including midco. ♪ midco supportc-span as a public service, along with these other television providers, giving you a front row seat to democracy. coming up this morning on "washington journal," a member of the committee for safe and secure elections, al schmidt, discusses efforts to protect election workers and voters. and we take your calls to discuss the january 6 committee vote to subpoena former president donald trump. "washington journal" starts now. ♪ host: good morning. it is friday, october 14, 2022.

yesterday, the house january 6 committee held its ninth and possibly final public hearing, and there were new elevations about what was known ahead of january 6, the scramble to get help during the riot, and the unanimous votes by the seven democrats and two republicans to subpoena former president donald trump for testimony. we are getting your reaction to all of it this morning. phone lines split up by political party. republicans can call in on (202) 748-8001. democrats, (202) 748-8000. independents, (202) 748-8002. you can send us a text at (202) 748-8003, please include your name and where you are from. catch up with us on social media. twitter, @cspanwj. facebook, facebook.com/c-span. you can start calling in now. we will take you to that moment from yesterday's january 6

committee hearing where vice chair liz cheney called for a subpoena to be issued for former president donald trump. [video clip] >> our duty today is to our country and our children and our constitution. we are obligated to seek answers directly from the man who set this all in motion. and every american is entitled to those answers so we can act now to protect our republic. so this afternoon, i am offering this resolution, that the committee direct the chairman to issue a subpoena for relevant documents and testimony under oath from donald john trump in connection with the january 6 attack on the united states capitol. host: panel vice chair liz cheney yesterday at that hearing. here is the front page of "usa today" this morning, panel demands trump testimony under

oath. the former president responding on his social media platform, truth social era two comments from yesterday. first, why didn't the una lot -- unselect committee asked me to testify month ago? why did they wait until the end? it is because the committee is bust, and the country is doing very badly. the president is calling it a laughingstock all over the world. he also promised to put out his official response to the un select committee of political hacks and thugs, as he describes them, saying it will be right at 8:00 a.m. we will look to see what he posts at 8:00 a.m. this morning. we will bring it to you when he does. until then and for the first two hours of the "washington journal" today, getting reaction to yesterday's ninth and possibly final january 6

committee hearing. republicans, (202) 748-8001. democrats, (202) 748-8000. independents, (202) 748-8002. we will also look for your social media posts. we start in bradenton, florida. this is tony, line for democrats. caller: good morning. i think trump is not going to be laughing when he is sent to prison. then again, he is not going to show up. if he shows up, he is going to take the fifth. remember trump's own words, only monsters, thugs, criminals use the fifth, and i bet you he is going to use the fifth. either that or he is not going to show up. that is the facts. he is a criminal since the 1970's, for god's sakes. host: a call from north

carolina, line for republicans. caller: i think it is the same thing, you always push your leftist crap on america. i think freaking donald trump is going to testify and embarrass all of you on live tv. but of course, this unselect will not put him on tv. they will make sure no one ever sees it. that is what you people in media do. you hide stuff from everybody. just like the $1 million, the guy from the fbi just tried to pay that british spy. like always -- host: all right, that is mike in north carolina. this is sophia in florida, line for democrats. good morning. caller: hello, yes, this is cynthia. host: cynthia, ok. caller: i want to say that i am extremely proud of cheney and kissinger and the way they handled the entire situation.

i am proud of the entire investigative process. it was meticulous. they wrapped it up in a pretty bow. now to investigate the secret service. something is wrong with that process. but thank you, thank you for showing america that what trump did was entirely wrong. host: what about that question that the former president asked on truth social. why did they way to the end to subpoena him? if you want him to appear, why not do that with the most impossible? the clock is possibly taking on this committee if republicans take over the house, as it is expected they may in midterm elections, unlikely that this committee's work will continue. caller: i don't know. i don't have an answer for it. but i just like the way they just did everything. i don't have an answer for that. i wish i did. host: mike in paterson, new

jersey, republican. good morning. caller: good morning. i am just calling up because i think there's january 6 -- i think this january 6 is another hoax. and i also think if we keep letting the immigrants in, we're going to bankrupt the country. i do not think they want to build us back better for me and you. it is for themselves, our control. we need to get rid of joe biden and get a real precedent and not a traitor. they ought to be looking at joe biden and his family. thank you for letting me share. host: in michigan, line for independents, this is robert. caller: thank you for taking my call. i have one question, you go -- you guys go back in the archives, trump's second year he was being interviewed -- i am absolutely sure of this -- when

i listen to the interview, he threatened the country that there would be violence if he was not reelected. and it came true. personally, i think he needs to be put in a rubber room in a straitjacket. thank you for taking my call. host: trish, seattle, washington, democrats. good morning. caller: good morning, everyone. well, i agree with the lady that called earlier. i thought the committee did a great job. i was particularly interested and fascinated by jamie raskin's comments. and in addition to that, for the first time we got to see what was going on behind the scenes. and that was illuminating. this was real. those people and how they kept it together to move forward to get that vote in, because they

realized how important it was. in addition, i would like to say that the former guy really had a bummer day between the fbi showing that the documents had been moved in mar-a-lago, the supreme court shut him down, and then he got a subpoena. all in all, i think it was a good day for america in that sense, that we will bring this person to justice as we all should, where nobody is above the law. and he is not above the law. host: that is trish in seattle, washington, referring to that new video that we saw yesterday, behind the scenes look at their leadership, congressional leadership, scrambling to get aid to the capitol during the riot. it was congressman jamie raskin, the democrat from maryland, who introduced that video. here is about four and a half minutes of that presentation. [video clip] >> the president watched the

bloody attack unfold on fox news from his dining room. members of congress and other government officials stepped into the gigantic leadership void created by the president's chilling and steady passivity that day. what you are about to see's previously unseen footage of congressional leaders, both republicans and democrats, as they were taken to a secure location during the riot. you will see how everyone involved was working actively to stop the violence, to get federal law enforcement deployed to the scene to put down the violence and secure the capitol complex. not just democrats like speaker nancy pelosi and house majority leader steny hoyer, but republicans like vice president pence, senate majority leader mitch mcconnell, majority whip john soon, and count to loose -- john thune, and countless others. it is what trump was not doing what he simply refused to do.

take a listen. >> we're starting to get surrounded. they are taking the north front scaffolding. >> we're not going to be able to hold. >> at the door has been breached. the people are gaining access into the capitol. >> we have got to get the senate to proceed. [chanting usa] >> they are locked down in the senate. there has to be some way we can maintain the sense of people have that there is some security or some confidence that government can function at that you can elect a president of the united states.

did you go back into session? >> we did go back into session, but apparently now everybody on the floor is putting on gas masks. we are trying to get more information. >> they are putting on their tear gas masks? >> area for the house members, all walking now through the tunnels. [indiscernible] >> we have some senators still in their hideaways. we need massive personnel now. can you get the maryland national guard? >> i am going to call the mayor of washington, d.c., right now to see what outreach she has, as leader hoyer has mentioned.

>> get 'em out. >> governor, i do not know if you have been approached about the virginia national guard. i think you probably need the ok of the federal government in order to come into another jurisdiction. thank you. oh, my gosh. they are just breaking windows. they are doing all kinds -- it is really -- they said somebody was shot. it is just horrendous, and all at the instigation of the president of the united states. ok, thank you, governor. i appreciate what you are doing. i would like to say thank you. >> virginia guard has been called in. >> governor northam said they

sent 200 state police and a unit of the national guard. they are breaking windows and going in and obviously ransacking our offices and all the rest of that. that is nothing. the concern we have about personal safety, that transcends everything. but the fact is, on any given day, they are breaking the law in many different ways. and quite frankly, much of it at the instigation of the president of the united states. now if he could at least -- somebody -- >> why don't you get the president to tell them to leave the capitol, mr. attorney general, your law enforcement responsibility? a public statement they should all heed. host: part of that presentation yesterday from the house select january 6 committee.

the story behind some of that video, a member of the "washington post" asking, how do we see that historic video from inside a secure location with congressional leadership? he notes that the speaker's daughter was with her that day on january 6. a documentary filmmaker, she was the one who shot that video that was presented yesterday. we are getting your reaction to yesterday's hearing, setting aside the first two hours of the "washington journal" today to talk about it. you can join us on the phone lines, as usual. republicans, (202) 748-8001. democrats, (202) 748-8000. independents, (202)748-8002. larry, independent, hillsdale, michigan. caller: good morning. i would like to know why they continue to go on trump when there is an epidemic going down south, all these people coming in, drugs coming in.

i mean, nobody pays attention to things that are happening now. i mean, didn't trump call for 20,000 additional national guard? and pelosi and the mayor of washington shut it down. host: larry, what did you think about that video we just showed showing the congressional leaders there during the riot, trying to get troops there, trying to get the president to make a statement -- what did you think of that new video that was released? caller: i think it was a little too late, don't you? don't you think they should have been standing by? he called for that, trump said we want 20,000 national guard. they should have been there. but pelosi and the mayor --it is a joke. host: larry in michigan.

to tom in fort lauderdale, florida, democrat. caller: no, independent. good morning, a few points, he is not going to testify. he is not man enough to testify for the questions i have about this committee is, why didn't they subpoena the vice president and grant him immunity to testify? in two years, they won't even talk to him the second thing is, if they talk about the fake electors, where is the hearing on the fake electors? ever since ginni thomas got linked to the fake electors, they have been quiet about it. ginni thomas, rudy giuliani, they lead that. where is the hearing on the fake electors? thank you. host: before you go, what do you think about the timing of this, coming just a few weeks before the 2022 midterm elections?

i think we lost tom. bud, west virginia, republican. good morning. caller: good morning. thank you for taking my call. first thing, we need to look at the whole picture. the first thing that we need to look at is that the capitol police's first line of duty when the capitol is being attacked is to use deadly force. ok, excuse me. but anyway, the security of the capitol was in the hands of nancy pelosi and the mayor, not the president, at that time. i believe it was all set up through the democrats to make it

look bad for trump. if you look at some of the videos, the doors was open for some of the protesters. host: did you watch the videos yesterday? what did you think of those efforts by congressional leaders to try to get additional military and police to the capitol to try to clear out the capitol behind the scenes? what did you think about that yesterday? caller: well, they should have had them on hand already. and they should have been there in the first place. before they ever entered or when they started to enter the capitol. that was the fault of somebody in security. that was nancy pelosi and the mayor. they were responsible. and that is what people need to look at, who was responsible for the security. and i don't blame trump -- i do not think it was his fault.

it was all set up. host: walter here in washington, d.c., line for democrats. good morning. caller: good morning. i am not a fan of trump, but in all nine hearings, this committee has demonstrated that they are not trying to find it exactly how this riot happened in the first place. the elephant in the room that everyone noticed even in the first hearing is that the capitol was left open and vulnerable to attack, even of the fbi on december 21, 2020, one the former u.s. capitol police chief son about this threat. what is not addressed is in four different videos, u.s. capitol police officers actually left trump supporters inside the capitol. black and white officers allowed and invited them in. who gave these orders and why this committee don't even mention this despite the fact that there are four videos showing this?

