force for empowerment. that's why charter has invested billions, building infrastructure, upgrading technology, empowering opportunity in communities big and small. charter is connecting us. >> charter communications supports c-span as a public service along with these other television providers giving you a front row seat to democracy. >. host: matt lewis joins us. you can find him at matt lewis.org or on twitter. we are talking about party politics. you wrote in a recent piece that the honeymoon is over for the administration. reality has set in. why? guest: joe biden wins the

presidency. that gives everyone a big boost. whoever wins the presidency thinks that they have a mandate but usually they do not. his mandate was do not be donald trump, but people who run for president have all sorts of ideas and plans, but his agenda was going to be fairly modest until he won those senate seats in georgia. all of a sudden, he has democrats controlling both houses of congress. there was a sense of, we could be lbj. we can pass a lot of progressive legislation. it was not a good thing for joe biden. the expectations were raised. it just steamrolled republicans.

it set the expectation that this would be easy. it has not been. host: you wrote that joe biden can quit trying to be fdr or lbj. he can reinvent himself and rewrite his own narrative. he can start acknowledging that he was elected to study the ship, not -- steady the ship, not rebuild it. guest: i believe that joe biden's mandate was, do not be donald trump. it was not, pass a lot of legislation. there are progressives. i do not think that is why joe

biden won the presidency. it was a presentation of folks, some of whom voted for donald trump last time. there was a sense in america that donald trump was very chaotic and we needed to return to normalcy. there is this golden opportunity . in some ways, that was a trap for joe biden. success is measured by how much you accomplish and how many points you put on the scoreboard. the problem is that was never joe biden's raison d'etre.

i think that joe biden, by virtue of being himself can do that. it is about expectations. success means passing a bunch of legislation. they might be disappointed. lbj and fbi both had overwhelming majority of democrats to work with. joe biden has a very of -- very narrow majority. i think it is time to reset the expectations. i feared for his sake that if his success is measured solely by how much legislation he passes, it might be

disappointing. host: call in this morning and let us know how you think the president can be consequential. if you voted for him, i am curious as to what you think the president can do to be consequential. or if you disagree, those that supported the president, he flipped five states. he flipped four senate seats. so why not go for big change? >> part of the problem is, i do not think he can do it. -- guest: part of the problem is, i do not think he can do it. you are what your record says it is. i might be proven wrong, but the problem for now is that even to pass things via reconciliation

--there are specific types of legislation that can pass. just to do that, he needs to have all 50 democratic senators supporting him, and he does not have that on a lot of things. just to name the most prominent democrats who are not necessarily on board with everything that joe biden might want to pass. if he can do it, he can do it. i am skeptical of the fact that he can pass a lot of landmark legislation. when i look back at other presidents who are considered your great in recent history, i think of ronald reagan. he passed a lot of legislation

and did things like tax cuts and amnesty, which may not be popular with callers today. they consequential president. when you look at what are the most important things that reagan did, there were things like winning the cold war and restoring faith in america. they are not legislative bills, per se. these are things that encompass a lot of things, including rhetoric. that is what he does. it is a big deal and it will not require congress to make that a victory for him, if he ends up having a good showing. i am not suggesting that joe biden should give up legislation.

a bunch of things via executive order. i think it is time now. he has hit a bit of a wall to evaluate what he once sprang from his presidency and maybe reset expectations. host: help explain the role that joe manchin plays. guest: he is a u.s. senator from west virginia, a former governor of west virginia, a democrat, sort of an old-school democrat. from the days when west virginia was a predominantly democratic state. obviously a rural state that donald trump won by almost 40 points last time. politically speaking, he has

different political incentives than other democrats, certainly cortez, a more progressive member. joe manchin is more conservative and old-school. he probably, on principle, has different ideas. he was meant toward by robert byrd, the former senator from west virginia who was an unofficial or official historian and had great belief in institutions, including things like the filibuster and preserving things like the filibuster. it informs the politics today and is part of the controversy. a lot of the anger that democrats have towards him.

