on the future of nuclear disarmament. later, the pew research center kiana cox discusses the findings of the pew survey of black americans views on race and politics. as always you can join the conversation and tweets. ♪ host: good morning, everyone. it's september 1, 2022 and day number four of no safe drinking water of the city of jackson, mississippi. the state capital, where 100 2000 remained without access to drinking water and the emergency could last indefinitely. according to officials. many say that there are jacksons across the nation ready to happen because of climate change

. this morning we want to know from you what it's like, what is your drinking water like where you live. are you concerned about it? if you live in the eastern central part of the country, dialing at (202) 748-8000 -- dial in at (202) 748-8000, mountain pacific at (202) 748-8001. you can also text us, include your first name, city, and state, at (202) 748-8003. go to c-span.com/c-span to post your comments there or send a tweet with the handle @cspanwj. "washington post" wording this week that the experts say the crisis was years in the making. a result of inadequate running central structure of raid between the leaders of this majority black and democratic led city and the white republicans who run the state. the head of the department of planning and development in

jackson said that the seeds of the water crisis were planted in the 19 fix these when white residents left the city in droves after federal courts mandated integration of city schools. as the city shrank, there was less money to fund schools and other resources. middle-class families left as a result, leaving jackson without the tax revenue is needed to upgrade its system. state investment would have helped to close the gap state officials repeatedly declined to fund it, leaving the city to fund for itself. governor tate reeves did not respond to an interviewer last but said in a news conference on monday night that he appeared to suggest that the mayor of the city had cap state officials in the dark about the status of the water treatment plant. want to show you what the governor had to say earlier this week. here he is in mississippi. >> at the end of last week i was briefed by the state health

department on the discoveries that jackson's main water treatment facility has been operating with zero redundancies. the main pumps had recently been damaged severely. about the same time as the prolonged boil water notice began and the facility is now operating on smaller backup pumps. the city government was not able to give them a timeline for when the facility would be back in proper operating condition. a far too small number of heroic front-line workers were trying their hardest to hold the system together, but it was a near impossibility. we were told on friday that there was no way to predict exactly when, but it was a near certainty that jackson would fail to use running water sometime in the next several weeks or months if something did not tear really and roof. we began preparing for a

scenario where jackson would be without running water for an extended amount of time. over the weekend we started developing water distribution lands, sourcing tankers and assessing all the risks associated with an event like this. we also set a meeting for today between the mayor and our experts. all of this was with the prayer that we would have more time before their system ran for failure. unfortunately, that failure appears to have begun today. host: the republican governor of mississippi earlier this week. here's the mayor of jackson. here he is from tuesday in a news conference that he held. >> it is because of our transparency that the state is aware of the many challenges our system faces. because of our transparency that we know about the staffing

shortages. it is because of our transparency that they know about the system issues and it is because of our transparency that they know about the numerous equipment failures that we have. this is a set of accumulated problems based on deferred maintenance that has not taken place over decades. so, let's talk about what you do next. let's look forward to the united front we have now announced and look forward to. we are grateful to add the state to our team for the betterment of our city, jackson, and our water system. host: the mayor of jackson, mississippi earlier this week. we are asking all of you this morning to tell us if you are concerned about the drinking water in your community and why. we will get to those calls. joining us this morning by zoom is mark edwards, a professor of water resource engineering at

virginia tech university. thank you for being with us this morning. experts in newspaper reporting are quoted as saying that there could be jackson's happening all over the country. do you believe that's true? guest: without a doubt. many cities have revenue shortfalls, that are shrinking in population and struggling to meet pa regulations. what happened in jackson is exactly what i noted when the flint disaster occurred back in 2015, 2016. the only thing unusual about flint is that it got national attention and outside assistance to fix its problems. guest: what does the infrastructure of jackson look like and how is it similar roster country? guest: jackson is in many ways a twin of flint michigan. they have had a source water

change instructor 14 and never implemented corrosion control. they have been above the lead action level since 2015. two months before flint was discovered to have high lead in its system. unlike flint, which was taken over, essentially, by ima because of the imminent and substantial endangerment and billions of dollars that flowed into fix the system, jackson has just been allowed to continue without following federal law. the national enforcement investigation center in february of 2020 detailed all of these problems. epa put out an emergency order march of 2020 that says the residents of jackson were in imminent and substantial endangerment. you are left wondering why they didn't exert emergency powers in

the system. they don't have trained personnel or the equipment. nor are they following federal law and they have been breaking it decades. host: the residents in the city of jackson were told to boil their water even be where this happened. guest: that's right. i mean they had a source water change. the water is difficult to treat. they are not following basic protocols necessary to remove the particulate matter. it's all detailed painstakingly in april or with 2000 pages of appendices in february of 2020 by the epa national force investigation center. host: the report this morning is that it could be up to $1 billion to fix the infrastructure in jackson, mississippi. does that sound about right to you? guest: that's the estimate

to fix the sewage, not even the problem we are talking about today. it will take hundreds of millions to get them through the next couple of months, in order to get them back on track. host: you are credited with uncovering the water contamination in flint back in 2014. what has changed since that city got this national attention? guest: well, flint because of the malfeasance of the state and federal government in terms of causing that problem, they had access to outside hunting. since the declared federal emergency in early 26 team, literally billions of dollars have flowed into flint. fema helped get the system working again. you know, the city could not have done that on their own. the difference here is that jackson has been left on their own and i think partly because of what happened in lent, no one

wants to exert emergency powers and or take over the system to protect the health of the residence because as it stands, the city has just been violating federal law for decades. host: what does the nation's water system look like? can you explain it? why are we having situations like flint and jackson and potentially more? guest: on the whole the country is doing ok. if you are living in a bigger city with stable population revenue, people can plan. but you have a subset of the country in poorer white and black communities where a lot of the population has left the town and the tax base has declined. that puts them in really dire straits. they just cannot afford to make the pipe upgrades and treatment raids necessary to keep the

system running. so there is a subset of the country that is in these shrinking cities with declining tax bases who cannot afford. the paradigm is you get the water you can afford. short of a disaster like water crisis that brings in outside money, you just have to do the best you can, even if you don't have the funding to meet federal law. host: "white house retrofits infrastructure build to better help communities, to help the plumbing for. that's how they put it in this article and it seems that the white house is trying to bypass loans given to state governments and instead give grants right directly to these cities. do you think that would help? guest: i think that's part of the solution but presently in jackson they just don't have anyone trained to know how to

treat the water. nor do they have enough of them. so this is really a situation where i think pa and/or someone should have been granted emergency powers. at least back in 2020, 2021. i'm glad they are finally doing it. now there is an emergency being declared with outside resources and trained people who can come into to try to get this water treated to not only be delivered for quality, which was the problem in flint, but they don't even have quantity of water. they don't even have enough capacity to get water coming out of the tap. host: mark edwards, what are you watching for as this crisis unfolds? the lead paragraph of the story is that this could be indefinite. guest: oh yeah, no, this is a major, major problem. like lent, someone will have to come in there and you will need

a fema like situation to oversee the system months and months and months. the failure here is just the tip of the text -- iceberg. the lead problem is still ongoing. epa had a mission just last month where they are still not implementing corrosion control. the water in their system is so aggressive, leaching lead, destroying what's left of their pipe system. host: the story that we show you and the viewers from "the new york times," it was because the president had read recently a different story from "the new york times" finding that there were minority communities in the south where there was literally sewage in their backyard. sewage backing up into their bathtubs. guest: well, that's right. as i said in jackson, the biggest problem financially is there sewage system. we are not even talking about that here. basically the water has just

stopped quant -- stopped coming out of their taps in the quantity that they need. they cannot even get quality. but now the water is stopping and there is not enough water coming out of their taps to even flush toilets and the bigger problem in the midst of all of that is sewage. host: mark edwards, thank you very much for your time this morning. the professor of environmental water resources and engineering, we she. now we turn to all of you. are you concerned about the drinking water your community? start piling in. we have divided the lines regionally and you can text us by city and state at that number. (202) 748-8003 you can also go to facebook.com/c-span and send us a tweet. we are waiting for your calls. as we do so, the white house was asked about the times story that we just showed you and what the plan is from the president to

money to these communities where the water infrastructure is so bad that this is, people are called there the plumbing or. here is the white house press secretary. [video clip] >> what's the timeline for residents to start feeling the impact of the package funding? plex when it comes to residents getting their water back we want that timeline to happen as soon as hospital. so that is our hope, sooner rather than later. so, we are going to continue to work with the people of jackson and the state of mississippi during this urgent time of need. as we just said, i'm making that happen. it's imperative and important for people to have clean and running water. i just listed out a number of items from the american rescue plan. $460 million.

20 million of that was given to the city through the american rescue man. that was for water and sewer infrastructure leads. already the funding was given to the city to deal with that imperative. that really important need. as we talk about the bipartisan infrastructure law, 75 million was given to support the state to provide clean and safe water for this year. with an additional 420 $9 million available to the state over the next five years, you see the long term commitment coming from the bipartisan infrastructure law. another piece of that coming through is the epa involving the loan funds that d.c. for treatment and distribution systems. $30.9 million going to jackson specifically. we are committed. the end has provided. we are going to continue to work

with this city and the state. as you know, mitch landry is the coordinator for the bipartisan infrastructure law. a former mayor from new orleans and louisiana, he's committed to this. he has traveled around the country meeting with folks on the ground on how things are going and how we can be helpful. as far as the date or timeline we don't have that for you, but i just listed out our commitment and where the funding is gone in the state of mississippi and jackson as well. host: that was the white house press secretary this week when asked about the response that jackson and other communities across the nation. if you are living so where you are concerned about the drinking water, we want to hear from you and hear your reaction to the jackson water crisis.

your thoughts on that as well. susan in germantown, maryland. good morning, how are you? caller: i'm fine. i still drink bottled water in maryland. i know it's cheap if you know where to get it, to use slang. but mainly what's happening in jackson, mississippi and others, it's all over. it's global warming plain and simple. look at what's happening in some states where it's drying up and other water sources are drying up. you can tell it's global warming and we have a president and a president that don't even believe that climate change exists. i think it's just climate change. biden can do so much. what he passed was a good thing but he can only do so much. our allies have to do the others. if we don't, we are in for a very dark days in the years ahead. we really are. host: recent article from "the

washington post," extreme weather triggering the name water crisis," echoing what you were saying. here's a quote from an environmental engineer at purdue university advising utilities in the u.s. army on water safety issues. every public drinking water system in the country is vulnerable to natural disaster but many are not actually prepared to respond in a way that they are going to need to be. that's the quote from the post. taking a look at some of the headlines from water situations across the country. the great lakes water authority in michigan, the wisconsin area telling to boil water in 23 communities, affecting 935,000 after a leak there. you'll also have in california in august that says nearly one million in that state face long-term health issues due to unsafe drinking water.

in the usa today they were did that rainwater just unsafe to drink worldwide because of forever chemicals according to a study. and from "usa today," the city of akron, ohio, is the water safe to drink? here's what we know about their recent water boil alert. it's happening across the country and we want to know from you this morning but it's like where you live. annapolis. good morning, go ahead. caller: good morning. when you have a natural disaster like this paramount but there isn't much you can do. i will say that it's amazing that republican led states, they want to talk about holdouts, the best place to lead a, stuff like this. i've heard it. you go to these rural areas, they look like world areas.

