the speaker pro tempore: the chair lays before the house an enrolled bill. the clerk: h.r. 82, an act to amend title 2 of the social security act to repeal the government pension offset and windfall elimination provisions. the speaker pro tempore: pursuan t to section 3-z of house resolution 5, the house stands adjourned until noon on friday, >> when the 118th congress will gavel out for the last time and the new congress will begin. as always you will find live coverage of the house on c-span. >> during christmas week each night at 9:00 p.m. eastern, c-span will feature interviews

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this december 24. happy holidays to all of you. we will kick off this morning with your view on health care and whether or not you think it is a federal responsibility. republicans, (202) 748-8001. democrats, (202) 748-8000. independents, (202) 748-8002. if you work in the health-care industry, your line this morning is (202) 748-8003. all of you can text us at (202) 748-8003. include your first name, city, and state. you can also post on facebook.com/c-span or on x with the handle @cspanwj. 15 years ago today, this was the headline in "the washington post ," senate passes the so-called obamacare bill on a 60-39 vote.

going into the archives, we will show you then president obama talking about the bill. [video clip] >> in a historic vote this morning members of the senate joined their colleagues in the house to pass a landmark health insurance reform package. legislation that brings us towards the end of a nearly century long struggle to reform america's health care system. ever since teddy roosevelt first called for reform in 1912, seven presidents, democrats and republicans alike, have taken up the cause of reform. time and time again, such efforts have been blocked by special interest lobbyists who perpetuated a status quo that works better for the insurance industry than it does for the american people. with passage of reform bills in the house and the senate, we are finally poised to deliver on the promise of real, meaningful

health insurance reform that will bring additional security and stability to the american people. host: 15 years ago today, the senate passed, on christmas eve, their health care legislation that later became obamacare. this morning, his health care coverage a government responsibility? that is our question for all of you this morning. take a look at the recent poll. government responsibility to ensure health care coverage, the question posed to those that they polled, 62% said yes. 36% said no. here is how it broke down by party. 90% said that it was the responsibility of the federal government. 90% of democrats, 32% of republicans, 65% of independents said it was a federal government responsibility. we want to know from you this morning.

do you agree, disagree, and tell us why. we have a fourth line this morning for those who work in the health-care industry, we want to hear from you. start dialing in on this christmas eve morning. donald trump in a recent nbc interview was pressed on his plans for health care the coming year in his new administration. here is what he had to say. [video clip] >> talking to republican lawmakers, they say it is no longer feasible to repeal and replace obamacare because it is so entrenched in the system. do you see it that way, is it off the table? >> john mccain let us down by voting, as well as murkowski, collins, whoever, they let us down. they did a great disservice. obamacare is lousy health care. it's very expensive health care for the people. for the country and for the people. it's lousy health care.

when john mccain gave his thumbs down, saying for 10 years he wanted to repeal and replace and then he came down and did his famous thumbs down and became a hero to the left. just let me just tell you. if we find something better, we would love to do it. unless we find -- but one thing i have to say -- i inherited obamacare. or anything else. it's got 20 names. i inherited it. i had a decision to make with health and human services. i had a big decision to make. do i make it as good as we can make it or do i let it rot? a lot of people said let it rot and let it be a failure. i said that's not the right thing to do. i had good people in the medical area that handle that. i said what do you want to do. they said they had an obligation to make it as good as we can. we did. we made it as good as we could make it. instead of making it bad where

everybody would be calling for a repeal, i made it work. >> you tried to overturn it. you did have your justice department try to direct the supreme court. >> we got a surprising opinion, to be honest with you. if it had been overturned we would have had much better health care right now. but right now we have something i made the best of. i could have made the worst of it and it would have fallen by the wayside. i did the right thing from a human standpoint. but you know, i'm sort of proud of my decision. at the same time, sometimes i regret it. i told the people. i give the money to do it. i said fix it. people. make it work. people would've suffered. it's too bad. john mccain. he fought for 10 years on repairing, replacing, for 10 years, and then he voted against . nobody understands. >> during the campaign you said

you had concepts of a plan. do you have an actual plan? >> we have concepts of a plan. >> do you have a fully developed plan? >> let me explain, we have doctors and health care companies looking at it. obamacare stinks. it's lousy. there are better answers. if we come up with a better answer, i would present the answer to democrats and everybody else and i would do something about it. but until we have that or we can approve it, but we aren't going to go through the big deal. i'm the one that saved obamacare, i will say. i did the right thing. i could have done the more political thing and kill it. i tried to starve it to death. from a legal standpoint. >> you did try that with your legal department. >> but from a physical standpoint. host: in a recent interview, donald trump set obamacare is lousy.

gallup conducted a recent poll. 54% approve of the affordable care act. 38% disapprove. broken down by party, 94 percent of democrats say that they approve. 19% of republicans. 53% of independents. this morning, his health care coverage a government responsibility? chris, auburn, maine, welcome to the conversation, go ahead. caller: good morning. boy, it's hard to listen to donald trump do this lying pretzel thing about how he saved it. my head is exploding. i don't know why most of my friends are far right wing, but we were having this conversation about someone saying health care was a human right and i thought about that. it's not a human right. it's a social responsibility.

what i did was i equated it to a person walking on the side of the canal. there's a guy in the middle of the river who is driving and there is a row right there in front of you -- rope right there in front of you. you can throw the rope to save him. the guy that's drowning, does he have a human right? is it a human right that he has to be saved? or is it the social responsibility of the person walking to throw the rope? i think of health care as the same thing. i personally got a cancer diagnosis and recently had to have an mri. when i went back to see my cancer doctor i asked -- because the process took about one hour -- i said, do you know what it costs? he said yeah, 1500 bucks in your portion is 500. i said no, it was $6,000 into my portion was five grand. i posted this on facebook. it was my first real experience of treatment. a friend of mine who is an

oncologist from ireland, he said chris, come over here, it's only $300. i flew to ireland, had a nice little vacation, had another mri done. why is that? because we have a ceo who makes $15 million per year quote unquote running a health system in america. in america we decided that health care is in the profit center, not a social responsibility. my answer is that it's a social responsibility and we are insane in this country for not recognizing that. we are different from every other country on the planet in that regard. host: when you call it of social responsibility, does the federal government hold the responsibility? caller: there's nobody else i can do it. you can't leave it to a bunch of charities to try to do it and help from the best. you have seen from these christian funding networks where

they tried to pool money, they found the costs of giving birth is too high, they are running out of money. the federal government is the only thing that can effectively pull together the funds to do it. host: all right, chris, best of luck to you. delia, miami, republican. caller: yes. i have experienced socialized medicine. my family lived in spain. if people are prepared to wait for a surgery in wait a whole year to get it, yes, that's fine. if people think yes, here you can get an mri right away, they are insane. it takes months to be called to have an mri was something like that. my husband's uncle had melanoma,

diagnosed in february. you know when he has the said that surgery? at the end of june. by then, we were told that it was vetted -- embedded in his head, skin cancer that was really bad. there was nothing they could do about it. what happened? it grew right back. why? because he didn't get the surgery when he should have had it. host: ok, delia in miami arguing against government having the responsibility for health care. that is the conversation this morning. it's jean, ohio, democratic caller. what do you say? caller: i would like to point out that the government already takes a lot of the burden off of the insurance company.

they are already responsible. when you get sick, too sick to work, you go on disability. when you are old and have high medical expenses, i'm now 70, i've never been sick in my life, wonderful. what do they do to me? offload me into medicare, right? and i'm glad to. but i'm just saying, look at the disabled children that are born. what happens to them? they are put on disability. the insurance companies are skimming off the cream. that's my point. host: what do you think about these health care industry companies then? loss. we will leave it at that. in this first hour here on "washington journal," talking about health care and whether or not you think it is the federal government's responsibility to provide it in this country.

