including charter communications. >> broadband is a force for empowerment. 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. ♪ >> here on c-span, "washington journal" is next. at 12:30 p.m., andrew cuomo speaks to the national governors association at its annual summer meeting. at 1:00 p.m., legal experts discussed the supreme court's most recent term. we take you back to the nga for remarks from arkansas governor asa hutchinson. this morning on "washington journal," author and psychiatrist dr. jonathan metal

talks about gun violence in the u.s., then a look at state and federal voting laws and election integrity with former deputy attorney general george ter williger. ♪ host: it's "washington journal," for july 8. president trump filed suit against social media companies are banning him from their sites and claiming that the companies engage in shameful censorship of the american people. this follows congressional attempts on both sides of the aisle to change rules that deal with the content posted on these forms by users and when it comes to the approach of tech companies to moderating content, how much do you trust them to do just that? here is how you can let us know this morning. (202) 748-8000 per democrats, --

four democrats -- for democrats, (202) 748-8001 for republicans. text asset (202) 748-8003 -- text us at (202) 748-8003. @cspanwj on twitter, and on facebook, facebook.com/c-span. the former president going before cameras, announcing the lawsuit, aiming it at social media companies. here is a bit from him yesterday. [video clip] >> in conjunction with the america first policy institute, i'm filing is the lead class representative a major class-action lawsuit against the big tech, including facebook, google, and twitter, as well as the ceos, mark zuckerberg,

[indiscernible] and jack dorsey, three nice guys. we are asking the u.s. district court of the southern district to order an immediate fault to social media companies, illegal, shameful censorship of the american people and that's exactly what they are doing. we are demanding an end to the shadow banning, a stop to the silencing, a stop to the blacklisting, banishing, and canceling that you know so well. our case will prove this censorship is unlawful, unconstitutional, and completely un-american. we all know that, we all know that very, very well. the filing also seeks relief to allow prompt restitution and lily restoration, you can name

about 20 other things and it has to be prompt because it is destroying our country. of my accounts, in addition we are asking the court to impose -- impose punitive damages on these social media giants. we are going to hold big tech very accountable. this is the first of numerous other lawsuits that i assume would follow, but this is the lead and i think it is going to be a very, very important game changer for the country. it will be a pivotal battle in the defense of the first amendment and in the end i am, didn't that we will achieve a historic victory for american freedom and at the same time, freedom of speech. host: that's the president from yesterday, former president trump talking about this lawsuit filed over issues of content and moderation. joining us now to elaborate on

the lawsuit and the issues involved, sarah fisher, who reports on the media for axios. thanks for joining us. can you elaborate more on the legal basis the president is basing this suit on? guest: essentially he's alleging that tech companies are so big, that we should be treating them like state actors and if we treated them like state actors, they would be bound by the first amendment. you and i both know that's a tough case to make. they are not state actors, they are publicly traded companies. because they are publicly traded but private companies, they can make all the rules they want. that's one of the arguments he's making. the other thing that he suggests is that section 230 of the communications and decency act, a law passed by congress 25 years ago should be deemed unconstitutional. you and i both know you can't just deem a law unconstitutional

. congress would have to go revoke the law and pass something else. i wouldn't expect the defendants in this case, the big tech companies, to even reference that in their defense. host: can you elaborate on 230 and how social media companies are governed by it? guest: it says that internet platforms are not liable for what other parties post. people would be too afraid to have anything posted on the sites, they would be worried that they would be constantly in lawsuits. 230 is what a lot of web platforms come not just social media but think about anything that you use, could be egg -- a news site, angie's list, they wouldn't really be allowed to succeed. there have been a lot of challenges to it. people saying it needs updated, but not something that would be

updated through orts, which is why trump mentioning it here is misleading. host: talking to experts, getting a look at the lawsuit itself, looking at the headline, they say that the lawsuit is likely doomed. can you elaborate on that? guest: a lot of people have tried similar lawsuits against tech media giants and none of them have ever done well. there's one expert i spoke to who evaluated 61 similar lawsuit that have been brought up in the past few years and he said that the defendants have been the winners in every single instance, so even if donald trump goes forward with this, looks like he is, history is not on his side here. doesn't look like he has a strong case to make. host: if the average tech company were able to respond in real time, what defense with a offer in terms of how they

moderate content currently? guest: that they are not state actors. the people that want to use their platforms are bound to their rules and community service terms and that trump was banned because he violated their terms by inciting violence around the january 6 c and they would say that they have done nothing unlawful or unstick -- unconstitutional and are trying to say that should they have acted otherwise is unconstitutional itself, trying to force the hand of a private company when it comes to free speech. that will be their defense, but i don't expect them to stay up at night around this. they pretty much know they have this in the bag in terms of having legal precedent on their side. what this shows is that donald trump sees censorship as a strong campaign issue. he started fundraising immediately after the speech. that's the bigger picture here, this isn't meant to legally challenge tech but forms, it's just meant to the trump

campaign. host: this is something that members of congress on both sides of the aisle have focused attention on. can you briefly give what these both sides have wanted as far as potential changes? guest: totally. people who are very progressive say that the law should be abolished completely. people who are conservative say it should stay the same. most people fall in the middle. you can't abolish the law, the web as we know it would collapse , but it needs reform. the challenge is that we don't know what these reforms will look like. some people have suggested that the middleground would be forcing tech companies to be more transparent and you are starting to see more tech companies get ahead of this by issuing reports. another middleground suggestion is to regulate the way that algorithms work better. not about content up or down, but regulate how much you distribute to your users.

these are all things congress is considering but i don't personally think we will have any legislative movement on this in a long time because it is such a tough, tough issue to crack. host: sarah fisher reports from axios. thank you for your time and your explanations of these issues this morning for our audience. really appreciate it. guest: thanks so much, have a good one. host: as you heard our guest talk about the issues of moderating content, this going to the lawsuit filed by president trump yesterday, we are asking you to give your thoughts on the ability of these companies to moderate content. (202) 748-8000 free democrats, -- for democrats, (202) 748-8001 republicans, and for independents, (202) 748-8002. @cspanwj for twitter. this text this morning, doesn't trust big tech, they would have

to banner remove 75% of their users if they enforced. ray in colorado saying that some big tech -- big tech companies are better than others and they do it better than government could. we should embrace the choices we have. wayne miller off the facebook page, many of you posting before the show this morning, big tech shouldn't be moderating anything. georgia, republican line, on the capability of big tech to moderate content, go ahead. caller: love c-span, been calling your great network for 30 years. i'm a strong donald trump supporter and i think every american ought to have the right, i teach a leadership class at spanish barbecue and i teach the young leaders to call in and express concern and thought but to do it with no malice. to be positive, in other words. the democrats are spending too much money, but i don't attack

them personally. host: to the ability of expressing content or thoughts on social media and the possibility of moderation there, what do you think of that? caller: i think it ought to be, i think 230 ought to be eliminated where every american can speak up and give their thoughts. i'm a conservative, but the liberals ought to be able to do there's, too, but don't do it with malice or hatred. i tell my young people at the barbecue to preach love. but i do think that 230 ought to be eliminated so that, so that everybody in america can follow their first amendment rights and give their opinion, i think that's very important. y'all do a great job, pedro, at c-span, it's a great network. host: tommy, massachusetts, independent line.

tommy in massachusetts? hello. one more time for tommy. malden? let's go to ray. ray in homestead, pennsylvania. caller: i have a few comments on this issue. number one, i agree totally with a girl who was on a few minutes ago. if you get rid of 230, the internet will be gone, everyone will be suing them for everything. the guy who was just on talking about the first amendment, what you guys ought to do is put up the first amendment or make them say, whoever says the first amendment is being used against them, this 230 or whatever it is, just put up a copy of the first amendment with regards to freedom of speech and let them see exactly what the first madman says or make them say it. so that they know. host: as far as the moderation

practices of companies themselves, do you trust them generally? caller: who are you going to trust? the politicians? trumpers to regulate it? who are you going to trust? it's going to have to be done over time. it will happen, they will moderate 230 or fix it some way, but it's not going to happen because the trumpers don't have first amendment rights. make them tell you what the first amendment is. they know the second amendment by heart. host: you made that point. james, aberdeen, hello. caller: how are you doing, man? thanks a lot for taking my call. i just want to say, this is great. something to watch. it's a little early for me. i want to say this is a free country and we need to keep it that way. host: so, went it -- when it

comes to the social media companies and their practices of moderating content, what did you think about that and how far you trust it? caller: i think it's misconstrued. i think there's a lot of divisiveness on both sides. i think that we just need to do the right thing, the right way, according to it just being common sense. i think that there's a lot of things, a lot of battling going on. i hope it goes the right way. for me, i'm a christian. i believe that it's a battle. a lot of people have a lot of different opinions. i love everybody. i'm not a racist, even though i'm a white guy. host: ok. that's james in south dakota.

when it comes to section 230 as referenced earlier, to give you the language provided under subsection c, no provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information from another content provider and no provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be held liable on account of any action voluntarily taken in good faith to restrict access or availability from materials that the user considers to be obscene, lewd, lascivious, violent, harassing or otherwise objectionable, whether or not the material is constitutionally protected. those are the debates going on on capitol hill that you heard our guest reference earlier regarding seeing possible changes to that section around the idea of larger issues for these companies and what they do with moderating content.

that's what we are asking you in this first hour this morning. mechanicsburg, pennsylvania, independent line, you are next up. >> i trust these companies to do the right thing. i do not believe that they are a force of the government, and therefore the first amendment doesn't apply and therefore i feel that any action against this is an action against the country, not for the country. host: as far as the companies themselves, what do you base the trust on? caller: the knowledge that these people have a right to do as they please. i trust them to control hate speech and other forms of

fascism that i do not believe in. host: that's jeffrey in mechanicsburg, pennsylvania. we will hear next from charlie in california, democrats line, good morning. caller: good morning, how you doing, thanks for taking my call. i don't trust them, they are trying to limit freedom of speech. it's the opposite of what, you know, the issue is. host: can you clarify that? caller: well, we are talking about, we are limiting certain people. i'm a democrat, go figure. i mean everybody should be heard within reason on this or not. you know, becoming violent and divisive, you know? plain and simple, you know? your question is do we trust big tech to moderate content? no, we don't.

they are silencing one side. you know? everybody to be heard as long as they act in a civil way. it's pretty cut and dry, your guest earlier, she's a reporter, she talked like she was a lawyer and in the end, you know, i believe that if you show clips of donald trump, he will prevail . that would be like shutting down joe biden or anyone else. as long as you are being civil. i appreciate your time. i'm all about civility. we need to get back to where respect, common courtesy, it is lost in this country and until we get back to there, i'm in my late 60's. i've been around a day or two. it saddens me that we are dividing this way. it does get back to freedom of

speech. egg tech should not be able to control people to be heard. host: ok, that's charlie in california making his thoughts known on the moderation of beach in the ability of big neck mnes, as the former president listed in his suit against these companies in your ability to trust them when it comes to content moderation. terry, high. caller: good morning, c-span. kudos to that guy from california, democrat but american first. appreciate that. big tech, for four years, character assassinated and lied about the sitting president of the united states of america. call him a pundit -- a puppet of putin. they lied. as a business owner, if i looked out there and decided i don't want you, pedro, in my business

because of the color of your skin, i would be able to do that now. that's what's going on. they are called reverse racist. marxist democrats. it's what the problem is in this country. host: are you talking about the companies themselves or the people who post on these sites? caller: i'm talking about the companies themselves. did they or did they not run a campaign against the sitting president of the united states? they shut him out and said you did not have the right to speech . by the way, the first amendment, the first amendment is to protect speech that you disagree with. that's why the first amendment is there. when you say that, one side of the country cannot say that we have the right to character assassinate you, your family, and your children because of the color of your skin. that's called racism.