why have none of these officers been reprimanded? this guy who is a trump supporter, ray epstein, who is this guy? he is instigating trump supporters to go inside the capitol and riots. he was on the fbi most wanted list, photograph number 16, and he was found and identified, and now jamie raskin and others are defending him. is he an informant? and we got a guy that no one is interested in finding out who he is, but this guy did a terrorist act that it does not come up. and there is documentation that ariel bowser, pelosi, and u.s. capitol police all rejected the offer for national guard. trump authorized it, they said no. so not only trump should be subpoenaed but also nancy

pelosi, maryhill bowser, and cash patel. they need to explain. most likely pelosi orchestrated this. i am a democrat, but pelosi is corrupt. that is all i got to say. thank you. goodbye. host: sophia in manhattan, independent. you are next. caller: good morning. thank you for taking my call. i have been watching c-span over 35 years. i have been consistent calling every month over five years. it is -- i do not know how to -- i call over four and half years, and every time i call, i say he is making me cry. i vote for him in 2016. god help me. i stayed with god.

but i stayed in every channel watching what is going on, watching him, even watched his rally. the only one he has now left is newsmax and fox. first wife died in june 2014 -- host: bring me to january 6 and yesterday's hearing. caller: that is where i am coming. what they did, what happened, my prayer. my prayer. i don't want him to die. i don't want him to get sick. host: we will move onto a call from savannah, georgia, democrat. caller: my problem is, this insurrection, people are looking

the other way. if it was people of color, they would have been mowed down on the capitol lawn, all killed. if they don't stop this thing, this insurrection, the next thing they will do is be marching on the supreme court. it is not wrong to demonstrate and to protest, but when you start going to the capitol in places like that, we do not have a law-abiding system no more if this going to take place. so this could be stopped. host: the question again, why way to the very end here to subpoenaed the president? especially if the clock is ticking on this committee, if this committee is unlikely to continue in the 118th congress of republicans take over, why not do that sooner? caller: well, they have to get all the evidence, everything on the table.

they came with an of evidence and proof, and they needed the proof. so that is why they waited until the end, this time of year, to get it done. but the caller saying trump is not guilty, he motivated and instigated the whole thing. so you have to be blind or ignorant because it is cut and dry, trump is the cause of this whole problem. he need to be put in jail. thank you. host: this is peter baker, white house correspondent for the "new york times," his news analysis piece, his take on the timing of the subpoena. he writes today, a subpoena at this stage may more symbolic than successful, issued too late to obtain the testimony it aims to secure. he says from the vantage point of the committee members who spent more than a year investigating how a mob of trump supporters came to strum the capitol to stop the transfer of power, the subpoena puts the focus back where it should be, he writes, on mr. trump himself.

orlando, social circle, georgia, republican. good morning. caller: good morning. i would like to say, first off, that both the democrats and the republicans have polarized the country and used the polarization of racism. it was donald trump and joe biden that caused the insurrection at the white house. donald trump need to go to jail, and joe biden need to retire. host: who would you like to see lead this country, orlando? caller: an independent, someone who does not have a financial gain to run the country, someone young and fresh, with new ideas. put the people first. host: is there anybody out there that fits that bill right now, orlando? caller: i don't have an idea.

but it could be a celebrity or anybody that don't have an objective. i believe the american people would vote for anybody. it could be for kim kardashian, kanye west, anybody other than a democrat or republican. host: that is orlando out of social circle, georgia. we are spending our first two hours of the program getting your reaction to that hearing yesterday. also want to bring in reaction from folks who work in that building, in the capitol. darting on the republican side, this is -- starting on the republican side, a member from illinois. -- witchhunt for donald trump when there is an energy crisis, 40-year high inflation, and a brick of nuclear are being get in and world war. i miss president trump and the america first agenda.

andy dick's, the illegitimate january 6 committee vote is a political hatchet job. this committee is diligently -- illegitimate, and it is organized to search and destroy political enemies. republican from california saying i cannot get excited about the season finale of the january 6 committee when the show is about to be canceled. a democrat saying when donald trump shriveled away to watch the catastrophe caused on tv, speaker pelosi stood tall and took charge. never forget her courage or the president's cowardice. senator chris van hollen of maryland tweeted yesterday, trump loves to talk but never after raising his right hand and being sworn in after penalty of perjury. this is the right move. one more from a democratic congress woman, saying i

strongly agree with the decision to subpoena trump. we know he has a history of dismissing subpoenas and believing he is above the law, but this must be on the record. the evidence clearly shows his role before, during, and after january 6. if you missed any of the hearing yesterday, you can go to our website at c-span.org. you can watch that, about two and a half hours, the hearing, it is on our homepage page of our website, c-span.org. carolyn waiting in vincent, ohio, democrat. what did you think about yesterday's hearing? caller: i didn't see much of it. but i do have an answer to your question, and it may be just coincidental. but former officer michael put known -- the former officer, he was on one of the stations and i have no idea which station, but

they asked him what i think is a very important question, what did he think about the january 6 committee, did they do what the officers wanted to find out? and he did say something about trump. so i am wondering, you know, that that was left dangling and he was not taking responsibility, etc., etc. but i will say that i think it was jamie raskin, he said that the committee was for -- to help the police officers, which i agree wholeheartedly, wholeheartedly, and for the american people, too, but for the officers. i saw every single thing that went down on january 6, and i am still having problems seeing what happened to that young

lady. they showed everything. they don't show it anymore. but wow, did they show everything, and i had never seen something like that happen in my life, and i am a senior citizen. so i can only imagine how those officers have posttraumatic stress disorder, etc., etc., from all that, because wow, that was way too much. so i am glad that the officers are definitely top priority. and i did watch all of the officers' testimony and most of the testimony from those young ladies. so proud, so proud of them. host: you mentioned the officers, several of them in the room yesterday for that ninth hearing by the january 6 committee, including michael for known, he mentioned. michael fonone on what

happened. called "hold the line." this is the cover of the book. this is charles in fort collins, colorado, republican. did you watch yesterday. caller: i am an independent. i heard something on npr when i was driving to work and stuff, and this is how i think of it, trump sits here and says all this stuff, if he thinks he is innocent, if this is a political hack job, great, get on the stand under subpoena, under oath, and then prove that this is a political hack job. i'll bet anybody out there $100 he is not even going to get close, close to accepting that subpoena. he is going to shell out bs like a feedlot farmer and say it is a witchhunt and all this stuff.

just smoke and mirrors. host: we might find out more about what the former president is going to do when it comes to the subpoena. he has promised an 8:00 a.m. response to yesterday's hearing, although he responded quite a bit on his trump social page yesterday. so we do not know if that response is going to come in the form of a video, in the form of another statement. but we are expecting that at 8:00 a.m. eastern. any predictions of what he might say? caller: he is going to say it is a witchhunt and all this and just shell out a bunch of bs. and he will not go under oath. i guarantee you, john, he will not go under oath. there is no way. if he does, he is in serious trouble. perjury and stuff. and he is not going to do that. he is going to sit out on truth social and shell out on this crap and sale this stuff, but

he will never go under oath. i guarantee it. i bet $100. host: this is dolores in alexandria, virginia, independent. go ahead. caller: i watched it. and i was appalled all over again. and i'm watching these elections around the country and thinking, how can these people in these various states vote for people who are election deniers? listening to some of these people who watched nancy pelosi back for help from the governor of virginia, from the governor of maryland, and they still blame her for this awful spectacle that we had to see. i am just amazed at how we can all see something and come away with totally different viewpoints of what is going on.

host: do you see anything in the timing of the hearing? this could be the final hearing, although there could be a hearing after the election, or if democrats hold a house, there could be several more hearings. did you see anything in the timing of these hearings coming just a couple weeks before the midterm elections? caller: absolutely. i think they did this for political impact and trying to affect the elections. i don't blame them for that, because i think we are right on the prep assists -- precipice of losing the democracy that we bragged about all of our lives. and they are saying this might be the last one because if the democrats don't hold the house, republicans are not going to allow any more hearings to take place. host: what do you say to the callers who will say this whole thing is political, all the hearings are political? there have been callers over the

course of the nine hearings you have called in and said that what would you say to them? caller: that they are bringing you the facts. if you want to say it is all politics, so be it, but had they brought you anything that was not true? did you learn anything from this? we saw what happened on the sixth of january, and we set at our tv's with our mouth dropped thinking, what is going on? so i think these hearings are critical. i think we, as a country, needed to see what was behind this. i am so happy that biden rescued us from this man who would go this far to protect his personal interests. host: independent from alexandria, virginia. taking you back to the newspapers today, "wall street journal," often a critic of democratic policies or democratic actions on capitol

hill, their editorial board, i should say, often a critic. but this is one of their lead editorials today, headline, what the january 6 inquiry accomplished. they say it has accomplished cementing the facts surrounding mr. trump's recklessness after november 3 and the dereliction of duty on january 6. the justice department and mr. trump's own campaign repeatedly told him that his fraud claims were without basis. whether it was willful oneness or intentional strategy, he kept repeating them. they said the january 6 probably will not get mr. trump under oath, but the evidence of his bed behavior is now so convincing that political accountability hardly requires it. that is from the editorial board of the "wall street journal." this is linda in mississippi, you are next. caller: good morning. about that january 6 committee

you know, in that photograph of man's -- with nancy pelosi begging for help from anyone, the governor, the mayor, and, you know, steve scalise was in the room with her with a mask on but came out and told a lie, like, you know, no one knew what nancy was doing, where was she, and they did not ask the question, and he was one of the ones in the room with her. that is the problem, john. republicans are constantly lying to their republican constituency . they run to fox and submit these

lies. as liz cheney said yesterday, if you don't have accountability, meaning donald trump, the next president to do this and he might be a democrat and he would steal the election just like trump tried to do. host: that was the most interesting thing for you yesterday? those videos, seeing the republican members of congress in those idiots, mitch mcconnell, john thun -- seeing the republican members of congress in those videos, mitch mcconnell, john thune, steve scalise? caller: this is our democracy. if you cannot depend on representatives to tell the people the truth, what do we have? host: go ahead.

