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january -- good morning. it is thursday, january 11. in washington yesterday, house oversight and judiciary committee voted to recommend hunter biden be held in contempt of congress. this happened after he made a surprise appearance at the oversight hearing. we are getting your reaction to both or either of those items. democrats are at (202) 748-8000. republicans at (202) 748-8001. independent at (202) 748-8002. you can text us at (202) 748-8003. make sure you send us your name, city and state. welcome to today's washington

journal. let's start with that debate last night. winners and losers of the last to be. the debate was a critical encounter for the foreign -- former u.n. vestry. they locked in battle for second place. trump avoided this debate hosted by cnn. trump needs the polls in isla according to the average maintained by headquarters. haley has recently overtaken the average but the florida governor is only one point behind. let's hear from the candidates on last night's debate, talking about abortion.

>> you said she has chastised pro-lifers. d believe she is sufficiently pro-life? >> when she says things like pro-lifers need to stop talking about throwing women in jail, that is a trope. not one i have ever met things that is something that needs to happen. a lot of times, they do not have resources themselves and we have to have compassion for the situation, but when she starts bringing that in, that is using the language of the left. at the end of the day, i do agree with her on this, donald trump should be on this stage. he owes it to you to explain why

he has a tough time saying whether a man can become a woman or not, to explain why he wants to build a billion-dollar place new fbi building in the heart of the swamp in washington dc and why he did not build the wall and why he added to the debt. every candidate needs to earn your vote. no one is entitled to your vote. he comes in here, does his spiel and then leaves. you are a servant of the people, not a ruler of the people. >> governor haley, a response? >> i did not see -- i did not hear the criticism about being pro-life. it is something he does all day, every day. i am pro-life because my husband is adopted.

i have right to children in front of me. these fellows do not know how to talk about abortion. this is too personal of an issue to put fear or judgment. our goal should be how do we save as many babies as possible and help as many moms as possible? we are going to treat it like the respectful issue that it is. the tropes you keep talking about it -- where are people talking about getting -- putting a woman in jail? south carolina. host: that was the debate between nikki haley and ron desantis. we are taking your calls and getting your reaction from that. also on this issue, the boats

and hearing about -- hunter biden being held in contempt. it puts him in the hot see and hear he is in the front rail of that hearing between his lawyers. we will take a look at what the chair of the oversight committee said yesterday, laying out his case against hunter biden. [video clip] >> he refused to comply with his subpoena, duly issued by the committee. the house committee is issued subpoenas to hunter biden for a deposition to be conducted on december 13, 2023. on december 13, he failed to comply with the subpoenas and

the committee oversight investigations. instead he appeared on the grounds of the capital where he read a short, prepared statement without taking any questions from the media. based on witness testimony, joe biden was the brand his family sold around the world. they raked in over $24 million from 2014 to 20 countries like china, russia, romania and pakistan. witness testimony confirms vice president biden had coffee with his family's foreign business associates. he has repeatedly lied about speaking with his son's associates.

we plan to question hunter biden about this record of evidence during our deposition. hunter biden's refusal to comply with subpoenas is a criminal act. it constitutes contempt of congress and warrants referral to the appropriate office for prosecution, as prescribed by the law. we will not provide special treatment to him because of his last name. all americans must be treated equally under the law, and that includes the bidens. host: we will go to your calls now starting with caller: pennsylvania. -- with pennsylvania. caller: good morning. there are a few things.

c-span never plays the whole clip where hunter biden walked out of the hearing and marjorie taylor greene had a few words. you guys did not play the whole thing. host: the whole thing was on c-span. it is just we are limited on where we can put the cameras. you may not have been able to see hunter biden walked out of the room. caller: they stop the guy that was defending hunter biden and then other channels played a. just very limited and another thing with the january insurrection, you guys never played the clip where trump asked the protesters to peacefully go protest. i heard another lady say it before and.

he failed to ever play it. host: you know that all of our videos are on our website. if you go to c-span.org, you can search for whatever you are looking for an find everything online and you can find hearings and speeches in their entirety. good morning. caller: good morning. how are you? host: i'm doing great. caller: what i would like to say about hunter biden -- he is a total disgrace. a son like that brings shame, even though his father is shameful himself, but that is -- i do not understand how the democrat voters find a way to excuse anything that the democrats do. if trump's son or daughter walked out of there disrespecting the law the way that hunter has, not once but twice, basically telling

everyone -- what he has been allowed to get away with? you want to talk about white privilege? i thought they hated white privilege. this is the epitome of white privilege. if any of trump's kids had done that, they would be locked up today. i'm sick and tired about hearing -- hearing about the republicans . it is so sickening. i absolutely want to puke because they cannot do one thing without bringing up trump's name. hunter biden walks out of that courtroom like he just knew nothing was going to happen to him. host: all right. and monique in washington dc, democrat. caller: alrighty then. you could hear the venom and the

fire coming out of these individuals. everything that that caller said basically broke down donald trump and his kids. the democrats did not go after the kids of the president. they tried to keep it separate. the reason i am going to the for biting is because of how they are treating his son pregnant they are treating his son just like america treats black african-american men and the judicial system. you know, i am so sick of majority -- i'm not even going to say majority. about 60% of republicans do not do research. they do not going to c-span and listen to the hearings. you guys are giving them the information from the hearings

from when they come out of congress and stand up at the podium. i am behooved. these people are the generation, the people who are calling in are the ones who got us into this situation in the first place. i am gen x and i am a political junkie. when i sit up there and i hear these will with -- it is ridiculous, especially those who call in -- my mom always said, just because you have a college degree does not mean that you have common sense. also, this is my last thing. to all of this news calling in collecting social security and decayed, pump your brakes. we are the ones ensuring that you are getting that social security and medicaid because we

are paying into it. i am so sick and tired of it. this is america. white privilege exists because of the system that was created from the jim crow through slavery. many african-americans are over. we do not use the race card them especially in my family. we pull ourselves up and we get ourselves out there to work. majority of black families? we do not even use privilege. my son is not no discrimination or anything of that nature. he is 17 and he has all kinds of friend. you need to fix yourselves and those of you calling in that are uneducated, go to c-span, listen to the hearings and be honest. if i was biden's son, i would

smile and walk out the same way. i would also say, i want to do it in public. you're not going to take me behind closed doors. do it publicly. host: that hearing yesterday, talking about those issues. [video clip] >> the chairman has refused offers from hunter biden and his attorney to meet with the chairman and his daft, and with embers of the committee. mr. biden's lawyer responded and offered to sit with them and their staff to see whether mr. biden's has information that may inform some ledges -- legislative purpose. the chairman never spot -- never responded.

they wrote to him again in which the chairman possible -- falsely claimed that he never got a response back. the chairman actually never responded to his offer to discuss the request but stated that he remained available to have the discussion, but the chairman failed to respond aga n issued subpoenas to mr. biden, requesting his appearance at a deposition. the chairman noted, given your client's willingness to address this investigation publicly -- we would expect him to testify before congress. he urged mr. biden to appear at a public committee hearing.

stating he is more than welcome to come before the committee. if he wants to clear his good name, he is invited today. we will drop everything. host: that was jamie raskin on the oversight committee. a call from new jersey, independent. hello. caller: all rhetoric, 100% by elected officials. specific solutions about problems and some inspiration, urging the public to treat everybody with love and kindness . the larger issue, we need to have a convention to start the government over again. 100% new people. host: all right. lauren says this on facebook.

debate is terrible. we want to seessues being debated, not a hunter not a shouting match. gel in new york, new york. caller: good morning. it is a circus show, to be honest with you. it is a political witch hunt. it is just politics as usual. you cannot have mega -- you cannot have maga without mega. mega is make earth great again. host: in michigan, democrat.

good morning. caller: i think -- is that ann arbor? host: maybe. are you in ann arbor? caller: never mind. it does not matter. why do you have the three choices for the lines? you have the demra, republicans and independent come and nine times out of 10, they are trump supporters. i think tt sounds pretty committed to the republican rty. my point is, there are too many opportunities, t to for trump supporters to use and one for democrats. i think it is really not representative and not fair. itveremphasizes the trump supporters all morning long, and

gets very tiresome because it is just not even set up. i do not whyomne is independent. sure, they arendependent. there were times i voted republican or democrat, but that does not necessarily make me independent, i'm just choosing one or the other, democrat or republican. host: did you watch the debate last night? caller: no, i did not. i was going to catch up on it, but no. i do not want to be riled up at night before bedtime. i just wait and i get it off of the video. i did watch part of the biden arguments. that was ugly. just terrible. i lay until i begin my day, when i do not have to go to sleep. host: all right.

let's listen to a portion of the debate last night. they were asked about chris christie's comments about moral character and whether the president has the moral character to lead. [video clip] >> i think the next president needs to have moral clarity. it is taxpayer money and not your own money. we always have to fight for democracy, human rights and protecting americans and preventing more. i have said, i think he was the right president at the right time. but his way is not my way. i do not have vendettas and i do not take things personally. it is very much about no drama, no whining and getting results, and getting them done. i think it is time for a new

generational leader who will go and make america proud again. that is what i will do. >> what is your response to chris christie. do you believe he has the character to be president again? >> i will be the guide to engineer a come back for this country. let's be honest, he said he would build a wall that mexico would pay for and he did not deliver. he said he would drain the swamp. he said he would hold hillary accountable. we need to deliver and get this stuff done. the difference between nikki haley and me? i debated on the floor with gavin newsom and i thought he lied a lot. nikki haley might be able to give him a run for his money. as republicans, you need somebody who will be in there and fight for you.