take a look at this headline from "the hill." "anger, pessimism over congress enacting new rules around the health insurance industry, even as they try to appear responsive to growing calls for reform following the killing of a united health care ceo, brian thompson. nguyen -- luigi mangione faces charges for the killing on december 4 and his death unleashed a torrent of anger on social media against the u.s. health system and insurance companies specifically and it opened an uncomfortable discourse given the profits he made personally given the high percentage of claim denials. this morning, is the federal government responsible for providing health care? janine, kissimmee, florida, good morning to you.

caller: good morning to you. happy and merry christmas and hanukkah to everybody. i just want to say that there are several points here. our government cannot even run itself, why would we want them running our health? socialism? socialistic health care doesn't work. that's proven, like the other caller just spoke about, regarding a lot of people from europe in those socialistic countries come to the united states because they can get immediate, they can get it immediately. i had a friend who was diagnosed with cancer in england and she came to the united states because it was going to take a year just to see an oncologist, not to even start her treatment. here, i think insurance industries collect a lot of money and people get misled. just like the guy who shot the

ceo, a lot of people feel -- i'm buying into this health, but all it is is healthy health care. you get one valuation per year. they really don't cover you or they deny because you don't meet certain requirements and a lot of people don't understand that. if you don't go in right away to get the mri, you have to try the medication and the therapy. they drag everything out. our insurance companies are still paid to the big bucks. look at your eob when it comes in every month if you have an appointment. they charge you $17,000 that here, my husband is going through chemo right now. $50,000 for chemotherapy sessions. when it goes through medicare, it's only $1000. and then your gap or your advantage picks up the other

$200. what the heck is this? why is that they can charge this ridiculous amount and they already have contracts? why is it always that cheap? host: what do you think is the solution? if you don't think the federal government should provide it, then how do you negotiate the lower prices? caller: if our legislators had the same insurance we did, i bet they would figure something out. because they get full coverage of everything. they don't have the same coverage as regular people have. they have a lot of special stuff going on. what is the answer? we need to go back to rolling back and stop allowing insurance companies to profit off of the taxpayers. we are constantly -- look at, look at, you have got people who say they are disabled. my sister was a nurse taking

care of a child who had some abnormal tees when she got born. the family was living big time off of the government when we paid and they could have been working, supporting themselves. there's a lot of problems we have. we need to go back to looking seriously at why we have to take care of everybody. we are able people. the people should be able to pay into their own funding as they are working. there's got to be something else. i'm not an expert. i'm not. but i just see a lot of problems and our government, our government, they cannot even take care of themselves. they print money up like it's nothing. host: janine, talking about her own and her husband's experience. we want to hear those stories from you this morning as you

tell us whether or not you think the federal government is responsible -- should be responsible for health care this morning. headlines dominating front pages this morning, coverage on capitol hill, starting with this story on politico, "a 17-year-old paid for sex, matt gaetz, cnn reporting that he paid for sex or drugs 20 times. according to the report put out yesterday by the health exit -- house ethics committee released yesterday. you can find that in the front page of the newspaper as well. former president bill clinton hospitalized for us -- observation and testing after developing a fever. cnn reporting that he is expected to be home by christmas , he is alert and resting. and then also this from the front pages of "usa today," joe

biden commutes sentences of most federal death row inmates." and is covered from capitol hill, back to politico, "president trump's big mike johnson decision. the president-elect is not happy with speaker johnson and some of his colleagues. senator rand paul predicted that the speaker would be ousted in 2025. that vote takes place january 3, opening day of the 119th congress. set your conch -- set your television to c-span for live gavel-to-gavel coverage that day , january 3. want to also share another headline with you this morning. this was related to our conversation about health care, from nbc news, read you mangione

to plead not guilty to the killing of the health care ceo. accused of gunning down brian thompson on midtown manhattan sidewalks, pleading not guilty yesterday. -- yesterday." going back to the phone calls and just a minute. more from our archives, mike johnson on the campaign for last fall, previewing the gop health care overhaul plan when they continue with their majority in the 119th congress. [video clip] >> health care reform will be a big part of the agenda. we've got a lot of things to go on the table. [laughter] health care, it's not a secret, big ideas on the table. we have these physicians who serve in the house and they have

spoken to us about this. it's a part of it. you have doctor-patient relationships keeping everyone more efficient, bringing in the free market. you had a sample of that last night. we want to take a blow torch to the regulatory state. it's crushing the free market. it's a boot on the neck of job creators and risktakers. we need this across the board. trump is going to go big. host: promising a big agenda in the 100 19 congress. mike johnson, along with trump in the second administration. this morning we want to know from you, do you think health care is a federal government responsibility? democratic caller caller:, good morning. caller:-- caller, good morning. caller: happy holidays.

the caller before me had us -- a criticism of socialized medicine and began to criticize private insurance. i didn't quite understand that. it doesn't make sense. the insurance company business model is to collect premiums from employers and us and they use that money to pay, hopefully , any time we need any type of coverage. they would be there for us. but there model is based on denying that coverage so that the business itself can make money and have profits. if we are looking at insurance companies to make profits, the whole idea with wall street is for the shareholders doing what they are supposed to be doing. host: if these insurance

companies don't scrutinize the claims, we do not have concerns there that people are making claims that could be false, fraudulent, etc.? if they don't scrutinize every claim for fraud, you know, false claims, everyone is paying into a system in the insurance company is paying out and are trying to protect profits and the money they pool. caller: correct. it's like johnson said, leave it up to the patient and the physician, that is where it should be. but that is not where it is. the physician then has to find for the coverage. often that's the case. 99.9% of the time, that's the case. if we had average denial for dissent on regular insurance

exchange, unitedhealth was at 32%. that means every third person that went with united, the largest provider, they are denying that coverage. they have strict scrutiny there. if there's a problem in the model and you remove that and have a universal coverage for all people, and then have these republicans, the rich ones that say they want it privatized, anytime they want to go and see a doctor with a diagnostic that's done, the trying out of that extra coverage, we can use that for those who want to use it and afford it. in terms of coverage for any type, let's follow all of the other countries that use this model and save our collected

taxes to fund the v.a., medicare, both of those are good models. we have other instances of the government providing public schools, colleges. community colleges are publicly funded. the k-12 grade is funded. so, if you are wanting to do it, you can do it. but the concept needs to be revised the american people need to look at health care, not health profit. if we start from that discussion, and i don't believe this republican party will do anything to do this. like he said, like he got done saying, leave it up to the physician and that and the private sector? capitalism. capitalism is what we have right now in the insurance companies. thank you.

host: same to you. united health care, "facing scrutiny over denying claims, accused of using algorithms to deny treatments in refusing coverage of nursing care to stroke patients." franklin, california. thank you for joining the conversation. what do you think? caller: good morning, greta. happy holidays, america. can you hear me ok? host: good morning. we can. caller: look, i don't have easy, facile answers to this problem. i know that the health care system we have today is incredibly dysfunctional. the clip you played earlier of donald trump, the fact that he was standoffish and didn't try to attempt to give easy answers is appropriate. this is an intractable problem. it's not an easy problem to solve.

sorry, i see your lips moving. were you going to say something? host: you are watching on a delay. go ahead. caller: anecdotal observation and personal observation, i will try to keep it short, i know there are a lot of callers. a guy gets a snake bite in georgia. i read about this. he was carried into a hospital. it up with a bill for 75 thousand dollars for a snake bite. i think that people can use their own logical reasoning and see that there is something out of line there. i don't want to go so far as he used the word malfeasance or corruption, but i don't know, call a spade a spade, the health care system is gouging the health care payer. and in my own personal experience here in marin county, i had a case of high blood pressure. my primary care provider said go into the er and boy they ran every test in the world.

