>> coming up on washington journal, your calls in comments wise, and then akash chougule reviews his organization's recent campaign and legislative agenda in the second tmp administration. dr. georges benjamin, executive director of the american public health association discusses the trump administration's public health action and al gangitano talks about the latest in the federal response to wednesday's dead air collision in d. and other white house news of the day. she spends washington journal is next. join the conversation. ♪ host: good morning and welcome to the washington journal this

writing, january 31. we begin with a tragic and busy day in washingtoyesterday. first, the collision between an army helicopter and a passenger jet dear washington, d.c. no svivors were found and an investatn is underway. your reaction to president trump and washington's response to the collision. on capitol hill yesterday, three contentious confirmation hearings for president trump's pick to service health and human services security, director of national intelligence, and fbi director. rfk junior, tulsi gabbard and kash hotel sitting for hours for heated exchanges and questions. we will get your take on it this morning. democrats, (202)-748-8000. republicans, (202)-748-8001. independents, (202)-748-8002. you can also join us in a text,

include your first name, city and state at (202)-748-8003. or on facebook at facebook.com/c-span and you can also post on x with the handle --@cspanwj. we will get to the conversation with all of you in a minute. let's begin with president trump in the briefing room for the first time in these early days of his administration, yesterday talking to reporters for news conference. here is what he had to say about the collision that happened here in washington. [video clip] pres. trump: last week long before the crash, i signed an executive order for air traffic controllers and other important jobs throughout the country. about a week ago, almost upon entering office, i signed something last week that was an executive order, very powerful and restoring the standards of air traffic controllers and others, by the way, and my

administration will set the highest possible bar for safety. we have to have our smartest people. it does not matter what they look like, how they speak or who they are, it matters intellect, the word talent. they have to be talented, naturally talented geniuses. you cannot have regular people doing a job that they cannot do. i would like to point out that various articles appeared prior to my entering office, and here is one, the faa's diversity question goods focus on hiring people with severe intellectual and psychiatric disabilities. that is amazing, and the faa says people with severe disabilities are the most underrepresented segment of the workforce, and if the want them,

they can be air traffic controllers. i don't think so. [end video clip] host: if you missed it, you can watch it in its entirety on c-span.org or our free video mobile app. c-span now. on the senate floor, chuck schumer of new york responding to what the president had to say. here he is. [video clip] >> my heart goes out to everyone impacted by the incident. i'm praying for the victims, families, and brave first responders as we monitor the situation. but, i have to tell you i just watched president trump's news conference. it is one thing for internet pundits to steal off conspiracies. it is another for the president of the united states to throughout idle speculation -- throughout idle speak elation as bodies are still being recovered and families are still notified.

it just turns your stomach. [end video clip] host: chuck schumer, the minority leader of democrats in the senate reacting to the remarks made by president trump after the collision. there is an update on that story this morning from usa today. black box flata recorder recovered in d.c. plane crash. and from the reporting, they said that todd inman of the ntsb said it is too soon to know whether human error or other factors were at play in wednesday night's collision which left no survivors, but the agency expects to have a preliminary report within 30 days. let's hear from cindy in connecticut, republican. busy day here in washington. your reaction to the dual headlines. caller: hi, good morning.

my heart goes out to those who lost all those young people with so much promise. it is so upsetting. but, you know, i have to see when there is a mass shooting, and we republicans get all upset when democrats within 24 hours start making it political and asking for more gun control laws, i'm going to put that out there because it is a little hypocritical. i don't really like it. but you know what, i know president trump is genuinely mad about it. it is chilling how they have lowered the standards to have equality. everybody would like a quality. when it comes to something like this, you just cannot have it.

there were no fatalities under the biden administration, but if you look it up on wikipedia, new york times reported that in 2023, there were a record amount of near misses, 46 in one month when they were planes that had to take off or make a move to avoid a collision on the runway. we cannot have this. we lost a lot of good people because they do not want to take the vaccine mandated joe biden, so it does need to be looked at. there is blame to go around. we do not want a blame, we would like a fix. host: picking up on congestion in the skies, this is from reporting in the washington post this morning. according to a 2port to congress, 50 entities od -- excuse me,8,000 helicopter flights within 30 miles of the 2017 and 2019 based on the faan

data. others included flights by medical operions, state and local law enforcent and federal agencies. some experts and aircraft safety raised questions about procedures and helicopter flight patterns, so on top of congestion passenger flights, you have helicopters operating in the same airspace out here in washington. more information from the washington times, the government acbility office reviewed air traffic control systems after a system outage shutdown national airspace in 2023 and found that 51 of its 138 systems were unsustainable, meaninghe had outdated functionality, lacked spare partsr had other problems. meanwhile, air traffic volumes reached new highs. overall, passenger air traffic was up 10.4% in 2024 fro2023 and up we .8% from pre-pandemic

levels in 2019. this according to the national air transport association and that reporting from the washington times. john, democrat, we will hear from you next. caller: thank you so much for reading that. these people listen to this individual, and we know this man is a pathological liar. that is what is so sad, but i'm so thankful you read that. host: which part? which part are you thankful for, the data? caller: yes, the data on all you have collected here to let these people know that what donald trump is trying to do once again, he is using white supremacy to stay where he is and i'm thankful you brought out the facts that you got together for the american people, the problem is lack of money.

i don't trust nothing that they say because it is obvious everybody coming before is going to have to take an allegiance to donald trump. they are going to take allegiance to the constitution. look at the republican senators, all to defend the constitution. all of them but these lackeys, donald trump, they will be able to see that he is not governing for the people who put them in office. they are there to maintain donald trump because they are intimidated by him, the money he has in order to remove them from office. that is sad. host: why do you say that they are all lackeys or that they need to be for the president? what evidence do you have? caller: because donald trump cannot be trusted. he came into office paying off

hookers and he is a felon and he is a convicted felon himself. he should be in jail. look at what happened to this nation.. thank you for letting me have my say. i have watched this country. i have studied this country. this thing is going downhill bad because of white supremacy. what is that about it is they are following this stuff rather than speaking against it. more of your calls coming up. rfk junior, president terms's pick to human and health -- both in human -- health and human services, along with kash patel

who would like to be the fbi director, and tulsi gabbard, who was in the hot seat yesterday in front of the senate intelligence committee. she was picked to serve as director of national intelligence. the wall street journal editorial board this morning writing this, tulsi gabbard's surveillance folly, and the right that terrorists have a nice vantage over open society -- advantage over open society because they operate in secret and only need to succeed wants to do enormous destruction. this is the great lesson of 9/11 . surveillance is one of the few tools the u.s. has to detect and prevent such attacks before they happen, including overseas communications with people in the u.s. who may intend harm. giving her views on 702, it is no surprise she sounds badly uninformed on the subject. legal on to write this, mr.

trump made a campaign deal with miss gabbard to give her a cabinet position in return for her endorsement. he did his part by nominating her, but the senate can do mr. trump, country a favor by rejecting a director of national intelligence who does not understand the vital tools of the job. yesterday's hearing, senators on both sides pressed the nominee over her refusal to call for nsa contractor edward snowden -- refused to call edward snowden a traitor. [video clip] >> this is a big deal. it is helpful to hear your part on this. was edward snowden a traitor? >> senator, my heart is with my commitment to our constitution and our nation security. >> ours, too. >> july.

-- thank you. i have shown with my time in the military, as well as in congress, how seriously i take the privilege of having access to classified information under nation secrets. that is why i'm committed, if confirmed, as director of national intelligence to join you in making sure there is no future snowden type leak. >> was edward snowden a traitor to the united states of america? >> senator, i will also -- >> you said earlier you were offended by question my colleague asked, which i think is his duty as someone on this committee to fill his responsibility to advise and consent. we are not here to be a rubberstamp for the president of the united states. . let me ask you again, do you believe mr. chairman of this committee believe, as the vast majority of our intelligence that edward snowden was a

traitor tonight season america? >> if confirmed as director of national intelligence, -- >> this is not a moment for social media, or conspiracy theories or attacks on journalism in the united states. this is when you need to answer the questions of the peoples whose votes you are asking for to be confirmed as the chief intelligence officer of this nation. as my colleagues said, this is not about you, it is about the people who serve the intelligence agency who serve the people of the united states, is edward snowden a traitor to the united states of america? that is not a hard question to answer when the stakes are this high.

[end video clip] host: from the confirmation hearing from tulsi gabbard to service director of national intelligence. the new york times headline picks up on those questions on edward snowden. hearing turns tense as senators grill gabbard on snowden. that is the new york times headline on her confirmation hearing. take a look at the washington times, their front page, the headline for that newspaper, gabbard tells senators, she is nobody's puppet. skepticism leaves nomination hanging. if you missed any moments from yesterday's confirmation hearing from tulsi gabbard, you can find it online at c-span.org. if you don't have hours to sit through the confirmation hearing, hit the player on the video player and gold stars will appear, and those are the key moments from yesterday's hearing, so you can quickly go through and get an idea of the

questions and answers from yesterday's hearing. we covered it here on c-span in its entirety. you can also watch it in its entirety on c-span.org or our free video mobile app, c-span now. in new york, a republican, we are talking about the hearings, as well as the tragedy in the air on wednesday night. caller: with rfk junior or kash patel, basically in its entirety and i think those two should be confirmed and particularly with rfk junior. he was not allowed to ever really answer a question. they threw about five things at him, cut him off, never let him answer anything. he is the most popular of all the trump nominees. i think he would truly like to make america healthy.

for a guy who was a democrat his entire life to be treated as poorly as fellow democrats is shameful. i think those two deserve to be confirmed. i have not seen enough of tulsi gabbard to make a decision on that one, i've seen all the press comment on those, but really the disrespect -- host: i would like you to hold online and show you one of the moments from the confirmation hearing with the chair of the committee yesterday holding the hearing, it was senator bill cassidy, a doctor, telling rfk junior why he is hesitant to vote for him. [video clip] >> my responsibility is to try and determine if he can be trusted to support the best public health.

a worthy movement to improve the health of americans or to undermine it by asking for more evidence and never accepting the evidence that is there. i looked at the article from the doctor, and it seems to have some issues. and that is why i have been struggling with your nomination. ultra processed food, obesity, we are completely alone, and someone who has discussed vaccines who are safe and effective and we are using a preponderance of evidence to reassure -- and quite

differently, we are about the same age, as a 71-year-old man who spent decades criticizing vaccines and was financially invested in finding the fault of vaccines, can he changes attitudes and approach now that you have the most important position influencing actsing policy in the united states? -- visiting policy in the united states? will you continue what you have been or will you overturn a new leaf and accepted? i recognize if you come out unequivocally with vaccines are safe, it does not cause autism, that would have an incredible impact. that is your power. so what is it going to be, will it be using the credibility to support or will it be using credibility to undermine? i have got to figure that out for my vote.