nikki haley, any the going gets tough, anytime, she caves. when you need someone to fight for you, do not look for nikki haley. you could not find her even if you had a search warrant. >> no one ever said i caved. i defended america and i fought for america. but i will also say this. this is not a time where you have to have pettiness. i wish donald trump was on the stage. he is the one i am running against and he needs be defending his record. he's not defending the fact that our kids are never going to forgive us for the that. the fact that they gave us covid, the fact that they have continued to put up chinese police stations and continue to threaten our military.

but we need is a leader not looking at four years and eight use. i want my kids to have a good future. host: that was from the debate last night. here is a text that we got in bedfor new hampshire. he said, i was a chris christie supporter but i will now vote for nikki haley. next up is joey in colorado, independent. caller: good morning. how are you? host: good. how are you. caller: i'm good. my name is actually jayland. it's ok. how come we always have to see pictures -- i feel like we are all adults and we know what he did, but every time, they have to show pictures of what hunter

biden has going on downstairs. my second point i would like to bring up, they will not be irrelevant in the next year and it is really funny watching cnn not press these people. they are supposed to be the more liberal news broadcasting source and not pressing these people as if biden is not making them more riled up with more deportations than trump or obama. i think we are doing just fine, so thank you and have a great day. caller: first, alrighty then. the people coming in over the border more than any other president, like that guy that just spoke, 10 times more coming

over are taking all the black man's rights because they are going to give -- get all the jobs and all that. number two, we talk about how every time trump did this or trumpeted that, how can a man -- his own daughter who is 14 years old? that makes him scum of the earth. number three, leader people tell the government what to do. have you noticed lately how the government tells us? they tell us who we can vote for , what we should say they can do. we got to drive an electric car and we cannot have a gas stove. we are not allowed to burn wood. that will be next. host: who are you planning to

vote for? caller: donald j. trump. but here is final point. if he is not on the ballot, america is burning to the ground. bye-bye now! host: asked about his plans to lower the national debt. [video clip] >> they call you a big government republican. what do you say to them? mr. trump: we were going to pay down a lot of debt and when covid came along, if i did not inject this country with money, we would have had a depression the likes of which you would have never seen. businesses were going bankrupt, but they needed money. we helped businesses. if i did not do that, you would

have had a depression in this country. now, what they should be doing instead of the kind of debt they are building at record levels, they should be paying down their debt. >> what about the future? what about cutting spending? let's look at what you would do in terms of getting that number down. what would you do? mr. trump: we have a lot of cutting but also a lot of income . oil and gas -- more than saudi arabia and more than russia. when i came in, leader number four. when i left -- not that long. -- not that long a period of time. we were going to double up saudi arabia and russia combined, and we were going to make a lot of money.

desantis wants to cut social security and medicare. nikki haley wants to cut social security and medicare. nikki haley wanted to raise the age from 65 to 74. >> only for young people in their 20's. at some point, someone has to address it. mr. trump: that is what they say when it starts, only for young people. then they get young people of the age where it matters and it is no good. host: that was yesterday and now we are taking your calls. alana, democrat. hello. caller: good morning. thank you to c-span for having such a level head. think it's my friend marcus for introducing me to the show. i really appreciate that. i appreciate how the hosts sit

there and listen to all these points of view, no matter how crazy they are. i wanted to comment on something i have said before on the show, that trump is the first conspiracy president. he came in talking about how obama was not born in america and he has continued this conspiracy theory thing, and it has really galvanized the right wing because there is a right-wing echo chamber on the internet and it extends to the hunter biden thing. the amount of conspiracy surrounding that -- there are very little facts going against hunter. they just spread conspiracy and rumors. that is what the republican party is motivated by now. i feel sorry for hunter biden because he was addicted to drugs and he got over it. yes, he made mistakes, but they really hate him because of how

cool he is. he is a rolex wearing, wheeling dealing, limousine writing, jet plane flying son of a gun. i think it is all just smoke and go after the president. he is not a part of the government. he is his son and it used to be that families were off-limits. he is part of the biden family, but there is no evidence that he influenced the president. thank you for the show again. have a good time. host: dottie. -- got it. another agrees with alana ands comber wants to keep it behind doors so he c keep making things up. and jean in stockton, new york.

hello. caller: i want -- i think hunter should be treated as any other person. if he breaks the law, he broke the law. as far as trump running, i thought we had some pretty good years. it has been a nightmare since biden has been here and it scares me a lot. i do not like it at all, but that is all i have to say. i wish everybody good luck. i know who i am voting for, even though i am a democrat. host: john in orville, ohio. good morning. caller: good morning. i am john and donald trump --

[indiscernible] that is what we need. host:utting in and out. if you could give us a call back on a better line. minnesota, independent. can one. caller: i just turned on the tv and i was surprised that somebody was complaining about the independent line, that too many republicans -- isn't that how democracy is supposed to work say our democracy. each year the media say our democracy, well actually, we are a constitutional republic. anybody can called independence line and their mind. if she does not like their mind, i guess she is saying she does not like my chrissy. what i am really talking -- calling about is the hunter

biden hearing. is there or is there not a signed, legal subpoena for him to appear? yes? what does the rule of law state? it is really that simple. you can draw anything else you want from it, but the other family members -- the only thing you can compare it to is the trump kids that did show up and testify. host: i have a question for you. hunter biden has said, i will appear before the committee but publicly. caller: that is great but after the deposition. why should he get other treatment than any other person what? what is surprising to me is you keep saying he is a private dissent. if he is just one private citizen, why are semi politician just sticking up for him semi?

do you think any other private citizen would have so much defend for all the things he has done? host: right. let's take a look at a portion of yesterday's oversight hearing. here is jamie raskin who is a ranking member of the oversight committee, talking about other refusals by gop members to comply with january 6 subpoenas. [video clip] >> we believe everyone is subpoenaed by congress, whether it is hunter biden, steve bannon or scott perry. they should engage in good faith compliance with the committee's subpoenas. we are here today because the chairman has decided to obstruct his own investigation and is now

seeking to hold hunter biden and contempt, after he accepted the chairman's multiple public offers to come answered questions under oath before the american people. this is the same time that they stand by the categorical noncompliance of republican members of congress like mr. jordan, who have material information about the violent attack. >> one moment. the cameras cannot be in the well. yeah. proceed. >> thank you. i was just making the point that our colleagues, who are raining mr. biden today on charges that he is not rendered 100%

compliance, allegedly, with a subpoena are standing by republican colleagues who rendered 0% compliance with their subpoenas, including mr. jordan, mr. biggs and mr. perry when they have material information about the violent attack on the capital, the congress and the vice president of the u.s. host: bacteria calls -- back to your calls. caller: i think it is left before the government runs out of money again. they are trying to push this inquiry. they are trying to get trump to recoup in this campaign. that will not happen because he

will be removed from the ballot. they are so ignorant that they do not realize that their own party is in disarray. mike johnson does not realize that americans have a two vote majority. president biden will have a landslide victory in mackay will retake the house. we already have the senate. the republican party will be gone. that is all i have to say. host: next, sacramento, california on the independent line. caller: thank you for my call. i would like to thank the gentleman from minnesota. i believe it was him who spoke up for those of us on the independent line. i am an independent because i am undecided. i intentionally tape it so i can

rewind it come here the questions clearly and to hear both candidates answer them. when i look at both of them, it seemed like desantis was quite unnerved, like she was nervous at times. i watched his body language. he seemed very uneasy. when our lady candidate spoke, she seemed more sure of herself. she seemed more confident in herself and again, when i look at desantis, body language wise, he does not give me that leadership feeling. im undecided. there are moments in california when i speak to neighbors and family and it is becoming very undecided in california. the only chance -- the only choice we have is desantis,

haley and trump? you know what i might do? i might take my ballot and put a great big x on it and send it in. i am a retired law enforcement officer. i do not know where i am going on this. i will be watching every debate. i will be taking everyone -- taping everyone. i do not want to miss a thing. he promised and kamala promised to take care of the border and now it is a disaster. i'm so thankful to c-span for letting me share my voice and for you all being my voice during this critical time in our country. that is all i had to say.

thank you. host: paul in chesapeake, virginia. good morning. caller: i am also -- i claim to be independent, but i am more -- i am more libertarian, but you do not have a libertarian mind. i would like to say that with your questions -- i have been at -- i have been watching c-span for years. the topic today is more open forum than with the totally opposite things, one about the election and the other about trump. the only thing i will say about hunter biden is that he and that crew and the well where there for a docudrama that he would like to make. as far as the debate, yes, i did

watch the debate. from the beginning, i have been a nikki haley supporter because she has supported many policies that were in effect. a lot of the policies -- this takes me back. a lot of the policies that desantis talks about our implemented in florida. that is fine. i do not think they work on the national basis. mitt romney tried that. we see where that went. host: what is it that you like about her policy wise? caller: for one, first up, her economic policies. that is number one. she is correct in that the gas

caps is supposed to go to the federal highway fund but what people forget is that the federal highway, that interstate system used to be funded by the federal highway fund. it is no longer funded by the federal highway fund. that money is supposed to be sent to the states to take care of the highways. the states are responsible for how that money gets used. taking money and using it for her green projects. that is for sidewalks and bike lanes, but they are using it for green spaces, etc. the other thing i would like to say is on the social security issue. i have yet to hear one

politician say that the way to keep it solvent is to take off the cap, after you pay and so many quarters. there are so many people that may only pay into social security for three months because of their income and then no longer have to pay anymore for the rest of the year. if they want to keep it solvent, what they need to do is take that cap off and have people come in a matter what their income, pay all year long. that would keep it solvent. host: brandon, good morning. caller: i'm just calling -- host: i guess we lost him. in somerville, texas.

good morning. caller: good morning. thank you for taking my call. i watched a little bit of the thing with hunter biden. it was a circus. they should be embarrassed. if i did not show up for that, i would be in jail. you would be in jail. how long did he know he was going to do this? that is what needs to be looked into. it is unreal what happened. it is an embarrassment to our country is what it is. host: this is a text that we got from myrtle beach. hunter biden should be i for not showing up in front of congress. y are the politicians defending him?

democrats do not want anything he says to lead back to joe biden. anndependent in tallahassee, florida. caller: i would like to agree with the last two callers, especially the one about the socialecity cap. i want to respond to the first person who called about social security. d ybody know that joe biden the one thatctually taxed social security? also, i wanted to know -- that was a circus yesterday. when are you guys going to start covering epstein? because joe biden went to epstein's island. it is on the list. host: let's take a look at

hunter biden. his attorney gave a statement to reporters gathered at the capital after his client's appearance at that hearing. [video clip] [indiscernible] >> relevant information for any inquiry. [indiscernible] in november -- a behind closed doors deposition.