i had a whole circle of doctors around my bed and they put me through cat scans, meningitis tests. i walked out with like a $30,000 bill, you know? host: how much of it did you have to pay? caller: i was very fortunate, i won't lie. i only had to pay about 25 hundred dollars of it. i'm fortunate in that regard. mostly worked for a lot of fortune 500 companies, even fortune 100 companies, very good health care plans. but i have been on the others, too, where i didn't have any health care and i went without it, honestly, for a couple of years. if i had gotten sick or fallen down the stairs, you know, that would have bankrupted me. host: go ahead, finish your thought. caller: yeah, i don't know what

-- to your point, is government health care -- is health care a government responsibility? i would say the government is responsible for the reformation and overhaul, yes. as to the degree that it should be responsible? i don't have a quick answer to that. i know a lot of people say -- look at sweden, look at canada. it's going to take, it's going to take some deep thinking on this from people who are smarter than me to figure out the problem. host: franklin, we will leave it there. a couple of callers talked about health care insurance and denied claims. take a look at the kaiser family foundation website, claim denials and appeals in the aca marketplace plans in 2021.

when you take a look at this, healthcare.gov issuers denied 17% of in network claims in 2021. so, take a look at that pie chart, compare the affordable care act to private health care insurance in our question this morning, should the government be responsible, the federal government, for providing health care. michael, florida, democratic caller. hi, michael. good morning. caller: the reason i'm calling is a few different things. health care is an ongoing issue in this country, has been for many years. it seems to me that it all starts in washington with the lobbyists. the insurance industry has tremendous lobbyists in washington who cater to the politicians, the politicians cater to them. when a politician is first elected, the first thing they

ask is where do i sign up for health care? they have the best health care. if they are our politicians and leaders, why don't they give that health care to the people they represent? why not do that? do the right thing. host: mel, thank you for joining us this morning. what do you say? caller: health care does not belong in the federal government. it should be managed by state government. the reason i say that, the constitution mentions nothing about health care. are we going to be a people who abide by it? or are we going to trust bureaucrats in washington, d.c., politicians who make these deals, instead of doing it in a way where the free market is a much better option? in that the states take care of it and see which state does the best.

if a state wants to have government control in everything, then fine. if a state says no, operated by the fruit market. host: all right, that was mel in new york with his ideas of who should be responsible here. our question this morning, is the federal government responsible for providing health care? we will continue with your calls, text messages, and posts. breaking news here from abc news, "american airlines" requests ground stops for all flights, according to the faa, that was early this morning. a technical issue disrupted their flights nationwide. it's the start of the busy christmas eve eve for travelers around the country. american airlines requested a ground stop for all of their flights. they have said that once the

business is rectified, you will be safely on your way to the dust -- or destination, that was the quote from american airlines. tony, buffalo, new york, good morning to you, tony. caller: good morning, ma'am. good morning, america, on this beautiful christmas eve day. i would like to state some facts. i know there's a lot of opinions out there this morning, but i would like to state some facts. during the trump administration, my health care as a single person was 542. it has gone up to 980. do the math. it's double. you know, we all have to understand also, i disagree with the entitled government. first of all, where are we going to pull that out of with $36 trillion in the hole, paying everyone to be in the federal government's hands? what i do think, and i do believe in president trump, he

needs to have a little round table discussion with all the insurance companies, to stop the gouging. like the one caller stated about all of these lobbyists. you know, enough is enough. sit down. he's a dealmaker. cut a deal. stop gouging the citizens of the united states of america. host: tony, you and others might be interested in the year and spending proposal debated and finally approved after several iterations last week, related to the debate was the pharmacy benefits manager. there were reforms in the first year and spending bill that were dropped and failed to make the cut in the package. for a moment it looks like congress would actually enact reforms of controversial pharmacy benefit management after several years of holding hearings and passing bills, but

it wasn't to be. the slate of measures that would have injected more transparency into the industry and changed practices were stripped from the massive bipartisan government funding package torpedoed by trump and musk. the vastly slimmed-down legislation that prevented the federal government from shuttering was signed by joe biden on saturday. the pharmacy benefit managers serve as middlemen between drug manufacturers, insurers, and governments. they determine which medication is covered by insurance plan and pay the pharmacies and have raised the ire of congress and others with opaque practices. the funding deal would have required them to provide more information on rebates and negotiations, as well as what they pay for drugs and how much

they compensate pharmacies, removing the connection between the price of drugs and compensation received in the medicare part d drug plans, shifting the payment model to flat fees. that was not included or signed into law. trish, democratic line, seattle, good morning to you. caller: hey, happy festivus, everybody. i'm a retired nurse. i worked in research. my lab gig as a case manager was with a big insurance company here in the northwest. last check, the ceo made $20 million last year. i'm on medicare. i have an advantage plan. let me tell you, it is not effective. it is not watching out for the

patient. ordering tests that don't need to be ordered in order to, in order to pull the paperwork to a higher costs level. for example, i went in and had my annual wellness check. that's supposed to be free. and then i got a bill for a five dollar co-pay. they had coded up the reason for that. i'm like no, i'm not going to pay that. i did not come in with anything brand-new to discuss with you today. between the doctors in the billing department, they will, they will find a way to up code your billing charge to make you pay more or get less service.

regarding health, look at women's health care. particularly maternal childcare, welfare and care. you don't see anybody rolling around without one when we can't get treated properly if they have a problem with their pregnancy. it's just like, oh well, let's wait and see what happens. host: on the floor, recently, of the house, democrats from california earlier this month talking about the anger towards health insurance companies. here's what they had to say. [video clip] >> across our land, there is outrage at national health insurance companies, private health insurance companies denying claims. denying claims for heart disease. denying claims for cancer.

denying claims for diabetes. mr. speaker, the average cancer patient in america will lose their entire life savings in two years. 42% of americans with cancer lose their life savings in two years. mr. speaker, 18% of americans have had their health care claims denied. 3.4 billion americans. on a very small matter, i had my health care claim denied by united health care when i wanted to get a $100 nasal pump for allergies. the claim, denied. i couldn't get that reversed. imagine people with more serious problems. one of the people that died in my district, sarah, died of a

sinus infection because her health insurance company denied her claims for basic health care . americans face denial after denial after denial. what is happening with these private insurance companies? let me tell you. 1.4 trillion in revenue. $70 billion in profits for the top seven private insurance companies. they say it's only 5% profit. it's $1.4 trillion sucked out of our economy while basic americans are denied health care. where does this money go? it's going to administrative costs. it's going to advertising. it's going to bloated executive pay salaries. we can't get people treatment

for cancer, for diabetes, for basic health issues. the american people are outraged and are lining up across the country to demand fundamental change to a broken health care system. enough. host: congressman ro khanna on the floor of the house, talking about the anger towards health care industries. this morning, do you think the federal government should be responsible for our health care in this country? here are some posts this morning on x. "any government that provides free health care for illegals and not citizens is incapable." another viewer saying -- i believe that as a civilized society we should at least start our student -- children off on a right and healthy track, a national health care system for

zero to five-year-olds. -- five-year-olds." patty, retired health care worker, good morning. caller: thank you for the excellent reporting. good morning, greta. it's tragic that a ceo needed to be assassinated to bring attention to the injustices in the health care system. i work for many years and major hospitals in rural hospitals and there is discrimination. if i could wave a magic wand, i would have everyone walking into a facility get excellent health care. i have seen discrimination. it's tragic when a couple of doctors get together in a corner and say well, this person doesn't have insurance. they are this, they are that, below socioeconomic and a discussion on further treatment that could save their lives. host: you have witnessed those

conversations? caller: absolutely, absolutely. i'm the nurse standing by. what am i supposed to do? continue treatment or step back? host: do they have a responsibility to treat? don't they have an ethical code? caller: absolutely, absolutely. we all do. interestingly enough, if you are of wealth, they will charge you more to cover their losses on someone who walked in without insurance. host: how do they do that? caller: they just do it through billing. i came upon it accidentally. it was in a christian facility. [laughter] host: explain. what did you discover? caller: doing the paperwork. i had to move some paperwork to get at my chart on the night shift. i kind of looked at it, the paperwork, just briefly, standing up. i saw the name that i knew.

