i think that is important because this region has always it's an extremely important region in the world and what goes on there resonates and has an impact in a lot of other places. so it is important for us to understand basically what people are thinking and feeling there on the ground and why they are feeling it and how that might impact the future. host: people can watch this documentary tonight 10:00 p.m. eastern time on pbs it is available to stream on frontline's website, youtube and the pbs video app. we have to leave it there. a year of war, thank you so much for the conversation. guest: thank you very much. host: the house will gaveling quickly and go back out. they are not in washington this week, this is a pro forma session. we'll bring you up to capitol

hill. [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2024] the speaker pro tempore: the house will be in order. the chair lays before the house a communication from the speaker. the clerk: the speaker's rooms, washington, d.c. october 15, 2024. i hereby appoint the honorable h. morgan griffith to act as speaker pro tempore on this day. signed, mike johnson, speaker of the house of representatives. the speaker pro tempore: the prayer will be offered by chaplain kibben. chaplain kibben: would you pray with me. teach us today, o lord, to live by faith and not by sight. there are so many issues, concerns, worries that press us from every side. remind us again that our faith in you will not allow us to be crushed. countless unknowns, the uncertainty of our future, our

health, our welfare all cause us to be perplexed. remind us again that our faith in you will not leave us in despair. the suffering in our world, in our nation, in our communities, even in our homes persecutes our sense of rightness. remind us again that our faith in you assures us that none of your children are abandoned. none will separated from your love. when all hope seems lost, when our energies are depleted, whe we are struck down with nothing le to pick us up, remind us again thatur faith in you will always protect us from being destroyed. all of what we see around us is temporary. may we fix our eyes on what is unseen. your eternal andracious plan for our lives today and always. in your sovereign name we pray. amen. the speaker pro tempore: pursuant to section 3-z of use

resolution 5, the journal of the last day's proceedings is approved. the chair will now lead the house in the pledge of allegiance. i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under god, indivisible, with libey and justice for all. the speaker pro tempore: the chair lays befe the house the following communication. the clerk: the honorable the speaker, house of representatives, sir. i hereby submit by resignation as legislative counsel of the united states of the house of representatives effective at the end of november 3, 2024. it has been a great honor and privilege to serve as legislative counsel to the house, its members, and committees and to lead the office of the legislative counsel. signed, sincerely, ernest wade

balou jr. legislative counsel. the speaker pro tempore: the speaker accepts the resignation of ernest balou jr. legislative counsel effective november 3, 2024. pursuant to section 521 of legislative reorganization act of 1970, 2 u.s.c. 282, the speaker appoints warn burke legislative counsel to succeed earnest bay lieu -- balou jr., resigned. pursuant to section 3-z of house resolution 5, the house stands adjourned until 10:30 a.m. on friday, october 18, 2024.

>> more debate on federal spending. the chamber will continue these brief sessions every few days and as always live coverage of the house here on c-span. we take you to a conversation with labor leaders on the state of union organizing in the u.s..

>> once again we are alive at the national press club waiting to hear from labor leaders on union organizing here in the u.s.. apparently a technical issue they are to iron out. we expect to hear from the national labor relations board general counsel, general counsel of laborers international union of north america's mid-atlantic regional organizing coalition and the international president of the cwa.

>> c-span said they are ready so we are ready now as well. as soon as i can control this microphone. there we go. perfect. good morning, welcome to the national press club, the place where news happens. i'm emily wilkins with the honor of being the 117th president of the national press club and a correspondent for cnbc in washington. thanks for joining us of the national press club for headliners panel on unions, labor and the national labor relations act and thanks to those of you joining the discussion online or by tuning in on c-span television and radio. we are very happy to accept questions from the audience and we will take as many as time

permits. if you would like to submit a question please admit email headliners. it is plural at press.org. and right labor in the subject line. the survey by gallup published in august found 70% of americans approve of labor unions. in the past several years millions of workers around the country including high profile -- in the past several years millions of workers around the country include in high-profile campaigns at starbucks, amazon, wells fargo and apple stores have sought to organize. in data the bureau of labor statistics released shows union election positions were up 27% from fiscal year 20 23 year 2024. and doubling since fiscal year 2021. yet 10% of wage and salary workers or 14.4 million workers

belong to unions in 2023. that's now 20 -- down 20% from 1983 according to the pls. meanwhile employers are increasingly challenging the constitutionality of the national labor relations board and its power to enforce the national labor relations act. spacex recently winning a stay in a texas court that stopped the nlrb from pursuing administrative cases for unfair labor practice. and in april the supreme court heard a challenge brought by starbucks after a lower court ordered the company to reinstate several paris's does who were fired after they announced plans to unionize. in june the court sided with starbucks. exploring these with us today we are delighted to have with us an all-star panel. we have national labor relations board general counsel jennifer abruzzo who is responsible for the investigation and provocation of unfair labor practice cases.

general counsel abruzzo had previously worked for more than two decades in various roles of the nlrb including field attorney, deputy regional attorney and deputy general counsel. she served as a special counsel for strategic initiative for the commute workers of america. brian patrice, general counsel of the labor international union of north america mid-atlantic regional organizing coalition is a frequent presenter of panels at the union lawyers alliance and the national employee lawyers association in relation to his work obtaining new visas. and the international president of the news guild communication workers of america a former reporter at the arkansas democrat gazette and the los angeles times. part of a group of workers who organized the first newsroom union at the los angeles times. he was elected president of the

new guild in 2019 and since then more than 7500 workers from 180 workplaces have organized with the new guild. please join me for a warm welcome for our esteemed guests. [applause] >> now i think i get to move to this chair. we can have a great conversation between the three of us. i just want to start off with a broad general question and feel free to take this in a direction you want. tell me about what you see for the purpose for the national labor relations act. >> we went out of order there. sorry about that. so obviously the purpose of the act is to restore balance between workers and their employers. it's very clear through the industrial age that employers

had too much bargain leverage for workers and workers as a result were suffering inadequate wages and working conditions, safety problems pride the act was established by congress to give workers greater leverage and also to control the violence that resulted from the fact workers were struggling often violently with their employers to get dignity at work and fair wages. so the purpose of the act is to allow workers to come together to act as a more powerful bargaining force in the economy against increasingly large employers. so that i think is the purpose of the act and then all these other rights are designed to make sure workers have free choice to make the decision to come together and bargain with employers and they will in fact recognize their representatives and bargain with them so that workers can get better wage conditions and safety at the job site.

>> general counsel of the nlrb. brian is 100% right, the statute is a most 90 years old during the great depression 1935 congress enacted it. there was a lot of industrial instability, wildcat strikes going on because workers lacked channels of communication to engage together and with their employers to improve their work circumstances. and that was affecting a failing economy. so it is a statute that's designed to level the playing field between employees and their employers by promoting the practice process of collective bargaining. allowing for workers to freely choose who they want to collectively bargain on their behalf with their employers and to otherwise engage with one another to improve their wages

and working conditions and address issues of mutual concern. so we are enforcing a pro-worker statute. a pro-worker statute. i am often maligned, i don't know or often asked what do you do about the situation where when a democratic administration and the nlrb is prounion and when a republican administration is the agent -- the agency's pro-employer and there is this flip-flopping and back-and-forth and what are people supposed to do. the answer is the statute is not prounion and it is not pro-employer. it is pro-worker. and we promote workers ability to elevate their voices and be heard and seek the respect and

the dignity they deserve in the workplace and get a piece of the pie for the value they add to their employer's operations. so that's what we are about, that's what we've been about for 90 years and we will continue to be about that forever. >> >> those were great views from lawyers. i will not speak like a lawyer but the thing that strikes me about the act is probably the fact that it's provided some any basis protections that many americans have no clue about. i grew up in rural arkansas and i did not know any thing about unions. i thought it was a far off thing. big bulky guys down in mines or putting together cars and so i didn't have a clue it all that i could actually form a union. the national labor relations act provides americans working in the private sector the right to collectively bargain to

negotiate to talk about their wages, this is something that is super taboo in a lot of newsroom circles with the workers would mostly represent but a lot of workplaces it's taboo to talk about your wages. it something you can legally do. you can talk about your working conditions or your benefit to come together and try to make them better. at a basic level the thing i love is it is this amazing power that every american working in the private sector has right there that they can take advantage of and most of them don't even know it. >> that was a fantastic overview , i want to get to the news today that we did see this increase in these decisions over the last year can you just talk about why you think we are seeing this increase now. what does it mean to you and what does it mean for the future of unions. >> a lot of it has to do with education as john said. so many workers it's a very

broad statute. it covers unionization of course but it also covers workers just engaging together talking about issues of mutual concern, talking about discrimination in the workplace. advocating, engaging in social, racial and economic justice advocacy where there's a nexus to something going on in the workplace. we want to case where there was racial discrimination happening at home depot, of the workers were complaining about it internally obviously it had a broader impact socially. we said that was a concerted activity. the press has done a wonderful job in getting the message out there because workers need to know there is a statute that protects the rights to talk an with -- with one another about health and safety issues or whatever is of concern to them

and they cannot be retaliated against for doing so and if they are there is an agency that will not only protect their rights to engage in that behavior but to remedy violations and a hold the violators accountable. and so it's really i think the education is key, knowledge is power. there is strength in numbers and so the more we can get out there and advise workers about the rights that they have, the better. i think that's why we are seeing this surge and certainly during the time i've been back at the agency, i was with the agency for 25 years than out during the trump administration and now back in my current role as general counsel. i do think that we are seeing underserved vulnerable populations actually feeling empowered to elevate their voices and be heard, to demand to see -- a seat at the

bargaining table with her that's their established labor organizations or through homegrown ones. it does not really matter. i think labor organizations need to be nimble. there is no one-size-fits-all. workers are organizing in different ways using social media for example. they are bargaining in different ways. hybrid bargaining, a virtual bargaining. i see where workers weathered through established labor organizations are not are feeling more empowered to engage with their employer and i hope we see more of that. i will say we -- fiscal year 21 when i came in as general counsel today, our case intake has increased 47%. so it's wonderful. i think it is wonderful. i don't want to see violations of the statute but, and certainly workers need to file

charges with us. we have no independent investigatory authority. so we have to be out there and educating not only about rights but about the agency because otherwise they really have no place to go, no private rights to sue in court. they have to know that our agency exists. so education. >> to build on that, the other thing is when we talked about the purpose of the act to level the playing field and what we are seeing recently is areas where the playing field was previously seen as level it's now not level and we are seeing that increasingly with higher educated employees. even medical workers, position -- physicians, nurses. everyone in the hospital seeing private equity by medical practices and doctors who used to consider themselves as having

a very high leverage position economy going lower and we are seeing that across the board with educated workers. so we are actually seeing the lack of a level playing field stretch with the economy. it isn't going away it's getting worse. it's spreading to places where this was originally passed people probably never thought that a worker like this would need a union. and now increasingly some workers are coming to the idea may be unionization should benefit my profession as well. and i do think that -- see that a lot in the statistics around the energy around collective bargaining right now is that more workers in new industries are saying this is something we need because we need a level playing field. >> the fact that 2018 when you guys started these unions it was not that long ago. i'm wondering if there was a tipping point for you or a moment where you are just like we really need to have more

power on the sides of the worker. >> it started when we got a link in our slack channel at the l.a. times. for me it started we got a link in the slack channel for our group and journalists were all in love and hate slack for work. and the link was a hidden youtube video from the director of hr now -- announcing with so much glee in her voice that she was eliminating our crew paid vacation time. and switching to an unlimited flexible time off which would mean we could take as many days as we wanted. but effectively meant that we were not accruing value in our vacation and our paycheck every single day that we could then use two for having a kid, for planning for some emergency, for some medical procedure. it was stripped away from us because we did not have a union. so it became a very quick conversation of may be we should

form a union. that was the case for so many folks, so many journalists we've seen over and over again, mentioning private equity spreading across the economy but hedge fund private equity have taken that on. all with global capital. the chicago tribune, the baltimore sun. bought up the orlando sentinel 11 years ago bought at the denver post and has basically been siphoning resources out of it. and really reducing the number of working journalists and local communities across the country. so we've basically seen this huge wave of organizing in response to really terrible conditions at least in the news industry where we've lost 35,000 workers in the last 15 years. through the consolidation, through the in coach -- encroachment of equity. and i think journalists like a lot of other workers are just like that is ridiculous we have to stand here and fight back because this is something we care deeply about and if it's

not can it be the boss because they're controlled by private equity then it's good to be us. >> that was i think a really illuminating example of some of the things workers are being making us think a we need to get together and see what our power can be in pushing back against some of these practices. i know were having a number of questions come in. if you're in the room if you want to take one of the cards there write a question and you can pass it who sitting there in the lovely purple dress. we had a couple of questions come in. forgive me parker for slaughtering your last name. this question jennifer is for you. the agency walked away from its litigation around joint employer rules. can you give us any insight into that decision and what next steps are providing in the standard sprayed and if you could start off with a five second version of that for the few people here who don't know what that is paid >> sure.

the trump board joint employer rule was -- joint employers are two or more employers that are controlling some terms and conditions of employment of a set of employees think of a dominate -- a company using a contractor and they have employees but the dominant company is controlling the wage range or the schedules, opening and closing up the stores or any number of things or a franchise, or a franchisee situation. we had that with mcdonald's for example. so that's what a joint employer is, a relationship is. the trump board issued a rule that i won't go into the gory details about why they issued a rule. if there was adjudication initially there were some issues

with one board member who failed to recuse himself. they decided to issue a joint employer rule basically said you are not a joint employer unless you control a essential terms and conditions of employment and that control has to be direct and substantial control and then they lifted what the essential terms and conditions of employment were. which did not include health and safety. at any rate the biden board then issued its own rules because that's the only way you can typically undo a previous rule. which went back to more of a common-law which was direct or indirect control over terms and conditions of employment. and that got enjoined i am not a board member as you know. and so -- there is a law -- wall

between the general counsel side which is a prosecutorial arm and the board side which is the adjudicatory arm. and never the twain shall meet. i can engage in apartheid communications with them so i do not know exactly why they decided to give up the ghost on the joint employer rules there. however i do think personally that they could go back to adjudication and go back to the correct standard in my opinion which is the direct or indirect control which is the common-law factors. >> jennifer we do have another question here from a law 360 reporter which hopefully this one you will be able to answer. while your office recently released a memo about non-competes in state or pay clauses how does your theory about the lawfulness of these

provisions balance the rights of employers and workers? >> let me just start with that last piece. workers have rights. unions and employers have obligations under our statutes. let's just start there. in terms of the restrictive covenants which there's a number of us at various government agencies who are all looking at this obviously from our different lenses. but the issue with non-competes from at stay or pay arrangements where you've got to sign off and you are required to stay at a particular employer for two years making a hypothetical for two years if you don't stay for two years you have to pay back $100,000 may it's prorated if you stay a year or what have you but it's a substantial amount of money.

or basically just indentured servitude, forcing people to stay at their employing entity. despite how horrendous the working conditions may be. and so from my perch with regards to these restrictive covenants, as we've been saying, the statute was enacted to equalize bargaining power between workers and their employers. and when you have these restrictive covenants whether it be a noncompete or fair pay or something else you are taking away one of the greatest weapons that workers have which is to threaten to resign or to actually resign in concert and go elsewhere to get better conditions. you've taken away that weapon because they can threaten to resign or they can even resign. but where are they going, this a geographic restriction.

there's a time restriction. you are killing them from actually engaging together because of their unlawfully fired, where they going to work while the trying to get the job back trade will they have to relocate their family. if they go on strike and one supplemental income where will they go because they are subject to these restrict of covenants. so to me it's clearly chills employees exercise of their rights to unionize, to engage in protective conservative activity and our job is to make sure that there are not restrictions to those rights and if there are violations that we are quickly remedying them. you brought up very early the issues of spacex and other companies that are challenging us. i just want to say out loud and this is kind of evidence i

think. but it is worth saying. it's a distraction right because we are trying to hold violators of our statute accountable and when you've got these deep pocket corporations that would rather spend money fighting and litigating versus provide their workers with better wages or better benefits or whatever it is that's what their workers want. it's truly is a distraction from them being held accountable as violators of the law. so you know a lot of the reporting is about constitutional challenges and spacex got that in texas in district court where there more than happy to enjoin us at the fifth circuit and we will see what happens.

but their goal is to just stop us from doing our jobs. and we have been governing labor-management relations for just about 90 years now. everybody in this country. we are the only federal agency that enforces the only federal labor law in this country. it would be chaos if the agency was not allowed to perform its functions and do it properly. >> kind of just following off of that. please feel free to jump in here if you guys have thought sprayed what needs to happen now that some of these big companies have figured out that there are ways they can sort of sell your work, put you through this really long court process and take you away from your main mission of litigating some of these claims. >> shout out to the law 360 reporter for her great question and congratulations on their

eight day strike that they won last month. >> i think that one of the biggest challenges right now for jennifer and the entire board is underfunding. they do not have enough staff to actually adequately handle that increased whether it's elections or unfair labor practices. they lost about 40% of their staff since 2010 which is really decimated their ability to move quickly so they need proper funding. i think personally the budget should be doubled based on the amount of need that there is out there and separately i think there should be some real aggressive penalties for companies when they violate the law. we file unfair labor practices a lot, almost every week against major news companies across the country for violating federal law as we see it. and we get rulings but it takes a while for them to actually move through the system especially when you have lower

staff. we've been on strike of the pittsburgh post-gazette for two years. and it's taken a very long time for the unfair labor practices to go from a charge to a complaint to getting a full board ruling that we got last month a few weeks ago. but there really should be some aggressive penalties i think for companies and for employer specifically. i think there should be strong fines. i think there should be potential jail time for companies and bosses that break the law. this is the law, there should be consequences for violating the law. as jennifer said. >> i just need to jump in. a lot of people violate the law and get out with like paying a fine. why go as far as jail time. >> you've got ceos making millions of dollars a year and spending millions of dollars paying attorneys to violate the law.

so for instance of the pittsburgh post-gazette it's a pretty straightforward issue. it's a lack of following the law and bargaining in good faith is the specific wording but showing up for the bargaining table and agreeing to move a little bit here and there. to work out a compromise to get to a contract that's also about arguing and agreeing to pay for health care. the actual cost to resolve that is minuscule to the amount of money that these companies and specifically large chair people like john bloch and alan block the people of the pittsburgh post-gazette lock indications to actually follow the law instead they're spending millions of dollars hiring attorneys. i think they should be held accountable. there should be more penalties. they should face jail time if they do it. and it's not out of the realm of possibility for the board to actually call the u.s. marshals and go after folks who do violate the law when it becomes

this bad for so long, or needs to be serious consequences. the law is just followed. >> i'll piggyback on that. >> the current law does not allow jailing employers except for extreme instances of contempt of court. but i do agree with the comment that we do need to have more respected norms around this issue because what we are seeing is employers just do not respect the idea that the workers have the right to make this choice. the workers make this choice, they make it unmistakably and the employers still do not care. and we see this, a lot of this started as really kooky right-wing theories of attacking the national labor relations board based on the supreme court had clearly rejected and we were seeing them come back like zombies now 90 years later. which is a clear indication of the employer's contempt for this

idea that the workers have these rights, the workers forced them to sit across the table and bargain. so we do need as a society to translate the widespread respect for collective bargaining that we've had as seen by public sentiment. we need to find a way to translate that into a norm that all the important players are willing to respect. if we have that if we can get that we will see the operation work much better. more freedom of workers to join unions and bargain. but we have to get to the point and a lot of that is going to be public opinion. with respect to company's the do show complete contempt for the collective bargaining law.

if they are good essay i want to have courts enjoin collective bargaining law in the country, they need to take that into account. they do need to fill these norms and it's incumbent on every citizen. to say this is an important right and we don't like it when you show contempt to it. >> we do have a question from the audience talk of the kinds of workers and the laborers union of what changes under the current nlrb have helped them in organizing or bargaining. >> we represent construction workers and it's kind of exactly what you would expect particular with laborers for their mostly people who carry heavy things on construction sites and you shall go up shovels to dig. the thing that this

administration has been doing that has most benefited the workers. this is not exclusive but i think the general counsel has done this better than anyone else probably in the country which is deferred action for workers who do not have immigration status who are victims of violations of the rights under u.s. laws. the country has always had a problem with enforcement of laws and criminal laws, civil laws if people who are victims do not feel free to report when their rights are violated and that has the effect of undermining standards across the country. there's been a program to provide deferred actions to those victims so if the laws can be enforced. this is at a major positive impact in terms of bringing forth complaints, violations, people who have -- we have

recently and example of workers who are having their supervisors shake them down to say you get your paycheck and then say hand over some portion of it. it's like a bully, a schoolyard bully taking someone's lunch money. it is at that level and they are doing it because the supervisor felt certain there's no way this worker will report me. the worker is going to report him. and we would not have this tool without the deferred action. to protect workers who have these violations. so i think that is probably the most significant thing that we have had showing a direct affect on the ground for workers who have very immediate problems. >> we have a question that says does the nlrb protect. it sounds like the answer is it does. >> yes.

whistleblowers are very broad term. it's a very broad term but in general the technical answer is technical. it protects certain activity for mutual aid protection. it's very easy for the nlra to protect we have a look at the specific fact. if they are whistleblower on behalf of other employees including themselves than absolutely provide protection for them. >> that's the more -- that's where you are more protected anyway. when you are forming a union or decide to go on strike you do it as a collective. there is power in the numbers so the more you can bring your colleagues together to do something the more protection you'll have regardless. >> i just want to say one thing about what brian very eloquently said before and i'm happy to hear that some of what we're doing is making a real impact on the ground which is obviously our goal. you know there's a lot in the

news these days about immigrant populations and i'm very proud of the fact that we have issued a number of memos, one of which was about immigrants are employees under our statute and are entitled to the same rights as everybody else and we have made sure that they have safe access to our operations when they need us and that they are treated with dignity and respect. and certainly we are engaging with dhs to ensure that those that are assisting us, our enforcement actions are protected and are not exploited again. typically you get these vulnerable populations, immigrant populations in particular that is exploited once by the schoolyard bully that says here is your paycheck and now give me some money back. certainly we don't want them to

be exploited once again by a threat of deportation for example. there's plenty of as we know legal -- people who are legally here and so just to say it's really important that we recognize that we are all in this together and you know there's a lot to say about collectivism and unity. >> we only have a little bit more than 15 minutes left. still have a ton of questions and i will try to get them as quickly as we possibly can. another one for you jennifer. a number of companies have contended the nlrb structure is unconstitutional. an emergency petition was submitted this morning to the supreme court to stop and administrate if hearing against an employer. will your office biju dictating these cases while these constitutional agreements are considered and does this change anything for you about how you litigate unfair labor practices? >> the short answer is yes but we are not can estop what we are

doing. and we have been successful. we have been unsuccessful in certain district courts in texas. we've been successful in other district courts elsewhere in batting back these request for pull, nary injunctions or temporary restraining orders or administrative proceeding. we are knocking a stop, we are going to continue to enforce the act as we have. john raised a really good point about the lack of resources. our case in taste is way up. you gave a statistic. it's in the field office of 48 offices around the countries where the vast majority of the work is performed. we have lost since 2011, 62% of the field offices. it is a huge resource issue. and it is because we do not have

a reasonable appropriations and congress really needs to step up and provide us as i said earlier we are the only federal agency that protects the only federal labor law in this country and we want to and do the best that we can. but justice delayed is justice denied. there are inherent delays because of the lack of resources , i.e. funds available so that i can staff up. it is really crucial. all of that being said we have the greatest board agents. they are super committed to the mission. they are super committed to effectuating our congressional mandate and they are doing everything that they can to help workers in this country and i will say all the cases that are brought to us about 40% of those cases are found to have merit.