[indiscernible] host: let's go to massachusetts. emma cracked. caller: good morning. i had a quick question. do you know if president biden will be on the massachusetts primary ballot? i know he has decided not to put his name on the new hampshire ballot and the democratic party has said that the primary election is meaningless, according to the paper the other day. if i go to vote, will i see president biden as a choice? host: i do not know that, but we will find out for you. caller: thank you. i would like to know because i always vote. my son was in the marines and we believe in elections, not like russia. host: tell me why you follow

williamson. caller: i have followed her for years. what she is really tuned into, nutrition in our farmland. in that respect, i thought she is really intelligent and she thinks like i do about the environment, but i did not see her debates. she is the one that i will be voting for, but i'm concerned because i do not know who is voting. but i do not know if the president -- host: we actually have that for you. that is how fast our producers are. here is who will appear first on the massachusetts presidential primary ballot. the drawing is held tuesday with

chris christie coming out on top. followed by joe biden and marianne williamson. they have it. caller: thank you so much. host: we are here to serve. caller: i wanted to talk about one of the colors he said the trump children have not been questioned by the government and whatnot. i know that donald junior was subpoenaed five times. i think it might've been four times, twice by the same committee. i know that they have been. not the defendants. the defendants do not set the rules. i'm looking at it. i was reading an article where it said she talked to them to

get information on the lawsuit in georgia. it says at the end, because the january 6 committee later destroyed it records. ironically, he faces separate prosecution handling documents. it makes it impossible to get any of the evidence that the prosecution is saying that they do not have if biden is not going to be on the ballot -- they are talking about democracy being killed by the republican, but it is the democrat who have weaponized our government, and it has gone on and on. host: who are you supporting on the republican side?

caller: i'm supporting donald trump. i think he has more to do for our country that he has already done. host: if you had to make a second choice, who would it be? caller: probably nikki haley. but i have been saying this. no labels. i wish that joe manchin would run for senator. you cannot start this. you have to start getting another party together in the senate and house prior to the presidency. host: good morning. let's set -- caller: let's set the record straight. it was clinton's who said that biden -- obama was not born in

america. the arrogance of this guy come hunter biden bringing a camera crew? come on. how crazy is that? and another thing, joe biden went to the floor twice to try to cancel social security and decayed, so wake up. host: alan in danville. good morning. caller: good gracious. who are you people watching? you come on tv with no fax. the only thing that you blabber out is conspiracy theories that here on fox. the infrastructure bill -- they are building stuff everywhere,

everywhere. donald trump. are you listening? he said he would have the right to assassinate his opponents. donald trump said that. he has the lowest iq in america. are you listening? unemployment has been the lowest ever. are you listening? numerous other things he has done. the border is the only thing he is running on, trying to impeach has nothing to do with moving this country forward. are you listening? my goodness, people what is wrong? wake up. host: let's go to los angeles,

california. good morning. caller: that last caller is one of the people -- the black voters that vote democrat are the ones that get nothing from joe biden. hunter brought a camera crew. he is making a movie by himself. this is one of those things. they called him out on it. now this is very important. this man brought a gun, lied on his application. he is the epitome of white privilege. host: next line, caller: democrat. good morning. you look marvelous today. the deal with hunter biden, he

is a superman and kryptonite. they are still afraid of hunter biden. secondly, the debate, i watched it. somebody needs to design a website called trump lies.com because desantis lies.com shows all the things that he is tripping all over the place. i am proud that nikki haley is running. i think she could be a strong candidate and go toe to toe with trump. let me remind americans that the checkbook for republicans -- $7.8 trillion under trump. 1.5 trillion tax cut for trump and $1.2 trillion stimulus. that adds up to $13.1 trillion to the u.s. debt. part of that, the 1.2 million --

trillion dollars stimulus, many were on medicare and others were on food stamps. that is not my words. that is nikki haley. host: good morning. i have always voted republican. [indiscernible] host: emma? you do not have a very good connection. try again. go ahead. caller: just look at the way that donald trump has tried to destroy this country. i will never vote again for republican. i look at hunter biden and we all know. we are just doing that to try --

this guy has nothing to do with the office. people, we need to get back to the basics. we can agree and even if we do not. host: eric in arizona. independent. caller: i have a quick question. how do you feel about the level of ignorance our government has gotten to now and where we are headed, because watching the house was painful. host: how do you feel about that, eric? caller: i'm kind of perplexed, seeing the lack of accountability, just complete ignorance to the facts and it is

frustrating to watch because if there were a respectable republican, i would vote for them. on the other site, they cannot put anybody up but biden but trump is the only option? that is kind of frightening. host: who did you vote for in the last presidential election? caller: biden. host: and you do not want to support him again? you want an alternative? got it. let's talk to stephen in wilmington, illinois. caller: hello. how are you? i would like to complement you on your -- i thought that

hearing was hilarious because vulcans prove every time that they do not know how to do anything or run a committee. marjorie taylor greene should be arrested for posting nude pictures of hunter biden. and then trump's immunity case, he argued that he could kill somebody and not be arrested for it come as long as he left office. their logic is just flawed. anyways, thank you. host: that will be the last call for this segment, that there is a lot more to come. up next on washington journal, mariano -- mariana joins us. and the first of two lawmakers joining this morning. talking about opposition to the

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host: "washington journal welcome back to." we are joined by liliana mason from johns hopkins and the co-author of the book called " radical american partition ship." welcome to the program. guest: thank you so much for having me. host: let's start with the institute. tell us about what the focus of your research is. guest: the missionsns gore to strengthen global democracy by research group public facing work and explaining things to the public and providing advice to public officials and of

course having increased quality of dialogue across differences and trying to encourage a democracy that includes all the parts of our society. i particularly study partisanship, polarization in the u.s. and now attitudes about political violence in the u.s. and americans'acceptance of higher levels of political violence and threats. host: let's talk about that. here is a headline from the washington post that says violent political threats surges 2024 begins hunting american democracy. what do you think is behind that surge? guest: this is the surge in the new year but this is -- it didn't just start right now. this is been something that's been increasing over the last many years. in general, we have seen larger numbers of threats to local officials all the way across the

country. this is having an impact on not only who stays in office but who runs for office in the first place because these threats have a real escalating effect. a bomb threat can stop people from doing their job during the day so a lot of this is intended to disrupt our politics but it's also intended to intimidate people from wanting to do their job in a way that requires principles and courage in these threats can be an effective way to silence people who might otherwise stand up to extremism. host: tell us how the nature of political threats and political violence have evolved. you talked about violence against -- threats against elected officials and there is also swatting, a series of bomb threats against state capitals. what is the trajectory here?

guest: this is something -- people have been looking into this during and after the trump administration. a lot of the threats have been two democrats and republicans who oppose trump. the idea of swatting which is calling the police to come to your house and telling them there is a murder or something and they come with a swat team is extremely disruptive and can be terrifying and dangerous. even things like doxing which is exposing people's personal information, it can requirements to recover. these things have been increasing. the actual threats, calling somebody and offering a death threat to them has been increasing as well. as these things all the way through the trump administration but it spiked during times when trump was being threatened like

during his impeachment and then after january 6 during -- deciding what the outcome of the election would be, there were more threats and we are seeing it continue on. it seems to respond to times are situations when trump himself seems to be under threat of persecution or losing power or some way he is being insulted or discriminated against in their view. host: we will take your calls for our guest. you can call us and are lined by party, democrats, (202) 748-8000 , republicans (202) 748-8001, an independents (202) 748-8002 you can also text us at (202) 748-8003 and we are on facebook and x. you mentioned before that the attitudes and the tolerances of

the public are shifting regarding their willingness to accept political violence net willingness is going up. can you tell us more about that and why that might be? guest: we started collecting data in 20, asking, regular americans, to what extent do you think it's ok to use violence to attain political bowl -- goals or is it ok to threaten people from the other party and in 2017, the support for these kind of things was pretty low, 10% republicans and democrats but they seem to react to political events of during trump spur -- first impeachment, the numbers among republicans when up to over 20% approval of using violence or threats. for democrats, the same bump wasn't there because they weren't under threat. after january 6, republicans went up again.