host: ok, we will move onto another caller. john, independent line, ohio. caller: good morning, i've been watching c-span since 1980. laws in any country, including the united states, you cannot catch up with society legally. it takes time. supreme court is very behind. facebook technology, google technology, things are happening so fast, the horses is out of the barn. section 230? they never even thought about cell phones, probably. first of all, we have to pledge allegiance not to the party. to the country. i teach this to people. host: to boil it down to your level of trust in these companies, how would you describe it? caller: facebook

and other things, you cannot stop the hackers, but we have to have the sensibility of the diaper changing mom and dad with adoption. stand in line. the law is not just for one person. host: your trust in these companies themselves when it comes to content moderation? caller: it takes time for the law to catch up with the development of a human being's mind. god gave us that. host: ok, that was ohio there. jay, wake forest, north carolina, republican line. jay in wake forest? caller: right now i'm ashamed to call myself an american. when you have the media like you, pedro, all the rest of the e bullcrap media lying

about trump every day, now you had that lady from axios come on tv to say that this has no chance? everybody says that same thing. funny as hell, alan dershowitz and justin -- justice thomas says it does stand a chance. host: ok, let's focus on the companies in your level of trust in them. caller: i've never used a single one a day in my life and i never will. host: hold on, you had your chance to make a statement and we are focusing on a russian here. why do you avoid them? caller: because they are trash, like the media in this country. host: ok, you made these points. a manual, texas, democratic line. -- emmanuel, texas, democratic line. caller: trump used social media for five years to attack people. to disparage people, to divide this country more. facebook, trump got elected with

the help of russia and facebook with all the disinformation targeting people. another thing, i'm very disappointed with y'all, you continue to cover him like he's still the sitting president. this man is a relevant and a divider. host: relevancy goes to the suit filed yesterday that prompted us to ask these company -- these questions about social media. since you called into talk about that, how much trust do you have? caller: in the media? host: in social media companies to moderate content, how much trust do you have in that? caller: it's like a 50-50 for me, man. i try to research to the best of my ability, but there is a lot of misinformation out there and a lot of it comes from continuing the big lie and you all continue to give him a platform.

host: so, so, when you go to the sites and see something that concerns you as far as information, how do you cross-reference and check up on that? caller: by trying to read. it's kind of a hard question to answer. sometimes i don't know if, i look at the person, you know, who's writing the article, you know, if the person is legitimate, you know? there's a lot of wacs out there throwing things to see what sticks to the wall. you can't just take everything on information. there's a saying that what you take in is what you think, be careful what you read. i think you know where i'm coming from. host: i hear you. texas there, talking about a lot of things including his ability to trust a big tech companies

when it comes to content moderation. you heard our guest talk about section 230 and the interest in congress to see changes to it. to elaborate a bit on those potential changes, three senators, democratic senators, mark warner, mazie hirono, ab -- amy klobuchar, proposed changes to that section of the communications decency act. the current version as it stands , no provider or user of an interactive service shall be treated as the publisher of the speech provided by another provider. the changes proposed to the language, adding to it initially, saying no provider or user of direction computer service shall be treated as the publisher of any speech provided by another information content fighter and it also adds except to the extent that they have accepted payments to make the speech available or in whole or part created or funded the creation of the speech, language

adding that it should be at -- an affirmative defense to a claim that they are the speaker with respect to speech provided by another content provider at an interactive computer service provider accepting the burden of proof. much more there at the techcrunch website for the safe tech act the senators have taken a look at when it comes to this area. republicans, to. highlighted by the examiner this morning. jim jordan, speeding up and strengthening enforcement. tech companies, around that decision, proposals in the agenda will be coming in house judiciary republicans and kevin mccarthy. big tech has targeted conservatives for too long, we have had enough, mr. jordan told the examiner. we believe this will serve the

platform of taking on big tech going forward with cancel culture practices. the public's and -- -- republicans and democrats on this issue, trust over big tech companies moderating content. william, hello. caller: pedro, how you doing this morning? host: fine, thanks. caller: ok, good. i've been a loyal c-span junkie since about 80 my sent -- myself. i've been to your studios, one of the great days of my life, i really enjoy what you do, thank you for it. to get to your point, i appreciate you putting the question out there. it's a serious matter. obviously these big tech companies have enormous influence, good or ill. i have problems with any censorship myself, but the

reality is, though they don't want to face it, donald trump invited and incited the events that wound up happening there at the capital and, you know, you can't get away with the kind of things that he has said repeatedly. the constitution is not a suicide pact, as one of the supreme court justices said. these are private companies, after all. i personally thought he should have been permanently banned for his inflammatory, irresponsible words long before he was. host: so, for that content that you talked about, what do you think the level of burden should be on the companies themselves? particularly on the people who post that content or other content on social media? caller: i wish i knew, i actually don't.

i'm very interested to see the details. the devil is always in them. ross perot, one of the guys i voted for years ago, famously said that. i'm curious to see what the legislation would propose. probably antitrust. these entities being broken up. i'm sure there are some, some measures that could be taken that are responsible. but the idea of letting donald trump spread poison without his speech being curtailed, fox news, oann, newsmax, they run it all the time. those outlets, he can speak. nobody is stopping his speech. but personally, i think that you know, i think he ought to be in jail for what he's done right now. host: ok, we will go to bob in tyler, texas, republican line. caller: good morning, pedro.

thanks very much. the problem with 230 and the legislators in these companies, they haven't been educated. she not on speech of u.s. law. they don't know the proof of u.s. government. so, the first three signs of the u.s. government are high laws that the constitution cannot infringe. the first and third amendment by 13 years, they are saying the same. the whole deal is -- host: how does that apply to 230 ? caller: something that some of the supreme court justices did not know is that the purpose of government is to protect rights.

the businesses operate under the auspices of the government to protect those rights. they are not exempt, the first laws are on page one of the entirety of hundreds of thousands. go to the library and the first page in the first sentence host: given that, do you think that 230 itself needs updating, given the time that we live in? caller: 230 violates the purpose of u.s. government, u.s. law. if you read the first page -- host: you have made that point

over again. so we will leave it there. doug, illinois, hello. caller: caller: -- caller: hello, yeah, facebook should concentrate a lot not on the content but the veracity of the content. i have been kicked off of facebook -- facebook for asking someone if they wanted a cracker, kicked off her giving someone a complement. i referred to them as a vulcan, like mr. spock. as far as truthfulness, i guarantee it is like 9-1, right-wing versus left-wing, the right wing people, especially the trumpet people, they post stuff that is just outright lies and facebook has allowed them to do it over and over and over again. as far as, i think something

needs to change. for one thing, my name is doug, a name i have been called ever since i can remember, and they made me change my name, not my first name, but they made me scan in my drivers license and made me change my name -- host: who is that they? caller: facebook. host: facebook demanded you scan your drivers license? caller: yes, they made me change my name to what was on the first name, and then when i asked to change my name back they said that i couldn't do it because i had done it too many times when the only time it was changed was because they forced me to. i would like for them to monitor the truthfulness more than anything. host: ok, let's hear from carla in illinois, republican line. caller: yeah, i don't believe in big tech. i think they moderate much. i have been kicked off for 24

hours because i was supposedly bullying someone who had been harassing for three days. because of a comment i didn't post. it wasn't just me, he was harassing other people posting on my comment and next thing you know, i'm banned for 24 hours for making a comment. i even sent a letter to big tech and told them i thought it was rough. they don't censor the people that come in and troll and harass people. like they do the republican people, the people who are conservative. they want to just censor what they want. they don't care if somebody comes in and starts harassing you. if you say anything back to

them, they start harassing you instead of the person who started the harassment. host: how did you respond -- resolve the whole issue? caller: i quit responding to the trolls. i don't mind anybody's comment or opinion. but when you start attacking me or attacking people who are commenting, i am going to have to say something back. that was the problem. ok? he was calling people ignorant, you don't know nothing. you must be a fourth-grader. just belittling people. caller: that's -- host: that's carla there, talking about her experience. some of you have a little over our half-hour now, we have been asking you, in light of the former president's lawsuit, asking you about how much you trust in the ability of these companies themselves when it comes to content adoration. democrats, (202) 748-8000. republicans, (202) 748-8001.

independents, (202) 748-8002. not long ago when she was the nominee for the federal trade commission, lena con had an exchange with a texas republican senator, ted cruz, about the issues of big tech and censorship as the senator was talking about and here's a bit of that exchange. [video clip] >> as you know, i have deep concerns about tech and its power. i believe the fcc should be doing much more to reign in the anti-competitive abuses of big tech, to reign in the blatant censorship and hubris demonstrated by big tech. what are your views on the risks posed by big tech, both on a competition side and on a consumer protection side? particularly the risks posed by

censorship and imposition of their views upon the free market of ideas? >> i have been quite public about my concerns around concentration of power in digital markets. on the competition side, there are a whole range of potential risks. one that comes up across the board is the way it -- in which being able to dominate one market gives these companies in some markets the ability to expand into adjacent markets while making it much easier to capture an entire ecosystem. on the consumer protection side there are interesting questions to be asked specific to behavioral add taste business models insofar as these business models really incentivize endless vacuuming of data and i worry that in some cases some of these companies may think it's worse -- worth the costa business to violate privacy laws . those concerns come to mind.

i think, you know, it seems like these are growing increasingly bipartisan concerns. >> i look forward to working with you on them and i will say in particular i think there's a lot more the commission can do in terms of promoting and ensuring transparency from big tech chai think is incredibly opaque right now. thank you. host: if you would like to see more on that hearing, you can head to our website to learn more about the issues on areas of tech. anne-marie, new york, independent line. caller: hello? host: you are on. caller: i'm calling on the independent line. i was a republican my whole life but now i call myself independent because a lot of republicans through trump under the bus -- threw trump under the

bus for no reason, he was actually the best president since the founding fathers. as far as facebook goes, just banning, they ban all republicans. they target all republicans. they do not target democrats ever. ok? you cannot discriminate against one group of republicans, ok? host: when you say they don't target democrats, how do you determine that? caller: because i was targeted online, including my friends who post political, who are republican and post political post. i'm talking about real news posts and opinion. ok? i was friends with democrats on line also, ok? i don't discriminate. i will listen to everybody. democrats that i was friends with online could post anything

they wanted. they were never flagged for fake news ever, ever. ok? my post had labels of out of context, not true. they took down my posts, ok? also, they took down pictures. i posted a picture of the happiness and diversity in the round on january 6 gathering. ok? i shared that and they took them down. i mentioned the diversity in the crowd and they took all of those pictures down. host: in light of your experiences, do you still use the services? caller: i haven't been on there for quite a while, for different

reasons. i mean, they banned the president, ok? a president trump was for all racists, ok? host: gerardo, hello? caller: i don't understand what they are talking about. moderating speech? the people moderating things are the algorithms you follow. you can find anything you want to on the web. you follow certain things, those of the things that are going to come up. host: do you invest a lot of trust in the web or these companies themselves to do that? caller: no, no. host: why is that? caller: because any personal person? no. if you come with a news organization that has a reputation for being truthful? or we could get on to a

government page that has facts. but as far as what people say? everybody's got elbows. you know? there are one million opinions out there about all these things . you have to go to places that are reputable for telling the truth. if you keep hearing that someone stole the election, that's your truth. host: congratulations to the lightning there in tampa. let's go to mark in idaho, republican line, post falls. caller: hello, pedro? thanks for having me on. i think that what we are losing track of here is that this provision for section 230 is like a quarter of a century old. it popped up when the internet was in its infancy. the whole purpose for it was to

protect certain outfits who were providing platforms from liability from what the people that posted to these platforms might say. it was protecting them from, from, from lawsuits and things like that. because we didn't really know what this whole internet was going to morph into. the problem we have now, and i think this is the big question that will ultimately end up in the supreme or, once these platforms begin censoring, have they crossed that line where they they lose that protection of, of section 230? they lose the liability protection. yes, they are private companies, but so is the new york times and the washington post. host: so you are saying an

update is probably needed to the current law? caller: i think so, pedro. we have got to take another look at it. nobody knew what the internet was going to turn into in 1996. i mean some of us were still getting those little aol discs in the mail and wondered what to do with them all. we just didn't know. host: not laughing at you, laughing at your reference. i get it. as far as legislative efforts themselves, do you trust the legislators themselves to make the updates to reflect the current time is and the nature of the law considering where we are with the internet should mark caller: well, i would hope so, but the problem is that this has become so politicized. that's why i think this is ultimately going to have to wind up in the hands of the supreme court. for them to moderate this whole thing.