caller: republicans are putting election deniers and to position. next time, our democracy will not hold. it is fragile. it is a fragile document, and these republicans are all about money power, not about constitution and not about the people. host: that video showing the leadership that was evacuated during january 6 to a separate location. of course, we know other members of congress were in their offices, senators and some members trapped on the floor of the house until they were evacuated. but that core leadership on capitol hill evacuated to fort mcnair in washington, d.c. for those who do not live in washington, d.c., here is a map. at the top here, the national mall in green. top across here, the capitol right here at the east end of

the national mall. fortman mcnair is down at the southern tip -- fort mcnair is done at the southern tip of washington, d.c., where the rivers come together. that is where the leadership team was transported to. and you saw during that video, nancy pelosi on the phone trying to get congress to reconvene at the capitol that also some discussion about possibly reconvening members of congress on january 6 down at fort mcnair if they cannot reconvene at the capitol. they were transported across town, down to the southern tip of the this is gail in new york, line for democrats. good morning. caller: good morning. thanks for taking my call. you know, the last election two years ago when biden was made president, i was so happy. but i was also discouraged because there were so many

people that voted for trump, and it made me disheartened. and the last couple years with the republicans denying and buying this steel -- that the election was stolen, i was just disheartened. i am 78 years old and from a family where my father and my uncle were in the second world war, and they both died within two weeks of one another. so i grew up with a family who had said to me it is very important, we lost our sons and grandsons and whatnot and make sure you vote, make sure you are a concerned citizen. so all i can say is i am so grateful for the committee. they made we so proud. they restored my confidence. i am just so indebted to those

people that put all this work into telling us what has happened, and they are making it come to light and maybe people will start to understand how horrible what happened the last couple of years and how our democracy can be stolen so easily. so i am just grateful to the committee. and thank you for listening to me. host: this is jason in liberty, south carolina, republican. caller: good morning. i want to start by making a suggestion to you guys. seeing as how you guys left to step to the -- stick to the liberal talking points in your liberal media post, why don't you invite alan dershowitz on, the harvard law investor, a former liberal hero who was on newsmax last night stating that it was, in fact, a kangaroo court and that jamie raskin is a former student of his and

absolutely knows better. second point is, it is not a bipartisan committee because kevin mccarthy did not appoint any of the so-called republicans on that committee. they were all chosen by nancy pelosi. one more point before you hang up on me, you guys ran the january 6 committee on a loop all day yesterday. i want to know why you guys do not cover the daily press briefing at the white house. why do you, as a democrat, tried to hide your hero joe biden from the world? why do you try to smash the fact that he has zero control of his faculties? why don't you put alan dershowitz on your show and let him take phone calls? second point, there is a newspaper called "revolver news" who has done more investigation into january 6 then all of your

so-called media outlets combined. have you ever quoted anything from their page, sir? no, you haven't. thank you. have a good day. host: alan dershowitz has been on c-span some 41 times over the years. that is his page at c-span.org. you can check it out. i am sure he will be on at some point again in the future. yes, we do cover the daily press briefings. if you missed yesterday's, c-span.org is also where you go and you can watch that, as well, and you can go through all of them. c-span cameras always there at those daily press briefings. this is dale charlotte,, north carolina, independent. caller: good morning. how are you, sir? host: doing well. go ahead. caller: i just want to say that i am 60 years old and my father fought in a couple wars for the united states, some of my other family members. and i never seen anything more

horrific in my whole entire life . and i also want to say that donald trump should be prosecuted and put under the jail for the lies and the commercialism of misrepresentation, of what our flag represents, and what we stand for. because this is not a republican or a democrat thing at this time. at this point, to me, it is an american thing and people should stop trying to find petty issues just and on when a person has committed such horrific crimes on our country possibly half. that is all i want to say, and you guys have a great day. host: larry, new jersey, independence. good morning. caller: yeah, good morning. a few things.

i see you fact-check individuals after they hang up. what you just said about the person calling in about alan dershowitz coming in, you should have cut him off right then and there and said, yes, they do come in. secondly, when anybody calls in and says that nancy pelosi is in charge of the capitol, will you please put up on your screen -- would you please put up on your screen that under two u.s. codes , 1901, she is not in charge of the u.s. capitol security, no more than mitch mcconnell is. there is a sergeant in arms for the senate and a surgeon in arms for the house. start fact checking people midterm before -- host: the capitol police award which controls security on capitol hill, it is a few

surgeon arms and a member of the capitol police board, the speaker is the one who takes the house sergeant at arm's and the majority leader takes the -- picks the senate sergeant in arms. i believe it is a presidential appointment, so that is the group in charge of security on capitol hill. caller: so when people do call in saying nancy pelosi let this happen, you should post it on the screen, whether than just elaborating on it like you just did. put it on the screen so before people other -- utter a lie, put it on the screen, u.s. code 2-1 901. then people, before you open your mouth and talk -- not you -- just speak the truth to people and fact-check them when you can. host: this is lisa in lexington park, maryland, democrat. caller: good morning. i fully agree with that gentleman that just hung up.

i am frustrated and tired of these republicans who call themselves republicans and support donald trump but call actual republicans who do not leave -- who do not agree with him rinos. there republican in name only. it is demeaning, to be honest. i agree about the nancy pelosi issue. they do it all the time. one lady called in and specifically said that c-span said that nancy pelosi was responsible for that. it was not you. it was on a different day. they do it all the time. the gentleman that called in prior to the gentleman is not yelling at c-span for not having daily press briefing.

google what c-span is, why we have c-span. they have daily press briefing and will stop any show to show you the daily press briefing. we have google machines, people. we can get the facts if we want it. he was talking about alan dershowitz not being on your program, he has been on your program many times over and over. there is a reason he is on newsmax. host: so what are your thoughts on yesterday's hearing? let's look at the topic at hand. what did you take away from it? caller: i have been so frustrated. i was actually surprised at -- watching all of them prior to yesterday, it was gut wrenching to see that we got so far, so far, that this man has so much control of so many levers that he can't do this. but yesterday, they show just how terrifying it really was for

the members. second of all, can you just imagine what the police officers, the capitol police, all of these people that was standing guard was going through? third, we came so close to losing our democracy. think about it, people. i mean, to simplify it, i think it is, like the lady that said what if it was a democrat, they sit there, and he can put whatever he wants at 8:00, republicans, but guess what, he is not standing in front of the united states people and putting up his hand and swearing. host: lisa referring to the former president donald trump has promised a reaction, a statement on yesterday's hearing at 8:00 today. if and when he puts that up, we

will bring it to you. we will continue to take your calls, your reaction to yesterday's hearing, in the first two hours of the program today. plenty of time to talk about it if and when he does. in missouri, diane, republican. good morning. caller: good morning. i am calling because this committee is one-sided. like you say, kevin mccarthy, he wanted two people that the democrats refused to let on. they let this woman who completely based her testimony, or whatever, on hearsay. and we are to believe that.

i mean, i cannot imagine donald trump trying to go over and take the wheel from the driver of this car. that just doesn't happen. yet, it is always focused one-sided, without any really truth or anything about it. host: have you learned anything over nine hearings? is there anything you have learned, anything you will take away from this investigation? caller: yes. it is how the left really hates trump. they make up these stories like russian collusion and stuff, and they just want to have it their way. on top of that, democracy, these people calling in, look at everything that biden has taken away.

and the democrats, because they run everything right now. they don't bring that up or they don't bring up how unsteady biden is. trump can do two hours of talking at a rally, and biden can't even talk for maybe 10 minutes without screwing up. host: diane in missouri this morning. one of the revelations from yesterday's hearing was on the intelligence that the u.s. secret service had ahead of january 6. as the "washington post" puts it, more details on trump's early knowledge of the violence in the records, they write, likely to be a significant focus. they were a big part of the focus yesterday. here is committee member adam schiff, democrat of california, talking about it. [video clip] >> on january 6, the president

senior advisers at the department of justice and fbi, for example, received an intelligence summary that included material indicating that certain people traveling to washington were making plans to attack the capitol. this summary noted online calls to occupy federal buildings, rhetoric about invading the capitol building, and plans to arm themselves and to engage in political violence at the event. other agencies are also hearing predictions suggesting possible violence at the capitol. on a call to president trump's white house national security staff early january 2021, the deputy secretary of defense had warned about the potential that the capitol would be the target of the attack. here is general mark milley, who was also present for this call, describing the deputy secretary's morning. >> so during these calls, i only

remember in hindsight because it was almost like clairvoyant, norquist says during one of these calls, the greatest threat is a direct assault on the capitol. >> this email was an alert that the secret service received on december 24 with the heading, armed and ready, mr. president. according to the intelligence, multiple users online were targeting members of congress, instructing others to march into the chambers on january 6 and make sure they know who to fear. in this report received on december 26, the secret service field office relayed it to perceived by the fbi, according to the source of the tip, the proud boys planned to march armed to the and they think they will have a large enough group to march into d.c. armed, the source reported, and will

outnumber the police so they can't be stopped. the source went on to say their plant is literally kl people -- their plan is terally kill people. please, please, take this tip seriously and investigate further. the soce also made clear that the proud boys had detailed their plans on multiple websites, like thedonald.win. let's pause. the secret service had advanced information within 10 days beforehand regarding the proud boys planning for january 6. we know now that the proud boys and others did lead the assault on our capitol building. host: that from yesterday's january 6 committee hearing. it is the ninth and possibly final hearing, just over two hours, close to two and a half hours long yesterday. and we are getting your reaction to all of it this morning on the "washington journal." republicans, (202) 748-8001. democrats, (202) 748-8000.

independents, (202)748-8002. we will go to pell city, alabama, randy, good morning. caller: yes, i learned from all of them things -- i am a democrat, have been for 63 years, but i learned from all of these hearings that i will never, never pull another level -- another lever for a democrat as long as i live. the democrats done lost their damn and eight got no sense. i will never vote for another one of them. host: did you vote for joe biden? caller: hell no. host: did you vote for hillary clinton? caller: i have not voted for a democrat since barack obama's second term. i would never vote for another. i give them up. i will never vote for a democrat

again for nothing, local, federal, or dog catcher. i would never vote for another democrat. it would suit me to divide this country up again, make two countries, give the democrats their northern states. south take it back over and be done with it. host: this is sarah in humble, texas. independent. caller: yes, i was calling about the video you showed of nancy pelosi calling for the national guard from virginia and maryland. i want to say that it one thing they have been talking about forever is the fact that nancy pelosi had not called for help, and this video that her daughter

took, just happened to show up all of a sudden -- host: do you think the video is fake? caller: yes. i was calling about the video. host: we got your point. in the future, it is better if you turn down your television. it is easier to have the conversation. stephen in virginia, democrat. good morning. caller: good morning. i want to share that we can all look at the same thing and take different positions. i think that is exactly what is not happening. i think you should get rid of the republican, democratic, and independent lines and put on news sources. if someone is listening to cnn and nbc, dine up a line, if there listening -- call on a line. if it is public radio, another one. and they are only watching fox

or newsmax all they're saying is, we know what they are not seeing. they are not seeing the facts. yesterday, the person, four or five republicans called up and assaulted her about bias and i love when they call into you guys and they talk about your bias and then they say well i can't say what it is. it's invisible but i you have. this news source thing is really more important. even more important than the person try to facilitate the cause what do you think about yesterday? the purpose is to give you guys a forum to react. the key here is to make it about you. there are so many programs based out of the city that focus on the person in the chair and that is not what we are trying to do. caller: when they say a boldface

lie, they repeat the facts that are totally false. 170 fact-checks and they get angry at the person. they just cannot even, they just can't process the truth. host: what'd you take away from yesterday? the actual event that we are talking about? caller: the actual event we are talking about is the fact that, you know, everybody is set in their ways and what they do at the hearing is really great. it's not a hearing, they are just try to find the facts. this is a fact-finding mission. they weren't going to get to the facts, it would have been grandstanding just like ghazi. -- benghazi. host: over the course of nine hearings and however many hours it's been, do you think any minds have changed from the first hearing to the last hearing?