democrats and republicans are at tenor 20% right now approving of using violence and threats to achieve their political goals. host: your organization called project protect democracy has a tracker online at protect democracy.org. it has this tracker with current impact and has several categories like elections and individual liberties. can you explain how this tracker works and where the data comes from? guest: we developed this project largely because i was moderating these attitudes in the public and we know certain things about political violence and what it does in other countries. one thing we didn't have a sense of was what was the impact of violence on our democracy today. we collected a panel of a few hundred experts on political

violence which includes academics, members of think tanks and people who have done research into political violence around the world. we asked them to fill out this survey assessing the degree to which violence is attacking eight different colors of democracies like election integrity, jude the judicial oversight of the executive, the freedom of expression, freedom of speech among americans and what we found from that -- this was done in a quarterly basis. currently, the level of worry of experts about the effect of violence on our democracy is not low but it's not as high as it could be. a scale of one, everything is great and on a scale of five, everything has fallen. we are right now at about 2.6. host: that's a little over halfway to five. guest: yeah, that score reflects

something between significant erosion of these institutions because of violence to this is in danger of falling. the current floor is somewhere between this is not good and this is about to fall apart. host: what is the american public supposed to do with that? what do you recommend for a regular american citizen? guest: we wanted this to be a resource for people to kind of keep track of these things over time. the reason we started it is we wanted to have a baseline of what experts were thinking before we get deep into election season. ultimately, as we do this quarterly, we can show trendlines. our -- our experts getting more worry or less worried? it's sort of a barometer of the people who understand political violence and its role in a democracy worrying about today and has that increased over time

and therefore, should be -- should be we did should we be worried? host: let's start talking to colors. keith in denver, colorado on the line for democrats. caller: good morning and very consistent work. i would like to posit a theory here. in the late 1980's, hyper partisanship and violence is tied to media for -- fragmentation. we've seen increased polarization for 25 or 30 years which correlates to the violence you are monitoring particularly domestic threats like christian nationalism. that's one of the primary threats. for the first time in history, we had partisan news in the 1990's with the introduction of

fox news. prior to that, a lot on the right believed that rush limbaugh was news. all of that programming was anti-liberal. as a result of that, fox has spawned a complete ecosystem that's been alternative reality. these are not news stations. they are information networks and entertainment but they are not what we call objective news. can you respond to that please? guest: that's a really good insight actually. in my own research, i have combined that media consolidation and partisan news and partisan media with the rise of social media and also some

deep demographic changes that are happening that happens within the two parties with republicans after the civil rights legislation of the 60's becoming increasingly having democrats moving to the republican party so we have a party that's largely white. it's this perfect storm of media resources and demographic changes and cultural differences emerging between the two parties so that every election we have is like a contest over who we are rather than what we want government to do. it's really important to pay attention to that. i agree with you on the media effect. i think it's dangerous for us to have the entire media ecosystem that just kind of doesn't refer to each other. particular on the right, we see different evidentiary standards of news outlets on the far right where and not mainstream news

outlet, people say yesterday we were wrong about this thing and they put a correction up. we don't see that as much on the right. there is not as much self reflection and searching for evidence based news. we are in a really tough situation. i think it's a combination of these media affects and democrats and republicans becoming very different types of people and it becomes increasingly difficult for them to talk to each other. also hear each other. or even to understand how anyone would vote for the other side because they don't know anybody who does. host: let's talk to a republican in california next. caller: hi, thank you for having me on. i have two questions -- have you done any research to have any statistics on charismatic or political people like prime minister or

presidents around the world and the political climate in which this happens? i find these people are polarizing and the politics around them are very aggressive. another thing i wanted to ask -- any thoughts on when donald trump waelected in 2016 why there is so much anger towards him? it was right off the get go in all the people that worked on his cabinet. a lot of yelling and telling people who pushed back on him and accosting his children and grandchildren, picking on them at a restaurant. and that went on forever. it's still going on. thank you. guest: to your first question, there is research in other countries about when political

systems break down. one of the big predictors of that is what i was talking about with the last caller, the ability of when a political system in a country realizes that realigns itself around ethnic or religious lines. that becomes a higher risk for political violence and civil war. i'm not suggesting we are going into that right now but it seems when our society becomes divided by these deep identities that are hard to compromise on like our own racial or religious identity, that's when political systems often fall apart. it's very difficult to have an election that is also reflecting the status of religious groups or racial groups. it's not something the government was set up to do. as for animosity towards trump, this is one of the things where i think obama's administration

had the most assassination attempts or threats in history. our politics are first of all just becoming much more toxic. most political figures at this point are getting death threats if they are prominent. there was a lot of anger at trump and i think there still is for saying things that were kind of explicitly violating norms of what we thought -- normal political norms like patterns of speech and talk about women and minority groups. honestly, running government in a way that felt more like a cult of personality than sort of a stable, traditional presidency. that's my guess about why people were hostile for trump. honestly, they are quite hostile to him. most of that for my

understanding is coming from deep worry about the quality of government and the ability of democracy to function and so on. host: we have a question for you over text. guest: right, yes. swatting is extremely dangerous especially for people, groups that tend to be marginalized, disproportionally targeted by police like swatting a black american is different than swatting a white american, for example. the bots and international threats -- there is a group called the

bridging device initiative at princeton that's working to track the number of threats to local officials by asking them. they have a survey of hundreds of local officials and he asked them about the extent to which they are being threatened. it's an interesting data set to look at. i don't know whether it's possible to know if these threats are coming from international places. a lot of these threats are phone calls. for a phone call that's not possible to mimic a u.s. area code, it seems like most of these threats are americans calling from within the united states and we have voicemail recordings. this is one of the most scary and i think potent types of threats is someone yelling at someone else over the phone and offering dangerous threats. i don't actually know the answer

to your question of how many might be international or not real but it seems that especially on these phone calls, they seem to be pretty authentic. host: let's go to manhattan, new york, independent, good morning. caller: good morning. happy new year to you. i may be a little late on but the set is beautiful. you are an amazing host. i absolutely love you. i just wanted to get that in first. host: thank you. caller: donald trump seems to be using the internet to send threats. that's what it seems to be. he put out a comment and disparaged the manhattan d.a. and afterwards he received credible threats. it did the same thing with the judge in d.c..

he put out comments about her but the one i think is most interesting is about a week or two ago after the main secretary of state was removed from the ballot, he didn't disparage her. he didn't insult her. all he did was he posted on social media her contact information. he put her bio which has a contact page. i said to myself i bet you within the next amount of time, couple of days, i bet she will get threats and lo and behold, watching television or the new york times, i don't know, it said the main secretary of state now has threats. if any other american was doing that on social media because they knew that it would lead to a threat and possibly god for

bid even worse, we would be held accountable. there must be some professional listening so he never once said we can link the threats to his social media. it's not even his comments, just social media alone. he knows that the end result of putting the information of these people out there is going to lead to this. it's impossible he can't know that would be the end result. why isn't he held responsible for that the way all of us would be? thank you, mimi, you're the absolute breast. host: let's get a response. guest: i think there is an important difference between delivering a threat and encouraging a threat. it's a lot harder to hold people responsible for encouraging someone else to deliver a threat. it's easier to say the person

that delivered the threat is the person that is doing the damage. one thing i found in my own research is that the power of elected leaders or political leaders in general is to either encourage or discourage violence -- violent threats or violent approaches to politics is pretty huge. we've done experiments where we had people read a quote from donald trump or joe biden that says violence is not ok. it reduces people's level of violence. it's quite easy to do that. our leaders have a lot of responsibility. it's probably not legal responsibility, i'm not a lawyer. they certainly have moral and ethical responsibilities to speak responsively to their supporters. that means there is good and bad. it's easy for leaders to discourage violence if they speak out against it but also, if our leaders refused to discourage violence, they are

extraordinarily encouraging it. one thing we should be doing as a society and the electorate is remind our elected leaders they have a responsibility to keep the peace and try to make sure these threats and violence is not occurring. when they don't do that, when they explicitly encourage violence or they just don't discourage it, we have a really risky situation and we should be asking more of our leaders. host: we have a text from kevin. guest: there is a lot of different types of violence. one is threats to other people. the blm riots like 96% of them

were peaceful. probably it's a real tool to damage property and make chaos in a place is a way of using political violence or just sort of chaos to affect political outcomes. the black lives matter summer actually did have a political outcome. the question is -- what type of violence is occurring and what are the goals of the violence? the difference between the black lives matter protest and january 6, 2021 is that the black lives matter protest were not attempting to stop a political process. the january 6 attack, the point of it was to stop the electoral certification of the election. that's directly connected to democratic procedures. blm was much more about raising

the voice of people who are not being heard. it didn't actually attack a government and didn't actually create a situation in which our laws cannot be an acted. in terms of protest, that is generally to raise the voices of people who feel violence. you can have violence in both domains. i think the results of that violence really matters or the intent of the violence matters. but tickly when we have violence occurring in order to stop political officials from doing their job to prevent legal processes from occurring, that's a different type of threat to a democracy. protest activity becomes violence, it is protected under the first amendment and then it gets out of control. there is no protection under the first amendment for stopping the accounts of votes for example. host: let's get one more call

from larry in hempstead, new york, republican. caller: good morning. with all due respect, violence, the root of violence, what causes the root of violence? it's anger. what's making people angry is a very extreme divisive media that is so thorough in their divisiveness that me as a black republican, in theyears or eighy since trump first took office, when i try to get one of my friends families were democrats or liberals to try to come on the other side and listen and let me show them the evidence and show them the information we on the right have to counter whatever information they have, they won't give me a chance.

