>> garrett: welcome back to "face the nation." as promised we continue our conversation with north carolina republican mark meadows. chair of the house freedom caucus. conservative side of the republican. >> without a doubt. >> garrett: you've also been mentioned congressman, lot of jobs, chief of staff, president of the united states, you want that job? >> really, general kelly is doing a great job and contrary to a lot of the headlines that are out there, i can tell you that i don't believe his job is in jeopardy. i know that the president has not spoken to me or mick mulvaney about replacing him. quite the opposite in my conversations with the president he is expressed confidence in general kelly and certainly brought order and responsibility to the white house. >> garrett: one thing i have heard about general kelly that he is not as adept in politics

as perhaps chief of staff should be. do you worry about that? >> nor should he be. he was a general. >> garrett: most important part of the job? >> it's an important part of the job. but incumbent upon all of us to make sure that we give him the political backdrop that maybe some of these decision are being made. i know that he's reached out to me a number of times on number of different issues. he is not managing in vacuum. he's truly trying to make sure that the president gets the best information, i believe he does that. >> garrett: should the president has fought harder ton this budget deal? >> the president was faced with -- i was expecting him to continue to push back on draining the swamp. yet he was given binary choice. or you don't. i can tell you that that is not the choice that many of us on capitol hill believed was before us. it was either supporting the

military or continuing what i would say the traditions of the senate. at some point we're going to have to say, mitch mcconnell, enough is enough. 51 votes on anything that is of national security interests, it is time that we change this, the american people, your viewers right now could care less about tradition of the senate. if they do care about their pocketbook what we've done we've taken money from them to grow the size of the government by almost 13%. >> garrett: how deep is the swamp now? >> the swamp is obviously deeper but when you look at -- when you look at 300 billion over ten-year period it makes even a drunken sailor blush. the sailor spent his own money we have the government spending yours. >> garrett: immigration. bottom line for house freedom caucus once something comes from the senate what must it have to

get through the house of representatives? >> the speaker of the house needs to do what he said he would do. that is to whip the bill, put it on the floor, make sure that it passes out of the house. we are the most conservative body. and we've got a bill ready to go. and chairman -- >> garrett: in other words, speaker should not wait for the step at do that now? >> absolutely not f. we wait for the senate go home, take naps wait for 60 senators to decide what we're going to do as a nation. i didn't sign up for that most people that elected me didn't want me to sign up for that. it's critical that we go ahead and work and that's where you are going to see freedom caucus engaging over the next couple of weeks, we're going to hold our speaker to his word which said that he was going to whip the good bill make sure that it happens the threshold and then send it -- >> garrett: you're very good at this. what is in the bill. four pillars? >> biggest thing is, it puts emphasis on border security and not creating a special pathway to citizenship.

>> garrett: very good. thanks for join ups. great to have you on "face the nation." we'll be back with our panel, please stay with us. [ click, keyboard clacking ] [ keyboard clacking ] [ click, keyboard clacking ] ♪ good questions lead to good answers. our advisors can help you find both. talk to one today and see why we're bullish on the future. yours.

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broadcast she is congressional correspondent with national public radio, peter beinart at the at plan particular and cnn political commentator, that's a mouthful. susan, set the domestic stuff aside i'm fascinating what is going on at the olympics and all of what the south koreans peer receive as this unbelievable propaganda coup so far for the north koreans. what should we make of it? >> calling it the olympic opening. it's spiking that kim jong-un the leader has basically decided to use the olympics as a way of stealing a march on trump administration that extraordinary picture from the other day of kim's sister sitting a seat away from the vice president of the united states who is if not scowling, something pretty close to scowling. i think that it doesn't necessarily mean that kim has succeeded in dividing south korea from the united states. but i would look for lot of