do you think there were people who believed one thing that were in another place now? what were the points of these hearings? caller: ok, so they changed very few minds. all are set and i do believe that you're out out too long and they should have just, they really should just watch fox news and then go point to make sure they are delineating, they are clearly putting facts out there and they didn't do that. they are overly great, those skies are great but they really meandered on this. this video clips, they didn't have -- they didn't save any time. all those republican code liz cheney said it right. they all work for the guy. host: for the folks who have called and tweeted and said they're just doing this a couple

weeks before the election because they want to influence the midterms, what do you think of those? caller: i'd say that's, i don't think that's the case. i think it your on because there is so much evidence. i think they made the evidence on the bid to impeachment they should have done this in the first place and just brought it into focus for the facts. host: should they have subpoenaed donald trump back in may or june or july? as opposed to october 13? caller: like i said they drew this out way too long. one thing about the subpoena haven't you already asked somebody to testify by the time you send them a subpoena? host: say that again? caller: isn't a subpoena at last resort? don't you ask them first are you going to testify? i don't think they just jumped to a subpoena. trump had all the time he needed to get in front of this committee. he won't get in front of the committee.

but they did tried out too long. i just think they are trying to, they are doing the right thing. but the facts are not what is going to drive the country. people don't vote on facts anymore they vote on what they see on newsmax and fox nobody watches cnn or cnbc anyway. where is all the misinformation other than the on source. host: were you get your information from? caller: i listen to c-span. and i do a lot of bbc. and washington post. you know, i subscribe to ground news and they give you all the different headlines and they try to tell you who is covering and not covering things. i'm too much of a news junkie and i go all over. it's hard to watch some of the things. host: it sounds like you don't have a high opinion of fox or newsmax. do you go over there and check

in over there to see what they are writing about? host: i got to the fox news website. and i peru's i don't watch the channel anymore. i do watch, again when i will go to these new sources busy with the cover. i will say i don't watch newsmax or oann. i get a lot of that from your show here. when they: i know who they are listening to. i get most of my news from c-span. host: do you find it helpful to listen to colors that you disagree with? caller: if i disagree with a caller they are misinformed i have no problem debating but when they are, this hopeless and thing that you guys just went on -- trump never ordered, he never

asked for that. he mentioned it in the conversation if that. they're not even sure he did that. pelosi denied trump this 20,000 guards, that didn't happen. these things just didn't happen so how do you debate someone that puts out facts that didn't happen? host: we use to debate, we used to have better debates? caller: 30 years ago you had the pbs newshour, the government was watching over for fairness, you had a little bit of a chance with others as well. the new space of -- the newspapers were better you didn't have been pitted against each other. then you didn't have the stuff going on. was into what he said yesterday.

it's crazy. host: the former president said again yesterday i think i want to for social media posts that he did want them there and placed the blame on pelosi so the former president saying that yesterday. the little fact is one of the fact checking organizations. back earlier in august, dated -- they did this fact-check. there is no record of the former president authorizing or requesting national guard troops for the capitol on january 6. they said they never heard trump request national guard support before or during the attack. only to the president, if such a request had been made they did not have to have authority, they

would not have had the authority to deny that. so the little fact fact checked that. we saw on the post yesterday that the former president said he wanted the troops there. caller: the thing is have him come in front of the committee under oath and make the same statement. it's not going to happen because, even if he did his over a coffee table while he is watching fox. jose both get troops in there. he knew it was going to be a big show. he used the word peaceful. it was 12 minutes, 15 minutes into the thing so he only used it once and it was part of the speech and he went off on this rift and he used the word fight like 40 times. all these people talking about, again they get their news from a source that just is misinformation. i read that simple that affect ash a lot of factp --olitifact

weird host: dan is in michigan. caller: [indiscernible] host:. i have trouble with some of those in wisconsin. caller: why did they wait that long before they subpoenaed donald trump and the one thing i was thinking about was i think that was smart if at all but i thought it was smart he was openly downplaying january 6 situation and denying involvement and all that but i

think them getting the witness, the statements and a lot of that video and like steve bannon, where they had that clip of him talking we ahead of time about they were going to deny the results if he lost and what was going to happen. and then the clip from roger stone or about him saying even if he visits he's going to say he won and possession is 9/10 of the law, whatever. i think by them getting all the witnesses statements, getting who could come and who would come and testify and give a statement and getting all the information and then ended up with, ok, subpoenaed donald trump and see what he's going to say. i think they already figured

he's not going to come and testify or give a statement. he already opening -- openly denied all that. they knew there was a going to be anything coming from him. i think from the clips, the video and especially the clip of roger stone and steve bannon and what they are saying ahead of time, i think that pretty much is enough evidence if you were in a court of law it's not but if you were in there was that much evidence, i think the person would be found guilty. host: you talked about some of the clips, new footage aired by the committee yesterday but also yesterday, new footage not aired by the committee. cnn yesterday evening airing their exclusive footage as they put it from a documentary

filmmaker alexandria pelosi on january 6, here is the clip that seen in aired last night. [video clip] >> walked onto the capital. mike pence is going to have to come through for us. and if he doesn't, that will be a sad day for our country. >> they are marching now. you can see them marching now. they told him they don't have the resources. he is not coming but that could change. they've been waiting for this.

going to pension out, go to jail and be happy. host: airing that footage leslie. we are taking your calls asking for your reaction to yesterday's ninth and possibly final january 6 committee hearing. the numbers are on your screen we can talk about it. we will continue to talk about it. we were expecting new reaction from former president trump truth social media account on yesterday's hearing he tweeted, or he posted through social place last night -- late last night that we would hear from him we will keep an eye out for it and bring it to you when he does. that was just two minutes before midnight that he was posting something this morning at 8:00 a.m. so we will see what he puts out. this is the line for

republicans, anton from florida. caller: i watched this michael the others before. my only uplifting moment was when i heard people yelling usa, usa. there was a segment a few years ago 67% at the time, this year less than 34% it seems like this great country is sad. it was a great country. that's pretty much all i have to say. host:anton why do you think the numbers have changed so much? caller: i am a refugee from a communist country. a large part of my family. so i not -- know a lot about

this stuff. i see this country going through a communist dictatorship. the inflation numbers came out. biden is responsible, nobody else. we could be self-sufficient. we have the oil, food, everything. but they are globalists. maybe they hate america. host: do you mind seeing what country you came from? caller: i was born during a war. i am old man. my family, they called it workers paradise in east germany. i tried to visit. or forget i was interrogated for four hours. it's a long story. i love the country. you know, i have been here for a

fun time. i have been all over the world, actually. host: are you so proud to be an american? caller: i hope we can right the wrongs. i hope we don't become a communist country. look at venezuela. these people who call in in they don't understand what it means to be, to go too far to the left. like east germany they have to produce, the state controls everything. they produce 3000 pairs of shoes but only for the right foot, things like that. american citizen. i'm fine. i hope the country survives. i really do. somebody mentioned it today, the lady yesterday you had on, i watched c-span for at least 30 years probably since the beginning.

the lady, i didn't know she goes on msnbc and does speeches. this lady, i don't know why you keep her. host: we have a lot of confidence in all of our moderators to moderate a conversation to allow you to speak and express your views because there are a lot of places where people can go and just hear from commentators. we bring folks that we think can moderate a conversation and do a good job in of argue to talk. so we were happy for all of our folks who sit in this chair because it's not an easy job thanks for the call. i do want to bring up the hope that you were referring to, the pride in being an american. it is a gallup poll i think is the one you were talking about. we have talked about it before on this program. you can see the green lines at

the top those who are extremely very proud to be in american, the blue line below it those saying they are extremely, just extremely proud to be in american. the numbers reaching heights of 70 and i 60's back in the early years period those numbers following -- falling over the years just 38% of respondents saying they are extremely proud to be american. again,.com is where you can go for that. back to your phone calls. this is stephen. caller: great show. i just wanted to ask a question. i used to be a limousine driver. way back in the 80's i used to take them to studio 54. at that time we used to get no

problem. they were nice people. one thing i didn't know -- host: you were the driver? caller: yes i was the driver. east coast limo. on 54th, east 54th street and hatton. we get donald trump in the car and he would like take over. he, he had to read the car. their job was to go in and bamboozle everybody who came in underneath the club. you can ask like a coherent about that. you can check that fact. there are a lot of people who want him sued. host: related to january 6, we are far left field of that. caller: ok we are going back to this. on the protesters, they are

talking about how, why, you know, like the freedom of the press was attacked. my question is was at c-span there? because everybody loves c-span. those guys are going to set up there and attack you guys, you know what i mean? what are you trying to do? stop all freedom of the press? that is the most important thing. if they attack c-span they attack all of the freedom this country stands for which is freedom of the press, right? we don't need the republicans are all those other groups settled with them. host: stephen in georgia. anderson in north carolina, republican good morning. caller: last comment there, yes freedom of speech, can i not

speak out as a republican and not be called a white supremacist and communist? but anyway, the january 6 hearing they are showing that early morning, late night. they are doing everything they can, pulling everything out of their hat to try to destroy mr. trump who is not a perfect man as none of us are. we are all sinners, right? ok. the day that happens, the insurrection, those security guys, those capitol police stood back, those doors open, a pristine think there a lot of them with their hands in their pockets. you have one person, one person shot to death.

why, why weren't so many, why weren't all those people shot to death coming in that building? something doesn't smell right. if i was mr. trump, i wouldn't answer to any of them. fact check. we see what's going on in this country. we can't even buy a roast for under $20. our gas is high. they are bringing in immigrants taking our houses before us citizens. that is a fact check. not watching fox, not watching cnn, it's what we are seeing every day in our lives. but we are having to go through gas, all of that. and, nancy pelosi, i would love to punch her in the face. host: all right. we will hold off on violence.

we are not going to do that here. we want to have a productive conversation and those comments are harmful. democrat from new york, good morning. caller: hello, good morning, john. i want to say i watched c-span quite a bit through the years and you do a good job. i want to thank you for that. a lot of people call in and say the worst things. anyway, i'm a little nervous so i'm probably going to stutter a little bit. anyway, i wanted to say you had a call just a little while ago. the guy was on for a very long time and i find that sometimes it's unfair that some people get cut off and other people are let to go on for so long. that's just something i wanted to let you know that makes me feel really sad.