the job has been done so thorough. for them to say that liberals were the blm thing wasn't this just wasn't the same as the january 6 incident -- remember? these people have been more divisive. host: let's get a response. guest: basically, violence comes out of anger and it also comes out of frustration and passion. it usually corrupts when democracy doesn't seem to be working. you are right that democrats in 2016 in the state of virginia, 70% of hillary clinton supporters never meant a trump supporter and 70% of trump supporters never meant hillary supporter. it's difficult to talk across them moon we have different informational privileging certain points over others. we say this is the most

important thing in the other sized debts and the other side says this is the most important side to me. those conversations are difficult to have but i would argue that they are important to have an keep having. it not only explains your side but you can begin by asking questions of people you disagree with and say why do you believe that, what events do you think led to this or what part of you is inclined to believe what you believe. curiosity towards people who disagree with us is important. i think it will lead to more open and honest conversations between democrats and republicans. i think those conversations are important and they should be had and they need to be had with more an aspect of curiosity rather than lecturing or teaching or trying to tell our friends who don't agree with us what to think. host: liliana mason from the johns hopkinssns gore institute, mapping violence, thanks so much

for joining us today. guest: it was my pleasure, thank you. host: coming up next on "washington journal," republican tim burchett of tennessee will be here to talk about his opposition to the new spending dealing whether speaker johnson still has his support. later, the democrat from nevada talks about the looming government spending battle and house republican efforts to impeach homeland security officer à la andro mayorkas. ♪ >> c-span's campaign 2024 campaign coverage continues with the iowa caucus. the first votes in the country will be cast for the upcoming presidential election along with candidate speeches and results beginning with the iowa caucuses january 15 and the new hampshire

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featuring their nonfiction books. kimberly crenshaw shared stories of police violence in her book say her name. then on afterwords rachel slade features her book making it an america when she looks at a sweatshirt company in maine and is interviewed by the new york times editorial board member. watch book tv every sunday on c-span2 and find a full schedule on your program guide or watch online anytime at book tv.org. >> "washington journal" continues. host: welcome back, we are joined representative tim burchett come a republican from tennessee. he is a committee member on the oversight and accountability committee and also foreign affairs committee member. welcome to the program. guest: thank you for having me on, ma'am. host: let's talk about spending. you have said you're not

supporting the latest spending bill so tell us why. guest: $1.6 trillion, 800 -- excuse me, 886 william for defense and that's 25 million more than last year. the pentagon has not passed an audit. they have lost over half $1 trillion in assets. to me, that is inexcusable and yet we reward them and that's way government works. i'm basically a hawk. i was a marine in the second world war, my mama fluent airplane. i lost a brother fighting the nancy's so i believe in a strong national -- the nazis so i believe a strong national defense and that's a microcosm of what's going on in washington. people call it the swamp but the swamp is something god created. washington is more of an open sewer.

everything flows in and nothing flows out. we are at the will of the lobbyists and the powerful elites. i'm sick of it. we are $34 trillion in debt. we taken $5 trillion per year and yet we spend $7 trillion per year. you can call it new math or whatever but it does not work. we are going off a fiscal cliff and somebody has to say no, enough is enough. host: you mentioned the defense budget. what would you cut that to? guest: i would say no increase until you can account for the half trillion dollars you lost, half $1 trillion in assets you've lost. the arrogance of this bunch is beyond belief area they control congress. the military defense committees, some years they get more money than they ask for.

we can't even control our southern border and we are giving these folks more money. we're in syria and were all over the world. i don't see that -- when somebody joins the military, they take an oath and they hold the right hand up and say i want to protect the constitution of the united states of america and i daresay a lot of these wars and things we get into have nothing to do with that. one example, when we decided to give our missile defense system to ukraine, i'm not here to debate that one way or another, we immediately had to replenish our missile defense system which we should get members of both parties own stock in the missile-defense company or had bought stock prior to that transaction. i see that there is a lot of things going on in washington and i think the public needs to know is both parties.

people need to pay attention and they need to start digging. this is all public record and i feel like everybody goes home and feeds their people read me. i'm conservative and they go home and they say we will cut the u.n. budget or this or that. then we get back to washington it's the same old games. keep adding more and more. that's how we get to 30 $4 trillion. host: you're a congressman part of washington. guest: and i'm fighting it. host: what guest: guest: can you do? i'm exposing a lot of this, every opportunity i get. i'm sure somebody will say pick up the phone call their congressmen and say we are $34 trillion in debt, what's your plan? we don't have a plan. it's just spend more money and it cannot continue. the republicans and democrats, everybody wants to stay in power. it has nothing to do with doing

what's right and saving our country. i like to say it's portfolios over people. the wealthy elite -- for instance, we like to rail on the budget issue -- on the border issue which we should. we are close to $400 billion per year to maintain the 8 million plus people who have come over the border in the last three years. that's the size of the state of tennessee. you would be surprised that our national chambers of commas -- of commerce have tried to block every effort we've had to hold those numbers down. they are getting free or cheap labor. it's unregulated. shame on us for that. greed is what drives this thing. that's a problem. those are some things i think we can address but we don't have the guts to do it. host: if you would like to join the conversation and have a

question for congressman burchett, you can call us, democrats (202) 748-8000, republicans (202) 748-8001 an independents (202) 748-8002. you are one of the votes that ousted speaker mccarthy. how are you feeling about speaker johnson and how he's doing specifically about spending? guest: as a conservative and a christian i like speaker johnson. he has great credentials. i think the conservatives have done up poor job of backing them up. i would like to see him flourish in that role as the speaker because he is a man of god and he loves his wife and his family and he loves his country. i'm just afraid that he got thrown in the deep end early on this thing. one day he is literally organizing the speeches on the floor and he gave -- he received the national thomas -- i receive

the national thomas jefferson statue for how many speeches you give on the floor and that's what he did. it's part of leadership that's important and it sets a tone to put it out on the news and it was covered by folks like you all. the next day, after the vote, he was on an airplane negotiating with benjamin netanyahu and flying to israel for this country. he inherited a lot of bad things like the budget. it wasn't his budget, he inherited the vast majority of it. chuck schumer said we have every nickel we asked for which isn't helping things when he says that. i think we have to realize that what speaker johnson has done is he's talked about the things that were not talked about, the so-called side deals. you can google that and it will explain what those were, the billions of dollars that were spent on side deals that were not discussed openly about the budget.

speaker johnson has done that because he's a man of his word. i would hope he remembers his conservative credentials from here forward. host: there is talk about a temporary spending bill next week or sometime this week. also moving the deadlines for all 12 spending bills. are you in favor of that? will that happen? do you think the government will shut down? guest: i think it could happen. nobody wants a shut down. that's really the only leverage we have is taxpayers. the first part of your question was, i'm sorry, long day already -- host: not good. guest: i sat through the hearing yesterday with hunter biden so if you can imagine that. host: let's talk about that. guest: the chairman came by and thanked me for staying the whole time. host: tell us what was it like in there? guest: it was just washington,

d.c., it was made-for-tv. the republicans were the only ones who didn't know hunter was coming in. the democrats knew and it's funny like go to a little conservative group on wednesday mornings. i was getting texts from reporters saying what time is hunter supposed to be there. i didn't know he was even coming. i was coming in my usual time, i was leaving our conference meeting and i left there early to get to the committee and the two taxpayer funded suburbans were pulling up with sirens and i heard somebody say that's hunter. the press was waiting at the entrance of course. i was told later by another reporter that it was a very respected reporter who said they are filming a documentary. we were all sort of ponds in

this whole thing in its washington, d.c.. it's made-for-tv, it's click bait and it's unfortunate. they kept saying he will answer questions and marjorie taylor greene started to answer desk asking questions and he got up and lift -- and left. it was like his press conference a few weeks back. he said i will answer all your questions and he turned around and got in his taxpayer-funded suburban and security detail and pulled away. i don't get too upset about it, everybody's getting all fired up about it. memberssleep last night but i'm conservative but i'm not angry about it. it's just what washington, d.c. is now. it's made for television until this country decides to elect some folks that take the job serious and are not there just for the irate nature of things. i think it will remain the same

or get worse. it makes for good tv. you will have plenty to talk about. host: are you ready to talk to callers? guest: i will take them. as long as they don't get on any blooper reels. being southern baptist, i would not be used to the swearing. host: democrat, good morning. caller: i appreciate you and your my favorite. i have an answer to getting these democrats and republicans together. i will give you an example that was a hoax. global warming. alaska was melting, the polar bears were dying and all of that was a hoax. we herded seven days per week on every hour. for years. this is not a hoax and this will happen. we owe $34 trillion.

