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the competition deadline is friday january 19, 2024. for information, visit our website. host: in times of fast-moving news on capitol hill, it is always helpful to have scott wong. good morning. guest: good to be with you. host: before we dissect what happened on saturday this continuing resolution funds the government through november 17. what needs to happen between now and then to avoid another one of these shut down showdowns 45 days from now? guest: we could be back in this exact same spot 45 days from now right before the thanksgiving holiday. what mccarthy has done is by

himself some more time -- buy himself some more time to pass these appropriation bills. if you go with the regular order, the house passes there 12 -- their 12, the senate passes their 12. they are now up to 4 out of those 12. the senate has not moved any of their appropriations bills. mccarthy wants to pass a bills so they can negotiate them with the house-senate, come up with a packages bills that can pass congress and fund the government. this should have been done much earlier this year. many lawmakers were complaining,

why did it we work through the august recess? they took an entire month and some change off. there is probable frustration that we waited until this point to start negotiating these appropriations bills. the continuing resolution, the house conservatives bills would reduce spending, something demanded of those conservatives, so that will be where we see inferences with the senate and the house over federal spending levels. host: does this mean in the next 43 days does the senate have a lot more work to do than the house? are all of these 12 appropriation bills going to be passed? why hasn't the senate passed any of their appropriations bills? guest: [laughter]

typically these things are negotiated by the top appropriators, by senate leaders. they have been dragging their feet. there has been disagreement. we have not seen the senate be as productive. that has been a point that kevin mccarthy has said. look, we have passed 4 out of the 12. the senate has passed zero. therefore, we have made more progress. while technically that is true, in any sort of deal defined the government, you need agreement from the 4 corners, the top appropriators plus the congressional leaders, 2 in each party. we will be very much following this closely. the house is going to be taking up another one of those appropriations bills they hope as early as this week.

they have already passed some of the lower hanging fruit, including funding the pentagon, funding homeland security, so they are tackling this one bite, at a time starting from the low hanging fruit and getting to the more challenging bills. we could very much be in the same spot right before thanksgiving. host: this is the one that members of congress do not tell too often because it is the till that funds congress itself -- bi ll that funds congress itself. no ukrainian aid in this package that came together. when and how will a vote on additional funding for ukraine happen? guest: if you listen to the president of the united states just yesterday in talking to this cr deal funding the

government, he said there was another deal made with kevin mccarthy on ukraine. he seemed to suggest that there was an agreement that there would be votes on some sort of ukraine package. that was interesting kevin mccarthy's spokesperson responded that the priorities will be border security and ukraine, getting those things through the congress. mccarthy's folks want to tie together those two very challenging issues, border security and ukraine. the one positive ray of light for ukraine is that it does have the support of all the leadership, especially mitch mcconnell, the republican leader in the senate who very much tried to ensure that ukraine funding was attached to this cr

that passed through the congress. the house bill that eventually did pass did not include the ukraine. mcconnell in a closed-door meeting with his republican congress was overruled after insisting that ukraine remain in the package. he was overruled by senate republicans according to our reporting. at the end of the day ukraine funding does have broad support among all of the key negotiators who will be involved in the future funding of the government. that is a very good sign for ukraine funding. the president says he is going to get it done, so a lot of political influence behind getting maury economic and military -- more economic and military aid to ukraine as they wage their war against russia. host: start calling in with your

questions or comments. republicans, it is (202) 748-8001. democrats, (202) 748-8000. independents, (202) 748-8002. scott wong was up there tracking as that deal was coming together on capitol hill going right to the 11th hour. in the wake of that, we are expecting a motion to vacate the chair this week. scott wong wh how do yo see this playing out and what have you been hearing about this, and if mccarthy is ousted who could unite the conference? guest: we are several steps away from that scenario, but clearly

we have to look to the number two republican leader, steve scalise, notably from louisiana. he is battling and receiving treatment for blood cancer, which he announced the state short -- just a short few weeks ago. he does have some conservative allies, although there are some conservative groups who do question how conservative his record is but he does have people like andy big, the former freedom caucus leader pushing him is a possibility. there is of course wildcards, people like patrick henry the financial services chairman who has served in leadership before who is an institutionalist, widely respected as a

legislator, and someone who knows the conference very well, and others like tom cole who is the rules committee chairman. very well-respected knows the ins and outs of every note and cranny of the united states congress who would be seen as a placeholder while the republican conference resolves its internal issues and divisions. those are some of the names i would throw out there to keep your eye on. host: if there are democratic votes to, save a mccarthy speakership who should we be watching? who is most likely to make that trip across the aisle? guest: i think it would be the moderates. the moderates looking at the bipartisan problem solvers, the people who meet weekly democrats and republicans, this group of

now more than 60 individuals who do not like the chaos that has transpired on capitol hill in recent weeks, who want a return to working across the aisle, getting things done. this is the group led by brian fitzpatrick of pennsylvania. what i am hearing from moderates and really from democrats across the spectrum, including progressives is that they are looking to hakeem jeffries right now. you laid out earlier how it would work, and the numbers, and the fact that kevin mccarthy would need some democratic votes in order to survive, or he would need some democrats to vote present to lower the threshold in order to survive. what democrats have told me is they are looking towards their leader hakeem jeffries to give them direction, give them

marching orders about how to proceed. certainly, there would be in that event conversations between mccarthy and hakeem jeffries. i think a power-sharing agreement is something a little too far out of a west wing episode, a little too cute, but democrats would want to extract something from mccarthy. what that is remains to be seen. if it is it an up or down vote on ukraine aid, that may not be enough for democrats to get on board. kevin mccarthy is someone who democrats do not trust at all, going back to his reiterated support of donald trump after the january 6 attack on the capitol. president biden says he reneged on the deal that raised the debt limit.