sometimes people are saying. factual things into important things and they get cut off. ok, so i have been a lifelong democrat and i just wanted to say that the committee hesitant a great job. i think they should actually continue. i think there is a law or facts that they should be sharing with the public. especially with the issue with the secret service. all these things that were deleted, without this technology that we had host: been a cadet back? the only thing that concerns me is the for the national guard not to have them come in. i remember it was like a year ago, i can't remember who was talking about it but they were saying that flint's brother, i think he is in the national guard and he put orders not to allow them to come in if you

could look into that. but obviously somebody was not allowing that protection to happen. that is something the committee should expand on. host: that is faye in new york. this is ryan, good morning. caller: good morning, john. i was just calling in, i appreciate the show. it's a good one today. this whole thing, we have all these people for liz cheney. her father was a real war criminal. the whole process is totally political. it's right before the midterms. they are trying to get the gas reserves, trying to release more gas. the oil reserves and stuff. totally political. i don't know, i think it's

beating a dead horse. i think trump was bad, it made his supporters look bad. one person was killed, it was one of the protesters. it wasn't like this army attacked the capital. they need to kind of keep it in perspective. this is like, there is a lot of crazy stuff going on, the pipeline getting plan up and stuff like that. i think this has been just total political theater. host: this is pam, dixon, tennessee. good morning. caller: i, john. this is one of the crazy things that has been going on. no, this wasn't insurrection to try to stop the election, the will of the american people. it wasn't a protest. it wasn't insurrection, it needs to be called that. the committee has done a good job presenting facts that will

go down in history books. we are not sure get who will be writing the history books which is a little scary. which are not it will talk about the glorious rise of alone dictatorship which is what he wants. i have a couple of questions, why are people who are election deniers about to run for public office? they can't even pledge allegiance to the republic for which it stands because they are trained to overturn democracy. so people who are election deniers are in fact part of the 45's movement to overturn democracy and usurp the will of the people. these people should not be of to run for office because they are clearly running for office to be able to allow another president or perhaps this one again to change the will of the people and destroy democracy.

what is it that the supporters want? do they even know? i understand being disenfranchised with the government. i am too. but do they realize that mr. trump wants to become a dictator? that is what he has always wanted. that is the point of all of this. do they realize that is what they are supporting? otherwise what is it they want? if you want to destroy democracy, what are you going to replace it with? so will somebody please get on the phone, ring the alarms and do not let these election deniers run for office. they are not americans. i think the committee has done a wonderful job of presenting facts. facts are things that are backed up. there's witnesses and legal documents. host: is there any other view that you think if somebody holds in this country it makes them not an american? caller: any other view besides

destroying democracy? host: is there anything else that has come up over the years that you, that makes you feel the same way? that you feel you should be barred from running for office and you are not american? caller: i remember kennedy's assassination, so many bad things killing college students at penn state. but now i don't think so. i think destroying democracy is the one thing. if you want to destroy democracy you are not an american and you should not have the right to vote american or to run for office at least. people are walking to their private opinion but as far as running for office so you can change the law to support the destruction of democracy, that should not be allowed. host: him in tennessee. this is tonya fredericksburg, genia.

that morning, you are next. caller: good morning, c-span. i have to say i watched for hours on january 6. and, you know, i have to say i am disgusted that veterans and former police officer's were involved in this debacle. i also want to say that nancy pelosi is a boss in her high heels in 80 plus years. it is disgusting to see people call her and disparage this woman who was doing her job on that day. i am also proud she was working with mike pence to try to get some help on that day. so people need to open their eyes. this woman was doing a fantastic job. she is still doing a fantastic job and she has more spine that the former guy who presented in the white house.

i want to say, people, open your eyes and get out and vote. especially in this november 8 election. it is your duty to get out and vote and put the right people into the white house and also don't put these election deniers. especially women. host: got your point. you talk about some of that video that we got to see speaker pelosi and other numbers of the leadership reacting that day after they had been whisked away to a secure location. it was the speakers daughter who was with her that day, documentary filmmaker. she shot most of that new video please during yesterday's hearing here is a bit more of it. [video clip] >> usa. usa. . usa. >> we need them there now.

whatever you got. we also have troops. >> all right. thank you. >> active duty, national guard. how soon can you have them? >> i don't want to speak for them. leadership is responsible for executing the operation. ask just for a minute [indiscernible] or some other entity that was under siege. get people there.

[crowd shouting] >> we said we have to expedite this. and hopefully that can be, the rest of the state. wishes to do it at the capital, but we are being told very directly is is going to take days for the capital to be ok again. defecation and all that kind of thing. that's part of the cleanup. i think it was more from a security standpoint to make sure everybody is out of the building. >> i just got off the phone with

the vice president. >> he said he had the impression that they want everybody back to do it there is that we are kidding a counterpoint that it can take time to clean up the pooh-pooh that they're making literally and figuratively they are making at the capital. ask him at the capitol building i'm literally standing with the u.s. capitol police. what you all here through official channels we will inform you that the misinformation is they believe that the house and the senate will be able to be roughly an hour.

>> thank you very much. host: this video you just saw senator chuck schumer to get president trump to call off the riders. of course acting ag resident did try to take on the government as many other officials by congressional leadership recognized on a bipartisan basis that president trump was the only person who could get the mop to end the violence each at the congress, leave the capital and go home. host: that is more from yesterday's hearing and you can watch it in its entirety at c-span.org. it is just after 8:30 on this friday morning. beautiful day on capitol hill. live shot of the united states capital. we have been taking your calls

on this first hour and half of our program. we are going to keep continuing to take your call. all of the phone numbers are on your screen, let us know your thoughts on the committee hearing. as you continue to call and keep me updated on some of the other stories that we have been talking about on this program. some major stories from yesterday, the inflation number coming out yesterday. the front page of the wall street journal, the labor department said on thursday consumer price index rose 6% in september from a year earlier that is the biggest increase since august of 1982. the increase 6.3%. the stocks chirping yesterday morning and then surging yesterday afternoon. the top half of this morning focusing on the inflation number , stock market reaction.

also, yesterday we learned that social security checks are set to grow in the coming years. the check will grow 8.7 percent bigger in the year 2023. it is the biggest cost-of-living adjustment in four decades. that announcement from the social security administration. the extra funds will provide for the social security recipients who have already been stretched thin by hot inflation rates. it is good to ensure to keep up with inflation. it is tied to the average inflation for august and september. the price index for urban wage earners and clerical workers, it was a .2% in september. that is how that number is calculated. back to former president trump, they -- but not particularly the january 6 hearing this action coming from one of the other buildings here on capitol hill

the supreme court yesterday rejected, without comment, failed to restore the master general masters power. the removal of prosecutors to proceed with what they say is the most serious part of a national security investigation over the records taken from the white house. there was no explanation as is typical the usa today, the wall street journal rights when it comes to these kind of matters, the special master was appointed last month after mr. trump's attorneys argued that former president potentially retained privileges that could allow him to deny investigators access to at least some of the materials. the government is appealing the special master appointment but at the circuit court for remission for their investigation to proceed.

back to your phone calls. about 20 minutes left in this segment we continue to get your reaction to yesterday's january 6 hearing. we want to hear your thoughts. the phone lines for republicans, democrats, and independents. peter in new york go ahead. caller: i just want to say upfront i did not watch the hearings i believe it's theater. a couple of points. the videos that you were selling, they edited out the part where trump said we are going to march to the capital and he said we are going to protest, patriotically and peacefully. they conveniently left that out. in addition, nancy pelosi minority leader mccarthy wanted to put jim banks and jim jordan on that committee to be

adversarial to get the other point of view and nancy pelosi said no. she put kinzinger and cheney on their because both of them are anti-trump. number two, the video that you were showing with nancy pelosi and the rest of them, that was after the fact. after the fact. not before. she was never in there to testify on what she did that day. now, in addition to that, as patel -- cash patel who was in the room when he authorized the national guard 20,000 troops. i don't know if he testified or didn't testify. that you can look up. but he said that president trump authorized it and that nancy pelosi and muriel bowser said they did not want that.

nancy pelosi was never asked to testify as far as i understand. also, it was my understanding that originally they said there was no intel that there was going to be any problem on that day. now they are saying there is. i don't know who's telling the truth. but this is what was reported in the media as far as i can understand. host: with all your interest in this topic and looking in the media, why not watch the hearing yourself? caller: i'm a busy man, number one. and, number two, it's all negative. if there is going to be a fair hearing you have to have both sides. and what i see the weight this is being conducted particularly with adam shift, adam shift for the last five years was coming all the time and think trump was this there is evidence about collision with russia. now it all came out that it was

all a lie. in fact, you should be covering the fact that mr. dan chanko is on trial. and all that evidence is coming out that this was a collision. what i believe, john, i actually believe that they allow this to happen. because they did not want the preceding as it was originally intended to go on. and they were successful in doing that. so i think they wanted this to happen because they wanted to stop what was being done in congress. why would he -- host: when you say they, you say democrats didn't want the certification? caller: now, they wanted the certification, they wanted to stop the preceding as far as the controversial whether or not it was legitimate.

what they per supposed to be conducting was that these states like georgia for instance, the supreme court in the state court of the judges in georgia changed the rules as far as the election was concerned, how it was conducted. which was illegitimate and the republicans in the president wanted governor kemp to send back, reinstate the legislature to reevaluate how they counted the votes. that is what they wanted pence to do because under the role of 1887 the vice president can send the slate back to the state and have them reevaluate whether or not it was done legitimately. the court said no they didn't want to do that because they had no standing. host: that is peter this morning

about 15 minutes left. good morning. caller: good morning, john. thank you to c-span. i have to commend you. you are a very patient man. in you have been listening to a lot of stuff. i did see the whole hearing. and i was impressed, i was a little disappointed that it seemed a bit rushed and they started getting into, you know, the real causes of why so many things happened. in other words the culprits at the top. a lot of time was spent, i wouldn't say basted on trying to convince people that the insurrection actually did happen and how it happened one we all brought -- watched it in real time. a lot of time was spent on that.