he had the power to help public health institutions re-earn the trust of the american people. now, let's be political. i'm a republican. i represent the amazing state of louisiana and as a patriotic american, i would like trump's policies to succeed in making america and americans more secure, more prosperous, healthier. but if there is someone who is not back stated because of policies or attitudes you bring to the department and there was another 18-year-old who dies from a disease, it will be blown up in the press. the greatest tragedy will be our death, but i can also tell you and associated tragedy with that will cast a shadow over president trump's legacy, which i would like to be the absolute best legacy i can be. so, maybe you will be hearing

from you over the weekend. [end video clip] host: senator cassidy, also a doctor from louisiana, chair of the health committee and that confirmation hearing yesterday, sounding skeptical about -- or undecided about whether or not he will vote to confirm rfk junior as health and human services secretary. ray, you were waiting in new york, do you think you should be confirmed? what do you think about the hesitancy from senator cassidy? caller: i can understand some of the hesitancy, but what mr. kennedy had explained was when he came up with the lawsuit, that is on the started trying to do things for little children for doing the shots, and to the best of my knowledge, not one healthy kid was killed or, excuse me, passed away during covid and he was for the shots for people who had health

issues, older people, and those with the people who were most susceptible. and that unless the mother is a drug user, a sickly -- and basically, if the mother did not have it, there is no reason to do something on day one. so sometimes i think it is the timing, sometimes it is the studies on these things, and they did not ask a lot of questions. i also think a lot of these folks put money in their campaign and we had to take that into consideration, too. host: that was exchanged between rfk junior and bertie sanders yesterday. it got heated between them on pharmaceutical contributions.

the washington times' headline on that, gop holdouts press rfk junior for assurances on vaccines, saying science is clear. from the washington post this morning, mitch mcconnell had polio as a child who could cloud jfk junior's nomination. the republican senators childhood bouts with the disease has informed his ardent support for vaccines amid increasing skepticism of them within his party. they go on to report in the washington times that for the first time since 2007, mcconnell, now 82, is no longer the top senate republican, affording him more freedom to decide whether to support trump nominees. if every democrat decides to vote against kennedy, then he can afford only three gop defections in the closely divided senate. and losing mcconnell, the famously deliberate senator,

would indicate bipartisan concern about kennedy and his allies' views on vaccines. and you will recall that senator mitch mcconnell, no longer in leadership, was one of the three republicans who opposed pete hegseth for defense secretary. earl, idaho, independent. good morning. caller: good morning, greta. what they should both fools. i ranch and farm out here in south central idaho, granted, back to the midair collision, there are days when i get shaded out to the point where the sunlight does not get through

and it cannot provide for the fields i work, but we have got to hang a stop sign out there somewhere to slow this thing down because, wow, what a mess we are in. host: so you think they need to take a hard look at the congestion in our nation's airspace and perhaps bring it back quite a bit? caller: not only the federal government but the people and the people have to realize that they have got to spit out that silver spoon and get back to the basics of life. this is just nuts where we are going. host: the washington post -- disaster in crowded skies, and they note that the control tower

staffing levels, the report concludes were not normal for the time of day or in the amount of air traffic over d.c., were an average of over 100 helicopters a day zip around and underneath arriving and departing airline flights. there is more in the papers this morning about the crowded skies. here is from usa today. in may, airport officials and experts warn that adding more daily flights under what is known as the slot and perimeter rolled those concerns -- rule" concerns. in 20 23, reagan national broke its all-time passenger traffic record with 25.5 million passengers according to airport managers. passenger data for 2024 not yet available. this is from the new york times this morning with the headline congress approved more flights at reagan, despite warnings of danger.

congress has repeatedly voted to increase the number of daily flights at reagan national airport, adding departures that made life more convenient for lawmakers, despite warnings that increased air traffic around washington would raise the risk of delays and accidents. they go on to note congress has added more than 50 new slots to the airport's daily schedule, including 10 lawmakers approved last year. the newest slots are not yet in use. those flights are expected to begin the coming weeks. when they do, congress' actions will increase authorized traffic by more than 50 takeoffs or landings for more than 25 roundtrips. the other is the airspace nearby, the potomac river is the region's air highway, a wide, open corridor from north to south that is used by coast guard helicopters, police air units and military helicopters,

of vips, and personnel. planes at reagan often crossed the highway in their ascent or descent. and these military helicopters, according to reports in newspapers this morning, are often used to ferry members of congress to locations, and they were used, as well, in emergency situations. so that a some data for you this morning on the airspace here in the washington region following that fatal crash between military helicopter and the passenger jet. let's go to ruben, philadelphia, democrat hurried we are spending the first half of this morning's washington journal getting your thoughts on what happened here in washington, capitol hill, and the collision at reagan national airport. caller: good morning. since 2018, npr [indiscernible]

about why the number of military and aviation accidents has sharply increased. and december 2020, the trump administration reports the military aviation crisis' lack of training and fatigue. d.e.i. was not around during this time, this was during the trump administration. i became interested in this stuff, that is when senator cornyn tried to blame joe biden for a military accident that happened at the border, saying it was joe biden's border policy that caused this. i wish you guys would put up all the crashes that took place with the trump administration because he continually blames people of color, transgender, disabled people for stuff that has taken

place with the same things that happened on his watch, and like i said, the hill, at 615 10:00 p.m., their support on military -- they report on military aviation crashes and npr also did military clashes. host: the faa or ntsb says an investigation underway, a preliminary report will be out in 30 days on what happened wednesday evening here in washington. the new york times was first to report this yesterdaffing at the air traffic control tower was not normal for the time of day th the volume of traffic, cording to an internal preliminary safety report about the collision that was reviewed by the new york times. the controller who isandling airports in the vicinity was also instructing planes that were landing and departing from

its runways. those jobs, typically, are assigned to two controllers, rather than one. daniel, south carolina, a. good morning. caller: morning. i would like to make a remark about everybody calling in and blaming biden, but you can probably blame biden for all of this, all the time biden the last four years blames everything on trump. trump tried to make this a better place to live, would you have all democrats who would like to call in, and they would like to call everybody racist and that is what they are. we are all americans, not democrats, republicans, americans. the problem is you have a bunch of idiots out there who don't know what they are talking about. host: daniel's thoughts and south carolina.

jim, maryland, republican. caller: hello? host: good morning. your turn. caller: it is germantown. anyway, i have been following this crash, and i support donald trump. i support his border policy, his appointments, but i don't support what he said this morning because from what i've read, and i have read a lot, the helicopters have to maintain 200 feet around that so they fly under the airlines, and if they had, there would be no story and they would be like, whatever, 65

or i don't know how many people died, alive, but the helicopter, for some reason, went up to 350 feet. this was on youtube, s two or three pilots of the apache helicopter and they all agreed that this sounds like it is helicopter pilot error. and i don't know why in gods's name they would have to have training go underneath these flights. it seems like the only reason there has not been a crash in the past is dumb luck. host: but what do you disagree

with with the president on? what exactly did he say that you disagree with? caller: well, he insinuated that d.e.i. hires and air traffic controls, controllers, were responsible when it sounds like it is all the fault of the helicopter. i mean, unless something else comes out. that is everything i have learned, 200 feet, they are supposed to maintain 200 feet and i think there may have been approximately apparatus -- been a proximity apparatus that was not working or shut off and that would tell them, hey, you are going to crash. host: president trump made a

comment about d.e.i. hires earlier in the day. later in the day, he brought the media back into the oval office, where he signed a memorandum on aviation safety, ordering the secretary of transportation and the faa acting administrator to undo d.e.i. policies for the previous ministrations. take a look. [video clip] >> we have a presidential memorandum titled aviation safety. in light of the damage done to aviation safety by the biden administration's d.e.i. and woke policies, what this memorandum orders is for your secretary and the faa, strader, acting the faa administrator, to basically ensure that we are actively undoing all of the damage, that we are assessing how much damage was done and that we are ensuring that people hired within the faa in keeping with your memorandum of january 21 or only the most outstanding,

capable people for the jobs that they are being hired to do. pres. trump: in other words, competence. >> yes sir. elevated competence instead of the d.e.i. policies that were pursued by the biden administration. pres. trump: i think everyone understands that. and obama. ok. but biden much worse. for they have done is just crazy in so many ways. >> are you saying race or gender played a role in this tragedy? pres. trump: incompetence might have played a role. we will let you know. but we would like the most competent people. we don't care what race they are. we would like the most competent people, especially in those positions. we were talking about actually complex things. and they don't have a great brain, great power of the brain, they will not be very good at what they do and bad things will

happen. host: president trump late thursday, talking to the oval office on the collision between the military helicopter and passenger jet. this morning on the washington journal, we are getting your reaction to the response from the president and washington to that collision, as well as the contentious confirmation hearings that took place on capitol hill yesterday. rfk junior, tulsi gabbard, the president has picked them to service the national intelligence director, and kash patel, the president's pick for fbi director, all up on capitol hill yesterday, taking questions from senators for hours. we covered them in their entirety here at c-span. this morning, we are getting your reaction to what you heard from the nominees. jeff, indianapolis, democratic caller, good morning. caller: yes, thank you for

taking my call. i would like to say something to all the republican trump supporters out there about d.e.i.. d.e.i. has never been known to lower standards or qualification. all d.e.i. was to expand the pool of qualified, qualified candidates. it has never been designed to lower standards. what you have been brainwashed to believe is a lie. now, i don't understand what donald trump and the republican party's obsession with d.e.i. is

because what you have been told, again, is a lie. if anybody is lowering standards , it is donald trump. based on who he has nominated for his administration. he is lowering standards. host: give us an example. caller: rfk junior is nowhere qualified for being secretary of hhs. i work for a large pharmaceutical company here in annapolis. and because of that, we are regulated by organizations such as the fda. who would be in control of that? he is nowhere near qualified to run hhs. tulsa gabbard is nowhere near qualified to run, to be director

of national intelligence. but he would like to blame d.e.i. and say they are putting unqualified people, but he's doing that himself. host: michael, independent, detroit. good morning. caller: and the same to you. yes. when have the republicans had an intelligent president? when you go to nixon, who got convicted, and then a replacement when he was involved in criminal activity, and then they follow tuneup with reagan. what was his educational background? then they followed him up, they followed nixon up with gerald

ford. when did they have an intelligent president? look at the two bushes. excuse me, let's look again. educational background, the most intelligent president you done had in modern times was barack obama. host: hi what you are saying -- tied what you are saying to the new cycle here in the last 24 hours. caller: what just happened when they said they need competent people, like trump is in a position to evaluate competency. he is a guy who sells the bible. the word of god is to be told, not sold. this is a fraudulent, caring institution.