sister explained, saying it's the name of the game. so. host: explain a bit more, what did she mean by it's the name of the game? caller: that you had to compensate. this particular patient was of means and had the ability to pay because of his insurance and his position in the community. so, the ones with lesser or no insurance, it covers their expenses in the facility. yeah. host: so, the insurance company doesn't see the different rates the facility is charging? caller: apparently not, apparently not. that being said, i had a number of retired family members in the v.a. system and even though they served in the military, they have to battle to get their payment through the v.a.. to me if you are a veteran,

everything should be taken care of. we can manage this. god bless you for reporting. eliminate the middleman. thank you, greta. host: kevin, north carolina, independent. caller: hi, greta. thanks for taking my call. most of the people in this country who have medicare, medicaid, insurance, it's all subsidized. all of it is controlled by the government. the problem is, people don't understand. the taxpayers pay for it. 100% of that is a write off for the corporations. meaning that the taxpayer is paying for it. you know, i just think that people don't open their eyes to that. they don't consider this as government-subsidized, but it actually is. host: doing a quick search year,

caller, from what i found in the united states, most people get health insurance through their employer. 53.7% of the population had employment-based insurance. you said it's coming from the government in some sort of way? caller: it is. these companies write off every nickel, dime, and quarter on their taxes. that's coming from the people. the taxpayers. host: from that end. ok. stuart, nebraska, republican. hello, stuart. caller: ma'am, i consider myself the most fortunate person you will talk to on the phone about this today. ok. my social security check is only $1250. meaning i'm eligible for nebraska medicaid and medicare.

it's all subsidized. i get subsidized. i live in a housing and urban development apartment. a condominium. it pays all rent in utilities for 300 $77 a month. all of my medical bills are paid. i am getting united health care supplementary deals, which i don't really need, because i'm going to get $200 a month in free groceries down at the store . plus, they supply, if i have to go to the doctor they supply the transportation to the doctor. i have had stents put in. thousands and thousands of dollars. i didn't even have to pay copayment. what a wonderful country we live in. [laughter] host: do you agree with this? some would say that that is the safety net at work, right?

you don't make enough money, or you make a certain amount, so the safety net kicks in and all these different ways. caller: that's what i'm saying, what a wonderful country. ok, they just shot down an air force plane that costs 50 million dollars, right? although money is government money. plus we are 35 trillion in debt. they just added another $200 billion on the deficit. this is going to last very much longer. if you read the book, "last days of the roman empire," you know, we are living in the last days of it. and i'm grateful for what i have. host: ok. we show you what trump had to say recently about his plans for health care. the health and human services secretary recently spoke at a public health symposium at johns

hopkins university. they had this to say about the biden administration's record on health care. [video clip] >> today in america, more americans have a chance to go to a doctor. or to visit a hospital in leave their child there without worrying about going into bankruptcy. more people in america today can do that than ever in the history of the united states. more than 300 million americans today have their own health insurance. whether it is private or public. they have their own health insurance. meaning they can walk into a doctor's office without bowing their head. they can leave the child in the hospital without worrying about the mortgage or the rent, they come with coverage. that has never happened in this country 04. today in america, -- country

before. today in america, we are inventing the next generation of medicines and vaccines that will continue to save lives. today in america, we are developing some of the best ways to move our country's health system from one that treats illness to one that print out -- promotes wellness. host: the outgoing health and human services secretary talking about the biden administration record on health care. this morning we are asking you if the federal government should provide it. liz, new york. caller: hi, how are you? host: good. caller: my belief is that health care is a human right and that the federal government should provide it. the reason is, the federal government doesn't have a profit incentive like these other insurance companies. if you are on traditional

medicare, not medicare advantage, you are getting some of the best health care in america. it's an efficient system. there's is very little fraud and waste, because we blew it out. -- boot it out. we can do this. taxpayers are going to pay for this. whether we pay for employer health care through tax credits or be paid through medicaid because people don't have coverage. or if we pay through our medicare taxes. so, the costs is going to be borne by the american taxpayer. -- cost is going to be borne by the american taxpayer. do we pay a ceo $20 billion per year to put money in the coffers of these insurance companies?

if we take the profit motive out, health care will be better. host: all right. liz, new yorocratic caller . mark in canada says -- speaking as a canadian physician, it's unconscionable to take advantage human misery. llective responsibility with no expectation of profit i best way to do it. like it or not, that means societywide and that means government," he writes. cary, texas, good morning. cary, you are a health care worker? caller: i wanted to just call out a few things. we owe it to franklin roosevelt, lbj, and barack obama, everything we have to aid our health care. further, i just wanted to suggest to the audience, grab someone in new york or d.c. who

has a contact with either hillary or some of her workers to help her with her investigation on the subject. you will not find a better informed person in the world. thank you very much for taking my call. have a great day. host: same to you. anne, independent line, new mexico. hi i'm in the hospital -- caller: i'm in the hospital right now, just getting over surgery. it would not have been covered by blue cross blue shield of that law have been passed. that made me realize that right now ultimately i think the government is responsible. looking at a transition only, regulating the costs instead. moving to single-payer afterwards in the transition.

we can't do anything as it is right now. another thing is i have ppo and brought two children to the doctor for a well check. treated as a separate bill, it was differently coded than the other ones for the exact same thing. that's why i think there should be some sort of oversight on the insurance agencies to include more of the codes that they use. host: well, if the doctor who is putting in those codes, the hospital administrators putting in the codes. oversight over them as well? caller: over what sort of codes can be used for the same exact procedure. host: all right. we wish you a speedy recovery, there. eric, tennessee, democratic

caller, hello. caller: i did a little quick research and i'm sure it's not perfectly accurate, but it looks like maybe $7,500 to stay at a hospital bed overnight. that's on the average in the united states. that has to be paid by somebody. the problem is, if you look at canada, and i have personal experience there, and europe, a lot of those systems where you get really good emergency hospitalization treatment, but anything that would be a scheduled procedure, you get, it's rationed and you get put on an interminable waiting list. and it's all about costs. you know, the money doesn't grow on trees. you've got to tax the citizenry if they want that kind of, you

know, coverage for everything. and the people, the regular people, can't afford it. so, it's, that's the problem with that. we saw that with the aca, obamacare, the costs of it has skyrocketed. thanks. host: a few minutes left in our conversation this morning in our first hour of "washington journal." on c-span two, you may have noticed our promotion on the screen, there is a marathon session of trump nominees. those that trump put forward to serve in his cabinet, in their own rd we are digging into the c-span ariv to show you what the nominees have set over the years , either about policy, politics, or the president-elect himself.

in their own words, all day marathon. today at all this week, it's on c-span2. you can watch our free mobile video app or online, c-span.org. those of the folks on ur screen that we are featuring today. pete hegseth, doug collins, scott turner. joe, marilyn, hi -- mirror land, -- maryland, hi. caller: i just wanted to say that last year i wasn't doing too well, financially. i was briefly on medicaid, i think that's what it is? for the people without money. maybe i got that mixed up. frankly, it was the best health care i have ever had. it just -- things were made easy instead of difficult. honestly, you know, now that i

feel better and i look at my insurance now and i would gladly pay the same amount or whatever the fair market rate would be to have the same health care that i had under medicaid. host: tell me, what made it easy? caller: there weren't the same, you know, back and forth's that you do with insurers. the co-pays were one dollar. everything was covered. instead of covering 80%, leaving you with still, you know, deep financial hardships if something bad happen to you, 20% of a huge amount of money is still a large amount of money. you know, i don't know what all the things are that go into medical costs. it seems like a very tangled system. i don't see why we have to have

entirely government sponsored health care and nothing else, but why not let the federal government compete? they are a large agency in a competent system. why not let them compete in the same way private companies do? i would gladly buy in or pay taxes for it. host: you are talking about, perhaps the way that works, if you remove the employer-based insurance, like with car insurance, you go and you find the best deal that works for you, rather than getting caller: i think that employer-based insurance is an odd set of things to weld together. it seems like an unnecessary extra step in the system, and