tension in the months and weeks ahead. >> garrett: tension because south koreans will resent this over shadowing was supposed to be their moment or sense that they don't believe north koreans are interested in any kind of reunification, that would be the biggest thing. >> look, there's a lot of skepticism but right now about washington as well. skepticism about the trump -- >> garrett: being too hard on this. >> new leader of south korea, president moon decided that talks might be the way go. he's now been invited. if that summit comes up you could see a real concern that the united states and japan are trying to hold the line to be tough on north corey then south koreans are interested in pursue can much more diplomacy. >> garrett: we'll revisit that, susan. mick mulvaney said, normal and reasonable. this last week of the white house, did it feel that way, does it look that way? do you think that most americans watching this play out as they

did said to themselves, yes, reasonable. >> if was isolated incident, maybe. but this is about something much bigger than rob porter. this is about the me too movement. the "access hollywood" tape. administration and president that time and time again has been dismissive of female voices and female concerns. at a time when women voters are incredibly motivate. you have women running for office in the mid term election at record levels. and you have a real anger among women in this country that they perceive men in power to not care about their concerns. and also comes at a moment where capital hill, republicans have much better story to tell. also this week in the house republicans under speaker ryan passed landmark that changed the culture of capitol hill to crackdown on lawmakers to make them pay out of pocket to of a sexual harassment settlements. >> garrett: not a lot of headlines created. important piece of business.

>> they get no credit for it. because what the president says and does overwhelms everything else so the good things they're doing are completely negated. >> garrett: speaking to what the president says, he says due process, does that not open up for those 19 women who have said, you assaulted or abused me in some way, give them the avenue at the president's own twitter feed to seek due process. >> in the back of everybody's mind when he talks about this. you'll notice that the due processes concerned about is the due pros for the accused. there has not been any expression of sympathy -- >> garrett: don't define due process. >> it's remarkable. he says in his tweet, some of these allegations against people are true but he doesn't say anything about sympathy for anybody who has been mistreated. people get their lives destroyed by allegations. he doesn't talk about people getting their lives destroyed by actual -- up until he started

commenting i think you could have made the case that the president had been ill-served by his staff. but it was his decision to make these comments repeatedly in a way that i agree with susan davis. the president had been on a little bit of upswing, he's been going up in the polls. this is completely self generated police call disaster. >> garrett: the calm reassurances that there's no turmoil inside the west wing? >> presidency with donald trump is guaranteed to have turmoil. he's walking turmoil. and part of what's happened here is, one of the points of the me too movement tried to make, i think, is that environments where you do not have significant number of women in position of power tend to breed tolerance for this kind of abuse. this is a classic example of this. this is the least diverse administration, least diverse white house at least since the 1980s if not before that. if you had had more genuinely diverse white house that rob porter would have been able to survive for a year when you had

these two ex-wives out there, the fbi already gathering information. it's a culture of tolerance that flows from the fact that it's an administration that looks nothing like the united states in 2018. >> garrett: yet mick mulvaney said, no one should think we have lacks attitude about domestic abuse. >> not only does that sort of defy the facts. point out a couple of other important things. number one, this is also a national security crisis really of a very significant level. rob porter was in this crucial position seeing all the paperwork including the nation's most classified secrets with interim security clearance, he was informed, general kelly was informed that there would be no permanent classified clearance for him. that is a violation really of basic principles, it suggests that the white house far from having become more orderly discipline place under john kelly, has actually made an extraordinary exception and

potentially given nation's most classified secrets to somebody who the fbi believed was not worthy of a clearance. >> garrett: my understanding if you have interim clearance, those things that are registered at the very top of the security pyramid you don't touch because you don't have it. i think rob porter had a lot but i have been told by those who are not necessarily in the white house but who are familiar with this general pros that if you're interim base at the very top you don't see the executive secretary of the national security council would have handled that. >> that's what's so exceptional about not having come forward with clear and consistent account of the facts. we don't know yet what rob porter was handling and whether he did or not. number two, his clearance would have run out his interim clearance would have run out of january 15th, 201. >> garrett: it's clear that his portfolio was enlarged when some of these issues were at least at some level known. it's a big enough job. but he also not just in terms of fact checking but played a