this hearing seemed a bit rushed and it could have been a little, they spent a little more time in going into details about all the different ways that all the players different schemes on how they were going to overturn the election. everyone involved pretty much agreed they were going to do it for you, mr. trump, but it's illegal. host: do you think spending more time would convince more people in this country to change their mind about what happened on january 6? caller: i don't know if it would have changed anyone's mind that i think the facts and details matter. i think it was a bit rushed and not going into more detail explaining each and every scheme that was concocted, how it was concocted, how it was real, and

how it failed. spend a little more time detailing. would it change any men -- anyone's mind? i don't think it would have but it would have made a case for the department of justice to see this and review it themselves and make their own decision on whether they think they have a strong case to indict trump. host: this is alvin in new castle virginia. you are next. caller: yes, i have about four short things to say. i need to go back and start the day he came down the escalator. to show what he went through until this happened. the so-called insurrection. and the other thing is when they talk about calling in the other

branches, why should he have even done that? when they had all those riots, they didn't want to hear that. on many occasions to bring in the national guard and they refused. that's all i had to say. thank you. host: roland in independent. from maryland. good morning. caller: good morning. host: go ahead, sir. caller: i watched it live when it happened. but the thing we keep missing, it's a coup. why do we need president trump

to ask this? why did the police shoot them? why did we drop the ball? it's a coup we should stop using the word insurrection. they try to overthrow the government, period. we saw it live. when this was shown, i thought it was a joke. i thought it was a movie. i thought it was the game of thrones. when it said breaking news, blah blah blah, we thought this would never happen in this country. america is the credo in the world for democracy. had this been any other country, america would go crazy. overthrow the government, come on now.

people that have grown up, the baby boomers, we are getting older. what are we going to tell our children? they could not believe it. my children are current, the youngest is 18. all my four children thought america was cool. they cannot believe they did that. if this can from africa what we you do? it is a coup. i would like to thank you for taking my call. host: previous callers talking about criminal referrals to the justice department. dana milbank in today's washington post, his column saying a criminal referral from the committee that doesn't name the former president that would be criminal. if you want to read his column at the washington post.com.

this is charlotte from north carolina. democrat, good morning. caller: thank you for having me, good morning. when i hear all this, it's clear the insurrection was not staged. this was a group of people that were mad and wanted their way. that's clear and concise. but, i guess i get confused on the contradictions. which is you have a group of people that are fighting the police and basically trying to make something happen from out of nothing and they say it is there inalienable right to do so. and on the others that of that, whenever there was a big movement of people saying that the police are treating them unfairly in a community of black

individuals continuously, it was shot down by those same groups of people and send you are not supporting the police, blue lives matter. so i sometimes wonder how is the contradiction from the republican mass able to handle this division so, i guess without concern? you are now fighting the same thing you did not appreciate before. you did not like like people getting upset about the unfair treatment of over policing they get from their communities and now that you have something you didn't like because you felt like the system has cheated you from getting the president you wanted, you then say it's justified to hate the fbi, is justified to hate the capitol police because this was all staged and those people are

corrupt. but they are not corrupt whenever they are in neighborhoods? i tackle with that perspective and i really wish that a republican individual could really speak on that contradiction on how you have this upset behavior that you have towards police because going against something that you like that you can understand how a demographic that did not want to be over policed wanted it to stop. host: this is patty, connecticut. independent, good morning. caller: good morning. i'm calling because i'm taking count here and there are more democrat calls. you notice how they complement your show. not the republicans and not the independents. but i'm going to say about

nancy, give me time like you did. the thing she did was very good. she and her husband paul did inside trading and became millionaires. that's why she's parked up there. in other thing about the videos. there were many more videos, they said they didn't even want to look at them. they picked and choose what they are going to put out there. i'm sure we would have seen a lot more and as far as "washington journal", i have been watching you for years. and when someone asks ryan a question he said no, i'm not answering. i'm only here to push a button. give me your opinion. and he wasn't sitting there having, you know, talking about lots of different things and asking questions.

another thing, the woman who hosts the show, she was -- it was a weekend. she was giving her view i don't think that's right. there is a lot of things when it republican calls and nonchalantly you can see your right hand going over to the button. there's a lot of things, it's a big change from what i remember. that's all i have. host: we all try to be like ryan lamb, certainly. i think you were just referring to the reporter for the atlanta journal-constitution coverage congress and the appearance you are talking about i think you were talking about some of her coverage just like we invite reporters all the time. caller: she goes on cnn. i mean, come on. we know what cnn is. you can't get any more left than that. it's biased. it is showing bias.

and then there she is on this show pushing the button. it's not right. it really isn't. host: we it compliments and we get criticism from both sides. you're right, we are here to push the button and let you all talk so that is what we will continue to do. this is gene in detroit, michigan. good morning. caller: i just want to say i have been watching the hearings. and i watched it yesterday. and the bottom line is the people are like in two camps. their beliefs are more or less set. what saddens me is that the ones who have justified, have been the ones who work around trump and they are reporting on something soft. in the other thing that has really and me said is that it's

pointed out the lack of spirituality. those who study the word of god in know it no who trump is. he is against the word of god. he is a liar and deceiver. he planned that rally for the day they were supposed to certify. he knew what he was doing. he knows that he lost the election and i believe the people that support him know he lost it. and i just wish they could restore it we talk about being a christian nation that there should be no stores open on sunday. it's a commandment. honor the sabbath day to keep it holy. host: we will stick to january 6. let me try to get karen in in

alabaster, that's alabama. good morning. caller: i just wanted to fact-check to couple things said today. first of all who overseas the capitol police. who was on that board? the sergeant of arms u.s. representative. those people are elected by the members of congress, not by the president. number two, trump did offer to have national guard in the area before january 6 there is a timeline people -- and burial browsers in email he is not requesting other personnel and discourages any other deployment without immediate notification.

if such plans are underway. they do not offer to have national guard troops there why did he send in email? fairly another thing the january 6 committee forgot to ask. two days ago you had a guest on your show, a reporter i think it was from cbs and someone asked him about the video about the police weaving people into the capital he said i never saw that video. that's a complete lie. that is all kinds of video on it. the other thing i wanted to say, i'm not a big fan of alex jones but he has been in the press lately. so somebody wrote a documentary about them or created a documentary about it so i watched it. they have him on a megaphone telling people do not go into the capitol building. don't do it. as a complete set up. and you asked why did, the other thing i want to talk about is

ray. he was on video the night before telling the crowd of protesters, tomorrow were going to go to the capital. were going to jail but, you're going to do it anyway. people were saying no, were not going to do that. the next day the frontline that broke through the frontline there. he was whispering in their ears telling them to do certain things. then he would whisper something to them and go forward. so why in the fact that they have not talked to him at host: our last caller in this last segment of the "washington journal." up next, we will be joined by al schmidt, a member of the committee for safe and secure elections. we will talk about how elections are administered around the country and how they are preparing for next month's midterms. stick around. ♪

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host: our conversation on election security with al schmidt. he is currently a member of the committee for safe and secure elections. he previously served as philadelphia city commissioner. explain what the committee for safe and secure elections is. guest: after the 2020 election, administrators experienced across the country, it became clear both from the election administration standpoint and from a law enforcement standpoint that we needed to build a better relationship between those two communities. election administrators, including myself, and others had it worse than i did, were on the receiving end of an avalanche of threats of violence and worse, targeting myself and my family and my little kids.

before 2020, that had not been as common of an occurrence as we saw that time. because those relationships had never really been built before. we began meeting informally and then formed the committee for safe and secure elections to try to build a partnership between the election administration community and the law enforcement community. host: for folks who do not know your background, when and where were you and election abatis traitor? guest: philadelphia has -- and election administrator? guest: i was the republican city commissioner from 2012 until 2022 and ran, it would have been about 2000 elections during that time. host: when and why were you targeted? guest: in my case, we began

receiving threats before election day. they were pretty generic in nature. corrupt election officials will get what is coming to them, you are what the second amendment is for, you are walking into the lion's den, general hateful things like that. a few days after election day after the former president targeted me by name in a tweet, that is when the threats became much more specific, much more graphic, named my children, provided my home address, pictures of my home, and obviously descriptions of what they were threatening to do to my children if i did not lie about the election. threats like that are intended to coerce and intimidate.

it was important that i keep doing my job, which was to count voters' votes and let law enforcement do their job, which is to protect my family, my colleague and everyone involved in counting the voters' votes. host: what does safe and secure mean for election 2022? guest: one thing that was really lacking was there was no relationship before on the side of election administrators who had never received threats like this before, not knowing what to do with them. there is a report that indicates about 1 in 6 election administrators received threats during that election and half of those did not report them. building this relationship and a cross partisan way will help us

develop solutions to better protect election workers should problems like this occur down the line. by election workers, i do not just mean someone like myself who is running elections. on election day, by far the most important people are your friends and neighbors working the election board at your local precinct in a church basement or a rec center or community center or something like that for a very long day to make sure your votes are counted. it is important we protect them and it is important they feel safe and they be safe. and when unfortunate events like threats occur, they know what to do in the right way to respond. host: from a story earlier this week, a picture of some preparations that are underway for the midtereltions. they write in flagstaff,

arizona, and election office will be barricaded by bulletproof glass and anyone wishing to enter will have to ri a buzzer intel hassey, florida, -- an office conducted active shooter training for its workers and has bullets and bomb resistant glass. in jefferson county, colorado, security guards will be positioned outside of the busiest polling centers. what does that picture tell you about the threat environment right now? guest: the threats are very real. i know philadelphia has taken steps to also help protect the vote counting center and other things like that from any sort of acts of violence. the delicate balance is making

sure you are able to be safe and secure when doing your job, but also to not prevent the transparency of the process. it is important that elections be not only safe and not only fair, but also transparent and done in a bipartisan way. you have to make sure you can protect election workers and counting votes, but at the same time not prevent transparency. when i say the threats are real, in our case in footnote yet, we had two their arranged individuals drive up from virginia with guns on them to go to the convention center to, in their words, prevent some sick tisha's truck load -- ficticious truckload of fake ballots.

they were arrested outfront. they were armed with guns from out of state in philadelphia. they were just found guilty of those charges earlier this week. it is important our federal, state and local law enforcement partners know how to react when threats arrive. when people move from just making threats, as bad as they are, to email, text messages or voicemail or whatever else, when that moves to an area where they are physically acting out as a result of believing whatever they believe from whatever sources they are getting it and crossing over a line to where they are physically taking action. host: do you want law enforcement or an armed guard at polling stations in 2022? guest: no. every jurisdiction in the

country has different laws that control the precincts and voting locations. in philadelphia, the philadelphia police are permitted to be at a polling place unless something occurs, there is a fistfight or the election board or voters call them in and say they are needed, that can otherwise not be there. i am confident in the presence of law enforcement. it is a matter of working with law enforcement before election day to make sure they be aware of the threat environment and to have a plan in place for what you do should it occur. that is the most important thing. the preparation should the sort of events occur, both on the election administrator side and align enforcement side. host: it is called the committee for safe and secure elections.