furthermore i would like to be able to buy from the government, because it seems that they have the system that works best for the average american. host: got it. i'm going to leave it at that. coming upext, we continue with this week's holiday author series on the waon journal. eight days of conversations with across the political spectrum on a variety of public policy and political topics. after the break we will be joined by author and journalist ray suarez discussing his book "we are home: becoming american in the 21st century: an oral history." we will be right back. ♪ during christmas week, each night at 9:00 p.m. eastern, c-span will feature interviews

with departing members of congress, republicans, democrats and independents from both chambers. abel discussed their careers, key legislative achievements, the state of congress and american politics and their farewell speeches. tonight california democratic congresswoman -- and cathy mcmorris rodgers. patrick mchenry, dan kilby and earl blumenauer. friday, delaware senator tom crawford in california democratic congresswoman --. watch our interviews with departing members discussing their in congress this week starting at 9:00 p.m. eastern on c-span, c-span now, or online at

c-span.org. >> sunday on q&a, virginia's newly elected democratic speaker of the house of delegates and the state's first black speaker in 405 years talks about his life including spending almost eight years in prison. >> i had never been in trouble before and i was hoping that i would get a little bit more grace, and he probably could have given me even more time than he did. i remember my mother, when he said 10 years, that yelp of pain, it always stays with me and it always lets me know how fragile our freedom is and if you make one wrong move

sometimes, it can literally be the end of your life as you know it. >> virginias democratic house speaker donald scott on c-span's q&a. you can listen to cuban day and all of our podcasts on air free c-span now app. the house will be in order. >> c-span celebrant 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 to where the policy is debated and decided all with the support of america's cable companies. c-span, 45 years and counting powered by cable. listening to programs on c-span through c-span radio is easy. tell your smart speaker play c-span radio and listen to

washington journal daily, important public affairs events throughout the day and weekdays, catch washington today. listen to c-span any time. just tell your smart speaker play c-span radio. c-span, created by cable. washington journal continues. host: washington journal annual holiday authors week series ntues. ght ys of conversations with ame's top writers from across the political spectrum on a variety of public policy and political topics. and this morning we want to welcome author and former pbs news hour chief national correspondent ray suarez. his book "we are home: becoming american in the 21st century: an oral history." mr. suarez, good morning to you. why did you decide to write this book? guest: i guess one of the conception moments for a book like this is when i was sitting

in my living room watching the unite the right rally in charlottesville, virginia and watched a long, torchlight parade of young men chanting "you will not replace us" and i knew something had gotten really off-track in the great american family fight over immigration. and i started to gather the way you do when you're starting a book project. clipping articles, saving files and starting to write a pitch. and things only got worse from then on as the worldwide crisis in southern migration, people fleeing their home countries got worse. and america, it wasn't a great moment for the way we handled it and the we we talked to each other about it. host: when you started your research then, what did you find? guest: that immigrants to the

united states, many of them are of the last two generations have higher levels of workforce participation, lower levels of involvement with the criminal justice system, and higher levels of education than earlier generations of immigrants. they are undoubtedly a net plus to the united states, and at the same time, because for the first time in our history most immigrants to the united states are not white, we have a much more conscious feeling of the presence of a different kind of people among us that is causing social anxiety, cultural anxiety, and again, the panic that accompanies that idea that america will be a nonwhite majority nation in the future

has led us to some places where when we handle immigration the way we set policy on immigration has not been best for the country or best for the immigrants. host: i want to read from the book foruriewers. the idea that forces are engineeringraphic change in the uniteds to the detriment of wof european igin by encouraging higher rates of immigration to shift the balance of political power in the united states has moved from the fringes of american ideological battles to somewhere much closer to t emotional center. as tucker clson climbed the greasy pole at fox news channel he frequently told his audience among the largest in cable television history that the democratic party was trying to replace the current u.s. electorate with new people, more obedient voters from the third world, and that is a quote that

you pulled from tucker carlson. so do you blame the media, and is it the conservative media? guest: in part. the great replacement theory needs oxygen to get traction, to move from the fringes of american discourse to the center of it. and it is personalities like tucker carlson who have given the great replacement theory that kind of attention that gives it currency, that gives it power, that gives it the kind of cultural currency that it might not have had otherwise. and it is an ugly, anti-american idea that the new arrivals, unlike those from palermo in warsaw and dublin of 120 years

ago, that these people can never get the hang of being part of us. that is i think part of the ugliest part of this whole idea about new immigrants, that while my great grandparents or my great-great-grandparents could get the hang of being american, these new people from these new places won't. and that really needs some examination, for people to ask themselves why they believe that when so many millions of immigrants are succeeding so phenomenally. host: how does your book tell the opposite of that? guest: it does a deep dive. i spent a lot of time with immigrants in recent decades talking to them about why they came, how they got here, how to get the hang of being here, what they make of the place, how they feel about being american. and you come away with the kind of heartening, encouraging idea

about the future. listen to the immigrants themselves. they realize this country is a hard place to get ahead. they realize that it takes a phenomenal amount of hard work to get here and start with very little and make a secure life for yourself. the othering of these new people, casting them into some new place in our history that is different from our own ancestors is really doing them a disservice. host: kalus one story. guest: i begin the book with a guy came from kenya at the age of 18, a city on the indian ocean. he was from the very old arab community in kenya. he came to columbia, maryland as he finished high school, and he was immersed in american pop culture and thought he would

immediately get the hang of being here. and before long he's working two full-time jobs, one doing the breakfast line at mcdonald's. he would go home, get a couple hours nap and then do another shift at the convenience store wawa. there he is working 80 hours a week going slightly crazy and his answer is to join the united states army. and the stories he tells about being a brand spanking new resident of the united states and a member of the united states army are sort of touching and whole areas the same time. he gets shipped out to korea and they often pair american units with korean counterparts so they can work together. and his korean soldiers all have relatives in the united states

and they are pumping him for information about what it is like to live in america and he finally has to tell them i don't know what it's like to live in america, i was there a couple of months and then i joined the army. he has an amazing story with i think a very redemptive ending. he goes and protests at douglas international airport against the muslim ban, the trump era policy that blocked arrived and majority muslim countries and the alliances that he couldn't do that in his own country. he would be surveilled, he would be photographed, he would be tracked. he was there with all kinds of other people protesting against this policy with his sign. they made cardboard signs at home and ran down to the airport and he had been ambivalent after 9/11, the rise of anti-muslim feeling, and he said he felt very american at that moment.

the freedom to protest, the freedom to be seen in public, opposing the government and government policy. and his son is now in the maryland national guard. host: our guest this morning, ray florida -- ray suarez, author of the book "we are home: becoming american in the 21st century: an oral history." part of our holiday authors series this week. also the host of shifting ground with ray suarez. we're talking about immigration and immigration policy. republicans dial in at (202) 748-8001. democrats, (202) 748-8000. independents, (202) 748-8002. democrats, (202) 748-8000. we are going to get to your calls and just a minute.

i want to show our viewers and have you respond to president-elect donald trump. he was at turning point usa on sunday and this is what he had to say about his border, mass deportation proposal. trump: on my first day back in the oval office i will start a slate to close our border to illegal aliens and to stop the invasion of our country. and on that same day we will begin the largest deportation operation in american history. larger even than dwight d. eisenhower. and as part of operation aurora. you know all about aurora, how horrible that has been. every single foreign gang and illegal alien member, all of this criminal network operating on american soil will be dismantled, deported and

destroyed. we will get them out. think of it. they sent their gang members to us. busload after busload. we had an open border. they are gang members, they are drug dealers, they are drug addicts. people that were sick, people that were healthy. what the hell was that? you get a little yips appear every once in a while. i wonder why. that was a strange sound. very strange sound. every foreign gang member will be expelled and i will immediately designate the cartels as foreign terrorist organizations. we are going to do it immediately. and we will unleash the full power of federal law enforcement, ice, border patrol. by the way, how good is tom

homan? he's phenomenal. i've known him a long time. the dea, the fbi, the intelligence community and financial sanctions to remove the migrant gangs and criminals that are killing and raping and maiming our citizens, we are going to get them out fast. we have no choice. we have no choice, by the way. i don't want to do that, but we have no choice. host: ray suarez, when you hear the president elect talk about border proposals, mass deportation plan that he ran on and he won, what goes through your head after writing this book? guest: is part of a very ugly american tradition.