a lot of people need to stop believing everything they hear or see on tv. maybe do some straddling and you will see the difference of a liberal run area compared to ray rural conservative run area. a lot of that technology, a lot of that infrastructure is outdated. i live in a state, -- i neighbor estate, west virginia, it's so outdated where you have a lot of poor people with no internet, the infrastructure is so terrible. people need to really pay attention and understand the difference in the policies of what these two parties one. thank you. host: dallas, in oklahoma. what's it like where you live? caller: wanted to comment about the drinking water situation that is happening in flint, michigan and mississippi and in our area here in the great

panhandle of oklahoma. we are experiencing a 20 year drought. we are having trouble with our groundwater and our water wells. i'm a ranch lady. our ranch is experiencing our water levels dropping from windmills. we are having to drill new water wells. there is a water shortage. when you do not have the aquifer being replenished by rainwater, then you do have problems with water. these communities that need infrastructure development? to wear that they can change the lead pipes and have a sewage system that is working? that needs to happen. instead of our money going to

foreign countries, we need to be using that money for the infrastructure of our own country to help these communities. i feel sorry for them. i really do. i'm sorry they have to go through this. but we are also having problem's in our areas. it's just, we all need to be very mindful about the water that we are using. we need to conserve water. we need to make sure that the water that we are using is being wasted on stuff that should, shouldn't be, shouldn't be being used right now. thank you very much. appreciate this. host: before you go, is this a debate happening with your elected officials? your mayor, your governor, about the water shortage? caller: our city, about 20 miles away from me, they actually about two weeks ago they told the residents to quit watering for the week.

so, this is all, these are issues. yeah, we are facing a lot of water shortages in our area. thank you very kindly. host: ok. this is from a viewer that posts -- how long until the lake in las vegas runs dry? they wanted the income from the population explosion but failed to prepare for the inevitable. it's like that all over. he continues to say that we don't talk about these crises where water supply is the critical part of the infrastructure and ignoring the signs perpetuates the situation all over. lack of planning by all government is hurting citizens the most. mountain hall, joel, what do you say? caller: thank you for taking my call. as a former resident of mississippi, this is terrible for the people. jackson, mississippi, and for the country. i would like to say, jackson,

mississippi is 75 to maybe 80% black. we have the necessary in the military to deliver water to anywhere in this country. we have got tankers, we have got the equipment. we need to activate this. the army is to welcome now. they don't know what they are doing anymore. anyhow, we need to stop sending money and funds to ukraine and start taking care of the residents of this country. i feel sorry for the children, the women and the men in this country having to pump water with the gas prices high as it is, having to go out and get gas . just look at what you are showing right now. mississippi is 80% lack. it's not pay -- fair to these residents. the recession is killing them and they got to go get water hauled to them.

host: they are waiting in line for hours according to cnn to get their ration of water and there are six different sites running out of water before residents can even get there version. we are asking your thoughts and reactions this morning to the crisis in jackson, mississippi. "the washington post" saying it could happen other places because of the extreme weather that jackson, mississippi saw with the flooding and it could happen to other water systems in the country. they write that generations old supers are routinely overwhelmed by bigger storms. lg blooms and access center -- sediment contaminate reservoirs amid droughts with rising sea levels that stymie septic systems to cause saltwater to reach into wells. wildfires destroying water mains

and spreading chemical contamination, it could take months for drinking water to become safe again. do you live in communities like the ones described in this paragraph hereby "the washington post"? are you worried about the water, are there lg blooms, have you heard other concerns? that is what we are discussing this morning. mark in cloverdale, indiana. good morning. caller: good morning. the reason i'm calling just because we have a problem here in cloverdale, greencastle indiana. we have plenty of wells and water. it also happens to be a republican area where we invest in our infrastructure year after year to keep it up and drill new wells. whereas down in these cities, the democrats have control of the government and they do not maintain their systems.

this problem in the cities is not an overnight situation. this has been coming on for years and years. they know it but nobody act. it just degenerates lower and lower as the democrats are in charge of this these. whether is that war crime. no matter what, what area you look at, the republicans maintain order and keep prices down. keep governments and services going. i'm very, very happy to be living in a republican area where we have sanity and decency. host: christine, rhode island. hello. caller: good morning, greta. i want to comment. i'm glad that he lives in a red state where he's safe and has clean water but i'm going to make a comment about the people where they are having this problem.

why isn't the governor calling in the national guard? to help people? this is a situation where the infrastructure bill from biden is going to help. other than that, i don't know what they did with the money that goes to this state to help these people. that's a republican, isn't it? the governor? host: the governor is a republican, yes. caller: ok, so there you go. well, have a good day. i just hope they all in somebody to help these people. just pay attention to where you live at. they usually send out some notice for you watch it on your local television, about the city, the water is what they are doing. they are not going to let you know. host: ok, christine. a little of the back story for you. again this is from "the

washington post," state lawmakers in mississippi sunk efforts to raise infrastructure funds through a sales tax. during the winter of 2021 140,000 jackson resident went weeks without running water, the governor told city leaders they needed to do a better job collecting water bill payments before they started asking everyone else to pony up more money. in 2020 he vetoed bipartisan legislation that would have provided relief to poor residents for past due water bills calling the idea free money. the 2021 bill that would have authorized a bond issuance to assist jackson with making repairs and improvements to water and sewer systems died in the republican state ways and means committee. in the wake of the water crisis city officials have called on state leaders to take action. what is your reaction to the water crisis in indiana?

caller: it's sad. it's really sad that these people cannot get water to drink . shower. cook. any of that. i live in great falls, montana. we have no problem with our water. my -- i don't drink the water. that comes out of the faucet. i have somebody deliver water to my house. we have all the water we need to read water the lawn. but we have watering restrictions. like i water only on days. we have beautiful lawns, all the water we need. host: why do you not drink the water? caller: because i will tell you why. the company that has this water out here, it's not, they fixed

it, did everything. but it just doesn't taste good, so i don't drink it. host: ok. caller: i mean, they raise the water bill constant every year here. so it's expensive. but we do have all the water we need. host: ok, or that point. here's a text from mckinley park, illinois. thankful to live in the midwest and great lakes. i'm originally from a small town where there is a high incident of cancer. there water system was rotting pipes and it was atrocious. the continuous elected public officials of mississippi couldn't care less about small towns with mostly people of color. south haven, michigan. ed, where is southaven? caller: good morning, thanks for taking my call. i love watching the show. just a couple of comments. i wonder, the gentleman from

kokomo, i'm just north of him by a couple of hours in michigan. i 1000 feet from lake michigan in my cottage. why do republicans have to make everything political, you know? it really gets me. they divide the country and yet they want democrats to work with them. it just doesn't make sense. another comment about making everything political. when you have hearings in the senate and in congress, whenever the republicans are at their it's a campaign. host: let's stick to the water issue. caller: i really feel sorry, it would be nice if we could all work together to solve the problem. it's an american thing. it's not a republican or democrat thing. the gentleman from kokomo, he can go down there and help solve the problem is that of, instead of cause -- instead of causing the problem. but i really feel sad and maybe

we should set up a, you know, a donation hotline so that we can get that system fixed as soon as possible. jeff, nebraska, good morning to you. caller: for the record, the national guard was deployed to jackson, mississippi and they are currently the one making sure that those people do have drinking water. also, oklahoma, come on, give me a break. in the 1930's they had to dust bowls out there because they had no rain. and the whole point of oklahoma, they cloud up all the grass is that were natural to the area and they planted crops. but it turned into was the dustbowl. and they always have really,

they got a lot of time between rains. it happens all the time out there in oklahoma. she shouldn't be whining about the water thing out there, that's a natural out there. also, lake mead, well when you have got all of those gambling casinos and everybody in the area with pools and everything else, watering the grass, i mean what do they expect? it's just, i don't know. it's crazy. host: ok. jeff, nebraska, here's a viewer from twitter saying that my family would joke on me when i bought my first grid in the early 1980's. yeah, it was a bad back then like tofu. i never trusted new york city water then or now or any other place i have lived or traveled in the last 40 years.

i have filters in my home. this from twitter. on a well in vermont, the water is not drinkable by any metric yet it is deemed acceptable for residential water by the ea. have had together springwater for years to drink. drought has dried up the spring and driving 15 minutes plus for water. shirley and mansfield, ohio, good morning. caller: good morning. i have lot the efforts you make every day. thank you. i just want to say that mississippi is a very poor state . if you do research. mississippi has never gotten what it needed. i don't know if it's the governors or if it's just the whole system down there. money is put into certain areas. i want to say this thing about color and the politics, it doesn't matter. this man bragging about what all

he has where he lives. i would do that for the people of mississippi this morning. that is so hurtful. if the people put the money where it's supposed to go, when the government gives it instead of picking and choosing where the money goes because of color. you don't go by color when people need a drink of water. i would never do that to anybody . please, people. stop it this morning about the red state state. mississippi don't have no water. it's a terrible situation and i pray that they get the help they need. joe biden is doing his best. where is this money going to go. put the money in the reservoirs. in the treatment plants. i live in a small town. mansfield, ohio. we have stuff around here that needs repairing but we are nowhere in the condition that those people in mississippi are in and they are white people.

white people in jackson, mississippi. there are quite able in jackson, mississippi. it's not black people in jackson. thank you so much for your program. host: all right, shirley. the president tonight giving a primetime address. in philadelphia this evening to discuss the state of american democracy, focusing on what they are calling for the battle of the soul of a nation coming two months ahead of the midterm election. live coverage from outside of historic independence hall begins at 8 p.m. eastern time on c-span. you can watch on the free mobile video app c-span now or i'll mind on demand at c-span.org. now, before the president addresses the country the republican leader in the house kevin mccarthy of california is set to give a free bottle to the speech and is going to scranton,

pennsylvania. mccarthy has traveled the country campaigning and fundraising for the august house recesses he will talk about what he has heard from the american this summer regarding rising crime, record high inflation and other hardships brought on by democratic party politics according to a release from that speech. for more details on our coverage of these remarks, you can go to c-span.org. eva, good morning. where is columbia related to jackson? caller: halfway between jackson and new orleans. the pearl river that is originally causing the problem comes to the west side of our town. we are not flooded right now but there are some areas in the county that are. the pearl river doesn't start in jackson. it starts north of jackson to come to that reservoir and it comes down through jackson. let me say. this is not a political nor

racial issue. it's a human issue. washington doles out the money, literally they don't put enough watchdogs on it and it goes to the cities. there's not enough watchdogs on it to see that it's spent properly. mismanagement from the top to the bottom. everybody acts like everybody in mississippi has no drinking water. we are not all same as jackson. it's a capital city. it's become very bad for crime in the last years. it's our capital. we are proud of it. i live in a small town. we are not destitute like a lot of these people think we are because we are in mississippi. that lady, it was a spokesman for the president i think mentioned about the used to be mayor of new orleans. they are a pretty good ways apart though i'm only about 40 miles on the line in louisiana.

but people need to pray for us to help the people of mississippi. before i met you had good drinking water in columbia but there are people hurting and we need to pay. we need to see that they get the things they need and we need to -- people need to realize that who you elect has consequences. that's all in going to say, it's not a political issue, it's a human issue and please pray for the people up there. host: ok, eva. this is alan in a text from hawaii. we have looming water crisis because of underground u.s. aviation fuel tanks with 93,000 impacted and the entire aquifer may have been contaminated. the epa call it an emergency. it started in the last 18 hours, the lawsuit. here is "usa today" to back it

up, hawaiian families sue the u.s. because of contaminated drinking water from jet fuel at the navy red hills facility. cheryl is in florida. good morning to you. caller: thanks for taking that call. that woman is right, it's a human issue but i dare the american people who believe that democratic infrastructure bill is going to help any of them. don't just listen to what they are saying. they are lying. a fraction of the bill goes to infrastructure. a fraction. our government blows on money on the most outrageous things. america wants this country fixed and they are not doing it. they don't care about the american people. the children and the poor will suffer the most. i am praying nearly for the people of jackson. not just air but across the

country. suffering at the hands of a feckless government. there are even republicans just as guilty of blowing our money. we are spending billions and billions in ukraine. so much of that could help our own people. not just in mississippi but michigan. look across the country. bridges are rumbling. pipes are rotting. water is not reachable. this is unforgivable. our government, our own government does not care about its own people. that is the sin of the whole thing. i dare the people to read the infrastructure bill instead of blindly believing what they are told. host: all right, or that point. quick look at the headlines this morning. efta no authorizing an updated booster shot for the fall set to curb the omicron variant and subvariants. they are targeting that.

