impacts hiring decisions. we will speak with pat nolan from the american conservative union association. next, on washington journal. ♪ host: good morning. it is saturday, october 23, 2021. we talk about labor unions and labor restrictions by those with federal offenses. amid clashes over pandemic restrictions, the rights of transgender students, and how to handle race and history we want to know what role you think parents should play in public education. phone lines split this way,

parents (202)-748-8000, teachers (202)-748-8001, all others (202)-748-8002. you can send a text, (202)-748-8003. if you do, include your name and where you are from. catch up on social media on twitter @c-spanwj and facebook at facebook.com/c-span. good saturday morning to you. you can start calling in on lines for parents and teachers and others. we begin with this story from npr. the political implications of the clashes between parents and local school boards. the headline, school board elections will be an early test on what motivates voters. school boards have become the latest political battlefield with fights over masks and covid vaccines and conservative parents worried about diversity curriculum. these are watched by republicans

who lost a lot of ground in the suburbs the last eight years and hoping education could be a winning issue for them in congressional races in 2022 and the next presidential race. republican pollster christine matthews, who spent time doing focus groups with suburban women, saying she is not sure that will work. for independent voters this could cause backlash. with school boards kids are involved and board members are trusted members of the community. that story from npr. it was out from earlier this week. setting the background of the conversation we are trying to have this morning with parents and teachers and others. asking what role parents should play in public education. this issue very much the focus

of the gubernatorial race taking place in the old dominion now just 10 days away. here is a headline from nbc news, in virginia, republicans see education as a path to victory and this issue about the education curriculum the focus of recent ad spending by the democratic and republican candidates in that race. glenn young can is the republican. here is one of his recent ads airing in virginia. [video clip] >> virginia parents have a right to make decisions on their children's education. that is the virginia i grew up in. terry mcauliffe wants to change that. >> i do think parents should tell schools what they should teach. >> the fbi is trying to silence parents. that's wrong. as governor, i will increase teacher pay and pass the largest education budget in history. i sponsored this ad because i will always stand up for virginia's parents. host: the response ad came out

this week, two or three days ago from terry mcauliffe. here is what he had to say. [video clip] >> dorothy and i have always been involved in our kids' education. that is why i want you to hear this from me. glenn youngken is taking my words out of context. as governor, we scaled back standardized testing, expanded pre-k, and invested $1 billion in schools. i sponsored this ad because working together, we can give our kids the education they deserve. host: all of this stemming from comments terry mcauliffe made in a gubernatorial debate. here is that debate that spark these ads and a lot of discussion about education in virginia. [video clip] >> with regard to the kids in

schools, we are called to love everyone. and i agree with your conclusion, we should let local school districts make these decisions but we must ask them to include safety and privacy and respect in the decision and demand they include parents in this dialogue. what we have seen the last 20 months is the school systems refusing to engage with parents. in fairfax county this past week, we watched parents so upset because there were such sexually explicit material in the library it was shocking. you veto the bill that would have informed parents. you think school systems should tell kids what to do. i think parents should be in charge of their kids' education. [applause] >> this shows how clueless glenn youngkin is because he has never

been involved in helping virginia. it was not. the parents had the right to veto books and take them off the shelves. i am not going to let parents come into schools -- we vetoed it. [applause] i don't think parents should be telling schools what to teach. i get really tired of everyone running down teachers. i love our teachers and what they have done through covid, these are real heroes. [applause] you keep running them down. host: terry mcauliffe and glenn youngkin from the end of september. we are 10 days away from that gubernatorial race in virginia. bellwether race heading into the 2022 midterms. we are asking you about that issue that came up in the debate that is the focus of so many ads, education and what role parents should play. phone lines, (202)-748-8000 for

parents, (202)-748-8001 for teachers, and all others (202)-748-8002. joe is up first in summit, new jersey. what role should parents play in public education? caller: they should play a role. as far as what they say in these arguments going on with racial stuff if they keep talking about racial stuff, it is going to be everybody, black-and-white. they shouldn't talk about it. it is as simple as that. it will eventually go away. it has been going away ever since the 1960's. you are still going to have people saying this and that on both sides. like, they are prejudice against this, they are prejudice against that. the blacks say it and the whites say it about each other.

the democrats are leaning toward the black and they accuse the whites of being racist which is not so and they could do the same with the blacks. they don't like the whites but what is the difference? they are all human, you know? host: asking you what role parents should play in public education. michael in south portland, maine. caller: parents should have run of the administration. we have christians coming in, separation of church and state, and we have law signed in. the christian religion, you have to get them out.

the essential oils, the masks -- host:host: that was michael in south portland, maine. you bring up private schools. a story on that from today's new york times focusing on the boom in evangelical schools amid a fraught time in education. the booming conservative christian schooling driven nationwide by a combination of pandemic frustrations, rising parental anxiety about how schools handle educations including race, and the right of transgender students. quoting this from the founder of the conservative christian education initiative, this is a once in 100 year moment for the growth in christian education. in 2019 to 2020 school year 3.5 million schoolchildren of attended religious schools.

the story noting before the pandemic private school enrollment overall declined gradually since the turn of the millennium while the subset of non-catholic schools held steady, suggesting the recent growth in conservative evangelical schools is a distinct phenomenon rather than a generational retreat. this is glenn in lakeland, florida. your thoughts on the role parents should play in public education. caller: good morning. how you doing? i don't believe parents need to be involved when it comes to teachers. all of this talk about, well, you know, education is going to be different and the teachers are going to be doing what they're going to be doing. it is about one particular thing. critical race theory is not taught in school, they lying, and it is about the 1619 project. they don't want the history

of white americans in this country and what they were doing when slavery started until now. all these town halls and people mad about, well, you are teaching critical race theory. it is a lie. why can't we see it for what it is? you just keep adding things into it. look at all the books in school but have these different things. it is not the children that don't want to learn, it is the parents that don't want their kids to understand they have been lied to their whole lives. this is why they don't want to accept the fact slavery happened and enslaved black people and 20 plus million died under the program. host: a question that has come up in school boards around the country, how much say should parents have in curriculum? as an example, out in utah, this out of the sully tribune, one utah lawmaker wants to require

all material for social study classes in k-12 schools be vetted and posted online for parents to review in advance of the teaching. teachers pushing back saying, that shows lack of trust in educator's judgment. what would be your thoughts on that proposal, seeing everything that is going to be taught in social studies and being able to review it? caller: i will go back to the same thing i said. this is about controlling the narrative when it comes to teachers and how they do their lesson plans, what books are going to be, textbooks are going to be published, what is going to be inside. it is the whole gamut and that does not happen. they are not professional teachers. they are not taught to teach students. the history of this country is what the history is. we don't need to try to say, we are fine. we are going to take this out but leave this in. i am a black man in my whole

life i have known, during slavery, they were slaves. they were not helpers, they were not immigrants, they were slaves. when you look at how we got this world this country was based on freedom, it was based on racism. host: that was glenn in lakeland, florida. jay next out of wake forest, virginia. caller: crt is racist garbage created to divide america even more. that is a fact. my point was about, can you please, and you have not mentioned it yet, the ninth grader that got raped in a bathroom by a boy in address? i think it was in may actually. her father got assaulted at the school board in loudoun county. they beat the hell out of him

while he was trying to explain his daughter was raped by a faggot an address. host: sorry, we are not going to use that kind of language. dahlia is next in miami, florida. caller: i am a grandmother. miami-dade county has lost a lot of students, including my grandson and my granddaughter. he had a teacher, his father is a police officer, who showed up in class with a t-shirt saying "black lives matter, defund the police." that was outrageous. his mother, who worked for the school, took it to the principal and the principal said, there is nothing we can do. now he is in catholic school. he is getting to graduate in

may. not only will he have high school diploma he will have two years of college finished. he has a gpa of 5.0. in broward county, teachers went door-to-door looking for thousands of children who are no longer in public school and it is because of the teachers and the curriculum and what they are teaching them. they are indoctrinating them and i should know because i am cuban and that is exactly what happened in cuba. thank you very much. host: that was dahlia out of miami, florida. phone lines, what role should parents play in public education? the number for parents (202)-748-8000, the number for teachers (202)-748-8001, all others (202)-748-8002.

as you continue to call in this morning this battleground over school boards and public education and parent's roles played out in a house judiciary committee meeting this week with attorney general merrick garland. in that hearing garland defending his october 4 memo that instructed parts of the justice department to coordinate a response to threats against school officials. garland writing that memo less than one week after the national school board association asked the biden administration to take act against what they called a growing threat against school officials. here is part of that exchange between merrick garland and congressman steve shepard, republican from ohio. [video clip] >> we don't need you, your justice department, or the fbi trampling on the rights of american parents who just want the best possible education for their children. mr. attorney general, let me ask

you this. according to the sarasota herald tribune one example of a so-called terrorist incident was a parent merely questioning whether school board members had earned their high school diplomas? that might have been rude, but does that seem like an act of domestic terrorism that you or your justice department ought to be investigating? >> absolutely not and i want to be clear, the justice department supports and defends the first amendment right of parents to complain as vociferously as they wish about education of their children, about the curriculum taught in the schools. that is not with the memorandum is about at all. nor doesn't use the words domestic terrorism or patriot act. like you, i cannot imagine any circumstance in which the patriot act would be used in the circumstances of parents complaining about their children, nor can i imagine a

circumstance they will be labeled as domestic terrorism. host: that from the house judiciary committee meeting earlier this week. you can watch the whole thing at c-span.org. as the sun begins to rise on this saturday, october 23, asking you what role parents should play in public education. several responses from social media. elizabeth writing, parents should have complete control over their children's education. anne say, parents should play a role in education but let the professionals that we all pay for lead and do their jobs. the majority are not skilled or educated enough to determine curriculum. it is a shame the extremists are trying to bully the professionals about things they don't know or don't exist. also, try to push a whitewashed agenda to keep our kids ignorant. brenda saying, any parent who does not pay attention to anything your child is taught is

asking for trouble. go to the meetings, talk to your school board. parents have been allowing liberal indoctrination for 20 years. pay attention. yes, parents should review school programs in advance. jimmy saying, kids are not government property. you cannot treat your offspring as if it estate property. the state must back off or it will face a sad fate. we want to hear from you on phone lines for parents and teachers and others. this is ralph in morning view, kentucky. caller: come on, these people who say we should leave teachers alone, have they not seen the statistics on education in this country? especially black parents. i mean, their kids are failing at greater rates all over this country.

teachers don't have the ability, apparently, to teach these kids because they are all failing. host: what is the answer to this question of what role parents should play in public education? do you think, as we talked about before, curriculum should be posted online for parents to review before the school year starts? do you think parents should be able to dictate what should be taught? how would you answer the question? caller: i don't know about dictating necessarily, but they should be aware and they should be informed. children are the most important asset this country has and their education has to be number one. there is cameras everywhere else. why can't there be a camera in the classroom? host: that was ralph in kentucky. bernard, a teacher here in washington, d.c. good morning. caller: good morning.

how are you doing on the saturday morning? host: doing well. caller: i think public schools and special ed schools, charter schools are good and everything, but i think all cell phones should be put in the locker so it will not distract the classes and things going on. i know here in d.c. they recruiting men and women to watch the schools and things. i go once a week around a private charter school with a friend of mine over to our office and there is nobody there and the school is right across the street.

it is something that just started. host: it is like a community watch program for school safety? caller: we already started it and, you know, have a good day. when you cut in i forgot but have a good day. host: up to new hyde park, new york. what role should parents play in public education? caller: good morning. to me, it varies across the country. i am not going to disrespect the teachers' union but they are teachers. they deliver the information that these school board and administrators tell them to. the parents that get involved because they here with the teachers are teaching, they are not in that process and it

should be a collaborative effort. you should have the teachers involved, should have parents involved. you have some parents that may be professors that may be smarter than others or others that may be plumbers that have a different view of the world and can participate. i think it should be a collaborative effort. the parents should participate, the school board should participate, and the school administrators should listen to both of them. host: when you say participate, how? caller: participate in the process. create a process that, when you have new information coming, everyone gets together and they kind of fine-tune it. when they changed the program in new york to critical thinking, not crt book thinking and changed math, they change the way i did math and grew up learning math.