in the second half of the 19th century, tens of millions of people came to this country, mostly from europe. and people who were not happy about that said that they were diseased, criminals, and bringing foreign ideas and forward ideologies to the united states. basically making the u.s. a less healthy place by being here instead of making it an economic superpower which they did by coming here and going to work. it's literally running the 19 century playbook again. instead of admitting that of these hundreds of thousands of people who made it across the border and go to work taking your prompts, busing your tables, running through shingles and electrical wire, he makes it sound like they are all members of criminal gangs.

obviously some of them are members of criminal gangs and some of them are criminals. but the stuff during the campaign about emptying out insane asylums and emptying out prisons, and exciting certain countries from which an infinitesimal number of immigrants come, like the democratic republic of congo. he kept bringing up,". think about that. it was really a disheartening display. i don't know if he doesn't know or if he knows and he says it anyway, but it was just untruth and fantasy about who comes to the united states, how they get here. we've never had an open border. the border has never been more heavily patrolled, and at the same time, the border has never

been under heavier stress. why? because there is a worldwide migration crisis, not because the united states is julie early or particularly open. they've got the same problem in turkey, the same problem in greece, the same problem in italy, the same problem in france and great britain. the idea that the united states, one of the biggest and most powerful countries in the world with one of the largest populations in the world was somehow going to sale by while 25% of the entire population of venezuela left the country because it is a cratering, failing state, whoever came up with that idea? of course the united states was going to be put under pressure. and even much poorer countries are being put under pressure by what is going on around the world right now. host: ray suarez is our guest, author of the book "we are home: becoming american in the 21st

century: an oral history." we want to have a conversation with all of you this morning about immigration and immigration policy. we will go to joe in plainfield, new jersey. welcome. caller: thank you for having me, it's actually north plainfield. keep up the good work, mr. suarez. i'm calling because they want to address two issues. i'm wondering if your book at all the addresses the fact that many people come here particularly from sale the va state -- south of the united states and of america because of the economic conditions that they were facing, not only because of drug cartels but also the fact that many of the people there suffered under american practices of coming in and taking their products out of their countries at a reduced price that made it profitable

for the united states. i don't know if your book addresses that. and i would also like to know if your book addresses the kind of becoming american in the united states that also requires, in many ways, the idea that you must take on the morals, and in some ways the prejudices that americans, the dominant american culture has. because i noticed that you mentioned the person you just talked about profiling, you mentioned he was not a black african and i'm wondering, and i see how often probably because people want to -- don't want to be seen in a certain light themselves and issue other people's views of them as immigrants and all of the prejudice to go along with that, but i also see that many times, immigrants take on the prejudices that are already here in america and dismissed people because of our color and i am

wondering if your book addresses that as well. guest: thank you very much for your call in for your question. one of the chapters in the book is specifically about black immigration to the united states, particularly from africa. i think it is a remarkable and redemptive story that after america's very tangled and very unhappy history with race and particularly with slavery, that now, today in america, one out of every 10 black people in the united states is an immigrant and one out of five black people in the united states is either an immigrant or the child of black immigrants. so immigration from the caribbean and particularly from africa is soaring, and there are now among us people who are ready to throw in the line and do the work of being a newcomer to the united states from nigeria, from liberia, from

senegal, from ethiopia. i profile some of those people in the book and talk about how many of them are aware when they come to the united states, very aware of this country's history, and they set it aside. they assume that the country is a better place today, and i talked at length to a nigerian oncologist working in chicago, an ethiopian who came during the ethiopian civil war because they were at child soldiers and his family sentiment of the country, and he went to high school in the united states and then to college. and when he watched the world trade center fall fund a beautiful workday in september of 2001, he realized this was his country. this was the country that he knew as an adult and his fantasies about going home to ethiopia, his dream of someday going home and educating -- as

an educated person going back to work in ethiopia really weren't going to happen and he became a united states citizen at that point. and man who came from senegal when all his friends were aspiring to immigrate to france, he said no, i want to go to america. and he became an english teacher in senegal, and won the diversity lottery, got a visa and came to the united states. did a long hitch in the army and now lives in harlem and is a religious teacher. a wide variety of stories. color is very much a part of his story because until the post-civil war constitutional amendments, only white people could naturalize. if you came here from anywhere else in the world you can only become a citizen if you were white. chinese were specifically barred. then later, asians more

generally were specifically barred from naturalizing, from becoming citizens. and i tell the story of how our concept of widening the net has been a steady progression and now people are coming here from everywhere to become citizens and it is changing what we look like as people, changing our image to the rest of the world. but color is very much a part of this story because american law was very much obsessed with color for a long time. and that has changed. host: ray suarez is our guest this morning. talking about immigration, the lines are regional this morning. (202) 748-8000. mountain pacific, (202) 748-8001 . and if you are and immigrate to the united states, we want to hear from you at (202) 748-8002.

brad in texas, good morning to you. go ahead. caller: good morning to you. the gentleman, he lives in lala land. there color is their advantage. affirmative action, they are accepted to med school and law school. they destroy our elementary schools. my mom was a teacher for 30 years, she had to get out because they are not to the benefit of the american people. host: why do you say that? caller: because i see them every day. they live better than americans. they have a man that is out working, a woman with four or five kids getting welfare. it's almost always that way. that's why over 70% of all immigrants are on welfare. these people are living off the flood of america with immigrants. host: ok, we will get ray

suarez' response. guest: well it is checkable and simply not true that 70% of immigrants are on welfare. immigrants, whether naturalized american citizen or legal permanent residents or certainly undocumented are simply not qualified, they're not allowed to take advantage of a lot of social welfare programs. i'm talking to you this morning not from lala land, but from new york city, where 40% of all residents were born somewhere else outside the united states. 8.5 million people, that is about 4 million people. 600,000 of them, or roughly the size of the entire city of milwaukee are undocumented immigrants. and this is a bustling, hard-working city. two people cheat? yeah, people cheat to get benefits. two foreign-born people cheat?

some, there is some cheating in the system. but this idea that immigrants just flood in and don't do anything, we've just got to look. look at the world that you live in. in restaurants, in travel, in parking garages. everywhere you go in big metropolitan areas there are people who were born somewhere else. doing jobs that we are happy there is someone to do. when unemployment is at 4% you've got to wonder just how many of these large taking jobs that americans want? do some of them, yeah, probably in construction and transportation and others job categories, jobs that americans would like to compete for and either don't, or feel that the wages have been bid down by the presence of an immigrant workforce. a lot of that work does not work

that are caller from texas is dying to get out there and do. host: perception is reality, so how do you then tell the story that you are telling so that people understand from what you found out about why immigrants are coming here and what they are doing when they get here? guest: as the earlier caller alluded to, a lot of them come from places that have long histories with united states, and one of the people i profile in the book came to the united states because his country, el salvador was mired in a terrible, destructive bloodletting civil war. at the end, he started as a student and then office cleaner in washington, d.c. at the end he reflected on his american life, all of his kids had gone to college and done

quite well. he said what i have liked to continue growing up in el salvador? having a life there among my family and everything i knew and my own hometown? that would have been great, but that was not possible. it just wasn't possible. during the worst years of the liberties were, he didn't want to leave her country. her family forced her to go. she was from the armenian minority in beirut. and they moved to los angeles and she hated it. and eventually got the hang of it. during the iranian revolution. she was a trained and qualified nurse from scotland, her husband was a librarian from the countryside in ron. they didn't want to leave iran. they didn't want to come to the united states.