sometimes workers get confused and are not sure what agency this goes to so we gear them -- steer them to another. but we find merit in 40% of all cases that are brought to us. and we settle 96% of those cases. >> upfront for complaints issue or right after perhaps. so the vast majority of the violations are getting remedied once they are investigated and i recognize there's a delay in the investigation but we actually are getting remedial relief rather quickly for victims of unfair labor practices. there's very few that actually get -- go through the adjudicative process. >> the statistic you laid out earlier is still very interesting. the same number of petitions and cases go up you still have

district offices handling these go down because of a lack of funding. i think 2022 was the first time in nearly a decade congress increased funding. i believe the nlrb is currently underfunded by 100 20 million according to some estimates. and you laid out the impacts really clearly there. i'm sorry everyone wants to ask you questions today so we have another one. if donald trump wins in november do you worry a trouble point general counsel will undo your agenda. >> trump is not in a win in november. you can move on the question. >> we do have to answer that question i'm sorry. >> this is what i will say. so we are a government of people by the people and for the people. this government official is going to do everything she can and i will tell you all the

agencies, board agents will do all they can to protect workers rights and to hold violators accountable. i think that no matter who is in the job i go back to what i said the beginning. which is it is a pro-worker statute. and if you take on the job per your congressional mandate you are required to protect workers rights in this country. >> i wanted to make sure no one had anything else to ask. i know the nlrb has expanded its interagency collaboration with partners like the ftc and doj to promote competition in labor markets. what has been the biggest win for these collaborations and what's on the horizon for this whole of government approach and this is from chris. >> i really applaud the biden harris administration. i've been with the agency for a very long time. as i said earlier and we really

have broken down the silos, we really are taking the toll of government approach which is in essence means we are sharing information with one another. because unfortunately when we see violations of our statute which is a very broad statute we often see violations of other statutes. for example workers are complaining about the fact they did not get overtime and they are suspended as a result of that. that's falling under our statute. they engage in collective protected concerted activity. and it also falls into fair labor standards act. they get the overtime they were entitled to under the law. and so we are talking with one another, we are co-investigating when appropriate, we are co-enforcing. and i'm really proud of the work, the partnerships that we continue to develop but we start develop these under the obama

administration with regards to worker protection agencies. but where i've expanded our interagency collaborations has been with those that are the traditional worker protection agencies. the ftc, the doj, antitrust division. because we are looking at we are all about the same thing. you want to stop unfair and deceptive practices, you want to stop misclassification. you want to stop employment structures and models and practices that are creating vertical restraints on competition that are affecting consumers, that are affecting workers. and so we are all tackling these looking at it from our different lenses. but the goal is to all address them at workplaces at the same time as possible so that workers

can actually enjoy working in a conducive environment and which benefits not only them but their families and communities. if they feel empowered to elevate their voices and if their employees actually -- employers listen to what their concerns are and address them, then workplace conflict diminishes and that's a win for everybody and i will say with the ftc and doj antitrust which -- what has been nice is the educational piece between the two, because i'm certainly not an antitrust expert by any stretch of the imagination. we provide technical assistance to one another which i also think is key and we are assisting with doj antitrust merger investigations so that they are considering the effects on the labor market. the effects on workers, not only

on consumers, not only on product or service markets. >> different collaborations. >> it is a continual. we are all trying -- our goals are the same. it is just how we get there may be different. the idea is to ensure that we are doing all that can for working families in the country. >> the -- i do want to say how much i appreciate general counsel abruzzo's vision of the national labor relations act. i think her view of the fact that non-competes as we discussed, those sorts of impediments to an employer -- employees, her ability to see that that has an impact on the division of really understanding

the role leveling the playing field has really been, i just really appreciate it. i represent construction workers. you might think we have no problem with non-competes. we have the guys who hold the paddles and tell you when to go who are subject to noncompete agreements because of the intellectual property they might acquire holding the paddles. this stuff is so widespread and reflects the way employers have maximize their leverage in the employment market. and nothing was being done about it until the biden administration, including the work of the general counsel here. i think it's been really valuable and really important that we have this sort of vision of really an act that provides freedom to workers and i do think that is what the -- it should be about. it should give a tool to workers

to act on their own behalf to improve their lives and we are having a lot of trouble getting there with all of this employer resistance and people trying to get the extra. but that should be the vision that we all share. >> we had a question again from the audience from you. and the person who wrote it wanted to see what you would say to a midcareer journalist who opposes his union organizing because he feels unions are only for dangerous jobs and that it re-allocates midcareer salaries to inexperienced reporters. >> it is pretty common that different types of workers will have different questions about unionizing when they're going through the process. i remember early on organizing it happened in every single one of them especially in newsrooms in particular because you have young workers who are fresh out of college coming into the newsroom being taken advantage

of by the employer, paid next to nothing with terrible benefits. there's not a lot of people in their late 30's and 40's and a lot of newsrooms and there's a lot more veteran journalists who have been around for maybe a few decades at the organization and built up a lot of time. the thing about unionizing is there's benefits for everyone. there's a benefit for a veteran journalist in having job security. if they've got seniority of being at that workplace for a while, they are probably going to be one of the highest-paid journalists in the newsroom this gives them the chance of job security. they will be the first one laid off. when you're owned by a hedge fund that's typically what they are kind of angling to do. it also helps you negotiate better health care agreements. i remember we've seen in the tribune properties there were eight different types of health care plans you could pick whether it was an hmo or a ppo

and the younger journalist ended up getting the most expensive in terms of high ductal plans because they could not afford the monthly premiums. the more veteran journalists who may be had a spouse or some kids would opt for the health care plan that covered their entire family. and when you are in a union and you come together and you look at these issues you are like we are all paying way too much for health care and we should all pay less and have better coverage. so it's really about a question for me is your care about the actual work and your colleagues and your mission. and for journalist we have an ethical duty to minimize harm. we do that making sure we don't take advantage of sources. we also do that in the workplace to make sure we are not letting younger workers are women of people of color taken advantage of by a company that is actively creating inequities. we have a duty to hold -- it's

on us ethically to make sure that the employer follows the law to make sure that the newsroom leadership is doing what they are saying rather than doing their standup meeting where they make a bunch of promises. i think it's actually a very solid ethical thing and if seen a lot of people come together recently on strike we were on strike for 24 days at the rochester democrat, -- chronicle to fight for a successor contract. some of the best leaders with a veteran journalists who were really trying to build an organization in the newsroom that was good for rochester and future generations of journalists. >> i also wanted to ask because we talked about some of the concerns facing the overall enforcement agencies and some of the current shifts that we are now seeing with employers and employees. i know there is legislation out there which is backed by think it's mostly democrats at this point. but can you talk about if that law was passed what it would do, what would it change and would

any of these issues that we discussed today benefit from that. >> as far as the proactive. one of the things it would change would be both to make it easier to originally establish a union and collectively bargain the first contract, the traditional statistic on bargaining the first contract is less than half of successful elections lead to first contract. it is very difficult to do. the proactive would actually establish a process where it would have to happen quickly over short amount of time and if the parties don't agree they go to arbitration in a manner similar to employees similar to major league baseball on the good arbitration over player salaries. that would provide profits to get into a first contract which would be extremely important change to the act because that's what that is all about is

getting to the contract so if you're not delivering that, so that would be a massive change as well as greater protections for the initial organizers as we discussed. there is this problem that there needs to be more deterrence against employers paid a talked about norms but we need more penalties. maybe not necessarily jail, but more employer -- penalty so they comply. and they would deliver that as well. all of what we are trying to do with that proposed change or any changes currently is just to make it easier for workers to establish a union. the problems that make workers form a union are usually not world historic. a lot of times it's a bad supervisor or a crude lead. it's a very practical problem. if you make it that they have to go through a gauntlet of hostility and intimidation to

get there, it is not as useful as a tool for addressing a simple problem like my supervisor is really a jerk. it is important that the actual decision to choose to join a union be obtainable. workers come together so we want this. so i think it will be the step in the right direction. >> i just come back to the thing we said earlier, which is that we need funding for the nlrb. it can actually be enforced. again, the agency is really underfunded. the challenge with -- organizing drives are very challenging in themselves, right? an employer can voluntarily recognize workers or push for an administration, but then you start bargaining and right now for the news guild we have 91st contracts we are currently bargaining for. and that is literally half of

the number of bargaining units that have unionized in the last five years i have been president. now for us, you know, i mentioned it earlier, we are also realizing we just have to do more collective action, and you are seeing that in workers at uaw going on strike. we have had before four strikes so far this year. from the l.a. times to continuing to be on strike at the pittsburgh post--gazette. we have had newsrooms gone strike in the past, the new york times or washington post, but you have to move to withholding your labor to move the company to agree to what i think are commonsense proposals to make the place a better place to work. ms. wilkins: this is a fantastic discussion. i feel like we could have gone

on for another hour, but before we wrap and i ask a final question i wanted to take a moment to think our headliners. and the headliners team member who organized today's event. donna, thank you. as well as the program manager and the club's executive director. we are also very grateful to have the privilege of hosting our extraordinary guests, and there are three of them. we are honored to offer you the official log of the national press club. it has been given to celebrities, ambassadors, heads of state, and now you are joining the ranks. thank you for taking the time to be here today. also while we have -- it is less than $10, yes. [laughter] you can also get it in the gift shop, but it only counts if it is handed off to you after the panel. i want to let everyone know

about a couple of events. we are going to be hearing from craig unger, who will discuss his new book, the secret history of the trees and that stole the white house, and october 29 we will be welcoming veteran affairs secretary dennis mcdonagh you, who will deliver an update on the state of america's veterans and their families. and now for the final question. i'm going to ask everyone for short answers. why do you think journalists have been as successful as they have in unionizing so many newsrooms over the last couple of years? mr. petruska: hard question. at the end of the day journalists, we are weirdos in that we really love our work. we love the idea of seeking truth and telling stories. for us it comes with this very core passion to protect that work and make sure it is better so we are unionizing at a record pace to continue that work for future generations.

ms. abruzzo: i would hope we are helping in that regard in terms of being very aggressive about our enforcement activities so that people feel comfortable engaging together and not fear being retaliated against. mr. schleuss: i will combine those. the additional pressure in the workplace in order to have a good workplace to live in, and also making it easier to organize, you know, the biden nlrb decision that made it easier for workers to organize. especially in cases where the employer is either delaying or resisting the organizing drive. i think that has helped and played a key role in increasing employees' willingness to file petitions and utilize the machinery of the act.

the protections are more robust and the ability to get the union you are looking for is more obtainable. i think those have been important. ms. wilkins: i love the range there, from the technical answer, top i love our jobs a lot. thank you for being here today and thank you for joining us here at the national press club. [applause]

[captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2024] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] >> with 21 days until the elections he was a look at our live campaign coverage. republican nominee and former president donald trump sets down for an interview with the economic club of chicago to address business community leaders and members. cohosted by bloomberg news, that comes up at noon eastern today.

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democracy. >> with one of the tightest races for control of congress in modern political history stay ahead with c-span's comprehensive coverage. c-span brings you access to the nation's top house, senate, and governor debates from across the country. debates that are shaping your state's future and the balance of power in washington. following our campaign coverage from local to national debates any time, online at c-span.org/campaign. be sure to watch tsday, november 5, for a live real-time election night result. c-span. your unfiltered view of politics. powered by cable. now a debate for connecticut's fifth congression seat. the 55 minute debate, hosted by

wfsb. the nonpartisan cook political report rates the race means democrat. and her republican challenger, george logan. we appreciate both of you being here tonight. it is important to note that this is the first and only debate between these candidates prior to election day.

tonight the candidates will be taking questions from our three panelists. next to me we have channel three's susan rath. she is our chief political report. after that we have dan hart. he is the senior editor of ct insider. finally, the senior political reporter for wfhu public radio. thank you to you three being here as well. we did a coin toss on monday and determined that mr. logan will give the first opening statement. congresswoman hayes will answer our first question and make the first closing statement. now to the rules, which both of these campaigns have agreed upon. each candidate has 90 seconds to make an opening statement. after that they will be asked a question and have two minutes to respond. the opposing candidate will have one minute for a rebuttal.

as the moderator i have the ability to grant another 30 seconds to the original question if it is determined a response is warranted. after that we will move onto the next question. each candidate will be given two minutes at the end of the debate to make a closing statement. now that we have gone over the rules, let's get started. mr. logan, we begin tonight with your opening statement, and you have 90 seconds. mr. logan: thank you. i want to thank everyone for being here today. my goal here today is to make the fifth congressional district the best place to live, work, raise a family, and retire. when you take a look at where we are now, 32 years ago, when you look at affordability, the cost of everything from groceries, milk, bread, seasoning, gasoline prices have all gone up.

you take a look at the border, right? we have folks coming across the border illegally. folks bringing in illegal drugs, human trafficking. it is a problem and it is a main issue. my opponent has done little to help that situation over the last years. i would claim she has made it worse. my parents came to america from guatemala to make things better in terms of an education for me and my siblings. to give us the opportunity for a better job. i don't want that dream to and -- to end with me. i want to go to washington and work on a bipartisan basis to reduce wasteful spending. i want to lower taxes. i want people to have more money in their pockets. i want people to feel safer in their communities. i want to fix broken washington. right now it is too partisan. we have an opportunity to go in a new direction and i want to be part of that. >> thank you very much.

congresswoman hayes, you have your opening statement and 90 seconds. rep. hayes good evening: to everyone and thank you for being here tonight. i look forward to having a spirited debate as the moderator said, about the issues that affect people in this district. about the things you care about. the economy, affordability, the border, all of those things are things people want to talk about, and i plan to tell you what i have done and also what i plan to do. i also look forward to hearing from my opponent, and not in platitudes like status quo and rubberstamped, but what he has actually done. he also has a voting record. as a connecticut state senator. i would like to hear how he has made this state better. what he has done to affect the people of this district. hopefully, actually i believe at the end of this debate that people will see that there is a clear contrast between me and my

opponent. i want this district where i have lived, raise my children, worked my whole life, still worship, shop, everything, this is a community i am part of, i want this to be a community where everyone can prosper not just a few people. not just the wealthy and well-connected, but everyone. i plan on leaving no one behind and i have the record to prove that. he says he is bipartisan but he has nothing to show that. hopefully tonight that will come out and i look forward to a discussion. i look forward to sharing my work and what i have done. >> thank you very much. we appreciate both of your opening statements. the first question tonight will go to you, congressman hayes, and it will come from susan rath. >> i want to thank you both again for agreeing and participating in this debate. congresswoman hayes, what do you see is the most important things in the fifth district that you would like to address in the

next two years? rep. hayes: as i travel around the district, whether it is the cities, the suburbs, rural communities, there are some things that are through lines everywhere. one of the top issues that people talk about is inflation. we hear a lot about that. we talk about inflation it is not just the price of gasoline. it is affordable housing. 36% of people's income goes to affordable housing. i brought money back to this district for affordable housing in waterbury in different places around the district during to help people so that when they are deciding on their bills and what they have to pay, knowing that a huge chunk is not going to their rent. part of our inflation conversation is about making sure people have living wages. i voted to increase the minimum wage. my opponent voted against that when he was a state senator. lowering the cost of prescription drugs and health care. that is something i have done

time and time again. 129 thousand people sign up for the affordable care act in just 2024. that is something he does not support. i want to make sure we are addressing all of those issues. i also support the vice president's plan to go against corporations that are price gouging so we can lower the cost of groceries and things like that. that is a huge issue for me, and we talk about inflation and affordability. i think in this district a big issue for me will be passing a farm bill that provides crop insurance, that feeds our children. when you talk about bipartisanship, i have a problem with some of my republican colleagues because my hardline -- hard lines are to feed children, for public education. they don't want to sign on to things like that. then i would say protecting our democracy. january 6 should have been a nonstarter for everyone.

it is a disqualifying factor. you should be able to agree with that, and he said he would not have voted for january 6 commission. those feed into all of the other issues we are going to talk about. >> thank you very much. mr. logan, you have one minute to reply. mr. logan: as i talk to folks the common theme i hear over and over again, are the pocketbook issues, for sure. affordability is a big issue. and the reckless spending in washington and the policies coming from washington. that have resulted and government induced inflation has caused the increases of all kinds of goods and services that the people in the district are suffering from. when you take a look at energy costs and the cost of gasoline, you know, the administration in washington, the first thing they did was they killed the keystone pipeline. my opponent and support of washington, and terms of absence

of war against american energy and american energy independence, i want our [indiscernible] to be energy independent. when i take a look at the southern border, again, we must secure the southern border. my opponent has shown no ability to do that. folks are tired about the partisanship we have in washington. we need a new voice in washington. she has had six years. >> thank you very much. we are going to move on to question two. this is in regards to the economy. it will be for you, mr. logan, and it is coming from dan hart. >> you have both talked already in a short few minutes about the economy and jobs. i want to drill down a little bit more and talk about how you think things are right now. i understand, and you have both talked about families struggling. and that is always the case. but how do you think things are right now?

jobs are at a high, sustainable number. wages have out-paced inflation for the last two years. how would you characterize the economy and what do you think should happen differently? mr. logan: sure. for me and the people in the district, statistics mean absolutely nothing. when you take a look at what the people in the district are suffering, right? again, with high grocery prices, high gas prices. mortgages, rent payments are going up. we have young people who do not have the ability to do -- what i have been able to do with my family, which is by a home, find a job. the cost of everything is going up. jobs are going down. america's place in the world has been exponentially weakened by the current administration in washington, supported by my opponent. we need to go in a different direction. it is time for us to really hone

in on wasteful spending. this time for us to reduce taxes, put more money into the pockets of folks. that is going to help our economy. we need to make sure the government stops putting together these bloated programs that results in deficit spending. deficit spending is kicking the can down the road. deficit spending is not only holding -- hurting the folks right now but shamefully hurting our children. we are not encouraging businesses to grow. we are not encouraging job growth. i would argue that right now the economy is trending poorly over the long-term. we need a sustainable, healthy economy, and we do that with responsible spending. making sure we focus and make our communities safer. need to secure our borders. we've got approximately 500,000

illegal guns entering our country every year. my opponent is supporting bloated government programs to give legal counsel to illegal immigrants. using your taxpayer dollars to bring immigrants and send them to different parts of the country. that is a problem. that is wrong. need to secure our borders. your time is up. >> we appreciate it. congresswoman hayes, you now have a minute for your bottle. rep. hayes: i think it is notable that while mr. logan is talking about the cost of living he doesn't bring up energy costs. because when you have the opportunity to do something about one of the things people in this district are talking about, your light else, he took a walk on that boat as a state senator. i guess it was too hard for him to make a decision on that. what i would do in order to make sure we are adjusting our economy is talk about jobs, unemployment. we have the lowest unemployment rate, the investments we made during the pandemic have helped

spur the united states to recover faster than any developing nation in the world. some of the things i have worked on his job training programs. but you cannot have a job without childcare, without making permanent the child tax credit. taking care of labor so that when we are distributing some of these contracts for these infrastructure projects, five hundred thousand dollars i came back to the state that we are paying fair wages and people have jobs so they can feed their families. >> thank you so much. the next question will be going to you. this will be about crime and it is coming from -- about crime. >> crime has been a big issue in your last campaign, and two years ago. mr. logan has brought it up again this year in his campaign ads. he claims you support an open southern border, which has led in deadly drugs and crime.

but the state office of management's report shows a sharp drop in all categories of crime in connecticut. violent crime has dropped 41% in the past 10 years. property crime, 23%. the prison population is about 41% what was 10 years ago. is crime a problem? and if so, what can be done about it? ms. wilkins: yes rep. hayes:, according to your statistics crime is down, but for the people in this district it doesn't matter what the statistics say. if they are affected in any way then that is their metric for evaluation. as far as what my opponent is saying about me on this issue, a lie does not care who tells it. as your congresswoman i brought $15 billion in funds to support law enforcement. one of the biggest investments ever. as congresswoman i brought back

community projects to upgrade and improve communication systems in the police department in new fairfield. and also bought tens of thousands of dollars back to our police athletic league's in both water bearing and new burden, to build trust with community. this is a back-and-forth. this is the idea that we can incarcerate our way out of crime problem is flawed. you have to build trust with communities. we have to make sure that not only are we supporting our law enforcement officers and giving them the resources, the training they need, but we are also making sure that accountability is there. i am the wife of a police officer. my husband has been on the job for 27 years but i am also the mother of three black sons, and i want to make sure my sons are not afraid of their encounters with police, and that has to be a part of the conversation. mr. logan has a lot to say on this, but again, when he was a state senator and had the opportunity to vote to support

the connecticut state police for hazard pay and raises in their salaries, he voted against it. he is introducing himself to this district and deciding who he wants you to believe he is. i offer you to fact-check everything i'm saying, to look at his record and the fact that he voted against the connecticut state police when he had the chance. he can say whatever he wants. he can stand in front of any building to convince you what you know not to be true, but i voted. >> mr. logan, you have one minute. mr. logan: during my time in the state legislature there were some very difficult bills we had to bring. i support increasing wages for our state police and i have been consistent in my support. the issue with that bill had to do with the process that democratic leadership in washington was pushing the bill before we put together a budget. the issue was more to do with a process issue, not by willingness to increase officers' pay.

we need to have responsible budgeting. the 2017 budget she is talking about, we passed a bipartisan budget. i think i have done more for the state of connecticut then you have as a congresswoman we passed the 2017 budget, a bipartisan budget. we instituted guardrails against spending caps, volatility caps, and these things have allowed us to have a multibillion-dollar surplus. we sure up our budget in terms of pension debt, shore up our budget and make sure we are not doing as much debt spending as we were before. we have had great success in terms of my time in this legislature and we are seeing the results of this now. >> congresswoman hayes, would you like 30 seconds to respond? rep. hayes: yes. mr. logan talks -- i am a history teacher. i taught civics. first job of the legislature is to make the laws and past

budgets. the fact that you voted on a budget is not specific to your successes as a state legislator. you remind me of the kid who is part of a group project and does not do anything but wants credit for the final grade. that is something everyone did, and our state is in the position it is in now because of the federal investments that have come back to this state for my time in congress. >> we do have a lot more to get to. the next question will be for mr. logan. this is coming from susan and it is about the border bill. >> immigration is a big issue in this upcoming election and it is important to the people in connecticut. you have mentioned immigration and the border. many times while running for congress. would you have supported the border bill, the one that was proposed that never brought to the house floor? and why? and if it were to be reintroduced, no matter under which administration, would you support it?

and further, would you support a comprehensive immigration bill? mr. logan: i will start with your last question. yes, i would absolutely support a comprehensive immigration bill. we must fix our immigration system but we cannot do that until we secure our border. the bill supported by my opponent would have brought in 1.8 million illegal immigrants into our country. that is where we would have taken your tax dollars and using it to provide legal counsel to illegal immigrants. that is taking your tax dollars to move and transport illegal immigrants to all parts of the country. my goal is to fix illegal immigration problem. my goal is to fix immigration, but first we must have secure borders and we need someone who is going to be strong in terms of -- against crime, illegal immigration. we can do that, but my opponent has shown no desire, knowability, no leadership in

washington on the border bill. she has gone with her record and 99 percent voting record, along with the washington democrat leadership. you don't need that. we need someone who is to speak independently. we need someone who is going to be a voice for you in washington. at election time she goes into the community. once the election is over she disappears. she is quiet and votes in line with the democratic leadership. i'm going to work on a bipartisan basis and vote for those that help our community and i'm going to criticize any legislation that hurts the people of the district, guard us of whether i am on the republican side of the aisle or democrat side of the aisle. my opponent has shown no ability to do that. there is also a competing house bill out there as well. i'm confident that with the right folks in washington if we have true bipartisanship we can make some gains. but we cannot do that with the current congresswoman. she had almost six years to make a difference and sheila made the situation worse.

it is time for a change. i'm hearing from folks, why can't washington work together? i had a 97% bipartisan record. >> i want to go now to congresswoman hayes with one minute. rep. hayes: i just want to make clear that i don't come back at election time, because i live here and i'm here all the time, mr. logan. mr. logan said he was going to move to the district permanently. i guess he has not gotten around to that yet. he voted with senate republicans all the time. you can look at that if you would like, but on the border, yes, we need to address our immigration system. we have a broken immigration system. people who are presenting themselves at the border are doing it following u.s. law. our laws need to be changed, but we need to do this in a humane way. yes, i would have supported the bipartisan bill that was negotiated in the senate.