no matter who is in power, the republicans, the democrats, they are each going to have their own perspective on how this thing should be handled. but basically, big tech has gotten too big for their britches. they are just sort of begging for a sherman antitrust action to be taken against them all and have them all broken up. i hope that doesn't happen. host: ok, that is mark sharing his thoughts on 230, potential changes in what he sees as a possible need for change. over many years the heads of these companies have appeared before committees in congress to talk about issues of privacy and other things around content as well. go to our website, c-span.org, you can type the names mark zuckerberg, jack dorsey, you can find the hearings and everything related to them there. also want to point you to our digital, our program that deals

with digital policy issues, "the communicators," scheduled for this week, elizabeth nolan brown talking about a recent article, the bipartisan antitrust crusade against big tech, this coming saturday at 6:30, you can see it then and online as well. a lot of other content when it comes to digital media companies , particularly in the area of the program where there is 800 plus programs archived at the web -- the website. rodney, indiana, independent line. caller: yes, sir, how are you this morning? host: fine, thank you. caller: calling and because two of the biggest problems with the censorship online is that these social media companies now have lobbying power as well as there is no alternative to the big

three that is facebook, twitter, and youtube. the same way for big years we watched big pharmaceutical companies donate to certain candidates and help them get elected and then receive certain benefits because of that, we are now watching a silicon valley that has a tired enough wealth to do the same thing. to the point that some of your callers have made about it seeming political or like liberals get a break in these situations, i think it might be true because silicon valley is in favor of a lot of really great things, gay-rights, social rights, other liberal issues. they are getting these left-leaning people elected. during that last election cycle there were a lot of republican ideas taken down and things like that. i do think that there was a slight agenda, you know, behind those sort of things. but i don't think it was jack dorsey and zuckerberg necessarily who wanted the agenda, but rather the people

that they helped to elect, you know? each of the parties sort of a week other these favors. host: that's rodney, they are, talking about the lobbying aspect. the freedom institute highlighting these issues when it comes to how tech companies handle it. just to show you what it says under the section of misinformation that they define as false or inaccurate information including rumors, insults, pranks, with examples of more deliberate misinformation being fear fishing and propaganda, referred to as fake news. the first amendment allows for people who make false statements of fact sued for defamation. how do tech companies highlight it at the facebook content

policy? they highlight the fact that the facebook policy is not to remove false news but instead attempt to remove the visibility, banning political ads in fall of 2020. twitter, as far as their policies, they said you may not use the services for the purpose of any relating or interfering in elections, putting suppressing or misinforming. host: the freedom form -- misinforming. you can find the website at the freedom form institute. patrick, north carolina, democratic line. caller: hey, good morning. i just want to say that i am in favor of there being some kind of regulations on big tech and what can be posted online. maybe not completely censoring people, but kind of how twitter did with trump at the time, you know, leading up to the

elections shortly after that where they would flag his post by saying do more research or if it was misleading, kind of leading people to do your homework and see if this stuff is true. i'm kind of more in favor of people, you know, studying themselves in their spare time instead of just believing everything that comes out of the mouth of just one person. that said, i think there needs to be some kind of nonpartisan commission, if they are going to go that route and not leave it in the hands of big tech. who it should be left to? i definitely don't think it should be the supreme court or people in congress. it should be like an outside firm or something that's hired based on consensus to monitor that. host: patrick in north carolina, mlb says private companies can institute policy for their customers to implement online

services or brick and mortar services. jason from honolulu says that trust big tech 100% to moderate and i have a problem with me being targeted by ads. this viewer from twitter saying that there is no media site that moderates content mostly enough and that most that is flag is done by other users. then from louis in washington state, tech companies have the right to moderate their service, you still have hackers but if it is people terrorist a speech, they should have the right to cut it off, it's their company. those are the ways people are reaching out to us. as well as the phone lines. the springs, colorado, sean on the republican line. caller: i just think the democrats went out of their way to recruit zuckerberg, facebook, and twitter to weaponize them against trump.

you know? they dumped money into political action groups. yes, they should be totally taken apart. and section 230. host: what benefit is that, do you think? caller: they clearly hid the biden story, along with media? you hid the biden story that came out, people saying that if they had known about that they would have voted for trump. host: you said take apart the companies, take apart 230, what's the benefit of that? caller: they are too big, they have too much power. it's very bad, really. host: ok. iris, san antonio, hello. caller: this is iris. host: you're on, go ahead. caller: hello, i'm calling, it's

asking if i trust big tech. i do not trust big tech to moderate content. i read edward snowden's permanent record and i don't trust anybody that spies on me and keeps a permanent record of everybody. and advertises to them based on that. listens to me through my microphone. watches me through my camera. host: did you use any of these platforms that you have concerns about? caller: no. i used to use facebook until i read the edward snowden book and saw the movie. i think that it's bizarre, the power they have. also, google, how they are into

antiaging and trying to get your genes through ancestry.com? i don't trust any big tech to moderate anything. i believe everybody is being socially engineered. everybody is meant to look the same, dress the same. i think it's, we are getting to a time that's super creepy. host: ok, that's iris in san antonio, texas. morning consult, the organization, gave a pole to people and asked them about various issues when it comes to technology. one of the russians they asked, -- questions they ask, do you support congress imposing new regulations on large technology companies that may change or eliminate certain services or functionality that they provide? when it comes to the responses in the initial read on the support of the bill, 24% said

they would strongly support that, versus 32% saying they would somewhat support it. 25% saying they would somewhat oppose. 9% saying they would strongly oppose. 23% not giving an opinion whatsoever. they also ask about how much congress should be involved in these things. there is more there at the progress chamber of morning consult on it comes to this bowl . you can read it for yourself. democratic line, holland dale, florida, part, hello. caller: very interesting topic this morning. don't want to change subject, but when regulating big tech, you want to regulate banks and the stock exchanges, the various commodity exchanges? reagan once told gorbachev trust but verify.

have watchdogs out there, which is going on right now, even though the great prevaricate or has called in the troops, trust but verify. host: as far as social media itself, where does trust but verify go for you when it comes to verifying interesting content? caller: well, i'm a dinosaur. i come from a bygone age when the computer would fill a room. i don't find big tech to be a monolithic structure. it changes according to the will of the people who use it. i have seen big tech go from, you know, a trumpet for trump and now it's moderated in the other direction. i think, let the american people decide. host: ok.

dave, denison, texas, republican line. caller: big tech has never been for trump, americans don't get a chance to decide because companies like google and facebook make contrarian opinions that they don't agree with disappear so that people never see it. that's not what i wanted to say. your first guest, from axios, i believe, i wish you would play a clip from the legal analyst over at fox who was discussing the case yesterday. not trying to say that it was good, bad, or indifferent, but she had some very interesting particulars that explain how the case has a chance to succeed. not that it's a one in a million that can't, based on the premise that the digital platforms because -- that they are quasi-governmental institutions and have been granted special favors by the government and don't have the right to exclude that a lot of private companies do.

that being said, she wasn't saying that that is an accurate statement, but that that is what the case is based on. it's also based on the justice thomas dissented in the biden versus knight decision from april of this year. it's a new legal issue from the standpoint of basing that, this argument, on something that's only a few months old. host: let me turn this to our topic and your ability to trust content moderation by the companies themselves. caller: well, i don't. i've been doing internet web design marketing since 2001, before google existed. 96%, 98% of the money that goes to political campaigns from the tech companies is from the democrats, which is fine, i don't mind that, but it will change how they moderate or decide something as true or not true and the reality is that these are things that are

opinions that are being argued until they get enough air under them so that people can make a decision on it, like that, like the possibility or probability that the covid came from a lab, not from a wet market. there's plenty of evidence coming out now that they are permitting to be discussed, they've shut it down the same way they shut trump down regarding the election issue. host: ok. elizabeth, san diego, california, you are the last call on this. go ahead. caller: yeah, good morning, c-span. i do trust big tech at this point to moderate content. i kind of picture it like a giant hyde park in london with a half a billion tweets going out on twitter every day. someone has to moderate. what happened with trump is that he, it's well-documented, he

told over 50,000 lies. probably most of them were sent out over 20 or -- twitter. most of them went out. but what happened on january 6 was hate speech. he's attempted to take over an election, a fair election. they rightfully shut him down because he was dividing the country and creating hate. host: but to the issue of tech companies themselves, ultimately why do you trust them? caller: well, flip it, who would you trust? when the fairness doctrine went away, we had the rights of fox news and rush limbaugh. host: that was were largely over the air broadcasts, but go ahead and finish your thought, we are out of time. caller: look what happened fox

turned into a hate speech. donald trump parked himself on fox during the election. there was no fairness there. host: we will finish it there. thank you all who participated in the first hour. we turn out to having guests join us on other topics. gun violence is the first topic this morning. we will talk about the recent rise reported in gun violence and documented by the white house as well. later on in the program, we will have a conversation with the man who helped lead the bush cheney recount effort back in 2000 and talk about voting rights issues, former deputy attorney general george terwilliger. those conversations, coming up on "washington journal." ♪

before from arkansas. -- -- listen on the free c-span radio app. a conversation on the supreme court's 2020-2021 term with legal experts, including former u.s. solicitor general gregory of the george w. bush administration. watch the heritage foundation discussion live at 1:00 p.m. eastern on c-span online at c-span.org, or listen on the free c-span radio app. ♪ >> weekends on c-span two on -- every saturday, you will find events and people that explore our nations passed on american history tv. on sunday, book tv brings you the latest in nonfiction books and authors.