drafting hand in the state of the union but also was running trade meetings, interacting with those most concerned about future trump trade policy. >> i think -- >> garrett: conscious decision you're not only good you're extra good. >> everything we've heard from the administers that they thought of him in very high terms they trusted him. they relied on him that reliance was growing not shrinking. i think that we have the moral problem, the security problem potentially, also got this managerial problem. it's been stark relief as we've seen all of these conflicting accounts, all of the back biting leaks surrounding this. >> garrett: yet the government continues to function, there is at least a bipartisan arrangement on the budget. there are details fob worked out over the next six weeks. immigration right in the middle of it. when you talk to members and when did you last week, there was a big sigh of relief around this budget deal in a sense that, we can have some calm for a year and a half iep at a high cost? >> certainly expect spent what

that deal does end the cycle of shut down threats and default threats for the next two years. what we don't know yet. we heard that from, is that a vote that comes back to haunt republicans. vote that becomes issuish primary races in general election that the question of what is this party about and what does it believe in. is fiscal responsibility still something that is at the core of what it means to be a conservative in washington? that vote this week undermine that nor lot of republicans. >> garrett: peter two, issues for you, what is republican under president trump, mark meadows says the swamp is deeper since he got here. two, what do you make of this clash between house intelligence committee democrats and white house about this underlying memo and adam schiff saying, i think everything the fbi did was proper. there's plenty people who wonder if everything the fbi did was proper with carter pain and the surveillance warrant. >> move away from the narrative,

and suddenly now has become irresponsible? we see this movie twice before. with ronald reagan and with george w. bush. big tax cuts, high levels of spending, wars that are paid for onment credit card then only when democratic presidents come into office republican party freaks out about deficits to the degree that in 2011 they were willing to default on the national dote, throw entire world into crisis. >> garrett: such a big issue. >> because it was -- now what they're doing is, they are doubling the size of the debt when the economy is very strong. what any economists will tell you when economy is strong you want to reduce the debt so the debt is low so you can stimulate the economy and have to increase the debt when the economy is weak. what you have now doing over heeding the economy, forcing federal to raise interest rates undoing very stimulus that you just passed. this is how utterly incoherent this is.

we need to put lie that they ever compared about fiscal responsibility. they care about cutting tax and military spending they do not compare about fiscal responsibility. >> garrett: susan, take this on in couple of ways. does the defense spending increase make any difference in terms of the way north koreans, japanese, chinese, secondarily do the chinese look at these fiscal choice say united states is in for some rough times that they may not anticipate and were even stronger than we were couple of months ago. comparatively from economic point of view. >> i think the time in general, as you pointed out on budget but just more generally on trump foreign policy, they might be the biggest winners in the entire world from the trump administration. i think there's a sense that while the long term trends were already suggesting the relative rise of china compared with the united states that donald trump has been like dramatic

accelerator of chinese influence, power and prestige around the world that is being tested in some ways in this north korea crisis. can the united states work together more coherently with china on a major foreign policy problem that is not clear at all. but the bottom line is that the economic investments, there's a lot of talk about budget increases for the military, for example. the strategic effort required to pivot to asia has become the dream, it was a dream of the obama administration, might now be the dream of the trump administration. >> garrett: yet to be realized. ramesh? you have 30 seconds. >> republicans are deciding they don't think they need to accomplish anything. they don't need to use power they have to amass better record going into november. that's interesting decision that they made politically. >> garrett: give me ten more second, what do you mean by that? >> because they -- with this budget basically decided they are not going to try to pass major legislation with majority vote in the senate.

they foreclosed that option practically you would think they want to maximize that use of the power still have the house and senate this year but not. >> garrett: susan, ramesh, peter, thank you, like to thank all of you for being on "face the nation" panel we'll be with joe califano, he's a legend. and here you have a bánh mi inspired fried chicken sandwich. you'd never find this at a fast food restaurant - it's a good thing. is that right, martha? why don't you try my asian fried chicken sandwich? it's made with crispy fried chicken strips, crunchy asian slaw and a gochujang mayo - all on a toasted baguette. security! get him! you afraid of a little competition? you want to go to war with me, jack? do you really? oh my gosh! what! i can't smell! i can't smell!