doses ready as soon as next week because of the expected surge of the winter. then you have the front page of "the wall street journal" this morning, oil crisis extending into the fall. market sees strong chance of a recession. oil prices shed eight percent over the last two days, posting their third straight monthly decline. this from the front page of "the washington post," historic learning losses in pandemic, national test scores plunge for fourth-graders. many of the most vulnerable students, losing and reading and math. also this morning inside of the newspapers, a picture that many of you may have seen come out from the justice department. a court filing by the justice department tuesday night including a redacted photo of items recovered from the former president donald trump's

mar-a-lago to state. the items that investigators laid out on the door include cover sheets saying that they are classified. this is getting much coverage today and is something that we end you can talk about in open forums later on in the program. and then this from "the washington times" on the same story with this picture, their angle, the trump attorney says investigators cannot be trusted to be fair, claiming the justice department built impugn, leak, i just of the size of materials. david, madison heights, michigan. where are you and where is madison heights? where is that elation to flint and other areas? caller: thank you very much for

taking my call. we are about 50 miles away from flint but we are still having massive problem's. the republican governor, snyder, switched flint to try to save a bit of money on the water he ended up poisoning all the people. giving 100,000 kids brain damage for life. killed seniors. we are still playing -- paying the price here in michigan. we have massive water problems. when he was governor he took over the detroit water department and totally destroyed . they have nothing but problems here. macomb county, they have massive problems over and over and over again. my prayers go out to mississippi. my understanding is mississippi is the poorest state out of the 50 states. my prayers go out to them.

but i do have one thing to say. they need to stop voting for republican failure. thank god here in michigan we have a democrat that is starting to clean up the mess that the republican governor did. i don't want to make it political, but it seems that every time a republican gets in, they destroy the whole state. i'm sure it's that way out of 50 states but my prayers go out and i hope mississippi can really benefit from all the great work that president biden is doing on the infrastructure bill. i have read the bill. a lot of money is going to go to mississippi and surrounding states with these massive water problems. i hope some much needed money goes to michigan. because we are still paying the

price for the republican failure. thank you so much for taking my call. host: all right, david. from the civil engineers group in the nation, from their website, "the national infrastructure drinking water system is made up of 2.2 million underground pipes to deliver safe, reliable water to millions. on urgently the system is aging and underfunded. there's a water main break every two minutes and an estimated $6 billion of treated water lost each day in the u.s.. enough to fill 9000 swimming." here is cindy from connecticut. "lake mead, people keep -- it's been drying up with young people moving into new condos faster than ever. why not curb population growth in these vulnerable areas"?

joe, dayton, ohio. caller: i have a couple of comments to make. number one, our water situation here -- the last two female collars, those from feet -- mississippi and florida, they got it yet on. your last caller from michigan is a fool in my opinion. we have to look at the mayor of misses jackson mississippi. why hasn't he done anything? they knew that this problem existed. all of a sudden it becomes an emergency when it happens? where was he at all this time? something has happened. you know? these people, your callers this morning have made it very political. your first caller blamed trump. the second caller blamed people living in red states being

terrible. why not look at the mayors that run these cities? all you have to do is look in your civics book. mayors run the city, governors run the state. the governors cannot come into tell you how to govern the city. that's the call. one of the mayors of these cities take responsibility? host: joe, listen to the mayor of jackson, mississippi. here he is at a news conference on tuesday. [video clip] >> it is because of our transparency that the state is aware of our many challenges that the system faces. because of our transparency we know about the staffing shortages. because of transparency they know about the system issues. it is because of our transparency that they know about the numerous equipment failures we have. this is a set of accumulated problems based on deferred maintenance that has not taken

place over decades. so, let's talk about what we do next. look forward to the united front that we have announced and look over two. we are grateful to add the state to our team for the betterment of our city, jackson, in our water system. host: that was the mayor of jackson, mississippi earlier this week. texas, good morning. your reaction to the water situation and what it's like where you live. caller: i just, this woman was mentioning and so forth scrutinizing the -- the government in so forth. ralph nader said we need to know as much about politics as we do about sports. with all that's happening now i would say we need to know much more about politics than sports. it's good to scrutinize the government, but ourselves. every time we sit down to eat,

those that cannot afford to eat, nutrient dense plant-based eating plan. nitrates and phosphorus going into our water supply due to the cattle industry. they are clearing forests to keep cattle eating. you know? they point out the cattle industry, they go through and drain the aquifer this left over from the ice age. such a terrible impact on these high plains states. you know? john robbins, hair to the baskin robbins fortune. nobly he turned it down and founded the earth safe foundation instead. pointing out that we lose -- sounds exaggerated but you got to research it. lose 5000 -- you use 5000 gallons of water with the production of one pound of beef. it's astonishing.

they pointed it out on democracy now. they can fill lagoons with liquid and solid animal waste and as it overflows they take power washers and spray the waist all around the area. and so forth. then these hurricanes hit. it's just that much more the waste getting scattered and it's incredibly toxic. host: go ahead, finish your thought. caller: sorry, i'm doing something else and i haven't gotten that much sleep. host: that's all right, we heard your point. following up on the mayor from the news conference on tuesday, jackson has struggled for years with water issues. epa administrator michael reagan just toured the main plank last year to highlight with the agency calls long-standing environmental justice concerns or a historically marginalized community. in march they issued an emergency order saying they

wanted to present eminent and substantial -- saying that it could contain e. coli and was a substantial danger to residents. president biden said last year never allow can we what happened in flint, michigan and jackson, mississippi but the governor has repeatedly opposed efforts to fund water treatment upgrades. state lawmakers sunk efforts by the city to raise infrastructure funds through a sales tax in the winter of 2021 went 40,000 residents went weeks without running water he told city leaders that they needed to do a better job of collecting water bill payments before they started asking everyone else to pony up more money. in 2020 he -- the governor vetoed bipartisan legislation would have provided relief to poor residents for their water bells, -- water bills calling it free money. improvements for the water

systems died in the republican-controlled house ways and means committee. gina, good morning to you. where are you at? caller: good morning, good morning. i live near the gulf coast. i just want to say that mississippi is a beautiful state to live in. we are not all dirt poor and living in squalor. however, the city is run by a democratic mayor and is 80% black. they don't have the tax base to provide the necessary money to keep the city up. people are afraid to even go there. i was literally shook down in

the er before they would let me go in when my brother was in the hospital there because there is so much time. it is run by a democratic mayor. since so many democrats want to blame it on a republican governor, i just wanted to point that out. thank you, greta. host: addy, what is your situation like her slowly and jackson, mississippi? caller: the situation here is terrible. we have been having problems since 2016. the majority of our city council was black. for the last several months they have been fighting over a trash contract using the money to go to court because i don't agree with each other instead of using money to work on our water system that has been out in

2016. host: do you personally have water in your home? caller: no, i do not have water in my home. i don't know how long it will be until we have water at our home. i'm sure a lot of people cannot imagine what it's like to not be able to wash dishes, take a shower, do many of the usual things that you try and do. host: so, what are you doing, how are you managing? caller: bottled water to take a shower. picture that in your mind. while the city council and the mayor fight over new buildings that need to go up and trash contracts they don't agree on and crime that is rampant through the city. meanwhile, we cannot even drink our water. host: have you gone to pick up

water, the bottled water? caller: you go in line as you go in you sit in line for hours. the water thing opens up at 9:00 and by 10:00, everything is gone. you try. host: where are you getting water, then? are you buying it? caller: yes, we are buying it. i had a daughter coming out from california saying do you need me to fill my jeep with water and come to you and i said i don't know. i said i really don't know. this is not something that we are getting any answers on this far as how long it's going to take. this is the first time we have had the governor come and try to explain things to us. considering that a couple of weeks ago when we had turbidity problems, the mayor came out on

tv and said don't worry about it. the water is clear. don't listen to what the city is saying about not drinking the water. so we have a lot of confusion about who is wearing the pants in the city of mississippi and our city councilman, they are mainly black. the mayor is black. they are trying to blame the problems on the republicans. host: how much are you paying for water when you go to the store? >> i think four dollars a case. host: have you seen the price go up? caller: well. i'm not really sure. host: is it, is it there in abundance or are the shelves -- caller: no, it is not there in abundance. in the city of jackson, its trunk -- they are trying to get

water. a lot of elderly people that cannot get out and get this water. it's amazing, the problems we're we are having right now this moment. everybody is worried about politics and everything else when they should be worried about making sure that we get water. host: how long will you go before you ask your daughter to make the trip? caller: probably a couple more days. people are wondering why jackson is so poor, it is because none of the business is can make it. we have a high crime incidents. and when people commit crimes in other counties right around us, they get on a car, run to jackson and no police are allowed to follow them. it is against the law for them to come into jackson.

host: it is a top of the hour and when we come back arms control association's daryl kimball discusses the age of nuclear disarmament and then later we will talk with the pew research center's new paul on the survey of issues important to black americans. ♪ ♪ >> middle and high school students, if -- it is your time to shine, you are invited to participate in the student camera documentary competition. in light of the upcoming midterm election feature yourself as a newly elected member of congress

and we ask what is your top priorities and why. make a five to six minute video that shows the importance of your issues from opposing and supporting perspectives. do not be afraid to take risks. among the 100,000 dollar cash prizes is a $500,000 grand prize. idioms must be submitted by january 23, 2023. visit studentcam.org for tools, kits and to sign up. >> hello everyone and welcome to the national book festival. >> over the past 21 years in the partnership with the library of congress booktv has provided uninterrupted coverage of the national book festival featuring hundreds of nonfiction authors and guests. on saturday booktv returns to the library of congress national book festival. all day long you will hear from

and interact with guests and authors such as library of congress carla hayden. david marron, clayton smith, and more. the library of congress national book festival live saturday beginning at 9:30 a.m. eastern on c-span2. ♪ >> c-spanshot.org -- c-spanshop.org is your place for c-span apparel, books, home decor and accessories, there is something for him every -- for every c-span fan and it help support our nonprofit operation. shop now or anytime at c-spanshop.org. >> "washington journal" continues. host: daryl kimball is the executive director of the arms control association. you celebrated six years, your group.

guest: indeed, 1972 the arms control association was established to deal with problems related to the world's most dangerous weapons, namely nuclear. and so the work continues. we have made a lot of progress over the last two decades to reduce the number of nuclear weapons to prevent the spread working with governments and legislators. but the nuclear age is not over and there are a tremendous number of nuclear threat that we face today, which is why this conference that was held at the united nations on the nuclear nonproliferation treaty was such an important opportunity to address these issues. host: month-long negotiations were happening and according to a news report collapsed last week in new york, what happened? guest: this is the keystone agreement that was -- concluded in 19 68, the nuclear nonproliferation treaty that

obligates countries to prevent the further prolabor -- proliferation of nuclear weapons and states agree not to produce nuclear weapons. the nuclear arms states recognize, there were five, the u.s., u.k., france, china, and russia agreed to take steps to end the arms race and to negotiate to stand down and pursue disarmament. it also allows for the peaceful use of nuclear energy under safeguards which is a big issue at this conference. and that is why there was severe disagreement over who controls ukraine's nuclear power plants, a lot of other countries wanted the conference to recognize that it is competent ukrainian authorities to control the plan. in the very last hour the russian delegation objected which meant that the whole meeting collapsed. they could not agree by consensus to the document.