for me, it was difficult. i taught my son the way i did it and helped him with the way he was learning but i can see how other parents, may be single parents or families that don't have the ability we had to reach out to others to learn how to do that. they did not include the parents of that decision. to me, it messed everything up. i think there has got to be a better way to do this. we should not be divided on this. we agree that kids are important, the most important thing in our world. why can't we come together and sit at the table? each place has to do this. this shouldn't be something the government does, this should be put down to the state and community level. may be some communities look at it differently. i believe a collaborative effort, let everyone talk peacefully with each other, understand the direction you are looking to head, create a

portfolio of items you want to address, and attack it and go after which ways are the best ways for us to teach our kids. host: peacefully and calmly is not what we have seen in some of these videos from around the country. that is the reason we are having this conversation this morning. this issue of parents, their role in public education playing a role in the high-profile virginia gubernatorial race. we saw a focus on it this week in the house judiciary committee hearing with merrick garland. we figured we would give an hour this morning to chat about it. tell us what role you think. the washington post editorial board from earlier this week saying, parents are embedded in public education. they elect members of the school board and lawmakers who fund schools. they sit on the advisory committees that formulate policy and practices and give public testimony before decisions are

made. they volunteer in schools and communicate their concerns and children's needs to teachers. there is no question parents should have a say in the education of their students, but individual parents cannot dictate what schools teach and what they want. allowing one parent or group of parents to bully or threaten and intimidate school officials into their way of thinking is not what our democracy is about and not what learning should be about. the editorial board of the washington post from thursday this week. this from this morning's opinion page of the wall street journal. philip hamburger, columbia law school teacher, who asked the question, is the public school system even constitutional? he writes, education is mostly free speech and parents have the constitutional right to choose the speech with which their children will be educated. they therefore cannot be constitutionally compelled or pressured to make their children

a captive audience for government indoctrination. the public school system pressures parents to substitute government education speech for their own speech. when government makes education compulsory and offers it free of charge it crowds out parental freedom in this area of educational speech. the poor parents have more profound pressure and that is by design. it is intended to pressure poor and middle-class parents into substituting government education speech for their own speech and their unconstitutional project has largely succeeded. most parents can't afford to turn down public schooling. they therefore cannot adopt speech expressive of their own views and educating their children, whether by paying for private school or dropping out of work and home schooling children. they are constrained to adopt government education speech in the place of their own and that, he writes, is in violation of the first amendment. if you want to read more, his column today in the wall street journal. back to the phones.

mary is a teacher in canton, illinois. what grade do you teach? caller: i am a retired teacher. i taught both in public schools and one year in a christian school. i am currently retired. i have five grandchildren and one of them is special-needs. and is homeschooled. i think this indoctrination of what can be taught and what cannot be taught has been going on for a long time. i had a secondary specialization in history and social studies and in 1980i was being told what i could and couldn't teach

according to the school i graduated from which was a very liberal school. host: who should make that decision on what should be taught in the classroom and how you use those limited hours in the classroom to reach students? who should make that decision? caller: ok, it has to be a collaboration. it has to be a teacher who is well aware of what the community is asking. host: in your experience teaching public school and private school, where did you think teachers did a better job of that? of being aware of what the community wanted? caller: that is very difficult to say. both -- in the public schools i

taught in were very keyed in. it was a very small community, very keyed in. the attitude of the superintendent and it was keyed into the attitude of prominent -- the mayor of the town, prominent people in the community. it wasn't necessarily sensitive to all people in the community. like, there were many spanish individuals in the community. spanish was not even on the curriculum. it was responsive in some ways and other ways it was not. the private school, the christian school, was extremely

sensitive to individuals but there was also bickering in it. there were issues. [laughs] it was less than what i thought should be ideal. host: thank you for the call and talking about your experience. just after 7:30 on the east coast. continue to call in on what role should parents play in public education? just want to update you on a couple of news items we have been tracking, including this out of the supreme court yesterday. the supreme court agreed yesterday to quickly consider two lawsuits challenging the texas ban on most abortions but left that law in place for now, adding a new blockbuster battle to the docket that already includes another major abortion rights case.

this the lead item in the wall street journal. the court said oral arguments for november 1 but acting on emergency request from the justice department to block the law while the federal government challenges legality. the justice department -- the justices, excuse me, will review an appeal by the state of mississippi which is seeking to implement an abortion ban after 15 weeks of pregnancy. even more action on that front from the supreme court this term. this story from the new york times this morning on stats out of the border on border crossings. highest numbers since the 1960's. a record 1.7 million migrants from around the world, many fleeing pandemic ravaged countries, were encountered trying to enter the u.s. illegally in the last 12 months. those are the new federal numbers. highest number of illegal crossings reported since 1960

when the government began tracking such entries. the number similarity high for the 2000 fiscal year when they caught 1.6 million people according to government data. single adults represented the largest group of those detained and represent 64 million of all crossers -- 64% and large numbers of migrant families. more than 4790,00 of those -- 479,000 of those. the nearly 147,000 children have been larger since 2008. those coming from the federal government this week. back to your phone calls. stephen, lexington, kentucky, a parent. what role should parents play in public education? caller: good morning. i believe parents should be a lot more involved in their

children's education and i will say i will not blame the teachers. the teachers are doing an amazing job. i believe it is a combination of american parents, not enough funding, not enough transparency, and parents just using education and schooling as childcare. i believe they need to go to the meetings. just because it is a hot topic, what about back in the past? they are not going to the meetings, not voting for officials. my wife is a teacher. she's a middle school teacher for social studies. what i topic to be on right now. she calls parents, they don't call back, they don't email, they don't communicate with the teacher. they get surprised when they see certain things. hey, teachers are trying their best. host: has she ever gotten a call from a parent say, why did you teach that or i don't think you should be teaching that? if so, how did she respond? caller: yes.

not directly but to the leader of the social studies program. you get phone calls -- she says you get phone calls, emails, parents inquiring, why is this topic being taught? let me tell parents, you have a choice. you don't have to use public education. you can find other means to teach her children. host: thank you for the call. what grade did she teach? caller: middle school teacher. host: thank you for the call. michelle in washington, d.c., a teacher. good morning. caller: good morning. i used to teach for public charter schools, all grades, and i was original teacher. my comment this morning is i believe the role parents -- parents should be involved in public schools should not be banned. parents should be allowed to participate as much as they like.

they should be involved in curriculum and choosing the curriculum. i would like to see african centered schools for african children. african-american children are not learning survival survival school. i think they are failing the children at all levels, particularly at puberty age where the teachers don't seem to know what to do with pushing forward and letting the black boys be creative as they go over into puberty, 11, 12 years old. you have to have children take leadership roles, be creative. they have to learn how to speak in public. also, children have to learn survival skills, particularly in ninth grade such as

entrepreneurship and learning about accounting and, of course, civics. but we have to learn what our african-american people laid the foundation for. we do not get that in public schools. about how we are to look at racism. not to hate but how would deals with us in this country. it is very needed. but we need schools that can do that without being micromanaged by the government. there are curriculums that are available for black schools. in short, my comment is i would like to see african-american centered schools that want to teach a culturally relevant curriculum to the children so the children can survive in america. host: before you go, can you

explain, for folks who are not in d.c., what i public charter school is and how that works? caller: yes, i can. a public charter school is run like it is funded publicly with money allowed by the city or the state. it is government money but it is privately operated. however, it is oversight, the administration, what it teaches has the oversight body such as the board. it could be a charter school board or board of education for the state. but it has a lot of say. more say than the parents sometimes in the school. publicly funded but privately

operated. you have to teach with the federal curriculums allow you to teach and that becomes a problem many times because of you not teaching whatever that thing is the government wants you to teach. then you have to explain and you run into obstacles and you may not get funded or the charter may be revoked. host: thank you for explaining. 20 minutes left in this segment. taking your phone calls on phone lines for parents and teachers and others. james is a parent in lancaster, virginia. good morning. caller: good morning. [indiscernible] host: we cannot hear you very well. can you try to speak more into the phone? there is a lot of background noise.

i think he might try to call us back. robert in hudson, florida. you are next. caller: good morning. how are you doing today? host: doing well. caller: i think the primary role parents should be playing in public schools is to get their children ready. teach them discipline, tell them to act civil in the classroom, help them with their homework, make sure they do their homework. if they keep on their child or work with their child, they will know what is going on. if there is a problem with what they are being taught, they can talk to the teacher. with the main thing is to keep them on topic, keep the kids learning. that is the primary responsibility of the parent. not fighting with the school board or the governor. host: a very unique situation parents are facing and have faced the past year is this return to schools amid a time of

the delta variant surge in the country. we have seen a lot of clashes between parents and school boards over masking and what is appropriate and how long students have to be out of school if they are in contact with somebody who has contracted covid. how should parents try to navigate those situations? this very unique situation we are facing this year. caller: i was a pharmacist for 45 years. i have a lot of confidence in the fda and cdc. they should follow their guidelines. host: on that, parents should defer to the federal government, to the experts you are saying? caller: yeah, not to governor desantis. that is for sure. host: that was robert in florida. crystal in pennsylvania, good morning, a parent.

caller: not only am i a parent and grandparent i also work in the schools. i want to make two points. last week we had parent-teacher conferences. only 1% of the parents came to school or called into school and got involved in their child's education. when i see parents going to school boards and hitting people and screaming about children wearing masks, i wish they had that much energy and involvement in their child's education when it comes to parent-teacher conferences and finding out what is going on in their child's life. they will not get involved in that. they do not come to the conferences. that is one thing. another thing, i am 60 something years old.

when i was young i was taught christopher columbus discovered america. we are talking about curriculum. i mean, there should be truth in curriculum. there is nothing wrong with teaching african-american education. there is nothing wrong with teaching any cultural education that applies to our students in our school. we have a mixture of students in our school, predominantly white, but we have black, we have spanish, we have dominican. there is nothing wrong with teaching them to be proud of their culture. but i just want to say to the parents, all of you who go to the school board meetings screaming and yelling at the school board member, cut it out. come to the conferences when your teacher calls you and says, we can sit down and talk about your child's education. that is when you are needed. host: that was crystal in

pennsylvania. on twitter, teachers are there to teach and parents can parent at home. mary saying, parents should play every role. volunteering, getting kids fed and rested, helping with homework, monitoring the curriculum, attending teacher conferences and voting, voting, voting. mrs. k from new york saying, separation of church and state is best. we are there to teach basic knowledge, math, reading, knowledge, anatomy not x rated curriculum. this is eric from new york, like our media consumption we can no longer handle an opposing view. teach your kids that others, even those in authority positions, may have opposing views and think for yourself. not shot down everything with which you disagree. now to prince george, virginia. bradley, you are next. caller: good morning.

always a pleasure talking to you. let's see, this is a fun topic. i agree parents should be involved in discussing curriculum with teachers and educators at pta meetings and any time can get one-on-one. i think that our public school systems advanced along way since i was going to school. early college programs and i think michelle spoke upon the charter school systems. these are all kind of new programs compared to when i was going through school. i think parents and educators should always find the time to discuss how the curriculum can evolve. parents at home should definitely be as helpful as they possibly can to provide

assistance to their kids and making sure they are staying on top of things. i think the number one issue that can be addressed is readying our children for the realities of the world. as our nation and the planet faces new problems we should be on the forefront of that and start getting our kids ready to tackle those problems. of course, as michelle mentioned, entrepreneurial ship and it starts there, giving the kids the discipline and the knowledge to think for themselves. to work collectively as a group. you have a great weekend. host: bradley in virginia. kevin in marshall, texas. good morning. caller: good morning, john. i wanted to comment on a

previous call about charter schools. you asked a really good question. i teach at a charter school. i used to teach public school here in texas. every state is different on the charter school situation. they passed the laws and they decide how they apply charters. the main selling point on charter schools is that, you know, a parent can choose to send their kids to that school whereas public school, you are pretty much tied into it. the funding is public funding. we follow the same guidelines as far as, you know, special ed students. we cannot discriminate. all the general rules that apply to public education apply to us, too. host: where did you find that

parents were more involved? in the public schools or the charter schools? caller: you know, it is parent specific to be honest. in the public schools, we always had some really great parents who really work hard and get involved in their kids' education. that is a percentage. but in a charter school, at least an hour charter school and this is another point on charter school. we are chartered for a specific purpose. for example, our charter school is to deal with dual credit students. kids that are going to college and getting their high school diploma at the same time. our school pays for their college but we have the kids there. our parents are more involved but i think that is just because certain parents are more involved in their kids' education.