i'm using numbers i'm not sure of but let's say we take in about $3.5 trillion per year and we spend let's say $5 trillion. this country is actually going to go bankrupt. but when we do go bankrupt, all your federal employees that are retired come of that money is gone. your social security is gone. a lot of your benefits are gone. if we tell people every hour on the hour like we did global warming for years, i promise you you're democrats and your republicans will get so much heat they will come together. i was the guy that called you one time and i asked you if you was a united states senator. somebody offered you $2 million to vote a certain way, what

would you do? you turned it on me and you said what what i do? sa i hope i wouldn't do it by human nature set i would. do you remember that call? host: actually, i do. guest:1 [laughter] caller: the only way we can bring these people together is for the news media, you included who i appreciate and i think is the best in all your news media around the country to harp on that just like they did global warming. host: let's see with the congressman thanks. guest: i'm not really sure what the question was. i always room every the commercial that said every polar bear on the earth will be dead in 50 years. the vast majority on this people will be dead in 50 years. it's just a lifespan. i started thinking about that and i couldn't get what his question was. host: do you think global

warming is a host -- a hoax? guest: i don't. i don't know that we cause it but i believe we are stewards. i own a farm we don't use any chemicals on it. i'm an organic gardener. that might be a shock to people but i believe the answer to the environment is capitalism. i believe we can figure out ways like tires. tires are horrible. we've got to have them but they pollute the environment and they collect water and mosquitoes and they break down whatever. if you can figure out what to do with them, every tire, you generate one tire per person per year in a population. tennessee would generate about 8 million tires per year. if you can figure out what to do with those tires and profit would be the incentive, i think we could clear it up. i think we go through cycles. host: let's talk to john in

texas, republican, good morning. caller: good morning, congressman. i've got several solutions for the debt but i will give you three off the top. i'm curious what you think. number one is social security. there is a cap on the social security tax. if you make one million per year, you pay the social security tax on one million per year. then there is a lot of cash flow coming in. jew do away with the child tax credit. we shouldn't reward people for having children. number three is the expansion of medicaid. you have able-bodied people on medicaid, make them start paying a premium of $50 per month. it's time they pay their fair share like others pay for medicare. those are three right off the top and i'm curious what you think about that. guest: i would say that all those have merit. the child credit would probably

be one of the tougher ones. any time you deal with medicaid and medicare, i like to say people are just selling memberships. i appreciate that call but people are just selling memberships on these issues. i will get a lobbyist to see me on a bill dealing with term limits. we all know term limits is a great idea. i sponsored legislation and ted cruz has a bill and i was a house sponsor of the equivalent bill. yet it will never pass because people don't have the guts to do it. second of all, the lobbyists are just selling memberships to these organizations. send us $50 and we will stop the tide of whatever of communism. that's all they are doing. it's like finding bigfoot. if they found bigfoot, there would never be a tv show. they are not in the business of stopping something but perpetuating your $50 per month membership fee. host: ron in illinois,

independent. caller: yes, wow. i wish i had a representative like tim burchett, incredible. guest: thank you. caller: can you tell your story about how it works when a new politician gets to washington? we all know it but to hear you say it was so refreshing. my question -- are you ready to shut the government if they don't shut the border? guest: yes, sir i am. it's that important we cannot continue down this path. we've had people dying particular in my district. an illegal alien cross the line and killed him. wonderful human being and a great family. we have 100,000 children unaccounted for over the border. we know the cartels are into sex

trafficking and this insatiable appetite this country has for it and i condemn those people to help personally. i would like to send them there. they are involved with this and abusing these children but we know of 100,000. we have 8 million illegals in multimillion getaways. do you expect these people will show for court? they will get in the system and go to california and get free health care. they will become voters. and they will not be citizens. it's a very corrupt organization. the cartels are making 30-40,000,000 dollars per month hauling humans over the border. shame on this country for magnetizing this. i'm working on legislation that we will in fact establish capitalism which is a great thing we should be exporting to other countries. we need to provide tax credits for people who invest in these countries that would do business with this country. when you get to washington, i

have often said it will find you whatever you are looking for. unfortunately, it will find you. if people tell you how great you are you start believing it -- i remember when i was first elected to the state legislature and the ladies were paying me attention and they were laughing at my jokes and how intelligent i was. i've been down that road before. i know what's going on and unfortunately, some people when they get to washington, they are right off the boat and they real the men. you see them walking down the hallway with their entourage because they are the chairman of the subcommittee on intercoastal basket weaving or something and they are all pumped up. that's how they real you in and that's how nothing gets done. that's unfortunate. i sleep in my office at night. i don't go out much. i love my wife and daughter and i want to get back to knoxville as soon as i can.

god has given me an incredible life. all that stuff doesn't have much appeal to me. unfortunately, it has a great appeal to other people. host: on the line for democrats, dan, good morning. caller: good morning. i've got a few things here. the first one is -- on the people testifying against trump, over 95% of them have been republicans. secondly, if you want the american people to decide not to run, get rid of the electoral college. trump was found guilty in new york. the gop says the crime rate is on the up, it's not, it's going down. the murder rate has gone down by 12%.

that's since bide got in office, thank you very much. host: what do you think? guest: i couldn't understand his first question as far as crime going down, that's great for new york. i just saw where they closed one of their schools to bring an illegal aliens and kick the kids out of the schools. as far as the murder rate goes, i don't have the statistics in front of me. i don't think you can blame a president or praise a president for what happens at the state level. we have states rights in this country so those kind of things -- i can name you have a dozen democrat-controlled communities that have an incredibly high murder rate, chicago for example. it doesn't really matter, that's the kind of thing that separates this country. we got to stop worrying about black or white or all that.

the only thing washington is concerned about his green and that's the problem, the color of money. everybody dying -- anybody dying is a horrible situation. isome inner-city violence this morning and it turns my stomach because those are americans, those are friends of mine. it just disgusts me. i'm not going to get into the partisan thing. as far as trump, i couldn't quite get the analogy with trump being found guilty and the crime rate in new york. i'm not sure how that went. host: do you endorse former president trump or president? guest: no, ma'am. host: are you going to? guest: i don't know about endorsements. i've had a lot of people pull me in different directions. i know ron desantis come i know nikki haley, i know donald trump area they asked me when i walked off the capital one day who i

was for for president and i said me. they asked if i was running for president. i said heck no. i'm running for reelection though. i stay in my lane. i got my own race to run. i don't know what these endorsements carry. you usually just tick people off. the big boys come out and endorse somebody but in my district, that looks very heavy-handed. that means money is behind you but it doesn't mean you are people. days of ward healers are going. host: you seem so frustrated at how washington works and the dysfunction that's going on in congress. guest:■é because i think it is worse the fight. in my mom lost her brother fighting the nazis and my father would say it was worth the fight.

until the day my daddy died i would grab him by his big toe because even as an 80-year-old man he suffered the price. he went to china and fought the communist for a short. period of time. he had a great i go to his gravesite and that still part of my life. i think about the sacrifices they made and it is worth it. we have to fight for this country, both parties, we have to come together. i am incredibly frustrated but until we realize we are one

nation under god, we will fall apart. i believe that is partially by design. i believe there aropnarchy. republicans and democrats. sorry i went to preaching, i won't have an altar call. host: karen from alabama. caller: good morning. i just want to make a comment on the global warming comment that they were making in the beginning, man-made global warming is a hoax. the reason they want to switch to electric cars is because they are making money off of it. pollution is different than global warming. representative, thank you for everything you are doing.

mccarthy was part of the swamp i am glad you ratted him out. i would just like to say, i am in favor of term limits but when there are people like you in there i would like you to stay until the government is fixed. guest: thank you, i think jesus will come before we fix it all. and thank you for your kind words. i love to hear people from delta south, they don't have an accident and i can understand what they are saying. and i know people in alabama because nick sabin retired. caller: good morning, happy new year.

i think the lady before me stole my thunder about term limits. i am in favor of term limits. i think we would get more done if the people of congress would stop worrying about the money they were going to make while they were in there. you mentioned that before. not the term limits but making a lot of money. and second, i would like to know how you voted on january 6 when we tried to count the electoral votes. thank you. guest: that is a good question. the problem we had with the electoral votes is that there were discrepancies in six states. the federal law says the state government is the only one who

can make laws or rules concerning elections. we had county court clerk's that were moving voting registration. we had a judge intervened in one state that said you don't have to show any id. until we get to that, i suspect we will have two fix it is that we have completely verifiable vote and that would be paper ballot. when you put paperboard over windows where they are counting the votes, that creates a real problem. in these drop off boxes for votes, as we say into the sea that is crooked as a dog's leg. there is no verification whatsoever and i have a problem with those. host: i want to close with another question about hunter biden. you have said you are open to

hip testifying openly. you don't think it is a big deal that your republican colleagues insist that this is a closed-door deposition? guest: the first deposition is, and the reason they do that and shame on the national media because they know that there are confidential things discussed. innocent people could be brought up that we need to verify one way or the other and don't throw them under the bus in a made-for-tv hearing. it would just people going on and on for the click bait so you can get the ratings up and nothing is solved. that is the reason they do that but i don't have any problem with it. i'm not a lawyer, i just have some questions that the people want me to ask. host: what's the biggest

question you want to ask? guest: how did you not pay taxes on that and i would like to asked the justice department, why was the statute allowed to run on that? that is what they got al capone on. i start sweating is something like that happened to me. i would call my accountant and ask him what the heck is this? there are two tiers of justice and it doesn't have anything to do with r's or d's. there are always people on the tarmac gritting the president. i have never been asked out on the tarmac. i have been a state legislator, county mayor, a congressman and never asked out on it.

now, i see it. but when i was younger it hurt my feelings but i'm glad they did it. host: representative tim burchett of tennessee, thank you for joining us. guest: and thank you for my cool mug i hope i get to keep it? host: you get to keep it. guest: cool. host: we will hear about the looming house battle and secretary may artist. but first, it is open for them. you may start dialing in now. >> american history tv saturdays on c-span two exploring the people and events that tell the american story. as 7:00 eastern, free to choose which originally aired on 1980

by milton friedman. they were advocates of free market principles and limited government intervention. and then on lectures of history, matthew jones on the history of artificial intelligence and the debate over its development. on the presidency, we will look at lyndon johnson's record on race and domestic policy. at 10:30, historic campaign speeches. we look at past campaigns to hear from presidential candidates before voters. we look back to 2007 with oprah winfrey joining michelle and barack obama is speech. exploring the american story. find a full schedule on your program guide or watch online at any time.