the bill that they asked for. the builder republicans said they wanted. their most conservative republican center to negotiate -- senator to root -- to negotiate this bill, and then donald trump told them to vote against it and the bill was changed. >> we appreciate your time. thank you. next, the question is for you. a very important question. with hurricane milton about to make landfall the next question has to do with the role of fema. this is coming from you, dan. >> congresswoman, as aaron said, we are all hoping and praying for the better result as this latest hurricane hits. we are seeing an increasing number of weather crises, especially flooding. perhaps because of climate change. do you think the fema response of emergency management agency response by the administration has been adequate? what do you think should happen differently if not?

in the big picture do you see connecticut, which has had its own flooding in this district being left out as the money runs out? should congress allocate more money? rep. hayes: so, yes, i think that one of the things we did in the inflation reduction act was for the first time in history address climate change. for the problem that it is. and the infrastructure bill, we had money for mitigation, for resilience, for making sure we were proactively dealing with all of these things. by the time fema comes in a disaster has already happened. i can tell you that under donald trump's entire time as president he last -- lessened or reduced the amount of funding for disasters. people are talking about money running out for fema. before we left congress in september democrats pushed to increase fema funding because we knew with the intensity and severity of the storm we would need more money.

republicans blocked it, voted against it, every single one of them voted against it, did not want additional funding. when you talk about in this district, and i know my opponent is going to bring this up, my job is not to post on twitter or take pictures, it is to get people to help the knee. my republican-first elected a couple of months ago reached out to me, thanked me for being in constant contact them and getting funding in record time. i have continued to do that to make sure i advocated for funding to go back to those places. because that is what people need. action. need our lawmakers to do the job that they were elected to do. i know that my opponent is going to say that i was out of the state during the storm, and i was. i had already flown out. but when i was in chicago the president was on the ground, the governor was on the ground. that entire delegation is on the ground and we worked at lightning speed to make sure we brought a disaster declaration

back to this date and get the funding we needed to rebuild. but also the infrastructure funds that were already in place had already started to harden our bridges, our roads, to make sure it was not catastrophic. >> thank you so much. one minute for you, mr. logan, to discuss fema. mr. logan: i am in favor of properly and adequately funding fema. when he talked about taking pictures and posting on social media, you know, my opponent, when we had terrible floods in august this year, whether it was bethel, dan berry, other areas, she went to chicago. she stayed in chicago, right? for a political party. we talk about disaster, we talk about leadership, we need true leadership you can recognize your people are hurting. i went down into that area and met with families to see firsthand what was going on.

we need someone who is going to be a leader and understands people are hurting. they need you to be present. that is what we need to do. my opponent, again, she is more concerned about satisfying her party leadership. she puts them over the people. she does that over and over again, with her voting record, her actions, and need someone who is going to represent the district and be there for them. >> thank you. would you like to add 30 seconds? rep. hayes: i would like to say when it comes to predicting storms republicans right now want to get rid of the national weather service to defund the national weather service. that is very basic. when you want to talk about politicizing a storm, click right now with the leader of your party is doing when people are actually dying, trying to convince them not to take fema funds, not to evacuate, not to listen, trying to convince them that the administration is not coming to their aid when everyone republican governor is

saying that they are. you want to talk about partisanship in storms? it is on that side. >> we have to stop you there. we want you both to sit tight for a moment because we do have to take a quick commercial break. the fifth district debate airing live on channel three continues right after this. welcome back to the primetime debate between congresswoman jahana hayes and her challenger, republican george logan. have a number of other questions we want to get you tonight. our next question will be for mr. logan, and it will be asked. >> mr. logan, congresswoman hayes has said tonight that democracy is an issue in this campaign and election. both parties nationally are putting out messaging that democracy is at stake. do you agree? what does that mean? what exactly is at stake? mr. logan: i believe that the

direction of our nation is absolutely at stake. do we want two more years or four more years of failed policies from washington? that is what is at stake. people want to be able to afford to live in the district want to be safe in their communities. they want the borders to be secure. they want to make sure we support our allies internationally. they want to make sure that everyone has the opportunity to work, to grow, and be happy in our nation. right now folks are very concerned. they see the liberal, very left-leaning policies coming out of the washington leadership right now. it is really heading toward socialism, and that is what the fear is. when they make policies that continue to increase the cost of everything that drives up inflation, it is a problem. when they see the open borders and they see -- my opponent is going to continue to tell you over again that she is doing a

good job, that things are not as bad as they are. you see it with your own eyes. all of the fancy talk that she can say, look at the result. she has not delivered. we need folks in washington that are going to work across the aisle. she has not delivered on all of the things important to you, the people of the fifth congressional district. whether it is affordability, whether it is safety. the education system. we have issues here that need serious, serious attention. we need someone that is going to focus on the more than my opponent has. i have gone into waterbury public schools. i see what is happening. underreporting of crime. that is why you hear her listing all of the statistics. they decided, if you don't report it, we can say it's not happening. but you live in these communities. you know these schools are more dangerous than before. that needs to change. >> mr. logan, thank you very

much. congresswoman hayes, you have 60 seconds to respond. rep. hayes: i'm going to respond to the question you asked, because you don't even want to go there with the public school system with me. what i can tell you is that first of all, for all of your talk, nothing you have said or done is bipartisan. you can't even acknowledge when something literally is basic fact. everything one of us, no matter what side of the aisle you are on, no matter what your political affiliation, should be able to agree that january 6 cannot happen again. that it is a disqualifying factor. mr. logan would vote for the person who incited january 6. he told you that asked -- after he asked you to turn off your cameras, that he would vote for donald trump. mr. logan said mike johnson is a great leader, the person who authored the plan to not certify the election. none of those things matter that he is talking about if we don't have free and fair elections and a peaceful transfer of power.

our democracy is at stake. donald trump has promised it will be the last election we have to go in. not going to stand for that and i'm not going to stand here and let mr. logan pretend it is not an issue. >> would you like 30 seconds to respond? mr. logan: absolutely. i condemn all forms of political violence, including january 6. including the riots of 2020. including anti-semitic riots and protests going on here and across the world, including the assassination attempt on the former president. yes, i condemned political violence. we have an opportunity to make things better. my opponent cannot help it. she continues to go the partisan route. i have told you over and over again i am here for you. i'm here to represent you and i will do that. >> we do have a lot to get you tonight. our next question will be coming from susan. it is for congresswoman hayes and it is about all of the world

conflicts happening right now. ms. raff: i would like to know what you feel the united state'' role is when it comes to world conflict, specifically israel. a lot of people are on edge, worried about what is going to happen in the middle east. what role does the united states play and what response should the united states have when it comes to iran, and more specifically iran's nuclear weapons? rep. hayes: just like everyone else i'm heartbroken by what is happening, and we want this conflict to end that we are seeing in israel and in gaza, and expanding into other countries. i do believe we have a responsibility to support our allies who are israel, however, what that support looks like matters, and how they use that support matters. i think that much as i met with families of the hostages who have said they want a negotiated cease-fire, they also want a release of all of the hostages

that have been held. i would say moving forward we have to make sure that there is a path toward peace that gives self-determination to the palestinians in gaza. the innocent people who literally through no fault of their own -- >> does not care about the hostages! [booing] they will continue the genocide! free, free, palestine! >> we do apologize for that disturbance. it is obviously uncalled for. the rules were given to everyone in this room prior to matt that

we need to refrain from speaking, cheering, or anything of the such. this is about the voters and there are a lot of important topics to get to hear. congresswoman hayes, we apologize for that. we did stop the clock and you can begin again. rep. hayes: i would say, in addition to everything i said, that there are also voters that are suffering because of what is happening in palestine, and in gaza. that cannot be overlooked either. that is something we have to make sure that they are part of the conversation. i am the only person on this stage who has even acknowledged the suffering of the palestinian people. mr. logan has never evening knowledged that there are people in the gaza strip that are suffering, that have been displaced. children who are dying. that has to be part of the solution. i understand that people are passionate about this issue, but they have a reason and right to be passionate about this.

we talk about our allies around the world it is not just our allies in israel. i can tell you that my republican colleagues held up the budget because they did not want us to support ukraine. if ukraine falls as a democracy we have problems in all of europe. trump, the head of his party, has supported putin, has continued to tow the line for him. we have to make sure that as the united states we stand on our principles and be a beacon for democracy around the world. >> thank you so much. mr. logan, you now have one minute. mr. logan: first of all, i do support ukraine and the effort to help them defend themselves against the devastating invasion from vladimir putin. when it comes to israel this is the issue we have with my opponent. she shows tepid support of israel and then she also shows tepid support for those who want to do harm to israel. you take a look at the party, when you go on the ballot you will see it, the working family party these are things they are aiming for, their goals, to

defund the police. they are against sending weapons to israel. that is a problem. my opponent is one of only 40 congress persons -- congressmen to withhold sending critical resources to israel. israel has the right to defend itself. war is terrible and everyone involved on both the israeli side and palestinian side, there are an instant -- innocent people suffering. i want the war to end as soon as possible. i believe in a two state solution. but one of those things cannot be run by a terrorist organization. >> mr. logan, thank you. mr. logan: i think it is important we remain steadfast. >> we want to move onto the next question. you have 30 seconds. rep. hayes: the vote i voted for was an investigation into the world central kitchen killings. we had united states citizens killed and we have a responsibility as a congress to figure out what happened and make sure it does not happen

again. that is my job, to have oversight over these funds we are sending and make sure they are used appropriately and in the way they were intended. if he is saying he would not have even ask any questions about the united states' mission workers killed, that is a problem. >> thank you very much. the next question is for you, mr. logan. this will be coming from dan and it is -- it is in regards to the 2024 presidential election. mr. haar: how supportive are you of your party's nominee? maybe i missed it, but i want to get a clear articulation from you about that. obviously we don't need to list the various ways's behavior has called attention to itself. he has called his opponent -- opponent mentally ill. he has denied the election, which i believe you have not. and on and on. what do you say about that when

constituents ask you that question? mr. logan: i have been very consistent. i have said over and over again, right, folks in our community are suffering. the affordability issue is huge. the border, the open border, a huge problem. america's state in the world has only been weakened since the last election. that is a problem. i cannot in good conscience support four more years of the bad policies from the biden-harris administration. my opponent wants to continue on that same path that has led to a lot of this -- these problems we have now, there it is inflation, chaos applaud -- abroad. we need strong leadership. we cannot get that by the current administration. so, i will be supporting the presidential ticket of this election. rep. hayes: you can't say the

name? mr. logan: the republican presidential ticket. this election. >> we were waiting with baited breath for that response. congresswoman hayes, you have one minute. rep. hayes: i think the non-answer says more than the answer. the fact that my challenger, who claims to be the party of law and order, he cares about all of these things, cannot even say the name of the 34-time convicted felon he plans to vote for. this person who literally has tried to overthrow our government one time and will try to do it again. he can't even say his name out loud. i guess because you have a camera right there. this is who he says he will vote for in the election. when he goes to washington, if he were to go to washington, he would vote with him on all of his dangerous policies. on project 2025 and all of those disastrous policies we are talking about. this is someone who cannot even

say that joe biden won the election. if you are that supportive of your presidential nominee, say it with your chest. you are going to support donald, you're going to vote for donald trump. and people know what that means. >> this is a very hot-button issue. mr. logan, i would like to give you another 30 seconds to possibly clarify your position. mr. logan: the issue is my opponent cannot fathom an independent voice in washington. i will work with whoever is in the white house after the selection. my goal is to work in a bipartisan manner. i am an individual thinker who is going to make decisions for the folks in our district. unlike my opponent, who is making it clear she is going to give us more of the same and supporting the bed policies coming from democratic leadership has only made things worse. i believe we need to go in a different direction. i believe i have the ability to work in a bipartisan manner. >> mr. logan, we appreciate it.

we do have to talk about a very important topic, which is abortion and rape -- and reproductive rights. mr. logan: laser-like focus -- >> thank you. we have a lot to get to tonight. abortion and reproductive rights is a big issue that many voters are thinking about your question tonight will be going to congresswoman hayes. mr. udoma: congresswoman hayes, what is your position on abortion, and, basically, we have had a situation in which mr. logan has said abortion is not an issue in connecticut and he would not support a national abortion ban. what is your take? rep. hayes: thank you. abortion is an issue for everyone, and i support a woman's right to choose.

a woman's right to make her own health care decisions between her and her doctor. mr. logan just said he was running for congress. the congressperson for this state has to weigh in on federal issues and how it affects the entire country, from the perspective of the fifth district. i can tell you that since roe v. wade fell, who was overturned, and mr. logan said the supreme court made the right decision and he would not vote to codify roe, we have seen over 200 room and around the country criminalize, put in jail. we have seen women die and bleed out. i care about those women even if they do not live in the fifth district. i don't want the government making decisions for me, for my daughter, for my granddaughter, and i do not trust mr. logan. because he filled out questionnaires and says he supports a woman's right to choose, but also said he would not vote to codify roe. just last week he said he would join the republican study committee whose number one issue, one of their top issues is the conception bill.

which version of george logan would we get on this issue? the one that gives interviews and says he supports a woman's right to choose or one who would not vote to codify roe? the one who would join the republican study committee? it is not mike johnson's place. it is between a woman and her doctor. roe v. wade says that abortion should be legal and has been the law of the land for over 50 years before donald trump put extreme supreme court justice is in place to overturn it, and up until the age of viability. so, all of this nonsense about post-birth abortions, which incidentally is murder -- infanticide, abortions up to the ninth month is nonsense. it should be between a woman and her doctor, and neither one of us should even have an opinion or -- on that issue. >> thank you very much.

mr. logan, your thoughts? you have one minute. mr. logan: sure. my opponent continues to use the abortion issue for political gain, and that is shameful. look at my record. as a state senator i had a 100% voting record supporting women's reproductive issues. i have been very consistent in my support of a woman's right to choose. i support connecticut's abortion law. i would support on the federal level a woman's right to choose, as long as it does not undermine connecticut's abortion law and it is constitutional. i'm the only one on this stage who supports 100% connecticut abortions and i'm going to do everything in my power to preserve it and protect it in washington. that is where i stand on it. micah -- my opponent continues to tell that lie, spend money to try to convince folks otherwise, and i'm hoping enough folks are watching this and no look at my record.

look at every interview i have given, every discussion i have given. i support a woman's right to choose. >> your time is up. we appreciate it. do you want 30 seconds? rep. hayes: i would like 30 seconds. i am not paying money to peddle a lie. those were your words. i would not vote to codify roe v. wade at the federal level. those were your words. you did not take any votes on this issue. you have given interviews, you have filled out questionnaires, but you have not taken any actual votes. i have taken votes. i have tried to sign amicus briefs. and it does not stop just at abortion. it is ibf, it is contraception. we took a vote in the house to protect contraceptives for women and 195 republicans voted against it. abortion is just the gateway. it is just the beginning. >> thank you so much. you're going to make this a short question for time. mr. logan, you will get one minute.

congressman hayes, you will get 30 seconds to respond. susan, this question is coming from you on the housing crisis. ms. raff: my question is on housing, which is a huge problem not only in this country, but connecticut. and despite efforts by the legislature to get cities and towns to build more affordable housing it has not worked. kamala harris has suggested giving families a break. i believe $25,000 a year. for housing. is that a good plan? what would you do to create more affordable housing? mr. logan: so, that plan, coming from the democratic presidential nominee, vice president, is not a good plan. because what it is going to do is, it is going to make things worse. that is why these reckless government spending plans need to go. when you take a look at the housing market, in terms of people, more people getting into

the housing market without actually doing something because there is more housing available. housing prices are just going to go up. it is a supply and demand issue. that is why these cockamamie plans coming from the white house have repeatedly failed. they keep going to the same well. what we need to do is make things more affordable so builders can build more, so people have more income, more money in their pockets. so they can afford to do what i have been able to do with my family and some of you have been able to do as well. we need to make things more affordable. we need to have responsible fiscal policies. that is not a responsible fiscal policy. >> we appreciate your time. congresswoman hayes, you have 30 seconds. rep. hayes: thank you. i hope you all are listening, because this is his idea of bipartisanship. mr. logan's campaign is funded and bankrolled by a group called blackstone, which are corporate landlords which are price

gouging and driving up the price. we are seeing that everywhere. what have i done? i have brought many back to the district for affordable housing. i supported the vice presidents plan to build affordable housing units so people are not spending more than 36% of their income. let's get our carpenters back to work, our treatment back to work on the and open up the housing market so people can afford to buy a home. >> thank you so much. it is time now for the closing statements, and as determined by the coin toss which i mentioned earlier, congresswoman hayes, you are up first and you will have two minutes. rep. hayes: thank you and thank you for being here. this hour went by much quicker than i thought and i welcome the quest -- the opportunity to answer these questions. i hope you have heard what i have actually done. i have taken resources, i have delivered and brought to the district mr. logan talks about his record of bipartisanship. he had zero bills passed in the state senate.

never move to bill, never did anything. he voted on the budget. we appreciated that in the state of connecticut. there is so much more to legislating than that. i have to tell you, i have traveled around this district and really gotten to know the people of the fifth district and make sure that every single one of those communities is important to me. everything one of those communities is represented. mr. logan talks about partisanship, but he wants to go to congress. to be a rubberstamp for the trump administration. for mike johnson, who would have the gavel and all of the things we are talking about right now. we would not even vote on those things because he would never bring them to the floor. so, i will continue to do the work that i have been doing and continue to deliver on behalf of the people of this district. there is so much at stake. he cannot even denounce january 6. he said he would have voted against a bipartisan commission to investigate what happened on january 6.

he cannot even say trump's name because god forbid he offend anyone in national republicans they will stop funding his campaign. if he cannot see it in this room when trump is not even hear what do you think he would do in washington? i hope that once and for all we will send mr. logan back to wherever he came from so that we can continue to do the work that is important for the people of this district. all of the people. not leave anybody behind. that is what i plan to do. that is who i am. that is who you sent to washington and that has not changed. >> we appreciate that. mr. logan, you have the final two minutes tonight. mr. logan: thank you. you see clearly the nastiness that comes out from my opponent. you see how partisan she is. she is one of the most partisan members of congress. there are only 29 members more partisan than she is. when she had the opportunity to be here she decided to stay in a political party.

the choice is clear. she has a 90 9% voting record with the washington administration and the white house. i have a 90 -- 99% bipartisan record. the head chairperson and cochair of planning and development in the state senate, veterans, i am the cosponsor of dozens of bills. you have the information wrong, all right? i'm someone who knows how to work hard. we are not on the same page on a lot of different issues. she again, repeatedly over and over again, tried to use this divisive rhetoric and outright lies on my position on things for political gain. i say over and over again i want to work on a bipartisan basis. my focus is on this race, as opposed to my opponent's focus. that is, satisfying party leadership.

i've made it known to my district, i'm representing you and not some interest is group. i never heard of project 2025 until she started talking about it. that's not where my head is at, it's about helping the people in my district. now i'm going to talk to my friends and family out there when are latino and spanish speaking. [speaking in spanish] >> i'm going to ask all of you for your vote so we can move our country forward. >> thank you very much. thank you mr. logan and ms. hayes. we appreciate both of you being here tonight. with that, i do ask you to hold

your applause for a few more minutes here. that concludes tonight's debate. i do want to thank our partners at c.n.c. insider and wtr radio and our three panelists for their great and thoughtful questions. we'll have a wrap-up on eyewitness news at 11:00 tonight and hope you tune in for that. we also encourage you to go to ct insider.com for more reporting and analysis. keep in mind, tuesday, november 5 is election day. that is when it is up to you. so go out there and vote. from all of us here at channel 3, i'm erin connelly. good night. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2024] announcer: with 21 days until the election, here's our live

campaign coverage, former president donald trump will sit down with the economic club of chicago and will be speaking to community leaders and club members co-hosted by bloomberg news and is expected to start soon, about 12:30 eastern. again, we'll have live coverage. and democratic vice-presidential candidate tim walz will speak to voters in pennsylvania, scheduled for 5:00 p.m. eastern today. also this evening at 7:00, pennsylvania senator bob casey and his republican challenger david mccormick face off in their third and final debate to represent the keystone state in the u.s. senate. all of this live on c-span, c-span now, our free mobile app and online at c-span.org. >> with one of the tightest races for controlling congress in modern political history, stay ahead with c-span's comprehensive coverage with key state debates.

this fall c-span brings you access to the top debates across the country. debates shaping your state's future and the balance of hauer in washington. follow our campaign 2024 coverage from local to national debates any time online at c-span.org/campaign. watch tuesday, november 5 for live, real-time election night results. c-span, your unfiltered view of politics, powered by cable. >> the house will be in order. >> this year, c-span celebrates 45 years of covering congress like no other. since 1979 we've been your primary source for capitol hill, providing balanced, unfiltered coverage of government, taking you where the policies are debated and decided all with the support of america's cable company. c-span, 45 years and counting.

powered by cable. former president bill clinton campaigned on behalf of kamala harris in columbus, georgia, and highlighted the vice president's economic plan for the country and talked about border security and investment. he criticized former president donald trump's part in a bill. and this is a multiday swing through the peach state on behalf of vice president harris. ♪ >> now ♪ ♪ baby give it up ♪ ♪ now ♪ ♪ baby give it up ♪ ♪ baby give it up ♪

♪ ♪ kamala: all right, columbus! y'all ready? y'all ready? i don't think y'all are ready. y'all, remember, i told you i had somebody who worked with me every day in washington, d.c. fighting for your values down here in southwest georgia? y'all, today i need you to give a warm welcome to your congressman, the dean of the georgia delegation, congressman bishop! congressman bishop: hello, hello, columbus! are we ready? are we fired up? fired up?

ready to go! listen, we are fortunate. this has been a great, great two days. we have an exciting, exciting, energized, we're coming up and we are counting down to november 5. more importantly, we're counting down the hours until tomorrow where we can do what? early vote! we have the

we need to make sure we can deliver for the united states of america and we have to make sure we have those working on behalf of those working in the white house and make sure kamala harris and tim walz are there in january to be president and vice president of these united states.

we spent time with the faith leaders and we have to pray because god is in this. god is controlling this and we are going to pray like everything depends on god. but you know what, we've got to work like everything depends on us. >> that's right! congressman bishop: when we fight -- when we fight! all right. now, i don't need to tell you how important this election is. georgia has delivered for this country in 2020 we sent joe biden and kamala harris and we turned georgia blue and sent two senators to washington to clean up the mess that had been left and now we are going to send kamala and tim walz to washington to finish the job that joe and kamala have started

we're going to get it done for the american people. and to help put in context how important georgia is in saving our country, saving our nation, saving our health care, saving head start, saving all the things that mean a better life for america's people, for you and for me and our children, our children's children and our children's children's children. we are going to bring the 4 2nd president of the united states of america, bill clinton!

mr. clinton: thank you. thank you very much. thank you. thank you. columbus has really changed since i came the first time and we can give a little credit to your congressman. my long time friend. he's done a great job here. it's just wonderful to be back. i've been hanging around here the last two or three days, you know, traveling out and going

around. i went to the fair and everybody was in such a good humor, i even had one guy in a maga cap ask to take a picture. and it made me feel good. i thought maybe there's hope for this country yet. part of kamala harris' new way forward is we're going to have more us and fewer them. this us and them thing is eating us alive. so when the guy asked for a picture, i said come on up here, man. who knows, maybe i can infect him before election day. meanwhile, we've got a race to win. i want to thank another man, native of columbus, who was for a while the longest serving member of any state collect you

are in the state of america. calvin smirely from columbus has been with me. i want to thank congresswoman williams, your state chair and great friend of many of my friends. thank you representative carolyn and teddy reese and all the local campaign people. i've had the best time the last few days. i got to go to the state fair i thought was pretty cool. [inaudible] mr. clinton: i didn't eat one and got one and gave it to somebody younger with a higher metabolism.