. discover, explore, weekends on c-span2. ♪ >> washing journal continues. host: dr. the jonathan metzl with vanderbilt university, the director of the department of medicine and health and the author of the book "dying of

whiteness: how the politics of racial resentment is killing america's heartland." thank you for joining us. guest: thank you. host: can you start by talking about your background, particulate when it comes to the subject of gun violence. guest: i am trained across the board, i am an mba doctor, i trained in psychiatry and i went back to school and got a phd in sociology and politics. i tried to combine those in it to decade study of guns in america, not just on gun violence, but what guns mean, i have done a lot of work on the social political meetings of guns in america. i help run a group called a project -- a group in tennessee that brings people across lyrical divides to talk about how we can form, even though it seems impossible sometimes, to try to keep people in community

safer and the last part is, as you mentioned, i had a book cannot about a year and a half ago called "dying of whiteness," and it has a lot of topics. i was doing research into missouri pro-gun communities and talking to people about guns and looking at that tension between liberty on one hand and safety on the other. host: statistics about gun violence, particular event this year, 10,000 people related to that in the first half of this year. from your background, what is the best way to understand the rising numbers? guest: i think it is a question, not an answer. in a way, with what we are seeing, it is a spike in certain kinds of gun related injuries and deaths. that comes in the context of coming out of a pandemic but in the pandemic, we saw a lot of

guns -- sold a lot of guns and there are more shootings now and more gun owners. more guns in circulation. for me, what this says is on one hand, we need to do what governor cuomo started to do the other day, say this is an emergency impacting a lot of people, but i would also say we need to have a broader conversation about what it means to live in a society where there are so many millions of guns in circulation and come to some kind of common understanding, which seems likely -- seems impossible. host: imagine governor cuomo, he was describing the situation in response to this, there is a study -- a sortie in the paper saying that he is planning on bolstering the law enforcement presence in cities were shootings on the rise and saying the state will establish a new gun private desk and violence prevention office -- establish a new gun violence prevention office.

and establish a council on gun violence reduction. as far as reactions to what he describes as an epidemic, what you think of those as reactions? guest: there is no silver bullet. new york can do what it wants and what it should do, but new york is one state in the united states and so it is hard for a state like new york to regulate guns. we have orders in this country and what is more important to anyone policy that governor cuomo did and i am happy to talk about this, the aspect of why i think this is important, is to try to change the narrative. in a way, we have this ridiculous gun debate with gun control seemingly on one side and gun liberty on the other. in a way, there is no room for change the debate. i'll communities are suffering right now. in, i think what he did as he

won big and tried to at least shake up the narrative and have people talk about different things. that being said, i think there are things that he did that were important in terms of opening gun manufacturers for civil liability if they made false claims about their products and even more important, working with local communities. it is not just police, working in communities to engage with violence intervention and police community relationships and so, there were a lot of aspects. this is a starting point for -- what we should do -- for what we should do as a country. host: this is our guest and he will bs and -- we less -- with us until a: 45. (202) 748-8001 for independents. (202) 748-8002, when you talk about changing the narrative,

what is the lead aspect? what is the first thing that needs to change? guest: empathy, understanding, although these things seem impossible right now. i am from missouri, i was born on a military base, i grew up knowing a lot of people who own guns. it is not like i have assumptions about people who are on any side of this. we have gotten in this position where there is no common conversation. i think we have a common interest in keeping our communities and families safe and there are so many things we cannot talk about because this conversation is so inherently polarized and in a way, i think we should be having big, national conversations about what we can do about this in ways that lets people at least see where the other side is coming from and realize that is happening in the context of the pandemic where issues of mortality and life and death are

really at the front of people's minds for some people having a gun is a way of protection against that or something like that. i think in a way, we are not talking to each other and thinking about the second you have before this. when we engage on each other just on social media, it foments an understanding -- a misunderstanding. i think there needs to be away to break out of this pro or anti-kind of debate we are having. the other point is there are a lot of times -- the most urgent is what i wrote my book about, gun suicide. about two thirds of gun death in this country. when we talk about numbers like 10,000, like you were saying before, we do not talk about the leading cause of gun deaths in this country. what can we do about gun suicide? again, i think polarization is

not helping us right now. host: as of july 8, the gun violence archive highlights 22,000 gun violence deaths in the united states. homicide murder and unintentional death plus about 10,000 461 suicides, more than that, over 12,000 when it comes to deaths related to guns. president biden entering the conversation, dr. metzl, as far as this topic is concerned. i will play a bit of what he has to say and get your response to it. [video clip] pres. biden: it historically rises during the summer. as we emerge from this pandemic, our country opening back up again, the spike will be more pronounced than it usually is. for folks at home, here is what you need to know. i have been at this a long time. there are things we know that work that reduce gun violence and violent crime and things that we do not know.

the things we know about, background checks, purchasing a firearm are important. ban on assault weapons and high-capacity magazines. no one needs to have a weapon that can fire over 30, 40, 50, up to 100 unless you think -- community policing and programs that keep people safe and people out of trouble. these efforts work and save lives. over time, these policies were gutted and woefully underfunded. host: he lists a few things, but as far as this response and some of the things he brought up to the table, what you think? guest: one issue is first ball, i think it is important to focus on this issue and i appreciate the importance of doing these rudimentary background checks.

if you get a car, you cannot start driving the car. you need to get a drivers license. this is like the smallest possible thing. part of the issue is what is you talk about in terms of background checks and community policing, these are important beginning steps. on the other hand, to be honest, presidents do not have a ton of power right now to implement gun policy there because a lot of gun policy is being set by the courts, being set by particular states, we have an important case in the fall that is going to look at national rates. there are so many things a person can do right now. -- there are only so many things a president can do right now. what a president can do in addition to talking about basic kinds of policy. he was also talking about the assault weapons ban on

high-capacity magazines. it was in effect and some people argue reduced the number of deaths from mass shootings in late -- the late 2000's. again, most gun deaths are suicide, partner violence, accidental shootings. we need to have a bigger conversation than what he is suggesting. the president is doing the right thing by at least trying to focus the conversation in ways that might bring people together. host: let's start with catherine from st. joseph, michigan. catherine, you are on with our guest. caller: good morning. hello. i hope that we do have the background checks and that. i am 100% for that. i am surprised that you have not addressed the problem -- let me

back up. you said that with the influx of people buy more guns, that there is more violence. people do not feel safe. that is why they are buying more guns. when we have people say defund the police, you defined the police and then you do not have that protection. this is why people are buying more guns. accidents, when you buy a gun, you have the response ability of making sure -- that response ability of making sure that gun is locked. you have not really touched on the aspect of what the real problem is. that is accountability. people go to jail and they can get out without a bond. and they go back and do the same thing. if they are not going to have their -- because of what they done, we will have a rotation of people coming in and out of

jail. that is the primary thing in this country that we are having problems with. host: ok. catherine in michigan. dr., go ahead. guest: i appreciate the question. one is the question of safety which is important. it is on a lot of people's mine. safety could be the bigger conversation we have because if you think about it right now, on one hand, feeling unsafe in a pandemic is a natural response. there is a pathogen flooding that in the air. -- floating in the air. early on in the pandemic, the feeling of safety and i did a lot of interviews who -- with people who said they do not know about the coronavirus. from the very beginning, of the pandemic, and that is when we saw around the block guidelines. -- gun storylines.

-- storelines. some people are feeling unsafe because of social political climate or police violence or police brutality, but i would just say that when you think about the problem of guns and by the way, i agree with the caller also, she highlights that there is a lot of support for gun owners for basic things like background checks. it is not like that is some huge thing. the survey suggests that about 80% of american, 90% of americans believe that we should have some kind of regulatory process for purchasing and carrying a gun. it is not like we are so divided when it comes to the everyday policy level. again, i would highlight that part of what my research shows is that on one hand, there are these sometimes racial stereotypes that we have that the reason we need -- the ceo of

the nra, gang bangers and carjackers, others who are going to come get us, but when you look at the real risk of guns is, a lot of times, it is people who have never had a gun before who bring it into their home and they harm themselves in a moment of despair. it goes off accidentally. so bringing guns into people's homes is itself a form of risk that is not about the gang banger or whatever. it is about what it means to have a gun in your house. what i found out is, at least in the research i was doing, that was a risk predominantly among middle to lower income white men in missouri. there are a lot of these ways in which the popular conception of why people need guns and the real risk of guns sometimes are discarded. this does not discount what the caller said. i think we need to have a

national conversation about safety and what needs to be safe. i think it is important to recognize the importance to organize our biases about who is a risk and what we need to do about it. host: from new york city, democrats line. caller: i would like to comment on one thing. did the united states government start this country with violence against the indigenous people of this land? and how gun violence -- eliminating large segments of the indigenous people in this land. we do not talk about that. other than that, we have television and television shows across the countries that promote violence. they show every day, they show violence in the news, in the media, they show violence in olive these -- in a ball of

these commercial shows -- in awl -- all of these commercial shows. we know that violence has started with the bank. -- klan. when this country was born, man was not allowed to have rights. there was not not many people in america when the founding fathers came here and -- host: dr. metzl, go ahead. guest: i have a lot of agreements with the caller. i would like people to pick up my book that goes into the

history that color was referencing. -- caller was referencing. we live in a violent country. we live our daily lives -- i have done research in other parts of the world and it is funny, you go in the outside looking in, and even research has been about guns. you go to other con -- countries, i have been researching in other parts of europe and people who own guns there, wendy why they own a gun, -- when you asked them why they own a gun, they say they are defending their nation. in the united states, the narrative of why people own guns is about individual rights, property, things like that. we are very individual about guns. it leads to a lot of anxiety about every person for themselves and things like that. personally, we live in a country where we habituated a lot of

violence and a lot of everyday violence that almost traumatized us as a nation and the caller is referencing the racial history of gun ownership, not just about what the previous caller was talking about in terms of threats, but he is right that there is a racial history of who gets to own a gun in this country. it predates the founding of the country. in my book, i talk about precolonial america. if you are allowed to carry a gun in public, you are either a white landowner or a white person working for a white man under his -- his job was to scorch uprisings by nigro's and indians at the time. that went on the way to the civil war and what were called black codes. the ku klux klan was meant to disarm african-american gun

owners and that has gone through the 1960's, malcolm x, and people like robert williams wrote a book that said people have a right to defend themselves under the second amendment, and that is when the country discovered that gun control after 1968. there is a long history of racial politics of who is seen as a threat. and then who gets to carry a gun and who gets to defend themselves. there is this conversation about what is playing out now, which is in part about guns, but it is also about stereotypes, safety, immunity and it is a far bigger issue that ties into the racial history of the country. host: frank in new york, independent. hi. caller: good morning. good morning, dr. metzl. you were talking violence, guns,

race, i think that for me, my opinion can be reduced to income disparities. in this country, we think it is around the procapitalist side or on the way to the left of socialism -- i want to get your opinion on how much that plays into although this. when i said income disparities. thank you. guest: thank you. quick question. -- great question. i feel like everyone should be on the independent life. -- independent line. we have an interest in finding

common solutions. it is an epidemic on top of a pandemic right now. i think the caller raises an interesting point, this one, what is the role of private industry? do we want to regulate private industry? i say that not -- we have a constitution that guarantees a second amendment right for some people to carry firearms for sure, but i would also say that is there accountability for the industry? that is one thing governor cuomo brought up and what might be coming down the pike in new york and i say that because thinking about what we have been talked about in this conversation, there are different points along the way where gun manufacturers have promoted their products in ways that i personally find socially irresponsible. ins about -- things about