like 25 million, also when they talk about make america great again, they just found out in china they came up with ai where they have big corporations here that is equal to or surpass they i that america has developed, and they did it with a small -- host: i will jump in at that point and show you headlines on the confirmation hearings from capitol hill yesterday. these on kash patel, who the president tapped to serve as fbi director, patel says fighting crime top priority over politics. , crites dig up his past statements in the confirmation hearing, and then there is the front page of the new york times, the way they framed the confirmation hearing, patel will not say if he used fbi to hunt his foes. take a look at the exchange yesterday between senator dick durbin of illinois and the fbi

director nominee, kash patel. [video clip] >> was president trump road to give blanket clemency to the january 6 defendants? >> thank you ranking member. a couple of things on that, one, the power of the presidential pardon is just that, the presidential. >> i'm asking was you want to do it? >> as we discussed in our private meeting, senator, i have always rejected any violence against law enforcement, including in that group, specifically addressed any violence to law enforcement on january 6, and i do not agree with the commutation of any sentence of any individual who committed violence against law enforcement. >> do you think america is safer because 1600 people have been given an opportunity to come out of serving their sentences and live in our communities again? >> senator, i have not looked at

all six and hundred individual cases, i have always advocated for those who caused harm to our enforcement and civilian communities, and they also believe america is not safer because of a man who murdered agents deserved better than a man who at point-blank range fired a shot, so it goes both ways. >> he was in prison for 45 years. he is 80 years old and sentenced to home confinement, so he is not free like you just suggested. >> he killed two fbi agents >> that is true, and he went to prison, as he should have. >> i question to you is do you think america is safer because president trump issued the pardons to criminal defendants, any of whom assaulted our police in the capitol? >> america will be safe when we

don't have 200,000 drug overdoses, when we don't have 50 -- >> so you just won't answer the question. >> from the senate judiciary committee yesterday on capitol hill, c-span cameras were there for the entire confirmation hearing for kash patel to serve as fbi director. if you missed any moments, the questions and answers, find them online at c-span.org or are free mobile app, c-span now. an update on the president's cabinet, the senate last night confirmed doug burgum, the former governor of north dakota as interior secretary. the vote was 79 to 18, a little more than half of senate democrats joining republicans. they voted 62-35 for chris wright to leave the department of energy, that is a test vote and a positive sign for the nominee. and president trump's pick to

lead the department of veteran affairs, doug collins also passing a test about, advance to a full senate vote, 83-13, the democrats joining in on those two votes, as well. this morning, we are talking about the collision that happened here in washington, as well as the capitol hill confirmation hearings yesterday. kate, long island, new york, republican. your turn. caller: yes, i'm traffic control for the united states air force, under jimmy carter, the regulated the airlines and it has been downhill since then. [indiscernible] host: pete, in what way did it go downhill? caller: well, airline pilots and

air traffic controllers happened to be white males. they were washed out and they tried to get them in, but they cannot pass the test, only white people, so the president is right in that respect with d.e.i. because here it comes to a head. host: tell us why it is a hard test to pass, why? caller: 10 days on, 10 days off. they did that for two years, so you have to be proficient, and these experts, you have to retire at 56. airline pilots used to be 60, and they raised it to 65. 99% [indiscernible] and most of them are veterans,

12,000 air traffic controllers, and staffing levels have never been up to parsons. air traffic has increased 50 fold. host: what do you make of the new york times reporting yesterday that the job of the air controller on wednesday night is typically done by two people, not one? he was directing helicopter traffic and as well as passenger jets. caller: again, like the one expert came on, they combine sectors and de-combined radar sectors and position in power and this was around 9:00 at night, so everybody cannot work, he could only work 10 hours. it used to be 10, but he only worked eight, and then it moved from eight hours to 10 hours between shifts. in 1981, they visited facilities

, and washington, d.c., new york, which has three airports, the busiest airspace in the world, they have put 10 pounds in a five pound bag every day, and you put weather into the factor, you put all of these things combined, like i said, under jimmy carter and the deregulation 1978 of the airlines, [indiscernible] host: pete -- caller: everybody takes line for granted and they don't know what goes on behind the scenes. they retire host: at host: 56. " you said is something very similar -- they retire at 56. host: the quote musetta something similar, the president was asked, is it safe to fly in u.s. airspace? caller: yes because you have dedicated, you have dedicated

professionals who are checked out and certified. they don't let you work by yourself unless you are safe, safe and efficient. the model air traffic control is safe, efficient flow of air traffic. safe, efficient flow. so you have got to have all three of those when you work. that is what you have got to have. and because of deo, which was way before d.e.i., under jimmy carter, and then reagan who had pretty much alex military. -- ex-military. i got hired in 1984 and they were still a couple of world war ii guys on staff who were still around, also from korea, vietnam, so forth. if you are not in war, but after 1981, people do not know nothing

about, there are good at taking tests, just like police departments. host: alright, i'm going to move on to other calls, robin, tennessee, democrat. caller: well, he was one contradiction after another because the majority of people that work in those towers are white, so once we find out that this person that was in the power was a white person, we are going to slide to something else. we will make up other excuses for why they were not where they were supposed to be. i'm trying to figure out, what is wrong with white people? what is wrong with white people that they think they are the only people that are smart enough to be able to do anything when a black woman invented gps? it is getting to the point where it is ridiculous, and it is going to be dangerous. you're going to have a long four years because every time something happens, donald trump is going to say it was the black

or brown people in the white people are going to believe it. what is wrong? host: anthony, independent, detroit. good morning. welcome. caller: good morning. i think the nominees are mostly kash patel and tulsi gabbard, i think the qualified, technically, based on the jobs they have had. i don't think he was very qualified because he cannot really answer questions about medicare and medicaid, because of the majority of what they would be dealing with, they did not know much about those, but with tulsa gabbard, you just have to worry about i think she will give away state secrets to israel's government. that is what happens, but our senators don't really care about that. host: so you think she should be confirmed?

caller: i don't have an opinion on it. but rfk, to get the fluoride out of the water around the poison out of the food, i'm for that, but what about trump just announced ai medical surveillance and a new shot? is rfk in favor of the mrna shot? they have given false hope to renegade by the people who were against this techno-crabby control in the industrial revolution. this should be against that, but they are being lulled into a false sense of hope. host: independent caller talking about the confirmation hearings. tulsi gabbard did sit before the committee yesterday for a confirmation hearing, her first before the senators, and she was

asked repeatedly about her past statements, here is what she had to say about some of the reporting and criticism she has received. [video clip] >> i would like to warn the american people watching at home that you may hear smears that challenge my loyalty and love for my country. those who oppose my nomination imply that i'm loyal to something or someone other than god, my own conscience, and the constitution of the united states, accusing me of being trump's puppet, putin's puppet, motie's puppet, not recognizing the absurdity of simultaneously being the puppet of five different puppet masters. the same tactic was used against president trump and failed. the american people elected president trump with a decisive victory in mandate for change. the fact is, what truly unsettles my political opponents is i refuse to be there puppet.

i have no love for assad, gaddafi, or any dictator, i just hate al qaeda and i hate that if leaders who cozy up to islamist extremists, minimizing to so-called rebel. [end video clip] host: tulsi gabbard, the nominee to serve as director of national intelligence. her opening statement yesterday. you can find it on c-span.org or c-span now. sal, new jersey, republican, your turn. caller: how are you doing, good morning. just wanted to say i think president trump did a good job of explaining. i watched what he said. he did a heckuva job explaining it. host: what part? caller: about how they explained the helicopters was at the same level in the air as the plane,

and it should not have been. and maybe the goggles he had on were not on correctly because he should have been able to see on a clear night. host: others reporting on whether or not the pilot developed -- of the helicopter was wearing night vision goggles, which if they were, it might have obstructed their site. caller: my mind says the poor people died for nothing. i think they did not have location. i think it is a bad idea, and i was sad about hearing chuck schumer through insults about the president already instead of worrying about getting them on the same page and getting things rolling.

just had negativity to say about the president. and tulsi gabbard did not come on c-span one or 2 -- host: her hearing was on c-span as well yesterday, on c-span2 i believe. caller: i seen robert kennedy, and i watched patel, and the democrats, every time they asked a question, the nominees have to think about their answer. they don't give them much time to answer. they jump on them right away. president trump picked these three people, and i think they have qualifications. they do a heckuva job. you have to get new blood in here and change things. the last thing i wanted to say, like me, i had to get a back operation, i don't care what

color skin or whatever, i would like the best qualified person in surgery operating on me. if they have to get the best qualified people to be an air traffic controller, that is what they have to do. you cannot go by nationality are you have to go by the best qualified people. that's the way i see it. that is so important. a republican caller talking about the tenants back-and-forth exchanges that we saw on capitol hill yesterday. he was one of them before the senate health committee, the ranking member senator bernie sanders and the nominee, robert f kennedy to serve as health and human services secretary over campaign directions from the pharmaceutical industry. [video clip] >> in many ways, president trump and mr. kennedy have asked the right questions, problem is their answers will only make a

bad situation worse, so let me ask mr. kennedy again, if we want to make america healthy, will you assure the american people that you will fight to do it every other major country on earth does, guarantee health care to every single american? >> i will make america healthier than other countries -- >> will you guarantee to do it every other major country does? simple question >> by the way, bernie, the problem of corruption is not just the federal agency, it is in congress, too. almost all the members of this panel, including yourself, are accepting billionsprotecting ae. >> no. i thought that would,. i ran for president like you. i got millions and millions of contributions and they did not come from the executives. not one nickel of pac money.

>> in 2020, you are the single largest receiver of pharmaceutical money. >> because i received workers -- contributions from workers. not a nickel from corporate taxes. >> you are the single most guarantee from pharmaceutical dollars. >> out of 200 million. all right. but, you have not answered my question. >> mr. chairman we are three minutes over. >> how will you make america healthy if you do not guarantee. >> how long does it keep going? at some time you are just battering the witness. >> yes you are. you are going at him just like anyone else. >> bernie has gone over. [end video clip] host: from the senate health committee on capitol hill. one of those moments between rfk jr. the nominee to serve as

health and human services secretary and independent senator bernie sanders. we are getting your reaction to the confirmation hearings on capitol hill not only for rfk jr. but kash patel and tulsi gabbard. we also yesterday had the tragic news of that plane crash that happened in the washington area that left 67 people dead. survivors and an investigation underway. president trump responding twice the tragedy from the white house yesterday. that is l the table this morning. ted in ocean, hawaii. democratic caller. caller: a couple of things on the air crash. i started flying the year before we landed on the moon in 1968. i know a little bit about flying and they are right about the levels. it is pretty easy to keep an aircraft 1000 pete apart but it

-- 1000 feet apart and it is a narrow window. they need to do what they can to increase that. it is like when people say take your time. they need to consider that when they are scheduling these flights and these -- in these really ultra busy areas. it is not necessary to schedule them that close to each other. host: what about the added element of military helicopters doing exercises in and around the same airspace? caller: i was in the air force during the vietnam war. and there are so many air force bases around this country that those choppers can be doing their practices with. and you are right, they do not have to be near the civilian airports. there are so many air force bases and army bases that they could be doing this practicing in. and, as a former pilot, i get it.

i understand and i have been there and done that. i would like to say something about the nominees for the posts. i live -- after i got out of the air force i came to hawaii, and i lived within 10 to 12 matt -- miles of where tulsi gabbard rue up and lived her life. and i feel very bad that i voted for her when she was going into lower offices. host: as a member of congress? caller: yes. i knew some things about her, and she was local. very near to where i spent the last 50 years. and i mistakenly, i did not do enough research before i voted for her. and i think more people need to do that. i would like to say one more thing about president trump and

what he said. he tends to, as we have all heard, he wants people who are loyal to him, not necessarily competent. several callers have mentioned this. loyalty is good, but competency is better. i think we can all agree on that. host: mike in california. independent. good morning. caller: good morning. interesting the last commenter mentioned gabbard, i was impressed with her performance yesterday. and i thought she handled unfair questions as well as could be handled. particularly by senator michael bennet. i looked him up and he is a yale law graduate so i am not surprised with him demanding four or five times that she declare edward snowden a trader. aunt -- traitor.

he has not been convicted of anything. jonathan appears on c-span from time to time and he has written some articles about how up in the air on whether he is a traitor or not. it is a very convoluted situation. he is calling for a legal code -- conclusion. tulsi avoided that after being baited. she has focused on the constitution and fourth amendment rights. and that was the proper response. so far, i think she has done a terrific job in the question-and-answer. rfk, people are criticizing him because he was for naught -- not for mill year with a dual funding of medicaid by federal and state agencies and he was asked how many babies were born with medicaid assistance. he guessed 30 million and it turned out from that senator who asked the question it was only 1.5 million, that means nothing

in terms of competence. maybe he should have crept a little better -- prepped a little better. he is a successful trial lawyer and incredibly bright. and he is focused on issues that this country should have addressed years ago. he is a first-rate guy as far as i can tell from his performance. the other candidate, patel, he also has done well. and he is very close and listens very carefully to the questions. in each case he is knocking it out of the park. i am not a trump fan. for him to off of the cuff on this aircraft say it must be dei. i am a white person and i am hearing these comments from other people and saying what the hell is wrong with us? it does not help him or the country to shoot from the hip and make gases.

i have already seen videos on the internet. that helicopter and those helicopters can be autonomous. we all assume that there are three people on the helicopter and that has not been established in in the best -- and an investigation is forthcoming. these can be autonomous helicopters. there were three or four close crashes with other airlines and other jets before we had this collision between the helicopter and the american eagle flight. host: mike citing some reporting about some close calls before what happens on wednesday night. i want to pick up on what he said about the confirmation hearing to kash patel. i want to show you this exchange between the nominee for fbi director and democrat chris coons on maintaining independence from the white house. [video clip]

>> if fbi agent brought to you a factual leader -- legal basis predication and you are about to refer to a prosecutor, and you get a call from the white house saying do not proceed, this is a major donor or someone close to the president and this is an appropriate, what would you do? >> simple and you answered it in your question. the line agents who are trained to bring investigations on behalf of the fbi will make that decision making process. and they will only have my full support so long as it upholds absolutely every value of the constitution and that is it. >> i went back and looked and i asked the same questions of director comey and director wray. director wray said you should be willing to resign if necessary over conduct if you are pressed to engage in it which is unethical, illegal or unconstitutional. if pressed would you resign?