look, we start early voting tomorrow, right? and if you look at all these recent georgia elections, they've all been close because we fought hard. and try to rig the rules away so it's hurt us and there's been innovative efforts in that regard, trying to rig the rules away from us. but you did well. we won in 2020 and then you have rafael warnock and john ossoff in. and we did it not just because we did well in atlanta but

because there was an opportunity anywhere outside of atlanta we punched above our weight. that's what the elections is coming down to. if you want it bad enough you can win it and you'll be proud of yourself the rest of your life. and your children and grandchildren will be grateful. and if you decide you've got something better to do for the next few days, you'll regret it most of your life. i know quite a bit about being president and about the current issues and the competing candidates. and the thing that i said

speaking at the democratic national convention, people talk about donald trump lying, that he just makes stuff up. well, he does, you know. and he's got a lot of help. marjorie taylor greene the other day, did you see this, our friends in north carolina got creamed by that terrible storm helene. usually hurricanes hit the coast. this one hit inside the west and it was terrible damaging asheville which is pretty much a democratic city but also hurt all these rural counties that were mostly republicans. and they acted like we've done something unfair. because i knew when i went to the east coast of north carolina in 2016, i didn't see how

hillary could possibly win because i went to this national guard armory and all the people that lost everything were in there and half of them had their buttons on and i knew their lives were wrecked and knew they couldn't get to go vote and there wouldn't be an organization to go do it. but now they're saying we have the power. >> we do. mr. clinton: to change the weather. i tell you something, folks, i love being in politics and i love public service but if i had the power to change the weather, i'd be in a different line of work. and you know, i would have underwritten this entire campaign if that had happened.

we're having a good time but we need to be serious. there is a lot at stake. the thing that bothers me more about the opposition campaign are all the i's. the sun came out today. i did it. yesterday it rained. if i had been president, it never would have happened. >> speak it! speak it. mr. clinton: this is about me. there's nobody in the world like me, i can do things nobody can do. i can stop things nobody can stop. i listened to all this stuff and i thought, is that true? how come since the cold war there's been 50 million new jobs added to the country by

democrats and one by republicans. and we are about to finish the four-year period that will produce the most new jobs of any four-year period in the history of the united states. they have a real load to carry, the republicans, they want to attack kamala harris and blame her for a anything they manage to keep from happening. like they claim she was the border czar and that wasn't her job. her job was to go down to these other countries sending a lot of people and trying to get them, to enroll them in a legal process while they were still in the country so they wouldn't be

illegally trafficked, show up at our border, had to be cared for on one side of it or another and then we'd run the risk of having people get in here that weren't properly vetted. that's what she tried to do. and we had some success with that but those traffickers make a lot of money. so the last three years, the biden-harris administration has done increasingly tough things trying to control the border and the illegal crossings have gone down every year for three years. our friends in the other party don't want to talk about that's true. >> that's right! mr. clinton: then president biden called the republican senators who seem genuinely concerned about it and said let's make a deal. the only thing you care about is having fewer people come in,

right? they said yeah, we don't want them. and so there is a limit to how many people we can officially take, so i'll make a deal with you. i'll take your limit if you'll give me enough money to make sure these families can stay together and no kids are taken away from their children, and if we do serious background checks so the people who shouldn't get in because they're highly likely make crimes don't get in and we'll make a deal. they made the deal. biden said you write the first half of the bill. i tried to. you never hear this. and then donald trump hears about it. and he says oh, my god, we can't fix the border. what am i going to do for tv ads. who am i going to demonize every

day. i don't get into politics to solve problems. i get in it to get into problems. he got into it to help senator mccarthy deny everything and accuse people of doing what they're doing. so there it was on a silver platter, a new direction to manage an immigration crisis and a tough time where there's upheaval all over the world, where there are border problems all over the world, where millions of people are trying to escape the misery they're in and other people saying i want to do what i can but maybe there's a limit to things we can do. americans aren't anti-immigration but anti-chaos.

they don't want us to use more than we can but recognize, at least most people do, we've got the lowest birth rate we've had in well over a hundred years. we have to have somebody come here to keep growing the economy unless one of you is with this artificial intelligence and have figured out we can all grow with no work, which i'm not sure will be good for us. i think it helps to get up and go to work every day. so what you've got is a clear choice. kamala harris has authored a credible, compelling economic vote. there was a huge number of economists more than divided equally by philosophy that reviewed these programs.

and basically her program would help twice as many because they give more money than they need to on the high income people and i'm on the bottom end and elon musk is on the top end of high income people. i don't need a tax cut and don't want them to cut spending to kids and do all those things. but their program would not help as many people but cost twice as much money because one of the reasons they exist and live, i just can't wait until we get in the white house again so we can

give millionaires another tax cut. they need some incentive to invest. well, let me tell you something i've got a few friends who made a billion dollars. they worked for it and earned it. but friends that i have, they're proud to pay taxes on what they owe. they don't believe you should pay less and they leave you should live in -- believe you should live in a country that gives all the kids a chance to become what they did, not a millionaire, maybe just a poor millionaires. not a -- maybe a musician or maybe a carpenter or maybe a whatever. they should have a chance. so kamala harris and tim walz

want to make it possible for many more jobs to be open for people with skills training who didn't get a college degree but have skills training. republicans don't give a hill about that. they want to make it easier for people to go to college and stay there and make it easier for people to repay their debt because they want us all to have a chance to live the way people who feel successful and fulfilled have lived. and you've just got to decide how bad you want this. >> we want it bad! we want it bad! mr. clinton: you've got to decide. mr. johnson, you look good in your t-shirt. so i think that's all i need to say. i have loved being here.

i've relived 30 years and thought about everything in the wide world has happened to me here. i love driving all over columbus to see how beautiful it is. but it is literally possible the whole election could be decided here. but it's possible. there are seven states where the election is too close to call. we could win them all or we could lose them all and depends on want to. and the supreme court has had a lot of terrible rulings since

the last election and they've been able to make it easier for states that agreed with them to make it harder for people to vote but not impossible. georgia has more experience than almost any other state and climbing those barriers and raising them. i was looking at that gentleman in the beautiful cap that says bronze star. you have too many military veterans in georgia who have paid too high a price who served their country to turn around and discriminated against and access to the polls. you can say no. you can be no. so that's the last thing i want to leave with you.

i want you to celebrate on election night. i want you to be happy. i want you to know i am here because i believe, i believe, based on my personal knowledge of the job and the candidate that kamala harris will be a fine president and will make a huge difference, that the risk her opponent will actually do what he said and now he says who are these 2025 people. i don't know them. well, president trump, 144 of the writers were in your administration. just 144 of them. about that many, over a hundred military and administration of

the trump years already endorsed kamala harris because they saw up close what happened to ordinary people. don't be fooled. just bear down. have a good time. >> yes, we will! mr. clinton: look for somebody in a maga hat to take a picture with. but don't forget, they'll be better off if you win. and you won't be better off if they win. so forand, those of you who have grandchildren, including me. please, make sure that we turn out. all we have to do is show up. if we show up, we will win. it is in your hands.

god bless you. thank you. ♪ [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2024] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] ♪

♪

>> with one of the tightest races for control of congress in modern political history, stay ahead with c-span's comprehensive coverage of key state of a -- state debates. it brings you to -- access to the top house, senate and governor debates from racist shaping your state's future and the balance of power in washington. follow our 2024 coverage anytime online at c-span.org/campaign. be sure to watch tuesday, november 5 for a live real-time election night results. c-span, your unfiltered view of politics powered by cable. >> a live picture this afternoon and coming up shortly, republican nominee in former president trump will sit down with the economic club of

chicago and bloomberg news. we will have live coverage when it gets underway here on c-span. ♪ host: this morning we are

starting with pew research. 71% of they pulled said that the campaign is too negative. only 27% say it is not too negative. 62% say the campaign is not focused on important policy debates. 37% say that it is focused on the right one. 19% say that it makes them feel proud of the country while 79% say it does not make them feel proud. 68% say the campaign is interesting while 30% say that it is dull. you would -- do you agree or disagree with any of these numbers? 14% say it is clear who will win and 86% say it is not yet clear. your thoughts on the tone of the campaign and possible outcomes.

the vice president, kamala harris in pennsylvania had this to say about the former president's phrase about enemy within. [video clip] >> he is talking about the enemy within pennsylvania. he is talking about the enemy within our country, pennsylvania. he is talking about that he considers anyone who does not support him or who will not bend to his will an enemy of our country. [booing] it is a serious issue, he is saying. he would use the military to go after them. think about this. and, we know who he would target. and we know who he would target because he has attacked them before.

journalists who stories he does not like. election officials who refused to cheat by filling extra votes and finding extra votes for him. judges who insist on following the law instead of bending to his will. this is among the reasons i believe so strongly that a second trumpet term would be a huge risk for america and dangerous. [cheers and applause] donald trump is increasingly unstable and unhinged. [applause] and, he is out for unchecked power. that is what he is looking for.

[end video clip] host: the vice president in pennsylvania campaigning and picking up on a phrase the former president has iterated at campaign rallies. "the guardian" with their writeup of the vice president's remarks. "harris called trump a risk for america after former president's enemy within remarks. on saturday trump referred to democratic opponents calling them the enemy within saying that they cause a bigger rat than before and targeting adam schiff who is running for the u.s. senate in california." "the new york times" with a similar story this morning relative to this conversation. this is a front page of the new york times with the headline " come believe in trump without believing him doubting he will carry out our threats."

that is the front page this morning. we are asking you this morning what do you think about the tone of this campaign? do you believe the former president when he says what he says. deborah in florida. supporting the trump-vance ticket. let's go to you. caller: yes. morning. i do believe that he is going to carry out. he is strong and has good policies. he puts in place good people. and he does listen. i do not believe that the things that are democratic party are chanting are real. it is not logical. we need more safety and people in charge who know what they are doing. iran the hospital -- i run the hospital at cape canaveral.

i am not putting those in charge -- people in charge of those who do not know the job itself. it is very disappointing. trump will carry through. host: what do you want him to carry through on? caller: how about safety. how about good schools? how about getting prices down? how about all the things that our forefathers came here to do? and not pull on weaknesses, let us strip ash focus on strengths. we do not need 30 handicap spots at home depot. we need to get people and get them moving again. and bring them around. host: so you believe he is going to follow through on his policy agenda. do you think that this campaign is too negative, and does the former president bear responsibility for that? caller: are we talking about the president that is in there with

dementia that has -- you cannot follow through or someone in the future that has proven for four years? host: ok. that is deborah, and florida. the former president at a town hall recently was asked about the economy and immigration and deborah says that he will follow through on those policy platforms. here's what he had to say. [video clip] >> i was raised in a philadelphia democrat and union household. as a mother of a blended family my top issues are the same issues that face all-americans. illegal immigration hurts black americans. inflation hurts black americans and dangerous cities hurt black americans. [applause] like my fellow americans, my

grocery bill has not gone down and everything is very expensive. what steps will your administration take to help american families suffering from this inflation? >> it is such a great set -- question in the sense that people do not think about groceries. it seems like an unimportant word when you talk about homes. more people tell me about grocery bills where the price of bacon, lettuce and tomatoes they tell me. we will do a lot of things. the farmers are not being treated properly. we had a deal with china and it was a great deal. i never mentioned it because when covid came in they said it was a bridge too far because i had a great relationship with president she. he has a fierce man and a man who likes china. he was perfect on that deal. $50 billion he was going to buy. we were doing numbers that we would not believe. the farmers are badly hurt and we have to get them straightened out and we will get the prices

down. you asked a question about safety and also about black population jobs and hispanic population. in particular those two. when millions of people go into the country they are having a devastating effect on black and hispanic families more than any others. i think it will spread to a lot of other places and i think unions will have a big problem because employers are never going to pay the price. and it will be some very bad things happening. many are coming in for jails and prisons and mental institution and saying that this is an insane asylum. whenever i go to hammond -- hannibal lector, and there is a lot of fake news back there. [booing] they always mention as a way of demeaning, they say hannibal

lector, why would he mention? because he was a sick puppy and we have them coming into our country. that is better than wasting a lot of words. you just say hannibal lector. they always say why would you say that and i do it for a lot of reasons but i do it because we are allowing bad people into our country. [end video clip] host: the former president campaigning during a count -- during a town hall. we covered both the former president and the vice president. you can find all of our campaign coverage on c-span.org online and on demand. as we noted, pew research did a poll that found 62% say the campaign is not focused on important policy debates while 47% say that it is. do you agree or disagree? carol, in wisconsin sport -- supporting the harris- walz ticket.

[applause] >> hello, everyone. as the voice of god just said i am claire. it is my privilege to serve as a ceo of feeding america and first vice chair of the economic club of chicago. i thank you for joining us for a limburg news interview with the 45th president of the united states. and the 2024 republican presidential candidate. donald trump. [applause] he will be interviewed by bloomberg editor-in-chief, john mickle weight. in keeping with our mission for the economic club of chicago, we invited both the 2024 presidential candidates.

we are hopeful that vice president harris will join us as well. one important note. this program will be live on bloomberg platforms and on the youtube channel. we ask that during the program the room stay quiet while we are broadcasting. ok. now, onto the reason that we are all here. i will keep my introduction brief so we have maximum amount of time for the interview. the economic club of chicago has been fortunate to cohost this event with bloomberg news, led by the editor-in-chief. born and educated in the u.k., john started his career at chase-manhattan bank before becoming a journalist at "the economist," and later its editor. and then bloomberg editor-in-chief in 2015. he is the author of several

books including "the wake-up call: why the pandemic has exposed the weakness of the west and how to fix it." there is no person -- no better person to lead a discussion about global business, politics and the economy. please join me in welcoming bloomberg at interim chief. -- editor and chief -- editor-in-chief, john. [applause] [no audio]

john: and that is partly because it is a business audience but voters insist that the economy is the main issue that matters when they vote. so, let me introduce to the stage. president trump. [cheers and applause] have a seat. you got a standing ovation. >> welcome to chicago. [cheers and applause] john: president trump, thank you

to -- thank you for doing this. the business people of chicago like a lot of the things you want to do in terms of tax cuts and spending proposals. but like many business people what they are worried about is the cost. the committee for responsible federal budget, a bipartisan outlet put out some predictions the other day. if you add up all the promises you have made then your plans would add $7.5 trillion to the debt. that is more than twice the total for vice president harris. you are on course to push the debt up to 150% of gdp. this is a very businesslike audience. why should they trust you with that? fmr. pres. trump: even today you see these empty old beautiful steel meals -- milsl and

factories that have been falling down. some have been converted to senior citizens homes but that will not do the attack -- the trick. we were lower taxes still further for companies making their product in the usa and protect those companies with strong tariffs. i am a believer in tariffs. i do not think you are. but i congratulate you and your career. [laughter] to me the most beautiful world in the dictionary is tariff and it is my favorite word. [applause] john: do you think that will bring in the revenues. to use another bipartisan group it will only bring into billion dollars. that is barely the cost of two promises. fmr. pres. trump: but for what company? i was just getting started. and then covid came and which,

because i did a very good job with covid. no one knew what the hell it was and i called it the china virus because i like being accurate. but we have hundreds of millions of dollars from china alone and i had not even started yet. tariffs are two things if you look at it. number one it is protection of the companies that we have here and the new companies that will move in. you will have thousands of companies coming into the country and we will grow it like we have never grown it before and we will protect them because we will not have somebody undercut them. i can give you an example. would you like me? john: a quick example. fmr. pres. trump: i just found out about it. i have been talking about it for the last year about detroit and how horribly it has been -- it is best -- it is horrible. detroit has been coming back for 40 years, but it has never come back. it is dependent on the car

industry. they lost 60% of the business over time. what happened is that i found out, offend of mind builds auto plants and that is all he does. that is what he is good at. and he builds the biggest in the world. and for the last year and a half of anybody, i was talking about mexico and he says a tremendous challenge for us right now. china is building massive auto plants in mexico. they are going to build them and take those cars and sell them into the united states. and they will have all of the advantages and none of the disadvantages and that will be the end of michigan, south carolina and the end of everything. i have been talking to this and i set about nine months ago i said i want to do -- i want you to do me a favor john, and i will not give his last name because he might not like it. and i said i want to go in cds. you press a button and everything works.

i want to see one of the big ones and he said good. and i said i would like to go to michigan or someplace in the united states and he said we cannot do that because they are not building anything big. we do not build the big ones here. i said where? and i said in mexico, the giant plants and the biggest anywhere in the world. in mexico? they will make cars cheaply and have advantages and labor and other things and sell them into the united states? they will put michigan out of business? i do not know anything about that, if you want to see a plant we will go to mexico and show you the biggest plans in the world. that was nine months ago. i talk about it all the time because i think it is a serious threat to our country. so then i see him two days ago and i was talking at another club, a very nice club like this except i think you people are even wealthier, ok? [laughter] this is in detroit,

which was appropriate. i was showing all sorts of charts, because it has just gone down and it is terrible. and i said how are you doing and how have you been? i said can i ask you how are those plans that you mentioned, those giant plants that you are building in mexico, how is that coming along, have you finish them? no, they abandon the project when you heard -- when they heard that you were running and they saw that you are winning and doing well. and i said well -- [applause] and i told them and i said it publicly. they are not can sell one car into the united states. and i said if i run this country and i will be president i will put a 100 or 200 or 2000% tariff. they will not sell one car into the united states, because we

will not destroy our country because i know you are anti-tariff but i am the exact opposite. there is no other way i could have stopped them other than negotiate with mexico or china? you will not get anything for them. i said i will put a 100, 200, or 300 tariff and stop them from ever selling a car into the united states. so he says, they have abandoned it. by the way they built foundations and they were going to do it. they thought that i was going to win or maybe they are just holding off. if i do not win those factories are going to wipe out this country. they are the biggest factories ever built for cars and they will wipe out my country. she does not know what the hell she is doing. if she wins, she will not be thinking about -- every speech i made having to do with cars or tariffs, i mentioned it.

our country is being threatened by mexico. now all of those things beyond the car companies, all of those things are dead. i asked them when will they start, probably not, dead as a doornail. if she gets in it will start up. john: i let you give them an example. you talked a lot about tariffs and you look at the american economy. 14 million. jost -- jobs rely on paid -- on trade. if you cut that off that will have an effect on many business people here. tariffs have another side. isn't that something you have to acknowledge. fmr. pres. trump: no. john: you could be plunging america into the biggest trade war. there are tariffs already. fmr. pres. trump: there are no tariffs. all you have to do is build the plant in the united states and there are no tariffs. john: a lot of places like this, there are a lot of jobs that rely on things coming in. you will basically stop trade with china. there is a 60% chance on --

tariffs on that. 100% in 200 things on things you do not like bud 10 and 20% on the rest of the world. that will have a serious effect on the economy. you will find some people who gain individual tariffs. the overall effect could be massive. fmr. pres. trump: i agree it will have a massive effect, positive. it is going to be a positive and not a negative. you know how committed you are to this and it must be hard for you to spend 25 years talking about terry tibbs -- tariffs as negative and somebody explain to you that you are totally wrong. [applause] if you'd -- john: president trump 14 million jobs is a lot of jobs. fmr. pres. trump: they are all coming back. john: 14 million jobs in america that rely on trade. fmr. pres. trump: john deere a great company. they announced that they are going to build a big plant outside of the united states.

they are going to build them in mexico. and i said if john deere builds those plants they are not selling anything into the united states. they just announced that they are probably not going to build the plans. i kept the jobs here and john deere will stay here. and i will say if you do build outside of the united states if you want, india is a tough country. you know that china is and i would say probably the toughest. but you know it is very tough? the european union. european countries are wonderful. but if you add them up they are almost the size of us. they treat us so badly. we have a deficit. i said to angela merkel when she was there and i wonder why she is not. when she was there i said how many chevrolet do we have? while i do know that you are -- you have none. how any forwards in frankfurt? i do not know.

none. she said that is right. do you know how any cars we have, mercedes-benz, bmw, volkswagen, millions and millions of cars and then i said they do not want our farm products or anything from us. we have deficits that are crazy. and we will not have them. we will put tariffs on them and you know what they can do? mercedes-benz will start building in the united states. they have a little bit. do you know what they really are, assembly. they build everything in germany and they assemble it here. they get away with murder because they are building. they take them out of a box and assemble them. you could have a child do it. mr. micklethwait: let's come back to europeans in the second. fmr. pres. trump: what about consumers? they're going to be the biggest beneficiaries. mr. micklethwait: critics have said your tariffs will be like a national sales tax. we trillion dollars worth of imports.

you're going to add terrorist every single one of them. that is going to push up costs for all of those people that want to buy foreign goods. it is mathematics, president trump. fmr. pres. trump: it is, but not the way you figure it out. i was always very good at mathematics. they don't have to pay. the higher the tariff the more likely it is to have them come in. mr. micklethwait: the higher the tariff the more value you're going to put on those goods, the higher people are going to pay in shops. fmr. pres. trump: the higher the tariffs the more likely it is the company will come into the united dates and build a factory in the united states so it doesn't have to pay the tariff. mr. micklethwait: that would take many, many years. fmr. pres. trump: no. in fact, i will tell you there is another theory. the tariff, you make it so high, so horrible, so it noxious that they will come right away. 10% is really -- first of all,

10% when you collect it is hundreds of billions of dollars. all reducing our deficit. but really there is two ways of looking at a tariff. you can do it as a moneymaking instrument or do it as something to get the companies -- now, if you want the companies to come in the cab has to be higher than 10%, because 10% is not enough. they are not going to do it for 10. but you make a 50% tariff they are going to come in. the other thing about tariffs that are great, our steel companies, when i was in office i saw a man from a big steel company and he was devastated. i knew him for a long time and it has been a tough business. it was a great business many years ago and i would not let u.s. steel be sold to the japanese, because psychologically i think it would be terrible. i would not let it be sold. i would stop it.

even though it has not been completed by the time i was president. i think it sets a horrible tone. i had a lot to do with steel. you are going to lose all of our steel companies because china was dumping steel at levels nobody has ever seen before. i put a 50% tax on that and it was also bad steel. it was what they called dirty steel, which is a bad thing for structural components of buildings and things like that. they were dumping crab into our country. and i put a 50% tariff, i started a 25, i raised it to 50 because the 25 did not do it. i raised it to 50 and they did it. they stopped dumping steel. i having that we saved it. he saved our steel. what was left? because we have lost so much, but there are certain companies, certain things you have to have. if you go to war there is a possibility you go to war, i

kept us out of war. i was the only president in 82 years that kept you out of a war. except i defeated isis, but i inherited that one. [applause] by the way, i think it is very important. i call it the weave. as long as you end up in the right location at the end. while we are talking about it, we have never been so close to world war iii as we have right now with what is going on in ukraine and russia and the middle east. i had no wars in the whole world. think of it. i talked them out of wars. i talked plenty of countries out of wars. the whole world other than isis -- which i inherited -- and i knocked out isis in a matter of weeks. it was supposed to take four or five years. i did it in a matter of weeks. we have a great military. mr. micklethwait: i was asking you about tariffs. many people would say that the biggest problem with your tariffs is actually geopolitics.

