ahead at the white house. be sure to join the discussion with your phone calls, text messages, and tweets. washington journal. host: the house and senate return today for a full week of legislative work ahead of the july 4 recess. this past weekend as summer officially began, gave us a glimpse of what returning to norm almay be like and what we could expect over the july 4 who day. good morning, welcome to "washington journal," for important, june 21, 2021. we'll start the program asking you about that return to normal. are you resuming your prepandemic activities? here's how we have separated the line this morning for your thoughts and comments. if you are under the age of 35,

call 202-748-8000. between 35 and 60. the line is 202-748-8001. over the age of 60-202-748-8002. if during the pandemic you were diagnosed with covid the line is 202-748-8 o 003. we welcome your texts, also 202-748-8003 tell us your name and where you are texting from. on facebook post your thoughts at facebook.cop/c-span or send us a tweet @cspanwj. it's not just the return to normal in temples weekend or family activities. in terms of the economy. your job. are you back at work? is your office or place of work planning to reopen or fully reopen? maybe they never closed. we would be interested to hear your experience and what you may anticipate in the weeks and months ahead as things open up in the economy. the associated press polled

americans and their thoughts on the pandemic. their summation the headline many americans resuming previrus activities. they write that many americans are relaxing precautions taken during the covid-19 pandemic. and resuming everyday activities. even as some worry that coronavirus related restrictions were hastily lifted. the poll is from the associated press and nrc center republic affairs research. the majority of americans regularly doing so before the pandemic say they returning toe bars and restaurants. traveling, and attending events such as of movies or sports. in this they say 21% are very or extremely worried about a covid infection in their inner circles. and the lowest level since the pandemic began only 25% are hardly concerned that the lifted restriction also lead to additional people being infected in their community. they also say in this survey from the associated press that just 34% of americans think

restrictions in their area have been lifted too quickly. and that while somewhat fewer, 27% say that they were not lifted quickly enough. about four in 10 rate the pace of reopening as about right. that's the associated press. we'll check back with that poll and other results from that poll as well. are you resuming your pre pandemic activities? cnn, one of their economic pieces yesterday said -- had this headline, the u.s. economy is never going back to normal. they write in this piece that the u.s. economy has come a long way since last year's devastating down turn. but a return to norm almay not be possible. the back to normal index created by cnn business and moody's analytics stands at 93% as of june 18. a new pandemic era high. the index is prized of 37 national and seven state level indicators that track metrics such as consumer credit, unemployment claims, job

postings, domestic he air travel. the latest reading write cnn that america is inching closer to normalcy but the last mile will be tough. various states have done away with restrictions, life as it used to be hasn't demrifully resumed. 202-748-8000. if you are under 35. 2302-748-811-8001. 35 and 60. over 60, 202-748-8002. if you had covid or diagnosed with covid 202-748-8003. not just your personal life and your economy and what your tate is doing. if they lifted all restrictions or if some are still in place. be interested in hearing that. one of those states earlie

spikes in the pandemic, washington state, from the "seattle times." the headline says washington is tantalizingly close to a near return to normal but covid risks are staying higher in some areas. washington is going to fully reopen soon. not today, probably not tomorrow. but soon. end of the month at the latest. quote, we are on the 2-yard line. the governor said last tuesday, pleading with state residents to hold out just a little longer before the state drops its remaining covid-19 restrictions. to suss out the metaphor the goal line is 70% of washington residents, 16 and older, receiving at least one vaccine dose. washington according to the department of health has given shots to 67.8% of those residents. two yards or 2.2% of residents or fewer than 135,000 people to go. the "seattle times" writes in recent weeks the state has been averaging about 10,000 2015,000 first -- to 10,000 first doses

per day according to the state department of health. from the "seattle times." your experience. are you resumeling your prepandemic activities? alan's in brooklyn first up. good morning, alan. go ahead. caller: good morning. thank you. so many aspects of this -- relationship with elderly mother. young grandson. synagogue activities. i had been near retirement before the pandemic hit in solo law practice in brooklyn. the necessity for people to basically digital remote operators to continue working during the pandemic forced me to be pretty much inactive and paying to keep the office rent and salary and phone up as a pilot light hoping things get back to normal. i had no idea it was going to drag on so long that basically i paid out of pocket to keep the

office open because it's a small office. we were not able to continue operating as usual remotely. i still don't know at this point whether i'm going to be trying to get back up to speed before actually formally retiring. everything is at a lower level activity now. i'm one of the few people in my office building who is coming in in person. larger offices may be continuing to operate. but there are people at home. but i'm not set up for digital operation. although, i, my wife, son, and daughter-in-law have all been vaccinated, we are afraid of giving a 3-year-old grandson exposure to one of the variants by getting indoors with them. so we have continued to limit our activities with our grandson very rare at all to outdoor until we know these variant exposures are not a problem. and then our synagogue has been trying the best to be responsible, but we are in a period now where governor

cuomo's directives give people the impression they can be almost at normal operation indoors. they still give people instructions to be careful and about half of them still wear masks. and they are still an area where people want to wear masks can sit separately. for many the return to normal is happening too rapidly and some people are being a little reckless about getting close together. host: how have you done financially in terms of your business? caller: basically i'm paying to keep the office open this past year because there have been no trials. there's been very little in the way of in-person depositions. as a small office we were never set up to operate remotely. we were basically dormant for most of the year. until spring when all of our vaccinations allowed us to go back in and try to operate out of the office. but basically it's out of pock tote keep the place running

until we could start getting up to the point where revenues are coming back in. host: thanks for your comments this morning. we'll show you the headline later. this is the front page of the "new york times" this morning. new york trails the rest of the u.s. in virus rebound. economic scars linger. we'll get back to that in a moment. carolyn, calling in, vincent, ohio. hi, good morning. caller: good morning. i would say i am back to normal. i'm not wearing a mask. but i will say i'm on the border of west virginia and ohio and i notice many people are still wearing masks. i will say they are wearing masks more than they ever did during the past year and some odd months. i was beginning to wonder if

maybe i should wear my mask because i know the fully vaccinated amount for the two counties, one in west virginia and one here in ohio, is pretty low. i'm fully vaccinated, but i see all these people when i'm out and about wearing a mask and it's more than what it was. host: what do you think is driving that? additional mask wearing that you are seeing? caller: well, i'm wondering -- was listening intently to the gentleman that was just on and he had very good reasons. he said about grandchildren and on and on. that can't get the vaccine. and maybe that's what's up with them, too. they are concerned about the young ones that can't get the vaccine that are under 12. i'm just thinking it's an older

community, too. and they are trying to protect themselves. yeah, i was beginning to think that maybe i should go back to wear my mask. i don't want to, but with the low amount of fully vaccinated and what the gentleman was saying before my call, i'm beginning to wonder if maybe i should be more cautious, too. host: appreciate your call this morning from ohio. we go to linda in mississippi. you were diagnosed with covid. hope everything's ok now. caller: oh, yeah. good morning. i've had the virus at my age with my issues i'm blessed. me and my husband both vaccinated and the children. but it's still -- we still wear our masks even when we went back

into church. but we still sit separately. we still doing the same we did before we were vaccinated because i live in mississippi. and mississippi percentage is just 28%. even though there's a chance of my contact, might get sick, i'm not taking a chance anymore because there are reckless people out there. the virus cares nothing about your religion, your political affiliation, your race, your job, or whatever. people need to get vaccinated and get us to a high percentage of vaccinated america or we are going to have another wave. host: even wearing your mask there, linda, do you feel comfortable around people again?

particularly family. are you really close friends, are you comfortable being back together with them again? caller: only with the ones that i know is vaccinated. the ones i don't know is vaccinated i still keep my distance from because they are careless. my family, most my family is vaccinated. but there are many that are not. so i just do what i did before for my safety and for other people around me. i just wear my mask, wash my hands, and still disfans myself from those -- distance myself from those that i don't know. host: our opening question this first hour are you resuming your pre3ec9 activities. -- prepandemic activities. 202-748-8000, under the age of

35. 202-748-8001 under the age of 60. and if you are diagnosed with covid, call 202-748-8003. the both your personal experiences, what your state is doing, and what it's like with your place of employment and whether that's returning to normal any time soon. we'll get back to more of your calls and comments momentarily. we are joined next by susan crabtree who is white house national political correspondent for real clear politics. good morning, susan. guest: good morning. host: been a busy time for the president overseas last week returning midweek. this coming week a busy week domestically. at least certainly on the thing that he's interested in, the infrastructure proposals in congress and the coat. the preliminary vote in the senate on tuesday. on voting rights. tell us more about his week ahead. guest: back to basics at the white house.