>> my answer is i would never do anything unconstitutional and i never have in my 16 years of government service. >> would you be willing to resign the post if pressed and given no choice but to obey the order or resign? >> i will always obey the law. >> does it require you as attorney general bell or fbi director wray said refuse or resign? >> i am not familiar with the extent of the law you are referring to my answer is simple in my 16 years of government service. we will simply follow the law. i have done that in the obama justice department, and republican departments. i have never once wavered from my constitutional oath of office. >> your predecessors have been clear that they would be willing to resign if forced or directed to do something unethical or

illegal. one of your past statements that is conserving me -- concerning the it is a post on true social and a podcast, the "sean borden report." your predecessor has "broken the law and the fbi people should go after him" and "there should be a criminal referral for fbi director wray." if confirmed he will follow through on the statements that he needs to be prosecuted? >> this reminds me of the conversation you and i had which i greatly appreciate. there is enough violent crime in this country and enough national security threats that the fbi will be busy going forward preventing 100,000 overdoses and rapes. >> we agree that it should be the principal focus. what i am trying to get to is a whole series of very troubling to me and many other statements you have made about instead using it to pursue those who

might be used as political enemies. >> i have no interest and will not go backwards. there will be no politiciz ation or retribution actions if i am confirmed. i told you that your office and i will tell you that today. [end video clip] host: kash patel and senator chris coons on independence from the white house. we covered that hearing on c-span and you can find it at c-span.org or the free video and mobile app, c-span now. rose in wisconsin, democratic caller. that confirmation hearing along with two others along with the confirmation hearing -- along with the collision in washington that point of conversation on washington journal. caller: good morning, i am a little bit nervous and i have so much stuff to say. why doesn't our country come to a conclusion that there is no racist?

there are. the president of the united states is causing racists. i see you smiling. the accident yesterday morning, i think it is awful that our country fights over something like this, ady and points fings each other. this has got to stop before 70 gets really hurt. the congress wants more flights out of that airport and the airport is too small. make it larger the infrasucre thing was supposed to be doing all of that stuff and nowe e right back into the pointing fingers attitude of this country. i do not care if you are inpendent, democratic, republican or whatever you are, black, white, brown and donald trump deporting all of these mexicans is ridiculous.

he lets people out of the prisons and here we are having mexicans that are working and trying to make a living in this country, the honest ones are getting deported. this is awful. so please, take a different stance with donald trump because he has nothing good with this country and he has dividing this country. ever since he came in the picture we are fighting. this is awful. host: those are rose's thoughts. democratic caller. a republican, trudy in maryland. good morning. caller: good morning. i would like to extend my sympathies to the families of the air crash, -- collision. i think most people have forgotten that they are out there. so i wanted to remind everyone. they need your sympathy now and thoughts and prayers. and the second thing that i wanted to talk about is trump. he did quite well the first

half. after the second half, it went political. that should not have been. it was disrespectful to the family. host: talk about the first half, what did you like about what the president said in the first half of the news conference? caller:'s sympathy to the family. he should have stopped at that point. he was being presidential at that point. after that he started with the political stuff. that was disrespectful to the family. and then the people that he had on the stage, all of that was political. there should have only been mr. trump and the ntsb person. those were the only two people we needed to hear from. not all of those other people that were around him. and the third thing that i want

to say is the media. when he starts spouting the d.e.i. stuff he always starts off with race. he never mentioned the other things that are included in d.e.i. like women, handicapped. all those people, d.e.i. is not just about race. it is about giving the expanding pool of applicants. it is letting people know that there are more than just white people in the world. there are women and handicapped people, they are brown people, asians and others. that is what d.e.i. covers. it is getting the best of the best, not mediocre as he portrays race and mediocre together. they are not the same thing at all. host: trudy, a republican in

maryland. donna in hanover, pennsylvania. democratic caller. caller: i agree with the last caller. i had kind of tuned out of watching the news cycle because it just got exhausting ever since trump won. but, i was on my way to work, and i work at night and i was watching rachel meadow and the breaking news comes in about the crash. and i am devastated. and the next day, trump gives a press conference and i was like let me watch and just see. how do you go from having a moment of silence for the people that died in this horrible accident to saying and blaming that this was caused by

diversity, equity, and inclusion? it is disrespectful. it is despicable, and it is horrible. i just do not know what to say about this man. he has horrible. he should not be in office. it amazes me that america voted this man back in office. if he is not capable, what makes you think that the people that he wants to pick are capable? none of them are capable. host: donna in pennsylvania. maggie, an independent in maryland. what do you say this morning? caller: hello? host: good morning. caller: sorry, i am at work and we were trying to offload a truck. so, i think the biggest thing

that i hope people ask themselves when they hear this is that diversity, equity and inclusion could be the culprit for this accident. i implore people to push their questioning further in the sense that most people look to race to say that that is the avenue of diversity that is the problem. when you examine race, it is essentially a way that we have organized people and looked at our genetic biomes of how we have evolved as people. so as a white person my ancestors came from northeastern america as compared from friends from ethiopia. it is just a matter of what you have taken in genetically. so, why are we stopping at skin color. i could asked a pressing the question further and say if we believe that melanin in our skin can contribute to lack of education or understanding and causing accidents, what do we say, brown hair is a pigment or

something that could affect intelligence? someone who has brown eyes? no one wants to ask that question and a lot of people when you hear that say that makes no sense, why would you bring up haircolor or eyecolor. that hasn't nothing to do with how capable you are. exactly. host: maggie in maryland. john is a republican in georgia. good morning. caller: good morning. i would like to talk about kash patel's nomination hearing. i think it is rather hypocritical for senator coons to ask kash patel if he would resign if he was asked to do something if you had james comey

on -- striking on donald trump's campaign. we have messages about his girlfriend. an fbi makes -- in fbi agent's change a message and he spends 12 months in prison for that. after trump is elected, james comey takes his notes from the meeting and sends them to a friend of his so that they can go public for the purpose of instituting or beginning the muller investigation. -- muller investigation. fast forward to 2020 b fbi works through the democrat party to go through twitter and facebook taking down messages regarding the laptop. cia and fbi agent's write the letter knowing that it is not true and you had the deputy assistant director of the cia testify in front of congress that the purpose of the letter

was to help joe biden win. host: by listing all of those off your point is what? caller: it is why are they worried about kash patel? when the fbi has had a history of cultural deceit. they have interfered with two presidential elections for the purpose of assisting one political party. host: john's beliefs. mark is an independent in indiana. mark, good morning. caller: good morning. i am calling in and i would like to give a view from 30,000 feet instead of 20. 350 feet above yours. the main thing that i want to emphasize is this. there were probably may be less than 100 killed on the crash, which is a real disaster. but if you take a real

perspective, you divide 900,000 babies that are born every year and you figure that out per day. and it comes out -- it comes down to a figure of 30 plane crashes per day of unborn babies going into the potomac. so, we need to take a look at where our real big losses are. another thing. i am a senior citizen. and everyone is worried about medicare and social security. but, we would have all of the 70 million babies growing up, we would have surpluses in our medicare and social security accounts. and we would be in perfect shape as a country. instead we have used the money

to raise dogs and cats and buy tinker toys from china. host: i will leave it there. an update for all of you in "the washington post" about the funding freeze that happened. this is from the politics of the nation section. "the white house regroups after chaotic funding freeze. by the time the white house rescheduled or -- rescinded the freeze on wednesday, the scare had briefly disrupted medicaid payments, senior meals, special education and housing stipends. it punctured the sense of accomplishment among trump officials eager to take the levers of power in a more orderly and effective manner than last time. the president blamed the rescinding of the freeze on media coverage, but republican lawmakers set a surge of constituent concerns created pressure for the reversal. and democrats, who spent their first week locked out of power struggling to keep up with the

onslaught of action exec of action on the pupils, the clare victory for dealing the new president his first setback." related to the controversy over the funding freeze and the rescinding of it. senate democrats yesterday boycotted a committee vote on the nomination of russell though to serve as the budget director in the -- in the trump presidency. here is the top democrat on the senate budget committee talking about why democrats are united against vought's confirmation. [video clip] >> he has done so many things that make him dangerously unfit. ee illegally held up military aid for ukraine, contributing to president trump's first impeachment. he coordinated an order at the end of the last trump administration to strip civil service protections for civil servants -- for thousands of

capable government employees. he was thwarted by the failure of president trump to win reelection. he supports prosecuting the officials that investigated president trump. he advocates for that very same discredited impoundment strategy that he used on ukraine. he wants to transfer the power of the purse as constitutionally given for congress to the president so the president can decide how much goes to each program. this is breaking the law and the constitution. he promotes using the military to quell domestic unrest. he calls for drugs used in medical abortions to be banned, and abortion itself to be banned without exception for rape or incest or the life of the mother. his vision of an all-powerful president is completely at audits with the constitutional

separation of powers. it is completely out on with the constitution -- at odds with the constitution's checks and balances. not only are his policies a threat to the programs that serve families across america, but in fact, he has a dangerous threat to our constitutional system of representative democracy. [end video clip] host: jeff merkley talking about why democrats were united in opposition against russell vought serving as the budget director. he was approved out of the budget committee despite the boycotting of that vote. 11-0. that nomination moves forward to the senate floor where there will be procedural hurdles for that nominee as there have been for others in these first few days of the trump administration. stephanie in new jersey.

a democratic caller. we are talking about the new cycle over the past 24 hours. your thoughts. caller: first of all, d.e.i. is not about race. it is about equality for black, brown, women and those with disabilities, ok, adding a fair shot. that is about -- that is what d.e.i. is about. secondly, trump -- obama put in place the d.e.i. proposal. ok. trump did not do away with it when he was in office. and not only that, there was no director for saa.