you in your first term, you got some credit, effectively saying there was a cold war against china. you look at the last cold war against the soviet union, america won it in part because it rallied allies to it. you are talking about slamming allies with 20% tariffs. is it this time you were going to end up rallying the west and you are dividing it instead? isn't that the real problem with tariffs, even beyond the problems to the economy? you keep bringing up these individual examples but the overall effect is going to be dramatic. answer first about foreign policy. how does it help you take on china, turning all of your allies? fmr. pres. trump: china thinks we are a stupid country. a stupid country. they can't believe someone finally got wise to them. not one president, bush, obama, barack hussein obama, have you heard of him? not one president -- think of

it. not one president charged china anything. they said, they are a third world nation. we are a developing nation too. take a look at detroit. we are a developing nation. we have to develop more than they do. we are way behind them. take a look at what has happened in our cities. mr. micklethwait: my question was about your allies, not about china. you are going to annoy the people rallying behind you. fmr. pres. trump: our allies have taken advantage of us more so than our enemies. our allies of the european union. we have a trade deficit of three hundred billion dollars with the european union. our allies are japan. abe was a friend of mine. he was assassinated and he was a great man. i did not see too many like him and he got very sick and had to take off and he was actually making a comeback. he was going to make a comeback

and he would have won easily, but he was a great gentleman. inspected by everybody. he -- i went to him and said, we have to talk. why? trade. and he goes -- i will never forget -- i know. i said, what do you know? i knew you would come to me. why do you say that? because i can't believe -- i wouldn't tell the story if he was alive. i said, i can't believe how many years it has been that nobody even negotiated with us in america. i said, you have to pay for your cars. you don't accept a car from us. you don't have one car you accept and yet we are selling 3 million of your cars. i said come on agriculture, you will not even accept our agriculture. i renegotiated the whole trade deal. i was stuck with a bad deal. we have trade deals that were so

bad that i said, who are the people doing it? they are either very stupid or they are getting paid off, ok? it is one of the other. it is very simple. we have the worst trade deals all over the world. i love south korea. they are wonderful people. they have a money machine. protect them from north korea and other people. north korea is very nuclear. i get along with them very well. kim jong-un. but wait, they don't pay us anything. and i said, this is crazy. if i did not put tariffs on, you know, the motor company, the car companies, they make most of their money in small trucks. i put tariffs on china i put 27.5%, otherwise we would be flooded with chinese cars. and all of our factories would close. we have no jobs in the auto industry. that goes for electric, which is a killer, which i explained.

i put tariffs on south korea because they were sending in trucks and i put tariffs on fairly substantial tariffs. did you know there are car companies that make almost all of their money with small trucks, suvs and small trucks? if i took those tariffs you would be inundated, every car company would be out of business. and i got calls from ford, i got calls from everybody saying, sir, i cannot believe you are doing this for us. you saved our company. they make all of their money with us. they make most of their money with small trucks -- ev's. mr. micklethwait: many consumers ended up with more expensive cars, but let me come at you on foreign policy. fmr. pres. trump: you would not have a car company. mr. micklethwait: you have said that taiwan should pay for u.s. protection. fmr. pres. trump: yeah. mr. micklethwait: you mentioned north korea. the chinese army are engaged in rehearsals for a novel -- a naval blockade in taiwan. if china invades taiwan would

you send american troops to defend it? fmr. pres. trump: the reason they are doing it now is they are not going to do it afterwards, ok? so they are doing it now. [applause] i had a very good relationship with president xi and a very good relationship with pruden and a very good relationship with kim jong-un. today it was announced that he just blew up the railroad going into south korea. that means south korea is now cut off from russia and china and various other places. mr. micklethwait: you just mentioned -- fmr. pres. trump: these are things i have to mention. mr. micklethwait: you just mentioned putin. the controversy this past week, can you say whether you have talked to vladimir putin since you stopped being president? fmr. pres. trump: i don't comment on that, but if i did it is a smart thing. if i am friendly with people, if i can have a relationship with people that is a good thing, not a bad thing, in terms of a country.

he has 2000 nuclear weapons and so do we. china has less, but they will catch us within five years. i don't talk about that. fmr. pres. trump: you don't talk about talking to netanyahu? fmr. pres. trump: russia has never had a president they respect so much, but more importantly or less importantly, i guess, i went into russia and people said, he likes putin and putin likes him. let me tell you, the first thing i did was terminated nord stream 2. nobody ever heard of nord stream 2. it is a pipeline from russia to germany and all over europe. i said, wait a minute, tomato, let me get this straight, my first meeting, i said, putin is building the biggest pipeline in the world. he is going to germany, but all over europe, and you are paying him billions of dollars a year -- billions of dollars a month? germany is paying billions of dollars a month and we are

supposed to protect you against the guy you are paying all of this money to? is there something wrong with my thinking? so, he is building a pipeline to germany and we are spending -- by the way, until i got there we were spending almost 100% for nato because we had all of these delinquent countries. they were not paying. when i got there i said, you know what? and by the way, my biggest is stalled in bird leaving, secretary-general of nato. he said when bush came in he made a speech and left, when obama came in, he made a speech and left. when trump came in he said, let me see your books. there were only seven countries pain. we were supporting nato. they screw us on trade so bad, the european nations, and then on top of that they were screwing us on the military. they were taking tremendous advantage of us, $350 billion on trade.

and we are than supporting them. in other words, it is not sustainable. you cannot keep doing this. you cannot have this, china, all of these countries, and stupid people made these deals. i saw trade deals that were so stupid. that were so bad that you would have to be an idiots to sign them. and we signed them for years. we had -- i could tell you trade deals that i have never seen. i said, who would agree to this? they had to be corrupt. they had to be corrupt to make those deals. because there is no way a rational human being -- i always say either corrupt or chinle stupid because there is no way a rational human being would ever sign the trade deals that this countryside. and i got out of many of those deals. i told south korea, i'm sorry, you are going to have to pay for your military. we have 40,000 troops over there. you have to pay.

you become a very wealthy country -- they said, no, we will not pay. we will not. have not paid since the korean war. i said, you've got to pay. i said, $5 billion year to start off with. they went crazy. they agreed to $2 billion. i got to billion dollars for nothing and i said, here is what we are going to do. they said, we can't agree to this because we have to go to parliament. they have the parliament or whatever their legislature is. i said, i fully understand that, make it $2 billion, but next year i'm going to talk to you again and make it $5 billion. they knew it was coming. the happiest people, to see that it was bite and instead of trump. you know what they did? they cut off the deal i made. they are back to nothing because they went back to biden and they gave it to him for nothing. we have 40,000 troops in harm's

way because you have north korea is a very serious power. they have tremendous nuclear power. i showed it to south korea, you have to pay, and they agreed to do it. but then cut it back. i could tell you, if i were there now they would be telling -- there would be paying us $10 billion a year. it is a money machine, south korea. you wanted to mention taiwan. mr. micklethwait: you said you would defend them. you also seem to imply that putin, you had talked to him. fmr. pres. trump: i said i don't comment on those things. mr. micklethwait: can i ask you a particular thing about the dollar? you have talked about wars. you said if you lost the dollar as a reserve currency it would be like america losing a war. look at what you are going to do in terms of protectionism. and all of that debt is going to lessen the dollar's stasis as the world's reserve care --

reserve currency. fmr. pres. trump: your reserve currency is the strongest it will ever be. mr. micklethwait: at the moment there is a thing called the trump trade in the market. you know what that is? people are betting that your policies are going to drive up debt, they are going to drive up inflation. they are going to drive up interest rates. are the investors wrong? fmr. pres. trump: i had four years, no inflation. [applause] it is better than that. and biden, who has no idea where the hell he is, ok? biden went two years with no inflation because he inherited it, and then they started spending money like drunken sailors. it was so ridiculous, the money they were spending. the green new scam. the green new deal. it was conceived of by aoc plus three.

she never even studied the environment in college. she came out, see -- she just said, the green new scam. mr. micklethwait: the markets are looking at the fact you are making all of these promises, the latest ones was car loans, you are flooding with giveaways. the upper estimate is $15 trillion. people like the wall street journal, hardly a communist organization, they have criticized you as well. you are running up enormous debt. mr. micklethwait: i'm meeting with them tomorrow. they have been wrong about everything. so have you, by the way. mr. micklethwait: you are trying to turn this into a debate. fmr. pres. trump: it is not a debate. you are wrong. you have been wrong all of your life on this stuff. let me tell you about currencies. you are jumping into a lot of different subjects. the reserve currency, that is

where you start, right? the reserve currency is under threat because you have iran, you have russia, you have china. china is the one you have to worry about because they want to have the wan be the thing of power. here is what i'm doing. i had to go back to it. somebody says, i know countries want to get out because they don't respect our leadership. they look at this kind go, you've got to be kidding. i never thought i would say this. she is not as smart as biden if you can believe it. we had four years of this lunacy and we cannot have anymore. we are not going to have a country left. currency. very important. if you want to go to third world status, lose your reserve currency, we have to have that. we cannot lose it. you go to third world status in this country because you take a look at how things are running. if a country tells me, sir we

like you very much, but we are no longer going to adhere to being in the reserve currency, we are not going to salute the dollar anymore, i will say that is ok, and you're going to pay a 100% tariff on everything you sell into the united states and we love your product i hope you sell a lot of it into the united states, but you are going to pay 100% tax. he will then follow it up saying, sir, it would be an honor to stay with your reserve currency. that is not even chess. that is checkers. listen to this. you don't have other people that can talk that way. a lot of people say, we love trump's policy, but we would like to have another message because we don't like him, he is a little bit crass. it was lindsey graham, i must say, he was a progressive. lindsey graham said, trump's policy does not work without trump, and there is a lot of truth to that. emmanuel macron -- he is a wise

guy, but he is from france and we are from the usa. you know this, right? he was going to tax american countries -- companies doing business in france. i told my people, i did not even like the companies, but i am representing american companies. so i said, call emmanuel macron and call his people and say we are not going to stand for that i got my new chin and a lot of guys, smart guys -- if i can finish. i will go longer if you want. you have to be able to finish a thought, because it is very important. this is the stuff we are talking about. let me just tell you, so i said, i'm just telling you basic -- it is called the weave. it is all of these different things happening. i said to steven mnuchin, call him up and say, no way. he did and he came back to see

me he said, they will not do it, sir. i said to somebody, let me do it. and i called him. anna said, emmanuel, you are taxing american companies very substantially. you are not doing it with other companies. you must think we are stupid. it's not going to happen. i cannot do anything, it is too late, it was approved by the legislature. that's ok. every bottle of wine and champagne you send into the united states, effective immediately, and i'm signing it as i speak, i'm charging you 100% on every bottle of wine and champagne. they like their wine and champagne. every bottle of wine and champagne that comes into the united states of america has attacks starting on monday morning. this was a friday. of 100%. that is better than you are doing, ok? he said, no, no you cannot do that.

i say, i've done it, it is already signed. monday morning he says, can i call you back? he calls me back in about three minutes. we have decided to remove the tax. i did this all day long. but you think biden does that? i don't think so. mr. micklethwait: let me ask you a very factual question. the federal reserve. you say you don't want interest rates to go higher. you have gone backwards and forwards about whether you want to keep your own power as chair of the federal reserve. the term as chair runs to may 2026. would you seek to remove or demote him? fmr. pres. trump: i think it is the greatest job in government. you show up to the office once a month and you say, football going. and everybody talks about you like you are a god. what will he do? the guy used to walk into my office and he was begging, he

was fired. fmr. pres. trump: we talked about removing him once. mr. micklethwait: i did, because he was keeping the rates too high. mr. micklethwait: and you would do that again? fmr. pres. trump: in fact, he dropped them too much. because i said, i was threatening to terminate him. there was a question as to whether or not you could. it was an article in the new york times, one page said i can do it, one said i couldn't. that was enough for him. he dropped them too much. here's the story. i think that if you are a very good president with good sense you should be able to at least talk to him. i don't say make the decision at all, but i have been a very successful businessman. now people are understanding how good i have done because they are seeing it. much better than the fake news wants to give me credit for.

i think i have the right to say is a very good businessman and somebody who has used a lot of sense, i think i have the right to say that, you know, i think i am better than he would be. i think i'm better than most people would be in that position. i think i have the right to say i think you should go up and down a little bit. i don't think i should be allowed to order it, but i think i have the right to put in comments as to whether or not interest rates should go up and down. 6 -- mr. micklethwait: the supreme court, you made a list. would you do that with the federal reserve? fmr. pres. trump: it was a great thing. a lot of people said i got elected because of that. it was an unknown quantity. i was known as a business guy but i was not known as a political person or the leader of a country. people were very worried about, actually they were worried, am i going to be liberal, if you want to know the truth. some but he said, would you come up with a list of 20 or 25

justices, in this case mostly judges, that you would put in in case it were necessary? now it is amazing, because i got three in four years. those people get none. you put them in their young, you tend to put them in young. only stupid people put old. you don't put old in, because they are there for two years or three years. i got three. a lot of presidents get none. i got three. i think they have been three great choices too, by the way. by the way, i think they have been really great choices. but i got three judges and you know what they want to do? they want to now put up to 25 justices into the supreme court, the radical left. and that can't happen. i think i have done a great job putting in justices.

and 300 judges. and that made a tremendous difference in the country. i was a little lucky because barack hussein obama did not get his judges approved. a lot of them. so i ended up with 125 judges before i got there. again, most presidents do not even get to put a supreme court judge in, because it is nine and they are there for a long time. most of them are there for a very long time, and i got three, which is a very unusual situation. i got three in four years. mr. micklethwait: maybe we can change the subject to technology? the u.s. justice department is thinking about waking up alphabet, as google likes to be known now. should google be broken up? fmr. pres. trump: i just have not gotten over something the justice department did yesterday. where regina cleaned up its voter rolls and got rid of thousands and thousands of bad votes and the justice department

sued them, that they should be allowed to put those bad votes in, illegal votes back in, and let the people vote. i have not gotten over that. a lot of people have seen that. they cannot believe it. mr. micklethwait: the question was about google, president trump. fmr. pres. trump: google has been bad to me. very bad to me. i can speak from that standpoint. in other words, if i have 20 good stories and 20 bad stories and everyone is entitled to that, we will only see the 20 bad stories. and i called the head of google the other day and i said, i'm getting a lot of good stories lately, but you don't find them in google. i think it is a rig to deal. i think google is rigged. mr. micklethwait: you would break them up, and other words? fmr. pres. trump: i would do something. look, i give them credit, they have become such a power. you have to give them credit for that. how they became a power is really the discussion.

at the same time it is a very dangerous thing because we want to have great companies. we don't want china to have these companies. right now china is afraid. you know, china is a very powerful, very smart group of people. i will tell you that from very personal experience. mr. micklethwait: a chinese tech company, tiktok, you wanted to ban tiktok. now you like it, apparently for some reason to do with facebook. it's chinese parent would have to sell it by january 19. would you force them to do that? fmr. pres. trump: i originally had it all done, and then i said to congress, your decision. i said, i'm not going to pull any strings, nothing, your decision. you make it. but i had it all done. i said, you make it. and they decided not to make it. i did not care if they made it or not because to me it was the

flip of a coin. you have some first amendment problems. you have a lot of problems. mr. micklethwait: you just talked about chinese technology, the need to defend against it. the threat people see two american children. fmr. pres. trump: i think it is a threat. i think everything is a threat. there is nothing that is not a threat. sometimes you have to fight through these threats. like google, i'm not a fan of google. they treat me badly. are you going to destroy the company by doing that? if you do that are you going to destroy the company? what you can do without breaking it up is make sure it is more fair. they do treat me very badly. he told me, no way, you are the number one person on all of google for stories. which probably makes sense. most of them are bad stories, but these are minor details, right?

it has only been because of fake news because the news is fake. have to straighten out our press because we have a corrupt press. that is the one. [applause] mr. micklethwait: can i ask you about silicon valley? you talk to tech people. there seems to be a real fear that what you would do with tech is handed over to elon musk and say, you sort it out. fmr. pres. trump: i have great respect for elon. look, i saw that rocketship come in yesterday and go right back to work. took off to the gantry, i guess they call it. i said, what the hell? i was talking about probably politics and the television is on, and i'm seeing this big thing where the white paint was burned off from thousands of miles an hour, the heat. this big, massive tube that is 10 stores, 20 stories tall come

down. i told the person on the phone, wait a minute, i'm seeing something. i don't believe it. neither does anybody else here. i said, wait a minute, and i got the guy on the phone, he waited for half an hour, and i watched that come down and i watched it come down and come right in between us, big levers, and i said, and it looked to me like it was going to crash. all of a sudden you see motors, the fire kick in. i call elon and said, that is the most incredible thing. i said, can russia do that? nope. can the united states do it? no. he is the only one. do you mr. micklethwait: want to put him in charge of deregulation? cutting wasteful spending? fmr. pres. trump: including deregulation. no. mr. micklethwait: every president talks about cutting wasteful spending. fmr. pres. trump: there is tremendous waste. mr. micklethwait: give me an example of something you will do that will get rid of government

spending. fmr. pres. trump: when i came into government the first thing -- mr. micklethwait: going forward. not what you did in the past. fmr. pres. trump: this is the same thing. a general came into my office and he said, sir, it is nice to meet you, would you please sign this? i said, what is it? it is a contract for a new air force one, which is actually two planes, not one. i said, how much is it? $5.7 billion. there is reasons for that. i said, nope, i'm not signing it. who negotiated it? barack hussein obama. i said, i'm not signing it. why? because there is a lot of fat. it's got to have a three on it long story short, some of you heard this. i got it down because first week they cut off $400 million, and i met with the head of boeing. dennis, i said, dennis, 5.7 is too much.

i've $.7 billion. he said, the most will take off is $700 million. i said, that's not bad for one conversation. then he took off two more. anyway, two months went by, i felt that we blew the deal and i didn't care. but we should have a new air force one. when we see these planes from saudi arabia, from different countries, brand-new, ours is 32 years old, and it is a very different plane, the united states should have the best plan, i will tell you. mr. micklethwait: let me just ask, would you -- fmr. pres. trump: he calls up after 2, 3 months, i did not call him, which is the best way to buy something. don't call back. when he called me i said, i wonder what he wants? that is a good way to negotiate, let me tell you. he calls me back, he says, sir,

3,999,000,000. and $.99. one penny below $4 billion. i said, you've got yourself a deal. then i said to him, let me ask you a question. you had a deal at $5.7 billion and i got $1.7 billion off. that means you are going to make $1.7 billion profit on an airplane. did nobody ever negotiate with you? well, not really, sir, this is the price, and they said, we will take it. i said, you know, and then i learned, that was my first experience from that, but then i learned everything is like that. i'm getting -- think of this -- the exact same plane for $1.7 billion less, except i have a better paying job. much better paint job. red, white, and blue, it is beautiful. if you look at every contract,

that is one contract, and relatively small compared to most. think of it. you save $1.7 billion because you negotiated? every deal is like that. we are building ships that cost 2, 3 times more. mr. micklethwait: you give me an example. fmr. pres. trump: there is tremendous waste, fraud, and abuse and if you could cut it you would have a surplus without even going into growth. but growth, we will grow, we are going to bring companies and jobs and at levels you have never seen. you would never be able to do it because you are not a believer. let me tell you, the only way you can do it is through the threat of tariffs. that is the only way you can do it. mr. micklethwait: can we come back to one thing on that? dealmaking. there are some big businesses, but a lot of small ones. you have given us a lot of examples of things where you have negotiated with the heads of big businesses.

when you put the tariffs on china, much smaller than you are planning to do at the moment, apple came, you negotiated a difference for them. fmr. pres. trump: i did. mr. micklethwait: that is much harder for small business people. isn't the way you deal with the steals, there are small companies that get hit by all of these different things i cannot find exceptions? fmr. pres. trump: we have exceptions. no, no. i give apple an exception. mr. micklethwait: apple it -- is not a small company. my question is about small businesses. what will you do for them? fmr. pres. trump: we have a very talented group of people. bob lighthouse did a good job. we had great people. we had central casting. and a large group of people. we made exceptions. in the case of apple they needed an exception. you know why? because of samsung. he came to me he said, samsung makes a product similar to ours,

very good, phones and other things. because they are in south korea they don't have the tariffs. i said, you happen to be right. you are not going to be able to compete. i said, i'm going to give you a one-year break, but i'm going to have you build factories in this country. he said, what does that mean? you have everything in china. i want you to move it back to our country. and he started doing that. and he built a factory, a big one in texas. this was all a process. it was all happening. but i did give him an exception and the reason was he said -- as soon as he said samsung i said, how does that product compared to yours? i said, you cannot compete. you cannot have a 50% tariff and compete, right? i said, i'm giving you an exception. and i did it for many companies. mr. micklethwait: small businesses. that was the question. fmr. pres. trump: we do it for

small businesses too. he came to me, he was at a meeting, and he built kitchen cabinets. and he was, you know, pretty big in business. he said, sure -- sir, china and south korea are building kitchen cabinets for one third of what i can make. i said, what is the quality? they are not as good, but they are good enough. i'm going out of his nose. i put a 25% tariff -- still on -- on kitchen cabinets. i saw the guy 2, 3 days ago, he said, i'm the man that saw you about kitchen cabinets. you saved my company when you did the tariff and you saved thousands of jobs and my company is now doing very well. and he started to cry. this is a guy who has not cried too much, i will tell you. he said, you saved my company. mr. micklethwait: maybe i can

ask you about something else. business people in this room, business people, capital markets, they all like the rule of law, they like certainty. the chinese do not like it when things -- they like it when things go wrong in america. if you look at the events of january 6, 20 21, it showed too many people america's democracy was unruly and violent. only three weeks to go until the election. will you commit to inspecting and encouraging a -- a peaceful transfer of power? fmr. pres. trump: you had a peaceful transfer of power. mr. micklethwait: you had a peaceful transfer of power compared to venezuela, but it was by far the worst transfer of power for a long time. fmr. pres. trump: thank you. i appreciate that. this is what they like to do. this is what they like to do. mr. micklethwait: the question is, would you respect the decision? fmr. pres. trump: when i find

out about this interview i did a little checking. this is a man who has not been a big trump fan over the years. i had a choice, do i do this interview or not? i'm glad i did it, but do i do this interview or do i disappoint a lot of people? i know a lot of people in the audience, but his view is different than mine. mr. micklethwait: i'm asking you. fmr. pres. trump: we had a term. peacefully and patriotically. these were people -- if you think an election is crooked -- and i do, 100% -- if you think the day it comes when you can't protest -- you take a look at the democrats, they protested 2016. they are still protesting. nobody talks about them. but if we protest we want to have honest elections. you think the last election was honest? mr. micklethwait: it went to the courts. fmr. pres. trump: they went to court, and the courts all said, you don't have standing. nobody had standing.

and it is hard after an election for a judge, but nobody ever had standing. but the facts, if you take a look, i would show you hundreds of pages of facts. people were angry. and i will tell you what. they never show that. the primary seen in washington was hundreds of thousands, the largest group of people i have ever spoken before. and it was love and peace. some people went to the capital, and a lot of strange things happened there. people being waved into the capital by police, with people screaming "go in" that never got into trouble. i don't want to mention names but you know who they are. but you had a very peaceful -- i left. i left the morning that i was supposed to leave. i went to florida. and you had a very peaceful transfer. i will tell you what. those people that did go in,

which was a tiny fraction of people that went to washington, you are talking about a very small -- hundreds of thousands of people, and i don't know what you had, 5, 6, 7 -- 700 people go to the capital. those people, not one of those people had a gun. nobody was killed except for ashli babbitt. she was killed. she was shot in the head by a police man that knows what he did was horrible. so, i think we should be allowed to disagree on that. and obviously you see by the reaction. mr. micklethwait: let's return to one another subject to bring up repeatedly, immigration. i know it is a very emotive issue for you. just from the perspective of business people here you look at the full effect of taking a lot of people out of the workforce, removing a lot of people.

