♪ host: it is wednesday, february 19. last night in their first joint television interview, president trump and elon musk spoke to sean hannity about doge and the first 100 days of the administration for it we will show you portions of the

interview and get your reaction to that and the role elon musk is playing in government and the actions of doge so far. are you in support or opposed to those actions? republicans, 202-748-8001. democrats, 202-748-8000. independents, 202-748-8002. you can send a text to 202-748-8003. include your first name intercity and state preyed we are on social media, facebook.com/c-span and x @cspanwj. starting wh this news from the hill headlined chutkan refuses to blossom -- block musk and doge from several federal agencies. the judge ruling yesterday refused the request by 14 democrat state attorneys general

to immediately oppose wide-ranging restrictions on elon musk's doge. a coalition of states claims that muska's far-reaching role heading doge is unconstitutional since he was not confirmed by the senate and the states sought to block doge from accessing seven federal agencies. there fuse the demand saying they had not made the necessary show of irreparable harm. here is what she said, plaintiffs will generally called into question what appears to be the unchecked authority of an elected individual and entity that was not created by congress and over which has no oversight. in the circumstances it must be indisputable that this court acts within the bounds of its authority. accordingly it cannot issue a temporary restraining order. especially one as wide-ranging as plaintiffs request without clear imminent irreparable harm to theselaintiffs. the current record does not meet that standard.

we will show you a portion of the interview that aired on fox news last night. here is elon musk responding to criticism about doge. [video clip] >> this is what you get from the democrats, you get nobody voted for elon. nobody voted for any of your cabinet nominees. people are dying because of doge cuts. i will give you a chance to respond. what doge is doing is illegal, elon musk is more street vernacular for a male body part. there's a constitutional crisis. >> why are they reacting like this? >> first of all do you give a rip. >> i guess we must be doing something right or they wouldn't be complaining so much if they weren't doing something -- we weren't doing something useful. all we are really trying to do is restore the will of the people through the president and what we are finding is there is

an unelected bureaucracy, there is a vast federal bureaucracy that is implacably opposed to the president and cabinet. it is 92%, in d.c.. that's a lot. >> they don't like me here either. >> 92%, that's basically most everyone. but -- but, how -- if the will of the president is not implemented and the president is a representative of the people that means the will of the people is not being implemented and that means we don't live in a democracy, we live in a bureaucracy. i think what we are seeing here is this sort of thrashing of the bureaucracy as we try to restore democracy and the will of the people. host: we will take your calls now and start with sterling,

virginia, a line for democrats. good morning. caller: this introduction of elon's copresident of the united states is probably one of the most dangerous, undemocratic actions that have been done by a sitting u.s. president. we now have a president and a copresident who are in the process of destroying this country, this democracy. he was not an elected official, he has not gone through proper -- he has not gone through any kind of security clearance. he has gone through every department in this country and basically undermining and destroying what makes this country work and what makes it great. this guy is truly in danger. trump along with musk have basically sold our country out to putin and every dictator in this world. host: respond to what you just

heard elon musk say that he is restoring democracy and it is the bureaucracy that is contrary to the people's will. caller: for them to attack federal workers, to go through every department and just slash and burn when these workers who are the heroes of this country, who are basically protecting every american citizen, it is crazy. i would love to know what kind of position this country will be in after four years of these two clowns. you won't be able to recognize this country. we will resemble russia, china, we will resemble every dictatorship in this world. and the american people are going to suffer. i would like to think the american people after what they have seen in the first few weeks are regretting to vote for donald trump. this is not what they asked for. >> let's see if anybody is

regretting that vote as you believe. this is a republican in wilmington, north carolina, david good morning. caller: good morning. to respond to the last caller, democracy is not equated with wasting trillions of dollars. a couple of points that c-span can bring up. inflation is not the rising prices. inflation is the rise inflation of the money supply, one of the symptoms of which is a rise in prices so the root cause is an increase in money supply through borrowing. and the other is well -- the point about, this was an aside but to set the record straight on elon musk security clearance. i think three of -- he has top secret. host: it is not clear to me as far as -- i have been looking into this and i will continue to

look into it because it is not clear. i had seen that he did not get a top secret clearance because of previous drug use and his international. caller: because of those other missions. host: so does that mean he has a secret clearance and not a top secret clearance? it is not totally clear to me. >> it is also based on your need to know and doesn't cover all areas that is correct. the other major point is again congress could do a better job. which is to explain to americans the magnitude of the debt and the trouble but we are in. talking about this on c-span the last couple of years and after all the other major issues it's a big issue coming up is going to be the debt and the changes that we will have to make, cutbacks and entitlements as the

number one. you only hear that mentioned sometimes congress and senators mention it. cutbacks and entitlements it's a painful withdrawal from our addiction to spending. it's going to hurt. but it's not because we are not democratic or ruining democracy, it's because we are in debt and americans understand the price we will pay if we go over the cliff. i wish c-span would have more programs on that, thank you very much. host: this -- our producer found a posting on x by elon musk who says this, i have had a stop -- top secret clearance for many years and have clearances themselves that are classified. that said far too much information is made "classified. if something is easily found online are patently obvious it should not be classified. we have no way of checking on that information.

here is william in ohio, independent line. good morning william. caller: i would like to say one thing before i get into elon musk and trump. the republican party cannot call themselves the party of law & order ever again after having a convicted felon like that. they are destroying my beautiful country. this has been a democracy for 248 years and it's being destroyed in a matter of weeks. it doesn't matter how big your pocketbook is, it is supposed to be for all people. a lot of people depend on the stuff they are giving them. they're going to give themselves big tax cuts and it's going to destroy democracy. trump is a cancer in the body politic and needs to be removed. i'm sorry i say that but it is crazy. he is not a republican, he is a trumplican.

he only things about one person, thank you very much. host: we got this from robin on facebook who said who wouldn't support cutting fraudulent spending. let's talk to howard indianapolis democrat good morning. caller: good morning. my concern is this whole issue is just a mask to cut government. all the items i've heard reported from elon that his team have been things they don't like. that they have called waste. for example some program advanced d.e.i. initiatives, they will call that waste. because the president now has this racist view that d.e.i. is not important. that is not waste, that is doing things that congressional legislative body approved and then what trump and elon are engaged with particularly trump is an unlawful act because they are changing what was approved

by congressional process reflects the collective will of all of our citizens. so the gentleman before who says trump is just trying to be a dictator and using this doge thing is in the excuse is one thing. another important point is this distortion over the federal budget deficit. there is no such thing as a deficit for currency based country like the u.s. heard in other words the u.s. can issue any currency in any value it wants than what we call debt is just federal expenditures beyond taxes. and it does not -- it is not necessarily detrimental or positive. it is an irrelevant measure. but this doge and trump and this budget austerity march they are on is a useful excuse to take benefits away from people. and i look to c-span to do a much better job of having a more intelligent discussion on budget

planning for the u.s. because we are a sovereign city. where that simply means we issue our own currency. issue bonds, do any of that. in the u.s. has done that over time. if you just look at the history of our country in terms of employment, low employment and inflation. you'll see that the budget deficits and debt have been all over the place. they have no impact, the actual activity is on our economy. so thank you. >> let's take a look at another portion of that interview from yesterday on hannity talking about the goal of getting $1 trillion out of the debt. [video clip] >> if you had to put a number on it how much do you think you've identified waste, fraud abuse and corruption at this point. we will be scrolling this throughout the program. >> well, the overall goal is to

try and get a trillion dollars out of the deficit. if the deficit is not more under control america will go bankrupt. this is important thing to understand. if that an individual over spends, the end vigil can go bankrupt pray and soak in a country. the massive waste fraud and abuse that been going on which is leading to $2 trillion year deficit, that's what the president was handed on january 20, $2 trillion deficit. it is insane. >> for this fiscal year. >> we inherited it. and inflation is back. i'm only here for two and half weeks. think of it, inflation is back and they said trump. i had nothing to do with it. these people who run the country they spend money like nobody has ever spent. they were given $9 trillion to throw out the window. 9 trillion and they spent it on the green noose scam i call it red the greatest scam in the history of the country.

one of them. >> dollar wise d.e.i. and woke-ism. and lgbtq+, by the way not in america other countries. >> the amazing thing is when you see the teaching of d.e.i., $9 million. no matter what it is you could teach, you could go to m.i.t. for a lot. the teaching of d.e.i.. >> how much do you believe you've identified in waste fraud and abuse corruption now and how much do you anticipate. >> sure. president trump: 1%. this is huge money. >> we are just getting started. >> they are not going to find some contract that was crooked and there's going to be so much. what is spent i think is good to find a trillion dollars.

i think it's a very small percentage compared to what it is. >> this is what fred says. >> we just keepeang democrats warning about elon and they won't even bring up all the wasted tax dollars i tnk they are more worried it's going to come out. they've been making money off of just one big money laundering scam. and let's hear from john in new york. >> good morning. caller: i just wanted to comment on the caller to call as go who said i can't wait to see -- i'm scared as he with his country will look like after four years of trump and elon musk. i was wondering what the country would look like in four years with kamala harris running the show because between the open border and energy, the gender, what somebody doesn't as adult is my own business but a five or older 10-year-old kid it's ok to switch sex.

general overall insanity that they were pushing, it had to be stopped. trump might come up with an idea remaining the gulf of mexico. or you know but by and large, he is writing the ship that the democrats have tried so hard in the last four years. democrats 10 years ago you know they had a lot of normal positions. just look at taylor reid and obama talking about immigration 10 years ago. it's basically the republican position, get in line, now it is like open borders anybody can come in. host: so john, i hear what you are saying, you are talking about the immigration and the border, but if we are just to look at the actions of doge and elon musk's role. are you in full support of what he is doing? caller: yeah. the democrats are upset, what they are more upset about is

they are basically shining a light on the spending that's going on and you know the $200 million for transgender -- pulling examples wildly off the top of my head. but the -- they are upset because they are exposing what has been probably an insider secret in terms of the level and amount of waste that was not in the american people's interest. it is just wasteful spending. a bunch of -- i'm not for a bunch people losing their jobs, but the waste has to be cut and the money that could be saved, it's only a few billion here or there. but it adds up. i think the -- host: i know you're still talking but i wanted to ask you one more thing, elon musk in the first clip that i played talked about the bureaucracies not elected and anyway everybody who lives in d.c. practically every buddy who lives in d.c. voted for kamala harris, do you think

that federal employees should be asked who did you vote for and if you are not supporting or if you didn't vote for let's say the current president, so this would apply and deftly that you should not be hired into the federal government question mark caller: no. i don't believe that at all. democrats were actively persecuting people -- not persecuting but not promoting from within and that was wrong. in either case. whether it's a weaponization of any agencies going after certain people because you don't agree with them is wrong. i think trump is addressing that as well. it shouldn't happen on either side that it was happening on steroids under biden and harris. and when democrats say we can't how we lost, with these policies, well i can understand how they don't understand because the policies were so horrible and for elon musk and

trump to expose the wasteful spending is them being upset because there wasteful spending is being exposed. host: is it cerebral in michigan, independent line? caller: that is correct. host: good morning, go ahead. caller: yeah, here is my thing heard elon musk in the musketeers, isn't the budget, a 50% of it is from defense spending and didn't he have a rocket he launched that exploded in the air. how many millions to that cost into the new york times expose they said they found 8 billion in fraud and corruption but it was really 8 million. the only thing they're probably good at is because it's just his illegitimate girlfriend is all over tmz with his illegitimate child, one of them. we are living in the united

states of south africa now. host: you mentioned spacex, this is the washington post, team from elon musk's spacex to review air traffic control system. transportation secretary sean duffy announced the plan after the faa laid off roughly 400 probationary employees. it says that a team from elon musk's rocket company will help envision ways to overhaul the nation's aging air traffic control systems. it says that spacex's rocket launches are regulated by the faa and the agency has alleged that the company violated safety rules in the past. officials did not respond to questions about what air traffic control expertise spacex, which specializes in rocket launches, could bring to bear. that is on the washington post

and this is rob in florida, democrat. caller: good morning. just want to say you do an excellent job as a host position when you are on. i say that because you challenge both democrats and republicans callers and guests that you bring in, which is kind of hard when i see the other hosts on there. and i appreciate you. let's get back to elon musk. you really have to make a line for progressives and maga. i'm a progressive. i think what elon is doing is ok , but it is the process that he is going about doing it that i have the issue with.