targeting, are you afraid of the place if you are a black american? do not take a chance, take matters in your hands. in my book, i talk about how there is a lot of anxiety about white masculinity. all of a sudden, manufacturers are saying you need an ar-15 to feel like a real man. many products -- what gun manufacturers do as they recognize the tension, the anxieties in our country and they put their products in the middle of it. the urgent question for our country is, should there be any regulation on that process or any accountability? we had a reckoning before in our country, when drunk driving became and i'm -- and thought -- an problem. car manufacturers need to do a better job. that led to antilock brakes and

different kinds of steering and many more cars are on the road now. car manufacturers of a site and had responsibility for their products. it led to a safer product and we can think about secondhand smoke and many other examples. gun manufacturers have been shielded from that kind of liability and so, it is not like they had to address the problem in ways that other manufacturers did. there are technologies, you can make smart guns that recognizes someone's hand. you can think about having conversations about how they advertise their products, particularly in moments of social tension like a pandemic resembled. or reckonings with racism in this country. the issue is the relationship between industry and government and society. i think it is also important

that people think the gun industry is on one side or another. their aim is like many industries -- i do not think they should come with the same kind of response ability as any other product. host: what you think about use of this rhetoric when it comes to the type of discussion, some would say use the term defined the police, president biden talking about no one -- weapons no one needs to have. guest: the hard part as we know is that rhetoric is harder to control right now, particularly in an era of social media and anxiety and also because we are in a pandemic. there is a risk of really engaging other people because when you talk with a stranger, you can get the coronavirus and in a way, rhetoric feels very

inflamed in a moment that is a tense moment in the history of our species. the history of our planet. in a way, toning down the rhetoric i think it is one responsible thing that government can do and again, i think that can theoretically and in a different planet other than ours, a bipartisan conversation because if you think about issues like defund the police, it is not like people are saying i want to go rob a store. it is not like people start saying -- we do not feel safe from the people who are supposed to be protecting us. it is a question of safety, so we want a better system that acknowledges our humanity, acknowledges our need for safety. that ties into other things we hear in other places in the country where people feel like they are not safe from politics or from whatever.

you name it. in a way, there are somebody different conversations around now about how we feel safe. what we are missing is a kind of empathic understanding. thinking about the republican caller in the beginning, i agreed with what he said the pandemic hit and people run out to buy guns because they did not feel safe. i have done a little that's a lot of interviews and they said, i did not note -- i have done a lot of interviews. we are having different conversations about safety and one thing we can say is, as humans, as americans, people living in this country, people deserve to feel safe. let's start with that as the beginning of the conversation. and then work backwards and maybe it will lead to different outcomes. host: our guest, dr. metzl of vanderbilt university. in his book, other --"dying of whiteness: how the politics of

racial resentment is killing america's heartland, dorothy. caller: good morning. i agree with everything that dr. metzl said. as long as we are having the second amendment, that holds people from having this conversation. if we get the conversation away from the regulation of guns, to the regulation of bullets. can we not tax bullets and cell bullets the way they did cigarettes -- and sell bullets the way they did cigarettes? if we went at that at that angle, we can have the same conversation over and over about second amendment rights and what people are allowed to own a gun. you can own a gun, but can we not regulate the ammunition part? package it the way they do,

alcohol, tax it. so we will have those funds to help take care of the people that are actual victims of gun violence. host: that is dorothy in clarksville, tennessee. guest: thank you. so many important things to think about there. again, i agree with pre-much everything you said. i would say a couple of things. first the ball, in terms of bullets, there has been a several decades long conversation about the possibility of regulating bullets and it is important to note that i'll bullets are not the same. there are different kinds of bullets that do more or less harm and for me, i think about what happens, there was a debate over at the time called kevlar piercing bullets, a ticket or so ago -- a decade or so ago and many police organizations across the country came out in support of a ban on kevlar piercing bullets because their officers were at risk of getting shot and

getting killed through their kevlar vests and initially, police unions said, let's start regulating kevlar piercing bullets and this was not ok by many gun manufacturers. the weight of capitalism came down on them. efforts to regulate bullets, believe it or not, in these extreme examples, with the same kind of responses as originating guns. i would urge everybody to read the second amendment in the constitution. it does not say anything about -- it talks about well-regulated militias being a right in this country, but in a way, it has become a kind of test and i talked about this in my book. we do not always interpret the second amendment the way we do now. there are about 1980, we thought

that melissa meant melissa, the military. -- militia meant melissa -- militia, the military. the initial framers of the constitution meant that militia s should be families, homes, and cars and we have not seen with the evidence was, but there was a commission led by a senator and other people at the time and that led to a real change -- before 1980, guns were for police and armies and things like that. it was not for every single person. that changed about the 1980's and in the early 2000's, 2008, there was a big supreme court case, it confirms the right of individuals to have guns in their cars and a huge case coming up in the fall that talks about whether or not cities can regulate on whether -- can

somebody carry a gun on a subway? is it an individual right? we have a bigger issue about public safety. we have been debating this question about what the second amendment means. personally, i wish they put more text and the second amendment. -- more text in the second amendment. it is important to note that when people wrote the constitution, they did not have 3d printer guns, they did not have ghost gun, -- ghost guns. we have taken this ambiguous text in the second amendment. we have interpreted that in ways that led to more expansion of gun rights in this country. dorothy, i would say, read the second amendment and you will see that a lot of the things that we assume to be true now are not explicitly clear their

desk there and what we have been debating is what that means and i think is simple -- they are and what we have been debating is what that means. host: about criminalist carey. -- about permit-less carey. guest: it takes away another layer of public safety and a countability. if you believe that police are there to keep you safe, which i know a lot of people do not believe, then if police said -- and see someone walking down main street in tennessee or with ar-15, should they -- or someone is acting in a threatening manner, should the police stop them and as the present have a right to take an ar-15 and carry it in a bar. i live downtown, i think having a lot of guns in bars is a bad idea because there are higher

rates of shooting when people are drawn. -- drunk. you're taking away another level of accountability and the thing we see also is that when people start to feel anxious, when they are not being protected, they buy guns and you end up with a much larger militarized society. and people start to say i did not feel safe, -- when people start to say i do not feel safe, you do not feel safe because of legislation. i can say with a lot of data behind the that what we are going to see is more shooting and more death and the question for our country and the state of tennessee is, is it a fair trade-off? pretty much versus more not just death and injury, but anxiety and distress. i think what they have done is not going to help us. host: from darlene in las vegas.

independents line. caller: good morning. how are you today? guest: good morning. caller: it is my understanding that criminals do not carry around -- care about legislation for guns. they get it illegally. i also understand that courts got involved so that they can clarify that ambiguous second amendment. the supreme court case in 1989, the supreme court ruled police are not responsible for your protection. you are. with that being said, single women, two little girls, i am an optimal target walking through a parking lot. we are two of the highest people at risk.

responsible gun owners like me, we have our guns in a locked safe until we take them out. we go to gun ranges, we go to gun safety classes. and then there are the looney tunes that do go out and buy guns. and then there are there criminal elements that jump through flaming hoops to make sure -- guest: it sound like we might be in agreement. i think there should be hoops. i am not against -- i hope nothing i said is against the second amendment. i think we have to look at it as a document like any other document. the question is when you take away the hoops that you're talking about, which are important. the safety, training process, background checks, other things

like that. for me, it breeds more excited because what we do is we weaken the divide as he put it -- as you put it between legal guns and illegal guns. when there is no permit required no background check required and anybody can buy a gun, how do you know what is an illegal gun and illegal gun in the first place? remember when you were 15 in high school and you stay outside of the liquor store and waited for somebody to go in and buy a bunch of beer and give them 20 bucks? that is kind of what guns are. you have no regulation whatsoever and you cannot really create this divide between legal and illegal because guns are flowing and if you cannot buy them, somebody else can walk in and buy them for you. in a way, what i am suggesting is that listening those divides makes this anxiety -- loosening those divides makes -- makes

this divide more prevalent. i think it is important that many responsible gun owners -- let's have a national conversation about what are the rights and response abilities and what it means -- forget shootings. let's talk about what it means to be a responsible gun owner. let's have a national conversation about that. what should be the process? when you're loosening although these laws make it easy for people to get guns and we have not talked about gun show loophole is for example where you can walk in. that creates anxiety, it creates -- it reaffirms the sense that nobody is in control. that is a long-winded way of saying i agree with many parts of what the caller says and we should be thinking about not just about shootings, but what

does it mean to be a responsible gun owner. what process should people go through, which had their responsibilities be? -- what should they responsibilities be eco -- responsibilities be eco -- caller: i am a strong believer in the second amendment. i do not own a gun. i do not like handguns whatsoever. i think it comes down to a couple of things. safety. people do not feel safe. they will do what they have to do what they have to to protect themselves. also, this is kind of like the opiate crisis. going after people that are needing medication and then they come out -- and the ones that need it are the ones that it is hurting. it is not hurting the illegal drugs. same with the guns. you can put l of the regulations

and do what you want to with it. but the illegal guns will still be there. people will keep it in stock. you are going after people that are law-abiding. we can debate the second amendment, we can debate i'll you want, but we are going to have to start with in my opinion is to quit blaming one race or the other. that is so divisive. start with an honest conversation about the gun problems and quit trying to punish the ones that are being responsible. another issue is, this is my last point, they need to come out with some type of law. these people that leave their guns in their cars do not lock their cars, it is just stupid. i do not understand that. maybe if we come out with something to keep these guns from being stolen every night in

nashville or someplace in tennessee, it might be a good start. guest: he has some good points. we were talking about -- the result of a law that made it ok to p -- to bring guns in cars. this ties into many pieces of legislation like the castle doctrine, the right to protect your home and your body. it extended to people's cars and there are a lot of people leaving their guns in their trunks in their cars which then led to more gun theft, more gun circulation, and i'll of problems. in a way, that resulted from a law that made it easier and illegal for people to have their guns in their cars in the first place. for me, that means if that law was weeding out the bad consequences, that's come up with a better policy. there are so many factors. let's think about the cost today.

this is the world we are living in where people want individual liberty on one hand and say they do not feel safe and want the right to protect themselves. that is important to pay attention to. honestly, people have a right to feel safe living in the country. i think that should be the starting point of the conversation, but people are also saying that if the other side is not playing by the rules, i do not think i should lay by the rules are there should be rules governing not those people, -- not me, but those people. it really does come back to these national conversations about safety. and about what you do as a society to reassure people because i personally feel and i have studied this for a long time. every person in this country has a gun. i do not think it would make us feel safe. i did not think it would lead to changes in gun injury and death rates we have. i think it would lead to more

mistrust. i think we are -- it is going to take a kind of coming together and i do want to go back to the point i was making before which is also there is the threat we can imagine. thinking about the last caller, -- you hear that a lot. it is important to remember thinking about the opioid crisis. perfect example. there is an industry behind us. they are making money by trying to overturn common sense regulation. the biggest risk in this country is getting -- having a gun in your house and having no training, not having the gun safe, having it unlocked. and again, when i did my research, we had about 40,000 guns in this country, about 25, 26, 27, were gun suicides, accidental shootings. in a way, i think it is

important for almost to think about what is the threat we imagine versus what is the actual threat and start there. host: dr. metzl a vanderbilt university and the author of "dying of whiteness: how the politics of racial resentment is killing america's heartland." thank you for your time today. guest: any, thank you so much. host: coming up, a discussion on voting rights and election integrity with the man who led the bush-cheney recount in florida in 2000. and former deputy attorney general george terwilliger. he will join us next. ♪ >> weekends on c-span2 rings you the best in american history and nonfiction books. on saturday's american history tv tv exploring the nation's past. coming up saturday on 3:00 p.m. eastern on oral history, iraq war veteran recalls his experiences in the war, including the day his vehicle