congressional budget office is banking on the fact that there will be $9 trillion added to the gdp of america over the next 10 years by immigrants. you wanted to stop the process. for all the people who run businesses in the audience, i'm focusing on the economic. are you prepared to say, it is fine to have a slightly smaller economy in exchange for having immigration control? fmr. pres. trump: simple answer. i won a lot of people to come into our country, but i want them to come in legally. [applause] mr. micklethwait: that means you will have to deport -- you are talking about deporting 11 million people. that is a lot of people. fmr. pres. trump: it came out last week that 400 when thousand people are horrible criminals at the highest level. but it came out that 14,099 were let in during their

administration. over the last 3.5 years 13,000-plus people came in, murderers. they are in jail for murder. some were having the death penalty. there were all released into our country. 13,099 people were released into our country. we had drug dealers released. we had street gangs released. look at what is happening in aurora. now i don't have to go with aurora anymore. look at what happened yesterday in times square, where rough migrants from all over the place -- you know, it is not just south america. we have people coming in from the congo. large numbers from the congo and africa. they came in as of last night i was speaking to tom homan, 180 countries, people came in, they came from prisons and jails. they went from mental

institutions and insane asylums, a step above. they came from the terrorists. we had large numbers of terrorists come in. and i was president we had the strongest border in the history of our country. i built hundreds of miles of wall -- and walls work, by the way. now we have the worst numbers, and here is the problem. we have some of the worst criminals in the world coming in. now, venezuela, their crime has gone down at levels nobody has ever seen before. because they have taken their street gangs and drug dealers and they have emptied their presence. not fully, because they cannot get enough buses. they emptied their presence. they loaded up there buses and they drive them into the united states, and they are dropping prisoners into our country. their numbers are crazy, how low it has dropped. i heard 72%. they have taken their gangs,

they have taken their criminals off the street. they have taken people out of mental institutions, which cost them a fortune, and they have taken them and drop them into the united states of america. those people have to be returned. we cannot live with thousands of murderers. mr. micklethwait: the issue i asked you about was the idea that if you reduce immigration -- every economist will tell you if you have fewer people there is a smaller economy. fmr. pres. trump: i like immigration, but they have to come in legally. no, i want to make sure. look, i don't want to have people that have killed nine people and are sadistic, crazy nut jobs. we have to have people that can love our country, that will obey the laws and everything else. you have hundreds of thousands of terminals being dropped in. venezuela is one country. look at what they have done in aurora.

they have taken over apartment complexes. they have gone into the real estate business. they are like us, except they have done it with mk whatever the hell they are called, right? they have weapons that are so sophisticated -- our military does not have them -- they have taken over parts of cities. in colorado you have a place called beautiful aurora. take a look at what has happened in springfield, ohio, where they dropped 30,000 people into a community of 50,000 people, and it is total bedlam. the hospitals cannot be used anymore by the residence. the schools cannot be used by the children that were there last year because other people that don't -- don't even speak the language. mr. micklethwait: many companies here have a shortage of labor. fmr. pres. trump: we will take care of that. we are going to get people in here rapidly and there are going to be people that want to be in here and people that love our country and will not kill people because they have -- because

they don't like the way they look. by the way, these -- some of these killers are among the most evil killers. they will look at you down a beautiful woman there, they will look at you and kill you. these are seriously sick people, and, no, i don't want them in our country. they are in our country right now because kamala harris, who is an incompetent person. mr. micklethwait: did you know the crime rate is lower? can i finish with two questions? the first, you just said it, you don't own and run businesses. would you appoint a ceo who was 78? fmr. pres. trump: oh yeah. yeah, i would. it depends on people like biden who is in bad shape? i would not appoint him. he is 81 or 82. but i would appoint -- i know some of the smartest people i know. i know a man that made all of his money from the time he was

80 to 90, and he was a failure all of his life. he was in the drinks business. mr. micklethwait: strangely you can -- you did not bring this up when you were running against joe biden. fmr. pres. trump: i never attacked him for his age. i attacked him for his lack of confidence. -- competence. i think it is important. and i know you do too. i know so many people in their 80's that are among -- marcus is 95, the founder of home depot. he is just as sharp until he as he ever was. he is 95. i could tell you -- i don't want to get into the 90's stuff, but you know what? i know many people in their 80's. i know guys in their 80's that will not leave the company, like family companies where they do not want the kids to take over, because they are much more competent than their kids.

i would have no problem. you do have another factor. mr. micklethwait: on the supreme court, you just said you did not do well. fmr. pres. trump: some world leaders are in their 80's. if you look throughout history some of our greatest world leaders were in their 80's. but, you know, i took two cognitive tests and i aced them both. i think that, frankly, people regardless should take -- if they are 50 or 40 or i think people should take cognitive tests not because of the age, book -- but because of something else. he was the problem. they say it is unconstitutional. but i would love to see cognitive tests. i don't think she could pass a cognitive test. i don't think she could pass a cognitive test. mr. micklethwait: you have gone over many issues on this. i asked you many questions about things. one thing i have not ask about is the state of the race. i had a question for you. on election night which estate

would you look at first? which estate do you think this race is going to be decided by? fmr. pres. trump: they say pennsylvania, i would say, most. i think we are doing very well there. i think you look at michigan too , and i'm doing very well there. we are not going to necessarily -- the votes are starting to come in now so you look at polls, but you can also look at the votes that are being cast right now. people get a pretty good indication. as we discussed backstage, aced on the votes coming in so far we are doing very well. we are way up in pennsylvania. we are way up in michigan. we are doing well in arizona. somebody said they are going to pull the plug in arizona because it looks like we are ahead. i think we are doing well. look, this is a party, the republican party, of common sense. forget about conservative, liberal.

we are really a party of -- we need borders, we need fair elections. we do not want women -- men playing in women's sports. we don't want transgender operations without parental consent. there are so many things, but it is 99.9% is common sense. it really is common sense. i like to say it. i don't know if anyone has said it in the past, but we are really a party of common sense and we want to have great people in our country. i want to have a lot of people come in so they have a choice. i have a good heart. i have a heart where i want people to be taken care of, but i do not want to take in people where millions of people, 21 million people at least have come in in the last 3.5 years unvented, unchecked, we don't know anything about them, how about this? gavin newsom, the governor of california. new scum, i call him.

he corrected me. mr. micklethwait: there are ceos out here if they said that sort of thing about arrival ce -- rival ceo they would be sacked. fmr. pres. trump: they don't have to go through what i went through. there has never been a president treated like me, so i have to fight my own way. [applause] mr. micklethwait: you have made a very good job of -- nine fmr. pres. trump: he signed a bill two days ago that you don't even have the right to ask a person for voter id, and if you ask a person for voter id, of course you have to show voter id. the only reason you would not do it is because they want to cheat. the bill says you cannot, it is against the law for you to ask a person. may i please see your voter id? what is our country coming to? mr. micklethwait: you have given us a tour of the reason of where their country may be going to.

thank you very much, president trump. [applause] fmr. pres. trump: good job. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2024] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] ♪ >> as this interview comes to a close we will take you live to the pentagon. sabrina singh is briefing reporters amid rising tensions in the middle east. we join it in progress. >> i can confirm that secretary austin, but secretary blinken, they cosigned a letter that went to their honor parts. this was personal, private correspondence, so i'm not going to get into more specifics of it other than, you know, it was expressing concern about the humanitarian conditions in gaza, but beyond that, just not going to be able to provide more details. >> personal and private when it

is the secretary of state and secretary of defense? >> the secretary of defense and secretary of state can send private correspondence to their israeli counterparts or counterparts all over the world. that does not mean those letters need to be public. i understand there is reporting out there and imagery out there of a letter, but that does not mean it is a public letter for public consumption. can i just finished? it was private correspondence because it was addressed to their israeli counterparts, both of them. they send letters all the time, whether it be to members of congress, or their counterparts all over the world that are not intended for public consumption. so, the letters were not addressed to, you know, associated press or fox. it was addressed to two people, to their counterparts. and it was a letter that i'm not going to get into private, -- private correspondence.

>> is it on letterhead? >> the statement was on letterhead, but what i can tell you is just because something is on letterhead does not mean it is meant for public consumption or to be leaked to the press. sure. of course. >> u.s. government official and you are writing to your counterpart that is not private. or personal. you are a u.s. government official. >> i understand the back-and-forth here, but i think in fairness u.s. government officials can engage their counterparts. they can have closed-door meetings with counterparts. it can do calls with their counterparts. we provide readouts of those calls. there are letters that are sent often between government officials that are not intended to be made public. i have seen some of the social

media circulating around this letter. i understand the questions you are asking, that this is meant to be a private letter. should not have said personal. a private letter between government officials talking about the situation in gaza. it was intended to be private, and those are conversations that also happen in person that are private conversations. we don't read those out every time. can i come around the room or do you have another one on this? >> policy on how they qualify a country to qualify for foreign military? that is u.s. policy. >> i'm not going to be able to go into details on the letter itself. i confirmed that a letter was sent. it was meant to be private. someone obviously felt the need to get out this private correspondence, but i'm not going to be able to get into more details on that. >> the state department, talking about this letter, we need to

see further changes by the government of israel. what can you talk about the pentagon sees on changes to how israel is safeguarding civilians or failing to? >> without speaking to the letter itself, you have seen us from this podium and from a few of the readouts that the secretary had with minister gallant, speak about the deteriorating and dire humanitarian situation within gaza. just because there is other, you know, engagements happening in the region doesn't mean we have taken our eye off of what is happening in gaza. we know that humanitarian aid is still stalling to get into gaza and reach civilians who need it desperately. that is some of the things that the secretary talks about. those are some of the things we talked about publicly in our readouts. this follows on a letter that

secretary blinken sent in april. we are looking to see concrete measures taken to address the humanitarian situation in gaza, which we know continues to be an issue and we want to see how they conduct operations that they are considering civilians in the battle space. that is what we have said from the beginning. >> failing to do this leverage, which is weapons to israel, to influence israeli military action. is that a fair characterization? >> i would push back on that. again, without going down the rabbit hole, it is a private conversationhole of private cone have had very frank and direct conversations, the secretary has with his israeli counterpart. not going to go into a line item list of every time they have done something differently or because of conversations we've had, but we have seen them

change their behavior in certain circumstances. is there more that we are working with them on, there is an we are going to continue to engage with them on that. we continue to have throwing -- frank conversations with them. we still have that one shipment of the 2000 pound bombs. i'm not going to be able to go beyond that. >> you said you have seen some changes in their behavior. we haven't seen that happen. is that something they have committed to? >> i'm not going to be able to go beyond the conversations and the readouts we have provided but one of the things that i think you have seen in the

readout is the secretary impart the need to protect innocent civilians, whether it be in beirut on that border region, where they are conducting operations to clear hezbollah infrastructure. we have said from the beginning that civilians need to be considered in the battle space and measures need to be taken to protect innocent lives. that is something that is not new and we have continued to say from the very beginning. it was a conversation between both governments. i think it is fair to say that we have seen two unprecedented attacks from iran on april 13 and october 1. we have seen our destroyers engaged from the sea. this is now a land-based capability that can protect from a ballistic attack if iran chooses to respond in that way.

>> is the department able to provide weapons to the country -- >> i think that is a fair assessment that supplies are not endless. you've seen us request supplemental packages to be able to support ukraine and support israel. you have seen in past issues when it came to reinvigorating the defensive industrial base, we are continuing to support ukraine and what it means on the battlefield. we are continuing to support israel in its self-defense.

part of the way we have to work and continue to do this on all fronts is through congress and not to belabor the point but for nearly six months, we had to delay a supplemental package which delayed our own shells from being backfilled. that puts pressure on the system but one thing we are always going to do and one thing that the secretary is always considering is our own readiness. we have to way that when we are considering that, whether we are supporting ukraine or israel, our own forces, always keeping an eye on the indo pacific. >> is there anything secretary austin wants to see done, to increase aid and also is there a concern that israel --

>> not going to be able to get more into the letter. in terms of what the secretary wants to see in gaza, you have seen it in his readouts. he wants to see the humanitarian situation -- it continues to deteriorate and that is why what we did what we did -- that is why we did what we did over the summer, installing a core door -- a corridor to get humanitarian aid in. we know more trucks need to get in. the land routes are the most effective way to get aid flowing to civilians who need it most. that is something the secretary continues to emphasize in his calls. not going to be able to go more into the letter other than what i said earlier, but the

humanitarian situation in gaza remains on the secretary's mind. just to clarify, it'll take approximately 100 soldiers to operate it. we had personnel in israel before october 7. think of it as an augmentation to israel's air defenses and exactly what our ddts do. they provide a missile defense capability that is sea based. this one is land-based.

it augments israel's defense, and we saw the attacks that happened on april 13 and october 1. we know we need that additional layer and we are happy to provide it. i don't have anything to add on timelines. but the secretary of course continues to urge for a diplomatic offramp. we know that is the best path forward and that is what this

administration continues to push for. that is what he emphasizes. so our assessment is they are still conducting operations to go after lebanese hezbollah infrastructure along that northern border. as you heard me readout at the beginning, we expressed deep concern over what happened with those u.n. peacekeeping -- u.n. peacekeepers within lebanon.

that is still our assessment, that they are conducting operations along the border. i don't have anything to readout from the secretary level. i can't speak for other components when speaking for the department. >> the united states needs to be seen to be doing something. why wasn't it a phone call? why was it a letter? >> i appreciate the question. we didn't know it was going to get out. we didn't know someone -- all i can tell you is that the

secretary and secretary blinken sent a letter. are not going to go into those details. i have seen social media reports but i am not going to go into the details of the letter. i'm not going to go into the decision-making of why it was a letter versus a phone call, but it was meant to be a private correspondence between two senior administration officials from the department of defense and the department of state counterparts. i understand it is an official letter on official letterhead, and those correspondence are meant to be private and i will not go into more detail on it. you have to understand that we do statements that are press releases that are for press consumption.

that was private correspondence with their counterparts. i'm not going to be able to go into more detail. >> what specific role does it fill, what hole in israel's defenses, and why now? there has been lots of trouble in the past. what specifically does that bring to this fight? >> on october 1, approximately 200 ballistic missiles iran fired toward israel. they launched -- we had more of our fighters in the air. shooting down uavs and cruise

missiles. our fighters will not engage these types of ballistic missiles. so what we saw on october 1, adjusting the strategy, we have to augment israel's air defense system. we are there to help. why now? should iran choose to respond again, not trying to go down a hypothetical but if it is what we saw previously, thad adds capabilities and can help shoot those down and perfect -- and protect innocent civilians. we have made some of these posture adjustments in the past. we are always nimble, always able to adjust as needed. this was a decision the secretary decided to make.

>> what is the potential for u.s. soldiers to be in harm's way? >> i think it is important to remember that it serves a similar purpose to our ddg. it is an air defense system helping augment israel's air defenses that can help shoot down ballistic missiles. this is also meant to be a temporary provision of air defense capabilities to better protect israel. it is keeping with our intent to reduce tensions and it is also

there to help de-escalate. but of course as the president has said from the beginning, we are there to support israel's self-defense. this is a capability we felt was needed. both forces in the sea or on the land are in harm's way. just taking a step back, our destroyers in the red sea are getting shot at by the houthi's pretty regularly.

our forces in iraq and syria getting attacked by iran backed militias, from october 17, there was a regular cadence. we have forces deployed all around the world in harm's way. our forces are bravely serving to protect american citizens and in this case, aid in israel's self-defense. this is an operational deployment very similar to what you are seeing in the red sea or in the eastern mediterranean. this is a capability that will help augment israel's air defenses. this is not meant to draw us into a larger regional conflict. it is a commitment the president made. to stand with israel in their self-defense. sure, but they are still in

harm's way. you are talking about a nation's own actions but let's not forget what happened on october 7. reiterating the need to do more when it comes to protecting innocent civilians. we've had a military presence in israel before october 7.

we've had personnel after. not the first time that military personnel has been with israel since october 7. if you are asking about the thad specifically, we do true -- we deployed it to the region post october 7 and it was there in 2019 for an exercise. i'm just going to go to someone else. i would mind revealing those. i'm not going to give an operational placemat of where our defenses are. i don't think -- i think that would help our adversaries but what you can be assured of is we are always going to have capabilities in the region needed to protect our forces.

because of what we are doing to defend israel, it made sense. we have troops all over the world. let me be clear. we don't seek a war with iran. we don't want to see a wider regional conflict, but iran

proxy groups have attacked u.s. forces since october 17, whether it be the bases in iraq and syria or the forces operating in the red sea or the eastern med. again, this is a capability that is land-based but serves a similar purpose to what our destroyers did on october 1 in the eastern mediterranean, which helped augment israel's air defenses. the message is that the united states stands with israel in their self-defense and that message has been clear from the beginning.

i'm not confirming the authenticity. i'm confirming that cosign the letter sent to the israeli counterparts. appreciate the question. israel continues to receive support from the united states, whether it be through sales or what we are seeing in their self-defense. i just don't have more to provide.

different capabilities, different wars, different regions. the commitment to israel and ukraine, they are different. we have a long-standing partnership to come to israel's self-defense. you have seen the president commit that from october 7. when ukraine was attacked over two years ago, the president made a commitment to stand with ukraine for as long as it takes. you are talking about different

capabilities and what is needed -- should iran attack again, for what russia is doing in ukraine, different capabilities. it is a little bit of apples and oranges here. i don't want to go down the whole list of everything we are providing ukraine to everything we are providing to israel but what i can tell you is this administration, this department continues to support both in the different needs that they need.

i think i have answered that question. >> can you say where it is coming from? >> it is coming from the united states. not sport -- not more specifics than that. >> this building had -- it point out no boots on the ground to the point that maritime experts said it hampered the operation and limited them.

>> israel is different than gaza and before october 7, we had military personnel within israel. and that has been a relationship and partnership that goes far back. in gaza, the president committed to not putting troops on the ground which is why you saw what we did. we continue to support and stand by israel in their self-defense. i know there is a lot of parsing here but the thad kit will -- the thad capability, it is a temporary provision of air capabilities that they nietzsche they face another attack like they did on october 1. it does not minimize what we did in gaza. we are incredibly proud of the

humanitarian -- whether it be food, water, medical supplies, but more needs to be done, and it needs to be done quickly and that is something that the secretary continues to impress upon. no forced posture changes to make today. it is something in reference to what you mentioned, something we monitored and as the white house

noted last week, it is long-standing tradition for taiwan's president to deliver remarks on october 10. we remain focused on the indo pacific, but i don't have any forced posture changes to announce today. thanks so much for the question. specifically, langley air force base did experience incursions of unauthorized aunt -- unmanned aerial systems. the number of those uis incursions did fluctuate on any given day. it is something we have kept our eye on.

>> why couldn't the air force shoot down these drones if they were coming toward the base? >> so the commander or any commander of a base has the authority necessary to protect forces, protect facilities, infrastructure and capability. there is another level of coordination that needs to take place but the commander absolutely has the authority to gate -- to engage any system that is a threat to the base.

i can't confirm what you are saying, all i can tell you is that the air force base did experience a number of incursions and we have been looking into it. without going into the interagency private correspondence, i think it is fair to say there was an effort by the agency, you can see that

with one of the cosigners being secretary blinken but i'm going to waive that back. in terms of the no hostile intent -- hostile intent, that is our initial assessment.

while we don't have more to provide, it is something we will continue to do an assessment on. in terms of the reports you are citing, i don't have anything to add, but i can tell you we always work with our german counterparts. we have forces that engage with our german counterparts, whether it be in exercises or it will not military channels. it is something we keep an open line of communication on.

the attack twice as large as the attack we saw on april 13 in terms of ballistic missiles that were used. are we concerned? yeah of course we are concerned. we don't know what a response could look like, but we are not going to wait find out. we are going to do things that we need, to protect, whether it is u.s. forces are what you have seen us do before, taking protection measures at our bases.

to help defend israel. i completely acknowledge that you are putting capability with people on land, but it is also a capability that is similar to what is on those dvds -- ddt's. we don't know what a potential response would look like from iran but what this does is help ulster the air defenses should there be a response. thanks everyone. >> with 21 days until the elections, we haveore live campaign coverage on-span today. govern tim walz speaks to voters as a kit -- at a campaign rally in pittsburgh, 5:00 p.m. eastern. is set for this evening at 7:00,

pennsylvania senorob casey and his republican challenger wi face off in their third and keystone state in the u.s.the senate. all of this, live on c-span, also c-span now and online at c-span.org. >> c-span is your unfiltered view of government. we are funded by these television companies and more, including wow. >> the world has changed. a fast reliable internet connection is something no one can live without. we are there for our customers with speed, reliability, value and choice. it all starts with great internet. >> wow! supports c-span as a public service alo with these other television providers, giving you a front row seat to democracy. >> the third debate between the two candidates for main's second

congressional seat. this nearly hour-long debate was hosted by whem tv. he has been serving in congress since 2018 and currently serves on the small business committee and he lives in lewiston with his wife and his two daughters. republican challenger austen terrio is from a

multigenerational logging and farming family. he is a former nascar driver who captured a racing series national title. he stepped away to focus on the business side where he meant toward -- mentors, manages and -- new drivers. he currently lives in fort kent. john and jason will be helping me ask questions of our candidates. i will now it's plain the rules of our debate. each candidate will be given one minute for opening statements and the end of the debate, each candidate will be given one minute and 30 seconds for a closing statement. we will not be timing responses to questions throughout the debate, but we do have a lot of questions to get to, so we are asking candidates to keep their responses within a minute or two. we are hoping to get a discussion going this evening between the candidates to provide you the viewers an opportunity to get to know who you are voting for. we did a coin toss before the

debate to determine the order of the opening and closing statements and we will begin with jared golden. you will have one minute for your opening statement. >> thank you and good evening. i've been representing you in congress for six years now. it has been a huge honor and i am running again, if you so choose to send it back, i look forward to doing it for another two years. i want to say thanks to my family, to my wife, our daughters back home, to my family and hers. i want to thank austin for doing the debate here and of course, thanks to our moderating team and all the crew here tonight. i appreciate you putting this on. thank you back home for tuning in and i look forward to a hour of conversation. >> we are now going to go to austin terrio. >> thank you for the opportunity

to be in your living rooms tonight. for some of you with us for the first time, i am running to represent you in the second district. really proud to have been born and raised in fort kent and there was a lot of hard-working people in that area and around the rest of the state right now that honestly feel like their leaders have forgotten them. they are not aggressive enough to represent those folks back home and that is why i am running. i think about people like my grandparents watching tonight. 82 years old, you guys taught me a lot. you taught me to not give up, to be persistent, to fight for your family and community and that is why i am running for office. we need more of that in washington. there is too much divisiveness and extremism and we have a lot of problems whether it is the border crisis, crime, inflation, natural resource economy. we have to find solutions to address those problems so i am running to represent you to put people over politics and i look forward to having a discussion tonight. >> we don't want to waste any

time, so we're going to go ahead and get right to the first question. >> thank you very much. we begin with this question. as mainers prepare for winter, the high cost of food and energy will make it difficult, especially for vulnerable low income families to afford groceries, medicines and fuel. at the same time, costs are up, benefits from key programs are down from before and during the pandemic because of flat funding and significantly increased demand. what do you propose be done at the federal level and what would you advocate for to ensure residents in the second district do not go without having critical needs met this winter? >> right now, energy is a huge driver of inflation. we have seen it over the past

several years. inflation is driving up the cost of goods, the cost of groceries, the kind that and underneath it, i believe it comes from energy. what we have seen from washington and this administration and from jared golden is a focus on legislation coming through congress right now that is very costly to the maine ratepayers, the folks paying their electricity bills. the inflation reduction act disproportionately has driven inflation out of control. it has increased the cost of electricity, one of the reasons we have green energy schemes popping up around the state, because of the energy tax credits being used to finance those programs. there is nothing wrong with clean energy, but the issue is it is expensive and on the backs of people living on fixed income. seniors and businesses right here in the valley and around the state right now like the potato growers who are having to

pass those costs onto the consumer. what i would like to focus on in washington is looking at natural gas, oil, nuclear. there is nothing wrong with solar and wind in the right places and for the right cost but right now, you're giving away money. it has raised inflation and it is driving the economy and making it tougher people to be able to afford their goods. -- tough for people to afford the goods. >> i did vote for the inflation reduction act. we will get right into that. we talked about at the last couple of nights. that bill is the model of and all of the above energy approach the united states. it made investments not only in gas and oil production, carbon capture so that we can do that and use those fossil fuels with less emissions, that is great.

it made investments in nuclear energy, investments in geothermal, the development of hydrocarbons for the future of potential transportation and invested in wind and solar as well. when i voted for that legislation in august 2020 two, gas was almost five dollars a gallon and now it is down to almost three dollars. that is in part because that law is working the way it was supposed to. that bill also had tax credits that will help mainers better afford heating their homes, important tax credits for insulation and weatherized windows and it also brought down the costs of medicine for our seniors. $35 insulin is not a law of the land because of the inflation reduction act. we are capping out-of-pocket prescription drug prices for seniors, saving about $500 per senior. right here in the second district. finally i would say the lightning program is really

important and i just have to point out that austin has criticized every budget i've ever voted for. every one of those budgets is where that funding comes from so the people of maine, i've joined the delegation getting more money put into that program. at the end of the day, you can't deliver that assistance to people if you don't vote for the budget. >> i want to specifically address the second part of that question which is what are we going to do this winter for mainers facing a critical shortage, which i sort of hidden this problem in terms of the rising costs. groceries up as much as 30% and average households that rely on programs are going to be looking at a reduction in their benefits this year while facing higher costs. how would you address that in the immediate term? >> i would like to see more money appropriate for like keep.