the more basic, less glamorous job of legislating. when lawmakers left town last week there was significant progress being made, bipartisan progress being made on three different things. infrastructure, as you mentioned voting rights, and the police reform bill. as you look ahead to the week, we have a meeting today with the white house, president biden is meeting with financial regulators. we don't know too much about this meeting other than it will focus on regulatory priorities, including climate related financial risk and agency actions. then on wednesday there is an interesting meeting that the president will be doing on crime prevention. there's been a lot of spikes in crime around the country anti-president has avoided this so far. it's been a republican talking point that he is now going to address this and have a meeting with stakeholders on wednesday. thursday, he'll be traveling to

north carolina to promote vaccinations. and on friday, he will deliver remarks on pride month. and also meet with the president of afghanistan about the withdrawal. as you mentioned the big action is going to be taking place on capitol hill this week. we have a lot of response we are waiting for from the white house on this new bipartisan infrastructure bill that this group of 21 lawmakers have backed. the lead republican, senator portman, has been talking this up over the sunday talk shows over the weekend. there is disagreement, as you know, on the -- how to pay for it. senator bernie sanders the budget committee chairman has his own $6 trillion proposal which is far more expansive. he was somewhat opened to the idea of the bipartisan proposal, which was much more scaled down at $1 trillion, but he said he didn't agree with the republican proposal to increase gas taxes

and index for inflation or have an additional tax on clean energy vehicles. he didn't like that. so they are at a crossroads again on the infrastructure bill when it comes to paying for it. host: the president reviewing that bill. will we hear from him today or tomorrow on that bill? guest: we are expected to hear from him today on that bill. this afternoon we are waiting that response. there's also we are going to get hints of that at the noon -- noon press briefing with general psaki. host: what about the procedural vote in the senate tomorrow. a tweet this morning from vm harris, she's headed to pittsburgh and tweets about that on child tax credit awareness day. susan, the president has designated kamala harris, the vice president, as the point person on voting rights. do we expect her to play some sort of role or be in the senate

as that procedural vote happens tomorrow and days to come on voting rights? guest: well, that's a really good question. she is the point person on that and border security. and border crisis. i don't think you can call it anything else but that right now. we haven't seen her very much on the voting rights initiative. you have civil rights leaders saying they want progress on this. you don't have any type of bipartisan agreement on this. you have joe manchin coming out saying he's going to support this scaled down voting rights bill that would have basically unvail election day holiday and 15 days ahead of time for some voting. provide more absentee ballots for people who need them. it's much more scaled back than what the democrats really want. we haven't heard very much from kamala harris on this. i think people on the hill are

waiting her response. this is not going anywhere in the senate in terms of republican support. even senator rob portman yesterday senate talk shows he was saying he just doesn't believe fundamentally he could support what he called a federal takeover election because the constitution, he said, provides that right to run their own elections to the states. host: we'll play some of that audio from senator poreman in our program later. let me ask you about the president's 70% goal for july 4. the first lady will tout vaccinations in nashville and other places. you entionmed the president getting to north carolina later in the week to do that very same thing. how important of a goal is this for the administration? guest: they are scaling it back a little bit because it's not going to reach the 70% he wanted to by july 4. they are not near that goal. they are inching closer. they have revised it they want

300 million vaccines by july 4. the first 150 days. that's why they are shooting for that. this is one of the few pandemic goals the president hasn't met. he's scaled that back but also upping his selling it to the american people with a trip to north carolina i believe on thursday. host: susan crabtree is national political correspondent, white house and national political correspondent for real clear politics. read her reporting at realclearpolitics.com. thanks for being with us this morning. our opening question for you this morning. are you resuming your prepandemic activities. interested in your both permanent life and what are you doing and your job and economic situation. 202-748-8000 the line to call if you are under the age of 35. 202-748-8001 between 35 and 60.

and if you are over the age of 60. 202-748-8002. the redline of this piece earlier this morning, from "the new york times" in terms of where that state is. their headline, new york trails the rest of the u.s. virus rebound. economic scars linger. as the national economy recovers from the pandemic and begins to take off. new york city is lagging with changing patterns at work and travel threatening the engines that have long powered its jobs and prosperity. new york has endured deeper job losses as a share of the work force than any other big american city. other country has remained gande 2/3 of the positions it lost. new york has recouped fewer than half leaving a deficit of more than 500,000 jobs. restaurants and bars are filling up again. scars are everywhere. boarded up storefronts and for lease signs dot many neighbor b neighborhoods.

empty sidewalks in midtown manhattan make it feel like a weekend in midweek. subway rider ship on the week days is less than half two years ago. it stems largely from the heavy relines on office workers, business travelers, and service businesses catering to all of them. all eyes on september when many plan to bring workers to the office and broadway reopens. even then the rebound will only be partial. from "the new york times." get back to your calls. louise in oklahoma city. thanks for waiting, louise. go ahead with your comment. caller: yes. i live in a senior citizen apartment complex. and there's 80 apartments here. and everybody was doing rather well. a good percentage of not having it. it's getting worse again.

and not me personally but all around me. next door, across the hall. everybody's just about had it. i don't get out at all. i've got a friend that does. and she has had both her shots. i have, too, but i'm not going to get out there. she gets my mail for me. so i don't have to do anything if i don't want to get out. host: your view, louise, it's still not safe for you to go out. caller: no. we've got about -- i heard we've got two new cases here. and i heard from another friend there's five. host: to bismarck, north dakota, john. caller: yes. good morning. thank you for c-span.

north dakota had some very limited restrictions back in march, april and may of 20. we didn't really -- we really didn't do anything with restrictions here in north dakota. we did much like south dakota. south dakota was 100% open all the time. they didn't do any restrictions with businesses or masks or anything. and north dakota was very close to that. we did end our mask restrictions in march of this year. business is booming. back to normal. we've got jobs, jobs, jobs. if anybody needs a job, good-paying jobs, north dakota is the place to go. it's beautiful this time of year. we are looking forward to prosperity ahead. host: this is ray, ithaca, new

york. hi. caller: good morning. i haven't resumed no activity. i'm still very scared. new york state's been hit very hard by this. it seemed like one day the lady from the c.d.c. said i wouldn't send my own son to summer camp. the very next day, literally the very next day, you don't have to wear a mask anywhere. anything. i don't trust it. i think they are pushing to reopen. i'm very scared. host: lines divided by age. if you are under the age of 35. 202-748-8000. between 35 and 60, 202-748-8001. and over the age of 60, 202-748-8002. are you resuming your prepandemic activities? headline from the "wall street journal" says, forget going back to the office. people are just quitting instead they write in this piece that several factors are driving the

job turnover. many people are spurning a return to business as usual. preferring the flexibility of remote work or reluctant to be in an office before the virus is vanquished. others are burned out from extra pandemic work loads and stress. some are looking for higher pay to make up a spouse's job loss or use the past year to reconsider their career path. and shift gears. that's from the "wall street journal." in seattle, trish on the over 60 line. hello, welcome. caller: hey, good morning, everybody. just three quick points. i retired earlier than i planned. as a nurse case manager, taking calls from sick people all the time was just absolutely exhausting hearing all this really, really sad stories where people were isolated, couldn't get to their doctors, etc.

the second point is, yes, because now i'm retired i'm really looking forward to getting out and doing things. and the third point, with that being said, i have trepidation about going out a lot because of all the shootings and really benign places. the grocery store, the whatever. so that's what's on my mind. host: appreciate that. this is from "politico" this morning. somebody mentioned hearing from the c.d.c. director. this is "politico's" story this morning. the headline is america is ready for -- to return to normal. biden's c.d.c. she isn't sure. the newly installed director of the center for disease control and spreengs had one big request for agency employees at an all hands meeting in march. don't talk to the press without permission.