the purpose of these meetings we have to remember is to reflect on what has happened over the last five years, they take place every five years to try to assess where things are to respect to the obligations and also to set out steps to advance look old, like disarmament and nuclear nonproliferation. and there was disagreement in those areas but no other countries were willing to block consensus, but russia did. there was more that the countries agreed on and they disagreed, although the ambition of the conference i think was relatively low and a lot of countries complained about that. and that is because we face some pretty severe problems with competition between the united states, russia, and china on nuclear weapons, crises with the iran nuclear program still going on, north korea, and some of the treaties that were established during the cold war to rectify

this are either gone or they will expire. that was one big issue that president biden spoke about in his opening statement to the conference in august, the need to renew talks with russia on further measures to reduce u.s. and russian arsenals which are the largest oil today. host: i want to show our viewers the secretary of state and respond. here is antony blinken on the legacy of this nonproliferation treaty at the start of the conference that you were talking about. [video clip] >> more than five decades ago, at the height of the cold war, representatives of 18 nations drafted the treaty on the nonproliferation of nuclear weapons. in the years that followed nearly every country on earth has joined the npt, and countries put safeguards in place to monitor their nuclear programs. nuclear weapon states move

towards disarmament including the united states. the number of nuclear weapons in our stockpile is now nearly 90% lower than it was at its height in 1967. the united nations security council affirms that proliferation constituted a threat to international peace and security. entire regions, south pacific, central asia, africa, joined latin america and the caribbean in declaring them nuclear weapon free zones and we saw countries use nuclear technology safely and peacefully to improve the lives of millions of people on earth. so, there is no question that the npt made the world safer. but there is also no doubt that it is under increasing strain. and so we come together at a critical moment. [end video clip] host: the secretary of state at

the beginning of the conference and we talked about negotiations collapsed. even though they were not ambitious as some said, what were the goals this year? guest: there were a lot of different goals from a lot of different countries but what brought people together was the idea that at this time of international crisis when the rules-based system that secretary blinken talked about is under assault from a number of different corners, they needed to reaffirm the importance of the agreement, which 191 countries are party to. and so, i think some of the key goals of the majority of the states who are nonnuclear weapon states was to strongly encourage the five nuclear armed members of the treaty to commit to advanced measures to reduce the role of nuclear weapons in their security policies, to reduce the numbers of those weapons particularly in the united states and russia. and also to encourage china to

engage in the process and china was pushing back on that. the united states was very interested in reaching consensus and the u.s. delegation which was led -- the u.s. delegation i think today a very good job of trying to bring countries together. but there were a lot of differences. what happens with these documents is that they are negotiating through the month. and those items on the draft document that somebody objects to are usually dropped. it means that it is a least common denominator kind of document. but the united states and many other european countries also intend to make it clear that russia's war against ukraine has threatened some of the very foundations of this treaty. earlier this year we recall that president putin written the use of nuclear weapons against any country that might interfere

with the invasion of ukraine. one big issue is how to respond to that. can the comfort -- can the conference condemn those kind of nuclear threats. there were innovations on that. the u.s. u.k. and france tried to distinguish between those kinds of threats, irresponsible threats and other kinds of threats of nuclear use that are important for maintaining nuclear deterrent and there was talk about supplying australia with nuclear submarines.

there was compromise language that was reached on that. and the chinese were pushing back on any additional what the nuclear weapon states to report on progress. they are not interested in transparency or any calls for the end of the production of material, which are plutonium which can be used to produce nuclear weapons and that is because the chinese are observing the option to increase the amount of material they have and weapons just to clear out

that china is on the cost of building up their smaller arsenal around 300 nuclear weapons total. we might aa or aaa ringing it closer but not sustain -- not to the same size of the russian and u.s. arsenals. you can call in with democrats at 202-748-8000. republicans at 202-748-8001. independence -- independents at 202-748-8002 and you can text that 202-748-8003. what is the situation with iran? guest: they are looking into a proposal for the two countries to return to the nuclear deal that president obama or other european powers negotiated to constrain the nuclear program to put rigorous inspections in place. they are very close to doing this, this is an important way to keep iran's nuclear technologies under watch to prevent them from being amassing

enough material to produce a nuclear bomb. there are issues on the margins, iranians are concerned about. we will receive a response by the end of the week. there was a nuclear nonproliferation treaty conference in new york but it is critical to the future because if iran's program continues apace we could see other countries hedging its bets and making preparations itself for a nuclear weapons capability. it is very important that for many reasons to keep the program in check, and the best option we have in my view is to bring the deal back in place and i hope that the iranian leadership and president biden see the larger issues at stake and do not let this fall apart over side issues. host: is there a timeline for getting this done?

guest: that is a question, everybody has been saying it has to be in the next month but they have been saying that for months. it is an indication of how important it is to get two countries to content best to return to compliance and bring iran back within the strict lehman -- limits. iran wants sanctions relief that they were promised and lost when president trump unilaterally withdrew from the deal in 2018. they are hoping to be able to sell their oil on the international market but they will have to take a lot of steps to reduce the iranian enrichment capacity as well as other things. host: let us hear from frank, philadelphia, an independent. caller: i was wondering if anyone can deal with the united states with all the lies they are told and honor anything that the united states tries to put forward? guest: i think at the

international system and in the conference like the nonproliferation treaty review conference they have a great deal of credibility. everyone is aware of the long history of international relations, different countries with different views about the mistakes that the united states or other countries might've made in the past. in this context at this conference under this president, joe biden, you know the united states was seen as one of the responsible actors, even though there is a great deal of frustration about the slow pace of action by the united states and russia in particular who -- to follow through on their commitments and the treaty on nonproliferation to pursue negotiations on nuclear disarmament, and that was one of the big issues at this conference and it was one of the few bright spots that came out of the draft document. the russians and the americans

did agree to something that joe biden proposed at the beginning which was to resume negotiations on agreements to the only remaining pretty -- treaty that limits the u.s. and russian arsenals and that treaty will expire in 2026. as of the united states and russia do not get back to the negotiating table and the discussions has been suspended since russia invaded ukraine, we will not have any legally binding limits on the russian or u.s. arsenal for the first time since 1972. and if we think our international system is complicated now and the nuclear problem is difficult now it would be far more difficult to manage in the absence of predictability that that kind of agreement provides. host: let us talk about russia's stockpile, 1058 strategic

warheads, submarine launched ballistic missiles and strategic bombers, military stockpile approximately 400 -- 4497 warheads and 160 retired warheads awaiting dismantlement. guest: that is a lot of firepower and the united states has a rough equivalent stockpile. though strategic nuclear weapons that you referred to, those are the ones that can be delivered within 20 minutes in an order by president putin or president biden. those are the ones constrained by the nuclear arms reduction treaty. some of the other weapons are not constrained by any treaty, the shorter range nuclear weapons. so these are some of the issues for future negotiations, can we maintain limits to keep those numbers down and further reduce them? can we maintain the inspections and the reporting of by each

other of what we have to make sure that we know that the russians say they do according to the treaties? so the other thing i would just note is that when we talk about nuclear weapons we have to remember that these are weapons that are far different from anything we are seeing on any battlefield's right now. the use of even a portion of the u.s. and russian strategic arsenal, thousands of nuclear weapons would lead to approximately 100 million people killed in europe, russia, you the united states within the first hours of an exchange. we are talking about lobe alarm again and -- global armageddon. even if a few weapons are used between nato and russian forces there is no guarantee that it will not escalate to all-out nuclear war, which is what the wargames and the pentagon ones

always wind up doing. this is why this is an important issue that affects everybody, not just in the nuclear states but around the world. host: do we know where the russian stockpile is located? guest: the u.s. government and independent researchers pay close attention because of the treaties that have been negotiated, especially since the reagan era. we have the benefit of on-site inspections at the facilities where the weapons are, not stored, but where the missiles are that deliver them. and the submarine base is, the air bases, and the russians have that access to. u.s. intelligence has a good sense of where russia stores some of those reserve warheads. so both sides have a very good look into what one another has.

that provides predictability that helps us understand what we need to do to -- and what they might do and vice versa. that is important in a relationship that is so fraught and dangerous and antagonistic right now. host: what is the status of u.s. military complex in poland, and the criticism of russia that the united states put that they in poland? guest: i think you are referring to russia has over the past few months picked up on some stray remarks by nato secretary-general that it is possible that the united states could forward deploy tactical nuclear weapons towards the east. bates is a reference to politics in germany where the weapons are held -- this is a reference to

politics in germany where the weapons are held. in the last few years there are 150 grabner bombs -- gravity bombs stored on nato bases in germany, italy, turkiye, and the netherlands. russia complains that it has nuclear weapons outside of its borders russia has similar types of weapons and more number in europe because russia is in europe. these are the sub strategic, the tactical nuclear weapons that both sides have that is not covered by any treaty. in the next round of arms control talks, this will likely be an issue, can we bring these types of weapons into a nuclear arms control regime? host: here is a viewer who says "on nuclear nonproliferation you need russia and the u.s. to work together to reduce their stockpile.

this could encourage china and iran to reduce theirs as well. the only problem is ukraine. how is u.s.-russia diplomacy going to proceed in ukraine and the historic commitment to nato and the e.u.?" guest: that is a good question. that is the challenge right now. not only has russia's invasion of ukraine led to extreme violence and bloodshed and it shook international borders, risking the nuclear power plants , but it has also led to the suspension of talks that began last fall between u.s. and russia on further reductions in the nuclear stockpiles. one thing that came after this -- came out of this review conference was an important statement from president biden and i will quote him. he issued a statement just before secretary blinken spoke on august 1 and he said "even at

the height of the cold war the united states and soviet union were able to work together to uphold our shared responsibility to ensure strategic stability. today my administration is ready to replace new start when it expires. that requires a willing partner operating in good faith." the table is set for the two sides to return to talks and if they make progress that is a question we cannot answer today. both countries say that they want to do that and there is an interest in both sides to have limits on the strategic arsenals that threaten one another. even vladimir putin is concerned about those. but can the turbulence that the war in ukraine has created, will that interfere. i think it is very important that we encourage the two presidents to pursue these negotiations because time is running out on the historic treaty.

at the very least i think they could agree to maintain the current limits, they might be able to agree to lower the limits so that it is below the current cap of 1550, which is far more nuclear weapons that we need to determine attack. and on the other question is what happens here in washington, treaties are difficult to ratify under normal circumstances. i think it is fair to say we are not living under normal political circumstances, though it will be difficult to bring back and negotiate a treaty with vladimir putin who is widely believed to be and i believe is a war criminal in the united states senate, i believe there is resistance to that. it could be an executive agreement, the first agreements in 1972 was an executive agreement and did not require the approval of two thirds of the senate. there are options and i think that president biden in his

statement anticipated this question, which i think is a central question that we are facing in terms of the future of nuclear disarmament. host: here is the usa today, experts chastise russia. "the e.u. decry playing games on safety" so how is this related? guest: as we speak this morning the director general of the international atomic agency is leading a 14 person mission to try to get into the nuclear power plant -- plant which is ukrainian but the russians have occupied it since march. this was really the central issue that brought down the nuclear nonproliferation treaty review conference because the european countries, united states and many others were trying to maintain the principle that ukraine controls this plant, not russia. it is responsible competent

ukrainian authorities and russia objected. the steak is not a negotiated document, but the safety of a nuclear power plant complex with six reactors, lots of spent fuel that could leak if the fuel storage facilities are disturbed, if power is cut off into the plant which is necessary to operate the cooling systems, diesel power generators kick in, that they can only last for a few days. the security situation, safety and security is tenuous, the director general is there to assess what the situation is, and i think the real question is what happens after this team leaves. can the safety and security be maintained. ideally what i think we want to have and what the u.s. and europeans have called for an russia does not want is a demilitarized zone around the site to prevent shelling by

anyone that could hit the reactors, and etc. host: texas, a republican. question or comment? caller: i am from dallas and you mentioned earlier about history. well, did everyone forget about chernobyl and the fact that russians cut off the outside from trying to help them, and here we are begging the iranians into a nuclear agreement? do you not use facts and experience instead of wishful thinking with the world's leading sponsor of terrorism and the fact that the israelis took out thousands of missiles in syria and russia is telling israel that they are upset about it, why?