going back to the conversation on the legislation coming out of d.c., over the past couple of years, inflation has gone down to the reason it has gone down is the federal reserve has raised interest rates to a point where it is putting -- it is hurting the economy and making it hard for families to afford to buy their first homes because of interest rates. they did that because of the wishful government spending coming out of washington, d.c.. we can be in support of lowering the cost of prescriptions and we don't have to put it into bills that spend hundreds of billions of dollars, money we don't have that drives up inflation and then we have to fix a problem years down the road because inflation is spiraling out of control. it is hurting you, it is making your mortgage payments go up, it is making it difficult to invest in properties. we wonder why the cost of housing is so high, is because interest rates are high. the lumber industry is struggling right now because of high interest rates, because of legislation that jared golden

and joe biden and kamala harris have pushed through. >> what would you do this winter? >> i would certainly be pushing for that. i would like to see the administration draw down on the strategic oil reserve, get that out into the market. people are going to be looking to be making purchases. i do want to point out on the inflation reduction act, we actually said even if they wanted to release permits for wind projects, they would first have to release projects for oil and gas. that is a market that is based on future projections. when the government gives a signal to the oil and gas industry like they did with the inflation reduction act, they know and they have been given

the go-ahead to drill more and that helps them make decisions to bring down prices. >> we are going to move on to a question that is not too far away from the same topic that came from a viewer in our area. that question is, how will you seek further funding for vital programs that assist our aging population? issues such as food insecurity, social isolation and access to health care. programs such as meals on wheels are experiencing extensive -- >> i am certainly supportive of the budgets that provide money for things like meals on wheels and a lot of that money goes through local nonprofit organizations that do really good work. i think that is a very important program and i talked about medicare and social security and those are the foundations of a secure retirement for every american.

we saved medicare $200 billion over the next 10 years by negotiating lower drug prices as part of the inflation reduction act. we took those savings and put them out toward helping seniors afford important medication. we are capping out-of-pocket costs to save hundreds of dollars. if you have diabetes and you are a senior, you are now guaranteed to pay $35 for insulin. >> austin? >> to give you a story recently, i had a constituent reach out and she was an elderly lady, she had cancer and she couldn't get a ride to her medical appointment and i got on the phone and talk to some folks and were able to find her a ride so she could get a procedure, but it shows that we have a bigger problem, especially in rural maine, where our constituents who have been paying taxes and

paying into the system and paying their fair share years can't even get access to those services when they need them. we also have an issue right now, i think we need to protect social security and medicare. there are a lot of claims out there that i want to cut those programs. that is not true. my grandparents are watching tonight and they depend on those programs. we need to look at cutting in other areas and that includes benefits for people in this country illegally. you can look at it, how much money has the u.s. taxpayer spent on housing illegals, on giving them transportation, giving the medical care? it is in the billions of dollars. i would like to see that money allocated to americans who are struggling and can't get access to medical care, who can't get treatment because they are living on a fixed income or living by themselves. there are a lot of things we can invest in, but we are spending

too much money on illegals and certainly that money is being wasted. >> we definitely have some immigration questions coming up as well. did you want to rebuttal? >> on social security, i want to point out, there is no light out there. austin has committed to not raise taxes. we look at the shortfall in the trust fund security, you could raise revenue, you could let people retire at a later age, which i think working people -- you could cut their benefits. if we do nothing, sometime in the next decade, there is going to be a 20% cut for beneficiaries. my plan is to raise the contributions by millionaires and billionaires. if we eliminated the cap, we

could eliminate 75% of that shortfall. if you are not willing to raise taxes to do it, you will have to look at taking benefits away from people or raising the retirement age. one of my colleagues, a super conservative from georgia, he has a plan that calls for raising the retirement age, calls for cutting benefits to seniors. that is the plan that often is going to have to support if you want support raising taxes. >> that is just not correct. that is the scare tactics being used right now. millions of dollars being spent on tv to spread lies. have you gone to a mcdonald's recently where they have shut down the in dining because there were not enough people to work? but we can focus on is growing the economic pie.

getting more people in the workforce, reforming welfare. we've been looking at helping people get a hand up, getting back into the work hours so that we can have more people paying into social security and medicare. that is how we can strengthen it. jared's response, he wants to raise taxes but what he doesn't say is that is going to affect people here and around the state because what we have seen happen over the past 50 years is that businesses and people move away where taxes are lower. during the trump era, was the highest level of economic growth, low inflation, people had more wages in their pocket at the end of the day because taxes were low. jared wants to raise taxes and that is one of the things he and his friends will do in the next congress is raise taxes on the middle class, on businesses that are just trying to survive, trying to make a dollar they can hire more people and -- and invest in our local economy. >> did you want to respond to that? >> certainly.

if you make more than $168,000 a year, i would propose you should pay more to social security and make sure it is there for our seniors. if you are a millionaire or a billionaire, it is true i want to raise your taxes so we can extend tax breaks for working-class families. without busting our deficit even worse than it already is. we can pay for middle-class tax cuts by raising taxes on the very rich and the largest multinational corporations. many of them pay 0% because of loopholes that congress has put in. i want to make sure they pay their fair share. >> just quickly, and this is where there is a difference between us. i run my own business and what we have seen is we live in a world economy and when businesses feel like they can get lower taxes, they will take the jobs out of the united states. that is the reason i support

tariffs in the united states for things like lumber and steel because we need to tax people, corporations that want to take jobs out of the united states. it keeps businesses here but in terms of making sure the united states can remain competitive, we need to have a tax plan that people cannot illegally escape paying taxes but something that is fair to the people can create jobs here. what have we seen? more people coming into the county, to start new companies and invest? that is not happening. they're going to other states, other countries and that is why i believe tariffs are a good answer for that but also lowering the tax break for americans, that provide jobs and that is how we can grow our economy. >> we are going to move on to our next question. >> thank you both for joining us tonight. we kind of have a theme here, starting out this debate as our viewers have -- viewers have made clear to us that the economy and the high cost of living is the most important

issues to them. you both touched on a little bit but i want to ask a specific question about the high cost of housing, a very important issue. whether you buy or rent, i know the previous debate, you both talked about public-private partnerships and estate programs but i would like to focus on congress. what can the federal government do to help bring down the high cost of housing, whether you rent or own? >> we need to stop the government's wasteful spending. in 2020, look at where interest rates were. look at where they are in 2023 and 2024. they have gone up astronomically and that has affected people's ability to buy and build new homes. if we want to get serious about making sure we have an economy that works for everyone, we need to have an economic plan and a spending program down and d.c. that doesn't waste trillions of dollars because what happens is the federal reserve had to respond by raising interest

rates. if you want to make sure we have more homes, we have an economy that works for everyone, we have to look at programs for the illegals we are spending money on, we have to look at reforming our budget process so we have a level zero-based budgeting program. some of these agencies have to prove to us that that money they want to spend is going to be spent in good use and is going to be good for the taxpayer. those are things i would like to do in d.c. an example where we differ for example, he voted against a bill because he blamed it for putting the deficit out of control and then literally a year later, the inflation reduction act, some estimates say it is going to cost over $1 trillion of the time this is all said and done. this is an example of a flip-flop, an example of when your party tells you to vote for a green energy agenda that raises inflation. that is what he did. >> i think first, you have to

reduce spending. i agree with austin about that. the congressional budget office scores every piece of legislation. they put the price at $440 billion and it raised about $700 billion in revenue. that is raising more money than spending. that reduces the deficit. under a guy that helped recruit austin, kevin mccarthy, he struck a deal with the biden administration just last year that reduced our spending. kevin put out a press release about how that was going to reduce our federal deficit. we have made progress on this which is why the fed was confident enough to lower interest rates. by doing that, they will bring down the cost of taking out a loan to purchase a home, that'll be a good thing right there.

i hope that they will continue to lower rates even more. i expect that they will. i want to talk about the regulation, to make it less expensive to build homes, easier to build them. i've talked to construction businesses that say local regulations are very difficult from one locale to another. some are better than others but that is the main thing they talk to me about. >> let me talk a little bit about the monkey in the room here. as a response to something i wasn't able to get out before. we talk about making sure the middle-class, the taxes are low in the middle class and making sure people have more money. inflation is a tax on the poor and middle class and what has inflation done over the past three or four years? they decimated the middle-class, they may people have to work two or three jobs in this economy. jared wants to be serious about building homes and having an economy that works for everyone, and he shouldn't have gone down

and voted for the wasteful spending he has. kamala harris was the deciding vote in the senate for the inflation reduction act and you and your colleagues in the house got it through to where that is now the law of the land and now we are digging out of a deep hole because energy costs have gone up and that is what is driving inflation out of control. now we are going to have to fix the issue. it is not going to be a quick fix, this is going to take some time but it starts with getting our fiscal house in order and people have been saying that for too long. jarrett has been there for six years and the national debt has going on the control. it's not just him. it is all the people to go down there and say one thing and do another. we need to bring people to the table because other than that, our kids and grandkids are going to be paying the national debt and we are to the point now where the interest on the national debt is actually higher than what we are spending on defense. there is something wrong with that. we are paying more on interest and we are for our military and

defense. >> the deciding vote in the united states senate was joe manchin. joe is the chair of the energy committee in the senate. he is from west virginia, coal country. only if it is being produced here in the united states. i put tariffs against any wind or solar made in china to make sure that it is backing up the inflation reduction act. we've had a lot of talk about the inflation reduction act. you have to weigh the good and the bad in these thousand page bills. austin is on the sidelines and wants to throw bombs about it. i worked on that legislation,

helping health care for seniors. when he says he doesn't support the elation reduction act, he is saying he does not support lower prescription medications, not supporting insulin. >> that is what is wrong with d.c. if more people went down there and stood up for what was right, we wouldn't have 1000 page bills. we will be able to get prescription costs down for seniors, we will be able to cap these costs and protect medicare and social security we wouldn't have to have -- we wouldn't have to put so much pork in these bills so joe manchin voted for it. joe manchin voted for it because they gave him special treatment. he was able to put stuff in that bill that benefited him and it hurt the american people. that is why we need more balance and less extremism. we need to look at these bills in their totality. if it is bad for the taxpayers, it is bad for the taxpayers. >> having a conversation about the process in a legislative body, often keeps telling me i should be amending things until

they are perfect. that's a scenario where you end up taking nothing instead of taking half a loaf. he understands this. he says he supports law enforcement and wants to make important investments in mental health. he wants to support our lobster communities. yet when the state budget came up for a vote this year, he voted no. in that budget was money for law enforcement to hire more state troopers and give them raises. money to repair working waterfronts damaged by the winter storm. a big investment in mental health funding around the state. austin voted no. why didn't he amend it? he can't live up to his own standards. he's just trying to cherry pick my record. you have to be ready to make tough calls on every bill. when you are new and voting in congress, you're are not in full control. you have to take the time to read the bill and make the tough decisions about what is best for your constituents. >> we are going to stop on this

one and move on to the economy and the second district specifically. congressman golden, you mentioned the lobster industry. much has been set throughout this campaign. -- has been said throughout this campaign. what would you propose doing in the coming congress to better ensure the sustainability of these key sectors in our state economy? >> we've talked a lot about the lobster fishing. it is so important to maine's economy. obviously farming. it is huge those things are the cornerstone of our economy. i'll hit again on the inflation reduction act. that had a tax credit specifically for forest products, timber hp, a paper

mill that closed in 2015, 2016. they reopened and are making insulation out of wood fiber. we got them a $16 million tax credit out of the inflation reduction act that will help them open up their final product line and ultimately ramp-up to employing 150 people. i've done things like supporting millions of dollars for the mechanized loving operations training program that you have up here. it's a great program. i've worked closely with the logging contractors to get them money when we had weather up here that because their operations to go sideways and they were losing money hand over fist. we got them millions of dollars from the federal government to help out their losses. on the farming side, i've

actually tried to work closely with agencies like usda, small business development centers, and others to make sure we are getting them the resources they need to continue doing work that way they want to do it and make smart investments in their farms. >> representative theriault? rep. theriault: this is personal for me, i come from a farming and logging family. a lot of people watching tonight have some sort of story of a grandparent or whatever that picked potatoes at one point in their lives. here's the deal, when government creates bad economic climate and the government tries to come into save the day, that is exactly what mr. golden just talked about. in particular with logging, the logging industry is really struggling because of high interest rates, because of out-of-control government spending. let's look at the farming industry. i was in a potato house this afternoon and i asked the guy, how do you store these potatoes, and he said "our energy costs

have doubled, almost tripled." that is what they are facing now. they are -- they may be making more money at the market, but they have such high costs, they are not able to buy new equipment and whatnot. in terms of the lobster industry, this is even more challenging. the federal government is coming after the fisheries, particularly noaa, the agency that is put a lot of regulations on the lobster industry. i've been against offshore wind pretty consistently. jared golden says he's just not support offshore wind, but on several occasions he supported additional subsidies and funding for offshore wind, and the lobster industry is spending millions of dollars in losses trying to fight back against what is going on. they know if the offshore wind turbines come to maine, they will be decimated. this is personal because it affects a lot of people i

know. in the inflation reduction act, there's a lot of money spent on renewable energy, even joe biden said it had nothing to do with inflation, it was a green energy bill. noaa is going after fisheries. i would like to go to noaa and say we will not give you any more money unless we come to the table with all the stakeholders involved in the natural resource industries and find a long-term solution, because the people in d.c. like harris and biden and those running his agencies don't know better than the farmers, loggers, and lobster men on the ground at home. they've been doing it for decades and generations and i trust them more. >> last word, each of you. rep. golden: well, on the lobster fishery, since the last election i've successfully helped get a six-year freeze on proposed regulations. lobstermen were telling us it would be absolutely devastating for the industry. we had to take a compromise to get what we could. i would like to see more years

added onto that. certainly i will be trying to do that. the money from noaa was in the same bill that the freeze on the regulateds was in -- regulations was in. if i said no, austen would be attacking me for not getting rid of those regulations. it is like a catch type of argument he's going to use it -- catch-22 type of argument he is trying to use. i've gotten that moved, especially as of the second of january, they can move that to july and keep fighting it. austin is talking about wind repeatedly, and every debate. right here he voted for the gateway, a powerline. the bill he voted for was with the state government to take private land from the mainers to connect power to the maine

grade. those costs get passed off to ratepayers. you voted for it. that is fine if that is what he thought was the right thing, but to stand here for three nights and say you think wind is bad and can it all on me, you have a voting record, too, on this issue. i'm proud of what i've done with the inflation reduction act. we're going to help with energy projects. we have helped oil and gas production increase in this country. and yeah, we have made smart investments in the future of things like renewable energy. rep. theriault: i never said i was against clean energy. i i said i was against clean energy that raises the price of electricity for people living on a fixed income and businesses now, and that is what is happening not only in maine, but around the country. in particular you changed the subject. we were talking but offer wind in the lobster industry. offer wind is a whole different -- offshore wind is a whole different animal. offer wind is going to devastate the lobster industry.

we talk in previous debates, if you want to be serious about making sure offshore wind is not coming to maine, we need people like jared golden to ask for a meeting with joe biden to say we cannot let this happen. and he has claimed he has never had a meeting with joe biden, so is it because you didn't ask for a meeting or they never gave you a meeting with joe biden? i'm deeply concerned, this could decimate an industry for generations come and we need strong and aggressive leadership, and i'm committed to doing that regardless of who the president is. we need people who can get into the administration and say this is what is happening on the ground, and we can't be playing games because at the end of the day we are talking about livelihoods of hundreds of people on the coast. rep. golden: talking about offshore wind, i have a bill at the federal level to say no offshore wind. that is something i've been pushing the biden administration and noaa to come out and say they will respect that decision. i call it a decision because it was a decision made by the maine legislature.

they passed the state law. 75% of our lobster fishing area. that was the piece of legislation that austin voted against. again, he's got his record on these things and he is always just pointing the finger at me you could have protected the lobster fishery and you voted against that. rep. theriault: that's got to be false. i don't know what you are talking about. never voted for anything related to offshore wind that would allow that. back to the issue at hand, we have a real problem with lack of leadership. if we want to be serious about preventing these issues, we can't vote for money that is going to fund these programs in the first place, and then three or four years later say, oh man, we opened up a can of worms, we gotta fix this issue. you shouldn't have voted for money for offshore wind, because whether it is maine or the federal government, the federal government and maine is looking at that bill and singular so much money in tax credits and subsidies -- let me get started

on ev vehicles, four of these programs -- that is why the lobster industry and lawyers are having to go to court to stop this from happening because it is going to decimate this industry. >> we are going to leave it there and move on to another important topic that has been mentioned this evening, border security and immigration. here in maine, residents and communities are faced with the challenge connected with our nation'immigration policy thats for this race. as a growing number of people face homelessness and housing and security with not enough resources to house them, refugees and asylum seekers are being provided shelter in parts of our state. how do you propose we address this at the national level and what specific measures would you propose to ensure mainers experiencing homelessness are able to access housing like those for out of -- those coming from the state from out of the country? we will start with you, representative theriault. rep. theriault: i think this is one of the most important topics we will discuss tonight.

obviously the economy is number one, but this is number two because we affect people coming across unvented, we have not had background checks on them, and they are coming to neighborhoods across the country and they are coming to maine i understand the attack is going to be that you are not compassionate, but it is very non-compassionate to let somebody come into this country when we are not able to provide services for the, we are not able to make sure they get what they need. we have americans, we have veterans, we have people who are homeless. it cannot get access to substance abuse counseling, they cannot get access to mental health because our system is being overtaxed. we literally have tens of millions of people who have come across illegally on the southern border, even the northern border. the northern border is facing a crisis as well. i was endorsed by the border patrol council because they understand that i'm going to go down to washington, d.c., and fight for them, make sure they have the resources they need to protect the border. the difference between me and jared on the stages before the

crisis spiraled out of control in 2018, 2019, 2020, we did have a low-level of people coming across the border. there was some people, but it wasn't in the millions. he voted against building the wall and finalizing the wall, he voted against h.r. 2, the toughest border security measure to make it to the house floor. after several million people across the border, the national news started talking about it, he reversed course, flip-flopped on the issue, and voted for legislation that protected the border. this is about judgment, this is about not letting politics get in the way of what is right for the american people. unfortunately we will see the results of this in maine, we will have to take people in that we cannot provide for them. social services are paying for housing, medical care, transportation. meanwhile we have people on the streets right now bit i think there's something wrong with that. >> congressman golden? rep. golden: austin claims i watched the national news and suddenly had a change of heart.

of course this has been in the national news since i got into politics, so obviously he is wrong about that. my ninth vote in congress in 2019 was for a border security bill that reopened government. it had been shut down by the republican majority prior to my getting into office. we reopened government and we gave $1.3 billion to construction of the border wall. since then i voted for another $5.5 billion for the border wall. collectively over six years, $80 billion for customs and border protection, for border patrol, for ice. we have put forward a 22,000 border patrol force down on the border, the largest workforce that we have had patrolling the border ever. that is my record. that should speak to you back home, no matter what austin has to say about it. on asylum-seekers, probably what we should do is require them to

work. the moment that they come here and we acknowledge them and their claim for asylum, here is your work permit, get to work, we need you to work. and they want to work, i know that they do. while we talked about work and the issue of illegal immigration, austin doesn't have a record on border security. he does have a record on immigration, illegal immigration. he voted against a bill that would have raised penalties on companies here in maine, particularly in the construction industry, who have been employing illegal immigrants, and even more, stealing their wages. that's called wage theft. austin voted against a bill that would've tightened penalties on them. if we cannot trust him to be strong on enforcement of employment laws, how do you trust him in washington with the southern border? rep. theriault: i'm not sure what jared is referring to, i don't know what bill he's talking about. at the end of the day it is a distraction from the larger issue, which is in 2018, joe biden, kamala harris, and then

jared golden made this political. they said we are not going to let donald trump this border fence because we don't want to give them a win, we don't want to let republican secure the border. what happened is we had millions of people come across. now, i do support allowing them to work. if you do that without securing the border, you are only going to incentivize more people to come across. that is why they are coming, they want the american dream, they want to come here. but at the end of the day all of us have immigrated at some point, whether it was two generations or 10 generations ago, and we follow the process and we follow the law. we are for the immigration process, perhaps letting more people in legally, but don't incentivize more people -- literally right now there is flights coming across from some of the countries in south of mexico, and those people are coming across right now, right now, and they are unvetted, we are unable to give them a back on check because the governments don't work with the u.s.

government, and nothing has happened. that is just an example of golden saying he voted for border security, but i'm sorry, it was too little, too late. and now we have people that we don't know who they are and we don't know where they came from, and we have to deal with the consequences of that, because of some of them unfortunately don't have the best interests of you in mind and they have bad records. rep. golden: austin is describing that people coming into the country on planes from another country who aren't u.s. citizens, they go through customs. those are people claiming asylum that is what i was talking about when i said we should require them to work. if they have legal status here, we ought to make sure they can legally work. i'm talking about legislation austin opposed. if they weren't employers giving them jobs, they wouldn't come. when we catch a company doing that and taking advantage of those poor people by stealing their wages, it is hard for american workers to compete with that. but then austin doesn't want to see us throw the book at those

types of companies. >> we want to move on to make sure we can get to as many topics as possible. >> we will move on to a topic that i don't think has been addressed much in this race, but as you both know, there have been numerous illegal marijuana groves busted across the state. it is estimated there are hundreds in maine. the director of the fbi says there appears to be a chinese organized crime get what needs to be done at a federal level to help local law enforcement to, number one, stop these growths from happening, and number two, to take them down in a faster rate? we begin with congressman golden. rep. golden: the maine delegation has been having regular meetings with the federal law enforcement and state law enforcement about this. often times they won't share everything with us because they are in the middle of investigations and they are not going to tell us everything they're doing. often when they take out one of

these, they are setting up to go after the next one, so we are not privy to everything. but i'm supportive of what they're doing and i want to continue to give them resources to take on these illegal grove houses. a lot of them are tied to china. in the trade space we can punish them for what we know they are doing to the united states, sending precursors for fentanyl and things, yes, across the southern border, but also through mail packages. there is a thing, de minimis, a trade-related issue or any package under $800 doesn't have to go through customs, it goes right to a warehouse for distribution. it is easier for americans to ship things -- let's say if they are on vacation and want to send something home, but $800 is way too high in this age. if we can get rid of that right there, we can stop some of these precursors that are used to make fentanyl. i talk about fentanyl as it relates to this because i don't know for sure, but i think there

is annexes between the flow of fentanyl -- a nexus between the flow of fentanyl through china and these illegal grove houses, turning red and using it for other illicit purposes. rep. theriault: it has been reported that the illegal money is transferred over to china, the byproducts of fentanyl shipped to mexico, and then they come across the southern border and end up in towns across maine and across the united states. i think there's a couple things here. we need to empower law enforcement to go into these facilities and obviously bust them. it's been happening, i'm glad to see it's been happening, and i fully support the sheriff's department that are doing that now. that is why i was endorsed by seven sheriffs in the district. in terms of specifically the illegal chinese folks that are coming in, i think it is symbolic of a larger issue, once again, of lax laws and people

not taking america seriously with our immigration system with . we have had too many years of too many politicians voting against border security, and i guarantee these multinational gangs and criminal organizations said the united states borders seem like they're open right now, let's cash in. they are cashing in on those overdosing on drugs, fentanyl, and cashing in and buying up houses -- we talked about housing. 300 homes in maine have been bought sight unseen from people out of state, moving into these homes and growing illegal marijuana. and we wonder why we have a housing issue. i want to make sure law enforcement has the tools they need and the federal government needs to make sure they get involved, and i'm disappointed it took so much time for this to happen. >> we are running short on time and i want to get a few more issues in here. >> obviously, this month marks

the anniversary of the tragic shooting in lewiston. do you feel there should be a yellow and/or red flag law at the national level? austin theriault, we will go to you. rep. theriault: this is a sensitive topic. i've supported the yellow flag law and we currently have that at the state level. in this particular case with the lewiston shooting, we know there were instances where this gentleman could have been brought in, his weapons taken under the yellow flag law, because he was obviously -- had mental problems. he was dangerous and he was violent. unfortunately, there was a lot of things that didn't happen correctly. i am for making sure that those issues are addressed, that law enforcement has what it needs in order to make sure that doesn't happen again, and that the v.a. at the very least is communicate better with law enforcement and mental health practitioners back here at home. but the larger question, and this is the difference between jared and i on this issue, is

the second amendment discussion comes up. jared's first thing after this was to say that he supported banning one of the most popular weapons, firearms herein maine. that would not have solved this issue. at the end of the day, by saying that he says he is in line with joe biden and kamala harris on second amendment and gun policy. i think we have a mental health crisis in this country. we have to get tough, make sure that mental health practitioners have the funding they need to assist people when they are in crisis. and when we went away from these larger buildings and larger places that people could go for a period of time and we went to a community health model, we didn't make enough investments in mental health and people are slipping through the cracks. i've been endorsed as somebody who is going to support the second amendment. gun owners in maine have given me an a, they have given jared an f, because he is flip-flopped

on the issue and needs not trusted by hunters and people who believe the second amendment is an important part of life, here in maine and certainly across america. that is the difference between golden and i. rep. golden: i've not been supportive in the past of extremes protection orders like you talked about. i voted against red flag proposals in the maine legislature and the united states congress. after the shooting in lewiston, austin made reference to it, came right from the heart. i said we should have a conversation about the most lethal of firearms. 18 people were killed that night. 13 were wounded. if this type of firearm wasn't the one that was used, we would have more people alive today. i don't think we are going to legislate our way through a country that doesn't have gun violence. we're not going to get rid of all guns. no when here would support that but what we can do is have

a conversation of how to reduce the fatalities by getting some of the most dangerous firearms either off of the shelves or, as i have proposed, let's have a higher threshold for legal possession limit. let's as people like myself, let's meet a higher standard. let's prove we're in a good mental state, we are not addicted to mind-influencing drugs, that we are going to be responsible. maine is not unfamiliar with that type of permitting system like what i proposed right there. i've always sought, through 10 years in office now, to be balanced and looking at how we protect the individual's second amendment right with an extremely important duty to keep our communities safe. that is what my voting record has reflected for six years now. austin says i have lost trust on this issue.