but they had to get out of the iran, and they came here and they went to texas because there were texas hospitals that really needed nurses, and they were glad to have her. people come for a variety of reasons. they come in a variety of ways, legal and illegal. we've got to admit that yes, some of them come in ways that are contrary to the law, but a lot of the people i spoke to came with a real desire to get their lives in order and they saw the united states as a way to do that. they saw the united states as a place where people like themselves could succeed. there's a lot of countries in the world that people look at and say that is not a place that i want to move to. that is not a place where i can live at my dreams, and that is not a place that is going to let me live out my aspirations. i wrote a chunk of this book while working as a teacher in

china. china has a very different attitude toward immigration and toward immigrants. part of the strength of the united states, one advantage it has over its competitor china is that we make immigrants into americans and you can live for decades in china and you would still be a foreigner. host: you were teaching english in china, is that what you said? guest: i was teaching in the political science department at nyu in shanghai. host: and when was this? guest: in 2022, during the pandemic. host: and part of that experience is what shaped this book. guest: absolutely. because it forced me, living as a foreigner in a big, complicated society like china really helped crystallize my thinking as i was writing about what it means to be a foreigner in a place and what does it even

mean to be foreign? it was a very clarifying experience. host: jacksonville, florida. caller: hello. so i think everyone realizes that we want people to come to this country illegally, but the issue is is the people who don't want to assimilate. we are seeing it in new york. we seen it with the woman who was lit on fire on the subway. these things are horrible and this is becoming more regular. but another issue is we are seeing it all over europe. we are seeing it in germany and the christmas market. we are seeing it in france and england. people are getting tired of this, that is the issue. we want these people to come here.

look at japan. if you actually go and stay there permanently, you have to assimilate. host: we will take that concept. guest: i think part of that is scale and i think he is onto something. there is a moment of reckoning in the countries that he mentioned. germany took in a large number of refugees and there's a great deal of political back and forth inside and some soul-searching inside about whether that was the right thing to do if you hold back -- whether or not these immigrants are succeeding. in france, there are and their half-inch for decades now argument in the french society about the scale and extent of immigration to largely french cities.

all over the anglosphere. in australia and canada as well. it is absolutely ripe and the idea that people don't assimilate it is, i think, encouraged in every encounter you have with an immigrant that is not totally fluent in english yet. every person that you see on the street who outwardly appears foreign, wearing the garb of their country, maybe a headscarf he job. -- i think there is a new model for immigration. this issue is going on at the same speed that it did with earlier generations. this idea that they come here and never speak english wasn't true in 1920 and it wasn't true

in 2020. what is different is that monitoring communications and monitoring commerce offers immigrants a way to stay fluid and stay current but wasn't as a level to someone who came to the united states in 1910. so spanish language networks. cable television in farsi and arabic, these were things that were not part of the scene with earlier immigration. so in immigrant can remain who they were and keep up the culture of the united states instead of being forced to set aside everything they were before they came here. it's more a la carte. it is really up to the immigrant how much culture they want to retain. some people jump in with both feet and set aside who they were immediately.

and others want to be they were they learn and i live among us and they get the hang of feeding where -- american the same way people from poland and italy and romania did. host: joy, next, in las vegas. caller: good morning. host: questioner, yes. caller: caller: i was wondering why american did not have open borders, i don't understand why the media or people just tell the truth. we do not have open borders. we have an area where people can come in on the border illegally.

what they are talking about is getting rid of the people that come over illegally, but if this is happening in other countries, i've not read your book but i am going to get it and read it and i would just hope that we will take that. guest: i think she's really onto something important. the republicans very potently and very effectively use the idea of -- in past elections. and the democrats were almost supine on this issue. did not point out that there were more agents on the border than they have ever been in their history.

more heat sensing technology that can figure out if bodies are moving across the border. more intelligence, more deportations. they treated this issue like kryptonite and instead of pushing back and saying this is what we do, this is what has been done, this is what happened -- hasn't changed since donald trump was president, this is that had to change when barack obama was president and deporting many more people than george w. bush. the number of people trying to come across the border increased. the number of encounters with republican travel agencies increased. the difference was more people were trying to use international law regarding refugees. they were coming across here is who i am, i want to stay.

that gave the it challenge the it is still coping with to this day and instead of being honest about it, i fault the democrats for not making a real fight. republicans, you want to fight about this issue? what would have made donald trump sinking that deal in the congress earlier than 2024, and more important issue. there's never been an open border. there hasn't been an open border in recent history, not at all. host: a headline from december, just days ago. joe biden ministration to ports more vibrant that donald trump and his at 10 year high. mark in ocean city, maryland, you are next. caller: i just wanted to take exception to the way you

portrayed donald trump as if he is the only president in recent history to take such a strong position. you can look at youtube videos from bill clinton or hillary clinton, barack obama and anything joe biden is saying is very much the same kind of thing. even joe biden was a proponent of having immigrants, forcing them to learn english. i think donald trump with the only one who was actually doing something rather than talking about it, and perhaps his presidency just coincided with a lot of other things like the ddi initiative, that if you are white you are the oppressor and things like that, just a lot of things coinciding at the same

time. maybe the tearing down of statues in different cities, things like that. just a whole lot of things happening all at once just stirring the pot. >> i think that is a fair point. i think some of the cultural anxiety about these questions has to do with a lot of things happening at once. yes, every reason president has had something to say about illegal immigration and the number of people living long-term and undocumented in the united states has continued to rise. you can't have a country where the commercial sector , where private business has a 100 foot high blinking sign that

says help-wanted and at the same time have a government that is saying don't come here. that is what we had for the last four years. we are reaping what we've sewed. political crisis is different. you have a meltdown in venezuela. 15% of the entire population of cuba has left the country. 11 million people have left venezuela. a lot of them have gone to other neighborhoods and a lot of them have tried to come to the united states. they were also chinese and ukrainians and people from west africa who made their way through panama, up through central america and mexico.

the united states has experienced something part of a worldwide basis right now we are not handling at all that well. immigrants, if we allow them to work, will succeed. the rising tide will lift all those, as it has throughout our history. it wasn't immigrants tearing down statutes, it wasn't immigrants marching with torches in shows for virginia. it is just that a lot of these crosscurrents are happening to coincide. closing down highways after the killing of george floyd and carrying black lives matter signs, for that matter. but it just comes at a moment of high cultural conflict and immigrants -- attract their

attention even as they are quietly picking crops and busing and plastering and painting walls. host:'s book is "we are home: becoming american in the 21st century: an oral history." did you look at laws, what impact could they have had on where we are today?. guest: a lot of today's americans praised them for "doing it the right way doing at the legal way as a way to contrast them with today's veterans. i don't really grasp of the fact that for much of american history, until 1924, there were virtually no rules.