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>> washington journal continues. host: george terwilliger served as the deputy journey -- deputy attorney general for the bush-cheney. he's a partner of mcguire woods. we will talk about election integrity. can you go back to the year 2000 and the role you played in the recount and what it taught you about issues of election integrity. guest: i would be glad to. the issue in the recount as it evolved over time was really, what is a valid vote? much different question than some of the issues that exist today. a vote is really a form of human occasion. where a person -- a form of communication. where a person communicates in confidence. if that communication is unclear for some reason, then what

really florida boiled down to is the necessity of having objective criteria and equal criteria by which that communication would be interpreted and judged. in that case, there were of course the use of punchcard ballots in some of the contested counties and every time the punchcard is put through the recount process in a machine, it changes the nature of the card such that we wound up with some little holes being partially punched out, some being dimpled and so forth. but then the larger legal issues that came about there had to do with in a presidential election, the constitutional role of the state legislature to prescribe the election procedures. and when the courts, the florida courts, started to change deadlines and change the election procedures prescribed

by the legislature, it really became too much of a constitutional matter for the supreme court. host: from what you learned on those two fronts, you have seen -- has anything changed much since those days of 2000 when it comes to administration of election? guest: yes, a great deal. my experience goes back a bit before. i assisted the late senator john warner when he was chairman of the senate of the rules committee of judging the election of mary, her original auction to the senate which was contested by her opponent on allegations of vote fraud. as much as is true today, the fact that there is no vote fraud is a myth. but proving that vote fraud can affect the outcome of an election is almost impossible. the reason for that is that when the boat becomes -- the vote

becomes dissociated by the vote or person -- or in person, it becomes impossible to prove what the effect of any number of fraudulent votes were and to put that more plainly if i may, let's say there is an election in a precinct where there are 100 votes. if you find out later that 10%, 10 of those votes were invalid for one reason or another, either the voter was dead or that mailer was not filled out correctly or so forth, does make a difference in the outcome of election. it only makes a difference in the outcome of the election if those 10 votes could have affected the outcome. if they did, yes it can. there is nothing that can be done about it at that point because we do not know who those 10 invalid votes were cast. fast-forward to the 2020 election and allegations of

voter fraud made there, that can never be proven. and it is irresponsible frankly in my opinion to continue to push the idea that that election has a level of fraud that affected the outcome. we will never know. host: our guest at joining us to talk about issues of voting and election integrity, (202) 748-8000 for democrats. (202) 748-8001 for republicans and independents, (202) 748-8002. you can text us at (202) 748-8003. to the last statement, i am sure people have called this program, i'm sure you heard this yourself that people will point to cases in various states that they can say, yes, there were clear issues of voter fraud, about the recounting, windows recovered or things like that. when you hear those things, how do you respond to that? guest: i think it is very important to look at these issues objectively and to

separate the phenomena of voting irregularities which have been every election from voter fraud. i would encourage people to look at two sites from left and right from this issue. one is the heritage foundation has an excellent piece on its website about voter integrity and believe it or not, it is not much different from what the brennan center has on its site about voter integrity. the brennan center does a pretty good summary on its website of a number of instances where victor fraud occurred that probably affected the outcome -- where the vote fraud occurred that probably affected the outcome of the election, especially lyndon johnson in 1948 and perhaps the election of others over time that it recounts.

both of those sites from the left and right had some objectives which they espoused which is in comment of how we can have election integrity and i wish that our public discourse about this was a less political -- was a less political and factually precise -- was less political and more factually precise. the more we have questioning, the more seed of doubt we are sowing in the minds of the american public, which is a pernicious thing. host: did you have any role in the 2020 election when it came to recounting? guest: i did not. i did represent the candidates in the republican senate campaign committee in that run up to the georgia recount trying to get some procedures in terms of the georgette mail-in ballot

review change in order to make them more equal in terms of the judgment of signatures. the whole mail-in ballots thing is a mess to be honest with you. the idea that we are going to ask nonprofessional handwriting experts to compare signatures as a means of verifying that a ballot has come in the mail from an eligible voter is really absurd when you think about it. and that is one of the reasons i think the rhetoric surrounding some of the changes that the georgia legislature has made to the georgia election procedures, not eligibility, but procedures, are actually quite sound and some of the rhetoric we have heard in opposition to that, such as new jim crow and that sort of thing, is really rather irresponsible. host: the president referring to it as jim crow 2.0.

guest: i have known president biden since he was judiciary and i saw that commentary as disappointing. host: we have a call lined up for you. virginia beach starting off, republican line. go ahead. caller: thank you very much for taking my call. i have two comments to make and i would like our reaction to them. the first one is, i take a lot of pride in my id when i go to vote. it proves who i am, that i am a registered voter in that poll and i am an american. i take a lot of pride in that and i have no problems with an id. the second comment is that i am tired of hearing the excuse implied or set specifically, we

ran out of time. we do not have time for the recount. we do not have time to do a total revote of the country to find out any errors in the recording of people's votes. we need someone we just ran out of time. that seems to be the excuse every time we have a presidential election. i would like your comments on that. guest: on your first point, i think the idea that we should require identification to get on an airplane to go to a liquor store and buy alcoholic beverages and all of the other things that require identification but not require identification in order to vote, in order to improve in fact

eligibility is unfortunate that that has become part of the battery. clyburn has come out in favor of voting identification after having opposed it. hopefully we are getting by that issue. that being said, i think it is important that a means of identification available to every voter. there are two fundamental pin -- fundamental pillars of establishing public confidence in the election process. one is that those eligible to vote should do so and that their votes would be accurately counted and tabulated. on the second issue you mentioned about time, going back to pedro's initial question about the 2000 election, you may recall that in the recount in florida there was an allegation that the butterfly ballot used

in palm beach county, florida in the 2000 election was so confusing that they should do it over. i remember standing with secretary baker when that issue initially came to vote -- initially came up the first week we were down there and saying there are no do overs in a presidential election. that is because the timing of the election is dictated both by the constitution and bylaws that congress has passed under -- and by laws that commerce has passed under provisions. the pressure of time israel. -- of time is real. recounts for the most part are ineffective. i don't know if you heard of the example i give before, but there is no point in doing every cap after the fundament votes and the good folks have been separated. there is no way to know who

voted for who and separate those ineligible votes out. you can catch the same ballots over and over and within statistical norms you get the same result aside from some other accounting regularity -- accounting irregularity. host: from texas, tom s, you are up next -- thomas. caller: you say jim crow does not exist but they took 50 drug boxes and limited them down to one out here. this is 10 miles from where i live. do you know how many people died from -- die for voting rights? dash diet for voting rights -- died for voting rights? imagine jim crow, states do what

they do. they went back and said i want this to be done and that to be done. there is nothing you can do about it. the only thing we can do is get your id, make sure you get to vote. the thing is that i give it another 10 years, that is probably as long as republicans have. thank you. guest: your prognostication on the future of the republican party be interesting to see. your point that getting an id and putting is important. one of the things that has happened is that partisans have tried on both sides to manipulate the voting process to their advantage. that is wrong. campaigning and seeking to get votes for a candidate is a very

different exercise than the voting process itself. in my view, we should look at the voting process, the casting of ballots as sacrosanct and we should respect it. it should not be manipulated for political purposes. the caller is right that we have a sorry history, particularly in the 19th and early 20th century of keeping people particularly -- keeping people, particularly minorities, from the polls. the voting rights act and other things that took place, there is no doubt we have made good progress on that and we will continue to struggle as we go forward. now there has to be a shared objective in making the franchise of the vote available to all, but also assuring people that process is conducted with honesty and integrity.

if the people this confidence in that, we have lost a cornerstone of our democracy. host: alabama, this is from karen in alabaster. republican line. caller: i have two points here. the first is that you say we cannot prove you won an election by auditing an election but i don't see why we can't. we have paper ballots. joe smith says i voted for trump and he puts it in the machine and we look at the machine and the machine says we voted for biden. i don't see how that cannot be proven. you can prove if that person is illegal american citizen and has the right to vote. that is what they are doing an arizona. the second thing is that he say the voting as sacrosanct and so they we should protect. i agree. in pennsylvania when the government to the voting laws at the last minute, bypass the

state legislature which the constitution says that the state legislature is the one that passes the voting law. how did that happen? you may not know this, but vice president pence could have sent the votes back to pennsylvania. he got one from the state legislature and one from the governor. the state legislature's -- just later is the one who has the right to oversee election. host: we will let our guest respond. guest: it is not quite as simple as that in terms of the legislature. i take your point that the governor of pennsylvania did change the administration of the voting laws. where the line is between the administration authority that belongs to a governor or secretary of state and the rules

for voting as prescribed by the legislature is very important. let me go to your point about voter fraud. the flaw in the analysis of how you could boot -- how you can prove vote fraud is that we have a secret ballot -- we have a secret ballot. we separate the identity of the voter from the vote. whether it is mailing or in person, the act of casting the ballot for a particular candidate is kept separate from the identity of the voter. no matter how many times we find an ineligible ballot was cast, once it is separated from the identity of the voter, which is what makes it eligible or not eligible to be a valid vote, it is too late.

that is why what the legislatures do and are doing to ensure the integrity of the process up to that point is so important in ensuring election integrity. host: when you were talking about georgia's voting law, the department of justice announced they are filing suit on aspects of that. i want to play little bit from the attorney general. [video clip] >> the department of justice today is suing the state of georgia. our complaint alleges that recent changes to their election laws were enacted with the purpose of denying or abridging the right of black georgians to vote on account of their race or color in violation of section two of the voting rights act. several studies show that georgia experienced record voter turnout and participation rates in the 2020 election cycle. approximately two thirds of

eligible voters cast a ballot in the no november -- in the november election. this is cause for celebration. then in march of 2021, georgia's legislature passed a law. many of that law's provisions make it harder for people to vote. the complaint alleges the state enacted those restrictions with the purpose of denying or abridging the right to vote on account of race or color. host: mr. george terwilliger, what do you think about the case dd -- the drg has to make? -- ddo g has to make? -- v doj -- the doj has to make? guest: that will be played out in court. the central premise of the department's case and what the attorney general stated is that the georgia legislature acted with a discriminatory intent.