those parents are more apt to look at a charter school and say, hey, this is what they have to offer because they do get involved. host: do you think this year from your view, i know you were not in both this year, but in your area in marshall, texas push against covered restrictions in school. do you think there was more pushback in the charter schools, more in the public schools? caller: like you said, i have been in the charter. we did not get a whole bunch of pushback. our parents and our teachers and our administrators, you know, we always work together kind of a thing. there were parents that were very concern and they wanted to make sure their kids were masked. last year that is what we did. we masked up, we desanitized.

host: did your schools stay open the whole time? caller: that was the benefit of our school. most of our curriculum was online to begin with so we were set up to do distant learning before the public schools. my wife, she teaches at a public school and, i mean, it was a big deal. when kids are so used to having a certain kind of curriculum delivered a certain way that, you know, it was hard for them to do that electronic distant learning switch. whereas our school, we were doing that kind of thing in class. now the only difference was you were at home doing it. host: what is your favorite topic to teach? caller: [laughs] i love them all, i really do, and that is another good thing about our school.

i get to teach them all. i am certified for english and speech but working at this school i have been able to teach math, algebra, history. i have enjoyed that. all of them. i like teaching all of it to be honest. host: thank you. family of teachers, thank you for what you and your wife do. carl in carlsbad, california, you are next. caller: good morning and thank you for c-span. you are kind of jogging all over the place so let me make three points if you don't mind. to the immigrants in the article you read, if you are entering this country, you have every single right as all of us. second of all, the young lady that called and talked about black and white and segregation. that is not occurring anymore.

we sit side-by-side. those days are long over. and my point is, about the pt a, the pta was a fundamental institution within our country. the parents are there, just like they are speaking out in town hall meetings. pta was involved in all forms and levels of education. i would like to tell you that i was brought up in a private school system. i went to buckley in los angeles but my parents took us out of a private school, not because they couldn't afford it, the education was not good enough.

the public school system is wonderful. you know, it is the best system you can have because it is the best education you can get. host: did you ask why they put you in private school in the first place? caller: oh, well, just because they thought -- i am 46 years old. that is what they thought the best thing was. but when they realized i was not getting the best education, the best education is in public school. that is why i kind of disagree with the lady. black and white, this and that, no. public education is wonderful and we should be entirely grateful for the teachers across this country. it is beyond belief. like the first responders, the teachers, i mean, imagine the

kids that didn't get to go to prom during covid. if you don't go to school and enjoy middle school, junior high, high school, i mean, thinking back, you are over 21 years old. if you don't have those kind of blessing and the camaraderie, the unity, between students what did you have? but with parents, is the question you are asking about covid? i mean, this really wasn't a question besides masking, right? host: the role parents should play in general at this time when there has been, what we have seen, tension between parents and school boards. these viral videos. just asking what role parents should play when it comes to

public education. you mentioned teachers. here is the view of one teacher from a recent op-ed. jennifer wolf, new york high school teacher in new york state. she writes in her op-ed posted on cnn earlier this month, unfortunately, school board meetings have become a forum where scared and angry people dissent on the one accessible government structure they feel they have the most control over and then, without filter or grace, hurl personal insults demanding someone listen. as a teacher trying to educate students, some of whom are the children of parents participating in these outbursts, i have been thinking about what is at stake for the future generations if we don't change. we need to do better. our country deserves people willing to have difficult conversations and solve problems together. we need to turn toward each other, not away from each other, in spaces where uncomfortable discussions are treated like a crime.

without civil discourse we risk tumbling toward civil unrest. about five minutes left in this segment. continued to get your phone calls on phone lines for parents and teachers and others. david is a parent in kennesaw, georgia. caller: how are you doing this money? host: doing well. caller: the guy from california, you should've asked him, did his mama put him in a predominantly white school? everything in america is black and white. everything we do in america is based on white supremacy to keep you in charge. to the lady from pennsylvania, she put up an excellent point. we have a euro-centric curriculum based on indoctrination. the map itself shows the black countries smaller than the white

countries. have 60 you have to be to do that -- sick do you have to be to do that? we have a divided educational system. host: how are schools doing in kennesaw, georgia where you are? caller: you like to direct people to get them off topics. we have a divided system where the rich and white go to the best schools. we built all the white schools get the best schools. that happens all over america. it is indoctrination program where people like to send their kids to school like a nursery. the kids will go on youtube and see these parents who go to school and speak up and hear about their kids being mistreated. what do you have to say about the people who actually teaching

the students? you have to start there. you cannot always blame the parents. all the teachers are good and wholesome. that is fairytale stuff. host: this is alan in florida. you are next. are you with us? caller: good morning, john. just wanted to say some of the things that the person prior to me said, there was some truth to that about the inequality in the type of education in certain areas. but i was fortunate enough to go to public school and i think parents have a role. they have the right to know what is going on in their schools. as far as the curriculum and as far as conduct and behavior of

the student. but when it comes down, i think, to curriculum, i was an advanced honor student and we learned about the civil war. we learned about racism. we were even taught about the incident during the second world war where there were internment camps for asian american people. these things didn't turn us against the country. it was simply learning the truth. and it does help you to understand the fact that there are other cultures in this country. and i think parents do a great deal by setting a proper example for their children. it is right to have questions, it is right to be involved. but as you read from the op-ed, there has to be civility when this happens. people have to be able to talk to one another, not be worried

about being threatened, about acts of violence and that is the biggest thing. people aren't against the fact parents want to know. people are against how parents are acting. the claimant that they are creating at these school board meetings, at these schools. and i also believe that parents are parents, they are not doctors. the covid restrictions are put in place for the very safety and health of your children, and all the other children at the school. so it's not just you. host: on the outburst at school board meetings, the lack of stability, i wonder, getting a lot of focus now because of viral twitter videos and youtube videos. do you think these things happened in the past, too and

they are just getting amplified more by social media? do you think it is worse now than it was in the past? caller: i believe it is worse now than it was in the past. i am sure that it happened. there were subjects that brought some ire from parents before, but no, this is a situation that has been amplified by, unfortunately, yes, social media, but just the general state of the country politically. i do believe that the prior administration kind of gave people a pass, if you will, to act out, and to forget about civility. and even, unfortunately, to disregard statistics, to disregard truth and facts. all these things have been i guess amplified by the rhetoric coming from the prior

administration and the people that support them. caller: that's our last caller in this first segment of "washington journal." stick around. plenty more to talk about, including up next, "huffington post we will be joined by "huffington post" labor reporter dave jamieson to discuss the wave of worker strikes taking place across the united states. and later, more of your phone calls. stick around. we will be right back. ♪ >> exploring the people and events that tell the american story on american history tv. on lectures in history, two discussions about the american military and the revolutionary war. first, julianne sweet of baylor university talks about the capabilities of the continental army and militia troops, as well as advantages and disadvantages the american and british forces had.

craig bruce smith of william with university compares how the american and british militaries compared. and on the presidency, i look at the life and times of abraham looking, with historians david reynolds -- abraham lincoln, with historians david reynolds and hwb. watch american history tv every weekend. watch online anytime at c-span.org/history. ♪ >> sunday night on q &a, a retired california judge takes a look at legal system and offers suggestions on how to improve it. her latest book addresses judicial independence, mandatory minimum sentencing, racial bias in jury selections and police are form. >> particularly in urban settings, but not exclusively, police officers, they are not interested in the fact that you

didn't have your traffic signal on. they are not interested in it. what they want to do is have a reason to stop you to then engage in conversation and maybe then search your car. the u.s. supreme court has said to police officers, that's just fine. you can make these kinds of stops, and it doesn't matter that that's not really what you are really interested in. and i think what has to change is that the very nature of policing has to change, and we need to take that role out of policing. police should be used to investigate crimes and certainly to help prevent crimes, but i think traffic stops are major problems, because they disproportionately focus on people of color. >> sunday night at 8:00 eastern on c-span. you can listen to "q&a" and all of our podcasts on our new c-span now app. >> "washington journal 'continues.

>> "huffington post" labor reporter dave jamieson joins us now to talk about the wave of worker strikes taking place across the country. can you start by explaining what this term striketober means? dave: sure. this term popped up on twitter by people who are frankly excited to see workers pushing back and going on strike, or threatening to go on strike. and so, you know, this hashtag came about largely because john deere workers moved to go on strike and eventually did. also in hollywood, we see all the film and television crews were threatening a strike that was 60,000 people there. there are also nurses in southern california who have authorized a large strike. so we see kind of large numbers of, in some cases, workers going on strike, but in more broadly, workers threatening to go on strike. these are pretty large numbers for one month, so i think that's kind of what's fed this

excitement about striketober. host: how many are we talking about and is this a historic level strikes? dave: i would say it's not a historic level strikes. you know, the numbers are, when people ask, are they really huge numbers? they are and they aren't. there are large numbers in workers authorizing strikes. if this strike in hollywood were to come to pass, and it's not completely off the table now, that would be the largest strike we have seen in the u.s. in almost 15 years. if all these workers with john deere, the nurses and other health care workers were to go on strike, that could feasibly be over 100,000 workers in one month. that would be very significant. to give a little, you know, kind of broader perspective on this, over the past decade, each year in large strikes, we've averaged around 150,000 workers going out on big strikes each year.

so, that number is actually quite small historically. if we go way back and kind of broaden this timeline to, you know, the post-world war ii years when union density was very high in this country, around one third of workers belonged to unions, those were years where you might have a couple million workers go out on strike. the way i would explain this is kind of in the broad sweep of history, these are small number's, because union numbers have been trending down for a long time now. but kind of in this moment, i think something is happening where workers are recognizing that they have leverage now. we see this kind of tight labor market happening, we tight -- weirdly tight and a lot a pockets of the economy. workers sense the winds shifting in their favor a bit and they feel like right now is a good time to strike for a better bargain. host: you mentioned union numbers trending down. to put some numbers specifically to that from the bureau of labor

statistics, 18 million union members back in 1983. that represented about 20% of the population. in 2020, that number was 14 million workers but just 11% of the population. we will talk more about those trends this morning, but we are talking about these labor strikes around the country. let me invite viewers to join into the conversation on phone lines, split as usual. a special line this morning for union members, we want to hear your stories, especially if you are in one of the situations where there is an active strike. 202-748-8003 is that number for union members. you've mentioned a few of these strikes at every strike has its own story. but what are the ones to watch? and what are the workers demanding at some of these biggest strikes? dave: so, the john deere strike is pretty fascinating for a few

reasons. i say the biggest is because this strike is, the workers, it's kind of a repudiation to john deere. they are very unhappy with what the company has offered. but it's also a repudiation of the worker's own union, the united autoworkers. the uaw has represented these workers for decades. they've been frustrated with what they feel like our concessionary contracts in recent years, essentially, the union giving things back to the company and not getting a line return. the union in this case, the uaw negotiated a tentative agreement with john deere. the bargaining folks ticket to the union members and said we think this is a satisfactory deal, and the workers voted it down in astounding numbers. 90% voted to reject it, preferring to go out on strike. they said go back to the table, this is not good enough. since they couldn't improve on it, that's why the workers came out on strike.