al schmidt is our guest and with us for the next 20-25 minutes. phone lines for you to call in. as usual, republicans, (202) 748-8001. democrats, (202) 748-8000. independents, (202) 748-8002. i want to start on the line for independents, barbara from oklahoma. good morning. caller: good morning. this thing about safe elections, i am 86 years old and the first time i ever remember an unsafe election was when chavez got in and was the first mexican to be elected into l.a. is a congresswoman. i do not remember who she was running against, anyway, the guy who lost wanted the ballots

recounted. they recounted and it came out that he did win, but california would not change it. chavez is still in office as far as i know, i live in oklahoma now. at one time, everyone in california -- i am from san jose -- i never had any trouble voting or watching anyone else vote but l.a. in the valley over different ballgame. it has been like this for years and i do not think it will be stopped. host: have you ever felt unsafe on election day? caller: oh, no. i like the way they do it in oklahoma. when you vote, your vote is counted right there and then. host: that is barbara in oklahoma. guest: i cannot really speak to

that specific election in california, although i think you have the name wrong of the candidate involved. i have no doubt there have been specific races or cases across the country in recent years and also going way back, where there have been individual instances of threats occurring on, before or after election day. in 2020, the experience was much different as this happened to election officials across the country. it happened to democratic officials and republican officials. it happened in big blue cities and rural counties. there is nothing partisan about the people on the receiving end of these threats or partisan about efforts to make sure the people who run elections are safe. host: aubrey in alabama,

republican. good morning, you are next. you are with us. go ahead and turn down your tv because it will make the conversation easier and go ahead with your question or comment. caller: ok. once we get donald trump out of the way and everything will get back to the way it is supposed to be. host: that is aubrey with this comment. this is tim in arkansas, an independent. good morning. what is your question or comment, tim? caller: hello. host: go ahead. caller: am i on? host: go ahead. caller: i hear your speaker talking, the gentleman from pennsylvania. [indiscernible] host: you are just breaking up a

little bit too much. guest: could i say something related to aubrey's comment? what we are experiencing is not entirely about one person. we have nearly 1/3 of americans who don't have trust in election results. as disturbing as that is, that number was pretty much the same right after the 2020 election. nearly two years on and we find ourselves in a similar place. there is an expression that it is a lot easier to fool someone than to convince someone they have been fooled. in the 2020 election, a lot of people were fooled into believing that election was rigged or corrupt or that it was

close. it was not. joe biden won pennsylvania by more than 80,000 votes. it certainly was not close in our state. host: you testified in a june hearing for the january 6 committee. what were you asked about and what did you tell the committee on that day? guest: i was asked about allegations of voter fraud that we received and whether we had looked into them or not. the one allegation that was repeated by former mayor rudy giuliani and others were that 8000 dead voters voted in pennsylvania's election and i simply pointed out that when investigating cases like this,

it is very easy to investigate whether a vote was cast for a deceased voter or not. you have access to the date the voter passed away. in the voter registration database, you have access to see when dates were cast by certain voters. a dead voter voting is the easiest thing in the world to prove and i pointed out that not only did we not have evidence of 8000 of them -- repeated by prominent people -- we did not have evidence of 8 of them. some of that was related to that and some was related to what we are discussing today, the sort of threat environment and what can be done to help with that. i testified in front of the january 6 committee and the senate rules committee on threats to election workers. i know senator amy klobuchar, i am grateful she did this recently, she put forward a bill called the "election worker protection act," which is something being done at the

federal level to protect election workers. it is important that things like that are addressed. the election laws were written so long ago that they really do not take things like we are seeing now into account. it is illegal, in our case, for someone to show up at a polling place to try to disrupt voting. but there is nothing about showing up at the vote tabulation center to disrupt the counting of votes. the laws have to get up to date. host: you mentioned the election workers protection act. we will put some information on the screen for theiers. several for training, retentn d recruitment of po workers, training resources iestigate threats to workers, grants to states, as well and several other pieces to that piece of legislation. what do you think is the most

important part? guest: obviously, grants are important because you cannot take some of these actions -- election administration is historically not well-funded for many people, including the people who appropriate our taxpayer dollars. people frequently do not pay that much attention to elections other than at election time and there is a lot of preparation that has to be done in advance. that is an important part. the other part, as i reference, is the need to have laws that are able to accommodate threats of violence and intimidation directed at the people who are making our democracy possible, people who are counting our voters' votes. there are plenty of good actors out there and plenty of bad actors. i want to be careful to not paint everyone who has questions

about the election as abad-face actor. many of them love america and care about election integrity as much as i do, but it is important that they go to trusted sources of information and that they do not allow themselves to be deceived and led down a road that leads to threats and, unfortunately in some cases, violence. host: talking about the threat environment right now. mark on twitter asks what violence has actually occurred at election offices or against election workers this cycle, this year? guest: in our case, in philadelphia, we know from the investigation that was presented in court that they had every intention of trying to breach

the philadelphia convention center. their communications show that. their efforts to go around and photograph the entranceways and all the rest, they had lockpick tools with them, it clearly indicates an intention to act on their misinformed beliefs for what was really going on. we are grateful that law enforcement was able to prevent that from occurring. host: joyce is in pennsylvania on the line for democrats. you are on with al schmidt. caller: hi. this is the first time i have ever gotten through and i cannot believe it. i just wanted to say that i know

in the last election that there was some kind of a supreme court ruling that happened because of the pandemic. they changed the rules in some way. i believe that our elections are free and safe. it is beyond my comprehension that people just do not believe that they were, and cannot believe that trump started this back in july, even before the election, that they would be stolen. even in 2016, if he would have lost, he would have done the same thing. i just wish people would trust

our government, our elections and move on, because it is really sad when it breaks up marriages, families, for something that is so trivial, in my estimation. guest: ma'am, i think what you are referring to in pennsylvania is probably referring to mail-in ballot voting. in pennsylvania prior to 2020, the only way to vote was to show up in person and vote on election day. or if you were absent from the county on election day or physically incapacitated in some way, you could cast an absentee ballot vote. in 2019, before covid was even

on the horizon, our republican house and our republican senate passed mail-in ballot voting, which was signed by our democratic governor. mail-in ballot voting was new in 2020, although it was unrelated to covid and its arrival. we had about half of our voters vote by mail in the 2020 election. one pennsylvania supreme court case but affected that was because of issues with the postal service presented to the supreme court, they ruled that boards of elections should count mail-in ballots received up to three days after election day. mail-in ballots are due back, by law, by in :00 p.m. on election evening. the pennsylvania supreme court ruled there were three extra days were ballots could arrive, provided they were not

postmarked after election day, and that those ballots should be counted. there was subject of much litigation. the number of ballots in question were not significant at all. pennsylvania was decided by more than 80,000 votes. at the end of the day, it did not have an impact one way or another but it was a specific court case related to the covid environment in 2020. host: virginia, this is ray, a republican, good morning. caller: good morning. am i on? host: you are on with al schmidt. caller: al seems like a very honest fella. i can tell you my outlook on the 2020 election. i think i can explain why so many people got upset. i really got upset, but i have a brain and i was not going to --

somewhere. first off, from the time donald trump came down the escalator, they were after him. they come up with every kind of falsehood, everything they could against him. even going into the election, everybody in washington, it seemed like, was against him. all of this collusion and all of this stuff. the night of the election, i do not know how to explain this other than saying -- biden was at 2, trump was that 3. biden got to 3, trump got to 4.

the next to you know, here is biden, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 and trump's figures never moved. that is where people started getting the impression, wait a minute, there is something wrong here. host: it might be helpful to talk about how ballots are actually counted on election day , election night and the days after. guest: i think ray raises a very good point that contributed to a lack of trust in the election results. it was because in pennsylvania's case, we had never had mail-in ballot voting before, like many states do, including many very red states. but other states like florida allow mail-in ballots to begin

being processed in the days and weeks before election day. mail-in ballots have a declaration envelope the need to be reviewed to make sure they are signed and that has to be opened and a secrecy envelope has to be extracted. the ballot has to be extracted. and then scanned. there is a long assembly line that goes into before a vote is even counted. many states that have been doing mail-in ballot voting for a while, including florida, do it very well. on election night, they are able to scan the mail-in ballot votes and present the results i'd 11:00 or 12:00 at night. in our state and our county, where half of our votes were counted by mail, pennsylvania's lodges not allowed to begin processing mail-in ballots until 7:00 a.m. on election day. i do not mean counting ballots,

i mean processing envelopes, the beginning of the assembly line that i described, which causes a delay of days until all of the ballots can be fully counted that were returned on or before election day by registered voters who requested those ballots and applied with a drivers license number. in pennsylvania's case, it is frustrating because it takes a much time to cap the ballots and there is a very easy solution to it. allow our state, like most other states that have mail-in ballot voting, to begin the process before election day so you can get the overwhelming majority of your mail-in ballots counted and recorded on election night and that you do not see this going on for days after. host: time for just maybe one or two more phone calls. tom in milwaukee, wisconsin. good morning.

caller: i want to piggyback on the previous caller. the rise in the numbers between trump and biden. i was watching the election that night and i went to bed around 2:00, 3:00 in the morning. several states just stopped counting, which was georgia, wisconsin, where i am from, michigan, pennsylvania. pennsylvania, i think trump was leading by 455,000 votes. regardless of mail-in ballots -- sometimes it takes days and it was just implemented -- it was something i felt was a little odd and i think that is what happened with january 6. people came there because they were upset. you have to cheat me to beat me.

let's just play with our abilities and let the better man win. biden is the president, i accept that. there was an article written where the media said they went out of their way to make sure trump did not get elected and they brag about it. host: we are running short on time. let me give al schmidt a chance to respond. guest: i think tom also raises a good point. by the way, we did not stop counting in philadelphia. you could see it for yourself because we had a live feed running 24 hours a day, showing our workers working 24 hours a day to count votes in shifts to try to do it as expeditiously and with much -- integrity as possible.

because we have the former president discouraged republicans from voting by mail, the election day results as in people showing up and voting on the voting machines in pennsylvania suggested a larger republican presence. because democrats voted so overwhelmingly by mail relative to republicans, when all those votes were counted, which took days after, it resulted more votes for democrats than republicans. it was just a matter until waiting until all of our voter'' votes were counted. it is no wonder that people like tom and others, who have not experienced that before, have that sort of whiplash between in person election day results on election night and the mail-in ballot results going on for days after.