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there is a day between ron desantis and nikki haley last night. former president trump held a town hall. there is also hunter biden, spending. i wanted to show you speaker dodson with reporters on capitol hill yesterday. voicing concerns about his job security in the spending deal. [video clip] >> members have opposed your spending deal and talked about a motion to vacate. chip roy's spoke about it publicly. what do you say in response to those members that you could lose your job over this deal? >> i'm not concerned about this job. chip roy is one of my closest friends but i talked to him about it and the reality of the smallest majority in the history of congress. have a difficult challenge

but we will advance the ball and advance our conservative principles and demonstrate we can govern well. leadership is stub. you take a lot of criticism. remember, i am a hard-line conservative. i come from that cap. chip and i do agree on that. when i was chairman of rsv we prepared budgets and it would give us back to balance. this, to me as a down payment on restoring us to fiscal sanity in this country. last week, we crossed a dangerous threshold, 34 trillion in federal debt. we borrow every 140 days $1 trillion.

just think about it, the scale of this. we have to cut more and i think if we demonstrate that we govern well we will grow the house majority. i believe republicans will vote the senate and white house. we will turn this thing around. host: for the next 20 minutes taking your calls with the numbers on your screen. we go straight to richard and jacksonville, florida. caller: good morning mimi. i am a 70-year-old marine corps veteran. i have sworn an oath to the constitution of this nation and i don't know why they are standing back and let donald trump speak file a disgusting thing about us.

--bile and disgusting things about. the republicans are standing behind donald j trout. saying those things about veterans in this country. god help us, we need a lot of help in this country and the republican party is not the answer. you have a fine day mimi and i hope you have a good one. host: let's speak to charlotte, a democrat. caller: i don't understand what's going on. i am 81. i have followed politics most of my life. in fact, i remember studying civics. i don't think young people even

understand how the government works. or people in general. i heard mr. johnson talking about the budget and the deficit. however, in the past five years, we never heard anything about the budget until a democrat got elected. i think they have changed the whole philosophy talking about saving and budgets. because there seems to be no plan for the american people. i thought american was established by the people of the people for the people. we have a defense budget that

could kill the world five times over. no one talks about the military budget or the defense budget. they only talk about cutting things that help the people. the people should be considered when the congressman are passing laws. it doesn't seem to be that way anymore. i can understand what is going on. especially with the republicans. i heard representative burkett say he sleeps in his office. perhaps that's what's wrong. he doesn't go out much and doesn't mingle with people, the regular people. you need to be there in order to see what is going on or at least

listen to the people whenever they are complaining about their inability to make ends meet. because the longer i live, the more i understand how we the people should be in charge. and term limits? that will never happen. we have talked about that since i was 16 years old and i am 81 now. host: let's talk to pete in appleton, wisconsin. caller: how are you doing? host: doing ok. caller: i have two things. with mayorkas, provided and

harris must be telling him what to do just like all the cabinet members. the executive branch is telling them what to do and they are just doing it. gavin newsom, there are a whole bunch of rich people in this country that think he is just waiting in the wings provided to back out. when by then backs out he will jump in there. if gavin newsom is in their entrances country into what california is, forget it, it will be over. they need to think about that one. host: you mentioned the homeland committee security chair mark green. [video clip] >> today is a solemn occasion as

we began impeachment proceedings against alejandro mayorkas and his handling of the border. i wish we weren't sitting here today in these proceedings were necessary. i wish our southwest border was secure. i wish that our government was enforcing the laws passed by congress and doing its job keeping the american people say. unfortunately, he has done none of these things. we've conducted a competence investigation into the cost and consequences of the unprecedented crisis that our southwest border. our evidence makes it clear, secretary mayorkas is the architect.

the secretary's refusal to changewith no alternative than to pursue impeachment. his actions have brought himself today, not ours. host: here's a portion of the top democrat arguing the gop efforts to impeach him is all about politics. [video clip] >> republicans go to the border to oppose for pictures. but they leave the uniform and work boots behind. the want to get border agents what they need to secure order and the republicans do not. securing the border is not really their top concern. if it was, they would provide the people wit boots on the ground at the border which they need to get the job done.

republicans would rather exploit a challenging policy issue for their own political gain. they disagree with the biden administration's immigration policies and angry this administration won't take babies from their mothers or put kids in cages like the last administration. you could not impeach a cabinet secretary because you don't like the president's policy. let me say that again, you cannot impeach a secretary because you don't like the presidents policy. that is not what impeachment is for. they are willing to do grave damage to the constitution that they hold dear because they think it will benefit them politically. host: joanne is in council bluffs, iowa. good morning. caller: i would just like to ask

a question, there is some concern about how christians can support morally corrupt former president truck. he has done's so many evil things. how can you justify voting for someone who still has election fraud, the gripping scandal, all of these horrible things and they still worship this man and how he could be so far ahead in the polls? i just don't understand it how a christian like your former representative who was just on, professes to be a christian but he supports somebody with constant name-calling, profanity, bias. that's all i have to say. host: there is an interesting

article on the front page of the new york times this morning, it says, a new breed of evangelicals bides defender and trump and christianity defined by politics and not church. " a woman who says trump's are david and goliath. so you might want to catch the. in oregon, jeanette. caller: i totally agree with that last lady. i was born and raised catholic and donald trump is definitely disgusting. he is the antichrist. i would never vote for him and i don't understand these people calling themselves christians? are you kidding me?

i was just going to say, donald trump is pulling the republican party down. i watch the debates, all of them. it made the hair stand up on the back of my neck. neither one of these people, dukakis or haley talked about the country at all. they spent the whole time putting each other down. they didn't put truck down because they love him too. -- they did not put trump down. and then he was on fox news saying that he doesn't want any violence. is he kidding me? does he think were all stupid? he has a criminal with 90 indictments.

that's not who americans vote for. that is not who we are. i am 65 years old. my husband and i are both disabled and i saw him make fun of disabled people. i love hunter biden and i feel so bad for him. he already went to court. he already pled guilty. and republicans said we have to open this fact out. they have nothing to run on. they're going to run on hunter biden and impeaching alejandra mayorkas. they asked for money to go to the boarded but they did not want to vote on them because they want to run on it. they don't care about the country and if you vote for them you are out. host: let's go to jeff, in

portage, michigan. a republican. caller: every morning is a good morning on the other side of the door. when i watch the stuff yesterday , with hunter biden. the different hearings. i felt like i was watching maury povich and jerry springer. there has to be a better way than five minutes here and there. everyone has their hotshot and i know there are very good representatives, good sincere people there. i want to know their ideas, with

five minutes back and forth you can do anything. it's just their little time in the spotlight. they are not fixing anything. i've been republican, democrat and independent. yeah, what do they really do? it is quite entertaining. who needs a circus or soap opera when we can watch cnn? host: albert in california, and independent. caller: i would just like to say that the gentleman you had just speaking prior, he should run for president. he touched on all three bases cartels on the border. for the environment, as far as climate, california is disgusting it's so dirty.

and last but not least build the wall and stop the fentanyl and clean it up. host: stephen lebanon junction, kentucky. caller: we have to clear the view for what republican or democrat leadership looks like. if you look at what trump did for this country. if you look at the border it was the best of 40 years, the economy best in 50 years. everyone was working. the crime rate was down. people could afford to live in their houses. contrast that with what the democrats have done in the last 3.5 years. you want to contrast, just look at what the cities are like, what the borders or the like.

the world is on fire and a big part of it is because of democratic leadership. we have to turn this thing around and if we doubt, this country is doomed. host: donna is next in rhode island, a democrat. caller: good morning. i think it is super important that everyone to have a voice. i'm kind of shocked at some of the callers, especially the ones that say global warming is a hoax. where did they get their information? that's my biggest concern. i have watch the news my entire life and i am awestruck at the false information out there between social media and the news, it is constant. i don't even blame the

republicans because they are in a bubble and they just keep hearing the same rhetoric, the same hateful things. the same divisiveness. everything is the radical dems. i am a democrat. my thoughts, my views of religion are all mine. they are privately mind. i don't go around aware them on my sleeve. i vote by issue in backs and these people are not making decisive decision on facts. they are following cultish, mind blowing rhetoric. it is disturbing. there is no peace in this country. there is so much stress.

worried about mental health, but we are causing our own mental health issues. we need to find peace and restore a government that works on facts. facts, not fiction. host: a few programming notes i want you to be aware of, the house just come in at 10:00 and we will have gavel-to-gavel coverage starting at 10:00 a.m. here on c-span. also this morning us in a panel looks at the fentanyl crisis. jason jellyroll the ford will talk about the impact that the drug has on communities. watch that hearing live at 10:00 a.m. eastern over on c-span3. it is also on our free video on

c-span now and c-span.org. officials testify on u.s. policy towardafghanistan following the military withdrawal. they are appearing in front of the house foreign affairs committee. and finally, flora governor in 2024 republin presidential candidate speaks to voters at a meet andre in iowa ahead of the caucus. we will have live coverage of thought beginning on 9:00 a.m.. christina and cedar rapids, iowa. or joyce from georgia.

are you there? i think we might be having trouble with our phone system. let's try howard. in salisbury, north carolina. ñis this joyce? caller: yes it is, hello. i was trying to mute the tv. i'm sorry. the lady who called and she was catholic. how could anyone vote for trump?

i thought catholics were against abortion. they talk about hate and divisiveness, did they not see president biden hate the maga republicans. that's 70-80 million people that he hates. i don't understand how people can constantly blame trump and the maga republicans. we are out of time, after the break we will speak to dina titus of nevada talking about the government spending battle and house republican efforts to impeach alejandra mayorkas. we will be right back.