you know, he resigned. the director resigned. host: there is an acting administrator right now. caller: but the director -- the administrator resigned when trump was inaugurated, the day he was inaugurated. elon musk tried to get rid of him in september because he was not for his space whatever that blew up. and then, a couple of days -- two weeks before the inauguration, elon musk put another shuttle in the air. and it blew up. and the administrator did not go along, and he was not willing to fund his program or whatever. host: that is stephanie's thoughts. john in california.

republican. good morning. caller: i am not a maga republican, a true republican. host: what does that mean versus a maga republican? caller: i do not follow everything that this president says that comes out of his mouth. and, also, these other republican congressmen that support him, they only support him because of the fact that they did not want their families to go through death threats. that is the only reason they support him. why but their families through death threats? also the d.e.i., it is too complicated for some people. they just do not want to do critical thinking to think about the d.e.i., that is all. host: we will leave it there for now. we will take a short break.

when we come back we will be joined by akash chougule from the group americans for prosperity. we will hear about their push to extend president trump's tax cuts. last -- that conversation coming up after this short break. stay with us. ♪ >> 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 at 7:00 a.m. eastern, important public affairs events and weekdays h washgton today. just tell your smart speaker play c-span radio. c-span, created by cable. >> american history tv saturdays on c-span2, exploring the events

and people that tell the american story. at 3:00 p.m. eastern we will bring you the military commissioning ceremony for harriet tubman given posthumously. the maryland governor spoke at the event. and michael looks back on the career and legacy of mitch mcconnell who stepped down as senate republican leader at the end of the 118th congress. he has the deputy washington bureau chief for the associated press and an autobiography on senator mitch mcconnell. and then on saturday american history tv looks at the first 0 days of past presidential terms. we focus on the early months of president george washington's term including the establishment of the office of the president, the formation of the cabinet in the first judicial appointments. 8:00 p.m. eastern on lectures in history, the college of william and mary lecturer amy stallings discusses the history of the

1607town settlement and efforts to preserve and remember the first permanent english settlement in the americas. exploring the american story, watch american history tv saturdays on c-span2, and find a full schedule on your program guide or watch any time at c-span.org/history. ♪ >> in his latest book titled " wasteland" robert kaplan focuses on the importance of technology on determining the world's future. he holds a chair in geopolitics at the foreign policy institute. in chapter three in his 177 page book, he claims "civilization is now in flux. the ongoing decay of the west is manifested not only in racial tensions coupled with new

barriers to free speech in the deterioration of dress codes, the erosion of grammar, the decline in sales of seriou books and classical music and so on, all of which have been signs of civilization." >> author robert kaplan talks about his book "wasteland"n this episode of booknotes+. it is available on the c-span now free mobil app where wherever you get your podcasts. democracy, it is not just an idea, but a process. a process shaped by leaders elected to the highest offices and entrusted to a select few by guarding its basic principles. it is where debates unfold, decisions are made and the nation's courses charted. democracy in real time. this is your government at work. this is c-span. giving you your democracy, unfiltered.

>> washington journal continues. host: joining us at the table this morning is akash chougule, a vice president of government affairs for the americans for prosperity here to talk about tax cuts and deregulation. thus begin with our group, -- with your group, remind what the group is and who funds you? guest: we are a 20-year-old grassroots organization, the largest conservative organization in the country. you have more than 4 million members and 38 physical state chapters. we are 24/7, 365 educating and activating average everyday citizens and giving them the tools to make the needed -- that they need to make a difference, holding lawmakers accountable for bad policy and helping them push the tax cuts and jobs act. host: and you are funded by? caller: thousands of donors.

they give anywhere from a couple of dollars to larger gifts and we are grateful for their support. host: how much funding by the co-brothers? guest: we are proud to have been founded by them but we are grateful for everyone who supports our work. host: do the coke brothers do the majority of the funding? guest: we do not disclose our donors. we are proud of the association. he has one of the most successful launch burners the country has seen and we are grateful for his contributions and for his support of our organization. grateful for everyone who supports our organization. host: you announced a $20 million campaign to extend the 2017 trump tax cuts. and what does $20 million campaign spending plan look like? guest: so the 27 team -- 2017 tax cuts and jobs acts reduce the family tax burdened by $2000.

6 million americans were lifted from paws already from 2017 until 2019. we hit the lowest poverty rate and record low unemployment for black, hispanic and americans without a high school degree. it was a smashing success. however key provisions of the law expire at the end of the year, in particular the individual side tax cuts for american families. if those expire families will face tax hikes as high as $2400 a year in pennsylvania and $3500 a year in nevada. the pass-through deduction expires if not extended so this campaign will include ads, doorknocking, employer roundtables with two goals, make sure the american people know that the tax cuts are excel -- are expiring and make -- and give them tools to get lawmakers to set their priorities straight to make sure that the number one priority is to extend those low

tax rates. host: how do you respond to critics saying that the first round of tax cuts added to our nation's debts and deficits? guest: the main driver is not taxes. we will never tax our way into prosperity. you have talked about it. the main driver is an enormous growth of spending on entitlement spending programs, and just to give you a sort of a picture. president biden alone in four years spent $5 trillion in additional borrowing. that is more than three times the 10 year cost of the tax cuts and jobs act. in that instance much of it was to benefit his special interest allies, the green energy movement and trial lawyers. the tax cuts and jobs act allowed the american people to spend -- to keep mope of that -- more of their money and benefited a wide range of people. government is badly in need of spending cuts about raising taxes is not how we cut the

deficit. host: compare that to president trump's first term. guest: we have been critical of overspending for both parties. all the way going back to president bush, there really has been no one party at fault for the overspending. that is something we have had a strong track record on going back two decades. we are working hard with both parties with reforming the federal budget process to get this under control. it is in our opinion the most serious long-term issue facing the country. what we can do this year is to keep the tax cuts in place for the american people because they have already been hit by inflation crisis driven by overspending. the last thing they need is a tax increase. host: u.s. debt is projected to grow 23.9 trillion in 10 years not including the cost of extending the tax cuts. guest: spending is a major problem in this country.

until congress get serious about addressing the major drivers which are those mandatory spending programs, health care entitlements and debt interest, this problem will continue to be an issue. taxes are not the driver of the deficits. tax cuts are a driver of economic growth which is essential to addressing the debts and deficits. if you look at history not only with the tax cuts and jobs acts but previous round of tax cuts under president bush and president reagan, government revenues exceeded the pretax cut projections for government resonate -- revenue. that is a way to increase growth without increasing taxes. we think that is an essential part of addressing debts and deficits but spending cuts are not all only largely often good policy that essential to addressing the overspending problem. host: he has promised not to cut medicare and social security to

pay for tax cuts which leaves republicans consider government-subsidized health care under the affordable care act and other alternatives. so, where do republicans cut in order to pay or do they even need to? guest: our priority is that congress passed the most progrowth tax bill that they can put together. the spending conversation is a different conversation then tax policy. there are plenty of spending cuts to be had across the federal government that may or may not save money but are good policy and things that the government is not doing properly and should be doing less of or not at all or there are systemic reforms that government can pursue. we have urged congress to do so but there are a number of inflection points to cut spending, the annual appropriations fight, a debate over the debt limit. if congress is serious about cutting spending there are plenty of inflection points. the focus on the tax bill needs

to be it is as progrowth as it can be and keeps rates low on american families and businesses. host: speaker johnson has a problem within his party over how to move on extending these tax cuts. they report that "rank-and-file house republicans feel like they have no idea where the reconciliation process is going. it seems exceedingly unlikely that republicans will be able to craft a single package that lifts the salt cap, extends the -- the trump tax cuts and slashes the corporate tax cut, eliminates taxes on tips, overtime and social security and boost military spending while also cutting social spending." guest: governing is hard. we saw that the first time around. i believe 13 republicans voted against the act last time. no one said governing is easy but we are optimistic about the republicans' ability to get it

done rather than no other reason that they need to. there is an inflection point that if they failed to do so taxes will go up. there are trade-offs to all of these policies and people will have to give and take a little bit. our priority is making sure that the low tax rates that were a result of the 20 sing -- 2017 tax cuts and jobs acts state in place. there are different takes as well as our priority is but that is where our focus is. host: senate majority leader john thune says we have a plan and it is ready to go. he wants to wait and see what house republicans do. how familiar are you with the senate plan? how will they move the extension? guest: what we have heard so far is that they are looking at a two prong approach they are looking at border policy and energy policy. we are frankly agnostic on when they do so whether it is one or two bills. the house seems to be coalescing around a one bill strategy and

to be the first ones to take a swing. we are optimistic about speaker johnson's ability to get it done. he is a limited government conservative and he has the right priorities and he has the tools of the skills to get it through the house and we are optimistic that that could get to the senate and eventually be signed by the president. we do not have a position on whether it should be one bill or two, we are optimistic. host: a narrow majority in the house. is it likely that republicans will need votes for democrats to extend any tax cuts? guest: we would live to have -- love to have a bipartisan bill. the democratic party has made clear that their desires to raise taxes on wealthy and middle class families and big businesses and small businesses. they have any number of problems that are unaffordable for the -- programs that are unaffordable for the american people. it would be nice if they were to come on board. host: akash chougule is our

guest. george in philadelphia. democratic caller. caller: why can't they raise the taxes on the rich? and the businesses? guest: so, that is a good question and one that comes up a lot. this conversation about the rich paying their fair share there are a lot of misconceptions. we never hear a definition of what it is. the top 1% earn about almost 30% of income and they pay more than half of all federal income tax or about half. no matter what group of people towards the top you are talking about, without fail they pay a larger portion of federal income tax they on the portion of income they earn. we have a very progressive tax code and the rich pay a larger share of taxes today than they did prior to the bill being passed. host: what percentage do they

pay? guest: there is -- the lower rates across the board thanks to the tcja, but they pay a larger share of the overall burden today than they did prior to the tcja. rates came down across the board and we think that is good policy. the standard deduction was doubled. that is a tax cut from the bottom. so this created economic opportunity from americans from all socioeconomic statuses because of the progrowth nature. host: tcja for those outside of washington? guest: tax cuts and jobs act. a progrowth tax bill that republicans pass. host: keith in missouri. republican. hello. it is your turn. caller: hello. i have been watching you guys talk about the tax cuts and stuff. my thing is thank god that trump is doing it again because the

last four years for people like me have been suffering to pay the bills -- and we could not do nothing and taxes have been outrageous. and i agree with these tax cuts. we were able to stand up on our own feet. host: how did you personally benefit from the 2017 tax cut? caller: i benefited greatly. before i could not life without help. but not as much taxes have been coming out on me, making a certain amount and only being able to bring home half of that. host: so will he see more of a tax cut or is just -- or is this to extend what he is getting? guest: at the very least we want to extend the existing tax cuts. he addressed something that is a very important point is that

inflation is a tax on the american people and under president biden we had the worst inflation this country has seen in four years. the average american family was spanned -- was spending $12,000 more per year to afford the same quality of life as i had the day president biden took office. $12,000 more per year to afford the same quality of life because of the inflation crisis. and that is why you see 76% of americans saying that now is a bad time to rage's -- to raise taxes. the american people have really taken it on the chin and we want to make sure they do not get another cost-of-living increase. and keith touched on that point which is that people are being lifted up from the bottom. 6 million americans were lifted out of poverty thanks to the regulatory reforms, tax cuts, and other progrowth measures. host: west point, mississippi. lisa, independent. caller: good morning.