her remarks caught many c.d.c. scientists and officials off guard. her boss, president biden, had campaigned on a promise to take control of the pandemic by letting science lead. a pledge that hinged almost entirely on allowing the nation's top health experts, including those at the c.d.c., to speak publicly. "politico" writes the c.d.c.'s director's request seemed to contradict what the biden administration was trying to achieve. revitalizing the federal government's covid-19 response by spotlighting federal scientist that is former president trump had cast aside. it was very clear that walensky did not want anyone talking to reporters at the time. a senior, c.d.c. official told "politico" she wants to control the narrative as much as possible. "politico" writes that the anecdote highlights the extent to which the c.d.c. and its director have struggled to send a clear and unified message on public health measures to fight covid-19. their track record so far has been mixed, including an abrupt reversal on -- abrupt reversal

on masked rules on vaccinated adults after a public outcry. brenda in ohio. good morning. caller: hello. i have grandchildren that haven't had the shot. and i had a granddaughter start summer school because of her grades. she raised flags all year with this remote learning. she was a straight a student before. so we had trouble with that. but they stopped the restrictions in our schools and my granddaughter was going to summer school with no mask, all these kids going on field trips and school buses, sitting next to each other. you don't know if the parents have had the shot. all these kids are just put into a petrie petrie dish. you hope they don't get the covid. this is political when it should

be not even political. it's a health thing. at first the kids were thought, oh, they can't get t they have a low rate of getting it. we protected our elderly. now we don't care about the kids. and i don't know what i'm going to do next year when school opens because i still have grandkids that haven't had the shot and the restrictions are gone. i just can't understand how our nation can just throw the kids under the bus when we were trying to save the rest of us. host: i think, brenda, you may know better being a grandmother, that the age now for kids, the lowest age is age 12, correct, for kids to get the vaccine. caller: right. i'm just waiting and praying for the time that our kids can get it because we still live in a bubble. i have had the shot. my husband. i have had different family

members. but we still have family members that are young that haven't. your first job as a human you marry, have children, and your job becomes not just protecting your spouse but your children. and now as you get older it's your grandchildren. there is a crazy line. it's not protect your children anymore. let's open up and have jobs. i think people should work. but i mean i think your first job in life is to protect your family. host: for the family members, the grown family members you have that have not been vaccinated, generally, what's their reason? caller: their reason, i hate to say it, it's political. i have a family on both sides of this political hoopla and the ones that are democrat they have been vaccinated.

the ones that are republican, they go on the internet and believe everything off that and don't even watch the news on any station. and it's political. it's sad and scary. i stay away from the ones that aren't -- had their shot because my first job is protect my grandkids. host: appreciate your call this morning. 202-748-8000 the line for those of you under age of 35. over 35, 35 to 60. 202-748-8001. and over 60, 202-748-8002. and again if you've had covid, diagnosed with covid, it's 202-748-8003. a couple comments on twitter. this one says went to the movies with a friend yesterday here in new york city. amc still has retirements but relaxed mandates. i still prefer to wear a mask. i feel things have gotten too

comfortable and fear another major spike. facebook says, fully took advice of the best scientists in the world as i have done my whole life, got the shots. lance says no not enough people have been vaccinated. dean says never miss add day of work on a federal lake. both sales and rentals all the way lockdown never have wedown more busy. fernando in san bernardino, california. good morning. caller: good morning. the question of if i'm going to resume my activities prepandemic, i will not, sadly. and that's not due to -- actually it's due to the fact that i'm trying to protect my family. i know that there's a lot of good people in this country who have gotten their shot. they are ready to protect not only their community but their fellow workers. essential workers especially.

but it's not the time for people . personally i have lost my father, not from covid, but from other complications. during the covid outbreak, especially in february, it was very tough to be in the hospital with him during his last moments. and i don't see many -- any safe place, really, especially during this time of the pandemic, i have seen in the news, i'm 20, just for the viewers who are listening. i have seen people, especially some of my friends, who go out, watch movies, or at the beach, who go to mexico, gone to canada gone to florida and seen the festivals. for me it's something as a

thing, i care about my community. i care about my health. but i want to do what i want to do first. and for me that's more of something that really doesn't fit with me in the slightest. i have my mother. i have two nieces. i have my sister. my brother-in-law. their health comes first. in my community it's easy to get infected by covid-19. it's easy to get infected once and spread it to other people without knowing. i want to visit my aunts. my cousins who live especially close bye. -- close by. but it's more of a hassle to live with covid than to protect yourself and your family. host: what's going to be a sign for you that things have cleared up? that you can resume some of those prepandemic activities? caller: one of those things

would be going back to my religious meetings with my congregation. host: that they open back up those meetings. caller: they have not. we are doing it through zoom. especially hard for the older folks. especially my congregation not seeing them. i'm blessed to be able to use zoom. to see them at least during this time. but until that happens, until we are able to meet each other it feeling faith, i think that's the moment when i will feel comfortable resuming my prepandemic activities. i feel that's going to happen maybe in a year. host: thanks for your call this morning. as he often does, author brooks with a unique perfect spect. a once in a lifetime chance to start over. here's just a bit of what he

writes. he says, we all yearn for the end of human suffering brought toy buy the pandemic. many if not most of us look forward to the end of the constraints and inconveniences it has imposed. deep inside there are probably a few things you dread about going back to normal life. each of us if we are brutally honest could make a list of the activities and relationships that we didn't like in prepandemic times. but that we accepted through self-deception, shear inertia, and the pressure to go along and get along. a bit of what author brook -- arthur brooks is thinking and writing. we hear from dennis next. hello. caller: hello. this is dennis. what the lady in ohio was saying. she's worried about her grandkids getting no shots. i never heard any of the kids

getting sick. the older people were getting sick. i don't know when the american people wake up and realize that this is all just propaganda bull crap from the government just trying to get you to get shots. like 50 years ago, a whole bunch of us got shots. we never had colon cancer before. now we got colon cancer. what's this shot going to do to people years down the road. host: dennis, you think there was a correlation -- what were your shots 50 years ago? polio vaccine? caller: yeah. everybody had holes in their arms. them circles in there. host: you think that led to colon cancer? caller: who knows. you never know.

host: to dianne in ann arbor, michigan. welcome. caller: yes. hello. i'm calling about the masks, using them. you have to protect yourself. you have to do what makes you feel comfortable. if you don't feel comfortable going in a public setting where you don't know people, by all means wear the mask. when you are with family members you know are immunized then take it off and enjoy time with your close friends and family that you know are safe. it's as simple as that. we just have to protect ourselves. this idea of people being pushed to believe -- if you believe -- support trump you don't wear a mask. the churches say if you have enough faith in jesus you don't need the covid shot.

and also add our local church here, not mine, one in our community, was saying that. actually it was causing divisions in the families in that church because if you got the shot then you had less faith. that's what this is all coming to. and you just have to decide for yourself. i'll also add in that church they got 20 cases of covid. people are -- you're right are being pushed in a corner. it's not right. that we do that, that you are less of a family or whoever, supporter, that getting the shot. it's political divisiveness that's just everywhere. also, could i just -- it's about the unemployment deal. i just spoke to a friend and they said, they are just sitting back and getting unemployment. think of it from a mother's perspective especially if she's

a single parent. if she goes back to work, number one, she's exposing bringing something back to her family. if she can find daycare. she's making more than she would have otherwise? corporations have to step up. they have to pay people what they are worth. small businesses, i think, it would be great if our -- if the government, maybe subdiced them so everybody made $15 an hour. this idea of if they can't -- if they give them the support, it goes directly back in the economy. it just makes sense. host: another story here complicating the employment situation. showing how complicated it is in the country. millions are just quitting their jobs as the headline, the business section of "new york times." at some point earlier this year justin hoffman concluded he was being underpaid. the marketing director of an

orthopedic practice in ohio was making $42,000 a year. about $13,000 less by his count than people were making in similar jobs elsewhere. but when asked for -- asked for a raise in march he was given only a small bum national park pay. he said that was the straw that broke the camel's back. after careful thinking mr. hoffman, 28, did what he longed to do. he quit, his last day was june 4. he's among millions of workers who have voluntarily left their jobs recently. one of the most striking elements of the newly blazing hot job market. nearly four million people quit their jobs in april. the most on record. pushing the rate to 2.7% of those employed. the rate was particularly high in the leisure and hospitality industry where competition for workers has been especially fierce. but the number of those quitting registered across the board. that's from n.y. times.com. this morning, are you resoming your prepandemic activities. 202-748-8000 is the line to call

if you under the age of 35. between the ages of 35 and 60, 202-748-8001. and over the age of 60, 202-748-8002. on this topic on covid-19 we have a hearing coming up today on c-span2 this morning at 10 a.m. eastern. public health exspeerts will be talking about some of the lessons learned on the rollout of the covid-19 vaccines. from the center for strategic and international studies. 10 a.m. eastern on our companion network c-span2. let's go to richard in pennsylvania. good morning. caller: thanks for taking my call. i'm 75 years old. i didn't have the shot. and, sir, it's not for any political purposes. that is absolutely nothing to do with it. it's just a personal decision.