host: you wrote this article. abortion is why never trump republicans cannot work with democrats. what does that mean? guest: there is a sense out there that those who are never trump should give up on the republican party and throw in with democrats and basically become democrats. there is a schism. 10 people in america who are never trump conservative. most of them live in or near washington dc. i consider myself loosely part of this group. there is even disagreement among us and some never trump conservatives think that the party is long gone. therefore, we should join with

the democrats and vote for joe biden. others --even elected officials, people like liz cheney or the former congresswoman barbara comstock. they tried to reform it and restore it. my argument has been -- it is a debatable question, whether or not the republican party could ever be restored to its former glory. in terms of joining with the democrats, there are a lot of reasons not to, if you are conservative. the one issue that i think is a moral issue is the pro-life issue. the democrats -- joe biden actually was a pro-life democrat. later, he was pro-choice.

he opposed using tax funding. he has reversed his position on that. even if you hate a lot of things that donald trump and the party has done, it has a vastly different worldview. host: let's go to henry in michigan. go ahead. caller: good morning. here is the way that i see things. joe biden and the democrats have a very unique problem. that is that about 70% of the republican party is fascist.

they have authoritarian leanings because of their devotion to donald trump. joe biden is a seasoned politician. messaging is the number one key. they have legislation that they are trying to pass. they have a way to message, to get the message across to people that it is the republicans that are obstructing this progressive improvement that joe biden wants bang to build america back better. joe manchin has to do the bipartisanship route. he has to play the theater route. we have to show the american

people who it is. in our social infrastructure, in our police reform, we have been retarded as a society by a small group of the american body politics. they are extremists on the far right. guest: democracy is messy. if we had a dictator, we could do infrastructure quickly. we have a very messy system. some people might even call that gridlock. i'm not sure if he is engaging in theater.

i'm not sure if we can play it out in front of the american public. kind of a permission structure. it is possible. the one thing i do agree with is what we need is for some leadership. i do not want to criticize joe biden. i do not think any of our recent presidents have done this. we need to go to the american public. use the bully pulpit. just kind of call on the public to go over the heads of the

other party. again, we live in a very polarized country right now. to push the opposing party to do the right thing. if joe biden could say, we need to do infrastructure and went over the american public sufficiently, that would be a positive thing. it has not happened in america in a long time. host: a bipartisan block in the senate sent to sell its compromise. what is the possibility of this getting passed and signed by the president? guest: this will tell us a lot. either republicans are engaging in good faith, which is to say

there are a handful of republicans, people like susan collins, mitt romney and others who are sincerely negotiating in good faith and are willing to make a deal. or they are not. maybe they are stalling and this is a ploy to drag out, run out the clock on joe biden so that he cannot accomplish things. we might be about to find out. i do not know the answer to it. i hope that republicans are just holding to their principles. i shared concerns about the price tag on some of these things. i think joe biden had about six trillion dollars in mind. you do not think that there are going to be problems with the budget and inflation and other externalities?

they have a defensible point about wanting to control. i think -- we do need infrastructure. i am curious as to how this plays out. if republicans do this whole lucy pulling the football away from charlie brown at the last minute act, that might persuade someone like joe manchin to go ahead and support the democrats, if they act unilaterally. >> 19 6 -- color: i remember a man went to jail for smoking marijuana and 1970, i was sworn in. the very next year, they decriminalized marijuana and i

think around 1980, they passed a law that you could have marijuana, but you could not deposit it in a bank. they put tax so high that it was cheaper to buy it on the street. they said that they attempted to bring america back to what it was. remember, i have 80 years on this earth and politics have never been good. h we were talking -- host: we were talking about this. putting the money back into communities that have been hurt. chuck schumer is looking at legislation as well.

he think they can get on board? >> i think it is definitely possible. this is one issue that we have talked about the cultural warriors. the fact that this is not a terribly controversial issue anymore speaks to how things have shifted. there was a time when this was a hot button issue and people would have been very divided about this as a gateway drug. the fact that i do not think i have heard any color yet who opposes decriminalizing marijuana. there are a lot of republicans who would be fine with it. it will be curious. one trend that we are seeing is a spike in violent crime in major cities. this is something i am keeping

an eye on. it seems like inflation, the border crisis and crime would be the three things that i am watching that joe biden really has to be wary of. you can imagine that if crime becomes a major issue in america , public opinion could shift again on the issue of marijuana, but as of right now, i think you will get plenty of republicans who support this. host: what is the impact of marjorie greene. there was a holocaust comparison after she visited the holocaust museum. you have democrats who wanted to put a resolution on the floor,