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can you respond to yesterday's proceedings of their effort to impeach alexandro may arcus. orkas. guest: the senate is working in a bipartisan way but not so in the house. the speakers were three republican attorneys general from states that win for donald trump. our witness was a legal scholar and very respected throughout the country for his work on impeachment. all of the questions were blasting the biden administration, showing pictures of the border showing problems but not coming up with any solutions.

if you disagree with the policy, those are not grounds for impeachment. impeachment has to be for high crimes and misdemeanor not for maladministration. host: how would that benefit the border situation if the secretary mayorkas was removed? he would just be replaced by someone else president biden would nominate. guest: i'm at the end of the road so i go last. i said all of this does not explain how you are going to solve your problems. we had one person from entire not talking about fentanyl, another about marijuana growers and one who is concerned a missouri about terrorism coming in. if you get rid of him how would

this change the administration's problem? they have no answer. host: where are we on border security, what is happening with the discussions on that? guest: we have been working on this issue since 2008 and we have not moved very far. we have several senators who have tried to come up with a bipartisan proposal but have gotten stalled over the parole issue. in the house, nothing is being done. they passed house resolution to the beginning of the term that was outrageous and had no chance of passing. this is a huge issue in my district. host: if you would like to join the conversation you could do so for democrats (202) 748-8000,

for republicans (202) 748-8001 for independents (202) 748-8002. speaker johnson with hr 2 why are you opposed to it? guest: there were writers and it , legislation about abortion. a lot of things about the while the net. we don't believe that would work. it is going anywhere in the senate. you can switch secretaries but what is not going to do? in one household he will have someone undocumented, someone who was a dreamer. someone who is legal in someone who doesn't know what they are? it's a complex issue. host: let's talk about the

solution. you've agreed that something needs to be done on the border? guest: there was a supplemental program that called for additional personnel. they have said they need more resources. hiring more people, more immigration judges to decide asylum cases. more technology, not razor wire but may be drones in the latest technology. we need more defense on the parts of entry not from the family swimming across the river. host: what do you think of bid en's performance so far? guest: he knows they need more resources. he has pushed diplomacy in the

area where people are coming from. not just mexico but in that triangle of three countries. he is stymied by the lack of attention from the congress. host: i want to ask you about funding because the budget is going to run out. what do you think is going to happen? will there be another cr? where are you on the funding debate? guest: i was optimistic at home when i saw they reached a deal that they agreed to the top line. it is pretty much whatesident ae party. but that is why they throughout mccarthy is the speaker and already the maga wing has said they don't want to show for this.

they said no posters or we will get rid of you. it looks like we will have to have another short-term cr because i don't know what they are going to do. host: i want to ask you about aid to israel and ukraine? guest: that was part of the negotiating going on between two leaders. you have reasons for supporting israel and other reasons for supporting ukraine and neither of these things have to do with the border. there should be policies defined by their own men are. anner. host: what kind of influence does the united states have on israel regarding how they are executing their war in gaza and

calls that they are violating international law? guest: both the secretary blinken and the president said we support israel's right to defend themselves but it has to be done within a proportionate way and according to international rules. we have pushed for humanitarian aid to gaza and sec. blinken came back from meeting with people in the region defined regional solution so this conflict is not spread. host: we have hank in south carolina, a republican. caller: thank you. i'm concerned about immigration. these kids going to school.

bring in an immigrant that just came across the border yesterday and taking up all the time from the teachers trying to teach students. it is messing everything up. can you respond to that? guest: i agree with you it is a challenge. is not just for housing, medical assistance, trying to find work for people who come in. but also, many of these children don't speak english so you have to have english as a second language to help them catch up with where our own students are. it becomes a question of resources and we don't want a separate family is like they did under trump's legislation.

this is an unintended consequence of not fixing the border issue. host: lauren in baltimore, maryland. caller: i love c-span, thank you for your work. i listen to the hearing yesterday on the impeachment of mayorkas. one thing i was confused about is the debate about whether impeachment was a policy difference or whether it was about him actually violating the law that has been passed by congress in the way he is administering dhs. i would like to hear the democratic response of the claim that mayorkas is violating the law. i did not hear not addressed by democratic speakers in the hearing. guest: that is the argument

republicans are trying to make entiat to dereliction of duty. when you talk about a law that sets up a policy, this different than a criminal law. he has not been charged with any kind of criminal offense. nothing that has to do with bribery, corruption. a kind of law that is punishable by criminal courts. it's about his administration a policy. it is usually pretty broad and vague and up to the executive branch to fill in the details as they carry out the direct have. if you look at the federalist papers for the constitutional convention you can see they debated this very issue and madison is the one who said you don't include maladministration and if he did that he would give the senate the authority to pick

and choose who is going to be president. that's not fair. we don't look at the administration of policy you have to look it after violation of criminal statutes and that's not president -- present. host: from new york we have denise. caller: i'm going right now? host: you are on the air. caller: i watch the trump impeachment hearing and if you ask me i think it's a crock of crab. i think democrats need to get off of their vaccines and start

thinking for themselves and see what's really going on. host: any comment there? guest: that's an opinion i won't be able to change. host: todd from north dakota, good morning. caller: good morning, i would just like to say president biden and kamala are the heroes of drug cartels. meanwhile, our taxpayers are paying billions of dollars. you have been a mess of this and you want more money to help bring more people in. you need to close the border. that's all i have to say. guest: we all agree we need improvements on the border. you have to have rules for people who want to come to this country. we were made by immigrants

people coming to this country for opportunity and that is what they are doing now. they are coming because they are facing violence and they are coming because of climate change, drought, there is no place to farm anymore. this is not just the u.s.. all over the world where there are affluent and poor countries people could see where opportunities are and figure out how to get there. europe is dealing with this issue. we are dealing with it. as from the middle east, asia, latin america. it is a social logical phenomenon and is not just the president's fault it's much more than that. host: and fentanyl coming in from the ports? guest: it's something

republicans want to bring up and it's a serious problem that's killing young people. most of fentanyl comes from ports of entry where is hidden in drugs. most of the fentanyl is being smuggled then by u.s. citizens, so you have to break that spiral. we had an agreement where the president met with the leaders of china to crack down on fentanyl and that's but a conversation with mexico as well. host: patrice is next from spartanburg, north carolina. caller: every time i call in the mainstream media is the weapon used against the people.

why when elon musk bring the film crew to the border denied there was a problem on the border? why not put trump policies back for when he gets back into office? guest: i don't believe he is going to win, i don't believe he is going to win it all. he's been indicted 90 times and has anemic come through his own primary caucus process. his policies were not closing the border. this border problem goes back several generations. you added to that humanitarian problems that i mention.

people in cages, separating children from their parents. those are not humane ways to deal with immigration. we need improvements in the whole asylum process. we need to help those countries where people have nothing. i agree we need a closed border but it is how you close it and keep it closed is where we disagree. host: the issue of parole is a sticking point for republicans. can you explain what it is and where you stand? guest: it varies, is whether people can come to this country if they meet certain criteria and they can be released under sponsorship of someone already here. they will be in the country even though they haven't gone through the whole process.

you parole them in that sense. host: what is your stance? guest: i don't know what else you are going to do. documented airport or a school? you can put these people to work . they are the hardest working people i know. them doing lawn work, construction, back of the house and casinos. that will add to the economic taxpayers. host: sterling heights, michigan, randy. caller: i wanted to talk about the slot act where you are the sponsor along with the republican from pennsylvania. do you know when this is going to be passed? you have sponsored the bill and can you talk about why that

threshold the $1200, it is been 46 years. i think it is time for that to be raised. can you comment? guest: thank you for bringing that up. i have introduced this for several sessions of were doing it together. we are code chairs of the gaming caucus. anytime you get a jackpot over 1200 they have to shut down the machine and you have to report to the irs. that $1200 threshold was set 40 years ago. we think you should raise that to $5,000 which is what it would

be with inflation. it makes it easier on the company and easier on the person who wins the jackpot and because it is a better policy at 5000, it is more likely people legally reporting what they one. won. host: let's speak to mike, a republican. guest: cages were obama cages they were there way before trump . can you literally tell the american tax paper how many illegals have nothing but taking government subsidies like welfare, wake and section eight housing? i want to know that. guest: i can't give you a figure, it varies. but it is certainly too high.

we have seen people in the last few months living in circumstances that were worse than what they were coming from. a lot of services that you are entitled to as a u.s. citizens you are not entitled to as an immigrant without papers. there is a, believe that immigrants to pay taxes and that is not true if they are employed. host: we have a text from n oklahoma that says what can we do about extreme partisanship? do you believe in cranked choice voting? with this help with hyper partisanship? guest: i studied political science for 35 years. that was my real job before i got into politics and became a member of congress. i have seen partisanship get

worse and worse. there are a number of reasons. one of them is that through the primary system people have been pushed to the extreme to win their primary so it's harder to come back together once they get here. and it gets so negative that it's hard for you to be friends with the one selected. other people go home to raise money because campaigns are so expensive so they don't stay around to washington to make friends off campus. when your kids go to school together, play golf together. then of that exists. we have become very extreme over the time i have been involved. how do you fix it? i don't think it is spring voting. i think it's so confusing by the

time people figured out fewer people will participate then would if they understand how the process works. ranked voting like iniative to california or alaska. where people will decide if they want to do it or not. i don't think they will because they don't understand the complicated process. sometimes it works to moderate things, they said they would not of one that seat if it was in alaska. i don't think it has been in place long enough to see if it will have that impact. right now, the way to be bipartisan says ca't you get along? and get something done? i pick and choose my issues. there are some things i can talk to a republican about that i can work with the republican on the slot act.

i'm working with brian mast from florida and we would not agree on anything but one thing. he is a veteran with small children and we don't think the v.a. should be testing on bigo puppies. -- beagle puppies. host: and that will be the last word from representative dina titus, democrat from nevada. and that is the end of today's washington journal. here is our live coverage of the house.