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along with the other television providers. giving you a front row seat to democracy. k. we're joined now by charlie dent, a senior advisor to the group called our republican legacy and also a former u.s. representative and republican from pennsylvania. welcome to the program. guest: great to be with you. host: you are an advisor to the group called our republican legacy. what is the mission and how are you funded? guest: we are a 501-c4 organization, not a lobbying group, you're not even really advocating for or against anyone in particular. we are a group in the spirit of republicans who want a better direction for the republican party. we want to create an alternative narrative to maga. those of us in the party who want a different direction have been far too quiet, so what we've done is we've laid out

five core principles that we think have guided the republican party and should guide it going forward. the constitution, the rule of law, the peaceful transfer of power. we think january 6 was an abomination. we believe in unions. abraham lincoln was our founder. his objective was to keep this great country together, and unfortunately donald trump and his movement want to divided further. -- divide it further. we also believe in peace as strength in foreign policy, rejecting autocrats like vladimir putin and kim jong-un. we are in a very different place than the maga movement. we are also for free markets. we are not talking about the 1850's of the 1920's, that the same time we think across the

tariffs would really wreak havoc on the country and our economy and not in keeping with the traditions with where we as republicans should be. host: we will talk about tariffs and fiscal discipline. when with the organization created? guest: i believe back in april or march. former senators jack danforth, alan simpson and bill:. -- bill cohen. we thought it was time to really create a strong voice as an alternative to maga. the republican is divided. not evenly divided, but it is divided. host: what is the ultimate goal, are you going to try to run another candidate for president in the next cycle? host: guest: we haven't even gone there. we are trying to create a

groundswell of support. we are looking beyond the selection. about how do we get this republican party a better place? the principles i just laid out, they sustained the party for a seven years. maga, they've been around for 10 years. we understand we are not going to go back to roby were, but we need to get to a better place. we want to help shape the conversation going forward. that those principles will still be respected, and frankly thriving which should be the republican party. this isolationism and protectionism, ♪. host: what caused that? given the deep roots of the republican party, what caused it to go in the maga direction? guest: a lot of anger in the country.

there always have been some dark elements within our nation and sadly i think donald trump helps bring that out with his incendiary rhetoric, how he talks to people in ways that he frankly will bring out the worst in some people. there's no restraint. we've always have these isolationist and protectionist candidates in this country, this is nothing new. but he's the first republican president who has actually embraced others. and i think that is part of the reason why the party has shifted, because the leader of the party has taken these positions and frankly what we need is an alternative voice. we need republican voters to hear something different than what they are hearing today. host: you've announced that you have voted early in pennsylvania and you have voted for vice president harris. elaborate a little bit on that. was that a vote against trump or do you believe more firmly in her policies than his? guest: it was more a rejection

of donald trump. i did not vote for donald trump in 2016 and in 2020, i voted joe biden because at this point it was a return to normalcy. i didn't expect to agree with joe biden on many of his policies but at least he was going to bring back some sense of normalcy and stability the white house. and in the case of kamala harris, she is trying to pivot to the center. i hope she does embrace that going forward. i will certainly have policy differences but she is a decent and honorable person and i think she will put the interests of the country ahead of her own. host: the vice president is making a speech at the national mall tomorrow. what would you like her to address, what is it that she needs to say that would get republicans like yourself that are not comfortable with donald trump? guest: what she needs to say is this pivot toward the center is real, and it is sincere.

a lot of republicans say she is from san francisco, she's taken position that many of us have disagreed with. in pennsylvania she was opposed to fracking and has obviously changed her position. there are other issues where she maybe has gone too far to the left or made statements in the 2019 campaign. i think she has continued to demonstrate that he will try to govern from the center, and resist the urges of many of the extreme elements within her own party. i think she needs to do that. some will say that might quiet her base, but her base is motivated to be donald trump more than anything else. i think she has a tremendous opportunity not having gone through a primary to be able to govern from the center which is what many americans want right now. they are tired of these rather shrill, extreme voices and there are a lot of republicans out there who don't like donald trump but are just nervous that the vice president will be pulled further to the left by

those more extreme elements in the party. so she's got to assure those voters she is going to govern from the center. host: you wrote an opinion piece with the headline donald trump's tariffs plan could bring us back to the 1930's. explain that. guest: in 1930 a law was passed that imposed rod tariffs across the board. it was passed at a time not long after the stock market crash of 1929 and actually the market was beginning to recover. global trade just dropped, crashed from $3 trillion to $1 trillion every economist of every stripe will tell you that smoot-hawley exacerbated the great depression. it made it much worse. i would argue something similar could happen now, that if we had across-the-board tariffs as donald trump was talking about,