my question today is what this organization's position is on a simplified tax code? i believe that the politicians of both parties really use these very different deductions and very complicated process to manipulate voters and manipulate what money goes to individual constituents that are sometimes a very tiny percentage of the overall taxpayers. and i believe that if it was a much more transparent system and understandable, people would not have such an issue or claim that you are paying my share or i am paying your share. and secondarily to that, i would be encouraged if there was a way that -- something posted that individually showed what taxes are paid.

maybe there is and you can educate me on that. guest: to your first question and this is an important point and the tcja made progress but there is plenty more to be made which is getting rid of deductions and tax credits and things like that. they do complicate the tax code that result in corporate cronyism and giveaways to special interest groups. we are for eliminating almost all of them because as you mention, the rest of the country ends up picking up the tab in the form of higher taxes. the other place that the tcja did a lot to simplify the code was doubling the standard deduction. as a result, 29 million households take that standard deduction. there is a 75% decrease in middle-class families forced to itemize resulting in thousands of hours saved with tax compliance and $5 billion in savings.

that was a really important reform to simplify the code and to make it more progrowth. host: jackie in new jersey. democratic caller. hello. caller: good morning. i have a question related to what would happen to the economy if the tariffs cake and against canada --kick in against canada and mexico who everyone knows excel a lot of parts used in american manufacturing. and the tax cuts bill being proposed is not pass considering the inflation? i would like his feedback on that. sorry. guest: tariffs can be inflationary and raise costs on the american people especially broad-based tariffs on everything coming from mexico and canada. we are concerned about those proposals but certain situations

where the president is looking, there is some justification for the special tools at the executive branch has at uits --its disposal. america is too reliant on china for national defense and security. it is reasonable to think that the president should use for instances of -- like that but we want to do so in a way that is not broad-based or raises cost. ultimately what congress can do and what american prosperity is focused on is extending the tax cuts so the american people avoid a tax increase. one of the other important principles that the caller is alluding to is avoiding any kind of tax increase on the american people. last time around there was debate on a proposal that people called the border adjustment tax which would have been a trillion dollar tax hike on consumers and one of raise costs on retailers and manufacturers that relied on foreign parts.

there is a lot we can do to make america competitive on the global scale. raising taxes on families and businesses is not a host: host: way to do so. a headline from newsmax saying " tariffs on mexico and canada coming saturday with decision on oil tax pending." guest: it would be unfortunate if a broad-based tariff was put into place but president trump has moved in both directions even in the short time he has been back in office. we have seen a lot of and chatter. hopefully they find a way to avoid those broad-based tariffs. the usmca enacted under president trump comes up from her -- comes up in renewal for 2026. we are hoping for more free-trade with three countries. we think it is a benefit to the american people. it strengthens communities, particularly communities that need more jobs and economic growth.

more free-trade with three countries is important. host: newsmax saying "president donald trump says that his 25% tariffs on canada and mexico are coming on saturday that he still considering whether to to include oil from those countries as part of his import tax. he said his decision will be based on whether the price of oil charged by the two trading partners is fair, although the basis of threatened tariffs pertains to the stopping of illegal immigration and smuggling of chemicals used for the stopping of -- used for the making of fentanyl." peter from new york. hello. caller: i would like to make a couple of points. if they extended the 2017 tax cuts that is already baked in. only if they change the tax cuts, like for instance the corporate tax from 21 to 15%, then there would be implications regarding that. but the 2017 tax cuts were baked

in already. in 2017 the federal government brought in $3.33 trillion of money. in 2023 it brought in $4.8 trillion. the corporate tax, which was 39% and was reduced to 21%. in 2017 it brought in $225 billion. the recent numbers showed that that number went up to over $500 billion. they do not use dynamic scoring when they talk about these tax cuts, and they assume that the amount of tax revenue that is brought in is going to stay the same with the regular scoring that they use. if you use dynamic scoring it actually brings more revenue in. that is something that they need to explain regarding this issue. thank you. guest: another super important

point and i appreciate the call. for folks outside of washington this can get complicated. the official scorekeeper is a body called the congressional budget office. when they assess apology changes what the caller is referring to as static scoring, what is the impact on government revenue because of tax cuts. by nature they would decrease revenue. the caller is referring to with dynamic scoring is because the tax cuts create economic growth it creates more revenue and tax receipts for the government because more people are working and companies are earning more and paying more in taxes and that is an important point and hopefully that congressional republicans are taking into account with that. the cbo does not have a strong track record and other organizations on the outside like the upn model and other organizations have done dynamic scoring and showed what the caller is referring to.

progrowth tax cuts can drive greater revenue for the federal government. we saw that with the 2017 tax cuts that revenue exceeded pretax cut expectations. host: stephen next in indianapolis. democratic caller. caller: please give me time, i want to get my point across. i am a member of -- i am a member of a large group of americans out here and that group has to do with senior citizens. i am also the member of a group who are on disability. i became disabled in my 40's and now i am in my 70's. and i listen to you speak about this tax cut and how it will benefit everyone. trump's last tax cut did not benefit me. all of my friends both black and white, we all say the same thing. we have not or we did not

benefit from trump's tax cut. so, this is where the rubber meets the road now. could you simplify how am i -- how i and millions of my friends who are senior citizens, disabled, lined or otherwise, how is this tax going to benefit us. please keep it simple. remember us -- remember, a lot of us have a little bit of mental disturbance, a touch of the alzheimer's or something. guest: two key points. one of the things that could have been done better following the tax bill was educating the american people on the changes they actually experience. the vast majority of the american people got a tax cut. more than 80% saw their taxes cut. even the biden administration and janet yellen manage that.

the new york times said that you got a tax cut. that has been well-established. because of the timing and the events thereafter, many americans are not aware that they received a tax cut. if you go and look at your tax bill from 2017 versus 2018 to 2019, the vast majority of americans would see that there tax rate fell. i cannot speak to your situation. those are the facts, and it is important that we do not let that expire because that would be a massive tax increase on the american people. host: robert is in greenville, north carolina. independent. caller: no transparency to the people giving hundreds of millions of dollars.

earned benefits are not the problem. the problem is greed. the problem is we have no way of seeing who is doing what. we should have complete transparency. in the eisenhower days, we had much higher taxes and we thrived. the middle class thrived. you are just a talking head for the brothers. they don't want to help us. guest: the fact of the matter is the facts do not bear out the point is caller is making. in 2018 and 2019 alone, median household income grew more than $6,000 and hit an all-time high

in 2018. the average american family was wealthier and more prosperous in the two years after the tax cut than in any point in america's history. that growth was more than the previous 10 years combined. one of the misconceptions is that when you cut taxes on employers, it benefits workers and consumers. that is something that economists agree on because the burden of the corporate tax is borne by the american people in the form of lower wages, higher costs and lower returns for investors. your 401(k) for example. ultimately this bill created a progrowth environment by reforming both the corporate site as well as the individual income tax side. as i mentioned, it actually made the tax code more progressive. the top 1% paid about 39% of federal income tax in 2017. they paid 42% in 2018. if your issue is making sure

people are being lifted from the bottom, this bill not only lifted 6 million people out of poverty along side reforms, the rich are paying a greater share than prior to this legislation and actually shrank income inequality. because the growth was disproportionately benefiting people at the bottom, income and wealth inequality shrank in the years following this legislation because it did what it was intended to do which was create opportunity and uplift the american people. host: viewers can check the numbers from the americans for prosperity if you go to the website. akash chougule is the vice president of government affairs for americans for prosperity. thank you for the conversation. guest: thanks for having me. host: when we come back, we will talk with dr. georges benjamin, american public health association executive director. we will talk about the trump administration and public health policies. we will be right back.

>> watch american history tv's new series "first 100 days" with historians, authors and c-span archives. we will examine how events impacted presidential terms and the nature of the present day. we will look at the first 100 days of george washington's presidency, he established the office of the president, created the first cabinet, helped establish the nation's courts and the first system of tariffs and taxes. watch american history tv's new series "first 100 days" saturdays at 7:00 p.m. eastern on american history tv on c-span 2. >> book tv every sunday on c-span 2 features leading authors discussing their latest nonfiction books. here is a look at what is coming up this weekend. former obama administration homeland security senior advisor

marino argues that president biden's border policies have weakened u.s. national security and has let terrorists in our country. at 9:00 p.m. colette shade reflects on how cultural innovations of the late 2000's impact at the present, past and future. then at 10:00 p.m. eastern, eva dou shares her book that examines how huawei became china's most powerful company. she is interviewed by national security chair adam segel. watch book tv every sunday on c-span 2 and find a full schedule on your program guide or watch online any time at book tv.org. >> democracy. it is not just an idea. it is a process shaped by

leaders, elected to the highest offices and entrusted to a select few with guarding the basic principles. it is where debates unfold, decisions are made and the nation's course is started. democracy in real time. this is your government at work. this is c-span, giving you your democracy unfiltered. >> "washington journal" continues. host: joining us is dr. georges benjamin, executive director of american public health association. remind us of your group, what are the goals and who funds it. guest: we are the nation's national association of people interested in public health of professional society. it has been around since 1872. we are funded from membership dues, revenue from the annual meeting, revenue from our

publications and some grants including federal grants. host: who are your members? guest: they are people who work in the state and local health departments who teach and do research at our nation's health centers, public interest groups like the diabetes association and other nonprofits interested in health, a lot of them small. host: as the executive director of the american public health association, is rfk junior qualified to serve as health and human services secretary? guest: we believe he is the wrong guy for this job. we don't believe he has the proper training, the management skills and the judgment to do this job well and we saw that on full display during the two hearings he had this week. host: talk about proper training. what is needed? guest: somebody with a background in health. we have had a lot of attorneys in that job but they all had health experience.

they have been legislators or they had a broad health experience in healthcare financing or health insurance. he does not have that. he is an environmental lawyer that has been in a very narrow focus area. environment is important for your health but he does not have the broad range of skills necessary for this job. host: management skills, you cited that. guest: hhs is almost a $2 trillion agency with 80,000 employees and 13 operating divisions. it covers everything from before you are born to when you pass away. it is complex. and he at most has managed a couple of organizations on their board at their peak with a $30 million budget which is a rounding error in the budget for the department of health and human services. host: critics of rfk junior believe he does not know how

medicare and medicaid work. do you share that concern and what do you point to from his testimony? guest: absolutely. he confused medicare with medicaid. medicare is our nations program for seniors, people over the age of 65 and older. medicaid is one of the many programs that we have for people whose incomes are around 138% of the federal poverty level. it does not have premiums. it does not have very many copayments if any. sometimes you have to pay a copayment for medication but it is like one dollar or two dollars. he talks disparagingly about the clinical outcomes from medicaid programs. it turns out if you have medicaid, you get a pretty good coverage, extraordinary benefits and all of the studies show that it improves our health. we have a natural experiment in

our country where we have 10 states that have not expanded medicaid and when you compare the health outcomes from those states that have expanded medicaid versus those states that have not expanded medicaid, you have better outcomes in the states that have expanded medicaid. host: what were your takeaways when you heard rfk jr. testifying about vaccines and his past statements on vaccines? guest: he says he is not anti-vaccine and that he just wants vaccines to be safe but his record is unchallenged. his record is clear that he has spent his whole adult lifetime disparaging vaccines. he said that vaccines are not safe, not effective. he has filed motions to get vaccines pulled from the market. he even had the hubris to try to

pull the covid vaccine during the middle of the outbreak when people were dying every day. his statements about not being anti-vaccine are disingenuous. host: if not robert kennedy, then for this job is there a high-profile republican that you would like the president to nominate instead? who could do the job? guest: anybody that i say, they will not get the job. bobby gentle, bob redfield who used to run the cdc. those are highly qualified republicans who know health policy. those are people who have good clinical skills or good health policy skills. this is not against people on a partisan basis. we were very supportive of alex

azar when he was the secretary of health and human services. this is about getting somebody who can protect the health of the american people. host: referring to the first trump administration alex azar who served as health and human services secretary. when it comes to public health policy, what are you watching during these first few days of the trump administration? guest: the challenge and the tragedy is absolute chaos. it took them a while to name acting directors but some of the most damaging things is they have stopped communication of people in the agency, even routine communications. sharing data. we hear they are scrubbing websites and taking things from websites. we are in the middle of a major h5n1 bird flu outbreak and at the proper data that needs to go out to the states for them to manage the outbreak is not happening in a meaningful way.