if you would arrive it was really easy to come into the united states. doing it the right way when you arrive that sends immigrants into a byzantine maze of laws and requirements and documents and filings, something that would've driven the immigrants from 1890 crazy. it is a very different world as a very different world as mentioned earlier in our conversation for much of the early part of american history. the systematically excluded people from most places in the world except for europe, so we got european immigrants. and because of that reason as i also write about at length in the book, america's religious

landscape is changing at the same time. there were virtually no hindus in the united states. very few until 1965. a very, very small number of muslims in the united states until 1965, and then we changed the laws, the immigration and nationality act of 1965 scraps the system that favored europe and basically opened the door to a much broader set of countries. and america starts to change from 1965 on with that law signed by president johnson, champion in the senate by edward kennedy, teddy kennedy of massachusetts, and at the time that that law passed, they both promised they had members of congress that the country but he wasn't going to change that much i don't know whether they were just saying it to get other members on board, i don't know

whether the the didn't think that the country was going to change that much, so i run a lot about the laws that were enforced during the 19th century 20th-century and of course 1965 that that really changes immigration to the united states and makes us the complicated and diverse place that we are today. host: joseph in baltimore, good morning to you. caller: good morning. host: questioner,? caller: i have a question and a comment. host: go ahead. caller: a little bit, about expanding sure, united states, and also the reason why, and the third thing is the difference

between boarding and crossing. and one more thing. the original slave that came over here underneath the sea, over top of the sea, in trucks, it is a big, big difference. most of them do not want to work in there told by employers. for the last four years, the united states, -- guest: i think joseph is getting at something that is very interesting warned to understand about america in the 21st century. lack immigrants to the united states with her they come from the caribbean, from africa, or from the african diaspora in other parts of the world are

given terrible social messages about being black in the united states when they arrived as immigrants. it has been savored the by historians earlier on the social ladder, you know you were a couple of runs up the ladder from day one for people who were born here and lived here their whole lives. that is black americans. it's not a proud part of our history but it is part of our history. there are tensions between black immigrants in black americans. there are misunderstandings that go in both directions, and i

also want to speak briefly about something that joseph mentioned earlier, which is the way that the united states porter moved in the 19th century meant that a lot of latinos in the united states are non-immigrants, people who were part of the spanish empire and then the expansive united states moved from sea to shining sea and under manifest destiny they became part of the united states in texas, arizona, new mexico, california. and they are part of a much older civilization on this continent and have never been immigrants. it's useful to remember and understand that. that they have been much outnumbered by people who have come here from the rest of the hemisphere in more recent decades. but joseph makes a very good point, both about black americans and their relationship with lack immigrants and about

latinos being both new arrivals and among the oldest residents of this continent in this country at the same time. host: good morning to you, go ahead. caller: merry christmas and i look forward to a happy three kings day. the gifts are right behind me for tomorrow morning. and i also want to thank brian lam and everyone at c-span for democratizing the information that is out there. i want to say how great i think the silence of -- styles of journalism that you do is, and some of you callers have some different opinions than other folks and i think it is really wonderful the way you handle things. my question or comment is around the economic organizing that is happening right now within the democrat and refugee community in the history of america.

right now there is a whole slew of low-wage workers across the country from waffle house to amazon to the airports. and much of that work is being done by folks in a precarious situation with their legal status. in the consequence of mass deportations, not only are we going to have this cultural anxiety, but there is an economic interest. there is a really beautiful history of 1199 in new york with dr. king. right now in minnesota there is this alignment that is happening. an excellent article called turning the tables in minnesota. and severe -- for your next project i really think you should take a look at the intersection of economics and immigration.

but again, thanks for all you do and merry christmas and happy holidays. guest: thanks a lot. as marty mentions, as he implies, it's impossible to talk about the history of labor in this country without talking about in ration but an interesting thing is happening. shout out to the service employees international union, organizing, and workers throughout the country. united food and commercial workers. people who work in meat plants and work with chickens and pigs. people who work in the needle trades in southern california. there is a lot of organizing that needs to go on, there is a lot of organizing that is going on, and it connects in a lovely way to union square a couple of miles from where i'm sitting right now where you can see signs italian and get it --

yiddish as union rallies went on in lower manhattan. that is part of the story with low-wage workers. another one that is less talked about i think is home health care workers who are in the nascent months and years of organizing a national movement. 14% of the united states was born somewhere else in the world. 14% of the people who live in this country were born in another country, but more than 50% of the people who provide home health care were born somewhere else in the world. it is a fertile field for organization. they are some of the lowest paid workers united states and interestingly at the country ages, i mean, my beard is turning white. as the country gets older, we

are going to rely on those workers a great deal more to look after our mothers and fathers and grandparents, to allow them to age in place, to allow them to age with dignity. and immigrant workers, people who might have otherwise never met your grandma are going to spend their most intimate moments with her. bathing her and feeding her and making sure she gets her meds on time. this is work that creates a loving, intimate bond between people at the most helpless times in their lives, and we should value this portion of immigrant labor in little bit more, and we should give them a little bit more training. and we would save a lot of medical expenses down the road because they would be the early warning system for knowing something is going really wrong with your mother or father, as

they stay in their apartment instead of moving into institutional care. so thank you for the christmas wishes and yes, immigrant labor is going to be a think part of the future of organized labor in the united states. host: thomas is in california. where are you from originally? caller: good morning and i appreciate you for taking my call. i am from liberia, west africa. host: and how did you come to the united states and why? caller: so we had a 40 year civil war in liberia that really destroyed the country, and all the people, they were recruiting citizens to become rebel fighters and all of that, but for some of us, because of the fear, we were all hiding and i

made my way here just to avoid becoming part of the destructive force liberia host: how do you view america today? caller: i appreciate mr. suarez for telling the story of immigrants in america. this topic has become a political issue. every four years, immigrants are beat down and treated like nothing. and i'm so sad that americans don't read history. they don't even know their own history. when you look at the history of liberia, it is the history of america. we have the same constitution, the same kind of government. white americans, americans way. white people.

when we come here, we love this country. i'm part of the military. and because we love this country and like i said, the issue that liberia is the history. suarez for telling the story of emigrants. host: let's get a response from ray suarez. guest: liberia is one of the few african countries that has a long history of contact with the united states, unlike the european powers that divided up africa in the late 19th century and basically carved it up like they were carving up a birthday cake. the united states stood apart from that. liberia was established as a home for freed slaves from the united states and there was transportation shipment of free people who wanted to go back to africa and a movement in the

united states to help africans who wanted to get back to africa to go to liberia. liberia has had a troubled history in much of the time since then the displacement and the domination of the nativeborn people of that part of the west african coast is a very tangled and unhappy story. but the liberians to have a connection with the united states that makes it one of the places that they have fled to when they had to leave the country during the terrible recent past. between sierra leone and liberia, burkina faso and some other countries there have been some terrible wars in west africa and this has become a haven, a place of safety for people like thomas and many others. so it is a great story and yes when thomas is americans should know their history better i

fully agree and certainly on this topic it's one that is endlessly fascinating, but because we didn't have a big network of colonies throughout the world the way france and britain did, the way germany wanted to and have them all taken away under the first world war. we don't have those kind of connections. as an earlier caller noted our connections have been commercial when you talk about the history of united fruit in central america you are talking about instead of going and taking over other countries away the british did, we had our companies go places and become very important parts of the way those countries were run and it is a different kind of relationship and it has made people both admire and love and fear the united states and other places in the world. it's very complicated.

but i think on balance, the country is still pretty well thought of in the rest of the world. in ways that i think are not totally appreciated by americans here in the united states. host: for our viewers who want to learn more, the book is "we are home: becoming americans in the 21st century, an oral history." you can also listing to his podcast called on shifting ground. thank you for your time, happy holidays to you. guest:

the book "fragile neighborhoods" watch live and join the discussion on washington journal wednesday morning starting at 7:00 a.m. eastern on c-span, c-span now, our free mobile app or online at c-span.org. >> this week we are showing encore presentations from our weekly interview program q and a. tonight, author malcolm gladwell discusses his book revenge of the tipping point about the downside of social epidemics including the rise of opioid abuse and medicare fraud a follow-up to his international bestseller "the tipping point" on how ideas and behaviors spread in society to create positive change. >> the guys in the fraud task force took me to an office building in miami divided into hundreds of tiny closet sized offices. each of which, basically, was a mailing address for a different

fraudulent medicare provider. you would see this office. it was the size of a broom closet. there would be no one in it or one person in it behind a desk. but their computer would not be plugged in. on the door there would be a placard that said greater miami health care research center. or, rehabilitation center. it would just be a front. for the collection of fraudulent medicare payments. there would be hundreds of fronts in one building. >> watch the program and other episodes of q&a all week at 7:00 p.m. eastern on c-span, c-span now are free mobile video app or online at c-span.org. >> c-spanshop.org is c-span's online store. browse our