also and this is in the international media because iran is going to back off of this agreement because they are weak and that is the culture of the muslim philosophy? when your enemy is weak lie and wait until they are strong? guest: i think the caller is raising questions about if the united states should be engaging in talks with iran about its nuclear program, and the united states has decided, and i think this is the right approach which began with president eisenhower and kennedy that you do not make choices about who your adversaries are and when it comes to preventing proliferation you have to deal with adversaries in order to address the issues. we dealt with the soviet union in the 1960's and in the 70's and 80's russia. iran, a similar case. iran is an adversary of the

united states but they are pursuing a capability that would allow them produce highly enriched in rate -- uranium which can be used for nuclear weapons and they have engaged in experiments with nuclear explosives. so how do we deal with this? the approach that some propose to bomb reactors and nuclear facilities in iran, that might have short-term results and it might lead to a wider war but it will not end the knowledge of nuclear technology and uranium enrichment. we have a deal that was negotiated that prevents iran from being to amass enough material for even one bomb and that deal was disrupted by the policies of president trump. this is the best way to make sure that iran is not just a bad actor in the region but a bad actor in the region with nuclear weapons. i think this is the best

available option we have, negotiating with iran is not pleasant and what the united states is doing is not negotiating directly and we are negotiating indirectly with the european union serving as an intermediary. whether or not iran was abiding by the agreement and they were when trump pulled out. if they do not a massive sanctions regime that we have in place now will snap back into effect. in the iranians know that and they do not want to see that. host: one of our viewers texting to you. "do you reason it would be appropriate for the u.n. to designate russia as a sponsor of state terrorism for atrocities committed in ukraine?" guest: that might be accurate. the u.n. cannot do that. the u.n. takes decisions that are supported by its member states and russia is a member state and russia will not allow that. the real question is should the united states do that? and what effect does that have?

and does not affect our ability to deal with russia on issues we have to deal with and does it create a backlash? how does it help address what vladimir putin is doing? so those are some of the questions that have to be answered and i'm not prepared to answer them. those are not questions that we deal with at our association. but we have to feed think about -- we have to think about the benefit versus the setbacks that that might create. host: texas, a democratic caller. caller: thank you. i would like to first of all say that i want to commend c-span because you are doing a great job. america is the strongest country on this planet. we have to stand up to russia because they are doing is evil, evil treatment of people and they are about money. we got a president like former president hot -- trump who was waived by putin but we have a great president and a great vice

president and a government force to stand up and represent the world because everybody is looking at america. we are the strongest nation in the world and that is because we have more people than we believe in god than crazy people. the majority of people in america are true god-fear and -- fearing or respecting people. we will win in iran, warsaw and whatever. when you do the right thing you will win in the name of our god, amen. guest: i think despite the challenges we have here at home on a lot of different things internationally, the united states is still an indispensable nation on a lot of key issues. we cannot do it alone, we cannot solve all international issues i ourselves, climate change to nuclear weapons and the covid epidemic. u.s. leadership is key in one of

the things that united states needs to continue to do is to provide the leadership that was necessary to negotiate the nuclear pull information treaty and it requires among other things making sure that we do our part to prevent countries like iran from acquiring nuclear weapons capabilities, engaging with north korea to try and roll back their nuclear weapons program through diplomacy, and we work with russia and try to work with china to restrain the arms race. one of the things that i want to mention with the nuclear nonproliferation treaty. it does not require the elimination of nuclear weapons. it does not say you have to do the following things, but it does obligates all states in article six to engage in good faith negotiations to end the arms race and pursue disarmament. that is a legally binding obligation that we have signed up to, and the future of the

treaty appends upon further progress, and over the last decade because of deteriorating relations between the u.s. and russia and others we have not seen much progress in that area. so that is one area where the united states can and should lead and we have led through republican and democratic administrations, the long tradition. host: let us talk a little history because mikell grover trough -- gorbachev passed away. his legacy on this issue? guest: he has a lot of legacy inside and outside russia. we know him in the united states and europe as a man who helped open up russia in ways that allowed for the end of the cold war and the dissolution of the soviet union. without a shot being fired, and he also had a series of meetings

with president reagan and former president george h w bush to reduce the cold war arsenals through the first strategic arms reduction treaty and the nuclear reinforcement treaty and other initiatives that cemented the end of the cold war and reduce the nuclear danger in ways that are hard for us to imagine today. it was the preeminent issue in 1985 and 1986. gorbachev's legacy is reagan's legacy and that is at risk because as i said before the bilateral treaties between the u.s. and russia that have led to these reductions, the last one expires in 2026 and unless we continue to work to pursue further negotiations and reductions, the legacy of mikell gorbachev, ronald reagan, george h w bush and barack obama would have been lost. host: anthony in staten island,

new york. independent. good morning. caller: why would russia want to go into a treaty with us? they look so weak. it is not about the u.n., it is about us. why would they want to go into a treaty with us? they do not respect us anymore. everything they touch and foreign policy they ruin, so why would they want to go into a treaty with us? let us talk about that. guest: is a good question. right now russia is isolated. they are in a war that they thought they would win in a couple of weeks that has gone on for more than six months. they are looking for friends and they do not have many friends. syria, iran, belarus and so, they are lashing out wherever they can and however they can. they are trying to fight the sanctions. one area that they still need cooperation with the united

states is in managing this nuclear weapons problem. russia knows that the united states has enormous nuclear capabilities and we have the capability of building up our arsenal. so the russians want to make sure that they do not have to, in the future, compete with united states with respect to larger numbers of nuclear weapons and more sophisticated types of nuclear weapons and they do not want to get in a nuclear war with nato or the united states because a nuclear war means mutual suicide. so they might disrespect joe biden, they might disrespect european leaders, but putin understands that it is still in russia's interest to have an agreement that he can verify that limits the united states' nuclear stockpiles. that is one area where you have a common interest and that was

the case during the cold war. we had huge disputes with the soviet union, the two sides understood that the common security depends on reducing and managing the nuclear weapons threat. host: norman in wesley chapel, florida. republican. caller: good morning. i have trouble understanding why people really think that trump and putin were such good, i do not know, friends? whatever. the only money that putin ever sent to the united states was for hillary foundation. but there is a guy before talking about democrats and god. i do not think anyone, republican or democrat in washington gives two hoots about

god. host: here's a question from erwin, "what is to prevent iran, saudi arabia or any other country from buying nuclear weapons from russia, saudi arabia or france? guest: buying them? it is illegal. united states, russia or france do not want saudi arabia or iran to have nuclear weapons. one thing that this treaty conference shows is that despite the differences between the great powers, despite the disputes that we might have with other countries, everybody agrees that the spread of nuclear weapons two additional states would undermine everyone's security, which is why that treaty is so important which is why 151 country showed up and tried to reach an agreement. and in the closing of the

meeting, i think the u.s. ambassador said something that is important. he said the conference show that we do agree more on what -- we do agree on more than we disagree about and we are prepared to define ourselves by what we hold in common rather than what divides us. one of the things that holds all of these countries together is that the spread of nuclear weapons to any country whether it is a friends or a follow, that is something that cannot be allowed. the united states does not want to see saudi arabia wanting weapons, and as i said before, nuclear war is unlike any other war that anyone has said and fit -- seen in 50 years. host: the talks still fell apart, what will happen next? guest: there will be another conference in 2026, but what is

not important is not so much the conferences what happens in between and what the governments decide to do. they agreed to a number of steps in the draft document. there were caveats and such. but the nuclear weapon states and nonnuclear weapon states need to think about how they can follow through on those action steps in order to reduce the risk of the spread of nuclear weapons and nuclear weapons technology and how those states can engage in good faith negotiations to pursue disarmament. i think the first step that the united states and russia can pursue is to reengage on agreements to the new start agreement before it expires in 2026. host: for the viewers who want to go -- to learn more you can go to armscontrol.org or follow them on twitter at arm's control now. daryl kimball is the executive director. thank you.

we will take a break and later on in the program we will talk to kiana cox on the new survey of issues important to african-americans, before that we will be an open forum. any public policy issue on your mind, that is next. those are the numbers on your screen, start dialing in. ♪ >> in 2019, ben raines discovered the remains of a slave ship in a swamp outside of mobile, alabama. sunday night as we showcase some of the best of q and a, he talks about his book, the last slave ship which details the history of the clout tilde and how and why it transported slaves in 1860 more than 50 years exact center -- after the transatlantic slave -- slave

trade was outlawed. >> local -- the clotilde a serves as a proxy as anyone in the united states or in the world whose families arrived in whatever country they are in and the hold of a ship. most of those people, millions upon millions we do not know much about because our stories were not recorded. the clotilde is a proxy for the lost history for these millions of people stolen from africa and spread all over the world. that is really what is so unique about it. it is the whole story of slavery encapsulated in one piece and we know everything about these people and what happened in their lives. >>'s book "the last slave slip -- the last slave ship" on q&a. you can listen to all of those on our new c-span app. >> at least six presidents recorded conversations while in office.

hear many of those conversations during the podcast presidential recordings. >> the nixon tapes part private conversations, part deliberations and 100% unfiltered. >> let me say that the main thing is is that it will pass and my heart goes out to those people who with the best of intentions were overzealous and i am sure that you know and i will tell you, if i could have spent a little more time being a politician last year and a lot less time being president i would've kicked thereabouts out that i did not know what they were doing. >> find it now on the c-span mobile app or wherever you get your prod casts. -- podcasts. there are lots of places to get political information, but only at c-span do you get it straight from the source. no matter where you are from or where you stand on the issues,

c-span is america's network. unfiltered, unbiased, word from word -- word for word. if it happens here, here, or anywhere that matters. america is watching on c-span, powered by cable. listening to programs on c-span through c-span radio got easier. tell your smart speaker to play c-span radio and listen to washington journal daily, important congressional hearings and other public affairs events through the day and weekdays at 5:00 p.m. and 9:00 p.m. eastern. catch washington for a fast-paced report. listen to c-span any time and tell your smart speaker to play c-span radio. c-span, powered by public radio. >> "washington journal" continues. host: we are back here for the next half an hour and we are back here for open forum, any

public policy issue on your mind. we can start with the president's speech tonight. he will be addressing the nation in primetime at 8:00 p.m. eastern time. the speech will focus on what they are calling "the battle for the soul of a nation" two months ahead of a midterm election. live coverage from outside the historic independence hall begins at 8:00 p.m. eastern time on c-span, you can also watch on the free mobile video app or online and on demand at c-span.org. before the president's speech you can watch online at c-span.org the leader of the republican party in the house kevin mccarthy giving a prebutta l to the speech in scranton, pennsylvania to give that speech, and according to a press release he will talk about what he has heard from the american people this summer while he has

been campaigning and fundraising for republicans ahead of the midterms regarding rising crime and record high inflation and other hardships brought on by democratic harmful policies. that tonight happening in scranton, pennsylvania and the president in philadelphia. we are in open forum, any public policy issue on your minds. the other top story across any of the newspapers this morning is the release of this picture by the justice department's showing -- justice department showing classified documents at mar-a-lago and the headline reporting that some documents bear the hallmarks of close documents with national secrets. "the department of justice filing to a federal court late tuesday including the photograph

seeks the accusation that someone at the florida estate might have tried to remove papers before an fbi visit the property following a grand jury subpoena. that signaled possible obstruction and help secure a warrant to carry out the unprecedented search of mar-a-lago. a photo included in the 36 page filing shows paul -- people -- papers during the bold red marks of a top-secret along the frame of time magazine it is unclear who arrange on that way -- arrange them that way." the president saying this "there seems to be confusion as to the picture where the documents were sloppily thrown on the floor and then released photographically for the world to see as if that is what the fbi found when they broke into my home, wrong. they took them out of cartons and spread them on the carpet making it look like a big fine for them. not -- very deceiving and

remember we can have no representative including lawyers present during the raid, they were told to wait outside." those are some of the public policy issues on the table this morning. michael in syracuse, democratic caller. go ahead. michael are you there? caller: good morning. i am here. can you hear me? host: we can. caller: is a tvt allowed? host: know you are ok. caller: i would like to say that i am waiting to hear the speech tonight. i cannot wait to hear what the president has to say about the banana republicans. he says maga republicans and i say banana republicans. they need to have their, parents, no doubt. -- their comeuppance, no doubt.

all about the president in secret documents it is nonsense. he needs to be held accountable for his wrongdoing, no doubt. that is all i have to say. host: jay, wake forest, north carolina republican. caller: here is some company up and -- comeuppance, the media has said that donald trump committed treason with these documents. but you just put the documents on the tv that are not even classified. are you a traitor too media? you are -- that are you are doing fake news. let us talk about our nazi democrat party. they do not know what fascism is and they are so stupid that mussolini created fascism and he was a journalist. i wonder how may people are aware of that. what? host: are you still there?