they have stopped all funding the other day. there was a big brouhaha about that. we are one of the organizations that did sue them to get them to rescind that. that process is still going on. while they partially pulled back that information, it made it more confusing. they sent out notices just the other day for all work to stop on any diversity, equity and inclusion grants. they just made the problem more confusing and people really don't know what to do. that is at not just the federal level but at the state and local level. host: on h5n1, why is this an important issue for the public health and their safety? guest: obviously, bird flu can be a very lethal infection. we are very worried that it will mutate to a form that can be spread person-to-person and kill

lots of people. we are very worried about that. we know that that is the trajectory of bird flu. we have seen that type of outbreak before. we just got over covid, which was a very bad outbreak. the other thing is just think about the number of farmers in middle america and california who are losing their livestock. chickens, ducks, cows and milk cows. if anybody does not understand why they are being impacted, look at the price and availability of eggs. this administration needs to get their hands around this in an all of government response or it will get worse. people are the problem. i worry about the people the most. right now, the livelihood of so many americans in middle america

is being impacted and they are asleep at the switch. host: in what way? guest: they have not talked to any of us. they need civil society to make this happen. they have frozen a lot of the funds that people need to make this happen. they are sitting on the data that we need to make data-driven decisions. they have not filled the pandemic preparedness office which is the contact to create an all of government response for these types of outbreaks. asleep at the switch. host: debra in west chester, ohio, republican. caller: good morning. i am concerned about our nutrition for our children. my parents had a daycare and i ran the cfcpp program. that program is mandated in

daycares but it is only offered k-12. in the fall of 2008, we changed snap and added sugary soft drinks and candy. now we are in a position where we all know, anyone in the medical field, we all know that was a terrible decision. as a matter of fact, in the department of agriculture, when you go to my plate, you see that we have 20% protein, 30% vegetables. we have to make a major change and we have to change snap back to what it was. but it is going to be difficult because now the people can buy any foods. i don't understand why we ever did that or why the public health officials did not stand up and scream and prevent that from happening. host: let's get a response.

guest: we really thank deborah for her work and advocacy. you are right. we did stand up and scream in many quarters. i remember when michelle obama was trying to improve the quality of school lunches. we got a lot of pushback by that. big food is a major political force. i know that president trump has said he wants to make americans healthy again. that is something that i think everyone in this country can get behind. we need to use it in a science-driven way and that means we have to take on big food. if we can do that, tobacco and getting people more physically active, get the salt out of our diet, we will be a lot healthier. we tried to get soda taxes and tried to reduce consumption of sugary beverages and we have

been stopped and most jurisdictions have tried to do that. i applaud you for your efforts and i look forward to working with groups like yours to make that happen. host: polly is next in florida, independent. caller: hi. how are you doing? guest: hi. caller: my education was in public health back in the early mid 1990's. i went on to work in public health on the border of the united states and mexico. it was pre-9/11. my experience has been that i worked hard. i was eager and enthusiastic as a representative for public health at the time. i had been pretty disillusioned by how i had watched things unfold on a macro scale. specifically 9/11, after that we

developed -- there was a massive program that started down there to deal with terrorism type things. my experience, this was 30 years ago, was that it was pretty pathetic. here we are 30 years later and now we see plain disasters, and the media will hyperfocus on things of that nature. i do not feel there is anything actually occurring in the world. i am pretty disillusioned. i think these confirmation hearings are performative. it is just drama for the committee to waste time and get views. i just do not feel there is any legitimate movement to genuinely protect the health of people not just in this country, but in the world. host: we will get a response.

guest: i am an emergency physician and i was the secretary of health in maryland on 9/11 and the anthrax letters. we have this terrible tendency that when something bad happens, to throw a lot of money at it through public health. then the event goes away and then the money goes away and we never get any long-term capacity to address the things we need to address. we also do not build long-term capacity and we make a false trade-off between managing the relating cause of the death like lung disease, heart disease, obesity, substance issues and we do not build that infrastructure. we trade off and play hot potato with the money and move the money around and still building long-term capacity -- instead of building long-term capacity so that we can respond in an effective way. every new administration throws out the old people, brings in

new people and do not build on the successes of the old group. the truth of the matter is you can never be successful as a nation. we spent over $5 trillion as a nation on health and we are at the bottom of the rankings of other industrialized nations. we actually know the solution to that. my appeal, i think what you are saying is we need to finally decide seriously we are going to do that. that does mean tough political decisions. that means getting the right person at the department of health and human services who can sit by the president and give him the best advice so he can make sound decisions. host: we will go to ohio. dave is there. good morning. republican. caller: good morning. the health system has been politicized since 1986 when they decided to hold manufacturers

harmless from manufacturing vaccines. it has been terrible since then because now if you get entered by a vaccine, you cannot sue in front of a jury of their peers. you have to go to a special master and if he decides to give you some money, it comes out of taxpayer funds. we need somebody like kennedy to unravel that system. to give you an example of how dangerous the system is, i would like to know if you are aware that in 2014 when the women in kenya were subjected to the pertussis virus which was spiked with an infertility agent and the catholic church of kenya brought this to light. the worst thing is, not what was done to the people of kenya, but the system. it was a virus, a vaccine, and make your body reject something natural. you can develop peanut allergies. i would like to know your response to that. guest: i don't know the

particular issue you are talking about. i am also always very cautious to do research before i respond to accusations around that kind of thing. in terms of a particular situation with a particular vaccine or experience, let me say that our nation decided one of the best ways from a policy perspective to move forward was to have a vaccine compensation program which is what we do have. we have a very robust system to do studies to make sure that vaccines are safe and effective. once you are on the market, to do post-market surveillance to follow up on that. we have a low bar for reporting things that people might be concerned about. those get studied and once we do that, then we make informed decisions. sometimes we have taken therapeutics, not just vaccines, but other drugs off the market when we thought that the risk of someone taking a vaccine or other therapeutic was not worth

it. i think we have a good system. my issue with mr. kennedy is he is not the right guy to do this. there are a lot of people who have talked about trying to enhance the vaccine safety system in this country. some folks at johns hopkins have ideas on how to do it. but he is not the guy to do it. host: dr. georges benjamin is our guest this morning, executive director of the american public health association. anthony, you are next in new york, democratic caller. caller: dr. benjamin, can you explain why mary gruber and philip crouse, senior officials at the fda resigned their positions due to the implementation of government overreach by the biden administration to mandate vaccines for children? can you also explain why it is that the congress and the senate and their staff are exempt from vaccines that you seem to want to shove down the throats of the

american taxpayers? my body, my choice. i refuse to consume vaccinations. i do not want my health care delivered by way of a hyper direct needle. can you explain why those senior officials resigned their positions in protest to the biden administration's overreach with regard to vaccination of children? guest: one of the benefits of being an american is you get to walk with your feet when you disagree with policy. anyone who wants to do that can do that. i was in the camp of people that felt that we should encourage people very strongly to get vaccinations. because of the early signs of the morbidity and mortality from the covid vaccine, i was encouraging people very strongly and we eventually got to the mandate camp because we were concerned about the fact that we would have a real problem. we lost over one million people

from covid. many of them were disproportionately from minority communities. it does impact kids. kids were not as impacted as older adults but it does absolutely impact kids. so we did recommend that children be vaccinated as well. host: michael, massachusetts, republican. caller: good morning. guest: how are you doing? caller: not too bad. i am curious why everybody is against kennedy because all he wants to do is make the united states healthy again. everyone is against him because they want to expose the mandates. host: dr. benjamin? guest: i am opposed to him for concrete reasons. not properly trained. does not have the management experience. has expressed lots of disin

formation. i am in the camp that believes that he was responsible for the outbreak in samoa, at least partially responsible for that where there were many deaths including deaths among children. i think there are many people who can lead our nation to improve our health. having had a job like this at the state level, i know the job and i know what qualities it takes to do that job and i do not think he is the guy. host: any areas where you agree with mr. kennedy? guest: i agree we need to pay more attention to chronic diseases but not at the expense of infectious diseases because they are interlinked. i also disagree with him on his stand on vaccines. i disagree with his demonizing federal workers who get up everyday and go to work. i disagree with his assertions around fluoride. when used in the proper doses. i absolutely disagree with his

recommendation to create -- drink raw milk in the middle of a bird flu outbreak. i believe pasteurized products are the safest. that is my professional device. -- professional advice. you have a right to do what you do. i get that. i will not tell you not to drink raw milk. i will tell you not to drink raw milk but i will not stand in the way and stop you because i do not have one of those jobs that i can do that anyway. i will give you as much information as i can. hopefully you will make a good decision based on the information that i give you that is factual. if you don't, that's up to you. host: helen, new york, independent. caller: hello? host: we are listening to you. caller: you guys are talking about all of these diseases and vaccines and stuff. i want to ask you something.

wouldn't it also be with the weather that changes, the climate change, the air that we breathe and the oil? doesn't have a lot to do with health but he still wants to drill, baby? guest: climate change is real and impacting our health today. wildfires, intensified hurricanes, floods, severe weather. this is all because we are burning fossil fuels, increasing carbon in our environment. we understand the science. it is unequivocal right now that this is true. it does impact our health. we still have people living under blue tarps in the southern part of our country because their property was destroyed from the hurricanes we had last year.

hurricane season will come again this year. i don't know what it will look like but it will come back this year because it does every year. the wildfires we saw were the result of severe drought that they have had on the west coast of our country. of course, the wildfires just devastated and there was a real tragedy. we will have to do something about that. the air that came from that caused numerous problems. the health department was intimately involved in trying to protect people. we had this fight about wearing masks. there were no arguments about wearing masks out west. even the fires in canada last year brought bad air to the northeast part of our country. that is all due to climate change. host: dr. benjamin, thank you very much for your time this morning. if viewers want to learn more, they can go to apha.org.

thank you for the conversation. guest: thank you. host: when we come back, open forum. any public policy issue or political one, dial in. we will start that conversation in a minute. the lines are on your screen. >> if you ever miss any coverage, find it anytime online at c-span.org. videos of key hearings, debates and other events have markers that guide you to newsworthy highlights. these >> if you ever miss any of the c-span's coverage, you can find it anytime online at c-span.org, video of key hearings, debates and other events feature markers that guide you to interesting and newsworthy highlights