the last president of the sportsmen's alliance of maine when the shooting happened, he just resigned a couple month ago, he is in an ad telling people is the former chief of the maine state of police that he trusts me on the second amendment any trust me to do every thing i can to keep our state and our communities and families safe. rep. theriault: jared, you have the same essentially policy on the second amendment as kamala harris and joe biden. they want to do the same thing with these types of firearms. your permit system is essentially a gun registry, which will allow the government to know what sort of weapons you have in your homes. people actually right now have to pass a background check to buy a firearm. this is one level too far for the government to get involved with law-abiding gun owners. sportsmen alliance -- once again, sportsmen alliance of maine, gun owners of maine have given me an a rating and given jared feeling ratings because he has flip-flopped and has taken the same position as kamala harris and joe biden.

when stanley, you don't even -- coincidentally, you don't even say you are supporting kamala harris, but you have the same policy in the second amendment as she does. rep. golden: it is complete just crazy. everyone knows i am one of the most conservative democrats out there when it comes to gun rights and what i would or wouldn't support is nothing like what austin is suggesting. >> it is hard to believe, but we have actually gone through our our, so we are going to be wrapping it up to make sure that both candidates have time for the closing. that is all the questions we have this evening. we thank you both for that. but we do want to allow you to have your closing statements. each candidate, as we said at the beginning, is going to get one minute, 30 for closing remarks. austin theriault, we start with you. rep. theriault: this was a lively discussion because i'm passionate about being able to serve the maine people.

very proud of being born and raised in fort kent. the values i learned as a kid growing up picking potatoes in the potato field, working in the shop greasing trucks, working with my dad and grandfather in the family business, and ultimately going and racing in nascar, has taught me that we have so much we can be proud of, we have so much we can look forward to. for too long leaders have gone down to washington, d.c., and not delivered and followed through with promises they have made. that is why my campaign has been about making sure we put people over politics, making sure we can create a situation where we have less extremism and more balance in the legislative process. god knows we have a lot of work to do, and it's certainly not going to happen overnight. i'm just one person, but one person in a group can make a difference. we need more people who are willing to stand up, speak up, and be aggressive for what is right. i can give you my word, we may not agree in all of these issues, but i can promise you you will have a seat at the table with me, you're going to have somebody who is going to fight every single day especially for people who feel lost, that behind, and

abandoned. we can do better. washington has failed us, and it is time for a change. i would really appreciate your vote in november. >> thank you very much. jared golden, you have your moment now. rep. golden: austin is calling for less extremism and more balance. i've been one of the house of representatives six years now. if that is what you like, if you like the original band, why pay to see the cover? i've been one of the most bipartisan members of congress year-in and year-out in my voting record reflects that. it's a record i am proud of. i understand maine, i understand you and your communities. we are independent people, we are fair-minded folks. that is how i've been your representative now for six years in congress. i appreciate having had the opportunity. i'm never going to forget where i come from. through six years, three

campaigns, you know i am no matter what the attacks are. you give me another two years, i will continue to do the job the way i have done it the last six years. >> ok, we thank you both very much for participating in this debate, and hopefully the voters/viewers had the opportunity to really get to know the candidates this evening. >> the important job is yours to cast your ballots, whether you are casting absentee or on election day. >> that is the important thing, to register to vote. voting is underway so hopefully you exercise that right. >> we want to thank you gentlemen for a great debate tonight and for being here to discuss these important issues. >> and this debate, if you were not able to see the whole thing or you want to rewatch it, is going to be available on the wabi website, wagm website, and we hope you will take advantage of the opportunity to listen

back and hear what your candidates have to say. we do thank wabi's news director very much for making the trip up here and joining us this evening, and jason parent, thank you very much for being willing to come in and help us with this debate. we thank you tuning in, and we hope you will get out there and vote on november 5. we will be doing political profile next wednesday on october 16 with the four candidates running for the u.s. senate, and we are going to be doing our local political profiles here and that will begin on monday, october 21. thank you to everybody. we hope you are going to get out there and vote on november 5. we thank you for tuning in, and we'll hope you have a wonderful night. >> with one of the tightest races for control of congress in modern political history, stay

ahead with c-span's comprehensive coverage of key state debates. this fall c-span brings you access to the top house, senate, and governor debates from across the country, debates from races that are shaping your state's future and the balance of power in washington. follow campaign 2024 coverage from local to national debates anytime online at c-span.org /campaign, and be sure to watch tuesday, november 5, for live real-time election results. c-span, your unfiltered view of politics, powered by cable. >> and with 21 days until the elections, we have more live campaign coverage on c-span today. democratic vice president of candidate governor tim walz speaks to voters at a caaign rally in pittsburgh, pennsylvania. that iset for 5:00 p.m. eastern. this evening at 7:00, pennsylvania senator bob casey and his republican

challenger, dave mccormick, face off in the finate to represent the keystone state in the u.s. senate. all of this live on c-span, also c-span now, our mobile app, and online at c-span.org. >> will you solemnly swear that in the testimony you are about to give will be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you god? >> weeknights, watch our encore estation of american history tv's series "gas investigates, -- "congress investigates." authors dennis torres will tell these stories, we will see historic footage, and we will examine the legacy of key congressional hearings. tonight, a senate committee in 1975 led by idaho democratic senator frank church investigated alleged abuses in the intelligence community.

tonight at 10:00 eastern on c-span2. >> next, a conversation on how the words we use ship political language with a focus on words that have been deemed socially unacceptable over time. from the american enterprise institute, this is an hour and 20 minutes. >> good evening, and welcome to the american energize institute. i'm chris scalia, senior fellow here, and it is an honor to introduce tonight's installment of the american dream lecture series. part of the american dream initiative and in the tradition of our esteemed bradley lectures, this series provides a form for america's premier

public intellectuals to address the most pressing political and social challenges facing our nation as we approach our 250th birthday. we have distributed flyers listing some of our upcoming lectures. our next event, scheduled for february, will feature "commentary" editor john podhore tz speaking about the state of american culture. that is favorite 15 so mark your calendar -- that is february 15, so mark your calendar and bring a valentine. numerous online sources but the left-wing activist saul alinsky with saying "he who controls language controls power." i haven't been able to find that sentence in "rules for radicals," but as aristotle observed, the internet is never wrong about quotations. i am certain, though, that one reason george orwell's dystopian

novel "1984" remains so hunting is its depiction of how a totalitarian regime can control its people by cracking down on what words they use. we sense some truth in the novelist angela carter's observation that language is power, the instrument of domination and liberation. this belief that the words we use actively shape our political beliefs and behavior crosses partisan lines. but in our contemporary discourse, the left is especially inclined to try shaping political thought by imposing changes on our language. see, for example, trying to make "latinx" happened. but are these assumptions about language is power actually troop? -- true? can pronoun lists and fashionable jargon usher in political reform? do they instead have unintended consequences?

to address these questions, we are fortunate to have one of america's most foremost linguists, dr. john mcwhorter. dr. mcwhorter is an associate professor of english and comp lit at columbia university. he received his phd in linguist expense stanford and is the author of several books including hope and quote the power of -- "the power of babel," "english in the gutter," which is frickin' great, and "woke racism." he has been published in "city journal" and "the atlantic." he is a cohost of "the glenn show" with gun larry could-- glenn loury. i recommend his piece last year about steely dan. he will participate in a

discussion with another great scholar of language, aei's own joshua katz. john and joshua will converse for 20 minutes, and then we will turn to audience questions. afterwards i hope you will join us for deep conversation and light refreshments in the adjoining gallery. but first, please welcome to join me in welcoming john mcwhorter to discuss language in the left. [laughter] -=-- [applause] john: thank you, aei, for inviting me. thank you especially to chris scalia and joshua katz for wanting my company. i want to talk a little bit about what you could call an effort coming mostly from the left to create change through language, which can seem so wise at first but also has pitfalls and probably frustrates a lot of us.

one manifestation of that is that these days, especially over the past four, maybe five years, one gets the sense that terminology keeps shifting under our feet, that there are always new ways of saying things that if we don't say it in that particular way, we are craving some kind of-- creating some kind of tort. you would like to have you have some basic command over your own language, and you find out you don't. one is not to say, for example, "homeless" at this point. it is now "unhoused." that seems to come from somewhere, and one is expected to subscribe to it. or you might have something coming from especially some universities where it has been stipulated, for example, by a list that came out of brandeis and another out of stanford that you shouldn't say "crazy" under any circumstances because that

could be construed as offensive to people who might be having some sort of psychological problems. you don't want to say "walk-in" as in-service service industry because that is biased against people who may not have the ability to -- as in service in a store because that is biased against people who may not have the ability to walk. that comes from many places. it deserves more forbearance than we are always inclined to give it. of course, you can feel like there are a group of people who are trying to catch you out. and of course, there is a certain degree of smugness in some of the circles of people who are asking us to use vocabulary in this way. you get a sense that you are ahead of the curve, that there are people who need to be taught to the right thing. it is a natural human impulse, and it is definitely there. that can certainly be frustrating, especially because if you take an historical perspective, and it is not always easy to do that, but if

you do, if you look at what, for example, civil rights leaders or liberals in the past, and not in 1600, if there were liberals then, but talking by 1920, 1950, what is interesting is that the dog that doesn't bark any stories, and by that i mean how little concern there was, be it left or right, how little concern there was with what you call things. this is not to idealize the past, but being concerned with the labels you put on them, or if you crated a label, it stuck. there wasn't the idea that what you call it is something significant to think about. i think the people back then have something on us. there was something in the air among a lot of people calling themselves fostering change and thinking language has something crucial to do with it. the people who keep insisting we

use these new terms are basing it on something that can seem extremely reasonable, a kind of street myth about language and psychology that i'm sure everybody in this room has encountered either in an anthropology class when you are an undergraduate or some column in whatever newspaper, whatever it is you read at this point. it is all over the internet, which is the sapir-whorf hypothesis, a rather fearsome name, named after two people, one of them benjamin whorf, for the idea that your thoughts and thought patterns and even the culture that results from them are the product of particularities of the language you happen to speak. the way your language happens to split up the world in terms of words can even the way your grammar works in the language are supposedly shaping the way you think.

benjamin wharf, was very earnest, but not to sound la di da, he wasn't a linguist, he was a fire insurance inspector who love languages. he felt that hopi didn't have any ways of marking time good everything is or was, as opposed to the normal european language like the one i'm speaking where everything is about whether it was or will be or is. this is not chronically attractive idea, that -- this is a narcoticically attractive idea, that hopi psychology is cyclical, how the hopi see time, as opposed to european-type thinkers who see everything as linear. the truth is that is not true about hopi at all.

he had not studied the language enough, but he was a charismatic speaker that imprinted in idea that is still discussed in the humanities and social sciences today that language ships the way you think. the people who are changing of the vocabulary on us and are operating under an illusion, and understandable allusion because it is what you were taught, what you are fed all the time, that if they are doing this, they are changing thought. that is so deeply entrenched in today's american thinking culture that i imagine many of the people who are doing this don't know formally that it is based on what is called whorfia nism at all. nevertheless, what is escaping a lot of these people is something that requires pulling the camera back and thinking about the passage of time, be it linear or circular. that is when you change terminology, it only works for a little while. my friend steven pinker -- and my getting to the point where i

say things about people i know? steven pinker, who is kind of my friend but i will not use that phrase -- steven pinker has created the term "the euphemism treadmill." what he means by that is you could have crippled on the building 100 years ago and that wasn't considered osler. then there were a suit that wasn't considered --and that wasn't considered a slur. "disabled" became the term of art, and now we say "differently abled." whatever the attitudes are that you are trying to ward off or going to be like gnats and settle back down on that term again. that is something we always know will happen. that is a regular historical process. what is now known -- often in political circles in this city, tanefs, temporary aid to needy

families, that is the term one uses. the original term in the 1930's was "home relief," a beautiful euphemism for a delicate topic that was difficult to get through politically. home relief. by my count, the 1950's, because of negative associations with home relief, take them or leave them, they decided that home relief wouldn't work anymore because it became a negative term, people said it was a smear. that changed to welfare. if you can pull out any associations you seem to have, it was a beautiful term, "welfare." what you would use that gorgeous work for was about helping needy families. by the time i was growing up in the 1970's, that was tarnished as well. that's what a thing goes on and on and we are seeing it happen now. for example, when i was a kid, a person who was on the street, so to speak, was called a bum or a

tramp. that was by enlightened people as well as people who disparaged. my mother, god bless her, was a social worker and social work teacher. she didn't say "bum" in disparagement, but that was the term. that changed to "homeless," once again, a beautiful term, because it takes away all agency, it doesn't impute fall on the person, it implies that it is society's fault that the person doesn't have a home. whatever one thought of the bum or tramp or hobo, the gnats settled down on "homeless," and that is why we are now being told to use "unhoused." it's not going to work. i've seen the cycle with "homeless." "unhoused" will feel the same way in 20 years and we will need a new term. something that happened right under our noses and i didn't

think about it until two weeks ago, whoops, there went another 1 -- it used to be that you quote something affirmative action. then that became problematic in terms of association, so one said "racial preferences." now we talk about something called dei. all that is, 95%, is a new way of saying preferences because of the associations many people have with preferences and whether or not they are fair. dei is tarnishing as we speak, and it will be replaced, i think rather sooner than "homeless" was. i think the message is that people on all sides of the aisle -- in this case now it is mostly the left -- would benefit from understanding that what we need to change is the thought or the society, rather than thinking that changing language is going to do anything significant. it is not that it does nothing. benjamin lee whorf made mistakes in his early work, but it has

been shown by many psychologists that aspect of your language to channel your thought about this much, things that are only detectable in very sophisticated but artificial experiments, a little bit, a tiny bit, but not enough that changing the words that we used to refer to controversial things can be thought of as a truly useful form of politics. and so hopefully that is a fashion that will change, and i'm going to come back to that when i finish in terms of what i mean by change. but then there was something else, which is that uniquely confounding, especially if you are over 40 i would think, which is the youth of "they," the pronoun. roberta is in the hospital and they got their hair cut. that is the new use of "they." that can feel really different if you grew up using pronouns the way they were used before this new usage of "they."

i've noticed that many people have intense discomfort with this new usage. listening to the kids do it, or people who are not kids, many people are reading it as some sort of forced imputation of a certain position of gender politics, almost designed if you are over a certain age, which i definitely am at this point, to make your trip up. you are not sure if it is "they want" or "they wants," and nobody can tell you, and it's a problem. with the new they, i'm of two minds, and it's not about being wishy-washy. it's about the passage of time. first of all, the truth is there are languages in the world with even fewer pronouns than english is trying to have at this point, and everybody gets along fine. i could choose many right now for no particular reason. there is one that is spoken by

_17 people-- -17 people in new guinea. it is a complicated language, but there is only one word for "you," you in the singler, yo-- singular, you in the plural. there is one word for he, she, it, and they. there is i and we, but that is the only place where the pronouns establish singular --distinguish singular and plural. they get along fine. there are languages in south america, you don't need a bunch of pronouns to be sophisticate because context can take care of so much. one way we know that is if you watch people who today are about 14 and under, they use the new "they" with the fluency that i find absolutely awesome. they never knew any america where "they" wasn't used that

way and they took it in. they are managing it in the same way all of us manage something. this is a comparison that is going to make some of you angry, and i'm just sorry, but it's this -- billy and me went to the store is a perfectly legitimate sentence. you've been taught that it is supposed to be billy and i, that you would never say "me went to the store." i know, i know. that is something a couple people made up in the 1700s because that is the way it happened to work in latin, and everybody loved it latin and english was supposed to be like latin because english wasn't sophisticated yet. you have to say "billy and i" rather than "billy and me." shakespeare would not have recognized that rule and didn't. it happened very naturally for reasons i won't go into here because it goes too much into the weeds. but the idea that we are not supposed to say "billy and me went to the store" would make no

sense to, for example, a french speaker. i don't have to go to new guinea for this one. and yes, all of us, including me, and public circumstances have learned to not say "him and me" like that. you say "he and i." just like learning how to pick your clothes up at the store, you want to -- you learn to get good at it. you have to tell the child that, sylvia, for no reason, you have to change it. would you say "me went to the store"? if it were french she would say we. if we can say "he and you went to the store," we can master "they." two minds. here's the second mind, which is that it's hard, it's really

hard. honestly, sometimes the fluent use of the new "they" can be awkward despite all efforts otherwise, especially in writing. i was reading, what was it, an article in "the new yorker"? yeah, and it was about judith butler, the literary theorist, she now goes by they. great. but the article, describing various things judith butler has done and where they have gone made it hard to understand sometimes who the they was. it was a situation where there are several other people and potentially violence that is going to happen. no violence did happen. and then it said "they asked why did you have it in your hand?" was it her they, or the people surrounding who they was with? these things are very tricky sometimes.

i will say this year for the first time-- this here for the first time. i'm not advertising it, but i have a book coming out and it's on pronouns and it is coming out in april. i of course discuss the new "they." it's this new thing coming in, it's not going away. we can master new ways of using pronouns and we can still do it even though we are not eight. but if i'm honest, and i held off from saying this because i want to be a cheerleader if i can and i don't want to be unmodern, i get the feeling -- i could be wrong, and it will be online, me being wrong, i'm ok with that -- i get the feeling that they has peaked and among those using they that wait, it was an experiment that was

especially popular five, six years ago, and it will always be with us, but i'm noticing more and more the people i've known, young people i've known who wanted to be addressed as they can only the-- and only they as much as possible have let go of it as they've gotten older. among many students it is, to say that one wants to be called he or they, or she or they. my sense of it now as somebody who's trying to feel the culture and can only do it approximately because i minute is that the -- i'm in it is that they is seen to be a sign of an advanced way of thinking, a way of getting beyond the gender binary, which is fine, but you don't necessarily require in the sense of trying to change the language itself. if that's the way it turns out to have been, we need to wait another five years to see and i think we are seeing something general which applies to the vocabulary i talked about in the beginning, which is one thing

that we may be seeing is the enrichment of where the emergence of a kind of jargon. and of course there is a particular jargon that many groups use, but a certain roughly artistic/academic group, also activist group -- three a's, artistic, academic, and activist group -- are inclined to use. characteristic which chris mentioned is latinx. latinx is very clever, you want to get beyond gender binary. last i heard 3% of latinos use it and they are in those three groups. i was in a have really latino -- heavily latino group for years and i've never heard anyone use it and i'm surrounded by spanish all day. it is used by certain circles, and you know what, there's nothing wrong with that at all, there's nothing wrong with

people having a certain jargon. a lot of the vocabulary uses a lot of the use, of they exclusively, although we have to see, might be that we are seeing a certain jargon emerge, in that kind of jargon is perfectly natural. human beings tend to separate into groups and to express either subconsciously or consciously their sense of membership in that subgroup with, among other things, first you think of clothes and hair, but also with language. and it can be quite subconscious. for example, here is one you may have never thought of. generally men say "uh," women say "um." nobody teaches that, you never think of it, but if you measure groups of people and there are men and women involved, overwhelmingly a woman is um and a man says uh. you can think of reasons why it would be, but subconsciously

there is something one internalizes depending on what side of the fence you are on that would create something like that. or sometimes semiconscious. chris mentioned to me writing about musical theater, something that we fans of that do no matter where we are elsewhere in the world, the way you single you have a student kind of conversation when you are surrounded by other people's you refer to one of the stars of new york musical theater by just their first name. if you say audra, if you say bernadette, you instantly know who you are talking to. i don't know if i've ever thought of that consciously, it is that. they, and don't say "walk-in," things like that, might be one of the subgroup markers as well. my sense of these things is it all fits into, in the grand scheme of things, is that we talk often of something called peak woke. i wrote a book called "woke

racism" because i was usually frustrated,infuriated--- hugely frustrated, infuriated it during the lockdown of what was happening to innocent people. 2020, that was peak woke. that was four years ago. something changed roughly in the fall of 2022. and that doesn't mean that wokeness is all bad and that doesn't mean that the excesses of wokeness do not ensnare people here and there. everybody is aware of that. but an era has passed, and a lot of what might frustrate us with what we might feel is a language pressure, especially from the left, is something that will ease up into becoming a new way of speaking on the left sooner rather than later. that is my linguistic culture prognostication for right now. we'll see if it's the case, but i think it's a more useful way of approaching these sorts of changes than shaking our fists

in frustration. so those are my words about language, the left, and what it can do for you. and i guess now, josh, we open it up to us. [applause] john ok -- joshua: ok, there we go. thank you for that bracing talk. that is a classic mcwhorter talk. i guess i should say john and me are going to talk for a little bit. john: yes. joshua: john said he was a cheerleader and he doesn't want to appear not modern. nobody who knows me could think i am a cheerleader, and i'm definitely not modern. this will be a good conversation. there will also be time for all of you to speak, and if you are watching online now and you have any questions or comments you

wish to make, you can send them to nate.moore@aei.org. so john, you said you were going to talk about, and you did, language and the left. the subtitle, which i think was not mentioned, was, can words create justice. you said at the very beginning you were going to talk mostly about the left and then at some point in the middle you sort of said that again. so you didn't say anything about the right. you are not a man of the right. you've called yourself a liberal democrat. many people say and i have to say this sounds right to me that you are a radical centrist. that was definitely a radical centrist talk. so what would a talk by you or conceivably by somebody else look like, that was language in