again, a lot of republicans like to say well, kratz did this, they like to mention clinton who did this, but he did it legally through the court process, got us a surplus, fired 300,000 people. you can look at the stats. but what elon and trump and this waste fraud and abuse, i know it's billions, but in the big scheme of things in our budget it is pennies. less than like 2%. when trump was doing the interview yesterday in mar-a-lago and he was reading off the numbers in the episode you just showed when he was on hannity and you're looking at the numbers, counting maybe $10 billion that's $10 billion. and again i'm on the fence as far as what they are doing in their "audits", but i'm just waiting for them to get to the military which they said they

would do this week or next week. the military that has 850 billion dollar budget that is rising failed seven audits, three under trump in his first term, four under biden and probably another one under trump. host: so what do you do with the contracts that elon musk has with the defense department? caller: well he is policing himself, so we have to see how honesty will be. but halfway through this audit -- the so-called audit, you know he has gained some contracts. so again, where is the transparency? i am still waiting to see. it is a hard one. you have to police your own but when it comes to money and greed

, it is hard to police your own. host: i want to show you some results from a yugo of pole -- ugov pole. it asked how much influence do you think elon musk has within the trump administration. so the stark purple is a lot and then it gets lighter to a little, not sure and not at all. among all u.s. citizens, the number from dust rose from 51 to 63% who says they believe elon musk has a lot of influence. and then you can see how it is broken up by democrats, independents, republicans. then it asks the question the difference between perceived influence, how much do you think he has within the trump administration versus how much influence do you want elon musk to have within the

administration. among all u.s. adults that were question, the perceived influence that he has a lot of influence is at 63%. how much do you want him to have is only at 18%. so quite a difference there. you can take a look at that. here is michael in new jersey, republican, good morning. caller: i appreciate what you are doing getting a lot of different perspectives. i just want to point out the glaring obvious i am not a republican, i guess i would consider i voted for trump in this last election but i consider myself more of a libertarian and when the right started leaning that way it's pretty obvious that everyone in trump's orbit is basically a former democrat. so i think that speaks volumes to what he is doing and i think people should just relax and see what comes out of this.

doge is doing a lot. host: and what have you seen as far as what has come out so far or do you think it is too early to tell? caller: i think it is too early to tell. i think people should just take a rest. republicans you know, they are more libertarian leaning now and i think democrats shouldn't die on this hill. i think if you listen to podcasts, to the joe rogan podcast with mike ben's, usaid is a cia slush fund. i know that sounds conspiratorial but if you listen to all three and a half hours he makes a pretty good point. >> this is ron in florida, independent line. >> good morning, how are you. i would just like to say when things are at their worst we should all be hoping for the best. and i don't see a lot of that happening in this country. i see a lot of people that have more than they need out to get

more and destined people who don't have enough can figure out how to put food on the table and i think the people who have more than they need should think about that a little bit. and that's about all i have to say, except like i said at the beginning when things are at their worst we should all hope for the best. host: here is a democrat in west palm beach, florida, alfred good morning. caller: good morning. i certainly appreciate c-span for all of the information from people around the country and the outrage is looming high now with an unelected person who has the power being given to an elected person. congress and the government is now obvious skating its powers that they have.

-- obvious skating -- ob fuscating that power they have. inspector generals were put in place, it's a conflict of interest when you are getting multibillion-dollar contracts and you are the one that is supposed to be doing audits for the government. that is a conflict of interest. congress itself has no spine. they asked for this person to come in and i'm going to close with this. my last point is they left with one of the highest amount of lost jobs and now he is beginning his administration on the road to surpass that.

so i want to say if america is going to be america and we are going to have elected officials, then we ask for them to do their part. and i will let you know a veteran, a retired civil service employee, i want to say please i am asking you because you will have the biggest uproar you've ever seen. it's a benefit not entitlement, the benefits that have been earned by american citizens in any way is brought to an end, america now has one of the biggest problems. my last point is when we make promises to countries, we should keep our promise. and 47% saying ukraine started the war, that's a hoax. we know who started the war. thank you.

host: jimmy in alabama, republican. caller: hi, baby, how are you doing? host good. host: good. caller: i sort of agree with this administration. i'm a poor man but the dang government keeps giving money to all these democrats. we all know that the government is crooked, republican, democrat or whatever. they're as crooked as the devil. i say let's start the damn war and get this stuff going and straight tennessee out this way. host: what war, jimmy? caller: the dang war. just like a civil war. let's just start it all over again. host: come on, jimmy, you don't want us to go to war with each other. caller: it don't make a damn. we're at war with each other right now. host: all right. and this is allen, an

independent, in cleveland, ohio. good morning. caller: good morning, hi. i'm just sharing my thoughts. i don't think it's a political thing like republican or democrat. i mean, over the decades, both parties have spent all this money. but it's funny, my feelings about it, i remember several years ago watching judge judy. judy is democrat but she'd ask so many very young people, where do you get your money? and they'd say i'm on disability. she'd say what's your disability? always my back, my back, and these people are standing up. and they're very young. so you know there's a lot of waste. hopefully they'll look into that. i don't think it's a political thing. i support what they're doing, going agency by agency. i think the programs that are good they're going to keep and we'll find a way, even with usaid. if they have good programs out there, let's keep them. but the bad ones, we'll have to

get rid of them. i don't think we really had any choice. we couldn't -- when kamala harris was running, she's beautiful and talented but put her talents somewhere else and not in government. when she would talk, i wanted to throw up. host: allen, i wanted to ask you, going back to doge, when you say they'll keep what's good and throw out what's bad, one of the criticisms is they're throwing out the baby with the bath water and that they're not being careful and asking, what are the different roles, what are the good programs, let's continue those. what do you think of that criticism? caller: i don't know everything but i'm not so sure they're able to say hey, just listen, this is a bad program, i just threw it out. i don't think it can be thrown out. some of the stuff will probably have to go through congress. i do trust trump to -- because i come think he's a humanitarian though he doesn't seem like it

and do think he'll keep the best programs. and even ones that are bad, some people are going to consider someone's bad and some will consider some of the programs good. i think we need to have that discussion in detail. so far i am going to trust what he's doing and urge all americans to at least give president trump a chance this time and see what comes out of it. i don't think he's going to get rid of things that are very humanitarian based. host: all right, allen. this is abc news that says this, elon musk's doge asks for access to i.r.s. taxpayer data. if granted, doge would have personal financial details on millions of americans. it says doge is pushing for access to an internal revenue service system that retains the personal tax information of millions of americans for the ostensible reason of rooting out fraud, according to several sources, the move has rattled agency insiders and privacy experts who warn that granting

political operatives access to such private information could be extraordinarily dangerous. the system known as the integrated data retrieval system, used by i.r.s. employees to review a person's tax information, issue notices and update taxpayer records. the database includes such private information as a person's social security number and address as well as details on how much they earn, how much money they owe, properties and even details related to child custody agreements. here is elizabeth, new bedford, massachusetts, democrat. good morning, elizabeth. caller: hi, mimi, thanks for having me and thank you for doing what you do. i had a few points i wanted to go over with what trump and elon are trying to do. there are so many issues there and what they're doing and how they kind of go about it that i for one don't agree with. everybody talks about the top

clearance that he doesn't have, that elon has or doesn't have. there's no transparency on that or accountability. but also, the people under him, the staff that's under him, under elon, they just sort of shot them in there and don't know what their qualifications are and clearances are and that's a concern and what could happen in the future with what these gentlemen are doing for -- the staff are doing for elon. the other thing i think is a conflict is nobody brought up that elon is paid billions, i'm not sure exactly, i forgot the figure, to trump's campaign. how can he be such a significant campaign donor? host: millions, not billions. caller: how can you do that and then having be the figurehead to this doge investigation? i'm sure that's a conflict. and the other thing that i wanted to bring up is all of his

contracts that elon does have with the government. that he actively has. i'm surprised that's not a conflict and either congress isn't pushing harder or that is even being allowed. but trump is like a bulldozer and really doesn't care what's allowed. i think that raises alarms to me. host: elizabeth, let me show you a portion of president trump. he had a news conference outside of mar-a-lago yesterday, and he talked about some of the issues you just brought up. reporter: president, given your concerns about corruption, you said if there were any conflicts of interest with elon musk, you wouldn't let him anywhere near it. president trump: that's right. reporter: doge and space x employees are working at the federal aviation administration and defense department, agencies that have billions in contracts with musk's companies or that directly regulate his companies. how is that not a conflict of interest? president trump: i mean, i'm

just hearing about it and he told me before i told him, but obviously i won't let there be any conflict of interest. he's done an amazing job. they revealed -- in fact, he's on tonight, a big show, "sean hannity" at 9:00 and he's on and i'm on and we talk about a lot of different things. any conflicts i told elon, you can't have anything to do with that. anything to do with possibly even space we won't let elon partake in that. host: we're asking you for your opinion, do you support or oppose elon musk and his doge efforts? what are your thoughts on that. we'll talk to raymond, a republican in chesapeake, virginia, good morning. caller: good morning, how are you doing? host: good. caller: i'm so amazed of the american people. i love this country. but to sit here and keep calling people racist, you can't trust musk, it's insane.

they are opening the books up for everybody, for everybody to see. we had a president that just left, you couldn't get anything, any information. what they're doing is a good thing for this country because everybody knows there's a lot of corruption going on in there. up in congress. so you want to just relax and let the people do their job. musk and his people are excellent. all he has is the right to do is find this information out. that is it. you have this last administration that let over 20 million people enter this country, you don't know who they are, you don't know what they are, but you want to hop on musk. i'm a retired driver. and like i say, i have security clearance to go on many bases. and to see what's going on in this country, it just boggles my

mind that so many people don't understand the constitution and how it works. and that's what scares me right now. is that these people just calling in don't have any clue what these people are trying to do. one reason i voted for trump the first time and this time is because the man really loves his country. if i had the money he had, i'd be gone. i'd be out of here. but he's trying to do his best to bring to light the problem we have in this country, you know. and these people with these egos on them, these democrats, it just boggles my mind. and every time i heard about someone being racist, i'm about sick of it. i'm a black man, 71 years old. i love this country. i worked hard, my grandparents. my parents and grandparents told me when we were coming up, baby, i'm going to let you know

something, the world owes you nothing. the only people that owe you something is me and your father, that's it. and how we raised you. this has got to stop. host: this is an article in news nation, white house seeks to rehire nuclear weapons workers fired by doge. they said last week more than 300 staffers at the national nuclear security administration were fired as part of wider layoffs at the department of energy. however, the cuts may have overlooked critical roles leading to the reveal of some terminations. while the energy department insists there's no need for concern, lawmakers are demanding answers. and this is lori in north carolina, independent line. good morning, lori. caller: good morning. i just want to throw out a couple numbers and a fact. the fact is that elon musk is

not disclosing his financial records to us. he wants to look at our financial records. i don't understand that. that should be the least of the requirements, if he has or doesn't have a reason to do what he's doing. the second thing is this, initially corporations, the billionaires, the millionaires are paying 34% tax, when trump came into office, he reduced it down to 21%. i don't have the number of how much revenue we lost then but now it's going to go from 21% to 15%. and that little jump there is going to cost us $4 trillion in revenue, $4 trillion by giving those tax breaks to those

people. now, when he was president the first time, he added $8 trillion to our debt. $8 trillion. the other part, you know, whatever that is minus the $37 trillion we're in now came from the 1940's when the presidency started. he did $4 trillion. obama was in office for eight years and i believe he was $3 trillion in eight years. he did $8 trillion in four. those are numbers. i'd love for republicans without insulting us, without calling people names and without opinions tell me how to fix those numbers because elon is tasked with cutting $1 trillion in debt. $1 trillion but those taxes are taking away $4 trillion. doesn't make sense. host: got it, lori. and this is a te we got. it says, qui becoming a musk

fan after witnessing all these new cost-cutting measures funded corruption waste.yer washington, d.c. appearpeople in veryishous as to where all these money trails connect and might ultimately end. i also wanted to show you an opinion piece that was in "the new york times" with the headline, elon musk is leading a hostile takeover of the federal government. this is thomas eb -- thomas edsell. president trump has empowered elon musk one of the richest men in the world to fire government employees, eliminate the federal agencies and run roughshod over the federal government and constitution. the elevation of music demonstrates a major reversal of trump ideology from the angry working class anti-elitism of his first winning campaign in 2016 under the guidance of steve bannon to the explicit

privileging this time around of tech oligarch, rich beyond the imagination of ordinary people to guide policies. that's in "the new york times" if you want to read that. to share their opinion, here's morell, odenton, maryland, democrat. good morning. caller: how are you? host: doing ok. caller: first of all, i'd like to say that i don't -- that last call, a couple callers ago who said he's fine with elon musk going into our financials and all that and talking about how he raise $. i'm a democrat and not calling in to bash republicans. why don't he give them his bank information because they're about to have power to go into all of our records to see what we have in our banks and all of our financial statements, and i just don't think that's right.