we are listening. caller: i am still here and we are talking about mussolini. he was a journalist but your button keeps cutting me off. host: you have been on this entire time. caller: thank you. somebody cut me off and they said something in the background. joe biden, i would like to ask everyone a question, a simple question. when ron desantis and greg abbott and kay ivey in alabama, they said enough with an american president that rigged the election with the help of the fbi and say we are done with this nazi governments and we will order the arrest of any federal officer in the state, what are you going to say then? host: timothy in crystal lake, illinois. democratic caller. caller: i want to talk about your last guest. first of all the nuclear treaty.

i think it was kind of a political stunt from russia going on in ukraine right now because they cannot talk about the fact that -- host: the nuclear treaty is 50 years old. caller: they are bringing it up on purpose to do that because they want to say it is that. host: they negotiated every five years. caller:, you -- nuclear treaties voted no and have been widely embraced by every other country on landmines or the international criminal court which the u.s. were forces just refuses to join. and in the china the nuclear ranged missiles. 2019 the trump administration withdrew from that which is why russia felt concerned by ukraine joining nato because it is right by there border and the usa could put missiles right there. also 2002, the usa pulled out of

the no anti-ballistic missile treaty and now that is a big reason why russia felt like they were being backstabbed because the usa could develop things to shoot down missiles. also 2001, russia tried to join nato and the usa said no to that. these have contributed to russia playing on the defensive after the 90's and the early putin era. they want to work with the usa. the usa is surrounding military forces and that contributes to their feeling of being besieged. and if you hate inflation it is not just a pandemic it is also the sanctions on russia. that has more influence than the inflation. the conflict is limited in the sanctions in russia are hurting america and the world they are so crazy. host: florida, republican.

good morning to you. caller: good morning. i have two things i want to speak about so do not cut me off. the first thing is about the doj , the department of justice and the fbi. they cannot be believed anymore. they have a stack of papers laying out there for everybody to see, ok. that could be -- there is no way president trump would leave that stuff laying out. i would like to see if they are really being honest they have to have a video of it being taken out of the office. snapping a picture after they spread themselves out saying this is what they found, i do not believe that for one second. host: if the fbi released a video and then the former president the video is fake, who do you believe? caller: well, there are people out there that i am right now in this day and age that are really

up on detecting stuff and they can tell if a video has been fixed or added to. because they can do that, a citizen can do that, just transfer a video. there are whale ash there are ways to tell so they will have to get into that to be sure. a video is the way to go with this. i also want to talk about russia, ok? in the united states. i would like to know why the united states from the very to get -- very beginning decided to be mother and father to the world. we are the only country that will actually travel thousands of miles to bomb cities and kill citizens and then walk away from it. we are the only country that does that and as far as nato is concerned, russia started this war because of the united states, nato does not love us, that is a fact. they do not even like us. they like the money in the united states gives them lots of

money. we are the bosses and we tell them what to do so nato is running on what the united states wants. nato encroached on russian territory and that is what got the russians started. this is not a russian war, this is an american war that we started when president zelenskyy talked about going to russia and having a meeting with russia and two weeks check back in the paper, back two weeks into the war. host: ok. in some campaign 2022 news, " the washington post" and "new york times" saying that mary petloa won the special election in alaska and she becomes the first alaskan native elected to congress and it was a special election filling the seat of the late congressman don young was -- he represented the state at

large for decades. he passed away in march and served in congress for 49 years. and now mary peltola wins that seat. host: greg, bel air, maryland. independent. caller: two things. the first thing is going back to the photo that the fbi talk with the documents at mar-a-lago. just a point on that i want to say that for secure documents like that there is normally a chain of custody that shows who took it out and extracted it from whatever facility it came from. secondly as far as i know mar-a-lago is not a sensitive compartmented information facility so i do not believe it could even handle sensitive information like that. anybody can come and go. there is no way to know who is going in and out of whatever location those documents were in. i know for myself working for a federal agency you have to put your cell phone away in a locker before you go into the rooms to

view the documents. so for them to be in a resort with as far as i know no extra security precautions as a liability. host: you are saying that -- explain what it isn't what it looks like. and you are saying that the documents with this designation on them could only have been read in one? caller: correct. that particular facility is usually in a building and usually off-limits, only those that have appropriate clearances, and the fact that it is inside some kind of resorts is a little sketchy to me. i understand that if at the time he was president and may be bringing documents there and holding meetings, post that period, there has to be some mechanism or something to secure the documents outside of being in an office or wherever it is not place. host: "the new york times" report saying that the folders " were arrayed by agents, they

were not found scattered on the floor. the justice department used 35 pages of type in a court filing to provide new details into the investigation of former president donald trump's details of its investigation into former president trump's handling of classified documents taken from the white house at the end of the term. the most easily digested element was appended at the end, showing documents with secret and top-secret markings with a carton of flamed pictures on the others. the photographs to not reveal any details of the subject matter of the documents which were bordered in red when labeled secret and yellow for top-secret. on wednesday mr. trump took to a social media site, but the genesis of the photograph appears to be in keeping with standard protocols for how federal agents handle evidence they come across in a search.

they have been removed from what the filing indicated was mr. trump's office. the justice department would not comment on the specifics of the photograph, but it is standard practice for the fbi to take evidentiary pictures to ensure items were properly catalogued and accounted for. the marketing, 2a, on a folded piece of paper corresponds to a listing of items seized in the search that was made public along with the search warrant. in that inventory the item marked as 2a is marked as very classified documents. files or documents are not tossed around randomly even though they might appear that way. they are splayed out so they could be separated by the markings.

one notable element is not of the folders bear a label or stamp indicating mr. trump declassified them as he has periodically claimed when asked about his retention of government materials requested by the national archives. documents that have been declassified typically contain explicit markings documenting the change. greg, you are still there. what do you think? caller: i think going back to that previous caller who was insistent on there has to be a video that shows them taking all the documents and all of that, i trust the fbi and what they are doing. as far as i know they are doing standard practice. if they go to any kind of crime scene they have to take photographs and catalog what they are taking and there is a chain of custody forever whatever documents, especially

given the nature of what they are. if anything were to go missing between the time of the fbi agent sticking it from mar-a-lago and taking it to d.c., there could be a problem if something that is lost. they could do due diligence to catalog everything they are getting. that is beyond clearance i would have. it is pretty sensitive stuff. there should be no reason the former president should have it in a facility that is not secure. maybe at the time they have that capability. there should be no reasons. david in florida, what is on your mind? caller: i also work with classified material in every page have to be marked at the top of the bottom -- always at

the margins on the top and the bottom. also everyone i have ever used has been put into a folder that has a two hole punch. i did not usually go into top-secret. there should be a two hole punch. all of those papers they have, all of the ones all of the cover sheets are new, they have never been used. we did not do it like that. host: how many years has it been since you have seen the documents? caller: 20 years. host: it could have changed? caller: they may have done it differently. you are exactly right. they will -- host: pause for one second because you are breaking up. go back. i said maybe they do it and what

did you say? caller: what i said was but according to the regulations we had we had to market. most of the information had to be marked, each page had to be marked on the top and the bottom , each paragraph or sentence would start with an s or ats because the whole document that was secret for toxic -- was secret or top secret would not of been secret or top secret, just parts of it. also this mar-a-lago thing, i think this is a diversion from what has been going on in the government. we have the inflation reduction act which is all we are talking about right now is the drug thing where there is lot more something not being talked about. we are talking about this thing right here, this mar-a-lago thing rather than the loan forgiveness for college students.

that is not getting talked about as much. i think those issues are more important than keeping trump in the news for something like this. host: sandy in ohio, republican. caller: could you please let me get my points in before you hang up on me because you say you are not biased and that is not true. certain people you shut off too fast. host: why do you watch if you believe that? why do you watch if you believe we are biased? caller: because you have people -- the democrats do not understand that they are being brainwashed with the media. they believe trump is evil. he has been set up ever since he started running. first nancy pelosi said -- right

from the beginning of the first impeachment trial, what does that tell you? he did not do anything but obama and all of the democrats wanted hillary to win. obama said we are five days away from fundamentally transforming the country, which is turning us into a socialist or a communist country. he lived with a communist, frank marshall davis. maybe someone would like to look it up. democrats, wake up. you keep calling in saying you do not want to live in a dictatorship. what is it that is going on? rating a president's home? is that normal. i am not done. i'm trying not to get angry like that other guy. we are almost gone as far as being a free country. we are almost there. host: one more point and then we

will get in some other calls. caller: ok. the biden calling maga republicans -- it means make america great again instead of destroying the country -- he is so full of angry and he lies. they use solid ski tactics. they accuse the other person of doing what they are actually doing. how about that transgender thing they had with 100 antifa's with ar-15 starting it. are republicans going to pull people out. nobody said anything about all of those antifa's with ar-15's guarding a transgender thing that had kids? the democrats want to turn us into a communist country. that is why they let russia invade ukraine.

russia is getting richer, we are getting poorer. merrick garland told the fbi to stop talking to congress because there a lot of whistleblowers that do not want to lose their jobs because this is practically a communist country. host: let me get in dennis in ohio. caller: oh my god. i cannot believe some of the people that are coming on and some of the things they have been saying. i cannot get over this. i've never thought of myself as the voice of reason but some of these folks are coming on here so angry, so aggravated. you need to just take a breath. it is both sides. the guy from north carolina who wants to secede, please go. the guy from illinois sounded all wound up as well. the bottom line is the president did break the law.

he is going to have to pay for it, and the folks in this country are going to have to understand that no matter how much they complain about it, in the end he is probably going to have to go to jail. he has to. he broke the law. what he did was treason. he should not have had the records, he should not have had them where he had them. he is not a bright man. he does not understand the rules of law. i do not think he cares that much. america, relax, would you, please? host: carol in north dakota, independent. caller: hello. host: go ahead. caller: i would just like to state to the last one on the phone we are furious of what we have seen from the time president trump decided to run.

secondly, we saw him destroy millions and billions over in afghanistan. they are pushing sexual shit that should not be on four children, our own government. as for what is in mar-a-lago, let's talk about hillary clinton. let's talk about bama. let's rate their houses and see what they have took. don't put it one way. you act like the democrats are angels with wings flying through the air. host: the washington times with this headline a previous collar pot up -- our previous cal ler brought up, ag -- among a

flood of complaints. marion in las vegas. democratic collar. good morning. caller: trump is a private citizen, a former president. he had ample opportunity to just give the documents back. the department of justice was not the one who brought this out in the open. this was donald trump's doing because he is always playing the victim. it is poor donald trump, they are after me, donald trump has been talking about stop the steal since 2012. there is a memo that came out on william barr and the mueller report. he lied to the american people. he also was instrumental in killing the special counsel

investigation into iran-contra. he has a history of this. he also slept investigations made by the inspector general down to mitch mcconnell's wife, he swept them under the rug. they were referred for criminal investigation. then you have medicare and social security at risk. you have a senator from florida who wants to eliminate it within five years, social security and medicare. he was part of the largest medicare fraud in u.s. history. mitch mcconnell does not think the taxpayers should keep paying for social security and stop, but they do not mind getting their taxpayer funded thousand dollar a month pension. as far as ron desantis goes, they talk about big government? the state governments are

mandating a woman's autonomy over her own body. host: purge your thoughts. we will go to -- we heard your thoughts. we will go to nathaniel in mississippi. caller: i am a 57-year-old black man and i vote every year democrats, and i cannot understand why these people are so upset about trump. the man did wrong. he had no business taking these documents to his mar-a-lago house. period. they always like to bring up hillary clinton and obama? have they found any documents at their house? no. host: you have to mute your television when you call in so we can just hear you and you can listen through the phone. robert in lancaster.