i think that is going to be very difficult to prove under the relevant jurisprudence. i think others have questioned, legitimately, and i think this will be an issue if what the georgia legislature did actually made it harder to vote. georgia has a very liberal, open voting process in terms of the number of days that voting by mail and other means is possible. and so forth. as the supreme court said in the arizona case, placing certain requirements in the voting process does not necessarily affect eligibility and the ability to cast a vote. that is what will be played out on a factual basis first in the district court. it will then have to be reviewed

jurisprudencely. some people have questioned the timing of the suit of the justice department and have suggested political motivation. i have no idea if that is true or not. i hope it is not. i will go back to the point i made before, if i may, and i think it is that partisans on both sides should not try to use the voting process as a means to win elections. elections were meant to be won in campaigns, the voting process should be sacrosanct. host: george terwilliger is our guest. he was a former attorney general -- deputy attorney general for george w. bush. from michigan, democrats' line. caller: in michigan, we have a voter id law. when you go to vote, you have to

show two valid ids, your driver's license or your state id with your voter registration card and it had to match up with your address, your street number and your address. i have been voting absentee. when i voted absentee this last time, former president trump said we stole the election. they came to michigan and tried to break into the center. if they had gotten into the tef center, they would have destroyed all of our ballot -- our absentee ballots that came out of wayne county. do think that president trump won the election fairly -- lost

the election fairly? do you think that michigan helped steal the election? host: sorry about that, but mr. george terwilliger you can answer. guest: i accept the outcome of the presidential election completely. i think the michigan republican party produced a 50 page report that refutes many of the allegations that were made of voter fraud in that election that affected president trump's opportunity for victory in michigan. i think that was a very good thing for that party to do. once again, you have to be sure not to conflate voting irregularities with widespread voter fraud which can affect the

outcome of an election. that being said, what the gentleman described is a very good, solid voting procedure. i am glad he was able to get the opportunity to cast a vote. james madison warned in the federalist papers that partisans will always try to interfere in the election process to their advantage. no matter what form that interference takes, it is simply wrong. that is what i mean about keeping campaigns and campaign issues and the object of getting somebody elected needs to be kept separate from how the voting process is administered. host: it was president trump's former attorney general, bill barr, making statements in the atlantic when asked about the prospect of widespread voter fraud. what do you think about a

statement that describes the relationship you have with mr. barr? guest: bill barr is my friend and has been my friend for over 30 years. we share views on a lot of things. he does not v my views and i do notet vet his views. the library of congress reported prior to the 2020 election the use of absentee and mail-in ballots has increased exponentially. covid increased that. there's no question that at least at the time of the 2020 election that the ability to ensure the eligibility of a voter casting a ballot by mail is much more different -- much more difficult than ensuring the eligibility of a voter who casts a vote in person.

voter id make sense. even democrats are now agreeing with that even though they opposed voter id laws in court through their partisans over and over. effect of the matter is that mail-in ballots and absentee ballot processes do present a greater challenge to ensuring the integrity of elections. thus, it makes sense to me that legislatures and election administers -- administrators take steps to letting that process up -- to tighten that process up as much as possible. host: his claims about pride claims be? without merit, do you believe him. -- is about fraud claims to be without merit, do you believe him? guest: yes, i believe him.

in an election in 1996, in an on the ground investigation, we found numeral instances of invalid votes being cast. some of them systematically, as evidence of voter fraud. as senator warner said publicly at the time and as a senate committee adopted a resolution at the time to seat misses landrieu in the senate, there was no way to prove that it affected the outcome of an election. the referenceable claims of voter fraud as made to the 2020 election. i think it was to those that the attorney general was making at the time. host: from florida, independent line. caller: so much to talk about in this country, but today we are

talking about voting. i don't understand how we can't come together and there are rules and policies, how we can sue a state saying they're trying to keep certain people from voting is the most ludicrous thing i have heard in my life. i have been around quite a many years. it is what it is, anything you do in life you need to show id. i had to show my id to get my covid shot. don't you have to show an id to do anything that is of constitute? this is absurd. the time and money we are wasting when there are hurricanes and people dying in buildings, it is absurd what our government is doing. let's get together and take care of one another. caller: -- guest: that is a great sentiment which i hope, regardless of already affiliation and

philosophical approach we can all agree. one thing that those comments bring to mind, two things. the first is that this is a great show because this is one of the few things in the media today where there is any opportunity for americans' voices to be heard. i think that is a wonderful thing and i am honored to be here. the second thing this brings to mind is that all of this focus on these issues are something that is very healthy. after the 2000 election and the recount was over, it was largely a forgotten public issue.

while i think what happened post-20 election has had many tragic aspects -- post-2020 election has had many tragic aspects, i think many people are misled in their beliefs about that and that has been detrimental. that being said, the focus on these issues and on the asus -- and on the issues of making sure only eligible voters vote, but that all eligible voters have the opportunity to vote and when they do their votes are counted accurately and honestly, i think that will be a healthy thing for the country. and perhaps as the caller suggested as we come together on these issues, we will be able to put these controversies behind us and focus on some things that matter more to us as americans and human beings. host: because of the people you

get to interact with, they come in on twitter. this is matt smith he makes this statement that "the guest argues that voter fraud is easy and therefore warrants limitation. can he present any examples of massive male in fraud in voting." guest: i'm not suggesting it is easy, rather that it is possible. the best example, in north carolina, a republican candidate for congress's election was invalidated because of ballot fraud and the election had to be held over. yes, it is very possible. it can be done. i don't think the result of that needs to be making it more difficult for people who want to vote to vote. i think we just need to have a clean set of procedures of which identification of the voter is

an important element that we can go forward from there. host: because of your time on capitol hill, you know about the efforts by the senate and the house to pass the for the people act which would make changes when it comes to voting laws, including automatic voter registration and creating public financing and the like. what do you think about this effort? guest: i agree with senator joe manchin that that legislation is divisive and is constitutionally questionable if not invalid. the prescription of the means of voting belongs to the states and to the state legislatures. the administration of voting and the voting process belongs to state and local election officials as a constitutional matter. i don't think federal lysing that process makes sense --

federalizing that process makes sense. i think that legislation is a good example of partisans trying to manipulate the electoral process, the process by which you are cast and counted to partisan advantage. i am glad that legislation is not going to make it through. host: senator joe manchin offering his own compromise, including making election day holiday, 15 days of mandated early voting and the like. it is a better approach? guest: i have not looked at this compromise in particular. i would not be in a position to make a subjective judgment on that. i would say as a general proposition, voting in new york is different than voting in montana. voting in california is different than voting and a texas.

-- voting in texas. we are better if we push these issues down to smaller forms of government who can conform the process to the needs and abilities of their states. we federalize so many things that the federal government has become so huge, so many dictates from lightbulbs to tags on mattresses. i think voting ought to be left to the states and to the elected representatives that are closest to the people in states and localities. host: this is actually from texas, republican line. guest: -- caller: one comment on the 2020 election as far as why people think there were so many

nefarious things going on is that for the first time in our country's history, they stopped counting at a certain point of the night and the next morning when everyone woke up and counting was supposed to resume, everything was different. other than that, with the hr one which safely will not go anywhere, i agree with the gentleman, federal lysing elections is ridiculous and should never happen -- federalizing elections is ridiculous and should never happen. host: we will let our guests respond. guest: in terms of the counting process itself, obviously, counting votes in an honest and transparent manner is important to ensuring the people of the integrity of the electoral process as a whole.

click to call referenced i don't know, i don't know what the facts might be that she had in mind. in a state like texas where there are a lot of rural votes that have to be counted, the fact that the counting in a close election in particular may go on to the next morning for the next day or day or so is not surprising. but, if you recall the election of what people nicknamed " landslide linden" -- "landslide lyndon," there were a lot of ballots that showed up late that change the outcome. the lesson of that is not that

we can't have election integrity. the lesson is that it makes sense for legislatures, including those in texas to take steps that are validly being pressed into service -- pressed into service and used to ensure that the people who are eligible to vote get the vote and their votes are honestly counted. if there are disputes about that , not so much in the context of elections but with election procedures, then we have courts to sort that out. such will happen with the suit the justice department has filed against georgia. that is how we resolve things in this country. if there are disputes, we resolve them peaceably through litigation. host: howard is in north carolina, democrats line -- democrats'. .

line caller: i heard the gentleman speak of irregularity. he could not really pinpoint one. he did mention the one in north carolina, my state. it was republicans harvesting ballots from people of color and changing the vote. we do know that is a fact and we know there are a lot of republicans who don't even have to fill out absentee ballots and they get one anyway. this is how they were winning in the beginning. when the president of the united states called the secretary of state in georgia and asked can you find me 11,000 votes? what would you consider that to be? guest: i think the color has a

valid point -- the caller has a valid point. as i pointed out with that congressional election, in fact the opportunity for vote fraud is equally partisan opportunity. the fact that it was demonstrated on the part of republicans only points out a weakness in the system that can be exploited by either side in a hotly contested election. i will not comment on the president's behavior after the election, i think it speaks for itself. host: this is sherry from mississippi, republican line. caller: good morning. i believe we are headed the right way as far as integrity laws. what i'm not hearing and what i personally experienced here in

mississippi was electronic voting. i don't get a receipt of what about it for. all there is, an electronic screen saying this we voted for -- is this who you voted for. -- guest: a great point. i am not a political scientist, nor am i an election procedure expert. those who are are apparently looking very closely at the question of maintaining the integrity of electronic voting systems. we certainly see with the amount of hacking that takes place and so forth that the opportunity to

manipulate a system that is totally electronic is there. i know that many states and localities have taken steps to try to ensure the integrity of electronic voting and it is people like the caller who should hold the state and local eviction -- state and local election officials' feet to the fire to ensure the integrity of those systems. if our people lose faith in the integrity of the voting system, we have lost a cornerstone of democracy. host: george terwilliger served as deputy attorney general ring the george w. bush administration -- the george bush administration. caller: -- guest: it was a pleasure to be with you. host: you are invited to partake in our open forum. if there are interests of

politics that interest you, you can call and make your comments. 202-748-8000 for democrats. 202-748-8001 for republicans. independents, 202-748-8002. you can text us at 202-748-8003. we will take those calls when "washington journal" continues. ♪ >> saturday on "the communicators." >> republicans and democrats have been attacking tech from all angles. they have coalesced on we need tougher antitrust laws and we need to use antitrust enforcement to go after tech companies. they have different reasons for doing so, even though they coalesce on the same solution. for democrats, it is rooted in a typical animosity toward big

businesses in general and skepticism about corporations and general and needing to shrink them. for republicans, you have this culture war against technology companies in general where they perceive them as being biased against conservatives in the way they moderate content. the antitrust movement against big tech is from the feeling that tech is out to get them. >> listen to elizabeth nolan brown on her article, saturday at 6:30 p.m. on c-span. >> "washington journal" continues. host: this is open forum, your chance to comment on things of politics as a matter to you. you can call us on the phone lines. 202-748-8000 for democrats. 202-748-8001 for republicans.

for independents, 202-748-8002. text us at 202-748-8003. if you want to post on social media, facebook.com/c-span. our twitter feed is @cspanwj. you can follow on instagram as well. president biden is expected to deliver remarks today on the withdrawal of troops from afghanistan where the swift exit has collided with gains from the taliban and amid rising concerns of a civil war. jen psaki said the president plans to meet in the morning with his national security team to receive a update on the process of the military drawdown. in the afternoon, making comments about ongoing security and humanitarian issues, including the assistance to the afghan national defense and security forces. the topic of hacking by russia

is also expected to be addressed sometime today by the president. you can follow us at c-span.org and follow the network. the hill reporting this morning that when it comes to the infrastructure deal, the president worked with a group of bipartisan -- a bipartisan group of senators and chuck schumer saying that deal could be on the senate floor as soon as july 19. that is reporting by the hill this morning. we will start with leland in kansas, democrats' line. caller: i wanted to point out one big problem that the republican party has. they like to make the point that it seems very sensible to require that voters present identification because that

lends integrity to the election. why don't republicans agree that the electoral college, which allows someone that does not get the majority of votes to win the election -- there is no greater example of an election not having integrity when the person that gets fewer votes is declared the winner? leyland in kansas -- host: leland in kansas there. colors, if you would not mind turning down your television sets. harry from georgia, independent line. caller: nice to talk to you. i did want to get through when

mr. george terwilliger was on. i was surprised of the topic of heritage action which is part of the heritage foundation, a political action committee, has been writing up generic legislation and taking it around to all of the states. they have been on tape bragging about it. they brought a 90 page bill into the georgia senate. the vote was of the next morning, no one had time to read it. they did go over it some. the one aspect of this legislation is the allowance for the state legislatures to take over local voting boards.