one other thing i'd like to say is, i keep hearing about these entitlements. i'm currently on ssdi due to a work injury. i've had seven back surgeries as a result of it. i paid into social security for 42 years before i got hurt, so i would love for someone to tell me exactly what i am entitled to and what i earned. and that for now is all i have to say and thank you for taking my call. host: there's other news. yesterday secretary of state marco rubio was in riyadh, saudi arabia, and talking about the talks between the united states and russia on the ukraine war. here's a portion. [videotape] mr. rubio: we're not going to negotiate the end to this. it has to happen over time.

there are two things, there are only two leaders in the world that can make it happen and talk about it in a serious way, is president trump. he's the only one that can do it right now. the second thing, in order for the conflict to end, everyone involved in that conflict has to be ok with it. it has to be acceptable to them. but we have to understand it's been 3 1/2 years since there's been any sort of regularized contact between the united states and russia. and in some cases between any of the participants in this conflict and russia. so the goal of today's meeting was to follow up on the phone call the president had a week ago and begin to establish those lines of communication. the work remains. today is the first step of a long and difficult journey but an important one. and president trump is committed to bringing an end to this conflict. as he said when he campaigned for president. and he wants it to end in a way that's fair. he wants it to end in a way that's sustainable and enduring, not that leads to another conflict in two or three years. that won't be easy to achieve but he's the only one in the world that can begin that

process. donald trump is the only leader in the world that can initiate that process. today is the first step in that process. host: secretary of state marco rubio yesterday in saudi arabia. and back to the calls, to betty, a republican in blacksburg, south carolina. betty, are you there? blacksburg, south carolina? no. here's mike in oak grove, missouri, independent. good morning, mike. caller: good morning, mimi. do i support or oppose this? i highly oppose this. it's being done by a man who should be in prison. the only reason he's not is because of the judges he appointed. elon musk, he is a foreigner who has no business in our government.

donald trump, he spent over $126 million his first go round golfing at his clubs. he charged our secret service twice, sometimes three times the price he would charge anyone else. i mean, elon musk, he shut off his starlight deal so ukraine couldn't do a crippling attack on russia. i mean, of course i disagree with all this. i mean, a foreigner, not even an american dealing up our government. host: no, no, he's a naturalized american citizen, mike. caller: well, he shouldn't be. you're showing pictures of music parading around and acting like somebody high on drugs but

haven't shown the nazi salute he threw to his buddy trump. host: we did show that after he did that. the hand gesture. but not today, you're right. caller: a nazi salute and then they want to say it wasn't a nazi salute. he was so excited. he forgot where he was and threw a nazi salute to trump p. all right. ok. host: all right, mike. let's take a look at the poll. it was about the favorability of elon musk. he's unfavorable at 52%. that number rose seven points from last week. favorable is at 42%. then when asked about doge, favorability rate is at 42%, unfavorable at 38%. the rest did not haven

opinion. rick in virginia, democrat. caller: i'm so fired up. i'm so sorry. you have some callers coming in. i guess they say the u.s. is on a fifth grade level of understanding and com hennigs. some of the things i'm hearing from people don't make any sense. because if obama was president and he decided ok, i'm going to get louis farrakhan and his tech group to go into all these agencies, what do you think fox news would be doing? what do you think, if he had the presidency, he had the senate and congress, what do you think senators in congress would be doing? nobody is investigating musk. he has two people, mimi, on his team who are racist, who said they're racist. even music in "the new york times," you just quoted "the new york times," february 5 -- february 6, 2025, the company

was accounted for almost half of the electric cars sold in the united states last year has been sued by the california civil rights department for what the agency calls pervasive racial discrimination and harassment. pervasive. who is this guy? you said he's an american now naturalized but his affinity is with apartheid south africa. we've got apartheid south africa and trump who is a racist and fraudster. he owes new york $5 million for his civil penalty. he had to shut down a charity. he shut down a school. he's a felon. where is our common sense? where is our critical thinking? you know, mimi, this country, if i was to put a white man and black man on a racetrack, just real quick and we ran a mile which is four laps around the

track, 3 1/2 miles of that track, the black man stays still, the white man's running, the last half he runs. have we caught up? is that catching up? d.e.i. is a problem? come on, really? people need to wake up and start critically thinking and start investigating people. dig into music. dig into trump, mimi. the press needs to be digging into people. they're taking stuff away from the american people and it's all illegal. host: all right, rick. here's a republican in miami. rodney, you're next. caller: good morning. you know, that racist rant, i don't know. that made my morning. i appreciate that guy going off on race. you know, democratic leaders for decades have been clamoring for smaller government. clinton did, obama did. the only person that's powerful enough to do this is a business leader who founded a worldwide

payment system called paypal who saw all of our data anyway, who understands the utility of a.i. and has some workers that understand the utility of a.i., and has one of the largest, most transparent media platforms in the world. music can find the corruption and then he can report on the corruption, which is blowing democrats' minds now. now, mimi, many media outlets, including c-span refused to report on the foreign d.e.i. and sex change grant for usaid and the $8 million for politico subscription. host: it's not $8 million. that $8 million has been debunked, no. go ahead. caller: and then, you know, i think that all these media outlets know they're terribly on the wrong side of what the public wants. trump's approval ratings are

very, very high and our country is on the precipice of bankruptcy. musk and trump are saving it. next we need real economic growth. host: ok. i wanted to bring up, since you mentioned the subscriptions, this is factcheck.org. trump online posts misrepresent government subscriptions to news services. take a look at that at factcheck.org if you want to read the details on that. and here is patricia, independent. chris field, maryland. good morning, patricia. caller: good morning. first i listened to the democrat and republican, who is making sense, who isn't making sense, a lady talking about what trump did for trillions of dollars. i'm sure she wasn't having a problem when she was getting her stimulus checks. as far as musk is concerned, he

doesn't have anything to gain on this. he's trying to help our government here and cut out this waste. no one seems to complain on the democrats' side when these representatives go into government with nothing and come out millionaires. has anyone complained about biden and brought that up recently as to what went on, having his son in the white house doing drugs? you know, come on. trump has nothing to gain either. he is rich. you know, so is musk. so they want to see what his bank account says. hey, i don't have a problem with anybody going into my bank account because i don't do anything wrong. those who complain the most are the ones that as far as i'm concerned have something to hide. these democrats out there

screaming, come on, maxine waters, it's about that time woman went over the hill. some of these over the hill. schumer. why does pelosi still have her fist in this situation? come on, people, think about it. ok, there's some on the republican side but the democrats always come out rich. think about that. thank you very much. host: cal in silver spring, maryland, democrat. caller: good morning. i listen to your show every morning. going to work here in d.c. and it's always amazing to witness democracy where -- [indiscernible] host: cal, you're breaking up.

if you can, give us a call back on a beuerlein because we're not able to make out what you're saying. elsie in alabama, republican, good morning. caller: i fully support what they're doing to find the waste in the government. there's much too waste in the government. and some of the money that they can find should go towards the deficit. we're getting close to the -- where we can't borrow money anymore. thank you very much. host: here is joan in carmichael, california, democrat. good morning. caller: good morning. host: go right ahead, joan. caller: yes, i'm opposed to what elon musk is doing. our government is being run by criminals and people who have never worked an honest day in their life. and so looking into the american people's social security, my

banking, how does it help with fraud, waste and abuse. the abuse comes from the white house. he has been very clear about it. going after people because they disagree with him. that is abusive. i am opposed to it. i'm not opposed to cutting back on things that are wasteful but start with the white house. all of the security that we provide for a criminal is outrageous. nobody provides that kind of support and protection from me. i thank you for taking my question, my answer. host: all right, joan. that's it for this segment. but after the break, we'll have two different perspectives on president trump's nearly one month in office. first up, entrepreneur, author, and talk show host armstrong williams. and later, "nation" magazine

correspondent elly mystal. we'll be right back. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2025] >> all this week watch c-span's new members of congress this week where we speak with republicans and democrats about their early lives, previous careers, families, and why they decided to run for office. tonight at 9:30 p.m. eastern. our interviews include virginia democratic congressman eugene vinedman who was born in ukraine and served as a u.s. army officer and played a role in 2019 for his testimony before congress on president trump relationship with ukraine. >> i was lt. col. assigned to the white house on detail. getting legal advisor of national security council staff. the chief ethics official in the national security council that, so i worked right across the hall from my twin brother and he

had the portfolio of russia or ukraine, belarus, moldova. he listened to the phone call, he heard the president's attempt at extortion, and he reported directly to me. >> launch new members of congress all this week starting at 9:30 yen eastern on c-span. looking to contact her members of congress? c-span is making it easy for you with our 2025 congressional directory get essential contact information for government officials all in one place. this compact spiral-bound guide contains contact information for every house and senate member of the 119th congress. the president's cabinet, utterly agencies, and state governors. congressional directory cost

teacher dollars 95 cents plus shipping and handling and every purchase helps support c-span's nonprofit operations. scan the code on the right or go to c-spanshop.org to preorder your copy today. washington journal continues. host: welcome back. we are joined by armstrong williams, a columnist, tv talkshow host and entrepreneur. guest: good morning. host: you have been largely supportive of president trump's actions this first month in office. tell me why, and why you think trump 2.0 as it is being called is different from the first. guest: first as a broadcaster and a media owner it's not about being supportive of the president or not i think it is the media's responsibility to be more of a referee and just tell the facts about what any administration is doing weather is biden/harris or trump/vance.

i think when you look at the legal border crossings and when you think about the fact that on the southern border you have less than 269 people crossing a day vs. 11,000 when vindman harris were in the white house, you cannot ignore that as progress for the american people, and that is one of the things the american president promised he would deal with 20 to 20 for president, and that has happened even when you talk about doge, he and elon musk campaigns together and made it clear that they were going to reduce the waste and fraud in government. they want to make sure the taxpayer money works better for them. obviously meeting there's a lot of chaos in the process, obviously that people have to be terminated. that probably should not have been terminated, obviously there is some harm done but in chaos, particularly at the speed that trump is moving, obviously you're going to have to have

some corrective courses. and this is why it is necessary that cognitive, unlike the last congress, ceded so much of their responsibility to the white house. this is why we have a check and balance system in place and the congress to balance out with the president does. because the president cannot shut down a federal agency that is funded by congress. that is congress' role. and i think congress has given over -- host: but usaid has been shut down and those programs have been stopped, even the site has been taken down. guest: this is true, the usaid is sort of unique in its own way, and we understand that. but there's a lot of waste, fraud and abuse in usaid as well as other government agencies. the conversation that we should have, and we should criticize the president constructively, that is what a democracy is. but if you just look at the

whistleblowers when you talk about the waste, the checks being written because they've been written this week or so long, you can't even question if it is a terrorist organization or going to people in need. that may not seem like a lot when you think about the budget for the u.s. government, but it is a start. i will take my own example. as someone in the media when companies community action agencies around the country, you have people that go to these agencies to make sure they are able to have their water turned on, they cannot pay rent on time. sometimes what agencies will do is pay this than three or four months in advance and people come back the same time because they don't use the money that they have to pay for the expenses. a lot of these things go on and on and what is needed is better management. yes, we know these agencies do a lot of good. but sometimes they are in need because the systems that become so corrupt and so mismanaged that the people that really need

it don't get it. so the fact that the president and elon musk are pursuing this government efficiency accountability and responsibility is a good thing. and as a ceo of a business, i understand. we can talk about working from home and the benefits that has, but there's nothing like being in person, coming up with ideas, having these exchanges, running back to the office, when you're talking face-to-face, there is nothing like human interaction. the government, when the federal government to shut down, it affects tourism, it affects the economy, it affects everything. yes, there maybe some people who do need to work from home. people being at work is like an economy in and of itself. host: as you said, you are a businessman and you have questioned elon musk not to approach the federal government as he would in sizing one of his

businesses. what you see is the fundamental difference there of how elon musk should approach the good objective of reducing fraud? guest: this is a piece that was in the baltimore sun on sunday, and while you may have these noble intentions, you cannot run a private business the way you run the federal government. you can go in and you can cut and slash, but in government, you've got to respect the processes. elon musk, as well intended as he may be, he has to work with congress. he has to work with people within these agencies that you have to trust the circuits that are billing. there are people willing to tell you where the waste and fraud is you cannot just go and shutdown agencies and not realize the harm you could do in the long run because that becomes the narrative. you cannot become a dictator when it comes to the government because you will lose. as well intended as he may be,

he will fail in the process and because what he's is doing is so important, he should respect the different processes that are in place that could better help him accomplish the goals he is trying to achieve. host: if you'd like to join a conversation with armstrong williams, start calling in now. (202) 748-8001 for republicans. (202) 748-8000 si for democrats. (202) 748-8002 for independents. you just mentioned the baltimore sun, this is on the front page of the paper for today. christian leaders grapple with new trump policies targeting of anti-christian bias, eradication of di programs reactions from maryland clergy. explain that article. guest: castor al hathaway who a prominent pastor is quoted throughout the article. he talks about the bible endemically understanding.