center --censuring her for those comments. republicans wanting to censure democrats like congresswoman omar for her rhetoric. speaking of marjorie taylor greene, what is the impact of her election on the republican party? guest: i was happy to see her apologize. that is something that is rare in politics today. we have seen a message from donald trump that you never apologize. that was sort of the mantra. it was noteworthy that she apologized. it is good that she did it. otherwise, i think i kind of look at marjorie taylor greene as more of a symptom of a broken political system then someone who will be driving things that

much. i know that she drives a lot of news coverage because of her outrageous rhetoric, but mainly, the take away is that she is a symptom of a very dysfunctional political system. the fact that she got kicked off of her committees and still raised over $3 million in the first quarter speaks to some real institutional problems. it used to be that there were party bosses in smoke filled rooms. they decided who the nominee's work. there were some problems with that system. he probably got some competent, experienced people nominated to represent your party. we have a different system now

where you can be super outrageous, and you can even get kicked off of your committees, and your political party -- the bigwigs in your party, the gatekeepers and elites -- the leaders of your party do not have much leverage over you. it is almost like a utopian thing. they can crowd source and fund you. it is actually really bad. we need some gatekeepers because the inmates are running the asylum. i think that marjorie taylor greene is probably a good example of that. host: i think party politics could be tempered if the administration made changes to secure the border. we need acknowledgment of operation warp speed from him.

guest: not everything that donald trump did was bad. some of the things that donald trump did, they --take the border. the implementation of it was flawed and uncompassionate. then i think joe biden made a mistake coming in, signaling that the border was open again. that borders do not even exist, so we had this rush of people and migrants to the border which led to a humanitarian crisis. even kamala harris is saying, do not come to the border. she is angering some progressives. what we have to do -- i agree. it is bad if joe biden cannot control the border.

inflation, crime --a border crisis is not good for joe biden. what --if a country is going to be successful, we need a lot of immigrants and legal immigrants. we need to control our border. you cannot have people coming into your country illegally. you are not a country if you cannot control your border. we need to be humane and compassionate about how we police it. if people are fleeing, we need to have a system to rapidly adjudicate that and determine if they can stay or not. i guess i am a moderate on this. we have to control the border. we need to find a way to do it compassionately. we have not been able to strike

that balance in a long time. host: robert is a republican. welcome to the conversation. caller: perfect segue to my question. joe biden. does he support sanctuary cities? if he does, it is in violation of current immigration law. how can he be sworn to uphold the laws and ignore sanctuary cities? for the vice president to say, do not come here when you have dozens of cities that are saints immigrants, if you can get in here, break our laws and game the system, we will take care of you. i think the president is doing a great disservice to america. can you explain how sanctuary cities benefit america? guest: i am against sanctuary

cities. i do not know where joe biden stands on it. it is one of the benefits of joe biden is that she has not --during the presidency, during the presidential primary season, when a lot of democrats like kamala harris where endorsing the medicare for all and defunding police, kind of sticking out progressive controversial positions that were very popular on woke twitter, joe biden resisted the urge, or if he supported things, there were always caveats and nuances. it was hard to label joe biden. people want to call joe biden medical, socialist and marxist, and it is kind of laughable to say that.

he is a democrat and a liberal. you could argue that in some ways, because of the way our politics have shifted, the most progressive president, but he has also avoided many landmines, those issues that are hot button issues. we are probably one google search away from knowing the answer, but it certainly has not hurt him so far. host: let's go to our democratic color. caller: good morning. my comments are as follows. we are constantly talking about bipartisanship, however the republican's mission is to make sure that the democrats are not able to implement anything. their whole, entire goal is to

block joe biden from doing anything, and every time a democrat gets in office, the republican party does this. they talked about tax, tax, tax or always spending. let's look at the debt that we are currently in because of the last administration. it boggles my mind that my percentage of taxes is higher than those of proctor and gamble. i am just amazed, yet we continue to bash the democratic party by saying that they will not do anything. your entire goal is to shut it down. >> it definitely seems that way. if you go back and you actually look at barack obama's

presidency, there was a lot more bipartisan accomplishment than people appreciate or realize. we think of these issues that get covered on cable news. there are a lot of things that happened in congress, a lot of bipartisan legislation that does not get through the headlines. i do think that the way to win power is to stop the other party from accomplishing anything. it is a different dynamic. there was a time when democrats had been really dominant. they controlled the house for something like four decades.