i don't think i'm going to get covid. i think i have a real good immune system. i have never had a flu shot in my life. i have never had the flu. so that's the basis for my decision. it has nothing to do with politics. maybe it does for some people, but not for me. host: how about your activities. you are affected by what's done in pennsylvania in terms of the closures there. are things opening up there in pennsylvania in your area? caller: they are. they are, sir. the only restrictions that i put on my activity was the restrictions that were imposed on us by businesses not operating. some closed. some were only takeouts. we had a lot of that where you could only go to their drive through. that's not from talking to the business owners or operators.

it's not because they are afraid of covid now. they can't get the help. so they have to confine themselves to just one aspect of their business and they focused on takeouts. other than that -- even at the height of covid i went out. i just did everything i ordinarily do. host: thank you for that. kathleen, next up in bloomfield hills, michigan. you are on the air. go ahead. caller: yes. i was watching your show. as far as being vaccinated i have yet to be vaccinated. but it's a personal choice. i wanted the johnson & johnson. and -- i'm in michigan. and we are unable to get the johnson & johnson. it's moderna or the pfizer.

and i like the choice of johnson & johnson because it was only one shot. but the pandemic when it came out and all the vaccines were coming out and they were talking about two-step process. in lieu of the pandemic i knew that was going to turn to something really complicated to where percentage of people would get the shot. but then there would be a quagmire or something to where they would be unable to get the second dose. so that's the reason i wear a mask. i have always worn a mask. i agree to some extent to the gentleman that was just on. but this is a recovery of a pandemic. and we never experienced this. and it's something that's definitely very serious. and it's something we cannot take lightly. and cannot rush anything,

either. i can see all the concerns. i'm hearing people say. you have to have common sense and if you listen to what the scientists said, just pay attention. i guess that's all. host: let's hear from cliff in essex, maryland. hi. caller: good morning. i was watching one america news and there's a government study came out of the u.k. with a company called vaer, they are vaccine researchers. they put out a statement saying these vaccines are unsafe for use in human beings. i see these vaccines being pushed everywhere. they are pushing on kids. they are pushing on people. in rest homes. they are pushing this vaccine like if you don't get this

vaccine you are going to die. ok. the fact is if you get this vaccine you might die. a lot of people have died from this vaccine. host: not from the vaccine itself. very, very small amount of people have died from the covid vaccine itself. caller: there have been more people that died and had adverse reactions than all the other vaccines combined to date. host: cliff, are you not yourself getting vaccinated? caller: no. aim not going to get vaccinated. host: typically do you get a flu shot or other vaccinations in the past? caller: i have had i think three vaccinations in my life. one for smallpox. one for polio. when i was a kid. and had one shot when i went overseas. that was the only vaccine igs -- vaccinations. host: the reason you don't want to get vaccination this time is because of this report you read?

caller: no. never going to get a vaccine. host: ok. caller: this report came out verified what i have been thinking. host: where did you read this report? caller: this whole pandemic has been a global sigh op by china -- syop by china to repress all the economies in the world except theirs. host: more of your calls coming out of play this. and talking about what's ahead. scott wong joining us. from his publication the hill, their headline this morning. this week senate set for voting rights night on the senate a key vote set to comp on tuesday in the u.s. senate. senator lindsey graham from south carolina was on fox news sunday yesterday and asked about that pending vote. here's what he said in response to chris wallace. >> let me move on to another area because senator schumer, the senate democratic leader, is going to bring up a voting rights bill this week. the centrist, moderate always --

maybe the most powerful man in the senate joe manchin will offer his stripped down version of that bill this week. i want to put up the main elements of the manchin proposal. make election day a holiday. mandate at least 15 days of early voting. ban partisan gerrymandering and use computer models. require a voter i.d. senator manchin took out a lot of the basic senate plans, s 1, the for the people act, like public financing of congressional elections. can you go along with the manchin stripped down version? if not, why not? >> i like joe manchin a lot. we had the largest turnout in the history of the united states. and states are in charge of voting in america. i don't like the idea of taking the power to redistrict away from state legislators. you are having people move from blue stays to red states under this proposal.

you would have a commission redraw the new districts. don't like that. i want states where people moving to have control over how to allocate new congressional seats. as much as i like joe manchin, the answer would be no. in my view, s.r. 1 is the biggest power grab in the history of the country. if mandates ballot harvesting, no voter, i.d., it does away with the states being able to redistrict when you have population shifts. it's just a bad idea. and it's a problem that most republicans are not going to sign -- they are trying to fix a problem most republicans have a different view of. host: more of your calls and comments on question. opening question, are you resuming your prepandemic activities. 202-748-8000 if you are under the age of 35. 202-748-8001 if you are between 35 and 60. and 202-748-8002 if you are over the age of 60. on facebook, on twitter some reaction on social media. facebook post here from julius

who says no, such activities will probably take time getting back to the level of normalcy. if ever. assessing inflation in the months and years ahead will dictate if activity also resume the normal course. susan says that almost, i retired just before we heard of covid. we sold our home and bought another very carefully with precaucuses last year. we were all ok. but an elderly extended family member died of it and another middle-aged member had a mild case. we restricted our lifers a lot then. we have to be back to church with masks. we took a train trip with masks. we shop when we want and do what we want. we do have smaller grandchildren so they wear masks. their parents bring them virtually nowhere indoors. derek says i'm more active than last year but nowhere near close to prepandemic activities, especially with the delta strain on the rise. back to calls, michael beverley

hills, california. hi. caller: hi. i just wanted to say this. because of my long street in beverley hills, california, 46 people have died, 19 have died because of blood clots. i have -- i left nine months ago to go back to florida to stay with my cousins. we see what's going to happen. i personally feel that the vaccine is not safe. i went to harvard medical school. all my friends agree that there's problems down the line with it. especially with the increase in pancreatic cancer and brain tumors. so i'm very leery of if we'll ever get back to normal for at

least four years. thank you. host: ohio, joe. hello. caller: hi. i just like to let you know i had the pfizer vaccine. i have had both of them. and i noticed after a week of have a that i lost like 20% to 30% of my energy. and i'd like to know if anyone out there has had any effects on them that way after they took it. so -- i have never gotten my energy back that i had. host: still down you think 20% 25%. caller: yes. and the reason i noticed it is because when i would do an exercise on my elliptical i was doing about a mile in eight minutes. and now it takes me 12 minutes to do a mile. host: what's your doctor say about it? caller: he said that it should have no effect on me.

due to that's just some kind of -- some kind of protein in your system. but i have yet to be able to get down to eight minutes again. host: reporting on the economy this morning, heather long writing in "the washington post." her piece is headlined, the economy isn't going back to february 2020. fundamental shifts have occurred. the u.s. economy is emerge interesting the coronavirus pandemic with considerable speed, but marketedly transformed as business and consumers struggle to adapt a new landscape -- to a new landscape with higher prices, few he workers, new innovation, and lange ever inconveniences. in late february, 2020 the unemployment rate was 3.5%. inflation was tame. wages were rising, and americans companies were attempting to recover from a multiyear trade war. the pandemic disrupted everything, she writes. damaging some parts of the economy much more than others. but a mass vaccination efforts and virus' steady retreat this

year have allowed many businesses and communities to reopen. what americans are encountering, though, is almost unrecognizeable from just 16 months ago. prices are up. housing is scarce. it takes months longer than normal to get furniture. appliances and numerous parts delivered. there is great dislocation between millions of unemployed workers and millions of vacant jobs. helen in south carolina. good morning to you. caller: good morning. this is not a vaccine. it is an mrna gene altering protein, spike protein producing agent that is being administered to a great deal of the world's population. people will be altered by this. spike proteins will be selecting in their bodily organs. it will change them. it will affect them. it will adversely affect their health. it is an extremely dangerous thing to ingest. certainly in children. nobody should take it.