listen, when donald trump evaded death where the bullet grazed his ear and he could see the blood, even he has said that god saved him and it was an act of god. many christians will see that as not having a greater purpose for donald trump. and so therefore donald trump is a president of destiny and it was destiny that he won. but also you could look at his character and you can they that would donald trump does in his moral life and is personal life is not necessarily what christians adhere to. but then they also pointed david who is in adulterer and how he betrayed his wife but don was able to use and for the greater good. host: he also repented. guest: i'm not saying the president has not repented, i don't know what he does in his private life. but when you think about his extraordinary journey, what he has gone through, the indictments, lawsuits, people have given up on him, the fact

that he could come back after surviving an assassin's bullet and become president again for christians, that has a very spiritual and strong foundation for them and they think there is a greater good. and that is why they believe that there is a possibility that he could usher in a golden age. but i would say you have to be cautious with that because listen. the bottom line is trump's human and sometimes you don't want to become a sycophant for the, that everything he does you support and you turn a blind eye to the things that the caution to be a better person. you don't want to be an enabler. and while i would say that he is a much calmer president, not sending out the crazy tweets, not attacking people the way he has attacked them, you do see a more laid-back anymore measured president, and i say that is progress. but still, i do think that trump from his experience as a businessman, you've got to have some compassion about his policies. because the bible tells you

don't allow your good to be even spoken of. so trump needs to be very measured. i like the fact that he is getting on very well with elon musk, that is sort of a surprise. i like the fact that he is working well with congress, they all seem to be on the same page. the people who are upset seem to be the democratic members of the media but for the most part americans, 55%-60% are willing to give him a chance to see if his policy works in the long run for the american. how long are they willing to suffer the inconvenience and live in fear? that remains to be seen, but i do think that the american people believe that these are the promises made, the promises kept. with give him a chance. i just don't know how one this honeymoon will last. host: let me ask you about di efforts. are you supportive of president trump's efforts to essentially take that out of the federal government completely?

guest: i think that is what he promised to do. host: that is happening, they are all closing. guest: look, it's one thing to talk about equality. i think we all believe in equality. but equity is a different thing. i don't want anyone to give me an advantage because of what they perceive my race as. i want to go back to the dream of dr. king where a man is judged not by the color of their skin but by the content of the character. but let me also caution that races and figure street -- and bigotry is not dead. people still harbor that in their hearts and people are not always going to do what is in the best interest of people because sometimes they cannot let go of the baggage of their ancestry, but still, the government needs to be accountable. i don't like filling out a form with someone asking me what my race is. i do want somebody to perceive just because some kid got to college on a scholarship they got there because of their race.

i think it cheapens those who fight hard, work hard. not only in the classroom, but wherever they are. i do think that we live in a country today were we should be judged not by the color of our skin, not by our sexual preference, but by the content of our character in our work ethic and our sacrifice and edges of -- and air discipline. host: and you think that is going to happen during the next four years? guest: nothing happens overnight. justice, equality. host: are optimistic that it is moving in the right direction? guest: i am cautiously optimistic. i don't have an issue with with the president is doing because i find it shocking that some of his campaigns made all these promises and are actually in them. the problem is the democrats and others do not taken seriously and for the speedy is working in his late 70's, his focus, his

organization, the latest d has been in place putting this together, these executive orders, it did not happen overnight. donald trump is prepared. whether congress is prepared or not, that is a different western. host: i want to show you a clip of hakeem jeffries talking about the programs and then you can respond. >> diversity, equity and inclusion are american values. it is about economic opportunity for everyone. we support merit for everyone based on what you know, not who you know. the problem that seems to be unfolding is that there are some in this country who want an america of the billionaires, by the billionaires, and for the billionaires. not for working-class americans,

middle-class americans or everyday americans. a country of the billionaires, either billionaires, and for the billionaires. diversity, equity and inclusion are about economic opportunity for everyone, even if you are not wealthy, well or well-connected. these are values that everybody in this country should embrace. host: what do you think, armstrong williams? guest: listen, i was with him until he got to the billionaires. we can talk about these di programs, you ask how the average low income person benefits from these programs. how much does government really change the lives for the biden and harris is in the white house, or trump-pence in the white house, how much does it really impact progress? unfortunately, the people who

were poor red biden and harris were in the white house, they are poor now. what he is talking about our contracts that go to their friends and colleagues. you are talking about rules that we have to abide by that you cannot have a conflict of interest. with companies that come before the legislative body. and it wasn't until recently that the civil rights law that he applies -- alludes to applied to congress. i don't want to call him a hypocrite but this is political grandstanding. they are the minority, they lost. and until they learn the lessons of that election, to try to support donald from where he is, they try to improve di and bees program that he speaks of where they work across the board and they don't figure some illogical thing like race or gender, where it works with people because they are qualified, they have got to realize this messaging that they have the last election

was profoundly defeated. they need to face the reality they lost and they need to find a new message that resonates with the american people because until they do so, they will continue to lose and lose again. the democratic party has been decimated because they lost touch. they used to be the party of the working class of america and the middle class of america. that demographic voting for trump. blacks, hispanics, even people in michigan who consider themselves to be muslim and people said how in the world did you support donald trump at his policies? it seems to go against your best interests, but they are voting for family values. it's not just about the economy, it is about what is gender affirming. you're talking about drag queens teaching children in the classroom. you're talking about parents cannot have a say so and their children talking about if they are going through some kind of sexual evolution. the bottom line, america still cares about traditional values until hakeem jeffries and the

democratic already get a message that resonates with the majority of americans, they will continue to remain in the minority. host: homer is a republican in florence, massachusetts. good morning. caller: amen and hallelujah to everything you said. you are highly intelligent. i'm wondering why it's ok for joe biden fight federal workers for not getting a vaccine but now it's not ok for trump to fight people and i also noticed that bill clinton fired 400,000 federal employees, and trump is not even close to that. so i don't know why he's complaining. i'm just curious, 283 million people active on social security , there's only 340 million people in the country. 383 is a lot more. that's ridiculous, we got to look into these things. i love the election deniers are called in for the democrats now and it's all ok because it was racism and misogyny and sexism. can you guys please tell me why

that is ok, that you let those people go on and on same race x-men thank you for not -- guest: there is a larger point. this criticism of trump using executive orders, this criticism of his cabinet that he put forth before the senate and all of them are going to be confirmed, this criticism about trump embracing billionaires and the like like elon musk, and nobody talks about why men harris embracing george rose and bill gates and jeff bezos. host: since you bring it up, he's got a trifecta. why not go to congress and some of these things, why depend on the executive order that can be reversed by the next president? guest: we agree. but we know trump. trump feels that congress does not move fast enough for him. it would be better for him to wait.

his attitude is that the american people cannot afford to wait. and wife and something in place that three or four years later another administration come in &? i agree with you, but trump is not like any president that we seen in emory never seen such a frenetic way of so many executive orders because he wants to change it, and he also knows that a lot of these things that are pushing will probably go through and become effective, and once that happens, people will billy needed to believe it is having an impact on their lives in particular may come to the economy, it will remain lace. because remember it does not matter whether it is a president or congress, their boss is the american people, and the american people, we have awakened a sleeping giant and they are not going back to sleep. they are more educated, more into them they have ever been before. host: james, democrat in

chicago. caller: yeah, people to make them out say anything. all this fraud and waste, is anybody going to jail? has anyone been accused of this? and since he brought the lord, the man on the stage with him, that he had a purpose for that? thank you. guest: when it comes to what donald trump is doing, it takes time before you find out what the fraud is and who the culprits are. that doesn't mean that someone won't be held accountable down the road. and listen, i don't try to understand the ways of god. my heart goes out to that person that died on that stage. you ask yourself why is it that the toronto plane that crashed in the snow, everyone survived, but those of the potomac a few weeks ago, everybody died?

god has ways that many of us cannot understand. i don't get into trying to that because you know why? some things you cannot explain. host: i want to ask you about a posting on x that elon musk wrote in response to the 60 minutes interview. he says 60 minutes are the biggest liars in the the engaged in deliberate deception to interfere with the last election. they deserve a long prison sentence. i want to ask you since you are the owner of the baltimore sun now, if one of your journalists did an interview that elon musk disagreed with, how would you respond if you posted on x that they deserve a prison sentence? guest: i would vehemently push back. you cannot judge cbs for immediate institution by a 60 minutes interview with kamala harris and obviously the media is biased, there is no question about that.

obviously many people believe that it was in the tank with biden and harris and they feel as though their policies are more active of the agenda they want for america, but i would defend the state at every turn. i would defend that because many of these reporters, they do their jobs very well and they put a lot of aligned to do those jobs. host: should and what changes should we expect the baltimore sun? guest: we are fortunate because david smith, made business partner, we are working with a terrific group of people. people perceive the baltimore sun as being this liberal paper and us being conservative but is -- it is generalist integrity. finding the voices that represent all voices in the community, and when you want to deal with commentary that reflect her people are and getting a lot of attention to

local issues, the local dishes that people are about that affect their way of life immediately it's not only about what is going on on the national stage. we put together were collaboration with the baltimore sun. i've never worked with a greater group of people that i work with the baltimore sun. host: fairfax, virginia, and dependent line. caller: how are you doing, thank you for taking my call. first time caller, so i appreciate your time. wanted to do a quick plan highlight michael asian -- the department of education. there are warning schools that take consideration according to scholarships. not ti necessarily, but culturally-based aspects. sororities or fraternities or something like that.

i just want to know president trump, all politics generally have been ok with generalizing. not a sleeping giant like myself, i don't think i represent that population, the hardware, now you want to shut down hybrid asian, that kind of will impact i think a part of society that your guest could sort of illuminate on where the department of education may be going a little too far maybe. host: ok. and i just want to show you what i think he is talking about, this is the new york times or the headline education department gives schools two weeks to eliminate race-based programs. it says the department office for civil rights warned that it would line that consider race in

scholarships, hiring, and an array of other activities. guest: i actually think the president is correct. i think that is favoring certain americans over other americans. you have a new leader in town that is donald trump. he made it clear that during his campaign this is exactly what he would do, and i think it would be wise for the department of education to adhere to these guidelines. host: since talked to mark next in florida, republican. caller: good morning, thank you very much for taking my call and i agree a lot with what your guest has to say, mr. williams. and i am in favor of what is going on with elon musk, president trump and doge. and the biggest thing that i would contradict your guest on is there is a way the private industry works and the way that they go through their process, and there is the way that the government works.