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from c-span's perch at the white house is the white house reporter for the hill newspaper. let's start at the beginning or with the latest from president trump just posting on tooth social this morning the black hawk helicopter was flying too high by a lot, it was far above the 200 foot limit. it is not really too complicated to understand, is it? what do you make of the three question marks following the statement from the president? guest: we have been seeing the truth social posts that he has been bringing up questions or theories that he has about what happened in this crash. he was asked, why are you bringing up things before the investigation is over, and he pivoted away to say that the investigations are underweight but he has questions and has been focused on the helicopter in the flight patterns which all

of us are focused on how this could have happened and how the helicopter was able to get that close to the plane. even yesterday when he was taking questions, he brought up the height of the helicopter, and should it have gone above or below or to the left or right of the plane and then posting again about it this morning was interesting and shows his commitment and pointing fingers at the helicopter pilots as those that were at fault here. whereas he also has brought up other areas he thinks are at fault, including diversity, inclusion and equity programs in the government and air traffic controllers but it is interesting this morning focused on the helicopter pilots. anything new from the federal agencies overlooking the response? guest: we know that they were able to get the black box out of the potomac river and it will tell us information about the

final moments of the pilots on the american airlines j a what they were experiencing. otherwise, the secretary of defense pete hegseth usually the role will be the person to answer for how it went with the army helicopter getting that close to the plane and looking into if training should even operate that close to a national airport again. we will hear more from the military on that front. otherwise, it seems like the d.c. fire department, police, and ntsb are taking turns giving us more and more information as they receive it. we will have a white house briefing later today that we might get some more information out of the white house. host: the briefing at 1:00 p.m. eastern time and we will have live coverage on c-span,

c-span.org and the free video mobile app c-span now. the president also named a new interim faa administrator who is see and why was are not one in place when this collision occurred? guest: he said yesterday in his press conference, he was in the briefing room yesterday and said the deputy administrator at the faa will step in as an acting role. the reason there is not a current faa administrator in place is because mike whitaker, who was just confirmed in october 2023 by the senate for a five-year term at the head of the faa resigned on inauguration day. he announced that in december 2 his team that would -- that he would be leaving. and that left a hole. part of the reason when he

decided to retire is he said comments about spacex, elon musk's company during testimony and elon musk then pushed for him to resigned and started a pressure campaign to have whitaker step aside. so after trump won the election, he decided to step aside before it trump was sworn in and he would beat working with elon musk around the white house. an interesting turn of events that allowed for there to be no faa directed in place. he could have supper and left the president decided to push them out when he took over. so then he was able to appoint an acting director. and we know the secretary sean duffy was just one in so we have someone in place for that role. host: three nominees on capitol hill yesterday. is the white house confident

those three can get confirmed in the senate? guest: a lot of fireworks with the confirmation hearings with those three nominees. when they are the most concerned about is director of national intelligence nominee, tulsi gabbard, because she did not seem to convince enough republicans in that hearing yesterday to support her. we heard a lot of republicans pressuring her to say that edward snowden was a traitor and to say that she does not have any allegiances with other foreign adversaries after her complicated background. they left the hearings telling my colleagues on capitol hill that they still have questions and she can't afford to lose too many votes coming out of committee. and if it goes to the full senate, i don't think she can get votes at this time from

senate republicans. but i am curious for the white house. what we are hearing is they want her to get the committee vote as opposed to pulling her out before she could potentially fail the vote. we know the first department of justice mate -- matt gaetz backed out before he could fail a confirmation vote out of committee. so far it seems like she could be getting the vote in a few days but we will see if the white house makes moves so she doesn't feel the vote. host: will we see the president today? guest: we know he is holding a

round table to talk about school of choice after he signed an executive order. a lot of information coming out of the white house later today. host: we thank you very much. we will be covering all of the news of the white house here on c-span. you can check it out on c-span.org or are free video mobile app c-span now. the briefing that will take place at 1:00 p.m. eastern time with the white house press secretary, you can watch on c-span, c-span radio, c-span now, or c-span.org. nicole in brookland, maryland, a republican. good morning. caller: i would like to first say that peace be unto the families and during the tragedy that just happened. three quick points, i would just like to say that first of all,

the financial peace covered it seems like the blue color has no margin anymore and that skill-based jobs are going to artificial intelligence. business that was capable to outsource or move headquarters to other countries is because in america to crash. when the gentleman was talking about health care, the medicaid nominee or whatever, my hope is that we are able to have a more comprehensive plan for ourselves to be able to get private insurance. an example, a recent her issues and the doctor referred me to get care and it was denied. however, the reason i am saying

this today is it is imperative that you are allowed to get to the root of the issue so it doesn't become a deteriorating tunnel down, that you have the time to have a better healthier lifestyle to yourselves. host: we are in open forum for the remainder of today's "washington journal. kevin in indiana, independent. what is on your mind? caller: mr. trump is accusing the traffic controllers. you wants qualify come educated people in these jobs but yet he is picking people for these cabinets like mr. kennedy. in pete hegseth is an alcoholic.

and he has high married three times with seven children and can't even name all seven of them. and -- host: how do you know that? caller: he admitted to being on pier 1 for 14 years. and then he has never been arrested for using heroin for 14 years yet you have people in jail and prison for doing less than that? they were very educated people. host: we will go to rob who is a democratic caller in phoenix. caller: i would like to talk about something coming up next week, wednesday night in maricopa county. a meeting of the court appointed monitor team who were assigned

by a federal judge in a case of the racial profiling of the sheriff's department. this will be the first meeting with the new elected sheriff. he has been out of office for eight years and has come back after november and he is what they call a constitutional sheriff. he is calling himself a constitutional sheriff which says they are the highest authority in the country. answerable to no one. he is ready to defy the federal judge whose republican nominated federal judge who found guilty -- who found -- guilty.

next wednesday night, having the first meeting with the new sheriff. this is an opportunity for arizonans to come in and say we will not allow him to run over the federal court appointed monitor team. host: john is in in massachusetts, a republican.

of the justice department. the reason i am calling today is this i want to talk about caroline kennedy's comments that

she had a video of a couple days ago. i voted for rfk junior in the new jersey election. actually the democrats in new jersey didn't even list his vote total as he was running as an independent. i am sure thousands of people voted for him in new jersey, but that was not even listed. when caroline kennedy came out with this post, besides god, families are a been there in my activities of daily living. i was taught that if you have nothing to say good, don't say nothing at all, especially with the family. i really thought that was a bad thing and it don't think she should have done that. host: headlines this morning from politico, the panama

president had a visits that i cannot negotiate on the canal. that is the first trip overseas for the secretary of state who has been in the position. marco rubio, the secretary of state writing in today's opinion pages of the wall street journal, an america's first foreign policy, he said it is no accident that my first trip abroad is secretary of state to central america which will keep me in the hemisphere. this is where among secretaries of state over the past century. u.s. foreign policy has long been focused on other regions while overlooking our own. as a result, we have let problems fester, missed opportunities, and neglected partners. that ends now, he writes in the wall street journal this morning. you can read more there from the new secretary of state. at diane in south carolina, it

-- democratic caller. caller: robert f kennedy did admit that he was a heroin addict for 14 years and anybody in this united states of america and around the world that thinks somebody that has a heroin 14 years something is not wrong with him, it is a constant thing heroin. he did it for 14 years. he admitted it. he does not get my vote and everybody have a great day. host: allen in arkansas, independent. allen in arkansas, good morning. caller: good morning. a compliment and a criticism

real quick. first, the reference to the drought in california has been stunning for me and i am going to repeat it. they are saying that they have plenty of water in the northern part of the state that they can canal to the southern part of the state and have absolutely all the water in the world that they need is the most stunning good i did not know that. that is the most stunning mismanagement it makes it sound like they want to create a crisis circumstance, whether that is for whatever reasons, government control or whatever it is. that is a stunning thing to have found out from president trump's visit out there. i want to get to a criticism to

you professionally and a reference to january 6. i was watching the morning that you were posting that morning and i called you once before to make this point but you've hung up on me so i hope you will let me make this point. on the whole issue of january 6 hearing, no one is talking about, and honestly i am stunned to not have you and everyone else really repeating what the legal issue was that morning, and the legal issue was, to decide whether or not it was legal for states to allow their voting laws to be changed by other entities other than their state legislature. all states had to change their

voting rules to their state legislature but some of the swing states had changes made by the lawyer entities rather than through their state legislatures. that was the issue on january 6 two decide whether or not to count those votes that were added to the total that were outside the legal voting requirements in those states. that was the legal issue good i keep listening for someone to make that clarification, especially at you on c-span, and you are not making it. so do that. and here is my criticism. forgive me for saying "you," you had david horwitz on as a guest and i have never seen a guest more rudely treated, unprofessionally then your

demeanor with david horwitz. i wonder if that is because he is now a conservative and he is so articulate. after that, i bought all of his books and i bought each one in every one of his books. if people will go back and look at that interview. your behavior toward him was so condescending and you compare that to your cordial nests toward this guest that has been on a hundred times and he gets treated with such just glaring, polite etiquette and 100 times he has been invited on. host: i heard your criticism. we will move on to tom in principle frederick, maryland, republic -- prince frederick,

maryland, republican. caller: i would not criticize you personally or professionally. but a couple of things. watching senator klobuchar and other democrat senators scream about the high prices of pharmaceuticals and the republicans have to do something about it. i agree, except the democrats had control of the country for 12 of the last 16 years. my question would be, why didn't they do something about it during those 12 years? the second thing is, all of the talk about the pardons of trump over the january 6ers. but everybody is screaming about all of the horrible, violent

people. no one is mentioning that joe biden pardoned a drum draw -- drug lord who killed an eight-year-old girl and her mother, murdered. nobody is mentioning another pardon by joe biden that someone else killed two police officers. and joe biden issued more pardons than all of the presidents combined going back to 1960. that is pretty much all i have to say. host: we are in open forum. any political issue on your mind. pam in maryland, democratic caller. caller: i think -- i agree with the man who said something about getting water for california fires from the upper state. i agree with that. i don't know why they aren't doing that. i think maybe they should build

a soul dissolving plant in the middle of the pacific and send it to those dry areas to prevent wildfires. host: helen, oklahoma city, republican. caller: i was just wanting to speak about the doctor you had on talking about how many people died from covid. he never did mention how many died from the vaccine. and i would like to speak about people talking about president trump. they have talked about him for the last nine years. do you think it is going to be another four years of trump, trump, trump. it is just ridiculous. they have talked about that man so much i don't even see how he can --

host: sandy, stockton, california, democratic caller. caller: people have talked about trump a lot and i am going to talk about him this morning. there is nothing that anybody should leave coming out of his mouth. i am going to refer back to the gentleman who mentioned trump coming to california and turning on the spigot in california because there is so much water in the northern part of california and that the drop is really not happening. we have two separate water systems in the state of california. one is in northern california and the other is in southern california. california southern california captures the water from the rain

when it rains in southern california. northern california captures the rain mostly from the runoff from the mountains. they are two separate water systems. what happened in california is that the federal government was doing maintenance on its own water taps. it had nothing to do with that fires. it had nothing to do with any of it. fires, the water issue in california did not have anything to do with northern california. northern california cannot turn on a spigot and get it to southern california. that is not the way the water system works. i realize people think it is north to south so it should just flow downhill.

if that is not how the water system works. number two, host: sandy, you are going to have to make it the people in support of trump, i hope you know what you voted for. host: the doors are about to open to the house floor. we will take you up there now for this quick pro forma session. the house is not in session this week. they will gave and out is what we expect.