everybody should when they ingest any medicine, over the counter or otherwise, you have to weigh the risks against the risk of getting a disease. this actual disease, covid, had a 99% rate of recovery. so pretty much nobody was going to die from it. host: you, yourself, are not getting the vaccine. have you changed your -- have you resumed any prepandemic activities? presumed your normal -- caller: i never changed any of my activities. i'm healthy 65-year-old woman who is extremely active. i traveled. i shopped. i did -- i eight out. -- i ate out. didn't change anything. nothing happened. people that have no disease. i'm certainly not going to take medicine for a disease i do not have. and i would hope that everybody listening to me will do more

research. this is not a vaccine. and the vaer site, that is a site by the c.d.c. that tracks adverse reactions, all kind of adverse reactions to any kind of vaccine. host: one of the downsides of the recovery the post pandemic is the spike in crime, president biden set to address that this week. this is froma hoo news, their headline, downtown chicago emerges from pandemic hobbled by a crime wave. they write businesses in downtown chicago that survived the pandemic related economic slump and two spasms of looting last sirm should be he static with monday's reopening of america's third largest city. many are battling a new hardship. a surge in crime keeping customers and their money away. in did he ever, this is benjamin next up. hello. caller: howdy. thanks for having me on. i kind of want to spend the entire time just talking about

the last lady was very on point on the spike proteins and everything else. whether i'm going to go and resume my prepandemic routine. the answer to that is kind of. because prepandemic i was starting to ramp up and figuring out how i could invest in something that might create business opportunity for more than just me. that's what i was looking to do. although the pandemic really kind of shuffled me around and made me rethink what i was doing and where i was getting funding source at all, i think i'm pretty well positioned now. i think a lot of people might be, too, to say, hey, what can we do to rebuild things? that's where i'm at. i'm not going to go back prepandemic. i'm thinking about -- host: without giving away your investment strategy, where do you see promise investments in the economy these days? caller: social businesses.

i see a lot of potential there. what is innovation? you have to open your eyes to whatever is around you. look at what you can understand and look for understand, and look for whatever else you can apply that knowledge to. host: benjamin, we appreciate your call this morning. there is more ahead here on washington journal. up next, we've got a preview of the week ahead in congress. will we will joined by scott wong. later, we will turn our attention to pandemic unemployment fraud. some reports that losses in the billions of dollars in fraud. that conversation with someone who follows the money. announcer: this morning, discovered insurance --

discussions about lessons learned hosted by the center for strategic and international studies. live at 10:00 a.m. eastern on c-span 2, online at c-span.org, or on the free c-span radio app. tonight, on the communicators, antitrust and competition policy in digital technology markets. >> we are off the charts in terms of where we have been for the last 40 years in terms of competition policy and monopoly and in the last year, we had five antitrust lawsuits against google and facebook and we have all kinds of actions against amazon. we have people talking about new philosophies and competition policies. this is all a radically new. this conversation is turning out to be truly transformative for the united states.

announcer: the communicators tonight at 8:00 p.m. eastern on c-span 2. c-spanshop.org is c-span's online store. your purchase will support our nonprofit operations and you still have time to order the congressional directory with contact information for members of congress and the biden administration. go to c-spanshop.org. washington journal continues. host: and with us here on washington journal is senior staff writer scott wong with the hill. great to have you with us. guest: great to be with you. host: it will be a busy week for you and your colleagues ahead. let's start with the infrastructure discussions. it is pretty much in the hands of republicans, a bipartisan group of democrats and

republicans at this point. they have a proposal before president biden. tell us about that. guest: this is the second iteration bipartisan talks. the first bill had to do with between president biden and senator capito of west virginia. this second group of bipartisan senators picked up the mantle and really has started to make quite a bit of progress and gain some momentum in recent days. the other day, they said that they now have 11 republicans on board, 10 members of the democratic caucus including the independent angus king of maine. they are gathering more and more support as they move forward. i think there's really two camps here.

one is the progressives that want president biden to go big with multitrillion dollar packages including infrastructure, but also other measures including health care and perhaps immigration. this group of bipartisan senators, they want a more narrow approach and they think they are on the cusp of something bipartisan, which is really what president biden has emphasized during his campaign and also during his presidency, is that he wants to restore bipartisanship to washington and they think they are really on the cusp of doing something. this would include about $1 trillion of infrastructure, more traditional infrastructure spending. about $580 billion of that would be new spending. i think this is a pretty critical week to see what could

actually be done on a bipartisan basis, or if the talks fall apart and president biden decides he's going to go big on infrastructure and do something with democrats only in the senate. host: it always seems like to hang up on these discussions has been in the so-called pay-fors, which includes taxes. where are they on that? guest: from my understanding, there is nothing that has been decided yet. they floated a number of ideas, one would be indexing the gas tax to inflation. that is an idea that has been kicked around washington for quite a while. congress has never really had the appetite to tackle that in the past. another would be to use some unused funding, billions of dollars of unused funds from the relief package that passed congress earlier this year,

because, i think the economy is starting to heat up. there is a sense that maybe not all of that money needs to be spent, some of that could be transferred over for infrastructure spending. those are some of the ideas that this group is looking at. nothing has been finalized at this point. there is still no final deal. host: i want to ask you about the status of investigations on the january 6 attack on the capitol. democratic clamor grows for select committee on the january 6 attack. remind us where they are. the senate rejected that, correct? the idea of a bipartisan commission, independent commission, 9/11-style commission, i should say. guest: exactly. a couple weeks ago, the senate republicans did reject that house-passed bill that would have created the 9/11-style commission.

what the house is doing right now and what nancy pelosi is doing right now is making a number of phone calls to her rank and file members to also meeting with her key committee chairman who have been already investigating the january 6 attack as part of their oversight responsibilities. pelosi has a few options here. it looks like the democrats have been consolidating around one specific option, that is a special, select committee. one of the more high-profile select committees we have seen in the past years was the benghazi committee that house republicans had used to investigate the benghazi terrorist attacks as well as come at the time, the presidential candidate hillary clinton who had to testify before that committee. and so this committee, the select committee, if nancy

pelosi chooses to go down that road, she would have much more control over that committee. she could unilaterally create that committee and put members that she wants to on that committee, kevin mccarthy, the house minority california would also get to pick some members of that committee. that would be a house-only committee and it would move away from this idea that president biden and a number of house democrats and even some republicans wanted, which was a bipartisan outside committee. this would bring it in-house, and nancy pelosi would have much more control over it because the senate has decided not to act on that initial independent committee. this looks like the most likely route. host: scott wong is with us, a senior staff writer for "the hill," looking ahead to what is

coming in the weeks ahead in the house and congress. (202) 748-8001 that is the line for republicans. (202) 748-8000 is the line for democrats. independents and others, (202) 748-8002. i want to ask you about the voting rights bill, the procedural bill. let me just remind our viewers of what we are talking about. that for the people act is what it is called. the bill would create automatic voter registration and strengthen early and absentee mail-in voting. it would create small, non-taxpayer funding for offices. it would call for a constitutional amendment to overturn citizens united decision, prohibit the coordination between super pac's and candidates, require states to use independent redistricting commissions, and also to enhance the research to stave off foreign threats and cyber threats on elections. and at this point, joe manchin

has another key role. his compromise that he has floated on this legislation, and that includes joe manchin's compromise includes voter registration automatically. election day would be a national holiday, mandating at least 15 days of early voting for federal elections, banning bipartisan gerrymandering, and it would support voter id provisions with a wider list of alternatives to prove a voter's identity like a utility bill. telus, first of all, about the vote that is coming up tomorrow and how the joe manchin alternative may play into all of this. guest: well, republicans including mitch mcconnell have said they are opposed to both of those pieces of legislation. there is a much more sweeping bill that passed the house of representatives as well as for the pared down version, what we

are calling the joe manchin compromise, which is something that he has been trying to reach across the aisle and get buy-in from republicans on. so far, not a whole lot of republicans are dividing on that offer. over the weekend as i understand it, my colleague has reported that senator schumer and joe manchin have been having conversations about what it would take to get manchin's support on tuesday on that for the people act. we are not quite sure if that is going to be senator schumer extending an olive branch to joe manchin and saying maybe we can really rally behind the joe manchin plan, maybe it is something in between. but from senator schumer's point of view, he wants all 50 democrats to sit together on this issue.

joe manchin said he is not further for the people act -- not for the for the people act. senator schumer's goal is to get all of his democrats to march in line and stick together on this vote. really put the onus on republicans to demonstrate to voters that if the republicans are blocking this voting rights legislation, not joe manchin, one of the democrats who has been in the way. host: in terms of the timeline, how important is it to the president's agenda and senator schumer's senate agenda that they get some of these things done? voting rights, infrastructure, before the august recess. guest: i really think it is a six week sprint to the august recess right now and a lot of those weeks, in fact, are going to be a race because we will break for the fourth of july, the senate and the house are in on different weeks during the summer.