that's a very interesting scenario where we see kind of rank-and-file members really pushing back on the entire system. you know, one big feature in that fight and this is a very common theme and a lot of the strikes we've seen, elsewhere, places like kellogg's, where workers at the cereal maker have gone on strike, is this concept known as the two-tier agreement where essentially, workers are treated differently as kind of separate classes. and this is kind of a common thing that companies try to get in contracts where new workers who come in under the contract are basically going to get lower pay or lesser benefits down the legacy employees who are currently there. i talked to a bunch of john deere workers about this. the company had proposed eliminating the defined-benefit pension for anyone who comes on after this contract. there ready have a two-tier system at john deere that has proved very contentious.

people feel that they are not treated equally and it kind of sows resentment. a lot of workers told me we are tired of these systems, we are tired of being treated different. we want equal pay for equal work, and we don't want to be divided in. and that's a factor we are also seeing in this health care dispute in california, where some 30,000 workers have authorized a strike against kaiser permanente. that strike has not happened yet but it's possible. like i said, it's also been a factor, you know, in kellogg's and some of these smaller strikes we've seen in food production where people are tired of this two-tier system. host: coming back to that john deere strike, a picture from axios from this past week. the picture is with uaw workers on the picket line welcoming in agriculture secretary tom vilsack there to join the picket line. how unusual is it to have a cabinet member join a picket line? dave: it's quite unusual.

a lot of people have been pushing the biden administration to be more aggressively prolabor. biden, somewhat famously, very early on, i cannot remember whether this was -- i think it was actually shortly before he won the election, he said he would be the most prounion president ever. we've had unions kind of positioning themselves to get biden to be more aggressive. and really, he has been quite aggressive. you might remember earlier this year when workers in alabama at amazon were moving towards a union vote. people had pressured the administration to speak out and biden eventually did, addressing it directly. he did not name amazon, but he alluded to this big election that was happening in out them. he said no company should be telling workers whether they should or shouldn't unionize. he kind of gave this speech blasting companies for pressuring workers not to form

unions. and that was really historic, kind of a direct address that we had never seen from a sitting president. when it comes to the strikes, i think, you know, a lot of union supporters do want to see him come out and directly say, you know, john deere, give your workers a fair contract. he hasn't done that. i would frankly be surprised if he did. that would be fairly unprecedented. precedents -- presidents, while they have in the past tried to help workers, it's usually behind the scenes, you know, through mediating, you know, with the company and that union trying to get some kind of agreement together, especially when it impacts big things like the supply chain on the broader economy. but usually, we don't see presidents wading in directly. he hasn't done that here. i think a member of the cabinet going out there and standing on a strike line, and you know, visually stranding -- standing with workers i personally think was quite significant. host: how aggressive was president joe biden, when he was

vice president joe biden during the obama and restoration? dave: it's interesting. we've seen a big shift in the democratic party over the last few years, kind of a more progressive shift. and i think unions are having a bit of a more renewed power within the party. and i think there is a lot of frustration under the obama years that, you know, unions feel like they did not really get ahead. on the numbers, they didn't. as a share of the economy, they got smaller. and so, there was this kind of growing sense that democrats hadn't really done much for unions. and so, i think biden has, and i thinksmart politically, smartly, has kind of leaned into this and kind of tried to carve himself out as much more, you know, openly prounion than kind of the democratic establishment has in the past. it still remains to be seen whether unions are going to win

major reforms that help grow their ranks. democrats have been pursuing this legislation, this really big, sweeping law that would essentially make it easier for workers to form unions. filibusters have gotten in the way of that. not all democrats are on board yet. you know, a couple of, kyrsten sinema, for one, has not signed onto that. they are trying to maybe get some of this through on the big reconciliation bill that democrats are still trying to corral. this could come to pass where we see some fairly significant, maybe even, you know, the most significant labor reforms in a couple of generations, if democrats can pull it off. unions are doing everything they can to make that happen. host: the proactive, protecting the right to organize act of 2010 when, past the house back in march, introduced by congressman bobby scott, the democrat from virginia. and a lot of discussion on that.

when we have these conversations on labor and unions, dave jamieson a great person to ask your questions on that front to. he's with us for about the next half hour. remember the special line for union members. we will start in mcbee, south carolina. bridget is out first, republican. good morning. caller: good morning. i am very thankful to live in south carolina, right to work state. and i've sort of been antiunion, to tell you the truth. during my time working. but i wanted to know how much of the vaccine mandates are playing in these strikes, what is the role of the vaccine mandate? and also, i wanted to ask about the bureau of labor statistics. their third quarter review of average weekly wages, the year

over year comparison, it is actually showing a decline in wage earners, in wage growth, a decline. the wages are going down. so, if you could speak to that, if you can? thank you very much. host: thanks for the question. dave jamieson, where do you want to start? dave: thanks for the call. first thing i'd say is if you a fan of south carolina's right to work law, you are not going to like the pro-act, because it would essentially ban right to work laws. we would basically see those off the books a lot of states if democrats managed to pass the pro-act. the vaccine mandate is really not playing a role in these strikes we are seeing. it is playing a role in some of the bargaining that we are seeing between unions and employers. there's been kind of a lot of attention on unions that have opposed vaccine mandates when they've been proposed by their

states or by the biden administration, which is looking to do through osha. it's really been, you know, may be a bit overhyped, the opposition. there's been quite a few police unions, the firefighters union has opposed to them. they don't want to see mandates for employees. they think this stuff should be voluntary. in most cases, most unions are open to them, they just want to be able to bargain over the particular's and they have successfully done that in a lot of cases. a lot of states have not implemented the vaccine mandates with the cooperation of the unions after fairly quick bargaining. that's the best case scenario you can see. as to what you said about real wages, that's a really important point. wages are going up in a lot of places. but of course, we are seeing really high inflation, so the inflation is eating into the wage gains that a lot of people are making. i think the inflation is playing a role in the strikes we are

seeing, and displaying a direct role at john deere, where workers were offered raises over the course of five or six years, 11 or 12%, which that would not keep up with the inflation we are seeing. workers are very unhappy to see that, especially when they see, you know, social security administration, you know, revising the numbers that, you know, increasing the percentage boost that people would see. people are looking around, they are saying the cost of milk, my groceries is going up, cost of gas is going up, my wages need to go up more than they are going up. you look at what's going on in hollywood with the strike that was considered there, workers i have talked to are not pleased with the 3% annual increase proposal that has come back. they feel like it needs to be way higher due to inflation. that is the real wage issue that bridget brought up as a really important factor in a lot of this. host: that john deere strike taking place at the john deere factory outside of the morning,

as i understand it -- outside of des moines, as i understand it. don is in des moines and a union member. you are next. go ahead. caller: hello. yes, i'm here. hello. host: you are on with dave jamieson of the "huffington post ." go ahead. caller: i wanted to talk about the wages, particularly about the john deere. wages, i have been there for 38 years, ok. i was a union member for 38 years. host: you just got to turn down your television and talk through your phone. you are at john deere for 38 years and you are retired now? caller: yes. and i was making an excess of $30 an hour on incentive work. they cut my wages to $26 an hour

when they had the new pay scale. i was wondering why they cut that pay scale when they doubled their profit just in one years time by double. and so, i took a lesser job at john deere, and i'm retired now, but i'm getting a pension. the people that were hired after they cut the wages were hired in at about $12 an hour. i was making in excess of $30 an hour for the work on incentive work. host: i will let dave jamieson answer your question. have you made it out to the picket line out there at the john deere factory? caller: yes, i was at the ankeny plant. host: have you walked at the picket line since this started? caller: i wondered then why my wages were cut when they were.

when they made twice as much money this year as they did last year. dave: do you know what your, which contract you are talking about when you're wages got cut? caller: i'm sorry, i didn't hear you. dave: do you know which year, which contractor you are talking about that cut your wages? caller: yes, the contract, it was the contract that was cut. host: what year was that? dave: at john deere. host: what year did that happen to you? dave: 1989 -- caller: 1989. host: a while ago. dave jamieson? dave: thank you for the thoughts. that's going back a long way. i am not familiar with what happened in that contract. what i can say is that 1997, there was a contract at john deere that workers are still talking about to this day. that was the contract that set up the second lower tier, which i think don may have alluded to

their, where workers that came in were making quite a bit less money and had lesser health and pension benefits than the previous employees. i was talking to one worker last week who said, you know, we are not so young that we don't remember 1997. you know, we are not up for more of this two-tier business. john deere wants to create a third-tier where all the new workers wouldn't have the pension at all. they said we are sick of getting divided like this. i think what don was saying, when he had wages above $30 an hour, was that this was always traditionally seen as a really good job, right. you know, john deere, as workers have told me, kind of felt like they always have the pick of the litter. if you got in at john deere, you had a good career. there were people who spent generations there, whose father

worked her and whose son went to work there, too. so, there's this fear that the job is being degraded over time, that it is not what it used to be, and that what comes after this could be worse than what they have now. and i think that's why, you know, workers there are trying to make this stand now. they don't want to see this job degraded more than they feel that it was in past contracts, where they gave away concessions. host: lake geneva, wisconsin. good morning. caller: thanks for taking my call. like mr. jamieson said, there's been a change in a generation. there was a lot of bad things going on -- back when unions were first design, there was a lot of bad things going on with employers, 80 hour work weeks. i think companies have come a long way, a very long way, as

far as all the government stuff. i was in a union back in the 70's briefly, late 70's, early 80's. and it wasn't a very strong union, but i went to a nonunion place, and i had a good job. when i retired, i was making $28 an hour, and that was just in the not too recent past. the previous caller said he was making $30 an hour in 1989. that's huge money in 1989. that's upper-middle-class to almost, you know what i'm saying. really excellent wages. that doesn't even factor in the amount of benefits they got. i think unions have their place in time. right now, i think it's more political than anything else. if you're making john deere people, right now, they're making $50 an hour more, it's like, what are you striking for? host: dave jamieson? dave: first off, i'd say the

john deere workers do not make that much. there are, you know, quite a few workers who say they make, you know, and the $40,000 range, depending on our end bonuses and all that. this is a common theme i see, where, you know, some people are not necessarily, like our caller here, onboard with striking workers who they feel already have a pretty good deal. and we see this, you know, view a lot towards kind of, you know, i would say legacy unions in places like manufacturing, where, you know, people sometimes feel like the workers are asking for too much. but, you know, at john deere, the workers and the community there certainly don't see it that way. the consensus that there needs to be a floor in these things. you talk about the issue of the

pension. there are still some out there who have it, but most of us, if we have anything, are in a 401(k). people may say, well, i don't have a pension, why should that guy have a pension? what i would say is, you know, more people would probably have pensions if the attitude was that, you know, people deserve them to begin with. i think that's why we see, you know, workers like the deere workers fighting to maintain to what they admit have been solid middle-class jobs, because they feel like it creates a floor underneath the economy and their community, and that it helps keep the standards up, not just for themselves, but for everyone. and that, you know, just because an amazon worker at a warehouse doesn't get a pension doesn't mean that a john deere worker shouldn't have one. host: coming up on 8:30 on the east coast. dave jamieson is with us. he's the "huffington post" labor

reporter and easy enough to find on twitter. dave jamieson, you are talking about legislative efforts when it comes to capitalizing on these wave of strikes happening around the country. that was a topic that congresswoman alexandra ocasio-cortez brought up in her conversation this week with bernie sanders, a wide-ranging conversation, on the budget reconciliation bill. this is what she had to say about these union strikes and the legislation that congress is trying to move. rep. ocasio-cortez: i think one of the most exciting stories this year in our country is the increased militarism of the labor movement in the united states. we are seeing strikes. it started off in january right here in the bronx. we had the teamsters threatening to walk off the job in order to get a raise. we won. after that, we started seeing organizing happening all across the country. mary kay had mentioned the

amazon, the amazon drive in bessemer -- strike in bessemer. we are starting to see john deere strikes. iatse, they have their demonstration. you have kaiser, cwa. there are strikes happening around the country with existing members of unions. now, what would happen if we allowed people all across the united states to unionize and collectively bargain the way that these unions are doing right now in order to elevate their quality of life? that is why these provisions are so incredibly important for us to fight for. right now, you know, i am heading up to buffalo this weekend. i know you endorsed's india walton -- cynthia walton. there are starbucks workers attempting to unionize in buffalo. we have been seeing what's

happening out there. these starbucks locations, they are requiring mandatory antiunion meetings while their workers are on the clock. how is stuff like this legal? how is it legal? or you have amazon that was lobbying to kind of put up usps kind of postal boxes, which is why that whole election got overturned, the abuse of power in order for them to intimidate workers. so these key provisions from the pro-act and reconciliation on the act overall would really protect workers and really penalize workplaces that use these tools to try to dismantle the labor movement in the way that they have tried to, and the way that they have eroded it over the last 20, 30, 40 years. host: congresswoman alexandria ocasio-cortez earlier this week. dave jamieson, she talked about the pro-act.

