you know, the price tag. the biden administration is pushing for a big covid relief package. and there are thoughts that depending on where that goes, or how that goes, the green energy push will be in a future stimulus, perhaps an infrastructure bill. host: who else is on the committee worth noting and watching today? guest: i think what is really interesting, if you watch the committee, the department of energy has a 17 national laboratories, so he will probably hear her promise to

visit at least 17 states, because everybody has an interest. we did not mention the one big program at the department of energy, it's the nuclear waste pickup. or nuclear waste cleanup. the department is responsible for the cold war legacy of nuclear war weapons. that's a huge issue. the nevada senators will be interested in that, hearing what she has to say about how do we store nuclear waste. i can assure you every senator will have some energy interests and maybe even a facility in their state they will want her to see and talk about. host: greg in pittsburgh, a democratic caller. caller: good morning. my question is how much has joe biden proposed for retraining these people? in western pennsylvania, we lost

steel mills, west virginia with the coal miners -- how much have they put in their plan to retrain workers? host: quick answer. guest: that is a great question. i did not have a dollar figure, but they are working with a lot of the unions and he has union people in the administration, who jobs will be that very thing, jobs for energy workers and figuring out the transition. host: lesley clark is a reporter for e&e news. can you follow her reporting on eenews.net. guest: good to be here. host: the former michigan governor is in the room there. that confirmation hearing will be underway in a minute or so, live coverage right here on c-span.

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