and i question the government's process. when i say that, do you think that there are 9000 certified? these are certifications that the federal government requires private business to be in order to conduct business with them, and i don't think they have the same standards. i can speak to this because i was in the industry for almost early nine years. i worked for the largest defense contractor in the world, and there are some good government employees, don't get me wrong, but there's a lot of absentees, a lot of cruisers. they will pass on their test and tells you it takes an act of congress to fire them. nobody in their job in the private sector thinks like that or works that way. i mean, no matter how important you think you are at the general worker, if god forbid you would die that day, the stock is not going down one penny because you

died, that is a fact. so the government needs to work at a more efficient rate and that might mean slashing complete areas because it is redundancy. and the private sector, they make us look at ourselves as to how can we be more efficient? every single year, how could we squeeze out more efficiency and get better at what we do? and unless you are trying to practice continuous improvement, then you are just doing the same thing over and over again looking for a different result, and they keep doing it the same way. why? because that is how they have always done it. guest: he makes an excellent point. and this is why you have to create chaos in government, because they've created this preponderance of layers where they are protected and it has created a lot of incompetency. they know where the duplication is, and what many of these

government workers should be doing now is working with the government, with the president and the white has to say this is where we can do better. this is where we are ineffective. these other programs that are working. they know this. the bottom line is that nothing remains the same. change is necessary and our government is not effective, not as accountable, not as responsible and not as efficient as they could be. this is a start. no one knows how it is going to play out, but donald trump has the right attitude. and don't forget we still face this trillion dollar deficit that america could go if we don't get our financial house in order. caller: joanne in tulsa, oklahoma, democrat. caller: i just want to tell this guy that there is only one god and his name is definitely not trump or williams. thank you for your time, have a

nice day. his lips keep moving and the let's keep flowing. guest: and i absolutely agree with her that trump is not god, never will be. he is just a man like anybody else but he just happens to be president of the united states host: here is maria, independent in maryland. caller: good morning, can you hear me? host: yes we can. caller: this is what i don't understand. i don't like anyone having my social security number because the nra has taken a lubin of money out of my checking account. we don't look at the small thing. the nra was moving money from my checking account without my permission, i can imagine what somebody else was going to have my social security number, what they are going to do. but the main thing that i don't understand is what happened to

the values of the adults here in this country. the president of the united states, all of you act like this is something to applaud. you should be ashamed of yourselves for even thinking about that. he is a registered sex offender. so how do you feel about that? guest: i don't think the president is a registered sex offender. we do know that the president is flawed, we know the president has had more challenges like all of us, but the american people understand this better than anyone else. i think it is because he was -- and they thought that the government targeted him until they became his protector until the last presidential election. i think they know exactly what he is and i think that is why he was elected, because they realize they would rather have an imperfect man to do their

bidding than someone who professes something very different. host: here is jesse and babylon, new york, republican. caller: yes, good morning. mr. williams, you are a very interesting man to listen to. i just want to ask you, do you support mr. trump 100%? guest: as a broadcaster, i support journalism. i am a referee, i am not a coach. it is our responsibility to present both sides without manipulative the facts, they bridging facts, -- favorite facts and let you come to your conclusion. i'm not here to do bidding for donald trump or for the democrats. my bidding is bringing the facts forget to make your own determination. host: i want to ask you about mayor eric adams, the trump administration's department of justice has asked that all the charges of corruption against

him be dropped. what was your reaction to that? guest: obviously a lot of top prosecutors resigned over this. there are two schools. donald trump believes because of his own journey and prosecution in court that he feels it was a witch hunt, that this happened to mayor adams because the biden the ministration -- host: even though the prosecutors said they had been investing allegations of corruption before he said anything? guest: yes, i believe that also. but i don't believe that governor hogan will -- governor hochul should have the power, because she's trying to make the decision of whether to remove governor adamson office. i don't think the governor should undo the will of the people. we have an election that is coming up. donald trump wants to have someone he can work within new york because that is a very

important sanctuary city and immigration is very important. it could have been done a little differently. some of these top prosecutors that stepped down were republicans. these people had just been recently appointed by the president himself. you've just got to let this play out. mayor adams is very defiant. he feels he's done nothing wrong but in the end, the president has the justice department to drop the case, there's been a fallout, we will just have to see where it goes. guest: lisa, democrat, you are next. caller: yes, i've been very upset with what is going on with what trump is doing. i find that he put elon musk in place to do what he is doing because trump likes to get other people to do his dirty work, so

he could have elon musk do the dirty work so he can say i have nothing to do with that, and with what is going on with russia and ukraine, it is pretty disgusting because russia started it. russia started it. and putin is not scared of trump. trump is scared of putin. and if he gives putin everything he wants, no, this is wrong. and you know what, you are right. god lets trump live that day because he does pile it up. he will get him in the end. guest: let me respond because i

think she said something that really need to be addressed. listen, the only people who pay the price for war are the innocent families who lose their sons in this war. jd vance gave a speech in europe that was defiant, but it was truthful. the germans did not like it. france called it emergency meeting. but listen, politics are really out of control. they could use knives, they could attack you, they could beat you, they could assault you, and you have no rights. if you punch back you are going to jail. the fact that europe has not carried its weight, if they don't like that in particular leader is about to be elected, they suspend the elections. i think jd vance gave europe a reality check. the bottom line is donald trump maintained a relationship with putin. say whatever you want to say about that but it is because of

that relationship that you stay in contact, you are able to bring ukraine and russia to saudi arabia -- host: ukraine is not there. guest: marco rubio said they will be at the table, and i'm going to take his word for it. but still, it is best to cut out the bureaucracy in russia and ukraine and europe to bring a close to this so people stop dying in the infrastructure is destroyed. but i heard the foreign minister of the e.u. say as early as this morning let's try to work with the united states instead of fighting against her and bring some kind of resolution to the situation when innocent people continue to die. if it were your son or somebody else dying in this war, someone steps in like donald trump and says let's bring a close to this, marco rubio said it is not going to happen, but this is where we should be instead of innocence continuing to die. host: let's talk to mark in clearwater, florida, independent line. caller: i have a question for

the gentleman here. i was watching one of your shows a few weeks back where it was about the insurance thing and this and that. you had one on the phone and one at the table and she was going to make a statement about the subsidies that government gives to corporations and i looked it up and the government gives to corporations $500 of insurance coverage for the company to put out there coverage, $1200 for two people and then x number for a family. the gentle man, does he take subsidies for insurance coverages, and is the government going to look into those fraud and abuse and why the american people are paying companies subsidies for their employee insurance? guest: what is not talked about enough, it is not just people who did not support people on the lower rung of the ladder, the people of the federal government that have been impacted by trump policies, there are a lot of businesses,

farmers who hire these workers were not showing up for work because they feel that ice is going to come along and pick them up. you've got these venezuelan migrants who are not extending their work visas which really impacts a lot of companies in this country. listen, i don't do work with the government. i went through this thing called no child left behind early on in my life and almost got left behind and i vowed after that i would never have any kind of business with the government. i'm in the private industry. we cannot allow our operation to be run by the government because we would not be a business. you could not allow your household to run a certain way. we provide health care coverage for our employers, not because we have to, because we choose to, because it is the right thing to do. this only so much government to do in people's lives and i do think for private corporations that you well, you should take care of your employees first. the government can only do so much with people who are struggling. corporations to a lot to lift up

lives that are struggling, particularly in the economy that we are in right now. but i think everything is open in terms of government in terms of what elon musk is trying to do because they are looking for transparency. host: i want to ask you about a criticism of president trump that says one of the biggest concerns of the american people during the campaign was the economy and inflation, and that president trump has not done enough or has not focused enough on bringing prices down at the grocery store. guest: it is a slow process and he has admitted that it may have been able over exaggerated during the campaign but i do think when you cut out waste and abuse, when you cut out the number of migrants were crossing the borders, i think many people felt that way on their way of lives related to housing and other things. i think those things let release, what you just mentioned, that is a slow process that must take place. it's not going to happen overnight and people have to be patient. host: gary in georgia,

republican. caller: good morning mr. williams, how are you this morning? you know, when i was young, we always took a vacation up to smoky mountains and we were all piled into the station wagon and go. and back then, they would allow you to feed the bears right on the side of the road, and it got to be a big thing and it went on for years and years. well, when they stopped that, all of the bears just stood out on the side of the road because they didn't know how to feed themselves. you know, if you've got a man that is going to teach you how to fish, and you've got a man that is going to give you a fish and you come back to him tomorrow for that fish, which man are you going to be with? guest: guest: the best

department of education and welfare that i had growing up as my mother father much of what is happening today, why there is so much pain in society, these young boys have no idea what it means to be a man, no idea of right and wrong and we must strengthen the family again. not only do we need men in the households, but we need them in the school system. because where you have men in the school system teaching these kids, especially these young boys, they react differently. you have less behavioral problems, less crime, less homicide, less rape. so we've got to get back to the understanding and the work ethic, discipline, sacrifice. and that is something that can be taught in the family. this only so much that government can do and only so much the government can help unless you already built yourself a stable foundation and every now and then you may struggle. but at least because you have a stable foundation the government is better prepared to help you. but if you are just solely

dependent on the government and not bringing anything else to the table except the government, that is not going to work for you in the long run. host: you said there should be more men in the classroom. how do you encourage more men to be teachers especially if there is no department of education? guest: i'm not going to save is not going to be a department of education. i do believe the states to a federal job -- better job in the federal government. host: so how can states encourage men to be teachers? guest: you must make them realize the value of being in the classroom because this is a job that you take life someday this is a child i could marry her daughter someday. i think men want to be in the classroom but you got to give them better pay. i think teachers should be paid like ceos. i think they have more of an impact on the lives of these kids than the ceos who make millions of dollars. we need to show more spec for teaching because it has become a war zone. that is what it is. host: carolyn in baltimore,

democrat. caller: good morning, i'm glad i got through, thank you for this information. two comments and a question. i'm a retired federal government worker. i wish people would stop trying to demonize federal government workers, we work hard and we had a lot of credentials to get to the positions that we have i do see, and there were people who didn't work, but those were few, and i have an issue with the indiscriminate firings that are going on. you have people who are working hard and they shouldn't be fired just because some random issue. second, the media has always been biased. i hope you show more black people doing well. they seem to focus on the ones that are not, and there's more of us doing well with christian values, family values, and i wish she would focus more on that because i'm tired tonight that.

my question is 63 years old, when i was coming up, our community taught us we had to be twice as good as other populations to get a job. so as far as dei is concerned, and adding to that, i personally trained at least two white people who got promoted over me. so my question is regarding dei, do you actually think of the people who are hired under these programs are incompetent and got the position only because they are black, because i would say that is not the case. guest: absolutely the majority not. i think most people would get there on their own merit, that's why you don't necessarily need dei, but i really appreciate you calling from baltimore because we have over the last few weeks than focusing on very successful americans who happened to be black and how they contribute to the better way of life in baltimore.

and i would encourage you also to subscribe to the baltimore sun. i had to get that in there. host: armstrong williams, his website is armstrongwilliams.com, also the owner of the baltimore sun. guest: i always enjoy watching you when i'm not here, such a great job. host: after the break, a conversation with ellie missile -- elie mystal about trump's first month in office and how democrats are reacting. we will be right back. >> saturdays, watch american history tv's 10 week series, first 100 days. we will explore the early months of presidential administrations with historians, authors, and through the c-span archives. we learn about accomplishments and setbacks, and how events

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member of the 119 congress, federal agencies and state governors. the congressional directory cost $32.95 plus shipping and handling and every purchase helps support c-span nonprofit operations. scan the code on the right or go to c-spanshop.org to preorder your copy today. washington journal continues. host: welcome back. we are joined now by elie mystal , a justice correspondent and columnist for "the nation." guest: thank you so much for having me. host: i want to start with this associated press article with the headline "trump administration once a supreme court to let the firing of whistleblower agency had proceed." could you get us up to court on -- up to speed on what that case is about and what the question is? guest: trump likes to fire people and he think because he is president he can fire anybody

wants for any reason whether they were not just because he feels like it and remembers it from his tv days, right. there are laws regarding how you can fire people when they work for the federal government. who you can fire, what the proper process is and all that sort of thing. he wants to ignore those laws, a north people who have the positions that are authorized by congress, and fire people willy-nilly and he is hoping for the supreme court to let them let them do that. there are specifically laws in place to protect whistleblowers from retaliatory firings. one of the reasons why we have whistleblowers is because we have these laws, but trump because he has that kind of mobster mentality, he wants people to have america and never say anything against them, so he thinks that it whistleblower law is completely ridiculous and he should never be bound by it, and so we have classic set up of trump vs. american law and he is once again hoping the supreme court allows them to escape the

realities of american law and quite frankly the supreme court has done that for him before and might well do that for him again. host: so when do you think the supreme court would rule on this? guest: the timing right now, i cant quite no. there is so much percolating through the lower courts to the supreme court. we've seen in the past the supreme court can move very quickly, especially when it wants to help trump. we see in the court can move very slowly, when extending the timeframe is in his benefit. and i don't know how they will play this one. what i do know if the supreme court has the conservatives, the republican justices, the most extremist ones believe in this very impactful theory called unitary executive theory which basically holds that the executive branch of government, article two of the constitution is the president of the united

states and nobody else, that he is the entire executive branch and everybody in the executive branch from a whistleblower to the department of justice, everybody serves at his pleasure. that is something they have been trying to push over the years. trump is going to give them many opportunities to push that theory, to stretch that theory even further and make him an even more powerful present, and people often wonder why would the supreme court give him so much power, aren't they concerned about their own power? and of course they are, but the idea here is that if you make the president kind of the very most powerful person in the world, and the only person who can tell the president know is the supreme court because the supreme court then becomes the only body that is able to say. if they make up the theory, then they are the only people who can tell you if somebody has gone too far against their made

theory, right. it's not congress, it's not the people voters elected who can restrain the president, it is the court and only the supreme court, so that is why giving the executive more power actually rebounds to give the supreme court itself even more power, and that is what roberts has always been about, chief justice roberts has always been about arrogating as much power to himself and his court as he possibly can. host: you said that the president does not have the legal authority to fire whoever he wants whenever he wants, but he and elon musk have been making the argument that the people who are being fired and the federal government are in unelected bureaucracy, that we are trying to restore democracy by getting rid of these people, and that yes, the president should have the right to fire people that are not on board with his policies. guest: first of all, i don't

want to hear anything from elon musk. you can't be an unelected bureaucrat talking about the dangers unelected bureaucrats i voted many times in my life and never once have i seen elon musk's name on a ballot. i don't know anybody who has pulled a lever for him, so he needs to shut the hell up. he's going to talk about unelected bureaucrats running america. number two, of course the president has the power and should have the power to assign people to work with him and advance his agenda. we have an entire process for this. it is called the cabinet and if you think about the cabinet, this idea that the president can just hire or fire anybody wants at any time, we know that's not true because we know that even for his own cabinet, even for the people that he put in charge of executive agencies, they have to go through a senate confirmation process.