it is an easy solution, allowing pennsylvania to do it other states do, prepare mail-in ballots to be counted on election night and that you can get results that night. host: mr. schmidt, let me stop taking calls and do this with you in the time we have left. we have been waiting for a response from former president trump to yesterday's what could be final january 6 committee hearing. that response coming in the form of a more than 10 page letter, four-page letter to the committee and an appendix letting out concerns in specific states. he has three concerns with pennsylvania. his first concern about pennsylvania in the election of 2020, he said in pennsylvania as of february 21 -- as of february 2021, there were 121,240 more

votes than voters. by law, pennsylvania cannot certify an election with the kind of discrepancy. do you want to respond to that? guest: that is false. we did not have more votes than voters. host: a lawsuit filed in delaware county showed video discussing destroyed election evidence in 2020. that is a felony. one official talked about the need to get rid of voting scanners and he goes on from there. do you have concerns there? guest: when it comes to mail-in ballot voting or voting in person on election day, one great improvement we had in 2020 relative to the past was that every vote was recorded with a paper ballot, with human readable ink on paper with names of the candidates the voters

selected that we used in not one but two on its after every election to make sure the electronic scanning results match the human hand counted results. host: the final concern about pennsylvania, he goes point by point in several states, attorney general bill barr ordered u.s. attorney bill mcswain to stand down and not investigate election irregularities even after mcswain said his office received reports of voter fraud and election irregularities. guest: my understanding is the former u.s. attorney said that that occurred. i think the attorney general had a different opinion about the facts surrounding all that. i know firsthand and i know personally that cases we referred to federal, state law enforcement were investigated in

the days after the election between election day and certification. host: al schmidt. i know we are past your time but we went to go through that sense that just came out. al schmidt is a member for the committee for safe and secure elections. if you want to read more, go to safeelections.org. thank you for stopping by. guest: thank you for having me. host: we are going to take a break and in our last 20, 25 minutes, we will return to the topic that we have been talking about all morning long. yesterday's january 6 committee hearing, getting your reaction on the hearing on the phone lines for republicans, democrats and independents. start calling in and we will get your calls after the break. ♪ ♪ >> middle and high school

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exploring the people and events that tell the american story. at 12:30 p.m. eastern on the presidency, revealing the life of first lady martha washington from her personal letters. at 8:00 p.m. eastern on lectures in history, a college professor talks about american churches and religion during world war i. he shares how american pastors spoke about the great war before and after the u.s. entered the conflict. exploring the american story. watch american htory tv saturdays on c-span2. find a full schedule r program guide or watch online. >> "washington journal" continues. host: 20 minutes left in our program this morning. we will continue to get your thoughts and reactions to

yesterday's january 6 committee hearing. it was the ninth hearing, it could be the final hearing. a little over two hours long. you can watch it in its entirety on c-span.org. the former president, the focus of the hearing, he watched it and gave his response and it came out in the last half-hour or so in the form of a letter to the committee from the former president. it is addressed to the honorable chair thompson. just under his name and date, the former president putting "pe acefully and patriotically" in quotes. he seemed to be quoting himself from the speech he made in front of the white house. at one point he said to those who had gathered to peacefully and patriotically make their

voices heard. this is how he begins what is a four-page letter and a 10-page appendix including pictures outside the capitol on january 6. in all capital letters, the presidential election of 2020 was rigged and stolen! the same group of radical left democrats to create fiction about russia, russia, russia, impeachment hoax number 1, impeachment hoax number 2, ukraine, ukraine, ukraine, the illegal spying on my campaign at so much more created this committee of partisan hacks and thugs that want to destroy the lives of patriots whose lives have been unblemished to this point. he said the double standard

between what is taking place on the right and what has taken place with radical left lawless groups such as antifa and black lives matter is startling and will never be acceptable, even to those who have been -- who will write the history of what you have done to america. the former president released the letter that is linked to his social media site. that is his reaction so far. you can read more of it if you like. we have about 15 minutes left and want to hear your thoughts and reactions. robert in randolph, massachusetts, a democrat. caller: good morning. thank you for taking my call. how convenient it is for the former president to send home and still talk about pennsylvania, pennsylvania this.

this guy invited the russian into the white house. this guy tried to bribe ukraine. he grabbed women and said that is not what i meant. it is locker room talk. this guy is a sick puppy. it is one fire after another. mitch mcconnell said he is responsible. you have his friend that went to china explaining we are going to deny the election. he was going to create martial law. it is convenient that he gets to sit at his house and does not want to answer the question. he wants to say whatever he

said. can trump show up and show people he is not a born lian and leave the american -- born liar and leave the american people alone. host: this is margaret in pennsylvania, independent. good morning. caller: hi, there. i really tried to get through earlier because i want to speak to the gentleman you just had on. i wanted to apologize to him for what he went through. i do believe biden won pennsylvania because i voted for him. 80,000 others and 81 million people in america. trump lost the election and he lost georgia because the people in georgia, they voted but they

did not vote for president. i have been watching the proceedings and i was just appalled. i was really afraid. for the first time in my life, i am afraid for the future of america. thank you. host: staying on the independent line, this is betty in illinois. caller: hi. i always get so nervous when i call. i do think it was stolen because the republicans voted for biden or did not vote at all. now that i have your attention, i want to mention a couple other things. first of all, if you do not believe that it is easy -- if you do believe that it is easy to cheat, go and volunteer at the voting places. as far as the january 6 thing, i was really concerned when i heard steve bannon talking to

his chinese associates. roger stone talking, saying we are just going to take it and all of that. anyway, i think that he incited those rioters. they started calling pence a tr aitor. they love pence and then they called him a traitor and they were going to hang him? those are my thoughts. host: republican in new york. good morning. caller: good morning. all the elections would be all right if we used a paper ballot, fill in the dot and waited until each estate closed. and then start counting the votes. hillary clinton could have said she was ripped off. she was supposed to get 97% of

the vote. just have all states be the same, take the time, fill in the dot and these problems will be solved. i did not watch any of the january 6 stuff. if donald trump runs again, i will be glad to vote for him. the the house in the senate, they said their friends on the others of the aisle. it is not true. they are not friends. republicans look at things one way. hillary clinton could have said she got robbed. people voted for john kennedy in 1960. fill in the dots in all 50 states and we will be all right. host: majestic beach, this is john, democrat. . good morning. . caller: good morning. on election fraud, i know people

that have five new york state licenses. he has many friends from here to california. that is how they got all the extra votes. five times in new york state. can you imagine 1000 other people. host: you have a friend who voted five times in new york in the same election? why would he want to do that. caller: five new york state licenses. he is a democrat. he wanted to get the democrat in. anything to get in. with five licenses in new york state, that is the proof of i.d. in new york state is your drivers license. if you show one with a different name or whatever, you can vote five times, maybe more.

host: here in d.c., this is skip, independent. good morning. caller: hello. this is personal for me because i live in d.c., where january 6 happened, and saw on the streets what happened. there were protests before january 6. they were violent. it was between the proud boys and the oath keepers and antifa types. i do believe in prosecuting the antifa types in other cities -- and they have been prosecuted -- but what happened in d.c. was an actual attempt to take over the countryby violence. we all see what happened. we all know who was responsible for it and all because of lies. trump has been lying so much about everything. why do people believe what he

says? there is an excellent website. it is called lostnotstolen.org. all of these people that believe trump's lies on the election, go to lostnotstolen.org. these are conservative republicans that make the case that trump lost and biden won the 2020 election. host: gary in texas, republican. good morning. caller: morning. i am calling regarding the people complaining about the people who do not believe in the election are the same ones pushing russia. there were so many in detroit the took a lot of the old former people that were on the title and show them as the people who were making the votes. but there is no way for them to

identify all of this stuff after the fact. it is a sham. host: how have you identified it, gary? caller: what is that? host: how have you been able to identify that? caller: there have been claims of that happening. it happened all over the country. do not sit there and pontificate that these things are done properly. they are not. the whole process is a joke. host: are you going to vote in 2022? caller: what is that? host: are you going to vote in the midterms? caller: yes i'm going to vote and i will be upset when the results are smeared. they have propaganda stuff. they are trying to light a fire to everyone. this whole country is full of crap. host: barbara in massachusetts, line for democrats.

good morning. caller: good morning. i do not think this is over. i think trump has another plan. he is doing the same play. he wants to get indicted and his people will go crazy. he knows it, he loves it, and please, look into it. he is doing it again. and nobody will listen. but you will all find out in the end. thank you. host: this is how the former president ended his response, a four-page letter and 10-page appendix to the committee. it came within the past half hour. the people of this country, he writes, will not stand for unequal justice under the law or liberty and justice for some. election day is coming and we demand answers for the crime of the century. sincerely, donald j. trump, the

45th president of the united states. he includes an appendix with plenty of pictures about the crowds on january 6. also, his state-by-state concerns. we went over a few of them in the last half hour or so with our previous guest. it is a 14 page letter. if you want to read it in its entirety, the former president links to it on his social media account. dj, hampton, virginia, independent. good morning. caller: good morning. i wanted to get on with your last guest about elections. i am a true independent. i think january 6 is so bogus. i have not bothered to watch. i have not heard anyone say how few people actually watched yesterday's show.

my suggestion for elections, i think it would be easy to do and it would be a great way for no cheating. have the machines set up like you do in the grocery stores, where it shows who you voted for , spits out a receipt, so if there is any problem after the election, everyone has their ticket. it would be very simple to have a recount that is legal and honest. that is my suggestion. i think it would be very easy to fix the machines to spit it out that way. you could see before you left the precinct that your people were the right ones that you voted for. there should not be any argument afterward as to if there is a question about who won. host: a couple minutes left in our program today. wanted to give you a few

programming notes for later today on c-span. coming up at 1:30 p.m. eastern time on c-span, you can see the treasury secretary, janet yellen, talk about the u.s. economy during a news conference. coverage on c-span, c-span.org and the free c-span now video app. when it comes to election 2022, thwionsin governor debate tonight between tony evers and his republican challenger. that bei hosted by the wisconsin broadcasters association. live coverage at 8:00 eastern. to eve, grand rapids, michigan, good morning. go ahead. caller: good morning, john. good morning to the c-span space. this is what i want to say. i cannot believe people are

still saying they do not believe this about the insurrection when they watched it with their own eyes. i would like to say also the people complaining about people being dead and voting, don't they know that during the pandemic, people voted and then they died. your vote does not count because you died during the pandemic? host: one more caller this morning. rita in wisconsin, independent. are you going to watch the wisconsin governor's debate? caller: you betcha. i was so shocked yesterday about what was going on. the only way to save our democracy is please, please get out there and vote and vote for our democracy. otherwise, we will lose it. host: that is rita, our last

caller on today's "washington journal." we will be back tomorrow at 7:00 a.m. eastern. in the meantime, have a great friday. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2022] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] ♪ >> today on c-span, a discussion with democratic representative out of california out of president biden's decision to review decisions with saudi arabia following recent oil production cuts by opec. at 1:30 p.m., janet yellen talks about the u.s. economic outlook at the international monetary fund in washington, d.c.

at 2:30, wyoming representative liz cheney talks about defending democracy at the university of notre dame. you can watch live coverage on the free c-span now video app or online at c-span.org. ♪ >> c-span's campaign 2022 coverage of the midterm elections continues with candidate debates from around tonight at 8:00 eastern.ive from wisconsin, incumbent democratic governor debates to michael's. democratic congressman peter welch and republicanan congressman debate the seat in vermont. colorado governor debates his republican challenger heidegger and all. do not miss a single election moment on c-span, take us with you on the go with our free mobile video app.