so this is a critical stretch, i think, for joe biden. he is fresh off his first international trip to europe. that was hailed is largely a success with not a lot of missteps. i think now, you're going to start to see biden turning his attention back to his domestic agenda. this is really christ time for biden, the white house, and his allies in congress, the democrats. they have a lot on their plate. they have voting rights, they have police reform of the george floyd policing bill. infrastructure, obviously, just to name a few. the question is really, will they be able to get any of those things done? at the moment, where we stand today, that still remains an open question, whether any of those will be turned into law by the end of this year. host: let's go to calls and we

will hear first from our democrat line. john in brooklyn, good morning. caller: how are you doing? host: good, thank you. caller: i want to say that i think nancy pelosi and schumer is too old to combat mitch mcconnell. it's not like it was in the old days. i think we should have some new blood in their because if you look at it, the power is in the vote. if they don't straighten out this vote so everybody can vote freely, we could lose. but if they straighten out that voting thing and all the democrats can vote, we will win both houses. now, he just said nancy pelosi got options. but she is too old. schumer is the same way.

if we can get all the democrats voting without these restrictions, we will win. thank you very much. host: scott wong? guest: these leaders in the senate and the house, in both parties, the speaker mentioned mitch mcconnell who was in his 70's himself. there is something to be said about experience in this town. the more experienced members tend to rise into leadership levels. it does take time for people to make those relationships, to know how the building works and to figure out how to win elections and obviously, these individuals, nancy pelosi, chuck schumer, mitch mcconnell have been around for a long time and have been in power and have understood how to hold onto that power for a long time. and so there is a clamor, yes, in the halls of congress as well

as outside of congress, for new blood and new leadership. we are seeing a number of those voices stepped forward and raise their profiles both through twitter followings like aoc and others, but also having some influence in the building. i think if you ask democrats, nancy pelosi is listening to many of those younger members and she knows that her time here is not going to go on forever. it will be finite and this may possibly be her last term in congress if not the next one. eventually, there will be a changing of the guard in the democratic party. host: the president has appointed the vice president as his person for voting rights, among other things. is she expected to be in the chamber on tuesday on that key procedural vote? guest: that's a good question, i don't know the answer to that.

but she has been put in charge of some of the most prickly issues in washington from voting rights to the border situation. and so she is somebody who has a broad experience coming up as california attorney general, where she would have prosecuted a lot of those crimes on the border. obviously as a center of the largest state in the union, she has the relationships now obviously in the senate. i'm not sure if she will be on hand or what her schedule looks like. she is definitely somebody to watch. host: they have line of your colleague alexander bolton's piece says centrists gain leverage over progressives in senate infrastructure battle. we talked a little bit about that bipartisan group pushing this so-called skinny infrastructure package. i want to give you a sense of

what bernie sanders said about this infrastructure proposal yesterday on the sunday show he was on. here is what he had to say. >> i mentioned that the biden agenda is moving on two tracks. that bipartisan infrastructure deal which we are going to get to in a moment, and then there is the democrats-only effort that you are leading. the $6 trillion reconciliation package will likely include infrastructure like paid family leave, elder care. but you've also indicated that they could go beyond that. addressing the climate crisis, medicare, even immigration. i know you speak with president biden frequently. you have his blessing to go this big? >> i think what the president has done is given us a blueprint as to where we want to go and i think it is a serious and comprehensive blueprint. i sometimes think we get bogged down in numbers and that is important, but we have got to look at what the needs are of the american people.

and what is going on right now, obviously, the very rich are doing very well. and yet, we have come in terms of real wages for working people, it is lower today than it was 48 years ago. half of all people are living paycheck-to-paycheck. does anyone think that child care in america is satisfactory? it is a disaster. working families can't pay $20,000 per year for child care. we've got a housing crisis. how do you not deal with climate? you tell me. look at what is going on in california. scientists say we have a few years left before a disaster. of course you have to deal with climate, we are the only major country on earth not to have paid family and medical leave. meanwhile, large corporations avoid paying their share of taxes. all that the president is doing, all that i am doing is taking a look at the reality for working families and

understanding their needs that have been ignored for decades. it is time to create millions of good paying jobs addressing health care, housing infrastructure. >> told my coanchor that it is your job also as budget committee chairman to get input from the other 49 members of the democratic caucus. a number of them, i'm sure you have heard by now, joe manchin, jeanne shaheen, jon tester, they are already expressing deep reservations about what you just described which they believe is $6 trillion. are you willing to come off that number or scale back to follow how you describe your plan? scale back in some of what you want to do in order to get it passed? >> the process has just begun. that is what the process is about, channeling of the committee. i intend to be meeting and discussing these issues with every member of the democratic caucus. i think that there is general

agreement that the time is long overdue that we address many of the long-neglected problems facing the middle-class and working-class in this country. are there differences about this proposal, that proposal, the amount of money? yeah, there are. that is something we are going to have to work to hammer out and i intend to do that. host: sanders talked about the president's blueprint, seeming like the budget committee chair sometimes reads the blueprint differently than the biden blueprint itself. guest: i don't think so. i think the disagreement right now is over taxes, whether to start small and bipartisan with the infrastructure proposal and then sort of as a down payment for the president's american families plan which is more of that care economy. for the bernie sanders approach, which is to go big and try to do everything in one fell swoop through the budget reconciliation process.

now, senator schumer and nancy pelosi, they already are having these bipartisan talks. they are already moving forward with the reconciliation package with the profit which would allow senate democrats to pass something with only democratic votes. but biden has said both things. he has said we need to do something transformational in this congress as well as we need to restore bipartisanship to washington and so i think his allies on capitol hill are starting to figure out where those two things in which approach will really win out in this sort of debate over ideas as the crock -- clock is ticking down. host: oklahoma city is next. charles, republican line. caller: i would just like to ask you a question. i hear some of the people say

that it discriminates against people if they have to show voter id to vote. as far as i know, you have to have your id to get a covid shot, go to the doctor's office, anything that you do. so how is that discriminatory? that is my question. host: scott wong, how big of a sticking point is that provision? guest: well, you know, in the joe manchin plan, he has even said as sort of a middle ground that there should be some way of proving you are who you are by showing some form of voter identification. bill, i think you referenced it earlier, that doesn't necessarily have to be a drivers license. not everyone has a drivers license, not everyone drives. it could be something like a bill that gets sent to your

home, a utility bill, for example. this is still being discussed, but i think joe manchin has seen the benefit of having some way to prove, to show that you do live at a certain residence and you are who you say you are. host: let's hear from universal city texas, democrat line. caller: good morning. i would like to address the january 6 insurrection. commission. i think that nancy pelosi needs to assign an independent, her own independent counsel other than members from congress. get some professional legal people in there.

the congress police officers defending the that day testify. cnn had a special on last night that was very scary. that's just my comment. we need to hold those people accountable as well as elected officials. you very much. host: ok. scott wong? guest: i would just point out, nancy pelosi doesn't have the authority to create an independent outside commission. that authority would come from congress and as we pointed out, senate republicans at the moment are blocking the independent commission. the one person who does have the power to create an independent commission would be president joe biden, and that is an idea that we have heard from jerry conley, the democrat from virginia and a former biden senate staffer who has said that biden is the best person to create an independent outside commission.

similar to what happened after the assassination of president kennedy. lbj in the weeks afterwards created the commission that investigated the assassination of president kennedy. it would be a similar idea for biden. the white house is very cool to that idea. they want congress to take the lead and work out their problems. another idea that nancy pelosi is flirting with his having the chairman of the homeland security committee take the lead with his committee since he and the republican ranking member of new york came up with the initial legislation that created the independent commission. there was some bipartisan agreement. one idea is for the investigation to remain in the homeland security committee and for bennie thompson to take the lead.