that has happened throughout american history. the secretary of state, the secretary of war, now the secretary of defense, the attorney general, all these people have to be confirmed by the senate, and the senate doesn't want to confirm somebody then the president can't have that person in that position. hello, mr. matt gaetz, i hope you are well wherever you are in florida. but we know just from a basic understanding of american civics that what trump and musk are arguing for is provably wrong and inconsistent with american law. host: i'd just like to say, elon musk right now is a special advisor to the president, and the president can have whoever advising him he likes, and they are not seven-confirmed. guest: yes, elon musk is an advisor so he cannot talk to me about being in unelected official holding our. and sure, the president to have advisors. the president can talk to whoever he wants. he wants to put his body --

buddy musk on the payroll, his daughter or his son-in-law on the payroll, that is fine, he can talk to whoever he wants. but there is an entire government that he represents. there is an entire government that he works for any does not have unaccountable power to hire and fire every single person in the federal government. he just doesn't. and they just prove to you why he doesn't. the idea that just because you are the president can reach all the way down into a lowly civil service person working in the gao and fire them if they happened to be black, that is insane and that is again against the entire thrust of american civics. not even law, just a pacific structure of how the country works. this isn't how it is supposed to work. trump is claiming authority that no other president has had, and you know that he is asking for

something that no other president has had because he has to ask for it. if this is how we always did it, then trump wouldn't have to ask the supreme court to let him do it, because it would just be the thing that is always done. it is not always done, this isn't have a supposed to work and there is a really good reason for why it is not supposed to work because we like to think of the president as one official among many. he has a specific job, a unique job, an important job, but he is not the only person who has authority in the federal government. host: elie mystal is our guest, a justice correspondent columnist with the nation. if you'd like to join the conversation, you can. republicans, (202) 748-8001. democrats, (202) 748-8000. independents, (202) 748-8002. it's president trump has said that he will abide by court

orders that block parts of his agenda. do you see that as likely, and what happens if that doesn't happen? guest: he's already lying, he's not abiding by court orders against him right now. the federal funding freeze, the put on is being blocked. the republic did a report on this last week. if you go to organizations that are expecting federal checks, they will tell you in many cases, the money hasn't been turned back on. that is a clear example of trump lying to everybody's face. and all of us are pretending like it's normal. it's not normal. he said he will abide by court orders. this is a court order against him. he is not abiding by it. a, b, c. so do i think he will abide by future court orders? well, hell, i don't know. he's not abiding by this one.

maybe he'll abide by some other one he finds more amenable to him. here's the rub, mimi, here's my real issue. whatever trump says he is going to abide by, there has so far been no at all indication he will enforce court orders against his owner elon musk. we haven't seen any indication of that at all. there's no suggestion at all that trump will impose a court order against elon musk telling him to rein it in. that's what i'm most worried about. but that's because i already know that trump is lying about whether or not he himself will follow court orders because he's not following a court order right now. host: i want to play for you white house secretary caroline leavitt when she was responding to people who say that trump's actions are causing a constitutional crisis and then

i'll get your response. [videotape] karoline: i'd like to address a narrative we've seen emerging. many outlets have been fear mongering the american people in believing there's a constitutional crisis taking place here at the white house. i've been hearing those words a lot lately. but in fact the real constitutional crisis is taking place within our judicial branch where district court judges in liberal districts across the country are abusing their power to unilaterally block president trump's basic executive authority. we believe these judges are acting as judicial activists rather than honest arbiters of the law and issued at least 12 injunctions against this administration the past 14 days, often without citing any evidence or grounds for their lawsuits. this is part of a larger concerted effort by democrat activists and nothing more than the continuation of the

weaponization of justice against president trump. quick news flash to these liberal judges supporting their obstructionist efforts, 77 million americans voted to elect this president. and each injunction is an abuse of the rule of law in an attempt to thwart the will of the people. as the president clearly stated in the oval office yesterday, we will comply with the law and the courts but we will also continue to seek every legal remedy to ultimately overturn these radical injunctions and ensure president trump's policies can be enacted. host: your reaction to that? guest: if i can translate that gobbledygook, every judge i don't like is a constitutional crisis. she's obviously wrong. it's a well established part of american law that when you do something you can be sued and that lawsuit will go to a judge and that judge will make a ruling and that ruling will be

appealed and once you get to a final ruling, that ruling is final. that's just how it works. there is no constitutional crisis with judges imposing the law. there is one with presidents ignoring the law. that's the inversion leavitt is trying to gas light people and it is very simple to have a court order and follow it. that's normal. it's easy. it's trump who doesn't want to do the normal easy thing and trying to say these judges doing their job is a constitutional problem. republicans have been saying trump was elected with 77 million people. so that somehow means he won a majority of the vote he gets to do whatever he wants. again, that's not how it works.

that's not how law or civic works. the president was elected fairly. congratulations to all your success, donald trump. he's still part of a system. he's still part of the legal structure. he's not above that legal structure and there are therefore limitations on what he can do no matter how many people want him to do it. there are things he can do and things he can't do. the judges are saying in many cases he is exceeding his constitutional and legal authority. just because 77 million people ostencibly want him to exceed his constitutional and legal authority doesn't mean he can. it's that simple. host: let's go back to the supreme court, your cover article for "the nation" how trump could remake the supreme court for a generation with the subheading donald trump is poised to become the first president since f.d.r. to have

appointed the majority of the high court justices, his potential picks are terrifying. guest: so liberals generally think the supreme court can't get any worse because it's already stacked 6-3 with republican appointees over democratic appointees, and i write to remind people it can always get worse and worse right now is taking that republican 6-3 majority and making it permanent for the lifetime of my natural life and everybody reeling this program's natural life and two older justices are republican, clarence thomas is 76 and samuel alito is 74. if both those two men retire in the next four years, trump will have the opportunity to replace them with those men 30 years younger, thus at some level, i can't say permanentizing but

giving him control of the supreme court long after trump's life. these are justices that are going to outlive trump. these are justices that are going to impose the maga legacy on the rest of us through unelected means for the next 30 or 40 years and trump is in position if alito and thomas retire to become the first president since f.d.r. to appoint not just supreme court justices but the majority of the supreme court if these two men retire will be appointed by trump and that is what keeps me up at night. host: there's a question to you from dave in elmira, n york, in for the following court orders p. if i'm not mistaken, biden did not follow court orders either giving forgiveness of millions of dollars in school

loans. guest: he did follow it. they said he can't do it that way so he did it some other way. he followed the letter of the law and spirit of the law and because he got an adverse court order he didn't give up on the program and tried to find another legal way to achieve his end. trump did that last time. the first muslim ban overruled by the court, the second muslim ban overruled by the court. did trump say no i'm going to stop banning muslims. no, he didn't say i'm going to stop banning muslims but tried again and again until he got a muslim ban the supreme court was willing to uphold. i think that was a horrible decision by the supreme court in trump v. hawaii but that's a problem with the supreme court, not donald trump. donald trump when he was trying to amorally ban muslims coming into the country did it the right way. joe biden trying to relieve student debt relief did it the right way.

what trump is doing now by ignoring the court orders ordering him to restore the funding he illegally and unconstitutionally took away, that's different in kind than anything that biden did and anything that trump did the first time and frankly that anything that any other american president has done until we have to go all the way back to andrew jackson or abraham lincoln to find somebody who openly defined a court order. host: let's talk to callers and start with maria in atlanta, democrat. good morning, maria. caller: good morning c-span family and mia and elie, i was wondering whether they'd bring you back again. i bigtime follow you. nevertheless trump gets on tv and says all kind of stuff and a wild man got on tv and talk about how elon musk helps him and swing states and how he went over there and worked on his computer and said he's awfully

good at computers. do you actually think because i never heard none of the media ever pick this up again and comment, you think he was trying to say the election was stolen? guest: no, i don't. thank you for the love and for your own mental health, try very hard to stop watching trump on tv, it's not good for you. he's going to say the same thing. once you see a dog bark and the dog run, you don't need to hear it the rest of your afternoon. go out and touch grass, man, because it will get in your soul if you listen to that man too much. as opposed to the specific allegation, no. trump is not the most rhetorically cautious individual. he's not trying to say elon musk helped him steal the election and i do not think elon musk help steal the election but i actually think that democrats and liberals somehow sometimes roll into or protect themselves with feelings that maybe

something fishy or something untoward happened because it's easy to believe 77 million americans voted for a convicted felon crazy person, right. it's easier to believe something had to be fishy there than no, they knew who trump was and just wanted to do this to the country. the latter is actually true. no, i don't think elon musk helped him steal anything. i do think now he's in power, elon musk is helping him do some serious illegal activity with musk wielding power he never should have but that's a different problem. host: let's talk to a republican in clifton park. caller: trump won the election fair and square and he has a mandate to govern conservatively. he's allowed to govern

conservatively for at least the next two years until the midterm and the next four years until a republican successor will have to run again. so trump is given the latitude because he won the election by the popular vote and a landslide electoral vote. guest: we agree he won fairly and doesn't believe he won the mandate. that's a word, who cares. he won fairly and is allowed to govern as a conservative and the conservatives are allowed to like the crazy things he d. what he's not allowed to do is illegal stuff. surely, we can agree he's not allowed to do illegal things. that he's not allowed to do unconstitutional things. surely we can agree on that. while you and i might disagree on what's legal and constitutional, surely we can agree a federal judge is the right person, is the person who should be able to tell us what's

legal and what's constitutional and what is not. so mark, can we not agree that trump, while yes, he's allowed to govern conservatively, while yes, he's allowed to do what the people elected him to do, he is not allowed to break the law. host: are you still there? do you agree with that? caller: what trump is doing is the right thing. he's doing the right thing. guest: is it the legal thing, mark? who is supposed to decide whether or not it's the legal thing? is nobody supposed to decide whether or not it's a legal thing. is anything trump says is legal? are we back to nixon now. when the president does it, it's not illegal? is that literally the best can you get to, mark? or do you think maybe somebody who is not the president should have a say in whether or not what the president is doing is legal or illegal? host: let's give mark a chance. go ahead, mark. what did you think of that?

caller: i think what trump is doing is great right now. he's cutting waste. host: that's not the question, mark. as far as legality. caller: i think that he has a large latitude and we're going to have to find out because obviously these court orders and judges blocking things, i think they will eventually work their way through the process, i suppose. host: the court system. caller: yeah, that's it. host: got it. elie mystal. there's a posting on x i'm sure you're aware of by vice president vance who said this, if a judge tried to tell a general how to conduct a military operation, that would be illegal. if a judge tried to command the attorney general in how to use her discretion as a prosecutor, that's also illegal. judges aren't allowed to control the executives' legitimate power. what's your response to that?

guest: i was harvard and j.d. vance went to yale and i'm feeling really good about my choices if that's the best j.d. vance can do right now. if j.d. vance was right, the dobbs decision canceling the right to abortion was illegitimate and illegal on its face and joe biden should have personally performed abortions for the last four years if j.d. vance was right. of course j.d. vance is not right. j.d. vance sounds like an idiot when he says that because the idea that judges -- that the third branch of government doesn't have a legitimate check on the power of the other two branches, the legislative branch and the executive branch, again, flies in the face of basic american civics, all right? i have many problems with the supreme court and how it wields power. in the past i'm in favor of what the scholars call jurisdiction

tripping and a way to limit the power they may have on constitutional issues and all for reform of the supreme court. i don't think it's the greatest body on earth but it is a legitimate part of american government and acting what it can say or constitutional or not is just not something we do in this country. we understand the judges have a role and the rest of us have to follow the judges rule. if you don't like it, there are many ways to reform the supreme court and many articles i've listed j.d. vance is allowed to read but to say he can do it because he's president flies in the law of civics. j.d. vance knows that. he's saying what he's saying because it's in his best political interest to lick trump's boots even if it flies in the face of all law and

reason and civics. host: here's lewis in new jersey, independent. good morning, lewis. caller: good morning, sir. this reminds me when trump was in his first term and had judges blocking him from building the wall. it's politics and judges should not be involved in politics. he's an executive and can fire anybody he wants. maybe. guest: maybe you feel good inside knowing there's a strong daddy person firing people. maybe that's what you want but he doesn't have the power to fire anyone he wants no matter how many times he beats his chest and says he's the president and he's the executive.