we are at a time when things are being cut from budget reconciliation as democrats try to come up with a deal. is there any chance this is left on the cutting room floor? and what else is in that very large bill being put together for unions? dave: so, there's a chance that some of the pro-act stuff does survive reconciliation. most of is not in there. there are reconciliation rules. you've got to pass muster with those. a lot of the pro-act stuff does not do enough with the budget to really survive. one thing democrats and unions are pursuing is putting in monetary penalties against companies that commit unfair labor practices. on the idea being since that is something that would raise revenue, would therefore pertain to the budget, that it could somehow get through in this package. that, i think, would actually be a pretty big deal. because right now, the penalties

for a company if they tried to bust a union are pretty small to nonexistent. if an employer fires a worker who is leading and organizing effort, if they did it illegally, they generally just have to pay them back pay. there's no damages. they want to create damages to create a disincentive, you know, for companies to not do this sort of stuff. that is one possibility. still remains to be seen whether that will get through. one other thing they have been considering, these kind of, you know, smaller pieces, one is a juicier tax credit for electric vehicles that are made in union factories. so the idea being there, that were kind, you know, steer customers towards companies that have unionize factories here in the u.s. that is good for, you know, the big three out of detroit, ford,

gm, still lantus. other companies, the transplants, the foreign-based automakers that have factories in the u.s., are not happy about that. you know, talking about toyota, companies like that, because they feel like it would create a unfair competition for them because their facilitiesn are nonunion. this is all stuff that is being haggled over on the hill. maybe some of it will survive, maybe it won't. host: to hazard, kentucky. this is robert waiting on our line for republicans. good morning. caller: do you think the vaccine is causing most of the strikes? what is the percentage you think of the people that are on strike for more powers or for more insurance? do you think it's mostly the vaccine? what's the mix on that, do you think? and is it the vaccine mostly? thank you.

host: dave jamieson? dave: i would make clear to anybody watching that the vaccine is essentially a non-issue in these strikes we are seeing. these fights are essentially over compensation, over wanting, you know, equal pay for everyone within the union. the vaccines are really not a big issue. you did mention hours. are they striking for more hours? in a lot of cases, it's the opposite. we see a lot of the workers in these strikes, they are saying they are tired of working mandatory overtime, especially in the food production, kellogg's, frito-lay. a lot of workers said they were working back to back shifts, 16 hour days, that sort of thing, working literally every day of the. part of that is maybe, you know, companies might say they are having a hard time finding workers. they don't want to hire more people who they are going to have to give good health care benefits to and may be a

pension, so they would rather just work their current workforce, you know, the extra overtime and pay that penalty. we see a lot of workers are exhausted. this is not only among the union workers who are striking. we see this in nonunion places, too, where workers feel like event employers are not staffing up enough right now and they are expecting them to come in and work sort of crazy hours. huge issue in hollywood, may be the center to that labor fight among these tv and film crews, who are saying we have no time to see our families, we are not getting enough sleep at night. i talked to a lot of workers who say they regularly work 14 hour days. you throw in the coming, driving all around l.a., you know, you might have, you know, literally eight hours off of work to get home, go to sleep, you know, and do all that stuff. people are tired. they want to see a change to that stuff. host: frankfort, illinois.

this is lehman, a democrat. good morning. caller: good morning. host: go ahead, sir. you are on with dave jamieson. caller: when you were talking about the john deere and the contract of 1997, i was expecting you to say something about nafta, which i didn't hear you say. you avoided that. and with the outsourcing and rightsizing and on-time that killed labor right there. host: dave jamieson? dave: yeah. nafta, it's a very, you know, salient issue and a lot of these fights -- in a lot of these fights. you take some of these food manufacturers that have, you know, sent jobs to mexico over the years, and that unions are very frustrated over that. they want guarantees on production in the u.s., and that

has been a factor in some of these strikes. and i think the companies having diversified where their workforces are, it does help them manage the strikes, too. these legacy employers, their workers are not all in u.s. factories anymore. they've got stuff going on overseas someone strikes happen, they can kind of supplement the production they've lost by moving it elsewhere. nafta and sort of the movement of a lot of these assorted industrial jobs overseas, i think it does play a factor, maybe an indirect one, but it is a factor here. host: west palm beach, florida. independent, this is stephen. good morning. caller: excuse me, you are going to cut me off, i don't want to speak. you let a lot of people go on and on. you going to let me speak? host: you're on now. caller: find. i want to mention three things about labor unions. i am a white collar person, as

white collar as they get. i double majored as an undergrad in physics and math and got a masters degree in material science. i moved out to california in 1988, and i had to manage blue-collar people for a year. and that's what unions represent, blue-collar folks, all right. that was the longest year of my life, ok. they didn't care about learning. they didn't care about improving their skills and things like that. they could have cared less about that. they were just there to collect a paycheck. of course, the bigger the paycheck, the better. that's obvious. that's basically managing the trailer park trash. that's who joins unions. host: what's your question? caller: it's not a question. these are comments, like you let other people give comments about their histories. second of all, inflation, that's what unions generate, they generate inflation. i live here at a condo in a high-rise.

i couldn't believe the things i was hearing about what i was not allowed to do in my high-rise. i can understand not being able to do structural work, like pulling down concrete walls and things like that, because of weakening the structure, and i should know what that is, given my educational background. about the only thing i am allowed to do now is paint. why is this? simple. because they unions have bribed the town council and the building inspectors to make sure that, like, we are not allowed to do stuff like that. i can't even lay down laminate flooring in my condo. third thing, we hear all the time, and this man over here from the "huffington post" should know this and i don't think he does. we hear this now going back, what, 15 years? how the workers are not getting the benefits of their productivity, and that this started in the 1970's. but has anybody ever asked whether those workers were

overpaid before their real wages started leveling out? host: we will put that to dave jamieson. dave: not sure where to start ther thanks for the calle. as for blaming unions for inflation, you know, we have very high inflation right now, maybe it's temporary, maybe it's not. i think you'd be hard-pressed to find many economists out there who would lay the blame for the inflation we are seeing at the feet of unions. i just don't see that. so, yeah. host: just a few minutes left with dave jamieson taking your phone calls. mention his twitter handle @jamieson. i wanted to ask you about one of your recent tweets. you talk about the 300 flight attendants at american airlines at the subsidiary, piedmont airlines, that have authorized a strike with 100% backing in

their vote. flight attendant unions have their own trademark strike strategy here called the kr strategy. can you just explain what the chaos strike strategy is? dave: sure, yeah. this is the afa, a union for flight attendants. this is a strategy that they have developed over the years where the ideas to carry out sort of surprise, small, intermittent strikes that keep the company on its heels. so, this could mean, you know, one crew of flight attendants walking off a plane so that plane can't operate. they wouldn't do this, or they wouldn't have all their flight attendants walk off at once and create this huge bottleneck, what they would do is have this kind of element of surprise that, you know, could really make things tricky and annoying for the company, but without sort of bringing the whole system down and creating these ripple effects at different

airports, which could really frustrate passengers. it's kind of a clever strategy to maybe get the company in line without sort of disturbing air travel in general, and really annoying a lot of passengers. so, you know, there's a lot of strategy behind strikes and one thing i always tell people is that sometimes there is years of planning that goes into these things. it's not always like, well, we are frustrated, let's walk out of here. you talk to john deere workers, some of them have been wanting to go on strike for several years. they even thought they might do it last time. and they see kind of things in their favor right now so they decide to move. in the case of john deere, not only is there a tight labor market going on with them, there's also, you know, high commodity prices in agriculture. john deere is really profitable right now. there's a lot of demand for their equipment. if the workers shut things down, shut down production, that's going to hurt john deere. these are all the things that

unions and rank-and-file members think about when they decide, you know, should we go out on strike? host: time for one or two more calls. this is allies in philly, a democrat. good morning. caller: good morning, mr. jamieson, and to the c-span family. and i am in a union, local696 district council. i had to fight to keep my pension, because the city took like eight of us out the pension, and i had to literally fight. and with the help of counsel person, i got back in the pension, i won my case. my question is that, should politicians, especially democrats, get more into helping unions? thank you. host: dave jamieson? dave: that's a terrific question and an excellent political

question, because i think there's a sense among unions that they been taken advantage of. excuse me, that democrats have taken them for granted over the years, that they are a very reliable voting bloc for democrats, and that unions are going to be there for them on election day, whether or not democrats ultimately deliver for them. and so, i think what we are seeing now is this discussion around the pro-act is unions saying, hey, look, we've had democrats on all the levers in washington before and we didn't get sort of the big systemic change we wanted to see, so now is the time to deliver. part of the argument being made to democrats, look, you guys aren't really remaining in power without us. in wisconsin, republicans have really, you know, declared war

with unions, especially public-sector unions. decimating membership, which benefits republicans politically in those states, because unions are a pillar of the democratic party. i think unions are telling democrats are now, look, help us strengthen unions, a, because we think it's good for workers and good for the economy, but also, it's frankly smart politics. because you know, democrats get drubbed when unions disappear. host: dave jamieson with just about minute left. we talked at the beginning about striketober. are we on the downside of this wave of strikes or is it going to become strikevember next month? dave: we are seeing more strike authorizations happening. the strike authorization at kaiser in california has grown. hollywood, strike is not off the table. you know, those 60,000 workers have a tentative deal right now,

and their union is walking them through the context of that you. i've spoken to a lot of workers who are not thrilled and plan to vote it down. i don't know how the vote will go. it may well pass, this agreement. but it is totally possible that this agreement gets voted down, and we have a situation like we had at john deere, where the workers tell the union, this is not good enough, go back to the table, you better get more than this. and a strike could still be feasible. so, i think we are going to see a lot of this spill into november, and probably beyond. what's happening here, as i said earlier, workers are sensing kind of a moment of leverage here. it could be fleeting, if the labor market, you know, changes and workers lose leverage there. you know, then we may not see big strikes. this dovetails a lot with what we are seeing in the broader economy with nonunion workers who are sitting on the sidelines. millions of workers who are not

going into the job market for one reason or another. a big reason probably being they don't like what's being offered. they maybe have savings that they've been sitting on, and they, would rather not go back towardor they would rather quit the job they have and take a better one. they are forcing employers to bid up wages. we are seeing this leverage for unions, we are seeing it for nonunion workers out there. we don't know how long it will last. i think, you know, without some sort of systemic change to how things work, you know, this may well be a temporary thing. if we see something like the pro-act or elements of the pro-act pass, then it may be, you know, more lasting change for unions. host: dave jamieson, labor reporter with the "huffington post." give him a follow on twitter. appreciate your time this saturday morning. dave: thanks for having me. host: up next to this morning and for the next 30 minutes, we turn the phone lines over to you, as we often do, letting you

lead the discussion in our open forum. let us know what public policy, what political issue you want to talk about. republicans can call in at 202- 748-8001. go ahead, start calling in and we will get to your phone calls right after the break. ♪ >> next week on the c-span networks, the house and senate are both in session. watch live coverage on c-span, and c-span 2. on monday at 9:30 a.m. eastern on c-span2, facebook whistleblower frances haugen testifies before the u.k. parliament joint committee. tuesday at 8:30 a.m. eastern on c-span3, the fda advisory committee meets to consider authorization of pfizer's covid vaccine for children 5-11 years old.