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paige our next guest is joseph califano, he was key and crucial advisor to president lyndon johnson later was secretary of health, education and welfare under president jimmy carter. he's now on the cbs board of dreg for his 14n book. our damaged democracy: we the people must act is out tuesday. thanks for joining us. >> great to be here. >> garrett: what is damaged about our democracy. >> it's in deep trouble. >> garrett: deeper than it was when you were in government? >> much deeper. we have a major cries in the system. the president s so powerful he'r all presidents? >> building for 15 years. all been the same. ever president increases power. we have, more legislation than

congress does. regulation. put out about 20 regulation mr. toy law congress pass, that's number one. number two, they have sent 100,000 people in the military to their death in combat, a million have been wounded in wars since 1945, world war 2. >> no declaration of war. they haven't even bothered indeed with respect to obama, for example, when he was in libya he called the attorney general said, are these hostilities i have to report to the congress or get out. then went to own in-house counsel who said you don't have to do it. they got their own -- white house staff has exploded. >> garrett: letting president gather that. power? >> congress is crippled and

cowardly. look at the rand resolution, they didn't have to any way, shape or form. >> garrett: the nuclear deal. >> didn't have to vote on it. because for democrats the problems of the jewish road and jewish money they didn't want to be on record. they weren't on record. number two, they don't use their appropriations power. you talked about this a little earlier. but they have been passing continuing resolution for most of the last 20 years. and the president has the power to supersede state law upped the constitution. used to be congress would do that because federal law is the law. now the president does it. >> garrett: one thing,

because i think nostalgia can be dangerous. sit your belief that things were all so much better in the '60s when government was essentially populated by white men around a table? wouldn't you say now, whatever our problems are there are far more voice, people with access to power that they didn't have back then? >> there are, thank god there are. but that's even very one sided. the democratic party, the last time democratic party got majority of the white votes when lyndon johnson ran in 1964. they built up the proportion of the black vote, it's been over 90% except for hillary clinton. only got 8%. on the republican side they now have a majority of the white vote in the '60s. they have about 20-30% max -- down to 8% of the black vote. so we have this split in the

party that fractures them. at the conventions this year, 50% of the democratic convention was white. 25% was black. republican convention, 94% was white. we have a racial split. we have racial parties and also -- i must say this. petty, petty partnership that we never had. look, just your prior guests, can schiff talk to nunes. they don't talk to each other they put wall up between their staff. >> garrett: you mentioned the convention, one of the fascinatings things in the book, you're advocating that americans participate in primaries far more than they do. these tiny percentages think identify that produce nominees which the whole country has to deal with. >> lack at the last election. trim of was ego maniac.

those were the two candidates. hillary was picked by 8% of the registered democrats. trump by 7% of the registered republicans. we should all look in the mirror. >> garrett: before we let you go, the opioid cries in this country is real it's an emergency, you have an idea about that. >> the opioid cries to real and it's an emergency. this lack of trust is killing the ability of the government to deal with it. the government is uniquely positioned, national government, because you really dealing with the whole system. how do you make the pills, you make them so they're hard to abuse, that's food and drug administration. what do you do with the medical profession. how do you train them. what do you do with the hospitals. the ability to limit what they are putting out in pills. my wife got almost 100 pills and then beyond that what do parents

do. because what's left in the medicine cabinet that's where third to half of the kids get their first. >> garrett: talk about government response, opioid could be one if people got together. >> if people got together we ha- >> garrett: i got to end it right there. joe, thanks. good luck on the book. and we'll be right back.

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