republican. caller: good morning. i have been watching and my question is are the same cia and fbi still -- that told us about weapons of mass destruction, i would like you to show the video of the vice president saying down in ukraine if you cannot fire the attorney you cannot get to call obama. i watched him try to destroy trump. this is a man that tried to does -- if you can say you are living in a country safer than you were living with trump? the people who are running the law are the criminals. the thing about it is these people interpret the law. they do not follow the law, they

give themselves the right to interpret it. i've seen this -- like i said, i'm not prejudiced, i do not care what you are or what you do, we all bleed red. our government right now is bleeding green and it is not their greed. if you would, show that video of our president when he was vice president on tv. host: we do not have video at our fingertips. mark in austin, texas. independent. caller: good morning. we are -- host: we are in open forum. caller: everyone is in an uproar about what former president trump done with these documents. we all know he broke the law. i just want to say this. somehow fox news needs to be taken off the air.

fox news is helping perpetrate all of what is going on. i have turned to different news networks this morning. fox news is not even talking about these documents, they are playing like it is not even happening. then you have all of these other republicans that come on and try to placate donald trump. this is america. i am an independent but i'm going democrat this year because this does not make any sense. host: it was the last republican you voted for? caller: i voted for mitt romney. i do not know how long ago that has been. please, america, wake up. democrats, wake up. if we do not do this our country will go to hell. host: in other news, front pages of the national newspaper, new

york times, "the fda has authorized an updated booster ahead of what is expected to be a surge in the wintertime." the front page of the wall street journal: "oil prices extend fall amid growth concerns." and then you have this in the washington post. " historic learning losses in the pandemic. test scores plummeted to levels unseen for decades according to the first nationally represented report comparing student achievement from just before the pandemic to performance two years later. math scores dropped seven points , marking the first ever decline while reading scores slipped five points marking the largest loss in 30 years on the national assessment for educational progress, also part of -- also

called the nation's report card." those are some of the headlines. beverly in wyoming, democratic collar. good morning. caller: good morning. it is funny to see the tv. it is so different. i wanted to say i am glad joe biden is our president. everybody that is bashing trump, why? he will get what he gets and that is it. everybody is getting excited. the law is the law. you have to go by the law. host: jim in pittsburgh, independent. caller: because president biden is not obeying the constitution, the judicial system -- we need

to go to the third branch of government and have congressional hearings on that mar-a-lago. ideal. -- i yield. host: jose in florida, democratic collar. are you there? caller: i am here. host: mute your television. caller: i am a republican but i've not voted for the republicans for the last two elections. i want to say one thing. the reason he took this paper is because he knows he is broke. he needs money. he sold this information to the foreign country. i guarantee you that. he is broke. that is why he has never shown the tax paper. he has never shown his finances.

he never love this country. host: we will go to craig in d.c. republican. caller: are you doing today? i've been trying to analyze this whole thing. i wanted to say, i am a republican and i want all of the republicans to catch a grip. this man is really crooked. these maga republicans are not the ones you need to vote for. we need to get ourselves back in order. donald trump is a bum, he is a thug, he deserves what he gets. host: we will go to wisconsin, david, a republican. caller: good morning. people probably will not like my comments. host: david, you have to mute

your television. host: tony in white plains, maryland. independent. caller: good morning. i want to say i live right outside the d.c. metro area in the news we've been having a lot of carjackings going on. almost like it is going on nationwide, it is just a new trend. what is funny to me is a lot of times it gets swept under the rug but these are young people committing armed carjackings that often times here in the city, in d.c., in the dmv area, we see they committed these offenses before and it is pretty recent when they committed these offenses. i wonder what will take for people actually speak up and somebody say we need the police to help us with these carjackings going on almost every day in d.c.

the other thing is just the culture itself that the youth is infatuated with nowadays seems to be a lot more aggressive and a lot more acceptable to a lot of violent things, more so than ever before. i hope somebody can step up and speak against that. thank you. host: we will take a short break. when we come back we will be joined by kiana cox with the pew research center to talk about the findings of their new survey of black american views on political engagement, racial inequality, and other topics. we will be right back. ♪ >> live sunday on "in-depth," uc berkeley governmental studies caller: be our guest to talk about leadership, ronald reagan, the american conservative movement. he is the author of several

books, including two volumes in the age of reagan series, greatness, and politics is not enough. join in your conversation with texts and tweets. in depth with steven hayward live sunday at noon eastern on tv on c-span2. >> there are a lot of places to get political information. only at c-span you get it straight from the source. no matter where you are from or where you stand on the issues, c-span is america's network. unfiltered, unbiased, word for word. if it happens here or here or here or anywhere that matters, america is watching on c-span, powered by cable. >> at least six presidents

recorded conversations while in office. here many of those conversations during season two of c-span's podcast, presidential recordings. >> the nixon tapes are part private conversations, part deliberations, and 100% unfiltered. >> the main thing is it will pass and my heart goes out to those people who with the best of intentions are overzealous. if i could have spent a little more time being a politician last year and less time being president i could've kicked there butts but i do not know what they were doing. >> find presidential recordings on the c-span now mobile app or wherever you get your podcasts. >> "washington journal" continues. host: showing us is kiana cox, research associate with the pew research center here to talk

about a new survey about black opinions on race in u.s. society. why do this survey and how did you go about doing it? guest: one of the things that was really important to us as we looked at black americans and their attitudes about inequality in the united states was to look at black politics beyond voting behavior. we thought were there were -- there were evergreen conversations black americans have had for generations in terms of being able to understand their position in the country, how they experience inequality, and what pathways to equality look like. we wanted to provide a round her perspective on what black politics look like aside from how black americans vote. host: how did you go about conducting the survey? guest: we did an online poll of nearly 4000 black americans. at pew research center we recruit black males into our american panel and we have all

of the black participants, we invite all the black participants on our panel and additional panels to take our survey on the internet and fill out those questions for us. host: i want to show some of the results from the survey. after george floyd's murder have a black americans expected policy changes to address racial inequalities. this is the percentage of black adults who say increased attention to issues of race and racial any polity will lead to major policy changes. 50% said yes to that. 56% said it would lead to changes that would improve black lives. what did you find by 2021? guest: a year later, after that: 2020, in 2021 we found that almost 70% of black americans said the increased attention to racial inequality as a result of george floyd's murder had not

yet yielded changes that improve their lives. as you mentioned, there was some optimism in terms of hoping that attention would bring about some differences that they could cn feel. a year later our responses said those differences have not occurred yet. host: 44% -- equality for black people is little or not at all likely. guest: right. in addition to asking them about the increased attention to racial inequality, we wanted to get a read on how black americans feel about their position in society and we asked them, do you feel like black americans whatever achieve equality, and 44% or almost half said equality is not likely. one thing we found throughout the survey was that kind of pessimism is pretty widespread in terms of multiple questions we asked, not just about black

americans position in society but about various institutional changes and pathways to equality. no more than 20% of black americans said they thought any u.s. institution would change in terms of the criminal justice system, the political system, the health care system and others we asked about. no more than 20% of black americans thought any of those institutions would change in order to treat black people more fairly. host: and they view these as roadblocks? guest: they view these institutions as one's that need either made -- either major changes or complete overhauls in terms of being able to get rid of racial discrimination. these numbers represent a critique of these institutions and how black americans feel they are being treated within them. host: i just want to show the viewers the results of what you were just talking about. black american views on reducing racial inequality.

many black adults say institutional overhauls are necessity -- are necessary to ensure fair treatment. here is a percentage of black adults say each of the following needs to be completely rebuilt. 54% said the prison system. 49% pointed to policing. the courts and the judicial process, 48% of them pointed to that. the political system, 42% said the political system needs to be changed. 37% said the economic system and 34% said the health care system. talk about these numbers. guest: in terms of assessing these institutional changes, we asked black adult how much these institutions need to change? no changes, minor changes, major changes, organ they require complete overhauls or to be completely rebuilt? we broke those numbers out and

we are reporting primarily on the completely rebuilt numbers. the broader picture is those numbers tellabs is nearly 90% of black americans set each of those systems need major changes or to be completely rebuilt. sure, we are paying attention to the completely rebuilt number, but it is important to recognize that a vast majority of black americans would like to see significant shifts in all of these institutions so they can be treated more fairly. host: i want to share this as well for our viewers. the percentage of black adults who say funding for police departments in their community should be increased -- 35% said increased. 39% shed -- said should stay the same. only 29% said it should be decreased. this debate over defunding the police and what does that mean. guest: right.

one of the things we sought that is really important to understand about our findings on policing is black americans views about policing are complex. on the one hand we see 60% of black americans say police brutality is an extremely big problem for black people in the country today. we asked these questions a year after george floyd's murder and several months after derek chauvin was convicted. even in that timeframe 60% of black americans said police brutality was still a big problem. they also said, about half of laugh -- about half of black adults said various aspects of the criminal justice system need complete overhauls. on the one hand there is still a critique of policing as an institution, but on the other hand there is also not necessarily a push based on our data come in terms of the percentage of black adults would like to see funding decrease. the majority of black adults

want to see funding stay the same or to increase. there are some nuance in terms of how black americans you policing. a critique, but not necessarily a removal of funding on the other. host: even those who said funding should be decreased, this is what they said money should be used for. 40% said it should be part medical, mental health, and social services. 25% for k-12 schools, and others for roads and water systems and infrastructure. guest: even among the 23% who wanted to see decreases, it is those social services, those mental health services, that was the top priority for that group of people, those who are in support of defunding, they would like that money redirected to those community services. host: let's get to calls on your survey. anna in texas, democratic caller .

good morning. caller: good morning. ms. cox, one of the first things i will say, martin luther king's lawyer wrote a book on what martin would say, the first thing was about policing. he said defund the police, martin would say are you crazy. our neighborhoods need policing more than anyone. the other one is voting. the next one becomes food deserts. we have politicians who look like me and you and some of these areas, they do not go, we just reelect the same people over and over again and do nothing for us. we do not attend school board meetings, we do not attend city council meetings, we do not vote for crucial people, like in

texas, people just do not vote. it is pathetic that they complain and complain and complain. they complain about the governor, but when it comes time to vote they do not go vote. that is a problem for me. i am 74 years old. i was taught to vote. and we vote. our kids -- it is not important. it is important when it comes to your state representatives. when you go out to vote, you vote for everybody, attorney general, governor, lieutenant governor. we do not teach that anymore. it was taught when i was in a segregated school. we have all of the schools and nobody wants to teach or say. another thing. we need a national curfew. it is 2:00 in the morning. do know where your children are? thank you very much and i

appreciate it. host: kiana cox? guest: i think the caller's frustration shows up in our data in a couple of ways. in terms of approaches to equality, we found in our data that the majority of black americans said voting is an extremely or very effective pathway towards equality for black americans and that also efforts to limit voting is an extremely big problem for black americans in the country. also she mentioned her age and that was the number one of the significant findings we found. black adults, particularly those older than 65 or more likely than those who are on birth -- than those who are under 30 to say voting is an extremely or very important pathway to equality for black americans. younger black adults were more likely to champion approaches such as establishing a national black political party, and some of these other approaches that

are more about community and black americans self-determination. our data reflects a lot of the different points your caller made. host: let's hear from joe in scranton, pennsylvania. independent. caller: hello. i am speaking from a point of view -- i am 60 years old. what i have seen is a reduction in the formal christianity of a lot of families. i believe a lot of that has to do with the reduction of the nuclear family structure. as i'm sure you are well aware, the amount of african-american children who are lacking having that father figure in their

family. is there any part of the studies or anything that are identifying that in coming up with some resolutions and some training or teaching to bring back that responsibility of being a father? guest: in this particular survey we do not cover those topics, but about 18 months ago we published a survey that was on african-americans and their religious traditions if you would like to take a look at that survey. you can visit pe wresearch.org. some of the things we found in terms of that survey that do overlap with what we are looking at here is that black americans by and large are more likely than the general public to say antiracism is an essential part of their faith and morality.