that day, we will have live coverage of congressional hearings on c-span.org and the c-span now mobile video app. the senate armed services committee will hold a hearing on the security situation in afghanistan and the region. at 10:00 a.m. eastern, representatives from tiktok, snapchat, and youtube testified before the senate commerce committee on children and social media. then on wednesday at 10:00 a.m. eastern on c-span3, attorney general merrick garland testifies before the senate judiciary committee on issues facing the justice department. and on thursday at 9:00 a.m. eastern on c-span3, the heads of four major oil companies and other industry leaders will testify before the house oversight and reform committee about information the fossil fuel industry publishes on climate change. watch next week on the c-span networks, or you can watch coverage on c-span now, our new video app. head on over to c-span.org for scheduling information or to stream video, live or on-demand,

anytime. c-span, your unfiltered view of government. >> "washington journal" continues. host: some time here for our open forum, where we let you lead the discussion on any public policy issue, any political issue you want to talk about. phone lines split, as usual. republicans, democrats, and independents can call in for the next 30 minutes. brian is up first out of fulsome, pennsylvania. what's on your mind? caller: good morning, guys. thank you for your venue here. that fella who called from florida hit some nerves regarding labor. i've been a blue-collar worker pretty much all my life. i've worked for what was a major retail company that has been disheveled by misuse of management. in any case, i go to people's

homes and repair appliances. the gentleman was talking about how blue-collar workers and unions do not want to learn. that is the biggest farce i've ever heard on your program. the problem with this country is that private and public sector is not paying, or not educating the workforce, ok. it is much easier to leave these jobs overseas if you have an uneducated workforce. i cannot tell you how many bosses i have been through who i want to get more training on the product that i work on on a daily basis, and they refused to give it to you. they need you out in the field to do the job. therefore, you are going out, and you are doing a job that you have been doing all your life, and you feel uncomfortable with. there's an anxiety level among the individual worker. and i assume that's going in the nationwide area.

the gentleman from florida, he may be republican, i am also republican, and i feel that he was unfair. now, as far as unions are concerned, i think there's public sector unions that are, in essence, communists. i think that's a whole different issue. but the average american worker wants to do his job well, he wants more training on his job, ok, and -- host: you said you're an appliance repair? how is the appliance repair business in a time that we are hearing about these supply chain issues? are a lot more people choosing to repair their appliances than risk ordering a new appliance and it being stuck on a cargo ship somewhere? caller: yeah, there's definitely some of that going on. and i think there's also issues of getting parts, you know. some of the parts are also in supply chain issue. and i must tell you that, you

know, i think the industry is in a flux, because everything is either made overseas. we need to bring back manufacturing home. if we don't get manufacturing back in our nation, we are going to be, we are going to lose. if you don't manufacture, you lose your power. i tell you, if you go to gary, indiana, chester, pennsylvania, trenton, new jersey, these cities that are devastated by crime and lack of jobs, these companies, lg, whirlpool, you name it, ge, they should be bringing manufacturing back to the united states of america and giving these inner-city kids jobs. host: thanks for the call. mary is in las vegas this morning, democrat. what's on your mind? caller: i agree with the most 99% of what the last caller set. -- with almost 99% of what the last caller said.

i think citizens united did is an injustice, giving large corporations so much money, money that they could share with their employees. whatever happened to profit-sharing? you know, instead, they are buying off politicians. and i don't care what party you are with, when they start talking about we don't want a society that are just a bunch of takers, well, you know, the government gets their pensions, they get nice, hefty pensions. some people would love to have pensions like that. who are really the takers here? yeah, people want more money, because you can't live on $10 an hour. host: that's mary in nevada. this is raymond, aurora, colorado, independent. good morning. caller: yes.

hi. good morning. we are not talking about theelephant in the room in the ceo 's ratio to the average worker has increased and is continuing to increase. jeff bezos is about to be the first person to become a trillionaire. and his ex-wife is up there in the billions. so, you look at all the ceo's of these companies like papa john's got a 48 car garage. they are not helping the average worker. and this society right now is in a lot of trouble. we are creating more billionaires and people that are becoming close to trillionaire's, so how can it not be fair that a worker should earn a living to take care of his family? it's agreed, that's the elephant -- it's agreed, that -- it is greed, that's the elephant in the room. thank you. host: john. good morning. caller: how are you doing?

host: doing well. caller: don't cut me off. i know how you like to cut off white people. host: not trying to cut off anyone, who are just trying to have a civil conversation and stay on topic, john. caller: i got you. good morning, everybody. i just wanted to say your last guest, mr. jamieson, he had a difficult time trying to tie in inflation with this, with the union workers, the contracts, you know, that these unions have, they get everything given to them. you know, my property taxes here, particularly my school taxes, tripled, you know, mainly in part because of the teachers union. you know, we have here in the state of pennsylvania, right now, they are trying to tie in a vehicle mileage tax, which is going to raise our gas $2 price

because the penndot unions are running $9 billion deficits. but this is, you know, this pro-act that is being proposed, it's bad for the economy. you have to have competition. you can't be, you know, solely giving government contracts for all the work that needs done out there. you have to have competition in the labor force. and one other thing i wanted to say, you know, everybody wants to talk about trump being divisive with, you know, his followers, and you know, promoting, you know, inequities, you know. you go back to the previous administration, barack obama, you know, he was the one that tried to divide this country. i always referred to him as the instigator in chief, because he

would talk, you know, about the veterans, and he will talk about, you know, white people having a war against women. when you start to divide people like that, you know, that's just bad. host: you mentioned former president obama. he is back on the campaign trail today and that closely watched gubernatorial race in virginia. we are going to be talking more about that race. barack obama, the former president, campaigning for terry mcauliffe, the former governor who is trying to run for that same office again in virginia. you cannot run for reelection as governor, you have one term and then you have to leave the governor's office. terry mcauliffe has done that and is trying to become governor again. more on that in a little bit. until then, your phone calls. james in venice, florida. good morning. democrat. caller: good morning. host: go ahead, sir. caller: oh, good. thank you. i'm shocked.

i've been washing for so long, i set, i've got to get on that thing. in venice, florida, we have benatar lucy -- notoriously brought up in the news for two things. there was a chiropractor here in town who was handing out covid excuses. i kid you not, parents were in line for a couple of blocks getting these things. they finally found out a chiropractor is not a medical doctor and he couldn't do this. host: when you say covid excuses, you are saying a medical reason not to get the covid vaccine, is that what you mean? caller: right, right. host: got you. caller: thank you for correcting me. ok, he is not handing them out anymore. anyway, th the other thingen -- then the other notorious think

in our community, a woman being murdered out west and then her killer was found a couple of miles from here. it's a sad, sad thing. but i really wanted to call senator manchin. i was a classroom teacher, and i was very fortunate in having a beautiful school in new jersey, and a handpicked staff, and it was the best time of my life as far as work is concerned. one of the things we tried ever students,, and we were upper-middle-class, to go out and see what america was like. we would exchange with another community. one that was absolutely mind-boggling was we went into

west virginia, and mccoy had been there. and when we were there, we put a man on the moon and it had just been completed. there were three television sets on doilies. it was a good place to put things, and i asked people in the home there, and they were there. what do you think about getting to the moon. her answer was, son, we did it. that was the big thing. host: good morning, go ahead. caller: i would like to discuss

a situation that is going on with the kids. i am not trying to be political or anything like that, but what i'm saying is the kids are being abused. what do we do about that? host: which kids were talking about, diamond? what situation? caller: i'm talking about every situation in america. the pta meetings. covid, and parents shouldn't be going to a pta meeting in the first place host: diamond, in louisiana. we mentioned a virginia gubernatorial race. let's focus on that. sir reagan with the associated press is covering state politics

and state government, all the politics of the old dominion and virginia. a lot of your job these days is focusing on the gubernatorial race. what is your take on why this race has become so close at the end with about 10 days until election day? guest: thank you for having me. i think it is quite close, as he said. we have seen polls through october. they seem to have some structural advantages, for quite some time. he is running against glenn young can who has managed to pull support from all parts of the republican base. host: in these final days -- 10 days to go. president barack obama's on the

campaign trail for terry mcauliffe area. where are they going and who are they meeting with? caller: they will be at the virginia commonwealth university, and we will also hear from top democrats and elected officials. they are expecting a crowd of several thousand. host: will he be campaigning with joe biden? caller: yes they campaign over the summer. they are expected to campaign at an event in northern virginia. host: in terms of former presidents, how much of a role is former president donald trump playing in his race? how much as bring young can referenced donald trump on the campaign trail. guest: young can knows that

trump is not popular in virginia. he lost by nine points. he has embraced trump's endorsement, but they have not campaigned together in person. they have reported that it is unlikely that trump be headed to virginia in person between now and election day. the top surrogates will come afterwards for victory rally. host: 10 days to go in the election. his early voting? guest: there is early voting. it has been expanded by democrats and between 19 cycle. host: where will you be headed, and what will you be watching for? what does this race turn on? guest: that is the key question and i don't know if i am -- i do not have all the answers. i will because crossing the

state and i will be looking for signs of voter enthusiasm. there is talk about an enthusiasm gap favoring republicans, and we will be looking to see how engaged things are on the democratic side on the final stretch? host: how does one judge voter there's he hasn't? guest: it's hard to do. i've traveled across the state and there are pockets that are tempered with signs, which is something of a departure from the past few years. the usually are not as many. through the valley, it is expected to be covered. it probably has hundreds if not close to 1000 people. so, republicans are widely saying there is more there is as a side, and more excitement for young can and the candidate. host: this raises a national story that will be covered. explain to viewers who do not

live in virginia, what parts of the state they should be looking for as they try to understand what the results mean that night mark --? guest: we will be watching northern virginia. it is deeply blue, but the campaign hopes they can do better there -- candace another recent years. -- candidates and other recent years. they pulled in strong support. they're looking to see the bellwether of richmond that has been blue in recent years. if democrats hang on there. host: sarah in the old dominion of virginia. thank you for your time this morning. good luck in the next 10 days. guest: i appreciate. host: back to our phone calls. we let you lead the discussion. let us know what issues you want to talk about.

about 10 minutes left in the segment. martin has been waiting in smithtown, new york. independent. good morning. caller: good morning. i would like to give an economic cycle. the ends go on strike for $.25 and they settle. the manufacturers pass it on to the wholesaler. it is now up to $.50. the wholesaler passes it on to the jobber. it is $.75. the jobber passes it on to the retailer, and it is up to a dollar 25. the gentleman who settled the union for $.25 is now causing people a dollar. as far as the keystone pipeline, i do not know what biden has against trump, but just think about the price of gasoline. how it is passing through the economic cycle. the same way as the truck goes

through the retailer, the whole thing, and i feel that if we go back to the stone pipeline, regardless of if you are king or democrat or what ever you are, and the price of gasoline, our country will get rid of inflation. host: sabrina in new york city. democrat. good morning. are you with us? jimmy and athens. good morning. caller: good morning. thank you for noticing the measurability of enthusiasm. i want to talk about inflation. it is in the news a lot, and it has economic history with inflation. the highest inflation has been in my lifetime was 1980, ronald reagan was elected president. not only was inflation high that

year, but so is unemployment. that was the main reason reagan one. while reagan was president, he immediately tackled the unemployment issue by lifting defense. that caused jobs to be created that we did not have unemployment. inflation stuck around for a while, and the cpi, which was the main way we measured inflation did not go down right away. then i remember reagan did something i didn't like and he gave amnesty to a bunch of illegal immigrants in our country. he allowed them to come out of the hiding and work, and that is why inflation came down. in the reagan years. that is some important history, and i hope it has a lesson for the future of our country. host: how optimistic, if that is the right word for you, about this congress passing any sort

of immigration legislation right now? caller: i am not very optimistic about it. i wish it would work like, the republicans would get together and say we want cheap labor, and the democrats was a, we want more votes. together, they could get some compromise which would help get inflation down. we are not going to get to that point. i am always hopeful, and after an election cycle, more interest will be in office. host: lawrence in north carolina, democrat. good morning. caller: two independents and republicans, i am a retired union worker making about $30 an hour. thank you very much.