there is one slight west to that. nancy pelosi is possibly creating a select committee and she could choose to put the chairman of homeland security as the chair man of this new, january 6 special committee that is also another option that she has upper sleeve. host: let's go to richard in lynchburg, virginia, democrat line. good morning. caller: on want to say that covid-19 shot killed -- 66 years old. host: who is that, richard? caller: -- had looked -- hadler? host: i didn't catch that. i'm sorry. we will go to don.independent line. caller: the week ahead in

congress, i would hope that congress, congress is one of the three branches of the federal government. we have the executive branch and the judicial branch. but also if you look at the great seal of the eagle, it has the owls and it has the olive branch. but this week is about the palm branch, the branch of victory. and the president and the congress have to understand they are the victors. the american people voted them in and even with this stonewalling and this filibuster, those who are representing the people in republican or red areas, voting instead of this infrastructure bill. they are denying their own constituents a victory. and so we have to understand that it is time, this week, we have dealt with the pandemic,

and i think that if the president and the federal reserve wants to get more vaccinations into these other communities, it has to tie it to economics as well and the equity of black-owned and minority banks and tie it in to vaccinations as well. host: scott wong, any response? guest: i think the caller was speaking to the urgency of the times. that is an idea that is being echoed not only from progressives in congress, but also from a number of people in the white house itself. we are trying to bend biden's ear and say we have this historic opportunity to do something really big, really transformative, and we cannot delay any longer with these bipartisan talks that seem to just be going on and on and on.

democrats have a long memory from 2009 when president obama's first year, they were trying to pass health care reform. because they continued to talk to republicans and those talks dragged out, a number of things happen, including the passing of senator ted kennedy in the summer of 2009, which deprived democrats of one of those key votes. anything can happen and i think there is this real sense of urgency among progressives who are saying we can't delay any longer. we have to press forward. as the caller pointed out, we were the victors of the 2020 election. now let's go ahead and spend that political capital. host: our guest, scott wong reporting from the capitol on january 6, trapped in the capital on the sixth of january. you have obviously been back in reported since then. what is it like back up on the hill now? guest: i have to say with the

fence coming down around the perimeter, with some of the covid restrictions lifted, reporters and lawmakers no longer have to wear masks the building. last week was the first time it really did feel like things were back to normal. the gaggle of reporters around senators and house members, they are very crowded. there is access to the lawmakers. which necessarily wasn't happening before. and so it really did feel like things are easing back to normal. the speakers lobby, as i understand it is a beautiful space right off the house floor. on january 6, unfortunately, is where one of the rioters was fatally shot, but that speakers lobby is where reporters and

lawmakers interacted, and has been closed to reporters ever since january 6. and i understand they will be opening up that speakers lobby back to members of the press and allow those interactions to happen just off the house floor, which are obviously very helpful and beneficial to reporters like myself. host: we follow scott wong, and you can, too on twitter. senior staff writer with "the hill." guest: great to be with you. host: coming up here on washington journal, we will turn our attention to pandemic unemployment fraud. we will hear some of the reports that indicate that losses could be in the billions of dollars. that conversation with someone who follow the money. we will be joined next. later, the university of maryland, dr. kiersten -- is

with us talking about her research into covid-19 vaccine booster shots. >> dan glickman's autobiography is titled "laughing at myself: my education in congress, on the farm, and at the movies." former representatives glickman served in congress for 18 years. he went on to serve as president clinton's agriculture secretary from 1995-2001. in 2004, he replaced jack maloney as chairman and ceo of the motion association in america until 2012. in our interview, we spent some time talking about his interest in humor. announcer: listen at c-span.org/ podcast or wherever you get your podcasts.

♪ announcer: later this morning, a forum on strengthening the public's trust in presidential election results hosted by the american press institute. that is live at 10:00 a.m. eastern on c-span, online at c-span.org, or listen on the free c-span radio app. washington journal continues.

host: you may have heard about unemployment fraud during covid and unemployment money being stolen. we are going to talk about that next with our guest. joining us is haywood talcove, he is the government division ceo and joining us to talk about the issue and the potential billions of dollars. good morning. guest: good morning, sir. host: let me start first with the headline that we've noted about this among others in terms of where the problem is, and then it did to your comments. it says half of the pandemic unemployment may have been -- money may have been stolen. first of all, you are with the risk solutions. what is it, broadly, that your group does and how are you monitoring the unemployment, the potential for unemployment fraud? guest: we do very simple things.

we help catch bad people, we stop fraud, and we enable digital governments. our company is a market leader in identity verification. in the government space, we call that imposter fraud. we do over one billion transactions per day and we stop over $1 billion in fraudulent payments each week. we do business with dozens of states and help to mitigate the risk of this transnational criminal gang attacking the unemployment insurance systems. host: let's give some perspective here, this is the reporting on those figures from axios. criminals may have stolen as much as half of the unemployment and benefits the u.s. has been pumping out over the past year. unemployment fraud could easily reach $400 billion, they write. the bulk of that money likely in the hands of foreign crime syndicates making this not just a theft, that matter of national security.

one of the things they point to is that in terms of the states, the states all new that fraud was inevitable but decided against getting the money out to people who desperately needed it was more important than laboriously making sure all of that was genuine. this is now coming back to haunt those states. guest: i don't know -- there was a publication written back in 2015 by larry benson. the book was called where is the fraud? and it focused on these transnational criminal groups stealing government funds. the issue is that a lot of governments, federal, state, and local entities, they don't have policies in place of the private sector does to make sure you are who you say you are. what the criminals did, they took advantage of this at scale.

some of the breaches from target, equifax. and because the state government didn't have tools in place to validate identities, it was very easy for these groups to feel mast -- steel massive amounts of money. host: for people who were expecting to be paid unemployment benefits, how did this manifest itself? did they not see that money show up and then have to file for that money? guest: i mean, that is a great question because a lot of people aren't talking about the individuals that have been impacted. what happens is you put thing into two buckets. your information is stolen by one of these criminal groups. they use it to get benefits in your name. unfortunately, if you find yourself in a situation where you need the benefits and you apply, you can't get your benefits. that has been a huge issue

across the country and a number of your viewers today have experienced receiving a 1099-g form that isn't attributable to the benefits they receive. the second part of this is individuals whose identities are reviewed in different states. one of the best stories as governor dewine in ohio, someone applied for benefits in his name in the state of california. he will never find out. ultimately, what has happened is these foreign adversaries have used the information in a way that has made it very hard for individuals to get access to funds. further, some states have put systems in place that rely on outdated technology including facial recognition, which has a discriminatory effect amongst women and minorities.

host: to your role in lexis-nexis, you got 50 different states, the district of columbia, but on a federal level, you are doing the fraud monitoring. that, in itself, must be an incredible task. because guest: of our position as a leading identity company and seeing as many transactions as we see and also the analysts that we have studying the dark web, we see things before most people. for example, before the show today, i had the analysts working on some of our bigger states. new york, california, florida. we are still seeing significant attacks out scaled particularly by these foreign groups. right now, they are selling a kit.

you can get on the dark web and acquire that for $15 and it will show you how to get through those boundaries in place in those states. as of this morning, over 11,000 of those kits have been sold. host: our guest is woody t alcove, we are talking about the fraud and the unemployment benefit money in covid-19 relief. also, your experience on this if you have actually had some of this happened to you. the lines are for republicans, (202) 748-8001. democrats, (202) 748-8000. independents and others, (202) 748-8002. have you been able to recover some of this, or has the state government been able to recover any of this money that has been stolen? guest: i would say very little. the ones that are getting caught are the domestic ones and the reason they are getting caught is they are sharing their names

on facebook and other social media sites. the money that went overseas, which i believe is close to 70% of it, that money will never come back. that money went into accounts controlled by foreign entities. they took that and they converted it into crypto using different exchangers and trying to catch them is like trying to catch a needle in a haystack. the most important thing the state government can do is to put these imposter fraud tools in place to make sure that the right people are receiving the benefits. the money that is lost, in my estimation, is close to $250 billion. it is for the most part gone. never to be recovered. host: you mention you had gotten an update on some of the biggest states. per capita, can you tell us which states are doing the best on this, in which states are

doing the worst? guest: i don't want to call that specifically the state of ohio, which is a hometown of lexis-nexis and governor dewine. governor dewine noticed a problem in january and what he immediately did was form a group, a private sector company in the banking and insurance industry that deals with this every single day just to give you a sense. credit cards lose about $3 billion annually to fraud. the government lost $250 billion. what he did was pull together the brightest and the best in the state of ohio. they put together a task force and within two weeks, they were able to shut it down. one of the most interesting things that we do here is see how all of this fraud is interconnected.