if they are thinking there is a problem, all they have to do is say there is fraud going on. they can take over those local boards and nullify the vote. i am surprised this does not get brought up more often. thank you, c-span. host: harry in georgia, there -- there. this is from michigan, republican line. caller: i wanted to comment when george terwilliger was on. my concern was the ability for nonpartisan inspections during the vote counting process. it seems there should be some standardized way so that at that point there would be no political denial of people to

inspect the voting process. host: what do you think is the best body? if you want to make it nonpartisan, what is the best body to do that? caller: i think it should be prescribed ahead of time who the voter process witnesses should be. there should be no denial at the last minute for anyone to get into see the voting process. host: while there with his suggestions when it comes to the voting process. charlie in maine, this is on outline for democrats. caller: thank you for the opportunity. listening to the last person you had on their, i thought it was pretty convenient the way he acknowledged things like what happened in north carolina.

it could happen both ways, but it has happened on the republican side most of all. another thing, what do we do about a president at that for about a year before the election started changing minds about whether it is going to be legal or not. now he's going throughout the country promoting the same thing. i'm getting sick and tired of the republicans allowing this. this guy lost, period. he still has all of this control and it is going to affect what comes up in the next election. i don't think it is right. i wish they would take a stand. become true republicans. host: tom is in florida, independent line -- independent line.

caller: i am wondering, when it comes to the issue of the voter id, why can't the governments of the states make it possible for people to get their voter registration card at the same time they get their drivers license or state id card and combine them into one? why not put the same information you need on a state id card or driver's license onto a voter id card? you would not need both if you just combined them into the one card. that would be an easy way for me to do it. when you get your voter registration card or driver's license or state id card, put the same information on a voter registration card. put a picture on a voter registration card. why have two separate ids. it seems to me like the voter

registration card is pretty much moot if all you need is an id card, a driver's license, or a state id card. without those, the voter id -- the voter registration card is not worth anything. host: two stories relating to january 6, the hill with the story saying capitol police union leaders say more than 75 officers have left the force the months following the capitol riot's citing low morale and longer working hours. union officials say the officers have been leaving about three per week with one officer telling them "the old -- the young guys don't want to be here and the old guys who are eligible are just rolling out." republican john katko on the homeland security committee told cnn the capitol police needs a

"radical infrastructure -- radical restructure. they need to decouple it from any political structure but it is not great should be." the temporary fencing around the capital will likely be dismantled starting friday. the capitol police board concurred with the recommendation "to make incremental modifications to the capital campus." you can read more about that at roll call. this is from surely calling from texas, republican line. caller: thank you for taking my call. my question is, why have the courts not taken this evidence and looked at it, that mike lindell has brought up about the voting machines and all the other voting? why have the courts not taken that up? will the supreme court at any

time take any of this up? host: why do you think the courts and the supreme court should take it up? caller: there is evidence that there was cheating. there is plenty of evidence that there was cheating. the courts want to take it up. and i don't understand why. we are losing our country. host: we will hear from tom in pittsburgh, california. democrats' line. caller: the problem is, this is what i have always feared. in california, when we do the absentee ballot which has been going on for decades is that as we turn in our absentee ballots, they are counted. they don't wait for election day. by the time the polls close, the majority of the absentee ballot has already been counted. the trouble is that he saw on the other states cannot start counting absentee ballots until the day of the election.

when everybody went to bed, as a lot of them did, trump was in the lead because they counted the day of election ballots but had not gotten around to the absentee ballots. that is where this whole problem about stealing any election came about. they have not even started counting the absentee ballots. it takes a couple of days, two or three days to cap absentee ballots. you have -- to count absentee ballots. plus you have covid which takes em longer. i don't see with the problem is. absentee ballots have been going on for decades. host: from st. louis, missouri. independent line. caller: am i here. host: go ahead. caller: one thing is that -- one reason i feel d justice

department is attacking the georgia state legislature is because they feel things that passed in that bill are being used to negatively impact people of color or minorities by making it harder for them to get the votes done. some have to wait in long lines and people are not allowed to bring food and water to the. think about a hot day and they are in line. in november, maybe it is not as hot, but it is still burning up -- but it is still a long line. i know sooner or later we will have to have a voter id law to make sure no one who registered to vote is not native or or

nationalized. host: the fda announcing their changing prescribing able for an alzheimer's treatment, used for patients with a milder form of the disease. they describe it as a clarification meant to better reflect on the clinical trials. it will be seen as the fda feeling to outside criticism that the drug was overly permissive. from arkansas, this is linda. republican line. caller: i think everybody ought to have a voter id. i don't think you can register the same day and get it because illegals can get a driver's license without being a citizen. they can use that for a voter id. there has got to be a voter id that says i am an american, i am eligible to vote.

just because you can get a drivers license does not mean your citizen. guest: -- host: ernest from new york, hello. caller: i wanted to talk about the election because i believe they are looking on the wrong side. i believe that the republicans cheat. i believe this election was stolen in 2016 and tried to be stolen again in 2020. they are looking on the wrong side. president trump same there is a lot of reading going on in elections, how does he know that? i believe he treated first. and then he came back and tried

to do it again in 2020 and said it is the democrats. we are looking on the wrong side. 70 million is a lot of votes. host: combine in new york, republican line. caller: it is a few years ago, but goodwin related a story on c-span about elections regarding lbj early on in his career. she said when he was in texas and a young congressman, he would go into cemeteries in his district, marking the names on the tombstones, write them down, and have the dead vote and have their votes counted. this came from her directly.

it had so much shock value and see -- shock value when she said this that i am thinking to this day there may be little things in the electoral process that we don't know about but should. thank you for taking my call. host: the letter -- the atlanta journal reporting about a statue being unveiled of john lewis. they write that 10 days before the anniversary of the passing of john lewis, another legacy was fulfilled with the unveiling of the statute in atlanta's west side. the trust for public land and the national monuments association erected the statute. they hope it revitalizes the struggling but improving neighborhood by providing a safe and clean outdoor space. there are comments about the statue itself. aps also shows the picture of the statue at its unveiling.

you can find more about that at the atlanta journal-constitution. letter from scott in michigan, independent line. caller: hello. there are two things i would like to say. one, for the boating while -- for the voting law, if you're going to have mail in, everybody would have to do like to do in iraq, where they put a thumbprint on it so the fbi can run it to their computers and anybody that is double matched can be canceled. the next thing would be for the insurrection, isn't nancy pelosi the one who has to tell the sergeant of arms to tell the police to do anything?

that is it for me. host: brenda from houston, texas. ' democrats -- democrats' line. caller: thank you for taking my call. first, if you will tell stephen the best of luck. i will miss him tremendously. now to my reason for calling. over 2000 years ago, there was a man that walked the earth that spoke of love, caring, sharing, and he did healing. they nailed him to the cross and murdered him. then there was a southern baptist preacher that marched and begged and pleaded and tried to love everyone and fight for everyone's freedoms around the world. they assassinated him, they put

a bullet in his head. and then we have donald trump who has caused more chaos in this country than anybody i have ever known. god bless america. . host: kelly is up from washington state, republican line. caller: i don't see a big issue with some of these voting rights coming down the inverted in. as far as -- being voted in. vote day is on tuesday so there is like 17 days of voting. there are so many extra days to vote. as far as ids go, it is not hard to get any id. i was raised up knowing you're supposed to know your social security number. i know my my heart, it is not that hard.

it builds some responsibility and is someone to actually know these things. maybe that will be good for people. host: the louisville courier journal reports that a state representative is challenging john yarmuth in next year's democratic primary for the only congressional seats that party holds in kentucky. she announced her candidacy wednesday morning for the district which covers most of jefferson county saying "i am running for congress for the citizens of louisville who have asked me to run, including the black women who have never had a representative in congress that looks like us. we talk about being an inclusive city, imagine what it would mean to celebrate, elevate, and recognize that diversity with our vote. we still have large geographic and racial differences that persist across our city. now we have any opportunity to

change that by changing the people in office." you can read that more at their website. from colorado, this is michael. independent line. caller: i recently called in about the arizona situation. i agreed with the gentleman about the thumbprint. i think that would solve a lot. a thumbprint is unique and you cannot mistake it. put it on the ballot. in terms of the voting laws, it is upsetting the supreme court is unwilling to overturn some of these. there are about 35,000 navajo tribal members within arizona that voted using tribal ids and whatnot. i lived in that area before so i know a lot of these people are out in the desert. they don't have access to the

public so they need to have an individual to pick their ballots up. how hard is it to actually vent and designate -- actively vet and designate a person to do that to those who don't have access to the polls? why was it so hard for them to authorize tribal ids to be used as well so they can cast their ballot? it seems like with the amount of votes and biden got that that law was strategically designed to take the whole amount of gap he had between him and trump. most of those were 35,000 americans -- 35,000 native americans. host: that is michael in colorado. the japanese prime minister is announcing a state of emergency for tokyo, especially with the olympics opening up in two --. two weeks.

daily picks are still on but without fans in tokyo -- in two weeks. the olympics are still on but without fans in tokyo. sue, republican line. caller: i've had some things i would like to discuss. people who are in jail for the insurrection should be able to get out. there are still people on the street you are shooting and killing people. i don't know why they should be there when nothing has been proven of what they have done. there are a couple of people who did pretty bad things but nobody was killed by these people. it has been a total lie. a lot of people don't like trump because he says mean things on tweets about people. you know what? he said what he was going to do

and he did it. our economy was better and we don't have any problem with china. we were not having a problem with russia. now we have the taliban coming back. this is not even one years he is in office. where are we going to go from here? host: let's you from jane in chicago. democrats line. caller: your prior guest, he had an opinion about everything until the caller asked him about trump calling the secretary of state to find more votes. why did he do that? host: why do you think either that? caller: because the republicans don't want to have any opinion about anything that could come back on them for some reason. host: okay. we will hear from phil in washington, d.c. democrats line -- democrats'

line. caller: i am a vet, i love this country. i think we have a great democracy in a fragile state. i wish we could go back to the day of 9/11, i have never seen this country come together. everybody had flags on their doors and cars. everybody was greeting everybody with a smile. there was no separation between democrats and republicans. it was just a joyous environment in this country. i just wish we could go back to that. if we look back at history, we see from day one we are not racist but this country has waited some time before blacks were allowed. we were not given the privilege

to vote -- to vote and as we were given the privilege, we were urged not to vote and threatened to death. it seems like we transitioned forward to the present and as a minority we are just a pawn. we are ponds between the drivers of the republican and democratic party. every time we take one foot forward, we take two steps backward. host: i hate to interrupt you but we are out of time for this program. for those of you who purchase paid in the open form portion, we thank you for that. another edition of washington journal comes your way tomorrow morning at 7:00. see you then. ♪

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