have a great day. host: ralph and washington, d.c.. independent. good morning to you as you get into your car. caller: how are you? where you headed? host: i am headed to pick up coffee and tea. we are running out of it at the house. what's on your mind this morning? caller: you hear people talking about rages -- wages and poverty and stuff. ever since reagan got out of office, we have seen nothing but tax cuts on the wealthy. this is well documented. tax cuts on corporations. the sheer of the average working man's salary, compared everyone else, it has gone from 33% to 47% of the total taxes.

the top 1% account for 20% -- they have captured 90% of the wealth over the last 20 years. the democrats talk, but if you look at capital gains, i have been in the situation where i made seven figures one year. it was a great amount of money because of an investment i had made. the taxes i paid on that were substantially less than when i paid when i was an engineer. you know, what the people you sell this tax situation, many of these work for the right wing think tanks. they say that the wealthy pay the biggest percent of the tax, but it is only federal income taxes. they are not talking about social security, medicaid medicare, and more taxes on things.

if we do not get the situation under control, we have a society that is unbalanced. we have a huge number of people who are barely scraping by, and you get a varies mall set of people who are making money. they are making huge money. when corporations like amazon pay no taxes, you have to's that back and say -- you have to step back and say there's something wrong with that. you have 10,000 pages of tax code, and most of it is written to give the wealthy and the corporations tax breaks. the rest applied for the little guys. they don't even think of their money because it is taken out of the paycheck. they have no way of setting up trust funds and setting up tax deduction havens and stuff. it's going to destroy this country, and less we stop it, and it will end up in the degeneration of our society.

caller: ralph weighing in. indiana, independent. good morning. caller: i've a few things to say. i am 70 years old, but my family has been in this country since 1630. we were brought to this country, and we need to stand back up and fight for this country. we worked hard. host: the hoosier state. this is tommy in hammond. republican. caller: i have a few questions. i want to make three quick comments on three separate subjects. one, the economy. it is a proven fact as you can see that we don't need a politician in office. we need, whether it is trump or someone like him, we need a businessman.

because look at trump's track record as opposed to biden's track record or the democrat as a whole track record. my honest opinion is the biden plan is going to keep as many americans out of jobs because all of the aliens and migrants that have come across the border somehow, i think, they are going to give them jobs and what they want is payment. number two, growing up, we used to play a game on the farm. we would throw cow patties on the side of the barn. whoever's cow patties stuck the longest, that is who won. it looks to me like the democratic party is doing exactly that. they are all over the board,

just throwing cow patties and we will go with whatever sticks it. host: philip is in michigan. good morning. caller: good morning. when biden entered office, the very day he entered office, he cut off our northern pipeline, the keystone pipeline got shut down. i'm not sure it was the keystone pipeline, but he by doing that, he has increased almost double the price of gas on everybody. he wants us to bear the burden, the medium class and the middle class of going green. everyone wants to hop in an electric car and drive $100,000 electric car around. host: you are calling on the democratic line. did you vote for joe biden? caller: i did. host: why did you vote for him? caller: i thought he was going

to put tax on the superrich. that has certainly not happen. he has put tax on the poor who cannot afford the gas to get your car and go to work. we are stuck with a giant bill for gas doubling. they have to pay gas when they go. the gas bill is double. the employers are like, you gotta pay a certain amount of the gas bill. it is coming out of the trucker's pocket. i am surprised they are not all on strike, they are on strike, they are at home. host: one more call. republican, neil, go ahead. caller: i wish i been able to call and when you had a guest speaking about unions. i just want to make a comment.

they have a very happy workforce that could carry. they would show up all the time wanting to unionize, and they did not push hard. all it required was a little money in his pocket, and this is how the union leaders represented their people. they took care of themselves and did not care about unionizing people for their benefit. but the comment i wanted to make was, i noticed that all of these people who are prounion call in and they talk about how the ratio between a ceo salary at a workers is increasing, and they talk about sharing the profits, but i don't hear anyone talking about workers who are sharing the loss. not all years are great for businesses, but they want to dip into the pockets when their bosses are having problems. host: our lost -- last caller in the segment. about 40 minutes left, and in that time, we will spotlight a magazine segment. we will be joined by pat nolan

of the americans conservative union association with the peace in the american spectator. sick around, we will be right back. >> a new global video out from c-span. c-span now. download today. >> weekends bring you the best in nonfiction books on book tv. watch our coverage of the 33rd annual southern festival of books from nashville. the book jesus and john wayne. the book on a troubled water. the book faithful prophet. and afterwards, democratic congressman adam schiff, chair of the intelligence committee, midnights in washington, the role in the trump impeachment trial and the threat on american

democracy. he will be interviewed. watch tv every weekend and the whole schedule on your schedule and watch online any time at book tv.org. >> get an early start on the holiday gifts with shop.org. c-span's online store. shop now through wednesday and say 15% on our latest collection of c-span products, apparel, home to core, and accessories. there is something for every c-span fan for the holidays and it helps to our nonprofit operations. use the code get the team at c-span.org. "washington journal" continues. host: each week in a segment of the washington journal, we focus on a recent magazine piece and we are focused on the pages of the american spectator. pat nolan is a director emeritus

of the american conservative union foundation for justice, and he wrote this piece. the headline, businesses beg for workers and exclude a whewell -- huge pool of applicants. mr. nolan, who is in that pool of eager applicants? guest: men with chemical -- criminal convictions. host: how are why are they being excluded? guest: frankly, most company hr departments automatically toss out anyone with a conviction, no matter how long ago it was, and no matter how clean a life they have lived since. it is a mark of cain. it makes it very difficult to get employment, if employers would only look behind the conviction and see how long it is, and what kind of life they have lived. they would have a shot at it.

the fact is, the employers that you hire, they find them more loyal, more hard-working, less likely to quit, and of course, we save them a whole bunch of money from having to keep hiring new people and trying them out. as a player said to me, dealing difference between those with a record and those without our -- i don't know the background of those that don't have a record. i do know the those with. i can see if they've been leading a productive life since. host: from the pages of years -- or peace, -- your piece, college is used background checks, and any records for minor offenses can be used to reject the job applicant and deny them a place to live or a college education. --.

there are many restrictions and they are prohibited from obtaining a barbara cosmetology license. that would be funny if it weren't so stupid and harmful. what states are the most restricted? guest: they tend to be those with tough on crime policies. it is really interesting. those with restrictions on licensing, they are usually dominated by people who already have licenses. not the public. they tend to exclude anybody who is not competition. here in arizona, the governor signed a far-reaching legislation which said that you cannot look at the record, so long as they satisfy all of their obligations to the public. they've been kept out of trouble with the law.

there are many states moving that way, but the majority of states still have an impediment to getting any kind of licensing. one example is tyrone peake, a young 18-year-old who learned to drive, took a ride with his buddies. one of them had stolen a car. he was convicted and he had a felony on his record. he did not get any scale time and he only had probation. and after getting a degree in behavioral sciences and specializing in helping the elderly, he still finds it difficult, after no other involvement in the criminal justice system, he still finds it difficult to find employment in helping the senior citizens

in hospice, which is his desire. another example is darrell langdon who was caught with half a gram of cocaine back in 1985. he was sent to prison, he was on probation, he has had a totally clean record since. he has no drug involvement at all. 35 years later, he still, when he applied to the chicago school system to work in the boiler room, he was denied a job because, it only because, a scaled conviction from 35 years earlier. host: criminal records in hiring god is our segment -- hiring is our segment for the segment. employers can call in at (202) 748-8000. those with experience in the criminal justice system can call in at "washington journal" (202) 748-8001.

all others, rep. smith:. , (202) 748-8002. explain the justice system and how you go about your work. guest: we believe in limited government but also redemption. we tried to apply to conservative principles with the criminal justice system. we work to help support legislation that helps vendors turn their lives around. they have reasonable restrictions on future employment, but, they don't put it totally off limits for employment. we were strong supporters of the firststep act rated a strong bipartisan effort led by president trump, but also leading democrats, as well as

republicans that passed overwhelmingly, and it is helping turn the tide, so criminal justice is the focus on those that really pose a threat, a physical threat to us, rather than those who happened to break the tens of thousands of laws on the books for relatively minor things. host: we are talking about personal issues for you. can you talk about your background and how you got into this work? guest: sometimes, god hits us upside the head. i was a member of the california legislature. i was targeted by the fbi in a very political investigation. i, rather than running the route, because of mandatory sentences, i risk going to prison for 21 years. i children were very young. they were 5, 4, and 10 months old.

i would've missed their childhood, so i did what a lot of folks did and said i did something i didn't so i limited the damage to my family, but it was through that that i had my eyes opened because it was a tough law and order legislature. to the injustices of the system, having relatively small players who were caught up in the war on drugs -- the people that end up, are the low-level folks. one of the rubrics at the center states that prisons are for people who are afraid, not those who you are mad at. as a conservative, we think that the government should be limited to certain roles. obviously, protecting us from physical violence is important. but a young kid with merely possession of pot that is imprisoned, that makes no sense.

it is a terrible use of resources. it destroys their future, as their families often times on welfare, and from a conservative and libertarian point of view, that makes no sense. here in arizona, we have the highest number of people for -- imprisoned for pot possession, not for sale. mere possession. more than any other state. i am in arizona resident and we are working to change that here. host: you brought up those examples, the most extreme examples, of criminal convictions. keeping someone from being hired on the road, but what is a reasonable restriction? how far out do you think a conviction should follow somebody? how do you know when it is right to return to the working world? guest: you're actually right. we are not saying that get out

of prison all the ollie oxen free. they have to pay recompense to the victim if there is a victim, and in which most cases they are. most of the states, 10 years. some are as low as eight and some are higher. if you have been able to keep your nose clean for that long, if you are meeting all of your obligations, no other run-ins with the law, there needs to be a. where we say, ok. we will give you a second chance. america is a land of second chances. some people came here with records from abroad, and they became solid citizens your over the centuries. a lot of folks had a record, and they started over, here.

they live great lives and contribute. there needs to be a. to show that they are serious, that they have met their obligations. are they paying child support or are they supporting their children if they art? it is difficult if they don't have a job, but if they are meeting those obligations, we should give them a second shot. host: is there federal legislation to that effect, and is this subnet can be on a state level? guest: there is currently in the first step of implementation act, there is a provision to allow a clean slate. several states have already adopted it. justice brandeis said we are a great laboratory 50 states. good legislation has to be tested in the states, and when proven successful, it becomes national. currently, states have already adopted clean slates like

pennsylvania, utah, michigan, connecticut, delaware has in the past. they had a governor who supported with a signature. virginia has passed a slimmed-down version for pot. the states that are pending right now are texas, new york, north carolina, massachusetts, louisiana, and oregon. the thing is, the mix of random blue states, some of the most conservative states, they are saying yes. we believe in redemption. we believe in a second chance. after an appropriate. , let's give them another shot. let's let them join the workforce. they are not untapped reinforce -- resource. we have an 87 billion dollar domestic product.

a job is the most likely to keep somebody from recidivism. from committing another climb -- crime. we win, all the way around. host: what is the window on the clean slate legislation that you're talking about? what is the timeframe that would be codified? guest: it is fluid. 32 b that -- there needs to be that period, and dick durbin and ashley in the senate, the republican and democratic leaders in the senate judiciary committee, they have been outspoken on this issue. between the two of them, as they did with the firststep act itself, they will come up with a reasonable.