caller: i'll lick anyone's boots. guest: why can't he fire people the right way? why can't he use that process, lewis? caller: i agree with you there, ok. host: let him address his second point. guest: you were saying the judges were playing politics with the wall like in the first trump administration. have you forgotten what happened in the biden years because there were decisions from these exact same judges that were averse to biden's agendas and policies and one of the other callers brought up the student debt relief as one. if you think the judges are playing politics, do you think it's politicks that hurts trump? really? because i seem to recall. caller: i agree with you what they did to biden, too, sir. i agree with you there, too. guest: so you think judges shouldn't have as much power as they do? caller: it's politics, that's all. host: all right. and i want to ask you about an

article you wrote for the nation with the headline, trump's attacks on d.e.i. are a green light for the government to discriminate. i want to you explain that because critics of d.e.i. say it is discrimination because it's preferring people of diverse races, women over men, that kind of thing. what's your response to that? guest: so d.e.i. was invented by white people. d.e.i. was invented by white men to try to comply with the civil rights act of the 14th amendment of the constitution. d.e.i. was their white male creation to comply with constitutional law. what diverse people, if that's what we're calling us today, what women have been asking for has not been d.e.i. they've been asking for fair and

equal employment opportunities. they've been asking for the application of the equal -- of the equality clause in the 14th amendment and the application of the civil rights act in hiring. that's it. it was white guys that were just like, we don't know how to hire all these people so we're just doing some d.e.i. and makes sure we have to hire black people and women and latinos and whatever. that was their solution. now they don't like that solution anymore, that's fine. d.e.i. is a policy. it's constitutional to change policy. trump has every authority he might need to change the policy of the united states. my question is what are you doing instead? what are you doing instead,

trump and meta and musk to make sure you're in compliance with the civil rights act and 14th amendment and there they never have an answer. host: we'll hire the best person for the job and therefore we knorr compliance. guest: is that what is happening? d.e.i. was amended and it wasn't happening because they weren't able to highway the most qualified person for every job and only able to highway the whitest male person for every job, right? that's what was happening before d.e.i. and now do we see them hiring the most qualified person for every job? do we see them only firing the least qualified people for every job? no, we don't see that. in your last segment with armstrong williams, there was a caller who specifically asked that man, does he think that every single person who works in the federal government who is of color is a d.e.i. hire and was

unqualified for their job and armstrong says no, of course not, that would be ridiculous. of course he said, and i'm quoting him from your last segment, said most people got their job on merit which is an interesting statement because they're firing everybody. they're firing people not based on merit, not based on their qualifications, not based on their actual work history. and they're firing people. and that violates the constitution. it is legal for you to get rid of d.e.i. policies. what's not legal is for you to fire people just because they happen to be black at work. it's ridiculous to fire everybody who has been hired under a d.e.i. program without any kind of assessment of their actual work performance, their actual, dare i say, merit for the job. but they're not doing it that way. they're firing everybody who happens to be black in government. that's what is what is legal and

what the problem is. host: let's hear from jennifer in midlothian. good morning. caller: thank you for taking the time to listen to our calls. my question is piggybacking on what you're talking about with d.e.i., i tend to understand, right, we know there's no statute for taxation, quote, without representation. but what legal recourse do those of us who fall within these marginalized youth, i.e., youth, lbgtq+, those labeled as marginalized communities to push back on everything being dismantled in the name of d.e.i. if we are federal taxpayers and we're paying our money but every book that represents us is being banned from schools, every program that potentially may create spaces and access for these individuals, special education, all the same, we're paying our money. this is an economic issue. so as citizens and residents of

whatever state you're in, commonwealth of virginia, commonwealth of massachusetts, how can we push back and say wait, my tax dollars are going to everybody but my community, and how is that legal that we don't have any recourse because they're doing it in a discriminatory way like you said under the impies of well, that's considered d.e.i. because we just don't want it. no, we have title 6 and title 7 and all these rights we're supposed to have access to and we're paying our money and we're seeing we don't get the services and access and empowerment we should be getting. so do we need recourse? guest: jennifer, i believe it is illegal. you named the statute. i believe that what they are doing is illegal under the civil rights act. again, that's not because they're changing the d.e.i. policy. d.e.i. is not required by the civil rights act but fairness is but equality is and so when they

willy-nilly fire everybody for the crime of being black, fire everybody for the crime of being a woman without any individualized assessment of their merit, i believe that is violating the civil rights act and should catch a lawsuit. now, unfortunately, once they catch that lawsuit and i know lewis is still out there, why are they suing the courts, but when they do catch that lawsuit, eventually that goes to the supreme court and the supreme court, my read on the six republican judge is that they don't think the civil rights act should be constitutional in the first place. they don't like the voting rights act and roberts has done everything he can to eviscerate the voting rights act which is the most important piece of legislation in the american history. they've already gotten through the 1965 voting rights act, i believe next on the chopping block for these conservative is the 1964 civil rights act and don't think the lawsuit that trump deserves to catch because what he is doing and the way he's doing it is legal i know that's going to work at the supreme court. so to jennifer's question, what's the recourse?

the recourse is the recourse that the people always have. trump was elected by a majority of americans and the only people who can take that power away are a majority of americans. activating, voting, convincing people. i personally have started to boycott target. i vote with my wallet as well, target specifically because target has spent a decade telling my community, we like you here, come to target and put your products on our shelves. target is basically jerry maguire. we love black people except when trump is in charge but we hate black people and target deserves to not have my dollars at this moment and doing what i can with my wallet and my feet and my voice. we all have to do that. in the words of kermit the frog, we need more dogs and cats and mum either and chickens and

things. host: let's hear from denia, republican. caller: can you hear me? host: go right ahead. caller: i have a question biden didn't do nothing but stay on vacation most of the time and i hear people keep calling in and badmouthing trump and what he's doing and everything, and you know, it's like deja vu. are we going to keep trying to put trump in the courts again during his presidency or are we going to give him a chance? i say give him a chance. i think he's the best president we've ever had. and whatever he does, he knows right from wrong. he ain't going to do anything wrong. look at all the lawsuits they did and all of them dismissed. come on. it's the witch-hunt starting all over.

this person you have on your show morning, if they are so smart and think that trump is doing wrong, why ain't they president? they don't they get off their lazy butt and run for president. host: let's get a response. go ahead, elie. guest: i will fight trump with everything i have and fight him on the streets and never yield to this orangemen us. if that makes denir unhappy i apologize but i will do everything in my small power to fight this man and what he's trying to do to my country. host: but his supporters are saying that's exactly the problem, you're just fighting him for no reason. so give us a reason. guest: you want me to start listing the reasons. host: give us a little bit. guest: that man has been convicted on 34 counts of a felony. the only reason those other cases have been dismissed against him is because he has judges in his pocket like eileen

cannon. the supreme court gave him absolute immunity for official acts for the first time in american history. the president was placed squarely above the law by his handpicked supreme court justice. we have been talking about his racist actions with d.e.i. and calling white south africans to live as refugees in this country while expelling actual black and brown refugees living here. he's trying to overturn the 14th amendment and strip away birthright citizenship from people who have been born americans and those are the reasons i can think of to oppose him off the top of my head. so yeah, i will keep fighting. host: you have a book coming out next month called "bad law," 10 popular laws ruling america. give us one of those, a real brief explanation. guest: let's go with voting registration. all voting registration should

be renounced. voting registration does not help keep our elections safe. all it does is increase the participation in our elections and the first chapter in the book, we have a section of the book how voting requirement eligibility requirements and you should be automatically registered to vote and that registration should be portable which means when you move you're still registered, the registration follows you, you don't have to chase registration. people might think it's a radical idea and i point out to people in the first chapter of that book that's the way they do it in most of the rest of the functional democracies in the world. it's how they do it in england and france and how they do it in argentina and australia. that's how they do it everywhere else. we're the slow people. we're the people who haven't caught up with the 21st century by still doing registration in a case by case basis instead of having automatic and mandatory registration for all eligible

voters and if we had that, i wonder if the 77 million people who voted for trump, i wonder if that number would be enough. host: dave in lynchburg, virginia wants end on a positive note. you suggested what keeps u up at night, conversely, what gives you hope? guest: i've got two kids, 12 and 9 and beautiful little boys and they're not afraid. they're not depressed all the time and think the world is going to get better. they understand we've got serious problems but my kids think they'll be the people who come up with a solution for climate change. they think they'll be the people who come up with solutions for our problems and i take a lot of strength and hope from them. i do think generally and it's right to say, i do think the kids are right and i think the kids are seeing how my

generation, again x is -- gen-x is screwing up and they're committed to doing better and hope it remains the case. host: you can find elie mystal's work at thenation.com. guest: thanks for having me. host: more phone calls after the break in open forum. call now. the numbers on your screen. while dialing in, we want to let you know there are me than 60 new members of the u.s. house of representatives and you can meet many on c-span. we got to talk to them about their lives, past careers and why they ran for congress. here's some of what they had to say. >> my father integrated alabama's law school and following that experience, he came back home and launched into a civil rights, among other things, labor lawyer as well with other civil litigation but spent a lot of time focusing on civil rights and one of the more

noteworthy things dein the civil rights face is bring a lawsuit against the united klans of america in the 1980's after they lynched a young man in 1981 in mobile. that lawsuit ultimately resulted in a financial bankruptcy of the plan and obviously not bankrupting their mission but putting a dent in their financial capacity to execute that mission and that was something that's a case that obviously has loomed large over my life and something that my father was very well known for and several members around here still know him for that case. caller: i actually was born in the district and grew up in the district and did time in d.c. when i went to georgetown for undergrad and my first year of law school and moved back to my district right before i had my second child and have been living there sense and had deep roots there, raising four children there and very much in touch with the people who live there. >> did i read before law school you worked in thailand for a

while, what did you do there? >> i did. i was a dive master at a scuba school on an island. i spent time there. worked there on my way to india. ms. guillen: after i lived there i went to india and went to calcutta and worked for mother teresa. >> what was the motivation? >> i ms. gillen: i went to visit a friend who was a chinese major and went to visit her and did some traveling with her and was her sister and got the travel bug and decided i was going to go explore more of the world while i was single and in my 20's and had the opportunity to do that. but i did want to have a focal point for my travel, so i found a book called "volunteer vacations" and looked for different volunteer opportunities and found you could show up in calcutta and you want to work for mother teresa, you can. that was the focal point of my trip. reporter: what did you do for

mother teresa and what was the overall experience like for you? ms. gillen: i worked in her home for the dying and your task there could be anything from cooking breakfast, cleaning up, bathing patients, feeding patients, providing comfort to the patients, doing the laundrie, all kinds of tasks. where there are people willing to work they'll give you something to do. you go there to give but get so much more. it was one of the most fulfilling experiences of my life. >> born and raised in fort worth, a fifth generation native of texas and fourth generation native of fort worth. mr. goldman: it's been fascinating to trace my family roots. my late, late grandfather moved in the 1,800s to help build the original railroad from fort worth to el paso and know this because there was a article written about him in 1910 and his name was ike ronski and he was a character. so you know, just really establishing roots and helping build not only fort worth but

help build texas. my family has been a part of for a number of generations. so yeah. with that kind of base of my family being there, not only texas but in fort worth, i know, and it's kind of been instilled in me from the very beginning, as a baby in fort worth, we're here to serve the community. in and all opportunities i've had to be able to give back to the community i love so much, i've been able to do it and got into politics about 12 years ago, 13 years ago and i've loved every second of representing southwest turin county and northern parker county. ms. ms. mcdonald rivey: i dressed up like wonder woman three years in a row. flash forward we're in the middle of a campaign and they say ok, you can have any

surrogate in the country come in for you, who do you want? people were saying things like michelle obama, who is great, but i just said linda carter, can you please get linda carter here. the last week before the campaign, she came in and she went all throughout my district, did a whole district tour with me and went and got in front of these groups of people and everybody was so excited to see her. the governor came and we were all at the start of every single one and we just started talking about how important it is in the world to protect the country. and i said everybody in their wonder woman stance and everybody was doing this and the most memorable moment of the campaign. it was a big deal to me in my road to victory. announcer: washington journal continues. host: we're in open forum until the end of the program at about 10:00 a.m. eastern time. this is the front page of "the washington times," it's got the picture of the table, the

american delegation here, the saudis in the middle and the russian delegation and the headline is talks open door to more russian land. and president trump was in mar-a-lago yesterday talking to reporters and here's what he said about those talks between the u.s. and russia. president trump: i think i have the power to end this war. i think it's going very well. but today i heard, we weren't invited. you've been there for three years, you should have ended it in three years. you should never have started it and could have made a deal. i could have made a deal for ukraine that would have given them almost all of the land, everything, almost all of the land and no people would have been killed and no city demolished and not one dome knocked down but they chose not to do it that way. president in biden in all fairness, he doesn't have a clue, was is so bad, so pathetic and so sad. but with all of that being said, look, it is what it is.