black adults in that survey also mentioned it was important for black youth to see black men and women be role models for them in their religious communities. black adults were also very likely to say they thought the roles mothers and fathers played in their families in terms of income and supporting the family, but also in terms of household duties around the home were also important. we do not touch on those gender or religious issues in this report, but other reports we have done in previous years certainly do talk about those issues. host: james in louisiana. independent. caller: thanks for taking my call. ms. cox, out of all the questions on your survey did you ask the black people what they could be doing for themselves to alleviate the problems we are suffering? we are appealing to a system that created the problem.

my last point. go to any chinatown in america, you do not see any policeman stopping and frisking, shooting and murdering. they have their own policeman in chinatown. thank you. guest: our survey did not necessarily ask black adults about what they individually could do, but certainly we asked lack adults to weigh in on the pathways to advancement they think would work. on the one hand nearly 70% of black americans said discrimination is the main reason black people cannot get ahead, but around 30% of black adults set of black people cannot get ahead they are responsible for their own condition. on the one hand nearly 60% of black adults said working hard is no guarantee of success, but about 40% said if you do work hard you can get ahead.

while we did ask individual black adults about their particular pathways, certainly there is a sizable minority of black adults who think in terms of self responsibility and pulling your own self up is the pathway to equality versus looking at racial discrimination as a barrier. host: west virginia, republican. caller: yes. i had a comment. about the survey results. in america we have raised at least two generations of young black people being told, taught repeatedly by their leaders, democrat politicians, by everyone and their civil rights structure that everything is bad, it is rotten, racism

destroys all of their opportunities. of course that is what they think. they are being fed that on a daily basis by everyone they interact with. you look at school systems that are basically all-black like d.c. they have a truancy rate of something like 40% of the students missed two or more days a week. they are complaining they cannot get a good education? that it is not fair? that discrimination holds them back. you can bet if they missed two days a week if they show up they are probably disrupting for the other students. host: have you know that? -- how do you know that? guest: i was going to say that almost like your last caller, we do not have any data in terms of

asking black americans about their own individual paths. we do not have any data about attendance at school. certainly black adults do point to racism, racial discrimination is a significant barrier and they also have these critiques of institutions. these critiques are systemic ones pointing to society, pointing to racism as barriers to their pathway to equality. host: and one result you publish on the website, you show there is little hope among black adults that changes to racial inequality are likely. here is the percentage of adults who say each of the following is little or not at all likely. 82% said little or not at all likely there will be reparations to descendants of people enslaved in the u.s.. 67%, it is not likely there will be changes to the prison system. 58% gap changes to policing to treat black people fairly.

44% doubted equality for black people in the united states. guest: across all of the different approaches to equality we talked about, those institutional changes and also reparations as a historical corrective for slavery, there is broad skepticism. even though black americans view reparations as a pathway, they view institutional changes we've been talking about as pathways, they did not think any of those changes are very likely in their lifetime. host: let's go to boston. michael, good morning. caller: good morning. i hope you can hear me. fabulous. i'm going to give an opinion. i believe the black community has a major issue. i do not think they realize that from the 1960's until the present time there has been a continuing program of mass

incarceration of the males, a portion of the females, coupled with importation -- with importation of aliens because they are subject to the jurisdiction of other nations. there has been a replacement program. we have been people that can speak like this young lady. host: we will go on to george. apologies for anyone offended by those comments. caller: longtime time listener, first time caller. can you hear me? i just wanted to make a comment. i was in the military. i am a first generation immigrant. i see things through a different lens now. in the 1950's the u.s. congressional makeup was anglo. in just a few decades they want us to believe, is like the

sports advocates as wide is the jersey so expensive, because you pay for it. the government has led us into this distraction, everything is a distraction. to the legislation and the state of this country. decades ago it is all anglos governing, the melting pot. now it is the old bait and switch. if this government has taken any lessons from the lich empire that subjugated south -- from the english empire that subjugated south africa, now look at the congressional makeup which is in a few decades is all mixed. what i'm trying to say is be aware the bait and switch when it was the good old days and it was not good for everybody. that is what i'm trying to say. look at the obvious. host: you did break down the survey results by party affiliation as well.

those that lean republican, democrat. guest: one of the differences that we saw were consistent differences in terms of party for black americans and actually being able to talk about black republicans is one of the neat features of this study. we are able to have a large enough sample to look at black republicans and compare them to black democrats. on the one hand we see black democrats are more likely to support these institutional critiques we have been talking about. they are more likely to say that funding to police department should be decreased. they are more likely to say the criminal justice system and some of these other institutions like politics and health care need complete overhauls in order to treat black people fairly. on the other hand black republicans are more likely to support individualist approaches to equality. they are less likely to say discrimination is the main

reason black people cannot get ahead. they are more likely to point to pulling yourself up to work hard and success and to save black people cannot get ahead they are responsible for their own condition. black republicans are also more likely to say individual acts of racism are a bigger problem for black people than systemic racism or racism built into laws. those are the primary differences we see in terms of party for black americans. black democrats want to see systemic changes and black republicans are more in support for individual approaches to equality. host: let's hear from john in oregon. you are on with kiana cox. caller: i have some questions in three areas. one, what are the african-american views on

efforts to gerrymander and decrease black representation and houses of representatives and the senate. i am a firm believer in education or apprenticeships or a good path to economic freedom. three, president biden in pennsylvania just the other day talking about a national prohibition of no-knock warrants on the federal level and an increase in community policing. any questions on those type of views? thank you very much. guest: sure. we have questions that address

several of the items you mentioned. 40% of black adults feel efforts to limit voting is an extremely big problem. to your question about gerrymandering and changing districts, certainly a sizable minority of black adults think efforts to limit voting is an extremely big problem. they think police brutality and racism are problems but they still view voting as a big problem for black adults in the country. in terms of education, one of the ways we asked about education was as a part of a reparations package. for example, black adults who thought descendants of people enslaved in united states should receive reparations, that is about 80% of black adults. among people who supported we asked what forms of reparations would be helpful.

about 80% said reparations in the form of educational scholarships would be a helpful form of repayment in terms of a corrective for slavery. we do not talk about schooling in this survey and the weight you mentioned, but we do look at education and support for education as one of the pathways to equality in the form of reparations. host: we go to new york, democratic caller. caller: i am calling to say i am enjoying the program and to go away back. slavery did a number on the black folks. in the beginning they separated the children from the parents. that has a big effect and that will last for years and years. on the other hand, we have come a long ways and we are trying to

pull up as much as possible but you can still see there is a big difference in who runs the country and who gets the better jobs and who gets more educated. when you are poor and at the bottom, and when you go to work, parents are not able to get the money to keep their kids even when they come from school to take care of them, they strangle around by themselves and do not get the care they need even because the parents cannot afford to stay home with them and cannot afford to pick them up from school and whatnot. that is what happens when you are middle in or have high income. all of that takes effect on a kid. a kid needs the do's and don'ts and all of that and this does not happen a lot. as far as cooperation and stuff, it is hard for blacks to pull up

and you have to have a lot of incentive to want to pull up and strive. some people just do not have that desire to pull up. we have to start teaching them to pull up. host: i think one of the points your caller made in terms of looking at, and i think some of the things she was saying is a lot of the deficits we see in black communities we can link back to slavery and as black adults we felt the legacy of slavery impacts black people in the united states today. 60% of black adults say the legacy of slavery impacts black adults a great deal. our data supports the main point your caller was making. host: sean in california, democratic caller. caller: good morning and how's

everyone doing? i was just sitting up and listening to the conversation. first, when some of the callers get your name incorrect, that right there shows the racism. i am a very educated african-american woman. i do not necessarily like the term black because i do not look black. i am not that dark. i am african-american. i look at african-americans, we need to break that cycle. some spanish people, they do not like to be called brown, they like to be distinguished with their nationality. i am educated. i grew up learning, getting an education, you are to get ahead in life.

i got a masters degree, i went all the way up to get a masters degree. as soon as i got my degree and got out of college i cannot get a job, only as an in-home care service person. i did that job, i worked my way up, i became a program director and i had my boss who was an african-american come after me. the thing is what we see our people in higher positions, we have to support them, and then we have to go back and help our people with getting those opportunities. there are a lot of people, not just white, people of non-african-americans are jumping on the bandwagon and pushing us to -- and pushing us down. as far as reparations, the united states of america could give african-american

reparations, they just do not want to do it. we have people coming in from every country that we are giving free everything. however, we are deporting the people from darker countries like haiti. when it comes to these people that are from's dates, people like me in california, it is helping to pay for your state, i look at that as welfare. pull yourself up. you have been given your bootstraps to tie. african-americans, keep fighting. we need to start banding together. host: let's have kiana cox respond. guest: thank you. your caller mention one thing i think is important for us to define and that is who gets to be black, or who is black?

one of the things we do at the center is if someone selects -- we ask people what is your race. if a person selects that they are black, we count them as black. our way of measuring blackness in our survey is by self identification. one of the reasons we use "black " as opposed to african-american is our survey encompasses black adults from all ethnicities. primarily in this report we look at black adults who are non-hispanic, but also black adults who identify as hispanic and we look at black adults who identify as black and some other race, or in this report we refer to them as multiracial. i think you are caller brings up a good point in terms of questioning who is black. in our survey blackness is based on self identification. host: glenn in arizona, independent.

caller: did i pronounce your name right? i've been listening to you since there were about three people in a row when they ask the hard question. i do not quite understand it. host: i hung up on the color because it was a racist comment. go ahead. caller: you hung up on one caller because he asked about the nuclear family and you held up on -- you hung up on another because he asked about kids missing school. host: she responded to the nuclear family. go ahead. caller: that is my point. you are being biased. you are shutting people off if you are afraid you are hosed cannot answer the question correctly. host: got it all. vicki -- not at all. vicki in north carolina. caller: i agree with the first

caller who said we need more policing in the black neighborhoods, black people need to stick together, do not be racists and do not hate each other. parents need to find out where the kids are getting the guns in the black neighborhoods. why are young black males armed? underage 19, what are they have guns? it makes no sense. host: any final thoughts? guest: your last caller's point, we do not cover this. to a report in april we looked at connections between black americans, we mention black people supporting one another. earlier this year we looked at to what extent do black people feel what happens to other black people in the country will have a significant impact on their lives and about 40% of black adults say that. i would encourage her to take a look at that data.

we asked several questions about those points. certainly our data reflects black people do feel connected with one another across national boundaries, cross regional boundaries, and across various income groups as well. host: our viewers can find the survey and the findings if you go to pewresearch.org. kiana cox, research associate with the pew research center, we thank you for your time this morning. guest: thank you for having me on. host: or on a website as c-span.org and you can find on our app and website, -- the rebuttal -- and he will be in pennsylvania for those remarks. thank you for watching and

enjoying the rest of your date and we will be back tomorrow morning at 7 a.m. eastern time. ♪ >> here is what is coming up on c-span. let that's -- live at 12 p.m. eastern, a discussion on the supreme court decision. at 5 p.m., jeh johnson and former acting cia director mike morel talk about the fbi search of president's mar-a-lago home and you can watch on our free mobile video app, c-span now.

>> president biden is in philadelphia this evening to discuss the state of american democracy. the white house says the president's speech will focus on what they are calling the battle for the soul of a nation. this is two months ahead of the midterm elections. there is live coverage that begins at 8 p.m. eastern on c-span and on our free mobile video app c-span now or online at c-span.org. >> ahead of president biden's speech on the state of american democracy, kevin mccarthy will be speaking in scranton pennsylvania about the biden administration and the democratic party agenda. watch live at 5:45 eastern c-span now -- at c-span now. >> c-span is your unfiltered view of government. the are funded by fees

television companies and more. >> homework can be hard but squatting for internet is even harder. we are providing lower income students access to affordable internet so homework can just be homework. >>cox, along with these other television providers giving you a frontload c2 democracy -- front row seat to democracy. >> officials from the food and drug administration assured lawmakers that food safety remain a top priority for the agency after political -- politico published a report on how the fda had repeatedly failed to take timely action on foodborne outbreaks. they were also asked about the recent baby formula shortage and other regulatory challenges facing the agency. this hearing is one hour 45 minutes.