period. but for most states, it is in the range of eight to 12 years. this doesn't expunge the record. all this does is seal it to the public. law enforcement still has access to these records, and for licenses that are needed for senior care, working in hospitals, daycare centers, it is still available for review, but they cannot automatically exclude them. they have to look and see if the offense applies directly to the situation or runs the risk for the public and that. it gives credence to the idea that if they have been crime free all these years, two or three decades, that is a very low risk. all the studies show that recidivism decreases

dramatically over time. the further you get, the more you have lived life free of crime, and the more likely you are to not commit another crime. bill is on the line for employers out of northbrook illinois. you are online. caller: a great discretion -- discussion. here's my question. with states to have recreational marijuana, we have thousands of people incarcerated for drug offenses. some of them for dealing, distribution, and some of these people are pleading down to a lesser crime. they had a gun used, and my question is this -- how would you go about looking at these individuals on a case-by-case basis about releasing them? it was a selling or using -- how

do you get a handle on these individuals? guest: first of all, that's a very good question. nobody wants to endanger their customers or the other employees. i guess my suggestion would be, if you have this long. , and i'm not saying, most of the states that have adopted it, it is only misdemeanors. their only stew states -- two states that allow felonies and restricted circumstances. none of the states or proposals are including that, for instance. the legislature is really trying to limit risk while allowing for opportunity, but for an employer, it is recommended that an employer really looked beyond -- do not automatically reject

them. instead, except the application, look at the circumstances, see if it was of any threat or danger to you, and yes. look if they pled down from a violent felony to a lower one, but if the states have adopted it, most of them do not allow felonies. it is only misdemeanors. the risks are low. an employer, one of the big concerns is liability. you want to hire one of these folks with the record, and does that make you more liable for a lawsuit. we are working with a state to come up with a good solution to protect you from liability, for giving a second chance, while also having an employer liable if they hire somebody with an egregious offense. they just ignore further

customers and employees. we are still working out the details of that, but again, the lack -- laboratory of 50 states allow some play of the joint to figure out what works, but we are sensitive to employers who do not want to open up themselves to bore liability from this. we also have to say, take a second look at folks who haven't record. host: just about tournament slept. jerome, you are online with -- just about 20 minutes left. jerome. caller: excellent topic. i've been sitting here, and incidentally, i am involved in the criminal justice system. i have been in a motion to have a record expunged.

i am a discharged army veteran with a diagnosis of ptsd. i worked with missiles in the service. along with ptsd, came involvement with the criminal system. it goes with the territory. with that, it brought me inside of the colonel justice system. i wanted to say that everything is -- the topic that is going on, i have had thoughts on these things. it is just my experience. with regards to employers, i am concerned -- having concerns with convicted offenders, and with insurance purposes and things of that nature, most states give a bonding process where they can apply for a grant , or i am not exactly sure.

i've not read about it this in some time, but you can apply for bonding. you can be bonded. there is definitely a process where expungement, the exile or can go in some state to apply for what is known as a certificate of rebuild tatian. you can go to the employer when they go for job -- for an interview and so on and so forth. i also wanted to put in to the conversation to the biggest employees of ex felons, from my personal experience, i worked in the ip w, and i am a strong supporter of the unions. the way the units work, -- unions work for mike springs, you can ship -- from my experience, you would not be on

any federal contract or building contract, or thing of that nature. host: let's let nolan jump in. guest: first of all, thank you for your service to us in defending our country. that is honorable and sadly, as with my brother and other dear friends, ptsd is all too frequently a lingering wound. it stays on and it has sadly led many to them -- the colonel justice system. the points you make are good. the bonds are helpful. certifications of rehabilitation, they are excellent, but seldom used. we need to look at their regulations regarding that. the courts have the authority to issue them, but they are reluctant to.

i don't know why they are. the judge is intimately familiar with the crime and the circumstances surrounding it. if the person has shown, they can be good contributing member of the community, the circumstances show them as being rehabilitated. that would give some insulation to the employer if they are ever soon. to say, look, i have the certificate that shows the court has said i am rehabilitated. one of the problems for employers is, you know, being able to will lawsuit is different than someone being able to file one against you. the cost of defending that, even if you have a legitimate defense, like a certificate. you make a lot of good points, and we really need to work with the employer community to say,

how do we give these folks a second chance. let them get to the interviewed stage before they automatically exclude them. how does it make you feel, when applications literally are thought away before it ever his review. by the employer. at least look at it and give them a shot at explaining the circumstances and the life sentence. there is a company in pennsylvania, and when i was working with prison fellowship, the owner of that was a good friend of chuck colson, and i met with them, and the director of operations, and they hired over half of their employers. how did this come about? the owner said, my director of operations here said we need to

hired offenders. i said why the hell we do that? jesus told them to. so they did. they found that those employees they hired, and they work with prison to to identify the prospects, galvanizing is a dirty hot work. no one really wants to do that. but these guys were eager to work. bishop more often, they are loyal, they actually police each other because they don't want somebody going off the rails for the rest of them, or they are x offenders, and they have made a decision, and frankly, it is the best decision i ever made. host: for those with experience in the criminal justice system, thank you for waiting. ron, florida. caller: thank you. i appreciate it. mr. nolan, i have never talked

to a conservative and appreciated what he was doing. i think i am coming at it from a different angle. i was charged with a couple of felonies, and my saving grace was the attorney. those felonies, he negotiated time limits on them with different steps to go through to come up to an expungement at the end of it. after a 10 year time limit, everything was expunged. i got the felonies dropped after two years, and believe it or not, i got my second offender

status dropped after 10 years. but, the other point i wanted to make, if i could, and this is, i think, one of the things -- i am white. my attorney was white. the chief judge was also white. i think that is one of the problems that we have -- some people don't have good attorneys to make good cases or them, either in the beginning, middle, or the end. to help them along even before the person gets to jail or prison and then gets out. mr. nolan? guest: i hope you will look at

conservatives and libertarians differently on this. i think you will find you have a lot more in common with us then you start feeling. the movement in the states and federal government has been conservative lead. of course, liberal support, but we have been instrumental in changing the tough on crime rhetoric to be more interested in reducing crime rather than punishing and reducing the risk. i saw, imprison, racial disparity. you'd have to be a blind man not to see it. i don't think it is deliberate, but it is actual. is there. i did time with some kids, young black and hispanic folks who,

had they had the opportunity in life, would've been facing -- there was one kid who is just a delight. fun, great sense if you were, but also hard-working. if you growing up in any area other than a gang infested neighborhood, he would have been a ceo of a company. this kid was so talented. you know, the number -- one of the black kids i was with, usually, they are stuck with a public defender who has 300 files and is -- he went into a hearing, to go to trial, and he had given the public defender a whole bunch of witnesses, and they say he was not even there.

this was allegedly when it occurred, and he said, where all the witnesses. the public defender said i didn't have time to contact them. of course, he turned around and said his mother, please, go call so-and-so and so-and-so. she had eight bad reporter, and it was too late. they were deprived of his defense, which was that he was not there. he didn't have time to presented because of his public defender, and i know they are doing the best they can, but they are overwhelmed with files. they don't have the resources for investigation. not like the prosecutors. the points you make are valid, and i think, you know, to reevaluate the criminal justice system, it has been healthy.

people don't realize, it is harder and states before the federal program, and tough on crime texas. they decided that they were locking up a lot of folk and it was costing them a fortune. they had to build more prisons, and they cannot afford it. they reevaluated, and they changed the sentencing laws, and did more to help the families to stay out of trouble. it has been remarkable, the drop in crime there. i can't say -- crime statistics are always a year or two behind, but before all the pandemic, crime in texas, they closed eight new prisons, saving billions of dollars. but the crime had dropped to the lowest level since 1967.

you can have a safer public and smaller prisons and save money, all at once. it is a win win win situation. it started in conservative states like texas, georgia, louisiana, utah, and other liberal states have come along. but it was conservatives that led the way, saying this does not make any sense. host: we are running short on time, so let me take a couple of calls in a row, and we will come back to you. in ohio, experience with the kernel justice system. caller: good morning. i just want to say, type in trouble twice, and both times, it was kind of bad. but it was smoking where wanda -- marijuana, and i am not one that was to buy a bag of weed off of somebody i don't know anything like that.

so i grew a few plants of my own. just for myself. i was arrested the first time, and it wasn't too bad. it cost me $3500 to get out of there with a public defender and stuff. the second time, about 10 years later, i did it again. this time now, they took all of my sentence rights away from me, and everything. i second amendment is no longer. i've been in the oilfield. i have done heavy equipment. i've done things throughout my life, they should be able to use. now, it is against me because of this, and i don't know what else to do. now i am legal to smoke marijuana. it is crazy, man. host: thank you for sharing your

story. jimmy in neary, pennsylvania. caller: the morning, nice to hear from you. i am a retired school bus driver here in theory, pennsylvania. -- theory -- theory pennsylvania . there's always the same stuff and it is always repeat offenders, and if you want to become a school bus driver in pennsylvania, you have to fill all kinds of paperwork, and then, by chance, the person who runs the school bus, they happen to get somebody in there who has a record or, guess what, they are going to take his rights away. there was just a case in philadelphia where, on a subway,

i was c-span would've covered it. a guy on the subway, rain delay, it was a 40 minute episode. people said they dialed 911, and they get to the police to take care of the sky. they were all videoing on their phones. turns out the guy was a repeat offender. philadelphia is a sanctuary city, that is part of the problem. but i can tell you, i don't know whether the last time you spoke pot was, but this pot is laced with fentanyl. where is the fentanyl coming from? across the southern border. there was a bus down there at the border -- 40 pounds of fennel. brought up a lot of points. host: what about the last two calls? guest: i am sorry to callers who

are waiting have not had a chance to get through. you can reach me at conservative justice reform.org. i would be glad to hear any of your thoughts. as far as these cases, the less callers have it right. that fellow, he shouldn't have been prohibited. it is lately. he was a sentence offender. he cannot make this stuff up. the fact that people stood by and videoed it, rather than help the poor woman, that is just stunning to me. as a kid, i remember a case where they were murdered. people all around watched it happen. they did not come to her aid. it looked like we sunk to that again. the first fellow, the idea that

he is prohibited from working, and it is legal to smoke pot now. he was not distributing it. he was growing it for some years, but that was a violation that is not the type of client -- crime we are afraid of. it is ridiculous that he still suffers from that. and the second amendment right. i was pardoned, and i was grateful for that, and one of the big reasons i am is because i was observed. i was a marksman. after my conviction, i could not have a gun to protect my family. it really distressed me, and now i am able to carry again. i have a concealed weapon permit. i am a good shot.

we should not strip people of their second amendment if they were not involved with violence. is martha stewart a danger? should she have a gun? i've had the benefit in working for chuck olson for 13 years. was he a danger? he was next marine. you cannot -- it makes no sense. to deny people to protect himself. host: caller: pat, you touched my heart. i have worked in logistics and supply chain for 30 years. we have locked up so many kids. we need truck drivers and forklift drivers and people to put the packages. you hit a nerve with me.

for the people that smoked some pot or somebody killed and murdered, lock them up. but 20 minutes ago as you said, if you just smoked some pot, we have locked up a whole nation of attentional workers. within supply chain's, those are one of the best jobs for x gang members. they drive the forklift. they drive the truck. they don't have to interact with a lot of people. now we are in a supply chain shortage. i have been in the industry 30 years. i wanted to express to you that this is a very critical topic. host: mr. nolan, i will give you the final minute. guest: she make such a good point. we are hurting ourselves fight excluding these x offenders. there are 70 million people in the u.s. with criminal records. that is one of out of every three adults.

why are we denying them a chance to get back on their feet? especially, when they have shown for a decade or two that they are straight arrows. they are doing a good job. we are harming ourselves and the economy. also, as a nation, you know, redemption is important. these stories of people that have turned their lives around our legend. tim allen, the fellow that was in rudy charles, chuck olson. so, having committed a terrible crime should not condemn you forever. john, thank you for this chance. i am a big fan of your show. i watch it often to you i appreciate this chance to talk with you and share thoughts on this important issue. host: pat nolan is the director

emeritus at the american servant of union foundation nolan center for justice. it is conservativejustice reform.org. before we go we are saying goodbye today to our longtime producer on this program, jan ross. -- jen russ. in her goodbye imo she wrote "when i started at the washington journal as an intern, i knew i had found my place." you certainly did over 17 years. we will miss you. best of luck in your next adventure. we will see you down the road that will do it for our program today. we will be back here tomorrow morning at 7:00 a.m. eastern 4:00 p.m. pacific. have a great saturday.

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