host: the president yesterday in mar-a-lago and the headline in "the washington post" this morning, trump blames war on ukraine, he, quote -- kyiv should never have started it. here is senator dick durbin on the senate floor, the minority whip, talking about president trump's approach to ending that war. [video tape] mr. durbin: president trump announced he'd like to make a deal with ukraine and apparently ignoring their key demands for peace. trump and his fledgling defense secretary publicly gave away huge concessions at the start, signaling they would not insist on a return to ukraine's sovereign 2014 borders or future nato membership. it's also not clear from the administration's bewildering

munich conference remarks if president trump intends to include ukraine or our european am lies in the negotiations for the future of ukraine. it's no wonder that in the united kingdom where they remember chamberlain's folly all too well, donald trump's early pronouncements were land blasted by misreading leaders across the political spectrum. let me share some of the things that have been said by our ally, united kingdom, about trump's opening bid to end the war in ukraine. one member of parliament lamented the west now, quote, might be facing the worst betrayal of a european ally since poland since 1945. another said surely in europe no matter what we give president putin, he'll always want more. one final member of the

parliament in a refrain that best summarizes the situation said there is less the art of a deal and more a charter for appeasement. president trump has always had a strange affinity for auto kratz and dictators, a troubling character weakness of the leader of the free world to have. he almost seems to want their adoration than admiration, especially compared to the clear eyed leadership of previous leaders even on the republican side like ronald reagan who knew how to deal with the soviets. but there are real consequences to trump's autocratic liaisons for america and allied security. host: senator durbin yesterday. to your phone calls in open forum. vince, a lake city democrat. good morning. caller: how are you doing this morning? host: good. caller: good. i think the problem we have is with ourselves. because we all wake up to the

point where a lot of people hate each other. you know, i grew newspaper a time when the songs were like, come on people now, smile on your brother, everybody get together, love one another. you remember that song? host: yeah, i do. caller: what's wrong with us? we're all connected. i was a union guy. i grew up in philly. and there's no unions. we're on that now. but anyway, we had power against the machine, per se, because we had the right to strike. and when we'd do that, we'd shut them down and hurt them in their pocket and that's all they care about, their pocket. they don't care about their own mother. does that make sense?

host: richard in texas, good morning, richard. caller: yeah, i want to make a little comment, kind of what this guy said. i'm not a history professor, but in my lifetime, i've read well over a thousand books in history. i'm not a complete idiot on the subject. i agree with that man and i've been saying this. if you look at history and you look at a country like we are right now, this country did not hate each other in 1860 as much as we hate each other now. and that is a fact. history tells me the only way this will end is when enough people pick up guns and one side wins the war. because it will never end. the hate will never end.

host: surely there's a solution rather than taking up arms against everyone other. caller: would you please like to tell me what it is? host: what do you think, richard? caller: what i'm trying to tell you is history tells me that when a country hates each other the way this country hates each other, and if you don't think we don't, look at this last individual you had answering phone calls. all i heard out of his voice was hate for the other side. all i'm telling you is history tells me the only solution that's going to happen is when one side is eradicated. host: here's lillian in temple hills, maryland. good morning. lillian? caller: yes. good morning.

host: go ahead. caller: i have an issue with congress. with the republicans. i'm so upset they're not doing their constitutional duties. as far as firing all the federal employees, about the budget. we all know that congress is responsible for doing the budget. donald trump has no right to go in and just have elon musk delete what he feels like he wants to delete. congress is supposed to do line by line item with each agency individually annually on a fiscal basis, which they have not done in the past four years. so my thing is the republicans therefore and what is wrong with their constituents that they

cannot see they're neglecting to do their duties. host: molly in o'claire, wisconsin, independent line. caller: yes, i'm calling because i feel that it's not just hate, it's fear. we fear what trump can do. i think he wants to be a ruler that takes over, following the steps of hitler and other people like that. what he says has to be done. and it has caused us to hate or fear one another who are afraid to speak out against him. and it's shameful that's what's happening to our country and we can lose all of our democracy if we don't take a stand. our congress won't take a stand against him. if he says vote for this, they do it. even if they know that some of the people he's putting in

charge are not equipped to handle that job but vote them in because they're afraid of him and once we don't stand up for what we believe, whether in congress or on the street, we're going to lose our democracy. thank you. host: and a republican in florida, pam. good morning, you're next. caller: good morning. can you hear me? host: yes, go right ahead. caller: i'm one of those former democrats that went republican after 9/11. and i can tell you that what caused me initially to switch or to vote for a republican for president was love of country. over all the hate and division.

and what i'm seeing in our country, similar to what some of the other callers have said regardless of what political views they may have is that there is so much hate. your last guest, hate. that's all i could hear coming from him, all right. that's the problem with our country right now. the left wants us divided. they don't want black people, and i'm a black female. i'm an american first. they don't want us to succeed. that's the goal to keep us down and we fall for it or you fall for it every single time because i'm done with people who benefit from my failure. and i tell black people as a whole, stop making white people your standard, you will continue

to fail. if you continue to believe that the only way you can succeed in life is a white person has to give you something, you continue to fail. and the people like your last caller and maxine waters and nancy pelosi and all these people who pretend to be your friend because they want to give you things, they want to give them to you to keep you down, brothers and sisters of all races. they don't care about you succeeding. they benefit when you fail. and what you have to do and what i decided to do many years ago, i have my own values and i work hard and i live within my means. and i try to do the best for myself and try to do the best for my own family. that's all you can do. host: all right, pam. this is bill in minneapolis,

democrat. billy? caller: good morning. that was really passionate. i appreciate what the last caller said. so this is more directed towards the d.n.c. and head of the d.n.c., ken martin and the democratic party. i have ideas if i could really quickly. you're losing the communication battle against the g.o.p. they have a huge apparatus and steve bannon's war room has multiple episodes of daily live and charlie kirk, multiple episodes daily and an extension of g.o.p.'s communication. what the d.n.c. has to do is get a live podcast going every night, a live podcast press conference. get everybody out there, speak to the press live every night and explain what the trump administration did to hurt the american people that day and explain what they're going to do to help them. get out there and communicate. also, yes, the campaign season

doesn't exist anymore. it's year-round 24 hours a day starting on day one. you have to start campaigning again and get people on tour, your jazz mine crocketts and a.o.c.'s, get them out there to speak to the american people. you'll find out who your primary, strongest candidate will be no 2028 that way, get the people out there and speak to the american people. the second idea is tell the trump voters who will be affected from all these cuts from the f.d.a. and all the cuts elon musk is doing, there will be an effect and they will feel the pain. tell them every day you're there with them and will be there with open arms to help them once they start losing their health care and v.a. benefits, things like that. the third thing, i'm old enough to remember the days of the first trump administration during the a.c.a. fight. there were town halls.

the g.o.p. were holding town halls and the constituents were speaking out in these town halls and they were loud. they were speaking. well, g.o.p. doesn't do town halls anymore. what d.n.c. needs to do is hire some sort of p.n.c. paparazzi or something. the g.o.p. members have to go back home every weekend. camp out at the airports with these paparazzis and ask the g.o.p. members when you bump into them, what are you doing, why are you relinquishing your duties to elon musk and giving up your power and see where it goes? host: billy, do you work in this kind of field, in politics? you seem to have a lot of plans here. caller: i appreciate that. not politics but in communications and media. i'm sort of like on the fringe side of things. but i do have a passion for politics, it affects us all as an american. host: all right.

i want to let you know something starting very soon, laurie chavez-deremer's choice for labor ary. and to give you an idea of her background served as a u.s. representative from oregon's fiftrictrom 2023 until january of this year. prior to congress, s w the mayor of happy valley, oregon. you can watch that confirmation hearing. it's before the senate health, education, labor, and pensions committee. it will be live. you can see now on your screen the room is starting to fill up. once the nominee arrives, we will take you there and show you that. so do stay with us for that. here's marshall in nashville, republican. good morning, marshall. caller: good morning, mimi, how are you? host: good. caller: i'm going to ask you and your party to give me three

minutes. i want to read a poem, only a minute or so long but want to address a couple things. first off, you had a couple people called in and hinted towards a civil war. you've also had people who have called in and said we have to get rid of trump. on the democrat side, they're talking about constitutional crisis and the end of democracy. i want the viewers to know, 80% of us agree with each other. a lot of this is done by the news media and politicians. don't fall into their game of separating us. two things for c-span. during the jimmy carter funeral, there was a program on, it wasn't identified as "washington journal" but had a different phone number. and i just want to see if it was discrimination against the conservative. i called into that number.

and i was disconnected. because i know for washington journal it's a 30-day limit on calls. but this didn't have the same number. i ended up calling that number 65 times and being disconnected. host: this was during the funeral in the morning between 7:00 and 10:00 a.m. eastern? caller: no, it wasn't washington journal and the number with us 202-748-4920. i'll invite your producers to look at that. because like i said, it wasn't advertised as washington journal. so i felt i had the right to call in and to give my opinion. host: that was within the 30 days? caller: it was within the 30 days. host: actually, marshall, so everybody knows the rule, it's any c-span program, you have to wait 30 days. not just "journal."

caller: i need to apologize then. host: no problem. go ahead. the -- caller: the other thing is, i need to apologize to you. you probably don't know about this but when you had the young lady who did the book review on "second class." you had a caller call in and first noticed the star of david around her neck and then ranted and raved about segregation and i took it the wrong way and called in and complained. when i went back and looked at that segment, i realized what he was saying had a smell of anti-semitism, everything he said he said. and i called back to apologize. i want to openly apologize to you because i complained you let that go on and hope, like you said, you probably don't even know about it but it's been on

my heart ever since. host: i remember that segment but appreciate you apologizing and i accept. caller: the other thing is how you tailor a conversation. it's not just you. i mean, it's just the way journalists do and hosts do. when trump did all the pardons, which i disagreed with, when you opened that segment up, you said a moment ago, i'll go on one word, "the fallout of his decision." you never mentioned the millions of people -- once again, i disagreed with it. but who agrees with what he did -- and i just ask you kind of look at that as how you steer a conversation when you open up

"washington journal." host: all right, marshall. thanks for all that. this is kathy in florida. independent line. caller: hi, good morning. and happy m.l.k., black history month, and merit history for everyone of all colors, creeds, red, yellow, black and white, they are precious in our sight. i just want to say, like one of the ladies said before, most of the people who voted for president barack obama voted for president donald j. trump. why? because we're americans first. calling the race card, it's just so -- it's just -- it doesn't cut the mustard. we know now more than ever before, there should not be one person in this country that's an

american homeless without a roof over their head or without food on their table. we're the richest country in the world. and if we can get to that page and make that solidify, i do see where we can open the borders. president obama was the most supportive president in terms of the border. no president has done more with the border than president obama until now, where every single president has done something good. let me interject that first. every single president has done something good, even nixon in creating the e.p.a. i want to end on this note with this your special month. our president and the first lady, president donald j. trump, he was the best friend of michael jackson when nobody else

and people turned their back on michael jackson and they said things about him that were not true, who did he lean to? president donald trump at that time was not president of course back in 2015. but they were so close. they were the best of friends. if you look in history and look back, you'll see, and you can say a lot of the rhetoric is not needed. maybe you can open your heart and look and see the good in someone who you do not understand. there is absolutely no reason for us to have this discrepancy. and i have one thing here -- and i'm going to let you listen to this. ♪ host: all right, thanks, kathy. i want to bring this to your

attention. one of our hill producers sent us this. with senators continuing deba today on the senate g.o.p. 2025 budget resolution, president trump on t social this ing called on both chambers to "pass the house budget to kick-start the reconciliation process." you can follow all the senate on c-span2. and that is going to be it for us today. we will see you again tomorrow morning at 7:00 a.m. eastern. thanks, everybody, for watching. we're going to take you directly over now to that senate hearing with lori chavez-deremer, president trump's nominee to serve as labor secretary. here it is. [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2025] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org.]