that is why we are in this situation in the first place. finally, kevin mccarthy has launched in recent weeks this impeachment inquiry into president biden that democrats feel is purely political and meant to damage president biden ahead of 2024. for a lot of those reasons there is not much trust or will from democrats 212 bailout kevin mccarthy as he heads into this difficult motion to vacate vote. host: scott wong, senior congressional reporter and no stranger to c-span viewers. mary is up first, las vegas, line for democrats. caller: good morning. a third of the house are election denying, anti-democratic, authoritarian minded people. matt gaetz and his ilk -- if i

recall right was biggs the one who is at the podium on january 6 with the bullet-proof vest? matt gaetz opens his big mouth so he can make money and go on fox news. we need to vote out these conspiracy theorists in our house now so we can get back to having a democracy before we lose it. this third of the house that i am talking about are nothing more than the disciples of a cult leader, and trump on the podium more than just spewing rage is no starting to sound likew a rapper with the swearwords. host: scott wong, is that what he is doing, a wip count on the

motion to vacate? it only takes more than four republicans to vote on that motion to vacate. do we know how many we are watching here who might vote to vacate the chair? guest: we do not have a specific number yet. i saw a tweet yesterday from eli crane that responded to matt gaetz' threat to vacate. he said "let's roll," "let's do this," essentially. the math is going to be so tricky just not knowing what the democrats are going to do. i mentioned earlier one possibility is that some of the moderate democrats who do not like the chaos that has rained on capitol hill could vote present, thereby lowering the threshold that kevin mccarthy needs in order to survive.

yes, matt gaetz is an ally of president trump, one of the top allies of president trump as the caller mentioned. kevin mccarthy and his allies have been portraying matt gaetz in recent interviews as somebody who has a purse over vendetta against -- a personal vendetta against the speaker of the house. he led the effort to block kevin mccarthy from becoming speaker of the house back in january. he is someone that mccarthy allies say just wants to get on tv, perhaps one day to run for governor. my colleague matt dixon had a piece about how matt gaetz is buying the governor's office in 2026. this could be an effort to

to raise his fundraising base before that potential run. he organ the -- he orchestrated the successful bid for ron desantis. matt gaetz knows the internal workings of how you run for governor and how you win. i think we will see matt gaetz perhaps run as well as another florida congressman who has recently clashed with matt gaetz named byron donalds. a wad of internal political dynamics a here when we talk about this --dynamics at play here when we talk about this motion to vacate. caller: i feel like kevin

mccarthy is a wonderful speaker of the house. he handles everything in a very professional manner, including dealing with the news media, all of the questions they continually ask, and how he goes about answering them very directly. the democratic party are not even transparent, from biden all the way down. we don't know what is going on most of the time. as far as matt gaetz, matt gaetz -- i like matt gaetz a lot, but he is totally out of control, and i think he is trying to do something for other means. that is all i have to say today. it is very frustrating, seeing what is going on and how even the speaker is being treated. thank you for having me. host: that was teresa with her

comments in pennsylvania. let me go to rock in new york. caller: my comment really is for you more than the guest you have, but let me just say on the question i did not get in on time. my real problem is that somebody called in and said to you "the democrats are the nazi party." while you are doing your job, you would cut those things. this discourse is toxic. you as a journalist need to -- host: got your point. i asking the -- i ask callers to refrain from nazi comparisons. i appreciate the thought.

do you have a question for scott wong? caller: no, i see him sometimes on msnbc. i appreciate the job that he is doing. the media at this point in our history is very important. host: we think scott wong does a good job as well. a story that got a decent amount of attention that was not on the floor of the house that in one of the house office buildings, jamaal bowman under investigation for pulling the fire alarm as mccarthy compares it to january 6. can you explain what happened? guest: mccarthy called this last-minute vote to pass the cr to fund the government. it caught democrats by surprise. the democrats called an emergency caucus meeting, which means they simply wanted to meet to discuss what their plan of

action was. this was happening as some democrats were saying "i think i am going to vote for this." there were a number of procedural delay tactics the democrats employed in order to buy more time so they could read the bill, make sure there were no poison pills secretly inserted into this. at that time a fire alarm started going off around the capitol complex. we later learned that it was a fire alarm that was pulled by congressman jamaal bowman, a progressive democrat from new york. there is video surveillance of it. there are photos circulating of bowman pulling the fire alarm at an emergency exit. it is very clear. democrats immediately said that he was doing so to try to interrupt the vote as one of these