we see hundreds of devices used hundreds of times in different states. and what is amazing to me is that all of this stuff today is easy to fix. the fraud that they are perpetrating has basically been stopped in the private sector and that is why governor dewine really has some insights. host: we will play you some comments in a moment from the secret service on law enforcement's role in protecting against fraud, but in his comments he says that as of last year, the government had issued some $3 trillion in covid-19 relief through the cares act and other measures and that if you even factor in a 1% fraud factor, that is still $30 billion. is that pretty much accurate across the board, that typically

on these large government programs, you're going to have at least 1% fraud? guest: first of all, let's give credit to the secret service. when they testify back in june, he was the one that alerted the government that there was going to be a massive problem. he got everything right in his report except for the scale of it. it is much bigger today that he could have ever anticipated back in june and the secret service, and elite agency with some of the best experts in cyber, they were the ones that were beginning to notice these trends. particularly if you look at his report, the transnational nature of these attacks. host: let's give our listeners and viewers some perspective on this. this is the testimony last june on the potential for fraud. here is what he had to say. >> major disasters have long invited fraud.

from the terrorist attacks on 9/11 to hurricanes katrina and maria and indeed, well before. criminals throughout history have used public emergencies as opportunities to fraud the public. however, this presents a scale and scope of risk we have not seen before. enabled by the internet, criminals all over the world are abusing programs. since we released our first alert on march 4, we observed a significant part of criminal schemes. we have seen a surge in crimes darting various economically programs such as those provided by the cares act. countering this fraud has become a core focus of our investigative work and i expect our investigative efforts will continue for years. host: woody talcove of lexis-nexis, what are your thoughts on those comments from a year ago? guest: i think he is right on.

the only part i would add is that because these criminal groups have been so successful in unemployment insurance, i would want, as governor, i would want the administration and every local government that government is now the target for these groups and they need to put in place tools to ensure you know who you are interacting with. basic identity verification systems. because of the scale and scope and the ease of which they got this money, they are going to continue to attack these systems until they are updated. host: what is the biggest country you are noticing is involved in terms of transnational crime? what country are receiving the most? guest: i would say if it is a race for first place, russia, of course is right in there. then we have nigeria. the nigerians were able to take over $1 billion in the state of washington.

then we have, of course, china. and over the past few months, we started to see the romanians. i do want to point out, and i do want to give secretary wash credit. i know he started just a month ago -- host: the labor secretary. guest: the labor secretary is taking this very seriously and has a real opportunity to lead not just in the unemployment insurance space, but across all government programs. because the basic fact is anytime, anyplace where the government is sending a check, these criminals can use the same exact process they used to defraud the unemployment insurance system with the department of revenue, with the food stamp program, with everything a benefit program that we have in place to help people that are in need. host: let's get to your calls. (202) 748-8001 for republicans. democrats, (202) 748-8000. independents, (202) 748-8002.

david is in illinois. good morning. caller: good morning. my name is dave williams and i've been unemployed for over a year. i've been certifying every two weeks to get my unemployment check. so the last week or so, i've been getting text messages that if i do not open up an account, my checks. within 24 hours. and i called the number that is at the top of the text and it says that you have reached a number that has not been set up yet. it also shows when i get the text a picture of an idf form. and it asks for my username and my password.

and i want to know, is that legitimate, or is that a half? host: what do you suggest? guest: what is the url that you are trying to access? caller: they want to know my user, they said they need additional information from me within 24 hours for my unemployment will stop. they want my username and password and they put a picture of the ids company on my text. guest: right. what i think they are asking you to do is verify your identity and it sounds like they are using that facial recognition tool. so what i recommend is going through that process, setting up an account, and then once you have done that, see if you can get through. the challenge is some of those

facial recognition tools don't work well and cause issues like you need to have an updated smartphone and you will also need copies, i believe, of the utility bill and you need to have a contract with the cell phone carrier. if you have any problems, what you should do is just look me up on linkedin, and i will see what i can do to help you. i think that is what you need to try to do. host: we will go to new jersey. jerry, you are on the line, go ahead. caller: yes, hello. i have a question. my daughter-in-law was having a lot of trouble getting the unemployment and how did they go about reapplying? can they reapply? the other question i have for you, with all this going on and everything, could the election have been done the same way? in other words, could we have

the same issues with the election? did the same actors have the ability to work on elections? thank you very much for that question. guest: right. in your first question, you just log onto their system and follow their processed and they will evaluate the claims. the department of labor has things to get you answers in that process. this has nothing to do with the election. the issue that we are dealing with isn't a democratic issue. it isn't a republican issue. it is a national security issue. everyone needs to be aware that these transnational groups are now focused on government programs and as the caller mentioned or alluded to, what it is doing is is making it harder for an individual to actually

get the benefits to get through. my hope is that one day, government will be like retailers and it will be very easy to do a transaction with a very high level of assurance that you are who you say you are. host: what is the biggest stumbling block to some of these states not getting updated technology? guest: it's like everything in life. i don't think there was a belief in immediate need. if you spoke to the governor for you spoke to the director of unemployment insurance two years ago, what they would have told you is that most of it is about integrity. currently, integrity is to get a job and you tell the state you are gainfully employed. so you get both the on employment insurance check and a paycheck. the issue is that no one is ever checking for imposter fraud.

they hadn't built those systems. i don't think they felt like they needed to. that's why i am really pleased with the direction that secretary walsh is moving in. he is working with congress, he is working with his team to try to get programs in place to mitigate this risk going forward. there's nothing we can do about what happened. it's over. that money is generally gone. what we need to do is to protect those systems going forward. i really do believe the secretary has a plan. host: let's hear from champaign, illinois. caller: first of all, i wanted to thank mr. talcove for what he is doing. i got something in the mail around october or september of last year and it didn't make sense because i had not applied for unemployment insurance. i originally thought it was a scam.

i realized that somebody had stolen my identity or taken this issue and was getting money. i called the illinois state unemployment and told them what was going on, and then i guess they are looking into it, i'm not sure what happened at that point. but then i went ahead and the next time i got something it actually had the name of the bank that was cashing these checks. and it was out of utah. i went ahead and tried contacting them as well. i didn't get any answer from them. i tried than a couple of times. nothing, no response. i personally am retired. i was just wondering if there is anything else that can be done in the church to take responsibility for the things that tried to come my way.

it is very unfair that this is going on and they want to take responsibility. i wanted to know his point of view, is there anything else i could have done at that point? host: thanks for the question. guest: there are millions and millions of people in this country whose identities are used nefarious sleep that are now getting these frauds. and so you have to do three things and you need to do it very quickly. the first thing you need to do is you need to go to your local police department in illinois and file a police report. you're going to need that police report because you need to let the state of illinois as well as the internal revenue service know that you did not receive those benefits and they should not be present on your taxes. the next thing you need to do is you need to go to the credit bureau. you need to go to transunion at the facts and freeze your credit.

make it clear that fraudsters have access to your identity and they're going to use it in different ways. you are the innocent victim in this. unfortunately, that process is probably going to take you 60-70 hours of your personal time to work through while the state has programs in place. i would suggest to every single viewer that when you get that 1099-g form that isn't correct, don't just sit on it. you have to take those steps. you could get audited by the state, you could get audited by the federal government. you could find yourself in a really difficult situation. it is very important the first thing you do is document that your identity was used for nefarious purposes and that you had nothing to do with getting those benefits. host: dennis in florida, you've

got about 30 seconds here. the house is coming in at 9:00. go ahead with your comment. caller: i'm here in florida and we have, ever since the pandemic started, report after report after report of the follow-up of the unemployment insurance program in our sunshine state. they put in a guy by the name of adolf who seems to not be able to get his thoughts together and be able to move the program so that it is more secure. people are getting their funding . that is my basic comment. let's face it, it has been a royal screwup. host:woody. guest: i give governor desantis credit.

they are still being attacked at scale and they need to take a closer look at how those transnational groups are accessing the system. host: haywood talcove is with lexisnexis. would love to have you back to get an update on this story. thank you for being with us. guest: great. and if you want to learn more about fraud, we have a webpage called fraudoftheday.com. thanks and have a great day. host: appreciate you joining us. ahead on washington journal, the house is in next in a pro forma session. we will be joined by dr. kirsten lyke from the university of maryland about what could be ahead in covid vaccines and needing booster shots. first, we will take you to the house floor. they are coming in at 9:00 for a brief pro forma session.

we don't expect any legislative business and we will be back in a few minutes when they wrap up.