they were complicit in this. newt gingrich came along and said, no, we are not going to take deals and take our share of the crumbs left over. we are going to fight. that probably began the political era that we are in, for better or worse. i think that part of the problem is that there is not a dominant political party. since 2000, we had the 2000 election, which was obviously incredibly close. we had control of the house, back and forth, control of the senate --that has not been one political party that has emerged as the dominant party. some of that is because republicans have been able to win by virtue of things like the

electoral college. it is beside the point. neither party has been able to put together a coalition that would make them dominate. if one political party is dominant for long enough, the other party will realize that they have to cooperate. that has not been the case. the lesson has been that obstruction works. if you prohibit the party in power from accomplishing things, then you will get back in power. that is obviously such a horrible system, but that is kind of where we are right now. caller: hello. how are you doing?

i just want to say, if you do not go back in history and look at political parties, you do not realize what we have here today. my history with the political party started with eisenhower. and you go through all the different republicans and democratic presidents. back in the day, some of them had the same ideas of low taxes producing a viable economy. now you move through nixon. he had good ideas and policies. moving through the history, now we are here with the democratic party. if you have a party that is dominant for a long period of time, the other party has to come in and cooperate to get anything done. that works for both parties. if you do not work together, you

come to where you are at now. the democrat party gone so far left that they want socialism or communism. they want to be the dominant party. all the other parties, they would have to come in along with the program, but what you have to vote for, you do not vote for the ideology. evoke for the policies. if the person has good policies, it works for you. i do not care if you are republican or democrat, but i do not think you could get a communist to do the right thing because they do not care about how you vote. they just care about your money and that you work for the state. guest: a few things there.

it is interesting to see how the medical parties align and reform. in many ways, the republican party is really focused on winning working-class white men. republicans --donald trump made some strides there, but the working class white and populist vote. the caller mentioned kennedy and nixon. nixon created the epa and price control. this is a weird business. just the way that things shift, if we are not careful, we could lose track of that. the color also talked about things like communism.

i have to say, again, if one political party were to be dominant for long enough, it is like a bully on the playground. you do not have a lot of fight if there is an established bully. it is when the different sides think that there is a competition. among the many scary developments that we are seeing is that these two sides are becoming more radical. we have had colors report -- referring to republicans as having an authoritarian or fascist strain. the last caller talked about democrats as communists. in modern american policies, we were much more centrist.

we called bill clinton a communist, but certainly right now, i think joe biden has a moderate temperament. when you look at people like those on the left and those on the right, they are not president, but you can begin to see how the extremes in our politics are certainly becoming more mainstream and prominent. caller: yes. good morning. two things. everybody keeps talking about communism, but this is a fascist government i'm aware politics are hand in hand. that is why corporations --nobody goes to jail, but they want to be known as a person.

look at the way that wells fargo does business. they should not be allowed. let's get back to immigration and the illegal situation. this is a definition of racism. it is to control the black community. that is exactly what you are doing. you are telling your citizens, not only must we learn english but spanish. you are telling them that we can come over here and if you want english, press one. this is crazy, but it is a racist situation because the biggest employer of illegals is the government. that is crazy. it is like getting a license and saying, we are going to automatically register you to

vote. host: we will leave it there. guest: i do not think immigration is a conspiracy theory. maybe democrats like a lot of immigration because they assume --maybe wrongly that immigrants will be more likely to vote for democrats, but i do not think there is a grand conspiracy theory to keep down african-americans. there is always just been this assumption that the way to win hispanic votes and other minority votes is to be pro-immigration and pro-amnesty. i'm not saying that this color as -- is representative of a large swath of voters, but you can see that there are americans out there who are minorities,

who see immigration, illegal immigration differently. you could be someone who immigrated to this country from central america and resent other people coming in illegally. they might end up driving down the price of labor. it is a complicated issue. the fact that donald trump did surprisingly well among hispanics in places like florida speaks to this notion --this whole idea that the way to attract immigrants and minorities is to be open borders -- that is not necessarily a correct analysis. host: matt lewis is a senior columnist and you can find him on mat lose.org on the daily