he's using across-the-board. the prices everything goes up. one, it is inflationary. it is going to harm american manufacturers and american growers. go to hershey. i represented that community. 70 million hershey kisses a day, that's a lot of chocolate. how do you make chocolate? you have to get that cocoa. last i checked, we don't grow it in the united states, we have to import it from west africa. that is just one example. people like coffee. we have to import that. your couple coffee just went up in price. you like a banana, same thing. a lot of those big machines are

made by a dutch company. to make these chips cost a few hundred million dollars a pop. a lot of what we import is used for making things. ultimately, consumers will pay more. we are going to lose jobs over this, and this going to have a devastating effect on manufacturers. when trump talks about punishing john deere and slapping they tariffs on mexico, they are going to retaliate against american corn and other agricultural products. and that is what we saw with the chinese. when trump did all the chinese tariffs back in the first initiation, we ended up paying more out in subsidies to farmers then we collected. i get it, there are times you

should use tariffs and countervailing duties. if they are a slave laboring place, if they are dumping illegal subsidies, i get it. but across-the-board, devastating. we ran trade surpluses, we had unemployment rates over 20%. host: if you'd like to join the conversation with our guest charlie dent, you can do so. republicans are on (202) 748-8001. democrats are (202) 748-8000. independents, (202) 748-8002. a lot has been made of people who have worked in the trump administration not endorsing him. john kelly, his former chief of staff saying that he praised hitler and is a textbook fascist. the flipside of that is people saying well, he was fired and he's got an axe to grind.

jd vance has said it is because they couldn't control him and they share the same worldview. what is your response to that? guest: first, john kelly is an extraordinary american. four-star marine general. for him to come out and say the things he said wasn't easy. because these are military guys, they try to avoid getting in the political fray. i think john kelly was doing his duty as a chief of staff and homeland secretary doing his best, and he witnessed up close in person with many of us have seen in our interactions with a foreign president, that he is unfit and he is at times unstable. we've all seen the narcissism, the add, the impulse control issues, the temper. and lack of interest in policy. these are the kinds of things that john kelly has talked about. he saw it probably more than anybody else.

we should believe him. not just him, believe rex tillerson. john bolton, mcmaster, all these people worked around him had for quite public. and it's obvious why they are concerned. he's embraced vladimir putin. he's embraced kim jong-il, kim jong-un. host: but explain the word embraced. guest: he seems to be much more comfortable talking to these autocrats that he is with allies. in other words, he didn't distinguish between friend and foe. he was more critical of angela merkel and justin trudeau and he was of vladimir putin and kim jong-un. we have allies and friends and shared interests and values. you'd think we would embrace them more than people who try to undermine american

foreign-policy interest all around the globe. that is what i thought was so stunning. i thought that is probably but those individuals them stunning. host: let's talk to callers and start with bob, atlanta. caller: thank you for your program. sarah, i served in the military and i'm 78 years old and i just got one question for you. you a communist? guest: absolutely not. are you, sir? caller: kamala harris is so far to the left you can even see her. host: we will get a response. guest: i get it, i have policy disagreements with kamala harris just as you do, sir. but sometimes elections are not about right or left, enters a policy. maybe it is sometimes about right or wrong. one candidate here has demonstrated his unfitness.

repeatedly. the other, whatever you think of her policy positions, she strikes me as normal and honorable and i hate to say that that is where we are right now, but i'm going to choose honorable over dishonorable. host: austin, texas, democrat. caller: good morning. i just like to ask, i'm a convicted felon. i can't vote, but donald trump can and he is also a convicted felon. guest: that's a good question, actually. that's a great question. he's been convicted, but he has not yet been sentenced. i don't know when that sentence takes effect. he is a resident of the state of florida and i think there's rules on felons voting that are really determined at the state level as election law is governed at the state level. i'm not sure what florida's law

is on that, i think it might be a bit more permissive than texas. it's a matter of a function of state law. host: derek in minnesota, independent line, good morning. caller: good morning america and c-span. i have a couple points here. i want to walked on memory lane. we had a governor named tim walz who is the vice presidential candidate, he said that he was going to make one minnesota and bring everybody together just like joe biden said. save the soul of the nation. let's see what happen. minneapolis burned. we surrendered the police station. they took total control of the legislature, and we now have a brand-new flag that nobody likes. joe biden, who you said you voted for for those reasons, he has bragged he is the most

progressive presidential president ever. that didn't really work out. now you are doubling down and saying that harris is the one that is going to come to the center? let me give you some news on that, buddy. they said they made -- want to make washington, d.c. a state with two more senators. they want to make puerto rico a state with two more senators. they want it jampacked to add supreme court justices pass the court. they want to end the filibuster. is that going to the center? you are a useful idiot. guest: good morning to you, too. let me just take a few of these issues. i'm for divided government for a good reason, for the check on both parties, frankly. that would be the best thing that we could have happened in this country. a number of policy positions, i agree with you on some, others i disagree with. but the point